Q & A Archive

In a huge win for the French defense industrial base, Dassault Aviation has emerged as the lowest bidder for a $10 billion contract to supply India with 126 of its Rafale fighter jets. If finalized, the deal for medium multi-role combat aircraft would be the first overseas order for the Rafale.* It would also represent a major loss for the rival bidder, the Eurofighter Typhoon, backed by the four-nation consortium of Britain, Germany, Spain and Italy. “Fighter jets are among the most expensive investment any country can make at the moment, and hence, because selling these is an expensive issue, […]

Last week, a group of rebel soldiers stormed the Papua New Guinea Defense Force barracks, placing the military commander under house arrest and calling for Prime Minister Peter O’Neill to step down. The mutiny, led by a retired colonel who was subsequently arrested over the weekend, was a failed attempt to put an end to the political impasse that has gripped the Pacific Island country for the past six months, ever since the parliament replaced former Prime Minister Michael Somare while he was out of the country for medical treatment. In December, the Supreme Court ruled that the parliament had […]

The government in Edinburgh, Scotland is holding a public consultation on the terms of a ballot for the upcoming referendum on Scottish independence. First Minister of Scotland Alex Salmond, who wants to hold the vote in the fall of 2014, intends to ask voters: “Do you agree that Scotland should be an independent country?” The U.K. government insists that these matters must be decided in Westminster, home to the U.K. Parliament. But while they want to keep Great Britain as a united country, Prime Minister David Cameron and his deputy, Nick Clegg, wrote that they “will not stand in the […]

The global financial crisis has shifted the patterns of global migration, with migrants in the Western Hemisphere increasingly avoiding the United States for the emerging South American democracies and migrants in Europe flocking to Germany. In an email interview, Stephen Castles, a specialist in international migration at the University of Sydney, discussed changing global migration patterns. WPR: What impact has the global financial crisis had on global migration patterns? Stephen Castles: The sharp fall in migration predicted by some experts in 2008 and 2009 did not materialize. Stocks of migrants overall have not declined and have indeed begun to increase […]

Boko Haram, the radical Islamist sect behind a recent surge of violence in Nigeria, launched a series of attacks Friday that left at least 185 people dead in Kano, the country’s second-largest city. The attacks struck multiple security buildings as well as the regional police headquarters, and were the deadliest yet by the militant organization. The group, which aims to overthrow the Nigerian government and impose Sharia law, has grown increasingly violent, with its August 2011 bombing of the United Nations building in Abuja, the capital, as well as its attacks on churches raising alarm among international observers. “Boko Haram […]

Law enforcement officials from seven West African countries met in Sierra Leone last month to discuss increasing anti-corruption efforts at a conference organized by the U.S. State Department and U.S. Justice Department under the auspices of the West Africa Cooperative Security Initiative (WACSI). In an email interview, Boubacar N’Diaye, an associate professor of black studies and political science at the College of Wooster, discussed the WASCI. WPR: What is driving the West Africa Cooperative Security Initiative, and which U.S. government agencies are involved? Boubacar N’Diaye: The driving force behind the WACSI is the United States’ desire to curtail drug trafficking […]

Relations between Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan have grown increasingly strained in recent weeks, particularly after Erdogan, a Sunni Muslim, urged the Shiite leadership in Iraq to resolve sectarian tensions, which have escalated in the wake of the recent U.S. military withdrawal from the country. Maliki responded by telling Erdogan to stop interfering in Iraqi affairs, with the sharp exchange between Baghdad and Ankara taking an alarming turn when several rockets were fired at the Turkish embassy in Iraq last week. According to Henri Barkey, a Turkey expert at Lehigh University, the recent […]

Newly inaugurated Guatemalan President Otto Perez Molina ordered the army to join the fight against organized crime and drug cartels last week. In an email interview, Bruce Bagley, chair of the department of international studies at the University of Miami, discussed Guatemala’s place in the war on drugs. WPR: What is the nature of Guatemala’s drug crisis, and what has recent policy been to confront it? Bruce Bagley: Guatemala has become a major transit country for cocaine moving north along the Pacific Corridor from Colombia to Mexico and into the United States. Mexican President Felipe Calderon’s militarization of Mexico’s anti-drug […]

