Hamas claimed credit for killing four Israeli settlers near Hebron, as Israel’s right-wing Shas party—which opposes any settlement freeze—said that Hamas terror would sabotage the peace process.
Anti-war groups have issued a statement denouncing the “Iraq Debacle,” and calling for withdrawal of all US troops and military contractors, and for reparations to help the Iraqis rebuild.
Iraq’s Oil Ministry said the agreement Germany’s RWE public utility signed with the Kurdistan Regional Government to supply gas for the Nabucco pipeline project is illegal.
Our August issue featured the story BP: The Case for Public Ownership by Billy Wharton, a reprint from In These Times. Our multiple-choice Exit Poll was: “Should BP be nationalzied?” We received 16 votes. The results follow: Yes, it is… Read moreOur readers write: Should BP be nationalized?
CountertVortex editor and main contributor Bill Weinberg (that would be me) is currently without phone service, and only intermittent Internet access, due to a Verizon equipment failure. The last Verizon chat-jockey I spoke with said "it is major cable issue and will need some time to be solved." That basically means they don't intend to fix it. I use DSL and a land-line—going through the old copper wires that Verizon is trying to phase out. If my service is not restored, I will have no means of producing CounterVortex—or the journalism I must write every day to pay the rent. Many people in New York and around the country are in the same position. We urgently must press Verizon to maintain the old copper-wire infrastructure we depend on—which they are required to do by law. (Photo: IBEW)
French prosecutors issued international arrest warrants for three prominent Syrian officials charged with collusion in crimes against humanity, in what human rights lawyers are calling a major victory in the pursuit of those believed responsible for mass torture, abuse and summary executions in the regime's detention facilities. The warrants name three leading security officials—including Ali Mamlouk, a former intelligence chief and senior adviser to President Bashar al-Assad, as well as head of the Air Force Intelligence security branch, Jamil Hassan. A third, Abdel Salam Mahmoud—an Air Force Intelligence officer who reportedly runs a detention facility at al-Mezzeh military base near Damascus—was also named. Hassan and Mamlouk are the most senior Syrian officials to receive an international arrest warrant throughout the course of the conflict. (Photo of hunger strikers at Syrian prison via Foreign Policy. Credit: Louai Beshara/AFP/Getty Images)
Private security firm Blackwater violated US arms trafficking regulations when training Colombian military personnel for service in Iraq in 2005, a State Department report shows.
Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos promised to return 6 million hectares of farmland stolen by right-wing paramilitary groups after the original owners were forcibly displaced.
Authorities in Colombia’s southern Nariño department found the bodies of Ramiro Inampues and his wife, Maria Lina Galindez, two Guachucal indigenous leaders who had been shot by unknown assassins.
Four people were detained for an attack on Chinese military police in the far western region of Xinjiang. Six police were killed and 15 injured in the first major terrorist attack in China since 2008.
Selig Harrison writes in the New York Times that China's People's Liberation Army has taken effective control of the northern Himalayan enclaves of Pakistan-controlled Kashmir.
Members of the indigenous Dongria Kondh tribe dance in India’s Orissa state. In an unprecedented move, India’s Environment Ministry blocked Vedanta Resources’ controversial plan to mine bauxite on the sacred hills of the Dongria Kond.
Photo: Survival International
