-
BY: David Pierson | Los Angeles Times
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said Thursday that his nation was committed to deepening its ties with Iran, a declaration that underscores the difficulty the United States will face in seeking broad economic sanctions against Tehran in an effort to rein in its nuclear program.
-
BY: Jane Perlez | The New York Times
A wave of attacks against top security installations over the last several days demonstrated that the Taliban, Al Qaeda and militant groups once nurtured by the government are tightening an alliance aimed at bringing down the Pakistani state, government officials and analysts said.
-
BY: Nadia Abou El-Magd | The National
With nationalist songs blaring from his law firm’s downtown Cairo offices, opposition leader Ayman Nour announced the formation of the Egyptian Campaign Against Tawreeth, or inheritance of power, at a press conference on Wednesday that was attended by opposition groups from across the political spectrum.
-
BY: Christopher Schult | Der Spiegel
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is damaging his standing with his own supporters as he careens back and forth between Israel and the United States. As his support fades, Palestinians are beginning to discuss a possible successor. Someone who might pave the way for reconciliation between Abbas' Fatah party and the radical Hamas.
-
BY: Donald McIntyre | The Independent
Israel's increasingly troubled relations with its main ally in the Muslim world took a turn yesterday when it formally protested to Turkey over the "incitement" generated by a television series featuring fictional scenes of barbaric acts by Israeli soldiers.
-
BY: Liz Sly | Los Angeles Times
Plans to hold a referendum that could have accelerated the withdrawal of American forces have quietly been shelved, as even those Iraqi politicians who were pushing for the poll conclude that it no longer would be a useful exercise.
-
BY: Elisabeth Bumiller and Sabrina Tavernise | The New York Times
The government of President Hamid Karzai is preparing for the likelihood that he will have to face an election runoff with his main challenger, Afghanistan’s ambassador here said Thursday, acknowledging an outcome that Western diplomats had been pushing for but that could complicate the debate over whether to send more American troops.
-
BY: Aunohita Mojumdar | Eurasianet
Widespread evidence of fraud marred Afghanistan’s August 20 presidential vote and subsequently raised disturbing questions about the future legitimacy of Afghanistan’s executive branch. It now seems that the country’s leading political actors are exploring a way to restore the election’s integrity. Ironically, it appears as though a back-room bargain, rather than continued reliance on the ballot box, may be the preferred way to solve the crisis of legitimacy.
-
BY: Stephanie McCrummen | The Washington Post
A top U.N. human rights investigator on Thursday blasted a U.N.-backed Congolese military operation targeting rebels in eastern Congo, calling its results "catastrophic."
-
BY: Paul Richardson and Jerry Bungu | Bloomberg News
Voters in Botswana began casting their ballots in an election that will probably extend the ruling party’s more than four-decade hold on power, even as the country faces its worst economic crisis.
-
BY: Rachel Donadio | The New York Times
The Italian government denied a British newspaper’s report on Thursday that Italy’s forces paid off the Taliban in 2008 to maintain calm in an area of Afghanistan under Italian control.
-
BY: Sinziana Demian | Global Post
A primary concern of millions of Romanians is that political insecurity would cause a further devaluation of the national currency RON against the euro, and therefore ever higher loan payments, since many loans are denominated in euros.
-
BY: Fred Weir | The Christian Science Monitor
Northeast Passage through the Arctic slashes time and money for mariners and could be a boom for Russia. But it raises concerns about ice loss induced by global warming.
-
BY: Vladimir Socor | Eurasia Daily Monitor
This agreement turns Azerbaijan for the first time in history from an importer of Russian gas into an exporter of gas to Russia –albeit with small initial volumes– thanks to growing internal production in Azerbaijan. If understood and handled appropriately by the European Union and Turkey, this event can lend impetus to the E.U. and U.S. backed Nabucco pipeline project, notwithstanding European media speculation that Russia is pre-empting Nabucco’s Azerbaijani gas supplies.
-
BY: Choe Sang-Hun | The New York Times
The North Korean military on Thursday accused South Korean warships of trespassing near the North’s west coast, a reminder to its neighbors that it can raise tensions even as its government reaches out for talks with the United States and South Korea.
-
BY: Karin Bruillard | The Washington Post
A spectacular spasm of insurgent attacks that penetrated high-security zones on Thursday prompted shock and confusion across Pakistan, where intelligence agencies and the military have long been viewed as the nation's most potent and prepared institutions.
-
Asia Sentinel
Indonesia has suddenly woken up to the fact that President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, elected as a reformer in 2004, could be on his way to amassing a political coalition that could rival the stranglehold on power once enjoyed by former President Suharto before he was ousted from office in 1998.
-
The Economist
Amid a surge in terrorism, Pakistan’s army prepares to enter the lair of its Mehsud militants.
-
BY: Daniel Ten Kate and Ranjeetha Pakiam | Bloomberg News
The spread of fundamentalist Islam across a swath of Southeast Asia is testing the ability of policymakers to appeal to devout Muslims while simultaneously protecting the rights of Buddhist, Christian and Hindu minorities. Striking the right balance is key to limiting tensions among religious groups, said Bernhard Platzdasch, a visiting research fellow at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies in Singapore.
-
BY: Juan O. Tamayo | The Miami Herald
Cuba recently gave a top State Department official a long-blocked permission to visit dual U.S.-Cuban citizens jailed on the island -- but it did not accept a U.S. offer to relax travel restrictions on each other's diplomats.