In 2015, Salma’s husband and his parents held her down and poured nitric acid down her throat because they wanted more than the Tk 100,000 (USD 1,100) that her parents had already paid in dowry. For months since the wedding, …

Australia has a culture for war, and that culture breeds atrocities.

The Australian government’s own inquiry has confirmed many of the allegations leaked by journalists regarding war crimes in Afghanistan, stemming from the execution by Australian special forces of prisoners …

Afghanis who say they have witnessed torture and murder at the hands of Australian soldiers want the chance to testify in court as well as compensation, a journalist says.

***

Australia’s Defence Force Chief Angus Campbell announced yesterday that there …

Funded by the US government via the notorious National Endowment for Democracy (NED) – iLaw set about petitioning the Thai government to have the nation’s entire constitution rewritten and rewritten in such a way as to make it easier for …

Everything is going as China has wanted with its India strategy since April. The situation has been evolving as Beijing predicted.

In other words, whatever China wants India to do, India does.

Because of its opaque governance system, it is …

Indonesia’s dwindling forests may be cleared for farmland under a government-led program to boost domestic food production, raising fears of a surge in deforestation.

The government’s “food estate” program calls for establishing millions of hectares of new farmland, mostly for …

The Maguindanao Massacre is unanimously viewed as the most tragic event in the Philippines that capped 2009. On the fateful morning of 23 November 2009 — exactly eleven years ago — fifty-seven helpless civilians including women and media people were …

In the West the population is at present sheltering to protect itself from Covid, entering the greatest economic downturn since the Great Depression, and facing the threat of unemployment and reduced living standards. On the other side of the world …

This article was originally published in May 2019.

The result of the biggest election in history, India 2019, is terrible news for tribal peoples in the world’s biggest democracy. Politicians with authoritarian nationalist inclinations like India’s newly invigorated Narendra Modi…

The close attention widely paid to the recent election campaign in the United States is understandable. We are talking about a change in the leadership of a country, which continues to occupy the position of one of the main pillars …

Malaysia has once again reiterated its stance to never entertain or recognise any claim by any quarters on Sabah.

Deputy Foreign Minister Datuk Kamarudin Jaffar said the claim on Sabah, particularly by the Philippines, was not only baseless but also …

First published on APR in June 2020.

Andrew Korybko gave an interview to Indian journalist Parth Satam (June 2020) about India’s relations with China, the US, and Russia, just days before Monday night’s deadly clash between Indian and Chinese troops. …

China’s state-owned telecommunications carriers plan to launch as many as 10,000 satellites in the next five to ten years to form a constellation in low-Earth orbit and keep pace with US rivals.

Chinese cadres overseeing space technologies were reputedly jolted …

Chinese Belt and Road Initiative (BRI or B&R), a global transport and economic project, is well known world-wide. While some countries endorse it, many others consider it a form of Chinese expansion designed to subordinate the economies of other countries …

In 1939, a population of orangutans was found in the Batang Toru jungle in South Tapanuli on the Indonesian island of Sumatra. They were thought to be Sumatran orangutans, but in 2017 scientists discovered they were an entirely new species …

Then and Now

The geopolitical frame of inter-state relationships as it exists today in East Asia remains as set around 70 years ago in the wake of the cataclysmic Second World War and subsequent San Francisco Treaty (1951), when the …

In recent years, Japan has started a new wave of militarization, which has surprised experts worldwide. Its closest neighbors, China and Russia are the countries that are most concerned with this new Japanese militarization.

After World War II in which …

China is notorious for a “Social Credit System” that controls the lives of citizens, rewarding what the authorities want and punishing what they don’t. The United States has a social credit system, too, even if we don’t call it that. …

After the third annual “2+2” high-level US-Indian talks in Delhi on October 27, a very important defence pact was signed: the Basic Exchange and Cooperation Agreement (BECA). With so much focus on the American election, little attention has been given …

On November 15th, 15 nations in Asia-Pacific, after eight years of negotiations, sealed the largest trade agreement in the world, known as the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP). China is part of this new association, which surprises experts for its …

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s remarks at the 17th ASEAN-India Summit on November 12 makes sad reading. It comes in the specific context of the signing of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership [RCEP] on Sunday — the mega free trade agreement …

“Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes. Don’t resist them – that only creates sorrow. Let reality be reality. Let things flow naturally forward in whatever way they like.” – Lao Tzu

“Holding on to anger is like …

This article was originally published on Reporting ASEAN in November 2019.

Fifty-two years after its creation and over a decade after its charter came into effect, ASEAN has come quite a way in making its identity more visible. But its …

India and Myanmar agreed this week to move forward on a number of initiatives that are central to New Delhi’s efforts to counter China’s influence in Myanmar, during a visit by a high-level Indian delegation. In particular, the two sides …

Mountaineers, scientists, climate researchers, and local shepherds are all flabbergasted by a 7,000m high mountain in remote far western Nepal which seems to have lost almost all snow in the past two years.

