The pretexts used for demanding the opening of negotiations often lack honesty and even the most basic “decency”. The question of whether to consider, initiate or even impose negotiations to stop the war in Ukraine is subject to multiple versions, whether expressed by the responsible actors directly or indirectly involved in the conflict, by the politicians who claim to defend the interests of their constituents or by the military, economic, industrial, political and psychological specialists who overwhelm us with their science. If every reasonable person is in favor of peace, if no one doubts that in the end a negotiated or imposed agreement will put an end to hostilities, the content of the arguments put forward hardly conceals – with…

Its media coverage by Western platforms serves his interests powerfully. Commentators are happy to compare the “professionalism” of President Zelenski’s communication with the “propaganda” we are fed by the Russian authorities and media. However, Putin is achieving many of his objectives with the active and naive help of his detractors. On the Russian domestic front, there is nothing new to disturb the passive swallowing of “his master’s voice“. More than a million of the most educated objectors chose to vote with their feet, while a large segment of the remaining public, kept in the dark about the reality of the conflict, remains particularly sensitive to the official discourse complaining about Russia’s deliberate isolation. Abroad, on the other hand, the derisory,…

While the immediate reason for the recent political crisis in Britain can be pinned on the announcement of a totally ill-considered “mini-budget”, received with disbelief and given short shrift by financial markets, its root causes can be traced to a combination of factors, some of which affect simultaneously the European Union if not the whole world: they include global warming, the pandemic, the war in Ukraine, the energy crisis, inflation, etc. There is, however, one cause that is specific to Britain: “BREXIT”. The consequences generated by these parallel crises have undermined the central premise – “making the UK a global and sovereign power” – on which the rational for leaving the EU was based. Indeed, it was shortly after the…

Are negotiations with the master of the Kremlin possible? As the list of military and civilian casualties increases daily amidst a growing pile of ruins, the pressure for a “ceasefire” is intensifying to end the unbearable human suffering and senseless material destruction in Ukraine. Is this first step towards resolving the conflict possible or even desirable? Russia says it is “open to the possibility” while Ukraine is firmly opposed. Both positions are easily explained: a simple “ceasefire” without further conditions would mark a significant victory for Russia, which occupies a large part of 4 “Oblasts” in the south and east of the country as well as Crimea, all territories internationally recognized as being part of Ukraine. Not only would the…

The war in Ukraine is only the emerged tip of an iceberg obfuscating a conflict with global implications. While public opinion is inflamed by debates over the use of nuclear weapons (expanded to include civil nuclear power), energy shortages, climate change, a global financial system burdened by excessive debt, unreliable supply chains or unbridled inflation, politicians appear unable to devise a coherent hierarchy among these problems whose causes and therefore solutions are intimately intertwined. This list, however incomplete, shows that there is not a single inhabitant of our planet who will not be affected by the choices made to resolve these challenges. The unfolding of the war in Ukraine has created a situation where the use of nuclear weapons –…

Only a shared objective will be capable of ensuring the cohesion of democracies and of arousing a constructive and mobilizing spirit. The recent political, military, economic or environmental events are likely to exacerbate the existing high level of anxiety pervading the population; people feel intuitively that the declaration of President Macron, announcing “the end of the period of plenty“, marks a decisive turning point in the apprehension of our common future. The greatest risk would be to allow fear and withdrawal to dominate our attitude to the challenges ahead because, far from providing an answer, such postures would only aggravate and accelerate the self-fulfilling nature of these anticipations. The only force capable of facing up to these difficulties is unity,…

An old dream that is not of this world! A “new order” has been the object of religious belief, philosophical debate or political manifestos for as long as man has been trying to make sense of the world around him. With the emergence of the “Enlightenment” and the seemingly limitless “progress” of science, the West may have thought for a while that rational answers would be found to all its questions; but reality has caught up showing that the sum of the mysteries remaining unsolved grows in proportion to our new discoveries and deeper knowledge. If the vast majority of mankind has, since the dawn of civilization, projected into another world their fears of the forces of nature and the…

The media are full of scholarly, moralistic or “objective” debates aiming to inform public opinion about the drama of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict. In order to give themselves an appearance of credibility, they all too often feel obliged to present the facts, either leaving each individual to make their own judgement, or by presenting contradictory assessments that poorly conceal the subjectivity of those who express them. The emblematic example of this phenomenon is illustrated by the recent report of “Amnesty International” which lists indisputable facts perpetrated in Ukraine, but which unilaterally authorizes itself to qualify them as “violations of international humanitarian law”, a privilege which belongs solely to judicial authorities. Although no one questions the reality of the facts reported, their…

From an expression expressing brotherhood between human beings, “solidarity” has become the key to the survival of the species! What a magic word! It immediately arouses a warm feeling of belonging, benevolence, good conscience, commitment by encouraging the surpassing of oneself and implies a will to act towards a shared objective that transcends individual interests. A distinction must be made between its idealized form, which belongs more to the philosophical or religious spheres, and its pragmatic form, which concerns its implementation. “Idealized” solidarity is thus interwoven with the confrontation of moral values or legal norms such as “good and evil”, “individual versus collective rights”, or even refers to ethical or religious precepts such as “do not do unto others what…