And so much more, starting with the inevitable from BBC News:
US-Cuba shift: Opponents threaten to block changes
Opponents of President Barack Obama’s new Cuba policy have threatened to block his efforts to restore diplomatic relations after 50 years of hostility.
Florida Senator Marco Rubio promised on CNN to block the nomination of any US ambassador to Cuba. Other anti-Castro legislators suggested Congress would removing funding for any normalised ties with the country.
US-Cuban ties have been frozen since the early 1960s – a policy of isolation Mr Obama condemned as a failure. On Wednesday, the US president said it was time for a new approach.
Part of the deal with the New York Times:
C.I.A. Mole, Now Out of Prison, Helped U.S. Identify Cuban Spies
He was, in many ways, a perfect spy — a man so important to Cuba’s intelligence apparatus that the information he gave to the Central Intelligence Agency paid dividends long after Cuban authorities arrested him and threw him in prison for nearly two decades.
Rolando Sarraff Trujillo has now been released from prison and flown out of Cuba as part of a swap for three Cuban spies imprisoned in the United States that President Obama announced Wednesday in a televised speech. Mr. Obama did not give Mr. Sarraff’s name, but several current American officials identified him and a former official discussed some of the information he gave to the C.I.A. while burrowed deep inside Cuba’s Directorate of Intelligence.
Mr. Sarraff’s story is a chapter in a spy vs. spy drama between the United States and Cuba that played on long after the end of the Cold War, decades after Cuba ceased to be a serious threat to the United States. The story — at this point — remains just a sketchy outline, with Mr. Sarraff hidden from public view and his work for the C.I.A. still classified.
Another frightening case of transnational corporate exceptionalism from the Guardian:
US tries to strike deal with EU for immunity over online security breaches
Critics fear Tisa talks could be used to further interests of large corporations and undermine right to privacy
The US is attempting to secure immunity from investigation for online security breaches by major US companies under negotiations between Washington and Brussels, according to leaked documents seen by the Guardian.
Such a deal would prevent US companies that were operating inside the EU from being prosecuted by regulators or law officers for data breaches or claims of negligence in the host country, forcing European governments to pursue cases in the US courts.
Public service unions said the Trade in Services Agreement (Tisa) talks in Geneva revealed how the US planned to protect homegrown businesses from regulations that might hinder their expansion into sensitive areas such as government data handling and healthcare.
Rosa Pavanelli, general secretary of Public Services International (PSI), which represents 650 unions in 150 countries, said the leaked documents, obtained by the Associated Whistleblowing Press, confirmed her fears that “Tisa is being used to further the interests of some of the largest corporations on earth”.
Another major law enforcement failure, from the Los Angeles Times:
Feds sue N.Y.C. citing ‘deeply disturbing’ conditions at Rikers Island
Federal prosecutors sued New York City on Thursday over its handling of violence against young inmates held on Rikers Island, calling the jail complex a place where adolescents are “subjected to unconstitutional conditions and confinement.”
Preet Bharara, U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, said in a filing Thursday that his office wanted to speed reforms at the facility following a Justice Department report in August that found “Rikers is a dangerous place” where a “pervasive climate of fear exists.”
At a news conference announcing the suit, Bharara said, “Today we have taken a legal step that we believe is necessary …. Much, much more needs to be done,” to safeguard inmates at Rikers.
Before federal officials filed the court documents, they notified New York Mayor Bill de Blasio of their intention. Bharara said the mayor supported the move.
The Los Angeles Times again, with the politics of race in Ferguson:
Ferguson-area school district strips power from black voters, ACLU says
The American Civil Liberties Union on Thursday filed a federal lawsuit against a school district that serves Ferguson, Mo., alleging that the district disenfranchises black voters.
The lawsuit, filed in conjunction with the Missouri NAACP, comes after months of scrutiny by government agencies and civil rights groups into the area’s local governments and predominantly white political leadership following the Aug. 9 police shooting of an unarmed black man. That incident has triggered a protest movement that has yet to fully subside.
The Ferguson-Florissant School District has seven board members, and only one is black. The district serves 11,000 students in northern St. Louis County, 79% of whom are black, according to the ACLU.
The school board members are selected in at-large elections. The lawsuit charges that because black voters are a minority inside the district’s boundaries, their relative voting strength is unfairly weakened in at-large elections.
From RT America, another troublesome Ferguson failure:
Ferguson grand jury witness wants to “stop calling blacks n*****s”
Program notes:
One of the witnesses in the grand jury that reviewed the actions of Ferguson, Mo. police officer Darren Wilson is under scrutiny by journalists who believe she may have not even been at the scene of the shooting. Adding to their speculation is a journal entry from “Witness 40,” in which she writes that she wanted to “drive to Florisant… Need to understand the Black race better so I stop calling Blacks n*****s.” Andrew Goldberg, managing editor of The Smoking Gun, gives more details to RT’s Ben Swann.
