At the turbine hall at North Korea's Wonsan Number 5 hydropower station, a placard mounted on a wall proclaims: "Prosperous and Powerful Nation".

Take 7,100 islands, add 100 million people, throw in a twist of corruption, an unhealthy slug of poverty and a dab of dynastic politics, and what do you get? A recipe for disaster, you might think. And yet the Philippines has been simmering nicely enough as a developing democracy since the overthrow of the dictator Ferdinand Marcos in 1986. Recent years have been marked by relative stability and economic growth that’s outpaced most of Southeast Asia.

Now is not the time to talk to North Korea, the White House declared Monday, as President Donald Trump appeared to undermine efforts to force Pyongyang to the table.Until this weekend, Washington's plan to counter Kim Jong-Un's increasingly sophisticated nuclear arsenal seemed to be to employ sanctions and diplomatic pressure to convince him to talk.Secretary of State Rex Tillerson confirmed this on Saturday in Beijing when he told reporters Washington is using diplomatic channels t