‘U.S.A. is the slice of a continent … U.S.A. is the world’s greatest river valley fringed with mountains and hills, U.S.A. is a set of bigmouthed officials with too many bank accounts. U.S.A. is a …
The world The world lost another one of its greats this week. Kofi Annan passed away after a short illness. Ramesh Thakur looks back at the former UN secretary-general and Nobel Peace Prize laureate’s achievements, …
After a suspiciously sudden conversion, Russian President Vladimir Putin now claims to be worried about the fate of millions of refugees who have fled the carnage in Syria. In last weekend’s meeting with German Chancellor …
India has recently been called out for being the weakest link in the revitalised Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, a framework for cooperation involving three other democracies in the Indo-Pacific—Australia, Japan and the US. One of the …
The Turnbull government’s latest announcement on how its new telecommunications sector security reforms will apply to 5G in Australia has effectively excluded Huawei (and ZTE, the other Chinese large telecoms provider) as vendors of 5G …
As I described in my previous piece, I’ve recently come around to the view that we need to do something to reduce the probability of a civilisation-ending nuclear exchange. Put like that, it sounds like …
The beat Militarising police doesn’t sit well A new study has found that the deployment of heavily armed SWAT teams in the US reduces public support for police but doesn’t reduce crime or increase safety. …
The UK House of Commons Digital, Culture, Sport and Media Committee recently published its interim report on its inquiry into disinformation and ‘fake news’. The report makes a lot of good recommendations, but one in …
After years of negotiations, China and ASEAN have agreed on a single negotiating text for a code of conduct in the South China Sea and a path for future rounds of negotiations. While those are …
President Donald Trump’s ‘America First’ agenda is a dramatic departure from US leadership of a multilateral order that has been the guiding norm for over 70 years. That order defines the rules of trade and …
The Irish border is a potent symbol and evidence of how innovative policy can resolve seemingly intractable problems. The extreme political violence that plagued Northern Ireland and Britain only ended with an adjustment to thinking …
Kofi Annan deserves to be remembered as a near-exemplary United Nations secretary-general (SG). Great chief executives need a guiding vision for the exercise of authority, and all the more so when that authority is international civil …
Advocates of stronger and more effective Australian engagement in the South Pacific face a couple of entrenched structural challenges. First, the region is hardly critical to Australia’s economic future—the South Pacific accounts for a mere …
Though the British Labour Party’s anti-Semitism scandal has dominated headlines in the United Kingdom of late, there is a more profound debate with the same theme taking place in Germany. Most worryingly, the fundamental tenets …
Sea state The US has announced a plan to deploy a hospital ship to Colombia to assist with the Venezuelan refugee crisis. The schedule for the departure of the ship, most likely to be USNS …
Schloss Meseberg is a Baroque-style palace that serves as the official guest house of the German federal government. It sits in an idyllic location 70 kilometres north of the capital, and on Saturday Chancellor Angela …
One of the reasons countries support indigenous defence industries is to ensure their sovereign control over defence capabilities. The argument is that by having the ability to design, manufacture and sustain military equipment, a country …
The immediate future of the RAAF’s strike and air combat capability seems clear. We’re getting 72 F-35A joint strike fighters that will form the heart of the force into the 2040s and serve alongside up …
The Kremlin’s foreign policy increasingly seems to rest on the assumption that all countries are as corruptible as Vladimir Putin’s Russia. This was evident most recently in Russia’s alleged efforts to undermine an agreement between …
On 9 August in South Lebanon, a routine patrol of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) was attacked by civilians. In the course of the incident, their vehicles were set on fire and …