US immigration authorities have taken Pakistan’s former cricket superstar-turned-politician Imran Khan off a flight to New York and interrogated. Khan is known for his anti-drone campaigning. - Khan, who is now a popular political figure in Pakistan and ahead of the Pakistan Movement for Justice party (PTI), was removed from an American Airlines flight heading from Canada to New York and interrogated. Immigration officials asked him whether he was planning to protest in the US, as well as demanding to know his views on drone strikes and jihad. Earlier this month, the former cricket star led thousands of Pakistani protesters, together with some US anti-war advocates, on a march from Islamabad to the tribal region of South Waziristan in opposition to US drone strikes. About 15,000 of his supporters joined him in the high-profile march, which focused attention on the strikes that have killed large numbers of civilians. Islamabad recently said that 80 percent of drone-related deaths were civilians. Khan also expressed confusion over why he was granted a visa to visit the US given if his stance on drones was a problem.

Greek police have arrested one of the country’s top journalists, after his publication Hot Doc released the so-called 'Lagarde list,' containing the names of some 2,000 Greeks with funds hidden in Swiss bank accounts.

The police arrested Kostas Vaxevanis, the owner and editor of Hot Doc, during a live radio interview on Sunday. “They're entering my house with the prosecutor right now. They are arresting me. Spread the word,” Vaxevanis tweeted. He is due to appear in court on Monday to answer charges of privacy violations from publishing the list of names, which dates to 2007. “Instead of arresting the tax evaders and the ministers who had the list in their hands, they are trying to arrest the truth and free journalism,” Vaxevanis said in an interview. The speaker of the Greek Parliament, several Finance Ministry employees and a number of business leaders all reportedly had Swiss HSBC bank accounts. The Hot Doc article revealed that data matched that of Christine Lagarde, the former French finance minister who in 2010 provided her Greek counterpart a list of names of those alleged to have large sums of money stashed away in Swiss banks. Citing privacy concerns for individuals on the list, Hot Doc said it had redacted exact bank balance figures, but added that some accounts contained as much as 500 million euros. The Greek government took no action at the emergence of the first 'Lagarde list.' Tax evasion has become a hotly contested issue, as the country’s parliament is expected to vote on a new 13.5 billion euro austerity package that most Greeks oppose.

BBC: Greece arrests journalist over 'Lagarde List' banks leak - Video
Ta Nea: Αναβολή για την Πέμπτη πήρε ο Κώστας Βαξεβάνης
Ta Nea: Το ντόμινο: Τα ονόματα, η δίωξη και τα ερωτήματα
New York Times: Greek Editor Is Arrested After Publishing a List of Swiss Bank Accounts

Greece is putting immigrants in camps and shipping them off while the police force is overrun with Golden Dawn fascists. Unemployment was 30% in Germany when Hitler took power; it is 25.1% and rising in Greece. GDP collapsed by about 7% in both 1931 and 1932 in Germany. Its current rate of collapse in Greece is roughly the same: 7% per year. Germany's banks had gone bust in 1931. Greek banks are effectively part nationalised already.

Police across Canada are urging Ottawa to resurrect a controversial Internet surveillance bill that would allow them to monitor Canadians' digital activities in real-time without a warrant. - The Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police has made a plea to on the federal government to pass Bill C-30, [fraudulently referred to] as the "Protecting Children from Internet Predators Act" ahead of a gathering by the provincial and federal justice ministers next week. The group is concerned that Parliament will be closed down before the legislation is passed.

Colin Powell's former chief of staff condemned the Republican Party on Friday night, telling MSNBC's Ed Schultz, "My party is full of racists."

Retired Army Col. Lawrence Wilkerson made the comment in response to Mitt Romney campaign surrogate John Sununu's suggestion on Thursday that Powell's endorsement of President Barack Obama's re-election was motivated by race. Wilkerson, who served as Powell's chief of staff when the general was secretary of state during the first George W. Bush term, told Schultz that he respected Sununu "as a Republican, as a member of my party," but did not "have any respect for the integrity of the position that [Sununu] seemed to codify." When asked by Schultz what, if anything, the remark said about the attitudes of the Republican Party, Wilkerson said:

My party, unfortunately, is the bastion of those people -- not all of them, but most of them -- who are still basing their positions on race. Let me just be candid: My party is full of racists, and the real reason a considerable portion of my party wants President Obama out of the White House has nothing to do with the content of his character, nothing to do with his competence as commander-in-chief and president, and everything to do with the color of his skin, and that's despicable.

The retired colonel also said that "to say that Colin Powell would endorse President Obama because of his skin color is like saying Mother Theresa worked for profit."

