The SASSI Blog

Iranian Aircraft Carriers in the Gulf of Mexico - Satire

2012-01-30T14:44:00.001-08:00

Exclusive: New Iranian Commando Team Operating Near U.S.

(Tehran, FNA) The Fars News Agency has confirmed with the Republican Guard’s North American Operations Command that a new elite Iranian commando team is operating in the U.S.-Mexican border region. The primary day-to-day mission of the team, known as the Joint Special Operations Gulf of Mexico Task Force, or JSOG-MTF, is to mentor Mexican military units in the border areas in their war with the deadly drug cartels. The task force provides “highly trained personnel that excel in uncertain environments,” Maj. Amir Arastoo, a spokesman for Republican Guard special operations forces in North America, tells Fars, and “seeks to confront irregular threats...”
The unit began its existence in mid-2009 -- around the time that Washington rejected the Iranian leadership’s wish for a new diplomatic dialogue. But whatever the task force does about the United States -- or might do in the future -- is a sensitive subject with the Republican Guard. “It would be inappropriate to discuss operational plans regarding any particular nation,” Arastoo says about the U.S.

January 30, 2012 "Tom Dispatch" - - Okay, so I made that up. Sue me. But first admit that, a line or two in, you knew it was fiction. After all, despite the talk about American decline, we are still on a one-way imperial planet. Yes, there is a new U.S. special operations team known as Joint Special Operations Task Force-Gulf Cooperation Council, or JSOTF-GCC, at work near Iran and, according to Wired magazine’s Danger Room blog, we really don’t quite know what it’s tasked with doing (other than helping train the forces of such allies as Bahrain and Saudi Arabia). More

Given that the US has at least two carrier battle groups in the Persian Gulf, which is not America's geographical sphere of influence, Iran having aircraft carriers in the Gulf of Mexico should not disturb the Pentagon in he least. Editor.

The Rohingya: Myanmar's outcasts

2012-01-30T05:24:00.001-08:00

This article is the first in a series by Ambassador Akbar Ahmed, a former Pakistani high commissioner to the UK, exploring how a litany of volatile centre/periphery conflicts with deep historical roots were interpreted after 9/11 in the new global paradigm of anti-terrorism - with profound and often violent consequences. Incorporating in-depth case studies from Asia, Africa, and the Middle East, Ambassador Ahmed will ultimately argue that the inability for Muslim and non-Muslim states alike to either incorporate minority groups into a liberal and tolerant society or resolve the "centre vs periphery" conflict is emblematic of a systemic failure of the modern state - a breakdown which, more often than not, leads to widespread violence and destruction. The violence generated from these conflicts will become the focus, in the remainder of the 21st century, of all those dealing with issues of national integration, law and order, human rights and justice.

Washington, DC - The image of a smiling Daw Aung San Suu Kyi receiving flowers from her supporters is a powerful message of freedom and optimism in Myanmar, the symbol of democracy in a country which has known nothing but authoritarian oppression for decades.

Yet few ask one of the most pressing questions facing Daw Suu Kyi. How will she deal with the Rohingya?

"The Rohingya," you will ask. "Who are they?"

The Rohingya, whom the BBC calls "one of the world's most persecuted minority groups", are the little-publicised and largely forgotten Muslim people of the coastal Rakhine state of western Myanmar. Their historic lineage in Rakhine dates back centuries, as fishermen and farmers. Over the past three decades, the Rohingya have been systematically driven out of their homeland by Myanmar's military junta and subjected to widespread violence and the total negation of their rights and citizenship within Myanmar. They are a stateless Muslim minority.

The continued tragedy of the unrecognised Rohingya, both in Myanmar and as refugees abroad, casts a dark shadow over the bright hopes and prospects for democracy in a country plagued by violence and civil war. Suu Kyi is ideally placed to extend democratic reforms to all ethnic peoples, including the Rohingya, in a free Myanmar. More

Is the World Really Safer Without the Soviet Union? By Mikhail Gorbachev

2012-01-29T13:15:00.001-08:00

January 29, 2012 “The Nation” — Since the breakup of the Soviet Union twenty years ago, Western commentators have often celebrated it as though what disappeared from the world arena in December 1991 was the old Soviet Union, the USSR of Stalin and Brezhnev, rather than the reforming Soviet Union of perestroika.

Moreover, discussion of its consequences has focused mostly on developments inside Russia. Equally important, however, have been the consequences for international relations, in particular lost alternatives for a truly new world order opened up by the end of the cold war.

Following my election as general secretary of the Communist Party in March 1985, the Soviet leadership formulated a new foreign policy agenda. One of the key ideas of our reforms, or perestroika, was new political thinking, based on the recognition of the world’s interconnectedness and interdependence. The top priority was to avert the threat of nuclear war. Our immediate international goals included ending the nuclear arms race, reducing conventional armed forces, settling numerous regional conflicts involving the Soviet Union and the United States, and replacing the division of the European continent into hostile camps with what I called a common European home. More

US DoD 2012 Defence Budget - Priorities and Choices

2012-01-26T12:38:00.001-08:00

Nave delays new nuclear sub by at least two years.

The debate over defense spending will light its afterburner Thursday afternoon, when SecDef Leon Panetta and Army General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs, invite us into the Pentagon kitchen and show us how they plan to use their knives to trim $487 billion from military spending over the coming decade.

Before the hyperbole begins (oops – sorry – too late for that) check out this “reader’s guide” to the looming fight by Jeff Smith of the Center for Public Integrity (before that, he was a long-time national-security reporter at the Washington Post). Smith straight-forwardedly answers key questions on the defense budget’s size, its impact on job creation, and to what extent the Adminstration is simply trying to cram a strategy into a skinnier wallet. More

US 2012 Defence Budget - Priorities and Choices

All Silk Roads Lead to Tehran

2012-01-23T16:03:00.001-08:00

Sanctions aren't the answer. If Washington is serious about building a new economic and security architecture across South and Central Asia, it can’t avoid working with Iran.

Speaking last September on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly, Secretary Hillary Clinton articulated the U.S. government's vision of a "New Silk Road" running through Afghanistan. In a throwback to the circuit that once connected India and China with Turkey and Egypt, she argued in favor of a network of road, rail, and energy links that would traverse Central Asia and enable Turkmen gas to fuel the subcontinent's economic growth, cotton from Tajikistan to fill India's textile mills, and Afghan produce to reach markets across Asia.

By enhancing economic integration, the strategy aims to boost local economies and stabilize the region. There are certainly doubts about the plan's feasibility. But at least, after years of endlessly repeating the myth that Afghanistan is the "graveyard of empires," this new Silk Road recognizes that, from the times of the ancient Persians to Alexander the Great, and through the Mongols, Mughals, and Sikhs, Afghanistan was at the center of global exchange.This effort has the dual benefit of distributing the Afghan burden away from Pakistan, which has long been America's only link to Central Asia.

For decades, Washington's dependence on Islamabad has amounted to U.S. support for a Pakistani military-economic complex that has played a bloody double game in Afghanistan, uses terrorists and militants as strategic weapons, and has proven the world's most flagrant nuclear proliferator. And it's working: By late 2011, increased use of the Northern Distribution Network (NDN) through Central Asia shifted NATO's dependence on Pakistan from bearing nearly 70 percent of its supplies and fuel in previous years to less than 30 percent today. But the NDN comes with pitfalls of its own, giving Russia and Kyrgyzstan increased leverage over U.S. supply lines, forcing the United States to turn a blind eye to unsavory dictators in Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, and costing three times more than shipping from the Arabian Sea. More

UNDP Calls for “Energy Plus” Approach to Reduce Poverty in Asia and the Pacific

2012-01-23T14:28:00.001-08:00

19 January 2012: A report by the UN Development Programme (UNDP) calls for an “energy plus” approach to sustainably reduce poverty by combining access to modern energy for heating, cooking and electricity with measures for income generation and improvement of health and education services.

The report, “Towards an ‘Energy Plus’ Approach for the Poor,” is based of a review of 17 energy access projects implemented by governments, development agencies and the private sector in Asia-Pacific

The report further explains that energy access projects and programmes that combined the delivery of energy services with income-generating measures – such as business development, information support, access to capital and market linkages measures – had higher potential to reduce poverty sustainably. The report considered projects in the following countries: the Philippines, China, Nepal, Fiji, India, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Lao People's Democratic Republic, Timor-Leste, and Vanuatu. [Publication: Towards an 'Energy Plus' Approach for the Poor: A Review of Good Practices and Lessons Learned from Asia and the Pacific] [UN Press Release]

Pakistan: Turmoil and Spillover

2012-01-19T09:10:00.001-08:00

Pakistan: Turmoil and spillover -- Pakistan's economic and security challenges will become more difficult in 2012, driven by weak governance, the spread of extremism, and deteriorating ties with the U.S.. The state will not collapse, but the risk of severe political instability is growing, not just for Pakistan but also the region, as the U.S. withdraws from Afghanistan.

Q- What are the Pakistani government's biggest problems?

A- There is the weak economy, the government's deteriorating finances, a hostile military, judges spoiling for a fight over corruption charges, determined militants who have proven they can strike virtually anywhere inside the country, and worsening ties with a key source of direct and indirect financial aid -- the United States. Flooding last year did considerable damage to exports of rice and cotton, undermining the country's balance of payments position. Higher electricity subsidies and renewed pressure for large financial bailouts for cash-strapped public sector enterprises (especially airlines and railways) will also limit the government's ability to mind the budgetary gap.

The best thing this government has going for it is that neither the opposition nor the military wants responsibility for this mess and aren't ready to try to force the ruling party from power -- at least not yet.

Q- How does the beginning of withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan feed these problems and what is the risk of spillover?

A- A smaller U.S. footprint in the region will feed financial insecurity in Pakistan, because Washington will probably reduce development aid to the country and roll back Coalition Support Funds, a reimbursement program for Pakistan's counter-terrorism cooperation. Pakistan isn't totally dependent on U.S. aid, but it does plan on external financing from the U.S. and other donors when it prepares a domestic budget. More

Multilateral Cooperation For Security

2012-01-18T12:31:00.000-08:00

The Institute of Strategic Studies, Islamabad (ISSI) organized the seminar titled “Multilateral Cooperation for Security: The Example of Chemical Weapons Conventions (CWC)”, with the collaboration of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Quaid-e-Azam University Department of International Relations, Institute of Strategic Studies, Research & Analysis (ISSRA), National Defense University (NDU) and the South Asian Strategic Stability Institute (SASSI).

Left to Right: Shakir Bachaa, Dr. Ahmet Uzumcu - D-G OPCW, Dr. Maria Sultan - D-G SASSI, Dr. Zafar Jaspal

The Director-General of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPWC) Dr Ahmet Uzumcu acknowledged Pakistan’s immensely constructive role in helping the OPCW reach its target of a world free of chemical weapons. In his address, Dr Uzumcu recognized that the value and importance of multilateralism depended greatly on sustainable progress. He said that the case of chemical weapons in particular should provide hope and encouragement, describing the objective of the CWC as encompassing peace and security as the collective responsibility of all member states and verified the destruction of over 71 percent of international weapon stockpiles. More

Three Pots of Tea

2012-01-17T13:25:00.001-08:00

Peace in Afghanistan Depends on Its Leaders, Neighbors, and Security Forces

There are three key ingredients for peace in Afghanistan. Afghan leaders must negotiate a peace. Afghan neighbors must respect the peace. And Afghan soldiers and police must keep the peace.

Only the Afghan parties should take part in the formal negotiations over their country’s future. But all of the major external stakeholders, including India, Iran, Pakistan, Russia, and the United States, should conduct parallel, less-formal discussions, with a view to exercising convergent influence on the Afghan parties. All potential parties to a peace treaty accept that the Taliban must be involved in negotiations and granted some role in the resulting government.

As for keeping the peace, there is likely no organization in the world other than the U.S. Army that can train security forces on the scale needed in places like Afghanistan. But current U.S. Army doctrine is insufficient for this task, and Western models for security forces may not work in Afghanistan. Developing and fielding

host-nation forces that take the unique context of the country into account will be critical. So will be the army’s selection of advisers and preparation of leaders.

Pacifying Afghans and Their Neighbors

Agreement among the main Afghan parties is a necessary but not sufficient condition for peace. Unlike Iraq and Yugoslavia, which are strong states riven by even stronger ethnic antipathies, Afghanistan is a weak polity that has been torn apart by its near and more-distant neighbors, not unlike the hapless sheep that is pulled apart by mounted riders in buzkashi, the Central Asian version of polo. Until these neighboring countries sense that there is a credible endgame for an Afghan peace accord that protects their interests, they have every incentive to continue meddling destructively and to promote divisions among Afghans. To succeed, any peace process must include Afghanistan’s neighbors. More

Iran, the U.S. and the Strait of Hormuz Crisis

2012-01-17T07:48:00.001-08:00

The United States reportedly sent a letter to Iran via multiple intermediaries last week warning Tehran that any attempt to close the Strait of Hormuz constituted a red line for Washington.

The same week, a chemist associated with Iran's nuclear program was killed in Tehran. In Ankara, Iranian parliamentary speaker Ali Larijani met with Turkish officials and has been floating hints of flexibility in negotiations over Iran's nuclear program.

This week, a routine rotation of U.S. aircraft carriers is taking place in the Middle East, with the potential for three carrier strike groups to be on station in the U.S. Fifth Fleet's area of operations and a fourth carrier strike group based in Japan about a week's transit from the region. Next week, Gen. Michael Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, will travel to Israel to meet with senior Israeli officials. And Iran is scheduling another set of war games in the Persian Gulf for February that will focus on the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps' irregular tactics for closing the Strait of Hormuz.

While tensions are escalating in the Persian Gulf, the financial crisis in Europe has continued, with downgrades in France's credit rating the latest blow. Meanwhile, China continued its struggle to maintain exports in the face of economic weakness among its major customers while inflation continued to increase the cost of Chinese exports. More

Policy draft to mitigate climate effects

2012-01-16T10:37:00.001-08:00

PAKISTAN’S climate change policy whose draft took more than a year to be readied is now under print and may be presented to the federal cabinet for approval in a few weeks.

The draft will unveil an action plan to mitigate adverse effects of extreme weather events as witnessed in 2010 and again in 2011 and likely to face more such happenings in the years to come.

The subject is partially covered by Pakistan Environmental Protection Act 1997 and the National Environment Policy, 2005, but they have proved to be ineffective for lack of implementation of the suggested measures. A high-level committee appointed by the prime minister to coordinate actions on climate change has failed to meet even once in the past three years.

How far the climate change policy will succeed in motivating the bureaucracy to meet the challenge is difficult to foresee. But the magnitude of the challenge — rise in temperatures, frequency of heavy rains and floods, large-scale damages to property and infrastructure, rehabilitation of climate refugees and losses in agricultural output — is too enormous that it hardly provides any room for lethargy, inefficiency and corrupt practices on the part of relevant authorities.

The draft will address the issues of adaptation to the changes in climate and their impact on sectors such as irrigation, energy, crop patterns, clean water, transport, disaster management and capacity building of several departments. Besides, people in Pakistan will have to be prepared to learn to live and cope with most of the changes in climate in the future. More

13 Reasons For The US Not To Attack Iran

2012-01-16T08:45:00.001-08:00

A U.S. ambassador in Europe was recently asked by an Israeli ambassador what could be done to improve the lousy relations between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Obama. He replied: “Every once in a while, say thank you.”

The American ambassador added a couple of other thoughts. “Maybe, once in a while, ask the president if there’s anything you can do for him. And above all stay out of our election-year politics.”

This sharp riposte reflects Obama’s fury at several things: the way Netanyahu has gone over his head to a Republican-dominated Congress where he is a darling; Netanyahu’s ingratitude for solid U.S. support, including the veto of an anti-settlements resolution at the United Nations last year and opposition to the unilateral Palestinian pursuit of statehood; the delaying tactics of Netanyahu reflecting his conviction Obama is likely a one-term president; and Netanyahu’s refusal to pause a second time in settlement building for the sake of peace negotiations.

I would add a further piece of advice to Netanyahu if he cares about his dysfunctional relationship with Obama — and he should because Israelis know the United States matters and might be disinclined to re-elect a man who has poisoned relations with Washington. That advice is: Do not attack Iran this spring or summer.

Netanyahu is tempted to bomb Iran in the next several months to set back its opaque nuclear program and — despite a call from Obama last Thursday and messages from Defense Secretary Leon Panetta — has declined to reassure the United States that he will not. Several factors, Iranian and American, incline Netanyahu to move soon.

