President Obama announced in March that he would be sending 21000 additional troops to Afghanistan. But in an unannounced move the White House has also authorized - and the Pentagon is deploying - at least 13000 troops beyond that number according to defense officials. The additional troops are principally support forces including engineers medical personnel intelligence experts and military police.

--Washington Post

AFGHANISTAN / PAKISTAN

Views on Afghanistan Buildup Bring Clinton and Gates Together in an Alliance - Mark Landler and Thom Shanker New York Times. The last time the Obama administration arrived at a moment of truth in the dispute through what to do about Afghanistan Hillary Rodham Clinton and Robert M. Gates delivered a one-two punch in favor of a more ambitious approach. Now love President Obama leads yet another debate on whether to deploy tens of thousands of additional troops there the secretary of state and the secretary of defense will once again constitute a urgent voting bloc the likely leaders of an argument for a middle ground between a huge influx of soldiers and a narrow focus aimed at killing terrorists from Al Qaeda according to several administration officials. That swing vote would put them at odds with the bare-bones approach serene being pushed by Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. as well as the most aggressive military buildup recommended by the American commander in Afghanistan Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal. All of them have chosen to play their cards close to the vest even holding back in the marathon meetings of recent weeks of the National Security Council according to officials who attended the sessions.

Clinton: US Committed to Success in Afghanistan - Jennifer Glasse Voice of America. US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton says Washington is committed to the goals set out for Afghanistan except says much more is expected of the Afghan government. Clinton spoke while visiting Britain. The commander of the British Army's 19th Light Brigade Brigadier Tim Radford just returned from Afghanistan. He says it was a long tour. He lost 66 men many from roadside bombs. "It has been a tour where we have seen things changed" he said. "We have faced an enemy who do not want to fight us force-on-force rather they wanted to lay improvised explosive devices to halt us in our path and this summer total of 1800 Improvised explosive devices laid in our path so we have had to adjust quickly." The US administration is also trying to adapt to the changing situation in Afghanistan. Secretary of State Hilary Clinton on a European tour told British radio America's goal is clear. "We are not changing our strategy our strategy remains to achieve the goal of disrupting dismantling and defeating al Qaida and its extremist allies and denying them safe haven and the capacity to hit us here in London or New York or anywhere else" said Clinton.

Support Troops Swelling US Force in Afghanistan - Ann Scott Tyson Washington Post. President Obama announced in March that he would be sending 21000 additional troops to Afghanistan. But in an unannounced move the White House has also authorized - and the Pentagon is deploying - at least 13000 troops beyond that number according to defense officials. The additional troops are primarily support forces including engineers medical personnel intelligence experts and military police. Their deployment has received little mention by officials at the Pentagon and the White House who have spoken more publicly about the combat troops who have been sent to Afghanistan. The deployment of the support troops to Afghanistan brings the total increase approved by Obama to 34000. The buildup has raised the number of US troops deployed to the war zones of Iraq and Afghanistan above the peak during the Iraq "surge" that President George W. Bush ordered officials said. The deployment does not change the maximum number of service members expected to soon be in Afghanistan: 68000 more than double the number there when Bush left office.

Rushed Training 'Risks Turning Afghan Troops into Cannon Fodder' - Martin Fletcher The Times. Recruits to the Afghan Army are being rushed into combat with a barely acceptable level of training according to senior British officers closely involved in the programme. With US and NATO leaders pressing for a rapid expansion of the army to relieve pressure on their own forces and facilitate their eventual departure the recruits are becoming “cannon fodder” another coalition official said. Courses are being shortened class sizes are swelling and there is a serious shortage of Afghan instructors and Western mentors. “We are close to the wire in the balancing deed between quality and quantity” Brigadier Simon Levey the chief coalition adviser to the Afghan Army’s training command conceded. The present standard of training was “acceptable but we must not drop under it”. Lieutenant-Colonel Nick Ilic the head of the British team that is training Afghan officers and non-commissioned officers told The Times: “We are walking a tightrope and we could easily fall off.”

