Online Journal of Politics and Foreign Affairs
Australia’s ABC News has video smuggled out by an activist showing widespread famine in North Korea, including filthy children begging in the streets and evidence that even soldiers are not getting enough to eat.
A Pew Research Center poll released this week provides a stark reminder of just how bad the reputation is in what is arguably one of our most important strategic allies: Currently, just 12% express a positive view of the U.S. and only 8% have confidence in President Barack Obama to do the right thing in [...]
As the President prepares to announce his plans for the future in Afghanistan, a majority of Americans want the troops home now.
The nuclear disaster that occurred at the Fukushima nuclear power plan in Japan in the wake of the earthquake and tsunami that occurred in April has largely disappeared from the American media, where stories about a murder trial in Florida, the wine cooler induced antics of an Alaska teenager, and a Congressman’s body parts have [...]
The ISI appears to have shown a special interest in informants that helped the CIA find bin Laden.
Turkey has had elections, and the ruling AKP has retained a majority in parliament. The next major issue appears to be constitutional reform.
Not in Germany, anyway. Via the AFP: Germany to scrap nuclear power by 2022. This is in response to the disaster in Japan. Of course, with growing concerns about the environmental impact of the use of fossil fuels to generate electricity, the abandonment of nuclear power begs the question of where the energy is going [...]
Via the AP: Thailand arrests American for alleged king insult The 54-year-old Thai-born man lived in the U.S. state of Colorado for around 30 years before returning recently to Thailand for treatment for high blood pressure and gout, the website said. If the allegations are true, the infractions would have been committed while he lived [...]
The Navy’s director of warfare integration says China is a “smart and learning enemy.”
As James Joyner noted in the days after the raid that killed Osama bin Laden, the helicopter that was disabled and had to be destroyed in bin Laden’s compound was a previously secret stealth helicopter that the U.S. military had never revealed before. In the aftermath of the raid there was concern over what Pakistan [...]
Just in case you didn’t think there was already reason enough to be concerned about Pakistan, here’s about 50 more: ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — China has agreed to immediately provide 50 JF-17 fighter jets to Pakistan, a major outcome of a visit by Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani to Beijing this week, Pakistani officials said Thursday. [...]
I think it’s safe to say that tensions between Pakistan and US/NATO forces in Afghanistan are on a bit of a hair trigger: ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Pakistani ground troops opened fire on two NATO helicopters that crossed into Pakistan’s airspace from Afghanistan early Tuesday morning, the Pakistani Army said in a statement. A firefight then [...]
It’s been some time since the nuclear disaster that occurred in the wake of Japan’s earthquake and tsunami has been in the news, but it appears that things still aren’t going well: An adviser to Prime Minister Naoto Kan indicated Sunday that a plan to flood and cool the No. 1 reactor’s containment vessel at [...]
Just a reminder of what else could go wrong: JAMMU, India (Reuters) – Indian and Pakistani troops exchanged sustained cross-border fire on Sunday, security officials said, a day after an Indian soldier was killed by Pakistani troops while patrolling one of the world’s most heavily guarded borders. The two sides exchanged small arms fire for [...]
The question of how the world’s most wanted man could’ve hidden in plain sight in Pakistan continues to be asked.
Bin Laden spent the last half-decade in a compound where his only contact with the outside world was a few couriers.
How exactly was the most wanted man in the world able to hide in this house without anyone in Pakistan knowing about it?
A Pakistani man named Sohaib Athar unwittingly became part of history in the early hours of Sunday morning when he started telling twitter about some odd events in Abbotabad, Pakistan
At least on television: BEIJING — In a bizarre move, China’s television censors have issued new guidelines that all but ban TV dramas featuring time travel. In a statement (available here in Chinese) dated March 31, the State Administration for Radio, Film & Television said that TV dramas that involve characters traveling back in time [...]
It’s likely to be the end of the year but before the nuclear crisis in Japan is fully contained: The operator of Japan’s crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant has said it expects to bring the crisis under control by the end of the year. Tokyo Electric Power Co (Tepco) aims to reduce radiation leaks in [...]
Via the AP: US: FARC and Taliban are among largest drug trafficking organizations in the world Assistant Secretary of State William Brownfield said drug-trafficking organizations have aligned with political and ideological movements in recent decades. He cited the followers of Osama bin Laden and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia as examples. Brownfield said that [...]
Now, he wants Congress to condemn the actions of one idiot in Florida: The Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, appears to have added fuel to the violent protests in Afghanistan after calling on the US Congress to condemn a Christian preacher’s burning of the Qur’an. Karzai’s demand came despite a statement from Barack Obama denouncing the [...]
