Iran and world powers gather in Geneva to resume nuclear talks. Iran and the six world powers of P5+1 (the permanent members of the U.N. Security Council (the United States, Russia, China, France, and Britain plus Germany), meet today, November 20 in Geneva to resume the stalled nuclear talks. Represented by moderate Foreign Minister […]
The Islamic Republic of Iran’s eleventh presidential election will take place on June 14, 2013. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s time in office will end soon afterwards, but he will always be remembered for his outrageous comments including his denial of the Holocaust or the non-existence of homosexuals in Iran. Ahmadinejad’s undiplomatic language and his controversial comments were […]
FPA event – “Iran and the U.S.: Endless Enemies?” Ambassador John W. Limbert joined the Foreign Policy Association at The Colony Club this past Wednesday, April 24 to discuss anything but the nuclear situation in Iran. Limbert’s lecture suggested that if the only topic of U.S.-Iranian relations continues to be nuclear weapons, we will never […]
Foreign Policy Association’s 2013 “Great Decisions in Foreign Policy” on PBS, a series of half hour documentaries providing background information for and evaluation of leading contemporary issues, airs this March. The forthcoming series includes a segment on Iran’s controversial nuclear ambitions. “Red Line: Iran, Israel, and the Bomb” begins with the same powerful introduction as […]
On March 5, 1957, under the Atoms for Peace Program, Iran started its nuclear program with the United States’ assistance. Initiated during the Eisenhower administration and reign of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the relationship aided Iran’s quest for peaceful atomic energy. In 1968, Iran signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), an international agreement created to […]
The Set-Up Overflowing with distrust, deception, and ulterior motives, America and Iran’s tumultuous saga has the makings of a made-for-TV, B-rated movie. The twists, turns, and over-the-top drama are a guilty pleasure for movie viewers just as news junkies cannot get enough of the endless dramatics between the United States and Iran. The world wants […]
By James Stafford World markets appear to be hovering over a precipice as Europe’s sovereign debt crisis, slowdowns in India and China and further bank downgrades threaten to send stocks and commodities down even further. Falling oil and gas prices may offer some respite to consumers but are they enough to help the economy or […]
During his 2008 presidential campaign, Barack Obama advocated diplomacy over coercion to resolve the Iranian nuclear threat, pledging to open the lines of communication and work to reinstate trust between Washington and Tehran. Barely having time to file for a change of address to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, newly sworn-in President Obama’s Iran policy was challenged […]
Dr. Payam Akhavan is a Professor of International Law at McGill University, co-founder of the Iran Human Rights Documentation Centre, and the first Legal Advisor to the Prosecutor’s Office of the International Criminal Tribunals at The Hague. Dr. Akhavan sat down with Reza Akhlaghi, senior writer at Foreign Policy Association, to discuss the following issues: […]
Political liberalism emphasizes the effectiveness of diplomacy and cooperation to solve international problems. Under the principle of liberalism, countries’ interactions to solve shared problems can result in mutually beneficial resolutions. Contrastingly, liberalism’s counterpart, political realism, emphasizes the maintenance and use of power in a country’s domestic and international agendas. Stressing countries’ individual struggles for power, […]
In recent days and weeks Fidel Castro has reappeared everywhere in Cuba—on television, on the radio, in the news—but he has made it, too, into international exchanges again. Ever the clever statesman, he is proving once more that he knows what to say and when to say it to participate in the most relevant international […]
So Fidel did, in the end, appear and speak before the Cuban National Assembly—just in a separate meeting from that of his brother Raúl (though the current President Castro joined this meeting as well to hear Fidel speak). In his 12-minute speech on Saturday, Fidel repeated his recent warnings that tensions between the United States […]