1. If you were North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, which candidate would you hope wins the South Korean presidential election?
2. Will rising global oil prices trigger Kazakhstan-like protests in other nations?
3. Should Central American countries continue to aid the United States in stopping migrant caravans?
4. If the Labour Party were to return to power in Great Britain, should they restore Britain’s membership in the European Union?
5. Is Russia becoming overextended?
6. Should Serbia press forward with its lithium mining plans?
7. Is it too late for Jair Bolsonaro to mount a successful re-election effort?
8. Should revisions be made to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT)?
9. Why is the French Socialist Party struggling to be relevant?
10. Should the Mexican government reject Obrador’s energy policies?
Category: International Extemp Page 10 of 59
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This week’s R&D covers the political unrest in Kazakhstan. Increasing fuel prices provoked protests in the Central Asian nation last week, leading to wider protests against the country’s autocratic government and its economic policies. Kazakhstan’s leadership called in Russian troops to help restore order and to date more than 9,000 people have been detained by authorities. Experts see the problems in Kazakhstan and the resulting issues as another example of Russia trying to enhance its influence over former Soviet republic states.
A War of Words: Kazakhstan, Terrorists, and Protestershttps://t.co/QjLqLaFIir
— The Diplomat (@Diplomat_APAC) January 13, 2022
In Kazakhstan, the violence has eased but questions loom https://t.co/2murPjw2rX pic.twitter.com/d8jozM9MsH
— Al Jazeera English (@AJEnglish) January 12, 2022
Five questions on the troubled country answered by a former American ambassador https://t.co/6U947uCuiF
— Asia Times (@asiatimesonline) January 13, 2022
1. Which candidates will make the French presidential runoff this spring?
2. How can Turkmenistan put an end to the “Gates of Hell” fire?
3. Are Russian concerns about NATO expansion to its border justified?
4. Can the UN save Sudan’s democratic transition?
5. Was Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen’s recent trip to Myanmar helpful or harmful for efforts to resolve the nation’s political crisis?
6. How can Bulgaria reverse its population decline?
7. Is Bosnia falling outside of the West’s orbit?
8. Will street protests in Kazakhstan produce lasting change?
9. Is the refusal of some nations ot sell defense components to Turkey weakening the NATO alliance?
10. How can African nations reduce their reliance on commodities?
1. Will 20222 see the end of the COVID-19 pandemic?
2. Should the international community refuse to release funds to the Taliban government until their human rights record improves?
3. How can Ukraine best prepare to defend itself from a Russian invasion?
4. Is Gambia’s truth commission working?
5. How can the Chinese government encourage its population to spend more in 2022?
6. Are Erdogan’s policies making Turkey’s economic situation worse?
7. Should African countries rely on their neighbors more than the United Nations to put down internal rebellions?
8. How can Boris Johnson reverse his eroding political position?
9. Does Chile need more or less “neoliberalism”?
10. Will Libya be able to hold a fair and impartial presidential election?
Note that these will be the last questions of the first semester. Extemp Central will resume posting new, original content on Monday, January 3.
1. How will the world decide the COVID-19 pandemic is over?
2. Should the British Conservative Party give Boris Johnson the boot?
3. What will be the global impact of the Evergrande default?
4. Is Aung San Suu Kyi the best leader for Myanmar’s democratic movement going forward?
5. To what degree can Emmanuel Macron make the European Union more powerful in the world?
6. Should El Salvador’s political leadership continue negotiate with street gangs?
7. Will New Zealand’s anti-smoking plan work?
8. What can cure the dysfunction that bedevils global democracies?
9. Who will win Colombia’s next presidential election?
10. Should Israel end its policy of nuclear ambiguity?
Today’s R&D is brought to you by Prepd (pronounced “prepped”). Prepd is building debate technology that helps extempers and congressional debaters research, practice, and compete. Visit www.prepd.in to learn more.
This week’s R&D covers the ongoing negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program. The United States backed out of a 2015 framework on Iran’s nuclear program during the Trump administration, something that President Biden is looking to reverse. However, ongoing talks in Vienna, Austria between Iran and negotiators from the United States, Russia, China, Great Britain, Germany, and France are deadlocked over Iran’s demand that all American sanctions against it end. Some fear that the U.S. not joining a new nuclear accord could mean that Iran gets a nuclear weapon, potentially triggering a military conflict with Israel, who fears a nuclear Iran threatens its survivability.
