No sooner had Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) candidate Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) secured victory in Saturday's presidential election than the Chinese-language media began to speculate on candidates for the Cabinet.

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By Ruan Ming 阮銘
President-elect Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) may now be basking in a round of congratulatory messages on his landslide victory in last Saturday's election, but the road ahead promises to be a tough one as he has to deal with difficult issues, both domestically and internationally.

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By Sushil Seth
As expected, Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) has won the presidency. The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) was worn out and didn't seem to be going anywhere, except backward. The economy under President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) had faltered, and there was a stench of corruption enveloping his family and cronies. Chen also had the "distinction" of being disliked both in Washington and Beijing. Indeed, Beijing hated him on a par with the Dalai Lama.

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By Nigel Daly
Why should foreigners have to sound like native speakers anyway?

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Ivory from long-extinct woolly mammoths is a more conscionable alternative to illegal elephant ivory
By Andrew Kramer
As Viktor Seliverstov works in his makeshift studio in this hardscrabble Siberian town, he is enveloped in a cloud of ivory dust. His electric carving tool whirs over the milky surface of the teeth and tusks, as he whittles them into key fobs, knife handles and scrimshaw figurines.

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By Anders Aslund
Between Wednesday and Friday next week, NATO will hold its biggest summit ever in Bucharest, the capital of its new member, Romania. Incredibly, NATO has invited its fiercest critic, Russian President Vladimir Putin, to attend. For the first time since 2002, he will. His presence is an embarrassment to NATO, but an even greater disgrace for Russia.

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Centralization has taken place at such pace that more than 60 percent of banking assets in Europe are now in the hands of fewer than 50 multinational banks
By Markku Pohjola
The EU lacks an efficient supervisory framework for its vast financial industry, and the gap between what is needed and what exists is widening.

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