Arms trade trafficking war — East-West-Libya lessons?

Re-reporting, editing, comment by Carolyn Bennett

The international community must examine the role of arms supplies to Libya in the present conflict. They must critically evaluate arms supply policies toward Libya and assess (a) how those policies risk emboldening authoritarian regimes and (b) how commercial and national interests may blind governments to the repercussions involved in arms trade. — Pieter D. Wezeman —

Is it reasonable to suggest that nations and leaders in this century with memory of war are ignorant of the consequences of and their complicity in trading arms that traffic war? Do these nations and leaders care about, are they seriously inclined to “learn lessons?” This notion of “lesson learning” writers often raise in the midst of or soon after the latest disaster serially brought by heads of state and factions on their countries, their people and the world.

If nations and leaders were concerned with the consequences of their actions, (a) would they be using the public purse to fund and simultaneously take funds (kickbacks, campaign contributions, perks) from industries of violence; and (b) would citizens of the world continue cuddling corrupt and compromised power in office, in military, in monarchy?

Stockholm International Peace  (SIPRI) researcher Pieter D. Wezeman holds out hope that as we look at the war in Libya and the complicity of now-outraged nations “lessons in controlling the arms trade” might be learned.  His thoughts provide insight and education potential. Here is an edited version of some of his essay.  

Nations once supporting Colonel Muammar [Qaddafi]’s regime are now (under cover of a UN sanction) conducting military air strikes against Libyan forces. These nations, Wezeman writes, “are attacking the forces they were marketing and delivering arms to only weeks before.…

“As the violence escalates and the international community examines how to respond to internal conflict and human rights violations, arms supply should be analyzed as it implicates the international community as complicit in the violence it is now trying to end.” 

Circularity — 
Arms traders perpetuating violence they then arm to put down

Ending global violence, impossible by design

Libya announced that it had ended its nuclear, biological and chemical weapon programs and agreed to compensate the families of those who died in Libyan acts of terrorism, Wezeman writes. Then in 2003 and 2004, the UN and European Union (EU) lifted sanctions on Libya, including arms embargoes.  

“Owing to its oil resources, its geographical position as a buffer against unwanted migration from Africa to Europe and its potential role in fighting al-Qaeda related groups, Libya’s return to the international community was welcomed”; [and] “part of the process of inclusion was acceptance of Libya as a buyer of arms” — implicating “supplier countries in [Libya’s] sustained oppressive military rule.

“Libya was expected to spend billions of dollars to modernize parts of its large arsenal of outdated arms … [and] many companies eagerly competed to supply arms to the wealthy state.”

The Libdex 2010 arms fair [November 2010) in Tripoli reportedly attracted 100 companies from at least 24 countries — sales efforts often politically supported. “Leaders of France, Italy, Russia and the United Kingdom visited Libya accompanied by representatives of arms companies. Competing with several EU countries, Russia labored to sell combat aircraft and advanced S-300 long-range air defense systems, and clinched deals for the overhaul of tanks and fast attack craft.” More than half of the exhibitors at Libdex 2010 were from the United Kingdom.

Several EU states (despite EU embargoes and arms supply restrictions having been imposed following human rights abuses in places such as China, Myanmar and Zimbabwe) have until now seemingly overlooked [Qaddafi]’s 41-year track record as an authoritarian and unpredictable ruler with a well-documented lack of respect for human rights, Wezeman reports.

Weapons proliferating - Prolonging violence

Leaking to conflicts, armed groups beyond Libya

Italy, now a main base for operations against Libya, had previously cornered the Libyan market for advanced border security and surveillance equipment. In 2009, an Italian company supplied about 10,000 handguns.

France's president Nicolas Sarkozy’s decision denouncing the Libyan regime and calling for military action reverses his enthusiastic support for arms sales and “came immediately after the return from Libya of the last French engineers who had been working on military contracts with Libya.”

French [Dassault] Rafale combat aircraft, which France had been eagerly trying to sell to Libya, have now bombed Libyan howitzers an Italian company had planned to refurbish under a 2010 contract.

The UK marketed advanced Jernas short-range air defense systems and supplied an advanced communication system for Libyan T-72 tanks — now being targeted by UK combat aircraft.

Though it blocked an export of 130,000 Kalashnikov rifles because of the risk of diversion to Darfur, the UK allowed the marketing of sniper rifles to Libya.

Ukraine in 2007–2008 supplied more than 100,000 rifles to Libya.

