Hosted by Dr.G., Minister of Information of the Northbay MDS. Tune in Thursdays 4 to 5pm (PST), at 89.5FM in the northeast San Pablo Bay Area, or on a Smart Phone [link], Desktop U-stream [link], Live Mp3 (.pls) stream [link], Netbook [link]. Be a Community Journalist with our Community Journalist's Notebook [link]. Send news & info to [NorthbayMDS@) gmail.com]! Northbay Uprising News scripts [link]. Archived webpages at (archive.org) and at (archive.today) are available even if the original is taken down. News links are provided for educational purposes only, and do not constitute an endorsement of political tendencies, or, of foreign governments.
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Recommended Radical Newsletters:
* Presente! (Spring, 2015) [https://web.archive.org/web/20150407054516/http://www.soaw.org/presente/images/pdf/Spring2015.pdf]
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ACTION HEADLINES!
Stories are reviewed and provided by Northbay MDS Committees and Affiliates
information collected by the
SOLANO PEACE, JUSTICE, AND FREEDOM COALITION
Sunday, April 12, Noon, CODEPINK Monthly Golden Gate Bridge Peace Walk
NOT ONE MORE COFFIN, NOT ONE MORE COUNTRY!
At Noon, gather at the SF or Marin side of the eastern walkway of the Golden Gate Bridge to process and converge in the middle! Parking lots on all four corners., Then, at 1:00pm, we will hold a closing circle, rally, singing, and treat sharing on SF side after the bridge walk.
Photos: CODEPINK Mothers Say No War at Creech Air Force Base / A Peace family celebrates 8 years of CODEPINK on our bridge!
Had enough of War and more War? Under President Obama, U.S. "military intervention" has expanded into at least seven countries. Most recently we are supplying Saudi Arabia with billions of dollars in military aid so that they can do our killing for us in Yemen. At least 74 children have died in just 2 weeks of Saudi bombing. Then there are the millions who have been killed, tens of millions displaced, and tens of millions injured...in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Libya, Yemen, Pakistan, Somalia and elsewhere. And our dear soldiers suffer too, if not from death or injury, then from PTSD and death by suicide. Clearly and tragically, WAR IS NOT WORKING, except for the war profiteers!Will you join us? Wear black to be part of the somber funeral procession, as we carry 7 coffins for the 7 countries who are victims of this continued bloodshed. White masks will be provided, or come with white face paint or your own mask. Bring drums. I'll bring the giant PINK floral peace wreath too. Or, just come as you are, and bring friends!
PLEASE BRING SIGNS: All peace & justice messages welcome.
Suggested messages:
-MUSLIM LIVES MATTER
-ABOLISH WAR
-NOT ONE MORE COFFIN, NOT ONE MORE COUNTRY
-WAR: WHO PROFITS?
-WAR IS NOT WORKING
-$$ FOR HUMAN NEED, NOT WAR & GREED
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* "Women Plan Walk Across the DMZ to Support Peace and Korean Unification" (2015-04-08, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/9sFDb]
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* "Lodestar of Peace (and the Now Distant Efforts to Outlaw War)" (2015-04-02, commondreams.org) [https://archive.today/jalfP] [begin excerpt]:
“Deeply sensible of their solemn duty to promote the welfare of mankind . . .”
What? Were they serious?
I kneel in a sort of gasping awe as I read the words of the Kellogg-Briand Pact, a treaty signed in 1928 – by the United States, France, Germany, Great Britain, Japan and ultimately by every country that then existed. The treaty . . . outlaws war.
“Persuaded that the time has come when a frank renunciation of war as an instrument of national policy should be made . . .”
ARTICLE I: “The High Contracting Parties solemnly declare in the names of their respective peoples that they condemn recourse to war for the solution of international controversies, and renounce it as an instrument of national policy in their relations with one another.”
ARTICLE II: “The High Contracting Parties agree that the settlement or solution of all disputes or conflicts of whatever nature or of whatever origin they may be, which may arise among them, shall never be sought except by pacific means.”
Furthermore, as David Swanson has reminded us in his book When the World Outlawed War, the treaty is still in effect. It has never been rescinded. It’s still, for what this is worth, international law. This is nuts, of course. War rules and everyone knows it. War is our default setting, the ongoing first option for pretty much every disagreement among global neighbors, especially when different religious beliefs and ethnicities are part of the divide.
[end excerpt]
In 2010, the “war business” reached 1.6 trillion dollars according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute [https://archive.today/OnT45]. In a bitter irony, the world’s top weapons traders (US, Russia, Britain, France, China) are the countries designated under the UN Charter to “preserve peace”, namely as permanent members of the UN Security Council. (See Richard F. Grimmett, CRS Report for Congress; Conventional Arms Transfers to Developing Nations, 2003-2010 , September 22, 2011.) [http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/weapons/R42017.pdf]
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* "The Iran Regime Change Act of 2015" (2015-03-29, dailykos.com) [https://archive.today/rdaZg]
* "The US-Iran Nuclear Deal and Regional Political Re-alignments" (2015-03-28, journal-neo.org) [https://archive.today/jZMKk]
* "U.S. Defense Secretary: We Might Bomb Iran Even If a Peace Agreement Is Signed" (2015-04-01, washingtonsblog.com) [https://archive.today/XlAhK]
* "Propaganda on Steroids: Iran Might have 'Secret Nuclear Weapons in North Korea'?" (2015-04-01, silentcrownews.com) [https://archive.today/dT2c4]
* "Israeli Official Says Military Action Against Iran 'Still on Table' " (2015-04-06, commondreams.org) [https://archive.today/ZbQzX]
* " 'Liberal' New York Times Provides Cover for Washington’s War Plans for Iran" (2015-04-01, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/s9AlY]
* "NYT Publishes Call to Bomb Iran" (2015-03-28, consortiumnews.com) [https://archive.today/WKQYz]
* "A Middle East Holocaust" (2015-03-30, PaulCraigRoberts.org) [https://archive.today/ngWFK] [https://archive.today/ngWFK]:
Nuclear weapons are no longer restrained by the Cold War MAD doctrine. Washington has released them into pre-emptive first strike form.
The targets of these pre-emptive strikes–Russia and China–know it, because Washington proudly proclaims its immorality in public documents describing its war doctrine.
The result is to maximize the chance of nuclear war. If you were Russia and China, and you knew that Washington had a war doctrine that permits a surprise nuclear attack, would you sit there waiting while Washington cranks up its anti-Russian and anti-Chinese propaganda machine, demonizing both countries as a threat to “freedom and democracy”?
The fools in Washington are playing with nuclear fire. Noam Chomsky points out that in a less dangerous time than currently exists, we came very close to nuclear war [https://archive.today/8cIaX].
Harold Pinter, one of the last Western intellects, understood the danger in Western arrogance. He denounced the West’s crimes and called for the crimes to be subject to established law before it is too late for humanity.
“We have brought torture, cluster bombs, depleted uranium, innumerable acts of random murder, misery, degradation and death to the Iraqi people and call it ‘bringing freedom and democracy to the Middle East’. How many people do you have to kill before you qualify to be described as a mass murderer and a war criminal? One hundred thousand? More than enough, I would have thought. Therefore it is just that Bush and Blair be arraigned before the International Criminal Court of Justice.”Harold Pinter, 2005 Nobel Prize Acceptance Speech.
“An Iraqi Holocaust” by Gideon Polya [https://archive.today/3r1UI] and “Genocide In Iraq” [https://archive.today/UN0KO] provide abundant evidence for convicting Bush and Blair.
Dr. Gideon Polya is a professor of science in one of Australia’s leading universities. He has a moral conscience, something increasingly rare in the Western world.
His articles are based largely on the just published by Clarity Press two volume heavily documented Genocide in Iraq by Abdul-Haq Al-Ani and Tarik Al-Ani. Abdul-Haq Al-Ani is a British-educated lawyer with a Ph.D. in International Law and a Ph.D. in electronics engineering. Tarik Al-Ani, is an architect, translator, and researcher.
Currently I am reading the two-volume work and intended to review it. But Professor Polya’s articles suffice as an introduction to Genocide in Iraq. Washington has committed a terrible crime in our name. Washington not only murdered Iraq, Washington has murdered the Middle East. Washington and its despicable vassals–”the Coalition of the Willing”–are responsible for a Middle East Holocaust.
For people in the Anglo-American world who have a moral conscience, the facts are soul-wrenching. The populations of the countries whose governments comprised “the Coalition of the Willing” are contaminated with war crimes committed by their governments in the Iraq Genocide. A progressive modern state was obliterated, and 2.7 million Iraqi people were murdered.
The crime was covered up with propaganda that demonized Saddam Hussein and created fear of nonexistent weapons of mass destruction.
The Iraqi genocide was based on a lie, and both Bush and Blair knew it. The two satanic leaders simply decided to destroy a people who they first demonized and marginalized. [end excerpt]
* "Oil Imperialism and the US-Israel Relationship", Noam Chomsky interviewed by Roger Hurwitz, David Woolf & Sherman Teichman (1977-03, chomsky.info) [https://archive.today/bT7yg]
* "International Terrorism: Image and Reality" (1991, Noam Chomsky, chomsky.info) [https://archive.today/XNKy]
* "Body Count: Casualty Figures after 10 Years of the 'War on Terror' " [https://web.archive.org/web/20150325143625/http://www.psr.org/assets/pdfs/body-count.pdf].
A new investigation by Physicians For Social Responsibility has concluded that the War on Terror directly or indirectly killed 1 million people in Iraq, 220,000 in Afghanistan and 80,000 in Pakistan; a grand total of 1.3 million. This “conservative estimate” contradicts media and government estimates, and does not include spillover wars in Yemen, around the Horn of Africa or in Syria. Nor does it include the estimated 50,000 Libyans killed as a result of Obama’s “NATO-led” toppling of Gaddafi.
* "Body Count Report Reveals At Least 1.3 Million Lives Lost to US-Led War on Terror ; Although a conservative estimate, physicians' groups say the figure 'is approximately 10 times greater' than typically reported" (2015-03-26, commondreams.org) [https://archive.today/gN4Tq]
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* "US aerospace command moving comms gear back to bunker" (2015-04-04, AFP newswire) [https://archive.today/iBNSW]
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* "Russia announces plan to build new space station with NASA" (2015-03-28, AFP newswire) [https://archive.today/boj2G]
* "Russia, US to Jointly Prepare Mars, Moon Flight Road Map – NASA" (2015-03-28, sputniknews.com) [https://archive.today/nakeF]
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* "How to Beat Internet Trolls" [https://archive.today/VHTdG]
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“Welcome to Afrikatown, home of Qilombo, Oakland, CA” [https://vimeo.com/123859697] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=scXyokF3Peg]
"The entire Afrikatown territory is within one of the “opportunity areas” of the West Oakland Specific Plan (WOSP). Because of this, the block that houses Qilombo and several low-income apartment buildings is now under increased threat of eviction. The forces of capitalism are gathering around San Pablo – but so is the resistance."
SUPPORT AFRIKA TOWN!
“Keep the Afrikatown Garden Safe From Developers!” [https://vimeo.com/123604223] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NOnApgSv6TM]
Original call-to-action to Defend Afrikatown (2015-03-12) [https://archive.today/p4grj]
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TOWARDS REVOLUTIONARY SOLUTIONS
SOLIDARITY WITH THE NEW AFRICAN NATION!
Black people are more than 10 times as likely as white people to be in prison in many states.
#Ferguson is everywhere. SHARE this now for all the people who say police violence has nothing to do with racism. Confront their ignorance. The following image was posted on a facebook.com page used by self-described "liberals", yet many comments show a disregard for the facts concerning the new Jim Crow, as shown here [https://archive.today/mgaba].
The incarceration rate of African Americans in Milwaukee--13,000 out of 100,000 people--is the highest in the world. That compares with 30 per 100,000 in India. It's so fucking inhuman it's difficult to comprehend.
* "John Legend is right: Prisons are disproportionately black. The worst states are some of the whitest" (2015-02-23, washingtonpost.com) [https://archive.today/sH8Y9]
* "Wisconsin Prisons Incarcerate Most Black Men In U.S." (2013-10-03, npr.org) [https://archive.today/ZMAgZ]
Comment by Zach Traficanti: If blacks create more crime then there will be more blacks behind bars. It's simple as that. It's like your trying to push for incarceration equality. Let's throw some white guys in jail to even it out.
Reply by Bob Dobrow: Comments reveal how ignorant so many whites are to the realities of Black America. Blacks and whites use drugs at about the same rates. But you don't see SWAT teams descending on white college dorms or busting up coke parties at mostly white clubs or raiding white corporate offices where lots of high end drug use is happening. The war on drugs is overwhelmingly racist. Read Michelle Alexander's The New Jim Crow to open your eyes.
Its funny I always see the cops in the poor neighborhoods targeting ethnic minorities but never in the high end rich neighborhoods where all the rich Caucasian kids are smoking pot and drinking while driving... And when a privilege white kid does something they call it "affluenza".
* "Texas teenager suffering 'affluenza' avoids jail for second time" (2014-06-06, theguardian.com) [https://archive.today/Bq60u]
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information collected by the Worker's Defense Committee
WORKER'S POWER!
* "Growers Move to Gut California’s Farm Labor Law" (2015-04-07, capitalandmain.com), page 1 [https://archive.today/g3Gex], page 2 [https://archive.today/Pg9jK] [begin excerpt]: Much of the San Joaquin Valley is very conservative Republican territory. In The Perfect Fruit, author Chip Bradley quotes Ray Gerawan: “My philosophy is survival of the fittest. In this family, we’re real big on free enterprise.” He says his ambition is “to put my competitors out of business … because that makes us all stronger.”
When the Gerawans are criticized, they react with hardball tactics. After the city of Berkeley passed a resolution like the one approved by Los Angeles’ City Council, it got a swift and threatening response. Company attorney David Schwarz wrote a four-page letter to its city council. “Republication of libelous statements,” he fumed, “whether in newsletters, press releases, constituent updates, or speeches outside the legislative chamber, is not immunized from liability…”
This year the Gerawans’ local state Assembly member, Republican Jim Patterson of Fresno, introduced Assembly Bill 1389. It would allow outside anti-union parties (such as Silvia Lopez) to inject themselves into mandatory mediation proceedings on the same basis as the union’s elected negotiating committee. Further, it would permit growers to decertify unions that “abandon” workers for three years, an obvious reference to Gerawan, which has used that language to describe the UFW’s 20-year absence from its fields. Both measures would make mandatory mediation essentially inoperable.
Despite the threats and name-calling, city councils in New York City and Washington D.C. are taking up measures like Los Angeles’. The grower’s biggest buyer is Walmart, an inviting target for people already angry at that chain’s treatment of its own workers. After the L.A. City Council vote, Maria Elena Durazo, then the head of the county labor federation, warned Gerawan Farming of a possible boycott: “You will not be welcome in the stores of Los Angeles if that’s the next thing these workers ask us to do.”
Boycotts can take time to have an effect — the original UFW grape boycott lasted five years. And once started, they’re hard to stop. But targeted boycotts have been very successful in recent years at forcing garment companies selling clothes on college campuses to recognize unions in sweatshops. The Farm Labor Organizing Committee won an agreement covering thousands of North Carolina farm workers several years ago by successfully boycotting Mount Olive pickles. By taking on the largest consumers of Gerawan’s Prima brand fruit, such as school districts, the UFW could make a big dent in sales. Cesar Chavez believed that cutting off five percent of sales was normally enough to make a boycott successful.
[end excerpt]
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* "To raise wages in Panama, dockers join a U.S. union" (2015-04-06, peoplesworld.org) [https://archive.today/oRin7]
Photo: ILWU President Bob McEllrath led a solidarity delegation to Panama in Sept. 2011, part of an ongoing effort to support maritime workers there. Dockworkers in this photo have since changed their union's name to SINTRAPORSPA, affiliated with the Panama Canal Division of the ILWU and won a four year contract in December that will improve pay and working conditions at Panama Ports - a subsidiary of the powerful Hong Kong-based Hutchinson Port Holdings.
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BAY AREA SOLIDARITY
Updates on campaigns for for Peace, Justice, & Freedom across the greater Bay Area, Norcal, and Socal
* "How to Beat Internet Trolls" [https://archive.today/VHTdG]
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“Welcome to Afrikatown, home of Qilombo, Oakland, CA” [https://vimeo.com/123859697] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=scXyokF3Peg]
"The entire Afrikatown territory is within one of the “opportunity areas” of the West Oakland Specific Plan (WOSP). Because of this, the block that houses Qilombo and several low-income apartment buildings is now under increased threat of eviction. The forces of capitalism are gathering around San Pablo – but so is the resistance."
SUPPORT AFRIKA TOWN!
“Keep the Afrikatown Garden Safe From Developers!” [https://vimeo.com/123604223] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NOnApgSv6TM]
Original call-to-action to Defend Afrikatown (2015-03-12) [https://archive.today/p4grj]
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* "Maile Hampton's 'lynching' charge sparks outrage — Take action!" (2015-04-06, answercoalition.org) [https://archive.today/abEPp]
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* "Maile Hampton's 'lynching' charge sparks outrage — Take action!" (2015-04-06, answercoalition.org) [https://archive.today/abEPp]
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"The City of Berkeley is underestimated by Attorneys for the United States Postal Service" (2015-04-06, Berkeley Post Office Defenders):
Thursday, April 2nd, 2015, in the matter of City of Berkeley v USPS, Berkeley's lawsuit to stop the sale of its downtown Post Office, United States Postal Service lawyers notified Judge William Alsup that they will continue to disregard common sense, the will of the people and federal law by refusing to say that they are halting the sales process of the Main Berkeley Post Office at 2000 Allston Way.
The Post Office's lawyers stood before Judge Alsup on March 26th in Federal Court and repeatedly asked him to dismiss Berkeley's lawsuit against the sale on the grounds that a sale was no longer under consideration by the Postal Service. Yet one week later - after being asked by Judge Alsup to "put that in writing" - they refused.
Berkeley Post Office Defenders occupied the exterior of the century-old Post Office building at 2000 Allston Way in August of 2013 in protest over USPS's announced intention to sell and in opposition to the privatization of the Postal Service. We have supported the First They Came For the Homeless occupation and information booth since it began in November, 2014. And today we denounce this USPS doublespeak non-decision. We point to a two and a half year struggle by the Berkeley community, and the prospect of more years of fighting and litigation, as reason enough for Post Office officials to have come to their senses. Berkeley's City Attorney, in their reply brief on Friday, described the USPS response as a "convoluted mirage" and "blatantly inconsistent."
On all these bases, Judge Alsup should have an easy time deciding that the lawsuit must be allowed to proceed, and that this theft of our heritage must not be allowed to happen.
Berkeley's Post Office belongs to the people. The privatization of our commons does not serve the interest of anyone except the 1%. We will continue the fight to preserve this vital component of our public infrastructure.
* The text of the USPS Attorneys reply to Judge Alsup's request can be seen here [https://archive.today/9sI6P].
* First They Came for the Homeless page [https://www.facebook.com/pages/First-they-came-for-the-homeless/253882908111999]
* BPOD is affiliated with Strike Debt Bay Area: [http://strike-debt-bay-area.tumblr.com]
* USPS mission [https://archive.today/YJnVx].
For more on the privatization of the USPS:
* Saving the United States Postal Service as a Public Enterprise [https://archive.today/cAH8U].
* Saving the United States Postal Service as a Public Enterprise [https://archive.today/cAH8U].
* Privatization Is Social Cancer; Saving the US Postal Service [https://archive.today/eF2ai].
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* "Meet the 2015 Frank Porter Graham Awards Recipients" (2015-01-08, acluofnorthcarolina.org) [https://archive.today/DiC48]:
This year’s Frank Porter Graham Award, our highest honor awarded for longstanding and significant contributions to the fight for individual freedom and civil liberties in North Carolina, is being presented to Jim Grant, who has worked to advance and defend civil liberties in North Carolina for nearly as long as the ACLU of North Carolina has existed.
Beginning with his involvement in the fight against school segregation in Hyde County in 1968, Grant committed his life to working for social justice, workers’ rights, and equality. Grant was incarcerated for nearly four years in the 1970s after being arrested and charged as a “political terrorist” in a case in which the government paid witnesses against him and two other African American men, known collectively as the “Charlotte Three.” Grant received the longest sentence of 25 years. The many injustices around the case
garnered national attention, and their sentences were eventually commuted.
In 2009, the ACLU of North Carolina successfully defended Grant after he was wrongfully arrested for trespassing at an apartment complex where he and another member of the Human Justice Coalition were helping low-income residents after raw sewage backed up into apartments and management refused to help.
