The guided missile cruiser USS Cowpens, was confronted by Chinese warships in the South China Sea near Beijing’s new aircraft carrier Liaoning, according to officials familiar with the incident. http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article37115.htm

Are the Senkakus Islands Worth a War? 

The islands, could bring on a shooting war. And if it does, America would be in it.

 

Iranian negotiators halted nuclear talks after Washington blacklisted a dozen companies and individuals for evading US sanctions, state media reported.

 

With or without nuclear weapons, Iran and its allies are the chief impediments to Israeli hegemony in the Middle East.

 

‘No one will prevail over Russia militarily’: Putin eyes $700bn to advance Army.

 

The Congress and the president should rethink the need to give the Pentagon over $20 billion more in fiscal 2014.

 

The CIA publicly admits Robert Levinson was a CIA agent, but the agency claims he was in Iran as a rogue agent.

 

What does it mean when a notoriously profit-driven, warmongering, climate-killing media system mourns, with one impassioned voice, the death of a principled freedom fighter like Nelson Mandela?

 

Endowed with virtue and decorated with knowledge, the sacred responsibility of human agency rests in the hands of its masters: yourselves.

 

Fischer, who holds both U.S. and Israeli citizenship and now lives in New York, stepped down as governor of the Bank of Israel on June 30, midway through his second five-year term.

Bush- Blair Legacy Continues As –

Violence in Iraq, including an attack by gunmen on workers on a gas pipeline from Iran, killed 37 people on Friday and raised fears the country is falling back into all-out conflict.

 

 

Bush- Blair Legacy Continues As –

The workers were attacked as they dug a trench to extend a gas pipeline from Iran to Iraq.

 

 

Bush- Blair Legacy Continues As –

Ten years after the capture of Saddam Hussein, Iraq is facing an insurgent bloodbath again as al-Qaeda reclaims vast swathes of the country.

 

 

An attack by Islamist rebels has left at least 10 people dead over the past two days in the Syrian town of Adra, activists and eyewitnesses say.

 

 

Syrian soldiers surrounded an industrial area near Damascus Friday after an al-Qaida linked rebel faction infiltrated the area earlier this week, reportedly killing dozens of civilians, according to the government and activists.

 

 

The fighters of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), an insurgent group active in Iraq and Syria, entered the village of Ihras, 20 kilometers south of the border town of Azaz, taking the civilians hostage and transporting them to an unknown location, said the British-based Observatory.

 

 

For January summit, opposition forces keen to form a delegation that’s ‘as wide as possible,’ including al-Qaeda-linked groups

 

 

It is now more evident than ever before that Qatar is playing a vital role in stoking up the chaos which is tearing Syria apart.

 

 

Ahmed Luay’s second-eldest son, a soldier in the Syrian army, fell in battle with rebels just over a month ago. Three more of his sons are still on the front lines in the Damascus suburbs. Luay insists he’s prepared to sacrifice them all in what he says is a war against a terrorist invasion.

 

 

But Michael Hayden, the retired US Air Force general who until 2009 was head of the Central Intelligence Agency, said a rebel win was not one of the three possible outcomes he foresees for the conflict.

 

 

European leaders should be ashamed by the paltry numbers of refugees from Syria they are prepared to resettle, human rights group Amnesty says.

 

UN confirms Syria chemical arms use, US rues rebel setbacks:

The report does not attribute blame for the attacks, as this was beyond the team’s mandate from the UN Security Council.

 

 

A militia group has killed 27 Muslims in a village in the Central African Republic, the United Nations said on Friday, in an attack underscoring the difficulties faced by French troops in stabilising their former colony.

 

 

Two young men were killed in clashes Friday between supporters and opponents of Egypt’s toppled Islamist president as police used tear gas to disperse protests, officials said.

 

 

Mohammed Osman Akoush, head of the city’s civil records office, was killed Friday when unidentified gunmen opened fire on his car in al-Sabri district as he left a restaurant, the official said.

 

 

Every week, about a dozen Syrians arrive at Benghazi’s airport for what’s described as insurgent training. When they fly out, they’re carrying fake Libyan passports, according to three officials familiar with the comings and goings of foreigners at the airport.

