be just

Big Win for Watada: A Study in Courage and Honor : "On Thursday, November 8, Hon. Benjamin Settle, a federal court judge, issued a preliminary injunction halting any further court-martial proceedings of 1st Lt. Ehren Watada and effectively ruling against the Army on virtually every issue in the case. This injunction not only extends the stay until the conclusion of the habeas corpus proceedings, but also addresses the specific request for relief from further legal proceedings, stating, 'the remedy sought by Petitioner, while rare, is appropriate.' Although the Army issued a press release claiming to 'look forward to the opportunity to further explain to the District Court judge the full extent of the protections and safeguards that are afforded to a military accused,' (Seattle Times, 11/9/07), anyone who glances at the court ruling will agree that the Army's only lingering hope is to appeal this ruling to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Judge Sett...

Innocents and Foot Soldiers: The Stories of the 14 Saudis Just Released From Gitmo - by Andy Worthington : "Of the 14 men, seven – five humanitarian aid workers and two missionaries – had no connection whatsoever with any kind of militancy. I found the story of the first of the missionaries, 24-year-old Khalid al-Bawardi, utterly convincing while conducting my research. After pompously lecturing his tribunal about the finer details of Sunni Islamic practice, he explained that he had traveled around Pakistan and Afghanistan hectoring his fellow Muslims for their failings (mainly to do with raised graves and good luck charms) and also providing food and clothing. He was handed over to U.S. forces by opportunistic border guards after crossing into Pakistan after the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan began. The second, 26-year-old Sultan al-Uwaydah, did not take part in any of the tribunals or review boards in which, though deprived of legal representation and subject to secret eviden...

NPQ : "A “made in Washington” settlement in Afghanistan — the heart of the problem — is not going to work. It only generates increasing hostility as thousands more Lilliputians swarm the helpless Gulliver, drawing hostile Pakistani Islamists more deeply into the equation as well. In this sense bin Laden is winning. The region will only calm down following a withdrawal of U.S. forces from its confrontation with “Islam” and the development of a regional approach to the Afghan issue — one that acknowledges the deep interests of the main regional players who also seek stability in the region: Pakistan, Iran, Russia, China and India. Yet this reality is anathema to the hegemonic global strategy of the Bush administration."

Santa Barbara News-Press CAIRO, Egypt - The U.S. government is ''unforgivably slow'' in resettling Iraqi refugees and has failed to coordinate with its Arab allies to address the suffering of an estimated 4.5 million displaced Iraqis, according to a report released Tuesday by a leading Washington-based refugee advocacy group. Nearly five years after the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, the Bush administration has made little effort to speed up relief for a population that's growing more vulnerable by the day, Refugees International concluded after its most recent trip to Iraqi refugee communities in the Middle East. The group's advocates said the White House appeared oblivious to the magnitude of the war's humanitarian disaster. ''The first reason for this is the lack of political will,'' said Kristele Younes, a co-author of the Refugees International report. ''Until very recently, the Bush administration never even acknowledged the humanit...