Prisoners

A leading Democratic senator said Sunday that independent investigators should determine whether Bush administration officials ought to face charges over the harsh interrogation techniques used against suspected terrorists. The White House had hoped to let the attorney general make that call. Other liberal Democratic lawmakers appearing on the Sunday news shows joined Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) in pressuring the Obama administration to pursue investigations into the interrogation policies.

Paul House, a Tennessee death row inmate, was just one vote away from possible execution when a divided Supreme Court said three years ago that new DNA evidence called for reopening his case. The Tennessee Supreme Court already had rejected his appeals, as had the U.S. Court of Appeals in Cincinnati.

U.S. officials have persuaded the tiny Pacific island nation of Palau to accept some of the Chinese Muslims held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, representing a major step in the Obama administration's plan to close the prison. In a statement released to the Associated Press today, Palau President Johnson Toribiong said his government had "agreed to accommodate the United States of America's request to temporarily resettle in Palau up to 17 ethnic Uighur detainees . . . subject to periodic review."

Stymied by Congress so far, the White House is considering issuing an executive order to indefinitely imprison a small number of Guantanamo detainees considered too dangerous to prosecute or release, two administration officials said Friday. No final decisions have been made. One of the officials said the order, if issued, would not take effect until after the Oct. 1 start of the 2010 fiscal year.

The young man waved a pistol at them. "I am your judge," he said as he aimed his weapon at the faces of the prisoners, who were protesting their innocence and loudly complaining about their treatment. "If you shout again, I can shoot," he continued. "If you are brave enough to go out on the streets to protest, you should have the guts to be brave here too." The book publisher, who had been arrested at his office, said he was speechless.

A man charged with shooting a prominent Kansas doctor who performed late-term abortions has been advocating through mailings from his jail cell that such killings are justifiable and communicating with individuals on the fringes of the antiabortion movement, weeks after suggesting others might be planning similar attacks. Scott Roeder, 51, is charged with first-degree murder and aggravated assault in the May 31 death of Dr.

The statement posted on the lauraandeuna.com website said it all: "Our girls are coming home . . . we are counting the seconds to hold Laura and Euna in our arms." In some circles the release of journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee revolved around complex questions of nuclear security and global politics.

A Myanmar court convicted pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi today of violating her house arrest, but the head of the military-ruled country said that she could serve a 1 1/2-year sentence under house arrest. The court initially sentenced Suu Kyi to three years in prison. But after a five-minute recess, the country's home minister entered the courtroom and read aloud a special order from junta chief Than Shwe. The order said that Than Shwe was cutting the sentence in half to 1 1/2 years and that it could be served under house arrest.

An arms dealer arrested by U.S. agents in a 2008 sting operation at a Bangkok hotel could go free this week after a Thai judge's unexpected decision Tuesday to reject an American request for extradition. Bangkok Criminal Court Judge Chittakorn Pattanasiri ruled that Viktor Bout's alleged crimes, which U.S. officials say involved a Colombian terrorist organization, actually would be classified as political offenses. Extradition is not allowed for political offenses. According to an indictment, Bout was attempting to sell more than 700 surface-to-air missiles, a massive cache of automatic weapons, and airplanes and helicopters to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, which the U.S. considers a terrorist group.

Nearly a month later, she can't erase images of the dying young man from her mind. All but two of his upper teeth had been knocked out. His nails had been pulled out. His head had been bashed in. His kidneys had stopped working. But what most disturbed her, she said, were the stitches around his anus -- a sign, the nurses told her, that he had been raped. Iranian reformist websites and activists in recent days had identified 19-year-old Mohammad K. as one of the protesters arrested during Iran's postelection unrest, locked up in the Kahrizak detention facility and severely beaten.