U.S.-IRAQ:Massacre Puts War Trauma Under the Spotlight
    on 11/05/2009 23.23.06 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, May 11 (IPS) - A U.S. soldier shot five of his colleagues dead at a base in Baghdad, Iraq Monday. The Pentagon says at least two other people were hurt in the shootings and the gunman is in custody.... (continue)

BOOKS-US:Wounded Veterans Treated as an Afterthought
    on 16/01/2009 19.47.02 GMT
Dahr Jamail MARFA, Texas, Jan 16 (IPS) - "But the [George W.] Bush administration was never seriously interested in helping veterans. The sorry state of care for Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans is not an accident. It's on purpose."... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Vets Health System in Need of Triage
   Analysis by Aaron Glantz* on 15/01/2009 12.11.08 GMT
SAN FRANCISCO, Jan 15 (IPS) - Eighteen U.S. veterans kill themselves every day. More veterans are committing suicide than are dying in combat overseas. One in every three homeless men in the United States has put on a uniform and served his country. On any given night, the U.S. government estimates 200,000 veterans sleep on the street.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Vets See Hope for a Broken System
    on 18/11/2008 10.42.58 GMT
Aaron Glantz OAKLAND, California, Nov 17 (IPS) - Thirty-three-year-old Walter Williams was among the thousands of revelers who flooded into the streets of Oakland on Nov. 4 to celebrate Barack Obama's election as the 44th president of the United States.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Vets See Hope for a Broken System
    on 18/11/2008 10.39.16 GMT
Aaron Glantz* OAKLAND, California, Nov 17 (IPS) - Thirty-three-year-old Walter Williams was among the thousands of revelers who flooded into the streets of Oakland on Nov. 4 to celebrate Barack Obama's election as the 44th president of the United States.... (continue)

BOOKS-US:A Liberal's Travels in "Flyover Country"
    on 23/10/2008 18.53.42 GMT
Aaron Glantz* SAN FRANCISCO, Oct 23 (IPS) - "What are they thinking?" is a question my mother screams at the television every election season. A union nurse in overwhelmingly liberal, Democratic San Francisco, she cannot believe that the presidential election is even close.... (continue)

BOOKS-IRAQ:Kurdish Jews Recall a Paradise Lost
    on 10/10/2008 18.10.20 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, Oct 10 (IPS) - It's become popular, when talking about ongoing violence in U.S.-occupied Iraq, for officials in Washington and the media to paint the Iraqi people as savages who can't help but keep killing each other.... (continue)

BOOKS-IRAQ:"We Blew Her to Pieces"
    on 16/09/2008 18.14.58 GMT
Dahr Jamail MARFA, Texas, Sep 16 (IPS) - Aside from the Iraqi people, nobody knows what the U.S. military is doing in Iraq better than the soldiers themselves. A new book gives readers vivid and detailed accounts of the devastation the U.S. occupation has brought to Iraq, in the soldiers' own words.... (continue)

BOOKS-US:Revelations of an Abu Ghraib Interrogator
    on 04/09/2008 19.22.58 GMT
Aaron Glantz* SAN FRANCISCO, Sep 4 (IPS) - Few people have thought as much about the morality of the U.S. occupation of Iraq than Joshua Casteel, a former U.S. Army interrogator who served at Abu Ghraib prison in the wake of the detainee abuse scandal there.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:McCain's Plan to Privatise Veterans' Health Care
   Analysis by Aaron Glantz* on 21/08/2008 12.48.18 GMT
SAN FRANCISCO, Aug 21 (IPS) - If John McCain is elected the next U.S. president, wounded veterans could be in for a world of hurt.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Vets Mull Wins and Losses in Benefits Fight
    on 04/07/2008 13.05.12 GMT
Aaron Glantz* SAN FRANCISCO, Jul 4 (IPS) - You could hear the joy in Patrick Campbell's voice as he reflected on U.S. President George W. Bush's signing Monday of a new GI Bill of Rights for veterans returning home from Iraq and Afghanistan.... (continue)

US/IRAQ:Soldier Refuses Tour, Citing "Stomach-Churning Horrors"
    on 16/05/2008 20.45.26 GMT
Aaron Glantz WASHINGTON, May 16 (IPS) - A U.S. Army soldier who served as a military journalist in Afghanistan, Japan, Europe and the Philippines announced Thursday his intent to refuse orders to deploy to Iraq.... (continue)

