15 January 2007
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From the Editor…
Welcome to the New Statesman website. Whether you are a new reader or an existing one - online or via the magazine - I hope you'll enjoy the great writing, fresh ideas and provocative debate that make the New Statesman Britain's award-winning current affairs weekly
Cover story
Africa's inferno
In the Darfur region of Sudan, civilians are raped and killed, not for land or goods, but because of who they are. The killing is an end in itself.
Features
Brown's year zero
The wait will soon be over for Gordon Brown. After dogged resistance, the Blairites have given up trying to stop the transition. And a parallel government is being established
When good intentions turn to dust
Charles Clarke asks whether Gordon Brown has what it takes to pursue a progressive foreign policy
Saudi torture: a Whitehall cover-up
It is not just in arms deals that Britain twists the law to please the Saudis. The human rights lawyer Geoffrey Bindman tells another shocking story
Britain's moving story
New studies of names and genes are confounding core beliefs about being British. We are unadventurous, our family ties are strong and women are exceptionally faithful
Get a life
Every year 100,000 Britons seek the services of a life coach. Do you need one, too? Viv Groskop doubts it
Regulars
New Statesman Leader
Patients should be treated and not turned into pre-criminals
Legislating is the easy option. The real scandal in mental health lies in the lack of psychiatrists and hospital beds
Diary
An unlikely anti-war pin-up
My attitude to columnists critical of political journalists like me is that I'm glad they're saying what they're saying but I can't bring myself to join them
Lame man's terms No 3960
Set by Brendan J O'Byrne
Prose that makes (some sort of) sense to the hearer, but absolutely none to the reader
Arts & Culture
Agent provocateur
Alejandro González Iñárritu's latest film, Babel, has provoked anger in the US. Here he talks about Hollywood, George Bush and confronting global injustice
Theatre
Hear no evil, see no evil
Real-life story draws uncomfortable parallels between Israel and the Nazis
IWitness Finborough Theatre, London SW10
Film
A string of mangled opportunities
Forest Whitaker as Idi Amin gives a fine performance against all the odds
The Last King of Scotland (15)
dir: Kevin Macdonald
Television
When fashion gets ugly
A sly satire on race and class makes a welcome and witty comment on the US
Ugly Betty
Channel 4
Travels
In the cold Thai hills
Carl Wilkinson made a journey to meet the Karen tribes of Burma - and found them in Thailand
Drink
Resolution: don't diet
Nicholas Clee is determined to shop better and eat more brassicas (probably)
Books
Torturer's Apprentice
The Inquisitor’s Guide
Bernard Gui, trans Janet Shirley Ravenhall, 208pp, £15.99
Home affairs
Hyde Park Gate News: the Stephen family newspaper
edited by Gill Lowe Hesperus, 250pp, £14.99
Poetry corner
The big poetry prizes, embittered critics claim, are judged by a cabal of sinister academics determined to scare away readers. Not so, writes T S Eliot Prize judge Sean O'Brien
Temple of unreason
The Tibetan Book of the Dead
eds Graham Coleman and Thupten Jinpa, trans. Gyurme Dorje Penguin, 592pp, £12.99
The real Peter Rabbit
Beatrix Potter: a life in nature
Linda Lear Allen Lane, the Penguin Press, 583pp, £25
Miraculous conversion
Trickster Travels: in search of Leo Africanus, a 16th-century Muslim between worlds
Natalie Zemon Davis Faber & Faber, 435pp, £20
Faking it, Byron-style
Imposture
Benjamin Markovits Faber & Faber, 20opp, £10.99
Observations
NHS: Can this patient survive?
Reform of the health service is slowing just as it needs to intensify. If we don't accelerate now, billions of pounds will have been wasted, warns the top cancer consultant
Farmers find a new friend
Mugabe is inviting white farmers back after previously pledging to clear them from Zimbabwe's farms
