Published Weekly by the United Nations Information Centre New Delhi

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13 November, 2004
 

Table Of Contents

 

S-G Hails New Accords Between Sudanese Government And Darfur Rebels 1

United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan on 10 November warmly welcomed the signing of humanitarian and security accords between the Sudanese Government and rebels in the western region of Darfur and urged them to resolve without delay what the international organization has called the world's worst humanitarian crisis.

But at the same time the UN mission in Sudan reported that police again raided the Al Geer refugee camp near Nyala, South Darfur destroying flimsy shacks, shooting in the air and shouting at terrified people. Due to the shots, UN agencies and partner groups were immediately withdrawn for their own safety into Nyala town.

About 1.45 million people are internally displaced within Darfur, a vast area the size of France, where Janjaweed militias are accused of killing and raping thousands of villagers after rebel groups took up arms against the Sudanese Government last year. Another 200,000 are living as refugees in neighbouring Chad.

The Government and two rebel groups - the Sudan Liberation Movement/Army (SLM/A) and the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) - signed the Protocols on the Improvement of the Humanitarian Situation and on the Enhancement of the Security Situation in Darfur at a meeting on 9 November in the Nigerian capital of Abuja.

In a statement issued by his spokesman, Mr. Annan congratulated the parties on this "significant achievement" and commended the active efforts of the African Union and its current Chairman, Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo, in mediating the talks with the support of the UN, European Union, League of Arab States and other partners.

"He is hopeful that these measures, combined with the deployment and strengthening of the expanded African Union mission, will re-establish security and stability in the region, and facilitate the safe return of the displaced and refugees to their home areas," the statement added. "He urges the parties to intensively pursue the political negotiations and conclude an agreement without further delay."

 

S-G Calls On All Parties To Resume Talks In Violence-Wracked Côte d'Ivoire 2

Welcoming South African President Thabo Mbeki's peace mission to Côte d'Ivoire on 9 November, United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan called on all parties to resume talks after last week's resurgence of violence and voiced increasing concern over the humanitarian situation in a country torn between government and rebels.

The UN Operation in Côte d'Ivoire (UNOCI) reported an increase in the number and abusive nature of hate messages on radio and television, which in one instance broadcast the number of a van said to be driven by French nationals, target of attacks since French troops destroyed the Government air force in a reprisal attack on 6 November.

Violent demonstrations showed no signs of waning in Abidjan, the main city, and thugs controlled streets despite joint patrols by UN peacekeepers and their counterparts from France and Côte d'Ivoire aimed at securing some areas and reassuring frightened residents, UNOCI said. The number of people, mostly foreign nationals, seeking refuge in UN-protected sites has reached more than 1,800.

Mr. Annan deplored the continuing violence, called for an end to all hate media and urged all parties to maintain the ceasefire that ended direct fighting in the West African country early last year, and resume the peace process.

 

S-G Mourns Death Of President Yasser Arafat 3

The Secretary-General was deeply moved to learn of the death of President Yasser Arafat on 11 November. President Arafat was one of those few leaders who could be instantly recognized by people in any walk of life all around the world. For nearly four decades, he expressed and symbolized in his person the national aspirations of the Palestinian people.

President Arafat will always be remembered for having, in 1988, led the Palestinians to accept the principle of peaceful coexistence between Israel and a future Palestinian state. By signing the Oslo accords in 1993 he took a giant step towards the realization of this vision. It is tragic that he did not live to see it fulfilled. Now that he has gone, both Israelis and Palestinians, and the friends of both peoples throughout the world, must make even greater efforts to
bring about the peaceful realization of the Palestinian right of self-determination.

 The Secretary-General's deep-felt condolences go to his wife Suha and his young daughter Zahwa and to the Palestinian people.

 

Secretary-General: International Community Needs To Heal Divisions 4

United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan said on 10 November that the international community needs to heal its divisions and engage in a constructive debate about how to build a collective system of security, forge global partnership for development, and promote greater tolerance and understanding among the peoples of the world.

"Events over the past few years, in particular those related to terrorism and the war in Iraq, have upset the consensus behind the Millennium Declaration," said Mr. Annan in a message delivered by his adviser Giandomenico Picco to the Fifth World Summit of Nobel Laureates, which started on 10 November in Rome.

