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How the US thinks Russians hacked the White House
CNN Washington (CNN) Russian hackers behind the damaging cyber intrusion of the State Department in recent months used that perch to penetrate sensitive parts of the White House computer system, according to U.S. officials briefed on the investigation. REPORT: Russia hacked the White HouseBusiness Insider Report: Russia behind 2014 attack on White House computer systemFox News Russia might have hacked the White HouseEngadget USA TODAY -CNBC all 73 news articles » |
What makes a great leader? Knowledge, smarts and vision, to be sure. To that, Daniel Goleman, author of “Leadership: The Power of Emotional Intelligence,” would add the ability to identify and monitor emotions — your own and others’ — and to manage relationships. Qualities associated with such “emotional intelligence” distinguish the best leaders in the corporate world, according to Mr. Goleman, a former New York Times science reporter, a psychologist and co-director of a consortium at Rutgers University to foster research on the role emotional intelligence plays in excellence. He shares his short list of the competencies.
1. SELF-AWARENESS
Realistic self-confidence: You understand your own strengths and limitations; you operate from competence and know when to rely on someone else on the team.
Emotional insight: You understand your feelings. Being aware of what makes you angry, for instance, can help you manage that anger.
2. SELF-MANAGEMENT
Resilience: You stay calm under pressure and recover quickly from upsets. You don’t brood or panic. In a crisis, people look to the leader for reassurance; if the leader is calm, they can be, too.
Emotional balance: You keep any distressful feelings in check — instead of blowing up at people, you let them know what’s wrong and what the solution is.
Self-motivation: You keep moving toward distant goals despite setbacks.
3. EMPATHY
Cognitive and emotional empathy: Because you understand other perspectives, you can put things in ways colleagues comprehend. And you welcome their questions, just to be sure. Cognitive empathy, along with reading another person’s feelings accurately, makes for effective communication.
Good listening: You pay full attention to the other person and take time to understand what they are saying, without talking over them or hijacking the agenda.
4. RELATIONSHIP SKILLS
Compelling communication: You put your points in persuasive, clear ways so that people are motivated as well as clear about expectations.
Team playing: People feel relaxed working with you. One sign: They laugh easily around you.
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In September 1996, I visited Iran. One of my most enduring memories of that trip was that in my hotel lobby there was a sign above the door proclaiming “Down With USA.” But it wasn’t a banner or graffiti. It was tiled and plastered into the wall. I thought to myself: “Wow — that’s tiled in there! That won’t come out easily.” Nearly 20 years later, in the wake of a draft deal between the Obama administration and Iran, we have what may be the best chance to begin to pry that sign loose, to ease the U.S.-Iran cold/hot war that has roiled the region for 36 years. But it is a chance fraught with real risks to America, Israel and our Sunni Arab allies: that Iran could eventually become a nuclear-armed state.
President Obama invited me to the Oval Office Saturday afternoon to lay out exactly how he was trying to balance these risks and opportunities in the framework accord reached with Iran last week in Switzerland. What struck me most was what I’d call an “Obama doctrine” embedded in the president’s remarks. It emerged when I asked if there was a common denominator to his decisions to break free from longstanding United States policies isolating Burma, Cuba and now Iran. Obama said his view was that “engagement,” combined with meeting core strategic needs, could serve American interests vis-à-vis these three countries far better than endless sanctions and isolation. He added that America, with its overwhelming power, needs to have the self-confidence to take some calculated risks to open important new possibilities — like trying to forge a diplomatic deal with Iran that, while permitting it to keep some of its nuclear infrastructure, forestalls its ability to build a nuclear bomb for at least a decade, if not longer.
“We are powerful enough to be able to test these propositions without putting ourselves at risk. And that’s the thing ... people don’t seem to understand,” the president said. “You take a country like Cuba. For us to test the possibility that engagement leads to a better outcome for the Cuban people, there aren’t that many risks for us. It’s a tiny little country. It’s not one that threatens our core security interests, and so [there’s no reason not] to test the proposition. And if it turns out that it doesn’t lead to better outcomes, we can adjust our policies. The same is true with respect to Iran, a larger country, a dangerous country, one that has engaged in activities that resulted in the death of U.S. citizens, but the truth of the matter is: Iran’s defense budget is $30 billion. Our defense budget is closer to $600 billion. Iran understands that they cannot fight us. ... You asked about an Obama doctrine. The doctrine is: We will engage, but we preserve all our capabilities.”
The notion that Iran is undeterrable — “it’s simply not the case,” he added. “And so for us to say, ‘Let’s try’ — understanding that we’re preserving all our options, that we’re not naïve — but if in fact we can resolve these issues diplomatically, we are more likely to be safe, more likely to be secure, in a better position to protect our allies, and who knows? Iran may change. If it doesn’t, our deterrence capabilities, our military superiority stays in place. ... We’re not relinquishing our capacity to defend ourselves or our allies. In that situation, why wouldn’t we test it?”
Obviously, Israel is in a different situation, he added. “Now, what you might hear from Prime Minister [Benjamin] Netanyahu, which I respect, is the notion, ‘Look, Israel is more vulnerable. We don’t have the luxury of testing these propositions the way you do,’ and I completely understand that. And further, I completely understand Israel’s belief that given the tragic history of the Jewish people, they can’t be dependent solely on us for their own security. But what I would say to them is that not only am I absolutely committed to making sure that they maintain their qualitative military edge, and that they can deter any potential future attacks, but what I’m willing to do is to make the kinds of commitments that would give everybody in the neighborhood, including Iran, a clarity that if Israel were to be attacked by any state, that we would stand by them. And that, I think, should be ... sufficient to take advantage of this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see whether or not we can at least take the nuclear issue off the table.”
He added: “What I would say to the Israeli people is ... that there is no formula, there is no option, to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon that will be more effective than the diplomatic initiative and framework that we put forward — and that’s demonstrable.”
The president gave voice, though — in a more emotional and personal way than I’ve ever heard — to his distress at being depicted in Israel and among American Jews as somehow anti-Israel, when his views on peace are shared by many center-left Israelis and his administration has been acknowledged by Israeli officials to have been as vigorous as any in maintaining Israel’s strategic edge.
With huge amounts of conservative campaign money now flowing to candidates espousing pro-Israel views, which party is more supportive of Israel is becoming a wedge issue, an arms race, with Republican candidates competing over who can be the most unreservedly supportive of Israel in any disagreement with the United States, and ordinary, pro-Israel Democrats increasingly feeling sidelined.
“This is an area that I’ve been concerned about,” the president said. “Look, Israel is a robust, rowdy democracy. ... We share so much. We share blood, family. ... And part of what has always made the U.S.-Israeli relationship so special is that it has transcended party, and I think that has to be preserved. There has to be the ability for me to disagree with a policy on settlements, for example, without being viewed as ... opposing Israel. There has to be a way for Prime Minister Netanyahu to disagree with me on policy without being viewed as anti-Democrat, and I think the right way to do it is to recognize that as many commonalities as we have, there are going to be strategic differences. And I think that it is important for each side to respect the debate that takes place in the other country and not try to work just with one side. ... But this has been as hard as anything I do because of the deep affinities that I feel for the Israeli people and for the Jewish people. It’s been a hard period.”
You take it personally? I asked.
“It has been personally difficult for me to hear ... expressions that somehow ... this administration has not done everything it could to look out for Israel’s interest — and the suggestion that when we have very serious policy differences, that that’s not in the context of a deep and abiding friendship and concern and understanding of the threats that the Jewish people have faced historically and continue to face.”
As for protecting our Sunni Arab allies, like Saudi Arabia, the president said, they have some very real external threats, but they also have some internal threats — “populations that, in some cases, are alienated, youth that are underemployed, an ideology that is destructive and nihilistic, and in some cases, just a belief that there are no legitimate political outlets for grievances. And so part of our job is to work with these states and say, ‘How can we build your defense capabilities against external threats, but also, how can we strengthen the body politic in these countries, so that Sunni youth feel that they’ve got something other than [the Islamic State, or ISIS] to choose from. ... I think the biggest threats that they face may not be coming from Iran invading. It’s going to be from dissatisfaction inside their own countries. ... That’s a tough conversation to have, but it’s one that we have to have.”
That said, the Iran deal is far from finished. As the president cautioned: “We’re not done yet. There are a lot of details to be worked out, and you could see backtracking and slippage and real political difficulties, both in Iran and obviously here in the United States Congress.”
On Congress’s role, Obama said he insists on preserving the presidential prerogative to enter into binding agreements with foreign powers without congressional approval. However, he added, “I do think that [Tennessee Republican] Senator Corker, the head of the Foreign Relations Committee, is somebody who is sincerely concerned about this issue and is a good and decent man, and my hope is that we can find something that allows Congress to express itself but does not encroach on traditional presidential prerogatives — and ensures that, if in fact we get a good deal, that we can go ahead and implement it.”
Since President Obama has had more direct and indirect dealings with Iran’s leadership — including an exchange of numerous letters with Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei — than any of his predecessors since Iran’s revolution in 1979, I asked what he has learned from the back and forth.
“I think that it’s important to recognize that Iran is a complicated country — just like we’re a complicated country,” the president said. “There is no doubt that, given the history between our two countries, that there is deep mistrust that is not going to fade away immediately. The activities that they engage in, the rhetoric, both anti-American, anti-Semitic, anti-Israel, is deeply disturbing. There are deep trends in the country that are contrary to not only our own national security interests and views but those of our allies and friends in the region, and those divisions are real.”
