Amnesty International condemns sentencing/NY Times blog holds forum on jailed journalists in Iran/WMA signs Condoleezza Rice....

Obama calls on CIA to chart new course
After banning harsh interrogation tactics, he tells the agency that the way forward is by deploying 'both our power and the power of our values.'
By Mark Silva
April 21, 2009


Reporting from Washington -- After banning and then publicizing the most controversial interrogation practices employed by the CIA, President Obama called on the agency Monday to live up to its mission under its new marching orders.

Obama called the CIA "an indispensable tool, the tip of the spear" in national security as he addressed its employees while standing before a marble wall with 89 stars representing, anonymously, agents who have died in the line of duty.

• Emanuel dismisses calls to investigate Justice Department memos
• Panetta bans CIA use of contract workers for interrogations, security
"We live in dangerous times," Obama said at the CIA headquarters in Virginia. "I am going to need you more than ever."

Obama last week released legal memos written by the Bush-era Justice Department that gave the CIA authority to use harsh interrogation tactics on Al Qaeda suspects -- including waterboarding, in which drowning is simulated.

The release of the memos has drawn criticism from some current and former intelligence officials and Bush administration officials.

Former Vice President Dick Cheney has continued to defend waterboarding and other banned tactics. He demanded the declassification of the results of the interrogations to prove the value of the techniques.

However, Atty. Gen. Eric H. Holder Jr. has called waterboarding "torture." Along with other methods, it is forbidden under orders Obama signed in his first week in office.

"I have put an end to the interrogation techniques described in those memos," Obama said Monday. "I believe that our nation is stronger and more secure when we deploy the full measure of both our power and the power of our values -- including the rule of law."

CIA Director Leon E. Panetta drove the same message home: "We can fully protect our nation and our values at the same time," he said Monday.

The White House sought to show that it is leaving the past behind by announcing that no CIA agents would be prosecuted for interrogations sanctioned under the Bush administration. Obama's advisors also have suggested that the highest-level officials who authorized the practices will be immune.

But the White House came under new pressure Monday to leave open the possibility of prosecutions.

Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, asked Obama in a letter that pledges of immunity "be held in reserve" until her committee had completed an investigation.

The panel is expected to review thousands of classified CIA cables and other materials describing the interrogations of self-proclaimed Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and others. Feinstein said the review would take eight months.

The released Justice Department memos show that the CIA waterboarded Mohammed 183 times in 2003. Another suspected senior Al Qaeda operative known as Abu Zubaydah was waterboarded 83 times that same year.

The numbers are far higher than any previously reported, raising questions about the effectiveness of the method.

But Cheney maintained that the techniques were crucial to national security. In a FOX News interview, he said: "I know specifically of reports that I read, that I saw, that lay out what we learned through the interrogation process and what the consequences were for the country."

Obama acknowledged the widespread criticism, but the White House maintains that much of what was disclosed had been known and written about.

mdsilva@tribune.com

Greg Miller in the Washington bureau contributed to this report.



WMA signs Condoleezza Rice
Agency pacts with outgoing Secretary of State

Former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has signed with the William Morris Agency, the first step in what is being called the �reinvention and evolution� of her career.
The agency said Rice will focus on books, lecture appearances, philanthropic activities and �new business initiatives in the media, sports and communications sectors.�
Rice will be represented by WMA chief Jim Wiatt and Wayne Kabak.
Kabak said that Rice will be writing two books: One will focus on her diplomatic career, and the other will be about her parents, the Rev. John Wesley Rice Jr. and Angelena Ray, whom her daughter has referred to as �educational evangelists� for their influence on pursuing academic excellence.
The diplomatic memoir will probably be written first, Kabak said.
If the past is any guide, Rice will be among a flood of former administration figures pursuing book deals and other projects.
President Bush says he is planning to write his memoirs, and Laura Bush recently landed a deal with a publisher for her tome.
The agency currently represents House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Sen. Byron Dorgan, Sen. Jim Webb and former Sen. Fred Thompson. In the past the agency has repped former President Gerald Ford and his wife Betty, Gov. Mitt Romne

NY Times blog holds forum on jailed journalists in Iran
21Apr

Categories: Info
The New York Times Room For Debate blog asked four people who have been jailed in Iran or who have worked with journalists who have been detained there to comment on their experiences. Read the remembrances of Iranian journalist Roozbeh Mirebrahimi, mortgage banker Ali Shakeri, president of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Jeffrey Gedmin, and Joel Simon, the executive director of The Committee to Protect Journalists.

