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: AFP
May 8, 2009
Every spring, when the ground thaws, searchers fan out across Russia's vast swamps and forests armed with metal detectors, shovels and long metal probes, scouring for bones.
Most are are barely teenagers, their nails caked in the dirt of this valley west of Moscow, where up to 30,000 soldiers died before Adolf Hitler's advancing Nazi army in 1941.
The fields, about 140 kilometres (90 miles) west of Moscow, where the Red Army's 32nd Rifle Division held Nazi troops for 15
Source: Daily Mail (UK)
May 8, 2009
Historians have uncovered a list of the names of 17 British soldiers in an Auschwitz bunker.
The details, which were found during routine preservation work at the concentration camp, has puzzled researchers who have no clue how it came to be there.
Experts are divided over the list with some claiming the names belong to former Jewish prisoners of war who were sent to die at the camp.Others say they could have belonged to a British SS Division
Source: AP
May 8, 2009
The son of John Demjanjuk says immigration agents have served the suspected Nazi guard with a notice to surrender at an immigration office in Cleveland.
The notice was served Friday, one day after the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear the 89-year-old suspect's appeal to stop the deportation.
Lawyers for the retired autoworker said he's in poor health and too frail to be sent overseas.
Source: AP
May 8, 2009
Col. Harold E. Fischer, an ace fighter pilot whose high-profile captivity became a symbol of heightened tensions between the U.S. and China at the end of the Korean War, has died. He was 83.
Fischer died April 30 after suffering complications from back surgery, his companion Tsai Lan Gerth said.
He received the Silver Star, the Distinguished Flying Cross and the Distinguished Service Cross, among many other decorations
Source: AP
May 9, 2009
The mayor and a top state lawmaker on Friday called for a meeting to resolve a power struggle at ground zero, with growing momentum to build fewer skyscrapers than planned in an uncertain economy.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg invited the governors of New York and New Jersey, Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, the agency that owns ground zero and trade center developer Larry Silverstein to a meeting at his mansion next week.
The developer and the Port Authority of New York and
Source: NYT
May 7, 2009
A couple of days ago, Fred R. Shapiro, the editor of The Oxford Dictionary of American Legal Quotations, asked constitutional law scholars for memorable quotations from Justice David H. Souter of the Supreme Court.
Mr. Shapiro got only four responses. One was about television coverage of the court (“The day you see a camera come into our courtroom, it’s going to roll over my dead body”). Another concerned the limited pleasures of reading legal briefs rather than serious books (“I fi
Source: Telegraph (UK)
May 8, 2009
Memorials of Air Chief Marshal Park will be placed at Trafalgar Square and Waterloo Place in London.
Westminster City Council officials decided it was right to recognise the contribution of Sir Keith in defending London during World War Two.
The New Zealander took charge of RAF 11 Group Fighter Command, which bore the brunt of the Battle of Britain.
Source: Telegraph (UK)
May 8, 2009
The wild fruit tree cousins of Britain's favourite domestic apples are teetering on the brink of global extinction, according to a new report.
Scientists have drawn up a 'Red List' of 44 species of Central Asian fruit trees that could soon disappear unless drastic action is taken.
Around 90 per cent of the fruit and nut forests in Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan and Tajikistan have been destroyed over the past 50 years.
Source: CNN
May 8, 2009
Pope Benedict XVI arrived Friday in Amman, Jordan, for a weeklong visit to the Middle East that he hopes will help "foster good relations between Christians and Muslims."
It will be the first papal visit to some of Christianity's most holy places since Pope John Paul II made the pilgrimage in 2000. The pope will also meet with Muslim scholars and visit Jordan's King Hussein Mosque.
"My visit to Jordan gives me a welcome opportunity to speak of my deep res
Source: Daily Mail (UK)
May 9, 2009
Albert Einstein's phone number - Berlin 2807 - has been published online.
Ringing it, for a spot of help with your eldest's science homework perhaps, wouldn't do a great deal of good, however.
The number has long since been replaced and, in any case, Einstein died in 1955.
