bad liars [caught on satellite]

WP: bombing reflects, deepens sectarian rift in northwest Pakistan, kills at least 30
The suicide bombing, which turned a solemn [Shia] mourning procession into a scene of strewed limbs and bloody clothing, provoked a frenzy of retaliatory violence against local Sunnis, police and witnesses said. Dozens of Sunni-owned houses and shops were burned, and security forces imposed a curfew on the area.
BBC: how the cleavage has changed over time
In Pakistan, the focus of the sectarian violence has arguably changed. In the 1980s and 1990s the problem was acute in Karachi and in the province of Sindh.

But tough policing - especially in Karachi - over this period meant that many militants were either killed or arrested.
Slate: more skepticism on the Swat Valley deal
...as respected journalist Ismail Khan notes in an article in today's Dawn, the country's most widely read English-language newspaper, the deal calls for Pakistan's secular criminal code to be observed, unless a council of sharia judges rules that some law or another is un-Islamic. The deal also calls for a halt in the fighting between the Pakistani army and the Taliban militias.

The key facts here are that, at the moment, there is no working judicial system of any sort in the Swat Valley—and that the Taliban militias have routed the numerically superior Pakistani army in their armed confrontations. So the deal imposes national secular authority even more than it legitimizes sharia justice. And given the balance of power, it's unclear why the Taliban would go along with that.

The deal was made not with "the Taliban" as a whole—the term implies a more cohesive entity than actually exists—but rather, specifically, with Maulana Sufi Muhammad, whom the Pakistanis arrested two years ago for leading jihadist raids across the border into Afghanistan. He was released from prison after agreeing to give up the struggle and to work for peace.

The hope is that he would strike a deal with his son-in-law Maulana Fazlullah, who is the deputy to a much more militant Taliban leader—or that, if he can't come to terms with his son-in-law, a wedge might be driven between various Islamist factions, peeling Sufi Muhammad and his followers away from the radicals and thus strengthening the hand of the central government.

This is why the deal is not only ill-fated but potentially disastrous: It reveals the severe weakness of the Pakistani state. The politicians pursued the deal only because the state cannot control its own territory. Unless Sufi Muhammad can convince his son-in-law to accept peace and obeisance to secular authority in exchange for a parcel of land where Islamic law carries some weight, the deal is more likely to convince the militant Taliban simply to press on for more favors still.
AP: ...but it appears that the Taliban have agreed to a cease-fire
Slate: technology and warfare: Google Earth pinpoints a US drone base in Pakistan
The picture, together with a second picture of the same site taken sometime this year and posted on Google Earth, destroys much of the political advantage of the U.S. drones. The drones aren't supposed to be a U.S. military presence in Pakistan. They're unmanned, and until now, they were thought to be flown exclusively from the Afghan border. The satellite images, backed by expert analysis, prove otherwise. The drones are on Pakistani soil. And if the drones are there, so are the U.S. personnel who physically manage them.

BBC: militias in Paktia, Afghanistan
The insurgency has raged and grown in this part of the country. Paktia borders Pakistan and is a route for insurgents coming into the country. The Taleban and al-Qaeda have a growing presence here and clashes between them and government and foreign forces have escalated.

But Ahmadabad district is an exception, thanks to the gunmen of the Arbakai, a tribal militia that has protected this area and its people for centuries, making it something of a safe-haven from the violence all around.

They are a volunteer force of men and boys, armed with old rifles and true grit. They are part of a traditional code of conduct and honour called Pashtunwali.

The tribal elder is Haji Gulam Khan. He tells us that the area is stable and that there is a good relationship between the people and the government.

He is in no doubt who to thank: "If it weren't for the Arbakai, this area would've been controlled by the Taleban or mafia groups."
AJE: US acknowledges 13 civilians killed in missile strike in Herat earlier this week

AP: US Army medic sentenced to life in prison for executing four detainees in Iraq
NYT: another US soldier found not guilty in killings of 2 New York National Guard soldiers
AJE: Abu Ghraib re-opens as "Baghdad Central Prison"
NPR: how many have died in Iraq since the start of the war?
"By orders of minister's office, we cannot talk about the real numbers of deaths," says a man who works at the Baghdad central morgue statistics office, where all the deaths that take place in Baghdad get recorded. He doesn't want his name used because he's been told by his superiors at the Ministry of Health that he is not allowed to talk to the media. "That's been the case since 2004. When press comes to the morgue, they are taken to our boss's office and we have never been allowed to meet with them."

The reason, he says, is because the number of deaths the morgue registers never corresponds with numbers from the Ministry of Health or the Ministry of Interior.

"They do it on purpose," he says. "I would go home and look at the news. The ministry would say 10 people got killed all over Iraq, while I had received in that day more than 50 dead bodies just in Baghdad. It's always been like that — they would say one thingm but the reality was much worse."...

Dougherty [of Iraq Body Count] estimates at least 20,000 Iraqi civilians have been killed during U.S. military operations.

The military and human rights groups often disagree over whether victims were civilians or insurgents.

Econ: Turks and (Iraqi) Kurds getting along better for the moment
Turkish officials, who used to dismiss Iraq’s Kurdish leaders as “tribal upstarts”, privately concede that part of the solution is to co-opt Iraq’s Kurds. In the past year Turkish intelligence men and diplomats have held secret talks with Nechirvan Barzani, the Iraqi Kurdish region’s prime minister, to get the PKK to call off its fight, even as Turkish aircraft continue, with America’s blessing, to pound rebel strongholds near Iraq’s mountain border with Iran. One idea is that rebels untainted by violence might be coaxed home and their leaders offered cash inducements to move to any European country that would take them in.

NYT: Netanyahu invites Kadima and Labor parties to form moderate coalition
Mr. Netanyahu and Ms. Livni have agreed to meet Sunday, but the negotiations are likely to be tough. Ms. Livni, his chief rival for the premiership, has said she would rather go into opposition than serve as a fig leaf for a coalition of the right.

Mr. Barak, whose Labor Party fared badly in the elections, has already said he would head into the opposition.

To many here, it is increasingly likely that Mr. Netanyahu’s government will consist exclusively of parties from the right, which oppose a Palestinian state and favor expanding Israeli settlements in the West Bank, making it much harder for him to exercise his pragmatic penchant.

NPR: Saudi religious police facing more constraints

NPR: Lebanon no longer requiring sect identification

WP: Calderón will not relent, despite demonstrations against militarization
Calderón, who has sent more than 45,000 troops to fight the cartels, said the military would remain on patrol until the government had control of the most violent parts of the country and civil authorities were fully able "to confront this evil."

Only then, he said, "will the army have completed its mission." Turf battles involving the drug traffickers, who are fighting the army, police and one another in order to secure billion-dollar smuggling routes into the United States, took the lives of more than 6,000 people in Mexico last year. The pace of killing has continued in 2009, with more than 650 dead, most in the violent border cities of Ciudad Juarez and Tijuana. In the past few days, a running gun battle between soldiers and gunmen through the streets of the northern city of Reynosa, captured live on television, left five people dead.
LAT: Ciudad Juárez police chief opts out after threats, though
BBC: photos of the violence indicate why
SDT: lessons from Colombia's drug war (via Adam Isacson)
The drug-trafficking operation in Mexico is different than in Colombia. While there is some marijuana and opium grown in Mexico, as well as methamphetamine manufacturing, the cartels aren't fighting over production. They are battling to control the smuggling routes used to move drugs, including Colombian cocaine, into the United States...

The strategy of Mexico's leaders is to break the cartels into smaller pieces, as happened in Colombia, where local police in urban areas were better able to get a handle on street crime once the larger criminal organizations receded.

The assumption is that smaller drug operations would be better handled by state and local police, Shirk said. But it is not clear such a strategy will succeed, and institutional corruption presents a challenge...

But even if the Mexican government is successful in breaking up the big cartels, neither Mexican soldiers nor U.S. equipment and training are going to stop the demand for drugs, [former DEA regional director] Holifield said.

“The biggest lesson is for the U.S.,” he said. “And that is to stop using (drugs). Until that happens, nothing the U.S. does can prevent these people from doing this. There is absolutely no way to stop it.”
NPR: on top of that drug demand issue, US also arming Mexico, informally
The weapons and ammunition are being bought on the black market and at gun shows, but mostly from licensed dealers. Arizona and Texas make it especially easy to buy guns retail. Basically, any adult with a valid ID and no criminal record can buy as many as he or she wants...Authorities call the weapons smuggling trafico de la hormiga, or "ant traffic," because it's done in small steady shipments to avoid detection. And after all, the main mission of the customs service is not examining vehicles leaving the U.S....nearly 8,000 guns sold in America last year were traced to Mexico. That was more than double the number the year before.

Econ: Ortega as Somoza

WP: LTTE bomb Colombo, kill three and injure 48
The attack shows the apparent air power of the Tamil Tigers far from the northern war zone, where they are said to be boxed into a 34-square-mile sliver of the jungle, with government troops closing in.

AJE: riots claim lives in Bauchi, Nigeria
Several churches and mosques were set on fire in the violence on Saturday and at least 28 people were injured, but it was not immediately clear what triggered the unrest.

NYT: Latvian PM steps down, gov't dissolves over recession
BBC: 100,000 march in Dublin
Many are angry at plans to impose a pension levy on public sector workers.

Trade union organisers of the march said workers did not cause the economic crisis but were having to pay for it.

BBC: Bosnian Serbs ordered to pay for mosques destroyed between 1992-1995

Ind: German MP appointed to head new museum of expellees from Eastern Europe after WWII; Poland takes umbrage
Wladyslaw Bartoszewski, Poland’s special envoy on German affairs and a former foreign minister, summed up Warsaw’s objections to Mrs Steinbach’s planned appointment. “It is as if the Vatican had decided to give the Holocaust-denying Bishop [Richard] Williamson the task of overseeing its relations with Israel,” he said.

