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Michel Thierry Atangana Abega spent 17 years in detention in Cameroon, locked in a tiny underground cell. He was alone for nearly all that time, denied access to lawyers and doctors and dependent on charity to supplement meager, state-issued rations. His primary connection to the outside world came from a radio that carried local stations and, sometimes, Radio France Internationale and the BBC. Born in Cameroon in 1964, Atangana studied in France and became a naturalized French citizen in 1988. He embarked on a career as a financial engineer and, in 1994, traveled back to Cameroon to develop road projects. […]

In the end, the result was little surprise. On Feb. 4, Nicos Anastasiades won a second term as president of the Republic of Cyprus. Although the margin of victory was perhaps a bit closer than many predicted—he won by 56 percent in a runoff against Stavros Malas, an independent backed by the Greek Cypriot communist party, known as AKEL—polls had shown Anastasiades with a comfortable lead for many months. Now that the elections are over, attention inevitably turns to the long-running efforts to reunify the ethnically split Mediterranean island. Since violence first flared up between Greek and Turkish Cypriot communities […]

The contentious relationship between Turkey and the West hit a little-noticed but significant milestone this week, when the Dutch government announced it was formally downgrading diplomatic ties and officially withdrawing its ambassador from Ankara. Turkey and the Netherlands remain NATO allies, and diplomatic relations continue at the level of charges d’affaires. While not garnering the attention of the escalating confrontation between Turkey and NATO in Syria, the Dutch move is an important marker of Turkey’s continuing drift away from the West under President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. The decision was also unexpected because Turkey and the Netherlands had been in talks […]

At the end of January, 23 African nations announced plans to launch a single aviation market in an effort to boost connectivity and economic growth. While airline executives and industry analysts described it as a “seismic event,” African states have not had the best track record implementing integration policies. In an email interview, Richard E. Mshomba, a professor of economics at La Salle University in Philadelphia and the author of “Economic Integration in Africa: The East African Community in Comparative Perspective,” explains what is behind the initiative, as well as the obstacles and opportunities for broader economic integration on the […]

The National Defense Strategy released by the Pentagon in January paints a worrying picture not only of the world, but also of the Pentagon’s perception of it. In doing so, the document manages to achieve an extraordinary feat: repudiate the worldview of both the sitting president and his predecessor. The National Defense Strategy, or NDS, portrays the international arena as a field of strategic competition, where geopolitical contests have replaced terrorism as the chief threat to American security. This newly competitive world pits the U.S. against great powers in China and Russia and regional ones in Iran and North Korea. […]

BELGRADE, Serbia—Is China building a Trojan horse in a divided Europe? The diplomatic initiative between China and 16 countries in Central and Eastern Europe, known as the 16+1, has become more controversial since its launch in 2012 at a summit in Poland. Critics worry that it may undermine the European Union’s unified approach to Beijing, weaken transparency in economic and diplomatic engagement, and give a secretive regime with an increasingly muscular foreign policy a foothold in Europe. The 16 European countries are all ex-communist states, and all but five are EU members. In January, Hans Dietmar Schweisgut, the EU’s ambassador […]

Donald Trump’s first State of the Union address last week may have been mild by his standards. But while generally lacking in inflammatory rhetoric, the speech wasn’t devoid of it altogether. In a moment that deserves more attention than it received, Trump referred to a vast swath of countries, including many U.S. allies, as “enemies of America.” Those three words, which did not appear in the prepared text released by the White House before Trump’s address, were directed at the 128 countries that backed a December resolution at the United Nations General Assembly condemning the Trump administration’s unilateral decision to […]

On Jan. 22, a court in the Central African Republic convicted and sentenced a former warlord and leader of the anti-Balaka militia, Rodrigue Ngaibona, to life in prison. Human rights groups described it as a first in the war-torn nation and a “decisive first step” in delivering justice for crimes committed during the violence that has gripped the country for the past five years. In an email interview, Elise Keppler, the associate director of the International Justice Program at Human Rights Watch, and Lewis Mudge, a senior researcher in the Africa Division at Human Rights Watch focusing on the Central […]

