Terrorism and Political Extremism

The Asia Foundation will release findings from its fifth public opinion poll, "Afghanistan in 2009: A Survey of the Afghan People," the most comprehensive survey conducted in all 34 of Afghanistan’s provinces.

 H.E. Ihsanoglu discussed OIC projects contributing to peacemaking and assessed the prospects of advancing U.S. - Islamic relations.

Education plays a critical role in preparing communities for change and has made important contributions to post-conflict reconciliation in numerous war-torn societies, yet education issues have largely been excluded from past efforts to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.  A new USIP report argues why an education track should be included in the negotiations phase and in the text of an agreement itself, and puts forward practical recommendations on how Israelis and Palestinians – and the international community – can move forward with a successful peace process that incorporates education.

The trade of stolen oil, or “blood oil,” in Nigeria is fueling a long-running insurgency in the Niger Delta region that has claimed many lives. A USIP special report by Judith Burdin Asuni shows how the big business of blood oil poses a threat not only to the Nigerian state and the region, but to the international community as well.

In Afghanistan's poppy-rich south and southwest, a raging insurgency intersects a thriving opium trade. A new USIP report, How Opium Profits the Taliban, examines who are the main beneficiaries of the opium trade, how traffickers influence the Taliban insurgency as well as the politics of the region, and considers the extent to which narcotics are changing the nature of the insurgency itself.

Ambassador Lodhi has long been an expert on Pakistan’s security decisions and on Pakistan’s relations with the United States and the West and is well known in Washington, DC. Her presentation at USIP will review the internal political and security problems that challenge Pakistan from the spread of Taliban influence and extremism, and the impact on Pakistan and its relations with Afghanistan and other neighbors of US and NATO operations in Afghanistan.

Fighting in Pakistan’s tribal areas rages on, as government forces step up their battle against Taliban fighters and other militants. Pakistan authorities recently said it will go after Pakistani Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud in his stronghold South Waziristan along the Afghan border. USIP’s Imtiaz Ali wrote about Mehsud in Foreign Policy magazine, arguing why this man is the new "public enemy" number one to Washington, D.C. and Islamabad.