Witness to a World Of Defiant Enemies: Interview with a 22-year-old Afghan describing the Taliban cave complex near Shahikot in which he says he was a captive during last week’s battle. “(The man’s) credibility was difficult to judge with certainty; his very name could have been an alias. But three hours of detailed questioning left little doubt that he had spent time in the caves with the anti-American forces during the battle of Shahikot, whether he was taken there willingly or not.” Among other details, he describes how the Afghan and foreign fighters freely “slip into nearby villages despite a security belt established by U.S. and allied Afghan forces.” Washington Post

Domestic Disturbance: the growing labor movement among New York’s nannies and housekeepers. Village Voice

US sends suspects to face torture: “The US has been secretly sending prisoners suspected of al-Qaida connections to countries where torture during interrogation is legal, according to US diplomatic and intelligence sources. Prisoners moved to such countries as Egypt and Jordan can be subjected to torture and threats to their families to extract information sought by the US in the wake of the September 11 attacks.” Guardian UK

Remains of 11 Firefighters Are Found at Trade Center NY Times

National Review

editor suggests nuking Mecca The American Prospect

Improving the Way Humans Walk NY Times

Andy Borowitz: Gore loses bid to run ‘shadow government’:

Just days after it was revealed that there is a “shadow government” in place underground somewhere outside of Washington, D.C., former Vice-President Al Gore was trounced in his bid to become President of it.

Subterranean voters gave the former vice-president a scant 38% of the vote, with 59% going to Buford T. Bush, an amateur motocross competitor and a distant cousin of President George W. Bush. JWR

Mugabe’s villainy and Africa’s cynical complicity: ‘(Opposition candidate) Mr Tsvangirai, and the men and women who have conquered their fear in his support, deserve the unstinting support of all African leaders with any claim to democratic legitimacy. They are not getting that support. The Organisation of African Unity, true to its reputation as a despots’ club, has pronounced the poll to be “transparent, credible, free and fair”. Kenya’s Daniel arap Moi has congratulated his “dear brother” on the “confidence and high esteem the people of Zimbabwe hold in you”. Tanzania’s President delights in his “richly deserved” triumph. The observers sent by South Africa’s Thabo Mbeki, ferociously mocked at home for their complacency, term the outcome “legitimate”, though they could not quite bring out the words “free and fair”.’ The Times of London

America is becoming its own worst enemy,” says Anatole Kaletsky in The Times of London.

In the immediate aftermath of September 11, the consensus in Britain and most of Europe could be described as morally sympathetic but pragmatically hostile…

Today, the reaction to Vice-President Cheney’s anti-Iraq mission is the mirror image of last year’s view about Afghanistan. The world is emotionally hostile to President Bush’s belligerent and overweening rhetoric. Even Washington’s best friends abroad resent American arrogance and are forced to acknowledge publicly, as Jack Straw did last month, that Mr Bush’s “axis of evil” campaign is motivated as much by domestic political calculations as by legitimate security concerns. Yet despite the emotional hostility and the public expressions of distaste, politicians all over the world are quietly offering Mr Bush practical reassurance…

Unfortunately for America and the world, the tacit support for US policy on Iraq today may prove every bit as misguided as were the anxieties about Afghanistan last year.

Exploding star may have sparked Earth disaster: “Piecing together clues from astronomy, paleontology and geology, scientists have proposed that an ancient supernova may have damaged the protective ozone layer around the Earth and wreaked havoc on terrestrial life.

The researchers theorize that a group of young stars prone to short, cataclysmic lives passed relatively near our solar system several million years ago.” CNN