SHEIKHA LATIFA AL MAKTOUM OF DUBAI: IS SHE DEAD OR ALIVE? (HUMAN RIGHTS OF WOMEN)

PRINCESS SHEIKHA LATIFA AL MAKTOUM OF DUBAI:

IS LATIFA DEAD OR HAS SHE BEEN IMPRISONED AGAIN?

DID INDIA HELP TO SEAL LATIFA'S FATE?

PLEASE PRAY FOR LATIFA.

DUBAI IS A BEAUTIFUL PLACE TO VISIT BUT WHAT ABOUT HUMAN RIGHTS?

HOW MUCH FREEDOM ARE UAE WOMEN IN 21st CENTURY ALLOWED?


Post Sources: BBC News, Forbes, Independent.co.uk, NDTV, Youtube


*******Dubai princess: UN asked to intervene over ruler's daughter 'detained against her will' after failed escape from UAE


Sheikha Latifa bint Mohammad al-Maktoum tried to flee in February 2018.

The lawyers representing an Emirati princess believed to be detained in the UAE have asked the UN to urgently intervene to help secure her release.

Sheikha Latifa bint Mohammad al-Maktoum – the daughter of Dubai ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum – tried to escape the UAE in February before the boat she was on was allegedly intercepted off the coast of India and she was forcibly returned home.

“The whereabouts of Sheikha Latifa is currently unknown. However, given the circumstances and reports in the media, it is believed that she is in the custody of the UAE authorities, detained against her will,” Toby Cadman, of law firm Guernica 37 International Justice Chambers, told The Independent.

As such, he added: “She is subject to ‘enforced or involuntary disappearance’ – and further, if it is confirmed that she is in the custody of the UAE authorities, she is being ‘arbitrarily detained’.”

Tiina Jauhiainen, a Finnish friend of Ms Maktoum’s, told Human Rights Watch she was also involved in the escape attempt, and that the two of them left the UAE in late February, boarding a boat belonging to French-American dual citizen, Herve Jaubert.

Guernica 37 is also representing Mr Jaubert and Ms Jauhiainen.

On 4 March the boat was intercepted by armed men, said Ms Jauhiainen, off the coast of India and they were forcibly returned to the UAE.

Upon Ms Maktoum’s disappearance, a video was released in which she said: “I’m making this video because it could be the last video I make.”

Guernica 37 has now lodged an appeal with the UN Working Group on Enforced and Involuntary Disappearances, the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention and the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture.

“We alleged that both [the UAE and India] are responsible for the enforced disappearance of Sheikha Latifa,” said Toby Cadman.

The UN working groups now have to decide whether to pass on the communication to those two countries, Mr Cadman said.

“Once communicated to the concerned states they will be invited to respond as a matter of urgency. They can refuse or decline to respond or they can respond to the substance of the allegations.

“We would encourage both states to respond and to clearly set out where she is being detained, why, and to release her forthwith. We will then urge the UN to take greater action in securing her immediate release.”

An Indian English-language newspaper reported that the Indian Coast Guard intercepted the boat, at the behest of Emirati authorities – something denied by both India and the UAE.

A source close to the Dubai government said in April that the princess was “brought back” to the Gulf country.

But while Ms Jauhiainen was later released, after being forced to sign a confession in Arabic, Ms Maktoum has not been let go, according to the source.

“UAE authorities should immediately reveal the whereabouts of Sheikha Latifa, confirm her status, and allow her contact with the outside world,” said Sarah Leah Whitson, Human Rights Watch’s Middle East director.

“If she is detained she needs to be given the rights all detainees should have, including being taken before an independent judge.”

Radha Stirling, the founder of Detained in Dubai, an international authority on UEA law, told The Independent that she last spoke to Ms Maktoum as the yacht was allegedly being raided off the coast of India, and she has not been heard from since.

“All their communications were then severed, and we believe there was electronic warfare aircraft” above the boat, blocking contact with the outside world.

And while Ms Jauhiainen and the crew members were held in the UAE for three weeks, and threatened not to speak out about the case, they are now doing so as they believe it is the only way to help Ms Maktoum be freed.

“At first they were very nervous, of course,” said Ms Stirling. “But they thought it was the only way for Latifa to have a chance at freedom.”

Ms Maktoum had previously tried to escape in 2002, she said in the video released in March, but UAE authorities stopped her at the border, returned her to Dubai and held her in a detention facility, where she was tortured, for three years.

At this weekend’s Kentucky Derby, friends in the US skydiving community flew a banner saying: “DUBAI, WHERE IS PRINCESS LATIFA?”

Ms Stirling is quietly optimistic the renewed focus on her case will mean she might soon be released.

“We are hopeful. It becomes very difficult for them when you have the UN involved and Human Rights Watch, and the whole world talking about it – it looks extremely bad for them to keep her locked up.

“She has faced torture and abuse and detention, and forced medication for years. An assurance from the government of the UAE isn’t enough – people aren’t going to stop campaigning for her absolute freedom.”

The Emirati authorities have not responded to a request for comment.

OTTO'S STRANGE MURDER WARNS AMERICANS TO STAY OUT OF N. KOREA

OTTO WARMBIER'S MYSTERIOUS MURDER WARNS AMERICA TO STAY OUT OF N. KOREA:

WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED TO OTTO IN NORTH KOREAN CUSTODY??


Post Sources: Daily Mail, WCPO, YouTube


**** Hell on earth: Otto Warmbier's death from mystery brain damage brings fresh scrutiny to the horrors of North Korea's brutal torture camps


Focus on brutality of North Korean labor camps renewed by death of US student
Otto Warmbier, 22, died Monday following 17 months as North Korean prisoner
Was released after suffering mysterious brain damage while in regime's custody
North Korea believed to have as many as 120,000 imprisoned in brutal camps
Reports abound of torture, rape and public executions in political prison camps
Warmbier's death brings new scrutiny to regime's longstanding brutalities
Yet other American prisoners speak of their gentle treatment as foreigners.


Beatings, rape, starvation and sick public executions are a daily reality for thousands of North Koreans, according to years of witness testimony.

Now, the death of a US student following mysterious brain damage suffered while a prisoner in the isolated state has brought fresh scrutiny to the regime's brutal torture camps under leader Kim Jong-Un.

Otto Warmbier died on Monday at age 22, just days after his release from North Korea in a vegetative state following 17 months in custody.

Warmbier's doctors in Cincinnati said that the student had suffered 'extensive loss of brain tissue in all regions of his brain' consistent with oxygen deprivation for a prolonged period.

The isolated North Korean regime is believed to have as many 120,000 political prisoners in its harsh labor camps, where grotesque stories of torture offer among the few clues to Warmbier's fate.

In a 2014 report, the United Nations Human Rights Commission called North Korea 'a state that does not have any parallel in the contemporary world' due to the country's 'systematic, widespread and gross human rights violations'.

Beatings are widespread in the camps, in which guards are given near-absolute authority to abuse and kill prisoners, according to survivors who have survived to speak out.

Escapees have said that the sounds of beatings were so extreme each night that it was impossible to sleep.

Yet Warmbier's doctors have said that extensive scans have revealed no evidence of broken or fractured bones, including to his skull. They also found no damage to his neck tissue that could indicate strangulation.

One woman interviewed for the UN report, who had been imprisoned for practicing Christianity, told of a torture room with a water tank in which suspects could be immersed to simulate drowning.

'She indicated that she was fully immersed in cold water for hours,' the report said. 'Only when she stood on her tip-toes would her nose be barely above the water level. She could hardly breathe. She was gripped by panic, fearing that she might drown.'

