Research & Commentary Results

Marine Le Pen, leader of France’s far-right National Rally, was convicted of embezzling EU funds and barred from running for office for five years, effectively disqualifying her from the 2027 presidential race. Meanwhile in Turkey, Ekrem İmamoğlu, mayor of Istanbul and President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s most formidable rival, was arrested on corruption charges and jailed, just as he was poised to become the opposition’s presidential candidate. Both Le Pen and Turkish officials are now pointing to each other to justify their own actions.

President Masoud Pezeshkian might be the loneliest man in Iran. Just eight months into his term in office, he is already losing the support of those who once championed him. While the Iranian presidency is a thankless job, Pezeshkian is not helping his own case.

Endemic corruption in Libya continues to deter foreign investment, cripple public services, and erode trust in government. This dismal situation is driven by the ongoing power struggles among Libya’s political and military elite. Recently, bad actors in both Libya’s east and west have undertaken a spree of arbitrary arrests and detentions that the United Nations Support Mission in Libya has now warned are not only illegal, but creating “a climate of fear.”

Just days before Turkey’s main opposition party was set to select its next presidential candidate, the leading contender, Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu, was arrested and jailed, effectively removing him from the race.

Reflections on a recent visit to Baghdad. Much has changed and ordinary life has resumed in Iraq’s capital, but deep challenges remain.

The work of the Syria Strategy Project and the considerable policy recommendations found in this report present a realistic and holistic vision for Syria’s recovery and reintegration into the international system.

Syria’s national dialogue, held in Damascus at the end of February, was intended to chart the country’s future, one that would have been unthinkable just three months earlier. However, the process and outcomes of the dialogue were flawed, left critical questions unanswered, and raised new concerns.

A historic shift may be on the horizon, as Turkey and Kurdish militant leader Abdullah Ocalan engage in unexpected peace talks. After 40 years of insurgency and 40,000 lives lost, Ocalan is expected to call for PKK fighters to lay down their arms. However, with President Erdogan’s democratic backsliding and continued crackdown on Kurdish political rights, questions remain about whether lasting peace is possible. MEI’s Gönül Tol explains.

Under former President Bashar al-Assad’s regime, the Syrian security sector kept meticulous records of their crimes. The international community must now step up to help Syria’s new authorities secure and protect the documents, provide information to the loved ones of those who suffered in Assad’s prisons, and pursue justice.

Since the end of the civil war in Syria, government officials have inaugurated high-end tourist projects and upscale urban housing schemes, while at the same time preventing Syrian refugees and internally displaced persons from returning to their ruined neighborhoods or rebuilding their demolished homes. The focus on luxury housing in a country devastated by conflict and within a city suffering from massive destruction and housing shortages encapsulates the contradictions of the regime’s policy for reconstruction and early recovery not only in Damascus but in the whole country.

Last month marked the second anniversary of the death of 22-year-old Kurdish-Iranian Mahsa Amini and the “Women, Life, Freedom” movement born of her murder. The authorities’ subsequent brutal crackdown on the protesters is but one flagrant example of the government’s appalling human rights record. The regime’s disdain for international human rights norms is not the recent result of Iran’s transition from Islamic theocracy to nationalistic military-security state. Rather, it has been a feature of the regime from the beginning, as shown by (inter alia) the 1988 mass executions of Iranian prisoners.

US President Joe Biden will meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during his visit to Washington this week. The meeting provides an opportunity to double down on considerations of what a “day after” might look like and how best to promote moderate Palestinian voices in the effort to rebuild Gaza.

At the Washington Summit, NATO member states mostly focused on efforts to counter Russia and to support Ukraine. However, the 2024 summit communiqué also addresses non-Euro-Atlantic risks and opportunities, based on the idea that “conflict, fragility and instability” elsewhere directly affects NATO security.

Anti-migration policies in Libya, Tunisia, and Niger have had dire consequences, as highlighted by the more than 25,000 migrant deaths in the Mediterranean since 2014, a figure that does not fully capture the extent of the tragedy. To address these failures will require substantial policy changes and an evolution in approach to the migration issue.

Israeli leaders insist that the extreme destruction in the Gaza Strip is unavoidable given Hamas’ use of “human shields” and the fact that the militant group has embedded itself among the civilian population and routinely operates from civilian structures like hospitals and schools. But far from explaining the current devastation, the questionable “human shields” charge has become a way to shield Israel from legitimate scrutiny and accountability.