Asia & Pacific
Defense & Security
NATO Summit: “Trump-proofing” Ukraine support while Biden appearances under a microscope
The July 9-11 NATO Summit was originally envisioned as a celebration of the alliance’s 75th anniversary at the organization’s founding venue in Washington D.C.,...
Energy
Russia failing to replace lucrative European gas deliveries with sales to China
Russia’s attempts to build the Power of Siberia 2 (PS-2) natural gas pipeline to China appear to be stalling despite repeated statements from Moscow...
International Organizations
Astana SCO Summit reaffirms its growing geopolitical role
The 24th summit of the Council of Heads of State of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), chaired by Kazakhstan, took place on July 4...
Asia & Pacific
Japan, the Republic of Korea (ROK), and the U.S. condemn DPRK-Russia Cooperation
During his June 19-20 visit to Pyongyang, Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un signed a comprehensive strategic partnership treaty...
The Philippines
Manila rejects Beijing’s South China Sea demands as “absurd”
The Philippine Coast Guard accused its Chinese counterpart on June 7 of blocking efforts to evacuate a sick member of its armed forces in...
China
Xi challenges a divided Europe
After the May 5-9 visit of President Xi Jinping to Europe most of the political analysts in Brussels who argued that the Chinese President's...
Development Assistance
Outline for Luzon Economic Corridor takes shape
While most headlines from the Indo-Pacific Business Forum held on May 21 in Taguig, just outside Manila, focused on the latest official data concerning...
Russia Sanctions
New wave of U.S. sanctions target Russia’s foreign suppliers and industrial base
On May 1, the U.S. Department of State together with the U.S. Treasury Department unveiled a wide-ranging new list of anti-Russia sanctions covering an...
Democracy & Human Rights
G7 Italy 2024 Foreign Ministers’ Statement on Addressing Global Challenges, Fostering Partnerships
The text of the following statement was released by the G7 foreign ministers of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the...
Democracy & Human Rights
Western corporations must be held accountable for their role in China’s Uyghur genocide
In recent testimony before the Senate, U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen stated that “the Biden Administration should be sanctioning human rights violations” there and...
Defense & Security
New U.S.-Japan-Philippines Pacific bulwark established
The leaders of Japan, the Philippines, and the United States met in Washington April 11 for the first ever trilateral summit with a deep...
The Philippines
U.S. condemns latest PRC actions in South China Sea as dangerous
Coming just days after U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited Manila (March 19), Washington released on March 23 a strongly worded statement of...
Myanmar
Myanmar’s instability deepens as the world watches silently
Myanmar’s stability has eroded significantly since the 2021 military coup. But the coordinated attacks by multiple separatist and pro-democracy groups in late 2023 has...
Defense & Security
Joint Statement on the Trilateral United States-Japan-Republic of Korea Indo-Pacific Dialogue
The inaugural Trilateral Indo-Pacific Dialogue between the United States Japan and South Korea was held on January 5, with this new format presented as...
Defense & Security
Washington strongly supports Manila in latest confrontation with Beijing
After a difficult year in the loosely defined maritime boundary region between China and the Philippines, including vessel collisions and Chinese use of water...
ASEAN
Why China’s new map has stirred regional tensions
In the waning days of summer, closely following a BRICS summit and mere days ahead of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and Group...
Development Assistance
New DFC commitments to maritime infrastructure projects
The US recently announced two major commitments to funding maritime infrastructure and related commercial projects, one in Sri Lanka and another in Greece through...
Minerals, Mining and Rare Earths
IEA warns transitions bring new risks to energy security
Clean technology and critical mineral supply chains are highly geographically concentrated, the International Energy Agency warned in its World Energy Outlook for 2023 and...
China
Central Asian leaders travel to China to pay homage to Xi’s BRI vision
China’s leader Xi Jinping threw a 10th anniversary bash for the Belt & Road Initiative (BRI), his $1-trillion plan to leverage Beijing’s financial resources...
Asia & Pacific
Ethnic violence in India explained
The ethnoreligious violence in the northeastern Indian state of Manipur between Meiteis and Kukis has been ongoing since May, but it was only in July 2023 when a...
Op-Eds & Guest Contributors
How countries prepare for population growth and decline
Early this year, India surpassed China as the most populous country in the world, with the latter having 850,000 fewer people by the end...
Asia & Pacific
US-ASEAN establish a research center in Washington, D.C.
Vice President Kamala Harris, who was in Jakarta for a US-ASEAN Summit on September 6, announced Washington’s decision to establish a joint center with...
Global Energy Insider
Mongolia to expand its economic and trade partnerships
Mongolia, the landlocked mineral-rich country bordered by Russia and China - the world's two preeminent authoritarian-run nations, is looking to expand its economic, trade,...
Op-Eds & Guest Contributors
Cambodia’s Hun Manet is a puppet prime minister; his father will still pull the strings
The handing over of power by Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen to his son Hun Manet is an attempt to maintain the old regime,...
China
Can Central Asia escape China’s debt trap?
While Washington focuses on the war in Ukraine, Russia and China seek to expand their influence in regions where the US is not sufficiently...
