"My neighbours thinks I torture dogs for a living"
As a husky owner I can confirm they’re all like this
Huskys are equal parts adorable and dumbass.
Huskies are just toddlers in a dog body. Total drama queens
Guantánamo inmate sent to home country in Biden policy shift
July 19, 2021
By DINO HAZELL and ALEXANDRA JAFFE
WASHINGTON (AP) —
The Biden administration on Monday transferred a Guantánamo Bay detainee to his home country for the first time, a policy shift from the Trump presidency that repatriated a Moroccan man years after he was recommended for discharge.
The prisoner, Abdullatif Nasser, who’s in his mid-50s, was cleared for repatriation by a review board in July 2016 but remained at Guantánamo under President Donald Trump. In announcing his transfer Monday, the Pentagon cited the board’s determination that Nasser’s detention was no longer necessary to protect U.S. national security.
Nasser, also known as Abdul Latif Nasser, arrived Monday in Morocco, where police took him into custody and said they would investigate him on suspicion of committing terrorist acts — even though he was never charged while in Guantánamo.
The State Department said in a statement that President Joe Biden’s administration would continue “a deliberate and thorough process” to reducing the detainee population at Guantánamo “while also safeguarding the security of the United States and its allies.” A senior administration official who insisted on anonymity to discuss internal deliberations told reporters Monday that the Biden administration is engaged in that process with the aim of ultimately closing the Guantánamo Bay facility.
Of the 39 detainees remaining at Guantánamo, 10 are eligible to be transferred out, 17 are eligible to go through the review process for possible transfer, another 10 are involved in the military commission process used to prosecute detainees and two have been convicted, another senior administration official said.
The Biden administration didn’t address how it would handle the ongoing effort to prosecute five men held at Guantánamo for the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
The detention center opened in 2002. President George W. Bush’s administration transformed what had been a sleepy Navy outpost on Cuba’s southeastern tip into a place to interrogate and imprison people suspected of links to al-Qaida and the Taliban after Sept. 11.
The Obama administration, seeking to allay concerns that some of those released had “returned to the fight,” set up a process to ensure those repatriated or resettled in third countries no longer posed a threat. It also planned to try some of the men in federal court.
But the closure effort was thwarted when Congress barred the transfer of prisoners from Guantánamo to the U.S., including for prosecution or medical care. President Barack Obama ultimately released 197 prisoners. With Nasser’s transfer, the Guantánamo population stands at 39.
The prisoner transfer process had stalled under Trump, who said even before taking office there should be no further releases from “Gitmo,” as Guantánamo Bay is often called. “These are extremely dangerous people and should not be allowed back onto the battlefield,” he said.
The possibility that former Guantánamo prisoners would resume hostile activities has long been a concern that has played into the debate over releases. The office of the Director of National Intelligence said in a 2016 report that about 17% of the 728 detainees who had been released were “confirmed” and 12% were “suspected” of reengaging in such activities.
But the vast majority of those reengagements occurred with former prisoners who did not go through the security review that was set up under Obama. A task force that included agencies such as the Defense Department and the CIA analyzed who was held at Guantánamo and determined who could be released and who should continue in detention.
The U.S. thanked Morocco for facilitating Nasser’s transfer back home.
“The United States commends the Kingdom of Morocco for its long-time partnership in securing both countries’ national security interests,” the Pentagon statement said. “The United States is also extremely grateful for the Kingdom’s willingness to support ongoing U.S. efforts to close the Guantánamo Bay Detention Facility.”
In a statement, the public prosecutor at the Court of Appeal in Rabat said the National Division of the Judicial Police in Casablanca had been instructed to open an investigation into Nasser "on suspicion of committing terrorist acts.” It didn’t specify what those “terrorist acts” are.
Nasser’s attorney in Morocco, Khalil Idrissi, said judicial authorities should not “take measures that prolong his torment and suffering, especially since he lived through the hell of Guantánamo.” Idrissi said he hoped the investigation into Nasser would not “continue to deprive him of his freedom” so he could finally “meet his family again.”
He said the years Nasser spent in Guantánamo “were unjustified and outside the law, and what he suffered remains a stain of disgrace on the forehead of the American system.”
Nasser initially got news he was going to be released in the summer of 2016, when one of his lawyers called him at the detention center and told him the U.S. had decided he no longer posed a threat and could go home. He thought he’d returned to Morocco soon: “I’ve been here 14 years,” he said at the time. “A few months more is nothing.”
Nasser’s journey to the Cuban prison was a long one. He was a member of a nonviolent but illegal Moroccan Sufi Islam group in the 1980s, according to his Pentagon file. In 1996, he was recruited to fight in Chechyna but ended up in Afghanistan, where he trained at an al-Qaida camp. He was captured after fighting U.S. forces there and sent to Guantánamo in May 2002.
An unidentified military official appointed to represent him before the review board said he studied math, computer science and English at Guantánamo, creating a 2,000-word Arabic-English dictionary. The official told the board that Nasser “deeply regrets his actions of the past” and expressed confidence he would reintegrate in society.
AP writer Tarik El-Barakah contributed to this report from Rabat, Morocco.
Microsoft Exchange hack caused by China, U.S. and allies say
July 19, 2021
By ERIC TUCKER
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Biden administration and Western allies formally blamed China on Monday for a massive hack of Microsoft Exchange email server software and accused Beijing of working with criminal hackers in ransomware attacks and other cyber operations.
