Geopolitics / Middle East

Mar 18, 2013 at 13:01 | Charles Kennedy

Now that Iran has made the high-profile deployment of a guided missile destroyer in the Caspian Sea, its neighbors should all be “happy” at the major advancement in regional security.…

Mar 13, 2013 at 18:01 | Claude Salhani

The announcement earlier this week of an agreement between Iran and Pakistan to build a pipeline between the two countries has ruffled some feathers in Washington where the Obama administration,…

Mar 04, 2013 at 17:01 | Felix Imonti

As the war in Syria moves into a third year, there are serious concerns that the violence will spread throughout the Middle East.  No one seems to have the answer…

Mar 04, 2013 at 16:56 | John Daly

While the western media remains largely fixated on the existential Iran nuclear threat and the gory slow-motion Syrian civil war, other momentous events are occurring in the world’s most volatile…

Feb 22, 2013 at 13:24 | Editorial Dept

Bottom Line: Iraq’s agreement to allow Iran to build a pipeline through its territory and on to Syria is in direct competition with Qatar’s similar designs for a Syria pipeline…

Feb 18, 2013 at 17:25 | Daniel J. Graeber

Militants in Iraq targeted a 16-inch fuel oil pipeline from the country's largest refinery last weekend. The attack forced the country to ship fuel oil by road through the northern…

Feb 18, 2013 at 17:10 | Gregory R. Copley

All intelligence indicators received and processed by GIS/Defense & Foreign Affairs show that the nuclear weapon tested by the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK: North Korea) on February 12,…

Feb 14, 2013 at 16:38 | Editorial Dept

Bottom Line: Against the backdrop of 25 February P5+1 talks in Astana, Kazakhstan, the Obama administration is seeking to lay the foundation for a deal with Tehran once Iran’s June…

Feb 14, 2013 at 16:34 | Editorial Dept

Bottom Line: US claims that Iran is smuggling weapons to Shi’ite Houthi militants in Yemen come as Yemen embarks on a serious restructuring of the military to rid it of…

Feb 13, 2013 at 16:55 | Claude Salhani

Syria today finds itself on the edge of a precipice, on the verge of falling into a deep political, social and economic abyss that could send the country spiralling into…

Feb 08, 2013 at 14:15 | Editorial Dept

Bottom Line: Our attempts at offering probability scenarios for an end game in Syria are crippled by the intensified meddling of a growing number of private actors who have formed…

Feb 01, 2013 at 16:55 | Daniel J. Graeber

An audit of U.S. defense spending in Afghanistan finds the Pentagon may have spent a significant amount of money on fuel for the military there that came from Iran. Congress…

Feb 01, 2013 at 14:15 | Editorial Dept

Situation: Qatar continues to funnel weapons and facilitate other assistance to Syrian rebels and Salafi jihadists fighting the Assad regime in Syria.Bottom Line: Determining the outcome of the…

Jan 29, 2013 at 17:13 | Claude Salhani

Until now, the Arab oil producing countries of the Persian Gulf, also called the Arabian Gulf, or to those seeking political neutrality, simply the Gulf, looked at their Persian neighbour…

Jan 29, 2013 at 17:12 | Charles Kennedy

BP Plc (NYSE: BP) and Exxon Mobil Corp. (NYSE: XOM) are caught on opposite sides of the front line of the oil war between the Iraqi central government and the…

Jan 25, 2013 at 12:55 | Editorial Dept

Incident: On 22 January, 17 people were killed and dozens wounded in a series of attacks in and around Baghdad and in Northern Iraq. Explosions targeted a military checkpoint in…

Jan 25, 2013 at 12:49 | Editorial Dept

Incident: Parliamentary elections on 23 January were billed as King Abdullah’s reform remedy for stemming the tide of rebellion. The opposition Muslim Brotherhood boycotted the polls because the King’s reform…

Jan 18, 2013 at 12:03 | Editorial Dept

Incident: In an indication of the dangerous new low reached in Iraqi-Turkish relations, Iraq’s central government has rescinded an exploration deal with a Turkey’s state-run TPAO and approved a new…

Jan 15, 2013 at 17:20 | John Daly

News emanating from the Middle East since the outbreak of the “Arab spring” two years ago has been intermittently nervous, but beneath the headlines, some political seismic shifts have been…

Jan 15, 2013 at 17:12 | Claude Salhani

A demographic time bomb is clicking away in the Middle East with the creation of a new refugee problem as the continuing civil war in Syria is seeing the numbers…