NYT: Guantánamo complies with Geneva Conventions, according to Pentagon report
Slate: (other) prison growth in the US
The United States has a prison population like nowhere else. With one out of every 100 adults behind bars, our incarceration rate is the highest in the entire world. Our inmates—1.5 million in prison, with another 800,000 in jail—comprise one-third of the world's total. This is a surprisingly recent development. After barely budging for 50 years, our incarceration rate increased sevenfold (to 738 per 100,000 people) between 1978 and 2008.

BBC: Italy implements new rape law
The decree sets a mandatory life sentence for the rape of minors or attacks where the victim is killed.

It also establishes rules for citizen street patrols to be conducted by unarmed and unpaid volunteers.

The number of sexual assaults fell last year, but three high-profile rapes last weekend sparked national outrage.

Many recent rapes have been blamed on foreigners, especially Romanians. Violent attacks on immigrants have since been reported.

Police say a mob of around 20 masked men beat up four Romanians outside a kebab restaurant in Rome on Sunday in an apparent vigilante attack.

The government has pointed to official statistics saying immigrants committed as many as 35% of crimes in Italy in 2007.

But analysts and opposition parties say many of these are related to breaches in immigration rules, and that foreigners have often been unfairly targeted amid a xenophobic backlash from right-wing politicians and the media.

++
Slate: Q: does decapitation have a special meaning in Islam?
A: Yes, but it's important in other cultures, too. [eg, Mexican drug gang violence above.]

++
Salon: Murakami accepts award in Israel
In most cases, it is virtually impossible to grasp a truth in its original form and depict it accurately. This is why we try to grab its tail by luring the truth from its hiding place, transferring it to a fictional location, and replacing it with a fictional form. In order to accomplish this, however, we first have to clarify where the truth lies within us. This is an important qualification for making up good lies...

I have only one reason to write novels, and that is to bring the dignity of the individual soul to the surface and shine a light upon it. The purpose of a story is to sound an alarm, to keep a light trained on the System in order to prevent it from tangling our souls in its web and demeaning them. I fully believe it is the novelist's job to keep trying to clarify the uniqueness of each individual soul by writing stories -- stories of life and death, stories of love, stories that make people cry and quake with fear and shake with laughter. This is why we go on, day after day, concocting fictions with utter seriousness.

NYT: resisting North Korean propaganda by parody

overwhelming fire [from your friends in Pine Bluff, Arkansas]

BBC: LRA focuses brutal attacks on civilians in Congo and Sudan, in response to coordinated government offensive...
This pattern of attacks, all along a 300km (186-mile) stretch of the Sudan-Congo border, follows a co-ordinated offensive against the LRA late in 2008. On 14 December the forces of three countries ­- Uganda, Sudan and Congo -­ attacked LRA bases in Congo. It was an attempt to kill as many of the LRA as possible and shatter the movement's command structure.

But the operation was hampered by poor co-ordination and the dense forests in this region -­ ideal cover for guerrilla forces... The LRA responded as it had done in March 2002, when the Ugandan army launched a massive military offensive, named Operation Iron Fist, against the LRA bases in South Sudan, with the agreement of the government in Khartoum. In 2002 LRA leader Joseph Kony split up his forces, before bringing them together again and crossing back into Uganda to carry out attacks on civilians on a scale and a brutality not seen since 1995 to 1996.

In December 2008 the LRA repeated this tactic, dividing into small units,­ some as few as five or six men. These units launched a series of attacks on an unprecedented scale in towns and villages across northern Congo and South Sudan. The UN and humanitarian agencies estimate the rebels have slaughtered some 900 civilians since Christmas. Villages along the border are now empty as people have fled before the LRA atrocities, which have included tying groups of women together before smashing their skulls and killing babies with heated machetes.
BBC: ...and despite "catastrophic" effects for civilians, Uganda troops to continue offensive
The mandate of the Ugandan army in the DRC had been due to expire this week, but a Ugandan army spokesman said this had now been extended. A Congolese minister said the extension would last until the end of this month.

Last week a top UN official said the offensive against the Ugandan rebel LRA had been "catastrophic" for civilians. But he said the operation against the LRA should continue.
BBC: still, more UN troops needed; Security Council to meet today to discuss
"We're seeing very little protection of civilians there. We have less than 300 UN peacekeepers in a humungous area, this is something like 15,000 sq km," Anneke van Woudenberg, a senior HRW researcher, told the BBC.

"Almost no UN peacekeepers are there. And of course the Ugandans and the Congolese who are involved in an operation against the LRA are not doing nearly enough to protect the civilians," she said. She said an additional 3,000 troops authorised for DR Congo by the Security Council had not yet materialised.

BBC: Sudanese government signs declaration of good intentions with Justice and Equality Movement rebels, in move toward peace deal
The accord was struck in Qatar, which has been mediating a week of talks. It includes an end to attacks on more than two million people in refugee camps and an exchange of prisoners.

But hanging over the agreement is a proposed indictment from the International Criminal Court of Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir for alleged crimes. And other rebel groups are refusing to talk to the government.

AJE: fresh protests in Madagascar as police fire warning shots

BBC: judge in trial of Niger Delta rebel steps down amidst discussions over the trial's location
Mr Okah's legal team had accused the judge of bias against their client, because of his insistence the trial continued behind closed doors miles away from where the offences occurred.

They have demanded the trial is relocated to the southern state of Bayelsa, where the alleged offences were committed... A militant group says two British hostages will only be handed over when Mr Okah is released.

LAT: Mugabe jails MDC opposition leader, previously named deputy agriculture minister, for treason; violates power-sharing agreement
[O]n Friday, Mugabe tried to swear in more than 20 ministers from his own party, not the 15 agreed upon by the two sides. He ended up with 18 -- and even senior members of the MDC were confused about whether Mugabe's last-minute maneuvering had stripped them of a majority in the Cabinet.

"We are absolutely angry. We are furious. You can't talk about power sharing when people are being arrested," a senior MDC member said, speaking by phone from State House, the presidential residence, shortly before the swearing-in ceremony... Another senior MDC figure said that in addition to the 18 ZANU-PF ministers, 15 with the MDC and three with a smaller MDC faction were sworn in. It was not clear Friday whether some of these would be excluded from the Cabinet.

Analysts said the treason charges against Bennett and the wrangling over Cabinet positions were ominous signs. Bennett was charged just days after a judge threw out treason charges against another top MDC member, Tendai Biti.
BBC: opposition politician charged with various crimes; defense claims the government is "shooting in the dark"

BBC: UN special rapporteur in Kenya investigating 2007 post-election killings...
[Philip Alston, the special rapporteur on extra-judicial killings,] will talk to human rights groups and eyewitnesses to the violent aftermath of the 2007 presidential election. Mr Alston will also look into allegations of increased arbitrary killings by security officers. They include operations against rebel militias in Mt Elgon in western Kenya, and violent encounters against the Mungiki sect in the capital, Nairobi. His visit comes just days after the government's failure in parliament to establish a local tribunal to charge the perpetrators of the post-election violence which killed 1,500 people.
BBC: ...while Kofi Annan suggests an ICC investigation
[A Kenyan commission of inquiry into the 2007 violence] delivered a sealed list of suspects to Mr Annan and said it should be sent to the ICC if a local tribunal was not set up by 1 March...

Parliament on Thursday rejected a bill to establish the special court... Under parliamentary rules, the bill cannot be re-introduced to parliament until six months have elapsed... The opposition to the bill came from MPs who support both Mr Kibaki and Mr Odinga.

BBC: Rwanda genocide expert Alison Des Forges one of the dead in Buffalo plane crash

LAT: Karadzic to face two genocide counts in UN tribunal for Bosnia war crimes
The new indictment covers the same allegations as the existing charge sheet but reduces the number of crime scenes from 41 to 27 in an attempt to speed up what is expected to be a lengthy trial... According to Monday's decision, the first genocide count covers ethnic cleansing campaigns throughout Bosnia and the second refers only to the July 1995 Srebrenica massacre where Serb troops and paramilitaries rounded up and murdered some 8,000 Muslim men...

Karadzic will be asked to enter pleas to the new indictment at a Feb. 20 hearing. He faces a maximum sentence of life imprisonment if convicted.

He refused to enter pleas when he was brought before the tribunal's judges last year after his arrest on a Belgrade bus in July ended 13 years on the run from international justice. The court entered not guilty pleas on his behalf. No date has yet been set for his trial to begin.
LAT: France's top judicial body recognizes history of deporting Jews to death camps during the Holocaust; rules out any further reparations
LAT: Khmer Rouge torturer on trial
Kaing Guek Eav — better known as Duch, who headed the S-21 prison in Phnom Penh — is charged with crimes against humanity, and is this first of five defendants scheduled for long-delayed trials by the U.N.-assisted tribunal...

Duch, 66, is accused of committing or abetting a range of crimes including murder, torture and rape at S-21 prison — formerly a school — where up to 16,000 men, women and children were held and tortured, before being put to death.

He has made no formal confession. However, unlike the other four defendants, Duch "admitted or acknowledged" that many of the crimes occurred at his prison, according to the indictment from court judges. Duch, who converted to Christianity, has also asked for forgiveness from his victims.
NYT: ...amid criticism over politicized indictments and lengthy trials
Four senior Khmer Rouge officials who were in a position to give those orders are also in custody, but court officials say their trials may not start until next year. They are Nuon Chea, 82, the movement’s chief ideologue; Khieu Samphan, 76, who was head of state; Ieng Sary, 82, the former foreign minister; and his wife, Ieng Thirith, 75, a fellow member of the Khmer Rouge Central Committee...

The trials are being held by a hybrid tribunal supported by the United Nations that includes Cambodian and foreign judges and prosecutors in an awkward legal compromise that has drawn criticism from human rights advocates and legal scholars.

The chief concern is that the Cambodian members of the tribunal will not be independent of their government’s political agenda. Questions have already been raised about the Cambodian co-prosecutor’s reluctance to recommend further indictments.

Foreign and Cambodian analysts say the government, fearing that a widening circle of defendants could reach into its own ranks, wishes to limit the number of those being tried, harming the tribunal’s credibility.

