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As President Obama prepared to explain his military strategy for Afghanistan Tuesday, his secretary of state said U.S. civilian efforts are just as critical to successfully getting Afghanistan back on its feet.

Washington (CNN) - As President Obama prepared to explain his military strategy for Afghanistan Tuesday, his secretary of state said U.S. civilian efforts are just as critical to successfully getting Afghanistan back on its feet.

At the same time, a diplomatic source says the United States is pushing for an international "special coordinator" to work in parallel with the government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai.

Speaking Monday in New York to the Business Executives for National Security Gala, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Washington's "goals in Afghanistan include providing the government with the support that it needs to take full responsibility for its own country.

"That makes civilian efforts as vital as military operations and of longer duration," she said. "We have begun to elevate diplomacy and development alongside defense in our national security strategy, and we are certainly engaged in doing so in Afghanistan."

Clinton described the work of the State Department, USAID and other government agencies deployed in Afghanistan. She said experts from the U.S. Department of Agriculture are embedded with the U.S. military and "rule of law" experts are working to extend a system of justice "so that the Taliban would not offer the only form of justice in Afghanistan."

The State Department says it is tripling the number of civilian staff deployed to Afghanistan, and plans to have 974 staff members there by early 2010.

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WASHINGTON (CNN) - Widening rifts over America's war in Afghanistan were laid bare Tuesday with the revelation that a State Department official recently resigned in protest over what he termed a "cavalier, politically expedient and Pollyannaish misadventure."

Foreign Service Officer Matthew Hoh, a 36-year-old former Marine Corps captain, submitted his resignation letter on September 10.

Richard Holbrooke, the Obama administration's special representative in both Afghanistan and neighboring Pakistan, made a personal plea for Hoh to change his mind. Hoh refused.

His resignation took effect September 28.

"I do not believe any military force has ever been tasked with such a complex, opaque and Sisyphean mission as the U.S. military has received in Afghanistan," Hoh wrote.

"Our forces, devoted and faithful, have been committed to a conflict in an indefinite and unplanned manner. ... We are mortgaging our nation's economy on a war which, even with increased commitment, will remain a draw for years to come."

News of Hoh's resignation came as the administration continues to deliberate whether to change course in an eight-year conflict once dubbed a "war of necessity" by President Barack Obama.
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WASHINGTON (CNN) - Israeli and Palestinian negotiators will soon be heading to Washington to discuss the stalled peace process, the U.S. State Department said Tuesday.

The Israeli team is scheduled to arrive on Thursday and the Palestinian negotiators will arrive next week, State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said.

The Israeli team will be led by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's advisers Yitzhak Molcho and Mike Hertzog, the prime minister's office said Sunday.

Top U.S. envoy to the region George Mitchell invited both sides to Washington during his weekend discussions with Israeli and Palestinian leaders.

It is unclear who will represent the Palestinian side.

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State Dept. on Nobel: 'Better to be thrown acolades than shoes'.

WASHINGTON (CNN) – "Certainly from our standpoint, this gives us a sense of momentum - when the United States has accolades tossed its way, rather than shoes."

That's the take of Hillary Clinton's State Department on President Obama being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, according to her spokesman, Assistant Secretary PJ Crowley.

Crowley was referring to the incident last December when an Iraqi journalist threw his shoes at President George W. Bush during his final visit to Iraq of his presidency.

Muntader Zaidi, who worked for the Iraqi television station Al Baghdadiya, hurled both his shoes at Bush and called him a "dog" during a press conference with Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. He narrowly missed the president, who quickly ducked.

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JERUSALEM (CNN) - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's meeting on Friday with the top U.S. envoy to the Middle East was "useful and constructive," the Israeli leader's office said.

Talks between George Mitchell and Netanyahu focused on efforts to restart the stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace process, and the two men agreed to continue their discussions in the coming days, the minister's office said.

Mitchell will meet Saturday with two of Netanyahu's advisers, Yizhak Molcho and Mike Hertzog, it said.

He also plans to talk with Palestinian leaders in the West Bank, including Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas on Friday and Prime Minister Salam Fayyad on Saturday, the State Department said.

Mitchell returned to the region this week to advocate peace negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians, but significant obstacles remain.

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WASHINGTON (CNN) - Secretary of State Hillary Clinton embarks Friday on a six-day trip to Europe and Russia that comes at a crucial time in the Obama administration's decision-making on a strategy for Afghanistan.

She will depart one day after the inaugural flight of the "lethal transit" agreement, signed in July by President Barack Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, which allows transport of military personnel and equipment across Russia to support the U.S.-NATO mission in Afghanistan.