Could drowning explain the oxygen deprivation event that damaged Warmbier's brain so severely? Possibly, but doctors have not said they've found any evidence indicating that's the case.

Other baroque torture methods of the North Korean regime have come to light as well.

One Ministry of People’s Security official who defected revealed that the agency made use of small metal cages in the Pyongyang offices of its pre-trial investigative bureau.

'Victims would be crammed into the cage for several hours so that the circulation of blood to extremities becomes interrupted and other parts of the body swell up,' according to the UN report.

The victim turns into a rusty brown color. After removal from the cage, the victim is abruptly “unfolded” causing further excruciating pain,' the report said.

The same witness recalled receiving formal training on torture techniques, including 'how to cut off a suspect’s blood circulation using straps, while simultaneously placing the suspect in physical stress positions in order to inflict the maximum level of pain.'

Notably, most foreign prisoners of the North Korean regime report significantly more gentle treatment, presumably because they are considered geopolitical bargaining chips.

Matthew Todd Miller, a California man who was sentenced to six years in a North Korean labor camp in 2014, was released six months later and said that he was treated relatively well.

'I was prepared for the torture. But instead of that, I was killed with kindness,' he said in an interview with NK News.

Miller's case is unique though, in that he entered North Korea with the intention to defect, and he was detained after he was asked to leave the country and refused.

In 2013, Merrill E. Newman, an 85-year-old former US Army officer who served in the Korean War, was accused of war crimes and held by North Korea for 42 days.

Most of that time he spent confined in a hotel in Pyongyang, were Swedish consular officials who had access to him said he was well cared for and had even received needed medical attention for a heart condition.

In Warmbier's case, the official story from Pyongyang is that the student contracted botulism shortly after he was sentenced last spring in a show trial for allegedly stealing a propaganda poster from his hotel.

The North Koreans claim a sleeping pill put Warmbier into a coma from which he never awoke.

The astonishing claim is almost certainly false - doctors found no evidence of botulism, and a sleeping pill would not be indicated in the case of that rare illness, which is treatable with an antitoxin.

The true cause of Warmbier's tragic death may never be known, but the brutality of the regime responsible for his death remains grimly clear.

UNITED NATIONS HARSHLY CONDEMNS UNITED STATES FOR POLICE BRUTALITY AGAINST BLACK PEOPLE (DEMANDS U.S. GOV'T IMMEDIATELY ADDRESSES ISSUE)

UNITED NATIONS TORTURE COMMITTEE HARSHLY CONDEMNS UNITED STATES FOR RACISM......POLICE BRUTALITY..........AND EXCESSIVE FORCE:

U.N. OFFICIALS DELIVER 16-PAGE EMBARRASSING, SCATHING REPORT REVEALING HOW HORRIBLY POLICE MISTREAT BLACK YOUTH & BLACK INMATES IN THE UNITED STATES.

U.N. DEMANDS THAT U.S. FEDERAL GOV'T OFFICIALS INDEPENDENTLY INVESTIGATE & ADDRESS THESE ISSUES IMMEDIATELY.

Article Sources: International Business Times; TIME; CNN; PressTV; Youtube

ARTICLE: "Ferguson Shooting: UN Torture Committee Condemns US For Excessive Force In Law Enforcement"

The United Nations on Friday denounced the U.S. for reportedly violating an international treaty against torture, including several instances of police shootings of unarmed black youth.

In a 16-page review of the U.S.’ track record on torture since 2006, the U.N. took aim at what it said were “numerous reports” of police brutality against minorities as well as distressing conditions in some U.S. prisons, according to Reuters.

The document, which does not mention the recent events in Ferguson, Missouri, specifically, came in the wake of a grand jury’s decision not to indict a Ferguson police officer in the August shooting of unarmed black teenager Michael Brown.

The U.N. Committee against Torture cited several examples of "excessive use of force by law enforcement officials, in particular against persons belonging to certain racial and ethnic group.”

The report, the U.N.’s first on the U.S. since 2006, condemned the extensive use of Tasers against people resisting arrest, citing two recent cases in Florida and Chicago that turned deadly.

In response to the grand jury’s decision not to indict Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson for Brown’s death, committee member Alessio Bruni said the U.N. "has to respect the decision" of the jury, according to CNN.

The comments were made Friday at a news conference in Geneva, Switzerland, where Brown’s parents testified in front of the committeeearlier this month.

The committee’s report focused mainly on the U.S.’ treatment of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, however its allegations broadened to include other alleged abuses, such as the “prolonged suffering” endured by victims of prison rape and death row inmates who undergo so-called botched executions, as well as the excessive use of solitary confinement.

Wilson gunned down 18-year-old Michael Brown in August.

The shooting sparked national protests over police brutality and the nature of policing in the U.S. Wilson will not stand trial for the shooting after a grand jury found that he had acted in self-defense, a decision that was met with riots across the country.


#StopPoliceBrutality

"Obama Lost Focus On Jobs" Colin Powell Speaks

Powell: Obama Failed To Focus On What's "Most Important"


While saying he talks regularly with President Obama and his administration's officials, former Secretary of State Colin Powell said Monday that the nation's 44th president has overreached and lost focus in his first term -- and lost votes because of it.

Powell, a self-described moderate Republican who served as a top military, national security and diplomatic official under presidents ranging from Ronald Reagan to George W. Bush, said he did not regret backing the then-Illinois senator over Republican Sen. John McCain during the 2008 election campaign.

But he said that Democrats suffered "a real body blow" in the recent midterm elections -- when the party lost seats in the Senate and control of the House -- in large part because Obama didn't prioritize or communicate effectively enough.

"He should have focused on the economy ... to the exclusion of most everything else domestically," Powell told CNN's Larry King. "When you're starting out as a president, you have to figure out (what) is most important."

Powell said he has been "in regular touch with authorities within the administration and the president," including talking "all the time" about its approach to Afghanistan. He credited Obama for stabilizing the economic system, and "doing a good job in ... a number of directions with respect to Iraq and Afghanistan."

He also offered mixed reviews of former Alaska governor and 2008 Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, calling her a "fascinating individual, ... a political celebrity (and) a political force." Powell said that her positions were "very populist, but they are not very specific as to what she would cut and what she would eliminate."

He challenged Palin and Tea Party-backed politicians to offer precise ideas of what programs to eliminate from the federal government in order to simultaneously lower the federal deficit, freeze spending and cut taxes.

"How do we solve that equation, governor?" said Powell.

Still, for all his political opinions, the retired Army general insisted he had "no interest" in government service -- whether it would be as secretary of defense or, as recently suggested by Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell, as Obama's White House chief of staff.

"I haven't been asked, and I don't expect to be asked," said Powell, jocularly suggesting that Rendell himself would make "a terrific chief of staff." "I have no interest in government service."

The former Joint Chiefs of Staff chair said he's talked recently with Pakistani Gen. Ashfaq Kayani about the situation in his southwest Asian nation, including the hunt for al Qaeda and fight against pro-Taliban forces. Powell said he thinks Obama's administration understands the importance of supporting Pakistan but that efforts so far have been "inadequate."

As to Pakistan's neighbor, Afghanistan, Powell stressed that it is important to realize that the ultimate goal -- for Afghans as well as Americans -- is to create conditions so that political, military and law enforcement authorities there could take over and U.S. forces can get out.

Powell also said that previous decisions -- including U.S. and allied forces' military approach to Afghanistan in the years right after September 11 -- should be looked back at critically.

"Maybe we should have considered some years ago that the light footprint we had in the early years (to 2003) was not adequate," said Powell, who was secretary of state during that time. "I think we might have been better served by a larger footprint earlier."