But, he added, “what we’ve also seen is that there is a practical streak to the Iranian regime. I think they are concerned about self-preservation. I think they are responsive, to some degree, to their publics. I think the election of [President Hassan] Rouhani indicated that there was an appetite among the Iranian people for a rejoining with the international community, an emphasis on the economics and the desire to link up with a global economy. And so what we’ve seen over the last several years, I think, is the opportunity for those forces within Iran that want to break out of the rigid framework that they have been in for a long time to move in a different direction. It’s not a radical break, but it’s one that I think offers us the chance for a different type of relationship, and this nuclear deal, I think, is a potential expression of that.”
What about Iran’s supreme leader, who will be the ultimate decider there on whether or not Iran moves ahead? What have you learned about him?
“He’s a pretty tough read,” the president said. “I haven’t spoken to him directly. In the letters that he sends, there [are] typically a lot of reminders of what he perceives as past grievances against Iran, but what is, I think, telling is that he did give his negotiators in this deal the leeway, the capability to make important concessions, that would allow this framework agreement to come to fruition. So what that tells me is that — although he is deeply suspicious of the West [and] very insular in how he thinks about international issues as well as domestic issues, and deeply conservative — he does realize that the sanctions regime that we put together was weakening Iran over the long term, and that if in fact he wanted to see Iran re-enter the community of nations, then there were going to have to be changes.”
Since he has acknowledged Israel’s concerns, and the fact that they are widely shared there, if the president had a chance to make his case for this framework deal directly to the Israeli people, what would he say?
“Well, what I’d say to them is this,” the president answered. “You have every right to be concerned about Iran. This is a regime that at the highest levels has expressed the desire to destroy Israel, that has denied the Holocaust, that has expressed venomous anti-Semitic ideas and is a big country with a big population and has a sophisticated military. So Israel is right to be concerned about Iran, and they should be absolutely concerned that Iran doesn’t get a nuclear weapon.” But, he insisted, this framework initiative, if it can be implemented, can satisfy that Israeli strategic concern with more effectiveness and at less cost to Israel than any other approach. “We know that a military strike or a series of military strikes can set back Iran’s nuclear program for a period of time — but almost certainly will prompt Iran to rush towards a bomb, will provide an excuse for hard-liners inside of Iran to say, ‘This is what happens when you don’t have a nuclear weapon: America attacks.’
“We know that if we do nothing, other than just maintain sanctions, that they will continue with the building of their nuclear infrastructure and we’ll have less insight into what exactly is happening,” Obama added. “So this may not be optimal. In a perfect world, Iran would say, ‘We won’t have any nuclear infrastructure at all,’ but what we know is that this has become a matter of pride and nationalism for Iran. Even those who we consider moderates and reformers are supportive of some nuclear program inside of Iran, and given that they will not capitulate completely, given that they can’t meet the threshold that Prime Minister Netanyahu sets forth, there are no Iranian leaders who will do that. And given the fact that this is a country that withstood an eight-year war and a million people dead, they’ve shown themselves willing, I think, to endure hardship when they considered a point of national pride or, in some cases, national survival.”
The president continued: “For us to examine those options and say to ourselves, ‘You know what, if we can have vigorous inspections, unprecedented, and we know at every point along their nuclear chain exactly what they’re doing and that lasts for 20 years, and for the first 10 years their program is not just frozen but effectively rolled back to a larger degree, and we know that even if they wanted to cheat we would have at least a year, which is about three times longer than we’d have right now, and we would have insights into their programs that we’ve never had before,’ in that circumstance, the notion that we wouldn’t take that deal right now and that that would not be in Israel’s interest is simply incorrect.”
Because, Obama argued, “the one thing that changes the equation is when these countries get a nuclear weapon. ... Witness North Korea, which is a problem state that is rendered a lot more dangerous because of their nuclear program. If we can prevent that from happening anyplace else in the world, that’s something where it’s worth taking some risks.”
“I have to respect the fears that the Israeli people have,” he added, “and I understand that Prime Minister Netanyahu is expressing the deep-rooted concerns that a lot of the Israeli population feel about this, but what I can say to them is: Number one, this is our best bet by far to make sure Iran doesn’t get a nuclear weapon, and number two, what we will be doing even as we enter into this deal is sending a very clear message to the Iranians and to the entire region that if anybody messes with Israel, America will be there. And I think the combination of a diplomatic path that puts the nuclear issue to one side — while at the same time sending a clear message to the Iranians that you have to change your behavior more broadly and that we are going to protect our allies if you continue to engage in destabilizing aggressive activity — I think that’s a combination that potentially at least not only assures our friends, but starts bringing down the temperature.”
There is clearly a debate going on inside Iran as to whether the country should go ahead with this framework deal as well, so what would the president say to the Iranian people to persuade them that this deal is in their interest?
If their leaders really are telling the truth that Iran is not seeking a nuclear weapon, the president said, then “the notion that they would want to expend so much on a symbolic program as opposed to harnessing the incredible talents and ingenuity and entrepreneurship of the Iranian people, and be part of the world economy and see their nation excel in those terms, that should be a pretty straightforward choice for them. Iran doesn’t need nuclear weapons to be a powerhouse in the region. For that matter, what I’d say to the Iranian people is: You don’t need to be anti-Semitic or anti-Israel or anti-Sunni to be a powerhouse in the region. I mean, the truth is, Iran has all these potential assets going for it where, if it was a responsible international player, if it did not engage in aggressive rhetoric against its neighbors, if it didn’t express anti-Israeli and anti-Jewish sentiment, if it maintained a military that was sufficient to protect itself, but was not engaging in a whole bunch of proxy wars around the region, by virtue of its size, its resources and its people it would be an extremely successful regional power. And so my hope is that the Iranian people begin to recognize that.”
Clearly, he added, “part of the psychology of Iran is rooted in past experiences, the sense that their country was undermined, that the United States or the West meddled in first their democracy and then in supporting the Shah and then in supporting Iraq and Saddam during that extremely brutal war. So part of what I’ve told my team is we have to distinguish between the ideologically driven, offensive Iran and the defensive Iran that feels vulnerable and sometimes may be reacting because they perceive that as the only way that they can avoid repeats of the past. ... But if we’re able to get this done, then what may happen — and I’m not counting on it — but what may happen is that those forces inside of Iran that say, ‘We don’t need to view ourselves entirely through the lens of our war machine. Let’s excel in science and technology and job creation and developing our people,’ that those folks get stronger. ... I say that emphasizing that the nuclear deal that we’ve put together is not based on the idea that somehow the regime changes.
“It is a good deal even if Iran doesn’t change at all,” Obama argued. “Even for somebody who believes, as I suspect Prime Minister Netanyahu believes, that there is no difference between Rouhani and the supreme leader and they’re all adamantly anti-West and anti-Israel and perennial liars and cheaters — even if you believed all that, this still would be the right thing to do. It would still be the best option for us to protect ourselves. In fact, you could argue that if they are implacably opposed to us, all the more reason for us to want to have a deal in which we know what they’re doing and that, for a long period of time, we can prevent them from having a nuclear weapon.”
There are several very sensitive points in the framework agreement that are not clear to me, and I asked the president for his interpretation. For instance, if we suspect that Iran is cheating, is harboring a covert nuclear program outside of the declared nuclear facilities covered in this deal — say, at a military base in southeastern Iran — do we have the right to insist on that facility being examined by international inspectors?
“In the first instance, what we have agreed to is that we will be able to inspect and verify what’s happening along the entire nuclear chain from the uranium mines all the way through to the final facilities like Natanz,” the president said. “What that means is that we’re not just going to have a bunch of folks posted at two or three or five sites. We are going to be able to see what they’re doing across the board, and in fact, if they now wanted to initiate a covert program that was designed to produce a nuclear weapon, they’d have to create a whole different supply chain. That’s point number one. Point number two, we’re actually going to be setting up a procurement committee that examines what they’re importing, what they’re bringing in that they might claim as dual-use, to determine whether or not what they’re using is something that would be appropriate for a peaceful nuclear program versus a weapons program. And number three, what we’re going to be doing is setting up a mechanism whereby, yes, I.A.E.A. [International Atomic Energy Agency] inspectors can go anyplace.”
Anywhere in Iran? I asked.
“That we suspect,” the president answered. “Obviously, a request will have to be made. Iran could object, but what we have done is to try to design a mechanism whereby once those objections are heard, that it is not a final veto that Iran has, but in fact some sort of international mechanism will be in place that makes a fair assessment as to whether there should be an inspection, and if they determine it should be, that’s the tiebreaker, not Iran saying, ‘No, you can’t come here.’ So over all, what we’re seeing is not just the additional protocols that I.A.E.A. has imposed on countries that are suspected of in the past having had problematic nuclear programs, we’re going even beyond that, and Iran will be subject to the kinds of inspections and verification mechanisms that have never been put in place before.”
A lot of people, myself included, will want to see the fine print on that. Another issue that doesn’t seem to have been resolved yet is: When exactly do the economic sanctions on Iran get lifted? When the implementation begins? When Iran has been deemed to be complying fully?
“There are still details to be worked out,” the president said, “but I think that the basic framework calls for Iran to take the steps that it needs to around [the Fordow enrichment facility], the centrifuges, and so forth. At that point, then, the U.N. sanctions are suspended; although the sanctions related to proliferation, the sanctions related to ballistic missiles, there’s a set of sanctions that remain in place. At that point, then, we preserve the ability to snap back those sanctions, if there is a violation. If not, though, Iran, outside of the proliferation and ballistic missile issues that stay in place, they’re able to get out from under the sanctions, understanding that this constant monitoring will potentially trigger some sort of action if they’re in violation.”
