Burning Birds in the Philippines
In the Philippines, authorities are killing and burning thousands of birds to address an outbreak of avian influenza or bird flu. Already in Pampanga, a region just north of Manila on the main island...
Category: Politics & Economics
Koreans in the Middle
North Korea’s leaders are desperate for attention, and the leaders of other nations, particularly the United States, are responding. While the dictator Kim Jong-un and his lieutenants in Pyongyang, the capital of North Korea,...
Xi Jinping’s Power Play
China’s communist party officials are jockeying for position in the months before the next party congress in Beijing this October or November. Many of the Asian nation’s decision makers will learn their fates at...
China’s Market Play
China’s communist party leaders want recognition as a market economy for their nation, but government officials in other nations, particularly the United States, are opposed. President Xi Jinping and his ministers in Beijing believe...
Labor Reform in Vietnam
In Vietnam, the workers who toil in the factories driving the nation’s rapid economic ascent belong to a single labor union: Vietnam General Confederation of Labor, or VGCL. As the only labor union in...
Vietnam’s Fading Free Trade Hopes
The prospects for the Trans-Pacific Partnership, or TPP, in the United States do not look good, and Vietnam’s leaders are not happy. An expected rejection of the ambitious free trade accord by the U.S....
Vietnam’s Illicit Animal Trade
A taste for rare and exotic animals and a desire to flaunt newfound wealth have transformed Vietnam into the world’s largest trafficking hub for rhinoceros horn. Despite global protections the rhinoceros, which scientists classify...
Xi Jinping’s New Bank
The Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank will replace the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank, according to Xi Jinping and his colleagues in the Chinese Communist Party. The new bank, known as the AIIB,...
A South Korean Hell
On the Korean peninsula north of the demilitarized zone, established in 1953 at the end of the Korean War, the population remains trapped in a prison built by the Kim dictators. But south of...
Xi Jinping Gets Serious
Xi Jinping wants more time to execute his plans for China. One analyst, Willy Lam, a professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, says, “Like his good friend Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping wants...