This page features brief excerpts of stories published by the mainstream
media and, less frequently, blogs, alternative media, and even obviously
biased sources. The excerpts are taken directly from the websites cited in
each source note. Quotation marks are not used.
Source: AP
May 13, 2009
The gunman who tried to assassinate Pope John Paul II would like to convert to Christianity at a baptism ceremony at the Vatican after his release from prison in January, according to his lawyer.
Over the years, Mehmet Ali Agca has made frequent claims that he is the Messiah or Jesus Christ, raising questions about his mental health and leading to speculation that he had converted to Christianity.
Agca is currently serving a prison term for killing Turkish journalist Ab
Source: Spiegel Online
May 13, 2009
They committed their alleged crimes more than six decades ago but have escaped justice. Dozens of suspected Nazi war criminals are enjoying the twilight of their lives. For investigators into World War II atrocities, it is a race against time.
For Charles Zentai, Tuesday was a good day: His extradition from Australia to Hungary was halted at the last minute after the government in Budapest withdrew its opposition to the 87-year-old's application for bail. Zentai, who now lives in Pe
Source: Telegraph (UK)
May 13, 2009
Frederick Toben, an Australian 'revisionist historian', has been sentenced to three months in jail after publishing offensive material about Jews and the Holocaust on his website.
Toben, 65, had been banned in 2002 from circulating anti-Semitic material on the website of the Adelaide Institute and had promised to abide by the order.
But a civil case brought by Jeremy Jones, former president of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, found Toben had breached the orde
Source: Telegraph (UK)
May 13, 2009
A macabre catch by Thai fishermen could finally solve the mystery over missing victims of a notorious act of repression by the army.
A haul of skulls and other body parts has been linked to five shipping containers on the sea bed off the southern Chon Buri province.
Some believe they hold the bodies of pro-democracy protesters killed by the army in 1992. Police have said that their divers will examine the containers within the week.
Over the years rumour
Source: Telegraph (UK)
May 13, 2009
A collection of personal letters and photographs from Queen Mary to a friend spanning half a century has been revealed for the first time before being sold at auction.
The birth and christening of Queen Elizabeth II are detailed in the collection, which also includes cheques made out to Queen Mary from her friend, Kate Rube.
Mrs Rube, and later her daughter Elizabeth Gillman, corresponded with the wife of George V from the turn of the 20th century and into the 1950s.
Source: Reuters
May 13, 2009
A campaign by heirs of Polish aristocrats to recover a palace seized by the communists has exposed Poland's continued failure to resolve the restitution of property to former owners after two decades of democracy.
The Branicki family says it has now decided to demand the return of the entire estate at Wilanow Palace, not just family heirlooms and archives as previously planned, due to frustration over lack of progress in a legal battle dating back to 1990.
The baroque p
Source: CNN
May 13, 2009
His was the first photo of a missing child to appear on a milk carton. Almost 30 years later, Etan Patz is still missing.
Etan was 6 when he disappeared on May 25, 1979, the Friday before Memorial Day. He was on his way to school in what is now the upscale Soho neighborhood of New York.
The boy's disappearance was one of the key events that inspired the missing children's movement, which raised awareness of child abductions and led to new ways to search for missing ch
Source: Times (UK)
May 12, 2009
The big lesson out of all this stuff is: don’t do it again.” That is, don’t invade countries in pursuit of a few Islamic terrorists and turn the whole population against you.
That is the message from David Kilcullen, an Australian academic turned military strategist and one of the most influential advisers to General David Petraeus. Kilcullen, the author of a thoughtful new book on lessons from fighting radical Islamists, is blunt about the operations in Iraq and Afghanistan — and
Source: Times (UK)
May 13, 2009
A Soviet mole who recruited a network of communist spies at Oxford before and during the war has been unmasked as Arthur Wynn, a distinguished former civil servant who was also “Agent Scott” of the KGB.
Historians have speculated for years about the true identity of “Scott”, a British spy known to have recruited the Oxford Ring of spies and informants in parallel to the better-known Cambridge Ring of Soviet agents.
Agent Scott first came to light when the KGB briefly pe
Source: NYT
May 13, 2009
No one would mistake the Stone Age ivory carving for a Venus de Milo. The voluptuous woman depicted is, to say the least, earthier, with huge, projecting breasts and sexually explicit genitalia.