The first is the Israeli judgment that Iran is close to “irreversibility” in its pursuit of the various elements — from uranium enrichment to trigger mechanisms — needed for a nuclear warhead. The start of enrichment at the Fordow underground facility near Qum intensified these concerns, as has Iran’s bellicose tone in response to threatened oil sanctions. More

Western intelligence sources tell Time Magazine Israel's Mossad targeted Iranian scientist

2012-01-15T13:06:00.001-08:00

Western intelligence sources told Time magazine on Friday that Israel’s Mossad is responsible for the latest assassination of an Iranian nuclear scientist.

A magnetic bomb was attached to the door of 32-year-old Mostafa Ahmadi-Roshan’s car during the Wednesday morning rush-hour in Tehran. His driver was also killed. Sources tell the magazine Israel was behind three previous assassinations of scientists.

A senior Israeli official told is quoted in the report as saying “yeah, one more… I don’t feel sad for him.”On Saturday, Iranian state television said that Iran had evidence the United States was behind the latest assassination. We have reliable documents and evidence that this terrorist act was planned, guided and supported by the CIA,” the Iranian foreign ministry said in a letter handed to the Swiss ambassador in Tehran, state TV reported.“The documents clearly show that this terrorist act was carried out with the direct involvement of CIA-linked agents.”

The Swiss Embassy has represented U.S. interests in Iran since Iran and the U.S. cut diplomatic ties shortly after the 1979 Islamic revolution.Tension has mounted between Iran and the West as the United States and European Union prepare measures aimed at imposing sanctions on the Iran’s oil exports, its economic lifeblood.The United States and Israel have not ruled out military action if diplomacy fails to resolve the nuclear dispute.Also on Saturday, the Wall Street Journal reported that the U.S. has stepped up contingency planning in case Israel launches a military strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities. More

Superpower Adrift In An Alien World

2012-01-15T05:11:00.001-08:00

Here’s the ad for this moment in Washington (as I imagine it): Militarized superpower adrift and anxious in alien world. Needs advice. Will pay. Pls respond qkly. PO Box 1776-2012, Washington, DC.

Here’s the way it actually went down in Washington last week: a triumphant performance by a commander-in-chief who wants you to know that he’s at the top of his game.When it came to rolling out a new 10-year plan for the future of the U.S. military, the leaks to the media began early and the message was clear. One man is in charge of your future safety and security. His name is Barack Obama. And -- not to worry -- he has things in hand.Unlike the typical president, so the reports went, he held six (count 'em: six!) meetings with top Pentagon officials, the Joint Chiefs, the service heads, and his military commanders to plan out the next decade of American war making. And he was no civilian bystander at those meetings either. On a planet where no other power has more than two aircraft carriers in service, he personally nixed a Pentagon suggestion that the country’s aircraft carrier battle groups be reduced from 11 to 10, lest China think our power-projection capabilities were weakening in Asia.

His secretary of defense, Leon Panetta, spared no words when it came to the president’s role, praising his “vision and guidance and leadership” (as would Chairman of the Joint Chiefs General Martin E. Dempsey). described Obama’s involvement thusly: “[T]his has been an unprecedented process, to have the president of the United States participate in discussions involving the development of a defense strategy, and to spend time with our service chiefs and spend time with our combatant commanders to get their views.” More Sustaining U.S. Global Leadership: Priorities For 21st Century Leadership

International security requires multilateral cooperation

2012-01-14T16:41:00.001-08:00

ISLAMABAD - The speakers at a seminar on Tuesday stressed upon the need for mutual and sincere cooperation for the prohibition of chemical weapons in the emerging international security threats.

The Institute of Strategic Studies, Islamabad (ISSI) organised the seminar titled “Multilateral Cooperation for Security: The Example of Chemical Weapons Conventions (CWC)”, with the collaboration of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Quaid-e-Azam University Department of International Relations, Institute of Strategic Studies, Research & Analysis (ISSRA), National Defense University (NDU) and the South Asian Strategic Stability Institute (SASSI).

Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPWC) Director General Dr Ahmet Uzumcu acknowledged Pakistan’s immensely constructive role in helping the OPCW reach its target of a world free of chemical weapons. In his address, Dr Uzumcu recognized that the value and importance of multilateralism depended greatly on sustainable progress. He said that the case of chemical weapons in particular should provide hope and encouragement, describing the objective of the CWC as encompassing peace and security as the collective responsibility of all member states and verified the destruction of over 71 percent of international weapon stockpiles.
He said that the development of national preparedness was an essential task so that the states could respond appropriately in the eventuality of an attack or accident. He said that more than 2,000 verifications had been conducted in over 80 countries. He concluded by acknowledging the support extended by Pakistan to the OPWC and projected that by 2016, only one percent of weapons will remain to be destroyed.
Disarmament and CWC National Authority Director General Dr Irfan Yousaf Shamsi emphasised that the CWC was the only international treaty in recent history that had unilaterally and un-categorically called for the complete destruction of chemical weapons. According to Dr Shami, both the CWC and the OPWC were fundamental cornerstones in international disarmament. More

Another Iranian nuclear scientist killed: part of 'covert war'?

2012-01-11T08:39:00.001-08:00

Tehran blamed the death of Iranian nuclear scientist Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan, a deputy director at the Natanz enrichment facility, on the US and Israel.

Iranian officials decried the assassination of a scientist involved in Iran's nuclear program in Tehran today, claiming that Israel was behind the latest strike as part of a broader covert war waged by the US, Israel, and the West to slow Iran's nuclear efforts. The attack – reported by witnesses to be carried out by two men on a motorcycle, who affixed a magnetic bomb to the target car in north Tehran – fits a pattern of previous killings of Iran's nuclear scientists. It comes as Washington is increasing pressure with sanctions targeting the Central Bank and Republican presidential candidates threatening military action against Iran.

The scientist killed, Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan, was a deputy director at Iran's Natanz uranium enrichment facility, a professor, and a chemistry graduate of Tehran's prestigious Sharif University of Technology. Iranian officials claimed the assassins were working for Israel and the US. “The terrorist action was carried out by the hirelings of the Zionist regime and those who claim to be fighting terrorism,” Iran’s First Vice President Mohammad Reza Rahimi told a cabinet meeting, according to the semi-official Fars News Agency. He condemned the killing as "evidence of [foreign] government-sponsored terrorism" and vowed that it would not stop "progress" of Iran's nuclear program. More

The US-Iran Economic War compliments of American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC)

2012-01-10T19:53:00.001-08:00

This amendment - for all practical purposes a declaration of economic war - was brought to you by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), on direct orders of the Israeli government under Prime Minister Benjamin "Bibi" Netanyahu.

Here's a crash course on how to further wreck the global economy.

A key amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act signed by United States President Barack Obama on the last day of 2011 - when no one was paying attention - imposes sanctions on any countries or companies that buy Iranian oil and pay for it through Iran's central bank. Starting this summer, anybody who does it is prevented from doing business with the US.

This amendment - for all practical purposes a declaration of economic war - was brought to you by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), on direct orders of the Israeli government under Prime Minister Benjamin "Bibi" Netanyahu.

Torrents of spin have tried to rationalize it as the Obama administration's plan B as opposed to letting the Israeli dogs of war conduct an unilateral attack on Iran over its supposed nuclear weapons program.

Yet the original Israeli strategy was in fact even more hysterical - as in effectively preventing any country or company from paying for imported Iranian oil, with the possible exceptions of China and India. On top of it, American Israel-firsters were trying to convince anyone this would not result in relentless oil price hikes.

Once again displaying a matchless capacity to shoot themselves in their Ferragamo-clad feet, governments in the European Union (EU) are debating whether or not to buy oil from Iran anymore. The existential doubt is should we start now or wait for a few months. Inevitably, like death and taxes, the result has been - what else - oil prices soaring. Brent crude is now hovering around $114, and the only way is up.

Get me to the crude on time
Iran is the second-largest Organization for Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) producer, exporting up to 2.5 million barrels of oil a day. Around 450,000 of these barrels go to the European Union - the second-largest market for Iran after China.

The requisite faceless bureaucrat, EU Energy Commissioner Gunther Ottinger, has been spinning that the EU can count on Saudi Arabia to make up the shortfall from Iran. More

Analysis: New rules in play when CIA drones return to Pakistan skies

2012-01-10T11:45:00.001-08:00

The current pause in CIA drone strikes in Pakistan is now the longest of Barack Obama’s presidency.It is 55 days (and counting) since a deadly attack on November 17 2011 killed at least seven people.

According to the Bureau’s extensive database on drone strikes, the last gap of similar length was in 2008. If things continue in this vein, that record will be broken next Monday (January 16).There was a pause of 59 days between March 16 and May 14 2008 under George W Bush; and a 57-day halt between December 3 2007 and January 29 2008. Before then US drone strikes were highly intermittent, often occurring months apart.Strategy shiftThe current break in drone strikes is enforced. After NATO accidentally killed 24 Pakistani soldiers in November, Islamabad effectively shut down the drone campaign.Weeks later the Long War Journal confirmed that all CIA attacks were officially on hold: ‘There is concern that another hit will push US-Pakistan relations past the point of no return. We don’t know how far we can push them, how much more they are willing to tolerate.’ an official told LWJ.The break coincided with a major policy reappraisal by Washington – and it has given Islamabad room to refocus on its own strategic needs. In the coming weeks CIA drone attacks are expected to resume in Pakistan’s tribal areas. But according to leaks and hints, there are likely to be far less strikes, and far fewer casualties.The Bureau’s records show that CIA drones struck 75 times in 2011. Some 470 to 655 people were killed in the attacks, the majority of them anonymous alleged militants. Among the dead were between 53 and 126 civilians, according to credible reports. Despite these reports, the CIA continues to claim that it has killed no civilians since May 2010. More

To Avoid All-Out War Give Iran One Last Chance

2012-01-10T09:03:00.001-08:00

Three years ago, President Barack Obama came into office with a very good idea: He would reach out to the mullahs in Iran to see whether they were interested in rethinking their hate-based relationship with the U.S.

So Obama, despite criticism from Republicans, wrote private letters to the Iranian supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and made a public appeal for a fresh start.

“In this season of new beginnings, I would like to speak clearly to Iran’s leaders,” Obama said in a message broadcast in early 2009. “We have serious differences that have grown over time. My administration is now committed to diplomacy that addresses the full range of issues before us, and to pursuing constructive ties among the United States, Iran and the international community.”

When the Iranian people rose up later that year, Obama only tepidly endorsed them, and he was measured in his criticism of the vicious manner in which the Iranian leadership suppressed the protests. He may have been motivated partly by an assessment that the uprising wouldn’t succeed, and that the U.S. would still have to grapple with the Iranian theocracy. His approach was neither morally nor emotionally satisfying, but it showed a certain cold logic.

Nothing happened, of course: The ayatollahs showed no interest in Obama’s entreaties.

Getting Tougher

Fast-forward three years. The Obama administration is now tougher on Iran than was the administration of George W. Bush. It has imposed the most sweeping sanctions ever placed on the country, including sanctions against the Iranian central bank. It is helping coordinate a threatened international boycott of Iranian oil (IATBXOIL). And, according to diplomatic sources I spoke to last week, it has asked its Gulf Arab allies -- including Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates -- to sharply limit their contacts with official Iranian delegations. More

Next Moves on North Korea

2012-01-09T11:13:00.001-08:00

North Korean strongman Kim Jong Il may be gone, but the dangers posed by Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile programs persist. Although the long-term future of the regime under the new young ruler, Kim Jong Un, remains uncertain, it is clearly in the United States’ interest to get the much-delayed denuclearization process back on track.

A third round of U.S.-North Korean bilateral talks was to have been held in December but was delayed as news of the elder Kim’s demise broke. Those talks were expected to lead to U.S. food assistance to the impoverished North and the renewal of six-party negotiations addressing North Korea’s nuclear weapons program.

Now, as the symbolically important 100th anniversary of the birth of North Korean founder Kim Il Sung approaches, it is vital that President Barack Obama re-engage the North Korean regime and re-establish a verifiable freeze of North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs before they take yet another turn for the worse. Pyongyang has publicly and privately said it would be willing to impose such a freeze in return for resuming the six-party talks.

Given that further international sanctions and isolation will not alter the North’s behavior or precipitate “regime change,” Republicans and Democrats interested in protecting U.S. and international security have an obligation to put election-year politics aside and support the administration’s efforts to restart the nuclear talks. More

Iran: Pressure and Possibility

2012-01-04T17:33:00.001-08:00

Facing intense political pressure, with elections due in March, and economic and currency collapse brought on by sanctions, Iran has ratcheted up its military bluster in the Strait of Hormuz and sent conciliatory messages looking toward new talks on its nuclear program.

Meanwhile, Iran's regional support is dwindling as Syria's travails continue and its former clients look for other supporters. Military and diplomatic leaders seek to balance a firm line in response to threats to the economically vital strait while avoiding escalation that aids only extremists in Iran. They have gone out of their way as well to debunk a shoddy case for war that overstates Iran's regional power and understates the costs of force to the U.S., our economy and our allies.

Iran proposes re-opening nuclear talks as its economy, currency reel from sanctions. The Iranian foreign ministry said yesterday that it plans to attend a meeting with international negotiating group known as the P5+1. The New York Times summarizes the pressures Tehran faces: "Iran's economy, already reeling from Western sanctions over its nuclear program, has been hit hard by discussion of new sanctions aimed at its oil exports, the world's third largest. President Obama signed new legislation on Saturday that could penalize buyers of Iranian oil, and the European Union has openly talked of a boycott of Iran's oil. On Tuesday, France urged the European Union to adopt stricter sanctions, including an oil embargo, by the end of the month. Iran's currency, the rial, fell to record lows against the dollar on Tuesday, news agencies reported. Oil prices rose sharply in trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange, with the benchmark contract for crude up more than 4 percent to $102.91 a barrel. The attempts by Iran's leadership to flex the country's muscles on the world stage coincide with efforts to stamp out dissent at home ahead of planned parliamentary elections in March, the first ballot to be held since a disputed presidential vote in 2009 prompted national protests and a severe crackdown." [ISNA,1/3/12. NY Times, 1/3/12.]

Pentagon pledges stability in Strait of Hormuz. Yesterday, in response to an Iranian threat to shut off the Strait of Hormuz, the Pentagon spokesman George Little stated: "The deployment of U.S. military assets in the Persian Gulf region will continue as it has for decades... These are regularly scheduled movements in accordance with our longstanding commitments to the security and stability of the region and in support of ongoing operations... The U.S. Navy operates under international maritime conventions to maintain a constant state of high vigilance in order to ensure the continued, safe flow of maritime traffic in waterways critical to global commerce... We are committed to protecting maritime freedoms that are the basis for global prosperity; this is one of the main reasons our military forces operate in the region." More

The Pentagon Sends US Troops to Israel. Iran is the Unspoken Target

2012-01-04T13:30:00.001-08:00

January 2, 2012. Jerusalem. In one of the most blacked-out stories in America right now, the US military is preparing to send thousands of US troops, along with US Naval anti-missile ships and accompanying support personnel, to Israel.

It took forever to find a second source for confirmation of this story and both relatively mainstream media outlets are in Israel. With one source saying the military deployment and corresponding exercises are to occur in January, the source providing most of the details suggests it will occur later this spring. Calling it not just an “exercise”, but a “deployment”, the Jerusalem Post quotes US Lt.-Gen Frank Gorenc, Commander of the US Third Air Force based in Germany. The US Commander visited Israel two weeks ago to confirm details for “the deployment of several thousand American soldiers to Israel.” In an effort to respond to recent Iranian threats and counter-threats, Israel announced the largest ever missile defense exercise in its history. Now, it’s reported that the US military, including the US Navy, will be stationed throughout Israel, also taking part.

While American troops will be stationed in Israel for an unspecified amount of time, Israeli military personnel will be added to EUCOM in Germany. EUCOM stands for United States European Command.

In preparation for anticipated Iranian missile attacks upon Israel, the US is reportedly bringing its THAAD, Terminal High Altitude Area Defense, and ship-based Aegis ballistic missile systems to Israel. The US forces will join Israeli missile defense systems like the Patriot and Arrow. The deployment comes with “the ultimate goal of establishing joint task forces in the event of a large-scale conflict in the Middle East”. More

Insanity: MAD in a world at risk

2012-01-04T09:18:00.001-08:00

After years of delays, Russia has formally leased to India an advanced nuclear-powered submarine. For India, the move is a further indication of its shift towards the modernization of its naval capabilities. Russia, for its part, will be hoping the signing is a step away from a series of accidents that have haunted its navy for over a decade.

