Updated at 1:28 p.m. EDT, Sept. 30, 2011 At least 22 Iraqis were killed and 61 more were wounded in new attacks, including one that targeted mourners at a funeral in Hilla. This is the second day in a row that dozens have been killed or wounded in violence. A massive car bomb exploded at …
Continue reading “Second Bloody Day in Iraq: 22 Killed, 61 Wounded”
More than a dozen U.S. and international human rights and arms control groups are urging Congress to block a proposed 53-million-dollar arms sale to Bahrain, which hosts the U.S. Fifth Fleet, until it ends its crackdown against the opposition and adopts serious reforms. In a letter sent to lawmakers Wednesday, the groups, which include Human Rights First …
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A broad coalition of 20 human rights, labor and consumer groups is appealing to the administration of President Barack Obama not to renew military aid and sales to Uzbekistan, widely considered one of the world’s most repressive dictatorships. In a letter sent Tuesday to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the coalition, which includes Amnesty International, Human Rights …
Continue reading “Rights Groups to Clinton: Don’t Let Logistics Trump Uzbek Rights”
The Latest in Guarding the Empire
At least 13 Iraqis were killed and 90 more were wounded in the latest violence. One attack, on security personnel, took place in Kirkuk where a U.S. general says American troops are no longer needed. Separately, a U.S. soldier was also killed in a rocket or mortar attack. Meanwhile, Turkey continued its aerial assault on suspected P.K.K. hideouts across northern Iraq.
In a development that could help resolve an 8-year-old diplomatic and humanitarian standoff, the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK), an Iranian opposition group that has several thousand adherents at a military camp in Iraq, has agreed to allow residents to apply for refugee status and be interviewed individually by U.N. officials. Vincent Cochetel, Washington representative for the …
Continue reading “MEK Allows Adherents in Iraq to Seek Refugee Status”
If it is actually true that those whom the gods seek to destroy they first make mad, it would seem that the insanity process has at its epicenter the White House. How else to explain the various bits and pieces of counterterrorism policy that have been revealed over the past two weeks? A Sept. 15 …
Continue reading “Robo-Death: Made in the USA”
This week marks the beginning of what is supposed to be the final 100 days of the U.S. occupation of Iraq. But if U.S. troops are to leave Iraq at the end of this year as promised — repeatedly — it will take grassroots pressure to counter the growing “occupy Iraq forever” chorus in Washington. …
Continue reading “100 Days of Solidarity With Iraq”
At least 14 Iraqis were killed and 41 more were wounded in the latest violence, which included a bloody attack on a Sahwa fighter’s family. Meanwhile, Iran has accepted a peace deal with P.J.A.K. rebels, but Turkey continues to bomb P.K.K. targets in northern Iraq. The P.K.K., not to be left out, kidnapped three schoolteachers in Turkey.
There will be no Friday column, unfortunately: we had an auto accident a couple of days ago, and I’m picking up the pieces – literally. No one was hurt, thank the gods, but our car was totaled and since I don’t live in the Big City anymore, but, instead, way out in the woods, life …
Continue reading “Failure in Libya” 
