be just

Al Jazeera English - Africa - Gabon's president Bongo dies : "Omar Bongo Ondimba, the president of Gabon, has died in a clinic in the Spanish city of Barcelona, the country's prime minister has said. Bongo, who had been the longest-serving ruler of a African state, died at the Quiron clinic on Monday at the age of 73, Jean Eyeghe Ndong said in a statement."

Al Jazeera English - Middle East - Nasrallah concedes election defeat : "The secretary-general of Hezbollah, a Shia political party, has accepted that his opposition alliance has lost a parliamentary election in Lebanon to the ruling March 14 coalition. Hassan Nasrallah made the acknowledgment on Monday, hours after official results of the popular poll were released. 'We accept the official results in a sporting spirit,' he said in a televised address. 'I would like to congratulate all those who won, those in the majority and those in the opposition,' he said."

Al Jazeera English - Americas - Peru protest leader in asylum bid : "A Peruvian Indian leader charged with sedition for leading protests against land development in the Amazon is seeking asylum at the Nicaraguan embassy, Peru's prime minister has said. Alberto Pizango took refuge in Nicaragua's embassy on Monday, days after violent clashes between Peruvian police and indigenous Indian protesters left dozens dead, including at least 22 police officers. Pizango, the head of the Peruvian Jungle Interethnic Development Association, 'has already taken asylum,' Yehude Simon, Peru's prime minister, told a special session of congress called to discuss the protests."

Dokka Umarov 'killed' in response to success of Mujahideen in Dagestan - Kavkazcenter.com : "The representative of General Mission (the Wekalat) of the Caucasus Emirate has told Kavkaz Center that the information on wounding and death of Emir Dokka Abu Usman is not true. According to him Dokka Umarov had not been wounded, he is alive and nobody of his security had been killed. A fuss around the fictional 'death' of Dokka Umarov and the so-called 'examination of body' which should 'confirm his death', is a 'response' of invaders to elimination by Mujahideen in Dagestan of the ringleader of puppet gang of 'MIA' Magomedtagirov."

Daily Times - Leading News Resource of Pakistan - Taliban faction parts ways with Mehsud : "Taliban faction parts ways with Mehsud PESHAWAR: The leader of a Taliban faction at odds with Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud denounced Mehsud for staging attacks inside the country. “Whatever Baitullah Mehsud and his associates are doing in the name of Islam is not a jihad, and in fact it is rioting and terrorism,” Qari Zainuddin said in a face-to-face interview with the AP. ap"

RebelReports - BREAKING: $15 Million Settlement in Wiwa vs. Shell Oil : "Today, the parties in Wiwa v. Shell agreed to settle human rights claims charging the Royal Dutch/Shell company, its Nigerian subsidiary, Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC or Shell Nigeria), and the former head of its Nigerian operation, Brian Anderson, with complicity in the torture, killing, and other abuses of Ogoni leader Ken Saro-Wiwa and other non-violent Nigerian activists in the mid-1990s in the Ogoni region of the Niger Delta. The settlement, whose terms are public, provides a total of $15.5 million. These funds will compensate the 10 plaintiffs, who include family members of the deceased victims; establish a Trust intended to benefit the Ogoni people; and cover a portion of plaintiffs’ legal fees and costs. The settlement is only on behalf of the individual plaintiffs for their individual claims. It does not resolve outstanding issues between Shell and the Ogoni people, and the plaintiffs ...

Bill Moyers Journal . Watch & Listen | PBS June 5, 2009 BILL MOYERS: Welcome to the JOURNAL. There was good news and bad news about Afghanistan this week. And it was the same news. That's right. The Senate held confirmation hearings for Lieutenant General Stanley McChrystal, slated to be the next commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan. Here's how two different news organizations reported his testimony: The Associated Press headline read, "War in Afghanistan is 'Winnable,'" but the "Washington Independent" reported that the general had, quote, "painted a bleak picture of the Afghanistan war" and that the United States "needed to show significant progress within '18 to 24 months' or risk the war spiraling out of control." What we know for sure is that the fighting in Afghanistan is escalating. At least 21 thousand more American troops are going in and the number of private security contractors working for the mili...

Mud, mud, glorious mud. Nothing quite like it for beating the Israeli blockade - Middle East, World - The IndependentMr Al Shaer, 36, first became interested in the multi-millennium-old technique of building mud houses when he visited Bangladesh during a religious trip in the 1990s. "This was what our ancestors did before us," he says. "But I never thought I would be doing it myself." Last year, when his parental home, in a town whose chronic housing shortage is compounded by the relentless demolitions along the border with Egypt during nine years of conflict, became too overcrowded, he realised he needed somewhere else to live. Money was in short supply and cement, which Israel has not allowed into Gaza since Hamas seized full control by force in June 2007, unaffordable. But thanks to the multiplication of smuggling tunnels under the border, mud was abundant. It was also free apart from the £32 a truckload it cost to transport it to his 300 square metres of land on...