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The Mine Ban Treaty is one of the most successful humanitarian disarmament agreements in modern history. Also known as the Ottawa Treaty, it emerged in the 1990s in response to the devastating impact of landmines on civilians worldwide. At the time, millions of these hidden explosives were scattered across conflict zones, continuing to kill and maim long after wars had ended. A coalition of activists, survivors, and diplomats led a groundbreaking campaign to ban these weapons, culminating in a treaty that transformed global approaches to disarmament and humanitarian action.
But how did this treaty come to life? What made it so effective? And what challenges does it face today?
I speak with Tamar Gabelnick, Director of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines – Cluster Munition Coalition, who tells the story of the treaty's journey from grassroots activism to high-level diplomacy, explaining how the ban became a reality. We also examine the treaty's lasting impact—how it has reduced the use of landmines, driven demining efforts, and supported victims—while also considering ongoing challenges, including some recent setbacks.
This episode is produced in partnership with Lex International Fund, a philanthropic fund dedicated to strengthening international law to solve global challenges. It is part of a series that demonstrates the impact of Treaties on state behavior that we are calling "when treaties work"
There are a small number of people to whom I owe my career, and one of them is Ted Turner. In 1998, he famously pledged a billion dollars to support UN causes, leading to the creation of the United Nations Foundation. The UN Foundation, in turn, was one of my key backers early in my career when I launched the first blog about the UN, UN Dispatch.
There's a new six-part documentary on MAX about Ted Turner that I cannot recommend highly enough. Call Me Ted delves deep into both his personal history and business ventures, including the founding of CNN. But for me, the most intriguing part of the documentary is its exploration of Ted Turner's deep commitment to philanthropy. As I discuss in my interview with filmmaker Keith Clarke, his example stands in stark contrast to today's social media moguls.
CORRECTION: "Call Me Ted" is playong on MAX, not Netflix. Definitely watch it on MAX. It's so good!
The Trump administration's fight against DEI has come for the United Nations. In this episode of To Save Us From Hell, Anjali Dayal and Mark Leon Goldberg discuss what we are seeing unfold at the UN in terms of Trump's push against inclusion and gender equity. These moves are already disrupting the regular order of business at the UN, and we explore what this portends for the organization moving forward, including potential impacts on a wide range of UN agencies, programs, and policies—from peacekeeping to the Sustainable Development Goals. Make no mistake: Trump's crusade against DEI is coming for the UN. We explain what that means and how this anti-DEI agenda may manifest itself at the UN. Meanwhile, Trump's pick for UN Ambassador, Elise Stefanik, is languishing in the Senate. For now, her confirmation appears to be on ice — and she may not get confirmed at all, despite having some support from Democrats!
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The foreign aid freeze, destruction of USAID, and withdrawal from the World Health Organization have severely undermined America's ability to fight infectious diseases at home and abroad. With outbreaks of the deadly Marburg and Ebola viruses underway in East Africa and a fast-mutating bird flu spreading across the world, these moves by the Trump administration have left Americans highly vulnerable.
I'm joined in today's live chat by Dr. Emily Smith, an epidemiologist at Duke University. She is a fellow Substacker who runs Friendly Neighbor Epidemiologist and is the author of the book The Science of the Good Samaritan: Thinking Bigger about Loving our Neighbors. We kick off with something of a global tour of concerning infectious diseases before having a wide-ranging conversation about how recent moves by the Trump administration have incapacitated our system of disease surveillance and pandemic defense.
On February 12rd, Donald Trump held lengthty calls with Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelenskyy to advance a vague peace plan for Ukraine. But can a peace deal actually come together in a way that upholds Ukraine's determination to exist as an independent state, free from Russia's yoke? And does Russia have any incentive to relent, given its slow but steady progress on the battlefield against war-weary Ukrainian soldiers?
Joining me to discuss these questions and more is Yaroslav Trofimov, a Ukrainian-born journalist and chief foreign affairs correspondent for The Wall Street Journal. His book Our Enemies Will Vanish, published last year, tells the story of Russia's invasion of Ukraine and Ukrainians' determined efforts to push back. His new book, No Country for Love, is a work of historical fiction set in Ukraine in the 1930s.
Hear directly from one of the best journalists covering Ukraine today as he shares insights on the current state of the conflict, Zelenskyy's domestic political challenges, and whether or not Trump's peace plan is for real. You will learn a lot from this conversation. I certainly did.
