In Asia: Weekly Insight and Features from Asia

The phrase “gender equality as smart economics” has become the recent mantra of such powerful women leaders as Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and UN Women Executive Director Michelle Bachelet. It is also the rallying cry of the World Bank’s 2012 World Development Report…

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A rapidly increasing number of people across the globe are now staying connected to one another via a mobile phone device – whether it’s an iPhone, Nokia, or Samsung. In fact, the United Nations reported earlier this year that the worldwide figure for cell phone subscriptions had topped five billion at the end of 2010. According to the International Telecommunication Union, approximately 3.8 billion of these mobile subscriptions were from developing countries…

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On Monday, September 26, The Asia Foundation will host preeminent South Asia expert, former U.S. Ambassador to Sri Lanka, and former deputy assistant secretary of state for South Asian affairs Teresita C. Schaffer for a conversation on the topic of her new book, How Pakistan Negotiates with the United States…

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Read an interview with Asia Foundation trustee Teresita C. Schaffer, former U.S. Ambassador to Sri Lanka and former deputy assistant secretary of state for South Asian affairs, that originally appeared on DAWN.com.

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President Barack Obama’s June announcement that the United States will pull 33,000 troops out of Afghanistan by the end of next summer provides a strong catalyst for Afghanistan to assume a central focus in both meetings [U.S.-India Strategic Dialogue, Pakistan-India ministerial dialogue].

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The floods of 2010 swept away homes and livelihoods, affecting more than 18 million people and killing more than 1,750 in Pakistan. They also destroyed and contaminated precious water systems integral to the survival of Pakistan’s communities. For example, in Union Council Amaze, a remote location in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province…

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In April, Mukhtaran Mai had to relive the most excruciating memory of her life when the Supreme Court of Pakistan acquitted all but one of the accused in her rape case. The decision elicited a sharp reaction from civil society groups and media organizations in Pakistan.

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Earlier this month, the World Bank released its 2011 World Bank Development Report, “Conflict, Security and Development.” This highly ambitious report intends to challenge conventional wisdom and propose a new strategy for the international community to help countries emerge from war, long-running violent conflict, entrenched criminality, and fragility. In my view, the report has accomplished this goal, and in so doing, may change the way we work with fragile states and conflict-affected regions.

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In Asia recently spoke with Pakistani journalist Wajahat Ali, on a visit from Washington, D.C., where he just finished a fellowship at the New America Foundation as an Asia Foundation William P. Fuller Fellow in Conflict Resolution.

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Pakistan-watchers tend to focus on political and security issues. But they need to start thinking as well about the economy, the outlook for which is grim over the next several years. Some of Pakistan’s problems were spawned by the epic floods of the summer of 2010, but most have resulted from the long-standing failure of the Pakistani government to invest in its people, or from more mundane mismanagement of vital sectors, such as energy.

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