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Atlantic Council blogs provide short-form analyses from Council experts and a wider community of global voices on the world’s most important news stories.
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New Atlanticist

Sep 13, 2017

Time is Running Out: The Case for US Investment in its Energy Infrastructure

By Cynthia L. Quarterman

As Hurricane Irma, one of the most powerful ever recorded, leaves Florida battered in its wake, US energy infrastructure continues to bear the strain of long-term planning neglect. The damage wrought by the storms and the impact on the energy sector demonstrates that the time is right to prioritize infrastructure, particularly pipeline infrastructure planning.

UkraineAlert

Sep 13, 2017

The Key to Fixing Ukraine Isn’t What You Think It Is

By Michael Getto

Health care reform should be a top priority for Ukraine’s Verkhovna Rada this fall because it can help transform Ukraine. As President Petro Poroshenko has said, “I am sure that healthcare…reforms would help [in] attracting investment and increasing economic growth,” and he’s absolutely right. In June, parliament greenlighted comprehensive health reform legislation in the first […]

Ukraine

New Atlanticist

Sep 13, 2017

NAFTA Negotiations: Why Are They So Controversial?

By Sara Van Velkinburgh

In the midst of North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) renegotiations in August, US President Donald J. Trump tweeted saying that NAFTA is the “worst trade deal ever made,” and threatened to withdraw the United States from the agreement because Canada and Mexico are being “difficult”. While many have brushed these statements off ahead of […]

Mexico United States and Canada

SyriaSource

Sep 13, 2017

Ahrar al-Sham Tries to Catch its Breath Under New Leader Hassan Soufan

By Saleem al-Omar

The Ahrar al-Sham movement was shattered when Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) launched a massive assault against it. The movement lost all its financial resources and many of its most strategically vital territories, including a border crossing that earned it more than $8 million a month. In the wake of the attack, its young leader Ali […]

Syria

UkraineAlert

Sep 13, 2017

Russia: It’s Not Just Putin

By Khatuna Mshvidobadze

With Russian fingers apparently thrust into all manner of cybercrime and espionage, Western publics are trying to make sense of it all. But most news accounts do not include the key to deciphering Russian behavior in cyberspace. What drives Russia is its unique nexus of government, business, and crime, perpetuated by systemic corruption and glued […]

Cybersecurity Russia

UkraineAlert

Sep 13, 2017

Does Russia Have Hard Power in the US?

By Lada Roslycky

There is something naïve about many people born in democratic countries. They seem to take the human rights, values, and principles upon which their countries are built for granted. Dangerously, they have a difficult time imagining that their rights and freedoms can be manipulated in such a way as to threaten their institutions, national security, […]

Russia Ukraine

New Atlanticist

Sep 12, 2017

A Strategy for Dealing with North Korea

By Ashish Kumar Sen

Former US undersecretary of state, R. Nicholas Burns, discusses US options, the importance of Chinese pressure, and lessons learned from the Iran nuclear crisis New sanctions imposed by the United Nations Security Council on September 11 in response to North Korea’s latest nuclear test are “not significant enough,” according to R. Nicholas Burns, an Atlantic […]

Japan Korea

MENASource

Sep 12, 2017

Running out of water: Conflict and water scarcity in Yemen and Syria

By Margaret Suter

Water scarcity may not be the most apparent driver of conflict, yet in Syria and Yemen, the water crisis is an important factor that continues to impact both countries. While the violence and political turmoil in these countries may seem more pressing, the conflicts themselves are linked with water shortages, and exacerbated by this underlying […]

Energy & Environment Syria

UkraineAlert

Sep 12, 2017

Russia’s Peacekeeping Proposal in Ukraine Is a Sham

By James J. Coyle

Russia has introduced a United Nations draft resolution for peacekeepers in Ukraine amid acclaim by German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel and the chairman of the Organization for Cooperation and Security in Europe (OSCE). On its face, this would appear to meet a long-standing demand of the government in Kyiv and mark a reversal of Russia’s […]

International Organizations Politics & Diplomacy

UkraineAlert

Sep 12, 2017

North Korean Missile Engines: Not from Ukraine

By Mariana Budjeryn and Andrew Zhalko-Tytarenko

A new report points to Ukraine as a possible source of liquid propellant engines (LPE) powering intercontinental-range missiles successfully ground-tested by North Korea last year and flight-tested this year. As the world grapples with the fait accompli of North Korean nuclear and missile capability, the path Pyongyang took to acquire it is of considerable interest, […]

Korea Russia