Robin Wright's Blog, page 9
February 25, 2016
The New Yorker
Iran's Technicolor Election
By Robin Wright
My piece for The New Yorker on Iran's Technicolor Election. To help voters choose among 6,000 candidates in a (yes, only!) eight-day campaign, new coalitions have selected colors: Turquoise for the Universal Coalition of Reformers. Bright yellow for Grand Coalition of Principlists. Indigo for conservatives. Pity the color blind voter! Lots at stake in this poll, which will pick a new parliament as well as an Assembly of Elections, a rough equivalent of the College of Cardinals, as it selects the Supreme Leader, the ultimate authority in Iran.
Read on...
http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/irans-technicolor-elections?intcid=mod-latest
By Robin Wright
My piece for The New Yorker on Iran's Technicolor Election. To help voters choose among 6,000 candidates in a (yes, only!) eight-day campaign, new coalitions have selected colors: Turquoise for the Universal Coalition of Reformers. Bright yellow for Grand Coalition of Principlists. Indigo for conservatives. Pity the color blind voter! Lots at stake in this poll, which will pick a new parliament as well as an Assembly of Elections, a rough equivalent of the College of Cardinals, as it selects the Supreme Leader, the ultimate authority in Iran.
Read on...
http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/irans-technicolor-elections?intcid=mod-latest
February 22, 2016
A Ceasefire in Syria? By Robin Wright My New Yo...
A Ceasefire in Syria?
By Robin Wright
My New Yorker piece on prospects for the new ceasefire in Syria--and the daunting odds against it. Trust the Russians? (Really? Remember Ukraine.) Trust the Syrian regime to comply? (No brainer.) And then there's the nasty little fact that ISIS is not part of the deal. (The beheaders.)
And yet, after at least 250,000 dead, 4 million refugees and 13.5 million dependent on humanitarian aid for daily survival, there's nothing else visible. Read on...
http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/a-ceasefire-in-syria?intcid=mod-latest
By Robin Wright
My New Yorker piece on prospects for the new ceasefire in Syria--and the daunting odds against it. Trust the Russians? (Really? Remember Ukraine.) Trust the Syrian regime to comply? (No brainer.) And then there's the nasty little fact that ISIS is not part of the deal. (The beheaders.)
And yet, after at least 250,000 dead, 4 million refugees and 13.5 million dependent on humanitarian aid for daily survival, there's nothing else visible. Read on...
http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/a-ceasefire-in-syria?intcid=mod-latest
February 13, 2016
The New Yorker
Iran's Revolutionary Grandchildren
By Robin Wright
My New Yorker piece on the grandchildren of Iran's revolution--and how their fate reflects the tensions within Iran on the anniversary of Ayatollah Khomeini's return from exile to replace the monarchy with a theocracy and on the eve of pivotal elections that will determine Iran's future.
Read on....
http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/irans-revolutionary-grandchildren?intcid=mod-latest
By Robin Wright
My New Yorker piece on the grandchildren of Iran's revolution--and how their fate reflects the tensions within Iran on the anniversary of Ayatollah Khomeini's return from exile to replace the monarchy with a theocracy and on the eve of pivotal elections that will determine Iran's future.
Read on....
http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/irans-revolutionary-grandchildren?intcid=mod-latest
February 10, 2016
The New Yorker
Beastie Boys and Girls:
The New Anthropomorphism
By Robin Wright
I had so much fun writing this piece!
Turns out it’s perfectly human to imagine ourselves as animals. In Britain, an Oxford don decided to experience life as a badger, slithering on the ground and eating worms. The Furry Movement holds conventions for fur-suited humans whose spirits “align” more with animals. On Twitter, users who tweet as pandas, cobras, cats and other animals have accumulated huge followings. @bronxzooscobra has as many followers on Twitter as Bernie Sanders. Who knew!
The human imagination is utterly amazing.
Read on....
http://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/beastie-boys-and-girls-the-new-anthropomorphism
The New Anthropomorphism
By Robin Wright
I had so much fun writing this piece!
Turns out it’s perfectly human to imagine ourselves as animals. In Britain, an Oxford don decided to experience life as a badger, slithering on the ground and eating worms. The Furry Movement holds conventions for fur-suited humans whose spirits “align” more with animals. On Twitter, users who tweet as pandas, cobras, cats and other animals have accumulated huge followings. @bronxzooscobra has as many followers on Twitter as Bernie Sanders. Who knew!
The human imagination is utterly amazing.
