Having rapidly become one of the world’s premier (and fastest) builders of high-speed rail, China is now looking to export its know-how around the world.
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China’s High-Speed Rail Diplomacy
Category: Geopolitics
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Iraq’s Thirty Years War, And Counting
Since 1979, Iraqis have known only war and conflict, both from outside and within. With Islamist radicals advancing toward Baghdad, the future looks as grim as ever.
MOSCOW — The funeral for the two young men was held on June 7 in a church in Kubinka, near Moscow. Aleksander Efremov and Alekei Yurin had gone to Donbas in the midst of the battle over the Donetsk airport in the eastern Ukrainian city. Neither came home alive. It was May 22 when 20-year-old […]
Words making news…News making words.
The trafficking of young men as soldiers is on the rise in Syria. One mother thought her 16-year-old was being taken to find medical treatment, until she saw a photo of him in uniform.
A Polish reporter checks out sentiment in the heart of UKIP country after the anti-immigration party’s success in recent European elections.
One hundred years ago, the Archduke of Austria was assassinated by a Serbian ideologue. Today, the threats are different but, like in 1914, conflicts are multiplying and leaders failing.
BRUSSELS — The Ukraine crisis and Russia’s aggressive behavior have hit NATO right between the eyes. Utterly caught off guard, the defense alliance has begun asking itself how it must react, both in the short-term actions, as well as bigger questions about NATO’s role for the future. The pressure to be decisive has a firm […]
BUREBIEY — Six months ago, the brown water of the Baro River was flowing peacefully between South Sudan and Ethiopia, and the town of Burebiey was just another dot on the map in western Ethiopia. But now, we are standing at a key crossing point for refugees of a spreading civil war. Throughout the day, […]
MOSCOW — Upon getting the news that the United States and European Union wouldn’t issue travel visas to certain senior officials as part of the continuing sanctions in response to Russia’s annexation of Crimea, no one in Moscow complained out loud. Indeed, several prominent officials publicly declared that they would vacation in Russia, even if […]
After the verdict sentencing Al Jazeera journalists to prison, it is difficult to consider the country’s court system independent. Dark days ahead for freedom of expression in Egypt.
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In Kirkuk, Last Bastion For The Kurds
Facing advancing jihadist fighters, the Iraqi army fled without fighting, and the city of Mosul fell on June 10. Kirkuk, a multiethnic oil city, has been saved by Kurdish fighters. So far.
How did a city known for its ethnic and religious mix roll over for a band of Islamist radicals? In the wake of the ISIS conquest of Mosul, the spectre of it spreading to the capital looms.
MOSCOW — According to a recent poll, the number of Russian citizens who would be prepared to vote for President Vladimir Putin if he were up for reelection now has been increasing every month since Russia annexed Crimea. In April, his approval rating was 62%, in May it increased to 73%. At the beginning of […]
Sure to be the leading candidate in August’s first-ever direct election of Turkey’s president, the current prime minister is touring Europe to woo Turks living abroad. Not all are convinced.
Newsmaking images that caught our eye.
As Islamists gain ground in Iraq and Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki appeals for help, the U.S. says it will only help if he first resigns. But it’s not the only reason why his regime may fall.
The growing tendency to say ‘there is no just war’ is just a way to keep one’s hands clean, while leaving it to others to pay the consequences for your freedom. A view from Germany.
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A Challenger For Erdogan
The main opposition parties have chosen Edmeleddin Ihsanoglu to run against Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the Aug. 10 presidential election. A summer campaign is about to heat up.
Another twist on the geopolitical and economic chessboard. As relations sour with Russia over Ukraine, Europe looks at an increasingly accessible Iran. But it’s not so simple.
The abduction of three young Israelis unfolded across the Internet, even as newspapers in Israel were barred from reporting it. What does social media mean for both democracy and security?
The ISIS assault in Iraq is spectacular proof that the U.S. has failed in the Middle East. It’s time for a return to power politics and a bloc of former enemies to take on the extremists.
The Islamist radical group’s conquests in Iraq could help it take control of parts of eastern and northern Syria it had been forced to abandon.
The Arab Spring is now but a tiny trickle, as the new Egyptian government jails not just the Brotherhood but activists of any kind. Those still standing continue, despite the poor odds.
BEIJING — With President Barack Obama’s recent announcement that the United States will remove all military forces in Afghanistan by the end of 2016, American foreign policy is preparing to turn a page full of blood and tears. But this also may mark the beginning of another era: when China will play a prominent role […]
WARSAW — While protests swept Maidan Square in Kiev, both Polish and German media reported the same storyline: Ukraine was overthrowing a bloody dictator and changing its course toward the West. German politicians, much like their Polish counterparts, made fiery speeches and pushed the European Union to address a “serious offer” to Ukrainians. The pro-Ukrainian […]
As Colombia prepares to elect a president, voters must choose between a candidate willing to make painful concessions with FARC guerrillas and a hawk keen on the status quo.
BEIJING — Three years after his imprisonment, still deprived of his passport and shut off in a bubble of official Chinese silence, Ai Weiwei, 57, neverthless appears ubiquitous everywhere else on the planet. The Martin-Gropius-Bau exhibition hall in Berlin devoted a huge retrospective entitled “Evidences” from April to July. His last documentary, Ai Weiwei’s Appeal […]
Kneeling on the sidewalk, Guilherme and his friends are busy preparing their banner ahead of a protest march against the World Cup, which starts in São Paulo on Thursday. In the nation of soccer, people have grown increasingly disenchanted and the Copa is growing more unpopular by the day. Only 48% of Brazilians support the […]
-OpEd- PARIS — Let’s be honest, Syria’s June 3 presidential election was nothing but a giant government-orchestrated masquerade. Bashar al-Assad will remain president of Syria, a country whose population has been largely decimated, as the three-year-long conflict has turned the country into a battleground for international jihadists from Shia and Sunni Islam, with the direct […]
Hundreds of thousands of Libyans fled to Tunisia after the 2011 revolution that toppled Muammar Gaddafi. A visit with those who mourn the fallen dictator, including his relatives.
The stories that counted…
Janusz Korwin-Mikke, who has made outrageous comments about women and the disabled, has managed to gain a following among disenchanted, young Poles.
PARIS — There is no doubt among the people at the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA), Europe’s soccer governing body, that allegations of corruption against UEFA President Michel Platini is a case of paranoia gone wrong. Some there believe that the controversy suggesting Platini was bribed to support Qatar’s 2022 bid may be the […]
BEIJING — Recent acts of violence in China have prompted the country to step up its anti-terrorism measures, leading the Beijing government, for example, to give police more authority to use force to stop a terror attack. The capital’s public security bureau has given anti-terror units twice the normal amount of bullets, Beijing News reports. […]
France and the entire European continent, but also the U.S. and Russia, all look very different than they did at the last commemoration 10 years ago. Ghosts of the past indeed.
KIRI SAKOR — It was 8 in the morning, and families living in Cambodia“s Kiri Sakor district were desperately fleeing from their homes. Backed by the military, a company called the Union Development Group was systematically burning down people’s houses. Children were crying while their parents fought authorities, who marched on their community with guns. Nearly 2,000 families had been living in the area since the 1980s. Local farmer Prak Sareth, who is 30, says her 49-acre piece of land was seized by the Chinese-owned company last year and now their houses have been burned down. “This is our parents’ […]
A visit in southern China to a movement afoot to openly challenge the regime. It remains, 25 years after the Tiananmen Square protest was crushed, a risky affair.
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Turkey And Israel, Frenemies Forever?
Much has changed, but some has not, in the complicated relationship between Israel and Turkey.