In The News

US Snooping Revelations Cause Trouble for Allies

Andrew Osborn June 11, 2013
Exposure of the US National Security Agency’s vast intelligence collection program through the use of internet companies like Google and Facebook is creating headaches for allied governments across the world. UK Foreign Secretary William Hague attempted to assure Britons that privacy laws were respected, while the opposition in Germany expressed displeasure and urged Merkel to demand answers from...

Maritime Game-Changer Revealed at Shangri-La Dialogue

Rory Medcalf June 6, 2013
US naval vessels have long conducted surveillance activities in China’s exclusive economic zone, 12 to 200 nautical miles off the coast. China is now following the US lead, conducting its own surveillance off the coasts of Guam and Hawaii; “somewhat counter-intuitively, this may prove to be in the interests of peace, stability and security right across Indo-Pacific Asia,” writes Rory Medcalf in...

Discovery of Rogue GMO Wheat Raises Concerns Over Controls

Carey Gillam, Julie Ingwersen June 3, 2013
Genetically modified wheat, supposed to be destroyed long ago, was found in an Oregon field and could disrupt the $8 billion US wheat export market. US consumers may shrug abut GM crops, but other countries fear accidental contamination of their crops. Japan and South Korea promptly suspended orders for US wheat. “The wheat was developed years ago by Monsanto Co to tolerate its Roundup herbicide...

Tunisia Turns Up Heat on the Salafis

Roula Khalaf May 30, 2013
Salafi Muslims promote a fundamentalist interpretation of the Koran, insisting on original Arabic translations and rejecting moderate Muslims as infidels. Freedoms won in Tunisia after the 2011 Arab Spring revolution allowed Salafis to evangelize. Now the government is cracking down on the controlling ways of Ansar al-Sharia. “As elsewhere in the region, not least in Egypt, formal politics in...

Temporary Immigrants Mean Temporary Loyalties

Ratna Omidvar May 23, 2013
The lingering effects of global recession contribute to high unemployment rates and immigration policies favoring temporary guest-worker arrangements over an eventual path toward citizenship. Canada has reduced emphasis on family reunification, treating parents and grandparents as tourists and imposing a two-year period of “conditional” residence on sponsored spouses. The country still offers a...

Can Global Supply Chains Be Accountable?

Jerry Davis May 16, 2013
A factory collapse in Bangladesh that killed more than 1,100 workers may be a wakeup call for apparel manufacturers, retailers and consumers. More than 90 percent of US apparel is made outside the country, and the unending quest for low prices and profits encourages crowded factories with brutal work conditions. Corporate leaders orchestrating long supply chains can shrug and claim ignorance...

US Senate Plans Crackdown on Visa “Abusers”

Anna Fifield April 24, 2013
Proposed US immigration reform may include tough rules to weed out IT sourcing companies that are believed to abuse the H-1B visa system for skilled scientists and researchers. Program abuses include undercutting wages and hiring workers with skills that duplicate those already available among US workers. Top recipients of H-1B visas include Indian firms, with a bulk of their employees based in...