Russia provides 10 MiG fighter jets to Lebanon for free


Russian MIG-29 fighters
(Yuri Kadobnov/AFP/Getty Images)

Russia gave Lebanon ten MiG fighter jets yesterday in a deal to boost defence cooperation.

The MiG29 Fulcrum fighters would be provided free to Lebanon under an agreement on military-technical assistance, the head of Russia’s defence cooperation service said. Mikhail Dmitryev said that the jets would come from Russia’s existing stock.

He said that Moscow was also in talks to supply Beirut with heavy armour, adding that supplies of such weaponry were “now possible after the situation in this nation has stabilised”.

He said: “We view the Lebanese army as the main guarantor of this nation’s stability, therefore the armed forces of this country must be strengthened.” The deal followed a meeting in Moscow between Anatoly Serdyukov, the Defence Minister, and Elias Murrhis, his Lebanese counterpart. Mr Serdyukov said that Russia had received a detailed list of armaments sought by Lebanon.

Read moreRussia provides 10 MiG fighter jets to Lebanon for free

American commandos get UN go-ahead to hunt down Somali pirates

Pirates operating from safe havens along the Somali coast could become the target of hot-pursuit missions by American commandos for the first time, after approval was given by the United Nations Security Council to launch land and air attacks on pirate bases.

The Americans had sought a new robust mandate to attack the pirates at source to ensure that there was legal backing for chasing those who escaped confrontations at sea and headed for the safety of lawless Somalia.

Many of the most successful pirates are rich home-owners, living along the coast in a strip of expensive houses bought with the ransoms paid by shipping companies for the release of hijacked vessels.

Yesterday, in another example of the more aggressive stance taken by the international community against the pirates, the Chinese crew of a pirate-seized vessel, later aided by helicopters from a US-led maritime coalition force, fought off the would-be hijackers.

The 30 crew members of the Chinese-owned vessel, the Zhenhua 4, sailing in the Gulf of Aden, foiled the pirates by locking themselves in their cabins and radioing for help. A warship from Combined Task Force 150, an American-led naval group operating around the Horn of Africa, sent two helicopters which fired on the pirates. CTF 150, based in Bahrain, is a coalition of 20 nations, including Britain.

Read moreAmerican commandos get UN go-ahead to hunt down Somali pirates

‘I was still holding my grandson’s hand – the rest was gone’

In the second of our series of dispatches from the ravaged country, Afghans explain how mounting civilian casualties are aiding Taliban recruiting

Clancy Chassay on Afghanistan‘s civilian casualties Link to this video

It was 7.30 on a hot July morning when the plane came swooping low over the remote ravine. Below, a bridal party was making its way to the groom’s village in an area called Kamala, in the eastern province of Nangarhar, to prepare for the celebrations later that day.

The first bomb hit a large group of children who had run on ahead of the main procession. It killed most of them instantly.

A few minutes later, the plane returned and dropped another bomb, right in the centre of the group. This time the victims were almost all women. Somehow the bride and two girls survived but as they scrambled down the hillside, desperately trying to get away from the plane, a third bomb caught them. Hajj Khan was one of four elderly men escorting the bride’s party that day.

“We were walking, I was holding my grandson’s hand, then there was a loud noise and everything went white. When I opened my eyes, everybody was screaming. I was lying metres from where I had been, I was still holding my grandson’s hand but the rest of him was gone. I looked around and saw pieces of bodies everywhere. I couldn’t make out which part was which.”

Relatives from the groom’s village said it was impossible to identify the remains. They buried the 47 victims in 28 graves.

Stories like this are relatively common in today’s Afghanistan. More than 600 civilians have died in Nato and US air strikes this year. The number of innocents killed this way has almost doubled from last year, and tripled from the year before that. These attacks are weakening support for the Afghan government and turning more and more people against the foreign occupation of the country.

Read more‘I was still holding my grandson’s hand – the rest was gone’

Analysts say Federal Reserve has fired all shots in its armoury

Shares soared on Wall Street last night, but the dollar tumbled after the US Federal Reserve’s shock decision effectively to cut American official interest rates to zero.

