News Story: World Bank to provide technical assistance to rebuild Philippines' war-torn city of Marawi

MANILA, Sept. 1 (Xinhua) -- The World Bank (WB) said on Friday that it will provide technical assistance for the early recovery, rehabilitation and reconstruction planning to rebuild the ruined southern Philippine city of Marawi torn by an ongoing war between the government security forces and the extremists.

"The WB, together with the Asian Development Bank, will coordinate financial assistance from the development partners for the rehabilitation and reconstruction of Marawi City," Mara Warwick, the WB country director for Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Thailand, said in a statement.

The WB also vowed to scale up support for peace-building and development in Mindanao as part of the midterm adjustment of its country partnership strategy.

It said the "scaled-up program from the entire Mindanao will focus on supporting the government's program to raise agricultural productivity and improve connectivity from farm to market, boost educations, skills, and employability of the youth, and help build resilient communities."

Read the full story at Xinhua

News Story: EU providing P49-M aid to Marawi evacuees

By Richmond Mercurio

MANILA, Philippines - Nearly two months since the Duterte administration decided not to accept new funds from the European Union (EU), the European Commission yesterday announced it is providing 850,000 euros or about P49 million in humanitarian aid to the country to support victims of the conflict in Marawi City.

The funding is seen to benefit over 50,000 people affected by the ongoing fighting between the Armed Forces and Islamist militants who have taken over parts of the city. 

“The unprecedented violence in Marawi has caused tens of thousands of families to flee, leaving everything behind. This has triggered a sharp increase in humanitarian needs as many of the displaced people are currently deprived of fundamental means to sustain their day-to-day lives,” said Pedro-Luis Rojo, head of the East, Southeast Asia and Pacific Regional office for the European Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations (ECHO).

“This grant from the EU will support the delivery of immediate life-saving assistance to those most in need and contribute to increased protection of populations affected by the conflict,” he added.

The EU funding, which will be channeled through the Commission’s ECHO, will focus on the provision of crucial support including food, water supply, healthcare, hygiene kits, sanitation facilities and essential household items as well as ensuring improved protection for those of concern.

Local business chambers led by the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry are also donating P1.65 million in cash in addition to relief goods for Marawi city evacuees.

Read the full story at PhilStar

News Story: Red tape and taxes put brakes on 'Make In India' push

By Megha BAHREE

When Saurabh Ahuja tried to import a $600 3D printer for manufacturing drones in his Delhi workshop, he ended up spending another $900 in taxes and bribes and waited three months for it to clear customs.

"We lack in technology and industry to make the smallest things, so we have to import," Ahuja said as he listed the frustrations entrepreneurs still encounter since the government launched its "Make In India" project.

"If my business grows, the country grows with me. But the government won't let me grow."

Since coming to power in 2014, Narendra Modi has been looking to overhaul India's image as an awkward country in which to do business and instead emulate China by becoming a global manufacturing hub.

In September that year, the right-wing premier unveiled "Make in India" as a flagship initiative which would have an "unprecedented overhaul of out-dated processes and policies" at its core.

The government has tried to woo investors by promising to simplify the tax regime and liberalise rules on foreign direct investment (FDI).

But in the World Bank's most recent chart ranking countries for their ease of doing business, India came 130th out of 190.

While much of the focus has been on the travails of foreign firms, local entrepreneurs who should be the poster boys of Indian manufacturing are also struggling.

Read the full story at TerraDaily

News Story: Gov't, MILF reaffirm commitment to Mindanao peace, dev’t

By Czeriza Valencia

MANILA, Philippines -  The Philippine government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) yesterday reaffirmed their commitment to support peace and development work in Mindanao through the World Bank-administered Mindanao Trust Fund (MTF). 

The World Bank said the development arm of MILF and the main partner of the fund, the Bangsamoro Development Agency (BDA), has committed to pursue development efforts in the region under the trust fund in support of the peace process. 

The MTF team turned over yesterday a rice mill, solar dryer and warehouse to the 1,704 residents of Barangay Cabpangi in Cotabato City as part of the Bangsamoro Advance program. The initiative provides livelihood and infrastructure projects in 50 conflict-affected communities in the areas under the 25 MILF base camps. 

