Military emissions were exempted at Kyoto and made voluntary at Paris, which leaves roughly 5.5 per cent of global emissions, some 2,750 MtCO2e a year, off the world's climate books. Reconstructed from expenditure data, that footprint would rank as the fourth-largest emitter on Earth, ahead of Russia and larger than aviation and shipping combined. This piece reads the full ledger: operations, the industrial supply chain, reconstruction, lost carbon sinks and the capital diverted from climate finance.
Syria’s Reconstruction: A Blueprint for the Many, Not the Few For generations, Ahmad’s family tended their olive grove on a sun-drenched hill in Syria. The trees were their inheritance and their future, a symbol of peace and permanence. Then the war came and turned it all to ash. Today, Ahmad’s dream isn’t just to replant
In the fragile yet hopeful process of rebuilding a nation, symbols carry immense weight. The recent unveiling of Syria's new visual identity and the plans to issue a new currency represent defining moments. Yet, while these new designs were presented as a symbol of unity, the transitional government has remained silent on a fundamental question: how was the decision actually made?
Order your copy What If We Get It Right? Reimagining a Nation’s Future For more than a decade, the story of my homeland, Syria, has been a relentless accounting of loss. It has been defined by everything that went wrong: the humanitarian catastrophe, the failed state, the unsolvable problem. The global narrative has been one
The ‘Umayyad Comeback’ in Post-Assad Syria Introduction The sudden collapse of the Assad regime in December 2024 shocked the world. After 50 years of rule and a brutal 13-year civil war, the government of Bashar al-Assad fell with surprising speed. Into the resulting power vacuum stepped Ahmed al-Sharaa, the de facto leader of the new
Syria's reconstruction is not a conventional post-conflict challenge. It is a "hyper-complex" crisis where both scenarios overlay a landscape of fragmented sovereignty, highly politicised legislation, and intense geopolitical rivalry. This report argues that sustainable and equitable reconstruction depends on resolving fundamental contradictions between the exclusionary nature of the current legal framework, political imperatives, and international conditions.
On 8 December 2024, the Assad family regime collapsed in Syria. This report presents a central hypothesis: the collapse does not merely create a power vacuum but resurrects suppressed social structures and primary identities, tribal, sectarian, and regional, that were kept dormant under an iron security grip but never truly disappeared.
Thankfully, the immediate threat of the recent wildfires has subsided. Now, as the smoke clears, the true challenges facing our nation are laid bare. The government's responsibilities must shift from immediate crisis management to the complex, long-term task of recovery and building resilience.
Executive Summary Syria faces a devastating “polycrisis.” The growing impacts of climate change are deeply connected to years of poor governance, a brutal conflict lasting over a decade, and a severe economic collapse. This report argues these are not separate problems. Instead, they are part of a single, widespread failure. Environmental damage has both driven
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