The chairman of the Chemical Safety Board hit a buzz saw of criticism on Thursday at a House hearing that brought multiple calls for his resignation, with sparks flying over an allegedly dysfunctional investigative agency accused of retaliating against whistleblowers and stifling inspectors general seeking evidence.

Rafael Moure-Eraso, chairman of the independent 43-person accident-investigating agency with an $11 million budget, found himself at the center of a new report from two House committees quoting whistleblowers inside the agency portraying a "toxic work environment." They also alleged that general counsel Richard Loeb retaliated against them for disclosing management problems to the Office of Special Counsel and blasted Moure-Eraso for invoking attorney-client privilege and declining to hand over certain emails sought by inspectors general.

Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, assembled witnesses that included inspectors general and governmentwide Special Counsel Carolyn Lerner, threatened Moure-Eraso with criminal contempt and called upon him to resign.

The Chemical Safety Board chairman's failure to turn over documents "is a criminal obstruction of this committee's work," Issa said. "If my attorney has not received them by the end of the week, I will issue my own subpoena mirroring all the other subpoenas and will seek to hold you in contempt."

Russian President Vladimir Putin has welcomed the ceasefire announced by Ukraine's President Petro Poroshenko. However, for the plan to become "realistic," Putin said both sides of the Ukrainian conflict must stop the fighting and sit down for talks.

Putin "supports" Poroshenko's decision for a "cease fire in the south-eastern Ukraine, and his pronounced intention to take some concrete steps for achieving peaceful settlement," a statement published on the Kremlin website said on Saturday.

With that, the Russian President notes the 15-point peace plan suggested by Poroshenko on Friday "will not be viable and realistic... without practical actions aimed at the start of the negotiations process."

Putin called on both Kiev and anti-government forces to "halt any battle actions and sit down at the negotiating table."

He also noted that the Friday incident, when a Russian checkpoint came under fire from the Ukrainian side after the ceasefire was announced was "unacceptable."

The Russian leader urged Poroshenko to use the opportunity for reaching "political compromises" with eastern Ukrainians, adding that the peace plan "should not be an ultimatum by nature."

Yet another scandal has engulfed the Obama administration, as the President has come under fire for his prisoner swap that secured the release of the only US POW remaining in Taliban custody.

However, the real scandal is not whether Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl is a hero or a traitor, but rather the fact that the US - purportedly the "land of the free" - detains prisoners indefinitely, denying them any legal process.

In fact, under President Obama (a constitutional scholar), the practice of indefinite detention without trial or legal counsel, has been codified into US law. Perhaps this is what Obama means when he waxes poetic about "American exceptionalism" - the exception to the rule of law, the exception to international law, the exception to human rights?

The story behind the story

While media pundits, security "experts," and politicians engage in the typical finger-pointing and political jockeying around the Bergdahl scandal, there is one critical point entirely left out of the US and Western media narrative: that Washington continues to hold, illegally and without charge, many prisoners from the so-called "War on Terror" in its gulag at Guantanamo Bay. Such grave abuses of human rights, which have been enshrined as US policy, are far more destructive and scandalous than any backroom deal made by President Obama.

The ongoing detention of Saudi citizen and permanent UK resident Shaker Aamer is perhaps the most obvious example of the criminality and inhumanity of the US and the Obama administration. The UK-based human rights organization Reprieve, which works for the release of all prisoners held beyond the rule of law in the "War on Terror," has been actively working to secure the release of Aamer, along with all other prisoners held at Guantanamo. As the organization's website notes, "Shaker has long been cleared for release by the United States. He has never been charged by the United States with a crime and has never received a trial. However, he has been repeatedly abused and subjected to extended isolation in Guantánamo Bay."

This week the regular hosts were in the hot-seat as SOTT.net Editor Pierre Lescaudron interviewed Joe and Niall about their recently published book, Manufactured Terror: The Boston Marathon Bombings, Sandy Hook, Aurora Shooting and Other False Flag Terror Attacks.

Manufactured Terror is an anthology of investigative reporting on some of the most heinous crimes committed on American soil in recent years. While these events invariably go down as the work of 'lone nuts', gaping holes in the official narratives invite us to look behind the dramatic headlines and officials' psycho-babble.

Context is everything. Sometimes a lone nut is just that. But given abundant historical precedent for the involvement of state actors (note: not 'actors') in terror attacks and mass shootings, those who do most to position themselves as 'protectors of the people' appear to have most to gain from terrorizing their own population.

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The 44,000-capacity Arena da Amazonia in Manaus will host four group stage matches during the competition but many fear it will be left vacant and become a white elephant.

