Private pilots who stray into Normandy air space during the 60th anniversary of D-Day next weekend will be shot down, French officials said yesterday.
With at least 16 heads of state, including the Queen and President George W Bush, attending the ceremonies, organisers are guarding particularly against an al-Qa'eda attack from the air.

A television sewn into your shirt sleeve. A dashboard screen to monitor the kids in the back seat. A 3-D computer monitor sharp enough to make a hardcore gamer's heart stop - or help a surgeon start one. The gizmo-packed exhibition hall at the Society for Information Display's international symposium offers a tantalizing vision of what's to come.

A vicious skin infection resistant to all but the most powerful antibiotics has jumped out of New York City hospitals and onto the streets.

Everyone knows by now (or should) that the Patriot Act allows the FBI to conduct surveillance on Internet and email usage. Using so-called National Security Letters (NSLs), the FBI directs Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to provide passwords and identifying information that will allow the government to target people who are plotting terrorism or who are otherwise potentially dangerous to national security. I am sure that many of you reading this (and I, likely) have the government in our computers.

Russia is gradually ceasing to be a democratic state. This painful conclusion was reached by Freedom House, a major international human rights organization, founded by Eleanor Roosevelt.The report's authors believe that the current Russian policies "have sought to centralize power, leaving little room for a vibrant civil society, independent media, or political opposition." The document says that, "while Russia has emphasized the importance it places on maintaining strong ties to the West, it is headed in an increasingly authoritarian direction."

Leaders and top diplomatic officials from 33 Latin American countries and 25 European nations joined in the Mexican city of Guadalajara to blast the US-led campaign in Iraq. The 58 nations signed a joint declaration which denounces "the abuse of prisoners in Iraq", as delivered criticism of the United States for its refusal to cooperate with the United Nations. As it was expected, neither British Prime Minister, nor his Italian counterpart Silvio Berlusconi, attended the meeting.

The introspection and analysis of America's rush to war with Iraq have turned into a race among the ruins. Few people doubt any longer that the agencies of the U.S. government did not properly perform. No institution, however, either public or private, has violated the trust of its vast constituency as profoundly as the New York Times.

Despite widespread objections to these techniques, only a third of Americans would define what happened at Abu Ghraib as torture.

In an interview, Bergrin quoted Davis, 26, as saying that when he asked some of the mysterious agents and interrogators for their names, they would say, " 'I'm Special Agent John Doe,' or 'I'm Special Agent in Charge James Bond.' "

Armed men riding in two cars and a motorcycle shot and killed a senior Sunni Muslim cleric in violence-prone Karachi.

Saudi forces have rescued dozens of hostages after an attack on a compound and a dramatic standoff that left at least 22 people dead.

US President George W Bush has been given a pistol Saddam Hussein had with him when he was captured and now proudly shows it to selected guests, Time magazine reported today.

...the U.S.-led coalition had "overthrown two vicious regimes and liberated 50 million people, disrupted terrorist cells across the globe and thwarted many terrorist attacks."
Yet despite our successes, we are closer to the beginning of this struggle with global insurgency than to its end," he said.

The CIA's discovery of psychological torture was a counter-intuitive break-through--indeed, the first real revolution in this cruel science since the 17th century. In its modern application, the physical approach required interrogators to inflict pain, usually by crude beatings that often produced heightened resistance or unreliable information. Under the CIA's new psychological paradigm, however, interrogators used two essential methods, disorientation and self-inflicted pain, to make victims feel responsible for their own suffering.

...the Republicans have absolutely NO OTHER ISSUE on which to run. None.

Sharon seemed to indicate readiness to fire ministers in order to assure a Cabinet majority for his plan.

There's also a lot of suspicion that maybe Nick unwittingly got sucked into spy games that ultimately cost him his life...

Attempts by the White House to defuse the Iraq torture scandal by claiming that the prisoner abuse didn?t represent US policy have unravelled in the face of more evidence that US President George Bush and members of his cabinet had a direct hand in devising a post-9/11 policy of torture.

The Sun obtained the guide via the Freedom of Information Act and said that the guide confirms that the torture at Abu Gharib Prison was executed systematically.

Iyad Allawi, Iraq's prime minister-designate, plans to recall four divisions of Saddam Hussein's old army to create a rapid reaction force and anti-terrorism unit to deal with the country's security crisis.

But his low public profile, his Baathist past, long years in exile and ties to Western intelligence created a mixture of cautious optimism, indifference and hostility among ordinary Iraqis.

"Never heard of him," said Mudhar al-Hassan, 32, a grocer. "We will never get a decent leader of our own. Saddam killed them all. I don't think people will listen to him; nobody likes outsiders running their country."

As the deceptions that launched the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan unravel before our eyes, it is good to look back in history with our newly gained insights, to see how easily the nation was tricked into past wars.

"Were you involved in any way in the awarding of those contracts?" Cheney's reply: "Of course not, Tim ... And as Vice President, I have absolutely no influence of, involvement of, knowledge of in any way, shape or form of contracts led by the [Army] Corps of Engineers or anybody else in the Federal Government."

...in the face of these mounting criticisms, a leading Jewish Democrat on Capitol Hill, Rep. Nita Lowey of New York, told the Forward that the president's policies were increasing the danger to Jews across the world.

"I give total support to what the President does-without any reservation."

If today the U.S. government were to put itself on trial, on the same basis it employed to try the Nazis at Nuremberg, for actions taken in Afghanistan and Iraq in recent years, it might have to convict itself?if only for the sake of consistency. Justice is no respecter of person. Can anyone sincerely maintain that what was a crime for Hermann Goering and Alfred Jodl is not equally a crime for Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney?

From the Geneva Convention, Part III, Section I, Provisions Common to the Territories of the Parties to the Conflict and to Occupied Territories, Article 34:
"The taking of hos-tages is prohibited."
Period, end of section. There's no list of exceptions.
It doesn't say hostage-taking is OK, if the U.S. does it. Or if the hostages are treated humanely, or even eventually released.
It says,
"The taking of hos-tages is prohibited."

"Hollings is an unpatriotic disgrace to the American Flag and if he does not immediately resign, he should be impeached. Furthermore, in Genesis, G-d tells Abraham, the founder of the Jewish people, 'I will bless those who bless you [Israel] and him who curses you [Israel], I will curse.' And by cursing the Jewish people, Hollings has invoked the wrath of G-d upon himself."

Attorney-General John Ashcroft is priming the public for a terrorist attack, which can only mean Bush is sharpening his blades to behead the Constitution.

Up to 150,000 Israelis have rallied demanding that Prime Minister Ariel Sharon push ahead with his stalled Gaza pullout plan.

With just over five months to go before election day, it must be asked: How far would they go? With blood on their hands and God on their side, what actions would Bush & Co. consider too extreme--when the goal is to extend their control over the financial and military power of the American presidency?

