India's soft power in Afghanistan is omnipresent. Bollywood films, film stars, TV serials and cricket players are a national obsession...New Delhi's role in providing humanitarian support... has also helped build the groundswell of goodwill.

The U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs announced today the 2011 late fall tour schedule for The Rhythm Road: American Music Abroad...Using music and culture as diplomatic tools to bring people together and foster mutual understanding...

The State Department’s summer cultural-exchange program is supposed to be a uniting exercise in public diplomacy...It was quite embarrassing, therefore, when 200 students walked off their factory jobs at a Pennsylvania Hershey plant in August, protesting exploitative working conditions.

Prime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani called on the US Secretary of State Ms Hillary Clinton to give peace a chance... which reflected the sentiments of Pakistani people....Both the sides urged on the importance of the positive messaging in public diplomacy...

Our diplomatic resources will need to be expanded and strengthened. More diplomats, more training, and more synergy with resources outside the government will be needed. Diplomacy will need to include diverse interests. Public diplomacy will be an integral component of diplomacy.

A pair of giant pandas could be on their way to a zoo in the tsunami-affected area of Japan. The idea originated from correspondence between Premier Wen Jiabao and a Japanese girl he met during his visit to Miyagi prefecture in late May following the magnitude-9 quake and ensuing tsunami that struck Japan on March 11.

The editorial seems reflective of a trend...Chinese policymakers, academic strategists, and journalists are stil a lot more obsessed with the United States than the other way around. Yes, there's been some perfunctory rhetoric about "getting tough with China" on the campaign trail, but there's still far more ink spilled over the Middle East in the U.S. national political conversation.

Given rapid economic development of Asian countries and the gradual formation of a new type of cooperation pattern, the United States is afraid to miss the express train of Asia's development and lose its dominance of regional affairs. The U.S. move to "return to Asia" aims to gain more interests from Asia's regional development and cement its dominant position.