Biden Should Think Big on the U.S.-EU Trade Agenda
When U.S. President Joe Biden participates in his first summit between the United States and the European Union tomorrow in Brussels, he should keep the focus on the big picture.
An Anxious Erdogan Tries to Make Nice With the West
Weeks before U.S. President Joe Biden met with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on the sidelines of the NATO summit, Erdogan vowed that the meeting would be transformative. In a virtual gathering with American investors last month, he predicted that the encounter would “herald a new era.” It was no surprise, then, that after the Monday meeting in Brussels concluded, Erdogan took pains to stretch the truth and describe it as a major success.
Whatever happened to the provocateur, the pugnacious politician whose words and actions so frequently put him at odds with his neighbors and his allies? Where did that Erdogan go?
Biden’s Tour of Europe Leaves a Lot of Unfinished Business
“America is back at the table,” President Joe Biden said at a press conference Sunday in Cornwall following his first G-7 summit. That statement perhaps best encapsulated Biden’s message during his maiden voyage overseas. While he didn’t mention his predecessor by name, the contrast with Donald Trump couldn’t have been clearer. And it certainly came as a relief to the other G-7 leaders, as the summit was mercifully free of temper tantrums and Twitter tirades.
Iran’s Engineered Election Leaves Reformists With No Good Options
Iranians will go to the polls this Friday to choose the successor to centrist President Hassan Rouhani, who is winding down his second four-year term and cannot run for reelection. The polls will take place in an atmosphere of widespread public apathy, as voters choose from a list of presidential candidates that has been heavily vetted beforehand. Of the seven contenders approved last month by the Guardian Council—an oversight body of 12 clerics who are closely aligned with Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei—five are regarded as hard-liners, while the other two are uncharismatic moderates with relatively low profiles. Ebrahim Raisi, a hard-line jurist, is widely seen as the front-runner.
Biden Administration Unveils Strategy to Counter Domestic Terrorism
The Biden administration released its strategy to counter domestic terrorism, detailing how the U.S. government plans to respond to the growing threat.
The strategy, the first of its kind, is comprised of four main pillars that each focus on a different aspect of the domestic terrorism threat.
Virtually Held Hostage: Ransomware Attacks are a Strategic Challenge
In the recent summit between U.S. President Joseph Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin, cyberattacks and ransomware were high on the agenda.
According to Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Christopher Wray, cyberattacks from U.S. adversaries are reaching a crisis point.
As US withdraws, Afghanistan’s lure returns for Southeast Asian extremists – women and children included
It took 25-year-old Wardini and her two young children almost two months to travel with smugglers by road from Jordan, through Iran, to western Afghanistan. By the time they were arrested by Afghan border guards, she had burned their Indonesian passports. They were not going home, she told an Indonesian consular officer who visited her in a Kabul prison in 2019. With the end of days near, she and her children, both then under three, would live in “Khorasan, the blessed land”, she said.
Pentagon Works to Sharpen Definition of ‘Extremism’
Review could reshape cooperation with domestic agencies, consequences for troops’ social media posts, and more.
How do you define extremism? That’s one question the Defense Department is asking itself as it works to implement the first National Strategic for Countering Domestic Terrorism, released by the White House this week.
Rumors of U.S. Secretly Harboring Top China Official Swirl
Reports that a top Chinese official defected to the U.S. have swept Chinese-language media this week. The alleged reason? Sharing sensitive information about COVID-19 origins.
Chinese-language anti-communist media and Twitter are abuzz this week with rumors that a vice minister of State Security, Dong Jingwei defected in mid-February, flying from Hong Kong to the United States with his daughter, Dong Yang.
The European Union Moves to Fight Terrorist Content Online
The European Union (EU) has adopted a new regulation that is designed to crack down on the dissemination of terrorist content online.
Despite safeguards to preserve freedom of speech, the new EU regulation is unlikely to curb potential tension with U.S. free-speech standards.
The new EU regulation can result in the imposition of financial penalties for non-compliance.