Asia
Iran: Presidential election preview
Dina Esfandiary is an Iran specialist and a Research Associate in the Non-proliferation and Disarmament programme at the International Institute for Strategic Studies.
Next…
Why has China's president forsaken protocol?
Much has been made of the fact that the Chinese and American presidents are meeting in informal surroundings on Friday at the Sunnylands retreat, the former estate of Walter…
Self-reliance: Mere lip service to a bygone notion?
Jack Georgieff is the 2013 Thawley Research Scholar in International Security at the Lowy Institute and the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Washington DC.
The…
US Embassy in Pakistan the first to pass 1 million Facebook fans
The US Embassy in Pakistan has just cracked a diplomatic milestone, becoming the first mission in the world to pass 1 million fans on Facebook.
Its rise to top spot has been…
Reader riposte: US surveillance in China's EEZ
Mark Valencia responds to Is China 'Reciprocating' US Maritime Surveillance?:
I usually enjoy Rory Medcalf’s iconoclastic analyses. But this one – unless it is tongue in cheek …
Burma: Conspiracies and other theories
Andrew Selth is a Research Fellow at the Griffith Asia Institute.
There is something about Burma which seems to encourage conspiracy theories. Not only does it create them in…
Commentary
U.S. soft power & the rebalance: Public diplomacy in New Zealand and Indonesia
In this article for CSIS' CogitASIA blog, Lowy Institute Thawley Scholar Jack Georgieff looks at US soft power and public diplomacy in New Zealand and Indonesia, and how that…
Why China is beating America to Middle Eastern oil. Or not.
A few days ago the New York Times ran a rather breathless story about how China has emerged as the biggest beneficiary of Iraq's post-Saddam oil boom. The story prompted a bit of…
The rebalance and the sequester
US Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel was in full reassurance mode at the Shangri-La Dialogue over the weekend. Not so US congressman Randy Forbes in an interview on the rebalance…
Commentary
Shangri La Dialogue: Hints of stormy weather ahead
In this article on The Diplomat's Flashpoints blog, Rory Medcalf explores the way regional tensions played out at the recent Shangri La Dialogue in Singapore.Rory Medcalf