The State Department's point person on human rights says his office is in a "cat and mouse" game with authoritarian governments that are trying to restrict free speech on the Internet. "We are trying to stay ahead of the curve and to provide technology, training and diplomatic support to allow people to freely express their views," Assistant Secretary of State Michael Posner told a group of reporters at the State Department this week.

The Japan Exchange and Teaching (JET) Program has been around since 1987. This program, the largest component of which places native English speakers in Japan’s junior and senior high schools for year-long tours of duty as Assistant Language Teachers (ALTs), has thousands of alumni from around the world – more than 20,000 from the United States alone.

In a $20m (£12m) remake of the classic American children's programme, the setting for the show has moved from the streets of New York to a lively village in Pakistan with a roadside tea and snacks stall, known as a dhaba...

“We have been doing well on the development front,” the official, Zhao Qizheng, former head of the State Council Information Office, was quoted by China Daily as saying. “Now we need to talk better, to make our messages clearer to the world.”

"Persian Visions: Contemporary Photography from Iran," featuring 58 works of photography and video by 20 Iranian photographers, is one-half of a cultural exchange with a gallery at the University of Minnesota, and already has toured the states extensively, even during times when official U.S. relations with Iran were at their worst.

The education of the girl child has been described as key to National development as the importance of education and the role it plays in the advancement of women cannot be overemphasized..

If anyone was underestimating the spread of these tools it only took the social media-infused revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt a few months later to spell out how wired the world has become and how unpredictable the uses of social media will be. For public diplomacy practitioners it served as a reminder...

These Chinese are not alone. A recent poll shows there are more Americans who believe China will be the dominant power in 20 years than believe the United States will retain that position.