Few people are happier to see 2012 end than Hu Jintao, Yoshihiko Noda or Lee Myung Bak. It was a rocky year for the leaders of China, Japan and South Korea, who leave office with legacies in tatters. Gripes about President Hu doing little about China’s biggest challenges outnumbered the accolades. Noda’s premiership ended as ingloriously as those of the […]
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said that India and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) have concluded negotiations for a free trade agreement (FTA) in services and investments. The background work clears the way for greater economic and political integration between India and the bloc of 10 countries that accounts for a GDP of about […]
The signs are unmistakable. Once again, the West is preparing to escalate military intervention in the Arab and Muslim world. This time the target is Syria. Since the US presidential election, the warnings have multiplied. First, in a breathtaking reprise of the falsehood that paved the way for the invasion of Iraq, US and British […]
The India–Israel friendship has been flying very well under the radar for years, arguably to the benefit of both sides. But Israel now wants a public acknowledgement of the bond. It would like India to invite President Shimon Peres for a visit to put a seal on the relationship and take it to a higher […]
In the United States, it’s the Kennedys and Bushs; in South Korea, it’s the Parks. On December 19, South Korea elected Park Geun-Hye as president — but she’s not just the country’s first female head of state, she’s heir to a controversial political legacy. Her father, Park Chung-hee, was South Korea’s dictator in the 1960s […]
As the war in Afghanistan winds down, with the withdrawal of American combat troops scheduled to be completed by the end of 2014, there’s a modest ratcheting up of movement towards a reconciliation with the Taliban. Though many analysts are skeptical a deal can be reached within the limited amount of time before the withdrawal, and though […]
One year ago, the chubby and blubbering soon-to-be leader of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea was seen walking alongside the hearse that carried his dead father, Kim Jong Il. Kim Jong Un was young, inexperienced, unqualified, and bereft of any of the larger-than-life myths that had sustained his father’s and grandfather’s rules. And yet, […]
We’ve been saying it for years: This coming year represents the moment of truth on Iran. Except that this year, it’s for real: 2013 represents the moment of truth on Iran. The year the Iranians pass the point of no return in their drive to the bomb. Or the year, one way or another, they […]
The crisis was precipitated by weakness in the global economy and the effects of recent policy errors. Other contributors were the strategies left over from the pre-1991 Soviet-style planning era and the Congress Party’s socialist background and bent toward income redistribution in favor of rural areas instead of economic growth. Furthermore, the elections scheduled for 2014 […]
The leading demographic accounts of contemporary slavery project a global slave population of between 20 million and 30 million people. Most of these people are in sedentary forms of slavery, such as hereditary collateral-debt bondage. But about 20 percent have been unwittingly trafficked though the promise of opportunity by predators through varying combinations of deception […]
