News + Media

Robert Murray

News@E40

July 9, 2018

Celebrating Robert Murray, a colleague and friend

The Center hosted a retirement party for Robert Murray on June 28. Bob, as he was known at CIS, served as the Center’s administrative officer for seventeen years. The event was as celebratory as it was poignant.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo arrives at Nom Bar International Airport in Hanoi on July 8, 2018. Pompeo shrugged off North Korean accusations of "gangster-like" behavior and said sanctions on Pyongyang would only be lifted with "final" denuclearization. (Andrew Harnik/AFP/Getty Images)

In the News

July 9, 2018

Heated rhetoric from North Korea

Lisa MullinsWBUR Here & Now

President Trump heads to Europe this week for the NATO summit after a weekend that featured heated rhetoric from North Korea on denuclearization. Jim Walsh weighs in on Here & Now.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo arrived in Pyongyang, on Friday, in the first negotiations since the historic June 12th summit between President Trump and Kim Jong Un.

In the News

July 8, 2018

North Korea declares US diplomacy “gangster-like”

Robin WrightThe New Yorker

Vipin Narang described the criticism as a “negotiating tactic.” But he also cautioned, in a tweet, that the Kim regime is signalling “… (1) We aren’t unilaterally disarming…(2) Any other stuff short of that? Gonna cost you chief…”

 An increasingly harsh approach to dissent has created a ‘climate of fear,’ says Audrey Li Photo: AFP/Wang Zhao

Analysis + Opinion

July 6, 2018

More and more, overseas Chinese fear the long arm of Beijing

Audrey Jiajia LiInkstone

When Audrey Jiajia Li was invited to host a panel at a conference in Singapore, she didn’t expect to be shouted at for being too negative on China. But it’s part of a disturbing trend of Chinese being unable to speak their mind overseas, she says.

White House national security adviser John Bolton

In the News

July 2, 2018

US has plan to dismantle North Korea nuclear program within a year: Bolton

The New York Times

The North could try to trade sites and technology that have relatively low values in exchange for sanctions relief, while covertly operating facilities required to advance key capabilities, SSP's Vipin Narang said. What it suggests is that Kim has no intention of surrendering his nuclear weapons.” 

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un

In the News

July 2, 2018

Is North Korea secretly continuing its nuclear programme?

Andreas IllmerBBC News

You can imagine a North Korean strategy where without a full disclosure of all their facilities they can offer to shut down some of the known sites in order to get sanctions relief, SSPs Vipin Narang explains to BBC News. At the same time they would clandestinely push ahead at the secret sites.

President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un shake hands on June 12 following their summit in Singapore. (Jonathan Ernst/Reuters)

Analysis + Opinion

June 30, 2018

There are signs North Korea is still working on its nuclear program. Here’s why ‘denuclearization’ is so problematic.

Jane Vaynman and Vipin NarangThe Washington Post

There are signs that North Korea is continuing to improve and expand infrastructure at key nuclear-weapons-related sites, including multiple suspected clandestine sites, and a strategy to deceive the United States about them. And it has yet to raze the Sohae missile test site, as Trump claimed Kim promised to do in Singapore.

New satellite images show North Korea has made rapid improvements to the infrastructure at its Yongbyon Nuclear Scientific Research Center.

In the News

June 27, 2018

Satellite images show North Korea upgrading nuclear facility

Zachary CohenCNN

North Korea has had a decade-long nuclear testing sequence where they have presumably learned a lot about designs, SSP's Vipin Narang told CNN. They probably do not need full blown tests to go into serial production of warheads.

Siemens trains its next generation of workers at this complex outside Munich.

In the News

June 22, 2018

Rebuilding Germany’s centuries-old vocational program

Russ JuskalianMIT Technology Review

The Ausbildung is widely touted as an example other countries should follow. But it’s struggling to keep up with technological change. But don’t write off the German system just yet. Over the centuries, it “has survived and been adapted to massive changes in technology,” says Kathleen Thelen.

Orkideh Behrouzan

In the News

June 21, 2018

The psycho-politics of wellbeing

Middle East Research and Information Project

CIS affiliate scholar Orkideh Behrouzan speaks about the politics of Iranian mental health and the effects of 40 years of revolution and war and the ways in which a younger generation is forming identities. 

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