Word: centralizes
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...funnel scarce resources into weapons programs. Food shortages returned last year, while aid and investment from neighbors such as South Korea and Japan have dwindled. How bad the situation may be is hard to assess since North Korea doesn't reveal significant economic data. Estimates from South Korea's central bank, released on Monday, suggest that North Korea's gross domestic product recovered in 2008 after two years of contraction, with 3.7% growth. The bank attributed the increase to "one-off factors," such as an improved harvest. (See pictures of the global financial crisis...
That fact makes Beijing's policy toward North Korea even more central in any effort to convince Pyongyang to give up its nuclear-weapons program. But the North's recent disregard for its own economic conditions doesn't bode well for any attempt to use financial incentives to woo Pyongyang into better behavior. "They may still negotiate for some kind of deal," Noland says. "But I don't think we're going to get denuclearization" in the near term. That means North Korea's economy, just like its relations with the outside world, is likely to get worse...
Observers at the trial in the central Italian hill town of Perugia say there's plenty left for Knox to defend herself against. Forensic evidence includes bloody prints that allegedly match Sollecito's and Knox's feet and a knife found in Sollecito's apartment with the victim's DNA on it. The two have given conflicting accounts of their whereabouts, and there is evidence that the murder scene was tampered with before police arrived. Then there's the confession, in which Knox said she was at the house during the killing but blamed her boss, bar owner Patrick Lumumba...
...would the citizens of a Middle Eastern nation in political convulsions turn to Twitter? It's free, highly mobile and very quick. It's easy for the average person to use and hard for any central authority to control. And it's loud: tweets are public and readable on many different devices...
Boosting tourism, however, isn't merely about attracting foreigners: governments are also courting their own citizens. In China, local authorities have distributed domestic-travel coupons nationwide. In Wuhan, a city along the Yangtze River in central China, $146,000 worth of coupons was snatched up within 10 minutes at a promotional event, and the city has pledged more vouchers, totaling $73 million. In Britain, it's estimated that 5 million more citizens will choose a staycation this year rather than venture to the pricey euro zone...