The Pacific Islands region is in the midst of an information and communications technology (ICT) revolution that could have profound implications, particularly for democratic governance and the region’s development. Approximately 60 per cent of Pacific Islanders now have access to a mobile phone and this figure continues to climb. Mobile Internet is leapfrogging obvious barriers […]
The new Japanese prime minister reiterated his “values diplomacy” recently, confirming his nation’s “pillar” ties with the US and reaching out to two countries in particular, Australia and India. “Freedom, democracy, and fundamental human rights,” Shinzo Abe told the newspaper Yomiuri Shimbun in a December 28th interview. “We will deepen ties with nations that share and uphold these values.” […]
The 2008 Indo-U.S. Civilian Nuclear Agreement was supposed to mark a watershed moment for India – U.S. relations, ending the two democracies long-standing estrangement and ushering in a new era where New Delhi and Washington would be “indispensable partners.” But four years after the deal came into effect, much of the initial enthusiasm that it […]
The overlapping power transitions in East Asia’s three main economies promise to mark a defining moment in the region’s tense geopolitics. After the ascension in China of Xi Jinping, regarded by the People’s Liberation Army as its own man, Japan’s swing to the right in its parliamentary election seems set to fuel nationalist passion on both sides […]
Khin Yu Waddy Myint is manager at Pyrex Trading and Distribution, a Burmese pharmaceutical company that employs 250 people across the country. Part of her job is to source and import medicines from India and Australia, a task she concedes she doesn’t know enough about. “It is the first time for me to learn many […]
Worldwide, more than eight-in-ten people identify with a religious group. A comprehensive demographic study of more than 230 countries and territories conducted by the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion & Public Life estimates that there are 5.8 billion religiously affiliated adults and children around the globe, representing 84% of the 2010 world population of […]
Australia’s economy slowed last quarter as the government and consumers tightened spending, validating the central bank’s decision to cut interest rates yesterday. Third-quarter gross domestic product advanced 0.5 percent from the previous three months, when it expanded 0.6 percent, a Bureau of Statistics report released in Sydney today showed. The result compared with the median […]
There are many challenging numbers confronting China‘s new leaders, but two are especially stark. China has 20 per cent of the world’s population, but only nine per cent of the world’s farmland. And even that imbalance in the amount of land available to produce food for an increasingly demanding population of 1.3 billion is getting worse […]
A recent report on the humdrum subject of plans to build new coal-burning plants to generate electricity helps to explain why Asia – led by its rising economic giants, China and India – is at the epicentre of concern about global warming and climate change. Policy makers from nearly all of the world’s countries meet […]
China, Japan and South Korea started talks on a free-trade agreement vital to an Asia-wide deal in a move to forge closer economic ties even as they spar over disputed islands. The countries, representing three of Asia’s four biggest economies, will hold the first round of talks early next year, according to Xinhua, China’s official […]
looking beyond borders 