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: Frontline/PBS
April 7, 2009
As the global financial downturn continues and pressure for profits increases on corporations across the world, a small group of lawyers in the U.S. Justice Department is pursuing an aggressive crackdown against an international business tactic -- bribery -- which the World Bank says amounts to as much as a trillion dollars a year in payments.
"Over the past two years, the U.S. government has collected almost a billion and a half dollars in fines in foreign bribery cases,"
Source: Guardian (UK)
April 9, 2009
A French scholar imprisoned in 1971 by a Khmer Rouge official now facing a genocide court said today he heard the "triggers of the guns" but the shot he expected would execute him was not fired.
François Bizot testified before Cambodia's UN-backed tribunal for a second day in the trial of Kaing Guek Eav, also known as Duch‚ the chief jailer for the Khmer Rouge during its 1975-79 regime.
"The shot didn't happen. I was still blindfolded," said Bizot, w
Source: Daily Mail (UK)
April 8, 2009
Two men who filmed their wives stripping naked at a sombre World War I memorial have been sentenced for insulting the memory of heroic soldiers.
The women who exposed themselves for the cameras at the Vimy memorial in northern France were also sentenced for exhibitionism.
The poignant monument pays tribute to hundreds of Canadian soldiers who fell at the 1917 Battle of Vimy Ridge, one of the bloodiest battles in the Somme.
Source: Daily Mail (UK)
April 8, 2009
For the average five-year-old, you might expect playtime rather than Plato to be upmost in their thoughts.
But now the sound of neo-Socratic dialogue can be heard in primary school classrooms throughout the land as infants debate life's great mysteries in philosophy lessons.
Children as young as five are grappling the big questions that have troubled speculative thinkers from Aristotle through to Darwin, Freud and Kant.
Philosophy lessons are being introdu
Source: NYT
April 8, 2009
An international war crimes court in Freetown, Sierra Leone, sentenced three rebel leaders on Wednesday to long prison terms for atrocities committed during the country’s decade-long civil war of the 1990s. The conflict became notorious because of its particular brutality, including the hacking off of the limbs of uncounted civilians, the use of child soldiers and the digging for diamonds to pay for guns and ammunition.
The sentences handed out at the Special Court for Sierra Leone
Source: BBC
April 9, 2009
Conservative grandees, and members of the British establishment in general, were sniffy about Margaret Thatcher.
When she became leader of her party in 1975, many of them declared that she would never last.
Fifteen years later, when she had won three elections and survived as prime minister for over a decade, they often suggested that the serious thinking behind her policies had been done by other people.
Nigel Lawson, who was Chancellor of the Exchequer
Source: BBC
April 9, 2009
Cambodia says it is running out of money to pay staff, but international donors are withholding fresh cash until claims of corruption are addressed.
The deadlock could derail the trials of the surviving Khmer Rouge leaders.
Meanwhile, a French scholar detained for alleged espionage in the 1970s has testified against the chief jailer.
Source: National Geographic News
April 6, 2009
A medieval Hungarian town full of ritually sacrificed dogs could shed light on mysterious pagan customs not found in written records from the era, a new study suggests.
Roughly 1,300 bones from about 25 dogs were recently discovered in the 10th- to 13th-century town of Kana, which had been accidentally unearthed in 2003 during the construction of residential buildings on the outskirts of Budapest.
Researchers found ten dogs buried in pits and four puppy skeletons in pot
Source: Global Media (Toronto)
April 7, 2009
Precious items are the plunder of looters who had hoped to sell them to private collectors.
Fifteen hundred pieces of this country's history are sitting in crates in the Afghanistan National Museum. Half of the relics date to the time before Islam arrived in Afghanistan in 642 AD. The rest cover the Muslim period up to and including the 20th century. But they did not come directly from archeological sites in Afghanistan.
They came instead from Heathrow Airport in London
Source: Press and Journal (UK)
April 8, 2009
Skeletons uncovered at Marischal College.
Archaeologists have uncovered seven skeletons and five additional human skulls in the grounds of historic Marischal College in Aberdeen.
The skeletons, all men, are thought to be Franciscan friars.
The excavations are being carried out by Aberdeen City Council archaeologists in advance of the creation of the council’s new £80.4million headquarters.
