Hilde F Johnson, the former UN Special Representative in South Sudan, provides an insider’s account of the years following the country’s declaration of independence in July 2011. From her vantage point in Juba, Johnson witnessed how the seeds of conflict were sown and the rapid escalation of violence into what Desmond Tutu describes in his foreword as ‘an atrocious and senseless civil war’. This in-depth study of the new nation attempts to answer the question: why?

This compelling book tells the dramatic story of the Arab Spring and its troubled aftermath through the lives of ordinary people, showing how the bright hopes of 2011 descended into civil war, autocracy and fanaticism. A Libyan rebel must decide whether to kill his brother’s murderer; a jihadi discovers that life in the Islamic State is far from paradise; and two young Syrian women’s friendship turns to enmity as their sects go to war.

China is rapidly becoming the most powerful nation on earth, and its leader, Xi Jingping, is enshrined in its constitution – an honour not seen since Chairman Mao. This succinct, accessible primer charts his rise to power and explains his world-view, his plans to eradicate poverty and extend his country’s global reach, his thoughts on China’s Communist legacy – and how far he is prepared to go to defend it.

Margaret Thatcher remains one of Britain’s most polarizing prime ministers. This provocative investigation sheds new light on the Iron Lady’s war against the ‘enemies within’: striking miners, trades unionists, anti-nuclear protestors, feminists, gay rights campaigners and poll tax protesters. Drawing on countless news reports, studies and personal recollections, it sifts the real conspiracies from the theories that flourished in a paranoid age, to chart the lasting effects of the growth of the secret state on British society.

Riot police patrol the borders, children’s bodies wash up on beaches, and refugees crowd into makeshift camps; how did the EU, founded on the values of human rights and dignity for all, reach this point? With vigour and compassion, Cast Away reveals the human stories behind the numbing statistics through the first-hand accounts of five people forced to flee their homelands, and forms a scathing indictment of Europe’s political leadership.

In this meticulously researched, fiercely argued book, the columnist Peter Hitchens responds to the legion of politicians, commentators and cultural figures who repeatedly declare that the ‘war on drugs’ has failed. Hitchens makes the case that the ‘war’ was never really fought, and that since the adoption of the Wootton Report in 1971, which classified cannabis as a ‘soft’ drug, successive governments have pursued a policy of covert legalization, effectively disarming the police in their efforts to counter this threat.

In October 1956, the Hungarian people rebelled against their Soviet overlords; by 4 November, the revolt had been brutally crushed, leaving thousands dead and a quarter of a million in exile. Erich Lessing (b.1923) was the first Western photographer on the scene: accompanied by short essays on the revolution, the 150 images reproduced here capture the hope and despair of the short-lived uprising.

Jang Jin-Sung was one of North Korea’s most senior counter-intelligence officers, a member of Kim Jong-Il’s inner circle, with all the privileges that entailed. Yet he could not ignore the disparity between his own life and the lives of the people he saw starving in the street. In this harrowing first-hand account, he describes the inner workings of the secretive state, and recounts his own daring escape across a frozen river into China to freedom in the West.

Since its foundation in 1948, Israel has been torn between its ambition to be ‘a light unto nations’ and its desire to expand its borders. Drawing on declassified documents, personal archives and interviews, this epic history demonstrates how military service binds Israelis to lifelong loyalty and secrecy, making democracy a hostage to the armed forces. A compelling study of character, rivalry, conflict and the competing impulses for war and peace in the Middle East.

The genocide of one million Armenians in the Ottoman Empire in 1915-16 was the greatest atrocity of the First World War, and remains a divisive, hotly contested issue to this day. This major study attempts to understand not only the tragedy itself, but the contending narratives that have surrounded it over the century that followed. Meticulously researched and scrupulously fair, it also charts the courageous attempts at reconciliation between Armenians and Turks.

By August 1969, the two-year campaign for civil rights in Northern Ireland, under increasing attack from loyalist paramilitaries, exploded into rioting on the streets of Belfast. This book charts three days that changed the course of Northern Irish history and radicalized a generation of Catholic youth. It sets the events in their historical context, includes interviews with individuals from both sides, and with British Army officers, and asks how we can avoid the mistakes of the past.

