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COMMENTARY / World

Oct 1, 2008

The Dragon and the Bear

By Dmitry Shlapentokh

SOUTH BEND, Indiana — Second honeymoons rarely, if ever, recapture the zest of lost love. Yet ever since the Soviet Union's collapse in 1991, Russia and China have sought to rekindle the close relations that once supposedly existed between the Soviet Union and Mao's China before Nikita Khrushchev's...

COMMENTARY

Oct 1, 2008

The Middle East quartet's failing mission

By Cesar Chelala

The creation in 2002 of the Quartet on the Middle East, comprising the United States, Russia, the European Union and the United Nations, raised hopes for its critical contribution to the peace process in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. A report released on Sept. 25, "The Middle East Quartet: A Progress...

COMMENTARY

Oct 1, 2008

Time for geoengineering?

By Gwynne Dyer

Scientists have their own way of putting things. This is how Dr. Oerjan Gustafsson of Stockholm University announced the approach of a climate apocalypse in an e-mail sent recently from the Russian research ship "Jakob Smirnitskyi" in the Arctic Ocean.

COMMENTARY

Sep 30, 2008

Education key to prevent 'honor killings'

By Gautaman Bhaskaran

The act of killing is not so surprising when senseless brutality, especially against women, engulfs a community. Thousands of women are murdered every year by their families in the name of "honor." This heinous crime cuts across continents, with most killings going unreported. When they are reported,...

COMMENTARY / World

Sep 29, 2008

Putin of Arabia as America's foil

By Mai Yamani

BEIRUT — Almost undetected, Russia is regaining much of the influence that it lost in the Middle East after the Soviet Union collapsed. Ever since Russia invaded Georgia in August, Arab satellite television and Web sites have been rife with talk about the region's role in an emerging "new Cold War."...

COMMENTARY

Sep 29, 2008

Learning from BOJ's choice to do nothing

By Tom Plate

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. — Ben S. Bernanke, the chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve System, may be dead wrong about the urgent need for the proposed $700 billion that the former professor and his buddy, U.S. Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson, have been peddling to Congress.

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM NEW YORK

Sep 29, 2008

'Good old days' dispensed with body counts

By Hiroaki Sato

NEW YORK — Driving back from Sunset Beach, North Carolina, where we spend two weeks every summer, we hugged the coastline. After crossing the 40-kilometer Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel, we stopped for the first time at the Visitors Center for the Eastern Shore of Virginia National Wildlife Refuge. The...

COMMENTARY / World

Sep 29, 2008

Blank check for Paulson?

By George Soros

NEW YORK — U.S. Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson's $700 billion rescue package ran into difficulty on Capitol Hill over the weekend. Rightly so: It is ill-conceived. Congress would be abdicating its responsibility if it gave the Treasury secretary a blank check.

COMMENTARY

Sep 28, 2008

Bush will go away as a true friend to China

By Frank Ching

HONG KONG — As the world prepares to bid farewell to U.S. President George W. Bush in a few months, his foreign policy lies in tatters. Wars continue in Iraq and Afghanistan, a crisis looms in Iran, relations with Russia are badly strained, and now North Korea is threatening to restart its nuclear-weapons...

COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT

Sep 28, 2008

Talking of fanatics, careerists, cynics . . . and true believers

By Roger Pulvers

"We're doing the worst thing to you: We're depriving you of an enemy."

COMMENTARY / World

Sep 27, 2008

Israel looks ready for an atypical leader

By Fania Oz-Salzberger

HAIFA, Israel — Famously irreverent, Israelis tend to call their leaders by their first name or childhood nickname. But don't be fooled: Tzipora "Tzipi" Livni is nobody's close friend. Her dry style, personal remoteness and forced smiles make her an atypical Israeli. Perhaps the country needs exactly...

COMMENTARY

Sep 27, 2008

The world's new hot spot

By David Howell

BAKU, Azerbaijan — In this large Caspian city on the edge of Europe and Asia the problems of the Western world — shaky banks, financial upheavals, struggles with terrorism — seem far away.

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.

Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Japan's growing ranks of centenarians are redefining what it means to live in a super-aging society.

What comes after 100?

By Tomoko Otake

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

Smile! It’s ‘Sanrio Time,’ now and ever after

Smile! It’s ‘Sanrio Time,’ now and ever after

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