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Published daily by the Lowy Institute

  • 1 hour ago
    • China
    • Sustainability
    • Technology

    US “minerals mafia” report reveals the battle with China for the next industrial era

    Lynne O’Donnell
    A US congressional report on Chinese mining practices exposes a supply-chain dominance the West is still scrambling to answer.
  • 3 hours ago
    • North Korea
    • Ukraine

    North Korea’s battlefield dividend

    Anton Ponomarenko
    Kim Jong-un’s bet on Moscow has paid off – in cash, technology transfers, and now a place at Russia’s Red Square parade.
  • 5 hours ago
    • Japan
    • Australia
    • Diplomacy

    Foreign leaders given Australia’s parliamentary privilege

    Daniel Flitton
    A look at who has stood in the chamber – and why it matters less than it seems.
  • 8 hours ago
    • Space exploration

    Data centres in space won’t escape conflict on Earth

    Nimra Javed
    The trickier issue is governance – how these assets will be treated once they become part of a contested space environment.
  • 8 May 2026
    • Energy
    • Trade
    • WTO

    Export bans: Wrong way, go back

    Robert Walker
    Governments continue to erode international trading norms and give in to short-term thinking about trade. That needs to stop.
  • 8 May 2026
    • Antarctica

    Antarctic diplomacy’s “back to basics” test

    Jeffrey McGee , Richard Rowe
    The upcoming Hiroshima meeting can be a showcase for competent, good-faith multilateralism at a time of global turmoil.
  • 8 May 2026
    • Aid & Development
    • Sex and Gender

    Budget week puts Australia’s aid ambitions on the line

    Joanna Pradela
    By resisting the global aid retreat, Canberra can demonstrate what development leadership looks like.
  • 8 May 2026
    • Global Issues
    • United Nations

    Indigenous peacebuilders have a different answer to Carney’s rupture

    Erin Hurley
    As the liberal order fractures, Indigenous peacebuilders are pressing forward – they never trusted it to begin with.
  • 7 May 2026
    • Global Issues
    • Pacific Islands

    Technology is making the Pacific’s drug highway harder to detect

    Jose Sousa-Santos
    Narco-subs, drone systems, and encrypted finance are turning the Pacific from a transit zone to a node in the global drug economy.
  • 7 May 2026
    • India
    • Defence & Security
    • Maritime Security

    India is building a navy of neighbours

    Shantanu Roy-Chaudhury
    IOS Sagar puts foreign naval personnel on Indian warships, building the kind of maritime trust that communiqués cannot.
  • 7 May 2026
    • New Zealand

    New Zealand’s treaty troubles

    Mary Watson‑Burton
    Quiet changes matter in a Pacific Islands region built on trust.
  • 7 May 2026
    • Defence & Security
    • Iran
    • United States

    How Trump got Iran wrong

    Thomas Wright
    To mark the launch of Thomas Wright’s “Inflection Point: Biden, Trump and the Future World Order”, published by the Lowy Institute in conjunction with Penguin Random House Australia, we present this exclusive epilogue on the Iran War.
  • 6 May 2026
    • Indonesia

    Indonesia: Democracy without collapse

    Cecep Hidayat , Sondang Grace Sirait
    Nearly three decades after Reformasi, Indonesia’s democratic guardrails are eroding without rupture and without fanfare.
  • 6 May 2026
    • India
    • Australia
    • Migration

    Beyond the model minority: Rethinking Australia’s Indian diaspora

    Hiya Harinandini , Maisha Samiha , Teesta Prakash
    Reducing what is now Australia’s largest overseas-born community to an economic asset is corroding the foundations of social trust.
  • 6 May 2026
    • Asia
    • Iran

    The Iran war’s toll on the Indo-Pacific

    Ahmed Albayrak
    Countries that can least afford the energy, food, fiscal and political pressure are the most exposed.
  • 6 May 2026
    • Taiwan
    • Australia
    • Defence & Security

    Taiwan’s mobilisation model holds lessons for Australia

    Mick Ryan
    The All-Out Defence Mobilisation Agency shows how proximity to cabinet, not size, is the source of institutional authority.
  • 5 May 2026
    • Afghanistan
    • China
    • Pakistan

