By Atia Abawi, NBC News Correspondent

KABUL, Afghanistan – In a country where underage marriage is common, education for girls is limited, and, according to the U.N., at least 90 percent of women suffer domestic abuse, “feminism” is not a word frequently tossed around.

Long after the fall of the Taliban, some strides have been made, but women continue to be treated like second-class citizens in some Islamic nations like Afghanistan.

One of the biggest struggles has been to teach Afghan society that Islam in fact promotes equality for women, and that the misinterpretations stem from cultural, not religious, ideals.

Since 1998, Imam Yahya Hendi, an American imam, has traveled to over 60 Muslim and non-Muslim countries to share his views and knowledge of Islam.

“In so many places I have become the ‘feminist imam,’” said Hendi as we recently sat down to chat at the U.S. Embassy in Kabul.

---

He’s met presidents, villagers and religious scholars of all faiths. It was an orthodox rabbi he befriended in Sydney, Australia who first gave him his nickname.

“I think it is a title I have to be proud of and it means a lot to me.”

Woman are equal in the Quran
Hendi believes that many Muslims and non-Muslims alike misinterpret the religion because they have not truly informed themselves on the teachings of the Muslim holy book, the Quran.

During his current trip to Afghanistan, sponsored by the U.S. State Department, Hendi met with Afghan students, religious leaders and officials sharing his perspective after decades of educating himself not only on Islam, but also on Judaism and Christianity.

“Islam would consider Judaism and Christianity as partners in this family – human family.  [The Prophet] Muhammad considered these religions complementing one another, not at odds with one another.”

During his group sessions in Afghanistan he explained that in Islam, women are equals not only in theology, but also in law, ethics and morals.

“Muslims speak a lot about how Islam is for women. My challenge to Muslims – if that is the case, and I think that that is the case – is how can we translate theology into practice.”

Hendi has actually issued a fatwa against abusing women in which he quotes examples from the Quran and the Prophet Muhammad to bolster his argument that violence against women has no place in Islam.

In the fatwa, Hendi wrote, “Prophet Muhammad, upon him be peace, made it very clear that the beating of the wife is harm and prohibited.

"Do not beat the female servants of Allah";

"Some (women) visited my family complaining about their husbands (beating them). These (husbands) are not the best of you."

During his time in Afghanistan, Hendi told crowds that if the country wants to move forward, it must empower women and make them an equal part of the educational and social-political system of the country.

“Islam should not – must not – be used as an excuse to force women to their homes,” he said.  “There’s nothing that Afghan women cannot do.”

Advice: Be leaders
In a country dominated by political and religious extremists the imam said the reactions to his message were generally positive, but that there are still lots of roadblocks.

“Some imams and mullahs told me, ‘Imam, you are right, but we cannot say this publicly because we will be killed by the Taliban.’”

His advice to the religious leaders was to be what they are meant to be: Leaders.

“What makes a leader a leader is his or her ability to be courageous.  To stand up or take a stand.”

Hendi told the Muslims he met with to look at Islam differently, and to look at Judaism and Christianity differently.

Able to recite prayers and their meanings from the Torah, the Bible and the Quran, Hendi believes the divisions among the religions are made by humans who practice them – not the teachings.

“We all need to challenge ourselves and go out of the box and understand the other from within, not from without.”

From Sept. 11 – Sept. 25 Hendi and a group of other imams, rabbis and priests will be driving a ‘Caravan of Reconciliation’ around the US. Their group, Clergy Beyond Borders stop at cities, from Washington, D.C. to Chattanooga, Tenn,, to promote peace and understanding.

By Stephanie Gosk, NBC News Correspondent

TRIPOLI – Libya's Abu Salim prison is one of the world's most notorious. For four decades, Moammar Gadhafi threw "enemies of the state" behind its bars without a trial to languish for years. Stories of torture and months in solitary confinement were common. 

In 1996, guards allegedly killed more than 1,200 prisoners in what is now known as the "Abu Salim Massacre." Last February, lawyers seeking justice for the families of those killed staged protests in Benghazi that eventually sparked the nation-wide uprising.

This week rebel forces successfully battled for control of the feared prison. They opened the doors and let everyone out.  Some of the prisoners, unable to believe that Gadhafi’s reign is over and angry over the years of their lives lost in jail, are now driven by one goal: Find Gadhafi.

---

Amid the chaos at Gadhafi's recently conquered compound we met Ali Ahmed Sussi. He was released from the Abu Salim prison on Wednesday. Sussi was born in Benghazi but like many Libyans, he traveled abroad to get his education.  He studied communication at the University of California and lived in Los Angeles with his family for 12 years. 

Driven by hatred for Gadhafi's regime, the father of three returned to Libya to start a revolution in 2004.  But when he smuggled weapons into the country from Yemen, the government caught wind of the plan, arrested him, and locked him up at Abu Salim. 

Now, seven years later, the rebel forces have freed him.

Standing among the hundreds of armed fighters who saved him, Sussi said "I can smell freedom." 

As soon as he was released the 46-year-old asked for fatigues and a gun. His hopes of staging a revolution are over, but he can still take part in the final days of one. 

Fueled by memory of his years in Abu Salim, Sussi has now joined the hunt for the despot turned fugitive.  He told us "I will search home to home, room to room, alley to alley.  We gonna catch you Gadhafi."

By Jim Maceda, NBC News Correspondent

LONDON – Black smoke billowed from parts of the capital. The crack of gunfire echoed off buildings. Rag-tag gunmen manned checkpoints on dozens of street corners, covered in bullet-belts and brandishing RPG launchers. A massive statue symbolizing the dictator’s rule had fallen just two days before. Some were still kicking at his likeness and tearing up his posters.

