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Glad to be gay (but a bit shy about it) (03 July 06:32) |
| Where Victorian values and repressive laws still holdTHERE were no half-naked dancers, pink floats, or sailor boys locked in clinches; but India's gay-pride parade was ground-breaking enough... |
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The war president (03 July 06:32) |
| Sri Lanka's army chief says the government has won its 25-year war against the Tamil Tigers. This is not trueMAHINDA RAJAPAKSE, Sri Lanka's president, shakes out his white outfit and spread... |
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Land and blood (03 July 06:32) |
| The independence campaign flares up in a row about land for Hindu pilgrimsFIRE crackers and scattered cheering dotted the night on July 2nd in Srinagar, as Kashmiris celebrated a rare victor... |
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Tough love (03 July 06:32) |
| This time "white paternalism" might actually be doing some goodWHEN Sue Gordon was four, in the late 1940s, the authorities took her from her aboriginal community in outback Western Australi... |
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Steppe change (03 July 06:32) |
| An election turns uglyIN THE 18 years since the nation threw off Soviet domination and embraced democracy, Mongolian politics have been vibrant and even chaotic; but never violent. That sudd... |
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Here we go again (03 July 06:32) |
| Allegations against Anwar Ibrahim may backfire on the governmentIN FEW countries does the word "sodomy" evoke a sense of political deja vu. Malaysia is one. On June 28th a male volunteer wor... |
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A movable feast (03 July 06:32) |
| A collision over cab collusionTHEY are called "pub taxis". These fancy cabs drive Japanese bureaucrats home in the evening, provide a few beers, snacks and sometimes a discreet kickback (usu... |
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Maoists prepare for power (28 June 08:38) |
| Nepal's ageing prime minister stands aside. A leading Maoist will probably replace himNEPAL'S Maoists, surprise victors of a general election in May, are now claiming their spoils. On Thursd... |
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Still a prison (26 June 06:54) |
| Under Turkmenbashi?s shadowWHEN Saparmurat Niyazov, Turkmenbashi or father of all the Turkmen, died of heart failure in December 2006, there was guarded optimism that better days might lie a... |
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A game of chicken (26 June 06:54) |
| The government?s caution arouses suspicions about what it knowsALMOST as long as it has had people, Hong Kong has had booths selling squawking live chickens. They are treasured by locals who... |
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Manmohan Singh?s burning ambition (26 June 06:54) |
| To salvage an important policy, the prime minister allegedly gets tough with his government; then goes weak againIN FOUR years as India?s prime minister, Manmohan Singh has come to resemble ... |
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Those in peril (26 June 06:54) |
| Not for the first time, navigating the archipelago by ferry proves deadlyTHE shipping industry in the Philippines put another big blot on its abysmal safety record when the ferry Princess of... |
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Going bang (26 June 06:54) |
| Finding the truth in the debrisAS NORTH KOREAN spectaculars go, the promise to blow up the cooling tower of the Yongbyon nuclear reactor, the source of plutonium for Kim Jong Il?s nuclear ar... |
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G?day Asia (26 June 06:54) |
| Not yet mates with its neighboursKEVIN RUDD, Australia?s prime minister, wants to make Australia the ?most Asia-literate country in the collective West?. But many countries in Asia think Asi... |
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Limbering up for the games (19 June 06:18) |
| The security forces rehearse their exercise routinePETS, prostitutes and prospective political protesters should consider themselves forewarned. The Chinese authorities, doggedly determined ... |
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Crony charity (19 June 06:18) |
| Big business to the rescue?BUSINESSES in Myanmar are not famous for their public-spiritedness. But since last month's cyclone, several well-known companies have helped the relief effort. The... |
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Two into one won't go (19 June 06:18) |
| The once-royal army bristles at enlisting its former insurgent foes ON A sun-baked plain four hours' drive south of Kathmandu, the capital, a platoon of Maoist fighters in jungle fatigues is... |
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Still in the fight (19 June 06:18) |
| A good week in the war for the Taliban's propaganda machineEVEN NATO officials gave grudging respect to the audacity of the Taliban raid that sprang the entire population of the main prison ... |
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Profit over patriotism (19 June 06:18) |
| A new geographical discovery in Asia: a ?sea of peace and co-operation?THE simmering dispute between China and Japan over the East China Sea has long been high on the list of possible region... |
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No quick fixes (19 June 06:18) |
| Even a vaunted ?poppy-free? province may not stay that way for longSURROUNDED by his pyramids of fruit and vegetables, Gul Khaliq is a cheerful man. ?Thanks to God we have customers, we have... |
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Strait talking again (12 June 06:39) |
| Picking up where they left off in 1999THE previous attempt by China and Taiwan to end their decades of official acrimony ended in a mutual huff. But now they are talking to each other again ... |
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The cat got your mother tongue? (12 June 06:39) |
| The Brits make a linguistic comebackIT WAS an admission of cultural defeat; but then Hong Kong is nothing if not pragmatic about such things. On June 6th its education minister, Michael Suen... |
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Why Grandpa Wen has to care (12 June 06:39) |
| Despite not having to face elections, China's Communist Party wants to be liked. Nothing wrong with that: but populism does bring some dangersHE SCRAMBLES through earthquake debris, he weeps... |
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Yasuo Fukuda's Lazarus moment (12 June 06:39) |
| A grey man tries to show his gumptionIT HAS, says the ruling coalition's exhausted parliamentary chief, Tadamori Oshima, been a bruising battle. And hardly beautiful: the six-month session o... |
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Stopping the rot (12 June 06:39) |
| Just like the bad old daysBRIGHTLY painted Tata lorries, laden with sacks of onions, wait in the noon heat at the Wagah border post between India and Pakistan. Once past customs, the onions ... |
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Capital idea for a present (12 June 06:39) |
