AFGHANISTAN: Debate Rages over U.S. Withdrawal

With only three weeks left before U.S. military forces are scheduled to begin withdrawing from Afghanistan, the debate over the size and pace of that withdrawal has become increasingly intense.

Slain Writer’s Book Says US-NATO War Served Al-Qaeda Strategy

Al-Qaeda strategists have been assisting the Taliban fight against U.S.-NATO forces in Afghanistan because they believe that foreign occupation has been the biggest factor in generating Muslim support for uprisings against their governments, according to the just-published book by Syed Saleem Shahzad, the Pakistani journalist whose body was found in a canal outside Islamabad last week with evidence of having been tortured.

U.S. Uses Peace Talks to Divide Taliban from Pakistan

The leaked reports over the past two weeks of a series of meetings between U.S. officials and a Taliban figure close to leader Mullah Omar seemed to point to real progress toward a negotiated settlement of the war in Afghanistan.

U.S.: House Votes Suggest Growing War Weariness

In a sign of growing war weariness in Congress and among the general public, the Republican-led House of Representatives voted Thursday to bar the deployment of U.S. troops to Libya and narrowly defeated a provision requiring President Barack Obama to submit a plan for withdrawing U.S. troops from Afghanistan.

U.S./SOUTH ASIA: Influential Think Tank Urges Long-Term Commitment

With public and Congressional debate hotting up over post-bin Laden U.S. policy in South Asia, a think tank with close ties to the administration of President Barack Obama is calling for a strategy that will keep Washington deeply engaged in the region for a long time to come.

Tajikistan’s New Generation of Guerrillas

While most of the world is closely watching the Middle East, monitoring the human rights situations in Bahrain, Syria, Libya and Israel, the International Crisis Group (ICG) is keeping its eye on neighbouring Central Asia.

Obama Troop Surge Decision Ignored Pak-Taliban Ties

The unilateral U.S. raid that killed Osama bin Laden created a spike in mutual recriminations between U.S. and Pakistani politicians, but their fundamental conflict of interest over Afghanistan was already driving the two countries toward serious confrontation.

Obama Faces Mounting Arab Disillusionment

On the eve of a much-anticipated address by President Barack Obama on U.S. policy in the Middle East, a new survey suggests that disillusionment with both Obama and Washington's approaches to the region are once again on the rise throughout the Muslim world.

Armed Conflicts Claim Unprecedented Number of Civilians

Afghanistan, once described as the graveyard of empires, is ranked number one as the country with the most "significant rise" in civilian deaths last year, turning it into a veritable killing field, according to a new report by the London-based Minority Rights Group International (MRG).

U.N. Experts Push for Details on Bin Laden Operation

Was last week's killing of an unarmed Osama bin Laden in his hideout in Pakistan legitimate self-defence, justified homicide or extra-judicial execution?

After Bin Laden Hit, U.S. Aides Raise Dubious Hopes for Peace

Barack Obama and top administration officials have taken advantage of the killing of Osama bin Laden to establish a new narrative suggesting the event will pave the way for negotiations with the Taliban for peace in Afghanistan.

Bin Laden Coup Could Mark New Beginning for Obama

Five days after U.S. Navy Seals shot and killed Osama bin Laden at his secret compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, U.S. President Barack Obama is enjoying a significant boost in public approval, as well as a transformation in his public image.

OP-ED: Gunfight at Abbottabad: Dismantling the Myth of an American Hero

In Hollywood Westerns, the sheriff engages in a shootout with bad guys and wins. Such was the story of Wyatt Earp, who killed rustlers in the "Gunfight at OK Corral". Then there is the American cowboy, represented by John Wayne - tall, handsome, Anglo-Saxon – who rides into town whistling before he dispatches the "bad guys" sometimes represented by "Indians" like Geronimo, the Apache, who supposedly terrorised innocent settlers.

CIA Feared Pakistan Would Alert Bin Laden

U.S. officials were concerned that Pakistan could jeopardise the Osama bin Laden operation and "might alert the targets", if Islamabad took part in the mission, Leon Panetta, the CIA director, has said.

Osama the Symbol Not So Easy to Vanquish

Far from concluding the war on terror, both Western and Muslim-majority countries - many emerging or still embroiled in months of popular protests – will continue to face a threat from extremist ideology after the United States' decade-long campaign to capture or kill Osama bin Laden has come to an end, most analysts say.

A Fork in the Road of U.S.-Pakistani Ties

The U.S. discovery and killing of Osama bin Laden in a compound some 50 kilometres from Islamabad is a "defining moment" for a U.S.-Pakistan relationship fraught with duplicity and dashed expectations.

U.S. Refusal of 2001 Taliban Offer Gave bin Laden a Free Pass

When George W. Bush rejected a Taliban offer to have Osama bin Laden tried by a moderate group of Islamic states in mid- October 2001, he gave up the only opportunity the United States would have to end bin Laden's terrorist career for the next nine years.

INDIA-PAKISTAN: Osama’s Death Changes Little

Osama bin Laden’s killing by U.S. troops, in a safe house adjacent to a Pakistani military academy in Abbottabad, may vindicate India’s charges that its neighbour is a haven for jihadist groups, but it will do little to change that reality.

EU-PAKISTAN: Bin Laden’s Death May Sour Relations

In a surprise address late Sunday night, U.S. President Barack Obama declared Osama bin Laden - leader of the terrorist organisation al-Qaeda and the world’s most wanted fugitive - dead. According to Obama, bin Laden was captured and shot in Pakistan’s Abbottabad city, just north of Islamabad. Within minutes of the announcement, leaders across the globe began to issue statements expressing their views on bin Laden’s death.

U.S. Celebrates Controversial Justice

By a few minutes before midnight on May 1, huge jubilant crowds had amassed outside the White House in Washington D.C. and around Ground Zero and Times Square in New York City.

U.S.: Bin Laden’s Killing Could Alter Af-Pak, Other Policies

Sunday's killing of al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden by a small, helicopter-borne team of U.S. Navy Seals could result in significant impacts on U.S. relations and strategy both in Pakistan, where the raid was carried out, and neighbouring Afghanistan, where it was launched, according to policy experts here.