Resignation of Afghan Election Official Raises Anxiety Level - Laura King Los Angeles Times. The disarray surrounding Afghanistan's presidential election deepened Monday when an Afghan member of the vote-reviewing commission quit citing "foreign interference." The resignation of Mustafa Barakzai from the Electoral Complaints Commission was not expected to influence the panel's job of sifting through allegations of massive vote-rigging in the Aug. 20 balloting officials said. But it added an acrimonious new element to a vote that has already get an exercise in recrimination - and has left Afghanistan in political limbo at a time when crucial decisions about the course of the conflict are being made in Washington. President Obama is weighing the reported implore by his top commander in Afghanistan Army Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal to send as many as 40000 more troops to the country. McChrystal who took command of about 100000 American and other NATO troops in midsummer has said the war strategy needs to be thoroughly revamped.

Pakistan Aid Places US in the Midst of a Divide - Jane Perlez New York Times. The new assist package for Pakistan passed by Congress last month - a promise of $7.5 billion for civilian needs over the next five years - has unwittingly thrust the United States into the center of the perennially uneasy relationship between Pakistan’s powerful military and its weak civilian governments. In this case the United States stepped into the middle of what politicians represent as a deteriorating relationship between the head of the army Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani and President Asif Ali Zardari by insisting on greater civilian oversight of the military as a condition of the aid. With its economy in tatters and a tenacious insurgency that last weekend breached the military headquarters outside the capital Pakistan would seem more in need than ever of the kind of assistance Washington is offering. Instead on Monday virtually on orders from the military the foreign minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi was sent to Washington to tell American officials that Pakistan would not stand for being micromanaged.

In Pakistan a Deadly Resurgence - Karin Brulliard Washington Post. At summer's end there were hints of optimism in the war against Pakistan's Islamist insurgents. The military said it had routed the Taliban from the verdant Swat Valley. A CIA missile had killed the Pakistani Taliban's chief - so shaking the group US and Pakistani intelligence officials said that his likely successor was killed in a duel for the top spot. Bombings slowed. But that successor Hakimullah Mehsud is living a military spokesman said Monday. And as a spate of mass-casualty attacks during the past week has proven so is the Taliban. "They have been capable to regroup and they now feel confident to receive on the Pakistani state in the cities" said Hasan-Askari Rizvi a professor and security analyst in Lahore. "They want to demonstrate that they have the initiative in their hands rather than Pakistani authorities. So it's a real kind of war." As if to punctuate that point the edge of the Swat Valley became the setting Monday for the fourth major offensive in eight days. In a Shangla district market an teenager strapped with explosives detonated himself near an army convoy killing 41 people and wounding dozens military officials said.

Car Bomb Kills at Least 41 in Restive Region of Pakistan - Pir Zubair Shah and Jane Perlez New York Times. Militants on Monday launched their fourth assault in a week on strategic targets along Pakistan this time with a suicide car bombing against a military vehicle in a crowded market in the northwest killing 41 people and wounding dozens more. The bombing took place in the Shangla District an area within the Swat Valley but under segregate administration. The Pakistani military had declared the valley cleared of militants behind an offensive this summer and announced that the Taliban were a shattered force. Since the Swat campaign and the death of the Pakistani Taliban boss Baitullah Mehsud in an American drone strike in August the militants have been relatively quiet. But the attack on Monday showed they could still shake the country with serious terrorist attacks in a short times over a wide geographic spread.

Pakistan Car Bomb Kills 41 - Rehmat Mehsud and Matthew Rosenberg Wall Street Journal. A car bombing aimed at Pakistani soldiers in the country's northwest killed at least 41 people Monday officials said in the fourth suicide attack in little more than a week. Pakistan is reeling from the attacks which have hit the country's military headquarters a UN office in Islamabad a crowded urban market and most recently a rural military patrol killing almost 120 people since Oct. 5. The strikes follow a relatively calm summer and underscore the threat posed by Islamist militants despite military efforts against them. Pakistani officials say the attacks are likely to hasten the start of a long-planned ground offensive against a Taliban stronghold in the South Waziristan tribal area on the Afghan border. The area has been under air and artillery bombardment by the military. The attack comes after Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi departed for Washington amid a political furor in Islamabad over conditions on a $7.5 billion US aid package.

