These riches are, however, a source of misery for Papuans, ensuring Indonesia's powerful military maintains a suffocating presence.

The burden of servicing debt and the payment of arrears have a suffocating effect on the economies of developing countries.

It's not something you have to worry about the air in this room all gathering over one part of the room and suffocating us.

Indeed, Palestine had become a suffocating open air prison for its people, although what happened there went largely unnoticed by the world media, especially in the West.

The witnesses implied in their testimonies to the Special Committee a common feeling that Palestine was suffocating and going through a kind of silent death, unnoticed by the entire world.

As the Special Committee had stated in its report, there was a common feeling that Palestine was suffocating and going through a kind of silent death, unnoticed by the entire world.

But, nowadays, research increasingly is misdirected toward lucrative prizes, professional recognition, and financial gains rewards that are suffocating the creativity and passion that scientific progress demands. As T.S. Eliot put it, Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge?

Darfur may be a less active war zone than it was a year ago, but violations of human rights continue to occur frequently, and active combat has been replaced by a suffocating environment of intimidation and fear, perpetuated by ever present militias.

Under such conditions, the option of Hamas agreeing to a cease fire and some form of power sharing with the Fatah led Palestinian Authority would no longer be viable. Sharon's disengagement plan may ultimately render the Gaza Strip little more than a suffocating ghetto isolated from Israel and the rest of the world.

The eurozone is unique among currency areas Its central bank lacks a state to support its decisions, while its member states lack a central bank to support them in difficult times. Europe s leaders have tried to fill this institutional lacuna with complex, non credible rules that often fail to bind, and that, despite this failure, end up suffocating member states in need.

BEIJING Even in the best of times, it is difficult for China s small and medium size enterprises to get bank loans. But with the current regimen of credit austerity, imposed to contain economic overheating and inflationary pressure, making conditions for SMEs worse, the financial sector the least reformed sector in China now is suffocating the beating heart of the country s economic dynamism.

The two most recent episodes the rioting and arson in French cities last autumn and the successful student campaign earlier this year against a new law governing young labor market entrants seem to have little in common. But their unifying thread is youth, unemployment, and uncertainty about the future, as well as the suffocating state paternalism that underlies the wider malaise itself.