Read the full story at PhilStar

News Report: India to Consider Revision of Water Treaty With Pakistan After Kashmir Attack

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi will meet top officials today to discuss Indian-Pakistani Indus Water Treaty in the wake of the September terrorist attack in Kashmir, NDTV reported Monday.

MOSCOW (Sputnik) — Modi will meet senior officials from different ministries, including external affairs, to discuss the 1960 treaty, possibly as a potential leverage over Pakistan, the broadcaster reported.

Government sources told to Sputnik that officials also presented various implications including China’s possible reaction in case of India’s tough stance. 

The Indus Water Treaty brokered by the World Bank outlines the share of the six local rivers by India and Pakistan with special provisions for how the water may be used and in what quantity. 

Tensions have been rising in Indian-Pakistani relations lately, as on September 18, four militants reportedly crossed from Pakistan into India-administered northern Kashmir territory and attacked the Indian base in Uri, killing 18 servicemen. Pakistan denied its involvement.

This story first appeared on Sputnik & is reposted here with permission.

News Story: Historic peace conference in Myanmar boosts national image, paves way for development

BEIJING, Aug. 31 (Xinhua) -- Myanmar is again in global news headlines Wednesday as the country starts a landmark peace conference, dubbed the 21st Century Panglong Meeting, in reference to a historic gathering in 1947 that led to the country's independence from Britain.

The conference, attended by the government and 11 ethnic armed groups, is the most inclusive peace talks the country has ever seen since it slid into a long-running civil war some 60 years ago.

Generations of Myanmar national leaders have tried various means to resolve the ethnic issues at the heart of the protracted war, but such attempts failed to bring lasting peace.

Nowadays there is consensus in the Myanmar society that political dialogue is the only way forward to national reconciliation and peace.

The ruling National League for Democracy, led by Aung San Suu Kyi, has made national reconciliation a priority, and Aung San Suu Kyi herself said on various occasions that "without peace there can be no sustained development."

Despite a lack of official data on civil war casualties in Myanmar, it is estimated that armed conflicts claimed tens of thousands in the country in the past several decades.

Read the full story at Xinhua

News Story: International experts to gather in Bali to seek steps to paralyze terrorists' financial strategy

JAKARTA, Aug. 4 (Xinhua) -- Experts from several countries and officials of international organizations will meet in Bali island, Indonesia next week to discuss ways to counter rising militant threat through their financial system.

A total of 24 countries, such as the United States, Turky and Saudi Arabia, and officials of the United Nations, ASEAN, IMF, the World Bank and others, have confirmed their participation in the meeting from Aug. 8 to 10 at Nusa Dua resort of Bali, according to Arrmanatha Christiawan Nasir, spokesman of the Indonesian foreign ministry.

The meeting was expected to boost understanding, coordination and cooperation among legal officials and financial institutions, including sharing of intelligence information, said Gatoto Djemirin, director of international security and disarmament at the ministry.

Read the full story at Xinhua

News Story: AIIB approves half a bln USD for its first four projects in Bangladesh, Indonesia, Pakistan, Tajikistan

DHAKA, June 24 (Xinhua) -- Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank or AIIB has approved 165 million U.S. dollars in loans for a Bangladesh project - the first batch of loan for the country from the China-led development bank.

The banks Board of Directors Friday approved its first 4 loans totaling 509 million U.S.dollars to finance 4 projects including that one of Bangladesh.

Three of the 4 projects are co-financing operations with multilateral development bank (MDB) partners, said the global lender in a website post on Friday.

The three other approved loans are a 216.5 million U.S. dollars loan for Indonesia, a 100 million U.S. dollars loan for Pakistan and a 27.5 million loan for Tajikistan.

Read the full story at Xinhua

Editorial: China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank Enters Into Force - What Next?

By Ankit Panda

The AIIB’s Articles of Agreement entered into force, taking the China-led development bank one step closer to operational status.

On December 25, the China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) effectively launched in earnest, marking a major milestone in China’s bid to play a more active role in global governance and development. With the ratification of the bank’s Articles of Agreement by 17 member states, representing 50.1 percent of the bank’s capital stock, the AIIB entered into force. The members that have ratified that bank’s Articles of Agreement include Australia, Austria, Brunei, China, Georgia, Germany, Jordan, Luxembourg, Mongolia, Myanmar, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Pakistan, Singapore, South Korea and the United Kingdom.

