Influenced by the upheaval that has stricken many Arab countries in the Middle East and North Africa, the people of southwest Iran’s Khuzestan Province have tried to start their own protest movement.  Khuzestan is inhabited by a majority of Arabs and is home to more... MORE

Turkey’s decision to host a NATO early warning radar in the US-led missile defense program continues to reverberate, especially for its relations with Iran. High ranking Iranian officials repeatedly criticize not only Turkey’s cooperation with the United States on the missile shield, but also Ankara’s... MORE

Introduction  After the Anglo-American invasion that toppled the regime of the former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein and his Arab Ba’ath Socialist Party, thousands of junior and senior members of the party fled the country. From their exile in Syria, Jordan, Egypt, Yemen and elsewhere, some... MORE

Iranian military forces began a large-scale and ongoing offensive in the northwestern part of the country in early July. The target of the operation is the militant Kurdish group Partiya Jiyana Azad a Kurdistane (PJAK - Party of Free Life of Iranian Kurdistan), a group... MORE

Iran’s ties to Syria go beyond the geo-politics of the "Axis of Resistance." This is evident in the remote, volatile, and oil-rich al-Jazirah region of northeastern Syria, where there has been a noticeable increase in Iranian investment in religious and cultural centers over the last... MORE

In a speech on June 20, Syrian president Bashir al-Assad identified three components of the unrest in his country: citizens with legitimate grievances and needs that must be addressed; criminal elements; and “radicals” seeking to destabilise the country. He accused external forces, outlaws, and radicals... MORE

Turkey has announced various measures, in an effort to punish Israel for its failure to meet its demands for the Mavi Marmara incident last year, in which nine Turkish citizens were killed by Israeli soldiers. Ankara’s decision came on the eve of the announcement of... MORE

On September 2, a small demonstration took place in front of the Iranian embassy in Baku. The event, organized by the Baku branch of the World Azerbaijani Congress, focused on the ecological problems of Urmiyya Lake in Iran and the related demonstrations by thousands of... MORE

Last April the Kuwaiti government started building a new port on Boubyan Island near the marine border with Iraq. The port, named Mubarak al-Kabir (Grand Mubarak) after the founder of the Kuwaiti al-Sabah ruling dynasty, triggered the latest crisis between Baghdad and Kuwait, with the... MORE

Executive Summary: In the absence of police and government security forces, al-Qaeda-sympathetic movements, including al-Shabaab al-Islam (The Youth of Islam), have formed in the Sinai Peninsula. The demands of these Salafi-Jihadist groups reflect both local and regional concerns. Among their demands are calls for a... MORE