Asia-Pacific Archive

Earlier this week, South Korea made the surprising announcement that it intended to sign a landmark military pact with Japan today. But faced with domestic criticism over the potential partnership, South Korea postponed signing the General Security of Military Information Agreement. As historical tensions between the two countries continue to hamper their attempts to develop a closer relationship, the fate of the treaty remains unclear. “There is just an overriding common interest on the part of South Korea and Japan to share some critical information, especially about North Korea,” Patrick Cronin, senior director of the Asia-Pacific Security Program at the […]

After Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao and Bhutanese Prime Minister Jigmi Y. Thinley met for the first time on the sidelines of the U.N. Rio+20 Conference in Brazil on June 21, Beijing announced that the two leaders had expressed their willingness to establish diplomatic relations between the neighboring countries. But Thimphu promptly disputed the report, saying Thinley and Wen had only discussed bilateral issues and multilateral cooperation, not diplomatic ties. The statement by China’s Foreign Ministry concerning the meeting reveals Beijing’s desperation to establish formal ties with the Kingdom of Bhutan, a tiny nation of about 700,000 people tucked between China […]

On Sunday, an old Army friend sent me a note to let me know that an officer with whom we both served had died in Afghanistan. I first fought in Afghanistan more than a decade ago, so the fact that friends are still fighting and dying there more than 10 years later gave me pause. Despite President Barack Obama’s promise to reverse the neglect of the Afghanistan War that had marked his predecessor’s time in office, most of the United States is eager to forget the war. So it will be interesting to see the reception that greets Rajiv Chandrasekaran’s […]

Robust economic growth proved to be elusive in the U.S. and Europe over the past decade, but that certainly was not the case across Asia, Africa and Latin America. From 2003 to 2007, developing countries averaged 7.2 percent in annual economic growth. Further indications that developing economies had effectively delinked from the West came in 2010, when dozens of developing countries recovered to near-record rates of growth while the United States and Europe remained hamstrung by financial and debt crises. China’s rapid industrialization triggered much of this expansion by driving up global commodity prices. In sourcing commodities from other developing […]

India is currently finalizing a $500 million contract with South Korean arms manufacturer Kangnam for eight minesweeper vessels. In an email interview, Rajaram Panda, an expert on East Asia and former senior fellow at the Institute of Defense Studies and Analyses in New Delhi, discussed ties between India and South Korea. WPR: What is the current state of trade and defense ties between India and South Korea, and how have they evolved over the past several years? Rajaram Panda: India-South Korea relations have been developing based on three important pillars. First, the Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement, signed in 2009 and […]

Pakistan’s parliament elected Raja Pervez Ashraf prime minister today, after the Supreme Court disqualified and unseated former Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani. The high court justices confirmed Gilani’s April conviction for contempt of court over his refusal to request that Switzerland reopen a corruption investigation against Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari, as the court had ordered him to do in 2009. Shahab Usto, a lawyer and academic based in Karachi, Pakistan, told Trend Lines that the developments are part of a feud between the country’s executive and judiciary branches that will only worsen in the run-up to general elections, which […]

Less than a month after Nepal’s Constituent Assembly was dissolved following its failure to draft a new constitution despite three extensions, the country’s largest and ruling Maoist party split this week. Discord and delay have characterized the country’s ongoing peace process since the signing of the Comprehensive Peace Accord between the government and Maoist rebels in November 2006. They have now led to a political crisis that has disillusioned citizens and made neighboring India and China edgy. The split in the Unified Communist Party of Nepal-Maoist is expected to exacerbate Nepal’s already bumpy transition from a Hindu monarchy to a […]

Editor’s note: This is the second of a two-part series that uses current trends in the Chinese political economy to forecast the outcomes and implications for China under the fifth generation of Communist Party leadership. Part I examined a best-case scenario. Part II examines a worst-case scenario. SHANGHAI — China’s fifth-generation leadership cadre will assume office later this year at a critical and perilous juncture in the country’s socio-economic development. They do so against a backdrop of weak global economic growth and growing geopolitical uncertainty in North Korea, Iran and multiple Central Asian states. Moreover, the U.S. is on a […]

