Human Rights

A Freedom of Information Act request revealed that Selective Service System acting Director Lewis Brodsky, in a February 2003 proposal to Pentagon officials, recommended that the draft "be re-engineered toward maintaining a national inventory of American men and, for the first time, women, ages 18 through 34, with an added focus on identifying individuals with critical skills." The agency's public and congression

"Freedom of the press declined substantially around the world in 2003, including a worrisome drop in Italy, according to a survey released Wednesday by Freedom House. "Despite some specific recent improvements, and an overall upward trend towards greater press freedom worldwide during the late 1990s, the last two years have seen a dramatic deterioration," said Karin Deutsch Karlekar, the survey's managing editor.

Nuclear whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu is scheduled to be released soon from prison after serving an 18-year sentence for blowing the whistle on Israel's weapons of mass destruction. However, Israel is also forbidding him from communicating with foreigners or moving about without permission and has been told that any infraction of these rules will land him back in prison without trial.

"A year after US-led forces launched war on Iraq, the promise of improved human rights for Iraqis remains far from realized," warns Amnesty International in a detailed new report. "Most Iraqis still feel unsafe in a country ravaged by violence," the report states. Moreover, "Coalition Forces appear in many cases to be using the climate of violence to justify violating the very human rights standards they are supposed to be upholding. They have shot Iraqis dead during demonstrations. They have tortured and ill-treated prisoners and detainees.