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Headline News 6-18-09
No Sign of Movement on Either Side as Iran Protests Continue
Hundreds of thousands of pro-Mousavi protesters remain in the streets of Tehran and other major cities, demanding that the Guardian Council throw out the results of last Friday’s presidential election. But the rallies show no sign of ending and the stalemate could go on for days.Read more
ElBaradei Has ‘Gut Feeling’ Iran Seeks Nuclear Weapons
International Atomic Energy Agency chief Mohamed ElBaradei says he has a “gut feeling” Iran wants to have nuclear weapons “to send a message to their neighbors and the rest of the world: Don’t mess with us.” The Iranian government is poised to open the Bushehr nuclear energy plant, insisting it is for peaceful purposes.Read more
US Drone Attack Kills 13 in South Waziristan
US drones launched an attack on a compound near South Waziristan’s capital of Wana Thursday, killing 13 people and wounding an unknown number of others. According to residents, most were killed when locals rushed to help rescue the wounded trapped under the rubble, and the drones fired more missiles. Read more
February Killing of US Soldier Puts Uncomfortable Spotlight on Mosul Police
In February, two Iraqi policemen in Mosul killed a US soldier and wounded four others. Last week the US turned over two suspects to Iraqi police, who still haven’t brought the suspects before a judge. With just two weeks to go before US troops leave Mosul, the incident is casting doubts if the police can really operate independently. Read more
Iraqi Oil Minister accused of mother of all sell-outs
On June 29 and 30, Iraqi Oil Minister, Hussain Shahristani, will award contracts to the world's largest oil companies to develop six of Iraq's largest oil-producing fields. Fayad al-Nema, director of Iraq’s South Oil Company, said: "The contracts will put the Iraqi economy in chains and shackle its independence for the next 20 years." Read more
Clinton, Israeli FM Clash Over Settlements
Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman Wednesday ruled out a demand by Secretary of State Hilary Clinton to freeze further growth by Israeli settlers. The major issue keeping the two sides apart is Israel’s claim the Bush Administration secretly made a deal allowing Israel to continue natural growth in the settlements.Read more
Activists Urge Obama to Use Trade Pact as Leverage
The US is coming under intense pressure from rights organizations and environmental groups to redefine its trade pact with Peru. Andrew Miller of Amazon Watch said: "The U.S.-Peru Trade Agreement gave license to the [Alan] Garcia administration to roll back indigenous rights and has contributed to increasing social conflict and human rights abuses in Peru." Read more
Some Israelis Prize Ahmadinejad's Role
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has gained unlikely supporters in Israel, a country he wants to eliminate. Meir Dagan, chief of Israel's Mossad spy agency, told a closed Knesset committee hearing Ahmadinejad's reputation as a Holocaust-denying rabble-rouser makes it easier for Israel to enlist international support against Iran's nuclear program. Dagan said a victory for Ahmadinejad's challenger, Mir Hossein Mousavi would have presented Israel with "a graver problem." Read more
AIG's ex-CEO had private jet fly stock to Bermuda
Maurice "Hank" Greenberg, former head of ailing US insurance giant AIG told a court Wednesday he had a private jet fly a large block of the company's stock to Bermuda to prevent AIG from seizing it. A key witness in the dispute between Starr International and AIG, Greenberg admitted to being "angry" at suddenly losing his job at the company he had built into the world's largest insurer. Read more
Gonzales's Advice to Bush on How to Avoid War Crimes
Domestic
In January, 2002 then-White House counsel Alberto Gonzales advised George Bush to deny al-Qaeda and Taliban prisoners protections under the Geneva Conventions because doing so "substantially reduces the threat of domestic criminal prosecution under the War Crimes Act" and "provide a solid defense to any future prosecution." Two weeks later, Bush signed an action memorandum addressed to Dick Cheney, which denied baseline protections to al-Qaeda and Taliban prisoners under the Third Geneva Convention. That memo, according to a bipartisan report by the Senate Armed Services Committee, opened the door to "considering aggressive techniques," which were then developed with the complicity of then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Bush's National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice.The committee's December 11 report says: "The President's order closed off application of Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions, which would have afforded minimum standards for humane treatment, to al-Qaeda or Taliban detainees."
Ft. Detrick inventory finds 9,220 untracked pathogens
Domestic
Army officials said Wednesday an inventory of potentially deadly pathogens at Fort Detrick's infectious disease laboratory found more than 9,000 vials that had not been accounted for. Investigators at the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases in Frederick found 9,220 samples that hadn't been included in a database. Col. Mark Kortepeter, the institute's deputy commander, said some vials contained some dangerous pathogens, including the Ebola virus, anthrax bacteria and botulinum toxin. Most of them, forgotten inside freezer drawers, hadn't been used in years or even decades. Kortepeter said the vast majority were left there by scientists who had left the institute.. Richard Ebright, a Rutgers professor who follows biosecurity, said: "Nine thousand, two hundred undocumented samples is an extraordinarily serious breach. It is unacceptable" The institute has been under pressure to tighten security in the wake of the 2001 anthrax attacks, which killed five people.
Biggest Shift in US Health Care May Emerge in 45-Day Sprint
Domestic
Congress Thursday began crafting legislation that Democratic leaders plan to push through both chambers by their August recess. The measure may require all Americans to get medical insurance, force insurers to accept all patients and end the tax break for employer-paid health benefits. These changes may be hammered out with unprecedented speed. Barack Obama has made a health-care overhaul his top domestic priority, using his February budget proposal to call it a "moral" imperative to extend coverage to the country's 46 million uninsured. Obama also tied the long-term fiscal soundness of the U.S. to controlling medical costs. Health care consumes 18 percent of the U.S. economy and may rise to 34 percent by 2040. Robert Blendon, a professor of health policy and political analysis at Harvard University said: " I don't think we've ever had anything this large in American history aimed to go this quickly," adding: “They're moving at a pace we've never seen before."
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