So far, the wave of protests jolting the Middle East has targeted mostly regimes friendly to the United States. With the prominent exception of Libya, a country that is rather peripheral to the region’s political life, the uprisings of the Arab Spring have weakened Washington’s friends and, consequently, brought satisfaction to its foes. All of that could change with the events unfolding in the latest country engulfed by reformist protests, Syria. Much like Egypt, Syria stands at the heart of the Middle East. But unlike Cairo, Damascus has remained a very large thorn in America’s side for decades. Run by […]

Europe Fears an Immigration Surge From North Africa Unrest

Europe’s leaders are voicing increasing concern that unrest in North Africa and the Middle East will cause a surge of illegal immigration to the continent. And with current European Union laws placing the onus of dealing with immigrants on the country where they land, the possibility of a surge has some more on edge than others. Italy, for instance, says it shouldn’t be left to “bear the brunt of the new arrivals just because it is so close to North Africa,” according to this New York Times story about the country’s present scramble to house people evacuated from Lampedusa, a […]

Côte d’Ivoire: Teetering on the Edge of Civil War

Clashes are spreading between opposing forces loyal to Laurent Gbagbo and Alassane Ouattara in Côte d’Ivoire, where tensions have been on the rise since November’s contested election between the two. With the country teetering on the edge of civil war, Ouattara’s party issued a statement this week asserting that all peaceful means to get Gbagbo to recognize defeat have been exhausted. Gbagbo has since offered a ceasefire, which according to the New York Times, “appeared to be a delaying tactic and was ignored by Mr. Ouattara’s forces as they continued their advance from two sides of the country.” Lauren Gelfand, […]

KAMPALA, Uganda — With an estimated 2 billion barrels of oil sitting beneath its Lake Albert, Uganda boasts the largest reserves among a number of African countries whose recent discoveries of petroleum have swelled the ranks of the continent’s oil-possessing states. But it took a recently signed agreement resolving a tax dispute between the government of President Yoweri Museveni on one side and two companies — Tullow Oil and its former partner, Heritage Oil — on the other to open the door for an estimated $10 billion of investment in the country. By the terms of the agreement, announced Feb. […]

Armed Ivorian Opponents Gang up on Gbagbo

Tensions continue to run high in Ivory Coast as forces loyal to incumbent president Laurent Gbagbo patrol the streets of Abobo, Abidjan. Gbagbo is struggling to contain a rebel advance from the north, where forces loyal to his rival, Alassane Ouattara, have reportedly seized several towns.

Global Insider: Turkey-Turkish Cyprus Relations

Turkish Cypriots held protests in Nicosia recently in opposition to austerity measures being imposed by Ankara on the Turkey-supported territory. In an email interview, Mehmet Hasgüler, an expert on Turkish international relations at the International Strategic Research Organization and Çanakkale Onsekiz Mart University, discussed relations between Turkey and Turkish Cyprus. WPR: Why have tensions risen between Turkey and Turkish Cyprus in recent months? Mehmet Hasgüler: As a matter of fact, tension has always been a part of the relations between Turkey and Turkish Cyprus. A decade ago, Turkish Cypriot grievances toward the Turkish government erupted into a series of demonstrations […]

Observers around the world are glued to their TV and computer screens, barely able to keep pace with popular protests seizing one Middle Eastern country after another and changing the Arab world for good. Yet, largely ignored by Western media, the revolutionary wave of the “Arab Spring” has also reached the autonomous Kurdistan Region in Iraq, where it could have the dangerous side effect of plunging the whole of Iraq back into sectarian violence at the very moment the last American troops are scheduled to leave. Unsurprisingly, the popular protests originated in Sulaymaniyah, Kurdistan’s most secular and liberal city, where […]

Kazakhstan’s oil and gas reserves, as well as its pivotal location, make it of strategic importance to the United States and its allies. But in the run-up to Kazakhstan’s presidential election later this week, the country’s contested democratic practices and uncertain transition to the next generation of political leaders leaves its future unclear. Unfortunately, due to Washington’s preoccupation with the Middle East, North Africa and Afghanistan, both Kazakhstan and its upcoming election run the risk of being largely overlooked. Last month, Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev rejected the idea of using a national referendum to extend his term until 2020, despite […]

