After two years of controlling the coronavirus pandemic with stringent border restrictions and social distancing measures, Hong Kong’s zero-COVID policy has collapsed under the weight of the omicron variant. In the past few months, the city has experienced its largest outbreak of coronavirus cases to date, with tens of thousands of daily infections and a total of over 500,000 recorded cases as of Tuesday. The fatality rate has also soared, as the coronavirus ravages nursing homes in the city and afflicts its large population of undervaccinated elderly residents. Medical experts have attributed the spike in cases to a series of [...]
The Russian invasion of Ukraine has brought some clarity to regional realignments and strategic partnerships in the Middle East, with the changing relationship between the United States and the oil-producing members of the Gulf Cooperation Council in particular coming into sharp focus. War has a tendency to cause states to pay closer attention to and accelerate policy decisions on issues that they might otherwise prefer to defer action on or to leave ambiguous or unresolved. But after more than a week of fighting in Ukraine, one thing has become clear: Washington’s partners in the Middle East are increasingly confident about [...]
Just over a week into Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the shock has begun to fade, while the outrage continues to mount. The tenacious resistance of Ukraine’s military, its president and its people in the face of what have become increasingly indiscriminate attacks by Russian forces has created a rising tide of support and solidarity across Europe and the world. That has translated into stepped-up deliveries of military aid by European countries, mass rallies in capitals across the continent and an open-door policy for the hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian refugees now fleeing the war. While the Russian military continues to [...]