On the trip, the secretary will confer with key allies about Obama's emerging strategy on Afghanistan and Pakistan, said Phil Gordon, assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian Affairs.

Meetings are planned with the French foreign minister, the British foreign secretary and prime minister, the Russian foreign minister and Medvedev. She also will discuss the next steps on Iran and North Korea and international efforts to have the two countries end their nuclear programs.

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WASHINGTON (CNN) – The Obama administration has made no decision on whether to remove Sudan from a list of terrorism-sponsoring countries, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Friday, a day after another administration official spoke in favor of its removal.

Sudan is hoping to improve diplomatic ties with the United States, which is now reviewing how best to deal with that government and the crisis in the nation's Darfur region, where an estimated 300,000 people have been killed and more than 2 million forced to fell their homes.

"We have made no decision to lift the listing on the terrorist list of Sudan," Clinton said at the State Department during a picture-taking session Friday. "As you know, there is a very intensive review going on within the administration concerning our policy toward Sudan, but no decisions have been made."

On Thursday, the Obama administration's special envoy to Sudan made headlines saying there is no evidence to keep Sudan on the terror-sponsor list. Envoy Scott Gration said at a Senate hearing called the terrorism designation "a political decision" and said it is hindering his work.

He said lifting sanctions against Sudan would allow heavy equipment and other assistance to flow more easily to people desperately in need.

The State Department denies there is any split on Sudan policy inside the administration.

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WASHINGTON (CNN) – The Obama administration continued its outreach to the Muslim world Wednesday, introducing a special envoy for Islamic relations tasked with improving international dialogue at the grassroots level.

Farah Pandith, the State Department's new Special Representative to Muslim Communities, promised to pursue an "out of the box" approach to local engagement around the world.

"There is no one bullet that's going to fix everything. There's not one program that is going to be the magic program to engage with Muslims," she said at a State Department briefing.

"It's really listening. It's really understanding what's taking place on the ground. It's finding opportunities ... to get to know what others are saying, thinking and dreaming and believing, and acting as a facilitator and a convener and an intellectual partner when we can."

Pandith declined to engaged in many specifics about how she intends to pursue her agenda. She did, however, reference a long State Department history of using "a lot of different mechanisms," including town gatherings, meeting "like-minded thinkers that are innovators and entrepreneurs," and promoting various local community projects.

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U.S. Mideast envoy George Mitchell will spend two days in Syria this weekend.

WASHINGTON (CNN) – U.S. Mideast envoy George Mitchell will spend two days in Syria this weekend as part of the Obama administration's effort to jump-start comprehensive peace efforts in the region, the State Department said
Tuesday.

Mitchell is already in Israel and plans to visit Ramallah, the seat of the Palestinian Authority, and Lebanon before heading to Damascus, State
Department spokesman Ian Kelly told reporters. Mitchell's visit is a follow-up to President Barack Obama's speech to the Muslim world last week in Cairo, Egypt, and part of his policy to pursue a "broad-based, comprehensive peace dealing with all the regional players."

"This is a very high priority," Kelly said.

U.S.-Syrian ties have been strained in recent years over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the war in Iraq and the ongoing political
struggle between pro- and anti-Syrian factions in Lebanon. The United States has not had an ambassador in Damascus since 2005.

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Ex-State Department employee Kendall Myers and his wife were arrested last week, suspected of spying for Cuba.

WASHINGTON (CNN) - Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Monday she has ordered a review of security and vetting procedures that let a State Department employee suspected of spying for Cuba slip through the cracks.

Clinton told reporters she directed State Department security personnel to review "every possible security program we have, every form of vetting and clearance that we employ in the State Department, to determine what more we can do to guard against this kind of outrageous violation of the oaths that people take to serve our country here in the State Department."

Walter Kendall Myers, a 72-year-old former State Department employee, and his 71-year-old wife, Gwendolyn, were arrested Thursday and charged with illegally aiding the government of Cuba for almost 30 years, the Justice Department said.

The Myerses were charged with conspiracy to act as illegal agents of the Cuban government, providing classified information to that government and wire fraud, according to court documents unsealed in Washington on Friday.

"We are concerned by the announcement of the arrests and the charges against these two individuals, one of whom, as you know, was a former State Department employee, along with his wife," Clinton said.

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WASHINGTON (CNN) - A former State Department official and his wife have
been arrested and charged with being spies for the Cuban government fo the past
30 years.

WASHINGTON (CNN) – The State Department has revised a report that erroneously pegged the salaries of some foreigners working abroad at U.S. embassies and other places at less than $1 per day.

It's not $1 a day, it's $4 a day, the inspector general's office said Friday, two days after the report was released.

"We were given that information erroneously," inspector general spokesman Tom Burgess told CNN. "We know it is between three dollars and four dollars a day."