The long glacial valley below Mt …

Fifteen Asia-Pacific nations are set to sign an enormous free trade deal at an online summit that started Thursday, with the pact seen as a coup for China in extending its influence across the region.

Once signed, the Regional Comprehensive …

This article was originally published on Mongabay in April 2020.

Each weekend since March, no one has crossed the boundary into the town of Bauko, in the northern Philippine region of Cordillera. The prohibition,  a municipal advisory, was prompted by …

In an open letter, more than 1,200 academics from universities and institutes across Australia have written to the Victorian government to protest against the destruction of Djab Wurrung country as part of a highway duplication in the west of the …

This summer, during the 201^st session of the Japanese parliament, a bill to amend the Plant Variety Protection and Seed Act (PVP Act) was submitted. Hoping for an immediate vote without a plenary session or any substantive debate, the …

This article was published by Global Research in April 2015.

This video describes China’s system of despotic capitalism, under a “Communist” label.

Wages are exceedingly low, productivity is high. These are the social realities of commodities “Made in China”, marketed …

This was previously published in July 2016.

The Shanghai Spirit — the core value of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) — has played a significant role in safeguarding regional security and promoting regional development.

The SCO’s undergirding values, which features …

Introduction

To research my book, Night in the American Village: Women in the Shadow of the U.S. Military Bases in Okinawa, I lived in Okinawa for a summer in 2003, a year from 2008 to 2009, and a few months …

Australia has joined the global wave of economic digitization. On November 2, the Australian Reserve Bank launched its own digital currency project. According to the Bank’s official statement, the project seeks to “explore the potential use and implications of …

First published in 2019.

Political posturing aligned with commercial interests means that truth is becoming a casualty in the debate about genetically modified (GM) crops in India. The industry narrative surrounding Bt cotton is that it has been a great …

This article was originally published in June 2020.

Australia’s Admission to the treatment of the indigenous people, as their slaves, came to light recently when Prime Minister Morrison revealed some of the detail of Australia’s “treatment of slaves”.

Australian Prime …

This article was originally published in April 2020.

As we know that the world is in the grip of a raging coronavirus pandemic and uncertainty and fear are gripping everywhere. Amidst the widespread of Covid 19 when every country is …

This article was originally crossposted in June 2020.

Last month, I completed work on my first film, writing and directing a documentary titled Atomic Cover-up. Below you can watch via a link four brief clips. The story for me began, …

Since Susi Pudjiastuti left her post atop the Indonesian Ministry of Marine Affairs and Fisheries in 2019, the nation’s fisheries policy has undergone major changes. Besides reviving a controversial lobster larvae export program that Susi had banned and ending her …

iLaw is a US government-funded front petitioning the Thai government to have the entire Thai constitution rewritten and rewritten in such a way as to make it easier for US-backed opposition parties to get into power.

I cover iLaw’s US …

This article was first published in March 2018.

When an airplane is approaching Singapore Changi Airport, it makes the final approach either from the direction of Peninsular Malaysia, or from the Indonesian island of Batam.

Either way, the scope for …

Trump administration officials are quietly considering the creation of a NATO-style alliance with Asian countries in an effort against China, the Washington Times reported.

The idea was first publicly floated by Deputy Secretary of State Stephen Biegun last month …

Did Indian soldiers outsmart their Chinese counterparts?

According to a report by Indian news outlet Swarajya, India has strategically deployed tanks and other equipment on crucial high ground in the Ladakh Valley, giving it a potential advantage over Chinese …

Major (later Lieutenant General) Nagata Tetsuzan (widely believed to be the most brilliant staff officer in Japan, 1922-1935, and mentor of Tōjō Hideki), observed of future wars after he returned from seven years in Europe during and after World War …

Introduction

On 8 December 1945 Son Il, the chairman of the Aomori Regional Office of the Korean Association in Japan (Zainihon Chōsen Renmei), visited the Hirosaki branch of the Supreme Command of the Allied Powers (SCAP) to lodge a charge …

Relations between Mexico and India are taking a new turn. Recently, in a bilateral remote meeting between the respective foreign ministers, the governments of both countries agreed to promote a new “vision of the future”, focusing on social development and …

The landlocked Southeast Asian nation of Laos, officially the Lao People’s Democratic Republic and home to a little over 7 million people, has over the past decade built important ties with neighbouring China particularly in the fields of tourism, trade, …

Some years ago, I was part of a delegation of scholars sent to Japan to learn about Tokyo’s diplomatic approach to Southeast Asia.

