A Surveillance State Unlike Any the World Has Ever Seen
http://www.spiegel.de/international/worl...20174.html
EXCERPT: In western China, Beijing is using the most modern means available to control its Uighur minority. Tens of thousands have disappeared into re-education camps. [...] Nowhere in the world, not even in North Korea, is the population monitored as strictly as it is in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region, an area that is four times the size of Germany and shares borders with eight countries, including Pakistan, Afghanistan Tajikistan and Kazakhstan. Oppression has been in place for years, but has worsened massively in recent months. It is targeted primarily at the Uighur minority, a Turkic ethnic group of some 10 million Sunni Muslims considered by Beijing to be a hindrance to the development of a "harmonious society." A spate of attacks involving Uighur militants has only consolidated this belief....
MORE: http://www.spiegel.de/international/worl...20174.html
Trump Reveals Himself as the Bully of His Allies
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/25/opini...-nato.html
EXCERPT: . . . The European side of the trans-Atlantic family is at last accepting the idea that its reliable uncle has turned into a bully. Sure, that kinsman was always bossy, easily irritated. But when the going got rough, Europeans knew they could count on him. After all, they came from the same world, with common memories and values, and shared interests.
Since Mr. Trump’s July sweep through Europe — to Brussels, England, Scotland and Helsinki — that certainty has evaporated. The American president made clear that he could not care less about common memories and values, that he hates the family’s culture, its do-gooder attitude. He sees America’s interests differently. He has convinced himself that the family is taking advantage of him. “You’re stealing from my piggy bank!” he rages. He wants his money back. “Me first!” has become his motto.
Mr. Trump, who has never liked strong women, brutally pressured Angela Merkel of Germany and Britain’s Theresa May. The last thing he wants is a united family, so he plays on Europe’s divisions, openly courting rebellious members of the bloc who promote his toxic views.
The family is somehow holding together, but is traumatized. It is not ready to cut ties with the uncle. Yet it knows, now, that it must devise a new way to deal with this angry, out-of-control, but still powerful big man — and possibly learn to live without him....
MORE: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/25/opini...-nato.html
RELATED: How Europe Can Survive the Trump Era (Spiegel)
http://www.spiegel.de/international/worl...20174.html
EXCERPT: In western China, Beijing is using the most modern means available to control its Uighur minority. Tens of thousands have disappeared into re-education camps. [...] Nowhere in the world, not even in North Korea, is the population monitored as strictly as it is in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region, an area that is four times the size of Germany and shares borders with eight countries, including Pakistan, Afghanistan Tajikistan and Kazakhstan. Oppression has been in place for years, but has worsened massively in recent months. It is targeted primarily at the Uighur minority, a Turkic ethnic group of some 10 million Sunni Muslims considered by Beijing to be a hindrance to the development of a "harmonious society." A spate of attacks involving Uighur militants has only consolidated this belief....
MORE: http://www.spiegel.de/international/worl...20174.html
Trump Reveals Himself as the Bully of His Allies
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/25/opini...-nato.html
EXCERPT: . . . The European side of the trans-Atlantic family is at last accepting the idea that its reliable uncle has turned into a bully. Sure, that kinsman was always bossy, easily irritated. But when the going got rough, Europeans knew they could count on him. After all, they came from the same world, with common memories and values, and shared interests.
Since Mr. Trump’s July sweep through Europe — to Brussels, England, Scotland and Helsinki — that certainty has evaporated. The American president made clear that he could not care less about common memories and values, that he hates the family’s culture, its do-gooder attitude. He sees America’s interests differently. He has convinced himself that the family is taking advantage of him. “You’re stealing from my piggy bank!” he rages. He wants his money back. “Me first!” has become his motto.
Mr. Trump, who has never liked strong women, brutally pressured Angela Merkel of Germany and Britain’s Theresa May. The last thing he wants is a united family, so he plays on Europe’s divisions, openly courting rebellious members of the bloc who promote his toxic views.
The family is somehow holding together, but is traumatized. It is not ready to cut ties with the uncle. Yet it knows, now, that it must devise a new way to deal with this angry, out-of-control, but still powerful big man — and possibly learn to live without him....
MORE: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/25/opini...-nato.html
RELATED: How Europe Can Survive the Trump Era (Spiegel)