These are always news stories but I'll be mixing in other things, first with a great overview with some amazing insight into the world of Scientology. It discusses some of the former members, some very high ranking (previously) and the reprocussions of those that do decide to leave the church. A definite must read.
Breaking With Scientology
Mar 06, 2010 - 11:33 pm
Category: News
- 0 Comment
Son of Hamas founder spied for Israel
Feb 24, 2010 - 9:18 pm
Category: News
The son of one of Hamas’s founding members was a spy in the service of
Israel
for more than a decade, helping to prevent dozens of Islamist suicide
bombers from finding their targets, it emerged yesterday. - Times Online
U.S. Marines, Afghan Taliban battle in Marjah
Feb 12, 2010 - 11:32 pm
Category: News
U.S. Marines at the tip of a NATO assault battled with Taliban militants on Saturday in the town of Marjah, the last big militant bastion in Afghanistan's violent Helmand Province. - Reuters
Terrorist attack foiled
Dec 26, 2009 - 10:36 pm
Category: News
An attempted terrorist attack on a Christmas Day flight began with a pop and a puff of smoke - sending passengers scrambling to subdue a Nigerian man who claimed to be acting on orders from al-Qaida to blow up the airliner, officials and travelers said. - AP
Bin Laden 'seen in Afghanistan in early 2009'
Dec 06, 2009 - 9:10 pm
Category: News
A Taliban detainee in Pakistan claims to have information about Osama Bin Laden's whereabouts in January or February of this year. The detainee claims to have met Osama Bin Laden numerous times before 9/11. - BBC
Bill would give president emergency control of Internet
Aug 28, 2009 - 8:44 pm
Category: News
Internet companies and civil liberties groups were alarmed this spring when a U.S. Senate bill proposed handing the White House the power to disconnect private-sector computers from the Internet.
UAE seized North Korean arms bound to Iran
Aug 28, 2009 - 8:37 pm
Category: News
The United Arab Emirates has seized a cargo of North Korean weapons being shipped to Iran, which would have violated a U.N. embargo on arms exports from the communist state, Western diplomats said on Friday.
The weapons seized on Aug. 14 included rocket launchers, detonators, munitions and ammunition for rocket-propelled grenades, they said. The ship, called the ANL-Australia, was Australian-owned and flying a Bahamas flag. - Reuters
US Missile Defense test a success
Jul 31, 2009 - 8:36 pm
Category: News
The latest US missile defence test, conducted last night in Hawaii waters, was deemed a success as tensions continue with North Korea over that country's missile programme.
Deadly blasts hit Indonesian Hotels
Jul 17, 2009 - 1:06 am
Category: News
The death toll from bombings at two luxury hotels Friday morning in south Jakarta, Indonesia, has risen to eight, a presidential spokesman said. The number of wounded people was in the 40s, the spokesman said.
At the Ritz, windows were blown out on the second floor, as though the blast occurred from inside a hotel restaurant that would have been crowded with breakfast eaters at the time. - CNN
Russia opens important route for Afghanistan War
Jul 03, 2009 - 2:05 pm
Category: News
The Russian government has agreed to allow American troops and weapons bound for Afghanistan to fly over Russian territory, providing an important new corridor for the United States military as it escalates efforts to win the eight-year-old war, officials from both sides said Friday.
The agreement, to be formally announced when President Obama visits here on Monday and Tuesday, represents one of the most concrete achievements of the effort to rebuild a relationship severely strained. - NY Times
Marines push further into Southern Afghanistan
Jul 03, 2009 - 2:01 pm
Category: News
U.S. Marines pushed deeper into Taliban areas of southern Afghanistan on Friday, seeking to cut insurgent supply lines and win over local elders on the second day of the biggest U.S. military operation here since the American-led invasion of 2001.