| Aw shucks, you shouldn't have...I couldn't possibly acceptWHAT do you give a man who has everything, or at least the seemingly permanent presidency of a big Central Asian republic? You renam... |
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Ill met by candlelight (12 June 06:39) |
| Ministerial resignations may not be enough to save the presidentTHE huge candlelit demonstration in Seoul on the evening of Tuesday June 10th was a sight to behold. Some 700,000 protesters w... |
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Friendless fire (12 June 06:39) |
| An alliance under strainMANY Americans fondly believe it is only diplomatic tact that restrains them from surgical strikes against their enemies in Pakistan to prosecute the ?war on terror?.... |
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Into the wide blue yonder (05 June 07:30) |
| Asia's main powers are building up their navies. Is this the start of an arms race? IN THE 15th century China possessed a mighty navy of ?treasure fleets?. They sailed as far as Africa and t... |
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A month of misery (05 June 07:30) |
| The junta is still thwarting efforts to help its desperate peopleWHEN the United Nations' secretary-general, Ban Ki-moon, met Myanmar's reclusive leader, General Than Shwe, on May 23rd, he s... |
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Summer of discontent (05 June 07:30) |
| President Lee Myung-bak's first 100 days have not gone according to planTHERE was little to celebrate as South Korea's president, Lee Myung-bak, marked his hundredth day in office this week.... |
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Thou shalt have no other (05 June 07:30) |
| It is no longer enough simply to praise ChinaBORN in what was then a colonial outpost, Gregory So Kam-leung has led a life typical of many in Hong Kong: higher education and early career in ... |
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Going, maybe (05 June 07:30) |
| Pervez Musharraf may be on his way out. But he is taking his timeMANY Pakistanis think that Pervez Musharraf's days as their president are numbered. They may be right. On June 4th a senior a... |
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Looking for an exit (05 June 07:30) |
| Like so many before it, the army finds that coming in is easier than going outTHE two big political parties in Bangladesh are loth to accept what lawyers say is now only months away: the con... |
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Sentence first, verdict afterwards (29 May 07:11) |
| India's anti-Maoist laws become an international embarrassmentHOTEL MAHENDRA, in the capital of the Indian state of Chhattisgarh, seems an unlikely spot from which to hatch a plot against th... |
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Protests and coup rumours return (29 May 07:11) |
| Thailand's squabbling elites seem intent on ruining the countryWHEN an elected government took office in January, after 16 months of military rule, Thailand looked as if it might be returnin... |
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Goodbye to all that (29 May 07:11) |
| The abolition of the monarchy may be the easy part for Nepal's governmentAT 6.15pm the fountains were switched on. The water danced. The white-clad military band stood to attention. And wait... |
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Help with a bow (29 May 07:11) |
| An unexpected bringer of relief in Myanmar and ChinaTHE natural disasters that recently befell Myanmar and China have tested the willingness of both stricken countries to let in foreign help... |
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Give us your huddled masses, mate (29 May 07:11) |
| Where immigration is still boomingLAST time Australia's airlines turned to other countries to recruit large numbers of pilots, the year was 1989 and they were trying to break an unprecedente... |
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How the other 0.0000001% live (29 May 07:11) |
| The hermit kingdom's elite spend, spend, spendEVERY developing country worth its salt has a bustling middle class that is transforming the country and thrilling the markets. So does Stalinis... |
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A modest opening (22 May 06:22) |
| Foreign pressure on the junta is only partly successfulTHE millions of victims of cyclone Nargis have now endured three weeks of misery while the military regime that runs Myanmar has dragge... |
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Lost momentum (22 May 06:22) |
| Talks resume, but get nowhere WHEN Pranab Mukherjee, India's foreign minister, met Pakistan's leaders this week he may well have been wondering who was in charge. It was the first high-level... |
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Shooting the messenger (22 May 06:22) |
| The press fights back as two graft-busting reporters are arrestedTHE leaders of Vietnam's Communist Party say they are conducting a ?no holds barred? crackdown on corruption in public life. ... |
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Strait is the gate (22 May 06:22) |
| Ma sets out his stall. China's buying, and, for now, so are Taiwan's people WHEN Taiwan's new president, Ma Ying-jeou, made his inaugural speech on May 20th, he was listened to closely not j... |
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Comrades in arms (22 May 06:22) |
| Local elections in India's biggest Communist state are as bloody as everTO THE rattle of gunfire, the Indian state of West Bengal completed local elections in traditional fashion on May 20th... |
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Not yet a dream; no longer a nightmare (22 May 06:22) |
| A boom in satire marks a decade of sturdy democracyAMIEN RAIS, a leader of the mass protest movement that brought down the authoritarian Suharto regime ten years ago this week, is being inte... |
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China helps itself (22 May 06:22) |
| The government's relief effort is impressive; even more inspiring is what ordinary people are doing to fill the gapsSOME 200 survivors of China's deadliest earthquake in more than 30 years l... |
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Correction: Vietnam (15 May 06:38) |
| A couple of errors crept into our special report on Vietnam (April 26th). The new Intel facility is being built outside Ho Chi Minh City, not Hanoi; and Vinamotor plans to expand to the Domi... |
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Blood in the Pink City (15 May 06:38) |
| Terrorists strike one of India's tourist capitalsBICYCLES carry some extraordinary loads in India?bulging sacks of rice, grain, even coal. But the humble push-bike is earning a reputation as... |
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The coalition collapses (15 May 06:38) |
| And a dangerous game beginsTHE spectre of instability haunting Pakistan will not go away. On May 13th the fledgling governing coalition of the Pakistan People's Party (PPP) led by Asif Zarda... |
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