Middle East
- Tino Calabia
- • December 9, 2016

WASHINGTON, D.C. — One year ago, almost 1 percent of the world’s population, about 65 million people, had been forcibly displaced from their homes. That is a population size that would constitute a nation larger than Britain or would…
- Categories: Development, Humanitarian Aid, Middle East, Migration, Refugees
- Ilgin Yorulmaz
- • November 21, 2016

The United Nations Counter-Terrorism Center was set up in 2011 with money from Saudi Arabia to combat terrorism worldwide. Some experts, however, now question the center’s ability to eliminate terrorist threats. There are also questions about whether the money…
- Categories: Middle East, Peace and Security, Security Council, Terrorism
- Johanna Higgs
- • July 9, 2016

ERBIL, Iraq — Despite the war crimes being committed against women and girls in northern Iraq since the extremist group ISIS invaded two years ago, rejection of entrenched violence and discrimination against females may be taking root among pockets…
- Categories: Gender Violence, Middle East, Terrorism, Women
- Barbara Crossette
- • May 1, 2016

Grim images from the small world of children are multiplying. Little bodies adrift in the Aegean and Mediterranean seas. Uncomprehending faces pressed against wire fences and barricades in Europe from the Balkans to the French port of Calais. At…
- Categories: Africa, Asia, Child Soldiers, Middle East
- Johanna Higgs and Liga Rudzite
- • April 6, 2016

GAZIANTEP, Turkey — Amima and Fatima Jebari are Syrian sisters who fled last year to the southern Turkish city of Gaziantep, near the Syrian border, after the Free Syrian Army entered their village in the north, they said, and…
- Categories: Gender Violence, Human Rights, Middle East, Refugees, Women
- Barbara Crossette
- • March 20, 2016

Only close cooperation between the United States and Russia can end the “terrible tragedy” in Syria, says Lakhdar Brahimi, the highly respected international mediator in the Middle East for more than two decades. Brahimi, who led United Nations missions…
- Categories: Middle East
- Barbara Crossette
- • March 1, 2016

For more than a quarter-century, beginning in the late 1970s, the number of children born to a woman in Egypt had been declining, on average, to about 3.0, in line with declining fertility rate trends in much of North…
- Categories: Health and Population, Middle East, Women
- Barbara Crossette
- • February 7, 2016

He can’t risk the lives of family members by identifying himself by name, but he is willing to tell his story, a reflection of what has happened to intellectual life in what was once a center of higher education…
- Categories: Education, Middle East
- Dulcie Leimbach
- • January 20, 2016

While new Syrian peace talks organized by the United Nations remain tentatively scheduled to begin on Jan. 25 in Switzerland, a substantial group of Syrian women is preparing to convene in Geneva starting that day to demand an equal…
- Categories: Gender Violence, Human Rights, Middle East
- Dulcie Leimbach
- • December 26, 2015

When the United Nations Security Council recently approved timelines to begin peace talks and institute a national cease-fire in Syria, the language in the resolution gave no hint of the magnitude of such undertakings, nor did the congratulatory speeches…
- Categories: Gender Violence, Middle East, Peace and Security, Security Council, Women
- Katherine M. Wolchko
- • December 16, 2015

SOUTH ORANGE, N.J. — For some Syrian refugees, “home” is no longer the plains of war-torn Syria but the densely populated cities of northern New Jersey. Since January this year, 86 refugees have arrived in the state, according to…
- Categories: Middle East, Migration, Refugees, Women
- Barbara Crossette
- • November 24, 2015

At the end of July, Physicians for Human Rights, a group of health care professionals who have been documenting abuses in conflict areas for nearly three decades, went to Turkey to hear the stories of Syrian doctors who are…
- Categories: Middle East, Terrorism
- Dulcie Leimbach
- • November 15, 2015

The United Nations has wedged its way into playing a monitoring role in a possible cease-fire in Syria and a convening role in gathering the Syrian government and opposition parties to try to meet for formal talks by Jan….
- Categories: Middle East, Peace and Security, Refugees, Security Council, Terrorism
- Tom Woodcock
- • October 26, 2015

While the regional coalition led by Saudi Arabia continues its aerial bombardment against the Houthi rebels in Yemen, and as ground troops — from Bahrain, Sudan and United Arab Emirates — join the Saudis in the fray, the pain…
- Categories: Human Rights, Humanitarian Aid, Middle East, Secretary-General, Security Council
- Barbara Crossette
- • October 4, 2015

With an astounding 12 million people in Syria displaced from their homes in a population that numbered about 23 million before its civil war began in full fledge in 2012, the questions that inevitably arise are: Why isn’t the…
- Categories: Middle East, Migration, Refugees