US President Joe Biden likes to say that we are locked in a global battle pitting democracy against autocracy. In Seattle last week, he described a phone conversation he’d had with Chinese President Xi Jinping in which Xi argued that democracy doesn’t work anymore. Among other things, Xi said, democracy requires consensus, and mustering a consensus takes too long in a fast-moving world. Biden d...

With Elon Musk set to buy Twitter for $44 billion, commentators are scrambling to understand what the “free speech absolutism” espoused by the world’s richest person will mean for the platform. But the principle could also create headaches for Musk himself. With the European Union and the United Kingdom about to enact laws aimed at making social media safer and more accountable, Musk has seeming...

When I was young, my mother used to take me for a drive in the mountains during spring. We enjoyed looking at the flowers. The frozen land during winter has resurfaced with a scene of spring surrounded by trees and flowers. The change from winter to spring was truly beautiful. When she took a drive with me, we always listened to songs related to spring. Mother and I especially enjoyed “Spring” b...

Five Israelis shot dead in Bnai Brak and two more in Tel Aviv. Clashes at the Al Aqsa Mosque, where more than 150 Palestinians were wounded by Israeli riot police. Stabbings in southern Israel and Jerusalem; counterterrorism raids across the West Bank that killed more than a dozen Palestinians. Exchanges of rockets and airstrikes between the Gaza Strip and Israel. These are headlines from the la...

Widespread skepticism and misgivings about relocating the presidential office and residence before Inauguration Day on May 10 have been validated, unfortunately. The eight-week window to replace the Blue House has proven overwhelmingly inadequate. President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol has painted himself into a corner with his campaign vow to “never spend a single night in the Blue House” after he takes...

The level of European solidarity sparked by Vladimir Putin’s war against Ukraine has surprised even Europeans. Leaders in Russia, China and Iran are perplexed as well. They had assumed the invasion would exacerbate strains in the transatlantic community. There is not, however, unanimity on every issue. The real question is how Europeans will deal with the consequences of the war and their own di...

George Orwell’s prophecy was right, after all. In his 1949 dystopian novel “1984,” Orwell envisioned a world divided into three totalitarian super-states: Oceania, Eurasia, and Eastasia. Oceania included the United Kingdom, the United States and Australia. Eurasia referred to continental Europe annexed to the Soviet Union. Eastasia indicated China, South Asian countries and the Japanese islands. ...

With over two-thirds of the African continent still unvaccinated against COVID-19, it is clear that the global pandemic preparedness and response, or PPR, regime remains seriously underfunded and lacking in resilient, effective delivery systems. While the World Health Organization’s Access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator has helped to address the gross inequity in access to testing, treatments, and...

The stories from Shanghai, a city of 25 million entering its fourth week of COVID-19 lockdown, have been harrowing. Millions have been confined to their homes, their movements monitored by pandemic police in white hazmat suits. Almost 300,000 people who’ve tested positive or had contact with someone positive have been forcibly moved to spartan quarantine centers. Videos on social media have sho...