Pages

Share This

Thursday, September 16, 2021

Doctor's orders: Take a hike, you'll feel better

 

 While more doctors are looking at using time outside as a medical strategy, park prescription programmes face issues of access. Photo: Unsplash/Jon Flobrant 

 When Annette Coen went for a health check-up last summer in Washington state, she and her doctor discussed concerns around her weight and asthma. Then her doctor offered a novel prescription: regular hikes in the woods.

He gave Coen a one-year pass to Washington's state park system and told her to "go for walks, go camping, do what you need to do," Coen, now 53, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

A year on, she said the park prescription was a "great experience" for her and her whole family. "I have lost 13.6 kg since April this year... just being out and about," she said.

With the Covid-19 pandemic highlighting the health benefits of spending more time outdoors, a growing faction of the US medical community is prescribing time outside the same way they would traditional medication.

The idea of writing out park or nature prescriptions has taken hold particularly among pediatricians.

"It all came together" during the pandemic, said Maya Moody, president-elect of the Missouri chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), pointing to spikes in childhood anxiety and pediatric obesity since the coronavirus outbreak started.

With lockdowns keeping children indoors, "we were seeing 30-, 50-, 60-pound weight gains," said Moody, who attends to around 3,000 low-income children in the St. Louis area.

This April, she became one of about a dozen pediatricians across the state who have started offering nature prescriptions.

"When I give a prescription, it's

specific, just like an antibiotic. They use it for this many days, and I say go to this park," she explained. Buy-in has differed with different age groups, Moody noted, with younger children and their parents being more open to the approach but teenagers expressing skepticism.

"Sixteen- and 17-year-olds look at me and say, 'You want me to get off TikTok and get an actual tick in the woods?'" she said.

But Moody said the fact that doctors and health experts are now seriously looking at how something as simple as a walk in the park can help patients is exciting.

A spokesperson for the AAP said the group is forming a committee on the issue of nature prescriptions but declined to offer additional details.

Take a walk

Nature prescriptions are still new, so there is little data on their effectiveness, but one 2018 analysis by researchers from Britain's University of East Anglia did find they "may have substantial benefits".

There has been much more research done on the general benefits of being outdoors - in one example, starting next month, a study supported by the Welsh government will look at the benefits of treating hospital patients outside.

In more than 500 scientific studies in recent years, researchers have linked time spent in nature with decreased anxiety, reduced risk of obesity and even reduced overall mortality, said Maryland-based pediatrician Stacy Beller Stryer.

Stryer is also associate medical director with Park Rx America, an online platform that helps medical professionals write nature prescriptions.

Using its database of thousands of parks and public lands, prescribers can filter by activity, distance from a patient's home and amenities such as playgrounds.

"Once (the patient) decides on where to go, the prescriber talks about what they should do - maybe walk a dog? And how often - maybe every Monday, Wednesday and Friday for 30 minutes?" she said.

Writing out an actual prescription for time in nature gives patients a useful extra push, said Brent A. Bauer, research director of integrative medicine and health at the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota.

"More than half of my patients who receive a 'prescription' for time in nature go ahead and do so successfully," he said.

A census of park prescription programmes last year estimated that there were more than 100 nationwide.

The Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy began a pilot programme in collaboration with the UPMC Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh in 2016, after a pediatric resident was leading patients in a weight management clinic, said Kathryn Hunninen, a senior manager with the conservancy.

"He wanted to encourage patients to get outside but didn't know where to send them," she said.

"This started with an inquiry from him to the parks system and has blossomed from there."

In a 2018 survey, more than 80% of personnel at participating Pittsburgh clinics said they were frequently recommending that patients visit parks.

Last year, Salt Lake County in Utah offered park prescriptions to its employees "to improve or maintain physical and mental health while building sustainable health behaviors," Sarah Kinnison, who oversaw the programme, said in an email.

That first year, 335 employees participated, and the county is running the program again this fall.

Financial stability

While more doctors are looking at using time outside as a medical strategy, park prescription programmes face issues of access.

In low-income neighborhoods, parks are four times smaller and more crowded on average than parks in high-income areas, said a study released last year by the Trust for Public Land, a nonprofit that analysed government data from 14,000 US towns and cities.

