Australia

Aba Naam bridge on the Hijaz Railway

The bridge was T.E. Lawrence's first sight of the railway in April 1917

I'm next speaking at the Australian War Memorial in Canberra, on 27 November at 10.30am in the Telstra Theatre. I'll be talking about my travel in the Middle East (with some slides) and looking into the reasons behind the differing versions of key events in the campaign.

The AWM is about to open a major exhibition on Lawrence of Arabia and the Australian Light Horse Brigade, which played an important part in the 1917-18 Palestine offensive. Mal Booth, the curator, has been running a blog where you can find further useful information as well as details of my talk and the others that the Memorial has lined up to accompany the exhibition.

Jaw Jaw...

Reuters is reporting that British and American envoys will join representatives from Iran and Syria next month to discuss ways to stabilise Iraq. The approach - which was recommended by the Iraq Study Group but studiously ignored by President Bush - tends to confirm other reports that US efforts to quell the violence in Baghdad by means of a troop surge have not succeeded.

Earlier this week one of those who did the ground-work for the Northern Ireland peace agreement, Michael Ancram, pointed out the inconsistency between the American pressure on the British to open talks on Northern Ireland in the 1990s and their position now. Like all the best letters to newspapers, it is short, and well worth reading.