Word: brutality
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...extreme violence against rivals and police has given La Familia a brutal reputation across Mexico. The group first burst to fame in 2006 when gangsters severed the heads of five rival traffickers and rolled them onto a disco dance floor. The latest round of bloody mayhem kicked off on July 11, following the dawn arrest of alleged gang lieutenant Arnoldo Rueda from his family home. In an attempt to rescue him, gunmen besieged a police base for 20 minutes with grenades and automatic-rifle fire. When they couldn't break him free, they launched simultaneous attacks on police in towns...
...Iranian government. The regime's shock troops, the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps, referred to as Sepah in Farsi, use the main building - which resembles a high school gym in shape and size - to train its members. For the past month, they have participated in the government's brutal response to mass demonstrations by beating protesters in the streets with truncheons and overseeing the notorious Basij militia, a paramilitary group that has been accused of killing dozens of civilians. (Read about the violence in the streets of Iran...
...took the stand on July 14 at the U.N.-backed Special Court for Sierra Leone for the first time since his trial began 18 months ago. He is accused of arming, training and controlling Sierra Leone's Revolutionary United Front (RUF) rebels, who rampaged across the country during its brutal 1991-2001 civil war. Prosecutors allege that Taylor targeted Sierra Leone so he could strip it of its vast mineral wealth, in particular its diamonds. Earlier in the trial, chief prosecutor Stephen Rapp insisted that Taylor was "an exceptional violator of human rights" who steadily provided weapons and support...
...Hundreds of people gathered outside France's Justice Ministry on the evening of July 13 to hail the decision by French authorities to re-try 14 of the 27 people convicted of the abduction and brutal 2006 murder of cell-phone salesman Ilan Halimi. Though the verdict announced on July 10 handed out stiff sentences to the leaders of the gang, Halimi's family, supporters and Jewish groups across the nation were outraged that 14 defendants got lighter punishments than prosecutors had requested. In response, Justice Minister Michèle Alliot-Marie announced Monday evening that she'd ordered prosecutors...
...Republicans and even centrist Democrats have pressured the Administration to take a harder line against Iran, and even left-leaning politicians who once pushed for engagement now say a diplomatic initiative appears unseemly given the accusations of vote-rigging by the Iranian government and the security forces' brutal response to the protests. Vice President Joe Biden's July 5 comment that the U.S. wouldn't stand in the way of an Israeli air strike on Iranian nuclear sites made it sound as if the Administration's message in favor of engagement was slipping. (See pictures of people around the world...