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As negotiators in the Iran nuclear talks strive to meet the March 31 deadline for a framework agreement, which is supposed to be followed by a more detailed implementation package by June, critical external players like Israel and the U.S. Congress have been expressing loud opposition to a deal that they perceive as too lenient on Tehran. French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius’ expression last week of similar concerns highlights the fact that differences exist even among the six powers—the U.S., France, Britain, Germany, Russia and China—that are negotiating with Iran. In this context, the quiet if conditional support offered by […]

When Juan Manuel Santos became president of Colombia in August 2010, it was clear he had one overriding aim: to end his country’s longstanding internal armed conflict, chiefly with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). Re-elected to a second term last June, Santos now appears to be in the final stretch toward reaching a peace agreement with the FARC. Talks in Havana between government negotiators and FARC leadership have advanced enough for some victims of the conflict and an array of military officials to have joined the negotiations. In addition, Santos managed to get the United States to name […]

Last year, during a midnight search for contraband in South Africa’s St. Albans maximum security prison, more than 200 inmates were forced to lie naked on the ground in a human chain, each one’s face pressed into his neighbors’ buttocks. They were then subjected to beatings, electric shocks and torture. The abuse was not an isolated case. According to a complaint lodged by former inmate Bradley McCallum with the United Nations Human Rights Committee (UNHRC), a similar incident occurred at St. Albans in 2005 after the stabbing of a prison warden. In his complaint, McCallum alleged that inmates were forced […]

On April 15, exactly 18 days before the end of President Faure Essozimna Gnassingbe’s second term in office, Togo will go to the polls to elect its next head of state. In power since the death of his father, Gen. Eyadema Gnassingbe, in 2005, Gnassingbe will be running for a third term as president. Though permitted by the 2002 constitution passed by his father, which removed presidential term limits, his candidacy is nevertheless contested by the opposition, concerned by what it calls the “confiscation of power” by a man whose family has ruled the country for over 40 years. During […]

U.S. President Barack Obama’s ability to influence the future of American foreign policy is inevitably shrinking as he approaches the end of his second term. But as president, he still has enormous leverage over the direction of United Nations diplomacy. In the next few weeks or months, Obama could dump two exceptionally sensitive tasks on the U.N.: finding a new way out of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and monitoring an agreement on Iran’s nuclear program. If the U.N. can successfully accomplish either of these things, the organization will receive a gigantic boost. If it fails on both, the long-term damage to […]

The U.S. Department of the Interior is due to decide this week if Royal Dutch Shell can restart drilling for oil off the coast of Alaska after it was forced to shut down operations in 2012 over safety and environmental concerns. In an email interview, Robert Huebert, an associate professor at the University of Calgary, discussed Arctic drilling amid the slump in global oil prices. WPR: Who are the main parties interested in exploring Arctic hydrocarbon resources, and what projects are currently underway? Robert Huebert: Hydrocarbon development and exploration is occurring in the northern land and maritime regions of Canada, […]

As the negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program careen toward the finish line, tensions between U.S President Barack Obama’s administration and Israel remain high. The inability of the United States and Israel to reconcile their positions is not, as some critics contend, the result of Obama’s wavering commitment to Israel’s defense, but of two enduring and deep peculiarities of U.S. strategy: first, its expansiveness, and second, America’s uniquely idealistic strategic culture. These shape not only U.S. cooperation with Israel but also U.S. security partnerships around the world. Unlike Israel, the U.S. has far-ranging, interconnected global concerns. How the U.S. deals with […]

In February, China’s State Council announced the approval of two new nuclear reactors at the Hongyanhe nuclear power plant in the northeastern province of Liaoning, underscoring Beijing’s intention to move forward with an ambitious nuclear power plant construction program despite the 2011 Fukushima nuclear accident in neighboring Japan. In the wake of that accident, when other players slowed and in some case scuttled nuclear development, China limited itself to holding off on approving new reactors while safety procedures throughout the country’s nuclear facilities were reviewed. However, none of China’s 24 nuclear reactors already in operation were shut down, and ongoing […]

Earlier this month, Tajik opposition leader Umarali Kuvvatov was shot dead in Istanbul. In an email interview, Lawrence Markowitz, an assistant professor at Rowan University, discussed the state of the opposition in Tajikistan. WPR: What is the current state of the Tajik opposition, both within Tajikistan and in exile? Lawrence Markowitz: Tajikistan’s political opposition has been significantly marginalized over the past 15 years. When the country’s civil war ended in 1997, a power-sharing agreement was struck that provided opposition groups 30 percent of the top positions in the central leadership and guaranteed competitive elections for seats in Majlisi Namoyandagon, Tajikistan’s […]

