On Aug. 27, U.S. military forces in Afghanistan killed 12 Taliban fighters located in Pakistan’s tribal zone after the insurgents attacked U.S. and Afghan troops in eastern Afghanistan. The following day, U.S. State Department spokesperson Tom Casey stated that the governments of Afghanistan, Pakistan, and the United States had an agreed mechanism for resolving these kinds of cross-border exchanges. Pakistani authorities immediately denied that they had ever granted Afghan or coalition forces permission to attack fighters on their territory. This recent incident underscores the longstanding controversy regarding military operations in the Afghan-Pakistani border region. Last week, while reviewing more than […]

The majority of the English-language media outside of India have been notably tentative about accepting the obvious premise that the recent mob attack on eight Indians in the eastern German town of Mügeln was a racist attack. (See the earlier WPR report here.) To the extent they have, however, virtually all have framed the issue of racism and xenophobia in Germany as a specifically “East German problem.” CNN, for example, noted that “since German re-unification in 1990, racist violence has broken out sporadically in the poorer east of the country.” A Reuters report used a similar formula: “Eastern Germany has […]

BOGOTÁ, Colombia — Forty-six days after leaving his native Pasto, Gustavo Moncayo arrived in Bogotá with nothing more than a white t-shirt bearing a picture of his son, a metal chain draped across his chest and a walking stick. Together with his two daughters, Moncayo walked over 1,000 kilometers to raise awareness and pressure the Colombian government and the left-wing Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) to negotiate the release of his son and hundreds of other victims kidnapped by the guerrillas. Many FARC hostages have been held for years, including former Colombian presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt and three U.S. […]

Before the United States and India can consummate their nuclear pact, a major hurdle remains: The guidelines of the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) prohibit nuclear export to countries that, like India, lack full-scope safeguards. Many expected that, at Washington’s behest, the NSG would rubber stamp an exception for India — until Beijing hinted again this week that it might block such a rules change. The Nuclear Suppliers Group, a cartel of 45 nuclear fuel producing countries that coordinate export controls to non-nuclear-weapon states, is little known outside of nonproliferation circles but plays a critical role in limiting access to uranium […]

WASHINGTON – Eight leaky patrol boats are at the heart of a bitter dispute between the Coast Guard and its former partners in the defense industry as the nation’s smallest military service struggles to update an antiquated fleet on a tight budget. In April, Adm. Thad Allen, Coast Guard commandant, announced at a press briefing that the service would decommission the eight patrol boats, worth around $100 million combined, just months after the first emerged from extensive work at a Northrop Grumman shipyard that included lengthening the hull by 13 feet. The lead vessel’s hull buckled on its maiden voyage, […]

Calling on Russian pilots to resume “combat duty,” Russian President Vladimir Putin announced Aug. 17 that his country’s strategic nuclear bombers would resume their Cold War-era practice of conducting long-range patrols “on a permanent basis.” He told reporters that “our pilots have spent too long on the ground. I know that they are happy to now have this chance to begin a new life and we wish them luck.” Although the main function of these aircraft is to conduct nuclear missile strikes against the continental United States, Putin said he hoped that other countries would show “understanding” for the Russian […]

On August 9, the Bush Administration issued its revised U.S. Counternarcotics Strategy for Afghanistan. The main innovation is the explicit use of enhanced “sticks and carrots” to change Afghans’ behavior. Protracted infighting within the administration in recent weeks about timing and tactics had twice delayed the new strategy’s publication. Despite the extra editing time, senior Democrats and Republicans in Congress called the revisions inadequate given the magnitude of the problem. Preliminary assessments of the data the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime plans to release next month indicate that opium poppy cultivation in Afghanistan has increased by 15 percent during […]

Three months ago, the city of Ramadi was dark. The city of 400,000 in western Iraq was completely severed from the country’s delicate electrical grid; those who had power got it strictly from generators that hummed all day and night. But then came the much-heralded “Anbar awakening” — a banding-together of Sunni sheiks and their militias into a loose alliance that fought alongside U.S. and federal Iraqi forces to all but eradicate terrorist cells in Ramadi and other large western towns. As security improved in Anbar province, U.S. Provincial Reconstruction Teams (PRTs) — some military-led, some commanded by State Department […]

On Aug. 2, after being escorted by a nuclear-powered icebreaker and another research vessel, two Russian mini-submarines traveled more than two miles below the ice at the North Pole and planted a titanium Russian flag in the seafloor, claiming the underwater territory for Moscow. The publicity stunt played to huge audiences in the Russian media and on state-run television, where the tone of the coverage resembled that given to Soviet cosmonauts. Elsewhere, the underwater mission was greeted with a mixture of humor and anxiety. Late night talk shows worried what the land grab would mean for Santa’s village and his […]

