As part of China’s flagship ‘belt and road initiative’, the China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) has formed the keystone of the two nation’s relations since 2013, with vast capital being poured into the programme. However, as Chinese infrastructure has appeared, so has violent opposition, including lethal bombings of Chinese workers by Pakistani insurgent groups, greatly […]

Ukraine’s independence day is on Wednesday 24 August: peaceful mass gatherings and celebratory events are common in urban areas to mark independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. This year, however, independence day events across the country (particularly in Kyiv and Kharkiv) have been banned after President Zelensky warned yesterday that the Russian military is […]

On 27 July, following months of political stagnation, tension among Shia protestors boiled, and thousands breached the secure Green Zone district in central Baghdad and broke into the Iraqi parliament building. Dispersed by security forces and tweets from their spiritual leader Muqtada al-Sadr, protestors returned three days later to rerun their storming of Parliament, but […]

Territorial revisionism pursued by Russia in Ukraine raises questions over the prospect of similar policies being pursued elsewhere. Amid souring relations between Washington and Beijing over the recent visit by Nancy Pelosi to Taipei it is not unrealistic to probe whether Beijing would seize a string of isolated islands in close proximity to mainland China: […]