The past year has been a difficult one for world peace. This has been true not only because of the severity and escalation of civil and regional wars in different parts of the world, but also because of how certain of those conflicts have influenced international tensions and driven renewed polarization among leading world powers. The principal concern for the year has had to do with a major deterioration in relations between the West and Russia. Riding on his bolstered popularity at home, which was powered by the economic improvements with which his government has been credited, Russian President Vladimir Putin chose 2014 to be a year of self-assertion on the world scene. Putin has been at the pinnacle of power in Russia, as either president or prime minister, throughout the first decade and a half of the new millennium. After years of leading—together with his partner in power, current Prime Minister Dimitry Medvedev—a movement toward closer ties with the West but a separate p...
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Author Roberto Vivo comments on wars past and present, on the world’s great peacemakers and on the pathway to global peace. His basic philosophy: In a world where 9 out of every 10 victims of armed conflict are civilians, war is no longer a viable political alternative. Indeed, it is the ultimate crime against humanity. If rising generations are to have a future, the key will lie in world peace. War is the pathway to oblivion.