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CIA bought foreign cooperation against terrorism, says report Julian Borger in Washington Saturday November 19, 2005 The Guardian (UK) The CIA set up a network of secret joint operations centres with two dozen foreign intelligence agencies to hunt down suspected terrorists in the years after September 11 2001, it was reported yesterday. According to the report in the Washington Post, the cooperation of foreign agencies was bought with hi-tech gadgetry to help them conduct wiretaps and other surveillance, shared intelligence, and occasional personal favours. In the case of the Indonesian spy chief, Lieutenant General Abdullah Hendropriyono, the CIA arranged for...

SACRAMENTO - Stressing his love of the country to the south, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger emphasized his goal of stronger ties with Mexico in his weekly radio address Saturday. Looking to boost his image with Hispanics at home, Schwarzenegger visited Mexico on Friday, meeting with his Baja California counterpart in talks on security and immigration. "Mexico is our Number One trading partner, and I am proud that we have increased trade with Mexico by 16 percent last year alone," Schwarzenegger said Saturday. "Our trade relationship supports as many as 200,000 California jobs and generates nearly $160 billion for our economy." Schwarzenegger...

WASHINGTON, Sept. 17, 2005 – President Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin emerged from a Sept. 16 meeting with a renewed commitment to working together in fighting terrorism and preventing proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, the two leaders told reporters at a White House news conference. Bush noted that both countries have felt the scourge of terrorism - the United States on Sept. 11, 2001, and Russia in September 2004, when a school siege in Beslan left 331 people, 186 of them children, dead. "We've got a strong ally in Russia in fighting the war on terror," Bush said....

"The British and the American people loudly declared their support for their leaders decision to attack Iraq. It is the duty of Muslims to confront, fight, and kill them."Osama bin Laden, as quoted in various press accounts, December 26, 1998 "Oh sons of Arabs and the Arab Gulf, rebel against the foreigner . . . Take revenge for your dignity, holy places, security, interests, and exalted values."Saddam Hussein, January 5, 1999 THE "LONG SHORT WAR" with Saddam's Iraq, as author Christopher Hitchens has aptly described it, has had many tense moments. Perhaps never more so than in late 1998. Tensions...

Drafted By: Dr. Michael A. Weinstein Overshadowed in the Western press by the G8 summit of leading industrialized nations and the complications to it caused by the London transit bombings, another summit -- the July 5 meetings in Astana, Kazakhstan of the heads of government of the six members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (S.C.O.) -- promised to have greater geostrategic significance than the more widely reported events. Created with its present membership of China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan in 2001, the origins of the S.C.O. date back to 1996 when Beijing initiated the Shanghai Five, which included...

N.Korea provides nuclear aid to Iran -intel reports By Louis Charbonneau Wed Jul 6, 9:18 AM ET Recent intelligence reports accuse North Korea of secretly helping Iran develop its nuclear program, raising fresh concerns about Pyongyang's nuclear proliferation and Tehran's atomic intentions. The United States and the European Union fear Iran is using its nuclear energy program as a front to develop nuclear weapons and have called on Iran to cease all sensitive atomic work. Tehran says its program is peaceful and refuses to give up its sovereign right to a full atomic program. "In the late 1990s, cooperation began...

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich says he and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton teamed up at a May 11 press conference with one goal in mind -- to get Congress to pass, and the president to sign, a health information technology bill. Gringrich told Fox News's Bill O'Reilly that the bill's sponsors (Reps. Patrick Kennedy, a R.I. Democrat, and Tim Murphy, a Pennsylvania Republican) said if he and Sen. Clinton appeared together at the press conference, they'd get a lot more publicity for the bill they both support. As for the suggestion that Sen. Clinton is using Gingrich to show that...

For Immediate ReleaseOffice of the Press SecretaryJune 4, 2005 President's Radio Address      Audio THE PRESIDENT: Good morning. America's economy is on the right track. Over the past two years, we've added more than 3.5 million new jobs. More Americans are working today than ever before. Home ownership is at an all time high. Small businesses are flourishing. Factory output is growing. And families are taking home more of what they earn. These are hopeful signs for our economy, and we must work hard to sustain that prosperity. When members of Congress return next week, they need to take action...

PRESIDENT George W Bush is a “jerk”. His administration is a “mafia of assassins”. And, according to Hugo Chavez, the belligerent populist president of Venezuela, Condoleezza Rice, the US secretary of state, lies in bed at night dreaming of him. Chavez, 50, is rapidly becoming a US nightmare in Latin America. He aroused further American anger last week by threatening to form a nuclear alliance with Iran. The prospect of two hostile, oil-rich governments working together against US interests has shocked Washington and plunged relations with Venezuela to a dangerous new low. US officials have begun to suspect that Chavez...

Last Updated: Tuesday, 17 May, 2005, 15:49 GMT 16:49 UK   German far right unites for polls Germany is gearing up for a key election on Sunday in the mainly industrial state of North Rhine-Westphalia. But the BBC's Tristana Moore in Berlin reports that far-right parties have their sights on a bigger goal - they are joining forces for next year's federal elections. Police blocked a neo-Nazi march in Berlin on VE Day The activities of neo-Nazis were very much in the spotlight on 8 May as Europe marked the 60th anniversary of the Allies' victory in World War...

