My feature in the Australian literary journal Overland: Flying into Bentiu, a town in northern South Sudan, is unnerving. The front of a broken plane, cockpit windows smashed, sits close to the dusty airstrip; long green grass sprouts around the cracked fuselage. Soldiers of the Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA), a former guerrilla movement and…
Showing all posts tagged United States
Drug cartel wars between Mexico and the US
My essay in the Los Angeles Review of Books: Joaquin Archivaldo Guzman Loera, known as “El Chapo,” was recaptured by Mexican marines in January. It was the latest in a long history of farcical escapes and imprisonments that have dominated the life of the world’s most infamous drug boss. His legacy is clear. Unmarked graves…
The nightmare of today's Western-backed Rwanda
My book review in The Australian: Rwandan President Paul Kagame is feted across the world, celebrated for rescuing his country after the 1994 genocide and bringing stability to a devastated nation. Kagame’s government has received billions of dollars in aid and weapons for more than 20 years from the US, Israel, Britain and the EU,…
What the Sanders and Corbyn movements say about Australia
My column in the Guardian: Charisma and persuasion matter in politics. Though neither trait guarantees fair policies or outlook – think Tony Blair… backing the catastrophic war… against Iraq, or Malcolm Turnbull hailing himself as a free speech champion before… pressuring the ABC… over its robust journalism – image is apparently more captivating than ever in the 21st century.…
Private immigration facilities making money from misery
My debut article in the New York Times: Berlin — Immigration and Customs Enforcement calls the detention site in Dilley, Tex., a “family residential center.” But to the 2,000 migrant children and mothers who live there, it’s something else: “People who say this is not a prison are lying,” Yancy Maricela Mejia Guerra, a detainee…
Where is all the US aid money in Afghanistan?
My investigative feature in UAE newspaper The National… (PDFs of the stunning looking feature… DC.front… and… DC.spread): The human cost of the Afghan war has been devastating. The United Nations estimates that at least 20,000 Afghan civilians have been killed since 2001 and violence is worsening across the country. United States president Barack Obama, fearing an Iraq-style state collapse…
How South American drug cartels embraced Guinea-Bissau
My investigation in the Guardian: Guinea-Bissau’s Bijagós islands look like a tourists’ paradise – the 88 mostly uninhabited islets are filled with palm trees and white, sandy beaches. But the archipelago has been best known as a smugglers’ paradise. Described by the… UN as a narco state, Guinea-Bissau has long been a drug trafficking hub for…
How Guinea-Bissau became a cocaine smuggling hub
My investigation in Foreign Policy: BISSAU, Guinea-Bissau — The headquarters of the Judicial Police, the government agency charged with prosecuting Guinea-Bissau’s war on drugs, sits on a dusty street in the middle of this deceptively quiet West African capital city. Inside is the country’s only drug-testing laboratory, a recent addition thanks to a surge in…
US Minnesota radio interview about natural resources in Afghanistan
This month I have a feature in The Nation magazine about the failed mining industry in Afghanistan, a key theme of my film-in-progress, Disaster Capitalism. I was interviewed today by US Minnesota radio about my research on the subject and the troubles facing the country:
The Laura Flanders TV show on Disaster Capitalism
During my recent New York book tour for Disaster Capitalism, I recorded an interview on The Laura Flanders TV show. It’s airing this week on TV channels around the world: