The death of the most wanted Islamic militant – a soft spoken, bearded man – came ten years after his most audacious and deadly terrorist act. His killing in a special forces operation placed a giant question mark over the future of the insurgency he had led, but lent an equally big boost to the President’s […]
The Taliban declared that, on Sunday April 31st, they would begin operations on their spring thaw military strategy against “the foreign invading forces“. The Taliban, the self-proclaimed Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, promised to attack U.S and NATO assets and soldiers as well as businessmen who wish to work with Western institutions and agencies. Officials close […]
Twenty five years separates us from the worst nuclear disaster in the history of mankind. I recently wrote about the 50th anniversary of human spaceflight and realized that a mere 25 years also separated April 1986 from Gagarin’s first human spaceflight in April 1961. On an early Saturday morning in April of 1986 at 1:23 […]
President Obama’s expected and whispered about Pentagon reshuffle heralds the likelihood of a rather more rapid draw down in Afghanistan than has been entertained so far. The reshuffle also suggests that in one swift move, President Obama is looking to get the CIA and the Pentagon entire to cooperate on, and finish up well, what […]
There’s no dearth of coverage of well-known philanthropist, and professed education advocate Greg Mortenson’s alleged malfeasance with funding for his renowned Central Asia Institute. The author of the popular volume, “Three Cups of Tea” and advisor to the U.S. military brass there has been accused of pilfering millions of dollars that he raised on the […]
I came across a series of amazing photographs of the Aral Sea by Radek Skrivanek, a photographer who started visiting and documenting the devastation of the Aral shoreline and the surrounding areas since 2004, and returning to the region many times between 2004 and 2007. You can read more about his fascination with the Aral […]
US Ambassador to Azerbaijan Matthew Bryza has been denied permission to visit the Armenian cemetery in the Azerbaijani exclave of Nakhchivan. Bryza had promised to go to the (former) cemetery, located in the village of Djulfa, during his confirmation hearings before the US Senate last year after he had been criticized for what was perceived […]
This year the world commemorates the 70th anniversary of the German invasion of the Soviet Union. Another sad 70th anniversary coming up in the fall is the massacre of the Jewish population in a ravine near Kyiv in Ukraine. The ravine called Babi Yar, or Babyn Yar in Ukrainian, is a site where around 100,000 […]
Bringing war and conflict back to those watching in far away homes and offices is vital task. It is also a very dangerous one, and the deaths of Restrepo (my review) co-director Tim Hetherington and his fellow journalist Chris Hondros in Libya yesterday show why. The work of these brave men brought a distant conflict […]
Young women beside a fountain in a park, Tajikistan, July 2009. © Amnesty International I am a huge fan of the BBC World Service and have been following their Extreme World series of programs – a collection of TV, radio and online coverage that examines the extremes of our planet from education and corruption to attitudes […]
I urge all our Afghanistan readers to check out Sean Patrick Murphy’s review of the film ‘Talibanistan’ over at his FPA Global Film Review blog. I have not seen the film, but from Murphy’s description it sounds worthwhile. Here is his intro: Hearts and minds. That’s what narrator Peter Coyote says coalition forces in Afghanistan […]
As the 2012 Russian presidential election draws near, there has been a buzz of speculations and a flurry of possible scenarios floating in the press as to who will run in the election and most importantly be the next Russian president. Though incumbent Dmitri Medvedev has not officially announced his bid for a re-election although […]
As the number of Russian billionaires swells to record numbers (101 from last year’s 62) – recession be damned! – old-school raw materials magnates face competition from a new breed of internet entrepreneurs. According to the FT, the Forbes list – long the preserve of well-connected oligarchs that had made their fortunes from ex-state assets […]
Though the piece is now over a month old, I really would like to recommend this incredible story by Greg Jaffe of the Washington Post on Lt. Gen. John Kelly’s family. Kelly lost one of his two sons to a land mine in Afghanistan and is now a close adviser to Defense Secretary Robert Gates. […]
Fifty years ago today, the Soviets blasted off the first man into space from the Baikonur Cosmodrome, deep in the heart of the Kazakh steppe. His name was Yuri Gagarin, a 27-year old outstanding test pilot selected out of the 19 final candidates for the first human spaceflight. He came from very humble roots, born […]