In a press release on the bank’s website, the AIIB interim secretariat noted that “Entry into force under Article 59 of the Articles of Agreement required deposit of such instruments by at least 10 Signatories with at least 50 percent of the shares allocated.” The next step for the bank as it moves toward becoming operational as a full-fledged multilateral development bank will be the inaugural meeting of its Board of Governors, which will be held on January 16 and 17 in the new year. The interim secretariat, in the same release, notes that “the Board of Governors will announce the commencement of operations, in accordance with Article 60 of the Articles of Agreement.”

The inaugural meeting of the Board of Governors is really when the bank will “kick off,” so to speak. According to Article 60 in the AIIB’s Articles of Agreement, the inaugural governors meeting will formally anoint Jin Liqun (whom I wrote about here), a Chinese bureaucrat and vice minister of finance, its first president. The meeting will additionally elect directors for the bank, set a start date for the bank’s formal operations, and decide a range of other administrative matters.

Read the full story at The Diplomat

Editorial: Why Indonesia Joining the TPP Would Be a Good Thing

Image: Flickr User - The White House

By Todd Williamson

Jokowi’s intention to join the TPP, while easier said than done, is still a welcome move.

Given that Indonesia has long refrained from committing to the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo’s announcement in late October that “Indonesia intends to join the TPP” came as a surprise to most of the world. Jokowi’s statement directly followed his trip to Washington, D.C., where he met with Barack Obama to discuss the possibility of Indonesia joining the massive Pacific Rim trade agreement.

With regional neighbors Australia, Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam and Brunei already signed on to TPP, Indonesia has come to recognize that it risks falling behind as a regional power if it does not join the 12-nation trade bloc. But a declaration of intent is only the first, and easiest, step: securing the backing of the Indonesian legislature, which is necessary in order to join TPP, will be much tougher.

Indonesia belongs to all of the right geoeconomic clubs. It is a G20 member with a trillion-dollar economy, and boasts memberships in both the U.S.-led World Bank and China’s Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank. It is also currently the chair of the Indian Ocean Rim Association for Regional Cooperation. But throughout 2015, Indonesia found itself in the headlines for a variety of unsavory reasons: strained relations with Australia, Brazil and the Netherlands due to the execution of Indonesian citizens by firing squads; haze pollution in its peatlands that led to over 500,000 cases of severe respiratory issues; and increasing investor frustration with the country’s outdated protectionist policies which bode poorly for its growth. Indonesia was starting to look less like the largest economy in Southeast Asia and third-largest democracy in the world, and more like a country unable to pull its own weight.

With his endorsement of TPP, Jokowi has signaled that he is getting serious about attracting greater foreign investment to Indonesia’s shores and moving the country away from its nationalist economic policies. Through TPP, Indonesia’s small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) will have greater access to markets from as geographically close as Australia to as far as Canada, allowing them to expand capacity and create more jobs at home. In addition, TPP will put Indonesia in a single market with countries that make up a fourth of the global trade market. Tariffs on various items and industries such as agricultural products, financial services, tourism, insurance and capital transfers will be completely dissolved between TPP members.

Read the full story at The Diplomat

Editorial: China’s AIIB and OBOR - Ambitions and Challenges

By Zhiqun Zhu

The two ambitious projects have become an integral part of Chinese diplomacy.

The China initiated Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), signed by 51 Prospective Founding Members (PFMs) as of September 2015, is expected to be operational by the end of this year. China has been generally cooperative with and supportive of the Bretton Woods institutions. At the same time, it is frustrated that existing multilateral institutions limit its global ambitions. The slow pace of reforms at the Western-dominated IMF and World Bank prevents China and other emerging economies from playing a greater role in international political economy. The AIIB will help to rectify the situation and boost China’s status as a global power.

