The US military and NATO force in Afghanistan (ISAF) say the July 17 raid against “high-priority Taliban targets” in Herat province led to the deaths of two key insurgent tribal leaders—identified as Haji Nazrullah Khan and Haji Dawlat Khan—and a… Read moreAfghanistan: US bombs civilians —again?
Police officials in Mexico say drug traffickers have built makeshift car bombs to attack police officers, troops and rivals. Soldiers found two car bombs in a safe house in Culiacán, Sinaloa, July 14. One vehicle was packed with cans of… Read moreMexico: narco gangs gird with car bombs, submarines
Michael I. Niman, writing for ArtVoice of Buffalo, NY, July 16, reports on repression by federal law enforcement at this year’s Rainbow Gathering in Wyoming’s Bridger-Teton National Forest. The annual back-to-nature gathering—held in a different state each year, with a… Read moreFederal police brutalize peaceniks in Wyoming
The US Interior Department July 16 opened 2.6 million acres of potentially oil-rich territory in northern Alaska to exploration, but deferred for ten years a decision on opening 600,000 acres north of Teshekpuk Lake that is the summer home of… Read moreInterior Department opens Alaska North Slope to oil biz; enviros applaud
The insidious thing about Al Gore is that he superficially sounds pretty good to environmentalists—so much so, that his ideas are even blasted as extremism by right-wing idiots. But if you scratch them, there is always less there than meets… Read moreAl Gore’s pseudo-ecology strikes again
It is axiomatic that the closer Obama gets to the White House, the more beholden to oil interests and imperial designs he will become—and therefore the more equivocal his opposition to the Iraq occupation. Watch this process in action. Andrew… Read moreObama website deletes criticism of Iraq surge
With all eyes on the Tribal Areas, the insurgency in Pakistan’s bordering Baluchistan province continues. A roadside bomb wounded seven security personnel and two passers-by in Mastung district July 15. (AP, July 15) On July 4, an eight-year-old beggar was… Read morePakistan: who is behind Baluchistan terror?
Libyan leader Moammar Qadaffi made a big show of boycotting the Mediterranean Union summit in Paris, bashing the new initiative as a “neo-colonial” project to weaken African and Arab unity. (RFE/RL, July 14) But days earlier, France and Libya signed… Read moreLibya and France in nuclear cooperation agreement
Barack Obama proposes the US deploy 10,000 more troops to Afghanistan to fight insurgents even as he pledges to remove troops from Iraq, plugging the proposal in a New York Times op-ed, “My Plan for Iraq.” (NYT, July 14) Meanwhile,… Read moreAfghanistan, Pakistan: already at war?
The European Parliament approved 336-220 a resolution branding Italy’s fingerprinting members of the country’s Roma community a direct act of racial discrimination, and called on Rome to bring the program to an immediate halt. Italy’s Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said… Read moreEU raps Italy on Roma fingerprint program
An Italian court July 15 found 15 officials guilty of brutalizing protesters at the Genoa G8 summit in 2001. Sentences ranged from five months to five years. The accused include police, prison officials and two doctors. Another 30 were cleared… Read moreItaly: cops convicted in Genoa G8 repression
Belgian Prime Minister Yves Leterme submitted his resignation July 14, citing the inability of his coalition government to successfully divide powers between the Flemish and French-speaking communities. Leterme had set a deadline of July 15 for the four-month-old coalition to… Read moreSplitsville for Belgium?
