Opinion pieces

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With a Lion Behind and the Sea in Front, G20 Leaders Head to Hamburg

Tuesday, July 11, 2017

Not far from Hamburg’s heavily-guarded Messe und Congress, the convention centre where much of the business of the G20 summit will be done, is an abandoned theatre, the Rote Flora, now a graffiti-covered squat where the blazing red banners of anti-G20 activists this week are proclaiming: ‘Welcome to Hell’.

Opinion Pieces, Africa, Middle East, Eastern Europe & Central Asia, Foreign Aid, Tim Costello, G20

Even Poor Countries Are More Generous To Refugees Than Rich Australia

Tuesday, June 20, 2017

Once upon a time there was a poor landlocked country and a rich island nation. When strangers seeking help came by foot to the poor country, they were welcomed in a rich spirit of generosity and given food and water and land. But when strangers seeking help came by boat to the rich country, they were banished to tiny islands offshore, proving that at heart, the country was not really rich at all.

Opinion Pieces, Africa, Middle East, Eastern Europe & Central Asia, Tim Costello, Uganda, Refugee Crisis, Syria

What Turnbull Needs To Remember When He Meets Donald Trump

Thursday, May 4, 2017

Travelling in Africa recently with an envoy of German chancellor Angela Merkel, I was struck by the differences that have emerged in the international response to suffering – to the plight of millions of Syrians who have fled six devastating years of war, and now as famine rears its terrible head in the Horn of Africa and Yemen.

Opinion Pieces, Foreign Aid, Tim Costello, South Sudan, Syria

After The Last Famine In Africa The World Said 'Never Again'. Yet Here We Are, Again.

Thursday, April 6, 2017

Here we go again: another African crisis with 20 million people on the point of starvation -- hunger from South Sudan and Somalia, to Nigeria and Yemen.

Opinion Pieces, Tim Costello, Kenya, Drought, East Africa, Famine

Syria After Six Years of War a Patchwork of Misery

Wednesday, March 15, 2017

As Syria marks six years of civil war, delegations from Russia, Iran and Turkey have arrived in Astana, Kazakhstan, for a third round of peace talks. Syrian rebel groups have stayed away, blaming Russia's unwillingness to end air strikes against civilians in rebel-held areas and its failure to put pressure on the Syrian army to abide by a widely violated ceasefire.

Opinion Pieces, Tim Costello, Syria

War in the Garden of Eden

Wednesday, March 8, 2017

While the battle for West Mosul rages from house to house, tens of thousands of people displaced by the fighting are filling camps around the city. Most arrive with just the clothes on their backs. Some are barefoot. Many have suffered years of unimaginable misery. Yet they are the lucky ones. They have survived.

Opinion Pieces, Tim Costello, Conflict, Refugee Crisis, Iraq

Australia Needs to be Open to the World in Troubled Times

Tuesday, February 7, 2017

Right now Australians are probably more concerned - and perhaps more nervous - about international affairs than they have been for a long time.

Opinion Pieces, Foreign Aid, Tim Costello

Aleppo's Despair Shows the International Community is Failing Syria

Monday, December 12, 2016

The ancient city of Aleppo is one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world. But the name Aleppo now evokes apocalyptic scenes of destruction and despair, a city reduced to rubble, a child wiping blood from his face. Aleppo has become a byword for human misery.

Opinion Pieces, Syria, Refugees

Looking The Other Way Is No Longer An Option

Monday, September 19, 2016

"You may choose to look the other way but you can never say again that you did not know." -- William Wilberforce, to the English parliament, 1789. Wilberforce was speaking of slavery in his dogged pursuit of abolition, but more than two centuries later, we are no strangers to looking the other way when it suits us, as it often does.

Opinion Pieces, Tim Costello, Asylum Seekers, Refugees

World Vision Completely Opposes Terrorism

Friday, September 9, 2016

When the prophet Micah asked what does the Lord require of you, the answer was beautiful in its simplicity: “Walk humbly with your God, love mercy and do justice.” It is this that we are asking for now in Israel, where World Vision employee Mohammed El-Halabi faces charges of funnelling humanitarian aid to Hamas.

Opinion Pieces, Gaza, Israel