China has also proposed the “Silk Road Economic Belt” and “21st Century Maritime Silk Road,” or “One Belt, One Road” (OBOR), an even broader and more ambitious initiative. The AIIB will serve as the financing arm of OBOR. The AIIB will begin with authorized capital of $50 billion, eventually to be raised to $100 billion. The projected investment for OBOR will be $1.4 trillion, about 12 times larger than the Marshall Plan, which was about $120 billion in today’s value. In addition to the economic benefits, the AIIB and OBOR will significantly facilitate the movement of goods, services, and people across national borders. Over the past two decades, China has contributed substantially to infrastructure or “hardware” of many developing nations, but it remains short of “software” or soft power. Beijing hopes that its new initiatives with a non-coercive, non-military approach will help enhance its international image as a responsible global power. The AIIB and OBOR have become an integral part of China’s new diplomacy, reflecting its growing interests and clout. They are also important steps to realizing President Xi Jinping’s “Chinese dream.”

China is transitioning from export-oriented growth to a new model based on consumption and outward investment. This process accelerated after the 2008-9 global financial crisis, which sharply weakened the ability of Western countries to absorb Chinese manufacturing products and to invest in developing countries. China is not just investing in developing countries; it is investing in developed economies as well. According to a recent study by the National Committee on United States-China Relations and Rhodium Group, from 2000 to 2014, Chinese firms spent nearly $46 billion on new establishments and acquisitions in the U.S., most of it in the past five years. Chinese-affiliated companies now directly employ more than 80,000 Americans. If the U.S. continues to be a major recipient of China’s booming outward investment, it could receive between $100-200 billion of investment by 2020. This would increase the number of full-time U.S. jobs provided by Chinese U.S. affiliates to somewhere between 200,000 and 400,000.

Read the full story at The Diplomat

Editorial: Aung San Suu Kyi's China Trip and the Future of Sino-Myanmar Relations

Aung San Suu Kyi (Image: Wiki Commons)

By Cristina Garafola

The importance of a recent visit extends beyond its unprecedented nature.

In June 2015, Burmese parliamentarian and opposition party leader Aung San Suu Kyi led a delegation of National League for Democracy (NLD) party members to China. Aung San Suu Kyi (ASSK), the general secretary of the NLD, met with President Xi Jinping and other senior Chinese officials.

The trip marked a series of firsts in the Sino-Myanmar relationship: the first visit by the Nobel Peace Prize winner to China since her release from house arrest in November 2010, as well as the first meeting between President Xi and ASSK, both heads of their respective parties, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the NLD.

The high-level discussions also reflected the importance of ASSK’s trip for both sides. For China, whose relations with Myanmar have become increasingly strained since 2011, ASSK’s visit provided an opportunity to engage with a key player in the now-pluralized political landscape prior to Myanmar’s upcoming parliamentary elections on November 8th. For ASSK and the rest of the NLD delegation, meeting with Chinese leadership provided a forum for bilateral engagement with one of Myanmar’s most important neighbors in the region, relations that will continue, if not expand, if the NLD performs as well as expected in the November elections. 

Read the full story at The Diplomat

News Story: China & Russia align strategies against US - Global Times

China and Russia are aligning their strategies to team up against the United States, according to a commentary by the Global Times, a tabloid under the auspices of the Communist Party mouthpiece People's Daily.

Following more than two decades of development, bilateral relations between China and Russia have reached a new phase, the July 18 commentary said, adding that China now considers Russia an irreplaceable partner for all its key strategies.

These include the Silk Road Economic Belt, the land-based component of Beijing's amibitious "Belt and Road" initiative to boost cooperation and connectivity in Eurasia; the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, the political, economic and military organisation the two countries founded along with Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan; and the BRICS association comprising Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, as well as the group's New Development Bank.

During Chinese president Xi Jinping's visit to Moscow in May, the two sides also signed off on a joint declaration detailing cooperation between the Silk Road Economic Belt and the Eurasian Economic Union, which comprises the Eurasian states of Russia, Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan.

Read the full story at Want China Times

Editorial: Shaping the Asia-Pacific Order - Don’t Count the US Out

By Robert A. Manning

With some foresight and leadership, the postwar system can survive.

For all the hand-wringing about China remaking Asia in its image – as evidenced in the recent controversy over Beijing’s new investment bank, the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank – reports of a U.S. retreat are greatly exaggerated.

