MINUTES after last week’s violent attacks on America’s missions in the Middle East, the country’s embassy in Cairo was already on Twitter. It tweeted an emergency number for American citizens. It criticised Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood for supporting the protests on their Arabic feed. And it thanked fellow tweeters for their condolences on the murder of […]
China‘s first aircraft carrier has entered into service, the defence ministry says. The 300m (990ft) Liaoning – named after the province where it was refitted – is a refurbished Soviet ship purchased from Ukraine. For now the carrier has no operational aircraft and will be used for training. But China says the vessel, which has undergone extensive sea […]
President Obama challenged the Arab world to use its newfound embrace of democracy to ensure protection for freedom of religion and speech and even life, using the last address of his first term to the General Assembly on Tuesday to call for a renewed focus on the “painstaking work of reform.” Read Here – New York […]
Seventeen months before George W. Bush announced that he was sending five additional brigades to Iraq for the 2007 “surge,” a team of officers and civilian analysts gathered in Baghdad to conduct a classified review of America‘s military strategy in Iraq. In a June 2005 speech at Fort Bragg, President Bush had told the nation that […]
President Hosni Mubarak did not even wait forPresident Obama’s words to be translated before he shot back. “You don’t understand this part of the world,” the Egyptian leader broke in. “You’re young.” Mr. Obama, during a tense telephone call the evening of Feb. 1, 2011, had just told Mr. Mubarak that his speech, broadcast to hundreds of […]
Much has already been said about former Pakistani ambassador to the United States Husain Haqqani’s return to the public sphere after being accusedof requesting an American intervention in Pakistani politics. The crux of Haqqani’s argument—to be developed in a forthcoming book on U.S.-Pakistan relations, Magnificent Delusions—is that the United States and Pakistan willfully mislead themselves about what […]
What was most significant about the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) Summit that was held in Tehran recently was that almost all of its 120 members gathered there in the face of U.S., allied western nations and Israeli attempts to pressure and isolate Iran to abandon parts of its nuclear programme. Great pressure was even brought on […]
Rage is all the rage. As we all know, radical Muslims are enraged about blasphemous videos and cartoons—so much so that an American ambassador to a country liberated by the United States was murdered by a howling mob in Libya. I worry about that. I worry even more about this administration’s lame response to it. But […]
The rise of information and communication technologies has not only revolutionized how people interact with each other but also forced many governments to operate in significantly altered political landscapes. In some cases governments can help unleash the full potential of an open and free internet; for instance, by ensuring that the web is accessible and affordable […]
Critics often assert — now more than ever — that money spent on international development is money that is wasted. They argue that it’s squandered on bad projects, that it bypasses the neediest or is spent in countries with governments that don’t serve their people. But not all foreign aid is guaranteed — and nor […]
