Radovan Karadzic is captured
A special ploy of Radovan Karadzic and his military sidekick, Ratko Mladic was to cut off Sarajevo's water supply, writes Marcus Tanner. When the queue for the dribbling pump then became particularly dense, the Serbs would pound it with shells, so that a lot of Muslims were killed. So perished countless innocent victims of Karadzic's inexhaustible rage against the city that he thought had denied him his due; had failed to respect his poetry; had not invited him into its bosom; had kept him out at as a Serb, as a mountain man, as a Christian. For years, nationalist Serbs have idolised Karadzic as an almost mythical figure, the equivalent of the hajduks, or Serbian outlaws of old, who defied the Ottomans. It will be interesting to see if the legend lives on in the mundane circumstances of a Hague courtroom. Marcus Tanner The Independent
Full article: Karadzic, the psychiatrist who became a genocidal madman 
Captured: one of the world's most wanted men
Justice at last for the mothers of Srebrenica
Zimbabwe's shameful agreement
The power sharing agreement would simply legitimise Robert Mugabe's shameful flouting of the democratic process, says a Telegraph leader. He would remain president while Morgan Tsvangirai would become a titular prime minister, without any real power. The cabinet would be doubled in size to accommodate MDC ministers, no doubt at vast expense to an already wrecked economy (official inflation is 2.2 million per cent and a newly issued $100 billion banknote is not quite enough to buy a loaf of bread). The deal would be hailed by its broker, South Africa's unimpressive president Thabo Mbeki, as a diplomatic masterstroke, an "African solution" to the problem - and the wider international community would have little option but to look impotently on. Leader Daily Telegraph
Full article: A disgraceful 'solution' for Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe Today: all the latest from our man in Harare
Alex Salmond bides his time
Alex Salmond, Scotland's First Minister, has offered, over the past year or so, a display of good governance to hush those who thought him obsessed with boring, anachronistic old questions of national identity, says Andrew O'Hagan. Political insiders in Scotland see him as biding his time, rolling in the Trojan horse of wise and sedate counsel on fisheries and tourism, only to spring the tartan furies when the moment is right. All of which would be bad news for Scotland, bad news for England, and bad news for the people of Glasgow East. The Nationalists may be nice - or not so nice - civil servants and bank managers, but their vision of modern Scotland is at heart poisonously regressive. They are without intellectual content. Andrew O'Hagan Daily Telegraph
Full article: Glasgow no longer belongs to Labour
A cowboy astride a phallic missile
There isn't an American president since Eisenhower who hasn't ended up, at some point or other, being depicted by the world's cartoonists as a cowboy astride a phallic missile, writes David Aaronovitch. It happened to Bill Clinton when he bombed Iraq; it will happen to Barack Obama when his reinforced forces in Afghanistan or Pakistan mistake a meeting of tribal elders for an unwise gathering of Taliban and al-Qaeda. Anti-Americanism is inevitable. The author Andrew O'Hagan defines their exported popular culture as "Spite as entertainment. Shouting as argument. Dysfunction as normality. Desires as rights. Shopping as democracy." This in the country that has sent Big Brother, Pop Idol, Wife Swap and Location, Location, Location over the Atlantic in the other direction, while taking delivery of Curb Your Enthusiasm and The Wire. David Aaronovitch The Times
Full article: Eventually, we will all hate Obama too
Andrew Roberts: The decline and fall of the American empire
Labour get tough on scroungers
They were headlines to die for, everything that James Purnell had planned, says Polly Toynbee. "Labour blitz on dole scroungers" said the Sun, with "Get clean or lose your benefits, junkies told" from the Daily Mail. My, it was tough, tough, tough. The stage management of this "revolution" will not make him popular with many colleagues, nor his party. His aides say of course it had to be billed as super-radical, to deny the Tories this turf. Cameron says he's "thrilled" with the policy - so in the short run, Labour has neutralised welfare reform. But where does it take the party beyond a couple of days' headlines? The timing is bad for a target of getting 80% into work: extra toughness is an odd response to thousands of jobs cascading out of the building industry. Polly Toynbee The Guardian
Full article: Labour's sin-eater has now neutralised welfare reform
