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US pressure hasn’t changed China’s views on currency – and it is not interested in US efforts to ‘isolate’ Iran
The United States and China seem to have reached an agreement with regard to the exchange rate between their two currencies. The agreement is that the US government will stop yelling about it, and China will do whatever it wants to do, which will probably include some modest rise in the yuan some time in the near future.
This agreement was seen in the statements from both parties during the nuclear summit held in Washington over the past few days. “China rightly sees the issue of currency as a sovereign issue,” said President Obama in response to a question about his meeting with…
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Offensive remarks on Honduras, gratuitous insults in Brazil – Hillary Clinton’s Latin American tour has not been a success
Hillary Clinton’s Latin America tour is turning out to be about as successful as George W Bush’s visit in 2005, when he ended up leaving Argentina a day ahead of schedule just to get the hell out of town. The main difference is that she is not being greeted with protests and riots. For that she can thank the positive media image that her boss, President Obama, has managed to maintain in the region, despite his continuation of his predecessor’s policies.
But she has been even more diplomatically clumsy that Bush, who at least recognised that there were serious problems…
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The goal of Hillary Clinton’s rhetoric seems to be to promote conflict and convince Americans Iran is a threat to their security
In a visit to Qatar and Saudi Arabia this week, Hillary Clinton said that Iran “is moving toward a military dictatorship,” and continued the administration’s campaign for tougher sanctions against that country.
What could America’s top diplomat hope to accomplish with this kind of inflammatory rhetoric? It seems unlikely that the goal was to support human rights in Iran. Because of the United States’ history in Iran and in the region, it tends to give legitimacy to repression. The more that any opposition can be linked to the United States’ actions, words, or…
