Asia

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India-Australia strategic partnership: Leveraging aerospace capacity

The forthcoming virtual summit between Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison assumes considerable significance for an India-Australia strategic partnership, particularly as it comes against the backdrop of heightened friction with China for both countries.

By M Matheswaran

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Who really killed the Quad 1.0?

The tale has become accepted diplomatic folklore. In the telling, it was Australia, back in 2008 in the early days of the Rudd government, that decided to scuttle the then-nascent Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, the four-way talks also involving Japan, the United States and India. To compound

By Daniel Flitton

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Prospects for closer strategic ties between India and Australia

China’s rise and assertive behaviour has been a source of concern to both India and Australia. While India prioritises its territorial disputes with China and China’s growing presence in the Indian Ocean, Australia is concerned about growing tensions in Sino-US relations and the undesirable

By Biren Nanda

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Going local: Lessons from Covid response in Indonesia

Covid-19 and the significant changes it presents are forcing new ways of working, including for humanitarian responders. In Indonesia, the government response to the crisis has been criticised internally and internationally as slow and lacking transparency. Senior government figures downplayed the

By Puji Pujiono, Jess Lees, Jesse McCommon

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The local cost of rising India-China tensions

India-China tensions have recently escalated at two Himalayan flashpoints: Ladakh and Sikkim. On 5 May, scuffles broke out between Chinese and Indian soldiers near Pangong Tso, a lake that straddles the border in Ladakh. At the same time, there were skirmishes near Nathu La, a mountain pass that

By Alexander Davis, Ruth Gamble

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Seychelles: Truth, justice and Australia

Australia has not usually had a high profile in the Indian Ocean island states such as Seychelles, Mauritius and Madagascar. This despite Australia’s huge Indian Ocean littoral, presence of three oceanic territories, mutual Commonwealth links and substantial investment. Inter-governmental visits

By Ashton Robinson

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The Trump card in the Sino-Indian rivalry?

As worrying details about the month-long India-China border dispute continue to pour in, Donald Trump, in his signature style, has muddied waters in two significant ways. First, on Wednesday morning, he tweeted: “We have informed both India and China that the United States is ready, willing and

By Abhijnan Rej

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There is no quick fix to our parlous relationship with China

Originally published in the Australian Financial Review

By Richard McGregor

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Another pearl in China’s string?

The Cambodian island of Koh Rong, long a backpacker’s haven, lies just a quick boat ride from Sihanoukville, a city that has come to symbolise the governmental intimacy of Cambodia and China. Omnipresent Chinese-owned casinos, along with frequent reports of criminal behaviour, have turned

By Charles Dunst, Shahn Savino

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Rohingya in Malaysia, doubly trapped

For some people living in the Ampang district in eastern Kuala Lumpur, self-isolation is nothing new. The area is known for its concentration of Rohingya refugees from Myanmar, nestled in the grimy apartments and neighbourhoods of this former tin mining centre, and they haven't been going out for a

By JJ Rose

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China and Australia's relationship is souring but not weakening

COVID-19 and politics are driving them apart but trade keeps them together. Originally published in Nikkei Asian Review.

By Natasha Kassam

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Hong Kong: System override

At first glance, the latest protests in Hong Kong may seem like a carbon copy of what happened in 2019. On 24 May, thousands of pro-democracy protesters crowded into one of the city’s busiest shopping districts, only to be met by riot police with tear gas and water cannons. Officers arrested at

By Holmes Chan

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Push India towards the Quad to deter China

A four-country bulwark against Beijing's regional dominance is an idea whose time has come. To make it work, New Delhi must be convinced to join in. Originally published in the Australian Financial Review

By Lavina Lee

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How is an advanced Australia faring in the Asian century?

China’s barley tariffs have thrust the challenges of trade into the headlines with a prominence rarely seen in the popular Australian media. Although a crucial basis of national prosperity, the “trade” side of Australia’s international engagement has seemingly always had a lower profile than

By Tim Harcourt

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Global consensus can sway China

Events this week show that, amid the most protracted great power stand-off since the Cold War, middle powers can forge global consensus. Originally published in the Australian Financial Review

By Hervé Lemahieu

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Investors will lose as Beijing squeezes Hong Kong

Originally published in the Australian Financial Review

By Ben Bland

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Why Beijing feels compelled to destroy Hong Kong’s freedom

Originally published in the Sydney Morning Herald.

