contributions

By COLIN BROWN
LONDON - Lord Butler has dropped a bombshell on Downing Street by reopening the investigation into whether Prime Minister Tony Blair deliberately misled Britain over the claim that Saddam Hussein could use weapons of mass destruction within 45 minutes.
The Prime Minister’s key advisers are horrified that Lord Butler has reopened damaging charges against Mr Blair and Alastair Campbell, his former Director of Communications, on which they were exonerated by the Hutton (…)

Twenty years ago, he served as envoy to Honduras
DUNCAN CAMPBELL SPECIAL TO THE STAR
Suspicious deaths in custody. Allegations of torture. Claims of a military out of control. These are some of the key issues that will face John Negroponte, the newly appointed U.S. ambassador to Iraq.
Suspicious deaths in custody. Allegations of torture. Claims of a military out of control. Those were some of the key issues that faced John Negroponte 20 years ago when he was U.S. ambassador to (…)

By Rupert Cornwell
Despite a massive damage-control effort, the prisoner abuse scandal is threatening to poison further the image of the Bush administration at home and abroad, deepening the cloud over the President’s re-election prospects.
Last week the White House tried to draw a line under the affair by releasing hundreds of classified internal documents, in a bid to show it had never condoned the use of torture against detainees in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. In the (…)

Analysts and some U.S. commanders say it could be too late to reverse the wave of violence. Sunnis are seen as the stronger, long-term threat.
By Patrick J. McDonnell
June 26, 2004 "Los Angeles Times" — BAGHDAD — As this week’s coordinated violence demonstrates, Iraq’s insurgent movement is increasingly potent, riding a wave of anti-U.S. nationalism and religious extremism. Just days before an Iraqi government takes control of the country, experts and some commanders fear it may be too (…)

By Damien McElroy in Baghdad
With american fighter jets and helicopters buzzing the skies overhead, an officer in Iraq’s new police force approaches a group of fighters on Fallujah’s front lines with an urgent call to arms.
"I need a man who can use an RPG," says Omar, who wears the uniform of a first lieutenant. Four hands shoot up and a cry rings out: "We are ready." He chooses a young man, Bilal, and they drive to an underpass on the outskirts of the city.
There, on Highway One, an (…)

“Today you are free. The torture chambers and rape rooms have been shut down” — US Secretary of State Colin Powell, told Iraqi women on March 8, International Women’s Day.
In one of the most secular countries in the Arab world, where women were until recently a visible and integrated part of public life, females have all but disappeared. The lawlessness brought by the occupation forces into Iraq is felt disproportionately by young women and girls who have yet to finish their education. (…)

by Dahr Jamail
How much worse does it need to get here before the occupiers consider changing their policy? One hundred dead every day? In light of what happened here yesterday, it appears as though we’re heading in that direction. For those of you who think June 30th will signify a decrease in the number and magnitude of attacks against the occupation forces after the “transfer of sovereignty” — think again.
After having coffee and listening to the Coalition Provisional Authority’s (…)

Bruce Kennedy
Over the past months, JUS has been watching a frightening trend of “false flag” operations beening waged by US intelligence. The latest in the series is Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi, who has been accredited with everything from the Ricin attacks (which later turned out to be fake) to the resistance in Fallujah. An amazing enemy in deed for a man who has the staring role in an American “False Flag” operation.
As America escalates its “war on terrorism” which in fact is a war on (…)

More Indian workers are returning from Iraq with distressing tales of torture and human rights violations in the military camps of the United States.
"It is slavery there in the American camp. We are being treated worse than animals," Peter Thomas, a native of Mavelikkara in Kerala, who did odd jobs such as cleaning and laundry works in an American army camp, told rediff.com
Thomas along with two of his friends Anil Kumar and Justin C Antony reached Kerala this week, after the Indian (…)

The shameless corporate feeding frenzy in Iraq is fuelling the resistance
by Naomi Klein
Good news out of Baghdad: the Program Management Office, which oversees the $18.4bn in US reconstruction funds, has finally set a goal it can meet. Sure, electricity is below pre-war levels, the streets are rivers of sewage and more Iraqis have been fired than hired. But now the PMO has contracted the British mercenary firm Aegis to protect its employees from "assassination, kidnapping, injury and" - (…)