Afghanistan was one of many topics Powell touched on from his tenure, between 2001 and 2005, in the State Department under Bush.

In his memoir and again Sunday night on CNN, Bush said he stands by his decision to support the use of waterboarding -- a form of simulated drowning -- as an interrogation technique against terror suspects. When its use came up after 9/11, Powell said "all of us felt that waterboarding was, if not over the line, that at least very close to the line."

He said that he understood why Bush authorized waterboarding, but said he himself wouldn't support something he said "could be called now torture."

The then-secretary of state stood by his presentation to the United Nations -- information he insisted that was vetted and approved by the U.S. intelligence community -- in early 2003 suggesting weapons of mass destruction were in Iraq. But he did have disappointment about the talk, which was critical in swaying public opinion in support for the war, in retrospect.

"I regret it now, because the information was wrong," he said.

For all his comments on the past, the 73-year-old former general and statesman said he was optimistic about the future.

"American people still believe in this country," said Powell. "What they're waiting for is for the political leaders in Washington to get on with the solution to problems and not continue to argue with each other. The next year is going to be important."






Colin Powell Critical Of President Obama


Former Secretary of State Colin Powell, who endorsed Democrat Barack Obama for president in 2008 despite serving three Republican presidents, said Sunday that Obama needs to change his approach in the White House because voters are feeling overwhelmed by sweeping new laws that expand the scope of government.

“The president also has to ... shift the way in which he has been doing things,” Powell said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “The American people feel that too many programs have come down. There are so many rocks in our knapsack now that we’re having trouble carrying it.”

Powell, a retired Army general, who was national security adviser and chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under President George H.W. Bush and who ran the State Department for President George W. Bush, said Obama must focus “like a razor blade” on employment, giving the same level of attention to creating jobs — and bringing down the 9.6 percent unemployment rate — as he did to passing bills overhauling health care and reforming education.

“I understand the importance of all of that,” Powell said, referring to Obama’s signature legislative accomplishments. “But as far as the American people are concerned, the main attack is employment.”

Powell’s critique is noteworthy, given his decision in the 2008 election to spurn Republican John McCain — a fellow Vietnam veteran and personal friend — to back Obama, whom he described as offering “generational change.” The president has continued to consult with Powell in the White House.

“He has lost some of the ability to connect that he had during the campaign,” Powell said. “And it is not just me picking on the president. It’s reflected in the polling. Some of the anxiety and anger that you see out there, I think, comes from a belief on the part of the American people — whether it’s correct or incorrect, and the White House would say it’s incorrect — that ... his singular focus should be on employment.”

Powell declined to say whether he would endorse Obama and the Democratic ticket in 2012, adding that he will evaluate him and a Republican candidate as Election Day nears.

But Powell did praise the president, saying he still considers Obama a “transformational figure.”

“Some people don’t like what he has done in transformation,” Powell said. “And it’s caused him some difficulty. But the fact of the matter is, he did put together a health care reform. It’s not perfect. And I think it’ll have to be fixed over time. And a lot of people are not happy with that health care reform. But he did it.”

Nevertheless, Powell said, he still considers himself a Republican.

“Yes, why shouldn’t I?” Powell said Sunday, adding that he hasn’t thought about leaving the party.

“I still think that there is a need for a two-party system,” Powell said. “And that the Republican Party still has strength in it. It has strength with respect to its feelings about foreign policy and defense policy and our place in the world. And I’m not happy with the rightward switch, [the] shift that the party has taken. And I’ve said this on many occasions.

“And so, I’m not about to give up,” he said.

Powell also leveled some criticism at the GOP for embracing positions that are hostile to immigrants.

“They’ve got to take a hard look at some of the positions they’ve been taking,” Powell said. “We can’t be anti-immigration, for example. Because immigrants are fueling this country. Without immigrants [the U.S.] would be like Europe or Japan, with an aging population and no young people coming in to take care of it. We have to educate our immigrants.”

Powell, the son of immigrants who rose through the ranks of the Army, said that Congress should approve the DREAM Act, which would provide a pathway to citizenship for young illegal immigrants who attend college for two years or join the military.

“America is going to be a minority nation in one more generation,” Powell said. “Our minorities are not getting educated well enough now. Fifty percent of our minority kids are not finishing high school. We’ve got to invest in education. We should use the DREAM Act as one way to do it. Whether it should be part of the defense bill or not is something the Congress will decide.”

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) will offer the DREAM Act this week as an amendment to the defense authorization bill. The chances of passage are uncertain, as Republicans who have supported the initiative in the past say it should not be tacked onto a spending bill.


Sources: CNN, Meet The Press, MSNBC, Politico, Youtube

Bush Discusses Waterboarding, Other Decisions & Mistakes

Bush Says New Orleans Flyover After Katrina A "Huge Mistake"

Former President George W. Bush said he made a “huge mistake” in not stopping in Louisiana after Hurricane Katrina and allowing photographers to take pictures of him looking at New Orleans as he flew over the city.

The photograph, taken on board Air Force One, made him look “detached and uncaring,” Bush said in an interview scheduled for broadcast on NBC next week in connection with the Nov. 9 release of the former president’s book, “Decision Points,” about his time in office.

Bush was widely criticized for the federal government’s botched response to the 2005 storm that devastated New Orleans and other parts of the Gulf of Mexico coast and for not going to the area soon after the hurricane hit.

“I should have touched down in Baton Rouge, met with the governor and walked out and said, ‘I hear you. We understand. And we’re going to help the state and help the local governments with as much resources as needed,’” Bush, 64, said according to excerpts from the interview with Matt Lauer scheduled to air at 8 p.m. New York time on Nov. 8.

In his book, Bush writes that a low point in his presidency was a remark by rapper Kanye West shortly after Katrina hit that the government’s response to the disaster showed Bush “doesn’t care about black people.”

“I faced a lot of criticism as president,” Bush wrote, according to the NBC excerpt. “I didn’t like hearing people claim that I lied about Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction or cut taxes to benefit the rich. But the suggestion that I was racist because of the response to Katrina represented an all- time low.”

‘Not True’

In the interview Bush said, “I resent it, it’s not true, and it was one of the most disgusting moments in my presidency.”

The former president, who served two terms in office, defended his decision to go to war in Iraq in 2003, saying the world would be much more unstable if Saddam Hussein were still in power.

Bush began the U.S.-led attack on Iraq on March 19, 2003, because, he said, Iraq’s Saddam Hussein had scorned the United Nations’ 12 years of mandates to get rid of its chemical and biological weapons of mass destruction.

He wrote that he felt “sickened” when the U.S. found no weapons of mass destruction. In the interview, Bush said he never considered apologizing for the decision to go to war.

“Apologizing would basically say the decision was a wrong decision,” he said. “And I don’t believe it was the wrong decision.”

In the interview and in his memoir, Bush talked about his struggles with alcohol. Drinking “became a love,” he said, according to interview excerpts. “And therefore, began to compete for my love with my wife and my daughters.”

He said he was able to quit on his own because he was never “chemically addicted.” He described himself as a “habitual drinker” before stopping at the age of 40. He said he has not had “a sip” of alcohol since 1986.


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Sources: Bloomberg.com, MSNBC, National Geographic, Wikipedia, Youtube, Google Maps

Pres. Obama's Historic Sunday Morning Media Blitz (5 Networks!)...Highlights

Obama Sunday Show Blitz



(Pres. Obama states his administration will continue focusing on creating more Jobs.)



(No deadline on Afghanistan)

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

(On World Series: Who will win?)

