Technological Prowess and Entrenched Poverty
July 16, 2010 4 min. read

Two events occurring within hours of each other earlier this week illustrate India’s potential for great power status as well as the vast distance the country still has to travel to fulfill its global ambitions.

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Bangladesh, Nepal Sign Transit Deal, Likely Increase Trade
July 16, 2010 1 min. read

In another mutual advantage move, Bangladesh and Nepal have signed a deal that will very likely increase bilateral trade between the two countries.  A transit deal, including a transport route worked out in Dhaka–and finalized in early 2011– will increase transport and tourism between the two countries. The deal initially made in 1976 will finally […]

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Flying the Friendlier Skies: Saudi Flight Lands in Iraq after 20 Years
July 15, 2010 2 min. read

Although the news is yet to hit the Iraqi Ministry of Transportation’s state-of-the-art  website, Ayad Katheer Raheem, director-general of the Iraq’s aviation department, said Tuesday that Saudi Arabian Airlines tapped privately-owned Al-Wafeer Airlines to run daily flights between the two Arab nations.     Saleh A. Bogary, Alwafeer Air’s marketing director , confirmed the news, […]

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Introducing This Blog
July 15, 2010 7 min. read

Welcome to this Foreign Policy Association blog dedicated to Southern Africa. This blog is an inside perspective on latest news, discussion, analysis, and commentary in Namibia and Zimbabwe. Although Namibia and Zimbabwe are the main focus of my attention, I also expect to be posting on other countries in Southern Africa. I suspect that politics […]

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Petrobras’ Lesson From BP: Invest in PR
July 15, 2010 3 min. read
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Petrobras announced today the discovery of gas reserves in the Camarupin fields in the Santos Basin as well as the signing of a landmark $160 million-dollar deal with GE Oil & Gas to develop power turbines for offshore platforms. These announcements come on the heels of Tuesday’s press release by Brazil’s National Petroleum Agency (Agência Nacional […]

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The Indian Rupee gets its unique symbol
July 15, 2010 2 min. read

The Indian Rupee now has its unique symbol – a confluence of the Roman ‘R’ and Indian (Devanagari script) ‘Ra’. The symbol was finalized yesterday by an Union Cabinet Committee. Uday Kumar, the designer of the symbol explains the symbol, “My design is based on the Tricolour with two lines at the top and white […]

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Back in Texas: In Search of Plan B
July 15, 2010 4 min. read

More than 70 hours of plane travel later and a five-plus hour drive to get me home I’m finally back from my great World Cup adventure. I hope you’ll appreciate some scarce posting while I readjust to life back in the States and make sense of it all. But two quick points/anecdotes: First, are there […]

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George Packer on the Fallow Ground in the War in Afghanistan
July 15, 2010 3 min. read

George Packer’s latest piece in the New Yorker is a must read for anyone interested in Afghanistan and the war, there, boiling over. Packer is sifting through President Obama’s Afghanistan war strategy.  He’s interested in parsing through the infighting, the dramatic change in leadership personnel, the wild hedging on Obama’s fruitless partnership with the heroically incompetent Karzai […]

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The Awami League Afforded Opportunities to Take Down Religious Right
July 15, 2010 4 min. read

The government has stumbled upon the opportunity to move against all its enemies on the religious right.  International partners are asking the Awami League government to take its next steps carefully.  The BNP is backing down from its high pitched rhetoric on the ruling party’s moves against the right.  With that confluence of events, the […]

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European Parliament accepts the establishment of the EEAS
July 14, 2010 3 min. read

The Parliament’s acceptance of the EEAS, the EU’s diplomatic corps, on July 8 was hailed as a ‘historic’ moment by the EU’s foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton. Of course, such words are necessary on special occasions. Nevertheless, Ashton certainly has plenty of reason to be pleased.   The overwhelming support among MEPs (549 votes for, […]

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Thoughts on Gen. Petraeus As a Game Changing Commander in Afghanistan?
July 14, 2010 3 min. read

It seems that the day’s reportage always fails to deliver good news.  Lives lost and opportunities squandered, squarely pegged in the middle of each New York Times piece, is the mounting price we pay. NATO troops and Afghan sons and daughters, fathers and mothers dead and dying. Today’s bomb attack has added four more casualties […]

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Dilemmas in Jammu and Kashmir
July 14, 2010 2 min. read

The street protests in Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) are de javu for many locals. It is claimed that a new generation of youth in the state are turning to confrontational tactics as the state continues to define security in strictly militaristic terms. For the Indian side peace in J&K implies ensuring that separatists and militants […]

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