Mandy新聞英語閱讀

哇，大家有沒有看到這一期經濟學人的封面照片，埃及的金字塔火山不斷的冒著煙，眼看就要爆發了。

請一併複習我們這期上的敘利亞及中東局勢囉！

The Arab spring

Egypt in 1)peril-Courtesy of The Economist

Beneath the 2)chaos lies a complex power struggle between generals and Islamists. The West should back the latter

埃及在軍人與伊斯蘭教徒的複雜權力鬥爭下，情況更混亂。

西方應該支持伊斯蘭教徒。

Jun 23rd 2012 | from the print edition

A YEAR and a half after the optimism of the 3)Arab spring, the Middle East is in frightening 4)turmoil. Syria is close to sliding into a full-scale 5)civil war whose outcome is unknowable, though its 6)bloodstained president, Bashar Assad, looks likely sooner or later to fall. Libya, mercifully 7)shorn of its crazy 8) tyrant, is being periodically rocked by the still-9)untamed 10)militias that ousted him; its general election, scheduled for this month, has been pushed back until next. Yemen, having shed its ruling 11)bully of 33 years, has become 12)al-Qaeda’s favourite haunt. Tunisia, which had been gliding most smoothly from 13)despotism to democracy, has seen 14)riots by religious extremists  Sudan’s 15)vile government and Oman’s more 16)amiable one have also both been 17)rattled by protests. And in Saudi Arabia a long-lingering 18)succession crisis is back starkly in the spotlight with the death of its 19)crown prince  

大意：在阿拉伯之春帶來的曙光一年半後，中東處於讓人生畏的混亂局面。敘利亞的內戰眼看就要全面開打，雖不知道結果如何，但手上沾滿血腥[記得我們上的虎拉鎮事件嗎？]的總統阿薩德遲早會倒台。利比亞好不容易脫離了暴政，卻也因為民兵的騷動而陷入週期性的動盪。這個月即將舉行的大選也被迫延後。葉門雖然擺脫了三十三年的暴政，但卻也因為變成阿爾蓋達組織的樂土所苦。突尼西亞雖然是最平順的轉化為民主政治，但也因為宗教極端分子而暴動。蘇丹的邪惡政府與阿曼相形親民的政府都因為抗議聲浪而鼓譟著。沙烏地阿拉伯長久以來的繼承問題又因為王儲的死亡而又成為焦點。