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For the first time since the beginning of the Syrian crisis in 2011 a significant number of international experts, political analysts, and journalists have reported about the near conclusion of the civil war. The military operation of the Syrian Arab Army on the liberation of the rest part of the country from various terrorist organizations is currently in the final stage. [ 485 more words ]
https://orientalreview.org/…/syria-returns-its-citizens-wh…/

The resolution of the Syrian crisis is quite close, but the European leaders must realize that the full settlement is impossible without resolving some humanitarian issues. In particular, the return of refugees. Both the Syrians and Europeans are interested in this.
orientalreview.org

The head of the Russian Armed Forces General Staff Valery Gerasimov asked his closest American counterpart Joseph Dunford to assist his country in jointly stabilizing Syria. Reuters reported that the proposal to cooperate on the repatriation of refugees and reconstruction projects in the Arab Republic was met with an “icy reception” by US decision makers, though this could have been expected considering that Washington had previously said that any assistance that it might provide to the government-controlled areas of Syria would be tied to the implementation of UNSC 2254’s constitutional reform and new elections. [ 431 more words ]
https://orientalreview.org/…/the-us-rebuff-of-russias-coop…/

Making humanitarian and developmental assistance conditional on political factors is Machiavellian to the core but unsurprising to those who have a solid understanding of the cynicism behind American strategic planning.
orientalreview.org
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Perhaps the most striking thing about human beings is that we don’t actually come into existence by ourselves. There are parents (two of them when the laws of biology are allowed to work). The parents themselves are points of contact to a much larger world of the family and the culture itself. Human beings do not come without cultures. In a relatively short time, we acquire language and a host of other things from this culture around us. [ 972 more words ]
https://orientalreview.org/…/not-a-single-individual-will-…/

The unchurched, non-sacramental evolution of contemporary Christianity follows the track of modern culture’s portrayal of human beings as atomistic individuals. Catholics and Orthodox frequently hear others assert, “I don’t need a priest. I can go straight to God.”
orientalreview.org

The Pakistani Navy commenced Regional Maritime Security Patrols (RMSP) in the northwestern corner of the Indian Ocean last month that have since seen the country’s ships pay visits to Saudi Arabia and Oman, thereby broadening the scope of Pakistani influence in the emerging Multipolar World Order. The patrols are fully in line with international law and are designed to establish a symbolic presence along the Sea Lines Of Communication (SLOC) between… [ 446 more words ]
https://orientalreview.org/…/pakistans-regional-maritime-s…/

The Pakistani Navy is just the latest party to express an interest in these waterways and the hinterland markets that their terminal ports lead to, thus confirming the trend that the center of naval gravity is shifting in the direction of the Horn of Africa because of strategic economic reasons.
orientalreview.org

World wars do not only end with a winner and a loser. Their termination defines the contours of a new world. The First World War ended with the defeat of the German, Russian, Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman Empires. The cessation of hostilities was marked by the elaboration of an international organisation, the League of Nations (LN), tasked with abolishing secret diplomacy and settling any conflicts between the member-states by arbitration. [ 1,079 more word ]
https://orientalreview.org/20…/…/11/the-twilight-of-the-war/

If we consider the war in Syria not as a singular event, but as the culmination of a world war which has persisted for a quarter of a century, we have to ask ourselves about the consequences of the imminent end of hostilities. Its completion marks the defeat of an ideology, that is to say globalisat...
orientalreview.org

Russia and Pakistan are well on the their way to reaching a strategic partnership with one another in light of four very high-profile events from the past two weeks, and sticking to the roadmap of “Rusi-Pakistani Yaar Yaar” (“Russians and Pakistanis are buddies”) could allow their relations to blossom to the point of resembling Moscow’s Soviet-era ones with New Delhi that were popularly known as “Rusi-Hindi Bhai Bhai” (“Russians and Indians are brothers”), albeit this time the Kremlin will be seeking to “balance” affairs in South Asia instead of decisively siding with one country over the other. [ 2,083 more words ]
https://orientalreview.org/…/the-roadmap-for-rusi-pakistan…/

Ties between Russia and Pakistan represent one of the 21st century’s most promising partnerships and perfectly embody the very essence of multipolarity, which is why they must be prioritized by both countries’ leaderships in order to take them to the strategic level as soon as possible.
orientalreview.org

The global silence over Israel’s hopes that “the Iranian regime would disappear entirely from this world” stands in stark contrast to the worldwide outrage over similarly phrased wishes on behalf of Iran 12 years ago to see its Zionist enemy “vanish from the pages of time”. International Relations are characterized by double standards because each actor is striving to advance their own interests first and foremost with only a secondary regard for “ideological consistency”, and a recent reminder of that happened earlier this week when the world was silent after the Israeli “Minister” of Public Security Gilad Erdan channeled the previously condemned words of his entity’s hated foe former Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. [ 662 more words ]
https://orientalreview.org/…/israel-vs-iran-disappear-from…/

The world’s silence on Israel’s desire to see the Iranian government “disappear entirely from this world” is proof of the double standards inherent in International Relations when most of the same actors felt compelled to condemn Iran for wishing that the Israeli government would “vanish f...
orientalreview.org

Even though a vast majority of the population admits the saying that history is written by those who win the wars, most are unwilling to question its core and rather choose to accept that what they're being told by their government controlled education and mainstream media reflects reality. We have to keep in mind that our knowledge of the Second World War was mostly redacted by American and Western historians that carried over time a deeply fake idea of reality. [ 1,594 more word ]
https://orientalreview.org/…/the-unpleasant-truth-about-th…/

To confront the spectrum of narratives that our official history offers, especially in the case of an event that took place 77 years ago, independent researchers have to mostly rely on logical speculation, because of the lack of access to precious documentation that is kept confidential in locked va...
orientalreview.org

