NEW YORK Obviously the story that dominated the news over the past couple of days is Tuesday's terrorist attack in Lower Manhattan. Sayfullo Saipov, a 29 year old Uzbek immigrant who came to the US in 2010, drove a rented truck down a bicycle path Tuesday afternoon, killing eight people and injuring another 12, before … Continue reading Europe/Americas update: October 31-November 1 2017

ASIA UZBEKISTAN The big story of the day is obviously the aftermath of Tuesday's terror attack in New York, and we'll get to that later but here I wanted to try to say something about the US media's immediate obsession with Uzbekistan. The attacker, alleged I guess, was an Uzbek national named Sayfullo Saipov, and … Continue reading Asia/Africa update: October 31-November 1 2017

IRAQ Well this is probably bad news: Iraq says negotiations with the Kurds over the deployment of federal forces along the borders of their autonomous region have failed. The body overseeing Iraq's security forces said Wednesday that Kurdish forces had delayed talks in an effort to strengthen their defenses, and that as a result, both … Continue reading Middle East update: October 31-November 1 2017