The Dow Jones industrial average jumped by more than 359.61 points, or 4.2 per cent, as markets hailed the US central bank’s landmark move to cut its key Fed Funds rate from a previous record low of 1 per cent to a target range of zero to 0.25 per cent.

The broader-based S&P 500 index of US blue chip shares also surged by more than 5 per cent as investors cheered the Fed’s decision to combine last night’s historic cut in rates with a raft of other ground-breaking steps to combat the economic slump.

Related article: Fed throws out the rulebook

The Fed fulfilled predictions that it would announce extraordinary moves to bolster America’s economy through so-called “quantitative easing”. It confirmed that it will buy up “large quantities” of mortgage-backed securities to try to ease the flow of lending to a slumping US housing market.

Read moreAnalysts say Federal Reserve has fired all shots in its armoury

Scott Ritter: Dick Cheney’s fantasy world

Despite the facts, the vice-president still insists that Saddam Hussein could have produced weapons of mass destruction

Scott Ritter was a UN weapons inspector in Iraq from 1991-1998 and is the author of Iraq Confidential.

In yet another attempt at revisionist history by the outgoing Bush administration, vice-president Dick Cheney, in an exclusive interview with ABC News, took exception to former presidential adviser Karl Rove’s contention that the US would not have gone to war if available intelligence before the invasion had shown Iraq not to possess weapons of mass destruction. Cheney noted that the only thing the US got wrong on Iraq was that there were no stockpiles of WMD at the time of the 2003 invasion. “What they found was that Saddam Hussein still had the capability to produce weapons of mass destruction. He had the technology, he had the people, he had the basic feed stock.”

Related article: ‘I think we’ve done pretty well.’ Dick Cheney has no regrets about eight years in office

The vice-president should re-check both his history and his facts. Just prior to President Bush’s decision to invade Iraq, the UN had teams of weapons inspectors operating inside Iraq, blanketing the totality of Iraq’s industrial infrastructure. They found no evidence of either retained WMD, or efforts undertaken by Iraq to reconstitute a WMD manufacturing capability. Whatever dual-use industrial capability that did exist (so-called because the industrial processes involved to produce legitimate civilian or military items could, if modified, be used to produce materials associated with WMD) had been so degraded as a result of economic sanctions and war that any meaningful WMD production was almost moot. To say that Saddam had the capability or the technology to produce WMD at the time of the US invasion is a gross misrepresentation of the facts.

Read moreScott Ritter: Dick Cheney’s fantasy world

Paul Craig Roberts: Are You Ready to Face the Facts About Israel?

By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS:
Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan administration. He was Associate Editor of the Wall Street Journal editorial page and Contributing Editor of National Review.

“On October 21 (1948) the Government of Israel took a decision that was to have a lasting and divisive effect on the rights and status of those Arabs who lived within its borders: the official establishment of military government in the areas where most of the inhabitants were Arabs.”
Martin Gilbert, Israel: A History

I had given up on finding an American with a moral conscience and the courage to go with it and was on the verge of retiring my keyboard when I met the Rev. Thomas L. Are.

Rev. Are is a Presbyterian pastor who used to tell his Atlanta, Georgia, congregation: “I am a Zionist.” Like most Americans, Rev. Are had been seduced by Israeli propaganda and helped to spread the propaganda among his congregation.

Around 1990 Rev. Are had an awakening for which he credits the Christian Canon of St. George’s Cathedral in Jerusalem and author Marc Ellis, co-editor of the book, Beyond Occupation.

Realizing that his ignorance of the situation on the ground had made him complicit in great crimes, Rev. Are wrote a book hoping to save others from his mistake and perhaps in part to make amends, Israeli Peace/Palestinian Justice, published in Canada in 1994.

Rev. Are researched his subject and wrote a brave book. Keep in mind that 1994 was long prior to Walt and Mearsheimer’s recent book, which exposed the power of the Israel Lobby and its ability to control the explanation Americans receive about the “Israeli-Palestinian conflict.”

