Toshihiro Menju

29 December 2018 Author: Paul Stronski, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace Twenty-seven years after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the prospects for Central Asian integration finally look brighter. This development comes amid political and economic liberalisation in Uzbekistan, hardening authoritarianism elsewhere in the region, widespread economic distress and China’s growing influence — the five major trends that marked Central Asia in 2018.

28 December 2018 Author: Robert Ayson, Victoria University of Wellington As 2018 began New Zealand did not have an answer to its leading political question: would the coalition government between Jacinda Ardern’s Labour and Winston Peters’ New Zealand First, bracketed by support from the Greens, go the distance? As the year ends we have a positive answer to that query. This unlikely coalition, a marriage of convenience, is on course to serve a standard three-year term.

28 December 2018 Author: Rainer Heufers, Center for Indonesian Policy Studies The Indonesian public worried about the economy this year, despite economic growth of above 5 per cent and a poverty rate which, for the first time in history, was below 10 per cent of the population. Public unease stems from the trauma of the economic crisis in 1998. Even 20 years later, images of the past still haunt the Indonesian news.