AU Mission to Somalia Faces Deteriorating Situation With Inadequate Resources

On Aug. 7, the government of Burundi again announced that it would delay sending its planned contingent of 2,000 troops to Somalia to bolster the embattled African Union (AU) peacekeeping force there. Burundi officials blamed the failure on delays in the delivery of communications and transport equipment from France and the United States, but the decision underscores the fragility of the AU peace mission there. In June 2006, war-torn Somalia experienced a new phase in its 15-years-old civil war when militiamen from the Islamic Courts Union (ICU) took over the capital, Mogadishu, and other important parts of northern Somalia. By […]

Editor’s Note: Over the last month, World Politics Review published Swiss journalist Kurt Pelda’s diary of his three-week trip, during late February and March, to eastern Chad on the border with the Sudanese region of Darfur. The diary originally appeared in German on the Web site of the Swiss newspaper the Neue Zürcher Zeitung, and was published in WPR for the first time in English. Today we present Pelda’s epilogue to his diary, penned exclusively for WPR. In it, Pelda provides a penetrating analysis of the conflict’s causes, and of various proposals for its resolution. He also responds to criticism […]

Editor’s Note: In March, Kurt Pelda, Africa Bureau Chief of the Swiss daily the Neue Zürcher Zeitung, traveled to eastern Chad on the border with the Sudanese crisis region of Darfur. Over 200,000 Sudanese refugees live in eastern Chad, having fled the violence in Darfur. The region likewise serves as staging grounds for the Darfur rebels fighting against the Sudanese government. During his three weeks traveling in the region, Pelda kept a diary, which provides a portrait of the Darfur conflict that is perhaps unrivaled in its detail and nuance. World Politics Review presents this important document for the first […]

In a written statement submitted for his July 31 Senate confirmation hearing, Gen. James E. Cartwright, commander of the U.S. Strategic Command and the Bush administration’s nominee to become the next vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, revealed that the administration has decided not to extend the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) after it expires in Dec. 5, 2009. In his written description of his vision for developing a conventional, non-nuclear, prompt global strike capability, Gen. Cartwright included the following question: “Does the Administration’s decision not to extend the START Treaty have any impact on development of a […]

‘FULL AND FRANK’ — While President Bush insisted that the change of leadership in Britain had not altered U.S.-British relations, Gordon Brown’s first official visit to Washington as prime minister somehow managed to place the partnership in a more distant, formal context. “Full and frank” — Brown’s description of his talks with Bush — recalls the Cold War, when it was diplospeak for “we disagreed,” and one step above “useful exchange of views.” We are a long way from Tony Blair’s warm, intense, and (at least in public) full endorsement of George Bush’s policies. European diplomats in Washington, briefed by […]

Editor’s Note: In March, Kurt Pelda, Africa Bureau Chief of the Swiss daily the Neue Zürcher Zeitung, traveled to eastern Chad on the border with the Sudanese crisis region of Darfur. Over 200,000 Sudanese refugees live in eastern Chad, having fled the violence in Darfur. The region likewise serves as staging grounds for the Darfur rebels fighting against the Sudanese government. During his three weeks traveling in the region, Pelda kept a diary, which provides a portrait of the Darfur conflict that is perhaps unrivaled in its detail and nuance. In daily installments through the beginning of August, World Politics […]

Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai and U.S. President George W. Bush are scheduled to meet this weekend at Camp David to discuss the situation in Afghanistan. Two topics likely will dominate their conversation: the death of Afghan civilians from NATO military action and Afghanistan’s narcotics problem. The civilian casualty issue was an important agenda item at the NATO Defense Ministers’ meeting in June 2007. At the time, NATO leaders largely argued that civilian casualties were an inevitable characteristic of war. A joint press conference with Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer and Afghan Defense Minister Abdul Rahim Wardak following the Ministerial meeting, […]

Editor’s Note: In March, Kurt Pelda, Africa Bureau Chief of the Swiss daily the Neue Zürcher Zeitung, traveled to eastern Chad on the border with the Sudanese crisis region of Darfur. Over 200,000 Sudanese refugees live in eastern Chad, having fled the violence in Darfur. The region likewise serves as staging grounds for the Darfur rebels fighting against the Sudanese government. During his three weeks traveling in the region, Pelda kept a diary, which provides a portrait of the Darfur conflict that is perhaps unrivaled in its detail and nuance. In daily installments through the beginning of August, World Politics […]

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