It also remains unclear how to keep the programmes financially sustainable. Currently they have to rely on ad hoc funding, often cobbled together from grants, philanthropy or as publicly funded pilot projects.

The costs involved are not particularly high, but they do exist, said Bradford S. Gentry, co-director of the Center for Business and the Environment at Yale University.

They could include the costs of park passes, the salaries of community health workers and park workers to coordinate and lead programmes, and transportation to and from the green space, he said.

"If there are all of these (health) benefits, how do we move from grant funding or public funding to health systems funding?" asked Gentry, who focuses on the intersection of health and land conservation. "I haven't found an answer yet."

The US Department of Health and Human Services did not respond to a request for comment.

Gentry pointed to Oregon, where work is underway to try to address the funding issue by requesting that certain federal rules be waived involving Medicaid, the US government's health care programme for low-income people.

Every five years states have the opportunity to request such a waiver, if they can show it will result in better care and cost no extra money, said Lori Coyner, who was the state's Medicaid director until July and is now senior Medicaid policy adviser at the Oregon Health Authority.

The state's waiver request is due in December, when it plans to ask for more flexibility in how local organisations address health issues.

"We believe there is real opportunity to use some of these Medicaid dollars... to promote spending more time outdoors," Coyner said. - Thomson Reuters Foundation

Source link

 

Bukit Jambul - Penang, Malaysia | AllTrails

 

Doctor's orders: Take a hike - KUOW

 

Related posts:

 

Healing through hiking mountains

 

Think forward, walk backwards

twitter sharing button
email sharing button
sharethis sharing button
linkedin sharing button
pinterest sharing button
weibo sharing button
https://youtu.be/rMxGVVBUSIc

Walking Backward: Benefits for Mind and Body - Healthline

 

What you need to know before you get that pup, Run, Rover, run


Science on why living near trees might improve your health!

 

 

Penang Forum tells Chief Minister: the unmitigated disasters on hill projects

Wednesday, September 15, 2021

A great Malaysian tragedy

Funeral of children who died

Questions about Malaysia's treatment of this minority:The runaway children Malaysia failed to ...

 
Young, impoverished mother from Chinese viral photo finally found after 11 years, and how different her life is now | The Star
 

THIS is one article that I didn’t want to write. I put off writing it for two years. Writing 900 words about this subject was more painful than taking three years to write a 100,000-word thesis. I would do three more theses if I could avoid writing these next 900 words.

This article is about a tragedy that concerns us as a people and a nation. The tragedy should have sparked a national debate, but it was ignored despite being repeated four times.

What is this great tragedy, you might ask? Is it the May 13 race riots in 1969? Is it the Bukit Kepong incident in 1950? Is it the first riot in 1964 in Singapore before it left the federation? Is it the fall of a government? Or is it the dismal state of our institutions of education, justice and administration?

To me, all of these things combined fail to measure up to the tragedy I am about to describe.

Two years ago I happened to read a news article about an Indian-Malaysian family whose father killed all of his children. The report related how the mother died of cancer a few days before and the father, who was jobless and also in poor health, had become distraught. He ended up killing his 15-year-old son and three other children by strangling them all. After that horrifying deed, he hanged himself.

I could not sleep well for several days after reading about that, wondering why a father would kill his children. What drove him to do that? The police and other authorities dismissed it as the act of a crazy man. I did not think so.

Two weeks later, there was a report of another destitute Indian-Malaysian family whose parent, also suffering from an illness, killed the children. Again, the authorities dismissed it as “orang gila punya kerja” (a mad person’s act).

Several months later, I read of Chinese-Malaysian parents who poisoned their four little children and then themselves. At the last minute, an ambulance was called, but all the children died; the parents survived.

And just last week, a penniless father, whose race was not stated, smothered his three children after his wife died.

After each of these cases, our nation went on with business as usual. No professors from our 200 universities raised the issue. No religious clerics from any religion made it into a social and political issue. No NGO stood up and demonstrated or wrote press statements about the tragedies.

Was I the only one who cringed at the news of parents killing their children? Was I the only one to ask questions?