But many others were keen to withdraw funds from the bank, reopen their shops and put their lives back together. Some were giddy with revolution. Others feared the looting they’d witnessed and warned of worse to come. The people were awash in weapons. The dictator, meanwhile, had disappeared.

This might sound like today’s Tripoli, but this was the scene in Baghdad as our NBC News convoy drove into the war-torn city on April 11, 2003.

---

Bagdad? Tripoli?
I find myself flashing constantly back to those heady days as I watch the amazing images of the collapse of the Gadhafi regime. It was a collapse which, as with Saddam Hussein’s, outpaced my own expectations. I’m clearly not alone. Here in London, many British papers have been replete with editorials by “experts” recalling early “post-Saddam” Iraq, and drawing comparisons – and mostly differences – with post-Gadhafi Libya. 

Among them, former British Foreign Minister Malcolm Rifkind neatly laid out the biggest contrasts in an editorial in the Times of London.

First and foremost, Rifkind pointed out that the Libyan people – unlike the Iraqis – fought for and won their freedom. Iraqis, he wrote, had their freedom handed to them. Secondly, Iraqis had to suffer “the humiliation” of a U.S. occupation for years; but there are no “foreign boots” on the ground in Libya, though a small contingent of U.N. peacekeepers may be welcomed to help police Tripoli. Thirdly, the “seeds of civil war” were already planted in Iraq, with deepening bad blood between the Shiite majority, who were suddenly handed power, and Saddam’s Sunnis, who had lost their traditional hold on it.

These differences are real, and Libya is not Iraq for many other reasons. But the rebels, and the NATO coalition that helped them win, are clearly worried about the similarities, and about not repeating the mistakes made in the days and weeks after Saddam’s fall.

Lots of promises
The rebel leadership has promised to include all Libyans in the New Libya. It’s asked policemen to stay at their posts. It claims that Libya will generate enough income through its restored oil industry to pay for its own nation building. And it promises a new constitution, a national referendum, and both free and fair parliamentary and presidential elections.

Encouraging? Of course; but let’s take a step back again in time.

The security vacuum left in Baghdad was filled by over-armed, disoriented U.S. soldiers, who did little more than watch, agog, as anything with value was looted.

Who will fill a similar security vacuum in Tripoli if those Libyan police are too afraid of pro-Gadhafi snipers – or rockets – to actually police the streets? It would seem that unless Gadhafi and his sons are captured or killed, a pro-regime insurgency may well take root quickly. They could do as much damage in Tripoli as the black-clad Fedayeen Saddam, a paramilitary group loyal to the former Ba’athist government of Saddam Hussein, did in and around Baghdad.

In addition, the rebel leadership says it will move “trained” security forces from Benghazi, in the East, to Tripoli, in the West, to avoid perhaps the biggest mistake made in Iraq, and keep the remains of the regime’s armed forces together. But how would that work, given the historic tension and animosity between the Eastern and Western Libyan tribes?

In Libya, tribal loyalty rules supreme. It can be just as strong – and deadly – as sectarian ties in Iraq. In 1969, Gadhafi overthrew the Eastern tribal King Idris. For more than 40 years, Gadhafi survived by isolating, impoverishing, and sometimes crushing those tribes, near Benghazi. Now, seething with rage and greed, those same tribes want their due. Meanwhile, Western tribes, even those who side with the rebels, want anything but.

It may be as dangerous for a Benghazi policeman or soldier to work the streets of Tripoli as it would have been for a Sunni cop to survive in Sadr City. And if Libyan security forces can’t manage to unite, who then would fill the vacuum? U.N. peacekeepers? The African Union? Or, more likely, French, British and U.S. “special advisors” and troops?

Remember the Bush administration’s vision for post-Saddam Iraq back in 2003? That, after the Iraqi people rose up as one and Saddam Hussein fell, the nation’s rebuilding would be financed by oil money?

What happened? Instead, insurgents sabotaged pipelines, assassinated engineers and managers, and suppressed Iraq’s oil industry for years. That same scenario could play out in Libya if today’s flimsy rebel coalition disintegrates into fighting between Libyan tribes, or between secular Libyans and Islamists.

Thursday’s “London Times” summed up the worry, saying, “complacency would be foolish. Looting, revenge attacks against Gadhafi loyalists or internecine fighting could all make life rocky as any new regime seeks to gain a foothold in the country.” 

Seen this movie before
What is promised for Libya looks like a familiar movie.

Iraq, like Libya, tried to move from decades of dictatorship to democracy almost overnight. It wrote a new constitution, held nation-wide elections – but that didn’t prevent an insurgency from killing thousands of U.S. troops and Iraqi civilians; it didn’t stop Sunni-Shiite bloodshed; nor did it prevent the rise of al-Qaida in Mesopotamia, one of the terrorist group’s most brutal affiliates.

Rifkind, the former British Foreign Minister, said that “there is no evidence that [Libya’s Islamists] have any significant following.” But that was also the case in Iraq in 2003. Islamist radicals emerged there from the chaos and power vacuum left behind.

It’s too early to say if Libya can avoid either, and not repeat history.

Jim Maceda is an NBC News correspondent based in London, who has covered both Libya and Iraq.

By Baruch Ben-Chorin, NBC News Producer

TURKANA, Kenya – “Hunger, hunger,” the old man repeated over and over.

Lomaidi crouched in front of his hut under the scorching African sun. He was too weak to move and his ribs stuck through his skin.

We were in Kalapata, a small village in Turkana, a remote part of northern Kenya. Lomaidi was once wealthy, but drought and cattle raids had wiped out his herds completely.  He hadn’t eaten in weeks when we met him and appeared to be waiting to die.

This was the face of famine in Turkana.

