Voice of America Radio

Voice of America Interviews Nir Rosen on Iraqi Exodus

Communications — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 13:01:00 -0400

New America in the News:

The United Nations estimates there are now more than four million Iraqis who are either internally displaced or have fled the violence in their homeland to become refugees, mostly in neighboring states. Middle East analysts say the crisis is continuing to grow and is straining services in Syria and Jordan, where most of the refugees now live. VOA correspondent Meredith Buel has details in this background report from Washington.

The United Nations says the magnitude of the crisis is staggering. More than two million Iraqis are believed to be displaced inside the country, and another 2.2 million are refugees in other nations.

About 1.4 million refugees now live in Syria, 750,000 in Jordan, 80,000 in Egypt and about 200,000 in Persian Gulf countries...

The U.N. says the current exodus of Iraqis is the largest long-term population movement in the Middle East since the displacement of Palestinians following the creation of Israel in 1948.

Middle East analyst Nir Rosen, a fellow at the New America Foundation, says the millions of displaced Iraqis are likely to further destabilize the region.

"You will hear Iraqis say we are being treated like Palestinians," said Rosen. "We are the new Palestinians. I believe in years to come we will see them too becoming more organized, mobilized and indeed militarized and I think the Iraq conflict will become the Middle East conflict quite soon..."

For the complete article, please visit the Voice of America website.

VOA Interviews Afshin Molavi on Iran, Saudi Arabia, and U.S. Policy

Communications — Sat, 14 Apr 2007 19:44:00 -0400

New America in the News:

Iranian-born author and scholar, Afshin Molavi talks about Iranian politics, Saudi Arabia’s growing diplomatic role in the Middle East and US policy toward the region. He also discusses "the new Silk Road, an economic dynamic fueled by India and China's rising influence in the Persian Gulf region, with VOA’s Spozhmai Maiwandi, program Manager of the South and West Asia Division, and host Carol Castiel.

To listen to the interview, please download the attached MP3 recording below. Additional audio formats are available at the Voice of America website.

Afshin Molavi, Flynt Leverett on Iran, Saudi Arabia on Voice of America

Communications — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 17:14:00 -0500

New America in the News:

Before the U.S. toppled Saddam Hussein, Iraq had been something of a counterweight to Iranian power in the Middle East. Now with Saddam gone, Iranian political influence has been expanding, not just in Iraq, but in the region. As VOA correspondent Gary Thomas reports, Saudi Arabia is not happy about the shift in what had been a delicate balance of power.

Empowering Iran was not one of aims of the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq. Nevertheless, analysts say, it has become one of its unintended consequences.

In an interview with a pro-Saudi group, Flynt Leverett, former senior director for Middle East Affairs at the National Security Council, said it has been especially worrisome for Saudi Arabia.

"I think that the Iraq war has been almost disastrous from a Saudi perspective," he said. "It has completely upset the balance of power in the Gulf, enabled Iran's rise, created a dynamic in post-Saddam Iraq where the most powerful political forces are Islamist Shia with ties to Iran..."

The rivalry is rooted in both religion and politics. Saudi Arabia is a Sunni Muslim Arab state controlled by a royal family. Iran is a country of Persian Shi'ite Muslims that has been under the theocratic rule of Islamic clerics since 1979. Both are major oil-producing nations.

Secular Iraq, under the autocratic thumb of Saddam Hussein, was kind of a counterweight that kept regional power in check. Analysts say Saudi Arabia was quite content to see Iran and Iraq slug it out in a bloody war from 1980 to 1988 in which thousands died but no one emerged the clear victor.

Afshin Molavi, a fellow at the New America Foundation, says both Iran and Saudi Arabia harbor ambitions to be leaders in the Islamic world.

"In many ways, Saudi Arabia views itself as a pan-Islamic power, it doesn't view itself only as a Sunni power," he said. "And, interestingly, Iran is sometimes characterized as the vanguard of the Shia of the region, but Iran also likes to think of itself as a pan-Islamic power. So in some ways, both of these countries are vying for the mantle of leadership in the Muslim world..."

For the complete article, please visit the Voice of America News website.