Senate group warns China faces test over N. Korea By Carol Giacomo, Diplomatic Correspondent Fri May 20, 2:58 AM ET WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A North Korean nuclear test can still be averted but China must agree to join the United States and other Asian nations in a quarantine of the isolated communist state, according to an analysis by the Bush administration's U.S. Senate allies. A South Korean man sits in front of a banner against North Korean leader Kim Jong-il at a rally against North Korea's nuclear ambition in Seoul May 20, 2005. A North Korean nuclear test can still...

/begin my translation Bush & Hu Remaking the Global Order? Entering into 5 'consecutive summits,' N. Korean nuclear crisis may take a sudden turn [ 2005-05-03 18:16 ] President Bush and President Hu will have five summits this year. U.S. President George W. Bush and Chinese President Hu Jintao are scheduled to have five summits this year to discuss issues to concern both countries.  All attention are focused on whether they can reach an important agreement on N. Korean nuclear crisis at the summits. According to  May 2nd issue of 'Ming-bao,' a Hong Kong daily(note: a pro-Chinese daily,) starting with the May 8th Sino-American summit at the 60th...

WASHINGTON -- President Bush's chief of staff appealed on Sunday for congressional Democrats to work with the administration and Republicans rather than complain and stall action on Capitol Hill. Andrew Card, appearing on three talk shows, also reaffirmed the president's support for House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, the Texas Republican whose ties to lobbyists have raised ethics questions, and John R. Bolton, the embattled nominee to be U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. "We'd like to see more cooperation from the Democrats," Card said. "We have some serious problems in this country that must be addressed. We'd like to see...

NASA payload may ride India’s moon mission PRANAB DHAL SAMANTA Posted online: Tuesday, April 26, 2005 at 0202 hours IST NEW DELHI, APRIL 25: In a recognition of India’s capabilities in space sciences, the US has evinced keen interest in placing a payload aboard India’s first spacecraft to the moon, the Chandrayan-I. ........................... A joint working group on space cooperation is expected to meet for the first time in mid-May. ........................... This will open a new chapter in Indo-US space ties which did start on a positive note back in the early 1960s when the US help set up the...

U.S. Forest Service District Ranger Pam Brown and Joe Lowe, the state of South Dakota's top fighter of wildfires, were almost giddy Wednesday over what happened last Sunday during the Camp 5 forest fire near Deadwood

http://www.csis.org/pacfor/cc/0501Qnk_sk.html North Korea-South Korea Relations January-March 2005Jan. 2, 2005: Yonhap News reports ROK will help subsidize private company investments in North Korean infrastructure. The Ministry of Unification expects to revise rules for Inter-Korean Cooperation Fund and implement them later this month. Jan. 3, 2005: ROK's Korea Container Terminal Authority says it has plans to develop North Korean Nampo port in a joint venture with Kookyang Shipping Co. and Dongnam Shipping Co. Jan. 3, 2005: Chosun Ilbo reports Chairman Kim Jong-il's favorite bottled water, Mount Myohyang Mineral Water, will be available for consumption in the ROK. The first shipments have arrived...

Drama at the open sea: Israeli, American and French naval forces assisted Wednesday in the rescue of Egyptian and Syrian sailors whose ship sank in international waters off the coast of Nahariya. Shortly before 2:00 p.m. (7:00 a.m. EST), the cargo ship Adora, traveling from Ashdod to Turkey, received a dispatch that another ship, which was apparently transporting cement, was in trouble. The dispatch said the ship, which was carrying at least seven Egyptian and Syrian crew members and flew a North Korean flag, was sinking in international waters as it was making its way from EL Arish Port in...

Will the 21st century be another "American Century" or will it be the first "Asian Century"? A peaceful - for now - struggle has been joined. For the past few weeks Americans have been focused on news from the Vatican. And for the past few years the bulk of "foreign news" has concerned the Middle East. But in the Far East three huge fuses are burning. First, the prime minister of China, Wen Jiabao, traveled to India and declared that the two countries would be the "two pagodas" of economic might in the coming hundred years - the "Asian Century,"...

Report: South Korea calls for increased military cooperation with China South Korea is planning to bolster its military cooperation with China, local media on Tuesday quoted the South Korean defense minister as saying, signaling a key shift in alliances in northeast Asia. Although China is the last major ally of the South's rival, North Korea, President Roh Moo-hyun has in recent weeks stressed that his country should help balance the region _ implying a shift from Seoul's traditional alliance with the United States and Japan toward a neutral position among regional powers, which include China and Russia. "We plan to...

A few years ago, I wrote an article discussing the ways in which libertarians and conservatives have common cause on a number of policy issues -- and how the Blogosphere can work to bring libertarians and conservatives closer together. Along somewhat similar lines, we have seen articles by people like Kenneth Silber who have discussed the fusion between libertarian and conservative ideas, and Stephen Stanton, whose analysis of "South Park Republicans" helps further identify people who are comfortable as libertarian-conservatives -- people like me. My status as a libertarian-conservative is why I took interest in a recent debate concerning whether...