What is it going to take to get the people to rise up and demand Congress remove George W. Bush and his whole administration from power on charges of and conviction for treason and other high crimes and misdemeanors?

Think of it: the presidency, the Pentagon, the military, the mercenaries and the many secret armies, secret prisons and roving death-and-snatch squads run by the various U.S. intelligence agencies -- all unleashed from any legal restraint, all operating outside "the normally observed laws of war." And all of it -- the entire system of torture, abuse, atrocity and aggression -- was ordered and approved and officially documented at the very highest level.

Described as the "James Bond tunnel" because of its resemblance to a tunnel in the film The Spy Who Loved Me, the prime minister's tunnel is said to be equipped with a lift that will deposit visitors inside the villa. The tunnel, which local media only learnt about this week, is nearing completion and major construction activity has shifted to a 400-seat amphitheatre being constructed of pink-veined orange granite, a step away from the small castle in which Mr Berlusconi accommodates the bodyguards who escort him on his morning walks.

Neocons behind bars? Sounds good to me?.

Officials said the Homeland Security Department knew in advance about the news conference but expected it to focus on seven suspects with ties to al-Qaida who were wanted for arrest or questioning. Department officials were caught off guard when Ashcroft went further and warned that al-Qaida "is ready to attack the United States."

Numerous federal government agencies are collecting and sifting through massive amounts of personal information, including credit reports, credit-card purchases and other financial data, posing new privacy concerns, according to the General Accounting Office

The American church "is called to respond to the profound religious needs and aspirations of a society increasingly in danger of forgetting its spiritual roots and yielding to a purely materialistic and soulless vision of the world," John Paul said.

Before the Iraq War spins further out of control, former President George H.W. Bush should sit down his son, George W. Bush, and level with him about the real history of U.S. relations with Iraq, Iran and Israel?s Likud Party - even if the father has to admit to illegal and unethical conduct in the process.

Bahrain and the US have reached a free trade agreement that Washington believes could be a model for other Middle East countries to follow.

Security sources said soldiers opened fire when protesters began throwing stones on Thursday, angry over soaring fuel prices.

India's new left-leaning ruling coalition plans to scrap an anti-terrorism law after criticism it has been used disproportionately against Muslims. Prevention of Terrorism Act (POTA) "has been grossly misused in the past two years".

Twenty Chechen fighters have been killed by Russian troops in a two-day special operation in the restive republic of Chechnya.

French President Jacques Chirac has stressed Iraq's interim government must have full sovereignty, particularly over operations that may be conducted by a US-led multinational force.

Some Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib said they were abused by occupation troops from Poland and other countries, according to copies of statements to Army investigators obtained by AP.

Britain says it is sending more soldiers and heavy arms to Iraq.

The British government says it is "very concerned" about the arrest and is seeking more information from Israel.

The president of Venezuela has made a dramatic plea for divine intervention to stop the spread of neo-liberalism and capitalism.

Dodging the draft will be more difficult than those from the Vietnam era. College and Canada will not be options.

Pacifica News and the AP have both stated in the last two days that there is potential for the use of Lethal Force at the G8, DNC, and RNC this summer.

An anti-Israel and anti-America music video called "Hey Arabs Leaders" is the latest smash hit in Egypt and the Arab world.

There is no political leader in the US who can even dare to rap the Israeli leadership on its knuckles

I think the secret services can pretty much do what they like in Israel

The scandal at Abu Ghraib prison was first exposed not by a digital photograph but by a letter. In December 2003, a woman prisoner inside the jail west of Baghdad managed to smuggle out a note. Its contents were so shocking that, at first, Amal Kadham Swadi and the other Iraqi women lawyers who had been trying to gain access to the US jail found them hard to believe.

Democratic Underground Forums

THE United States-led war on terror has produced the most sustained attack on human rights and international law in 50 years, Amnesty International said in its annual report yesterday.

Nine months after Congress shut down a controversial Pentagon computer-surveillance program, the U.S. government continues to comb private records to sniff out suspicious activity, according to a congressional report obtained by Reuters.

Filmmaker Michael Moore, whose incendiary new documentary lambastes President Bush's handling of the war, said Thursday that he has footage unused in the film of Nicholas Berg, the American civilian later beheaded in Iraq.

Amnesty's report, released in London, said the worldwide crackdown on terrorism has led to a "new wave" of human rights abuses and diverted attention from older problems.

Michael Moore's controversial documentary on America since the attacks of September 11, 2001, will have its Australian premiere at the Melbourne International Film Festival

Amer El-Maati, the man at the very top of Ashcroft's list of mean ol' terrorists, is reportedly in jail.

Six U.S. soldiers have been diagnosed by the military with permanent brain damage from an anti-malaria drug used in Iraq and Afghanistan, and health officials must reassess its safety, a U.S. senator said.

This confirms that Aafia Siddiqui, listed yesterday on Ashcroft's list of wanted terrorists and arrested a year ago, was still presumed in custody only a few weeks ago.

...six of them have been released before by the bureau.

In what appeared to be a veiled swipe at the United States, though it was not explicitly named, the leaders called on Wednesday on rich countries to fight terrorism and instability by sharing their wealth, rather than through military intervention.

...here...focus your hate feelings on them, be scared and do what we say!

...article from March explaining that it's a phantom organization. Now, Ashcroft insists the same group is 90% ready to attack America.

"How dare the incompetent and willful members of this Bush/Cheney Administration humiliate our nation and our people in the eyes of the world and in the conscience of our own people."
I believe we have a duty to hold President Bush accountable - and I believe we will. As Lincoln said at our time of greatest trial, "We - even we here - hold the power, and bear the responsibility."

The first signs of uranium sickness surface in troops returning from Iraq

The mysterious world of Israeli movers

Is terrorism inside the United States really from outside, or is it a stage managed production, designed to cause Americans to believe they have no choice but to surrender the Republic and accept the totalitarian rule of a new emperor, or a new Fuhrer?
This article first appeared in late 2000.

"I was calling for political change considering the lies and half truths that have been thrown at us to take the nation to war," said Bazian. And in turn, he said, critics spun that to mean he was calling for 'global jihad,' charging that his comment was 'sedition' and 'treachery.'

Retired U.S. Army Gen. Tommy Franks, who oversaw military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, will receive an honorary knighthood Tuesday in recognition of his "inspirational leadership", officials said.
Britain's Ministry of Defense said Defense Secretary Geoff Hoon will make Franks a Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire in a private ceremony. [Guardian, 5/25/2004]

...this is the guy who says:
"If [conquering Iraq] costs 500 [American lives], that's OK,
or 5000, OK, or 50,000, that's OK with me." [Counterpunch, 4/8/2004]

A new city law in Brunswick gives police the power to halt protests during the G-8 summit now that the governor has declared a pre-emptive state of emergency in coastal Georgia through June 20.

Two Israeli men working for a moving-and-storage company who attempted Kings Bay Submarine Base Friday are being held for deportation. Kings Bay is near Sea Island, which will host the G8 Summit next month.
deportation = free. Nice. Case closed.

