Free Republic

MOSCOW, March 28. /ITAR-TASS/. Russian President Vladimir Putin has submitted a proposal to the State Duma on terminating the legal effect of a number of Russian-Ukrainian agreements on the parameters of division of the Black Sea Fleet that were signed on May 28, 1997, as well as on the status and conditions of the Russian Black Sea Fleet’s deployment on the territory of Ukraine, on reciprocal payments in connection with the Russian Black Sea Fleet’s deployment in Ukraine, and on the stationing of the Russian Black Sea Fleet in Ukraine (the latter agreement signed April 21, 2010). A report on...

It is hard not to notice two contrasting stories that have run side by side during the past week. One is the story about the violent protests in the Muslim world triggered by a report in Newsweek (which the magazine has now retracted) that U.S. interrogators at Guantanamo Bay desecrated a Quran by throwing it into a toilet. In Afghanistan alone, at least 16 people were killed and more than 100 wounded in anti-American rioting that has been linked to that report. I certainly hope that Newsweek story is incorrect, because it would be outrageous if U.S. interrogators behaved that...

Did the Russians help Saddam pre-war to cover the tracks of their conventional, WMD arms trade? (Washington, D.C.): Intrigue surrounding the disappearance of 377 tons of explosives from the al-Qaqaa facility in Iraq seems to be deepening, while preliminary reports that the material was lost due to American negligence appear to be among the least likely of explanations. As initially suggested to the public by the New York Times, large quantities of powerful HMX and RDX - plastic high-explosives that can be used for civilian purposes but are particularly well suited to military ones (including triggering nuclear weapons) and terrorist...

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) - Saudi state television turned to interviewing everyone from children to intellectuals to try to rally citizens against terrorism as it reported Saturday on the latest outburst of extremist violence in the kingdom. Suspected Islamic militants fired inside two office compounds in the oil city of Khobar, 250 miles northeast of Riyadh, Saturday morning, killing at least 10 people before taking dozens of hostages at a luxury resort. As the hostage standoff continued into the night, Saudi TV's last newscast of the day included brief interviews with six men, apparently security officers, injured in Khobar. They...