A Wilson resident, Grant has worked or held leadership positions with the Human Justice Coalition, Black Workers for Justice, the Southern Coalition for Social Justice, the Pitt County Coalition Against Racism, North Carolina Prisoners’ Labor Union, NC Fair Share, and Legal Aid of NC Client Counsel.
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* "Meet the 2015 Frank Porter Graham Awards Recipients" (2015-01-08, acluofnorthcarolina.org) [https://archive.today/DiC48]:
This year’s Frank Porter Graham Award, our highest honor awarded for longstanding and significant contributions to the fight for individual freedom and civil liberties in North Carolina, is being presented to Jim Grant, who has worked to advance and defend civil liberties in North Carolina for nearly as long as the ACLU of North Carolina has existed.Beginning with his involvement in the fight against school segregation in Hyde County in 1968, Grant committed his life to working for social justice, workers’ rights, and equality. Grant was incarcerated for nearly four years in the 1970s after being arrested and charged as a “political terrorist” in a case in which the government paid witnesses against him and two other African American men, known collectively as the “Charlotte Three.” Grant received the longest sentence of 25 years. The many injustices around the case
garnered national attention, and their sentences were eventually commuted.
In 2009, the ACLU of North Carolina successfully defended Grant after he was wrongfully arrested for trespassing at an apartment complex where he and another member of the Human Justice Coalition were helping low-income residents after raw sewage backed up into apartments and management refused to help.
A Wilson resident, Grant has worked or held leadership positions with the Human Justice Coalition, Black Workers for Justice, the Southern Coalition for Social Justice, the Pitt County Coalition Against Racism, North Carolina Prisoners’ Labor Union, NC Fair Share, and Legal Aid of NC Client Counsel.
The "Tobin Tax", also known as the "Robin Hood Tax" [http://www.robinhoodtax.org] is a reformist solution that is intended as a measure to help save the lives of Federal Citizens immediately by funding social programs through finding an alternative Federal income source that does not increase the burden on workers or small-business owners. While not intended as a revolutionary solution, it is found to be worth advocating for. While a Tobin Tax does not address the social contradictions prevalent in our society, our people are dying of artificial poverty and persistant malnutrition (famine), and this measure will, at least, serve to fund quality education and health care. The drawback is that the Tobin Tax ("Robin Hood Tax") is contingent on the perpetual growth of the capitalist market and the financial transactions of monopolist holding companies and banks.
* "Robin Hood Tax Coalition Calls on Congress to Fulfill Dr. King’s Vision of Social and Economic Justice" (2015-04-07, commondreams.org) [https://archive.today/sYad9]
* "Channeling MLK's 'Beloved Community,' Vigils Call for Robin Hood Tax" (2015-04-08, commondreams.org) [https://archive.today/HR9sd]
* "Robin Hood Tax Coalition Calls on Congress to Fulfill Dr. King’s Vision of Social and Economic Justice" (2015-04-07, commondreams.org) [https://archive.today/sYad9]
* "Channeling MLK's 'Beloved Community,' Vigils Call for Robin Hood Tax" (2015-04-08, commondreams.org) [https://archive.today/HR9sd]
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SOLIDARITY WITH THE NEW AFRICAN NATION!
Black Power! Revive the Community! Defend the Nation!
Black people are more than 10 times as likely as white people to be in prison in many states.
#Ferguson is everywhere. SHARE this now for all the people who say police violence has nothing to do with racism. Confront their ignorance. The following image was posted on a facebook.com page used by self-described "liberals", yet many comments show a disregard for the facts concerning the new Jim Crow, as shown here [https://archive.today/mgaba].The incarceration rate of African Americans in Milwaukee--13,000 out of 100,000 people--is the highest in the world. That compares with 30 per 100,000 in India. It's so fucking inhuman it's difficult to comprehend.
* "John Legend is right: Prisons are disproportionately black. The worst states are some of the whitest" (2015-02-23, washingtonpost.com) [https://archive.today/sH8Y9]
* "Wisconsin Prisons Incarcerate Most Black Men In U.S." (2013-10-03, npr.org) [https://archive.today/ZMAgZ]
Comment by Zach Traficanti: If blacks create more crime then there will be more blacks behind bars. It's simple as that. It's like your trying to push for incarceration equality. Let's throw some white guys in jail to even it out.
Reply by Bob Dobrow: Comments reveal how ignorant so many whites are to the realities of Black America. Blacks and whites use drugs at about the same rates. But you don't see SWAT teams descending on white college dorms or busting up coke parties at mostly white clubs or raiding white corporate offices where lots of high end drug use is happening. The war on drugs is overwhelmingly racist. Read Michelle Alexander's The New Jim Crow to open your eyes.
Its funny I always see the cops in the poor neighborhoods targeting ethnic minorities but never in the high end rich neighborhoods where all the rich Caucasian kids are smoking pot and drinking while driving... And when a privilege white kid does something they call it "affluenza".
* "Texas teenager suffering 'affluenza' avoids jail for second time" (2014-06-06, theguardian.com) [https://archive.today/Bq60u]
information collected by the Worker's Defense Committee
WORKER'S POWER!
* "Growers Move to Gut California’s Farm Labor Law" (2015-04-07, capitalandmain.com), page 1 [https://archive.today/g3Gex], page 2 [https://archive.today/Pg9jK] [begin excerpt]: Much of the San Joaquin Valley is very conservative Republican territory. In The Perfect Fruit, author Chip Bradley quotes Ray Gerawan: “My philosophy is survival of the fittest. In this family, we’re real big on free enterprise.” He says his ambition is “to put my competitors out of business … because that makes us all stronger.”
When the Gerawans are criticized, they react with hardball tactics. After the city of Berkeley passed a resolution like the one approved by Los Angeles’ City Council, it got a swift and threatening response. Company attorney David Schwarz wrote a four-page letter to its city council. “Republication of libelous statements,” he fumed, “whether in newsletters, press releases, constituent updates, or speeches outside the legislative chamber, is not immunized from liability…”
This year the Gerawans’ local state Assembly member, Republican Jim Patterson of Fresno, introduced Assembly Bill 1389. It would allow outside anti-union parties (such as Silvia Lopez) to inject themselves into mandatory mediation proceedings on the same basis as the union’s elected negotiating committee. Further, it would permit growers to decertify unions that “abandon” workers for three years, an obvious reference to Gerawan, which has used that language to describe the UFW’s 20-year absence from its fields. Both measures would make mandatory mediation essentially inoperable.
Despite the threats and name-calling, city councils in New York City and Washington D.C. are taking up measures like Los Angeles’. The grower’s biggest buyer is Walmart, an inviting target for people already angry at that chain’s treatment of its own workers. After the L.A. City Council vote, Maria Elena Durazo, then the head of the county labor federation, warned Gerawan Farming of a possible boycott: “You will not be welcome in the stores of Los Angeles if that’s the next thing these workers ask us to do.”
Boycotts can take time to have an effect — the original UFW grape boycott lasted five years. And once started, they’re hard to stop. But targeted boycotts have been very successful in recent years at forcing garment companies selling clothes on college campuses to recognize unions in sweatshops. The Farm Labor Organizing Committee won an agreement covering thousands of North Carolina farm workers several years ago by successfully boycotting Mount Olive pickles. By taking on the largest consumers of Gerawan’s Prima brand fruit, such as school districts, the UFW could make a big dent in sales. Cesar Chavez believed that cutting off five percent of sales was normally enough to make a boycott successful.
[end excerpt]
---
* "To raise wages in Panama, dockers join a U.S. union" (2015-04-06, peoplesworld.org) [https://archive.today/oRin7]
Photo: ILWU President Bob McEllrath led a solidarity delegation to Panama in Sept. 2011, part of an ongoing effort to support maritime workers there. Dockworkers in this photo have since changed their union's name to SINTRAPORSPA, affiliated with the Panama Canal Division of the ILWU and won a four year contract in December that will improve pay and working conditions at Panama Ports - a subsidiary of the powerful Hong Kong-based Hutchinson Port Holdings.
information collected by the Committee to
DEFEND THOSE WITHOUT HOMES!
San Jose's Community Homeless Alliance Ministry
Four Months after the Closure of the “Jungle”: STILL NO PLACE TO GO FOR SILICON VALLEY’S HOMELESS
Sponsored by CHAM and H.O.M.E.L.E.S.S., a group of homeless people, advocates, and people of faith will gather at the former site of the “Jungle” homeless encampment at 12 noon on Cesar Chavez Day, Tuesday March 31.
We will speak out about the injury of a homeless woman last Friday while Caltrans was bulldozing her tent in a “clean-up” near Story Road. Thousands of Silicon Valley’s homeless still have no place to lay their heads tonight, almost four months after the Jungle was destroyed by the City of San Jose on December 4. In fact, the situation will get worse on Wednesday, when the County winter shelter program discharges an additional estimated 270 homeless out onto the streets.
People who were evicted from the Jungle have moved and been displaced over and over with no end in sight. Some moved to the Walmart parking lot, then Roberts Road, then south of Tully, then to Phelan at the railroad tracks, then to north of Tully, then to Monterey Highway, then to Almaden Road, and they are still moving.
When questioned by the Board of Supervisors on March 24, County officials stated that there are some 5300-5400 homeless for whom there is no housing or shelter available. When asked for their plan to address this situation, they responded, “There is no proposal at this time.”
Having no proposal to house or shelter the homeless is not acceptable in the richest area in the world. A five-year plan is not acceptable, because people have no place to go right now. They are persecuted with endless nightmare evictions, harassment, criminalization, and frequent seizure of their personal belongings.
Cesar Chavez dedicated his life to organizing for justice for the poor, and San Jose’s homeless and their allies are building a movement for the same cause.
We call for an immediate commitment by elected officials to affordable housing for the homeless and for all people in need in Silicon Valley. While housing is being built, we call for establishment of legal campgrounds with appropriate sanitary facilities and trash disposal.
Finally, we call on the state legislature to enact SB 608, the “Right to Rest Law”, that would outlaw discrimination against homeless people in public places.
JOIN US AT 12 NOON TUESDAY, MARCH 31
PLACE: THE FORMER “JUNGLE” ENCAMPMENT, SENTER & STORY ROAD, SAN JOSE
Please allow time for parking on Twelfth Street, near Kelley Park, or at Walmart.
CHP Tractor Runs Over Homeless Woman
(KGO) - Officials say that a homeless woman was injured after getting run over by a CHP tractor that was working to clear out a homeless encampment in San Jose.
The CHP reports that a loader-tractor was clearing a homeless encampment on Story Road at about 10 a.m. today when the accident occurred. The loader was tearing down a tent when someone warned the operator that there was a person still inside the tent.
Officials say the woman suffered minor injuries, and she was treated at the scene.
===*===*===Four Months after the Closure of the “Jungle”: STILL NO PLACE TO GO FOR SILICON VALLEY’S HOMELESS
Sponsored by CHAM and H.O.M.E.L.E.S.S., a group of homeless people, advocates, and people of faith will gather at the former site of the “Jungle” homeless encampment at 12 noon on Cesar Chavez Day, Tuesday March 31.
We will speak out about the injury of a homeless woman last Friday while Caltrans was bulldozing her tent in a “clean-up” near Story Road. Thousands of Silicon Valley’s homeless still have no place to lay their heads tonight, almost four months after the Jungle was destroyed by the City of San Jose on December 4. In fact, the situation will get worse on Wednesday, when the County winter shelter program discharges an additional estimated 270 homeless out onto the streets.
People who were evicted from the Jungle have moved and been displaced over and over with no end in sight. Some moved to the Walmart parking lot, then Roberts Road, then south of Tully, then to Phelan at the railroad tracks, then to north of Tully, then to Monterey Highway, then to Almaden Road, and they are still moving.
When questioned by the Board of Supervisors on March 24, County officials stated that there are some 5300-5400 homeless for whom there is no housing or shelter available. When asked for their plan to address this situation, they responded, “There is no proposal at this time.”
Having no proposal to house or shelter the homeless is not acceptable in the richest area in the world. A five-year plan is not acceptable, because people have no place to go right now. They are persecuted with endless nightmare evictions, harassment, criminalization, and frequent seizure of their personal belongings.
Cesar Chavez dedicated his life to organizing for justice for the poor, and San Jose’s homeless and their allies are building a movement for the same cause.
We call for an immediate commitment by elected officials to affordable housing for the homeless and for all people in need in Silicon Valley. While housing is being built, we call for establishment of legal campgrounds with appropriate sanitary facilities and trash disposal.
Finally, we call on the state legislature to enact SB 608, the “Right to Rest Law”, that would outlaw discrimination against homeless people in public places.
JOIN US AT 12 NOON TUESDAY, MARCH 31
PLACE: THE FORMER “JUNGLE” ENCAMPMENT, SENTER & STORY ROAD, SAN JOSE
Please allow time for parking on Twelfth Street, near Kelley Park, or at Walmart.
CHP Tractor Runs Over Homeless Woman
(KGO) - Officials say that a homeless woman was injured after getting run over by a CHP tractor that was working to clear out a homeless encampment in San Jose.
The CHP reports that a loader-tractor was clearing a homeless encampment on Story Road at about 10 a.m. today when the accident occurred. The loader was tearing down a tent when someone warned the operator that there was a person still inside the tent.
Officials say the woman suffered minor injuries, and she was treated at the scene.
NORTHBAY COPWATCH
* "Bullwhips Crackin' in Northern California" (2015-04-08, readersupportednews.org) [https://archive.today/Bpvil] [begin excerpt]:
San Francisco evokes images of hippies, gay tolerance, and world class dining. It is viewed as the most liberal major American city. But there is another, darker side to San Francisco and the region that surrounds it.
It began with a federal investigation into allegations of corruption. Ultimately San Francisco police officers would be charged with stealing cash and other property from a wide range of suspects. One of the officers charged, Reynaldo Vargas, would later testify, “If I saw something I wanted, I took it.”
Vargas and other officers would also implicate a colleague who would emerge as a central player and focus of the investigation and subsequent trail: Sergeant Ian Furminger.
As part of their investigation into corruption charges, the FBI had obtained copies of Furminger’s phone records including, most notably, his text messages. What was contained in the messages made the corruption problems pale in comparison:
“We got two blacks at my boys [sic] school and they are brother and sister! There cause dad works for the school district and I am watching them like hawks.”
In response to a text asking, “Do you celebrate quanza [sic] at your school?” Furminger wrote: “Yeah we burn the cross on the field! Then we celebrate Whitemas.”
“Its [sic] worth every penny to live here [Walnut Creek] away from the savages.”
“Those guys are pretty stupid! Ask some dumb ass questions you would expect from a black rookie! Sorry if they are your buddies!”
“The buffalo soldier was why the Indians Wouldnt [sic] shoot the niggers that found for the confederate They [sic] thought they were sacred buffalo and not human.”
“Gunther Furminger was a famous slave auctioneer.”
“My wife has 2 friends over that don't know each other the cool one says to me get me a drink nigger not knowing the other is married to one just happened right now LMFAO.”
“White power.”
In response to a text saying “Niggers should be spayed,” Furminger wrote, “I saw one an hour ago with 4 kids.”
“I am leaving it like it is, painting KKK on the sides and calling it a day!”
“Cross burning lowers blood pressure! I did the test myself!”
In response to a text saying “All niggers must fucking hang,” Furminger wrote, “Ask my 6 year old what he thinks about Obama.”
In response to a text saying “Just boarded train at Mission/16th,” Furminger wrote, “Ok, just watch out for BM’s [black males].”
In response to a text from another SFPD officer regarding the promotion of a black officer to sergeant, Furminger wrote: “Fuckin nigger.”
There was yet another exchange: Furminger comments to another SFPD officer, “I hate to tell you this but my wife friend [sic] is over with their kids and her husband is black! If [sic] is an Attorney but should I be worried?” The other officer responds, “Get ur pocket gun. Keep it available in case the monkey returns to his roots. Its [sic] not against the law to put an animal down.” To which Furminger responds, “Well said!”
[end excerpt]
---
Vallejo Police Department Chief went on a goodwill tour for the "hearts and minds" of the people.
* "Peace and Justice Forum" from Vallejo City Manager’s Bi-Weekly Report (2015-04-03): On March 28, Mayor Osby Davis and Police Chief Andrew Bidou participated in the Peace and Justice forum held at the Vallejo’s Revival Center. The event was organized by Pastor Ricky Nutt Jr., and other attending panel members included retired Vacaville Police Chief Richard Word. As part of this event, attendees were encouraged to submit question and comment cards regarding the Vallejo Police Department and community relations. Chief Bidou shared his philosophies on building trust and relationships between the community and the VPD, adding that the organization has assigned two sworn officers to the Community Services Section and just recently hired a Community Engagement Officer, a new position created to improve community communications both inbound and outbound.
* "Vallejo CVB Lodging Committee Meeting" from Vallejo City Manager’s Bi-Weekly Report (2015-04-03): On March 31, the Vallejo Convention and Visitor’s Bureau (CVB) held a lodge meeting at the Best Western Inn and Suites located at 1596 Fairgrounds Drive. Vallejo Police Chief Andrew Bidou was invited as a guest speaker where he spoke to members of the Convention and Visitor’s Bureau, as well as numerous managers from various motels, hotels and inns throughout Vallejo.
Chief Bidou answered many “quality of life” related questions and offered valu-able advice on a variety of topics. He also spoke about some of the VPD’s pro-active efforts to increase community connection and boost communication between community members and the police department. Additionally, Chief Bidou committed to sending Community Services Section employees to future Vallejo Convention and Visitor’s Bureau meetings.
* "Code for America Survey": As Code for America partners with the City Manager’s Office to build a tech tool intended to improve relations between the Vallejo Police Department and residents this year, the CFA fellows hope community members will also get involved by participating in an online outreach survey. In filling out the brief sur-vey, community members will help CFA understand the perspectives of living in Vallejo. For those who want to re-main anonymous, simply leave the contact field blank. CFA will use the information gathered to steer their work and identify individuals who would like to stay in touch with the program and provide additional feedback in the future.
---
* "Police killed more than twice as many people as reported by US government" (2015-03-04, theguardian.com) [https://archive.today/dkeGQ]
---
* "Report on Philadelphia Cops Makes Reform Recommendations" (2015-04-07, socialistorganizer.org) [https://archive.today/tl5qu]
---
Five-Eyes and allies
* "NSA Mapping Networks of Major Telecom/Finance/Oil/Manufacturing Companies, Including From US & Five Eyes Countries" (2015-03-22, leaksource.info) [https://archive.today/W8eP9]
* "Is Facebook’s “Faceprint Database” Illegal?" (2015-04-08, allgov.com) [https://archive.today/2HCcZ]. whowhatwhy.org writes: What’s in a name? When you’re talking about “Facebook” it’s everything! That’s because Facebook is compiling a gigantic, secret book filled with faces and the names that go with them. At issue is the biometric data collected by Facebook’s facial recognition software… acquired from an Israeli company called “Face.com.” Facebook faced similar complaints in Europe, where it agreed to forego use of biometric collection system.
And any criticism of government policies is now considered “extremist” and potential terrorism [https://archive.today/ADAyA]. According to Department of Defense training manuals, all protest is now considered “low-level terrorism” [https://archive.today/hRGl6]. And see this [https://archive.today/qPJHK], this [https://archive.is/2GVO8] and this [https://archive.today/DsQwj]. Questioning war is considered extremism [https://archive.today/z18pS].
* " 'Terror' watch now includes: Catholic Worker groups, anti-war activists, anti-drilling activists, environmentalists, animal-rights groups..." (2010-09-28, datelinezero.com) [https://archive.today/CfWeT]
* "DoD Training Manual: Protests are 'Low-Level Terrorism' " (2009-06-14) part 1 [https://archive.today/hRGl6], part 2 [https://archive.today/Pshnm] [begin excerpt]:
Finally, as I pointed out in my article, the term “low-level terrorism” appears to be a “term of art” within security agency circles given that a scholarly paper delivered in February of 2009 at an international conference incorporated it into its title as such:
“Vinthagen, Stellan. ‘Labeling “Low Level Terrorism:” The Out-Definition of Social Movements’ Paper presented at the annual meeting of the ISA's 50th ANNUAL CONVENTION ‘EXPLORING THE PAST, ANTICIPATING THE FUTURE’ New York Marriott Marquis, NEW YORK CITY, NY, USA, Feb 15, 2009.
“Abstract: This paper explores current state security tendency to label ordinary protests and opposition as "low level terrorism" or social movements as "terrorist environments" and the political and democratic consequences of such a politics of fear. The judic [the abstract cuts off here.]”
The problem at its heart, in other words, is that this particular question in the DoD training exam is merely a glaring individual example of a larger trend and mentality – the criminalization of protest and dissent and its relegation to a category of “terrorism,” legitimating the repression of dissent and free speech and assembly, ranging from declarations by public officials that dissenting ideas are “unpatriotic” and “traitorous” to training DoD employees that protest is terrorism-lite. The prospects revealed here are alarming. [end excerpt]
* "What Exactly Are the Spy Agencies Actually DOING with their Bag of Dirty Tricks?" (2014-07-15, washingtonsblog.com) [https://archive.today/gjfzE]
* "Intelligence Services Block Activists’ Emails … And Frame Them With Fake Emails" (2015-03-25, washingtonsblog.com) [https://archive.today/4HseA]
* "Yahoo Accused Of Censoring Occupy Wall Street Emails" (2011-09-20, gothamist.com) [https://archive.today/MAUoG]
NSA's department for Tailored Access Operations (TAO)
* "Inside TAO" (2015-12-29, spiegel.de), part 1 "Documents Reveal Top NSA Hacking Unit" [https://archive.today/Uqh1l], part 2 "Targeting Mexico" [https://archive.is/gQY6R], part 3 "The NSA's Shadow Network" [https://archive.is/XKAmV], also see [https://archive.today/9Lj0u].
* "Shopping for Spy Gear: Catalog Advertises NSA Toolbox" (2013-12-29, spiegel.de) [https://archive.today/Q6F7o]
NSA's Catalog of Tools and Techniques for the Joint Threat Research Intelligence Group (JTRIG) of the UKGB (updated 2012-07-05) [https://web.archive.org/web/20150209045912/http://cryptome.org/2014/07/nsa-jtrigall-intercept-14-0714.pdf], or [https://archive.today/fVXir]
The following are among the capabilities offered in the catalog:
“Change outcome of online polls” (UNDERPASS)
“Mass delivery of email messaging to support an Information Operations campaign” (BADGER) and “mass delivery of SMS messages to support an Information Operations campaign” (WARPARTH)
“Disruption of video-based websites hosting extremist content through concerted target discovery and content removal.” (SILVERLORD)
“Active skype capability. Provision of real time call records (SkypeOut and SkypetoSkype) and bidirectional instant messaging. Also contact lists.” (MINIATURE HERO)
“Find private photographs of targets on Facebook” (SPRING BISHOP)
“A tool that will permanently disable a target’s account on their computer” (ANGRY PIRATE)
“Ability to artificially increase traffic to a website” (GATEWAY) and “ability to inflate page views on websites” (SLIPSTREAM)
“Amplification of a given message, normally video, on popular multimedia websites (Youtube)” (GESTATOR)
“and it also used 'fake victim blog posts', “'false flag operations', 'honey traps' and psychological manipulation to target online activists, monitor visitors to WikiLeaks, and spy on YouTube and Facebook users.”
The catalog includes base stations for fooling mobile networks and cellphones ($40,000), bugs disguised as USB plugs ($20,000) and also cheaper rigged monitor cables for spying on targets’ monitors.
“The catalog even lists the prices for these electronic break-in tools, with costs ranging from free to $250,000. In the case of Juniper, the name of this particular digital lock pick is “FEEDTROUGH.” This malware burrows into Juniper firewalls and makes it possible to smuggle other NSA programs into mainframe computers. Thanks to FEEDTROUGH, these implants can, by design, even survive “across reboots and software upgrades.”
* "HACKING ONLINE POLLS AND OTHER WAYS BRITISH SPIES SEEK TO CONTROL THE INTERNET" (2014-07-14, firstlook.org) [https://archive.today/RPf5I]
* "GCHQ JTRIG Tools and Techniques for propaganda and internet deception" (2014-07-15, securityaffairs.co) [https://archive.today/suEKI]
* JTRIG article at Wikipedia.org, retrieved 2015-04-03 [https://archive.today/IzMM6]
* "How GCHQ and NSA spied on German citizens and global politics; GCHQ infiltrated German firms while NSA obtained a court order to spy on Germany and collected information about the chancellor in a special database" (2014-03-30, securityaffairs.co) [https://archive.today/OsSUD]
* "PRISM – US Top Secret massive surveillance program revealed; The top secret PRISM project claims direct access to servers of major IT corporates including Google, Apple and Facebook" (2013-06-07, securityaffairs.co) [https://archive.today/iMc61]
* "CIA, FBI, NSA, differents agencies for an unique intent…global monitoring" (2012-05-28, securityaffairs.co) [https://archive.today/4941O]
* "Is Facebook’s “Faceprint Database” Illegal?" (2015-04-08, allgov.com) [https://archive.today/2HCcZ]. whowhatwhy.org writes: What’s in a name? When you’re talking about “Facebook” it’s everything! That’s because Facebook is compiling a gigantic, secret book filled with faces and the names that go with them. At issue is the biometric data collected by Facebook’s facial recognition software… acquired from an Israeli company called “Face.com.” Facebook faced similar complaints in Europe, where it agreed to forego use of biometric collection system.
And any criticism of government policies is now considered “extremist” and potential terrorism [https://archive.today/ADAyA]. According to Department of Defense training manuals, all protest is now considered “low-level terrorism” [https://archive.today/hRGl6]. And see this [https://archive.today/qPJHK], this [https://archive.is/2GVO8] and this [https://archive.today/DsQwj]. Questioning war is considered extremism [https://archive.today/z18pS].
* " 'Terror' watch now includes: Catholic Worker groups, anti-war activists, anti-drilling activists, environmentalists, animal-rights groups..." (2010-09-28, datelinezero.com) [https://archive.today/CfWeT]
* "DoD Training Manual: Protests are 'Low-Level Terrorism' " (2009-06-14) part 1 [https://archive.today/hRGl6], part 2 [https://archive.today/Pshnm] [begin excerpt]:
Finally, as I pointed out in my article, the term “low-level terrorism” appears to be a “term of art” within security agency circles given that a scholarly paper delivered in February of 2009 at an international conference incorporated it into its title as such:
“Vinthagen, Stellan. ‘Labeling “Low Level Terrorism:” The Out-Definition of Social Movements’ Paper presented at the annual meeting of the ISA's 50th ANNUAL CONVENTION ‘EXPLORING THE PAST, ANTICIPATING THE FUTURE’ New York Marriott Marquis, NEW YORK CITY, NY, USA, Feb 15, 2009.
“Abstract: This paper explores current state security tendency to label ordinary protests and opposition as "low level terrorism" or social movements as "terrorist environments" and the political and democratic consequences of such a politics of fear. The judic [the abstract cuts off here.]”
The problem at its heart, in other words, is that this particular question in the DoD training exam is merely a glaring individual example of a larger trend and mentality – the criminalization of protest and dissent and its relegation to a category of “terrorism,” legitimating the repression of dissent and free speech and assembly, ranging from declarations by public officials that dissenting ideas are “unpatriotic” and “traitorous” to training DoD employees that protest is terrorism-lite. The prospects revealed here are alarming. [end excerpt]
* "What Exactly Are the Spy Agencies Actually DOING with their Bag of Dirty Tricks?" (2014-07-15, washingtonsblog.com) [https://archive.today/gjfzE]
* "Intelligence Services Block Activists’ Emails … And Frame Them With Fake Emails" (2015-03-25, washingtonsblog.com) [https://archive.today/4HseA]
* "Yahoo Accused Of Censoring Occupy Wall Street Emails" (2011-09-20, gothamist.com) [https://archive.today/MAUoG]
NSA's department for Tailored Access Operations (TAO)
* "Inside TAO" (2015-12-29, spiegel.de), part 1 "Documents Reveal Top NSA Hacking Unit" [https://archive.today/Uqh1l], part 2 "Targeting Mexico" [https://archive.is/gQY6R], part 3 "The NSA's Shadow Network" [https://archive.is/XKAmV], also see [https://archive.today/9Lj0u].
* "Shopping for Spy Gear: Catalog Advertises NSA Toolbox" (2013-12-29, spiegel.de) [https://archive.today/Q6F7o]
NSA's Catalog of Tools and Techniques for the Joint Threat Research Intelligence Group (JTRIG) of the UKGB (updated 2012-07-05) [https://web.archive.org/web/20150209045912/http://cryptome.org/2014/07/nsa-jtrigall-intercept-14-0714.pdf], or [https://archive.today/fVXir]
The following are among the capabilities offered in the catalog:
“Change outcome of online polls” (UNDERPASS)
“Mass delivery of email messaging to support an Information Operations campaign” (BADGER) and “mass delivery of SMS messages to support an Information Operations campaign” (WARPARTH)
“Disruption of video-based websites hosting extremist content through concerted target discovery and content removal.” (SILVERLORD)
“Active skype capability. Provision of real time call records (SkypeOut and SkypetoSkype) and bidirectional instant messaging. Also contact lists.” (MINIATURE HERO)
“Find private photographs of targets on Facebook” (SPRING BISHOP)
“A tool that will permanently disable a target’s account on their computer” (ANGRY PIRATE)
“Ability to artificially increase traffic to a website” (GATEWAY) and “ability to inflate page views on websites” (SLIPSTREAM)
“Amplification of a given message, normally video, on popular multimedia websites (Youtube)” (GESTATOR)
“and it also used 'fake victim blog posts', “'false flag operations', 'honey traps' and psychological manipulation to target online activists, monitor visitors to WikiLeaks, and spy on YouTube and Facebook users.”
The catalog includes base stations for fooling mobile networks and cellphones ($40,000), bugs disguised as USB plugs ($20,000) and also cheaper rigged monitor cables for spying on targets’ monitors.
“The catalog even lists the prices for these electronic break-in tools, with costs ranging from free to $250,000. In the case of Juniper, the name of this particular digital lock pick is “FEEDTROUGH.” This malware burrows into Juniper firewalls and makes it possible to smuggle other NSA programs into mainframe computers. Thanks to FEEDTROUGH, these implants can, by design, even survive “across reboots and software upgrades.”
* "HACKING ONLINE POLLS AND OTHER WAYS BRITISH SPIES SEEK TO CONTROL THE INTERNET" (2014-07-14, firstlook.org) [https://archive.today/RPf5I]
* "GCHQ JTRIG Tools and Techniques for propaganda and internet deception" (2014-07-15, securityaffairs.co) [https://archive.today/suEKI]
* JTRIG article at Wikipedia.org, retrieved 2015-04-03 [https://archive.today/IzMM6]
* "How GCHQ and NSA spied on German citizens and global politics; GCHQ infiltrated German firms while NSA obtained a court order to spy on Germany and collected information about the chancellor in a special database" (2014-03-30, securityaffairs.co) [https://archive.today/OsSUD]
* "PRISM – US Top Secret massive surveillance program revealed; The top secret PRISM project claims direct access to servers of major IT corporates including Google, Apple and Facebook" (2013-06-07, securityaffairs.co) [https://archive.today/iMc61]
* "CIA, FBI, NSA, differents agencies for an unique intent…global monitoring" (2012-05-28, securityaffairs.co) [https://archive.today/4941O]
from the Committee to
FREE 'EM ALL!
[PoliticalPrisonersUSA.blogspot.com] End the Drug War! Stop Jim Crow! Close the Torture Chambers!
** Become a Human Rights Pen Pal! [link]
* "23rd of Each Month: Statewide Coordinated Actions To End Solitary Confinement" [https://prisonerhungerstrikesolidarity.wordpress.com/2015/04/03/23rd-of-each-month-statewide-coordinated-actions-to-end-solitary-confinement/]
Free Antoine Thomas [https://freeantionethomas.wordpress.com]
Read more info below on Antoine, and to get involved in how to support his cause e-mail: freeantionethomas@gmail.com
* "Justice For Antoine Thomas" (2014-08-06, claritybee.wordpress.com) [https://archive.today/ndHTu]
Here is a video clip of Antione’s family with more information on the case:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ON3fitJYy6Q]
He was set up by the OPD for filing claims against them for abuses experienced in a previous situation. In result, an elaborate “armed robbery” was setup to set a third strike against Antione, fast-tracking him into a long-term, illegal imprisonment, on bogus charges. He is now being held, unjustly, as a political prisoner, and victim of racist incarceration.
---
* "Prisoners Want Jobs!" by Alex Krehbiel for "The Mobilizer: Online newsletter for the CCDS" (2015-04). About the author: Alex Krehbiel is a young African-American man incarcerated in a California prison. He is a member of the Committees of Correspondence for Democracy and Socialism. [begin article]:
There are 2.3 million people behind bars in the US. Nearly one million inmates are African-Americans, while African-Americans make up just 13% of the US population. Marx wrote that there are two major classes, capitalists and workers. The capitalists own businesses and the workers work for them. There are other groups. Small individual and family businesses, professionals who work for themselves like many doctors and lawyers, skilled trades workers are examples.Another group are those who have been pushed out of the working class or were never able to get established in it because there aren't enough permanent jobs for everyone in this phase of capitalism's development. When industry closed manufacturing plants in the US in the late 1970's, 1980's and later, millions of workers lost their jobs, and many never found a comparable job.
My generation - their children, didn't have the option of getting those kinds of jobs because they were mostly gone - gone overseas to exploit poorly paid workers there. That situation combined with increasing mechanization in the US, and more jobs were lost. Some in my generation went to college to get education for jobs in the "information" economy, but graduated to find "not hiring" signs. These young people, with tens of thousands of dollars in student debt and no job, were outraged. Many of them organized the Occupy Wall Street movement which correctly pointed the finger at Wall Street and capitalism as the cause of high and chronic unemployment.
Private businesses haven't provided the number jobs needed to put the unemployed to work. We need the government to step in to create these jobs, and productive jobs that will help make life better for people, not the unproductive parasitic jobs that Wall Street has created.
Look at a construction worker and a Wall Street financial derivatives trader. The construction worker produces things that people can use - a house, a hospital, a building where people work, roads and bridges. Everyone recognizes the contribution construction workers make to society. Unfortunately, the construction worker is not fully rewarded for his contributions. The construction worker may or may not live well, depending on how high or low his wage is, how many hours he works, the prices he must pay to live, if he has a union, and other factors.
The derivatives trader, on the other hand, produces nothing. Many get rich by betting against the success or failure of somebody else. A derivative trader will sell someone junk bonds or debt obligations that the trader thinks will tank, and when they do, the trader walks off with someone else's money. Somebody else's loss is the derivative traders gain. Under capitalism, this is not only legal, but rewarded. If the construction worker asks for a pay increase or joins a union to create a better life, they and their union are attacked as greedy and selfish. Truth is turned upside down.
Prisoners want jobs when we get out of prison. There are 2.3 million people behind bars in the US. Even after we have served our time, we are discriminated against. It's very hard for former prisoners to get a job, we can't vote, and many other doors are closed to us that are open to others. The kinds of jobs we want and the training we need are for productive jobs. We aren't going to become Wall Street derivatives traders. What is ironic is that many prisoners, who are mostly poor and working-class and often people of color, have gone to prison for petty crimes, while Wall Street hustlers have ripped off millions of dollars from others and rarely see the inside of a courtroom.
===*===*===
articles recommended by the
SAN PABLO BAY ECOLOGICAL PRESERVATION ASSOCIATION
Campaigns, info, and more [SanPabloBayEPA.blogspot.com]
* "Demolition & Abatement of Mare Island Building 755" from Vallejo City Manager’s Bi-Weekly Report (2015-04-03): The abatement work continues for this project. Materials with elevated levels of lead and asbestos are being separated from the regular construction and demolition debris. Demolition operations will follow.
* "Monsanto Has a 'Discredit Bureau' " (2015-04-01, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/az2ra]
* "Monsanto Has a 'Discredit Bureau' " (2015-04-01, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/az2ra]
* "Presidio’s Mountain Lake begins revival with native fish" (2015-04-01, sfgate.com) [https://archive.today/BGOlJ]
* "Carly Fiorina blames environmentalists for California drought" (2015-04-06, politico.com) [https://archive.today/yQ2uW] [begin excerpt]: Carly Fiorina is blaming liberal environmentalists for what she calls a “man-made” drought in California.“It is a man-made disaster,” Fiorina, who is “seriously considering” a run for president in 2016, told the Blaze Radio on Monday.“California is a classic case of liberals being willing to sacrifice other people’s lives and livelihoods at the altar of their ideology. It’s a tragedy.” [end excerpt]
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Health and the Human Ecology
Monopolists enforce a regime that does not recognize the natural right to health and life
Biological effects of transgenic maize NK603xMON810 fed in long term reproduction studies in mice [https://web.archive.org/web/20150327060721/http://www.biosicherheit.de/pdf/aktuell/zentek_studie_2008.pdf]
* "License to Ban Safe GM Crops Undermines Innovation and the Single Market" (2015-01-13, europabio.org) [https://archive.today/e23qb]
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Save The Birds [link]! and the Bees [link]!
A campaign to preserve and expand the habitat and populations of pollinators in the San Pablo Bay Area.
* "EPA Must Do More to Protect Pollinators From Harmful Pesticides" (2015-04-03) [https://archive.today/huqTv]
===*===*===
articles recommended by the
NO NUKES! campaign
[StopNuclearDeath.blogspot.com]
* "PG&E minimizes quake risks at nuclear plant, critics say" (2015-04-05, sfgate.com) [https://archive.today/mJosM]---
* "Refinery plan threatens Rodeo residents’ safety" (2015-04-06, sfchronicle.com) [https://archive.today/2WnbY]
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REVIEWING ENVIRONMENTAL DOCUMENTS:Tips For Evaluating Cumulative Impact Analyses [https://archive.today/MLWKi] [begin intro]:
A vital provision of the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) is the requirement that environmental documents contain an analysis of a project’s incremental impacts combined with the effects of other projects. Environmental damage often occurs incrementally from a variety of small sources. It is only by analyzing the effects of these sources together that the full environmental consequences of a project become known. While the cumulative impact analysis should be a key component of environmental impact reports and negative declarations, these documents often provide no more than a cursory review of a project’s cumulative environmental effects. Members of the public would be well served to review with a critical eye the cumulative impact analysis in an environmental document.
[end intro]
---
* "Fukushima radiation found off Canada’s west coast" (2015-04-08, presstv.ir) [https://archive.today/CdPjF
===*===*===
UNITED STATES FASCISM WATCH
[UnitedStatesFascism.blogspot.com] Current trends among fascists, monopolists, and their vanguards.
* "The Federal Reserve’s 'Financial Airplane'. The Fed’s Economic 'Assumptions', 'Falsified Data to Portray Growth' " (2015-03-30, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/h3DCh]
* "Government Corruption Has Become Rampant" (2015-03-30, washingtonsblog.com) [https://archive.today/CBDsZ], a remarkable catalog of sources documenting the process of fascism in the USA.
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U.S. Church Leaders: “Christians must Obey the U.S. Government … No Matter What”.
* "Resistance to Tyranny is Obedience to God" (2015-40-03, washingtonsblog.com) [https://archive.today/YicjN]
* "Texas approves textbooks with Moses as Founding Father" (2014-11-21, patheos.com) [https://archive.today/LlyH1] [begin excerpt]: Scholars claim the decision to include the biblical figure of Moses in social studies education is part of a concerted effort by Christian extremists to promote the idea that the United States is a “redeemer nation” – giving a divine justification for supposed American exceptionalism. [end excerpt]
The words of the Founding Fathers of the USA, who allegedly believed that America should be a Christian nation governed by the Bible as conservatives constantly claim, on the contrary, show that the great majority of the Founders believed strongly in separation of church and state. So keep in mind that this country has survived for over two centuries under the principle of separation and it is only now when conservatives are attempting to destroy that very cornerstone that we find America becoming ever more divided and more politically charged than ever before. If this right-wing faction has their way, America as we know it will cease to exist and the freedoms we have enjoyed because of the Constitution will erode.
