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{News Archive} – {News Links} News Stories
Climate resets BBC News By Molly Bentley Experts assessing the dangers posed to civilisation have added climate change to the prospect of nuclear annihilation as the greatest threats to humankind. As a result, the group has moved the minute hand on its famous "Doomsday Clock" two minutes closer to midnight. The concept timepiece, devised by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, now stands at five minutes to the hour. ... Not since the darkest days of the Cold War has the Bulletin, which covers global security issues, felt the need to place the minute hand so close to midnight. Click here to see how the clock has changed The Real Disaster The New York Times Times Lead Editorial President Bush told Americans last night that failure in Iraq would be a disaster. The disaster is Mr. Bush?s war, and he has already failed. Last night was his chance to stop offering more fog and be honest with the nation, and he did not take it. Americans needed to hear a clear plan to extricate United States troops from the disaster that Mr. Bush created. What they got was more gauzy talk of victory in the war on terrorism and of creating a "young democracy" in Iraq. In other words, a way for this president to run out the clock and leave his mess for the next one. ... In any case, Mr. Bush's excuses were tragically inadequate. The nation needs an eyes-wide-open recognition that the only goal left is to get the U.S. military out of this civil war in a way that could minimize the slaughter of Iraqis and reduce the chances that the chaos Mr. Bush unleashed will engulf Iraq's neighbors. What it certainly did not need were more of Mr. Bush's open-ended threats to Iran and Syria. ... Bush's refusal to face reality The Boston Globe A GLOBE EDITORIAL THE INCREASE of US forces in Iraq that President Bush announced Wednesday night offers practically no chance of thwarting the Sunni Arab insurgency or quelling the sectarian civil war that is turning life there into a nightmarish inferno for Sunnis and Shi'ites alike. The changes Bush proposed reflect a refusal to recognize the durability of the Sunni insurgency and the deeply rooted communal passions that have been loosed. There is really nothing new about the ''new strategy'' Bush proposed. There were earlier attempts to tamp down the insurgency and the sectarian violence by deploying more US troops to Baghdad, and they failed utterly. A surge of US forces in Baghdad last summer only resulted in a higher death toll. ... Bush's invasion and bungled occupation of Iraq brought about these perils. His prolonging of a failed strategy in Iraq looks more and more like a refusal to cope with the looming consequences of his own mistakes. Have These People F--king Lost It? BBC News By Justin Webb, US President George W Bush intends to reveal a new Iraq strategy within days, the BBC has learnt. The speech will reveal a plan to send more US troops to Iraq to focus on ways of bringing greater security, rather than training Iraqi forces. Its central theme will be sacrifice. ... Already one senior Republican senator has called it Alice in Wonderland. 3000! The Associated Press BAGHDAD, Iraq - The death of a Texas soldier, announced Sunday by the Pentagon, raised the number of U.S. military deaths in Iraq to at least 3,000 since the war began, according to an Associated Press count. The grim milestone was crossed on the final day of 2006 and at the end of the deadliest month for the American military in Iraq in the past 12 months. At least 111 U.S. service members were reported to have died in December. ... 'No proof' of Iran nuclear arms BBC News The US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) has not found conclusive evidence that Iran is developing nuclear weapons, a US magazine has reported. Veteran investigative reporter Seymour Hersh, writing in The New Yorker, cites a secret CIA report based on intelligence such as satellite images. ... The CIA assessment, according to unnamed officials quoted in the article, casts doubt on how far Iran has actually progressed to making a nuclear weapon. Confession That Formed Base of Iraq War was Acquired Under Torture: Journalist Agence France Presse An Al-Qaeda terror suspect captured by the United States, who gave evidence of links between Iraq and the terror network, confessed after being tortured, a journalist told the BBC. ... "What he claimed most significantly was a connection between ... Al-Qaeda and the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein. This intelligence report made it all the way to the top, and was used by (former US secretary of state) Colin Powell as a key piece of justification ... for invading Iraq," he told the broadcaster. "At the time, the caveats to say this intelligence was extracted under torture were not provided," Grey said. Active Duty Troops Speak Out On War U.S. Newswire By Trevor Fitzgibbon Active-Duty Troops Launch Campaign to Press Congress to End U.S. Occupation of Iraq For the first time since the U.S. invasion of Iraq, active- duty members of the military are asking Members of Congress to end the U.S. occupation of Iraq and bring American soldiers home. Sixty-five active-duty members have sent Appeals for Redress to Members of Congress. Three of these people (including two who served in Iraq) and their attorney will speak about this on Wednesday, Oct. 25 at 11 a.m. EDT ... The Exodus: 1.6m Iraqis have fled their country since the war The Independent By Patrick Cockburn Iraq is in flight. Everywhere inside and outside the country, Iraqis who once lived in their own houses cower for safety six or seven to a room in hovels. ... Out of the population of 26 million, 1.6 million Iraqis have fled the country and a further 1.5 million are displaced within Iraq, according to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees. In Jordan alone there are 500,000 Iraqi refugees and a further 450,000 in Syria. In Syria alone they are arriving at the rate of 40,000 a month. It is one of the largest long-term population movements in the Middle East since Israel expelled Palestinians in the 1940s. Few of the Iraqis taking flight now show any desire to return to their homes. The numbers compelled to take to the roads have risen dramatically this year with 365,000 new refugees since the bombing of the Shia shrine in Samara in February. Iraq death toll report defended by researchers Group: Estimate of up to 794,000 civilian deaths based on sound methods Reuters LOS ANGELES - A controversial estimate by public health experts that hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have died because of the March 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq is likely an accurate assessment, researchers said on Saturday. ... The study, published earlier this month by the Lancet medical journal, employed a method known as "cluster sampling" in which data are collected through interviews with randomly selected households. ... Researchers from Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore and Al Mustansiriya University in Baghdad estimated with 95 percent certainty that the war and its aftermath have resulted in the deaths of between 426,000 and 794,000 Iraqis. Iraq war fuels terror - US report BBC News The Iraq conflict has become a "cause celebre" for Islamic militants worldwide, declassified parts of a US intelligence report say. It has been "cultivating supporters for the global jihadist movement," the National Intelligence Estimate says. ... The Iraq conflict had bred "a deep resentment of US involvement in the Muslim world," the report said. US planned Iran invasion since 2003 - analyst April 17, 2006 Washington - A former US intelligence analyst says the United States began planning a full-scale military campaign against Iran to establish control over the Strait of Hormuz even before the March 2003 invasion of Iraq. William Arkin, who served as the US Army's top intelligence mind on West Berlin in the 1970s and accurately predicted US military operations against Iraq, said the plan was known in military circles as TIRANNT, an acronym for Theater Iran Near Term. [...] Meanwhile, Iran has formed battalions of suicide bombers to hit American and British targets if its nuclear installations are attacked, London's Sunday Times newspaper said. According to Iranian officials, 40 000 trained suicide bombers were ready to strike. THE IRAN PLANS by SEYMOUR M. HERSH Would President Bush go to war to stop Tehran from getting the bomb? The Bush Administration, while publicly advocating diplomacy in order to stop Iran from pursuing a nuclear weapon, has increased clandestine activities inside Iran and intensified planning for a possible major air attack. Current and former American military and intelligence officials said that Air Force planning groups are drawing up