For the first time in nearly 20 years, India and Pakistan have announced that they’ve agreed to a ceasefire across their shared border, effective February 26. Joanna Slater of the Washington Post reports from New Delhi that this is the first such announcement between the two Asian neighbors since such sporadic cross-border firings began in…
Secretary of State Antony Blinken, addressing the 47-member United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva February 24, reaffirmed the new Biden administration’s commitment to support human rights efforts throughout the world. It clearly is a core issue in U.S, public diplomacy in the four years ahead. He said the United States “will fully re-engage in…
Will the U.S., Western and industrialized countries with anticipated surpluses of the vaccine against the 21st century’s deadliest disease join to help provide relief for hundreds of millions of COVID-19 victims in Africa, Asia and Latin America? It’s too early to say, but there compelling reasons to do so. Worldwide, there have been more than…
Joe Biden made his first contacts with foreign leaders, among them, Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Mexico’s President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, just three days after the 46th U.S. President’s inauguration on January 20. In Trudeau’s words: “Canada and the United States will continue our partnership as we fight the global Covid-19 pandemic and…
Is it possible that we are on the threshold of an end to the devastating half-dozen years of civil war in Yemen — regarded by some scholars and Middle East watchers as today’s most serious international crisis? Fresh diplomatic initiatives, led so far by the United States, signal an already fast-moving way ahead. On…
So far, the top issue for the new Biden Administration combining foreign and domestic policy is climate change. And it’s no wonder. Ice caps encircling the North and South Poles are receding rapidly. Their melting is causing all oceans globally to rise threatening vulnerable cities in all continents with inundation beginning within a decade or…
The appointment of a new acting chief executive for America’s five taxpayer-funded overseas networks and two senior leaders of the Voice of America is a major achievement of the new Biden administration. At 2 p.m. January 20, Michael Pack, the departing CEO, announced his resignation at President Biden’s request barely two hours after Mr. Biden…
Less than a week before the end of President Trump’s term in office January 20, at least 30 VOA journalists and staff members petitioned for the immediate resignation of its new director Robert R. Reilly, and his recently appointed deputy director Elizabeth Robbins. As the Washington Post reported: “Simmering tensions between journalists and managers at…
January 6, 2021, is a day that will live in infamy, not only in the United States but among tens of millions of friends and allies abroad and millions of Americans here at home. The assault by protestors on the U. S. Capitol is an unprecedented 21st-Century challenge for our nation’s public diplomacy. WHAT WAS…
New Year resolutions that matter. There are millions of these, circulating the globe. Here are some of my favorites — past and present. All are a public diplomacy challenge to the U.S. and its allies, as noted below. 1.The tragedy of COVID-19 continues to be overwhelming, especially in developing countries. New York Times columnist Nicholas…