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DENVER (AP) - A National Guardsman testifying at a hearing for U.S. soldiers accused of killing an Iraq general said he saw classified U.S. personnel beat prisoners with a sledgehammer handle and mock the general's death, according to a transcript. The transcript, obtained by The Denver Post, includes an exchange during the hearing that suggests the CIA was involved. Sgt. 1st Class Gerold Pratt of the Utah National Guard said he saw unidentified U.S. personnel use the 15-inch wooden handle to hit prisoners. "They'd ask you a question, and if they didn't like it, they'd hit you," he said, according...

Since his arrest last July -- he was accused of helping to plan the post-election uprisings -- Kian's family and friends have made countless appeals for clemency to the Iranian government, written letters to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad pleading his innocence, and signed dozens of petitions. All to no avail. I've come now to realize that the regime probably thinks we're obtuse. Indeed, they know better than anyone that Kian is an innocent man. As the expression goes in Persian, "da'va sar-e een neest," i.e. that's not what this fight is about.

BEIJING, July 17 (Xinhuanet) -- The 2005 International Beer Festival will combine Munich characteristics, according to the festival organizers. The festival will introduce a Munich beer tent. Both the inner side and outside decoration will display characteristics of the Munich Beer Festival, such as German-style wooden chairs, German cooks and German bands. The festival has already attracted 30 international and domestic beer manufacturers, with over 100 kinds of beer. The annual beer festival was launched in 1999 and moved from Beijing to Dalian in 2002. It has already become one of the most influential beer festivals in the world. The...

The Justice Department has launched a criminal investigation into whether Democratic Senators Dick Durbin, Jay Rockefeller and Ron Wyden leaked details about a secret "black ops" CIA satellite program last December in a move that may have seriously compromised national security, former Deputy Undersecretary of Defense Jed Babbin said on Saturday. "The CIA made a request to the Justice Department to investigate and possibly bring criminal charges against these three [senators]," Babbin told WABC Radio host Monica Crowley. "My information is that investigation is ongoing." Rockefeller is the vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee and Durbin is the No....

Meanwhile, There's A War On by John HinderakerWe noted here the mysteriously under-covered story of the three would-be terrorists who were arrested in Italy after vowing to launch an attack on America that would dwarf September 11. A reader sent us a link to this article, which has more: The mainstream U.S. media outlets have failed to report a major terrorist plot against the U.S. - because it would tend to support President Bush's use of NSA domestic surveillance, according to media watchdog groups. News of a planned attack masterminded by three Algerians operating out of Italy was widely...

The wife of disgraced former congressman Randy "Duke" Cunningham felt deceived about the extent of her now-estranged husband's corruption, she said in her first public interview since the scandal broke last year. Nancy Cunningham told The New Republic magazine that she didn't question junkets paid by defense contractors because other senior congressional figures, including Speaker Dennis Hastert, joined in. "How can it be illegal or unethical if the most important man in Congress is doing it?" she asked interviewer Kitty Kelley, the celebrity biographer. Duke Cunningham, who held seats on powerful House intelligence and appropriations committees, resigned from Congress last...

Taliban hang Afghan tribal chief Sat Jul 16, 2005 Taliban guerrillas hanged a pro-government tribal chief in the troubled southern Afghan province of Zabul, accusing him of being an American spy, officials said on Saturday. Malik Agha's killing was the fifth in the past six weeks and came as violence mounts in the run up to the Sept. 18 parliamentary elections that the Taliban have vowed to disrupt. Agha was kidnapped on Friday by Taliban remnants as he came out of a mosque in Atghar district of Zabul and was hanged in a tree, district chief Gul Habib said. Agha...

MOSCOW - Russia on Friday rejected accusations by the top U.S. military officer that it, along with China, was trying to bully smaller Central Asian nations out of hosting U.S. troops fighting terrorism. "We have been bewildered by the comments" of Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, a Foreign Ministry statement said. "As is well-known, all decisions made within the framework of the SCO are consensus-based and reflect the collective opinion of all the member-countries," the ministry said. The Shanghai Cooperation Organization, a regional alliance led by China and Russia, last week called on the...

FBI Intelligence Analyst Arrested, Accused of Passing Classified Information; Former Philippines National Police Official Also Charged NEWARK - An FBI intelligence analyst at Fort Monmouth and a former official with the Philippines National Police were arrested Saturday morning, charged in a federal criminal complaint with acting as unregistered agents of a foreign official and passing classified information to that official and others in the Republic of the Philippines, U.S. Attorney Christopher J. Christie and FBI Special Agent in Charge Leslie Wiser, Jr. announced.Leandro Aragoncillo, 46, a former U.S. Marine, was arrested by Special Agents of the FBI at his home...

A Saudi national who served as director of the Virginia office of the Muslim World League (MWL) has been deported by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents on immigration charges. ICE spokesman Dean Boyd said Abdullah Alnoshan, 44, of Falls Church, was returned to Saudi Arabia over the weekend. He was arrested in July by ICE and FBI agents assigned to the Joint Terrorism Task Force. A criminal complaint charged Alnoshan with conspiring to commit immigration fraud by using fake employment documents to enter, exit and live in the United States. Alnoshan also was accused of seeking to deter...

