INQUISITION NEWS

Dozens 'tortured and killed in Syria detention centres'

Dozens 'tortured and killed in Syria detention centres'

Many of the arrests were carried out in the city of Homs

Amnesty International has said it believes that at least 88 people have died in detention in Syria during the past five months.

It says those who died, including 10 children, were subjected to beatings, burns, electric shocks and other abuse.

The group says it believes all of those who died were arrested after taking part in anti-government protests.

Foreign journalists have been blocked from entering Syria and the reports could not immediately be verified.

The allegations, published in a report, come shortly after the Syrian government denied persistent reports of at least one mass grave being uncovered in the restive southern city of Deraa.

"These deaths behind bars are reaching massive proportions, and appear to be an extension of the same brutal disdain for life that we are seeing daily on the streets of Syria," said Neil Sammonds, Amnesty's researcher on Syria.

Mr Sammonds told the BBC that they have the names of at least 3,000 people who are currently in detention.

"There are said to be 12-15,000 people detained in the country at the moment. We know that torture has been widespread over many years and it has got much much worse. Most people are held in incommunicado detention."

Torture allegations

He said the volume of abuses, many of which had been documented on video and occurred near the cities of Homs and Deraa, had returned almost to levels not seen since the 1980s.

Deraa was the first Syrian city to see pro-democracy protests, in mid-March, and became an epicentre of the unrest after security forces launched a major operation to crush any dissent there. Dozens of people are believed to have been killed and hundreds arrested.

In its report, Amnesty said that the victims were all men or boys and, in at least 52 of the cases, there was evidence that torture or ill-treatment caused or contributed to the deaths.

Deaths in detention have also been reported in five other governorates - Damascus and Rif Damashq, Idlib, Hama and Aleppo, Amnesty said.

Amnesty International says it has compiled the names of more than 1,800 people reported to have died since pro-reform protests began. Thousands of others have been arrested, with many held incommunicado at unknown locations, according to the group.

Residents said that in the early hours of Wednesday morning Syrian troops backed by tanks raided houses looking for activists in two main districts of Hama.

A local activist told Reuters that several tanks were parked at a bridge at the eastern entrance to the city and then hundreds of troops entered two neighbourhoods on foot.

On Tuesday, as people streamed out of mosques after prayers to mark the end of Ramadan and renewed protests against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, security forces shot dead four demonstrators.

Those who died, including a 13-year-old boy, were killed in the towns of al-Hara and Inkhil in the southern province of Deraa.

Are you in Syria? Do you have family or friends in Syria? Send us your comments and experiences.

Send your pictures and videos to yourpics@bbc.co.uk or text them to 61124 (UK) or +44 7624 800 100 (International). If you have a large file you can upload here.
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Teacher Fired for Pro-Family

Everywhere in this country the radical Homosexuals are beating their drums, trying to intimidate any who would dare oppose their agenda publicly. They are trying to scare all Pro-family Americans into hiding.

And now they have targeted “Teacher of the Year,” Jerry Buell, simply because he dared to publicly profess his belief in God and his opposition to homosexual marriage.

Mr. Buell, who teaches American History at a Florida high school, came under attack by his school board because he posted on his private Facebook page that he was disgusted with the passage of the New York Homosexual Marriage law.

“I was watching the news, eating dinner when the story about New York okaying same-sex [marriage] came on and I almost threw up. . . don’t insult a man and woman’s marriage by throwing it in the same cesspool of whatever.”

Sounds like an opinion pretty much any Pro-Family American can relate to, right?

But, in a country built upon the freedom of speech, the Homosexuals and the Perverts are trying to make it illegal to speak out against them and their twisted choices.

The radical Homosexual Lobby knows that they don’t have the support of most Americans; they know they will never win their war by trying to change our minds one at a time.

And so they resort to these sort of tactics, viciously attacking individuals like Jerry Buell when they dare speak their mind.

Public Advocate will never stand by and merely watch this sort of injustice happen. I acted immediately and wrote this school board a letter spelling out all the manners in which they had violated Jerry Buell’s Constitutional Rights.

I told them if they didn’t reinstate Mr. Buell, I would be forced to take action.

And I’m proud to report that Public Advocate’s efforts have paid off. Mr. Buell has been reinstated in his classroom!

His persecutors quickly rethought their scheme and suddenly “discovered” that what Jerry had said was completely legal -- and completely within his rights.

However, they refuse to admit defeat with grace. Mr. Buell is now under investigation for allegedly forcing his religious beliefs upon his students -- citing the nonsense “separation of church and state” argument.

He has never made it a secret that he believes in God. He is upfront about his beliefs and has been happily supported by students and teachers -- and under the First Amendment his freedom of religion cannot be abridged.

But, the radical liberals have decided that admitting to his own faith is somehow a violation of freedom of religion and they are trying to censor Jerry’s words.

But the good news is that Jerry Buell is not planning on backing down to their ridiculous attacks; not now, not ever.

“I teach God’s truth, I make very few compromises.”

And Public Advocate will be there to support him the whole way.

I am so proud to know I have allies like Mr. Buell in my struggle. I am proud to see average Americans following the example that Public Advocate has set for more than 30 years.

