President Erdogan’s “reconversion” of the Hagia Sophia, into a mosque is a very Trumpian move, making a populist gesture to his base evoking shared misconceptions of history, reckless of its actual diplomatic and economic cost.
An old adage passed on by veteran U.N. staff to younger recruits is, “Do nothing whenever possible. It’s safer.” For a junior officer that might indeed be career-enhancing.
Looking at the deserved outpouring of eulogies over Kofi Annan I could not help remembering the advice of the old Latin saying, “Say nothing about the dead unless it’s good.”
President Trump’s nomination of John Bolton as his National Security Advisor highlights the deep irrationality of this White House’s global agenda. Apparently, the world has hitherto been spared Bolton’s robust sabotage only because the President has an eccentric visceral antipathy to his mustache, but so far could not find another, clean-shaven, candidate in the rapidly draining pool of applicants for White House jobs.
Will Tokyo’s bid for a permanent seat on the U.N. Security Council be frustrated by its Foreign Ministry’s undiplomatic and uncalled for attack on U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki Moon?
A little overshadowed by the Olympics, the
Yeosu 2012 Expo is, in its own way, doing more than the London Games to promote global harmony - and without stirring up the waters the way the British did when they posted the ROK flag for the DPRK women’s soccer team.
The Yeosu Expo 2012 exemplifies how the Republic of Korea (ROK) has made its debut on the world stage.