Newly elected Georgian President Salome Zourabichvili made her first regional visit to the neighboring country of Azerbaijan. Her trip was of critical importance in terms of both bilateral relations and wider geopolitical developments in the South Caucasus. Specifically, Zourabichvili’s arrival in Baku, on February 27,... MORE

In October 2018, the Taliban announced that Mullah Mohammad Fazl, Khairullah Khairkhwa, Abdul Haq Wasiq, Norullah Noori, and Mohammad Nabi would be among its representatives at upcoming talks with the United States. The five, who were imprisoned at the U.S. military detention facility at Guantanamo,... MORE

Long-time al-Qaeda operative Jamal al-Badawi was killed in what U.S. military officials called a “precision airstrike” on January 1 in the Yemeni governorate of Marib (al-Jazeera, January 6). Al-Badawi was a key accomplice in the October 2000 al-Qaeda led attack on the USS Cole in... MORE

The Silence of the Muslim World Regarding Repression in China Throughout 2018, a steadily growing body of evidence revealed the existence of a vast network of detainment facilities in China’s western Xinjiang Province, in which hundreds of thousands of Uighurs—a Turkic-speaking and majority Muslim ethnic... MORE

Iran: Jaish al-Adl Attack Could See Increased Iran-India Cooperation Brian M. Perkins Iran has seen a recent surge in terrorism incidents within the country over the past year, particularly in the provinces of Khuzestan and Sistan-e-Baluchistan. Among the most notable incidents have been attacks on... MORE

One of Vladimir Putin’s earliest proposed mega-projects—first announced on September 12, 2000—calls for the creation of a North-South transportation corridor linking Russia with the Caspian littoral states, including Iran, as well as India and Sri Lanka. Such a transit network would permit these countries to... MORE

Mid-February registered a remarkable sequence of international forums, whose participants debated and sought to counter Russia’s power politics in Europe and the Middle East. First, defense ministers of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) had their regular meeting in Brussels (February 13–14) and then proceeded... MORE

On January 21, Sergey Chemezov (the CEO of the Russian arms producer Rostec) announced that, by mid-2019, Russia’s Armed Forces would receive 200 units of Pishal “radio-electronic guns” and Ratnik multifunctional infantry combat systems—elements specifically designed to deal with enemy unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV). Among... MORE

On November 29, 2018, the Iraqi National Intelligence Service (INIS) announced that it had arrested Jamal al-Mashhadani, a senior member of Islamic State (IS). Al-Mashhadani occupied senior positions in IS, including as the provincial ruler (Wali) of IS’ self-districted provinces of North Baghdad, Kirkuk. He... MORE

Recently, a senior Iranian national security official stated that his country would utilize its proxy forces in Lebanon and Gaza to unleash an “inferno” on Israel (Times of Israel [Jerusalem], January 29). These comments come as Israel has increased its military activities against Iran in... MORE