Author: Steven Sahiounie

Steven Sahiounie, journalist and political commentator The Syrian government has warned farmers in northeast Syria against using the wheat seeds supplied by USAID, which is a department of the US State Department in Washington.   The “seeds contain a high rate of nematodes [plant-parasitic worms], which reached 40 percent, and this poses a great danger to agriculture in the region, especially as its effects cause great damage that is exacerbated by the passage of time,” according to Said Hajji, head of the government’s agriculture directorate in Hasaka province. USAID says the wheat seeds it recently provided to farmers meet “high standards…

Steven Sahiounie, journalist and political commentator The news is full of startling information about the US, Europe, Turkey, Russia and the Middle East.  China has been involved as well, and people are trying to make sense of the fast breaking news, which have politics, economy and the pandemic intertwined.  In an effort to understand the meaning behind these topics, Steven Sahiounie of MidEastDiscourse has interviewed the independent journalist Sonja van den Ende, who is an expert on the West and the Middle East, including Turkey. #1. Steven Sahiounie (SS):  The Russian/American tension is increasing politically, economically, and even militarily. In…

Steven Sahiounie, journalist and political commentator On Monday, November 29, the parties involved in negotiations considering a new nuclear deal with Iran, the so-called ‘5 plus 1’, will meet in Vienna. Will Iran’s demands be met, and will the US be willing to compromise to avoid a regional military conflict, which all sides want to avoid? At the same time, there are rumored to be serious negotiations between Saudi Arabia and Iran. The outcome of those meetings may stabilize the entire region. However, in the border area of Iran and Azerbaijan, we see the hand of Israel causing chaos and…

Steven Sahiounie, journalist and political commentator Hundreds of migrants are roaming the forests along the huge border between Belarus and Poland as they attempt to make their way into the EU. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen stated on Twitter last Wednesday that the rising tensions on the Belarus-Poland border were not a “migration crisis” but a “hybrid attack,” a form of irregular warfare that blends military and non-military methods. Most of the refugees attempting to cross the Belarusian-Polish border are from Iraq, but nationals from Syria, Africa, and Afghanistan are also among those making the journey to Minsk.…

Steven Sahiounie, journalist and political commentator Saif al-Islam Gaddafi will run for president of Libya in the country’s first direct presidential election set to be held starting on December 24.  He is the son of Libya’s late leader Muammar al-Gaddafi who was murdered on October 20, 2011. Gaddafi wore traditional garments as he addressed the camera and recited a verse from the Koran while announcing his bid to lead the country out of chaos and war. The UN-sponsored plan has called for both presidential and parliamentary elections to be held simultaneously. Gaddafi was captured by a militia after his father’s…

Steven Sahiounie, journalist and political commentator Iraq’s National Security Council formed a committee to investigate the assassination attempt on Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa Al-Kadhimi, who was targeted on early Sunday morning by three explosives-laden drones, two of which were intercepted. Kadhimi appeared only lightly injured, wearing a bandage on his wrist, in a video soon after the attack on his residence in the Green Zone. According to sources who spoke to Reuters on Monday, the attack was carried out by at least one Iranian-backed militia group and said the drones and explosives used in the assault were Iranian-made. Two Iraqi…

Steven Sahiounie, journalist and political commentator Tunisia has issued an international arrest warrant against former president Moncef Marzouki, it was reported on November 4.  The charges may be connected to allegations Marzouki had conspired against state security after he had asked France to end support of the current administration last month. President Kais Saied accused “traitors that seek refuge overseas” of threatening Tunisia’s sovereignty and urged the new Justice Minister Leila Jaffel to open an inquiry. Marzouki fled Tunisia for France, the former colonial power in Tunisia, and he told Al Jazeera TV he was not surprised by the arrest…

Iran’s foreign minister says the United States has not shown any serious determination to back up its verbal claims that it is ready to return to the nuclear deal with Iran from which Washington withdrew under former President Donald Trump back in 2018. In a Sunday interview with Iran daily newspaper, Hossein Amir-Abdollahian reflected on the diplomatic efforts launched to resume talks, several rounds of which have been already held in the Austrian capital, Vienna, to remove unlawful sanctions imposed by the United States on Iran following the former’s withdrawal from the nuclear deal, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of…

By Charles Kennedy OPEC+ is ready to risk prices going higher and affecting demand rather than add more supply to curb the upward potential of benchmarks, Reuters’ John Kemp wrote in a column this week. According to Kemp, OPEC+, like US shale oil drillers, tend to put more weight on the downside risks for prices than on upside risks. Indeed, Saudi Arabia’s oil minister Abdulaziz bin Salman earlier this week said OPEC+ was in no rush to boost production in response to calls for more barrels as the cartel didn’t take anything for granted. “We don’t take things for granted,” the official said.…

Sergey Lavrov has condemned the US’ move to deploy a guided-missile destroyer to the Black Sea, stating that the ship’s mission was not an “isolated incident” but part of a consistent confrontational policy targeting Russia. Speaking on the sidelines of the G20 Summit in Rome on Sunday, Lavrov criticized the deployment of the USS Porter to the Black Sea region. “Demonstration of the US Navy flag in the Black Sea is not an isolated incident. There were several times when the United States explicitly explained the need for its warships to enter this waterway to ‘contain’ Russia,” Lavrov told reporters. Such…