South Asia

By Scott Lucas | – The last adult in the Trump White House playground has gone – and the president is throwing his toys around. James Mattis, as defence secretary, was one of three retired generals in the Trump administration whose hope was to contain an ill-informed, temperamental, and unpredictable president. Now they’re all gone: […]

Afghanistan

With US Troop Pull-Out, Afghans Fear Return to Taliban Era

Allison Jackson

With Thomas Watkins in Washington – Kabul, Afghanistan | AFP | – The move has stunned foreign diplomats and officials trying to end the 17-year conflict with the Taliban, which already controls vast amounts of territory and is causing ‘unsustainable’ Afghan troop casualties US President Donald Trump has decided to pull about 7,000 troops from […]

Bangladesh

Rohingya Refugees Pushed to a Frontline of Climate Change

TeleSur

Bangladesh, and its environment, has been struggling to accommodate over 1 million Rohingya refugees who have fled state violence in Myanmar, a predominantly Buddhist-majority country. More than 900,000 Rohingya live in Bangladesh’s Cox’s Bazar district, mostly in camps, according to the United Nations. For decades, Cox’s Bazar, a strip of land between Myanmar and the […]

Afghanistan

Trump Nominee admits Afghan Security Losses May not be Sustainable

AFP

Washington, DC (AFP) – Lieutenant General Kenneth McKenzie, nominee to lead Central Command, testifies during a Senate Armed Service Committee confirmation hearing The death toll among Afghanistan’s security forces will no longer be sustainable unless urgent measures are taken to address recruiting and training issues, a top US general said Tuesday. Since the start of […]

Pakistan

Pakistan: Baluch Separatists Storm “Oppressive’ Chinese Consulate in Karachi, kill 2 Policemen

AFP

Karachi (Pakistan) (AFP) – Two policemen were killed on Friday when gunmen stormed the Chinese consulate in the Pakistani city of Karachi, officials said, with the attack claimed by a separatist group which branded Beijing “an oppressor”. Pakistani authorities said that security forces had secured the area after the attack, the latest in a series […]

Afghanistan

For First Time, Afghan President admits 30,000 Troops killed since 2015

AFP

Washington (AFP) – The death toll among Afghanistan’s security forces is nearing 30,000 since the start of 2015, Afghan President Ashraf Ghani has said, a figure far higher than anything previously acknowledged. Ghani appeared via video link this week at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in Washington, part of a university he […]

Afghanistan

Haunted by the Hole where our Memories of the Afghanistan War Should Be

Rory Fanning

(Tomdispatch.com) – I’m here in Chicago, 7,000 miles and 15 years away from Jalalabad, a desolate town in southwestern Afghanistan. Yet sometimes it seems to me as if it were yesterday, or even tomorrow, and anything but thousands of miles distant. There are moments when it feels like I never left — or maybe I […]

Afghanistan

Afghanistan: America’s Longest Forgotten War Turns a grim 17

Tom Engelhardt

(Tomdispatch.com) | – We’re already two years past the crystal anniversary and eight years short of the silver one, or at least we would be, had it been a wedding — and, after a fashion, perhaps it was. On October 7, 2001, George W. Bush launched the invasion — “liberation” was the word often used […]

Afghanistan

When US Allies Murder US Soldiers: Blowback From U.S. Policy in the Greater Middle East

Danny Sjursen

(Tomdispatch.com) – He was shot in the back, the ultimate act of treachery. On September 3rd, a U.S Army sergeant major was killed by two Afghan police officers — the very people his unit, the new Security Force Assistance Brigade, was there to train. It was the second fatal “insider attack,” as such incidents are […]