A global justice gap is being made worse by power politics despite a landmark year for international justice, said Amnesty International today in its annual assessment of human rights worldwide. Launching Amnesty International Report 2010: State of the World's Human Rights, which documents abuses in 159 countries, the organization said that powerful governments are blocking advances in international justice by standing above the law on human rights, shielding allies from criticism and acting only when politically convenient. "Repression and injustice are flourishing in the global justice gap, condemning millions of people to abuse, oppression and poverty," said Claudio Cordone, interim Secretary General of Amnesty International. "Governments must ensure that no one is above the law, and that everyone has access to justice for all human rights violations. Until governments stop subordinating justice to political self-interest, freedom from fear and freedom from want will remain elusive for most of humanity." Amnesty International called on governments to ensure accountability for their own actions, fully sign up to the International Criminal Court (ICC) and ensure that crimes under international law can be prosecuted anywhere in the world. It said that states claiming global leadership, including the G20, have a particular responsibility to set an example.

Iranian naval forces have detected a US nuclear submarine in the Persian Gulf waters, amid growing concerns over the safety of one of the most important energy routes in the world. An Iranian patrol on Thursday spotted the nuclear-armed and -powered submarine in the strategic Strait of Hormuz, which allows the passage of 90 percent of the oil produced by Persian Gulf states to Asia, the US and Western Europe.

There are currently 48 logistic and 18 combat US vessels in the Persian Gulf waters, among them the USS-Eisenhower aircraft carrier. Experts say aside from the risk of ecologically disastrous accidents, the presence of a nuclear submarine in a narrow waterway also poses a threat of nuclear pollution. In 2009, a US Navy Los Angeles-class nuclear-powered submarine collided with a San Antonio-class amphibious transport dock in the strait. The incident caused a spillage of nearly 25-thousand gallons of diesel fuel. In 2007, a submerged US nuclear vessel collided with a huge Japanese crude tanker in the south of the strait. The US is yet to comment on the report. PressTV: Israeli war game rehearses 'Iran attack'.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has warned that Russia's stance against the Tehran declaration could turn it into an "enemy" of the Iranian nation. "Russian leaders should not create a situation that makes Iranian people place Russia in the ranks of their historic enemies," Ahmadinejad said in a speech in Kerman on Wednesday. His comments came in response to Russia's decision to back a US-proposed UN Security Council resolution against Iran. "Today, it has become difficult for us to explain [Russian President Dmitry] Medvedev's behavior to the Iranian nation. The [Iranian] people don't know whether they [Russian officials] are our friends or are after something else," the Fars news agency quoted Ahmadinejad as saying. "If I were the Russian president, when taking decisions on subjects related to the great Iranian nation, I would think things through more," he said. Juan Cole: Ahmadinejad Blasts Medvedev over UNSC Sanctions; Brazil still Reaching out to Obama on Nuclear Deal. PressTV: Russia vows support for Iran fuel swap.

One of the items on the agenda of the talks is Iran's nuclear issue. Speaking at a business conference in Sao Paulo on Wednesday, Erdogan stated that Turkey and Brazil have the courage to tackle the issue that is "making the international community very uncomfortable." Erdogan was referring to the Tehran nuclear declaration, which has been strongly supported by Turkey and Brazil as the solution to the dispute over Iran's nuclear program. The declaration, signed by the foreign ministers of Iran, Turkey, and Brazil in the Iranian capital on May 17, commits Tehran to deposit 1,200 kilograms (2,640 pounds) of its low-enriched uranium in Turkey that would be exchanged for 120 kilograms of 20 percent enriched nuclear fuel for the Tehran research reactor, which produces radioisotopes for cancer treatment. Erdogan's visit to Brazil is the first by a Turkish prime minister. His Latin American tour will also take him to Argentina and Chile. PressTV: Brazil writes to Western leaders on Iran.

Israel faces unprecedented pressure to abandon its official policy of “ambiguity” on its possession of nuclear weapons as the international community meets at the United Nations in New York this week to consider banning such arsenals from the Middle East. Israel’s equivocal stance on its atomic status was shattered by reports on Monday that it offered to sell nuclear-armed Jericho missiles to South Africa’s apartheid regime back in 1975. The revelations are deeply embarrassing to Israel given its long-standing opposition to signing the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, arguing instead that it is a “responsible power” that would never misuse nuclear weapons technologies if it acquired them. Reports of Israel’s nuclear dealings with apartheid South Africa will also energise a draft proposal from Egypt to the UN non-proliferation review conference that Israel – as the only nuclear power in the region – be required to sign the treaty. Israeli officials are already said to be discomfited by Washington’s decision earlier this month to agree a statement with other UN Security Council members calling for the establishment of a Middle East zone free of nuclear arms.

