Australia and Japan have been in the news lately. The prime ministers of both countries got together to issue a Joint Declaration on Security Cooperation (JDSC). They reaffirmed their vital “Sp...
https://www.fairobserver.com/politics/a-new-fusing-of-japanese-aussie-synergies-in-the-indo-pacific/
In the summer of 2022, Professor Srinivas Reddy, Scholar, Translator & Musician at Brown University, and Anne Hofmann, Chair of the English & Humanities department and a Professor of English at F...
https://www.fairobserver.com/region/asia_pacific/an-open-conversation-on-buddhism/
Kashmir has long experienced conflict. Since 1989, a full-blown insurgency has ravaged this beautiful land. Pakistan claims that India has occupied a Muslim-majority area that rightfully belongs ...
https://www.fairobserver.com/world-news/it-is-taboo-to-talk-about-metoo-in-kashmir/
The world imagines the Taliban to be a monolith of bearded Islamic fundamentalists. However, much like Afghanistan and the rest of the region, the Taliban are deeply divided. There are two main f...
American political scientist Francis Fukuyama hailed “the end of history” and the ascendancy of Western liberal democracy in an article published in the National Interest at the very moment o...
https://www.fairobserver.com/politics/the-russia-ukraine-war-shows-history-did-not-end-ethics-did/
30 April 2022 To: H.E. António Guterres, United Nations Secretary-General CC:H.E. Ambassador Barbara Woodward, Permanent Representative of the United Kingdom to the UN and President of United Na...
https://www.fairobserver.com/politics/appeal-to-the-un-to-protect-hazaras-in-afghanistan/
My wife and I are not religious. Monica was raised as a Gujarati Hindu while I grew up in an orthodox Parsi family in Ahmedabad, India. Formal religion — hers or mine — plays no role in our d...
The unprecedented political drama finally concluded with a successful vote of no-confidence in the National Assembly, Pakistan’s lower house of parliament. On April 9, the National Assembly of ...
In this episode, we have a Ukrainian-American guest and you can read what she has to say below. FO° Insights is a new feature where our contributors make sense of issues in the news. Katerina Ma...
On top of a highly contested presidential race and the election of People Power Party (PPP) candidate Yoon Suk-yeol on March 9, South Korea’s COVID-19 numbers are rapidly rising, with the cou...
This is Fair Observer’s new feature offering a review of the way language is used, sometimes for devious purposes, in the news. Click here to read the previous edition. We invite readers to...
Michael Beckley is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and the author of “Unrivaled: Why America Will Remain the World’s Sole Superpower.” He has no time for the commonly h...
The leaders of Russia and China are joining forces. Russian President Vladimir Putin traveled to Beijing for the Winter Olympics to show solidarity with his largest trade partner at an event that...
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the world’s largest corporations are allowing the government of China to use the Winter Olympic Games to promote and advance its notion of the supe...
In the aftermath of terrorist attacks in Madrid (2004) and London (2005), many Western governments developed countering violent extremism (CVE) strategies, with the UK’s PREVENT scheme, launche...
In a recent article on Fair Observer titled, “Making Sense of Vladimir Putin’s Long Game,” Atul Singh and Glenn Carle make the case that Russia’s president has an overarching plan to brin...
On December 6, the world saw Myanmar’s leaders ousted by a military takeover earlier this year receive their first verdict in a series of trials. National League for Democracy (NLD) leader Aung...
The Green New Deal is a progressive wish list that combines the reduction of carbon emissions with investments in Green technologies and Green jobs. In the United States, the Green New Deal has l...
Taiwan is a problem. Historically separate from but linked to China, Taiwan was colonized by the Dutch and partially by the Spanish in the 17th century. Through a series of conflicts between abor...
Two starkly different viewpoints published in The Australian over Canberra’s posture toward China show the contrasting approaches to strategic uncertainty and perception of threat from Beijing....
There is no question about it: Our planet is warming faster than ever before. Having plateaued around 280 parts per million for thousands of years, global CO2 emissions have shot past 400 ppm a...
North Korea is one of the most heavily sanctioned countries in the world. It has been subject to US and international sanctions for more than 70 years. Those sanctions have come in three overlapp...
Some 40 years ago, the Club of Rome published a study with what at the time was a relatively provocative title, “The Limits to Growth.” The book appeared at a time of rising environmental con...
