The international community has poured billions of dollars into aid, services and protection for civilians in Afghanistan hoping that winning their support would help the fight against insurgents. But new research shows that strategy has an unintended consequence: villages where residents support the international forces are more likely to face attacks from the Taliban-led insurgency.

South Korea will play a bigger role in Asia's investment in sustainable infrastructure through its experience of economic development and constant investment in basic facilities, a senior official at an international institution said. [...] The AIIB was formally launched on Jan. 16, with 57 founding members including South Korea, in a bid to promote economic growth in the Asian region by supporting infrastructure investment.

Following 9/11, there has been a growing recognition in the Pentagon that the "soft power" of overseas aid helps in the fight against extremism. If America is seen to be indifferent to, say, the Ebola crisis or a huge earthquake, it can act as a recruiting sergeant for radical groups. There are some signs that Mr Trump might be persuaded by this argument; that aid and security go hand-in-hand.

[…] With only 50 instructors, small Kenyan charity Ujamaa has trained almost 25,000 Malawian children to fight the sexual abuse that is commonly committed by those they most trust. […] Backed by the United Nations Children's Fund, UNICEF, the Ujamaa network, which started in some of the Kenyan capital Nairobi's toughest slums, now extends to more than 250 schools across seven districts.