There are still United States sanctions that are related to Iran’s behavior in terrorism and human rights abuse, though, the president added: “There are certain sanctions that we have that would remain in place because they’re not related to Iran’s nuclear program, and this, I think, gets to a central point that we’ve made consistently. If in fact we are able to finalize the nuclear deal, and if Iran abides by it, that’s a big piece of business that we’ve gotten done, but it does not end our problems with Iran, and we are still going to be aggressively working with our allies and friends to reduce — and hopefully at some point stop — the destabilizing activities that Iran has engaged in, the sponsorship of terrorist organizations. And that may take some time. But it’s our belief, it’s my belief, that we will be in a stronger position to do so if the nuclear issue has been put in a box. And if we can do that, it’s possible that Iran, seeing the benefits of sanctions relief, starts focusing more on the economy and its people. And investment starts coming in, and the country starts opening up. If we’ve done a good job in bolstering the sense of security and defense cooperation between us and the Sunni states, if we have made even more certain that the Israeli people are absolutely protected not just by their own capacities, but also by our commitments, then what’s possible is you start seeing an equilibrium in the region, and Sunni and Shia, Saudi and Iran start saying, ‘Maybe we should lower tensions and focus on the extremists like [ISIS] that would burn down this entire region if they could.’ ”
Regarding America’s Sunni Arab allies, Obama reiterated that while he is prepared to help increase their military capabilities they also need to increase their willingness to commit their ground troops to solving regional problems.
“The conversations I want to have with the Gulf countries is, first and foremost, how do they build more effective defense capabilities,” the president said. “I think when you look at what happens in Syria, for example, there’s been a great desire for the United States to get in there and do something. But the question is: Why is it that we can’t have Arabs fighting [against] the terrible human rights abuses that have been perpetrated, or fighting against what Assad has done? I also think that I can send a message to them about the U.S.’s commitments to work with them and ensure that they are not invaded from the outside, and that perhaps will ease some of their concerns and allow them to have a more fruitful conversation with the Iranians. What I can’t do, though, is commit to dealing with some of these internal issues that they have without them making some changes that are more responsive to their people.”
One way to think about it, Obama continued, “is [that] when it comes to external aggression, I think we’re going to be there for our [Arab] friends — and I want to see how we can formalize that a little bit more than we currently have, and also help build their capacity so that they feel more confident about their ability to protect themselves from external aggression.” But, he repeated, “The biggest threats that they face may not be coming from Iran invading. It’s going to be from dissatisfaction inside their own countries. Now disentangling that from real terrorist activity inside their country, how we sort that out, how we engage in the counterterrorism cooperation that’s been so important to our own security — without automatically legitimizing or validating whatever repressive tactics they may employ — I think that’s a tough conversation to have, but it’s one that we have to have.”
It feels lately like some traditional boundaries between the executive and legislative branches, when it comes to the conduct of American foreign policy, have been breached. For instance, there was the letter from 47 Republican senators to Iran’s supreme leader cautioning him on striking any deal with Obama not endorsed by them — coming in the wake of Prime Minister Netanyahu being invited by the speaker of the House, John Boehner, to address a joint session of Congress — without consulting the White House. How is Obama taking this?
“I do worry that some traditional boundaries in how we think about foreign policy have been crossed,” the president said. “I felt the letter that was sent to the supreme leader was inappropriate. I think that you will recall there were some deep disagreements with President Bush about the Iraq war, but the notion that you would have had a whole bunch of Democrats sending letters to leaders in the region or to European leaders ... trying to undermine the president’s policies I think is troubling.
“The bottom line,” he added, “is that we’re going to have serious debates, serious disagreements, and I welcome those because that’s how our democracy is supposed to work, and in today’s international environment, whatever arguments we have here, other people are hearing and reading about it. It’s not a secret that the Republicans may feel more affinity with Prime Minister Netanyahu’s views of the Iran issue than they do with mine. But [we need to be] keeping that within some formal boundaries, so that the executive branch, when it goes overseas, when it’s communicating with foreign leaders, is understood to be speaking on behalf of the United States of America, not a divided United States of America, making sure that whether that president is a Democrat or a Republican that once the debates have been had here, that he or she is the spokesperson on behalf of U.S. foreign policy. And that’s clear to every leader around the world. That’s important because without that, what you start getting is multiple foreign policies, confusion among foreign powers as to who speaks for who, and that ends up being a very dangerous — circumstances that could be exploited by our enemies and could deeply disturb our friends.”
As for the Obama doctrine — “we will engage, but we preserve all our capabilities” — the president concluded: “I’ve been very clear that Iran will not get a nuclear weapon on my watch, and I think they should understand that we mean it. But I say that hoping that we can conclude this diplomatic arrangement — and that it ushers a new era in U.S.-Iranian relations — and, just as importantly, over time, a new era in Iranian relations with its neighbors.”
Whatever happened in the past, he said, “at this point, the U.S.’s core interests in the region are not oil, are not territorial. ... Our core interests are that everybody is living in peace, that it is orderly, that our allies are not being attacked, that children are not having barrel bombs dropped on them, that massive displacements aren’t taking place. Our interests in this sense are really just making sure that the region is working. And if it’s working well, then we’ll do fine. And that’s going to be a big project, given what’s taken place, but I think this [Iran framework deal] is at least one place to start.”
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Emboldened as they mop up the last Islamic State forces in the city of Tikrit, Iraqi military leaders are already vowing to follow up that operation with a much more ambitious one: marching into the vast Sunni heartland in western Iraq to root out some of the most significant militant strongholds.
Iraqi and American officials say some progress in that region, Anbar Province, will be necessary before a serious effort is mounted to retake the northern city of Mosul from the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL.
But just how that can be accomplished is a source of concern. Despite boasts by the Shiite militias that they were ready for Anbar, some Iraqi and American officials say it would be disastrous for a mostly Shiite-led force to begin assaulting towns in the Sunni-dominated area, and are seeking to limit the militias’ involvement.
Anbar, after all, was the heart of the Sunni sectarian uprising against the American invasion and against the Shiite-dominated national government that followed. It was Al Qaeda’s original incubator in Iraq, and it was among the first places to fall to the Islamic State’s incursion.
The militants now hold more than half the province — including the city of Falluja and large areas around the capital, Ramadi. And they are ruthlessly trying to suppress a group of Sunni Arab tribes who are resisting them with the help of the Iraqi Army and some Shiite militias.
Still, Anbar tribal leaders who would be willing to work with the Iraqi government are adamantly opposed to more militias in Anbar, and want tribal forces to be armed and trained in their place.
One obstacle is that the Shiite-led Iraqi government has proved reluctant to arm the Sunni tribes more aggressively — as the Americans have tried to persuade it to do and are expected to encourage again when Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi visits Washington on April 14.
Mr. Abadi has publicly conceded the importance of getting more Sunni forces into the fight. On Friday, he met with political figures from Anbar Province, including Ahmed Abu Risha, a tribal leader whose brother was one of the critical leaders of the Sunni Awakening in Anbar Province, in which the tribes defeated Al Qaeda with American military help.
“Liberating Anbar Province will form an important gate to liberate the rest of the areas under the control of ISIS,” Mr. Abadi said.
Despite his military commanders’ tight timeline to begin an Anbar operation — some say it could start soon after Mr. Abadi’s return from Washington this month — it is still unclear where the manpower for the mission would come from.
Even with the use of large numbers of Shiite irregulars, along with Iranian military advisers, theconquest in Tikrit proved difficult, stalling for weeks until the advent of American airstrikes.
Relying heavily on those forces in Anbar would outrage the Sunni population there, American officials insist, and might further alienate people who are still on the fence about whether the Islamic State or the Shiite Iraqi government is the greater evil.
The Iraqi Army commander in Tikrit, Lt. Gen. Abdul al-Wahab al-Saadi, head of the counterterrorism force, said, “When I finish with Tikrit, I will go to Anbar, because I promised those people I would.”
Still, he conceded that it could not be with large numbers of Shiite militiamen — even though he is quick to credit them as an important part of recent Iraqi victories in Diyala and Salahuddin Provinces, including Tikrit.
“They were responsible for liberating 10,000 square kilometers of territory,” he said, or 3,861 square miles.
Replacing them in Anbar, for the most part, will be local Sunni tribes. But efforts to arm those tribes have moved slowly, as the Iraqi authorities remain suspicious that some might end up fighting against the Iraqi government or supporting the Islamic State.
There are also disputes among the tribes over which ones should get weapons, with some saying that the American military and Iraqi authorities are backing the wrong groups.
A visual guide to the crisis in Iraq and Syria.
OPEN Graphic
Sheikh Abdul Razak, a Jordan-based leader of the large Dulaimi tribe from Anbar Province, said that what he disparagingly calls “Baghdad sheikhs” had joined the government and would let Iranian-backed Shiite militias into Anbar to fight the Islamic State.
“It’s clear the popular mobilization is the hand of Iran, and this is going to be like ethnic cleansing of the Sunnis,” he said, referring to the militias by their official name, the Popular Mobilization Forces.
Mr. Razak even hired an American consultant, Jonathan S. Greenhill, to lobby Congress on his behalf and promote his view that the American-led coalition is picking the wrong partners in Anbar. Mr. Greenhill, of the Greenhill Group in Arlington, Va., is a retired Central Intelligence Agency officer whose biography lists him as former “chief of base in a Near East war zone.”
“The sheikh has deep support in Anbar and important valuable information on the terrorists,” Mr. Greenhill said, adding that his client has been unsuccessful in meeting with military officials from the coalition. “The coalition is dealing with the wrong sheikhs, who do not enjoy widespread Sunni support.”