World capitals and Olympic committees will soon need to make a consequential decision. They can either reward and reinforce Chinese President Xi Jinping’s unprecedented power grab — at home a...
On November 6, Brianna Fruean and other Pacific Islands representatives marched in Glasgow as all eyes are on the United Kingdom for the COP26 climate change summit happening this month. The chil...
Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen recently confirmed reports that US Marines and special operators are training local troops on the island, reflecting growing concerns in Washington over the stat...
The New York Times has produced one of the silliest news articles about Chinese history — or, for that matter, anyone’s history — ever written. Chris Buckley’s article, “To Steer China�...
The international order is in deep trouble, and not only since the onslaught of the COVID-19 pandemic. This is not how things were supposed to turn out. The collapse of the “evil empire,” the...
By June, the economic impact of the pandemic had been felt by the most marginalized in Indonesia, particularly sex workers. Restrictions to curb the spread of COVID-19 meant fewer people paid for...
Associated Press reporter Nomaan Merchant has been listening to the latest warnings from the US intelligence community that wants the public to understand it is time to be seriously afraid of Chi...
Under the leadership of President Xi Jinping, China has been transformed into a paranoid state fanatically motivated by ensuring security at any and all cost. This obsession stems from the desire...
In early September, with the war in Afghanistan officially over and the Middle East retreating from the media’s landscape, The New York Times began preparing the American public for the next th...
For over 50 years, I have been writing about foreign policy — mostly America’s but those of other nations as well. I think I have a pretty good grasp of places like Turkey, China, India, Russ...
Earlier this month, the US, UK and Australia announced an unprecedented agreement to provide nuclear-powered submarines to the Australian Navy. The move provoked outrage from France, which had be...
For most of the 20th century, Westerners had one word to sum up any thoughts they may have had about China: inscrutable. Several decades of globalization have radically changed that perception. F...
The European Union received a serious shock last week that confirmed the seismic shock it received a month ago when US President Joe Biden made good on his decision to unilaterally abandon the 20...
The far right would like to impeach Joe Biden, kick him out of the White House, perhaps even throw him in jail. “Lock him up” has been a predictable chant at Trump rallies going back to befo...
The summit in May between Joe Biden and Moon Jae-in delivered numerous positive outcomes that advanced the United States and South Korea as a future-oriented alliance. The two allies redoubled th...
The sudden reemergence of the lab leak theory earlier this year — that COVID-19 was made in and escaped from the Wuhan Institute of Virology — has hit international media and occasioned nervo...
In early 2020, as soon as the epidemic caused by a novel coronavirus began turning into a global pandemic, everyone, from scientists to politicians and media pundits, was eager to understand wher...
China has been recognized by Washington as the major rival to the United States in nearly every field. However, this isn’t the first time an Asian country has posed a threat to America’s econ...
When the United States began Operation Enduring Freedom, leading its forces into Afghanistan to empower local resistance to oust the Taliban, Afghans around the world cheered in sheer jubilance. ...
In August, the Daily Devil’s Dictionary appears in a single weekly edition containing multiple items taken from a variety of contexts. This week, before glancing at political division in the US...
On July 1, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) celebrated its 100th anniversary. During his commemorative speech at Tiananmen Square, President Xi Jinping claimed that China has never oppressed the...
Gwen Berry recently protested the playing of the US national anthem by turning away from the flag and holding up a shirt that read “activist athlete.” The protest took place at the Olympic tr...
Sport is often a great source of soft power, or the ability to shape the preferences of others by appeal instead of coercion or monetary incentives. The Olympic Games are a powerful tool for this...
In these times of historical transition, volatility has become the norm. China, despite its autocratic discipline, is unlikely to be spared. A young generation has begun calling into question som...
On the domestic front, Joe Biden is flirting with transformational policies around energy, environment, and infrastructure. It’s not a revolution, but it’s considerably less timid than what B...
The COVID-19 pandemic has sent shockwaves through energy markets. Since March 2020, lockdowns around the world have led adults to work remotely and children to learn virtually. Last year, accordi...
In 2019-20, a pro-democracy movement erupted in Hong Kong. Students from both high schools and universities took to the streets. They gambled with their futures for democratic ideals. Instead of ...