Whistleblowing website WikiLeaks is releasing over 100 classified documents detailing US Department of Defense procedures for running Guantánamo Bay, Abu Ghraib, Camp Bucca and other infamous prisons where terror suspects are detained. - The directives and manuals, which for more than a decade directed the US military’s policy for treatment of its detainees, will be released chronologically over the next month, WikiLeaks said in a statement. The first batch of the documents released is the 2002 Camp Delta – Guantánamo Bay prison – Standing Operating Procedure manuals. “This document is of significant historical importance. Guantánamo Bay has become the symbol for systematized human rights abuse in the West with good reason,” WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange said.

Wikileaks: Wikileaks Press Release: The Detainee Policies

Please do something to stop killing children and old people in the city of Bani Walid, the hometwon of the tribe of Werfalla, Libya. Massacres and war crimes are taking place right now in there. The armed tribal militias controlled by the tribe of Misurata are attacking the city of Bani Walid with rockets and heavy weapons. They don't care about the civilians in the city. Many people including children and women have already died and injured because of the missiles launched to the city of Bani Walid by the armed militias. The armed militias of the tribe of Misurata want to destroy the city of Bani Walid and kill its people as they did to the city of Tawergha and its people. They even say that in their local media a few days ago. Many evidences on Youtube show that they want to take revenge of people of Bani Walid blaming them for supporting the previous regime. Because the UN argued to stop the siege and the war on Bani Walid, they started their propaganda to pretend that they want to only arrest some wanted people. They are taking advantage of being in power as they are governing Libya now to make this appears as a legitimate operation the army is taking against some wanted people. What a stupid excuse that allows armed tribal militias to attack a city with almost 100,000 population just to arrest a few wanted people?. Libyan people went to streets almost a month ago in Benghazi and Tripoli asking for establishing the army as the armed tribal militias are the ones who have the power in Libya now. All Libyans know that those tribal militias are trying hard to get more and more power so that they can impose their agendas on the Libyan National Congress as well as the new government. We, the people of Bani Walid, want the whole world as well as the UN to work ASAP to stop the genocide and the war crimes that are taking place in Bani Walid now by the armed tribal militias controlled by the tribe of Misurata. We, the people of Bani Walid, do believe that the war on Bani Walid is because of historical tribal issues that took place in the region almost a hundred years ago. [Video][Video]

The U.S. Armed Forces recently sent soldiers to Turkey amid the incidents in Syria and the soldiers deployed in Turkey have been sharing intelligence, U.S. Army Europe Commander Lt. Gen. Mark Hertling has said, according to USNews.com. - “We have had a relatively few number of U.S. Army Europe personnel in Turkey recently,” the general said. “Some of that has been sharing intelligence.” Turkey is concerned about how to handle the humanitarian crisis on its border with Syria, Hertling added. “It’s October. What [Turkey is] very concerned about is the approach of winter, and the way they can address the humanitarian crisis on the border,” Hertling said. If Turkey asks for corporation [sic], American soldiers could be used in evacuation operations, the general said. “However, no request has been made yet by Turkey.”

1. At an event in Defiance, Ohio, last night, Romney told voters, "I saw a story today, that one of the great manufacturers in this state, Jeep, now owned by the Italians, is thinking of moving all production to China." Even by Romney standards, this was a rather brazen falsehood.

2. At a campaign event in Reno, Nevada, Romney said President Obama has been "unable to communicate an agenda" for a second term. The day before, Obama published a 20-page agenda for a second term.

Around the clock, about 16 times a day, drones take off or land at a U.S. military base here, the combat hub for the Obama administration’s counterterrorism wars in the Horn of Africa and the Middle East. The Obama administration has gone to extraordinary lengths to conceal the legal and operational details of its targeted-killing program. Behind closed doors, painstaking debates precede each decision to place an individual in the cross hairs of the United States’ perpetual war against al-Qaeda and its allies. Increasingly, the orders to find, track or kill those people are delivered to Camp Lemonnier. Virtually the entire 500-acre camp is dedicated to counterterrorism, making it the only installation of its kind in the Pentagon’s global network of bases. Secrecy blankets most of the camp’s activities. The U.S. military rejected requests from The Washington Post to tour Lemonnier last month. Officials cited “operational security concerns,” although they have permitted journalists to visit in the past. Taken together, the previously undisclosed documents show how the Djibouti-based drone wars sharply escalated early last year after eight Predators arrived at Lemonnier. The records also chronicle the Pentagon’s ambitious plan to further intensify drone operations here in the coming months. The documents point to the central role played by the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), which President Obama has repeatedly relied on to execute the nation’s most sensitive counterterrorism missions.

