China has announced some major policy changes. It will drop its “one child policy” adopted in 1979 as a means of controlling the country’s large population. In truth, the policy had never been uniformly enforced, but the change was necessary as China goes through a major demographic shift to a much older population. The slow growth in its population means that there will be too few workers to support a large number of retired persons. China also announced that it was going to end its prison labor camps. These camps have held hundreds of thousands of Chinese citizens without trial. All in all, more than 60 reforms were announced by the Chinese government in Xinhua.
The UN Security Council has failed to delay the trial of Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta and Deputy President William Ruto. Rwanda, Togo and Morocco sponsored the resolution to delay the trial by one year, and they were joined by Russia, China, Azerbaijan and Pakistan. The resolution, however, required nine affirmative votes and all other members of the Council abstained. Curiously, the US abstained from the vote which effectively reinforces the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court. The US, however, has never recognized the authority of the ICC in its own affairs. This is part of the statement released by US UN Ambassador Samantha Power explaining the abstention:
The United States and Kenya have been friends and strong partners for half a century. We value the friendship and will continue working with the government and people of Kenya on issues of shared concern, including security against terror, economic development, environmental protection, the promotion of human rights, and justice. We also continue to recognize the important role that the ICC can play in achieving accountability, and are steadfast in our belief that justice for the innocent victims of the post-election violence in Kenya is essential to lasting peace.
I do not know if this article will be accessible to the readers of the blog. It is a blog post from Professor Stephen Walt who teaches at Harvard University who is unquestionably one of the most astute analysts of world politics today. He is also a self-avowed realist and co-author of a very important book that analyzed the power of the Israel lobby on American foreign policy. Unfortunately, it is posted on Foreign Policy which requires registration. I am hoping that the blog sections of the online version do not require registration (since I subscribe to Foreign Policy I automatically have access to the blog and therefore cannot test whether non-subscribers have access). But, given the discussions we have had in class about the current Iranian negotiations, I thought the Walt post would be very helpful. If you have access to a College computer, Foreign Policy can be accessed automatically. Obviously, I will not ask any questions on the quiz about this article.
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