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

President Barack Obama today became the first president to appear on five Sunday network shows in the same morning, an extraordinary effort to build public support for health care reform, his top domestic priority.

Here are some notable highlights from the Sunday show blitz:

ON HEALTH CARE POLITICS: IT'S A HARD TOPIC TO TALK ABOUT

Despite so many weeks of speeches, town halls and interviews, Pres. Obama said he has found it difficult at times to make a complex topic clear and relevant.

"I've tried to keep it digestible," Pres. Obama said. "It's very hard for people to get their arms around it. And that's been a case where I have been humbled and I just keep on trying harder."

Pres. Obama told Univision's "Al Punto" ("To the Point") that the strong opposition to his plan is part of a political strategy.

"Well, part of it is ... that the opposition has made a decision," he said. "They are just not going to support anything, for political reasons."

ON TORTURE: JUSTICE DEPT. OK TO CONDUCT INTERROGATION REVIEW

President Obama says he has no plans to ask the Justice Department to end its criminal investigation into the harsh interrogations of suspected terrorists during the Bush administration.

Seven former CIA directors have asked the president to do just that. In a letter to Pres. Obama on Friday, they warned that the probe could discourage CIA officers from doing the kind of aggressive intelligence work needed to fight terrorism.

Pres. Obama tells CBS' "Face the Nation" that he appreciates that the former CIA chiefs are wanting "to look after an institution that they helped to build."

Pres. Obama says he wants to make sure that he's not somehow overruling the decisions of prosecutors such as Attorney General Eric Holder who are there to uphold the law.

ON ECONOMY: NOT READY TO DECLARE RECESSION OVER

President Obama isn't ready to close the book on the recession.

Only last week Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said the worst recession since the 1930s was probably over.

But Pres. Obama tells CNN's "State of the Union" that he's going to leave it up to the Fed chairman to say whether it's officially over or not.

Pres. Obama says all the signs are that the economy is going to start growing again. But he says jobs are a challenge.

The president says job figures usually are the last to catch up in a recovery and he says that making up for all those jobs that have been lost will require really high growth rates.

He's warning that the jobs picture could get even a bit worse over the coming months and that there might not be enough job creation until next year to deal with the rising population.

ON AFGHANISTAN: NO "INDEFINITE OCCUPATION"

President Obama says he has no deadline for withdrawing U.S. forces from Afghanistan and is pledging there will not be an indefinite American occupation. Sounding much like his predecessor, Pres. Obama said he won't base any war decision on "the politics of the moment."

The 8-year-old conflict in Afghanistan, overshadowed by the war in Iraq during much of George W. Bush's presidency, is a dominant challenge for Pres. Obama.
The American public and leaders of his own party have eroding faith in the face of a resurgent Taliban, doubts of Afghan leadership and rising U.S. engagement.

"I don't have a deadline for withdrawal," Pres. Obama said in one of a series of television interviews broadcast Sunday. "But I'm certainly not somebody who believes in indefinite occupations of other countries."

Pres. Obama has ordered 21,000 more troops to Afghanistan, increasing the number of U.S. forces there to 68,000, and is expecting to get a request for more from the U.S. and NATO commander. Pres. Obama said the decision is more than the inclination of "If I get more, then I can do more."

"Right now, the question is, the first question is, are we doing the right thing?" he said. "Are we pursuing the right strategy?

Pres. Obama has pledged no imminent decision on sending in more troops and says he wants to see updated reviews on all aspects of his war strategy. His road map to winning the war in Afghanistan relies heavily on clearing Al-Qaida terrorists from Pakistan, according to a list of benchmarks given to Congress last week.

Pres. Obama said once he hears from advisers and has a better idea on whether more troops or needed, then "what I will say to the American public is not going to be driven by the politics of the moment." Bush often used similar language when overseeing a war in Iraq that had lost support of much of the public.

ON ACORN: NOT SOMETHING I'M FOLLOWING CLOSELY

On ABC, George Stephanopoulos pressed President Obama on the recent controversy surrounding the community group ACORN. Here's the full exchange:

STEPHANOPOULOS: How about the funding for ACORN?

PRES. OBAMA: You know, if -- frankly, it's not really something I've followed closely. I didn't even know that ACORN was getting a whole lot of federal money.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Both the Senate and the House have voted to cut it off.

PRES. OBAMA: You know, what I know is, is that what I saw on that video was certainly inappropriate and deserves to be investigated.

STEPHANOPOULOS: So you're not committing to -- to cut off the federal funding?

PRES. OBAMA: George, this is not the biggest issue facing the country. It's not something I'm paying a lot of attention to.

ON MISSILE DEFENSE: DECISION NOT ABOUT RUSSIA

President Obama sharply dismisses criticism that Russian opposition influenced his decision to scrap a European missile defense system, calling it merely a bonus if the leaders of Russia end up "a little less paranoid" about the U.S.

"My task here was not to negotiate with the Russians," Pres. Obama told CBS' "Face the Nation" in an interview for broadcast Sunday. "The Russians don't make determinations about what our defense posture is."

The president's comments were his first on the matter since he abruptly announced on Thursday that he was scuttling plans to deploy 10 missile interceptors in Poland and a related radar in the Czech Republic. That shield had been proposed under President George W. Bush.

Russia condemned it is a threat to its security despite years of U.S. assurances to the contrary.

In its place will be a different missile-defense plan relying on a network of sensors and interceptor missiles based at sea, on land and in the air. Obama says that adapts to the most pressing threat from Iran to U.S. troops and allies in Europe, potential attacks by short- and medium-range missiles.

Yet at home and abroad, Pres. Obama's decision immediately raised a political question of whether it was done in part to appease Russia and win its help in other areas, mainly in confronting the potential of a nuclear-armed Iran. That point was underscored when Russia lauded the change.

In an interview with CBS News that was taped Friday, Pres. Obama was pressed on why he did not seek anything in exchange from Russia.

"Russia had always been paranoid about this, but George Bush was right. This wasn't a threat to them," Pres. Obama said. "And this program will not be a threat to them."

He added: "If the byproduct of it is that the Russians feel a little less paranoid and are now willing to work more effectively with us to deal with threats like ballistic missiles from Iran or nuclear development in Iran, you know, then that's a bonus."

ON WORLD SERIES: WHO WILL WIN?

On NBC's Meet the Press, David Gregory asked President Obama who he thinks will win the World Series. The president's response: "The White Sox can still make the Play-Offs".


Sources: Huffington Post, MSNBC, CBS News, ABC News, CNN, Univision

U.S. A.G. Eric Holder Wants To Hire Torture Prosecutor, White House Opposes ...Is It About Politics Or The Law?

Newsweek, Huffington Post----


It's the morning after Independence Day, and U.S. A.G. Eric Holder Jr. is feeling the weight of history. The night before, he'd stood on the roof of the White House alongside the President of the United States, leaning over a railing to watch fireworks burst over the Mall, the monuments to Lincoln and Washington aglow at either end. "I was so struck by the fact that for the first time in history an African-American was presiding over this celebration of what our nation is all about," he says. Now, sitting at his kitchen table in jeans and a gray polo shirt, as his 11-year-old son, Buddy, dashes in and out of the room, Holder is reflecting on his own role. He doesn't dwell on the fact that he's the country's first black attorney general. He is focused instead on the tension that the best of his predecessors have confronted: how does one faithfully serve both the law and the president?