RIGHTS-US:Vets Await Verdict in Class Action Lawsuit
    on 02/05/2008 17.06.56 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, May 2 (IPS) - Arturo Gonzalez delivered his closing arguments inside a packed courtroom on the 17th floor of the Federal Building in downtown San Francisco.... (continue)

RIGHTS-US:Vets' Lawsuit Opens Door on Suicides, Poor Care
    on 22/04/2008 11.52.24 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, Apr 22 (IPS) - The United States government does such a bad job of caring for wounded war veterans, advocates told a federal judge here Monday, that 18 veterans commit suicide every week.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Army "Rewards" Outspoken Antiwar Soldier
    on 15/04/2008 12.48.18 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, Apr 15 (IPS) - One of the leading voices of dissent inside the U.S. Army has been promoted.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Vets Press McCain to Back Greater Benefits
    on 09/04/2008 11.59.28 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, Apr 9 (IPS) - A leading political action committee founded by Iraq and Afghanistan veterans has launched a new internet video and petition demanding Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain throw his support behind a new G.I. Bill to provide improved education benefits for soldiers returning home from the two wars.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Winter Soldiers Move Toward GI Resistance
    on 21/03/2008 19.17.12 GMT
Aaron Glantz* SILVER SPRING, Maryland, Mar 21 (IPS) - Hundreds of veterans who gathered outside Washington last weekend to testify about their experiences in Iraq and Afghanistan are returning to their communities across the country with the goal of stoking resistance to the Iraq war from inside the U.S. military.... (continue)

US/IRAQ:"I Saw the Interrogator Waterboarding Him"
    on 18/03/2008 12.18.48 GMT
Aaron Glantz* SILVER SPRING, Maryland, Mar 18 (IPS) - "I would like to share with you how one goes about becoming a concentration camp guard without having made many decisions," 24-year-old former Guantanamo prison guard Christopher Arent told a crowd of hundreds at last weekend's Winter Soldier gathering outside Washington, DC.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Embattled Veterans Official Resigns Post
    on 29/02/2008 23.51.52 GMT
Aaron Glantz* SAN FRANCISCO, Feb 29 (IPS) - Another high-ranking George W. Bush administration official has resigned. The Department of Veterans Affairs Undersecretary for Benefits Daniel Cooper quit Thursday amid mounting criticism over a backlog of disability claims for injured veterans that runs six months long and an appearance he made in a fundraising video for an evangelical Christian organisation where he said Bible study was more important than doing his job.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Vets Break Silence on War Crimes
    on 28/02/2008 21.20.08 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, Feb 28 (IPS) - U.S. veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are planning to descend on Washington from Mar. 13-16 to testify about war crimes they committed or personally witnessed in those countries.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Democrats Cagey on Immigration Reforms
    on 05/02/2008 14.31.46 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, Feb 5 (IPS) - As voters in 24 U.S. states go to the polls for the "Super Tuesday" caucuses and primaries that will help determine the formal presidential nominations for each party, Democratic contenders Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have been actively courting support from Latino voters across the country.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Bush Signs Vets Bill, Won't Ban Permanent Bases
    on 29/01/2008 20.19.00 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, Jan 29 (IPS) - President George W. Bush signed a 696-billion-dollar Pentagon spending bill immediately before his State of the Union address Monday night, which funds all Defence Department programmes not directly tied to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, expands health care for injured veterans and gives U.S. soldiers a pay raise.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Dems Spar Over Ailing Economy
    on 25/01/2008 08.17.04 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, Jan 24 (IPS) - With financial markets crumbling around the world and some 3.5 million U.S. homeowners facing the prospect of defaulting on their mortgages over the next three years, how to stave off a major recession is taking centre-stage for voters and politicians of all stripes.... (continue)

CHALLENGES 2007-2008:Wounded Vets Trade One Hell for Another
    on 15/01/2008 18.31.54 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, California, Jan 15 (IPS) - Last year, the United States woke up to the reality of hundreds of thousands of soldiers wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan -- and began to grapple with what to do about it.... (continue)

