Free Republic

VIENNA -- An international human rights organization has criticized a U.S. Supreme Court ruling about election spending in America. The criticism comes from a senior official of the 56-nation Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. The head of its office that monitors democratic practices says the ruling effectively lifting limits on election spending by corporations and unions "threatens to further marginalize candidates without strong financial backing or extensive personal resources."...

On October 20 the U.N.'s cultural wing, UNESCO adopted an insidious treaty to preserve the world's "cultural security" — a locution concocted by U.N. Chinese delegates in support of the proposition that culturally weak nations should be able to protect against the influence of culturally powerful ones by barring cultural imports and subsidizing their own culture. The vote in Paris was 148-2, with only the United States and Israel opposed. This latest French- and Canadian-instigated folie by UNESCO, with its history of corruption and anti-Americanism, could ignite the mother of all culture wars and shackle free cultural interchange. The agreement...

Terri Schindler-Schiavo Foundation Urges Wife of Disabled Jacksonville Man to Err on the Side of LifeTo: National DeskContact: Pamela F. Hennessy for the Terri Schindler-Schiavo Foundation, 727-445-1766, phenn@zimp.orgCLEARWATER, Fl., May 14 /Christian Wire Service/ –- The volunteers with the Terri Schindler-Schiavo Foundation, along with the family of Terri Schiavo, are urging Jacksonville, Florida resident, Eliza Thomas, to allow her 34 year old husband to live.The Foundation has learned that Scott Thomas suffered brain injury in September of 2004 and has since been incapacitated and dependent on others. His mother, Pamela Patton, has petitioned the courts for guardianship of the...

HUMAN RIGHTS organisations expressed increasing concern yesterday over the treatment of the captured Iraqis on the American “deck-of-cards” list of most-wanted regime members. Their intervention came after the detention of three more senior officials on Wednesday, including the former chief of military intelligence and the former head of the country’s military air defences. Their arrests brought the total to 11, but the Bush Administration is refusing to disclose where or in what conditions they are being held. The whereabouts of Abu Abbas, the Palestinian behind the 1985 hijacking of the cruise liner Achille Lauro, who was arrested by US special...