By Ben Bland

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In Afghanistan, one step forward, but peace still a far leap

Last week, Afghanistan’s top two politicians, Ashraf Ghani and Abdullah Abdullah, signed a power-sharing agreement in Kabul, ending their eight-month standoff over September’s presidential elections. The deal allows Ghani to remain president, while giving Abdullah control of the top peacemaking

By Arif Rafiq

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Getting back to harvest: The way forward after China’s barley tariff

China’s decision to impose heavy tariffs on Australian barley and the alleged connection with Australia’s call for an independent international investigation into the origins of the Covid-19 pandemic has been widely and intensively reported in recent weeks. What is more important now is to

By Weihuan Zhou

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The battle for a Covid vaccine risks losing the “war”

Leaders of nations around the globe have resorted to the language of warfare to characterise their fight against Covid-19. From US President Donald Trump, who declared himself a “war president”, to China’s Xi Jinping committing to a “people’s war”, to Britain’s Prime Minister Boris

By Geoff Kitney

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Islands of opportunity: Where India and Australia can work together

As India and Australia prepare for a virtual summit next month between prime ministers amid the coronavirus pandemic, a possible strategic initiative could involve the cooperative use of their respective island territories in the Indian Ocean for strategic purposes. India’s Andaman and Nicobar

By Darshana Baruah

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South Korea’s foreign ministry: Just a few bad eggs?

In April, media reports revealed that a New Zealand court had issued an arrest warrant for a South Korean diplomat on sexual assault charges. South Korea’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) refused to cooperate with New Zealand authorities, invoking diplomatic immunity. Instead, they disciplined

By Jeffrey Robertson

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The tangled web of India-China relations

The present phase of India-China relations emerged from the desire and imperative to reset relations after the Doklam standoff in 2017 and the realisation that, despite the persistence of major differences between them, India and China have significant areas of cooperation both in the bilateral and

By Biren Nanda

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West Papua: Looking for an opening

When the world is grappling with the kind of calamity few of us have experienced before, it can be easy to forget other crises. Climate change springs to mind. So, too, does the record level of human displacement around the world, a problem largely driven by conflict. That brings us to the long-

By Johnny Blades

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India’s Covid-19 tracing app: Power in the right hands?

Governments around the world are working hard to convince their populations to download the various Covid-19 infection tracing apps. As well as potentially helping to stymie the spread of the virus, the app download numbers serve another purpose: they could be read to indicate how much trust there

By Aarti Betigeri

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Covid-19: The need to aid Asia to open up

Two things about the public health and economic impacts of Covid-19 are now clear. First, with just a few exceptions, most affected countries have suffered egregiously, and in many cases unnecessarily. This is a tragic situation. Second, the response has been mainly left to the national

By Haider A. Khan, Peter McCawley

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As Jakarta trims defence, Beijing makes waves in the South China Sea

The Covid-19 outbreak has hit hard for Southeast Asian economies. Anticipating more shocks to come, several countries have already moved to cut defence spending, seeing the military as a budget line that can be readily reduced. Indonesia, for example, has announced it will slash its defence budget

By Aristyo Rizka Darmawan

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The false dichotomy at the heart of Australia’s China debate

A new narrative, advanced by the “wolverines” and like-minded commentators, is emerging and solidifying within Australia’s China “debate”. This narrative casts disliked Chinese policies as attacks on Australian sovereignty, and thus any problem in the bilateral relationship is instantly

By Iain Henry

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Why Vietnam embraces multilateralism at this uncertain time

Today the mere mention of multilateralism leaves many jeering that the heyday of international cooperation has past. Isolationist politics appear preferred. Yet Vietnam’s recent activism in multilateral forums appears to demonstrate that Hanoi does not believe that cooperation is a faded luxury.

By Le Dinh Tinh

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Hong Kong's new 'Basic Law' is that whatever China says, goes

Judges alone cannot protect territory from Beijing's heavy-handed interventions. Originally published in Nikkei Asian Review

By Ben Bland

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In an Olympic-sized challenge, Japan’s golden chance could go begging

There have been plenty of Japanese officials weighing in on Tokyo’s Olympic rescheduling plans over the last few months. At times, it’s been hard to know who to focus on, especially when trying to follow the whole affair from Australia. From the ageing Tokyo 2020 President Mori Yoshiro to

By André Leslie

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Covid contest in Indian Ocean region: India, China jostle for top spot

In recent times, Australia has been searching for ways to support its Pacific “family” through the Covid-19 crisis with an eye on China’s moves. India has also been trying to help countries in the Indian Ocean region amid China’s growing influence. Responses to the corona crisis have so far

By David Brewster

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The Taliban’s empty promises of peace

In a Covid-19 world, there is perhaps little that can still shock and surprise. Still, this week’s brutal attack by Afghan insurgents on a clinic in a hospital in Kabul’s western suburb of Dasht-e-Barchi, during the holy month of Ramadan, made for particularly horrific news, given the targets

By Susanne Schmeidl

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Covid-19 and the acceleration of state surveillance

If the 15th-century philosopher Niccolò Machiavelli were alive today, he would surely have recognised the power of surveillance technologies that states such as China, Singapore, South Korea, and others have adopted in the fight against Covid-19. Patrol robots and drones, CCTV cameras and

By Muhammad Faizal Abdul Rahman

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In beef over barley, Chinese economic coercion cuts against the grain

Last weekend news broke that the Chinese government was considering imposing large tariffs on Australian barley exports. Now, China-bound exports from four Australian meat processors have been suspended. Following Australian calls for an independent inquiry into the early handling of Covid-19,

By Darren Lim, Victor Ferguson

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Where did Kim Jong-un go?

