In The News

US Should Slap Sanctions on ISI Officials

Bruce Riedel July 12, 2011
Evidence is emerging that top officials of Pakistan’s ISI spy agency assisted fugitive Osama bin Laden. Because of such links, Pakistan could not serve as a base of operations for fighting extremism for the foreseeable future, predicts Bruce Riedel, former official with the US Central Intelligence Agency, now with the Brookings Institute. He argues that imposing tough sanctions against...

Top Taliban Leader Quits the Pakistan Taliban

Owais Tohid June 29, 2011
A Pakistan Taliban commander has quit, protesting suicide bombings as an indiscriminate tactic that result in too many civilian deaths. Militant Fazal Saeed Haqqani will form his own group in the Kurrum tribal area between Kabul and Pakistan. “The fracture within this terrorist outfit may be welcome news to Pakistan’s military, which has failed to break its backbone despite increasing US pressure...

From Abbottabad to Worse

Christopher Hitchens June 10, 2011
A rise of extremism signals a society that is deeply insecure and troubled. In a provocative essay for Vanity Fair, Christopher Hitchens blasts Pakistan for refusing to confront forces that weaken the nation, including the failure to resolve the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, strip extremist elements from the military and intelligence service, or quell hatred for the US while accepting billions...

Can Anyone Control Pakistan's ISI Spies?

Aamer Ahmed Khan June 9, 2011
Pakistanis' trust in the country’s intelligence service, the ISI, has been shaken by recent events, but last month reached an all-time low, after the corpse of journalist Saleem Shazad was found with signs of torture. Shazad, the Pakistan bureau chief with Asia Times Online, who had previously been warned by ISI, disappeared shortly after publishing an investigative piece connecting...

Private Prayers for Assad's Survival

Dilip Hiro June 7, 2011
Street protests, along with a nod from the US, quickly led to the fall of Egypt's long-time ruler. Syrian streets have been the stage for protests and violent clashes since late January, too, but desire for stability from both friends and foes could ensure that Assad stays in power, warns author Dilip Hiro. Russia, a longtime ally of Syria, has supplied the regime with advanced weaponry...

The Battle for Pakistan

Bruce Riedel June 2, 2011
Pakistan's conflicting policy of fighting Al Qaeda while supporting Islamist militants against India has boomeranged spectacularly. Former intelligence official Bruce Riedel, now senior fellow at the Saban Center for Middle East Policy in the Brookings Institution, discounts the notion that Pakistan is a failed state. It is a state under siege by the very radicals nurtured by elements of...

Yemen Truce Ends With Blasts, Stokes Civil War Worries

Mohamed Sudam June 1, 2011
As citizens protest poverty and autocratic rule throughout the Middle East, global powers urge leaders to arrange transfer of power quickly, avoiding instability that allows terrorist groups to thrive. Yemen’s President Ali Abdullah Saleh has been in office for more than three decades, and analysts question whether a strategy is in play to allow Al Qaeda and extremists some gain in rural areas...