Mike Norman Economics

Pakistani Foreign Minister says his country will work together with Russia and China in the light of the new US strategy for Afghanistan. Sputnik InternationalPakistan to Seek Consensus With Russia, China Over Trump's New South Asia PolicyChina Affirms Alliance with Pakistan After Trump Says Islamabad Abets Terrorists

Backgrounder. MENA is much more complicated than it portrayed in the West. The reasons that the West is there at all are oil and gas, and Israel.LobelogLibya’s Role in the Polarized Sunni World Giorgio Cafiero, CEO and founder of Gulf State Analyticsa Washington, DC-based geopolitical risk consultancy, and Elaine Miao, contributor to Gulf State Analytics

Russia’s Federal Agency for Technical Regulation and Metrology (Rosstandart) appointed a new technical committee to work on the standardization of “the software and hardware of distributed register and Blockchain technologies", East-West Digital reported. “The standardization of Blockchain will allow these technologies to develop at a new level,” expects the agency, acknowledging that Blockchain technology is “actively spreading” across Russia. Blockchain technology will develop through...

Iraqi Prime Minister Haidar Al-Abadi has said that if the United States intends to carry out an aggression against the Iranian government, Iraq will not allow the U.S. to use its territory for its aggression. “Iraq is not a starting point for attacking other countries. If there are clashes between Iran and the United States, then we will not allow the U.S. to take advantage of us,” he said.“Iraq has its own interests and is an independent country and we call on all countries to respect the...

The research has now progressed to outlining the prevailing characteristics of Central America and listing the relevant regional integration organizations that its constituent countries are a part of. The first part of this chapter is divided among the four categories of economic, socio-political, military-security, and geopolitical commonalities which bind together Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama, and is presented in a concise bullet-point format for easy...

Fort RussGoogle Losing its Market to Yandex in Russia Samer Hussein

China bought 90,000 robots in 2016, accounting for almost a third of the global total, and the robot revolution may raise China's economic competitiveness, according to a report released this week by Bloomberg Intelligence. China.org.cnChina on rapid progress of robotization: study Xinhua

Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu has warned Russian President Vladimir Putin that Israel is prepared to intervene in Syria to counteract the Iranian influence in the conflict. Moscow, which views Iran as key to resolving the crisis, said it will note Israeli interests.When the two leaders met in Sochi on Wednesday, Netanyahu told Putin that any peace deal in Syria must entail the full withdrawal of any Iranian forces from the area. "Iran is already well on its way to controlling Iraq, Yemen...

U.S. Vice President Mike Pence has been in Florida to meet Venezuelan opposition leaders, capping off his tour of Latin America last week where he sought support against the government of President Nicolas Maduro.... Pence, for his part, continued to repeat the White House position that the democratically-elected government in Caracas resembled a “dictatorship,” and that there was “more to come” in terms of sanctions. Soon after visiting the house of worship, Pence also made his presence...

Chris Williams reviews Marx and the Earth: An Anti-Critique by Paul Burkett and John Bellamy Foster, Haymarket Books, 2017.... As shown by Foster and Burkett, Marx and Engels believed that to be truly free, humanity not only needed to overcome the alienation of labor but simultaneously our alienation from nature, both bestowed on us by capitalism Capitalism privileges property ownership over people and the environment. Marx and Engels go far beyond a mere utilitarian conception of nature...