Griffith Asia Quarterly

This paper addresses the issue of China's rise in the Middle East through the prism of the Uyghur and Xinjiang issues. Given the Middle East's contemporary and vociferous denunciations of the perceived 'persecution' of Muslims throughout the globe, we would expect a harsh reaction to China's ongoing maltreatment of its Muslims in general, and the Uyghur, in particular, primarily from the centre of global Islam. This paper argues however that this has not been the case, particularly at the official level, where Middle Eastern government's have been constrained in their response to China's repression of the Uyghur by a number of factors, including China's growing strategic and economic weight in the region and their own authoritarian political practices

This commentary discusses the historical and contemporary conditions, underlying causes and future trajectories of the Uyghur conflict in the XUAR, China, and deals with issues of ethnicity, identity, religion, and nationalism in the context of the challenges within the region. It shows the asymmetrical historical development of the conflict and how its more contemporary conditions in fact exacerbate rather than assuage the Uyghur conflict in the XUAR. This paper, therefore, seeks to show that the underlying cause of the conflict and Uyghur 'separatist' activity in China are not necessarily a simple one-sided story of terrorist activity or religious extremism, but the result of a distinct power dynamic that perpetually favours the Chinese government in practice and policy, thereby encroaching any legitimate claims Uyghur's may have to form an independent and fully autonomous nation-state on their own terms.

While the People's Republic of China (PRC) has worked to expand cultural and economic ties throughout it's near abroad and beyond in the last decade with great alacrity, the same cannot be said for its relationship with neighbouring Afghanistan. This paper will explore the history and nature of the Sino-Afghan relationship with an emphasis on the post-9/11 years. It will offer some reasons why the relationship is not as well established as with other countries in the Eurasian region and beyond, and it will explain how the relationship has developed in the last decade. Finally, it will make some suggestions as to what the future of this relationship might hold after the final withdrawal of NATO/ISAF-Afghanistan troops in light of China's often conflicting concerns about and goals in Afghanistan.

Pakistan and China friendship, described by the leadership of both countries as higher than mountains, deeper than oceans and sweeter than honey is a unique case in the international system. The relationship is based on the geostrategic and geo-economic calculations. An important contributing factor in strengthening the relation would be how both countries perceive each other. Pakistan needs to understand the mindset of rising China, the compulsion and limitation of the relationship. However, people-to-people contact is required between the two countries. At present, the relationship is mostly at the state-to-state level. In recent years, the role of media has been enhanced. Scholars, analysts, students, youth visit both countries reflecting the future prospect of relationship.Scant scholarly attention has been devoted to how Pakistani media, elite or general public perceive China's ascendancy The present research paper seeks to define opinion and response of Pakistani views on the core opportunities and challenges posed by China's growing power for them. It ends with a discussion of the possible scenarios of future Sino-Pak relations.

This article argues that it is the national imperative of 'social stability' and not the yearning to establish a socialist version of the 'rule of law', that has been the main catalyst for reforms to the system of law and justice in China. The author argues that some of the current instability has been triggered by the Central Party's own economic policies, which has forced the local governments to become economically self-reliant. Consequently, the local governments have allowed the private and state-owned industries to plunder farming land and residential areas, leading to the dispossession of land by local owners. In the wake of widespread civic protests in the 2000s, the courts often acquiesced to local elites rather than redress citizens' grievances, which would necessitate reforms in the justice system for achieving social order and stability. The article recommends that to facilitate harmonious social progress and stability in China the system as a whole needs to address the engrained deficiencies in the administration of justice.

This paper scrutinizes India's outmoded laws governing sexual offences, how they impact on women and how they deny access to justice for members of vulnerable groups in society. The authors posit that public concern over a perceived 'epidemic' of sexual violence ignores the prevalence (and immunities) granted to sexual violence that occurs within the family. The authors argue that the marital rape immunity in the Indian Penal Code (IPC), which is one of the few codes in modern democratic systems that accords males a right to rape wives with impunity, preserving an outdated view of gender relations and female sexuality that denies some women the right to denial based on marital status. The essay's comparative account reveals that Indian criminal law is seriously 'out of step' with legal developments in the UK, Australia and elsewhere. For instance, denying marital immunity to rape of child bride (under 15 years of age) and in cases, where a court has issued a judicial separation offers cold comfort to the majority of women whose husbands may still claim a legal privilege to rape. The development of rape laws in India since the 1980s, the authors conclude shows that reform invariably follows from crisis, such as the 2012 brutal rape of a physiotherapy student in New Delhi. Bronitt and Misra note that crisis-drive reforms tend to highlight the community concerns about leniency of punishment, rather than providing better laws, procedures and tools for investigation and supporting victim. The authors recommend that public debate in India must be shifted away from viewing sexual offences as crimes against public morality, decency or modesty. Instead, sexual offences reform must be viewed through a human rights prism, which is consistent with India's international obligations, seeking to eliminate both gender and sexuality-based violence and discrimination.

