An ongoing stand-off between an elite force of Iraq's national army and Kurdish Peshmerga forces around the contested northern city of Kirkuk led to skirmishes that left two dead and several wounded at the village of Tuz Khurmatu this week. The army's Dijla (Tigris) Operations Command (DOC), launched in June by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, was ostensibly sent to put down the remnants of insurgency in Diyala, Kirkuk and Salahaddin governates. But local Kurdish leaders—including Kirkuk governor Najmaddin Karim, of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK)—charge that the real aim of the deployment is to prevent Kirkuk governate from be annexed by the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), now made up of the governorates of Erbil (also Arbil or Irbil), Slemani (Sulaymaniya) and Duhok. (See map.) A referendum on the future of Kirkuk, mandated by Aritcle 140 of Iraq's constitution, has been repeatedly put off by the central government.

Following disturbing findings of thyroid growths in children of Fukushima prefecture, Japan's Environment Ministry this week began thyroid gland tests on children in Nagasaki prefecture, across the central island of Honshu to the south. Those children will serve as a control group for kids undergoing similar tests in Fukushima prefecture. Fukushima's prefectural government one year ago launched what it intends to be a lifelong thyroid gland test program for 360,000 children who were aged 18 or under when the disaster began in March 2011. The Fukushima screening have been conducted on 115,000 children—about one third of the total number of children that will require testing. In July, it was revelaed that over 35% of the 38,114 then screened were found to have abnormal thyroid growths.

As Islamist miltias have established Taliban-like rule in northern Mali since taking the vast territory in March, regional powers have been muddling towards military intervention. On Nov. 21, Reuters reported that "military experts from Africa, the United Nations and Europe have drafted plans to retake control of northern Mali." We are told that "African leaders will this month seek a UN mandate to send a mainly West African force of some 4,000 to Mali to...back military operations to retake swathes of the Sahara desert from rebels." Quoted is Stephen O'Brien, the UK's first special envoy to the Sahel, speaking from Nigeria: "This deep insecurity... we have to recognize that, unless it is checked and it is not met, then it will have the potential for export." He called the Mali crisis was "a universal threat" with "the capability of threatening interests outside the...region." While no other European countries are mentioned, we may assume that France will play a leading role.

The only surviving shooter from the 2008 Mumbai terrorist attacks was executed at a prison in India Nov. 21 hours after President Pranab Mukherjee finally rejected the gunman's clemency appeal. Pakistani national Mohammad Ajmal Kasab was hanged and buried in the prison yard in the central Indian city of Pune just days before the fourth anniversary of the Mumbai attacks. Kasab was convicted in May 2010 on more than 80 charges of waging war against India, multiple murders and conspiracy for his participation in the attacks, during which the group of gunmen killed more than 160 people in three days of targeted assaults on luxury hotels, Mumbai's main railway station and a Jewish cultural center.

Israel launched new air-strikes across the Gaza Strip late Nov. 21, even as Egypt's foreign minister Mohamed Kamel Amr announced a ceasefire to end eight days of violence. Missiles fired by an unmanned drone slammed into Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip around 7:30 PM local time, killing a youth and critically injuring another. Another air-strike killed a Palestinian in Gaza City's Sheikh Radwan neighborhood, with six more wounded elsewhere in the city. The ceasefire, announced at a Cairo press conference with the US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton, was to take effect at 9 PM. The Palestinian death toll in the eight days of bombing stands at some 170, with another 1,000 wounded. Five Israelis have been killed, including one soldier. (Maa'n News Agency, Nov. 21)

Thousands of students protested in the Democratic Republic of Congo cities Kisangani, Bunia and Kinshasa on Nov. 20 after M23 rebels seized the eastern city of Goma. They were mostly expressing their rage at the M23 rebels, but also targeted the government and the UN mission in DR Congo (MONUSCO). Despite government and UN assurances, M23 rebels took Goma with little resistance from either Congolese or UN forces. French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said it was "absurd" that UN troops could not stop the rebels from entering Goma. With a 20,000-strong military and civilian staff, MONUSCO has a yearly budget of close to $1.5 billion, the second-largest peacekeeping mission in the world (after Sudan).

Mourners clashed with Israeli troops at two funerals Nov. 21 as Palestinians across the West Bank continued to protest the Israeli assault on Gaza. In Hebron, hundreds attended the funeral for Hamdi Mohammad Jawwad al-Falah, shot by Israeli troops at a protest in the city's Bir al-Mahjar neighborhood. After the burial, hundreds of young men began marching towards a Jewish settlement, to be set upon by Israeli forces with tear gas and rubber bullets. In Ramallah, thousands attended the funeral for Rushdi Tamimi, a police officer who died Nov. 19, two days after he was shot by Israeli forces at a protest in Nabi Saleh. A video of that protest shows Israeli forces threatening demonstrators who tried to administer first aid. At Nabi Saleh, where he was buried. mourners chanted "Martyr, rest, we will pick up the fight." After the procession, masked youths hurled rocks at Israeli soldiers lined up at the village entrance, who again responded with tear-gas and rubber bullets.

Afghanistan's President Hamid Karzai said Nov. 18 that US forces were capturing and holding Afghans in violation of a detainee transfer pact and that US forces should turn over that responsibility to Karzai's forces. Karzai's statement urged Afghan officials to make efforts towards toward obtaining entire responsibility for Bagram Prison. Listed abuses included Afghan detainees held by US forces despite Afghan rulings to the contrary and the continued arrest of Afghans by US forces. The statement comes less than a week after negotiations began on a bilateral security agreement that will govern US military presence in the country after the majority of US troops withdraw from Afghanistan after 2014. The US has delayed the handover of detention facilities to Afghanistan citing both lack of preparation by Afghan leaders in detention center management and discrepancies over treatment of detainees the US deems too dangerous to release. Both countries agreed to sign the bilateral security agreement within a year.