Bordering Sudan and Ethiopia, this vast, arid part of Africa is home to the Turkana. These proud and gracious semi-nomads’ ancient culture revolves around livestock. Their cattle, goats and camels are their source of food, the center of their social structure and key to their identity. 

Now the drought engulfing the Horn of Africa has destroyed much of the grassland throughout Turkana, devastating their livestock herds. Aid workers told us that authorities declare a famine when 30 percent of a population is malnourished. Close to 40 percent of the people are malnourished in some parts of Turkana, the highest proportion in the entire region.

Still, very little aid seemed to be getting to the Turkana, who make up a small minority in this deeply divided and corrupt country. Nobody seems to be fighting their corner, maybe because they’re Kenyan and not refugees of a failed state like Somalia that have populated our TV screens.

---

Young and old
It took us a day-and-a-half to get to Loitanit, which is near the border with Sudan. James Mwangi, the head of the Kenyan Red Cross crisis team in Turkana rode with us in a 4X4 truck.
 
Mwangi was soft-spoken, but determined to combat the famine in any way he could.  In recent weeks his team had managed to set up feeding centers for the children and the elderly in many of the villages throughout Turkana. So the network of local volunteers helped provide a bowl of porridge a day to the needy, which was better than nothing – but not nearly enough. Mwangi is fighting an uphill battle.

A heartbreaking scene greeted us at the local school: Akibur clung to his mother amid a crowd of children waiting for food.  The six-year-old hadn’t eaten anything in two weeks, his mother said.  Flies swarmed the tiny child’s face and acute malnutrition had turned his hair reddish-brown. 

Akibur’s father had died from starvation the previous day as the family neared the end of a week-long journey from their mud hut to a feeding center. When Akibur finally got his bowl of maize-porridge, he was so overwhelmed by the sight and smell of the food he didn’t eat for a few minutes. The meager bowl of food probably saved his life.

Many of the children we saw had looked like Akibur just three weeks before, aid workers told us. But then the Red Cross started feeding children here once a day and soon the kids began running around, like kids do throughout the world, aid workers said.

Still, I wondered what future these children had.

The elderly got their daily rations at a separate distribution point. The Red Cross insisted on feeding the old men and women directly, otherwise they would give their food portions to other family members. Sharing is very important for the Turkana, Mwangi told us. 

The old people sat under the trees, ate and looked lost.

‘How can he say that?’
Philip Elimlim, the chief of Kalapata, was very angry when we met him. 

He said that a Kenyan government minister, Orwa Ojode, had denied there was even a famine in Kenya. The stories of people dying of hunger were all made up, the minister had said on television. 

Elimelim took us to a fresh grave which he said held the body of someone who had had starved to death.

“The people in my village are hungry,” he told us. “They are starving, I know them. They are dying. How can he say that?”

The chief decided to take a stand and openly challenge the minister.  Now the government is trying to get him fired, according to local reports.

But Elimelim said he won’t give up and will speak his mind even if it means losing his job.

‘These are my people’
We had gone to Kalapata after Dorcus Ngipou, a Turkana friend, told us things were really bad there.

Ngipou lives in Nairobi but had traveled to her home region twice in the last few weeks. She helped organize a privately organized food convoy to the region, and then spent a week cooking food for the people in Kalapata with four other women from Nairobi. 

“These are my people,” she said. “I have to do this.”

Some Kenyans are trying to shame the government into helping the people of Kalapata.

The “Kenyans for Kenya” campaign has already raised $5 million and organized aid convoys to the area. Some of the biggest rock stars of Kenya visited Turkana when we were there. They now plan a big benefit concert at the end of the month, which will be carried live on all Kenyan TV stations.

Is this people power in action? Maybe, but it's far short of what is needed, and unless something changes dramatically, the Turkana will continue to starve.

By Arata Yamamoto, NBC News Producer

TOYKO – If disaster struck, and millions of dollars in cash turned up, do you think it would be returned to its rightful owners?

In Japan, it was.

During the four months since the giant tsunami struck Japan's northern coast, more than 5,700 safes containing approximately $30 million has been recovered from the three hardest hit prefectures, Japan’s National Police Agency recently announced.

Remarkably – since residents of the tsunami zone have scattered across the country and even the world – 96 percent, or nearly $29.6 million in cash, has already been returned to its rightful owners, or if authorities feared the owner had died in the disaster, their closest relative. 

---

Detective job to find rightful owners 
The majority of the safes recovered in Iwate, Miyagi and Fukushima were collected by Japan’s Self Defense Force, police, and volunteers while combing through destroyed homes and buildings and clearing debris left behind by the devastating wave; some individuals also came forward with lost valuables.

Masao Sasaki, with the Iwate prefectural police, said that determining who the money belonged to and then actually finding them proved to be a great challenge and often involved excruciating detective work.

"In some cases, entire communities were completely washed away. Even if we had information on the address of the owner, there would be no building left, landlines were destroyed,” Sasaki explained. “So we went around to the various evacuation centers and started checking through the rosters."

In Iwate prefecture alone, where more than 23,000 structures along the coast were destroyed, 2,400 safes containing a total amount of $10 million was collected. Incredibly, 91 percent of it has already been returned.

Considering that up until June there were more than 330 evacuation centers in Iwate, and people were constantly moving to new locations, it was no small feat to return that much money.

“You can just imagine the difficult work involved in tracking down the owners,” Sasaki said. "In some cases where the owner was thought to have perished, we had to find the closest kin who could have been anywhere inside or outside Iwate.

It’s not unusual for Japanese, especially the elderly, to keep cash at home. In particular, fishermen, who made up a large portion of the coastal population, traditionally preferred cash transactions and often even paid salaries in cash. 

