Arab Awakening's columnists offer their weekly perspective on what is happening on the ground in the Middle East. Leading the week, The second anniversary of the Syrian uprising

Firmly in the “solar belt”, the area of the world with ideal conditions for solar power, Jordan should strive to become the poster child for renewable energy.

Youths would just waste their lives away, willingly or unwillingly, it did not matter much: what mattered was that their lives were wasted. It was wasted on drugs, drowning in the sea while following a mirage, following false leaders.

Individuals should be able to feel that not all of the risks of the world, and especially not those of banks and states threatened with bankruptcy, are being dumped onto their shoulders. But that something exists that deserves the name “European Community”.

The European Union was founded in reaction to what I call ‘old war’ – the wars of the twentieth century. Even though material interests ought logically to lead to increased political cooperation, contemporary European politics, or the absence of politics, suggest instead the possibility of what I call a ‘new war’.

It was the French colonisers, after all, who were bound to international conventions that govern the practice of harm in a way that a small groups of individuals like the Algerians, were not.

On Monday 18 March a potentially historic vote on whether and how the UK press should be regulated will be voted on by the House of Commons. This sets out the case for the opposition against the British government's approach.