lists of targets, and teams of American combat troops have been ordered into Iran, under cover, to collect targeting data and to establish contact with anti-government ethnic-minority groups. The officials say that President Bush is determined to deny the Iranian regime the opportunity to begin a pilot program, planned for this spring, to enrich uranium. [...] A government consultant with close ties to the civilian leadership in the Pentagon said that Bush was "absolutely convinced that Iran is going to get the bomb" if it is not stopped. He said that the President believes that he must do "what no Democrat or Republican, if elected in the future, would have the courage to do," and "that saving Iran is going to be his legacy." One former defense official, who still deals with sensitive issues for the Bush Administration, told me that the military planning was premised on a belief that "a sustained bombing campaign in Iran will humiliate the religious leadership and lead the public to rise up and overthrow the government." He added, "I was shocked when I heard it, and asked myself, ?What are they smoking?? " [...] The Administration?s case against Iran is compromised by its history of promoting false intelligence on Iraq?s weapons of mass destruction. In a recent essay on the Foreign Policy Web site, entitled "Fool Me Twice," Joseph Cirincione, the director for nonproliferation at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, wrote, "The unfolding administration strategy appears to be an effort to repeat its successful campaign for the Iraq war." FBI Keeps Watch on Activists Antiwar, other groups are monitored to curb violence, not because of ideology, agency says. By Nicholas Riccardi, Times Staff Writer DENVER ? The FBI, while waging a highly publicized war against terrorism, has spent resources gathering information on antiwar and environmental protesters and on activists who feed vegetarian meals to the homeless, the agency's internal memos show. For years, the FBI's definition of terrorism has included violence against property, such as the window-smashing during the 1999 Seattle protests against the World Trade Organization. That definition has led FBI investigations to online discussion boards, organizing meetings and demonstrations of a wide range of activist groups. Officials say that international terrorists pose the greatest threat to the nation but that they cannot ignore crimes committed by some activists. [...] ACLU attorneys say most violence during demonstrations is minor and is better handled by local police than federal counterterrorism agents. They say the FBI, which spied on antiwar and civil rights leaders during the 1960s, appears to be investigating activists solely for opposing the government. [...] An FBI counterterrorism official showed the class, at the University of Texas in Austin, 35 slides listing militia, neo-Nazi and Islamist groups. Senior Special Agent Charles Rasner said one slide, labeled "Anarchism," was a federal analyst's list of groups that people intent on terrorism might associate with. The list included Food Not Bombs, which mainly serves vegetarian food to homeless people, and ? with a question mark next to it ? Indymedia, a collective that publishes what it calls radical journalism online. Both groups are among the numerous organizations affiliated with anarchists and anti-globalization protests, where there has been some violence. The Abu Ghraib files By Joan Walsh
279 photographs and 19 videos from the Army's internal investigation record a harrowing three months of detainee abuse inside the notorious prison -- and make clear that many of those responsible have yet to be held accountable. Editor's note: The 10 galleries of photo and video evidence appear chronologically in the left column, followed by an additional Salon report on prosecutions for abuse and an overview of Pentagon investigations and other resources. The nine essays accompanying the photo galleries were reported and written by Michael Scherer and Mark Benjamin. Photo and video captions were compiled by Page Rockwell. Additional research, reporting and writing for "The Abu Ghraib Files" were contributed by Jeanne Carstensen, Mark Follman, Page Rockwell and Tracy Clark-Flory. [Webmaster's warning: These pictures will DEFINITELY stay with you! YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED! Sy Hersh almost quit his job after seeing the videos. There is HEAVY evil going on here, and OUR country did it.] The Courage to Resist: A US Lieutenant Refuses Deployment to Iraq Left Turn Ehren Watada is a 27-year-old First Lieutenant in the United States Army. He joined the Army in 2003 during the run-up to the Iraq war. He turned in his resignation to protest the war in Iraq in January 2006. He expects to receive orders to deploy in late June and will become the first Lieutenant to refuse orders to deploy to Iraq, setting the stage for what could be the biggest movement of GI resistance since the Vietnam War. He faces a court-martial, up to two years in prison for missing movement by design, a dishonorable discharge, and other possible charges. He says speaking against an illegal and immoral war is worth all of this and more. Journalist SARAH OLSON spoke with Watada in May. [...] OLSON: You joined the Army during the run-up to the Iraq war, but you had misgivings about the war. How did that happen? WATADA: Like everybody in America and around the world, I heard what they were saying on television about the stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction, and the ties to al-Qaeda and 9/11. I also saw the millions of people around the world protesting and listened to the people resigning from the government in protest. I realized that the war probably wasn?t justified until we found proof of these accusations the President and his deputies were making against Iraq. [...] I started asking: why are we dying? Why are we losing limbs? For what? I listened to the President and his deputies say we were fighting for democracy; we were fighting for a better Iraq. I just started to think about those things. Are those things the real reasons why we are there, the real reasons we are dying? But I felt there was nothing to be done and this administration was just continually violating the law to serve their purpose and there was nothing to stop them. The deciding moment for me was in January of 2006. I watched clips of military funerals. I saw the photos of these families. The children. The mothers and the fathers as they sat by the grave, or as they came out of the funerals. One really hard picture for me was a little boy leaving his father?s funeral. He couldn?t face the camera so he was covering his eyes. I felt like I couldn?t watch that anymore. I couldn?t be silent anymore and condone something that I felt was deeply wrong. New 'Iraq massacre' tape emerges BBC News The BBC has uncovered new video evidence that US forces may have been responsible for the deliberate killing of 11 innocent Iraqi civilians. The video appears to challenge the US military's account of events that took place in the town of Ishaqi in March. [...] The new evidence comes in the wake of the alleged massacre in Haditha, where US marines are suspected of massacring up to 24 Iraqi civilians in November 2005. Probe Into Iraq Deaths Finds False Reports Pentagon to Review Training After Alleged Massacre in Haditha The Washington Post By Thomas E. Ricks The U.S. military investigation of how Marine commanders handled the reporting of events last November in the Iraqi town of Haditha, where troops allegedly killed 24 Iraqi civilians, will conclude that some officers gave false information to their superiors, who then failed to adequately scrutinize reports that should have caught their attention, an Army official said yesterday. The three-month probe, led by Army Maj. Gen. Eldon Bargewell, is also expected to call for changes in how U.S. troops are trained for duty in Iraq, the official said. [...] The Bargewell investigation is likely to be explosive on Capitol Hill, because it focuses on questions that have haunted the Bush administration and the U.S. military since the scandal over abuse at Abu Ghraib prison emerged two years ago: How do U.S. military leaders in Iraq react to allegations of wrongdoing by their troops? And is the military prepared to carry out the long and arduous process of putting down an insurgency as part of the first U.S. occupation of an Arab nation? Lawmaker says Marines killed Iraqis 'in cold blood' Citing ongoing investigation, Marines mum May 18, 2006 WASHINGTON (CNN) -- A decorated Marine colonel turned anti-war congressman said Wednesday that Marines killed at least 30 innocent Iraqi civilians "in cold blood" in Haditha in November, suggesting the attack is twice as bad as originally reported. Rep. John Murtha, D-Pennsylvania, told reporters Wednesday that he got his