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This would be a giant step forward toward an eventual agreement in Afghanistan. Good news:

KABUL, Afghanistan — Giving a first major public sign that they may be ready for formal talks with the American-led coalition in Afghanistan, the Taliban announced Tuesday that they had struck a deal to open a political office in Qatar that could allow for direct negotiations over the endgame in the Afghan war.

The step was a reversal of the Taliban’s longstanding public denials that they were involved in, or even willing to consider, talks related to their insurgency, and it had the potential to revive a reconciliation effort that stalled in September, with the assassination of the head of Afghanistan’s High Peace Council.

It was unclear, however, whether the Taliban were interested in working toward a comprehensive peace settlement or mainly in ensuring that NATO ends its operations in Afghanistan as scheduled in 2014, which would remove a major obstacle to the Taliban’s return to power in all or part of the country.

In a statement, Zabiullah Mujahid, a spokesman for the Taliban, said that along with a preliminary deal to set up the office in Qatar, the group was asking that Taliban detainees held at the American prison in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, be released. Mr. Mujahid did not say when the Qatar office would be opened, or give specifics about the prisoners the Taliban wanted freed.

“We are at the moment, besides our powerful presence inside the country, ready to establish a political office outside the country to come to an understanding with other nations,” the statement said.

Sensational headlines aside, there are some revealing moments among the few newly-released Department of State cables published by Wikileaks. Although the transcript for this particular cable is long, it's worth reading the entire strand in context rather than by excerpt.

A somewhat long cable narrative, relating the gist of a meeting between Senator John Kerry and the Amir of Qatar reveals how the urgent the Obama administration views Iran's misbehavior in the region, and how frustrated they are at Iran's continued rebuffs. Qatar's Amir is clearly biased toward Iran, claiming that Ahmadinejad's success is due to the fact that he is "uncorrupted" as he chides Kerry and the US for siding with the protesters during the Iran elections.

At one point, the Amir points out that the US must remember that Iranians are Persians first, and must be approached on that basis. What does that mean, exactly? There is another cable from 1979, written by Victor Tomseth before he was taken hostage later that year which outlines the basis upon which the US should approach any negotiations with Iran, beginning with the understanding that the single dominant aspect of the Persian psyche is an "overriding egoism". I'm not sure if this was what the Amir was referring to, and Senator Kerry seems to look at his warning as an admonition to recognize the Persian tradition in arts, education and music. It might be instructive for him to consider the content of Tomseth's cable.

The takeaway for me so far with regard to the Middle Eastern set of cables is how the Obama administration is taking that region as a holistic endeavor, recognizing that peace between Israel and Palestine is part of finding a peaceful resolution to the ever-restive Iranians, and they are serious about trying to broker a peace throughout that region.

The full quote from the cable of this portion of the conversation follows.

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England pulls the Official Secrets Act against the press.

This story has found legs after the UK pulled a Patriot act on the press. Why isn't Karen Hughes flying over there and doing her job for once? What does she do anyway except get Middle Eastern women mad at her?

Brad Blog has this London story up. A new blog has been created.

Mark Kleiman says that:.."the apparent plot to bomb Al-Jazeera has apparently seriously annoyed the ruling family in Qatar. Not only is Qatar an ally of the U.S., but it has one of the less objectionable regimes in that part of the world: not at all democratic, but not kleptocratic, either, and with a strong liberalizing tendency. (Women were allowed to vote in elections for local councils last year.)...read on"

(Update)- Boris Johnson is a member of the Conservative Party in Britian, a member of Parliament, He says he'll print the memo.

The Moderate Voice has a right/left round up...