The 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China has selected the country’s next leaders. The leadership transition, however, will be formalized only with the consent of the National People’s Congress (NPC)—a puppet parliament with highly predictable voting patterns. Officially the highest state body in China, the NPC is mostly a showcase of democratic mimicry. […]
Chinese Vice Premier Li Keqiang, promoted last week to the No. 2 spot in the ruling Communist Party and set to take the job of premier in March, said three decades of economic opening must be accelerated as the push to overhaul the economy encounters obstacles. Li, speaking Nov. 21 at a meeting in Beijing, […]
When oil prices spiraled much higher in global markets between 2003 and 2008, the governments of several oil-producing nations — including Algeria, Bolivia, China, Ecuador, Russia and Venezuela — responded by expropriating local assets of independent oil companies that had contracted to operate in their territories, or by imposing large windfall taxes on their oil […]
This month, a curious thing happened in the annals of diplomacy. A country offered up a peace plan to put an end to a seemingly endless civil war in Syria. This country was not one of the usual foreign policy suspects — it was not the United States, it was not in Europe, and it wasn’t Syria’s […]
UNTIL the late 1950s America produced all the coal, oil and natural gas that its citizens could burn. But as they grew rich and bought cars as big as whales, America began to suck in fuel from beyond its shores. It now accounts for nearly a fifth of world energy consumption. China may be the […]
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 […]
Not too long ago it would have been unthinkable: the sight of a U.S. president standing next to Aung San Suu Kyi, the woman many believe should be — and might yet become — the president of her long-suffering country, Myanmar (also known as Burma). When Barack Obama was first elected to the White House […]
Xi Jinping, the new head of China’s ruling Communist Party, told his fellow leaders that unless they address corruption social unrest may rise and it could lead to the demise of the party. “The preponderance of facts tell us that the more severe the corruption problem becomes, it will ultimately lead the party and the nation […]
Sri Lanka‘s first communication satellite is expected to be launched on November 22, 2012 from the Xichang Satellite Launch Centre in China. This geostationary satellite would get operational by mid-2013 for commercial purposes. The satellite is partly owned by a private company, Sri Lanka’s first Satellite Company called SupremeSAT. The cost of the project is […]
The bruising Apple-Samsung fight raises major intellectual property rights (IPR) issues that South Korea and Asian economies generally are ill-prepared for. Unless the concerns raised by the Samsung-Apple dispute are resolved, Korea should expect regular trade friction with major partners and frequent accusations of copying and cheating. As wealthy countries like Korea move away from manufacturing […]
looking beyond borders 