Newsletter Archive

Editor’s Note: This is the web version of our subscriber-only weekly newsletter, China Note, which includes a look at the week’s top stories and best reads from and about China. Subscribe to receive it by email every Wednesday. If you’re already a subscriber, adjust your newsletter settings to receive it directly to your email inbox. In his keynote address to the annual Boao Forum last Tuesday, Chinese President Xi Jinping delivered one of the clearest statements to date of China’s ambitions on the global stage, rejecting hegemony, whether for China or any other power, and calling for an international order […]

Editor’s Note: This is the web version of our subscriber-only weekly newsletter, Middle East Memo, which takes a look at what’s happening, what’s being said and what’s on the horizon in the Middle East. Subscribe to receive it by email every Monday. If you’re already a subscriber, adjust your newsletter settings to receive it. What does the Middle East have to do with the spectacular launch, crash and burn of the European Super League? Though indirect, the influence of Gulf Arab state backers’ financial largesse on European soccer played a major role in the shifts that gave birth to the […]

Editor’s Note: This is the web version of our subscriber-only weekly newsletter, China Note, which includes a look at a top story as well as a roundup of the rest of the week’s news and commentary from and about China. Subscribe to receive it by email every Wednesday. If you’re already a subscriber, adjust your newsletter settings to receive it directly to your email inbox. The United States and China struck a rare cooperative tone in a joint statement issued after two days of meetings between John Kerry, the Biden administration’s climate envoy, and his Chinese counterpart, Xie Zhenhua, in […]

Editor’s note: This is the web version of our subscriber-only weekly newsletter, Middle East Memo, which takes a look at what’s happening, what’s being said and what’s on the horizon in the Middle East. Subscribe to receive it by email every Monday. If you’re already a subscriber, adjust your newsletter settings to receive it. As negotiations over the future of the Iran nuclear deal finally began in earnest in Vienna last week, reports emerged of direct talks between Saudi Arabia and Iran, seemingly reflecting a potential shift in regional dynamics. The meetings were purportedly hosted by Iraq, a country whose […]

Editor’s Note: Every Friday, Andrew Green curates the top news and analysis from and about the African continent. Subscribers can adjust their newsletter settings to receive Africa Watch by email every week. Benin, Chad and Djibouti held presidential elections over the weekend, although opposition leaders in all three countries, as well as outside observers, said the outcomes were predetermined. Not surprisingly, early returns have the incumbents easily winning all three contests. In Benin, the run-up to Sunday’s vote was marred by violent protests and accusations that President Patrice Talon was undermining what has been one of West Africa’s most stable […]

Editor’s Note: Every Wednesday, WPR contributor Rachel Cheung and Assistant Editor Benjamin Wilhelm curate the week’s top news and expert analysis on China. Subscribers can adjust their newsletter settings to receive China Note by email every week. On Monday, China’s People Liberation Army flew 25 aircraft, including fighter jets and bombers, through Taiwan’s air defense identification zone, marking the largest such incursion since the self-ruled democracy began making its data on them public last September. Taiwan has continued to monitor the movements of the Chinese aircraft, transmit radio warnings to them and track them with its missile defense systems. But […]

Editor’s Note: Every Friday, Andrew Green curates the top news and analysis from and about the African continent. Subscribers can adjust their newsletter settings to receive Africa Watch by email every week. The latest attempt by Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia to negotiate a resolution to their decade-long dispute over Addis Ababa’s controversial dam project on the Nile River’s largest tributary failed this week, bringing the region closer to a crisis. Tensions were already high heading into the meetings in Kinshasa, the Democratic Republic of Congo’s capital, with Egyptian officials warning that it was the last chance to reach an agreement […]

Editor’s Note: Every Wednesday, WPR contributor Rachel Cheung and Assistant Editor Benjamin Wilhelm curate the week’s top news and expert analysis on China. Subscribers can adjust their newsletter settings to receive China Note by email every week. China’s “wolf warrior” diplomacy may have backfired in Australia, Canada and most recently France, but in a sign of its hardening attitude toward the West, Beijing is not backing down from its aggressive posture. Defying diplomatic norms, a growing number of Chinese envoys are adopting a belligerent tone in their speeches and tweets, which Chinese authorities have justified as a necessary response to […]

Editor’s Note: Every Monday, Managing Editor Frederick Deknatel highlights a major unfolding story in the Middle East, while curating some of the best news and analysis from the region. Subscribers can adjust their newsletter settings to receive Middle East Memo by email every week. A former crown prince is under house arrest, accused of a plot to apparently destabilize the kingdom. He denies all that and has instead vowed to defy the orders to keep him quiet at home. He has already shared one video with the media and another audio message to his supporters online, declaring his innocence and […]

Editor’s Note: Every Friday, Andrew Green curates the top news and analysis from and about the African continent. Subscribers can adjust their newsletter settings to receive Africa Watch by email every week. For more than a week, Islamic State-linked militants have laid siege to Palma, a coastal town in northern Mozambique that serves as a hub for natural gas projects worth a combined $60 billion. The sustained attack has left dozens of people dead, potentially displacing tens of thousands more. It is the most severe escalation of a jihadist insurgency that began in 2017, and is expected to exacerbate an […]