After being evacuated from East Timor, Jacqueline Aquino Siapno writes about the deliberate burning of the house in Dili she built with her husband, Fernando de Araujo, leader of the Democratic Party. Writes Siapno: “Many of the arson attacks witnessed in Dili in the past few days have been ordered by government figures and military...

For the first time in its history Australia is in an interesting place at an interesting time, argues David Martin Jones, as the current ideology driving US foreign policy comes into conflict with developing Chinese reality, which is projecting its soft but essentially illiberal power into the wider region. This, he argues, has profound strategic...

Ron Huisken argues that after a difficult and somewhat unilateralist start, the US-led Proliferation Security Initiative appears to be maturing into a useful and accepted counter-proliferation measure. While the inherent imprecision of the terms of UNSC 1540 “combines with the labyrinth of international law concerning governance of the oceans and seas to produce an arena...

Nic Maclellan reports that over 1000 Fijians are working in Iraq and Kuwait as soldiers, security guards, drivers and labourers, and more than 2000 Fijian soldiers are serving in the British Army. So far at least eight Fijians working in Iraq have been killed, with many others wounded. The official and unofficial Fijian deployments to...

Richard Tanter argues that there is a tendency in both Japan and abroad to underestimate Japan’s actual military strength – especially that of its naval forces. Maritime Self Defense Force destroyers and refuelling supply ships have been continually on-station in the Indian Ocean since November 2001, well away from the public eye. The rules of...