China's Debt Bomb

Published on Sep 8, 2012 by Luke Hunt

China’s massive bank financed stimulus was intended to keep the economy moving. It may instead lead to economic disaster.Financial collapses may have different immediate triggers, but they all originate from the same cause: an explosion of credit.  This iron law of financial calamityshould make us very worried about the consequences of easy credit in China in recent years.  From the beginning of 2009 to the end of June this year, Chinese banks have issued roughly 35 trillion yuan ($5.4 trillion) in new loans, equal to 73 percent of China’s GDP in 2011. About two-thirds of these loans were made in 2009 and 2010, as part of Beijing’s stimulus package.  Unlike deficit-financed stimulus packages in the West, China’s colossal stimulus package....

Laos Mulls Reforms

Published on Aug 27, 2012 by Luke Hunt

Latter day communist countries still carry the legacies of their past. Somewhat secretive and sensitive to criticism, authorities in one-party states tend to hide at the slightest hint of criticism. It’s a routine in East Asia that is as common in Laos as it has been in Vietnam, China, or even North Korea.But more recently the government of Thongsing Thammavong in Laos has been making some very different noises. His government has lashed-out at the faceless bureaucrats behind the nation’s dilapidated health services, a bungling judiciary, and even the state-controlled press.Read more in The Diplomat..

Propping Up Dictators

Published on Jul 24, 2012 by Luke Hunt

It was all smiles and “brotherly love” as Gambia’s President Yahya Jammeh received full state honors and a 21-gun salute from Taiwanese president Ma Ying-jeouin Taipei late last month.Jammeh, making his ninth trip to this diplomatically isolated island republic 100 miles off China’s southern coast, has called Taiwan “one of the best friends Gambia has ever had.”Taiwan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs sent out a press release calling the impoverished West African nation “an important ally” before writing that “the close partnership and brotherly bonds between the two countries remain strong.”Read more from Cain Nunns in The Diplomat..

Pöyry Blacklisted by World Bank

Published on Jul 19, 2012 by Luke Hunt

THE World Bank has placed the Finnish consulting and engineering firm Pöyry on its blacklist of non-responsible vendors. Late in June, the World Bank accused the Finnish consulting powerhouse of “submitting false invoices and providing improper benefits to World Bank Group staff.”The organisation says that Pöyry Management Consulting is ineligible to bid or receive contracts for three years. Pöyry has denied the allegations.Taloussanomat contacted the World Bank and report that the incident occurred in 2009 in the East Asia/Pacific region. They say a World Bank worker, who is no longer with the organisation, was presented with a single gift. The “false invoices” have not been explained.Read more in the Helsinki Times..

Backslide: Burma & Malaysia

Published on Jul 10, 2012 by Luke Hunt

Malaysia and Burma remain poles apart in most aspects of life—religion, ethnicity, and politics—but where they seem more akin in recent times has been in trying to improve relations with the West while introducing much needed reforms at home.Those reforms have been welcomed by the people of both countries and the international community but it remains a difficult process with Malaysia again raising fears of a revival of media oppression and Burma living up to its past with the detention of  political activists.Read more in The Diplomat..