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Venezuela’s Tarek El-Aissami The Americas Report | Oct 03, 2008  By Nicole Ferrand [...] Mr. El - Aissami is a Venezuelan national of Syrian descent who, before becoming Minster of Interior and Justice, occupied the position of Deputy Interior Minister for Public Security. His father, Carlos Aissami, is the head of the Venezuelan branch of the Iraqi Baath political party. Before the invasion of Iraq, he held a press conference in which he described himself as a Taliban and called Osama Bin Laden, "the great Mujahedeen, Sheik Osama bin Laden." Tarek's great-uncle Shibli el-Aissami was a prominent ideologist and...

A graduate student at the University of California, Berkeley, has been killed in Mexico — where his bullet-riddled body was found in his SUV after his fiancée reported him missing on his trip to conduct field research about plants. Gabriel Trujillo, 31, a botanist and fourth-year PhD candidate in the Department of Integrative Biology, was shot seven times June 19 in the northwest state of Sonora and his body was discovered three days later, his family said.

According to Democratic strategist Michael Trujillo, the dam is about to burst wide open. Well, wider: Michael Trujillo @mikehtrujillo SOURCES: @CNN and @washingtonpost working on exposing 20-30 congressional members 4 sexual harassment. #DC

Today would have been the 80th birthday of one of the great conservative cardinals of the era of John Paul II, Alfonso Cardinal López Trujillo (Nov. 8, 1935 -- April 19, 2008). He was appointed President of the Pontifical Council for the Family (PCF) exactly 25 years ago (November 8, 1990, his 55th birthday); he remained at this post until his death from cancer in 2008, at the age of 72. It can be argued that it was López Trujillo, even more than Ratzinger, who provided much of the steel behind John Paul II's war on the "culture of death"...

VATICAN CITY, 23 APR 2008 (VIS) - This morning in St. Peter's Basilica, Benedict XVI pronounced a homily following the funeral Mass for the late Cardinal Alfonso Lopez Trujillo, president of the Pontifical Council for the Family, who died on Saturday 19 April at the age of 72. The Mass was celebrated by Cardinal Angelo Sodano, dean of the College of Cardinals. The Holy Father traced the biography of the youngest cardinal created by John Paul II in the consistory of 1983, recalling his priestly ordination in 1960, his work as auxiliary bishop of Bogota in the 1970s, as president...

Cardinal Alfonso López Trujillo, President of the Pontifical Council for the Family, died Saturday of complications from diabetes. The cardinal had been in a hospital fighting different health complications for nearly four weeks before he passed away. Cardinal Trujillo, Archbishop emeritus of Medellin, Colombia, was 72. Born on November 8, 1935 in the Colombian city of Villahermosa, he moved to the capital Bogotá when he was a young boy. After entering seminary, he studied in Rome and obtained his doctorate in philosophy from the Angelicum, taking courses in theology and sociology and also studying Marxism. Ordained a priest on November...

Taos County administrators plan to talk next week to one of their Adult Detention Center officers — an unidentified employee who released an inmate Dec. 22 without first checking his paperwork. Jerry Trujillo, who is now at large, was arrested Dec. 12 by Sheriff’s Deputy Jason Wardlow on three counts of burglary, one count of larceny and two counts of criminal damage to property. Trujillo was being held pending a preliminary hearing scheduled Dec. 23. He did not attend that hearing. There are two open warrants against Trujillo. Victor Robles, one of two assistant county managers, did not know what...

Sources: Chavez Calls In Foreign Aid in Preparation for Crackdown?Dec 09, 2002 Summary The risk of violence is escalating in Venezuela, where multiple sources say President Hugo Chavez is arming domestic supporters and possibly calling in help from Cuban nationals and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia. Analysis The threat of major violence in Venezuela within the next two or three days is increasing rapidly in cities like Caracas and Maracaibo, Stratfor sources say. The government of embattled President Hugo Chavez is arming hundreds of civilian supporters, at least three small groups of Colombian rebels have crossed the border...