An unusual nasty mix of a hurricane and a winter storm that forecasters are now calling "Franken-storm" is likely to blast most of the U.S. East Coast next week, focusing the worst of its weather mayhem around New York City and New Jersey. Government forecasters on Thursday upped the odds of a major weather mess, now saying there's a 90-per-cent chance that the East will get steady gale-force winds, heavy rain, flooding and maybe snow starting Sunday and stretching past Halloween on Wednesday.

A Milan court on Friday convicted former Premier Silvio Berlusconi of tax fraud and sentenced the media mogul to four years in prison — a verdict that could see him barred from public office for five years. - The 76-year-old billionaire businessman — who just two days ago said he would not run in Italy's spring election — is expected to remain free until the appeals process is exhausted. In Italy, cases must pass two levels of appeal before verdicts are final. Prosecutors had brought the case against Berlusconi and 10 other co-defendants over the purchase of rights to broadcast U.S. films on Berlusconi's Mediaset empire.

Nicholas Mockford, a British executive for the oil company ExxonMobil has been shot dead in front of his wife in an assassination-style killing in Brussels. - Belgian police have imposed a news blackout after Nicholas Mockford, 60, was shot as he left an Italian restaurant in Neder-over-Heembeek, a suburb of the capital. The executive was shot three times, once as he lay on the ground, after leaving the Da Marcello restaurant in Rue de Beyseghem at around 10pm on Oct 14. His wife, Mary, was left beaten and covered in blood. Mr Mockford died on the way to hospital.

Abby dissects the ongoing narrative of sweeping generalizations resounding in the establishment following a wave of protests that have spread across the Muslim world and explores why 'they' really hate the West.

A leader of Georgia’s ruling Georgian Dream party, which won recent parliamentary elections, has accused President Mikhail Saakashvili of provoking a war with South Ossetia in August 2008. - “This huge provocation was planned by you and your military chiefs,” claimed Bidzina Ivanishvili, addressing members of former ruling party United National Movement, led by Saakashvili. “Americans and Europeans think the same. This wouldn’t have happened if we had a normal government,” he added. Ivanishvili also slammed Saakashili’s actions, which he said, allowed Russia to complete its long-standing dream of “getting over the Caucasus Ridge.”

'Join the queue' for EU membership, Spain tells Alex Salmond. Further blow for Scottish independence camp as Spanish foreign minister says new nation would not be automatic EU member. - Alex Salmond's chaotic attempts to persuade voters he could take an independent Scotland smoothly into the European Union have suffered another setback, after Spain said Scotland would need to "join the queue" and negotiate as a new member state. Foreign minister José Manuel García-Margallo told the Spanish senate on Tuesday that an independent Scotland would have to go through a potentially long negotiating process and win the support of all 27 members, including Spain – directly contradicting Salmond's position on EU membership.

Robert Gibbs said if US citizen Abdulrahman al-Awlaki didn't want to be killed he "should have a far more responsible father". - When Robert Gibbs, former White House Press Secretary and a senior adviser to the Obama campaign, was asked why the administration killed the 16-year old son of suspected al-Qaeda member and US citizen Anwar al-Awlaki via a drone strike last year, he said it was the boy’s fault for having a father like Awlaki.

The U.S. and Israel simulated rocket attacks during their largest-ever joint military drill Wednesday, just as as real ones fired from Gaza exploded in southern Israel. - U.S. military officials insisted the joint exercise, called Austere Challenge 2012, was planned long before the latest flare-up between Israel and Hamas-ruled Gaza and a long-running debate over how to deal with Iran, unrelated to specific threats facing Israel. It comes at a time when Israel and the U.S. have openly debated the merits of a strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities, and as US support for Israel has emerged as a central issue in the upcoming American presidential elections. “Make no mistake. The U.S. is 100 percent committed to the security of Israel. That commitment drives this exercise,” said U.S. Air Force Lt. Gen. Craig Franklin in a news conference at a training site near a beach in the Tel Aviv area.

Jason Ditz: Netanyahu, Lieberman Merge Parties for Next Election War

Amid conflicting reports that the Libyan city of Bani Walid was captured by army forces, RT has learned that 600 people were allegedly killed in Wednesday’s fighting, and over 1,000 have been hospitalized. Locals are appealing for international aid.

Libyan officials claimed that government forces conducted a 20-day siege before capturing Bani Walid, the last stronghold for supporters of the Gaddafi regime, and seized the city. Sources in the town gave conflicting reports, saying that local militias were responsible for the siege and now control of the area. “We continue to receive conflicting reports. From sources on the ground, we’re hearing that the army is withdrawing from the city, although we are hearing of widespread killings. Government sources say the city has fallen,” RT correspondent in neighboring Lebanon, Paula Slier, said. An individual in Italy who allegedly has relatives in Bani Walid spoke to RT about the current state of the city. Calling himself ‘Alwarfally’ – referring to a tribe from Bani Walid – he asked to remain anonymous for the interview.

