Briefing Archive

President Donald Trump has mostly ignored Central America save for his attempts to bully the region’s leaders into helping him slash the number of immigrants entering the United States, but President-elect Joe Biden is promising a radically different approach. With extensive foreign policy experience and a genuine interest in Central America stemming from his time as vice president, when he served as former President Barack Obama’s chief regional emissary, Biden has vowed to directly address the brutal conditions that are at the heart of the migration crisis in Central America. Biden has also pledged to “immediately do away with” President […]

NAIROBI, Kenya—Federal elections that were supposed to be held in Somalia starting this month are behind schedule due to a dispute between the president and his political rivals. According to the electoral plan, legislative elections were to be held throughout December, followed by a vote in the Federal Parliament in February to elect the country’s next president. But opposition candidates are protesting the membership of two committees charged with overseeing the balloting, claiming they are packed with President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed’s allies, allegedly giving him an unfair advantage as he seeks reelection. The president, widely known in Somalia by his […]

Many world leaders, dismayed by four years of Donald Trump, are hoping that President-elect Joe Biden will return to an American foreign policy that is more pragmatic and balanced, less fickle and pettily punitive. One region crying out for an urgent recalibration in the U.S. approach is the Persian Gulf. Thanks to an emerging European initiative to help bring a modicum of calm to the tense region, Biden will have the opportunity to do a lot of good early in his term without having to invest too much political capital. Ever since the 1979 Iranian revolution, tensions between Iran and […]

In early November, Oman’s government announced plans to institute an income tax on high earners by 2022. The policy will break precedent in the oil-rich Gulf, where states tend to pay their citizens, rather than requiring citizens to pay the state. The question now is whether this decision will fundamentally shift the social contract in Oman, which has been an absolute monarchy for decades. Oman’s neighboring rentier economies will be watching closely to see whether direct taxation leads Omanis to more vocally demand representation in government. Oman’s experience will also have implications for U.S. engagement with the region. That Oman […]

President Nana Akufo-Addo’s bid for a second term in Ghana’s upcoming general election took a hit last month, when the country’s anti-corruption czar, Martin Amidu, announced his resignation, citing political interference and lack of support from the government for his work. The incident is a setback for Ghana’s anti-graft campaign, which has seen mixed progress under Akufo-Addo’s government. But while it is a significant development that is injecting some uncertainty ahead of next Monday’s polls, it is unlikely to definitively swing the election result in favor of the opposition candidate, former President John Mahama. Amidu stepped down as special prosecutor […]

Over the past four years, America’s relationship with the United Nations underwent a dramatic shift, as the U.S. undermined, withdrew from or threatened withdrawal from some of the most important multilateral organizations, processes and accords. These include the Iran nuclear deal, the Paris climate agreement, the U.N. Human Rights Council, the World Health Organization and the World Trade Organization, to name a few. But it isn’t just America that drew away from multilateralism. Major and middle powers around the world have distanced themselves from multilateral institutions to embrace more naked forms of nationalism. This has led to greater risks of […]

A shock wave rattled South Africa’s political landscape on Nov. 10, when the Directorate for Primary Crime Investigation, a unit known as the Hawks, issued an arrest warrant for Ace Magashule on 21 charges of corruption, theft, fraud and money laundering. Magashule is currently the secretary general of the ruling African National Congress party and a longtime ally of former President Jacob Zuma, who is himself awaiting trial for graft. The charges against Magashule have to do with the awarding of a contract worth 255 million rand ($16.5 million) for work that was ultimately never done, as part of a […]