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Due to a public holiday, Asia Times Online will next upload on May 28.
China's reform hands fail to clap
The young Chinese leadership is displaying a near-schizophrenic split that can be summed up by President Xi Jinping's gung-ho style and no-holds-barred defense of Mao Zedong and the seriousness with which Premier Li Keqiang, China's first "PhD prime minister", is pushing economic reforms. Irreconcilable contradictions persist between nurturing the marketplace and the Chinese Communist Party's power imperative.
- Willy Lam
(May 24, '13)
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SPEAKING FREELY
Western hypocrisy over Chinese nukes
Speculation that China plans to depart from a strict nuclear policy that emphasizes minimum deterrent and a no-first-use pledge flies in the face of official rebuttals and the fact that its nuke arsenal hasn't expanded with economic advances. Instead of assuming Beijing is aggressive, Western nations should ask why their own policy is based on preemptive strikes and not more defensive postures.
- Hui Zhang
(May 24, '13)
Neo-Nazi denial in Myanmar
Myanmar has a newly registered Nazi party, the Rakhine National Development Party, created in the wake of anti-Muslim violence in Rakhine State. Opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi has dined publicly with its leaders, confirming the strength of race-based politics in the country, where fawning by Western interests has helped to create a sense of invincibility regarding such fascist attitudes. - Maung Zarni
(May 23, '13)
Obama narrows scope of war on terror
Barack Obama announced a new policy to limit the conditions for drone strikes against terrorist suspects. Groups sharply critical of the US president's failure to break with George W Bush's "war of terror" gave his pledge to emerge from the legal shadows a cautious, if somewhat skeptical, welcome.
- Jim Lobe
(May 24, '13)
America's truth-seeking drone program
Hunting militants through morally and legally questionable bombing missions hardly provides real justice to the victims of the September 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center in New York. The same international laws are broken by the drone program purportedly intended to protect American soil from foreign enemies seeking to eliminate its citizens.
- Elliot Saunders
(May 24, '13)
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Neighbors eye Sharif with caution
Pledges new Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has made to investigate the Kargil border conflict and Inter Services Intelligence agency involvement in the Mumbai bombings will be welcomed in Delhi. However, as past stints as premier saw him recognize the Taliban as a legitimate Afghan government and take his country diplomatically closer to Saudi Arabia, leaders in Kabul and Tehran will be less enthusiastic about his return to power.
- Fatemeh Aman
(May 24, '13)
What's a disqualified candidate to do?
Disqualifications by Iran's unelected Guardians Council of former president Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani and Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei for next month's presidential race have sparked an outcry. Rafsanjani seemingly buckled, while Mashaei, the incumbent president's protege, is taking the only route available to reinstate his candidacy - a direct appeal to the Supreme Leader.
- Frud Bezhan
(May 24, '13)
SPEAKING FREELY
Turkey puts a new paradigm in play
The Arab Spring and the conflict in Syria have forced Turkey to reassess its policy stance of non-interference towards the Middle East "swamp". Ankara has grasped the opportunity created by the conflict to resolve its Kurdish question - taking a path its leaders hope will enable a reawakening of the country's regional ambitions. - Omer Aslan
(May 24, '13)
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Hashimoto echoes Japan's past failure
Many in Japan are dismayed by Osaka Mayor Toru Hashimoto's claim that "comfort women" were necessary for the morale of troops in World War II. Abetted by the present government, more incendiary sound-bites from the far-right can only be expected. They are symptomatic of the nation's failure to come to terms with a checkered past.
- Walden Bello
(May 23, '13)
Tokyo, Seoul hold 'ugly' nuclear option
The strategic consequences of a sustained North Korean nuclear weapons program are immensely troublesome. As neighbors such as South Korea and Japan consider possible countermeasures, they might consider it time to reassess whether nuclear weapons are an option to maintain an "ugly stability" in the region.
