This page features brief excerpts of stories published by the mainstream
media and, less frequently, blogs, alternative media, and even obviously
biased sources. The excerpts are taken directly from the websites cited in
each source note. Quotation marks are not used.
Source: http://www.abc.net.au
Jun 18, 2008
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) says there are more displaced people in the world than at any time in history, with Afghanistan and Iraq the leading countries of origin.
Launching its report in London, the UN agency said 67 million people have been forced out of their homes by conflict, persecution and natural disasters.
In recent years, resettlement in Afghanistan had seen numbers drop, but in 2007 the total cared for by the UNHCR jumped by 3
Source: china.org.cn
Jun 18, 2008
Ruins of two large palaces dating back to the Shang and Zhou dynasties have been found at the Jinsha relic site in Huangzhong Village at the western suburbs of Chengdu. They both date back 3,000 years and are considered to be one of Sichuan's most important archaeological finds, according to archaeologists from the Chengdu Institute of Archaeology. The new discovery has contributed toward the identification of a large palace site inside the Jinsha relic area.
Archaeologists have hai
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Jun 18, 2008
After 700 years, Dante Alighieri, Italy's most famous poet, will have his criminal record scrubbed clean.
Florence's city council has approved a motion revoking a sentence on Dante from 1302 which stated that he would be executed if he stepped foot in the city again.
The sentence forced Dante into exile and he spent the last 20 years of his life wandering through Italy, finally ending his days in Ravenna in 132
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Source: Earth Times
Jun 18, 2008
The Jordanian authorities said Wednesday that they planned to hand back to the Iraqi government 2,466 artefacts looted from Iraq since the US-led invasion. "The artefacts will be handed over on Sunday to the Iraqi Minister of Tourism and Antiquities Mohammad al-Oraibi, who is currently in Jordan to attend the Arab Tourism Council meeting," Jordanian Minister of Tourism and Antiquities Maha Khatib said.
The pieces were seized by the Jordanian customs authorities in 22 anti-
Source: Armenian News Network
Jun 18, 2008
Turkish President Abdullah Gul said on
Tuesday that Turkey opened to researchers its most secret archives regarding the incidents of 1915."Keeping record of history is not a business of politicians and/or parliaments. It should be a business of historians and scholars,"
Gul told the 11th International Congress on "Social and Economic History of Turkey" held at Ankara's Bilkent University.
Source: BBC
Jun 18, 2008
The Bangladesh proclamations of independence - drafted on paper during the war against Pakistan in 1971 - have gone missing, officials say.Officials say it was only discovered they were missing when the government handed over important artefacts to the national archive in April.
The documents were drafted on behalf of imprisoned Bangladeshi independence leader Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in 1971.
Some former government officials say that the independence
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Jun 18, 2008
The 8th Duke of Wellington has joined leading military historians in a bid to save the farm that was pivotal to British victory at the Battle of Waterloo.They are trying to raise €3 million (£2.4m) to save the dilapidated Belgian farmhouse where the 1st Duke of Wellington's men staged a brave defence that swung the famous 1815 battle in favour of the Allied forces.
They want to turn the Hougoumont farmhouse near Waterloo into an education centre that
Source: Salon
Jun 18, 2008
A first edition of the Nicolaus Copernicus book that puts forth the theory that the sun — not the earth — is at the center of the universe has fetched more than $2.2 million at an auction, nearly double the expected price.The 1543 copy of Copernicus' "De revolutionibus orbium coelestium" (On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres) was among more than 300 books offered Tuesday at Christie's auction. It was expected to sell for up to $1.2 million.
Source: LAT
Jun 18, 2008
Rafid Ahmed Alwan hoped for an easier life when he came here from Iraq nine years ago. He also hoped for a reward for his cooperation with German intelligence officers.
"For what I've done, I should be treated like a king," he said outside a cramped, low-rent apartment he shares with his family.
Instead, the Iraqi informant code-named Curveball has flipped burgers at McDonald's and Burger King, washed dishes in a Chinese restaurant and baked pretzels in an all
Source: BBC
Jun 17, 2008
Flags from the battlefield at Waterloo have been found in a cupboard at the home of Sir Walter Scott.
The four banners, which date from 1815, were discovered by trustees sorting through Abbotsford, Scott's home near Melrose in Roxburghshire.
The novelist brought them from the scene of the battle, which he visited after hearing of Napoleon's defeat.
