A forceful President Barack Obama put Republican challenger Mitt Romney on the defensive on foreign policy issues on Monday night, scoring a solid victory in their third and final debate just 15 days before Election Day. Obama displayed the experience of a commander-in-chief in explaining U.S. policy under his leadership and attacking the views and […]
While both Tehran and Washington were eager to deny a New York Times report which claimed they had agreed “in principle for the first time to one-on-one negotiation,” the covert war between the main camps in the Middle East moved to the Lebanese capital Beirut. Even more than a coup for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad […]
Soft power tools have served Ankara well in the past, but the Turkish government is no longer in a position to distance itself from the region’s disputes if it envisages a leadership role. Read Here – Gulf News
On the southern outskirts of the city Zaranj, where the last derelict shanties meet an endless, vacant country — beige desert and beige sky, whipped together into a single coalescing haze by the accurately named Wind of 120 Days — there is a place called Ganj: a kind of way station for Afghan migrants trying […]
Iraq has no national foreign policy. For the past decade, a lack of unity among its ruling elite has failed to allow for a unified approach towards its international relations — one that could have protected the country from becoming a playground for outside powers, with disastrous consequences for its political and security stability. Read […]
Bashar al-Assad has failed to quell a stubborn rebellion despite his regime’s massive edge in military manpower and weaponry — but also because of these material advantages. His forces, replete with heavy armor, attack aircraft, and big guns, have tried to use something akin to our Powell Doctrine of “overwhelming force.” Yet the insurgents’ nimble, loose-jointed networks […]
U.S. exports to Iran rose by nearly a third this year, chiefly because of grain sales, according to U.S. data released last week, despite the tightening of U.S. financial sanctions. The jump to $199.5 million in the first eight months of 2012 from $150.8 million a year earlier, according to Census Bureau data, is surprising given Western […]
It’s like Eskimos running out of ice: A recent report by Citigroup warns that Saudi Arabia — the world’s biggest crude exporter — may need to import oil by 2030. How did Saudi Arabia allow its fortunes to slip, even as it supplies an eighth of the world’s oil and natural gas liquids? The country […]
YESTERDAY marked the 11th anniversary of the US war in Afghanistan. More than 2,000 American soldiers have now been killed, and as the US presidential candidates debate each other to lead the most dominant power on Earth, perhaps it is time for someone to ask them: Was it worth it? On Sept. 11, 2001, 2,977 […]
Emirates foreign policy has gone through a dynamic change in recent years. The change is apparently broad and indeed fundamental. It encompasses the very content as well as the style in which the UAE deals with external opportunities and challenges. The relatively small but oil-rich UAE is noticeably more assertive and active regionally and globally […]
looking beyond borders 