04/30/12

Permalink Senate probe finds little evidence of "effective torture"

A nearly three-year-long investigation by Senate Intelligence Committee Democrats is expected to find there is little evidence the harsh "enhanced interrogation techniques" the CIA used on high-value prisoners produced counter-terrorism breakthroughs. People familiar with the inquiry said committee investigators, who have been poring over records from the administration of President George W. Bush, believe they do not substantiate claims by some Bush supporters that the harsh interrogations led to counter-terrorism coups. The backers of such techniques, which include "water-boarding," sleep deprivation and other practices critics call torture, maintain they have led to the disruption of major terror plots and the capture of al Qaeda leaders.


Permalink Homeland Security drones patrol Washington-B.C. border

The federal government's unmanned drones patrolling the U.S.-Canadian border are venturing into Washington state's airspace. In testimony before a U.S. Senate panel this week, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said northern border surveillance using unmanned aerial aircraft now expands from North Dakota to eastern Washington. The two 10,000-pound Predator-B unmanned aircrafts based in Grand Forks, N.D., have a 950-mile coverage range and "they do enter Washington airspace, in the vicinity of Spokane," said Customs and Border Protection spokeswoman Gina Gray on Thursday.


Permalink US Using Staged "Blind Activist" Stunt For Leverage Ahead of Talks

Reuters has recently reported in their article, "U.S. eyes testy China talks, Chen backer expects Chinese decision," that "religious and political rights advocacy group ChinaAid is the chief source of information about Chen," referring to Chen Guangcheng, the "blind activist" who has allegedly escaped from house arrest recently and who "activists" claim is being harbored by the United States in their embassy in Beijing.


Permalink ‘Jailed Palestinians’ mass hunger strike case to go to UN’

Hamas Political Bureau Chief Khaled Meshaal says the case of the ongoing mass hunger strike by Palestinians in Israeli jails will be referred to the UN. - Meshaal said in Cairo on Sunday that he had agreed on the issue with the acting Palestinian Authority chief, Mahmoud Abbas and the Arab League (AL) Secretary-General Nabil al-Arabi, reported English-language Lebanese newspaper The Daily Star. Earlier in the day, the AL chief and Hamas leader held talks in the Egyptian capital to discuss the Israeli-jailed Palestinians’ mass hunger strike. Al-Arabi has denounced Israeli detention policies as being inhumane and in violation of human rights. Around 2000 Palestinian prisoners have gone on hunger strike in Israeli prisons, with more detainees pledging to join the protest movement next week, according to Palestinian organizations in Ramallah, West Bank.


Permalink Bombs welcome new UN chief monitor in Syria - Video

The head of the new UN observer team is starting his work in Syria amid sporadic violence. On Monday, twin suicide bomb attack killed at least eight people, fuelling doubts over how long the shaky ceasefire can hold.

The blasts killed eight security personnel near state intelligence buildings in the north-western city of Idlib, the Syrian state news agency SANA reported. The Britain-based human rights organization Syrian Observatory puts the number of casualties higher, saying more than 20 people have been killed. The new act of violence comes as Norwegian Major General Robert Mood is paving the way for a full 300-strong monitoring team, which is to be deployed in the coming months. The 52-year-old veteran peacemaker, who takes over the UN Mission in Syria, is no stranger to Damascus. Between 2009 and 2011 he headed the UN Truce Supervision Organization, which monitors Middle East cease-fires, and visited Syria. On arrival he called on both the government and opposition groups to co-operate with the UN, saying the effort of the monitors alone is not enough to defuse the situation.


Permalink A former prostitute plans to sue the U.S. Embassy in Brazil, alleging that members of its security team in December threw her from a van and ran over her

Romila Aparacida Ferreira showed CNN photos of injuries she claimed she received in the incident. Ferreira claimed she suffered a broken collarbone, three broken ribs and a punctured lung. The story broke this week, eliciting a comment from visiting U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta. The Marines involved were disciplined and are no longer in Brazil, he said. The incident is the third to come to light this month involving alleged transgressions by U.S. government employees or military personnel.


