Sri Lanka owes 81 percent of its external debt to U.S. and European financial institutions and to Western allies, Japan and India. China owns just 10 percent. But Washington blames imaginary “Chinese debt traps” for the nation’s crisis, as it considers a 17th IMF structural adjustment program, reports Benjamin Norton.
Heavily dependent on grain imports and suffering its worst financial crisis, Tunisia is struggling with the global wheat shortage brought on by the fallout of the Russian “special military operation” in Ukraine. That’s why Ramadan, known in the Islamic calendar to be a holy month of fasting—but also of feasting and consumption—is looking different this year, reports Alessandra Bajec.
Contrary to the narrative of U.S. politicians and journalists, the August withdrawal of U.S. and NATO forces from Afghanistan did not mark the end of the United States’ so-called “forever war” but rather a shift in U.S. policy—from direct military intervention and occupation to one based on economic sanctions and indirect political subversion, writes Zachary Scott.
Afghanistan is teetering on the brink of universal poverty. As much as 97 percent of the population is at risk of sinking below the poverty line unless a comprehensive response to the country’s multiple crises is launched.
Copyright Toward Freedom 2019