Afghanistan
The global impact two years after the Taliban’s takeover
Two years ago, the world saw the return of a repressive Taliban regime. The rapid fall of the Afghan government sent shockwaves throughout neighbouring...
Afghanistan
The Taliban and Islamic State continue to fight for Afghanistan’s future
In April, American officials confirmed that the Taliban had killed the head of the Islamic State (IS) cell operating in Afghanistan. Though his identity has...
Asia & Pacific
Cambodia’s current government is the face of tropical Fascism
There is no hope that the authoritarianism that the world sees in places like Russia, China and Cambodia can ever be interpreted as a peaceful and benign phenomenon, or that it should be accepted by an implicit racist or discriminatory assumption that some cultures just don’t have a democratic tradition and aren’t quite capable of ever developing one.
The Philippines
US & Philippines agree to ramp up defense cooperation
The US and Philippines announced on February 2 a substantial expansion of their existing military cooperation arrangements, increasing the number of facilities that American...
Analysis
Xi’s China could be more dangerous than Mao ever dreamed
China’s Communist Party, which has undergone a transformation back to its Maoist roots under Xi Jinping, has been caught off guard by the widespread...
China
Chinese operatives accused of supporting Huawei in the US
Chinese spies were conducting foreign intelligence operations to impede an ongoing investigation involving the technology and communications firm Huawei.
Russia
Major Japanese auto companies giving up on Russia
Toyota and Nissan, two major Japanese automakers with substantial manufacturing capacity, pulled out of Russia after both claimed that carrying out any future business...
China
How China took over the WTO behind the West’s back
Last year marked the 20th anniversary of China’s entry into the World Trade Organization, a result that followed 15 arduous years of negotiations. Many...
China
What South Korea’s new president means for Japan
On March 9, 2022, South Korean voters elected Yoon Suk-yeol – a former prosecutor turned politician from the main opposition People Power Party (PPP)...
Analysis
Historical differences will not erode an advantageous 21st-Century Chinese-Russian partnership
The 21st century has seen the forging of “cooperative” relations between China and Russia, with the benefits of this new partnership outweighing the historical differences between...
South Korea
EU blocks takeover of DSME by Hyundai Heavy Industries
The European Commission has prohibited the acquisition of Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering (DSME) by Hyundai Heavy Industries Holdings (HHIH), noting that the merger...
Analysis
The Korean Peninsula should remain a security concern
With both South Korea and the United States focused on domestic matters – 2022 presidential race and 2022 midterm elections respectively, it will be...
Analysis
Why China cannot invade Taiwan
China’s recent aerial incursion in Taiwan air defense zone and President Xi Jinping’s confrontational remarks re-prompted a debate on whether or not Beijing is...
Archive
EU, South East Asia launch Green Team Europe Initiative to protect the environment
During the 3rd ASEAN-EU Dialogue on Sustainable Development, European Union Commissioner for International Partnerships Jutta Urpilainen launched on November 18 a Green Team Europe...
Archive
ASEAN at a crossroads
The recently concluded ASEAN summit held under the chairmanship of Brunei was emblematic in underlining the ambitions of the regional South East Asian regional...
Archive
Clean energy key for net zero by 2050
Following the start of the COP26 global climate summit in Glasgow, Scotland, Alberto Troccoli, the managing director of World Energy & Meteorology Council at...
Archive
EU, UNEP launch International Methane Emissions Observatory
At the G20 Summit, on the eve of the COP26 UN climate conference in Glasgow, the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) with support from the...
Archive
Uzbekistan re-elects President Mirziyoyev to second term
Uzbekistan held presidential elections on October 24, in a peaceful and secure atmosphere, with incumbent President Shavkat Mirziyoyev handily taking first place with 80.1%...
Archive
A dash of UK Hubris: Containing China
Hubris is a fickle emotion. Too much of it can be deadly, while too little of it can be crushing. A country with a...
Afghanistan
In US foreign policy, realists are finally on the rise
During the autumn of 2020, the United States lost one of its most brilliant, incisive, yet unheralded thinkers in Sherle R. Schwenninger.One of Schwenninger’s...
Analysis
The need for trilateral cooperation in the Indo-Pacific
A coercive China and a nuclear North Korea are peripherally affecting the U.S.’ security interests in the Indo-Pacific. With increasingly well-developed power derived from...
Africa
EU-US mobilise further support for Global Methane Pledge
Ahead of the UN climate summit in Glasgow, European Union Executive Vice-President Frans Timmermans, who leads the EU's international negotiations on climate, and Special...
Afghanistan
Athens rocked by Biden’s nomination of political operative
After an extended period of uncertainty over who would be tapped, on October 8 US President Joe Biden announced his intention to nominate influential...
Analysis
Is the EU ready to protect its food supply chains?
The EU’s internal market commissioner Thierry Breton conducted a tour of Japan and South Korea last week, in a bid to strike up partnerships...
China
What kind of a threat Is Russia?
In his latest book, The Stupidity of War: American Foreign Policy and the Case for Complacency, American political scientist John Mueller demonstrates that since the...