ISDP Voices

At the Munich Security Conference in February, Wang Yi, China’s highest-ranking diplomat and member of the Politburo, stated that China should not be perceived as a rival but rather as a partner of Europe. The EU, however, designated China a “systemic rival” in 2019. In January this year, Sweden assumed the presidency of the European […]

Eurasia is undergoing a geopolitical Zeitenwende. The Russia–Ukraine war has transformed the continent’s security perspective, bringing its opposite ends together into a strategic tandem. At the same time as longstanding neutral countries Finland and Sweden have decided to join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the transatlantic alliance has extended its reach to the Indo-Pacific, […]

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 was a watershed event in contemporary international politics to the extent that it has divided all international developments into prior and post the Ukrainian war. From the onset of the war itself, many analysts have been debating that the war would sooner or later bring about changes in […]

The Chinese government has been making diplomatic overtures to areas close to the polar regions as an integral part of its maritime strategy. Beijing’s outreach is not only steadily expanding in the Southern Hemisphere but it maintains a low profile by not questioning the Western order in the region, especially the Antarctic Treaty System (ATS). […]

President Ranil Wickremesinghe of Sri Lanka last month postponed the local government elections scheduled for March 9, 2023. “This is the height of absurdity,” explained senior parliamentarian M. A. Sumanthiran. Despite the executive decision to postpone, Sri Lanka’s top court ordered the government to proceed with the delayed local election, overruling President Wickremesinghe, who argued […]

The Indo-Pacific has rapidly become the global geopolitical and geo-economic epicenter, encompassing roughly two-thirds of the world’s population, global GDP, and international maritime trade, as well as some of the world’s most important strategic challenges. By Indo-Pacific, we generally refer to a macro-region stretching from East Africa to West America – thus decentralizing China’s strategic […]

“No partner is closer and more capable than Japan,” gushed NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg during his visit to Japan in early 2023. These words were welcomed in Japan, a country beset by multiple threats – from a potential war with China over Taiwan to an increasingly erratic, nuclear-armed North Korea. It is little surprise […]

On February 2, 2023, the U.S. got access to the four additional bases requested in the Philippines by fully implementing the signed Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA)  in 2014. Though it took time, this agreement gives American forces more extensive access to the region. The agreement states that the U.S. forces will be able to […]

In the event of February 24 marking a year to the Russia-Ukraine War, the People’s Republic of China (PRC), unlike any other country, released a position paper calling for the “Political Settlement of the Ukraine Crisis” suggesting that “dialogue and negotiation are the only viable solution to the Ukraine crisis”. China’s position paper on the […]

Prior to the occurrence of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) was launched at the World Economic Forum (WEF) annual meeting at Davos in January 2017. CEPI was initiated as a “billion-dollar project” in order to develop and prepare necessary vaccines prior to the outbreak of endemics or pandemics. Japan, […]