The accused mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks has a right to justify the worst terror attack on U.S. soil at his death-penalty trial, and that requires exchanging material about jihad with his defense team, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed's lawyer told an Army judge Wednesday.
Veteran criminal defense attorney David Nevin invoked "recent history, ancient history" and "impressions throughout many areas of the world of Western oppression" in an argument to bring Guantanamo prison's legal-mail handling policy in line with what he cast as American Bar Association standards.
Guantanamo lawyer floats possible defense argument: 9/11 attack justified
FBI granted power to delay citizenship for Muslims, ACLU report says
A covert national security programme allows the FBI and US immigration authorities the power to indefinitely delay immigration benefits to Muslims and those from Muslim countries, according to an investigation by the American Civil Liberties Union.
The previously unknown programme, which began in 2008 under George W Bush to identify those with links to terrorism, has continued under President Obama to blacklist law-abiding applicants and profile Muslims as "national security concerns", according to the ACLU.
Secret Court: NSA Surveillance Program Was Unconstitutional
A secret federal court found that the National Security Agency violated the civil rights of Americans when it collected thousands of emails and other digital messages between Americans, according to a 2011 opinion released Wednesday.
The FISA court ruled parts of the program to be unconstitutional and ordered them to be revised. The government made changes and the court signed off on the program in November of 2011.
The release of a key opinion from October 2011 (pdf) and other documents was authorized today by Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, in response to requests from privacy advocates.
Bradley Manning's sentence: 35 years for exposing us to the truth
As of today, Wednesday 21 August 2013, Bradley Manning has served 1,182 days in prison. He should be released with a sentence of time served. Instead, the judge in his court martial at Fort Meade, Maryland has handed down a sentence of 35 years.
Of course, a humane, reasonable sentence of time served was never going to happen. This trial has, since day one, been held in a kangaroo court. That is not angry rhetoric; the reason I am forced to frame it in that way is because President Obama made the following statements on record, before the trial even started:
TVNL Comment: This is breaking news. It is also a black mark on our system of military 'justice.' Despite their crimes, George Bush, Dick Cheney and their murderous cohorts go free, while a man who dared to reveal the atrocities committed by his own country is imprisioned.
How The NRA Built A Massive Secret Database Of Gun Owners
The National Rifle Association has rallied gun owners — and raised tens of millions of dollars — campaigning against the threat of a national database of firearms or their owners.
But in fact, the sort of vast, secret database the NRA often warns of already exists, despite having been assembled largely without the knowledge or consent of gun owners. It is housed in the Virginia offices of the NRA itself. The country’s largest privately held database of current, former, and prospective gun owners is one of the powerful lobby’s secret weapons, expanding its influence well beyond its estimated 3 million members and bolstering its political supremacy.
Al Jazeera launches US television news service
Al Jazeera America will be available in almost 48 million US households, offering 14 hours of news each day.
The new network replaces Current TV, the cable television network founded by former US Vice President Al Gore, which the Qatar-owned broadcaster acquired in January 2013 for around $500m (£308m).
However, it has yet to sign agreements with major operators, such as Time Warner Cable, to carry the channel.
Sea level could rise 3 feet by 2100, climate panel finds
An international panel of scientists has found with near certainty that human activity is the cause of most of the temperature increases of recent decades, and warns that sea levels could conceivably rise by more than three feet by the end of the century if emissions continue at a runaway pace.
The scientists, whose findings are reported in a draft summary of the next big United Nations climate report, largely dismiss a recent slowdown in the pace of warming, which is often cited by climate change doubters, attributing it most likely to short-term factors.
Abu Ghraib contractor, accused of human rights abuses, sues former prisoners
After a US federal judge ruled that CACI International, a US corporation, was not culpable for torture allegations at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, lawyers for the defense contractor have filed a suit against the former detainees seeking legal expenses.
A group of 256 Iraqis originally sued CACI International in 2004 accusing the company of committing war crimes, crimes against humanity, sexual assault, participating in torture and a variety of other allegations at Abu Ghraib prison.
CIA admits role in 1953 Iranian coup
The CIA has publicly admitted for the first time that it was behind the notorious 1953 coup against Iran's democratically elected prime minister Mohammad Mosaddeq, in documents that also show how the British government tried to block the release of information about its own involvement in his overthrow.
On the 60th anniversary of an event often invoked by Iranians as evidence of western meddling, the US national security archive at George Washington University published a series of declassified CIA documents.
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