POLITICS:Canada Shuts Doors to U.S. War Resisters
    on 16/11/2007 21.42.12 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, California, Nov 16 (IPS) - Two U.S. Army deserters who fled to Canada and sought refugee status on grounds of their opposition to the war in Iraq have lost their bids to have the Supreme Court of Canada hear their cases.... (continue)

BOOKS-US/IRAQ:Outrage in a Time of Apathy
    on 13/11/2007 15.32.32 GMT
Aaron Glantz* SAN FRANCISCO, Nov 13 (IPS) - Unlike most U.S. journalists who went to Iraq to cover a war, Dahr Jamil went to try to stop it.... (continue)

RIGHTS-US:Case Crumbles Against Officer Who Refused Iraq
    on 09/11/2007 21.09.20 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCSICO, Nov 9 (IPS) - First Lt. Ehren Watada, the first commissioned officer to refuse deployment to Iraq, won what his backers are calling a "huge victory" in court Thursday.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Homeless Vets Play the Waiting Game
    on 19/10/2007 18.48.26 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, Oct 19 (IPS) - U.S. Army Specialist James Eggemeyer injured himself before he even set foot in Iraq, jumping out of a C-130 gunship during training at Fort Bragg, North Carolina.... (continue)

HEALTH-US:Soldier's Death Highlights Medical Staff Shortages
    on 17/10/2007 14.33.20 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, Oct 17 (IPS) - On Sep. 19, Kay McMullen had the last conversation she ever would with her son, Gerald Cassidy, or G.J., as he was known to his family and friends.... (continue)

HEALTH-US:Brain Trauma the "Signature Injury" For Iraq Vets
    on 26/09/2007 18.06.22 GMT
Aaron Glantz WASHINGTON, Sep 26 (IPS) - On Mar. 19, 2004 Corporal Justin Bunce was on patrol in the Iraqi city of Husayba on the Syrian border when a bomb exploded in the wall of a cemetery.... (continue)

HEALTH-US:Soldier's Tragic Suicide Just One of Dozens
    on 10/09/2007 20.38.30 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, Sep 10 (IPS) - Dane and April Somdahl own the Alien Art tattoo parlor on Camp Lejeune Boulevard -- just outside the sprawling Marine Corps base of the same name in Jacksonville, North Carolina.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Bush Appointee Campaigns for Evangelicals
    on 05/09/2007 17.09.24 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, Sep 5 (IPS) - The head of the U.S. federal government agency that doles out benefits to disabled veterans is under fire for saying Bible study is "more important than doing [my] job."... (continue)

HEALTH-US:Vets Sue Gov't for "Shameful Failures"
    on 24/07/2007 01.47.52 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, Jul 23 (IPS) - Two veterans' groups sued the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) in federal court in San Francisco Monday for alleged "shameful failures" to help tens of thousands of Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans who suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD.... (continue)

HEALTH-US:Troubled Soldier Gets Demoted, Not Treated
    on 06/07/2007 15.25.22 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, Jul 6 (IPS) - Cody Miranda joined the U.S. Marine Corps when he was 17 years old. He loved the military and hoped to spend his entire career in the service.... (continue)

RIGHTS-US:Good Enough to Serve, Not to Stay
    on 28/06/2007 19.54.18 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, Jun 28 - The wife of a U.S. soldier missing in action in Iraq remains in legal limbo this week, even after the Department of Homeland security dropped deportation proceedings against her.... (continue)

FILM:U.S. Military's 'Don't Ask' Policy and One Gay Marine
    on 22/06/2007 17.11.14 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, Jun 22 - Jeff Key grew up in a small, conservative community in rural Alabama in the south-east United States. A large man standing well over six feet tall, he had already come out as gay to his friends and family, graduated with a degree in theatre, and moved to Los Angeles when, at age 34, he decided to join the Marine Corps.... (continue)

HEALTH-US:Surviving War, Slowly Dying at Home
    on 12/06/2007 17.37.58 GMT
Aaron Glantz LOS ANGELES, Jun 12 (IPS) - The U.S. Vets Westside Residence Hall is a hulking eight-story structure a few blocks from Los Angeles International Airport. It's the largest transitional housing and employment centre for homeless veterans in the country, hosting 700 veterans annually.... (continue)