...at one level it is the war that George Bush is talking about: a war against a brutal regime that has in its possession weapons of mass destruction. But at a deeper level it is a greater war, for the shaping of a new Middle East. It is a war that is intended to change the political culture of the entire region.

The organisation, legendary for its shadowy operations, has gone public by launching its own permanent website for the first time. The site offers dozens of openings for would-be operatives, from highly skilled technicians to a waiter with conversational English.

Federal officials have information suggesting that al Qaeda has people in the United States preparing to mount a large-scale terrorist attack this summer. Attorney General John D. Ashcroft and FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III intend to hold a joint news conference this afternoon to discuss the threat and to ask Americans to watch for several suspected al Qaeda operatives who may be in the country, officials said.
...be afraid, be very afraid!

Italy and Poland, two major European allies in the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq, pressed on Tuesday for a prompt handover of power to a government that fully represents the Iraqi people.

A day after U.S. President George Bush outlined his plan for Iraq, the White House is facing muted response in Baghdad and from diplomats at the United Nations.

Al Qaeda has 18,000 fighters, says study
....and they have big knives and they crazy and they will get ya all!

You Call This 'Sovereignty'?

"Some intelligence officials now believe that Iran used the hawks in the Pentagon and the White House to get rid of a hostile neighbour and pave the way for a Shia-ruled Iraq," it said in a front-page dispatch from Washington.

Top officials and analysts speak as if an attack were probable if not certain, and indicate the major concern in Washington is how such an attack would affect the outcome of the elections.

Consider this: Bush's policy in the Middle East -- get rid of Saddam, occupy Iraq, exploit its resources, agree with anything Ariel Sharon wants, say nothing critical of the Saudis, who are the philosophical and financial backers of bin Laden -- will provide us with a more spectacular Armageddon than Hollywood will offer this summer.

May 21, 2004 , Berkeley, CA
Protest photos

This article aims to shed light on the apparent execution by beheading of Nicholas Berg . I believe that most of the available evidence surrounding the case suggests that it was a "black operation" by US psychological warfare specialists, the purpose of which was to provide the media with a "moral relativity" argument to counter the adverse publicity over torture at Abu Ghraib prison.

"You offer no proof that he did something wrong, you refuse him a lawyer, and then you kill him. Why?"

Famed Israeli director Keren Yedaya, who was awarded Saturday, May22 , the Golden Camera of the Cannes Film Festival, dedicated her prestigious award to the Palestinian people and other peoples who struggle under the yoke of slavery.
"I want to create a different cinema that criticizes the Israeli politics and the occupation of the Palestinian territories," Yedaya said

As concern about the situation in Iraq grows, 65 percent now say the country is on the wrong track - matching the highest number ever recorded

It's time to stop beating around this Bush and start beating up on him - but good. There is no set of humanitarian or democratic principles by which this administration would not have been removed in any sane society. The last election was questionable at best, and his reckless, dangerous and criminal actions in the ensuing years have shown the whole world he is unfit to govern.

Israeli Justice Minister Tommy Lapid told the weekly Cabinet meeting Sunday, May23 , that Israel's "demolition of houses in Rafah must stop. It is not humane, not Jewish, and causes us grave damage in the world," reported Ha'aretz.
"...we look like monsters to the rest of the world"

Photostory

The Commissioner-General of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), Peter Hansen, questioned Israel's statement that they did not tear down houses on dwellers in the city of Rafah.

For several weeks now, right-wing talk radio hosts Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh and Michael Savage have been hammering home the idea that our enemies are subhuman and, therefore, deserving of torture and death. This is typical war propaganda, which involves dehumanization of the enemy to the point where killing and torture seem not only justified but also downright patriotic.

President George W. Bush is still talking about Iraq as if nothing had changed, but even his most zealous Pentagon aides -- Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and his deputy, Paul Wolfowitz -- admit serious mistakes for the first time and concede that victory is not necessarily assured.

In a coordinated attempt, the U.S. intelligence agency CIA and Israel's Mossad are making every possible effort to implement the Greater Middle East Initiative by liquidating regional leaders and fomenting insecurity in the region, said the political analyst Dariyush Mortazavi.

...blame it on the rain

The US Armed Forces increased their use of depleted uranium weapons in Iraq six times. This resulted in radioactive contamination of a number of regions in Baghdad.

The Department of Homeland Security is on the verge of awarding the biggest contract in its young history for an elaborate system that could cost as much as $15 billion and employ a network of databases to track visitors to the United States long before they arrive.

E.L. Doctorow, one of the most celebrated writers in America, was nearly booed off the stage at Hofstra University Sunday when he gave a commencement address lambasting President George W. Bush and effectively calling him a liar.
Hofstra University is the largest private university on Long Island,New York.

A military intelligence unit that oversaw interrogations at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq was also in charge of questioning at a detention center in Afghanistan where two prisoners died in December 2002 in incidents that are being investigated as homicides.

This is an interview with someone who works with Circus2Iraq, a group of people travelling the wasteland that was ancient Babylon, trying to bring cheer to children.

"But why should we hear about body bags, and deaths, and how many, what day it's gonna happen, and how many this or what do you suppose? Or, I mean, it's, it's not relevant. So why should I waste my beautiful mind on something like that? And watch him suffer."
- Barbara Bush on "Good Morning America" - March 18, 2003

An attempt to list and document each of the lies, deceits and distortions of Bush's 2004 election campaign

It's difficult to think of anyone who has inflicted more harm on Americans than their current president.

...just in from Eric Idle. Awesome.
Direct link to the song (3.1 meg, MP3)

Isamu Kaneko, a very well-known software engineer and a research associate of Tokyo university, was arrested for creating a P2P software called 'Winny' which supports anonymous bulletin board and file-sharing.
Creating file-sharing software is completely legal in Japan. Therefore, police is justifying his arrest as for 'assisted two persons who illegally uploaded copyrighted materials using Winny'. This kind of stretch of the rules is a very serious threat to our freedom and rights.
Isamu was arrested May 10, 2004 in Tokyo, by Kyoto prefectural police. And still under detention without accusation.

"I certainly would need to be convinced it [the decapitation video] was authentic," Dr John Simpson, executive director for surgical affairs at the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons, said from New Zealand. Echoing Dr Simpson's criticism, when this journalist asked forensic death expert Jon Nordby, PhD and fellow of the American Board of Medicolegal Death Investigators, whether he believed the Berg decapitation video had been "staged", Nordby replied: "Yes, I think that's the best explanation of it."

More than 5,500 Iraqis died violently in just Baghdad and three provinces in the first 12 months of the occupation, an Associated Press survey found.

"There was no evidence of a wedding: no decorations, no musical instruments found, no large quantities of food or leftover servings one would expect from a wedding celebration," Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt said Saturday. "There may have been some kind of celebration. Bad people have celebrations, too."