Coalition officials insist that the Iraqi government will decide which tribes to arm and that any military aid to them must go through the government.
“This is their show,” said one senior coalition official, speaking on condition of anonymity as a matter of official policy. But, the official said, no one now seriously believes that Iranian-backed Shiite militias will be part of any major offensive in Anbar.
Unlike Anbar, the provinces of Salahuddin and Diyala, where the Shiite militias have been most active, have mixed Shiite and Sunni areas. In areas where Shiite militiamen were victorious, if there were populations of Sunnis, there were also reports of human rights abuses by the irregulars.
Such abuses — including extrajudicial killings of prisoners and looting by militiamen — are also being reported to a lesser degree in and around Tikrit, even though almost all of its population fled before the heaviest fighting.
Prime Minister Abadi publicly criticized the looting and ordered the militias to be withdrawn from Tikrit on Saturday as a result, a move that was widely praised by Sunni leaders.
On Tuesday, Mr. Abadi went a step further, ordering that all the popular mobilization forces be placed under the direct command of the prime minister’s office. The collective popular mobilization had been led by Hadi al-Ameri, a prominent Shiite politician and leader of the Badr Organization and militia, who has close ties to Iran.
“He tried his best to stop the looting in Tikrit, and we appreciate that, but he couldn’t,” Hamid al-Mutlaq, a Sunni member of Parliament from Anbar, said of the prime minister’s efforts. “The people of Anbar will not let that happen there.”
Hikmat Ayada, an adviser to Suhaib al-Rawi, the governor of Anbar, said officials expected an offensive to start there as soon as the prime minister returned from Washington. He said a final decision on starting the offensive had already been made in a meeting hosted by the American ambassador, Stuart E. Jones, the prime minister and other top Iraqi officials late last month, even before Tikrit fell.
“This will not be the same as in Salahuddin, in which the whole popular mobilization took part,” Mr. Ayada said. “Even if we have a few members of the popular mobilization, they are all under the leadership of the tribes or the army.”
Mr. Mutlaq and other Sunni leaders expressed doubt that the offensive would begin soon, largely because the process of arming Sunni tribes had gone so slowly. But he said the tribes were committed to ousting the Islamic State from Anbar.
“In the beginning, there were some people who supported ISIS in Anbar,” Mr. Mutlaq said, noting that many Sunnis had been angry at the former prime minister, Nuri Kamal al-Maliki. “Now, no one welcomes ISIS. The people of Anbar and Falluja are in a prison now, and they only want to get rid of ISIS.”
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They were four years apart, but death came for them in the same instant: in an explosion in the East Village on March 26, engulfing a block in smoke and shattering three buildings on Second Avenue. Moises Ismael Locón Yac, 27, was busing tables in the midafternoon lull at Sushi Park, a restaurant on the first floor of 121 Second Avenue. Nicholas Figueroa, 23, had just paid his lunch bill there.
They were pulled from the rubble on the same afternoon, a few days later. And on Tuesday morning, the two strangers were given their funeral rites — Mr. Locón, a Guatemalan immigrant, in his gunmetal gray coffin at a church in Jamaica, Queens, and Mr. Figueroa in his gleaming brown coffin at his family church on the Upper West Side, borne on the shoulders of his father and three brothers.
“Today we send you off with our love and blessing,” Luis Benitez, one of Mr. Figueroa’s former scoutmasters, said at the service. “We will always love you, Nicholas.”
The Roman Catholic funeral Masses for the men concluded nearly two weeks of searing agony for their families. The piercing fear as word spread of the explosion, and the terror as hospital wards remained empty of either man. The grim, wavering hope as days passed without any sign of them in the collapsed buildings. The dread when news came that two bodies had been found.
Then, finally, the anguish.
“I don’t want to accept it,” one of Mr. Locón’s brothers, David Locón Yac, 23, said at Mr. Locón’s wake in Bushwick, Brooklyn, on Monday evening.
A few dozen mourners — mostly men in their 20s, Guatemalan deliverymen and busboys like Mr. Locón and his brothers — had gone to the wake. But the crowd was thinning, and it was almost time to go. David had to say goodbye to his brother. He laid his arms over the coffin, crushing some flowers that sat there. Then he crumpled beside it, resting his head on it with his eyes closed.
“I love you,” he said softly.
A friend gently urged him away. “No one wanted it to be him,” his friend said. “Let’s go.”
David ran his hands along the coffin. He placed his cheek at one end, at a place where his brother’s face might be, then turned and kissed the metal.
He began to sob as he was led away.
Though both bodies were discovered on March 29, Mr. Locón’s body was not positively identified until April 1, six days after the blaze, an achingly long wait for his relatives. Until then, the family had held out hope that Mr. Locón would turn up alive somewhere, perhaps in a hospital, Myriam De La Roca, Guatemala’s consul general in New York, said in an interview.
Mr. Figueroa’s family, too, anchored themselves in the faith that he had survived, perhaps buried alive under the rubble. As his parents grieved at home, his three brothers, Neal, Brandon and Tyler, and a group of their friends and relatives kept watch at the explosion site. They carried white roses like torches.
On Tuesday, they wore red roses in their lapels as they carried Mr. Figueroa’s coffin into the gray church, the Church of the Holy Name of Jesus. Hands reached out to them from the pews as they came down the aisle, offering silent sympathy.
There were city officials, including the Manhattan borough president, Gale A. Brewer, and the City Council speaker, Melissa Mark-Viverito; friends of Mr. Figueroa from Buffalo State and public schools on the Upper West Side, where he grew up; fellow Boy Scouts from Troop 735; and New Yorkers who knew no more of Mr. Figueroa than his face, seen on countless missing-person fliers.
The pallbearers lowered his coffin before the altar where Mr. Figueroa had had his confirmation and had taken communion on many Sundays.
“He always carried a warm smile and kindness in his heart,” Mr. Benitez said at the beginning of the hymn-filled Mass, calling Mr. Figueroa “a hero in his own right.”
Outside, his father, also named Nicholas Figueroa, thanked all those who had come to pay their respects. He seemed to draw strength from the many who approached to embrace him. It was raining lightly, he noted, but “it’s a beautiful day still.”
In Queens, where Mr. Locón lived in a rented room decorated with images of his adopted city, the Guatemalan Consulate had arranged a funeral at the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary Parish, a church with connections to Guatemalans in Jamaica, as well as the wake in Brooklyn. It had been up to Mr. Locón’s three brothers and his cousin, far from their family in Guatemala, to take care of everything else.
“He was just working,” Mr. Locón’s cousin, Pablo Yac, 23, said during the wake. “I’m crying for him.”
Mr. Locón’s brother Alfredo, 30, stood off to one side, trying to organize things. He was the oldest, the one who had tried to take care of his brothers in New York. Asked if he knew that people had been donating to a fund for the family, created by a woman in the East Village, Alfredo nodded. “We’re thankful for everything that people have done for us,” he said, his voice breaking.
GoFundMe pages for the two families have raised more than $34,000 together.
Only one Sushi Park employee was at the wake. Hugo Ortega, 39, who made sushi at the restaurant, had worked with Mr. Locón on the day of the gas explosion, but escaped with only minor injuries.
“I’m always going to miss him. I love him. He was my best friend,” he said, distraught. “He was a very good person. Everyone loved him very much.”
Before leaving, the last of the mourners knelt before the coffin and clasped their hands in prayer. Their mouths moved in unison.
Repatriation of his body to Guatemala was delayed because of the Easter holidays, but his body will be sent there on Wednesday, the family said.
Around 30 people attended a small, somber funeral Mass for Mr. Locón on Tuesday morning. There was no music; the family did not speak.
The pastor, Pedro Guerrero, gave a sermon on the theme of hope. Mr. Locón “carried that hope here, to this country,” said Ms. De La Roca, the Guatemalan consul general, paraphrasing the pastor. “But we should keep carrying it in our hearts.”
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Couch is a series about psychotherapy.
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I knew my psychiatric practice was forever changed the day a patient arrived with a manila folder stuffed with printouts and announced that it contained the contents of a Google search that he had done on me. He pulled out a photo of my mother and me, age 7, that had been published in my hometown newspaper; architectural plans for an addition to my house that was never built but apparently was registered locally by the architect; an announcement about my great-grandfather’s becoming editor of Amazing Stories magazine in his old age; and my brother’s history as a college activist.
I’d forgotten that many of these documents existed, and there were others I’d never seen or heard about. My patient knew things about me that I didn’t know.
In psychiatry, there’s a long tradition of viewing any personal information about the therapist that the patient stumbles upon as “grist for the mill.” In other words, it’s material that can be processed in the treatment just like any other experience or dream or recollection the patient might have. (A colleague of mine once asked her psychoanalyst why his head was wrapped in gauze, only to have him reply, “What are your fantasies as to what it might mean?” She never got a straight answer.)
But after a few minutes of listening to my patient present his findings, I was nearly overwhelmed by feelings both of exposure and of curiosity about his trove. Clearly, this was part of his intent, which would be the subject for many a future session. But I also realized that the relative anonymity of therapists, and all the mystery, power and privacy that attended it, were being swept away.
Patients’ access to huge amounts of information about therapists’ lives can’t help but change both members of the therapeutic dyad. It can have, for instance, a chilling effect on the therapist’s work outside the office. As a psychiatrist who occasionally writes and speaks, I now have to think about the impact of these activities on prospective patients. If I write a feminist article, will I end up with only female patients?
And what about a therapist’s avocations? A friend of mine Googled her therapist and discovered that he was an accomplished singer — intensifying her already romantic and idealized transference. On a later occasion, an Internet search revealed that the therapist had participated in a gay musical event. When she asked him about it, he explained that he was not gay and had been helping out some friends, but it had been a confusing piece of information for her — and, I suspect, for him. Will he feel as free to sing at the next concert with these friends?
