Photo source: Gulf news By Naveed Qazi | Editor, Gloeb Upfront Duterte has some serious answers to give on his coveted war on drugs. It was in June 2020 when UN’s High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet compiled a twenty-six-page report on the drug related killings in Philippines, where around nine hundred submissions from human rights defenders, journalists, trade unionists were recorded. Human rights defenders in Philippines believe that the total number of extrajudicial killings are around twenty-seven thousand. This death toll bears comparison to the ‘disappeared’ under the Argentinian junta of the 1970s. The police, for their part, reported more than 23,000 “homicide cases under investigation” during the two years from July 2016. Judy Pasimio, a spokesperson for the advocacy group In Defense of Human Rights and Dignity Movement (iDefend), believes that the official death toll was likely to be an underestimate, because so many relatives were afraid to speak out....

Photo source: Politico By Naveed Qazi | Editor, Globe Upfront A ustralia has stabbed France in the back. They ditched a nuclear deal with them worth more than $66 billion and instead acquired nuclear powered subs from the United States. Canberra had signaled in June 2021 that it was looking to turn away from the contract signed in 2016, during the Turnbull government, with French company DCNS (now known as Naval Group) to build twelve Barracuda submarines. Outraged and humiliated, France had recalled its ambassadors from the U.S. and Australia. France had hoped that its deal with Australia would bring the two countries strategically closer. According to a report in Guardian, France was even looking to protect its interests,  which include the overseas territories of New Caledonia and French Polynesia. It is the only European country with a presence in the region, with nearly two million French citizens and more than seven thousand troops. When the deal was first announced in 2016, ...

  Photo source: Indian Express By Naveed Qazi | Editor, Globe Upfront I n May 2020, India and China engaged in aggressive melee  along the  Panyong Lake in Ladakh, the Tibet Autonomous Region, and the border near Sikkim. This hustling mainly occurred because the Chinese had objected to the road construction by India in the Galwan Valley, a region which China believe is its territory. Tens were killed and soldiers were also taken captive from both sides. Eventually partial disengagement from Galwan, Hot Springs, and Gogra had occurred between June and July 2020.  The victims from the military represent the first violent deaths on the India-China border since 1975, and the most fatalities in the locations since 1967 in the Galwan valley. Amid the standoff, Indian government commissioned the region with approximately twelve thousand workers, who could assist India’s Border Road Organisation to build infrastructure along Sino-Indian border. The Chinese aggression could b...

  Photo source: Al Jazeera By Naveed Qazi | Editor, Globe Upfront D ue to an unpopular tax reform in April 2021, tens of thousands of protestors across Colombia, had joined to vent the frustration over rising inequality against the right-wing administration of President Ivan Duque. Infact, Colombia is a country where more than forty percent of people survive on less than $90 dollars a month. The majority of protests were largely peaceful, even though dystopian, which led to some vandalism and looting leading to damaged public transport, businesses and state buildings. Colombians believe that there is also a discontent over corruption, and the absence of state in rural areas, all serving to fuel protests in Colombia. According to statistics agency Dane, the middle class fell, the incomes declined, and at the same time the number of poor households have had surged for a while. The United Nations had violently condemned the violent repression of protests. Witnesses amid the protests...

  Photo source: Scroll.in  By Naveed Qazi | Editor, Globe Upfront The passage of the Citizenship Amendment Act in December 2019 was described by The Hindu as one of the most divisive legislative moves in recent Indian history, a moment when religion was explicitly introduced into the framework of citizenship. The Act, introduced by the Bharatiya Janata Party government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, provides a pathway to citizenship for undocumented migrants from Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan belonging to six non-Muslim religious communities—Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis and Christians—who entered India before 31 December 2014. BBC News reported that the exclusion of Muslims immediately raised questions about the secular character of the Indian state, with critics warning that it could marginalise India’s 200 million Muslims. The government defended the law as a humanitarian measure to protect persecuted minorities in neighbouring countries, yet the choi...

Photo source: Foreign Policy By Naveed Qazi, Editor, Globe Upfront Alexei Nalvany, the leader of the Anti-Corruption Foundation, started his political career, by launching a dozen regional headquarters, staffed by young, social media savvy volunteers, with little political experience, but having enough zeal to defeat Putin run institutions. It was in March 2017, as part of his presidential bid, Navalny released, via his YouTube Channel, an investigation detailing the vast illegal fortune of Putin’s prime minister and ex-president, Dmitry Medvedev. The next day, Navalny summoned Russians to the streets. The protests were crushed by pre-emptive police harassment of organisers and the general public. The regime shrugged off the protests by saying that there was an interference of NATO in it. Still, the marches exceeded their geographic footprint, than any other show of discontent in post-Soviet Russia. With the result, thousand people were detained including Nalvany himself. Young protest...

Photo source: Al Jazeera By Naveed Qazi | Editor, Globe Upfront In August 2020, a movement erupted in India of around three hundred thousand protestors. It was led by farmers, who were multi- generational, multi-faith, and multi caste. Concentrated in north India, the central theme of protests was their discontent against three laws passed by BJP led federal government that the farmers saw as an exploitation of India’s agricultural sector by the private corporations. It emerged as one of the largest protest movements in South Asia. At the same time, the movement also reflected global issues of worker rights, and labour regulations. For their retaliation, farmers were met with water cannons, barbed wire, and Internet shutdowns. In the first initial months, these protests didn’t get worldwide attention. This, however, changed on India’s republic day, the following year, when farmers drove their tractors into Delhi’s city centre, and stormed New Delhi’s Red Fort, where they had clashed wi...

  Photo source: BBC By Naveed Qazi | Editor, Globe Upfront I n August 2020, Malian President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, was forced to announce resignation live on state television by the army. From Kati, one of the biggest garrison towns of Mali, soldiers had marched to the capital, arrested high level state officials, and surrounded Keita’s residence in Sebenikoro.  The mutiny was done by mid and high-level officers of the armed forces. After Keita’s resignation, the coup leaders gathered under the banner of the Comite National pour le Salut du Peuple appeared on national television. Although reaffirming political transition, and allowing elections within a reasonable time frame, they vowed to the public that elections would be held sooner or later. They had justified their incursion for bringing social peace and stability to the country, as Mali was already in deeper chaos, anarchy and insecurity. Since 1960, when Mali gained independence from France, there have been five coup...