This article was published 1 year ago

https://nordictimes.com/debate/why-macedonia-needs-better-alternatives-to-eu-and-nato-integration/

Debate

“Why Macedonia needs better alternatives to EU and NATO integration”

Macedonia should develop a new strategy to become an independent state away from the despots in the USA and the EU or anywhere else. Macedonia must reject any alliances which undermine its independence, freedom, democracy and human rights, writes Ordan Andreevski, Co-Director of the United Macedonian Diaspora in Australia on TNT Debate.

Published 9 March 2024

Photo: Private.

Protests by the Macedonian Diaspora in Melbourne.

This is an opinion piece. The author is responsible for the views expressed in the article.

Since independence in 1991, the Republic of Macedonia has been indoctrinated and bullied by the G7 to believe that there are no alternatives to EU and NATO integration and their form of dictatorship.

EU propaganda claims that Macedonian democracy is too fragile and incapable of being a sovereign nation that can manage its own affairs. They forget that Macedonia is one of the oldest states in Europe from the time of the Ancient Macedonian Kingdom to the struggles for independence in the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries.

EU narratives told us repeatedly that “Better social, economic and political outcomes can be achieved by being third class members of an undemocratic EU”.

There was also no shortage of evidence of blackmail and bullying by new depots in the EU and the USA of Macedonia on a regular basis.

Former NATO Chief Javier Solana, (3 Aug. 2001): “If you don’t sign the Ohrid Framework Agreement such as it is you will never have a society for all citizens. You will wait for decades to join the EU”.

Edward Joseph (12 Dec 2003): “If you don’t adopt the Local Government Law and don’t allow for wider rights to the Albanians, it is possible that you will be stuck in the EU waiting room for years and decades”.

Nicolas Sarkozi (6 March 2008): “I consider the geographic reference in front of your name and the amendments to your Constitution are a small price to pay for membership of the Euro-Atlantic structure. Contrary, you may be faced with waiting for such an opportunity for decades”.

Johannes Hans (14 Oct. 2018): “Unless you change your name now, Macedonia will wait for decades to enter the EU”.

German leaders Merkel and EU Commission Ursula Von der Leyen and Chancellor Scholtz are notorious for excessive bullying and manipulation of Macedonia.

From the 1990s the G7 enhanced its geo-political and geo-economic power and influence at the expense of liberal democracies in Europe including Macedonia. The NATO driven wars in Yugoslavia, around the Mediterranean and the Middle East exposed Macedonia with many crisis and challenges. These include how to deal with KLA terrorists in Kosovo and Macedonia who the G7 still uses as bullies and proxy war mongers in 2024. How to deal with large waves of refugees from Kosovo in the 1990s and the Syrian War more recently.

In 2001 the G7 imposed the disastrous Ohrid Framework which gave the Taliban style Albanian political parties a disproportionate share of power in Macedonian democracy. Albanian terrorists like Talat Xhaferi and his CIA puppet boss were not only pardoned but were made Ministers of Defence, Speakers of the Parliament and other portfolios. The G7 granted them illegal mandate to act as power brokers in the creation of Macedonian governments and policies.

The dysfunctional and discredited Hellenic Republic abused its membership of the EU and NATO to block Macedonia’s integration unless its racist and denialists demands were met.

Macedonia had to respond to the toxic and ever changing goalposts and double standards imposed by the undemocratic elites in the EU on its path to Euro integration. Macedonia had to constantly defend and sadly adjust its Constitution, flag, democracy and human rights to appease the new despots in the EU.

Since 1991, the G7 have undermined the major tenets of the UN Charter, the EU Charter of Human Rights and international law. So much for a Rules Based Order where the rules are designed by the powerful G7 oligarchs, new despots and corporate cartels at the expense of the rest of humanity and the planet.

