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Juggling foreign policy hotspots from Israel to Iran to Ukraine, Secretary of State John Kerry strongly defended the Obama administration’s foreign policy to Meet the Press host David Gregory, arguing that the administration had successfully used diplomacy to further peace whereas certain previous administration (a-HEM) were “trigger happy” to the point of starting wars. “What [Obama] faces is a problem with a bunch of critics who want to jump to conclusions without looking at the facts,” Kerry said. “The facts could not be more clear. The United States of America has never been more engaged, helping to lead in more...

ISLAMABAD: Even though US Secretary of State John Kerry succeeded in brokering a deal to resolve the deadlock over the Afghan presidential election run-off, confusion still persists about the proposal of forming a “government of national unity”. On July 12, Kerry announced the agreement in the presence of both rivals Dr Ashraf Ghani and Dr Abdullah Abdullah in Kabul. “The winner of the election will serve as the president and will immediately form a government of national unity,” said Kerry. However, the top US official failed to explain the composition of the unity government. Kerry’s vague proposal has caused uproar...

The details of how Kerry defused the stalemate, based on accounts from a half-dozen officials familiar with the talks, reveals an Afghanistan closer to the brink than many outsiders may appreciate. It also illuminates rare foreign policy win for Kerry and for an Obama administration staggered by months of setbacks,

US Secretary of State John Kerry called on Russia on Thursday to disarm separatists in Ukraine within "the next hours" as the European Union prepared to discuss deeper sanctions against Moscow. Washington and other Western powers have stepped up pressure on Russia to take concrete action to defuse the conflict in eastern Ukraine, where a ceasefire between Russian-speaking rebels and government forces has appeared to be crumbling. "We are in full agreement that it is critical for Russia to show in the next hours, literally, that they're moving to help disarm the separatists, to encourage them to disarm, to call...

Thursday, June 26, the day before US Secretary of State John Kerry was due in Riyadh, King Abdullah summoned a National Security Council meeting “upon the current security events in the region, especially in Iraq,” and ordered “all necessary measures to protect the kingdom against terrorist threats.” This meant a general call-up of military units for a high level of preparedness. DEBKAfile’s military sources disclose that Egypt is assembling an expeditionary commando force to fly to Saudi Arabia and bolster its border defenses. This flurry of Saudi-Egyptian military steps comes in the wake of intelligence gathered by Saudi reconnaissance planes...

National Security Advisor Susan Rice said on June 24 that “America’s support for LGBT rights is not just a national cause but it’s also a global enterprise.” “President Obama has specifically directed that American diplomacy and American assistance promote and protect the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender men and women, all around the world,” she said in an address to the first White House Forum on Global LGBT Human Rights. “Universal human rights are not bestowed by governments or powerful majorities, they are God’s gift and the birth right of all people,” she added. “They belong to lesbian,...

Secretary of State John Kerry on Monday gave the clearest indication yet that President Obama may order military action of some type against Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS) fighters who have been capturing territory in northern and western Iraq – and may do so soon.Speaking in Baghdad, Kerry appeared to be preparing the ground for such action, stressing the scale of the threat posed by ISIS not just to Iraq and the region but also to the United States, and emphasizing that if Obama does give the order it would be because of that threat, not in...

Secretary of State John Kerry “should be on a plane right now for Baghdad,” former U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker said Tuesday. Crocker served as ambassador to Iraq under President George W. Bush from 2007 until 2009, and ambassador to Afghanistan under President Obama until July 2012. The Obama administration should have had more high-level diplomatic engagement with Iraq, he argued Tuesday, and emphasized the U.S. must now respond with urgency. “We are hard-wired into their political system. We helped create it. We can’t walk away from it,” Crocker said. “I would have preferred since 2011 to see us...

The Department of State warns U.S. citizens against all but essential travel to Iraq. Travel within Iraq remains dangerous given the security situation. On June 16, the Department of State began relocating some staff members from the Embassy to the Consulates General in Basrah and Erbil and Iraq Support Unit in Amman. The Embassy remains open and is operating. This Travel Warning supersedes the Travel Warning dated June 11, 2014, to update information on security incidents and to remind U.S. citizens of ongoing security concerns in Iraq, including kidnapping and terrorist violence. The ability of the Embassy to respond to...

There are a couple of significant news items in Ukraine today, and both of them will hike tensions in the region. Earlier today Pro-Russia Rebels Down Ukraine Jet as Fighting Escalates. Pro-Russian rebels shot down a transport plane in eastern Ukraine, killing 49 servicemen and threatening to ratchet up east-west tensions over suspicions President Vladimir Putin is backing the uprising. The killing of the 40 soldiers and nine crew was the deadliest strike on Ukrainian forces since separatists seized government buildings on April 6. The IL-76 aircraft went down as it approached Luhansk airport at 1:10 a.m. local time under...

