• Title/Summary/Keyword: Middle East security

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An investigation on the relationship between religion and supports for suicide attacks among citizens in Egypt, Pakistan, and Morocco (종교와 자살테러에 대한 지지의 관계분석: 이집트, 파키스탄, 모로코의 사회조사데이터를 근거로)

  • Kim, Eun-Young
    • Korean Security Journal
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    • no.43
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    • pp.37-65
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    • 2015
  • There has been discussions and investigation on the nexus between religion and citizen's supports for suicide attacks and terrorist groups conducting such acts. In terms of the relationship, there were two potent hypotheses attempting to explain the process and mechanism of the relationship: religious belief hypothesis and coalitional commitment hypothesis. previous studies examined these hypotheses have been carried out across different cultural, religious, and political contexts. Until today, however, there are still lack of concrete evidence, which is generated from empirical studies, supportive evidence for any of these hypotheses. Therefor this study aims to investigate the association between religion and popular support for suicide attacks by using a survey data collected from three middle east countries, Egypt, Morocco, and Pakistan. In analysis, a step-wised regression analysis conducted with a set of variety of variables considered to be related with the association. This study found that variables reflecting religious belief hypothesis, such as prayer to God, religious devotion were unrelated to support for suicide attacks. Yet, prayer time predicted reduced supports for suicide attacks. Further, attendance at religious services, thought to enhance coalitional commitment, predicted support for suicide attacks. Yet, it showed negative association with support for suicide attacks. These findings suggest that regular attendance at religious services and regular prayer have combined effects reducing on the willing to support for suicide martyrdom. However, this study findings affirmatively support for neigher religious belief hypothesis nor coalitional commitment hypothesis. Instead, it suggests the needs for further research examination on the relationship as well as corrections of these hypotheses. Finally, Implications for the research findings for preventing suicide attacks are discussed.

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A study on the recent trends of Islamic extremism in Indonesia (인도네시아 이슬람 극단주의 실태 연구)

  • Yun, Min-Woo
    • Korean Security Journal
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    • no.50
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    • pp.175-206
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    • 2017
  • The current study described the history of Islamic extremism and the recent expansion of international Islamic extremism in Indonesia. For doing so, both content analysis of the existing written documents and qualitative interviews were conducted. For the content analysis, media reports and research articles were collected and utilized. For qualitative interviews, Indonesian students and workers in Korea, Korean spouses married to Indonesian, and Korean missionaries in Indonesia were contacted and interviewed. Qualitative interview was conducted between 30 minutes and 2 hours. On the spot, interviews were recorded and later transcribed into written documents. Due to the difficulty of identification of population and the uneasiness of accessability to th study subjects, convenient sampling and snowball sampling were used. According to the results, Islamic extremism in Indonesia had a deep historical root and generally shared similar historical experience with other muslim countries such as Afghanistan, Pakistan, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia where Islamic extremism was deeply rooted in. That is, Islamic extremism began as a reaction to the western imperialism, after independence, Islamic extremism elements were marginalized in the process of construction of the modern nation-state, and Islamic extremist movement was radicalized and became violent during the Soviet-Afghan War. In addition, after 9.11, Islamic extremism in Indonesia was connected to international Islamic extremism network and integrated into such global movement. Such a historical development of Indonesian Islamic extremism was quite organized and robust. Meanwhile, the eastward infiltration and expansion of international Islamic extremism such as IS and Al Qaeda was observed in Indonesia. Particularly, such a worrisome expansion was more clearly visible in the marginalized and underdeveloped countrysides in Indonesia. Such expansion in Indonesia could negatively affect on the security of South Korea. Geographically, Indonesia is proximate to South Korea. This geographical proximity could be a direct security threat to the Korean society, as if Islamic extremism in North Africa and Middle East becomes a direct security threat to Europe. Considering the presence of a large size of Indonesian immigrant workers and communities in South Korea, such a concern is very realistic. The arrest of an Indonesian Islamic extremism supporter in November, 2016, could be a harbinger of the coming trend of Islamic extremism expansion inside South Korea. The Indonesian Islamic community in South Korea could be a passage of Indonesian Islamic extremism into the South Korean society. In this context, it is timely and necessary to pay an attention to the recent trend of Islamic extremism expansion in Indonesia.