The radical Homosexual Agenda has perverted our laws just as they would pervert our society. It is up to Pro-Family Americans to stand up to them and say NO MORE.

And with your support, I am proud to say Public Advocate will always be there, leading the fight.

For the Family,

Eugene Delgaudio

President, Public Advocate of the United States

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Astronauts might have to abandon space station

Amplify’d from old.news.yahoo.com

Astronauts might have to abandon space station

By MARCIA DUNN, AP Aerospace Writer Marcia Dunn, Ap Aerospace Writer

AP – FILE - This May 23, 2011 file photo released by NASA, shows the International Space Station flying at …

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – Astronauts may need to take the unprecedented step of temporarily abandoning the International Space Station if last week's Russian launch accident prevents new crews from flying there this fall.

Until officials figure out what went wrong with Russia's essential Soyuz rockets, there will be no way to launch any more astronauts before the current residents have to leave in mid-November.

The unsettling predicament comes just weeks after NASA's final space shuttle flight.

"We have plenty of options," NASA's space station program manager, Mike Suffredini, assured reporters Monday. "We'll focus on crew safety as we always do."

Abandoning the space station, even for a short period, would be an unpleasant last resort for the world's five space agencies that have spent decades working on the project. Astronauts have been living aboard the space station since 2000, and the goal is to keep it going until 2020.

Suffredini said flight controllers could keep a deserted space station operating indefinitely, as long as all major systems are working properly. The risk to the station goes up, however, if no one is on board to fix equipment breakdowns.

Six astronauts from three countries presently are living on the orbiting complex. Three are due to leave next month; the other three are supposed to check out in mid-November. They can't stay any longer because of spacecraft and landing restrictions.

The Sept. 22 launch of the very next crew — the first to fly in this post-shuttle era — already has been delayed indefinitely. Russia's Soyuz spacecraft have been the sole means of getting full-time station residents up and down for two years. The capsule is parked at the station until they ride it home.

To keep the orbiting outpost with a full staff of six for as long as possible, the one American and two Russians due to return to Earth on Sept. 8 will remain on board at least an extra week.

As for supplies, the space station is well stocked and could go until next summer, Suffredini said. Atlantis dropped off a year's supply of goods just last month on the final space shuttle voyage. The unmanned craft destroyed Wednesday was carrying 3 tons of supplies.

For now, operations are normal in orbit, Suffredini noted, and the additional week on board for half the crew will mean additional science research.

The Soyuz has been extremely reliable over the decades; this was the first failure in 44 Russian supply hauls for the space station. Even with such a good track record, many in and outside NASA were concerned about retiring the space shuttles before a replacement was ready to fly astronauts.

Russian space officials have set up an investigation team and until it comes up with a cause for the accident and a repair plan, the launch and landing schedules remain in question. None of the spacecraft debris has been recovered yet; the wreckage fell into a remote, wooded section of Siberia. The third stage malfunctioned; a sudden loss of pressure apparently was noted between the engine and turbopump.

While a crew may well have survived such an accident because of safety precautions built into the manned version of the rocket, no one wants to take any chances.

One or two unmanned Soyuz launches are on tap for October, one commercial and the other another space station supply run. Those would serve as important test flights before putting humans on board, Suffredini said.

NASA considered vacating the space station before, following the space shuttle Columbia disaster in 2003. Back then, shuttles were still being used to ferry some station residents back and forth. Instead, the station got by with two-man crews for three years because of the significant cutback in supplies.

The space station's population doubled in 2009, to six. It wasn't until the space station was completed this year that science research finally took priority.

Even if the space shuttles still were flying, space station crews still would need Soyuz-launched capsules to serve as lifeboats, Suffredini said. The capsules are certified for no more than 6 1/2 months in space, thus the need to regularly rotate crews. Complicating matters is the need to land the capsules during daylight hours in Kazakhstan, resulting in weeks of blackout periods.

NASA wants American private companies to take over crew hauls, but that's three to five years away at best. Until then, Soyuz capsules are the only means of transporting astronauts to the space station.

Japan and Europe have their own cargo ships and rockets, for unmanned use only. Commercial front-runner Space Exploration Technologies Corp., or SpaceX, plans to launch a space station supply ship from Cape Canaveral at the end of November. That would be put on hold if no one is on board to receive the vessel.

Suffredini said he hasn't had time to consider the PR impact of abandoning the space station, especially coming so soon after the end of the 30-year shuttle program.

"Flying safely is much, much more important than anything else I can think about right this instant," he said. "I'm sure we'll have an opportunity to discuss any political implications if we spend a lot of time on the ground. But you know, we'll just have to deal with them because we're going to do what's safest for the crew and for the space station."

Online:

NASA: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/main/index.html
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Comet Double Feature: Comets Elenin & Garradd Now Showing in Night Sky

Amplify’d from www.space.com

Comet Double Feature: Comets Elenin & Garradd Now Showing in Night Sky

by Geoff Gaherty, Starry Night Education

Comet Garradd can be seen right now with binoculars in the constellation Sagitta

CREDIT: Starry Night Software

View full size image

Skywatchers often ask "When's the next comet?" In fact, if you’re prepared to do a bit of searching, there are always several comets visible in the night sky, including two right now.

