U.S. OFFERS A THIRD DRAFT RESOLUTION IN SEARCH OF UN BACKING
Having twice been rebuffed by key Security Council members France, Germany, Russia and China, the Bush administration submitted a third draft resolution Monday in hoping of winning a vote endorsing its current Iraq effort -- a move that Washington hopes would provide political cover for greater military and financial assistance from reluctant allies. But although the new draft seeks to address concerns on the need for a timetable and a vehicle for restoring Iraqi sovereignty, its chances of winning unanimous support may be clouded by the fact that it continues to offer only a vague political role to the UN.
(Washington Post, October 13, 2003)

IRAQIS REJECT TURKISH TROOPS
The announcement that Turkey had agreed to send up to 20,000 men to Iraq may have come as welcome relief for an overstretched U.S. military, but it has been greeted with alarm by ordinary Iraqis and the U.S.-appointed Governing Council. Despite efforts to persuade the IGC to back down, the Council has stuck to its guns and has instead gone to the Arab League to seek support for its position that no neighboring countries should send troops into Iraq. Mindful of Kurdish concerns, the U.S. intends to deploy the Turks instead in the "Sunni triangle" where resistance has been strongest. But Iraq's Sunnis are also hostile to the Turks, under whose occupation they lived until World War I.
(Financial Times, October 13, 2003)

SADR'S IRAQI SHIITES CHALLENGE THE U.S.
The radical firebrand Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr has raised the temperature of his dispute with the U.S. occupation authorities in Iraq by declaring his intention to launch his own, Islamic government to challenge the legitimacy of the U.S.-appointed Iraqi Governing Council. While hardly speaking for all Shiites, Sadr has mass support in the slums of east Baghdad and a number of other cities, and last Friday's clashes in which two U.S. soldiers were killed on his turf underline the mounting danger. Sadr's followers have now warned the U.S. forces to stay out of their neighborhoods, leaving the U.S. facing some uncomfortable choices: They can't let Sadr have his way, but as they've discovered each time they move in his direction, confronting him risks a violent clash with a major Iraqi constituency that has, until now, stayed out of the anti-American insurgency.
(Knight-Ridder, October 10, 2003)

FORMER MINISTERS ROUND ON BLAIR
Former UK Foreign Secretary Robin Cook quit Tony Blair's cabinet even before the Iraq invasion in protest over Blair's support for the war, and now he's telling Britons that the prime minister had privately conceded, two weeks before the war began, that Saddam posed no immediate danger. Cook, in his newly published diary, maintains that Blair had decided to go to war to back Presidnet Bush regardless of the outcome of UN weapons inspections.
(ITV, October 4, 2003)

CHENEY COMES OUT SWINGING
Before the Iraq war, Vice-President Dick Cheney went further than most administration officials in overstating the threat supposedly represented by Saddam Hussein -- Cheney even said Saddam had "reconstituted nuclear weapons" -- and the failure to find postwar evidence to back many of the administration's claims has not deterred the Vice President. Indeed, even after President Bush disavowed the claim, Cheney continues even to hold out the possibility that Saddam may have had a hand in the 9/11 attacks. And in a muscular defense of the administration's preemption doctrine, Cheney insists that the invasion was the only prudent course of action because failure to act against even the potential of an Iraqi weapons of mass destruction threat combined with the potential of an Iraq-al Qaeda alliance could have been fatefully negligent.
(Heritage Foundation, October 10, 2003)

MIDDLE EAST TEETERS WITHOUT RULES OR BORDERS
The geopolitical equilibrium of the past three decades in the Middle East has been both unhealthy and hazardous, argues former State Department official Robert Malley (currently with the International Crisis Group). But over the past three years, many of the spoken and unspoken rules that contained the conflicts of an inherently unstable region have been broken, and they haven't been replaced by any new set of rules or framework. All the players now, are acting simply on the basis of fear and strength, while the U.S. has almost entirely abdicated its refereeing functioning. The result, Malley warns, is a vacuum far more dangerous than the previous unstable order.
(Washington Post, October 13, 2003)

ISRAEL EXPANDS ITS NUCLEAR CAPABILITY
U.S. efforts to deter Iran from going nuclear won't be helped by the revelation by U.S. and Israeli officials that Israel is now capable of launching nuclear-armed cruise missiles from its submarine fleet. Israel's capability creates a strategic incentive for its Middle Eastern neighbors to seek parity, suggesting that sooner or later the U.S. will have to take the lead in a process of writing a new nuclear rule book for the region.
(Los Angeles Times, October 12, 2003)

UN EXPANDS AFGHAN SECURITY MISSION
Hoping to reverse a rising tide of violence in Afghanistan, the UN Security Council has authorized the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) to begin operating outside of the capital, Kabul. The first contingent of Germany troops will leave shortly to conduct operation in the north, around Kunduz. But making the decision to expand beyond the capital effective will require up to 10,000 new troops, which have yet to be found.
(BBC, October 13, 2003)

BOLIVIA FACES GAS SHOWDOWN
At least five Bolivians have died in clashes over the decision by the government in La Paz to begin exporting the country's natural gas. At issue: An IMF-backed economic liberalization policy shepherded by a president well liked by international institutions but deeply unpopular at home. In other words, a test case for globalization in Latin America.
(BBC, October 13, 2003)

KOSOVO TALKS REVIVE A DEFERRED MOMENT OF TRUTH
The cease-fire ending NATO's military operations over Kosovo deferred the question of the territory's political status. It remains legally part of Serbia, but is run as a UN protectorate in what Kosovar Albanians see as a progenitor of sovereign independence. And both sides appear to be doing their best to avoid long-scheduled talks on the issue due to begin in Vienna this week
(Washington Post, October 13, 2003)

SOUTH KOREA POLITICAL CRISIS COULD HINDER EFFORTS TO DETER PYONGYANG'S NUKE AMBITIONS
South Korea's dovish President Roh Moo-hyun announced this week that he no longer enjoys the confidence of the electorate to do his job, and will hold a referendum in December on whether to remain in office. Besides plunging Seoul into a new season of political turmoil, the same month that South Korea, the U.S., China and Japan had hoped to join North Korea in a new round of talks designed to curb Pyongyang's nuclear program. The timing couldn't be worse, warns the Economist.