Even as some leaders exploit the COVID-19 pandemic, their inability to deal with popular suffering will act against the myth that they and their regimes are impregnable, the Economist observes…. Read more »
The coronavirus is leading Iranians to question the relationship between state and religion, putting the theocratic state in “an unusual and awkward position“, observers suggest. The Islamic Republic had to… Read more »
Former State Policy Planning Director Steve Krasner (someone we have worked with and respect) has written a piece in Foreign Affairs (“Learning to Live with Despots”) that advocates realism as the… Read more »
The Algerian government has begun investigating the funding of media organizations and news sources that it claims are using foreign funding to promote anti-government and anti-reform content. The authorities have… Read more »
United States intelligence agencies have assessed that Chinese operatives helped push disinformation about #Covid-19 messages across platforms, according to six American officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to… Read more »
China, Iran and Russia are using the coronavirus crisis to launch a propaganda and disinformation onslaught against the United States, the State Department warns in a new analysis, POLITICO’s Betsy… Read more »
As the world has been engulfed by the coronavirus pandemic, the authorities in Hong Kong have arrested prominent pro-democracy figures in politics, civil society and the media, waging a broad… Read more »
In many countries, restrictive laws already had been squeezing civil society before the Covid-19 crisis hit. The pandemic provides a convenient cover for governments to further tilt the balance of power… Read more »
The remote northern Russian region of Komi is a coronavirus petri dish for the horrors lying in wait for the world’s largest country. Amid growing evidence that the pathogen had… Read more »
Washington still has the power to prevent Beijing and Moscow from dominating their regions, so long as it rejects advice to cut loose its vulnerable frontline allies. A tougher, more… Read more »