The three-week disappearance by North Korea’s chairman Kim Jong-un prompted plenty of questions. Could a succession crisis unfold? Might it go even further, with the risk that North Korea could collapse? Analysts have long argued that Kim’s health is a wild card when it comes to regime

By Khang Vu

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Vietnam defies the odds on Covid-19

If you want to see real Olympic-level panic-buying, head to a Vietnamese supermarket a week before Tet, or Lunar New Year. Yet when the coronavirus broke out in China, Vietnam, with which it shares a border, there was only an hour or two of panic-buying before things settled down to

By Helen Clark

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Weight on the scales

A few months back – only in January, yet seemingly a very different time – Mike Mazarr and I offered some initial reflections on America’s and China’s contrasting “theories of influence”. The article prompted a series of contributions, including an initial rejoinder from Sam Roggeveen

By Ali Wyne

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Malaysia needs a shadow cabinet to check an amateurish government

In the name of containing Covid-19, the Malaysian parliament will be convened for one day later this month, on 18 May. It’s a cynical move, much more about power struggles than containing the virus. The aim is to protect the three-month-old National Alliance (PN) government from scrutiny and a

By Chin-Huat Wong

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Indonesia’s democracy is flawed, but do enough people care?

The Covid-19 outbreak has once again exposed Indonesia’s lack of preparedness to handle disasters and emergencies. After weeks of denying the severity of the pandemic, the Indonesian government’s response to the climbing numbers of confirmed cases has been confusing. A lack of coordination

By Fadhilah Fitri Primandari

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Under cover of Covid-19, conflict in Myanmar goes unchecked

For Myanmar, the onset of Covid-19 has sparked a renewed crackdown in Rakhine and Chin states. These developments may not capture widespread attention – particularly as relations with China become increasingly fraught – yet they cannot be ignored, and must be recognised as a serious

By James Barklamb

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Wuhan lab claims: Is Australia questioning China? Or the US? Both?

A calculated leak? – Ben Scott Local newspapers have published remarkable claims detailing Australia’s reported concern about suggestions coming out of Washington that the outbreak of Covid-19 may have been the result of an accident at a laboratory in Wuhan rather than coming from an

By Ben Scott, Sam Roggeveen, Natasha Kassam

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With US Afghan exit, Russia eyes Central Asian security

Three months have passed since the United States and the Taliban signed an “Agreement for bringing peace to Afghanistan”. For the Americans, it aims to put an end to the US military intervention in Afghanistan, which has lasted more than 18 years. The provisions of the agreement stipulate a

By Azima Akhmatova

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Beyond Covid, might China overreach?

A major disruption and the emergence of a global threat in the shape of a pandemic may have been expected to foster closer global cooperation. While this may momentarily be true, as countries cooperate to strengthen their healthcare infrastructure and in seeking effective cures and vaccines, there

By Biren Nanda

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Thailand: Killings of insurgents ends southern separatist ceasefire

Insurgents have resumed attacks in Thailand’s south after Thai security forces killed three rebels during a ceasefire declared unilaterally by the main separatist group, the Barisan Revolusi Nasional (BRN). The raid bodes ill for a quick political solution. But insurgents will stay focussed on

By Craig Keating

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Philippines: Bangsamoro, between conflict and Covid-19

In the midst of a delicate war-to-peace transition, still punctuated by military operations, attacks from militant groups and vendettas between feuding clans, the newly created autonomous region of Bangsamoro, in the southern Philippines, is now living in fear of Covid-19. While the extent of the

By Georgi Engelbrecht

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Who would Beijing prefer wins in November?

The 2020 US presidential election may well go down in history as the “China election”. Indeed, if the past month has been any indication, the narratives around this race for the White House will heavily feature how each candidate plans to manage the rapidly deteriorating relationship between the

By Elliott Zaagman

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Despite headwinds, China prepares for world’s largest carbon market

In late 2017, China released its national emissions trading system (ETS) plan, laying out a three-stage transition from regional pilot systems that began in 2013. The national ETS announcement came at a time of intense global interest in China’s climate action, especially given the November 2020

By Huw Slater

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The prospects for China’s post–Covid-19 economy

While the Canberra political establishment has been sparring with China’s Foreign Ministry – and with Australian billionaires – much of the corporate elite has begun puzzling how to slipstream China’s post–Covid-19 economic recovery. Optimists hope that Beijing will summon a massive

By Rowan Callick

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Gwadar Port: New Dubai or pie in the sky?

The small port town of Gwadar, in the south-west of Pakistan, is the centre stage of the $50 billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) project, the Pakistan component of ther Belt and Road Initiative. Under CPEC, Gwadar is to be developed into a smart port city, and will be not only a major

By Adnan Aamir

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