flashpoint

Mr Ma's actions have won praise in Washington, which is grateful to him for cooling one of the world's hottest flashpoints.

The speed with which this relationship has developed has meant that most potential flashpoints are only emerging now.

The mini-riot could be just one of many flashpoints in Chinese cities featuring people with little confidence in the legal system.

The ever-cheerful UNDP said in 1999 that the basins of the Nile, Niger, Volta and Zambezi were all potential flashpoints.

One of the flashpoints could be over relationships, including sexual relationships, with humans, she claims.

Although tension across the Taiwan Strait has cooled, several other regional flashpoints have become hotter, for two related reasons.

It has eased tensions in what has long been one of the world's most dangerous flashpoints.

As China's currency is appreciating and its trade surplus is falling, two of the traditional flashpoints have dimmed.

The 110-mile strait separating Taiwan from China's mainland is one of the world's great flashpoints.

One of the big flashpoints on that day was Hackney, in north-east London.

Covering an area of 3. 5 million Square Kilometers, the South China Sea is becoming one of Asia's most dangerous flashpoints for conflict.

Flashpoints, particularly along a "trigger line" between Iraq's Arabs and Kurds, threaten the peace.

The big Sino-US flashpoints remain the same: Taiwan, Tibet and the trade surplus.

He withdrew troops from flashpoints such as Armenia, but maintained influence overseas through complicated negotiations and treaties.

And all three stand behind state-funded religious schools, though these are frequent flashpoints in Britain's various multicultural battles.