Asia

The United States has labelled China a currency manipulator. The move sent shock waves through markets early this week and left many speculating what may come next. Trump has repeatedly called for lower interest rates and a cheaper currency to help him win his trade war with China (and the next US

While President Donald Trump’s bull-in-a-China-shop approach to reforming international trade doesn’t appeal, it is possible that some of his objectives might make sense. This was the logic behind comments by former Barack Obama adviser Daniel Russel, suggesting that Australia

In June, a controversial statement from a UBS economist set off a firestorm in mainland China, causing serious trouble for the Swiss banking behemoth in one of its most important markets. Nationalist anger circulated on Chinese social media. The company apologised for the remarks and placed the

Separation anxiety A new call to split trade negotiation from diplomacy in Australia has once again underlined how the rise of China has unsettled traditional frameworks for making policy about economic and security interests. The divide between neo-liberal economic policy approaches

On 28 June, two suicide bombers carried out an attack in the Philippines, targeting the headquarters of 1st Brigade Combat Team (BCT) in Indanan, Sulu. Days later, one of the suicide attackers was identified as Norman Lasuca, a 23 year-old resident of Jolo, now considered the first Filipino to be

Over the past few months, sugar has featured prominently in India’s political and economic discussion. Countries such as Australia, Brazil and Guatemala are upset with the Indian government’s subsidies to its sugarcane farmers, alleging in a claim to the World Trade Organisation (WTO) that the

The name Mukhriz Mahathir – son of Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad – is in the news once again, mostly by virtue of being the only child in the family to enter into politics. As a sex video scandal roils the People’s Justice Party (PKR) led by prime minister-in-waiting Anwar

Last week, as Taiwan’s presidential race gradually gathers pace before a ballot next year, opposition Kuomintang candidate Han Kuo-yu climbed a banyan tree. It was Han’s classically eccentric approach to countering an outbreak of dengue fever in the southern Taiwanese city Kaohsiung where he

For the first time since the Geneva Agreements of 1954, France has turned its eyes towards what is now termed the Indo-Pacific. The renewal of Paris’s interest in the region not only reflects a desire to tap on the wealth of rising Asia, but also Emmanuel Macron’s desire to restore France’s

In the 1970s, Australia’s main trading partner was Japan. For the first time we were dealing with a country outside the Anglosphere; not only one with a foreign language, but one commercially disciplined by an arcane process of coordination through the keiretsu system, whereby manufacturers,

If scientists are right, 85% of what comprises the universe is unseen, so-called “dark matter” material that neither reflects nor emits light. In recent times, “south-south” interactions have been somewhat analogous to “dark matter” for the West – that is, largely invisible. Studying

Last week Paramount Pictures released the trailer for its much-hyped Top Gun sequel, Top Gun: Maverick. The new movie sees Tom Cruise reprise his role as Pete “Maverick” Mitchell, now an aging fighter pilot facing the political and technological realities of a world in which there may no longer

The latest news coming out of Kuala Lumpur may alter the trajectory of Malaysian politics. On Wednesday night, 23 members of the Parti Keadilan Rakyet (PKR) central committee (half the members of this party leadership group) signed a statement rebuking party president Anwar

President Joko Widodo, best known as Jokowi, just won the presidential election and will officially start his second term in October. Much of his economic homework is still outstanding, one of the most significant how to deal with the impact of trade war between the US and China. The International

With a vote due to be called before 2021, the guessing game for when Singapore’s next general election will take place has begun. Everyone is squinting at the tea leaves, and many things can be taken as a sign. Is a recent tax rebate exercise a “red packet” designed to sweeten the ground?

Episode 5 of the Lowy Institute’s new podcast, Rules Based Audio, is out today. In Xi Jinping - The Backlash, Lowy Senior Fellow Richard McGregor discusses his new book on the Chinese leader, which studies the domestic and international reaction to Xi’s centralisation of

As Imran Khan’s government in Pakistan approaches the end of its first year, the country is rapidly drifting towards civil dictatorship. The arrest of opposition politicians, a crackdown on the media, and the imposition of a draconian economic policy has been the hallmark of the Pakistan

When I was a correspondent for the Financial Times in Jakarta, I often commiserated with my Australian media peers. While they worked hard to carve out time to shed light on the complexities, depth and wonder of Indonesia, they would inevitably be sucked into covering the latest high-pitched row

Other than the Chinese government in Beijing, the authorities in Taiwan are closely watching the latest developments in Hong Kong. After a series of protests in the Chinese special administrative region, Hong Kong’s Chief Executive Carrie Lam has since abandoned a proposed extradition bill that

Rumours of a Chinese military presence in Cambodia have again resurfaced following claims from a senior Pentagon official that Cambodia intends to host Chinese military assets. This week it was reported that Cambodia’s Defence Ministry declined a US offer to refurbish a training facility and

Own goals It is hard to find a more remarkable recent example of decades old unresolved nationalist tensions suddenly jumping the fence to the new world than Japan’s decision this week to impose trade sanctions on one of South Korea’s key industries. The spectre of Asia’s second and fourth

Just 40 kilometres southeast of Chennai in the south of India lies Sriperumbudur, a part of the Kanchipuram district of Tamil Nadu. While Kanchipuram is a town, famous for its silk saris and Hindu temples, the village of Sriperumbudur has mostly been famous for the assassination of the country’s

This week on the Rules Based Audio podcast: power in Asia. Who’s got it, who’s losing it, and who’s using what they’ve got in the smartest way? The world’s geopolitical centre of gravity is shifting to Asia; and tensions between the region's great powers threaten to shape this

The recent collapse and restructuring of Baoshang Bank ­– a smaller but still large bank based in Inner Mongolia in China ­– has once again raise the issue of the likelihood of a financial crisis in China. I argued last year (China’s looming financial crisis) that a financial crisis has been