“The ceremony to sign the document was held on Thursday at the shipyard in Bolshoi Kamen in the Primorsky Territory, where the Nerpa nuclear submarine is currently deployed,” an official in the Russian Naval Chief of Staff’s office told ITAR-TASS on Friday.

The Indian Navy will now operate an “Akula” II nuclear attack submarine for the next ten years per a special lease agreement. The move should prove a boon to the Indian Navy, giving the country the ability to not only utilize the vessel for combat patrols and train in one of the world’s more advanced nuclear submarines, but also apply lessons learned to its own domestic nuclear submarine program.

“All of the naval tests and performance checks have been completed,” the Russian official explained.

The submarine signing is a welcome piece of good news for the Russian Navy. Russia’s armed forces have routinely been criticized for an alleged lack of focus on safety, especially since the 2000 sinking of the Russian submarine Kursk in 2000. Safety questions were again raised following a recent fire aboard a Russian Delta IV nuclear submarine,which sparked fears of a possible radiation leak. The fire started Thursday at an Arctic shipyard outside the Russian port city of Murmansk where the submarine “Yekaterinburg” was in dry dock. The fire has since been contained, with Russian officials claiming no radioactive contamination as a result of the blaze. Officials have stated the fire beganon wooden scaffolding before going on to engulf the submarine’s outer hull. The Yekaterinburg’s nuclear reactor had been shut down along with its nuclear-tipped missiles and other weaponry having been removed before being placed in dry dock. More

Acquisition and retention of nuclear weapons systems in a world facing dire resource shortages, including food and water, petroleum, rare earths, climate change and sea level rise is beyond insane, it is MAD all over again. All of the risks facing us are conflict triggers and can only be addressed if all nations work together. Who will make the first move towards nuclear disarmament? Editor

U.S. Can't Fight Two Wars at the Same Time Anymore

2012-01-03T10:45:00.001-08:00

This week, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta is poised to deliver a humbling assessment of America's military capabilities in a budget plan to the White House, reports The New York Times. The gist: The U.S. military of the future will no longer be able to fight two sustained ground wars at the same time.

The strategic review will outline how the military can cut $450 billion from its budget, amid speculation that Congress may cut an additional $500 billion in the near future. Acknowledging an incapacity to wage two wars is not ideal, notes Andrew Krepinevich, a military expert at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, but it's better than the alternative. "You may risk losing the confidence of some allies, and you may risk emboldening your adversaries," he says. "But at the end of the day, a strategy of bluffing, or asserting that you have a capability that you don’t, is probably the worst posture of all.” So what spending priorities are dragging down the military budget? Here are some of the major ones, highlighted this week by the The Times, The Washington Post and Time.

Military personnel costs "As it stands now, the Pentagon spends $181 billion each year, nearly a third of its base budget, on military personnel costs: $107 billion for salaries and allowances, $50 billion for health care and $24 billion in retirement pay," report Elisabeth Bumiller and Thom Shanker in the Times. "One independent analyst ... has calculated that if military personnel costs continue rising at the rate they have over the past decade, and overall Pentagon spending does not increase, by 2039 the entire defense budget would be consumed by personnel costs."

Troops in Afghanistan and beyond "Sometime this year, there must be decisions on how to downsize in Afghanistan," write The Washington Post's Walter Pincus, "and what arrangements can be made to keep U.S. forces there after 2014, whether to send military trainers back to Iraq, and how to respond if Congress authorizes dispatching Special Forces to Nigeria to assist in fighting a terrorist group, as it did when U.S. troops were sent to help battle the Lord’s Resistance Army in central Africa." More

Top Risks 2012 - Ian Bremmer Eurasia Group

2012-01-03T08:01:00.001-08:00

Pakistan

Turmoil Spillover

In 2012, Pakistan will face its most severe challenges since the Bangladesh succession crisis more than 40 years ago. Domestic instability is growing as tensions between civilian and military leaders simmer, extremists continue to expand their presence in core regions of the country, and a severe economic crisis leaves government unable to provide essential public services. The unraveling of ties with the United States adds to the anxiety. Pakistan is not headed for state failure, but the risk of severe political instability and even more direct military interference in government is on the rise.

Pakistan also faces mounting threats from across its borders. American soldiers will begin the handover of Afghanistan’s security to local troops this year. By November, about 33,000 US personnel will have left the country. The security vacuum left behind will become the Pakistani military’s primary immediate concern as Afghan refugees flow into Taliban-occupied areas of the country. Should the Taliban further consolidate territory in southern Afghanistan, those areas could become safe havens for Pakistani Taliban who are challenging Islamabad’s authority in the tribal areas.

The American withdrawal will also fuel fears inside Pakistan that Washington is effectively “handing off” informal leadership in Afghanistan to India, allowing Pakistan’s long-time rival to encircle the country. Pakistan’s perceptions are reinforced by India’s large development and diplomatic presence in Afghanistan, which will continue (and potentially increase) after the US withdrawal. Pakistan is hedging its bets on Pashtun groups in Afghanistan that have a higher likelihood of controlling any future government in Kabul. India is focused on strengthening its historical ties to northern alliance groups.

As it tries to extend its economic reach into Asia, India will find itself drawn more deeply into the South Asian geopolitical morass, potentially provoking a proxy war that spells trouble for the region. The looming security failure threatens prospects for South Asian economic integration—and just at a time when greater collaboration is needed to meet growing energy, consumption, and production demands. More

Iran’s Quest for the F6 in its UF6

2012-01-02T12:06:00.001-08:00

In the old days before the first Gulf War, most nuclear export controls were pretty cut-and-dried: Exporters checked for items on a short ”trigger list” that could be used for making nuclear bomb fuel.

But after they learned what Iraq had secretly been up to for about a decade before 1991, the Nuclear Suppliers Group came up with a second list, Infcirc/254/Part 2, and it got into the tricky business of policing a panoply of dual-use goods sought by proliferators.

The stream of dual-use goods is virtually endless, and so has been the internal debate at the NSG about whether items should be listed or not. That’s even more so right now, because as I explained in this report published by Carnegie last month, the NSG has launched a comprehensive review of both its lists, and the decisions it makes about what to control and how to do it will profoundly impact how we attack procurement threats in years to come.

One of the items which is not on the NSG dual-use list is a chemical substance which Iran has been keenly and furtively trying to import since the mid-1990s. This is anhydrous hydrogen fluoride, or AHF. (The term “anhydrous” is just a fancy way of saying that hydrogen fluoride [HF], otherwise known as hydrofluoric acid, is more or less pure having less than 400 ppm of water.) More

Nuclear Power Play: Ambition, Betrayal And The 'Ugly Underbelly' Of Energy Regulation

2012-01-01T10:06:00.001-08:00

WASHINGTON -- A feud at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, where five presidentially appointed commissioners oversee the safety of the nation's nuclear power reactors, has broken out into full public view, with Chairman Gregory Jaczko's fellow commissioners assailing his character and management style, both in a letter made public earlier this month and in the resulting testimony before Congress.

Republicans have begun calling for Jaczko's ouster.

"The situation at the NRC sounds dire," wrote Rep. Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.) in a letter to President Barack Obama, "leaving me very concerned that the Chairman is unable to lead the Commission in the fulfillment of its responsibilities."

On K Street, energy lobbyists have rallied to support the four other commissioners.

So far, the White House is standing by Jaczko, one of the least industry-friendly leaders to serve at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in a generation.

For Washington's tight nuclear policy circle, where scientifically trained political operatives move back and forth between the industry, the NRC, the Department of Energy and key congressional committees, it's déjà vu. Interviews with several senior officials who worked on nuclear energy policy in the 1990s reveal that at least two of those operatives -- both with strong ties to the nuclear industry -- were closely involved in the ouster of an earlier reformist regulator and are now involved in the current drama.

What's unfolding at the NRC is a textbook example of a little-discussed corporate tactic that is employed against public officials in extreme situations. Observers of the way Washington works tend to describe the corruption of the political system and the people within it in terms of action and reward: Do what industry wants, and benefit both professionally and personally. But when carrots aren't enough, corporations have sticks to swing, too. More

Obama Signs Defense Bill Despite 'Serious Reservations'

2012-01-01T09:35:00.001-08:00

WASHINGTON — Indefinite military detention of Americans became the law of the land Saturday, as President Barack Obama signed a defense bill that codified that authority, even as he said he would not use it.

The National Defense Authorization Act states how the military is to be funded, but also includes a number of controversial provisions on arresting and holding suspected terrorists, which at first drove Obama to threaten a veto.

He retreated from that threat after Congress added provisions that took the ultimate authority to detain suspects from the military’s hands and gave it to the president. Congress also clarified that civilian law enforcement agencies — such as the FBI — would still have authority to investigate terrorism and added a provision that asserts nothing in the detention measures changes current law regarding U.S. citizens.

Still, the signing on New Year’s Eve as few people were paying attention angered civil liberties advocates, who argue that the law for the first time spells out certain measures that have not actually been tested all the way to the Supreme Court, including the possibility of detaining citizens in military custody without trial for as long as there is a war on terror. More

Pakistan to assume Security Council seat Sunday.

2011-12-31T16:30:00.001-08:00

NEW YORK: Pakistan will assume its seat on the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) on Sunday as a non-permanent member for a two-year term.

Earlier in October 2011, Pakistan was elected to the 15-nation Council in by a narrow margin contest when 129 out of 193 members of the UN General Assembly voted for it.

Kyrgyzstan, which had challenged Pakistan, was far behind with 55 votes.

Pakistan’s Ambassador to the UN, Abdullah Hussain Haroon, who spearheaded the campaign, had said that Pakistan would play a constructive role in resolving key global issues that the Council is dealing with or may face.

He added that Pakistan was committed to multilateralism and promoting the principles and purposes enshrined in the UN Charter.

“We hope to play our usual role of taking on matters which affect the underdog, so as to speak.”

The Security Council, a primary instrument for establishing and maintaining international peace, has five permanent members -Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States – and ten non-permanent members elected by the General Assembly for two-year terms, from five different regions of the world. Pakistan will replace Lebanon, which completes its two-year term on the Asian seat at midnight on Saturday. More

United States as a Global Power: New World Disorder

2011-12-31T09:38:00.001-08:00

The US is struggling with a paradox: while its military power retains global reach, its role as world leader is gradually ending

The time has long since past when it became fashionable to talk about a new world order. The collapse of the Soviet Union provided an opportunity to fashion one. But instead of using that opportunity to create a new security architecture in Europe, Nato expanded eastwards as the military anchor for democracy promotion. Not content to have seen off one global military competitor in the Soviet Union, the western military industrial complex and the think-tanks they funded scurried around for a worthy replacement. When 11 September happened, they thought they were in business again. For a brief moment, al-Qaida seemed to fulfil some of the characteristics of communism: it could pop up anywhere in the world; it was an existential enemy, driven ideologically and uncontainable through negotiation; and it was potentially voluminous. Neither the doctrines of the pre-emptive strike, nor attacking a foreign country abroad to ensure security at home, were new. Swap the domino theory of the Vietnam era for the crescent of crisis of the Bush and Obama eras, and you had the same formula for a foe that hopscotched across the globe.

But here's the curious thing. Al-Qaida failed, not by being bombed out of the tribal areas of Pakistan or by losing its video-hugging leader. It failed as an ideological alternative, in its own terms and for its own people. It failed in Egypt, the country that mattered most to its chief thinker, the Egyptian-born doctor Ayman al-Zawahiri. When the opportunity arose for millions of Muslims to shed their brutal Arab yoke (this was supposed to be the fourth phase in the construction of the Caliphate, to be accompanied by physical attacks against oil suppliers and cyber ones on the US economy), nothing of the sort happened. Islam is indeed winning the day, but it is political rather than military. It seeks alliances with the apostate and says it is committed to democratic partnership and the rule of law. More

Ron Paul: Sanctions Against Iran Are an ‘Act of War’

2011-12-30T18:30:00.001-08:00

December 30, 2011 "ABC News" - -Unwilling to back down from the growing criticism that his foreign policy would be “dangerous,” Ron Paul told voters in Iowa that western sanctions against Iran are “acts of war” that are likely to lead to an actual war.

Paul said that Iran would be justified in responding to sanctions by blocking the Straits of Hormuz, adding that the country blocking the strategically important strait is “so logical” since they have no other recourse.

He then compared the situation to China blocking off the Gulf of Mexico to trade.

“I think the solution is to do a lot less a lot sooner, and mind our own business, and we wouldn’t have this threat of another war,” Paul said.

Paul made the comments to a crowd of 100 people in Perry, Iowa, the first stop on his two-day campaign swing through the western part of the state.

The Texas congressman is not backing down from his view that a strike on Iran would cause economic hardship at home.

“If the Straits of Hormuz close, this whole financial thing could come down on our head. What would happen if oil doubled in price within a month or two?” Paul asked a crowd in Atlantic, Iowa.

Thursday was a tough day for Paul, beginning with a scathing editorial in the New Hampshire Union-Leader calling the Texas congressman a “dangerous man” who has been consistently spouting “nonsense,” adding, “it is about time New Hampshire voters showed him the door.” More

RE-IMAGINING THE INDUS: MAPPING MEDIA REPORTAGE IN INDIA AND PAKISTAN

2011-12-30T09:58:00.001-08:00

Water shortage has become a subject of intense public debate in the present political narrative on resource management and riparian rights.

In an attempt to discern the divergence on core issues and mainstream media reporting, Re-imagining the Indus is a methodological study based on Media Content Analysis of the reporting on water issues related to the Indus, in the leading dailies of both India and Pakistan. This monograph seeks to capture the existing discourse and stimulate policy dialogue on the subject.
What is the general discourse on water scarcity and related crises in the Indian and Pakistani media? The study conducted by Samir Saran (ORF) and Hans Rasmussen Theting, scrutinised the media coverage on water on three specific themes – the political discourse, water governance and people, practice and environment.
Titled ‘Reimagining the INDUS: Mapping media reportage in India and Pakistan’, the study found that the Indus Water Treaty (IWT) does not dominate the reportage in Pakistan, indicating a low level of discontentment or critique. It also found that it is only in the months of winter, when the water flow is low, that inter-country dispute between India and Pakistan, and significant negative sentiment against India, gets attention in Pakistan. But in the Indian media, Pakistan only appears during spring months. More

The study, now published in the form of a book, found that agricultural concerns and inter-provincial disputes dominate media reportage in Pakistan while in India media lays greater emphasis on urban water concerns and interventions, including ground water and domestic consumption.

The study also showed that media reports in both the countries, Pakistan more than India, recognise the need for the two countries to cooperate on water issues. From the study, it was also clear that in both India and Pakistan, there is equal emphasis on the aspects of water governance and infrastructure. More

Keeping Iran From Saying Yes

2011-12-30T09:06:00.001-08:00

Imagine that you are a senior adviser to the Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and have decided that sanctions and other pressures on Iran have accomplished exactly what they ostensibly are designed to do (to the extent that any such presumed purpose of the pressure can be discerned from what is coming out of Washington [3]): to change minds among policy makers in Tehran about Iran's nuclear activities.

You, the adviser, have concluded that the pressures are sufficiently damaging to Iranian interests that Iran ought to make whatever policy changes are needed to get the pressure to stop. What, exactly, do you advise your boss to do?

As you contemplate that question, you realize there are several conditions that would have to be met in order for any advice you gave not to be rejected immediately and categorically, if not by the supreme leader himself then by others in the regime who have a say in shaping policy. Whatever step you recommend would have to be politically feasible, which also means being psychologically feasible for the leader, for other Iranian policy makers and for the Iranian public. There also would have to be some mechanism for reaching an understanding or agreement with the Americans, given that ending the U.S.-led pressure would be the whole purpose of changing policy. Closely related to that last requirement, you would also need to point to good reason to believe that if Tehran did change policy, the United States would indeed end the pressure.

After carefully reflecting on all this, you would have to decide that—as long as the policies and discourse you hear coming from the United States remain as they are—the requirements cannot be met. The United States has made it almost impossible for Iran to say yes to whatever it is the United States is supposedly demanding of Iran. You quietly drop the idea of recommending to the supreme leader any change of policy. More

Happy New Year from SASSI

2011-12-29T16:24:00.001-08:00

Seychelles: An Open Invitation for China

2011-12-29T11:44:00.001-08:00

On December 3^rd 2011, as part of a ‘goodwill’ trip to the Indian Ocean island nation of Seychelles, Chinese Defense Minister Liang Guanglie met with Seychelles President James Michel and announced a boost in military cooperation between the two states. It was the first time a Chinese defense minister had visited the islands in the nations’ 36 years of ‘uninterrupted partnership’.