Ray Takeyh on what Iran wants from the nuclear talks and what could happen next. https://t.co/WkPsMMal9v
— Council on Foreign Relations (@CFR_org) December 9, 2021
If US nuclear diplomacy with Iran continues to stall out, Israel should seriously consider ending its longstanding policy of nuclear ambiguity, argues Bennett Ramberg of @PacCouncil. https://t.co/S9rWP8kvac pic.twitter.com/w2ymTzTeZ8
— Project Syndicate (@ProSyn) December 9, 2021
At some point, the Biden administration will have to ask itself if it is really worth a war with Iran to prevent nuclear proliferation, @EmmaMAshford writes in this week’s It’s Debatable. https://t.co/4QW1ZiG62C
— Foreign Policy (@ForeignPolicy) December 6, 2021
1. If Russia invades Ukraine, should China invade Taiwan?
2. Should Great Britain allow Scotland to hold another independence referendum?
3. Will Eric Zemmour be Macron’s runoff challenger in the next French presidential election?
4. How can Xiomara Castro improve Honduran democracy?
5. Did the BJP err by repealing India’s farm laws?
6. Will international powers fail to reach an agreement with Iran over its nuclear program?
7. Does Sudan’s military have too much control over the nation’s political transition?
8. Will Silvio Berlusconi become the next president of Italy?
9. Has Africa become the battleground of the West’s emerging rivalry with China?
10. Five years on, has Colombia’s peace deal lived up to the hype?
Today’s R&D is brought to you by Prepd (pronounced “prepped”). Prepd is building debate technology that helps extempers and congressional debaters research, practice, and compete. Visit www.prepd.in to learn more.
This week’s R&D covers the omicron variant of COVID-19. First discovered in South Africa, the variant is still under study and as of the time of this R&D’s creation, a handful of cases have been identified in the United States. There are fears that the new variant might infected vaccinated individuals and be more contagious than the delta variant from India.
As the omicron variant stirs concerns across the globe, the CDC says all American adults who have been vaccinated against COVID-19 should get a booster shot. https://t.co/bwuKaSZMaG
— U.S. News & World Report (@usnews) December 2, 2021
The possibility that Omicron might now outcompete Delta has the world on edge and may yet see markets lose their cool. We explain how wildly it differs from other variants https://t.co/KZFM8lNm7P
— The Economist (@TheEconomist) December 2, 2021
Biden says his top experts anticipate COVID-19 cases to increase in the weeks and months ahead as the omicron variant is likely to spread throughout the United States this winter. https://t.co/XiYLK6DWTj
— Roll Call (@rollcall) December 2, 2021
1. Does China have too much influence over the WHO?
2. Are travel restrictions an effective tool in the fight against COVID variants?
3. Will cryptocurrency mining harm global efforts to mitigate climate change?
4. Should France grant autonomy to Guadeloupe?
5. Are the energy goals for Germany set by the Green Party unrealistic?
6. Should OPEC increase oil production?
7. Is the threat of a coup growing in Burkina Faso?
8. How can the Mexican government get criminal cartels under control?
9. Should Spain make changes to its Citizens Security Law?
10. Are Western efforts to ban arms sales to Myanmar’s military counterproductive?
Today’s R&D is brought to you by Prepd (pronounced “prepped”). Prepd is building debate technology that helps extempers and congressional debaters research, practice, and compete. Visit www.prepd.in to learn more.
This week’s R&D covers the Chilean presidential election. Last Sunday the country voted in the first round of its presidential poll and right-wing candidate Jose Antonio Kast and left-wing candidate Gabriel Boric advanced to a runoff as neither won more than 50% of the vote. The runoff will take place on December 19 and, as noted in this week’s quiz, the winner will inherit a messy social and economic situation as Chile is still reeling from the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Chile’s conservative presidential candidate Jose Antonio Kast introduced a team of economic advisers, describing recovery and fiscal balance as central to his program https://t.co/ZgjSsRkeYF
— Bloomberg (@business) November 25, 2021
New in Opinion from @oppenheimera: The conventional wisdom is that Chile has committed political suicide after the victory of 2 extremists in the Nov. 21 first-round elections.
But there are reasons why they’ll have to make a sharp turn to the center. https://t.co/KIVYFC5oaf
— Miami Herald (@MiamiHerald) November 24, 2021
The centrists guided Chile to stability and prosperity but came to be seen as unresponsive to citizens’ demands. José Antonio Kast and Gabriel Boric are heirs of this decade of discontent https://t.co/YXmRyV70Kp
— The Economist (@TheEconomist) November 25, 2021
1. Is the reinstatement of Sudanese Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok a victory for the nation’s democratic forces?
