Iran
Prosecutors say they have unearthed evidence in recent international money-transfer investigations that Chinese banks may have flouted United States sanctions against Iran. – New York Times
The Iranian scientist considered Tehran’s atomic-weapons guru until he was apparently sidelined several years ago is back at work, according to United Nations investigators and U.S. and Israeli officials, sparking fresh concerns about the status of Iran’s nuclear program. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
Making his first visit to Iran as United Nations secretary general, Ban Ki-moon met with four members of the country’s hierarchy on Wednesday, including the supreme leader, in sessions that Mr. Ban’s spokesman described as “very serious meetings” that addressed the disputed Iranian nuclear program, the Syria conflict, human rights problems and what he called the leadership’s objectionable comments about Israel. – New York Times
The United Nations felt obligated to release a lengthy note to the media Wednesday justifying Secretary General Ban Ki-moon’s attendance at an international summit in Iran after it came under criticism from the United States and Israel. – The Hill’s Global Affairs
For Iran, the NAM meeting is a golden opportunity to reset its international image in the face of tough European and US oil and banking sanctions and the possibility of an Israeli strike over its nuclear programme. – Financial Times
The U.N. nuclear agency has created a special Iran Task Force of nuclear weapons experts, intelligence analysts and other specialists focused on probing allegations that Tehran has been — or is — secretly working on developing atomic arms, according to an internal document shared with the Associated Press. – Associated Press
Iran has no interest in nuclear weapons but will keep pursuing peaceful nuclear energy, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei told heads of state from developing countries in Tehran. – Reuters
The scope of a cyber espionage campaign targeting Iran and other parts of the Middle East has widened, even after security experts blew the operation’s cover last month, according to the research firm that discovered the Mahdi Trojan. – Reuters
Amir Abbas Fakhravar and G. William Heiser write: Few Americans have ever heard of Arzhang Davoodi, but he has sent messages of gratitude to the people of America. Early last year, at great personal risk, he secretly recorded a video from a smuggled mobile phone in Iran’s Rajee-Shahr prison. In the video, he addressed the participants of the first Iran Democratic Transition Conference organized and conducted by the Confederation of Iranian Students at the George Washington University, just blocks from the White House and State Department…Days later, Arzhang’s jailers savagely beat him and banished him to solitary confinement. – Shadow Government
Syria
President Bashar al-Assad said he was making progress in fighting Syria’s opposition but needed more time to conclude the battle, in a rare media appearance since four of his top security aides were killed and fighting erupted in Damascus and Aleppo last month. – Wall Street Journal
The Syrian Support Group, incorporated here in April as a nonprofit, has few resources and, so far, few donations, and whether it succeeds in its larger goal remains to be seen. But it is already serving as a conduit between the United States and the armed forces seeking to topple Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad, and having an effect on American policy. – New York Times
NATO is not making any contingency plans to establish a no-fly zone or a buffer zone for refugees as calls grow for more international action in Syria, a senior NATO official said Wednesday. – DEFCON Hill
As more areas in Syria slip from control of the Syrian military, the United States is training local opposition members how to run a local government free from the grip of the Assad regime. – CNN’s Security Clearance
The opposition Syrian National Council has failed to overcome internal divisions and is not up to the challenge of overthrowing President Bashar al-Assad, a prominent former member of the group has said. – Reuters
A meeting of U.N. Security Council foreign ministers on Thursday will focus on easing Syria’s humanitarian crisis, but the absence of the top U.S., Russian and Chinese diplomats will likely highlight the body’s paralysis over how to end the 17-month conflict. – Reuters
President Bashar al-Assad said talk of a Western-imposed buffer zone on Syrian territory was unrealistic and that the situation in his country was “better”, though more time was needed to win the conflict against rebels trying to overthrow him. – Reuters
Zeir is one of many Syrian farmers who have adjusted production during the crisis in order to grow enough produce for their own consumption and for use in exchange for other goods. – Reuters
Syria has issued a large tender for wheat, a commodity not subject to sanctions, as feeding its people becomes harder in the chaos of civil war. – Reuters
Iran will form a team with other non-aligned countries to explore solutions to the crisis in Syria, the Iranian foreign minister said on Wednesday, and U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon called on Iran to use its influence to help end the violence there. – Reuters
Iran will ask developing nations attending a summit there to back its call for a ceasefire in Syria, an official said on Wednesday, as Tehran seeks to be seen as a peacemaker in a region where its Arab neighbors often view it with suspicion. – Reuters
David Ignatius reports: Syria’s most prominent military defector says the key to political transition there is to provide a “safety net” that convinces Alawites they won’t be massacred if they break with President Bashar al-Assad. – Washington Post
