ajempire

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America's 'Global War on Terror' has come to Africa. Marwan Bishara asks: Is the new military aid the US giving to the African continent helping to stabilize Africa or is it dragging the continent into a war that is not its own? 

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Marwan Bishara speaks to author of "China's Second Continent: How a Million Migrants Are Building a New Empire in Africa", Howard French, about Chinese involvement in Africa and what it means for Africans. 

You can view the entire episode here: http://aje.me/1Apt8D7

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The United States is increasing its footprint across Africa with AFRICOM, fighting terrorism and ensuring stability are the trumpeted motivations. Resource security is a more hushed objective.

But it is not just about the US.

During the last decade, China's trade with Africa not only caught up with America's, it has more than doubled it.

The new battle for Africa does not deploy strong-arm tactics, it is now a soft power game: economic and humanitarian aid, interest-free loans, preferential trade agreements and investments in infrastructure are currency across a continent that is, for the world's established and emerging powers, seemingly up for grabs.

India, Brazil and Russia are all invested in Africa's present and future, and old imperial powers like France are fixing to retain their loosening grip on the riches of former colonies.

So what does all this mean for Africa and Africans?

Watch the latest Empire: http://aje.me/1Apt8D7

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Empire asks, Does Islam equal violence? To find out, watch our latest episode: http://aje.me/1mFUPwJ

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Bruce Riedel, director of the Brookings Institution Intelligence Project, spoke to Al Jazeera Empire, on how 'war on terror' rhetoric in Egypt is being used as an excuse for a war on reform. Watch, "What Future for the Arab World" here: http://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/empire/whatfutureforarabworld/

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“We got into Iraq with the belief that it would be a very inexpensive and quick war. I remember when I was in the government and I spoke to people about our misgivings about managing an occupation. They said, well we don’t have to manage an occupation in Iraq because everybody’s going on a 90 day personal service contract and then they’ll be out. There’s no long term US presence in Iraq, so why are you concerned?”

Former US State Department Policy Planning Staff Jon B. Alterman, speaking to Marwan Bishara on Empire's latest episode, which you can watch here: http://aje.me/1mFUPwJ

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Three years after the mass uprisings swept across the Arab world, a group of young people from across the Middle East and North Africa sit with Marwan Bisahra in Tunis to share their perspective on the future. 

We ask if the recent elections in Egypt and Syria constitute democracy. Is the so-called ‘War on Terror’ merely a mask for repression? And what is the future of political Islam?

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Marwan Bishara asks Issam Fares Institute's Rami Khouri, Would the Arab States have been better off with reform rather than revolution? Here is his response: "People have been talking about reform in many Arab countries... It hasn’t been done. And it got to a point where people’s grievances and discomfort, and even, I would say, their dehumanization at living in countries that were corrupt, that were mismanaged, where poverty was growing, and all of this done by their own regimes, not Israeli occupiers or American or British armies, their own regimes. Got to the point where they were dehumanized and they erupted. So I think the lesson is, when citizens express reasonable grievances that there should be a reasonable response to them by the ruling authorities. The second lesson is [00:06:30] that citizens have rights. They’re not only consumers. They Arab people, in the last 40 years, have been basically given the right to go to shopping malls and buy as many cell phones as they want, and buy and sell land and do things like that. They have no political rights whatsoever in any meaningful way." Watch Empire's full episode on the Future of the Arab World on http://aje.me/1mFUPwJ

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As tensions rise between Russia and the West over the crisis in Ukraine, Empire examines the politics of a post-post Cold War world.

Watch it on Al Jazeera English this Sunday at 2000GMT.

Follow us on Twitter and Facebook for more. 

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Our new collection of #Russian kitsch.

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Today the team is in #Miami to discuss the changing relationship between the #US and #Cuba.

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Empire's host, Marwan Bishara, on set talking to Mirodrag Soric and Steve Szabo about how #Germany and #Russia will work out their differences over #Crimea

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We talked to Miodrag Soric (left) of #DeutscheWelle and Steve Szabo (right) of the Transatlantic Academy in Washington, DC about new relations between #Germany and #Russia over #Crimea

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Writer Larry Beinhart and host Marwan Bishara share a moment before the discussion about the tensed relations between #Germany and #Russia

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We went to the Goethe Institute in Washington, DC to discuss #Germany's response to #Russia over the annexation of #Crimea

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As Ukraine crisis escalates, Vladimir Putin is likened to Adolf Hitler amid other ideocentric follies.

In the upcoming episode of EMPIRE: Al Jazeera English we discuss how the Western media is rife with Hitler and Nazism references as 'the former Cold War enemy makes for an easy target just as "imperialist America" is an attractive target for certain Russian nationalists.' Latest, by Marwan Bishara:http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2014/03/you-say-fascist-i-say-nazi-201431742329348214.html

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If you haven't seen our last episode, Hollywood: Chronicle of an Empire, check it out here.