[Clara Ferreira Marques] Poverty hasn’t gone away in China

China has all but met President Xi Jinping’s pledge to eradicate extreme poverty by 2020. More than 800 counties considered severely impoverished just under a decade ago have now cleared a government-defined line of 4,000 yuan, or roughly $600, in annual per capita income. The last nine, in the province of Guizhou in China’s southwest, were removed from the list this past week. The sheer scale of China’s overall achievements when it comes to poverty alleviation is remarkable.

Dec. 3, 2020

[Kim Myong-sik] Time for a reset to denuclearize North Korea

Have South Korea’s armed forces become stronger under the Moon Jae-in administration, or weaker? Those who believe our military power has grown over the past few years cite the 5-7 percent annual increase in the defense budget, much of which was used to purchase high-performance weapons. Yet others point to the low morale and loose discipline of military personnel, as revealed in frequent news reports. Some analysts attribute this hardly proud state of the 610,000-person armed forces to

Dec. 3, 2020

[France Wilkinson] Biden era neither normal nor boring

Having spent the past four years with the political equivalent of heavy metal music blasting outside their psychic windows late into the night, millions of Americans are hoping that the Biden administration will usher in a new era of calm. They are likely to be disappointed. To a limited extent, such wishes will be granted. Under President Joe Biden, the White House will no longer generate a cacophony of incompetence. Tweet tantrums will yield to process and predictability. Outright falsehood w

Dec. 2, 2020

[Kim Seong-kon] Wrong translations invite misunderstandings

Due to cultural differences, wrong translations of English words into Korean occurs frequently and inevitably. The problem is that such erroneous translations may lead to inaccurate perceptions of other cultures and political systems, at times creating serious misunderstanding. Many Koreans, for example, know that the United States is comprised of 50 states. Nevertheless, they do not know that a “state” is a “sovereign government,” not a province. The Korean translation

Dec. 2, 2020

[Jeffrey Frankel] Biden’s modest multilateralism

Like the Joni Mitchell song puts it, “You don’t know what you’ve got ‘til it’s gone.” For example, classroom education was often deemed boring by students and obsolete by tech visionaries. Then, COVID-19 made it difficult or impossible to meet in person. Now we yearn for in-class experiences. Perhaps the same is true of international economic cooperation. Multilateral institutions such as the World Trade Organization, the International Monetary Fund and the U

Dec. 1, 2020

[Jean Pisani-Ferry] Grading big pandemic test one year on from outbreak

From the moment COVID-19 emerged as a global threat, it was clear that it would test every society’s strength, resilience and response capabilities. Almost one year on, it is time to assess who passed the test, and who failed. From a public health standpoint, the answer is clear: East Asia -- including Australia and New Zealand -- passed the test with flying colors. As for the rest, Europe performed unevenly, the United States stumbled badly and developing countries have struggled. To be

Dec. 1, 2020

[Patty-Jane Geller] Welcome news as rogue threats advance

You wouldn’t know it from the lack of headlines, but the US Navy and Missile Defense Agency recently made history with something that should help make all Americans safer. Specifically, they successfully shot down an intercontinental-range ballistic missile using the navy’s Standard Missile SM-3 Block IIA interceptor launched from a navy destroyer. Missile defense is nothing new, of course. The US has had one for years. But until now, we’ve tested its ability to defend the ho

Nov. 30, 2020

[Serendipity] Light at the end of the tunnel, for everyone

Putting up the Christmas tree over the weekend, I was reminded once again of all the plans that came to naught this year, including long-planned trips. Among the ornaments that hang on the tree are baubles and trinkets bought on trips abroad -- a rough, handmade snowman bought at an Amish village in Pennsylvania, a Tiffany-style glass ball picked up on a rushed weekend trip to New York. Collected over the years, they remind us of our times there. It goes without saying that there were no new or

Nov. 27, 2020

[Trudy Rubin] Biden to put US first alongside allies

Does anyone recall the old Alka-Seltzer commercial that went, “Plop, plop, fizz, fizz, Oh what a relief it is?” That song ricocheted ‘round my head as the Trump administration finally greenlit a transition period to the Biden presidency. And as President-elect Joe Biden unveiled his national security team, including longtime foreign policy aides Antony Blinken as future secretary of state and Jake Sullivan for national security adviser, along with former Secretary of State Jo

Nov. 27, 2020

[Mihir Sharma] Price of making vaccines too expensive

The world is unequal enough and the COVID-19 pandemic threatens to make things more unequal still. Poorer countries have had to take on debt they will struggle to pay back. Their more fragile health care systems and crowded cities forced them into stricter and more economically harmful lockdowns, and poverty rates have risen dramatically. Now, they rightly fear a staggered recovery from the pandemic will further disadvantage them, given how expensive vaccine rollouts look to be. It should not b

