Peace and Security

June 19, 2008 - Blackwater Worldwide CEO Erik Prince, President Gary Jackson, and spokesperson Anne Tyrrell traveled from the company's compound in Moyock, N.C.

April 28, 2008 - That's the question posed in an article published today by CommonDreams.org and written by Ann Wright, a veteran of the U.S. Army and Army Reserves and a former U.S. diplomat who resigned from the State Department in 2003 over her opposition to the Iraq war.

April 8, 2008 - The Senate Foreign Relations Committee will hold a hearing tomorrow titled "Closing Legal Loopholes: Prosecuting Sexual Assaults and Other Violent Crimes Committed Overseas by American Civilians in a Combat Environment."

April 7, 2008 - The U.S. State Department has renewed its Iraq security contract with Blackwater Worldwide despite the FBI's still-unfinished investigation into last year's massacre of civilians in Baghdad's Nisour Square by employees of the North Carolina-based mercenary firm. The deal, which was up for renewal on May 7, has been extended for another year.

April 4, 2008 - The Nation published a story today about another case involving a woman working for Texas-based defense contractor KBR who alleges she was gang-raped in Iraq. Lisa Smith, the pseudonym of a 42-year-old paramedic from Texas, claims she was drugged and then sexually assaulted by a U.S.

March 7, 2008 - In last week's installment of Friday dogblogging, we brought you a feel-good story about a program that rescues dogs that have become companions of U.S. soldiers in Iraq. This week we have a sad report about soldiers' alleged mistreatment of animals.

February 21, 2008 - For year, British officials denied involvement in U.S. "extraordinary rendition" flights, like those that the Institute revealed last year started in North Carolina and led to torture of terror suspects.