Oceania

The two foreign visits that Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese made this year, one week apart, between late October and early November, should be analyzed in light of the state of the Great World Game at the moment. From this vantage point, they comprise a truly amazing, twofold interconnected enterprise.  To begin with, because the visiting countries were its two primary participants, namely the United States (October 23-26) and the People’s Republic of China (November 4–7), the complicated set of interactions between them is currently at the center of the game table…

In early September, a truly historic event took place. Russia and Myanmar re-established air links after 30 years. What does this do for our travelling enthusiasts? Should we expect a tourism boom to this exotic country? How promising is Myanmar for the Russian tourism industry today? Maya Kotlyar, the founder and head of MAYEL Travel, one of the most quoted public experts in tourism, will help us to understand these issues. – Dear Maya, Although Myanmar is quite an exotic tourist destination, you have a lot of experience in sending tourists there…

A series of announcements by the US reflect its large and still growing military presence across Asia-Pacific, particularly in East and Southeast Asia. Together, they reflect a continued and increasingly desperate desire by Washington to encircle and contain China. These announcements include plans for expanding the number of US air bases across the region as part of the US Air Force’s (USAF) new “Agile Combat Employment” (ACE) doctrine. It also includes plans for a “civilian port” in the Batanes islands, less than 200 km from the Chinese island province of Taiwan. Then there were recently announced plans by the US Department of Defense to create drone…