Thankfully, many of the safes also held bank books, certificates of land rights, name chops (traditional stamps used in lieu of signatures on personal documents) or some other form of identification. But because they were drenched in mud and water, each item often had to be carefully cleaned and dried, at times using a shirt iron in order to extract useful clues.

"It was important to be able to return these items properly cleaned, but our first and utmost priority was to find the owners and return their belongings as quickly as possible," said Sasaki.

Asked how they were able to return 91 percent of the lost valuables, Sasaki said it was simply the laborious work and perseverance of the prefecture’s officers.

Venturing into the nuke zone
It was a tougher task in Fukushima prefecture, where extra precaution was required to reach some of the areas affected by the nuclear accident.

When their officers entered the 12-mile-radius exclusion zone, they had to put on hazmat suits and equip themselves with survey meters so they could check the radiation levels.

"It might have taken a little longer in Fukushima," said Yoshiyasu Sato of the local prefectural police headquarters. "We had to start from the outer perimeter of the exclusion zone and slowly work our way in.”

But according to Sato, even though it took four months, the police have pretty much completed their task: they have already returned 96 percent of the $7.2 million found in some 900 safe boxes.

And in the Miyagi prefecture they had an even greater rate of return. More than 2,400 safes were collected that contained approximately $13.5 million –amazingly 99 percent of that has been returned to its owners or closest kin.

Almost done
In Iwate, as they get closer to completing the task of clearing away the rubble, the number of safes and other belongings recovered has dropped. But, Sasaki said, “the collection is still not completely zero, the numbers have come down, but items are being turned in sporadically.”

In total, if you included the money retrieved from lost wallets and purses, $48.3 million worth of cash was collected from the disaster zone. Out of that total amount, 85 percent has found its way to its rightful owners.

While the sheer amount of cash collected and returned is astounding, it is also another reminder of the scope of the damage brought by the March earthquake and tsunami which claimed the lives of more than 20,000 people and completely wiped out at least 112,000 homes and buildings.

Full text and video of President Barack Obama's statement on the rebel advances in Libya:

August 22, 2011

Good afternoon, everybody. 

I just completed a call with my National Security Council on the situation in Libya, and earlier today I spoke to Prime Minister Cameron about the extraordinary events taking place there. The situation is still very fluid. There remains a degree of uncertainty, and there are still regime elements who pose a threat.

But this much is clear: The Gadhafi regime is coming to an end and the future of Libya is in the hands of its people.

In just six months, the 42-year reign of Moammar Gadhafi has unraveled.

---

Earlier this year, we were inspired by the peaceful protests that broke out across Libya. This basic and joyful longing for human freedom echoed the voices that we had heard all across the region, from Tunis to Cairo.

In the face of these protests, the Gadhafi regime responded with brutal crackdowns, civilians were murdered in the streets, a campaign of violence was launched against the Libyan people, Gadhafi threatened to hunt peaceful protesters down like rats. As his forces advanced across the country, there existed the potential for wholesale massacres of innocent civilians. 

In the face of this aggression, the international community took action. The United States helped shape a U.N. Security Council resolution that mandated the protection of Libyan civilians. An unprecedented coalition was formed that included the United States, our NATO partners and Arab nations. And in March, the international community launched a military operation to save lives and stop Gadhafi's forces in their tracks. 

In the early days of this intervention, the United States provided the bulk of the firepower, and then our friends and allies stepped forward. The Transitional National Council established itself as a credible representative of the Libyan people. And the United States, together with our European allies and friends across the region, recognized the TNC as the legitimate governing authority in Libya. 

Gadhafi was cut off from arms and cash, and his forces were steadily degraded. 

From Benghazi to Misrata to the western mountains, the Libyan opposition courageously confronted the regime, and the tide turned in their favor. 

Over the last several days, the situation in Libya has reached a tipping point, as the opposition increased its coordination from east to west, took town after town, and the people of Tripoli rose up to claim their freedom.

For over four decades, the Libyan people had lived under the rule of a tyrant who denied them their most basic human rights. Now the celebrations that we've seen in the streets of Libya shows that the pursuit of human dignity is far stronger than any dictator.

I want to emphasize that this is not over yet. As the regime collapses, there's still fierce fighting in some areas, and we have reports of regime elements threatening to continue fighter.

Although it's clear that Gadhafi's rule is over, he still has the opportunity to reduce further bloodshed by explicitly relinquishing power to the people of Libya and calling for those forces that continue to fight to lay down their arms for the sake of Libya.

As we move forward from this pivotal phase, the opposition should continue to take important steps to bring about a transition that is peaceful, inclusive and just.

As the leadership of the TNC has made clear, the rights of all Libyans must be respected. 

True justice will not come from reprisals and violence. It will come from reconciliation and a Libya that allows its citizens to determine their own destiny. 

In that effort, the United States will be a friend and a partner. 

We will join with allies and partners to continue the work of safeguarding the people of Libya. As remaining regime elements menace parts of the country, I've directed my team to be in close contact with NATO, as well as the United Nations, to determine other steps that we can take.

To deal with the humanitarian impact, we're working to ensure that critical supplies reach those in need, particularly those who have been wounded. 

Secretary Clinton spoke today with her counterparts from leading nations of the coalition on all these matters. And I've directed Ambassador Susan Rice to request that the U.N. secretary general use next month's General Assembly to support this important transition. 

For many months, the TNC has been working with the international community to prepare for a post-Gadhafi Libya. As those efforts proceed, our diplomats will work with the TNC as they ensure that the institutions of the Libyan state are protected. 

And we will support them with the assets of the Gadhafi regime that were frozen earlier this year. 

Above all, we will call for an inclusive transition that leads to a democratic Libya. 

