Malaysian opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim’s seven-year fight against sodomy charges ended on 10 February 2015. His five-year prison sentence was widely seen as a victory for his political opponents in using the law to silence him (again). The opposition coalition will struggle to overcome the loss of its leader. But Prime Minister Najib Razak is expected to face minimal international pressure on the verdict.
The House of Commons has voted in favour of compulsory, standardised and logo-free packaging for cigarettes. If also approved by the House of Lords, the new law will enter into force in England in 2016. This will mean trademarks, graphics and logos will be removed from packs, except for the brand name, which will be displayed in a standard font identical for all brands in the market. Large graphic health-warning images will also dominate on the front. A dark colour such as olive green will permeate the pack.
The greatest threat to Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his ambitious agenda is political instability in Tokyo. The spectre of such instability is re-emerging after a remarkable period of quiet as cabinet ministers in Abe’s government are being tarred with political funding scandals. Individually, the offences are insignificant. But, cumulatively, they are a distraction from the important work at hand and a regrettable return to politics as usual in Japan — at least before Abe took office.
In recent years the power of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) has increased dramatically. If this trend continues, it may bear important implications for Vietnam’s political outlook.
Billionaire investor Warren Buffet does not approve of President Obama’s recent veto of the Keystone XL pipeline. Buffet believes Obama is thumbing his nose at Canada.
Buffet said another reason he would have passed Keystone XL is because the United States may need a favor from Canada in the future. It should be noted that Obama’s veto of Keystone XL is not his final decision on the transnational project. The president vetoed the bill because he wants to make the final decision as opposed to allowing Congress to back him into a corner.
Politics makes for strange bedfellows.
The German critics on the right of Chancellor Merkel think that Greece should leave the monetary union. The economic advisers to Merkel have argued that the Greece’s exit would not necessarily be disruptive.
The recent Japanese hostage crisis has divided public opinion on its dealings in the Middle East. On 20 January, the extremist organisation Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) released an online video showing two Japanese men kneeling in orange jumpsuits beside a masked man who demanded that Japan pay a US$200 million ransom within three days. The sum was no coincidence. On 17 January Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe pledged US$200 million in non-military aid for countries fighting ISIS.
Given the scandals, bonus increases and plummeting lending to small and medium-sized British businesses, reform of the banking system is likely to be a hot topic in the run-up to the general election. It is not surprising then that Labour has launched its plan on banking reform, which proposes measures to improve competition within the banking sector, lending to smaller businesses, and the culture of banking itself.
The Great Financial Crisis lingers. That the world economy continues to grow does not change that fact. There are different lenses from which one can view the crisis and seek to understand its implications.
We are drawn to a lens that was central to the political economic discourse from the middle of the 19th century through the Great Depression. It was the idea that capitalism was so terribly successful that it generated a surplus in excess of what it could profitably invest.
Syriza’s surge to power with a campaign against austerity has forced politicians across Europe to justify their economic policies. The UK chancellor was hot-off-the-mark to assure everyone that the Greek election result should not be interpreted as a rejection of austerity policies:
People get tired of economic failure, they [get] tired of rising unemployment… what you see is not a defeat of austerity, it is a defeat of economic plans that don’t work and in Britain we have got an economic plan that is working.