Firstly, why did these parents not seek help from other family members? All of us have wider family circles and if we begged several of them to care for one child each, surely they would respond? I have no issue whatsoever if adults decide to take their own lives, but I am aghast and crushed when children are killed just because one cannot figure out how to feed and care for them.

All children in this country – and the world – should be cared for and given a minimum chance to survive until they can make their own way. Is that not a social, political and spiritual right? What happened to the larger family system if parents think that it would burden other family members?

Then I asked the question: why did the parents not seek help from the leaders of their own race or religion? We have political leaders of all races and houses of worship worth millions. What is the purpose of religion and these splendid displays of architectural feats if parents had no faith that they could get help from going to a church, a mosque, a temple or a gurdwara to ask congregants to help their children?

If I were the parent, I would have taken them to the mosque and begged for help and asked to stay at the mosque. I would help sweep the floor of the mosque or scrub its toilets and then ask restaurants for leftovers so I could feed my children and myself. There is no shame in that. But, of course, I would ask for help from my own family and wife’s family first before going that far.

Finally, I asked: what should our government do for such families? Why did the four families not go to a zakat office or the Welfare Department for help? Why did they have no confidence in our institutions, orphanages and other forms of welfare? What are these zakat or welfare officers doing? Why are they not proactively walking the streets and looking under bridges for the homeless or talking to people in low-cost flats to see if there are families facing destitution?

I wish the four families had reached out to the media or someone for help instead of killing their children. What does it say about our nation when parents kill their children instead of trusting our institutions of race, institutions of religion and institutions of governance?

When I was in the United Kingdom, I was given a financial allowance for my four children. When I was in the United States, I was given food stamps when my daughter was born. I also remember watching a report on YouTube about 400,000 unemployed British youngsters given £250 (about RM1,400 at current rates) a month as a benefit back then.

I spent nine years overseas and I never read about parents killing their children because of poverty. What does it say about our country, our people and our faiths when four tragedies like these can happen – and that they raised not one iota of concern? We are, truly and sadly, a nation that is failing its most vulnerable people.


Prof Dr Mohd Tajuddin Mohd RasdiProf Dr Mohd Tajuddin Mohd Rasdi is Professor of Architecture at UCSI University. The views expressed here are entirely the writer’s own.

 Source link


Related posts:

 

https://youtu.be/nYSqwi8qY7w In the later years of my school life, I used to attend parties thrown by my schoolmates for their birthday,...
 
 
UMNO politician Ismail Sabri's rise to become Malaysia's prime minister   Malaysia's new PM brings graft-tainted UMNO back to p...
 
 
 
    Penang (2,474) reached a new record Sspt 8, 2021. Hospitalisation of Covid-19 patients has also been trending up, despite 49.4 perc...
 
 
Suaram adviser questions Pakatan Harapan's funding from the National Endowment for Democracy https://www.thestar.com.my/news/nation/202...
 
 
IN the first half of 2021, Asean-5 countries, comprising Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam and the Philippines experienced strong, ex...

Monday, September 13, 2021

Delta variant threatens Asean-5 recovery


IN the first half of 2021, Asean-5 countries, comprising Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam and the Philippines experienced strong, export-driven growth. However, renewed lockdowns amid significant outbreaks of Covid-19 Delta variant cases have dampened business sentiment and consumer spending in this region.

According to the Institute of International Finance (IIF), recovery will likely slow markedly in the second half of 2021 for Asean5.

“Given the rising number of Covid-19 infections, renewed pandemic containment measures, and the slow pace of vaccinations, authorities in Asean-5 countries have been revising down official growth forecasts,” IIF said.

The IIF said it would likely cut its gross domestic product (GDP) growth forecast for region.

In May, it forecast a GDP growth of 5.2% for 2021 and 5.4% for 2022.

Against the backdrop of current economic challenges, the IIF said it expected Asean-5 central banks to maintain their accommodative monetary policy stances well into 2022.

“Most of the countries are still experiencing inflation within the respective target ranges, except for the Philippines,” the IIF said.

“Fiscal policy will also continue to be supportive. While Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam have announced fiscal consolidation plans, the pace of adjustment will be modest,” it added.

