perceptions

NYT: Sadr City fighting continues
NYT: (op-ed) the conflict in Basra foretold
"As has been widely reported of late [in 2005], Basran politics (and everyday life) is increasingly coming under the control of Shiite religious groups, from the relatively mainstream Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq to the bellicose followers of the rebel cleric Moktada al-Sadr. Recruited from the same population of undereducated, underemployed men who swell these organizations' ranks, many of Basra's rank-and-file police officers maintain dual loyalties to mosque and state."
WP: report released Sunday on state of Iraqi police confirms not much progress has been made
WP: Shiites splitting
"The hostilities highlighted how intra-sect struggles, after five years of war, are increasingly defining the nature of conflict in Iraq, as violence lessens between Sunnis and Shiites."
CSM: Sunni groups, Islamic Army of Iraq, still fighting, though
"Chasing out Al Qaeda has benefited us a lot," he says, explaining that AQI militants have largely been driven out of Anbar and Baghdad and are now concentrated in parts of Diyala, Nineveh, and Salaheddin provinces to the north. He says AQI used indiscriminate violence to subdue other Sunni insurgent groups....
He says the situation pushed Sunnis to the brink of a protracted internal battle, so siding with the US military to root out AQI and preserve Sunni unity made sense.
'Some people joined ... while others are still in the resistance.… We wanted to prevent fitna [discord] among Sunnis, and to unite our front,' he says.
Members of these US-backed militias now number almost 91,000 and are paid a total of $16 million a month in salaries by the US. They are often lauded by President Bush in his speeches on Iraq.
The US military now calls these Sunni militias 'Sons of Iraq.' Iraqis simply refer to all these groups as sahwas. But the Shiite-led government is resisting US pressure to fold these groups, especially the ones in Baghdad and Diyala provinces, into the Army and police. 'Trust me, the sahwas are ultimately with the resistance, heart and mind,' says Abu Abdullah. He says IAI continues to have a loose affiliation with other factions that share its outlook, such as Muhammad's Army, the Rashideen Army, and Mujahedeen Army."
CSM: the Marines still fighting in Anbar
Slate: Petraeus and Crocker were predictable

NYT: secret military trials in Afghanistan
NYT: defense lawyers for Guantánamo prisoners try to delay trials, because don't want to confer legitimacy on tribunal system
LAT: a Saudi prisoner refuses to participate

LAT: policing in LA: public perceptions of racial violence (especially Latino-Black) vs how homicides have been recorded
"[Police Chief] Bratton now concedes that his 'just the facts' approach hasn't worked. Black commentators have accused him of downplaying a rising menace. Reporters have pressed him at every turn."
Ind: police in South Africa given shoot-to-kill orders from minister
"'You must kill the bastards if they threaten you or the community. You must not worry about the regulations,' said Deputy Safety and Security Minister Susan Shabangu."

LAT: gangs in Zimbabwe target opposition
"Intimidation of opposition activists is occurring -- outside the limelight -- in rural areas of Zimbabwe that have traditionally been ruling party strongholds but where the MDC scored upset parliamentary victories. One activist has been killed. The fear tactics are viewed both as political retribution and as an attempt to scare opposition supporters from backing the MDC in a possible presidential runoff, allowing the 84-year-old Mugabe to hold on to power. Thus far, many believe the heavy-handed tactics are working."
Gdn: regional summit called to try to broker election outcome

Ind: unrest in Kenyan slum as power-sharing agreement still not implemented
NYT: displacement still leaves some without adequate resources; threatens to reshape politics
"Hundreds of thousands have already resettled in areas where their ethnic group dominates, because that is seen as the only way to guarantee safety."

NYT magazine: memories of Liberia

LAT: Sudan census - first in 25 years - won't include religion or ethnicity

Ind: captured yacht reveals sophisticated pirate network
UNOSAT: a map of Somali pirate attacks (HT: Chris Blattman)

WP: Nepalis voting despite violence
Gdn: good Q&A on background of the elections

Gdn: riots continue in Haiti

BBC: Kosovo adopts new constitution
BBC: Burma puts its up for sale
BBC: Senegal amends its to charge Habre

Gdn: 1971 Bangladesh war of independence in photos

BBC: four army death squad members convicted of 1992 university massacre in Peru

NYT: (op-ed) more on MLK Jr and his legacy

NYT: Zakaria's take on Bhutto's take on Islam and politics

the Onion: Mead releases new grad-school-ruled notebook
BBC (really, not the Onion): for the good of the children, Venezuela drops the Simpsons for Baywatch

commemorating

MLK Jr's last speech
NYT: RFK's speech in Indianapolis upon learning of MLK Jr's assassination; two months before he himself was killed
(listen to the speech here)
"You know, Dr. King once said that the arc of the moral universe is long, but that it bends toward justice. But what he also knew was that it doesn't bend on its own. It bends because each of us puts our hands on that arc and bends it in the direction of justice." -Barack Obama speaking in Ft Wayne yesterday
the Root: how the assassination changed music
BBC: lingering questions about James Earl Ray
WP: the state of pioneering civil rights groups today

LAT: conflict in Mosul between Sunnis and Kurds
"The Iraqi government and U.S. military spokesmen blame the chaos on Al Qaeda in Iraq, a loosely organized Sunni Arab insurgent group, which desires to create a new base in the north. But the problems date to 2003, when the Kurds first sent fighters into Mosul, and the status of the city's Arab elite was diminished...
The Kurds want a referendum, called for under Article 140 of the Iraqi Constitution, to formally annex the disputed areas to Kurdistan. The referendum, postponed last year after the Iraqi government failed to conduct a census in the contested north, would also determine the status of the city of Kirkuk and other areas along the border of Kurdistan. A vote could prove to be the trigger for greater Arab-Kurdish bloodshed or a bridge to conciliation and prosperity...
U.S. officials recognize that their dependence on the Kurds may have tipped the balance of power in favor of their longtime ally. The Americans relied on Kurdish forces to stop Sunni fighters from seizing Mosul in November 2004, and the influx of Kurdish fighters allowed Kurdistan to cement its grip on Mosul's northern and eastern outer rings"...
an American official compared "Kurdish fighters favorably to Shiite security forces in Baghdad who have been accused of indiscriminately killing and arresting Sunni Arabs [said] 'When Kurds get killed in Mosul, Kurdish special operations/intelligence units surgically go after that person' who did the killing, the former official said. "It's not collective punishment, but they will go and kill that individual. . . . The Kurds are very responsible about it.'"
BBC: Maliki calls off attacks on militias, any "people who carry weapons"

Ind: US renews contract with Blackwater
AP: a contractor is charged under military law for the first time since Vietnam

LAT: Bush pledges more troops for Afghanistan

Gdn: veterans from the 1965 war - the Zimbabwe Liberators Platform - want Mugabe to go
WP: the opposition rejects calls for a run-off; police prevent them from filing lawsuit to release poll results

BBC: Nigerian rebel leader of the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (Mend) charged with treason and gun running

BBC: the Maoists' transition from bullets to ballots in Nepal; elections to be held Thurs for a constitutional assembly

BBC: new Tibetan riots in Sichuan
BBC: riots in Kashmir over treatment of political prisoners
LAT: 3 die in Haiti riots over food distribution

Gdn: German military officers accused of selling training services to Libyans

NYT: Sderot, town near Gaza, becomes symbol for Israel's survival, mostly for foreign donors

Ind: pirates are at it again