Israel's victory in the Six-Day War of 1967 gave the young nation new confidence, but not all of its consequences were beneficial. In the final volume of his acclaimed trilogy charting Israel's history, Leslie Stein provides a vivid account of the country's economic, social and political development over the past four decades, its military engagements, its relations with the Palestinians, the settlements in the West Bank and Gaza, and the varying fortunes of migrants from Russia and Ethiopia.

The overthrow of Qaddafi in 2011 appeared to signal a new dawn for Libya, but the country's future now seems uncertain once again. This comprehensive study navigates Libya's long history of occupation and despotic rule, from the ancient Greeks, through the Ottoman Empire to Mussolini. It provides an in-depth account of Qaddafi's regime, the Lockerbie bombing and the Arab Spring, and assesses the prospects for democracy in this troubled land.

In 2012 the security journalist Glenn Greenwald received an email from Edward Snowden, a contractor for the National Security Agency. At a clandestine meeting in Hong Kong Snowden handed over flash drives detailing the scale of illegal spying by the USA and Britain. This bestselling book gives the inside story of what followed: the fear of discovery and arrest, Snowden's flight to Russia, and the attempts to cover up this massive abuse of power.

With characteristic rigour, balance and readability, one of the world's foremost experts on the Israel-Palestine conflict charts its development from the 1917 Balfour Declaration to the 2008 invasion of Gaza. Shlaim assesses the impact of key figures such as Yasser Arafat, Ariel Sharon, Edward Said and Benny Morris, re-examines the role of the US, explores the many missed opportunities for peace, and considers the troubled region's future prospects.

In 2008, as Robert Mugabe refused to cede power after losing an election, Godwin defied the ban on foreign journalists and returned to his native Zimbabwe to see at first hand the violence and injustices of the dictator's regime during the period known as the Fear. In this book he describes his visits to the opposition leaders, farmers, churchmen and diplomats who courageously put their lives on the line as they resisted Mugabe's thugs. Felt-tip mark on lower trimmed edge.

As Scotland, Wales and England go their separate ways, what is left of Great Britain? Founding editor of the Independent on Sunday, now a columnist with the Guardian, Ian Jack is one of Britain's most insightful social commentators. This collection of his articles spans 20 years and ranges from the Titanic to consumerism, and reflects - often ruefully - on what it means to be British today.

Afghanistan is one of the world's most ancient and fascinating countries, yet in recent decades it has been scarred by successive invasions and civil conflict. These stunning, richly atmospheric photographs by Seamus Murphy - taken on many expeditions over 14 years - inevitably confront the ravages of war, but they also capture the stark beauty of the landscape, the dignity and resilience of its people, and the richness of its culture.

Since 2001, the US 'War on Terror' has achieved what Osama bin Laden could not: the unification of the jihad under the banner of Al-Qa'ida. In this important and meticulously researched study, Lebanese-born investigative journalist Camille Tawil draws on his unique access to key players to show how the failure of nationalist struggles in Egypt, Libya and elsewhere has drawn insurgents into Al-Qa'ida's orbit, with alarming implications for global security.

A comprehensive overview of the evolution of Shi’i opposition in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia from the Iranian Revolution in 1979 to the ascension of King

Bird and Marshall examine how and why the international community failed to achieve its October 2001 objectives in Afghanistan and why life has got worse rather than better for many Afghan citizens.

In this history of modern Wales - that 'complex and contradictory nation' - Martin Johnes focuses on the central issue of national identity as he examines in detail the remarkable transformations the country has undergone since the Second World War and what those transformations have meant in the lives of Welsh people. Covering a period during which 'Wales was remade from an idea into something more tangible', the study culminates in devolution. No jacket.

