Diplomacy & Politics Archive

In April 2013, outside the steps of Parliament in London, a group of nongovernmental organizations launched a new campaign to ban the use of fully autonomous weapons. Political entrepreneurs calling themselves the International Committee for Robot Arms Control had been raising concern over this issue since 2004, but their calls for a killer robot ban had been virtually ignored by the advocacy community. Things changed dramatically in 2012 when the well-known NGO Human Rights Watch published a report calling for such a ban. Within a month, nine well-known human security organizations had joined the steering committee for a new campaign. […]

Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s visit to India last week highlighted the two countries’ increasingly complementary geoeconomic objectives. The visit saw the conclusion of a much-delayed bilateral civil nuclear cooperation agreement that paves the way for uranium exports from Australia’s high-quality mines to fuel India’s ambitious nuclear energy plans. While in value terms future Australian uranium exports may not seem like much, they will actually enable India to undertake its next wave of industrialization in a more carbon-competitive manner, and that in turn will fuel massive demand for other Australian mineral exports. The strategic nature of the India-Australia alignment is […]

There was fighting talk at last week’s NATO summit in Wales. The alliance’s leaders pulled few punches in criticizing Russia’s actions in Ukraine and agreed on plans to counter future provocations by Moscow. The U.S. corralled a posse of its allies to coordinate the fight in Iraq against the Islamic State. After a summer characterized by global turbulence and ill-concealed uncertainty in both the U.S. and Europe over how to react, the summit signaled that the West has some sense of shared purpose. Yet it will take more than a decent conference to restore the Western powers’ vim and vigor. […]

On Aug. 14, the eve of its 68th Independence Day, Pakistan’s fragile democracy plunged into another period of turbulence as two sets of anti-government marches began in Lahore and made their way to Islamabad. One was led by Imran Khan and his Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaaf (PTI), which claimed that last year’s general elections were marred by widespread electoral fraud and demanded Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s resignation, an investigation of electoral rigging and fresh elections. The other was led by Tahir-ul Qadri and his Pakistan Awami Tehrik (PAT), and called for the dissolution of the national parliament and provincial assemblies. Qadri, who […]

Last month, Colombia signed a deal with the European Union on crisis management and counterinsurgency cooperation. In an email interview, Arlene Beth Tickner, professor at the University of the Andes in Colombia, discussed Colombia’s military cooperation. WPR: How extensive is Colombia’s military cooperation, and what countries are its main military partners? Arlene Beth Tickner: Since the mid-2000s, Colombia has received increasing numbers of requests for security cooperation from governments of distinct ideological stripes throughout Latin America and other parts of the globe. Between 2009 and 2013 alone, it provided police and military training to nearly 22,000 individuals from 47 different […]

In late July, State Grid Corporation of China—the world’s largest state-owned electric utility company—bought a 35 percent stake in Italy’s CDP Reti for $2.8 billion. CDP Reti, itself a state-owned energy holding company, has its own 30-percent controlling stake in the Italian natural gas giant Snam and power grid company Terna, giving the Chinese company major interests in Italy’s energy market. State Grid’s Italian purchase added to a portfolio that includes a 25 percent stake in Portugal’s REN, which controls the two main Portuguese power grids. The purchases were the latest sign that Europe has become a battlefield for China, […]

Washington is rife with calls to destroy the so-called Islamic State, also known as the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. The combination of far-reaching ambition, tactical skill, money, weaponry and depraved barbarity make the group a pressing, even unprecedented, security threat. Like al-Qaida a decade ago, the Islamic State has woven together a dangerous network, this one composed of fat-cat Gulf funders, angry young Western Muslims struggling with inner demons, local Sunni Arabs angered by repression from the governments in Damascus and Baghdad, violence-obsessed jihadists from across the Islamic world and former Baathists still bitter over losing power. As […]

Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s shift from the prime ministership to the presidency symbolizes a deeper shift for Turkey. While Erdogan has made progress towards peace with the Kurdish minority at home, he faces criticism for an increasingly autocratic ruling style. At the same time, Turkey’s relations both with its neighbors in the Middle East and with major powers such as the United States are under strain. This report covers Turkey’s domestic politics and foreign affairs, drawing on articles from the past year. Subscribers can download a PDF copy of this report here. Non-subscribers can purchase a PDF copy here. Domestic Politics […]