Alone among cabinet officers, Attorneys General are partisan appointees expected to rise above partisanship. All struggle to find a happy medium between loyalty and independence. Few succeed. At one extreme looms Alberto Gonzales, who allowed the Justice Department to be run like Tammany Hall. At the other is Janet Reno, whose righteousness and folksy eccentricities marginalized her within the Clinton administration. Lean too far one way and you corrupt the office, too far the other way and you render yourself impotent. Mindful of history, Holder is trying to get the balance right. "You have the responsibility of enforcing the nation's laws, and you have to be seen as neutral, detached, and nonpartisan in that effort," Holder says. "But the reality of being A.G. is that I'm also part of the president's team. I want the president to succeed; I campaigned for him. I share his world view and values."

These are not just the philosophical musings of a new attorney general. Holder, 58, may be on the verge of asserting his independence in a profound way. Four knowledgeable sources tell NEWSWEEK that he is now leaning toward appointing a prosecutor to investigate the Bush administration's brutal interrogation practices, something the president has been reluctant to do.

While no final decision has been made, an announcement could come in a matter of weeks, say these sources, who decline to be identified discussing a sensitive law-enforcement matter. Such a decision would roil the country, would likely plunge Washington into a new round of partisan warfare, and could even imperil Obama's domestic priorities, including health care and energy reform. Holder knows all this, and he has been wrestling with the question for months. "I hope that whatever decision I make would not have a negative impact on the president's agenda," he says. "But that can't be a part of my decision."

Holder is not a natural renegade. His first instinct is to shy away from confrontation, to search for common ground. If he disagrees with you, he's likely to compliment you first before staking out an opposing position. "Now, you see, that's interesting," he'll begin, gently. As a trial judge in Washington, D.C., in the late 1980s and early '90s, he was known as a tough sentencer ("Hold-'em Holder"). But he even managed to win over convicts he was putting behind bars. "As a judge, he had a natural grace," recalls Reid Weingarten, a former Justice Department colleague and a close friend. "He was so sensitive when he sent someone off to prison, the guy would thank him." Holder acknowledges that he struggles against a tendency to please, that he's had to learn to be more assertive over the years. "The thing I have to watch out for is the desire to be a team player," he says, well aware that he's on the verge of becoming something else entirely.

When Holder and his wife, Sharon Malone, glide into a dinner party they change the atmosphere. In a town famous for its drabness, they're an attractive, poised, and uncommonly elegant pair—not unlike the new first couple. But they're also a study in contrasts. Holder is disarmingly grounded, with none of the false humility that usually signals vanity in a Washington player. He plunges into conversation with a smile, utterly comfortable in his skin. His wife, at first, is more guarded. She grew up in the Deep South under Jim Crow—her sister, Vivian Malone Jones, integrated the University of Alabama—and has a fierce sense of right and wrong. At a recent dinner in a leafy corner of Bethesda, Malone drew a direct line from the sins of America's racial past to the abuses of the Guantánamo Bay detention center. Both are examples of "what we have not done in the face of injustice," she said at one point, her Southern accent becoming more discernible as her voice rose with indignation. At the same party, Holder praised the Bush administration for setting up an "effective antiterror infrastructure."

Malone traces many of their differences to their divergent upbringings. "His parents are from the West Indies..he experienced a kinder, gentler version of the black experience," she says. Holder grew up in East Elmhurst, Queens, a lower-middle-class neighborhood in the shadow of New York's La Guardia Airport. The neighborhood has long been a steppingstone for immigrants, but also attracted blacks moving north during the Great Migration. When Holder was growing up in the 1950s, there were fewer houses—mostly semi-detached clapboard and brick homes, like the one his family owned on the corner of 101st Street and 24th Avenue—and more trees. Today the neighborhood is dominated by Mexican, Dominican and South Asian families, with a diminishing number of West Indians and African-Americans.

As we walk up 24th on a recent Saturday, Holder describes for me a happy and largely drama-free childhood. The family was comfortable enough. His father, Eric Sr., was in real estate and owned a few small buildings in Harlem. His mother, Miriam, stayed at home and doted on her two sons. Little Ricky, as he was known, was bright, athletic, and good-natured.

As we walk past the baseball diamond where Holder played center field, he recalls how he used to occasionally catch glimpses of Willie Mays leaving or entering his mansion on nearby Ditmas Boulevard. Arriving at the basketball courts of PS 127, Holder bumps into a couple of old schoolyard buddies, greets them with a soul handshake and falls into an easy banter, reminiscing about "back in the day" when they dominated the hardcourt. "Ancient history," says Jeff Aubry, now a state assemblyman. "When gods walked the earth," responds Holder, who dunked for the first time on these courts at age 16.

Holder doesn't dispute the idea that his happy upbringing has led to a generally sunny view of the world. "I grew up in a stable neighborhood in a stable, two-parent family, and I never really saw the reality of racism or felt the insecurity that comes with it," he says. "That edge that Sharon's got—I don't have it. She's more suspicious of people. I am more trusting." There's a pause, and then, with a weary chuckle, one signaling gravity rather than levity, Holder says, "Lesson learned." And then adds, under his breath: "Marc Rich."

The name of the fugitive financier pardoned—with Holder's blessing—at the tail end of the Clinton administration still gnaws at him. It isn't hard to see why. As a Justice Department lawyer, Holder made a name for himself prosecuting corrupt politicians and judges. He began his career in 1976, straight out of Columbia Law School, in the Justice Department's Public Integrity Section, where prosecutors are imbued with a sense of rectitude and learn to fend off political interference. And though Holder has bluntly acknowledged that he "blew it," the Rich decision haunts him. Given his professional roots, he says, "the notion that you would take actions based on political considerations runs counter to everything in my DNA." Aides say that his recent confirmation hearings, which aired the details of the Rich pardon, were in a way liberating; he aspires to no higher office and is now free to be his own man. But his wife says that part of what drives him today is a continuing hunger for redemption.

When I ask Malone the inevitable questions about Rich, she looks pained. "It was awful; it was a terrible time," she says. But she also casts the episode as a lesson about character, arguing that her husband's trusting nature was exploited by Rich's conniving lawyers. "Eric sees himself as the nice guy. In a lot of ways that's a good thing. He's always saying, 'You get more out of people with kindness than meanness.' But when he leaves the 'nice guy' behind, that's when he's strongest."

Any White House tests an attorney general's strength. But one run by Rahm Emanuel requires a particular brand of fortitude. A legendary enforcer of presidential will, Emanuel relentlessly tries to anticipate political threats that could harm his boss. He hates surprises. That makes the Justice Department, with its independent mandate, an inherently nervous-making place for Emanuel. During the first Clinton administration, he was famous for blitzing Justice officials with phone calls, obsessively trying to gather intelligence, plant policy ideas, and generally keep tabs on the department.

One of his main interlocutors back then was Holder. With Reno marginalized by the Clintonites, Holder, then serving as deputy attorney general, became the White House's main channel to Justice. A mutual respect developed between the two men, and an affection endures to this day. (Malone, a well-regarded ob-gyn, delivered one of Emanuel's kids.) "Rahm's style is often misunderstood," says Holder. "He brings a rigor and a discipline that is a net plus to this administration." For his part, Emanuel calls Holder a "strong, independent attorney general." But Emanuel's agitated presence hangs over the building—"the wrath of Rahm," one Justice lawyer calls it—and he is clearly on the minds of Holder and his aides as they weigh whether to launch a probe into the Bush administration's interrogation policies.

Holder began to review those policies in April. As he pored over reports and listened to briefings, he became increasingly troubled. There were startling indications that some interrogators had gone far beyond what had been authorized in the legal opinions issued by the Justice Department, which were themselves controversial. He told one intimate that what he saw "turned my stomach."

