Last Wednesday Japan and China defused the dispute over natural gas and oil deposits in the East China Sea. Japanese companies can invest in Chinese projects in return for a share of the profits. The problem is that the deposits rest on the border of the two country’s exclusive economic zones (EEZs) established by the UN Convention of the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). UNCLOS gives countries economic rights 370 km from a country’s shortline. One pitfall of the treaty is that it is woefully unable to settle overlapping claims. Relations between Japan and China have improved this year. Chinese premier Hu Jintao was the first to visit Japan since 1998. Japan’s navy made a port call in China last week. Both countries have agreed to form a joint venture at the Longjing field, which crosses the meridian line.
Peace has finally come to Nepal after a ten-year civil war. The monarchy is gone, a government has formed, and elections were a success. Nepal’s next step is integrating 23,000 Maoist soldiers into the Royal Nepalese Army. Deciding how to do this is contentious. Some in the 93000-strong army are loyal to the old King Gyanendra, while others are not. The Maoists’ leader, Pushpa Kamal Dahal, is the head of the government but also commander of the Maoist forces. The UN is set to pull out of Nepal at the end of the next month.
The United Nations reported this week that the number of refugees rose in 2006 and 2007. 11.4 million people were under the UN High Commissioner for Refugees last year. There were also another 26 million internal refugees. Colombia had the highest number. Pakistan received the most refugees by far (2 million), followed by Syria, Iran, Germany, and Jordan. The number of asylum-seekers also went up to 650,000. The number of disaster refugees was close to 30 million.
The United Nations’ future in Kosovo is still unclear. Kosovo’s new constitution gives it no role but has accepted Europe’s mission, EULEX. The UN however has not accepted EULEX’s mission and has only accepted an enhanced role for the EU. The good news out of Serbia is that its foreign minister has promised that his government will be part of the solution to Kosovo. Kosovo’s independence is a done deal. Almost 50 countries recognize it and endless bickering won’t change it. Annexing Kosovo is not an option for Serbia. Elsewhere, Bosnia-Herzegovina announced a stabilization agreement with the EU. The country, split between the Croat-Bosniak federation and the Republika Srpska in the north, is now on track to become part of the EU.
1 comment:
Marko G says:
Kosovo independence ain't no done deal, boy. It's an act of NWO imperialism (terrible socialist word, but it fits the facts these days, as much it used to do).
Wait till other countries start unilaterally declaring part of your country to be independent of you. Then you'll see what's at stake here.
But of course in this latest NWO, military hardware holds sway and determines whose view holds, ie a New World law of the jungle is being encouraged where the rogue elephant on the block also encourages smaller elephants to go rogue in the same way so that the international organising principle (UN Charter, UN SC) is replaced with the jungle principle in which small states are most vulnerable, and the main rogue elephant state never gets shackled by the good sense of others but is able to foment disturbance at its whim or for its unilateral interest.
Nice.
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