Describing the Millennium Declaration as "a landmark document," the Secretary-General said it captured the aspirations of the international community for a world united by common values, striving to achieve peace through collective security, and decent standards of living for every man, woman and child through a global partnership for development.

Mr. Annan said the Millennium Development Goals had helped galvanize global action against critical challenges, such as massive poverty, disease and environmental degradation, but noted that so far results have been uneven. "There is no time to lose if we are to reach the Goals by the target date of 2015," he said. "That is where global partnership becomes crucial."

Referring to the September 2005 five-year review of the implementation of the Millennium Declaration by world leaders, the Secretary General said: "I expect this rendezvous to encourage governments to take decision between now and then."

Expecting that a high-level panel of experts on Threats, Challenges and Change would submit its report in the next few weeks, Mr. Annan hoped that Member States would respond "with vision, good will and courage."

"Change and renewal are of course constant processes in a living institution," he said. "But I see next year's high-level event as more than that. I see it as a rare opportunity to come up with collective answers that have come so starkly into focus over past few years - such as global terrorism and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, and the great global challenges of poverty, hunger and disease."

 

UNHCR Voices Extreme Concern For Iraqis Fleeing Fallujah Assault 5

The United Nations refugee agency on 9 November voiced extreme concern over the fate of tens of thousands of Iraqis who have fled the city of Fallujah to escape the fierce fighting in an assault launched on rebels there by United States and Government forces.

"The most immediate needs of the displaced are food, shelter, water and sanitation and health care," UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) spokesperson Jennifer Clark told a news briefing in Geneva.

UNHCR, which has no international presence on the ground in Iraq, is part of a joint emergency group with the International Committee for the Red Cross and non-government organizations (NGOs) based in Amman, Jordan. The group is in close contact with colleagues inside Iraq and with partner organizations monitoring the situation.

The displaced people are staying with relatives, friends or other Iraqis around Fallujah. Some have been provided with tents. The majority of civilians appear to have left the city, although it is difficult to establish numbers with any certainty, Ms. Clark said.

Despite the extremely volatile security situation in the country, UNHCR has continued to facilitate voluntary repatriation of Iraqis insisting on going home from camps in neighbouring Iran. Over the past two weeks, 64 people returned to southern Iraq, while more than 700 people returned to northern areas, bringing the total of facilitated returns to 18,115 people since August 2003. UNHCR also facilitated returns from Jordan.

Repatriations are becoming increasingly difficult with deteriorating weather conditions. Near the northern Iraqi border it has been raining steadily for the last three days and the convoys can take a long time getting to their destination. It is not clear how long the repatriation movements from the north of Iran can continue with the weather getting worse and snow expected to fall soon.

 

IAEA Urges Better Steps To Keep Nuclear Material Out Of Terrorist Hands 6

Declaring that the "threat of nuclear terrorism is real and current," the head of the United Nations atomic watchdog on 8 November called for urgent international measures to prevent radioactive matter from falling into the hands of terrorists, citing increased trafficking of nuclear or other radioactive materials as a "disturbing" sign.

"The security of nuclear and other radioactive material has taken on dramatically heightened significance in recent years," International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director-General Mohamed ElBaradei told the Asia-Pacific Conference on Nuclear Safeguards and Security meeting in Sydney, Australia.

"The events of September 2001 (terrorist attack on the United States) propelled the rapid and dramatic re-evaluation of the risks of terrorism in all its forms _ whether related to the security of urban centres, sports arenas, industrial complexes, harbours and waterways, oil refineries, air and rail travel, or nuclear and radiological activities," he said. "Nuclear security should be urgently strengthened, without waiting for a `watershed' nuclear security event to provide the impetus for needed security upgrades."

Mr. ElBaradei said that "perhaps the most disturbing lesson to emerge" from IAEA probes into recent nuclear programmes in Iran and Libya was the existence of an extensive illicit market for the supply of nuclear items which clearly thrived on demand.

"The relative ease with which a multinational illicit network could be set up and operate demonstrates clearly the inadequacy of the present export control system," he added, noting that 60 incidents of trafficking were reported in 2003 and the total for this year will be even higher.

