The World at Large

The Spanish Government is stuck in a predicament. Catalonia, the richest Spanish region, is seeking to hold a referendum on October 1 on whether or not to declare independence. If the majority say "yes," Catalan officials are planning to declare independence within a 2 day period (Reuters, 2017). But Spain is determined to keep that from happening, and the reasons are clear. Catalonia is the keeper...

Marco Island got its origins as a burial ground for Calusa Indians after they claimed it had a magic element that protected it from hurricanes. Centuries later, after developers have razed most of the protective mangrove forests and cut out large canals digging into the interior, the magic shield has crumbled. Even though Hurricane Irma’s destructive wind and storm surge (a large oceanic flood c...

In July of 2016 Indian forces killed a Kashmiri rebel named Burhan Wani, which created a domino effect of violent protests that injured over 120 people (The Hindu, 2017). The disputed territory is either Indian or Pakistani territory depending who you ask, and Indian forces have begun cracking down on resistance in the area in order to secure the land. What has followed is intense unrest. In the same...

The United States government recently announced its decision to give weapons to Kurdish fighters battling ISIS in Syria. Trump authorized shipments of arms to the Kurd fighters on Monday in order to fight in the self-declared ISIS Capital of Raqqa. But Turkey has disapproved of this strongly, announcing on Wednesday that, "cannot accept the presence of terrorist organizations that would threaten the...

39 year old Emmanuel Macron will become the next President of France following the election. His win has cemented him as the youngest French President in history. Macron is a self-identified centrist, and his competitor Le Pen was a right-winger nationalist who had been gaining momentum in the weeks towards the election. Despite a massive leak of documents and emails from Macron (NY Times, 2017), and...

  Opposition protesters broke into the Macedonian parliament in response to the first elected ethnic Albanian speaker. The nationalists attacked the MPs, with many injured- the opposition leader being one of them (Al-Jazeera, 2017). Tensions between minority Albanians and Macedonians have continued since the Albanians lead an armed insurrection in the early 2000s, which required NATO to int...

A large group of indigenous people lead a protest against the Brazilian government on April 25. The group clashed with police in the Capital of Brazil, Brasilia, where riot police had to be deployed. Thousands approached Congress to bring forward the issues they face, demanding land rights to keep loggers and farmers off their land. 13 indigenous people died because of land conflicts in 2016 (BBC, 2...

The US claimed recent MOAB bombing in Afghanistan has killed 90 members of ISIS. Hamid Karzi, a former Afghan President, has criticized the move, saying, “This is not the war on terror but the inhuman and most brutal misuse of our country as testing ground for new and dangerous weapons.” He went into a series of rants criticizing America’s role in his country. “It is upon us Afghans to stop th...

  Protests in major Venezuelan cities have reached a fever point recently. Upwards of 50 people are injured and 24 are reportedly dead in the riots, which are motivated by the demand for release of political prisoners and general elections in 2017 (BBC, 2017). The troubled country has recently come into criticism for its failing government, which has outlawed brownies due to flour shortages (G...