Read morePaul Craig Roberts: Are You Ready to Face the Facts About Israel?

Bailout payout tops $8 trillion


US President George W. Bush made a surprise visit to Afghanistan on Monday, holding talks with President Hamid Karzai and warning of a long struggle ahead to quell insurgent violence. (AFP/Saul Loeb)

As the holiday season commences, it’s worth taking stock of the last gift that President George W. Bush and the 110th Congress have left for U.S. taxpayers.

It’s a package of about $8.7 trillion dollars’ worth of potential taxpayer commitments for loans, guarantees and other bailout goodies for businesses and distressed homeowners.

Amid the tissue paper:

• More than $1.5 trillion in Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. loan guarantees, including a $139 billion assist to the lending arm of General Electric Corp.

• $1.8 trillion in cash, tax breaks and loan guarantees doled out from the Treasury Department to taxpayers, financial institutions and credit companies.

• $300 billion for homeowners from the Federal Housing Authority.

• $25 billion in assistance for auto companies from a program overseen by the Energy Department, which is separate from the bailout proposal that tanked last week in the Senate.

• And $5 trillion worth of new money, loan guarantees and loosened lending requirements from the Federal Reserve Bank.

Read moreBailout payout tops $8 trillion

New Rule Expands DNA Collection to All People Arrested

Civil Rights Groups Assail Change


Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) advocates DNA collection at arrest or deportation. (2006 Photo By Melina Mara — The Washington Post)

Immigration and civil liberties groups condemned a new U.S. government policy to collect DNA samples from all noncitizens detained by authorities and all people arrested for federal crimes.

The new Justice Department rule, published Wednesday and effective Jan. 9, dramatically expands a federal law enforcement database of genetic identifiers, which is now limited to storing information about convicted criminals and arrestees from 13 states.

Congress authorized the expansion in 2005, citing the power of DNA as a tool in crime solving and prevention.

The FBI created its National DNA Index System in 1994 to store profiles of people convicted of serious violent crimes, such as rape and murder, but the system has been expanded repeatedly, first to include all convicted felons, then misdemeanants and state arrestees. The data bank contained more than 6.2 million samples as of August, and officials estimate that 61,000 cases have been solved or assisted using DNA.

The change could add as many as 1.2 million people a year to the national database, U.S. officials said. Supporters equate DNA collection to taking fingerprints or photographs at the time of booking.

Read moreNew Rule Expands DNA Collection to All People Arrested

Fed Cuts Rate to as Low as Zero, Shifts Policy Focus

The Fed is creating a crisis that will be even worse than the Great Depression.

Related Interview with Peter Schiff (12/13/08).

When the dollar is starting to fail commodities will skyrocket.

Watch Gold, Silver etc. closely now.

The dollar is soon as good as toilet paper.

Ron Paul, Peter Schiff and Jim Rogers warned a million times about this.

And remember that for all the people who lose their money and their homes there is always someone who profits from that, because these assets do not just disappear into the void. So who profits?!

I am not saying like many others that Ben Bernanke and Hank Paulson do not know what they are doing. They know exactly what they are doing and they do what they are told to do by their elite masters. (Look who founded the Federal Reserve and why. You may watch Zeitgeist, The Movie, Final Edition Part III of the movie which starts at 1:14:30.)

Bush, Obama, Bernanke and Paulson are all puppets. Nothing they do is really for the people, absolutely NOTHING.

Even if they create a stimulus package and give you a check they know that that money has to be paid back with interest and that it will be the taxpayer who has to pay for it all.

All they do now is destroying the dollar, the economy and the middle class. I have studied economics and I can assure you that it can be easily proven that stimulus packages only have a short term effect and that they have very harmful effects in the long run.

If you want to look good in the short term like Mr. Obama than a stimulus package is just fine. I even seriously doubt that it will have much effect because the US are broke. The stimulus package has to be financed and there is not much confidence left that the US can pay all that debt back. So nobody will soon be willing to buy US bonds anymore and creating more money out of thin air will create another Zimbabwe.