information from U.S. commanders, who said the investigation will show that the Marines deliberately killed the civilians. [...] "There was no firefight. There was no IED that killed these innocent people. Our troops overreacted because of the pressure on them, and they killed innocent civilians in cold blood," Murtha said. [...] Murtha supported the invasion of Iraq in 2003, but last November, he distanced himself from the Bush administration and called for the withdrawal of U.S. troops because of what he called "a flawed policy wrapped in illusion." Doubts over Iran nuclear capacity BBC World News Doubts have been raised about how technically advanced Iran's nuclear programme is, after it emerged Tehran may have used material from China. Western diplomatic sources told the BBC the material used in Iran's recent uranium enrichment experiments probably came from materials supplied in 1991. ... Iran may have used stocks of high-quality uranium gas - or uranium hexafluoride gas - from China to speed up a breakthrough in enrichment, diplomats say. ... Nuclear experts say Iran has had some problems with impurities in its own production of the material. US rejects surprise Iran letter BBC World News A surprise letter to the US president from Iranian leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will not solve the growing nuclear dispute, US officials have said. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice dismissed hopes of a diplomatic breakthrough, telling the Associated Press: "This letter is not it." "It doesn't appear to do anything to address the concerns of the international community," White House spokesman Scott McClellan told reporters. ... Mr McClellan would also not confirm whether Mr Bush had personally read the letter, saying only: "I would just leave it at what I said: We've received it." Ahmadinejad sends letter to Bush BBC World News Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has written to George W Bush proposing "new solutions" to their differences. The letter will be sent via the Swiss Embassy, which represents US interests in Iran, a government spokesman said. Mr Ahmadinejad proposes "new solutions for getting out of international problems and the current fragile situation of the world", he said. Reports say it is the first letter from an Iranian president to a US leader since the Iranian revolution in 1979. ... The BBC's Frances Harrison in Tehran says that whatever is in the letter is significant because it is the first such high-level communication between Iran and America for almost three decades. As such it is a bold step by Mr Ahmadinejad, and the timing is key - just as the West is trying to persuade Russia and China to back tough action against Iran, she says. Mr Ahmadinejad is reinforcing the point that he is willing to negotiate with anyone, including the US president, to avoid conflict over the nuclear issue, our correspondent adds. The US and Iran have not had diplomatic relations since Washington severed ties with Tehran after Iranian students occupied the US embassy there and took 52 Americans hostage in 1979. Iran is the key to Jack Straw's demotion Guardian Unlimited He said a military strike against Iran was inconceivable. His problem is that Tony Blair thinks differently. By Ewen MacAskill The key to the demotion of Jack Straw from foreign secretary is Iran. Mr Straw for more than a year, in his favourite outlet the BBC Today programme or at various press conferences, said repeatedly a military strike on Iran was inconceivable. ... Downing Street phoned the Foreign Office several times to ask Mr Straw to stop being so categoric in ruling out a military strike. And the White House also phoned Downing Street to ask why Mr Straw kept saying these things. And that was before Mr Straw dismissed as "nuts" the prospect of a tactical nuclear strike on Iran, an option that Mr Bush subsequently refused to remove from the table. Margaret Beckett inherits the Iran portfolio. One of her first jobs will be in New York on Monday where she will meet Condoleezza Rice, the US secretary of state with whom Mr Straw built up such a close relationship, and other counterparts to discuss Iran. Iran threatens Israel if U.S. attacks The Associated Press TEHRAN, Iran - Iran's first target would be Israel in any response to a U.S. attack, a Revolutionary Guards commander said Tuesday, reinforcing the Iranian president's past call for Israel to be "wiped off the map." "We have announced that wherever (in Iran) America does make any mischief, the first place we target will be Israel," the Iranian Student News Agency quoted Gen. Mohammad Ebrahim Dehghani as saying. ... On Tuesday, Israeli elder statesman Shimon Peres called on Iran to scrap its nuclear program and warned: "Remember that Israel is exceptionally strong and knows how to defend itself." Report: Iran, Russia Reach 'Basic Deal' on Joint Uranium Enrichment on Russian Territory The Associated Press TEHRAN, Iran Apr 22, 2006 (AP)- Iran's envoy to the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency said Saturday the Islamic republic had reached a "basic deal" with the Kremlin to form a joint uranium enrichment venture on Russian territory, state-run television reported. Ali Asghar Soltanieh, envoy to the International Atomic Energy Agency, "spoke of a basic agreement between Iran and Russia to set up a joint uranium enrichment firm on Russian soil," Iranian state television reported. ... It remained unclear, though, whether Iran would entirely give up enrichment at home, a top demand of the West, or whether the joint venture would complement Iran's existing enrichment program. Enriched uranium can be used to fuel nuclear reactors that generate electricity or to make atomic bombs. [Webmaster's note: Weapons-grade uranium is far more pure than that used in power reactors, and takes many times longer to make.] Prominent U.S. Physicists Send Letter to President Bush, Call Nuclear Weapons Against Iran 'Gravely Irresponsible' UCSD Press Release Thirteen of the nation's most prominent physicists have written a letter to President Bush, calling U.S. plans to reportedly use nuclear weapons against Iran "gravely irresponsible" and warning that such action would have "disastrous consequences for the security of the United States and the world." The physicists include five Nobel laureates, a recipient of the National Medal of Science and three past presidents of the American Physical Society, the nation?s preeminent professional society for physicists. ... "It is gravely irresponsible for the U.S. as the greatest superpower to consider courses of action that could eventually lead to the widespread destruction of life on the planet. We urge the administration to announce publicly that it is taking the nuclear option off the table in the case of all non-nuclear adversaries, present or future, and we urge the American people to make their voices heard on this matter." Blair and Straw at odds over US action in Iran The Independent Jack Straw has warned Cabinet colleagues that it would be illegal for Britain to support the United States in military action against Iran. But Tony Blair has backed President George Bush by warning that ruling out military action would send out a "message of weakness" to Iran. Differences opened up yesterday between Mr Blair and the Foreign Secretary over growing alarm in the US at the refusal of Mr Bush to rule out military action. Mr Straw said on BBC Radio 4 that it was "inconceivable" that Britain would support a military strike against Tehran. Four hours later, Mr Blair refused to go that far when challenged to do so at Prime Minister's questions by the former minister, Michael Meacher. ... But most Labour MPs support Mr Straw's strategy and would revolt if Mr Blair showed any sign of lending support to a US strike against Iran. Mr Straw was given tacit support at a meeting of European foreign ministers in Luxembourg last week. France understands Mr Blair's argument that keeping the military option on the table would keep up the pressure on Iran. But it is to urge London to press the Bush administration to soften its approach so it no longer treats Iran as a "rogue state" but engages in a wider dialogue with Tehran on terrorism, the Middle East peace process and oil. Fallout from Chernobyl will cause 100,000 deaths, says Greenpeace The Independent The fallout from Chernobyl, the world's worst nuclear accident, will be 10 times more deadly than previously thought and will cause almost 100,000 people to die from cancer in coming years, Greenpeace says. Twenty years after Chernobyl's fourth reactor exploded, sending a radiation-lined cloud into the atmosphere, the green, anti-nuclear campaign group alleged that the human consequences of the disaster have been woefully and deliberately underestimated. ... With its new report Greenpeace became the latest interest group to