DIANA JABLONSKI WRITES – The government of Malaysia has been under close observation due to reports of corruption against current Prime Minister Najib Razak. Mahathir Mohamad, the longest serving former Prime Minister in Malaysia, has taken advantage of Razak’s vulnerable state by convincing the Malaysian people that Razak is unfit…
SHIRI FISHMAN WRITES – On September 11, 2017 Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, embarked on a 10 day trip visiting foreign leaders in Mexico, Colombia and Argentina. This marks the first time in the history of Israel that a sitting Prime Minister has ever visited South America. Netanyahu had previously…
AASHNA MALPANI WRITES – Muslim women in India took the lead in changing the tone of the narrative from being a victim to an activist. The women united against the disputed practice of “triple talaq”—an Islamic law that allows men to split from their wives by saying the Arabic word…
SEBASTIAN SEGURA-ACOSTA WRITES – On September 20th, renowned actor, Morgan Freeman, became the recent victim of Kremlin criticism after making a video calling for an investigation of Russia’s confirmed cyber-meddling in U.S. affairs. Soon after the video went live, social media bots, paid trolls, and the uninformed public ravaged the…
YI NING WONG writes – Hong Kong’s infamous city Lan Kwai Fong is well known for manifesting the city’s bustling spirit into a unique nightlife culture. Popular bars and clubs are only a few feet away from each other, attracting endless crowds and earning the city a reputation as Hong…
FOUNDER TOM PLATE WRITES — How can a fiery logjam be tamed by throwing more logs onto the fire? The Backstory: The Korean mess began brewing long before the current U.S. administration took power. It is true that since January President Donald Trump’s madman/rocket man pugnacity has unnerved just about…
KATRINA CROSBY WRITES – On Tuesday, September 5, 2017, novelist Ma Kwang-soo was found in the depths of his apartment in Seoul, South Korea hanging from his window pane with a scarf around his neck. Police ruled suicide as the cause of the 66-year-old’s death. Ma was a poet and literature…
ELIZABETH SOELISTIO WRITES – Despite the cheerful and bright colors advertised on its billboards and posters, “A Taxi Driver” is a film that depicts the serious tale of an unsung hero who helped defend democracy by exposing a military dictatorship’s misdeeds in Gwangju, South Korea. Balancing comedy and political thrills,…
YI NING WONG writes — The 1992 Los Angeles riots marked one of the most violent demonstrations of civil unrest in the United States. While the event largely signified the rising tensions between African Americans and LAPD, it also exposed racial contentions between African and Korean Americans. Director Justin Chon’s…
We’re just bragging of course, but so what? It’s totally justified! Above pix was shot at the 2017 annual national meeting of the American Political science Assn., in San Francisco just recently. The picture shows (left to right) Prof. Nancy Kassop, of the State University of New York, New Paltz…
TOM PLATE WRITES – It’s so easy to imagine that in some officers’ club, perhaps at Yulin naval headquarters on Hainan Island, where China’s brass (vice admiral, rear, lower-rank whatever) gather and after a few belts of Baijiu recycle submarine stories and second-guess their masters in Beijing – it’s easy…
WRITES PETER OLSZEWSKI (courtesy of Mediaweek magazine) – When veteran Aussie editor David Armstrong began working the Southeast Asian beat in the early 1990s, he confronted a regional phenomenon – the non-media-savvy media owner. “In Australia, I was working with people who had been in media all their lives,” he…
KATELYNN BARKLEY WRITES — To protest or not to protest? In Hong Kong, this has become a loaded question. On August 17, Hong Kong’s high court sentenced the pro-democratic, Umbrella Movement leaders, Alex Chow, Nathan Law and Joshua Wong, to several months in jail. The Chinese media has branded the…
China is notorious for its Great Firewall, the looming regulatory force that continues to censor Chinese netizens. The Great Firewall’s next victim is virtual private networks or VPNs. China recently released a statement that all VPN access will be blocked by February 2018. VPN serves as Chinese netizens’ saving grace…
SPECIAL TO AMI FROM PAVIN CHACHAVALPONGUN – The other day, it was to be a judgment day for former Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra. Throughout the past few months, Thailand’s political temperature has been rising following the heated court case of Yingluck, who is accused of mismanaging Thailand’s rice subsidy program.…
ALEXIS CRUZ WRITES – From its creation, Al Jazeera was bound to incite controversy. Though state-funded, it was the first allegedly independent news network in a region tightly regulated by the government. Contentious coverage of neighboring countries brought the network plenty of threats, but none lasted. Still, the threats to…