    Beijing arrived late to a war it cannot end

    Lynne O’Donnell
    China cast itself as mediator between Pakistan and the Taliban – and has found the role beyond it.
  • 5 May 2026
    • Trade
    • Sustainability
    • Technology

    Why your next car most likely to be an EV made in China

    Richard Neumann
    China’s decades-long bet on electric vehicles is paying off – with Australia already riding in the back seat.
  • 5 May 2026
    • Aid & Development
    • Energy
    • Sustainability
    • Pacific Islands

    The Pacific’s fuel problem has a solution – and the sun is shining

    Aquila Van Keuk , Deepak Chand , Paul Munro
    Pacific Island nations are already building the answer to fuel-import dependence, with the Hormuz crisis making the case for scale.
  • 5 May 2026
    • United Nations

    The UN is not broken – it was built this way

    Abhinandan Kumar
    The world body is neither a global policeman nor an impartial arbiter – and no amount of reform will make it so.
  • 4 May 2026
    • Japan
    • Australia

    “Why would Japan meet with a small country like Australia?”

    Richard McGregor
    Tokyo’s warming to Canberra tracks directly with its cooling on Beijing.
  • 4 May 2026
    • Global Issues

    Who speaks for the Global South?

    Sanchari Ghosh
    India, China and Brazil each claim to be a representative voice – but the constituency they invoke resists any single position.
  • 4 May 2026
    • Asean
    • Trade

    ASEAN’s rules-of-origin problem

    Henry Storey
    Washington looks set to force Southeast Asian nations to choose between the US consumer market and Chinese supply chains.
  • 4 May 2026
    • Pacific Islands
    • Papua New Guinea

    PNG’s frontier judges: peacebuilding from the bench

    Sinclair Dinnen , Miranda Forsyth
    In Hela and Enga, National Court judges are using PNG’s unusually expansive constitution in a bid to stop violence, not just clean up after it.
  • 1 May 2026
    • Europe

    Hungary shows illiberal regimes can be beaten – the harder question is whether they can be dismantled

    James Paterson
    Undoing what Orbán built will take something more than careful campaigning.
  • 1 May 2026
    • Terrorism
    • United States

    Trump gutted the very programs designed to protect him

    Lydia Khalil
    The administration has spent two years dismantling the prevention programs that could have stopped Cole Tomas Allen.
  • 1 May 2026
    • Energy
    • Trade
    • Sustainability

    When the tankers stop, the tractors stop

    Nischal Dhungel
    Asia consumes 80% of Hormuz oil and gas flows – the region’s food and energy systems are one crisis, not two.
  • 1 May 2026
    • Australia
    • Defence & Security
    • United States

    Canberra can’t want the alliance more than Washington does

    Sam Roggeveen
    Both major parties treat US support as a given, but an ambitious Australia can plan for its own defence.
  • 30 Apr 2026
    • Bangladesh
    • India

    India’s Bangladesh gamble

    Shanthie Mariet D’Souza
    Appointing a career politician as high commissioner to Dhaka breaks recent convention – a deliberate bet on personal chemistry over experience.
  • 30 Apr 2026
    • Australia
    • AUKUS
    • United Kingdom
    • United States

    On state visit to the US, Charles III cameos as King of Australia

    Charles Lyons-Jones
    Touting AUKUS to Trump signals a new kind of Commonwealth soft power.
  • 30 Apr 2026
    • Australia
    • Energy
    • Climate change
    • Sustainability

    The quiet contradiction at the heart of the energy transition

    Larelle Bossi
    Renewable energy is both an environmental solution and a form of industrial development – and they are increasingly in conflict.
  • 30 Apr 2026
    • Defence & Security
    • Technology

    When technology becomes a target of political violence

    Mauro Lubrano
    Understanding anti-tech extremism requires separating violent ideology from the legitimate concerns it exploits.
  • 29 Apr 2026
    • Pacific Islands
    • Papua New Guinea

    PNG court clears the way for Starlink

    Amanda H A Watson
    PNG’s national court has found the Ombudsman Commission exceeded its powers, likely ending a two-year block on licensing for the internet provider.
  • 29 Apr 2026
    • North Korea
    • South Korea
    • Nuclear Weapons