As we move forward, we should also recognize the extraordinary work that has already been done. 

To the American people, these events have particular resonance. Gadhafi's regime has murdered scores of American citizens in acts of terror in the past. Today we remember the lives of those who were taken in those acts of terror and stand in solidarity with their families. 

We also pay tribute to Admiral Sam Locklear and all of the men and women in uniform who have saved so many lives over the last several months, including our brave pilots. They've executed their mission with skill and extraordinary bravery, and all of this was done without putting a single U.S. troop on the ground. 

To our friends and allies, the Libyan intervention demonstrates what the international community can achieve when we stand together as one. Although the efforts in Libya are not yet over, NATO has once more proven that it is the most capable alliance in the world and that its strength comes from both its firepower and the power of our democratic ideals. 

And the Arab members of our coalition have stepped up and shown what can be achieved when we act together as equal partners. Their actions sent a powerful message about the unity of our effort and our support for the future of Libya.

Finally, the Libyan people, your courage and character have been unbreakable in the face of a tyrant. An ocean divides us, but we are joined in the basic human longing for freedom, for justice and for dignity.

Your revolution is your own, and your sacrifices have been extraordinary. Now the Libya that you deserve is within your reach. Going forward, we will stay in close coordination with the TNC to support that outcome.

I know there will be huge challenges ahead. The extraordinary events in Libya remind us that fear can give way to hope, and that the power of people striving for freedom can bring about a brighter day.

Thank you very much.

 

By Robert Windrem, NBC News investigative producer

Western intelligence agencies believe there is a "treasure trove" of material in Libyan intelligence archives, and they may have already prepared to exploit it once Moammar Gadhafi's regime finally falls.

Current and former U.S. intelligence officials point to the possibilities of what could be found in the files, among them:

• The intelligence service's (and Gadhafi's own) role in the 1988 bombing of PanAm 103 and UTA 772 months later, which killed 430 people in the air and on the ground, as well as their role in the 1986 LaBelle Disco bombing in Berlin, which killed two U.S. soldiers and wounded 79 others.

• Support for various terrorist groups, including Palestinian groups, the Irish Republican Army, the El Rukns street gang in Chicago and individual terrorists like Carlos the Jackal and Abu Nidal.

---

• A purported 1981 assassination plot against U.S. President Ronald Reagan.

• Gadhafi's financial support for the Pakistani nuclear weapons program in the 1980s and the relationship between Libya and Pakistani nuclear scientist A.Q. Khan a decade later, as well as Western countries that supported Gadhafi's chemical and biological weapons programs.

Obama promises to support Libyan transition

There may also be materials on U.S. intelligence operations against al-Qaida, which began under President George W. Bush after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. A steady stream of U.S. intelligence and law enforcement officials visited Libya over the last decade as relations between the two countries got better.  

U.S. officials say Gadhafi has one major intelligence service but that there are also "security elements around him" who carry out intelligence and security operations and whose files Western intelligence agencies would also like to exploit.

One former official suspects there may already be planning for that exploitation. He noted that Musa Kusa, the former head of Libyan intelligence and one of Gadhafi's most loyal aides, had defected. 

By Jim Maceda, NBC News correspondent　

Revolutions and major coups often look inevitable in hindsight, but 20 years ago today, when I got a 6:15 a.m. call from my acting Moscow bureau chief, I almost hung up in disbelief. What he was saying had to be a bad joke – or a dream. I only caught clips of his stressed-out, staccato voice and repeated what he said in a series of questions. "Gang of Eight"? … Declared a state of emergency? … Mikhail Gorbachev has "taken ill"? … His phones cut off at his Crimean dacha? … Tanks now ring the Kremlin? My wife, Cindy, and I had been based in Moscow for 13 months, but had never really unpacked. I ran to the shower, tripping over boxes.

Thus began 2 ½ days of raw Russian history, etched in my mind as a series of trembling limbs.

---

First, my own legs, which shook uncontrollably as I washed and rushed into the bureau (hoping to beat the tank jams). This junior reporter knew he was about to sink or swim. There would be no help – most of that was on summer break. NBC’s veteran Moscow correspondent, Bob Abernethy, would be delayed for at least several days, because – and who could make this up – Hurricane Bob had just shut down the northeast coast of America, and Mr. Abernethy was vacationing with family in Boston.

Then there were Gennady Yanayev’s trembling hands as the Soviet vice president, at a press conference later that day, tried to calmly claim that HE was now in control and that Gorbachev "needed time to get his health back." Even Soviet TV couldn’t resist zooming in on those conspiratorial hands.

But probably few remember how Russian President Boris Yeltsin shook from the waist down after he jumped on a tank outside the "White House" – the Russian government building – and called on citizens to resist the illegal coup. I remember this because his knocking knees were positioned right in front of my eyes – I could see nothing else – a lucky result of having ebbed and flowed with the waves of a 100,000-plus crowd. And I recall thinking, "so this is how heroes REALLY do it … despite their shakes."

 

The actual coup took place in the early morning hours of Wednesday, Aug. 21, 1991, when a KGB-led special force of tank corpsmen and police commandos moved in to break up the anti-coup civil disobedience. Conveniently, this was all happening in time for our Nightly News program, given the eight hours time difference with New York. But I didn’t make Nightly that night. At the height of the street violence, several Russian men jumped onto armored vehicles, trying to block the drivers’ view, and were either shot or fell to their deaths. Some resisters threw Molotov cocktails, setting vehicles on fire; the police blanketed the area with CS gas. In the mayhem I lost contact with my cameraman, Kyle Eppler – yes there was a time BEFORE portable phones – and, fearing I’d miss the Nightly deadline, ran a couple of miles, with Kyle’s tripod, back to the bureau. As I entered the newsroom, breathless, there was Eppler, removing an earpiece, having just gone LIVE with anchor Tom Brokaw with an eyewitness report. It wasn’t Kyle’s fault – he could always run faster.

