''The oppositions in Hong Kong should understand and accept that Hong Kong is not an independent country. They should not think that they have the ability to turn Hong Kong into Ukraine or Thailand,'' warned the Global Times, the most aggressively nationalistic of China's state-run newspapers.
''It's quiet out there. Too quiet.''
''The Polish-American alliance is worthless, even harmful, as it gives Poland a false sense of security. It's bullshit.''
Whatever else you may say about the ''young war criminal'' (as British journalist Alan Watkins used to call former prime minister Tony Blair), he certainly fights his corner with great determination.
The Iraqi army will have to destroy Mosul in order to save it - and it's not clear whether it can do the job even then.
The presence of President Vladimir Putin on the Normandy beaches on the 70th anniversary of the D-Day landings was planned long before the current conflict over Ukraine, but it is a useful reminder of the fact that Russia is not some Asiatic tyranny on Europe's eastern borders.
To the vast surprise of absolutely nobody, Field Marshal Abdel Fatah al-Sisi won the Egyptian presidential election last week.
"There is no doubt that many populist, Eurosceptic and even nationalistic parties are entering the European Parliament,'' said the German Foreign Minister, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, after all the votes in last Sunday's election for the European Union's Parliament had been counted.
Conducting an orderly retreat is the hardest thing, not only in war but also in politics, as Russian President Vladimir Putin is now learning.
Voting began last week to choose the problem the winner of the Longitude Prize 2014 will have to solve - and win 10 million ($NZ20 million).
If you were running China, and you wanted to distract your own population from economic woes at home by pushing one of your many territorial disputes with your neighbours into open conflict, which one would you choose?
If you are trying to get rid of the legitimately elected government of your country, it helps to have the Constitutional Court, the National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) and the Election Commission on your side.
Did he just blink? I think he did.
Hillary Clinton would never have used the word when she was United States Secretary of State, because she still has presidential ambitions.
On one hand, eastern Ukraine appears to be slipping out of the Government's control, as pro-Russian groups seize control of official buildings in big eastern cities like Donetsk and Luhansk and demand referendums on union with Russia.
''I prefer death to surrender,'' said Pakistan's former military dictator, Pervez Musharraf, on April 1 to the special court that is trying him on five counts of high treason, but it's a reasonable guess that he'd prefer exile to either of those options.
Crimea is going to be part of Russia, and there is nothing anybody else can do about it.
Britain's Prime Minister David Cameron rambled a bit on his visit to Afghanistan last December, but ended up sounding just as deluded as United States President George W. Bush had been when he proclaimed ''Mission accomplished'' six weeks after the invasion of Iraq.
The referendum on Scotland's independence is only six months away and suddenly the cautious sparring between the Conservative-led coalition government in London and First Minister Alex Salmond's pro-independence government in Edinburgh has turned into open war.
An Indian election is a marathon, not a sprint.