Free Republic

The Embassy of Venezuela in Mexico has been shown, by very different sectors in that country and in Mexico, to be an instrument of the ideological propaganda and political expansion of the personal interests of Hugo Chávez. Observations of interventionism include giving electoral support to the PRD [Democratic Revolutionary Party of Mexico], even "espionage," as well as a presumed importation of high caliber weapons and contacts with the FARC, ETA and Al Qaeda. Mexico City | Tuesday, 15 November 2005 | Vladimir Villegas is a person of Euro-African heritage showing a good sense of humor and charisma. Tall, robust, sporting...

The US government took the unusual step of accusing Northern Ireland's mainstream unionist parties of an "abdication of responsibility" towards the weekend violence that saw loyalist gunmen shooting live rounds at police officers in some of the worst unrest in years. Fifty officers were injured and 400 plastic bullets were fired by police as they attempted to quell the demonstration. Without identifying any party by name, Mitchell Reiss, George W. Bush's special envoy on Northern Ireland, said: "No political party, and certainly no responsible political leadership, deserves to serve in a government unless it co-operates and supports fully and unconditionally...

The three Irishmen in hiding after being sentenced to 17 years in prison for training Farc rebels in Colombia have returned to Ireland and insisted they are not on the run. Martin McAuley, Niall Connolly and Jim Monaghan have been on the run since a Bogota court overturned their original acquittal in December. A Government spokesman has been quoted as saying the Government had no prior knowledge of the men's return. "This issue was not part of the Government's discussions with Sinn Fein and we had no prior knowledge of their return to Ireland," a spokesperson said. The Department of...

The Kremlin warned Monday of possible retaliation against the United States for sanctions imposed on two major companies in the Russian defense industry. "We cannot rule out certain negative consequences for bilateral relations" between Russia and the United States, presidential administration spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Monday. "This was an unfriendly act toward Russia, and it was not done in a spirit of cooperation." Rosoboronexport chief Sergei Chemezov suggested Monday that a proposed deal for U.S. companies to deliver up to $1 billion in Russian military hardware to Afghanistan and Iraq could be jeopardized by the sanctions, Interfax reported. Meanwhile in...

Nidal Hasan remains incarcerated on death row at the United States Disciplinary Barracks at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. His death sentence was upheld by a military court in 2023 [after all appeals were processed], The last U.S. military execution occurred April 13, 1961, when Army Pvt. John A. Bennett was hanged after being convicted of rape and attempted murder. Nidal Hasan, Ronald Gray, Hasan Akbar, and Timothy Hennis are prisoners currently sentenced to death in the military system. They were imprisoned based on the following crimes: <<>> Nidal Hasan was sentenced to death in 2013 after killing 13 people at Fort...

WASHINGTON (AP) - The CIA took the first step toward a criminal investigation of a leak of possibly classified information on secret prisons to The Washington Post, a U.S. official said Tuesday. The agency's general counsel sent a report to the Justice Department about the Post story, which reported the existence of secret U.S. detention centers for suspected terrorists in Eastern Europe. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the issue deals with classified information, said the referral was made shortly after the Nov. 2 story. The leak investigation into the disclosure of covert CIA officer Valerie Plame's...

“Biden Gets China,” headlined the January 2, 2012 report in The Atlantic. As author Steve Clemons explained, “Vice President Joe Biden will take the lead on the administrations next phase China policy.” This marked a shift to a “strategy of engagement with Biden at the top,” that allows the US to deal with China’s likely next president from a Vice President to a Vice President/Next President status -- and to continue both the Departments of State’s and Treasury’s ongoing engagement with other designated key Chinese leaders.” As Clemons explained, the move to put Biden at the top was “orchestrated” by...

Tehran, Iran -- One of the bodyguards of Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was killed and another wounded when an attempt to ambush the presidential motorcade was thwarted in the southeastern province of Sistan and Baluchestan, according to a semi-official newspaper and local residents. “At 6:50 pm on Thursday, the lead car in the presidential motorcade confronted armed bandits and trouble-makers on the Zabol-Saravan highway”, the semi-official Jomhouri Islami reported on Saturday. “In the ensuing armed clash, the driver of the vehicle, who was an indigenous member of the security services, and one of the president’s bodyguards died, while another bodyguard...

China's Wu Yi cancels meeting with Japan PM KoizumiMon May 23, 2005 08:30 AM ET By Masayuki Kitano TOKYO (Reuters) - Chinese Vice Premier Wu Yi cancelled a meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi on Monday and flew back to China a day earlier than scheduled, saying she had domestic business to attend to. Koizumi said he did not know why Wu was returning to China, and officials in Beijing had no immediate comment on the cancellation of the meeting, which had been seen as another opportunity to improve frayed Sino-Japanese relations. "It would have been a good opportunity...

On 16 June, Gazprom’s Board of Directors finally agreed on the mechanism of buyout of the 10.74% of its shares necessary for the state to become the controlling shareholder in this monopolist company (until that time, the state had controlled 39% of shares in Gazprom). The decision is an element of the consistently implemented plan of strengthening the state’s position in economy. At the same time, it ends a subsequent stage of the battle between Kremlin-based coteries for control of the strategic assets in the energy sector. This battle has laid bare the divisions and conflicting interests among influential Kremlin...

