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21. Volume 1, Issue 6 - Full Issue

Publication Date:
05-2008
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
CTC Sentinel
Institution:
The Combating Terrorism Center at West Point
Abstract:
In the course of defending al-Qa`ida against charges of unjustly killing innocent Muslims during his April 2, 2008 “open interview,” Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri reintroduced Hukm al-Tatarrus (the law on using human shields) into the debate. A relatively unfamiliar term to non-Muslims and Muslims alike, al-Tatarrus refers to God's sanctioning of Muslim armies that are forced to kill other Muslims who are being used as human shields by an enemy during a time of war. Al-Tatarrus is a religiously legitimate, albeit obscure, Islamic concept that al-Qa`ida ideologues have been increasingly using in order to exculpate themselves from charges of apostasy. The method in which al-Qa`ida is promoting al-Tatarrus, however, seeks to facilitate the sacrifice of Muslim lives in contravention of 14 centuries of religious teachings. For instance, both al-Qa`ida in the Arabian Peninsula and the al-Qa`ida Organization in Yemen hid behind the protections offered by al-Tatarrus in their justification of terrorist attacks that resulted in significant Muslim casualties. Al-Qa`ida's use of al-Tatarrus was also at the heart of Sayyid Imam Sharif's recent attacks against al-Zawahiri and al-Qa`ida.
Political Geography:
Yemen, Arabia, and Sinai Peninsula

22. China - Korea: Underhanded Tactics and Stolen Secrets

Author:
Scott Snyder
Publication Date:
01-2008
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Comparative Connections
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
The Oct. 3 Six-Party Talks agreement on next steps in North Korea's denuclearization and the Oct. 4 inter-Korean summit declaration shaped developments in China-Korean relations in the last quarter of 2007, as China reaffirmed its peacemaking role on the Korean Peninsula. Chinese Communist Party official Liu Yunshan visited Pyongyang in late October with a message from Hu Jintao, resuming party-to-party high-level contacts with Pyongyang after a year's break. Similarly, Six-Party Talks lead negotiator Wu Dawei visited Pyongyang in mid-December to encourage North Korean counterparts to follow through on obligations to disable and declare nuclear facilities by the end of the year in accordance with the Feb. 13 and Oct. 3 agreements. South Korean telecommunications companies worked hard to gain an advantage over global competitors in the Chinese market, while Korean automobile and steel manufacturers faced new challenges as industrial espionage involving proprietary technology drew an even higher profile in both sectors. China's search for financing has not bypassed the Korean equity market, as Korea's China-focused equity funds gained while the Korean Stock Exchange attempts to attract Chinese firms to list directly on the Korean exchange.
Political Geography:
China, South Korea, North Korea, Korea, Sinai Peninsula, and Pyongyang

23. Camels don't fly, deserts don't bloom: an assessment of Saudi Arabia's experiment in desert agriculture'

Author:
Elie Elhadj
Publication Date:
05-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
School of Oriental and African Studies - University of London
Abstract:
Severe arid conditions constrained agricultural production and population size in the Arabian Peninsula over the millennia (except around oases and in parts of Yemen). An abrupt change in Saudi Arabia started in the 1980s to make the desert bloom. This study examines whether or not the Saudi experiment in desert irrigation has been worthwhile in terms of cost and benefit. It concludes that the project was a waste of money and water on a grand scale.
Topic:
International Relations, Development, Environment, and International Political Economy
Political Geography:
Yemen, Saudi Arabia, and Sinai Peninsula

24. Crisis on the Korean Peninsula

Author:
Richard Bush, Dean Nowowiejski, and Tomatsu Nakano
Publication Date:
04-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Brookings Institution
Abstract:
Most signs during the late summer and early fall of 2002 pointed to progress on the Korean peninsula. North Korean leader Kim Jong Il had finally grasped, it appeared, the need for international moderation and domestic reform. The United States seemed ready to respond in kind. But with the visit to Pyongyang in October of U.S. Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly – the first high-level contact since the Bush Administration came into office – the situation quickly unraveled. Instead of offering the “bold initiative” that was reportedly in the works, Kelly confronted his interlocutors with evidence that their government had mounted a new, clandestine uranium-based nuclear program. The North Koreans refused to disavow the program and insisted on their right to nuclear weapons. Kelly responded that the United States would not engage the DPRK unless and until it abandoned the program. The status of the 1994 U.S.-DPRK Agreed Framework, which had capped North Korea's plutonium-based program in return for international assistance in meeting its civilian energy needs, was uncertain at best. The Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization (KEDO), the mechanism for providing that aid, stopped heavy fuel oil shipments to North Korea at the end of 2002 at American insistence.
Topic:
Economics, International Political Economy, and International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:
United States, Asia, Korea, and Sinai Peninsula

25. The Future of the Multinational Force and Observers in Sinai

Author:
Gal Luft
Publication Date:
01-2002
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
Growing U.S. military involvement in new locations such as Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, and the Philippines has raised concerns in the Pentagon about overstretching the military and has prompted a call to reassess the future of America's long-standing contribution to peacekeeping missions worldwide. One of the missions at risk of being curtailed is the Multinational Force and Observers (MFO) — an independent, international peacekeeping and verification organization established by Egypt and Israel to monitor the security arrangements of their 1979 peace treaty. The idea of downsizing the 900-man U.S. contingent in the Sinai Peninsula has been raised several times by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. "I do not believe that we still need our forces in the Sinai," he said in a recent public statement. But the timing of such a change — especially in light of the deterioration in Egyptian-Israeli relations since the beginning of the al-Aqsa intifada — is questionable. At a time when other voices are calling for the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Saudi Arabia, a withdrawal from Sinai — even if only a reduction — could symbolize to many a decreasing U.S. interest in the region. It could also deny the recently violent Egyptian-Israeli-Palestinian border area an important and necessary cooling-off mechanism.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution
Political Geography:
Afghanistan, United States, America, Middle East, Israel, Uzbekistan, Philippines, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Sinai Peninsula

26. Russian Policy toward the Korean Peninsula, 1991-2001

Author:
Jane Shapiro Zacek
Publication Date:
09-2001
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Journal of Korean Studies
Institution:
International Council on Korean Studies
Abstract:
In July of 2000, Russian Federation (RF) President Vladimir Putin spent two days in Pyongyang, North Korea, the first Russian (or Soviet) head of state ever to visit that country. Newly elected President in his own right in March 2000, Putin wasted no time promoting his East Asia foreign policy agenda, including presidential visits to South Korea, China, and elsewhere in the region within the past year.
Political Geography:
Russia, China, East Asia, South Korea, North Korea, Soviet Union, Korea, Sinai Peninsula, and Pyongyang