Section: Kabayan Weekly (United Arab Emirates)
What’s causing Obama’s sleepless nights?
With the conclusion of a much-ballyhooed summit meeting between the leaders of the two largest economic superpowers in the 21st century, one would expect that peace would reign in the vast Asia-Pacific region. But this is farthest from the truth because the summit didn’t really accomplish anything but allow U.S. President Barack Obama and...
Prosecutors: Possible Buk missile parts found at MH17 site
THE HAGUE, Netherlands — Dutch prosecutors said Tuesday they have found what they believe could be parts of a Buk missile system at the site in eastern Ukraine where Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 was brought down last year. The announcement represents the first time prosecutors have confirmed possible physical evidence of a missile bringing down...
Passage of Magna Carta of seafarers pushed
DUBAI–Senator and acting labor committee chairman Edgardo “Sonny” Angara called for the immediate passage of Senate Bill 214, known as An Act Instituting the Magna Carta of Filipino Seafarers, which seeks to guarantee fundamental rights, benefits and comprehensive protection for the thousands of sea-based Filipino workers worldwide. “Filipino...
Philippine officials say China island-building in full swing
PUERTO PRINCESA, Philippines— China is pressing ahead with the construction of artificial islands on at least two reefs that are also claimed by the Philippines in an increasingly tense territorial dispute, Filipino officials said, despite Beijing’s pronouncement that some work would end soon. Mayor Eugenio Bito-onon of Kalayaan islands,...
Putin’s Roulette
Events this past week are changing the world in a way it never did since the end of World War II. It even made the Cold War look like a drill in preparation for what to come: a war to end all wars. Indeed, the next war – World War III – would end in the annihilation of life on Earth. Yet, there are those who believe that if they struck first at...
Fast-growing Asian aviation confronts safety challenges
HONG KONG — For Asia’s aviation industry, the growing pains have just begun. A year of disasters, the disappearance of Flight 370 and financial turbulence highlight the challenges confronting the world’s biggest air travel market, where governments, regulators and airlines are struggling to keep up after a decade of astonishing...
Obama Doctrine: Legacy or fallacy?
In his speech accepting the Nobel Peace Prize awarded to him in December 2009, President Barack Obama said: “I receive this honor with deep gratitude and great humility. It is an award that speaks to our highest aspirations — that for all the cruelty and hardship of our world, we are not mere prisoners of fate. Our actions matter, and can bend...
PERRYSCOPE – Obama vs. Putin: Can Obama survive Round 3?
By Perry Diaz It wasn’t too long ago when President Barack Obama was the undisputed world leader since the end of the Cold War in 1989; he reigned over the greatest empire the world has ever known. But recently, he had become too complacent lording it over a unipolar world order, confident that the sun will never set on Pax Americana. But...
PERRYSCOPE – One minute to midnight
By Perry Diaz Every year since 1947 in the month of January, members of the Science and Security Board of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists meet to perform an annual ritual of setting the time on the “Doomsday Clock.” It is a mechanism designed to warn the world of how close we are to doomsday; the closer the clock moved to midnight, the...
PERRYSCOPE – Multipolar world order in a shrinking world
By Perry Diaz After the collapse of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) in 1991, there was only one superpower left in a unipolar world order: The United States of America. For the next two decades, America was the world’s hegemon. It kept peace in an ever-increasing turbulent world. Thus began the era of Pax Americana (American...