Russia reportedly signed a major contract for small arms in 2010 and probably also delivered several compact Igla-S advanced anti-aircraft missiles.

Belgium authorities allowed the supply of a small batch of high-tech rifles, arguing that the weapons were intended for use by Libyan troops protecting humanitarian aid convoys to Darfur. 

The international community “soon after the First Persian Gulf War reviewed their arms trade policies, realizing that supplying arms to Iraq may have strengthened Saddam Hussein’s belief that he could invade Kuwait without punishment,” Pieter Wezeman concludes. In similar measures, the international community “must examine the role of arms supplies to Libya in the present conflict.”

Sources and notes

“Mar. 11: Libya: lessons in controlling the arms trade” (Pieter D. Wezeman), http://www.sipri.org/media/newsletter/essay/march11

http://www.sipri.org/newsletter/march11

Pieter D. Wezeman (Netherlands) is a Senior Researcher with the SIPRI (Stockholm International Peace Research Institute) Arms Transfers Program. His area of research is the global proliferation of conventional arms with special focus on arms procurement in and arms transfers to Africa and the Middle East.

Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), established in 1966, is an independent international institute, a global think tank, dedicated to research into conflict, armaments, arms control and disarmament. SIPRI provides data, analysis and recommendations, based on open sources, to policymakers, researchers, media and the interested public.

SIPRI maintains contacts with other research centers and individual researchers throughout the world and cooperates closely with several intergovernmental organizations, notably the United Nations and the European Union, and regularly receives parliamentary, scientific and government delegations as well as visiting researchers.

Located in Stockholm, Sweden, SIPRI was established on the basis of a decision by the Swedish Parliament and receives a substantial part of its funding in the form of an annual grant from the Swedish Government. The Institute also seeks financial support from other organizations in order to carry out its broad research program, http://www.sipri.org/about

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Bennett's books available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY]; Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]; LONGS’ Cards and Books: http://longscardsandbooks.com/ [Penn Yan, NY]

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Four weeks to recall of Chernobyl [4/25-26/1986] —

U.S. president pushes nuclear power

Re-reporting, editing by Carolyn Bennett


Nuclear power creates massive quantities of radioactive waste. There is no way to put it on earth that’s safe. As it leaks into the water over time, it bio-concentrates in the food chains; in the breast milk; in fetuses, that are thousands of times more radiosensitive than are adults. One x-ray to the pregnant abdomen doubles the incidence of leukemia in the child. Over time, nuclear waste will induce epidemics of cancer, leukemia and genetic disease, and random compulsory genetic engineering. Moreover, we are not the only species with genes, of course: it is plants and animals. This is an absolute catastrophe, the likes of which the world has never seen before. —  Dr. Helen Caldicott —

HELEN CALDICOTT still calls nuclear technology “madness,” “an obscene technology.”  She appeared today in debate on the Democracy Now program. This is some of what she said.

“A new report from the New York Academy of Sciences has just translated 5,000 papers from Russian into English. … Up to a million people have already died from Chernobyl, and people will continue to die from cancer for virtually the rest of time.

“What we should know is that a millionth of a gram of plutonium, or less, can induce cancer, or will induce cancer. Each reactor has 250 kilos, or 500 pounds, of plutonium in it. … There’s enough plutonium in these reactors to kill everyone on earth.”

Nuclear

“…If you inhale a millionth of a gram of plutonium, the surrounding cells receive a very, very high dose. Most die within that area, because it’s an alpha emitter. The cells on the periphery remain viable. They mutate, and the regulatory genes are damaged. Years later, that person develops cancer. Now, that’s true for radioactive iodine, that goes to the thyroid; cesium-137, that goes to the brain and muscles; strontium-90 goes to bone, causing bone cancer and leukemia.… “

Coal

“Coal is a deadly substance and we must stop burning it. We must also not go from the global warming frying pan into the nuclear fire. … This is an obscene technology. Seaborg, who discovered plutonium, said it’s the most dangerous substance on earth. Each reactor has 500 pounds of plutonium, lasts for half-a-million years, causing cancer after cancer.”

Renewables

“…There’s enough renewable technology now, right now, which is relatively cheap, to supply the whole of the U.S.’s needs by 2040 without any carbon and any nuclear. We just need to have the politicians to get out of the pockets of the nuclear companies, the coal companies, the oil companies, and start funding renewable energy. Why isn’t there a solar panel on every single house in America, solar hot water systems, windmills everywhere? You know it would increase the GDP and employ hundreds of thousands of people throughout the world. This is the way to go — it’s the prescription for survival.”