AJE: UN claims Tamil Tigers abusing civilians, preventing thousands from leaving the war zone
"There are two critical things here - one, that women and children be allowed to leave the conflict zone and go to safe areas where they can be reached with support; the other one is that both sides to this fight - the government troops and the LTTE - need to ensure absolute protection for those [trapped] civilians, and that has not been happening," [James Elder, a spokesman for Unicef] said Unicef has "reliable reports" that children as young as 14 are being forced to fight for the LTTE, Elder said.
BBC: pro-Tigers humanitarian organization claims UN not fulfilling its mandate
A statement by the Tamils Rehabilitation Organisation (TRO) published on the pro-rebel website TamilNet said: "The UN's inability to fulfil its obligations to civilians is explicit. Yet they don't say who is preventing them from their responsibilities."

TRO president Velupillai Sivanadiyar was quoted as saying by the website that the UN was "openly" talking about "withdrawing even the remaining few local staff from the conflict zone, completely shedding its responsibility of caring for the civilians trapped here... If they really care for the civilians, this is not the time for useless talk and accusations," Mr Sivanadiyar said.

LAT: South Koreans make money as vigilantes by selling information on crime to the government
The former gas station attendant isn't choosy. Even small crime pays big time -- more than $3,000 last month alone, he says. "It's good money. I'll never go back to pumping gas. I feel free now."

The skinny 34-year-old is among a new breed of candid-camera bugs across South Korea -- referred to as paparazzi, though their subjects are not the rich and famous, but low-grade lawbreakers, whose actions are caught on film that is peddled as evidence to government officials.

In recent years, officials here have enacted more than 60 civilian "reporting" programs that offer rewards ranging from as little as 50,000 won, or about $36, for the smallest infractions to 2 billion won, or $1.4 million, for reporting a large-scale corruption case involving government officials. (That one has yet to be made.)

The paparazzi trend has even inspired its own lexicon. There are "seonparazzi," who specialize in pursuing election law violators; "ssuparazzi," who target illegal acts of dumping garbage; and "seongparazzi," who target prostitution, which is illegal in South Korea.

PCB: FARC massacres 17 members of indigenous tribe in Colombia's Nariño state...
IHT: ...but the guerrilla group claims just 8 "executions" of "combatants"
There are about 20,000 Awa, and like many indigenous groups, they have often become enmeshed in Colombia's conflict, where warring parties including far-right militias and drug traffickers frequently exact violence on civilians they accuse of collaborating with their foes.

"Given the pressure of the operation, their responsibility in the death of numerous guerrillas and their irrefutable active participation in the conflict, they were executed," the statement on the ANNCOL site said.

The country's armed forces chief called the guerrilla claim false... In a separate communique, the army division that operates in the area accused the FARC of forcing the Awa off their reserve so it can plant coca, the basis for cocaine. Fighting over coca crops is a key reason behind the forced displacement of more than 2.8 million Colombians — an internal refugee problem second only to that of Sudan.

LAT: Tabasco state police officer killed along with 10 of his family members in Mexico
A team of gunmen in southeastern Mexico opened fire on the homes of a state police officer and his extended family, killing 12 people, including a 2-year-old and five other children, authorities said Sunday.

The shootings Saturday night in the state of Tabasco stunned an oil-rich part of Mexico that has not experienced the same level of drug-related warfare common elsewhere in the country, despite its position of strategic importance to traffickers.

The killing of police officer Carlos Reyes Lopez came days after police in Tabasco captured four gunmen and left one suspect dead. Although some speculate that the motive was retaliation, the state prosecutor's office also suggested that a personal dispute involving the Reyes Lopez family might have been behind the attack.
NYT: Hispanic day laborers easy targets for criminals in New Orleans
It is an under-the-radar crime epidemic: unarmed Hispanic workers are regularly mugged, beaten, chased, stabbed or shot, the police and the workers themselves say. The ruined homes they sometimes squat in, doubling- or quadrupling-up at night, are broken into, and they have been made to lie face down while being robbed.

They are shot when, not understanding a mugger’s command, they fail to hand over their cash quickly enough, shot while they are working on houses, and shot when they go home for the day. Some have been killed, their bodies flown home to families who had been dependent on their remittances.

NYT: Chávez wins battle over term limits

LAT: strikes against living costs and elite privilege turn violent in Martinique and Guadeloupe
Police detained about 50 people after coming under a barrage of stones as they tried to take down barricades on the island of Guadeloupe, said Nicolas Desforges, the island's top government official.

On the sister island of Martinique, 100 miles (160 kilometers) south of Guadeloupe, police said that as many as 10,000 demonstrators marched through the narrow streets of the capital to protest spiraling food prices and denounce the business elite.

Government offices, schools, banks and stores have been shuttered for most of the past 12 days as islanders demand lower prices and higher wages...

Living costs are high on the French islands, which depend heavily on imports and use the euro. The strike also is exposing racial and class tensions on islands where a largely white elite that makes up 1 percent of the population controls most businesses.

AJE: Pakistan to restore sharia law in Pakistan's Swat Valley, in peace move toward pro-Taliban rebels there...
The agreement was reached after talks in Peshawar between members of Tahrik-e-Nafiz Shariat Muhammadi and officials of the North West Frontier Province (NWFP) government on Monday... Officials gave few details of the kind of sharia they were planning to implement in the Malakand region, which includes Swat Valley, but said that laws that fail to comply with Islamic texts would be suspended... The Pakistani government has also agreed its troops will refrain from launching military operations in Swat as part of the deal.

The US, which is battling Taliban and al-Qaeda groups in the area, has previously said that such deals only serve to allow fighters to regroup. A senior US defence department official, speaking on condition of anonymity, called the deal a "negative development"...

[C]ritics expressed doubt that the deal would stop the violence in the region, pointing out that similar agreements in the past had broken down, the latest one in August, and only allowed fighters to regroup and rearm.

Shuja Nawaz, a strategic analyst with the South Asia Centre, told Al Jazeera that the agreement could prove problematic for Pakistan in future. "It will mean that the government is ceding territory to the Taliban, which will be a repeat of what happened when Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto was in power in 1994 and a number of districts in Swat and Malakand were handed over to essentially the same group so they could impose their rather convoluted view of sharia on those districts."
WP: ...despite past failures, hope for new, more fair justice system
In announcing the agreement, Pakistani officials asserted that the adoption of sharia law would bring swift and fair justice to the Swat Valley, where people have long complained of legal corruption and delays. They said the new system would have "nothing in common" with the draconian rule of the Taliban militia that ran Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001, during which thieves' hands were amputated and adulterers were stoned to death.

"There was a vacuum . . . in the legal system. The people demanded this and they deserve it," said Amir Haider Khan Hoti, chief minister of the North-West Frontier Province. The new system will include an appeals process, something the Afghan Taliban justice system did not allow for.
LAT: meanwhile, Predator strike in South Waziristan targets leader of Taliban in Pakistan...
NYT: ...and the Taliban extends its own reach to Swati immigrants in the US
Pakistani immigrants from the Swat Valley, where the Taliban have been battling Pakistani security forces since 2007, say some of their families are being singled out for threats, kidnapping and even murder by Taliban forces, who view them as potential American collaborators and lucrative sources of ransom. Some immigrants also say they, too, have been threatened in the United States by the Taliban or its sympathizers, and some immigrants say they have been attacked or kidnapped when they have returned home...

Before the start of the Taliban’s incursion into the region in 2007, Swat was treasured as a vacation spot, particularly among Pashtuns, the ethnic group that dominates the region. Known as “the Switzerland of Pakistan,” it has snowy peaks, fruit orchards, lakes and flower-covered meadows.

But the tourism industry has evaporated amid the Taliban’s uprising, and by some estimates, hundreds of thousands of residents have abandoned their homes, fleeing for Mingora or other regions of Pakistan. Immigrants have been coming from the Swat Valley for years, well before it became a front in the war between the Taliban and Pakistani government troops. There are an estimated 6,000 to 7,000 people from the Swat Valley in the United States, about half of whom live in the New York metropolitan region...
WP: US played important role in bringing together Indian and Pakistani intelligence in investigation of Mumbai attacks...
In the aftermath of the Mumbai terrorist attacks, the CIA orchestrated back-channel intelligence exchanges between India and Pakistan, allowing the two former enemies to quietly share highly sensitive evidence while the Americans served as neutral arbiters, according to U.S. and foreign government sources familiar with the arrangement.

The exchanges, which began days after the deadly assault in late November, gradually helped the two sides overcome mutual suspicions and paved the way for Islamabad's announcement last week acknowledging that some of the planning for the attack had occurred on Pakistani soil, the sources said.

The intelligence went well beyond the public revelations about the 10 Mumbai terrorists, and included sophisticated communications intercepts and an array of physical evidence detailing how the gunmen and their supporters planned and executed their three-day killing spree in the Indian port city. Indian and Pakistani intelligence agencies separately shared their findings with the CIA, which relayed the details while also vetting the intelligence and filling in blanks with gleanings from its networks, the sources said. The U.S. role was described in interviews with Pakistani officials and confirmed by U.S. sources with detailed knowledge of the arrangement. The arrangement is ongoing, and it is unknown whether it will continue after the Mumbai case is settled.
WP: ...which were indeed planned in Pakistan, admits the government

NYT: Taliban commander killed in Afghanistan
[Five months ago], Afghanistan’s president, Hamid Karzai, had intervened to release Mr. [Maulavi Ghulam] Dastagir from jail, where he was being held on charges of conspiring with the Taliban.

To many Afghans, the ambush seemed to vividly confirm one of the most biting complaints here: that the corrupt and the criminal often find a way to get out of jail. And it did it in a way that seemed to implicate the highest authority in the land...

But in the wilds of Afghanistan, fortunes can change in an instant. On Sunday night, five bombs fell on a compound in Badghis Province near the Turkmenistan border, where Mr. Dastagir and a half-dozen fellow Taliban commanders were meeting...

