Semira Nikou, from the United States Institute of Peace, speaks with Seyed Hossein Mousavian, the former foreign policy adviser to Iran's former nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani on whether Iran is "ready" to begin diplomatic negotiations with the United States.   According to Mousavian, Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei will be "ready to negotiate" once Iran is offered the "right solutions package" by the P5+1 (five permanent members of the ...

On Tuesday, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee held a nomination hearing for William J. Burns to become Deputy Secretary of State. The hearing was presided over by Committee Chairman Senator John Kerry (D-MA) with Senators Robert Menendez (D-NJ), Jib Webb (D-VA), Robert P. Casey Jr. (D-PA), Richard Lugar (R-IN), and Marco Rubio (R-FL) in attendance. William J. Burns is a career foreign service officer and former U.S. Ambassador to Russia and ...

Next Friday, April 29, America Abroad Media (a non-profit organization in Washington, DC that produces a monthly, hour-long documentary radio program on foreign affairs for broadcast on NPR stations across the country) is hosting a "town hall" event at American University's Katzen Center from 7:30-9am. They will be connecting DC's local WAMU radio station with a radio station in Kabul to facilitate a discussion ...

On Tuesday, during a visit to the Charleston Gazette, Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) called for increased scrutiny of the military budget and for the U.S. to immediately end operations in Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya. "We should be out of Iraq this year altogether," he said. "We are not going to win.  It is not in the cards.  Many Asian countries have a totally tribal culture.  It is the same thing ...

Writing at Foreign Policy, Ken Adelman, asserts that support for the U.S. foreign assistance budget is misguided and that arguments in support of these programs become "shallower" upon closer investigation. He argues that: "Four of the largest U.S. foreign-aid recipients today -- Egypt, Israel, Pakistan, and Afghanistan -- all take contrary positions on issues of critical importance to the White House."  Adelman also criticizes a recent article by Joseph Nye, stating ...

On Wednesday, The Johns Hopkins SAIS Center for Advanced Governmental Studies hosted an event focused on American foreign policy, entitled, “American Foreign Policy: A View From the Senate.” The event was moderated by Robert J. Guttman, founder and chair of the Center on Politics and Foreign Relations, and Richard McGregor, the Financial Times Washington Bureau Chief. The speaker at the event was Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC). For full notes, continue below ...

On Tuesday, the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) hosted an event in which Michael Corbin, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State in the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs for Iraq issues discussed the strategic challenges facing Iraq as the State Department prepares to take the lead on U.S. operations in 2012.  Anthony H. Cordesman, Arleigh A. Burke Chair in Strategy at CSIS moderated the event and made opening remarks.To ...

On Tuesday, Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) criticized the CIA and the intelligence community for failing to predict the uprising in the Middle East.  She stated that U.S. intelligence failed to warn about growing instability in Egypt, Yemen, and Bahrain and blamed their inadequacy on the lack of "the right 'human assets'" gathering information on the ground.  She also cautioned the Obama Administration against intervening in Libya without international support as it may lead to U.S. ...

Speaking in front of the Senate Appropriations Committee on State and Foreign Operations, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton discussed her recent meetings with world leaders in Geneva over the situation in Libya and stated that the USAID had deployed humanitarian teams to help refugees fleeing to Tunisia and Egypt.   She also stated that the situation in the region and in Libya is an example of this administration's use of combined assets of diplomacy, development, ...

On Tuesday, the House Committee on Foreign Affairs held an open hearing to assess U.S. foreign policy priorities in light of the country’s current economic challenges.  The Committee — chaired by Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL) and with Congressman Howard L. Berman (D-CA) in attendance — requested the testimony of U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.To see full notes, continue below or click here for pdf.  To see webcast, click here.Rep. Ros-Lehtinen opened ...

On Wednesday, Afghanistan’s Independent Electoral Commission released the results from the September parliamentary elections for 34 of 35 voting districts. A loose coalition led by former presidential candidate Abdullah Abdullah won over 90 of the 249 seats in the lower house of the Afghan parliament and will form a quasi-opposition to President Hamid Karzai’s parliamentary allies. Christian Science Monitor reports that the winners were disproportionally members of the Hazara ethnic community, largely because continued ...

The final results of the September elections for the Wolesi Jirga (lower house of parliament) will be announced by the Independent Election Commission on Wednesday. The announcement will come on the heels of 21 candidates who "earned a winning number of votes in their distric," being disqualified "'ue to irregularities, usage of fake votes and the influence of provincial officials, which created electoral fraud,'" according to Ahmad Zia Rafat, ...

Scott Worden writes that " Welcome to the messy end-game of Afghanistan's second Parliamentary election." Worden goes on to chronicle a number of difficulties resulting from the election (the preliminary results of which were released a month ago), including failed candidates' attempts to impugn the process (made less difficult due to a "lack of transparency in the process of invalidating ballots and deciding complaints"), the perception that President Hamid Karzai ...

Accusations of voter fraud in Afghanistan's September elections have triggered an investigation by the country's attorney general, according to Joshua Partlow in today's Washington Post. "Deputy Attorney General Rahmatullah Nazari said his staff has begun investigating nine cases in which election officials, all but one of them at the Kabul headquarters of the Independent Election Commission, are accused of rigging votes." Afghan officials announced following the election that 1.3 ...

On Monday, October 18th, the Brookings Institution held an event called “What Next for Afghanistan? A Post-Election Analysis.” The panel was moderated by Martin Indyk, Vice President and Director of Foreign Policy at the Brookings Institution. The panelists were Thomas Garrett, Vice President for Programs at the International Republican Institute; Michael O’Hanlon, Senior Fellow and Director of Research in Foreign Policy at the Brookings Institution; Vanda Felbab-Brown, Fellow at the ...

Writing in Politico, Michael O'Hanlon, who recently returned from a trip to Afghanistan, argues that the outlook for that country is more positive than has been reported. "I saw more basis for hope than recent perceptions in the United States would allow." O'Hanlon describes several reasons for optimism: "Four million in turnout is not bad for a midterm election in a troubled, war-torn countryWhatever Karzai’s limitations, there are a number ...

On Monday, September 27th, the Middle East Institute held an event entitled “The Struggle for a Democratic Future in Afghanistan: The 2010 Parliamentary Elections.” Kate Seelye, Vice President of Programs and Communications for MEI, introduced the two speakers: Marvin Weinbaum, scholar at the Middle East Institute, and Caroline Wadhams, Director for South Asia Security Studies at the Center for American Progress. Both recently returned from trips to Afghanistan, where they ...

An editorial in The National suggests that no matter how flawed, elections in Afghanistan are an essential step toward building a national identity: “The national project has never taken firm root in Afghanistan – tribes often reject the sovereignty of the provincial governments, much less the federal government in Kabul. The elections officials who are risking their lives in the hinterlands are engaged in an effort of nation-building. Fragile as it is, ...

Following last Saturday’s parliamentary election in Afghanistan both international and local observers documented widespread fraud. In its preliminary report, the Fair Election Foundation of Afghanistan (FEFA) reported extensive voter intimidation, use of fake voter identification cards, ballot stuffing, and intimidation of electoral observers, among other irregularities. Despite these issues, FEFA hailed the participation of Afghan voters in the face of security threats: “The participation of voters and the security arrangements put in ...

At a joint press conference yesterday with French Defense Minister Herve Morin, Secretary of State Robert Gates said he believes that Afghanistan has a “capable and competent” security strategy for the September 18 parliamentary elections. According to Gates, the Afghan army has improved significantly over the past months. Morin concurred: “I can see actually very, very visible improvements,” he said, adding "At the beginning, I saw an army that was not ...