enter the fray. It cited demographic data which showed that some 200,000 people appear to have already died in Ukraine, Belarus and Russia, the area most heavily contaminated, as a direct result of the 1986 Soviet-era accident. The total number of directly attributable cancer cases in that region was set to soar to 270,000, it added, of which 93,000 would be fatal. ... "The [emissions] from this one reactor exceeded the radioactive contamination by the nuclear weapons used at Hiroshima and Nagasaki by one hundred times. It has become clear that one nuclear reactor can contaminate half the Earth" Democratic Congressmen ask Bush about reports of US military operations in Iran RAW STORY Two Democratic Congressmen have written letters to President Bush on the heels of a growing number of news reports that American forces may have already begun military operations in Iran, RAW STORY has found. Both House members express concern that if the stories are true, then the president may have acted unilaterally without first obtaining proper authorization from Congress. "Recently, it has been reported that U.S. troops are conducting military operations in Iran," wrote Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) last Friday. Kucinich is the Ranking Democrat on the House Government Reform Subcommittee on National Security, Emerging Threats and International Relations. ... Congressman Peter DeFazio (D-OR) intends to introduce a resolution "expressing the sense of the Congress that the President cannot initiate military action against Iran without congressional authorization" soon, and is forwarding his letter to other House members to collect additional signatures. "We are writing to remind you that you are constitutionally bound to seek congressional authorization before launching any preventive military strikes against Iran," DeFazio writes. Oil prices settle at a record above $70 a barrel USA Today WASHINGTON (AP) ? Oil prices settled at a record high above $70 a barrel on Monday, rising more than $1 on concerns about supply disruptions in Nigeria and diplomatic tensions between the West and Iran over Tehran's nuclear ambitions. So long as these and other geopolitical issues persist, analysts said it will be difficult for prices to fall too far ? unless there is a significant drop-off in demand, which they aren't yet seeing. In the short-term, oil prices could climb above $75, they said. ... ABN Amro broker Lee Fader said the trigger for Monday's rally was "heightened fear about military action" against Iran, which has said it would go ahead with plans to enrich uranium, defying the United States, Europe and United Nations nuclear experts. Iran says its nuclear ambitions are peaceful, but the West fears the country is intent on arming itself with nuclear weapons. Photos the US Doesn't Want Seen The Sydney Morning Herald By Matthew Moore MORE photographs have been leaked of Iraqi citizens tortured by US soldiers at the notorious Abu Ghraib prison on the outskirts of Baghdad. [...] Although a US judge last year granted the union [ACLU] access to the photographs following a freedom-of-information request, the US Administration has appealed against the decision on the grounds their release would fuel anti-American sentiment. Some of the photos are similar to those published in 2004, others are different. They include photographs of six corpses, although the circumstances of their deaths are not clear. There are also pictures of what appear to be burns and wounds from shotgun pellets. [Same warning applies as above. These are very heavy.] Bush admits he authorised spying BBC News President George W Bush has admitted he authorised secret monitoring of communications within the United States in the wake of the 2001 terror attacks. [...] In his weekly address, he confirmed a report which appeared in the New York Times on Friday - and attacked it. [...] Senators of both Mr Bush's Republican party and the opposition Democrats expressed concerns about the programme on Friday. 'Big Brother' Senator Arlen Specter, the Republican chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee , said "there is no doubt that this is inappropriate", adding that Senate hearings would be held early next year as "a very, very high priority". "This is Big Brother run amok," was the reaction of Democratic Senator Edward Kennedy. Senator Russell Feingold, another Democrat, called it a "shocking revelation" that "ought to send a chill down the spine of every senator and every American". [...] The New York Times reported on Friday that Mr Bush had signed a secret presidential order following the attacks on 11 September 2001, allowing the National Security Agency to track the international telephone calls and e-mails of hundreds of people without referral to the courts. Previously, surveillance on American soil was generally limited to foreign embassies. American law usually requires a secret court, known as a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, to give permission before intelligence officers can conduct surveillance on US soil. Iraq probes US phosphorus weapons An Iraqi human rights team has gone to the city of Falluja to investigate the use of white phosphorus as a weapon by US forces, a minister has told the BBC. BBC News [Webmaster's note: If you think this is old news, you are right. About a year ago, there were stories, with very graphic photos, of melted bodies in Iraq. It took it that long to cross over into mainstream media.] [...] The US initially said white phosphorus had been used only to illuminate enemy positions, but now admits it was used as a weapon. BBC defence correspondent Paul Wood says having to retract that denial is a public relations disaster for the US. [...] Washington is not a signatory to an international treaty restricting the use of the substance against civilians. LA Times Fires Longtime Progressive Columnist Robert Scheer Democracy Now! Last week, the Los Angeles Times Newspaper announced that it was firing longtime columnist Robert Scheer. Scheer has been at the Times for 30 years and was one of the most progressive voices at the paper. In recent years, his columns took on the Bush Administration and its justifications for the invasion of Iraq. Scheer believes that his firing was because of ideological reasons. In a posting at the Huffington Post blog, he wrote "The publisher Jeff Johnson, who has offered not a word of explanation to me, has privately told people that he hated every word that I wrote. I assume that mostly refers to my exposing the lies used by President Bush to justify the invasion of Iraq. Fortunately sixty percent of Americans now get the point but only after tens of thousand of Americans and Iraqis have been killed and maimed as the carnage spirals out of control. My only regret is that my pen was not sharper and my words tougher." The Times also fired Michael Ramirez, a Pulitzer-Prize winning conservative staff cartoonist. Doubt on war grows in U.S. Even supporters say the effort isn't worth loss of American lives The Chicago Tribune By Mark Silva, Mike Dorning, CRANBERRY TOWNSHIP, Pa. -- As surely as sweet-corn stands and rolling farmland give way to the boxlike tract housing of new suburbs here, President Bush is losing ground on the battlefield of public opinion when it comes to the war in Iraq. Even among Republicans who cheered the invasion of Iraq two years ago, and some who supported Bush's re-election and his exhortation to "stay the course," the ongoing loss of American life without a clear course for withdrawal is taking a toll. ... It is not only the growing death toll that has eroded American support for the war, according to those interviewed, but also the failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. And it's the failure to capture Osama bin Laden, mastermind of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Guard Unit Probed in Abuse Allegations Los Angeles Times By JEREMIAH MARQUEZ, LOS ANGELES -- A company of the California Army National Guard has been placed on restricted duty amid allegations that members of the unit mistreated detainees in Iraq, military officials said Wednesday. Investigations are under way into the allegations of mistreatment by soldiers with the 1st Battalion of the 184th Infantry Regiment, said Col. David Baldwin, a California National Guard spokesman. ... In addition, at least six soldiers in the battalion are alleged to have extorted money from Iraqi business owners, apparently in exchange for protection from insurgents. The payments allegedly exceeded $30,000 and were made in U.S. currency, the newspaper said. CA National Guard Spies On Anti-War Groups San Jose Mercury News By Dion Nissenbaum SACRAMENTO - Three decades after aggressive military spying on Americans created a national furor, California's National Guard has quietly set up a special intelligence unit that has been given "broad authority" to monitor, analyze and distribute information on potential terrorist threats, the Mercury News has learned. Known as the Information Synchronization, Knowledge Management and Intelligence Fusion program, the project is part of an expanding nationwide effort to better integrate military intelligence into global anti-terrorism initiatives. ... Guard spokesman Zezotarski said the monitoring did not involve anything more than keeping tabs on the protest through the media and that no one went to observe the demonstration. But he said the military would be "negligent" in not tracking such anti-war rallies in the event that they disintegrate into a riot that could prompt the governor to call out troops. ... "That's ludicrous," said Joseph Onek, a former Carter and Clinton administration official who now heads the Liberty and Security Initiative for the Constitution Project at Georgetown University. "That's not what the American people expect its military to be doing." Pyle, the Army officer who exposed the abuses in the 1970s and is now a professor at Mount Holyoke College in Massachusetts, said that the evolving intelligence programs are susceptible to dangerous "mission creep" that led to overaggressive tactics during the Vietnam War. US acknowledges torture at Guantanamo; in Iraq, Afghanistan - UN AFX News Limited GENEVA (AFX) - Washington has, for the first time, acknowledged to the United Nations that prisoners have been tortured at US detention centres in Guantanamo Bay, as well as Afghanistan and Iraq, a UN source said. The acknowledgement was made in a report submitted to the UN Committee against Torture, said a member of the ten-person panel, speaking on on condition of anonymity. [...] UN sources said this is the first time the world body has received such a frank statement on torture from US authorities. Military Enlists Marketer to Get Data on Students for Recruiters Los Angeles Times By Mark Mazzetti, WASHINGTON ? With the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan making it increasingly hard for the U.S. military to fill its ranks with recruits, the Pentagon has hired an outside marketing firm to help compile an extensive database about teenagers and college students that the military services could use to target potential enlistees. The initiative, which privacy groups call an unwarranted government intrusion into private life, will compile detailed information about high school students ages 16 to 18, all college students, and Selective Service System registrants. The collected information will include Social Security numbers, e-mail addresses, grade-point averages and ethnicities. [...] Krenke pointed out that any students who did not want to be contacted by recruiters could have their names added to a "suppression list" that would keep the information private. Poll Finds Dimmer View of Iraq War 52% Say U.S. Has Not Become Safer Washington Post By Dana Milbank and Claudia Deane For the first time since the war in Iraq began, more than half of the American public believes the fight there has not made the United States safer, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll. [...] Nearly three-quarters of Americans say the number of casualties in Iraq is unacceptable, while two-thirds say the U.S. military there is bogged down and nearly six in 10 say the war was not worth fighting -- in all three cases matching or exceeding the highest levels of pessimism yet recorded. More than four in 10 believe the U.S. presence in Iraq is becoming analogous to the experience in Vietnam. Perhaps most ominous for President Bush, 52 percent said war in Iraq has not contributed to the long-term security of the United States, while 47 percent said it has. It was the first time a majority of Americans disagreed with the central notion Bush has offered to build support for war: that the fight there will make Americans safer from terrorists at home. In late 2003, 62 percent thought the Iraq war aided U.S. security, and three months ago 52 percent thought so. [...] While six in 10 were confident that the United States was not violating the rights of detainees at the military base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, Americans were more skeptical that the government is protecting the rights of U.S. citizens at home. Only half said Americans' rights were being adequately protected, down from 69 percent in September 2003. Anti-war sailor sentenced in court-martial Reuters SAN DIEGO (Reuters) - A U.S. sailor, whose refusal to go to Iraq has become a rallying point for anti-war activists, on Thursday had his pay cut, was restricted to base and sentenced to hard labor in court-martial proceedings. Navy Petty Officer Pablo Paredes, who refused to board the USS Bonhomme Richard as it was preparing to sail from San Diego in December, was convicted on Wednesday on a charge of missing his deployment. U.S. Navy Judge Robert Klant sentenced Paredes, 23, to a reduction in pay to the level of a basic recruit and ordered him to spend two months restricted to base followed by three months of hard labor. Paredes said he refused to board the ship because he did not want to participate in what he called war crimes and had not meant to mock the Navy with his action. His case has prompted demonstrations in San Diego and other U.S. cities by those opposed to U.S. policy in Iraq. Don't be fooled by the spin on Iraq The US is failing - and hatred of the occupation greater than ever The Guardian Jonathan Steele Saddam Hussein's effigy was pulled down again in Baghdad's Firdos Square at the weekend. But unlike the made-for-TV event when US troops first entered the Iraqi capital, the toppling of Saddam on the occupation's second anniversary was different. Instead of being done by US marines with a few dozen Iraqi bystanders, 300,000 Iraqis were on hand. They threw down effigies of Bush and Blair as well as the old dictator, at a rally that did not celebrate liberation but called for the immediate departure of foreign troops. [...] The weekend's vast protest shows that opposition is still growing, in spite of US and British government claims to have Iraqis' best interests at heart. It was the biggest demonstration since foreign troops invaded. Equally significantly, the marchers were mainly Shias, who poured in from the impoverished eastern suburb known as Sadr City. The Bush-Blair spin likes to suggest that protest is confined to Sunnis, with the nod and wink that these people are disgruntled former Saddam supporters or fundamentalists linked to al-Qaida, who therefore need not be treated as legitimate. The fact that the march was largely Shia and against Saddam as much as Bush and Blair gives the lie to that. Revealed: Israel plans strike on Iranian nuclear plant The Sunday Times Uzi Mahnaimi ISRAEL has drawn up secret plans for a combined air and ground attack on targets in Iran if diplomacy fails to halt the Iranian nuclear programme. The inner cabinet of Ariel Sharon, the Israeli prime minister, gave "initial authorisation" for an attack at a private meeting last month on his ranch in the Negev desert. Israeli forces have used a mock-up of Iran's Natanz uranium enrichment plant in the desert to practise destroying it. Their tactics include raids by Israel's elite Shaldag (Kingfisher) commando unit and airstrikes by F-15 jets from 69 Squadron, using bunker-busting bombs to penetrate underground facilities. The plans have been discussed with American officials who are said to have indicated provisionally that they would not stand in Israel's way if all international efforts to halt Iranian nuclear projects failed. Vietnamese Victims of Agent Orange Decry US Dismissal of Lawsuit VOA News By Kay Johnson Vietnamese victims of Agent Orange are outraged a U.S. court has dismissed their lawsuit against the chemical's manufacturers for crimes against humanity. The U.S. military in the Vietnam War sprayed the defoliant, which Vietnamese say has caused illnesses ranging from cancer to birth defects. A federal judge in New York Thursday decided the suit had no basis in law, and the plaintiffs had failed to prove a clear link between Agent Orange and their illnesses. [...] The lawsuit was filed against more than a dozen chemical companies who produced Agent Orange, which contains cancer causing dioxin. The suit represented some four million people that Vietnam claims are victims of the herbicide. But on Thursday, U.S. District Judge Jack Weinstein said there was "no basis" for claims that companies - including Dow Chemical and Monsanto - committed war crimes by supplying the toxic agent. Italy's relations with US soured by attack on hostage The Independent By Peter Popham, in Rome The return to Italy of the journalist Giuliana Sgrena from captivity in Iraq was meant to be another triumph for Silvio Berlusconi's chequebook foreign policy - a boost for his ruling coalition as it faces