Tag Archives: Afghanistan

"No one believes in Afghanistan any more"

European Union President Herman Van Rompuy told the United States in 2009 that “no one [in the EU] believes in Afghanistan any more,” according to a U.S. account of the meeting leaked by WikiLeaks (“‘No one believes in Afghanistan any more:’ EU leader in WikiLeaks cable,” Globe and Mail, 5 December 2010): U.S. Ambassador to […]

WikiLeaks: France went to bat for Omar Khadr

U.S. diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks on Wednesday reveal that France’s Foreign Minister, Bernard Kouchner, asked the U.S. to consider releasing Omar Khadr from Guantanamo Bay. Kouchner, who played a founding role in the international humanitarian NGO Médecins sans frontières, personally asked U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to review Khadr’s case during a meeting in February […]

Afghan intervention surpasses Soviet stay

The duration of the U.S. and allied intervention in Afghanistan now exceeds that of the Soviet intervention of 1979-1989. Sunday, 28 November 2010 marks the 3340th day since U.S. and allied forces entered Afghanistan in order to topple the Taliban government and capture Al Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden, and it is now clear that […]

WikiLeaks strikes again

After WikiLeaks’ controversial release in October of 400,000 Pentagon reports pertaining to the Iraq war, Washington is gearing up to respond to the release of another batch of secret files. Washington is also doing damage control in preparation for the release of internal documents that may contain reports of compromising “conversations with political dissidents and friendly politicians… […]

Peace talks with Taliban imposter?

Reports surfaced this week in the New York Times and Washington Times indicating that one of the high-ranking Taliban officials said to be leading the Taliban side of the informal peace talks with the Afghan government and coalition forces, Mullah Akhtar Mohammad Mansour, was instead a shopkeeper from the Pakistani city of Quetta (Dexter Filkins […]