Authors: Jonas Parello-Plesner and Parag Khanna, ECFR

Last year proved a tipping point for China’s approach to the world. The confluence of Europe’s debt crisis and America’s contracting defence budget has created rising expectations that China will shoulder ever greater power burdens for international stability.

No longer can it keep a low profile in international strategic and economic affairs. Could it join America as a world policeman sooner than expected? Read more…

Author: Parag Khanna, New America Foundation

The fate of the massive deposits of lithium recently discovered in Afghanistan is destined to be no different from that of landlocked Central Asia’s other natural resources: tapped by the West, and eventually controlled by the East.

Siberian timber, Mongolian iron ore, Kazakh oil, Turkmen natural gas and Afghan copper are already channeled directly to China through a newly built East-bound network that is fueling the rapid development of the world’s largest population. Read more…