In our hyper-connected world, the world has become a geospatial pinball machine, ringing and pinging with security, economic and cultural connections and implications for all of us; and that ball never stops coming around. So it is very much in our interests to engage fully, energetically, and creatively. There is no more urgent region for such U.S. engagement than the Middle East and North Africa.

Vice President Hamid Ansari has announced here that India plans to open a cultural centre in the Vietnamese capital this year to promote interchange of ideas and greater interaction between the people of the two nations. “We wish to bring together the exchange of ideas and culture, with a contemporary face, to our ancient bonds of friendship. To facilitate these ties and promote people-to people contacts, we plan to open the Indian cultural centre in Hanoi this year.”

Students of the Excelsior High School in Kingston yesterday engaged their peers from the Samuel W Shaw School in Calgary, Canada, in a friendly debate on ethical food... The debate took place via a live videoconferencing link connecting students of both schools. The schools are part of an exciting cultural exchange programme with students in Canada as a result of an International School Twinning Initiative (ISTI) spearheaded by the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA).

Bringing students together from across the globe, the 12th edition of International Children's Festival of Performing Arts (ICFPC) was initiated at Ryan International School, Ludhiana, on Tuesday. As a part of the Russian cultural exchange programme, around 18 students from Russia came to India under the theme "One World of Children" and participated in a month-long festival.

It would seem, from this quick thumbnail sketch, that Chinese soft power has been extraordinarily successful in the Philippines as in the rest of Asia. But that’s only part of the story. China, after all, has not restricted itself solely to the exercise of soft power to increase its influence in the region.

Table tennis has helped connect China and the United States since 1971, when the US team's visit to Beijing sparked a thaw in relations. The sport is poised to play a similar role again, as Dubai announced on Monday it will sponsor the Chinese national team as part of an effort to promote exchange and growth between the two nations."This will be the first time the Chinese national table tennis team has cooperated with a foreign partner."

In a ruling that could have dramatic consequences for online news agencies and digital journalists, a judge ruled Tuesday that two news outlets should have asked permission before using a Twitter picture from a photojournalist. According to the court's ruling, Agence France-Press violated the copyright of photojournalist Daniel Morel by taking photos of a 2010 earthquake in Haiti that he tweeted and disseminating them without permission via Getty.

African countries are interested in Turkey after many Turkish projects and investments launched in the continent. Turkey did not limit its activities with political or economic aims but contributed to African countries to develop in the fields of health, education and agriculture. Having spent his carreer mostly in African countries, retired Turkish Ambassador, Numan Hazar told AA that after Ottoman era, Turkey did not really have any dialogue with African countries.