Nowhere is safe, says Patrick Cockburn in The Independent. “Insurgents struck in the heart of the (Iraq’s) Green Zone yesterday, one of the most heavily defended places in Baghdad. The symbolism – and the bloody message – was clear with this attack on the home to the US-imposed democracy. “A suicide bomber cleared at least eight rings of security to blow himself up in the Iraqi parliament, killing eight people including three lawmakers as they were eating lunch. It was...

Pashtuns – circa 1879 What is the secret of the resilience and bravery of the fiercely independent Afghan tribes who keep battling until the very end when the alien forces come to subdue them? This question baffled all those who tried to conquer Afghanistan – the Mughal troops in the 16th and 17th centuries to the British in the 19th and Russians in the 20th centuries – and failed. And now in the 21st century, the NATO troops are discovering that with all the technological power...

In Pakistan, more alarmingly even than usual, the flag of jihad is fluttering and extremists are marching on the state, says The Economist. “Amid a worrying surge in Islamic militancy, a fight between rival radicals may not be the good news Pakistan says it is.” “Of several concurrent—partly co-ordinated—dramas involving Islamist militants, the bloodiest is in South Waziristan, a semi-autonomous tribal region on Pakistan’s north-western frontier. In three weeks...

This question was discussed in detail when the former Prime Minister of Pakistan, Ms Benazir Bhutto, visited India last month to attend “India Today Conclave”. In view of the recent hurly burly of Pakistan politics this was a much publicised event in this part of the world. To visit the India Today site please click here… And then under the heading “Can India-Pakistan Relations Be Reinvented?” please click on “speech transcripts”. And this is what you would...

Children born to parents infected with HIV/AIDS virus place impressions of their palm as part of observing Candle Day at Freedom Foundation, a community care centre, at Kolathur. — Photo: S. Thanthoni (courtesyThe Hindu) With its attention riveted to “War-on-Terror”, the world is yet to wake up to the HIV (human immunodeficiency virus) crisis that threatens to cripple a large section of the youth in India. Thanks to a recent study by the Indian branch of Population Council,...

So says the BBC’s diplomatic correspondent Bridget Kendall. “When (Iranian) President Ahmadinejad’s dramatic announcement came (about releasing the hostages), the British government was it seems, as stunned as everyone else. “The British government was kept firmly out of the loop, as far as one can tell. The moral of the tale is that the gap between Iranian claims and what is really going on may be quite great. “But do not rely on the British government to have the...

…Two decades into India’s phenomenal growth as an international center for high technology, the industry has a problem: It’s running out of workers, writes Tim Sullivan, Associated Press Writer. “There may be a lot of potential — Indian schools churn out 400,000 new engineers, the core of the high-tech industry, every year — but as few as 100,000 are actually ready to join the job world, experts say… ” ‘The problem is not a shortage of people,’...

(This is in continuation of my earlier post…click here to read). In spite of all the mixed reports coming in, General David Petraeus appears to be a thorough professional. Well, you may ask how I have arrived at this conclusion without meeting the chief of US troops in Iraq. Also, isn’t this a contradiction – on the one hand I oppose the continued occupation of Iraq by US forces, while on the other I praise this General? There are many reasons. Also, his recent interview with...

It seems the good old honey may be going out of our lives!!! I got a shock when I travelled from Hamburg to Husum, a small lovely town on North Sea, and discovered that honey bees have almost disappeared. It now seems to be a worldwide phenomenon. “US beekeepers have been stung in recent months by the mysterious disappearance of millions of bees threatening honey supplies as well as crops which depend on the insects for pollination,” reports Jean-Louis Santini of AFP. “Bee numbers...

Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright defended House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for going to Syria against the wishes of President George W. Bush, saying the trip showed the importance of meeting leaders at odds with the U.S., says Bloomberg. “While the U.S. has had minimal contact with Syria since the assassination of Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri in 2005, there has been a slight shift in course this year. U.S. officials met both Syrian and Iranian delegates at a March 10 conference...

“Robert Clive of India.” There has been a wonderful response to Michael van der Galien’s post Britain’s Lost Soul. I must say here that President George W. Bush and his team have done an excellent job of brainwashing people that “evil” nations of Iraq and Iran would swallow the Western nations. And this fear has paralysed public discourse in the USA. (I am surprised that in the comments that followed Michael’s post, Afghanistan and Bin Laden do not figure...

Benazir Bhutto’s supporters protested recently against Gen. Pervez Musharraf, though she has muted her criticisms to ease her path to elections. Photo: Nadeem Khawer/European Pressphoto Agency As the Pakistani president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, wrestles with swelling public disaffection over his rule, one of his key political rivals, Benazir Bhutto, has embarked on an international campaign to revive her political standing, says The New York Times. “In recent weeks, Ms. Bhutto, 53,...

