Category: Blogs

How to Identify the Kremlin Ruling Elite and its Agents

By Anders Åslund, Daniel Fried, Andrei Illarionov, and Andrei Piontkovsky

Criteria for the US Administration’s “Kremlin Report” On August 2, 2017, US President Donald J. Trump signed H.R. 3364, Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA), into law. Section 241 of the Act calls on “the Secretary of the Treasury, in consultation with the Director of National Intelligence and the Secretary of State” to submit […]

Why Putin Cannot Risk Peace in Ukraine

By Peter Dickinson

Imagine the scene: a patch of overgrown wasteland on the outskirts of an east Ukrainian rust belt town. Emergency services personnel are methodically excavating a large plot of earth while a huddle of journalists and aid workers look on. The date is October 2019. Another mass grave has just been uncovered. This grim but all-too-conceivable […]

Along for the Ride?

By Frederick Kempe

Beyond power machinations and political maneuvering, events in Saudi Arabia signal a more important, historic shift is underway Riyadh – King Salman’s unprecedented purge of the Saudi royal family this week was an earthquake whose ongoing aftershocks will go far beyond the country’s borders—rippling out across the Islamic world from the custodian of Mecca. The […]

TRADE IN ACTION November 10

By Global Business & Economics Program

THIS WEEK IN TRADEThis week’s news has been dominated by President Trump’s trip to Asia. 

Did Saudi Crown Prince Just Endanger His Reform Agenda?

By Ashish Kumar Sen

Anti-corruption crackdown targets princes, wealthy businessmen Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has unleashed an unprecedented crackdown on corruption that has, so far, resulted in the detention of more than two hundred people, including almost a dozen princes. The most significant targets are former crown prince, Mohammed bin Nayef, whose assets have been frozen; Prince […]

Here’s Why NATO’s Cyber Operations Center is a Big Deal

NATO’s newly announced cyber operations center will allow the Alliance to “respond more effectively” to cyber attacks by integrating cyber measures with conventional military capabilities, according to an Atlantic Council analyst. The Alliance has “always had significant conventional capabilities—land, air, and sea—now cyber can be included,” said Franklin D. Kramer, a distinguished fellow in the […]

Addressing Africa’s Rampant Unemployment

By Rachel Ansley

Africa’s rising levels of unemployment, which threaten further instability on a continent already susceptible to unrest and violent extremism, must be addressed by building capacity within the sectors of government able to instigate positive change, according to an Atlantic Council analyst. “The jobs issue has really concerned most companies, policy makers, stakeholders across the board […]

New Sanctions on Cuba: Bad for Cubans, Worse for the United States

By Nicole Wadley

Actions by US President Donald J. Trump’s administration, namely his November 8 announcement of further sanctions and travel restrictions on Cuba, have created a geopolitical vacuum, leaving the door open for US adversaries to reassert influence over one of the United States’ closest neighbors. Further measures which have ratcheted up tensions between Washington and Havana […]

Inside Rukban: One of Syria’s Most Dire IDP Camps

By Yasser Allawi

The situation in the Rukban camp for internally displaced persons near the border with Jordan is rapidly deteriorating. International humanitarian groups are close to being overwhelmed, despite local NGOs and rebel groups trying to help out as well. Tens of thousands of internally displaced persons (IDPs) stranded in an informal desert camp between Jordan and […]

Why There’s More to Alex Ovechkin’s Team Putin Movement than Meets the Eye

By Adrian Karatnycky

Hockey superstar Alex Ovechkin’s November 2 announcement that he is creating a social movement to support Russian President Vladimir Putin seems to be an ill-considered PR move by the Washington Capitals captain. In the capital of a country awash in anti-Putin sentiment, Ovechkin is defiantly flaunting his loyalty to a leader who has supported military […]