Need to know: Residents of the city of Hama in Syria are gearing up for a potentially massive assault by Syrian security forces, an attempt to quell the growing uprising. Security forces moved tanks and armored vehicles to the edges of the city overnight, while some residents attempted to block the road leading to the city's main residential neighborhoods to try and prevent the advance and, what could be, a massacre. GlobalPost's correspondent in Damascus, meanwhile, spoke with one soldier serving inside Syria who gave indications that the regime of President Bashar Al-Assad is feeling the pressure. The United States, or an unnamed senior official to be accurate, believes Pakistan's spy agency is reponsible for carrying out extra-judicial killings, including the murder of a Pakistani journalist who had recently written a report about militants infiltrating the country's military, according to the New York Times. Obama administration officials, concnerned about a worsening relationship with Pakistan, will deliberate in the coming days how to present these findings to the Pakistani government, the Times article said. Maybe they will leak it to the press? Just a thought. |
| Want to know: Just when the rehabilitation of Dominique Strauss-Khan had begun, he gets knocked back down again. The former chief of the International Monetary Fund and presidential hopeful in France was released from prison after the credibility of the hotel maid who accused him of rape was called into question and the case fell apart. Soon after, however, a French journalist came forward to announce that she was filing a separate lawsuit also accusing him of sexual assault. Lawyers for Strauss-Khan quickly counter-sued for what they said was a "false accusation." The most direct account of the housekeeper's version of events, meanwhile, has been obtained by the press. It is the account she gave to a counselor at St. Luke's Roosevelt Hospital Center in New York, where she was treated just hours after she said she was attacked. The account suggests that a serious sexual assault took place. |
| Dull but important: After just one week on the job, Japan's new minister in charge of disaster reconstruction has resigned, putting further pressure on the already unpopular government of Prime Minister Naoto Kan. The minister resigned after suggesting that governors would get no money from the central government unless they submitted strong rebuilding proposals. The Spanish economy's difficulties, including a soaring unemployment rate, have led to a wave of foreclosures, with home repossessions rising since the real estate market collapsed in 2008. But in recent months, victims of the crisis have been striking back at lenders. They have started blocking the doors of properties due to be repossessed so that officials cannot deliver eviction orders. The "15-M" or May 15 civic movement, which staged sit-in protests in cities across Spain this spring, has thrown its weight behind the anti-eviction initiative. |
| Just because: When leading Cuban writers and intellectuals want to circulate their views in a journal with a serious readership on the island these days, they turn to an unlikely publisher: the Catholic Church. Church dioceses around the world have publications and newsletters, of course, often engaging with the pressing topics of the day. But in Cuba, where the newsprint and airwaves are the sole dominion of the state, church-run magazines have become a critical forum for debates on the country's earthly problems - its faltering economic model, or the deep political divisions between Miami and Havana. |
| Wacky: It seems like it must have been a flawless plan. After a conjugal visit, which apparently went well, a woman tried to sneak her husband out of the Mexican prison he was supposed to be in for 20 years - by stuffing him into a suitcase. Guards said the woman looked nervous and was wheeling an oddly bulky black bag when she left, which, understandbly, raised their suspicions. In Indonesia, a monkey has taken a camera and turned it on humans, managing to take photos of stunning beauty. Check it out. |
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