mer, 01/30/2013 - 20:35

Old foes, new friends: Mali eases suspicious minds

In the old days, France was wary of the US messing around on its African turf. But the Mali intervention changed that. Then there’s Nigeria, France’s old Anglophone West African bogey, now turned new best friend. What a difference a war makes.
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mer, 12/19/2012 - 18:13

Taliban, CIA...who else can we blame for Pakistan’s polio campaign tragedy?

After a series of attacks killed eight Pakistani polio vaccination workers over two days, much time will be spent trying to figure whodunit. But with lives lost and more lives at stake, it’s time to set the blame-game straight. And it’s not the CIA.
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mer, 11/14/2012 - 18:21

Not a Happy Diwali for Family of Dead Hindu Woman Denied Abortion in ‘Catholic’ Ireland

Savita Halappanavar, an Indian immigrant, died at an Irish hospital after she was repeatedly denied an abortion, according to her husband. “This is a Catholic country,” she was told. It’s also a part of the 2012 Nobel Peace Prize-winning EU.
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mar, 08/14/2012 - 22:11

Succession Sagas: Daddy Is a Warlord, Junior Has a Foreign Degree

A new Time magazine article chronicling the return of mujahedin scions educated in “some of the world’s best schools” is surprisingly long on commendation and short on condemnation.
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mer, 08/01/2012 - 21:23

How Asma al-Assad’s Vogue profiler duped herself

Joan Juliet Buck, author of Vogue’s infamous “Asma al-Assad: A Rose in the Desert” piece, has given her version of the story in a piece titled, “Mrs. Assad Duped Me”. But the Syrian First Lady didn’t do the duping, that was done by solely by Buck.
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mar, 07/10/2012 - 13:16

Islamists, tribes, trends: Getting it right and wrong in the Libyan elections

The naysayers may now eat their words: contrary to the dire predictions so popular in some circles, the Libyan elections went smoothly. Now what about that much-predicted Islamist wave?
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mar, 03/20/2012 - 20:26

Does a US-born jihadist’s video revelation point to divisions in the ranks or that he’s just insufferable?

In a new video statement, by US-born al Shabaab militant Abu Mansoor al Amriki said his life was threatened by fellow militants. But does that point to divisions in the Somali Islamist group’s ranks or that al Amriki is just an insufferable blowhard?
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ven, 10/21/2011 - 17:32

Gaddafi’s gone and Libyans must come together – but how?

Okay, it’s the end of the long, loud road to revolution. Muammar Gaddafi is dead and now we start the longer, laborious road to democracy – or some form of it – in Libya.
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mar, 06/08/2010 - 17:02

Time to Go: Why Did 2 Top Afghan Security Bosses Quit?

Nobody really accepted the official version of the story. So now that the theories are starting to roll out, they’re worth considering.
 

On Sunday, the Afghan presidential palace announced the resignations of the country’s interior minister, Hanif Atmar, and intelligence chief, Amrullah Saleh.
 

The breaking news alert was presented as a fait accompli and caught everyone by surprise. Usually this sort of news starts with unconfirmed reports, followed by official confirmations, which in turn are followed by official announcements. This time, the old steps were skipped.

 

Instead, we got a statement from the presidential palace, no less, informing us that Afghan President Hamid Karzai had already accepted the resignations. The stated reason was the officials’ failure to prevent the attacks on the peace jirga. (See blog, “Let the jirga games begin – with a bang")
 

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