Way to go, Mr. Sensitive. From Japan’s Yomiuri Shimbun, Aug. 16: Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi visited Yasukuni Shrine in central Tokyo on Tuesday–the 61st anniversary of the end of World War II–writing his name as prime minister in the shrine’s… Read moreKoizumi visits Yasukuni on VJ Day
From the New York Daily News, Aug. 15: Crash horror on N.J. Turnpike A Queens couple and their 3-year-old daughter were among four people killed when an 18-wheeler hauling bricks spun out on the New Jersey Turnpike yesterday – but… Read moreWHY WE FIGHT
Seymour Hersh‘s latest feature in the Aug. 21 New Yorker openly portrays Israel’s Lebanon adventure as Washington’s test war for an attack on Iran. Like most of his recent journalism, it relies overwhelmingly on anonymous sources. One “US government consultant”… Read moreSeymour Hersh: Lebanon was Bush’s test war for Iran
The Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), which rules one half of Iraq’s northern Kurdish autonomous zone, is currently facing a wave of popular unrest. Among the greivances are deals the PUK has cut with local tribal leaders respecting their despotic… Read morePUK connives with “tribal” woman-killers
Another heroic blow by the Iraqi resistance… against Shi’ite civilians. From the AP, Aug. 14: BAGHDAD, Iraq — Residents dug through the rubble of devastated buildings today in a predominantly Shiite neighborhood of Baghdad that was pounded by a barrage… Read moreIraq: sectarian cleansing grinds on
From Prensa Latina, Aug. 14: LA PAZ — Bolivian government denounced indications of a conspiracy by economic power groups against the Constituent Assembly to open works in the southern city of Sucre on Tuesday. National Defense Minister Walker San Miguel… Read moreBolivia: conspiracy against constitutional reform?
From AP, Aug. 14: LA PAZ — Bolivia’s decision to suspend a plan to nationalize its oil and gas industry has reinforced doubts about the ability of its state-run energy company to manage the country’s gas reserves. The Hydrocarbons Ministry… Read moreBolivia halts hydrocarbon nationalization
We noted one year ago a heart-rending case of indigenous peasants in Mexico’s southern state of Chiapas dying after eating a stew of apparently poisonous mushrooms. The peasants were driven by hunger and failed harvests to gather wild mushrooms (which… Read moreChiapas mushroom poisonings point to ecological crisis
In a 10-2 decision released late on Aug. 9, the 11th US Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta, Georgia, turned down an appeal on behalf of the “Cuban Five,” a group of Cubans sentenced to lengthy prison terms in 2001… Read moreCuba Five appeal denied
On Aug. 9 the US Justice Department’s Office of the Inspector General (OIG) released a 237-page report on the killing of Puerto Rican nationalist leader Filiberto Ojeda Rios in the western town of Hormigueros on Sept. 23, 2005, by agents… Read moreFBI cleared in Ojeda Rios assassination
On Aug. 3, some 600 demonstrators, including many people of Palestinian and Lebanese descent, marched in Bogota to protest Israel’s military aggression against Lebanon. The march was called by the Platform of Colombians in Solidarity with Palestine and Lebanon, a… Read moreColombia: police attack march for Lebanon
Despite the ceasefire, Israeli soldiers fanned out across the Litani river, and between 10 – 30,000 may remain in Lebanon, creating certain logistics problems. According to Ha’aretz, Aug. 14: IDF general: Soldiers may steal food from south Lebanon stores “If… Read moreIsraeli general: troops in Lebanon should steal food, get ready for winter
