TOPICS

Dr. Pierre Thévenin Key Takeaways US-Iran Deal May Undermine Freedom of Navigation — The Islamabad Memorandum’s wording (especially Paragraph 5) could allow Iran to impose tolls or restrictions on shipping through the Strait of Hormuz after the 60-day period, violating the non-suspendable innocent passage regime under international law. Broader …

Collins Chong Yew Keat Key Takeaways Strategic Deepening of Ties — The Nikkei Forum and related engagements underscore Malaysia’s growing role as a key partner for Japan in semiconductors, energy (LNG), AI, critical minerals, and supply-chain resilience. This moves the relationship beyond the traditional “Look East Policy” toward high-value …

Dr. Ju Hyung Kim The United Arab Emirates’ move to revive the acquisition and local production of South Korea’s K9 self-propelled howitzer is more than a conventional arms deal. This reflects a broader shift in Gulf security thinking amid the ongoing Iranian war. For years, military modernization in …

Hadi Elis For nearly eight decades, the conflict in Balochistan has been portrayed by Islamabad as a separatist insurgency threatening Pakistan’s territorial integrity. Yet for many Baloch nationalists, the struggle is not about separation from Pakistan—it is about liberation from what they regard as a historical occupation. Their …

Willy Fautre Saudi Arabia’s Yemen policy master, Riyadh’s ambassador Mohammed al-Jaber, believes in stick-and-carrot diplomacy—he shows the stick to Yemen’s dissenters and the carrot to Europe’s defense ministries. And it’s a contradiction that now runs straight through Europe’s own legal order. Al‑Jaber is no ordinary envoy. Since 2014 …

“The Russia–Ukraine War has now exceeded the duration of the First World War, yet Russia is short of achieving its original political objectives, and Ukraine, supported by NATO, hasn’t given up.” This prolonged contest of wills has morphed into a grinding, industrial-age war of attrition fought with twenty-first-century …

Sana Khan This week, Washington faced a choice that it will face repeatedly until it finally makes it explicit. On Monday, the Trump administration demanded NATO increase defense spending. On Wednesday, Chinese military exercises around Taiwan escalated. On Friday, tensions spiked in the Middle East over Iranian oil …

Until not so long ago Latin America had been considered a quiet region, located far from the world’s superpower main strategic confrontations, with sporadic but crucial moments that helped to shape the international order as we know it today. The Cuban Missile Crisis is the clearest example: it …

National flags of NATO members flutter at the alliance’s headquarters in Brussels, Belgium April 2, 2025. REUTERS/Yves Herman/File Photo/File Photo Last Tuesday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio told European defense ministers that Article 5 the collective defense clause binding NATO together for 75 years was now conditional on …