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The Status and Prospect of CTL (Coal-to-Liquid) (CTL(Coal-to-Liquid) 기술 현황)

  • Jung, Heon;Yang, Jung-Il;Kim, Hak-Joo;Chun, Dong-Hyun
    • Journal of Energy Engineering
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    • v.16 no.2
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    • pp.64-72
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    • 2007
  • During the 2nd World War, several Coal-to-Liquid (CTL) plants were operated in Germany and England to convert coal to large volumes of liquid fuel. Big oil fields discovered in the Middle East after the war supplied crude oil at the low price and all CTL plants were forced to shut down. However, South Africa (Sasol) built a CTL plant in 1955 and 2 more plants afterward and the current production of coal-derived synfuel reached 150,000 bbl/day. Recently, the sustained high crude oil price and the fear of the "peak oil" rejuvenated the interest of CTL and several CTL projects are in progress. China established a plan to build CTL plants with the total capacity of 30 million tons of synfuel per year by 2030. China is building a direct coal liquefaction plant which is scheduled to produce 20,000bbl/day of synfuel in 2008. There are 8 CTL projects in USA either in the planning stage or in the ground-breaking stage. CTL projects are also carried out in Australia, Philippines, New Zealand, Indonesia and India. Korea needs to approach the CTL project in the perspective of the national energy security. In this paper, the history, the status, current activities and the prospect of CTL are described.

A Study of Power Law Distribution of Korean Disaster and Identification of Focusing Events (한국 재난의 멱함수분포와 사회적 충격사건에 관한 연구)

  • Kim, Yongkyun;Kim, Sang Pil;Cho, Hyoung-Sig;Sohn, Hong-Gyoo
    • KSCE Journal of Civil and Environmental Engineering Research
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    • v.36 no.1
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    • pp.181-190
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    • 2016
  • Improvements in disaster management has become a global necessity because the magnitude of disasters is intensifying in parallel with the increased disaster damage. The disaster risk in Korea is also increasing due to the emergence of new types of disaster; such as the Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus, the increase of complex disasters, and the heightened probability of a catastrophic event due to climate change. This paper aimed to identify the disaster loss-frequency relationship from 1948 to 2014 in Korea by using four types of variables. In addition, this paper found major disasters that resulted in the reformation of disaster response organizations, and inputted the deaths and economic loss attributed to those disasters into the disaster loss-frequency graph. The research result substantiated that the disaster loss-frequency relationship in Korea follows the Power Law and found the coefficients of each Power Function. Additionally, this paper found that most of the reformations of disaster response organizations happened after major disasters that concentrated societies attention and anger due to the high human and economic impact; such events are labelled as "focusing events." These focusing events, with the characteristics of a low probability and high impact, are located in the long tail of the Power Law Distribution. This paper suggests that the effective public policy for disaster response needs to be developed by paying attention to 'low probability and high impact' focusing events that are located in the long tail of the Power Law Distribution.

Eurasian Naval Power on Display: Sino-Russian Naval Exercises under Presidents Xi and Putin (유라시아 지역의 해군 전력 과시: 시진핑 주석과 푸틴 대통령 체제 하에 펼쳐지는 중러 해상합동훈련)

