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May 20, 2021 New Cybersecurity Executive Order Seeks to Improve Trust Through Verification President Joe Biden issued a new executive order last week to raise cybersecurity requirements for federal contractors and bolster the cybersecurity of federal networks. While the executive order will better... May 20, 2021 Treasury Sanctions Jihadist Financiers in Turkey – For the Fifth Time in Two Years The U.S. Department of the Treasury designated a Turkey-based company and three Turkey-linked individuals on Monday for facilitating the Islamic State’s (IS’) financial networks and transactions. The... May 19, 2021 Cover-Ups of WHO Misconduct Expose Leadership Failures and Compromised Agency Culture The World Health Organization (WHO) reportedly covered up sexual assault allegations involving senior agency officials, while Italian prosecutors are investigating another top WHO figure for making false... May 13, 2021 The United States Has a Data Broker Problem Apple last month released its new App Tracking Transparency feature, which seeks to help users prevent apps from tracking, capturing, or selling their digital activity to third-party data brokers. Stopping... May 13, 2021 Commerce Department Targets Former Turkish Banker for Evading Iran Sanctions The U.S. Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security on May 5 announced it would deny export privileges to Mehmet Hakan Atilla, the former deputy general manager of Halkbank, Turkey’s second-largest... May 13, 2021 Hamas Escalates Israeli-Palestinian Conflict Hamas’ rocket fire from Gaza into Jerusalem and other Israeli cities this week marked a dangerous escalation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, leading the Jewish state to respond with airstrikes. These... May 7, 2021 China and Russia Combine Forces to Undermine WHO Reform As diplomats prepare for the World Health Organization’s (WHO’s) annual agenda-setting meeting, China and Russia have combined forces to undermine EU-led efforts to reform the beleaguered health body.... May 6, 2021 European Parliament Raps UNRWA The European Parliament (EP) last week passed a budgetary resolution that rebukes the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) for preaching hatred of Israel in its school textbooks, and calls for... May 6, 2021 Time for Biden to Oppose Gulf Monarchies’ Outreach to Assad Saudi intelligence chief Khalid al-Humaidan reportedly met with his Syrian counterpart in Damascus on Monday, the first meeting of its kind since the war in Syria broke out in 2011. Humaidan’s visit provides... May 5, 2021 Biden Administration Should Ascertain the Status of Iran’s Arak Reactor The Biden administration says it wants to rejoin the 2015 Iran nuclear deal because the accord seals off Tehran’s pathways to nuclear weapons, one of which involves plutonium. Yet the accord will not... April 27, 2021 Ankara’s Crackdown Triggers Run on Turkish Cryptocurrency Exchanges Three Turkish cryptocurrency exchanges have suspended operations since last Wednesday after the central bank announced impending restrictions on the use of cryptocurrencies, triggering a run on the exchanges.... April 22, 2021 New Zealand’s Sovereign Wealth Fund Divests From Israeli Banks New Zealand’s $36 billion sovereign wealth fund divested $4 million from five Israeli banks last month because of their West Bank operations. This could cause reputational and financial problems for New... April 22, 2021 OPCW Member States Hold Syria Accountable for Chemical Weapons Use Eighty-seven member states of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) voted yesterday to suspend Syria’s voting rights in the organization. This was an appropriate, albeit overdue,... April 20, 2021 Halkbank’s Last-Minute Effort to Scuttle Iran Sanctions-Evasion Case Halkbank, a public lender majority-owned by Turkey’s sovereign wealth fund, claimed on April 12 before a U.S. court that the bank is immune from charges U.S. prosecutors brought in October 2019, which... April 20, 2021 Biden Administration Fires Warning Shot with New Russia Sanctions The Biden administration announced new sanctions and other punitive actions last week in response to a wide range of malign Russian activity. The sanctions entail a modest increase in economic pressure... April 16, 2021 The Biden Administration Reverses Trump’s Mistake in Germany Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin announced on Tuesday that the United States will bolster its military presence in Germany, reversing Trump-era withdrawal plans. The decision represents an important step... April 13, 2021 Biden Administration Nominates Key Cyber Personnel President Joe Biden on Monday announced the nomination of Chris Inglis as the inaugural national cyber director (NCD), Jen Easterly as the director of