Mr. Karzai’s biggest mistake may have been failing to discover that some of the tribal elders who sought Mr. Dastagir’s release had been threatened and forced by the Taliban to seek the pardon, as some later admitted.
LAT: and new US troops deployed in conflictive region
The new unit — the 3rd Brigade Combat Team of the 10th Mountain Division — moved into Logar and Wardak provinces last month, and the soldiers from Fort Drum, N.Y., are now stationed in combat outposts throughout the provinces... Militants have attacked several patrols with rifles and rocket-propelled grenades, including one ambush by 30 insurgents, Lt. Col. Steve Osterholzer, the brigade spokesman, said.

"In every case our vehicles returned with overwhelming fire," Osterholzer said. "We have not suffered anything more than a few bruises, while several insurgents have been killed."...

[Col. David B. Haight, commander of the 3rd Brigade] said he believes the increase of militant activity in the two provinces is not ideologically based but stems from poor Afghans being enticed into fighting by their need for money. Quoting the governor of Logar, the colonel called it an "economic war." Afghan officials "don't believe it's hardcore al-Qaida operatives that you're never going to convert anyway," Haight said. "They believe that it's the guys who say, 'Hey you want $100 to shoot an RPG at a Humvee when it goes by,' and the guy says, 'Yeah I'll do that, because I've got to feed my family.'"

Still, Haight said there are hardcore fighters in the region, some of them allied with Jalaludin Haqqani and his son Siraj, a fighting family with a long history in Afghanistan. The two militant leaders are believed to be in Pakistan.
NYT: UN says Afghan civilian casualties increased by 40% in 2008
More than half of the 2,118 casualties were caused by militants’ roadside bombs and suicide attacks, but many were from airstrikes and other actions by NATO and American forces battling the resurgent Taliban, the report said... The insurgents were blamed for 1,160, or 55 percent, of the deaths — an increase of 65 percent over similar attacks in 2007, the report said. The report said 828 deaths, or 39 percent, were caused by pro-government forces, an increase of almost a third over the 2007 level.
AJE: as Holbrooke, in Afghanistan, signs an agreement with Karzai to include an Afghan delegation in review process of US policy
LAT: ...and the GAO reviews (negatively) US control of weapons in Afghanistan
LAT: on Russia's role in Afghanistan
In recent days, Russian officials have rushed forward to offer logistical help to NATO troops in Afghanistan -- at the same time dipping into a dwindling budget to offer impoverished Kyrgyzstan more than $2 billion in an apparent payoff for ejecting a U.S. military base crucial to the war against the Taliban.

In fact, Russia is tugged between two strong, conflicting impulses. It distrusts U.S. motives, especially when it comes to America's penetration of former Soviet states. But Moscow's sense of invulnerability appears shaken by falling oil prices and the precarious economy. Many analysts believe the Kremlin is looking for an opening to make nice with the West. Nearby Afghanistan, where instability also spells danger for Russia, presents a handy opening.

And so Russian officials offer help with one hand, lash out with the other.

NYT: Israel-Gaza cease-fire talks slow but steady
The new prospective accord, again being mediated by Egypt, is aimed at rebuilding Gaza after the war and involves both reconstruction and reconciliation between Hamas and the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority, according to Ismael Ridwan, a Hamas spokesman, who spoke by telephone after extensive talks between Egyptian and Hamas officials.

He said among the materials that would be allowed to flow into Gaza in the new arrangement were cement and steel, which Egypt would monitor. Those materials are desperately needed for rebuilding, but the agreement would not allow pipes, cables and chemicals that Israel fears could be used for bombs.

Israel wanted to include the release of Cpl. Gilad Shalit, seized and held by Hamas since the summer of 2006, but Hamas said that would happen only in a separate, if linked, deal that frees hundreds of Palestinians held in Israeli prisons.
LAT: war crimes investigations may focus on events in Khozaa...
Weeks after Israel declared a unilateral end to its offensive in the Gaza Strip, the aftermath still burns in Khozaa, a farm town of 11,000 in the south of the territory. Chunks of white phosphorus still lie scattered throughout neighborhoods, buried in dirt and sand; when excavated, they immediately ignite and spew noxious smoke that smells vaguely of garlic.

As the International Criminal Court weighs a war crimes investigation of the Gaza offensive, the experience of Khozaa could be a key part in the evidence. It was here that Israeli troops staged a series of incursions from Jan. 11 to 13, facing off against local militant fighters and leaving a trail of accusations and recriminations in their wake.
LAT: ...as HRW examines evidence of white phosphorus use
On Jan. 24, a research team from Human Rights Watch visited Khozaa. Researcher Marc Garlasco, a weapons expert, examined the markings on the artillery shell that killed Hannan Najar. "This is clearly white phosphorus," said Garlasco, a former Defense Intelligence Agency official. "See those markings? PB. This was made in Pine Bluff, Arkansas."

In the streets and yards around Najar's home, Garlasco found remnants of several more phosphorus shells. Khozaa, he concluded, had seen the heaviest use of the controversial munitions in the three-week Israeli offensive. Garlasco reconstructed the X-shaped tray that holds 160 phosphorus wafers per shell. When the tray ejects, the wafers disperse over a 150- to 250-yard radius, depending on the height of the airburst.

The burning phosphorus puts out a dense white fog and causes intense chemical burns if it comes in contact with human skin. Its use as an offensive weapon in residential areas is internationally banned. Israel isn't a signatory to the phosphorus treaty, but in response to questions from The Times, the Israeli military released a statement saying that it "only uses weapons permitted by law."

NYT: support for UN tribunal investigating 2005 assassination of Lebanese prime minister
A huge rally on Saturday marking the fourth anniversary of the killing of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri turned into a show of support for a United Nations court that will pursue the case. Anti-Syrian politicians also urged supporters who engulfed central Beirut to vote for them in force in a parliamentary election in June that will decide whether their coalition will retain its slim majority, or lose to an alliance led by the militant group Hezbollah...

The United Nations tribunal is due to open in The Hague on March 1... After more than three years of inquiries in Lebanon, a United Nations investigative team has yet to identify any suspects. The team leader, Daniel Bellemare, has said the opening of the tribunal does not mean that legal proceedings will start immediately.

Since Rafik Hariri’s killing, Lebanon has suffered a wave of political assassinations, mostly of anti-Syrian figures.

Mr. Hariri’s killing intensified anti-Syrian sentiment, helping Saad Hariri’s alliance win the last legislative election in 2005.

LAT: Hezbollah defends right to (anti-Israeli) air defense system
LAT: Iran reorganizes military to build up air defense too

NYT: moderation in new Saudi appointments weakens hard-liners
King Abdullah removed the chief of the feared religious police and a conservative cleric who declared last fall that it was permissible to kill the owners of television stations that broadcast immoral content, the Saudi Press Agency reported. Also, for the first time in the kingdom, he appointed a woman to serve as a deputy cabinet minister, choosing a respected technocrat who will preside over girls’ education.

The changes are seen as an effort to moderate the power of hard-line clerics in Saudi Arabia’s religious establishment, which wields tremendous power but has come under strong criticism in recent years. The intolerance of the cane-wielding religious police, known as the mutawa, has become a special source of popular anger...

The changes announced by the official news agency included a reconfiguration of the Grand Ulema Commission, an influential body of religious scholars from all branches of Sunni Islam. In the past, the commission had been dominated by clerics from the austere Hanbali school, but now moderates will be represented. There were also changes to the Saudi military establishment.

LAT: high unemployment of young men threatens stability in Iraq
Overall, the country's unemployment rate is 18%, but an additional 10% of the labor force is employed part time and wanting to work more, said the first Iraq Labor Force Analysis, which cited falling oil prices and a weak public sector as major problems facing the nation. Among its findings: 28% of males ages 15 to 29 are unemployed, 17% of women have jobs, and most of the 450,000 Iraqis entering the job market this year won't find work "without a concerted effort to boost the private sector."....

The findings also bode ill for government vows to find civilian employment for nearly 100,000 Sons of Iraq, the mainly Sunni Arab paramilitary force, many of whom once supported the insurgency but who have been paid about $300 a month to bolster security alongside U.S. and Iraqi forces.
LAT: Shiite pilgrims face female suicide bomber in Iraq; 35 dead
NYT: Iraqi tourism and culture ministries debate reopening of the National Museum
The museum has undergone extensive renovations since the violence in 2003, with assistance from other countries, including Italy and the United States. Meanwhile, the repatriation of its looted treasures has continued, most recently with three objects that ended up in Peru, including a letter written on a tablet. The returning holdings, though, appear to have overwhelmed the museum and its staff. The Culture Ministry’s statement said the museum had effectively become “a large warehouse” for unregistered items, adding that allowing the public to visit could jeopardize “priceless relics.”...

The discord underscores the conflicting aims of the government of Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki. It has called the reopening of the museum, along with the preservation of archaeological sites, a high priority. But hopes of reviving a cultural institution and tourism have been tempered by declining resources and the danger that is still palpable in Baghdad, despite a significant drop in violence in the past year.

NYT: hunger-striking British Guantánamo detainee, whose lawyer begged for his release due to health reasons last week, to be released
WP: cases of four Guantánamo detainees reveal problems for Obama
As officials try to decide who can be released and who can be charged, they face a series of murky questions: what to do when the evidence is contradictory or tainted by allegations of torture; whether to press charges in military or federal court; what to do if prisoners are deemed dangerous but there is little or no evidence against them that would stand up in court; and where to send prisoners who might be killed or tortured if they are returned home.

Answering those questions, said current and former officials, is a massive undertaking that has been hampered by a lack of cooperation among agencies and by records that are physically scattered and lacking key details.

It is "a tough, unenviable task with imperfect solutions," said Sarah E. Mendelson, director of the human rights and security initiative at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and the author of a report on closing Guantanamo Bay. "But they need to get fully underway now," she said, reviewing files, marshaling evidence and finding countries willing to take those detainees who can be released.

