By Patrick Cockburn | It was revealed this week that a year before the Khashoggi killing in 2017, the CIA had plotted to kidnap or assassinate Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, who had taken refuge five years earlier in the Ecuador embassy in London. A senior US counter-intelligence official said that plans for the forcible rendition of Assange to the US were discussed “at the highest levels” of the Trump administration.

The debt problems afflicting China’s real estate market deepened this week after another property developer defaulted on its bonds and the world’s most heavily indebted property group Evergrande extended a suspension of its shares into a second day without explanation. Fantasia Holdings, a mid-sized developer, that just weeks ago assured investors it had “no liquidity issue”, said in a stock exchange filing that it “did not make the payment” on Monday of a $206m bond maturing that day, triggering a formal default. The default adds to fears that a crisis at Evergrande will spread to include more of China’s property developers, which account for a large portion of the Asian high-yield bond market.

The Pandora Papers, a massive expose about the secret shell games and tax avoidance schemes of the world’s ultra-wealthy, has just hit headlines around the globe. ... The Pandora Papers draws on leaks from confidential records at 14 different offshore wealth service firms in Switzerland, Singapore, Cyprus, Samoa, Vietnam, Hong Kong, as well as firms in well-known tax havens such as Belize, Seychelles, Bahamas, and the British Virgin Islands. These firms help wealthy individuals and corporations form trusts, foundations, incorporate companies, and establish other entities in low- or no-tax jurisdictions.

The Chinese state today wields enormous power, economic and coercive, and how it uses that power matters. As the war drums beat on, misinformation will proliferate and the danger of conflict will also escalate. Finding a path for peace is possible but not easy given that the world is already facing a climate crisis, an enduring pandemic, and the continuing effects of two centuries of settler colonialism.

The long-neglected northeast has been famed for its gemstones, but the Taliban are ill-equipped to exploit such resources

IATSE members voted overwhelmingly to authorize a strike today. In the television and film industry, where long hours and unpredictable schedules are the norm, crew members are being pushed to their breaking point.

The independence of central banks is based on the belief that they make neutral technocratic judgements, not political decisions – a belief which the last year has proved to be a lie.