Viewpoint by Kalinga Seneviratne*

SYDNEY (IDN) – With the spread of COVID-19 to Europe and the US a bout of Sinophobia seems to have infected the western media. On March 29, Australia’s 60-minute program – that is well known for sensational reporting – broadcast a program that portrayed China as the villain of the COVID-19 pandemonium and just stopped short of calling for war against China.

Then, you may have been thinking that Russian interference in western politics was a vitally important issue and something that we needed to invest much of our emotional and political energy in countering.

Viewpoint by Jan Egeland and Jean-François Riffaud

Jan Egeland is Secretary General of the Norwegian Refugee Council. Jean-François Riffaud is Chief Executive Officer of Action Against Hunger-France.

OSLO (IDN) — President Emmanuel Macron invited the five G5 West African leaders to the French city of Pau in January 2020 to shore up support for international engagement in restive Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger. All agreed that more European security support was needed to counter violent extremism in the Central Sahel.

By Jutta Wolf

BERLIN (IDN) – The world’s oldest peace NGO, the 1910 Nobel Peace Prize-winning International Peace Bureau (IPB), is calling for a “dramatic reduction” of military spending in favour of healthcare and meeting social needs. A petition launched on March 27 and signed by all interested will be submitted to the United Nations General Assembly on the first day of the next session opening on September 15, 2020.