04/25/05

Armed only with her humanity, Marla Ruzicka did the impossible. Virtually alone, she directed attention and resources to the invisible victims of war. She moved the military without using force, galvanized official Washington without powerful connections, and motivated the press without sensationalism -- just intimate connection to civilians whose deaths she documented and grieved. Her work was a triumph of the heart. She was recently killed by a car bomb while traveling to help Iraqis affected by the war. No one can take her place, but the United States can fulfill her mission to account more fully for civilian harm in war. Marla was a humanitarian. By the time she founded her organization, CIVIC, her early activism had shed its political skin and distilled into a personal campaign for civilian victims of war...

http://tinyurl.com/8atsl

from Boston Globe, by Sarah Sewall


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

04/25/05

In his final word, the CIA's top weapons inspector in Iraq said Monday that the hunt for weapons of mass destruction has 'gone as far as feasible' and has found nothing, closing an investigation into the purported programs of Saddam Hussein that were used to justify the 2003 invasion. 'After more than 18 months, the WMD investigation and debriefing of the WMD-related detainees has been exhausted,' wrote Charles Duelfer, head of the Iraq Survey Group, in an addendum to the final report he issued last fall...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7634313/

from MSNBC


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

04/26/05

A prominent Labour politician will announce today that he is defecting to the Liberal Democrats in protest at Tony Blair's 'lies' over Iraq. The defection of Brian Sedgemore, who is standing down after 27 years as a Labour MP, threatens to upset Mr Blair's apparently unstoppable campaign for a historic third term. Declaring that 'enough is enough,' Mr Sedgemore also reveals that a small group of unnamed fellow MPs who are standing down are secretly planning to leave the Labour Party in protest at Mr Blair's leadership after the election. His decision to defect will intensify the escalating row over the legality of the war which was yesterday thrust to the centre of the election campaign...

http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/story.jsp?story=633082

from Independent [UK]


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Mr Kennedy said Tony Blair had taken the UK into an illegal war and voters could deliver "justice by the ballot box" at the general election.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/vote_2005/frontpage/4479625.stm


From Information Clearing House

We've had enough of the prime minister's half-truths on Iraq. Let us see his legal advice in full.

http://politics.guardian.co.uk/election/comment/0,15803,1469563,00.html


From Information Clearing House

ARMED ONLY with her humanity, Marla Ruzicka did the impossible. She moved the military without using force, galvanized official Washington without powerful connections, and motivated the press without sensationalism -- just intimate connection to civilians whose deaths she documented and grieved. Her work was a triumph of the heart.

http://snipurl.com/e8hs


From Information Clearing House

War is always about sorrow and the deepest suffering. Nitwits try to dress it up in the finery of half-baked rationalizations, but the reality is always wanton bloodshed, rotting flesh and the lifelong trauma of those who are physically or psychically maimed.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article8652.htm

by SIMON WALTERS

The Iraq war has erupted as a major Election issue after legal advice warning Tony Blair that the conflict breached international law was sensationally leaked. The Government's refusal to disclose the advice has been one of the most controversial issues since the war ended, but The Mail on Sunday can now reveal for the first time exactly what counsel Mr Blair received.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article8658.htm