As tensions increase again on the Korean Peninsula, and China rethinking its rapport with Pyongyang, a reset could be in order between Seoul and Beijing.
Category: Ideas
After UK Prime Minister David Cameron’s support for a referendum on pulling out of the European Union, a German viewpoint on what it means for a country and a continent.
Many across the Arab region believed Muslim Brotherhood leadership in Egypt was the path to a new unity to defy Israel and the U.S. in the region. A different reality is setting in.
A Bosnian Serb who fled the Balkans as a teenager reflects on how hard it is to face the past in the Balkans, as much for history’s winners as losers.
–Analysis– RABAT – Recent estimates from the Moroccan High Commission For Planning (HCP) found the median age for marriage in Morocco was 31 for men and 27 for women. There are many reasons for this – more years spent studying, and the high cost of housing and wedding ceremonies being the most obvious. Some, it […]
Japan has just crossed perhaps the most vivid line in the demographic divide. Still, there are other surprises about what may ensure future economic growth across Asia.
-Editorial- BEIJING – The ambulance was stuck behind a sea of cars. Even though its blue lights were flashing and its siren was blaring, no cars gave way. Instead they squeezed by skillfully, one after the other. The video, which captures perfectly how difficult it is for an ambulance to drive through the streets of […]
CAIRO – “Hey there, Number 28!” – A friend texts me using my new nickname. Indeed, for at least one day of every month that’s what I answer to; Number 28. That’s where I fall in the list of 43 defendants on trial for working in what the government deemed “illegal civil society organizations.” It’s […]
Categories
Brennan And The Targeted Killing Legacy
John Brennan as CIA Director: What It Means
-OpEd- BEIJING – Despite strong opposition from the international community, North Korea went ahead with its planned use of a long-range rocket to launch a satellite. As the North Koreans were cheering the successful Dec. 4 launch, their longtime Chinese ally was in no mood for celebrations. North Korea’s missile and nuclear capabilities have been […]
-Essay- BERLIN – It would have been better if she had dark circles under her eyes. Maybe a little bit of flab around the middle. At the very least a stain on her blouse – anything. Instead, in her first public appearance since the birth of her son, Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer was as slim […]
SANTIAGO – Enrique Peña Nieto hasn’t stopped moving. Since he took over as president of Mexico, two weeks ago, he has signed enough documents and made enough promises to keep his government busy for the whole six years they have in front of them. In his inaugural address, he laid out a 13-point plan with […]
OpEd: Prime Minister Mario Monti has announced his resignation, after Silvio Berlusconi sabotages his technical government. Why can’t Italy be a “normal” country?
In November, both the U.S. presidential election and China’s change of leadership took place. They were the two most watched events of the year. China’s transfer of power within the party has become increasingly institutionalized. Meanwhile, America’s history of democratic election is deep-rooted and continues to play a fundamental role in its national and social […]
Let’s be real, says this commentator, Israeli settlers on the West Bank aren’t going away, UN statehood for Palestine notwithstanding. Here’s another way to imagine a two-state solution.
-Analysis- BRUSSELS – “It’s done,” a relieved Viviane Reding tweeted in several languages. The European Union Commission had finally approved her plan for women to constitute 40% of non-executive board directorships in large listed companies in Europe by the year 2020. In October, Reding had delayed the launch of her proposal which, having now been […]
-Essay- After Mo Yan won this year’s Nobel Prize for Literature, many Chinese people predicted that this would contribute greatly to the expansion of Chinese culture in the world. I sincerely hope so. However, in peaceful times the transmission and penetration of a culture are extremely slow. The Italian Jesuit priest, Matteo Ricci (1552-1610), was […]
TOKYO – The conflict between Japan and China over the sovereignty of the inhabited Senkaku Islands (Diaoyu in Chinese) is symptomatic of Tokyo’s diplomatic weakness. In its duel with Beijing, Japan appears isolated in its claim and abandoned by its allies. The United States announced that the islands were covered by the U.S.-Japan security treaty, […]
-Essay- SANTIAGO – As recent nationwide municipal elections proved once again, there’s never a shortage of surprises when it comes to politics in my country. The elections were a real blow to the rightist government of President Sebastián Piñera, a businessman who three years ago displaced the center-left Concertacion coalition that had led Chile since […]
His name is Xi Jinping (pronounced Shee Jin-ping). The future Chinese leader was born into privilege as a child of the “red dynasty.” His father was an old revolutionary companion of Mao’s. But after his father’s fall into disgrace, Xi experienced poverty, prison and the hardships of peasant life. What kind of leader will he […]
-Essay- As someone who writes and lectures about women and gender in Islam, I am often asked if women had any role in the making of the Islamic tradition. Happily, the answer is always yes. There were in fact many prominent women in the early history of Islam. At the top of the list would […]
-Essay- PARIS – If we ask the French what they don’t understand about the U.S. elections, we are spoiled for choices. Having seen French commentary on the Obama-Romney duel, the most pointed area of incomprehension is “what it means to be an American Republican.” We just can’t seem to wrap our French brains around this […]
-Editorial- BEIJING – In response to a letter sent by a women’s rights NGO regarding quota on enrollment of women in certain colleges and universities, China’s Education Ministry said that this restriction was based on “considerations of national interest.” The officials probably thought they would subdue any unruly voices with such a pompous answer. However, […]
-Editorial- BEIJING – Just like the former extrajudicial “Custody and Repatriation” procedure for moving beggars and homeless people out of Chinese cities, the Re-education Through Labor (RTL) camp system has long been criticized. There is now a general consensus that the unjustified administrative procedures of the labor camp system should be reformed. After years of […]
-Analysis- PARIS – In Paulo Coelho’s book The Alchemist, the shepherd Santiago travels to the ends of the earth seeking a treasure that was close by all along. And sometimes, too, we find the key to understanding what is happening in our country today by reading about things far away. Two scholarly articles published last […]
Categories
Is Africa’s Economic Miracle Just A Mirage?
