While Islamisation of the Maldives is currently making news, the nation's history shows that Islam has often been used as a means to gain political power.
Near the two-year anniversary of Mohammed Nasheed’s election in the Maldives, democracy in the atolls continues to experience growing pains, made more difficult by an increasingly bipolar polity.
The one who has smashed tyranny
Broken the back of untrammelled authority
The horse that pulls the chariot of destiny
That one cannot be destroyed.
That one will never die.
With its highest point a mere two metres above sea level, global warming is an imminent concern for the Maldives. As the conversation on climate change heats up prior to
Both Bhutan and the Maldives constitute Southasia's most interesting democratic experiments at the moment; and both seem to have hit on a formula to deal with India as
On 3 May, World Press Freedom Day, as seminar attendees around the world parleyed about whether the free media was actually free, journalists in the Swat Valley were more likely
In November, Mohamed Nasheed, in the immediate aftermath of being voted in as the new president of the Maldives, announced plans to purchase a new homeland for his country'
June, 1990. Following the publication of an article in the Sri Lanka daily The Island about the parliamentary elections of the Maldives that had taken place the previous year, the
Around this time last year, the political climate across Southasia looked grim. In Pakistan, Benazir Bhutto had just returned after years in exile, and had been greeted with bomb explosions
A referendum win of the presidential over the parliamentary system of government in the Maldives is being seen by President Gayoom as a personal success. But he may not be around long to taste the fruits of this contested victory.
