Author: Alejandro

Member of prominent Shi’a party calls for a complete withdrawal of all foreign troops and rejects permanent foreign military bases, but also supports greater decentralization of the Iraqi government, while Australia calls for snap election with the front-runner party declaring support for a complete withdrawal from Iraq: Top Shi’ite Seeks Total US Pullout (Agence France…

The Vatican’s head of interfaith dialogue and the head of the Anglican Church respond positively to the consensus letter from 138 top Muslim scholars of different schools of thought: Vatican Official Welcomes Islamic Initiative (Catholic World News) Anglicans Welcome Letter from Muslims (Associated Press/Yahoo) The CIA’s inspector general, a vocal inside critic of the agency’s…

“In refusing to consider Mr. Masri’s appeal, the Supreme Court has left an innocent person without any remedy for his wrongful imprisonment and torture. It has damaged America’s standing in the world and established the nation as Supreme Enabler of the Bush administration’s efforts to avoid accountability for its actions.”—New York Times editorial Supreme Disgrace…

With nauseating irony, a federal circuit court judge prevents the release a Guantanamo detainee for fear of being tortured in his home country, while the Supreme Court refuses to hear Lebanese-German citizen’s appealing claiming he was abducted and tortured based on the government’s argument of “state secrets privilege”: Supreme Court Refuses to Hear Torture Appeal…

Some members of Congress are ready to put electoral viability above the principle of liberty, signaling their willingness to make permanent the Big Brother powers of the Protect America Act: Democrats Seem Ready to Extend Wiretap Powers (New York Times) Failed satire or a dirty trick? Flyers posted on college campus to embarrass a group…

Iraqi political leaders now see national reconciliation not as goal, but as end result of more limited and efficient government run by the best people for the job, not political and sectarian cronyism: Top Iraqis Pull Back From Key U.S. Goal (Washington Post) Play written by local rights activist lampooning state officials for distorting so-called…

As a New York Times editorial asserts that banning torture and reviving the rule of law in Guantánamo Bay would not harm American lives, a federal judge reinstates 16 lawsuits that allow 40 detainees to challenge the legality of their imprisonment: On Torture and American Values (New York Times) Judge Reverses Guantanamo Ruling (Associated Press/MSNBC)…

After an expose by New York Times revealed secret endorsement of torture techniques, battles in Congress erupt over the treatment of terrorism suspects and whether Congress has been properly informed of White House legal policies: Debate Erupts on Techniques Used by C.I.A. (New York Times) In an odd attempt to smear Turkey’s mildly Islamist AKP-led…

The latest details of the Justice Department’s complicity of sanctioning torture reveal secret re-endorsement of brutal interrogation tactics again in 2005 under AG Gonzales after effectively banning it under acting AG Jack Goldsmith in 2004: Secret U.S. Endorsement of Severe Interrogations (New York Times)  While three Anglican bishops go public with a private letter sent to PM Gordon Brown…

As some members of Congress seek to unravel the mystery shrouding invasive NSA and FBI programs by pressing telecoms to disclose more information about their collusion with the government, a former high-level Justice Department official testified that the White House’s secrecy surrounding the NSA wiretapping was so tight that they kept the Attorney General and…