**SNIP** Indeed, when the question of using military force against Iraq was put before the U.S. Congress, 110 Democrats supported the 2002 Joint Resolution, which authorized President Bush to act as he ultimately did. Further, some very outspoken Democrats during that time said these sort of things including President Clinton, Vice President Al Gore, and Senator John F. Kerry. "[W]e urge you, after consulting with Congress, and consistent with the U.S. Constitution and laws, to take necessary actions (including, if appropriate, air and missile strikes on suspect Iraqi sites) to respond effectively to the threat posed by Iraq's refusal to...

The Iraqi government says it has halted a militant group's advance on Baghdad. As The Telegraph reports, the Iraqi army started engaging the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or ISIS, after it made a rapid advance in which it captured the key city of Mosul. "'Our security forces have regained the initiative,' said Maj Gen al-Moussawi, adding that the Iraqi army had won 'remarkable victories with the help of volunteers'. 'We will not stop at liberating Mosul from ISIS terrorists, but all other parts,' he continued."

A three word text was released from inside the Embassy about six hours ago: “Too late Alamo.” That message is open to interpretation. Just minutes ago news came from within the United States Embassy in Baghdad that the Iraqis have shut down internet service for those barricaded inside. Limited text messages via private cell phones are still coming through. It is unknown how many of the more than 5,000 U.S. civilians in Baghdad are actually taking refuge inside the embassy compound. NBC war correspondent, Richard Engel reported last night that civilians in and around Baghdad have boarded up residences and...

The United States has evacuated most of its personnel from the Embassy in Baghdad and dramatically stepped up security for those who remain as thousands of Islamic fighters bear down on Iraq's capital city. Some 5,500 people work in the massive Embassy complex in the heavily-fortified Green Zone in Baghdad. Many will be airlifted to Amman, Jordan, and others will be sent to consulates in Basra, in the south, and Erbil, in the Kurdish north. Other workers will remain in Baghdad. Some 12,000 fighters from the Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria (ISIS) are marching on Baghdad after quickly...

The explosion of bloodshed in Iraq has created the temptation for many to revisit their support for or opposition to the 2003 invasion of Iraq and to ascribe blame for the recent surge in violence to their preferred boogieman. Not all have succumbed to the enticing lure of nostalgia. Not even consistent Iraq War and George W. Bush critic Fareed Zakaria allowed himself himself to take a swipe at the former commander-in-chief for looming over the present crisis. Appearing on CNN on Thursday, Zakaria blamed Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki for undoing what he said was the good accomplished...

Secretary of state John Kerry has indicated that five Guantánamo Bay detainees released in exchange for an American soldier could be killed by drone strike if they return to the battlefield in Afghanistan. Kerry’s implied threat to the five Taliban fighters came as Republicans ramped-up their criticism of the deal to release Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl, a prisoner of the Taliban for five years until he was freed last week. The 28-year-old soldier has reportedly told medical staff at a base in Germany he was tortured and beaten by his captors, and once locked in a metal cage in total darkness...

Today, at a joint press conference between Barack Obama and Polish President Bronislaw Komorowski in Warsaw, Secretary of State John Kerry pulled the old "dad on the couch" move, testing the limits between what he called "a really long blink" and what looked more like a very short nap. The tell is always in the jerk back to wake up. Twitter: Brian Rie$ ✔ @moneyries Secretary of State @JohnKerry taking a power nap in Warsaw (in his defense...long flight!) http://twitpic.com/e5dtql John Kerry ✔ @JohnKerry Follow .@moneyries just a really long blink! The other dead giveaway is protesting too much.

Secretary of State John Kerry on Wednesday called National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden a fugitive and challenged him to "man up and come back to the United States." Kerry was asked about Snowden in a nationally broadcast interview in the wake of an interview in which Snowden said he never intended to be holed up in Russia but was forced to go there because Washington decided to "revoke my passport." Asked about this, Kerry replied on NBC's "Today" show: "Well, for a supposedly smart guy, that's a pretty dumb answer, after all."

Secretary of State John Kerry will be on a previously scheduled trip to Mexico on May 21, the day he’s been subpoenaed to appear before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee to testify on Benghazi, a State Department spokeswoman said Monday. Deputy spokesperson Marie Harf said Kerry, who has been overseas, is aware of the subpoena, announced Friday by Oversight Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif. “As we’ve said repeatedly, we were all surprised, quite frankly, that instead of working with us and reaching out to us and offering first an invitation to testify, that Chairman Issa jumped immediately to subpoenaing...

onday night Secretary of State John Kerry issued an almost apology for warning that if Israel did not make peace it would become an apartheid state. In the statement he issued (below) he never says he is sorry, simply that he has always loved Israel, the criticism he received for his statement was political, and if he could say it again he would change the words he used. For more than thirty years in the United States Senate, I didn’t just speak words in support of Israel, I walked the walk when it came time to vote and when it...