Damage caused to NGO offices CARE USA and Counterpart International following a Taliban attack in Kabul, May 2019 © DesClark Photos A...

Employment opportunities, especially for women, in Mosul, are few and far between.. © DesClarkPhotos 2021 In the summer of 2014, the...

Iraqi street wiring representing the political system. Connections. Convoluted. Complicated. Challenging. Corrupting. © DesClark Photos A...

Ready to take off and leave Afghanistan.... © DesClark desclark.photos U.S. and NATO troops are rapidly executing President Biden’s...

West Mosul June 2021 © DesClark Photos The biggest question now is when the system will collapse completely—and equally important what...

The September pullout of US troops will change the calculations of the Afghan negotiating parties and could lead to a recharged civil war...

Looking across the Tigris to the unfinished Al-Rahman Mosque, Baghdad © Des Clark 2018 In the eighteen years since the fall of Saddam’s...

The tomb site of Ahmad Shah Massoud in Panjshir, Afghanistan © Des Clark 2020 Serious conflict risks will exist in Afghanistan even after...

The stabilization of the Iraqi state remains strategically important to the United States and worthy of a concerted US policy effort....

A recently published research paper by Dr Renad Mansour, Senior Research Fellow, Middle East and North Africa Programme; Project...

On the eve of the one-year anniversary of the U.S.-Taliban agreement, Afghanistan remains unfortunately far away from peace. The historic...

Should Libyans employ a transitional justice process, with support from the international community, focusing on adjudicating the past...

At present, the Afghan peace negotiations (APN) between the Afghan government and the Taliban do not involve any third-party presence...

Community based education class in Parwan province, Afghanistan © Des Clark 2020 There are significant debates and differences of opinion...

This Clingendael Institute report assesses the impact of Turkish-Qatari cooperation between 2002 and 2020 on conflict and geopolitical...

The Islamic State still poses a lingering threat to peace and stability in Afghanistan, so it remains a key consideration for the...

Despite terrible losses, Médecins Sans Frontières has decided to keep working in Afghanistan in the name of a “humanitarian imperative” –...

Nearly half of the camps’ 65,000 residents are Iraqis, and their prospect for return remains deeply uncertain. USIP’s Sarhang Hamasaeed...

Around a dozen men, dressed mostly not in fatigues but in shalwar kameez and trainers, stand around. Some hold their guns; most do not. A...

In a year of Iraqi turmoil, including protests that ousted a government and rivalry between Iran and Turkey, Iraqi tribal and community...