AFTRA Urges President Obama to Use ‘Full Force’ on Behalf of Roxana
Posted: 20 Apr 2009 06:29 PM PDT
Roberta Reardon, National President of the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, sent the following letter today to President Barack Obama urging him to pressure the Iranian government to expedite a review of the case against American journalist Roxana Saberi who was convicted and sentenced to eight years in prison by an Iranian court last week. President Reardon sent a copy of the letter to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Dear President Obama:
On behalf of the more than 70,000 members of the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists—the people who entertain and inform America—whom I represent as AFTRA National President, I urge you to please use the full force of your administration to pressure the government of Iran to overturn the egregious eight-year prison sentence of American journalist Roxana Saberi imposed on her last week by an Iranian court.
Ms. Saberi is a professional journalist who has worked for a number of highly-respected news organizations around the world, including the BBC, and whose work has been broadcast across the country on NPR and other national news outlets. Her education and professional career are characterized by an unfailing commitment to excellence, accuracy, respect for others, and an open-minded fairness in reporting a story.
She is an American citizen who has chosen to live in Iran to pursue her career, further her education, and finish her work. Although not an AFTRA member, Ms. Saberi is an esteemed journalist who reported to the world the stories of people unable to make their own voices heard. She is a reporter who told the truth, and in doing so, angered the powerful elite.
We must protect those who speak truth to power, not punish them. I and my fellow AFTRA members are concerned about Ms. Saberi’s well-being, and we are deeply troubled by what appears to be a grave miscarriage of justice and a violation of her rights as an American citizen living and working abroad.
As the National President of AFTRA, the union that represents the voices and faces of professional broadcast journalists around the nation, I urge your administration to request that the Iranian government expedite a formal review of Ms. Saberi’s case and to release and return her to the United States as soon as possible.
I appreciate your attention to the concerns of AFTRA members, and I am available to speak with you at your convenience about this very serious matter.
In solidarity,
Roberta Reardon National President AFTRA

Amnesty International condemns sentencing
20Apr
Categories: Statements
The human rights organization Amnesty International issued a press release Monday criticizing Roxana’s conviction and sentencing. Its blog gives an overview of Amnesty International’s recent activity concerning her case.

Categories: Statements
Iran and North Korea should immediately free journalists who are being used as apparent political hostages in their wider diplomatic disputes with the United States, the International Press Institute said today.
The sentencing of an Iranian-American radio reporter on espionage charges last week and the continued detention of two American journalists who were seized in North Korea in March further erode chances for diplomatic settlements over the nations’ nuclear ambitions and only augment their reputations as leading suppressers of free speech.
“It is beyond contempt that these journalists are being held hostage to the fortunes of political brinkmanship by countries who share an outdated belief that this is the best way to conduct negotiations on difficult international subjects”, IPI Director David Dadge said. “Journalists are neutral observers who gather information. Accusing them of being spies is just another desperate way for authoritarian rulers to smother the truth and delude their populations”.
On 18 April, an Iranian court sentenced Roxana Saberi to eight years in prison for espionage after a one-day, secret trial. The US-born reporter was arrested in February, allegedly for buying wine. Saberi, a free-lance journalist, has filed reports on Iran for public broadcasters in Britain and the United States and also worked for the Fox News channel in the United States.
The two journalists detained for entering North Korea from across the Chinese border have been identified as Euna Lee and Laura Ling of US-based Current TV. They were captured on 17 March while apparently preparing a report on the rising number of North Koreans who are seeking refuge in China. Leaders in Pyongyang have been silent on the detention of the women since their capture.
The sentencing of Saberi comes after years of tensions between Tehran and Washington over Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s push to develop a nuclear energy industry that the United States, Europe and Israel contend is a mask for building atomic weapons. Since President Barack Obama took office in January, he has reversed his predecessor’s policy of shunning talks with Tehran, but the Iranian government has so far shown little interest in making concessions on the nuclear issue.
IPI’s Justice Denied Campaign has also condemned the Ahmadinejad government’s handling of Abdolvahed Botimar, a journalist and environmental activist, and his cousin, editor and journalist Adnan Hassanpour, who were tried in secret and accused of being “enemies of God”. Both men were sentenced to death, but in September 2008, a court of appeal overturned the death sentence against Hassanpour. He was then charged with espionage.
North Korea, meanwhile, has intensified its isolation by launching a missile over Japan and expelling international experts who were sent to monitor the country’s nuclear experiments. According to IPI’s World Press Freedom Review 2008, North Korea has the worst press freedom record in the world, with the country’s repressive dictatorship retaining complete control of the media while maintaining a blanket ban on foreign journalists.

Re – Edited by :MUKTI MAJID on behalf of various source/complementary