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America, Afghanistan and Pakistan: Kayani's gambit (Jul 29)
America is furious about WikiLeaks’ revelations on the war in Afghanistan. But Pakistan also has much to worry aboutGENERAL ASHFAQ KAYANI’S moment of pleasure was fleeting. Last week the Pakistani government granted him a second three-year term as army chief—something that no elected government in Pakistan had done before. But within days, thanks to a treasure-trove of 75,000 leaked American military reports, the Pakistani army was once again in the international spotlight for its suspected role in helping the Taliban in Afghanistan.The files released by WikiLeaks, a whistle-blowing website, are mostly sparse field reports and intelligence assessments from 2004 to 2009. They detail the grim reality of the war: the hunt to kill insurgent leaders, the death of Afghan civilians by error or callousness, bomb and shooting attacks by insurgents, the unreliability of Afghan forces, the corruption of political leaders and much more. ...

Thailand's state of emergency: Politics as unusual (Jul 29)
A vote in the capital, despite a state of emergencyA PARLIAMENTARY by-election in Bangkok on July 25th was the first test of public opinion since May, when the army put down street protests in which 89 people died. The opposition Pua Thai party made the most of it, picking a jailed “red shirt” leader, Korkaew Pikulthong, as its candidate, and calling for justice for victims of the crackdown. Campaigning from behind bars, he drew a substantial 43% of the votes. And although he was beaten by the candidate of the ruling Democrat Party, the jailbird’s performance shows that the red shirts are not squashed yet.Voting went smoothly but, as the ballots were being counted, a bomb exploded at a bus stop in a central shopping district. Eight people were injured and one died. The explosion was near the site of May’s bloody showdown between security forces and the red shirts. Security officials blamed the attack on “ill-intentioned people”, code for red-shirt militants, who were accused of a se...

Cambodia's war-crimes trial: Scarred, not healed (Jul 29)
The first war-crimes conviction in Cambodia was long overdueSLIGHT, well-kempt in grey trousers and a powder-blue shirt, the man in the dock cut the image of an ageing schoolteacher. In fact he had taught maths in the years before the Khmers Rouges seized power in Cambodia. Then he assumed a far more terrifying role: as commandant of the S-21 detention centre, overseeing the torture of some 14,000 adults and children, before they were carted off to the “killing fields”. On July 26th the ex-teacher, Kaing Guek Eav, became the first Khmer Rouge official to pay for his part in the genocide of 1975-79, when some 2m people died: a UN-backed tribunal convicted him of war crimes and crimes against humanity, and jailed him for 35 years. Comrade Duch, as he is better known, will serve only another 19 years because of time he has already spent behind bars and as compensation for a spell of illegal detention before he got to the tribunal. One of the five judges called his offences “shocking an...

Floods in China: Gushing (Jul 29)
The Three Gorges Dam is tested, but not to breaking pointHUNDREDS killed, hundreds of thousands of homes damaged or destroyed, tens of millions of people suffering. Many parts of China have been enduring the worst floods in years, but it is the flood-prone Yangzi river that is causing most concern. With the downpours has come an unusual sprinkling of doubts about the ability of the colossal Three Gorges Dam to keep the river in check. The dam, completed in 2006, has been praised by officials for limiting the impact of the floodwaters that have rushed from the Yangzi’s upper reaches. Officials say that well before the first flood crest reached the dam on July 11th, the water level in the more than 600-km (370-mile) reservoir behind it had been reduced to accommodate a surge. By July 28th the level in the dam was 158 metres above the sea, well within a 175-metre limit. But the flood season still has several weeks to run. ...

Scandal in Gujarat: Murder most common (Jul 29)
An accusation sheds light on some dirty aspects of Indian politicsIMPUNITY and power are old friends in India’s western state of Gujarat, which is home to over 50m people. In 2002 some 2,000 Muslims were murdered there, in a pogrom carried out with the collusion of police and senior members of the ruling Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). No high-level convictions followed. But the BJP’s knack of eluding justice in the state, which it still rules, may be fading. On July 25th a minister of state, Amit Shah, was arrested in connection with the alleged murder of Sohrabuddin Sheikh, a suspected extortioner. The case, though unrelated to the events of 2002, may prove damaging for Gujarat’s chief minister, Narendra Modi, a talented politician with ambitions to lead his party and country. When Mr Sheikh, a Muslim, and his wife were arrested in 2005 the police claimed that he belonged to a banned terrorist group and had been plotting to kill Mr Modi. Two years on, the state gov...