- Tahir Mahmood Azad
(May 23, '13)
US moves toward full Iran trade embargo
The United States Congress has stepped closer to a full trade embargo on Iran with legislation intended to increase support for Israel. If it is passed into law, President Barack Obama would lose his waiver rights that ensure countries with historic trade and financial relations with Tehran continue cooperating with Western efforts to pressure Iran over its nuclear program.
- Jim Lobe
(May 23, '13)
China's premier Li Keqiang in Islamabad
Several agreements including plans to work on developing a north-south economic corridor marked Chinese Premier Li Keqiang's visit to Islamabad this week. China has been a strong ally to its southern neighbor, but critics in Pakistan urge the government there to stop deluding itself and recognize that India is of far more importance to Beijing.
- Syed Fazl-e-Haider
(May 23, '13)
Darkness envelops Pakistan
Elections in Pakistan have seen one crony replaced with another, further distancing from power the educated and intelligent young generation that could shape a new future for the nation. Unless the generals and their political accomplices hand some power to the people, the moral and intellectual thread of society will continue to unwind.
- Mahboob A Khawaja
(May 23, '13)
THE ROVING EYE
And the winner is ... Khamenei
Iran's roster of would-be presidents has been whittled down to eight from nearly 700, courtesy vetting by the Guardian Council. Two potential big draws are ruled out - former president Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani and Esfandiar Rahim, too much outgoing President Mahmud Ahmadinejad's man. That leaves an uninspiring bunch and one sure winner whoever wins - Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei.
- Pepe Escobar
(May 22, '13)
SINOGRAPH
China nears point
of no return with Kim
China is losing patience with North Korean leader Kim Jong-eun, slowly but surely moving into the US orbit to deal with his threats and blackmail. As Beijing will sooner than later reach the point where it has little to lose from falling out with North Korea, Kim had better start contemplating his own mortality. - Francesco Sisci
(May 22, '13)
New spark in the South China Sea
Sanctions Taiwan has imposed following the fatal shooting of a Taiwanese fisherman by the Philippine Coast Guard, including a hiring freeze on Filipino workers and banning tourism to the Philippines, are shows of sovereignty aimed at bolstering the administration's sagging approval ratings. Manila has no such problems, but economically and diplomatically it can't afford another front opening in the South China Sea.
- Julius Cesar I Trajano
(May 22, '13)
THE ROVING EYE
Assad talks, Russia walks
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad wasted a golden opportunity in an interview to explain to the Western public, even briefly, why petro-monarchies Saudi Arabia and Qatar, plus Turkey, have the hots for setting Syria on fire. While he was talking, Russia was walking, sending a message it is ready to go where the Pentagon and others fear to tread.
- Pepe Escobar
(May 20, '13)
SPENGLER
Syria's madness and ours
While atrocities in Syria, such as the cannibalism viewable on YouTube, transfix the West, the real horrors of war are still to come in the Middle East. Americans, whose appetite for horror shows little sign of satiation, cannot abandon the region, but should avoid the conflict in the grim recognition that civilizations determined to destroy themselves cannot be prevented from doing so.
(May 20, '13) |
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Indian growth model
unsustainable at best
India managed growth of a mere 5% last year. That there is expansion at all is thanks to the services sector, one part of the economy able to operate outside government control. As a growth model, that's unsustainable.
- Kunal Kumar Kundu
MICHAEL PETTIS
German savings, crisis
in Europe, and China
Confusion between national and household savings can make even trained economists struggle to understand the imbalances and role of German savings at the heart of the current European crisis. China's "monumental savings" are subject to similar miscomprehension.
CREDIT BUBBLE BULLETIN
Financial euphoria
At this stage of an inflationary asset market boom, it's perfectly rational to double-down with the "house's money" and play for the spectacular big win, using unprecedented ultra-loose finance and government backstops to accumulate as much financial wealth as possible.
Doug Noland looks at the previous week's events each Monday.
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No Tibet, no Kashmir -
a Chinese handshake
No one is going to lose sleep in Delhi over the reports that China and Pakistan have signed a Memorandum of Understanding [MOU] to develop the Karakoram Highway as an “economic corridor".
- M K Bhadrakumar
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