The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) welcomed an unprecedented $150 million contribution from the World Bank to provide critical livelihood and life-saving assistance to the most vulnerable rural populations in Afghanistan.
The United Nations Deputy High Commissioner for Refugees, Kelly T. Clements and an accompanying delegation met with Afghanistan’s acting Deputy Foreign Minister, Mohammad Abbas Stanekzai, in Kabul where they discussed the return of refugees and resettlement of IDPs.
The study of economic growth is mandatory for those who pay attention to the economy, and that is precisely what we at ANBOUND are doing. As early as 2013, we conducted a study on China’s economic growth through information analysis methods. The conclusion is that China’s economic growth cannot continue to grow at a high speed, but will decline in stages. In an ideal scenario, roughly every 10 years, the average level of economic growth will drop by one percentage point. After three decades, its growth will reach 5%, thus forming a consumption-oriented society. The final result is a pyramid-shaped growth trend, therefore this conclusion is christened the “pyramid model”.
The war in Ukraine has become a turning point for developing countries, many of whom could give up the gains made in economic growth and reduction in poverty over the past three decades.
A growing number of developing nations are vulnerable to political instability caused by debt crises, as is shown by Sri Lanka’s current plight. US and Western leadership in reforming the international financial system is needed to avoid the developing world becoming more dependent on China.
How Beijing’s Economic Missteps and Support for Russia Soured European Leaders
In April and May, as Russia’s war in Ukraine entered its third month, China sent a special envoy to meet with officials in eight central and eastern European countries. The timing was not coincidental: in the two months since Russia had launched its invasion, China’s standing in Europe had sunk to new lows.
The war in Ukraine has become a turning point for developing countries, many of whom could give up the gains made in economic growth and reduction in poverty over the past three decades.
A growing number of developing nations are vulnerable to political instability caused by debt crises, as is shown by Sri Lanka’s current plight. US and Western leadership in reforming the international financial system is needed to avoid the developing world becoming more dependent on China.
Ukraine’s successes in resisting and even turning back an invasion by a numerically superior Russian force has raised expectations in East Asia that smaller nations in the region could conceivably fend off an attack from a large military like China’s. Taiwan, of course, has long struggled with executing such a defense strategy, but since its strategic considerations are in many ways unique, other countries nominally threatened by China may not be able to draw as many lessons from Taipei’s experience. Ukraine’s performance in its war against Russia, on the other hand, may look to them like a more relevant model—for better or worse.
“We have no competing fighting chance against China in 15 to 20 years. Right now, it’s already a done deal; it is already over in my opinion.” — Nicolas Chaillan, former first Chief Software Officer for the Air Force, who resigned in protest over the Pentagon’s slow pace of technological development, citing China’s fast advancements in artificial intelligence, machine learning, and general capabilities in cybersecurity, Financial Times, October 10, 2021
The Russia-Ukraine war is upending global supply chains.
In the case of Central Asia (the five republics plus Afghanistan) this impact reinforces the need for redundant transport routes and options for the landlocked states of Central Asia. These states still rely on Soviet-era transport links that connect them to markets. This remains true even though during the three decades since independence in 1991 have seen new roads, railways, and pipeline put in place, many funded by China.
Asia is undergoing a world-historical geopolitical transformation. The rise of the Indo-Pacific as a coherent geoeconomic and geopolitical system coincides with the rise of what this author has previously termed the “Indo-Abrahamic,” an emerging transregional order connecting India to West Asia and the eastern Mediterranean. Until now, the geographic vastness of Asia and the legacy of “divide-and-conquer” colonialism have kept the continent politically and economically fragmented. By reshaping their bilateral relations, Cairo and New Delhi can seize the strategic opportunity to link the Indo-Abrahamic with the Indo-Pacific, thus realizing this envisioned West Asian system.