At least 52 prisoners have disappeared from a Syrian jail following disturbances in 2008 that left 22 people dead, human rights groups have said. Families of the missing men say they have not been heard of since violence broke out at the Saydnaya Military Prison on July 5, 2008.
On the second anniversary of the violence, 18 of the missing prisoners now meet the international legal criteria of having been victims of "enforced disappearance", according to human rights groups, and questions remain over the fate of dozens more.
Syrian prisoners 'disappeared'
Migrant workers in Israel pay up to $31,000 in illegal recruitment fees
Since the first intifada of the early 1990s, more than a million migrants from the developing world have come to Israel to replace the Palestinians, who were the country’s original source of cheap labor.
At least 250,000 foreign laborers, about half of them illegal, are living in the country, according to the Israeli government. They include Chinese construction workers, Filipino home health care aides and Thai farmhands, as well as other Asians, and Africans and Eastern Europeans, working as maids, cooks and nannies.
First Amendment suspended in the Gulf of Mexico as spill cover-up goes Orwellian
As CNN is now reporting, the U.S. government has issued a new rule that would make it a felony crime for any journalist, reporter, blogger or photographer to approach any oil cleanup operation, equipment or vessel in the Gulf of Mexico. Anyone caught is subject to arrest, a $40,000 fine and prosecution for a federal felony crime.
Think You’re Operating on Free Will? Think Again
It is not only that people’s actions can be influenced by unconscious stimuli; our desires can be too. In one study cited by Custers and Aarts, students were presented with words on a screen related to puzzles — crosswords, jigsaw piece, etc. For some students, the screen also flashed an additional set of words so briefly that they could only be detected subliminally. The words were ones with positive associations, such as beach, friend or home. When the students were given a puzzle to complete, the students exposed unconsciously to positive words worked harder, for longer, and reported greater motivation to do puzzles than the control group.
China Fears Climate Effects as Consumer Class Rises
Premier Wen Jiabao has promised to use an “iron hand” this summer to make his nation more energy efficient. The central government has ordered cities to close inefficient factories by September, like the vast Guangzhou Steel mill here, where most of the 6,000 workers will be laid off or pushed into early retirement.
Already, in the last three years, China has shut down more than a thousand older coal-fired power plants that used technology of the sort still common in the United States.
Defense Department remains a large BP customer
The Defense Department has kept up its immense purchases of aviation fuel and other petroleum products from BP even as the oil giant comes under federal and state scrutiny for potential violations of clean-water and oil-spill laws related to the April 20 explosion of the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig, according to U.S. and company officials.
Blasts mar Biden's call for new gov't, unity
Vice President Joe Biden urged rival Iraqi politicians Sunday to end months of delays and select new leaders for their wobbly democracy, predicting a peaceful transition of power even as suicide bombers struck government centers in two major cities.
The attacks in Mosul and Ramadi underscored persistent fears that insurgents will exploit Iraq's political uncertainty to stoke widespread sectarian violence. Four people were killed and 25 injured in the two blasts that occurred hundreds of miles apart.
Belgian child sex abuse police probe death threats
Police investigating claims of child abuse by Belgian clergy have told the BBC they are probing death threats against witnesses and magistrates.
"There are some threats against certain people around the case, and the prosecutors office is investigating that," he told the BBC.
It's not just BP's oil in the Gulf that threatens world's oceans
A sobering new report warns that the oceans face a "fundamental and irreversible ecological transformation" not seen in millions of years as greenhouse gases and climate change already have affected temperature, acidity, sea and oxygen levels, the food chain and possibly major currents that could alter global weather.
The report, in Science magazine, brings together dozens of studies that collectively paint a dismal picture of deteriorating ocean health.
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