Author: Raphael Kevranian

Paris/Jakarta (24/7 – 28.57). “Coffee is the common man’s gold, and like gold, it brings to every person the feeling of luxury and nobility.” – Sheik-Abd-al-Kadir A friend recently opened a coffee shop is called after its owner, Muteeya. Though modest, it embodies the burgeoning coffee culture found in Paris, London, the US, and now Jakarta. The coffee is steaming hot, and soft tunes fill the air. Outside, rain pounds against the window, streaking down and forming small puddles on the street. As I gaze through the glass blurred by water, I take a sip of my warm coffee,…

Tajikistan officially banned the hijab, imposing hefty fines in its latest move to curb Islamic influence. The Central Asian nation of Tajikistan officially prohibited the wearing of hijabs and other “alien garments” this week, as the country’s parliament passed a new bill regulating Islamic clothing and Eid celebrations. The bill, approved by the upper house of parliament, Majlisi Milli, on June 19, comes after years of an unofficial clampdown on the hijab in the Muslim-majority country. Under the new law, individuals wearing hijabs or other banned religious clothing could face hefty fines of up to 7,920 somonis (approximately $700). Companies…

Budapest (5/7 – 11.11) Former European Commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker defended U.S. President Joe Biden after his disastrous debate performance last week and warned of his rival Donald Trump’s “incomplete mind and flawed reasoning,” in an interview with Brussels Playbook. Juncker, who was Commission president from 2014 to 2019 during much of Trump’s presidency, said he had yet to watch last week’s debate, which triggered calls for Biden to step aside and make room for someone else to run as the Democratic presidential candidate. Still, Juncker insisted that “one can be of a certain age … and do a good job.” But Juncker…

Tashkent 24/2/ (50). In Tajikistan, over 20% of the population lives in poverty, and millions of citizens have emigrated to Russia to find work. Meanwhile, a feudal elite under President Emomali Rahmon has ravaged the country with corruption, nepotism, and massive drug smuggling of Afghan heroin to Russia and Europe. Although Rahmon’s successor and son, Rustam Emomali, has been increasingly in the headlines, adopting a presidential look, his stiff and awkward appearance reveals a man seemingly afraid of his shadow. Sources inside the country’s security apparatus report that he is in conflict with his powerful sisters, including Ozada, the head…

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan met to discuss competition and cooperation between the two countries. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and United States National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan have held talks aimed at keeping in contact, both sides said, with Wang stressing that “Taiwan independence” posed the biggest risk to Sino-US ties. Wang and Sullivan met in Bangkok, Thailand, on Saturday, just more than two months after US President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping met on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in San Francisco. The two “had candid,…

A year ago Germany deported to Tajikistan an activist from that country’s exiled opposition movement who had been living in Dortmund since 2009. What happened next is a shocking example of what can occur when Germany fails to uphold safeguards in its increased efforts to deport unsuccessful asylum seekers. The Bundestag this month gave police greater powers to carry out deportations. The activist, Abdullohi Shamsiddin, 33, was deported to Tajikistan on January 18 2023. He was detained on arrival by the security services. Two months later he was convicted of trying to overthrow the constitution and jailed for seven years. No credible…

HSBC said it may buy financial businesses and shed unprofitable units around Asia to expand its footprint for serving wealthy customers, as Hong Kong’s largest bank looks to fine-tune its growth strategy to deliver the best returns for shareholders. “While organic growth will continue to be a core expansion strategy for HSBC, mergers, acquisitions and disposals will be a key strategy to expand in new markets and to strengthen our existing business lines,” the bank’s Asia-Pacific co-CEO David Liao said in an interview with the Post. “We will only conduct a deal when the targets can be fully integrated into our existing…

London (06/11 – 58) France and the United Kingdom (UK) have jointly made a request in favour of Sri Lanka to the court of the Southern District of New York, for a six-month freeze on any litigation in the Hamilton Reserve Bank case until Sri Lanka’s external debt restructuring is completed, the Financial Times reported. Accordingly, last week the two countries filed a joint “amicus curiae” to the New York judge hearing the case, arguing in favour of Sri Lanka’s request for a six-month freeze on any litigation. The co-signatories in their “amicus curiae” want the judge to grant Sri…

Türkiye has hailed a deal between arch-foes Armenia and Azerbaijan to swap prisoners of war and work toward normalizing ties torn by decades of strife over the Nagorno-Karabakh region. Azerbaijan reclaimed the long-disputed enclave after a lightning offensive against Armenian separatists in September. Türkiye’s Foreign Ministry said it “welcomes” the Dec. 7 breakthrough, and supports the work by the Caucasus neighbors on “adopting additional confidence-building steps.” “We hope that a peace agreement between Azerbaijan and Armenia is signed as soon as possible,” the ministry said. The two sides agreed in a joint statement to seize “a historical chance to achieve a long-awaited peace in the…

Toronto, Alaska (16/11 – 50) Our lives are being maneuvered and we are being manipulated by unelected, insidious forces, toward objectives not necessarily in the people’s interest. Now that the so-called “pandemic”, declared by the mysterious self-appointed World Health Organization, and followed obediently by governments everywhere, has been decreed “finished”, we should devote a moment to introspection, considering who is running the show and for whose benefit, as governments gaily abdicated their vested responsibility to govern. Pandemic is over? I hope they told those killer viruses who destroyed the population of Europe and North America. What? Oh, just 1% mortality?…