With New Ways to Fund Attacks, Al-Qaeda Now a Bigger Threat

Relations between China and Africa appear to have hit a rough patch, with several Chinese nationals and corporations ejected from a number of African countries. The tensions likely will not be long-lasting. Africa needs the aid that China provides, and China, in turn, needs Africa’s natural resources.

GLOBAL BUSINESS SURVEY

Continuing demonstrations and general political unrest aimed at President Mohammed Morsi and his Muslim Brotherhood supporters is taking an increasing toll on the Egyptian economy. Things are not likely to improve this year. Major stock indexes are off amid expectations that the demonstrations are likely to grow in number and intensity.

In choosing Susan Rice to be his next national security advisor, President Barack Obama is putting one of his most trusted advisers in a staff position of great importance. Rice’s authority will be derived from her ability to speak for the president and act on his behalf, while overseeing an often fractious bureaucracy. It also puts her at the apex of all decision-making on foreign affairs and defense. Is she ready?

The civil war in Syria has deepened Lebanon’s notorious political divisions and put efforts to establish a new political system at risk. The divide is so deep that on May 3, the Lebanese parliament voted to postpone new parliamentary elections for the first time since the end of the Lebanese civil war in 1990.

Mexico’s seemingly endless battle against its brutal drug cartels has been complicated by the emergence of civilian militias over the past year. Authorities in some cases have sanctioned the militias, but the fact that they are unregulated puts them at risk of subversion by the same criminal gangs they have vowed to eradicate.