Approximately 60 detainees who have been cleared for release by the Bush administration remain at the camp. An additional 21 detainees are facing charges before military commissions and are almost certain to face trial in federal court, courts-martial or some new version of the current system of military commissions. Nearly 60 others could be prosecuted, the Pentagon has said, although many legal experts say that is unrealistic because of a lack of evidence and other problems. That leaves the fate of roughly 100 prisoners unclear.

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photographs of 2006 Congo election, from a current exhibit at the SF MOMA

engagement [just listening]

BBC: first ICC trial begins, against militia leader for use of child soldiers in DR Congo conflict...
"[T]he case is the first in history to focus exclusively on the use of child soldiers as a war crime and the first time victims will have been allowed to participate fully in an international trial...

The prosecution says children were snatched as they walked to school and suffered beatings and other abuses. Many were plied with marijuana and told they were protected by witchcraft, according to human rights groups."
NYT: ...a trial that almost didn't happen
"Turf wars within the court, bitter legal squabbles and irritation among the trial judges had almost torpedoed the case. Last July, as the trial was about to start, judges put a halt to the proceedings, citing legal and strategic errors by the prosecution, and said Mr. Lubanga should be set free, though he was ultimately kept in custody. The judges said the prosecution’s handling of evidence amounted to “wholesale and serious abuse” of the process and ruled that a fair trial was not possible at that point...

One question now being asked in The Hague is whether the Obama administration will re-establish links with the court. The Clinton administration signed the 1998 treaty establishing the court on its last days in office, but President Bush ordered the signature withdrawn, leaving the United States as the only major Western power not to join.

In his opening statement on Monday, Luis Moreno-Ocampo, the chief prosecutor for the court, said Mr. Lubanga’s militia included children, some as young as 9 years old, who were used as cooks, cleaners, spies, scouts and sex slaves. They were ordered to kill, pillage and rape, he said, and they were often killed and raped themselves.

Congolese rights groups say that Mr. Lubanga is by no means the most senior commander responsible for the widespread killing in Congo’s ethnic conflicts, but that he became available to the court after he was arrested in 2005 during an investigation into the killing of United Nations peacekeepers in Congo... The case is making use of a new step in international law, namely allowing victims to play a direct role in the trial and to be represented by their own lawyers."
BBC: profile of Lubanga
Open Society Institute: daily coverage of Lubanga's trial

LAT: UNHCR says Congolese refugees fleeing to South Sudan to escape LRA; more than 600 civilians killed in last month

NYT: Gen. Laurent Nkunda captured by Rwandan army
"General Nkunda was one of Congo’s most powerful and unpredictable rebel leaders, a megalomaniac with proven military skill who, until his arrest along the Congo-Rwanda border, had single-handedly destabilized a large chunk of central Africa... Congo is now urging Rwanda to extradite him to stand trial for war crimes and treason charges.

A few weeks ago, top rebel commanders suddenly split off from General Nkunda, a charismatic figure who until then had appeared to engender fierce loyalty. Thousands of Rwandan troops then stormed across the border as part of a joint mission with the Congolese Army to flush out Hutu militants left over from Rwanda’s genocide in 1994.

The latest twist came Thursday, when instead of attacking the Hutu militants, the Rwandans marched straight into General Nkunda’s territory and bundled him away.

At least that is what the Rwandans say, though some of General Nkunda’s former fighters say he was lured into Rwanda for a meeting and then either captured or told to go underground."

WPost: in Zimbabwe, unclear if power-sharing agreement dead or not
"Leaders of the 15-nation Southern African Development Community met Monday in Pretoria, South Africa, in what was depicted as a last-ditch effort to salvage a deal between Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe and the opposition. After 14 hours of negotiations that ended at dawn, South African President Kgalema Motlanthe told reporters that opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai would be sworn in as prime minister Feb. 11, after Zimbabwe's parliament passes a constitutional amendment creating the position.

But Tsvangirai's party, the Movement for Democratic Change, swiftly issued a statement indicating that was not the case. While a communique issued by SADC addressed some of the opposition party's demands -- including, for example, a call for the parties to discuss the assignment of provincial governors -- the MDC said it had not gone far enough."

NYT: Islamist insurgents in Somalia take Baidoa...
"Islamist insurgents took over the city that houses Somalia’s Parliament on Monday, just hours after Ethiopian troops withdrew and formally ended a failed two-year effort to defeat Islamist militants in the country... Parliament is supposed to select a new president to replace Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed, who resigned in late December. Many Somalis, Western diplomats and aid officials have crossed their fingers in the hope that moderate Islamists and transitional government figures would work together to pick a new, unifying leader.

Mr. Yusuf, a former warlord, had been widely criticized for trying to thwart peace negotiations. One of the leading contenders to replace him is a moderate Islamic cleric."
NYT: ...and impose Sharia law
"The Shabab, one of the most militant Islamist militias fighting for control of the country, captured the town, Baidoa, on Monday, hours after the withdrawal of the Ethiopian troops who had been protecting it... In addition to Baidoa, a market town that has served as the seat of Somalia’s transitional government, the Shabab controls most of Mogadishu, the main city and official capital, and much of the southern part of the country. The Shabab, listed by the United States as a terrorist organization, seeks to turn Somalia into an Islamic state under its particularly strict brand of Islamic law...

Several moderate factions have sent delegations to Djibouti, where they are working with the Parliament to establish a unity government based on a power-sharing deal made in October.

That process moved forward on Monday when the Parliament voted to expand its membership to add 200 legislators from the ranks of the moderate Islamists. The new members are to be sworn in on Wednesday, bringing the total number of seats to 550.

The Parliament also hopes to elect a new president within five days, according to local radio reports..."
LAT: Japan dispatches ships to Somalian seas

AJE: 25 dead in Madagascar riots

NYT: "rehabilitated" jihadists at it again
"Nine graduates of an influential Saudi rehabilitation program for former jihadists, including some who had been imprisoned at Guantánamo Bay, have been arrested for rejoining terrorist groups since the program started in 2004, Saudi officials said Monday...

If doubts are raised about the Saudi program, they could complicate President Obama’s plan to close the Guantánamo detention center within a year, as required by one of his first executive orders after taking office last week. Almost half of the remaining prisoners there are Yemeni, and their return home depends in part on Yemen’s creation of a rehabilitation program, paid for partly by the United States, that is modeled on the Saudi one.

Pentagon officials have said that 61 of the more than 525 Guantánamo detainees who have been released have returned to terrorism. That claim has generated some skepticism, and the Pentagon is expected to declassify portions of a report on the subject in the coming days."
LAT: violent protests against Bahrain government after coup charge
"The riots continued Tuesday after the prosecutor's office announced that the three had been charged with promoting a coup "through terrorism," according to a statement by the office.

The statement said they also were charged with joining an outlawed group, violating other citizens' liberties and inciting hatred against the ruling regime. One activist was released but banned from traveling, and the two others were in custody, the statement said."

NYT: politics of rebuilding in Gaza...
"Aid agencies expect several hundred million dollars to be pledged at a conference next week for items like food, medicine and spare parts for electrical grids. But that does not touch the broader question of rebuilding, which will require large quantities of cement, metal and glass, all of which Gaza lacks.

The task is enormous: An estimated 4,000 homes were destroyed and 17,000 damaged in the three-week war that began Dec. 27, Palestinian authorities said.

Israel said that letting such supplies in freely would be risky. Hamas militants have built rockets from pipes imported for a sanitation plant last year, Israeli officials said, and while Israel is attending to humanitarian aid — the number of trucks with food and other urgent supplies that now pass through Israeli crossings into Gaza has tripled — the Israeli authorities have yet to decide what else they will permit into Gaza."
AJE: ...complicated, as Hamas says it will give victims reconstruction money
"We are a government that is in charge of all of Gaza," [Ahmed al-Kurd, the Hamas-appointed minister of social affairs] said. "The ministries have budgets, they have funds, just like in the rest of the countries of the world."
Gdn: 1 Israeli soldier and 1 Palestinian killed today post-ceasefire
"Israel also closed its crossings into Gaza, through which all humanitarian aid and other supplies have to pass. "The crossings have been closed due to the attack," Peter Lerner, an Israeli defence official, said. "This is another example of terrorist activities against the crossings, the same crossings that serve the Palestinian people for humanitarian aid."
AJE: ...prompting Israel to bomb Gaza-Egypt tunnels, again
"Israel has confirmed that it carried out the raids. It says the strikes on the Rafah tunnels are aimed at stopping alleged weapons smuggling into the Gaza Strip by Hamas fighters.

The tunnels are also used to smuggle food, fuel and consumer goods from Egypt and are considered a life-line for thousands of ordinary Gazans.

The latest attack came despite fragile ceasefires declared by Israel and Hamas last week, ending a 22-day Israeli military campaign on Gaza in which 1,300 people were killed.

Israeli warplanes had targetted scores of cross-border tunnels during the recent war, but many tunnels resumed work shortly after the ceasefire."
NYT: just as Obama's Middle East envoy is on tour
"Mr. Obama has moved swiftly to engage in the Middle East, phoning Arab and Israeli leaders on his first full day in office and announcing [George] Mitchell’s appointment the next day.

Mr. Mitchell, a seasoned negotiator, helped broker a peace agreement in Northern Ireland and led a commission investigating the causes of violence between Israelis and Palestinians."
NYT: closed crossings mean humanitarian aid sits, waiting
AJE: photos reveal Israeli white phosphorus use on UN compound
"White phosphorus - a high-incendiary substance that burns brightly and for long periods on contact with the air - is often used to produce smoke screens.

But it can also be used as a weapon producing extreme burns when it makes contact with human skin.

The Israeli newspaper Haaretz has reported a brigade of paratroop reservists fired about 20 white phosphorus shells into the built-up area of Beit Lahiya on January 17, which landed in the UN-run compound where the two Palestinian children were killed and severe burns were inflicted on 14 other people.

Amnesty International, the London-based rights group, has accused Israel of war crimes over its use of the munitions in heavily populated areas."
NYT: move to the right in Israel post-Gaza invasion
"That is not because Israelis have regrets or have become faint-hearted about the casualties and destruction in Gaza. To the contrary, there appears to have been a shift further to the right, reflecting a feeling among many voters that an even tougher approach may now be required.