EDUCATION-US:A Rough Road From Boot Camp to College
    on 06/06/2007 14.18.38 GMT
Aaron Glantz ARCATA, California, U.S., Jun 6 (IPS) - Derek Adams played with his two-year-old son on the grounds of Veterans Upward Bound, an outreach and education programme for former U.S. military service members outside the campus of California State University, Humboldt.... (continue)

HEALTH-US:For Some Vets, No Way Out of the War Zone
    on 25/05/2007 13.30.46 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, May 25 (IPS) - The widow of an Iraq war veteran who was shot and killed by the Maryland State Police is talking to a lawyer after a state attorney's report released this month found the troopers' behaviour was "flawed," "assaultive" and "militaristic".... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Latino Soldiers Who Refused Iraq Speak Out
    on 18/05/2007 19.29.32 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, May 18 (IPS) - A U.S. Army medic who refused to load his gun in Iraq and then escaped through a base window in Germany rather than be deployed a second time returned home to Los Angeles this week after serving six months in a U.S. military prison.... (continue)

HEALTH-US:Suicidal and Facing a Third Tour of Iraq
    on 15/05/2007 14.32.26 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, May 15 (IPS) - At the beginning of May, Corporal Cloy Richards tried to kill himself.... (continue)

POLITICS-US/IRAQ:Ex-Soldier Recalls Horrors of Abu Ghraib
    on 30/04/2007 15.44.28 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, Apr 30 (IPS) - Saturday marked the third anniversary of the Abu Ghraib prison scandal. On Apr. 28, 2004 CBS broadcast the first graphic photos of torture inside of the U.S.-run prison in Iraq on its 60 Minutes II programme.... (continue)

THEATRE-U.S.:Iraq, Afghanistan War Vets Find Relief in the Footlights
    on 22/04/2007 23.21.34 GMT
Aaron Glantz LOS ANGELES, Apr 22 (IPS) - The house lights go down and the stage lights come up on "The Wolf", the first production of VetStage, a non-profit theatre company run by veterans of the U.S.-led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. It opens with a funeral: a Roman Catholic priest preparing to deliver a eulogy for a U.S. soldier killed by a road-side bomb.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Civilian Court Sides With "Conscientious Objector"
    on 05/04/2007 18.24.32 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, Apr 5 (IPS) - University of California Santa Cruz student Robert Zabala joined the Marine Corps thinking it would be a "place where he could find security" after the death of his grandmother in 2003.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Peace Groups See Glimmer of Light
    on 26/03/2007 20.30.10 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, Mar 26 (IPS) - Peace activists reacted with cautious optimism to a vote by the U.S. House of Representatives Friday giving President George W. Bush an additional 100 billion dollars to fight the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. For the first time in four years, the appropriation contains a requirement that combat operations in Iraq cease by September 2008.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Congressman Trades Iraq Vote for Spinach
    on 23/03/2007 00.23.02 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, Mar 22 (IPS) - A liberal Congressman who represents California's picturesque central coast region is under fire for trading his vote on the Iraq war for spinach.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Key Democrat Pressured to Cut War Funding
    on 21/03/2007 15.24.04 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, Mar 21 (IPS) - Peace activists entered their 10th day camped outside House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's San Francisco home Wednesday, the latest in an almost daily barrage of demonstrations, vigils and local government votes designed to convince Pelosi to refuse President George W. Bush's 100-billion-dollar war funding request.... (continue)