Egypt
As other investors flee Egypt because of worries about the country’s rocky transition to democracy, Chinese companies are pouring money into Egyptian projects in the hopes of accessing a huge domestic market and acquiring a base for exports to the Middle East. – New York Times
Egyptian authorities will detain former presidential candidate Ahmed Shafiq for questioning in a corruption investigation if he returns from abroad, a judge said Wednesday. – Washington Post
Egypt’s military said on Wednesday it would broaden its offensive against militants in the Sinai Peninsula, a campaign that has raised concerns in Israel about the movement of heavy armor into the area near its border. – Reuters
At least 12,000 civilians have gone before army courts in the security vacuum that followed the fall of Egyptian leader Hosni Mubarak, according to the campaign group No to Military Trials, and at least 5,000 are still in jail….Activists want the remainder to be released or at least referred to civilian courts for retrials. Until Mursi acts, they say, his claim to champion the cause of last year’s Arab Spring uprising will be open to question. – Reuters
Libya
Libya’s newly elected national assembly on Wednesday suspended three members for having links with former leader Muammar Gaddafi’s government, a spokesman said. – Reuters
The United Nations cultural agency UNESCO has urged Libyan authorities to protect Sufi mosques and shrines under repeated attack by hardline Islamists who consider the traditional mystical school of Islam heretical. – Reuters
Daniel Nisman writes: Libya is a nation full of potential, one whose young, relatively liberal population sits atop some of Europe’s most desired oil reserves. Realizing this potential requires a focused, national effort toward reconciliation among all Libyans, while stamping out radical and uncompromising ideologies before they take hold. Until the new leadership accepts this reality, Gadhafi’s divisive and oppressive legacy will remain alive and well. – Wall Street Journal Europe
Yemen
A U.S. drone attack killed at least four suspected Islamist militants in a car in a remote province of Yemen, a security official said. – Reuters
Saudi Arabia will give $1 billion to Yemen at a donor conference in Riyadh next week, a Yemeni minister said on Wednesday, to support Yemen’s currency as the country tries to recover after more than a year of turmoil. – Reuters
Iraq
Colin L. Powell, who as secretary of state famously made the case for war against Iraq in 2003 with an impassioned speech at the United Nations Security Council, was more skeptical about the evidence he used to justify the American-led invasion than previously known, according to a new memoir by Kofi Annan, the secretary general at the time. – New York Times
The State Department on Wednesday urged Iraq to continue its efforts to address humanitarian concerns raised by Iranian dissidents at a camp near Baghdad. – Washington Times
Iraq’s military took delivery of nine American M1A1 Abrams tanks, the last in an order of 140 that it has received over the past two years, the U.S. embassy in Baghdad said in an Aug. 29 statement. – AFP
Bill Gertz reports: Iraq’s Shiite-dominated government, led by President Nouri al-Maliki, continues to align itself more closely with neighboring Iran. According to U.S. defense officials, including one who recently returned from Iraq, Mr. Maliki recently shifted a large number of Sunni-dominated Iraqi troop units near Syria away from the border and replaced them with Shiite troops. – Washington Times’ Inside the Ring
Levant
As spillover from the civil war in Syria increasingly threatens Lebanon’s stability, the Lebanese military remains weak, hindered by a lack of political support to confront security issues, low morale and a struggle against the pull of volatile sectarian politics. – New York Times
The Amman surgical program, run by Médecins Sans Frontières, was originally set up in 2006 to treat casualties of the Iraq war. Médecins Sans Frontières renovated a floor of a hospital belonging to the Red Crescent in Jordan to house the program, which today has expanded to become a vital refuge for victims of the many wars raging in the region. – New York Times
Although the websites’ purposes and the people behind them differ, on Wednesday these and other leading Jordanian blogs and online news sites shared the same home page: A black screen. This “blackout” campaign is an online protest against proposed changes in Jordanian laws that social media and free-press advocates call censorship under the cover of anti-pornography legislation. – LA Times’ World Now
Israel
Arab states may decide against targeting Israel over its assumed nuclear arsenal at the U.N. atomic agency’s annual conference so as not to imperil wider efforts for a nuclear weapons-free Middle East, diplomats say. – Reuters
A former Israeli official on Wednesday denied suspicions that Israel poisoned Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat as France prepared to begin an investigation into his possible murder following a Swiss lab’s claim that it found traces of a deadly substance on his belongings. – Associated Press
Israel’s high court ruled on Wednesday that the largest unauthorized Jewish settler outpost on occupied West Bank territory must be evacuated by next Tuesday. – Reuters
Afghanistan
President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan has broadened a top-level cabinet shake-up, firing the country’s spy chief on Wednesday and, according to Western officials, lining up replacements for that post and the vacant Defense and Interior Ministries, at least one of which seemed likely to heighten tensions between Parliament and the presidential palace. – New York Times
