In March, a few international media outlets quietly reported that Mongolia and the U.S. had been holding informal discussions on a proposal that would have Mongolia serve as a regional depository of spent nuclear fuel. The arrangement would allow South Korea and Taiwan, which the U.S. supplies with nuclear rods, to dispose of their spent fuel, resolving what has become an increasingly thorny problem for the U.S. News of the story spread quickly in the Mongolian press, and public opinion came out decidedly against the proposal. The Japanese nuclear crisis in Fukushima has compounded opposition in Mongolia to nuclear energy. [...]
In March, the Nile River Basin Cooperative Framework Agreement garnered enough national signatures to allow it to be presented to national parliaments for ratification. In an email interview, Aaron Wolf, a professor at Oregon State University specializing in water resources policy and conflict resolution, discussed the political maneuvering over water rights in the Nile Basin. WPR: What is the significance of the finalization of the Nile River Basin Cooperative Framework Agreement? Aaron Wolf: I’m not sure “finalization” is the right word. It seems clear that discussions over management of the Nile will continue for some time before anything is really [...]
This is the first of a two-part series examining diversification efforts by Latin American drug-trafficking networks. Part I examines the FARC’s illegal gold-mining operations in Colombia. Part II will examine Mexican drug traffickers’ use of oil-tapping to generate revenues. For more than 40 years, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, has waged a bloody war against the Colombian government, financed largely through cocaine trafficking. Over the past decade, as the Colombian government marshaled U.S. military assistance to greater effect, the FARC has seen its guerilla ranks diminished by about half. Meanwhile, coca eradication programs in the Colombian countryside [...]