Nov. 26, 2020

[Lee Kyong-hee] Unsung heroes who saved our nation’s jewels

About this time 70 years ago the Korean War reversed again. Alarmed by UN-South Korean troops rapidly advancing northward, China entered the war to prevent their permanent occupation along its border. Massive human-wave attacks buckled the Allied Forces, obliterating their “home by Christmas” dream. “My ROK 1st Division and the US 24th Division crossed the Chongchon River heading south on Nov. 28. It was snowing,” recalls General Paik Sun-yup in his memoir “From Pu

Nov. 26, 2020

[David Fickling] Beyond Meat faces ancient rival in China -- Tofu

You wouldn’t try to sell coal to Newcastle. So how would you rate your chances of peddling meat substitutes to the country that invented tofu? Beyond Meat Inc., the US maker of plant-based burgers and sausages, on Wednesday announced a new product designed to crack China, the world’s biggest meat market: imitation ground pork. It’s not hard to see why this was a necessary step. For decades, China has consumed about half the world’s pork. Even in the wake of an epidemic

Nov. 25, 2020

[Kim Seong-kon] Why are Koreans at the MAGA March?

While US President Donald Trump has not yet officially conceded his election loss, approximately 10,000 Trump supporters recently gathered at One Freedom Plaza in Washington, DC for the “Million MAGA (Make America Great Again) March.” Some of the protesters came all the way from the west coast and Florida. They sang the national anthem and chanted, “Stop the steal!” According to the Guardian, there was a group of Koreans and Korean Americans in the crowd. The Guardian wr

Nov. 25, 2020

[Richard A. Clarke] Terrorist threat to US still lurks　

A twisty, narrow way in the cramped heart of Vienna’s oldest quarter, a busy street in an upscale neighborhood of Tehran and remote woods in Nigeria seem unlikely to share a theme or have relevance for the incoming Biden administration. As Viennese were enjoying their last night out in the little bars of the Innere Stadt on Nov. 2, before another COVID lockdown started, the music and good times were suddenly punctuated by the sharp staccato of gunfire. A young radical Islamist ran through

Nov. 24, 2020

[Arvind Subramanian] America should rewrite the China trade contract

Once US President-elect Joe Biden’s administration has made the relatively easy decisions to rejoin the Paris climate agreement, remain in the World Health Organization, and attempt to reboot the World Trade Organization, it will confront three key foreign-policy issues. In order of importance, they are China, China, and China. Biden’s dilemma is that China has become too deviant to cooperate with fully, too big to contain or ignore, and too connected to decouple from. So, what prin

Nov. 24, 2020

[Ana Palacio] America, heal thyself and look forward

In 1998, then-US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright famously defined the United States as “the indispensable nation,” declaring that, “We stand tall and we see further than other countries into the future.” Two decades later, the US remains the indispensable nation. And yet, rather than seeing into the future, it has lately seemed to have its eyes closed. Does Joe Biden’s victory in this month’s presidential election mean the US is re-opening them? One thi

Nov. 23, 2020

[J. Bradford DeLong] The siren song of austerity

Ten years and ten months ago, US President Barack Obama announced in his 2010 State of the Union address that it was time for austerity. “Families across the country are tightening their belts and making tough decisions,” he explained. “The federal government should do the same.” Signaling his willingness to freeze government spending for three years, Obama argued that, “Like any cash-strapped family, we will work within a budget to invest in what we need and sacr

Nov. 23, 2020

[Digital Simplicity] Think twice before you sign up for ‘free’ digital service

Last week, Google announced it would change its storage policy for Google Photos, which is now being used by more than 1 billion people across the globe. Simply put, it will end its free unlimited photo storage service from June, 2021. To back up more photos, users have to sign up for a paid plan. I was neither shocked nor disappointed. I had already seen Google and other big tech companies calling it quits on their “innovative” services overnight. They didn’t -- and never w

Nov. 21, 2020

[Robert J. Fouser] Korean American women storm the House

The recent US election produced a mixed result. As expected, Joe Biden won the presidency, thus adding Donald Trump’s name to the list of defeated presidents. Down-ballot elections for the Senate, House of Representatives, governors and state houses, however, proved disappointing for Democrats, as Republicans beat expectations at every level. The results show that voters wanted a change at the top, but within the context of centrist moderation. Of all the races in play, the most surprisin

Nov. 20, 2020

[Max Nisen] A giant leap against pandemics

The world now seems likely to have at least two effective vaccines against COVID-19 with Monday’s announcement of positive early data from Moderna Therapeutics’s 30,000-person clinical trial. The result comes a week after Pfizer and BioNTech revealed a protection rate of more than 90 percent against disease. Moderna slightly one-upped its rivals, estimating that its shot is 94.5 percent effective at preventing COVID-19. Both results are highly impressive for inoculations developed at

Nov. 19, 2020