Bahrain: The Other Middle East Military Intervention

Coverage of the Western intervention in Libya has overshadowed the somewhat unprecedented regional intervention that has been going on for the past two weeks in Bahrain. Troops from the Gulf Cooperation Council’s Peninsula Shield Force (PSF) entered Bahrain after a “request by Bahrain for support,” Asharq Alawsat reported on March 15. According to Brian Katulis, senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, the development marks “a watershed moment: to see this force being used visibly to deal with internal unrest and to see the GCC states openly declare that these forces are being used in this way.” Katulis tells […]

Battleground Syria: Violence Intensifies as More People Die in Unrest

Protests are spreading in Syria. In the flashpoint coastal town of Latakia, troops have been deployed after twelve people were killed there over the weekend.

Is Syria’s Assad Next to Fall?

The regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has long been considered among the region’s most stable. But a growing uprising, along with the government’s aggressive crackdown on demonstrators yesterday, have many wondering if the Assad family’s decades-old grip on power might finally be breaking. A Washington Post report this morning called the demonstrations “the most serious unrest” of Assad’s 11-year tenure. (His father, Hafez, ruled the country for 29 years before him.) The Post cited a pre-dawn raid on the southern city of Daraa by Syrian security forces “in which dozens of people were killed, according to witnesses and activists.” […]

The young men and women who took over Cairo’s Tahrir Square in late-January electrified the Arab world with their calls for building a new Middle East. When their peaceful protests subsequently toppled Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, they took the first step toward moving their country from decades of autocratic rule into a future of democracy. Six weeks into that future, the forces of liberal democracy have suffered their first major defeat. On Saturday, Egyptians by the millions went to the polls to cast their vote on proposed changes to the constitution. The progressive leaders of the uprising struggled to get […]

Six Killed in Protest Crackdown in Syria

Six people were reportedly killed and dozens more wounded when security forces opened fire on protesters in Syria. Residents say the violence occurred at the Omari mosque in the south city of Deraa, which has been the focal point of a string of small but unprecedented rallies calling for the end of the ruling Assad regime.

Top Army Commanders Defect in Yemen

Senior military figures, diplomats and officials in Yemen are abandoning theirpresident of the last 32 years. Ali Abdullah Saleh’s government has been beseiged for weeks by protests in the capital Sanaa. On Friday, more than 50 were killed in a crackdown on the streets. BySunday, president Saleh had sacked all ofhis ministers.

Global Insider: Belgium’s Post-Election Standoff

Belgium recently surpassed Iraq to become the country that has gone longest without forming a government, after elections in June 2010 handed a plurality to a Flemish separatist party. In an email interview, Dave Sinardet, professor of political science at the Free University of Brussels and the University of Antwerp, discussed Belgium’s long-running political crisis. WPR: Why have tensions between Wallonia and Flanders become so pronounced in recent years? Dave Sinardet: Three key elements can help to explain the complex political crisis in Belgium. First, there is a structural element: the absence of national political parties. All parties are either […]

With All Eyes on Middle East, Armenian Unrest Spreads

In addition to spreading across the region, the Arab uprisings are inspiring peaceful demonstrations away from the Middle East — perhaps most notably, albeit with little international news coverage, in the former Soviet bloc country of Armenia. More than 10,000 anti-government protesters rallied last week in the capital, Yerevan, where according to the Associated Press, opposition leader and former President Levon Ter-Petrosian claimed the demonstration was inspired by the revolts in the Arab world. Outcry has mounted since Serzh Sargsyan, a former prime minister, became the nation’s third president in a disputed 2008 election, the immediate aftermath of which was […]

Armenian Protesters Call on Government to Go

Thousands of demonstrators in the Armenian capital Yerevan have called on the government to resign, in the former Soviet republic’s largest protest for for three years. The opposition are predicting a bloodless “velvet revolution” inspired by the Arab uprisings.

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