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For four years, former Iraqi prime minister Iyad Allawi has been a voice of reason in Iraq. He always stood out against religiously driven Shi'ite hegemony over Iraqi politics, although he himself is Shi'ite (but a secular one) and has refused the partitioning of Iraq and the sidelining of Iraqi Sunnis after the downfall of Saddam Hussein in 2003.
By Karim Sadjadpour
“You know the thing about Iran,” a European Ambassador in Tehran once lamented to me. “It has such a rich culture, a grand history, wonderful people. The cuisine is sophisticated and the scenery is breathtaking. It’s got incredible poets, musicians and filmmakers. Beautiful art and architecture…But it’s cursed with such lousy politicians.”
by Prof. Cynthia E. Ayers and COL (R) David W. Cammons
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the U.S. Army, the Dept. of Defense, or any organization within the U.S. government.
“Get the U.S. out of the U.N.!,” a sign near Gettysburg shouts. “The United Nations sabotages America’s security,” author Eric Shawn declared in his book The U.N. Exposed. Iranian spokesman Gholam-Hossein Elham told reporters that the U.N. “must be relocated from the U.S.” And a few days after Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez’s rant before a U.N. audience, a New York Daily News editorial encouraged Chavez to “take the atrophied, self-abasing remains of a global idea 2,100 miles to Caracas!”
By Susan L. Shirk
China’s Premier Wen Jiabao travels to Japan this week in what he is calling an “ice melting” visit, the first by a senior Chinese leader since 2000.
By Mark Weisbrot
The IMF and World Bank are holding their annual Spring Meetings this weekend. As usual, finance ministers, bankers, business lobbyists, and government representatives from around the world will flock to Washington – not so much for the official meetings, where little of interest usually happens, but for the networking opportunities that the meetings provide.
Graham Allison is director of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs and professor of government at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government. He recently tasked his graduate students with responding to a scenario on energy security and climate change. An abridged version of the scenario and a selection of student responses follow. Add your comments to join the discussion that they started, on what global leaders can really do with respect to energy security and climate change, or whether it is too late.
By Kelly Sims Gallagher and John P. Holdren
Last weekend, more than 1,400 public rallies were held all across America -- in churches, community centers, schools, town halls, parks, on tops of mountains and glaciers, and even under water in the Florida Keys -- urging Congress to “Step It Up” and commit to an 80% reduction in U.S. emissions of greenhouse gases by 2050 This demonstration of public support for real action against the causes of global climatic disruption was part of a cresting wave of change in the politics of the climate issue in this country.
By Haim Malka
Let’s stop fooling ourselves. No number of meetings between Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert will blossom into full-fledged negotiations. The U.S. strategy is to hold talks so Palestinians can begin to imagine what a final agreement might look like. Yet the two leaders are too weak, and their politics too complicated, to contemplate making even symbolic concessions on long-term outcomes. Jerusalem, refugees, and territory will not be the carrots to lead this process forward. Instead, they will be the poison that dooms any opportunity for progress.
With Boris Yeltsin’s passing, we see his famous photographs light up the front pages in Eastern Europe one more time – and the memories flood back, for better or worse. There is his picture standing atop a tank, the Soviet politician turned opposition leader speaking out against the August 1991 coup, helping hold the Russian state together.
By Adebayo Williams
Once again Nigeria picks up the bloody pieces from its latest democratic fiasco. It is not unlike the aftermath of a party that went up in smoke. Much of the debris of desolation is still in place. The streets are tense and sullen and in the violent Niger Delta, the night still echoes with the staccato bursts of small arms fire as marauding insurgents engage government troops in a deadly face off. This is as close to Dante’s inferno as it can get.
By Mark Weisbrot
The elections in France demonstrate the power of faulty economic analysis, and more generalized problems with arithmetic, to shape ideas and possibly the future of not only a nation, but a continent.
As you may have noticed, we've added a new feature to the PostGlobal home page. "This Just In" will provide a sampling of the latest news and views from the PostGlobal community and bloggers around the world.
By Peter Bergen and Paul Cruickshank -- Islamabad and New York
Five British citizens, four of whom are of Pakistani descent, were convicted Monday of planning to attack targets in the United Kingdom under orders from al Qaeda using fertilizer-based bombs. Their convictions underline the fact that from its Pakistani hub al Qaeda now has the capability not only to plan once-off attacks in the U.K., but is also able to plan a sustained campaign of terrorist operations against the United States’ closest ally. And the ease with which al Qaeda has recruited operatives from the U.K. suggests that a future attack on the United States by British militants trained in al Qaeda’s training camps in Pakistan is a real possibility.
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