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No reason for celebration

Dec 31,2016 - Last updated at Dec 31,2016

It is the start of a new year and I am one of those who still does not know what to make of it: celebrate or mourn.

Many people across the globe will celebrate the end of a year and the start of another. Others will find nothing to celebrate about.

Last year was bad no matter how one looks at it. Yet, many believe that the worse has yet to come.

Tensions between Moscow and Washington are on the rise. Russia and the US have already served notice on each another and the world at large that they are on the verge of ushering in a new nuclear armament era by increasing not only the number of nuclear bombs in their possession but, worse, enhance their destructive capabilities.

The threat of a new nuclear rivalry between the US and Russia should cause deep concern to mankind, which started to believe that the threat of a nuclear holocaust no longer exists.

Not to mention the fact that the multiplying regional wars can easily escalate into a nuclear exchange.

Nuclear proliferation seems to have become unstoppable, with Iran now joining the nuclear club, which will make other countries in the region feel the need to acquire their own nuclear weapons.

 

Meanwhile, tensions between religious and ethnic groups in many countries are now on the rise.

To make an already bad situation worse, poverty is projected to increase in developing nations. The number of peoples living below the poverty line are on the rise.

On the top of all this doom and gloom, human rights strategies failed to eradicate, or at least combat, grave human rights violations.

Terrorism and extremism are also on the rise in many parts of the world.

 

Against this backdrop, it is really hard to find good reasons to celebrate the beginning of the new year.

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