The 4,000-strong U.S. force met little resistance Friday as troops fanned out into villages in Afghanistan's southern Helmand province, although one Marine was killed and several others were wounded the day before, U.S. officials said. - AP
Honduras president arrested
Jun 28, 2009 - 8:48 pm
Category: News
The Honduran army ousted and exiled leftist President Manuel Zelaya on Sunday in Central America's first military coup since the Cold War, triggered by his bid to make it legal to seek another term in office.
President Barack Obama and the European Union expressed deep concern after troops came for Zelaya, an ally of socialist Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, around dawn and took him away from his residence. He was whisked away to Costa Rica. - Reuters
US Military tracking North Korean Ship
Jun 18, 2009 - 8:13 pm
Category: News
The U.S. military is tracking a flagged North Korean ship suspected of proliferating weapons material in violation of a U.N. Security Council resolution passed last Friday.
The ship, Kang Nam, left a port in North Korea Wednesday and appears to be heading toward Singapore, according to a senior U.S. military source. The vessel, which the military has been tracking since its departure, could be carrying weaponry, missile parts or nuclear materials.
Iran protests continue
Jun 16, 2009 - 9:24 pm
Category: News
Thousands of pro-reform protesters marched Tuesday in a second straight day of large street demonstrations in the Iranian capital, defying the government after the clerical regime said it would recount some disputed ballots from the presidential election.
Following a demonstration of hundreds of thousands of Mousavi supporters on Monday, the regime issued tough restrictions on journalists, barring foreign media from covering rallies in Tehran. - AP
North Korea may be prepping for 3rd nuke test
Jun 11, 2009 - 11:24 pm
Category: News
North Korea may be preparing for its third nuclear test, a show of defiance as the United Nations considers new sanctions on the dictatorship for conducting an underground nuclear explosion in May, according to a U.S. government official.
The White House National Security Council would not comment on the assessment of a possible third nuclear test in the works.
Man kills guard at Holocaust Museum
Jun 11, 2009 - 12:11 am
Category: News
At 12:40 p.m. yesterday a man stepped through the doors of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. He took two paces, lowered his rifle at a security guard and, before anyone could react, opened fire in a popular national landmark.
The guard, who did not have time to draw his gun, fell bleeding and fatally wounded to the polished floor. Other guards fired back, cutting down the assailant. Terrified patrons, many of them children, dived for safety. And what moments before had been a bright weekday in June became a tableau of violence. - Washington Post
D-Day
Jun 06, 2009 - 8:12 pm
Category: News
Today was the 65th anniversary of the Invasion of Normandy (D-Day), the largest amphibious invasion of all time - June 6, 1944.
160,000 troops landed at Normandy in 5 different sectors to re-take France from German hands. Along with the US, the Canadians, Norway, UK, Poland and "Free France" also participated in Operation Overlord.
Around 10,000 altogether perished in the 24-day battle.
Bin Laden new tape
Jun 03, 2009 - 9:34 pm
Category: News
Shortly after President Obama landed in Saudi Arabia, Osama bin Laden's homeland, a new audio tape purported to be from the al Qaeda leader was aired today on Al Jazeera television network.
Bin Laden makes reference to this spring's violence in the Swat Valley of Pakistan, indicating that he recorded his message relatively recently. - The Blotter
List of US Nuke sites revealed accidentally
Jun 03, 2009 - 9:19 pm
Category: News
The government accidentally posted on the Internet a list of all civilian nuclear sites and their activities in the United States.
The 266-page document was published on May 6 as a transmission from President Barack Obama to the U.S. Congress. Some of the pages are marked "highly confidential safeguards sensitive." - AP
North Korean successor picked
Jun 03, 2009 - 12:50 am
Category: News
After mounting tensions in the Korean peninsula, North Korea has picked the successor to Kim Jong Il - his son, 26 year old Kim Jong Un.
South Korea's spy agency told lawmakers the Pyongyang regime has begun "pledging its allegiance to Kim Jong Un," legislator Park Jie-won said Tuesday. The Hankook Ilbo newspaper said the announcement was made after North Korea's provocative underground nuclear test last week.