-Analysis- In the financial press, Africa is now hailed as the “go-to” continent. It seems to be at the cusp of a golden age: its growth and direct foreign investment rates recall those of China at the beginning of the 2000s; South Africa has become one of the booming BRICS (Brazil-Russia-India-China-South Africa). The continent also […]
-Op-Ed- MOSCOW – The reality of our lives in Russia is that the beginning of the 21st century is being dominated by the political leadership of Vladimir Putin. But it is perfectly obvious that the next couple of years will be the most difficult, and for Russian society these years will be the most important. […]
BEIJING – What exactly is the Chinese dream? You could define it using current key words buzzing on the Internet: “the counter-attack of the diao-sze”, meaning the little people, and in particular the poor who succeed in raising their status in society through their own great efforts. The Chinese dream is related to the “American […]
-OpEd- BERLIN – In a recent appearance on German TV, former chancellor Helmut Schmidt repeated something he had already said earlier about Germans bearing more responsibility for Europe than other nations because of the “”industrial” killing of “six million Jewish fellow citizens.” Bulls**t. And on three counts. First of all, the overwhelming majority of Holocaust […]
-Analysis- MUNICH – Last month, for a moment, crisis-plagued European nations seemed to have reason to rejoice: Germany’s Constitutional Court had cleared the way for the European Stability Mechanism, the European Central Bank (ECB) announced its plan for potentially unlimited purchases of government bonds in crisis countries, and the EU Commission laid out a new […]
SANTIAGO – The U.S. Federal Reserve’s recently announced stimulus package, designed to strengthen the American economy, offered a clear reminder of the huge gap that exists today between Mexico and the rest of Latin America. While Mexico enthusiastically applauded the Fed’s decision to begin pumping $40 billion per month into the U.S. economy through the […]
We often hear about the rise of the middle class in Asia, and in particular in the fast developing countries such as China and India. However, what exactly is the “middle class”? The term is widely cited around the world, applied without hesitation by all sorts of people. Nevertheless, it means different things to different […]
-Analysis– Karen L. King, the first woman to occupy the Hollis Chair of Divinity at Harvard, recently caused a sensation in Rome. At the International Congress for Coptic Studies, she revealed a fragment of papyrus measuring 4 cm by 8 cm (1.6 inches by 3.15 inches), dating back to the fourth century and covered with […]
-Analysis- Since the beginning of the crisis provoked by the Islamophobic film The Innocence of Muslims, the media have written about it from almost every angle: Coptic extremism, the danger of Salafism, the “arrogance” of the West, the “backwardness” of the Arab world, the shock of civilizations between the Sacred and Freedom of Speech, the […]
-OP-ED- In China, anti-Japanese sentiment is running very high. The call for a military occupation of the Diaoyu Islands is popular among the public. Managing Sino-Japanese relations and maintaining peace in the East China Sea has become a matter of urgency. China and Japan’s conflicting claims over the sovereignty of the Diaoyu Islands have always […]
-Analysis- LIMA – The negotiations that are set to begin formally in October are by no means the first attempt to demobilize members of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and incorporate the guerilla organization into the political process. There’s no guarantee, therefore, that these talks will succeed where others have failed. And yet […]
In no uncertain terms, the editor-in-chief of Moroccan daily Le Soir/Echos condemns the violence at US embassies in nearby Muslim capitals.
Essay: The fury of fundamentalist Muslims should not obscure efforts to consolidate democracy.