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Claims that major terrorist acts were foiled in Azerbaijan at the end of 2007 have prompted discussion about the extent to which Islamic extremism is a genuine threat in the oil-rich land.

The regional mediation offering the most realistic chance to resolve Zimbabwe’s eight-year crisis has failed. South African President Thabo Mbeki’s stated objective in talks between the ruling ZANU-PF party and the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) was to secure conditions for free and fair elections that would produce an undisputed outcome.

The policy of isolating Hamas and sanctioning Gaza is bankrupt and, by all conceivable measures, has backfired.

A month has passed since Kosovo declared independence on 17 February 2008. Much has gone well, but there is a real risk, as made most evident with the violence on 17 March around the courthouse in north Mitrovica, that partition will harden at the Ibar River in the north, and Kosovo will become another frozen conflict.

The policies of a decade or more to stop the flow of cocaine from the Andean source countries, Colombia, Peru and Bolivia, to the two largest consumer markets, the U.S. and Europe, have proved insufficient and ineffective.