Interview

Syrian Journalist Rami Jarrah: ‘The Russians Are The Airforce Of ISIS’

25 February 2016 -

The award-winning Syrian journalist Rami Jarrah fled Syria four years ago, but over the last few months he has returned several times to report on the situation in his country. Last week he was arrested in Turkey but he has now been released. Pieter Stockmans interviewed him one week before he was arrested.

Interview

‘Waging War, Eating Meat, Capitalism – Evidence Of A Harrowing Lack Of Imagination’

3 February 2016 -

Matthieu Ricard, a Buddhist who loves science more than incense, believes the logic of cooperation will, by a process of natural selection, eventually come to replace the logic of neoliberalism. With the government currently displaying less compassion than ever for vulnerable citizens, it was high time for a conversation with the author of “A ...

Interview

'The crisis is a conscious strategy for social demolition'

29 June 2015 -

The world today is facing a deep crisis. Yet at the same time, the neo liberal growth model is still presented as the only possible option. The Portuguese sociologist Boaventura de Sousa Santos exposes the myth and made it his life’s mission to build an epistemology of alternatives. It’s time to open the doors and windows of our univers ...

CC Stadslab2050/Fille Roelants Photography

Interview

Dilys Williams: 'Designers need to challenge the status quo'

30 April 2015 -

'It is not in the nature of fashion designers to follow the sheep. On the contrary, fashion is about challenging the system.' Head of the Centre for Sustainable Fashion Dilys Williams is certain of the fact that her colleagues have a lot of power in their hands. 'But there is still work to do. The current alternatives are simply not enough.'

Interview

21 years in prison for a crime he didn't commit

22 December 2014 -

Like many prisoners on death row, Nick Yarris held on to his innocence throughout his stay. As a twenty-year old drug addict, he ended up behind bars after a traffic violation. Hoping for a sentence reduction he provided false information with regards to the rape and murder of Linda Mae Graig. His plan backfired and Yarris was convicted for the cri ...

Interview

'Beware of entrepreneurs in sectarian identity'

12 December 2014 -

Toby Matthiesen, an internationally renowned British academic at Cambridge University and expert on the Gulf countries, warns in an interview with MO* for what he calls ‘entrepreneurs in sectarian identity’: elites that are abusing and manipulating sectarian differences for political and economical purposes. He also sheds his light on t ...

Interview

'Nigeria has been falling apart for a while' (Jeremy Weate)

10 December 2014 -

'Nigeria has been falling apart for a while', says Jeremy Weate. Weate is a co-founder of Cassava Republic Press, one of Africa’s leading new publishers.

Interview

A look inside North Korea, the hermit kingdom

27 October 2014 -

Now that Kim Jong-Un, Supreme Leader of North Korea, has resurfaced and all speculation of a coup or his death has been halted, the world can divert their attention away once again from what is known as the most isolated country in the world. MO.be interviews Julia Leeb, the German photojournalist who recently was offered a rare glimpse of North Ko ...

Interview

Montasser AlDe'emeh: 'Palestinian violence is legitimate but counterproductive'

25 October 2014 -

Three wars in six years and every time Hamas claims victory. 'But what kind of victory is this, when houses, schools and hospitals are reduced to rubble? When there are more than two thousand casualties', Montasser Alde'emeh asks. According to him, the Palestinians should opt for a radically different approach: non violent and designed to embarrass ...

Interview

Donor darling Mozambique goes to vote with gas bonanza in mind

15 October 2014 -

Today Mozambicans will cast their votes in general multi-party elections, for the fifth time after the ending of its civil war in 1992. Once a donor darling, this lusophone country in the South-East of Africa has recently discovered massive gas and oil fields up North. Still the exit out of poverty is not looming round the corner. An interview with ...

Interview

Mistakes in fighting Ebola repeated all over again, says pioneer

5 August 2014 -

‘Médecins Sans Frontières is repeating the same mistakes from earlier Ebola outbreaks’. Prof. Barry Hewlett, the first anthropologist ever to be invited by the World Health Organization in fighting Ebola, has given an interview to the Belgian MO* Magazine.

Interview

'In the end it's about redistribution'

10 May 2014 -

In Egypt, the military men are back in power. In Tunisia, two opposition leaders were shot dead this year and armed groups fight a guerrilla war with the forces of order. In Libya, the prime minister was briefly kidnapped, and in Syria the situation seems more hopeless than ever. Is the Arab Spring buried? Madawi Al-Rasheed weighs up the situation ...