In The News

Unreformed, Unrefined, Unrepentant

June 20, 2003
The 1997-1998 Asian financial crisis seriously disrupted many economies in the Asia-Pacific region and impeded global economic growth. Governments and international institutions have since tried to draw lessons from that nightmare. In this article in The Economist, the author says that there is still much to be learned and dealt with, including Thailand's current problems with its taxation...

Left to Their Own Devices

Amr Elchoubaki June 20, 2003
The United States has frequently criticized Arab governments for suppressing freedom of expression and pluralism. Yet, when popular movements such as student protests in Iran belie such criticism, the author argues, the US does not see the protests as manifestations of an existing democracy but as expressions of popular revolt,. In Iran, the religious Supreme Guide and democratically elected...

Without Firm Action, There's No Birthday Joy for Suu Kyi

Jody Williams June 19, 2003
As Burmese opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi draws more attention, the international community has begun responding. The Association of South-east Asian Nations (ASEAN), breaking with its policy of non-interference in the internal affairs of member states, pressed the Myanmar government to release Suu Kyi. Welcoming this positive step, writer and Nobel Peace Laureate Jody Williams cautions that...

Rumblings in Iran

William Safire June 19, 2003
In recent weeks, Iran has seen a wave of student-led protests against the country’s theocratic leadership. The uprising has similarities to protests of several decades ago that led to the fall of Iran’s Shah, and it is this historical precedent, argues New York Times columnist William Safire, that should lead the rest of the world to take today’s demonstrations seriously. For the US to engage or...

Not So Fast!

Omayma Abdel-Latif June 13, 2003
The question 'was it a war of occupation or liberation' dominated much of the international debate on the US-led war in Iraq. Now, the debate has reached the local level. The decision by the US administrator for Iraq, Paul Bremer, to appoint a council of Iraqis in an advisory capacity has many local political and religious leaders upset. Leading up to the fall of Baghdad, those in...

Students Roil Iranian Capital in 3rd Night of Protests

Neil MacFarquhar June 13, 2003
Violent and vocal, Iranian students marched in protest again this week. The immediate stimulus was a government proposal to privatize the universities, but, according to one government worker who joined in, "For 25 years we have lived without any freedom. We want social freedom, economic freedom and political freedom." Cell phone calls by protesters to a Persian-language television...

A Primer for Cross-Strait Relations

Chen Hurng-yu June 11, 2003
If Taiwan ever wants to improve cross-strait relations and free itself of interference from Beijing, it will need to depart from the 1971 framework and change its foreign policy, says Chen Hurng-yu, professor of history at Taiwan's National Chengchi University. The overlapping claims of Taipei and Beijing to sovereignty over China – a dispute that has continued since the UN denied Taiwan’s...