TRIPOLI ― With the creation of a new government, Libya’s leaders should finally be able to focus on organizing the transition from the authoritarian state that they inherited to the more pluralistic one they envisage. But are they really able and willing to achieve that goal?In the United States, the debate on Libya has focused on what steps its government should take next. Senator Robert Menendez argues it “must move quickly to embrace democratic reform,” while international development special

Here’s a trend to watch in the coming year: the rise of new economic powers.China, India and Brazil are in the ascendancy, as the economies of United States, Europe and Japan continue to stagnate.China and India are the two most populous countries in the world, together having about 37 percent of the world’s population.With 780 million workers, China has the world’s largest workforce. India is in second place, with 478 million. Both countries together have about 40 percent of the planet’s workfo

BRUSSELS ― Over the past four years, the European Investment Bank ― the European Union’s house bank ― has loaned 48 billion euros ($62 billion) to energy projects around the world. Indeed, the EIB lends more to the energy sector than to any other, except transport (and its 72 billion euros total loan portfolio in 2010 made it a bigger lender than the World Bank).Investment on this scale can help countries worldwide to make vital progress on reducing greenhouse-gas emissions at a time when politi

The emergency leadership council of the ruling Grand National Party has taken a scalpel to the embattled party. In its inaugural meeting held on Tuesday, the council decided to deprive GNP lawmakers of an important prerogative ― immunity from arrest while the parliament is in session.The council’s spokesman said the decision would become the party’s official policy if its 169 lawmakers endorse it at a general meeting. He said the council wanted to show the electorate that GNP lawmakers were read

More than 30 years ago, Kim Seok-dong, chairman of the Financial Supervisory Commission, tasted the bitterness of business failure. In 1978, he started a leather jumper exporting business after working for a trading company for a year. Kim’s company ran into trouble when the second oil shock hit the nation in 1979. As business soured, he faced funding problems. To keep his company afloat, he went to his bank to get trade financing. But the bank demanded that all his family members, including eve

Christmastime is a season of gratitude. Whether it’s because we reflect upon the birth of the Christ child or the blessings of the past year, the holiday often prompts a sense of appreciation and thankfulness, as well as the tradition of gift-giving.And this year, the season of giving and receiving gifts comes in sharp contrast to a succession of months pervaded with a sense of entitlement.An entitlement mentality ― a sense of being owed something for nothing ― settles in when people interpret w

LUKYANIVSKA PRISON, KYIV ― It has been said that there are no atheists in a foxhole. Here, after my show trial and four and a half months in a cell, I have discovered that there are no atheists in prison, either.When, despite unbearable pain, you are interrogated ― including in your cell ― for dozens of hours without a break, and an authoritarian regime’s entire system of coercion, including its media, is trying to discredit and destroy you once and for all, prayer becomes the only intimate, tru

A silver lining in the dark cloud of the deficit reduction supercommittee’s failure is that it gives Americans another chance to do the right thing to control health care costs. To save money, we must move beyond administrative fiat and put patients first.The problem is illustrated by the “sustainable growth rate” legislation to control physician payments by Medicare. The sustainable growth rate has been repeatedly countermanded by Congress, an issue that might have been addressed by the superco

We are witnessing the decline and fall of the investment-banking profession as we have known it for the past 40 years. The evidence is everywhere. The increasing regulations on Wall Street ― as required by the Dodd-Frank law and still being written by the Federal Reserve, the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Commodities Futures Trading Commission and others agencies in the U.S. and Europe ― will require the remaining companies to increase their capital, curb their risk-taking and reduce t

In cultural commentary about the American economy, one company at a time always seems to be the goat. Everything it does is interpreted as evil. In the 1950s, it was General Motors. GM’s CEO, Charles “Engine Charlie” Wilson, became a national figure of ridicule for telling a congressional committee, “What’s good for General Motors is good for America.” Except that he actually said, “For years I thought that what was good for the country was good for General Motors and vice versa” ― which is quit

