US-led soldiers have opened fire on a group of Afghan schoolchildren in the central-eastern province of Maidan Wardak, killing at least one pupil and injuring several others, security sources say. Local provincial officials said the teenager student was killed in Syedabad district of the volatile province on Thursday. An investigation has been launched into the fatal incident.

PressTV: Breaking: US assassination drone strike kills 4 in Afghanistan
Antiwar.com: US Drone Strike Kills Seven People in North Waziristan (Pakistan)

Leaked United Nations report reveals the world's temperature hasn't risen for the last 15 years. Politicians fear the findings will encourage deniers of man-made climate change.
● Scientists working on the most authoritative study on climate change were urged to cover up the fact that the world’s temperature hasn’t risen for the last 15 years, it is claimed.
● A leaked copy of a United Nations report, compiled by hundreds of scientists, shows politicians in Belgium, Germany, Hungary and the United States raised concerns about the final draft. Published next week, it is expected to address the fact that 1998 was the hottest year on record and world temperatures have not yet exceeded it, which scientists have so far struggled to explain. The report is the result of six years’ work by UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which is seen as the world authority on the extent of climate change and what is causing it – on which governments including Britain’s base their green policies.
● But leaked documents seen by the Associated Press, yesterday revealed deep concerns among politicians about a lack of global warming over the past few years. Germany called for the references to the slowdown in warming to be deleted, saying looking at a time span of just 10 or 15 years was ‘misleading’ and they should focus on decades or centuries. Hungary worried the report would provide ammunition for deniers of man-made climate change. Belgium objected to using 1998 as a starting year for statistics, as it was exceptionally warm and makes the graph look flat - and suggested using 1999 or 2000 instead to give a more upward-pointing curve. The United States delegation even weighed in, urging the authors of the report to explain away the lack of warming using the ‘leading hypothesis’ among scientists that the lower warming is down to more heat being absorbed by the Ocean...

US President Barack Obama will use his Tuesday's address to the United Nations in New York to demand that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad step down, according to US officials. ● White House spokesman Ben Rhodes told reporters on Friday that Obama's speech will also focus on the need for a tough resolution demanding Syria turn over its chemical weapons or face a threat of force. Obama will urge “the international community to stand up to the use of chemical weapons,” Rhodes said. US Secretary of State John Kerry also said Thursday the UN Security Council must be prepared to act on Syria’s chemical weapons program next week. "Now the test comes. The Security Council must be prepared to act next week. It is vital for the international community to stand up and speak out," said Kerry who will join world leaders for the annual UN General Assembly in New York on Sunday. Washington has claimed that the Syrian government is responsible for a chemical attack near Damascus on August 21.

Russia Today: Western countries blinded by ‘Assad must go’ mentality - Lavrov

■ While the Assad regime in Damascus has denied responsibility for the sarin gas missiles that killed around 1,400 Syrians in the suburb of Ghouta on 21 August, information is now circulating in the city that Russia's new "evidence" about the attack includes the dates of export of the specific rockets used and – more importantly – the countries to which they were originally sold. They were apparently manufactured in the Soviet Union in 1967 and sold by Moscow to three Arab countries, Yemen, Egypt and Colonel Muammar Gaddafi's Libya. These details cannot be verified in documents, and Vladimir Putin has not revealed the reasons why he told Barack Obama that he knows Assad's army did not fire the sarin missiles; but if the information is correct – and it is believed to have come from Moscow – Russia did not sell this particular batch of chemical munitions to Syria.
■ Since Gaddafi's fall in 2011, vast quantities of his abandoned Soviet-made arms have fallen into the hands of rebel groups and al-Qa'ida-affiliated insurgents. Many were later found in Mali, some in Algeria and a vast amount in Sinai. The Syrians have long claimed that a substantial amount of Soviet-made weaponry has made its way from Libya into the hands of rebels in the country's civil war with the help of Qatar – which supported the Libyan rebels against Gaddafi and now pays for arms shipments to Syrian insurgents.

The US is trying to blackmail Russia and the world by forcing its upside-down Syria peace scenario on the international community, Russia’s foreign minister Sergei Lavrov said Sunday in an interview to the country’s main TV channel, Channel One. ● The foreign chief accused Washington of excessively politicking the Syrian crisis. He said the US was using the civil war in the Middle East to “assert its supremacy” in order to make the region “dance to its tune.” Mr. Lavrov stressed this approach had nothing to do with the long-overdue peace process and the Russia-backed plan to take away chemical weapons from the Assad regime. The foreign minister called on the US to come to terms with the fact that the world had become “polycentric” and it was no good forcing America’s opinions onto it.

