Free Republic

In the besieged city of Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine, the volunteers collecting the civilian dead risk becoming casualties themselves. “Where? Where?” demands Daniel Wilk, a Canadian driver, in shaky video footage shot recently inside the city and seen by the Guardian. Wilk proceeds quickly, the anxiety of the situation visible in his movements as he is directed to a fence, cutting an uncertain path across the snow as another voice cries “no, no” repeatedly. The bodies, when Wilk gets to them, have been cut in half by the force of the explosion that took their lives, and still lie where...

The Bush administration more than doubled its financial commitment yesterday to provide relief to nations suffering from the Indian Ocean tsunami, amid complaints that the vacationing President Bush has been insensitive to a humanitarian catastrophe of epic proportions. As the death toll surpassed 50,000 with no sign of abating, the U.S. Agency for International Development added $20 million to an earlier pledge of $15 million to provide relief, and the Pentagon dispatched an aircraft carrier and other military assets to the region. Secretary of State Colin L. Powell, in morning television appearances, chafed at a top U.N. aid official's comment...

<p>HAMBURG, Germany — Usama bin Laden told followers before the Sept. 11 attacks that "we must strike at America" and there would be "thousands of dead," a witness at the trial of an alleged plot member testified Wednesday.</p> <p>Jordanian-born Shadi Abdellah, 25, told a Hamburg court he briefly served as bin Laden's bodyguard while attending an Al Qaeda training camp in Kandahar, Afghanistan, from early 2000 until May 2001.</p>