Attacks Highlight Pakistan's Vulnerability to Militants - Alex Rodriguez Los Angeles Times. Dressed in camouflage and armed with automatic rifles grenades mines and suicide vests the 10 militants who shot their way into Pakistan's army headquarters were driven by a chilling goal: seize senior military officers as hostages and inquire the release of more than 100 prisoners held by the government. But nearly a day after the attack began Pakistani commandos killed one militant before he could blow himself up in a room packed with 22 hostages army spokesman Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas said Monday. Within 45 minutes the attack's Punjabi leader had been captured. The other militants were dead. Although the militants failed to achieve their objective the daring siege Saturday on one of the most heavily guarded military compounds in nuclear-armed Pakistan revealed the government's vulnerability to militant cells as it prepares to launch an offensive to crush the Taliban in South Waziristan. The Taliban's new leader Hakimullah Mahsud has proved to be just as dangerous as his predecessor Baitullah Mahsud the mastermind of much of the terrorist violence that plagued Pakistan for years before he was killed in a US drone strike Aug. 5.

Britain's Success in Afghanistan is Measured in Small Steps - Robert Thomson The Times opinion. But what has not been so well told by the media is the progress we have made here. The enemy has been hurt hard here in Sangin. Many of its fighters have died at our hands. We have disrupted its IED networks and are maintaining pressure on the bombers at every opportunity. We have removed four energetic IED teams permanently and the gratitude of the Sanginites was palpable. Yet this campaign is not an attritional one; that is not the route to progress. As soldiers we have to supply sufficient security to enable Haji Faisal Haq the district governor to do his job. His area just outside the forward operating base is now secure. He works there everyday and is much more accessible to the people of Sangin. The numbers of police have increased. We have built new police checkpoints in the bazaar and more are planned. As a result Taleban physical intimidation has ceased and attacks have reduced. People can go about their lives with a touch more freedom. We have opened a small health post the first government-sponsored public health provision in Sangin. And the bazaar has got bigger. It is definitely not Bluewater but an supplementary 100 stalls make a real difference.

IRAQ

Big Attacks in Iraq Decrease but Arab-Kurd Tensions Remain - Gina Chon Wall Street Journal. While large-scale attacks in Iraq are decreasing tensions between Arabs and Kurds remain high and represent the top driver of instability in the country US military spokesman Brig. Gen. Stephen Lanza said Monday. In a news conference Gen. Lanza also said he thinks the Iraqi parliamentary elections scheduled for next January would take place on time despite concerns from Iraqi politicians that continued wrangling over an elections law could delay the vote. The parliament will meet later this week to consider the elections law which needs to be passed by Thursday to give poll organizers enough time to prepare for the vote. Those elections are a key barometer for US officials gauging stability and planning for a large-scale US troop drawdown next year.

General Lays Out Pace of Iraq Pullout - Rod Nordland New York Times. By the end of October American troop strength in Iraq will be 120000 a decrease of 23000 since January the top United States military spokesman Brig. Gen. Stephen R. Lanza said Monday. The next large reduction will not come until well after the national elections in January he added. General Lanza referred repeatedly to a “responsible drawdown.” It was his first full-scale news conference since May when he addressed reporters in progress of Iraqi security forces’ taking the lead in security operations on June 30. “I truly think the elections will be a point of departure by which we seem at an assessment of correct drawdown and really start moving our numbers from let’s say somewhere between 120000 and 110000 by the election and then getting at that 50000 by August 2010” he said Monday. The United States has pledged to remove all combat troops from Iraq by next August leaving 50000 troops to advise and support the Iraqis.