While the majority of these incidents did not involve nuclear material and most radioactive sources involved were of limited concern, the number showed that measures to control and secure nuclear and other radioactive materials need to be improved. "They also show that measures to detect and respond to illicit trafficking are essential," Mr. ElBaradei said.

He called for better control of the sensitive parts of the nuclear fuel cycle, namely the production of enriched uranium and the reprocessing of plutonium _ essential elements in producing nuclear weapons.

 

UNESCO: World Still Has Long Way To Go To Achieve Education For All 7

Despite significant efforts to increase resources, and record levels of children going to school, many drop out before the fifth grade or graduate without mastering even a minimum set of cognitive skills, threatening global educational goals set in 2000, according to a new United Nations-backed report.

"Overcrowded classes, poorly qualified teachers and ill-equipped schools with scant learning materials remain all too familiar pictures in many countries," the Director-General of the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), Koïchiro Matsuura, said.

"Yet, achieving education for all fundamentally relies on assuring decent quality: what children learn and how they learn can make or break their school experience and their subsequent opportunities in life," he added of the 2005 Education for All Global Monitoring Report launched on 8 November in Brasilia.

The study finds that more children are going to school than ever before and that significant efforts are being made to increase resources, broaden access to school and improve gender parity. But exhaustive analysis of research data shows that the quality of education systems is failing children in many parts of the world, and could prevent many countries from achieving Education for All (EFA) by the target date of 2015.

In one-third of countries with data, for example, less than 75 per cent of students reach grade five. National and international assessments also show that performance levels are very weak in low- and middle-income countries and among disadvantaged groups in some industrialized nations.

The report monitors progress towards the six EFA goals set by over 160 countries at the World Education Forum in 2000 in Dakar. These are: wider access to early childhood care and education; universal primary education; improved youth and adult learning opportunities; a 50 per cent improvement in adult literacy rates; gender equality; and an improvement in all aspects of the quality of education.

The report is prepared by an independent international team based at UNESCO Headquarters in Paris and is funded by UNESCO and a number of bilateral agencies. Its findings will serve as the basis for discussions at the Fourth High-Level Group Meeting on Education for All this week in Brasilia.

According to an index based on indicators for the four most measurable Dakar goals _ universal primary education, adult literacy, education quality (using survival rate of pupils to grade 5 as a proxy) and gender parity _ 41 of 127 countries studied are relatively close to achieving the goals. They comprise mainly industrialized and transition countries, but they also include such countries in Latin America and the Caribbean as Argentina, Cuba and Chile together with five small island States.

Another 51 countries, headed by Romania, Bulgaria and Costa Rica and including many Arab States and Latin American countries are well on the way to achieving some of the goals, but are being held back by slow progress on others, notably quality.

A third group of 35 countries, 22 of them in sub-Saharan Africa, but also including the high population countries of Bangladesh, India and Pakistan, are "very far from achieving the goals," with "multiple challenges to tackle simultaneously if EFA is to be assured."

 

UNICEF Calls On Nations To Overcome Hurdles To Gender Equality In Education 8

Acknowledging that HIV/AIDS, conflict and deepening poverty have eroded gains in enrolling more girls in school in many countries, the head of the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) has called on nations to respect promises made to ensure that girls and boys receive the same educational opportunities.

"We must not allow the promise of education for all to become another broken promise," Executive Director Carol Bellamy told the high-level meeting on Education for All, convened annually by the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and its partners, on 8 November in Brasilia, Brazil.

"We come up with a plan of action to make a radical breakthrough in countries where efforts are failing, and we must implement them as rapidly as possible," she added, outlining a five-point agenda.

The five points include: sending supplies and services to those countries where enrolment levels have been stagnating for decades; urging governments to abolish school fees and other costs where deepening poverty combines with a rising populating of children orphaned or made vulnerable by HIV/AIDS; and establishing standards for quality experiences and quality learning as an integral part of the new education systems, "so we do not have to continue fixing schools without water or toilets, schools that do not provide the necessary resources for teachers and learners, or schools that fail to create a welcoming environment for quality learning."