New York artist Leonard Rosenfeld created this portrait of David Petraeus in 2004, inspired by Petraeus’s famous question on Iraq: “Tell me how this ends.â€? Thank you Marc Schulman for the suggestion to read Jim Lehrer’s lengthy interview with the General Petraeus on PBS NewsHour. I have been doing a bit of research on this General, and the Lehrer interview confirms my findings that this Chief of the US army in Iraq is not an ordinary soldier/human being… Well, to...

Each development in the show trials of Guantánamo Bay inmates brings fresh evidence of how urgent it is for the courts to strike down the Military Commissions Act of 2006 and for Congress to rewrite it, says an editorial in The New York Times. “There has been much speculation about the Supreme Court’s decision not to hear an appeal from a group of Guantánamo Bay inmates until they have exhausted their legal options. “Was the court signaling that the appeal had no merit?...

Amy Kellog of Fox News provides an interesting first-person account of how she was caught off guard while listening to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad… Read on…

An Iraqi holds a British soldier’s helmet after a road side bomb hit a British patrol in Basra, Iraq. Iraq continues to remain a killer zone for foreign troops stationed there. Not much is known how successful the American army’s ‘surge’ is, or it’s cost in terms of civilian life and property. But the latest reports and pictures are indeed disturbing. “A U.S. Army helicopter went down south of Baghdad Thursday, injuring four of the nine soldiers aboard, while...

Nancy Pelosi, accompanied by Tom Lantos (in red tie), points to dried fruits and herbs during a tour of a central Damascus market in Syria. Photograph: Hussein Malla/AP If you can’t beat them then join them! That’s an old saying which President George W. Bush needs to follow to upstage the House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s much-publicised trip to the middle east. Sitting and sulking in the White House will not help much. After her visit to Syria, Ms Pelosi reached Saudi Arabia and...

Simon Massey, right, and Kaye Turney, the only woman amongst the 15 British service personnel released by Iran, smile after arriving at London’s Heathrow Airport, Thursday April 5, 2007. (AP Photo/Tim Ockenden-pa) What really led to the resolving of the Iran-Britain hostage crisis? We would have enough of it in the coming days. But the first story that comes out (from Associated Press) is that Syria played a crucial role in ending the Britain’s standoff with Iran. Indeed strange are...

WORLD PEACE! Courtesy Shanup Gundecha The successful resolution of the British/Iranian naval hostage crisis once again highlights the need for tactful diplomacy to solve problems that may appear intractable. Whatever the provocation, the concerned parties must talk instead of saber-rattling which seems to have become a favourite pastime of the present residents of the White House. One wonders how long the American Congress and the public tolerate this irresponsible and adventurist behaviour that...

The 15 Royal Navy crew, held captive by Iran, left Tehran Airport at about 0800 local time (0530 BST) on a British Airways flight bound for Heathrow… For more click here… Here’s BBC’s “Q&A: Iran’s handling of sailors crisis”. Please click here… Excerpts: How will this go down inside Iran? A lot of Iranians will be relieved that this crisis has come to a peaceful conclusion. The Iranian people are already fearful that the dispute with the West...

And that’s a serious matter, suggests The Christian Science Monitor in an article ‘Is US Army bent to the breaking point?’ “When some 4,500 soldiers heard over the weekend that they’d be deploying to Iraq earlier than expected, many saw it as yet another inconvenience that military personnel must endure. “But to some in Washington, the announcement is a glaring sign that the Army really is straining and that its well of rested, trained, and equipped soldiers...

U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, on a visit to Syria opposed by the White House, said on Wednesday she conveyed an Israeli message to President Bashar al-Assad that the Jewish state was ready to resume peace talks, says a news report. ” ‘(Our) meeting with the president enabled us to communicate a message from Prime Minister (Ehud) Olmert that Israel was ready to engage in peace talks as well,’ Pelosi told reporters in Damascus after talks with Assad. ” ‘We were very...

News regarding Gitmo are getting murkier and murkier. Here’s the latest about the American CIA and the British intelligence MI5… “Two British residents held in Guantanamo Bay for more than four years were detained by the CIA after MI5 failed to recruit them as paid informants, according to documents released in the United States, says The Times. “The extent of MI5’s involvement with Bisher al-Rawi and Jamil el-Banna — including offers of new lives and new identities...

President Ahmadinejad meets one of the sailors at his presidential office after agreeing to free them. The president of Iran shook hands with the British hostages this afternoon after announcing he was freeing them, says a news report. “Mr Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said he had pardoned them as an Easter present for the British people and to mark the birthday of the Prophet Mohammed. “Ahmadinejad smiled as he talked through an interpreter to several of the men held captive for 13 days in the...

What has been particularly frustrating about the debate in Washington over Iraq is that everyone seems to be fighting one another and forgetting the fundamental mission of the war, writes Leon E. Panetta in an Op-Ed piece today in the New York Times. He was a former chief of staff to President Bill Clinton and a member of the Iraq Study Group. “Whether one is for or against the war, the key to stability is to have an Iraq that, in the words of the president himself, can ‘govern itself,...