Play The Diplomat’s Quiz: September 20, 2015 Edition

After years of debate, Nepal is celebrating a new constitution. Out of the 598 members of the Constituent Assembly, 507 voted for the new constitution, 25 voted against, and 66 abstained in a vote on September 16, 2015. Some small parties of the Tharu and Madhesi ethnic communities organized protests against the constitution, leading to widespread violence in southern Nepal. More than 40 have people died in the violence, half of whom were members of Nepal’s Police and Armed Police Force.

Shenzhen sits in subtropical south China, where four-fifths of the country’s water resources flow. The monsoon brings heavy rains from April to September; at its peak, Shenzhen’s more than 7 million residents see pouring rain almost every day.

So why is this city facing a serious water shortage?

Statistics from the government show that Shenzhen is among the top 10 most water-scarce cities in China, with per capita water resources one-twelfth of the national average. Residents had less than 160 cubic meters of water available per person in 2010, significantly lower than the United Nations’ definition of absolute scarcity threshold (500 cubic meters).

Officials attribute the lack of water to the fact that no major rivers flow through the area. Worse yet, factories used to discharge wastewater without proper treatment into what small, seasonal creeks are here, causing serious pollution and tainting local drinking water.

To ease its thirst, Shenzhen has been scrambling to import water and become more efficient. But each solution comes with its own challenge. As the city’s population and economy grow, water demand is expected to outstrip supply by 2020.

The long-awaited UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) report that deals largely with wartime abuses in Sri Lanka has finally been made public.

It’s a big moment for the island nation and OHCHR has come out with a strong report. This is a detailed, lengthy document that covers a range of disturbing topics, including extrajudicial killings, sexual violence, disappearances, torture, and attacks on civilians. Importantly, the report also includes violations which have occurred since the end of the war (in 2010 and 2011).

It’s official: Chinese President Xi Jinping will pay a state visit to the United States from September 22 to 25, China’s Foreign Ministry announced on Wednesday. He will also travel to New York to take part in the UN General Assembly and the celebration of the UN’s 70th anniversary from September 26 to 28.

The White House also confirmed that U.S. President Barack Obama will host Xi for an official state dinner on September 25. Xi is not expected to arrive in Washington D.C. until September 24 – he will spend the first two days of his visit in Seattle, meeting with business executives. After two days in Washington, D.C., he will leave for New York on September 26. His speech before the UN General Assembly is scheduled for September 28.

After an intraparty leadership contest on Monday, Australia has a new prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull, the former environmental minister, communications minister, and leader of the Liberal Party. Turnbull’s ascension to the prime minister’s job was not unexpected, as this was the second intraparty leadership challenge this year in the governing coalition. The Wall Street Journal reported that, before the intraparty leadership contest, surveys of Australian voters “pointed to defeat for the ruling Liberal-National coalition at federal elections due next year.” Leadership contests between elections have become common for both major parties, adding to instability in Australian politics.

Finally, after many days of wrangling in the Japanese Diet and huge protests by naysayers outside, early on Saturday morning, the Upper House of the Diet passed a new package of security bills that mark a significant departure from Japan’s pacifist posture in the post-World War II era.

The opposition benches tried every trick in the book, including by submitting a series of censure motions and a no-confidence motion against the Abe cabinet, but they were all voted down. Finally, the bills were passed with 148 votes in favor and 90 votes against. The ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and its coalition partner Komeito enjoy a majority in both the lower and upper houses of the Japanese Parliament. They had also secured the support of three other smaller parties after the Abe government agreed to concede a greater say for the Diet in determining when the Self-Defense Forces (SDF) can be deployed overseas.

Malaysia and Thailand have agreed to build a wall along their common border next year amid growing concerns about human trafficking.

The 640-kilometer Malaysia-Thailand border has long been the site of transnational crime, including the rampant smuggling of weapons, drugs, and people. In May, the issue sparked international furor following the discovery of mass graves in jungle camps in Malaysia near the border used by suspected smugglers of Rohingya Muslims from Myanmar (See: “Can Southeast Asia Tackle its Human Trafficking Problem?”). Similar graves were discovered in Thailand, which again received the lowest ranking in the U.S. annual trafficking report this year.

On foreign policy, 91 percent of Indians surveyed expressed confidence in Modi’s handling of India’s affairs on the world stage. The prime minister’s tendency to travel widely and frequently, meeting with foreign dignitaries visibly and transparently, has paid dividends it seems. On relations with the United States, China, and Russia, more Indians approve than disapprove of the prime minister’s handling of relations. The reaction to Modi’s handling of relations with the United States is particularly positive: 66 percent of respondents approve while just 13 percent disapprove.

With the announcement by state media that its main nuclear facility has resumed normal operations, North Korea’s atomic weapons program is back in the public eye.

The news, reported by the Korean Central News Agency on Tuesday, dovetails with a report released in April by the Institute for Science and International Security, which cited satellite imagery as evidence that the facility’s plutonium reactor was back online.

The Yongbyon nuclear complex was shuttered in 2007 as a result of international denuclearization talks involving the United States, China, Russia, South Korea and Japan. Then, in 2013, at a time of elevated tensions with the U.S. and South Korea, Pyongyang declared its intention to restart the facility.

Tuesday, the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), Russia’s answer to NATO, gathered in Dushanbe for a summit. Attended by the presidents of the six member states — Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Belarus, Armenia, and the host, Tajikistan — the summit was preceded by a day of bilateral meetings. ISIS, also known as Islamic State, dominated the conversation and an unnamed source indicated that if Tajikistan asked, Russian troops would return to the Afghan border.