During the trip, Michel announced that the island republic would officially invite China to establish a military base there to help with its ramping up of efforts to combat piracy. The Republic of Seychelles spans an archipelago of over 100 islands approximately 1,500 kilometers off the eastern coast of Africa, just north of the island nation of Madagascar. Despite efforts by the international community and the constant patrolling of warships, this region is still heavily affected by organized (and unorganized) piracy by non-state actors.

Foreign Affairs Minister of Seychelles, Jean-Paul Adam, stated, “Together, we need to increase our surveillance capacity in the Indian Ocean [...] as Seychelles has a strategic position between Asia and Africa.” According to one report by Agence France-Presse, Seychelles and China signed on to a military cooperation agreement in 2004 which “has enabled some 50 Seychelles soldiers to be trained in China.” Adam reminded the media that China has already given two light aircraft to the Republic, with the visit by Liang signaling a renewed agreement with China for increased financial support, military equipment and further military training. Chinese media reiterated Seychelles’ adherence to the One-China policy. More

A World of Gray

2011-12-28T12:14:00.001-08:00

CANBERRA – Václav Havel, the Czech playwright and dissident turned president, and North Korean despot Kim Jong-il might have lived on different planets, for all their common commitment to human dignity, rights, and democracy. When they died just a day apart this month, the contrast was hard for the global commentariat to resist: Prague’s prince of light against Pyongyang’s prince of darkness.

But it is worth remembering that Manichaean good-versus-evil typecasting, to which former US President George W. Bush and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair were famously prone, and of which we have had something of a resurgence in recent days, carries with it two big risks for international policymakers.

One risk is that such thinking limits the options for dealing effectively with those who are cast as irredeemably evil. The debacle of the United States-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 should have taught us once and for all the peril of talking only through the barrel of a gun to those whose behavior disgusts us.

Sometimes, threats to a civilian population will be so acute and immediate as to make coercive military intervention the only option, as with Muammar el-Qaddafi’s Libya, at least at the time of the imminent assault on Benghazi in March. But more often it will be a matter of relying on less extreme measures, like targeted sanctions and threats of international prosecution – and on diplomatic pressure and persuasion. More

Obama should apologize

2011-12-27T16:07:00.001-08:00

ISLAMABAD – In the wee hours of Nov. 27, U.S.-NATO and Afghan forces based in Afghanistan's Kunar province engaged a Pakistani military outpost in Pakistan's tribal agency of Momand. Little information is publically available -- or likely to be -- about what happened or how. What is clear is that after several NATO airstrikes, 24 Pakistani soldiers were dead and many more injured. The episode, and the U.S. response, battered the ever-strained U.S.-Pakistan relationship. Pakistan immediately cut off ground routes for logistical support of the U.S.-led war in Afghanistan, and insisted that the United States vacate Shamsi, one of the airfields from which the U.S. launched drone attacks.

In quick succession, Pakistan convened a parliamentary commission to determine whether and how Pakistan will remain engaged with the United States. Pakistan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs recalled all of its ambassadors to hold a high-level strategic discussion about how Pakistan should refashion its relations with the United States. Their recommendations will be considered by the same parliamentary commission. Pakistanis, whether civilian or military, whether in the government or on the street, want out of this relationship and deeply believe that Americans do not value Pakistani lives. They may not be wrong.

Pakistani military officials quickly denounced the attack as deliberate, unprovoked U.S. aggression and demanded both an immediate apology and a renegotiation of military and intelligence cooperation. That Pakistani officials made such pronouncements in the complete absence of information about the attack cast aspersions on their motives. The move appeared to be another effort to wriggle free fromWashington's poisonous embrace, abandon military operations against anti-Pakistan militants, and pursue an independent Afghan policy. More

Release of Pakistan/Afghanistan Cross-Border Fire Investigation Report

2011-12-26T11:27:00.001-08:00

Release of Pakistan/Afghanistan Cross-Border Fire Investigation Report

MACDILL AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. (December 26, 2011) — The U.S. Central Command investigation into the Nov. 25-26 engagement between U.S. and Pakistan Military Forces near Salala Checkpoint, Khas Kunar Province, Afghanistan is complete.

The report can be found by clicking here. The Table of Contents can be found by clicking here. Click here for Annexes:A, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J. Click here for Brig. Gen. Clark'sAppointment Letter.

Specifically, U.S. Marine Corps Gen. James N. Mattis, U.S. Central Command Commander directed ISAF Commander Gen. John Allen to implement the following corrective actions as soon as operationally possible:

Establish an environment of improved, mutual trust among stakeholders working in the border areas expanding upon existing confidence-building measures.

Clarify authorities, responsibilities, and standard operating procedures for Command, Control and Communication in near-border operations. Develop formal individual training, collective training exercises and drills to practice and gain confidence with cross-border coordination and deconfliction.

Implement a program of full disclosure of all border area facilities and installations – including installations on both sides of the border with systematic updates based on a common data base and map, and incorporating periodic reciprocal coordination visits.

Direct all future Coalition units and formations contemplating near-border area operations to establish positive confirmation of all permanent/semi-permanent installations located near both the boarder and planned objective prior to the conduct of any operation or approval of any CONOP.

Develop and share with Pakistan Military if possible the common use of force escalation measures such as show of force and such other standard procedures as needed to prevent friendly fire incidents.

Consider harmonizing, where feasible, ISAF and OEF Rules of Engagement to promote clarity and transparency.

“The strongest take-away from this incident is the fundamental fact that we must improve border coordination and this requires a foundational level of trust on both sides of the border,” said Gen. Mattis. More

Pakistan, India to resume nuclear CBM's today

2011-12-25T15:36:00.001-08:00

Pakistan and India will resume talks on confidence-building measures (CBMs) regarding nuclear and conventional weapons on Monday.

Senior Indian diplomats, Yash Sinha and Venkatesh Varma, will lead the Indian delegation to Islamabad for the two-day talks. The Pakistani side will be led by Munawar Saeed Bhatti, former deputy high commissioner to India.

The talks, which are resuming after a gap of four years, indicate that the dialogue process between India and Pakistan is back on track.
CBMs on conventional weapons will be discussed on Monday, while nuclear weapons will be discussed the next day.
The talks are not ambitious in their scope, and the two sides are expected to talk about expanding conventional CBMs to include incidents at sea. This was necessitated after Indian and Pakistani ships brushed past each other in 2010, which could have gotten ugly. There will be more talks on facilitating trade and movement of people across the Line of Control, and some military issues. Pakistan has moved over 100,000 troops from its border with India to fight the war on terror along the border with Afghanistan.
On nuclear CBMs, while India and Pakistan notify each other on ballistic missile launches, cruise missiles remain outside this arrangement. Secondly, the two countries may even discuss the issues of nuclear safety, especially in the wake of the Fukushima disaster in Japan, which has prompted a safety rethink all over the world. On January 1, India and Pakistan will again exchange lists of nuclear installations, probably the oldest India-Pak CBM that has survived. More

ICIMOD Reports Warn of Vulnerabilities of the HKH Region to Climate Change

2011-12-22T17:30:00.001-08:00

6 December 2011: Three new reports released by the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD) warn that snow and glacier melt in Asia’s mountainous Hindu Kush-Himalayan (HKH) region threaten millions of mountain people and 1.3 billion people living downstream in Asia’s major river basins.

The report titled "The Status of Glaciers in the Hindu Kush-Himalayan Region" presents findings of a three-year research project funded by Sweden and led by ICIMOD, which through the use of remote sensing studies was able to tally the number of glaciers in the region—more than 54,000—and measure the area covered, 60,000 km. According to the report, glaciers appear to be shrinking in both the central and eastern Himalayas, with clean glaciers of the Tibetan plateau retreating at a faster rate than the glaciers of the rugged central Himalayas.

The second report, titled "Snow-Cover Mapping and Monitoring in the Hindu Kush-Himalayas," provides a comprehensive status report of snow cover in the region. According to the report, there was an indication of an overall decrease in snow cover over the decade in the central HKH region and overall, and a slight increase in the western and eastern parts of the region.

The third report, titled "Climate Change in the Hindu Kush-Himalayas: The State of Current Knowledge," reviews the research and data on climate and hydrology, biodiversity and ecosystems, and atmospheric changes and overall provides a snapshot on the changes that have occurred in the HKH region. [ICIMOD News] [Publication: The Status of Glaciers in the Hindu Kush-Himalayan Region] [Publication: Snow-Cover Mapping and Monitoring in the Hindu Kush-Himalayas] [Publication: "Climate Change in the Hindu Kush-Himalayas: The State of Current Knowledge] More

Dinner hosted by the South Asian Strategic Stability Institute on the occasion of the Twenty Sixth Anniversary of SAARC

2011-12-22T05:44:00.001-08:00

Dinner hosted by the South Asian Strategic Stability Institute in Islamabad, Pakistan on the occasion of the Twenty Sixth Anniversary of The South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC)

US admits mistakes over killings of Pakistan troops

2011-12-22T04:57:00.001-08:00

The US military has admitted it bears significant responsibility for last month's air strike on the Afghan border that killed 24 Pakistani soldiers.

A statement said US and Afghan troops acted in self defence, but conceded there had been a lack of proper co-ordination with Pakistani forces. BBC correspondents say the admission is expected to embarrass the US military.

In retaliation for the killings, Pakistan has closed its border with Afghanistan, cutting Nato supply lines.

There was no immediate response from Pakistan to the findings of the US investigation. Pakistan, a vital partner in the fight against militants in the region, has demanded a formal US apology.

'Incorrect mapping'

In the statement the US once again expressed its deepest regret for the "tragic loss of life" caused by the air strike in Mohmand tribal agency on 26 November. "Inadequate co-ordination by US and Pakistani military officers operating through the border co-ordination centre - including our reliance on incorrect mapping information shared with the Pakistani liaison officer - resulted in a misunderstanding about the true location of Pakistani military units," it said.

Start Quote

We cannot operate effectively on the border... without addressing the fundamental trust still lacking between us”

US Department of Defense

"This, coupled with other gaps in information about the activities and placement of units from both sides, contributed to the tragic result."

According to a report in the Wall Street Journal with more details, US and Afghan commandos made a series of mistakes on 26 November.

They incorrectly concluded there were no Pakistani forces in the Afghan border area where the coalition was conducting an operation - which cleared the way for a Nato air strike that devastated Pakistani positions.

After the initial strike, the US compounded its mistake by providing inaccurate data to a Pakistani military representative at a border co-ordination centre, missing an opportunity to stop the fighting.

The report says the 150-man US and Afghan commando team came under attack from positions along a ridge. The team requested a show of force from the air, wrongly understanding from a radio transmission from Nato that there were no Pakistani military in the area. More

The Pakistani's have a point

2011-12-14T13:12:00.001-08:00

As an American visitor in the power precincts of Pakistan, from the gated enclaves of Islamabad to the manicured lawns of the military garrison in Peshawar, from the luxury fortress of the Serena Hotel to the exclusive apartments of the parliamentary housing blocks, you can expect three time-honored traditions: black tea with milk, obsequious servants and a profound sense of grievance.

Talk to Pakistani politicians, scholars, generals, businessmen, spies and journalists — as I did in October — and before long, you are beyond the realm of politics and diplomacy and into the realm of hurt feelings. Words like “ditch” and “jilt” and “betray” recur. With Americans, they complain, it’s never a commitment, it’s always a transaction. This theme is played to the hilt, for effect, but it is also heartfelt.

“The thing about us,” a Pakistani official told me, “is that we are half emotional and half irrational.”

For a relationship that has oscillated for decades between collaboration and breakdown, this has been an extraordinarily bad year, at an especially inconvenient time. As America settles onto the long path toward withdrawal from Afghanistan, Pakistan has considerable power to determine whether the end of our longest war is seen as a plausible success or a calamitous failure. There are, of course, other reasons that Pakistan deserves our attention. It has a fast-growing population approaching 190 million, and it hosts a loose conglomerate of terrorist franchises that offer young Pakistanis employment and purpose unavailable in the suffering feudal economy. It has 100-plus nuclear weapons (Americans who monitor the program don’t know the exact number or the exact location) and a tense, heavily armed border with nuclear India. And its president, Asif Ali Zardari, oversees a ruinous kleptocracy that is spiraling deeper into economic crisis. More

New Armed Stealth Drone Heads to Afghanistan (And Maybe Iran, Too)

2011-12-13T16:17:00.001-08:00

The U.S. Air Force is sending a single copy of a brand-new stealth drone to Afghanistan. Only maybe notjust Afghanistan.

Officially, the General Atomics-made Avenger — a sleek, jet-powered upgrade of the iconic armed Predator and Reaper — is heading to Afghanistan as a combat-capable “test asset.” The Air Force said in a statement that it loves how the Avenger’s “internal weapons bay and four hardpoints on each wing,” will give it “greater flexibility and will accommodate a large selection of next generation sensor and weapons payloads,” as reported by Zach Rosenberg at Flightglobal.

Problem is, you don’t really need those things in Afghanistan. Weapons bays are for stealth: most warplanes don’t have them. And it’s not like the Taliban has been firing radar-guided missiles at NATO aircraft. Besides, there are already dozens of armed drones in Afghanistan. One more isn’t going to make much of a difference.

Which begs the question: Is the 41-foot-long Avenger really meant for Afghanistan? Or is it destined to patrol over Afghanistan’s unruly neighbors, Iran and Pakistan, both of which do have radar-guided missiles? That was a job assigned to the Lockheed Martin RQ-170 Sentinel before one of those dronescrashed in Iran two weeks ago. We’re sure the Air Force has a few more RQ-170s to throw at Iran and Pakistan. After all, the elusive ‘bots have been spotted in Afghanistan, South Korea and Japan. But the Avenger, which debuted just two years ago, is newer and more capable than the Sentinel, which is widely believed to be a product of the early 2000s.

The Avenger reportedly carries a ground-mapping radar and the same ultra-sophisticated cameras as the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, making it a perfect candidate for quietly snooping above, say, suspected nuclear facilities or terrorist camps guarded by air-defense radars and missiles. And for a psychological impact, there’s nothing like an advanced, armed stealth drone to put a dent in Iran’s swagger after Tehran captured an apparently intact RQ-170. More

Mercenaries (Blackwater / XE) May Run Air Missions on Afghan-Pakistan Border

2011-12-09T13:39:00.001-08:00

Barely two weeks after a NATO helicopter disaster killed 24 Pakistani troops, the skies above the Afghanistan-Pakistan border may get even more dangerous. The State Department’s Islamabad embassy is hiring a contractor to coordinate air operations along the border to stop the flow of drugs and insurgents.Just what a tense situation calls for.

The new “aviation adviser” will oversee both the State Department’s “fleet of … aircraft” in Pakistan, which isn’t very often discussed, and provide “aviation support” to the Pakistani Frontier Corps, which patrols the tribal areas. The “end game” of the adviser’s mission is “interdicting the movement of illegal drugs, arms and people across the border,” not exactly a diplomatic specialty.

It’s unclear what kind of aircraft the State Department has in Pakistan. It’s also unclear whether State will help the Frontier Corps maintain its own aircraft or actually provide air support for the corps, a much more dramatic step. Either way, the department’s call for the “aviation adviser” comes at a time when U.S. generals accuse the Frontier Corps of helping insurgents attack U.S. troops in Afghanistan.

Judging from a contract solicitation released on Thursday, the aviation adviser’s life in Pakistan will be a rugged one. The adviser “must be able to independently perform fieldwork in remote areas for extended periods without assistance,” the contract reads. “Some field sites have been declared hazardous duty locations by the Department of State due to hostile activities of armed groups within Pakistan and therefore pose significant risk to the incumbent while at these sites.”

And the operations themselves do not sound very diplomatic. The Frontier Corps has long possessed a mandate to stop the flow of drugs across the border — and performed pretty badly, from the U.S.’s perspective. Not only is the border porous for insurgents, but two Pakistani factories produce a total of400,000 metric tons annually of ammonium nitrate, a material commonly found across the border in Afghan homemade bombs.

Into that breach steps contractors for the State Department’s Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs. In the past, the bureau has provided aviation support in Colombia, another partner nation racked by narcoterrorism. In Colombia, the bureau merely trained the Colombian military in air operations; judging from the job solicitation, missions in Pakistan sound more, um, direct.

