This commentary in Egypt’s Al-Ahram Weekly gets it just right. The incredibly sad irony is that Al-Ahram’s editors obviously didn’t read it! The introdek they appended to it assumes the piece is making the same tired point about how the… Read moreArab scholar: “Jewish lobby” scapegoat for imperial interests
The countdown continues: how long before the idiot left in the West starts rallying around Lukashenko? From AP, March 24: MINSK, Belarus – Police stormed the opposition tent camp in the Belarusian capital early Friday and rounded up hundreds of… Read moreBelarus: police break opposition protests
From Knight-Ridder, March 21: BOGOTA, Colombia – It’s pretty easy to tell when Colombian President Alvaro Uribe is angry. The bespectacled president usually airs his grievances in public, particularly against errant generals in his army. Since taking office in 2002,… Read moreColombia: Uribe rift with military?
From the AP, March 22: WASHINGTON — The United States charged 50 leaders of Colombia’s largest guerrilla group with sending more than $25 billion worth of cocaine around the world to finance their fight at home, a federal indictment that… Read moreColombia: US indicts FARC leaders
The Basque separatist ETA has announced a permanent ceasefire after nearly 40 years and some 800 killings. Now, as this report from IOL notes, legal proceedings against accused ETA collaborators may be reconsidered. Note that Arnaldo Otegi faces prison time… Read moreSpain: ETA ceasefire throws internment into question
From AP, March 22: ROME — Italian police said Tuesday they have arrested five people suspected in the killing of a local politician who was shot last year at a polling station in southern Italy where he was voting in… Read moreCalabrian ‘Ndrangheta Europe’s leading crime machine —legacy of Kosova war?
From Reuters: QUETTA, Pakistan, March 23 – A bomb blew up a telephone call office in Pakistan’s troubled Baluchistan province on Thursday, killing the owner and wounding eight other people, police said. A police official, who did not want to… Read morePakistan: Baluchistan insurgency grows
From Pakistan’s daily Dawn: WANA, March 22: A pro-government cleric was killed by gunmen in the Laddah subdivision of the South Waziristan Agency on Wednesday and a telephone exchange was blown up in the Shakai area. Witnesses told Dawn that… Read morePakistan: Waziristan insurgency grows
From Reuters, via Khajeel Times, March 21: QUETTA, Pakistan – Suspected militants blew up a gas pipeline in Baluchistan on Tuesday, the latest attack in the troubled southwest Pakistan province where rebels are fighting for greater autonomy, officials said. The… Read morePakistan: Baluch rebels blow up pipeline —again
From Reuters, March 21: President George W. Bush held out the possibility on Tuesday of a U.S. troop presence in Iraq for many years, saying a full withdrawal would depend on decisions by future U.S. presidents and Iraqi governments. Bush,… Read moreBush: years-long military mission in Iraq
Another expendable piece of cannon fodder is scapegoated… WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A U.S. Army dog handler was found guilty on Tuesday of abusing detainees at Baghdad’s notorious Abu Ghraib prison and faces up to eight years and nine months in… Read moreSaddam’s torture chambers now Uncle Sam’s
Freedom’s on the march. From the BBC, March 20: An Afghan man is being tried in a court in the capital, Kabul, for converting from Islam to Christianity. Abdul Rahman is charged with rejecting Islam and could face the death… Read moreAfghan faces death sentence for Christianity
