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“I hope wounds will start to heal,” said Ruth Padel, blinking earnestly as flashbulbs popped. Her statement may not have contained the startlingly original imagery that propelled the poetess to prominence, but to her critics it represented a kind of poetry — poetic justice.
Shortly after 8 a.m. on July 12, 2006, Hezbollah fighters snatched two Israeli soldiers after carrying out an ambush on their patrol.
For decades, they have been a familiar sight in the sun-kissed Indian state of Kerala or the country’s crumbling eastern metropolis of Kolkata. The somber portraits of dead white men — a bearded Marx, a bespectacled Lenin, and Stalin, his moustache bristling — peer down at passers-by from banners strung up over palm trees or street-corner billboards, accompanied by the less-hallowed visages of local comrades. India’s Communists have been key players in the hurly burly of the world’s largest democracy, dominating the ballot box in states like West Bengal, where Kolkata is the capital, and where a Communist government has ruled for over thirty years.
Does trans-national democracy work? Or is Europe about to see a wave of new Far Right politicians and mavericks marching from obscurity to national prominence thanks to an election most voters are neglecting? Between June 4 and June 7 it could happen.
Dancing in public in not allowed in Iran, but thousands could hardly contain themselves at a recent presidential campaign rally in the capital city, Tehran. On this day, the deafening cheers were not for presidential hopeful Mir Hossein Mousavi, but rather for his wife — a woman some are calling Iran’s Michelle Obama. The comparisons to the first lady of the United States stem from the role Zahra Rahnavard is playing in her husband’s quest for the presidency.
Even "American Idol" winner Kris Allen couldn’t believe it. When Allen, the clean-cut guy from Arkansas, triumphed over the spiky-haired rocker Adam Lambert to win season eight of the competition, he seemed positively astounded.
Israeli President Benjamin Netanyahu met in President Obama what might be a new chapter in the 60-year relationship between Israel and the United States.
Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh resigned Monday to make a fresh claim to power, after his Congress party won an election mandate over the weekend. President Pratibha Devisingh Patil accepted the resignation of Singh and that of his council of ministers, and told him to continue in office till an “alternative arrangement” is made, presidential spokeswoman Archana Datta told CNN.
Since the moment Barack Obama took office, he has made a concerted effort to speak directly to the Muslim world. Even his inauguration address sent a new and different message from the United States: “To the Muslim world, we seek a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect,” he said on January 20, standing in front of a changed nation
The world’s largest electorate has spoken, although figuring out just what it said may still take a few days. India on Wednesday wrapped up its five-week election process, in which 428 million people cast their votes.