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East Asia
Will Dr. Mahathir succeed in the 14th General Election?
For the first time in Malaysia’s history since its independence in 1957, the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) being the dominant party in the Barisan Nasional (BN) government today, will be challenged by its former president who is also the former Prime Minister (PM) of Malaysia, Mahathir Mohamad, in the…
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South Asia
KIM – INDIA’S POSTER BOY
In December 2017, a peculiar development made the headlines of Indian national news. The face and name of North Korea’s Supreme Leader, Kim Jong-un, came up bold and strong on posters. Such posters belonged to the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M), a party prominent in the southern Indian state of…
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East Asia
Dubai vs Gwadar: The New World Economy War
Major industrial infrastructure investments launched by the UAE government are expected to push expenditure. According to a report published by the Dubai-based Arabic Language Al-Bayan newspaper, the Dubai economy will remain the least vulnerable to future economic crises due to current investments made in the build-up to Expo 2020.…
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South Asia
Pakistan – Where People Consume Poisonous Water
It was a frosty and misty Sunday morning of December 2017 when I noticed several people of varying ages riding bikes and three-wheeler Chinese rickshaws, locally called “Chingchi”, loaded with empty plastic cans. They all headed to a British-era canal flowing north to south in the east of town. “They…
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West Asia
Arabian Tales
Generations in India have grown listening to the “The Arabian Tales” (“One Thousand and One Nights”). The story of Aladdin, Sindbad, and of course, the story of Alibaba and the Forty Thieves; all of them carried a universal appeal. Each fable read aloud to young children before bedtime always…
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East Asia
Press Watch – Singapore:
Singapore’s leader Lee Kuan Yew, who dominated the political scene from 1959, when he first came to power, till his death on March 23rd, 2015, corralled the press as an instrument to help realise his own nation-building agenda. Retired newsman Yeo Toon Joo, who spent 12 years (1963-1975) in an…
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tobechecked
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Culture
[Book Review] A Journey Between Literature and Philosophy
The Unbearable Lightness of Being By Milan Kundera, Gallimard, 1984 Set in Czechoslovakia in 1968, The Unbearable Lightness of Being explores the artistic and intellectual life of Czech society in the 1960s and 1970s across the stories of four characters. Tomas, a surgeon, has managed to separate love and…
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Culture
[Book Review] Questioning the Role of Women in the 19th Century
Pride and Prejudice Jane Austen, Thomas Egerton, 1813 Set in rural England in the early 1800s, Pride and Prejudice is a novel of the Bennett family’s story. The family includes a negligent father, a silly empty-headed mother, and five daughters: the eldest Jane, Elizabeth (also called Lizze and sometimes,…
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