This year, the 47th Munich Security Conference included for the first time a special session on cybersecurity. “This may be the first time,” the president of a small European noted to the high-powered assembly, more accustomed to dealing with armies and alliances than with worms and denial-of-service attacks, “but it will not be the last.”

In his annual State of the Union address, delivered in Washington DC last month, US President Barack Obama spoke strongly about the need to promote science-based technologies to "protect our planet, and create countless new jobs for our people". His words have significance not only for the United States, but also for the Arab world.

After weeks of diplomatic wavering on the tumult in the Arab world, President Nicolas Sarkozy is scrambling to signal to the world that France is back on track, defending core human values and treading with a sure foot in the changed Middle East.

To make an impact, small-scale renewable energy systems must fit social expectations and cultural norms, argues Benjamin K. Sovacool.

The international community moved to isolate Libya further on Wednesday, with France pressing for European Union sanctions and Peru severing relations against Moammar Gadhafi's government after the U.N. Security Council condemned his crackdown on government protesters.

Half of Australians harbour anti-Muslim sentiments and a quarter are anti-Semitic, according to the biggest survey ever done on racism in this country. One in three also admit some level of racist feelings against indigenous people, reported the Herald Sun.

"New media and old media converge to become now media." That maxim, so persuasively articulated by 21st century public diplomacy guru Matt Armstrong, has now become real in a Voice of America Persian language television program called Parazit.

Where there is an absence of international political leadership, civil society should step in to fill the gap, providing the energy and vision needed to move the world in a new and better direction. I believe that we need a paradigm shift, a recognition that the essence of leadership is found in ordinary individuals...