potpourri

421 items, displayed chronologically.

Arrests in Spain 'linked to Iraq'

Spanish police early Monday arrested 14 people suspected of recruiting and indoctrinating others to be sent to fight against Western forces in Iraq, according to a government anti-terrorist source. The 14 are of various nationalities.

Report Cites Torture in U.S. Prison

The United States operated a secret prison in Afghanistan as recently as last year, torturing detainees by chaining them to walls and forcing them to listen to loud music in total darkness for days, a human rights group alleged in a report released today.[...] "They were chained to walls, deprived of food and drinking water, and kept in total darkness with loud rap, heavy metal music, or other sounds blared for weeks," the report said. "Some detainees said they were shackled in a manner that made it impossible to lie down or sleep."

Pentagon rolls out stealth PR

A $300 million Pentagon psychological warfare operation includes plans for placing pro-American messages in foreign media outlets without disclosing the U.S. government as the source, one of the military officials in charge of the program says.

ROGUE STATE: Investigator Sees Signs of CIA Role in Abductions

A European investigator said Tuesday that information he has gathered suggests U.S. intelligence operatives have abducted and transferred terrorism suspects in Europe "without respect for any legal standards" and that he has formally asked Poland and Romania whether the CIA operated secret prisons on their soil.

U.N. Official Faults U.S. Detentions

The U.S.-led fight against terrorism is eroding the time-honored international prohibition of torture and other forms of cruel or degrading treatment of prisoners, the top U.N. human rights official said Wednesday in a statement commemorating Human Rights Day.

Lords rule against use of torture evidence

Information which may have been obtained by foreign states using torture cannot be used as evidence against terror suspects in British courts, the Law Lords ruled today.

Cruel treatment banned everywhere, Rice says, signaling policy shift

In what appears to be a major shift in U.S. policy on detainees, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Wednesday that U.S. forces operating overseas are prohibited from mistreating suspected terrorists.

Rice Fails to Clarify U.S. View on Torture

Rice's latest comments left much unclear. She did not try to define banned prisoner interrogation measures or specify what, in the American view, constitutes cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment. She also did not address restrictions imposed by the torture convention on U.S. security contractors.

Pinter rails against US in Nobel prize speech

In a hoarse voice, he accused America of massacring innocent people all over the world in the name of democracy. He asked: "How many people do you have to kill before you qualify to be described as a mass murderer and a war criminal? One hundred thousand?"

WEDNESDAY FUNNIES #1: U.S. Military Covertly Pays to Run Stories in Iraqi Press

As part of an information offensive in Iraq, the U.S. military is secretly paying Iraqi newspapers to publish stories written by American troops in an effort to burnish the image of the U.S. mission in Iraq. [...] Many of the articles are presented in the Iraqi press as unbiased news accounts written and reported by independent journalists. The stories trumpet the work of U.S. and Iraqi troops, denounce insurgents and tout U.S.-led efforts to rebuild the country.

WEDNESDAY FUNNIES #2: Rumsfeld Hasn't Hit a Dead End in Forging Terms for Foe in Iraq

The Pentagon's long struggle over how to describe the war in Iraq moved to new ground Tuesday as Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said he wanted to retire the term "insurgents" in favor of "enemies of the legitimate Iraqi government." Rumsfeld, who has previously described the foe as "deadenders," "former regime elements" and in other terms, told a Pentagon news conference that the insurgent label lent the enemy "more legitimacy than they seem to merit." Iraqis now have a constitutional government that offers them legitimate means of political expression, and the foe lacks broad popular support, Rumsfeld argued.

'Saddam's uniform' up for auction

A military uniform said to have belonged to deposed Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein is being offered for sale by a US auction website. The green uniform, with epaulettes bearing the mark of Saddam Hussein's rank in the Iraqi army, has a starting price of $5,000.

Clark, Hussein Defender, May Put U.S. on Trial

Based on the Dallas native's performances in previous high-profile trials, legal observers say he is almost certain to bypass the specific allegations against Hussein and instead will try to turn the proceedings into a forum for airing his grievances against U.S. foreign policy.

Blair Failed In Dealing With Bush, Book Says

Prime Minister Tony Blair was so "seduced" by the "proximity and glamour of American power" that he failed to use his leverage with President Bush to slow the rush to war with Iraq, Britain's former ambassador to the United States has written in a new book.

