In The News

South China Morning Post: China-India Row as Catalyst?

Sarah Zheng August 28, 2017
India and China agreed to disengaging troops in the Doklam area of Bhutan after a two-month standoff. The announcement came just before the BRICS summit, starting September 3, for representatives of China and India as well as Brazil, Russia and South Africa. BRICS could be the ideal setting to develop an ongoing process for handling such disputes, suggest economists and researchers interviewed by...

The Economist: Stumped for Words: Language Battle Hampers Algeria’s Development

August 28, 2017
The legacy of the French settler-colonial project continues to impact the politics of education in Algeria. “The republic’s official language is standard Arabic, but few children grow up speaking it, so they often feel lost on their first day of school. Berber, the tongue of perhaps a quarter of Algerians, was officially recognised last year – but no one can agree on which of its six dialects...

The Telegraph: North Korea Attempted to Ship Material to Syria’s Chemical Weapons Agency, UN Experts Say

Harriet Alexander August 26, 2017
North Korea has twice attempted to ship chemical weapons to front companies for the Syrian government’s Scientific Studies and Research Center this year, according to a classified UN report. Two unnamed countries intercepted the shipments. “The shipments were sent by KOMID, the Korea Mining Development Trading Corporation – an organisation blacklisted by the UN security council in 2009, and...

Economics Wire: 3 Trends Shaping Global Labor Market

August 25, 2017
Technology, culture and globalization are influencing the global labor market, and Economics Wire identifies three trends. First, the internet is connecting more work equipment. More people work from home and other remote locations. Researchers are quickly developing robots and artificial intelligence, putting any task performed by humans under threat. Second, the workday is shrinking – which...

Caixin: Survey Finds Data Don’t Show Full Picture of Overseas Real-Estate Spree

Pan Che August 24, 2017
China invests more in global real estate than other Asian countries, but data do not show how much Chinese money already moves about offshore, reports Pan Che for Caixin. The Chinese government imposed regulations on outward direct investments, including limits on “irrational” investments like sports clubs or entertainment, “to stem capital outflows and prevent the yuan from depreciating further...

Reuters: Globalization's Castaways Haunt Central Bankers

Jonathan Spicer and Howard Schneider August 24, 2017
Central bankers insist that open borders and free trade contribute to national and individual prosperity. Yet at the US Federal Reserve research conference in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, bankers and economists acknowledge a challenge for the elderly, the poor, the uneducated, and the workers who lose their jobs due to technological advances and competition within their own country or beyond – anyone...

New Statesman: How the Saudis Make It Almost Impossible to Report on War in Yemen

Ahmed Baider and Lizzie Porter August 23, 2017
Saudi Arabia is intent on limiting media coverage of its role in the war on neighboring Yemen. Since 2015, the civil war in the poor country of 25 million, between Saudi-backed forces of President Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi and Houthi rebels has left 10,000 dead, more than 530,000 suspected cases of cholera and millions starving, and “Yet the lack of press attention on Yemen’s conflict has led it to...