In 2018 the new despots in the G7 imposed the Prespa Agreement on the Republic of Macedonia without the consent of the Macedonia people or its President who is the only one authorised to sign international agreements. Similarly, President Macron imposed a Friendship Agreement with Bulgaria on top of the Prespa Agreement in order to appease the ultra-nationalists and neo-fascists in EU Parliaments at the expense of the Republic of Macedonia.

The Macedonian people in the Republic of Macedonia and in the diaspora will never give up on reclaiming the lost rights in the inhumane process of Euro-Atlantic integration.

Macedonia should develop a new strategy to become an independent state away from the despots in the USA and the EU or anywhere else. Macedonia must reject any alliances which undermine its independence, freedom, democracy and human rights.

Option one is to look to the Swiss model of independence and governance. Option two is to follow the Singapore model. Option three is to join BRICS+

The Presidential and Parliamentary elections in Macedonia allow the country and its depressed people a chance to establish a new pathway for freedom and democracy.

It is regrettable that so many other democracy and freedom loving countries in Europe and Australia blindly accepted the neo colonialism, neo imperialism and new despotism of the World Economic Forum with its reckless re-set agenda without debate or critical analysis. Such is the power of propaganda. The protests by farmers and others against genocide in Palestine, the NATO expansion proxy war in Ukraine and the new world disorder is a positive sign of political mobilisation of European citizens and countries.

Ordan Andreevski

Ordan Andreevski is an advisory board member of the United Macedonian Diaspora in Australia.

https://nordictimes.com/debate/sweden-trading-biodiversity-for-trophies/

Debate

“Sweden – trading biodiversity for trophies”

Biodiversity

It is becoming a sore pill to swallow for most Swedish citizens, seeing how the country with one hand portrays itself as a nature-preserving country and with the other hand literally sells out the country’s biodiversity, writes wildlife expert Misha Istratov.

Published 28 April 2025

Montage. Photo: Private, Patrice Schoefolt/Pexels

This is an opinion piece. The author is responsible for the views expressed in the article.

While most Swedes were recovering after their New Year’s celebration, a few hundred were instead preparing for an adventure. On dark parking lots around five wolf territories, masked men in snow-white camouflage were adjusting silencers on their rifles and baiting their specially bred hunting dogs for a pursuit of a lifetime. The second day of the year bore promises of skins and furs from an endangered species, namely the Swedish wolf. Around 4,000 hunters had submitted interest in being chosen for killing one of the 30 wolves, out of which almost 400 were foreign trophy hunters. In the end, 25 wolves were killed, while the remaining five were not present in their territory. The only feasible explanation is illegal hunting, meaning that they had already been shot, but without permission.

The barrels had barely gotten cold before it was time for another next fauna execution. In February, practice is yearly allowed on the iconic lynx, where loose dogs are set loose in order to train the pursuers to find the mysterious cat. The practice is called “treeing” since the lynx has developed a defence against larger carnivores where it most aptly finds refuge in a tree. Unfortunately, this protection does not help against humans, whose rifles easily end the felines lives, after which they fall from the tree. The real hunt started on the first of March, and during the last two years, over 350 lynxes (roughly 13 percent yearly of the endangered population) have been shot to death, with over ten thousand hunters filing for the exclusive right to kill a lynx.

This “right” is delegated by the Swedish Environment Protection Agency to the counties to issue, and it is called “licensed hunting” or simply, culling. Most experts on European law agree that these practices violate the EU’s Habitats Directive since both the lynx and the wolf (as well as the bear and the wolverine, who are both also hunted yearly) are protected animals. Sweden has been under supervision by the EU for an infringement case in 2010 concerning the wolf hunt and this year a new submission will be opened because of the lynx culling.

Swedes are generally eager in shaming trophy hunters that go abroad to kill rhinos and other endangered animals and return with interior design items fashioned from the remains of their kills. Nor does the Swedish public brace itself in antipathy for killers of large African cats such as Cecil the lion. But when it comes to the rare cats in their own forests, such as the endangered lynx, the trophy hunt is met with surprisingly dispassionate reactions from the general public.