* “Of all the animosities which have existed among mankind, those which are caused by a difference of sentiments in religion appear to be the most inveterate and distressing, and ought to be deprecated. I was in hopes that the enlightened and liberal policy, which has marked the present age, would at least have reconciled Christians of every denomination so far that we should never again see the religious disputes carried to such a pitch as to endanger the peace of society.” ~Founding Father George Washington, letter to Edward Newenham, October 20, 1792
* "The Government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion.” ~1797 Treaty of Tripoli signed by Founding Father John Adams
* “I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibit the free exercise thereof, thus building a wall of separation between church and state.” ~Founding Father Thomas Jefferson, letter to the Baptists of Danbury, Connecticut, 1802
* “Because religious belief, or non-belief, is such an important part of every person’s life, freedom of religion affects every individual. State churches that use government power to support themselves and force their views on persons of other faiths undermine all our civil rights. Moreover, state support of the church tends to make the clergy unresponsive to the people and leads to corruption within religion. Erecting the “wall of separation between church and state,” therefore, is absolutely essential in a free society. We have solved … the great and interesting question whether freedom of religion is compatible with order in government and obedience to the laws. And we have experienced the quiet as well as the comfort which results from leaving every one to profess freely and openly those principles of religion which are the inductions of his own reason and the serious convictions of his own inquiries.” ~Founding Father Thomas Jefferson: in a speech to the Virginia Baptists, 1808
* “Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law.” ~Founding Father Thomas Jefferson, letter to Dr. Thomas Cooper, February 10, 1814,
* “The civil government functions with complete success by the total separation of the Church from the State.” ~Founding Father James Madison, 1819, Writings, 8:432, quoted from Gene Garman, “Essays In Addition to America’s Real Religion”
---
* "To Catch a Torturer: One Attorney’s 28-Year Pursuit of Racist Chicago Police Commander Jon Burge; A human rights attorney looks back at his nearly three decades going after Chicago’s notorious torturer of African-American men" (2015-03-30, inthesetimes.com) [https://archive.today/BN2mV]
* "Four More Victims Come Forward from Chicago Secret Prison, Man Tortured Over Weed" (2015-02-27) [https://archive.today/WNquF]
* "Homan Square Torture Center the tip of Chicago Police Crimes iceberg" (by Ted Pearson):
“The police in Chicago are clearly out of control,” according to Frank Chapman, Field Organizer of the Chicago Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression. “People in the communities of oppressed tell us that ‘the police are just another gang.’” The Alliance has gathered 12,000 signatures on a petition to the City Council and the Mayor demanding passage of a law creating an elected Civilian Police Accountability Council (CPAC) to replace the currently appointed Police Board and Independent Police Review Authority. “With all the police murders of Black and Latino men and women in Chicago, it is outrageous that only one cop has ever even been charged,” Chapman has said.
The Alliance has a goal of 100,000 signatures, and the petitions will be delivered to City Hall on August 29, in a mass march on City Hall in which 10,000 people are expected. Youth are in the forefront of this movement, Black Youth Project 100 and Black Lives Matter, who have organized mass protests demanding justice for victims of police murders, are part of this movement.
The background for this upsurge in Chicago has been continuing wave of racist police profiling, stop-and-frisk abuses of people of color, and continuing patterns of wrongful conviction, torture of suspects, and murder by police.
Reports in the Guardian UK that people have been picked up by Chicago Police and taken to a secret site in the old Sears Roebuck warehouse on the West side, Homan Square, have added fuel to this fire of protest. People held in the recently secret Homan Square holding cells have been held incommunicado for many hours, even days. Their lawyers, families and friends have called police looking for them, only to be told no one knows anything about them. They have “disappeared.” People have been arrested by detectives wearing masks with weapons drawn, and taken to the site where they are chained to a wall, denied a bathroom, and pressured to “confess.”
Police Department spokesman Marty Maloney told reporters on Feb. 18 that interviews at Homan Square are handled no differently than at other police facilities. This is hardly reassuring. Hundreds of people are known to have suffered torture and third degree interrogations at many Chicago Police stations. Sixteen, so far, have been exonerated since being convicted based on tortured confessions.
Estimates of the number of such wrongful convictions range from over 100 to many hundreds. Many are serving life sentences. Most are Black and the rest are Latino. No white people have alleged they have been tortured and made to falsely confess.
At least one person has died suspiciously while in custody at Homan Square. John Hubbard, 44, overdosed on heroin on Feb. 2, 2013 while being held there, according to the Cook County Medical Examiner, although initially they said they had no record of his death at all..
The Police say that the Homan Square facility is not a secret site. The department says Homan Square houses the department’s Organized Crime Bureau, the Evidence and Recovered Property Section, its ballistics lab and the SWAT unit. However, people taken there are not booked. If they are booked after being held there and interrogated for many hours, they are taken to other police stations. Many attorneys have said they didn’t know of the site, and those few who have gone there looking for their clients were barred from entering at the gate of the facility, unlike at other police stations.
A few years ago Homan Square was the home of the CPD Special Operations Section, which was disbanded in 2007 after SOS cops were charged with shaking down drug dealers for drugs, guns and money.
Craig Futterman, a clinical professor of law at the University of Chicago, has said prisoners are held without being entered into the system all over the city, not just Homan Square. He blasted what he called “a broader systemic problem.”
“People who are very vulnerable [are] denied their basic fundamental constitutional right.”
But Homan Square is just the tip of the iceberg of police corruption and racism in Chicago. The police are on a rampage of racial profiling and murder. Since September 1, 2007 Chicago police have shot 383 people and killed 121. This is according to official reports of the Independent Police Review Authority. Seventy-four per cent of the victims have been Black; 14 per cent have been Latino; only 8.5 per cent have been white.
A recent study of police stop and frisk incidents in Chicago – stops by police not ending in arrest - by the American Civil Liberties Union reveal that African Americans make up 72 per cent of all those stopped, and Latinos 17 per cent. Whites make up only 9 per cent of those stopped. These proportions are remarkably close to the same proportions by which Chicagoans are shot and killed by police. According to the ACLU, the reasons given by police officers for stopping people were often no more than “they walked away” when they saw the officer. This is an echo of the story police tell when they shoot someone: “We approached the subject and he ran.”
The number of such stops in Chicago per capita was 58 times the number of stop-and-frisk stops New York City last year.
This is why, in Chicago, the movement for democratic civilian control of the police is mushrooming. It’s an idea whose time has arrived. There really is no other choice. It’s civilian control or slide into a total police state.
---
Persistent malnutrition is artificial famine. At the 1990 World Summit for Children, the USA Federal Government promised 0.7% of income tax to save a million children's lives every month, looking forward to a time of peace and end to cold war when the "Peace Dividend" that would transfer military budgets to civil uses... a promise reneged through by the administration of the 2-party system, as endless wars continued throughout the 1990s against the Republic of Iraq and the Federation of Yugoslavia, and an expanding military budget. Every preventable death is attributed to the continuing war economy.
---
* "Arab nations’ donations to Clinton Foundation: Curing world’s ills or currying favor?" (2015-04-06, mcclatchydc.com) [https://archive.today/sKYPD]
* "US Expands “Secret War” in Afghanistan" (2015-02-23, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/TkWU8]
* "US Imperialism, Afghanistan, and Hillary Clinton" (2014-01-29, empireslayer.org) [https://archive.today/WN7An]
* "Whatever It Takes: Hillary Clinton's record of support for war and other depravities along her political ascension" (2014) [https://archive.today/IYdif]
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* "53 ADMITTED False Flag Attacks, Not Theory … Admitted Fact" (2015-02-23, washingtonsblog.com) [https://archive.today/13UWt]
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Detroit just announced they will build a 1,000 foot luxury water slide through downtown and charge customers $15 per ride while they continue to shut off water to 3,000 low-income homes per week.
* "The Detroit Water Crisis is Real" (2015-01-29, detroitwaterbrigade.org) [https://archive.today/dGu4i]
* "1,000 foot water slide to take over Detroit streets this summer" (2015-04-08, metrotimes.com) [https://archive.today/lUCka]
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* "Think Indiana is bad? It's legal to deny service to gay and lesbian people in 29 states" (2015-04-01, vox.com) [https://archive.today/kPYv3]
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* "WHO OWNS STEPHEN HARPER? More than $2 million was donated to the Prime Minister's two leadership bids, but the identities of his major backers have never been publicly disclosed" (2015-02-04, nowtoronto.com) [https://archive.today/My9Zq]
---
* "U.S. Propaganda 101: Illegally Invade Countries, Fund the Media, Call it 'Independent' " (2015-04-08, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/KXEbF]
===*===*===
GEOPOLITICAL NEWS
Provided by Northbay MDS Committees, and the 5th World News service [FifthWorldNews.blogspot.com], documenting Nations and Institutions of Self-Government not recognized by the United Nations. USA State Dept.'s legal statement supporting unilateral declarations of independence (2009-07) [.pdf link]: "The legal principle of territorial integrity does not prevent non-state entities from peacefully declaring its independence." Legal mandate set by the UN International Court (2010-07-22) [archive.today/mc6sX]: "No general prohibition may be inferred from the practice of the Security Council with regard to declarations of independence,” and “General international law contains no prohibition on declarations of independence."
WORLD FASCISM WATCH
Fascism is for the benefit of the economic dictatorship, whereby entire regions have been made deserts for the purpose of enhancing the private wealth of individuals.
* "Global Famine" By Prof Michel Chossudovsky (2008-05-02) [https://archive.today/38Q0c]
* "World capitalism in 2014: Two billion poor, one billion hungry" (2014-07-25, wsws.org) [https://archive.today/xej7d]
* "Wealth of World’s Billionaires Surges Past $7 Trillion" (2015-03-04, wsws.org) [https://archive.today/a8K0H]
* "Distributing Land from the Poor to the Rich: The World Bank’s Role in Global Land Grabs" (2015-03-27, agra-indonesia.org) [https://archive.today/En0Ti]
* "The New 'Water Barons': Wall Street Mega-Banks are Buying up the World’s Water" (2012-12-21, marketoracle.co.uk) [https://archive.today/idjru]
* "The Privatization of Water: Nestlé Denies that Water is a Fundamental Human Right" (2013-06-27, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/eScbu]
* "Rigged Trade Agreements and Rigged Government. “Secret Sections” of the Trans-Pacific Partnership Revealed" (2015-03-29, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/gHTZn]
* "Why I have resigned from the Telegraph" by PETER OBORNE (2015-02-17) [https://archive.today/OGMfm], The coverage of HSBC in Britain's Telegraph is a fraud on its readers. If major newspapers allow corporations to influence their content for fear of losing advertising revenue, democracy itself is in peril.
* "HSBC Documents Reveal Criminal Conspiracy of Banks and Governments" (2015-02-11, wsws.org) [https://archive.today/nElBa]
* " 'Too Big To Fails' Have Stopped Being Banks" (2015-02-20, washingtonsblog.com) [https://archive.today/QRBp6]
* "Lawyer Who Shielded HSBC for the Largest Drug-and-Terrorism Money-Laundering Case as Next US Attorney General?" (2015-02-11, blackagendareport.com) [https://archive.today/Mpggy]
===*===*===
Republic of El Salvador
* "Honoring Archbishop Romero's Legacy and standing with El Salvador today" (2015-04-08, soaw.org):
On March 24, SOA Watch joined with thousands in El Salvador to honor Archbishop Oscar Romero on the 35th anniversary of his assassination. 35 years since SOA graduate Roberto D'Aubuisson planned and ordered his death and a sharpshooter shot an explosive bullet directly into Romero as he celebrated Mass. 35 years since Romero stood up for the poor and marginalized and called on the US to stop funding the Salvadoran military as it massacred and murdered the population. Much has changed in El Salvador in the 35 years since Archbishop Romero's death.
When we met with President Salvador Sanchez Ceren, a former FMLN guerilla commander, and Minister of Defense General Munguia, President Sanchez Ceren remarked that in the past he and General Munguia would have been fighting each other but instead today they are working together. Indeed, the country has made enormous strides since the signing of the Peace Accords and President Sanchez Ceren expressed to us his commitment to addressing the poverty and inequality that caused the war in the first place.
We also learned on the delegation about the intense pressure El Salvador faces from the US to adopt and carry out policies that benefit multinational corporations, despite the costs to the population. El Salvador has resisted the privatization of water and social movements are calling for water to be protected as a human right. We also heard from Hector Berrios, who is on the frontlines of the struggle against destructive gold mining in El Salvador. Given the limited water in El Salvador and the enormous poisoning and use of water that mining represents, El Salvador has declared a moratorium on mining. Yet, a secretive World Bank tribunal located in Washington DC could force El Salvador to allow gold mining or have to pay $301 million to Oceana Gold, the multinational mining corporation suing El Salvador for not allowing it to mine.
Click here [http://tinyurl.com/okmwplu] to call on Oceana Gold to drop its lawsuit against El Salvador and respect El Salvador's right to protect its water, environment, and population from the destructive affects of open-pit gold mining.
Time and time again in El Salvador we heard about the imminent and ill-named Alliance for Prosperity. The White House has requested $1 billion for the so-called Alliance for Prosperity, including hundreds of millions in security aid in the name of fighting the drug war as well as “economic development” focused on opening Central America to foreign investors. We heard again and again how the US has pressured El Salvador to adopt laws or policies in the recent past to benefit corporations in order to receive aid and the Alliance for Prosperity seems to be more of the same.
Our SOA Watch delegation was joined by leaders for peace and justice throughout the Americas who made the pilgrimage to honor Romero. 35 years later Romero's message continues to resonate throughout the hemisphere. A press conference calling for the closure of the SOA-WHINSEC became a beautiful chorus of voices speaking out against US intervention thoughout Latin America. We were joined by Bishop Jose Raul Vera Lopez of Mexico, who implored us to call on the US to stop all funding for the Mexican government through Plan Merida and denounced the Mexican government's ties to organized crime. Fr. Cesar Espinoza of Honduras spoke of the terror in Honduras where the US-backed government and powerful interests are assassinating social movement leaders. And, in a very timely intervention, Abilio Peña from Colombia's Peace and Justice Commission shared that Plan Colombia is being used as a model for the Alliance for Prosperity and denounced the destruction that Plan Colombia has wreaked, particularly extrajudicial executions and false positive murders of civilians.The solidarity between countries and the need for all of us to continue Romero's work today could not have been more clear. When we met with Legislative Assembly member Nidia Diaz, in addition to sharing with us about the challenges that El Salvador faces, she invited us all to sign a petition [http://tinyurl.com/oex3n95] calling on President Obama to revoke his Executive Order declaring Venezuela an extraordinary threat to US security. This unilateral order by Obama has been rejected by all 33 countries of Latin America and the Caribbean, who called on Obama to respect international law and non-intervention and resolve issues peacefully [https://archive.today/jGXcg]. The order has renewed concerns over US intervention in Latin America and been widely criticized [https://archive.today/6ShZA].
As El Salvador and the world prepare for Archbishop Romero's beatification on May 23, we are challenged to remember Archbishop Romero's words just seconds before his assassination, “I will not tire of declaring that if we really want an effective end to violence we must remove the violence that lies at the root of all violence: structural violence, social injustice, exclusion of citizens from the management of the country, repression.”
Those words ring true today as people in El Salvador and throughout Latin America work to chart their own destinies, despite the obstacles.
===*===*===
Republic of Nicaragua
* "Nicaraguan farmers resist Grand Canal, the world's largest construction project; Former Contra militants unite with old Sandinista enemies to stop construction of Nicaragua’s Grand Interoceanic Canal, which would consume their land" (2015-04-04, theguardian.com) [https://archive.today/oxI85]
===*===*===
Republic of Honduras
[northbaymds.blogspot.com/2014/10/world-fascism-watch-honduras.html] Most of the comments are collected from the daily "Presente Honduras Digest", and from the "Honduras Solidarity Network" listserve, authored by experts in geopolitics and history of Latin America. Libre is the "leftist" party working to uphold human rights and sovereignty, JOH is the dictator of Honduras supported by the USA.
* "New Recuperation of Land In the Bajo Aguan" message from Greg McCain (relayed, 2015-04-07): Campesinos from the Movimiento Ebenezer have recuperated land that was taken into State possession after being confiscated from the narco group Los Cachiros. The land is located on the left side of the Aguan River, in the community of Romolino, Trujillo, Colon.
(Update, 30 minutes later): The new recuperation has already been evicted. In only a few hours after taking the land, the campesinos left peacefully when soldiers and military police showed up and threatened them with arrest.
---
* "U.S. military intervenes in Latin America, Marines going to Honduras" (2014-04-06, peoplesworld.org) [https://archive.today/nODnq]
---
April 8, 2015
From: Honduras Solidarity Network
To: Honduran Public High School and University Students in Resistance,
On behalf of over 30 organizations from the United States and Canada, the Honduras Solidarity Network (HSN) extends its deepest condolences to the family members, peers, and friends of the four students – Soad Nicole Ham Bustillo, Darwin Josué Martínez, Elvin Antonio López, and Diana Yareli Montoya – who were murdered on March 24 and 25, 2015 in Tegucigalpa.
We condemn the death squad-style killings of these four high school students, who had been involved in student protests in the days leading up to their murder. We are also outraged at the repression and terror campaign that the student and social movements face in the country as they organize street protests across the country to oppose neoliberal reforms to public education. These reforms - including closing teaching and technical schools, extending class times, and eliminating night classes, amongst others - are being implemented by the Honduran government with direct financing and support from the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the United States government’s Agency for International Development (USAID).
As a network that opposes US imperialism in Honduras, we express our shame in the US government’s unconditional support for the Honduran government and state forces that commit gross human rights violations with complete impunity, against children and youth. We condemn the participation of John Kelly, the Commander of the US Southern Command and Erin Logan, a high-level White House representative in the “Central American Conference on Transnational Security” in Tegucigalpa on March 25 – the same day that news surfaced about the murder of the four high school students. The involvement of the US and Canadian governments in “security” in Honduras and Central America is not producing safer streets or reducing the high levels of violence in the country. Instead the US and Canada trains and funds Honduran security forces to repress protesting students, indigenous and Afro-indigenous populations protecting their natural resources and land, women, the LGBT community, and campesinos, amongst others.
We stand in solidarity with the Honduran student movement, the Plataforma del Movimiento Social y Popular de Honduras (PMSPH), and the Frente Nacional de Resistencia Popular (FNRP) in demanding justice for the four murdered students, and their struggle for free, universal, and accessible public education in Honduras.
===*===*===
Republic of Haiti
* "Elections that bode ill for the Haitian people!" (2015-03-31, haiti-liberte.com) [https://archive.today/AlyzW] [begin excerpt]: It is hard to imagine a greater contrast than that which is evident in Haiti today. On one hand, we can see the triumphant posturing of the de facto tandem of President Michel Martelly and his new Prime Minister Evans Paul. On the other hand, we witness the pusillanimity of the so-called opposition under the leadership of MOPOD (Patriotic Movement of the Democratic Opposition), the Lavalas Family Political Organization, and the Dessalines’ Children Platform, three rather inconsistent formations which are now prepared to play the game of electoral lottery concocted by the government. Despite its record of lawless behavior and of association with people accused of rape, murder, drug trafficking, and kidnapping, this government is still moving towards elections that will no doubt deliver a society which is even more unjust and corrupt, with the encouragement of those who don’t see anything wrong with that. [end excerpt]
---
* "Uruguay in Haiti: The poorest president of a mercenary army?" (2015-02-24, haiti-liberte.com) [https://archive.today/IrHkZ]
===*===*===
Republic of Cuba
* "Cuba restructures its socialism: steadily but without stopping or pausing" (2015-04-06, peoplesworld.org) [https://archive.today/zADzp]
===*===*===
Commonwealth of Jamaica
* "Partners in Austerity: Jamaica, the United States and the International Monetary Fund" (2015-04, cepr.net) [https://archive.today/deQm9]
* "At Behest of IMF, Jamaicans Face Harshest Austerity Policies in World: Report from Center for Economic and Policy Research finds poverty- and debt- stricken nation faces budget more severe even than Greece's" (2015-04-07, commondreams.org) [https://archive.today/84Tp5] [begin excerpt]:
A large chunk of these public funds are going towards servicing Jamaica's colossal debt. The country's debt-to-GDP ratio stands at nearly 140 percent, and it has some of the highest interest payments in the world at 8 percent of GDP last year, the report notes.
These costly payments show no sign of letting up. "Even after the signing of the new IMF agreement, Jamaica paid $138 million more to the IMF than it received last year," the report states. "Jamaica still owes the World Bank and Inter-American Development Bank over $650 million through 2018."
This burden follows at least two decades of declining living standards. Poverty in the country is double the levels in 2007, and unemployment is at 14.2 percent—significantly higher than the peak of the global recession.
As Nick Dearden pointed out in the Guardian in 2013 [https://archive.today/SnB9h], "Over 40 years, Jamaica has been 'rescued' on countless occasions" from structural adjustment programs in the 1980s to international loans and austerity. In a national economy weakened by global plunder and the gruesome history of slavery, the impact has been devastating, spreading hunger and poverty and cutting access to vital public programs, from education to health care. [end excerpt]
===*===*===
Republic of Colombia
* "Colombian Report on US Military’s Child Rapes Not Newsworthy to US News Outlets" (2015-03-26, fair.org) [https://archive.today/VbAHq]
* "US Soldiers and Contractors Sexually Abused at Least 54 Children in Colombia Between 2003 and 2007" (2015-04-07, thenation.com) [https://archive.today/q9NN1]
===*===*===
Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela
Republic of Ecuador
NEW AFRIKAN PEACE MOVEMENT[northbaymds.blogspot.com/2014/10/world-fascism-watch-honduras.html] Most of the comments are collected from the daily "Presente Honduras Digest", and from the "Honduras Solidarity Network" listserve, authored by experts in geopolitics and history of Latin America. Libre is the "leftist" party working to uphold human rights and sovereignty, JOH is the dictator of Honduras supported by the USA.