Of course, the coup was short-lived. The plan to attack the "White House," which had become the heart of the anti-coup resistance, never happened. At least one of the "Gang of Eight" coup plotters – maybe all of them – lost their nerve. Boris Pugo, the interior minister, lost more than that – committing suicide with his wife after receiving news that the conspiracy had failed. The other seven were jailed, tried and eventually given amnesty. Gorbachev flew back to Moscow, his dignity intact, but Yeltsin was already in charge. Four months later, Gorbachev stepped down, effectively dissolving the Soviet Union. The rest, as they say, is history: 10 years of social and financial chaos that some have called "democracy," then another 10 years of oil-financed authoritarianism, or "Putinism." Many analysts see the August coup of 1991 as the catalyst for all of that.

But I like to think of the coup from the point of view of the man who was U.S. ambassador to the USSR then, Robert Strauss. On Aug. 21, with streams of Soviet tanks now moving OUT of the capital, Strauss, who’d just landed when the Moscow airport reopened to take up his new post, was driving INTO the capital. As his diplomatic car passed tank after tank along the highway – as he loved to tell the story – he turned to an assistant and said, "Damn, this is one helluva welcoming committee!"

In the end, the summer-staffed NBC Moscow bureau ran non-stop – and sleepless – for more than 100 hours. In signing off on my final affiliate live shot, I forgot my last name. Back home that Wednesday night for the first time since Monday morning, I saw Cindy was unpacking a box of crystal I’d tripped over. "What’s up with that?" I asked. "Might as well," she replied, "we’re staying here awhile."

Jim Maceda is an NBC News correspondent based in London. He covered the Soviet Union and Russia from 1990 to 1994.

 

 

 

 

A senior international development official in Pakistan who worked with kidnapped U.S. contractor Warren Weinstein over the last two years tells NBC News that Weinstein was "popular" and "well-known," particularly in bureaucratic and political circles in-country, and had earned a reputation for making efforts to respect and adhere to local practices, making his disappearance all the more difficult to understand.

Weinstein, 70, had been in Pakistan for more than five years doing development work when gunmen reportedly forced their way into his Lahore home and kidnapped him before dawn Saturday. The FBI and Pakistani authorities are investigating, and Weinstein's security guards and driver have been questioned, but so far there are no leads and no ransom demands, and no group has claimed responsibility. This week, police released a sketch of a possible suspect. 

The development official, who asked not to be identified because he is not authorized to speak on the matter, said Weinstein went above and beyond the efforts typically made by contractors in Pakistan — most of whom, he said, stay briefly, focus on the project at hand and leave when the work is completed. 

---

Weinstein, he said, adopted local practices and customs as much as possible, often wearing the traditional Pakistani shalwar kameez: loose-fitting pants and a long tunic top. He made an effort to learn Urdu and used a number of words in his everyday language. Weinstein also diligently worked to maintain contact with his network on the ground, sending out messages and greetings for religious and cultural occasions.

"That made him very popular with a lot of people here," said the official. 

Weinstein also built a wide circle of friends and contacts in Pakistan, using what the official called his "appetite for social networking."

Weinstein's primary responsibility in Pakistan was to serve as the country director for J.E. Austin Associates, a U.S.-based development consulting firm. But according to this official, Weinstein got more work through his extensive network and had a penchant for working his way onto contracts and into meetings that did not necessarily fall within his area of expertise, which included a focus on the agricultural sector.

"You'd walk into a meeting on industry or anything else — and Warren would be sitting there," said the official. "We'd laugh and say, 'How did you get on this one, Warren?!?'"

One such project included a Punjab government contract for private-sector development work, funded by the U.K.'s  Department for International Development. Weinstein had been requested by an official within the Punjab government for the project, which required developing a strategy for private-sector development and reorganizing provincial government departments to support that work. 

"I did advise [Weinstein] to join hands with an economist on this project, since it wasn't his expertise," said the official. "He laughed and said, 'Do you think economists are going to do anything good for your country?' He does have a  good sense of humor."

Despite working outside his comfort zone, the official said, Weinstein always had "a huge amount of energy and excitement" and was always "pleasant," "professional" and "incredibly personable." 

A year and a half ago, Weinstein confided in this official that he had a serious heart condition and was being treated in Pakistan.

"He had become extremely careful in his eating habits," said this official. "I asked him why he didn't just go back to the U.S. for treatment, but he said he trusted the doctors in Lahore."

 

By Courtney Kube, NBC News producer

BAGHDAD, IRAQ – One year ago today, the last of the "combat troops" drove out of in Iraq and into Kuwait, marking the symbolic end of more than seven years of U.S. combat in Iraq.

Less than two weeks later, President Barack Obama sat in the Oval Office and declared that, "The American combat mission in Iraq has ended." But has it?

---

 

June was the deadliest month for U.S. troops in Iraq since 2008. Fifteen U.S. service members died there that month.

A U.S. military spokesperson in Iraq said that there are an average of 14 attacks per day across the country, targeting Iraqi civilians, Iraqi military and police, and U.S. troops.

That's down from upward of 200 attacks per day back in 2007 during the height of combat operations there, but the spokesperson conceded that the number is still too high.

"It’s a lot of attacks," Maj. Gen. Jeffrey Buchanan said during a meeting with Pentagon reporters this week, adding that the numbers of attacks and casualties "are not satisfactory."

For some Americans, the war isn't over

Buchanan said that while al-Qaida in Iraq still has as many as 1,000 fighters operating there, the group is "a shadow of what it use to be." It "doesn’t represent the existential threat to the state" that it once did, and its finances are "seriously degraded," he said.