In the large, overcrowded, out-dated and under-funded prisons of the Philippines, the essential task of maintaining prison order is complex and often problematic. To carry out this crucial (albeit usually elusive) task, prison administrators are forced not only to compromise organisational integrity, but also to relinquish basic aspects of their management function to prison gang leaders. Due to scarce resources and high levels of corruption, prison administrators are also unable to adequately provide security and protection to inmates. It is therefore common practice for Philippine prisons to operate under a system of shared governance. In this type of arrangement, prison gang leaders help to maintain internal control and safeguard inmates as best they can. Even though prison stability is fragile, gang leaders help prison guards restore order quickly once disorder occurs. Based on the author's personal observations over a three-year period, as well as his personal interactions with prison gang leaders and prison officials, this paper provides insight into the compromises prison administrators take to gain inmate compliance in New Bilibid Prison (NBP) - the largest maximum security facility in the Philippines and one of the largest in the world.

In the Asia-Pacific region, China has emerged as the largest performer in many critical indices second only to the United States. Today China has become the second largest economy in the world, displacing Japan in 2010. Its gross domestic product of over $10 trillion is next only to the United States GDP of about $17 trillion. China also is next only to the US in terms of defence budget allocation and in 2014, China stated that it will spend an officially estimated figure of $132 billion. China is also the largest exporting country, displacing Germany in this role a few years ago. However, even though China has a mutually beneficial relationship with many Asia-Pacific countries, it is also involved in sovereignty and territorial disputes with Japan on Senkaku Islands, with Vietnam, Philippines and others on South China Sea islands, with India on the borders and the like. China claims Taiwan as well. As a part of its increasing profile in the Asia-Pacific region, it had unveiled several plans recently, including the 'two-ocean strategy', viz., the Pacific and the Indian Oceans. As the US President Obama has announced, in his first term, a 'rebalancing' strategy towards the Asia-Pacific region, China's role in the Asia-Pacific is being watched carefully by the international community.

This article outlines police cooperation strategies that have developed to fight organized crime in both the EU and Greater China. It explores the broadly similar organized crime problems faced within both systems while highlighting some of the major challenges to each. Using a socio-legal approach it compares the informal and formal cooperation mechanisms that have been established to address cross-border organized crime issues. The article uses the extensive literature analyzing the EU context as a framework for assessing the cooperation methods used within Greater China. Finally it uses this analysis to assess the police cooperation measures in place and explains what we can learn about the politics, law and culture of each region from this cooperation. The author contends that while police cooperation in Greater China is less formalized than that of the EU, significant informal cooperation exists which appears similar to how police cooperation started to develop within Europe half a century ago.

The post-cold war international strategic landscape is constantly evolving and there is no consensus on the nature as well as nomenclature of the emerging global order. However, a new concept of 'Asian Century' has gained currency with the simultaneous rise of China and India. Out of these two countries, China's sustained economic growth and its assertive power projection in its Asiatic neighbourhood have forced the US over the last few decades to pivot away from the Euro-Atlantic realm and 'rebalance' its forces in the 'Indo-Pacific' theatre, combining both Indian and Pacific Oceans. US policymakers have introduced yet another concept of 'America's Pacific Century' to signify long-term US pivot to the region. The paper seeks to isolate the compulsions behind shift in US policy as well as the responses from countries in the region, with special focus on India, and to assess its sustainability. The paper argues that given the interconnectedness of the globalized world today, it is far from certain whether Indo-Pacific will remain the only important theatre, as it was evident in the case of Russian assertion in Ukraine recently. Such events may compel the US and its allies and/or partners to constantly revise their policies towards the region. Moreover, in view of the complexity of inter-state engagements in the region - including the instance of US-China interdependence - regional countries may seek simultaneous engagement with the US and China in military and economic spheres respectively and hope that increased US strategic attention, together with China's compelling economic interests would ensure regional peace and stability. Therefore, rather than seeking 'alliances', the US should focus more on quality partnerships in the region to shape a truly pacific century.

Recent events in Ukraine have once more prompted debates about Russia's changing role and place in contemporary international relations. The imposition of sanctions on Moscow by the United States, EU and some Asian states, signifies a crisis in Russia's relations with the West. In this context Moscow's intensifying strategic dialogue with Beijing takes on greater significance. This paper argues that the close Sino-Russian security and defence cooperation transforms Eurasia's security environment with a possible impact on the Indo-Pacific geo-strategic situation. More broadly, a closer alignment between China and Russia reflects pragmatic approaches of foreign policy agendas of Moscow and Beijing, their intent to deconstruct the US global unipolarity and form the new multipolar global world order.