Fukushima Daiichi-Chernobyl blow back, propaganda campaign  

On March 25, Dr. Caldicott wrote, “As I write this from Ottawa, two weeks since the earthquake and tsunami and the calamity that has befallen the Fukushima Nuclear Plant No 1, the situation has grown increasingly grave.…

“What we have also seen is a second tsunami of a different kind — a tidal wave of blow-back from the nuclear industry around the world, which has been rocked back on its heels by Fukushima but is now regrouping. There are claims that radiation is good for you; that nuclear power is still the only answer to global warming; and that fears about the safety of nuclear power are unwarranted and panic-stricken.

“…  There are billions and billions of dollars at stake for the nuclear industry, which has … managed to bamboozle governments around the world, much of the press, and many ordinary citizens into believing that nuclear power is green and clean. Nothing could be further from the truth. [However], the industry will not walk away from that money without a fight.”

Sources and notes

“‘Prescription for Survival’:  A Debate on the Future of Nuclear Energy between Anti-Coal Advocate George Monbiot and Anti-Nuclear Activist Dr. Helen Caldicott,” March 30, 2011, http://www.democracynow.org/2011/3/30/prescription_for_survival_a_debate_on

“A Medical Problem of Vast Dimensions,” posted March 26, 2011, http://www.helencaldicott.com/

HELEN CALDICOTT

Helen Caldicott, MD, physician, author, speaker

Medical and Nuclear Education/Public Advocacy United States

Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR): Founder and President, 1978-1983; President Emeritus, 1983-Present

Women’s Action for Nuclear Disarmament (WAND): Founder, 1980

Nuclear Freeze Voter Initiative Campaign: Co-Leader, 1980

STAR (Standing For Truth About Radiation) Foundation: Co-Founder, 1997; President, 1999-2000

Nuclear Policy Research Institute: President, 2001- Current

Australia and New Zealand: Initiated movement against French atmospheric tests, 1971-72

Led education campaign among Australian labor unions about medical and military dangers or uranium mining, 1975-1976

Led public New Zealand education campaign, with Dr. William Caldicott, resulting in the official New Zealand nuclear-free policy, 1982

Founded Green Labor, a new section within Australian Labor Party, 1988

Ran as Independent Candidate for Australian Federal Parliament, 1990

Founding Patron, Parents Protecting Our Children Against Radiation, Lucas Heights, NSW, 1998

Founder, Our Common Future Party (OCF), Australia 2000

http://www.helencaldicott.com/about/cv/

Glenn Theodore Seaborg (b. 1912 Ishpeming, Michigan, U.S.; d. 1999, Lafayette, California) — American nuclear chemist best known for work on isolating and identifying elements heavier than uranium. With coworkers, Seaborg added (1940–55) 10 new elements that encompass atomic numbers 94–102 and 106, of which plutonium (94) is the best known because of its use as a nuclear explosive and for nuclear power.  Seaborg was chair of the Atomic Energy Commission (1961-1971); the American nuclear-power industry developed rapidly during that time. [Seaborg, Glenn T.  (2008). Encyclopædia Britannica. Deluxe Edition.  Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica]

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Bennett's books available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY]; Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]; LONGS’ Cards and Books: http://longscardsandbooks.com/ [Penn Yan, NY]
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Time to pony up — Uncut UK, USA

Re-reporting, editing by Carolyn Bennett

Make profit-makers pay taxes

NOTES FROM U.S. UNCUT AND UK UNCUT

If you have a dollar ($1) in your pocket, then you have more than ExxonMobil, General Electric, & Bank of America combined paid last year in taxes.

Big U.S. corporations dodge up to $100 billion in taxes every year. This amounts to $1 trillion every decade that does not invest in the future of the United States of America.

Because of overseas tax havens and other tax loopholes, U.S. corporations are making profits in America but are barely paying taxes in America.

There is a direct connection between corporate tax cheats and what is happening to real people’s lives. If we close those loopholes, we will not have to cut back on firefighters, library hours, student loans, and valuable public services.

STOP Corporate Tax Dodging

U.S. Uncut’s current corporate targets

(Targets = Corporate Tax Cheats) —

Bank of America (primary target)

Verizon

FedEx

Sources and notes

U.S. Uncut says —

U.S. Uncut is a new movement inspired by UK Uncut, the anti-austerity movement that has swept the UK. 


U.S. Uncut is a grassroots movement taking direct action against corporate tax cheats and unnecessary and unfair public service cuts across the United States.