The United Nations made a plea yesterday for a unilateral "humanitarian gesture" over the burials. This follows mounting unrest among the 25,000 residents of Tel Sultan at the inability, so far, of the families of the 16 people killed since the Israeli army made its incursion into the area last Monday to reclaim and bury the bodies.

"I feel like I'm in a nightmare," says the married father of three. "And I can't wake up."
...for capitalism to work, the vast majority of people must be kept poor enough that they can never quit working. And, the poorer the masses are kept, the more worth the money held by the ultra-rich gains in terms of the lives it can buy.

The US is supposed to represent the apex of "democracy" and "freedom"; hence, those terms have become as ugly as the US. Just hearing the terms makes ones stomach turn, feeling revulsion, as does looking at the faces of Rumsfeld, Rice, Wolfwitz, Cheney, Powell, Blair and Sharon. All of them are vile war criminals and state terrorists from their own definitions and actions.

Hollings, who is retiring this year at age 82, took to the floor to defend a column he wrote in a newspaper in his home state earlier this month, suggesting that the Bush administration went to war in Iraq on Israel's behalf.

With the advent of the Internet, computers and sophisticated programs it has become increasingly difficult for governments to "pull the wool" over the eyes of their citizens. The Internet has essentially allowed freedom loving people around the world to form communication networks that can now out compete the best intelligence government agencies or special operations groups. This has certainly been the case with the hastily released and shoddy video showing five phoney Al queda members participating in the decapitation of Nicholas Berg that was intended, exclusively, to defray attention from the scandalous sexual abuses of Iraqi POW's that took place at the Abu Ghraib prison outside Baghdad. Evidence in fact shows that the Berg decapitation was filmed inside the walls of the notorious Abu Ghraib prison, this cursed dungeon where probably Satan himself roams its corridors.

Ken Livingstone yesterday demanded that President Bush be prosecuted for war crimes over Iraq in an outburst bound to embarrass Tony Blair.

Iraqis, he said, "would see us debase their dead all the time. We would be messing around with charred bodies, kicking them out of the vehicles and sticking cigarettes in their mouths. I also saw vehicles drive over them. It was our job to look into the pockets of dead Iraqis to gather intelligence. However, time and time again, I saw Marines steal gold chains, watches and wallets full of money."

The butchered ostrich, the petrified kangaroo cowering in a basement corner, the tortoises crushed under the tank treads - all were held up as evidence of the pitiless nature of the Israeli occupation.

"People are more important than animals," said the zoo's co-owner Mohammed Ahmed Juma, whose house was also demolished. "But the zoo is the only place in Rafah that children could escape the tense atmosphere. There were slides and games for children. We had a small swimming pool. I know it's hard to believe, looking at it now, but it was beautiful. Why would they destroy that?

MOBILE phones fitted with digital cameras have been banned in US army installations in Iraq on orders from Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, The Business newspaper reported today.

Seems like the mainstream media is having a difficult time putting the news all together lately. This probably has something to do with the fact that they are not getting the usual clear signals from the butts that they suck on a daily basis. Why? The answer is simple, the owners of those butts, the wealthy elites of the world and their political minions, are at war with one another. They are confused, and in disarray.

Causing an uproar, an Israeli Cabinet minister said Sunday he was reminded of the suffering of his family under Nazi rule when he saw TV images of an Israeli offensive in a Palestinian refugee camp.
"We look like monsters in the eyes of the world," Lapid told Israel Radio. "This makes me sick."
Infuriated Cabinet colleagues said that even if unspoken, the analogy was clear, and demanded he retract his comments.

Despite widespread ill-feeling about the abuse of prisoners by American forces and allegations of mistreatment by British troops, coalition forces will be protected from any legal action.

These documents, obtained by The Washington Post, are the offical English translations of previously secret sworn statements by detainees at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. Some of the names have been withheld from these statements because they are alleged victims of sexual assault. These files are in PDF format. Some of the descriptions in these statements may be disturbing because of their sexually explicit or graphic nature.

Leading the army of critics, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan Thursday condemned as "state terror" the killings of civilians in the Rafah refugee camp in the southern Gaza Strip.

Michael Moore's "Fahrenheit 9/11," a scathing indictment of White House actions after Sept. 11, won the top prize at the Cannes Film Festival.

How can Bush justify banning a film in the US that has won the top film award in the world? And more to the point, how will Eisner explain to the Disney stockholders how he threw away blockbuster profits for his buddy Bush. This film will start the process of tearing down the 9-11 cover-up, and once started, the cover-up will collapse all the way back to who really did it and framed Arabs for it!

By America?s own standard, the standard of its self-image, the US is a sick society.

Does Israel care about the international condemnation it is facing over its military offensive in Gaza? This week I asked an Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman that very question.

"We care very deeply," was the answer.

"She took half a shekel from her father and left the house. We heard heavy shooting and when we went out we found her on the ground, two bullets in her neck and head," said Abu Zeid. Other witnesses said soldiers had opened fire from a nearby position.

Leaders of the world's 22 Arab countries gather today, anxious to develop their own reform program for the Middle East before U.S. President George W. Bush rolls out his proposals to overhaul the region's political scene.

A car bomb exploded outside the home of a deputy interior minister Saturday, wounding him and killing at least five people, including four police.

''I believe that the president's leadership and the actions taken in Iraq demonstrate an incompetence in terms of knowledge, judgment and experience,'' the California Democrat told reporters at a Capitol Hill news conference.

Republicans swiftly responded by defending the president and assailing Pelosi for crossing the line for political gain.

"The bombing started at 3am," she said yesterday from her bed in the emergency ward at Ramadi general hospital, 60 miles west of Baghdad. "We went out of the house and the American soldiers started to shoot us. They were shooting low on the ground and targeting us one by one," she said. She ran with her youngest child in her arms and her two young boys, Ali and Hamza, close behind. As she crossed the fields a shell exploded close to her, fracturing her legs and knocking her to the ground.

She lay there and a second round hit her on the right arm. By then her two boys lay dead. "I left them because they were dead," she said. One, she saw, had been decapitated by a shell.

"I fell into the mud and an American soldier came and kicked me. I pretended to be dead so he wouldn't kill me. My youngest child was alive next to me."

Israeli tanks and troops started pulling out of the Rafah refugee camp Friday, following strong international pressure to end the three-day incursion.
"The operation has not ended; we have redeployed forces and allowed residents to stock up on food," army spokeswoman Maj. Sharon Feingold said.

"There's nothing inappropriate about making sure Americans know about the scandal," said Peter Schurman, MoveOn.org's executive director. "It's the most patriotic thing we could do at this point."

Guardian Unlimited Special reports

When Iraqis are blown apart in Baghdad by a car bomb, or Israelis in Haifa by a suicide bomber, these are instantly and correctly labelled as terrorist attacks. However when American helicopters or Israeli tanks cause death to innocent civilians on a similar scale, there is always an alternative version on offer.