Cheney Fights for Detainee Policy

Over the past year, Vice President Cheney has waged an intense and largely unpublicized campaign to stop Congress, the Pentagon and the State Department from imposing more restrictive rules on the handling of terrorist suspects, according to defense, state, intelligence and congressional officials.

Cheney Told Aide of C.I.A. Officer, Lawyers Report

Notes of a previously undisclosed conversation between the vice president and his chief of staff appear to differ from I. Lewis Libby's federal grand jury testimony.

Iraq war forces Western military rethink says IISS

Western military powers are being forced to rethink strategy because conflict in Iraq has shown the limits of their conventional armies, the International Institute of Strategic Studies said on Thursday.

Galloway rejects senate perjury claims

"Because I publicly humiliated this lickspittle senator Norman Coleman - one of [George] Bush's righthand men - in the US senate in May, this sneak revenge attack has been launched over the past 24 hours."

Republicans Testing Ways to Blunt Leak Charges

On Sunday, Republicans appeared to be preparing to blunt the impact of any charges. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, Republican of Texas, speaking on the NBC news program "Meet the Press," compared the leak investigation with the case of Martha Stewart and her stock sale, "where they couldn't find a crime and they indict on something that she said about something that wasn't a crime."

'Cheney cabal hijacked US foreign policy'

Vice-President Dick Cheney and a handful of others had hijacked the government's foreign policy apparatus, deciding in secret to carry out policies that had left the US weaker and more isolated in the world, the top aide to former Secretary of State Colin Powell claimed on Wednesday.

CIA leak: Bush-Rove details sought

Democrats asked the White House on Wednesday for details of President George W. Bush's private conversations in 2003 with top political adviser Karl Rove after conflicting reports about whether Bush was aware of any role by Rove in the outing of a covert CIA operative.

Rove Told Jury Libby May Have Been His Source In Leak Case

White House adviser Karl Rove told the grand jury in the CIA leak case that I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, may have told him that CIA operative Valerie Plame worked for the intelligence agency before her identity was revealed, a source familiar with Rove's account said yesterday.

Spanish judge issues arrest warrant for 3 U.S. soldiers

A judge has issued an international arrest warrant for three U.S. soldiers whose tank fired on a Baghdad hotel during the Iraq war, killing a Spanish journalist and one other, a court official said Wednesday.

A Year Later, Goss's CIA Is Still in Turmoil

A year later, Goss is at loggerheads with the clandestine service he sought to embrace. At least a dozen senior officials -- several of whom were promoted under Goss -- have resigned, retired early or requested reassignment. The directorate's second-in-command walked out of Langley last month and then told senators in a closed-door hearing that he had lost confidence in Goss's leadership.

Cheney's Office Is A Focus in Leak Case

As the investigation into the leak of a CIA agent's name hurtles to an apparent conclusion, special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald has zeroed in on the role of Vice President Cheney's office, according to lawyers familiar with the case and government officials. The prosecutor has assembled evidence that suggests Cheney's long-standing tensions with the CIA contributed to the unmasking of operative Valerie Plame.

New York Times Story on Leak Raises Questions

A story published by the New York Times on Sunday to clarify its coverage of the Valerie Plame leak case has instead raised a series of new questions and complaints about veteran reporter Judith Miller and her supervisors in the long-running controversy. Critics inside the paper and in the wider journalism community said Monday that they found particularly disturbing the revelation that the newspaper's editors seemed unable to control Miller and that the reporter agreed to use a misleading identification to shield the identity of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff.

White House prepares for possible indictments

The White House is bracing itself for the possible indictment of senior officials as Patrick Fitzgerald, the special prosecutor, prepares to wrap up his two-year inquiry into the leaking of a covert CIA agent's name.

Poll: Fading Support For Iraq War

Public opinion is now fairly solidly against the war in Iraq. More than half of Americans – 55% - think the U.S. should have stayed out of Iraq (the highest figure to date), while 41% think taking military action there was the right thing to do. As the war began, Americans overwhelmingly approved of U.S. action against Iraq; 69% said the U.S. did the right thing in taking military action (the highest level of support in our polls for the war).

Airmen Fill the Gaps in Wartime

Straining to find ground troops to maintain its force levels in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Pentagon has begun deploying thousands of Air Force personnel to combat zones in new jobs as interrogators, prison sentries and gunners on supply trucks.

MONDAY FUNNIES: Robertson Accuses Chavez of Seeking Nuclear Material From Iran

"One day we're going to be staring at nuclear weapons and it won't be Katrina facing New Orleans, it's going to be a Venezuelan nuke," Robertson said in an interview.