Cold War 2.0, with added repartee, via the Japan Times:
Danger in the skies as Russia, NATO play cat-and-mouse
Recent close shaves between Russian fighters and civilian aircraft highlight the dangers of the cat-and-mouse game being played out between Moscow and the West in European skies amid the crisis in Ukraine, analysts say.
In the latest incident, Sweden said Dec. 12 that a Russian military jet nearly collided with a passenger plane south of Malmo shortly after take-off from Copenhagen International Airport.
Both countries called in their Russian ambassadors to protest, only to be told that a huge increase in Russian military activity in recent months was “a response to NATO’s activities and escalation in the region.”
Russia later accused Swedish authorities of being under the influence after smoking too much cannabis.
World War 2.0, via Al Jazeera America:
Dutch right-wing politician charged with inciting hatred against Moroccans
Geert Wilders’ political party tops opinion polls in the Netherlands
Anti-Islam politician Geert Wilders will be prosecuted in the Netherlands for alleged discrimination and inciting hatred against Moroccans during election campaigning in March, prosecutors said on Thursday.
The charges stem from an incident in The Hague, when Wilders led an anti-Moroccan chant in a cafe, which was broadcast nationally and prompted 6,400 complaints to the police.
Wilders asked supporters if they wanted more or fewer Moroccans in their city, triggering the chant: “Fewer! Fewer! Fewer!” A smiling Wilders responded, “We’ll take care of that.”
In a later TV interview, he referred to “Moroccan scum.”
Torture lessons from Cold War 1.0, from Newsweek:
When Torture Backfires: What the Vietcong Learned and the CIA Didn’t
The CIA is hardly the only spy service to grapple with blowback from making prisoners scream. Even leaders of Communist Vietnam’s wartime intelligence agency, notorious for torturing American POWs, privately knew that “enhanced interrogation techniques,” as the CIA calls them, could create more problems than solutions, according to internal Vietnamese documents reviewed by Newsweek.
In many cases, torturing people wrongly suspected of being enemy spies caused “extremely regrettable losses and damage,” says one of the documents, released to little notice in 1993 by Hanoi’s all-powerful Public Security Service (PSS). But unlike the CIA, Vietnam’s security service constantly engaged in Marxist-style “self-criticism” to review its mistakes, particularly those caused by relying on confessions extracted by torture, the recently translated Communist documents show.
The documents were obtained and translated by Christopher E. Goscha, a history professor at the University of Montreal and one of the leading international scholars on Indochina during the French colonial period. He included them in his book, Historical Dictionary of the Indochina War (1945-1954): An International and Interdisciplinary Approach, which was published to little notice in Denmark in 2011. “Torture and intelligence gathering in a time of war are a tricky combination,” he told Newsweek, “and the [Communists’] policing and military intelligence services were no exception to the rule.”
On to the battlefield, via BBC News:
IS leaders killed by US air strikes, Pentagon chief says
US air strikes have killed several high-ranking military leaders of Islamic State (IS) in Iraq, the Pentagon’s top officer says. Gen Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the strikes aimed to hamper the Islamist group’s ability to conduct attacks, supply fighters and finance operations.
IS controls a swathe of Iraq and Syria, where it has declared a caliphate.
Meanwhile, Kurdish forces say they have broken the IS siege of Mount Sinjar.
Gen Dempsey told the Wall Street Journal that the loss of IS leaders was “disruptive to their planning and command and control”. He added: “These are high-value targets, senior leadership.”
Cyberconvolutions from CBC News:
Hackers posing as Syrian-Canadians may be tied to ISIS
Malware aims to expose location of attacker’s target
Hackers suspected of ties to ISIS posed as Syrian-Canadians to try to implant malicious software on a computer of a Syrian citizen media group, an internet watchdog says.
A Citizen Lab report released today says there’s strong evidence that the Islamic jihadist group sent the phishing email in late November, but it’s not conclusive.
“This bears little resemblance to anything we’ve seen from the usual suspects,” said report co-author John Scott-Railton. “That, combined with who they are targeting … gives us pause and makes us think that maybe we’re looking at ISIS malware.”
If ISIS is responsible for the attempted attack on the citizen media group, it could mark an early warning sign that the group is embracing a new tactic in its fight to establish a caliphate.
Another ironic hack, via Nextgov:
48,000 Federal Employees Potentially Affected by Second Background Check Hack
The Office of Personnel Management is alerting more than 48,000 federal employees their personal information may have been exposed following a breach at KeyPoint Government Solutions, which conducts background investigations of federal employees seeking security clearances.
