Rafiq A. Tschannen is a Swiss national. He converted to Islam and joined the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community at the age of 16 after reading the German translation of the Holy Qur'an. He worked in 15 countries in Europe, Asia, Africa and the Caribbean, first as Finance Director in the private industry and later as Chief Executive Officer of NGOs and International Governmental Organizations. He is now devoting his time to The Muslim Times as Editor for Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Palestine and Switzerland and as Associate Chief Editor.
Jan 02,2017 – JORDAN TIMES EDITORIAL The UN Security Council on Saturday unanimously adopted a resolution that supports the Russian-Turkish peace initiative for Syria, which includes maintaining the recently declared ceasefire and projected talks in the capital of Kazakhstan, Astana. The resolution could be the very breakthrough sought by the […]
Jan 02,2017 – JORDAN TIMES – Gwynne Dyer So far the endgame in Syria has played out in an entirely predictable way. All of Aleppo is back in the Syrian government’s hands; that decisive victory for President Bashar Assad and his Russian backers has been followed by a ceasefire, and the […]
REPORT Daniel L. Byman Friday, December 30 Editor’s Note:Fighting terrorism has been at the top of the U.S. national-security agenda since 9/11, but the terrorism threat, and thus the appropriate means of counterterrorism, is often grossly misunderstood. Donald Trump must understand the changing nature of terrorism, revise U.S. policy in the […]
The arc of history is long, but it won’t ever judge the president’s Syria policy kindly. BY DAVID GREENBERG DECEMBER 29, 2016 Barack Obama’s impending departure from the White House has put many Americans in an elegiac mood. Despite an average approval rating of only 48 percent — the lowest, […]
DISPATCH Reporting Behind Enemy Lines in Mosul Omar al-Jubory believed the world needed to know what life was like under the Islamic State. He barely got out alive. BY DAVID KENNER JANUARY 2, 2017 Omar al-Jubory began his career as a journalist in the deep end — covering the most […]
TRUMP, BREXIT The ten flops of democracy in 2016 By Claude Longchamp, founder and chairman of the GfS Bern research instituteReuse article DEC 26, 2016 Donald Trump won the race for US president even though his Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton obtained a majority of votes. The reason is the electoral […]
AUGUST 8, 2014 BY ATIF MIAN AND AMIR SUFI Economists of all stripes are baffled by continued economic weakness in the United States. The easiest way to see the weakness is to compare where we are in terms of GDP today relative to historical trend growth, something we did in […]
PODCAST Language connects Swiss migrants to home By Jo Fahy JAN 1, 2017 – “My heart is in Switzerland, but I’m at home in America.” Choosing to set up a new life in a different country is a big step, but what effect does that have on the culture […]
Police chief defended detention of 650 North African men saying ‘their characteristics were such that potential crimes could indeed be expected’ Caroline Mortimer @cjmortimer Cologne’s police chief has denied accusations of racial profiling after the force tweeted they had detained hundreds of North African men to prevent a repeat […]
UN Security Council unanimously backs Syria peace plan By AFP – Dec 31,2016 – JORDAN TIMES Syrians gather around a Christmas tree in Aleppo’s government controlled Aziziyah neighbourhood on Saturday (AFP photo by George Ourfalian) UNITED NATIONS — The UN Security Council on Saturday unanimously approved a resolution […]
Sermon Delivered by Hazrat Mirza Masroor Ahmad at Head of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community. After reciting THANA, TAWUZ and Surah Fatiha Hazoor-e-Anwar(aba) Said: According to the Gregorian Calender, the New Year will insha’Allah start after two days. Worldly people pass these days in worldly pleasures, thus ending the previous year […]
MOHA ENNAJI Moha Ennaji is President of the South North Center for Intercultural Dialogue and Migration Studies in Morocco and Professor of Cultural Studies at Fez University. His most recent books include New Horizons of Muslim Diaspora in North America and Europe and Muslim Moroccan Migrants in Europe. FEZ […]
JEFF RAIKES Jeff Raikes is Co-founder of the Raikes Foundation, former CEO of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and, previously, President of Microsoft Business Division. He is a board member of the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA). SEATTLE – Picture a small farm under a […]
TUNIS – The recent terror attack on Berlin’s Christmas market – which killed 12 and injured more than 50 – cast a pall over this year’s holiday celebrations across Europe. Viewed from Tunis, where I happened to be during the fallout, the attack has also had a major, albeit different, […]
STEPHEN GROFF Stephen Groff is the Asian Development Bank’s vice-president for East Asia, Southeast Asia, and the Pacific. MANILA – Imagine that you are a farmer. Your crops are withering as weather patterns become more volatile, your well water is too salty to drink, and rice is too expensive […]
(This is one of the ten most read articles in 2016 of the Project Syndicate) https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/multiculturalism-versus-french-burkini-ban-by-peter-singer-2016-09 MELBOURNE – My parents came to Australia as refugees, fleeing Nazi persecution after Hitler annexed Austria. They arrived in a country eager to assimilate immigrants into its dominant Anglo-Irish culture. When my parents spoke […]
Cultured and consensual, the Portuguese politician has had the perfect preparation for the United Nations’ top job Antonio Guterres will take over on 1 January. Photograph: Mario Cruz/EPA Angelique Chrisafis andJulian Borger Sunday 1 January 2017 When António Guterres resigned halfway through his second term as Portuguese prime minister in […]
Reuters International JAN 1, 2017 An injured woman is carried to an ambulance from a nightclub where a gun attack took place during a New Year party in Istanbul, Turkey, January 1, 2017. Murat Ergin/Ihlas News Agency via REUTERS (reuters_tickers) By Humeyra Pamuk and Nick Tattersall ISTANBUL (Reuters) – […]
VERIFICATION By Geraldine Wong Sak Hoi DEC 21, 2016 Facebook headquarters in Menlo Park, California: the tech giant has announced plans to limit the spread of fake news, but whether it’ll succeed remains to be seen. (Keystone) Swiss and European researchers are working on algorithms to detect misinformation circulating […]
German Chancellor Angela Merkel poses for photographs after the television recording of her annual New Year’s speech at the Chancellery in Berlin, Germany, December 30, 2016. REUTERS/Markus Schreiber/Pool (reuters_tickers) By Joseph Nasr BERLIN (Reuters) – Islamist terrorism is the biggest test facing Germany, Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Saturday in […]