the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS’) Cybersecurity... April 12, 2021 Saudi Arabia Sentences Aid Worker to 20 Years Saudi Arabia last week sentenced Abdulrahman al-Sadhan, a 37-year-old aid worker for the Saudi Red Crescent, to 20 years of imprisonment followed by a 20-year travel ban for tweets criticizing the government,... April 9, 2021 Ukraine Calls Out Iran’s Lack of Transparency in Airliner Case An Iranian military prosecutor announced on Tuesday the indictment of 10 unnamed individuals in connection to the downing of Ukraine International Airlines Flight PS752. In response, Ukraine’s Ministry... April 9, 2021 Congress Must Oversee Renewed Assistance to the Palestinians The Biden administration this week restarted assistance to the Palestinian Authority (PA). The new direct assistance to the Palestinians includes $75 million in economic and development assistance in the... April 7, 2021 Biden Takes First Step in Countering China Through UN Elections The departments of State and Commerce last week announced their support for the candidacy of Doreen Bogdan-Martin to be the next secretary-general of the International Telecommunications Union (ITU). The... April 7, 2021 North Korean Human Rights Should Unite the U.S.-ROK Alliance, Not Divide It The U.S. State Department last week released its annual report on human rights abuses throughout the world, which included comprehensive detail regarding North Korea’s ongoing human rights violations... April 2, 2021 New State Department Report Documents Grave Abuses in Iran Impunity for Iran’s systematic human rights abuses “remained pervasive throughout all levels of the government and security forces,” according to an annual review the State Department released on... March 30, 2021 At UN, Blinken Calls for Action on Aid to Syria Secretary of State Antony Blinken personally represented the United States at a UN Security Council briefing on Syria yesterday, where he warned, “The lives of people in Syria depend on getting urgent... March 18, 2021 Erdogan Government Moves to Criminalize and Shutter Turkey’s Pro-Kurdish Party Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s ruling bloc stripped a pro-Kurdish lawmaker of his parliamentary seat on Wednesday and initiated a legal process to shutter Turkey’s pro-Kurdish opposition party.... March 11, 2021 Microsoft and CISA Warn of Chinese State Hackers Targeting Windows Exchange Servers Microsoft and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) issued alerts last week warning that Chinese state-sponsored hackers had leveraged previously undiscovered vulnerabilities to harvest... March 5, 2021 Biden’s Half Measures on Ebola Put the United States at Risk The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued an order on Tuesday detailing new public health measures in response to outbreaks of Ebola in Guinea and the Democratic Republic of the Congo... March 4, 2021 Iran Conducts Major Wave of Executions and Shootings of Ethnic Minorities Tehran has killed dozens of members of Iran’s ethnic minorities in recent weeks, especially among Iran’s Baluch and Ahwazi Arab communities. Ethnic minorities are increasingly conducting anti-regime... March 2, 2021 UN Rapporteur: Iran Committed Human Rights Violations in Downing of Ukrainian Airliner Agnes Callamard, the UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, announced on February 23 that the Islamic Republic of Iran committed multiple human rights violations related... March 2, 2021 House Joins Senate’s Call for Tougher Action Against Erdogan One hundred seventy U.S. House members released a bipartisan letter Monday urging Secretary of State Antony Blinken to address “the troubling human rights abuses taking place under [Turkish] President... February 26, 2021 Shifting Cocaine Routes Turn U.S. Ally Paraguay Into Main Transit Country German law enforcement earlier this week announced a record seizure of cocaine that had been smuggled in from Paraguay. The interdiction adds to a growing body of evidence indicating that Paraguay is fast... February 24, 2021 IAEA Weakens Iran Nuclear Safeguards Before departing Iran on Sunday, International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director General Rafael Grossi issued a joint statement with his hosts, announcing they had reached an agreement on Tehran’s... February 19, 2021 DOJ Charges Reveal North Korean Cybercrime and Money Laundering Schemes The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) on Wednesday indicted three North Korean cyber operatives and a Canadian-American money launderer for numerous cyberattacks against banks, virtual currency exchanges,... February 16, 2021 Iran’s Latest Wave of Electricity Outages Iran has experienced extensive electricity outages across the country in recent weeks, with air pollution levels soaring as Iranians