Permalink UN adds Israel to the list list of states limiting human rights organizations

UN Human Rights Commissioner Navi Pillay lists Israel along with countries such as Belarus, Zimbabwe, Egypt, Ethiopia and Venezuela. - Israel was named due to the bill approved by the Ministerial Committee on Legislation six months ago to restrict funding by foreign governments to nonprofit organizations. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu supported the bill throughout most of its formulation. However, he ordered it frozen after Attorney General Yehuda Weinstein said such a law would be struck down by the High Court of Justice.


Permalink Major European retailer joins campaign to boycott Israeli settlement products

One of the largest food retailers in the UK has announced that it will boycott four Israeli produce companies which are operating in illegal settlement colonies in the West Bank in violation of international law. - The Co-operative Group is the 5th largest food retailer in the UK, and supplies thousands of stores with fruits and vegetables from around the world. On Sunday, the company announced that it will “no longer engage with any supplier of produce known to be sourcing from the Israeli settlements". According to the Co-operative Group, this is not a boycott of all Israeli products, only of those products coming from Israeli settlements. The £350,000 in contracts will be transferred to companies operating inside the 'Green Line' (an unofficial border between Israel and the West Bank established after the 1967 war). The new policy by the Co-operative Group will include Agrexco, Arava Export Growers, Adafresh and Mehadrin. It expands a previously stated policy of boycotting Israeli settlement products to include a boycott of any company that is known to source products from the settlements in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.


Permalink Bo Xilai officials 'wiretapped call to President Hu Jintao'

New claims may shed light on why Bo – previously accused of unspecified disciplinary violations – was ejected from post - The spotlight on the Bo Xilai affair has turned back on to political tensions in China following reports that officials in Chongqing wiretapped a call to the country's president, Hu Jintao – helping to trigger the scandal that unseated Bo. Official accounts of the case have portrayed it as being unrelated to the political struggle for power in the country. Bo is instead accused of unspecified disciplinary violations while his wife, Gu Kailai, is accused of murdering the British businessman Neil Heywood. But the New York Times, which cited almost a dozen sources with ties to the Communist party, said the wiretapping was seen as evidence of Bo's overreaching ambition and compounded leaders' mistrust of him. It said anti-surveillance devices detected that the call to Hu, made by a senior anti-corruption official in Chongqing last August, was being monitored. Bo was party secretary of the south-western city at the time.

Justin Raimondo: China’s ‘Reformist’ Crooks
John Chan: The downfall of Bo Xilai in China - The case of Bo is so politically sensitive because it exposes the staggering levels of corruption at the top levels of the party and state apparatus.


Permalink Australian billionaire to build Titanic II: An almost exact replica of the original

Queensland billionaire mining magnate Clive Palmer has unveiled his plans to build the Titanic II to add to his tourism portfolio.

Mr Palmer said his new company Blue Star Line Pty Ltd had commissioned the state-owned Chinese company CSC Jinling Shipyard to build a near replica of the ill-fated Titanic. The cost is unknown.

He made the announcement on the same day he revealed his hopes to contest the next federal election in the Queensland seat of Lilley, held by Deputy Prime Minister and Treasurer Wayne Swan.

Mr Palmer said the companies had signed a memorandum of understanding to build the cruise liner in China, with the ship's maiden voyage from England to North America scheduled for late 2016.

"It will be every bit as luxurious as the original Titanic but of course it will have state-of-the-art 21st-century technology and the latest navigation and safety systems," Mr Palmer said.

Mr Palmer said the rebuild was a tribute to the spirit of the men and women who constructed the original Titanic.