regional elections next month. Instead, the killing of the chief negotiator, Nicola Calipari, by American "friendly fire" and the wounding of Ms Sgrena have created deep public anger against the Americans, which will take all Berlusconi's political skills to defuse. [...] "At last I felt safe," Ms Sgrena said. "We had nearly arrived in an area under American control, an area more or less friendly, even if it was still unsettled." Then, turning the corner, they found their progress baulked by an American tank. They were blinded by a powerful light. "Without any warning, any signal, we were bombarded with a shower of bullets," Ms Sgrena said. "The tank was firing on us, our car was riddled with bullets. Nicola tried to protect me, then his body slumped on top of mine, I heard his death rattle, then I felt a pain but I couldn't tell where I had been hit. Those who had fired came up to the car, but before I was taken to the American hospital there was an interminable wait, it's hard to know how long I was lying there wounded but perhaps it was 20 minutes." Was Ms Sgrena, correspondent of the communist daily Il Manifesto, who has repeatedly demanded an end to the occupation, the true target? She couldn't rule it out, she said. "Everybody knows that the Americans are opposed to hostage negotiations. So I don't see why we must exclude the possibility that I was their target. The Americans don't approve, and so they try to frustrate the negotiations every way they can." Support for War in Iraq Hits New Low Los Angeles Times Most no longer back the administration's basis for invading, but a majority say U.S. troops should stay longer to assist with stabilization. By Doyle McManus WASHINGTON - Support for the war in Iraq has continued to erode, but most Americans are still inclined to give the Bush administration some time to try to stabilize the country before it withdraws U.S. troops, the Los Angeles Times Poll has found. The poll, conducted Saturday through Monday, found that the percentage of Americans who believed the situation in Iraq "was worth going to war over" had sunk to a new low of 39%. When the same question was asked in a similar poll in October, 44% said it had been worth going to war. [...] full story U.S. ends search for Iraqi WMDs The Associated Press (Via CBC News) WASHINGTON (AP) - The search for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq has quietly concluded without any evidence of the banned weapons that President George W. Bush cited as justification for going to war, the White House said Wednesday. White House press secretary Scott McClellan said there no longer is an active search for weapons. "There may be a couple, a few people, that are focused on that" but that it has largely concluded, he said. [...] Duelfer reported then that Saddam Hussein not only had no weapons of mass destruction and had not made any since 1991, but that he had no capability of making any either. Impeachment Time: "Facts Were Fixed." A BUZZFLASH GUEST NEWS ANALYSIS by Greg Palast Here it is. The smoking gun. The memo that has "IMPEACH HIM" written all over it. The top-level government memo marked "SECRET AND STRICTLY PERSONAL," dated eight months before Bush sent us into Iraq, following a closed meeting with the President, reads, "Military action was now seen as inevitable. Bush wanted to remove Saddam through military action justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy." [...] The memo, uncovered this week by the Times, goes on to describe an elaborate plan by George Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair to hoodwink the planet into supporting an attack on Iraq knowing full well the evidence for war was a phony. A conspiracy to commit serial fraud is, under federal law, racketeering. However, the Mob's schemes never cost so many lives. [...] Now sharp readers may note they didn't see this memo, in fact, printed in the New York Times. It wasn't. Rather, it was splashed across the front pages of the Times of LONDON on Monday. It has effectively finished the last, sorry remnants of Tony Blair's political career. (While his Labor Party will most assuredly win the elections Thursday, Prime Minister Blair is expected, possibly within months, to be shoved overboard in favor of his Chancellor of the Exchequer, a political execution which requires only a vote of the Labour party's members in Parliament.) The Republicans impeached Bill Clinton over his cigar and Monica's affections. And the US media could print nothing else. Poll: Most in U.S. say Iraq war not worthwhile Cable News Network WASHINGTON (CNN) -- A majority of Americans do not believe it was worth going to war in Iraq, a national poll reported Tuesday. Fifty-seven percent of those polled said they did not believe it was worth going to war, versus 41 percent who said it was, according to a CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll of 1,006 adults. That was a drop in support from February, when 48 percent said it was worth going to war and half said it was not. It's also the highest percentage of respondents who have expressed those feelings and triple the percentage of Americans who said that it was not worth the cost shortly after the war began about two years ago. [...] Don't be fooled by the spin on Iraq The US is failing - and hatred of the occupation greater than ever The Guardian Jonathan Steele Saddam Hussein's effigy was pulled down again in Baghdad's Firdos Square at the weekend. But unlike the made-for-TV event when US troops first entered the Iraqi capital, the toppling of Saddam on the occupation's second anniversary was different. Instead of being done by US marines with a few dozen Iraqi bystanders, 300,000 Iraqis were on hand. They threw down effigies of Bush and Blair as well as the old dictator, at a rally that did not celebrate liberation but called for the immediate departure of foreign troops. [...] The weekend's vast protest shows that opposition is still growing, in spite of US and British government claims to have Iraqis' best interests at heart. It was the biggest demonstration since foreign troops invaded. Equally significantly, the marchers were mainly Shias, who poured in from the impoverished eastern suburb known as Sadr City. The Bush-Blair spin likes to suggest that protest is confined to Sunnis, with the nod and wink that these people are disgruntled former Saddam supporters or fundamentalists linked to al-Qaida, who therefore need not be treated as legitimate. The fact that the march was largely Shia and against Saddam as much as Bush and Blair gives the lie to that. Revealed: Israel plans strike on Iranian nuclear plant The Sunday Times Uzi Mahnaimi ISRAEL has drawn up secret plans for a combined air and ground attack on targets in Iran if diplomacy fails to halt the Iranian nuclear programme. The inner cabinet of Ariel Sharon, the Israeli prime minister, gave "initial authorisation" for an attack at a private meeting last month on his ranch in the Negev desert. Israeli forces have used a mock-up of Iran?s Natanz uranium enrichment plant in the desert to practise destroying it. Their tactics include raids by Israel?s elite Shaldag (Kingfisher) commando unit and airstrikes by F-15 jets from 69 Squadron, using bunker-busting bombs to penetrate underground facilities. The plans have been discussed with American officials who are said to have indicated provisionally that they would not stand in Israel?s way if all international efforts to halt Iranian nuclear projects failed. Vietnamese Victims of Agent Orange Decry US Dismissal of Lawsuit VOA News By Kay Johnson Vietnamese victims of Agent Orange are outraged a U.S. court has dismissed their lawsuit against the chemical's manufacturers for crimes against humanity. The U.S. military in the Vietnam War sprayed the defoliant, which Vietnamese say has caused illnesses ranging from cancer to birth defects. A federal judge in New York Thursday decided the suit had no basis in law, and the plaintiffs had failed to prove a clear link between Agent Orange and their illnesses. [...] The lawsuit was filed against more than a dozen chemical companies who produced Agent Orange, which contains cancer causing dioxin. The suit represented some four million people that Vietnam claims are victims of the herbicide. But on Thursday, U.S. District Judge Jack Weinstein said there was "no basis" for claims that companies - including Dow Chemical and Monsanto - committed war crimes by supplying the toxic agent. Italy's relations with US soured by attack on hostage The Independent By Peter Popham, in Rome The return to Italy of the journalist Giuliana Sgrena from captivity in Iraq was meant to be another triumph for Silvio Berlusconi's chequebook foreign policy - a boost for his ruling coalition as it faces regional elections next month. Instead, the killing of the chief negotiator, Nicola Calipari, by American "friendly