Liu Tienan, deputy head of the National Development and Reform Commission, China’s top economic planner, is under investigation for suspected “grave violations of discipline,” China’s top anti-graft authority has revealed on its website.The investigation of Liu, who was also director of the powerful National Energy Administration until March, is a fresh sign of the new leadership’s zero-tolerance toward corruption and its vow to hold violators accountable no matter who they are.On Dec. 6, Luo Ch

Racial and class divisions in Malaysia, shown up so vividly in the parliamentary and state elections, will surely hamper the nation’s progress, despite bountiful endowments and the enterprise of its people. Courage to acknowledge that and the political will to make necessary adjustments to policy and governing principles are more likely to bring Malaysia a level of prosperity and social harmony it deserves to have.In all first-past-the-post electoral systems, it is prudent to not just focus on o

“A new tower rises above the New York skyline, al-Qaida is on the path to defeat, and Osama bin Laden is dead.” ― President Barack Obama to the Democratic National Convention, Sept. 6, 2012.Five nights after that speech, scores of attackers struck an ill-secured compound in the Libyan city of Benghazi. By morning they had killed four Americans: security agents Glen Doherty and Tyrone Woods, information officer Sean Smith, and J. Christopher Stevens, Washington’s ambassador to that convulsing nat

Republicans in Congress are so hungry for scalps, they just can’t leave well enough alone. The scandal engulfing the Internal Revenue Service is a story that’s playing to their benefit. Yesterday, after having the weekend to think about it, Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida puffed himself up and called on the president to “demand the IRS commissioner’s resignation, effectively immediately.” Only one problem: The position of IRS commissioner is currently vacant. (Rubio’s spokesman later clarified he wa

It sounds like a Bond villain’s idle fantasy. An enchanted machine that can produce any instrument of criminality you can think of: weapons, money, illicit keys, magical pills. Three-dimensional printers, as it happens, may soon be able to produce all this ― if they aren’t doing so already. We’ve argued that these machines could have significant economic and social benefits. But as with all human creations, they will also have a dark side. The critical thing for government, as it contemplates th

The smile on Kazuo Hirai’s face shows why the yen’s drop below 100-to-the-dollar is as much a curse for Japan as a blessing. The Sony Corp. chief executive officer is beaming because his company has produced its first profit in years. Did the troubled giant that redefined consumer electronics with the transistor radio and then the Walkman dream up a new gadget better than Apple Inc.’s iPhone, iPad or iPod? No. Has Sony raised productivity or halted dangerous infighting between departments? Nope.

NEW DELHI ― The overwhelming victory of the Indian National Congress in elections in the important southern state of Karnataka in early May has shaken up the country’s political scene. India’s troubled ruling party had appeared headed downhill in the build-up to the next general elections, which must be held by May 2014. Now, following its huge win in Karnataka, all bets are off.Karnataka (whose capital, Bangalore, is a symbol of India’s thriving software and business-process-outsourcing industr

Should the government require companies to label food that contains genetically modified organisms? Last November, California voters rejected a ballot initiative that would require such labeling, but bills that would do so were recently introduced in both the U.S. House and Senate. Invoking “the right to know,” a lot of people support those bills. In the abstract, the argument for compulsory labeling seems exceedingly powerful. But there is a risk that a compulsory label for GM food would confus

The United Nations Security Council has made a wise decision to create an ambitious African stabilization mission for Mali. To succeed, however, this mission will need to draw lessons from the other side of the continent, where African peacekeepers have had notable results pacifying Somalia. Their experience suggests how an effective partnership between African nations and external powers, such as the U.S. and European Union, can create the space for promising political solutions. Mali is like S