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Beijing Versus Washington: The New Economics of Iran’s Sanctions War
China is buying ninety percent of Iran's oil exports, settling transactions in renminbi, and hiding the rest beneath layers of shell companies. This is...
Moscow Just Named Its Price. Nobody Can Pay It
An Accountant in Asheville
On 31 August, in Asheville, North Carolina, Anton Siluanov sat down at a G20 finance ministers' meeting for the first time...
Military Ambitions Challenge Paracel Islands Sovereignty
The eerie silence of the ocean
When people think of the South China Sea, they usually picture deep blue waters, peaceful waves over beautiful coral...
How Two EU Vetoes Are Quietly Handing Russia a Win in the Sanctions War
TODAY'S NUMBERS
$4,334 (gold, per ounce, near record) · $200bn (Russian reserves frozen at Euroclear) · Sept. 15 (deadline for the EU's Russia sanctions list...
Raymond Aron’s Warning for Northeast Asia: Close the Window of Opportunity
Raymond Aron died in 1983, long before China emerged as the US’ principal strategic competitor, North Korea acquired nuclear weapons that could threaten the...
The Benefits of ‘Expo’ Diplomacy
Expo isn't usually seen as a platform for international diplomacy. Conceived as a world's fair to showcase the achievements of nations, it has traditionally...
Venezuela’s Oil Deal Has a Guyana Problem — and an OPEC One
The August 28th oil deal's least-noticed effects run through two files nobody has read together: it gives Washington, for the first time, a direct...
Iran, Oil and a Hawkish Fed: Why the Dollar Is Winning the Week and Losing the Decade
TODAY'S NUMBERS 99.73 Dollar Index (DXY) · 4.81% US 10-year Treasury yield · $4,304 Gold, per ounce All three are rising together — the...
Regime Change, Itemized: Inside the Venezuela Oil Deal
The 65-billion-barrel Venezuela oil deal is not proof that regime change was sold with a resource contract attached as its explicit precondition — the...
Six Months, Five Mediators: The Diplomacy of the Iran War
On 28 August, six months to the day after American and Israeli aircraft opened the war on Iran, Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi posted that...