 

 

A government doctor said 90 per cent of the cases were pneumonic plague, a strain much more vicious than the common bubonic plague that can kill within three days, leaving little time for antibiotics to work.

 

 

A drone strike on a wedding convoy in Yemen killed 17 people, mostly civilians, medical and security sources said Friday, adding grist to mounting criticism of the US drone war.

 

 

 At least four people were killed in Bangladesh on Friday when supporters of Islamist leader Abdul Quader Mollah vented their fury at his execution for war crimes committed during the 1971 war of independence from Pakistan.

 

 

Unidentified gunmen attacked two separate polio vaccination teams operating in northwestern Pakistan on Friday, killing one vaccination worker and two police guards (AP, Dawn, ET).

 

 

President Mahmoud Abbas has rejected US proposals for Israel to keep troops in a future Palestinian state along its border with Jordan, a Palestinian source said on Friday.

 

 

According to senior Palestinian advisor, the atmosphere at the meeting last night was not good because of “American pressure.” The Americans want an Israeli presence in the Jordan Valley for a period of 10 to 15 years

 

 

Yeah right!

Secretary of state says Israel, Palestinians still on schedule to reach full Middle East peace deal by end of April, adds both sides are committed to negotiations

 

 

Really?

Infuriating activists, PA president tells reporters in South Africa he backs boycott of settlements but not of Israel, with whom ‘we have relations’

 

 

The unlikely pairing of Saudi Arabia and Israel are reportedly teaming up, in response to Washington’s Middle East policies. Representatives from the countries’ intelligence services apparently met for talks in Jerusalem.

 

 

Moscow said Friday it can not accept a recent U.S. decision to introduce new sanctions against a group of Iranian individuals and businesses, warning that the measure will jeopardize nuclear talks.

 

 

An American ex-FBI agent believed to have been held in Iran for the last seven years was working for the CIA on an unapproved mission, the Associated Press news agency reports.

 

 

Why AP is publishing story about missing American tied to CIA:

 The Associated Press today is publishing an article about serious blunders at the Central Intelligence Agency and an effort to cover them up. At the heart of the story is a retired FBI agent, Robert Levinson, who was recruited as a spy by a rogue group of analysts inside the CIA.

 

 

An American Jewish man who disappeared in Iran in 2007 had been working for the CIA in a rogue operation, an American newspaper reported.

 

 

Funds for missile defense collaboration are separate from the average $3 billion (NIS 10.5 billion) in defense assistance Israel receives from the United States annually .

 

 

Defense cooperation funding, to which Israel contributes, is separate from the $3.1 billion Israel receives in defense assistance as part of a 10-year package.

 

 

News agency says Jang Song-thaek, uncle of Kim Jong-un, was found guilty of seeking to overthrow the state.

 

 

South Korean defence chief Kim Kawn-jin promised “heightened readiness” after the purge of Chang Song-thaek. He said the execution could be seen as part of a “reign of terror” by the North Korean leader.

 

 

Portions of the Senate’s long-awaited report on Bush-era interrogation practices are poised to be released, according to Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence Committee.

 

 

FBI cons another patsy:

A 58-year-old airport worker was charged Friday with allegedly planning a suicide bombing at a passenger terminal at the Wichita Mid-Continent Airport in Kasnsas.

 

 

A Customs officer at Auckland International Airport took law graduate Sam Blackman’s two smartphones, iPad, an external hard drive and laptop – and demanded his passwords.

 

 

Privacy experts warn that advertisers, even the NSA, could be following your visits to adult sites.

 

 

President Yanukovich, holding talks with the opposition, promises to fulfill a key demand of demonstrators.

 

 

By Amnesty International’s researcher on migration in the European Union

 

 

A commission investigating the August 1976 death of Juscelino Kubitschek has concluded that the ex-Brazilian president (1956-1961) was the victim of a plot hatched by the US-backed military dictatorship.

 

 

The new energy law allows private oil and gas companies to drill for oil and gas with the state-run firm Pemex in exchange for a share of the profits.

 

 

Video report –

 

 

The Labor Department chose not to disclose that the data going into that figure are under investigation for falsification.