by DW.de

An agreement between the leaders of Serbia and Kosovo has been hailed as a historic step forward in putting conflict in the region to rest. Now everything hinges whether the deal can be implemented.

by Pierre Prier - Le Figaro

Le président du Soudan, Omar el-Béchir, n'était pas revenu au Soudan du Sud depuis la cérémonie d'indépendance, le 9 juillet 2011. Depuis, les relations entre Omar el-Béchir et son homologue du Sud, l'ancien chef guérillero Salva Kiir, ne s'étaient pas arrangées. Les deux nouveaux pays n'arrivaient pas à gérer la paix après leur séparation à l'amiable, qui mettait fin à près de cinquante ans de guerre civile.

FIFTH BRICS SUMMIT

by Emile Nakhleh - Lobelog

As the Bahraini and international media continue to dissect the meaning of Crown Prince Salman’s appointment as first deputy prime minister, powerful factions within the ruling Al-Khalifa family must be pondering the future of their rule.

by Moon of Alabama

The Turkish president Erdogan made a deal with the imprisoned leader of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) Abdullah Öcalan. The first part of the deal is a ceasefire that will stop attacks by the PKK on Turkish state security entities and vice versa. The PKK will pull out its fighters from Turkey and move them into north Iraq. The Turkish army will not interfere with this retreat.

by Jay Radzinski and Daniel Nisman - Christian Science Monitor

“I pointed out to you the stars, and all you saw was the tip of my finger.” This Tanzanian proverb should resonate deeply with anyone who fears the spread of Islamic extremism in Africa. On Tanzania's island paradise of Zanzibar, the killing of a Catholic Priest by Muslim extremists last month points to a series of mounting and long-ignored signals that the continent’s jihadist wave is expanding south.

by Philip Giraldi - The American Conservative

A great deal of reporting on the political unrest in Egypt offers simple explanations fully comprehensible to readers in London, Paris, or New York, couched in the political expressions that those audiences are accustomed to hearing. Egyptian President Muhammad Morsi has been depicted as an Islamist with an Islamist agenda who is also an inept leader unable to solve any of Egypt’s manifold problems, most particularly its shrinking economy. This in turn is producing a revolt of the middle class—which supported genuine reform after the ouster of President Hosni Mubarak—as well as of the proletariat and working class, which have seen declines in already marginal standards of living and have been on the receiving end of brutal police crackdowns that have included well-documented instances of torture both in Cairo and in the economically significant governorates adjacent to the Suez Canal.

by Mitchell Plitnick - Lobelog

The annual Israel-Congress orgy dubbed as the AIPAC Policy Conference kicked off today. It might just as well be called the War on Iran conference — that’s sure to be the issue that dominates the proceedings. The US-Israel relationship is taking the second spot. And the Palestinians? More than ever before, they will be invisible.

by Thierry Oberlé - Le Figaro

La guerre invisible menée par la France contre Aqmi est devenue depuis quelques jours indicible. Le président François Hollande, son gouvernement et l'armée française restent plus silencieux que jamais depuis l'annonce de la mort probable d'Abdelahmid Abou Zeid et de Mokhtar Belmokhtar, les chefs des deux principaux groupes djihadistes du Sahara. Dans une interview à La Dépêche du Midi à paraître ce lundi, le ministre de la Défense, Jean-Yves Le Drian, appelle à la «prudence», estimant ne pas être «en mesure de confirmer matériellement à ce stade» la mort des deux hommes. «Le ministère de la Défense ne parle pas au conditionnel, se justifie-t-il. Une rumeur répétée à l'envi ne fait pas une information.»

by Guy Verhofstadt - President group ALDe at EU Parliament

"European leaders must learn the lesson of the Italian election result. Fiscal discipline is absolutely necessary, but alone it is not a sufficient response to tackle the crisis. As we have urged from the beginning of the crisis, a real two track approach is needed, combining austerity with solidarity and policies for growth. It is not a choice between the two, both are essential ".