Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
The decision by the United Nations Security Council to establish a Special Tribunal to try suspects in the assassination of Rafiq Hariri and others under Chapter VII of the U.N. Charter has dramatically raised tensions in Lebanon.
On June 25, Carnegie senior associate Nathan Brown presented his commentary "The Peace Process Has No Clothes: The Decay of the Palestinian Authority and the International Response." Daniel Levy of the New American Foundation served as discussant and Marina Ottaway moderated.
John Holmes, United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, discussed his recent trip to Darfur, Sudan, Chad, and the Central African Republic in an event at the Carnegie Endowment.
The United States government is suffering from a curious learning disability when it comes to Iraq. As it begins the painful process of disengaging from Iraq, the U.S. is at risk of repeating the mistakes it made going into the war.
In spite of her support this month for a Senate resolution mandating withdrawal, Hillary Clinton is still a hawk on Iraq--and is still flying blind.
The U.N. on Thursday adopted a version of a British statement calling for the release of 15 sailors and marines who are being held in Iran, while Iran wants Britain to admit its sailors entered Iranian waters. Karim Sadjadpour, an Iran analyst at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, appeared on The Newshour with Jim Lehrer to discuss the rising tensions.
Facing an urgent need to defuse crises in Iraq, Lebanon, and Palestine, the United States is now focusing primarily on Arab states' foreign policy behavior and relegating democracy promotion to the background. But despite the risks of encouraging political change in an already chaotic region, abandoning Middle East democracy as a strategic goal would be a tragic and unnecessary mistake.