Islamic fundamentalism has grabbed the headlines as both a threat to the West and a potentially revolutionary trend in the Middle East. This authoritative study provides a much-needed overview of its origins and diverse strands, the effects of colonialism on Islam, secularism and the Islamic reaction, the effects of globalization, and political violence in the 9/11 era. This fully revised and updated edition also examines recent developments in the wake of the Arab Spring of 2011.

No jacket.

More than 3,500 people were killed during the conflict in the North of Ireland between 1969 and 1998, leaving a terrible legacy of grief and bitterness. Drawing on interviews with survivors, families and friends on both sides of the sectarian divide, this book explores the difficult aftermath of the Troubles, as some seek truth and justice while others prefer to forget. Humane, impartial and moving, it gives voice to the ordinary people too often overlooked in official histories.

John Simpson spent over two decades reporting from Saddam Hussein's Iraq. This is his compelling account of his experiences. He examines the period leading up to the 1991 Gulf War, the increasing tyranny of the regime in the years that followed, and the controversial question of the country's weapons programme. He offers his frank assessment of George Bush and Tony Blair's decision to go to war in 2003, and traces its chaotic aftermath up to the capture of Saddam.

Dealing analytically with the movement as a whole, this is a study of the East German uprising that overthrew Honecker's regime and culminated in the transition to parliamentary democracy in 1990. No jacket.

Western commentators usually attribute the turmoil in the Middle East to interference by global powers such as Britain, France, Russia and the USA. This provocative study aims to overturn that view, arguing that it is the culmination of long-existing trends in the region, from the disintegration of the Ottoman Empire to the rise of Isil, and that only when Middle Eastern people take responsibility for their actions, and the West drops its condescending approach, can the region look forward to a real Arab Spring.

In 2003, for the first time since the Second World War, the UK invaded a sovereign state: Iraq. In 2016 Sir John Chilcot delivered his long-awaited report on the war; its 2.6 million words fill twelve volumes. This accessible edition of the executive summary allows the reader to make up their own mind about the crucial questions. Did Saddam have chemical weapons? Were they a threat? Was the war legal? And was the planning adequate?

Fidel Castro (1926-2016) was a towering figure, the leader of Cuba's revolution and one of the world's last Communist strongmen; but his fiercely defended privacy meant that biographers could barely scratch the surface of his personal life. Here Juan Sanchez, once Castro’s bodyguard, but later persecuted by the regime, shares his intimate knowledge of this 'man of the people' who amassed vast personal wealth (partly through government-sanctioned drug-running) and enjoyed a lavish lifestyle including a luxury yacht and secret island marina.

Subtitled The Impact of the Good Friday Agreement on Northern Ireland, this volume looks at post-conflict peace- building efforts in the political, social and economic long-term peace.

Books 3 and 4 (The Certainties of Place and A Thicker Cut), here bound in a single volume, continue Kynaston's extraordinarily evocative narrative, from an ailing King George VI opening the Festival of Britain and the Conservative victory that made Churchill once more Prime Minister, to the Suez crisis, Soviet action in Hungary and bus fares raised in Lowestoft to offset petrol rises. Slightly off-mint.

In this third edition of Macdonald's widely praised introduction to Korea (first published 1988), Donald Clark has revised and updated the study to cover developments on the peninsula from 1988 to 1995.

This concise, readable and timely book offers an in-depth treatment of environmental, social and demographic issues, discussing topics such as energy supplies, cross-border crime and immigration.

Kenneth Roy's panorama of post-war Scottish life begins with the VE Night celebrations in the spring of 1945 and proceeds year by year to November 1975, when the first North Sea oil was pumped ashore. Using a wealth of contemporary accounts, the book tells a complex and often disturbing story of a country riven by poverty, struggling for a sense of its own identity, and ill-served by its masters. With a new post-Independence referendum afterword by the author.

In this hard-hitting account of Britain's military occupation of southern Iraq, from the aftermath of the 2003 invasion to 2009, when the last British troops were ordered to leave by the Iraqi government, Richard North argues that the occupation was an abject failure and the blame lies with the Blair government's failure to provide the Army with the forces and equipment to meet a challenge that it and the military establishment had hopelessly misread from the start.