Engaging in cultural exchange and trade with North Korea would be more productive than the US's existing failed policy. [...] A good, very small start toward for the long-term goal of undermining the regime rather than pursuing a short-term goal of trying to talk them off nuclear weapons would be to make cultural exchanges between the two countries.

South Korea’s capital Seoul is bustling with a huge group of Chinese tourists, reaching almost 10,000 people, on their company-sponsored incentive trip as a reward for great performance. On Friday evening, about 4,000 Chinese visitors enjoyed Korea’s signature herbal chicken soup, party after sightseeing and shopping in and out of Seoul. 

Valcourt and Attis are touring the United States as part of Lakou Mizik, an accomplished roots-revival collective that traces its origins in part to that moment. The nine-member band [...] released its debut album, Wa Di Yo, on the U.S. global-music label Cumbancha — and on May 6 the band plays Brooklyn's BRIC House as a highlight of Selebrasyon, a two-month arts biennial in New York that kicked off its second edition last weekend.

[T]he Voice of Libyan Women (VLW), a women’s rights organization focused on peace and security, the tools I use to drive change and create peace are rooted in diplomacy, cooperation, culture, and history. In other words, what some people call “soft power.”

When organizers announced Havana’s Musicabana festival at the beginning of this year, they called it an event that would “usher in a new era of cultural diplomacy” between Cuba and the United States, “offering a once-in-a-lifetime experience with an extraordinary multi-genre bill boasting over 25 artists, bands and global DJs.” [...] So what happened? Festival organizer Fabien Pisani blames bureaucracy.

There is a growing anxiety among some observers in the EU that a disinformation strategy pursued by the Russian government since the Ukraine crisis might fragment and disintegrate the Union. It is claimed that Russia’s use of targeted disinformation is seeking to influence public opinion within the member states with the aim of paralysing decision-making processes at the EU level.