The Debrief, 9/23/14

• On Wednesday, the United States Congress House Committee on Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific held a hearing on “A New Era of US-China Relations.” The hearing was for the markup of House Resolution 714, which seeks to limit China’s recent maneuvers in the East and South China Seas…
• On Thursday, voters in Scotland went to the polls for a historic referendum and voted down a bid for Scottish independence, with 55.3% voting no and 44.7% voting yes. Of 4.3 million eligible voters, the turnout was also a historical 84.59%…
• From September 16th to 18th, Chinese President Xi Jinping met with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in India. The summit meeting between the leaders of the two most populous nations in the world have produced mixed results, with trade and economic deals and border disputes on the table…
• Following US President Barack Obama’s pledge last week to send 3,000 troops to fight the ebola epidemic in West Africa, the UN humanitarian chief Valerie Amos again warned that the outbreak of the deadly virus could become a major humanitarian, social, and economic crisis. If not contained, she said, the continent could face the collapse of their economies, and the neutralization of post-conflict gains, which runs the risks of blanket stigmatization against countries that are most affected by the disease…

(Feature photo of effective control of South China Sea islands and atolls, by the US Central Intelligence Agency)