Alastair Sloan
Middle East Monitor
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Past articles by Alastair:
Military intervention to protect the Rohingya still isn’t on the Western agenda –
A key UN body has ruled that genocide was committed recently by the Burmese military. The atrocities, widely reported at the time, were against the Rohingya people, an ethnic group of Muslims living i... → Read More
Saudi Arabia really should listen to Human Rights Watch to improve its reputation –
It is sometimes hard to see why the war in Syria gets so much coverage in Britain, while the war in Yemen is all but ignored; it feels like a niche topic restricted to hard-core Middle East watchers. ... → Read More
What Elon Musk doesn’t get about Saudi Arabia –
Step on to any plane heading to Riyadh tomorrow and you will rub shoulders with returning Saudi families, pilgrims, oilmen and a new swell of eager Western consultants, clutching their ex-McKinsey CVs... → Read More
Bin Salman’s attack on Canada is destroying Saudi’s economy –
The Canada-Saudi spat looks set to accelerate as the Kingdom's central bank ordered its fund managers to withdraw hundreds of millions of dollars in equities, bonds and cash from Canadian financial ... → Read More
How the Gulf crisis is destabilising Somalia –
The impact of the anti-Qatar embargo continues to have strange consequences beyond the Gulf. Somalia is increasingly compromised by its schizophrenic approach to Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and the UAE on t... → Read More
Russia split GCC: Next NATO and EU –
As the world focuses on Vladimir Putin's attempts to break up the EU and NATO, overlooking how he has already done the same with the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) is done at our peril. On 11 Ju... → Read More
An ally of the UK, Bahrain is practicing collective punishment unabated –
The start of July has been a day-by-day microcosm of the struggles of Bahraini activists against one of the most repressive regimes in the world. Only thanks to the reporting of London-based activist ... → Read More
The far right thrives on Europe’s indifference to Muslim refugees –
The connection between Europe's reticence about taking-in refugees and the dramatic rise in Islamophobia since the early 2000s cannot be decoupled. Were these refugees not largely from Muslim backgr... → Read More
We need to address the UAE’s appalling human rights record –
The United Arab Emirates has succeeded in one of the most brilliant reputation-laundering operations of modern times. Nearly all of the outrage mustered by Western liberals, leftists and hard-working ... → Read More
Why is the UAE’s Bin Zayed so close to Europe’s Islamophobes? –
As Islamophobia rises across Europe, one Muslim world leader seems to be totally indifferent to the phenomenon. The Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, Shaikh Mohammed Bin Zayed Al-Nahyan, is a personal friend... → Read More
It’s time to pay more attention to Europe’s role in torture –
When a Polish MP first announced that mysterious planes were landing in the night in a forest, eyebrows were raised, eyeballs swung upwards, and some MPs even broke out laughing. This was the stuff of... → Read More
Iran has had a good run, but it looks like its luck has changed –
Has Iran reached its peak? It increasingly feels that way. Since the 2003 invasion of Iraq, through the war in Syria since 2012, and with the lifting of sanctions in 2015, Tehran's star has been eve... → Read More
With Pompeo and Bolton at Trump’s side, the wise men have left the room –
Mike Pompeo, John Bolton and Donald Trump are the American triumvirate who have just passed judgement on the survival of the Iran nuclear deal. There could not be three men less suited to the job. ... → Read More
Search Results for “obesity” –
* Saudi Arabia plans to spend 50 billion riyals ($13.33 billion) by 2020 on an initiative to promote entertainment, health, sports and education as part of a modernizing drive by... * Poor lifestyle, unhealthy diets and a lack of exercise are to blame for half of the Tunisian population being overweight, a new report claims. Issued by the Pharmaceutical Company... * Turkey is set to establish a… → Read More
How Vladimir Putin weaponised the Iraq dodgy dossier –
When he first came to power the world leader Vladimir Putin most admired was Tony Blair. This fact is little known, rarely acknowledged, and frankly scary. In fact, Blair was the very first foreign... → Read More
The concerning popularity of Enoch Powell and his racist speech
There have been no "rivers of blood" in Britain, but Enoch Powell and his racist thinking still find acceptance. → Read More
Don’t be fooled – Trump still loves Putin and Assad –
As Iraqi regular and irregular forces gathered on the edges of Mosul in spring 2016, flanked by Kurds and assisted quietly by Special Forces from several Western countries, Donald Trump was furious. H... → Read More
What the Islamic State got right — and very wrong –
Ignore the theological failings of Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi for a moment, and the enormous degree of violence and bigotry that his group practiced. It is time to give the Islamic State some credit. It kep... → Read More
Britain’s Prevent programme is a good idea gone bad, and it was the state that ruined it –
In April 2016, a UN official wrote to the British government expressing the international organisation's thanks for hosting Maina Kiai. The former Kenyan human rights activist was the special rappor... → Read More
Other countries have pulled back from the war in Yemen; why hasn’t Britain? –
As the church bells rang in the New Year of 2018, Norway announced that it would be cutting arms sales to any country fighting in Yemen. A couple of weeks later, Germany said the same thing. The Nethe... → Read More