Will the doom and gloom never stop? Nope, says the London-based think tank Centre for Economic and Business Research (CEBR) in their top ten predictions for the coming year. CEBR foresees another euro crisis in the spring of 2011stemming from Spain and Italy having to refinance their bonds. If the euro does not break up […]
This winter break has not been short on interesting, worrisome international developments like the new START Treaty, the latest Chinese anti-naval weapon system, the unpredictable North Korean foreign policy, the meltdown of the Eurozone, Estonia joining the Eurozone, and the Mikhail Khodorkovsky’s judicial drama among many others. Nothing, however, has been more concrete and disrupting […]
There is a number of terribly unexciting and obvious, or maybe rather dubious candidates for a European Person of the Year award of course. Thus Benedict XVI slackened his church’s stance on the sinfulness of condoms, yet he was forced to deal with (or at times: ignore) constantly recurring pedophilia revelations in Ireland as well […]
Year in review For Lebanon, 2010 was dominated by the continued investigation into the death of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. Hariri was murdered in February 2005, sparking off massive protests that led to the end of Syria’s 30 year occupation of Lebanon. Since 2007, the UN-backed Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) has been gathering […]
The Year So Far. Happy New Year to all. By the time this gets posted and read, Bangladesh will have been swept into the parade of countries switching alendars to a new year, 2011, and one sincerely hopes her people will turn to a new way of viewing the world. Bangladesh, its government and its […]
Well just when you thought US-Syria relations where stuck in a rut we get a major curveball from Pres. Obama. Robert Ford has been pushed through as US ambassador to Syria as part of a series of recess appointments by President Obama. While the manner of his appointment will limit the term of his ambassadorship, […]
I agree with the old adage that the more things change, the more they remain the same. Despite self-congratulatory speeches and political sloganeering, 2010 has not been the best year for Southern Africa in terms of problem solving, innovation, and policy entrepreneurship. Take for example (as I alluded in one of my previous blog entries): […]
By this time next year, the United States should have withdrawn all of its troops from Iraq. We can hope that this long, bloody chapter in American military history may be at an end.
What was the least expected event in Europe this year? Depends on your definition of unexpected. The most literal response, of course, is the eruption of Eyjafjallajökull in Iceland, though a study published three months before the eruption documented increased activity near the volcano. But it did not predict the category 4-level eruption that grounded […]
Overview 2010 was a year of both change and continuity in African affairs. The changes were clear: Kenyans approved a new Constitution, though the implementation will take time. South Africa successfully hosted the football World Cup, confounding the naysayers and taking another huge step forward in the process of nation building. There were elections across […]
Home away from home “Welcome to the home of your ancestors,” declared Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade in October 2010, welcoming 163 young Haitians to the campuses of many leading Senegalese universities, including the School Polytechnique of Tièce, the Faculty of Agronomy of Bambay and Cheikh Anta Diop University in downtown Dakar. “Your ancestors left here by physical […]
Peter Feaver of Shadow Government has penned (keyboarded?) a provocative analysis of coming dilemma facing President Obama and his forthcoming Afghan war decision. Feaver first recalls the candidate Obama’s rhetoric on the war in Afghanistan and Iraq, reminding us all how hawkish the future president sounded on Afghanistan. Feaver than discusses how some things have […]
This just in: Matt Bryza was confirmed today (December 29) as the new US ambassador to Azerbaijan. About time. This was a “recess appointment” by the White House, necessitated by a “hold” placed on Bryza by California Senator Barbara Boxer and Robert Menendez of New Jersey, both Democrats responding to strenuous criticism of Bryza from […]
It’s been a month since the results of the contested November 28th presidential election were announced in Cote D’Ivoire, where things have taken a turn for the worse over the end-of-year holidays. As tensions and violence escalate – at least 170 people have been killed so far in post-election violence according to the UN — […]
The Islamabad station chief of the Central Intelligence Agency hastily departed from Pakistan last week after his cover was blown due to a suspected deliberate leak by Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence. This act is the latest evidence of the tense relationship between the two spy agencies. It is believed that his cover was blown in retaliation […]