* "New Recuperation of Land In the Bajo Aguan" message from Greg McCain (relayed, 2015-04-07): Campesinos from the Movimiento Ebenezer have recuperated land that was taken into State possession after being confiscated from the narco group Los Cachiros. The land is located on the left side of the Aguan River, in the community of Romolino, Trujillo, Colon.
(Update, 30 minutes later): The new recuperation has already been evicted. In only a few hours after taking the land, the campesinos left peacefully when soldiers and military police showed up and threatened them with arrest.
---
* "U.S. military intervenes in Latin America, Marines going to Honduras" (2014-04-06, peoplesworld.org) [https://archive.today/nODnq]
---
April 8, 2015
From: Honduras Solidarity Network
To: Honduran Public High School and University Students in Resistance,
On behalf of over 30 organizations from the United States and Canada, the Honduras Solidarity Network (HSN) extends its deepest condolences to the family members, peers, and friends of the four students – Soad Nicole Ham Bustillo, Darwin Josué Martínez, Elvin Antonio López, and Diana Yareli Montoya – who were murdered on March 24 and 25, 2015 in Tegucigalpa.
We condemn the death squad-style killings of these four high school students, who had been involved in student protests in the days leading up to their murder. We are also outraged at the repression and terror campaign that the student and social movements face in the country as they organize street protests across the country to oppose neoliberal reforms to public education. These reforms - including closing teaching and technical schools, extending class times, and eliminating night classes, amongst others - are being implemented by the Honduran government with direct financing and support from the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the United States government’s Agency for International Development (USAID).
As a network that opposes US imperialism in Honduras, we express our shame in the US government’s unconditional support for the Honduran government and state forces that commit gross human rights violations with complete impunity, against children and youth. We condemn the participation of John Kelly, the Commander of the US Southern Command and Erin Logan, a high-level White House representative in the “Central American Conference on Transnational Security” in Tegucigalpa on March 25 – the same day that news surfaced about the murder of the four high school students. The involvement of the US and Canadian governments in “security” in Honduras and Central America is not producing safer streets or reducing the high levels of violence in the country. Instead the US and Canada trains and funds Honduran security forces to repress protesting students, indigenous and Afro-indigenous populations protecting their natural resources and land, women, the LGBT community, and campesinos, amongst others.
We stand in solidarity with the Honduran student movement, the Plataforma del Movimiento Social y Popular de Honduras (PMSPH), and the Frente Nacional de Resistencia Popular (FNRP) in demanding justice for the four murdered students, and their struggle for free, universal, and accessible public education in Honduras.
===*===*===
Republic of Haiti
* "Elections that bode ill for the Haitian people!" (2015-03-31, haiti-liberte.com) [https://archive.today/AlyzW] [begin excerpt]: It is hard to imagine a greater contrast than that which is evident in Haiti today. On one hand, we can see the triumphant posturing of the de facto tandem of President Michel Martelly and his new Prime Minister Evans Paul. On the other hand, we witness the pusillanimity of the so-called opposition under the leadership of MOPOD (Patriotic Movement of the Democratic Opposition), the Lavalas Family Political Organization, and the Dessalines’ Children Platform, three rather inconsistent formations which are now prepared to play the game of electoral lottery concocted by the government. Despite its record of lawless behavior and of association with people accused of rape, murder, drug trafficking, and kidnapping, this government is still moving towards elections that will no doubt deliver a society which is even more unjust and corrupt, with the encouragement of those who don’t see anything wrong with that. [end excerpt]
---
* "Uruguay in Haiti: The poorest president of a mercenary army?" (2015-02-24, haiti-liberte.com) [https://archive.today/IrHkZ]
===*===*===
Republic of Cuba
* "Cuba restructures its socialism: steadily but without stopping or pausing" (2015-04-06, peoplesworld.org) [https://archive.today/zADzp]
===*===*===
Commonwealth of Jamaica
* "Partners in Austerity: Jamaica, the United States and the International Monetary Fund" (2015-04, cepr.net) [https://archive.today/deQm9]
* "At Behest of IMF, Jamaicans Face Harshest Austerity Policies in World: Report from Center for Economic and Policy Research finds poverty- and debt- stricken nation faces budget more severe even than Greece's" (2015-04-07, commondreams.org) [https://archive.today/84Tp5] [begin excerpt]:
A large chunk of these public funds are going towards servicing Jamaica's colossal debt. The country's debt-to-GDP ratio stands at nearly 140 percent, and it has some of the highest interest payments in the world at 8 percent of GDP last year, the report notes.
These costly payments show no sign of letting up. "Even after the signing of the new IMF agreement, Jamaica paid $138 million more to the IMF than it received last year," the report states. "Jamaica still owes the World Bank and Inter-American Development Bank over $650 million through 2018."
This burden follows at least two decades of declining living standards. Poverty in the country is double the levels in 2007, and unemployment is at 14.2 percent—significantly higher than the peak of the global recession.
As Nick Dearden pointed out in the Guardian in 2013 [https://archive.today/SnB9h], "Over 40 years, Jamaica has been 'rescued' on countless occasions" from structural adjustment programs in the 1980s to international loans and austerity. In a national economy weakened by global plunder and the gruesome history of slavery, the impact has been devastating, spreading hunger and poverty and cutting access to vital public programs, from education to health care. [end excerpt]
===*===*===
Republic of Colombia
* "Colombian Report on US Military’s Child Rapes Not Newsworthy to US News Outlets" (2015-03-26, fair.org) [https://archive.today/VbAHq]
* "US Soldiers and Contractors Sexually Abused at Least 54 Children in Colombia Between 2003 and 2007" (2015-04-07, thenation.com) [https://archive.today/q9NN1]
===*===*===
Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela
* "Coup Plot in Venezuela Thwarted: Plotters Paid in US Dollars Planned on Assassinating the President and Installing a De Facto Government" (2015-02-13, telesurtv.net) [https://archive.today/alh8a]
* "Britain and Canada Involved in Foiled US Venezuelan Coup Plot" (2015-02-16, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/DxOrA]
The post-coup Transition Agreement included plans to erase images, public displays, and phrases related to Hugo Chavez. Source in Spanish.
* "El Acuerdo de transición también insta a borrar imágenes, esculturas y frases de Chávez" (2015-03-07, albaciudad.org) [https://archive.today/guk03]
* "Costa Rican Ambassador Fired for Defending Venezuelan Government Amid Escalating Media War" (2015-03-26, venezuelanalysis.com) [https://archive.today/qdFxm]
* "Op-Ed on Venezuela Slips Past NYT Factcheckers" (2015-02-19, fair.org) [https://archive.today/WCcRD] [begin excerpt]: In fact, the New York Times issued a correction last year after reporting that Globovisión was "the only television station that regularly broadcast voices critical of the government." It's a shame that the same standards for accuracy in the Times' news section apparently do not apply to the opinion page.
Krauze then says that Maduro "confronted" those "protesting students with arrests and gunfire," and that "many were killed" as, supposedly, Maduro "suppressed demonstrations by the opposition." A quick review of events last year--as covered by the New York Times, among others--reveals a wholly different story.
First, most of those killed were either pro-government or were bystanders. Many of those killed (at least 11, according to David Smilde of the Venezuelan Politics and Human Rights blog, who in turn cites the opposition paper El Universal) were National Guard officers, police or pro-government counter-protesters. A number of bystanders and motorists (at least 10) were also killed as a result of the protesters' violent tactics, which included stringing barbed wire across the streets in order to decapitate Chavista motorcyclists. (Two died this way.) Demonstrators fired on Guard and police officers, killing at least seven.
It is true that some security forces fired on demonstrators, killing at least three. Yet as over a dozen members of Congress noted in a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry, the Maduro government arrested some 20 security state agents in connection with these incidents. This was not a case of government-ordered crackdown on protests; if it were, the opposition's street blockades might have been cleared in days--instead, they remained for weeks--and motorists and cyclists might have been saved from decapitation, crashing into barricades, or getting shot when they got out of their stopped cars.
Having attempted to present the Venezuelan government as some sort of dictatorial regime where freedom of press and assembly are crushed, Krauze goes on to present a series of flawed statements about Venezuela's economic relationship with Cuba.
First, Krauze writes that "Venezuela absorbs 45 percent of Cuba's trade deficit." Official data on Venezuela/Cuba trade is opaque, so it is unclear where Krauze is getting his figure. In terms of its overall trade, Cuba does not have a trade deficit, but a small trade surplus ($697 million USD, according to the WTO). So this statement is false.
Krauze states, "Chávez-era economic agreements with Cuba were all highly favorable to the island nation." But that the agreements are favorable to Cuba does not preclude them from being favorable to Venezuela as well. They are complementary exchanges: Venezuela has a surfeit of oil yet lacks human capital in some sectors.
The fact is, whether Krauze wants to admit it or not, Venezuela is a democracy, and the Maduro government was democratically elected--as were the Chavista municipal officials who won a majority of elections half a year after Maduro was elected, in a stunning defeat for the opposition. Krauze doesn't have to like the current Venezuelan government, but he shouldn't confuse it with an unelected one, as in Cuba. [end excerpt]
* "Venezuela: Who Are They and How Did They Die?" (2014-03-12, cepr.net) [https://archive.today/M9TLc]
===*===*===* "Britain and Canada Involved in Foiled US Venezuelan Coup Plot" (2015-02-16, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/DxOrA]
The post-coup Transition Agreement included plans to erase images, public displays, and phrases related to Hugo Chavez. Source in Spanish.
* "El Acuerdo de transición también insta a borrar imágenes, esculturas y frases de Chávez" (2015-03-07, albaciudad.org) [https://archive.today/guk03]
* "Costa Rican Ambassador Fired for Defending Venezuelan Government Amid Escalating Media War" (2015-03-26, venezuelanalysis.com) [https://archive.today/qdFxm]
* "Op-Ed on Venezuela Slips Past NYT Factcheckers" (2015-02-19, fair.org) [https://archive.today/WCcRD] [begin excerpt]: In fact, the New York Times issued a correction last year after reporting that Globovisión was "the only television station that regularly broadcast voices critical of the government." It's a shame that the same standards for accuracy in the Times' news section apparently do not apply to the opinion page.
Krauze then says that Maduro "confronted" those "protesting students with arrests and gunfire," and that "many were killed" as, supposedly, Maduro "suppressed demonstrations by the opposition." A quick review of events last year--as covered by the New York Times, among others--reveals a wholly different story.
First, most of those killed were either pro-government or were bystanders. Many of those killed (at least 11, according to David Smilde of the Venezuelan Politics and Human Rights blog, who in turn cites the opposition paper El Universal) were National Guard officers, police or pro-government counter-protesters. A number of bystanders and motorists (at least 10) were also killed as a result of the protesters' violent tactics, which included stringing barbed wire across the streets in order to decapitate Chavista motorcyclists. (Two died this way.) Demonstrators fired on Guard and police officers, killing at least seven.
It is true that some security forces fired on demonstrators, killing at least three. Yet as over a dozen members of Congress noted in a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry, the Maduro government arrested some 20 security state agents in connection with these incidents. This was not a case of government-ordered crackdown on protests; if it were, the opposition's street blockades might have been cleared in days--instead, they remained for weeks--and motorists and cyclists might have been saved from decapitation, crashing into barricades, or getting shot when they got out of their stopped cars.
Having attempted to present the Venezuelan government as some sort of dictatorial regime where freedom of press and assembly are crushed, Krauze goes on to present a series of flawed statements about Venezuela's economic relationship with Cuba.
First, Krauze writes that "Venezuela absorbs 45 percent of Cuba's trade deficit." Official data on Venezuela/Cuba trade is opaque, so it is unclear where Krauze is getting his figure. In terms of its overall trade, Cuba does not have a trade deficit, but a small trade surplus ($697 million USD, according to the WTO). So this statement is false.
Krauze states, "Chávez-era economic agreements with Cuba were all highly favorable to the island nation." But that the agreements are favorable to Cuba does not preclude them from being favorable to Venezuela as well. They are complementary exchanges: Venezuela has a surfeit of oil yet lacks human capital in some sectors.
The fact is, whether Krauze wants to admit it or not, Venezuela is a democracy, and the Maduro government was democratically elected--as were the Chavista municipal officials who won a majority of elections half a year after Maduro was elected, in a stunning defeat for the opposition. Krauze doesn't have to like the current Venezuelan government, but he shouldn't confuse it with an unelected one, as in Cuba. [end excerpt]
* "Venezuela: Who Are They and How Did They Die?" (2014-03-12, cepr.net) [https://archive.today/M9TLc]
Republic of Ecuador
* "Chevron Whistleblower Leaks 'Smoking Gun' in Case of Ecuadorian Oil Spill" (2015-04-08, commondreams.org) [https://archive.today/KgcxX]
===*===*===
[NewAfricaPeace.blogspot.com], with the Green Charter Committee, for Pan-Afrikan Solidarity and Liberation!
* "United States Imperialism and Militarism Breeds Instability in Africa; Training exercises coordinated by the Pentagon take place again on the continent" (2015-02-24, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/leSAb]
* "Al Shabaab Benefited from Western Destruction of Libyan State" (2015-04-02, washingtonsblog.com) [https://archive.today/xKPou]
* "Confirmed: U.S. Armed Al Qaeda to Topple Libya’s Gaddaffi" (2014-04-24, washingtonsblog.com) [https://archive.today/NgHQA]
* "CIA Asset Joins Islamic State in Libya – Abdelhakim Belhadj Worked with U.S. and NATO to Overthrow Gaddafi" (2015-03-04, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/G9vkg]
* "Libyan rebel commander admits his fighters have al-Qaeda links; Abdel-Hakim al-Hasidi, the Libyan rebel leader, has said jihadists who fought against allied troops in Iraq are on the front lines of the battle against Muammar Gaddafi's regime" (2011-03-25, telegraph.co.uk) [https://archive.today/7fGJ]
* "Why Libya?" (2015-11-05, washingtonsblog.com) [https://archive.today/PRKv4]
* "The Curious Silence of the West Libya Falls Into the Abyss" (2014-11-03, counterpunch.org) [https://archive.today/6n5qr]
* "Libya: From Africa’s Richest State Under Gaddafi, to Failed State After NATO Intervention" (2014-10-19, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/OLD3O]
* "What the Hypocrites Want You to Forget about Nelson Mandela: His Support of Muammar Gaddafi" (2013-12-06, barakabooks.com) [https://archive.today/ssdVJ]
* "Is Boko Haram a CIA Covert Op to Divide and Conquer Africa?" (2015-02-14, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/7MhlV]
* "United States Imperialism and Militarism Breeds Instability in Africa; Training exercises coordinated by the Pentagon take place again on the continent" (2015-02-24, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/leSAb]
* "Al Shabaab Benefited from Western Destruction of Libyan State" (2015-04-02, washingtonsblog.com) [https://archive.today/xKPou]
* "Confirmed: U.S. Armed Al Qaeda to Topple Libya’s Gaddaffi" (2014-04-24, washingtonsblog.com) [https://archive.today/NgHQA]
* "CIA Asset Joins Islamic State in Libya – Abdelhakim Belhadj Worked with U.S. and NATO to Overthrow Gaddafi" (2015-03-04, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/G9vkg]
* "Libyan rebel commander admits his fighters have al-Qaeda links; Abdel-Hakim al-Hasidi, the Libyan rebel leader, has said jihadists who fought against allied troops in Iraq are on the front lines of the battle against Muammar Gaddafi's regime" (2011-03-25, telegraph.co.uk) [https://archive.today/7fGJ]
* "Why Libya?" (2015-11-05, washingtonsblog.com) [https://archive.today/PRKv4]
* "The Curious Silence of the West Libya Falls Into the Abyss" (2014-11-03, counterpunch.org) [https://archive.today/6n5qr]
* "Libya: From Africa’s Richest State Under Gaddafi, to Failed State After NATO Intervention" (2014-10-19, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/OLD3O]
* "What the Hypocrites Want You to Forget about Nelson Mandela: His Support of Muammar Gaddafi" (2013-12-06, barakabooks.com) [https://archive.today/ssdVJ]
* "Is Boko Haram a CIA Covert Op to Divide and Conquer Africa?" (2015-02-14, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/7MhlV]
===*===*===
European Union (EU)
* "NATO: In the Crosshairs of Critique Is Germany trying to distance itself from NATO's sabre-rattling?" (2015-03-23, russia-insider.com) [https://archive.today/qytSQ]
===*===*===
United Kingdom of Great Britain (UKGB) European Union (EU)
* "NATO: In the Crosshairs of Critique Is Germany trying to distance itself from NATO's sabre-rattling?" (2015-03-23, russia-insider.com) [https://archive.today/qytSQ]
===*===*===
* "Russia Today faces inquiry over anti-western comments in Ukraine debate; Media regulator to launch investigation into views expressed during Crosstalk programme on Kremlin-backed broadcaster" (2015-03-02, theguardian.com) [https://archive.today/tnJ9E]
===*===*===
Republic of Macedonia
* "Skype Messages Show Former Spy Chief Verusevski Discussed about a Ukraine Scenario in Macedonia" (2015-03-29, independent.mk) [https://archive.today/Yw6nK]
===*===*===
Republic of Ukraine
* "Land grab in Ukraine is Monsanto’s backdoor to the EU" (2015-04-06, orientalreview.org) [https://archive.today/eh7yd]
---
* "“We’re not cattle”: Kiev protesters throw manure at US embassy" (2015-04-03, offguardian.org) [https://archive.today/4UarY], video [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6GbjQdAhS30]
* "Anti-US Protests Broke out in Kiev" (2015-04-04, my.telegraph.co.uk) [https://archive.today/aRIzP]
* "2,500 Ukrainians Picket US Embassy in Kiev (Video) - Story Suppressed" (2015-04-04, russia-insider.com) [https://archive.today/Grq8k], video [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YURRAafIloo]
* "Ukrainians Protest U.S. Police-State the Only Available Way" (2015-04-05, washingtonsblog.com) [https://archive.today/l48Bg]
---
* "Forbes: Poroshenko offered Putin to take Donbass" (2015-04-06, offguardian.org) [https://archive.today/FGAzy] [begin excerpt]: At a meeting with the board of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs (RSPP) on March 19, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that the Ukrainian leader Poroshenko invited him to “take Donbass” and make it part of Russia, Forbes’ Russian edition reports [https://archive.today/gOB1M]. “He (Poroshenko) told me directly, “Take the Donbass “. I replied: “Lost your marbles, or what? I do not need Donbass. If you don’t need it, then declare its independence.” Poroshenko, according to the Russian president, said that the Ukrainian authorities cannot agree to this. Then the Ukrainian authorities should pay the people of Donbass pensions, allowances and restore the banking system, Putin demanded. [end excerpt]
"Yes, THAT man wants an ethnically pure Ukraine, has killed 50,000 ethnic Russians, and expelled a million more... THAT man is willing to destroy the European Union economy!"
---
* "US Sponsored Kiev Regime Appoints Nazi Anti-Semite to Key Military Position" (2015-04-07, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/858ep]
* "Kiev Ambassador to Germany: Neo-Nazis Are Part of Our Forces. Without Them Russia Would Have Defeated Us. Goes further and says there are no right-wingers currently serving in Ukrainian Parliament" (2015-02-20, russia-insider.com) [https://archive.today/ShM67]
* "Ukraine and neo-Nazis" (2014-09-16, williamblum.org) [https://archive.today/e87Be]
* "Ukraine Negotiates Creating New Neo-Nazi Division In Army, 1,000 U.S. Soldiers In Ground Operations In Eastern Europe" (2015-03-27, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/IoMW1]
* "US Army to Train Ukrainian Fascist Militias" (2015-04-01, wsws.org) [https://archive.today/o9bzV]
* "U.S. to Train Nazi Troops in Ukraine, Starting on April 20th" (2015-04-05, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/36Uqb]
* "On Hitler’s Birthday, US to Begin Openly Training Neo-Nazi Integrated Forces in Ukraine" (2015-04-02, washingtonsblog.com) [https://archive.today/E8wX3]
* "On Hitler's Birthday, U.S. Will Begin Training Ukraine's Far-right National Guard; Perhaps the Defense Department's PR staff could have picked a better day" (2015-04-02, alternet.org) [https://archive.today/A2mBA]
* "Even America’s “Media Watchdogs” Hide Washington’s Ukraine Nazification and Ethnic Cleansing Program" (2015-03-31, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/7GTZo]
* "New York Times Whites Out Ukraine's Brown Shirts" and other articles about the Nazi battalions (consortiumnews.com) [https://archive.today/5rNcq]
---
* "New Ukrainian Bill Threatens to Intern Russians Citizens Living in Ukraine" (2015-04-04, sputniknews.com) [https://archive.today/o5ElB]
---
* "Kiev Regime Conscripts Children in Foreign Countries for Military Service in Ukraine" (2015-02-22, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/8YR5x]
----
* "The $160 Billion Cost: Why Ukraine’s Viktor Yanukovych Spurned EU’s Offer, on 20 Nov. 2013" (2015-03-27, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/FgNUW]
* "US support of violent neo-Nazis in Ukraine: Video Compilation" (2014-03-18) [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8-RyOaFwcEw]: Shocking and insightful videos detailing the neo-Nazi, anti-Semitic, ultra-nationalist movement in Ukraine. The videos examine the ongoing US support of these groups, including the Svoboda party and Right Sector.