The assault on the Kandahar air field comes just days after two Taliban attacks on US and Nato forces in Afghanistan. The group says it has now begun its "summer offensive" and will increasingly hit foreign troops. Codenamed Al Fatah, or victory, the operation anticipates a planned summer offensive by coalition forces in Kandahar, aimed at driving the Taliban from their traditional heartland. Al Jazeera's Adam Raney reports. (May 23, 2010).

[This is a Kangaroo court based upon torure of prisoners and a profound lack of legal safeguards. These trials are nothing but insidious propaganda meant to fool the most stupid & reactionary people among us.] On June 1, a detainee will stand with a lawyer and plead his case in front of an Afghan judge, said Brig. Gen. Mark Martins, the deputy commander for detention operations. His remark came during a tour of the prison Tuesday for a handful of Afghan lawmakers who have been critical of U.S. detention practices. The facility, which is on the edge of Bagram Air Field, opened in December and can hold up to 1,300 inmates. It replaced a smaller — and more notorious — prison that was inside the base. The trial is one of the first tangible steps toward a pledge to hand over the facility to Afghan authorities and the latest example of a U.S. push to win over a suspicious population by being more open about what happens to the people it captures. AntiWar: Rights Groups Condemn Ruling on Bagram Detainees.

[Stealing Palestinian land in the illegally occupied West Bank:] The Israel Defense Forces and Civil Administration uproots 500 trees on land Nahlin village residents say belongs to them. Administration claims land not privately owned, says evacuation order issued two months ago, residents failed to file objection...

The chief rabbi of a West Bank settlement has prohibited women from standing in a local community election. Rabbi Elyakim Levanon of the Elon Moreh settlement, near Nablus, said women lacked the authority to stand for the post of local secretary. He wrote in a community newspaper that women must only be heard through their husbands.

A Palestinian woman stand near the debris of
her house that destroyed by Israeli Occupation
forces in Abasan village near Lhan Yunis,
21 May 2010

Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) Continue Systematic Attacks against Palestinian Civilians and Property in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT)

● Two Palestinian militants were killed by IOF in the Gaza Strip.

="#712F26">● Israeli warplanes bombarded a number of civilian and paramilitary sites in the Gaza Strip.

- 30 Palestinians civilians, including 9 children and 6 women, were injured or shocked.
- Dozens of civilian facilities were destroyed or damaged.

● IOF continued to use force against peaceful protest.

- 7 Palestinian civilians, including 4 children, were wounded by IOF

● IOF continued to fire at Palestinian farmers and workers in border areas of the Gaza Strip.

- 5 Palestinian worker, including a child, were wounded by IOF.

● IOF conducted 26 incursions into Palestinian communities in the West Bank and 2 limited incursions into the Gaza Strip.

- IOF arrested 49 civilians, including 11 children, 11 international and Israeli human rights defenders, in the West Bank.
- 14 of the detainees were arrested during the dispersion of peaceful protests.
- IOF razed a 2-donum[1] area of agricultural land and demolished a house and a bird farm in Khan Yunis.
- IOF ordered the deportation of a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council from Jerusalem.

● Israel has continued to impose a total siege on the OPT and has isolated the Gaza Strip from the outside world.

- Israeli troops stationed at a military checkpoint in the West Bank arrested a Palestinian civilian.

● IOF have continued settlement activities in the West Bank and Israeli settlers have continued to attack Palestinian civilians and property.

- IOF ordered confiscation of land in Hebron.
- Israeli settlers attacked Palestinian farmers in Kufor al-Labad village, east of Tulkarm.

Norway has announced $1 billion in aid to protect forests in Indonesia and hopes to forge a partnership to fight climate change. Norway hopes to boost aid to fight tropical deforestation at a conference tomorrow, and to set in motion a partnership to unlock cash pledged at the Copenhagen summit to help slow climate change [There is no significant climate change going on right now. Fighting deforestation is an importantant environmental initiative in its own right.]. Norway says developed nations have promised $500m (£347m) to fight deforestation by 2012 on top of $3.5bn agreed at Copenhagen, and new pledges at the conference may bring the total aid closer to $5bn.

The Daily Beast Media Gallery The Most Corrupt States

A week after the tea party favorite lost the special election in Pennsylvania’s 12th congressional district to a Democrat — and six days after Kentucky Senate candidate Rand Paul, a tea party favorite, imploded his campaign by coming out against the Civil Rights Act, results from Idaho’s primary yesterday produced yet another tea bagger snafu. AlterNet: The Tea Party: At Last a Citizen Movement the Corporate Media Can Love. AWIP/Bob Altemeyer: Comment on the Tea Party Movement.