The British MP Sarah Wollaston criticized the US approach on the issue of chemical weapons in Syria, slamming its intentions to launch a military strike against it. ● "It would send an incredibly mixed message for the US to be dropping bombs on Syria because they say they're using a hideous weapon, when they're selling another hideous weapon to Saudi Arabia,'' Wollaston said. The British MP was one of the House of Commons members who voted against a motion for military action in Syria. "I look at the Middle East and see seething resentment about what they see as an imperialist approach to their region and double standards,'' Wollaston added. She accused the US and Israel of using chemical weapons themselves when it suits them. "Look at white phosphorus. There's been very clearly documented examples where it's been used as a weapon, fired directly at people, and there's no doubt it's a chemical weapon used in those circumstances. It's a chemical which oxidises on contact with air and just keeps burning. It inflicts hideous burns because it just keeps on burning until it runs out of oxygen, so right down to the bone."

WikiLeaks released 249 documents from 92 global intelligence contractors. These reveal how, US, EU and developing world intelligence agencies have rushed into spending millions on next-generation mass surveillance technology to target communities, groups and whole populations. ● WikiLeaks' publisher Julian Assange stated: "WikiLeaks' Spy Files #3 is part of our ongoing commitment to shining a light on the secretive mass surveillance industry. This publication doubles the WikiLeaks Spy Files database. The WikiLeaks Spy Files form a valuable resource for journalists and citizens alike, detailing and explaining how secretive state intelligence agencies are merging with the corporate world in their bid to harvest all human electronic communication."

95 year old veteran shot and killed by Chicago police in riot gear after refusing to go to hospital for urinary tract infection. ● A 95-year-old world War II veteran died after being Tasered and hit with bean bag rounds by police for threatening care home staff - but his family insist he was killed unnecessarily. Police say that John Wrana, who lived in a Chicago assisting living home, was brandishing his cane, a metal shoehorn and a knife before officers shocked him and hit him with bean bag rounds. The senior citizen had been reported to authorities because he was being 'involuntarily' committed for medical treatment by staff at the Victory Centre, the Chicago Tribune reported. He was behaving in 'combative' manner, by threatening staff with his cane and a shoehorn. Wrana was reportedly scheduled to undergo a risky surgery, and was apparently afraid to end up on life support.

An American assassination drone strike has killed at least four people in Afghanistan's northeastern province of Kunar.

● 5 Afghans killed in US drone attacks
● 5 killed in US-led strikes in Afghanistan
● US-led airstrike kills six in Afghanistan
● US-led airstrike kills 16 Afghans
● US drone raid kills 5 in Afghanistan
● US terror drone kills 3 Afghan children

Under Obama, America more than ever is a global menace
● US assassination drone strikes kill 11 Afghans in 24 hours - Video

The UN nuclear agency crushed an effort of Arab states to rein in nuclear Israel, rejecting a non-binding resolution on Friday that would have compelled Israel to join the nuclear non-proliferation treaty and place its arsenal under International Atomic Energy Agency supervision. ● "Israel has once again become the exception to international norms to reduce the potential of nuclear war and reduce nuclear weapons," Deborah Agre from the Middle East Children's Alliance told Common Dreams. The "Israeli Nuclear Capabilities" measure, backed by Iran, was brought by a coalition of Arab states frustrated over the postponement of an international conference on creating a nuclear-free Middle East. The measure, which was vigorously opposed by the U.S., was voted down at the IAEA meeting, with 51 countries voting against and 43 in favor. The defeat of the resolution was broadly reported in the media as a triumph of the West over efforts to "single out" Israel. The backers of the resolution were publicly shamed by several Western powers, including the U.S. and Israel, for even bringing such a measure to the table. Israel is broadly known to be the only country in the Middle East to possess nuclear weapons and has been widely criticized for obstructing efforts to demilitarize the region.

Sen. Lindsey Graham says "Israel feels abandoned after Syria" war was rejected by U.S. public, hence has earned a blank check for U.S. war against Iran. ● After Graham repeated his intention to draft a use-of-force resolution, Huckabee stepped in to make sure everyone understood. "Lindsey, I want to clarify," Huckabee said. "You actually are going to seek sort of a pre-emptive approval to give the president a loaded weapon so that he feels the absolute freedom and support of a bipartisan Congress to take whatever action, including military, against Iran to prevent them from having nuclear weapons?" "That's exactly right," said Graham. Graham knows that Congress, particularly the House, was moving strongly against authorizing Obama to use force in Syria. And that was after a chemical weapons attack that clearly violated the president's "red line" in the Syrian civil war.

White House spokesman Jay Carney has talked about the possibility of a meeting between US President Barack Obama and Iranian President Hassan Rouhani in New York next week. "It's possible, but it has always been possible," Carney said at a press conference on Thursday. "The extended hand has been there from the moment the president was sworn in," Carney was quoted as saying by Reuters. The remarks were made two days after US National Security Council spokeswoman Bernadette Meehan said that there were “currently no plans” for President Obama to meet with President Rouhani on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly.

