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It's been a rough summer for generals in Cuba. They are dropping like flies, as we see in this report:Over just nine days this month, Cuban state media announced the deaths of five generals, sparking a wave of discussion and rampant speculation among analysts and exiles.The senior military leaders all appear to have died between July 17 and 26. Some were serving and others retired, but all had lauded military careers. The youngest was 58. Most were in their 70s or 80s. It is not clear what caused the deaths, and there is no indication they were related.The deaths of...

Experts from the Chinese laboratory at the centre of global suspicion over the coronavirus pandemic have ‘defected’ and are in the hands of Western intelligence, the architect of Donald Trump’s presidential victory claimed last night. Steve Bannon, who was Trump’s White House chief strategist and retains close links to the administration, told The Mail on Sunday that spies were building a case against Beijing on the basis that the global pandemic had been caused by a leak from the Institute of Virology in Wuhan and that the subsequent cover-up had amounted to ‘pre-meditated murder’. In an exclusive interview, Mr Bannon...

More than 300 Venezuelan soldiers have defected in just four days as the country plunges deeper into chaos. Soldiers who have sought refuge in Colombia since the weekend told the Associated Press that the catalyst for defection was the command from above to keep desperately needed humanitarian aid from their compatriots. "I was tired of people seeing me as just one more of them," Sgt. Jorge Torres said, referring to President Nicolas Maduro's socialist government. "I'm not." A high-stakes plan by the Venezuelan opposition to bring humanitarian aid into the country floundered over the weekend when National Guard troops loyal...

/start my translation A N. Korean escapee, a former N. Korean missile project worker, intent on defecting to U.S. came to S. Korea in '99 ... "secured an U.S. visa, evading S. Korean gov." "N. Korea imported 90% of missile parts from Japan. (missiles) were produced in 4 different factories" A N. Korean escapee, who worked for N. Korean missile production, held a press conference on May 15, 2003, at Washington's National Press Club, announcing his intention to defect to U.S. Revealing only his last name, Lee, he remarked that he met in the morning the Representative Ed Royce(R) and...

Earlier this month I reported here at PJ Media on the surrender and defections of U.S.-backed Syrian rebel troops to Jabhat al-Nusra (Al-Qaeda’s official affiliate), most notably the Syrian Revolutionaries Front, which the DC foreign policy establishment was hailing as “the West’s best fighting chance against Syria’s Islamist armies,” and Harkat al-Hazm, the first group to receive heavy weaponry from the U.S. earlier this year.Now Mona Mahmood of the Guardian reports that elements of the Free Syrian Army (FSA) are defecting to ISIS: US air strikes in Syria are encouraging anti-regime fighters to forge alliances with or even defect...

Five generals, two colonels and a major told a news conference in Rome that they fled Libya in protest at the killings of civilians and that Col Gaddafi's military strength had been reduced by 80 per cent. Only ten generals remain loyal, Gen Melud Massoud Halasa, one of the defectors, said. At least 100 more army officers have left Libya in recent days, according to Abdurrahman Shalgam, Libya's ambassador to the United Nations, who defected himself in the early days of the uprising against Col Gaddafi's regime. The mass defection will place more pressure on Col Gaddafi's military, which is...

The ripples from the Republicans painting the country red on Election Day continue to spread among the states. The sweep that brought Republicans to power in many states (the party picked up 690 seats in state legislatures -- and counting) will have manifold benefits far beyond the issue of redistricting Among the aftershocks from the political earthquake are defections of state Democrats from the party of Obama, Reid and Pelosi and their conversion into Republicans. The Washington Post reports that Republicans continue running up the score even after the election as state Democrat politicians become Republicans: "Staggering Election Day losses...

The latest reports of senior nuclear scientists defecting from Iran to the West have caused considerable embarrassment and concern to the regime in Tehran. The reports first broke in Londown-based newspaper Al-Sharq al-Awsat, and were followed up in the Iranian media. The reports suggest that at least one scientist, Shahram Amiri, who worked on nuclear research and development, defected several months ago to the west during the hajj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia. One more person, whose identity and specialization remains unclear - he may have been a scientist or held another key position in Iran's nuclear program - may have...

Two small parishes in the Episcopal Diocese of Southern Virginia have quit the denomination over gay ordination and joined a like-minded group of dissident churches based in Northern Virginia. The break-away Anglican District of Virginia announced Friday that Christ Church in Emporia and Grace Church in Purdy had become members. The district now includes 23 parishes that have cut ties with the Episcopal Church. Church of the Messiah in Chesapeake quit the Episcopal denomination in 2006. Grace Episcopal Church in Newport News quit a couple years earlier. The Southern Virginia diocese has about 120 parishes, including more than two dozen...

Seven members of Cuba's Under-23 soccer team defect in the United States, according to newspaper reports With one player already suspended following a red card, Cuba coach Raul Gonzalez had only ten players available to him and his team began the match against Honduras with a one-man disadvantage and no substitutes.