The IIF noted that due to their economic structure, Asean-5 countries benefitted strongly from the global demand recovery, with exports up sharply in the first half of 2021, particularly in the area of electronic appliances (Malaysia, the Philippines, and Thailand) and commodities (Indonesia and Vietnam).

“Looking ahead, the next stage of the global recovery will likely benefit services rather than goods and, thus, provide less of a boost to Asean-5 economies,” it said.

“Furthermore, the recovery in tourism in the five countries has been slower than our already-cautious forecast in the spring, with the Delta variant posing a new challenge to the sector,” it added
 
 

Related posts:
 
 

  THE Sengoku period (also known as the “Warring States period”) of Japan from 1467 to 1615 is a period of great turbulence and unrest due..

 

https://youtu.be/nYSqwi8qY7w In the later years of my school life, I used to attend parties thrown by my schoolmates for their birthday,...
 
 
Singapore on Wednesday reported 347 new Covid-19 cases, the highest since August 2020, as the first vaccinated German tourists arrived ...
 
 
    Penang (2,474) reached a new record Sspt 8, 2021. Hospitalisation of Covid-19 patients has also been trending up, despite 49.4 perc...
 
 
 
  Illustration: Liu Rui/GT    The Guardian published an article on Wednesday titled "'Like Game of Thrones': how triple crisi...
 
 
Tough times: A sign advertising job openings is seen in New York. The US economy is far from healed, with 5.3 million jobs lost to the pand.
 
 
 
  Expert: Both countries should cooperate in fight against pandemic   Prof Dr Jeffrey Sachs     KUALA LUMPUR: The United States needs to w...

Sunday, September 12, 2021

Coronavirus: Singapore cases highest in over a year; South Korea plans to ‘live more normally’ with virus

Singapore on Wednesday reported 347 new Covid-19 cases, the highest since August 2020, as the first vaccinated German tourists arrived

Singapore’s health ministry reported 347 new local Covid-19 cases, higher than the 328 cases reported the previous day.

Wednesday’s number was the highest since early August 2020.

This came as the first planeload of Germans allowed into Singapore as part of a tentative reopening for coronavirus-vaccinated tourists arrived at Changi Airport on Wednesday afternoon.

Singapore last month said it would accept double-jabbed visitors from Brunei and Germany, starting in September. While the travellers must test negative for the virus, they do not have to quarantine.

Among the passengers on Wednesday’s maiden flight were Germany-based journalists invited by Singapore Airlines (SIA) and the Singapore Tourism Board.

The flight took longer than usual due to it having to avoid Afghan airspace, according to German reporter Andreas Spaeth, who was on board.

After closing its border during the first pandemic wave last year, Singapore began readmitting tourists, with strict quarantine rules, from a handful of countries, including New Zealand, Vietnam and regions in Australia and China, after it ended its sole pandemic lockdown in June 2020. The list has been amended several times in response to fluctuating coronavirus case numbers in countries of origin.

So-called “reciprocal green lanes” for business or official travel between Singapore and several countries were also set up last year, but most have since been suspended, including one for Germany. Singaporeans were again permitted to enter Germany in October last year, after Berlin eased pandemic border curbs.

Latest Updates:

Daily infections likely to exceed 1,000 | The Star


S'pore hospitals to defer non-urgent ... - The Straits Times

Hospitals prepping more ICU beds | The Star

https://www.thestar.com.my/aseanplus/aseanplus-news/2021/09/12/hospitals-prepping-more-icu-beds


South Korea aims to live normally with virus

   People sit at the Cheonggye Stream in Seoul. About 42.6 per cent of South Koreans are fully vaccinated. Photo: AP

People sit at the Cheonggye Stream in Seoul. About 42.6 per cent of South Koreans are fully vaccinated. Photo: AP

Elsewhere, South Korea plans to open up once it reaches its 80 per cent vaccination milestone, and Japan is expected to ease curbs in November

 Meanwhile, South Korea is drawing up a plan on how to live more normally with Covid-19, expecting 80 per cent of adults to be fully vaccinated by late October, health authorities said on Wednesday.


The country is in the middle of its worst wave of infections, but it has kept the number of severely ill cases under control through steadily rising vaccination rates.