It also comes at the intersection of two trends. First, the State Department is beefing up its security contractor presence in Pakistan: It put out a call last week for Pakistani embassy guards. Second, the relationship between Washington and Islamabad is spiraling downward after last month’s helicopter accident, with the very Frontier Corps that the aviation adviser will work with getting yanked off the border.

State is about to send even more security contractors into that hostile environment. What could possibly go wrong? More

SASSI Delegates Attend OPCW Conference of States Parties 16

2011-12-08T13:21:00.001-08:00

The Conference of the States Parties to the Chemical Weapons Convention held its Sixteenth Session at the World Forum Convention Centre (WFCC), located next door to the headquarters of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), at Churchillplein 10, The Hague, the Netherlands, from Monday, 28 November to Friday, 2 December 2011.

A three person delegation from SASSI attended. The delegation consisted of Khadija Sharief and Shakir Baacha from the Islamabad office and Nick Robson from the London headquarters.

Shakir Baacha and Nick Robson with the Pakistani Delegation to the OPCW

The South Asian Strategic Stability Institute is a member of the Chemical Weapons Convention Coalition (CWCC) and sits on the Advisory Committee of the organization. See list of CWCC members attending CPO 16 here.

Pakistan a potential uranium customer, says Ziggy Switkowski

2011-12-05T19:19:00.001-08:00

AUSTRALIA will have to consider selling uranium to Pakistan in the future after agreeing to export it to India, according to nuclear expert Dr Ziggy Switkowski.

The assessment came as Pakistan demanded the same treatment as its nuclear neighbour, which Labor has agreed to export uranium to despite India's refusal to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Dr Switkowski, a nuclear physisist and former head of the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation, said Pakistan wasn't yet ready to be considered as a buyer of Australian uranium.

But he said that “down the line that will need to be considered”. “Pakistan is handicapped by its less than impressive history in the whole nuclear space, having traded nuclear secrets to unstable regimes, in Iran, in Libya and North Korea,” he said.

“It also has a miniscule civilian nuclear power program - I think they have two reactors. “So, at this stage it is very much a hypothetical. “But over time, as they gain the confidence of the international community and the civilian nuclear program builds, they will need to be considered.”

Pakistani High Commissioner to Australia Abdul Malik Abdullah said Pakistan should also be able to buy Australian yellowcake. “If Australia is going to lift the ban on a country which has not signed NPT it is much hoped that will also apply to Pakistan the same way,” he told ABC radio.

Mr Abdullah said Pakistan has not made a request to buy Australian uranium, but this could change in the future. “In that case we will hope that we will also be treated at par with other non-NPT signatories,” he said. More

Gambling on Reconciliation to Save a Transition: Perils and Possibilities in Afghanistan

2011-12-05T13:15:00.001-08:00

U.S. forces are beginning the long process of withdrawal from Afghanistan. The international community is committed to completing a security transition by 2014, at which point coalition forces will cease to have primary responsibility for assuring Afghan security. But even the best-laid transition plans are at risk of failure if shoring up the Afghan state is not made a priority. The international conference on Afghanistan in Bonn on December 5 offers the United States and its allies an opportunity to institute the changes necessary for success.

Although NATO’s efforts to train Afghan national forces have made remarkable progress in recent years, it is unlikely that the indigenous military, police, and militia will be capable of independently securing the country against the wide range of terrorist and insurgent groups that will still be present in the region in 2014. Moreover, President Barack Obama’s decision to withdraw the surge forces from Afghanistan by September 2012 will prevent U.S. military commanders from being able to complete what they have so effectively begun: decimating the mid-level command structure of the Taliban that serves as the vital link between the rahbari shura (the leadership council) based in Quetta, Pakistan, and their foot soldiers in the field.

The administration, supported by the international community, has attempted to resolve this conundrum by promoting reconciliation with the Taliban, but that effort too is faltering. The insurgent leadership simply does not believe that it has been conclusively defeated—and accepting the U.S. terms now would surely be tantamount to acknowledging defeat. These challenges are exacerbated by the most vexing issue of all—the problematic role of Pakistan, which provides the insurgents sanctuary while using them as tools in its efforts to subordinate Afghanistan. All things considered, therefore, the prospects for successful reconciliation are indeed dim.

Yet, after 2014, the international community can still leave behind an Afghanistan that is durable enough to ensure that the Taliban can never regain effective control. Such meaningful success will require not jettisoning reconciliation so much as recommitting to the “hardening” of the Afghan state. First, the United States and its allies must invest in strengthening Afghan political institutions to deepen democracy, foster internal reconciliation, and ensure a peaceful transition of presidential power in 2014. More

The Great Proliferator: Uranium from US supplies floats around unmonitored

2011-12-04T15:51:00.002-08:00

Western nations are hurriedly collaborating to tighten sanctions on Iran after the United Nations released documents that left little doubt the country is trying to produce nuclear weapons.

American diplomats are pushing North Korea to shut down its uranium-enrichment plants so that nuclear-disarmament talks can resume. And as Pakistan grows less stable with every passing week, the United States is urgently devising plans to secure that state's nuclear weapons should the government lose control.

Meantime, several federal agencies in charge of America's bomb-grade nuclear materials reacted with sneering disregard to a government auditor's report this fall that no one is monitoring large quantities of highly enriched uranium, enough to make hundreds of nuclear weapons. The United States loaned the material to dozens of countries for research projects decades ago.

The State Department, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the Department of Energy "are satisfied with the status quo on this issue," Eugene Aloise, director of nuclear security and nonproliferation for the Government Accountability Office, told me. The GAO published his report. "In our view, they have a pre-911 mentality regarding securing of this nuclear material." In 1993, the last time the United States tried to find all of the highly enriched uranium it had loaned out, it "was able to verify the location of 1,160 kilograms out of an estimated 17,500 kilograms of U.S. (uranium) remaining overseas," Aloise's report said. Despite that startling shortfall, no one has bothered to look since. Roughly two kilograms of the highly enriched uranium are needed to make a bomb. More

The Great Proliferator: Uranium from US supplies floats around unmonitored

2011-12-04T15:51:00.001-08:00

Western nations are hurriedly collaborating to tighten sanctions on Iran after the United Nations released documents that left little doubt the country is trying to produce nuclear weapons.

Pakistan orders US to leave airbase in row over deadly Nato assault

2011-11-27T04:06:00.001-08:00

Pakistan has given the US 15 days to vacate an airbase used as a key launchpad for drone strikes in Afghanistan in retaliation for a mistaken attack on a Pakistani border outpost that killed at least 24 soldiers and injured 13.

American forces were told to leave the remote Shamsi airbase, secretly given over to the US after 9/11, following an emergency meeting of Pakistan's top civilian and military leadership late on Saturday. Pakistan has also blocked supply routes for US-led troops in Afghanistan.

Shamsi was used heavily for launching the war in Afghanistan in late 2001, and later served as the base for the US drone programme. Set in sparsely populated desert in the western Baluchistan province, Shamsi is highly controversial within Pakistan for its association with drones, which Islamabad officially condemns.

The decision of the country's defence committee of the cabinet is an admission that Shamsi remains in American hands. The committee announced that the government would "revisit and undertake a complete review of all programmes, activities and co-operative arrangements" with the US, and US-led forces in Afghanistan, "including diplomatic, political, military and intelligence".

Relations between Islamabad and Washington were already under deep strain before the incident, in which helicopters from the International Security Assistance Force (Isaf) operating in Afghanistan shelled checkpoints on the Pakistani side, apparently in error. More

Propagandistan

2011-11-22T08:44:00.001-08:00

Why is the Pentagon spending tens of millions of U.S. tax dollars to whitewash the image of Central Asian dictatorships?

BISHKEK, Kyrgyzstan – When people read a news website, they don't usually imagine that it is being run by a major producer of fighter jets and smart bombs. But when the Pentagon has its own vision of America's foreign policy, and the funds to promote it, it can put a $23 billion defense contractor in a unique position to report on the war on terror.

Over the past three years, a subdivision of Virginia-based General Dynamics has set up and run a network of eight "influence websites" funded by the Defense Department with more than $120 million in taxpayer money. The sites, collectively known as the Trans Regional Web Initiative (TRWI) and operated by General Dynamics Information Technology, focus on geographic areas under the purview of various U.S. combatant commands, including U.S. Central Command. In its coverage of Uzbekistan, a repressive dictatorship increasingly important to U.S. military goals in Afghanistan, a TRWI website called Central Asia Online has shown a disturbing tendency to downplay the autocracy's rights abuses and uncritically promote its claims of terrorist threats.

Central Asia Online was created in 2008, a time when Washington's ability to rely on Pakistan as a partner in the U.S.-led operation in Afghanistan was steadily waning. In the search for alternative land routes to supply U.S. troops, Uzbekistan seemed the best option. Nearby Iran was a non-starter, and Uzbekistan's infrastructure -- used by the Soviets to get in and out of Afghanistan during their ill-fated war there -- was far superior to that of neighboring Tajikistan. Today, the U.S. military moves massive amounts of cargo across Uzbekistan. By year's end, the Pentagon hopes to see 75 percent of all non-lethal military supplies arrive in Afghanistan via the so-called Northern Distribution Network, a web of land-based transport routes stretching from the Baltic Sea to the Amu Darya River. More

Iran and the I.A.E.A.

2011-11-19T20:40:00.001-08:00

November 19, 2011 "New Yorker" - -The first question in last Saturday night’s Republican debate on foreign policy dealt with Iran, and a newly published report by the International Atomic Energy Agency.

The report, which raised renewed concern about the “possible existence of undeclared nuclear facilities and material in Iran,” struck a darker tone than previous assessments. But it was carefully hedged. On the debate platform, however, any ambiguity was lost. One of the moderators said that the I.A.E.A. report had provided “additional credible evidence that Iran is pursuing a nuclear weapon” and asked what various candidates, upon winning the Presidency, would do to stop Iran. Herman Cain said he would assist those who are trying to overthrow the government. Newt Gingrich said he would coördinate with the Israeli government and maximize covert operations to block the Iranian weapons program. Mitt Romney called the state of Iran’s nuclear program Obama’s “greatest failing, from a foreign-policy standpoint” and added, “Look, one thing you can know … and that is if we reëlect Barack Obama Iran will have a nuclear weapon.” The Iranian bomb was a sure thing Saturday night.

I’ve been reporting on Iran and the bomb for The New Yorker for the past decade, with a focus on the repeatedly inability of the best and the brightest of the Joint Special Operations Command to find definitive evidence of a nuclear-weapons production program in Iran. The goal of the high-risk American covert operations was to find something physical—a “smoking calutron,” as a knowledgeable official once told me—to show the world that Iran was working on warheads at an undisclosed site, to make the evidence public, and then to attack and destroy the site.

The Times reported, in its lead story the day after the report came out, that I.A.E.A. investigators “have amassed a trove of new evidence that, they say, makes a ‘credible’ case” that Iran may be carrying out nuclear-weapons activities. The newspaper quoted a Western diplomat as declaring that “the level of detail is unbelievable…. The report describes virtually all the steps to make a nuclear warhead and the progress Iran has achieved in each of those steps. It reads likes a menu.” The Times set the tone for much of the coverage. (A second Times story that day on the I.A.E.A. report noted, more cautiously, that “it is true that the basic allegations in the report are not substantially new, and have been discussed by experts for years.”) More

Pak Taliban no longer a unified group: Time for Reconciliation, Rehabilitation Reintegration

2011-11-15T19:14:00.001-08:00

ISLAMABAD: The Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) has splintered into dozens of groups and no longer functions as a unified insurgent force, militant sources and security experts said.

They said power struggles between rival militant commanders, both for overall control of the TTP and regional leadership, has fractured the coordinated command structure created by the charismatic militant overlord, Baitullah Mahsud, killed in a 2009 drone strike.

There are now an estimated 50-60 factions operating under the TTP banner that do not answer to its political leader, Hakimulah Mahsud, the militant sources and security experts said. “The TTP is no longer an effective organisation. It is riddled with splits and divisions. They have merely not announced a formal split, because were that to become common knowledge, the TTP would lose all credibility and power, and thus leverage,” said Mansur Khan Mahsud, director of research at the Fata Research Centre, an independent think tank based in Islamabad.

The Inter Services Public Relations, as a matter of policy, does not comment on the findings of independent research. The militant sources and security experts said infighting within the TTP has been rife since the demise of Baitullah Mahsud. Many faction leaders consider Hakimullah Mahsud, the political head of the TTP, a usurper. More

Iran's Nuclear Program and the Legal Mandate of the IAEA

2011-11-15T17:24:00.001-08:00

The IAEA went outside of its legal mandate with its latest report on Iran, a move that has been viewed by some states as indicating the IAEA's shift from a technical body to a politicized one...
November 15, 2011 "Jurist" -- On November 8, Yukiya Amano, the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), delivered a formal report [PDF] on Iran's nuclear program to the IAEA Board of Governors and the UN Security Council.

This report is most notable for its analysis and findings regarding possible military dimensions of Iran's nuclear program. In previous reports, the Director General had expressed concern about this as well. However, in this report, the Director General's office provided its most thorough and comprehensive analysis of all information and evidence that it has acquired on Iran's nuclear program, either directly through the work of IAEA inspectors, or by the provision of information to the IAEA by national governments.

The report details information on Iran's nuclear program and presents information which, the report asserts, "indicates that Iran has carried out ... activities that are relevant to the development of a nuclear explosive device." Most of the evidence for this assertion presented in this report has been known in official and non-official circles for some time. However, the report is notable for its public presentation of the information on Iranian weapons-related activities held by the IAEA, and its detailed analysis of that information. This analysis includes a discussion of Iran's capabilities and activities with regard to the production and enrichment of fissile material, in particular uranium, which has been the subject of a number of IAEA Board of Governors reports and UN Security Council decisions. More

Pak Taliban no longer a unified group: Time for Reconciliation, Rehabilitation Reintegration

2011-11-15T11:42:00.001-08:00

ISLAMABAD: The Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) has splintered into dozens of groups and no longer functions as a unified insurgent force, militant sources and security experts said.

Israel vs Iran: the regional blowback

2011-11-11T07:44:00.001-08:00

The prospect of an Israeli military assault on Iran's nuclear assets is growing. The scale and impact of any attack would be far greater than most observers expect.

The pre-publication hype surrounding the new report on Iran's nuclear ambitions from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) indicated that the conclusions would be definitive. In light of it, the document - released on 9 November 2011 - is rather cautious. It does claim that Iran has made sustained efforts to develop nuclear-warhead technology, though many of these occurred in the early 2000s and there is little hard evidence of what is happening now. It is the link between the weapons research and two other factors that makes the case for revisiting Iran's nuclear ambitions.

The first is the programme of uranium enrichment which is steadily accumulating stocks of lower-level reactor-grade uranium (about 4% enrichment) and a much smaller amount of research-reactor fuel (rated at 20%). Weapons-grade fissile material requires enrichment to well over 80%, but that could be within grasp; alongside the warhead work, this suggests Iran has made real progress towards a virtual bomb, even if it is still some way from being a nuclear power or even taking the final decision to become one. More

India, Pakistan Tout Progress in Relationship

2011-11-10T16:16:00.001-08:00

The leaders of Pakistan and India on Thursday vowed to begin a "new chapter" in bilateral relations, marking recent steps by the longtime nuclear-armed antagonists to move beyond their fractious past, Reuters reported
Pakistani Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani and his Indian equivalent, Manmohan Singh, met for close to an hour on an island in the Maldives.
"The next round of talks will be more positive, more constructive and will open a new chapter in the history of both countries," Gilani said to journalists following the meeting, which took place on the margins of a South Asian regional summit. "I can only assure you that I discussed all core issues."
Outstanding topics between the two states include the disputed Kashmir territory, terrorism, the sharing of natural resources and their respective nuclear arsenals. Pakistan and India have gone to war three times since 1947.
New Delhi and Islamabad earlier this year renewed their bilateral peace process after a multiyear hiatus prompted by the 2008 terrorist attacks that killed over 160 people in the Indian city of Mumbai. India blamed Pakistan for not doing enough to target the extremists that operated from its territory.
"We will resume this dialogue with the expectation that all issues which have bedeviled relations between the two countries will be discussed," according to Singh. "The time has come to write a new chapter in the history of the relationship of the two countries." More

Pakistan seeks full SCO membership

2011-11-06T17:56:00.001-08:00

The prime minister is accompanied by Minister for Petroleum and Natural Resources Dr Asim Hussain, Board of Investment’s Chairman Saleem Mandviwala and Senator Sughra Imam.