Visit [http://stpeteforpeace.org] for more info.
Source videos:
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fWkfpGCAAuw]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LCsz_ewYis]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rqlPvK8QtR8]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tHhGEiwCHZE]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5SBo0akeDMY]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2R7chF70UTw]
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-B1vWFdPXo]
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oKqPwGTjDlY]
* The Truthseeker: NGO documents plan Ukraine war (E35) [www.youtube.com/watch?v=BgAKD_0MOCc]. NGOs caught forging documents for war, insider warns all NGOs infiltrated.
---
* "Ukraine’s ‘Secret Weapon’ Fires at Will. His own" (2015-03-20, offguardian.org) [https://archive.today/qhxJh]
* "Crabs in a barrel" (2015-03-20, cassad-eng.livejournal.com) [https://archive.today/1wC3T], videos of Kolomoisky's "interview" given to the Radio Svoboda right after emerging from the building of the state oil company in question [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e1gh3it6JvQ] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LqL4rvxB3xQ], video originally posted at [http://www.radiosvoboda.org/flashembed.aspx?t=vid&id=26910861&w=640&h=363]
* "The heat is on?" (2015-03-22, offguardian.org) [https://archive.today/LKd5R], video [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kGCADcHTzUk]
* "Kolomoysky raids Ukrnafta" (2015-03-22, offguardian.org) [https://archive.today/bnyvd], video [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FvTotX2M67k]
* "Kolomoisky Admits Donetsk and Lugansk “Republics” Viable" (2015-03-23, offguardian.org) [https://archive.today/YxOU9]
* "Right now any reference to the developing situation in Kiev between Kolomoisky and Poroshenko is not just blacked out from above the line, it’s rigidly censored BTL also" (2015-03-23, offguardian.org) [https://archive.today/zW9wu]
* "Kolomoisky Taped Threatening 'Naftogaz' " (2015-03-25, offguardian.org) [https://archive.today/hVbgl], video [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EJupCbwR_I0]
* "Poroshenko Fires Kolomoisky as Dnepropetrovsk Gov" (2015-03-25, offguardian.org) [https://archive.today/ajO68]
* "Divisions within the Kiev Regime, the Role of Ukrainian Oligarch Kolomoysky" (2015-03-29, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/By8df]
===*===*===
Union of People's Republics of NovorossiyaFor more info, with maps, and news links, visit [NovorossiyaSolidarity.blogspot.com].
Ukrainian crisis news:
* (2015-04-02) [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T_XJ1PO8Q_s]
* (2015-04-06) [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DeN6p_kSozs]
* (2015-04-07) [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ro3U9CeVt3Q]
* (2015-04-08) [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lMwYRPTzvs]
* "Genocide by non-payment of retirement pensions: why Ukraine should pay pensions to the dwellers of the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics" (2015-03-27, novorossia.today) [https://archive.today/A7Lcs]
---
* "Southeast Ukraine: “We Have Built an Independent State”. Interview with Deputy PM, Donetsk People’s Republic, Mikhail Mnukhin" (2015-03-07, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/CYRhu]
===*===*===
Federation of Russia
* "Russia’s Remarkable Renaissance" (2015-03-09, New Eastern Outlook) [https://archive.today/ISzk6]
---
* "Russia’s Economic Self-Reliance: Yes to Hemp, No to GMO" (2015-02-22, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/B2UBk]
---
* "China Just Sided With Russia Over The Ukraine Conflict" (2015-02-27, zerohedge.com) [https://archive.today/LeRa6]
* "China Warns U.S. to Stop Its Ukrainian Proxy War Against Russia" (2015-03-02, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/BOKqK]
---
* "New Pipelines Start Supplying Fresh Water to Crimea" (2015-04-04, sputniknews.com) [https://archive.today/QfGt7]
* "Crimea: Was It Seized by Russia, or Did Russia Block Its Seizure by the U.S.?" (2015-02-22, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/GdyD6]
---
* University of Colorado Map at [https://archive.today/VESgh], Ethnic pluralities map of the Caucasus compiled from Beroutchachvili and Radvanyi (1996), 2002 Russian Census, Goskomstat Rossii (2004), and Rowland (2004, 2006, 2007).
===*===*===
Federation of Bosnia & Herzegovina, and the Serbian Republic (Republika Srpska)
Bosniacks are the descendants of those among the adherents to the Greek Orthodox Church who converted to Islam, the religion of the Empire of Istanbul (the Ottoman Empire) during the years that it administered the area of Herzegovina. The jurisdiction of the Federation of Bosnia-Herzegovina contains the vectors of three major religions: Roman Catholicism, Orthodoxy and Islam, which act as the foundations for the 3 separate nationalisms. Alija Izetbegović, the first President of Bosnia and Herzegovina, was a leader of the ruling Party of Democratic Action (SDA) for Islam, and an author of nationalistic Islamic Declaration of 1970 according to which any form of multiculturalism and multiconfessionalism was not possible for the Muslims who have to establish a pure Islamic society firstly by Islamization of the whole Muslim community.
* "Bosnia & Herzegovina sliding towards a breakup?" (2014-02-18, balkaninside.com) [https://archive.today/gkkkT]
Maps:
* Demographic map [https://archive.today/uUhwE], noted as Red - Srpska / Green - Bosniak / Yellow - Croation
* Canton map [https://archive.today/VAgWH], noted as of the Federation: Green - Bosniac Canton / Blue - Croat Canton / Yellow - Bosniac-Croat Canton. And with Red - Republika Srpska
* Demographic map showing Bosniack areas of habitation
* "Created by US-NATO, Linguistic Engineering: New “Boshnjak” Identity and “Bosnian” Language" (2015-02-16, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/ApPpv] [begin excerpt]:
This year in November (21st) is going to be the 20th anniversary of the 1995 Dayton Peace Accord – a treaty signed by four Presidents (the USA, Croatia, Serbia and Bosnia-Herzegovina) that led to an end of the civil war in Bosnia-Herzegovina.
As a result of the Dayton Peace Accord a new “independent and internationally recognized state” emerged: Bosnia-Herzegovina as a confederation of two political entities (the Republic of Srpska and the Muslim-Croat Federation) but ethnically strictly divided into three segments composed by the Serb, Croat and Muslim (today Boshnjak) controlled territories. In contrast to the Republic of Srpska (49% of the territory of Bosnia-Herzegovina) the Muslim (Boshnjak)-Croat Federation is cantonized on the ethnic basis.
However, Bosnia-Herzegovina is today just another non-functional western project – a country that is not independent; it is a Western protectorate, a territory, fully dependent on international financial donations and credits. The country is ethnically divided as imposed by US-NATO without any inter-ethnic cooperation between the three leading ethnic groups.
Nevertheless, one of the most important features of post-war Bosnia-Herzegovina is a creation and existence of a new ethnolinguistic and ethnonational identity – the (Muslim) “Boshnjaks” who speak the “Bosnian” language as a separate and independent language from the family of the South Slavic languages. This is an artificial construct with a view to creating ethnic and linguistic divisions.
The political consequences of the “Boshnjak” project are of international significance: this ethnonational identity is based Islam and Muslim political ideology as all other identity components, including the language which in the 1980s was Serbo-Croatian. Subsequently, the Muslim Boshnjaks accepted all components of political Islam ideology and as a consequence the world is today faced with the fact that the Muslim part (cantons) of Bosnia-Herzegovina is the first European Islamic State (the second one is Muslim Albanian Kosovo) – a country that is a main European recruitment center for the Middle East Jihad fighters.
The Bosnian language (de facto of only Muslim Boshnjaks), as a separate (South) Slavic one, was officially inaugurated in 1996 by publishing the book: S. Halilović, Pravopis bosanskog jezika (Orthography of Bosnian Language) in the capital of Bosnia-Herzegovina – Sarajevo.
According to the Constitution of Bosnia-Herzegovina official languages are: Bosnian, Serbian and Croatian. Such constitutional-linguistic situation in Bosnia-Herzegovina is quite similar to the Swiss one – Italian, French and German (plus Romansh, spoken by very small community).
During the Bosnian-Herzegovinian civil war of 1992–1995 Bosnian-Herzegovinian Serbs tried unsuccessfully to purify their language by elimination of the “Turkish” words. However, in many cases it was impossible without creation of new neologisms (ex: čarape=socks, šećer=sugar, pamuk=cotton, etc.). It is interesting that common nickname for Bosnian Muslims given by the local Christians, but also and as a group name used by Bosnian-Herzegovinian Muslims to identify themselves, was Turci (the Turks). The Bosnian-Herzegovinian Christians used and the term poturice (those who became the Turks, i.e. convertors). The Bosnian-Herzegovinian Muslims, on the other hand, called the real ethnolinguistic Turks (Turkish language speakers) from Anatolia as Turkuše or Turjaši.
Nominally, the Bosnian language is written in both Latin and Cyrillic scripts. However, in practice it is only in Latin (like Croatian) for the purpose to break any link with the Serbs for whom the Cyrillic script is (by language law) the first, while Latin is the second national alphabet.
It has to be emphasised that Croatian, Bosnian, Montenegrin and Serbian Latin script is identical. In a historical context, the native language of the inhabitants of Bosnia-Herzegovina (claimed to be Bosnian one) was written by three alphabets: “latinica” (Latin), “bosančica/bosanica” (Cyrillic) and “arabica” (Arabic). However, with regard to “bosančica”, the fact that this script came to mediaeval Bosnia-Herzegovina from Serbia and during the Ottoman rule is not recognized. It was known within the Bosnian Muslim feudal circles as “Old Serbia” up to the mid-19th century.
In historical sources the name Bosanski jezik (Bosnian language) is mentioned for the first time in the year of 1300. It is true that the earliest Slavonic philologists like P. J. Šafaŕík, J. Dobrovský and J. Kopitar used the term Bosnian language but only as provincial speech of all inhabitants of the Ottoman Pashaluk of Bosnia but not as a language of Bosnians in ethnic term.
For instance, according to the decree of 1880 for Austro-Hungarian administration in Bosnia-Herzegovina existed only Boshnjaks who are by confession divided into those of Muslim, Catholic and Orthodox denominations. In general, Austro-Hungarian administration in Bosnia-Herzegovina very much favored local Roman Catholic and Muslim inhabitants at the expense of the Orthodox.
It has to be emphasized that even before Austro-Hungarian administration in Bosnia-Herzegovina the local population used the terms Bosnian (“bosanski”) for the language and Bosnians (“Bosanci”) for themselves as inhabitants of this province alongside with more pure ethnic names Serbian/Serbs and Croatian/Croats.
Ottoman Pashaluk of Bosnia before 1683 encompasses and parts of historical territories of Croatia and Dalmatia.
Vinko Pribojević, a Dominican friar from the island of Hvar in Dalmatia in his De origine successibusque Slavorum (Venice, 1532) pointed out that Ottoman sultans appointed many South Slavs as the commanders of his army and that 20.000 of his guard (the Janissaries) are recruited among the Thracians, Macedonians and Illyrians (for Pribojević all of them have been South Slavs – aboriginal Balkan people, speaking one language that was later on called “Serbo-Croat”). With the help of them the Ottomans subjugated many states and peoples in Europe.
Mavro Orbini, a Benedictine abbot from Dubrovnik, in his famous pan-Slavic book (“the Bible of pan-Slavism”) De regno Sclavorum (in Italian version Il regno degli Slavi), printed in Pesaro in 1601, was very clear telling that all South Slavs are speaking the same language and composing one nation within a wider network of united ethnolinguistic Slavdom. More precisely, he inclined to call all speakers of ex-Serbo-Croat language of Shtokavian dialect as the Serbs. However, a Croatian nobleman of German origin from Senj, Pavao Ritter Vitezović (1652–1713) in his political-ideological-programmatic book Croatia rediviva: Regnante Leopoldo Magno Caesare, Zagreb, 1700 claimed that all Slavs, including and those in the Balkans, originated from the Croats and speaking in the essence Croatian language with regional dialects. The essence of both Orbini’s and Ritter’s (likewise Pribojević’s) writings is that all South Slavs (especially the Shtokavians) are composing one ehnolinguistic group (in modern sense – nation).
“Linguistic engineering” of Croatian language can be followed even from 1967 when a majority of the most important Croatian scientific, literal and cultural institutions signed a Declaration upon the name and position of Croatian literal language (“Deklaracija o nazivu i položaju hrvatskog književnog jezika”) requiring to be officially separated from Serbian one and purified from the so-called “srbizmi” (the words of a Serbian origin).
[end excerpt]
===*===*===
* "The male Nuland and the US’ Central Asian strategy" (2015-03-05, orientalreview.org) [https://archive.today/qoxPT], part 2 [https://archive.today/muvQw]
* "The Coming EU-Eurasian Union Crisis In The Caucasus" (2015-01-12, orientalreview.org) [https://archive.today/Navgz]
---
* "Russia's new Eurasian Economic Union could get its own single currency" (2015-03-20, businessinsider.com) [https://archive.today/YxnbI]
* "US Bid to Contain Russia and Latin America Speeds Creation of New Alliances" (2015-03-20, sputniknews.com) [https://archive.today/drmpM]
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Arab Republic of Syria
* "US-Israel Wage War on Iran in Syria" (2015-04-04, journal-neo.org) [https://archive.today/F6wvx]
---
* "Congratulations to National Leadership of Baath Arab Socialist Party" (2015-04-06, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/ULCPd]
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Global Islamic Caliphate / Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL ; ISIS)
* "Mass Killings, Looting in Tikrit by US-Backed Shiite Militia" (2015-04-06, wsws.org) [https://archive.today/waxld]
* "Obama’s “Fake War” against the Islamic State (ISIS). The Islamic State is Protected by the US and its Allies" (2015-02-19, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/P7hv6]
* "How US Ambassador Chris Stevens May Have Been Linked To Jihadist Rebels In Syria" (2012-10-19, businessinsider.com) [https://archive.today/WcLbx] [begin excerpt]:
In March 2011 Stevens became the official U.S. liaison to the al-Qaeda-linked Libyan opposition [https://archive.today/DoYbI], working directly with Abdelhakim Belhadj of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group [https://archive.today/wYjlN] — a group that has now disbanded, with some fighters reportedly participating in the attack that took Stevens' life [https://archive.today/TtEI4].
In November 2011 The Telegraph reported that Belhadj, acting as head of the Tripoli Military Council, "met with Free Syrian Army [FSA] leaders in Istanbul and on the border with Turkey" in an effort by the new Libyan government to provide money and weapons to the growing insurgency in Syria [https://archive.today/0IP4]. [end excerpt]
---
* "Staged Egyptian Executions in Libya ‘Expose’ ISIS Fraud Again" (2015-02-19, 21stcenturywire.com) [https://archive.today/zH2TV]
===*===*===
* "Kurdish govt imprisons German Yazidi leader" (2015-04-07, thelocal.de) [https://archive.today/Vjvd4] [begin excerpt]:
Shesho, the leader of the “Shingal Defence Unit” (HPS) – which counts some 3,000 men among its ranks – had rallied Yazidi resistance against terrorist group Islamic State, after the Islamist extremists had attacked the Yazidi region in north west Iraq in August.
The group was founded in August by Shesho's uncle Qasim, a gardener from Bad Oeynhausen in North Rhine-Westphalia.
Hayder Shesho had harshly criticized the Kurdish government in recent weeks for its treatment of the Yazidi, saying their fighters had left his people undefended as Isis advanced into the Sinjar mountains last summer.
HPS fighters were narrowly able to hold back Isis, although hundreds of civilians are reported to have died or been sold into slavery at the hands of the fundamentalists.
Shesho had complained that the Kurds were failing to provide his troops with weapons.
The Daily Telegraph reported that he had been seeking to acquire weapons from the Iranian-backed Popular Mobilisation Units, a Shiite militia. This decision is said to have proved unpopular among the Kurdish leadership [https://archive.today/ywQHG].
[end excerpt]
===*===*===
State of Palestine
* "Zionist Forces Arrest Palestinian Lawmaker from Her Home" (2015-04-02, almanar.com.lb):
Israeli occupation soldiers arrested on Thursday Khalida Jarrar, a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, after storming her home in Ramallah, reported the Samidoun Solidarity Network.According to Samidoun, dozens of Israeli soldiers arrived at Jarrar's home in the early morning, forcibly entered her residence, and temporarily detained her husband before arresting her.
Jarrar, is a leading figure within the leftist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and has been targeted by Israeli authorities before. In September 2014 she was issued “special supervision order” that would have forcibly moved her from Ramallah to Jericho.
She is also banned from leaving Palestine by Zionist authorities.
===*===*===
Kingdom of Saudi Arabia
* "The US- Saudi Military Deal And Global Military Expenditure" (2010-10-24, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/eQ2Yu]
* "Massive EU Weapons Sales to Saudi Arabia Contribute to Fuelling International Aggression and Terrorism in the Middle East" (2012-03-21, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/1TTYb]
---
* "New FBI Tactic Hints at Big DC Cover-up of Saudi 9/11 Funding" (2015-04-02, whowhatwhy.org) [https://archive.today/qW1I8]. The FBI is disowning an explosive internal report—which ties the 9/11 hijackers to some highly connected Saudis. Just what is going on here? Russ Baker looks at the Deep Politics in play as Cover-up Central goes into overdrive.
===*===*===
Ansarullah Revolutionary Government of Yemen
* "Key Facts to Understand Why Yemen Has Become a Political Flashpoint" (2015-04-02, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/sKmbG]* "Yemen and Syria – Two Different Rebellions, Two Different Stories, Same Belligerent West" (2015-03-29, activistpost.com) [https://archive.today/eVEAc]
* "The Geopolitics behind the War in Yemen" (2015-03-30, strategic-culture.org) part 1 [https://archive.today/KHxDt], part 2 [https://archive.today/7cS0K]
* "Yemen – the Big Picture. US Sponsored Civil Wars" (2015-04-06, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/xK5OB]
* "Saudi Arabia Funding al Qaeda in Yemen" (2015-03-11, 21stcenturywire.com) [https://archive.today/rTf5E]
* "As Saudi Dictator Continues US-Coordinated Bombardment, al Qaeda Gains Yemen Foothold" (2015-04-06, washingtonsblog.com) [https://archive.today/4ECtP] [begin excerpt]: The attacks by Wahhabi Saudi Arabia have allowed another Wahhabi-affiliated and Saudi-backed group, al Qaeda, to seize a major Yemeni port city, and now the Mukalla army base, securing al Qaeda’s foothold in Yemen’s southeast [https://archive.today/ueSmp]. [end excerpt]
* "Autocrats United Against Yemen: The Yemen war is a variation on an old theme, where despotic regimes in the Middle East call on the United States to do their dirty work" (2015-04-07, fpif.org) [https://archive.today/ZXi6H]
---
* "Obama’s Dirty War on Yemen Murdering Civilians" (2015-04-04, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/fpbHJ]
* "UN Announces Over 500, Mostly Civilians, Killed since Saudis began Yemen Aggression; US Announces Will Begin Refueling US-Made Saudi Bombers" (2015-04-03, washingtonsblog.com) [https://archive.today/KzuBa]
* "With Scores of Children Among Civilian Dead in Yemen, US Sending More Weapons" (2015-04-07, commondreams.org) [https://archive.today/mE0LE]
* "A Yemeni’s Call for Help" (2015-04-01, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/UBhbs]
* "As Saudi Arabia and Allies Continue Airstrikes, Sorrow and Rage in Yemen" (2015-03-26, commondreams.org) [https://archive.today/CYNNQ]
* "Dozens Killed in Airstrike on Dairy Factory in Yemen" (2015-04-02, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/DllSB]
* "Saudi Arabia to raze around 100 villages at Yemen border" (2015-04-05, presstv.ir) [https://archive.today/c8om0]
* "Coalition stopping Red Cross delivering medical aid in Yemen" (2015-03-31, reuters.com) [https://archive.today/zlpBH]
* "UN, Red Cross alarmed over Yemen deaths" (2015-04-01, AP newswire) [https://archive.today/An4Co]
---
* "Past Mistakes: Will Yemen Become Saudi Arabia's Vietnam?" (2015-04-03, sputniknews.com) [https://archive.today/V0NoX]
* "Yemen’s Response to Saudi Aggression 'Will Devastate the Arab Kingdom, Change the Map of the Region' " (2015-03-31, english.farsnews.com) [https://archive.today/3dwSg]
* "Saudi Invasion: Yemeni Forces Arrest 40 Saudi Military Men" (2015-03-29, english.farsnews.com) [https://archive.today/rptHz]
---
* "Saudis Bomb Russian Consulate in Yemen" (2015-04-02, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/s4Y2o]
* "Saudi Dictator’s US-Coordinated Terror-Bombings in Yemen: Updates" (2015-04-01, washingtonsblog.com) [https://archive.today/m1udc]
* "US-Coordinated Saudi Dictator Burns Women and Children Alive in Terror Attacks" (2015-04-02, washingtonsblog.com) [https://archive.today/yNupb]
* "Israeli Fighter Jets Join Saudi Arabia in War on Yemen" (2015-03-29, english.farsnews.com) [https://archive.today/SyrsH]
* "Saudi Airstrikes against Yemen Use Weapons 'Made in Israel' "(2015-04-04, english.farsnews.com) [https://archive.today/R4XwG]
---
* "The Money Trail: How the US Fostered Yemen's Separatist Movement" (2015-03-27, sputniknews.com) [https://archive.today/ZSusN]
* "Yemen and The Militarization of Strategic Waterways Securing US Control over Socotra Island and the Gulf of Aden" (2010-02-07, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/OtZ9w]
---
[http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2013/11/yemen-politics-left-reemergence.html].