“We’ll review measures that will allow us to live more normally, but any such switch will be implemented only when we achieve high vaccination rates and overall (Covid-19) situations stabilise,” Son Young-rae, a senior health ministry official, told a briefing.

The strategy will be implemented in phases to gradually ease restrictions, authorities said. Masks will still be required at least in the initial stage.

The government expects to implement the plan sometime after late October, when 80 per cent of the adult population is likely to have been vaccinated. As of Tuesday, South Korea had given at least one vaccine dose to 70.9 per cent of its adult population, while 42.6 per cent are fully vaccinated.

South Korea extended national social distancing curbs to October 3 this week as the country boosts its vaccination campaign ahead of a thanksgiving holiday that falls later this month. Restrictions in place include limited operating hours for cafes and restaurants and on the number of people allowed at social gatherings.

It reported 2,050 new Covid-19 cases for Tuesday, with 2,014 of those locally acquired. The country has registered 265,423 infections since the pandemic started, with 2,334 deaths.

The country has not seen a significant increase in coronavirus deaths, with a mortality rate of 0.88 per cent, largely due to high vaccination rates among the elderly and vulnerable. Severe or critical cases stood at 387 as of Tuesday.

 Worldwide total, from the most infected countries:  #1 USA,  

#2 INDIA,  #3 BRAZIL,  #4 UK,  #5 RUSSIA

 Source link 

 

Related posts:

 

 

    Penang (2,474) reached a new record Sspt 8, 2021. Hospitalisation of Covid-19 patients has also been trending up, despite 49.4 perc...

 

https://youtu.be/nYSqwi8qY7w In the later years of my school life, I used to attend parties thrown by my schoolmates for their birthday,...

 

Tough times: A sign advertising job openings is seen in New York. The US economy is far from healed, with 5.3 million jobs lost to the pand...
 
 
  Expert: Both countries should cooperate in fight against pandemic   Prof Dr Jeffrey Sachs     KUALA LUMPUR: The United States needs to w...
 
 
  Illustration: Liu Rui/GT    The Guardian published an article on Wednesday titled "'Like Game of Thrones': how triple crisi...

Saturday, September 11, 2021

Has US learned its lessons from post-9/11 wars?

 

 https://youtu.be/UkVPOADFvLM

 Post-9/11 wars: a defeat of Western values

 

Washington's dangerous habit of always seeking an outside enemy needs to change, analysts say

 


It has been 20 years after the world was shocked to see two planes struck the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York on September 11, 2001. It was a chaotic scene featuring fire and heavy smoke, the screaming and scattered crowds and people who were dumfounded by the fact that the US - a superpower - was attacked by terrorists on its ground.

This year's commemoration of September 11 is different as the US just ended the war in Afghanistan and the Afghan Taliban - after being overturned by the US three months after 9/11 in 2001 - has taken over Afghanistan, again.

The past few weeks have seen the Western media making rolling reports to mourn victims of the terror attacks and some reflecting on the failures of the US domestic and diplomatic policies in the past two decades.

However, the fierce criticism and the apparent failures of the past two decades have not awakened the US political elites. They refused to learn. And soon they will be looking for a new enemy in a new region, but even bigger failures await them, observers said. 


Photo:IC Photo:IC

Seeking truth

The US President Joe Biden, heavily criticized for his hasty and disorganized withdrawal from Afghanistan from all fronts, may attempt to use the 20th anniversary of the September 11 to shift the public attention. According to the schedule released by the White House, Biden and his wife are scheduled to visit all three 9/11 memorial sites -- ground zero in New York City, the Pentagon and the memorial outside Shanksville, Pennsylvania, where United Flight 93 was forced down -- on Saturday.

But nearly 1,800 people, including survivors of 9/11 and family members of the victims, are signing a joint letter asking Biden to not attend the memorial activities if he does not declassify documents related to the terror attacks.

Brett Eagleson was among them. His father Bruce Eagleson, who was on the 17th floor of the South Tower of the WTC, died in the collapse of the building, leaving his family unable to recover his remains even through DNA analysis. After luckily surviving when the planes hit the building, he chose to stay and assist more people to evacuate and was last seen going upstairs to retrieve a walkie-talkie to assist in communication between firefighters and the police.