Kofi Annan had what perhaps was the quote of the week recently. In an editorial displayed in The Washington Post, Annan said of Iraq: “In a media-hungry age, visibility is often regarded as proof of success, but this does not necessarily hold true in Iraq.” Most of Iraq’s successes have been away from the camera. They have been too far away for most Americans to see. President Bush has stated that “successes” abound in Iraq, but he has failed to elaborate. Therefore, I followed Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi’s advice and searched for the real facts about Iraq. We do see...

SNIPPET: "The Tablighi Jamaat (TJ) name has come up before in connection with terrorism plots, including the October 2002 Portland Seven and the September 2002 Lackawanna Six cases in the United States, as well as the August 2006 plot to bomb airliners en route from London to the United States, the July 7, 2005, London Underground bombings and the July 2007 attempted bombings in London and Glasgow, Scotland. Over the past several years we also have received several queries about TJ from U.S. law enforcement officials who are concerned about the group’s presence and activities in the United States. U.S....

In particular, Islamic radicals are looking to create cells of so-called white al Qaeda, non-Arab members who can evade racial profiling used by police forces to watch for potential terrorists. "They want to look European to carry out operations in Europe," said a Western intelligence agent in Belgrade, the capital of Serbia and Montenegro, adjacent to Bosnia. "It's yet another evolution in the tools used by terrorists." ... n addition, Serbian police accidentally came across a key suspect in the March 2004 bombings of Madrid commuter trains while he was traveling through the country by train. He arrived in the...

The explosive seized among terrorists supposed in Denmark was TATP COPENHAGEN - the substance, seized at one of the terrorists supposed stopped in Denmark last week, is TATP (triacetone triperoxyde), a chemical explosive snuffed by the islamist ones and used in particular at the time of the attacks of London, according to a Danish newspaper The bottle seized on September 5 in the residence of one of the supposed terrorists, at the time of a haul of the police force with Odense, contains "a clear liquid including/understanding a synthetic mixture for the manufacture of the TATP and of the...

State and federal authorities have three men in custody here in what investigators describe as a possible terrorist plot by an obscure Islamic group in California state prisons. FBI officials, who are overseeing the investigation, say they are not convinced that the three men posed a serious threat of violence on their own. But the bureau is continuing to investigate the possibility that they were part of a larger group planning to attack National Guard installations, synagogues and other locations in Southern California. The latest suspect to be arrested is Hamad Riaz Samana, 21, a Pakistani citizen who was taken...

During the raid to arrest two robbery suspects at a local apartment, police said officers uncovered details of a possible terrorist cell, with alleged plans for an attack in the Southland. Images In an exclusive investigation, Channel 4 News has learned more about the two suspects under investigation by the FBI's counter terrorism task force and an alleged plot that targeted several prominent locations in the Los Angeles area.ANA GARCIA (REPORTER): Is it possible that an Islamic Prison Gang with possible links to Middle Eastern operatives were planning to blow up these targets? El Al Airlines at LAXIsraeli Consulate On...

SANTA ANA – A man was sentenced to 70 months in prison today for his role in a domestic terrorism plot to wage war on the United States by attacking Jewish synagogues and military bases. Hammad Riaz Samana is the fourth member of Jami'yyat Ul-Islam Is-Shaheeh, or JIS, a prison-founded group that wanted to make a political statement that also had plans to attack the Israeli consulate in Los Angeles and El Al Israel Airlines at the Los Angeles International Airport. Samana was 21 when he was charged in the case in July 2005, along with the cell's mastermind, Kevin...

Following recent comments from Lord's Resistance Army rebel leader Joseph Kony in which he denied committing atrocities, Ugandan Ochola John, 25, responds by telling his story. He was abducted by rebels from his village, Namkora in northern Uganda, which was attacked in February 2002. During the attack 50 people were axed to death and he was one of 35 abductees. Ochola John was deformed by rebels from Joseph Kony's Lord's Resistance Army I wish I could be born again. It hurts me to see my reflection because of the way I now look. The memories of it all are so...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A fired CIA agent, who a newspaper says told superiors in 2001 that Iraq had abandoned part of its nuclear program, is asking the FBI to investigate allegations that the spy agency dismissed him for refusing to falsify intelligence. A July 11 letter to FBI Director Robert Mueller from the former agent's attorney suggests CIA officials may be guilty of criminal violations involving intelligence he produced on weapons of mass destruction in 2000 that contradicted an official agency position. The former agent's attorney, Roy Krieger, said his client initially asked the CIA's inspector general to investigate charges...

Ahmed Ressam was resentenced this morning to 22 years in federal prison for conspiring to bomb the Los Angeles International Airport despite telling a judge that he recanted everything he has told the federal government about terrorist activities. Federal prosecutors had urged U.S. District Judge John Coughenour to send Ressam to prison for life — a sentence Ressam said he would accept now that he had cleared his conscience about his cooperation, which ended in 2003. Prosecutors pointed out that Ressam's defiance has cost two high-profile terrorism prosecutions so far, and that Ressam has actively tried to help the cases...