A U.S. Army sergeant, the eleventh "Kill Team" soldier convicted of crimes in the widest-ranging prosecution of war crimes in the ten years of the Afghanistan War, was sentenced Friday to five years in jail for misconduct.
David Bram, 27, was found guilty on all but two of nine counts including solicitation to commit murder, conspiracy to commit assault and trying to derail the investigation into the slaying of innocent Afghans, reports the Associated Press.
‘Kill Team’ soldier David Bram sentenced to five years for war crimes in Afghanistan
Post-9/11 tradeoff: Security vs. civil liberties
In the early months after the 9/11 terror attacks, America's visceral reaction was to gird for a relentless, whatever-it-takes quest to punish those responsible and prevent any recurrences.
To a striking extent, those goals have been achieved. Yet over the years, Americans have also learned about trade-offs, about decisions and practices that placed national security on a higher plane than civil liberties and, in the view of some, above the rule of law.
Fake terror plots, paid informants: the tactics of FBI 'entrapment' questioned
Even more shocking was that the organisation, money, weapons and motivation for this plot did not come from real Islamic terrorists. It came from the FBI, and an informant paid to pose as a terrorist mastermind paying big bucks for help in carrying out an attack. For McWilliams, her own government had actually cajoled and paid her beloved nephew into being a terrorist, created a fake plot and then jailed him for it. "I feel like I am in the Twilight Zone," she told the Guardian.
Lawyers for the so-called Newburgh Four have now launched an appeal that will be held early next year. Advocates hope the case offers the best chance of exposing the issue of FBI "entrapment" in terror cases. "We have as close to a legal entrapment case as I have ever seen," said Susanne Brody, who represents another Newburgh defendant, Onta Williams.
Researcher says Palestinian land in West Bank seized by kibbutz inside Israel for first time
A tract of Palestinian land in the West Bank has for the first time been seized by a kibbutz located inside Israel, a prominent Israeli researcher said Saturday.
The land — about 365 acres (148 hectares) from the West Bank Palestinian village of Bardaleh — was seized by the nearby agricultural community of Kibbutz Meirav, which lies inside Israel proper, said Dror Etkes, a prominent researcher and activist against Jewish settlement in the West Bank.
Gaddafi's son captured, scared and without a fight
Muammar Gaddafi's son Saif al-Islam has been captured in Libya's southern desert, scared and with only a handful of supporters, by fighters who vow to hold him in the mountain town of Zintan until there is a government to hand him over to.
Crowds across the country fired guns and hooted car horns to celebrate the seizure of the British-educated 39-year-old, who was once seen as a future ruler of the oil-producing desert state.
Vote to frack in Delaware River Basin delayed for now
The Delaware River Basin Commission on Friday postponed a meeting set for Monday to consider draft rules for natural-gas wells developed using a controversial drilling process.
On Thursday, Gov. Jack Markell told the commission Delaware would cast a vote against the proposals. Commission officials said the delay was intended to give the five-member panel more time to consider the issue.
Lobbying Firm Memo To Advise Wall Street Clients On Occupy Movement
A lobbying firm has prepared a memo offering advice to its Wall Street clients to help them manage any political fallout from Occupy Wall Street, warning that Republicans may turn on big banks, at least in public, altering the political ground for years to come. It is one of the first clear signs that the movement may be starting to trouble the moneyed elite.
The memo, first reported by MSNBC's Chris Hayes, host of the show "Up with Chris Hayes," was written by the firm Clark, Lytle, Geduldig, Cranford and addressed to one of its Wall Street clients. It runs four pages long and is set to be sent on Thanksgiving.
Full Body X-Ray Scanners Banned in European Airports
The European Union has banned the use of full-body airport scanners that use x-rays "in order not to risk jeopardizing citizens' health and safety."
The 27 European countries that are part of the European Union will no longer use backscatter scanners -- which use very low levels of x-rays to produce anatomically correct images of passengers, according to a European Commission press release.
Report: Climate change worsens extreme weather events
Heat waves, floods and other extreme weather worsen with global warming, suggests a major international climate report released today. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report, obtained in draft form by USA TODAY, stresses that expanding cities and populations worldwide, also raise the odds of severe impacts from weather disasters.
"Unprecedented extreme weather and climate events" look likely in coming decades as a result of a changing climate, says the draft report. The final version was released early today by IPCC chief Rajendra Pachauri at a meeting hosted by report sponsors, the World Meteorological Organization and United Nations Environment Programme, in Kampala, Uganda.
Page 533 of 1155
