The tension, combined with constant saber rattling over Taiwan - the democratically run island that Beijing claims but Washington vows to help defend - has prompted the Biden administration to rapidly bolster its military capabilities. 'It is clear that we're in a deeply consequential period in terms of our Indo-Pacific engagements,' the official told reporters, speaking on condition of anonymity.Īlarm bells are ringing for Washington and its Asian allies as China moves ever more confidently to assert claims to sovereignty over almost the whole South China Sea - ignoring an international ruling that this has no legal basis. Spotify | Amazon | YouTube Music | Presto CD (U.K.'So it is only natural for the Philippines to look to its sole treaty partner in the world to strengthen, to redefine, the relationship that we have and the roles that we play in the face of those rising tensions that we see now around the South China Sea and Asia Pacific,' he said.Ī senior US official said the Marcos visit - which began with a military honor guard outside the White House - was the first 'at this level and intensity' between the two countries for decades. The libretto stays very close to the spirit of the original, conjuring up a fantasy world in which, nonetheless, one never entirely loses sight of harsh political reality and the great issues of freedom of speech and imagination. Salman Rushdie’s childrens book, written in the aftermath of the fatwa,as an effervescent style which is full of rhymes and wordplay. In a series of brilliantly imagined adventures, Haroun succeeds in defeating the powers of darkness, and restoring happiness to his family and to the city where he lives. He learns that the Ocean of the Sea of Stories, the source of all stories, is being polluted by the enemy of all stories, the sinister Khattam-Shud.

As Rashid despairs, Haroun determines to rescue his father’s talent – a project which takes him into an exotic world of water genies, mechanical birds, fantastical creatures, Guppees and Chupwalas. He is told that if he does not come up with his usual fund of tales, his tongue will be cut out. After this, Rashid loses confidence in his powers of story-telling, haunted by his son’s question: “What’s the use of stories that aren’t even true?” Rashid is due to speak at a political rally to be held by the sinister politician, Snooty Buttoo. Feeling neglected, his wife is persuaded to leave him and run away with a neighbour. Haroun’s father, Rashid, the Shah of Blah, is a professional and gifted story-teller, a popular figure much in demand at public events. In a make-believe world, based loosely on Bombay and Kashmir, the story of Haroun is a tale of a fight between the free imagination and the powers that oppose it. Instrumentation 3(picc)2, 3(bcl),3(cbsn) 4231 t,p(3),pf,hp,str Year 2001 Duration 120:00 Composed 12/1969 - Commission Mary Sharp Cronson

The sea of stories