The ongoing popular challenge to the pro-Western Lebanese government of Prime Minister Fouad Siniora marks yet another setback in the Bush administration’s attempt to impose a new order on the Middle East more compatible with perceived U.S. strategic interests.
The Iraq War dominated the electoral landscape during the recent mid-term elections. Voters swept in candidates across the nation who vowed for change in Iraq. But making good on his pledge that “I will not withdraw even if Laura and Barney [his dog] are the only ones supporting me,” President George W. Bush is readying the largest request for funds so far to continue the war. Even worse, he’s on the cusp of actually increasing troops.
My organization, the Institute for Policy Studies, gave its annual human rights award this fall to Maher Arar, an innocent man the Bush administration falsely accused of being linked to Al Qaeda. His chilling case represents an opportunity for the new Democratic leadership in Congress to show the world that America has not entirely forgotten its proud history on human rights.
The Iraq Study Group, led by former Secretary of State James Baker and former Rep. Lee Hamilton, is being portrayed as a magic wand that will conjure up a solution for Iraq the same way rabbits jump out of empty hats.
With power comes responsibility. Once they take over both houses of Congress on January 3, the Democrats will have the responsibility to get American troops out of Iraq as soon as practicable.
As part of our China Focus, we asked two leading scholars to reflect on the tensions and possibilities in U.S.-China relations. Bonnie Glaser is a senior associate at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. James Nolt is a senior fellow at the World Policy Institute. We asked them first about the potential for a strategic security partnership between the United States and China, then about their economic relationship.
On June 4, 1989, the world watched in horror as the Chinese government’s crackdown on student protestors took a deadly turn. As Chinese soldiers fired their weapons indiscriminately and Chinese tanks rolled through Tiananmen Square, an unknown number of students and soldiers were killed. The Chinese military continued its campaign of terror throughout the summer of 1989, drawing strong international condemnation.
The agreement reached on November 8, 2006 between the ruling seven-party alliance (SPA) and the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) holds the promise of ending the decade-long bloody conflict in Nepal. For years, the Maoist guerrillas have struggled to seize power by force of arms. Their decision to support a political resolution to the current conflict is comparable to the peaceful transformations of the Irish Republican Army and the African National Congress.
The global market and technological advancements have the ability to transform the world with remarkable speed. Not many would be surprised to hear that the computer I am using to write this article may be comprised of components from at least 10 different countries. The monitor may come from Singapore, the processor from Israel, the software designed in India, and all assembled in Tennessee. We are becoming so accustomed to this phenomenon, that we don’t even blink an eye.
Guantanamo, CIA secret prisons, and Abu Ghraib represent the first round of the Bush administration’s assault on constitutional guarantees. Now they’ve introduced Round Two with an attack on habeas corpus: the right to Âpresent one’s body before an impartial interlocutor to contest the basis for unexplained, secret, or wrongful incarceration. Habeas corpus is the oldest civil right in the western world and the foundation of constitutional democracy.