The inhuman manner in which the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) treats Rwandans who have been acquitted or who have been freed after serving their sentences obliges us to reexamine totally the body created by the UN Security Council in late 1994. How has this come to pass? Has the UN created its own system of judicial apartheid?

A serious injustice is occurring under our noses. Canada is part of it and has the key to a rapid solution. It is the case of former Rwandan Foreign Affairs Minister Jérôme Bicamumpaka, who was acquitted of all charges by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) in 2011. So why is Canada refusing to allow him to reunite with his family?

If Prime Minister Trudeau wants to bring Canada’s compassionate and constructive voice back to the world stage, this is the time to do so. The Abiy government’s war in Tigray represents a decisive moment for Canada to affirm the values it proclaims guide its presence in the world, by deploying all of the economic, political, and diplomatic tools at its disposal to help bring a swift end to the humanitarian crisis.

Rights-based development seeks to topple the capitalist logic of profit and center anti-imperialism and the need to assist in the creation of sovereign, autocentric economies across the Global South. Only then can the underdevelopment of means-based development aid be replaced by self-sufficiency which will benefit postcolonial countries far more than the IMF’s failed dictum that the private sector is the only viable engine for poverty reduction.

In recent decades, Canada has played an outsized role in a protracted process of underdevelopment in Burkina Faso—not through the direct overthrow of socialist governments and the propping-up of right-wing dictatorships, but through its exploitative investment in countries which have already had this economic agenda imposed on them by more overtly imperialist powers like the United States.

In a clash of ideological paradigms, Abiy Ahmed’s administration has embarked on a path of neoliberalism that has placed Ethiopia in direct conflict with the Chinese-backed developmental state initiated by former leader Meles Zenawi. In part, the military intervention in Tigray is a push by Abiy to integrate the rebellious region into the neoliberal fold and to eliminate any remaining obstacles to his Western-backed reform agenda.

What are the prospects for peace at what appears to be the beginning of a protracted civil war in Ethiopia? What can be expected from other Horn of Africa countries? Canadian Dimension put these questions to Eritrean human rights activist Paulos Tesfagiorgis, who has been carefully observing the situation by keeping in touch with many of his former comrades and friends in Ethiopia, Tigray and Eritrea.

In face of the seasonal waves of coup attempts that have most recently swept up Belarus and Mali, Canada’s Liberal government has proven selective in its statements of support for popular uprisings. After months of protests, a military coup on August 18 deposed Malian President Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta, who stepped into power following Mali’s infamous 2012 coup.

Which is more believable as motivation to send soldiers to other countries, altruism or self-interest? The Canadian Forces do not train their African counterparts out of a commitment to professionalism or democracy but to extend Canada’s influence on the continent while restoring the national security interests of the United States.

Lost in the palace intrigue of the WE scandal is the pernicious racial politics of the WE Charity and aspects of the wider charitable industry. Although the controversy comes at a pivotal moment in public discourse, accusations of racism within WE have been marginalized, as have discussion of the way WE gained such influence within Canadian schools, media, and politics as models of white saviourism.