Nicholas J. Conard, an archaeologist at Tubingen University in Germany, who found the small carving in a cave last year, says it is at least 35,000 years old, “one of the oldest known examples of figurative art” in the world. It is about 5,000 years older than some other so-called Venus arti
Source: Guardian (UK)
May 13, 2009
A prominent former student leader of the 1989 pro-democracy protests is under arrest on charges of fraud, his family said today, weeks before the 20th anniversary of the crackdown in Tiananmen Square.
Relatives said Chinese authorities had secretly detained Zhou Yongjun for more than six months. He has permanent residence in the United States but had returned to China to see his parents.
"At first he was accused of spying and political crimes, but now they have swi
Source: Times (UK)
May 12, 2009
The American journalist Roxana Saberi was jailed for espionage in Tehran after obtaining a confidential Iranian document about the American invasion of Iraq, it was claimed today.
Saleh Nikbakht, one of Ms Saberi's Iranian lawyers, revealed that a document Ms Saberi had obtained while working as a translator for a powerful clerical lobby had been used as evidence to convict her on charges of espionage.
Ms Saberi, 32, was released on Monday after an appeal court dismis
Source: Telegraph (UK)
May 12, 2009
The territorial dispute between the two countries now extends beneath the South Atlantic itself and to the submerged boundaries of continental plates.
The application has gone to the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf. But Argentina, which lodged its claim over the same area of seabed last month, denounced Britain's move.
"The British insistence in assuming extended competence over the Malvinas [Falkland Islands], South Georgia and Southern Sandwich Is
Source: Times (UK)
May 13, 2009
David Miliband hailed President Obama’s efforts to kick-start the Middle East peace process yesterday as a once in a generation opportunity to resolve the 60-year conflict between Palestinians and Israelis.
The Foreign Secretary, speaking before talks in Washington with Hillary Clinton, the Secretary of State, said that this was the first US Administration since that of Jimmy Carter in the Camp David talks of 1978 to have “thrown itself into the peace process from day one”. He also
Source: Telegraph (UK)
May 13, 2009
On the third day of his visit to Israel and the Palestinian territories, he crossed into the West Bank to visit Bethlehem.
While acknowledging the suffering of Palestinian people following the establishment of Israel in 1948, the Pope nevertheless urged moderation, telling Palestinians they should not use violence and extremism.
In his most sensitive speech yet of his tour of the Holy Land, the Pope sent a message of solidarity with moderate Palestinians such as Mahmoud
Source: Telegraph (UK)
May 13, 2009
As a nation, we are used to watching Hollywood distort history to suggest that some of Britain's finest moments of the Second World War were achieved by Americans.
However, a US science writer has now claimed that Britain's two most famous aircraft were not as significant in defeating the Luftwaffe as we might like to believe.
Tim Palucka asserts that the British fighters were able to outmanoeuvre their German opponents because they were running on a special high-octane
Source: Spiegel Online
May 12, 2009
James Mitchell's new life begins with the same ritual every morning: He goes jogging, wearing Adidas shorts and a black tank top, his iPod in his ear. Then he gets into his luxury SUV and drives back to luxury home on Lake Vienna Drive in Pasco County, Florida.
The hacienda-style house, with a natural stone façade, columned walkways and palm trees in front of the door is brand-new. Mitchell has just had it built, in the midst of an upscale, gated community.
The freestan
Source: BBC
May 12, 2009
Frank Lachner, 42, damaged the model after pushing past guards when it was displayed at a Berlin museum last year.
Mr Lachner, an ex-policeman, said he had been protesting against the presence of the waxwork 500m (500yds) from a Holocaust memorial.
The museum said the waxwork portrayed a key historical figure.
Source: BBC
May 13, 2009
Mr Demjanjuk, 89, was flown to Germany on Tuesday from the United States, where he waged a long battle against deportation, partly on health grounds.
But a spokesman for Stadelheim jail in Munich said "doctors have determined he is fit to remain in custody".
He faces charges of being an accessory to the deaths of 29,000 Jews.
Source: AP
May 11, 2009
From busting up John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil Trust in 1911 to going after Microsoft's use of its Windows monopoly, antitrust policy has been an important element of the U.S. regulatory landscape.
Now, in tough recession times, the Obama administration is swinging back the pendulum, maintaining that lax enforcement over the past decade has worsened economic woes and hurt consumers by failing to protect business competition.
What are antitrust laws and how can such
