Since 2008, the U.S. Embassy in Beijing has issued hourly pollution readings of small airborne particles known as PM 2.5 on the Twitter feed @beijingair, a service has since spread to U.S. consulates in Guangzhou and Shanghai. …
Must-Reads from Around the World, June 6, 2012
Beijing Impasse — The Washington Post provides a comprehensive look at the challenge China’s economic slowdown is presenting to Communist Party leaders seemingly unsure how to proceed. “Unlike in past slowdowns, Chinese …
A 12-Step Program for India’s Economic Recovery?
Indian industry leaders gathered on June 4 in New Delhi to unveil their solution to India’s unfolding fiscal crisis: a 12-step program to economic recovery. The dozen measures recommended by the Federation of Indian Chambers of …
The Six-Day War: Photos from a Short, Bloody Conflict
The war fought 45 years ago from June 5-10 helped bolster Israel’s legend of military invincibility but it also left a legacy of displacement and bitterness that unsettles the region to this day
Must-Reads from Around the World: June 5, 2012
High Stakes — The Guardian reports that Germany is weighing up a plan for a eurozone banking union to end the debt crisis, as Spain pleads for an E.U. rescue of its beleaguered banks. “The plan could see vast national debt and …
Amid Censorship, China’s Tiananmen Crackdown Is Remembered Online
In the years immediately following 1989, the anniversary of the deadly June 4 crackdown on demonstrators in Beijing was marked by smaller memorial protests. At universities in the northwest of the city, students would distribute …
Must-Reads from Around the World: June 4, 2012
Pivot Watch — Following U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta‘s weekend visit to the Asia Security Summit in Singapore, China’s Global Times analyses America’s shift to an enlarged military presence in the region. Their take: …
Five Sobering Questions About the Situation in Syria
The scale of the violence on the ground is amplifying calls for Western intervention. But it also points to the complexity of stopping the bloodshed.
As Panetta Visits Vietnam, China Warily Eyes U.S. Plans For Shift to Asia
Defense Secretary Leon Panetta filled in some details of the U.S. military‘s strategic ‘pivot’ to Asia, telling the Shangri-La Security Dialogue in Singapore on Saturday that the U.S. Navy will shift so that by 2020 the majority …
Meet French Candidate Marion Maréchal-Le Pen: Third-Generation Extreme-Right Militant
Though the surprising success of extreme-right presidential candidate Marine Le Pen may have made her the most attention-grabbing contestant in France’s recent elections, the 43 year-old National Front (FN) leader may soon find …
Life Sentence for Former President Hosni Mubarak: Egyptians React to the Verdict
Fervid but mixed emotions spread across Egypt on Saturday, June 2, 2012, after the news broke that ousted President Hosni Mubarak was sentenced to life in prison for failing to prevent the killings of 850 protesters during last …
Out of Africa: Israel Confronts a New Generation of “Infiltrators”
Israeli immigration enforcers do not work on the Jewish sabbath and so, on a Saturday afternoon, tattered southern Tel Aviv can look like nothing so much as an African city. Having slipped into Israei, young men from Sudan, …
The Lady Abroad: On First Foreign Tour, Aung San Suu Kyi Enchants and Lectures
Aung San Suu Kyi is many things. She is a global democracy icon. She is a beloved national hero in Burma, whose people call her Mother Suu. She is a newly minted parliamentarian in a country that is undergoing surprising …