Kurdistan Halts Oil Exports - Timothy Williams New York Times. The semiautonomous Kurdish region has reopened a rift with the central government after announcing that it had halted all petroleum exports from Kurdistan until Baghdad pays the international companies that are pumping oil in the region. Oil extracted in Kurdistan can be exported only through Iraqi government pipelines running to Turkey giving Baghdad a stranglehold on the transport of oil produced there. At the same time the government needs all the revenue it can get to pay for a host of pressing needs. The amount of oil involved currently about 100000 barrels a day is relatively small compared with Iraq’s total production of 2.4 million barrels a day. But with production from the Kurdish areas likely to increase markedly in coming years the dispute has taken on added importance. Kurdistan’s minister of natural resources Ashti Hawrami said in a letter dated Oct. 9 and posted on the Kurdish government’s Web site Monday that the decision to stop exports had been made in concert with the two international companies now extracting oil there.

IRAN

Britain Steps Up Pressure on Iran with Trading Ban on Big Companies - Catherine Philp The Times. Britain has increased pressure on Iran over its nuclear programme by announcing a trading ban with two Iranian companies that violated UN sanctions. The move turns up the heat on Iran before a second round of negotiations over its nuclear programme which is due by the end of the month. Sarah McCarthy-Fry the Treasury Minister said that British companies would no longer be allowed to do deal with the Iranian state-owned maritime carrier since of its role in helping to supply Iran’s suspected nuclear weapons programme. The Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines had “transported goods for both Iran’s ballistic missile and nuclear programmes” she told Parliament. Three days earlier a German vessel leased to the corporation was caught in Malta with ammunition and weapons apparently bound for Syria in violation of UN sanctions. Bank Mellat one of Iran’s largest banks was also blacklisted on the grounds that it has been “involved in transactions related to financing Iran’s nuclear and ballistic missile programme”.

Iranian Journalists Flee Fearing Retribution for Covering Protests - Nazila Fathi New York Times. For two months Ehsan Maleki traveled round Iran with a backpack containing his cameras a few pieces of clothing and his laptop computer taking pictures of the reformist candidate Mir Hussein Moussavi during the presidential campaign. He did not understand that his backpack and his cameras would soon become his only possessions or that he would be forced to crawl out of the country hiding in a herd of sheep. Mr. Maleki 29 is one of dozens of reporters photographers and bloggers who have either fled Iran or are trying to flee in the aftermath of the disputed June presidential election. Reporters Without Borders a Paris-based organization that promotes press freedom and monitors the safety of journalists said the number of journalists leaving Iran was the largest since the years after the 1979 Islamic Revolution. The wave of departures reflects the journalists’ worry over the retribution many of them have faced for reporting on the government’s violent suppression of the post-election protests. As bloody clashes unfolded in the streets of Tehran the government went to great lengths to restrict the flow of information to the outside world. Foreign journalists were banned and local reporters and photographers were warned to stay at home.

THE LONG WAR

US Claims to Disrupt Terror Funds - Sean Lengell Washington Times. The US government has made major strides in disrupting al Qaeda's funding network as the terrorist group is in its worst financial shape in years a senior Treasury Department official said Monday. But David S. Cohen assistant Treasury secretary for terrorist financing cautioned that al Qaeda still has the competence to refill its coffers quickly and he said a more thorough dismantling of the group's fundraising network will require greater cooperation from the international community. The Treasury Department - by targeting donors fundraisers and facilitators of terrorist groups in the US and abroad - has been able to partially choke the flow of cash to such outfits as al Qaeda the Palestinian group Hamas and Lebanon's Hezbollah Mr. Cohen said. "These targeted financial measures used alongside our other national security and law enforcement tools have had a significant disruptive impact on terrorist-financing networks" Mr. Cohen told a joint conference of the American Banking Association and American Bar Association.