Sorrow and bitterness have engulfed the better part of the last two decades of Brett's life, but it's mostly anger that stands out. The US government's investigation into the 9/11 attacks has been shrouded in secrecy with detailed reports on one of the most shocking terrorist attacks having never been disclosed.

"We have been fighting for 20 years about the information that our government has always been keeping this information from us," Brett Eagleson told the Global Times. "We have been fighting for so long; every family is tired and frustrated."

Brett Eagleson said those 20 years have changed his perception of the US government. "We have seen our government block its own citizens from truth and justice for its own selfish interests and to grow its relationship with Saudi Arabia, and as time goes on, we get further and further away from the truth."

Finally gathering up the courage to visit Ground Zero, the World Trade Center site in Lower Manhattan to see the changes in the place 20 years after it was hit by two planes, Mrs Tsou, a 50-year-old Chinese-American living in New York, remained calm but after seeing the smiling Muslim girls with headscarves painted on the fence not far from the square, she sighed with emotion.

"For the past 20 years, the American people have not seen much of the US counter-terrorism measures in Afghanistan and Iraq, but the fear of and discrimination against Muslims and people of color has grown within the US," she told the Global Times.

Tsou was a software engineer who worked in the north Tower of the WTC. The vacation on September 11 two decades ago saved her life, but more than 30 of her colleagues were wounded or killed in the attack. Tsou quit her job after the 9/11 attacks and has been doing odd jobs at home since then. Rarely has she left the house or have any contact with her former colleagues.

"War is always intertwined with too much self-interest, and 20 years later, the truth about the attacks remains unanswered, and the American people have not been given the answer for 'why do they hate us,' but our government has created more conflict and hate in America and all around the world," Tsou said.

Infographic: Wu Tiantong/Global Times

War on terror

Like Tsou, a lot of Americans are wondering why the US failed and whether the money and the American lives sacrificed in the war on terror in Afghanistan were worth it. But for many outside the US, the question remains how the world and the US were changed by 9/11.

Harvard University scholar Joseph S. Nye Jr. told the Global Times that "future historians will regard September 11, 2001 as important as Pearl Harbor was on December 7,1941."

In the 2000 presidential election, George W. Bush advocated a humble foreign policy and warned against the temptations of nation-building, but after the shock of 9/11, he declared a "Global War on Terror" and invaded both Afghanistan and Iraq, the professor said.

"While the 9/11 attacks killed several thousand Americans, the 'endless wars' that the US launched as part of the global war on terror cost much more," he said.

According to data from the Brown University Costs of War project, over 929,000 people have died in the post-9/11 wars due to direct war violence, and several times as many due to the reverberating effects of war. 38 million people became war refugees and displaced persons. The US is also conducting counterterror activities in 85 countries and the federal price tag for the post-9/11 wars is over 8 trillion.

All this money and lives invested in the post 9/11 wars under the banner of countering terrorism have not stopped terrorism from spreading globally. It has only caused more confrontations between different civilizations.

The rhetoric of the war on terror generated a geopolitical binary that divided the world into the uncivilized and civilized. Islam was posited as the enemy and the symbol of "the uncivilized world." Many Muslim populations -- including innocent civilians -- were viewed as "suspect communities" targeted under the rubric of counterterrorism, Stefanie Kam, associate research fellow from the International Center for Political Violence and Terrorism Research (ICPVTR) S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, told the Global Times via an email.

The old conventional "war on terror" approaches to terrorism - militarized counterterrorism response -- focused on short-term gains, rather than long-term gains attuned to the political realities and the social and historical forces on the ground, which was what largely defined the failure of US' approach to terrorism, Kam said.

Kam thought that the political vacuum engendered in a post-US Afghanistan has the potential to complicate the security landscape by creating breathing space for terrorist groups to consolidate in Afghanistan, and to inspire a wave of foreign fighters -- seeking militant training -- into Afghanistan. Apart from Islamic extremism, the rise of right-wing extremism is an emerging area of concern for governments in Asia.

"In particular, the Southeast Asian region has seen a recent growth in terrorist attacks by ISIS-inspired, self-radicalized individuals, and the involvement of women, youth and family networks in militancy," Kam said.

