The story has been remarkable for two reasons. First, for the pure depravity of the alleged crimes. According to Army prosecutors, a small group of soldiers from the 5th Stryker Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division who were deployed to Afghanistan in 2009-10 went spectacularly, murderously rogue. According to prosecutors, they engaged in …
More than a month after an online call for anti-government protests in major Chinese cities, a crackdown on dissent continues. On Friday writer Ran Yunfei, who has been in police custody since February 19, was formally arrested on suspicion of “inciting subversion of state power,” the advocacy group Human Rights in China …
There is one cricket tradition on the Subcontinent that, unlike those dapper white v-neck sweaters, has endured into the 21st century: cricket diplomacy. Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has invited Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani to attend tomorrow’s semi-final match in the Cricket World …
The Burma sanctions debate in the West is made largely immaterial by the investment currently flooding the country, mostly from Asian nations that have few moral reservations about enriching the Burmese ruling generals. Chief among the eager investors are China, Thailand, South Korea, Singapore and India. Their target? Burma’s rich …
The Pentagon often cites Afghanistan’s vast untapped mineral wealth when asked how, exactly, the country’s government will fund its security forces when the coalition leaves. The reality, of course, is that it will be several decades before any of those underground resources ever see the light. But there is another wealth to be found …
A 6.8 magnitude earthquake hit eastern Burma on Thursday night, its epicenter close to the border with Thailand and Laos. Sustained tremors were felt in Bangkok, more than 500 km to the south of the epicenter, and even as far as Hanoi, capital of Vietnam. So far, only one fatality has been reported — that of a 53-year-old woman in …
This article was written by Tim Padgett with Aaron Nelsen in Santiago
During President Obama’s visit to Chile this week, he and President Sebastián Piñera were supposed to have ceremoniously signed a nuclear energy cooperation agreement. Instead, the pact, under which Chile would gain U.S. nuclear technology and training, was …
The 300-year-old Daiou temple is the last thing left standing in its neighborhood of Minami Sanriku, perched over a tangled sea of what were once greenhouses, cars, houses and lives. A delicate bronze Buddha statue, just feet away from a trailer that has been tossed on its side, observes the destruction from behind a barrier of trees …
Lieutenant Junior Grade James Powell tells me to hold my hands out in front of my waist and waves a detector a few inches above them. “So where are you from?” he asks casually. Eyeing the digital numbers flickering on the counter, I answer. He tells me to turn around and lift my left foot so he can scan the sole of my sneaker for …
It was an offer Chiharu Marsh couldn’t refuse. Just eight weeks pregnant, the 28-year-old from Yokosuka had two days to decide whether to take the U.S. military up on its offer to fly her to America for a month, or to stay in Japan with her family and friends. As the wife of a U.S. service member at the Misawa Air Base, Marsh is one of …
Wikileaks has revived one of the most sordid episodes in India’s recent history — in which members of the opposition waved bundles of cash on the floor of Parliament — and forced Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to answer, yet again, for charges of corruption within his party.
The cable in question, from July 17, 2008, was sent by …
In China, there have been a range of reactions to the crises in Japan: smug satisfaction, heartfelt sympathy and, also, soul-searching. “Faced with that type of danger, I doubt I’d be able to behave so well,” said one blogger quoted by the Wall Street Journal. “The casualties from an 8.9 event in China would be hundreds of times higher …