5 Jun 2008
Iran and Turkey fight together against Kurds
The chief of Turkey's army said Thursday that Iran and Turkey are coordinating efforts against Kurdish militants, including the sharing of intelligence.
Turkey and Iran are not conducting joint military operations, said Gen. Ilker Basbug. His remarks reflect the complexity of the political and military situation in that region.
"When they start operations, we also conduct operations," said Basbug, who said the Iranians, like the Turks, are engaged in a "serious struggle" with such rebels.
"We share information. They conduct operations from the Iranian side of the border and we plan operations from our side of the border." Kurds live in a contiguous region across Iraq, Iran, Turkey, and Syria, and those governments long have been on guard against Kurdish separatist militants.
For more than two decades, Turkey has been fighting militants from the Kurdistan Workers' Party, PKK, in the southeast of its nation and in Iraq as well, and it has been getting intelligence help from the United States in its efforts.
Iran has shelled bases of the Party for Free Life in Kurdistan along the Iran and Iraq border, with the latest strikes coming on Monday in northern Iraq, according to a Kurdish regional government official in Iraq.
4 Jun 2008
Jordan Summons Danish Cartoonist on Blasphemy Charges
A Danish cartoonist and ten newspaper editors have reportedly been summoned by Jordan's public prosecutor on charges of "blasphemy" for reprinting cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad.
According to the Copenhagen Post, prosecutor Hassan Abdullat has subpoenaed the 11 Danes for drawing and reprinting cartoons they say offend Islam, charging them with "threatening the national peace."
Under Jordanian law, reproducing images of the Prophet Muhammad inside — or even outside the country — is illegal under the Jordanian Justice Act, the newspaper wrote.
A lawyer representing "The Prophet Unites Us," a Jordanian group angling for the prosecution, said that if the Danish journalists did not appear in Jordan for legal proceedings, the next step would be to inform Interpol and seek their arrest.
But the Danish foreign ministry said that the journalists would not be forcibly deported, as the printing of the controversial cartoons is not a punishable offense in Denmark.
Jordanian courts have not issued an indictment, but lawyers are hoping the case will help establish an international law against slandering religion, according to Danish reports.
This from Norway:
“I am Muhammed and nobody dare print me!”
more on Adresseavisen..
Morgan Tsvangirai arrested in Robert Mugabe blitz
Zimbabwe opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai and senior officials from his Movement for Democratic Change were held by police last night, amid heightened alarm that Robert Mugabe is planning to steal this month's runoff presidential election.
"It's the whole entourage of (Mr Tsvangirai), including his security personnel and other senior party officials," MDC spokesman Nelson Chamisa said.
Others arrested included the party's deputy leader, Thokozani Khupe, and MDC chairman Lovemore Moyo.
Mr Tsvangirai's detention came as aid group Care International said yesterday the Mugabe Government had halted its operations in the country for allegedly campaigning for the opposition.
Zimbabwe had ordered Save the Children UK and ADRA to stop work in the country immediately, according to Cephas Zinhumwe, chief executive of the National Association of Non-Governmental Organisations. The Australian
UPDATE: He is released the next day...
UPDATE: And he is arrested again...
Mugabe is attending a UN world food conference in Rome.
Republicans To Save Hillary With Obama Scandal?
Republicans are preparing to save Hillary Clinton’s doomed bid for the Democratic nomination and answer the question of why she has refused to concede a losing race, with the release today of a shocking video tape featuring Michelle Obama going off on a racist rant, but others maintain the rumour is nothing more than a hoax.
The tape allegedly shows Obama’s wife, sitting on a panel with Louis Farrakhan, making racist remarks about white Americans and using the term "whitey" during a speech at the then Jeremiah Wright-helmed Trinity United Church of Christ. Infowars
Tank Man
Tank Man, or the Unknown Rebel, is the nickname of an anonymous man who became internationally famous when he was videotaped and photographed during the Tiananmen Square protests on June 5, 1989. Several photographs were taken of the man, who stood in front of a column of Chinese Type 59 tanks, preventing their advance. The most widely reproduced version of the photograph was taken by Jeff Widener (Associated Press), from the sixth floor of the Beijing Hotel, about half a mile (800 m) away, through a 400 mm lens. Wikipedia. Below a documentary about the legendary tank man and surrounding events of the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989.
Bilderberg Kingmaker Power
A Portuguese newspaper has reported on something the American corporate media remains cowardly complicit about and dare not even mention - this week’s confab of nearly 200 of the world’s most influential powerbrokers in Chantilly Virginia for the 2008 Bilderberg Group meeting.
