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CURIOUSMINDS
A weekly serving of great articles we curate, and original content we produce. So, all you have to do is pick, read, watch and listen. |
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Issue #209 - December 2025
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Stories from Around the World that Affect Us |
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Sudan’s RSF trying to hide atrocities
Yale Humanitarian Research Lab finds paramilitary buried, burned, removed human remains after el-Fasher massacre.
The Sudanese paramilitary group the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) have carried out a systematic, weeks-long campaign to erase evidence of mass killings in the city of el-Fasher, according to a recent report released by the Yale School of Public Health’s Humanitarian Research Lab (HRL). “RSF’s mass killing campaign targeted civilians attempting to flee the city and those seeking refuge in the Daraja Oula neighborhood,” the report, released on Tuesday, said, referring to a neighbourhood in el-Fasher where massacres occurred. “RSF subsequently engaged in a systematic multi-week campaign to destroy evidence of its mass killings through burial, burning, and removal of human remains on a mass scale. This pattern of body disposal and destruction is ongoing.”
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 War-torn Myanmar 'sham' election
BBC(War/Politics)
Myanmar is voting in an election widely dismissed as a sham. With major political parties dissolved, many of their leaders jailed and as much as half the country not expected to vote because of an ongoing civil war. The military government is holding a phased ballot nearly five years after it seized power in a coup, which sparked widespread opposition and spiralled into a civil war. Observers say the junta, with China's support, is seeking to legitimise and entrench its power as it seeks a way out of the devastating stalemate. More than 200 people have been charged for disrupting or opposing the polls under a new law which carries severe punishments, including the death penalty.
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 Russia attack on Kyiv means no Peace
BBC (War/Politics)
The 10-hour missile and drone barrage targeting Ukraine's capital killed two people and left 32 others injured, local authorities said. Zelensky is expected to raise security guarantees and territorial concessions for Ukraine in his meeting with Trump, both of which are issues that Russia has previously been unwilling to compromise on. They will discuss the new 20-point peace plan, a revised version of the earlier 28-point plan drafted by US special envoy Steve Witkoff which was widely seen as being too favourable to Russia. Control of Ukraine's eastern Donbas has been a major sticking point in talks so far, but Zelensky has now said a "free economic zone" could be an option.
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2025 Reviewed by Francis Fukuyama
Philosophy
Francis Fukuyama is the Olivier Nomellini Senior Fellow at Stanford University. His latest book is Liberalism and Its Discontents. He is also the author of the “Frankly Fukuyama” column, carried forward from American Purpose, at Persuasion. In this week’s conversation, Yascha Mounk and Francis Fukuyama discuss why Donald Trump is flagging, whether American institutions are resilient enough to survive, and the future of Ukraine. This transcript has been condensed and lightly edited for clarity.
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Can Europe Control Its Fate? Yascha Mounk Philosophy/Politics |
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In this week’s conversation, Yascha Mounk, Timothy Garton Ash, Sabina Ćudić, and Nathalie Tocci explore the relationship between the United States and Europe, the Ukraine peace talks, and whether Europe has any hope of reinvigorating itself. Image by Leonardo |
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Quote of The Week
How did you end up in prison? I went out for a packet of fags and came home 17 years later.
- James King -
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Top Stories from our favourite publications to stimulate your curious mind, |
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The Bronze Age of Globalization
Reflection on the ancient world often brings to mind the city-state of Athens, the white columns of the Parthenon, and its philosophers such as Socrates, Diogenes, or Zeno. This seems ancient enough to us, and might seem to be the beginning of what we think of as Western civilization. And yet, already in the fifth century BC, the classical Greeks themselves looked back to a different vanished world, a lost civilization of the Mediterranean further east. It was the world remembered in the Iliad and the Odyssey, of warriors like Achilles besieging Troy and seadogs like Odysseus wandering across strange lands. When the Athenians contemplated antiquity, they reflected on what we today call the Bronze Age: an era defined by a metal that does not occur in nature and which dated from 3300 BC to 1200 BC, a timespan as long as the time from us back to Jesus Christ and Julius Caesar.
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Of Stars, Seagulls, and Love
THE MARGINALIAN (Literature/Philosophy)
Somewhere along the way of life, we learn that love means very different things to different people. And yet all personal love is but a fractal of a larger universal love. Some call it God. I call it wonder. Dante called it “the Love that moves the Sun and the other stars.” Because the capacity for love may be the crowning achievement of consciousness and consciousness the crowning achievement of the universe, because the mystery of the universe will always exceed the reach of the consciousness forged by that mystery, love in the largest sense is a matter of active surrender (to borrow Jeanette Winterson’s perfect term for the paradox of art) to the mystery. |
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Spirituality of Nature
THE MARGINALIAN (Literature)
Out of that responsibility arises a kind of quietly rapturous spirituality — a way of moving through the world wonder-smitten by reality. The great English neurophysiologist Charles Scott Sherrington (November 27, 1857–March 4, 1952), laureate of the 1932 Nobel Prize for his groundbreaking discoveries of the function of neurons, termed this orientation “Natural Religion” and explored its rewards in his 1937 Gifford Lectures, shifting harmony of sub-patterns... |
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Skytube
A world in chaos. A fanciful dream. Split allegiance could lead to disaster. When the World’s banking system collapses, everyone is hurting. The headless chicken doesn’t know which way to turn, while the wily fox sees the opportunity. Alfie's outrageous dream of a futuristic transportation system is the spark that ignites his fuse, and he acts. As he leads his team through desperate times, he streamlines the company by slashing overheads and retrenching staff. In three short months he turns it round. But little does he know the challenge that faces him in Thailand is much greater. And he may not make it with his sanity intact.