Read on....
http://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/beastie-boys-and-girls-the-new-anthropomorphism
February 8, 2016
The New Yorker
Female Genital Mutilation--Now 200 million
By Robin Wright
My New Yorker piece on a stunning UN finding that it had underestimated the number of little girls whose genitals had been scrapped, pricked or sliced--by 70 million. The new numbers mean that at least two hundred million girls and women across the globe (including thousands in the United States) have gone through "female genital mutilation." The UN reports that the trend is now global, not just in Africa. The UN has declared it an “irreversible human-rights violation.”
http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/female-genital-mutilation-the-numbers-keep-rising
By Robin Wright
My New Yorker piece on a stunning UN finding that it had underestimated the number of little girls whose genitals had been scrapped, pricked or sliced--by 70 million. The new numbers mean that at least two hundred million girls and women across the globe (including thousands in the United States) have gone through "female genital mutilation." The UN reports that the trend is now global, not just in Africa. The UN has declared it an “irreversible human-rights violation.”
http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/female-genital-mutilation-the-numbers-keep-rising
January 25, 2016
The New Yorker
Iran's Comeback Tour
By Robin Wright
My New Yorker piece on "Iran's Comeback Tour." After four decades as a pariah nation, Tehran is being courted by both East and West. It's one of the fastest turnarounds in history. On his first tour of the Middle East, China's president pledged Saturday to work with Iran to reopen the ancient Silk road trade route, this time with high-speed trains, and generate $600 billion in trade over next decade. On Monday, Iran's president began a European tour that will include buying more than 100 Airbus planes and a visit with Pope Francis. However, the comeback tour may not be a sell-out. Iran still has a revolutionary government with all the uncertainties that entails. Big banks and businesses still nervous.
http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/iran-is-back-in-business?intcid=mod-latest
By Robin Wright
My New Yorker piece on "Iran's Comeback Tour." After four decades as a pariah nation, Tehran is being courted by both East and West. It's one of the fastest turnarounds in history. On his first tour of the Middle East, China's president pledged Saturday to work with Iran to reopen the ancient Silk road trade route, this time with high-speed trains, and generate $600 billion in trade over next decade. On Monday, Iran's president began a European tour that will include buying more than 100 Airbus planes and a visit with Pope Francis. However, the comeback tour may not be a sell-out. Iran still has a revolutionary government with all the uncertainties that entails. Big banks and businesses still nervous.
http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/iran-is-back-in-business?intcid=mod-latest
January 17, 2016
The New Yorker
Obama's Secret Second Channel to Iran
By Robin Wright
Fourteen months ago, President Obama authorized a top-secret, second diplomatic channel with Tehran to negotiate freedom for Americans who had disappeared or been imprisoned in Iran. It was a high-risk diplomatic gamble. The initiative grew out of nuclear negotiations, launched in the fall of 2013, between Iran and the world’s six major powers. On the margins of every session, Wendy Sherman, the top American negotiator, pressed her Iranian counterparts about the American cases. The Iranians countered with demands for the release of their citizens imprisoned in the United States for sanctions-busting crimes. More than a year of informal discussions between Sherman and her counterpart, Majid Takht Ravanchi, the Iranian Foreign Ministry official in charge of American and European affairs, led to an agreement, in late 2014, that the issue should be handled separately—but officially—through a second channel. After debate within the Administration, Obama approved the initiative. But it was so tightly held that most of the American team engaged in tortuous negotiations on Iran’s nuclear program were not told about it.Read on...
http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/prisoner-swap-obamas-secret-second-channel-to-iran
By Robin Wright
Fourteen months ago, President Obama authorized a top-secret, second diplomatic channel with Tehran to negotiate freedom for Americans who had disappeared or been imprisoned in Iran. It was a high-risk diplomatic gamble. The initiative grew out of nuclear negotiations, launched in the fall of 2013, between Iran and the world’s six major powers. On the margins of every session, Wendy Sherman, the top American negotiator, pressed her Iranian counterparts about the American cases. The Iranians countered with demands for the release of their citizens imprisoned in the United States for sanctions-busting crimes. More than a year of informal discussions between Sherman and her counterpart, Majid Takht Ravanchi, the Iranian Foreign Ministry official in charge of American and European affairs, led to an agreement, in late 2014, that the issue should be handled separately—but officially—through a second channel. After debate within the Administration, Obama approved the initiative. But it was so tightly held that most of the American team engaged in tortuous negotiations on Iran’s nuclear program were not told about it.Read on...