It is being fast established that the Himalayan hydrology will be one of the critical frontlines in the global battle against climate change and water issues. The Himalayan mountain system is of crucial importance to the river system of Asia not only in terms of influencing the monsoon but also of the glaciers that are the source of many of the great rivers. Geologists often regard all the rivers, including those originating from Tibet, collectively as the 'circum-Himalayan rivers'.The Himalayan glaciers, regarded as the 'Third Pole', contain one of the largest reservoirs of snow and ice outside the Polar regions. Major Asian river systems - the Amu Darya, Indus, Ganges, Brahmaputra, Salween, Mekong, Yangtse, Yellow and Tarim have their sources in the Himalayan glaciers contributing to almost 70 per cent of water resources. Almost 2.0 billion people stretching from Afghanistan to the Ganga-Meghna-Brahmaputra basin in South Asia to the Mekong Delta in Southeast Asia are dependent on the flows of the rivers from the glaciers of the Himalaya that includes Tibet. The impact of global warming and climate change, as studies indicate, will gradually shrink glaciers resulting in the decrease of water runoff in the long-term. In the short-term earlier water runoff from glaciers when combined with seasonal rains can result in flood conditions.

This paper argues that the past two decades or so has witnessed a dramatic rise in the wealth and economic power of some parts of the Middle East, especially the Arab monarchies of the Gulf, while the non-energy exporting states, especially the republics such as Egypt, Syria, Yemen, Libya, and even Tunisia, lagged or even stagnated. The Gulf has had the financial power to cushion the effects of economic reform, and to engage with globalization on its own terms and at its own pace. The republics, meanwhile, have either blindly undertaken neoliberal reforms, which have been deeply unpopular with many people, or have tried to resist economic change and globalization, causing their economies to stagnate. There are now, it is argued here, two 'Middle Easts': the wealthy, predominantly Gulf one, increasingly engaged with Asia and the world and adapting to external change largely on its own terms; and a republican one, left behind by economic stagnation, political dissatisfaction, and a failure to address underlying problems such as rapid population growth, urbanization, and deteriorating social services. As regional power has shifted from this republican Middle East to the Gulf one, and the nature of this regional power has transformed from something primarily military to increasingly based on economic and 'soft' power, the future of the Middle East is becoming bifurcated. One part of it is looking increasingly active and open, while the other, after the shortcomings of the 'Arab Spring' and without dramatic reform, is at risk of remaining on the periphery of the international economic system.

One can identify three clusters of factors which have constrained Pakistan's capacity to integrate with South and Southwest Asia: the violent partition of the sub-continent and the unresolved issue of Pakistan's identity and the role of Islam in the administration of the country; the multi-ethnic and odd geographic nature of the country; and Pakistan's alliance with the United States. This article argues that Pakistan has sought to compensate for this isolation by building ties with countries outside its own region, notably China and the Middle East. This has not only further isolated Pakistan from its immediate region but also fuelled subsequent domestic instability.

The Sunni-Shi'a sectarian split has in recent years been accused of being the primary cause of the on-going violence in the Middle East. Here I describe the complex relationship this schism has with politics in the region. I explore this phenomenon at three different levels of analysis: the local, regional and international. I argue that in terms of motivating political actors, religion and politics form a hierarchy of importance. At the local level religion has the strongest effect, and is where we see the greatest level of violence. At the regional level I show that politics and religion appear to be of commensurate import. At the international level of Great Power politics religion plays the weakest role in motivating actors, however owing to what I term the 'Sectarian Lifecycle', international affairs still acquire a religious significance. This is due to high media consumption in the Middle East that means international affairs directly touch local affairs in real time and as such have the potential to trigger violence. I also show that at all levels the Sunni-Shi'a divide generates a tension between the short-term and long-terms goals of political actors. Finally this article argues that US-Iranian engagement would make it possible to dampen down the sectarian fire in this conflict without recourse to war.

North Korea is an outlier on the periphery of the East Asian economic miracle and simultaneously a key strategic actor amid the dance of regional great power competition. This article investigates the factors constraining North Korea's further integration into the Northeast Asian region and the implications of the maturation of its nuclear weapons program for regional security. These findings suggest that North Korea's doctrine of simultaneous nuclear weapons and economic development heralds the end of regional denuclearisation politics, which in turn is shaping the nature and extent of North Korea's integration into Northeast Asia. North Korea's nuclear gambit and the failure of regional states to adjust to North Korea as a nuclear weapons power may increase the danger of conflict escalation and expanded regional horizontal nuclear proliferation.

Front and centre in Australia's contemporary discourse about Asia is no longer the 'Yellow Peril', but the Asian Century. Nowhere is this new Asia discourse more prominent than in the recently released White Paper titled Australia in the Asian Century, whose broad themes on getting on to the Asia bandwagon have received rare bipartisan support in Canberra. Yet, in China, one of the main actors in the so-called 'Asian Century', this concept has yet to be widely embraced. While there has been some upbeat Chinese assessment of China's future in the new century, overall Chinese attitude has been characterised by ambivalence, caution and even scepticism about this notion (and its 'Chinese Century' variant). This article examines both Chinese perspectives on the Asian/Chinese Century and their implications for Australia's engagement with Asia and China. It argues that the Chinese ambivalence, conditioned by their historical memory and contemporary awareness of the US-dominated strategic order, needs to be taken more seriously by Australian observers and policy-makers, for such China knowledge could help Australia better reflect on its own hope and anxiety about the future of Asia and its at once promising and uneasy place within the region.