The total number of employees affected is 48,439, according to an email from OPM Chief Information Officer Donna Seymour obtained by Nextgov.
Seymour said OPM worked closely with the Department of Homeland Security to investigate the incident, “and while we found no conclusive evidence that [personally identifiable information] was taken by the intruder, OPM has elected to conduct these notifications out of an abundance of caution.”
And yet another embarrassing hack, via the Los Angeles Times:
Internet authority ICANN says it was hacked
The Internet authority responsible the Web’s address system has been hacked, compromising employee emails and personal information.
The Internet Corp. for Assigned Names and Numbers, or ICANN, said Tuesday that it fell victim to a “spear phishing” attack in November. The hack involved emails crafted to look as though they came from the organization’s own domain.
Earlier this month, ICANN learned that the stolen employee credentials were used to access other systems aside from email, including the Centralized Zone Data System that grants access to private employee information. Hackers accessed employees’ names, addresses, email addresses, phone numbers and usernames. The digital thieves also found employee passwords, though that information was encrypted instead of saved as plain text, ICANN said.
And a transition our first after-the-jump, hack-of-the-year stories, via the Associated Press:
Sony hacking fallout puts all companies on alert
Companies across the globe are on high alert to tighten up network security to avoid being the next company brought to its knees by hackers like those that executed the dramatic cyberattack against Sony Pictures Entertainment.
The hack, which a U.S. official has said investigators believe is linked to North Korea, culminated in the cancellation of a Sony film and ultimately could cost the movie studio hundreds of millions of dollars. That the hack included terrorist threats and was focused on causing major corporate damage, rather than on stealing customer information for fraud like in the breaches at Home Depot and Target, indicates a whole new frontier has emerged in cybersecurity. Suddenly every major company could be the target of cyberextortion.
“The Sony breach is a real wake-up call even after the year of mega-breaches we’ve seen,” says Lee Weiner, Boston security firm Rapid7’s senior vice president of products and engineering. “This is a completely different type of data stolen with the aim to harm the company.”
“Movie studios have, by and large, behaved as high-security intellectual property purveyors; prints have been tightly controlled, screeners are watermarked, and bootleggers are prosecuted wherever possible,” says Seth Shapiro, a professor at the University of Southern California’s School of Cinematic Arts. He said that’s what makes it so surprising that email leaks showed that Sony executives apparently gave out passwords in unencrypted emails and made other security blunders.
After the jump, on to the hack of the year, starting with another film pulled by another studio, a White House declaration, possible responses, a media war victor, potential impacts on the studio system, Sony emails force apologetics, an author enters the game, a plot twist about plot twists, revelations about studio battles with Google, plus curious legal ties, major router hackability revealed, Japanese ransomware debuts, a rebel ceasefire in Colombian and a violent protest in Brazil, complaints of wasted aid in Pakistan, thousands may be headed for Pakistani gallows, while Pakistan asks for help for Washington, and a court bails a major terrorism suspect, Christian fear in Indian as Hindu violence rises, a U.N. call for punitive action against North Korea and a North Korean nuclear count, a South Korean rift complicates air force plans, China clamps down on foreign television, Japan redefines scope of future military actions, and allegations of a curious cabal of upper crust British killer pedophiles. . .
Another studio, another film pulled, via the Los Angeles Times:
Paramount pulls screenings of ‘Team America: World Police,’ theaters say
Paramount Pictures has put the kibosh on screenings of its 2004 North Korea-themed comedy “Team America: World Police,” according to movie theaters in Cleveland and Atlanta.
David Huffman, director of marketing at Cleveland Cinemas, told The Times that Paramount contacted the theater chain and said “Team America” had been pulled from release. The Capitol Theatre had booked the film in October as part of a midnight screening series in June, Huffman said.
The Plaza Theatre in Atlanta, meanwhile, said on its Twitter account, “Team America World Police pulled from all theatres as per Paramount Pictures.”
Paramount did not immediately reply to a request for comment.
And a hack of a Japanese corporation draws White House interest, via BBC News:
Sony hack: White House views attack as security issue
A cyber attack on Sony Pictures that forced the cancellation of a major film release is being seen as a serious national security matter, the US says.
A White House spokesman said the US believed the hacking was the work of a “sophisticated actor” – but refused to confirm if North Korea was responsible.
At a White House briefing on Thursday, spokesman Josh Earnest said US officials had held daily discussions about the Sony cyber attack and were considering an “appropriate response”.
However, he refused to comment on who was responsible, saying he did not wish to pre-empt an investigation by the Department of Justice and the FBI.