Reports over the past three months suggest that Pakistani military leaders and Afghan officials are renewing efforts to open direct talks between the Taliban and Kabul. Though these steps show signs of promise and should be supported by U.S. policymakers, expectations about the talks’ prospects for a swift resolution to the Afghanistan War should be measured, given the history of breakdowns of past efforts and the potential for spoilers on all sides to derail them. The last bid for peace talks, supported by the U.S. State Department and facilitated by Qatar, was abandoned in 2013 after Afghanistan’s then-President Hamid Karzai […]

Dilma Rousseff has faced worse. Nothing that happens to her as president of Brazil could compare with the physical pain inflicted on her by professional torturers from the military dictatorship she fought to topple as a young revolutionary. But now that she is the one holding power, she is facing an avalanche of troubles, including the wrath of the people, the perils of a global economy and the stubbornly uncooperative forces of nature. Sadly for Rousseff, all signs indicate her problems are only about to grow worse. The dire signals started emerging a long time ago. But the evidence that […]

Rafael Correa, a left-leaning academic turned populist politician, has dominated Ecuadorian politics since 2007. He won three presidential elections and has consistently maintained popularity rates of over 50 percent. His movement, the Alliance for a Proud and Sovereign Homeland, controls the legislature. The judiciary and all institutions of horizontal accountability are in the hands of his lieutenants. At the time of this writing, Ecuador’s National Assembly, as the congress was renamed, is modifying Ecuador’s 20th constitution, enacted during Correa’s term, to allow for his permanent re-election. According to Correa, his regime is promoting a better democracy that is advancing social […]

Earlier this month, the director general of Israel’s Defense Ministry was in Hanoi to discuss boosting defense ties with the Vietnamese defense minister. In an email interview, Alvite Singh Ningthoujam, a doctoral researcher at the School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi, discussed Israel’s defense relationships in Southeast Asia. WPR: How established are Israel-Vietnam defense ties, and what initiatives are planned or underway to expand them? Alvite Singh Ningthoujam: Defense ties between Israel and Vietnam have been growing significantly, particularly since then-Israeli President Shimon Peres’ visit in November 2011. Given Vietnam’s large army and its obsolete Soviet-era […]

2015 has already been a very difficult year for Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff. After a hard-fought re-election last October, the most competitive in the past two decades, Rousseff is now confronted with the need to implement meaningful fiscal adjustments amid declining approval ratings and popular unrest, after hundreds of thousands took to the streets in protest Sunday. The series of negative developments since her re-election has been dramatic but is likely to get even worse, with Rousseff in the eye of a political perfect storm. The scandal and ongoing investigations surrounding state-controlled oil giant Petrobras are the biggest concern, having […]

Four years ago this week, the first protests against President Bashar al-Assad began in Syria. The toll from his regime’s crackdown and the ensuing civil war is staggering: at least 210,000 dead, 50 percent of the population displaced and over 1.2 million homes destroyed, along with half of Syria’s cities, where the lights have effectively gone out. Nearly 11 million Syrians have been forced from their homes. “The country they sought to improve literally no longer exists,” The Washington Post noted on this grim anniversary. The war’s toll on Syria’s cultural heritage, in particular, has recently received more attention, after […]

How do the crisis in Ukraine and the political situation in Russia look when viewed through the prism of Chinese media? The familiar Western narrative of Russian President Vladimir Putin as a dictator responsible for destabilizing Ukraine and snuffing out domestic dissent takes on a far different coloring. The appeal of the Chinese version of events elsewhere in the world could help explain why U.S. and Western efforts to marginalize Putin and Russia on the world stage have met with little success. At the Naval War College on Monday, Christopher Marsh, professor of national security and strategic studies at the […]

With the next stage of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) process set for November and December of this year in Paris, there has been a recent flurry of political and diplomatic activity from the European Union and its 28 member-states regarding their plans for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Their pledges have come alongside ambitious designs for future joint electricity generation continent-wide, given geopolitical tensions with Russia, which remains “Europe’s largest single foreign supplier of not only gas, but also oil, coal and nuclear fuel.” While there are still critical challenges to realizing the milestones set down […]