So who is behind the attacks in Iraq now?

Most can be linked to a Shiite extremist group called the Promised Day Brigades. The group, which boasts several thousand fighters, is the successor of the radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army, which disbanded several years ago.

Buchanan also warned of a significant increase in support for the insurgents from Iran and particularly from a special Iranian military unit called the Quds Force in recent weeks. The U.S. military recently displayed new, more lethal rockets that it said had been manufactured in Iran and then used to attack American troops.

The militants also still show a surprising ability to regenerate their leadership, Buchanan said. In the northern city of Mosul, the insurgent leadership has already been taken out five times this year, but each time a new leader has emerged quickly, often within a matter of days.

"It’s going to take a long time" to defeat these groups, Buchanan warned.

Just as violence has persisted in Iraq, U.S. military operations have continued there, as well. Although the Iraqi military is supposed to have the lead in security operations throughout the country, Buchanan revealed two unilateral airstrikes that U.S. forces conducted this summer.

U.S. Apache helicopters fired on several insurgents who were spotted firing rocket-propelled grenades at a U.S. base near the Basra airport in southern Iraq, he said. There was no Iraqi military involvement in the Apache strike.

In another incident in June, U.S. forces spotted several insurgents planting a roadside bomb to target an approaching U.S. convoy.　U.S. helicopters fired on the men, preventing the convoy from striking the bomb. There was no Iraqi military involved in this incident, either.

The continued danger to U.S. military men and women deployed in Iraq was brought home to an NBC News team at the beginning of this month. Pentagon correspondent Jim Miklaszewski, cameraman Jim Long and I were at Victory Base in Baghdad when insurgents began launching rockets at the complex. As the sirens blared and an announcer warned of "Incoming!" an enlisted soldier ran by and said, "Here we go again." He later explained that the enemy has been "peppering" Victory with rockets lately and showed off several places where shrapnel had pocked blast walls and shattered windows.

During his first visit to Baghdad as secretary of defense in July, Leon Panetta gave an exclusive interview to Miklaszewski, telling him that the U.S. will not sit idly by as troops are attacked. "We’re continuing to see attacks," Panetta said, adding that, "we have a responsibility to defend our soldiers, and that’s exactly what I’m going to do."

What does the future hold for the U.S. in Iraq?

On Aug. 2, the Iraqi government announced it wanted to begin negotiating for a continuing U.S. presence in Iraq beyond the current Dec. 31 deadline to have all U.S. troops out of the country.　 U.S. defense officials believe that the U.S. presence after the end of this year will be primarily for training and partnering with the Iraqi security forces.

But, more than two weeks after the Iraqi announcement, there is still no formal request from the Iraqi government for U.S. troops to stay.

Buchanan characterized the talks as still very preliminary, saying that they have not "progressed to a point I would call negotiations." He also warned that the longer the U.S. goes without a specific request for troops to stay, "we lose some options."

One thing has not changed much since the mission changed from Operation Iraqi Freedom to Operation New Dawn last year – the number of U.S. troops on the ground in Iraq.

This time last year, the U.S. had about 50,000 troops in Iraq.　Today, there are still roughly 46,000 serving there.　Buchanan admitted that will have to change in the very near future – though how many troops may stay on for the next phase remains a mystery.

By NBC News’ Claudio Lavanga  
The start of the debate in the Italian Senate over Berlusconi’s new austerity budget on Wednesday was always meant to be a predictable affair. In fact, it barely made the news – even in Italy. 

The $65 billion plan, scrapped together by a struggling Italian government in a desperate bid to balance the budget by 2013, is pivotal to the very future and stability not only of Italy but of Europe as a whole. The mix of tax increases and spending cuts was announced last week to satisfy the European Central Bank’s demands that Italy do something to correct it’s strained public finances.

So Italians are asking, why did only 11 out of 315 senators show up to discuss the measure on Wednesday evening? And why do just 0.016 percent of the proposed budget cuts apply to the political class itself?  
 
Attendance was not mandatory, but the en-masse absenteeism is viewed as a direct insult to the Italians who will bear the brunt of the new austerity measures forced upon them by the very politicians who dared not to show up to discuss the measures.

(You don't have to understand Italian to get this fun tour of the empty Senate the day before the debate from Corriere della Sera. "Tutto chiuso" says it all).

The empty senate chamber could be seen as a symbol of what’s wrong with the country, and cast some serious doubts over its chances of finding a political solution to an economic crisis that is threatening the existence of the euro and the stability of stock markets worldwide.

---

Summer time truancy
So what happened to the remaining 300-odd senators missing in action?

It is reasonable to suspect that most of them are still on vacation. It is the middle of August, a time when most of the country hits the beach; parliament, among other institutions, closes down for the summer.

There are surely plenty of excuses that might be offered up when the absent politicians roll back to town. Some might claim to have been on holiday at the Seychelles, and were so terrified by the shark that killed the honeymooner they could barely move. Others could claim to have taken an academic break in London, and to have fallen victim of the rioters who stole their plane ticket. A few could get away with one of the summer truancy classics: a bad sunburn, a nasty stingray sting, a water skiing accident.

Even though Wednesday was just the start of the debate over the plan and the vote will come later, very few, if any, will admit that they simply couldn’t be bothered to leave the beach even for a day to perform their duty in one of the most difficult economic times the country is facing since the Second World War.     

(Here is more video of the empty chamber "un Senato deserto").

Highest paid politicians in Europe
This attitude is symbolic of a privileged political class that has lost touch with its electorate and spends most of its time enjoying the benefit of being an Italian politician, without acting like one.

