Near the main office of Moqtada Al-Sadr, in the part of Baghdad known as Sadr City, followers of the rebel cleric continue to fight the U.S. military despite suffering heavy losses. While the military claims to have killed more than 800 Iraqis, most of them fighters, during the last nine weeks in the sprawling urban …
Continue reading “Iraqis Grow Weary of War, but Mehdi Army Pledges to Fight On”
A story is told in southern Xinjiang about the first carpet weaver, a princess named Gulem. One day, her father, the king of his realm, was hunting in the forest with his court advisors. A little bird flew from branch to branch following the king and singing into his ear. The king demanded that his …
Continue reading “The End of a Golden Age in China”
TOKYO (IPS) – The filing of a suit against his own government by a Japanese activist, blaming it for his ordeal in Iraq when he was briefly held captive there, is an indication of a new side to Japan’s young people. More of them are heading overseas to troubled spots, in defiance of official warnings, …
Continue reading “Backlash in Japan”
UNITED NATIONS (IPS) – As violence against civilians and humanitarian workers escalates in the world’s politically troubled regions, the United Nations and major relief groups continue to shy away from countries such as Iraq, Afghanistan and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) or to significantly downsize their emergency operations. “We have no plans to return …
Continue reading “Aid Agencies Forced to Leave War Zones”
The biggest single problem the federal government has is its hypocrisy. It talks one way and acts another. It talks of spreading democracy while supporting dictators; it blathers about human rights while violating them; and it claims to promote the rule of law while scoffing at laws it considers inconvenient. If the basis of our …
Continue reading “Hypocrisy: The US Government’s Biggest Single Problem”
Conducted by Saul Landau on “Hot Talk” radio Cal Poly Pomona. Check out his other interviews. High Bandwidth (DSL or Cable modem): Low Bandwidth (dial-up modem): Alexander Cockburn is editor of CounterPunch and is the author of the just-published Imperial Crusades.
Two years ago Jose Padilla was arrested for allegedly being sent back here by al-Qaeda "to reconnoiter potential sites" for detonating a radiological dispersal device – sometimes referred to as a "dirty bomb." President Bush promptly designated Padilla an "enemy combatant" and he has been confined to a military prison ever since. Because the issue …
Continue reading “Internet Nukes”
“It’s not fun to be accused of war crimes,” opines Gary Schmitt, executive director of the Project for a New American Century (PNAC). It’s even less fun to be victimized by war criminals, but, then again, why should the neocons at PNAC care about that? After all, as we all know, the scandal that’s increasingly …
Continue reading “Besieged, Bothered, Bewildered – and Busted”
Nearly three years have passed since 9-11, yet one wonders if Vice President Dick Cheney ever abandoned his “secure undisclosed location.” He still seems to be secreted away somewhere, only coming out of hiding long enough to resell the Iraq war on some friendly neocon stage lent for the spread of more false propaganda. After …
Continue reading “Tricky Dick Cheney”
I know it’s terribly naive to suggest such a thing, but you might have thought that if even a secondary purpose of the vaunted war on terrorism and the sidetrack into Iraq had something to do with demonstrating the superiority of democracy and the rule of law, that the administration would have taken steps to …
Continue reading “Thugs With Lawyers” 
