China’s Shadow Is Looming Over Pakistan’s General Elections

Pakistan’s general election is set for July 25, and the battle lines are clear. Three parties are contending for the national leadership—the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), the Pakistan’s People’s Party (PPP), and the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI)—and all three have big issues to confront: the problem of deep ethnic divisions, the implications of Chinese-backed economic growth, […]

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Theresa May’s Government Nears Collapse As She Prepares To Host Trump

Ahead of the already-fraught process of hosting President Donald Trump later this week, the government of Theresa May faces the most serious test of her premiership. David Davis, the Brexit secretary, resigned his post this past weekend. Boris Johnson, the foreign secretary, followed suit Monday. At issue is the putative raison d’etre of May’s administration: British […]

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Prime Minister Khan

And then there were two: Imran and the Sanjrani-type option. Shahbaz has fizzled, Zardari is embattled and Nawaz — well, what would you do if you were Nawaz? Return Nawaz has promised to do, but his words aren’t very convincing. Because return to what? It was already apparent that he wasn’t interested in fighting a bruising […]

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Erdogan Set To Be Sworn In As Turkey’s First Executive President

Recep Tayyip Erdogan is set to be sworn in as president of Turkey after his election victory last month which allowed him to keep his post with increased powers. The inauguration ceremony on Monday will be attended by dozens of foreign leaders and dignitaries, including Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and Qatari Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani. […]

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What Next For Nawaz Sharif?

Disqualified from holding public office, disqualified from holding party office and now, sentenced to 10 years in jail by an accountability court — it has been a year of massive political and personal setbacks for Nawaz Sharif. The legal dimensions of the accountability court judgement will be pored over by independent analysts and can be assessed at […]

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How Russian Society Created Putin

The degree of Putin’s genuine popularity is unknowable. His reelection earlier this year was more a display of apathy than ardor. All polling and electoral data in Russia are suspect, but Putin clearly dominates the political culture. He has delivered the stability that many Russians craved before his presidency, although, as Dugin realized in 2012, […]

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Pakistan’s Terror Central

The tribal areas of Pakistan have been much in the news in the past decade and a half, following the US military intervention in Afghanistan after the 9/11 terror attacks. They were the “headquarters of terror”, with some of the most dreaded terror groups such as the Pakistan and Afghanistan Taliban, the al-Qaeda and the […]

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How Africa Is Bucking The Isolationist Trend

The world seems to be moving away from multilateralism. The United States has withdrawn from the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the Paris agreement on climate change, attacked the World Trade Organization, and threatened to start several trade wars. The United Kingdom is negotiating a messy exit from the European Union. But one place is bucking the […]

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