Because of the centrality of two eastern states (Pennsylvania and Virginia) we should know by the early evening whether this is going to be a late night or an early night. Either way, UN Dispatch will be up until the polls close and a winner is declared. I'll be covering the elections from an international viewing party at the Historic Sixth and I Synagogue in Washington, DC (co-sponsored by Humanity in Action and L'Institut Montagne) and from the Democratic National Committee election watch party where I'm credentialed as media. Finally, readers in the Netherlands should attend the President's Night 2008 party at the Melkveg with which I will be corresponding throughout the evening via phone.
For people on the go tonight, check out UN Dispatch's twitter feed for updates throughout the evening.
Interested in what the rest of the world thinks about today's elections?
Check out MorningSide Post for international live blogging; PRI's The World for the global elite's take; and Voices Without Votes to see how bloggers around the world are reacting to today's historic elections.
What does your iPod, cell phone, pager, and laptop have to do with the crisis in the Congo? A lot, actually. Eastern Congo, where fighting has recently taken a dramatic upswing, is one of the best places in the world to mine Columbite-tantalite, otherwise known as Coltan.
Coltan is a unique metal used in the batteries of small electronics. And as devices like Ipods became more in demand around the turn of the millennium, so too did the demand for Coltan.
This turned out to be more of a curse than a blessing for the people of eastern Congo. competition over Coltan mines between the government of the Congo, Rwanda, Uganda and a panoply of armed groups in eastern Congo helped fuel a civil war in Congo that has claimed over 4 million lives.
The Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting offers a great explainer on the Coltan-conflict nexus in Eastern DRC.
By Olav Kjorven, Assistant Secretary General and Director of Development Policy at the UN Development Program
Something unprecedented happened in China in late October. It may not have been as glitzy spectacular as the Olympics in Beijing over the summer. It did not attract heads of state or world celebrities. But it possibly leave a more lasting imprint on the future of China and indeed the world.
Taoist masters from all over China gathered near the ancient capital of Nanjing to agree on a seven-year plan for climate change action. Anybody with minimal knowledge of China will immediately understand that this is more than a curiosity.
This week, I talk with Kristele Younis of Refugee's International about one of the most under reported stories out of Iraq: the plight of the some 2 million people who have fled Iraq since the outbreak of war in 2003. In the segment below, we talk about the particularly dire situation facing about 3,000 Iraqi Palestinians who have fled to refugee camps in Syria.
by Jana Gastellum, Associate Director, Energy Future Coalition
Among churning financial markets, two international organizations, the United Nations and the International Energy Agency, recently called for green growth as a solution to the current economic crisis.
Last week, Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon promoted the UN Environment Programme's call for a Green New Deal. Coupling solutions to poverty, energy security, and the environment, Secretary Ban says,
A solution to poverty is also a solution for climate change: green growth. For the world's poor, it is a key to development. For the rich, it is the way of the future... At a time when the global economy is sputtering, we need growth. At a time when unemployment in many nations is rising, we need new jobs. At a time when poverty threatens to overtake hundreds of millions of people, especially in the least developed parts of the world, we need the promise of prosperity. This possibility is at our fingertips. We have experienced great economic transformations throughout history: the industrial revolution, the technology revolution, and the era of globalization. We are now on the threshold of another -- the age of green economics.