It was soon clear to Holder that he might have to launch an investigation to determine whether crimes were committed under the Bush administration and prosecutions warranted. The obstacles were obvious.

For a new administration to reach back and investigate its predecessor is rare, if not unprecedented. After having been deeply involved in the decision to authorize Ken Starr to investigate Bill Clinton's affair with Monica Lewinsky, Holder well knew how politicized things could get. He worried about the impact on the CIA, whose operatives would be at the center of any probe. And he could clearly read the signals coming out of the White House.

President Obama had already deflected the left wing of his party and human-rights organizations by saying, "We should be looking forward and not backwards" when it came to Bush-era abuses.

Still, Holder couldn't shake what he had learned in reports about the treatment of prisoners at the CIA's "black sites." If the public knew the details, he and his aides figured, there would be a groundswell of support for an independent probe. He raised with his staff the possibility of appointing a prosecutor. According to three sources familiar with the process, they discussed several potential choices and the criteria for such a sensitive investigation. Holder was looking for someone with "gravitas and grit," according to one of these sources, all of whom declined to be named. At one point, an aide joked that Holder might need to clone Patrick Fitzgerald, the hard-charging, independent-minded U.S. attorney who had prosecuted Scooter Libby in the Plamegate affair. In the end, Holder asked for a list of 10 candidates, five from within the Justice Department and five from outside.

On April 15 the attorney general traveled to West Point, where he had been invited to give a speech dedicating the military academy's new Center for the Rule of Law. As he mingled with cadets before his speech, Holder's aides furiously worked their BlackBerrys, trying to find out what was happening back in Washington. For weeks Holder had participated in a contentious internal debate over whether the Obama administration should release the Bush-era legal opinions that had authorized waterboarding and other harsh interrogation methods. He had argued to administration officials that "if you don't release the memos, you'll own the policy." CIA Director Leon Panetta, a shrewd political operator, countered that full disclosure would damage the government's ability to recruit spies and harm national security; he pushed to release only heavily redacted versions.

Holder and his aides thought they'd been losing the internal battle. What they didn't know was that, at that very moment, Obama was staging a mock debate in Emanuel's office in order to come to a final decision. In his address to the cadets, Holder cited George Washington's admonition at the Battle of Trenton, Christmas 1776, that "captive British soldiers were to be treated with humanity, regardless of how Colonial soldiers captured in battle might be treated." As Holder flew back to Washington on the FBI's Cessna Citation, Obama reached his decision. The memos would be released in full.

Holder and his team celebrated quietly, and waited for national outrage to build. But they'd miscalculated. The memos had already received such public notoriety that the new details in them did not shock many people. (Even the revelation, a few days later, that 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and another detainee had been waterboarded hundreds of times did not drastically alter the contours of the story.) And the White House certainly did its part to head off further controversy. On the Sunday after the memos were revealed, Emanuel appeared on This Week With George Stephanopoulos and declared that there would be no prosecutions of CIA operatives who had acted in good faith with the guidance they were given. In his statement announcing the release of the memos, Obama said, "This is a time for reflection, not retribution." (Throughout, however, he has been careful to say that the final decision is the attorney general's to make.)

Emanuel and other administration officials could see that the politics of national security was turning against them. When I interviewed a senior White House official in early April, he remarked that Republicans had figured out that they could attack Obama on these issues essentially free of cost. "The genius of the Obama presidency so far has been an ability to keep social issues off the docket," he said. "But now the Republicans have found their dream…issue and they have nothing to lose."

Emanuel's response to the torture memos should not have surprised Holder. In the months since the inauguration, the relationship between the Justice Department and the White House had been marred by surprising tension and acrimony. A certain amount of friction is inherent in the relationship, even healthy. But in the Obama administration the bad blood between the camps has at times been striking. The first detonation occurred in only the third week of the administration, soon after a Justice lawyer walked into a courtroom in California and argued that a lawsuit, brought by a British detainee who was alleging torture, should have been thrown out on national-security grounds. By invoking the "state secrets" privilege, the lawyer was reaffirming a position staked out by the Bush administration. The move provoked an uproar among liberals and human-rights groups. It also infuriated Obama, who learned about it from the front page of The New York Times. "This is not the way I like to make decisions," he icily told aides, according to two administration officials, who declined to be identified discussing the president's private reactions. White House officials were livid and accused the Justice Department of sandbagging the president. Justice officials countered that they'd notified the White House counsel's office about the position they had planned to take.

Other missteps were made directly by Holder. Early on, he gave a speech on race relations in honor of Black History Month. He used the infelicitous phrase "nation of cowards" to describe the hair trigger that Americans are on when it comes to race. The quote churned through the cable conversation for a couple of news cycles and caused significant heartburn at the White House; Holder had not vetted the language with his staff.

A few weeks later, he told reporters he planned to push for reinstating the ban on assault weapons, which had expired in 2004. He was simply repeating a position that Obama had taken on numerous occasions during the campaign, but at a time when the White House was desperate to win over pro-gun moderate Democrats in Congress. "It's not what we wanted to talk about," said one annoyed White House official, who declined to be identified criticizing the attorney general.

The miscues began to reinforce a narrative that Justice has had a hard time shaking. White House officials have complained that Holder and his staff are not sufficiently attuned to their political needs. Holder is well liked inside the department. His relaxed, unpretentious style—on a flight to Rome in May for a meeting of justice ministers, he popped out of his cabin with his iPod on, mimicking Bobby Darin performing "Beyond the Sea"—has bred tremendous loyalty among his personal staff. But that staff is largely made up of veteran prosecutors and lawyers whom Holder has known and worked with for years. They do not see the president's political fortunes as their primary concern. Among some White House officials there is a not-too-subtle undertone suggesting that Holder has "overlearned the lessons of Marc Rich," as one administration official said to me.

The tensions came to a head in June. By then, Congress was in full revolt over the prospect of Gitmo detainees being transferred to the United States, and the Senate had already voted to block funding to shut down Guantánamo. On the afternoon of June 3, a White House official called Holder's office to let him know that a compromise had been reached with Senate Democrats. The deal had been cut without input from Justice, according to three department officials who did not want to be identified discussing internal matters, and it imposed onerous restrictions that would make it harder to move detainees from Cuba to the United States.

Especially galling was the fact that the White House then asked Holder to go up to the Hill that evening to meet with Senate Democrats and bless the deal. Holder declined—a snub in the delicate dance of Washington politics—and in-stead dispatched the deputy attorney general in his place. Ultimately the measure passed, despite Justice's objections. Obama aides deny that they left Holder out of the loop. "There was no decision to cut them out, and they were not cut out," says one White House official. "That's a misunderstanding."

Holder is clearly not looking to have a contentious relationship with the White House. It's not his nature, and he knows it's not smart politics. His desire to get along has proved useful in his career before, and may now. Emanuel attributes any early problems to the fact that "everyone was getting their sea legs," and insists things have been patched up. "It's not like we're all sitting around singing 'Kumbaya,' " he says, but he insists that Obama got in Holder exactly what he wanted: "a strong, independent leader."

There's an obvious affinity between Holder and the man who appointed him to be the first black attorney general of the United States. They are both black men raised outside the conventional African-American tradition who worked their way to the top of the meritocracy. They are lawyers committed to translating the law into justice. Having spent most of their adult lives in the public arena, both know intimately the tug of war between principle and pragmatism. Obama, Holder says confidently, "understands the nature of what we do at the Justice Department in a way no recent president has. He's a damn good lawyer, and he understands the value of having an independent attorney general."

