The following is a guest post from James A. Goldston, Executive Director of the Open Society Justice Initiative
Strasbourg – The United States government has been trying for close to a decade to hush up what it did to Khaled El-Masri, a German citizen whose story of mistaken identity, abduction and abuse marks …
Washington grumbles about the Indian relationship with Iran, but the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan leaves New Delhi little choice
The striking juxtaposition this week in New Delhi is a nice illustration of how Tehran has become a complicating factor in U.S.-India relations. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham …
Why is the captured U.S. soldier not part of the strategic release program in Afghanistan?
Update (May 9, 2012): Confirming earlier speculation, the parents of Bowe Bergdahl today announced that he is a focus of now-stalled negotiations between the United States and the Taliban over a proposed exchange of Guantanamo Bay …
With the United States and NATO making plans to draw down most of their troops over the next few years, Afghanistan faces a precarious future. While the military situation has improved, insurgency continues; the government’s authority extends little beyond the capital; foreign aid accounts for 80 percent of the national budget; …
As election season approaches, American voters’ beliefs about foreign policy issues are increasingly clear. According to a recent Pew “Public Priorities” survey, voters’ concerns about the economy trump all other concerns, with 86 percent of Americans classifying the economy as “a ‘top priority’ for the president and …
In the maelstrom of conflict reporting from different corners of the globe, and its analysis and resultant policy-setting by major powers, the local scorecard is often unclear. If insurgents control six out of ten villages in a district, are they winning? Many would say yes. But if we knew that …
“It’s all fucked up,” reflected Mads, a Danish soldier posted in Armadillo, a Forward Operating Base located in Afghanistan. One of his comrades had been seriously wounded by an IED. Such a statement was probably the most accurate description of the then-Vietnam war, and is as …
You may have heard that things are going poorly in Afghanistan. Is it true, maybe, maybe not. In either case, what you likely have not heard is any of this from President Obama. The President has spoken very little of the war in Afghanistan …
Perception is reality, here there and in Afghanistan; and for good reason, whatever the truth. After thirty years of near constant war the Afghan people might be forgiven for not being bothered to test their reality for truth, when often enough their lives are bought for cheap blood …
Right after U.S. forces went into Afghanistan in 2001 — in those heady “Paris 1944” days of liberating Kabul and most of the country — one of my best friends put to me an urgent request. Knowing I was en route to Kabul he asked me …
I recently had the privilege to attend an event sponsored by The Aspen Institute’s Justice and Society Program entitled, “Targeted Killings and the Law of War.” The roundtable discussion brought …
The New York Times reported Sunday that in 2011, for the first time, deaths among civilian contractors working for American companies in Afghanistan outnumbered the deaths of U.S. military personnel in that country. The figure highlights the extent to which modern U.S. military has come to rely on the private …
When speaking about US foreign policy during the Republican Primary debates, Mitt Romney often returns to a familiar theme: his belief that troop levels in Afghanistan should be determined through close consultation with the commanding generals on the ground. It is both a criticism of President Obama’s June 2011 decision …
Any suspicions that the US went into Afghanistan to secure access to resources went out the window last week. On Wednesday, Tom A. Peter over at the Christian Science Monitor reported, “China’s National Petroleum Corporation became the first foreign company to tap into Afghanistan’s oil and gas reserves. Chinese officials have …
A recent reading of E. M. Forster’s novel, A Passage to India, prompted me to reflect on the West’s drawn out engagement in Afghanistan. The centerpiece of this prescient narrative is an incident in an ancient cave in Northwestern India between an Indian doctor …