Mr Gilani will address the 10th SCO summit on Monday and seek Pakistan’s full membership of the organisation, whose profile and scope have assumed great importance with the presence of China, Russia and other Central Asian states as strong regional partners.
The prime minister is scheduled to hold separate meetings with Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, who are attending the summit along with other heads of governments and representatives of member and observer states. Pakistan holds the observer status, along with Mongolia, India and Iran, whereas Sri Lanka and Belarus have been granted the status of dialogue partners and Afghanistan is a special guest.

Ambassador to Russia Khalid Khattak said Pakistan carried regional significance at the SCO forum in the context of security and geographical location that linked South Asia with the energy-rich Central Asia. Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and his Chinese counterpart Wen Jiabao will meet on Monday to discuss expanding their loose Central Asian security alliance to include Pakistan and Iran.
Mr Putin will host Mr Wen in this city almost exactly 10 years after the two countries joined forces with the four ex-Soviet Central Asian republics to form the SCO. More

The Ally From Hell

2011-11-05T17:28:00.001-07:00

Pakistan lies. It hosted Osama bin Laden (knowingly or not). Its government is barely functional. It hates the democracy next door. It is home to both radical jihadists and a large and growing nuclear arsenal (which it fears the U.S. will seize). Its intelligence service sponsors terrorists who attack American troops. With a friend like this, who needs enemies?
SHORTLY AFTER AMERICAN NAVY SEALs raided the Pakistani city of Abbottabad in May and killed Osama bin Laden, General Ashfaq Kayani, the Pakistani chief of army staff, spoke with Khalid Kidwai, the retired lieutenant general in charge of securing Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal. Kidwai, who commands a security apparatus called the Strategic Plans Division (SPD), had been expecting Kayani’s call.

General Kayani, the most powerful man in a country that has only a simulacrum of civilian leadership, had been busy in the tense days that followed the bin Laden raid: he had to assure his American funders (U.S. taxpayers provide more than $2 billion in annual subsidies to the Pakistani military) that the army had no prior knowledge of bin Laden’s hideout, located less than a mile from Pakistan’s preeminent military academy; and at the same time he had to subdue the uproar within his ranks over what was seen as a flagrant violation of Pakistan’s sovereignty by an arrogant Barack Obama. But he was also anxious about the safety of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons, and he found time to express this worry to General Kidwai. More

ISAF Data Show Night Raids Killed over 1,500 Afghan Civilians

2011-11-02T18:38:00.001-07:00

WASHINGTON, Nov 2, 2011 (IPS) - U.S. Special Operations Forces (SOF) killed well over 1,500 civilians in night raids in less than 10 months in 2010 and early 2011, analysis of official statistics on the raids released by the U.S.-NATO command reveals.

That number would make U.S. night raids by far the largest cause of civilian casualties in the war in Afghanistan. The report by the U.N. Assistance Mission in Afghanistan on civilian casualties in 2010 had said the use of Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) by insurgents was the leading cause of civilian deaths, with 904.
Except for a relatively few women and children killed by accident, the civilians who died in the raids were all adult males who were counted as insurgents in press releases and official data released by the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF).

The data on night raids, which were given to selected news media, cover three distinct 90-day night raid campaigns from May through July 2010, early August to early November, and mid-November to mid- February. The combined totals for the three periods indicate that a minimum of 2,599 rank and file insurgents were killed and an additional 723 "leaders" killed or captured in raids. [See Sidebar].
Assuming conservatively that one-third of the alleged leaders were killed, the total number of alleged insurgents killed in the raids was 2,844.

Official Data on Night Raids
ISAF has leaked a set of statistics on insurgents killed in night raids published in major news outlets covering three 90- day campaigns of night raids. In August 2010, ISAF released figures to the Washington Post showing that 1,031 rank and file insurgents had been killed from May through July. In November 2010 the New York Times reported a total of 968 rank and file insurgents killed in the three months from Aug. 11 through Nov. 11.
Reuters reported on Feb. 24, 2011 that 600 people were killed during the 90 days from Nov. 18 to Feb. 18. The figure did not distinguish between rank and file and "leaders". Those three subtotals add up to 2,599 killed from May 2010 to mid-February 2011.

The Washington Post and New York Times articles also reported 355 and 368 "leaders" killed or captured during the May-July and August-November periods, totaling 723. An unknown proportion of that total was deliberately assassinated. Nevertheless, it is assumed in estimating the number killed in the raids that the proportion of alleged "leaders" killed to the total killed and captured in the first two campaigns was the same as the proportion of rank and file killed of the total killed and captured: 34 percent of 723, or 245.

The sum of the totals of 2,599 alleged insurgents and 245 alleged "leaders" assumed to have been killed in the raids comes to 2,844. The total number or SOF night raids can be estimated from officially leaked subtotals of 3,000 from May through July; 1,572 from Aug. 11 to Nov. 11, and 1,710 from Nov. 18 to Feb. 18.

Those subtotals add up to 6,282 night raids for the entire 10 months. SOF night raids during the 10-month period totaled 6,282, according to the same ISAF data. More

Imagine if you will: Armed Chinese Troops in Texas!

2011-10-31T12:23:00.000-07:00

Disclaimer: This video is posted to illustrate the argument that invading and occupying a sovereign state may well have negative security blowback. There is no political endorsement intended in sharing this video.

The Indus Water Treaty

2011-10-30T18:18:00.001-07:00

$12M to Improve Security for Nukes in Europe

2011-10-30T11:10:00.000-07:00

Atlantic CommTech Corp. in Virginia Beach, VA received a $12 million firm-fixed-price contract.

They’ll provide interior intrusion detection systems for protective aircraft shelters, and redundant cable, for the 498th Nuclear Systems Wing. Atlantic CommTech will be performing 100% of the work throughout 6 NATO installations in Europe. This is not surprising. Back in February 2008, “The Blue Ribbon Review of Nuclear Weapons Policies and Procedures”raised concerns about security practices at nuclear-capable facilities in Europe, and recommended a number of steps to improve the situation. Meanwhile, European countries’ waning desire to even host such weapons has become a subject of high-level debate among NATO members.

The 498th Nuclear Systems Wing is part of USAF Materiel Command, and handles nuclear maintenance projects, programs, & systems integration, advocacy, and oversight. The wing’s groups and divisions include the 498th Missile Sustainment Division based at Tinker AFB, OK, the 498th Nuclear Systems Division at Kirtland AFB, NM; the 498th Munitions Maintenance Group at Whiteman AFB, MO, and the 798th Munitions Maintenance Group at Minot AFB, ND. The USAF Nuclear Weapons Center/PKE at Kirtland AFB, NM, manages the contract (FA9422-12-F-0001). More

UN: Sharp Drop in Afghans Returning From Pakistan

2011-10-30T07:57:00.001-07:00

KABUL, Afghanistan-- The number of Afghan refugees returning home from Pakistan fell by almost 60 percent this year, the United Nations' refugee agency said Saturday, reflecting the reluctance of many to return to the war-ravaged country where security concerns abound a decade after a U.S.-led invasion to oust the Taliban.
The UNHCR said that 60,000 Afghans have returned so far this year under its voluntary repatriation effort -- 43,000 coming home from Pakistan and 17,000 from Iran.
While the number returning from Iran was double the level for the same period last year, 59 percent fewer returned from Pakistan, the agency said. In Pakistan, most of the Afghan refugees live in two trouble-prone northwest regions that border Afghanistan -- Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Baluchistan.
A NATO push over the past couple of years forced the Taliban to shift operations outside its traditional strongholds in the south. Afghanistan's eastern provinces have become particular hotspots in the war-ravaged nation where U.S.-led NATO forces, for the past decade, have been battling the insurgents. More

Over 15,000 CIA Contractors Will Not Give Peace A Chance

2011-10-09T09:07:00.001-07:00

ISLAMABAD: The “give peace a chance” counter-terrorism policy agreed upon at last weekend’s All Parties Conference dangerously fails to acknowledge the growing influence of Afghan warlords over the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), according to security experts, intelligence sources and veteran militants.
They said there is mounting evidence that the Afghan warlords are providing safe havens, logistical and monetary support to militant insurgents fleeing

counter-terrorist operations in the FATA.
The cross-border influence of the warlords has grown rapidly since their militias were hired to support US forces, notably during the 2010 troop surge in southern Afghanistan, they said.
The number of such “armed private security contractors” currently employed by the US depart of defence in Afghanistan is staggering: 15,305, including 13,330 Afghans, as of July, according to data released by the Central Command for Afghanistan and Iraq.
Officially, the contractors perform roles such as securing Nato convoys, military facilities and areas not yet policed by the Afghan government, enabling uniformed US personnel to focus exclusively on offensive combat operations.
However, the warlords’ empowered militias have frequently exceeded that brief, according to 2009 and 2010 reports by US think tanks, including the Congressional Research Service.
The empowerment of Afghan warlords, in turn, has added to the instability in the FATA and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, intelligence and militant sources said.
Current TTP safe havens in Afghanistan’s Kunar and Nuristan provinces are an ironic mirror image of North Waziristan, providing logistical support for armed incursions into Chitral and Dir, and strategic depth to the insurgents.
More >>>

Location: Islamabad

IAEA Sets Up Team to Drive Nuclear Safety Action Plan

2011-10-04T02:31:00.001-07:00

26 September 2011 | The International Atomic Energy Agency is setting up a Nuclear Safety Action Team to oversee prompt implementation of the

IAEA Action Plan on Nuclear Safety and ensure proper coordination among all stakeholders.

The 12-point Action Plan, drawn up in the wake of the Fukushima Daiichi accident, was approved by the Agency's Board of Governors on 13 September and endorsed by all 151 Member States at its General Conference last week.

The team will work within the Agency's Department of Nuclear Safety and Security, headed by Deputy Director General Denis Flory, and will coordinate closely with the Director General's Office for Policy.

"The Action Plan requires immediate follow-up," Director General Yukiya Amano said. "This compact, dedicated team will assist Deputy Director General Flory in implementing the measures agreed in the Action Plan."

Gustavo Caruso, Head of the Regulatory Activities Section in the IAEA's Division of Installation Safety, has been designated as the team's Special Coordinator for the implementation of the Action Plan.

The IAEA has already started implementing its responsibilities under the Action Plan, including development of an IAEA methodology for stress tests for nuclear power plants. The methodology will be ready in October.
More >>>

Location:Islamabad

World Food Day, 16 October 2011

2011-10-04T01:56:00.001-07:00

Food prices - from crisis to stability

Price swings, upswings in particular, represent a major threat to food security in developing countries. Hardest-hit are the poor. According to the

World Bank, in 2010-2011 rising food costs pushed nearly 70 million people into extreme poverty.

“FOOD PRICES – FROM CRISIS TO STABILITY” has been chosen as this year’s World Food Day theme to shed some light on this trend and what can be done to mitigate its impact on the most vulnerable.

On World Food Day 2011, let us look seriously at what causes swings in food prices, and do what needs to be done to reduce their impact on the weakest members of global society. More >>>

Location: Cayman Islands

Chomsky On “Occupy Wall Street”, Israel's Imminent Collapse and Pakistan

2011-10-02T12:36:00.001-07:00

Chomsky vividly shares his reflections on the wall street protests and warns of an impending serious poverty and real unemployment similar to the great depression, he talks about the 2012 American presidential campaign

spending and how positions in both the white house and the congress are being bought, not earned and he refers to the killing of Osama Bin Laden and how this marks a shift of American policy from Bush’s abducting and torturing whoever the CIA thought posed a threat to the U.S to Obama’s “just kill `em when you spot `em” approach regardless of the legalities overlooked in the process.

Click here for video

He concludes that the killing of Osama Bin Laden was done, in such a way, as to infuriate, and may be implicate the Pakistani military, something he seriously regards as extremely dangerous.

In regard to the Arab spring, Chomsky acknowledges that the U.S and its western allies did not support the Tunisian or the Egyptian revolutions; rather they opposed them, and backed the dictator till the last minute and then shifted policy when they were overthrown. More >>>

Location: Islamabad

Film on Climate Refugees Strikes a Chord

2011-10-01T16:58:00.001-07:00

During the shooting of his 2010 documentary “Climate Refugees,” the Irish-American filmmaker Michael Nash visited nearly 50 countries in about

18 months, interviewing politicians, scientists, health workers and victims of floods, cyclones, hurricanes and droughts.

Click here for film trailer

His conclusion was that short- and longer-term changes in climate are causing vast numbers of people to abandon their jobs, homes and countries to seek better lives elsewhere, or to simply survive. (Jeffrey Gettleman’s recent coverage of the Somali refugee crisis in The Times has offered some vivid and disturbing examples, although Somalia’s troubles are also inextricably linked to political turmoil.)

Mr. Nash poses a basic question: what will become of the millions of people whose lack of access to food and clean water leads them to take increasingly desperate measures? What type of strains will huge migration put on resources in more developed countries?

Will this dislocation eventually, as the retired Navy vice admiral Lee Gunn told Mr. Nash, pose a threat to Americans’ national security, too?

By focusing on the consequences of climate change rather than its scientific causes, some experts suggest that Mr. Nash succeeded in circumventing a divisive political debate over global warming and the extent to which human activity contributes to it. More >>>

Location: Cayman Islands

America’s Foreign Policy Fiasco

2011-09-29T22:44:00.001-07:00

September 29, 2011 "The Diplomat" --- US President Barack Obama is piling up the foreign policy disasters.

In at least three areas crucial for world peace and US interests – Arab-Israel tensions, Afghanistan-Pakistan and Yemen-Somalia – he’s pursuing a course that can only be described as foolhardy. Indeed, the anger and hate towards the United States that he’s generating could take a generation to dispel.
Obama’s abject surrender to Israel on the Palestine question has shocked much of the world and gravely damaged the United States’ standing among Arabs and Muslims. In what is seen by many as an effort to court the Jewish vote at next year’s presidential election, Obama has thrown into reverse the policy of outreach to the Muslim world that he expressed so eloquently in his 2009 Cairo speech. If he’s now driven to use the US veto at the UN Security Council to block the application of a Palestinian state for UN membership, he will have been defeated by the very forces of Islamophobia he once hoped to tame.

Obama’s policy in Afghanistan is equally perverse. On the one hand, he seems to want to draw the Taliban into negotiations. But on the other, some of his army chiefs and senior diplomats apparently want to destroy the Taliban first. This is hardly a policy likely to bring the insurgents to the table. In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Ryan Crocker, the new US ambassador to Kabul, actually said that the conflict should continue until more of the Taliban are killed. Who, one wonders, is in charge of US policy?

In a message on the occasion of the Eid at the end of Ramadan, Mullah Muhammad Omar, leader of the Afghan Taliban, seemed to hint at his readiness for a comprehensive negotiation. ‘Every legitimate option can be considered,’ he said,’ in order to reach the goal of an independent Islamic regime in Afghanistan.’ He urged foreign powers to withdraw their troops ‘immediately’ in order to achieve a lasting solution to the problem. In a gesture to his local opponents, he stressed that the Taliban didn’t wish to monopolize power and that all ethnicities would participate in a ‘real Islamic regime acceptable to all the people of the country.’ More >>>

Location:Islamabad

Pakistan PM: 'We won't be pressured by US' on Haqqanis

2011-09-29T09:19:00.001-07:00

Adm Mullen has described the Haqqani group as a ‘veritable arm’ of Pakistan’s spy agency.

Pakistan will not bow to US pressure to step up its fight against militancy, its prime minister has said.

Yousuf Raza Gilani told a rare meeting of political and religious parties that relations between the two countries should be based on mutual respect.
Relations have hit new lows since the top US military officer said Pakistan backed the Haqqani militant group in Afghanistan, a charge Pakistan rejects.

Correspondents say many Pakistanis see the US comments as a threat of war. Washington wants Islamabad to sever links with the Haqqani group, which analysts say has roots deep inside Pakistani territory. US officials say they are close to deciding whether to label the group as a foreign terrorist organisation.

“Pakistan cannot be pressured to do more,” Mr Gilani told the meeting in Islamabad. More >>>

Location: Islamabad

UNITAR is pleased to announce its new online courses

2011-09-27T09:32:00.001-07:00

UNITAR is pleased to announce its new online courses on:
Drafting and Adopting United Nations Resolutions (in English), which will take place from 3 to 28 October 2011.

