Obama in Poland: the real danger is from the West

Click banner for more info

On June 3-4 president Barack Obama is going to Poland before moving on to the G7 summit in Brussels. Obama’s visit  is theoretically devoted to the celebrations for the 25th anniversary of Poland’s first post-communist parliamentary election,  in 1989.

Obama though is unlikely to talk much about the past, he is much more likely to want to discuss the future, especially about the "containment" of Russia (the State Department’s new policy line on Russia, first hailed by the former US ambassador to Moscow, Michael McFaul, in his recent opinion piece in The New York Times).

Read more: Russia, China, non-aligned countries should call to abolish NATO - expert

In Warsaw, Obama will meet the Polish and American pilots of the Poland-based F16 fighter jets, a new symbol of this "new" containment. (It should not be forgotten that the "old" containment policy was launched in late 1940s on the advice of the great American diplomat George F. Kennan, also a former ambassador to Moscow, who  from the 1990s opposed NATO’s expansion and other hostile US and allied action against the new, non-communist Russia.)

Okonjo-Iweala Opens Up, Says Nigeria Economy Is In Danger

Click banner for more info

On Monday, June 10, at the third round of the 2013 ministerial platform in Abuja, Coordinating Minister for the Economy and Minister of Finance, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, spoke glowingly about the Nigerian economy, saying the fundamentals were strong and that the economy was buoyant beyond danger.

But a few hours later, on Tuesday, when all the doors were closed, the minister sang a different tune. She told her colleagues in government point blank that the Nigerian economy is shaky despite the official fundamentals and that drastic steps are needed to save it from collapse.

Mrs Okonjo-Iweala spoke at the 50th meeting of the 15-member Federal Government Economic Implementation Team held behind closed-doors at the presidential villa.