Free Republic

A new survey finds privacy and hygiene issues among the top concerns of Japanese earthquake survivors two months after the March 11 disaster that smashed the nation's northeastern coast. They say lack of information is also a problem. National NHK television marked the two-month anniversary of the earthquake and tsunami on Wednesday by reporting the findings from interviews with more than 400 survivors at temporary shelters and other locations. About 120,000 people are still housed in temporary shelters. Asked what bothers them most, 38 percent of those interviewed cited a lack of privacy.

Columnist Charles Krauthammer recommends you circle the date March 11 on your calendars. That's the day, per Facebook, that organizers are hoping to start their own revolution in the Kingdom. Via The Daily Caller: “The big one is March 11,” Krauthammer said. “There’s a Facebook call in Saudi Arabia for a day of rage all over Saudi Arabia on March 11. Now, the Saudis have really good intelligence. They are tough. They’re ruthless and they’re effective. There isn’t a lot of anti-government activity in Saudi Arabia.”

Maybe we should prepare for the possibility that the Middle East might someday descend into chaos… Too late, someday has arrived. How about this nightmare scenario? Cairo-style riots in Riyadh. Few pundits think it’s impossible now, and many talking heads of the intelligensia actually think the prospect of an Arabia sans the House of Saud is all but inevitable. Good riddance of course, but as with other Muslim Nations that are currently in flux: who or what will replace the sweet angels of the Saudi Fiefdom?

Still in Control Pervez Musharraf was calm, confident and—despite a flurry of rumors—not about to announce his resignation. Instead, the Pakistani president's "concession" to his troubled nation was an announcement that he would allow Britain's Scotland Yard to help local law enforcement agencies with their investigation into last week's assassination of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto. Speaking in a nationally televised address two hours after Pakistan's election commission announced the postponement of the ballot to Feb. 18, six weeks later than had been scheduled, Musharraf was notably deferential in his remarks about Bhutto, often invoking her "martyrdom" and extolling...

MADRID (Reuters) - A Moroccan suspected of direct involvement in the 2004 Madrid train bombings which killed 191 people was arrested on Sunday in Rabat, a judicial source in Spain familiar with the case said on Monday. Abdelilah Hriz, 29, will be tried in his home country for his suspected part in Europe's deadliest Islamist attack, the first time Morocco has agreed to try one of its citizens for crimes allegedly committed abroad, said the source. Spanish Judge Juan Del Olmo recently traveled to Morocco to question Hriz and take DNA samples, the Moroccan state news agency MAP said last...

He also reveals that The Tunisian talked to UCIE agents.Cartagena Identifies the Police Officer that Asked Him to Go into the Leganés Apartment in the Morning of April 3rd.The testimony as protected witness, asked by the State Attorney Olga Sánchez, of the Police informer nicknamed Cartagena has left a lot of question that might change drastically the trial. Some details had been already revealed by EL MUNDO, as the pressure from the Police to avoid mentioning ETA. According to his testimony, The Tunisian was also linked to UCIE Police Officers. Asked by the Accusation Attorney, he gave names: “Enrique, Rubio,...

MADRID, Spain (CNN) -- Thirteen men arrested in and around the Spanish capital last Friday on suspicion of collaborating with a terrorist group connected to the Madrid train bombings were freed from jail, a court spokeswoman told CNN. Police investigators said they had links to several other suspects in the train bombings, but after arraignments this week Judge Juan del Olmo released them on lesser charges of collaborating with a terrorist group.

That the world changed on 911 has become one of those true cliches that some people mouth unconsciously, and others mouth insincerely. But the world did change that day. Americans speak much less commonly of 311 as a day the world changed, but it did. March 11, 2004 was the day of the train bombings in Madrid that killed 192 people. After 911, we learned that the old European powers were not our allies, and would gladly see us destroyed by Islamic terrorism. (For reasons which I have earlier discussed, I do not count the British as Europeans, even though...

Since the Madrid bombings on 11 March there has been considerable media interest in a document found on radical islamist websites some months ago by researchers at the Norwegian Defence Research Establishment (FFI). The document recommends "painful strikes" against Spanish "forces" specifically around the time of the Spanish elections and there has naturally been much speculation about the relationship between this text and the Madrid events. Brynjar Lia and Thomas Hegghammer now present some clarifications and reflections on the significance of the 42-page Arabic document called "Jihadi Iraq, Hopes and Dangers". Date and origin of the document According to the...

    March 25, 2004 TERRORIST ATTACKS IN MADRID Suspect from Hesse Arrested In the investigation into the terrorist attacks in Madrid, authorities have hit upon their first clues leading to Germany. At least one of the three suspects Spanish police arrested on Wednesday shall have lived for years in Hesse. Chief Federal Prosecutor Nehm has taken up the case. AP Arrests in Madrid: Clues leading to Germany? Hamburg - The Spanish police have come a step further in the search for the ringleaders of the attacks on three commuter trains in Madrid. As the Spanish Department of the...

As new evidence points to the possibility that al Qaeda is responsible for the March 11 bombings in Madrid, Spain, America's top diplomat today noted in a television interview here that no country is immune to terrorism. The Spanish commuter train bombings, which killed 200 people and wounded more than 1,400, shows "there is a war on terror that must be fought," Secretary of State Colin L. Powell said to interviewer Chris Wallace on the "Fox News Sunday" program. Spain, a U.S. ally in the global war on terrorism, sent 1,300 troops to support efforts to establish a democratic government...

President Bush helped break ground March 11 for a memorial honoring victims of the World Trade Center attacks, after reminding America to remain vigilant against terrorism and condemning yet another horrific terrorist incident earlier in the day in Madrid. The president made no official speech at the solemn groundbreaking ceremony for the new Sept. 11 memorial in East Meadow, N.Y., a Manhattan suburb on Long Island. The memorial will feature two semitransparent 30-foot aluminum towers, representing the twin towers of the World Trade Center, rising from a reflecting pool. It also will include a wall with the names of 281...