The words ‘hope’ and ‘Pakistan’ do not often appear together. Pakistan, a sprawling nation of 205 million, is hard to govern, even harder to finance, and seething with tribal or religious violence and discord. But Pakistan, which for me is one of the most interesting and important nations on earth, is by far the leading nation of the Muslim world and a redoubtable military power. [ 695 more words ]
https://orientalreview.org/…/pakistan-needs-a-strong-new-l…/

After decades of dynastic politics under the Bhutto and Sharif families, there is suddenly hope that newly elected cricket star Imran Khan and his Tehreek-e-Insaf Party (PTI) may – just may – tackle Pakistan’s four biggest problems: endemic corruption, military interference, political tribalis...
orientalreview.org

In the debris of the Trump-Putin summit at Helsinki on July 16, the understanding reached on the Syrian conflict stands out as a positive outcome. The steady improvement in the politico-military situation in Syria and the easing of rivalries involving the external parties bears this out. Interestingly, a Xinhua report with Damascus dateline on Sunday highlights this happy outcome of the Helsinki summit, citing Syrian experts. [ 584 more words ]
https://orientalreview.org/…/helsinki-summits-positive-fal…/

In northeastern Syria, which is dominated by the Kurdish militia, there are new stirrings. The situation on Syria’s southern border has calmed down. These substantial achievements and the fact that Syrian government has become more stable and is in greater control will give impetus to the efforts ...
orientalreview.org

UAE Crown Prince Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan awarded the eponymous Order of Zayed to the leaders of Ethiopia and Eritrea for their fast-moving achievements in ending the two-decade-long conflict between their countries, highlighting the Emirates’ previously silent role in mediating between the two sides and underscoring its rise as a transregional power in the strategic Horn of Africa region. Abu Dhabi was able to skillfully leverage its military deployments in… [ 441 more words ]
https://orientalreview.org/…/the-uaes-ethiopian-eritrean-m…/

Altogether, the prime takeaway from the UAE’s hosting of the Ethiopian & Eritrean leaders and its awarding of the highest state honor to each of them is that Abu Dhabi is signaling to the world that it’s capable of punching well above its geopolitical weight and has indisputably become a transre...
orientalreview.org

Pakistan’s Prime Minister-elect Imran Khan made many promises during his election campaign. Now he has to deliver. This is not going to be easy, and speed will be of essence. His first priority must be to tap the best brains of the country as his closest Advisors who also cherish the moral and ethical values enshrined in Islam and on which the country was founded. [ 1,217 more word ]
https://orientalreview.org/…/dealing-with-pakistans-multip…/

Pakistan’s new Prime Minister has acknowledge the country has serious governance problems and will hopefully attempt to redress soonest its self-inflicted tyrannies. Only then will the country and its new Prime Minister restore its credibility within its own citizenry and also abroad as a trusted ...
orientalreview.org

Beijing proposed the format of “China-India-Plus-One” for cooperating with New Delhi in Africa. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang unveiled this framework last week when he announced that “We hope that China and India actively explore China-India plus one or China-India-X cooperation in accordance with the consensus reached by the leaders of the two countries, realise mutual benefit and win-win between China and India and other countries”, which was clearly in response to the overlapping African trips of the Chinese and Indian leaders in the run-up to the 10th BRICS Summit in Johannesburg. [ 405 more words ]
https://orientalreview.org/…/china-india-plus-one-could-se…/

If China and India joined forces to coordinate their developmental policies towards a certain African state or even entire region as a whole, then they’d remove the chance for any wasteful redundancies between them and resultantly improve the efficiency of their comprehensive strategies.
orientalreview.org

Post terror attack within the European Union, opposition political leaders raise demands for more cooperation between intelligence and security establishments, some even going to an extent to call for establishing a dedicated intelligence agency. So, the question is, will establishing a dedicated European Intelligence agency solve the problems? If it does, how feasible is this option? Intelligence cooperation amid terror attacks… [ 1,314 more word ]
https://orientalreview.org/…/for-intelligence-exchange-eu-…/

From the recent rampant attacks within the EU, threats pose to international security have become more severe than ever. The ripple effects will affect all member nations of the EU in varying extent. The common European Security Policy must reach its implementation stage.
orientalreview.org

The US Congress has revived the so-called “NOPEC” bill for countering OPEC and OPEC+. Officially called the “No Oil Producing and Exporting Cartels Act”, NOPEC is the definition of so-called “lawfare” because it enables the US to extraterritorially impose its domestic legislation on others by giving the government the right to sue OPEC and OPEC+ countries like Russia because of their coordinated efforts to control oil prices. [ 493 more words ]
https://orientalreview.org/…/americas-about-to-unleash-its…/

If looked at as the opening salvo of a global energy war being waged in parallel with the trade one as opposed to being dismissed as the populist piece of legislation that it’s being portrayed as by the media, NOPEC can be seen as the strategic superweapon that it actually is, with its ultimate ef...
orientalreview.org

Perhaps the most difficult personalities encountered in anyone’s life are those that can clinically be labeled “narcissistic.” It refers to a very describable disorder that can be diagnosed but treated only with difficulty. The narcissist is critically handicapped when it comes to recognizing and respecting boundaries. They want to run your life (and will). Everything in the world revolves around them simply because their own boundaries are so non-existent. [ 1,013 more word ]
https://orientalreview.org/…/beyond-narcissism-to-behold-t…/

At the core of a narcissistic disorder is shame. Strangely, the ability to bear shame is essential in the experience of God. God does not try to shame us or make us feel bad about ourselves. Shame is simply an objective reality in His presence.
orientalreview.org