FINANCE: IMF, Bank Move Into Middle East – Too Fast?

Middle Eastern governments need to adopt extensive free market economic policies, liberalise their business and trade and chop official spending if they want to spur growth and create jobs for their burgeoning populations, say the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.

POLITICS-MIDEAST: Israel’s Threats Boost Arafat’s Stock

Israel's threats to expel Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat from the West Bank and Gaza Strip has had the countereffect of what Israel wanted to achieve, say political observers in the region.

POLITICS: Donor Delay Dooming Afghanistan – Aid Agency

By completing just one percent of the reconstruction required in Afghanistan to date, the United States and other donors are risking renewed conflict, if not disintegration, in the devastated country, says an unusually frank new report released Wednesday by U.S. relief organisation, CARE.

POLITICS-U.S: War Spending Threatens to Squeeze Foreign Aid

With the Bush administration's most recent request to Congress to fund operations in Iraq and pressure from tax cuts, economic recession and previous spending on the "war on terror", economists are starting to doubt if the government can fulfil its commitments to foreign aid and overseas development.

POLITICS: World Antes Up for Iraq Not Humanitarian Crises – Report

The international community is so obsessed with its fight against global terrorism that it continues to neglect ongoing humanitarian crises in Africa and Asia, a leading aid organisation complained Tuesday.

IRAQ: No Timeline for Political Transition

Continued differences among the five members of the United Nations Security Council blocked an accord on Iraq's political future during a meeting here Saturday, hosted by U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan.

POLITICS-U.S.: The Hawks Fall Out

Faced with the rising costs and complications of occupying Iraq, the hard-line coalition around U.S. President George W. Bush that led the drive to war with Iraq appears to be suffering serious internal strains.

IRAQ: Experts Warn of Radioactive Battlefields

Concerns are growing about the presence of depleted uranium and other toxins in Iraq following a rash of illnesses among U.S. troops and the discovery by a reporter that radiation levels in parts of Baghdad are extremely elevated.

POLITICS-U.S.: ‘Oil War’ Questions Surround Cheney Energy Group

As the Bush administration begins to tacitly acknowledge its overreach in Iraq, a conservative judicial watchdog group is pursuing Vice President Dick Cheney, with the Middle Eastern nation figuring prominently in its allegations of wrongdoing.

POLITICS: Washington, U.N., Look Set to Clash Over Iraq

The United States and the United Nations are heading for another possible showdown over who should hold political and military power in an increasingly unstable Iraq.

POLITICS-U.S.: Both Sides in Terror War Bloodied, But Unbowed

Two years after President George W. Bush vowed to take the war to the terrorists who carried out the Sep. 11 attacks on New York and the Pentagon, the fight between the two main antagonists seems to be a draw.

POLITICS: Iraqis Unused to Reports of Terrorists in their Country

Having blamed the United States for months for occupying their country and causing them perceived and real miseries, Iraqis are now being told another thing many do not want to believe: Foreign terrorists have infiltrated their country.

POLITICS: India, Israel, U.S. Axis against Terror Takes Shape

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's visit to India, cut short Wednesday by reports of suicide bomb attacks back home, has highlighted the emerging axis among New Delhi, Tel Aviv and Washington on their worries about what they consider their terrorism problems.

POLITICS-ISRAEL: Where an Attack Is Not Just News

First comes the blast, towards the end of the evening in this quiet, residential Jerusalem neighbourhood. The loud dry sound is unmistakably that of a nearby bomb attack, the windows shake and the phoneline goes dead for a split second. After a minute or so of eerie silence, the sirens start screaming. The familiar scenario of a Jerusalem suicide attack once again unrolls outside in the street.

POLITICS-U.S.: Unilateralists Plunge Back to Earth

It was always only a matter of time, but who would have predicted that the steep unilateralist trajectory on which neo-conservative and right-wing hawks set U.S. foreign policy two years ago would lose momentum so quickly after Washington's stunning military victory in Iraq in early April?

IRAQ: U.S. Seeks International Help Again – in Dollars

As the Bush administration turns to Congress for billions of dollars more to help stabilise Iraq, U.S. officials say they will also seek foreign donors and investors to commit cash to the troubled country at a conference next month.

POLITICS-U.S.: UN to the Rescue?

Now that U.S. President George W. Bush has decided to ask the United Nations Security Council to rescue Washington's occupation of Iraq, the question here is, 'what will be the price'?

IRAQ: Mostly Outsiders Appointed Ministers

The first post-Saddam Hussein team of ministers took office Wednesday in the midst of a rapidly deteriorating security situation.

IRAQ: U.S. to Pinpoint Elections in Exchange for Military Force

The United States is trying to win support for a multinational peacekeeping force in Iraq by pledging a timetable for elections and the return of sovereignty to the Iraqi people currently under a U.S.-led military occupation.

POLITICS: U.S.Quagmire in Iraq Complicates Ties with Muslim World

Addressing the American Legion, a U.S. military veterans group, a defiant U.S. President George W Bush vowed in late August that ''there will be no U.S. retreat from Iraq''.

IRAQ: U.S. Bends on Demand for U.N. Peacekeepers – but Far Enough?

Faced with a no-win situation in an increasingly deadly Iraq, the United States is proposing the creation of a new U.N.-authorised peacekeeping force led by a U.S. military commander.