Southeast Asia

The headlines of virtually all the Malaysian newspapers have been screaming loudly and euphorically, since the ‘historic visit’ of Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak to the US, where he met President Donald Trump. They were ‘celebrating triumph’, hailing high hopes, and swelling with pride.
‘My gosh, the President of the United States really met the Prime Minister of Malaysia, face to face, during their ‘four eyes only’ meeting!
New Strait Times, on September 14, 2017:

Many geopolitical analysts and commentators have noted many worthwhile similarities between the Syrian crisis and the one now unfolding in the Southeast Asian state of Myanmar. However, what is different about these two crises is just as important as what is the same.
The Similarities 

It is all done in a fully barefaced manner. Those who are not part of this world could never even dream about such a ‘perfect’ design.
You come to your club, in my case to The Foreign Correspondent Club of Thailand (FCCT), and immediately the long arm of indoctrination begins stretching towards you.
You place yourself on a comfortable couch, and soon after get fully serviced. You get instructed, told what to think and how to formulate or modify your ideas.

Many honest, busy analysts outside established media circles in the United States and Europe are plagued by mythologies stemming from once pseudo-truths they simply lack the time or energy to dig into and finally correct.

It is hard to calculate the cost of the stubborn refusal of the Thai population to learn foreign languages. Some daring estimates, however, calculate that the losses could be in tens of billions of dollars, annually. And the situation is not getting any better.

Myanmar, the place we used to call Burma, has come back into the spotlight Western governments always try and keep it away from. Much is going on here, and too, many contradictions … but why?

With the recent attack on police in Myanmar by terrorists described by Reuters as “Muslim insurgents,” and ongoing terrorism plaguing the Philippines where forces are engaged with militants from the so-called “Islamic State,” it would appear that terrorism has spread into Southeast Asia with no signs of waning. 

US and European media decried in unison the arrest of Kem Sokha, leader of the Cambodian opposition party, Cambodia National Rescue. Sokha is charged with treason amid an alleged plot to overthrow the current Cambodian government with foreign assistance.

Some people want all the power and no responsibility.
Shortly before ousted Thai prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra was to face a court ruling for her failed populist rice subsidy scheme, she reportedly fled the country, joining her likewise fugitive brother Thaksin Shinawatra in hiding abroad. Thaksin Shinawatra was himself ousted from power in 2006 for similar charges of corruption and abuse of power.