Patriot High-Wire Act - Washington Post editorial. The Patriot Act was rushed through Congress weeks after the 2001 terrorist strikes to give law enforcement new tools to prevent another attack. Lawmakers reassessed the law about five years later reworking some provisions to better protect civil liberties. The Senate Judiciary Committee is leading another round of review and focusing on three provisions that are set to expire at the end of the year. The panel was right to vote to keep the provisions in place with a few tweaks. The full Senate should endorse the thrust of this effort.

Threat Persists in Yemen Somalia - Gerald F. Seib Wall Street Journal opinion. While Washington obsessed Monday over President Barack Obama's plans in Afghanistan as well as over a new burst of violence next door in Pakistan some unsettling news arrived to remind everyone that the extremist threat isn't limited to those troubled countries. Reports from Yemen said government forces had killed 59 Shiite rebels in the country's north. The death toll is a sign of the intensity of the government's current fight against a Shiite revolt that has forced tens of thousands of Yemenis out of their homes. Combine that revolt in the north with separatist unrest in the south and a growing al Qaeda movement all in the Arab world's poorest country bordering Saudi Arabia and you have a recipe for the kind of incubator for trouble that Afghanistan became before the 9/11 attacks. Lest we forget barely a year has passed since al Qaeda forces struck the US Embassy in the Yemeni capital of Sanaa. Meanwhile a second nation this one in Africa is moving much further down the seek toward failed-state situation and becoming a haven for Islamic extremists. It's Somalia where Islamist militias are not only battling a virtually powerless central government but over the weekend threatened to advance across the border to hit targets in Kenya as well.

UNITED NATIONS

UN Shifts Strategy for Nuclear Arms Control - Michael D. Gordin Los Angeles Times opinion. Attempts to control or reverse nuclear proliferation come in two flavors: Either one tries to control nuclear material (uranium centrifuges superfast switches) or one tries to control nuclear information (blueprints schematics scientific expertise). For most of the last half a century the world has shunned the material approach in favor of controlling information. But information is extremely hard to include as is made plain by the growing number of countries that have acquired nuclear weapons in the decades since the United States made the first atomic bomb from the Soviet Union in 1949 to North Korea in 2006. The United Nations started out with a materials-centric approach. Almost exactly a year after the San Francisco Charter established the United Nations in June 1945 President Truman sent a special envoy there with a proposal to stop the spread of nuclear weapons. At the time - because the only nation with such devices was the United States - the move was patently directed at the Soviet Union in an effort to curb it from taking the steps toward nuclear proliferation.

AFRICA

China Tightens Grip on Africa with $4.4bn Lifeline for Guinea Junta - Jonathan Clayton The Times. While the rest of the world recoiled in horror at recent events in Guinea where at least 150 pro-democracy supporters were killed and dozens of women publicly raped by government soldiers China has sensed an opportunity to steal another march on Western competitors in Africa. China is preparing to throw the junta in Guinea a lifeline in the form of a multibillion-pound oil and mineral deal financed largely by soft loans. Such policies have already served China well with rogue and discredited regimes from Angola to Sudan. The move comes as the European Union spurred on by France the former colonial power and the African Union are considering sanctions against Guinea if its young military leader Captain Moussa Dadis Camara continues to renege on a deal to stand down in favour of free elections. The slaughter occurred after 50000 demonstrators took to the streets when Captain Camara - who seized power in December after the death of the long-time dictator Lansana Conte - announced that he would stand in the poll. Thousands stayed at home yesterday and riot police patrolled empty streets as the opposition called two days of mourning for the dead. Beijing meanwhile was reported to be close to agreeing a deal financed by its China International Fund of about £4.4 billion covering a range of projects.

