Fresh fighting in Iraq; ISIS claims mass execution in Syria
(CNN)-- ISIS said Thursday that it has executed at least 250 Syrian soldiers at an air base in the northeastern city of Raqqa. The group said on one of its official websites that it killed the soldiers Wednesday. It also claimed to have killed 600 ...
Why Are Armed Drones Not Being Used in Iraq?
For years, the Obama administration's favored method to combat Al Qaeda-affiliated extremists in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia has been controversial drone programs, operated by the CIA and the Pentagon. But when it comes to fighting the radical Islamic ...
Humanitarian Access in Syria Improving Despite ‘Dire’ Funding Situation, Atrocities by Extremists, Security Council Told in Briefing
Source: UN Security Council Country: Syrian Arab Republic Security Council SC/11539 7252nd Meeting (AM) Aid access in Syria had begun to improve, but only the end of conflict would relieve the dire situation of civilians there who continued to die by the thousands and were now subjected to extremist ...
All You Can Eat
Last night I ate dinner with three old friends that I met last year in Richmond: San from Kirkuk, Laween from Erbil, and Yousif from Baghdad. We ate at Dawa 2, a restaurant that serves continuous courses of food for 1 set price of about $23 per person. As the waves of food began to arrive, our conve ...
Skousen: Beheading of James Foley as a New Provocation for War — “Remember that the US has a long history of creating horrific stories to justify going to war. Remember the supposed ripping of prematu ...
World Affairs Brief, August 22, 2014 Commentary and Insights on a Troubled World. Copyright Joel Skousen. Partial quotations with attribution permitted. Cite source as Joel Skousen’s World Affairs Brief ( http://www.worldaffairsbrief.com). This Week’s Analysis: Ferguson Riots: Militarization of Poli ...
Obama, Congress, and War Powers
It should go without saying that Congressional authorization is required for an ongoing war against ISIS, but we all understand that this isn’t going to happen. Neither the post-9/11 AUMF nor the authorization for invading Iraq applies to this conflict, as Robert Golan-Vilella makes very clear, and ...
Luxembourg and freedom of the press
The Grand Duchy, a land we all hold close to our hearts and love dearly, might be diminutive, but when it comes to press access and the treatment accorded to journalists, Luxembourg ranks fourth in the entire world. It mingles in the top ten with other European and Scandinavian counties with the inc ...
Dangerous drug or harmless herb? Europe cuts Ethiopia’s khat
He kept faith with his military creed in ongoing air raids against Sunni Islamic State targets in Iraq — in a war he had previously declared over. WASHINGTON: An apparently looming American clash with Islamic State in Syria presents a … read more »
Untitled
Are we sitting on breakout? Its been quite some time to have penned down my thoughts. Markets have been keeping everyone busy. It has been hell lot of rally and yes those higher double digit returns corrupt the mind to just raise your confidence to arrogance level and investments slowly take a shape ...
The Importance of Financing in Enabling and Sustaining the Conflict in Syria (and Beyond) – by Tom Keatinge
Abstract The availability, sources, and distribution of funding are critical issues to consider when seeking to address an on-going conflict such as the one we are witnessing across Syria and Iraq. In the Syrian case, whilst funds from states such as Russia, Iran, the U.S., Saudi Arabia, and Qatar s ...
The World’s Most and Least Religiously Diverse Nations
An extensive new report by the Pew Research Center, a leading pollster and think-tank, has yielded interesting and often surprising results about religious across the world. Before proceeding, keep in mind that for the sake of simplicity, Pew’s methodology looked at only eight main groups: Christian ...
The Guns Of August And September
August 1914. After years (centuries) of conflicts between protestants, capitalists, catholics, socialists, orthodox, nationalists, revolutionaries, communists, anarchists, freemasons, muslims, hindus, and various other interested parties, a planned political assassination in central Europe is transm ...
