US Finally Admits Blackwater Operating in Pakistan -- News from Antiwar.com: "After months of angry denials and accusing Pakistani media outlets reporting the story of engaging in “conspiracy theories,” the United States government has finally come clean about Blackwater forces operating in Pakistan, in the form of an interview by Secretary of Defense Robert Gates on local Pakistani television."
Broken Spring? : Information Clearing House This is a sequel to my June 2011 article, ‘After the spring’, on the upheavals in the Arab world. It is an article that has been painful to write, because it brings bad tidings and offers a pessimistic analysis of the upheavals, at least in the short term, in a number of Arab countries. The outcomes and potential outcomes of these uprisings have also acquired new, very significant dimensions. These include a complex entanglement with the accelerated preparations for a possible attack on Iran, and a poisonous, sectarian aspect that could have the consequence of ripping Syria and the Middle East apart.
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