In Yemen, the main "left" party is the Yemeni Socialist Party (YSP), alongside two competing Ba'athist parties known as the "Socialist Arab Resurrection Party". YSP was part of the delegation to Russia as there were serious negotiations between the YSP and Houthis to form a coalition government with a YSP leader to be named president. Those negotiations broke down, in part over the Houthis holding YSP fighters captive.
the Arab Socialist Movement
Important Statement
Issued by the Revolutionaries Youth Of The South
Aden 2 April 2015
The Southerners are resisting today the violence and brutality of the occupation of the Saleh/Houthi alliance of forces which seek to renew the 1994 war, when North Yemen forcibly occupied the South and has been there since. We condemn their shelling of our civilians.
To bring clarity to the public opinion, the Arab world and the International media, who knowingly or unknowingly are not monitoring and reporting the reality of the situation in the South. We think it is necessary to clarify these points:
- The resistance of the people of the South is to end the North Yemen occupation.
- There is no legitimacy for current president of Yemen Hadi, his fraudulent election was boycotted in the South and the Popular Resistance is for the liberation and independence of the South.
-We the South Popular Resistance who are resisting in Aden and the South, are the people of the South ,we are not Al-Qaeda ,ISIS or any similar organisation and we have no relationship with them currently or historically.
- The resistance does not take a sectarian position around Sunni -Shia issues but it is a struggle against occupation. We are non-sectarian and believe in the freedoms of all religions and sects.
- We totally reject the use of our cause and our land as a battlefield by all the involved external international power rivals.
Islamic Republic of Iran
* "Netanyahu slips, Reveals reason for Opposition to Iran Deal" (2015-04-07, juancole.com) [https://archive.today/DhIKP] [begin excerpt]:
Netanyahu let it slip in an interview on CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday: “Secondly, Iran is going to have sanctions lifted, including crippling sanctions, pretty much up front. And that’s going to have billions and billions of dollars flow into the Iranian coffers, not for schools or hospitals or roads, but to pump up Iran’s terror machine throughout the world. And it’s a military machine that’s now engaged in conquest throughout the world in Iraq and Syria and Yemen, around the borders of Israel elsewhere.”
In other words, Netanyahu wants to keep Iran poor and undeveloped. He wants to make sure that “crippling” sanctions aren’t lifted. He wants to keep Iranians in grinding poverty.
Is it true that the Iranian state would not spend the money that it garnered through a lifting of sanctions on schools or hospitals?
Look, I am no fan of the Islamic Republic or its system of government or its censorship and authoritarianism. But let us say that Netanyahu, in standing for permanent military rule over 4 million stateless Palestinians, and in launching disproportionate military campaigns with disregard for non-combatant life, is not obviously superior.
And, as far as social spending goes, Iran is in principal as progressive as Israel, though not as rich per capita. The Iranian state has built enormous numbers of schools since 1979, especially in rural areas, and [pdf] has brought literacy among the over-15 population from 65% in 1990 to 90% today. In the 15-25 age group, literacy is fully 98% and there are nearly 4 million university students. Iran has done better in educating its women than most other Middle Eastern countries, and a majority of Iranian college students is women [https://web.archive.org/web/20150319220629/http://www.uis.unesco.org/Education/Documents/UIS-literacy-statistics-1990-2015-en.pdf].
Literacy rates were low in the 1970s and relatively few Iranians went to university then. You can’t produce an impressive change in literacy that way without investing substantially in schools.
The crippling sanctions on Iran that make Netanyahu’s mouth water so much have badly hurt the 60,000 Iranian students studying abroad, making it difficult for them to transfer money and causing the value of the riyal to plummet. Those students are not politicians and ought not to have their futures held hostage to geopolitics.
As for health care, Iran has universal health care, unlike the USA, and it is mandated in the Iranian constitution. The Islamic Republic has spent substantial sums making it more available to the population, including in previously neglected rural areas. Crippling sanctions over the long term would certainly pose severe health risks to ordinary Iranians.
So it simply is not true that the Iranian state does not spend on schools and hospitals, as Netanyahu alleged. His purpose in making this false claim is to deflect an obvious critique of “crippling” sanctions, which is that they harm ordinary people, not just the state. [end excerpt]
===*===*===
Republic of Afghanistan
* "Former Blackwater gets rich as Afghan drug production hits record high; Opium poppy cultivation is up in Afghanistan despite the infamous mercenary firm formerly known as Blackwater being paid $569m by the Pentagon to stop it" (2015-30-31, theguardian.com) [https://archive.today/j4wna]
===*===*===
* "Maoists building weapons factories in India with help from China" (2012-04-26, indiatoday.intoday.in) [https://archive.today/MWjgr]
===*===*===
People's Republic of China
History & the Current Context [historyandcurrentcontext.blogspot.com/1979/10/peoples-republic-of-china.html]
* "Chinese Scientists Mull Power Station in Space" (2015-03-31, english.cas.cn) [https://archive.today/iZGbT]
---
* "Strikes proliferate in China as working class awakens" (2015-04-06, AP newswire) [https://archive.today/CZeg2]
===*===*===
Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO)
* "The New, Improved Shanghai Cooperation Organization" (2014-09-13, thediplomat.com) [https://archive.today/jZ7av]
===*===*===
Dai Nippon (Empire of Japan)
* "Japan rebuffs international outcry over new history textbooks" (2015-04-07, AFP newswire) [https://archive.today/8U7Il]
---
* "Personage of Int'l Body Calls for Stopping Suppression of Chongryon" (2015-04-07, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/ZC1pZ] [begin excerpt]: E. A. Vidyasekera, coordinating secretary of the Afro-Asian People's Solidarity Organization, issued a statement on April 2 denouncing the Japanese authorities for their brigandish suppression of the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan (Chongryon). [end excerpt]
* "Tajik Figure Accuses Japanese Authorities of Their Politically-Motivated Suppression of Chongryon" (2015-04-07, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/1Ilrn]
* "Pakistani, Bangladeshi Organizations Terms Suppression of Chongryon Human Rights Abuse" (2015-04-07, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/MOmdj]:
Pakistani and Bangladeshi organizations made public statements on March 31 and April 1 in denunciation of the Japanese authorities for their reckless suppression of the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan (Chongryon). The Pakistan Labour Federation said:
"The Japanese reactionaries have perpetrated illegal violence against Chongryon and Koreans in Japan. But it is the first time that they dared to commit such outrageous fascist tyranny against the chairman and a vice-chairman of the Chongryon Central Standing Committee who are deputies to the Supreme People's Assembly of the dignified DPRK. The Japanese reactionaries can never be allowed to commit mean acts of suppressing Chongryon and pushing the DPRK-Japan relations to a catastrophe. We strongly demand the Japanese authorities immediately stop suppression of Chongryon."
The Bangladesh-Korea Friendship and Solidarity Committee said:
"The Japanese police raided into the houses of the Chongryon officials with an armored car and many other vehicles to block them off before ransacking them, creating the terror-ridden atmosphere of fascist suppression. This is a gangster-like act that lacks legal validity. The search was an unprecedented illegal investigation in violation of Japan constitution and criminal procedure code as well as international law, and an unpardonable human rights abuse and discrimination against the Korean nationals in Japan. We bitterly condemn the Japanese authorities for their brigandish suppression of Chongryon."
* "Swiss, Austrian Organizations Accuse Japanese Authorities of Suppressing Chongryon" (2015-04-06, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/d7dHj]
* "Japanese Government Urged to Stop Crackdown on Chongryon" (2015-04-05, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/xsOzp]
* "Japanese Authorities' Suppression of Chongryon Denounced by British Organizations" (2015-04-05, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/fR3bf]
* "Japanese Authorities' Moves against DPRK and Chongryon Denounced by Ecuadorian, Nigerian Bodies" (2015-04-05, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/Dp3zd]
* "Japanese Authorities Should Make Apology to DPRK Government and Chongryon: Kyrgyz Political Party" (2015-04-05, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/gUIbW]
* "Bangladeshi Political Figure Denounces Japanese Authorities for Their Suppression of Chongryon" (2015-04-04, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/wRmqH]
* "Beninese Organizations Denounce Japanese Police Authorities' Suppression of Chongryon" (2015-04-04, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/6bm0E]
===*===*===---
* "Personage of Int'l Body Calls for Stopping Suppression of Chongryon" (2015-04-07, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/ZC1pZ] [begin excerpt]: E. A. Vidyasekera, coordinating secretary of the Afro-Asian People's Solidarity Organization, issued a statement on April 2 denouncing the Japanese authorities for their brigandish suppression of the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan (Chongryon). [end excerpt]
* "Tajik Figure Accuses Japanese Authorities of Their Politically-Motivated Suppression of Chongryon" (2015-04-07, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/1Ilrn]
* "Pakistani, Bangladeshi Organizations Terms Suppression of Chongryon Human Rights Abuse" (2015-04-07, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/MOmdj]:
Pakistani and Bangladeshi organizations made public statements on March 31 and April 1 in denunciation of the Japanese authorities for their reckless suppression of the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan (Chongryon). The Pakistan Labour Federation said:
"The Japanese reactionaries have perpetrated illegal violence against Chongryon and Koreans in Japan. But it is the first time that they dared to commit such outrageous fascist tyranny against the chairman and a vice-chairman of the Chongryon Central Standing Committee who are deputies to the Supreme People's Assembly of the dignified DPRK. The Japanese reactionaries can never be allowed to commit mean acts of suppressing Chongryon and pushing the DPRK-Japan relations to a catastrophe. We strongly demand the Japanese authorities immediately stop suppression of Chongryon."
The Bangladesh-Korea Friendship and Solidarity Committee said:
"The Japanese police raided into the houses of the Chongryon officials with an armored car and many other vehicles to block them off before ransacking them, creating the terror-ridden atmosphere of fascist suppression. This is a gangster-like act that lacks legal validity. The search was an unprecedented illegal investigation in violation of Japan constitution and criminal procedure code as well as international law, and an unpardonable human rights abuse and discrimination against the Korean nationals in Japan. We bitterly condemn the Japanese authorities for their brigandish suppression of Chongryon."
* "Swiss, Austrian Organizations Accuse Japanese Authorities of Suppressing Chongryon" (2015-04-06, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/d7dHj]
* "Japanese Government Urged to Stop Crackdown on Chongryon" (2015-04-05, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/xsOzp]
* "Japanese Authorities' Suppression of Chongryon Denounced by British Organizations" (2015-04-05, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/fR3bf]
* "Japanese Authorities' Moves against DPRK and Chongryon Denounced by Ecuadorian, Nigerian Bodies" (2015-04-05, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/Dp3zd]
* "Japanese Authorities Should Make Apology to DPRK Government and Chongryon: Kyrgyz Political Party" (2015-04-05, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/gUIbW]
* "Bangladeshi Political Figure Denounces Japanese Authorities for Their Suppression of Chongryon" (2015-04-04, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/wRmqH]
* "Beninese Organizations Denounce Japanese Police Authorities' Suppression of Chongryon" (2015-04-04, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/6bm0E]
Republic of Korea (RoK) in southern Korea
* "Corruption and Irregularities Get Endemic in S. Korean Society" (2014-04-03, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/dCtS8]: More scandals committed by abuse of power have been disclosed in south Korea, sparking off a big furor. Former chief secretary for Educational and Cultural Affairs of Chongwadae Pak Pom Hun was revealed to have embezzled funds of a local autonomous body.
In 2008 he donated funds to an art association and enabled Yangphyong County to construct an institute with an investment of 950 million won. But it was discovered that most of the plottage and premise of the institute were recently transferred to the foundation whose managing director is Pak. He is now under investigation by prosecution on charges of embezzling hundreds of millions of won of public funds.
* "S. Korean Peasants' Action for Agricultural Sovereignty and Vital Rights Supported" (2015-04-07, naenara.com.kp) [https://archive.today/LlUfS] [begin excerpt]: Actions of peasants are mounting high in south Korea to resolutely oppose the authorities' humiliating moves for acceding to the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and defend the agricultural sovereignty and vital rights. A spokesman for the Central Committee of the Union of Agricultural Workers of Korea said in a statement on April 6 in this regard: "The farmland in south Korea is turning into military bases of the US imperialists and theatres for north-targeted war drills and it is flooded with surplus farm produce of foreign countries, threatening the life of the peasants due to the puppet forces' sycophancy and act of treachery and unpopular moves to ruin agriculture." [end excerpt]
* "S. Korean Puppet Authorities Slammed for Their Fascist Suppression of Progressive Forces" (2015-04-06, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/pTdTi]
* "Rodong Sinmun Hits out at S. Korean Regime's Theory of 'Eliminating Followers of North' " (2015-04-04, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/hXncD]
===*===*===
Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) in northern Korea
Info collected by Juche-Buddhism Friendship Society, for Peace through Knowledge! [Juchebuddhism.blogspot.com]
* "University Graduates Volunteer to Work at Schools on Remote Islets and Mountain Villages" (2015-04-07, naenara.com.kp): Many university graduates across the DPRK have volunteered to work at schools in remote areas. Over the past decade more than 800 university graduates volunteered to teach children on islets in forefront areas and in remote villages in mountains. A number of university graduates volunteered to work at those schools this year, too.
* "Various Kinds of Measuring Instruments Developed" (2015-04-07, KCNA.co.jp) [https://archive.today/cNUTo]: Various kinds of measuring instruments for farming have been developed by Agricultural College of Phyongbuk University in the DPRK. Among them are meters for surveying soil acidity, water contents in crops, intensity of solar rays and soil temperature. Those measuring instruments have been applied to many co-op farms, proving highly practical not only in the field of agriculture but in the fields of forestry management and food administration.
* "Cross-linked Polyethylene (XLPE) Insulated Power Cable" (2015-04-07, naenara.com.kp):
XLPE cables used for power transmission in the electric circuits of 10, 3 and 60㎸ (AC) are now under production at the Pyongyang Electric Cable Factory 326 awarded with an ISO 9001:2008 certificate. The factory’s production items include a variety of such cables as EXPV (XLPE power cable with copper cores, XLPE insulation and PVC sheath), AIEXPV (XLPE power cable with aluminum cores, XLPE insulation and PVC sheath), EXPVSV (XLPE power cable with copper cores, XLPE insulation, PVC sheath, steel armour, and PVC sheath) and AIEXPVSV (XLPE power cable with aluminum cores, XLPE insulation, pvc sheath, steel armour, and pvc sheath), all of which enjoy great popularity among users for their high quality.
---
* "Regional Body Slams U.S. Anti-DPRK "Human Rights" Campaign" (2015-04-07, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/2K0r4]
* "World Conscience Strongly Censures Anti-DPRK "Human Rights" Racket: Syrian Paper" (2015-04-06, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/Qzdjl]
===*===*===* "University Graduates Volunteer to Work at Schools on Remote Islets and Mountain Villages" (2015-04-07, naenara.com.kp): Many university graduates across the DPRK have volunteered to work at schools in remote areas. Over the past decade more than 800 university graduates volunteered to teach children on islets in forefront areas and in remote villages in mountains. A number of university graduates volunteered to work at those schools this year, too.
* "Various Kinds of Measuring Instruments Developed" (2015-04-07, KCNA.co.jp) [https://archive.today/cNUTo]: Various kinds of measuring instruments for farming have been developed by Agricultural College of Phyongbuk University in the DPRK. Among them are meters for surveying soil acidity, water contents in crops, intensity of solar rays and soil temperature. Those measuring instruments have been applied to many co-op farms, proving highly practical not only in the field of agriculture but in the fields of forestry management and food administration.
* "Cross-linked Polyethylene (XLPE) Insulated Power Cable" (2015-04-07, naenara.com.kp):
XLPE cables used for power transmission in the electric circuits of 10, 3 and 60㎸ (AC) are now under production at the Pyongyang Electric Cable Factory 326 awarded with an ISO 9001:2008 certificate. The factory’s production items include a variety of such cables as EXPV (XLPE power cable with copper cores, XLPE insulation and PVC sheath), AIEXPV (XLPE power cable with aluminum cores, XLPE insulation and PVC sheath), EXPVSV (XLPE power cable with copper cores, XLPE insulation, PVC sheath, steel armour, and PVC sheath) and AIEXPVSV (XLPE power cable with aluminum cores, XLPE insulation, pvc sheath, steel armour, and pvc sheath), all of which enjoy great popularity among users for their high quality.
---
* "Regional Body Slams U.S. Anti-DPRK "Human Rights" Campaign" (2015-04-07, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/2K0r4]
* "World Conscience Strongly Censures Anti-DPRK "Human Rights" Racket: Syrian Paper" (2015-04-06, kcna.co.jp) [https://archive.today/Qzdjl]
Lao People's Democratic Republic (LPDR)
* "Laos as China’s pivot state for mainland ASEAN" (2015-04-03, orientalreview.org) part 1 [https://archive.today/7cnpO]
===*===*===
Republic of the Philippines
* "Change versus Continuity in the Philippines. Insurgency, “Counter-Terrorism” and the Mamapasano Incident" (2015-03-31, transcend.org) [https://archive.today/wdGT0]---
* "Int’l People’s Tribunal to try Aquino, Obama for crimes vs Filipino people" (2015-03-19, pinoyweekly.org) [https://archive.today/XWNPT]
---
* "The Destructive Impacts of Corporate Mining in the Philippines: The Tampacan Copper-Gold Mining Project in Mindanao" (2015-03-14, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/QHHHe]
===*===*===
Occupied State of West Papua ===*===*===
research from the Committee for the Study of
HISTORY AND THE CURRENT CONTEXT
* "Debt Default and Today’s Bail-Ins: Recalling the 1931 Austrian Credit Anstalt Financial Domino" (2015-03-13, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/J80yI]
---
* "Johns Hopkins Sued Over 1950s Non-Consensual STD Study; University infected Guatemalan subjects with syphilis and other venereal diseases without their consent, lawsuit charges" (2015-04-02, commondreams.org) [https://archive.today/CgrxH]
* "Sorry: US Apologizes for Syphilis and Gonorrhea Experiments on Guatemalans; US researchers infected patients with STDs without their consent in the 1940s" (2010-10-01, msnbc.msn.com) [https://archive.today/vQecO]
* "Hopkins faces $1B lawsuit over role in government study that gave subjects STDs" (2015-04-01) [https://web.archive.org/web/20150405185238/http://www.baltimoresun.com/health/bs-hs-hopkins-guatemala-lawsuit-20150401-story.html#page=1]
---
* "Former CIA director: In order to spy on domestic dissidents, just call them Terrorists" (2014-01-31, privacysos.org) [https://archive.today/wKYus] [begin excerpt]:
Betty Medsger’s new book on the Citizens’ Commission to Investigate the FBI, “The Burglary”, contains some relevant and largely suppressed history. In the wake of the Media, PA burglary and the subsequent newspaper articles exposing J. Edgar Hoover’s red squad surveillance programs, some CIA officers began to voice dissent internally about their own agency’s troubling domestic operations, codenamed MHCHAOS. In 1972, Medsger writes, CIA director Richard Helms
called his top aides together and said he was adamant that MHCHAOS would not be “stopped simply because some members of the organization [the CIA] do not like this activity.” He made changes in order to protect the program more now that the [dissident officers were] so determined to have it end. To the maximum extent possible, within the agency, the program and the agent then in charge of it, Richard Ober, would be identified with terrorism and not with American dissidents. The massive program would in fact have the same functions it always had, including the monitoring and destruction of the more than five hundred alternative newspapers staffs it had under surveillance. (At the same time, the FBI also monitored alternative and campus newspapers, sometimes suppressing them.)
