"Chavez steps up calls for socialism"

A Template for the U.S. War in Iraq
The composition of a coherent historical narrative is no easy task. Fortunately, the aspiring historian of the current U.S. war in Iraq can draw upon earlier narratives to ease the burden, merely substituting a word here and there in order to make the text accord with the specific names and places that are now pertinent. As the following illustrative statements show, however, basic patterns tend to persist, so one need not suffer through a protracted new search for how a particular war has come to be fought. My textual changes to apply the model to the present war appear in brackets.

Iran: U.S. 'hallucinating' over nuclear talks
The United States is "hallucinating" if it thinks Iran will scrap its nuclear fuel production plans in return for economic incentives, a senior Iranian official was quoted as saying on Sunday.

Israel ready to strike Iranian nuclear plant: report
Israel has drawn up plans for a combined air and ground attack on Iranian nuclear installations should diplomatic efforts fail to abandon Tehran's nuclear programme, a report in the Sunday Times said.

Khatami condemns 'military pressure'
Iran's president has said that wealthy nations cannot keep today's technology for themselves alone and that Iran must be prepared to defend itself if necessary.

War crime claims
When the U.S. went to war in Iraq, Jimmy Massey was a staff sergeant with a marine unit that had the job of setting up checkpoints to protect American forces. In a short period of time, Massey claims, he and his men had killed 30 Iraqi civilians. He says he and the others are guilty of war crimes.

Business As Usual?
Halliburton's CEO says his company is pulling out of Iran. But a corporate subsidiary is still going ahead with a deal to develop Tehran’s natural gas fields

Europeans probe CIA role in abductions
A radical Egyptian cleric known as Abu Omar was walking to a Milan mosque for noon prayers in February 2003 when he was grabbed on the sidewalk by two men, sprayed in the face with chemicals and stuffed into a van. He hasn't been seen since.

Chavez steps up calls for socialism
Speaking on his television program, Hello President on February 27, Venezuela's popular pro-poor president, Hugo Chavez, explained: "I am convinced, at this stage of my life - I am now 50 years old - after six years as a president, after nearly 30 years of political struggle... after many readings, debates, discussions and many travels around the world, I am convinced, and I think that this conviction will be for the rest of my life, that the path to a new, better and possible world, is not capitalism, the path is socialism." The studio audience cheered.

Germans Arrested in South Africa on Nuclear Charges
A South African court on Thursday charged two German men who live in the country with illegally exporting equipment used to enrich uranium needed to make nuclear weapons.

Israel ready to strike Iranian nuclear plant: report
Israel has drawn up plans for a combined air and ground attack on Iranian nuclear installations should diplomatic efforts fail to abandon Tehran's nuclear programme, a report in the Sunday Times said.

Rightwing always target Zim
South Africa's rightwing was not a newcomer to demonising Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe, said the African National Congress on its internet site on Friday.

PBS says American Slavery was Natural
For those interested in an alternative history of American slavery, the first installment of PBS's new four-hour series, "Slavery and the Making of America" (February 9 and 16) began on a promising note. The first American bond-laborers, we are shown in vivid color and told by narrator Morgan Freeman, were a rather mixed group: English, Scottish, Irish, and African. Rarely do U.S. history texts start with this crucial fact in telling the story of America’s so-called "Peculiar Institution." In the main, U.S. slavery is presented as either an embarrassing aberration or a painful yet necessary stage in the nation's triumphant march toward democracy and equality for all. In both conceptions, American slavery is always racialized, creating the false impression that Anglo-American slave-owners imposed a system of chattel slavery on Africans and African Americans because of their phenotype (or skin tone), not their labor power.

First vote since coup in CAR
Bangui, Central African Republic - Voters in the impoverished Central African Republic elect a president on Sunday, the first poll since rebels seized the capital two years ago and installed their headman as leader of the country, long blighted by coups and corruption.

Nigeria Debates Payment on Foreign Debt
Nigeria's Senate has approved legislation saying that Nigeria will pay its foreign debt obligations this year, but the House of Representatives says it wants the country to stop servicing its $35 billion foreign debt.

Africa's bid for UN seat gets a boost
Brazil and India stopped short of publicly backing South Africa's candidature for a permanent United Nations Security Council seat at the weekend.

Peace means little to Sudan's displaced
Baryar Camp, Sudan - Most children in this camp for displaced people have the swollen bellies of malnutrition. It is rare to see smoke wafting from the mud huts, an ominous sign that few families have food to cook.

Defense Minister Says Cubans Are United
Cubans form a "monolithic block" that will resist attempts to push the island toward political and economic change, Cuban Defense Minister Raul Castro said in remarks published Saturday.

UN Secretary General Criticizes US
and Britain for Violations of Human Rights
Madrid, March 12 (RHC)-- United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan has strongly criticized the US and Britain for violating human rights in the name of the so-called 'war on terror.' Speaking in Madrid on the first anniversary of the train bombings that killed nearly 200 people in the Spanish capital, Annan said that "human rights and the rule of law must always be respected."

Venezuela's Supreme Court Nullifies Sentence that Absolved Coup Organizers
The Constitutional Chamber of Venezuela's Supreme Court annuled the decision that let four military organizers of the April 2002 coup go free. This means that they can now be charged with military rebellion.

The world turns the US dollar down to the benefit of the euro
Central banks in several Asian states considerably reduced the dollar constituent of their reserves

American Business and Genocide Linked Again
The Asian American Hotel Owner Association (AAHOA), despite strong protests from several civil rights organizations and the Coalition Against Genocide is determined to honor Narendra Modi at their annual convention in Ft. Lauderdale, FL (March 22-24, 2005). Narendra Modi was indicted by many international humanitarian organizations for perpetrating a pogrom of mass murder, rape and arson against religious minorities in Gujarat in 2002 while he was the Chief Minister of that state in India. Even Indiaís Supreme Court acknowledged his complicity in the pogrom against minorities.

North Korea warns US-S. Korean military drill could result in "actual war"
SEOUL - North Korea warned on Sunday that annual US-South Korean military exercises due to start this week and designed to deter any military threat from the Stalinist country could turn into "an actual war".