SOCIETY

What Happened: Even before the pandemic shut down schools for 10 months, Afghanistan’s education sector was in dire straits. Nearly half of all school-aged children aren’t actually in school, teachers are woefully underqualified, and a majority of schools are located in dilapidated buildings – if they have buildings at all.

Our Focus: “Even if we have schools, we do not have high quality teaching at our schools,” Matiullah Wessa, an Afghan education advocate, told The Diplomat. “… We have failed to create a distinguished difference between a high school graduate and an illiterate person.”

What Comes Next: Even with schools finally reopening, Afghan students – especially girls and children forced into the workforce – may not be able to return. It will take concerted effort to fix Afghanistan’s schools, but with the war raging on it’s unlikely to break into the government’s priority list.

Interview

Robert Farley, co-author of the new book “Patents for Power: Intellectual Property Law and the Diffusion of Military Technology,” on the relationship between IP law and military tech: “There is a tight connection between the development of intellectual property protection and the modern defense industrial base. Governments have tried to use patents to protect and encourage military producers for a very, very long time.”

Northeast Asia

South Korea has been a rare success story in pandemic management thus far, managing to contain two previous waves of cases. Can it keep the streak alive in round three? The country looks to be in the early stages of another outbreak now, with Seoul tightening its social distance restrictions and experts warning the daily case count could double in coming weeks.

Southeast Asia

Asia and Pacific leaders are gathering this week via video link for the annual meetings of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum, which will culminate in the holding of the APEC Economic Leaders’ Meeting on November 20. Like last week’s ASEAN Summit and related meetings, expect the APEC agenda to be dominated by the question of recovery from COVID-19 pandemic.

South Asia

As the Imran Khan government in Pakistan seeks to reclaim political space lost to the opposition during the ongoing opposition parties’ campaign, some have suggested that Islamabad's latest move to present evidence about India’s alleged involvement in terrorist activity in Pakistan is part of that effort. Meanwhile, the opposition, despite showing some signs of fracturing, is soldering on, with its latest anti-Khan rally scheduled on November 22.

Central Asia

Turkmenistan persists in its pandemic denial, with last week marking three months since the WHO said it was hoping to make another visit ASAP. This week, reports indicate that Turkmen are avoiding hospitals altogether, figuring they have a better chance of survival at home than at an understaffed hospital.

ECONOMY

The annual amount of cross-border rail freight on the China Rail Express, a key part of the Belt and Road Initiative linking China and Europe via Central Asia.

SOCIETY

Literally, “land of the long white cloud”: The Maori term for New Zealand is becoming more widely used as the country embraces its Indigenous heritage – a shift made even more apparent with the appointment of the first Maori foreign minister this month.