North Korea threatens military action against the South, South Korea's Coast Guard attacks a Chinese fishing fleet, and China sends a naval force into waters claimed by Japan…
The oil and energy industry are funding both candidates—but not equally. Romney has received $6 million from individuals and PACs linked to the industry; Obama $1.6 million.
A court in Kazakhstan sentenced an outspoken political activist to seven-and-a-half years in jail for allegedly colluding with a fugitive billionaire to overthrow the government.
In Venezuela as in the US, third-party candidates were roundly ignored by the media—including a veteran labor leader who challenged Hugo Chávez from the left.
Japanese and Taiwanese patrol ships blasted each other with water cannon as a fishing fleet from Taiwan mobilized a protest flotilla to the contested East China Sea islands.
China and Japan are moving ahead with new Free Trade Agreements such as the ASEAN+6 pact and the Trans-Pacific Partnership, even amid escalated military tensions.
As a devastating blast rocked a Pemex plant, Mexico’s president-elect Enrique Peña Nieto told business leaders the private sector will help modernize the state-owned giant.
Leon Panetta warned that the latest escalation over islands disputed by China and Japan could lead to war—even as he arrived in Tokyo to inaugurate a new anti-missile system.
An oil spill at a refinery operated by the Venezuelan parastatal PDVSA on the Dutch Caribbean island of Curaçao threatens a nature reserve which is a critical flamingo habitat.
Venezuela’s opposition accused the state oil company of negligence after the deadly refinery explosion at Amuay, while the government says foreign subversion undermined safety.
The US Department of Defense announced new terrorism charges against a Saudi Guantánamo Bay prisoner accused of plotting with al-Qaeda to blow up oil tankers.
Romney’s new energy plan is billed as a drive towards “energy independence”—yet ironically mirrors the plan Obama unveiled two years ago to lift current restrictions on offshore drilling.