Apparently a currency conversion error was to blame, he said.

Other details of the report remain in place, including claims that some lower grade foreign nationals who work for the department earn so little that they must cut back to one meal a day and send their children out to peddle on the streets.

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WASHINGTON (CNN) - The United States is rushing emergency aid to Pakistan - an initial $5 million - to help people uprooted by the fighting against extremists, according to the State Department.

The U.S. had urged the Pakistanis to launch the military action that in recent days has driven hundreds of thousands of people from their villages.

Meanwhile, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee took a longer-term view Tuesday and discussed how the United States might triple aid to Pakistan over the next five years.

The State Department said Tuesday the U.S. Embassy in Pakistan and officials of the U.S. Agency for International Development were evaluating the needs of civilians fleeing the Swat valley and surrounding regions in northwest Pakistan.

"We are of course very concerned about the well-being of civilians who are fleeing the fighting in the area," State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said. "And we have personnel, USAID personnel, on the ground in Pakistan, not in the Swat valley, but in Pakistan, who are directing assistance to help them."

"We've provided a substantial amount of money through the International Organization for Migration," Kelly said at his daily briefing in Washington. "This is primarily to provide tents, provide shelter and emergency relief supplies, food and medicine to the affected populations."

Kelly said the $5 million was just an initial payment.

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The Iraqi government could be tweeting soon, courtesy of Hillary Clinton.

WASHINGTON (CNN) - The Iraqi government could be tweeting soon, courtesy of Hillary Clinton.

The State Department said Monday it is sending a team of technology executives to help the Iraqi government and other groups expand the country's emerging new media industry.

The nine-member delegation, which includes CEOs and other officials from such technology giants as AT&T, Google, Twitter and YouTube, will meet with Iraqi government and education officials, Iraqi technology companies and civil society groups.

A statement issued by the State Department said the team will "provide conceptual input as well as ideas on how new technologies can be used to build local capacity, foster greater transparency and accountability, build upon anti-corruption efforts, promote critical thinking in the classroom, scale-up civil society, and further empower local entities and individuals by providing the tools for network building."

"As Iraqis think about how to integrate new technology as a tool for smart power, we view this as an opportunity to invite the American technology industry to be part of this creative genesis," the State Department statement said.
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Hillary Clinton seeks improved relations with China, where she said the U.S. would renew military contacts.

ELMENDORF AIR FORCE BASE, Alaska  (CNN) – Hillary Clinton says her first overseas trip to Asia as secretary of state is aimed at creating a "network of partners" to tackle problems that no nation can deal with alone, including the global economic crisis.

En route to Asia on Sunday, Clinton told reporters that the economy would serve as the backdrop of her trip, and she intends to explain steps the United States is taking with its $787 billion stimulus bill. She said she will be "seeking cooperation on ways that we are going to work through these very difficult economic times."

Clinton is slated to travel to Japan, China, South Korea and Indonesia to discuss a range of issues, including mutual economic recovery, trade, the prevention of nuclear weapons proliferation and reversing the global warming trend.

The trip represents a departure from a diplomatic tradition under which the first overseas trip by the secretary of state in a new administration is to Europe.

Speaking at the New York-based Asia Society last week, Clinton said the Obama administration wants to "develop a broader and deeper" relationship with Asia, a region that has felt overlooked by the United States despite its growing global importance.

"It demonstrates clearly that our new administration wants to focus a lot of time and energy in working with Asian partners and all the nations in the Pacific region," she said, "because we know that so much of our future depends upon our relationships there."

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Bill Clinton looks on during his wife's ceremonial swearing in Monday.

WASHINGTON (CNN) - Bucking tradition, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will bypass Europe and travel to Asia on her maiden voyage overseas, diplomats familiar with the planning said Tuesday.

Clinton is expected to visit China, Japan and South Korea on her first trip overseas. The diplomats said she may also add other stops, including one in Southeast Asia.

The diplomats spoke on condition of anonymity because Clinton's schedule was still being finalized. The State Department has not commented on her travel plans.

Making Asia Clinton's first overseas destination illustrates the Obama administration's desire for a broader partnership with China and its commitment to resolving the North Korean nuclear issue, as well as strengthening ties with Tokyo and Seoul, the diplomats said.

The White House said President Barack Obama told Chinese President Hu Jintao in a Friday phone call that he looked forward to "to early contacts and exchanges between senior officials of our two countries."

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Secretary Clinton had a ceremonial swearing in as the nation's top diplomat at the State Department Monday.

WASHINGTON (CNN) - Hillary Clinton was sworn in as America's 67th secretary of state Monday - for a second time.