The Federal Reserve Refuses to Disclose Recipients of $2 Trillion: Dec. 12 (Bloomberg) — The Federal Reserve refused a request by Bloomberg News to disclose the recipients of more than $2 trillion of emergency loans from U.S. taxpayers and the assets the central bank is accepting as collateral.

These people are the worst criminals on the face of the earth. The elite has planned this crisis so many years ago that you would probably not believe me. Here always comes the question: “But why would they do this?” For MONEY, POWER and CONTROL.
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Source: Bloomberg


Jeffrey Vazquez looks at a television after the Federal Open Market Committee’s (FOMC) rate decision on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange in New York, on Dec. 16, 2008. Photographer: Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg News

Dec. 16 (Bloomberg) — The Federal Reserve cut the main U.S. interest rate to as low as zero for the first time and shifted its focus to the amount and type of debt it buys, seeking to revive credit and end the longest slump in a quarter- century.

The Fed “will employ all available tools to promote the resumption of sustainable economic growth and to preserve price stability,” the Federal Open Market Committee said today in a statement in Washington. “Weak economic conditions are likely to warrant exceptionally low levels of the federal funds rate for some time.”

Read moreFed Cuts Rate to as Low as Zero, Shifts Policy Focus

Sold as non-lethal, Tasers killed 400 in US, Canada since 2001

Take a closer look at the Taser logo. That logo is overlaying planet earth. Compare it to the logo of the Waffen SS. So what it means here is: ‘Fascism rules the world.’

The symbol Taser uses is immediately understood by the subconscious mind because the language of the subconscious mind are pictures.

What I have learned about this symbol is that it means ‘artificial activation’ to the subconscious mind. Hitler was aware of this and maybe thought : “Doppelt hält besser.” “Make assurance double sure.”

The New World Order is closing in from all sides.

And if you realize this, when you will have the microchip under your skin, then it will be too late.

Understanding the symbolism behind the logos of corporations, Homeland Security etc. may be shocking, but the truth ‘can’ set you free.

When fascism comes to America it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross. – Sinclair Lewis
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Source: The Raw Story

They are marketed as non-lethal weapons that allow police to capture suspects or criminals without causing any permanent harm.

Former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani and businessman Bernard Kerik made millions selling the idea to police departments across the country.

But Tasers have killed more than 400 people in the United States and Canada since 2001, according to a new study commissioned by the Canadian Broadcasting Corp.

Police departments across Canada began banning use of Tasers by their officers after the report found that Tasers deliver more power than the manufacturer says is possible.

It is unknown if U.S. police departments will follow suit.

The study includes a medical analysis that concluded someone shot with a Taser could face as high as a 50 percent chance of cardiac arrest.

The Taser company, however, still says its weapons can’t kill.

“It is unfortunate that false allegations based on scientifically flawed data can create such uncertainty,” Steve Tuttle, a Taser vice president, told The Arizona Republic.

Stories of Taser-related deaths have stacked up over the years, many involving police officers who never realized the harm their Taser could cause.

Read moreSold as non-lethal, Tasers killed 400 in US, Canada since 2001

U.S. Excluded by Latin American Summit as China, Russia Loom

Dec. 15 (Bloomberg) — Latin American and Caribbean leaders gathering in Brazil tomorrow will mark a historic occasion: a region-wide summit that excludes the United States.

Almost two centuries after President James Monroe declared Latin America a U.S. sphere of influence, the region is breaking away. From socialist-leaning Venezuela to market-friendly Brazil, governments are expanding military, economic and diplomatic ties with potential U.S. adversaries such as China, Russia and Iran.

“Monroe certainly would be rolling over in his grave,” says Julia Sweig, director of the Latin America program at the Council of Foreign Relations in Washington and author of the 2006 book “Friendly Fire: Losing Friends and Making Enemies in the Anti-American Century.”

The U.S., she says, “is no longer the exclusive go-to power in the region, especially in South America, where U.S. economic ties are much less important.”

Since November, Russian warships have engaged in joint naval exercises with Venezuela, the first in the Caribbean since the Cold War; Chinese President Hu Jintao signed a free-trade agreement with Peru; and Brazil invited Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for a state visit.