The next few weeks, though, could test Holder's confidence. After the prospect of torture investigations seemed to lose momentum in April, the attorney general and his aides turned to other pressing issues. They were preoccupied with Gitmo, developing a hugely complex new set of detention and prosecution policies, and putting out the daily fires that go along with running a 110,000-person department. The regular meetings Holder's team had been having on the torture question died down. Some aides began to wonder whether the idea of appointing a prosecutor was off the table.

But in late June Holder asked an aide for a copy of the CIA inspector general's thick classified report on interrogation abuses. He cleared his schedule and, over two days, holed up alone in his Justice Depart ment office, immersed himself in what Dick Cheney once referred to as "the dark side." He read the report twice, the first time as a lawyer, looking for evidence and instances of transgressions that might call for prosecution. The second time, he started to absorb what he was reading at a more emotional level. He was "shocked and saddened," he told a friend, by what government servants were alleged to have done in America's name. When he was done he stood at his window for a long time, staring at Constitution Avenue.


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Sources: Newsweek, Huffington Post, The Heritage Foundation, Voice of America, Google Maps

White House Addresses Rape, Sexual Assault Torture Photos....Denounces British Media

Huffington Post, Politico, Salon.com-------

White House reporters received an unusual email on Saturday, with a subject line stating, "Important Please Read: From White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs."

In the email body, Gibbs wrote:

A number of you have asked about or reported on a recent article in the Telegraph that inaccurately described photos which are the subject of an ongoing lawsuit. Both the Department of Defense and the White House have said the article was wrong, and now the individual who was purported to be the source of the article has said it's inaccurate. Given that this false report has been repeated around the world, and given the impact these negative reports have on our troops, I felt it was important for you to see this correction.

Gibbs included the full text of a story by Salon.com's Mark Benjamin, which features retired Army Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba denying reports that he has seen the photos of prisoner abuse that the Obama administration is trying to keep secret.

The Telegraph reported on Friday:

Maj Gen Taguba, who retired in January 2007, said he supported the President's decision, adding: "These pictures show torture, abuse, rape and every indecency.

"I am not sure what purpose their release would serve other than a legal one and the consequence would be to imperil our troops, the only protectors of our foreign policy, when we most need them, and British troops who are trying to build security in Afghanistan.

But Taguba told Salon that his quotes were taken out of context, and were not about the photos that Obama does not want released.

"The photographs in that lawsuit, I have not seen," Taguba told Salon Friday night. The actual quote in the Telegraph was accurate, Taguba said -- but he was referring to the hundreds of images he reviewed as an investigator of the abuse at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq -- not the photos of abuse that Obama is seeking to suppress.

During Friday's press conference, before Taguba's interview was published, Gibbs was adamant that the Telegraph piece was false, and ripped into the British press for consistently printing false information.

"I want to speak generally about some reports I've witnessed over the past few years in the British media. And in some ways, I'm surprised it filtered down," Gibbs began. "Let's just say if I wanted to look up -- if I wanted to read a writeup today of how Manchester United fared last night in the Champion's League cup, I might open up a British newspaper. If I was looking for something that bordered on truthful news, I'm not entirely sure it'd be in the first pack of clips I'd pick up."

"You're not going to find very many of these newspapers and truth within 25 words of each other," Gibbs continued.

A Telegraph columnist, Nile Gardiner, responded with a diatribe calling Gibbs' "unwarranted rant against the British press" an "absolute disgrace, and the President should disown his views."

I cannot recall an instance like this where the President's official spokesman has blasted the press of a key ally - in this case America's closest friend, Great Britain. [...]

Can you imagine Gibbs making these remarks about The New York Times or The Washington Post, or NBC, ABC or CBS? This would never happen.

The British press, especially the Telegraph, has been singled out because they frequently publish articles critical of the Obama administration and are not afraid to take on the status quo in Washington. Increasingly, millions of Americans are turning to online UK news websites for cutting edge reports on American politics and U.S. foreign policy that the mainstream media refuses to cover in the States, especially if it is unflattering to the Obama White House.

(White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs recently denounces the British Media.)




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Sources: Huffington Post, Politico, Day Life, Salon.com, Telegraph.co.uk, Google Maps

General Petraeus Publicly Admits Torture Is Wrong & Violated Geneva Conventions....Supports Closing Gitmo

General Petraeus discusses Torture on CNN.



Full Transcript from interview with Radio Free Europe/ Radio Liberty News Director Jay Tolson.

RFE/RL: Well, thank you for coming here today, General Petraeus, to talk to Radio Free Europe.

Petraeus: Good to be with you, Jay.

RFE/RL: As you know, General, the debate over Guantanamo and enhanced interrogation techniques has become "Topic A" in Washington. In your view, does the closing of "Gitmo" and the abandonment of those techniques complicate the U.S. mission in Iraq, Afghanistan, and in the overall struggle against violent transnational extremist groups or does it help it?

Petraeus: I think, on balance, that those moves help it. In fact, I have long been on record as having testified and also in helping write doctrine for interrogation techniques that are completely in line with the Geneva Convention. And as a division commander in Iraq in the early days, we put out guidance very early on to make sure that our soldiers, in fact, knew that we needed to stay within those guidelines.

With respect to Guantanamo, I think that the closure in a responsible manner, obviously one that is certainly being worked out now by the Department of Justice -- I talked to the attorney general the other day [and] they have a very intensive effort ongoing to determine, indeed, what to do with the detainees who are left, how to deal with them in a legal way, and if continued incarceration is necessary -- again, how to take that forward.

But doing that in a responsible manner, I think, sends an important message to the world, as does the commitment of the United States to observe the Geneva Convention when it comes to the treatment of detainees.

RFE/RL: With the approach of the June 20 deadline for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq's cities, is there a danger that you are removing a key component of the successful security strategy before the Iraq government and military are ready to handle things on their own?

Petraeus: Well, actually, we've been handing over cities and, indeed, entire provinces to the Iraqi security forces for years at this point. The question that revolves around a couple of key cities in which we still have a presence, Baghdad, Mosul, and Baquba to an extent, and ensuring that the Iraqi forces there are certainly ready to ensure the security after the departure of our forces from their streets, which is a process that has already been ongoing.

We believe that the Iraqi forces, indeed, can take this forward. They are in considerably better shape, much more capable and certainly more numerous than they were at the beginning of the surge. There are over 600,000 Iraqi solders, Iraq police, who are helping to take on the security burdens of their country, and we believe that they can do that.

Having said that, there will be periodic attacks, as there have been in the past as Al-Qaeda tries to reignite the sectarian violence that caused such horrific loss of life in the winter of 2006 and into 2007. It is very important to recognize, though, that even as we have seen some of these tragic losses, even just last week, for example, in a so-called sensational attack, a suicide bombing inside Baghdad, that the level of violence remains vastly reduced. It is down from 160 attacks per day, on average, in June of 2007 to between 10 and 15 attacks per day over the last five or six months. And that has remained there despite, again, these occasional "sensational attacks," which do, indeed, cause very tragic loss of life.

Terrorists' Funding

RFE/RL: We know that money from Saudi and various other Gulf states has been the lifeblood of Islamist extremism, including the Taliban. Why, more than eight years after 9/11, have the United States and its allies been unable to cut off this crucial source of funding? Is there anything new that you think should be done?

Petraeus: Well, first of all, I think it is important just to take the Afghan Taliban as an example. There are really three major sources of funding that they receive. There's the money that comes from the illegal narcotics industry, and that is the way to describe it. It is that large, and it is that problematic. There is money that comes from a variety of criminal activities, from kidnapping, from other extortion schemes and essentially mafia-like activity that the Taliban has conducted. And then there is, indeed, still money that comes in from the outside, some perhaps from neighboring countries and some perhaps from the Gulf states.

