Free Republic

The US State Department announced plans on Monday to promote online youth groups as a new and powerful way to fight crime, political oppression and terrorism. Drawing inspiration from a movement against FARC rebels in Colombia, the State Department is joining forces with Facebook, Google, MTV, Howcast and others in New York City next week to get the "ball rolling." It said 17 groups from South Africa, Britain and the Middle East which have an online presence like the "Million Voices Against the FARC" will attend a conference at Columbia University Law School from December 3-5. Observers from seven organizations...

The United Nations has described the situation in Darfur as the world's gravest humanitarian crisis. In 2004, then-secretary of state Colin Powell called it genocide. On Tuesday, a US Congressional delegation that had visited Sudan told UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, "The issue of Darfur challenges the conscience of our country." So what is being done about it? Darfur is a province in the southwest of Sudan, an Arab country. The area had a population of about 6 million - about 2 million have fled to neighboring Chad, while about 400,000 were killed by the Sudanese military and the Janjaweed militias...