After nine years of war in Afghanistan and seven more in Iraq, Americans are understandably weary of military interventions designed to remake or rebuild failed or fragile states. Nevertheless, many countries are still falling apart, or worse, falling into the hands of fundamentalists, terrorists, and other militants who disregard popular will and care little for human suffering. As a result, such nation-building interventions will remain necessary for the foreseeable future, as the U.S. involvement in Yemen, Somalia and Pakistan demonstrates. So instead of renouncing these missions, the U.S. must better define why and how it will carry them out, to [...]
This report offers a closer look at the background and political career of Omar al-Bashir, the Sudanese president and popular leader enjoyingsupportin Sudan’s north.
It has been said that the transition of power is the weakest part of democracy. If developments surrounding Egypt’s recent parliamentary elections are any indication, the same might also be true — at least in some paradoxical sense — for authoritarian governments. Outside analysts generally agree that the country’s Nov. 28 elections were wracked by widespread fraud and poll-rigging, resulting in a nearly across-the-board victory for President Hosni Mubarak’s ruling National Democratic Party (NDP). However, as the nation’s crippled opposition now bands together to form a “shadow parliament,” the extent to which the ruling party will be able to use [...]