Japanese Foreign Minister Koichiro Gemba paid a two-day visit to Turkey earlier this month. In an email interview, Selçuk Esenbel, a Japan specialist at Bosphorus University, discussed Japan-Turkey relations. WPR: How deep are diplomatic and trade relations between Japan and Turkey, and what is their recent trajectory? Selçuk Esenbel: Since Japan and what was to ultimately become the modern state of Turkey first established relations in 1873, ties have been friendly with no serious conflicts of interest. Geographic distance has hampered the development of close trade ties, but generally speaking Turkey has always been very friendly toward Japan. Since the […]

Qatar has gained increasing attention lately due to its heightened foreign policy profile in the Middle East, particularly its prominent role in responding to the Arab Spring uprisings across the region. Over the past year, Qatar has inserted itself as a mediator in Yemen’s political impasse, supported the NATO intervention on behalf of Libya’s rebels and led the Arab League in imposing tough sanctions against Syria. The high-profile activism has established Qatar as a regional “player,” but Gregory Gause, a Middle East expert and professor of political science at the University of Vermont, said he does not see any real […]

The Egyptian government is currently in talks with the International Monetary Fund over an emergency loan of $3 billion, after having declined a similar offer from the IMF last year. In an email interview, Magda Kandil, the executive director and director of research at the Egyptian Center for Economic Studies, discussed Egypt’s international borrowing. WPR: How dependent has Egypt been historically on international financing, and how has that changed since the revolution? Magda Kandil: Egypt has been dependent on financing to close the gap in the fiscal deficit. However, most of the borrowing has been domestic. Currently, public debt is […]

Earlier this month, India approved a $1.18 billion deal for the purchase of 500 Mica air-to-air missiles from the French defense firm MBDA. In an email interview, Jean-Luc Racine, a senior CNRS fellow at the Center for South Asia Studies at the School for Advanced Studies in Social Sciences and the vice president of the Asia Center in Paris, discussed France-India relations. WPR: What have been the Sarkozy administration’s main priorities in advancing France-India ties? Jean-Luc Racine: Since then-President Jacques Chirac’s visit to India in 1998, France-India ties have improved consistently, and current President Nicolas Sarkozy has clearly toed the […]

Since taking office in March 2011, Myanmarese President U Thein Sein has taken steps to move the country away from the political repression and human rights abuses that have left it internationally isolated over the past five decades. His initial efforts led to a process of engagement with the U.S. that culminated in U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s visit late last year, the first by a U.S. secretary of state to the country in half a century. At the time, Clinton held out the hope of further engagement in exchange for continued progress on a variety of human rights […]

Taiwanese voters will head to the polls on Jan. 14 to cast their ballots in a close presidential race that has focused largely on how to address relations with China, which claims Taiwan as a province. Ma Ying-jeou, the incumbent and chairman of the Kuomintang or Chinese Nationalist Party, has worked to strengthen ties across the Taiwan Strait. With James Soong, a candidate who trails a distant third, expected to bleed off some potential Kuomintang support, Ma is neck-and-neck with Tsai Ing-wen, the opposition candidate whose Democratic Progressive Party favors independence from the mainland. Expanding beyond the media focus on […]

A Russian naval flotilla, including an aircraft carrier, left the Syrian port of Tartus Monday after a six-day call, described by the Russian government as a routine stop. In an email interview, Mark N. Katz, a professor of government and politics at George Mason University, discussed Russia-Syria relations. WPR: How committed is Russia to the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, and how deep are its contacts with other political actors in Syria? Mark N. Katz: Moscow had especially close relations with President Bashar al-Assad’s father, Hafez — who ruled from 1970 until his death in 2000 — during the […]

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has asserted his power over the past 18 months by reducing the influence of independent institutions and increasing that of his ruling Fidesz party. In addition to passing a new constitution, which went into effect on Jan. 1, the government pushed through laws consolidating power over the judiciary and the central bank, while also restricting freedom of religion and freedom of the press. “Orban is trying to cement the place of the Fidesz party in the government,” said Balázs Jarábik, an associate fellow at FRIDE, a European think tank based in Madrid. “This democracy deficit […]

Outbreaks of violence between the Lou Nuer and Murle tribes in South Sudan, which began last month and continued into this week, have left hundreds dead and tens of thousands displaced in one of the most remote corners of the youngest nation in the world. The intertribal fighting in Jonglei state, near the South Sudanese-Ethiopian border, serves as a reminder that South Sudanese independence does not mean an end to conflicts within its own borders, said Alan Goulty, former U.K. Special Representative for Sudan and Darfur and a senior scholar in the Africa program at the Woodrow Wilson International Center […]