In Asia: Weekly Insight and Features from Asia

When we hear about the current slow pace of negotiations between the government of the Philippines and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, we can lose sight of the many concrete achievements made over the years. As peacemakers on both sides of the negotiating table try to learn lessons from past peace efforts…

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In a study I wrote a number of years ago, I quoted a peace activist in Mindanao lamenting the lack of success in ending the war between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF). He was speaking in the wake of President Estrada’s 2000 “all-out war” offensive that overran fixed positions of the MILF.

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One of the world’s most prominent experts in Afghan art, Mr. Omara Khan Masoudi, director of the National Museum of Afghanistan in Kabul, was in San Francisco recently on a two-week exchange at the Asian Art Museum as an Asia Foundation Brayton Wilbur, Jr. Fellow in Asian Art.

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Karl Eikenberry, former U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan and Asia Foundation trustee, wrote in an op-ed in the Financial Times that, “Afghanistan’s future is of course uncertain. Lower levels of international support will inevitably place stress on its security forces, depress the economy…

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Mindanao dominates the headlines in the Philippines this week for several reasons. There is the horrific aftermath of Typhoon Pablo (known internationally as Bopha), which slammed into an area of the island that typically does not get hit by storms. On a lighter note, but one that also riveted the nation, hometown boxer Manny Pacquiao (from General Santos City in Mindanao) was knocked out this past weekend in a surprise, convincing defeat – leading to speculation about whether his sterling career is on the wane.

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On October 19, The Asia Foundation held the Manila launch of the book, Dynamics of Gender and Conflict in Mindanao, written by conflict experts Rufa Guiam and Leslie Dwyer.

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It has been an exciting and emotional 10 days for the peace process between the Philippine government and the country’s largest rebel group, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), which looks to end 40 years of conflict that has left a reported 150,000 dead and devastated the economy.

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A fortnight ago I blogged about the energy for peace I found at two very different events in Mindanao. We might now ask: what is the origin of that energy, and of the general surge toward a peace agreement? At first glance, this may seem to have an obvious answer, since it is clear from citizen surveys…

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For the first time in my life, I am visiting London. Everybody tells me how unusual is the glorious weather we’re enjoying, and that my infatuation with the city might not be as strong if the weather were more normal – gloomy and wet – but I plan to take these first impressions as fixed.

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In March 2012, a few weeks before Thai New Year which is celebrated every April, a series of explosions rocked a district of Thailand’s Songkla province popular with tourists, and a business district in Yala province.

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