Mark Weston

Mark Weston is a writer, researcher and consultant working on public health, justice, youth employability and other global issues. He lives in Sudan, and is the author of two books on Africa – The Ringtone and the Drum and African Beauty.

The state of Spain

A joke told to me by an unemployed Spanish friend today: Three government ministers go on a tour of Europe. One is from Britain, one from France, and the...

The two sides of immigration

The Dark Side: I have recently moved to Spain. In order to buy anything official like insurance, a flat, a car or a bank account - you have to pay for your...

Joined Up Development

As the IMF agrees to grant Guinea-Bissau $700 million of debt relief, the European Union, the country's main donor, threatens to withhold $150 million of aid....

Desert Storm

Back in March of this year, I spent a couple of weeks in the far north of Burkina Faso. I slept under the stars on the edge of the Sahara, was offered a live...

Getting your priorities right

Eastern Turkey is currently plagued by a simmering war between the Kurdish separatist PKK and the Turkish army. Hardly a day passes without some battle or...

Are supermodels above the law?

Having refused to testify against Charles Taylor, the thuggish former Liberian president currently being tried at the Hague for war crimes, it now seems...

The lost children of Muslim Africa

A couple of weeks ago in the small, poor Sahelian town of Dori in northern Burkina Faso, we were sitting at a roadside stall having a breakfast of coffee and...

More drug trouble in Guinea-Bissau

Back in January, I posted the text below (I subsequently took it down for re-posting at a later date because of a bizarre and unnerving incident that happened...

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Switching Ministers and Crossing Canyons

Switching Ministers and Crossing Canyons

At the end of July, after months of lockdown, my first trip outside The Netherlands was to Tunisia. Just before I flew, the Tunisian prime minister tendered the resignation of his government. That meant possibly another minister of justice; the fourth in a little over...