The blurring of boundaries between the personal and professional can get quite creepy. A patient told me, in greater detail than I wished to know, about her <a href="http://Match.com" rel="nofollow">Match.com</a> date with a psychoanalyst with whom I’ve had professional dealings. It was an encounter that almost certainly would not have occurred in the pre-Internet-dating era, and it will be hard ever to think of him in quite the same way.
Googling, of course, can go in both directions. An emergency room psychiatrist tells me that it’s routine to check out new E.R. patients on the Internet before they are seen — to determine, at the very least, if they have criminal records. “I wonder how we survived without it,” she muses. But more than legal infractions are revealed by such Internet searches; the patient may turn out to be a V.I.P. or someone with an unsavory past. E.R. psychiatrists even check YouTube for patient postings. The experience of evaluating a patient with fresh eyes and no prior assumptions may, for better and for worse, disappear.
Patients’ electronic histories follow them everywhere — and so do doctors’. Patients can now, in effect, blackmail therapists by threatening to post negative reviews of them on the Internet if the doctor does not accede to their demands — whether for medication, hospitalization or special treatment. A supervising psychiatrist at a teaching hospital told me the frightening tale of a patient with a severe personality disorder seen in the E.R. by a psychiatrist who was just starting his practice. The patient threatened to place — and then actually did place — a potentially career-destroying evaluation on a physician evaluation website.
But the impact of technology on psychotherapy is not all bad; it’s even, at times, beneficial. The transparency of information can serve as an antidote to the fusty, authoritarian therapies of the recent past. For some patients, the new access to information about a therapist is liberating. They feel like Dorothy in “The Wizard of Oz,” pulling back the curtain to reveal that the wizard is a mere mortal. Therapists, it turns out, are just folks like you and me. Their authority is not a given, but something to be earned.
Technology can also insert into the often hermetic world of the consulting room a tonic dose of reality, an experience of how the patient actually functions outside the office. My patients arrive in my office and, like gunslingers in a saloon, unload their various electronic devices, laying them on the sofa, often two or even three, before turning them off. But there are times when the phones have to stay on: There’s a sick child at home or the boss may call. Hearing in real time patients’ responses to important figures in their lives gives me an unfiltered glimpse into those relationships. A man who sarcastically belittles his girlfriend to me is surprisingly tender speaking with her on his cellphone. An unhappy, self-deprecating executive is suddenly a confident and even commanding figure speaking with one of his subordinates. An aggressive lawyer becomes shy and awkward when speaking with his mother.
IN some ways, the relentless electronic interconnectivity of our lives serves to highlight therapy’s singular virtues. We are more appreciative of the strange, private dialogue that is the heart of therapy. There are precious few times and spaces left in our society in which people quietly speak to one another in a sustained, intimate conversation. The therapist’s office is one of the last safe places. Secrets, reflections, fears or confusion never leave the room.
And it is also a refuge. My patients often arrive early just to sit in the waiting room — an unusual interlude of quiet. Then there’s the session itself. In some ways therapy is, more than ever, the ultimate luxury: To be the focus of a thoughtful person who is listening, caring and helping to make sense of life’s chaos is something that the Internet can never provide.
Anna Fels is a psychiatrist and faculty member at Weill Cornell Medical College.
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A defendant has been added in the case of a group of Brooklyn men charged with trying to support the Islamic State.
Dilkhayot Kasimov, 26, was named in a court document filed on Monday in Federal District Court in Brooklyn.
He is named along with Abdurasul Hasanovich Juraboev, Akhror Saidakhmetov and Abror Habibov, young men from Brooklyn who were arrested and charged in February with trying to join the terrorist group, also known as ISIS.
Under watch by a government informant, Mr. Juraboev and Mr. Saidakhmetov had spoken admiringly of the Islamic State, and had purchased tickets to travel to Turkey. Prosecutors said they planned to slip into Syria and enlist with the group. Mr. Habibov, who owned cellphone repair kiosks at which Mr. Saidakhmetov worked, helped finance and arrange the travel, prosecutors said.
Mr. Kasimov, an Uzbek citizen who lived in Brooklyn, worked alongside Mr. Habibov to raise money for Mr. Saidakhmetov’s travels, prosecutors said on Monday.
They raised about $1,600 from several people, and Mr. Kasimov delivered the money to Mr. Saidakhmetov at Kennedy International Airport just before Mr. Saidakhmetov was to fly to Turkey.
Mr. Kasimov is to be arraigned on Wednesday.
NICOSIA, Cyprus — When Cyprus seized hundreds of millions of dollars from bank depositors, many of them Russians, as part of an internationally brokered deal two years ago to rescue its collapsing financial system, the Russian leader, Vladimir V. Putin, denounced the move as “dangerous” and “unfair,” warning of a sharp chill in relations.
But Mr. Putin was all smiles recently when he received Cyprus’s president, Nicos Anastasiades, in Moscow. He hailed relations with the Mediterranean nation as “always being truly friendly and mutually beneficial” and agreed to extend — on greatly improved terms for Cyprus — a $2.5 billion Russian loan.
The shift from fury to declarations of eternal friendship displayed Mr. Putin’s well-known flair for tactical back flips. But it also showed his unbending determination to break out of sanctions imposed on Russia by the United States and the European Union for Moscow’s annexation of Crimea and support for armed rebels in eastern Ukraine.
Mr. Putin has methodically targeted, through charm, cash, and the fanning of historical and ideological embers, the European Union’s weakest links in a campaign to assert influence in some of Europe’s most troubled corners. One clear goal is to break fragile Western unity over the conflict in Ukraine.
On Wednesday, Greece’s new left-wing prime minister, Alexis Tsipras, will be the next to visit Moscow. Ahead of the trip, Mr. Tsipras declared himself opposed to sanctions on Russia, describing them as a “dead-end policy.”
On Sunday, Mr. Putin’s efforts to peel away supporters from the European Union opened a new rift, after the United States ambassador in Prague criticized a decision by the president of the Czech Republic, Milos Zeman, to attend a military parade in Moscow on May 9. And in February, Mr. Putin visited Hungary, the European Union’s autocratic backslider, peddling economic deals.
Russia has so far been unable to turn such hand-holding into something more concrete against sanctions that require the approval of all 28 European Union members. But pressure for a rupture is building.
Speaking in an interview last week here in Nicosia, the capital of Cyprus, Mr. Anastasiades said Cyprus had grave doubts about Europe’s policy toward Russia and was part of a “group of member states who have the same reservations.”
He ruled out breaking ranks with what for the moment remains a consensus in favor of keeping up economic pressure on Russia. But he said he expected a unanimous vote in favor of lifting sanctions when they come up for review this summer.
He said he was convinced that Mr. Putin “realizes the consequences of further military involvement” in Ukraine and “means business” in putting in place a cease-fire agreement reached in February.
The cracks opening up in Europe’s policy toward Russia have presented a difficult problem for Donald Tusk, the former prime minister of Poland who is now president of the European Council, a body in Brussels that represents the European Union’s 28 leaders.
“To keep Europe united is today the biggest challenge,” Mr. Tusk said last month, referring to “the very fragile and difficult consensus” reached by European countries after Moscow seized Crimea in March last year.
Moscow’s skill at prying open fissures in European unity has been on display in Cyprus, a tiny nation that, because of its tight historical, religious and economic ties with Russia, has taken on an oversize role as a pivotal player in the geopolitical struggle set off by the conflict in Ukraine.
Tugged in different directions by outside powers, Cyprus hosts British military bases and vast eavesdropping facilities, allows the United States Navy to use its ports and has been a member of the European Union since 2004.
Yet it still looks to Russia as a vitally important diplomatic protector, particularly in relation to Turkey’s military occupation of the north of the country, and as a crucial source of business for its financial services industry, still a pillar of the economy despite the 2013 meltdown.
An agreement sealed during Mr. Anastasiades’s visit to Moscow allows Russian warships to dock in Limassol, which is Cyprus’s commercial hub and heavily dependent on wealthy Russians who want to set up shell companies to shuffle their assets overseas.
Mr. Anastasiades insisted that military accords signed in Moscow merely extended a 1996 agreement and were “nothing new.” The terms of the agreements, however, are all secret, so it is impossible to know what Russia managed to gain.
Mr. Anatasiades, who traveled to Moscow after recovering from heart surgery in New York, denied tilting away from the West toward Russia. As the leader of a small country, divided since a Turkish invasion in 1974 and situated on a fault line between East and West, Mr. Anastasiades said he sought good relations with all sides and “even with the devil.” He added, “I do not have the luxury to choose my friends.”
He said Russia might also get a role in the search for and development of gas reserves off the coast of Cyprus, a venture until now monopolized by Western companies.
Russia’s ambassador to Cyprus, Stanislav Osadchi, told a Russian-language newspaper, one of several in Limassol serving the town’s large Russian-speaking population, that Mr. Anastasiades’s meeting with Mr. Putin “demonstrated that, despite attempts to isolate Russia and revive the Cold War, there are countries that do not want this.”
The Russian Embassy in Nicosia reacted with fury last year when Makarios Drousiotis, a part-time historian and presidential adviser, published a diplomatic history that detailed Russian duplicity in its relations with Cyprus. The embassy denounced the book as “politically unacceptable” and criticized Mr. Drousiotis, who lost his job as an adviser to Mr. Anatasiades.