HEALTH:US Ill-Equipped to Deal With Wave of Troubled Vets
    on 15/02/2007 15.43.00 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, Feb 15 (IPS) - Staff Sergeant Don Hanks had served 15 years in the U.S. Army before he spent a year running patrols in the heart of Iraq's Sunni triangle. He said he returned from the conflict a changed man.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Reprieve for Officer Who Denounced "Immoral War"
    on 08/02/2007 15.14.16 GMT
Aaron Glantz FORT LEWIS, Washington, Feb 8 (IPS) - The court-martial of the first commissioned U.S. military officer to refuse to serve in Iraq ended abruptly Wednesday when the military judge overseeing the proceedings declared a mistrial over a technicality.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Officer Who Wouldn't Serve Goes on Trial
    on 05/02/2007 13.03.38 GMT
Aaron Glantz TACOMA, Washington, Feb 5 (IPS) - Supporters of the first commissioned U.S. officer to refuse to serve in Iraq plan to pack the courtroom at Fort Lewis, Washington where First Lieutenant Ehren Watada will face a court martial today.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Iraq War Opponents Follow the Money
    on 01/02/2007 18.33.22 GMT
Aaron Glantz WASHINGTON, Feb 1 (IPS) - Senior Congressional Democrats are brushing off questions about cutting off funding for the Iraq war, and indicate they will do little to forcefully stop President George W. Bush from sending 21,500 additional U.S. troops to Iraq.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Anti-War Marches Draw Hundreds of Thousands
    on 28/01/2007 17.42.14 GMT
Aaron Glantz WASHINGTON, Jan 28 (IPS) - Peace activists from across the United States gathered in Washington Sarturday for what they said was the largest demonstration to date against the Iraq war.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Anti-War Groups Plan "Surge" on Washington
    on 24/01/2007 19.39.38 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, Jan 24 (IPS) - Peace activists from around the United States will converge on Washington Saturday for what organisers hope will be the largest demonstration to date against the Iraq war.... (continue)

HEALTH-US:Sick, Literally, of Fighting in Iraq
    on 11/01/2007 19.55.44 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, California, Jan 11 (IPS) - Susan Tileston hasn't seen her son, Levi Moddrelle, in more than two years. Levi served in the 101st Airborne Division in Afghanistan and then Iraq, where he was stationed for almost a year. He returned home for Christmas in 2003, but wasn't the same.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:More Subpoenas Come Down in Watada Case
    on 08/01/2007 20.25.58 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, California, Jan 8 (IPS) - In a case that could have repercussions for free speech and press freedom in the United States, the U.S. military has subpoenaed two peace activists and two journalists in its case against Lt. Ehren Watada, the first commissioned officer to be court-martialed for refusing to serve in Iraq.... (continue)

IRAQ:Terrified Soldiers Terrifying People
    on 08/01/2007 16.18.26 GMT
Dahr Jamail and Ali al-Fadhily... (continue)

HEALTH-US:Iraq Vets Left in Physical and Mental Agony
    on 03/01/2007 15.41.04 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, California, Jan 3 (IPS) - On New Year's Eve, the number of U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq passed 3,000. By Tuesday, the death toll had reached 3,004 -- 31 more than died in the Sep. 11 attacks on the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon.... (continue)

POLITICS-US/IRAQ:Hussein's Death Leaves Unanswered Questions
    on 30/12/2006 20.34.14 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, California, Dec 30 (IPS) - Iraqi-Americans reacted with sadness to the execution of Saddam Hussein Saturday, calling the former Iraqi president's death by hanging early this morning Baghdad time a missed opportunity for justice.... (continue)

BOOKS-US:"Zebra Murders" Recalls a City's Collective Punishment
    on 27/12/2006 21.53.26 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, California, Dec 27 (IPS) - It may seem like an unlikely place to look, but those concerned with stopping the spread of terrorism would be advised to check out "The Zebra Murders: A Season of Killing, Racial Madness and Civil Rights", a new book about a string of murders in 1970s San Francisco written by the city's first black police chief, Earl Sanders, and co-author Bennett Cohen.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Reporter Summoned to Testify Against War Resister
    on 15/12/2006 01.38.04 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, California, Dec 14 (IPS) - The U.S. military subpoenaed an independent journalist Thursday, demanding she testify as a witness for the prosecution of First Lt. Ehren Watada, the first commissioned officer to be court-marshaled for refusing to serve in Iraq.... (continue)

POLITICS:Natives of Guam Decry U.S. Expansion Plan
    on 12/12/2006 16.49.36 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, California, Dec 12 (IPS) - A Pentagon plan for a massive military build-up on the Pacific island of Guam is meeting with resistance by ethnic Chamorros who live there and the Chamorro diaspora in the United States.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Spying Won't Deter Us, Peace Groups Say
    on 29/11/2006 18.30.04 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCSICO, California, Nov 29 (IPS) - A coalition of U.S. peace groups are pressing ahead with plans for what they hope will be a massive march on Washington Jan. 27, even though newly released documents show the antiwar community is under Pentagon surveillance.... (continue)