Recent polls indicate that Likud, Benjamin Netanyahu’s right-wing opposition party, has retained and even increased its lead. The other party that appears to have gained the most ground is the nationalist Yisrael Beiteinu, led by Avigdor Lieberman."
LAT: postwar boom for Gazan businesses... selling posters of martyrs

Gdn: Britain's security and counter-terrorism minister says Gaza attacks will fuel extremism
"In an outspoken assessment of the terror risk facing Britain, Gordon Brown's security adviser was scathing about the assertion, made by Tony Blair when prime minister, that foreign policy did not alter the UK's risk of a terror attack. "We never used to accept that our foreign policy ever had any effect on terrorism," he said. "Well, that was clearly bollocks."...

West, meanwhile, described the threat of international terrorism as a severe one... "Vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices are now, today, the greatest threat to us. If you put one near an old building the whole thing will collapse."
Gdn: British gov minutes discussing legality of Iraq war invasion to be released
"Secret government discussions about the Iraq war are to be disclosed after an information tribunal today ordered the release of cabinet minutes from 2003... The meetings considered the highly controversial issue of whether the invasion was allowed under international law. Lord Goldsmith, who was attorney general at the time, initially suggested that the legality of the invasion was legally questionable before subsequently issuing legal advice saying that it would be compatible with international law."

NYT: US helicopters down in Kirkuk; Iraqi budget also down as oil prices fall
"An Iraqi security source, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was forbidden to speak to the news media, said the helicopters had crashed in an open field in an area known as Chalak, about 10 miles south of Kirkuk... [A]fter the American military retrieved the wreckage, the Sunni Arab insurgent group known as the Army of the Men of the Naqshbandi Order, sometimes referred to as the Naqshbandi Army, distributed leaflets in the area claiming it had downed the two helicopters with makeshift rockets...

The group, named after a Muslim Sufi order, is linked to Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, who was one of Saddam Hussein’s top aides, and members of his family, according to American military intelligence officers. Mr. Douri, who is ailing but whose whereabouts remain a mystery, is an ardent follower and patron of the Naqshbandi order in Iraq...

The squeeze in Iraq’s finances comes as the government seeks to solidify fragile security gains by improving basic services, spurring job creation and rehabilitating the country’s battered infrastructure. In the past week, Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki has been on a whirlwind campaign tour of impoverished southern Iraq, drumming up support for his slate of candidates in provincial elections this Saturday.

He promised rapt audiences everywhere to provide jobs and housing.

“We have set our sight on rebuilding Iraq, providing an honorable life for its citizens, supporting agriculture, resuscitating our factories and plants, and building our armed forces,” Mr. Maliki told crowds during a rally on Monday in Babil Province.

But given the country’s immense investment needs, fulfilling some of these promises, at least in the short term, hinges on stable oil prices and higher production."
AJE: Abu Ghraib to be reopened under different name
LAT: hmm, any other signs of "normalcy" in Iraq?
NYT: Shiites on pilgrimage during provincial elections could bring unexpected surprises

LAT: Secretary of Defense Gates advises limited mission in Afghanistan
"Rather than the pursuit of democracy, Gates said the primary U.S. mission should be ensuring that Afghanistan did not again become a haven for Al Qaeda...

One new unit, the Ft. Drum, N.Y.-based 3rd Brigade Combat Team of the 10th Mountain Division, has arrived in Afghanistan, bringing the total number of U.S. troops to 36,000. The unit was originally scheduled to go to Iraq.

By spring, two additional brigades will be sent to Afghanistan, to be joined by a third in midsummer, Gates said.

Gates said it would be difficult to send troops to Afghanistan much faster than is currently planned because of a lack of infrastructure -- dining halls, bases, hospitals and logistics hubs -- there."
NYT: ...and wants to decrease delays for treatment of wounded soldiers there...
LAT: ...while Biden expects higher casualties and the Army pays for civilian casualties
"U.S. commanders on Tuesday traveled to a poor Afghan village and distributed $40,000 to relatives of 15 people killed in a U.S. raid, including a known militant commander. The Americans also apologized for any civilians killed in the operation... [Karzai] told the villagers he has given the U.S. and NATO one month to respond to a draft agreement calling for increased Afghan participation in military operations.

Karzai said if he does not receive a response within that time, he would ask Afghans what he should do about international military operations. The statement from the presidential palace describing the meeting did not elaborate...

Lt. Col. Steven Weir, a military lawyer who helped oversee the payments, said the payments were not an admission by the U.S. that innocents were killed. "It's a condolence payment," he said. "The villagers said none of them were in the Taliban, just peaceful individuals from the village. So by this payment they will understand it's not our goal to kill innocent people. This may help them understand we're here to build a safer and more secure Afghanistan."

NYT: Iranian terrorist group (says Iran) not a terrorist group (according to EU)
"The European Union removed a prominent Iranian opposition group from its list of banned terrorist organizations on Monday, a step that could worsen its relations with Tehran, which strongly opposed the move.

The decision, by the foreign ministers of the 27-nation bloc, ended a long battle by the group, the People’s Mujahedeen of Iran, to be removed from Europe’s list of proscribed organizations. It was placed on the list in 2002... The group advocates the overthrow of Iran’s religious leaders and the creation of a democratic, secular government. After the 1979 revolution, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini turned against the group, executing many of its members. The group has claimed responsibility for bombings that killed hundreds of officials and civilians in the 1980s...

Several thousand of the group’s members live in a camp north of Baghdad, where they have had American military protection since 2003. Iraq has been under pressure from Iran to expel the group, but if its members are sent back to Iran they will probably be accused of treason and almost certainly be executed."

NYT: Sri Lankan army takes Mullaittivu, last major rebel-held town
"The army’s taking of the rebel garrison town of Mullaittivu on Sunday may signal the end of conventional battles but not of suicide attacks and other deadly tactics that the guerrillas have used for decades in their campaign for an independent state in the northeast...

The army said it took the de facto rebel capital, Kilinochchi, three weeks ago, and Elephant Pass, a key corridor, a week later.

It is impossible to verify the government’s accounts because the authorities deny journalists access to anywhere near the front lines and because those who question the official version of events in the war are rebuked as traitors.

A journalist, a publisher and his wife have been held under antiterrorism laws for 10 months. A leading newspaper editor was killed this month, another was beaten on his way to work and a television station was attacked. Several journalists have fled the country recently."
AJE: looking for Tamil Tiger leader Velupillai Prabhakaran
"Officials said they were using spy planes that monitored satellite phone transmissions and took photographs of the jungle region to try to pin-point Prabhakaran's location... MR Narayan Swamy, an Indian journalist who wrote a biography of the LTTE leader, said the loss of Prabhakaran would be devastating to the group. "He is their brain. He is their heart. He is their god. He is their soul, and the whole organisation runs around him," he said."
NYT: no safe zone for civilians or UN staff
"First, the team of mostly Sri Lankan aid workers and their families were prevented by the guerrillas, also known by the initials L.T.T.E., from leaving the war zone. Then, on Saturday, they took shelter in what the government described as a no-fire zone, erecting a temporary compound, around which many civilians had also gathered.

A shell landed near the compound on Saturday evening, and then another early Sunday morning, killing 9 civilians and wounding more than 20, according to a memo sent by United Nations officials in Sri Lanka to their headquarters in New York."

AJE: Philippine rebel group to rejoin peace talks, on one condition: a separate Muslim state in the south
"The Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) and the Philippine government are trying to revive peace negotiations after a proposed deal broke down last year when the supreme court stopped the government from signing the deal... Al Jazeera's Marga Ortigas, reporting from Talayan in Mindanao, says thousands of people, mostly farmers, have been living in evacuation centres since last August, surviving on handouts under harsh conditions.

The MILF formed as a breakaway group in 1977 after splitting from the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF).

The MNLF subsequently entered into negotiations with the government in Manila and signed an agreement a decade later relinquishing its stated goal of independence.

The 12,000-strong MILF has, however, continued the struggle for political autonomy, becoming one of four groups that are fighting for a separate Muslim state in the southern Philippines."

LAT: Mexico a failed state? No way, says Mexican government
WPost: "Stew Maker" is captured, admits to burning bodies of 300 narco-rivals in acid

LAT: two former members of Peruvian military freed after courts fail to convict them for Barrios Altos massacre--after 6 years
"The former military officers are on trial on charges of murder, kidnapping and criminal conspiracy in the 1991 massacre of 15 people, including an 8-year-old boy, at Lima's Barrios Altos tenement, court clerk Daniel Luna told The Associated Press.

Barrios Altos is one of two massacres that ex-President Alberto Fujimori is charged with authorizing."

LAT: Obama has "constructive and cordial" conversation with Colombian president; they discuss security and Plan Colombia, among other issues

NYT: Iceland's government collapses
"Last week, [Prime Minister Geir] Haarde called elections for May, bringing forward a vote originally scheduled for 2011, after weeks of protests by Icelanders angered by soaring unemployment and rising prices. But Mr. Haarde said he would not lead his Independence Party into the new elections because he needed treatment for cancer.

Iceland has been in crisis since the collapse of its banks because of large debt in September and October, with its currency, the krona, plummeting. The government has negotiated $10 billion in loans from the International Monetary Fund and other countries, but the standard of living for the average person has sunk along with the currency, and the economy is expected to contract by nearly 10 percent this year."

LAT: Medvedev to alter Russian treason bill (in a challenge to Putin?)

