Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Though Thailand has tried to crack down on child sex and other crimes by foreigners, even when the Thai police do make an arrest, they often cannot hold onto their man. In 2003 alone, Thai authorities fired 18 cops for their complicity in trafficking, and police often take cuts from brothels.
As most Americans were celebrating Independence Day on July 4, the small, ravaged nation of Cambodia celebrated what it hoped would be its independence from one of the most horrific periods in twentieth-century history. In a hall of the royal palace in Phnom Penh, Cambodia's capital, in front of a Buddhist monk, judges for the upcoming tribunal of the Khmer Rouge were sworn into office.
By the end of 2005, Timor seemed relatively stable, and appeared to have developed a vibrant civil society and a nascent democracy. Today the entire nation has collapsed into an orgy of communal violence. The reason is that Timor could never broaden its economic growth, very much created by the UN. The idea of Timor as a success story has vanished, providing a lesson for future UN operations.
China's soft power strategy hopes to promote its image as a benign power, while reducing Taiwanese and American regional influence. By these criteria, China has been successful. In order to protect its position in Southeast Asia, the U.S. needs to improve its public diplomacy in the region, as the Chinese have proven adept at doing.
While China’s rising soft power could prove benign or even beneficial in some respects, it could prove disastrous for Southeast Asia—for democratization, for anticorruption initiatives, and for good governance.
China’s investments in Sudan and Burma have come under harsh criticism of late. Energy-hungry China will need to be convinced that bad governance in places like Burma or Sudan fosters instability that is bad for Chinese investment before it will rein in its rogue client states.
Ten years ago, Burma lacked the personality cult of totalitarian states such as North Korea and Turkmenistan. At the time, Than Shwe was one of three generals heading the junta and was considered the most dimwitted of the three. In the past five years, Than Shwe, 73, has turned himself into an object of Dear Leader-like adoration by pushing out rivals, consolidating power and using mass media.
Discussion of Moisés Naím's new book Illicit: How Smugglers, Traffickers, and Copycats are Hijacking the Global Economy. 
Features event video and audio.
Through a combination of country, regional, and topical studies, Strategic Asia 2005–06: Military Modernization in an Era of Uncertainty assesses how Asian states are modernizing their military programs in response to China's rise as a regional power, the war on terrorism, changes in U.S. force posture, the revolution in military affairs, and local security dilemmas.
The Carnegie Endowment recently hosted a conference on the Cambodian apparel sector, which has been revolutionized by an innovative trade agreement that helped create jobs and improve working conditions. Government officials, representatives from NGOs, intergovernmental organizations, and the private sector discussed how Cambodia's experience can be improved and replicated elsewhere.