Increased Focus and Growing Pressure on Pakistan

While President Barack Obama's announcement last week that he will "surge" 30,000 more U.S. troops into Afghanistan has received all of the attention here over the past week, Pakistan appears to be looming larger than ever in Washington's strategic...

read more

Senate Report Urges Warmer Ties With Sri Lanka

Despite ongoing concern about the country's human rights situation, the United States should seek a more positive relationship with strife-torn Sri Lanka, primarily for geopolitical reasons, according to a new report released here Monday by the Senate Foreign...

read more

US, Iran Moving Again Toward Confrontation

Iran's announced intention to build 10 new nuclear enrichment plants has been deemed "unacceptable" by the administration of President Barack Obama, which warned Monday of increased pressure on Tehran if it does not soon accept Western proposals to curb its...

read more

State Department Backpedals on Landmine Treaty

One day after the State Department announced that the administration of U.S. President Barack Obama will not sign the 10-year-old treaty banning anti-personnel landmines, it insisted that Washington's policy on the issue was still being reviewed. Human rights and...

read more

Groups Denounce Obama Rejection of Landmine Treaty

Human rights and disarmament activists reacted bitterly Wednesday to the decision by the administration of President Barack Obama, who will receive the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize next month, not to sign the 10-year-old treaty banning anti-personnel landmines. The U.S....

read more

Obama Returns to Greater Middle East Mess

As Barack Obama arrives home from his weeklong tour of East Asia, he confronts a growing list of ever more urgent problems in the Greater Middle East that he inherited from George W. Bush's "global war on terror." From Palestine to Pakistan, Obama, who also...

read more

Afghanistan, Iraq Near Bottom of Corruption Index

Despite billions of dollars spent by the U.S. and other countries to improve governance in Afghanistan and Iraq, the two countries remain among the world's most corrupt nations, according to the latest edition of Transparency International's (TI) Corruption...

read more

Obama’s International Political Capital Fading Fast

More than a year after his election, President Barack Obama appears to be dashing hopes both in the Arab world and in Latin America that he would bring major changes in U.S. policy toward their respective regions. His administration's decision to back down from its...

read more

Obama’s Outreach to Muslim World Teetering

U.S. President Barack Obama's extraordinary efforts since his first days in office to reassure Muslims in the Greater Middle East about U.S. intentions in the region have suffered a series of setbacks that threaten to reverse whatever gains he has made over the past...

read more