Reuters: No time left for negotiations with Iran: Israeli minister
Common Dreams: Don't Be Fooled, Says Israel, Bomb Iran Instead
Jason Ditz: White House Lashes ‘Insufficient’ Iranian Peace Offers

The Iranian spokesperson said the Western countries’ “no” vote to the resolution against the Israeli regime showed they were continuing their double standards in dealing with weapons of mass destruction. ● “Excluding the Zionist regime from laws and regulations on the non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction will have negative consequences for the process of curbing this international threat,” Afkham stated. She once again reiterated Iran’s “completely explicit and clear” stance on the non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and the establishment of a Middle East region free of such arms. The Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) on Friday expressed grave concern over Israel’s undeclared nuclear arsenal, saying it presents the greatest threat to the peace and security in the Middle East.

The bomb that nearly exploded over North Carolina
was 260 times more powerful than the US bomb which
devasted Hiroshima in 1945.

The US Air Force nearly detonated an atomic bomb over North Carolina that could have killed millions of people in the country, a secret document has revealed. ● On January 23, 1961, the US Air Force accidentally dropped two Mark 39 hydrogen bombs over Goldsboro, North Carolina. The bombs fell to earth after they became separated from a B-52 bomber, which went into a tailspin in mid-air, The Guardian reported based on a secret document obtained by investigative journalist Eric Schlosser under the Freedom of Information Act. One of the bombs, which was designed to be used in warfare, acted exactly as a nuclear weapon when its parachute opened and its trigger mechanisms engaged. However, one low-voltage switch, which failed to flip, prevented millions of Americans from being killed.

BBC: US plane in 1961 'nuclear bomb near-miss'
Russia Today: US Air Force once dropped live hydrogen bomb on North Carolina - report
The Guardian: US nearly detonated atomic bomb over North Carolina – secret document

Arms control advocates are decrying a new U.S. Department of Defence announcement that it will be building and selling 1,300 cluster bombs to Saudi Arabia, worth some 641 million dollars. ● The munitions at the heart of the sale are technically legal under recently strengthened U.S. regulations aimed at reducing impact on civilian safety, but activists contend that battlefield evidence suggests the weapons actually exceed those regulations. Opponents say the move runs counter to a strengthening push to outlaw the use of cluster bombs around the world while also contradicting recent votes by both the U.S. and Saudi governments critical of the use of these munitions.

Venezuela accused the United States on Thursday of denying President Nicolas Maduro's plane permission to enter U.S. airspace -- a claim that a State Department official denied. ● Foreign Minister Elias Jaua said U.S. officials have blocked plans for Maduro's presidential plane to fly through Puerto Rican airspace on the way to China. He [correctly] described the move as an aggression and called for an explanation from the U.S. State Department.

Stephen Lendman: Rogue State America
Russia Today: US airspace denial for Maduro is payback for offering asylum to Snowden

The Main Intelligence Directorate (GRU) is reporting today that signal intelligence analysts (SIGNIT) monitoring CIA-NSA-FBI “encrypted electronic communication traffic” in the United States have linked the 16 September Washington Navy Yard Shooting with the Obama regimes 18 June assassination of award winning American journalist Michael Hastings, and the 25 June ambush on the Los Angles Police Department detectives investigating Hastings’s murder. Aaron Alexis, a lone gunman armed with a shotgun, fatally shot twelve people and injured three others in a mass shooting at the headquarters of the Naval Sea Systems Command (NAVSEA) inside the Washington Navy Yard in Southeast Washington, D.C. this past Monday, this report says. The attack occurred around 8:20 a.m. EDT, this report continues, in Building 197 with the shooter Alexis being subsequently killed by US local and Federal police forces after what has been described as a “running gun battle.”

McCain has been calling for intervention in Syria from the very beginning and has been the American mouthpiece for Israel.

Whenever there was a so called ‘Friends of Syria’ (enemies of Syria) meeting he would be there with the Saudis and the Qataris, the Turks and the French and other Muslim Brotherhood leaders, planning on the next step to bring down the Syrian Government. These so called “Friends of Syria” meetings are nothing more than a gathering of leaders supporting Al Qaeda/FSA oppositions and the countries fueling the war in Syria, deciding what their next step will be. These enemy countries of Syria, who are supplying the terrorists with weapons and paying them a wage are now trying to hold another meeting. They are planning to hold it in Italy, but Italy does not want them in their country and are denying it. It is true that Senator McCain has been to visit his friends in Syria. He has been there on several occasions to support his FSA army. The very same army that has been butchering innocent Syrians. The same army which is made up of people from all over the world.