"Israel is a democracy and a friend...and has every right to defend itself from terror," he said.
...and they keep shooting

"We assume," says a top administration official, "an attack will happen leading up to the election." And, he added, "it will happen here."

The United States argues it cannot put itself under the jurisdiction of a foreign court it did not authorize and says its many troops abroad would be open to politically motivated prosecutions.

The most recent reality challenge is the policy of torture in both Iraq and Afghanistan, which the administration is frantically redefining as "abuse," "excesses," and "humiliation." We even have Secretary Rumsfeld describing footage of several American soldiers "having sex" with a female Iraqi prisoner.

Let's have a little plain English here. "Having sex" with a prisoner is known as "rape." Systematic beatings are called "torture." Excesses that lead to death are called "murder." The hundreds of women and children in mass graves in Fallujah are the product of a "massacre." Taken together, all of these add up to "atrocities."

Previously secret sworn statements by detainees at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq describe in raw detail abuse that goes well beyond what has been made public, adding allegations of prisoners being ridden like animals, sexually fondled by female soldiers and forced to retrieve their food from toilets.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) on Friday voiced renewed concern about an unknown number of detainees, rounded up in the U.S. global war on terror and being held secretly in various countries.

Collaborative Video Blog

Emergency Situation in Gaza

There is an emergency situation in the Gaza Strip right now. Please demand that Prime Minister Sharon halt the death and destruction wrought there by the Israeli army. The cycle of bloodshed must end.

Friends,

We need your help.

20-21/5 LIVE VIDEO
if...there is respect for international law and the sovereignty of nations.
if...political freedoms are guaranteed.
2 debates:
#1 The Case of Iraq.
#2 Political Liberties and 'The War on Terrorism'.
Live stream

WAR CRIMES OCCURRING RIGHT NOW,
EMAIL, FAX AND CALL YOUR REPRESENTATIVES AND THE PRESIDENT NOW!

Turkish officials said the blast caused damage but no injuries. Police said they had received a warning about the bomb in a phone call 15 minutes before the explosion.

Israeli forces have killed five Palestinians in Rafah as Israel threatens to continue demolitions despite a sharp rebuke from the UN Security Council.

An Israeli army helicopter fired a missile into a refugee camp on a third day of heavy fighting in the Gaza Strip

41 Palestinians have been killed in three days

The resolution, passed by a vote of 14-0, expressed grave concern at "the recent demolition of homes committed by Israel, the occupying power, in the Rafah refugee camp." It also calls on Israel to "respect its obligations under international humanitarian law and insists, in particular, on its obligation not to undertake demolition of homes contrary to that law."

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) is extremely concerned at concurring independent eye witness reports just received that the Israel Defence Forces have started to demolish houses in Rafah with their inhabitants still inside and prevented from exiting the buildings.

Accused of failing to tackle prison abuses in Afghanistan while rushing to contain the scandal in Iraq, the U.S. military in Kabul said it would review its secretive jails but vowed to keep them shut to the outside world.

In March 2003, a teenage girl named Courtney presented one of her poems before an audience at Barnes & Noble bookstore in Albuquerque, then read the poem live on the school's closed-circuit television channel. A school military liaison and the high school principal accused the girl of being "un-American" because she criticized the war in Iraq and the Bush administration's failure to give substance to its "No child left behind" education policy. The girl's mother, also a teacher, was ordered by the principal to destroy the child's poetry. The mother refused and may lose her job. Bill Nevins was suspended for not censoring the poetry of his students. Remember, there is no obscenity to be found in any of the poetry. He was later fired by the principal.

Most Canadians believe the U.S. Government knew that the attacks of September 11, 2001 were coming ? and did not act to prevent them, a poll released today indicates. When asked about the following statement, 63% of Canadians agreed that ?Individuals within the U.S. Government including the White House had prior knowledge of the plans for the events of September 11th, and failed to take appropriate action to stop them?.
Additionally, 16% of Canadians believe that individuals within the U.S. Government were involved in the planning and execution of the events of September 11th.

According to eyewitnesses, after the seige of Kunduz, some three thousand prisoners were forced into sealed containers and loaded onto trucks for transport to Sheberghan prison. Eyewitnesses say when the prisoners began shouting for air, U.S.-allied Afghan soldiers fired directly into the truck, killing many of them. The rest suffered through an appalling road trip lasting up to four days, so thirsty they clawed at the skin of their fellow prisoners as they licked perspiration and even drank blood from open wounds.

Witnesses say that when the trucks arrived and soldiers opened the containers, most of the people inside were dead. They also say US Special Forces re-directed the containers carrying the living and dead into the desert and stood by as survivors were shot and buried. Now, up to three thousand bodies lie buried in a mass grave.

"It is not anti-Semitic to criticize the policies of the state of Israel."

U.S. Sen. Ernest "Fritz" Hollings (D-SC) is under fire for remarks he made in an opinion column where he accused President Bush of going to war in Iraq "to secure Israel."

A leader of the armed wing of the radical Hamas movement has been killed in an Israeli air strike in the southern Gaza town of Rafah

"With Iraq no threat, why invade a sovereign country?" Hollings asked. "The answer: President Bush's policy to secure Israel. Led by Wolfowitz, Richard Perle and Charles Krauthammer, for years there has been a domino school of thought that the way to guarantee Israel's security is to spread democracy in the area."

"My message to the CPA is let my people go, let my people be free. We are grateful to President Bush for liberating Iraq but it is time for the Iraqi people to run their affairs," he told a press conference.:

U.S. soldiers and Iraqi police raided the home of America's one-time ally Ahmad Chalabi on Thursday, seizing documents and computers. U.S. officials

...an American general insisted Thursday that the air strike had killed foreign guerrilla fighters and said "bad things happen in wars."

Defense Minister expresses regret for Palestinian civilians killed during protest march in Rafah but emphasizes that the IDF operation is essential and will continue.

Rabbi Dov Lior, chairman of the settler?s rabbinical council ruled that killing civilians during warfare is permitted if it will save lives.

...it's not a joke

"To continue to support this administration at this point you?ve got to have a serious character flaw." Janeane Garofalo

...and if they don't?

The United Nations' special human rights envoy for the occupied territories said on Wednesday that Israeli military strikes against a Gaza refugee camp were war crimes and a violation of humanitarian law.

A U.S. aircraft fired on a house in the desert near the Syrian border Wednesday, and Iraqi officials said more than 40 people were killed, including children.

Tony Blair was hit with a flour bomb as he spoke in the Commons today - sparking a full-scale security scare.The flour, which had been dyed purple, was in two condoms thrown from a gallery by a protester.

Israeli forces opened fire on a protest march in a besieged Gaza refugee camp on Wednesday, killing eight Palestinians and raising the death toll in Israel's heaviest raid in the Gaza Strip in years to 31.

Reading the memo leaves the indelible impression that, at least as the White House counsel saw it, sometime in the future, Bush officials might very well be prosecuted as war criminals.

