The U.S. finds itself in good company as one of a handful of countries to hold public executions; others include China, North Korea, Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan. While the Taliban stone adulteresses in the public square, the U.S. will execute Timothy McVeigh in full view of the electronic eye. And there seems to be as much demand for a front row seat in Oklahoma City as in Kandahar.

The inconsistencies of the McVeigh story are intriguing. The Thursday night revelation of three thousand missing pages of documentation "mistakenly withheld" and now unearthed four days before the execution is incredible but will it lead to an investigation of the following? The most strking inconsistency is the fact that not one of the BATF staf were at their desks in the Murrah building at the time of the blast. In addition, a U.S. judge, whose office was in the Murrah building, was warned to be prepared for a "terrorist act" directed against the Murrah building. One witness, who worked nearby, told a reporter in the immediate aftermath that employees in her building had seen members of a bomb squad in the area shortly before the blast. She has since disappeared from public view. A report of two explosions from the University of Oklahoma Geological Survey as well as another report by a retired Air Force Brigadier General questioning the Ryder truck as the cause of the extensive damage done to the building were both quickly squelched. See "Thirty Oklahoma City Bombing Questions That Demand An Answer Now!".

Meanwhile back in Afghanistan, the Taliban continue their war on women. For a woman to walk down the street in an Afghani city is to take her life in her hands. One woman was shot by the Taliban for appearing in public in order to take her acutely ill child to the doctor. Said Madeleine Albright of the Taliban while US Secretary of State:

We are opposed to their {the Taliban} approach to human rights, to their despicable treatment of women and children, and their lack of respect for human dignity, in a way more reminiscent of the past than the future.

What she failed to mention is that it is largely due to the largesse of the United States' CIA that the Taliban wound up in power in Afghanistan. See the piece from Le Monde Diplomatique, "Fundamentalist Without a Cause".

And just one country away in Iraq, US/UK imposed sanctions continue to mete out their terrible punishment on the women and children of Iraq. To date some 15,000 contracts for equipment and supplies under the Oil for Food program worth some $3.3 billion have been held up by the Security Council. Of those, the U.S. is respnsible for holding up some $3.1 billion worth of contracts, arguing possible military application. Last year the US/UK blocked the sale of $11 billion worth of medical supplies out of a possible $14 billion from Siemens to Iraq.

The Iraq News Agency reports that only 25% of the equipment and spare parts slated for the oil sector have been able to leap the hurdles posed by the Sanctions Committee.

Both Kuwait and Iraq have asked for independent tests to be conducted on the effects of DU on local populations. Some 350 tons were dropped on Iraq during the Gulf War. Since 1998 the US/UK have flown some 31, 544 sorties over Iraq. On May 2, eight children were killed when a cluster bomb left over from the Gulf War went off unexpectedly. INA estimtes that 370,000 bombs, shells, and artillery shells are left undetonated in Iraqi soil as a result of the Gulf War and the fly-overs since then. See the piece from Orient Magazine.

It was not a good week for American PR. Following hot on the heels of the U.S. loss of its seat on the UN Human Rights Commission came the exclusion of the U.S. from the world narcotics control board. Is the rest of the planet trying to send America a message?

Timothy McVeigh with his strange dead eyes is hell bent, we are assured, on being executed much as he seemed determined to be caught after the bombing when he sped out of Oklahoma in a car with no license plate. The media hype and heavy-handed promotion of his book claiming credit for the bombing has seemed all to orchestrated. Why are these documents being brought before the public eye at this juncture and what will the morrow bring?