Radical Movements Archive

Tolib Ayembekov, a warlord formerly based in eastern Tajikistan, gave himself up earlier this month following a major military offensive by Tajik authorities. In an email interview, Paul Quinn-Judge, deputy director of the International Crisis Group’s Asia Program, discussed Tajikistan’s security situation. WPR: What is the background to the most recent round of violence Tajikistan? Paul Quinn-Judge: The current unrest in Tajikistan, in the mountainous eastern area of Gorno-Badakhshan Autonomous district, has some local elements — suspicion of central government that dates back to the 1992-1997 civil war and a strong sense on the part of the local inhabitants of […]

Eight policemen are killed and 15 injured in a suicide bomb attack in Russia’s restive Ingushetia, hours after a shooting in a mosque in neighboring Dagestan. Sunita Rappai reports. World News Videos by NewsLook

The Sinai Peninsula might stand at the fringes of the Egyptian state, but it has often been the location of some of the country and the region’s transformative events. That is happening again. What occurs in the Sinai in the coming weeks and months will help answer many questions about Egypt’s future, including its relationship with Israel and Hamas, and the relative power of the Muslim Brotherhood and the military in the post-Mubarak era. The triangle of land on the shores of the Red Sea at the meeting point of Africa and Asia forms both the border and a buffer […]

Later this month, Somalia’s eight-year political transition is scheduled to end with the declaration of a “post-transition” government. Casual observers will be forgiven for assuming such a step signals that, after 21 years of complete state collapse, a functional central government in Somalia is now in place. The reality is that the post-transition government will be unable to project its authority beyond much of the capital, Mogadishu. Most of the country and parts of the capital itself remain under the de facto control of autonomous strongmen, self-proclaimed regional states, clan militias and the jihadi group al-Shabab. Of these, only al-Shabab […]