http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/prisoner-swap-obamas-secret-second-channel-to-iran
January 15, 2016
The New Yorker
Washington's Panda Obsession
By Robin Wright
When I was little, I wanted a panda for my birthday. Last August 22nd, which happened to be my birthday, the National Zoo, in Washington, sent out an alert on e-mail, Twitter, and Facebook: its female panda, the gentle Mei Xiang, had gone into labor. I signed onto the zoo’s Panda Cam just in time to hear an eek-y squeal from the back stall where Mei had built her nest. It was the birth yelp of a baby boy. A four-ounce butter stick, pink-skinned and blind, slipped from his mom’s womb and slid across the floor. There’s something about pandas, the world’s rarest bear, that captivates the famous, turns the powerful into putty, and wins over skeptics. In 1956, Elvis Presley travelled with a huge stuffed panda on a twenty-seven-hour train ride from New York to Memphis. On the first leg, the bear was photographed in its own seat. At night, the photographer Albert Wertheimer later recounted, the bear was strapped into the upper berth in Elvis’ compartment, its legs protruding through the webbing, as Elvis listened to acetates of his recent recordings in the lower berth. The next day, Elvis, not yet a national icon, perched the bear on his hip and used it to flirt with girls as he strolled through a passenger car.Read on...http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/washingtons-panda-obsession
By Robin Wright
When I was little, I wanted a panda for my birthday. Last August 22nd, which happened to be my birthday, the National Zoo, in Washington, sent out an alert on e-mail, Twitter, and Facebook: its female panda, the gentle Mei Xiang, had gone into labor. I signed onto the zoo’s Panda Cam just in time to hear an eek-y squeal from the back stall where Mei had built her nest. It was the birth yelp of a baby boy. A four-ounce butter stick, pink-skinned and blind, slipped from his mom’s womb and slid across the floor. There’s something about pandas, the world’s rarest bear, that captivates the famous, turns the powerful into putty, and wins over skeptics. In 1956, Elvis Presley travelled with a huge stuffed panda on a twenty-seven-hour train ride from New York to Memphis. On the first leg, the bear was photographed in its own seat. At night, the photographer Albert Wertheimer later recounted, the bear was strapped into the upper berth in Elvis’ compartment, its legs protruding through the webbing, as Elvis listened to acetates of his recent recordings in the lower berth. The next day, Elvis, not yet a national icon, perched the bear on his hip and used it to flirt with girls as he strolled through a passenger car.Read on...http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/washingtons-panda-obsession
January 4, 2016
The New Yorker
Iran and Saudi Arabia: The Showdown
By Robin Wright
The rule of thumb in the Middle East is that diplomacy often—too often—makes progress only to be overtaken by unforeseen violence on the ground. It’s happening again. Tensions between the Islamic world’s rival powers—the Sunni monarchy of Saudi Arabia and the Shiite theocracy in Iran—that erupted over the New Year’s weekend now jeopardize a string of fragile peace initiatives: Peace talks on Syria (the political complement to the military campaign against the Islamic State) are set to begin January 25th. The Iran nuclear deal was expected to be implemented this month. Iraq is trying to consolidate its first military and political gains against ISIS, which were achieved last month. And a three-week ceasefire in Yemen’s ruthless civil war collapsed on January 2nd, endangering a second round of peace talks scheduled for this month. These initiatives are essential to the international effort to reconstruct the disintegrating map of the Middle East. Saudi Arabia and Iran—and their allies—are pivotal players in each flashpoint. Both countries have to make concessions for diplomacy to succeed anywhere. But, on January 3rd, Riyadh abruptly severed diplomatic relations with Tehran.Read on:
http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/iran-and-saudi-arabia-the-showdown-between-islams-rival-powers?intcid=mod-latest
By Robin Wright
The rule of thumb in the Middle East is that diplomacy often—too often—makes progress only to be overtaken by unforeseen violence on the ground. It’s happening again. Tensions between the Islamic world’s rival powers—the Sunni monarchy of Saudi Arabia and the Shiite theocracy in Iran—that erupted over the New Year’s weekend now jeopardize a string of fragile peace initiatives: Peace talks on Syria (the political complement to the military campaign against the Islamic State) are set to begin January 25th. The Iran nuclear deal was expected to be implemented this month. Iraq is trying to consolidate its first military and political gains against ISIS, which were achieved last month. And a three-week ceasefire in Yemen’s ruthless civil war collapsed on January 2nd, endangering a second round of peace talks scheduled for this month. These initiatives are essential to the international effort to reconstruct the disintegrating map of the Middle East. Saudi Arabia and Iran—and their allies—are pivotal players in each flashpoint. Both countries have to make concessions for diplomacy to succeed anywhere. But, on January 3rd, Riyadh abruptly severed diplomatic relations with Tehran.Read on:
http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/iran-and-saudi-arabia-the-showdown-between-islams-rival-powers?intcid=mod-latest
December 30, 2015
The New Yorker
My Tour of Cranky Old Revolutions
The first thing that struck me during a trip to Cuba this month was how much it reminds me of Iran. Despite divergent ideologies—one Communist, the other Islamic—the aging revolutions emit the same cranky melancholia. Rhetoric is still defiant, but public zealotry has atrophied. The graffiti of rebellion, once vibrant, has faded.
In Old Havana, only part of a popular street painting of Che Guevara, with his long locks and trademark beret, has survived the years; his washed-out mouth and mustache have been filled in with a Sharpie. In Tehran, billboards of the early turbaned revolutionaries are so dull, from the sun and the decades, that they seem ghost-like.Read on....http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/cuba-and-iran-melancholy-twins
The first thing that struck me during a trip to Cuba this month was how much it reminds me of Iran. Despite divergent ideologies—one Communist, the other Islamic—the aging revolutions emit the same cranky melancholia. Rhetoric is still defiant, but public zealotry has atrophied. The graffiti of rebellion, once vibrant, has faded.
In Old Havana, only part of a popular street painting of Che Guevara, with his long locks and trademark beret, has survived the years; his washed-out mouth and mustache have been filled in with a Sharpie. In Tehran, billboards of the early turbaned revolutionaries are so dull, from the sun and the decades, that they seem ghost-like.Read on....http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/cuba-and-iran-melancholy-twins
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