The United States, in contrast, has struggled to get a hearing. When Russia won gushing praise on social media for restructuring its loan to Cyprus, the United States ambassador, John M. Koenig, tried to dampen the enthusiasm with messages posted on Twitter that were widely interpreted as implying a link between Mr. Anastasiades’s visit to Moscow and the killing a few days later of the Russian opposition politician Boris Nemtsov.
The Twitter posts set off an uproar, prompting the United States ambassador to issue a contrite statement that his comments had been “misunderstood.”
“For lots of people on this island, Russia is seen as a savior,” said Harry Tzimitras, director of PRIO Cyprus Center, a Norwegian-funded research group in Nicosia. This, he added, provides fertile ground for efforts by Moscow to “infiltrate the European Union” and “show that it can disrupt certain policies” promoted by Washington and Brussels.
Vasilis Zertalis, the head of Prospectacy, a financial service company, described Cyprus as a “small piece on a big chessboard.” Europe, he said, tried to advance its own position during the 2013 banking crisis by seeking to end Cyprus’s role as a haven for Russian money.
“They wanted to scare the Russians away,” he said. “But the money that left was from Britain, from other European countries and from America.”
Ordinary Cypriots and politicians, he said, “all gave up on the European Union” because of the harsh bailout terms in 2013 and “know that the United States will never take a stand against Turkey.”
“So,” he said, “the only allies Cyprus really has are Russia and maybe China.”
Correction: April 6, 2015
An earlier version of this article misstated the year Cyprus became a member of the European Union. It was 2004, not 2008.
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The Greek government is facing a series of daunting challenges. It has to come up with money to pay off maturing debts, revive its devastated economy and renegotiate its loan agreements with other countries in the eurozone. Given those difficulties, it might be tempting — though misguided — for Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras to seek financial or other support from President Vladimir Putin of Russia, whom he is scheduled to meet in Moscow on Wednesday.
Greece and Russia have close historical and cultural ties that are based in part on a common religion, Orthodox Christianity. It’s not surprising that Mr. Tsipras, whose party formed a coalition government in January, would meet with Mr. Putin. But the timing of his visit, coming just a day before Greece must repay a loan of 458 million euros (about $503 million) to the International Monetary Fund, and his earlier statements criticizing the European Union’s economic sanctions against Russia have raised questions about what he intends to achieve.
What seems clear is that Greece cannot count on Russia to ride to its financial rescue. The sharp drop in oil prices and, to a lesser extent, Western sanctions have damaged the Russian economy and limited Mr. Putin’s ability to dole out aid to other countries. Russia’s foreign exchange reserves totaled $360 billion at the end of February, down more than $100 billion since August, according tothe Bank of Russia. And the I.M.F. estimates that the Russian economy will shrink 3 percent this year.
Greek officials have told journalists that Mr. Tsipras will not seek financial aid from Russia. But he has also said that European sanctions against Russia for its aggression in Ukraine are a “dead-end policy.” That stance is seriously harmful because the sanctions are having a real impact on Russia and should be maintained. But they have to be renewed periodically and all members of the European Union — including Greece — have to agree to extend them.
Mr. Putin has shown a keen interest in exploiting divisions within the European Union for his own gain. For example, he has recently courted the government of Cyprus by providing it a loan and reaching an agreement that allows Russian warships to dock at a commercial port in that country. Mr. Putin has also cultivated Prime Minister Viktor Orban of Hungary as an ally. And, last year, a Russian bank lent money to the far-right National Front party in France, which is gaining popularity in that country and says it would want France to leave the eurozone if it came to power. It would be a public relations triumph for Mr. Putin if Mr. Tsipras publicly criticized the sanctions while he was in Moscow.
Mr. Tsipras and Mr. Putin are expected to talk about business and trade. Russia would like to build a new gas pipeline to Europe through Greece, and the Greek government wants Russia to offer it adiscount on gas purchases and to roll back a ban on Greek fruit exports that is part of Mr. Putin’s retaliatory sanctions against the European Union.
If Mr. Tsipras appears to cut deals with or support Mr. Putin when the European Union is trying to maintain a united front on Ukraine, he will only further alienate Germany, France and other European countries. His government’s relations with those nations are already frosty, and it needs the help of those countries to revive the economy and keep Greece in the 19-member eurozone.
Most Greeks want to keep the euro, and leaving it could severely damage the economy and financial system. Of course, Germany and other eurozone members also need to work more constructively with Mr. Tsipras. They can start by granting Greece more flexibility in how and when it repays its debts and how it reforms its economy.
Mr. Putin clearly wants to lock arms with any leader who appears at odds with the European Union. But Mr. Tsipras should be careful not to let himself be used to undermine European unity.
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MOSCOW — A Russian nuclear submarine caught fire while undergoing repairs in a dry dock outside the city of Arkhangelsk and smoke billowed from it through the day on Tuesday. But emergency officials told Russian news agencies that the submarine posed no risk of leaking radiation because its nuclear fuel and armaments had been removed before the work began.
Ria, a state news agency, reported that sparks from welding most likely set off the fire on the vessel, an attack submarine of the same type as the submarine Kursk that sank in the Barents Sea in 2000. In the Kursk sinking and subsequent accidents on Russia’s nuclear submarines, the Russian Navy has been slow in acknowledging the gravity of emergencies.
Firefighters planned to flood the dry dock to extinguish the fire, the news agency said.
Emergency officials said that the submarine posed no risk of leaking radiation because its nuclear fuel and armaments had been removed before the work began.
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US to Press Cuba on Human Rights, Basic Freedomsby webdesk@voanews.com (Mary Alice Salinas)
President Barack Obama is expected to discuss human rights with Cuban leader Raul Castro when, for the first time, both the U.S. and Cuban presidents attend the Summit of the Americas. U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Roberta Jacobson said there would be "interaction" between the two leaders during the summit in Panama April 10-11. But she did not specify the circumstances of their meeting. The U.S. diplomat said Obama has made clear the U.S. does not believe the human rights situation in Cuba is "adequate," and added that the U.S. would not change its "willingness to speak out on human rights violations simply because we are now engaging with the Cuban government directly." In December, the White House announced a historic shift in its policy toward Cuba, moving away from 50 years of isolation to a policy of engagement meant to empower the Cuban people. During the summit, Obama is expected to meet with members of Cuba's civil society who will be attending. Jacobson said the U.S. leader would send a clear message that "in places where either political or civil space has closed in recent years or remains closed, such as in Cuba, we give support to those who continue to peacefully fight for the space to be open." Eyes on Havana With the U.S. and Cuba working to restore diplomatic ties, groups like Amnesty International are closely watching Havana’s handling of dissent and freedom of assembly, association and expression. In December, the same month Cuba released 53 activists from prison, the communist government also arrested dozens of other demonstrators and dissidents, and it even rearrested some activists it had just released. "We have been seeing that some prisoners of conscience or dissidents have been put back in jail. Some other dissidents have been harassed," said Marshelha Goncalves Margerin, Amnesty International advocacy director. While diplomats in the U.S. and Cuba are working to reopen embassies in Havana and Washington, they also have started laying the groundwork for human rights talks. Those talks will face challenges rooted in fundamentally different philosophies on human rights, according to Brookings Institution analyst Ted Piccone. “The Cubans will emphasize that, 'This is our own domestic sovereign affairs and you shouldn’t be poking your nose into our human rights issues,' " said Piccone, "and the Americans will say, 'No, these are universal norms that all states have agreed to adhere to, and that includes Cuba.' ” Comparison of records During human rights talks, the U.S. agenda most likely will focus on Cuba’s political and civil rights record, while Cuba most likely will criticize U.S. social services as inadequate and point to events in Ferguson, Missouri, as an example of civil rights problems in the U.S. The city became a flashpoint for a national debate on the state of race relations in America after a police officer, who has been cleared of wrongdoing, fatally shot an unarmed African-American teenager during a street confrontation last August. U.S. diplomats will be ready to take on such issues with Cuban officials, Piccone said. “We have court systems, we have accountability boards, we have auditing systems," he said. "We have a free media and a press, we have a very strong Congress. These are ways we have checks and balances in our system to address the underlying human rights problems, and in the Cuban case, they don’t." However, critics of U.S. policy toward Cuba say Havana has no intention of allowing dissent or basic freedoms. Others believe that as more Cubans are exposed to the rest of the world, they will bring pressure on the Cuban government and force change on the communist nation.
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Published on Apr 7, 2015
Who is arming, funding and training ISIS? An <a href="http://InfoWars.com" rel="nofollow">InfoWars.com</a> exclusive report by Darrin McBreen.
Once again, the growth of ISIS can be traced directly back to our government’s insane policy of aiding terrorists who went on to join ISIS after the destabilization of the secular governments of Libya and Syria.
Once again, the growth of ISIS can be traced directly back to our government’s insane policy of aiding terrorists who went on to join ISIS after the destabilization of the secular governments of Libya and Syria.
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Imprisoned journalist Barrett Brown joins us on the phone to explains how he ended up in prison, corporate spying and the DOJ.
BREAKING Barrett Brown Decision The End Of Internet Freedom - Duration: 5:19.
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| Barrett Brown | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | Barrett Lancaster Brown (1981-08-14) August 14, 1981 (age 33) Dallas, Texas |
| Education | Episcopal School of Dallas |
| Website | |
Barrett Brown (born August 14, 1981) is an American journalist, essayist and satirist. He is often referred to as an unofficial spokesperson for the hacktivist collective Anonymous, a label he disputes.[1] He founded Project PM, a research collaboration and wiki, to facilitate analysis of the troves of hacked emails and other leaked information concerning the inner workings of the cyber-military-industrial complex.[2] Project PM aims to operate a wiki in order to provide a centralized, actionable data set regarding the intelligence contracting industry, the public relations industry's interface with governments, the infosec cybersecurity industry, and other issues constituting what the project's members regard as threats to human rights, civic transparency, individual privacy, and the health of democratic institutions.
