The reversal in refugee policy, which follows the imposition of border controls two weeks ago, marks a policy choice the ruling red-green coalition would have considered unthinkable until asylum seekers began arriving this autumn at a rate of 10,000 a week.
The International Conference on Population and Development (Cairo, 1994) and the Fourth World Conference on Women (Beijing, 1995) marked a policy shift for both reproductive health and refugee health.
"Prosecuting these two for their roles, without any connection to a substantive criminal offense, is well wide of the mark from a policy and legal point of view; it's just like killing two chickens in front of the monkey," he said, referring to a Chinese proverb about punishing the weak to frighten the powerful.
Such reshufflings are common in Japan when a leader wants to mark a big policy push or change in direction.
The Bear deal does mark a major policy shift, since the Fed has now implicitly admitted that it will catch investment banks when they fall.
US officials say they have no intention of leading the US into deeper involvement in Colombia's vicious civil war, but, if approved, the aid would mark a major policy shift.
The strikes on IS mark a significant policy shift for Turkey, which is a member of the US-led coalition that has been bombing the group in Iraq and Syria since last year, but it had not taken on a prominent role, despite intense international pressure and criticism.
The BBC trailed Nick Clegg's speech on taxation today as marking "a party policy shift".
It marks a new policy for the gallery which houses one of the finest collections of Western European paintings anywhere.
The decision ends a raging debate within the administration over the wisdom of withdrawing from the treaty, and marks a major policy defeat for Secretary Powell.
