John Isaacs blog on his trip to Asia (cont.)
Jun 13, 2010

I have now completed the second and last leg of my trip to Asia, this time in Brunei, sponsored by the Department of State to speak about nuclear weapons issues.

Brunei is a small country of about 400,000 people surrounded by parts of Malaysia and on the island of Borneo. It is a monarchy independent of the United Kingdom since 1984 and run by a Sultan. It is a heavily Muslim and dry country with oil wealth to support the local population. It imports Thais, Philippinos, Indians and Indonesians to run the service industries in the country.

In Brunei, I spoke before three groups:  officials from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, a university group and about ten Ambassadors  or deputy chiefs of mission to Brunei from countries such as Russia, Indonesia, Germany, France, United Kingdom, Australia, Singapore and a couple of other countries. I also did two brief interviews with Brunei journalists.