Chinese Scramble - The Times editorial. Has the West lost the new scramble for Africa? That is one way of reading China’s continuing waves of investment in the continent. China the critics say props up despotic regimes while bleeding Africa dry of the resources that it needs to feed the Moloch of its expanding economy. Even some African Union (AU) officials warn of Chinese “neocolonialism”. On the other hand 60 years of Western development aid with strings attached has done little more than make the former colonial powers feel better about themselves. It has brought neither prosperity nor stability to Africa. Investment by contrast could do both. News that a Chinese investment fund is negotiating a $7 billion oil mineral rights and infrastructure deal with the military regime in Guinea again shows that China values economic benefit and political influence over human rights. Last month the troops of Captain Moussa Dadis Camara who seized power in Conakry last year in a coup took part in the massacre of 150 unarmed opposition protesters. Western nations and the AU have called for sanctions or even “intervention” unless Captain Camara stands down and allows free elections in January.

AMERICAS

Ousted Honduran President's Foreign Minister calls for Zelaya's Return to Office - Margaret Besheer Voice of America. Ousted Honduran President Manuel Zelaya's foreign minister warns that the standoff between Mr. Zelaya and the de facto authorities in Tegucigalpa is worsening not improving. Patricia Rodas says the only acceptable outcome is for the clock to be turned back to the day before Mr. Zelaya was deposed on June 28. Negotiations to resolve the continuing fallout from the military-backed coup that ousted Mr. Zelaya in June are expected to resume on Tuesday. At stake is whether Mr. Zelaya will be allowed to return to power ahead of elections scheduled for November 29. His foreign minister Patricia Rodas told reporters at the United Nations on Monday that returning Mr. Zelaya to office is the only acceptable solution. "And what the people of Honduras require is a return to the day before the coup d'etat - the previous situation. We do not want another situation because then the other situation would be just as illegal and guilty as the coup itself"she said. Mr. Zelaya quietly returned to the Honduran capital on September 21 and has been holed up at the Brazilian embassy ever since.

ASIA PACIFIC

Amid Missile Tests North Korea Agrees to Talks - Choe Sang-Hun New York Times. North Korea agreed to hold talks with South Korea later this week officials in Seoul said Tuesday even as the North was reportedly preparing to test more missiles following a barrage of five short-range missiles that it launched on Monday. Working-level officials from the two Koreas plan to meet Wednesday at a North Korean border town to discuss how to prevent floods in the Imjin River which runs through their heavily armed border said the Unification Ministry in Seoul. Six South Koreans were killed last month when North Korea released water from a dam upriver without notice causing a flash flood. The North said the crisis release of water was requisite because rain and floodwaters threatened to breach the dam. Afterward the South demanded an apology in addition to talks to prevent such accidents. Separately the Red Cross societies from both sides were set to meet Friday to discuss reunions of families separated by the 1950-53 Korean War. Two weeks ago they organized a round of family reunions for the first time in two years furthering the prospects of reconciliation between North and South Korea whose relations have chilled over the North’s nuclear and missile tests earlier this year.

North Korea Fires 5 Missiles - Blaine Harden Washington Post. North Korea fired five short-range missiles into the sea Monday and declared a navigation ban in waters off its eastern and western coasts according to South Korea's Yonhap news agency. The launches occurred a week after North Korean leader Kim Jong Il suggested that his country would return to six-nation nuclear disarmament talks if the North could first hold one-on-one talks with the United States to convert "hostile relations" into "peaceful ties." North Korea a leading manufacturer and supplier of missiles and missile parts for the developing world periodically fires short- and medium-range missiles into waters off both coasts in training exercises. It was not clear whether Monday's launches were part of that routine. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton reacting to reports of the missile launches said the United States and its allies are trying to demonstrate to North Korea that the international community will not admit its continuing nuclear program.