fire" and the wounding of Ms Sgrena have created deep public anger against the Americans, which will take all Berlusconi's political skills to defuse. [...] "At last I felt safe," Ms Sgrena said. "We had nearly arrived in an area under American control, an area more or less friendly, even if it was still unsettled." Then, turning the corner, they found their progress baulked by an American tank. They were blinded by a powerful light. "Without any warning, any signal, we were bombarded with a shower of bullets," Ms Sgrena said. "The tank was firing on us, our car was riddled with bullets. Nicola tried to protect me, then his body slumped on top of mine, I heard his death rattle, then I felt a pain but I couldn't tell where I had been hit. Those who had fired came up to the car, but before I was taken to the American hospital there was an interminable wait, it's hard to know how long I was lying there wounded but perhaps it was 20 minutes." Was Ms Sgrena, correspondent of the communist daily Il Manifesto, who has repeatedly demanded an end to the occupation, the true target? She couldn't rule it out, she said. "Everybody knows that the Americans are opposed to hostage negotiations. So I don't see why we must exclude the possibility that I was their target. The Americans don't approve, and so they try to frustrate the negotiations every way they can." Support for War in Iraq Hits New Low Los Angeles Times Most no longer back the administration's basis for invading, but a majority say U.S. troops should stay longer to assist with stabilization. By Doyle McManus WASHINGTON - Support for the war in Iraq has continued to erode, but most Americans are still inclined to give the Bush administration some time to try to stabilize the country before it withdraws U.S. troops, the Los Angeles Times Poll has found. The poll, conducted Saturday through Monday, found that the percentage of Americans who believed the situation in Iraq "was worth going to war over" had sunk to a new low of 39%. When the same question was asked in a similar poll in October, 44% said it had been worth going to war. [...] full story U.S. ends search for Iraqi WMDs The Associated Press (Via CBC News) WASHINGTON (AP) - The search for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq has quietly concluded without any evidence of the banned weapons that President George W. Bush cited as justification for going to war, the White House said Wednesday. White House press secretary Scott McClellan said there no longer is an active search for weapons. "There may be a couple, a few people, that are focused on that" but that it has largely concluded, he said. [...] Duelfer reported then that Saddam Hussein not only had no weapons of mass destruction and had not made any since 1991, but that he had no capability of making any either. Israel wall must be re-routed says court The Guardian By Conal Urquhart in Tel Aviv The Israeli government's security barrier is violating the human rights of Palestinians, the country's highest court ruled yesterday in a judgment that delivered a blow to prime minister Ariel Sharon's plans to seize large parts of the West Bank. The supreme court said that 20 miles of the fence planned to run through Palestinian land must be rerouted even if Israeli security was compromised. The ruling is likely to result in the re-examination of the whole route of the barrier. There are dozens of petitions against the fence in the legal pipeline and many groups of Palestinians were awaiting yesterday's result before deciding on a legal challenge. Rulings on prisoners would make Founders proud USA Today Editorial/Opinion The U.S. Supreme Court delivered a much-needed message Monday about one of the bedrock principles of liberty rooted in the American Revolution: In this country, unlike Iraq under Saddam Hussein, the government doesn't have the right to imprison people indefinitely without having to justify its actions. NATIONAL LAWYERS GUILD CALLS FOR PROSECUTION OF PRESIDENT BUSH FOR ROLE IN TORTURE 2003 State of the Union Address Contained Implicit Admission National Lawyers Guild New York, June 18, 2004--The National Lawyers Guild calls for the prosecution of President George W. Bush with a "command responsibility" theory of liability under the War Crimes Act. Bush can be prosecuted under the War Crimes Act or the Torture Statute, if he knew or should have known about the U.S. military's use of torture and failed to stop or prevent it. A comment in the President's January 2003 State of the Union Address contained an implicit admission by Bush that he had sanctioned the summary execution of many when he said: "All told, more than 3,000 suspected terrorists have been arrested in many countries, and many others have met a different fate." "Let's put it this way," he continued, "they are no longer a problem for the United States and our friends and allies." Al Qaeda-Hussein Link Is Dismissed The Washington Post By Walter Pincus and Dana Milbank The Sept. 11 commission reported yesterday that it has found no "collaborative relationship" between Iraq and al Qaeda, challenging one of the Bush administration's main justifications for the war in Iraq. Bush's Democratic challenger, Sen. John F. Kerry (Mass.), sought to profit from the commission's finding. "The administration misled America, and the administration reached too far," Kerry told Michigan Public Radio. "I believe that the 9/11 report, the early evidence, is that they're going to indicate that we didn't have the kind of terrorists links that this administration was asserting. I think that's a very, very serious finding." Former Officials to Criticize Bush Foreign Policy Reuters June 13, 2004 WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A group of former U.S. officials is urging voters to defeat President Bush in the November election, saying his policies have isolated the United States, a spokesman for the group said on Sunday. The group of 26 former diplomats and military officials, including appointees of former Republican presidents Ronald Reagan and George Bush, plan to issue an open statement on Wednesday criticizing Bush's foreign policies. "We just came to agreement that this administration was really endangering the United States," said William Harrop, a former ambassador to Israel under the previous Bush administration. Lawyers Ascribed Broad Power to Bush on Torture The Los Angeles Times By David G. Savage and Richard B. Schmitt, WASHINGTON — On the eve of the war in Iraq, Bush administration lawyers spelled out a strikingly broad view of the president's power that freed the commander in chief and U.S. military from the federal law and international treaties that barred the use of torture. The legal memo, written last year for the Defense Department and disclosed this week, did not speak for President Bush, but it claimed an extraordinary power for him. It said that as the commander in chief, he had a "constitutionally superior position" to Congress and an "inherent authority" to prosecute the war, even if it meant defying the will of Congress. U.S.'s Ashcroft Won't Release or Discuss Torture Memo By Laurence Arnold June 8 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft, testifying before a congressional committee, refused to release or discuss memoranda that news reports say offered justification for torturing suspected terrorists. Two Democratic senators said Ashcroft's stance may constitute contempt of Congress, a federal crime. Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee asked Ashcroft about reports in the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post and the New York Times that the Justice Department advised the White House in 2002 and 2003 that it might not be bound by U.S. and international laws prohibiting torture. Ashcroft said he wouldn't reveal advice he gave to President George W. Bush or discuss it with Congress. [...] The Washington Post, citing one Justice Department memo, said government lawyers told the White House in August 2002 that torturing captured al-Qaeda members abroad may be justified in the war on terrorism. Senator Edward Kennedy, a Massachusetts Democrat, held up copies of some of the photographs that have been released that depict abuses against inmates at Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad. Seven U.S. military police soldiers have been charged in the abuses. "This is what directly results when you have that kind of memoranda out there," Kennedy said. Beating Specialist Baker By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF If the U.S. military treats one of its own soldiers this way — allowing him to be battered, and lying to cover it up — then imagine what happens to Afghans and Iraqis. President Bush attributed the problems uncovered at Abu Ghraib to "a few American troops who dishonored our country." Mr. Bush, the problems go deeper than a few bad apples.
