In The News

The Economist: Syria Is Erasing the Palestinians’ Largest Refugee Camp

May 14, 2018
Recent bombing by Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Syria and its Russian allies devastated Yarmouk camp, located on the southern edge of Damascus. The camp was once the Palestinians’ “largest and liveliest refugee camp, sheltering displaced Iraqis and Syrians too.” However, war, attacks by extremists and bombing have resulted in the violent displacement of 350,000 people who once called Yarmouk home....

Atlantic Council: Win for Democracy in Malaysia

Huihui Ooi May 11, 2018
Opposition leader Tun Mahathir Mohamad, 92, is Malaysia’s new prime minister after defeating the incumbent’s Barisan Nasional coalition. “This is the first time since Malaysia’s independence in 1957 that an election has brought about a transfer of power and an end to BN rule in the Muslim-majority nation,” notes Huihui Ooi of the Atlantic Council, adding that the surprise outcome defies an...

Times of India: The Wuhan Puzzle

Nayan Chanda May 7, 2018
China and India, the world’s two most populous nations, are rivals for trade and regional influence. A two-day summit between Xi Jinping and Narendra Modi may have been a quest for cooperation and Nayan Chanda, writing for the Times of India, refers to a Mao Zedong theory on setting priorities: “In his famous work ‘On Contradiction,’ Mao stated successful policy depends on identifying the...

The Guardian: US Urges North Korea on “Irreversible” Steps to Denuclearization

Ed Pilkington May 7, 2018
Donald Trump’s national security advisor John Bolton expects North Korea to show “concrete and tangible evidence” on denuclearization prior to any formal easing of sanctions and political pressure on the state. With planning underway for a summit between Trump and North Korean President Kim Jong-un, Bolton confirmed that Pyongyang’s commitment to total and “irreversible” denuclearization was...

Bloomberg: EU Wants Members to Respect Values or Take Pay Cut

Leonid Berehidsky May 4, 2018
The European Union represents values as much as much as trade, political or economic relationships – and its staff proposes reducing budgets of member states that weaken the rule of law and tolerate corruption. The European Commission has proposed a $1.3 trillion budget that would “make it more difficult for nationalist governments to use the union’s money to garner voter loyalty,” explains...

Eurasianet: Armenia’s Diaspora Clout

Grigor Atanesian April 30, 2018
The Armenian diaspora supported protests in Yerevan against Serzh Sargsyan, president since 2008. ”Since protests in Yerevan began on April 13, rallies in solidarity took place in the global centers of the Armenian diaspora,” reports Grigor Atanesian for Eurasianet. “In the diaspora, support for the protests was far from universal, however, and some of the biggest diaspora organizations kept...

Inside Story: Domestic Disharmony for China and India

Kerry Brown and Marya Shakil April 27, 2018
Before aspiring to global leadership roles, China’s Xi Jinping and India’s Narendra Modi must demonstrate capability for handling domestic challenges. “Xi and Modi may operate in very different contexts, one in charge of the world’s largest Communist Party–controlled state, the other running the world’s largest democracy,” explain Kerry Brown and Marya Shakil for Inside Story. “But both can be...