Tensions continued to rise on the Korean Peninsula today, with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton following up the latest North Korean threats of war with a pledge to see “retaliatory” acts taken against the reclusive nation. But as with her previous comments, Secretary Clinton was big on rhetoric and short on specifics, once again underscoring the difficulty for the US to respond in any practical way to North Korea, which is already sanctions to the point of being a virtual pariah state. Denver Post: Zionist stooge Clinton: "World" must "act" on sinking of ship. AWIP: North Korea ready to fight if attacked: report.

$6 million study is used to lobby for cap-and-tax. With public faith in the global-warming myth on the wane, leftist zealots are desperate to spin a new tale - and they're spending your tax money to do it. Three years ago, Congress appropriated $5,856,600 for the National Academy of Sciences to complete a climate-change study. This bureaucratic attempt to cook the books, which was completed last week, may be too late to save this dying religion. WUWT: Australia’s Victorian government creates seminar to “deal with denialism”.

The Unspoken Alliance: Sasha Polakow-Suransky’s full two part interview on DN! “The Unspoken Alliance”: New Book Documents Arms, Nuclear and Diplomatic Ties Between Israel and Apartheid South Africa. Israeli President Shimon Peres has denied reports he offered to sell nuclear weapons to apartheid South Africa when he was defense minister in the 1970s. On Sunday, the Guardian newspaper of London published top-secret South African documents revealing that a secret meeting between then-defense minister Shimon Peres and his South African counterpart, P.W. Botha, ended with an offer by Peres for the sale of warheads “in three sizes.” The documents were first uncovered by senior editor at Foreign Affairs Sasha Polakow-Suransky, author of the new book The Unspoken Alliance: Israel’s Secret Relationship with Apartheid South Africa.

It cannot be done by setting up a confrontation between the people and the government. Change has to start within the government. I'm not talking about a coup. What I have in mind is to set the wheels of the law in motion. That is the only thing that could possibly work. [S]omebody who was involved in 9/11 will step forward, and that will blow the whole thing wide open. The idea is to proactively make that happen instead of waiting for somebody's conscience to prod them into action. The way to make it happen is to investigate everybody who might have been involved. Find out who they are, specifically. Interview them. Keep doing this until you find somebody who can be persuaded to come forward.

Respected Middle East expert and former BBC presenter Alan Hart has broken his silence on 9/11, by revealing that the world's most prominent civil engineering company told him directly that the collapse of the twin towers was a controlled demolition. Speaking on the Kevin Barrett show yesterday, Hart said he thought the 9/11 attack probably started as a Muslim operation headed up by Osama Bin Laden but that the plot was subsequently hijacked and carried out by Mossad agents in collusion with elements of the CIA, adding that since its formation, Israel has penetrated every Arab government and terrorist organization.

"My guess is that at an early point they said to the bad guys in the CIA - hey this operation's running what do we do, and the zionists and the neo-cons said let's use it," said Hart, making reference to how top neo-cons like Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz and their fellow Project For a New American Century authors had called for a "catastrophic and catalyzing event––like a new Pearl Harbor," the year before 9/11. "The twin towers were brought down by a controlled ground explosion, not the planes," said Hart, adding that this view was based on his close friendship with consultants who work with the world's leading civil engineering and construction firm.

BP, the operator of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig, disregarded indications hours before the April 20 blast that the rig might suffer a catastrophic blowout, according to a preliminary report published Wednesday by the House Energy and Commerce committee. The report showed that the Deepwater Horizon had received evidence of 'kicks' of oil and natural gas coming up the drill pipe several times before the blowout, but disregarded them and went ahead with its effort to cap the well. The report also outlined multiple safety failures on systems involved in making sure that the well remained under control.

On the day of the disaster, the Deepwater Horizon had just finished drilling an exploratory well and was in the process of capping it in order for a different vessel to harvest the oil. Halliburton, which was in charge of capping the well with cement, had just finished putting a cement plug at the well's bottom, and BP wanted to finish the job as soon as possible in order to avoid paying the $500,000-per-day rental fee on the rig any longer than absolutely necessary. WSWS: Gulf oil spill: Why is BP in charge? Online Journal/Wayne Madsen Report: Obama has avoided taking responsibility for the oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico because he would rather have BP "own" the disaster than his administration. Cleveland.com: The Obama administration today will suspend planned exploratory oil drilling in the Arctic Ocean off Alaska until at least 2011, a casualty of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. Live Images HERE.

Weather Services International (WSI): Weather Authority Predicts Increased Northeast US Threat During Most Active Season Since Record-Breaking 2005: In its latest tropical update for 2010, WSI now calls for 16 named storms, 9 hurricanes and 5 intense hurricanes (category 3 or greater). The 2010 forecast numbers are well above the long-term (1950-2009) averages of 10 named storms, 6 hurricanes, and 3 intense hurricanes and slightly above the averages from the more active recent 15-year period (1995-2009) of 15/8/4.