Mulling options with the New York Times:
U.S. Weighs Response to Sony Cyberattack, With North Korea Confrontation Possible
A White House official said on Thursday that the administration was considering a “proportional response” against those who hacked into Sony Pictures computers, a retaliation that could thrust the United States into a direct confrontation with North Korea.
Officials would not describe what such a response might entail, but they stressed that the episode had become a major concern at the upper levels of government, including President Obama, who lately has been discussing the issue with aides every day.
“This is something that’s being treated as a serious national security matter,” Josh Earnest, the White House press secretary, told reporters. “There is evidence to indicate that we have seen destructive activity with malicious intent that was initiated by a sophisticated actor.”
The war the hackers are winning, via the Washington Post:
The hackers are winning the media war
The hacks of Home Depot, celebrity iCloud accounts and Sony were likely the work of different people. But taken together, they show a growing cockiness, ambition and media savvy within the hacker world.
And that’s truly troubling, on a couple of levels. For one, the idea that North Korea may be behind these attacks — the prevailing determination of U.S. officials — shows just how easy it is to cause large-scale mayhem. Somehow a poor and not-at-all tech-friendly country managed to conduct these attacks. If it’s that easy, we can certainly only expect these splashy attacks to continue.
Secondly, the progression of hacks from credit card theft to sordid Jennifer Lawrence photos and now forcing Sony to cancel “The Interview” shows hackers gaining both technical prowress and media savvy. In the case of Sony, they didn’t just obtain and publish a list of social security numbers and home address to extort executives. The releases also have been framed in compelling and sharp ways — exposing racially-tinged jokes among top executives or demonstrating that men are paid more than women.
While that has prompted a debate about what the media should cover, the leaks from the hackers have been difficult not to read. The hackers were able to tap into the part of us that reads tabloids and tell-all memoirs.
Potential impacts on the studio system, via the Associated Press:
Will artists skip studio support after Sony scandal?
Artists could increasingly turn to the web as a way to distribute content without studio interference, amplifying a challenge the industry is already facing with audiences consuming more entertainment at home. Lizz Winstead, a creator of “The Daily Show,” suggested the creative community may have to go even further.
“Do performers and artists need to start buying theaters so we aren’t beholden to the multiplexes now?” she asked. “I feel like if this is the message from the studios, what is going to be the action for all of us who see how profoundly we can all just be cut off at the knees.”
Silencing creative expression in response to terrorists’ demands stifles the very thing art seeks to explore, she said.
“So now, creatively, when we can’t respond as a catharsis, as a reflection of where society’s at, because somebody can intimidate the creative process, what are we gonna be stuck with?”
Sony emails force apologetics, via the Washington Post:
Sony Pictures head apologizes personally to civil rights leaders
Amy Pascal, the embattled co-chair of Sony Pictures Entertainment, met Thursday with civil rights leaders to personally apologize for racially charged private emails that have sparked outrage and highlighted the lack of diversity in Hollywood’s highest ranks.
In a private 90-minute meeting in New York, Pascal told National Action Network president Rev. Al Sharpton and National Urban League president Marc Morial that her comments in the leaked emails were not truly a reflection of her beliefs and were meant as a joke, Sharpton said after the meeting. Melanie Campbell, president of the Black Women’s Roundtable, joined the meeting by phone.
Sharpton said that Pascal’s repeated apologies were noted, but that the civil rights leaders told her structural problems continue to exist in Hollywood.
An author enters the game, via Channel NewsAsia Singapore:
Author Paulo Coelho offers to buy rights to controversial film The Interview
In a Twitter post, the internationally acclaimed author offered Sony Pictures US$100,000 to buy the movie that is believed to have sparked the cyber-theft of confidential information from the company.
It appears that internationally acclaimed author Paulo Coelho is willing to pay for the right to “say no to terrorist threats”.
On Thursday (Dec 18), he tweeted an offer to buy the rights to The Interview, a comedy about a fictional plot to assassinate North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un. The film, which stars James Franco and Seth Rogen, is believed to have sparked a cyber-attack which saw hackers gain access to Sony’s confidential documents and unreleased movies. Reports have speculated that North Korea is behind the hack.
Sony Pictures announced on Wednesday that it decided to cancel the movie’s release after American theatre chains said they would not screen the movie, due to threats of attacks from self-proclaimed cyber-terrorists. “We respect and understand our partners’ decision and, of course, completely share their paramount interest in the safety of employees and theatre-goers,” the studio said in a statement.
In his tweet, Mr Coelho said he would post the movie for free on his blog if he could buy the rights for US$100,000.
The Christian Science Monitor offers a plot twist about plot twists:
Sony hack: No more North Korean bad guys? Or Russian? Or …?
