Showing 1 - 10 of 12
Modern medicine in ancient Rome
Sunday Spotlight, Published on 02/07/2023
» Doctors are generally held in high regard today, but Romans of the first century were sceptical, even scornful, of medical practitioners, many of whom ministered to ailments they did not understand. Poets especially ridiculed surgeons for being greedy, for taking sexual advantage of patients and, above all, for incompetence.
Life and death on the Dnieper River
Sunday Spotlight, Published on 28/05/2023
» The thunder of artillery echoes night and day over the mighty Dnieper River as it winds its way through southern Ukraine. With Russian and Ukrainian forces squared off on opposite banks, fighters have replaced fishermen, surveillance drones circle overhead and mines line the marshy embankments.
Iranian fighters feel the squeeze
Sunday Spotlight, Published on 11/12/2022
» Sitting under an oak tree on a mountainside in the Kurdish region of Iraq, Mohammad Kurd said he recently fled neighbouring Iran after two friends were killed by security forces and the powerful Revolutionary Guard started going door to door to arrest anti-government protesters.
German socialite financed own demise
Sunday Spotlight, Published on 11/12/2022
» Late in the summer of 1938, as the Nazis escalated their persecution of German Jews, Ilse Hesselberger and her daughter, Trudy, travelled from Munich to Milan to visit relatives.
Ancient Greeks outsourced battles
Sunday Spotlight, Published on 20/11/2022
» Wherever there is an out-of-the-way war, there will be mercenaries -- hired fighters whose only common bond may be a hunger for adventure. Some join foreign armies or rebel forces because they believe in the cause; others sign on because the price is right.
Let pupils design uniforms
News, Postbag, Published on 06/11/2022
» Re: "Casual dress allowed at college exams," (BP, Nov 5).
Asia's century, China's year
Asia focus, Published on 30/12/2019
» Way back when 1999 was winding down, pundits were telling us that the Asian Century was about to dawn. That prediction has not yet been fully realised, but few would disagree that 2019 belonged to China. Over the past 12 months, the top headlines have been about the bruising trade war with America, defiant protests in Hong Kong against Beijing's tightening grip, and the rise of a surveillance state that is herding hundreds of thousands into "re-education" camps on its western fringes. Below, the Asia Focus team looks back on a busy and sometimes troubling 2019.
Isis foiled
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 15/02/2019
» Until a few years ago, no Western publisher dared say a word against Isis, the Muslim terrorist extremists infamous for taking umbridge and reacting violently. No longer. Isis is now targeted by the media and by novelists with impunity.
Kingpins remain untouched
News, Postbag, Published on 20/05/2018
» A Bangkok Post report this week showed 36 foreign nationals and one Thai were detained during tourist police-led raids on 104 locations across the country in the early hours of Thursday.
Trump's Miss Universe foreign policy
News, Published on 12/05/2016
» OK, it's easy to pick on Donald Trump's foreign policy. But just because he recently referred to the attack on the World Trade Center as happening on "7/11" -- which is a convenience store -- instead of 9/11, and just because he claimed that "I know Russia well" because he held a "major event in Russia two or three years ago -- (the) Miss Universe contest, which was a big, big, incredible event" -- doesn't make him unqualified.