Chairing International Conferences (in English), which will take place from 10 to 21 October 2011.

These courses target members of the diplomatic community as well as government officials, staff of international and non-governmental organizations, professionals from the private sector, and post-graduate students. We would be grateful if you could share this information within your diplomatic academy and with your colleagues who may be interested in taking this course.

More information about the course content, fee, and registration is available at:

http://www.unitar.org/event/drafting-2011

http://www.unitar.org/event/chairing-international-conferences-oct11

Should you need further information, please contact the Multilateral Diplomacy Programme Team at: mdp-elearning@unitar.org

Location:Cayman Islands

Back to square one

2011-09-27T09:00:00.001-07:00

The diplomatic battle over negotiations for a treaty banning the production of bomb making nuclear material will shift next week to the UN’s General Assembly in New York.

The GA’s First Committee on Disarmament and International Security will be the venue for renewed debate over how to get discussions started in the 65-member Conference on Disarmament (CD) in Geneva on a Fissile Material Cut off Treaty (FMCT).

These discussions could set the stage and give a direction to what happens next year in the CD. For now Pakistan’s demand that the proposed treaty should include reduction of fissile material stockpiles and not just ban future production – a position supported by many nations – has halted talks in the world’s sole multilateral negotiating body on disarmament.

The upcoming debate in the First Committee will take place against the backdrop of a diplomatic climb down by the US, which had for the past year or more, been threatening to take the FMCT negotiations outside the CD if the stalemate persisted. More >>>

Location:Islamabad

The Economy, Peak Oil and Permaculture

2011-09-27T00:54:00.001-07:00

Richard Heinberg- Senior Fellow at the Post Carbon Institute is a Permaculturist.

His latest book describes The End of Growth- isn't looking for when the recession will end and we'll get back to "normal". He believes our decades-long era of growth was based on aberrant set of conditions- namely cheap oil, but also cheap minerals, cheap food, etc- and that looking ahead, we need to prepare for a "new normal". The problem, according to Heinberg, is our natural resources just aren't so cheap and plentiful anymore, and he's not just talking about Peak Oil, Heinberg believes in Peak Everything (also the title of one of his books). Heinberg thinks for many, adjusting to a life where everything costs a bit more, could be very hard, but he also thinks the transition to a new normal might actually make life better. "Particularly in the Western industrialized countries we've gotten used to levels of consumption that are not only environmentally unsustainable, they also don't make us happy. They've in fact hollowed out our lives. We've given up things that actually do give us satisfaction and pleasure so that we can work more and more hours to get more and more money with which to buy more and more stuff- more flatscreen tvs, bigger SUVs, bigger houses and it's not making us happier. Well, guess what, it's possible to downsize, it's possible to use less, become more self sufficient, grow more of your own food, have chickens in your backyard and be a happier person." This is not all theoretical. In the backyard of the home Heinberg shares with his wife, Janet Barocco, the couple grow most of their food during the summer months (i.e. 25 fruit & nut trees, veggies, potatoes.. they're just lack grains), raise chickens for eggs, capture rainwater, bake with solar cookers and a solar food drier and secure energy with photovoltaic and solar hot water panels. Their backyard reflects Heinberg's vision for our "new normal" and it's full of experiments, like the slightly less than 120-square-foot cottage that was inspired by the Small Home Movement. It was built with the help of some of Heinberg's college students (in one of the nation's first sustainability classes) using recycled and natural materials (like lime plaster). Heinberg admits it's not a real tiny house experiment since they don't actually live in it- his wife uses it as a massage studio, he meditates there and sometimes it's used as a guest house (though that's hush hush due to permitting issues). But their tiny cottage points to the bigger point behind why a transition to a less resource intensive future could equal greater happiness. "Simplify. Pay less attention to all of the stuff in your life and pay more attention to what's really important. Maybe for you it's gardening, maybe for you it's painting or music. You know we all have stuff that gives us real pleasure and most of us find we have less and less time for that because we have to devote so much time to shopping, paying bills and driving from here to there and so on. Well, how about if we cut out some of that stuff and spend more time doing what really feeds us emotionally and spiritually and in some cases even nutritionally." http://m.youtube.com/#/watch?v=cl8ZHDQQY7I

Shades of George Bush: You are either for us or against us

2011-09-12T09:10:00.001-07:00

Pakistan must do more in al Qaeda fight, Biden says

Pakistan has been an unreliable ally of the United States in the war against al Qaeda and other extremist organizations, U.S. Vice President Joe Biden told CNN in an interview set to air in full Monday night.

Biden, who spoke to CNN's John King on the eve of the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks, said Pakistan has failed "on occasion" when forced to choose between the United States and al Qaeda.

The price of Pakistan's choices has been the "loss of life of American soldiers in Afghanistan," the vice president said. Islamabad has "been very helpful in other times," he added. "But it's not sufficient. They have to get better. We need a relationship that is born out of mutual interest. And it's in their interest that they be more cooperative with us." "We are demanding it," he said. More >>>
"Mutual interest" is usually beneficial for both sides, so is the Vice President confused? Editor?

Location: Islamabad

Amano's Influence and the IAEA Fall Meetings

2011-09-11T18:40:00.001-07:00

This month the two decision-making bodies of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)—the Board of Governors and the General Conference—will convene back-to-back meetings in Vienna.

On the agenda will be a range of pressing issues, including the Middle East, Iran, North Korea, and the aftermath of the nuclear accident in Fukushima.

In a Q&A, Mark Hibbs explains that the deliberations will underscore the weakness of the IAEA’s leadership compared to its 151 member states. They—and not Director General Yukiya Amano—will call the shots on all important agenda items. More >>>

Location: Islamabad

The Peak Oil Crisis: Efficiency is the Solution

2011-09-07T19:03:00.001-07:00

If there is a way to get through the loss of fossil fuels, it lies in developing new and more efficient ways to generate renewable energy and more efficient ways of utilizing the fossil fuels we have left.

Renewable sources currently provide only 16 percent of our energy in the U.S. and 11 percent of our electric power. Unless the production of these renewables can be increased substantially in the next 50 years and the efficiency with which we use energy increased many fold, then the world is going to become a very dark and stagnant place.
There is running debate going on between people who believe all is lost without copious supplies of fossil fuels to power the global civilization and those who believe that the conservation and efficiency that will come with very high fossil fuel prices will provide a recognizable future for civilization. The great unknowns in all this is whether there will be sufficient financial and other resources available to effect the transition and whether or not the damage wrought by a changing climate will be so serious that a global transition to renewable energy will be difficult if not impossible.

For the immediate future, however, much of what life in the future will be like will depend on the technologies that will enable civilization to continue while using only a fraction of the energy that is consumed today and to develop the technology to produce large quantities of cheaper renewable fuels. The manner in which our fossil fuels are being used is so wasteful of the energy contained in fossil fuels that major reductions can be made with little real impact on the activities that consume energy. The prime examples of this waste is the internal combustion engine which uses only 14 percent of its fuel to turn the wheels while wasting most of the rest. Huge central power plants waste most of the energy that devours coal and natural gas, and produce much waste heat that is dumped into the air or local water bodies or in line losses. Without the massive waste, the fossil fuel age could last a lot longer. More >>>

Location:Amman, Jordan

"Was War the Only Answer to 9/11?

2011-09-05T17:58:00.001-07:00

September 05, 2011 "Nation Of Change" -- This is the 10th anniversary of the horrendous atrocities of Sept. 11, 2001, which, it is commonly held, changed the world.

The impact of the attacks is not in doubt. Just keeping to western and central Asia: Afghanistan is barely surviving, Iraq has been devastated and Pakistan is edging closer to a disaster that could be catastrophic.
On May 1, 2011, the presumed mastermind of the crime, Osama bin Laden, was assassinated in Pakistan. The most immediate significant consequences have also occurred in Pakistan. There has been much discussion of Washington’s anger that Pakistan didn’t turn over bin Laden. Less has been said about the fury among Pakistanis that the U.S. invaded their territory to carry out a political assassination. Anti-American fervor had already intensified in Pakistan, and these events have stoked it further.

One of the leading specialists on Pakistan, British military historian Anatol Lieven, wrote in The National Interest in February that the war in Afghanistan is “destabilizing and radicalizing Pakistan, risking a geopolitical catastrophe for the United States – and the world – which would dwarf anything that could possibly occur in Afghanistan.”

At every level of society, Lieven writes, Pakistanis overwhelmingly sympathize with the Afghan Taliban, not because they like them but because “the Taliban are seen as a legitimate force of resistance against an alien occupation of the country,” much as the Afghan mujahedeen were perceived when they resisted the Russian occupation in the 1980s.
More >>>

Location: Islamabad

US drone strike kills 7 in NW Pakistan

2011-09-04T21:21:00.001-07:00

A non-UN-sanctioned US drone attack has killed at least seven people and wounded several others in Pakistan’s northwestern tribal region.
The causalities come after US drones targeted suspected militants in an area of North Waziristan tribal region, Xinhua reported.

The US frequently carries out such attacks on Pakistan’s tribal areas. Attacks by unmanned American planes have left dozens of people dead in the volatile region over the past weeks.

The aerial attacks, initiated by former US president George W. Bush, have been escalated under President Barack Obama. Washington claims the attacks target al-Qaeda-linked and pro-Taliban militants in Pakistan’s northwestern tribal regions bordering Afghanistan. However, locals insist that the strikes kill mostly civilians.

The issue of civilian casualties has strained relations between Islamabad and Washington. Pakistan has repeatedly condemned the strikes as a violation of its sovereignty, asserting that such attacks have proven counterproductive in the so-called war against terrorism.

The United Nations says the US-operated drone strikes in Pakistan pose a growing challenge to the international rule of law.

Philip Alston, UN special envoy on extrajudicial killings, said in a report in late October 2010 that the attacks were undermining the rules designed to protect the right of life. Alston also said he feared that the drone killings by the US Central Intelligence Agency could develop a “playstation” mentality.
More >>>

Location: Islamabad

Iran Moves to Shelter Its Nuclear Fuel Program

2011-09-01T22:56:00.001-07:00

Iran is moving its most critical nuclear fuel production to a heavily defended underground military facility outside the holy city of Qum, where it is less vulnerable to attack from the air and, the Iranians hope, the kind of cyberattack that crippled its nuclear program, according to intelligence officials.

The head of Iran’s atomic energy agency, Fereydoon Abbasi, spoke about the transfer in general terms on Monday to an official Iranian news service. He boasted that his country would produce the fuel in much larger quantities than it needs for a small research reactor in Tehran that produces l isotopes.

The fact that Iran is declaring that its production will exceed its needs has reinforced the suspicions of many American and European intelligence officials that Iran plans to use the fuel to build weapons or to train Iranian scientists to produce bomb-grade fuel. More >>>

Location:Amman, Jordan

Solar May Produce Most of World’s Power by 2060, IEA Says

2011-08-30T04:29:00.001-07:00

Solar generators may produce the majority of the world’s power within 50 years, slashing the emissions of greenhouse gases that harm the environment, according to a projection by the International Energy Agency.

Photovoltaic and solar-thermal plants may meet most of the world’s demand for electricity by 2060 — and half of all energy needs — with wind, hydropower and biomass plants supplying much of the remaining generation, Cedric Philibert, senior analyst in the renewable energy division at the Paris-based agency, said in an Aug. 26 phone interview.

“Photovoltaic and concentrated solar power together can become the major source of electricity,” Philibert said. “You’ll have a lot more electricity than today but most of it will be produced by solar-electric technologies.”

The solar findings, set to be published in a report later this year, go beyond the IEA’s previous forecast, which envisaged the two technologies meeting about 21 percent of the world’s power needs in 2050. The scenario suggests investors able to pick the industry’s winners may reap significant returns as the global economy shifts away from fossil fuels. More >>>

Location:Cayman Islands

The Kingdom of Magical Thinking

2011-08-28T20:18:00.001-07:00

In 1935, an oilman visiting the Middle East reported back to his headquarters, "The future leaves them cold. They want money now."

Although the temptation of overspending has repeatedly undermined oil-rich governments from Caracas to Tehran, Saudi Arabia avoided this trap over the last decade through fiscal discipline that has kept its expenditures below its swelling oil receipts.

But in a recent report striking for the candor of its unpalatable conclusions, Saudi investment bank Jadwa laid out the kingdom's inexorable fiscal challenge: how to balance soaring government spending, rapidly rising domestic oil demand, and a world oil market that gives little room for further revenue increases. And that was before the recent economic turmoil knocked $20 per barrel off oil prices.

Saudi Arabia's government spending, flat since the last oil boom in the 1970s, is now rising at 10 percent or more annually. And it will rise faster still: The House of Saud's survival instinct in the wake of the initial Arab revolutions led King Abdullah to announce $130 billion of largesse in February and March. The resulting increases in government employment and salaries can be cut only at the cost of more discontent.

And that's only what the kingdom is spending on its "counterrevolution" at home. Saudi Arabia will pay the lion's share of the pledged $25 billion of Gulf Cooperation Council aid to Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, and Oman. With Iraq, Syria, and Yemen likely flashpoints yet to come, the bill will only increase. Already, nearly a third of the Saudi budget goes toward defense, a proportion that could rise in the face of a perceived Iranian threat. More >>>

Location:Cayman Islands

Pakistan calls for maintaining neutrality of UN peacekeeping operations

2011-08-27T09:36:00.001-07:00

UNITED NATIONS,Aug 27 (APP): Pakistan told the Security Council Friday that the credibility and neutrality of UN peacekeeping operations, the world body’s flagship activity, must not be compromised on the altar of political expediency.

Participating in a discussion on “Peacekeeping: taking stock and preparing for the future,” acting ambassador Raza Bashir Tarar stressed the need for adherence to the UN Charter, whose basic thrust is on maintenance of international peace and security, to ensure long-term success of peacekeeping.

“The Charter provides legitimacy to UN peacekeeping,” the Pakistani envoy told the 15-member council. “UN Peacekeeping enjoys universal acclaim, cost-effectiveness and professional precision,” he said, adding that peacekeeping offers hope amidst violence and conflicts.
“Recent events have proved that peace operations conducted unilaterally or by different coalitions are poor and costly substitutes to UN peacekeeping,” the Pakistani envoy pointed out. At the same time, Tarar said United Nations operations were largely under-funded and under-resourced, and it was no longer sustainable for troop-contributing countries to subsidize them.
Pakistan, with 11,000 soldiers in blue helmets, is the largest troop contributor to the UN peacekeeping mission around the world. He also emphasized the critical importance of dovetailing peacebuilding into peacekeeping strategies, a task that the Peacebuilding Commission was best placed to develop. More >>>

Location:Islamabad

Deterrence, Demonization, and Drumbeats on Iran

2011-08-26T16:22:00.001-07:00

When a rhetorical drumbeat about anything continues long enough and loud enough, the substance in it comes to be widely accepted as common wisdom no matter how flimsy a factual basis, if any, the substance had to begin with.

The demonization of Iran, and in particular the notion that an Iranian nuclear weapon would be a can't-possibly-live-with, must-prevent-at-all-costs proposition has become such a subject. Especially dismaying is the adding to the drumbeat by members of Congress or other political leaders who ought to know better. To what extent their doing so results from their own perceptions having been shaped by drums that have already been beaten and to what extent they are consciously manipulating a theme that sells is unclear. But the result is the same.

One subtopic on which the myth-making about Iran has proceeded apace lately concerns delivery systems Iran is likely to have in a few years. Senator James Inhofe (R-OK) has repeatedly asserted that Iran will have by 2015 an intercontinental ballistic missile capable of delivering a weapon of mass destruction to the United States. This assertion is supposedly based on an executive-branch assessment, but as Greg Thielmann of the Arms Control Association explains, no such assessment says anything like that. There is only a worst-case scenario in an analysis released by the Pentagon that is subject to conditions such as external assistance and is by no means the same as what Inhofe is asserting. More >>>

And lest we forget, remember the 1953 Iranian coup d'état (known in Iran as the 28 Mordad coup was the overthrow of the democratically elected government of Iranian Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh on 19 August 1953, orchestrated by the intelligence agencies of the United Kingdom and the United States under the name TPAJAX Project.[2] The coup saw the transition of Mohammad-Rezā Shāh Pahlavi from a constitutional monarch to an authoritarian one who relied heavily on United States support to hold on to power until his own overthrow in February 1979. Editor

Location:Islamabad

The explosive truth behind Fukushima's meltdown

2011-08-21T14:36:00.000-07:00

Japan insists its nuclear crisis was caused by an unforeseeable combination of tsunami and earthquake. But new evidence suggests its reactors were doomed to fail.

