Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez charged Feb. 21 that President Bush is behind a plot to assassinate him—and warned that if it succeeded, Venezuela would halt oil exports to the US. "If I am assassinated, there is only one person responsible:… Read moreChavez: Bush trying to kill me
Three international reports have fled Zimbabwe ahead of President Robert Mugabe’s 81st birthday celebrations, and a fourth is in hiding after police searches their offices and threatened to have them arrested for slandering the state. Those who fled, Angus Shaw… Read moreZimbabwe: journalists flee
Attorneys for former post-9-11 detainees at New York’s federal Metropolitan Detention Center call it "Brooklyn’s Abu Ghraib." The detainees—none of whom were ever charged with anything related to terrorism—say in sworn affidavits and interviews with Justice Department officials that correction… Read moreBrooklyn’s Abu Ghraib
Up to 400 are reported dead in an earthquake which struck near the city of Zarand in Kerman province of southeastern Iran. (RFE/RL, Reuters, Feb. 22) A December 2003 earthquake at the city of Bam, also in Zarand, killed some… Read moreIran: 400 dead in earthquake
Al-Jazeera has aired another propaganda video from Ayman al-Zawahiri, now said to be al-Qaeda’s number two man after Osama bin Laden. "Your new crusade will end, God willing, with the same defeat as its predecessors, but only after you have… Read moreAl-Zawahiri: We’ll kill thousands.
Bad news for freedom of speech on opposite sides of the planet. The presidents of both Kygyzstan and Venezuela seem to have gone litigation-happy against opposition figures. Most recently, Kyrgyz President Askar Akayev announced he will sue the opposition newspaper… Read moreKyrgyz, Venezuelan presidents silence opposition
“Peak oil” theorists will be vindicated by a Feb. 20 report on al-Jazeera that Saudi Arabia, the world’s top oil producer, has past its peak of production and may have in fact damaged its own extractable reserves through over-production. Writes al-Jazeera: As… Read moreSaudi Arabia at “peak oil”?
Speaking at an anti-war event in Olympia, WA, former Iraq weapons inspector Scott Ritter claimed that President Bush has already signed off on plans to start bombing Iran in June, ostensibly to eliminate weapons of mass destruction. If we live… Read moreScott Ritter: Iran attack planned for June
With Lebanon possibly next in the US crosshairs following the Valentine’s Day car-bomb assassination of former prime minister Rafiq Hariri, the Hezbollah militia movement marked the Shi’ite holy day of Ashura with a massive rally in Beirut. Amid requisite chants… Read moreHezbollah next US target?
Writes Israeli left-wing commentator Uri Avnery in a Feb. 19 piece for Media Monitors Network, "Beware of the Dog!": It is not very flattering to be paraded like a Rottweiler on a leash, whose master threatens to let him loose… Read moreIsraeli air-strikes on Iran planned?
Irish police say they have seized nearly $5 million in a series of raids on suspected Republican safehouses across the country, uncovering what hardline Justice Minister Michael McDowell called a "colossal crime machine, laundering huge sums of money." One suspected… Read moreAnti-Republican raids across Ireland
In an uncharacterstically strong and principled lead editorial Feb. 19, the NY Times says its "Time for an Accounting" on Abu Ghraib and the administration’s policy on torture and detainment generally. Maybe, finally, a sign that elite consciences are beginning… Read moreNYT: “Time for an Accounting” on torture, detainment
