President Donald Trump’s proposed deep cuts to humanitarian aid go against the global development goals the United States committed to in 2015, the European Union’s international development chief warned Friday. “Any withdrawal or cut in the development assistance would actually go contrary to the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals agenda,” 

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson arrives in Asia on Wednesday for his first foreign trip with almost no fanfare. He’s travelling on a “small plane” with “a modest footprint,” says a spokesman. He’s bringing along just one reporter and will hold only one brief press conference during his planned stops in Japan, South Korea and China. It’s a far cry from the splash Hillary Clinton made in February 2009 on her first trip abroad as secretary of state, following a similar itinerary through Asia. 

A closer look at this situation, which still stands today, shows a lack of Moroccan public relations campaigns in the region, a meager performance by the Moroccan embassy in Mexico City and a poor understanding of the foreign affairs “machineries” in Latin America. It did not take me long to realize, with the help of a Mexican PRI Senator [...] that the Polisario has indeed a diplomatic “machinery” in Central and South America.

The UAE has more open communication with its citizens than people abroad realise, acording to a senior adviser at the Emirates Diplomatic Academy. Tom Fletcher, former British ambassador to Lebanon, said there was a perception in the West that the region was a more "closed world". [...] He said social media had proven efficient in terms of crisis management because "you can move the dial more quickly".

The intermediate outcomes of the policy are the strengthening of the institutional and legislative environment, and providing a framework of cooperation among State and non-State actors for sustainability of the poverty reduction efforts. The policy and programme aim to eradicate extreme poverty by 2022 and reduce the national prevalence of poverty to less than 10 per cent by 2030.

Sakakibara stressed the importance of the Kingdom’s economic role for Japan and the keenness of the Japanese business sector toward the achievement of the strategic economic and developmental objectives of the Saudi-Japanese Vision 2030 that aims to bolster bilateral cooperation.

Ankara and Moscow are doing a diplomatic two step together. Conspicuously left out in the cold in this dancing duo, are two major power blocks which traditionally Turkey considers vital to its security needs: The United States and the European Union. The meetings between the Russian President Putin and his Turkish counterpart indicates a willingness on both sides to further consolidate economic, diplomatic and most importantly, and no doubt, also military ties.

In today’s increasingly uncertain world, powerful nations are more likely to use think tanks than military tanks to crush their enemies and shape policy. Thinks tanks are increasingly becoming what one author rightly called "masters of the universe". In geopolitical terms, policy institutes are indicators of soft power capacity of nations. [...] To be sure, the influence of think tanks in Africa is not new.