Foreign Policy Public Health Blog

Mon dieu! WikiLeaks makes the US look good. - By David Kenner

Wikileaks founder Julian Assange crowed yesterday that the State Department "is going to have a hard time of it trying to spin" his organization's ongoing document dump. U.S. diplomats, he said, will "find their very privileged position...

Published Wed, Dec 01 2010 12:21 PM by FP Passport

Morning Brief: Obama administration reverses plan for Gulf oil drilling

Obama administration reverses plan for Gulf oil drilling Top story: The Obama administration announced on Wednesday that it would maintain a ban on offshore oil drilling in the eastern Gulf of Mexico and off the Atlantic Coast for the next five years...

Published Thu, Dec 02 2010 5:28 AM by FP Passport

Filed under: Morning Brief, Oil / Energy Disaster / Problem / Shennanigans

The secret Somalia anti-piracy force

An un-named Muslim country is funding the creation of a well-armed and privately trained militia force in Somalia's north to fight piracy, the AP reports today. And behind the scenes consulting are the George W. Bush administration's former ambassador...

Published Thu, Dec 02 2010 2:51 PM by FP Passport

Department of unwanted endorsements

Brown Lloyd James, a PR agency that represents the Libyan government, just sent out a press release about Muammar Qaddafi's speech via satellite to students at the London School of Economics today. (Incidentally, his son Saif is in LSE grad .) Qaddafi...

Published Fri, Dec 03 2010 2:14 PM by FP Passport

Filed under: North Africa

Morning Brief: Iran announces it is mining uranium of eve of nuclear talks

Iran announces it is mining uranium of eve of nuclear talks Top news: On the eve of a new round of talks with six world powers in Geneva, Iran announced that it has processed its first batch of locally mined uranium. The announcement makes clear that...

Published Mon, Dec 06 2010 5:57 AM by FP Passport

Filed under: Morning Brief

Egypt's shark week: Mossad to blame?

Five tourists have been attacked by sharks (with one killed) over the past week in the waters off Egypt's Red Sea coast, a vacation area especially popular with snorkelers and scuba divers. And nobody knows what to do. Despite the frequent depiction...

Published Mon, Dec 06 2010 2:31 PM by FP Passport

Filed under: Science & Technology, Middle East, Egypt

Russian Media: Snowden Checked Out of Hotel

Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 For exactly a month , NSA leaker Edward Snowden has sat holed up in a Moscow airport, caught in the purgatory of its so-called "transit zone." Now, he's gone. Or at...

Published Tue, Jul 23 2013 2:23 PM by FP Passport

Filed under: Intelligence

America tries fighter jet diplomacy in Egypt

On July 11, the United States delivered its clearest message that it had made its peace with the military takeover in Egypt. Barely a week after President Mohammed Morsy was forced from office and three days after the army fired on pro-Morsy protesters...

Published Wed, Jul 24 2013 1:24 PM by FP Passport

The Great Global Drone Gender Gap

A new global survey from the Pew Research Center has revealed a striking difference of opinion along gender lines. The issue? Drone strikes. "It's one of the most extreme gender differences we've ever seen [on an issue]," Bruce Stokes...

Published Thu, Jul 25 2013 9:04 AM by FP Passport

Filed under: Science & Technology, North America, Security, Women

How Much Has Really Changed at America's 'Black Prison'?

Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 President Barack Obama may have outlawed torture, but in a secret prison at Bagram Airbase in Afghanistan, prisoners continue to languish in cells the size of closets and be subjected...

Published Fri, Jul 26 2013 6:09 AM by FP Passport

Filed under: Afghanistan, Military

With Manning Trial Over, Assange Sees Himself as the Target

Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 More than three years after Julian Assange and WikiLeaks began publishing classified documents provided to the organization by Pfc. Bradley Manning, the court marshal of the young...

Published Fri, Jul 26 2013 3:45 PM by FP Passport

Filed under: WikiLeaks

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

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

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

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