Iraqi Kurds possess at present not only their most powerful regional government since the creation of Iraq following World War I, but they also play prominent roles in the Iraqi central government in Baghdad, including the posts of president (Jalal al-Talabani), deputy prime minister (Barham... MORE

Although the final count will not be available until the end of March, the preliminary results from Iraq’s parliamentary election show a strong victory for the State of Law list (SLA), led by the current Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki and the Iraqiyya Coalition, led by... MORE

In late February, a high-level Israeli delegation visited China in an attempt to convince Beijing to go along with sanctions against Iran. Headed by Lieutenant General (ret.) Moshe Ya'alon, vice prime minister and minister for strategic affairs and former chief of general staff of Israel's... MORE

With an intelligence and military wing of over 1,000 people, the Sulaymaniyah-based Counter Terrorism Group (CTG) collects intelligence and carries out operations to prevent terrorists in Iraq from destabilizing the Kurdistan region in cooperation with U.S. forces. Lahur Talabani, the nephew of the Iraqi president,... MORE

Yemen has become one of the most important strongholds and safe havens for al-Qaeda.  The impact of Yemen’s Salafi-Jihadist movement is no longer limited to that nation and its national security alone. The threat posed by Yemen’s militant Salafists has spread to neighboring countries such... MORE

It is no secret that Iran’s influence runs deep in Iraq. Most Iraqi politicians with close ties to Iran, however, are wary of tarnishing their nationalist credentials by admitting that they prefer to cooperate with Iran rather than the United States, in part because of... MORE

The massive upheaval of Iraq’s population that has occurred since 2006 threatens the long-term stability of the country, regardless of short-term gains achieved through the political process or military surges. Symptomatic of a destabilized Iraq, displaced populations are themselves a source of future destabilization. Many... MORE

In his February 2, 2010 “Annual Threat Assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Community,” U.S. Director of National Intelligence Dennis C. Blair predicts that Iraq will continue making progress, although “this forecast is dependent on the next government’s effective management of Arab-Kurd tensions, continued progress in... MORE

Iraq’s Shi’a Arabs, the demographic majority with an estimated 60-70% of the population, wield the most political influence in Iraq. But the Shi’a of Iraq are a diverse group, with major regional differences between the Shi’a of Basra and the deep South and the Shi’a... MORE