The top intelligence official at the Homeland Security Department, worried about an increased risk of attack in coming months, says al-Qaida wants to strike on U.S. soil with something other than a conventional explosive - perhaps with a chemical or biological weapon.

Israel's continuing assault on the Rafah refugee camp has killed another 20 Palestinians.

...we (the US) signed the UN Convention Against Torture in 1994. In Article One from that convention, the US declared that:

" ...torture means any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a third person, or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity."

Two of the three Reuters staff said they had been forced to insert a finger into their anus and then lick it, and were forced to put shoes in their mouths, particularly humiliating in Arab culture.

In the wake of 9/11, a special Pentagon operation was set up by Rumsfeld - code-named "Copper Green" - that was in effect a secret army, complete with its own air force.

Four people have been arrested over the beheading of US businessman Nicholas Berg, whose killing was shown earlier this month in a video on an Al-Qaeda linked website, a senior Iraqi source said.

The Russian and U.S. military launched an unprecedented six-day command post exercise in Moscow on Monday to train for conducting joint operations in a third country.

Before, during and after the war, mainstream commercial journalists have failed to provide the critical analysis, independent reporting, and the diverse range of opinions necessary for the American public to evaluate the Bush administration?s claims about the war.

"If we go on like this, we may find ourselves in a permanent state of war."

...the United States "will never win."

...two serious historians, one French and one American, both have grave doubts about the Bush "crusade" to democratize the Arab world.

"These prisoners, you know they're not there for traffic violations. If they're in cellblock 1-A or 1-B, these prisoners, they're murderers, they're terrorists, they're insurgents. Many of them probably have American blood on their hands and here we're so concerned about the treatment of those individuals."

A senior British officer allegedly suggested releasing many of the prisoners detained by the coalition, but saw his suggestion shot down by American commanders.

Full-page ads to appear in New York City, San Francisco, and Baghdad, Iraq.

Israeli forces killed 10 Palestinians, at least four of them gunmen, early on Tuesday in what appeared to be the start of a large military operation in southern Gaza's Rafah refugee camp.

During his testimony before the Senate Armed Service Committee, Rumsfeld was pressed upon by Senator John McCain about the role of the private contractors in the interrogations and abuse. McCain asked Rumsfeld four pertinent questions, ". . . who was in charge? What agency or private contractor was in charge of the interrogations? Did they have authority over the guards? And what were the instructions that they gave to the guards?"

After several hours of research, JackBlood.com has learned the web addresses for the ?Islamic Websites? that posted the Nick Berg decapitation video. The website addresses are www.al-asnar.net and www.al-asnar.biz . Both websites have apparently been disabled by 'authorities.' The location of the web server is reportedly in Malaysia. However, the addresses of the publishers for these sites are located in London, England and Nurnberg, Denmark.

United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan today repeated his condemnation of Israel?s widespread destruction of Palestinian homes in the Gaza Strip, which a UN agency estimates will cost some $32 million to re-house the nearly 19,000 people left homeless by the demolition.

EU foreign ministers on Monday condemned Israeli home demolitions in the Gaza Strip as disproportionate and pressed Israel to stop the action immediately.

Asked about Kwasniewski's remarks as he visited with troops at Kentucky's Fort Campbell, Mr. Bush replied "I'm here to eat dinner,"

U.S. National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice wrapped up her three-day visit to Moscow on Sunday saying she had fresh assurances of Russia's support for U.S. efforts to stabilize the situation in Iraq.

Rebel MP George Galloway outlined plans to attempt to prosecute British Prime Minister Tony Blair and two leading government figures for war crimes.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair and US President George W Bush plan to make an unprecedented joint appearance in Baghdad in a "desperate" bid to quell mounting anger over the abuse of Iraqi prisoners. They fear the scandal over the torture of captives by US and British troops is threatening to wreck the coalition mission and destabilise the Middle East, the British Sunday Mirror tabloid reported today. The report, however, did not spell out the date when the two leaders will make the trip.

...doesn't make the el Presidente look good

MOORE BRINGS DOWN HOUSE: LONGEST STANDING OVATION 'IN HISTORY OF CANNES' FOR BUSH BASH FILM

20 mins standing ovation for FAHRENHEIT 9-11, yelling, screaming, cheering... 'This is the longest standing ovation in the history of the festival! Unbelievable!' declared Cannes stalwart Thierry Fremaux. Moore, raising fist, unable to speak over crowd, vows to fight...

...people don't like you and your lies.
I'm sorry, George...that's the reality.
...and...you can only blame yourself.

A few years ago, Michael Moore spoke then-Governor George W. Bush, who told the muckraker: "Behave yourself, will ya? Go find real work." Moore has made trouble for so many powerful people he has become a media power of his own. He can even make celebrities of mere movie reviewers: When his latest cinematic incendiary device, ?Fahrenheit 9/11,? had its first press screening Monday morning, American critics emerging from the theater were besieged by a convoy of TV and radio crews from networks around the world who wanted to know what they thought of Moore?s blast at the Bush Administration.

US President George W Bush's election hopes could be blown apart by a film to be shown at the Cannes film festival, which is why the White House is trying to keep it out of US theatres, its director, Michael Moore, charged.

Panicked Palestinians fled their homes Monday as Israeli forces surrounded a Gaza refugee camp to carry out a threatened mass demolition despite an international outcry.

Israeli security forces have prevented distribution of the three main Palestinian newspapers in the Gaza Strip for the last six days, sources within the papers and officials said on Monday.

If the Constitution still means anything, impeachment hearings should start immediately, and Republicans should lead the way.

Michael Moore's "Fahrenheit 9/11," a savage indictment of President Bush's handling of Iraq and the war on terror, was cheered and applauded at the Cannes film festival on Monday.

Film critics were warm in praise of the controversial director who later called in a news conference for America to pull out of Iraq.

The Arab Resistance Movement al-Rashid Brigades posted a statement on the internet saying two suicide bombers had been used to carry out "a qualitative heroic operation, which led to the killing of the traitor and mercenary" Ezzedine Salim.

An Israeli bombardment targeted today Monday morning the headquarters of the Palestine national liberation movement ( Fatah) in Gaza. News reports said that the missiles fell at the headquarters which is situated in al-Zeitoun quarters near al-Omari mosque.

American athletes have been warned not to wave the U.S. flag during their medal celebrations at this summer's Olympic Games in Athens, for fear of provoking crowd hostility and harming the country's already-battered public image.

White House

The head of the Iraqi Governing Council was killed today in a suicide car bombing as he waited in his vehicle at a US-controlled checkpoint.

Four small bombs targeted branches of the British bank HSBC in Ankara and Istanbul last night - hours before Tony Blair was scheduled to arrive in Turkey for a rapid summit.

Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11 is without doubt the most flaming-hot ticket at the Cannes film festival. And with good reason: Moore hopes that it will bring down the US government.