Mitt Romney’s single mention of Latin America last night, calling it a “huge opportunity" for the United States, generated immediate glee from Latin Americanists across Twitter – but the hemisphere got no nod from President Obama, and then both went silent on the topic. Given that the final presidential debate Monday evening was dominated by the Middle East and terrorism, most of the world was left out by President Obama and Mr. Romney. That includes the whole of Europe and its debt crisis. India. South Africa. And not a single mention of any country in Latin America or the Caribbean: neither Cuba specifically, Mexico, Brazil, Colombia, nor Peru. (Read a transcript here.) That means no candidate talked about the drug trade, despite historic violence playing out in Mexico, much of it along the 2,000-mile border that the US shares. They did not talk about energy policy in the Americas. Or the economies of Brazil and Mexico.

WikiLeaks will publish documents from the Department of Defense on detainee policies over the past decade.

WikiLeaks will begin releasing a new set of secret US government documents on Thursday regarding detainee policies over the past decade. The whistleblowing website will release more than 100 classified or otherwise restricted files from the Department of Defense covering the rules and procedures for detainees in US military custody, an issue of particular importance in the post-9/11 era. The internal documents will cover detainee policies in Iraq – from Abu Ghraib to Camp Bucca – and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, as well as interrogation manuals and detainee treatment. The documents will be released by WikiLeaks over the course of the next month. Among the first to be published is the founding document for the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay (Camp Delta). The previously unpublished 2002 manual went on to shape detention policies in subsequent years of the George W. Bush administration. [Photo: Jim Watson/AFP/Getty]

A entire tribe of 170 Indians have vowed to commit mass suicide after a court in Brazil ruled they must leave what they believe is sacred land, it was reported today. - The community of 50 men, 50 women and 70 children from the Guarani-kaiowa tribe are camped inside a ranch in Brazil's southern state of Mato Grosso do Sul. The Indians claim the land has been the graveyard of their ancestors for centuries, according to Brazil's Indigenous Missionary Council (CIMI). But this week, Judge Henrique Bonachela upheld a petition made by the ranch's owner to have the tribe evicted from the land. He decreed a fine of £150 for every day the tribe remains on the land, on the banks of Brazil's Joguico River. A spokesman for the tribe today said they do not intend to fight the judge's decision but would rather die on the land than be made to leave.

A US drone fired two missiles at near Pakistan’s border with Afghanistan on Wednesday, killing at least one person and possibly three, although officials said “It was not clear whether the three dead were men or women or whether they had any link to militancy,” according to the Associated Press. The attack occurred in the North Waziristan tribal area. Pakistani intelligence officials provided the AP with conflicting accounts of how many were killed, though, and could not confirm that those killed had any connection to militancy at all.

US troops engaged in a firefight with Taliban fighters killed four Afghan children tending to their livestock in Logar province on Saturday. - The New York Times reports that the incident occurred in the Baraki Barak district south of Kabul, site of many attacks by Afghan resistance fighters attempting to control one of the main routes to and from the capital. A spokesman for the provincial governor said that the firefight began around 4:30 p.m. on Saturday after Taliban gunmen opened fire on NATO foot patrol.

Bill Van Auken: Four Afghan children killed in US raid

US-led drone strikes — the targeted executions of suspected insurgents using remote-controlled, killing machines from tens of thousands of feet above the Earth — are not about to end. - In this week’s article, journalist Greg Miller suggests that the White House is ready to do more than just cross suspected terrorists off their kill-list one-by-one with each subsequent UAV strike. The real-world man-hunt will soon be operated by means of a “disposition matrix,” more modernized terminology and technology that will let counterterrorism experts in Washington plot not just who and how to kill, but where to find them and what to do in order to bring them to justice.

“The matrix contains the names of terrorism suspects arrayed against an accounting of the resources being marshaled to track them down, including sealed indictments and clandestine operations,” Miller explains. “US officials said the database is designed to go beyond existing kill lists, mapping plans for the ‘disposition’ of suspects beyond the reach of American drones.”

Miller goes on to say that these claims have been confirmed by dozens of current and former national security officials, intelligence analysts and others, and all but explains exactly the algorithms developed and the answers required to warrant a full-fledged manhunt and execution for any alleged enemy of the state. The disposition matrix, it would seem, is outlined perfectly in Miller’s report. One question, however, does remain: Why?

Bill Van Auken: Obama institutionalizes state assassinations
Washington Post: Plan for hunting terrorists signals U.S. intends to keep adding names to kill lists