Play The Diplomat’s Quiz: March 12, 2017 Edition

Chinese People’s Liberation Army-Navy (PLAN) and People’s Liberation Army-Air Force (PLAAF) warships and aircraft carried out exercises in the vicinity of Taiwan on Thursday. According to Chinese state media, PLAAF fighters, bombers, and early warning aircraft, along with PLAN warships, transited the Miyako Strait and entered the Western Pacific.

In response to Chinese activities in the Miyako Strait, Japan’s Air Self-Defense Force scrambled fighters to monitor the large-scale drill. The Miyako Strait runs between the Japanese islands of Miyako and Okinawa and offers a small passageway with international waters and airspace through Japan’s exclusive economic zone. Chinese strategists identify the Miyako Strait, along with the Bashi Channel, as one of the critical chokepoints in the so-called first island chain.

India has a long and complex tradition of student unions dating back to the 1970s. The advocacy groups may be organized either within universities — like the Delhi University Students’ Union — or outside with affiliations to political parties like the Congress, right wing Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP), or Marxist and Left-leaning groups. Some prominent student unions include the Indian National Students Organization, National Students Union of India, Akhil Bhartiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), Students Federation of India, All India Students Association, Muslim Students’ Federation, and the All India Democratic Students Organization Marxist.

According to data from the Ministry of Home Affairs, student-led movements in India surged 148 percent between 2009 and 2014. Overall, the country witnessed a 55 percent spike in protests in the same period, amounting to an average of 200 protests each day. Experts believe the rising number of student-led agitations is attributable largely to their ability to tap into the groundswell of youth angst through social media. Their aim, experts say, is to incubate future political leaders and highlight socio-economic malaises that remain unaddressed by governments, university managements, or policy makers.

On campus student bodies may raise a range of issues — from poor faculty and high fees, to reservations for certain castes and communities, and the general apathy from college managements. Many also protest the rot within academia, which remains pitifully under-reported and therefore unarticulated.

For Central Asia-watchers, the inclusion of Uzbekistan on the list signifies just how limited foreign nationals’ attempts at terrorism on American soil have been since 2011. (To say nothing of the fact that two of the states, Ethiopia and Cuba, are Christian-majority states.) That’s not to deny that Uzbekistani nationals have threatened to kill or maim Americans on American soil; rather, these attempts have been sufficiently ham-handed — and bizarre — that the inclusion of Uzbekistan on the DHS’s list undercuts the Trump administration’s executive order that much more.

Crossroads Asia was able to identify only a handful of Uzbekistani nationals tied to terrorist-related activities in the United States over the past few years — most notably, when a pair of Uzbekistani nationals were tied to threats to bomb Coney Island and assassinate then-President Barack Obama on behalf of Islamic State. More recently, a 25-year-old Uzbekistani national pleaded not guilty to making a terrorist threat following his arrest for aiming a pellet gun at passing cars in Missouri. (He didn’t fire any shots.)

The United States Navy and the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF) are conducting a bilateral naval drill, dubbed MultiSail 2017, off the U.S.-owned island of Guam in the northwestern Pacific Ocean from March 6-10, according to a U.S. Navy press release.

The U.S. Navy has dispatched a total of six surface warships including the Arleigh Burke-class destroyers USS Stethem, USS Barry, USS Mustin, USS Fitzgerald, and USS McCampbell, as well as a Ticonderoga-class guided missile cruiser.  The JMSDF is participating with two guided-missile destroyers. In addition, both navies have also sent number of subsurface and other special units.

Timor-Leste’s 15 years of independence have been marked by a mixed performance of progress and crisis. Having emerged from war and internal conflict in the late 1990s, Timor-Leste has a challenging path to get on par with other countries, in particular on issues related to development.

After 15 years of independence, it is time to take stock of how far things have come. The country’s presidential election will be held on March 20, with a potential second round of voting in April before the parliamentary election in July, the first such election to be held since the United Nations (UN) Mission departed in 2012.

Eight candidates, including one female candidate, will be contesting the March 20 presidential elections after fulfilling the criteria, including securing enough supporters. The eight candidates are Amorim Vieira, Angela Freitas, Antonio da Conceição, Antonio Maher, Francisco Guterres Lu-Olo, Jose Luis Guterres, Luis Alves Tilman, and Jose Antonio Neves. All eight candidates are scheduled to carry out their political campaigns from March 3-17. Voting is scheduled to take place simultaneously on March 20 both inside the country and overseas for Timorese abroad.

Last year, Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines reached agreement on limited, coordinated trilateral patrols in the Sulu Sea following a meeting in Bali.