On 15th of March, the close celebration of Nowruz brought together in Astana the heads of four of the five Central Asian states, with the notable exception of Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov, president of Turkmenistan, who was instead represented by the speaker of the Parliament, Akja Nurberdyeva. Hosted by Kazakhstan, at the initiative of the Uzbek president, Shavkat Mirziyoev, the summit was praised post factum as a significant step for closer regional cooperation. Read more ...
Five Economic Highlights of the 2017 BRICS Summit Xiamen Declaration
The annual BRICS Summit bringing together the leaders of Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa has been concluded in the Chinese seaside city of Xiamen with the issuance of the Xiamen Declaration, which summarizes the points of consensus reached by the BRICS countries in various fields of their cooperation. While BRICS annual summit declarations are traditionally lengthy documents covering a wide range of subjects, present note highlights five specific issues of economic cooperation, which bear a unique imprint of the BRICS “partnership without alliance” and are expected shape the BRICS economic cooperation during its “second golden decade”. Read more ...
Why Australia doesn’t face sovereign risk in the gas markets
Shortages of gas in the Australian market have led to calls for the government to impose restrictions on gas exports. Energy industry executives have responded by saying that market interventions would create a “sovereign risk”, deterring foreign investors and buyers of Australian gas. But this doesn’t apply to Australia for a number of geographic and geopolitical reasons. Read more ...
Australia First Up for New EU Express Trade Deal
An Australia-EU trade agreement may be completed within two years after Australia was announced as one of the first set to benefit from new fast-tracked EU trade deal negotiations. Read more ...
Russia’s Interests in Kosovo’s Election
While the EU waited for the elections in Kosovo and hoped that the process would lead to a more stable government that would tackle the true problems of the former Yugoslav entity, the latest negotiations among the political parties have quickly dashed all of those hopes. The PDK-run PAN coalition’s political tango and the power gained by Vetevendosje alone prove that Kosovo could be heading for a crisis that could easily derail the country from the European path. Read more ...
North Korea claims to have successfully tested a thermonuclear weapon to be mounted on top of ICBM
In an ever growing escalation of the tensions on the Korean Peninsula, the regime of Kim Jong-Un has performed a new nuclear test on Sunday, the sixth in a row to date and by far the most powerful. Read more ...
On Burdensome Allies: China’s Calculations on North Korea’s Erratic Behavior
During the morning of 29th August, the North Korean leader – Kim Jong-un – ordered his army, one of the most numerous in the world (over a million soldiers) to fire a missile over the Japanese island of Hokkaido, in a gesture of defiance not only toward Japan, but also toward the United States of America (the main protector of South Korea and Japan). Read more ...
Seeing Other People: Lukashenko’s Balancing Act
It is a hot (geopolitical) summer. In Asia and in Eastern Europe. Away from the North Korean crisis or the Qatar parading blockade, EU-based delegations are increasingly visiting Minsk these months. In one way or another, the European Union and its member states are looking for a readjustment of their relation with the secluded republic on the Eastern flank. Roughly put, Belarus is tucked in a Russian corner that it can hardly escape even if it wished. And it doesn't. Read more ...