  • Richard Weitz
    • Maritime Security
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    • v.5 no.1
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    • pp.1-53
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    • 2022
  • One manifestation of the contemporary era of renewed great power competition has been the deepening relationship between China and Russia. Their strengthening military ties, notwithstanding their lack of a formal defense alliance, have been especially striking. Since China and Russia deploy two of the world's most powerful navies, their growing maritime cooperation has been one of the most significant international security developments of recent years. The Sino-Russian naval exercises, involving varying platforms and locations, have built on years of high-level personnel exchanges, large Russian weapons sales to China, the Sino-Russia Treaty of Friendship, and other forms of cooperation. Though the joint Sino-Russian naval drills began soon after Beijing and Moscow ended their Cold War confrontation, these exercises have become much more important during the last decade, essentially becoming a core pillar of their expanding defense partnership. China and Russia now conduct more naval exercises in more places and with more types of weapons systems than ever before. In the future, Chinese and Russian maritime drills will likely encompass new locations, capabilities, and partners-including possibly the Arctic, hypersonic delivery systems, and novel African, Asian, and Middle East partners-as well as continue such recent innovations as conducting joint naval patrols and combined arms maritime drills. China and Russia pursue several objectives through their bilateral naval cooperation. The Treaty of Good-Neighborliness and Friendly Cooperation Between the People's Republic of China and the Russian Federation lacks a mutual defense clause, but does provide for consultations about common threats. The naval exercises, which rehearse non-traditional along with traditional missions (e.g., counter-piracy and humanitarian relief as well as with high-end warfighting), provide a means to enhance their response to such mutual challenges through coordinated military activities. Though the exercises may not realize substantial interoperability gains regarding combat capabilities, the drills do highlight to foreign audiences the Sino-Russian capacity to project coordinated naval power globally. This messaging is important given the reliance of China and Russia on the world's oceans for trade and the two countries' maritime territorial disputes with other countries. The exercises can also improve their national military capabilities as well as help them learn more about the tactics, techniques, and procedures of each other. The rising Chinese Navy especially benefits from working with the Russian armed forces, which have more experience conducting maritime missions, particularly in combat operations involving multiple combat arms, than the People's Liberation Army (PLA). On the negative side, these exercises, by enhancing their combat capabilities, may make Chinese and Russian policymakers more willing to employ military force or run escalatory risks in confrontations with other states. All these impacts are amplified in Northeast Asia, where the Chinese and Russian navies conduct most of their joint exercises. Northeast Asia has become an area of intensifying maritime confrontations involving China and Russia against the United States and Japan, with South Korea situated uneasily between them. The growing ties between the Chinese and Russian navies have complicated South Korean-U.S. military planning, diverted resources from concentrating against North Korea, and worsened the regional security environment. Naval planners in the United States, South Korea, and Japan will increasingly need to consider scenarios involving both the Chinese and Russian navies. For example, South Korean and U.S. policymakers need to prepare for situations in which coordinated Chinese and Russian military aggression overtaxes the Pentagon, obligating the South Korean Navy to rapidly backfill for any U.S.-allied security gaps that arise on the Korean Peninsula. Potentially reinforcing Chinese and Russian naval support to North Korea in a maritime confrontation with South Korea and its allies would present another serious challenge. Building on the commitment of Japan and South Korea to strengthen security ties, future exercises involving Japan, South Korea, and the United States should expand to consider these potential contingencies.

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The current state and prospects of travel business development under the COVID-19 pandemic

  • Tkachenko, Tetiana;Pryhara, Olha;Zatsepina, Nataly;Bryk, Stepan;Holubets, Iryna;Havryliuk, Alla
    • International Journal of Computer Science & Network Security
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    • v.21 no.12spc
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    • pp.664-674
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    • 2021
  • The relevance of this scientific research is determined by the negative impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the current trends and dynamics of world tourism development. This article aims to identify patterns of development of the modern tourist market, analysis of problems and prospects of development in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. Materials and methods. General scientific methods and methods of research are used in the work: analysis, synthesis, comparison, analysis of statistical data. The analysis of the viewpoints of foreign and domestic authors on the research of the international tourist market allowed us to substantiate the actual directions of tourism development due to the influence of negative factors connected with the spread of a new coronavirus infection COVID-19. Economic-statistical, abstract-logical, and economic-mathematical methods of research were used during the process of study and data processing. Results. The analysis of the current state of the tourist market by world regions was carried out. It was found that tourism is one of the most affected sectors from COVID-19, as, by the end of 2020, the total number of tourist arrivals in the world decreased by 74% compared to the same period in 2019. The consequence of this decline was a loss of total global tourism revenues by the end of 2020, which equaled $1.3 trillion. 27% of all destinations are completely closed to international tourism. At the end of 2020, the economy of international tourism has shrunk by about 80%. In 2020 the world traveled 98 million fewer people (-83%) relative to the same period last year. Tourism was hit hardest by the pandemic in the Asia-Pacific region, where travel restrictions are as strict as possible. International arrivals in this region fell by 84% (300 million). The Middle East and Africa recorded declines of 75 and 70 percent. Despite a small and short-lived recovery in the summer of 2020, Europe lost 71% of the tourist flow, with the European continent recording the largest drop in absolute terms compared with 2019, 500 million. In North and South America, foreign arrivals declined. It is revealed that a significant decrease in tourist flows leads to a massive loss of jobs, a sharp decline in foreign exchange earnings and taxes, which limits the ability of states to support the tourism industry. Three possible scenarios of exit of the tourist industry from the crisis, reflecting the most probable changes of monthly tourist flows, are considered. The characteristics of respondents from Ukraine, Germany, and the USA and their attitude to travel depending on gender, age, education level, professional status, and monthly income are presented. About 57% of respondents from Ukraine, Poland, and the United States were planning a tourist trip in 2021. Note that people with higher or secondary education were more willing to plan such a trip. The results of the empirical study confirm that interest in domestic tourism has increased significantly in 2021. The regression model of dependence of the number of domestic tourist trips on the example of Ukraine with time tendency (t) and seasonal variations (Turˆt = 7288,498 - 20,58t - 410,88∑5) it forecast for 2020, which allows stabilizing the process of tourist trips after the pandemic to use this model to forecast for any country. Discussion. We should emphasize the seriousness of the COVID-19 pandemic and the fact that many experts and scientists believe in the long-term recovery of the tourism industry. In our opinion, the governments of the countries need to refocus on domestic tourism and deal with infrastructure development, search for new niches, formats, formation of new package deals in new - domestic - segment (new products' development (tourist routes, exhibitions, sightseeing programs, special rehabilitation programs after COVID) -19 in sanatoriums, etc.); creation of individual offers for different target audiences). Conclusions. Thus, the identified trends are associated with a decrease in the number of tourist flows, the negative impact of the pandemic on employment and income from tourism activities. International tourism needs two to four years before it returns to the level of 2019.

