O RLY?

Irony is officially dead.

The U.S. is concerned about the centralization of power and democratic
backsliding ahead of Russia's legislative and presidential elections in
December and March. Putin will step down next year as president. He has
said he would lead the ticket of the main pro-Kremlin party in the
parliamentary elections and could take the prime minister's job later.

Rice sought opinions and assessments of the situation from eight prominent
rights leaders.
...

Lyudmila Alexeyeva of the Moscow Helsinki Group told the Interfax news
agency her organization sees "the purposeful construction of an
authoritarian society and an onslaught on the people's rights, elections
are being turned into farce, and human rights and opposition organizations
are experiencing pressure."

Alexander Brod, head of the Moscow Human Rights Bureau, said the
discussions touched on "authoritarianism and the crisis of human rights."
He said he disagreed with "the opinion that we had a flourishing democracy
in the 1990s and that we have a setback now."

"Not all is ideal in America, either. We see protests against the war in
Iraq and violations of human rights on the part of security services and
violations of human rights in countering terrorism," Brod said.

Vladimir Lukin, the government-appointed human rights ombudsman, was
quoted by Interfax as saying he told Rice that human rights should be
discussed in a dialogue rather lecturing in a "doomsday" style.

Doomed To Repeat

from Stars & Stripes

Under cover of night, Baghdad wall is built


By Monte Morin, Stars and Stripes
Mideast edition, Wednesday, June 6, 2007

Mike Pryor / Courtesy of U.S. Army From left, Iraqi police commander Lt. Col. Ahmed Abdullah, an interpreter, and 1st Sgt. Phong Tran, of the 2nd Battalion, 319th Airborne Field Artillery Regiment, survey a section of the wall in Baghdad's Adhamiyah district. Sean Ransford / Courtesy of U.S. Army A contractor helps emplace 12-foot-high concrete barriers along a road in Adhamiyah, Baghdad.

Construction of a controversial, three-mile blast wall in one of Baghdad’s most troubled neighborhoods was completed recently, following three months of grueling labor and heated protests from Iraqi residents and government officials.

The barrier, which consists of thousands of 12-foot-high concrete slabs, or T-walls, rings much of Adhamiyah — an island of Sunni families in Baghdad’s predominantly Shiite east side.

Engineers with the 82nd Airborne Division’s 2nd Brigade Combat Team lowered the final 7-ton slab into place in the early morning darkness of May 28, according to a U.S. military statement issued Tuesday.

U.S. commanders say the barrier will make Adhamiyah a safer neighborhood by restricting incoming and outgoing vehicle traffic to several guarded checkpoints. The project is part of an overall attempt by U.S. forces to quell sectarian violence in the embattled capital.

The plan triggered harsh criticism from both Sunnis and Shiites, who saw darker motives in the wall’s construction. While some compared it to Israel’s West Bank security wall, others insisted the project was part of a larger plan to divide the city into a maze of “gated communities.”

U.S. commanders insisted that this was not the case and that the wall was a temporary security measure.

Troops worked at night to build the wall, enduring attacks from insurgents and hauling concrete barriers and work equipment down roads heavily mined by roadside bombs. In one incident, the brigade’s comamnder, Col. Billy Don Farris, was shot and wounded by a sniper while inspecting the wall.

“We’re exhausted,” Lt. Eric Brumfield, a platoon leader with the 2nd BCT’s 407th Support Battalion, was quoted as saying in the release. “We’re tired of seeing that wall every night. But in the end, we did it. We were able to fight through the [roadside bombs] and the publicity and everything else and got it done.”

article

For The Record...

"mistakes were made" means "crimes were committed but we don't care"..