Source: International Herald Tribune
Jun 17, 2008
The yellow crates haunted Aditya Arya. A successful advertising photographer whose clients have ranged from India's luxury Oberoi Hotel chain to Russia's Bolshoi Ballet, Arya inherited the crates from a family friend, an old photojournalist named Kulwant Roy, in 1984. And for more than two decades, Arya had hauled the increasingly dusty trunks around a succession of studios, stashing them in out of the way corners and closets. He had a vague sense of what the crates contained - bundles of prints
Source: NYT
Jun 17, 2008
Did Senator John McCain overestimate the Nixon administration’s role in improving the conditions of the American prisoners of war in North Vietnam? The question has new relevance to those who liken the surge in Iraq to the latter stages of the Vietnam fight.
President Nixon’s first year in office, 1969, was a new day for the American POWs. Their captors scaled back their demands for propaganda statements, stopped torturing them as heavily, fed them better and even allowed them to in
Source: AP
Jun 17, 2008
A newly discovered batch of well-preserved dinosaur bones, petrified trees and even freshwater clams in southeastern Utah could provide new clues about life in the region some 150 million years ago.
The Bureau of Land Management announced the find Monday, calling the quarry near Hanksville "a major dinosaur fossil discovery."
An excavation revealed at least four sauropods, which are long-necked, long-tailed plant-eating dinosaurs, and two carnivorous ones, accordin
Source: Earth Times
Jun 17, 2008
A US archaeological team uncovered an ancient Egyptian administrative building and silos dating back to the 17th dynasty (ca. 1665-1569 BC) along with an older columned hall in the southern Egyptian town of Edfu, Egypt's antiquities department announced Tuesday. With sixteen wooden columns, the layout of the mud-brick hall shows that it might been part of a governor's palace, Egypt's antiquities chief, Zahi Hawas said. The hall, which predates the silos, had been used by scribes for accounting,
Source: http://www.montanasnewsstation.com
Jun 17, 2008
A massive fundraising campaign for a new History Museum in Montana is now underway, spearheaded by former First Lady Betty Babcock and former Attorney General Joe Mazurek.
The Capital Hill Mall in Helena will be the location for the new Montana History Center.
Governor Brian Schweitzer announced in May that he signed a letter of intent to buy the Mall property for $6.5 million, but before the state writes any checks, a massive amount of funds need to be raised. He's cha
Source: http://www.cronaca.com
Jun 17, 2008
One hundred years after the first Japanese immigrants arrived in Brazil, the country as a whole has been reflecting on an anniversary that has left a significant legacy.
Second generation Brazilian-Japanese are known as Nisei
Numbering an estimated 1.5 million, there are more people of Japanese descent in Brazil than anywhere in the world outside of Japan itself.
The celebrations are a chance to pay tribute to the pioneering immigrants that first arrived at the p
Source: Harris Poll
Jun 17, 2008
The latest Harris Poll finds the nation in a foul political mood. President George W. Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice all register their worst ratings ever. More people than ever also think the country is on the wrong track.
But this does not seem to help the Democrats. The Democratically-controlled Congress gets even worse ratings than the President and Vice-President, and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s ratings have also fallen to their lowest
Source: WaPo
Jun 17, 2008
The Bush Administration has long maintained that the overtly cruel and abusive treatment of detainees at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere was the conduct of a few "bad apples."
But a Senate investigation is tracking the rot to its source. And its findings add to the mounting evidence that the sometimes systematic torture of detainees at American hands was the result of decisions made at the highest levels of government -- and particularly within the office of the vice president.
Source: NYT
Jun 17, 2008
If Sok Chear had her way, she would slice the elderly man into ribbons and pour salt into his wounds. She would beat him up and torture him and give him electric shocks to make him talk.
For Ly Monysar, even that would not be enough. “Only killing them will make me feel calm,” he said. “I want them to suffer the way I suffered. I say this from the heart.”
Sok Chear, an office worker, and Ly Monysar, a security guard, are two of the millions of Cambodians who suffered fo
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Jun 17, 2008
An internationally wanted 'Nazi war criminal' has been spotted supporting his national team at the Euro 2008 football championships in Austria.
Milivoj Asner is wanted by Interpol for alleged genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity committed during his service as a police chief in Croatia during the Second World War, when the country was ruled by a Nazi puppet regime.
But Mr Asner, 95, who now lives a quiet and undisturbed life in Klagenfurt, Austria, has been