But, while his number might not be so useful, there are millions of others posted alongside it on the internet that will help thousands of Britons trace their ancestors.
In f
Source: Hilzoy at the Washington Monthly blog
May 8, 2009
As Steve and others have reported, the Georgia State Senate has adopted a resolution allowing the state to nullify any
Source: CNN
May 7, 2009
The Supreme Court on Thursday denied a stay of deportation for alleged Nazi death camp guard John Demjanjuk, who faces a war crimes prosecution in Germany.
Justice John Paul Stevens without comment refused to intervene in the planned transfer from the United States.
Federal courts have all rejected his appeals, and the order from Stevens clears the way for the Justice Department to move ahead with the deportation. No date for the transfer has been set.
Source: Telegraph (UK)
May 8, 2009
The government has released figures stating that 5,335 school children died when the 7.9 magnitude earthquake hit the south-western province. Most perished when their schools collapsed.
Anger over the number of children killed and the government's failure to hold an inquiry into the reason why almost 12,000 schools were destroyed or damaged has been rising ahead of the sensitive first anniversary of the earthquake, which left 70,000 dead and another 18,000 missing.
In
Source: Times (UK)
May 8, 2009
Barack Obama is a history buff. When he makes a political point he instinctively reaches for the historical parallel: the Lincolnesque “team of rivals” making up his Cabinet, Winston Churchill’s attitude to torture or his own family’s experience of the Second World War.
The only problem is that he sometimes gets history wrong.
His plan to visit Buchenwald is in part a tribute to his great-uncle, Charlie Payne, who participated in the liberation of Ohrdruf, a satellite
Source: CNN
May 8, 2009
That issue is at the heart of attempts by a Dallas, Texas, attorney to have social-networking site Facebook remove pages for Holocaust deniers.
Attorney Brian Cuban, brother of Dallas Mavericks team owner Mark Cuban, has been trying since last year to have the pages of groups with such names as "Holocaust: A Series of Lies," and "Holocaust is a Holohoax" removed from Facebook.
He pointed out that Facebook has removed groups based on complaints befor
Source: CNN
May 8, 2009
The crown of the Statue of Liberty will re-open to tourists on July 4, spokeswoman Kendra Barkoff of the U.S. Interior Department said Friday.
The crown has been closed since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
The National Park Service closed the crown amid worries that it would be difficult for visitors to evacuate quickly in the event of an emergency.
Source: Telegraph (UK)
May 8, 2009
Napoleon Bonaparte may be known as one of the greatest military leaders of history, but another talent has been unveiled as his romantic novel is set to be released in English.
The first English version of his romantic novella Clisson et Eugénie, is due out this autumn, according to the Bookseller magazine.
When Napoleon died in exile on St Helena, aged 51, his possessions included the manuscript of his novella, the pages of which were scattered as souvenirs. But the f
Source: Reuters
May 7, 2009
A military garrison of mud-brick and seashells unearthed in Egypt's Sinai desert may be key to finding a web of pharaonic-era defenses at the northeast gateway to ancient Egypt, archaeologists said on Thursday.
Archaeologists who discovered the 3,500-year-old garrison, where up to 50,000 soldiers could be posted in times of heightened tensions, say they hope inscriptions at Luxor's Karnak temple may serve as a guide to finding other outposts.
But knowing the location of
Source: BBC
May 8, 2009
The Amelia Earhart centre in Ballyarnet Country Park in Derry marks the spot where the American flier - the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic - touched down in Europe after her record-breaking flight in 1932.
The museum has been earmarked for closure by Derry City Council as part of a package of cost-cutting measures to save £1.5m from the city's rates bill.
Derry City Council have said they had to make "difficult decisions" in order to minimise th
Source: BBC
May 8, 2009
One of Russia's most important war memorials, a huge statue towering over the southern city of Volgograd, is in danger of collapsing, an official says.
The Motherland statue is leaning at such a precarious angle that many people are scared of going near it.
Rising water levels are causing the foundations of the memorial to subside.
It commemorates the Battle of Stalingrad, when the Soviet army eventually managed to defeat the invading German forces in wh