Five Australian troops were killed in two separate incidents in Afghanistan, making it the bloodiest 24-hour period for Canberra in the war as attacks on foreign troops by rogue Afghan soldiers continue. – Washington Post
Despite a recent spate of insider attacks, most U.S. and Afghan deaths at the hands Afghan security forces have not been organized by the Taliban as part of a larger insurgency, and coalition forces are continuing to make progress in the country, a senior NATO official said Aug. 29. – Defense News
American officials have hailed the ALP as an effective homegrown force which has restricted the ability of the Taliban to move in the countryside…But security gains made by the now 20,000-strong militia are often overshadowed by mounting accusations of abuses, including rape and murder. – Reuters
Pakistan
Obama administration officials confirmed Wednesday that the military operations commander of the Taliban-allied Haqqani militant network was killed by a U.S. drone-fired missile last week in Pakistan. – Washington Post
A Pakistani court adjourned on Thursday a bail hearing for a Christian girl accused of defaming Islam, prompting human rights activists to make fresh calls for her release in a case that has drawn renewed criticism of the country’s anti-blasphemy laws. – Reuters
Knox Thames writes: Pakistan’s blasphemy law sits at the intersection of vertical governmental repression and horizontal societal violence, with the two feeding off each other to create a cycle of suffering and cruelty. For the sake of stability, security, and freedom, Pakistan must take action now. – Freedom House’s Freedom at Issue
China
The 18th Party Congress in October will anoint the people who are to lead China through 2020. Yet even as police evict potential troublemakers from the city in preparation for the party’s biggest event in a decade, it still hasn’t dealt with the renegade politician whose wife was convicted last week of murder. – Los Angeles Times
Sluggish global growth has eased the world’s once-surging demand for Chinese goods this year, and the head of the world’s biggest shipping line believes the slowdown suggests more permanent challenges to China’s export sector. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
China’s Communist Party is considering downgrading the role of domestic security chief as part of a move to a new and smaller top elite, reflecting fears that the position has become too powerful, sources said. – Reuters
There are encouraging signs that attitudes towards Tibet are shifting in China, the Dalai Lama said on Wednesday, adding that the exiled Tibetan leadership is ready for fresh talks on his homeland if there was a genuine change of heart in Beijing. – Reuters
A Chinese dissident imprisoned for 10 years on a state subversion conviction supported by evidence from the Web portal Yahoo is due to be released Friday after completing his term, his wife said. – Associated Press
Miles Yu reports: Rear Adm. Yin Zhuo, a leading Chinese navy official, told his nation Aug. 24 that plans to boost U.S. missile defenses in Asia are a strategic conspiracy to trick other nations in the region into investing vast resources to develop nuclear and ballistic weapons. – Washington Times’ Inside China
Minxin Pei writes: China could come roaring back in a few years, and the United States should not ignore this possibility. But the party’s demise can’t be ruled out, and the current signs of trouble in China have provided invaluable clues to such a highly probable seismic shift. U.S. policymakers would be committing another strategic error of historic proportions if they miss or misread them. – Foreign Policy
East Asia
Government officials from Japan and North Korea held their first talks in four years on Wednesday, amid hopes that the North’s new leader could be trying to reduce tensions with Japan and, by extension, the United States. – New York Times
The latest flare-up of a territorial dispute between South Korea and Japan shouldn’t prevent economic cooperation between the two nations, Seoul’s finance minister said in Moscow. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
North Korea could be heading towards a crisis similar to the 1990s when a million people are thought to have died after a series of natural disasters brought widespread famine, said an aid worker, just back from a tour of the impoverished state. – Reuters
India
A former state education minister and 31 others were convicted on Wednesday for their roles in the deaths of 94 people during one of the most savage attacks of the 2002 Gujarat riots. – NYT’s India Ink
China’s defense minister is due to visit India next week to seek deeper military ties, in a rare trip seen as a sign Beijing wants to stabilize its heavily fortified Himalayan border as it deals with growing friction in the South China Sea. – Reuters
Trans-Pacific Partnership
U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk will discuss how the United States can deepen trade ties with fast-growing nations in Southeast Asia in talks this week in Cambodia, U.S. trade officials said. – Reuters
Russia
Russia’s most senior Islamic cleric warned on Wednesday that civil war could break out in the southern region of Dagestan after a moderate Muslim cleric was killed in a suicide bombing that has heightened religious tensions. – Reuters
Europe
The Georgian authorities said Wednesday that their forces had engaged in a fierce gun battle to free five Georgian villagers being held by a band of heavily armed militants who had crossed over the mountainous border from the Russian republic of Dagestan. Three Georgian officers and at least 10 militants were killed, officials said. – New York Times
