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CIA 'plot to kill Hugo Chavez' - Telegraph : "The Venezuelan president said on state television that he had eluded an assassination attempt in El Salvador where he was due to attend the swearing in of its new leader, a Left-wing ally. 'I am not accusing Obama. I think the American president has good intentions,' Mr Chavez said. 'But over and above Obama, there is the CIA, and all of its tentacles. I have no doubt US intelligence services are behind this.'"

Press TV - Masterminding CIA torture paid $1,000 a day : "The Central Intelligence Agency is revealed to have paid USD 1,000 a day to former military trainers to integrate torture into the body's interrogation methods. Beating the whistleblowers on the CIA's torture of 'terrorist suspects', on Thursday, the ABC News named two army psychologists and former military staffers as the officials receiving the steroidal paycheck to devise and administer the 'advanced' grilling methods. Bruce Jessen and Jim Mitchell, medics of questionable interrogation background, were enlisted to ensure the methods would guarantee pain but would not kill. The two reportedly engineered the CIA's 10-step interrogation plan. The final step was waterboarding or near drowning during which the victim would be laid on his back with half of his head dipped into water. They had an 'important role in developing what became the CIA's torture program,' an American Civil Liber...

Yemeni Prisoner Muhammad Salih Dies At Guantánamo | Andy Worthington : "It has just been reported that Muhammad Ahmad Abdallah Salih (also known as Mohammed al-Hanashi), a Yemeni prisoner at Guantánamo, has died, apparently by committing suicide. The news comes just three days after the second anniversary of another death at Guantánamo — that of Abdul Rahman al-Amri, a Saudi prisoner who died on May 30, 2007 — and just eight days before the third anniversary of the deaths of three other prisoners — Ali al-Salami, Mani al-Utaybi and Yasser al-Zahrani — who died on June 10, 2006, and it must surely hasten calls for the urgent repatriation of other prisoners before there are any more deaths at the prison. The Associated Press, which first reported the story, stated that US military officials had reported that Salih, who was 31 years old, was found “unresponsive and not breathing in his cell Monday night,” and that he had died of an “apparent suicide.” Like the other prisoners who die...

Robert Fisk: Police state is the wrong venue for Obama's speech - Robert Fisk, Commentators - The Independent : "Maybe Barack Obama chose Egypt for his 'great message' to Muslims tomorrow because it contains a quarter of the world's Arab population, but he is also coming to one of the region's most repressed, undemocratic and ruthless police states. Egyptian human rights groups – when they are not themselves being harassed or closed down by the authorities – have recorded a breathtaking list of police torture, extra-judicial killings, political imprisonments and state-sanctioned assaults on opposition figures that continues to this day."

Democrats to Obama: Ease pressure on Israel - Israel News, Ynetnews WASHINGTON – As Barack Obama prepares for his trip to Saudi Arabia and Egypt, Democratic Congress members are expressing concern over the pressure exerted by the president on Israel, the Politics website reported. According to the report, the Congress members asked Obama to moderate his pressure on the settlement freeze issue. “My concern is that we are applying pressure to the wrong party in this dispute,” Politico quoted Rep. Shelley Berkley as saying. “I think it would serve America’s interest better if we were pressuring the Iranians to eliminate the potential of a nuclear threat from Iran, and less time pressuring our allies and the only democracy in the Middle East to stop the natural growth of their settlements.” Politico reported that other representatives expressed similar sentiments in respect to Obama and Israel. Rep. Anthony Weiner, for example, said he would have liked to see President Obama pay more at...

Ethiopian News | Ethiopian rebel group threaten foreign oil companies : "By Barry Malone ADDIS ABABA (Reuters) - An Ethiopian rebel group on Wednesday warned international oil companies against exploring in a region of the Horn of Africa nation where the rebels attacked a Chinese-run field in 2007 killing 74 people. The Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF) — whose hundreds of fighters seek autonomy for the ethnically Somali Ogaden region — said oil firms had cleared some 1,600 square kilometers, displacing locals and destroying vegetation."

Al Jazeera English - Africa - Several dead in fresh Somalia clash : "At least 14 people have been killed in fresh fighting in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, between government forces and fighters. Dozens more were wounded as government forces intensified efforts to drive out fighters who have pledged to topple the interim government of Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, the Somali president. At least five of those killed in what was described as intense fighting in the city's Jamhuriya area were civilians, witnesses said. 'I saw the dead bodies of five civilians, one of them a woman,' Mohamed Bashir, a resident of the city's Jamhuriya district told the AFP news agency. 'Three of the victims died when a mortar shell struck their house.'"

Al Jazeera English - Americas - Americans 'negative' about Muslims : "As Barack Obama, the US president, seeks to mend the image of the US in the Muslim world, a new survey indicates almost half of Americans have a negative opinion about Muslim countries. The 46 per cent of respondents who held an unfavourable view of Islamic nations was up five per cent from 2002, while just 20 per cent said they held a positive opinion."