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What Rob Reiner Was Telling Us
At the time of Reiner’s death, his murder is in competition with a trifecta of terrible news stories—the Bondi Beach shooting in which at least 15 people were killed by gunmen while celebrating Hanukkah and the shooting at Brown University in which two people were killed. The very clear sense is of having entered into dark times—the kind of story where it’s not clear that optimism will prevail or that there will in fact be a happy ending. A year after Franklin Foer in an Atlantic article declared, “The golden age of American Jews is ending,” anti-Semitic violence has become commonplace. Mass shootings and school shootings are so frequent that what is produced is a society of distrust—it turns out, for instance, that two of the survivors of the Brown shooting had survived other school shootings.
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The 1950 heist to reclaim the ancient Stone of Destiny
BBC (History/ Natural Environment)
Early on Christmas morning in 1950, the Dean of London's Westminster Abbey woke up to discover his home had been visited overnight. Rather than leaving him a nice present, the mystery intruders had made off with one of the Abbey's most prized possessions. Since the 1066 Coronation of William the Conqueror, the Abbey had served as venue for royal occasions; the focal point of these ceremonies was the wooden Coronation Chair, which had a stone fitted into its base. This was no sparkling gem; the Stone of Destiny, also known as the Stone of Scone, was a 150kg (330lb) red-sandstone block – but it had heavy symbolic significance. And now it had been forcibly removed.
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UPGRADE to PAID
CURIOUSMINDS content and opinions contain important information curated from reliable sources. We rely on reader support to keep it FREE. We want it to reach as many people as possible. If you value what we do and would like to help us sustain it, please consider a small monthly or annual contribution. Contributing subscribers get full access to all James King Publications including archives of CURIOUSMINDS, and a valuable BONUS: FREE ebook versions of all James King’s published books.Click - View them at Amazon · Donate via the - Choose a subscription plan - page. If you are not a subscriber already - Go to the Welcome page |
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James King Blog offers valuable resources for students of Arts and Humanities. Particularly those interested in Environments, Literature, Performing Arts, Visual Art, Philosophy, Travel, and Human Rights. The articles provide insights into complex interactions between humans and their environments, and the ethical and moral dimensions of environmental issues. The Blog is relevant to students of all ages and those who are just fascinated by the Arts and Humanities. |
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 Implementation and Enforcement of Human Rights – Important Data
Implementation and enforcement of human rights are crucial aspects for ensuring the protection and realisation of the rights of all individuals. The conceptual foundation of human rights lies in the inherent dignity and worth of each person. Enforcing human rights is essential for functioning societies. |
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FREE BOOKS89 Mystery, Thriller, & Suspense FreebiesThis Promo Closes 31 December Thriller authors join forces in joint promotion campaigns to introduce themselves to readers. You can download as many books as you like.
I hope you find plenty to entertain you. CLICK THE BANNER BELOW TO VIEW THE PROMO - AND GRAB AS MANY BOOKS AS YOU WANT |
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ALFIE GOES TO THAILAND - SERIES
If you like thought-provoking drama, romantic tragedies, and damaged characters, then you’ll love the tropical sauna and wry humour of POST- IT NOTES and the other books in this Psychological Thriller series. The Series is a story of human challenge, manipulation, rejection, abuse, and a search for peace. |
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THE KENRIGHT CHRONICLES - SERIES
The Kenright Chronicles is a psychological thriller series. Jack Kenright, a young investment banker gets involved in an international art swindle. which cripples his business and threatens his life and his family. He ends up a recluse, working for the FBI undercover and exposes massive corruption in the gambling world. |
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Bridge of LiesBy Greg Dinallo
A Russian reporter's next big story leads him to Washington, DC, and a plot to destroy the Capitol in this explosive thriller by the author of Red Ink. Russian Nikolai Katkov grew up under the Soviet regime and came of age as a journalist during the Cold War. Devotees of truth, justice, and the American way, he and his colleague Nina Grafinskaya have always been highly critical of Russia's leadership. But soon after she publishes an article on their president's inner circle, Nina is assassinated. Then her FBI contact is found dead, leaving Niko to take over Nina's unfinished piece on a Russian mole within US federal security. Believing the two stories are linked, Niko heads to Washington, DC, to investigate—only to get a target put on his back in the process. In DC, FBI special agent and liaison to the Joint Terrorism Task Force Lana Nichols is implementing a major upgrade to railroad computer security. A sexy, young cyberterrorism expert, Lana also lands the assignment of babysitting Niko, who attracts Russian thugs and hit men like a magnet.
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Appointment in Tehran By James Stejskal
A Cold War Spy Thriller (The Snake Eater Chronicles) When radical Iranian students seize the U.S. Embassy compound in Tehran and take over fifty diplomats hostage the U.S. President has to negotiate with a government that wants only to humiliate the United States. When talks fail, the President must turn to the military to bring the Americans home by force. As preparations are made for an audacious rescue, an American intelligence officer hides alone in a Tehran safehouse with a secret. He is protecting a powerful weapon known as the Perses Device, which is now at risk of being captured and employed against the United States. The Agency Director orders that it must be brought out at all costs. But as a small American team clandestinely enters Tehran to lead the way for the rescue force, a traitor spills the secret and KGB Spetsnaz operatives begin their own search for the weapon. At the last minute, one more American is added to the advance team—his sole mission is to get the Agency officer and the Perses device to safety. When the rescue mission fails, only two Americans are left to run the gauntlet of enemy agents and get the weapon out. Getting in was easy…
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Substack - Creative Xellence -
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Medium
At Medium we curate high value informative articles related to A&H from major publishers and authoratative sources. And we publish a smattering of selected articles from James King Blog and articles written by James King for Medium Publications.
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