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'Targets, not drones, draw ire from Pakistan'

Wed, 16 May 2012 08:05:10 GMT

Pakistanâs relationship with the United States was hit hard in 2011, owing to various factors, prime amongst which were the May 2 raid to kill Osama bin Laden in Abbottabad and the attack on Pakista .....

Prospects for peace

Wed, 16 May 2012 07:31:40 GMT

Sunday was the day when President Karzai and his team had hoped the focus of media attention would be on the progress Afghanistan had made in developing its security forces. Ashraf Ghani, the head of .....

A new spurt in Dhaka-Yangon relationship

Wed, 16 May 2012 05:54:23 GMT

With the start in the process of democratisation in Myanmar and its opening up to foreign investment, countries rich in capital, technology and expertise are making a beeline to invest in that country .....

Cheese sandwich and white wine

Wed, 16 May 2012 04:48:45 GMT

In a democratic system, politicians exploit the mistakes of the opposition. They do so for their own reasons and justifications, they want to prove how wrong the other party was and at the same time p .....

Bhutan's veggie challenge

Wed, 16 May 2012 03:33:30 GMT

Going by the information Indonesian government agencies are dishing out to the media, it appears bent on convincing farmers, as well as consumers, that imported vegetables are way overpriced, have hig .....

Gaga all over

Wed, 16 May 2012 03:22:54 GMT

Thousands of tickets have been sold for the Lady Gaga concert, scheduled for June 3. If the event is cancelled, fans will surely get their money back, as with previously abandoned music performances. .....

Facebook follies

Wed, 16 May 2012 03:22:53 GMT

Two recent Facebook controversies have been grabbing media headlines lately. Both cases involved private schools, one in Cebu (central Philippines) and another in Marikina in Metro Manila, where offic .....

Living in Korea tough but hopeful

Wed, 16 May 2012 03:01:47 GMT

When I gave a talk at the State University of New York at Buffalo a few weeks ago, I briefly mentioned my fatherâs turbulent personal history. During the Japanese occupation, he was arrested by the .....

The âsecretâ is out

Wed, 16 May 2012 02:51:12 GMT

The Obama administration chose the first anniversary of the killing of Osama bin Laden to break its doctrine of silence over the CIAâs drone warfare. The most aggressive operation yet that the CIA .....

Hot-headed opposition still angry at presidential defeat

Wed, 16 May 2012 02:40:31 GMT

One suspects that Jerome A. Cohen, an 81-year-old jurisprudence scholar on the faculty of the New York University School of Law, was trying to be polite when he said earlier this week that President M .....

How to help boost economy? Spend more

Wed, 16 May 2012 02:40:30 GMT

The idea that Singapore's economy can be supported by the domestic consumer seems almost absurd, given its small population and reliance on exports for growth. But underestimating the strength of the .....

China's military spending meets country's need

Wed, 16 May 2012 02:40:28 GMT

Countries like the United States, the United Kingdom and Japan have criticised China for the rapid rise in its defence budget, which has maintained a double-digit growth rate for almost two decades. B .....

China's economy must advance on two legs

Tue, 15 May 2012 04:58:34 GMT

The phrase guojin mintui, or "the State advances while the private sector retreats", has been used by some scholars when talking about China's economy. I have no idea how they have reached this conc .....

Refugee issue at OIC meet

Tue, 15 May 2012 04:47:57 GMT

The International Ministerial Conference on Refugees in the Muslim World held in Ashgabat, Turkmenistan has had a special import. For one thing, it was the first of its kind under the auspices of the .....

The Herculean task of becoming an Indonesian family

Tue, 15 May 2012 04:26:33 GMT

Is mixed marriage a status symbol? For some, like movie stars and rich people, it may be, but not in my case. My wife, an Indonesian, and I met in a Jakarta hospital and fell in love, and decided to t .....

Travesty of justice

Tue, 15 May 2012 03:22:00 GMT

Amphon died of cancer last week at Bangkok Remand Prison's central hospital. He was 61. He passed away before he could apply for a royal pardon on his lese majeste conviction and prison sentence of 20 .....

Bitter taste

Tue, 15 May 2012 03:11:22 GMT

Observers had long anticipated that passions would become inflamed as the deadline for the constitution-drafting process approached. And in recent days, as political parties have been discussing the d .....

Could Chinaâs sanctions choke us?

Tue, 15 May 2012 03:11:22 GMT

One hundred fifty container loads of Philippine bananas are being left to rot in the Chinese ports of Dalian, Shanghai and Xingang, according to reports that came over the weekend. Our own governmen .....

Tweet with caution

Tue, 15 May 2012 03:00:48 GMT

Journalist R. Nadeswaran has learnt a bitter lesson that tweeting can be painful and costly. He had sent out tweets in 2010 that were deemed defamatory and last month, a Kuala Lumpur High Court order .....

Effective institutions

Tue, 15 May 2012 02:50:03 GMT

It could be asked why two countries that gained independence at same time grow at varying rates. There are three schools of thought about this, one of the leading ones relating to institutional econom .....

Doing right by foreign workers

Tue, 15 May 2012 02:08:09 GMT

Singapore's Manpower Ministry's move to toughen legislation on the hiring of foreign non-professional labour is partly to ensure that Singaporeans are not denied jobs through fraud committed by cost-c .....

How can Korea boost tourism?

Tue, 15 May 2012 01:57:37 GMT

Korean tourism has seen something of a boom in recent years. Foreign tourist numbers grew almost 50 per cent from 2007-2011, from about 6.5 million visitors to close to 10 million. This year, the Ko .....

Survey = Public opinion?

Mon, 14 May 2012 07:31:45 GMT

About a hundred thousand memebrs and supporters of Umno, Malaysia's ruling United Malays National Organisation, in red shirt had filled the National Stadium at Bukit Jalil to celebrate the partyâs 6 .....

Increased trade to spur growth

Mon, 14 May 2012 04:52:21 GMT

Pakistan and India have not fared well over the past two decades in negotiating confidence-building and nuclear risk-reduction measures. Existing measures, such as prior notifications for certain mil .....

Leave the man alone, please!

Mon, 14 May 2012 04:20:49 GMT

The great English essayist and lexicographer Samuel Johnson remarked about his critics: "A fly, Sir, may sting a stately horse and make him wince; but one is but an insect, and the other is a horse st .....