Asia

A belated tribute to Lyn Lusi, co-founder with her husband and orthopaedic surgeon, Dr Jo Lusi,  of \'Heal Africa\' in Goma. Lyn succumbed to cancer on 17 March this year. \'Heal Africa\' is a health service which provides fistula surgery and care for women with fistula

Alex Thursby is CEO of ANZ\'s Asia Pacific business and a career banker. Why is it that the conversation in Australia about Indonesia is so \'underdone\'? Notwithstanding the warmth evident during President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono\'s successful visit here, the public conversation is largely

Brendan Taylor is Head of the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre, Australian National University. It\'s more than flattering to attract attention from Michael Wesley and Hugh White, two scholars I greatly admire. But its also left me feeling a little like a shrimp caught between two

I was somewhat surprised to read Brendan Taylor\'s matter-of-fact statement that the South China Sea isn\'t really a vital interest for any of Asia\'s great powers, except perhaps for China. I\'m not so sure about this, for two reasons. First, the South China Sea is emerging as the

Lawrence Haddad is Director of the Institute of Development Studies in the UK. The debate in these pages on the case for aid resonates with one we are having in the UK: is aid about poverty reduction or economic growth? I have blogged about this topic in Development Horizons. A March

Brendan Taylor\'s post on Asia\'s shifting power balance shows his characteristic mix of grace and insight. I usually end up agreeing with Brendan. For years he has been telling me I\'m wrong to see Japan as a great power in Asia\'s emerging strategic order, and I\'m starting at last to

Good news from the Philippines, no longer Southeast Asia\'s economic laughing stock. (Thanks James.) \'At present our universities survive on foreign students paying high fees. Will this flow of revenue continue if a Chinese or Indian student can get a Stanford or MIT qualification at home?\'

Translation by Dirk van der Kley, an intern in the Lowy Institute\'s International Security program. As part of the Lowy Institute\'s focus on the rise of Asian aid donors we are planning a series of blog posts that will look at how these \'new\' emerging donors, namely China and

This is not so much a lucky country, according to the overarching critique by post-war Australian intellectuals, as an imitative country. \'I didn\'t mean that it had a lot of material resources,\' wrote Donald Horne in The Death of the Lucky Country, published in 1976, lamenting not just on how

China warns North Korea against a nuclear test. (Thanks Malcolm.) An Australia-Indonesia Youth Association survey finds that its hard for Australians to get working visas for Indonesia. To really leap into the Asian Century, Australia must become a republic, says David Morris. Nick

Nick Bryant makes a fair and important point. Some good things have been achieved in Afghanistan, and some of them may even last once ISAF has gone. But for those of us interested in the decisions that governments make about the use of armed force, the fact that something has been achieved is not

Giovana Arrarte attended the Lowy Institute\'s third China Changing Lecture last Thursday evening (recording now available here), and writes: Last night after listening to the thought-provoking presentation of Dr David Daokui Li, \'Is China Ready for Global Economic Leadership?\', several

Alicia Mollaun, a PhD candidate at the ANU, is based in Islamabad. For her research on US-Pakistan relations, she met with Pulitzer Prize winner Steve Coll, author of \'Ghost Wars\' and \'The Bin Ladens\'. To say that Pakistan has problems is an understatement. A quick

Peter Leahy, a former Chief of Army, is Director of the University of Canberra\'s National Security Institute. The Prime Minister has announced the details of the transition of Australian troops from Afghanistan. It is a plausible and workable plan dependent on two assumptions. 

Greta Nabbs-Keller is writing a PhD at Griffith Asia Institute on the impact of democratisation on Indonesia’s foreign policy. Indonesia\'s aspirational slogan, \'ASEAN Community in a Global Community of Nations\', posted all over Jakarta in 2011, has been undermined by recent events in

Tom McCawley is a Jakarta-based journalist and analyst. Indonesia\'s President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono must look back nostalgically on his landslide re-election in 2009. Voters rewarded his promises to fight corruption and create jobs with a 60% landslide victory in a direct election. He was

Annmaree\'s anxieties about the aid budget are well-founded. If the fiscal squeeze is to be as hard as everyone says, there seems little chance that aid will be spared. Of course, no one is talking about spending less on aid — only about slowing the rate of growth. Aid spending

John Blaxland proposes an Australian version of the US Peace Corps. North Korea\'s missile test was a flop. There may be a follow-up nuclear test. There\'s lingering distrust between China and Indonesia, meaning there won\'t be much of a shift in their relationship. the Asia

The UK Prime Minister is on a tour of Japan and Southeast Asia, and it\'s interesting to read this visit in light of Nick Bryant\'s comments on The Interpreter that Britain is increasingly looking to Asia as a source of economic opportunities. Judging by the Number 10 website, trade is certainly

If yesterday\'s speech by Prime Minister O\'Neill, given to up to ten thousand protesters who packed out Sir John Guise Stadium in Port Moresby, is anything to go by then protesters have achieved political change. O\'Neill was forced to address the stadium of protesters who

Tim Soutphommasane writes: I just noticed your blog entry of 5 April touching on my opinion column in The Age from 26 March on the Asian century. The \'Interpreter\' blog doesn\'t permit comments so I am resorting to email. I appreciate your comments, even if in disagreement,

Two recent pieces that take our discussion forward, the first by Daniel Flitton at The Age: ...the government seems unable to decide whether America belongs in the region - switching again from promising an \'\'Asian century\'\' back to an \'\'Asia-Pacific\'\' one. Prime

Via Spoon & Tamago (a rather wonderful blog about Japanese design) comes this trailer for a documentary about Japan\'s video-game arcades: The independent film-makers are still trying to raise money to complete their movie. Learn more here

If anyone thought the Arab League had finally been able to \'get it together\' and become an effective multilateral body, as some posited following its endorsement of military action against Libya and its imposition of sanctions against Syria, they should think again.  The Arab