Why autocrats root for an isolationist U.S.
There is a reason why the world’s illiberal and authoritarian forces are rooting for a more isolationist U.S. foreign policy, says Josef Joffe (above), editor of Die Zeit in Hamburg… Read more »
Author Archives: DemDigest
Neo-Maoist Xi consolidates power, cracks down on activists, Tibet
A year before a Communist Party conclave that could decide who will eventually replace him as China’s next leader, President Xi Jinping is maneuvering to reduce the power of a… Read more »
Russia’s ‘uncivil society’
On Wednesday evening, Anton Belikov, an artist and lecturer at Moscow’s Surikov Academy of Arts, walked through an exhibition of photographs documenting the war in eastern Ukraine, and threw paint… Read more »
Promoting labor rights in Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka is one of the rare developing countries in the region that has had in place, by law, a pension and social safety net for workers. But a recent… Read more »
Cambodia’s velvet glove frays
Hun Sen (left), Cambodia’s longtime strongman, faces local elections next year and a national contest in 2018. On his recent provincial swing he pressed flesh, announced local infrastructure projects as… Read more »
Saudi Arabia – can it really change?
In January, I went with my editor in chief from The Economist to Saudi Arabia to meet Mohammed bin Salman, a young, previously little-publicized royal, known to his courtiers as… Read more »
Iran: Narges Mohammadi sentence a ‘devastating blow’ to human rights
An Iranian appeals court has confirmed a 16-year sentence for one of Iran’s most prominent women’s rights activists, The New York Times reports: The activist, Narges Mohammadi, 44, a human… Read more »
A new Cuba – or Market-Leninism?
The independent Center for Legal Information Cubalex warned Thursday that the attack launched by the regime against it last Friday is not over and that its members could be subject… Read more »
Venezuela crisis: U.S. to send diplomat
President Nicolas Maduro says a top U.S. State Department official will soon visit Venezuela in a bid to ease tensions between the two nations, AP reports: Maduro’s announcement Tuesday… Read more »
Palestinian vote remote
Municipal elections rarely excite international attention, say analysts Nathan Brown and Caroline Zullo. However, when elections in the West Bank and Gaza were scheduled for October 8, they represented something… Read more »