Read moreU.S. Excluded by Latin American Summit as China, Russia Loom

Royal Mail needs cutbacks to fill £7bn pensions hole – report

Royal Mail is facing a pension deficit of £7bn and needs to implement sweeping efficiencies, a report to the business secretary, Lord Mandelson, and the Post Office minister, Pat MacFadden, will say.

A review of postal services conducted by Richard Hooper, former deputy chairman of the regulator Ofcom, will reveal a deficit so large that ministers are likely to argue outright privatisation is impossible.

The government is unlikely to want to take on the full cost of the liabilities, which reached £3.4bn in 2006, and are expected to have more than doubled by the time the next evaluation is made next year. As a result, Royal Mail is having to use more and more of its profits to plug the pension fund hole.

Lord Mandelson is expected to publish the report this week, although the government may be reluctant to reveal a review that is likely to lead to job losses when bad unemployment figures are expected on Wednesday.

Read moreRoyal Mail needs cutbacks to fill £7bn pensions hole – report

Pakistani lorry drivers supplying Nato troops in Afghanistan go on strike


Pakistani Taleban fighters (pictured) have vowed to step up attacks on supply convoys in the Khyber Pass (Tariq/AFP/Getty Images)

An association of Pakistani lorry owners and drivers refused today to resume delivering supplies to foreign troops in Afghanistan after a series of militant attacks on convoys plying the main supply route via the Khyber Pass.

An international shipping company that handles US military supplies through Pakistan also said that there was now “a large backlog of military freight” across the country from Karachi, where the cargo arrives by ship, to the Afghan border, “Clearly the security situation is very difficult,” Kevin Speers, a spokesman for Maersk Lines Ltd, told The Times. “Movement through the Pass has been severely restricted.”

Read morePakistani lorry drivers supplying Nato troops in Afghanistan go on strike

What part of Ireland’s ‘no’ does the EU not understand?

Asking the Irish to vote again on the Lisbon treaty is arrogant, insulting and undemocratic

Imagine if, following the election of Barack Obama by 52.9% of American voters, the Republican party, which got just 45.7% of votes, demanded another election. Imagine if the Republicans described Obama’s victory as a “triumph of ignorance” – brought about by an “unspeakable” and “ignorant” mass of people who should have been “swatted away by the forces of the establishment” – and insisted on holding a second election so that, this time, the voters could “get it right”.

There would be uproar, outrage, widespread disgust at such elite disdain for the democratic process. Well, now you know how the Irish people must feel. In June this year, 53.4% of Irish voters rejected the Lisbon treaty, against 46.6% who supported it (giving the “No” camp a “sweeping victory” similar to Obama’s). Yet now the Irish will be asked to vote again. EU officials’ behind-doors deal to force a second referendum in Ireland reveals their utter contempt for Irish voters, and for democracy itself. It is an historic sucker punch against the sovereignty of the people.

As soon as the Irish people’s ballots were counted in June, their rejection of Lisbon was treated as the “wrong” answer, as if they had been taking part in a multiple-choice maths exam and had failed to work out that 2+2=4. Now, they will be given a chance to sit the exam again, “until [they] come up with the right answer,” says George Galloway, attacking EU elitism. The notion that the Irish “got it wrong” exposes gobsmacking ignorance about democracy in the upper echelons of the EU. The very fact that a majority of Irish people said no to Lisbon made it the “right answer”, true and sovereign and final. “No” really does mean no.

Read moreWhat part of Ireland’s ‘no’ does the EU not understand?

Dollar Staggers as U.S. Unleashes Cash Flood, Deficit


U.S. one-dollar notes are arranged for a photograph in Tokyo, Oct. 1, 2008. Photographer: Tomohiro Ohsumi/Bloomberg News

Dec. 15 (Bloomberg) — The biggest foreign-exchange strategists and investors say the best may be over for the dollar after a four-month, 24 percent rally.