Just like African trophy hunters create myths like the ones that trophy hunting helps preserve species, boosts local economies, and is directed towards older individuals (all of which are scientifically inaccurate according to a large number of studies), Nordic trophy hunters have created their own fallacies to pawn in order to sway less knowledgeable politicians and civilians. Here, a myth has been fabricated that licensed hunting reduces illegal hunting, after a paper’s result was distorted by the hunting interest.

Several international studies, as well as a Swedish study, point in the direct opposite, and this is hardly surprising—if the authorities themselves allow the killing of wolves, how wrong can it be if private citizens take matters into their own hands? Since only three people have been convicted for illegal wolf killing in over ten years in Sweden, while hundreds of wolves have gone “missing”, the reward seems to outweigh the risk for certain individuals.

The propagators of these cullings, namely the two large hunting organisations, are receiving millions of governmental funds yearly. Meanwhile, nature protection organisations survive on scraps, and their funding is being cut by half this year. All this despite the fact that we are in the middle of a species crisis where 73 percent of global wildlife populations have disappeared in the last 50 years, according to WWF’s Living Planet Report.

In Sweden, red-listed species among mammals and birds have increased 50 percent in only twenty years. While the four large carnivores are on the Swedish red list, as well as 131 other species, one would expect the government to issue resolute action.

Instead, the authorities do all they can to enable the trophy hunt. It reaches such extents that they do not only allow the shooters to keep the furs of the killed red-listed animals, but the Swedish Veterinary Agency offers all the shooters the service of boiling and preparing the skull to keep as a keepsake for a symbolic cost.

Meanwhile, it is becoming a sore pill to swallow for most Swedish citizens, seeing how the country with one hand portrays itself as a nature-preserving country and with the other hand literally sells out the country’s biodiversity, encouraging trophy hunting of endangered animals.

Misha Istratov, entrepreneur, wildlife ambassador and writer

About the commentator

Misha Istratov is the CEO of Elithus and an independent commentator on sustainability in general, specializing in wildlife management.

https://nordictimes.com/debate/trade-wars-have-no-winners-protectionism-is-a-dead-end/

Debate

“Trade wars have no winners – protectionism is a dead end”

Donald Trump's USA

Open cooperation represents the trend of history and mutual benefit is what the people want, writes WAN Degang, Charge d'Affairs of the Chinese Embassy in Sweden.

Published 11 April 2025

Photo: iStock/tawatchaiprakobkit

Aerial view of cargo ship carrying container running for export import near cargo yard port concept freight shipping.

This is an opinion piece. The author is responsible for the views expressed in the article.

Recently, the United States has imposed tariffs arbitrarily on all its trading partners under various pretexts. This severely infringes upon the legitimate rights and interests of all countries, violates World Trade Organization (WTO) rules, undermines the rules-based multilateral trading system, and disrupts the global economic order. People from many countries have pointed out that the U.S. overlooks the well-being of of its own citizens and the interests of other countries, which could ultimately lead to internal and external difficulties, resulting in losses for all parties involved.

First, the U.S. tariffs are widely criticized by international community.

The U.S. side claimed that it is being ripped off in international trade, and increased tariffs on all its trading partners under the pretext of reciprocity. This is in complete disregard of the balance of interests achieved through years of trade negotiations. It also neglects the fact that the U.S. has gained huge interests from international trade over the years. Such action is widely criticized and opposed by the international community. The European Commission, the European Central Bank, Canada, Germany, the United Kingdom and other institutions and countries have stated that the U.S. tariffs negatively impact the global economy, disrupt the trading system that has fostered great progress for humanity and undermine the global free trade order. Faced with such unilateral and bullying action, the only way to stop the U.S. from harvesting the world is for all countries to strengthen their solidarity and cooperation to jointly resist and oppose such action.

Second, the U.S. tariffs hurt the U.S. itself as well as other countries.