Even Fifa admits on its website that the city is "not a traditional hotbed of Brazilian football".

But prison authorities have raised the possibility of using the massive arena to hold suspects temporarily before being transferred elsewhere.

Sabino Marques, president of the Amazonas custodial system's monitoring and control group, told Brazilian website G1: "After the World Cup, I believe there will be entirely idle spaces. Every day we have arrests in Amazonas and where are we going to put them?

"The prison in Manaus has capacity for 200 to 300 people but there are at least 1,000 detainees there."

Rostov-On-Don - More than 80 Ukrainian border guards crossed to Russia after the attack on Ukraine's Izvarino checkpoint overnight. Two people were wounded, the head of the Rostov regional border guard department, Vasily Malayev, told Itar-Tass.

"Unidentified armed people on Friday attacked the Ukrainian checkpoint of Izvarino (named Donetsk on the Russian side). More than 80 Ukrainian border guards came from Izvarino to (the Russian station of) Donetsk at about 22:30 Moscow time and asked for shelter from pursuing armed persons. Two among the Ukrainian border guards were wounded. First aid was rendered to them," the Russian official said.

None among Russian border guards and civilians was hurt. The Russian side took additional border guard strengthening measures.

Earlier on Friday, another incident occurred on the Ukrainian-Russian border. Malayev said fighting started near the Ukrainian point of Dolzhansky (Novoshakhtinsk on the Russian side) at 18:40 Moscow time between militiamen who controlled the border and soldiers of Ukrainian armed forces or the National Guards.

An online push by the US to promote a transatlantic partnership deal with Europe has been met with criticism on both sides of the ocean. Twenty thousand dollars is being offered to anyone who comes up with lucrative trade ideas, but opponents say that figure's tiny compared to the potential damage the massive cooperation agreement could do.

The world's most expensive weapon, the 400 billion dollar F-35 - an aircraft whose price-tag just went even higher thanks to additional funding. Plagued by delays, massive cost over-runs and bloating bureaucracy the jet's left even its top backers somewhat underwhelmed. And to cover the price, the plane's now being touted to foreign buyers, as RT's Marina Portnaya explains.

Stephen Harper's very ascent to the Prime Minister's office was enabled by a corporate media strategy of censorship through omission.

Corporate media conveniently suppressed Harper's previous affiliation with the fascistic Northern Foundation and the National Citizens Coalition -- an extreme right wing lobby group. The convenient suppression of his past political associations -- enabled by media baron Conrad Black (who was also a member of the Northern Foundation), allowed Harper to present himself as a "moderate" conservative, and to emerge victorious as Prime Minister of Canada in 2006.

Corporate media monopolies, already welded to transnational corporate polities
are now even more powerful. Information streams can be further exploited with the passage of the National Defence Authorization Act (NDAA) in the U.S.

The woman at the center of the scandal over Hillary Clinton's defense of an alleged child rapist speaks out in depth for the first time.

Hillary Clinton is known as a champion of women and girls, but one woman who says she was raped as a 12-year-old in Arkansas doesn't think Hillary deserves that honor. This woman says Hillary smeared her and used dishonest tactics to successfully get her attacker off with a light sentence - even though, she claims, Clinton knew he was guilty.

The victim in the 1975 sexual abuse case that became Clinton's first criminal defense case as a 27-year-old lawyer has only spoken to the media once since her attack, a contested, short interaction with a reporter in 2008, during Clinton's last presidential campaign run. Now 52, she wants to speak out after hearing Clinton talk about her case on newly discovered audio recordings from the 1980s, unearthed by the Washington Free Beacon and made public this week.

In a long, emotional interview with The Daily Beast, she accused Clinton of intentionally lying about her in court documents, going to extraordinary lengths to discredit evidence of the rape, and later callously acknowledging and laughing about her attackers' guilt on the recordings.

"Hillary Clinton took me through Hell," the victim said. The Daily Beast agreed to withhold her name out of concern for her privacy as a victim of sexual assault.

The victim said if she saw Clinton today, she would call her out for what she sees as the hypocrisy of Clinton's current campaign to fight for women's rights compared to her actions regarding this rape case so long ago.

"I would say [to Clinton], 'You took a case of mine in '75, you lied on me... I realize the truth now, the heart of what you've done to me. And you are supposed to be for women? You call that [being] for women, what you done to me? And I hear you on tape laughing."

The victim's allegation that Clinton smeared her following her rape is based on a May 1975 court affidavit written by Clinton on behalf of Thomas Alfred Taylor, one of the two alleged attackers, whom Clinton agreed to defend after being asked by the prosecutor. Taylor had specifically requested a female attorney.