Kevjn Lim: Iran’s Next Supreme Leader Is Dead…This Is a Problem…

Iran’s Next Supreme Leader Is Dead And it’s not going to be easy for the Islamic Republic to survive without him. On Christmas Eve (not that it matters in Iran), Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi, one of Tehran’s most understated powerbrokers, died after a particularly grueling year combating cancer. Despite his relative anonymity outside Iran compared …

Kevjn Lim: China Buys Into Israel

Israel and China’s Silk Road With BRI now at play, three implications and opportunities arise that transcend bilateral economic cooperation: infrastructural and trade interconnectivity, a closely-related “information Silk Road”, and Israel’s potential as mediator between the world’s two leading powers. The nexus of infrastructure, transport and communications transmission routes paves the way for an unprecedented …

Kevjn Lim: Why Iran Matters to China

Iran Seen from Beijing China views Iran as a central element in its much-touted Silk Road Economic Belt, which aims to extend Beijing’s influence overland through Central Asia to the Persian Gulf and Europe. Read full article.

Answers: Robert Steele to Kevjn Lim on Big Data

Kevjn Lim is an independent writer and Middle East foreign policy analyst at Open Briefing: The Civil Society Intelligence Agency. In the latter half of 2013, he was Turkey representative for the Syria Needs Analysis Project (SNAP), covering the Syrian crisis in the northern governorates and Turkey. From 2007-2011, he served as delegate with the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in …