To the astonishment of many political observers last month, Benigno Aquino III, the embattled president of the Phillipines, openly entertained the possibility of seeking a second term in office in 2016. That would require amending the constitution and contradicting the core principles of his mother, democracy icon and former President Corazon Aquino, who insisted on a single-term presidency to prevent the return of Ferdinand Marcos-style dictatorship. Aquino’s plans represent a sharp turnaround since his 2010 election, which precipitated an unusual period of political stability and economic dynamism in the Philippines. After a decade of political uncertainty and sputtering growth under […]

As Russia’s intervention in Ukraine increasingly takes the form of an outright invasion, the strategic response by the West must be viewed through a different lens. No longer is the reaction of the U.S. and its European allies a matter of symbolism or messaging. The question now is whether economic sanctions, the West’s principal tactical weapon against Russia in Ukraine, can prove effective in pushing back against Russian President Vladimir Putin’s military advances. Despite the news of a possible cease-fire agreement, there is little indication that Putin is giving up his effort to exert control over eastern Ukraine and undermine […]

Over the weekend, the European Union announced appointments to two of its top posts. Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk will take over the post of president of the European Council, replacing Herman Van Rompuy when his term expires in December, and Italian Foreign Minister Frederica Mogherini will replace Catherine Ashton as EU high representative for foreign policy. The appointments of “a Kremlin critic from ex-communist Eastern Europe and the foreign minister of one of Moscow’s biggest customers for gas,” as Reuters put it, is emblematic of the steps the EU has taken to balance divisions among its members. As I […]

In a security sweep last week, Jordanian authorities arrested 40 suspected members of the Islamic State, also known as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), and the al-Qaida-affiliated Jabhat al-Nusra, or the Nusra Front. The crackdown came as U.S. President Barack Obama called for a regional coalition in the fight against the Islamic State. In any such coalition, the Obama administration would rely on Jordan, a small but crucial Middle East partner, for intelligence and surveillance help in Syria. Jordan is treading lightly, balancing its support of U.S. security policy with the threat of homegrown Islamist militancy and […]

In responding to press queries last week about how the United States plans to tackle the threat from the Islamic State—also known as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or ISIS—President Barack Obama used an unfortunate choice of words in responding, “We don’t have a strategy yet.” The answer implied that Washington had been caught flat-flooted by the rapid deterioration of events in Iraq and was struggling to craft a response. In reality, whole segments of the U.S. government’s national security apparatus are devoted to strategic planning. With regard to the Islamic State crisis, options have been in development […]

Last month, amid the latest round of Asian regional summits in Myanmar, the United States called for a freeze in provocative acts in disputed areas in the South China Sea. While the move signaled Washington’s willingness to counter China’s growing maritime assertiveness, U.S. policy faces several structural challenges that could undermine the effectiveness of easing tensions in the South China Sea. As U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry put it at the ASEAN Regional Forum in Naypyitaw on Aug. 9, the freeze’s main objective is to manage competing territorial claims in the South China Sea by encouraging the six claimant […]

A pillar of Indonesian President-elect Joko Widodo’s campaign was an emphasis on strengthening the country’s identity as a “maritime nation” and becoming what he called a “global maritime nexus.” By giving his acceptance speech the night the official election results were announced onboard a traditional schooner in Jakarta’s main port, Jokowi, as he is universally known, demonstrated the importance he attaches to this vision, which was also prominent in his campaign’s 41-page “Vision Mission” statement. In comments since the election in July, Jokowi has called for the establishment of a maritime ministry and even waded into international waters by saying […]

Despite the recent prominence given to the issue of NATO’s membership enlargement, the alliance seems destined for at least the next few years to focus on broadening and deepening its partnerships with nonmember countries and other international institutions. NATO has developed an extensive partnership program since the Cold War and now has some two dozen official national partners, while developing ties with more countries as well as international institutions. Partners contribute capabilities, money and legitimacy to NATO activities. They have provided thousands of ground troops to NATO operations in Afghanistan and the Balkans, air capabilities in Libya and support to […]

Luis Otsuka, the president of a federation of small-scale gold miners in Peru’s Madre de Dios region called FEDAMIN, is one of tens of thousands of miners who are struggling to continue their lucrative activity in the face of a government initiative to reign in illegal mining. “In 1987, the government gave me a loan to purchase mining equipment. Now the government wants to destroy that same machinery,” he says. Otsuka and his fellow miners have spent much of the past year protesting a government crackdown on illegal mining and new legislation regulating legal mining. Over the past decade, a […]