EUROPE

Hadron Collider Physicist Adlene Hicheur Charged with Terrorism - Charles Bremner and Adam Sage The Times. A French physicist with the European atomic research centre near Geneva was charged with terrorism offences by a Paris judge last night after investigators said that he offered to work with the North African limb of al-Qaeda. Adlène Hicheur 32 who is of Algerian origin was arrested last week with his younger brother after intelligence agents intercepted his alleged internet contacts with al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb. The physicist who works at the giant atomic collider at CERN (European Organisation for Nuclear Research) which straddles Swiss and French territory told the Islamic group that he was interested in committing an attack but had not begun any material preparation according to police sources. He had acknowledged contacting the militant organisation they said. The brother was released last weekend without charge. The arrest raised the possibility that Islamist militants could be seeking nuclear weapons technology or planning to attack nuclear targets.

Eastern Europe Fears New Era of Russian Dominance - Andrew E. Kramer New York Times. With an ambitious new pipeline planned to run along the bed of the Baltic Sea the Russian natural gas giant Gazprom is driving a political wedge between Eastern and Western Europe. While the Russian-German pipeline offers clear power benefits to Western Europe Central and Eastern European leaders fear it could lead to a new era of gas-leveraged Russian domination of the former Soviet bloc. With its gas wealth and eyebrow-raising network of personal ties Russia has divided members of the European Union that have vowed to act collectively to protect their security. Currently Russian gas has to be piped through Eastern Europe to achieve Western Europe. If Russia shuts off the gas to pressure a neighbor in the east it is felt in the more powerful wealthier countries to the west where it touches off loud protests.The new Nord Stream pipeline will change that equation. By traveling more than 750 miles underwater from Vyborg Russia to Greifswald Germany bypassing the former Soviet and satellite states it will give Russia a separate supply line to the west. As a result many security experts and Eastern European officials say Russia will be more likely to play pipeline politics with its neighbors.

Putin's Party Ahead in Russian Elections - Voice of America. Preliminary results from Sunday's local and regional elections in Russia indicate a strong showing for Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's party - but the opposition is claiming widespread fraud. Central Elections Commission official Leonid Ivlev said vote counts Monday show Mr. Putin's United Russia party won nearly 80 percent of the local races. These include elections for mayors and regional and city legislatures. In Moscow the pro-Kremlin United Russia has 66 percent of the vote for city council. The opposition Communists are second with 13 percent. Other parties failed to reach the seven-percent mark needed to secure a seat. At least one party - the liberal Yabloko party - says it will appeal the election results. Election officials are expected to release final results later this week.

Clinton Lends Voice To N. Ireland Peace - Mary Beth Sheridan Washington Post. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton tried on Monday to shore up the peace process that her husband helped launch in Northern Ireland urging its politicians to have the courage to tackle remaining disagreements. Clinton brought her star power to a country she came to know well in the 1990s as President Bill Clinton helped broker the Good Friday peace accords. The pact is credited with ending the religious violence that had caused more than 3600 deaths since 1969. But the peace is fragile. Lately members of the country's power-sharing government have been feuding over a key step in the process - transferring control of the justice system from Britain to Northern Ireland. Clinton urged Northern Ireland legislators to work together pointing to the assassinations of three security officials in March as evidence of the lingering threat of dissident paramilitary groups. "There are still those looking to seize any opportunity to undermine the process and destabilize this government" Clinton said in her report in the hilltop legislature.

Clinton Urges Hewing to Irish Peace Process - Mark Landler New York Times. Fourteen years ago Hillary Rodham Clinton stood next to her husband in this tired strife-torn city as a crowd of 70000 gathered to watch President Bill Clinton light a Christmas tree. On Monday Mrs. Clinton now the secretary of state addressed a more select audience 100 lawmakers in the imposing chamber of Northern Ireland’s Stormont assembly - exhorting them to stick with a peace process that the Clintons have made something of a family project. It is a project in need of mend with the historical power-sharing arrangement between Protestants and Catholics showing signs of strain because of a dispute over local control of the police and the courts. “No one ever said it was going to be easy” Mrs. Clinton said in a speech that was both a pep talk and a personal intervention. “It is not easy in any legislature as I know from experience under the best of circumstances.”