Friday, March 14, 2008 Cuba's defection dilemma Andrew Hush As dawn broke on the morning after one of the nation's greatest footballing results, the mood in the Cuban camp should have been buoyant. Instead, the prevailing emotions were of confusion and dismay. The remaining Cuban players show their respect to their fans. (AP) Barely twelve hours after Raul Gonzalez's side had begun their Olympic qualifying campaign with a 1-1 draw against the USA, the team had been torn apart by the defection of seven of its number. As remarkable as Cuba's draw was with the host nation in Tampa,...

Anyone who follows the MSM knows that Cuba is a virtual paradise. A land of free health care, universal literacy and low infant-mortality rates where kids don't care about freedom and the only big problems are those caused by the U.S. Yes, Cuba is the sort of place no one would ever want to leave. Certainly not to go to live in the United States, where, as everyone knows thanks to Michael Moore's "Sicko," health care is so bad that 9-11 heroes are forced to seek help from Havana. And yet . . . According to AP: Defection fears to...

Cubans defect in Toronto Leave patriotic choir on tour By TOM GODFREY, TORONTO SUN More than 20 members of Cuba's world-famous national chorus are singing songs of freedom today after defecting in Toronto. Members of the National Chorus of Cuba dodged security officers and jumped into waiting cars, some on Sunday and others yesterday, said Cuban exiles who planned the defections. "These people are scared for their lives," said Ismail Sambra, president of the Cuban Canadian Foundation. "They are worried about their families back home. "It took a lot of planning to get this far." The highly acclaimed 40-member group,...

CANBERRA (Reuters) - A Chinese diplomat pleading for political asylum in Australia has said he would rather die than go home, as Prime Minister John Howard tried on Thursday to calm concerns the asylum bid may harm Sino-Australian relations. Howard said an application for political asylum by Chen Yonglin, a 37-year-old political affairs consul at China's Sydney consulate, would not be influenced by Australia's booming trade and economic ties with China. "Let me simply say that, just as in relation to the U.S., we have steadfastly refused to mix trade with politics and strategy and national security. So it is...

CANBERRA (Reuters) - A Chinese diplomat who has sought political asylum in Australia and claims spies are hunting him for aiding pro-democracy groups has contacted a U.S. consulate about his situation, an official said on Tuesday. A spokeswoman for the U.S. embassy told Reuters that Chen Yonglin, a 37-year-old political affairs consul at China's consulate in Sydney, had contacted a U.S. consulate in Australia about his situation, but was unable to comment further. Local media reported on Tuesday that Chen had asked if he could defect to the United States. Chen, who has worked in Sydney for the past four...

SACRAMENTO -- A group of moderate Democrats, many of them Latino lawmakers from Southern California and the Central Valley, united in the Assembly this week to defeat or significantly weaken a number of bills by fellow Democrats designed to impose new environmental regulations or consumer safeguards. Their success stunned other Democrats and environmental advocates. "This has been one of the worst years I can remember," said Mark Murray, who has been executive director of Californians Against Waste for 11 years. "It's shocking. I thought we had a majority of Democrats, but apparently we don't. ... Environmentalists are not getting any...

Link Dang copyright laws.

Title: Great General (Kim Jong il) Lives in Fear of Assassins By Shane Green, Tokyo, October 15, 2003 (The Australian Age) North Korean leader Kim Jong-il lives in constant fear for his life, using a fleet of luxury cars to act as decoys to confuse would-be assassins, a former bodyguard has claimed. Lee Young-kook, who has defected to South Korea, claimed the communist leader is concerned he will meet the same fate as Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceausescu, shot by a firing squad after a 1989 revolt. "Kim is in a serious dilemma," Mr Lee said. "If he opens the...

WITH THE THIRD INFANTRY DIVISION, Northwestern Kuwait, March 19 As more than 20,000 soldiers attached to the Third Infantry Division moved close to the Iraqi border within sight of it, in some cases 15 Iraqi soldiers guarding the border surrendered and crossed over to Kuwait this evening, officers here said. They are believed to be the first Iraqis to have surrendered, something the American Air Force has been actively encouraging by dropping more than 1 million leaflets in anticipation of a ground invasion. The soldiers not technically prisoners of war, since the war has not yet started are in the...

Kuwait given date for invasion, Iraqi diplomats pressed to defect SPECIAL TO WORLD TRIBUNE.COMTuesday, March 18, 2003 ABU DHABI — Kuwait has been given a date for the U.S. invasion of Iraq and has requested military units trained to respond to nonconventional weapons attacks. Meanwhile the Iraqi embassy in Bahrain complained that the United States and Britain were pressuring Iraqi diplomats to defect. Kuwait's military has been placed on war alert. Officials said military units were placed on Level One alert, the highest grade, on late Monday. They said Kuwaiti land, air and naval forces have completed preparations for...