The Syrian war is deadlocked. That’s how the Syrian Deputy Prime Minister Qadri Jamil described the situation in his interview with the Guardian newspaper. Both the government and opposition are too exhausted to continue fight and the Assad regime may call for a ceasefire at the Geneva-2 conference. Sevim Dagdelen, a German MP and a member of the Left Party who has been following the Syrian crisis closely, talked with the Voice of Russia about the evolving crisis. US Secretary of State John Kerry claims that the US is sure that chemical attack was carried out by the Government forces. What evidence, besides the UN report, does the US provide to prove it?

These are evidences like ten years ago for the start of the Iraq war. And we know that all this was a lie. And this time the Secretary of State John Kerry and the US Government are threatening to attack Syria basing on the same ridiculous premises. There is no evidence at all.

Press TV: You know the United States says it is sure that the Syrian government carried out this chemical attack, Russia says the attack was falsified and now the UN says the attack site may have been manipulated. What really is happening here?
Escobar: Manipulation. In short that is what is happening. The Americans have been saying from the beginning they had 99 percent certainty based on Israeli Intel which was probably compromised from the start. This is the Intel that they have from Benny Gantz, the IDF [Chief of Staff] passed to General Martin Dempsey of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. They stand by it. On the other hand we had independent analysts from all over. Even myself I wrote about this as well. The possibility of a false flag attack with kitchen sarin [gas] which was apprehended in Iraq by the Iraqi ministry of defense one month before the attack came the attack in Ghouta was transferred to Jabhat al-Nusra jihadists in Ghouta and it was probably a false flag operation.

This has not been investigated. How can the Americans, the French and the British say they have 99 percent certainty? It is absolutely impossible and this is part of a concerted effort by Washington along with Paris to derail the Geneva Agreement between Kerry and Lavrov even before it’s been implemented.

Divisive politics in the Palestinian territories has worsened living conditions for Gazans already living in an open prison.

Despite official withdrawal of Israeli forces in 2005, Gaza continues to be under a siege with economic, political and humanitarian repercussions . Aside from the closure policies of Israel, Gazans also lack basic constitutional rights to have a passport and mobility, not for tourist or entertainment purposes, but for vital access to education, health care and employment.

Ibrahim Dahman, Gaza national: “I was hit by Israeli shelling, directly and need medical care abroad… I received a phone call from Palestinian intelligence in Ramallah stating never dream of receiving a passport… I am now sending a message to President Abu Mazen, that I am a Palestinian national, my mom is Palestinian, my father is Palestinian, my grandfather is Palestinian and we are originally Canaanites. If we were not Palestinians, say Somalis, we’d send it to Somalia to apply for a Somali passport or Eritrean passport”. Ibrahim is only one of the tens of thousands of Palestinians that are denied a passport for alleged security reasons. Following the 2007 fighting between Hamas and Fatah, passports for Gazans started to be issued by the Palestinain Authority. Since then, a local service office prepares the file which must then be sent to Ramallah for final approval.

Occupied Palestine|فلسطين: Public health sector in Gaza faces disaster under tightened siege

Venezuela accused the United States on Thursday of denying President Nicolas Maduro's plane permission to enter U.S. airspace -- a claim that a State Department official denied. ● Foreign Minister Elias Jaua said U.S. officials have blocked plans for Maduro's presidential plane to fly through Puerto Rican airspace on the way to China. He [correctly] described the move as an aggression and called for an explanation from the U.S. State Department.

Stephen Lendman: Rogue State America

A report from Yahoo News Tuesday detailed a group of New York engineers who are developing a “biometric classroom” monitoring program that will track students every move. ● The report reads: “Students listen up! If you are used to passing notes, tapping out texts or even sneaking in quick conversations when you’re supposed to be working on fractions…beware! Those kinds of activities could be a thing of the past – or at the very least, closely monitored – in the biometric classroom of the future.” Sean Montgomery, co-founder and engineer for SensorStar Labs, says tracking students’ eye movements, conversations and smiles with “EngageSense” cameras will help teachers improve classroom learning. Algorithms in the program will crunch the raw visual and audio data to give teachers detailed information on students’ actions. Teachers will then be advised on how to better engage students. When asked about the privacy implications of such an intrusive technology, Montgomery defended the program by claiming that the usefulness somehow outweighed any privacy concern in typical “ends justify the means” fashion.

The FBI is instructing local police departments and "communities against terrorism" to consider anyone who harbors "conspiracy theories" about 9/11 to be a potential terrorist, in a circular released to local police departments. The memo thus adds 9/11-official-story skeptics to a growing list of targets described by federal law enforcement to be security threats, such as those who express "libertarian philosophies," "Second Amendment-oriented views," interest in "self-sufficiency," "fears of Big Brother or big government," and "Declarations of Constitutional rights and civil liberties."
A newly released national poll shows that 48 percent of Americans either have some doubts about the official account of 9/11, or do not believe it at all.