There have been penalties for those who looked the other way when Epstein was convicted of child sex offences and decided to maintain relationships with the financier — but not for the British ambassador to Washington, reveals SOLOMON HUGHES
Saudi Arabia to helm UN women’s forum: an irony lost on no-one
How has Saudi Arabia, notorious for human rights abuses, been appointed to lead the UN commission on gender equality despite continuing to imprison women activists advocating for basic rights, asks MARYAM ALDOSSARI
RESTRICTED FREEDOMS: Hessah al-Ajaji drives her car after midnight for the first time in Riyadh, June 2018
Labour’s new Treasury unit will ‘challenge unnecessary regulation’ by forcing nominally independent bodies like Ofwat to bend to business demands — exactly what Iain Anderson’s corporate clients wanted, writes SOLOMON HUGHES
DR DYLAN MURPHY looks at a Big Brother Watch report which exposes the government as an enabler of DWP secret spying on benefit claimants
The EU faces a critical choice: will it remain in the shadow of an increasingly unreliable US ally, or will it forge its own path in a multilateral world where co-operation with China is essential, asks MARC VANDEPITTE as leaders meet for the EU-China Summit
A lot of discussion about how the left should currently organise – including debate on whether the Green Party is a useful vehicle for advance – runs the risk of refusing to engage with or learn from the reasons the left was defeated previously, argues KEVIN OVENDEN
For Egypt trade trumps the Israeli genocide of the Palestinians, but how long can the country’s ‘misleaders’ – and others in the region – continue their indifference against the popular will of their own people, asks ROGER McKENZIE
THE appointment of Saudi Arabia to lead the UN commission on gender equality and women’s empowerment isn’t just a slap in the face of the long struggle against women’s rights violations in the kingdom; it’s a mockery of the global fight for gender equality.
Hardly surprising, considering Saudi Arabia’s knack for getting what it wants, even if it means getting away with murder, as the case of Jamal Khashoggi grimly demonstrates. Now, the kingdom is on a mission to sell itself to the Western world as a beacon of women’s empowerment — what better way to do this than by heading the UN’s gender equality initiative?
Since rolling out Vision 2030 in 2016, Saudi Arabia has masterfully orchestrated performances for the Western gaze, delivering well-crafted gestures that often earn applause from the West for their supposed strides in modernising the conservative kingdom — all part of the grand narrative championed by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
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The regime’s handpicked female firsts — drawn from elite families — mask the reality of Dar al-Reaya ‘care homes’ where disobedient women are beaten and drugged, and the feminists who fought for driving rights remain jailed, writes MARYAM ALDOSSARI
Palestinian women have been failed by the feminist movement overall, argues MARYAM ALDOSSARI, calling for a return to principled solidarity instead of selective outrage and dehumanising narratives
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From golf and football to Formula One, the kingdom uses unprecedented investments in global sport to divert attention from its persecution of journalists, dissidents and women, write BELLA KATZ and ROGER McKENZIE
The failure of international institutions, from the UN to the ICC, to hold the Taliban accountable for the brutal repression of women creates a climate of tolerance for daily crimes by the patriarchal regime, writes SHUKRIA RAHIMI
With its track record of leveraging cultural power for US gain and barely concealed promotion of coup attempts, the US Agency for International Development will not be mourned among the US’s southern neighbours, write JOHN PERRY and ROGER D HARRIS