Film-makers and Cambodia: Enemies of the People (Jul 29)
How a low-budget film helped to catch a Khmer Rouge leaderTHE Khmer Rouge “Brother Number 2”, Nuon Chea, plays with his grandchildren, watches a broadcast of Saddam Hussein’s execution and dreams of Democratic Kampuchea. For years Pol Pot’s right-hand man has had visits from Thet Sambat, a journalist whose parents and brother died in the genocide. The writer wants to learn why, but does not tell his story, hoping that the taciturn ex-leader will volunteer an explanation. He also tracks down Khuon and Suon, low-level cadres who executed villagers, slit stomachs to eat their gall bladders and buried victims in ditches. The edgy and often surreal conversations of these men are shown in “Enemies of the People”, a prize-winning documentary made on a shoestring. It has drawn interest from the tribunal that will try Mr Nuon Chea and three other regime leaders next year, and which has tried to subpoena the footage. ...

Strategic jousting between China and America: Testing the waters (Jul 29)
Tensions rise over efforts to create a new Chinese lakeON THE face of things, North Korea was supposed to quiver at the presence of a powerful American aircraft-carrier, the USS George Washington, at the head of a fleet of American and South Korean warships off the south-east coast of the Korean peninsula this week. The vessels fired artillery shells and lobbed anti-submarine bombs into the wine-dark sea. This was no idle show of force, but an act of intimidation aimed at deterring North Korea, which South Korea and the United States blame for the sinking in March of a South Korean corvette, the Cheonan.But more subtly, it was also a shot across China’s bows. China refuses to condemn North Korea over the Cheonan sinking, to the irritation of America and others, while describing the exercises as unwarranted warmongering. America and China have shown growing signs of friction over their competing security presence around the trade-clogged shores of Asia. ...

Australia's election: Abbott's angst (Jul 29)
The opposition faces a hard slogIN HIS campaign for the general election on August 21st, Tony Abbott, the opposition leader, has run into a problem with women. Julia Gillard, the prime minister, easily outpolls him as a leader. One recent survey showed female voters favour Labor by a mighty 16 points, double the lead for all voters. And now Mr Abbott’s frustrated colleagues seem to be trying the “gender card”: highlighting Ms Gillard’s status as an unmarried, childless woman (and an atheist, to boot). The idea is to appeal to conservatives in the populous states of New South Wales and Queensland, but it will inevitably drive yet more women away.A year ago, few would have given Mr Abbott much hope of leading the Liberal Party, the main partner in the conservative-coalition opposition. As an ambitious health minister under John Howard, Mr Abbott antagonised some women when he tried (and failed) to ban access to a drug allowing abortion without surgery. Critics pointed to his past as a...

Banyan: Leaving Asia's shade (Jul 22)
Asia does exist. And this columnist greatly regrets his going from itFIFTEEN months after we launched our column on Asia, the current Banyan is moving on. At the launch, readers and colleagues chipped in with a dire prediction. Banyan would find Asia had little in common with itself, a mere congeries of nations and occasional failed states. However defined, Asia was a geographical accident, a Western construct. Banyan himself, readers charged, entertained the fantasies of a fevered colonial mind.Yet after plenty of roaming, the prediction has failed to come true. The case for treating Asia as a shared space, falling under a columnist’s purview, is only reinforced. But let’s be blunt: no serious project for integration is close to existing. It is inconceivable that South Korea or the Philippines would have cheered, say, Bangladesh in the World Cup, as most of Africa roared for Ghana. ...

Corruption in Taiwan: Confirming the worst suspicions (Jul 22)
The arrest of three senior judges sparks renewed debate over corruptionRUMOURS of corruption among the judiciary have long flourished in Taiwan. Yet the news on July 14th that three high-court judges and a prosecutor had been detained amid allegations that they took bribes to fix the outcome of a high-profile case, has brought public outrage to boiling point. On July 18th Taiwan’s highest-level judicial official, Lai In-jaw, who is in charge of the island’s supreme and lower courts chose to resign because of the outcry over the case. The government is hastily promising reforms.The case is Taiwan’s biggest judicial-corruption scandal in over a decade. It involves Ho Chih-hui, an ex-lawmaker with the ruling Kuomintang (now expelled from the party), who was convicted in 2006 by a lower court for taking kickbacks over the building of a science park. He was given a 19-year sentence. Following that, according to Taipei District Court documents, contacts of Mr Ho tried to bribe judges sitt...