He has spent over two years in FCI Seagoville federal prison and at one time faced over a hundred more as he awaited trial on an assortment of seventeen charges filed in three indictments that include sharing an HTTP link to information publicly released during the 2012 Stratfor email leak, and several counts of conspiring to publicize restricted information about an FBI agent.[3][4][5][6]Between September 2013 and April 2014 he was held under an agreed gag order prohibiting him from discussing his case with the media.[3][7]
Early life and education[edit]
Brown was born in Dallas, Texas to Robert Brown and Karen Lancaster, who divorced when he was 7. He was brought up in the affluent neighborhood of Preston Hollow, living with his mother who saw something special in her only child and took a progressive approach to his rearing. He attendedPreston Hollow Elementary School (along with the Bush twins). Afflicted with ADD, young Barrett was restless in the classroom but a precocious reader and writer on his own, producing a newspaper on his home computer while still in elementary school. Early nurturing a capacity for moral outrage and quick to question authority, he embraced the writings of Hunter S. Thompson and Ayn Rand by middle school, declaring himself an atheist and founding an Objectivist club in high school; placing second in a national Ayn Rand essay contest.[2][8]
He attended the private Episcopal School of Dallas for high school but dropped out after his sophomore year. That summer, in 1998, he interned at the Met, an alternative weekly, and spent his would-be junior year unschooling in Tanzania with his father, who was trying to start a hardwood-harvesting business. While there Brown completed high school online through Texas Tech, earning college credit. He returned to Texas in 2000 and spent two semesters taking writing classes at theUniversity of Texas at Austin. He then pursued freelance writing.[2][8]
Journalism[edit]
Brown co-wrote the book Flock of Dodos: Behind Modern Creationism, Intelligent Design and the Easter Bunny, a comic critique of intelligent design and creationism.[9]
He has written for Vanity Fair,[10] True/Slant,[11] Huffington Post,[12] The Guardian,[13] and other publications.
Brown served as the Director of Communications for Enlighten the Vote, an atheist PAC that provides financial and strategic assistance to political candidates that advocate strict enforcement of theEstablishment Clause.[14][15]
In 2010, Brown began work on his crowdsourced investigation wiki, Project PM. Brown has written that the main goals of Project PM are to increase the positive influence of what he calls "the more capable segments of the blogosphere", while reducing the negative influence of well-regarded mainstream pundits, who may have political agendas not compatible with public interest. It was his aim that the wiki Project PM be established by way of the deliberate generation of critical mass of work and following among dependable bloggers in such a manner as that segments of the traditional media will be prompted or even forced to address critical issues in their own methods and means of reportage. A further and experimental aim of Project PM is also to develop a communicational schematic which could provide bloggers, reporters and any other concerned Citizen journalist with the best possible feed of raw information by which to produce content.
On the aim of Project PM, Brown has stated:
"The institutions and structures that have developed over the past two decades of accelerating public internet use have had what we reasonably describe as a wholesome effect on information flow. But the information age is a work in progress, and thus there are potential improvements to be made. More importantly, there are improvements that can be made by an initially small number of influential participants working in coordination. The purpose of Project PM is to implement these solutions to the extent that participants are collectively able to do so, as well as to demonstrate the beneficial effects of these solutions to others that they might be spurred to recreate or even build upon them independently of our own efforts."[16]
In June 2011, he and Project PM released an exclusive report about a surveillance contract called "Romas/COIN" which was discovered in e-mails hacked from HBGary by Anonymous. It consisted of sophisticated data-mining techniques leveraging mobile software and aimed at Arab countries.[17][18]
In November 2011, Brown said that 75 names of members of the Zetas drug cartel would be released if a member of the Anonymous group who had been kidnapped was not set free.[19] Brown claims the member was then released and that there was a truce between him and the drug cartel for the moment. Others have claimed the kidnapping was fake.[20]
On January 18, 2012, Brown interviewed with the cable news network RT about the cyber attacks by Anonymous and the temporary blackout of the US government websites WhiteHouse.Gov, DoJ.gov and FBI.gov.[21]
On March 6, 2012, he confirmed on Twitter that the FBI raided his residence after receiving information from Hector Xavier Monsegur (also known by the online pseudonym Sabu), the founder of LulzSec.[22]
In early January 2014, it was announced that his second book, started in 2006, will be published. According to his legal defense website:
The book was originally titled Hot, Fat, and Clouded: The Amazing and Amusing Failures of America’s Chattering Class and consisted of his attack on the ubiquitous newspaper columnists and media pundits whom he argues are undeservedly influential and able to form public opinion. … We are excited to announce that we have rescued the book from its fate and that it will soon see the light of day. Newly titled as Keep Rootin’ for Putin: Establishment Pundits and the Twilight of American Competence, the text become available as an eBook in the spring of 2014 for donors to his legal defense fund.[23]
During his incarceration, and beginning in September 2012, Brown is writing a series of columns forD Magazine titled "The Barrett Brown Review of Arts and Letters and Jail".[24]
Association with Anonymous[edit]
Some media outlets present Brown as a spokesperson for Anonymous.[8] He has appeared in the documentaries We Are Legion and Terms and Conditions May Apply.[25] Brown claims he renounced his links with the group in 2011.[19][26] It was also reported in 2011 that Brown and Anon alum Gregg Housh had landed a six-figure deal with Amazon for a book tentatively titled Anonymous: Tales From Inside The Accidental Cyberwar.[27]
Arrest and trial[edit]
On March 6, 2012, the FBI executed search warrants at Brown's apartment and his mother's house seeking evidence of alleged crimes. The items to be seized included "Records relating to HBGary, Infragard, Endgame Systems, Anonymous, LulzSec, IRC Chats, Twitter, <a href="http://wiki.echelon2.org" rel="nofollow">wiki.echelon2.org</a>, and pastebin.com". Agents took possession of his laptop computers. "I suspect that the FBI is working off of incorrect information", Brown told a reporter.[28]
On September 12, 2012, Brown was arrested in Dallas County, Texas for allegedly threatening anFBI agent in a YouTube video. His arrest occurred as he left a computer linked to Tinychat in which the raid could be heard in the background.[29] Brown has been public about his history of using heroin[26] and he was going through withdrawal[4][30] on the day of his arrest.
A magistrate denied bail, and therefore he was kept in pre-trial detention, because he was "a danger to the safety of the community and a risk of flight".[31]
On September 24, 2012, a Pastebin post appeared titled "Barrett Brown – Communiqué from Prison 9/20/12", in which Brown thanked supporters, described the insufficient medical treatment he received after having his ribs injured during his arrest, and acknowledged some past mistakes. The missive concludes, "I will personally thank everyone on the outside who has helped me and this movement particularly at this critical time, when I have regained the freedom that I did nothing to lose. For now, and until that time, it is war, on paper as always, but war."[32]
On October 3, 2012, a federal grand jury indictment was returned against Brown on charges of threats, conspiracy and retaliation against a federal law enforcement officer. Various tweets, YouTube uploads and comments made by Brown before his arrest were cited as support within the indictment.[33][34] He later entered a plea of not guilty to all three counts.[citation needed]
On December 4, 2012, Brown was indicted on an additional 12 federal charges related to the December 25, 2011 hack of Austin-based private intelligence company Stratfor carried out by Jeremy Hammond.[35][36] A trove of millions of Stratfor emails from the hack, including authentication information for thousands of credit card accounts, was shared by the hacker collective LulzSec withwhistleblower site Wikileaks (main article: 2012 Stratfor email leak). While Hammond plead guilty and received the maximum sentence of ten years in federal prison for the hack itself,[37] Brown faced up to 45 years in federal prison for allegedly sharing a link to the data as part of Project PM, after a presumed FBI entrapment maneuver.[38] Attorney Jesselyn Radack has raised connections between Brown's case, and that of her client Peter Van Buren, whom the State Department sought to prosecute over a link on his personal blog to a Wikileaks document. Two online commentators on internet security issues criticized the charges against Brown.[39][40] He has entered a plea of not guilty to all twelve counts.[citation needed]
On January 23, 2013, a third indictment was filed against Brown on two counts of obstruction for concealing evidence during the March 6, 2012 FBI raid of his and his mother's homes.[41] During a brief court hearing a week later, a judge found him mentally competent to stand trial, while Brown again plead not guilty to the additional charges.[42]
On May 1, 2013, it was announced that Brown had retained two attorneys, Charles Swift and Ahmed Ghappour, to represent him in his legal cases.[citation needed]
As of September 4, 2013, Brown was under a federal court-issued gag order; he and his lawyers were not allowed to discuss his case with the media, lest it taint a jury.[7][43] Assistant United States Attorney Candina S. Heath (the lead prosecutor) said that Brown has tried to manipulate the media from behind bars for his benefit, that Brown's attorney "coordinates and/or approves of his use of the media," and that most of the publicity about Brown has contained false information and "gross fabrications".[44] Defense counsel maintained the gag order was an unfounded and unwarranted breach of Brown's First Amendment rights. Though forbidden to write or speak out about his case, Brown continued to pen articles from his prison cell on unrelated topics.[45][46] The gag order was lifted on April 23, 2014, and key documents were unsealed.