Some comets are like old friends, they keep coming back at regular intervals to visit. These are called periodic comets; Comet Halley was the first such comet to be identified, by Edmond Halley back in 1705. It returns to the inner solar system every 75 to 76 years; its last appearance was in 1986 and its next will be in 2061. At present Halley is out just beyond Neptune;s orbit.

Other comets are one-time visitors: they come in to visit us from the Oort Cloud, warm themselves for a few months by the sun, and then head back out to the farthest reaches of the solar system. [Best Close Encounters with Comets]

There are two comets currently visiting the inner solar system — comet Elenin and comet Garradd — so the next two months will provide some excellent opportunities to observe these unusual visitors. The sky map of the two comets here shows they locations over the next few weeks.

All comets share one characteristic: they are like "dirty snowballs" in their makeup. Their nucleus of rock and ice, when warmed by the sun, sheds its ice which forms a graceful tail as it’s swept away by the solar wind. Because it’s the solar wind that drives the gas and vapor away, comet’s tails always point away from the sun.

In the sky, many comets appear like ghostly fingers pointing down towards Earth. That is one reason why comets have traditionally been viewed as harbingers of death and disaster. To astronomers, on the contrary, they are objects of great beauty and attract close scientific scrutiny for the information they reveal about the ancient history of the solar system and its farthest reaches.

Comet Elenin now showing

The first comet visitor in the sky we'll review is comet Elenin (C2010 X1). You may have heard about, because it’s become a popular item for the gloom and doom crowd, who see portents of disaster in ordinary astronomical objects.

The truth about Comet Elenin is that it is a quite ordinary, fairly small comet discovered on Dec. 10, 2010 by Russian amateur astronomer Leonid Elenin using a remote controlled telescope in Arizona.

This comet will pass closest to the sun on Sept. 10 (45 million miles or 72 million kilometers) and closest to Earth on Oct. 16 at a distance of 22 million miles (35 million km.)

Despite the fact that this is a really tiny body, 3 or 4 km. in diameter which will miss the Earth by 22 million miles, the purveyors of gloom and doom have seized upon it as bringing disaster upon the Earth. Please don’t take them seriously, instead try to spot this interesting little object.

At present, comet Elenin is too close to the sun to be viewed from the Northern Hemisphere, though observers south of the equator may catch it low in the western sky after sunset. Northern observers' turn will come after the comet passes the sun and starts back out towards the Oort Cloud.

In the last few days of September, Elenin will separate from the sun in our morning sky. It will be visible in binoculars in the morning sky for all of October, and we will publish finder maps then.

There is an unusual opportunity to “observe” this comet when it is very close to the sun during the last week of September. To do this, you won’t be able to use your eyes or any optical aid; instead you will use your computer.

Several times every day, the SOHO satellite returns images of the sun, including ones from the observatory's LASCO C3 camera which has a field of view of about 15 degrees. This has an occulting disk which blocks the Sun itself but lets the background stars appear.

If you take a look at it right now, you'll see Venus off to the left of the sun and the star Regulus to the right. During the last week of September, you will be able to see Comet Elenin pass through the field of view.

Comet Garradd graces the sky

The other bright comet in the night sky hasn't received the publicity of comet Elenin but is actually a better opportunity for skywatchers. This is comet Garradd (C2009 P1), which was discovered on Aug. 13, 2009 by Australian astronomer G. J. Garradd. [Video: Where Comets Come From]

Comet Garradd is very easy for any experienced skywatcher to locate and observe with binoculars. Currently it is just south of the small but well-known constellation of Sagitta, the arrow. This arrow-shaped constellation is right in the middle of the summer triangle formed by the bright stars Vega, Deneb, and Altair. On Wednesday (Aug. 24), Garradd was right under the tip of the arrow.

Tonight (Friday, Aug. 26), Garradd it will be impaled by the shaft of the arrow, and one week later (Friday, Sept. 2) it will be right by the "hook" of the popular Coathanger Cluster, also known as Brocchi’s Cluster. During that time it should increase in brightness slowly from about magnitude 8.2 to about magnitude 8.1, an easy object with binoculars.

The comet will continue moving westward and brightening, reaching magnitude 7.0 on Feb. 12. Astronomers measure the brightness of a night sky object using a reverse scale of magnitude. The lower the number of an object's magnitude, the brighter the object appears.

The sky map in this story shows the position of comet Garradd at 11 p.m. EDT each night from through Sept 2.

A reminder: All of the magnitudes given here for comets are estimates; comet brightness is notoriously hard to predict. The comets may be fainter than predicted or we may get lucky and get a couple of really bright comets.

Editor's note: If you snap an amazing photo of comet Elenin or comet Garradd, and would like to share them with SPACE.com for a possible story or gallery, please contact managing editor Tariq Malik at: tmalik@space.com.

This article was provided to SPACE.com by Starry Night Education, the leader in space science curriculum solutions. Follow Starry Night on Twitter @StarryNightEdu.