THANT MYINT U

China and India have always been seperated not only by the Himalayas, but also by the impenetrable jungle and remote areas that once stretched across Burma. Now this last great frontier will likely vanish - forests cut down, dirt roads replaced by superhighways, insurgencies ended - leaving China and India exposed to each other as never before. This basic shift in geography is as profound as the opening of the Suez Canal and is taking place just as the centre of the worlds economy moves to the East. Thant Myint-U has travelled extensively across this vast territory, where high-speed trains and gleaming shopping malls now sit alongside the last remaining forests and impoverished mountain communities. In Where China Meets India he explores the new strategic centrality of Burma, the country of his ancestry, where Asias two rising giant powers - China and India - appear to be vying for supremacy. Part travelogue, part history, part investigation, Where China Meets India takes us across the fast-changing Asian frontier, giving us a masterful account of the regions long and rich history and its sudden significance for the rest of the world. Thant Myint-U is the author of The River of Lost Footsteps and has written articles for the New York Times, the Washington Post and the New Statesman. He has worked alongside Kofi Annan at the UNs Department of Political Affairs and currently works as a special consultant to the Burmese government.

A Foreign Affairs Best Book of 2020A New York Times Critics Pick 2019A sobering account, told elegantly and eruditely.Financial TimesThant Myint-U is the greatest living historian of Burma. William DalrymplePrecariously positioned between China and India, Burmas population has suffered dictatorship, natural disaster and the dark legacies of colonial rule. But when decades of military dictatorship finally ended and internationally beloved Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi emerged from long years of house arrest, hopes soared. World leaders including Barack Obama ushered in waves of international support. Progress seemed inevitable.As historian, former diplomat, and presidential advisor, Thant Myint-U saw the cracks forming. In this insiders diagnosis of a country at a breaking point, he dissects how a singularly predatory economic system, fast-rising inequality, disintegrating state institutions, the impact of new social media, the rise of China next door, climate change and deep-seated feelings around race, religion and national identity all came together to challenge the incipient democracy. Interracial violence soared and a horrific exodus of hundreds of thousands of Rohingya refugees fixed international attention. Thant Myint-U explains how and why this happened, and details an unsettling prognosis for the future.Burma is today a fragile stage for nearly all the worlds problems. Are democracy and an economy that genuinely serves all its people possible in Burma? In clear and urgent prose, Thant Myint-U explores this question - a concern not just for the Burmese but for the rest of the world - warning of the possible collapse of this nation of 55 million while suggesting a fresh agenda for change.A compelling account of modern Burmas bloody history Amitav Ghosh

Drawing both on his own family''s stories and his years of hands-on political experience, Thant Myint-U has written an illuminating account of how Burma''s rich past informs its violent present, and of how the world might transform the country''s future. This is the story of modern Burma, and a narrative that is by turns lyrical, dramatic, and appalling.

A wonderful subject, beautifully written, evoking a world startlingly like and unlike our ownRory StewartA brilliant portrait not just of a great and unjustly forgotten man, but of an entire age William DalrympleImportant reading at any time in history; essential in the world of today Peter FrankopanIN THE EARLY 1960S, a peaceful world seemed possible. The still young United Nations was regarded as humankinds best hope for ending war. African and Asian nations, having recently won their freedom from colonial rule, sought influence on the world stage. At the helm of their international efforts was Secretary-General U Thant, a practising Buddhist and former schoolteacher from Burma.In Peacemaker, acclaimed historian Thant Myint-U traces his grandfathers integral yet forgotten roles in some of the twentieth centurys most critical crises: from battling white supremacist mercenaries in the Congo and mediating an end to the Cuban Missile Crisis to desperately trying to prevent the 1967 Six Day War. Drawing on newly declassified documents, he traces U Thants tireless efforts to bring peace to Vietnam, create a fairer international economy, safeguard the environment, and avoid a third world war.A testament to the power of hope and individual action in times of uncertainty, Peacemaker is an extraordinary chronicle of a golden age of diplomacy - and vital to a fresh understanding of our world today.

An unparalleled biography of the author s grandfather U Thant the United Nations longest serving Secretary General and his crucial role in the Cold War