The U.S. unilateral policy of so-called “reciprocal tariffs” is bound to result in a “lose-lose” situation in practice, inflicting direct harm to the global economy and the interests of its trading partners, while negatively impacting its own economy, businesses and consumers. The day after the U.S. announced its tariffs plan, the S&P 500 index plummeted 4.8%, wiping out over $4 trillion in market value in a short span. Experts at JP Morgan estimated that the tariffs could reduce U.S. GDP by 0.3% for the year, down from the previous forecast of 1.3% growth. Meanwhile, the U.S. inflation level remains high. The Core Personal Consumption Expenditure (PCE) Price Index, which excludes food and energy prices, rose 2.8% year-on-year in February. Relevant U.S. agencies predicted that the new tariffs will cost Americans an additional $660 billion annually in taxes, with average local car prices expected to rise by $3,000 to $5,000. The impact won’t stop at the automotive sector; industries such as food, electronics, household appliances, construction materials and agricultural equipment will also be affected, leading to significantly higher expenditures for American households.

Third, the U.S. tariffs hinder global sustainable development.

The U.S. abuse of tariffs deprives countries, especially those in the Global South, of their right to development. The U.S. imposes tariffs on more than 180 countries and regions worldwide, including some economies classified by the United Nations as least developed. According to WTO data, given the disparities in economic development and strength, U.S. tariffs could further widen the global wealth gap, with less developed countries suffering a heavier blow. The Spokesperson for the U.N. Secretary-General warned that the trade war will adversely affect implementation of Sustainable Development Goals, and the concern right now is with the most vulnerable countries, which are the least equipped to deal with the current situation. The WTO noted that the U.S. tariffs could lead to an overall contraction of around 1% in global merchandise trade volumes this year, disrupting global trade and economic growth prospects.

Open cooperation represents the trend of history and mutual benefit is what the people want. Development is a universal right of all countries, not an exclusive privilege of a few. Countries need to uphold the principles of extensive consultation, joint contribution and shared benefit, and remain committed to true multilateralism. They should practice true multilateralism, jointly oppose all forms of unilateralism and protectionism, and defend the U.N.-centered international system and the WTO-centered multilateral trading system. We are confident that the vast majority of countries, committed to fairness and justice, will stand on the right side of history and act in their best interests.

WAN Degang,
Charge d’Affairs of the Chinese Embassy in Sweden

https://nordictimes.com/debate/how-to-debunk-the-chinese-debt-trap-narrative-in-3-steps/

Debate

“How to debunk the Chinese debt-trap narrative in 3 steps”

An investigative method can be applied to study any country allegedly victimized by 'China’s debt trap' and thus separate facts from fiction, write Hussein Askary and Li Xing.

Published 20 December 2024

Photo: William_Potter

Is there any substance to the 'Chinese debt trap' narrative? the article's authors ask.

This is an opinion piece. The author is responsible for the views expressed in the article.

Our research into the Chinese “debt-trap” narrative, which the U.S. State Department has heavily promoted since May 2018 with substantial funding and media support, reveals no evidence to support such a claim.

The narrative serves primarily as a geopolitical propaganda tool to impede the progress of the China-proposed Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and damage China’s international reputation.

Our analysis of financial and economic developments in countries such as Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Zambia, Kenya and Montenegro over the past decade reveals a consistent pattern. This pattern indicates that their financial distress stems from a combination of internal and external factors, none of which are directly attributable to China or the BRI.

Through this investigation, we have developed a systematic method to highlight the main fallacies within this narrative. This investigative method can be applied to study any country allegedly victimized by “China’s debt trap” and thus separate facts from fiction.

… their financial distress stems from a combination of internal and external factors, none of which are directly attributable to China or the BRI.

Furthermore, this investigation will help policymakers determine sound policies for infrastructure development credit in the next decade of the BRI, building the cornerstone of economic development for their nation.