The other points are: anticipating and pre-empting crisis, as well as addressing emergencies and dealing with post-conflict situations in countries that are sliding towards crisis, are actually in a state of emergency, or in transition from emergency to development; and identifying countries which appear to be doing well but in which national averages mask pockets of serious discrimination and give rise to complacency in the form of wider gender discrimination in society.

UNICEF considers eliminating gender disparity in primary and secondary education by 2005 an essential step toward education for all children.

"All children have a right to schooling and all the opportunity that education provides," Ms. Bellamy said. "Children must no longer be denied an education simply because they are girls, or live in rural communities, or are from poor families or belong to minority population groups."

 

Lack Of Energy Services For Poor Could Doom Development Goals, UN Experts Warn 9

Many developing nations will fail to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) if they do not take solid steps to ensure the availability of energy services to the poor, United Nations experts on sustainable development warned on 10 November.

"Energy with business as usual will not lead to achieving the Millennium Development Goals," Susan McDade, a manager for a sustainable energy project of the UN Development Programme (UNDP), said at a press briefing in New York. Citing two studies by UNDP and the UN Millennium Project, which are due to be released later this year, she stressed that access to modern energy services could have a decisive impact on reducing poverty.

The studies, along with the International Energy Agency's (IEA) newly released "World Energy Outlook 2004," also suggest that meeting the MDGs will demand modern energy services for over half a billion people by 2015.

"These findings underscore the danger of overlooking energy's role in human development," said 

Ms. McDade, pointing out that almost 1.6 billion people in developing countries live without electricity in their homes.

According to UNDP, nearly one third of the world's population depends on dung, firewood and agricultural residues for cooking and heating. Experts say rural women and their children bare the brunt of this harsh reality.

"Day in and day out, rural women spend hours at a time gathering fuel-wood, inefficiently processing food and inhaling smoke from wood-fired cooking stoves," said Ms. McDade, who said she wondered why the international community had failed to set specific targets for the availability of energy services as part of its efforts to achieve the MDGs.

"For these women and their families, dependence on traditional fuels and fuel technologies barely allows fulfilment of the basic human needs of nutrition, warmth and lighting, let alone the opportunity for more productive activities," she added.

UNDP suggests that scaling up rural energy services can be a far more effective means of fighting poverty than previously thought. A recent study on Mali shows that mechanical power can help increase women's income by an average of 50 per cent and create conditions for better health and education.

The IEA estimates that eradicating extreme poverty by 2015 would imply that more than 700 million people will have to switch from using traditional biomass fuel to more efficient and clean commercial fuels. According to it report, halving the proportion of people living on less than a dollar a day would require electricity for an additional 600 million people - mostly in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa.

Vijay Modi, a Columbia University professor and author of an upcoming UN Millennium Project study who also addressed the news conference, estimated that achieving the MDGs would require an annual average of $20 billion of investment in the development of energy infrastructure and services.

"Energy services are a missing MDG," he said. "This requires a concerted and decisive international effort."

 

UNICEF: Asian Countries Report On Progress In Fighting Child Sexual Exploitation 10

Three years after Asian countries committed themselves to fighting the commercial sexual exploitation of children, new initiatives in the region are leading the way in countering the scourge, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) said on 10 November.

Representatives from more than 20 East Asian and Pacific countries met over three days in Bangkok to report on new measures and improvements to existing procedures designed to protect youngsters, help victims and punish exploiters.

The meeting was a follow up to the 2001 East Asia and Pacific Regional Consultation against Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children, which was held to provide input to the World Congress on that topic held later that year in Yokohama, Japan.

Among the regional efforts is the world's first multi-country Memorandum of Understanding against trafficking, which covers the prevention of trafficking; the repatriation, rehabilitation and sensitive treatment of victims; and the extradition and prosecution of exploiters. Participants in the agreement, signed last month in Myanmar, include Cambodia, China, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam.

Despite such progress, UNICEF said, the lack of reliable data remains a major obstacle to implementing well-targeted and effective measures to stop the sex trade in children. New research designed to address this shortcoming and better support the need for monitoring was also presented and discussed at the conference.