Voice of America Reports on New America's Ten Big Ideas Event

Communications — Sat, 03 Feb 2007 23:14:00 -0500

New America in the News:

U.S. Senator Hillary Clinton, a Democrat from New York, and Senator Lindsey Graham, a Republican from South Carolina, were the keynote speakers at a conference this week unveiling a number of radical ideas meant to inspire change in U.S. policy on areas such as health care, climate change, and energy efficiency. Both senators, who say they are good friends despite political differences, said they believe the country needs courage and compromise to make the radical changes they say are needed to solve some long-standing problems. VOA's Marissa Melton reports from Washington.

The theme of the Ten Big Ideas for a New America conference, hosted by the nonpartisan New America research group this week was, well, the Ten Big Ideas in the title, proposals by scholars on election systems, economics, health care, retirement, and higher education to improve long-standing problems in U.S. policy. But the big-name speakers, Clinton, Graham, and New America founder Ted Halstead, focused on a broader idea. Each said the results of November's congressional elections, in which Democrats gained control of both the Senate and the House of Representatives, signals a new feeling in the nation that this is the time for a new approach to old problems.

Halstead said there is support now for aggressive change in U.S. policy, after more than a decade of Republican control in Congress. "The political moment in America now is so ripe for big ideas. No question, the recent election was as significant turning point in American political history. As we all know, it was the end of conservative political domination of Congress that began in 1994. But what was so interesting about this recent election and this new era in American politics is that the pendulum has not swung back to traditional liberalism. Rather, this new era belongs to those who are willing to step outside of the partisan fray and offer the American people what they most want, which is bipartisan cooperation on bold reforms to solve our national problems..."

For the complete report and to listen to an audio clip, please visit the Voice of America website.

VOA Interviews Nir Rosen on Moqtada al-Sadr

Communications — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 21:53:00 -0500

New America in the News:

Hassan Nasrallah and Moqtada al-Sadr are both deeply religious Shi'ites who say they believe Islam holds the answer to the problems facing Muslim societies. They head organizations with a militant wing and a network that provides social services for thousands of the poor in their countries. Both are powerful politicians. They believe in armed resistance.

Both men are anti-American and anti-Western. The U.S.-led coalition in Iraq says Moqtada al-Sadr is responsible for much of the violence in Iraq, including a mob killing of a pro-American Shi'ite cleric in 2004. And Hezbollah, designated a terrorist organization by the United States, is blamed for a large number of deadly attacks, hijackings and the kidnapping of Westerners, and the bombing of a U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut that killed 241 people in 1983...

"Moqtada [al-Sadr] is still very inexperienced," says Nir Rosen, a Middle East expert at the New American Foundation in Washington.

"Moqtada's movement began as a reaction to the U.S. occupation [of Iraq] and its leadership. And they [al-Sadr's followers] don't have a real agenda yet, except for being against things. They are against the U.S. occupation, against all Sunnis. Nasrallah is much more of a uniting figure. You see a guy with a big beard and a turban talking about Jihad, you don't think of his potential as a uniting figure - - someone who can be a national symbol. But for many Lebanese, that's what Nasrallah is," says Rosen...

For the complete article, please visit the Voice of America Radio website.

Afshin Molavi Discusses Iran on Voice of America

Communications — Fri, 22 Sep 2006 07:30:00 -0400

New America in the News:

The European Union's foreign policy chief Javier Solana and Iran's top nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani have been meeting in recent days to discuss ways to resolve Iran's nuclear standoff with the West. Tehran recently hinted that it would be willing to freeze its uranium enrichment program for two months in a bid to jumpstart talks with the European Union and the United States.

Iranian journalist Afshin Molavi, a fellow at the New America Foundation, calls Iran's reported offer "significant." Speaking with host Judith Latham of VOA News Now's International Press Club, Mr. Molavi says there is serious debate within Iran about the efficacy of negotiations with the international community. If one examines the history of nuclear negotiations, he observes, the Iranian government has "tended to get a better deal when they have been more defiant." Regarding the controversial US visit of former Iranian president Mohammed Khatami, Afshin Molavi, author of The Soul of Iran, says the former president "clearly has differences" with President Ahmadinejad...

For the entire article, please visit the Voice of America website.