Firebrand Shi'ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr on Friday threw down the gauntlet: he threatened to resume attacks against U.S. troops if they don't leave Iraq "without retaining bases or signing agreements."
Firebrand Shi'ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr on Friday threw down the gauntlet: he threatened to resume attacks against U.S. troops if they don't leave Iraq "without retaining bases or signing agreements."
This much is agreed - a double bombing in Baghdad struck a school bus and those responding to the first blast. But the difference in casualty figures was stark. Iraqi officials said 31 people died; the U.S. military put the death toll at five.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has obtained evidence suggesting that documents which have been described as technical studies for a secret Iranian nuclear weapons-related research program may have been fabricated.
The documents in question were acquired by U.S. intelligence in 2004 from a still unknown source -- most of them in the form of electronic files allegedly stolen from a laptop computer belonging to an Iranian researcher. The US has based much of its push for sanctions against Iran on these documents.
Two former British military officers are expected to give crucial evidence against Georgia when an international inquiry is convened to establish who started the country’s bloody five-day war with Russia in August.
Ryan Grist, a former British Army captain, and Stephen Young, a former RAF wing commander, are said to have concluded that, before the Russian bombardment began, Georgian rockets and artillery were hitting civilian areas in the breakaway region of South Ossetia every 15 or 20 seconds.
Their accounts seem likely to undermine the American-backed claims of President Mikhail Saakashvili of Georgia that his little country was the innocent victim of Russian aggression and acted solely in self-defence.
The U.S. military acknowledged today that 37 civilians were killed and 35 injured during fighting this week in Kandahar province between insurgents and coalition forces.
Although the American statement stopped short of taking direct blame for civilian casualties in a southern province that is one of the country's most active battlefields, it represented an unusually swift public response to claims of mass casualties made by Afghan officials.
The US military said today it was investigating reports that a bombing strike it carried out on a remote Afghan village killed dozens of members of a wedding party, including more than 20 children.
TVNL Comment: George Bush will add as many notches to his killer belt as possible in these last days of absolute power.
A wave of violence, including an assassination attempt against a deputy oil minister, swept through Baghdad and neighboring Diyala Province on Monday as Parliament passed a bill that would grant the country's embattled minorities fewer guaranteed seats in upcoming elections.
The prospects of the enactment of the bill, which must still be approved by Iraq's executive council, is unclear. The council is composed of the country's president and two vice-presidents.
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