TV News LIES

Israel is expected to boycott the U.N. Human Rights Council next week despite the United States urging its ally to show up for an examination of its record, the U.S. ambassador said on Thursday.

The Jewish state is scheduled to be in the dock of the Geneva rights forum on Tuesday, January 29 as part of the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) process, the council's regular scrutiny of all United Nations member states.

Almost a third of all detainees recently transferred to Afghan control have been tortured and Afghanistan's spy agency is operating secret facilities to avoid international scrutiny, a United Nations report released on Sunday said.

The findings could complicate the already thorny issue of how to manage the security transition ahead of the withdrawal of NATO-led troops from Afghanistan by the end of next year. Hundreds of detainees are being transferred from NATO to Afghan control as part of that transition.

A US civil rights pioneer who confronted racial segregation in Alabama in the 1960s has died aged 70. James Hood died in his hometown of Gadsden in Alabama, a local funeral home said in an obituary notice.

Mr Hood was one of two black students to enter the all-white University of Alabama in June 1963. Their path was blocked by then Alabama Governor George Wallace and his state troopers until President John F Kennedy intervened.

Nato forces in Afghanistan have stopped sending prisoners to some Afghan jails after reports of torture and have asked Kabul to investigate allegations of abuse by members of a US-backed paramilitary police force.

The ban on transfers revives concerns about human rights in Afghan prisons, first raised in 2011 by a United Nations report. The report detailed widespread abuse, including the ripping out of detainees' toenails and the twisting of their genitals, and prompted Nato-led troops to halt prisoner transfers for several months.

The US military aircraft carrying the cargo is only used for missions like this.

Muhammed Farhan Latif and other members of his family waited at a gatehouse at Al-Dailami Air Base in Sana'a, Yemen's capital, for the plane to arrive from Ramstein Air Base in Germany. It touched down at around 9 PM on Saturday, December 15.

The special security detail assigned to the mission unloaded the cargo - a plain aluminum box - from the aircraft. A man and a woman from the US Embassy entered the gatehouse. They had papers they wanted Muhammed to sign, but they were written in English and Muhammed doesn't speak the language.

A judge has agreed that Top #Secret evidence against a Guantanamo Bay detainee can be kept from defense attorneys.

In a 13-page decision, U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer rejected the pleas of Wali Mohammed Morafa, an Afghan citizen. Specifically, Morafa's attorneys won't learn of the source of the information used against their client.

The U.S. government alleges Morafa used the cover of  money-changing activities to provide financial services support to the operations of the Taliban and other terrorist organizations. Many complicated legal proceedings have ensued, during which time Morafa's attorneys have held Secret clearances.