Foreign Policy Public Health Blog

Israeli supermarket parodies Dubai assassination in commercial

Continuing a recent trend of bizarre Israeli commercials , a supermarket chain has cashed in on the January assassination of Hamas official Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh in Dubai. Actors in a new television advertisement for Mahsanei Kimat Hinam are shown wearing...

Published Thu, Mar 11 2010 10:08 AM by FP Passport

Filed under: Middle East, Israel/Palestine

Chinese journalists to get refresher course in Marxism

Chinese officials have evidently had enough reporters' increasingly freewheeling free-market attitude, and are planning to send them back to the woodshed for some old-school Marxist ideological training: China will toughen requirements for reporters...

Published Thu, Mar 11 2010 7:28 AM by FP Passport

Filed under: China, Media

Morning Brief: Early reports suggest tight race in Iraq

Early reports suggest tight race in Iraq Top story: Iraq's election commission is expected to announce partial results from last week's parliamentary elections, but early reports suggest a close race between Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's...

Published Thu, Mar 11 2010 5:45 AM by FP Passport

Filed under: Morning Brief

A deal with a heinous Afghan warlord? Sign me up.

I haven't seen anyone blog this interesting tidbit from Robert Kaplan's new piece in the Atlantic , in which the top U.S. intelligence official in Afghanistan says two of the most notorious Taliban affiliates are "absolutely salvageable"...

Published Wed, Mar 10 2010 6:10 PM by FP Passport

Filed under: Afghanistan, Military

Quiz: What percentage of Americans are isolationists?

For those of you who don't subscribe to the bimonthly print edition of Foreign Policy , you're missing a great feature: the FP Quiz. It has eight intriguing questions about how the world works. The question I'd like to highlight this week...

Published Wed, Mar 10 2010 3:24 PM by FP Passport

Filed under: North America, U.S. Foreign Policy, International Relations

Kennedy: Washington press corps "despicable"

Rep. Patrick Kennedy is getting a lot of attention for some angry remarks he directed toward the Washington Press Corps during a debate on Afghanistan policy in the House today: "If anybody wants to know where cynicism is … cynicism is that there...

Published Wed, Mar 10 2010 3:19 PM by FP Passport

Filed under: Afghanistan, Media

Iran's record year

Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 Iran's drug squad commander pointed out in January, that narcotics forces had seized 340 tons of drugs and arrested 170,000 ‘drug dealers' in the previous nine months -...

Published Wed, Mar 10 2010 2:19 PM by FP Passport

Filed under: Human Rights, Freedom, Middle East, Iran

Pakistani officials refuse to submit to x-ray scan

U.S.-Pakistani relations tend to be defined by a certain set of core issues, which include the ISI's double-dealing with the CIA, the 2005 Indo-U.S. civilian nuclear agreement, and Pakistani nuclear security. While these issues are undoubtedly important...

Published Wed, Mar 10 2010 1:33 PM by FP Passport

Filed under: Terrorism, al Qaeda, Pakistan, Diplomacy, Taliban, State Department, Southeast Asia

Have Big Macs ruined Russian sports?

At FP, we've been following Russia's soul-searching following its subpar Olympic performance. This has included the sacking the country's sports minister and the admission by Prime Minsiter Vladimir Putin that funds may have been misspent...

Published Wed, Mar 10 2010 11:58 AM by FP Passport

Lula: Machismo will be defeated

I think Brazilian president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva may be promising a bit too much for his chosen successor, Dilma Roussef: Silva said he selected a woman as his successor because he believes that "we've won this stage of discrimination against...

Published Wed, Mar 10 2010 11:14 AM by FP Passport

Filed under: Latin America

French racists steal poster idea from Swiss racists

If you're going to make a xenophobic poster , at least make it original: The Algerian government has formally protested to Paris about a poster which associates its flag with Islamisme, or radical forms of Islam. The poster shows France covered by...

Published Wed, Mar 10 2010 10:14 AM by FP Passport

Chavez: "God is a Bolivarian"

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is counting on divine intervention to pull Venezuela out of its power crisis: Rationing and blackouts have afflicted the South American oil exporter since late 2009, due mainly to a drought that has cut water levels at...

Published Wed, Mar 10 2010 9:09 AM by FP Passport

Filed under: Latin America

Morning Brief: Gates and Ahmadinejad trade barbs in Afghanistan

Gates and Ahmadinejad trade barbs in Afghanistan Top story: U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates arrived in Saudi Arabia where he will discuss plans to confront Iran's nuclear program. Gates' Saudi visit follows three days in Afghanistan, where...

Published Wed, Mar 10 2010 5:57 AM by FP Passport

Filed under: Morning Brief

U.S. State Department apologizes to Qaddafi

This must have been humiliating. P.J. Crowley had to climb down today from his recent remarks about Libyan leader Muammar al-Qaddafi, in which the State Department spokesman said that Qaddafi's speech before the U.N. General Assembly amounted to "lots...

Published Tue, Mar 09 2010 7:31 PM by FP Passport

Filed under: Obama Administration, State Department, Libya

So much for a friendly Biden visit to Israel

It looked this morning like U.S. Vice President Joe Biden was going to have a nice, friendly visit to Israel, even though the government there announced on the eve of his trip that it was approving new construction in an existing settlement bloc in the...

Published Tue, Mar 09 2010 1:04 PM by FP Passport

Filed under: Israel/Palestine, Obama Administration