Earlier this month, Leon Panetta became the first U.S. defense secretary to visit Vietnam’s Cam Rahn Bay deepwater port since the end of the Vietnam War. He attended a ceremony at the USNS Richard E. Byrd, a cargo ship operated by a mainly civilian crew under the Navy’s Military Sealift Command, which was undergoing repairs by Vietnamese workers. Speaking on the deck of the ship, Panetta called for more high-level exchanges between the U.S. and Vietnam, as well as enhanced defense cooperation. If Panetta chose to stop in Vietnam for a few days during his nine-day tour of Asia, it […]

Editor’s note: This is the first of a two-part series that uses current trends in the Chinese political economy to forecast the outcomes and implications for China under the fifth generation of Communist Party leadership. Part I examines a best-case scenario. Part II will examine a worst-case scenario. SHANGHAI — As China approaches its once-a-decade senior leadership transition, structural weaknesses in the country’s economic model are becoming more apparent, even as the momentum surrounding progressive reforms appears to be incrementally increasing. A best-case scenario for China under the fifth-generation Communist Party leadership assumes a continuation of both trends, with the […]

China has taken an atypically strong stand in opposing efforts to force the Syrian government to end its brutal repression of anti-regime protesters. But China, unlike Russia, with which it has joined to block measures seeking to remove Syrian President Bashar al-Assad from office, is motivated primarily by principles rather than concrete strategic and economic interests in Syria. And China, unlike Russia, seems more open to changing its position. For the past two decades, Chinese leaders have typically opposed foreign military interventions seeking regime change. The Chinese government has traditionally sought to keep United Nations resolutions precisely worded to tightly […]

Refugees fleeing sectarian violence in Myanmar trying to enter Bangladesh by boat are turned away. World News Videos by NewsLook

Fighting between Muslim and Buddhist mobs broke out in Myanmar’s coastal state of Rakhine over the weekend, with the violence between minority Rohingya Muslims and majority Rakhine Buddhists set off by the rape and murder of an ethnic Rakhine woman and the revenge attacks that followed. The unrest, which included arson, rioting and the killing of about 25 people, reveals some of the deep-rooted ethnic and religious tensions in the country, which has only recently begun to open up after decades of isolation and military rule. Jason Abbott, Aung San Suu Kyi Endowed Chair at the University of Louisville’s Center […]

Despite all the attention given the recent Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in Beijing, it is often overlooked that the most powerful military alliance in Eurasia is the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO). Four of the five Central Asian countries belong to the CSTO, as does Belarus and Armenia. Vladimir Putin’s decision to skip both the G-8 and NATO summits in the U.S. and his choice of Belarus, rather than Europe or China, as the destination for his first official visit following his May 7 inauguration as president demonstrates the importance that he attaches to strengthening Moscow’s influence in the […]

U.S. and South Korean troops have conducted a joint military exercise simulating an attack from North Korea. World News Videos by NewsLook

Following the death of four French soldiers in Afghanistan on Saturday, French President François Hollande reaffirmed his decision to withdraw French combat forces from the country by the end of 2012, with the drawdown to begin in July. Hollande had already defended the move at last month’s NATO summit in Chicago, where it met with little public opposition from alliance members. Militarily, the withdrawal of French troops will have little impact on the war effort. The transition of security operations to Afghan security forces in France’s area of responsibility, Kapisa province, had already begun in March, and the roughly the […]

Following the United States’ restoration of diplomatic relations with Myanmar and the European Union’s relaxation of economic sanctions targeting Naypyidaw earlier this year, international investors have lined up to discuss opportunities for future investment in the resource-rich country, which boasts the world’s 10th-largest natural gas reserves. However, substantial hurdles must be overcome if Myanmar is to join the ranks of Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand and South Korea as the next Asian tiger economy. In an address at the World Economic Forum in Bangkok earlier this month, Myanmarese opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi raised a red flag for potential investors […]