Echoing Kam, global experts have expressed concerns over the spread of terrorism over the past two decades. The fact that the number of terrorist groups in Afghanistan had grown from less than 10 to more than 20 during the US military occupation also indicates the irony of Bush's words when starting the war.

"Our war on terror begins with al-Qaeda, but it does not end there," former US President George W Bush told Congress days after the attacks, on September 20, 2001. "It will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped and defeated."

US remains unchanged

For Adnan Akfirat, China Representative of the Patriotic Party (Turkey),it is the US that made an obscure concept of "international terrorism" to justify its occupations and military actions in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Syria and "cover up its imperialist aggression."

The US is not fighting against terrorism but using terrorist groups in different regions to play its geopolitical tactics, Akfirat noted.

"With the liberation of Afghanistan, the US had to admit that the 'Crusade' it launched since 2001 ended in disappointment and disgrace only 20 years later," Akfirat said, noting that all these failures could not wake up "the US ruling clique" who still thinks US "will subdue the peoples of the world with its terrible military power. Their class interests compel them to continue this madness."

Yasir Habib Khan, founder and president of the Institute of International Relations and Media Research in Pakistan, thought that lop-sided war on terror architected by America "is the epitome of complete failure" and it is ironic to see the war under the banner of peace and stability prompted more wars and gave rise to "white supremacy" to which Americans' lives are subjected to be more insecure and vulnerable.

In the eyes of some Chinese experts, the US debacles for the past 20 years also resulted in wrong policies and miscalculations as the US political elites failed to solve domestic problems on social polarization, rising economic disparities and other issues. Instead, the country focused on scrambling for power and playing geopolitical tactics in suppressing other countries.

The US' strength and international reputation have been damaged for the past 20 years. Putting huge resources into military actions or "rebuilding" other countries has worsened the overall crisis domestically, including deteriorating political polarization and struggles, the flooding of popularism and racism, confrontations of different classes and people's losing of recognition of national identity, Li Haidong, a professor at the Institute of International Relations of the China Foreign Affairs University, told the Global Times.

However, despite all these problems awaiting to be solved, the US hasn't changed its tactic of seeking enemies to ensure its global status and define its international policies. The US should have coordinated the international community to counter terrorism and extremism after 9/11, but it took unilateral military actions in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, and Syria for geopolitical purposes, causing ever-lasting regional chaos, experts said.

After all these years, one would think the US has learned its lesson and can now embark on a journey of solving domestic issues and shifting the focus of its policies. Unfortunately, that's not the case, the country has its eyes on a new "enemy" - China.

Khan said that 20 years after the September 11, the US should have built a broad-based global mechanism to promote counter-terrorism modalities and it should have snubbed impulsive of protectionism but unfortunately it did nothing. "It did not learn from the past. This makes the future of the world remain volatile."

Source link

 

RELATED ARTICLES

Today marks the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks. The attacks, which killed at least 2,996 people on that very day, convulsed the US. "America Attacked" was the headline on the front page of a major American newspaper. An angry US launched the war in Afghanistan within a month and the war in Iraq a year and a half later. Before the Afghanistan War, the American public discussed the idea of using nuclear weapons in retaliation.

September 11 attacks helped China's rise? A serious misjudgment: Global Times editorial

Though it is a major event, 9/11cannot change the logic of globalization and cannot affect China's national system and the Chinese people's dream and diligence. 

 

Related posts:

 

Taliban's rapid victory embarrasses US, smashes image, arrogance

 China respects Afghans' choice, urges Taliban to implement commitments
 

China in top spot for research amid US struggling to ‘contain’ China rise

 

Botched Afghan retreat reveals an America struggling to contain China

 

  Expert: Both countries should cooperate in fight against pandemic   Prof Dr Jeffrey Sachs     KUALA LUMPUR: The United States needs to w..
 
 
Illustration: Xu Zihe/Global Times   Source link   United States, the spreader of the COVID-19 virus to the world With the most confirmed c...
 
` A recent US CDC report found COVID-19 antibodies in blood samples as early as Dec 13, 2019. With more & more evidence surfacing a.
 
 
  Illustration: Liu Rui/GT    The Guardian published an article on Wednesday titled "'Like Game of Thrones': how triple crisi... 