The announcements, though not accompanied by sanctions against the Chinese government, were intended as a forceful condemnation of activities a senior Biden administration official described as part of a “pattern of irresponsible behavior in cyberspace.” They highlighted the ongoing threat from Chinese government hackers even as the administration remains consumed with trying to curb ransomware attacks from Russia-based syndicates that have targeted critical infrastructure.
The broad range of cyberthreats from Beijing disclosed on Monday included ransomware attacks from government-affiliated hackers that have targeted victims — including in the U.S. — with demands for millions of dollars. U.S officials allege that China’s Ministry of State Security has been using criminal contract hackers who have engaged in cyber extortion schemes and theft for their own profit, officials said.
Meanwhile, the Justice Department on Monday announced charges against four Chinese nationals who prosecutors said were working with the Ministry of State Security in a hacking campaign that targeted dozens of computer systems, including companies, universities and government entities. The defendants are accused of stealing trade secrets and confidential business information.
Unlike in April, when public finger-pointing of Russian hacking was paired with a raft of sanctions against Moscow, the Biden administration did not announce any actions against Beijing. Nonetheless, a senior administration official who briefed reporters said that the U.S. has confronted senior Chinese officials and that the White House regards the multination public shaming as sending an important message.
The European Union and Britain also called out China. The EU said malicious cyber activities with “significant effects” that targeted government institutions, political organizations and key industries in the bloc’s 27 member states could be linked to Chinese hacking groups. The U.K.’s National Cyber Security Centre said the groups targeted maritime industries and naval defense contractors in the U.S. and Europe and the Finnish parliament.
In a statement, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said the hacking was “conducted from the territory of China for the purpose of intellectual property theft and espionage.”
The Microsoft Exchange cyberattack “by Chinese state-backed groups was a reckless but familiar pattern of behaviour,” U.K. Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said.
NATO, in its first public condemnation of China for hacking activities, called on Beijing to uphold its international commitments and obligations “and to act responsibly in the international system, including in cyberspace.” The alliance said it was determined to “actively deter, defend against and counter the full spectrum of cyber threats.”
That hackers affiliated with the Ministry of State Security were engaged in ransomware was surprising and concerning to the U.S. government, the senior administration official said. But the attack, in which an unidentified American company received a high-dollar ransom demand, also gave U.S. officials new insight into what the official said was “the kind of aggressive behavior that we’re seeing coming out of China.”
The majority of the most damaging and high-profile recent ransomware attacks have involved Russian criminal gangs. Though the U.S. has sometimes seen connections between Russian intelligence agencies and individual hackers, the use of criminal contract hackers by the Chinese government “to conduct unsanctioned cyber operations globally is distinct,” the official said.
The Microsoft Exchange hack that months ago compromised tens of thousands of computers around the world was swiftly attributed to Chinese cyber spies by private sector groups. An administration official said the government’s attribution to hackers affiliated with China’s Ministry of State Security took until now in part because of the discovery of the ransomware and for-profit hacking operations and because the administration wanted to pair the announcement with guidance for businesses about tactics that the Chinese have been using.
An advisory Monday from the FBI, the National Security Agency and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency laid out specific techniques and ways that government agencies and businesses can protect themselves.
A spokesperson for the Chinese Embassy in Washington did not immediately return an email seeking comment Monday. But a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson has previously deflected blame for the Microsoft Exchange hack, saying that China “firmly opposes and combats cyber attacks and cyber theft in all forms” and cautioned that attribution of cyberattacks should be based on evidence and not “groundless accusations.”
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Kelvin Chan in London contributed to this report.
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Follow Eric Tucker on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/etuckerAP.
Garland formally prohibits seizure of reporters’ records
July 19, 2021
By ERIC TUCKER and MICHAEL BALSAMO
WASHINGTON (AP) — Attorney General Merrick Garland on Monday formally prohibited federal prosecutors from seizing the records of journalists in leak investigations, with limited exceptions, reversing years of department policy.
The new policy largely codifies the commitment Garland made in June, when he said the Justice Department would abandon the practice of seizing reporters’ records in leak investigations. It aims to resolve a politically thorny issue that has long vexed Justice Department prosecutors trying to weigh the media’s First Amendment rights against government’s desire to protect classified information.
But the memo makes clear that federal prosecutors can, in some cases, seize journalists’ records, including if the reporters are suspected of working for agents of a foreign power or terrorist organizations. There is also an exception for situations with imminent risks, like kidnappings or crimes against children.
Garland was moved to act following an outcry over revelations that the department during the Trump administration had obtained records belonging to journalists at The Washington Post, CNN and The New York Times as part of investigations into who had disclosed government secrets related to the Russia investigation and other national security matters.
Others whose records were obtained were members of Congress and their staffers and former White House counsel Don McGahn.
Garland’s announcement came after President Joe Biden said he would not allow the Justice Department to seize journalists’ phone records and emails, calling the practice “wrong.“ Since then, Garland and other senior Justice Department staffers have met with representatives of news media organizations, with both sides agreeing on the need for new department policies. Garland has also said he would support federal legislation to add additional protections for journalists.
Leak investigations have long challenged department officials, resulting in policy changes in the last decade as well as pushback from media groups against government encroachment into their work.
President Barack Obama’s attorney general, Eric Holder, announced revised guidelines for leak investigations after an uproar over actions seen as aggressively intrusive into press freedom, including the secret seizure of phone records of Associated Press reporters and editors.
Jeff Sessions, President Donald Trump’s first attorney general, announced in 2017 a leak crackdown following a series of disclosures during the investigation into Russian election interference.
This is truly unconscionable. There has to be a better way to work with and care for children with disabilities other than using electric shock on them.