On January 26, a Rwanda-backed militia known as M23 captured the city of Goma in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, massive city of two million people and a major regional trading hub. While M23 had been active in the region for quite some time, this move marked a significant escalation in the ongoing conflict. To escalate things further, the group also vowed to march to Kinshasa, DRC's capital, and overthrow the government.
So who are M23? Why is Rwanda backing them? What may come next in the conflict? And what can be done to de-escalate this crisis? Joining me to answer these questions and many more is Zaynab Hoosen, Africa Analyst at Pangea-Risk in Cape Town, South Africa. We kick off discussing the background to this conflict before having a wider conversation about its current dangerous trajectory.
Today's episode is a crossover with Robert Wright's Nonzero Podcast. I have followed Bob's work for years—he is a thoughtful commentator, author, and podcaster. He asked me to come on his show to discuss how the new Trump administration may approach the United Nations and what impact Trump's policies may have on international cooperation and global governance more broadly.
This is a long episode in which I more freely share my thoughts than I would in a conventional Global Dispatches episode. But I thought you would find this conversation useful and interesting—I know I did.
The first 45 minutes of this episode are freely available, and then there's a paywall for the second half of our chat. You can access the full episode by getting a paid subscription at GlobalDispatches.org or, if you are listening on Apple Podcasts, you can unlock our premium feed directly in the app with just a few taps. I hope you do.
On Day One, Donald Trump froze nearly all U.S. foreign aid. On Day Eight, the State Department issued a stop-work order for USAID. This is causing massive ripple effects around the world.
USAID staff and contractors are being laid off in droves. HIV patients in several African countries are being turned away from clinics where they had long received crucial medicines. Humanitarian and development non-profits in the United States and across the globe that depend on contracts from USAID and the U.S. government are now wondering if they'll be able to continue their work. Joining me to discuss the impact of this sudden curtailing of nearly all U.S. foreign assistance is Jeremy Konyndyk. He is a veteran humanitarian affairs official who led USAID's response to the Ebola outbreak in West Africa during the Obama administration. Now, he leads Refugees International, an advocacy group. He is in a unique position to speak freely on this topic because the NGO he currently leads does not receive government funding—whereas other NGO leaders fear retribution if they speak out.
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For the past two decades, Sri Lankan politics has been dominated by the Rajapaksa family, with two brothers more or less alternating between serving as president and prime minister from 2005 to 2022. Their regime was marked by corruption and sustained through appeals to ethnic nationalism among the majority Sinhalese Buddhist population, including by deliberately inciting sentiment against minority Muslim and Tamil communities.
This kind of appeal to nationalism was the dominant force in Sri Lankan politics for most of the last 20 years — until, that is, the elections this fall. In presidential and then parliamentary elections, a new coalition called National People's Power, led by Anura Kumara Dissanayake, better known as AKD, campaigned on a platform of ethnic pluralism and good governance. They won overwhelmingly, securing 159 out of 225 seats in Parliament — a supermajority — leaving the Rajapaksa party with just three seats.
Joining me to explain how this so-called "Peaceful Political Revolution" was achieved is Neil DeVotta, Professor of Politics and International Affairs at Wake Forest University. He is the author of a new article on this stunning turn of events, which appears in the most recent edition of the Journal of Democracy. We begin by discussing just how remarkable this political transition has been and what drove Sri Lankans to abandon the fractious ethnic politics of the past two decades. We then delve into how AKD and his National People's Power coalition can reverse Sri Lanka's democratic backsliding.
In this special live recording of To Save Us From Hell, our sister podcast about the UN, co-host Anjali Dayal and I discuss the highlights (and lowlights) from the confirmation hearing for Donald Trump's pick as U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations.
Elise Stefanik, a member of Congress from New York and a staunch Donald Trump loyalist, did not display the hardcore MAGA vibes one might expect during her confirmation hearing. As Anjali and I note, she came across as a fairly conventional Republican—touching on many familiar GOP talking points about the United Nations, but without suggesting that she believes the U.S. should withdraw from the UN or pursue any particularly radical actions.
To be honest, this may come as a relief to many at the UN, especially since just hours before the hearing, Donald Trump signed an executive order demanding American withdrawal from the World Health Organization.
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