    South Korea no longer holds the cards against the North

    Khang Vu
    Seoul built its North Korea policy on leverage it no longer has – and Pyongyang is in no hurry to negotiate.
  • 29 Apr 2026
    • Australia
    • Maritime Security

    The ocean is much more than a backdrop for Australia’s security

    Sean Andrews
    Australia relies on seaborne trade for 99% of its goods but often treats the oceans as someone else’s problem.
  • 29 Apr 2026
    • Europe
    • European Union

    Fickle Iceland in a geopolitical pickle

    Lisa Martin
    Just like the country’s volcanoes, Icelandic politics is about to explode with a divisive referendum on EU membership.
  • 28 Apr 2026
    • Trade
    • New Zealand

    Are New Zealand’s politicians ready for a cold stretch?

    Mary Watson‑Burton
    With chilled exports at risk, closure of the Strait of Hormuz is stretching New Zealand’s export model to breaking point.
  • 28 Apr 2026
    • China
    • Taiwan

    Beijing intensifies diplomatic isolation of Taiwan’s president

    Michael Cunningham
    Denying airspace transit is a new tactic – and its effectiveness may encourage China to use it again.
  • 28 Apr 2026
    • Afghanistan
    • Energy
    • Technology

    Afghanistan is surrendering its mineral wealth – and its future

    Javed Noorani , Lynne O’Donnell
    Afghanistan is exporting critical minerals at the bottom of the value chain, handing China processing, pricing and leverage.
  • 28 Apr 2026
    • Aid & Development
    • Japan

    Japan is charting a new course for development – but looking in the wrong direction

    Grace Stanhope
    Tokyo’s emergency energy package is nimble and generous, but locks in fossil fuel dependence at a cost to the region’s future.
  • 27 Apr 2026
    • Indonesia
    • Australia

    Australia’s oldest trading partner was Indonesia – it’s time students knew

    Ridvan Kilic , Sharyn Graham Davies
    Embedding Indonesian history into the Australian curriculum would deepen ties with our most important neighbour.
  • 27 Apr 2026
    • Myanmar

    Myanmar’s authoritarian creep

    Manny Maung
    When media outlets call Min Aung Hlaing “president” without caveat, they do the junta's work for it.
  • 27 Apr 2026
    • China
    • South China Sea

    China is remaking the South China Sea with a return to island-building

    Lowell Bautista
    A new Chinese outpost at Antelope Reef won’t create legal rights but will shape control over disputed waters.
  • 27 Apr 2026
    • Global Issues

    The misdiagnosis of middle power cooperation

    Biyon Sony Joseph
    Middle powers cannot fix the international order – but their influence should not be judged by an unrealistically high bar.
  • 24 Apr 2026
    • Australia
    • Global Issues
    • Technology

    AI danger is no longer a myth – it’s called Mythos

    Tom Barber
    AI can now autonomously exploit software vulnerabilities. Australia’s regulatory frameworks are not keeping pace.
  • 24 Apr 2026
    • China
    • Taiwan

    Taiwan’s deeper vulnerability is politics at home

    Aniello Iannone
    China doesn’t need to fire a shot if Taiwan’s fractured democracy does the work for it.
  • 24 Apr 2026
    • Mauritius
    • Australia
    • Defence & Security

    Australia’s Indian Ocean ambition needs capable partners

    Grace Corcoran
    Mauritius is one that sits at the nexus of Africa, the Indian Ocean and Asia.
  • 24 Apr 2026
    • Australia
    • Defence & Security
    • Poland

    Shared Solidarność: From Tobruk to Canberra

    Paul Pelczar
    A first-ever Polish defence attaché in Canberra marks the formalisation of a relationship built through war, migration and coalition service.
  • 23 Apr 2026
    • Indonesia
    • Malaysia
    • Singapore

    A toll on Malacca Strait puts Indonesia’s own legal foundations at risk

    Dita Liliansa
    A levy on Malacca transit would be illegal under UNCLOS – the same treaty that confirmed Indonesia’s archipelagic statehood.
  • 23 Apr 2026
    • Indonesia
    • Defence & Security
    • Sex and Gender

    Indonesia is falling behind the Indo-Pacific on military inclusion – it doesn’t have to

    Yokie Rahmad Isjchwansyah
    This is not only a question of fairness but about strengthening the military itself.
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