Brown has been in custody since September 12, 2012.[47] His mother was sentenced on November 8, 2013 to six months of probation and a $1,000 fine for a misdemeanor charge of obstructing the execution of a search warrant. "My better judgment was clouded by my maternal instinct", she stated in court. The judge said to her, "I feel for you, as a parent. I know you did the best you could."[48][49]
In March 2014, most charges against Brown were dropped.[50] In April 2014, it was reported that Brown had agreed to a plea bargain.[51]
In January 2015, Brown was sentenced to 63 months in prison. He was also ordered to pay over $890,000 in fines and restitution.[52] Journalist Joshua Kopstein said he believed the government considered Brown to be a threat and suggested that its witnesses may have lied to secure his conviction.[53]
See also[edit]
References[edit]
- Jump up ^ Patrick McGuire (March 1, 2013). "We Spoke To Barrett Brown From Prison". VICE. Retrieved November 11, 2013.
- ^ Jump up to: a b c Alexander Zaitchik (September 5, 2013). "Barrett Brown: America's Least Likely Political Prisoner". Rolling Stone. Retrieved October 10, 2013.
- ^ Jump up to: a b David Carr (September 9, 2013). "A Journalist-Agitator Facing Prison Over a Link".The New York Times. Retrieved December 19, 2013.
- ^ Jump up to: a b Peter Ludlow (June 18, 2013). "The Strange Case of Barrett Brown". The Nation. Retrieved December 19, 2013.
- Jump up ^ Kristin Bergman (August 6, 2013). "Adding up to 105: The Charges Against Barrett Brown". Digital Media Law Project. Retrieved December 13, 2013.
- Jump up ^ "A Dispatch From Outside the Prison Holding Barrett Brown". Vice. March 8, 2014.
- ^ Jump up to: a b Fruzsina Eördögh. "The US Government Just Upheld Barrett Brown's Gag Order". <a href="http://Motherboard.vice.com" rel="nofollow">Motherboard.vice.com</a>. RetrievedSeptember 6, 2013.
- ^ Jump up to: a b c Tim Rogers (March 23, 2011). "Barrett Brown is Anonymous". D Magazine. Retrieved October 9, 2013.
- Jump up ^ Donald R. Prothero (May 16, 2007). "National Lampoon Meets Creationism". Skeptic. Retrieved October 5, 2013.
- Jump up ^ "Barrett Brown". Vanity Fair. Retrieved September 6, 2013.
- Jump up ^ "Barrett Brown". True/Slant. Retrieved October 10, 2013.
- Jump up ^ "Barrett Brown". The Huffington Post. Retrieved September 6, 2013.
- Jump up ^ "Barrett Brown". The Guardian. Retrieved September 6, 2013.
- Jump up ^ Ryan Gallagher. "How Barrett Brown went from Anonymous's PR to federal target". The Guardian. Retrieved September 6, 2013.
- Jump up ^ "Barrett Brown". Bloomberg BusinessWeek. August 1, 2012. Retrieved September 6,2013.
- Jump up ^ Barrett Brown (March 24, 2010). "The Great Pundit Hunt – Barrett Brown at True/Slant". True/Slant. Retrieved July 24, 2014.
- Jump up ^ Barrett Brown (June 22, 2011). "Romas/COIN". Project PM. Retrieved January 31, 2014.
- Jump up ^ Barrett Brown (June 22, 2011). "A sinister cyber-surveillance scheme exposed". The Guardian. Retrieved January 31, 2014.
- ^ Jump up to: a b Tim Rogers (November 4, 2011). "Barrett Brown vs. The Zetas". D Magazine. Retrieved October 9, 2013.
- Jump up ^ Adam Clark Estes (November 4, 2011). "Anonymous and the Zetas Cartel Declare a Truce". The Atlantic. Retrieved October 9, 2013.
- Jump up ^ "Internet strikes back: Anonymous' Operation Megaupload explained". RT. January 20, 2012. Retrieved October 9, 2013.
- Jump up ^ Adrian Covert (March 6, 2012). "Anonymous Reacts to Sabu's Betrayal of LulzSec".Gizmodo. Retrieved October 9, 2013.
- Jump up ^ Rogers, Tim (January 6, 2014). "Barrett Brown Book Will Be Released After All". D Magazine. Retrieved January 8, 2014.
- Jump up ^ "The Barrett Brown Review of Arts and Letters and Jail". D Magazine.
- Jump up ^ "Barrett Brown (II)". Internet Movie Database. September 29, 2014. Retrieved September 29, 2014.
- ^ Jump up to: a b Nate Anderson (May 6, 2011). "Prolific "spokesman" for Anonymous leaves the hacker group". Ars Technica. Retrieved October 9, 2013.
- Jump up ^ Hannah Roberts (November 5, 2011). "Cashing in as the face of Anonymous: Hacking group spokesman lands a six figure book deal". Daily Mail. Retrieved October 10, 2013.
- Jump up ^ Michael Hastings (April 24, 2012). "Exclusive: FBI Escalates War On Anonymous".BuzzFeed. Retrieved December 28, 2013.
- Jump up ^ "Barrett Brown Busted". YouTube. September 12, 2012. Retrieved September 6, 2013.
- Jump up ^ Kevin Drum (September 9, 2013). "105 Years in Jail for Posting a Link?". Mother Jones. Retrieved September 10, 2013.
- Jump up ^ Robert Wilonsky (April 3, 2013). "U.S. Attorney’s Office asks judge to toss motion to intervene in the case of detained hacktivist Barrett Brown". Dallas News. Retrieved October 9, 2013.
- Jump up ^ "Barrett Brown – Communiqué from Prison 9/20/12". <a href="http://Pastebin.com" rel="nofollow">Pastebin.com</a>. Retrieved September 6, 2013.
- Jump up ^ Avi Selk (October 4, 2012). "Feds indict self-proclaimed Anonymous spokesman Barrett Brown on retaliation, conspiracy charges". Dallas News. Retrieved October 9, 2013.
- Jump up ^ "Federal Grand Jury Charges Dallas Resident With Making An Internet Threat And Other Felony Offenses". Justice.gov. October 4, 2012. Retrieved September 6, 2013.
- Jump up ^ Robert Wilonsky (October 7, 2012). "New federal indictment lists 12 more charges against Barrett Brown". Dallas News. Retrieved October 9, 2013.
- Jump up ^ "Dallas Man Associated With Anonymous Hacking Group Faces Additional Federal Charges". Justice.gov. Retrieved September 6, 2013.
- Jump up ^ "Jeremy Hammond, hacker for Anonymous, sentenced to 10 years". The Washington Post. November 15, 2013. Retrieved December 1, 2013.
- Jump up ^ Robert McMillan (December 7, 2012). "Feds Charge Anonymous Spokesperson for Sharing Hacked Stratfor Credit Cards". Wired. Retrieved December 16, 2013. )
- Jump up ^ Adrian Chen (December 7, 2012). "Former Anonymous Spokesman Barrett Brown Indicted For Sharing a Link to Stolen Credit Card Data". Gawker. Retrieved October 9, 2013.
- Jump up ^ Paul Wagenseil (December 12, 2012). "Editorial: If Barrett Brown's Guilty, Then So Am I".LiveScience. Retrieved October 9, 2013.
- Jump up ^ Anna Merlan (January 24, 2013). "Barrett Brown Was Hit With a Third Indictment Yesterday, This Time For Concealing Evidence". Dallas Observer. Retrieved September 6, 2013.
- Jump up ^ Anna Merlan (January 30, 2013). "Barrett Brown Found Competent To Stand Trial; Pleads Not Guilty On Newest Charges of Concealing Evidence". Dallas Observer. Retrieved September 6,2013.
- Jump up ^ Robert Wilonsky (May 1, 2013). "Hours before judge hears government's case to slap gag on jailed hacktivist Barrett Brown, his attorneys strongly object". Dallas News. Retrieved September 6, 2013.
- Jump up ^ Krause, Kevin (September 4, 2013). "Gag order issued in federal cases against Dallas man tied to hacking group Anonymous". The Dallas Morning News.
- Jump up ^ Ed Pilkington (September 4, 2013). "US stops jailed activist Barrett Brown from discussing leaks prosecution". The Guardian. Retrieved December 27, 2013.
- Jump up ^ Tim Rogers (December 18, 2013). "Barrett Brown Writes From Jail About Profanity on the Airwaves". The Guardian. Retrieved December 27, 2013.
- Jump up ^ Zetter, Kim (January 25, 2013). "Anonymous spokesman Barrett Brown faces new charges". Wired UK. Retrieved September 6, 2013.
- Jump up ^ "Mother of Anonymous-linked Dallas writer gets probation for hiding laptops from feds". Dallas News. November 8, 2013. Retrieved November 8, 2013.
- Jump up ^ Dart, Tom (November 9, 2013). "Jailed activist Barrett Brown's mother given probation for helping son". The Guardian. Retrieved December 27, 2013.
- Jump up ^ Mullin, Joe (March 5, 2014). "Feds drop most charges against former Anon spokesman". Retrieved January 24, 2015.
- Jump up ^ Krause, Kevin (December 17, 2014). "Update: Dallas hacktivist Barrett Brown thought he would be sentenced today. He was wrong". The Dallas Morning News.
- Jump up ^ Woolf, Nicky (January 22, 2015). "Barrett Brown sentenced to 63 months for 'merely linking to hacked material'". The Guardian.
- Jump up ^ Kopstein, Joshua (February 25, 2015). "Will Matt DeHart be the next victim of the war on leaks?". Al Jazeera America, Al Jazeera.
Further reading[edit]
External links[edit]
| Persondata | |
|---|---|
| Name | Brown, Barrett |
| Alternative names | |
| Short description | Author |
| Date of birth | August 14, 1981 |
| Place of birth | Dallas, Texas, United States |
| Date of death | |
| Place of death |
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