Vice President Joe Biden administered the oath to Clinton in a ceremonial star-studded gathering at the State Department, with actor Chevy Chase and designer Oscar de la Renta among those on hand.

Watch: Biden swears in Clinton

"It is an overwhelming honor ... to assume this position," Clinton said. "We have a lot of work to do (to ensure that) America's future can be even brighter than our storied past."

Watch: 'I am an optimist,' says Clinton

"In selecting Sen. Clinton for this critical task, I think the president selected a person of unrivaled talent and experience," Biden said. She is "equally at ease in the great diplomatic halls of Europe as she is in the small villages in Africa."

Several of Clinton's predecessors were in attendance for the unusual gathering, including Madeleine Albright, Lawrence Eagleburger, James Baker and Henry Kissinger. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid also attended, as did Clinton's husband, former President Bill Clinton, and former first daughter Chelsea Clinton.

Hillary Clinton's official swearing-in took place January 21 in her former Senate office. The low-key event was attended only by her husband and Senate staff.

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CNN=Politics Daily is The Best Political Podcast from The Best Political Team.

(CNN) – Want to apply for a job in the Obama administration? You may think twice when you hear about the privacy-invading background search. In the latest installment of CNN=Politics Daily, what happens to that personal information when the application process ends? From credit reports, private emails, and incriminating photos, CNN’s Jason Carroll has the details.

Also: Online thieves attempt to gain access to top-secret information from the pentagon, state department, and NASA every day. One commission says that the Obama administration will face more cyber attacks than any previous administration. CNN’s Jeanne Meserve takes a closer look.

America’s infrastructure has been neglected for decades as water systems, bridges, roads, and electrical grids are currently out-of-date. Barack Obama says he can fix it, and create jobs. So how exactly will the president-elect do it? CNN’s Chris Lawrence has the story in the latest “Memo to the President.”

Plus: President-elect Obama and former Vice President Al Gore met Tuesday to discuss environmental policy and job creation, but their talk is raising speculation. CNN’s Elaine Quijano tells us why.

Finally: President Bush gets down. CNN’s Jeanne Moos takes a look at the lighter side of the presdent

Click here to subscribe to CNN=Politics Daily.

Sen. Hillary Clinton is preparing to move from Capitol Hill to Foggy Bottom.

WASHINGTON (CNN) - Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Sunday that she believes Sen. Hillary Clinton will "do a great job" as secretary of state.

In an interview with CNN, Rice also addressed President-elect Barack Obama's victory, saying she believes Americans were "wise in wanting change."

Speaking to CNN's "Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer," Rice said she has spoken with Clinton since Obama named the former first lady as his pick to be the nation's top diplomat.

"I talked with her and we're going to sit down, and I'm really looking forward to it. I've known her a long time and she is someone that I admire."

Watch: The media obsession with Hillary Clinton

Though the two are from opposite political parties, Rice seemed to spare no praise for Clinton, who lost her battle for the Democratic presidential nomination to Obama.

"I've known her for a long time, ever since she brought her freshman daughter to Stanford, when I was provost at Stanford. I think she's going to be terrific," Rice told ABC's "This Week."

She added, "President-elect Obama has made his choice, and he's made a terrific choice. Hillary Clinton is somebody of intelligence, and she'll do a great job. She also has what's most important to being secretary of state, and that is that you love this country, and you represent it from a basis of faith in its values. And I know that she will do that.

"I've watched her - I watched her do it at the conference in Beijing on women. I know that she was someone who felt strongly about the Balkans and the need to stop that terrible killing there. So, from that point of view, she's going to be great."

In her interview with CNN, Rice described Obama's national security team as "people I know, and they are all people of substance. And the most important thing is that they are all people who are going to have the fundamental interests and values of the United States at the core of what they do."

Having grown up in segregated Birmingham, Alabama, Rice said Obama's election was "quite a moment. It means this country has come an enormous distance. "It means that the United States of America is what it claims to be, which is a place of opportunity for all. I don't think, by the way, that we're still color-blind. It's remarkable that we have an African-American president.

We've had back-to-back African-American secretaries of state. We have African-American heads of major corporations. "But still, we see race and that's fine. But increasingly we don't see race as all-defining, of who one is and what one can be. As long as we pay attention to opportunity - to making educational opportunities available, which is really what got me to where I am and I think President-elect Obama would tell you the same thing."

Asked whether she would help Obama if he asks, Rice responded, "He is not going to need my help. He has got plenty of help. But of course, he is someone that I admire. He was on my committee, the Foreign Relations Committee. We have talked a number of times. He is going to do very well for the country.

"But eight years is a long time. The American people are wise in wanting change. Two terms is plenty. And I'm going to go back to California and on to other things."