DIPLOMACY

What Happened: The COVID-19 crisis gave Russia an unpleasant preview of a world where oil demand – and the price – comes crashing down. For the past decade, China has done more than any other economy to sustain Russia’s oil export earnings and thus its economic model. But now that boom is coming to an end, hastened by the global economic restructuring that will follow the pandemic.

Our Focus: “China’s economic maturation into a consumer economy is a gut punch to Russia’s economic model,” writes Nicholas Trickett, an analyst covering oil and gas markets, trade, and political economy, with a focus on Russia. “Without strong external demand growth for oil and gas, Russians face a decline in their standards of living as state policy refuses to stimulate domestic demand while protecting large sectors from trade competition.”

What Comes Next: Russia went from a trade surplus to a deficit with China in the summer of 2021. That’s unsustainable for Moscow in the long term, given the lingering impact from U.S. and EU sanctions. Keep an eye on the Kremlin’s efforts to right the ship – if China is amenable to increasing non-oil and gas imports from Russia.

INTERVIEW

Duyeon Kim, adjunct senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security, on Moon’s attempts to revive inter-Korean relations: “The odds are greatly against President Moon. North Korea has made it clear for a long time that it’s not interested in Moon’s style of inter-Korean projects and meetings.”

Northeast Asia

A WHO team began their hotly anticipated investigation into the origins of COVID-19 in late January. The team is in Wuhan, China, visiting hospitals, disease control centers, and the seafood market where the initial outbreak was reported. But with intense political pressure from the Chinese government to find the virus did not originate in Wuhan after all, there are concerns about access and transparency.

South Asia

The months-long protest by Indian farmers against new agricultural laws passed in September last year by the Modi government shows no signs of abating, despite a stunning day of chaos on the streets of India's national capital, New Delhi, on January 26. Following violence that day, many had hoped that both sides would negotiate a compromise solution. However, that is still far from the case, as the internet remains shut down in many locations near New Delhi, prompting American celebrity Rihanna to draw attention to the ongoings.

Southeast Asia

This week, all eyes are on the fallout from Monday’s coup d’etat in Myanmar, which returned the Tatmadaw to power after a decade of civilian government. As the country’s people face a return to the bad old days of mass arrests and press censorship, Western governments will grapple with how best to respond to Myanmar’s sudden return to military dictatorship.

Central Asia

On February 3, the trial of former deputy Kyrgyz customs chief Raimbek Matraimov is set to begin in Bishkek. Matraimov, the alleged kingpin in a massive smuggling scheme revealed by Kyrgyz media and the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, was detained in October 2020 in a sign of strength by then-acting President Sadyr Japarov. But with many skeptical true justice is in the offing, the trial provides a more serious test of Japarov’s anti-corruption bona fides.

POLITICS

Myanmar’s soldiers stand guard at a roadblock manned with an armored vehicle in a road leading to the parliament building on February 2, 2021, in Naypyidaw, Myanmar. Hundreds of members of Myanmar’s Parliament remained confined inside their government housing in the country’s capital on Tuesday, a day after the military staged a coup and detained senior politicians including de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

POLITICS

The shortened slang for “charter change,” a term used in the Philippines to refer to the push for constitutional amendment.