CAMBRIDGE – As 2021 drew to a close, Russia had massed troops near its border with Ukraine; China had flown military jets near Taiwan; North Korea was still pursuing its nuclear-weapons program; and Taliban fighters were patrolling the streets of Kabul. Seeing all this, friends asked me: “Whatever happened to …

This paper, in a first, is sharing the picture of a rapist convicted of a heinous crime of  rape of an eight-year-old boy. The media in Bhutan so far have refrained from printing the pictures of even convicted rapists, but this practice has to evolve with the times. Traditionally, media …

NEW YORK – My book, A World in Disarray, was published five years ago this month. The book’s thesis was that the Cold War’s end did not usher in an era of greater stability, security, and peace, as many expected. Instead, what emerged was a world in which conflict was much more …

Bhutan made its first ever debut at the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games this year. Bhutan’s first female para-athlete, Chimi Dema, from Mongar created history by securing a Minimum Qualification Score (MQS) during the 2019 Dubai World Para Athletics Championships. She secured MQS of 4.51m, exceeding the requirement of 4m in …

The Accelerating Mother and Child Health Policy, 1000-Day Plus, was expected to start from August 2021, after its approval by the Cabinet on 6 January with Nu 1.8 billion (bn) allocation for the next five years. The new package is not just for the 6 months of breastfeeding, but it …

With 2021 behind us we now have a very critical year ahead in 2022 on some key fronts. An important task is starting to translate His Majesty’s national call on the 114th National Day into reality on the fronts of service delivery, education, economy, technology and more with the underlying …

With a first snowfall in Bhutan behind us, winter is clearly here and weeks of wintry weather might well lie ahead. Yet, so too arrives the lunar new year this February and Losar this March, and the Year of the (Water) Tiger.  As we now welcome in 2022, who was …

The third local government elections are probably the worst ever conducted by the Election Commission of Bhutan (ECB) till date not only in terms of the delayed results, but also in its shabby treatment of the private media. From the 2018 general elections it was amply clear that a large …

WASHINGTON, DC – Turkey’s economy is in crisis. Inflation is high and rising, economic growth is stalling, foreign-exchange reserves have plummeted, many goods are in short supply or simply unavailable, and low- and middle-income households are increasingly impoverished. With per capita GDP having fallen from $12,600 in 2013 to $8,500 in 2020, Turkey’s …