What intrigued me was the sheer industry of our Ministry of Foreign Affairs minders. One of them, …

First published in March 2020

Shaheen Bagh, in the neighborhood of Indian capital New Delhi, has been the epicenter of protests by mostly women, with some of them toddlers in their tows. They were expressing their gripes over the discriminatory …

First published in April 2020

As the major powers of the world look inwards to fight the coronavirus pandemic, Indian PM Modi exploits this “historic opportunity” to further his Hindutva-driven agenda in the disputed territories of Indian Occupied Jammu & …

Abstract

Despite one of the world’s strictest and longest lockdown policies, the Philippines’ securitized approach to containing the COVID-19 pandemic has led to unnecessary suffering, especially in poor communities. This article explores how the Philippine government’s prioritizing of punitive policies …

Influential BJP ideologue Subramanian Swamy published an unprecedentedly vitriolic screed against Russia which spits in the face of their decades-long strategic partnership by arguing that Moscow is an irresponsible imperialist power that’s historically exploited New Delhi’s naive leaders, but the …

Where is this nation of a hundred million inhabitants heading to? The future doesn’t seem rosy enough for people to hitch their hope on its government’s myriad promises most of which have gradually whittled down to bubbles that simply burst …

A court in the Philippines has dealt another setback to the company looking to mine Southeast Asia’s largest untapped deposits of copper and gold, ruling to uphold a ban on the type of destructive mining being proposed.

In its Oct. …

The Crown Resorts Annual General Meeting last year, held inside the company’s now flagging flagship Melbourne casino, was an ill-tempered matter.  Members of the board were in no mood to please shareholders, many of whom have occupied the barricades of …

There is a significant reason why political unrest fueled by US interference is flaring up across Southeast Asia – an attempt at derailing Beijing’s ambitious One Belt, One Road (OBOR) initiative.

The Global Network’s latest video focuses on the continuing struggle from Jeju Island, South Korea against the militarization of the island as well as US imperialism on the peninsula.

The Global Network was invited to hold our annual conference in …

In 1888, Prince Paul John Sapieha (1860–1934), a member of a respected, Polish noble family, embarked on a journey to East Asia. The journey brought him to Japan, making him one of the first Polish people to set foot on …

Introduction¹

Japanese empire-building relied heavily on the use of forced labour by politically marginalized – subaltern – people. It is well-known that prisoners across Japan have contributed to large-scale projects like the Miike coal mines² and road-building in …

The following is an excerpt from the author’s article that was first published in “2018 Philippine Development Report” by Hainan Normal University.

***

The year 2018 was a period of enormous challenges and opportunities for the Philippines in the arena …

China has made a decisive move to strengthen ties with one of its main partners in Southeast Asia by opening its markets for duty-free trade. Leaders in Beijing and the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh strengthened their political and economic …

This article was originally published on Asia Times.

Everything about US-China hinges on the result of the upcoming US presidential election.

Trump 2.0 essentially would turbo-charge its bet on decoupling, aiming to squeeze “malign” China on a multiple Hybrid …

Malaysians at this moment are concerned about two different types of numbers. The overwhelming majority are worried about the recent spike in Covid 19 infections and the increase in the number of related deaths. There is a much smaller segment …

Preface and Translation by Bo Tao

Translator’s Preface

The article translated below was written by Yoshida Yutaka, emeritus professor at Hitotsubashi University, for a 2006 edited volume on various aspects of the battlefield experience of Japanese soldiers during the Asia-Pacific …

Introduction

Although Prime Minister Abe Shinzo (2006-07; 2012-2020) repeatedly touted Japan’s values-oriented foreign policy in Asia, there is little substance to this agenda. Like other nations, Tokyo downplays human rights and democratic values in favor of maintaining trade ties and …

This article was originally published in 2018.

New huge wave of ‘China bashing’ is once again rolling from Europe and North America. Its water is filthy and murky. It tries to smear everything about the present Chinese system: from its …

Vietnam has reported its first ever COVID-19 death towards the end of July, roughly five months past the global pandemic announcement from the WHO. As of this writing, the Southeast Asian country has just a total of 35 deaths from …

In a 2017 article, I asked what might a future India look like and concluded that, if current neoliberal policies continue, there could be dozens of mega-cities with up to 40 million inhabitants and just two to three hundred million …

It was a calamity in cultural terms likened to the destruction of the Buddhist statues of Bamyan and the ancient city of Palmyra.  The explosive eradication of two Aboriginal sites in West Australia’s Juukan Gorge in May, said to be …

“Limitation is essential to authority.  A government is legitimate only if it is effectively limited.” – Lord Acton

It is a study both troublesome and perplexing.  To what end can a state trample on human rights ostensibly to preserve such …