diyaCFR military expert Stephen Biddle sees improvements in Iraqi security forces but worries about an erosion in stability if the U.S. military presence is sharply reduced.

Ethiopia’s U.S. ambassador says his government needs more international help in securing Somalia and is wrongly blamed by Congress for rights abuses.

Jan Eliasson, the UN secretary-general’s special envoy for Darfur, says any new political agreement on Darfur must reflect the realities on the ground.

John Kiriakou, a former CIA anti-terrorism official based in Pakistan, says the situation in Afghanistan has worsened in the past couple of years and life in Kabul has become much more perilous.

A U.S. official involved in training Iraqi forces says the U.S. military will likely have to adjust the way it assists Iraqi units as coalition forces withdraw.

Richard N. Haass, CFR president and an expert on the Middle East, says the congressional testimony by the top two U.S. officials in Iraq has to a large extent “regained control of the Iraq debate” for the Bush administration.

William H. Luers, a top U.S. expert on the United Nations, says the recent Security Council resolution authorizing increased UN diplomatic activity in Iraq marks a change in U.S. policy.

Sudan’s U.S. ambassador says Western states need to give the National Unity Government space to solve the Darfur crisis.

Princeton N. Lyman says that despite calls for military intervention in Darfur, he does not believe that such an approach would be practical. He hopes the U.S. special envoy to Darfur will be able to get the parties back to the negotiating table.

In this Policy Outlook piece for the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, NATO Deputy Assistant Secretary General for Emerging Security Challenges Jamie Shea discusses the role of NATO in times of austerity and how it can meet the challenges that lie ahead.

Michael Schuman of Time's The Curious Capitalist reevaluates the U.S. role of global policeman, especially in light of the federal deficit and other national security concerns.

Jeffrey White outlines the different forms foreign military intervention in Libya might take.

Presentation Speech for the Nobel Peace Prize of Barack Obama, by Thorbjørn Jagland, Chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, in Oslo.

Are U.N. peacekeepers failing in their mission to protect the world?

Alex de Waal asserts that success in international peace engagement requires three components: a normative agreement, improvement in human security, and an elite bargain.

PBS's Frontline explores the story of what happened in Haditha, Iraq, and how it forced the U.S. military to confront the rules of war in a way it never had to before.

A German institute for international and security affairs calls on the EU to re-examine the underlying purposes of EUFOR Chad/CAR and consider abandoning the entire operation.

Darfur online forum features a debate between Sudan experts Alex De Waal and John Prendergast.