By Hugo Novotny* | IDN-InDepth NewsViewpoint
NEW DELHI (IDN) – The US, Japan and the European Union nations are gradually losing their dominant positions in the world. At the same time, powerful countries like Brazil, India and China do not try to impose their political and cultural values on less developed countries, but rather they intend to base their relations on a mutually beneficial cooperation.
By Jaya Ramachandran | IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis
PARIS (IDN) – While the trend of rise in international development assistance, which increased by 6.1 percent in real terms in 2013, is expected to continue in 2014 and stabilize thereafter, the declining share of aid for sub-Saharan countries, which need it most, looks likely to continue, according to an annual survey of donor spending plans by the OECD Development Assistance Committee (DAC).
Development aid reached the highest level ever recorded in real terms in 2013 despite continued pressure on budgets in OECD countries since the global economic crisis, says the DAC report. Donors provided a total of USD 134.8 billion in net official development assistance (ODA), marking a rebound after two years of falling volumes, as a number of governments stepped up their spending on foreign aid.
By Monzurul Huq* | IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis
TOKYO (IDN) – The mere fact that the two-day foreign ministerial meeting of the 12-nation coalition of non-nuclear states took place in the Japanese city of Hiroshima, gives the clue to its symbolic significance. Being the first city in the world to witness the horrors of atomic destruction, Hiroshima, from that very fateful day almost 70 years ago, remains at the forefront of global efforts to learn about the devastating impact weapons of mass destruction can cause and also serves as a reminder of the necessity of eliminating nuclear weapons. That symbolic gesture of holding the meeting in Hiroshima on April 11-12, 2014 received added value as the ministers listened to the stories of atomic bomb survivors before starting their formal discussion.
By Jon Lomøy* | IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis
PARIS (IDN | OECD) – By the end of 2015, when the Millenium Development Goals (MDGs) come to term, the international community is expected to approve a new sustainable development agenda. All indications are that this will be a unique and universal agenda, focusing on the eradication of extreme poverty, but also addressing broader environmental, economic and social sustainability challenges. Finding the means to finance this broad agenda, and to make that financing work to produce maximum results without duplication or gaps, will be a challenge.
By Frederick N. Matti* | IDN-InDepth NewsEssay
ANNAPOLIS, USA (IDN) – Nuclear weapons are the most devastating of instruments, with their quadruple means of dealing mass death and destruction: blast, heat, radiation, firestorm. Surely, the last thing even the nuclear-armed states want is a nuclear “exchange,” anywhere on earth. But those states in general have not fully considered the security advantages of worldwide abolition of nuclear weapons, and a likely reason is that they have not been presented “satisfactory” answers to fundamental issues for abolishing nuclear weapons.
By Joergen Oerstroem Moeller*
SINGAPORE (IDN | YaleGlobal) – Shale oil and gas has been labeled a game changer. Statistics would suggest that, yes, the new technologies and discoveries associated with hydraulic fracking change the energy picture and economic outlook, in particular for the United States, but less so than predictions would have it a year or two go.
The greater impact won’t be on the US economy, but rather US-Saudi relations and stability for the Middle East. President Barack Obama met King Abdullah March 28, and both leaders recognize that the geopolitical ground shaped by their common interest in stable oil prices has shifted, creating a new imbalance that could spill over into Mideast security policy.
An Analysis by Gary Sick*
WASHINGTON D.C. (IDN | POMEPS) – Over the past quarter century, the most accurate single factor to explain security developments in the Gulf, as well as the best predictor of the future, has been and is U.S. policy in the region. Since it began to be a significant force, U.S. policy has undergone at least five major shifts. The current policy, which I will call the Obama Doctrine, represents the latest, and possibly one of the most important, iterations.
The United States has become the dominant military, diplomatic, and economic presence in the Gulf. It is, in effect, a leading Gulf power. This has become such an accepted condition that it is easy to forget just how recent and exceptional it is.
By Lucio Blanco Pitlo III* | IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis
MANILA (IDN | SGV) – Increasing ASEAN-China economic relations illustrate the dangers of possibly becoming too economically beholden to one major power. Greater economic integration may reduce the chances of conflict or tensions between countries. Among capitalist peace theorists who held this view include Immanuel Kant who maintained that “the spirit of commerce… sooner or later takes hold of every nation, and is incompatible with war.”
Historically good trade ties decrease uncertainty and establish mutual trust and confidence. To this extent, it can be said that trade is beneficial to concerned parties.
By Ramesh Jaura | IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis
BERLIN (IDN) – The Cuba missile crisis was moving towards a peak when President John F. Kennedy proposed in May 1961 the creation of a Development Centre at the Paris-based Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) to bridge the industrialised nations and the developing world. The Centre has meanwhile developed into a forum not only for South-South but also South-North and North-South cooperation, enabling the industrialised countries “to learn from, and maybe import, some of the policy experiences of the South”, says its director Mario Pezzini.
By Jamshed Baruah | IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis
GENEVA (IDN) – More than 163 parliaments from around the world, constituting the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), have adopted a landmark resolution urging parliaments to “work with their governments on eliminating the role of nuclear weapons in security doctrines” and to “urge their governments to start negotiations on a nuclear weapons convention or package of agreements to achieve a nuclear-weapon-free world”.
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