Critics argue that Sony’s decision to pull ‘The Interview’ sets a dangerous precedent and could lead to a chilling effect in Hollywood. One Steve Carrell film already has been canceled. Experts worry more movies about sensitive topics, under pressure from hackers or a wave of self-censorship, could follow.
“It does raise concerns over the ability of individuals with unknown capabilities to chill freedom of speech in the United States by making threats that may or may not have any basis in reality,” says Jeff Hermes, a deputy director at the Media Law Resource Center in New York. “The disturbing thing around this or any terrorist threat is that they’re intended to generate fear irrespective of whether or not the fear is rational.”
Mr. Hermes calls the attack “well executed in a scary way.” He says the initial breach of Sony computers – one of the most destructive cyber attacks seen on American soil – might have earned the hackers enough credibility for their threat of violence to be taken seriously.
“Is it worth frightening people who are going to movies theaters to perhaps see other films?” he asks, especially during the busy holiday season. “If you look at it from that narrow perspective, you can see why a movie theater may say it’s not worth it. But these decisions made in the moment do wind up having wider consequences.”
Revelations about studio battles with Google, from the National Journal:
Google: Hollywood Is ‘Trying to Secretly Censor the Internet’
Leaked emails reveal movie studios have been encouraging state officials to go after Google as part of a fight against online piracy.
Google is going after the major movie studios with guns blazing after learning of a secret legal campaign against it.
The Motion Picture Association of America is “trying to secretly censor the Internet” and revive the controversial Stop Online Piracy Act, Google general counsel Kent Walker claimed in a blog post Thursday.
The allegations are based on recent news reports and leaked Hollywood executive emails from the hack of Sony Pictures.
A spokesman for the MPAA did not immediately return a request to comment.
More from the Verge:
Documents in Sony leak show how state attorney general was cozy with Hollywood
At the end of last week, we dug up news of Project Goliath, a secret Hollywood project to investigate and discredit Google on issues of copyright and web freedom. But while the documents showed how bad things had gotten between Google and Hollywood, they also showed how eagerly many state attorneys general took up the MPAA’s anti-Google crusade – particularly Mississippi’s Jim Hood. And less than a week after the documents were made public, that eagerness is starting to have real consequences.
Hood has been at the center of many of the recent legal actions against Google in the US, investigating the company for involvement in both pharmaceutical counterfeiting and content piracy, but never assembling enough evidence for concrete charges. But on Tuesday, The New York Times revealed the MPAA may have had more of a hand in his actions than he let on. According to Times documents, a November 2013 letter Hood wrote criticizing Google for aiding piracy was almost entirely copied from text provided to him by lawyers working for the MPAA. In short, Hood’s lips were moving, but it was the MPAA’s approved text coming out.
Other emails show specific requests from Hood circulating among MPAA lawyers. In an email sent on January 16th, a few days before a scheduled meeting between Google and a group of attorneys general, MPAA counsel Vans Stevenson discusses which supporting documents they can provide to Hood and the other AGs in advance.
And from AL Jazeera America, context:
Sony hack reveals close bond between corporate and state interests
United States national security state prioritizes cybersecurity for private firms
Philip Bobbitt, director of Columbia Law School’s Center for National Security, said the U.S. government sees a vital national security interest in safeguarding the integrity of corporate information systems because of how much the nation at large relies on them. Banks, energy companies, transportation companies, and other sectors on the economy rely on networks similar to those employed by Sony — and if a bank or, say, a power plant had its security breached by a sovereign nation, the consequences could be disastrous.
“We need to learn how to protect these networks because their vulnerability is inextricably linked to their utility and usefulness as a society,” said Bobbitt. “There’s no real way to square that circle.”
The federal government has long considered the safety of some private entities to be important for national security. In 1998, President Bill Clinton signed the Presidential Decision Directive 63, directing the federal government to improve cybersecurity around “critical infrastructures.” The result was the creation of Information Sharing and Analysis Centers (ISACs), designed to help private entities strengthen their safeguards against online attacks.
Fifteen years later, in February 2013, President Barack Obama took another step when he signed an executive order intended to strengthen information sharing between private enterprise and the federal government. The administration unveiled its Cybersecurity Framework the next year, which the White House described as a “private-sector led” initiative to develop best practices around cybersecurity.
Major router hackability revealed, via Network World:
Vulnerability in embedded Web server exposes millions of routers to hacking
A serious vulnerability in an embedded Web server used by many router models from different manufacturers allows remote attackers to take control of affected devices over the Internet.
A compromised router can have wide-ranging implications for the security of home and business networks as it allows attackers to sniff inbound and outbound traffic and provides them with a foothold inside the network from where they can launch attacks against other systems. It also gives them a man-in-the-middle position to strip SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) from secure connections and hijack DNS (Domain Name System) settings to misrepresent trusted websites.
