London

By Lee Wellings in Europe on February 9th, 2012
EPA photo



The temperature outside the IOC headquarters in Lausanne is minus 12, but Olympic president Jacques Rogge is warming up as he talks about the challenges ahead, the London games approaching, and even taking on the mafia.

The 69-year-old Belgian has been in charge for almost a decade, managing to avoid the drama and controversy that has plagued the world's other major sports association - FIFA.

Intelligent and careful, his words are measured. but a flash of intensity surfaces when he maintains security remains the IOC's number one priority.

And then we move on to the dual threat from drugs and corruption.

Is corruption, in the form of illegal betting, REALLY a bigger threat than drugs?

By Barnaby Phillips in Africa on January 22nd, 2012
File 58061
A series of bomb blasts hit the northern city of Kano on Friday, killing at least 178 people [Reuters]

I bumped into an old friend at a book launch in London recently. She used to be a senior British diplomat, and is still involved in African affairs. The conversation quickly turned to Nigeria, a country that we are both passionate about, and that we visit regularly.
"I get the feeling that people in Lagos have been reacting to the violence in Northern Nigeria like we Londoners used to react to news from Northern Ireland during the Troubles of the 1970s and 1980s", she said. 
"They recognise that it's terribly sad, but it all feels so far away for many of them, not something that touches their day to day lives," she said. 
By Marwan Bishara in Imperium on September 29th, 2011
An ardent supporter of the Iraq war, Tony Blair is now tasked with brokering Middle East peace [AFP]

Tony Blair has been a political salesman since he first made his debut at the British Labour Party conference. And he is good, no doubt about that.

Not only because he speaks coherently; he is Scottish after all. Nor is it because he's often compared with George W Bush.

It's because Tony could peddle ideas and sell economic and military agendas better than most.

The question is: Would you buy a used car from Tony?

The Palestinians and the Arabs in general have concluded enough is enough.

Nabil Sha'ath, the Palestinian Authority's first ever foreign minister, told me last year: "Forget Tony Blair. I think Mr Blair is at the wrong time at the wrong place and he’s just making it easier for Mr Netanyahu to deceive us, really, in more ways than one."

By Elizabeth Dunningham in Europe on August 13th, 2011
Chuck Enriques believes that UK youth like himself , irrespective of their background, can attain success.

I never thought the next big international story I would cover would be on the streets where I live. Al Jazeera in London has not shied away from covering the underbelly of UK society, but this was different. Suddenly rioting Britain was worldwide news.

How had this happened?

Trying to get past the images of looting and rampaging and look at the reasons why seemed to be a journalistic no-brainer. Yet few media outlets seemed to want to broach this difficult topic.

Voices of kneejerk condemnation drowned out any soul-searching about what emboldened so many young people to take to the streets committing crimes regardless of the banks of cameras ubiquitous in today’s Britain - whether they be iPhones, street surveillance cameras, or amateur or professional TV news crews. 

Some of the worst clashes took place in the borough of Hackney where I live. On the notorious Pembury Estate, police were baited into running battles with residents.

By Barnaby Phillips in Europe on August 9th, 2011
Sympathetic? It's a tense time for Londoners as a growing class divide begins to fracture its society [Reuters]

I was standing on Brixton High Street, in South London, at 7 in the morning, looking at a row of looted shops.

A man, unshaven and in a track-suit pants trousers, walked by with a pit bull terrier on a leash. The dog paused in the middle of the street, and slowly defecated.

The man looked on, with apparent pride, until the dog had finished. Then men and dog continued their swagger across the road.

At this point, I committed a foolish error. With a look of disgust on my face, I caught the man's eye. Now he was coming towards me, pit bull straining at the leash.

I knew what was coming: The menacing language, "You [expletive], what the [expletive] are you looking at?" I walked away.

This encounter: its nuances, its predictability, are familiar to anyone who knows England.

In London, well-off people with lots of opportunities often live almost next door to poor people who live blighted, frustrated lives.

Tags: London
By Teymoor Nabili in Europe on July 4th, 2011
Photo by Reuters

The fallout over the ridiculous interview tactics of the leader of the British Labour Party, Ed Miliband, rumbles on in the UK media.

What's surprising to me is why the fuss this time, and why single out Miliband? Ever since "media training" became de rigeur in boardrooms and the corridors of power, high profile figures have been spouting memorised propaganda to journalists all over the world.

Examples are extremely easy to come by. My own worst experience involved the London 2012 Olympic bid. I was in Singapore at the time,  enjoying the celebrations and festivities to be sure, but the day after the London win came the great tragedy of the 7/7 bombings on the London transport system which killed 52 people and four suicide bombers.

By Marwan Bishara in Imperium on March 28th, 2011
Libya is not likely to emerge as a client state no matter how long the NATO bombardment goes on [EPA]

NATO's political mission "should swiftly identify and nurture a national opposition and plot the path for a post-conflict transition to democracy, probably under UN auspices", or so advises the Financial Times in its lead editorial, "Plotting the Way Forward".

Both the title and the advice are borrowed from a past era: the post-Afghanistan invasion strategy that plotted the nurturing, financing, and supporting of Hamid Karzai's - the former US corporate oil executive - bid for the presidency.

Or another throwback: pre- and post-invasion of Iraq, when London and Washington plotted their invasion as they prepared the Iraq National Congress to hopefully replace Saddam's regime.

By Al Jazeera Staff in Africa on February 24th, 2011
[Photo: Reuters]

As the uprising in Libya enters its eleventh day, we keep you updated on the developing situation from our headquarters in Doha, Qatar.

By Al Jazeera Staff in Africa on February 22nd, 2011
Alleged mercenaries deployed by Gaddafi in Tripoli, the Libyan capital.

As the uprising in Libya enters its ninth day, we keep you updated on the developing situation from our headquarters in Doha, Qatar.

By Al Jazeera Staff in Middle East on February 17th, 2011
Saif Gaddafi, the son of Libya's leader, warned of 'civil war' in a speech on Sunday night.

As protests in Libya enter their eighth day, following a "day of rage" on Thursday, we keep you updated on the developing situation from our headquarters in Doha, Qatar.

(All times are local in Libya GMT+2)

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