The scary decline of relations between the United States and Pakistan ― the world’s most dangerous nuclear-armed country ― is illustrated by the perilous plight of one man.Husain Haqqani was, until recently, the savvy and energetic Pakistani ambassador to Washington, dubbed by Bloomberg “the hardest working man in DC.” His job was thankless: trying to maintain ties between two countries that deeply distrust each other.Pakistan’s military disliked Haqqani because of his long-standing opposition t

Kim Seong-kon in “One exam decides your future” wrote an interesting piece in this paper last Wednesday (Dec. 21). Whilst sympathetic to the view of the writer, there was a hint that creative education was somehow linked to the “foreign” issue and that, yet again, Koreans are having to adapt to the external whims of foreigners. I would like to add a few reflections. On meeting President Obama earlier last month, President Lee in classic Korean style “complained” that the problem with Koreans is

In December 1908, the insurance industry declared war on Christmas. The New York Board of Underwriters issued an announcement to every client of every fire-insurance firm in the city.It read:Your attention is hereby respectfully called to the fact that the introduction about the premises of Christmas green, harvest specimens and other inflammable materials, such as cotton, to represent snow, and the like, and the use of moving picture machines, introduces additional hazard not contemplated by th

When 13 medical, pharmaceutical and medical instruments industry organizations held a joint rally last week to pledge to put an end to the practice of rebates between the medical goods suppliers and doctors, the Korea Medical Association, a powerful organization of doctors, did not take part. The KMA’s excuse was that the declarative action would have little effect and participating in such a move was like admitting that all doctors are corrupt.The body of nearly 100,000 medical doctors was in f

Schools in Korea are in crisis from the elementary to university level. Problems range from costly and prevalent off-school classes and high tuition fees for college students to rows between liberal and conservative educators over “human rights” in school. Classroom violence has worsened and adult society, preoccupied with its own problems, does not know what to do. The suicide of a middle school boy in Daegu last week once again alarmed teachers and parents about the growing evil of bullying in

The pressure is on. Four years ago, I picked Barack Obama to win 353 electoral votes and, twice, I correctly tabbed George W. Bush as a winner, including a 2000 forecast he’d beat Al Gore by four electoral votes. Here is a preview of the road to Nov. 6:January: Texas Rep. Ron Paul edges Mitt Romney in Iowa caucuses, and fast-closing Texas Gov. Rick Perry nips Newt Gingrich for third. Romney rebounds to beat Paul in New Hampshire, but Perry edges former Massachusetts governor in South Carolina, d

NEWPORT BEACH ― A new economic order is taking shape before our eyes, and it is one that includes accelerated convergence between the old Western powers and the emerging world’s major new players. But the forces driving this convergence have little to do with what generations of economists envisaged when they pointed out the inadequacy of the old order; and these forces’ implications may be equally unsettling.For decades, many people lamented the extent to which the West dominated the global eco

Barack Obama probably will have to pull out a familiar card next year: the luck of the draw. In winning the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination, the president defeated political heavyweights, starting with Hillary Clinton. His other triumphs were facilitated by lots of luck. In his 2004 race for a U.S. Senate seat in Illinois, the candidacies of both his chief primary opponent and initial Republican rival collapsed when divorce papers were disclosed during the campaign; one was accused of vi

Rarely in U.S. history has the end of a war been marked with less fanfare than the withdrawal of the last troops from Iraq in time for Christmas. Indeed, you could almost be forgiven for failing to notice it at all, so arbitrary does the timing seem. U.S. interests in Iraq will be no different in the first week of 2012 than they are now. Iraq’s government remains shaky, and the dangers of instability and civil war remain. About 16,000 Americans are still there, too, including an unspecified numb

NEW YORK ― The world’s greatest shortage is not of oil, clean water, or food, but of moral leadership. With a commitment to truth ― scientific, ethical, and personal ― a society can overcome the many crises of poverty, disease, hunger, and instability that confront us. Yet power abhors truth, and battles it relentlessly. So let us pause to express gratitude to Vaclav Havel, who died this month, for enabling a generation to gain the chance to live in truth.Havel was a pivotal leader of the revolu