The method suggests that anyone who accepts the debt-trap narrative must address three fundamental questions:

1. What is the composition of the country’s debt?

2. What is the quality of the debt?

3. What is the source of the country’s financial distress?

1. Debt composition

What is meant by “composition” is how much of a country’s total foreign debt is owed to various creditors, expressed as percentages, see Figure 1. We immediately discovered that the portion owed to China represents only a fraction of the total debt (10% in Sri Lanka’s case in 2022 and 15.5% in Kenya’s case in 2024).

Figure 1. Total foreign debt of Kenya in 2024 and of Sri Lanka in 2022

Data: Kenya National Treasury, Sri Lanka Finance Ministry; compiled by the Belt and Road Institute in Sweden

However, Western think tanks and media deliberately manipulate the semantics by focusing on the “bilateral” portion of debt rather than the total. They frequently highlight that “China is Country X’s largest bilateral creditor”, see Figure 2. This selective framing creates a skewed perception of China’s disproportionate role in these countries’ financial problems.

Figure 2. Emphasizing Kenya’s bilateral debt with China rather than its total foreign debt

Data: Kenya National Treasury; compiled by the Belt and Road Institute in Sweden

Therefore, researchers should not rely solely on media or think tanks for information; instead, they should use publicly available official data from each country’s finance ministry or central bank. In Figure 2, we use information provided by the Kenyan National Treasury.

This selective framing creates a skewed perception of China’s disproportionate role in these countries’ financial problems.

The composition charts of total debt reveal that China’s share of Sri Lanka’s debt is merely 10%, while 80% to 90% is owed to Western institutions or entities related to Western states. More importantly, the data exposes the “elephant in the room”: 47% of Sri Lanka’s debt comprises commercial loans owed mostly to private Western bondholders such as American BlackRock and British Ashmore.

These bondholders own four times the amount of China’s loans to Sri Lanka. In Kenya’s case, the commercial loans exceed China’s share, and the multilateral loans, owed mostly to the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), are three times larger than China’s.

2. Debt quality

China’s loans under the BRI are almost exclusively directed toward building modern infrastructure in sectors like transport, power, water, education and health care. These projects are productive investments that increase recipient countries’ productivity.

By enhancing infrastructure, the loans contribute to the industrial, agricultural and service sectors, enabling economies to generate income and create capacity to repay the loans. In contrast, most financial resources provided through commercial and multilateral loans are directed toward resolving fiscal and trade deficits.

When countries face dire financial straits, like those mentioned above, they resort to heavy borrowing from international bond markets to solve immediate economic crises.

Countries borrow from bond markets to repay older bonds, often at much higher interest rates. In February this year, the Kenyan government faced a precarious situation as it lacked sufficient cash to buy back $2 billion in Eurobonds due in June.

It managed to raise $1.5 billion through a new seven-year bond, but at an interest rate of 10% compared to the previous bond’s 6%.

This piling up of new debt to pay back old debt at higher interest rates exemplifies a “poison pill”. Even if borrowed funds are used for infrastructure, borrowing short term for projects that are profitable only in the long term represents a classic mistake. This is one key cause of the real debt trap.

China’s loans under the BRI are almost exclusively directed toward building modern infrastructure in sectors like transport, power, water, education and health care.

Another key qualitative difference is that Chinese loans offer longer repayment periods and lower interest rates. For example, the loan provided by the Export-Import Bank of China for Montenegro’s Bar-Boljare highway offers a 20-year repayment term, including a six-year grace period, at 2% interest.

Similar rates and terms apply to the Mombasa-Nairobi and other railway projects in Kenya. On the other hand, commercial loans are shorter-term at five to seven years, with much higher interest rates of 6-12%.

China often provides debt rescheduling or relief for distressed countries, while Western bondholders resort to legal measures in Western courts to compel timely and full repayment.

