By Sami Zubaida

Democracies are about more than elections and majorities: they require genuine separation of powers, autonomous institutions and associations, all regulated by the rule of law. The current Turkish situation is the product of social and institutional patterns, now in question, in which multiple centres of institutional power confronted and checked one another, unlike the centralised and personalised regimes of much of the Arab world.

By Matt Boyes

Speaking at the Hay-on-Wye festival earlier this week, David Miliband didn’t just raise questions about the direction of the Labour Party under his brother’s leadership. He also touched on a much wider issue.

By Kalsoom

On Sunday, Pakistani journalist Saleem Shahzad  went missing in Islamabad. Yesterday, news agencies reported that Shahzad’s body was found about 93 miles southeast of the capital, in Sira-e-Alamgir. In the aftermath of this tragic and shocking death, the question, Who killed Saleem Shahzad? continues to echo in the halls of the blogosphere and news outlets. While nothing is certain, many fingers are squarely pointed at the ISI.

By Randeep Purewall

In April 1998, just after India conducted its nuclear tests, the then Minister of Defence, George Fernandes referred to China as India’s “potential threat number one.” Years earlier in a personal letter, Nehru wrote of China as India’s “foe or adversary for a considerable time to come.” Nehru exhorted India to concentrate on buildings its defence “to meet the Chinese menace.”