Editor’s Note: In July 2019, this story received an Honorable Mention by the National Press Club for the Edwin M. Hood Award for Diplomatic Correspondence, which recognizes excellence in reporting on diplomatic and foreign policy issues. It is also one of 30 that we’ve selected from our archives to celebrate World Politics Review’s 15th anniversary. You can find the full collection here. For 15 years, El Salvador’s zero-tolerance approach to gangs—known as mano dura, or iron fist—has resulted in devastating violence while failing to address the root causes of the crimes it’s supposed to eliminate. Yet this approach to dealing with gangs […]

In early December, four new bills were introduced in the Australian Parliament that together represent the most sweeping proposed changes to the country’s national security laws in decades. In supporting their passage, Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull referenced Soviet spying in Australia decades ago. “The threat we face today is greater than when Soviet agents penetrated the federal government during World War II and the early years of the Cold War,” he warned. The four bills have all been submitted for review to the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security, which is expected to report its recommendations and any […]

Based on public polling, voter trends and the continued appeal of populist outsiders from Washington to Warsaw, it’s abundantly clear that there’s an erosion of competence and confidence in governments. It’s a global phenomenon, and U.S. President Donald Trump is a symptom, not the cause, of the slow, steady decline in the capacity of formal public institutions to make wise policies and implement them. In this age of uncertainty, however, civil society organizations have proven more able and willing to fill some of the gaps. While it is true that they lack the legitimacy of elected officials, and cannot actually […]

Editor’s Note: This article is part of an ongoing series about press freedom and safety in various countries around the world. On Jan. 15, the Securities and Exchange Commission in the Philippines revoked the media license for Rappler, an online, independent media outlet that had gained prominence for its critical reporting and investigative work. The decision has provoked a backlash from the media in the Philippines, which has been under increasing assault from the administration of President Rodrigo Duterte, the populist leader who was elected in 2016. In an email interview, Daniel Bastard, the director of Reporters Without Borders’ Asia-Pacific […]

International institutions offer spies incredibly easy places to ply their trade. Although this is a sensitive topic, it may be these institutions’ most important contribution to international stability. While organizations like the United Nations and African Union emphasize their contributions to peacemaking and sustainable development, their headquarters are also hunting grounds for spooks. Last month, Le Monde revealed that Chinese intelligence services have been downloading vast amounts of data from the servers at the AU’s offices in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, every night for five years. Beijing says that this is absurd. Everyone else assumes it is a fact. China generously […]

In making trade policy, process is as important as substance. If the process is perceived as fair, the participants, both citizens and policymakers, will likely view the outcomes as fair. The Trump administration has never understood that. It demands “fairness” from its trade partners but doesn’t always treat them fairly. After immediately withdrawing from the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership and threatening to withdraw from longstanding trade agreements, such as NAFTA and even the World Trade Organization, President Donald Trump has made it clear he views trade as a zero-sum game where only one side can “win.” But trade is about mutual […]

Editor’s Note: Every Friday, WPR Associate Editor Robbie Corey-Boulet curates the top news and analysis from and about the African continent. Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta was sworn in for a second term more than two months ago, but tensions around his re-election are clearly still fresh in Kenya. This week, the decision by opposition leader Raila Odinga to follow through on threats to stage a shadow inauguration brought those tensions to the forefront, and the government’s response raised questions about Kenyatta’s commitment to civil liberties. Thousands of Odinga supporters attended Tuesday’s ceremony, where Odinga, holding a Bible, declared himself “the […]

This week, a Chinese airline, China Eastern, canceled 106 round-trip flights to Taiwan around the busy Lunar New Year, citing a refusal by Taiwanese authorities to approve the flights. The spat is the latest in an escalating row between Beijing and Taipei at a time when the Trump administration’s policies in East Asia are raising concerns among some U.S. allies in the region. In an email interview, Joel Atkinson, an associate professor of East Asian international relations at the Hankuk University of Foreign Studies in Seoul, South Korea, discusses what’s behind the heightened tensions, how Washington fits in, and what […]

In this week’s Trend Lines podcast, WPR’s editor-in-chief, Judah Grunstein, managing editor, Frederick Deknatel, and associate editor, Omar H. Rahman, discuss the Trump administration’s new National Defense Strategy, which declares that “inter-state competition, not terrorism, is now the primary concern of U.S. national security.” For the Report, Peter Gill talks with Peter Dörrie about Nepal’s Muslim minority, which remains marginalized despite the country’s recent progress in promoting religious pluralism. If you like what you hear on Trend Lines and what you’ve read on WPR, you can sign up for our free newsletter to get some of our uncompromising analysis delivered […]