The Bali bomber found in Pakistan

The globalization of terror becomes fairly evident by the arrest of one of the suspects of Bali bombing from the tribal areas in Pakistan.

It is no longer the Uzbeks and the Chechens who found Pakistan's tribal areas as the perfect place to hide and launch their attacks within Pakistan and in Russia, now even the Indonesian militants are springing up in Pakistan. As if Pakistan needed any help on this front from others.

The Saudis Use Oil to Punish the Iranians - BusinessWeek

Image by Getty Images via @daylifeThe Arab (Saudi)-Iranian rivalry is centuries old. rom fighting wars in the ancient times to the last battle fought between Arab Iraqis and Iranians, the Arab-Iranian relationship has been a struggling one to say the least.

The latest episode of this age old rivalry involves trade where Saudis are trying to hurt Iranian oil exports to India! More on this from Bloomberg below:

The Saudis Use Oil to Punish the Iranians - BusinessWeek

Super flood blamed on lasers, a cruel Pathan – The Express Tribune

Pakistanis fall for conspiracy theories even when more plausible explanations exist. The case of last year's devastating floods is no exception. Many believe in Pakistan that the government deployed lasers to melt glaciers resulting in floods . . .

Super flood blamed on lasers, a cruel Pathan – The Express Tribune

Bush Tax and wars behind trillions in deficit

Professor Juan Cole explains what is causing the huge deficit in the US' national cash flow.

Downgraded US Credit Rating: What comes of Coddling the Super-Rich | Informed Comment

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Stop Drone Strikes: Former Intel Chief | Pakistan | DAWN.COM

"Former US intelligence chief Dennis Blair said Friday the US should stop its drone campaign in Pakistan, and reconsider the $80 billion a year it spends to fight terrorism.

Speaking at the Aspen Security Forum, Blair said the CIA’s unmanned aircraft operation aimed at al-Qaida is backfiring by damaging the US-Pakistan relationship."

Stop Drone Strikes: Former Intel Chief | Pakistan | DAWN.COM

Gunmen kill seven Shia pilgrims in Quetta – The Express Tribune

The Al-Qaida affiliates in Pakistan continue killing minoroties in Pakistan. Once again, Shiites in Quetta fell victim to the Sunni extremists, which are supported by other hardline groups.

Gunmen kill seven Shia pilgrims in Quetta – The Express Tribune

Victims of last year's floods in Pakistan

For more photographs of children still stuck in camps one year after the devastsating floods in Pakistan, please cllick on the link below:

Pakistani Perspective: Not a care in the world – The Express Tribune

Killing continues in Karachi

The last two days in Karachi has witnessed violent deaths of another 30 people in the poorest parts of town. My friends in the wealthier part of Karachi, which has seen almost no violence, are surprised at my concern about the spread of violence in the poor parts of town.

Unless the violence and its systematic causes are not addressed in the poor parts of town, the wealthier Karachi will not remain immune for long.

Karachi turmoil: Two days of violence leave 30 dead – The Express Tribune

Conflict spreading in Afghanistan over time

Based on the data retrieved from the Wikileaks it appears that the conflict in Afghanistan has spread over time.  The following series of images present frequency of attacks in Afghanistan from 2004 to 2009. Notice that in 2004 (the upper left corner), most attacks were concentrated along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, which is home to the Pashtuns in Afghanistan. This would also make sense since most Afghan Taliban are ethnic Pushtuns.

However, as one moves from 2004 to 2009, one sees a dramatic spreading of attacks along Afghan border, even along the Western border with Iran. The distribution of attacks in 2009 (lower right corner) suggests both an increase in the number of attacks as well as spreading of the conflict to parts of Afghanistan that were immune to the violence earlier.

It will be interesting to see what the latest numbers suggest in the post-surge Afghanistan.

Another interesting sidebar on the maps presented below is that the data analysis and the generation of the maps was done using R, which is a freeware stats software enabling social scientists to paint pictures with data that was not possible earlier.

Click on the image below to see the original post and a larger version of the image.

The above graphic has been produced by Drew Conway, who is a PhD student in political science at New York University. Drew studies terrorism and armed conflict; using tools from mathematics and computer science to gain a deeper understanding of these phenomena.

Surge in Number of Indian Students Heading to Canadian Colleges - NYTimes.com

"The number of Canadian student visas issued in India jumped to more than 12,000 in 2010, from 3,152 in 2008. "
Surge in Number of Indian Students Heading to Canadian Colleges - NYTimes.com