The Atlantic Council’s South Asia Center hosted a discussion entitled, “Health in South Asia - Leaping into the Future or Stuck in the Mud,” with Lois Quam, executive director, Global Health Initiative, US Department of State; and Robert Clay, deputy assistant administrator at the Bureau for Global Health, USAID.

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the United Nations in September 2012 that Iran is between six and eight months away from having sufficient enriched uranium to make a bomb.

The on-again, off-again musings about a deal between Washington and Tehran are on again. A deal might reconcile the most important demands of each side: Iran’s insistence that it has a legal right to an independent fuel cycle for what it insists is a nonmilitary nuclear program and the declaration of the United States that Iran must not be permitted to build nuclear weapons.

Hurry up and wait! This seems to be the order of the day as Pakistan and India take tentative steps towards normalcy. After much trumpeting of the visa accord signed in Islamabad after External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna's visit and discussions with Pakistan's Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar, the maw of the bureaucracy appears to have swallowed the agreement and refuses to release it.

The Atlantic Council’s South Asia Center is pleased to announce the launch of its Emerging Leaders of Pakistan (ELP) program. The fellowship seeks to support and empower the next generation of Pakistan’s civil society leaders through the creation of a sustainable forum of collaboration.

On October 18, the Atlantic Council’s South Asia Center held a discussion entitled, “Food and Water Security and Governance in Asia,” with Dr. Uma Lele, former World Bank economist and member of the Technical Advisory Committee of the Global Water Partnership.

On October 17, the Atlantic Council’s South Asia Center hosted a discussion entitled, “Combating the Global Improvised Explosive Device (IED) Threat,” with Lieutenant General Michael D. Barbero, director of the Joint Improvised Explosive Device Defeat Organization (JIEDDO).

The Atlantic Council’s South Asia Center held a discussion on philanthropy in Pakistan with Robin Raphel, senior adviser on Pakistan, Office of Special Representative for Af-Pak, US Department of State; Qaisar Shareef, executive volunteer and USA representative, I-Care Fund America; and Farrokh K. Captain, chairman, i-Care Foundation and director, Shell Pakistan, Limited. South Asia Center Director Shuja Nawaz moderated the discussion.

On October 12, the Atlantic Council's Iran Task Force and the Middle East Program of the Woodrow Wilson Center hosted a discussion about the consequences for the Iranian people of threatened attacks on Iran’s nuclear installations.

India and Pakistan have been engaged in military-level Track 2 talks for the past 12 months, with the delegates of the two sides meeting in Dubai, Bangkok and finally in Lahore in September this year. Smaller “sub-group” meetings in Chiang Mai (Thailand) and Palo Alto (California) have also featured in the Track 2 process.