South Asia

This essay examines Russia’s growing role in Asia’s energy markets, assesses the implications for the U.S., and examines the claim that closer Sino-Russian energy ties are adding new incentives for a broader strategic alignment.

As President Donald Trump heads to his meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping, he'll have the support of many other world leaders, former ambassador Nicholas Burns told CNBC on Thursday.

President Donald Trump, convinced that he alone can break stalemates with adversarial counterparts on trade and security, will put his theory to the test in Argentina this week. Global markets and foreign capitals are eyeing him anxiously.

The outcry over arms sales, Khashoggi and Yemen is building – but will anyone at the summit in Argentina stand up to MBS? Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s scheduled appearance at the G20 summit next week in Buenos Aires presents world leaders with a moment of truth they would rather avoid.

For weeks this fall, an ebullient President Trump traveled relentlessly to hold raise-the-rafters campaign rallies — sometimes three a day — in states where his presence was likely to help Republicans on the ballot.

But his mood apparently has changed as he has taken measure of the electoral backlash that voters delivered Nov. 6. With the certainty that the incoming Democratic House majority will go after his tax returns and investigate his actions, and the likelihood of additional indictments by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, Trump has retreated into a cocoon of bitterness and resentment, according to multiple administration sources.

Elon Musk jolted markets and shareholders when he tweeted his intention to take his electric car company, Tesla, private. Saudi billions, he proposed, could help the company escape the pressures of being publicly listed. In a blog post, Musk said that “the Saudi Arabian sovereign wealth fund [had] approached [him] multiple times about taking Tesla private”.

Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs has named Ambassador Richard Verma a non-resident Senior Fellow. Verma, who served as U.S. Ambassador to India from 2014-2017 and earlier as Assistant Secretary of State, will share with students and faculty lessons on diplomacy, developments in Asia, and U.S. national security policy.

Last week was a trying one for Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. You may think that I am referring to the imposition of U.S. tariffs on imports of Canadian steel. But Trudeau actually faced a harder issue than the one about how to respond to President Donald Trump’s declaration that trade with Canada posed a threat to U.S. security.

The goal of this report is to analyze the future of debtbook diplomacy: which countries are vulnerable to Chinese coercion; how U.S. strategic interests will be impacted; and how U.S. policymakers can mitigate the effects of this strategy.

The small open economies of the Gulf and Southeast Asia are pioneers in the establishment of

Sovereign Wealth Funds (SWFs). The SWFs of countries like Qatar and Singapore are among the

world’s largest in terms of total asset size relative to Gross Domestic Product. This article looks

at the different compulsions behind the setting up of SWFs by small open economies.