Free Republic

Italians reject hostages plea (Filed: 28/04/2004) Italy's political leaders refused yesterday to bow to Iraqi kidnappers' threats to kill three Italian hostages unless there are mass protests against their country's military involvement in the country. But the men's relatives urged people to turn out at rallies next week. The men, captured outside Baghdad, were working for a private American security firm. A fourth Italian captive was killed after the kidnappers demanded the withdrawal of Italian troops from Iraq.

WASHINGTON (July 15) - The Justice Department acknowledges its defiance of a judge's order may cause dismissal of charges against accused Sept. 11 conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui, but says it won't produce an al-Qaida prisoner for questioning by the defendant. The government notified the trial judge Monday that it wouldn't budge in its refusal to let Moussaoui, an acknowledged al-Qaida loyalist, interview a former superior - suspected Sept. 11 attack coordinator Ramzi Binalshibh. U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema can now penalize the government, but the ultimate sanction of dismissal is not her only option for disobedience of her order to allow...

Why We Fed the Bomber By ALLAN GURGANUS HILLSBOROUGH, N.C. Straight down the back of ornery American life, there runs this mythic skunk stripe: the cantankerous outlaw protester. "Are you talking to me? . . . " And Eric Rudolph, 36, my fellow North Carolinian, belongs right there, curled along our nation's bristling Mohawk cusp. Though, God knows, I never met the fellow socially, I can call forth both his blessed landscape and harsh bloodline. His tale seems a green boomerang hurled forward from the 19th century. James Fenimore Cooper might help place him in the forest, Twain could take...

Shias in Iraq told to reject all Western customs By Donald Macintyre and Phil Reeves in Baghdad 03 May 2003 Hundreds of thousands of worshippers in the Shia heart of Baghdad were exhorted by their spiritual leaders yesterday not to use their newfound liberation by US forces to absorb Western habits which were designed to "harm Islam". Several leading Shia clerics used the Friday prayers to outline a vision of a country in which alcohol would be eschewed, women would be covered from head to foot and the country's leading Islamic scholastic group would run schools at every level. Part...

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq has rejected a U.S. ultimatum for President Saddam Hussein to go into exile or face war, saying a decision by the United Nations to withdraw its staff from Iraq was an "unfortunate decision". Iraqi Foreign Minister Naji Sabri told reporters that "any child" in Iraq knew that U.S. President George W. Bush's ultimatum to Saddam was a non-starter. "The only option (to secure peace) is the departure of the warmonger number one in the world, the failing President Bush who made his country a joke," Sabri said on Monday.

Palestinians reject Sharon's plan for new state in unoccupied areas By Justin Huggler in Jerusalem 06 December 2002 Ariel Sharon gave details for the first time yesterday of the sort of Palestinian state he is prepared to agree to under a US peace plan – and the Palestinian leadership immediately rejected the proposals. The Israeli Prime Minister described a Palestinian state existing only in areas of the West Bank and Gaza Strip that were put under real or nominal Palestinian control as part of the Oslo peace process – that is, only in Palestinian population centres. The Palestinians want to...

Foreign Minister Shimon Peres rejected on Tuesday a proposal by recently resigned Palestinian Authority Planning Minister Nabil Shaath for a two-stage cease-fire. The two met following sessions with the Quartet - representatives of the United States, Russia, the European Union and the United Nations. The Quartet members agreed on a three-stage "roadmap" to achieving peace in the Middle East. The Palestinian proposal reportedly called for an end to the killing of "civilians" in its first stage, to be followed later by a general cease-fire. Peres said that it was better if such a proposal was not made, as it meant...