A Malaysian airliner with 298 people on board crashed in Ukraine on a flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, amid allegations it was shot down. Baker Institute fellow Joe Barnes examines the possible diplomatic ramifications of the tragedy in the Baker Institute Blog.
On May 23, Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto signed a series of bills to implement constitutional changes to the country’s political and electoral processes. The reforms bring some of the most dynamic shifts to Mexican politics since the 1990s, including replacing the Federal Electoral Institute (IFE) with the National Electoral Institute (INE). The new INE and the measures behind it now strive to replicate the IFE’s success in the country's states and municipalities.
One hundred years after the start of World War I, the legacies of decisions made by colonial powers during and after the period cast a long shadow over the Middle East.
Peter Hotez, fellow in disease and poverty, proposes ways for countries around the world to increase their reliance on vaccine diplomacy in their foreign policy approaches.
Despite his sweeping electoral victory, it seems that Egypt's new president, General Abdul-Fattah el-Sisi, has learned little from the past mistakes of Mubarak and Morsi.
On May 22, the House of Representatives passed the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2015, which specifies the budget and expenditures of the United States Department of Defense and sets the policies under which money (somewhat in excess of $600 billion) will be spent on our country’s defense. However, an amendment added to the bill will keep the Department of Defense from preparing for or performing any military activities that include any construction related to climate change.
President Obama’s commencement address at West Point on Wednesday was clearly aimed at deflecting rising criticism of his administration’s foreign policy. In particular, the speech was designed to address complaints that U.S. foreign policy under Obama has lacked strategic coherence and signaled a U.S. retreat from the international arena. The administration promoted the address as a platform for the president to describe his “vision” for U.S. foreign policy during the remainder of his term. To the extent that the speech did present a vision, it was not a particularly new one.
The violent struggle between rival Mexican drug cartels and other criminal groups has left tens of thousands dead and towns across Mexico paralyzed with fear. With overwhelmed police forces relatively powerless to control drug-related murders and kidnappings, a growing number of vigilante organizations, or self-defense
groups, aim to restore order — but now even they are fighting, and killing, among themselves.
Joe Barnes, the institute's Bonner Means Baker Fellow, blogs on concern in Kyiv, Washington and European capitals — not too far-fetched, given Russia’s seizure of Crimea last month — that Moscow might invade Eastern Ukraine on the pretext of protecting Russian speakers.
The situation in Ukraine is the most serious foreign policy challenge ever faced by the Obama administration, writes Rice faculty scholar Richard Stoll.