The meeting also considered strategies to stop the exponential rise in child pornography on the Internet, which, through the development of new technologies such as digital cameras and mobile phones, has increased the spread of such images.

 

UN Report: Research Into Health Delivery Systems Could Cut Global Deaths In Half 11

Integrating providers of reproductive health services into the battle against HIV infection could bring the campaign to millions of women who are now at the centre of the global pandemic but fall through gaps in preventive efforts, according to a new United Nations analysis published on 10 November.

"Integrating HIV and other reproductive health services seems obvious, but is often not recognized at the programme and policy level," said Purnima Mane, Director for Social Mobilization and Information for the Joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS).

"Policymakers and programme managers need to work together to find ways to deliver these inherently interrelated services more efficiently, more effectively _ and in a more coordinated manner _ to address the increasing global threat of HIV to women."

The analysis, "The Role of Reproductive Health Providers in Preventing HIV," is published jointly by The Alan Guttmacher Institute (AGI), a United States non-profit organization, and UNAIDS, with the collaboration of the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) and the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF).

It calls for overcoming financial shortfalls and resistance to public acknowledgement of women's and adolescents' sexuality in order to help reproductive health providers reach their full potential in closing the gap in HIV prevention, noting that they already offer a wide range of services to millions of women and are thus a largely untapped source as front-line providers of HIV prevention services.

It stresses that they already have access to millions of high risk people, including reproductive age women, who account for nearly half of adults living with HIV worldwide; young people between 15 and 24, who account for half of all new cases of HIV; and expectant and new mothers, who account for 630,000 infants worldwide infected with HIV during their mother's pregnancy, labour and delivery.

In addition to their ability to reach out to women, and increasingly to adolescents and men, the providers have the knowledge and skills upon which stepped-up interventions for HIV prevention could be built, it says.

Adequate resources are key to increasing their ability to offer three key HIV prevention services: HIV counselling and testing and condom promotion in a setting where many women and adolescents, in particular, are already comfortable; prevention, diagnosis and treatment of sexually transmitted infections that would otherwise increase the risk of HIV transmission; and assistance to HIV-positive women for the prevention of unwanted pregnancies, thus reducing the chances of transmission to infants.

 

UN Analysis Urges Integrating Reproductive Health And HIV Prevention Campaigns 12

Research into health systems could prevent half of all global deaths with simple and cost-effective measures, producing dramatic improvements in health worldwide by translating scientific knowledge into action on the ground, according to a new United Nations report released on 10 November.

The World Health Organization (WHO) World Report on Knowledge for Better Health: Strengthening Health Systems argues that science must help to improve public health delivery systems and should not be confined to producing drugs, diagnostics, vaccines and medical devices.

In Africa, for example, it is estimated that only between 2 per cent and 15 per cent of children slept under bed-nets in 2001 _ a simple, effective and proven method to prevent malaria.

Biomedical discoveries cannot improve people's health without research to find out how to apply them within different health systems and diverse political and social contexts, thus ensuring that they reach those who need them the most by bridging the so-called "know-do" gap, it stresses. But at present the field attracts less than one tenth of 1 per cent of total health expenditure in low-income countries.

"There is a sense that science can do more, especially for public health," WHO Director-General Lee Jong-wook said. "There is a gap between today's scientific advances and their application between what we know and what is actually being done. Health systems are under severe pressure and there is an urgent need to generate knowledge for strengthening and improving them."

Health systems research suffers from a poor image and has been under-funded compared to biomedical research despite widespread recognition of its importance. The lack of attention given to this field is also reflected in the fact that only 0.7 per cent of scientific articles published globally in 2000 were in the area of health systems research.

"We need to put a stronger emphasis on translating knowledge into actions _ health systems research will help us to bridge this `know-do' gap," said Tikki Pang, WHO Director for Research Policy and Cooperation, who coordinated the team of 12 internationally prominent health researchers in both developed and developing countries who developed the 143-page study over 18 months.

"Also, that research is an investment, not a cost," Dr. Pang added.

Ministers of Health from more than 30 nations as well as representatives of research institutions, academia, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), pharmaceutical companies and various key stakeholders in health/medical research will gather from 16 to 20 November in Mexico City in a Ministerial Summit on Health Research, hosted by WHO and the Mexican Government, to focus on the "know-do gap."