Saudi Arabia, if asked this question, by the way -- because I have had discussions with Saudi leaders about this, and most recently, the Saudi ambassador in Washington -- I think rightly would say, "You tell me the names of the people and the bank accounts, and we will shut it down." Because they have been, in fact, quite vigilant in shutting down, certainly, state-sponsored provision of money to extremist elements, and when it can be identified, when it can be found, any private activities that are similar to that. But again, these are large countries.

There are staggering amounts of wealth in some of these countries, the Hawala system -- through which much of this is transmitted -- is very difficult to track. It is not computerized, needless to say. It is relatively clandestine in nature. And it is somewhat impervious to the kinds of financial forensics that we can use with transfers that work through actual banking systems.

Threats In Afghanistan And Pakistan

RFE/RL: If the mission in Afghanistan is to ensure that it never again becomes a haven for Al-Qaeda or other violent Islamist groups, does that mean holding the Afghan government to certain nonnegotiable standards of liberal democracy and universal human rights?

Petraeus: Well, certainly there's no question that the Afghan government needs to do a better job in terms of achieving the support of its own people to be seen as legitimate and serving those people. And I think President [Hamid] Karzai would be the first, in fact, to note that and to note that some of the corruption that has been so widely publicized and has caused such problems.

Some of the predatory practices by some elements or individuals of the greater Afghan government indeed need to be curtailed and stopped. It is hugely important that they carry out those actions. There are ambitious anticorruption programs, for example, in the Ministry of Interior launched by Minister [Hanif] Atmar, that are quite impressive. But there obviously needs to be a vast amount more attention given to this if, again, this government is to be seen by the people as serving them and to be worthy of their support.

RFE/RL: To what extent do you think that Pakistan's government and, particularly, its military now understand that Islamist extremism within its borders poses a greater threat than India?

Petraeus: Well, it seems to be to a very increased extent, to a considerable extent. The fact is that the Pakistani military has been moving forces from the Indian [border] with orders to move more having been issued.

The fact is, you have a unique convergence right now of four major elements in Pakistani society: the government, including the major opposition figures, Nawaz Sharif and others. Virtually all the political parties, with a couple of exceptions, are united in saying that Pakistan must oppose and confront the Taliban and the other extremists in their country who do, indeed, threaten the very existence of the Pakistani state.

In addition to that, the people now, really for the first time, very much oppose what the Taliban has shown itself to do. There was some hope, I think, at one time, that perhaps the Taliban could provide something that the government was not providing: speedy justice, swift justice, as they say, in the Northwest Frontier Province. That now has been shown to be a myth and, in fact, the oppressive practices that the Taliban brought into Swat and then into Buner and Lower Dir, for example, showed what the rest of Pakistan would have if, in fact, the Taliban was allowed to expand its oppressive practices further. You also have, uniquely, [the fact that] the religious leaders have issued fatwas against the Taliban.

And with all of this, certainly the Pakistani military is very aggressively prosecuting the campaign in the Northwest Frontier Province and also continuing its activities in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas. I think that this is unique, since 9/11 certainly, and it bodes much better for Pakistan and for the hope of Pakistan as a country that is, compared to the Taliban, a moderate country that is tolerant and not one in which religious, ultraconservative, or extremist figures can tell the people how to pray, how to groom themselves, what music they can listen to, and all the rest of that.

Afghan Civilian Casualties

RFE/RL: While the counterinsurgency strategy you advocate concentrates on winning hearts and minds, the "human terrain" as the U.S. military now calls it, coalition air strikes against insurgents in Afghanistan appear to be having exactly the opposite effect. Do you see this problem being resolved anytime soon?

Petraeus: Well, first of all, it is a problem, and it is one that we must address and we must continue to work at how we can ensure that we still have access to these very important enablers, as we call them.

We shouldn't have our soldiers go into a fight with one arm tied behind their back. On the other hand, we have to figure out how to bring these forces, these combat elements to bear without, obviously, killing innocent civilians. And it is very, very difficult in some cases because the Taliban has been shown to use civilians almost as human shields or at least to provoke firing into areas where there are civilians.

There is a tactical directive that was issued General [David] McKiernan, the ISAF [International Security Assistance Force] commander. The application of that and also a number of other techniques that have been employed to partner Afghan and our special-operations forces in various techniques has seemed to work.

But still, there are cases, such as the one, certainly, in western Afghanistan several weeks ago in which innocent civilians were killed in significant numbers. And we won't debate the numbers. What we need to do is figure out how to move forward and how to avoid such cases and to keep them to an absolute minimum in the future.

So there is an investigation that I directed, [with a] brigadier general brought in from the United States with considerable time on the ground in Afghanistan and in Iraq, both as a special operator and as a conventional-forces deputy commander. And he is looking at this with a team. I will meet with them in Kabul...[to] review the initial findings as they finalize their investigation, and then see what that says about the need to either modify the directive, to suggest that to the NATO authorities, or, at the very least, to ensure the very proper training and education of our forces on the application of that directive.

RFE/RL: The Taliban and other Afghan insurgent groups are insisting on a U.S. pullout as a condition for peace talks, while your idea of reconciliation is a bottom-up, localized approach, of peeling away the foot soldiers from the hard-line core. How do you see reconciliation actually moving forward in Afghanistan?

Petraeus: Well, I think it is, most probably, to be more of a bottom-up approach. I think that negotiating with individuals who think that they are in the ascendant, who have some degree of momentum, at least in their own minds, certainly have increased the level of violence in Afghanistan significantly in the past two years, whose criteria is to remove those who are most helping the Afghan government, obviously doesn't hold much promise for improved security or progress for the Afghan people.

So, most likely, it is to be local elements to help re-empower, reestablish the traditional social structures, the mullah, the Malik, the tribal elders, the religious leaders at local levels who traditionally have always ensured the resolution of disputes at local levels, who have looked after the people of their tribes and so forth, while helping to extend the national government so that the two of those can connect in a productive and constructive manner. I think that is more likely to be the road ahead.

But clearly what you want to do is to determine who are the reconcilables, who are the irreconcilables. And you should not shrink from the fact that the irreconcilables have to be killed, captured, or run out of the country.

Central Asian Equation

RFE/RL: The Central Asian states all agree that the region's biggest security problems right now emanate from Afghanistan. Given that, why, in your opinion, has it been so difficult for some of them to commit more firmly to helping the U.S. and NATO efforts?

Petraeus: Well, I think if I could discuss what, perhaps, might be most beneficial for the Central Asian states and really all of the countries -- including my own and Russia and the other great powers of the world -- indeed would be to recognize that the common threats to the Central Asian states. And those are extremism coming out of Afghanistan, Pakistan, from the south, if you will, and the illegal narcotics industry that has enslaved so many people in the Central Asian states, even in Iran by the way, and works its way up into Russia as well.

These common threats warrant cooperation and a broad partnership rather than continued zero sum approaches to the new "Great Game," if you will, the competition for power and resources in the Central Asian states.

The fact is, actually, that I've visited every one of these states, their leaders, in the past four months or so, and we have, in fact, achieved agreements with them and even Russia now is supportive of the movement of cargo, supplies, and so forth through their borders. [There are] different arrangements with different countries -- a very important agreement with Uzbekistan, in particular, because all roads do lead through Uzbekistan and into Afghanistan. But we do see this kind of partnership that has developed, to a degree, and is one on which we hope we can build in the future.



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