contributions

by Julian Borger
Michael Moore’s satirical documentary on the Bush administration, Fahrenheit 9/11, may have broken box office records, but it was not enough to win the director an invitation to this week’s Democratic convention.
The feeling is mutual. In an interview with the Guardian, Moore made it clear that he would campaign against President Bush, not necessarily for John Kerry, who, he argued, had to perform better to avoid "blowing" the election.
"I have not publicly endorsed (…)

by Rohan Pearce
"I have long thought Michael Moore a liar, and should not have been shocked when I saw his `documentary’ Fahrenheit 9/11. Even so, I was horrified. This film - breaking box-office records in America - is so deceitful that it makes the infamous Triumph of the Will documentary by Hitler’s propagandist, Leni Riefenstahl, seem balanced. But what shocked me even more than Moore’s hymn of hatred of America and its president was the reaction to it of the small audience at the (…)

By John Byrne
The US army admitted Monday for the first time to having detained adolescents in its prisons in Iraq, according to a German press report.
The popular TV magazine "Report Mainz," broadcast Monday evening, quoted Lieutenant Colonel Barry Johnson, a spokesman for the US troops in Iraq, as saying that they still imprisoned 58 Iraqis in the age of from 14 and 17. The program had previously reported July 5 that 117 children had been held during the period of January through May. (…)

Iraq may not be receiving its full oil revenues as a lack of metering has made it impossible to monitor oil levels, according to a UN watchdog.
The revelation emerged after the international oversight body for the Development Fund for Iraq (DFI) briefed the UN Security Council behind closed doors yesterday. Following the meeting, UN Controller Jean-Pierre Halbwachs, who chairs the International Monitoring and Advisory Board (IAMB), told reporters that he had relayed the Board’s concerns (…)

Michel-Bôle Richard and Mouna Naïm, Le Monde
"There’s the Mossad" and "humanitarian organizations", a Turkmen Front leader asserts.
On Saturday July 24, for the second time in forty-eight hours, Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad Allawi formally denied the intelligence which alleges Israeli agents are in Iraqi Kurdistan. "There are no Israelis in Iraq. I formally deny these rumors," Mr. Allawi declared at a Damascus press conference in the company of his Syrian counterpart, Naji Al-Otri. He had (…)

The United States’ failure to practice what it preaches in Iraq could prove costly in the larger battle for control of the country. The hypocrisy is already painful for individuals.
The administration has held a top Iraqi scientist in solitary confinement for 17 months without any charges. The most obvious interpretation is that Lt. Gen. Amir al-Saadi is being hidden away because he told a truth that’s embarrassing to the Bush administration. Serving as Iraq’s chief negotiator with U.N. (…)

by Andrew Gilligan, Evening Standard
The father of a man allegedly murdered by British troops in Iraq will today appear in London to describe his anger and his "hope for justice" in the British courts.
Colonel Daoud Mousa’s son, Baha, died in British Army custody last year after allegedly suffering "severe and repeated beatings".
Colonel Mousa will be joined at a press conference by Kifah Taha al-Mutari, one of his son’s friends, who says he witnessed the assaults and was himself badly (…)

by John Farrell Co-coordinator, Voices in the Wilderness
William Rivers Pitt recently published an article on the Truthout website taking the US media to task for their failure to report the most disturbing story of the Iraq war: the imprisonment and torture of Iraqi children by the US Military. We should applaud the courage of journalists like Pitt and Seymour Hersh, not to mention whistleblowers such as Spec. Joseph Darby and Sgt. Samuel Provance who have faced military intimidation and (…)

by Lisa Ashkenaz Croke (bio)
Two weeks after the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) confirmed that the US had secretly shipped nuclear materials out of Iraq, the Agency has been invited back for the first time in over a year.
The US-installed interim Iraqi government requested the return of international inspectors. The Agency’s director general, Mohamed ElBaradei, confirmed to reporters Wednesday in Cairo that a team would return to Baghdad. Before the US-led invasion last year, (…)

By Patrick J. McDonnell
RAMADI, Iraq - Hunkered down in the turquoise-domed Islamic Law Center, a dozen Marines wait for the enemy to make its inevitable move. Insurgents equipped with Soviet-made sniper rifles keep the building in their cross-hairs. Assailants with AK-47s and grenade launchers regularly peer from nearby alleys and roofs. Attacks can come from anywhere.
The wait is unnerving, but it’s better than being in the streets of this turbulent city. On Wednesday, a Marine convoy (…)