Permalink P&O cruise ship staff paid basic salary of 75p an hour

P&O Cruises to withhold passengers' tips unless crew hit performance targets - Crew on British cruise holidays who are paid a basic salary of as little as 75p an hour face having extra tips from passengers withheld unless they hit performance targets. The boss of P&O Cruises said the move was part of a package to "make crew more responsive" and offer protection as tips dry up in the economic downturn. At the bottom end of the scale, a junior waiter on a ship sailing out of Southampton now earns a basic salary of £250 a month, for shifts lasting a minimum of 11 hours, seven days a week, with a possible £150 extra in bonuses. According to documents seen by the Guardian, this is "a significantly increased basic salary".


Permalink Canada announces that foreign workers can now be paid 15% less than Canadians

Immigration Minister Jason Kenney has always vehemently denied bringing cheap foreign labour into Canada. Employers had to pay foreign temporary workers “the prevailing wage,” he pointed out. That indeed is what the rules said – until Wednesday, when Human Resources Minister Diane Finley quietly changed them. Employers will now be allowed to pay foreign temp workers 15 per cent less than the average wage. Business leaders, eager to recruit low-cost workers abroad, were delighted.


Permalink Ex-Chief: CIA Investigation Could Be Construed as Anti-Semitic

Former CIA director George Tenet has acknowledged that elements of the counterintelligence investigation against a former Jewish attorney at the agency in the 1990s could be construed as anti-Semitic. - Tenet acknowledged this in a previously undisclosed sworn deposition, part of a privacy act lawsuit filed by the former attorney, Adam Ciralsky. In 1999, Ciralsky’s security clearance was revoked because of his alleged lack of candor about contact with Israelis and Israeli-Americans, effectively ending his brief career with the CIA. For the last dozen years Ciralsky has sued the CIA to bring to light how he believes a few agency officials—motivated by anti-Semitism—targeted him unfairly. On Friday he dropped his case.


Permalink US deploying fighter jets to the Gulf

The US says it has deployed a number of its most modern jet fighters to an air base in Southwest Asia. The announcement alarmed many, who suspect the base is actually in the United Arab Emirates just 200 hundred miles from Iran. The Air Force did not specify the exact number or location of the recently-deployed F-22 Raptors, but confirmed that they had been sent to a base in Southwest Asia, a region that includes the UAE.


Permalink Israel fumes over Diskin’s Iran remarks

Political tension is simmering inside Israel’s political circles over latest remarks made by a former spymaster, who said the entity’s leaders are guided by “messianic” impulses and are exaggerating the effectiveness of a possible military attack on Iran. - The Israeli cabinet met on Sunday to express anger over the scathing attack launched by former Shin Bet, Israel's domestic security service, director Yuval Diskin on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak. Speaking in a meeting with the residents of Kfar Sava city on Friday, Yuval Diskin said the pair is not worthy of leading the entity as they are making decisions 'based on messianic feelings,' Ha’aretz reported.

"My major problem is that I have no faith in the current leadership, which must lead us in an event on the scale of war with Iran or a regional war," he said. "I don't believe in either the prime minister or the defense minister. I don't believe in a leadership that makes decisions based on messianic feelings," Diskin added.

The Guardian: "Most Israeli citizens don't want a war with Iran"
Russia Today: Israeli intel ex-chief: Netanyahu’s policy on Iran ‘misleading,’ ‘messianic’


04/28/12

Permalink Israeli spy boss speaks out on Iran: Former Shin Bet boss says Netanyahu and Barak are not fit to lead Israel and are misleading public over Iran

Israel's former security chief has censured the country's "messianic" political leadership for talking up the prospects of a military stike on Iran's nuclear programme. - In unusually candid comments set to ratchet up tensions over Iran at the top of Israel's political establishment, Yuval Diskin, who retired as head of the internal intelligence agency Shin Bet last year, said he had "no faith" in the abilities of the prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, and the defence minister, Ehud Barak, to conduct a war. The pair, who are the foremost advocates of military action against Iran's nuclear programme, were "not fit to hold the steering wheel of power", Diskin told a meeting on Friday night. "My major problem is that I have no faith in the current leadership, which must lead us in an event on the scale of war with Iran or a regional war," he said.