Henceforth, Colby wrote in a memorandum after that meeting, the label “international terrorist” would replace “political dissident” as the target of the CIA’s illegal domestic operations. As part of this image transformation, Helms did what Hoover had done many times—and would do again in April 1971 to protect COINTELPRO when he thought it was about to be revealed—to minimize the possibility that secret operations would be exposed. Helms ended MHCHAOS in name, but continued it in reality with a new name: International Terrorism Group. It would be much easier for people, including people within the CIA, to accept the domestic operations if they thought they were aimed primarily at stopping terrorism rather than at stopping dissent.
It's common to hear law enforcement officials describe non-violent activists as terrorists today. History suggests we can thank former CIA director Richard Helms for that, at least in part. Years after his agency's assassinations, anti-dissent programs, antidemocratic coups, and other dirty tricks were exposed to the public in congressional hearings during the 1970s, Helms reportedly said that all of it was "just a congressional firestorm over nothing," Medsger writes.
[end excerpt]
---
* "Massive News-Suppression That’s Become History-Suppression" (2015-04-01, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/hQyu4]
---
* "American Historical Association Censors Ad for Book on Israel, Palestine & the US Keeping “Hidden History” Hidden" (2015-03-27, counterpunch.org) [https://archive.today/uhxLX]
* "US-Israel-Iran Triangle’s Tangled History" (2015-04-02, consortiumnews.com) [https://archive.today/uZ3M3]
* "Israel’s Secret Nuclear Biological and Chemical Weapons (NBC)" [https://archive.today/VKLtY]
* "US helped Israel with H-bomb - 1980s report declassified" (2015-02-13, rt.com) [https://archive.today/YnTum]
* "Israeli Nuclear Weapons Program: Israel’s Quest for Yellowcake – The Secret Argentine-Israeli Connection, 1963-1966" (by The National Security Archive) [https://archive.today/3l7Db]
More from the National Security Archive at George Washington University [https://archive.today/czRX]
* "How and Why the USA Has Sponsored Terrorism in the Mid East Since at Least 1948" (2014-09-05, washingtonsblog.com) [https://archive.today/mgMMe]
---
* "Americans Supported and Inspired the Nazis" (2015-03-27, washingtonsblog.com) [https://archive.today/KPULW]
---
* "The Forgotten Tradition of French Sovietism, a review of David Berry's A History of the French Anarchist Movement, 1917-1945" (2015-03-30, anarkismo.net) [https://archive.today/rjcOl]
---
* "Chinese Aid and Development in Africa During the 1960s" (2015-04-07, dissertationreviews.org) [https://archive.today/ntCbc]
---
* "Drugs, Contras, and the CIA" Peter Dale Scott [https://archive.today/GMUxz] [begin excerpt]:
[Circa 1980], the CIA was arming and advising heroin-trafficking guerrillas in Afghanistan. Its preferred leader, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, became for a period one of the leading heroin suppliers in the world.
In 1979, when the U.S. first established contact with heroin-trafficking guerrillas in Afghanistan, no heroin from the so-called Golden Crescent on the Afghan-Pakistan border was known to reach the United States. By 1984, according to the Reagan Administration, 54 percent of the heroin reaching this country came from the Afghan-Pakistan border.
[CIA officer] John Millis had served for thirteen years as a case officer supplying covert CIA aid to the heroin-trafficking guerrillas in Afghanistan…At least one of the airlines involved in the Afghan support operation, Global International Airways, was also named in connection with the [US] Iran-Contra scandal. [end excerpt]
---
* " 'Hollywood-Style” Foreign Policy: Remembering the 1983 US Military Intervention in Grenada" (2015-03-19, globalresearch.ca) [https://archive.today/2ld5A]
---
* "U.S. Nerve Gas Hit Our Own Troops in Iraq" (2015-03-27, newsweek.com) [https://archive.today/xBkoZ]
---
* "New FBI Tactic Hints at Big DC Cover-up of Saudi 9/11 Funding" (2015-04-02, whowhatwhy.org) [https://archive.today/qW1I8]
* "Why Do Good People Become Silent—or Worse—About 9/11?" (ae911truth.org):
part 1 [https://archive.today/WjQFc], part 2 [https://archive.today/kHMuv],
part 3 [https://archive.today/RSV6S], part 4 [https://archive.today/Fy2sc],
part 5 [https://archive.today/O0QVK], part 6 [https://archive.today/TYhR5],
part 7 [https://archive.today/GyawH], part 8 [https://archive.today/aNlQO],
part 9 [https://archive.today/pn8Tb], part 10 and part 11 [https://archive.today/Iawc0],
part 12 [https://archive.today/DwTO9], part 13 [https://archive.today/HBe1v],
part 14 [https://archive.today/gZMYM], part 15 [https://archive.today/gvKyr],
EDWARD BERNAYS: THE ENGINEERING OF CONSENT
Another example of citizen-battering — through the calculated manipulation of public opinion by governments, as well as by corporations — was instigated by Sigmund Freud’s Austrian-born American nephew, Edward L. Bernays. Strongly influenced by Freud, Bernays was convinced that human beings are innately driven by monstrous, irrational, inner desires and fears, which civilization is meant to restrain. As is true for many of us, Bernays was a complicated fellow who, while sincerely wanting democracy to flourish, also believed that the common citizen was, frankly, too stupid to be trusted with democracy.
His utopian vision was a democratic society in which the dangerous libidinal energies lurking just below the surface of every human could be harnessed and channeled by the corporate elite for economic benefit. The mass production of goods would fulfill the constant craving of the inherently irrational drives of the masses. This cultural dynamic would ensure ongoing mass production as well as sating the dangerous animal instincts that threatened to tear society apart.
In other words, Bernays believed that to form an orderly and prosperous society — the “American way of life” that he so valued — the masses would need to be scientifically manipulated by an elite class of citizens — by an “invisible government” who understood these dangerous forces.
According to Bernays, this manipulation would be based upon findings made in such fields as sociology, social psychology, and anthropology, and would be accomplished through covert techniques of opinion-molding, which he called the “engineering of consent.” In this strategy, advertising is employed to show the masses the self-images to which they should aspire and the products they would need to purchase in order to satisfy these self-images. Thus the science of public relations, more properly known as “propaganda,” was born, birthed in large part by Bernays and nourished and developed by corporations to sell their products, and by public relations companies to sell presidential candidates and foreign policy.5
As Bernays wrote, ("Propaganda" by Edward Bernays, Ig Publishing, 1928, pgs. 71 – 73) "[Researchers of mass psychology] established that the group has mental characteristics distinct from those of the individual, and is motivated by impulses and emotions which cannot be explained on the basis of what we know of individual psychology. So the question naturally arose: If we understand the mechanism and motives of the group mind, is it not possible to control and regiment the masses according to our will without their knowing about it? . . . . If you can influence the leaders, either with or without their conscious cooperation, you automatically influence the group which they sway."
Bernays made liberal use of these “third party authorities” to sell his clients’ cases. Among his successful propaganda campaigns: Trusted physicians pronounced bacon and eggs the best breakfast, dentists promoted fluoridation of water as safe and beneficial, and fetching young models lighting up “torches of freedom” broke the taboo against women smoking [https://archive.today/DKEif].
===*===*===
ACTION CALENDER
A list of gatherings, workshops, and educational events in the greater Bay Area region
Fukushima Response
Thursday April 9, 10:30 am - Noon
Coffee Catz, 6761 Sebastopol Ave., Sebastopol
fukushimaresponse.org
SHUT DIABLO CANYON! Fukushima Response is a regional network of concerned individuals working together to spur demands for action in response to the devastated Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in Japan. Our active monitoring program seeks to "Make the Invisible Visible", and we are organizing to close Diablo Canyon, California's last nuke. Come early and enjoy a treat to support our host.
Uplift The Youth
Thursday, April 9 at 9:00pm
At Harlows Restaurant & Night Club
2708 J St, Sacramento, California 95814
[https://www.facebook.com/events/1432419763717868/]
$10 suggested donation per ticket
Ages 21+
Doors open at 9:00 P.M.
Performances by:
MIC Jordan
TASK1ne
Zyah Belle
More artist T.B.A.
4th Annual Sogorea Te Reunion
Hello Warriors/Family and Friends,I can't believe that on April 14th it will be 4 years since we reoccupied our sacred land and stood together for 109 days in ceremony to preserve and protect this ancient site. Please come and share food and laughter. Please bring songs and memories to share. WE Have lost many warriors over the last few years, let us put down our medicine to remember their lives.
When: Saturday April 11th Noon to 4pm
What to Bring: Chairs to sit on, Food to Eat, your own utensils, cups, plates and bowls.
For those that have never been to the site, it is Glen Cove, Vallejo CA easy directions on line. I hope to see you all there. Would love to get a group picture of all the warriors on this 4th year.
Email questions to shellmoundwalk@yahoo.com
Sonoma County Taxes for Peace
Sunday April 12, 4:30pm
Friends House, 684 Benicia Dr, Santa Rosa 95409. Commons B.
We meet to educate and support around resistance to War Taxes.
Contact Ruth Paine for info: 707-576-6654.
Also see [nwtrcc.org]
Dorothy Day Working Group of Occupy Santa Rosa
Monday, April 13th, 1:00 to 3:00 p.m.
Ongoing work on the issues of homelessness and mental health in Sonoma County.
The Peace & Justice Center of Sonoma County, 467 Sebastopol Ave., Santa Rosa
Know Your Rights Forum/ Foro de Conozcer sus Derechos!
Monday, April 13 6:00pm - 8:00pm
Join the North Bay Immigrant Youth Union and VIDAS for a Know Your Rights forum.
2150 giffen ave. Santa Rosa
Andy Lopez Picket Line
Tuesday, April 14, 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.
Learn what the community is working on to create justice for Andy Lopez and improve law enforcement in Sonoma County.
Sonoma County Courthouse, 575 Administration Drive, Santa Rosa
Street Zen Vigil for Peace and Justice
Tuesday, April 14, 11:00am to 12:00pm
777 Sonoma Ave (Federal Building), Santa Rosa
Racial Justice and Resistance in the United States: a conversation with Angela Davis
Thursday, April 16 2015 @ 01:30 PM
De Anza College Visual and Performing Ar
21250 Stevens Creek Blvd
Cupertino, CA 95014
HUMAN RIGHTS, RACISM, & THE POLICE STATE
"INEQUALITY AND THE ROLE OF RESISTANCE" keynote speech by DR. ANGELA DAVIS, UC SANTA CRUZ
Thursday, April 16 2015 @ 6:30 PM
At the Morris Dailey Auditorium, San Jose State University, 1 Washington Sq, San Jose, CA 95192
suggested donation $5-10 at the door, visit [humanrightssjsu.eventbrite.com] for your ticket!
For more information see [http://www.sjsu.edu/mosaic]
SPONSORED BY: SJSU Department of Justice Studies, SJSU Department of African American Studies, SJSU Associated Students Partial funding provided by SJSU Fund, Chican@/Latin@ and African American Student Success Task Force
April 27-28, Join KATHY KELLY and others at
Occupy Beale, Direct Action
Let's make this the largest Anti-Drone Action at Beale AFB yet,
And give KATHY KELLY a big welcome to freedom after 3 mos of prison time!
Anti-Drone Vigils at Beale with Kathy Kelly and Brian Terrell
Monday, April 27, 3 to 5 p.m. at Beale’s Wheatland Gate
Tuesday, April 28, 6 to 8 a.m. at the Main Gate, with nonviolent direct action planned
Peace activists Kathy Kelly and Brian Terrell will join anti-drone activists at Beale Air Force Base on Monday afternoon, April 27 and Tuesday morning, April 28, to demonstrate opposition to the U.S. drone warfare program. Nonviolent direct action is planned for Tuesday morning.
Beale, near Marysville, California, is home of the Global Hawk Drone, a surveillance drone that assists in finding targets for Predator and Reaper weaponized drones. Kathy Kelly was arrested last year at Beale Air Force Base with twelve others at a Good Friday anti-drone action. The charges were subsequently dismissed.
Kathy Kelly and Brian Terrell are co-coordinators of Voices of Creative Nonviolence.
Kathy Kelly [https://archive.today/BiuBt], an internationally recognized peace activist, is currently serving a three-month prison term in Lexington, Kentucky, for crossing onto Whiteman Air Force Base property with another demonstrator while attempting to deliver a loaf of bread and a letter to the base commander, asking him to stop his troops from piloting lethal drone flights over Afghanistan from within the base.
Brian Terrell, a Catholic Worker and lifelong peace activist from Maloy, Iowa, has been arrested for anti-drone protests in Nevada and New York. He was one of the “Creech 14,” arrested in 2009 at Creech Air Force Base in Nevada in the first anti-drone action in the United States. In 2012-2013, Brian Terrell served a six-month sentence in federal prison for another anti-drone action [https://archive.today/ITQKG].
The theme of the April demonstrations will be “Taxes for human need, not for war.” (For directions, see below.)
The Monday afternoon vigil will be at the Wheatland Gate from 3 to 5 p.m. Following the vigil on Monday at the Wheatland Gate, we will drive to the Main Gate and set up a table and chairs for a potluck. Bring folding chairs or a blanket and some simple food to share. Mosquito repellent comes in handy, as do flashlights if you stay late. Some people will camp there or stay overnight in Marysville.
The Tuesday morning vigil will be from 6 to 8 a.m. at the Main Gate, with nonviolent direct action planned. Come to take this action in solidarity with others or stand in support.
This is a drug-free and alcohol-free action. Occupy Beale actions are strictly nonviolent. We come in the spirit of peace and good will, with respect to all.
(Yuba College is about five minutes down North Beale Road away from the Main Gate. There are bathrooms at the side entrance of the administration and there is a cafeteria also.)
These events are being organized by Occupy Beale Air Force Base [http://occupybealeafb.org/]. For more information, contact us at occupybeale@earth-justice.org. To keep current with demonstrations at Beale, check out the Occupy Beale Air Force Base Facebook Page [https://www.facebook.com/OccupyBealeAirForceBase].
May Day #Shutitdown Assembly fliers to print and hand out! [https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B9X_Db1CAHmyfmJQZHBDQ3pvNk1jSGpLTFVORWtXYVRQcXo3VVpNRVFpU1Jja1p3NkVfajg&usp=sharing]
Facebook Event - May Day #ShutItDown - Action Planning Assemblies!
[https://www.facebook.com/events/968418563198866/]
May 1st Facebook Event: [https://www.facebook.com/events/740295562752699/]
TO ENDORSE PLEASE EMAIL: MAYDAYSHUTITDOWN@RISEUP.NET
OCCUPY THE JUDICIARY
Friday, May 1, at 9:00am in EDT
Court Houses - State Capitals across America and Washington DC
On Law Day, Friday, May 1, 2015
[www.facebook.com/events/1718411085051453/]
Please invite all your friends and Please Help make this an Event that makes CHANGE - Hold the Judicial, Elected Officials, Government accountable - I can be e-mailed at [proseamerica@gmail.com] [ProSeAmerica.net] [www.ProSeAmerica.Blogspot.com]
THE GOAL IS TO BRING ATTENTION TO THE CORRUPTION OF THE JUDICIAL, GOVERNMENT AND ELECTED OFFICIALS - and the lack of accountability or a place to go for help when you find yourself in this Slippery Slope of HELL!!! The Judicial / Government / Elected Officials can not POLICE Themselves and Judaical Immunity has to end. Judge's have taken the position they are GOD. America needs to take back there Courts and in doing so will take back the Constitution of America and there personal Rights of Due Process - this is the Start and we need to work together - not as a splintered group. Which happens way to often - We need to join hands across America on May 1, 2015 and every year after to remind the Courts - Government - Elected officials we are watching - and holding them accountable!
The Bay Area Solidarity Committee For Jalil Muntaqim presents...
Re-Building 2 Win: Transforming the "Black criminal mentality into a Revolutionary mentality" (George Jackson)
Hosted by Mtumishi Wa-Watu and Yusef Bunchy Shakur [www.yusefshakur.org]
Saturday, May 2 at 6:00pm
At the Qilombo, 2313 San Pablo Ave, Oakland, California 94612
Event page [facebook.com/events/415889841906877]
An important gathering for Liberation, including:
* film screening of “Detroit’s Native Son” [youtube.com/watch?v=tphaRNcaqU8], hosted by Brother Yusef who is speaking on “Restoring the Neighbor back to the Hood”
* guest speakers relating to Prison Abolition Work and Freeing Political Prisoners, including updates on the case of Political Prisoner Jalil Muntaqim.
* Political Hip Hop Show from local community artists.
* Tables and vendors relevant to Prison Abolition work and Black Community empowerment
* Food will be served with Halal and Veggie options
If you would like more info on attending, participating, and/or supporting this event please contact Shango [shangoabiola@) gmail.com] [510-731-9083].
The struggle to end the Prison Industrial Slave Complex (P.I.S.C.) is a fight that must be waged on many levels. We must work to end what Political Prisoner Jalil Muntaqim calls “The Criminalization of Poverty”, the labeling of certain people(s) as “criminals”. The u.s. corporate media and white supremacist educational system purposefully projects self-hatred into the minds of Black Youth to produce Human bodies into Prison Commodities for Profits. This multi billion-dollar psychological warfare tactic, on top of the sub-human conditions Black People are forced to live in, produces and intensifies Black People’s attitude of inferiority and self-hatred. This in turn pushes us to live out the self-destructive images being fed to us. One of the ways we can combat this propaganda is by doing what George Jackson calls “Transforming the Black criminal mentality into a Revolutionary mentality.”
Brother Yusef Bunchy Shakur is a brother who has went through such a transformation into a well-known Human Rights activist and community organizer. Coming from Zone 8 in Detroit, Michigan Yusef, like many Black Youth in this country, was on a path for self-destruction. Yusef participated and became well versed in illegitimate capitalism (The street life), until being sent to prison for 9 years. While incarcerated Yusef met and was rehabilitated by his Father. After being re-educated with knowledge of self while in prison, brother Yusef has dedicated his life to re-building the community he once helped destroy. He is living proof that that it’s never to late to make a change and make a difference.
“By any measure, author, educator, entrepreneur and social activist, Yusef Bunchy Shakur’s life is an epic story of transformation, redemption and hope. Born to teenage parents, raised by an alcoholic mother and nurtured by the streets, Shakur co-founded the notorious Detroit “Zone 8” street gang. At age 19, he was sentenced to 5 to 15 years in prison for a crime he did not commit. During his nine-year imprisonment he met his father for the first time. The relationship with his father became the driving force of Shakur’s metamorphosis from a thug to a redeemed human and community leader.
In the fourteen years since being released from prison, Shakur has emerged as a respected activist, community organizer and entrepreneur focused on “Restoring the Neighbor Back to the Hood.” In 2009, he opened the Urban Network, which operated as a bookstore and community center providing literacy classes, digital training and a platform for local and national speakers and authors
In 2008, Shakur self-published the critically acclaimed memoir, ‘The Window 2 My Soul,’ and the accompanying curriculum guide in 2010. Shakur has answers for the disengaged and disenfranchised and shares his message of hope, redemption, transformation and triumph at conferences, community gatherings, churches, and top colleges and universities. His work has been used in universities throughout the country including the University of Michigan, Michigan State University, and Merritt College. Since 2010 Shakur has published, ‘My Soul Looks Back,’ the sequel to his first memoir; ‘Scribes of Redemption’ a collection of letters and lessons from his father and in 2014, ‘Redemptive Soul: The Yusef Bunchy Shakur Reader.” –Taken from [www.yusefshakur.org].
ALL POWER TO THE PEOPLE !
UWEZO WOTE WA WATU!
===*===*===
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