Congress’s recent approval of Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) and the likely approval of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), the Obama administration’s legacy trade deal, is the sort of economic statecraft that can update and sustain the open, ruled-based order. Yet as the pending demise of the EXIM Bank illustrates, such efforts have been all too rare.

Yes, a global diffusion of power from West to East is unfolding with potentially profound challenges to the international system under which the global economy has flourished since 1945. And yes, a shift in the center of economic gravity to the Asia-Pacific region has occurred.

China’s re-emergence is raising questions about the underlying bipartisan premise in the U.S. that as rising powers like China integrated into the global system, they would develop a stake in the stability of the international system and its norms, and would advance their interests within established institutions, rather than challenge its structures or seek to create alternative institutions.

Read the full story at The Diplomat

Editorial: The Philippines' Dilemma on China's New Infrastructure Bank

By Richard Javad Heydarian

Manila faces a tough balancing act.

Earlier this year, China was painfully isolated during the Shangri-La Dialogue, Asia’s premier security forum, when it came under criticism from across all quarters for its expansive reclamation activities across disputed features in the South China Sea. Recent weeks, however, have been kind to China.

China formally launched the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), a promising rival to the Bretton Woods institutions of the World Bank and its regional derivative the Japanese-dominated Asian Development Bank (ADB). China’s national legislature also approved another major Chinese-backed global financial institution, the New Development Bank (NDB). On paper, the NDB symbolizes the emergence of the BRICS as active shapers of the international economic order. In reality, however, it will depend largely on Chinese contributions ($41 billion), which represents 39 percent of total shares.

China’s ultimate economic initiative will be the “One Belt, One Road” project, which will place Beijing at the heart of infrastructure development across the Eurasian landmass while connecting a wide network of ports from the Pacific to the Mediterranean waters. These ambitious efforts fall under Xi Jinping’s “Peripheral Diplomacy” doctrine, aimed at wooing China’s immediate neighborhood, reviving ties with estranged maritime neighbors, and transforming China into the pillar of the Asian economic order.

Unsurprisingly, some neighboring states, particularly the Philippines, have come to view the AIIB and other Beijing initiatives as a disguised effort to create a Chinese ‘zone of deference’ across Asia. Amid an intensifying dispute in the South China Sea, Manila has shunned robust economic and diplomatic linkages with Beijing, depriving itself of much-needed capital and investments.

Read the full story at The Diplomat

News Story: China should not expect to oust US from global order - scholar

Zheng Yongnian, director of the East Asian Institute of the National University of Singapore (NUS), penned an article in Lianhe Zaobao on June 30, stating that China will do everything it can to avoid conflict with the US, according to Shanghai-based news web portal New Outlook.

In the article, Zheng first stated the importance of the US-China relationship in the global world order, adding that problems in this relationship have an effect on the global community.

Zheng cited 15 examples of emerging powers challenging established powers since 1500, stating that in only four of these instances has war been avoided. The most obvious example is the German challenge to the UK's status as Europe's largest economy which caused the two World Wars of the 20th Century. There was a similar situation in Asia at the time, as Japan tried to challenge the order imposed by European colonial powers in Asia, invading its neighbors, leading to the Asian front of World War II, Zheng said.

According to Zheng, history suggests that competition for hegemony is a norm of global politics and that cooperation is anomalous and by extension war is the norm and peace is anomalous. Zheng stated that prevailing theories in the field of international relations such as power transition theory, point to the inevitability of a conflict between the US and China. He said, however, that China is doing everything in its power to resist this fate.

Read the full story at Want China Times

Editorial: US Foreign Policy Bureaucrats See Tough Times Ahead

Secretary Kerry Delivers Remarks at the Release of the
2015 Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review
(Image: Flickr User - U.S. Department of State)

By Ankit Panda

The U.S. Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review (QDDR) offers insight into problems facing U.S. foreign policy.

The U.S. Department of State’s Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review (QDDR) came out earlier this week. The document is an introspective look into the diplomatic apparatus of the world’s foremost superpower and one that allows outsiders to glean, among other things, what keeps the bureaucrats down in Foggy Bottom awake at night. In the State Department’s more anodyne description of the document, the QDDR “provides a blueprint for advancing America’s interests in global security, inclusive economic growth, climate change, accountable governance, and freedom for all.”

