Free Republic

Enlarge ImageOn track. Colonies of genetically corrected cells taken from Fanconi anemia patients show red and yellow, markers associated with pluripotency. Credit: Juan Carlos Izpisúa Belmonte Two papers published this week appear to bring closer the day when embryonic-like stem cells can be used to treat human diseases. One study describes what scientists say is the safest method yet to produce these cells. The other reports success in using the cells to begin correcting a rare genetic disorder known as Fanconi anemia. Induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells were first reported in 2006 by Shinya Yamanaka, a researcher at Kyoto...

Families still hopeful(EDITOR'S NOTE: As the Communist Party of the Philippines marks its 35th founding anniversary this Friday, the Inquirer is coming out with this special report on the bloody purges within the party in the 1980s. With the country under Ferdinand Marcos' rule by martial law, the outlawed Marxist-Maoist party rose to the height of its political and military strength. It was also a time of infiltration by "deep-penetration agents" by the Marcos military. Within the party, hundreds of men and women who had dedicated their lives to what they believed was a noble cause, were suspected of being...

THE Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) said the revolutionary movement continues to gain strength in Panay Island amid massive military operations. "The rebel movement registered significant gains in 2003 as it frustrated intensive military operations," the CPP said in a statement marking their recent 35th Founding Anniversary. A military officer in the region, however, said there is no reason for the CPP to celebrate because it has done nothing for the country except contribute to the destruction of government properties, killing of own comrades and conduct of extortion activities. He added if the underground movement wanted reforms they should...

Ka Roger’s raspy voice filters out of the morning radio program, casual and so commonplace that millions of Filipino listeners have come to regard it as part of the daily news rather than a disturbing presence of a guerrilla openly challenging a government. “There are two governments in this country, the revolutionary government and the reactionary government,” said Roger, nom de guerre of Gregorio Rosal, spokesman for the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) and its armed wing, the New People’s Army (NPA). “They can’t deny that we exist and we exercise government powers,” Rosal said. Nilo de la Cruz,...

BAGUIO, Philippines, Aug 17 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - The spokesman of the communist insurgent movement in the Philippines Saturday, August 17, 2002, called for attacks on U.S. troops and companies in reaction to the U.S. labeling the group a terrorist organization, news agencies reported. Gregorio Rosal, spokesman of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), said the label was a sign of American "preparations for justifying its violation of Philippine sovereignty and launching a war of aggression," against local communist guerrillas. In a statement released in the southern mountain city of Rosal, he said U.S. troops are vulnerable targets...

THE HAGUE — The assets of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) and its exiled founder Jose Ma. Sison have been frozen following a request from the United States, which had put the group on a "terrorist" blacklist, the Dutch government said Tuesday. Dutch Foreign Ministry spokesman Bart Jochems said the Netherlands authorities have also asked European Union member-countries to freeze assets of the CPP and Sison. At Malacañang, President Arroyo welcomed yesterday the Dutch government’s move, saying she hoped such act would "hasten the peace talks" that may lead the CPP-NPA to participate in the parliamentary struggle instead...

Recently, I received a message from the Airline Pilots' Security Alliance (1), which is a coalition of the Allied Pilots' Association, the Coalition of Airline Pilots' Associations, the Air Line Pilots' Association, and the Independent Pilots' Association. The message concerned arming commercial airline pilots, but it provided some very good information the national media seems to have overlooked. For instance: “Most people don't know that for many decades after the dawn of commercial aviation, airline pilots carried firearms in the cockpit without incident. However, in late 1987, after a suicidal attacker broke into the cockpit of an airliner, murdered the...