Foreign Policy Blogs

Southeast Asia

Floods Cripple Southeast Asia

Floods Cripple Southeast Asia

Over 150 people have been killed throughout parts of Southeast Asia over the past two months as the region has been inundated by the worst flooding to hit the area in years. From Northern Thailand and neighboring Cambodia, all the way to Vietnam, the Mekong River Delta has turned poor, rural communities and even major […]

read more

Yingluck’s Foreign Policy

Yingluck’s Foreign Policy

When Yingluck Shinawatra was elected Prime Minister of Thailand this past July, I remarked how this development was likely to ameliorate the tensions which had developed over the years between her country and its neighbor to the east, Cambodia. Between allegations of espionage leveled by Phnom Penh against the government of former Thai Premier Abhisit […]

read more

More on Malaysia/Lynas Controversy

More on Malaysia/Lynas Controversy

Earlier this month, I wrote about a growing confrontation in Kuantan, Malaysia regarding a planned rare earth mining facility to be opened by an Australian corporation. The plant – which would become the world’s largest of its kind and the first rare earth refining operation built outside of China in many years – had been […]

read more

Australian Corporate Skullduggery in Malaysia?

Australian Corporate Skullduggery in Malaysia?

September was supposed to be the month in which operations began at a rare earth processing facility located in Kuantan, Malaysia, a fast-growing port city situated along the South China Sea. The project, awarded to the Australian-based Lynas Corporation, was originally envisaged as a lofty effort at breaking the Chinese monopoly of the production of […]

read more

SE Asia: Weekly Roundup

This isn’t going to be one of my typical analytical postings, but there was some interesting news as well as a few fascinating/disturbing videos that were brought to my attention this week that I felt I simply had to share. Firstly, there was a chilling scene outside a Phnom Penh money exchange yesterday that resulted […]

read more

Cambodia: NGOs vs. Government

Cambodia: NGOs vs. Government

Civil society in Cambodia is typically a very contentious issue. A few months ago, I attempted to dichotomize the diverging opinions on this subject by highlighting the urgent need for NGOs in the developing world whilst pointing out that many of these institutions are fatalities of their own benevolence. The problem, of course, is rooted […]

read more

Amigo: An Independent Film Review

Last night I attended the New York premier of Amigo (trailer above), the independent film and brainchild of John Sayles about the Philippine-American War. The film supplements Sayles’ novel A Moment in the Sun (McSweeney’s Books, 2011), which details a small chapter in American history but also one of utmost significance as a comparison to […]

read more

Judging Success in the “War on Terror”

Judging Success in the “War on Terror”

This past week, Umar Patek, the Jemaah Islamiyah militant responsible for assembling the explosives used in the 2002 bombings in Bali, was extradited to Indonesia after being captured in Pakistan in late March. Patek is also believed to have been behind the attacks on Christian churches in cities across Indonesia on Christmas Eve, 2000. His […]

read more

China: The Benevolent Hegemon in S.E. Asia?

China: The Benevolent Hegemon in S.E. Asia?

There is a common misconception that China is an actual member state of ASEAN. Indeed, China is not one of the ten member states that make up the organization. An interesting fact about this regional institution is that during its earlier years, two of the member states – Indonesia and Vietnam – had their own […]

read more

Change is Afoot in Thailand

Change is Afoot in Thailand

In a recent piece I authored at Dissent Magazine, I remarked about the ever-expanding income discrepancy between the rich and poor that has come to characterize Thailand as the region’s most evident and relevant example of class warfare. Not only were the results of the recent elections last month a manifestation of a nation-state’s proletariat […]

read more

Thailand’s Muslim Insurgency: Now What?

Thailand’s Muslim Insurgency: Now What?

A few weeks ago, I wrote about the interesting developments in Thailand’s “deep south,” the site of a long standing Muslim insurgency seeking independence from the government in Bangkok. Soon to be Prime Miniser Yingluck Shinawatra had been stumping in the region in mid-June in an attempt to capture some crucial electoral votes for the […]

read more

A Foreshadowing of Thailand’s Political Heterodox?

A Foreshadowing of Thailand’s Political Heterodox?

As news broke yesterday that a Cambodian solider was killed on the border with Thailand, the site of a border dispute that was just recently adjudicated by the International Court of Justice (ICJ), a brief but critical analysis is required in order to ascertain the significance of such a development. The Phnom Penh Post reported […]

read more

FPA Audio Voiceover: Thai Elections

In case you missed it posted elsewhere, here is my brief, audio synopsis on the Thai elections. This is part of the “Expert Minute,” a new feature at the Foreign Policy Association in which bloggers such as myself have an opportunity to orally explain a relevant event in our region or area of focus over […]

read more

ICJ Ruling on Thai-Cambodian Dispute

ICJ Ruling on Thai-Cambodian Dispute

The International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled today that both Thailand and Cambodia should pull their troops out from the site of an ancient Hindu temple and establish a demilitarized zone around its ruins in order to facilitate negotiations to finally end the long-standing spat between the two countries. The 11-5 ruling from the judges […]

read more

Thailand-Cambodia: Relations Reset

Thailand-Cambodia: Relations Reset

The extent of change in a country’s foreign policy during the transition to a new regime can sometimes be striking. It is a proposition which will be played out in Thailand over the coming weeks and months as the new Pheu Thai-led coalition begins to govern following its electoral victory last week. The result of […]

read more