The Sol newspaper carries a story today concerning two of the Portuguese attendees of this year’s conference, the mayors of Lisbon and Porto - Antonio Costa and Rui Rio.
(Our Queen Beatrix at an earlier meeting)
Tellingly, the report highlights the fact that Bilderberg has kingmaker power in vetting future Prime Ministers and Presidents, noting how Pedro Santana Lopes and Jose Socrates attended the 2004 meeting in Stresa, Italy before both going on to become Prime Minster of Portugal.
In addition, the report underscores how both Costa and Rio have ambitions to lead their respective parties and potentially run for Prime Minister in the future.
The clear implication is that Costa and Rio are being groomed by Bilderberg for future "selection" as Portuguese Prime Minister in the same way that Bill Clinton and Tony Blair were vetted by the secretive organization in the early 1990’s.
3 Jun 2008
Ahmadinejad says Israel will soon disappear
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad predicted on Monday that Muslims would uproot "satanic powers" and repeated his controversial belief that Israel will soon disappear, the Mehr news agency reported.
"I must announce that the Zionist regime (Israel), with a 60-year record of genocide, plunder, invasion and betrayal is about to die and will soon be erased from the geographical scene," Ahmadinejad said.
"Today, the time for the fall of the satanic power of the United States has come and the countdown to the annihilation of the emperor of power and wealth has started."
The White House quickly dismissed Ahmadinejad's latest broadside against Israel and accused him of having "total disregard" for the Iranian people's hopes and needs.
Since taking the presidency in August 2005, the Iranian president has repeatedly provoked international outrage by predicting Israel is doomed to disappear.
"I tell you that with the unity and awareness of all the Islamic countries all the satanic powers will soon be destroyed," he said to a group of foreign visitors ahead of the 19th anniversary of the death of revolutionary leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.
Ahmadinejad also again expressed his apocalyptic vision that tyranny in the world be abolished by the return to earth of the Mahdi, the 12th imam of Shiite Islam, alongside great religious figures including Jesus Christ.
"With the appearance of the promised saviour... and his companions such as Jesus Christ, tyranny will be soon be eradicated in the world."
2 Jun 2008
two radio reporters ambushed in Oaxaca
On April 7, two radio reporters from a community radio were ambushed in Putla de Guerrero, Oaxaca, and shot to death. Teresa Bautista Flores, 24, and Felicitas Martínez, 20, two women journalists working for La Voz que Rompe el Silencio (The Voice that Breaks the Silence), were murdered allegedly by paramilitary forces. Three other people were wounded in the shooting: Jaciel Vázquez, aged 3, and his parents.
In an interview with Radio Bemba in Sonora, Mexico, Jorge Albino, coordinator of La Voz que Rompe el Silencio said that the radio station had been receiving death threats since its inception. The station was inagurated on January 20 to serve the Trique indigenous community in San Juan Copala, a year after the locality was granted administrative autonomy.
The Mexican branch of the World Association of Community Radio Broadcasters (AMARC) said there have been acts of violence against other small radio stations belonging to indigenous groups in Oaxaca, such as Radio Nandia in 2006 and Radio Calenda in 2007. Reporters Without Borders, an international organization created to defend press freedom and journalists under threat, reported that risks run by the press in Oaxaca state are common, where the political climate continues to be tense.
Two journalists were murdered in Oaxaca during a major wave of protests against state governor Ulíses Ruiz Ortíz in 2006. They were Indymedia reporter and U.S. citizen Bradley Will, and Raúl Marcial Pérez, an indigenous community leader and columnist for the regional daily El Gráfico. No one has been brought to justice for their murders.
La Voz que Rompe el Silencio is considered a vital instrument to establish peace in the region, said Jorge Albino in his interview with Radio Bemba. “The blood of our colleagues were not shed in vain. In fact, it is with their blood that we will continue our work, boost the radio for the betterment of the Triquis community,” he said.
US accused of holding terror suspects on prison ships
The United States is operating "floating prisons" to house those arrested in its war on terror, according to human rights lawyers, who claim there has been an attempt to conceal the numbers and whereabouts of detainees.
Details of ships where detainees have been held and sites allegedly being used in countries across the world have been compiled as the debate over detention without trial intensifies on both sides of the Atlantic. The US government was yesterday urged to list the names and whereabouts of all those detained.
Information about the operation of prison ships has emerged through a number of sources, including statements from the US military, the Council of Europe and related parliamentary bodies, and the testimonies of prisoners.
The analysis, due to be published this year by the human rights organisation Reprieve, also claims there have been more than 200 new cases of rendition since 2006, when President George Bush declared that the practice had stopped.