This year’s big takeaway, as commentators elsewhere have noted, is that the State Department fears for the longevity and quality of the post-war international system that the United States helped created. This ‘house that Uncle Sam built’ is starting to show its age and irrelevance due to both outdated international governance models (internal factors) and rising powers such as China (external factors). The report triumphantly describes the United States’ post-war achievement:

Read the full story at The Diplomat

Editorial: With AIIB, US Shot Itself in the Foot on Indian Infrastructure

By Raymond E. Vickery, Jr and Michael Kugelman

The United States’ reaction to China’s AIIB will be a setback for its cooperation with India. It’s not too late to fix this.

During his first year in office, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has articulated his vision of Indian economic development to almost anyone who would listen – perhaps most notably to presidents Barack Obama and Xi Jinping. “Make in India,” electricity in every village, modern sanitation, and rising standards in health, education, and individual prosperity are all part of the Indian future according to Modi. With Obama’s visit to New Delhi earlier this year, U.S. support for this vision is now the cornerstone of U.S.-Indian relations. However, when Modi visits Xi next month, they will discuss India’s benefits from China’s new Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) and what India may receive from the $62 billion China has just announced for its “new Silk Road” infrastructure initiative.

Under these circumstances, the U.S. Congress has blocked the effectiveness of the most vital institutions for U.S engagement with India on infrastructure development. The Obama Administration has compounded the error through a futile effort to hamstring China’s attempts to provide a source of additional infrastructure financing through the AIIB. The U.S. effort has been rejected by India and 55 other nations, including some of America’s closest allies. Surely, this constitutes a self-inflicted wound—a shot in the foot.

Modi’s vision of exponential economic growth simply will not occur unless India can fix its infrastructure problem—the Achilles heel of the Indian growth story. The most pressing need is for energy infrastructure to rectify the rolling power cuts that have become endemic. Not far behind is transportation, where India wastes vast amounts of productivity through delays in moving people and goods to, from, and around the country. The Asian Development Bank estimates that Asia will need to invest about $800 billion a year on infrastructure through 2020. The previous Indian government estimated India’s share of that needed investment at about $200 billion a year.

Read the full story at The Diplomat

Editorial: AIIB - China's 'Phase Zero Operation'?

By William Yale

Can Beijing’s claim that it wants to provide ‘global public goods’ via the AIIB taken at face value?

A month after controversy erupted over the announcement that multiple U.S. allies will join China’s new Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), the Obama administration’s response was clearly misguided. Concerned that the AIIB represented a power play by China for influence in the rest of the world at the expense of the U.S., administration officials criticized the bank for not adhering to the “high standards” required of U.S. and Western-led international institutions such as the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank.

In contrast, there was a clear alternative for the United States: welcome China’s contribution to economic development in the developing countries of Asia and even join the bank itself. Indeed, U.S. officials, intellectuals, and pundits of all stripes repeatedly complain that China has not lived up to its obligations as a major power to provide the “global public goods” that help prop up the international system. At face value, the AIIB seems like it will exemplify the kind of role in the world the U.S. would like China to play.

Read the full story at The Diplomat

Editorial: China’s AIIB and the US Reputation Risk

By Mercy A. Kuo and Angelica O. Tang

What are the implications of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank for the next U.S. president?

India, Iran and Israel joined. Europe’s leading economies – France, Germany, Italy, Switzerland, and United Kingdom – are approved members. Russia is in. Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates are on board. Australia and South Korea are confirmed. Japan has allocated $1.5 billion for AIIB membership, though Tokyo is assessing AIIB’s governance framework and will decide in June. Canada is considering. North Korea’s application was rejected. Currently, 57 countries are confirmed founding members. The United States stands alone.

Critics of the U.S. decision not to join see Washington sidelined as allies jump on the AIIB bandwagon. Proponents of Washington’s position, mainly Obama administration officials, decry the absence of transparent governance standards and competition with the World Bank and Asian Development Bank, even though both banks have endorsed the AIIB. The White House’s concerns over AIIB’s environmental and social responsibility framework, though valid, miss the bigger picture. What is the strategic significance of the AIIB for the next US president and US rebalance to Asia?

Read the full story at The Diplomat