Politics

Glenn Greenwald – Salon.com

Glenn Greenwald – Salon.com. Just think about this for a minute. Barack Obama, like George Bush before him, has claimed the authority to order American citizens murdered based solely on the unverified, uncharged, unchecked claim that they are associated with Terrorism and pose “a continuing and imminent threat to U.S. persons and interests.” They’re entitled to no charges, no trial, no ability to contest the accusations. Amazingly, the Bush administration’s policy of merely imprisoning foreign nationals (along with a couple of American citizens) without charges — based solely on the President’s claim that they were Terrorists — produced intense controversy…

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Politics

Call for Action: Majid Zamani – UPDATED

UPDATE:  Majid Zamani has been released and I have removed the links to the action website. Received from a friend: Dear Friends, It is now 140 days since a good friend of mine, Majid Zamani, has been imprisoned in the aftermath of the elections in Iran. He is not a known political figure and thus his case gets little attention, yet given that he has studied in the U.S. (University of Illinois and Columbia University), we hear he is under pressure to confess to things he has not done such as training for velvet revolution. A group of his friends…

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Politics

ACLU’s new #torture Video: Justice Denied

The men in the video – Moazzam Begg, Omar Deghayes, Bisher al-Rawi, Ruhal Ahmed and Shafiq Rasul – were detained by the U.S. in Afghanistan and Guantánamo for years, without charge or trial, and without any meaningful opportunity to challenge their detention. In the weeks ahead, we will be releasing more videos that focus on these individuals’ lives before, after and during Guantánamo. WATCH THE VIDEO HERE: http://www.aclu.org/national-security/justice-denied-video-voices-guantanamo Technorati Tags: torture

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Current Affairs Politics

Penis Slicing and Cheney is more Taliban than the Taliban – #torture

Andrew Sullivan brings us two torture related stories today. One pulls on reporting by Glenn Greenwald, in which we find out Binyam Mohamed had his genitals sliced open as torture. If, for some reason, that image doesn’t nauseate you, imagine his name was Benjamin Moses (it is the Hebrew equivalent) and he was in Taliban custody. We surely would be up in arms. Speaking of the Taliban, Andrew also tells us that the Taliban treat their prisoners better than Vice-President Cheney did.

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Politics Religion

Iraqi Voices

Maybe instead of talking about them, we should be listening to them. This is a great project by a great group, and some really wonderful people whom I am privileged to know. Part of what happens when you bring a group of artists to speak to refugees (or really to speak to anyone), is that the subject of art comes up. When people hear that we are artists, they tend to start telling us about the art that they know and love. There stories begin to be told on the level of music and dance, picture and sound.

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Politics Religion

Note from near Urumqi – #Uyghur

Following email was received from a friend. Edited to remove identifying information. Initial email received on July 7, 2009. people who live in xinjiang province feel panic, riot just happened there, they are afraid where and when the riot will happpened again, the matter is really seriou, at the beginning i also heard the news from TV news, then I called my family and friends, but all phone numbers are baring, and was told this number does not exist. I even can not contact anybody and get any news from xinjiang except CCTV news. some calls is not easy to…

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