The currency weakened 5.9 percent measured by the trade- weighted Dollar Index after strengthening between July and November as investors bought the greenback to flee riskier assets and repay dollar-denominated loans from lenders reining in credit. Ever since peaking on Nov. 21, the dollar fell against all 16 of the most-widely traded currencies, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

U.S. policy makers are flooding the world with an extra $8.5 trillion through 23 different plans designed to bail out the financial system and pump up the economy. The decline shows that the increased supply of money may be overwhelming investors just as the government steps up debt sales, the trade and budget deficits grow and de-leveraging by investors slows.

“The dollar will go to new lows as the U.S. attacks its currency,” said John Taylor, chairman of New York-based FX Concepts Inc., which manages about $14.5 billion of currencies.

Read moreDollar Staggers as U.S. Unleashes Cash Flood, Deficit

Interview with Peter Schiff (12/13/08)

1 of 2

Source: YouTube

Read moreInterview with Peter Schiff (12/13/08)

Total Financial Meltdown – The End of Days

We’re all still plunging hither and thither, guzzling wine and wondering what preposterously expensive electronic toys the children will want to smash on Christmas morning this year. We can’t see the meteorite coming either.

I think mainly this is because the government is not telling us the truth. It’s painting Gordon Brown as a global economic messiah and fiddling about with Vat, pretending that the coming recession will be bad. But that it can deal with it.

I don’t think it can. I have spoken to a couple of pretty senior bankers in the past couple of weeks and their story is rather different. They don’t refer to the looming problems as being like 1992 or even 1929. They talk about a total financial meltdown. They talk about the End of Days.

December 7, 2008

Full article here: The Sunday Times

Rahm Emanuel’s Rise to Power


Rahm Emanuel (Brian Kersey-Pool/Getty Images)

Since Rahm Emanuel was appointed the next White House chief of staff last month, we’ve been retracing his previous life as an investment banker, which earned him more than $18 million in less than three years.

Today the New York Times sheds new light on Emanuel’s Wall Street days — and how they helped send him to Congress.

In late 1998, Emanuel left the Clinton White House to work for Wasserstein Perella, a now defunct investment bank run by Bruce Wasserstein, a major Democratic donor.

“I had this idea that this could work and that it had upside,” Wasserstein told the Times. “It worked out better than I could have hoped.”

Indeed, as we previously noted, Emanuel used his political connections to broker major deals while at the firm. (One deal was a $16 billion merger that created Exelon Corp., now one of the nation’s largest electric utilities. Another involved SBC Communications, the telecommunications company run by William Daley, Clinton’s commerce secretary and the brother of Chicago’s mayor.)

After leaving the bank in 2001 to run for Congress, Emanuel benefited from the sale of Wasserstein Perella, which gave him an unusually large payout. Russ Gerson, global head of financial markets for A.T. Kearney Executive Search, told the Chicago Tribune in 2003 that Emanuel’s compensation would put him “in the top 3 to 5 percent” of investment bankers at that time.

The cash proved helpful when Emanuel found himself in a tough fight for a seat in Congress. He contributed $450,000 out of his own pocket to the primary campaign, and his leading rival accused him of trying to buy his seat, the Times reports.

The financial industry also heavily financed Emanuel’s campaign. From the Times:

Read moreRahm Emanuel’s Rise to Power

Afghans Rape Children On Canadian Military Base

Such atrocities are ‘normal’ on planet earth: Pakistani women buried alive for choosing husbands
Human beings do net respect themselves, they do not respect others and they do not respect their planet.
This is the perfect recipe for the ultimate disaster.
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Dec 14, 2008 04:30 AM
Source: The Star

Chaplain says senior officer aware of rape by Afghans

Soldier recalls cries from boy brought onto Canadian base

The boy was no more than 12. He wore a wig, lipstick and perfume and was dressed in a flowing robe when an Afghan interpreter escorted him to the entrance of the Canadian base in remote Afghanistan.

It was June 2006 and it was one of Tyrel Braaten’s first days at Forward Operating Base Wilson, about 30 kilometres outside Kandahar.

Braaten watched as the local interpreter, who worked for the Canadians, ushered the boy through the security checkpoint and led him inside a nearby building.