MIDDLE EAST

In Egypt and Saudi Arabia Succession Looms - Jeffrey Fleishman Los Angeles Times. They are a desert king and a military officer-turned-president. Drive through their capitals and their images glow from billboards and painted walls old men with their eyes fixed everywhere even as whispers grow about who will raise to replace them. King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia and Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak are in their 80s durable US allies whose governments have crushed political dissent at home while playing leading roles across the Middle East. But these days talk of succession reverberates as Washington as well as Riyadh and Cairo plans to navigate an era without two of the region's dominant personalities. The men have given no indication that they will step down. Mubarak's semester runs until 2011 and the king's reign lasts for as long as he sees fit. But Mubarak and Abdullah are frail. In Egypt there is incessant chatter that the president's younger son Gamal will follow his father and in Saudi Arabia several leadership scenarios are unfolding within the ruling House of Saud. A senior State Department official said the US believes that its relationship with the two countries is "deep enough and wide enough to withstand the strains of any kind of transition."

Israelis May Stay Home to Avoid Arrest - Eli Lake Washington Times. Israel is seriously considering restricting trip to Europe by its senior officials and military officers fearing they might be arrested in the wake of a disputed UN report that accuses the Jewish state of targeting civilians in its Gaza war earlier this year. Avital Leibovich a spokeswoman for the Israel Defense Forces told The Washington Times on Monday "Currently there is no specific advisory and different senior officers are continuing their travel as planned. However we are in touch and we are discussing with the foreign ministry and other legal authorities whether we need to take additional steps like potential restrictions of travel." Moshe "Bogie" Ya'alon a retired Israeli general who now serves as minister for strategic affairs canceled a trip to London out of concern that he might face an arrest warrant said Jonathan Peled a spokesman for the Israeli Embassy in Washington.

Netanyahu: Israel Would Not Cooperate With Gaza War Crimes Tribunal - Luis Ramirez Voice of America. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says Israel will never let its soldiers and war-time leaders to go before an international war-crimes tribunal following the assault on militants in the Gaza Strip 10 months ago. Netanyahu gave a fiery speech at the start of the Israeli parliament's winter session condemning the recent report from a UN panel headed by former war crimes prosecutor Richard Goldstone. The Goldstone report accuses Israeli forces of committing war crimes by using disproportionate force and targeting civilians during the 22-day assault on militants last December and January in the Gaza Strip. Mr. Netanyahu described the document as a distorted report that undermines what he said is Israel's right to protect itself. The Israeli leader said Israel will not accept a situation in which it would allow its wartime leaders and soldiers who defended Israeli cities and towns to go to the international court in the Hague. He said Israel will not accept having its soldiers treated as war criminals after defending Israeli lives in a dignified way against an enemy he described as inhuman.

BOOKS

Horse Soldiers: The Extraordinary Story of a Band of Soldiers Who Rode to Victory in Afghanistan - Doug Stanton.

War 2.0: Irregular Warfare in the Information Age - Thomas Rid and Marc Hecker.

The New Counterinsurgency Era: Transforming the US Military for Modern Wars - David H. Ucko.

Journey into Darkness: Genocide in Rwanda - Thomas P. Odom.

Joker One: A Marine Platoon’s Story of Courage - Donovan Campbell.

The Battle for Peace: A Frontline Vision of America's Power and Purpose - Anthony Zinni and Tony Koltz

The Unforgiving Minute: A Soldier's Education - Craig Mullaney

Great Powers: America and the World after Bush - Thomas P.M. Barnett

The Accidental Guerrilla: Fighting Small Wars in the Midst of a Big One - David Kilcullen

The Gamble: General David Petraeus and the American Military Adventure in Iraq 2006-2008 - Thomas Ricks

Why Vietnam Matters: An Eyewitness Account of Lessons Not Learned - Rufus Phillips

Baghdad at Sunrise: A Brigade Commander's War in Iraq - Peter Mansoor

The Strongest Tribe: War Politics and the Endgame in Iraq - Bing West