The new vulnerability was discovered by researchers from Check Point Software Technologies and is located in RomPager, an embedded Web server used by many routers to host their Web-based administration interfaces.
Japanese ransomware debuts, from TechWorm:
TorrentLocker Ransomware variation targets Japanese users
A new variation of the TorrentLocker ransomware has been found by security experts at Symantec being exploited in the wild. This is the first reported instance of a ransomware specifically targeting users in Japan. Though Japan is not new to ransomware, never before has any cyber criminal made such an attempt to attack Japanese users so specifically. Symantec researchers say that this ransomware is a localized variant of TorLocker. The malware encrypts files with certain file extensions on the compromised computer and demands that the user pays in order to decrypt the files. Symantec researchers have also confirmed that there are multiple variants of this particular Japanese ransomware.
This new type of ransomware is a sibling of CryptoLocker and CrptoWall ransomware and uses communicates with its command and control server using Tor anonymiser network. TorrentLocker uses themes and naming from CryptoLocker and CryptoWall ransomware, but is very different at the code level and believed to be a new strain of ransomware. The malware first connects to a command and control (C&C) server over secure communications and exchanges a certificate before encrypting the malware. The malware uses the Rijndael algorithm for file encryption. This is a symmetric cipher and will use a password either stored locally or retrieved from the remote attackers’ server for encryption.
Ransomware generally spread through as many mediums as possible trying to infect unsuspecting users, however the most preferred medium for the cyber criminals is spear phishing. The malware is laden in a innocuous email as an attachment which the victim downloads thinking it to be a genuine file. Once a ransom ware has been downloaded onto a machine, it goes on to encrypt all the files it has been commanded to do via program and request payment – usually in Bitcoins – to decrypt the files, thus making user data the hostage. This particular ransom ware also works the same way with the addition that all instructions are written in Japanese.
On to Latin America and a ceasefire from the Associated Press:
Colombian rebels announce unilateral cease-fire
Colombia’s largest rebel group announced an indefinite, unilateral cease-fire Wednesday, saying guerrillas will refrain from staging attacks so long as they aren’t targeted by the U.S.-backed military.
The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia made the announcement in Cuba at the end of another round of peace talks aimed at ending Latin America’s oldest insurgency.
In a statement signed by the FARC’s ruling Secretariat, the rebels expressed hope that the cease-fire beginning at midnight Dec. 20th would “transform into an armistice,” and said it would seek the support of several Latin American nations and the international Red Cross to verify its enforcement.
Although the FARC have declared temporary cease-fires before, around Christmas and elections, this would be the first time they’ve offered to indefinitely lay down their weapons nationwide since the 1980s. The goodwill gesture would appear to add at least symbolic momentum to talks that were strengthened when the rebels last month unilaterally freed an army general two weeks after his surprise capture in a remote part of the country.
And a violent protest in Brazil from BBC News:
Brazil indigenous group clashes with police in Congress
Brazilian indigenous protesters armed with bows and arrows have clashed with police inside the National Congress building in the capital, Brasilia.
The group, with some 30 men, tried to break into the building to protest against a bill on indigenous lands. The bill, known as PEC 215/00, would give the Brazilian Congress powers to demarcate the indigenous lands.
The 1988 Constitution gave the indigenous groups rights over their ancestral lands. But many indigenous areas, especially in western Brazil and the Amazon region, have been occupied by farmers and loggers.
Police officers used pepper spray and blocked access to a committee that was due to vote on the proposal. An arrow struck a policeman’s boot but he was uninjured, said the Brazilian authorities.
Complaints of wasted aid in Pakistan, from Reuters:
Despite billions in aid, U.S. unable to get Pakistan to confront militants
Since 2001 the United States has tried virtually every strategy available to persuade Pakistan’s army to take the threat of militancy more seriously, but 12 years and $28 billion in aid later, all the American approaches are widely viewed as having failed.
First, the Bush administration heaped praise on former Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, agreed to reimburse the Pakistani army for anti-Taliban military operations and launched drone strikes that killed al Qaeda leaders and militants wanted by the Pakistani government.
Adopting a more confrontational stance, the Obama administration unilaterally carried out the raid that killed Osama bin Laden, vastly increased aid to Pakistan’s weak civilian institutions and, at times, cut off aid to the Pakistani military.
Yet the militants continue to operate, ever more brazenly, as illustrated by Tuesday’s harrowing attack on a school in Peshawar, in which 132 students were killed by a faction of the Pakistan Taliban. And with the United States increasingly focused on other crises, Washington’s options for bringing about change in an increasingly unstable Pakistan are dwindling fast.
