Asia

On March, the 9th ASEAN Defense Ministers’ Meeting was held in Langkawi, Malaysia. On 16 March, the 10 defense ministers signed a joint declaration with a focus on regional security cooperation, especially against terrorist threats posed by groups like the Islamic State . ASEAN was established in August 1967 with the purpose of accelerating the economic growth, social progress, and cultural development in the region, and promoting regional peace and stability. Although raking in the lowest growth rates in 2019, Pakistan continues to benefit from increased investments from China, and the return of Iran to international markets is expected to boost mutual trade. Additionally, the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor , a 3,000-kilometer network of roads, railways, and oil and gas pipelines from Pakistan to China, is expected to bolster the Pakistani economy through to 2030.

The Bank’s work also spans across several development goals and cross-cutting initiatives. ADB celebrates Gender Month during March every year as an opportunity to reflect on progress made in promoting gender equality and encourage increased participation of women in building a stronger and more prosperous Asia and the Pacific region. Bank boards can drive growth and profits while spurring positive social change by supporting small and medium-sized enterprises owned by women.

Countries & Regions

While all such intermediaries do not operate outside of the law, a substantial number do. Indeed, the involvement of crime syndicates in people smuggling and trafficking has increased exponentially and has become an important issue in international crime. The multinational nature of these groups makes them difficult to control and their influence is widespread, even involving officials involved in immigration.

Education About Asia: Online Archives

It assists its members and partners by providing loans, technical assistance, grants, and equity investments to promote social and economic development. Various countries, except Indonesia, carried out active exchanges with the People's Republic of China. For instance, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, the Philippines and Burma took part in the first Asian table tennis championship meet held in Peking , and Thailand and Malaysia sent government leaders to China. With the popularity of the Internet and its increased usage around the world and within Southeast Asia, it has now become an important medium through which academic and popular knowledge on Southeast Asian societies has become available. The source of the knowledge could be located outside or within the region but are now much more accessible for commercial and noncommercial purposes. There are two diseases that have created serious health problems in Southeast Asia in recent years and threaten to reverse the general trend toward improved health in the region.

China, India, Russia, and Indonesia are the continent’s most productive mining economies. At the 5th Ministerial Meeting in Manila from 24 to 25 July, the Foreign Ministers of ASEAN issued a Joint Communiqué in which they reiterated that signature of the SEANWFZ Protocol by the NWS would equal a pledge of support for nuclear disarmament and nuclear-weapon-free zones. The Communiqué also addressed the nuclear tests by India and Pakistan, by stating their view that the recent tests in South Asia were not conducive to the full realization of the Treaty. Also on 8 October, both the People’s Republic of China and India formally acceded to the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia, with the ASEAN member countries issuing a declaration of consent to this accession.

With Thailand’s ratification, all ten ASEAN countries have now ratified the treaty. In the Maldives, GDP growth has been driven by strong tourism, especially from Europe, China, and India. In fact, European guests accounted for about half of arrivals and grew by 16.5% in 2019.

Extensive Resources On Nuclear Policy, Biological Threats, Radiological Security, Cyber Threats And More

Today, Asian countries rank as some of the top producers of many agricultural, forest, fishing, mining, and industrial products. This increased production has brought both extreme wealth and negative environmental impacts to the continent. The geographic term “Asia” was originally used by ancient Greeks to describe the civilizations east of their empire. Ancient Asian peoples, however, saw themselves as a varied and diverse mix of cultures—not a collective group.

Additional confusion is created by transcontinental countries, which cross over continental lines. For instance, Egypt is mostly in Africa, but its northeast corner extends into Asia. Turkey lies almost entirely in Asia, but its biggest city, Istanbul, is located in the tiny portion of Turkey that extends into Europe. Nonprofit international development organization based in San Francisco with network offices located in 18 Asian countries and Washington, D.C. This LibGuide is designed to provide you with scholarly, high-quality print-based and web-based resources about the Middle East. The information included here is not all inclusive and should be treated as starting points for your research.

Asia’s population is unevenly distributed, mainly because of climatic factors. There is a concentration of population in western Asia as well as great concentrations in the Indian subcontinent and the eastern half of China. There are also appreciable concentrations in the Pacific borderlands and on the islands, but vast areas of Central and North Asia—whose forbidding climates limit agricultural productivity—have remained sparsely populated. Nonetheless, Asia, the most populous of the continents, contains some three-fifths of the world’s people. Supercomputers, drones, smart factories, and nanomaterials are all examples of the achievements of this revolution. Mobile technologies, artificial intelligence, and IoT may make geographical borders irrelevant.

(An oil barrel is 159 liters, or 42 gallons.) It also has the world’s largest oil reserves, at roughly 250 billion barrels. Saudi Arabia’s economy is heavily dependent on oil exports, which account for 80 to 90 percent of the country’s total revenues. Saudi Arabia, Iran, and the United Arab Emirates accounted for roughly 57 percent of global liquid fuels production in 2010.

Based on a global survey in 2006, Bhutan was rated as the happiest country in Asia and the eighth-happiest in the world. Besides Bengali, English is also used as a second language among the middle and upper classes and is widely used in higher education and legal system. Gulf of ThailandIsland resort in the Gulf of Thailand off the coast of southern Thailand. The Greeks used it to designate the lands situated to the east of their homeland.

Consuming The Knowledge On Southeast Asia

The ASEAN countries reaffirmed their support for and active participation in all efforts to achieve the objective of general and complete disarmament, especially the nonproliferation of nuclear weapons and of other weapons of mass destruction . They also noted the recent dialogues among the major powers and concerned States on national missile defenses . At the 5th ASEAN Plus Three Foreign Ministers Meeting (ASEAN+3), which convened on 1 July, Chairman H.E Dr. N. Hassan Wirajuda issued a statement noting that the meeting focused on various regional issues, with special emphasis placed on developments in Korea. Once gain, in addition to addressing administrative and economic issues, the Ministers also welcomed the accession of Japan to the TAC and China’s readiness to sign to Protocol of the Treaty of the Southeast Asia Nuclear Weapon Free Zone.

The focus of the meeting was on Energy, Environment, Climate Change and Sustainable Development. The potential increase in the use of nuclear energy was discussed in this regard. The members drafted an ASEAN Leaders’ Declaration on Environmental Sustainability to be signed at the 13th ASEAN Summit. In the days prior to the meeting, Ministers discussed the creation of an agency to monitor compliance with the SEANWFZ. The ministers also discussed their intentions to strengthen the regions relationship with the IAEA and capacity to implement safeguards. On 24 July, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea acceded to the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia.

Southeast Asia is also a major producer of tropical fruits, such as mango, papaya, and pineapple. India is the world’s largest mango-producing nation, accounting for roughly 40 percent of total global output in 2010. The TAC stated that ASEAN political and security dialogue and cooperation should aim to promote regional peace and stability by enhancing regional resilience. Regional resilience shall be achieved by cooperating in all fields based on the principles of self-confidence, self-reliance, mutual respect, cooperation, and solidarity, which shall constitute the foundation for a strong and viable community of nations in Southeast Asia. These conjectures, however, are very difficult to evaluate empirically because the emergence and characteristics of family planning programs are correlated with other determinants of fertility decline, most notably socioeconomic development. It is bordered by India to the east, Afghanistan to the west, Iran to the southwest and China in the far northeast.