FILM-IRAQ:A Glimpse of Life Under Occupation
    on 15/11/2006 14.07.18 GMT
Aaron Glantz* SAN FRANCISCO, California, Nov 15 (IPS) - The most honoured film about the Iraq war is opening at theaters across the United States this month.... (continue)

ELECTIONS-US:Antiwar Voters May Get Less Than They Bargained For
    on 10/11/2006 15.21.58 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, California, Nov 10 (IPS) - Democratic majorities in both the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate, and the resignation of Donald Rumsfeld as defence secretary, will not necessarily mean major changes for the war in Iraq, analysts say.... (continue)

U.S./IRAQ:A Convenient Verdict?
    on 06/11/2006 19.54.30 GMT
Emad Mekay* CAIRO, Nov 6 (IPS) - Saddam Hussein doesn't have many friends here, but the death sentence handed down Sunday against the former Iraqi president has invited accusations that the announcement was timed to influence the U.S. congressional elections set for Tuesday, only two days after the verdict.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Belafonte on Thinking Outside the Ballot Box
    on 31/10/2006 19.06.16 GMT
Aaron Glantz OAKLAND, California, Oct 31 (IPS) - Legendary musician and social justice activist Harry Belafonte grew up on the streets of Harlem, New York and Jamaica. After serving in World War II, he returned to New York and began a successful acting and singing career.... (continue)

POLITICS-US/IRAQ:"It's Time to Step Out"
    on 26/10/2006 14.03.50 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, California, Oct 26 (IPS) - For the first time since the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, active-duty members of the military are asking members of Congress to end the occupation of Iraq and bring U.S. soldiers home.... (continue)

HEALTH-US:Iraq Brings Wounds That Deepen With Time
    on 10/10/2006 21.34.44 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, California, Oct 10 (IPS) - A new report in this month's issue of the American Journal of Psychiatry finds that while a high percentage of soldiers returning from Iraq suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder, many do not show symptoms right away.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:More Dissention in the Ranks
    on 04/10/2006 16.11.36 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, California, Oct 4 (IPS) - A U.S. soldier who went AWOL -- away without leave -- over his opposition to the war in Iraq was incarcerated at the U.S. military's Mannheim prison in Germany Tuesday, pending an appeal in Washington this November.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:I'm a Veteran, and I Support/Despise This War
    on 26/09/2006 15:45:52 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, California, Sep 26 (IPS) - The 2006 U.S. Congressional elections are heating up, along with a proliferation of television ads featuring U.S. veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.... (continue)

RIGHTS-US:Jailed for Life, Migrant Says Justice Was Too Blind
    on 14/09/2006 15:44:26 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, California, Sep 14 (IPS) - A California immigrant serving a life sentence for lying to the Department of Motor Vehicles got a day in court Wednesday. Santos Reyes has already served six years for that crime, which he has never denied.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Soldier Who Chose Jail Over Iraq Goes Home
    on 06/09/2006 15:15:06 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, California, Sep 6 (IPS) - Last week, a 41-year-old U.S. army sergeant from Hinesville, Georgia was released from prison after serving 13 months of a 15-month sentence for refusing to board a plane bound for Iraq.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:An Army Minus One
    on 31/08/2006 22:50:04 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, California, Aug 31 (IPS) - On Thursday, 22-year-old Army Specialist Mark Wilkerson turned himself in to Fort Hood in Texas, after being AWOL (Absent Without Leave) for more than 18 months.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Kurdish "Thank You" a Republican Stunt?
    on 31/07/2006 15:17:06 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, California, Jul 31 (IPS) - Kurdish officials toured the United States last week to launch a massive advertising and public relations campaign thanking the United States for overthrowing Saddam Hussein and urging U.S. companies to invest in the region.... (continue)

IRAQ:A Story Left Incomplete
   By Sanjay Suri on 06/07/2006 21:39:54 GMT
LONDON, Jul 6 (IPS) - Alaa Hassan never did live to see publication of the last story he had filed. It got caught for a while, as stories sometimes are, in that no man's land between what a correspondent could reasonably get, and what an editor would really like.... (continue)