AJE: former Serb general, Vlastimir Djordjevic, on trial at The Hague for ethnic cleansing in Kosovo

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NYT blog/Errol Morris: the Bush years in pictures

Gdn: on "responsible sovereignty"
"A new phrase has rolled off the production line of foreign policy analysts: responsible sovereignty. In a world where the threats are transnational - climate change, terrorism, nuclear proliferation, the banking crisis - states not only have a responsibility to their own citizens, but to their neighbours and to the international community as well. States need to take responsibility for the international implications of their domestic actions. Responsible sovereignty underpins current attempts by a distinguished group of US experts to create a new world order based on revitalised international institutions, diplomacy and negotiation. They call it a project to manage global insecurity."

sort of like the boyscouts [hot commodities]

LAT: Mongols motorcycle gang infiltrated, indictments issued for racketeering, violent offenses
"The key to the investigation -- dubbed Operation Black Rain -- was the work of the undercover agents who spent several years gaining the Mongols' trust, officials said. Before being admitted to the gang, they were checked out by a private investigator who had been hired by the Mongols and they were given polygraph exams.

The Mongols were formed in the 1970s by a small group of Latinos who reportedly had been rejected by the Hells Angels. The gang now has between 500 and 600 members, the vast majority of them in Southern California, according to law enforcement officials.

The gang has a constitution and bylaws and some of the trappings of more conventional organizations -- its members are provided cellphones, for example. Decisions regarding membership, dues collection and club policy are made by leaders known in the gang as the "Mother Chapter." They have a headquarters in West Covina that is stocked with assault rifles, shotguns and bulletproof vests, according to the indictment.

As with many organizations, patches are awarded to signify the status or achievements of its members, though the behavior celebrated by the Mongols differs from most. For instance, a skull and crossbones patch or one proclaiming "Respect Few, Fear None" is given to members who commit murder or other acts of violence on behalf of the gang, according to the indictment...

There also are patches associated with the gang's alleged sexual rituals. Members are awarded wings of varying colors for engaging in sex acts with women at prearranged "wing parties," the indictment states. For example, members who have sex with a woman with venereal disease are given green wings, according to the indictment...

Much of the violence described in the indictment involved clashes between the Mongols and their longtime rivals, the Hells Angels...

But the violence was not limited to disputes between warring gangs; some were motivated by race, but others appeared to be random acts."

WP: Saudis held talks with the Afghan and Pakistani officials, Taliban
BBC: nearly 1,000 to go on trial in Riyadh for links to Al-Qaeda

WP: US-backed sheiks shaping local authority in Anbar
"A man from the Dulaimi tribe had killed a man from the Jenabi tribe. The elders of both tribes could have sought justice in a provincial court. They could have conferred with traditional sheiks versed in centuries-old ways of resolving disputes. But they didn't. They came to Sweidawi, a sunburned, American-backed chieftain who in less than two years had become the most powerful man in this patch of eastern Ramadi.

He asked the men if they trusted his authority. They nodded. Within minutes, he worked out a settlement. The men were not happy, but they also feared Sweidawi and needed his protection...

But the rise of these sheiks, collectively called the Awakening, is already touching off new conflicts that could deepen without U.S. military backing for the movement. They have stripped traditional tribal leaders of influence. They have carved up Sunni areas into fiefdoms, imposing their views on law and society and weakening the authority of the Shiite-led central government. Divisions are emerging among the new breed of tribal leaders, even as they are challenging established Sunni religious parties for political dominance...

Their ascent reflects how the struggle for local and regional centers of power is increasingly shaping Iraq's future. And their growing clout ensures that large segments of Iraq will remain influenced by tribal codes, rather than modern laws, posing an obstacle to the democratic foundations that many would like to see built here."
CSM: third-party brokering by US military between Kurds and Arabs in Diyala
"Few issues will affect Iraq's future more than the final relationship between the Kurds – whose autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in northern Iraq has its own president, ministers, militia, and flag – and the Shiite-run central government in Baghdad.

But this town in Iraq's troubled eastern Diyala Province is 15 miles south of the KRG line, and but one flash point along a swath of "disputed areas" where Kurdish troops and authorities have expanded control beyond their borders.

Iraqi Arabs charge that Kurds are forcing them out of these areas, in the same way that Saddam Hussein's "Arabization" efforts in the 1970s and '80s brutally removed tens of thousands of Kurds...

Kurdish forces were sometimes invited in years past to help secure these areas before the new Iraqi Army could deploy. But now as Iraqi security forces are expanding and taking a more proactive role, towns like Khanaqin are torn...

Top of the list is clarifying the blend of federal and local government authority. Resolving the 12 "disputed areas" is so sensitive that the UN makes no map of them public."
BBC: status of US troops agreement hits road bumps
Slate: Ackerman and Hathaway say that Bush doesn't have the authority to make an agreement anyhow (SV says, 'not that that's stopped him before...')

Nature: social science and the Pentagon
Newsweek: one psychologist tries to get others out of interrogation business

Econ: military offensive in Sri Lanka

Econ: Bashir organizing talks on Darfur, but main rebel groups uninterested

BBC: in Zimbabwe, MDC calls for new elections

Slate: commodity prices and civil war: coffee and oil in Colombia
"Using newspaper reports of violent skirmishes in 950 Colombian municipalities between 1988 and 2005, Dube and Vargas find that when coffee prices went up, violence went down in locations where a large fraction of land area was under coffee cultivation. When coffee prices fell, however, as they did by almost 70 percent in the late 1990s, violence in coffee areas rose dramatically. The researchers estimate that an additional 500 deaths may have resulted from the increased conflict that came from lower coffee prices. The opposite was true for oil: It was higher prices that intensified conflict in areas with productive oil wells or pipelines. (Since both coffee and oil prices are traded in global markets, it is unlikely that price increases were caused by panicking commodities traders spooked by increased civil-war violence in Colombia.)"
LAT: and then there's the commodity that really counts: cocaine ring bust in Colombia, linked to Hezbollah
"The suspects allegedly worked with a Colombian cartel and a paramilitary group to smuggle cocaine to the United States, Europe and the Middle East. Harb traveled extensively to Lebanon, Syria and Egypt and was in phone contact with Hezbollah figures, according to Colombian officials."
LAT: Sinaloa cartel leader arrested
BBC: human heads sent to police in northern Mexico
"The heads, all of men believed aged between 25-35, arrived last week in an icebox marked as containing vaccines."

BBC: agreement reached between gov't and opposition in Bolivia
"The proposed new charter sets out greater central control of the economy, greater distribution of wealth to Bolivia's indigenous majority and land reform."

BBC: Albanian tradition of women living as 'honorary men' or 'sworn virgins' (depending on the circumstances)
"Tradition, particularly prevalent in the north of Albania, dictated that turning down a suitor could lead to the man's family exacting revenge on the girl's father or brother.
The only way to settle the dispute without bloodshed, according to the same tradition, was for the girl to declare herself a virgin for life and assume the role of a man - and thus never marry."

the Hill: police prepare for election-day violence, in the US.
"Some worry that if Barack Obama loses and there is suspicion of foul play in the election, violence could ensue in cities with large black populations. Others based the need for enhanced patrols on past riots in urban areas (following professional sports events) and also on Internet rumors...
“We’re prepared for the best-case scenario, we’re prepared for the worst-case scenario,” [Detroit second deputy chief Tate] said. “The worst-case scenario could be a situation that requires law enforcement.”
But Tate declined to describe what the worst-case scenario might look like, speaking gingerly like other police officials who are wary of implying that black voters are more likely than other voting groups to cause trouble."
the Root: maybe the exurbs are really where deployment should increase
ABCNews: SV, for one, can't promise a pacific response if this one gets elected
"Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin said in a local interview that the vice president is "in charge of" the U.S. Senate and "can really get in there with the senators and make a lot of good policy changes" – the second time she has claimed a more expansive role for the vice president than the U.S. Constitution outlines."
BBC: the Brits' helpful guide to the Joes of US politics

all too common tragedies [can we talk?]

NYT: in defense of diplomacy: Martti Ahtisaari wins Nobel Peace Prize
Slate: Petraeus is pro
"In Iraq, the general recalled in his Heritage speech, "we sat down with some of those who were shooting at us"—a painful task but "an explicit part of our campaign." These talks formed the basis for the Anbar Awakening—in which Sunni insurgents allied themselves with U.S. forces to beat back the common foe of al-Qaida in Iraq—and for the tactical success of the "surge" itself."

new plans for Afghanistan include a little of this, a little of that:
BBC: talks with the Taliban and the other insurgencies: who will engage?
"And there's the question of who you speak to within the movement. Is it possible to speak to the senior leaders? In order to get an agreement that would stick, you would need to have these men on board.
And do the Taleban even want to hold peace talks?
From their point of view, it could be argued that things are going quite well.
The insurgency is spreading and the government is regarded as weak, corrupt and ineffective by many Afghans. Some of these people would prefer a Taleban alternative."
WP: NATO to begin interdiction in Afghanistan
"The vast majority of poppy cultivation in Afghanistan occurs in seven southern provinces, areas patrolled by U.S., British, Canadian and Dutch forces.
The compromise allows NATO troops to act after receiving a request from the Afghans and does not require any change in the alliance's operational plan in Afghanistan."
BBC: UK to launch anti-Taliban propaganda plan
LAT: US to train Afghan tribal militias
"Under that approach, U.S. forces would scale back combat operations to focus more on training Afghan government forces and tribal militias. The plan is controversial because it could extend the influence of warlords while undermining the government of President Hamid Karzai in Kabul, the capital.
The strategy also could set up a hair-trigger rivalry between national security units and the improved tribal forces, proponents acknowledge."

LAT: hopefully protection is part of the package - across the border, suicide bombers target anti-Taliban tribal elders in Pakistan

"Hundreds of people had gathered for the outdoor meeting in the remote village of Ghiljo, at which elders of the Alizai tribe were making plans to raise a fighting force and attack a base belonging to the militants.

Pakistani authorities have been providing tribal leaders in such villages with financial and logistical support to raise lashkars, or local militias, in a bid to counter the tightening grip of Islamic militant groups in the tribal areas along the Afghan border.

The tribe had already organized some smaller attacks against the Taliban in recent days, including the burning of two compounds occupied by insurgents...

It was the second attack in recent days on anti-Taliban tribal leaders. Authorities on Thursday recovered the decapitated bodies of four men from the Bajaur tribal agency who were believed to have been abducted by militants. The four were helping organize a tribal militia."