Gibbets readied, via the McClatchy Foreign Staff:
Pakistan’s gallows await 3,000 convicted terrorists; first will hang ‘within days’
Pakistan’s government fast-tracked warrants of execution for convicted terrorists Thursday, moving swiftly on its promise to crack down on militants after a Taliban massacre of 132 schoolchildren Tuesday in the northern city of Peshawar.
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had lifted a six-year moratorium on capital punishment Wednesday, vowing to eliminate terrorists in Pakistan irrespective of whether they targeted it or neighboring Afghanistan or India.
On Sharif’s orders Thursday, the country’s ceremonial president, Mamnoon Hussain, rejected 17 mercy petitions that convicted terrorists on death row had filed earlier. The army chief of staff, Gen. Raheel Sharif, who’s no relation to the prime minister, also signed six so-called “black warrants” for the execution of soldiers convicted of terrorism offenses by military courts.
Officials said those 23 terrorists would be executed within days, and they’re likely to be followed by dozens more hangings at prisons around the country.
While Pakistan askes for help for Washington, via the Express Tribune:
National action plan: Govt seeks help of US counter-terror experts
After getting go-ahead of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Thursday for holding the first meeting of all parliamentary groups for an anti-terror action plan on Friday, the government has also sought assistance of the United States anti-terrorism experts to help craft the plan, The Express Tribune has learnt.
Interior Ministry on Thursday approached American Embassy to send some counter-terrorism experts who are proficient in South Asian security affairs to assist Pakistan’s top counter-terrorism body – the National Counter Terrorism Authority (NACTA), said a senior official.
The development comes after two back-to-back meetings of Federal Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan with Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Thursday.
American security experts, if available in rapid response, will not only assist our security agencies but most likely brief representatives of all political parties at the National Action Plan Committee (NAPC) next week, added the interior ministry official, who did not want to be named.
Followed by an inflammatory move, via BBC News:
Mumbai attacks ‘mastermind’ Lakhvi bailed in Pakistan
A man accused of masterminding the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks has been granted bail by a court in Pakistan.
Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi is one of seven men facing trial over the attacks in the Indian city, which left 165 people dead. Nine gunmen were also killed. The attacks in Mumbai damaged peace efforts between India and Pakistan.
The bailing of Mr Lakhvi came a day after Pakistan PM Nawaz Sharif vowed to end terrorism after the Taliban killed 141 people at a school in Peshawar. Correspondents say the move will be an embarrassment for the Pakistani authorities who are under pressure to bring suspects in the case to justice.
Christian fear in Indian as Hindu violence rises, from the Washington Post:
Christian enclave in India fears violence as Hindus press for conversions
The trouble started a few months ago, when Hindu nationalists swept into a small village where several families had converted to Christianity more than a decade earlier. They held a fire purification ceremony with the villagers, tore a cross off the local church and put up a poster of the god Shiva. The space was now a temple, they declared.
Then right-wing Hindu groups announced a Christmas Day ceremony where they planned to welcome hundreds of Christians and Muslims back to Hinduism. A fundraising flier solicited donations for volunteers to do the conversions — about $3,200 for each Christian and about $8,000 for each Muslim.
After a nationwide furor, organizers postponed the ceremony on Tuesday. But one of them, Rajeshwar Singh Solanki, said in an interview Thursday they will demonstrate against any church baptisms performed on the holiday. He said his group’s ultimate aim is to ensure that Islam and Christianity “cease to exist” in India.
Christians in Aligarh say they are afraid of what might happen on their holiest of days.
Calls for punitive action against North Korea, via Channel NewsAsia Singapore:
UN General Assembly wants to refer North Korea to ICC
The resolution asks the Security Council to refer North Korea to the ICC and to consider targeted sanctions against the Pyongyang leadership for the repression of its citizens
The UN General Assembly on Thursday (Dec 18) condemned North Korea’s rights record and called for Pyongyang to be referred to the International Criminal Court to face charges of crimes against humanity.
The non-binding resolution was adopted by a vote of 116 to 20 with 53 abstentions in the 193-nation assembly. The resolution asks the Security Council to refer North Korea to the ICC and to consider targeted sanctions against the Pyongyang leadership for the repression of its citizens.
Co-sponsored by 62 countries, the resolution drew heavily on the work of a UN inquiry which concluded in a report released in February that North Korea was committing human rights abuses “without parallel in the contemporary world.”
And a Pyongyang warhead count from Want China Times:
North Korea has 20 nuclear warheads: Ta Kung Pao
Three years after the death of his father Kim Jong-il, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has overseen the successful development of about 20 nuclear warheads, according to the Hong Kong-based Ta Kung Pao.
Chinese and Japanese representatives were this year for the first time not invited to the annual ceremony marking Kim Jong-il’s death. Rumors attributed the total absence of foreign guests to Ebola prevention measures, said one source. The North Korean embassy in Beijing, consulates in Shenyang and the consular office in Andong did however hold smaller ceremonies to pay their respects to Kim Jong-il.
