Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: longnshort who wrote (331859)	4/5/2007 10:23:47 AM
From: Road Walker	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1574854

Gunmen kill nearly 20 Iraqi, foreign troops By Dean Yates 50 minutes ago Gunmen have killed nearly 20 Iraqi, British and American soldiers in the past 24 hours, officials said on Thursday, underscoring how deadly the country remains four years after the U.S.-led invasion. The attacks took place in Baghdad, near the northern city of Mosul and the southern oil hub of Basra. Four British soldiers and an interpreter were killed by a roadside bomb that destroyed their armored fighting vehicle when they were ambushed on the outskirts of Basra, a British military spokesman said. "The unit was involved in an operation elsewhere. As they were on they way back from the operation it was targeted by a roadside bomb in conjunction with small-arms fire and rocket-propelled grenades," he said. The nationality of the civilian interpreter was unclear. The British military denied accusations by Iraqi police that British troops had stormed a police checkpoint close to the scene of the attack shortly afterwards and beaten some police. Six British soldiers have now been killed in Iraq this week, making it one of the deadliest for British forces to date. At least 140 British soldiers have now been killed during the Iraq war. More than 3,260 U.S. soldiers have been killed. Gunmen also killed 10 Iraqi soldiers and wounded one in an attack on Thursday on their checkpoint near Mosul, an army source said. The source said at least 40 gunmen attacked the checkpoint at dawn northwest of Mosul, setting their vehicles on fire and seizing their weapons. Separately, four American soldiers were killed by two roadside bombs in and around Baghdad on Wednesday, the U.S. military said. Those attacks followed a relatively quiet period in Baghdad, where U.S. and Iraqi forces have deployed thousands more troops to enforce a new security crackdown seen as a last-ditch attempt to stop the country tearing itself apart. Sectarian violence between Sunni Arabs and majority Shi'ite Muslims has escalated since the bombing of a Shi'ite shrine a year ago. Since the U.S. invasion in March 2003, tens of thousands of Iraqis have been killed and millions displaced. BIG CRATER The attack in Basra tempered jubilation among British troops in Iraq after Iran sent home 15 British military personnel it had held for two weeks after seizing them in the northern Gulf. The Basra blast left a crater in the road at least a meter (yard) deep and several meters across. "We heard two explosions that shook the house. I went out and saw one armored vehicle that was completely destroyed and another with less damage," said one resident. Prime Minister Tony Blair said in February Britain would begin withdrawing a quarter of its 7,000 troops, who are stationed mainly in the Basra area, in coming months, so Iraqis could eventually take full control of Basra province. The U.S. military also said an army helicopter with nine people on board went down south of Baghdad. Four were injured. A statement did not give the cause of the incident or any other details. Witnesses reported seeing heavy gunfire force the aircraft down in an insurgent stronghold south of the capital. (Additional reporting by Ross Colvin, Aseel Kami, Dean Yates and Yara Bayoumy in Baghdad)

To: longnshort who wrote (331859)	4/5/2007 4:49:58 PM
From: tejek	Respond to of 1574854

GOP Advocate Targeted in Abramoff Probe Wednesday April 4, 2007 8:01 PM By JOHN HEILPRIN Associated Press Writer WASHINGTON (AP) - The head of a Republican environmental advocacy group has been told officially by federal investigators that she is a target for criminal prosecution in the Jack Abramoff corruption probe. Italia Federici, who co-founded the group with former Interior Secretary Gale Norton and conservative GOP activist Grover Norquist, was told by the Justice Department she faces up to five charges in the influence-peddling scandal that has produced convictions against one lawmaker, two senior Bush administration officials and several congressional aides. While running the advocacy group, the Council of Republicans for Environmental Advocacy, Federici was involved in a romantic relationship with J. Steven Griles, who was deputy interior secretary during President Bush's first term. Griles last month became the highest-ranking Bush administration official convicted in the lobbying scandal when he pleaded guilty to a felony charge of obstructing justice by lying to the Senate Indian Affairs Committee in 2005. Griles, a longtime oil and gas lobbyist, became an architect of Bush's energy policies while serving as No. 2 at the Interior Department. He admitted in federal court that he lied to investigators about his relationship with convicted lobbyist Abramoff, who repeatedly sought Griles' intervention at Interior on behalf of Indian tribal clients. Investigators have been looking at the hundreds of thousands of dollars that Federici's environmental advocacy council received from Abramoff's Indian tribal clients and from energy and mining companies, including some of Griles' former clients. Federal prosecutors told Federici in a confidential letter dated Jan. 19 that they are considering bringing charges of fraud, impeding the Internal Revenue Service, tax evasion, obstructing the Senate committee and testifying falsely to the committee and its investigators. The letter was first reported by Legal Times. ``The investigation is focused on the allegedly illegal manner in which you operated the Council of Republicans for Environmental Advocacy, commonly known as CREA,'' the letter says. ``The government has also received information that you may have assisted others in depriving the American public of the honest services of at least one administration official.'' Federici's attorney, Jonathan Rosen, declined Wednesday to comment on the letter or other aspects of the case. The Senate committee turned up e-mails detailing numerous contacts between Abramoff and Federici and between Federici and Griles from 2001 to 2003. Many of them seek meetings with Griles or favors from him. Griles' office calendars, obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests, show meetings with Federici soon after they were discussed in e-mails between Federici and Abramoff. Griles routinely passed on departmental information to Federici, who passed it on to Abramoff, according to e-mails and other evidence obtained by the Senate committee. Abramoff persuaded his Indian clients to pay him tens of millions of dollars to influence decisions coming out of Congress and the Interior Department. Abramoff awaits sentencing in the bribery scandal, but is serving a six-year prison sentence for fraud in a Florida casino deal. Federici was offered the chance to meet with prosecutors and agents in the case, and to negotiate a plea deal that would require her to plead guilty to at least one felony charge. Any such cooperation would be voluntary but ``time is of the essence,'' Federici was advised in the letter sent her by a trial attorney with the Justice Department tax division's criminal enforcement section. guardian.co.uk