Asia-Pacific

Photo: Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, founder and first President of the Turkish Republic, visiting Istanbul University after its reorganization in 1933 as a mixed-gender institution of higher education with multiple faculties. Wikimedia Commons | Public Domain

Reflections on Turkey: From Mustafa Kemal To Recep Erdoğan

Viewpoint by Pier Francesco Zarcone*

ROME (IDN) – Has Turkey changed under Erdoğan? The question may seem absurd due to the habit of considering Turkey a secular and Westernised country before Recep Erdoğan came to power.

However, this consolidated image turns out to be false. There has been a change, but not in substance: what has changed is its exteriority. In fact, albeit with periodic recourse to elections, the country has always been governed in an authoritarian way, and today this feature is only more evident and its quality is more pronounced.

: Phil Harris; THE WORLD; EU & Europe; 14 March 2018

Photo: Vocational training centre for women in Faizabad, Bakakshan province. Credit: UNAMA | Fardin Waezi

UN Pushes for Gender Equality in War-Torn Afghanistan

By Devinder Kumar

NEW DELHI | KABUL (IDN) – The UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) has documented that, in 2017, 359 women were killed – five per cent more than in the previous year – and 865 injured. Altogether about 10,000 civilians lost their lives or suffered injuries in 2017.

It is against this backdrop that the UN in Afghanistan marked International Women’s Day on March 8, recognizing the global movement for women's rights and the work of activists who have been central to the push for gender equality.

Afghanistan ranks 154th in the UN Gender Inequality Index, and this year’s Women's Day – under the theme 'Time Is Now: Rural and Urban Activists Transforming Women’s Lives' – sought to draw attention to rural and urban women who are left behind in many areas of development.

: Devinder Kumar; UN INSIDER; 12 March 2018

Photo: The House of Peace on the 38th parallel, likely to be the venue of the Trump-Kim summit by May 2018. Source: lifeinkorea.com

Surprise Trump-Kim Summit by May with Global Repercussions

By Jayantha Dhanapala

The writer is a former Sri Lanka Ambassador and UN Under-Secretary-General for Disarmament Affairs. He was also President of the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs for ten years until August 2017. Click here for his previous stimulating contributions for IDN. – The Editor.

KANDY (IDN) – Donald Trump has always had the capacity to surprise us. Amidst the actions to fulfil his Presidential Campaign promise to "Make America Great Again" by slapping tariffs on friendly allies and having declared Jerusalem to be the capital of Israel, he has now signalled a dramatic volte-face on talks with Kim Jong-un of the Democratic Republic of Korea (DPRK) whom he had frequently taunted as the "little rocket man".

: Jayantha Dhanapala; OPINION; 11 March 2018

Photo: In the worst outbreak of violence against Muslims in recent years, mobs were on the rampage earller in March attacking people and property in the central hill capital Kandy. Picture shows the Kandyan terrain as viewed in 2013. Credit: Wikimedia Commons.

Sri Lanka’s Extremists Find a New Enemy

Viewpoint by Dr Farah Mihlar*

LONDON (IDN) – After fiercely quelling a three-decade armed conflict fought mainly on ethnic grounds, majoritarian politics in Sri Lanka has found a new enemy – the country’s nine percent Muslim community.

In the worst outbreak of violence against Muslims in recent years , Sinhalese-Buddhist mobs were on the rampage earller in March attacking people and property in the central hill capital Kandy. One Muslim was killed in the violence and dozens of Muslim owned shops and properties set ablaze. The government imposed a curfew and sent in troops, but the situation remains volatile and tensed as police are at best ineffective and at worst complicit.

: Asia Editor; THE WORLD; Asia-Pacific; 10 March 2018

Photo: Sri Lanka's central province Kandy (as seen in 2005). Parts of the province have been affected by the latest spate of violence. Credit: Wikimedia Commons.

The Timing of 'Communal' Violence in Sri Lanka Raises Questions

By Kalinga Seneviratne

This article is the 21st in a series of joint productions of Lotus News Features and IDN-InDepthNews, flagship of the International Press Syndicate.

BANGKOK (IDN) – The damage has already been done. Buddhists are accused of Islamaphobic communal attacks in Sri Lanka and tourists are cancelling their trips to the country as the international media follow a common formula denigrating the Buddhist majority, while ignoring questions that are being raised in the country on the timing of these latest “communal” attacks.

