contributions

US marines backed by tanks and aircraft have seized the heart of the Iraqi city of Najaf in a major assault on Al-Mahdi Army fighters.
Warplanes and helicopters pounded the lightly armed fighters of the Al-Mahdi Army stationed in a cemetery next to the Imam Ali Mosque.
US forces stormed the home of Moqtada al-Sadr who was believed to be holed up in the mosque along with hundreds of his Al-Mahdi Army, witnesses said.
Hundreds of Iraqi civilians have been killed in the US bombing and (…)

by Vasily Bubnov
On August 15th citizens of Venezuela are going to decide, if they want President Hugo Chavez to resign. The controversy is gathering steam as the voting day is drawing near. Numerous pro and anti-Chavez meetings have swept over the country recently. Local authorities control the situation, although clashes in several cities were not possible to avoid.
Spanish newspaper El Mundo published a front-page article on Monday. The CIA, the newspaper wrote, is preparing a plan to (…)

By Ashraf Fahim
NEW YORK - It would be comforting to believe that Private Lynndie England’s appearance in a military court last week was the first step toward justice in the Abu Ghraib prisoner-torture scandal. Photos of the diminutive England grinning in front of naked, prostrate Iraqis, one of whom she held by a dog leash, made her a focus for the worldwide outrage that followed the release in April of graphic images depicting torture, sexual humiliation and perhaps murder by US soldiers (…)

By David Morgan
WASHINGTON - U.S. Congressman Porter Goss, President Bush’s nominee for CIA director, could be his own worst enemy when it comes to making the case that he deserves to lead the U.S. intelligence agency.
"I couldn’t get a job with CIA today. I am not qualified," the Florida Republican told documentary-maker Michael Moore’s production company during the filming of the anti-Bush movie "Fahrenheit 9/11."
A day after Bush picked Goss for the top U.S. spy job, Moore on (…)

Justice Disputes Key Terror Case Evidence
A man shown in a videotape of landmarks in New York, Las Vegas and California has told investigators the tape was an amateur film and not surveillance as prosecutors portrayed at the trial of four suspected terrorists last year, Justice Department officials and lawyers said Wednesday night.
The witness interview was conducted in January, months after the trial in Detroit ended, and was turned over this summer to defense lawyers. It could deal a (…)

by Anne Barnard
RAMADI, Iraq — Four months into their tour of duty at one of the most dangerous American bases in Iraq, young Marines say the slow pace of progress is shaking their faith in their mission.
Playing cards one recent evening while on call to respond to any outburst of violence, Lance Corporal David Goward and the rest of his squad expressed two growing concerns: that the US military will linger here indefinitely and that the troops’ very presence is provoking the fighting it (…)

American authorities have reportedly launched an inquiry into allegations of sexual and physical abuse by US Marines against 35 villagers in central Afghanistan.
The allegations were aired on Wednesday night in an SBS Dateline report by Australian journalist Carmela Baranowska, who was feared kidnapped by the Taliban in late June during her trip to the conflict-torn country.
In the report, former prisoners alleged US Marines used the tactic of sexual humiliation which Ms Baranowska (…)

A TV station ban, 160,000 foreign troops, trumped up charges: is this the free society Iraqis were promised?
by Jonathan Freedland They are falling like skittles in a bowling alley. One by one, the arguments for the 2003 invasion of Iraq keep tumbling. First to go was the big one. War was necessary because Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. It turned out there were none. Next was the insistent promise that a US-led conquest of Baghdad would end completely and forever human rights (…)

By Jim Sleeper
I am looking at a photo of the George W. Bush that you’ve probably never seen before. It’s a sports-action close-up of him at Yale, over a caption written prophetically by a fellow undergraduate more than 30 years ago: ’’George Bush delivers illegal, but gratifying right hook to opposing ball carrier.Nevermind that this is a rugby game, alien to most Americans, and that the caption writer’s assessment wasn’t political. I think it explains one reason why Bush hasn’t slid in (…)

by Abhinav Aima
Ever since 9/11, the American mainstream media has been chockfull of instant fixes to Islamic terrorism.
Some claim the fault lies with the Arab leaders, and hence they support the slaughter in Iraq for the removal of Saddam Hussein. A lot of good that did! But still, the mass media is inundated by "experts" who request for regime changes galore.
Others claim that the fault lies with Islam itself. These Bible, Torah and Gita thumping genocidal racists would like to see (…)