The Australia-United States Free Trade Agreement came into effect on the 1st of January 2005, after being signed the previous year. It has since allowed easy and greater access to Australian products into the United States.

Paris and Beijing want to enjoy the fruits of economic cooperation. However, stark variations in worldview, political standpoints, and global values give rise to diplomatic strife and conflicts of interests.

US-Pakistan relations have always been difficult and became particularly prickly at the height of the war in neighbouring Afghanistan. Washington needs to rebuild the trust if it doesn’t want to see Pakistan drift completely into Beijing’s orbit.

In a region long beset by political strife and interstate rivalries, Somaliland stands out as a beacon of hope in the Horn of Africa. It remains stable, relatively democratic, and broadly functional.

It took the recent murder of Javier Ordoñez by the Colombian police to generate the international attention that countless massacres in the country throughout 2020 have demanded. This renewed attention must help ensure full political commitment to the 2016 peace agreement.

The Trump administration’s strategy to engage with Thailand appears to be counterproductive. Trump saved the Thai authoritarians, but has weakened the US-Thailand security alliance amid the rising Chinese influence.

For decades, opposition to abortion and Roe v. Wade has been central to Republican social, political, and legal identity. Following the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the future of the Supreme Court will be front and centre in the final weeks of the 2020 presidential election.

This week in Australian foreign affairs: Morrison’s address to the UN, home quarantine for select international arrivals on the horizon, Quad consultations with India, Japan, and the United States, and more.

Russia, not Belarussian President Alexander Lukashenko or the EU and the West, holds the key to Belarus’ immediate and medium-term future. It will have the final say on whether he stays in power or not.

The abolition of DFAT’s Office of Development Effectiveness (ODE) is a bad decision. This development is made worse by the non-transparent way the decision was made.