In a clear violation of the Geneva Convention, the US made systematic torture a staple in its fight against terrorism. This revelation has resulted in international condemnation and lamentation, but nobody has been held accountable for torturing terror suspects — many of whom were released later without any charges having been filed. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) hopes to change that.

“Barbaric”

On behalf of three torture victims, one of them who died while detained by the US, the ACLU filed suit against James Elmer Mitchell and John “Bruce” Jessen — two psychologists who helped devise the Central Intelligence Agency’s (CIA) torture program.

Vertreter der „Freien Syrischen Armee“ führen nach Angaben eines ranghohen russischen Diplomaten Verhandlungen in Moskau. „Sie sind immer hier. Manche kommen, manche fliegen zurück“, sagte Vizeaußenminister Michail Bogdanow am Montag vor der Presse in Moskau.

Vor dem Hintergrund der erfolgreichen russischen Angriffe gegen den „Islamischen Staat“ in Syrien sucht die afghanische Islamistenbewegung Taliban laut Informationen der Zeitung The Daily Beast Kontakt zu Moskau und schließt sogar eine Zusammenarbeit nicht aus. Das russische Außenministerium bestätigt, dass ein Kommunikationskanal bereits besteht.

Rogue states make their own rules, mindless of inviolable international laws, norms and standards. On October 19, Israel’s repressive counter-terrorism bill passed its 2nd and 3rd readings – criminalizing legitimate resistance as terrorism, expanding regime authority to counter it extrajudicially.
Any activity can now be called terrorism or terrorist-related, innocent Palestinians subject to possible longterm imprisonment. Charity officials providing aid to anyone linked to or associated with Hamas or legitimate resistance groups can be arrested, charged and prosecuted.

We‘ve gotten information that Facebook is secretly lobbying for a dirty bill called “CISA” that would give them impunity for violating their users’ privacy—as long as they hand over user data to the government. Most tech companies are against it for privacy reasons, but apparently Facebook is working behind the scenes to make sure it passes.

Mark Zuckerberg once called Facebook users “dumb f*cks” for trusting him with their data. Now he’s trying to take advantage of us. If CISA passes, all your photos, posts, relationships, and likes will have a path to government databases.

On Tuesday, the European Union is expected to vote on new net neutrality rules, the end result of months of debate between the European Commission, European Parliament, and the EU Council. Of course just like here in the States, heavy lobbying pressure by ISPs has the lion‘s share of politicians supporting loopholes that will let giant ISPs do pretty much everything they want. The rules at first glance look very similar to the flimsy, 2010 rules proposed in the U.S. back in 2010 — allowing ISPs to engage in anti-competitive shenanigans — provided the carrier vaguely insists it‘s for the safety and security of the network.

Kazakhstan’s national manufacturer of weapons and military equipment ‘Kazakhstan Engineering’ and German Rheinmetall Eastern Markets company in the sphere of mechanical engineering have signed a foundation agreement on creating Rheinmetall KE joint venture, said the message from Kazakh government.

Inmitten der internationalen Bemühungen um einen neuen Machtabgleich im Mittleren Osten intensiviert die Bundesregierung die Aufrüstung der arabischen Golfdiktaturen. Dies belegt der Rüstungsexportbericht für das erste Halbjahr 2015, der in dieser Woche vorgelegt worden ist. Demnach ist Saudi-Arabien zum drittgrößten Käufer deutschen Kriegsgeräts aufgestiegen. Von den sechs Staaten des Golf-Kooperationsrats, in dem sich die Länder der Arabischen Halbinsel organisiert haben, gehören vier zu den Top 20-Empfängern deutscher Rüstungslieferungen.

Opposition leader Jeremy Corbyn recently called on Prime Minister David Cameron to scrap a controversial bid to run Saudi prisons given its human rights record, to which the Saudi’s U.K. Ambassador to the U.K., Nawaf bin Abdulaziz, hit back in an article in The Telegraph Monday, writing, “There has been an alarming change in the way Saudi Arabia is discussed in Britain,” and going on to threaten, “It should be worrying to all those who do not want to see potentially serious repercussions that could damage the mutually beneficial strategic partnership that our countries have so long enjoyed.”

HOLLY STERLING: I came to DC today to discuss Jeffrey‘s case, to really just let the public know of the tragedy that Jeffrey‘s endured for approximately over ten years. That Jeffrey was innocent, he was wrongly convicted. And mainly because I wrote a letter to ask the President to immediately pardon Jeffrey.