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Archives for May 2010

Afghanistan
Kabul Blast Kills 19, Wounds 52; 5 US Troops Dead

Kabul Blast Kills 19, Wounds 52; 5 US Troops Dead

Juan Cole

The BBC is reporting that Afghan guerrillas deployed a suicide car bomb against a NATO military convoy in west Kabul near the parliament building Tuesday morning, killing at least 19 persons and wounding 52. Five US troops are said among the dead. MSNBC has a good video report: The enormous fireball destroyed twenty vehicles. Spokesman […]

Uncategorized
Iran Announces Breakthrough Nuclear Exchange Deal

Iran Announces Breakthrough Nuclear Exchange Deal

Juan Cole

Veteran Iran observer Borzou Daragahi reports on the agreement just announced by Iran and Turkey on the disposition of Iran’s stockpile of low-enriched uranium. Under the deal, according to the Iranian spokesman, “After a final agreement is signed between Iran and the Vienna group, our fuel will be shipped to Turkey under the supervision of […]

Israel/ Palestine
Palestinians Observe Nakbah or Catastrophe Day, raise Hopes of Unity

Palestinians Observe Nakbah or Catastrophe Day, raise Hopes of Unity

Juan Cole

Thousands of Palestinians rallied in Gaza on Saturday to commemorate the Nakbah or national catastrophe of 1948, when European Jewish settlers brought into the Mandate of Palestine by imperial British policy expelled 700,000 Palestinians from what is now Israel and then sealed the border, confiscating all their property without compensation. These actions turned the bulk […]

Energy
BP Trashes Apollo Astronauts, Parrots Sarah Palin; Oil Godzilla heads for Coast

BP Trashes Apollo Astronauts, Parrots Sarah Palin; Oil Godzilla heads for Coast

Juan Cole

In a BBC interview British Petroleum CEO Tony Hayward said Friday that the massive petroleum gusher in the Gulf of Mexico, the greatest oil-based environmental catastrophe in recorded history with the exception of global warming itself, should not forestall further deep-water drilling. I’m not sure whether Hayward was channeling Sarah Palin, that font of good […]

Iraq
US Troop Withdrawal in Iraq on Track

US Troop Withdrawal in Iraq on Track

Juan Cole

WaPo says that the Obama administration is still on track to draw down to 50,000 troops in Iraq by September 1, despite press speculation to the contrary in the past couple of days. There are now roughly 92,000 – 94,000 US troops in that country, down from 160,000 when President Obama was first elected. Another […]

Uncategorized
Karzai Defeats Obama 2-1

Karzai Defeats Obama 2-1

Juan Cole

Afghanistan is already beginning to defeat Barack Obama. He came into office last year clearly hoping to find a way to move Hamid Karzai, the mercurial and ineffectual president of Afghanistan who only controls some 30 percent of the country, out of office in favor of someone more capable as a leader. Perhaps he had […]

al-Qaeda
Police: Shahzad has no Links to Taliban; Clinton Remarks Produce Firestorm in Pakistan

Police: Shahzad has no Links to Taliban; Clinton Remarks Produce Firestorm in Pakistan

Juan Cole

Pakistani authorities doing the hard police work in Karachi of attempting to trace the network of friends and contacts of attempted Times Square bomber Faisal Shahzad have come up empty-handed. There is nothing in Shahzad’s background that links him to the Tehrik-i Taliban Pakistan (TTP or Taliban Movement of Pakistan), based in the Federally Administered […]

Uncategorized
Follow IC at Twitter, Facebook

Follow IC at Twitter, Facebook

Juan Cole

Facebook keeps promising to lift the 5000-friend limit, but has not done it. So my account over there is more or less full. Just to let readers who are interested know that the Facebook Informed Comment fan page works nearly as well, and that I’ve been trying to spend some time there, making a few […]

Iraq
Iraq Death Toll from Attacks rises to 119, Biggest since Start of Year

Iraq Death Toll from Attacks rises to 119, Biggest since Start of Year

Juan Cole

AP is reporting that the wave of bombings and attacks throughout Iraq on Monday is now estimated to have killed 119 persons. Although some analysts are attempting to tie the attacks to the failure of Iraq’s political class to form a government, thus creating a vacuum, I do not see it that way. The attacks […]

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