Global Voices Online

Taiwan's Foreign Minister announced its recognition of Kosovo as an independent country, China Foreign Affair spoke person responded that Taiwan is not in position to give “recognition” to Kosovo. Bonnae from 1510.com pointed out that Kosovo's independence has put China into an embarrassing situation and Taiwan's attitude is also hitting Chinese government's nerve (zh).

Recent Links also in East Asia

Anup Kaphle wrote about his experience in Afghanistan in a post titled Helmand: A Nepalese View at The Atlantic. He compared the war torn nation with his homeland Nepal and found many similarities.

Lawyer and blogger raymiyatake expresses his doubts [ja] over the election of Japanese diplomat Yukiya Amano as director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). First, he says, Amano was supported by only 23 nations out of 35. Second, he points out the difficult situation that the Agency is dealing with, at present, and the “unfairness” of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which should be applied also to the five members already recognized as possessing nuclear power. Lastly, he suggests that instead of promoting a “pacific use” of nuclear energy, this should be replaced with clean energy sources (such as the geothermal or the aeolian ones).

This year is Mobile Suit Gundam's 30th birthday.
While a giant statue of the robot stands in Odaiba's park (in the Tokyo bay area), in a theatre of northern Tokyo, blogger/actress Rie Takahashi [ja] and her crew pay tribute to the animated television series in stage play Robot.