Libby Sentenced to 30 Months in Prison
June 5, 2007 -- SCOOTER LIBBY TRIAL
Libby Sentenced to 2 1/2 Years in Prison
Former White House aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby was sentenced to 2 1/2 years in prison Tuesday for lying and obstructing the CIA leak investigation. (AP)
JEFFERSON INDICTMENT
Jefferson Indicted on Graft Charges
Rep. William J. Jefferson (D-La.) was indicted Monday on charges that he used his congressional office to enrich himself and his family through a pervasive pattern of fraud, bribery and corruption that spanned five years and two continents. (LA Times)
Analysis: Mr. Jefferson Indicted
To read the indictment of Rep. William J. Jefferson is to wonder how, if the allegations are true, the Louisiana Democrat, so busy soliciting and dispensing bribes, had any time left over for his day job. The 16-count indictment handed up yesterday by a federal grand jury in Alexandria is staggering in the scope and audacity of the bribery schemes it portrays Mr. Jefferson as having peddled, from sugar plant and waste recycling projects in Nigeria to telecommunications deals in Ghana to oil concessions in Equatorial Guinea to satellite transmission contracts in Botswana to offshore oil rights in Sao Tome and Principe. All this might explain why it took nearly two years for prosecutors to secure the indictment after a search of Mr. Jefferson's home found $90,000 wrapped in tin foil in his freezer. (Washington Post)
AL QAEDA
Bin Laden Alive, Wrote to Me, Taliban Leader Says
A brother of a slain Taliban leader said al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden was alive and well and that he had received a letter of condolence from him after his brother was killed in May. (Reuters)
Former Osama bin Laden Bodyguard in Al-Arabiya TV Interview: I Love Him More Than I Love My Own Father
The following are excerpts from an interview with Nasser Al-Bahri, aka "Abu Jandal," former bodyguard of Osama bin Laden, which aired on Al-Arabiya TV on May 4, 2007. (MEMRI)
IRAQ
Female Suicide Bomber Foiled in Baghdad
Alert guards gunned down a black-clad woman at a police recruiting station Tuesday, a would-be suicide bomber who then exploded before their eyes. But another bomber succeeded, detonating an explosives-laden car at a checkpoint in Ramadi and killing six policemen. (AP)
Most Of Baghdad 'Not Controlled'
US and Iraqi forces control fewer than one-third of Baghdad's neighbourhoods, according to a review of a security crackdown in the city since February. (BBC)
AFGHANISTAN
Karzai Orders Taleban Body Swap
The Afghan government has agreed to hand over the body of Taleban commander Mullah Dadullah in exchange for the release of hostages, officials say. (BBC)
'Taleban Killed' In Afghan Clash
US-led forces and Afghan troops have killed an estimated two dozen Taleban militants near the southern city of Kandahar, a coalition statement says. (BBC)
20 Suspected Taliban Drown in River
A gunbattle and airstrikes killed an estimated two dozen Taliban fighters in southern Afghanistan, while more than 20 suspected militants drowned when security forces sank their boat as they were crossing a river to flee an attack, officials said Tuesday. (AP)
PAKISTAN
New Controls on Media in Pakistan
President Pervez Musharraf has signed into immediate effect measures to increase control over the media. (BBC)
DANIEL PEARL CASE
Pakistan Arrests Two Suspects in Daniel Pearl Case
Two Islamic militants linked to the kidnap and murder of the US reporter Daniel Pearl have been arrested in a remote town in southern Pakistan. (Guardian)
J.F.K. PLOT
FBI: Informant in JFK Plot was Drug Dealer
An informant who helped break up an alleged plot to bomb a fuel pipeline feeding the city's busiest airport was so convincing to the suspects that they actually thanked God he was with them, federal authorities said. (AP)
Plot Shows Dangers of Mundane Targets
Until a suspected terrorist plot was revealed, few people even knew there was a pipeline of highly combustible jet fuel snaking beneath the nation's largest city. (AP)
TB HEALTH SCARE
TB Patient May Be Allowed to Leave Room
The man infected with drug-resistant tuberculosis who set off an international health scare could be allowed outside of his isolated hospital room if a test for the bacteria is negative, a hospital official said Monday. (AP)
Where were the CDC Planes?
