The War in Ukraine and the Great Amplification Since the start of the Russian offensive on 24 February 2022, the raging war has triggered an amplification of the tension on global food and energy prices. The price trends for oil, gas, coal and agricultural products were already on the rise because of the Western “post” …
Continue reading “Food Security: China-Russia and Ukraine – Anthropocene Wars (4)”
(Art design: Jean-Dominique Lavoix-Carli on a photo by Francesco Ungaro) The war(*) in Ukraine is hastening changes in international politics in many different ways. The possibility to see the conflict morphing into World War III acts as a convincing spur for continuing efforts at understanding and adapting. Concerned and informed actors are thus trying to …
Continue reading “Information Warfare and the War in Ukraine”
The War in Ukraine as a Perfect Storm The war in Ukraine triggers a global whirlwind involving energy and food crisis. The latter is quite singular, because it combines the consequences of the war on the global agricultural system with massive extreme weather events, such as the U.S. midwestern megadrought. War as global disruption Indeed, …
A nuclear theatre of operations (Art Direction: Jean-Dominique Lavoix-Carli Image: Recognize Productions via Pexels). On 24 February 2022, at the very start of Russian offensive against Ukraine, after a two days battle, the Russian forces took over the Chernobyl power plant, where the historic nuclear accident occurred in 1986 (Mary Kekatos, “Seizure of Chernobyl plant …
Continue reading “Nuclear Battlefields in Ukraine – Anthropocene Wars (2)”
The aim of the Water Sigils is to be a daily scan focusing on water security. We are currently investigating new AI ways to deliver an even better Water Sigils. The original complimentary version ran from May 2012 to April 2023. The Sigils are a series of scans exploring the horizon for weak signals related to various …
(Art design: Jean-Dominique Lavoix-Carli) Russia’s attack on Ukraine on 24 February 2022 is profoundly changing the international order. The shock is notably hard for countries such as the members of the European Union, who thought they would be at peace for ever. Suddenly, these countries, their economic actors and their citizens rediscover war and the …
(Last updated 28 Feb 22 20:50 CET: added access to UN General Assembly Live) At 3:00 GMT Russia launched an attack on Ukraine. Russian President Vladimir Putin dubbed it a “special military operation”. Immediately, part of the international community condemned this attack. What is happening on the ground? How are events unfolding? How is the …
(Art direction Jean-Dominique Lavoix-Carli using a photograph created by Pete Linforth) Over the last decades, strategic surprises have accumulated and accelerated rather than receded. They continue to do so. Most actors, from governments and international organisations to businesses through citizens seem to be constantly and increasingly surprised by events they fail to anticipate, and thus for which …
Continue reading “Multiplicating Crises: Strategic Surprises or Strategic Shocks?”
(Art direction Jean-Dominique Lavoix-Carli) Belarus borders: theatre of operations Since July 2021, the Belarusian government literally projects migrants to the borders of Poland, Latvia and Lithuania. Those people come from Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Iran, Kurdistan, Afghanistan, Algeria, Morocco, the Republic of Congo, Cameroon and Venezuela (Yuras Karmanau, “Explainer: What’s behind the Belarus-Poland border crisis ?”, …
Continue reading “Belarus and the Weaponization of Migration – Anthropocene Wars (1)”
(Art design: Jean-Dominique Lavoix-Carli) Within the context of the heightened tensions between Russia and the U.S., Russia, on 1st February 2022, through its foreign minister Sergei Lavrov invokes an article of a 1999 agreement (Reuters, 1 February 2022). What is is this agreement and which article does Lavrov use? The 1999 agreement is actually the …
Continue reading “Russia vs the U.S. – The OSCE Istanbul Document”