WP: expect Iraq coverage to continue to decrease as Western bureaus pull out journalists
"It remains important and it remains interesting," said Alissa J. Rubin, the New York Times' acting bureau chief in Baghdad. "But what's in front of us now is almost a static situation. There's not a clear narrative line. The stories are more complex."
NYT: ...and more personal: one journalist remembers the victim of a Sept 28 bomb
WP: "sticky" IEDs used more frequently, seen as shift in insurgent tactics
"These assassination attempts mark a shift from mass-casualty attacks that triggered a backlash against insurgent groups and militias, U.S. military officials said, and come as the Iraqi government is asserting more control over security matters in the country and as the United States starts to reduce troop levels.

The bombs have been used against Iraqi government officials, particularly those who work in the army and police. Local leaders, judges, journalists and members of U.S.-backed Sunni armed groups have also been attacked."
BBC: as troops draw down, challenges range from rebuilding to revenge
"There are scores to be settled. As American forces begin to draw down, not everyone will be restrained. Grief and anger cannot just be wiped away.

And there is a new danger now from the Awakening movement - the fighters who used to support al-Qaeda in Iraq but who switched sides.

They are uneasy about the plan to absorb only 20,000 of their men into the armed forces.

The rest - about 80,000 - will be paid until they have found other work, but they risk losing their status in the community and, as one of their leaders said to me, they could become "bad people again" and re-join al-Qaeda."

Econ: Khatami might challenge Ahmadinejad
"Mr Khatami, who served as president between 1997 and 2005, after winning successive landslide election victories, could emerge as the most potent challenger to the incumbent, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has given every indication that he intends to seek a second term and who enjoys the support of both the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC)...Mr Ahmadinejad has succeeded in redefining the role of the presidency, accumulating extensive powers in his office, but largely at the expense of the institutions that Mr Khatami had been trying to build up as autonomous bastions of civil society and economic management—notably parliament, the media and the Central Bank of Iran."

Econ: Saudi Arabia's role in the region
"In recent years, as an ailing Egyptian government has faded from its former role as the Arab world’s chief broker, the Saudis have tried interceding in regional troubles ranging from Lebanon to Israel-Palestine, Somalia and Iraq. Yet for all the pious ritual and lavish banqueting enjoyed by their guests, and for all the moral authority carried by King Abdullah, who styles himself the Servant of the Holy Places, the Saudis have an uneven record of success."

Slate: the lawlessness of Guantanamo
LAT: whistle-blower started out as true believer

LAT: North Korea shuts down a reactor, leaves 'axis of evil'

NYT: China might allow farmers to sell land-use rights
"The Chinese leadership has long insisted that the country must remain self-sufficient in the production of staple foods, and is highly unlikely to allow farmers to sell land-use rights for nonagricultural development. But if a market for trading farmland developed as expected, peasants could gain a new source of cash income that could help revitalize the stagnant rural economy."

CSM: intervention in Georgia exposes cracks in Russia's military, prompts proposed increase in spending

Econ: as Sri Lankan army closes in on LTTE stronghold, end of war seems near to some

Econ: sectarian, or settler/indigenous violence in Assam
"The Bodos, among the earliest settlers in the Assamese plains, resent any outsider who encroaches on their tribal homelands. They do not make subtle legal distinctions between them."

BBC: founder of the Free Aceh Movement returns after 30 years in exile
"Gam signed a peace-deal in 2005 to end a 29-year conflict that killed 15,000.
The peace deal with Indonesia's government - which resulted in Aceh's autonomy - followed the devastation of the 2004 Asian tsunami."

LAT: cabinet in Peru resigns over bribery charges
"Many Peruvians are fed up with what they view as endemic corruption and the failure of the country's rapid economic growth to stem poverty, surveys show. Strikes and marches by teachers, farmers and doctors, among others, regularly paralyze public services and roads."
BBC: military convoy ambushed by Shining Path rebels; 12 die
"It came amid reports that Peru's army had launched an operation to remove some 300 Shining Path rebels who work closely with cocaine traffickers in [Huancavelica province]."

Econ: Chavez faces challenges in local elections
"It remains to be seen whether the government’s attempt to paint the opposition as unpatriotic and undemocratic and present itself as the main defence against US “imperialism” will bring significant benefits on the electoral front. At the end of September the opposition agreed to support a single, unity candidate for governor in every state except for Bolívar, and most pollsters concur that most of the urban electorate is pro-opposition, while the reverse is true in rural areas.Given Venezuela’s highly urbanised population, the danger for the government is that it loses big and significant states like Carabobo and Miranda, retaining rural backwaters like Apure and Delta Amacuro."
BBC: unclear if shutting down McDonald's (for 48 hours) will help or hurt

BBC: US court sentences 2 former Colombian paramilitaries to 20 years in prison, on drug trafficking charges
"Colombia's President Alvaro Uribe said any international assets seized by US authorities from the paramilitary leaders would go to compensating their victims.
But some Colombians feared their extradition meant the militia leaders would not disclose alleged links to many government figures."
AP: Colombian defense ministry links FARC to Mexican cartels
AP: cartel violence claims 11 in Mexico

BBC: Videla imprisoned in Argentina
"Jorge Videla, 83, was convicted in 1985 of the murder of 66 people, the torture of 93 others, and the illegal detention of more than 300.
Videla, who ruled from 1976 to 1983, was sentenced to life imprisonment.
He was pardoned by President Carlos Menem in 1990 but a court cancelled that order last year."

NYT: Mugabe disregarding the terms of power-sharing agreement
"An opposition spokesman, Nelson Chamisa, said Mr. Mugabe’s allocation of ministries was a strategy meant to pre-empt Mr. Mbeki’s mediation and called on African leaders and the international community to intervene. In a statement, he called Mr. Mugabe’s division of the ministries “a giant act of madness which puts the whole deal into jeopardy.”

BBC: new rebel group emerges in Congo's northeast
"The new rebel coalition, the Popular Front for Justice in Congo - known by its French acronym, FPJC, had earlier taken a village close to Bunia, killing soldiers and sending thousands fleeing for their lives into the bush.

Mayhem broke out in Bunia on Friday after government troops clashed with the rebels less than 10km (6 miles) south of the town...

The area around Bunia suffered almost a decade of war, which ended with a peace deal in 2006.

But the rebels say they represent a new coalition, formed to force the implementation of that deal, which included an amnesty for all those who participated in the previous fighting.

Tension in the region has been growing over the past two weeks, with fighting between Congolese troops and the rebels moving closer to Bunia."

BBC: DRC's president issues 'call to arms' to fight other rebel group, led by renegade General
"Over and above any political divide, we must mobilise as one behind our armed forces and our elected representatives to preserve peace and the unity and (territorial) integrity of the country," he said.

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NYT: extending equal rights to gays in CT
"Striking at the heart of discriminatory traditions in America, the court — in language that often rose above the legal landscape into realms of social justice for a new century — recalled that laws in the not-so-distant past barred interracial marriages, excluded women from occupations and official duties, and relegated blacks to separate but supposedly equal public facilities."

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the tragedy of the commons, on a global scale

BBC: yikes, forest crisis
"The global economy is losing more money from the disappearance of forests than through the current banking crisis, according to an EU-commissioned study.
It puts the annual cost of forest loss at between $2 trillion and $5 trillion."

Gdn: aligning incentives to protect rainforest in Ecuador
"The Ecuadorian government has said it is prepared to keep hundreds of millions of barrels of heavy crude oil in the ground, but in return it wants the international community to compensate it at the level of $350m (£202m) a year for a decade...

The Yasuni national park in Ecuador lies at the intersection of the Amazon, the Andes and the equator and spans almost a million hectares of primary rainforest. It is home to indigenous tribes, who wish to be left in isolation, and an extraordinary array of wildlife and plants, much of it endangered. Avoiding the oil extraction would also prevent the release of an estimated 100m tonnes of carbon into the atmosphere."

BBC: and Indonesia
"As well as protecting and restoring forest, the authorities have pledged to make development on Sumatra obey principles of "ecosystem-based planning", where any projects detrimental to the island's ecological health would be banned.

However, the vice-governor of the province of West Sumatra, Marlis Rahman, said help from the west would be needed to help meet the commitments. "We are calling on the international community to support us in implementing this commitment on the ground and help us to find extra livelihoods by protecting our forests," he said."

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history lessons

Gdn: Brits honored for fighting Franco in Int'l Brigades; offered Spanish citizenship
"Seventy years have passed since they marched out of Barcelona amid crowds of weeping, cheering Spaniards, but it is only now that the last few British volunteers who fought in Spain against General Franco's fascist-backed rebels are finally to be rewarded by the Spanish state...

While Hitler and Mussolini sent arms and troops to help Franco, Britain and Europe's other democracies stood on the sidelines as tens of thousands of volunteers from around the world travelled to Spain to help the Republic."

New Yorker: evolution of voting through 18th and 19th century US
“'To vacate an election,' an election-law textbook subsequently advised, “it must clearly appear that there was such a display of force as ought to have intimidated men of ordinary firmness.'...Americans used to vote with their voices—viva voce—or with their hands or with their feet. Yea or nay. Raise your hand. All in favor of Jones, stand on this side of the town common; if you support Smith, line up over there. In the colonies, as in the mother country, casting a vote rarely required paper and pen. The word “ballot” comes from the Italian ballotta, or little ball, and a ballot often was a ball, or at least something ballish, like a pea or a pebble, or, not uncommonly, a bullet. Colonial Pennsylvanians commonly voted by tossing beans into a hat. Paper voting wasn’t meant to conceal anyone’s vote; it was just easier than counting beans. Our forebears considered casting a “secret ballot” cowardly, underhanded, and despicable; as one South Carolinian put it, voting secretly would 'destroy that noble generous openness that is characteristick of an Englishman.'”

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conflict resolution
BBC: in some cases, partition could be the best option
"An estranged couple in Cambodia have sawn their house in half to avoid the country's convoluted divorce process."