The Iraq prisoner abuse scandal shifted Sunday to the question of whether the Bush administration set up a legal foundation that opened the door for the mistreatment.

At the Camp War Horse detention centre in Baguba, north of Baghdad, it is a surreal scene: US soldiers handing out cash to freed prisoners along with a note saying "You have not been mistreated."

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld authorized the expansion of a secret program that encouraged physical coercion and sexual humiliation of Iraqi prisoners to obtain intelligence about the growing insurgency in Iraq

"Let's just say that it ain't over yet," he said. "It's going to get a hell of a lot worse than now. This is going to go on for years from what we can see over here. And tell you what, blame the Yanks not the Iraqis. They only want a decent life and a fair go."

Ahmed Halless, Fatah's secretary-general in the Gaza Strip, said the site was a cultural center that offered social and educational programs to local families. "Israel should understand that aggression will not bring peace. Violence will bring more violence," he said.
The Israeli army described the targets as "focal points of terrorist activity."

...beheaded in front of a video camera - has taken place in such strange and suspicious circumstances that it raises deeply troubling questions. Among them is whether American agencies had a direct or indirect hand in the young man's murder.

42 percent

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...

"They tied me up like a beast and then they were kneeling on me, kicking and punching.

"Finally they dragged me out of the cell in chains...and shaved my beard, my hair and my eyebrows," he said.

"There was always this guy behind the squad, filming everything that happened," he added.

British defence chiefs have been drawing up plans to double the number of British troops on the ground in Iraq.

GAZA CITY, GAZA STRIP - A United Nations agency responsible for Palestinian refugees has described a scene of widespread destruction in the Gaza Strip after demolitions carried out by the Israeli army.

The government has no legal justification for concealing these photos, since they do not involve classified material. They are just sweeping the scandal under the rug because both Republicans AND Democrats are totally co-opetd by the NeoCon warhawks, and they want to save the war, no matter what it does to the nation.

Washington and the opposition are behind the
terrorist plot against Chavez

President Bush says U.S. troops will stay in Iraq after the June 30 handover of power.

Months ago they knew an attack on Najaf, the holiest of holy cities in Iraq, was a very bad idea. But they did it anyway. And to add insult to injury, our illustrious Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt claims the Iraqis did the damage to the golden dome of the Imam Ali mosque themselves.

Opposition leader Shimon Peres said that 80 percent of Israelis want peace and only one percent is trying to block it. "We will not allow them," Peres said. "We must not support a puppet government that follows the delusional ideas of the right," Peres added.

Danish army medics in Iraq saw two prisoners at a British field hospital who had been beaten, one of them to death, the Danish Defence Ministry said on Friday.

The incident was reported to British officials in September.

Controversial movie maker Michael Moore has revealed he smuggled three camera crews into Iraq to film disillusioned US soldiers for his new documentary, Fahrenheit 9/11.

American troops today admitted they routinely gun down Iraqi civilians - some of whom are entirely innocent.

WASHINGTON -- Too many routine government documents are being stamped secret, say leading members of the 9/11 commission, which is preventing the public from learning about all the warnings and information they may need to protect themselves.

Berg's body arrived Wednesday at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware.
His parents had requested permission to be at the base when the
coffin arrived, but that request was denied. Sen. Arlen Specter, R-
Pennsylvania, said Thursday that refusal came from the Department of
Defense.

At LEAST One Iraqi Prisoner Was Tortured to Death and the Cause of His Death Concealed

That's what they do when they conduct experiments on people -- they document it, to evaluate the methodology for further study. For reference. For next time.

....non-compliance would destroy their military career.

NAJAF, Iraq (Reuters) - U.S. forces intensified their war against Iraqi cleric Moqtada al-Sadr Friday, sending tanks into Najaf's vast cemetery to blast guerrilla positions on sacred ground in the holy city for the first time.

BEIRUT, Lebanon - Two Islamic militant groups, Hezbollah and Hamas, issued strongly worded condemnations yesterday of the videotaped beheading of an American civilian in Iraq.

Nick Berg Conspiracy Theories Abound

Conspiracy Theories Emerge About the Nick Berg Murder -- A BuzzFlash Reader Contribution

George Bush Supporters

Of the supposedly rock solid 45% of Americans who will vote for Bush -- even if he grows devil's horns -- how many of them are Neo-Confederate white males, how many are Stepford-Christians, how many are ignorant, and how many are just plumb stupid?

Nearly 300 Iraqi detainees, some weeping and waving to friends, were released from the Abu Ghraib prison on Friday, a day after Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld made a surprise visit and insisted the Pentagon did not try to cover up abuses there.

Guardian Unlimited | Special reports

Donald Rumsfeld has a new war on his hands - the US officer corps has turned on the government

"Obviously, I pray every day there's less casualty."
G.W.Bush, Fort Hood, Texas, April 11, 2004

ask anyone who has gone through military basic training and they might well ask you: "What did you THINK was going on in Iraq?"

What could be more naked abuse than cluster-bombing children and terrorizing whole cities? What could be more obscene than sending armless and legless GIs home by the planeload? Our leaders are outraged at what is happening inside Abu Ghraib? When they know full well that next door in Fallujah our troops were killing so many people -- including women and children -- that the soccer stadium was turned into a cemetery? There have been pictures of all this, too. Not on 19th Century Fox, or other corporate news outlets, but there were pictures aplenty.

As the U.S. government helped to obscure the ultimate fate of the missing American, it came to light that police in Chile arrested Horman, interrogated, murdered, then Dumped on the side of a road his body....

My son died for the sins of George Bush and Donald Rumsfeld. This administration did this," Berg said in an interview with radio station KYW-AM.

The multibillion-dollar U.S. ballistic missile shield due to start operating by Sept. 30 appears incapable of shooting down any incoming warheads, an independent scientists' group said on Thursday.

...between $26 billion and $130 billion of the money lent by the World Bank for development projects since 1946 has been misused.

At least 500 dead in Nigerian riot 13.05.2004

Southern Arizona's Fort Huachuca, in Sierra Vista, took another drubbing Wednesday when two former soldiers training there to become interrogators told ABC News that they were taught to "bend the rules" to inflict physical and mental pain on prisoners while still technically observing the Geneva Conventions.

Israeli missile strikes on the Palestinian refugee camp of Rafah, which killed 12 people and wounded 29 others.

Wolfowitz: Iraq, Afghan costs could top $50B

The embattled defence secretary - who was on a surprise trip to Iraq - told US soldiers that he was "a survivor".

The New York Post is breaking a story today that hurts the credibility of Lynndie England's claims that she was ordered to pose for the photographs.

NEW DELHI - The Gandhi political dynasty prepared for a return to power Thursday after a stunning election victory fueled by anger among millions of rural poor left behind by India's economic boom.

