Photo source: Euro News By Naveed Qazi | Editor, Globe UpFront Serbs participated in weekly protests rituals, in January 2019, that involved resistance against President Aleksandar Vucic, who came into power in 2012, after a twelve-year spell in the opposition. Every Saturday, Serbs  gathered at Republic Square at Belgrade, to counter ongoing assault on media freedoms, participative democracy and political violence. With neighbouring Albania and Montenegro, also volatile, Serbia's protests have been called as the beginning of a ‘Balkan Spring’. These protests had actually escalated in December 2018, and it might give emergence to a new global movement from Europe. In March 2019,  protests had escalated as riots spread to several neighbouring cities, including second largest city Novi Sad. However, protests outside Belgrade are smaller in comparison. This crescendo has helped several angry people and opposition leader to barge into the headquarters of Radio Tele...

Photo source: Rferl.org By Naveed Qazi, Editor | Globe UpFront T here has been a mounting pressure on Albanian socialists, in charge of the government, by opposition protestors, who demand an end to their democratic tenure.  Infact, the opposition calls the government of Socialist Party of Albania, as an illegitimate government, of thieves and criminals. These protests got active in February 2019, in the Balkan country. During mid-May 2019, more protests were held at the Martyrs of the Nation Boulevard in Tirana, before moving to other sites. Protestors, holding umbrellas on a rainy day, threw various kinds of flares, gasoline grenades, Molotov cocktails, and attempted to barge into the main government building, at the boulevard. As a reaction, security personnel, in return, fired tear gas, injuring many number of people. Several observers saw threatening words written at the building, where the OSCE ambassador in Tirana lives. The Italian Embassy, in Albania, h...

Photo Source: Scroll.in By Naveed Qazi | Editor, Globe UpFront T here has been a continuous allocation of forestland, in the Hasdeo Arand forest stretch, in Chhattisgarh, spanning 170,000 hectares, by the local government. Dubbed as India’s most pristine and densest forest area, it is been made accessible for open cast coal mining purposes. This plan has again raised concerns about the future of the country’s ecology. There has been a 55 per cent increase in forestland diversion between 2001 to 2008. This is indeed alarming. According to Committee of Land Reforms and State Agrarian Relations (CLSR), the total forestland, diverted for non-forest use, in Chhattisgarh, between 1987 to 2003, has been 1.71 lakh hectares, out of which 67 per cent has been used for mining purposes. This committee was formed in 2008, by Government of India, which drafted its official report in 2009. It had raised concerns about India’s dwindling forest area, as a whole, and not only in Chhatt...

Photo Source: Al Jazeera Written by Naveed Qazi | Editor, Globe UpFront I n 2019 , three years passed by   since Britain voted to leave the European Union. However, as a pending Brexit looms, amidst parties trying to lock horns, during May 23, 2019, election, and European election, there may be some real consequences which Britain could face.  As of now, the callous and slothful ways of the politicians show a deepening political discord. There is little lucidness regarding when the eventual Brexit would occur. UK Prime Minister Theresa May has agreed to meet the 1922 committee of Tory Members of Parliament once more. It might also propel her to provide final action on Brexit in the coming time. The rules for a new leadership contest, however, within the Conservatives might remain unchanged. Quite recently, in December 2018, several Tory MPs had tried to oust May, but they cannot challenge her for a year, at least. However, all these clauses can change, in the prospec...

Photo Source:  Al Jazeera By Naveed Qazi | Editor, Globe UpFront I n post-war Sri Lanka, when two hundred fifty civilians, including forty-two foreign nationals, were killed in a single day on 21 April 2019 across hotels and churches, in a string of coordinated attacks, it reminded the world of a predatory civil war, which rattled the country, in the past.  The hospitals had struggled to cope up with a high number of casualties, as suicide bombers, wearing backpacks, caught on CCTV, blew themselves up. Gory pictures in the press appeared showing debris spread from ceilings, walls and burst water pipes on roads. There were screams of helplessness around, as survivors got paralysed with shock. Sometime later, the army was seen looking for explosives in the earth, as pallbearers, handling wooden coffins, with mourners around them, were making a way for mass burials. The episode received worldwide condemnations, but the world also had scrambled for answers: Tamil ...