In March of 2007 Iranian Revolutionary Guards General Ali-Reza Ashgari defected to the West through Turkey. General Ashgari is the highest-ranking defector from Iran ever, a huge bonanza for our understanding of the Khomeinist regime's intentions and capabilities with regard to nuclear weapons. If he is for real. Troubling circumstantial evidence suggests that he is not. This week, a public summary of the new National Intelligence Estimate on Iran made worldwide headlines.  Contrary to endless public statements made over three decades from Khomeini to Ahmadi-Nejad, contrary to the 2005 NIE, contrary to the recent UN report, and contrary to Israeli intelligence, the...

London, Apr. 21 – At least 62 people have been killed and over 1,000 arrested in the week-long clashes between people and security forces in Iran’s southern Khuzestan province, according to the main Iranian opposition group, the People’s Mojahedin Organisation of Iran. Fierce fighting has brought the province to a complete stand-still since Friday, when State Security Forces (SSF) opened fire on a 3,000-strong anti-government demonstration in the city of Ahwaz. The residents who were mainly ethnic Arabs were complaining of government plans to redefine the ethnic make-up of the province. Ahwaz was placed under a de facto martial law...

Israel does not have the right to defend itself, Russia’s representative to the United Nations said on Wednesday. The United States and its allies are hypocritical for talking “about Israel’s alleged right for self-defense, which, as an occupying state, it does not have, as was confirmed by the [U.N.’s] International Court [of Justice] consultative ruling in 2004,” Ambassador Vasily Nebenzya told a U.N. General Assembly special session on the Israel-Hamas war. The ICJ’s 2004 advisory opinion stated that Israel could not invoke an inherent right to self-defense under Article 51 of the U.N. Charter against any threat coming from an...

He is an enemy combatant, so treat him as one. An Iran-backed Hezbollah commander who killed American soldiers in cold blood has been in U.S. custody for four years. Most Americans would see this as a good thing. For the Obama administration, it is a vexing dilemma. This highlights, yet again, why the country can’t afford a second Obama administration. Ali Mussa Daqduq has been a Hezbollah operative for almost 30 years. He is the hardcore. When he joined back in 1983, the “Party of God” (hizb Allah) was just getting its start as Iran’s forward militia in Lebanon, announcing...

Evidence in the trial against HLF showed that Ghassan Elashi, the treasurer of the charity, became the founding board member of CAIR’s Texas chapter and that HLF transferred funds to CAIR for “consulting services.” The prosecution also presented evidence that Hamas provided “seed money” for CAIR, according to a congressional hearing. “The history is very clear,” said Lorenzo Vidino, director of the Program on Extremism at GWU. “CAIR was created by this core group of Hamas leaders in the US in the early 1990s. There are FBI wiretaps of a workshop given by the group’s leaders on how to deal...

Abstract: North Korean dictator Kim Jong-il's faltering health has raised concerns about regime stability. Succession rumors have been swirling for years, with Kim's third son, Jong-eun, currently rumored to be Kim's favored choice. But regardless of whether leadership stays in the family or is wrested away by a challenger, a new North Korean leader is likely to keep in place the same belligerent policies--toward South Korea, toward China and Japan, and toward the U.S. If succession does not go smoothly, and if the North Korean regime were to collapse, the ensuing chaos would require immediate action by the U.S. and...

JERUSALEM -- In their first comment about the fate of two soldiers whose capture triggered a month long war between Israel and Hezbollah guerrillas last summer, Israeli officials said yesterday the two were seriously wounded -- raising the prospect they may no longer be alive.

A Swiss judge has issued an arrest warrant for the former head of Iran's secret police for his role in the killing of a leading Iranian dissident 16 years ago. Ali Fallahian is charged with masterminding the assassination of Kazem Rajavi, a renowned human rights advocate, near Geneva in April 1990. According to a report in Lausanne-based newspaper Le Matin Dimanche, the international arrest warrant was issued by Swiss investigating magistrate Jacques Antenen on March 20. It called on law enforcement agencies to arrest Fallahian – who for years headed Iran's Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS) and is currently...

One of France's most distinguished diplomats has confessed to an investigating judge that he accepted oil allocations from Saddam Hussein, it emerged yesterday. Jean-Bernard Mérimée is thought to be the first senior figure to admit his role in the oil-for-food scandal, a United Nations humanitarian aid scheme hijacked by Saddam to buy influence. The Frenchman, who holds the title "ambassador for life", told authorities that he regretted taking payments amounting to $156,000 (then worth about £108,000) in 2002. The money was used to renovate a holiday home he owned in southern Morocco. At the time, Mr Mérimée was a special...

A suicide bomber blew himself up on a bus in central Fuzhou Monday, killing himself and injuring 31 others, local police said. The blast in the capital of East China's Fujian Province went off at 2:32 pm as the No 5 bus pulled in at the Dongjiekou Stop in Dongda Road, one of the city's busiest streets. There was a deafening "big bang," said Lin Lina, a female employee working in an office building on the roadside. "Thick smoke rose into the sky, and we couldn't see or tell what was happening," Lin said. Even from her office on the...