---> "systemic" mistreatment, Human Rights Watch claimed Thursday

Mover' is son of top Likud Official

---> BBC NEWS

U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell is expected to tell the United Nations Security Council that Washington has clear evidence of Iraqi links to the Al-Qaeda terrorist network.

---> "We kept the president informed"

Infowars.com to Fight the New World Order

Who's responsible for dumping Nick Berg, an unarmed American Jew, wearing an orange jumpsuit (with a Star of David scrawled on his back) in the middle of hostile Arab territory?

---> Cosmos Left

Iraq militants claim al-Zarqawi is dead

--->European Union disregards US sanctions on Syria

it says - "You decide. Don't give clones a chance."

WHATREALLYHAPPENED.COM

"The reality of war in all its aspects needs to be reported and photographed. That is the patriotic, and necessary, thing to do in a democracy." - Michael Getler, ombudsman of the Washington Post, May 9, 2004.

BAGHDAD, Iraq - An American civilian who was beheaded in a grisly video posted on an al-Qaeda-linked Web site was never in U.S. custody despite claims from his family, a coalition spokesman said Wednesday.
But Berg was detained by Iraqi police at a checkpoint in Mosul on March 24. He was turned over to U.S. officials and detained for 13 days, the family said. His father, Michael, said his son was not allowed to make phone calls or contact a lawyer.
Michael Berg told The Associated Press, however, that U.S. officials were "playing word games."
"The Iraqi police do not tell the FBI what to do. The FBI tells the Iraqi police what to do. Who do they think they're kidding?" the elder Berg said.
On April 5, the Bergs filed suit in federal court in Philadelphia, contending their son was being held illegally by the U.S. military. The next day, Berg was released. He told his parents he had not been mistreated.

Coalition spokesman Dan Senor said that to his knowledge Berg "was at no time under the jurisdiction or detention of coalition forces."

The family firm of beheaded American Nick Berg, was named by a conservative website in a list of 'enemies' of the Iraq occupation. That could explain his arrest by Iraqi police --a detention which fatally delayed his planned return from Iraq and may have led directly to his death.

WASHINGTON - Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld defended military interrogation techniques in Iraq on Wednesday, rejecting complaints that they violate international rules and may endanger Americans taken prisoner.

No shame. Pure EVIL.

ROME (AP) - The scandal of prisoner abuses by U.S. soldiers in Iraq has dealt a bigger blow to the United States than the Sept. 11 attacks, the Vatican foreign minister told an Italian newspaper.
"The torture? A more serious blow to the United States than Sept. 11. Except that the blow was not inflicted by terrorists but by Americans against themselves," Lajolo was quoted as saying in La Repubblica.

Bush is scheduled to hold talks with Pope John Paul II at the Vatican on June 4.

LONDON - Amnesty International accused British soldiers in Iraq yesterday of killing civilians, including an eight-year-old girl and a wedding guest, when they posed no apparent threat.

Hell, in Iraq, erupts at night.

First, they break down your door and clamber inside - large, Yankee soldiers in combat gear with automatic rifles.

They bark orders, wrest men, women and children from their beds, assemble everyone in a single room. They start smashing your possessions in front of you - cabinets, chairs, tables, anything.

They shout insults, brandish their weapons, kick and punch their captives, striking out with their rifle barrels at anyone who resists.

They handcuff those they want - typically, anyone who happens to be male, no matter how old or infirm.

They hustle their prisoners, generally clad only in pyjamas or underwear, out into the dark Iraqi night. Essential items, such as eyeglasses or medicine, are invariably left behind.

They don't say where they are taking you, they don't say why, and they probably never will.

You are terrified, practically naked, already in acute physical distress, and almost certainly innocent of wrongdoing, but that doesn't seem to matter a whit.

This - as depicted in a report by the International Committee of the Red Cross - is merely the first circle of hell in an Iraq under occupation by U.S.-led military forces, and your torment has barely begun.

It gets far, far worse.

...hell in Iraq.

One naked detainee is forced to stand on a box with a sandbag on his head and with wires attached to his fingers, toes and penis to simulate electrical-shock torture.

A male military guard rapes a female detainee.

A guard smashes a chemical light and pours the phosphoric liquid on several detainees.

A detainee is beaten with a broom handle and a chair.

A detainee has his head slammed against a wall and his guard promptly stitches up the wound himself.

A hooded detainee is made to lie down on what is likely a running truck engine, burning him so badly he requires three months in hospital, extensive skin grafts over much of his body and the amputation of a finger.

A detainee is force-fed a baseball bat, which is then secured in place with a scarf.

Male detainees are forced to parade naked in public, with women's underwear wrapped over their heads.

Detainees are made to sit for hours in direct sunlight in 50-degree temperatures or forced to remain in awkward positions for hours at a time.

Detainees are kept naked in solitary confinement without light for days at a time.

A 28-year-old detainee, married with two children, is beaten to death by his captors, and his death is officially attributed to cardio-respiratory arrest-asphyxia, cause unknown.

The litany of horrors goes on and on, and the abuses continued unabated last year even though the Red Cross regularly expressed its concerns to coalition forces, making it difficult to reach any conclusion except the Red Cross' own ? that this harsh and inhuman treatment has been encouraged or at least tolerated at senior levels of the occupying armies.

(Reuters) - The EU expects to start issuing new biometric passports by the end of 2005

...in Afghanistan last summer

check out the video

----> careful!!! graphic images

.......home video did not show scenes of abuse but included comments by the soldier, whose name was not revealed to protect her identity, that make clear her dislike for the camp and the prisoners under her control.

"I hate it here," she said on the tape. "I want to come home. I want to be a civilian again. We actually shot two prisoners today. One got shot in the chest for swinging a pole against our people on the feed team. One got shot in the arm. We don't know if the one we shot in the chest is dead yet."

In her video, the soldier described the hazards of Camp Bucca. "This is a sand viper," she said. "One bite will kill you in six hours. We've already had two prisoners die of it, but who cares? That's two less for me to worry about."

The soldier said about three prisoners broke out of the camp every week, but they did not try to escape when she was on duty.

"It's 'cause they are scared of me," she said. "I actually got in trouble the other day because I was throwing rocks at them."

CBS said another soldier spoke of a chaotic situation at Camp Bucca with a dangerously low ratio of guards to prisoners.

Tim Canjar, who was discharged from the military for abusing Iraqi prisoners, said that during one disturbance "at one point, it was me and another soldier guarding. I was watching 535 prisoners on my side ... The prisoners started hitting us."

Fellow soldier Lisa Girman, who was discharged with Canjar, said commanders ignored the problems at Camp Bucca.

She complained of "the ignorance of the chain of command not to listen to the person who was actually on the front line."

Girman's and Canjar's families tried to draw attention to the problems at Camp Bucca last year. They called Rumsfeld's office repeatedly and talked to his staff, but got no response, CBS said. Their letters to the White House and two senators were also unanswered.

Misio, Moulin and me.
MMM
TRZEJ MUSZKIETEROWIE