All posts filed under: Spain

From the Archive: Cordoba and “The Edge in Dissent”

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“Cordoba had the edge in dissent,” begins Pakistani writer and commentator Tariq Ali in a section devoted to the one-time intellectual capitol of Al-Andalus, the once Muslim southern half of contemporary Spain that is home to one of the most spectacular works of Islamic architecture, The Mezquita, in his larger post-September 11 work, The Clash of Fundamentalisms: Crusades, Jihads and Modernity. Much has happened in the ever-complicated relationship between mine and Ali’s country in the last week since U.S. Navy Seals raided, killed and then buried at sea Osama bin Laden, who it turns out has spent several of the past fugitive years in an elaborate compound just off Kakul Road, the drive leading to Pakistan’s elite military academy equivalent to Sandhurst in the U.K. or West Point here in the U.S. The compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan was just 40 kilometers from the capital Islamabad. Not even former President and Head of the Pakistani Army Pervez Musharraf received such treatment, although he did assert he had gone jogging in the area in the past. The …

The Year in Pictures 2010: United States, Cuba, Slovakia, Azerbaijan, Turkey and Hungary

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The Year in Pictures 2010 by Amanda Rivkin available on PhotoShelter Archive. Images from the year include: Gitmo USA – the prison site designated for Guantanamo Bay detainees after the prison’s closure in rural Illinois that never quite opened because the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay has not yet closed. Portrait of William Fiedler, Owner of the Gallery Bookstore, Chicago – My former boss at one of the North Side’s finest used book stores. Injured Veteran – Portrait of Michael Jernigan, injured in Fallujah, Iraq in 2004; photographed at The Carter Center in Atlanta, Georgia. Baltasar Garzon – Former examining magistrate of Spain’s Criminal Court, extraordinarily controversial for execution of the practice of universal justice and far-reaching indictments of foreign leaders and terrorist organizations; photographed at the Instituto Cervantes in Chicago. Afghan Bowling Tournament (3 images) – Afghan-American bowling tournament in Annandale, Virginia. Cuba (8 images) – The Second Age of Castro, published on ForeignPolicy.com and The New York Times “Week in Review”. Spectacular Slovakia (13 images) – Weddings, floods, world cup, trains, planes, castles, …

Cablegate Continued: The System Is Watching and Other Sordid Tales From the Day’s Affairs of State

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Accessing the WikiLeaks site has gotten difficult, if not impossible now despite mirror sites and domain names registered at last check in France, the Netherlands, and Switzerland. However, those that visit the site undoubtedly receive a malware infection pretty fast. Similar tactics took down The Guardian’s website yesterday when it attempted to host a live, online chat with WikiLeaks founder, Interpol fugitive, and known loon, Julian Assange. I hate to ask an obvious question of Mr. Assange, but how does he expect a nation-state, a superpower notably to react? If he gets away with it, so can anyone and the United States of America cannot have that. Joking aside, there is a serious, massive question of what to do with Mr. Assange, how to prosecute him, all the while keeping in mind he may have made himself into a willing martyr of the data revolution and that the U.S. arsenal includes everything from drones to nuclear weapons, neither of which will be used in this case given the strategic predicament. To date, there has been …

The Day in Cablegate: As The World Turns…

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The cache of news and events surrounding the WikiLeaks Cablegate affair for December 3, 2010: WikiLeaks loses American domain server, wikileaks.org, moves to Swiss, wikileaks.ch, which also appears to be down at present: “WikiLeaks Dropped by Domain Name Provider,” The Associated Press “WikiLeaks Vanishes From Web As U.S. Company Removes DNS Support,” The Guardian Update from Amazon in The Wall Street Journal on the fairly obvious reason why WikiLeaks got booted off its servers (violation of its Terms of Service): “Amazon Says WikiLeaks Violated Terms of Service,” Wall Street Journal 8:37AM EST – The Guardian is holding a live webchat with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange as soon as it can: “WikiLeaks cables: Live Q&A with Julian Assange,” The Guardian 9:32AM EST – Crippling attacks continue, take down Guardian website during online Q&A with Assange: “WikiLeaks fights to stay online amid attacks,” The Associated Press “WikiLeaks’ Assange to Fight Any Extradition: Lawyer,” Reuters “WikiLeaks Struggles to Stay Online After Cyberattacks,” The New York Times “Julian Assange Answers Your Questions,” The Guardian Afghanistan: “Foreign Contractors Hired Afghan …

The Best in WikiLeaks Cablegate Coverage from News Sites Around the World

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December 2, 2010: “El ‘antiamericano’ Garzón tuvo especial seguimiento,” El Pais [in Spanish] Published under a headline on the homepage of the website, “El ‘antiamericano’ Baltasar Garzon” – photographs of Baltasar Garzon on Amanda Rivkin PhotoShelter archive. “Mafia Analogy for Aliyev Dynasty: Ilham Aliyev and Corleone Brothers (Wikileaks),” AzeriReport ” In US diplomatic cables newly released by Wikileaks, Aliyev clan’s rule over Azerbaijan is compared to mafia, specifically to the Corleones family in the famous ‘Godfather’ movie series. Ilham Aliyev himself ‘described alternately as a mix of “Michael” and “Sonny.”‘ Maintaining ‘a clever, realistic foreign policy’ that he inherited from his father, he reminds of the cold-calculated alliance builder Michael Corleone. But his domestic policies, with crude retaliation against even minor challenges to his authority and criticism, resemble the ‘brash, impulsive’ Sonny Corleone.” related posts: “Mafia Analogies for the Aliyev Family in WikiLeaks/U.S. State Department Cablegate: Is He Michael or Sonny?” Includes links to relevant background articles and blog posts to understanding the Aliyev/Corleone cable: “Donkey Video,” Emin Milli and Adnan Hajizade/OL! “Shown Trial,” Fortnight …