Prof. Margaret MacMillan�€™s Paris 1919 is not a book �€“ it�€™s a movie. Her description of all major and minor characters, their egos, their desperation, their tactics, their mistresses make the book a moving experience. Her eye for detail is amazing. Her description of the ladies of the story from a socialite who plotted to marry General MacArthur to the charming Queen of Romania is amusing. 

At a recent lunch with a distinguished group of Qatari leaders of thought, someone asked me the obvious question. What can one make of the cartoon controversy? I told them that it reminded me of a fight between a husband and wife over coffee. The couple was so upset about the kind of coffee they should have in the afternoon that they got into a verbal brawl and that ended in fisticuffs. Of course, the aroma of the coffee could not generate such heat. The coffee was just an excuse. The real reason for tension between the two was much deeper. The cartoons are like the coffee. To understand why they have generated such anger, it is necessary to look much beneath the surface.

As it stands, the government of Sri Lanka and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) have so far agreed to meet in Geneva, Switzerland later this month. This is the first, of any high level talks to take place between the two, since the stalling of the peace process in 2003 and is indeed a very positive development. 

That the Bush administration mentioned the name of Abu Mos�€™ab Al Zarqawi as a link between Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda while presenting its case to the United Nations for attacking Iraq, probably shocked no one more than Zarqawi himself. 

When I suggested the title of this article, given my tryst with theatre performances before I joined SFG, my colleagues joked, �€œAre you planning to write your autobiography?�€ Well, no, not yet. But then, as I perceive it, the current world is a theatre in itself, where multitude of complex issues unfold �€“ forces of modernisation and extremism; crosscurrents of transnational economics and nationalism; inequality of power and skewed development patterns; identity subjugation and relative economic deprivation; and social, political, cultural prejudices and manipulation. All, and more such factors, lead to conflicts within and/or between states.

Sundeep Waslekar, President of Strategic Foresight Group, delivered a keynote address at a special benefit event for Nelson Mandela Foundation at Dubai on 16 December 2005. This is an edited text of the speech.

Strategic Foresight Group mourns the recent death of Prof Bronislaw Geremek, former Foreign Minister of Poland, with whom we had interacted several times. Ilmas Futehally recalls her conversation with him, which is as relevant today as it was when she first met him.

What separates man from other primates, or indeed other animals? Jacob Bronowski, a mathematician trained in physics, examines the scientific and intellectual history of humankind in his book The Ascent of Man. Though the book is based on the television series aired on BBC in the 1970s, it is far from outdated. Over 30 years after it was first published; The Ascent of Man still invokes pride in our past and instils hope for our future in the reader.