Australia's ambition to become global arms dealer

My major investigation in the Melbourne Age/Sydney Morning Herald on Australia’s surging defence industry: This year’s Avalon Air Show in Geelong was the first chance for the public to see the long-delayed Joint Strike Fighter in action. At a cost of at least $100 million per aircraft, Canberra is slated to spend $17 billion on…

Who makes money from the crisis in Yemen?

Yemen is suffering one of the worst humanitarian crisis in the world, fuelled by the US-backed, Saudi Arabian war against civilians. Weapons manufacturers also have blood on their hands. I was interviewed today by journalist Jacob Burns in the Jordanian publication, Al Bawaba: Antony Loewenstein, an independent journalist and author of Disaster Capitalism:… Making A Killing…

Iran nuclear deal masks US and China arms race

My piece for American website Mondoweiss: The global arms race has never been more lucrative. America and China are engaged in unprecedented levels of spending around the world to influence and shape global affairs. The effects are devastating on civilians but Washington and Beijing insists they’re “stabilizing” nations. It’s one of the deadliest myths of…

Why Western leaders love dictatorships

My weekly Guardian column: Western-friendly dictators can die in peace, knowing they’ll be lauded as soon as they stop breathing. So it was for Singapore’s founding father Lee Kuan Yew, who recently passed away at the age of 91. Tributes poured in from across the globe. Barack Obama called him “visionary” while Australian prime minister…

Public talk on From Iraq to Gaza: The Politics of Fear

Last Friday I gave the following speech at Sydney’s… Lebanese Muslim Association forum on terrorism, Gaza, ISIS and Western governments spreading fear and anger towards the Islamic faith. Labor MP Tony Burke and Liberal MP Craig Laundy both pledged to bring harmony to the community and yet both their parties have flamed bigotry. Government surveillance is…

The mess in Libya is deep warning to "humanitarian interventionists"

My weekly Guardian column: Libya was sold as a glorious, liberating war. London’s Tory mayor Boris Johnson… wrote… in March 2011 that the overthrow of dictator Muammar Gaddafi was “of course ”¦ a good idea”. He was cautiously optimistic that a Western-led military campaign would not be a “disaster” like Iraq in 2003. “What kind of democracy…

Dangers of corporate sponsorship for cultural and artistic events

My weekly Guardian column is below: The 19th… Biennale of Sydney… opens on 21 March. There will be a… range of artists… displaying all manners of artistic endeavour. So far, so good. But a major sponsor is Transfield, a company used by the Australian Federal Government to handle refugee services and which therefore profits from the asylum seeker industry…

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