Outgoing Chinese Premier Wei Jiabao returned to Beijing this week office after disappointing ASEAN and East Asia summits that failed to live-up to years of diplomatic posturing and positioning, designed to protect his country’s territorial ambitions in the South China Sea. The pro-Beijing lobby will no doubt praise his efforts in Cambodia where China successfully thwarted attempts […]
On Tuesday, a Palestinian medical team cranked open the West Bank grave of former Palestinian leader Yasir Arafat, took samples of his remains, and handed the evidence over to European experts to determine whether Arafat was poisoned — by Israel, the theory goes — before his death in 2004. “This will bring closure,” Arafat’s widow observed, “We […]
IN THE negotiations to reduce America’s long-term deficit and to avoid the “fiscal cliff” of automatic tax increases and spending cuts at the year’s end, Republicans have so far done most of the retreating. But they still want something in return. Emerging from the first—and so far only— negotiating session with Barack Obama on November […]
The backlash after the heady Arab revolutions of 2011. The rumblings of war with nuclear-aspiring Iran. The bloody persistence of Bashar al-Assad in civil war-torn Syria. Not to mention a Europe mired in its biggest crisis since World War II and an American presidential campaign that distracted and depressed in equal measure. If ever there […]
The announcement in the New York Times that Ehud Barak, the Israeli defence minister and former prime minister, is retiring from politics is a serious blow to anyone who wants to see the Jewish state take a rational and reasonable approach to global security issues. From his time as an officer in Israel’s elite Sayeret Matkal special forces […]
The announcement by the Norwegian Nobel Committee in October 2009 that Barack Obama had won the Peace Prize came as a surprise to just about everyone, including the recipient. The president, barely nine months into his new job, knew that the award was an encouragement of his aspirations, not recognition of his accomplishments. He said […]
Following the conclusion of the 18thParty Congress, a new Politburo Standing Committee, the top leadership body of the Chinese Communist Party, has been named. Much of the recent commentary has revolved around whether or how China’s new leaders will pursue much-needed economic and political reforms. An equally important question concerns the future direction of Chinese foreign policy under Xi […]
Political turmoil in Egypt entered its fourth day Monday, after President Mohammed Morsi’s surprise power-grabbing decree galvanized the opposition and set off rounds of street violence, at a time when the nation needs unity to make difficult economic decisions. Egypt’s economy was already in trouble, with foreign reserves having fallen 40 percent since the uprising […]
Early in 2012, a small group of US congressmen looking for alternatives to the Obama administration’s AfPak policy made recommendations for two changes in the region. The first, that instead of fantasizing about incorporating the Taliban into the Afghan political system the United States ought to rearm the Northern Alliance, had been discussed previously. The […]
Over the decades Turkey has dictated its Middle Eastern relations based on opportunities presented by shifts in the regional balance of power. In the early 1990s up until around 2006, Turkey was finely enmeshed in Western sentiments and policies. But beginning in 2006 it recognized a leadership vacuum in the Middle East and began attempting […]
looking beyond borders 