Politics & Diplomacy

Afghan Leader Ashraf Ghani: Obama Pullout Plan Poses New Challenge

Ashraf Ghani, the former World Bank official who is one of two candidates in the June 14 presidential runoff election, said that President Obama’s West Point speech this week on foreign policy sharply compresses the time available for US troops to complete their mentoring of Afghan security forces. President Obama’s “West Point speech telescopes a […]

Egypt, the Election, and Sectarian Analysis

By Jayson Casper

One day before the beginning of presidential elections, the Egyptian Center for Media Studies and Public Opinion (ECMSPO) published the results of a counterintuitive poll. Based on personal interviews with 10,524 citizens throughout Egypt’s governorates, they predicted a turnout of only 10 percent.

Sissi Wins But How Will He Rule?

By Barbara Slavin

There was never any doubt about the outcome of Egypt’s presidential elections: with the full power of the state behind him and no real competition, Field Marshal Abdel Fatah el-Sissi has won more than 90 percent of the vote. But desperate efforts by the government to boost the turnout by extending voting to three days have […]

Egypt Elections: Preliminary Statements by Two International Observation Missions

By EgyptSource

The two major international election observation delegations present for the 2014 Egyptian presidential election, the European Union’s Election Observer Mission (EUEOM) and the US-based Democracy International (DI), released their preliminary statements at press conferences in Cairo today, May 29, the day after the polls closed. Both groups plan to prepare a final report in the […]

Defense Cooperation in the Arabian Gulf

In his commencement address to West Point graduates today, President Obama described his vision of a foreign policy that is founded not only upon a strong military but also by a web of alliances and partnerships that better position the United States as a global leader. Allies and partners, like those of the GCC countries, […]

EU’s Strengthened Political Parties May Soon Be the ‘Leading Instrument’ of Putin’s Europe Policy

By New Atlanticist

Now that Europeans have given more seats in their continental parliament to the far-right and far-left parties that want to significantly weaken the European Union, there will be some changes in Brussels, writes Damon Wilson in a posting today. “Will the EU Vote Bury Foreign Policy?” asks Judy Dempsey, European affairs analyst at Carnegie Europe, […]