IRAQ:A Story IPS Never Wanted to Tell
   *By Aaron Glantz on 05/07/2006 20:18:02 GMT
LOS ANGELES, Jul 5 (IPS) - IPS contributor Alaa Hassan was killed on his way to work last Wednesday. He was 35 years old. He is survived by his mother, four brothers, five sisters and his new wife who is pregnant with their first child.... (continue)

IRAQ:IPS Reporter Shot and Killed in Baghdad
    on 05/07/2006 18:53:50 GMT
IPS Editors ROME, Jul 5 (IPS) - Iraqi journalist Alaa Hassan, who reported for the international news agency IPS (Inter Press Service), was shot and killed in Baghdad.... (continue)

/CORRECTED REPEAT*/IRAQ:Basra Begins to Fall Apart
   By Aaron Glantz and Alaa Hassan on 16/06/2006 09:11:50 GMT
BAGHDAD, Jun 16 (IPS) - Basra in the south of Iraq is beginning to splinter under increasing violence and sectarian divisions.... (continue)

IRAQ:Zarqawi Killing May Not End Violence
   By Aaron Glantz and Alaa Hassan on 08/06/2006 19:46:28 GMT
BAGHDAD, Jun 8 (IPS) - Iraqis seem divided over the killing of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian-born leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq.... (continue)

IRAQ:'U.S. Military Hides Many More Hadithas'
   By Aaron Glantz and Alaa Hassan on 06/06/2006 17:55:42 GMT
BAGHDAD, Jun 6 (IPS) - An Iraqi doctor who was in Haditha during a deadly U.S. raid last year says there are many more stories like that in Haditha that are yet untold.... (continue)

IRAQ:Basra Begins to Fall Apart
   By Aaron Glantz and Alaa Hassan on 26/05/2006 12:00:08 GMT
BAGHDAD, May 26 (IPS) - Basra in the south of Iraq is beginning to splinter under increasing violence and sectarian divisions.... (continue)

MEDIA-US:And Now the News... Or Is It an Ad?
    on 07/04/2006 16:01:42 GMT
Aaron Glantz SAN FRANCISCO, California, Apr 7 (IPS) - If you had tuned into New York's WCBS-TV on Feb. 22, you would have gotten some very good news about glucosamine and chondroitin sulfate, two dietary supplements the anchors said can help blunt pain from osteoarthritis.... (continue)

RIGHTS-VIETNAM:Agent Orange Leaves Stigma Trail
    on 16/03/2006 03:58:28 GMT
Ngoc Nguyen and Aaron Glantz... (continue)

LABOUR-VIETNAM:Wildcat Strikes Pay Off
    on 17/01/2006 12:07:34 GMT
Aaron Glantz and Ngoc Nguyen... (continue)

LAOS:Tribal Group Emigres Return Home
   By Aaron Glantz and Ngoc Nguyen on 23/12/2005 09:48:22 GMT
HANOI, Dec 23 (IPS) - This month marks the 30-year anniversary of the communist takeover of Laos on Dec. 2, 1975 and the journey of a group of Laotian-Americans back to Southeast Asia, some for the first time.... (continue)

ECONOMY:China's Growth Bypassing Workers
    on 21/12/2005 10:15:32 GMT
Aaron Glantz HONG KONG, Dec 21 (IPS) - China's government kept a low profile at last week's WTO meetings although they were held in its own backyard, the "special administrative region" of Hong Kong. Its negotiators held no media briefings during or after negotiations and of the 1,100 NGOs and business groups accredited for the event, only five were from China.... (continue)

/REPEAT/WTO-SPECIAL:Farmers Get Violent as Trade Talks Fail
    on 18/12/2005 07:07:34 GMT
Aaron Glantz HONG KONG, Dec 18 (IPS) - It was a fight over rice. South Korean farmers battled police outside the halls where the week-long ministerial meet of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) was ending Sunday, with little progress on the issue of export subsidies that rich nations pay to keep their agriculture going and undercut farmers in developing countries.... (continue)

WTO-SPECIAL:Farmers Get Violent as Trade Talks Fail
    on 18/12/2005 04:33:56 GMT
Aaron Glantz HONG KONG, Dec 18 (IPS) - It was a fight over rice. South Korean farmers battled police outside the halls where the week-long ministerial meet of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) was ending Sunday, with little progress on the issue of export subsidies that rich nations pay to keep their agriculture going and undercut farmers in developing countries.... (continue)