Chinese loans have no political or economic strings attached, while Western multilateral loans often come with conditions such as currency devaluation, cuts to public infrastructure investment, enforcement of specific political changes and privatization of state-owned enterprises and natural resources. Cumulatively, these conditions lead to reduced economic productivity.

The privatization of copper mining in Zambia under IMF directives, now controlled by Western multinational companies, has returned very little of its natural wealth to the Zambian nation. Therefore, this qualitative difference must be considered when investigating different cases.

3. The real causes of these countries’ financial distress

Many of these countries were already in financial distress before the BRI was launched in 2013. Afterwards, various internal and external developments augmented their difficulties. The causes range from civil wars, terrorism, epidemics, pandemics, financial mismanagement to corruption and changes in the global financial and monetary system. None of these are related to China. We can list some key causes:

a. Many countries rely heavily on one or two primary income sources, making them vulnerable to price shocks or activity fluctuations. For example, both Sri Lanka and Montenegro depend heavily on tourism. When Sri Lanka was hit by terrorism in 2019, tourism declined dramatically. As soon as it recovered in 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic struck. The pandemic also severely affected Montenegro’s economy in 2021 and 2022.

b. Sri Lanka’s economy faces low productivity challenges. Its textile industry relies on imported machinery, fuel and cotton, adding value only through low-cost labor. When fuel prices rose globally in 2022 after the Ukraine crisis began, profit margins eroded completely.

c. Many nations in this category depend on imported oil, gas, and fertilizers for agriculture. Some borrow from foreign sources to import food. When global prices increase, these nations are hit hard.

d. Currency devaluation significantly increases debt burdens. Because foreign loans, including Chinese ones, are denominated in U.S. dollars, currency devaluation forces nations to pay more in national wealth to repay the same dollar amount of dollar debt. When the Biden administration passed the Inflation Reduction Act in 2022, the U.S. dollar rose against almost all global currencies, dealing a severe blow to indebted countries.

Conclusion

Examining and addressing these three key questions can provide a more accurate and objective evaluation of these nations’ debt crises. China is not responsible for causing these problems. In fact, China’s approach of issuing productive credit to these nations will help them escape the debt trap in which they have been ensnared for a long time.

By providing favorable financing for infrastructure, these nations will be better positioned to increase productivity, rebalance finances and repay their dues to both China and other creditors. In this sense, China and the BRI are part of the solution to debt problems rather than their cause.

However, China alone cannot resolve all the problems faced by these nations. There is a need to devise new methods of financing infrastructure and development. This will be addressed in a separate article.

Hussein Askary
Vice Chairman of the Belt and Road Institute in Sweden

Li Xing
Yunshan Leading Scholar and Professor at the Guangdong Institute for International Strategies in China and Adjunct Professor at Aalborg University in Denmark

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PalUbaZRWJg

This article is based on Hussein Askary’s presentation at the conference session The BRI and the Global South, chaired by Professor Li Xing at the 2024 International Think Tank Forum of the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road.

https://nordictimes.com/debate/tablet-or-pen-when-school-digitalization-goes-too-far/

Debate

“Tablet or pen – when school digitalization goes too far”

Why should it take so many years for our politicians to realize that younger children in school first need to learn to write with pen and paper before they are given digital tools? Writes Lena Nilsson from Uppsala, Sweden.

Published 16 November 2024

Photo: iStock/dolgachov

Politicians should have listened to teachers' warnings 25 years ago, says the writer.

This is an opinion piece. The author is responsible for the views expressed in the article.

In 1981 I started working as a primary school teacher. I had the privilege of working with the lower grades and every three years starting with a new first grade. In the first years of school, the pupils received a lot of training in shaping and writing both letters and numbers with a pencil. Many times we also used other materials to form and build letters, this to further train the motor skills and remember the letters in different ways, because we learn with the whole body.