It is the use of ships to detain prisoners, however, that is raising fresh concern and demands for inquiries in Britain and the US.
31 May 2008
Caring or cruel? Inside the primate laboratory
Anna stares at the computer screen and considers her options. In front of her are two shapes - a flower and a stripy diamond. If she picks the right one she will be rewarded with banana milkshake, but the wrong choice will briefly switch the lights off in her Perspex box. She opts for the diamond and is plunged into darkness.
During the next nine minutes Anna makes the same mistake over and over again. The neuroscientists who designed this experiment are testing how good Anna is at learning new rules. Over the last few weeks she has learned that the diamond was her ticket to a tasty, sugary drink, but this is the first test in which the rules have been reversed. Most of the subjects adapt quickly. But Anna is different.
In March she was subjected to precision brain surgery in which researchers destroyed a small area of her brain. To the untrained eye this has not affected her behaviour at all; she moves, eats and socialises normally. But the experiments are showing that the specific brain region knocked out is crucial for subtle behavioural abilities.
30 May 2008
Moronic priest talks about atheism on Fox News
This guy is simply laughable in his arguments. But what else to be expected on Fox News? Originally from One Good Move: onegoodmove.org
The most obvious case in this is his first point: atheism in it's weakest sense does not say there is not a god. Atheism is simply the lack of theistic belief. An atheist is not primarily a person who believes that a god does ~not~ exist, rather ~does not~ believe in the existence of a god. It's that simple. Atheists always leave open the possibility there is this weird cosmic thing-a-ma-jig, we simply demand some evidence before believing in such. None has come forward that hasn't been thoroughly refuted.
Uncontacted tribe photographed near Brazil-Peru border
Members of one of the world’s last uncontacted tribes have been spotted and photographed from the air near the Brazil-Peru border. The photos were taken during several flights over one of the remotest parts of the Amazon rainforest in Brazil’s Acre state.
‘We did the overflight to show their houses, to show they are there, to show they exist,’ said uncontacted tribes expert José Carlos dos Reis Meirelles Júnior. Meirelles works for FUNAI, the Brazilian government’s Indian affairs department. ‘This is very important because there are some who doubt their existence.’
Meirelles says that the group’s numbers are increasing. But other uncontacted groups in the region, whose homes have been photographed from the air, are in severe danger from illegal logging in Peru. Logging is driving uncontacted tribes over the border and could lead to conflict with the estimated five hundred uncontacted Indians already living on the Brazilian side.
‘What is happening in this region [of Peru] is a monumental crime against the natural world, the tribes, the fauna and is further testimony to the complete irrationality with which we, the ‘civilised’ ones, treat the world,’ said Meirelles.
There are more than one hundred uncontacted tribes worldwide, with more than half living in either Brazil or Peru. All are in grave danger of being forced off their land, killed and decimated by new diseases. Survival has launched an urgent campaign to get their land protected, and a unique film narrated by actress Julie Christie.
29 May 2008
Drunk Russian Politician Starts Shooting From Train
If I am to understand correctly, he's drunk on a train, sends an aide to the back to get his shotgun so he can hunt crows from the speeding train...gets trigger happy and so starts taking aim at chicken coups of the locals along the tracks as well. As if hunting crows from a train wasn't a bad enough idea.
Apparently this is a public train no less. I edited out the long lead in of him jabbering on and on and sending the aide to get his gun...I guess he's given to anti-semetic rants, which I think he was doing prior to this, but my Russian isn't so good.
This guy is the #2 in the Duma, and has run for president of russia several times. To his credit, he stops long enough to wave to kids.
Monkey's brain controls robot arm
The animals were able to feed themselves using prosthetic arms, which were controlled by brain activity.
Small probes, the width of a human hair, were inserted into the monkeys' primary motor cortex - the region of the brain that controls movement.
Writing in Nature journal, the authors said their work could eventually help amputees and people who are paralysed.
Lead researcher Dr Andrew Schwartz, who is based at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, said: "We are beginning to understand how the brain works using brain-machine interface technology.
"The more we understand about the brain, the better we'll be able to treat a wide range of brain disorders, everything from Parkinson's disease and paralysis to, eventually, Alzheimer's disease and perhaps even mental illness."
28 May 2008
Harvesting body parts in Tanzania: Sexual organs of male and female albinos are particularly sought
Since last month, there have been reports from that country about weird incidents of witchcraft and devil worship rituals involving human body parts.
Though in Kenya too there have been rumours of traditional healers who use human body parts in rituals, it is nothing compared to recent revelations of widespread use of body organs from albinos in Tanzania.
