Primark backs safety drive in wake of Bangladesh factory disaster Retailer warns it may pull its clothing manufacturing operations out of Bangladesh if standards fail to improve

Primark backs safety drive in wake of Bangladesh factory disaster Retailer warns it may pull its clothing manufacturing operations out of Bangladesh if standards fail to improve FESTOERNESTY@GMAIL.COM The rubble of collapsed Rana Plaza garment factory building in Savar, near Dhaka, Bangladesh, earlier this year. Photograph: Wong Maye-E/AP Primark has warned that it could pull its clothes manufacturing operations out of Bangladesh...

Read More

Iran: vote early, and vote often The election is not going to be boycotted by the opposition, and this can only be good news

A young girl holds a photograph of Saeed Jalili, Iran's lead nuclear negotiator and a candidate in the country's presidential election on 14 June. Photograph: Vahid Salemi/AP However far elections in Iran fail the basic test of being free and fair, they are not, paradoxically foregone conclusions. Last month, as hundreds registered to stand for the presidential election, everyone groaned as the two heavyweights who could have counterbalanced the overarching power...

Read More

Comment is free Iran: an opportunity to be seized This is about more than one man – the way he came to power matters, too

Iran's new president, Hassan Rouhani, has come across as strongly critical of his country's current trajectory at home and abroad. Photograph: Corbis Amid the storm clouds thickening and darkening over Syria, there was one shaft of sunlight at the weekend: the election of a moderate cleric as Iran's president. Whether it is because of the west's bungled intervention in Iraq, or simply the law of unintended consequences, Iran's influence has indisputably...

Read More