With the world hitting a record number of new COVID-19 cases in a single week in December, it is unsurprising that the coronavirus pandemic is once again dominating headlines. But one story in particular seems to have captured attention: that of Novak Djokovic, the top-ranked tennis player, whose visa was cancelled last week when he arrived in Melbourne to compete in the Australian Open. Djokovic was initially granted a medical exemption to enter Australia without proof of vaccination against COVID-19, which is normally required to obtain a visa. The Serbian tennis player now appears to have won an appeal against his [...]
By some media accounts, the recent Convention on Conventional Weapons Review Conference was a colossal disappointment for advocates of a treaty ban on autonomous weapons systems. After 10 years of calls for a ban on so-called killer robots—including powerful arguments against their use from scientists, scholars, engineers, Nobel laureates and a wide-ranging network of civil society organizations—governments at the RevCon, as the conference is known to participants, could come up with little more than an agreement to keep talking. Fortune magazine reported that “the world just blew a major opportunity.” In reality, however, the outcome at the RevCon is neither surprising nor troubling. [...]
As ever, the New Year presents an opportunity for reflection and reevaluation. In my last column, I explained that 2021 had been a “rollercoaster” for young activists, who saw their peers “suffering the worst during times of crisis” and “leading the way at moments of breakthrough.” As 2022 kicks off, therefore, young changemakers around the world will be thinking about how they can best make use of the next 12 months. However, progress will only be possible with the support of national and international leaders. Below is a wish list of the top three things that this young activist would like [...]
