Geopolitics
The Two Faces of Crisis: Western Energy Profiteering and the Heroic Demining of Ukraine
The conflict in Iran and the Strait of Hormuz has sharply driven up oil prices, revealing a strategic divide between trading-focused European majors like BP and Shell and production-heavy US giants like ExxonMobil. Meanwhile, the immense human tragedy of the landmine crisis in Russia's war in Ukraine is being combated with a dangerous, slow effort combining human deminers, machines, and AI. While Western corporations profit from the fires of war and conflict-fueled volatility, the heroic and dangerous work of deminers, many from civilian backgrounds, embodies the true cost of imperialism and the resilience of the global majority forced to deal with its horrific consequences.
