Good morning… here’s your Monday roundup…

US & Europe

• The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) found that Macedonian officials handed an (innocent) German citizen over to American officials who sodomized and tortured him in the presence of Macedonian officials and on Macedonian soil.  Something to ponder as you watch Zero Dark Thirty.

Central/South Asia

• Afghanistan: The AAN Network’s S. Reza Kazemi discusses whether threats of a spillover of armed conflict into Central Asia are being exaggerated by Afghanistan’s northern neighbors.
• Ajai Shukla’s Broadsword Blog provides an excellent and rather detailed analysis of the Indian Navy’s growing muscularity.

West Asia

• Some thoughts on the immanent contradictions with the dominant narrative contained in the beheading films making their rounds in Syria… (h/t David Patel)

Africa

• The Bridges from Bamako blog writes about the inevitable but not so imminent international military intervention in Mali (h/t Jay Ulfelder)
  

And in Galaxies Far, Far Away…

• George Lucas cut female pilots out of Return of the Jedi at the last minute… adding to his many bad decisions.
• Still need to find a gift for that special Duck blogger in your life?  How about a Death Star Ice Cube tray? Not their style? Perhaps this Hunger Games lunchbox and thermos might interest you…  Or a decal to make their own Iron Throne? [Dan Nexon here: the novelty rubber ducks you’ve seen here recently are all available from the British Museum webstore]