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Egypt’s petroleum minister announced last week that British Gas plans to invest $3 billion to $5 billion in development projects in Egypt. In an email interview, Gawdat Bahgat, a professor of national security affairs at the National Defense University’s Near East South Asia Center for Strategic Study, discussed the state of Egypt’s oil and gas industry. WPR: Where have the events of the past two years left Egypt’s oil and gas industry? Gawdat Bahgat: Unlike its North African neighbors Libya and Algeria, Egypt has never been a major oil producing and exporting country. It is not a member of OPEC […]

The large-scale anti-Japanese protests that swept across China over the weekend are likely to reach a crescendo today, as Sept. 18 marks the official Chinese anniversary of Japan’s invasion of China in 1931. The wave of public demonstrations was triggered by Tokyo’s announcement last week that it would purchase the disputed Senkaku Islands, known as Diaoyu in China, from a private Japanese owner. The islands are claimed by China and Taiwan but controlled by Japan. U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, who is on a week-long tour in Asia, and other American officials have expressed concern that the escalating dispute between […]

While in Japan on Monday to start off a three-nation tour of Asia, U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta announced that the United States and Japan had reached an agreement to deploy a second missile defense radar installation on Japanese soil. Panetta, who continued on to Beijing, China, following his stopover in Tokyo, said the agreement would enhance the Japanese-American alliance, improve Japanese defense and protect the U.S. from the threat of North Korea’s ballistic missile program. While Panetta insisted that the move does not target China, Beijing responded angrily to the announcement, which came amid heightened tensions between China and […]

Thousands of Chinese protested Tokyo’s purchase of islands claimed by Beijing in a territorial dispute while marking the 81st anniversary of a Japanese invasion that China has never forgotten. Video News by NewsLook

Navi Pillay, the U.N. high commissioner for human rights, recently warned of atrocities committed on both sides of the conflict in Syria in an effort to draw attention to the conflict. In an email interview, Hurst Hannum, a professor of international law at Tufts University’s Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, discussed the high commissioner’s role and capabilities. WPR: What is the role of the U.N. high commissioner for human rights within the landscape of U.N. agencies, such as the Human Rights Commission? Hurst Hannum: The U.N. high commissioner for human rights (HCHR) is the highest-ranking U.N. official specifically concerned […]

In the not-too-distant future, should a continent-spanning republic ever emerge in Europe, historians will probably point to Sept. 12, 2012, as one of the game-changing days in the historic march toward such a goal: The German Constitutional Court effectively accepted the European Stability Mechanism (ESM); the European Commission made public its far-reaching plans for a European banking union; European Commission President José Mario Barroso declared that “the EU must strive to become a federation of nations states” in his State of the Union speech before the European Parliament; and finally, Dutch voters strengthened the country’s pro-European center, while paring back […]

Some commentators have argued that last week’s attacks on U.S. embassies in Egypt, Libya and Tunisia will strengthen the radical and anti-Western Islamic factions in those countries. However, a number of political and economic realities suggest that the violent attacks might instead marginalize the extremists and strengthen these countries’ moderate Islamists. In Tunisia and Egypt, recent elections resulted in governing coalitions led by moderate Islamist parties. But gaining control of the executive branch has made moderate Islamists responsible for dealing with the mounting economic and social problems that have plagued both countries since the 2011 uprisings. Indeed, in both countries, […]

Dozens of protesters torched a U.S. flag in Turkey — a key U.S. alley — over the weekend as anger over a film mocking the Prophet Mohammed continued to spread. Video News by NewsLook

Violence in Afghanistan as NATO strike hits civilians and four NATO soldiers are killed in a suspected “insider” attack. Video News by NewsLook

Days after demonstrators stormed the U.S. Embassy in Cairo, Egypt, and the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya, a wave of anti-American protests has swept through the region. For now, the demonstrations targeting U.S. embassies remain limited in size and scope, and if previous episodes of similar reactions to perceived slights against Islam are any indication, they are likely to fade relatively quickly. Nevertheless, as expressions of the anti-American sentiment that pervades the region, the protests highlight the challenges facing Washington as it tries to navigate the changing political landscape of the Middle East. Before examining those challenges further, however, it […]

Three separate incidents this week have all highlighted how the growing distraction in Washington over the upcoming U.S. presidential election is undermining U.S. diplomacy. The first has to do with the territorial dispute between Japan and China over the Senkaku Islands, possession of which confers exploitation rights to the lucrative fishing grounds and vast offshore hydrocarbon fields in the exclusive economic zone that surrounds them. The Japanese government earlier this week announced that it would buy the islands from the family that holds the deed to the property, raising tensions with China, which also claims the islands as the Diaoyou. […]

Japan is on alert as six Chinese surveillance ships enter waters near islands claimed by both Tokyo and Beijing. Video News by NewsLook

Anti-American demonstrations turned violent Tuesday at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo, Egypt, and at the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya, where attacks killed Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three others. With similar protests now spreading throughout the region, the Defense Department, State Department and White House are working to step up security at embassies in the Middle East and around the world. While the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations holds the host country responsible for embassy security, the U.S. has established its own complex security bureaucracy to respond to ongoing threats. But in light of this week’s security breaches, diplomatic posts […]

New Zealand Prime Minister John Key met with Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda yesterday in Tokyo, where the talks focused on Japan’s interest in joining the negotiations for the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement. In an email interview, Yoichiro Sato, an expert in Japan’s foreign policy in the Asia-Pacific at the College of Asia Pacific Studies at Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University, discussed Japan-New Zealand relations. WPR: What is the extent of diplomatic and economic ties between Japan and New Zealand? Yoichiro Sato: Economic ties are asymmetrical, due to the difference in the two countries’ sizes. Japan is a major trade partner for […]

When Peruvian voters headed to the polls last year, the presidential election looked like a proxy contest for two radical views of the South American country’s future. Ollanta Humala, who emerged victorious, had left advocates of free-market economic policies feeling nervous due to his past support for the policies of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. Humala had previously run for president as an anti-business socialist in 2006, and before that, he had attempted a military coup in 2000. Many voters worried he would take the country in a radical, populist, anti-market direction. More than a year later, Humala’s presidency could not […]

The ongoing Shiite-Sunni cold war that is manifesting itself throughout the Middle East may be beginning to spill over into India. Home to a large Muslim minority consisting of both major sects of Islam, India has recently found itself forced to deal with increasing fallout from the intra-Islamic struggle. At one of the end of the spectrum was the attack against an Israeli diplomat possibly orchestrated by Iranian proxies; at the other were the recent violent protests by a Saudi-funded seminary in the heart of Mumbai. Given India’s dependence on energy exports from the wider Islamic world and the nation’s […]

The U.S. is still the undisputed space superpower, but China is fast gaining military and technological ground on its rival. Video News by NewsLook