In The News

Chinese Premier Li Warns Southeast Asia Nations Against “Provocations”

Andrew Browne April 11, 2014
The message from Chinese Premier Li Keqiang at the Boao Forum for Asia was meant to reassure China’s nervous neighbors: China is committed to peaceful development and supports initiatives that strengthen maritime cooperation, yet would respond to “provocations” that destabilize the South China Sea. “China's definition of what constitutes a provocation is linked to its claims to what it calls...

So Much for “China-Malaysia Friendship Year”

Bruce Einhorn March 27, 2014
China is in the position of having to rely on an investigation and initially less than forthright communications from a smaller neighboring state after the disappearance of Malaysian Airlines Flight 370. Most of the passengers on the flight were Chinese, and China is frustrated. The year “2014 was supposed to be a time to celebrate the strong ties between China and Malaysia,” reports Bruce...

It’s Putin’s World

Thomas Graham March 27, 2014
Determined to restore Russia’s standing as a great power, President Vladimir Putin has his reasons for annexing Crimea and amassing troops along the border with Ukraine. “Today the former Soviet space, with the exceptions of the Baltics and Russia itself, is a region of fragile states, corrupt elites and pervasive poverty that offers little resistance to a dynamic Russia,” explains Thomas Graham...

Missing MH370: China, Malaysia Mistrust Becomes War of Words

Alastair Jamieson and Constance Cheng March 26, 2014
The disappearance of Malaysian Flight MH370 over the Indian Ocean has ignited resentment between China and Malaysia. Most passengers were Chinese. Around the globe, researchers and technicians have volunteered hours to figure out why the flight went off course, and volunteers studied satellite images for debris – so common in oceans. Shortly after the flight from Kuala Lumpur failed to arrive in...

Cooler Heads Need to Convey Japan’s Message

Sadaaki Numata March 20, 2014
Rational players in the North Pacific seek stability and reliable partners who share the same concern. “Today, there is a concern as to how far the ‘new model of great power relations’ between China and the U.S. may develop, possibly to Japan’s detriment,” writes former Japanese diplomat Sadaaki Numata for the English-Speaking Union of Japan. “Ironically this time it is the U.S. that seems...

Can ASEAN Respond to the Chinese Challenge?

Carlyle A. Thayer March 18, 2014
China has twice as much territory and population than the combined 10 member nations of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations – not to mention three times the GDP and four times the military spending. China increasingly pushes its weight in the region, most recently by criticizing Malaysian leadership in the search for missing flight MH307. Control of the South China Sea is another area of...

Fig Leaf of Legitimacy

Nayan Chanda March 17, 2014
About 60 percent of the electorate turned out in Crimea for a special referendum; reports suggest that 95 percent voted to join Russia. Next, Russia will decide whether to annex the peninsula it passed to Ukraine in 1954. Most of the international community opposed the hurried election, especially after Russia dispatched troops and tanks to the area. “Among the undecided but leaning towards...