In the fall of 1996, we got a computer in the classroom for the first time. It was placed at the back of the room and at the beginning it was only me and my colleague who used it to learn different programs. None of us were really that interested in bringing digital technology into the classroom. Even then, we thought it was more important for our students to get the letters and numbers “in hand” before they started writing on the computer.

Eventually, several educational computer programs, aimed at younger children, were published by educational publishers. There were many programs with exercises in, for example, preparatory reading. I had a few students who got a little help from some programs, to get started with reading and writing. But most of the class used the computer mostly for games in the afternoons, when after-school activities took over the classroom.

In 2001, the directive in our municipality was that every classroom in primary school should have two computers, and the call to us teachers was to ensure that those pupils who did not have access to a computer at home would have priority for the school computers. There was a great concern that these children would fall behind in digital development. That’s what they said at the end of the 20th century, that some students would miss out. Imagine if we had known then what it looks like today.

Today, many have realized that the decision to digitalize schools happened far too quickly. There was an over reliance on digitalization, and there was a strong desire for Sweden to lead in all things IT-related in education. Digitalization advocates argued that children learn better with computers and tablets. This may be true in some areas, but in other contexts, it can be entirely inappropriate.

While research shows mixed results on the place of computers in education, what happens if students do not learn handwriting is clear. What is the risk that students who are forced to write by hand, with pen and paper, will have to take courses on how to surf the internet later in life? Most likely, that risk is zero. The big problem today is all the pupils who have been given a tablet as early as first grade, instead of a notebook and pen. Many teachers are concerned that students who have been in school for several years have no functional handwriting. In other words, they cannot write by hand.

We take so much away from our children when they don’t learn to form letters with their hands. When they don’t practice their own handwriting, they also have trouble reading other people’s handwritten messages. Many of us will remember when SÖ (The Swedish National Agency for Education) introduced the new writing style in the 1970s. Students found it difficult to learn, and as a result, they could no longer read the handwriting of their elders. The new writing style had been developed by a calligrapher. However, many teachers criticized it without being heard. More and more teachers reverted to teaching the old handwriting style, which had been developed over so many years. The school board introduced the new writing style without listening to and taking advice from the experts, the teachers who worked in the school.

According to the Swedish Teachers’ Union, 95% of teachers believe it is important for children to be able to write by hand, yet a fifth of teachers say their pupils never do.

The Swedish National Agency for Education is now proposing a change to the curriculum, emphasizing that more time should be spent on writing practice in the lower grades. It also wants to remove the requirement for digital learning tools in preschool. This is exactly what so many teachers said 25 years ago, that children need to learn to write with pen and paper in the early years of school. Learning to write is a craft and it takes time to learn to write by hand.

As in so many other contexts, people forget or ignore to listen to those who are experts and have experience in a field. Debates on important issues and decisions are missing. Only one side is usually given the opportunity to speak, while the other side is silenced, mocked or ridiculed. We need to learn to speak up when things go wrong – to have the courage to speak out.

Lena Nilsson, Uppsala Sweden

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“Why Macedonia needs better alternatives to EU and NATO integration”

“Sweden – trading biodiversity for trophies”

“Trade wars have no winners – protectionism is a dead end”

First, the U.S. tariffs are widely criticized by international community.

Second, the U.S. tariffs hurt the U.S. itself as well as other countries.

Third, the U.S. tariffs hinder global sustainable development.

“How to debunk the Chinese debt-trap narrative in 3 steps”

1. Debt composition

2. Debt quality

3. The real causes of these countries’ financial distress

Conclusion

“Tablet or pen – when school digitalization goes too far”

News

The Nordics

Opinion

Social Media

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Polaris of Enlightenment

News

Other

Subscribe to our newsletter!

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© 2022-2025 The Nordic Times TNT. All rights reserved.

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© 2022-2025 The Nordic Times TNT.
All rights reserved.

Our independent journalism needs your support!
Consider a donation.

You can donate any amount of your choosing, one-time payment or even monthly.
We appreciate all of your donations to keep us alive and running.