Turkish President Abdullah Gül keeps pressing for a way out of the political crisis in the country despite the opposition’s refusal to keep cooperating on a constitutional change
Archives for January 2014
Turkish state fund seizes assets of CHP Istanbul candidate Mustafa Sarıgül
The decision was taken after the current mayor of Istanbul’s Şişli district failed to repay loans worth $3.5 mln taken out in 1998, daily Hürriyet reports
UNESCO cancels event on Jewish ties to Land of Israel
Days before opening of Paris exhibit, UN cultural body bows to pressure from Arab states, who said it would harm peace talks
The Iraqi Heroine who Took on al-Qaeda in Northern Iraq
(By Ahmad al-Sayegh) Locals in the northern province of Ninawa are worried that extremists fleeing conflict in Anbar are going to end up back in Mosul, a traditional base for them. As signs that this may well be happening grow, many are singing the praises of one woman who took up arms against the group. […]
America Black Ops Wars in 134 Countries
(By Nick Turse) They operate in the green glow of night vision in Southwest Asia and stalk through the jungles of South America. They snatch men from their homes in the Maghreb and shoot it out with heavily armed militants in the Horn of Africa. They feel the salty spray while skimming over the tops […]
NSA Collects Hundreds of Millions SMS Text Messages every Day
(By Mike Masnick) NSA Collecting Hundreds Of Millions Of Text Messages Daily, Looking At ‘Untargeted’ Messages & Data (via Techdirt) The latest in the ongoing revelations for the Ed Snowden leaks is that the NSA and GCHQ are collecting what appears to be hundreds of millions of text messages every day. While it does try […]
Kerry urges opposition to attend Geneva on eve of vote
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry Thursday put in a last-ditch plea to Syria’s opposition-in-exile to attend next week’s peace talks in Switzerland.
Five Reasons Benghazi Wasn’t Hillary Clinton’s Fault
(By Juan Cole) Republicans like Marco Rubio are making hay of a Senate report on the Benghazi attack on a US consulate that left 4 Americans dead, including Ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens, on Sept. 11, 2012. The report doesn’t seem to me very good. Some of its positions are contradicted by solid reporting from […]
The Great Urban-Rural Struggle over the Constitution in Egypt
(By Juan Cole) The tale of two constitutions, 2012 and 2014, in Egypt has to be seen in my view as significantly an urban-rural struggle. Neither referendum had a big turnout, but the one in 2012 only attracted 32.8% of the electorate, while apparently the turnout in the referendum just held was slightly higher at […]