RIGHTS: EU Urged to Fill Global Leadership Void

With Washington's reputation as a leader on human rights gravely damaged by abuses committed in its five-year-old "global war on terror", the European Union (EU) remains the only credible candidate for filling the vacuum, Human Rights Watch said Thursday.

POLITICS-US: Hardliner’s Hardliner Led Bush’s Iraq Review

When President George W. Bush's unveils his long-awaited new strategy on Iraq Wednesday night, he will be relying heavily on the counsel of one J.D. Crouch II, perhaps the most hard line - if most obscure - of his hawkish advisers.

RIGHTS-US: Gitmo Detainees Mark Five Years in Limbo

This Thursday, with the fifth anniversary of the arrival of the first detainees at the U.S. naval facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, a growing number of people and organisations - from military officers and religious leaders to legal scholars and human rights groups - are labelling the prison a black hole of injustice and demanding that it be closed.

POLITICS-US: More Subpoenas Come Down in Watada Case

In a case that could have repercussions for free speech and press freedom in the United States, the U.S. military has subpoenaed two peace activists and a journalist in its case against Lt. Ehren Watada, the first commissioned officer to be court-martialed for refusing to serve in Iraq.

POLITICS-US: Bush&#39s Surge Strategy Faces Heavy Opposition

If, as expected, George W. Bush next week announces his intention to "surge" some 20,000 additional U.S. troops to Iraq to pacify Baghdad and Sunni-dominated al-Anbar province, he may find himself in a tougher fight than he expected even a week ago.

HEALTH-US: Iraq Vets Left in Physical and Mental Agony

On New Year's Eve, the number of U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq passed 3,000. By Tuesday, the death toll had reached 3,004 - 31 more than died in the Sep. 11 attacks on the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon.

MEDIA-US: Networks’ Foreign News Coverage Focused on Iraq

For the fourth straight year, Iraq dominated foreign affairs coverage by the three major U.S. commercial television network evening news broadcasts during 2006, according to the latest annual review by the authoritative Tyndall Report.

POLITICS: New U.N. Chief Ambiguous on Death Penalty

As he walked into a group of waiting reporters on his first day at the United Nations, the newly-anointed Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon refused to express his personal views on the death penalty - in contrast to his predecessor Kofi Annan who publicly opposed capital punishment.

POLITICS-US/IRAQ: Hussein’s Death Leaves Unanswered Questions

Iraqi-Americans reacted with sadness to the execution of Saddam Hussein Saturday, calling the former Iraqi president's death by hanging early this morning Baghdad time a missed opportunity for justice.

POLITICS-US: If Bush Wants Bipartisan Policy, It’s Out There

If U.S. President George W. Bush is serious about pursuing a foreign policy that can command bipartisan support, the basic elements of one already exists, according to a new analysis of seven comprehensive polls on foreign policy attitudes taken over the past nine months.

CHALLENGES 2006-2007: Bush Iraq Policy Murky on the Real Enemy

This year saw the emergence of a sectarian civil war in Iraq and much more open Sunni-Shiite conflict in the Middle East. Sunni regimes in the region expressed acute anxiety both about the possibility of the Sunni-Shiite civil war in Iraq spreading to their own countries and about the growth of Iranian influence.

CHALLENGES 2006-2007: A Bad Year for Empire

For those who believed that the precise and overwhelming demonstration of U.S. military power in Afghanistan and Iran would "shock and awe" the rest of the world - and particularly Washington's foes and aspiring rivals - into accepting its benevolent hegemony, 2006 was not a good year.

POLITICS: Blair’s Mideast Message Echoes Past Failure

British Prime Minister Tony Blair has been touring the Middle East with one clear message - to make peace in the Middle East, Iran must be isolated.

POLITICS-US: The Urge to Surge

As official Washington breaks for the two-week Christmas-New Year's hiatus, it knows that the number one issue it will face on its return in early January is the White House's apparent "urge to surge" as many as 50,000 new troops into Iraq for up to two years in a last-ditch effort to claim what President George W. Bush insists on calling "victory".

RIGHTS-US/IRAQ: Who Will Pay For Haditha?

With charges expected to be filed Thursday against five to eight Marines accused of killing 24 Iraqi civilians in Haditha, Iraq on Nov. 19, 2005, it now appears that at least one senior officer will also be charged in the case.

POLITICS-IRAQ: Crisis Group Seeks ‘Clean Break’ in US Strategy

Warning that Iraq faces ''complete disintegration into failed-state chaos,'' the International Crisis Group (ICG) is calling on the United States to make a ''clean break'' in its strategy for both Iraq and the wider Middle East region.

CHALLENGES 2006-2007: A People Under Siege

Five years after the terrorist attacks of Sep. 11, 2001, "Islamophobia" - intensified by the war in Iraq and government actions - has left millions of Muslims here and in other Western countries fearful of harassment, discrimination and questionable prosecutions, and confused about their place in society.

POLITICS-US: Holy Warriors Set Sights on Iran

Over the past 20 years, the U.S. Christian right has evolved into one of the most powerful grassroots organising forces within the Republican Party, and a host of Christian Zionists have taken a well-earned seat at the foreign policy table.

POLITICS-US: Neo-Cons Wanted Israel to Attack Syria

Neo-conservative hawks in and outside the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush had hoped that Israel would attack Syria during last summer's Lebanon war, according to a newly published interview with a prominent neo-conservative whose spouse is a top Middle East adviser in Vice President Dick Cheney's office.

AFGHANISTAN: Frustration Mounts With Pace of Rebuilding

Five years after the ouster of the Taliban, Afghans remain broadly supportive of their government and the western forces that protect it, but that support appears to be slipping due primarily to frustration with the pace of reconstruction, according to a new survey released here this week.

POLITICS-US: Reporter Summoned to Testify Against War Resister

The U.S. military subpoenaed an independent journalist Thursday, demanding she testify as a witness for the prosecution of First Lt. Ehren Watada, the first commissioned officer to be court-marshaled for refusing to serve in Iraq.