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North Caucasus insurgents shift focus
The various insurgent and terrorist groups in the North Caucasus, while still operationally and often ideologically distinct, are adopting an increasingly homogenous strategy built around...
02-Jul-2009

Angola government cracks down on Islam
Government concern over the expansion of Islam in Angolan society was reported on 31 March 2009 by the Angola National News Agency ANGOP. The report...
25-Jun-2009

Chechen president turns to nation building
While Moscow formally announced the end of its 'counter-terrorist operation' in Chechnya on 16 April, it is clear that the fighting is far from over....
17-Jun-2009

Al-Qaeda's administration of savagery
On 8 April 2009, Arab media reported that Saudi security forces had arrested 11 men in the southern part of the kingdom. The men were...
15-Jun-2009

Forging Pakistan/Afghanistan links
A flurry of bilateral negotiations have taken place between Afghanistan and Pakistan since the 11 September 2001 attacks on the United States and the fall...
28-May-2009

Deobandi groups and Ahl-e Hadith
In Pakistan, both Ahl-e Hadith and Deobandi groups have acted as proxies of the Pakistani military, which used them to wage jihad in Kashmir and...
21-May-2009

Questions about Hizbullah unity
The 12 February 2008 assassination in Damascus of Imad Mughniyeh, Hizbullah's long-time operations chief, was a major blow to the organisation. The killing exposed failures...
21-May-2009

Deobandi groups and Ahl-e Hadith
In Pakistan, both Ahl-e Hadith and Deobandi groups have acted as proxies of the Pakistani military, which used them to wage jihad in Kashmir and...
18-May-2009

Saudi Arabia's king changes the guard
saudi Arabia's King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz al-Saud carried out a major reshuffle of key ministries and institutions on 14 February, including replacing nearly every ...
12-May-2009

Algeria and France: the quiet Salafists
Salafism (salafiyya) is one of the most debated concepts in contemporary Islam. Its name derives from al-salaf al-sālih ('the pious predecessors') and stems from the ...
01-May-2009

Iran's gas swells economic frustration
Located in Central Eurasia, its southern shore bounded by the Persian Gulf, the northern shore by the Caspian Sea, Iran covers a region that is...
27-Apr-2009

Lebanon's March 14 coalition faces test
As Lebanon anticipates the next parliamentary election in June 2009, a lively domestic debate has emerged as to where the election results will take the...
17-Apr-2009

Leaders' mortality may sway Iraq's health
US President Barack Obama's plan to withdraw troops from Iraq is predicated on an assumption that Iraq's stability is durable. On 29 January 2009, General...
17-Apr-2009

Abu Sayyaf still holds Philippines to ransom
On 15 January 2009, the Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG) seized three International Committee of the Red Cross volunteers - an Italian, Swiss and a Filipina...
16-Apr-2009

Securing a stable future for Ingushetia
To mark his first 100 days in office, Ingushetian President Yunus-Bek Yevkurov gave interviews to Russian media in which he blamed his predecessor for bequeathing...
09-Apr-2009

Ahmadinejad fails to budget for dissent
The global financial crisis has amplified Iran's economic woes in ways that have political implications for both the current government, which is facing a re-election...
03-Apr-2009

Iran's vibrant feminist movement
The far right Islamist faction ('Osoolgarayan' or principlists), who are in the ascendency since the election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in 2005, considers Iran's burgeoning...
27-Mar-2009

Persian Gulf security: in flux or crisis?
The Persian Gulf security system is characterised by three enduring features. First is the vital importance of the region's oil and gas to the wellbeing...
25-Mar-2009

Turkish elections to test AKP influence
Turkey will hold nationwide local elections on 29 March 2009, and 48 million registered voters are expected to go to the polls to elect mayors...
17-Mar-2009

Iran's influence heightens Cairo concerns
"Iran threatens us with terrorism" announced a headline in Al-Gomhuria , a high-circulation Egyptian government newspaper on 5 March. The article criticised Iran's Deputy ...
16-Mar-2009

Bin Laden's history with Palestine
Global jihadists have always had a deeply ambivalent attitude to Palestine. Their spiritual leader, Abdullah Azzam, was himself a West Bank-born Palestinian who fled to...
10-Mar-2009

Algerian Islamists' financing tactics
From the early 1990s, the Armed Islamic Group, effectively made dormant since the early 2000s thanks to government efforts and internal strife, was the first...
10-Mar-2009

Turkey courts Iraq's energy-rich Kurds
Relations between Turkey and Iraq underwent a transformation during 2008. Talks about energy co-operation were the main drivers behind closer collaboration, along with negotiations relating...
27-Feb-2009

Ethnic fault lines grow in Pakistan
The ethnic divide in Pakistan has reflected the economic fortunes of the country's four provinces, which are linguistically and ethnically different. Balochistan (Balochis), the North...
27-Feb-2009

Ahmadinejad splits Iran's conservatives
On 1 February 2009, the conservative wing of Iran's 290-member parliament (known as the Fraktion-e Usulgarayan in Persian) witnessed the establishment of a smaller group...
20-Feb-2009

Crimea's Tatar renaissance
Ukraine's Crimean Tatars were deported en masse by the Russians to Central Asia in 1944 after being accused of collaboration with Nazi Germany during the...
20-Feb-2009

Why the race is on to rebuild Gaza
As the smoke clears in Gaza and damage assessments of the three-week Israeli military campaign roll in, perhaps inevitably, comparisons are being drawn between Israel's...
20-Feb-2009

Salafis' social networking in Lebanon
Salafis in Lebanon are a legitimate and officially recognised part of the domestic social fabric. They are Sunni Muslims who believe that the imitation of...
19-Feb-2009

Indoctrinated to Intervene: Iran's IRGC
The political leadership of the Islamic Republic of Iran is generally believed by both Iranian and foreign analysts to secure civilian control over the Islamic...
06-Feb-2009

Shifting populations
In assessing the most important factors shaping international affairs over the next two decades, the authors of the United States National Intelligence Council's November 2008...
30-Jan-2009

Gulen movement: Turkey's third power
Turkey's Fethullah Gulen Community (FGC), also known as the Gulen movement after its founder and leader Fethullah Gulen, a Turkish Muslim preacher, often escapes scholarly...
29-Jan-2009

Saudi extremism to Sahel and back
More than 700 alleged militants linked to Al-Qaeda were arrested in Saudi Arabia during the first six months of 2008, according to the latest figures...
27-Jan-2009

Iran and Saudi Arabia's Shia
In 1979 the world witnessed some of the most remarkable and unforeseen events in the modern history of Islam. The first was the February overthrow...
23-Jan-2009

Turkey's waning appetite for Europe
When the Justice and Development Party (Adalet ve Kalkinma Partisi: AKP) government took power in Turkey and vowed to pursue EU accession in 2002, there...
09-Jan-2009

Is Syria all talk and no action?
On 27 September 2008, a suicide bomber driving a dark red suburban GMC car blew up his vehicle on a crossroads in southern Damascus, killing...
09-Jan-2009





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