public diplomacy

What should President Barack Obama do next as a U.S. public diplomacy measure vis-à-vis the Arab world? As the regime in Libya crumbles to the cheers of Arab citizens across the region, the Syrian regime is still clinging to power, and even lending a voice to Libya’s fallen leader Muammar Qaddafi, who has been broadcasting defiant messages on a private pan-Arab satellite channel called Al-Oroba, which now shares its broadcasts with Syrian-based pro-regime channel Al-Rai.

So goes one of the fundamental laws of physics. In the face of recent "actions" in the West -- economic crisis and rampant Islamophobia, there is an inexorable "reaction", as the eternal values of Islam continue to manifest themselves.

August 24, 2011

Arriving Monday in Mongolia—where he was the first U.S. Vice-President to visit since Henry Wallace in 1944—Biden received an official gift-horse, a handsome colt... it was hardly a love of archery that drove Biden to make the trip: among other things, his presence was a reminder to undemocratic neighbors that America would frown on any interference with Mongolian democracy.

August 24, 2011

Libya should become an occasion for the exercise of soft power. We should have an active embassy and offer the transitional national council advice on how to forge a new government. We should establish intelligence links with the new authorities and offer military aid. We should be willing to help them institute a new constitution, build political parties, and rewrite its school curriculum.

“And what is more intensive is the cultural diplomacy. There is greater interest from other countries in what we are doing. I did a briefing for 55 consular corps in Scotland this week. That is my job: it’s who we are, where we are, and where we want to be.”

"The government does not trust the Foreign Service, does not understand public diplomacy and is only belatedly awakening to the re-emergence of the Asia-Pacific as the centre of the global political economy," said Copeland, now a fellow at both the University of Toronto's Munk School of Global Affairs and the University of Southern California's Center on Public Diplomacy.

August 24, 2011

Especially, in the matter of the Libyan people's interests, China will actively participate in post-war reconstruction, and provide humanitarian aid to Libya. It will also carry out public diplomacy and enhance China's national image in Libya, all of which are conducive to deepening friendship between the peoples of China and Libya and which are of great significance and far-reaching impact in promoting bilateral ties.

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