The violence against Muslim businesses and homes in Central Sri Lanka and in the East came a day before a no-confidence motion against prime mnister Ranil Wickremasinghe was to be tabled in parliament by the opposition.

: Kalinga Seneviratne; THE WORLD; Asia-Pacific; 09 March 2018

Photo: A view in May 2007 from South Korea towards North Korea in the Joint Security Area at Panmunjom. North and South Korean military personnel, as well as a single US soldier, are to be seen. Credit: Wikimedia Commons.

UN, EU, Experts Hail Outcome of Inter-Korean Talks, Call For Availing of Peace Opportunities

By Ramesh Jaura

BERLIN (IDN) – The United Nations and the European Union as well as independent arms control experts have welcomed the results of latest talks between South and North Korea, and called for seizing the opportunities opening up for peace in the region and for reducing international tensions.

The significance of emerging prospects is underlined by the fact that though the Korean War ended in 1953, in the absence of a peace treaty the two Koreas are technically still at war. As The New York Times notes, in the United States where coverage of the armed conflict was censored and its memory decades later is often overshadowed by World War II and the Vietnam War, the Korean War has been called "the Forgotten War".

: Ramesh Jaura; UN INSIDER; 07 March 2018

Photo: The Conference Row in the Joint Security Area of the Korean Demilitarized Zone, looking into South Korea from North Korea. It shows guards on both sides and a group of tourists in the South. Created: 26 July 2012. Credit: Wikimedia Commons.

Mixed Reactions To Inter-Korean Accord

By Yonhap News Agency

This report was carried by the South Korean news agency on March 6 (local time: 23.38) and is being reproduced to give a glimpse into how the current development on the Korean peninsula is viewed in the Republic of Korea. – The Editor

SEOUL (IDN-INPS) – South Korean political parties on March 6 demonstrated mixed reactions to the results of the high-stakes visit to North Korea by President Moon Jae-in's special envoys, which included an agreement to hold a cross-border summit next month.

Shortly after returning from his two-day visit to Pyongyang, Chung Eui-yong, Moon's chief security advisor and head of the South's 10-member delegation, announced a set of agreements with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.

: Asia Editor; THE WORLD; Asia-Pacific; 06 March 2018

Nuclear Deterrence Policy Gathering Steam in India

By Sudha Ramachandran

BANGALORE (IDN) – "Though India is a reluctant nuclear power, nuclear deterrence will continue to play a crucial role in India's national security strategy over the next few decades," says Brigadier Gurmeet Kanwal, Distinguished Fellow at India's Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses (IDSA).

In his recent book 'Sharpening the Arsenal: India's Evolving Nuclear Deterrence Policy', he explains the reason: "Only when India's adversaries are convinced that India has both the necessary political and military will and the hardware to respond to a nuclear strike with punitive retaliation that will inflict unacceptable loss of human life and unprecedented material damage, will they be deterred."

: Asia Editor; THE WORLD; Asia-Pacific; 06 March 2018

Photo: Singapore. Credit: Sven Scheuermeier on Unsplash

Patchy Progress on Fighting Corruption across Asia-Pacific

By Sean Buchanan

This is the third in a series of reports highlighting salient aspects of Transparency International's latest analysis on challenges posed by corruption around the world as well as successes and failures of efforts targeting a scourge that eats into the vitals of human rights. – The Editor.

LONDON (IDN) – When it comes to the fight against corruption, countries in the Asia-Pacific region are failing on average, according to this year’s Corruption Perceptions Index released by Transparency International.

The index, which ranks 180 countries and territories by their perceived levels of public sector corruption according to experts and businesspeople, uses a scale of 0 to 100, where 0 is highly corrupt and 100 is very clean.

: Phil Harris; THE WORLD; Asia-Pacific; 28 February 2018

UNESCAP, Islamic Development Bank Sign Landmark Agreement

By Santo D. Banerjee

NEW YORK (IDN) – One of the world’s largest multilateral development banks, the Islamic Development Bank (IsDB), has launched 'Engage', a new digital platform which will promote technological and scientific solutions to accelerate progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

IsDB President Dr. Bandar Hajjar announced on February 21 the launch of the new platform at an event hosted at Bloomberg's European Headquarters in London, together with UN Under-Secretary-General and Executive Secretary of the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), Dr. Shamshad Akhtar, Dr. Hayat Sindi, Chief Scientific Advisor to IsDB, and a group of business, innovation and development experts.