SOUTH-EAST ASIA: Facade of Unity Unravels over Burma

The facade of unity within the region's premier regional grouping, the Association of South-east Asian Nations (ASEAN), over member Burma seems to be unraveling.

POLITICS-SOUTH-EAST ASIA: Facade of Unity Unravels over Burma

The baffling question remains - one that seems to indicate that the facade of unity within the region's premier regional grouping, the Association of South-east Asian Nations (ASEAN), over member Burma seems to be unraveling.

U.S.-IRAQ: More Troops Mean More Trouble

The Pentagon's announcement this week that it is adding 12,000 more troops to the approximately 138,000 soldiers it already has in Iraq has put an abrupt end to the fleeting sense of triumph that followed November's ''victory'' by U.S. marines who regained control of Fallujah, the main Sunni rebel stronghold.

POLITICS: South Africa Keeps Out the Welcome Mat for Aristide

Haiti and South Africa are at odds over the fate of former Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide. Although the two countries are located at opposite points on the globe, distance seems unlikely to make the heart grow fonder in this matter.

PAKISTAN: Zardari’s Release Well-Timed With Musharraf’s Scheming?

Asif Ali Zardari who was just released after eight years in detention, has a single-minded resolve. In what he terms as the last battle, the husband of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto wants to fight to the end Pakistan's ''dwindling military-dominated establishment'' to ensure that power is returned to the people and multi-party democracy restored to the country.

POLITICS-PORTUGAL: Crisis Damages Durao Barroso’s Image in EU

By deciding not to comment on the political crisis that has broken out in Portugal, the president of the European Commission, José Manuel Durao Barroso, chose to elude the responsibility he assumed in July when he named Pedro Santana Lopes as his successor at the head of the Portuguese government.

POLITICS-SOUTH-EAST ASIA: Burma Thumbs Its Nose at Regional Grouping

South-east Asian leaders ended a two-day summit in the Laotian capital Vientiane with a calculated political stab in the back from a fellow member of their regional group, Burma.

ECONOMICS: India Courts Asia Tigers’ Poorer Cousins

As India embarks on its biggest eastward makeover to strengthen its kinship with Indochina, policy analysts expect New Delhi to concentrate on the poorer cousins of the ten-nation, Association of South-east Asian Countries (ASEAN) rather than the famed tiger economies.

POLITICS-THAILAND: Thaksin’s Stability Game Pays Off

When Thailand's parliament finished its final session this month, Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra entered a realm that had been denied to the 22 premiers before him. He became the first to complete his full four-year term in office.

POLITICS-U.S.: From Plymouth Rock to Baghdad, Iraq

As U.S. families partake of the turkey, yams, and other staples of the traditional Thanksgiving feast Thursday, they are unlikely to reflect on the enduring ideological - as opposed to the gastronomic - influences of that hardy band of Pilgrims that celebrated their first year of survival in the Massachusetts colony on the American continent back in 1621.

POLITICS-U.S.: From Plymouth Rock to Baghdad, Iraq

As U.S. families partake of the turkey, yams, and other staples of the traditional Thanksgiving feast Thursday, they are unlikely to reflect on the enduring ideological - as opposed to the gastronomic - influences of that hardy band of Pilgrims that celebrated their first year of survival in the Massachusetts colony on the American continent back in 1621.

AMERICAS: U.S. Media Miss Rumsfeld’s ‘Dirty Wars’ Talk

If three, five, or 10 years from now, Latin America returns to the military dictatorships and ''dirty wars'' of its all-too-recent past, analysts may point to the past week's conference in Quito of the hemisphere's defence ministers - and particularly Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld's role in it - as a milestone in that journey.

AMERICAS: U.S. Media Miss Rumsfeld’s ‘Dirty Wars’ Talk

If three, five, or 10 years from now, Latin America returns to the military dictatorships and ''dirty wars'' of its all-too-recent past, analysts may point to the past week's conference in Quito of the hemisphere's defence ministers - and particularly Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld's role in it - as a milestone in that journey.

POLITICS-BURMA: Mass Prisoner Release Another Junta Ploy

The initial euphoria that greeted the freedom granted to nearly 4,000 prisoners, recently released from jails in military-ruled Burma, seems to be dissipating fast. For all it may be, this amnesty might not necessarily translate into possible political reform.

IRAQ: France Stands Up to the U.S.

The differences between France and Iraq entered a new phase at the summit that began at the Egyptian resort Sharm el-Sheikh Monday.

POLITICS-IRAN: Doubts Persist as Tehran Makes Nuclear Commitment

As Iran promised to meet Monday's deadline for suspending a uranium enrichment process that could be used for making nuclear weapons - a freeze that could spare it U.N. Security Council sanctions - questions still remain unanswered.

POLITICS-IRAN: Doubts Persist as Tehran Makes Nuclear Commitment

As Iran promised to meet Monday's deadline for suspending a uranium enrichment process that could be used for making nuclear weapons - a freeze that could spare it U.N. Security Council sanctions - questions still remain unanswered.

POLITICS-SOUTH ASIA: Road to Peace Is Still Long in Kashmir

When it comes to Kashmir there can be no pleasing of anyone as Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh must surely have discovered during a two-day visit, this week, to the state troubled by 15 years of separatist insurgency and half-a-century-old territorial claims by neighbouring Pakistan.

POLITICS-U.S.: Don’t Count Out Realists Yet

While after a week of personnel announcements conventional wisdom appears to have concluded that the foreign policy of President George W Bush's second term will be at least if not more radical than the first, there is also a minority view that such a conclusion is premature.

POLITICS-IVORY COAST: South Africa Attempts to Defuse Tensions

South African President Thabo Mbeki is engaged in political fire-fighting in the Ivory Coast, where fears of a full-scale civil war between government and rebel forces loom large.

POLITICS: India Cannot Expect too Much from Powell’s Replacement

Outgoing U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell might not have had much say in Washington's critical policy decisions in Iraq, North Korea and Iran, but he managed to jar India on several issues that resulted in a less than happy relationship with New Delhi.