BBC: Israel ex-security chief says leadership 'misleading public' on Iran

Haaretz: Former Shin Bet chief: Netanyahu not interested in peace talks - Yuval Diskin, who was quoted earlier as saying he didn't trust PM, Barak on Iran, says Netanyahu knows that if he makes the slightest move forward, his coalition will 'fall apart.'


Permalink A new scramble for Africa is on

New international land deals database reveals rush to buy up Africa.

Almost 5% of Africa's agricultural land has been bought or leased by investors since 2000, according to an international coalition of researchers and NGOs that has released the world's largest public database of international land deals. The database, launched on Thursday, lifts the lid on a decade of secretive deals struck by governments, investors and speculators seeking large tracts of fertile land in developing countries around the world. The past five years have seen a flood of reports of investors snapping up land at rock-bottom prices in some of the world's poorest countries. But, despite growing concern about the local impacts of so-called "land grabs", the lack of reliable data has made it difficult to pin down the real extent and nature of the global rush for land. Researchers estimate that more than 200m hectares (495m acres) of land – roughly eight times the size of the UK – were sold or leased between 2000 and 2010. Details of 1,006 deals covering 70.2m hectares mostly in Africa, Asia and Latin America were published by the Land Matrix project, an international partnership involving five major European research centres and 40 civil society and research groups from around the world. It is the first time a comprehensive list of international land deals has been collected and made public. The database relies on a wide variety of sources – including media reports, academic research and field-based investigations – to add detail to a global phenomenon notoriously shrouded in secrecy.


Permalink Modern British policing: London siege reveals armed-to-the-teeth team preparing for Olympic Games

Bristling with guns, his face masked, a police officer moves in on a suspected suicide bomber. Just 91 days away from the start of the Olympics, the dramatic scene gave a foretaste of what can be expected this summer after a man threatened to blow himself up in a busy office block. Thousands were evacuated, Tube stations were closed and streets locked down over a wide area of London's West End. Snipers, bomb disposal squads, nuclear biological and chemical warfare specialists and dozens of armed police were scrambled to the building on Tottenham scrambled to an office block on Tottenham Court Road, one of the city's busiest shopping streets. As marksmen took up positions on rooftops, office workers were banished from their buildings while others were trapped as the man with canisters strapped to his body yelled that he would 'blow everybody up'. For three hours, as negotiators spoke with the man, named last night as 49-year-old Michael Green from Hemel Hempstead, terrified office workers and children were held back behind police cordons.


Permalink Cispa "cybersecurity" bill passed in US

Cispa approved by House but critics urge Senate to block 'horrible' bill. - Free speech advocates are calling for the Senate to block controversial cybersecurity legislation they claim will give the US authorities unprecedented access to online communications. The House of Representatives on Thursday ignored the threat of a White House veto to pass the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (Cispa). The bill aims to make it easier for companies to share information collected on the internet with the federal government in order to help prevent electronic attacks from cybercriminals, foreign governments and terrorists.

AWIP: CISPA passes House in unexpected last-minute vote


Permalink Dominique Strauss-Kahn : New York sex scandal orchestrated by political opponents

The former head of the International Monetary Fund, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, has accused political enemies linked to Nicolas Sarkozy and his ruling UMP party of destroying his bid for the French presidency by choreographing the scandal that erupted last year when he was accused of assaulting a New York hotel maid. In an exclusive interview published by the Guardian, Strauss-Kahn stated that he believes the highly public undoing that followed his encounter with the housekeeper in the Sofitel hotel's presidential suite, and his imprisonment on charges of attempted rape, were orchestrated by his political opponents.