The numbers speak for themselves: At $20,000 per month, Italian members of parliament are the highest paid in Europe.

They earn twice as much as German politicians, to choose just one nearby country. In addition, they enjoy a long list of benefits from free, unlimited flights in business class within Italy to the use of state cars to a fine restaurant in the house of parliament that serves succulent beef steak for a mere 2 euros.  

The overall Italian political system, including parliamentarians salaries, benefits and expenses, costs $33 billion a year, according to the country’s main financial paper Il Sole 24 Ore.
 
The cost to the country, if politicians continue to act as spoilt and pampered upper-class with no sense of responsibility, could be much, much higher.

By Catherine Chomiak, NBC News

WASHINGTON, D.C. – The Libyan Embassy in Washington, D.C. re-opened under a new flag on Wednesday, the banner of Libya’s Transitional National Council. 

Friends and supporters of the anti-Moammar Gadhafi rebellion gathered outside the Watergate building where the embassy is housed to sing and celebrate the reopening of the embassy. One woman, who drove all the way from West Virginia to take part in the celebration, called it a "historic day,” while others waved flags and sang the 1951 national anthem.

The new charge d’affaires Ali Aujali gave a speech thanking the United States, President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for recognizing the Transitional National Council as the legitimate government of Libya. He also said that the Libyan people "will be forever grateful for the United States coming to their aid in their greatest time of need." That sentiment was echoed by the people gathered as they chanted "THANK YOU U-S-A."

---

Aujali is no stranger to the embassy. He was the former Libyan ambassador to the United States but quit the post in February to protest Gadhafi’s violent crackdown on opponents. Returning to the embassy Wednesday, he said "we are born again." He was accredited as Libya’s official representative in the U.S. by the State Department last Thursday.

Aujali said that he is hopeful that the U.S. will move forward and release Libya's frozen assets to the council. State Department Spokesperson Victoria Nuland said Tuesday that the U.S. is currently in the process of working through the licensing process so that they can return embassy assets to the charge for his use for embassy operations.

NBC News producer Baruch Ben-Chorin just returned from Turkana, a remote region in northwestern Kenya badly hit by the drought that is afflicting parts of East Africa.  While the international community has focused largely on suffering in Somalia, relief workers say close to 40 percent of Turkana's population is suffering from hunger and malnutrition. 

While concentrating on his main task of producing, Ben-Chorin took pictures for himself and his friends and family.

Editor's note: These images were altered by a software application that uses filters to mimic the effects of shooting with an antique plastic film camera, even though they were taken with a modern digital phone camera.

 

---

 Ben-Chorin wrote the following upon his return from the region:

I've used my iPhone to take pictures while on assignment or on the road for a while, and discovered the Hipstamatic application while playing around with it.  I find the low-tech, old-fashioned look appealing, and there is always a sense of mystery in the resulting picture.  This technique adds an interesting dimension that allows me to focus beyond the immediate, which a regular camera doesn’t.

These photographs were taken during a three-day trip to the remote Turkana region, which has been badly affected by the long drought in the Horn of Africa. Because it is so remote, and to some extent ignored by the Kenyan government, there is little reporting about widespread hunger and malnutrition in Turkana. But it is bad, very bad. We visited a number of communities and witnessed these proud and beautiful people who have maintained their traditional way of life for thousands of years struggle to survive.

 

Watch an NBC News report from Turkana:

Related content:

• Slideshow: Suffering spreads as Kenyan drought deepens
• Slideshow: Famine strikes East Africa
• More images from Kenya and Somalia on PhotoBlog
• Story: World Bank calls Horn of Africa famine manmade
• Story: Somalia famine aid stolen, sold at markets
• Story: Ghana schoolboy launches $13 million drive for Somali kids
• PhotoBlog: Using an old camera, instead of a new app, to get that vintage look

Is he the new Mahatma Gandhi?

Not quite, but Indian social activist Anna Hazare, who was arrested in India Tuesday, has adopted some of the same strategies to protest actions by the Indian government. The 73-year-old Hazare was detained as he was about to begin a hunger strike, sparking protest by supporters, according to numerous published reports. But he reportedly started his hunger strike anyway while in police custody after refusing release from prison, the Times of India posted.

His campaign, and his arrest, will likely further weaken the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his ruling Congress Party, according to Lisa Curtis, senior research fellow at the U.S. nonprofit Heritage Foundation.

“(Hazare) is influential, he has street cred,” Curtis said. “And he is leading the show in terms of calling the government to to account on the corruption issue.”

---

The Singh government has been badly tainted by a series of high-profile corruption scandals. The country suffered international criticism when it became apparent that it was badly prepared to host the scheduled 2010 Commonwealth Games in New Dehli, an event that also was saddled with financial irregularities. The organizer was charged with corruption and fired.

More recently, the sale of 122 telecommunications licenses erupted into a major scandal when it emerged that some licenses were issued to companies with no experience in the sector and sold at fire-sale prices, depriving the government of some $40 billion in revenue.

“The feeling is that (the prime minister) turned a blind eye,” said Curtis. “That really made his reputation suffer.”

After these scandals, parliament introduced a bill to strengthen the country’s anti-graft efforts. But Hazare, who has historically championed the poor in India, argued that the bill did not go far enough. In April, he went on a four-day hunger strike, drawing out thousands of people in support of his anti-graft crusade.  Like Gandhi, who moved the Indian masses with his peaceful protest for Indian independence back in the 1940s, Hazare cannot be easily ignored.

The issue also has implications for U.S. relations with India. As Singh’s government weakens, it could also weaken U.S-Indian bilateral relations, as members of the prime ministers party who are not as enthusiastic about ties with Washington gain clout, Curtis said.

Click here to follow Kari Huus on Facebook.