Mozambique ranks among the world’s poorest nations and recovery from Cyclone Idai will be a challenge. Also hit hard: Zimbabwe and Mali. The storm made landfall in Beira on March 14 and aid teams arrived to find the fourth largest city, population 500,000, mostly destroyed with no power or...
Rivers contribute to transport, tourism, hydropower and resources including fish and freshwater. Yet excessive drought, dam-building and other development can ruin rivers. That is happening to the Mekong River, which flows from Tibet to the South China Sea. The Lower Mekong winds through Cambodia,...
Damned by humans: Laos population in Attopeu suffered from a collapsed dam in 2018, and elsewhere sandbanks fill the Mekong River
CAN THO CITY, MEKONG DELTA: The swirling currents of the once mighty Mekong, shrunk by drought and increasingly...
A newly signed strategic partnership agreement between Afghanistan and the United States stipulates that NATO troops will largely withdraw by the end of 2014 with Afghan security forces taking the lead in securing the nation. The US will provide limited training and counterterrorism support for the...
Endgame’s new challenges: President Barack Obama signs an agreement with Afghan president Hamid Karzai (top); Pakistan’s army chief Ashfaq Kayani with Karzai (middle); India’s road-building aid to Afghanistan
LONDON: President Barack Obama’s...
Uncertainty deters investment and slows economic growth, and the International Monetary Fund has introduced an index that attempts to measure trade uncertainty for 143 advanced and developing nations. The index relies on a search for words related to uncertainty and trade in the Economist...
Women have made great strides in education, employment, politics and equality in general worldwide, but participation in the labor force remains stubbornly below those of men. “By and large, a substantial proportion of mothers withdraw from employment after childbirth,” explains demography expert...
Homebound: Women’s participation in the workplace is growing around the world, but in both advanced and developing nations, some mothers feel pressure to stay at home
NEW YORK: Despite noteworthy progress achieved in gender equality, especially in...
Western terms defining regions often stick despite the existence of more relevant, indigenous language. The label “Maritime Southeast Asia,” covering the area shared by Indonesia, the Philippines and Malaysia, fails to take into account shared Austronesian language roots or history including the...
Seafaring legacy: Nusantaria is the world's largest archipelago, and advances in marine technologies over centuries drove global commerce and cultural exchanges; a stone relief from Borobudur in Central Java, built during the 9th century, details...
A small group of EU members of parliament, mostly representing right-wing, anti-immigrant and anti-trade interests, visited Kashmir. Other MPs pointed out they were disinvited after insisting upon meeting ordinary people of Kashmir and opposing the tight restrictions imposed by the Modi government...
COVID-19 spreads rapidly, posing a threat to the vulnerable including the elderly and those with chronic conditions. Sten Vermund, dean of Yale School of Public Health, urges aggressive measures for a virus that is overwhelming hospitals and health care providers. The new coronavirus emerged in...