WTO-SPECIAL:Red Carpet for Delegates, Activists Get Harassment
    on 13/12/2005 09:14:08 GMT
Aaron Glantz HONG KONG, Dec 13 (IPS)- After months of rumours that opponents of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) will wreak havoc on the city, activists here say Hong Kong authorities have launched a targeted campaign of harassment.... (continue)

POLITICS:Viet Cong Advice for Iraqi Resistance
    on 10/11/2005 03:38:48 GMT
Aaron Glantz* HANOI, Nov 10 (IPS)- Is Iraq another Vietnam? Tran Dac Loi should know. The secretary-general of the Vietnam Peace and Development Foundation grew up in Hanoi dodging bombs dropped by the United States Air Force, while his father fought in the successful guerilla war in the country's central highlands.... (continue)

HEALTH:Factory Fowl No Answer to Bird Flu
    on 03/11/2005 13:17:54 GMT
Aaron Glantz and Ngoc Nguyen... (continue)

ECONOMY:US Keeps Vietnam Waiting at WTO Door
   By Aaron Glantz and Ngoc Nguyen on 25/10/2005 18:01:00 GMT
HANOI, Oct 25 (IPS) - Vietnam's attempts to enter the World Trade Organization (WTO) have been blocked by what the country's negotiators say are unacceptable new demands by Washington that the socialist country change the way its economy works, more than it already has.... (continue)

POLITICS-US:Why Casey Sheehan Was Killed
   By Aaron Glantz* on 19/08/2005 15:17:10 GMT
DENVER, Colorado, Aug 19 (IPS) - For nearly two weeks, Cindy Sheehan has been camped outside George W. Bush's ranch in Crawford, Texas, demanding a meeting with the U.S. president.... (continue)

/ARTS WEEKLY/-IRAQ:Book Checks Hearts and Minds, Won or Lost
   By Katherine Stapp on 12/07/2005 07:06:08 GMT
NEW YORK, Jul 16 (IPS) - When journalist Aaron Glantz drove into Iraq from Jordan in a battered orange and white checkered taxi on Apr. 29, 2003, he was surprised to find most of the civilian neighbourhoods in Baghdad relatively unscathed by the U.S.-led bombing campaign.... (continue)

U.S.:No Place Like Home for Poor Under Bush Housing Plan?
   By Susan Wood on 31/05/2005 05:08:16 GMT
NEW YORK, May 31 (IPS) - The administration of President George W. Bush, having slashed hundreds of millions of dollars from public housing programmes, is proposing legislation that would reverse a decades-long federal policy that helped provide decent housing for some of the neediest people in the United States, say housing advocates.... (continue)

POLITICS:New Iraqi Gov't to Confront Future with U.S. Military
    on 06/04/2005 21:33:54 GMT
Aaron Glantz WASHINGTON, Apr 6 (IPS) - One of the first orders of business for the new Iraqi government under Kurdish leader Jalal Talabani and Shi'ite Islamist Ibrahim Jaafari will be to strike a deal with the United States military over the terms and conditions of the 150,000-troop-strong U.S. military presence.... (continue)

IRAQ:Where Abducted People Are An Expensive Product
   By Aaron Glantz on 11/03/2005 15:32:08 GMT
KIRKUK, Mar. 11 (IPS) - Whatever the circumstances, Italian journalist Giuliana Sgrena is free at last. But questions remain at what price.... (continue)

IRAQ:Shia Party Rises From the Ashes
   By Aaron Glantz on 28/02/2005 12:53:58 GMT
ARBIL, Feb 28 (IPS) - In the early days of the U.S. occupation of Iraq, when the international media was discovering mass graves throughout the country, journalists of all types were documenting the full scope of the old regime's brutality.... (continue)

IRAN:'Peaceful Dictatorship Better than Democratic Chaos'
   By Aaron Glantz on 23/02/2005 11:40:02 GMT
ARBIL, Iraq, Feb 23 (IPS) - The two Kurdish guerrilla fighters, if anyone, should have wanted someone to overthrow the regime in Iran. They have just escaped after five years in an Iranian prison for membership of the banned Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iran.... (continue)