04/27/12

Permalink Congress Quietly OKs Domestic Drone Use

The military contractors have much to gain from proliferation of drones in US airspace. - The big push in Congress to open up domestic airspace in the U.S. to unmanned aerial vehicles, or drones, is developing with hardly any lobbying opposition, despite potentially dire consequences for civil liberties. Congress quietly authorized the domestic use of drones this past winter, which the government says can be used for everything from law enforcement, first responders, and environmental monitoring. Drones have typically been used to kill people in Pakistan, Yemen, and beyond, and their domestic use could present problems for privacy and other civil liberties concerns. But opposition to the bill was negligible. The American Civil Liberties Union was the only organization to really lobby against the push for domestic drones, spending $500,000 during the first quarter, which partially went towards fighting this bill. But that is nothing compared to the benefits proliferation of domestic drones could bring to military contractors. Among those lobbying for the bill was Textron Inc., which makes surveillance drones. The company spent $2.2 million lobbying in the first quarter on a variety of issues, including this one.


Permalink CISPA passes House in unexpected last-minute vote

The House of Representatives has approved Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act with a vote count of 248-168. The bill is now headed for the Senate. President Barack Obama will be able to sign or cancel it pending Senate approval. - Initially slated to vote on the bill Friday, the House of Representatives decided to pass Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA) Thursday after approving a number of amendments. Apart from cyber and national security purposes, the bill would now allow the government to use private information obtained through CISPA for the investigation and prosecution of “cybersecurity crime,” protection of individuals and the protection of children. The new clauses define “cybersecurity crime” as any crime involving network disruption or hacking.

The key difference between CISPA and the defunct SOPA/PIPA bills is that CISPA has support from a number of tech companies, including Microsoft, Intel, Facebook and others. (SoftWareArchiveNet)

Cyberwar Central: Why CISPA sucks and what you can do about it
Russia Today: ‘CISPA: Patriot Act for the web’ – Internet activist
Time/Techland: 5 Reasons the CISPA Cybersecurity Bill Should Be Have Been Tossed

Jason Ditz: ‘Cybersecurity Bill’ CISPA Broadened Then Passed Through House - Already subbed “SOPA 2” by many of its detractors for its broad language and its potential use to violate the privacy of individual Americans, the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA) was actually given even broader authority by an amendment today, then passed in a 248-168 vote. The bill nominally aimed to strengthen information sharing across the intelligence community, but also encourages them to collect data on American citizens that they believe might conceivably benefit national security.


Permalink No information on Iran decision to build a nuclear bomb: Panetta

US Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta says Washington has not yet achieved any concrete information that proves Iran is building a nuclear weapon. - "I do not have any specific information that indicates (the Iranians) have made any decision one way or another" on whether to build a nuclear weapon, Panetta told reporters on Thursday after a meeting with his Chilean counterpart Andres Allamand, AFP reported. Panetta also pointed to the recent remarks by Israel's military chief Lieutenant General Benny Gantz describing Iran's leadership as “very rational” and expressed hope his statements were "correct." [...] Iran argues that as a signatory to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and a member of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), it has the right to develop and acquire nuclear technology for peaceful purposes. The IAEA has conducted numerous inspections of Iran's nuclear facilities but has never found any evidence indicating that Tehran's nuclear energy program has been diverted to nuclear weapons production.


Permalink Israel tries to prevent airing a report on displacing Christians from Palestine

American Network “CBS” disclosed, on Tuesday, that there was Zionist pressure exerted on the network to stop it from broadcasting a report within “60 Minutes” program discussing the Zionist policies to displace Palestinian Christians from Jerusalem and Bethlehem. - The correspondent on the U.S. news program “60 Minutes”, Bob Simon, has scolded Israel’s ambassador to US Michael Oren for his intervention and his attempt to prevent the airing of the report, saying that he had never received a reaction to a story that hadn’t been broadcast yet. The ambassador replied that there is always a first time for everything, and that he is serving his country and protecting it, pointing out that the channel should have broadcast reports on the situation of Christians in other countries in the region. The channel aired last night, the report unveiling the policy of the Zionist entity to displace Palestinian Christians from the Holy Land revealing the harassment and oppression by the occupation that Christians face and that turns their lives into hell.


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