Mitchell to Middle East, Holbrooke to Afghanistan/Pakistan

[The Original Nex]

Reuters, via Yahoo

Obama names Mitchell as Mideast envoy
By Caren Bohan Caren Bohan

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – In a flurry of diplomatic activity in his first week in office, U.S. President Barack Obama on Thursday named special envoys for the Middle East and the Afghanistan-Pakistan region.

Newly confirmed Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Obama had chosen George Mitchell, a former senator and seasoned international trouble-shooter, as an envoy who will try to jump-start moribund Arab-Israeli peace talks.

Obama tapped former ambassador to the United Nations Richard Holbrooke as a special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan and related issues.

"Today, we start the hard work to restore our standing and enable our country to meet the vexing new challenges of the 21st century but also to seize the opportunities that await us," Clinton said as she stood next to Obama.

"We must be smarter about how we exercise our power," she added.

The naming of the two diplomats came a day after Clinton's nomination as secretary of state was overwhelmingly approved by the U.S. Senate.

It also comes as Obama, who was sworn in on Tuesday, is moving quickly to tackle foreign policy challenges he highlighted during his campaign.

Those include pursuing a policy of much broader engagement abroad than the former Bush administration and refocusing the fight against terrorism away from Iraq and back onto Afghanistan.

Obama has ordered a full review of the U.S. strategy in Afghanistan, where he has pledged to boost troop numbers, and told generals to take the first steps toward a pledge to withdraw troops from Iraq. Osama bin Laden and other top al Qaeda militants are believed to be hiding in the mountainous border region of Pakistan near Afghanistan.

On the morning after his inauguration, Obama called Israeli and Arab leaders to commit himself to "active engagement" in the Middle East and to promise help consolidating the Gaza ceasefire.

Mitchell, 75, is best known for peacemaking efforts in Northern Ireland, but he also has experience in the Middle East and was appointed by former President Bill Clinton to find ways to halt Israeli-Palestinian violence.

Mitchell's 2001 report called for Israelis to freeze construction of new settlements and for Palestinians to crack down on terrorism. Mitchell is the son of a Lebanese immigrant mother and a father of Irish descent.

Holbrooke, 67, gained prominence by brokering the Dayton peace accords that ended the war in Bosnia and had been a contender for secretary of state in the administration of President Bill Clinton but the job was given instead to Madeleine Albright.

(Writing by Caren Bohan; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)

It will be interesting to see how Sen. Mitchell, who helped broker the Belfast Agreement, will be able to handle the I/P Conflict. Amb. Holbrooke also has his diplomatic work cut out for him in Afghan/Pakistan.

Refreshing to see the new Administration taking a more wide-reaching approach to foreign relations on the second day at work.

[Guardsman Bass]

Although hats are off to Holbrooke for negotiating a peace to that Bosnian mess, didn't the Dayton Accords set up that unwieldy Bosnia-Herzegovina governmental structure that doesn't work that well? Although it's better than out-and-out war . . .

[Netko]

Basically. Galbraith (then US ambassador to Croatia and the main US operative on the ground) later admitted that they should have let the Croatian and Bosniak forces overrun Republika Srpska since that would have led to a significantly more viable B&H today. However, back in the day they were worried about yet another refugee crisis if the Serbs collapsed and wanted a quick end to the war and as such pressured the Cro. and Bosniak factions to stop outside the Bosnian Serb capital of Banja Luka thus allowing the Serb statelet to live on, which today is leading to massive problems since everyone thought that RS would, in time, be absorbed into B&H proper - except everyone told the Serbs the exact opposite in Dayton, and they are taking that promise deliberately at face value.

All in all, they (Clinton, Holbrooke, Galbraith, etc.) sacrificed long term stability and viability of Bosnia for short term praise and less headaches for themselves.