EU officials say the region’s foreign policy chief, Baroness Ashton, is eyeing a more hands-on role in the [Kosovo-Serbia] talks in an effort to re-inject some energy. – WSJ’s Real Time Brussels
A political storm in Berlin over why German police were training Belarusian security forces as late as last year is increasingly turning into a spat between Germany and the EU. – Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
United States of America
On the evening of the biggest day in his political career, Mitt Romney previewed GOP convention speeches focused on the Republican plans for defense and foreign policy. – DEFCON Hill
Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.), who’s in line to become the top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee following the primary defeat of Sen. Dick Lugar (R-Ind.), has hired the director of the Bipartisan Policy Center’s Homeland Security Project to be his new legislative director and general counsel. – The Hill’s Global Affairs
President Obama has displayed a “breathtaking irresponsibility” on national security issues, endangering America by abandoning its closest allies and failing to lead on major defense issues of the day, according to a senior Romney campaign adviser. – Washington Free Beacon
Four years after losing badly to President Barack Obama, Sen. John McCain didn’t use his Republican National Convention speech to dwell on the past. Instead, the 2008 Republican nominee focused on the one issue that hasn’t gotten any air time at the RNC — foreign policy — arguing for a more forceful, interventionist policy in the Middle East. – Politico
Former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice offered an impassioned defense of American exceptionalism Wednesday, in what was arguably the best received address of the Republican National Convention thus far. – Washington Free Beacon
Read the Secretary’s remarks as prepared for delivery – The Weekly Standard Blog
“It’s time to begin to send a different message to” Iran regarding its disputed nuclear program, according to former Minnesota Governor and Romney campaign co-chair Tim Pawlenty. – Washington Free Beacon
Josh Rogin reports: The biggest looming question about how a President Mitt Romney would steer the American ship of state is whether he would favor the realist tendencies of the Republican Party establishment or the neoconservative leanings of its younger generation. – The Cable
Rogin also reports: In a move that is sure to ignite a firestorm of speculation about who would be Secretary of State in a second Obama administration, President Barack Obama has chosen Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) to deliver a key national security themed speech on the final night of the Democratic National Convention. – The Cable
Owen and Bing West write: We may never know which version is true. What’s certain is that the leaks from the top caused grave harm to sensitive programs and adversely affected the lives of foreign nationals who worked with us. The leaks damaged U.S. relations with other countries and individuals who have put their faith in us but may be wary of doing so in the future. Worst of all, the leaks undermined American trust in our top officials. – Wall Street Journal
Latin America
[S]ince the incident, which occurred just two months after a shootout involving crooked federal officers that left three dead at the Mexico City airport, the denunciations of the police have been withering. For many here, whether the attackers turned out to be corrupt or just bumbling, Calderon’s new and improved federal police force is just more of the same. – Los Angeles Times
The U.S. and Mexican governments have said little about the nature of their work since last week’s shooting, a silence that has put a spotlight on the growing but often secretive U.S. role in Mexico’s brutal drug war. – AFP
Activists including an American hiker who had been jailed in Iran delivered petitions with more than 100,000 signatures to a Nicaraguan consulate in Los Angeles on Wednesday demanding freedom for a U.S. citizen they say is unjustly imprisoned in the Central American country. – Reuters
Africa
Across Africa, protests have flared against long-serving leaders, beginning with the ouster of the entrenched presidents of Tunisia and Egypt. Activists have turned to the tools that unleashed the Arab Spring—Facebook and YouTube—to organize and agitate. African politicians and foreign governments have been forced to respond. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
Kenya’s enemies were behind the killing of a Muslim cleric that triggered riots and violence intended to create divisions between the country’s Christians and Muslims, Prime Minister Raila Odinga said on Wednesday. – Reuters
Rival armed groups may have killed hundreds of civilians in massacres and other “incomprehensibly vicious” attacks in eastern parts of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), senior U.N. officials said on Wednesday. – Reuters
A wave of labor unrest and violence in South Africa’s mining sector will have an impact on potential investments, the country’s resources minister said on Wednesday. – Reuters
Cathal Gilbert and Karl Beck write: In their addresses to the General Assembly, the same SADC leaders who killed the tribunal will express themselves piously on these subjects. Civil society must challenge them in the media and in the pertinent UN and other international bodies. These leaders’ records on human rights and rule of law with regard to the tribunal must be exposed. The only alternative is acquiescence to the transformation of SADC into little more than an exclusive political club aimed at entrenching dictatorial tendencies and shielding Southern Africa’s worst human rights abusers from sanction. – Freedom House’s Freedom at Issue
