IRAQ: Jordan Becomes a Doubtful Refuge

Hundreds of thousands have fled the violence in Iraq to seek refuge in Jordan, but refugees are now beginning to find its borders closing.

POLITICS-US: Anti-War Marches Draw Hundreds of Thousands

Peace activists from across the United States gathered in Washington Sarturday for what they said was the largest demonstration to date against the Iraq war.

AFGHANISTAN/US: Washington Ups the Ante

Despite growing domestic opposition to his plans for escalating U.S. military intervention in Iraq, U.S. President George W. Bush is calling for a sharp increase in Washington's economic and military commitment to Afghanistan.

IRAQ: Students, Professors Flee to the Kurdish North

Academic life in Iraq's volatile southern and central regions has become increasingly paralysed, with hundreds of students and professors targeted and many more abandoning their educational institutions in search of a refuge.

POLITICS-US: Mideast Strategy Increasingly Targets Iran

Six months after last summer's war between Israel and Lebanon's Hezbollah, Iran has become the George W. Bush administration's "Public Enemy Number One", against which its Middle East strategy is increasingly focused, according to one of the U.S.'s leading experts on the Gulf.

IRAQ: Amid Sectarian Chaos, Bird Lovers Persevere

Can Iraqi dreams for a better future be glimpsed in the publication Thursday of the first-ever field guide to the country's 387 bird species?

POLITICS-US/IRAQ: Bush’s Three-Front War Blunder

George W. Bush's State of the Union address appears to confirm other indications in recent weeks that the president is not merely sending more troops to Iraq to do more of the same, but has adopted a new strategy of fighting all three major Iraqi Arab political-military forces simultaneously.

POLITICS-US: Revolt Builds Against Bush&#39s Iraq Policy

In the first step toward what some believe could eventually lead to a constitutional crisis, a key Congressional committee approved a non-binding resolution here Wednesday formally dissenting from President George W. Bush's plan to send some 21,000 more troops to Iraq.

POLITICS-US: Anti-War Groups Plan Surge on Washington

Peace activists from around the United States will converge on Washington Saturday for what organisers hope will be the largest demonstration to date against the Iraq war.

POLITICS: U.S., Iranian Publics Not So Different

The people of Iran and the United States share many of the same hopes and fears about global problems but remain deeply distrustful of each other's government, according to a major survey of public opinion in both countries released here Wednesday.

POLITICS: Bush Continues to Unite the World… Against Him

Despite two years of a concentrated effort by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and her public diplomacy major- doma Karen Hughes to boost Washington's global image, more people around the world have an unfavourable opinion of U.S. policies than at any time in recent memory, according to a new BBC poll released here Monday.

HEALTH-IRAQ: A Long List of Pricy Failures

Today, almost four years after the toppling of Saddam Hussein, Iraq's healthcare system is still a shambles.

US/IRAN: Ahmadinejad Feels Economic Heat

The arrests by a U.S. military unit of six Iranians in Erbil, Iraq and several others in Baghdad earlier this month indicate the deployment of a new strategy against Iran's hardliner government.

POLITICS: U.S. Soldier Speaks Out From Baghdad

More than 1,000 active duty U.S. soldiers have signed a petition to Congress - known as an Appeal for Redress - calling for the withdrawal of all U.S. troops from Iraq. Among them is Sgt. Ronn Cantu of Los Angeles, California. He served in Iraq with the 1st Infantry Division from February 2004 until February 2005 and participated in the second siege of Fallujah in November 2004.

IRAQ: U.S. “Cure” for Health Sector Worse than the Disease?

While some critics of the stumbling rehabilitation of Iraq's health care system focused on the failure to deliver basic infrastructure and supplies, others questioned the whole U.S. approach.

IRAQ: Southern Tribes Joining Armed Resistance

Violence is spreading further across Iraq, as Shia Arab tribes in the south begin to engage occupation forces in new armed resistance.

POLITICS-US: Democracy Languishes, but Neo-Con Strategy Lives

The Project for the New American Century (PNAC) may have effectively closed up shop two years ago and its key neo-conservative allies in the administration, such as Scooter Libby and Douglas Feith, may be long gone, but the group's five-year-old Middle East strategy remains very much alive.

HEALTH-IRAQ: What They Asked For, They Did Not Get

The convoy of flatbed trucks picked up its cargo at Baghdad International Airport last spring and sped northwest, stacked high with crates of expensive medical equipment. From bilirubin metres and hematology analysers to infant incubators and dental appliances, the equipment had been ordered to help Iraq shore up a disintegrating health care system.

POLITICS-JAPAN: Iraq War Gets Military More Teeth

Ignoring public unease, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has endorsed United States President George W. Bush's controversial new plan to increase the number of troops in war-torn Iraq.

IRAQ: U.S. Offers Scant Help to Fleeing Refugees

With some two million of its citizens having fled to other countries and another 1.7 million internally displaced, Iraq has become one of the world's biggest and fastest growing humanitarian crises for which the United States should take far more responsibility, according to human rights groups and other experts.

IRAQ: The War Becomes More Unholy

A stepped up military offensive that targets mosques, religious leaders and Islamic customs is leading many Iraqis to believe that the U.S.-led invasion really was a 'holy war'.