The bombardier was bewildered. He asked another interpreter standing next to him who the boy was. The interpreter shrugged that the boy was one of “the bitches.”

“I said, `What do you mean?’ and he made the motion with his hips, like you know,” said Braaten, 24. “I remember saying, `Are we on Mars? Does this s— go on all the time?'”

The native of Saskatchewan is the latest soldier to come forward alleging in detail how young Afghan boys during his tour in Afghanistan in 2006 were regularly sodomized by Afghan interpreters and soldiers working alongside Canadian soldiers.

For the past four months, the Canadian Forces’ National Investigation Service, an arm’s-length military investigatory body with the power to lay criminal charges, has been probing claims that Canadian commanding officers ignored the complaints of lower-ranking soldiers about the alleged rapes.

Some soldiers have told military chaplains and medical personnel that they were instructed to disregard the sodomy because of a “cultural difference” between Canada and Afghanistan.

In a new development, Maj. Kevin Klein, a high-ranking chaplain, told the Star that a senior officer confided to him in 2007 that his soldiers were struggling to cope with the rapes. Klein has told his story to NIS investigators.

Read moreAfghans Rape Children On Canadian Military Base

Police charged £9m by phone firms to use tracking data, prompting calls for ‘free access’

mobile phone
Police forces are spending up to £9m every year to access details of phone records (Posed by model)

Mobile phone firms have been accused of cashing in on crime and terror after charging the police £8.7million a year to access data tracking information.

The companies keep records of the times, dates, duration of mobile phone calls and the numbers contacted but not the actual content of conversations.

They also hold crucial information about the whereabouts of a mobile phone at any given time – which can be accessed by the police to build up a picture of a suspect’s movements.

The details were crucial in the conviction of Soham murderer Ian Huntley and Ipswich prostitute-killer Steve Wright and in identifying those involved in the failed 21/7 terrorist plots in London.

But Vodafone, O2 and T-Mobile charge a fee for seeing the data – with the cost running at about £170,000 a week.

This is in addition to £8million the Home Office already pays telecoms firms to store information on their customers for at least a year so it is available to the police and MI5.

Police can see the phone records without having to apply to the courts, with senior offices issuing a Section 22 notice under the powerful Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act.

The process has become an everyday part of police inquiries and many forces and MI5 have automated systems to retrieve mobile data – prompting calls for the service to be free of charge.

Last year, Section 22 powers were exercised more than 500,000 times.

Read morePolice charged £9m by phone firms to use tracking data, prompting calls for ‘free access’

Gaza families eat grass as Israel locks border

Before you read The Times article below consider also the following articles:

A human rights crime in Gaza by Ex-President Jimmy Carter.

Carter says Israel has arsenal of 150 nuclear weapons:
Carter also condemned Israel’s blockade of the Gaza Strip as “one of the greatest human rights crimes now existing on Earth,” according to the Agence France-Presse news agency.
Carter said in reference to the situation of Palestinians in Gaza that, “There is no reason to treat these people this way.”

Gaza: A modern concentration camp run by Israel:
Gaza is being forced to pump 77 tonnes of untreated or partially treated sewage out to sea daily due to the Israeli blockade of the coastal territory. The fear is that some of this is creeping back into drinking water.
“The health of Gaza’s 1.5 million people is at risk,” Mahmoud Daher, from the UN World Health Organisation (WHO) told IPS.
The results revealed that three areas in Gaza and one area in the Rafah governorate (30.8 percent) are polluted with human faeces (Faecal Coliform) and animal faeces (Faecal Streptococcus), and three areas in Gaza city (23.1 percent) are polluted with animal faeces.

Hungry Gazans Resort to Animal Feed as U.N. Blasts Israel:
GAZA CITY, Gaza — Half of Gaza’s bakeries have closed down and the other half have resorted to animal feed to produce bread as Israel’s complete blockade of the coastal territory enters its 19th day.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon alarmed at the escalating humanitarian crisis called incumbent Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert last week and demanded that he lift the blockade.

