Asia

Mindanao has always been a militarised zone due to the combined influence of insurgency, high criminality, and clan violence. Yet the five-month Marawi siege in 2017 and the aftermath has further amplified what can be best described as a “securitised” state. More than 12,000 troops were deployed

Episode 10 of the Lowy Institute’s new podcast, Rules Based Audio, is out today. In Socialist Paradise: North Korea under Kim Jong-un, the Washington Post Beijing bureau chief and author Anna Fifield talks about how the strange, closed country is changing under its young leader. And

Twenty years ago, several hundred soldiers from the 3RAR Parachute Battalion Group, including me, flew from our base in Holsworthy to Darwin. We had a brief training session with a cavalry squadron we had never worked with, and then, never having conducted any maritime training, we embarked on HMAS

Bacharuddin Jusuf “BJ” Habibie, third president of the Republic of Indonesia, passed away on 11 September in Jakarta. After serving as vice president under Suharto, Habibie succeeded him when political and economic crisis forced the president of three decades to resign in May 1998. Although it

Increasingly, we are seeing reports that senior Indian politicians want India to obtain what New Delhi calls “Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir” (POK). It’s hard to know how seriously to take such remarks. Some Indians certainly aspire to reunify India by obtaining areas “occupied” by other

Ten days ago, US President Donald Trump called off negotiations with the Taliban about withdrawing US troops from Afghanistan, widely expected to be followed by intra-Afghanistan peace talks, which Norway hoped to host and President Ashraf Ghani had begun to prepare for by selecting a negotiation

On the weekend of 24–25 August, the Brisbane City Council painted over a freshly-completed mural of a Korean statue on a traffic signal box. The mural had been approved by the Council as part of its Urban Smart Project but it responded to complaints that it was “offensive graffiti

Bacharuddin Jusuf “BJ” Habibie, Indonesia’s third president, died last week at age 83. Habibie was an unexpected president. He hesitantly took over the reins of government from the second president of the Republic, Suharto, in an event televised worldwide on 21 May 1998. Unlike his predecessor

A rare image on social media of Indonesian paratroopers dropping into the troubled West Papua province this month was a stark reminder that, even in the age of 24/7 news, governments are good at keeping the cameras, and the world’s attention, away from persecuted communities. West Papua – the

Slow but steady It has often been said that despite periodic diplomatic upheavals, Australia has been fortunate to have a sprawling multi-ethnic Asian neighbour to its north that has managed to remain largely unified. But here’s a fresh take on Indonesian stability that puts the recently agreed

Staying true to his reputation for unpredictability, US President Donald Trump suddenly called off the Afghanistan peace negotiations with the Taliban last Saturday – a major policy decision announced, predictably, in a tweet. Trump cited continued Taliban attacks on US personnel as the reason for

As digital technology and information become more sophisticated, so does the Chinese internet and the ways in which it influences its people’s behaviour. It has established a “closed loop” of state media, homegrown internet companies, and censorship – blocking access to foreign platforms and

Southeast Asia is a region crucial to China, the geography creating what is known as the “Malacca Strait dilemma” – a strategic chokepoint located between the Malay Peninsula and the Indonesian island of Sumatra, it provides China with its shortest maritime access to Europe, Africa, and the

In March this year, Myanmar’s Defence Ministry submitted a proposal to parliament to establish a national coastguard. Given strong support for the idea from the main political parties, the armed forces, and the public, it is expected that the necessary legislation will be passed without undue

The political talk in South Asia at this moment is reminiscent of the 1990s. The Taliban are returning to Afghanistan and conflict is escalating between India and Pakistan in a seething Kashmir region. There is even debate on the potential use of nuclear weapons amid India-Pakistan crises ­–

Last week, Dili polished itself up and played host to visiting government officials from more than 20 countries, including Prime Minister Scott Morrison from Australia, to celebrate the twentieth anniversary of Timor-Leste’s vote for independence on 30 August 1999. As the excitement and gravitas

Indonesia’s dry season has never been easy. Dry winds blow from Australia and rainfall is almost nonexistent, which leads to major forest fires, choking air pollution, and searing heat, along with the energy-sapping effect the season has on residents. For many parts of Indonesia, one problem has

There are 100,000 people tonight in Tasi Tolu, a wide, flat, dusty expanse on Dili’s outskirts, near the capital’s western bus terminal, with enough space to fit all those coming to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Timor-Leste’s vote for independence. Inside, grandstand seating is set up

It is impossible to know what is actually happening in Kashmir. Since 4 August, Indian forces have effectively incarcerated the region, with people kept indoors and more than 1600 “social activists” detained. Communications to, and in, the Kashmir Valley have been severed. There have been no

Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte is scheduled to arrive in China on Wednesday for his fifth presidential visit to China in less than three years. His predecessor, President Benigno Aquino III, made only one trip to China, in 2011. China is Duterte’s most visited presidential destination.

In Malaysia, a sex-tape scandal engulfing the country in recent months has threatened to destabilise the governing coalition. While the tape has been determined by the police to be authentic, and not a forgery, it is still questioned in some quarters. The truth of the video itself is a point of

One, a rugged survivalist with a penchant for striding through dangerous terrain, accompanied only by a television crew. The other, the man who holds the hearts, minds, and fates of 1.2 billion people in his clenched fists. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi might not have a clearly articulated

Terrorist attacks inevitably generate frenetic global media coverage, with pundits examining motives, ascertaining network links, and theorising new developments or political repercussions. Numbers of deceased and injured are central to initial reports, but eventually victims are reduced largely to

Many of The Interpreter’s readers are experts on the theory and conduct of international relations. So, quite reasonably, they look at armed conflict through the lens of inter-state relations, where one state resorts to the use (or the threat of use) of armed force to prevail over another. For