A Korean wave is sweeping the world. The secretary-general of the United Nations is Korean, the head of the World Bank is a Korean-American. “Gangnam Style,” a song by the Korean rapper Psy, has become the most watched video on YouTube.

Chinese leader Xi Jinping on Tuesday said that promoting relations with Russia is a priority for Chinese diplomacy as he met with a Russian delegation in Beijing.
Xi, general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, told Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev that China will continue to push forward a bilateral comprehensive strategic partnership of coordination.

In 2006, a 5-year-old captive-bred giant panda named Xiang Xiang ("Lucky") was released into the wild — the first of his kind to make that transition. Ten months later, he was dead. Chinese wildlife officials reported at the time that it appeared Xiang Xiang had suffered fatal internal injuries after being attacked by other wild-born male pandas in a battle for food and territory.

Somewhere etched in memories and images of Louis Armstrong being royally greeted by throngs in Cairo and blowing his trumpet to the ear of the sandy sphinx, or of Duke Ellington's regal jazz ambassadorship as he stared down at sitars, American cultural diplomacy found its groove.

Whether you refer to it as a “pivot” or a “rebalance,” strengthened United States engagement in Asia is good news for the Philippines. That was clearly evident in the meeting last June in Washington...But lost in the talk of ongoing diplomatic and defense cooperation between the US and the Philippines is the need for further discussion of how to increase critical business-to-business and people-to-people contacts between the two nations.

The law was the White House’s most public strategy to date to counter Iran’s influence in the Americas, and gives the State Department 180 days to draw up a plan to “address Iran’s growing hostile presence and activity.” The US received prompt criticism from Iran who said the US “still lives in the cold war era and considers Latin America as its back yard.”

The U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs announces that 12 Burmese youth—six boys and six girls—and two coaches will travel to the United States January 7-20.

His spectacular images of the nighttime sky framed by Intermountain West scenery are breathtaking, and soon, photos by Bret Webster of Bountiful will be featured in the U.S. embassy in Tunisia. As part of the ARTS in Embassies program, his photographs are fostering U.S. relations within local communities worldwide.