ASIA: Rice-exporting Nations Still to Sow Price Stability Plans

While Asia's leading rice exporting countries have agreed to back a Thai initiative to co-ordinate the world's rice trade, one of the key elements of this unprecedented move - promoting export price stability - promises to be a daunting task.

ASIA: Rice-exporting Nations Still to Sow Price Stability Plans

While Asia's leading rice exporting countries have agreed to back a Thai initiative to co-ordinate the world's rice trade, one of the key elements of this unprecedented move -- promoting export price stability -- promises to be a daunting task.

POLITICS-SOUTHERN AFRICA: A Region Getting its Act Together

The Southern African Development Community (SADC) summit in Luanda, Angola has showed a region getting its act together, but one which has still not fully grasped the nettle of peer review - the principle that African leaders will keep each other in check to ensure democratic governance.

POLITICS-SOUTHERN AFRICA: A Region Getting its Act Together

The Southern African Development Community (SADC) summit in Luanda, Angola has showed a region getting its act together, but one which has still not fully grasped the nettle of peer review - the principle that African leaders will keep each other in check to ensure democratic governance.

POLITICS-U.S.: Hawks Now Justify Iraq Strike as War for Democracy

The normally cool - if not coldly analytical - Anthony Cordesman was uncharacteristically heated as he warmed to his subject.

POLITICS-U.S.: Hawks Now Justify Iraq Strike as War for Democracy

The normally cool - if not coldly analytical - Anthony Cordesman was uncharacteristically heated as he warmed to his subject.

FINANCE: Activists say World Bank, IMF Protests Working – Slowly

When protesters fill the streets here on Saturday to vilify the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for their harmful policies in the developing world, they may also be unwittingly admitting their own failure to substantially reduce world poverty and suffering.

POLITICS-U.S.: Iraq – Such Big Questions, So Little Time

With Washington war drums pounding ever louder, President George W. Bush's request to Congress for the broadest possible authority to disarm Iraq and oust its leader sets up a momentous debate over how much power Congress will cede to the president and about the future use of U.S. military power abroad.

SRI LANKA: Pragmatism, Respect and Mediation Key to Peace Process

The signals of peace from the just-finished round of talks on Sri Lanka's ethnic conflict stem from three elements that saw the negotiations through: pragmatism, mutual respect, and effective international mediation.

POLITICS-U.S.: Neo-Con Hawks May Have Over-reached on Iraq

By launching a major campaign over the last two months to extend the war on terrorism as far as the Saudi royal family, neo-conservative ideologues who have emerged as the predominant force around President George W. Bush appear now to have overplayed their hand.

POLITICS-U.S.: Democrats Discomfited by Iraq Debate, Vote

Democrats had a thoroughly enjoyable August.

POLITICS: In Year after Sep.11, U.S. Reaps Strategic Bonus in Asia

The Sep. 11 horrific suicide attacks on the United States have, ironically, turned out to be a strategic bonus for Washington, helping it spread its wings and extend its military presence across Asia.

POLITICS-U.S.: Vision of Might and Right Triumphed After Sep 11

When excerpts of the document first appeared in the New York Times in the spring of 1992, it created quite a stir. One senator described it as a prescription for ''literally a 'Pax Americana'.''

POLITICS-U.S.: ‘Chicken Hawks’ Lead Push for War with Iraq

A high-ranking State Department official was speaking to a room full of senior military officers last month when he cracked, ''There's more combat experience on the 7th floor of the State Department than in the entire Office of the Secretary of Defense.''

POLITICS: Afghanistan is Not to be Forgotten in Rush for Iraq

Thursday's foiled assassination attempt against Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai and blasts in the capital Kabul that reportedly killed at least 10 people are certain to bring that country back into the limelight just when President George W. Bush wants to focus world attention on the alleged necessity of ousting Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.

WSSD: A Sigh of Relief as World Summit Ends

Johannesburg breathed a palpable sigh of relief Wednesday as the United Nations largest ever, most expensive ever, Summit wound down.

MIDEAST: Islamists, Reformists Keep Saudi Royals on a Tightrope

The Saudi royal family is weathering the biggest challenge to its rule since it founded the kingdom about 70 years ago. But the task is harder without a definite roadmap to guide it through the post-Sep. 11 pressure aimed at diluting the influence of the puritan Wahabism brand of Islam in daily life.

WSSD: Spin Doctors Prepare to Turn Failure Into Success

As the 10-day sustainable development summit heads into its final week, U.N. officials are giving it a spin to ensure the meeting lives up to expectations as Rio+10 - an improvement on the 1992 Earth Summit - rather than ending up Rio-10 - a backwards slide.

PHILIPPINES: All Eyes on How Communists Survive ‘Terror’ Label

It survived the collapse of communism in the late eighties, the worst split within its ranks in 1992, and the counter-insurgency operations of five Philippine governments, including that of dictator Ferdinand Marcos, since the sixties.

POLITICS-U.S.: Washington Goes to War, Over War

War has been declared in Washington, but not against any foreign country, at least for the moment.

LABOUR: Unions Fear ‘War on Terror’ Will Overcome Right to Strike

A labour war looming on West coast U.S. docks could become the defining union conflict of the Bush era. But the traditional bargaining issues - wages, benefits and working conditions - have been pre-empted by a much more basic one: do dockers have the right to strike at all?