employ polluting fuels to generate power. The country’s electricity... February 12, 2021 Burmese Military Blocks Social Media Access With the Assistance of Telecommunications Providers Following the coup in Burma, the military junta has tried to quash public protests by cutting internet access and banning social media sites. The military has cloaked its actions in a veneer of legality,... February 12, 2021 FDA Takes Important Step to Securing Medical Devices The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) earlier this month named its first-ever acting director of medical device cybersecurity, Kevin Fu. This is an encouraging, if belated, step towards strengthening the... February 11, 2021 Biden Should Heed Senate’s Call for Tougher Action Against Erdogan Fifty-four U.S. senators signed a bipartisan letter Tuesday urging President Joe Biden to press the Turkish government to improve its troubling human rights record. The letter calls on the Biden administration... February 11, 2021 Washington Cannot Rely on Iran’s Alleged Anti-Nuclear Fatwa The Islamic Republic of Iran’s intelligence minister, Mahmoud Alavi, stated this week that although Iran’s supreme leader forbade the building of nuclear weapons according to an Islamic edict known... February 2, 2021 Treasury Report Highlights Turkey as Islamic State’s Logistical Hub The U.S. Department of the Treasury reported last month that the Islamic State often relied on “logistical hubs in Turkey” to transfer funds internationally, especially between Iraq and Syria. Treasury... January 29, 2021 Nord Stream 2 Sanctions Present an Early Test for the Biden Administration Just before leaving office, the Trump administration imposed sanctions on two Russian targets for their involvement in building the Nord Stream 2 (NS2) natural gas pipeline, which will bring Russian exports... January 29, 2021 With Trump Gone and COVID-19 Vaccines Arriving, Iran-China Trade Will Flourish in 2021 New data from Beijing show that China’s imports last year from the Islamic Republic fell to their lowest level since 2005; meanwhile, China’s exports to Iran reached their lowest level since 2009. However,... January 25, 2021 Iran Commemorates the Death of Qassem Soleimani Pro-Iranian outlets, including affiliates of Iran’s Al-Mustafa International University, earlier this month commemorated the first anniversary of the death of Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani, whom... January 21, 2021 Pentagon Decision on Israel Recognizes Reality and Presents Opportunity The Department of Defense announced Friday that it has moved Israel from the U.S. European Command (EUCOM) area of responsibility (AOR) to that of U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM), which includes the Middle... January 19, 2021 Treasury Sanctions Egyptian Terrorists Harbored by Turkey The U.S. Department of the Treasury last Thursday designated two Egyptian terrorists based in Turkey for “being leaders of HASM,” the acronym for Harakat Sawa’d Misr (Arms of Egypt Movement), which... December 21, 2020 Canadian Report Underscores Iran’s Culpability in Downing of Ukrainian Airliner Last week, Ralph Goodale, special advisor to Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, released a comprehensive report detailing the significant flaws in the Islamic Republic of Iran’s investigation into... December 21, 2020 Oil Prices Reach Highest Level Since Beginning of Pandemic The Brent and West Texas Intermediate oil benchmarks are both now back up to their pre-COVID-19 lockdown levels, reaching their highest point last week since March 2020. While oil prices took a dip today... December 18, 2020 White House Refusing to Hold Russia Accountable for Navalny Poisoning Investigative reports released on Monday eliminated any doubt regarding Moscow’s responsibility for the attempted assassination in August 2020 of leading opposition figure Alexei Navalny using a banned... December 16, 2020 CAATSA Sanctions Should Be Just First Step if Erdogan Does Not Change Course The United States imposed sanctions on Monday on NATO ally Turkey for its purchase of the S-400 air defense system from Russia. These long-overdue sanctions not only impose necessary costs on the government... December 16, 2020 Russian Hackers Target U.S. Government Agencies Multiple news reports from this past weekend indicate that hackers working for Russian intelligence breached networks and monitored email traffic at a number of U.S. federal agencies – including the Treasury... December 15, 2020 Occupied Territories Bill in Ireland Is Dead on Arrival Amid a COVID-19-induced economic recession, Irish independent Senator Frances Black has revived a draft law targeting Israel after a previous failed attempt. The Occupied Territories Bill, if enacted, could...

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