In a new twist in the trans-atlantic health scare triggered by TB patient Andrew Speaker, a Senate committee will hold hearings tomorrow to find out why the CDC didn't use one of its emergency jets to bring Speaker home from Europe. (ABC News)
U.S./LAOS
10 Charged with Alleged Laos Plot
Ten people, including a former general in the Laotian army, were arrested and charged in the United States with an alleged plot to overthrow the Laotian government. (CNN)
SYRIA
Syria Jails Four Dissidents, Including One for 12 Years
Syria has jailed four more dissidents, one for 12 years, matching the heaviest sentence handed down since President Bashar Assad took power seven years ago, a human rights group said Monday. "The state security court in Damascus sentenced Abdel-Jabbar Allawi to death, commuted to 12 years' imprisonment, for membership in the Muslim Brotherhood," said Ammar Qorabi, head of the National Organization for Human Rights in Syria. (AFP)
LIBERIA
Litany of Horrors at War Crimes Trial
The war crimes trial of former Liberian President Charles Taylor began Monday with a catalog of horrors, as prosecutors at a U.N.-backed court here accused him of subjecting tens of thousands of civilians to a systematic campaign of murder, sexual abuse, amputation and slave labor. (LA Times)
LEBANON
As Crises Build, Lebanese Fearful of a Failed State
A few miles from Mona Abboud's bookstore in Tripoli, passengers in cars ducked below the dashboard as volleys of gunfire resounded like a jackhammer Monday. Earlier in the day, more clashes erupted at a Palestinian refugee camp three hours from here. By nightfall, a bomb had gone off in a Christian suburb of the capital, Beirut, the fourth in less than a month. (Washington Post)
10 Injured in Beirut Bomb Blast
Clashes between Lebanese troops and Islamic militants have spread to Lebanon's largest Palestinian refugee camp in the south, underlining the complexities the country faces in trying to defeat al Qaeda-inspired fighters who are battling a continuing army onslaught in a northern camp. (AP)
MEXICO
19 Mexican Soldiers Jailed in Deaths
Nineteen Mexican soldiers were sent to a military prison Monday after troops allegedly killed two women and three children whose vehicle failed to stop at an army checkpoint, the Defense Department said. (AP)
ANALYSIS & OPINION
Does the West Need Musharraf?
By Ahmed Rashid
Ahmed Rashid, guest journalist and writer on Pakistan, Afghanistan and Central Asia, reflects on the West's relationship with Gen Musharraf. (BBC)
Bush and Putin Share Little Common Ground Before G-8 Meeting
By Sheryl Gay Stolberg and David E. Sanger
At a moment of rising tensions between Washington and Moscow, President George W. Bush and President Vladimir Putin of Russia appear likely to use a summit meeting in Germany this week to focus on the one area where they appear to share a common interest: Slowing Iran's ability to produce nuclear fuel. (International Herald Tribune)
How the Mighty are Falling
They are beginning to fall like ninepins. On Monday June 4th the trial began in The Hague of Charles Taylor, Liberia's former president and Africa's most famous warlord. He is accused of planning and financing horrific crimes committed during Sierra Leone's brutal civil war in the 1990s. Mr Taylor showed his disdain for the process by boycotting the start of the trial. A few days earlier, the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia announced the arrest on genocide charges of a former Bosnian Serb general, Zdravko Tolimir, one of the most wanted war-crimes fugitives in the Balkans. These are just the latest examples of a flurry activity by the institutions of international justice. (The Economist)
Muzzling the Press
By M Ismail Khan
Imagine, millions of people, who have been content with watching dramatic political events from their TV rooms, forced to hit the road to catch a glimpse of Chief Justice Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry in person. Imagine the kind of energy and potential chaos this would create in the streets if people who up till now have been patiently following the report and analysis on their TV screens turn in to a mob expressing its opinion through bricks and sticks like the Lal Masjid brigade. Imagine – well imagination is what one needs in understanding the delicate relationship between politics and media in the age of YouTube. (Daily Jang)
Peace not Bombs
By Ahmed Abdel-Halim
Peace and security in the Middle East cannot be achieved without a political settlement, a suitable level of economic cooperation, and even-handed security measures. For that to happen, we need to address current nuclear programmes in the region and build momentum towards the Middle East being declared an area free of all weapons of mass destruction, including nuclear arms. (Al-Ahram)
Dr. Kevorkian's Wrong Way
Dr. Jack Kevorkian — a k a "Doctor Death" for helping chronically ill and terminally ill patients commit suicide — has emerged from prison as deluded and unrepentant as ever. Brushing aside criticism by other supporters of medically assisted suicide that his tactics were reckless and harmful to their cause, Dr. Kevorkian asserted: "I did it right. I didn't care what they did or didn't do. When I'm going to do it, I'm going to do it right." (NY Times)
The JFK Airport Plot and the Caribbean Connection
U.S. and Guyanese authorities were still searching June 4 for a fourth suspect wanted in connection with an alleged plot to blow up jet fuel pipelines and storage tanks at New York's John F. Kennedy (JFK) International Airport. Although a serious flaw in the plot made the threat far smaller than the suspects apparently planned, the case does highlight the link between jihadism and the Caribbean islands -- and the effectiveness of jihadist propaganda. (Stratfor)
Is Putin the Bully Leading Russia Into Fascism?
By Michael Binyon
There is a nasty smell of Weimar in Russia nowadays. All the talk is of Russia's need to reassert itself and show the world it is still a great power. On the streets, skinheads and racists beat up foreigners and attack dark-skinned Caucasians. Gays are attacked, liberals jeered and opposition protests forcibly disbanded. At home there is growing intolerance of anything except the government line, while abroad President Putin picks quarrels with his neighbours and threatens his erstwhile Western allies. (London Times)
The Insider Daily Investigative Report (DIR) is a summary of major news articles and broadcasts relating to investigative news, including international terrorism and developments in Iraq. The DIR is edited daily from foreign and U.S. sources by Chris Isham and Elizabeth Sprague of the ABC News Investigative Unit. The views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ABCNEWS.