Alan Paige Lightman is an American physicist, writer, and social entrepreneur. He has served on the faculties of Harvard University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and is currently a professor of the practice of the humanities at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
The South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) is the regional intergovernmental organization and geopolitical union of states in South Asia. Its member states are Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka. SAARC comprises 3% of the world's land area, 21% of the world's population and 5.21% of the global economy, as of 2021.
The Economic Cooperation Organization or ECO is a Eurasian political and economic intergovernmental organization that was founded in 1985 in Tehran by the leaders of Iran, Pakistan, and Turkey. It provides a platform to discuss ways to improve development and promote trade and investment opportunities. The ECO is an ad hoc organisation under the United Nations Charter. The objective is to establish a single market for goods and services, much like the European Union. After the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the ECO expanded to include Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan in 1992.
The Erasmus Programme is a European Union (EU) student exchange programme established in 1987. Erasmus+, or Erasmus Plus, is the new programme combining all the EU's current schemes for education, training, youth and sport, which was started in January 2014.
Sophia University, is a private research university in Tokyo, Japan. Founded in 1913 by the Jesuits, it was granted university status in 1928, becoming the first Catholic university in Japan.
An autonomous administrative division is a subnational administrative division or internal territory of a sovereign state that has a degree of autonomy—self-governance—under the national government. Autonomous areas are distinct from the constituent units of a federation in that they possess unique powers for their given circumstances. Typically, it is either geographically distinct from the rest of the state or populated by a national minority, which may exercise home rule. Decentralization of self-governing powers and functions to such divisions is a way for a national government to try to increase democratic participation or administrative efficiency or to defuse internal conflicts. States that include autonomous areas may be federacies, federations, or confederations. Autonomous areas can be divided into territorial autonomies, subregional territorial autonomies, and local autonomies.
The Chevening Scholarship is an international scholarship, funded by the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office and partner organizations, that lets foreign students with leadership qualities study at universities in the United Kingdom.
The politics of Asia are extremely varied as would be expected of such a large landmass and a diverse population. Constitutional monarchies, absolute monarchies, one-party states, federal states, dependent territories, liberal democracies and military dictatorships are all factors in the region, as well as various forms of independence movements.
The Organization for Women in Science for the Developing World (OWSD) is an international organisation that provides research training, career development and networking opportunities for women scientists throughout the developing world at different stages in their career. It was founded in 1987 and was officially launched in 1993. The organisation was formerly known as the Third World Organization for Women in Science (TWOWS). It is a program unit of UNESCO and based at the offices of The World Academy of Sciences in Trieste, Italy.
The Asian Cultural Council (ACC) is a non-profit organization dedicated to advancing international cultural exchange between Asia and the U.S. and between the countries of Asia through the arts. Founded by John D. Rockefeller III in 1963, ACC has invested over $100 million in grants to artists and arts professionals representing 16 fields and 26 countries through over 6,000 exchanges. ACC supports $1.4 million in grants annually for individuals and organizations.
Harris Sam Sahayam Lawrence was an Indian educationalist born in Nagercoil, Tamil Nadu.
The Frank Knox Memorial Fellowship program is a scholarship program which funds students from Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the United Kingdom to undertake graduate study at Harvard University.
Afghanistan–Pakistan relations refer to the bilateral ties between Afghanistan and Pakistan. In August 1947, the partition of British India led to the emergence of Pakistan along Afghanistan's eastern frontier, and the two countries have since had a strained relationship; Afghanistan was the sole country to vote against Pakistan's admission into the United Nations following the latter's independence. Territorial disputes along the widely known "Durand Line" and conflicting claims prevented the normalization of bilateral ties between the countries throughout the mid-20th century. Various Afghan government officials and Afghan nationalists have made irredentist claims to large swathes of Pakistan's territory in modern-day Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Pakistani Balochistan, which complete the traditional homeland of "Pashtunistan" for the Pashtun people. Afghan territorial claims over Pashtun-majority areas that are in Pakistan were coupled with discontent over the permanency of the Durand Line which has long been considered the international border by every nation other than Afghanistan, and for which Afghanistan demanded a renegotiation, with the aim of having it shifted eastward to the Indus River. During the Taliban insurgency, the Taliban has received substantial financial and logistical backing from Pakistan, which remains a significant source of support. Nonetheless, Pakistan's support for the Taliban is not without risks, as it involves playing a precarious and delicate game. Further Afghanistan–Pakistan tensions have arisen concerning a variety of issues, including the Afghan conflict and Afghan refugees in Pakistan, water-sharing rights, and a continuously warming relationship between Afghanistan and India, but most of all the Taliban government in Afghanistan providing sanctuary and safe havens to Pakistani Taliban terrorists to attack Pakistani territory. Border tensions between Afghanistan and Pakistan have escalated to an unprecedented degree following recent instances of violence along the border. The Durand Line witnesses frequent occurrences of suicide bombings, airstrikes, or street battles on an almost daily basis. The Taliban-led Afghan government has also accused Pakistan of undermining relations between Afghanistan and China and creating discord between the neighbouring countries.
University Mobility in Asia and the Pacific (UMAP) is a voluntary regional association of government, non-government and/or university representatives of the higher education sector established in 1993 to enhance cooperation and exchange of people and expertise through increased mobility of higher education students and staff. UMAP has been endorsed by Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation and member countries are implementing UMAP projects.
Afghanistan–India relations are the diplomatic relations between India and Afghanistan. They had been historical neighbors when India was under colonial rule and have since shared cultural ties through Bollywood and cricket.
Kumiko Haba is a Japanese Professor of International Politics at Aoyama Gakuin University in Tokyo. Her research is International Relations, International Politics, International Sociology, Power Shift and National Anxiety, Immigrants-Refugee questions, Nationalism and Xenophobia in the European Union. She wrote a book, Division and Integration in Europe, Nationalism and Border in the Enlarged EU—Inclusion or Exclusion, Chuokoronshinsya, 2016.
Eastern Medical College (EMC) is a private medical college and hospital in Bangladesh, established in 2005.The campus of this college is located beside the Dhaka–Chittagong Highway at Kabila in Burichang Upazila, in the Comilla District of Chittagong Division.The college is affiliated with University of Chittagong and Chittagong Medical University.
Mahmoud Saikal is a senior Afghan diplomat and an international development specialist. He was the Permanent Representative of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan to the United Nations from October 2015 until February 2019.
Wahidullah Waissi is a career Afghan diplomat. He is now serving as the ambassador of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan to the Commonwealth of Australia, New Zealand and Republic of Fiji. He worked as Director-General for Economic Cooperation at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Islamic Republic of Afghanistan from 2012 to 2016 overseeing regional economic cooperation and multilateral development partnerships, chaired economic diplomacy committee, coordinated Regional Economic Cooperation Conference for Afghanistan process and projects and served as a Focal Point for economic Confidence Building Measures (CBMs) of the Heart of Asia Istanbul Process.
Hamidullah Farooqi is an Afghan politician, economist and activist. He has written several research papers and served in higher positions within the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan’s government. Farooqi served as the Chancellor of Kabul University from 2016 to 2021 until the fall of Kabul in the hands of Taliban. He also served as Advisor Minister to President Mohammad Ashraf Ghani on Higher Education. He previously served as Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation from March 2009 to January 2010 in the cabinet of former President Hamid Karzai.