 

UN Launches 2005 International Year Of Sport And Physical Education 13

Launching the International Year of Sport and Physical Education, United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan on 5 November said athletics are a good vehicle for promoting education, health, development and peace as part of the overall effort to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

"Sport is a universal language," Mr. Annan told a press briefing in New York on the launch of the Year, which will be observed throughout 2005. "At its best it can bring people together, no matter what their origin, background, religious beliefs or economic status.

"And when young people participate in sports or have access to physical education, they can experience real exhilaration even as they learn the ideals of teamwork and tolerance."

The MDGs are a set of eight time-bound targets for dealing with the world's problems, such as halving extreme poverty and hunger, ensuring universal education and fighting the spread of diseases such as HIV/AIDS and malaria, all by 2015.

Adolf Ogi, the Secretary-General's Special Adviser on Sport for Peace and Development, told journalists that sports are critical to improving the world.

"Sport can bridge difficulties. Sport can bridge cultures. Sport can bridge conflicts. Sport is the best school of life," he said. "We need desperately this international year…to spread the message that sport offers values to the younger generation."

Joining the UN officials were top-ranked tennis player Roger Federer of Switzerland and Margaret Okayo of Kenya, winner of the 2003 New York City Marathon.

Both expressed their enthusiasm for the International Year and agreed with the importance of sports for the development of children. They also described assistance programmes they supported in South Africa and Kenya.

 

UNEP: World Must Act Now To Forestall Staggering Threat From Global Warming 14

The Arctic climate is warming rapidly, much larger changes are in store due to increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases from human activity and the global impact such as rising sea levels will be "staggering," presenting one of the most serious threats to humankind, the United Nations environment agency warned on 8 November.

"With these facts before us, we need, more than ever before, a concerted and renewed international efforts to combat the climate change problem," Klaus Toepfer, Executive Director of the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) said in a statement citing a newly released report by an international team of 300 scientists.

The Arctic Climate Impact Assessment (ACIA), an unprecedented four-year scientific study, confirms earlier worrying research on global warming. Increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases are projected to contribute to additional warming of 3 to 9 degrees over the next 100 years and developing countries will suffer most.

"The Arctic region, the barometer on global climate change, is like an environmental early warning system for the world," Mr. Toepfer said. "What happens there is of concern for everyone because Arctic warming and its consequences have worldwide implications." 

Among its many detailed findings the ACIA, commissioned by the Arctic Council, a high-level intergovernmental forum comprising Canada, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Russia, Sweden and the United States, predicts that Arctic vegetation zones and animal species will be affected.

Retreating sea ice is expected to reduce the habitat for polar bears, walrus, ice-inhabiting seals and marine birds, threatening some species with extinction. Such changes will also affect many indigenous communities who depend on such animals, not only for food, but also as the basis for cultural and social identity. 

Beyond the region, as Arctic glaciers melt and the permafrost thaws, developing countries with limited means to adapt to environmental change will suffer most.

Mr. Toepfer praised Russia's recent decision to ratify the Kyoto Protocol on climate change as an important step in the international fight to check global warming but warned: "As the ACIA reveals the battle is far from over.

"I want to congratulate the Arctic Council for their decision to commission the report," he added. "We now have a clear scientific consensus that the Arctic is warming and the resulting affects on global climate will be serious."

 

Malaysian Expert Appointed To Senior Post In UN Economic Affairs Department 15

A Malaysian expert in political economics and development has been appointed to a senior post in the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA) to lead and coordinate statistical demographic and macroeconomic data gathering and analysis.

Jomo Kwame Sundaram will be the Assistant Secretary-General on Economic Development, a new post created this year as part of Secretary-General Kofi Annan's reform to support policy coherence and management in the Department. He will also serve as the senior adviser to Jose Antonio Ocampo, Under-Secretary-General for Economic Affairs.

Mr. Sundaram is currently a Visiting Senior Research Fellow at the Asia Research Institute at the National University of Singapore, and Professor in the Applied Economics Department at the University of Malaya in Kuala Lumpur.