According to reports, the sexual organs of male and female albinos are particularly sought because it is believed they can effect miracle cures or offer mystical powers.
Witch doctors and devil worshippers believe that the organs of these people are a potent remedy when mixed with certain concoctions.
The notion that human body parts can be used to heal or bestow special powers has caused panic among the albino community in Tanzania.
The problem has reached such proportions that Tanzania’s President, Jakaya Kikwete, used his monthly television address to announce a crackdown on the traditional healers as well as plans to register albinos to improve their safety. “These killings are shameful and distressing to our society,” said Mr Kikwete in his Wednesday night speech to the nation. “I am told that people kill albinos and chop their body parts, including fingers, believing they can get rich.”
Videos and films from Nigeria that tout the efficacy of witchcraft are widely to blame for the current crisis in Tanzania.
The phenomenon recently took on an East African dimension when Tanzanian police arrested two Kenyans in the Mara region of Tanzania for allegedly killing an albino woman.
The two men who are said to be from western Kenya are now in police custody in Tanzania.
Reports in Tanzanian media say the incident so incensed the Mara Provincial Commissioner, Luteni Kanali Issa that he revoked licences for foreign traditional healers and ghost busters from Kenya, Uganda and the DRC Congo.
“The influx of these traditional healers has contributed to mass deaths of albinos and soon they will be wiped out,” said Issa. “We will not allow any one to violate their fundamental rights.”
The administrator says the woman was killed at her house at Sarari in Tarime District on March 3 while another was killed at Kijiji cha Bwai Kwitururu, popularly known as ‘Paris’ among the locals.
It later emerged that the Kenyan men had been sent by a traditional healer to collect body parts of an albino, which he claimed would make them fabulously wealthy.
African Press International (API)
Also see The Independent: Crackdown on witchdoctors after albinos killed to harvest body parts
Twin boys Itohowo and Kufre stand surrounded by angry villagers who believe they are bringing evil to their lives
SEE:
The child 'witches' of the Niger Delta
(20 pictures on The Guardian website)
In certain regions of Nigeria, diseases (such as HIV/AIDS, malaria, etc.), accidents, drunkenness, mental health problems, the smoking of marijuana, divorce, infertility and other misfortunes are generally blamed on witchcraft. And evangelical Christian churches are exploiting this superstition for material gain, charging up to three or four months the average working person’s salary for “deliverances.” Now the “prophets” have started naming children as witches, with horrifying consequences:
How Suspected Witches are Treated
- Abandoned, isolated, discriminated, ostracized from the community
- Taken to the forest and slaughtered
- Disgraced publicly and murdered
- Bathed in acid
- Poisoned to death, often with a poisonous local berry (asire)
- Buried alive
- Chained and tortured in churches in order to extract confession
Guardian Film report here. Via The Good Atheist podcast.
UPDATE: More religion as child abuse at [GBG] Atheist News.
Ex-Spokesman Rips Bush
Former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan slams President Bush on domestic and foreign issues, such as Iraq and Hurricane Katrina, in his upcoming memoir saying Bush was not "open and forthright on Iraq" and was slow in his response to Katrina.
Politico.com reported late Tuesday McClellan's harsh words include allegations that two top aides held a secret West Wing meeting to get their story straight about the CIA leak case at a time when federal prosecutors were after them, and that Bush relied on "propaganda" to sell the war in Iraq.
The former secretary alleges in his book "What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and Washington's Culture of Deception," that I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, the vice president’s then chief of staff, and Karl Rove, the president’s then senior adviser, "had at best misled" him about their role in the disclosure of former CIA operative Valerie Plame’s identity, the Web site reported.
FOXNews.com - www.politico.com
BUT ALSO SEE: Phony McClellan Controversy Hyped To Cast Suspicion On Iraq Propaganda on INFOWARS.COM
Olmert 'took cash in envelopes'
Morris Talansky told an Israeli court he did not know how the money was spent, but linked it to Ehud Olmert's "love" of "expensive" luxury goods.
Police are investigating whether the PM took up to $500,000 (£250,000) in bribes or illegal campaign donations.
Mr Olmert says sums from Mr Talansky were legal campaign contributions.
Mr Talansky made his claim during testimony under oath at the request of prosecutors, before his expected return to the United States.
"I gave [Mr Olmert] cash in envelopes," the millionaire campaign fundraiser said, according to a transcript of the hearing.
"I asked him why I couldn't write a cheque and he said it's because of the way the money is channelled."
When asked how the money was spent by Mr Olmert, Mr Talansky said: "I only know that he loved expensive cigars. I know he loved pens, watches. I found it strange."
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