Guns and Roses: IPS's Reporting On Global Armed Conflicts and Resolution Efforts / IPS Inter Press Service

IPS Correspondent Gareth Porter talks to Real News.

The U.S. military establishment believed they could easily pressure President Obama to back down on his pledge to withdraw troops from Iraq within 16 months. Having found Obama unconvinced by their argument, they have now launched a campaign in Washington to blame Obama’s withdrawal policy for any future instability in Iraq.

RIGHTS: Karen Fear Military Offensive Near Planned Dam in Burma
By Marwaan Macan-Markar
BANGKOK - With the annual monsoon rains ending, there is a growing fear among the Karen ethnic minority living along military-ruled Burma’s eastern border of a dry season offensive. The most vulnerable are villagers residing in the vicinity of the controversial Hat Gyi dam.
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POLITICS: U.S. in Pakistan’s Mind: Nothing But Aversion
Analysis by Muhammad Idrees Ahmad*
PESHAWAR, Pakistan - To the west of Peshawar on the Jamrud Road that leads to the historic Khyber Pass sits the Karkhano Market, a series of shopping plazas whose usual offering of contraband is now supplemented by standard issue U.S. military equipment, including combat fatigues, night vision goggles, body armour and army knives.
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AFGHANISTAN: U.S., NATO Forces Rely on Warlords for Security
By Gareth Porter*
WASHINGTON - The revelation by the New York Times Wednesday that Ahmed Wali Karzai, the brother of Afghan President Hamid Karzai, has long been on the payroll of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency is only the tip of a much bigger iceberg of heavy dependence by U.S. and NATO counterinsurgency forces on Afghan warlords for security, according to a recently published report and investigations by Australian and Canadian journalists.
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AFGHANISTAN: Poll Finds Optimism, Amid Political Disenchantment
By Matthew Berger
WASHINGTON - As debate continues in Washington over what its next steps should be in Afghanistan and as the total of NATO-led coalition deaths in the country approaches 70 for the fourth straight month, a new survey says Afghans are slightly more optimistic about the future of their country than in years past.
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RIGHTS-UGANDA: Colliding with the Fourth Estate
By Evelyn Matsamura Kiapi
KAMPALA - Charles Odobo Bichachi, editor of the Independent Newspaper has in a span of a year, been summoned to the police several times accused of publishing seditious statements. And just last month, Bichachi fell into trouble again: this time over a cartoon.
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US-AFGHANISTAN: Kerry Argues for Counterinsurgency Lite
By Jim Lobe*
WASHINGTON - Amid growing speculation and partisan bickering over what President Barack Obama will do about the deteriorating situation in Afghanistan, an influential Democratic senator Monday warned against deploying tens of thousands more U.S. troops there.
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UGANDA: Rebuilding Home and Hearth
By Joshua Kyalimpa
PALEMY, Uganda - Dusk gathers in the thickets of Palemy village, in the Gulu district of northern Uganda. Men, women, and children follow foot paths through the dark to the residence of Mzee Otto Yuvani.
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RIGHTS: Arms Treaty Could Be Powerful Tool to Protect Children
By Suzanne Hoeksema
UNITED NATIONS - The impact of global weapons trafficking on children and their recruitment as fighters should be on the agenda of talks for an international Arms Trade Treaty, say United Nations experts and non-governmental organisations.
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SRI LANKA: U.S. Govt Report Adds to Pressure for War Crimes Probe
By Eli Clifton
WASHINGTON - The U.S. State Department released a report Thursday detailing possible violations of the laws of war in Sri Lanka during the first half of 2009, adding to pressure for an independent, international investigation into alleged atrocities committed by government forces and Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) separatists.
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FILM: The Man Is Steel, the Tank Is Only Iron
By Matteo Fracassi
NEW YORK - "War is not made by heroes or Hollywood studs," says director Samuel Maoz. "War is mostly made by young and inexperienced guys. Children that are sent to go after and kill the ones they used to play with. That's what this really is about."
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GUATEMALA: Town that Suffered Military Terror Fights Reopening of Base
By Danilo Valladares
GUATEMALA CITY - People in the town of Ixcán in northwestern Guatemala could relive the pain of the country's 36-year civil war if the army reopens a military base in the area, where more than 100 massacres of indigenous villagers were committed during the armed conflict.
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US-SUDAN: Activist Groups Cautiously Praise New Policy
By Jim Lobe*
WASHINGTON - Activist groups that have long urged a tougher U.S. policy toward Khartoum praised the new "comprehensive approach" toward Sudan announced here Monday by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, even as they expressed concern that it will not be fully implemented.
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DEVELOPMENT-SOUTH ASIA: Women’s Peace Offensive
Analysis by Beena Sarwar
KABUL - ‘Give peace a chance’ may just be another cliché for many, but for women who have suffered the ravages of war, endless strife and other forms of conflict, joining hands to find meaningful solutions to their collective aspiration lends it a whole new meaning.
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POLITICS: U.N. Body Backs War Crimes Charges on Israel, Hamas
By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS - The 47-member Human Rights Council (HRC) approved a resolution Friday endorsing war crimes charges against Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas, as spelled out in a report by a four-member international fact-finding mission headed by Justice Richard Goldstone.
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U.S.: Veteran Army Officer Urges Afghan Troop Drawdown
By Gareth Porter*
WASHINGTON - A veteran Army officer who has served in both the Afghanistan and Iraq wars warns in an analysis now circulating in Washington that the counterinsurgency strategy urged by Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal is likely to strengthen the Afghan insurgency, and calls for withdrawal of the bulk of U.S. combat forces from the country over 18 months.
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The Human Security Report of 2005 identified a fall in the number of armed conflicts since the end of the Cold War. But the evidence examined in the 2008 edition of the Peace and Conflict report shows that the decline has stopped. Armed conflicts -- wars, civil wars, revolts, coups, genocides, ethnic and political violence, and terrorism worldwide -- are flaring up across the world. Iraq, Israel and Palestine, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, Darfur, South Ossetia, Colombia...the list of conflict-zones is long. And the poor, women, and children, are the hardest hit. With focus on human rights and development, IPS examines armed conflicts around the world and the efforts to stop them.