Fahrenheit 9/11 finds coalition of willing distributors The Guardian After being famously dropped by Disney, Michael Moore's award-winning documentary Fahrenheit 9/11 has finally secured US distribution and will hit American cinemas on June 25. The film is to be released by a partnership of Lions Gate Films, IFC Films and the Fellowship Adventure Group, which was formed by Miramax's Harvey and Bob Weinstein specifically to market Moore's film. "I am grateful to them now that everyone who wants to see it will now have the chance to do so," Moore said in a statement. "On behalf of my stellar cast - GW, Dick, Rummy, Condi and Wolfie - we thank this incredible coalition of the willing for bringing Fahrenheit 9/11 to the people." Tillman Killed by 'Friendly Fire' Probe Cites Error By Platoon Mates By Josh White May 30, 2004 Pat Tillman, the former pro football player, was killed by other American troops in a "friendly fire" episode in Afghanistan last month and not by enemy bullets, according to a U.S. investigation of the incident. New details released yesterday about Tillman's death indicate that he was gunned down by members of his elite Army Ranger platoon who mistakenly shot in his direction when the unit was ambushed. According to a summary of the Army investigation, a Ranger squad leader mistook an allied Afghan Militia Force soldier standing near Tillman as the enemy, and he and other U.S. soldiers opened fire, killing both men. Exiled Allawi was responsible for 45-minute WMD claim By Patrick Cockburn The Independent (UK) The choice of Iyad Allawi, closely linked to the CIA and formerly to MI6, as the Prime Minister of Iraq from 30 June will make it difficult for the US and Britain to persuade the rest of the world that he is capable of leading an independent government. He is the person through whom the controversial claim was channelled that Iraqi weapons of mass destruction could be operational in 45 minutes. by Molly Ivins Creators Syndicate The problems go all the way back to the administration's refusal to abide by the Geneva Conventions. President Bush, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Attorney General John Ashcroft "signed off on a secret system of detention and interrogation that opened the door to such methods. It was an approach that they adopted in order to sidestep the historical safeguards of the Geneva Convention, which protect the rights of detainees and prisoners of war," according to Newsweek. THE GRAY ZONE
How a secret Pentagon program came to Abu Ghraib. The New Yorker Issue of 2004-05-24 The roots of the Abu Ghraib prison scandal lie not in the criminal inclinations of a few Army reservists but in a decision, approved last year by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, to expand a highly secret operation, which had been focussed on the hunt for Al Qaeda, to the interrogation of prisoners in Iraq. Rumsfeld's decision embittered the American intelligence community, damaged the effectiveness of élite combat units, and hurt America's prospects in the war on terror. According to interviews with several past and present American intelligence officials, the Pentagon's operation, known inside the intelligence community by several code words, including Copper Green, encouraged physical coercion and sexual humiliation of Iraqi prisoners in an effort to generate more intelligence about the growing insurgency in Iraq. A senior C.I.A. official, in confirming the details of this account last week, said that the operation stemmed from Rumsfeld's long-standing desire to wrest control of America's clandestine and paramilitary operations from the C.I.A. The Asahi Shimbun Bush's Mideast policies hurt the world economy. The key to the solution of the problem is held by the United States.
In his "Plan of Attack" published recently, Bob Woodward of The Washington Post revealed that the United States made a secret deal with Saudi Arabia by which the Saudis would lower oil prices prior to the 2004 U.S. presidential election in return for the overthrow of Saddam Hussein's government in Iraq. CBS News In her first interview since all of this began, one of the more famous faces of the scandal Pfc. Lynndie England, the guard seen smiling and pointing at Iraqi prisoners, said she was ordered to pose for the pictures by "persons in my higher chain of command." Correspondent Dan Rather reports. "Something would come up, an MI or an OGA would come in and then tell us, 'Hey, so-and-so needs this … we're going to come back in a couple of hours or in two days … Make sure so-and-so was ready … Make sure they are softened up and weak for interrogation," England said. Berg family angry with American government over son's brutal death By Jason Straziuso From Texas to Abu Ghraib: The Bush Legacy of Prisoner Abuse by Heather Wokusch CommonDreams.org While administration officials express shock and outrage over allegations of the torture and murder of Iraqi prisoners by US forces, a deeper look into Bush's stateside prison-system record shows disturbing similarities. In George Bush's America, denial about inmate mistreatment runs similarly rampant. As Texas governor, Bush oversaw the executions of 152 prisoners and thus became the most-killing governor in the history of the United States. Ethnic minorities, many of whom did not have access to proper legal representation, comprised a large percentage of those Bush put to death, and in one particularly egregious example, Bush executed an immigrant who hadn't even seen a consular official from his own country (as is required by the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations, to which the US was a signatory). Bush's explanation: "Texas did not sign the Vienna Convention, so why should we be subject to it?" UK forces taught torture methods The Guardian By David Leigh The sexual humiliation of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison was not an invention of maverick guards, but part of a system of ill-treatment and degradation used by special forces soldiers that is now being disseminated among ordinary troops and contractors who do not know what they are doing, according to British military sources The techniques devised in the system, called R2I - resistance to interrogation - match the crude exploitation and abuse of prisoners at the Abu Ghraib jail in Baghdad. An Illegal and Immoral War, Betrayed by Images of Our Own Racism The Independent By Robert Fisk First, our enemies created the suicide bomber. Now, we have our own digital suicide bomber, the camera. Just look at the way US army reservist Lynndie England holds the leash of the naked, bearded Iraqi. Take a close look at the leather strap, the pain on the prisoner's face. No sadistic movie could outdo the damage of this image. In September 2001, the planes smashed into the buildings; today, Lynndie smashes to pieces our entire morality with just one tug on the leash. Iraqi Prison Photos Mar U.S. Image Reuters Ltd by Paul Majendie LONDON - Photos of U.S. soldiers abusing Iraqi prisoners drew international condemnation on Friday, prompting the stark conclusion that the U.S. campaign to win the hearts and minds of Iraqis is a lost cause. "This is the straw that broke the camel's back for America," said Abdel-Bari Atwan, editor of the Arab newspaper Al Quds Al Arabi. "The liberators are worse than the dictators." "They have not just lost the hearts and minds of Iraqis but all the Third World and the Arab countries," he told Reuters.
Primary Sources The New Yorker Magazine Early this year, the senior U.S. Army commander in Iraq authorized a major investigation into the American Army's prison system there. The fifty-three-page report that resulted, which was written by Major General Antonio M. Taguba and was not meant for public release, was devastating.
Taguba found numerous instances of "sadistic, blatant, and wanton criminal abuses" of Iraqis by American soldiers at the Abu Ghraib prison, located twenty miles west of Baghdad. This systematic and illegal abuse, Taguba reported, was perpetrated by members of the 320th Military Police Battalion, and also by members of the American intelligence community. link to full caption, and 10 of the disturbing photosLA COUNCIL OPPOSES PATRIOT LAWS The Los Angeles City Council has voted to support the repeal of controversial provisions in the United States' Patriot Act, which has come under fire for infringing on civil liberties. "As a city we pride ourselves on being inclusive and protecting the basic rights of all people," Councillor Jan Perry said. The vote follows swiftly on the heels of President George W. Bush's State of the Union address when he asked Congress to extend the anti-terrorism legislation before it is due to expire in 2005. more
FORMER TREASURY SECRETARY SAYS WAR IN IRAQ WAS PLANNED BEFORE 9/11
2003 stories:Still No Mass Weapons, No Ties to 9/11, No Truth
State
monitored war protesters FCC:
Public Be Damned by John Nichols & Robert W. McChesney California
Town Criminalizes Compliance With Patriot Act New
ACLU Report Specifies Questions Needing Answers About Total Information
Awareness Cyber-Surveillance System Live
Sicker, Die Younger Bush
Officials Change Tune on Iraqi Weapons Frustrated,
U.S. Arms Team to Leave Iraq
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Coalition for World Peace
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