Recent reports by Humphrey Hawksley
Harrowing and beautiful Northeast India
Sanjoy Hazarika is a frustrated and restless native of the tea-growing state of Assam, and a highly respected human rights activist who wrestled for years over how he should write a book about his homeland. The result is a captivating analysis of a critically important area, not only of India, but also of Asia and […]
The West’s Failure to Reform Threatens World Order
Two years ago, China and Russia issued a joint declaration with the aim of throwing out an open challenge to the current US-led world order. Coming after Moscow’s annexation of Crimea and a court ruling against Beijing’s claim to the South China Sea, the two governments announced bluntly in June 2016 that they would enhance […]
Europe must resist the lure of Chinese money
The attempt by China’s Three Gorges to take control of Portugal’s energy group, Energias de Portugal, highlights Beijing’s accelerating campaign to invest in Europe — and a growing push from the European Union to hold back the financial onslaught. The state-owned conglomerate, which is already the largest EDP shareholder with a 23% stake, had its […]
India’s role in reshaping the Commonwealth
After months of planning that required the most choreographed of diplomatic skills, Britain hosted a lavish visit in April for the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, followed by a summit for the 53-member Commonwealth, a large international grouping that comprises a bygone colonial power and those it had once colonised. At first glance, not much […]
Is the Commonwealth still relevant?
The Commonwealth comprises 53 nations and makes up a third of the world’s population. But what does it do and is it relevant? David Foster hosted Humphrey on a TRT Roundtable discussion together with Rita Payne of the Commonwealth Journalist Association, David Martin Jones of the School of Political Science and International Studies at Kings […]
Russia and China Test Arctic Boundaries
OSLO: In 2016, two seemingly unrelated incidents unfolded in remote and vulnerable parts of Europe. One view might suggest the events, efficiently swept away with quiet diplomacy, counted for little. Another considers the incidents as demonstrating Russia’s and China’s determination to test the outer boundaries of European and American resolve. There may be nothing new […]
The Jaipur Literary Festival
During avisit to the world renowned book event, Humphrey Hawksley finds a refreshing antidote to growing global concerns about threats to freedom of speech and thought For five days every January, hundreds of thousands converge on the elegant old Diggi Palace in Jaipur for the world’s biggest literary festival. A half-hour flight from Delhi, Jaipur […]
The ‘Polar Silk Road’
With a lot of fanfare, China has expanded its flagship Belt and Road Initiative to a vast swath of new territory far removed from the Middle Kingdom — the Arctic. A detailed white paper last month outlined plans for a “Polar Silk Road” that would link Asia to Europe across the frozen far north. As has […]
Brexit Britain’s troubled quest to ‘Asianize’ the Commonwealth
As the U.K. reaches a critical phase in its negotiations to leave the European Union, Theresa May’s government is engaged in a desperate hunt for alternative partners. London has seized on the Commonwealth of Nations, formed out of the British Empire, as one way of strengthening its political and economic alliances outside the EU. On […]
Democracy in Kurdistan and Catalonia
In the early 1990s, as remnants of the Berlin Wall were transformed into a tourist attraction, there was a near-unchallenged presumption that governance, through the democratic will of the people, would underpin our future. Germany, once divided by two opposing ideologies, united under the democratic banner and countries that had mostly lived under Soviet control […]
Islamist radicalisation
Humphrey Hawksley asks why Islamist radicalisation has impacted some countries more than others. When President George W Bush ordered troops into Afghanistan after the September 2001 attacks on New York and Washington, the word ‘radicalisation’ was rarely, if ever, mentioned. Bush argued simply that terror was evil and needed to be stopped at source to […]
Fast, Furious or Fake News
LONDON: Disasters dominate the news agenda, with recent dystopian images of hurricanes raging in the Atlantic, earthquake-fractured streets in Mexico, apocalyptic flooding in South Asia and burning villages of Rohingya Muslims in scenes reminiscent of Cambodia’s killing fields. Advancing technology has changed how disasters are reported, but what attracts attention and how we react remain […]
Lessons of the opium wars
Humphrey Hawksley reports from the Opium War museum in southern China on the impact that Britain’s invasion in 1989 has on Beijing’s foreign policy today. Lessons of the opium wars
Taiwan-China
How China handles it’s renegade province of Taiwan will not only determine its own ambition of reunification but will also be watched closely by the rest of the Asia-Pacific region. Humphrey Hawksley reports from the once heavily militarised Taiwanese island of Kinmen. China Has Chance to Undercut US by Wooing Taiwan
America’s Naval War College
Humphrey Hawksley reports from America’s Naval War College which is preparing for possible wars with China and Russia and working out a strategy that might avoid them.
UK’s nuclear plant imbroglio fuels post-Brexit debate
Britain is putting down new markers on the global stage as it prepares to leave the European Union. But can it risk annoying China if it’s to succeed. Humphrey Hawksley – UK’s nuclear plant imbroglio fuels post-Brexit debate
Vietnam’s fishing war of the South China Sea
Vietnamese fishermen say they are being attacked by China with increasing regularity. Their boats have been rammed, equipment broken and crewmen beaten up. Vietnam accuses Beijing of trying to force them out of the South China Sea. Humphrey Hawksley and photographer Poulomi Basu went out on a boat with them. Beaten up by China for going fishing
On Little Diomede, American-Russian border
Two islands in the Bering Straits, one Russian, one American, are barely two miles apart. Only a few military observation posts remain on the Russian island, but a community of Eskimos lives on the US island. After the Cold War they hoped to resume regular contact with Russian relatives – but now the chances seem […]
Tea
The global tea industry is worth $20 billion a year, but on India’s tea estates millions of workers and their families suffer from hunger, disease, human rights abuse and exploitation. Marooned in an overgrown tea garden
Slavery
India’s economy is the 10th largest in the world, but millions of the country’s workers are thought to be held in conditions little better than slavery. One story – which some may find disturbing – illustrates the extreme violence that some are subjected to. They tried to escape and were punished with an axe. Punished by […]