The Week at Chatham House: Benjamin Netanyahu, the Cocoa Trade and India’s Changing Approach to Kashmir

Chatham House
Chatham House
Published in
4 min readNov 3, 2017

The latest international news and analysis this week.

Benjamin Netanyahu in Conversation

On the 100th anniversary of the Balfour Declaration, Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, discussed his views on the current politics and history of the Middle East in a wide-ranging conversation with Robin Niblett at Chatham House. Watch the video from the event.

Cocoa Trade, Deforestation and Climate Change

Chocolate-lovers worldwide might be unaware that a growing demand for cocoa is driving deforestation and climate change in West Africa and other countries around the world. Ambitious trade policies and governance reform can help to support more sustainable production practices, argue Alison Hoare, Richard King and Sam Airey, and therefore alleviate some of the pressures on land and forests while transforming the lives of the five million smallholders who feed chocolate-lovers globally.

Is India Getting Serious About Dialogue in Kashmir?

Since India’s partition and the creation of Pakistan in 1947, both countries have fought two wars over Kashmir and today the territory remains one of the most militarized zones in the world. The division of Kashmir between India and Pakistan has been a flashpoint of conflict and tension between the two countries for six decades, and since 1989, Indian Kashmir has suffered from an ongoing insurgency, due mainly to discontent over governance, corruption and unemployment, often exacerbated by the interference of Pakistan. Seventy years later, although complications still abound, the Indian government might now have a plan for opening a political dialogue with the state, writes Gareth Price.

The Struggle for Ukraine

Four years on from its Euromaidan Revolution, Ukraine is fighting for its survival as an independent state. The country is faced with existential threats on two fronts: externally, it must fend off Russian aggression while internally, a fierce push to modernize and reform its ineffective governance, fight corruption and deliver economic growth to its citizens is raging. A new Chatham House report assesses Ukraine’s future prospects and makes the case for increased Western support.

Chuka Umunna on Britain’s Global Role

The Labour MP spoke at Chatham House about why Brexit confronts Britain with profound questions about its identity and its role in the world, which it has not had to face since the Suez Crisis in 1956. Watch the video, listen to the audio or read the transcript from the event.

Modern Authoritarianism

Professor Timothy Snyder, author of the bestseller On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century, considers the spectrum of regimes that make up authoritarianism’s modern incarnation, asking in particular about the spread of new regime types from the East to the West. Watch the video.

The London Conference 2017

The world order is supposedly shifting: the Trump administration is threatening to leave a vacuum in global leadership, the struggle in the Middle East continues to rage on and Russia is persisting with asserting itself on the world stage while Europe remains preoccupied with its internal recovery. This year’s Chatham House London Conference tackled all of these pressing issues and video highlights, photos, reports and the most memorable quotes from the conference are now available, including sessions with UK Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, Saudi Arabia Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir and writer and producer Armando Iannucci.

VIDEO: Watch highlights from the 2017 Chatham House London Conference.

--

--

Chatham House
Chatham House

The Royal Institute of International Affairs. An independent policy institute with a mission to help build a sustainably secure, prosperous and just world.