truthout.org
Associated Press
    Kufa, Iraq – U.S. forces clashed Monday with gunmen protecting the house of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr in the holy city of Kufa. One woman was killed and three people were wounded, a hospital official said.

    The U.S. military had no immediate comment.

    At least six U.S. military vehicles entered the Zahra area in Kufa near al-Sadr’s house, which is protected by his militia, the Mahdi Army, witnesses said.

    Heavy gunfire and a mortar barrage set cars on fire before Iraqi police intervened and the U.S. forces withdrew, witnesses said.

    ”One woman was killed and we have three injured,” said Ajwak Kadhim, director at Al-Hakim Hospital in Kufa, 100 miles south of Baghdad.

    Al-Sadr, who is wanted by U.S. forces on an Iraqi warrant for the April 2003 murder of a moderate cleric in the nearby city of Najaf, was in his house at the time, witnesses said.

    The radical cleric, who has grassroots support for his anti-coalition stance, began a two-month rebellion in early April after the U.S.-led occupation authority closed his newspaper and arrested a key aide. A series of truces ended the fighting, and the issue of whether to arrest al-Sadr was dropped without resolution.

Looks like somebody was set up…

Scoop
Thomas Kean, Chairman
National Committee on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States
301 7th Street, SW
Room 5125
Washington, DC 20407

Dear Chairman Kean:
It has been almost three years since the terrorist attacks on September 11; during which time we, the people, have been placed under a constant threat of terror and asked to exercise vigilance in our daily lives. Your commission, the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks upon the United States, was created by law to investigate “facts and circumstances related to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001” and to “provide recommendations to safeguard against future acts of terrorism”, and has now issued its “9/11 Commission Report”. You are now asking us to pledge our support for this report, its recommendations, and implementation of these recommendations, with our trust and backing, our tax money, our security, and our lives. Unfortunately, I find your report seriously flawed in its failure to address serious intelligence issues that I am aware of, which have been confirmed, and which as a witness to the commission, I made you aware of. Thus, I must assume that other serious issues that I am not aware of were in the same manner omitted from your report. These omissions cast doubt on the validity of your report and therefore on its conclusions and recommendations. Considering what is at stake, our national security, we are entitled to demand answers to unanswered questions, and to ask for clarification of issues that were ignored and/or omitted from the report. I, Sibel Edmonds, a concerned American Citizen, a former FBI translator, a whistleblower, a witness for a United States Congressional investigation, a witness and a plaintiff for the Department of Justice Inspector General investigation, and a witness for your own 9/11 Commission investigation, request your answers to, and your public acknowledgement of, the following questions and issues: rest of letter…

Independent UK
Ministers from the world’s richest and poorest countries struck an 11th-hour deal yesterday to boost trade by cutting farm subsidies and import tariffs worldwide.

After five days of intense negotiation, the World Trade Organisation agreed to an interim text and set a deadline of December 2005 to hammer out a new global deal.

The deal was hailed as “historic” by the WTO and the main wealthy nations but fiercely attacked by activist groups who condemned it as a “catastrophe for the poor.” full article

by Jim Schultz zmag.org
Cochabamba, Bolivia – When Bolivians went to the polls earlier this month to vote on how to develop the nation’s vast oil and gas reserves, they went with history on their minds.

Just outside the old colonial city of Potosi sits the mountain known as “cerro rico” (hill of riches). Beginning in the mid-1500s silver extracted from the hill, mostly by forced Indian labor, virtually bankrolled the Spanish empire for three centuries. Today Bolivians remember very well that their country sat atop one of the planet’s greatest treasures of mineral wealth yet ended up the poorest country in South America.

Last October, as President Gonzalo Sànchez de Lozada pressed ahead with plans to export the nation’s gas through Chile and onward to the US, the country erupted into a month-long series of road blockades and protests. When the President sent out troops to quash the demonstrations, leaving more than sixty people dead, a surge of public anger forced him to flee to the US in exile.

As Bolivia’s Vice President, Carlos Mesa, stood before a special session of Congress to be sworn in as the nation’s leader he pledged a commitment to one of the protest’s key demands – to put the gas issue before the people directly, through the nation’s first-ever public referendum. full article

US forces hunt down al-Qa’eda in Sudan
UK Telegraph
American special forces teams have been sent to Sudan to hunt down Saudi Arabian terrorists who have re-established secret al-Qa’eda training camps in remote mountain ranges in the north-eastern quarter of the country.full article

British soldiers on standby to avert humanitarian disaster in Darfur
Independent UK
British soldiers are being put on standby this weekend for possible deployment to Sudan as aid agencies warned that hundreds of thousands of lives could be at risk in the western region of Darfur. full article

France Ferries Aid in Chad, Soldiers to Deploy
Reuters
ABECHE, Chad (Reuters) – France on Saturday flew a planeload of United Nations aid into eastern Chad where French soldiers prepared to deploy from their base in Abeche toward the border with Sudan’s Darfur region. full article

Mandelson rented flat from oil tycoon in coup claim
Guardian UK
Peter Mandelson, the twice-sacked minister who is to be Britain’s new European Commissioner, rented a luxury London home from the Lebanese millionaire now accused of funding an illegal African coup.

Mandelson’s links to Ely Calil – the British-basedtycoon who was Lord Archer’s financial adviser – will once again raise questions about the former minister’s links to rich businessmen.

Mandelson was forced to resign as Northern Ireland secretary in 2001 after he was accused of helping one of the Hinduja brothers obtain a British passport.

Calil, who made his fortune trading oil in Africa, is being sued in Britain for allegedly funding a coup to overthrow the president of the oil-rich west African state of Equatorial Guinea. full article

Pardon me for my scepticism as to the ‘humanitarian motives’ of the US, Britain, and France in Sudan. ‘Hunting terrorists’ is a great pretext for protecting US and European oil and natural gas interests from the Middle East all the way down the West African coast. Darfur Sudan comes at a very convenient time. Here is the ‘coalition effort’ Kerry and others are clamouring for, with capitalists cops deployed from Afghanistan to Angola.

Newsweek
Aug. 9 issue – Secretary of State Colin Powell recently testified before a federal grand jury investigating the leak of the identity of CIA covert officer Valerie Plame, NEWSWEEK has learned. Powell’s appearance on July 16 is the latest sign the probe being conducted by prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald is highly active and broader than has been publicly known. full article

This is not going away.

New York Times
RIO DE JANEIRO, July 31 – One American administration after another has tried and failed to maintain order and restore democracy in Haiti. Now, with Washington’s enthusiastic support, Brazil has stepped in at the head of a United Nations mission, and is using unconventional diplomacy to complement the usual military show of force.
[From Brazil’s ruling party:]

“The current mission runs the risk of becoming part of the U.S.’s international military policy of finding regional gendarmes to play a tutorial role in countries Washington considers incapable of governing themselves,” Emir Sader, a party leader, complained recently and “legitimates a military operation that overthrew a legitimately elected government.” full article
“…maintain order and restore democracy.” Yeah right. I don’t know what Lula’s thinking, but he will regret this one. ‘Maintaining’ an illegitimate government. Succumbing to the US ‘indirect rule’ strategy.