Moral vacuum at the heart of modernity, now embodied in US laws!

` 
In short, historically it was the Church that gave the moral blessing for colonisation, slavery and genocide during the Age of Globalisation. The tragedy is that the Doctrine of Discovery is now embodied in US laws. 
 

THE GLOCALISATION OF HUMANITY 

 
 "Globalisation is interpreted as universalisation of American or European values and standards. But the fact remains that these standards and rules were imposed historically by conquest, colonisation and force".

China Does Not Recognize The Rule-Based International Order imposed historically by Conquest, Colonisation and Force !

Friday, September 10, 2021

While sowing discord around China, the US is heading to be a 'failing state'

 

Illustration: Liu Rui/GT 

 

The Guardian published an article on Wednesday titled "'Like Game of Thrones': how triple crisis on China's borders will shape its global identity." The article says that North Korea, Myanmar and Afghanistan are "three ongoing crises in China's neighborhood," and called the three countries "failing states."

The logic of this article is reversed. It is not that these three countries neighboring China are "failing states." Instead, China's neighbors are targeted by the US to infiltrate and create disorder. Washington intends to use them to levy pressure on China. The chaos or difficulties faced by these countries are due to the intervention or suppression from the US.

Russia is also a major country the US deems as a rival, and Russia's neighboring countries, like Ukraine and Belarus, have also been infiltrated by the US. Washington aims at turning these countries into pawns in its strategic competition with Beijing and Moscow.

The Guardian's report quoted Thant Myint-U, historian and former presidential adviser of Myanmar, who declared that the Western approach to "failing states" is rooted in "ideas around elections, democracy, and human rights." But obviously, by doing so, the US' real purpose is to find excuses for interfering in these countries. The US government does not give any consideration to the feelings of local people, nor does it care about the interests of these countries.

"If the model imposed by the West is really suitable for these countries, then local people would have accepted it. But in fact, most people and political parties in these countries have rejected the US model. This shows that the model advocated by the US and the West is a political manipulation with evil intentions, rather than providing real freedom and democracy that benefit local people," Li Haidong, professor at the Institute of International Relations of the China Foreign Affairs University, told the Global Times.

However, such infiltration of the US is doomed to fail. Take Afghanistan, for example. The US tried to spread democracy in Afghanistan in the past 20 years, yet its hasty withdrawal shows that its so-called fight against terrorism and promotion of "democratic reforms" has completely failed.

The US' barbaric acts will undoubtedly run up against a stone wall in the world. However, China has always respected the sovereignty and independence of Afghanistan. The Afghan Taliban has shown its will to engage in good relations with China. The head of the Afghan Taliban Political Commission, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, said in a meeting in July with Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi that China has always been a reliable friend of the Afghan people. The Taliban has also said that it welcomes Chinese investments in Afghanistan's reconstruction.

"It now appears that the US is more like a 'failing state,' not these countries. The US government has failed to control the COVID-19 epidemic and its hasty withdrawal from Afghanistan has embarrassed itself in the international community. With unsuccessful governance, there are more signs showing that the US is becoming a typical failing state but it refuses to admit this itself," Li said.



Some Western countries and media outlets are still immersed in their own fantasies, sensationally hyping the "crises" surrounding China. In fact, most of China's neighboring countries are stable, as the center of the global economy is shifting from the US and Europe to Asia. 

Source link

MOST VIEWED
 
4 Second-phase political farce of the 'Uyghur Tribunal' ironic and ridiculous, shows no respect to 9/11 terror victims
 

 
Related posts:

 

Taliban's rapid victory embarrasses US, smashes image, arrogance

 China respects Afghans' choice, urges Taliban to implement commitments
 
 
  Expert: Both countries should cooperate in fight against pandemic   Prof Dr Jeffrey Sachs     KUALA LUMPUR: The United States needs to w...
 
 

China in top spot for research amid US struggling to ‘contain’ China rise

 

Botched Afghan retreat reveals an America struggling to contain China

` Unable to better China in positive competition and with military options unfeasible, the US can only fall back on the ‘moral high ground’. But in its hasty Afghan withdrawal, to focus on China, the US risks losing even this...