The only people responsible for the murders in Afghanistan are the people who committed them, but the demagogues like Terry Jones deserve condemnation as well.
The spark that was lit when Terry Jones burned a Koran a few weeks ago has turned into a conflagration: KANDAHAR, Afghanistan — Violent protests over the burning of a Koran in Florida flared for a second straight day, with young men rampaging through the streets of this southern capital, flying Taliban flags and wielding [...]
The Japanese government has announced that the Fukushima Reactor suffered a partial meltdown.
The Japanese nuclear crisis is becoming an international issue: A United Nations forecast of the possible movement of the radioactive plume coming from crippled Japanese reactors shows it churning across the Pacific, and touching the Aleutian Islands on Thursday before hitting Southern California late Friday. Health and nuclear experts emphasize that radiation in the plume [...]
Will one of the worst natural disasters to hit Japan in centuries change the relationship between the Japanese government and the people?
The latest casualty estimates out of Japan are quite disheartening: The terrible toll of Japan’s double disaster became clearer today as it emerged as many as 25,000 people could be dead. As rescue crews trawled through mile after mile of tsunami-stricken wasteland, officials from the coastal town of Ishinomaki confirmed that 10,000 of their citizens [...]
President Obama is once again catching flak for his leisure activities.
It seems that practically every story I hear about the very concerning situation in Japan regarding their damaged nuclear plants contains a requisite statement about how those events will affect moves to build new nuclear plants in the US. However, it strikes me that rather than being a blanket cautionary tale about nuclear power in [...]
A March 12 explosion at the earthquake-damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Okuma, Japan, appears to have caused a reactor meltdown.
The Dalai Lama will give up his political role in the Tibetan government-in-exile and shift that power to an elected representative.
An op-ed by a Hao Leifeng in China’s Global Times argues that “Actor Charlie Sheen is a classic example of the difference in Western and Eastern values and norms.”
A new Rasmussen polls shows, yet again, that public support for the war in Afghanistan has slip into Iraq War territory: A majority of voters, for the first time, support an immediate withdrawal of all U.S. troops from Afghanistan or the creation of a timetable to bring them all home within a year. A new [...]
After spending much of 2010 on a confrontational posture, North Korea has gotten quiet lately and has started asking the world for food again: TOKYO – North Korea recently took the unusual step of begging for food handouts from the foreign governments it usually threatens. Plagued by floods, an outbreak of a livestock disease and [...]
Though he has submitted his resignation, Jon Huntsman is still the U.S. Ambassador to China, which is why his decision to appear at an anti-government rally in Beijing strikes me as a bit of a diplomatic faux pas: Jon Huntsman was caught on tape at an anti-government protest in China—and quickly left the scene after [...]
The wave of popular protests that has swept that Arab world seems to have made its way to the Middle Kingdom: BEIJING – Jittery Chinese authorities wary of any domestic dissent staged a concerted show of force Sunday to squelch a mysterious online call for a “Jasmine Revolution” apparently modeled after pro-democracy demonstrations sweeping the [...]
Via the BBC: Iran: Mehdi Karroubi ‘house arrest’ after protest call Mr Karroubi and Mir-Hossein Mousavi, another opposition leader, had called for a rally on Monday to support the popular uprisings in Egypt and Tunisia. The authorities refused permission, calling it a political move. Although Iran’s establishment supports the Egyptian popular protests, a spokesman for [...]
Like it or not, human rights is only at the top of the agenda for countries that otherwise don’t much matter.
@pcam: “The 2009 Nobel Peace Prize winner holds a State Dinner for a man who has the 2010 winner under House Arrest.” Ouch. Photo: Reuters
The latest online service to find itself banned in China is Skype, the service which allows users to make voice and video calls over the internet: In the latest move dashing Western internet company hopes of breaking into China, it was announced that all internet phone calls were to be banned apart from those made [...]
Via the BBC: Mumbai manhunt for ‘four Lashkar-e-Taiba militants’ Police are scouring Mumbai for four Pakistani alleged militants believed to have entered the city to carry out an attack, a top police official said. There was credible information that at least four members of the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) militant group were in the city, said the [...]
On the same day that President Obama is set to release the latest review of Afghan War progress, a new ABC News poll shows that public support for the war has plummeted to Iraq War levels: A record 60 percent of Americans say the war in Afghanistan has not been worth fighting, a grim assessment [...]
A new Rasmussen Reports poll shows that the number of Americans who think we will eventually win the war in Afghanistan has hit a new low: Voter confidence in the outcome of the War in Afghanistan has fallen to a new low. A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that just 34% of Likely [...]