All North Korean diplomatic officials have been ordered not to return to their countries until the outbreak of Ebola in West Africa is over, said the report. Despite the lack of diplomatic or economic success, the People’s Army of Korea has at least successfully manufactured 20 nuclear warheads, according to the Seoul-based Chosun Ilbo. The senior military official cited said that North Korea has put its uranium mine, test site and power station into operation again.
A South Korean rift complicates air force plans, via Reuters:
South Korea balks as U.S. picks Japan, Australia to service F-35s in Asia
South Korea said on Thursday it will not send its F-35 fleet to Japan for heavy airframe maintenance, one of the two Asian hubs chosen by the United States to service the Lockheed Martin Corp stealth fighter.
Instead, it is likely to fly the jets to Australia for maintenance, about eight times further away than Japan and well beyond their operating range. The three nations, all key U.S. allies, are the only countries in the region to have ordered the F-35s.
“There will never be a case where our fighter jets will be taken to Japan for maintenance,” said an official at South Korea’s arms procurement agency, the Defense Acquisition Program Administration.
“South Korea has the right to decide where to conduct maintenance for its F-35 jets, and it will decide whenever the need arises.”
China clamps down on foreign television, via Want China Times:
Piracy set to return as China’s anti-foreign TV rules take effect
New regulations limiting the number of foreign TV series allowed on Chinese video-sharing websites set to come into effect next year have prompted concerns that piracy may see a resurgence, reports the Beijing Evening News.
The new limits set by the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television will force websites to stop showing foreign series for around six months next year. The number of imported TV series video-sharing websites can air has been set at one third of Chinese productions. Foreign series are also only allowed to be aired after gaining government approval. The government has also said that to promote health, truthfulness, kindness and beauty, plots that include violence, pornography, murder and political scandal will be cut or removed — which would certainly cover such widely popular series as Game of Thrones and House of Cards and appear to rule out all but the blandest and most inoffensive of fare.
The fact that websites will no longer be able to provide foreign series in a timely manner will give piracy a place to grow, said Zhang Yurui, head of video-sharing website Iqiyi. Since the websites purchased their broadcasting rights and have introduced them into China, the previously rampant phenomenon of piracy has been curbed. Ding Heng, senior executive of Youku Tudou, said the website will work with the authorities to seek a better solution.
Redefining in Tokyo with the Mainichi:
Areas where Japan will exercise collective self-defense right to be limited
The government is set to limit areas where Japan will exercise the right to collective self-defense to those close to Japan, government sources said.
Under national security-related bills that the government will submit to the Diet next year, the government will stop short of opening the way for Japan to conduct operations by exercising the right to collective self-defense in areas far from Japan, such as minesweeping operations in the Strait of Hormuz.
If such operations far away from Japan are to become necessary, the government will consider drafting a new bill. Still, the government may approve minesweeping operations in areas where a de-facto cease-fire agreement has been reached as part of international cooperation.
In his statements in Diet deliberations and on other occasions, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe pointed to the possibility that the Self-Defense Forces (SDF) will conduct minesweeping operations by exercising the right to collective self-defense if the Strait of Hormuz, a route for Japan’s import of oil, is to be blocked with mines. The ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) has supported the prime minister’s idea.
And those curious claims of an upper crust killer cabal in Britain, via the Guardian:
Claims that boys were murdered by VIP sex ring are credible and true – police
Metropolitan police launch murder inquiry into role alleged Westminster ring might have had in killings of three boys
The allegations made by the witness, known by the pseudonym Nick, have triggered a murder investigation.
Police said the alleged abuse by a Westminster-based paedophile ring lasted a decade at locations across London and the Home Counties, including military premises.
Det Supt Kenny McDonald, who is leading the homicide inquiry, told a press conference on Thursday that detectives believed the witness’s claims.
The abuse was said to have taken place from 1975 to 1984, when Nick was aged between seven and 16. Some of the abuse is linked to a flat in Dolphin Square, Pimlico, London, and at times is alleged to have taken place at “parties”. Sometimes it involved groups of men and other times a lone male.
More from BBC News:
Police say no confirmed identities or bodies of victims had been found. Officers made a public appeal for information relating to Dolphin Square estate in Pimlico, south-west London, amid claims boys were abused there.
Allegations of a paedophile ring involving prominent figures in the 1970s and 1980s are being investigated.
The appeal was made as part of Operation Midland, which is under the umbrella of Operation Fairbank, and is one of a number of ongoing inquiries into historical abuse.
The paedophile ring is alleged to have included senior military, law enforcement and political figures.