BBC: Gazans despair over blockade:
“People in Gaza are waiting in lines for almost everything, and that’s if they’re lucky enough to find something to wait for,” says Bassam Nasser, 39.

Israel blocks foreign media from Gaza

UN suspends food distribution in Gaza

Israeli siege leads to soaring anemia in Gaza newborns

Scottish activist films Israeli navy shooting at Gaza fishermen:
A SCOTTISH human rights activist has filmed the Israeli navy firing machine guns at unarmed Palestinian fishing boats in the Mediterranean Sea off the coast of the Gaza Strip.

Israel’s secret police pressuring sick Gazans to spy for them, says report
Israel’s secret police are pressuring Palestinians in Gaza to spy on their community in exchange for urgent medical treatment, according to a report released today by an Israeli human rights organisation.

Israel launches deadly airstrike in Gaza + Hamas fires rockets at Israel after 6 killed

U.N. chief condemns Israel after Gaza clash:
GAZA (Reuters) – U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon condemned Israel for using “excessive” force in the Gaza Strip and demanded a halt to its offensive after troops killed 61 people on the bloodiest day for Palestinians since the 1980s.

The New York Times: Making Nuclear Extermination Respectable:
On July 18, 2008 The New York Times published an article by Israeli-Jewish historian, Professor Benny Morris, advocating an Israeli nuclear-genocidal attack on Iran with the likelihood of killing 70 million Iranians – 12 times the number of Jewish victims in the Nazi holocaust:

” Iran ’s leaders would do well to rethink their gamble and suspend their nuclear program. Barring this, the best they could hope for is that Israel ’s conventional air assault will destroy their nuclear facilities. To be sure, this would mean thousands of Iranian casualties and international humiliation. But the alternative is an Iran turned into a nuclear wasteland.”

Eating weeds and herbs was often the only thing that kept people alive in prison camps.

Israel turned Gaza into one big concentration camp. Why is there no help? Look who rules the world and what interests they have, then you know.
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December 14, 2008
Source: The Sunday Times

AS a convoy of blue-and-white United Nations trucks loaded with food waited last night for Israeli permission to enter Gaza, Jindiya Abu Amra and her 12-year-old daughter went scrounging for the wild grass their family now lives on.

“We had one meal today – khobbeizeh,” said Abu Amra, 43, showing the leaves of a plant that grows along the streets of Gaza. “Every day, I wake up and start looking for wood and plastic to burn for fuel and I beg. When I find nothing, we eat this grass.”

Abu Amra and her unemployed husband have seven daughters and a son. Their tiny breeze-block house has had no furniture since they burnt the last cupboard for heat.

“I can’t remember seeing a fruit,” said Rabab, 12, who goes with her mother most mornings to scavenge. She is dressed in a tracksuit top and holed jeans, and her feet are bare.

Conditions for most of the 1.5m Gazans have deteriorated dramatically in the past month, since a truce between Israel and Hamas, the ruling Islamist party, broke down.

Read moreGaza families eat grass as Israel locks border

Emergency rescue plan for British motor industry


The Vauxhall factory at Ellesmere Port, Cheshire, yesterday. The struggling company has offered all 4,500 workers at the plant a sabbatical of up to nine months on 30 per cent pay

A financial rescue package for Britain’s motor industry was being put together last night, mirroring efforts in Washington to save America’s three big carmakers from collapse.

Lord Mandelson, the Business Secretary, and Alistair Darling, the Chancellor, may offer bridging loans on commercial terms to vehicle and component manufacturers and wider guarantees for loans from banks.

The peer is in regular contact with the industry, which has reached a crisis point. Several carmakers plan extended shutdowns over Christmas, leaving them with vastly reduced sales income but with salaries and other bills still to pay.

Suppliers, many of them small companies, are demanding weekly payments to secure their cashflows and stay in business. One firm, Wagon, has gone into administration with the loss of 500 jobs. If the supply chain crumbles, tens of thousands of jobs will be lost. The components industry supports 115,000 workers, while manufacturing employs 190,000 and the whole industry, including retail, 850,000.

Read moreEmergency rescue plan for British motor industry