Department of State

By John Terrett in Americas on July 12th, 2011
Technical glitch affects chances of thousands of people of getting a US passport [EPA]

A court case is underway in the United States to try and get an injunction to stop the state department from re-drawing its 2012 Diversity Lottery.

The lottery offers up to 55,000 green cards each year, allowing the winners from around the world to live and work in the US.

The names are normally pulled at random, but this year the state department says a mistake means the first 22,000 drawn to move further along the process towards getting a green card were incorrectly selected and they will have to be put back into the pot and drawn again along with thousands of other applicants.

Nader Habib is one of the 22,000. We met him at his home in the Egyptian capital, Cairo.

When I applied for the lottery, I had very little hope to win because millions of people apply. When I was selected it was a huge surprise.

But Nader’s happiness didn’t last long.

By Al Jazeera Staff in Middle East on February 16th, 2011
[Photo: AFP]

From our headquarters in Doha, we keep you updated with reports from our staff across the country and further afield. 

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By Al Jazeera Staff in Middle East on February 5th, 2011

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From our headquarters in Doha, we keep you updated on all things Egypt, with reporting from Al Jazeera staff in Cairo and Alexandria.  Live Blog: Jan28 - Jan29 - Jan30 - Jan31 - 

By Al Jazeera Staff in Middle East on January 31st, 2011

From our headquarters in Doha, we keep you updated on all things Egypt, with reporting from Al Jazeera staff in Cairo, Alexandria, and Suez.  Live Blog: Jan28 - Jan29 - Jan30 - Jan31 - Feb1 - Feb2 - Feb3<

By Imran Garda in Americas on January 31st, 2011
Photo by AFP.

Here’s a little help if ambition ever drives you to one day hope to be a spokesman for the US government. Alternately, if decoding why very similar events can be officially responded to in completely dissimilar ways gets you as excited as it gets me - read on.

Secretary of state Hillary Clinton - after the watershed popular uprising in Egypt against Hosni Mubarak’s 30 year, authoritarian rule, where police have gunned down protesters from Cairo to Alexandra - urged "restraint on both sides".

 

By Teymoor Nabili in Americas on January 19th, 2011
Photo by AFP

 

The Wikileaks fallout then:

"It puts people's lives in danger, threatens our national security and undermines our efforts to work with other countries to solve shared problems,"  Hillary Clinton, US secretary of state

 

By Teymoor Nabili in Middle East on November 24th, 2010
Photo by EPA

Another day, another top-level conference to analyse the "Iran threat", and once again the experts' conclusion is sharply at variance with the State Department's preferred narrative.

The Arms Control Association brought together the former IAEA Deputy Director-General for Safeguards Olli Heinonen, the International Institute for Strategic Studies' Senior Fellow for Missile Defense Michael Elleman, and the former National Intelligence Officer Paul Pillar.


Their conclusions?


Elleman - The intelligence community’s worst case scenarios for Iran have not come to pass.
Pillar - Iran is not trying to foment revolutions, even in Iraq, and fears that Iran's nuclear programme is encouraging a middle east arms race are overblown.
H

By Clayton Swisher in Middle East on June 4th, 2010
Photo by AFP

So much for helping our coverage of the Netanyahu visit.  I arrived in Washington, DC, last week thinking that would be my mission.  Instead I found myself - like the rest of Washington - reacting to the Flotilla crisis.
 
As I reported, the vast majority of Americans would have seen a highly skewed presentation of those events as reported by the dominant cable news channels.   TV is the preferred way most Americans get their news each day.  And the effects that has on US foreign policy is telling.  MJ Rosenberg at Media Matters Action Network summed it up best.

By Clayton Swisher in Middle East on April 2nd, 2010
Photo courtesy of Mohamed Nanabhay
I've been scooped on a story I should have owned. 
 
On February 23rd a US foreign service officer named Rachel Schneller appeared on a panel with Hamas spokesman Osama Hamdan, right here in Doha, at a Forum I attended that was hosted by the Al Jazeera Cente for Strategic Studies. 
 
According to today's Wall Street Journal, she acknowledged sitting with Hamdan afterwards for a friendly cup of tea, in a meeting that had the blessing of her superiors back at the US state department.

Now that is news. 
 
Below is what I submitted that night from Dubai (I had to travel from Doha that afternoon on business and could not finish the discussion). 
By Omar Chatriwala in Americas on January 20th, 2010
Photos courtesy of Ushahidi

It's now more than a week since the Caribbean nation of Haiti was rocked by a massive 7.0 magnitude earthquake, but the situation on the ground remains unstable, with people still being pulled from the rubble and the death toll continuing to rise.

With landlines in the country badly damaged, and ground transportation a significant problem, relief workers pouring into the country have had to turn to non-traditional means to try to get information from - and to - survivors of the quake.

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