Gujarat 'bans' new Bollywood film

Cinema owners in Gujarat have refused to show Bollywood actor Aamir Khan's latest film, fearing protests about Khan's criticism of a big dam project.

Fanaa, a film about a romance between a blind girl and a tour guide opened across India on Friday.

The youth arm of the state's ruling party, the BJP, has led protests and asked Khan to withdraw his comments.

Khan had called on the government to adequately compensate people displaced by construction of the Narmada dam.

He has refused to withdraw his comments.

The latest protests against the dam followed a decision to raise its height from 110 to 112 metres.

Aamir Khan added his voice to calls for a halt to construction after Indian environmentalist Medha Patkar launched a hunger strike in April.

Court ruling

The Save Narmada Movement says the state government has failed to provide adequate rehabilitation of the 35,000 people whose villages will be submerged when the dam is constructed.

They asked the courts to halt construction, but earlier this month India's Supreme Court refused to stop the heightening of the dam.

The Sardar Sarovar dam project was initiated by India's first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, in the 1950s. But it has run into long delays, legal disputes and protests.

Source: BBC News
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/5022892.stm

Iraq Veteran Speaks Out On War Crimes

Testimony from a former U.S. Army Ranger

Jessie Macbeth, a Former Army Ranger and Iraq War Veteran Tells All

This 20 minute interview will change how you view the U.S. occupation of Iraq forever. I cannot possibly recommend this more highly. An Iraq war veteran tells of atrocities he and other fellow-soldiers committed reguarly while in Iraq. I have never seen this level of honesty from a U.S. soldier who directly participated in the slaughtering of Iraqis.

Excerpts:

"When we were doing the night raids in the houses, we would pull people out and have them all on their knees and zip-tied. We would ask the man of the house questions. If he didn't answer the way we liked, we would shoot his youngest kid in the head. We would keep going, this was our interrogation. He could be innocent. He could be just an average Joe trying to support his family. If he didn't give us a satisfactory answer, we'd start killing off his family until he told us something. If he didn't know anything, I guess he was SOL."

and

"For not speaking out, I feel like I'm betraying my battle-buddies that died."

Produced by Pepperspray Productions