One of Aberdeen’s major religious houses, the Francisca
Source: New York Times
April 7, 2009
Last Saturday was tomb-sweeping day, when the Chinese traditionally honor the dead. Sun Wenguang, a 75-year-old retired professor, was one of many to visit the cemetery.
Apparently, though, he chose the wrong death to commemorate. He came to remember Zhao Ziyang, a former prime minister and Communist Party general secretary who lost his party position and his freedom after sympathizing with student-led, pro-democracy protests in Tiananmen Square in 1989. Mr. Zhao, who died in 2005,
Source: BBC
April 8, 2009
Four men accused of taking part in the 1994 Rwandan genocide have won their High Court battle against extradition from Britain.
Two judges ruled that there was "a real risk they would suffer a flagrant denial of justice" if returned to Rwanda to face trial. The news came a day after the 15th anniversary of the genocide in which 800,000 people were killed.
The court's decision makes legal history. It is the first time an English court has blocked an extraditio
Source: Telegraph (UK)
April 8, 2009
A forgotten nurse has finally been honoured for her extraordinary heroism during World War Two - 65 years late.
Eileen Driscoll, 90, was part of a team of Women's Royal Air Force who treated injured servicemen while they were being flown home from the front line.
The group - dubbed The Flying Nightingales - risked their own lives to help evacuate more than 100,000 wounded soldiers from the battlefields of Europe.
Despite their bravery, the nurses were paid
Source: AP
April 8, 2009
A Danish press freedom group said Wednesday it is selling copies of a cartoon of the Prophet Muhammad that caused outrage across the Muslim World.
Some 1,000 printed reproductions of a drawing depicting the prophet wearing a bomb-shaped turban are being sold for 1,400 kroner ($250) each, said Lars Hedegaard, chairman of the Danish Free Press Society.
Hedegaard said Danish artist Kurt Westergaard, who drew the cartoon in 2005, had given the society permission to produce
Source: AP
April 8, 2009
The family of John Demjanjuk said Wednesday they still haven't heard from an immigration appeals panel on a request to block his deportation to Germany, where an arrest warrant alleges the frail 89-year-old was a Nazi death camp guard.
The matter is now before the Board of Immigration Appeals, in Falls Church, Va., which previously upheld his deportation.
John Broadley, a lawyer for Demjanjuk, is seeking to stop the deportation due to Demjanjuk's poor health. The motion
Source: http://fredericksburg.com
April 3, 2009
Most Orange County supervisors don't appear any more interested in the latest attempt by preservationists to engage them in a discussion of land use than they were the first time.
Members of the Wilderness Battlefield Coalition sent a letter this week to Board of Supervisors Chairman Lee Frame asking for the county to agree to a "comprehensive planning process for the Wilderness Battlefield/Orange County gateway region."
The letter reiterates an offer made ear
Source: http://media.www.navigatornews.org
April 1, 2009
Lincoln Log Cabin was built on an 86-acre site. It is a replica of the Lincoln home, originally built in 1835. With current budget issues constantly fluctuating, weight is falling on the shoulders of the volunteers to keep up the farm.
Last year Lincoln Log cabin operated with four paid interpreters and two paid maintenance workers, volunteers made up the rest of the staff. Their contract was originally set to run from May 1 through Oct. 31. However, the contract for paid workers wa
Source: AP
April 7, 2009
A state Senate committee has rejected a bill that would have blocked construction of a proposed trash incinerator near a Civil War battlefield just south of Frederick.
The action effectively kills an effort by local Republican Sen. Alex Mooney to prevent Frederick County from building a $527 million incinerator in an industrial park near the Monocacy National Battlefield.
Source: http://www.eveningsun.com
April 7, 2009
Having sat virtually untouched since it was purchased by the Gettysburg Foundation last year, the historic George Spangler Farm has a long way to go before it is ready to join the ranks of Gettysburg's other tourist attractions.
But next week, the public will have one of the first opportunities to explore the farm - if they're willing to do some cleaning in the process.
Source: Foxnews.com
April 8, 2009
"Fall Weekend" will be taking the place of the holiday formerly known as "Columbus Day" at Brown University this fall.
The faculty of the Ivy League university voted at a meeting Tuesday to establish a new academic and administrative holiday in October called "Fall Weekend" that coincides with Columbus Day, but that doesn't bear the name of the explorer.
Hundreds of Brown students had asked the Providence, R.I. school to stop observing Colu
