Friday, February 11 was a momentous day in Egypt, in the Middle East and possibly for the world. How momentous and in what way is by no means clear. In this article, we seek to understand what happened on Friday and what it might mean for the near term and beyond. Naturally, we come up…
Editor’s Note: In this series of articles, we include important or interesting videoclips with our comments. Our Web Software does not permit embedding of the clips into our articles. So we shall have to be content to include the links to the actual videoclips. We are very happy with the tremendous response from readers to…
Editor’s Note: In this series of articles, we include important or interesting videoclips with our comments. Our Web Software does not permit embedding of the clips into our articles. So we shall have to be content to include the links to the actual videoclips. We are very happy with the tremendous response from readers to…
As Cairo, Alexandria and Suez exploded in massive protests against President Hosni Mubarak, there has been talk about “democracy” in Egypt and the need for “democratic reforms”. Our first thought is that such pressure for reforms should have come five years ago or at least a year ago when Mr. Mubarak began preparations for installing…
Editor’s Note: In this series of articles, we include important or interesting videoclips with our comments. Our Web Software does not permit embedding of the clips into our articles. So we shall have to be content to include the links to the actual videoclips. We are very happy with the tremendous response from readers to…
I read Amy Chua’s article about superiority of Chinese Mothers when it was first published. Frankly, I dismissed it. It reminded me of today’s full-of-itself regime in China. When America fell into the 2008 financial crisis, the Chinese Leaders thought their system had won. Since then, they have been acting as the next global superpower. They think…
Editor’s Note: In this series of articles, we include important or interesting videoclips with our comments. Our Web Software does not permit embedding of the clips into our articles. So we shall have to be content to include the links to the actual videoclips. We are very happy with the tremendous response from readers to…
This week, China and Tajikistan announced that they have settled their old border dispute. Under this settlement, Tajikistan ceded 386 sq miles or 1,000 sq km of land to China in the remote Pamir mountain range. China said that the move thoroughly solved their century-old border dispute. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei gave no…
Editor’s Note: In this series of articles, we include important or interesting videoclips with our comments. Our Web Software does not permit embedding of the clips into our articles. So we shall have to be content to include the links to the actual videoclips. We are very happy with the tremendous response from readers to…
We used the term Pashtunistan when we began writing about the current conflict in the Afghanistan-Pakistan area. While a new term for most readers, it was a natural term. The Samskrut suffix “Sthan” or “Stan” (its Hindi-Persian pronunciation) means “place of” or “land of”. The fact that Pashtuns (or Pakhtuns) live on both sides of…