A Study on the Cost Reduction Strategy of Aviation Ammunition (항공탄약 구매 비용 절감 방안에 관한 연구)

  • Kim, Yu-Hyun;Eom, Jung-Ho
    • Journal of National Security and Military Science
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    • s.15
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    • pp.57-86
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    • 2018
  • The ROKAF has been training for a number of exercise for victory in the war, but the lack of aviation ammunition has become a big issue every year. However, due to the limitation of defense resources, there are many difficulties in securing and stockpiling ammunition for the war readiness. Therefore, there is a need to find a way to secure aviation ammunition for war readiness in a more economical way, so In this study, we analyze the precedent research case and the case of the reduction of the purchase cost of weapon system of other countries, and then I have suggested a plan that is appropriate for our situation. As a result of examining previous research cases for this study, there were data that KIDA studied in 2012, Precision-guided weapons acquisition cost reduction measures pursued by US Air Force And the use of procurement agencies that are being implemented by NATO member countries. Based on this study, the following four measures were proposed to reduce the purchase cost of aviation ammunition. First, the mutual aid support agreement was developed to sign the ammunition joint operation agreement. Second, join the NATO Support & Procurement Agency (NSPA) Third, it builds a purchasing community centered on the countries operating the same ammunition Fourth, participating in the US Air Force's new purchase plan for ammunition and purchase it jointly. The main contents of these four measures are as follows. 1. the mutual aid support agreement was developed to sign the ammunition joint operation agreement. Korea has signed agreements on mutual logistics support with 14 countries including the United States, Israel, Indonesia, Singapore, Australia, and Taiwan. The main purpose of these agreements is mutual support of munitions and materials, also supporting the training of the peace time and promoting exchange and cooperation. However, it is expected that there will be many difficulties in requesting or supporting mutual support in actual situation because the target or scope of mutual aid of ammunition is not clearly specified. Thus, a separate agreement on the mutual co-operation of more specific and expanded concepts of aviation ammunition is needed based on the current mutual aid support agreements 2. join the NATO Support & Procurement Agency (NSPA) In the case of NATO, there is a system in which member countries purchase munitions at a low cost using munitions purchase agencies. It is the NATO Purchasing Agency (NSPA) whose mission is to receive the purchasing requirements of the Member Nations and to purchase them quickly and efficiently and effectively to the Member Nations. NSPA's business includes the Ammunition Support Partnership (ASP), which provides ammunition purchase and disarming services. Although Korea is not a member of NATO, NSPA is gradually expanding the scope of joint procurement of munitions, and it is expected that Korea will be able to join as a member. 3. it builds a purchasing community centered on the countries operating the same ammunition By benchmarking the NSPA system, this study suggested ways to build a purchasing community with countries such as Southeast Asia, Australia, and the Middle East. First, it is necessary to review prospectively how to purchase ammunition by constructing ammunition purchasing community centered on countries using same kind of ammunition. 4. participating in the US Air Force's new purchase plan for ammunition When developing or purchasing weapons systems, joint participation by several countries can reduce acquisition costs. Therefore, if the US Air Force is planning to acquire aviation ammunition by applying it to the purchase of aviation ammunition, we will be able to significantly reduce the purchase cost by participating in this plan. Finally, there are some limitations to the method presented in this study, but starting from this study, I hope that the research on these methods will be actively pursued in the future.

