Free Republic

Google and internet rights groups have called on Congress to weigh in on spyware, asking for sanctions and increased enforcement against so-called legit surveillanceware makers. During an open House Intelligence Committee hearing on Wednesday, US lawmakers heard testimony from Citizen Lab senior researcher John Scott-Railton; Shane Huntley, who leads Google's Threat Analysis Group; and Carine Kanimba, whose father was the inspiration for Hotel Rwanda and who was, herself, targeted by Pegasus spyware. This, of course, is the now-infamous malware that its developer, Israel's NSO Group, claims is only sold to legitimate government agencies — not private companies or individuals. Once...

Kofi Annan, a soft-spoken and patrician diplomat from Ghana, who became the seventh secretary general of the United Nations, projecting himself and his organization as the world’s conscience and moral arbiter despite bloody debacles that left indelible stains on his record as a peacekeeper, died on Saturday. He was 80. His death, after a short illness, was confirmed by his family in a statement from the Kofi Annan Foundation, which is based in Switzerland. Awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2001, he was the first black African to head the United Nations, and led the organization for two successive five-year...

Up for three Oscars Sunday night—and unsurprisingly snubbed by Hollywood—Hotel Rwanda is based on the incredible true story of Paul Rusesabagina, who used the five-star hotel he managed to shield almost 1,300 Rwandans from certain death in 1994. But if you watch this powerful film—and you should—what you won’t see is the even more incredibly true story of the man with direct culpability for the deaths of 800,000 Tutsis: now-UN Secretary General Kofi Annan. The only place you can find this stomach-turning story, in fact, is in Amb. Dore Gold’s new UN-trashing tome called Tower of Babble. Gold’s heavily researched...

Tagline of the movie: When a country descended into madness And the world closed its eyes He opened his arms And created a place Where hope could survive

<p>Maybe it's because I spent time last summer in Burundi, the poorer twin-sister country of Rwanda, which shares a similar history, tribal make-up, geography, culture, and terrifying undercurrent of genocide. Maybe it's because while there, I met some Anglican priests serving in Rwanda, who told personal stories of the tragedies there and their efforts to bring healing and reconciliation in the aftermath. Maybe it's because (I know some readers will be tempted to write me off after reading this sentence) I was so frustrated by last year's promotional hype surrounding Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ, and I was so frustrated by the movie itself, although I know many good people found it moving and spiritually edifying. Maybe it's because I have deep concerns about the alignment of major sectors of Christianity with "red-state Republicanism," and I worry that a kind of modernist, nationalist neo-fundamentalism is trying to claim all Christian territory as its sovereign domain.</p>

Use people power against genocide By SHMULEY BOTEACH Two things were on my mind as I watched Hotel Rwanda, the stunning depiction of the 1994 Rwandan Tutsi extermination that was the fastest genocide in the history of the world. The first was Hollywood, and how I owed it an apology for the many times I have railed against its degeneracy. A film this powerful shames the world out of its indifference to the slaughter of helpless humans and demonstrates the potential of movies to reach the places photos and words cannot. The second was Bill Clinton, the great 60's liberal...

Hollywood Exposes Clinton's Support of African Genocide So much for the myth of "America's first black president": A new movie reveals that racist Bill Clinton not only did nothing to stop genocide in Rwanda, he also pressured other nations to do nothing. In a rare case of exposing one of Clinton's greatest scandals, the New York Times today discusses United Artists' "Hotel Rwanda," opening Wednesday, along with former Clinton national security adviser Anthony Lake. Among the appalling truths revealed:

Anthony Lake WASHINGTON, Dec. 14 - In a pivotal scene in "Hotel Rwanda," which opens Wednesday, the colonel in charge of a beleaguered United Nations peace-keeping force rushes to talk with the commanding officer of a fresh and heavily armed United Nations contingent that has just arrived at a hotel packed with refugees from the bloody genocide outside its walls. The colonel, played by Nick Nolte, suddenly throws his blue beret on the ground in anger. The eyes of the hotel manager, played by Don Cheadle, slowly register concern, then fear. The awful truth becomes clear: the new soldiers...