2. Should European governments worry about growing protests against COVID-19 restrictions?
3. Does Israel need term limits for future prime ministers?
4. Will Russia’s anti-satellite test cause more countries to test similar weapons over the next several years?
5. Who is likely to win the Chilean presidential runoff?
6. Are pro-democracy forces in Cuba weakening?
7. Will recent bombings cause Uganda to violate the sovereignty of the Democratic Republic of Congo?
8. Do subsidy policies hurt the Indian economy?
9. Should Germany’s incoming government stop the nation’s involvement in NATO’s “nuclear sharing” agreement?
10. Is a “Cold War” with the United States in China’s best interest?
Today’s R&D is brought to you by Prepd (pronounced “prepped”). Prepd is building debate technology that helps extempers and congressional debaters research, practice, and compete. Visit www.prepd.in to learn more.
This week’s R&D covers recent Russian provocations. Over the past week, Russia has added to global anxieties by testing an anti-satellite weapon – causing the crew of the International Space Station (ISS) to seek cover from space debris – and massing troops on its border with Ukraine. France and Germany warned Russia earlier this week that harming Ukraine’s territorial integrity would met be met with “serious consequences.”
Earlier this week, Russia tested a direct-ascent anti-satellite (ASAT) missile against a satellite target, scattering thousands of pieces of orbital debris and heightening the risk of collisions between objects in space.@nktpnd explains what happened: https://t.co/AWeT1fMl3C
— Carnegie Endowment (@CarnegieEndow) November 18, 2021
Ukraine says Russia is massing as many as 114,000 troops to the north, east, and south of the Donbass, a mostly Russian-speaking region where Russian-backed separatists have fought government forces since a pro-western revolution in Kyiv in 2014 https://t.co/fmDQ8RduBL pic.twitter.com/vk064wbSHB
— Financial Times (@FinancialTimes) November 16, 2021
Russia poses a significant geopolitical threat to Ukraine, not only in terms of the energy sector but across the political, economic, and security spectrums, writes Eugene Chausovsky.https://t.co/xnaBpYqtYn
— Foreign Policy (@ForeignPolicy) November 18, 2021
1. Should governments abandon lockdowns as part of their COVID mitigation policies?
2. Will Seif al-Islam win Libya’s presidential election?
3. Why is Germany having a hard time stopping a new surge in COVID cases?
4. Will the EU win its showdown with Lukashenko?
5. Should the UN impose any conditions on future food aid to Afghanistan?
6. Would it be wise for Russia to avoid a larger military conflict in Ukraine?
7. Should the “right to die” become a global human right?
8. What can cure Latin America’s “democratic recession”?
9. Was Nicaragua’s recent presidential election fair?
10. What does India need to do to win its long-term rivalry with China?
1. Is Xi Jinping’s “cultural revolution” working?
2. Will the pledges at COP26 be enough to prevent a significant rise in global temperatures by 2050?
3. Should the ICC do more to investigate American war crimes in Afghanistan?
4. Will Portugal’s snap elections prove fatal for its governing Socialist Party?
5. How can South Africa’s ANC recover from a dismal municipal election showing?
6. Should the Bank of England wait to raise interest rates?
7. What role should developing nations play in global climate change efforts?
8. Is the Bangladeshi government doing enough to quell religious violence?
9. Should the international community continue to provide food aid to North Korea?
10. How should the Iranian government approach new talks with the U.S. over its nuclear program?
Today’s R&D is brought to you by Prepd (pronounced “prepped”). Prepd is building debate technology that helps extempers and congressional debaters research, practice, and compete. Visit www.prepd.in to learn more.
This week’s R&D covers the COP26 Summit, the twenty-sixth meeting of nations that signed the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in 1994 and later agreed to the Paris Climate Accord in 2015. The leaders of the attending nations are trying to work out a framework to prevent global temperatures from increasing by 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit over the next twenty years.
COP26 news: Coal phase-out boosts hope for limiting warming to 1.5°C https://t.co/4f5ou1KraU
— New Scientist (@newscientist) November 4, 2021
As long as multilateral engagement is defined by nationalism, power politics, and emotion, rather than solidarity, law, and science, our future will continue to grow bleaker, warns @ecfr‘s @markhleonard. #COP26 #climatechange https://t.co/djwaY5x5zJ
— Project Syndicate (@ProSyn) November 4, 2021
“COP is sort of turning into a greenwash campaign, a PR campaign, for C.E.O.s, world leaders, politicians,” said Greta Thunberg at an event on the sidelines of COP26. https://t.co/e2MzJMNgiw
— NYT Business (@nytimesbusiness) November 4, 2021