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Global Rice Production, Consumption and Trade: Trends and Future Directions

  • Bhandari, Humnath
    • Proceedings of the Korean Society of Crop Science Conference
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    • 2019.09a
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    • pp.5-5
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    • 2019
  • The objectives of this paper are (i) to analyze past trends and future directions of rice production, consumption and trade across the world and (ii) to discuss emerging challenges and future directions in the global rice industry. Rice is a staple food of over half of the world's 7.7 billion people. It is an important economic, social, political, and cultural commodity in most Asian countries. Rice is the $1^{st}$ most widely consumed, $2^{nd}$ largely produced, and $3^{rd}$ most widely grown food crop in the world. It was cultivated by 144 million farms in over 100 countries with harvested area of over 163 million ha producing about 745 million tons paddy in 2018. About 90% of the total rice is produced in Asia. China and India, the biggest rice producers, account for over half of the world's rice production. Between 1960 and 2018, world rice production increased over threefold from 221 to 745 million tons (2.1% per year) due to area expansion from 120 to 163 million ha (0.5% per year) and paddy yield increase from 1.8 to 4.6 t/ha (1.6% per year). The Green Revolution led massive increase in rice production prevented famines, provided food for millions of people, reduced poverty and hunger, and improved livelihoods of millions of Asians. The future increase in rice production must come from yield increase as the scope for area expansion is limited. Rice is the most widely consumed food crop. The world's average per capita milled rice consumption is 64 kilograms providing 19% of daily calories. Asia accounted for 84% of global consumption followed by Africa (7%), South America (3%), and the Middle East (2%). Asia's per capita rice consumption is 100 kilograms per year providing 28% of daily calories. The global and Asian per capita consumption increased from the 1960s to the 1990s but stable afterward. The per capita rice consumption is expected to decline in Asia but increase outside Asia especially in Africa in the future. The total milled rice consumption was about 490 million tons in 2018 and projected to reach 550 million tons by 2030 and 590 million tons by 2040. Rice is thinly traded in international market because it is a highly protected commodity. Only about 9% of the total production is traded in global rice market. However, the volume of global rice trade has increased over six-fold from 7.5 to 46.5 million tons between the 1960s and 2018. A relatively small number of exporting countries interact with a large number of importing countries. The top five rice exporting countries are India, Thailand, Vietnam, Pakistan, and China accounting for 74% of the global rice export. The top five rice importing countries are China, Philippines, Nigeria, European Union and Saudi Arabia accounting for 26% of the global rice import. Within rice varieties, Japonica rice accounts for the highest share of the global rice trade (about 12%) followed by Basmati rice (about 10%). The high concentration of exports to a few countries makes international rice market vulnerable to supply disruptions in exporting countries, leading to higher world prices of rice. The export price of Thai 5% broken rice increased from 198 US$/ton in 2000 to 421 US$/ton in 2018. The volumes of trade and rice prices in the global market are expected to increase in the future. The major future challenges of the rice industry are increasing demand due to population growth, rising demand in Africa, economic growth and diet diversification, competition for natural resources (land and water), labor scarcity, climate change and natural hazards, poverty and inequality, hunger and malnutrition, urbanization, low income in rice farming, yield saturation, aging of farmers, feminization of agriculture, health and environmental concerns, improving value chains, and shifting donor priorities away from agriculture. At the same time, new opportunities are available due to access to new technologies, increased investment by the private sector, and increased global partnership. More investment in rice research and development is needed to develop and disseminate innovative technologies and practices to overcome problems and ensure food and nutrition security of the future population.

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