Private US security guards being investigated over a shooting in Iraq that left 17 civilians dead, have reportedly been offered immunity by the US state department. The Blackwater employees, who were guarding an embassy convoy at the time of the shooting, were told they would not be prosecuted over statements to officials, the Associated Press news agency said. "Once you give immunity, you can't take it away," a senior law enforcement official ...

A United Nations human rights expert called on the US to put on trial or release all people detained as “unlawful enemy combatants”, move quickly to close the Guantanamo Bay prison camp in Cuba and abolish military commissions. In a report, Martin Scheinin, the UN’s independent investigator on human rights in the fight against terrorism, expressed grave concern at US detention practices, the existence and operation of military courts, and ...

By Nicole Belle Download (Windows) Download (Quicktime) BILL MOYERS: Remember “The Lives of Others” - the movie that won this year’s Academy Award for best foreign language film….a story of life under East Germany’s secret police. The critic Roger Ebert said: “The movie is relevant today, as our government ignores habeas corpus, practices secret torture, and asks for the right to wiretap and eavesdrop on its citizens. ...

By Jason Miller RINF Alternative News “America touts itself as the land of the free, but the number one freedom that you and I have is the freedom to enter into a subservient role in the workplace. Once you exercise this freedom you’ve lost all control over what you do, what is produced, and how it is produced. And in the end, the product doesn’t belong to you. The only ...

Kathy Gill It sounded good: Egyptian student helps 9-11 hijackers with airplane radio. Too good, in fact, because Abdallah Higazy is suing an FBI agent because of a coerced a confession in the wake of the 9-11 attack. And the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals has muddied things by withdrawing its original decision allowing Higazy's suit to move forward. In the substitute opinion, it has redacted Higazy's testimony about the forced confession. Higazy, who had arrived in the States on 27 August 2001 to study computer science at Polytechnic University in Brooklyn, escaped from his room at the Millennium Hotel on 9-11-2001 with only his student ID and cash. He was arrested in December 2001 after an ex-cop-turned-security-guard (falsely) claimed to have found an aviation radio and Egyptian passport in Higazy's hotel room. The FBI believed the security guard, not Higazy, and put him in the same maximum security jail as Zacarias Moussaoui. In January 2002, the FBI charged Higazy with "making false statements" after his interrogation with Agent Templeton, even though he did not sign a confession; the court denied bail. Higazy was released two days after "a private pilot who was staying one floor below Higazy at the Millennium on Sept. 11, returned to the hotel looking for his aviation radio." But the story does not end here. The original Court decision provided online (pdf) included this language:

· Erinys guards accused of causing death in Iraq · Authorities close down UK contractors in Afghanistan Suzanne Goldenberg in Washington The Guardian A British private security firm hired to protect the oil installations of post-invasion Iraq is being sued for causing the death of an American soldier.The case against the Erinys security firm, which reportedly has close ties to the former Iraqi exile Ahmed Chalabi, is believed ...

Order your copy here Only £5.99 “Fool me once …” is the latest offering from one of the UK’s most active Truth Campaigner’s. Recorded live at the Glastonbury Symposium in July 2007 Ian R. Crane, the immediate past Chair of the UK 9/11 Truth Campaign, reflects upon Gordon Brown’s overt commitment to the agenda of the New World Order and offers a startling prediction of what is being planned to accelerate ...

The Bank of the South: An Alternative to IMF and World Bank Dominance  By Stephen Lendman RINF Alternative News In July, 2004, the IMF and World Bank commemorated the 60th anniversary of their founding at Bretton Woods, NH to provide a financial framework of assistance for the postwar world after the expected defeat of Germany and Japan. With breathtaking hypocrisy, an October, 2004 Development Committee Communique stated: "As we celebrate the 60th ...

By John Ware John Ware discloses how the former prime minister was told repeatedly about America's lack of planning for peace – and did nothing Five days after the fall of Saddam, Tony Blair declared: "Iraq will be better. Better for the region, better for the world, better, above all, for the Iraqi people." Yet, as we know, four and a half years later, ...

Condoleeza Rice loses her memory at the most convenient times–call it diplomatic Alzheimers. Asked why America sent an innocent Canadian, Maher Arar, to be tortured in Syria, she answered: My memory of some of the details has faded. Those words are reminiscent of her testimony to the 9/11 Commission in which she repeatedly invoked her imperfect memory. One exchange with Commission member Richard Ben-Veniste ...

Ministers are funding genetically modified crop projects with scores of millions of pounds every year and are colluding with a biotech company to ease its GM tests, the IoS can reveal. Geoffrey Lean on a murky tale that Whitehall tried to hide   Ministers are secretly easing the way for GM crops in Britain, while professing to be impartial on the technology, startling internal documents reveal. The documents, obtained through ...

MoD begins study amid fears that up to 20,000 soldiers may be affected Matthew Taylor and Esther Addley The Guardian The Ministry of Defence is conducting a major study into brain injury in troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan amid fears that thousands of soldiers may have suffered damage after being exposed to high-velocity explosions.The US army says as many as 20% of its soldiers and marines ...

Mike Aivaz and Muriel Kane David Shuster, substituting for Keith Olbermann as host of Countdown, reported on Thursday that Rudy Giuliani's description of himself as the only candidate who foresaw the danger posed by al Qaeda before 9/11 has now been refuted by a leaked document. Typical of Giuliani's claims on the campaign trail is a speech he gave last summer in which ...

Like a cancer, private mercenary firm spreads influence in local communities. When the private military company Blackwater USA, a firm tied to the Bush family through marriage and to right-wing extremist and racist groups through politics and money, established its headquarters in Moyock, North Carolina in an former military reservation in the Great Dismal Swamp, just south of the Virginia border, practically no one noticed. Blackwater was founded in 1997 by ...

By Jacob Hornberger Immediately after he denounced Fidel Castro for being a dictator, President Bush unilaterally decreed new sanctions against Iran, moving the United States closer to war against Iran. Would someone please tell me how it is that Bush exercises such omnipotent power, without even a peep from both Congress and the mainstream press? How is he ...