It is one of the mysteries of Japan's ongoing nuclear crisis: How much damage did the 11 March earthquake inflict on the Fukushima Daiichi reactors before the tsunami hit?

The stakes are high: if the earthquake structurally compromised the plant and the safety of its nuclear fuel, then every similar reactor in Japan may have to be shut down. With almost all of Japan's 54 reactors either offline (in the case of 35) or scheduled for shutdown by next April, the issue of structural safety looms over any discussion about restarting them.

Plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co (Tepco) and Japan's government are hardly reliable adjudicators in this controversy. "There has been no meltdown," government spokesman Yukio Edano repeated in the days after 11 March. "It was an unforeseeable disaster," Tepco's then president Masataka Shimizu famously and improbably said later. Five months since the disaster, we now know that meltdown was already occurring as Mr Edano spoke. And far from being unforeseeable, the disaster had been repeatedly forewarned by industry critics. More >>>

Location:Cayman Islands

Call for reservoirs to store rainwater

2011-08-12T04:09:00.001-07:00

Monsoon always have a great impact on local agriculture as good rains always increase production of both major and minor crops of Pakistan, which boosts the agriculture sector growth.

There is a need to establish water reservoirs to store this precious natural resource while promotion of rainwater harvesting technique is also a need of hour for Pakistani agriculture.

These views were expressed in the Jang Economic Session on ‘Monsoon-Impact on Agriculture and Economy’, here on Thursday. Participants in the moot included Meteorologist Riaz Khan, Monitoring Chief PMIU Irrigation and Power Department Punjab Habibullah Bodla, President Basmati Growers Association (BGA) Hamid Malhi, Director Farmer Associates of Pakistan (FAP) Rabia Sultan and Chairman AgriForum Pakistan Ibrahim Mughal. The moot was hosted by Sikindar Hameed Lodhi and Intikhab Tariq.

Riaz Khan said that water was the lifeline for agriculture and Pakistani agriculture mainly depended upon rainwater. He said winter rains and snowfall in northern areas irrigated Rabi crop. He said historically 70 mm rain on average had been recorded in winters, which filled 80 per cent of Mangla Dam. He said low and medium flood was very important for river channels as well as for improving ground water table while high floods created troubles due to non availability of water reservoirs infrastructure. Habibullah Bodla said rainwater was very useful for agriculture sector but its benefits were never exploited properly. He said in 2010, Pakistan wasted 1.2 million acre feet rainwater in flood while China save similar quantity out of its 2.1 million acre feet rainwater by storing in dams. He said it has never been thought to utilize the abundant monsoon rainwater by constructing dams. He said that this year so far good rainfall was recorded in rice, cotton and other crops growing zones. He criticized that due to poor forecast system rainwater was also wasted in Pakistan. More >>>

Location:Islamabad

An Explosive New 9/11 Charge

2011-08-11T12:57:00.000-07:00

In a new documentary, ex-national security aide Richard Clarke suggests the CIA tried to recruit 9/11 hijackers—then covered it up.
With the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacksonly a month away, former CIA Director George Tenet and two former top aides are fighting back hard against allegations that they engaged in a massive cover-up in 2000 and 2001 to hide intelligence from the White House and the FBI that might have prevented the attacks.

The source of the explosive, unproved allegations is a man who once considered Tenet a close friend: former White House counterterrorism czar Richard Clarke, who makes the charges against Tenet and the CIA in an interview for a radio documentary timed to the 10thanniversary next month. Portions of the Clarke interview were made available to The Daily Beast by the producers of the documentary.
More >>>

Study reveals 168 child deaths in Pakistan drone war

2011-08-11T05:13:00.001-07:00

US drone strikes in Pakistan have killed more civilians than previously reported, including 168 children, according to figures compiled by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism.

The airstrikes are largely focused on the mountainous areas of Waziristan near the border with Afghanistan. In December 2010, Channel 4 News spoke to witnesses on the ground who said that women and children had perished in the bombing raids, as well as rebel fighters.

Now a detailed study by the London-based Bureau of Investigative Journalism (TBIJ) has been published containing new figures on civilian casualties. Its findings suggest the number of ordinary people killed could be 40 per cent higher than previously reported and that as many as 168 children have died since the strikes began.

Commenting on the findings, Unicef said: "Even one child death from drone missiles or suicide bombings is one child death too many. "Children have no place in war, and all parties should do their utmost to protect children from violent attacks at all times." More >>>

Location:Islamabad

Outsourcing National Intelligence

2011-08-10T05:59:00.001-07:00

The unprecedented involvement of private corporations in the Iraq War has been well documented.

Private soldiers working for Blackwater USA, Triple Canopy and others provide security services against military-level threats, and they regularly engage in combat. But what is not generally known is that the secret side of the Iraq War and the larger "war on terror" is also conducted by private corporations, fielding private spies. The reach of these corporations has extended into the Oval Office. Corporations are heavily involved in creating the analytical products that underlie the nation's most important and most sensitive national security document, the President's Daily Brief (PDB).

Over the past six years, a quiet revolution has occurred in the intelligence community toward wide-scale outsourcing to corporations and away from the long-established practice of keeping operations in U.S. government hands, with only select outsourcing of certain jobs to independently contracted experts. Key functions of intelligence agencies are now run by private corporations. The Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) revealed in May that 70 percent of the intelligence budget goes to contractors. More >>>

Location:Islamabad

GDP IS DEAD: Will the world be happier without it?

2011-08-09T10:07:00.001-07:00

Memo to politicians: Stop promising to grow GDP and start targeting social benefits you can actually deliver—or prepare to face angry mobs. Nothing grows forever on a finite planet, not even the US economy.

It’s not surprising that everyone from President Obama to Michele Bachmann is assuring the electorate that he or she can deliver more GDP growth. When GDP numbers are up, more jobs appear and investments reap higher returns. When GDP is down, economic mayhem ensues.

Yet there are signs that more GDP growth may not be in the cards, regardless whose economic remedy is chosen. In fact, the day may have arrived when GDP itself has outlived whatever usefulness it ever had.

GDP (Gross Domestic Product) is a number indicating the total spending occurring in a national economy annually. Since WWII, policy makers have used GDP as their primary index of national economic health. During the late 20th century, with the world awash in cheap energy to fuel ever more industrial output and transport-driven trade, the numbers kept going up—and most economists concluded they’d continue doing so forever.

A few contrarians (including Robert F. Kennedy, in 1968) suggested that relying on GDP wasn’t a good idea. Although soaring numbers lead to financial euphoria, they can hide social ills like growing inequality; moreover, GDP fails to distinguish between waste, luxury, and the satisfaction of basic human needs. Perversely, GDP often rises during wars or after environmental disasters, due to increased government spending.

Despite criticisms, economists and policy makers have stuck with GDP—perhaps because tracking a single number makes their jobs easier.

But now, the US may have reached its practical GDP limit. The bursting of a once-in-a-lifetime credit bubble, the maxing out of consumer borrowing and spending capacity, and tightening global resource constraints (showing up as stubbornly high oil prices) have caught national economic output in an undertow. Much of the rest of the world is being drawn in, with Greece, Ireland, Portugal, Spain, and Italy swirling ever closer to the drain. During the past two years, Americans bought an anemic recovery—a few hundred billion dollars’ worth of GDP growth—but at the cost of trillions in added government debt.

Now, as Washington descends deeper into partisan acrimony, efforts to generate further growth with yet more debt have become political orphans that no Republican and few Democrats will claim as their own. If the “recovery” was all smoke and mirrors, we’ve just run out of mirrors.
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Location: Cayman Islands

Drone Terrorism

2011-08-08T05:01:00.001-07:00

The use of unmanned drones by the U.S. to attack civilian population with Hellfire missiles is a form of state terrorism. It is designed not to assassinate individuals (extrajudicial killing), but to instil fear and terrorise the entire population.

We all know the U.S.-led war on Afghanistan is an illegal act of aggression, and there are no legal or legitimate grounds to justify the ongoing aggression. According to countless international law experts, the war on Afghanistan is an unlawful act of aggression. It “violates[s] international law and the express words of the United Nations Charter”. Article 51 only “gives a state the right to repel an attack that is ongoing or imminent as a temporary measure until the UN Security Council can take steps necessary for international peace and security”, he added. [1]. Indeed, all current U.S.-led wars on Muslim nations are acts of illegal aggression against sovereign nations. The use of armed drones, also known as pilotless planes or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), to attack defenceless people and assassinate individuals is criminal.

According to a new report by The Fellowship for Reconciliation, “Armed drones have been used by the U.S. military in Afghanistan (since 2001), Iraq (since 2002), and Yemen (since 2002), by the CIA in Pakistan (since 2004), by the UK military in Afghanistan (since 2007) and by Israel in Gaza (since 2008). It is estimated that drones are being used or developed by over forty countries”. The majority of armed drones are produced and used by the U.S. and Israel , the inventors of terrorism. More >>>

Location: Islamabad

Managing Contraction, Redefining Progress

2011-08-07T20:22:00.001-07:00

Only a crisis—actual or perceived—produces real change. When the crisis occurs, the actions that are taken depend upon the ideas that are lying around. That, I believe, is our basic function: to develop alternatives to
existing policies, to keep them alive and available until the politically impossible becomes politically inevitable.
—Milton Friedman (economist)

Many analysts who focus on the problems of population growth, resource depletion, and climate change foresee gradually tightening constraints on world economic activity. In most cases the prognosis they offer is for worsening environmental problems, more expensive energy and materials, and slowing economic growth.

However, their analyses often fail to factor in the impacts to and from a financial system built on the expectation of further growth—a system that could come unhinged in a non-linear, catastrophic fashion as growth ends. Financial and monetary systems can crash suddenly and completely. This almost happened in September 2008 as the result of a combination of a decline in the housing market, reliance on overly complex and in many cases fraudulent financial instruments, and skyrocketing energy prices. Another sovereign debt crisis in Europe could bring the world to a similar precipice. Indeed, there is a line-up of actors waiting to take center stage in the years ahead, each capable of bringing the curtain down on the global banking system or one of the world’s major currencies. Each derives its destructive potency from its ability to strangle growth, thus setting off chain reactions of default, bankruptcy, and currency failure. More >>>

Location: Cayman Islands

A Secret War in 120 Countries: The Pentagon’s New Power Elite

2011-08-06T05:37:00.001-07:00

Somewhere on this planet an American commando is carrying out a mission. Now, say that 70 times and you’re done… for the day.

Without the knowledge of the American public, a secret force within the U.S. military is undertaking operations in a majority of the world’s countries. This new Pentagon power elite is waging a global war whose size and scope has never been revealed, until now.
After a U.S. Navy SEAL put a bullet in Osama bin Laden’s chest and another in his head, one of the most secretive black-ops units in the American military suddenly found its mission in the public spotlight. It was atypical. While it’s well known that U.S. Special Operations forces are deployed in the war zones of Afghanistan and Iraq, and it’s increasingly apparent that such units operate in murkier conflict zones like Yemen and Somalia, the full extent of their worldwide war has remained deeply in the shadows.
Last year, Karen DeYoung and Greg Jaffe of the Washington Post reported that U.S. Special Operations forces were deployed in 75 countries, up from 60 at the end of the Bush presidency. By the end of this year, U.S. Special Operations Command spokesman Colonel Tim Nye told me, that number will likely reach 120. “We do a lot of traveling—a lot more than Afghanistan or Iraq,” he said recently. This global presence—in about 60 percent of the world’s nations and far larger than previously acknowledged—provides striking new evidence of a rising clandestine Pentagon power elite waging a secret war in all corners of the world. More >>>

Location:Islamabad

Pakistan's roller-Coaster economy: tax evasion stifles Growth

2011-08-05T12:03:00.001-07:00

Over the last sixty years, Pakistan's economy has seen severe ups and downs. Once considered a model for other developing nations, Pakistan has

been unable to sustain solid growth. Furthermore, a third of its population now lives below the poverty line, and its literacy rate is abysmally low.

Pakistan's economic instability stems in large part from low government revenue resulting from the elite's use of tax evasion, loopholes, and exemptions. Fewer than three million of Pakistan's 175 million citizens pay any income taxes, and the country's tax-to-GDP ratio is only 9 percent. Tax evasion means fewer resources are available for essential social services.

Pakistan spends too much on defense and too little on development: It has spent twice as much on defense during peacetime as it has on education and health combined.

The government knows how to increase its revenue through tax reform, but the rich and powerful have resisted such measures for fear of lowering their own incomes.

Without sufficient revenue the government will continue to be burdened with an unsustainable debt. It needs to end tax exemptions for the wealthy and develop broader, long-term economic plans for sustainable growth. More >>>

In the past, the United States and other Western nations have come to Pakistan's rescue by paying off debts and funding development initiatives. Pakistan's elite has no reason to support reform as long as these bailouts come with no conditions attached.

Location:Islamabad

Crisis management: A good lesson to learn?

2011-08-05T11:06:00.000-07:00

Last month three terror attacks once again struck Mumbai, killing approximately 25 people. The attacks turned out to be the doing of an India-based Islamist outfit, the Indian Mujahedeen, and did not involve Pakistan-based Islamist militants.

In the media coverage since, terrorism experts on South Asia have posited that this attack was not a decisive shift in Islamist terrorism in India -- their argument, instead, was that Pakistan-based militants, increasingly autonomous in their operations, still remain the most likely source of a large-scale attack on Indian soil.

Since the 1998 nuclear tests by India and Pakistan, major cross-border attacks have resulted in bilateral crises. This was the case with the 2001 attack on the Indian parliament and again after the 2008 Mumbai attacks that killed over 160 people. With this in mind, it should not be discounted that future cross-border attacks could raise tensions again. More >>>

Greening the Desert II

2011-08-05T05:35:00.000-07:00

Greening the Desert II with Arabic subtitles from nadia attar on Vimeo.

The World Needs a New Language

2011-08-04T15:03:00.001-07:00

We know it is dangerous to cross a red light, so we wait until it turns green.

We do not go out sailing when the weather forecast promises a great storm. We accept it when a doctor tells us to take medicine to prevent hypertension.

We do not drink the water if there is sign saying that it is contaminated. We are constantly accepting different potential risks and manoeuvring to limit them.

But when it comes to climate change, our willingness to accept it as a potential great risk is missing - and so is our motivation to respond to it with our normal risk-behaviour.

97 percent of the climate scientists believe global warming is happening, that humans are largely responsible and that we need to take action now. From their perspective there is a mountain of evidence on the reality of climate change; the nearest thing to an open-and-shut case that scientist can produce. They are constantly trying to convince us -- the public -- of this fact.

But still the concern shared by almost every scientist is not concurrent with the general public opinion. 44 percent of Americans still believe that global warming is primarily caused by planetary trends, according to a poll from Rasmussen Reports conducted in April. And 36 percent do not believe climate change is a serious problem.

Thus we are currently witnessing an enormous reality gap between science and the public -- with very different perceptions of the risks posed by climate change.

If scientists could solve climate change on their own, the lacking public support wouldn't be a problem. But they can't. Without the endorsement from the general public, the fight against climate change does not stand much of a chance. More >>>

Location: Cayman Islands

Is Iran Really After a Nuclear Bomb?

2011-08-03T07:23:00.001-07:00

One question has dominated the U.S. conversation regarding Iran for years: how long until they get the bomb?

Intelligence analysts are constantly updating their estimates, and politicians are always asking for the latest timetables. The problem is, it’s an impossible question. It might also be the wrong one to ask.
Despite the rhetoric from Iran’s president, the country’s nuclear program up to now has not been “like a train without brakes” moving inexorably toward the ultimate weapon. Iran has devoted billions of dollars, a large share of its impressive scientific establishment, and nearly three decades of work toward mastering nuclear technology, yet it has no nuclear arsenal. Compared to Pakistan, which had a far inferior technical foundation yet was able to acquire nuclear weapons capability in about a decade, Iran seems to be dragging its feet.

The really interesting question, then, is not when will Iran have the bomb, but rather why don’t they already, and how can we keep it that way?

In some important ways, nuclear weapons are just like any other tool that governments might choose to acquire. Though our political systems are vastly different, Iran’s decision-making process over whether to build nuclear weapons is not so unlike any decision that the U.S. government must make. There are short-term interests and long-term ones, domestic and international considerations, and the messy process of bringing personalities and institutions together to make a complicated choice with complicated ramifications. And it all occurs within a very specific political environment.
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Location:Islamabad