Washington’s proposed budget for the coming year sends a clear message: The wrath of budget cuts will fall upon the shoulders of hard-working Americans. This is unacceptable.

The Obama administration seeks to trim $1.1 trillion from the budget in the next ten years by cutting or eliminating more than 200 federal programs — many of them dedicated to social services and education. This budget, for example, slashes half of funding subsidizing heating for low-income Americans. It limits expansion of the Pell grant program for students. It decreases by more than 12 percent the funding for the Environmental Protection Agency.

Even more brutal spending cuts are being pushed by the new majority in the U.S. House of Representatives: At a time when America is most in need, they have made clear their intent to raid funds for Social Security, Medicare, education; to kill health care reform; and to gut investments needed to fund infrastructure, climate change, job creation. These cuts will come on top of the very painful austerity measures individual U.S. states have taken since the recession began — cuts worth hundreds of billions.

Washington clearly has abandoned ordinary Americans and there is an alternative — 

Make corporate tax avoiders pay.

Nearly two-thirds of U.S. corporations pay no income taxes — even while enjoying record profits and taxpayer-funded bailouts, as the economy slowly recovers from a financial crisis.

Eighty-three (83) of the top 100 publicly traded corporations operating in the United States, according to the non-partisan Government Accountability Office, exploit corporate tax havens.

Since 2009, America’s most profitable companies such as ExxonMobil, General Electric, Bank of America and Citigroup all paid a grand total of ZERO ($0) in federal income taxes to Uncle Sam.

Tax havens alone account for up to $1 trillion in tax revenue lost every decade — money that could be invested in K-12 education, colleges, public health, job creation and hundreds of other worthy public programs.

If we pay our taxes, why don’t they? Should not corporations who profit here pay here?

It is time for ordinary Americans to fight back — demand an end to the corporate tax avoidance. Join U.S. Uncut and together let’s make corporate tax avoiders pay.

http://www.usuncut.org/targets and http://www.usuncut.org/about

UK Uncut says —

Under the banner of UK Uncut, people from around the country have transformed banks and tax-dodging stores into schools, leisure centers and libraries to show that it’s society that’s too big to fail, not our broken banking system.

It was the greed and recklessness of the banks that caused the economic crisis, yet the government is making ordinary people pay the price in the form of unprecedented cuts to public services.

There are alternatives to the cuts, for example, making the banks pay for a crisis they created and stopping tax dodging by corporations and the rich. Instead, the government has chosen to cut vital public services. http://www.ukuncut.org.uk/

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Bennett's books available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY]; Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]; LONGS’ Cards and Books: http://longscardsandbooks.com/ [Penn Yan, NY]

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“American values” wanted by others

Compiled and edited by Carolyn Bennett

In travels and speeches across North America, Malalai Joya talks about “the blind bombardment and occupation by U.S.A.-NATO forces of [her] country.


She says she exposes “to justice-loving great people of the U.S. the wrong policy of the U.S. government” and informs them of “the wrongdoing of their government [engaged in] “killing innocent people under the name of the so-called war on terror.”


Afghan MP and human rights activist Malalai Joya appearing today on the Democracy Now program said, “I tell justice-loving people of the U.S. that their taxpayer money— billions of dollars that their government pays—goes into pockets of warlords, drug lords and criminals…”

U.S. Foreign Relations Path and Pathos

“They launched 110 Tomahawk missiles … there are charred bodies all over the place now. This is not to prevent a temporary humanitarian disaster. This is really about regime change and siding with one side. I don’t trust the motivations of the United States” — Michael Mandel (professor of law, York University, Toronto, Ontario, Canada) on U.S. airstrikes in Libya at “NATO Mission in Libya: Humanitarian Intervention or ‘Regime Change?’ March 23, 2011, http://btlonline.org/2011/110401-btl.html

U.S.’s AFGHANISTAN

Twenty-two year old U.S. soldier Jeremy Morlock stands accused of “killing innocent civilians out of pure bloodlust,” Spiegel reports over this past weekend. The soldier is one of a group of five soldiers in the 5th Stryker Brigade around Kandahar who committed the crimes between January and May 2010. They reportedly “used guns and grenades to make it appear they were under attack in order to justify killing civilians. They then took photos of themselves grinning while standing over their victims as if posing with hunting trophies.”


They took “gruesome mementos including bones and severed fingers. SPIEGEL has obtained a significant number of photos and videos taken by the troops.”

Additionally these U.S. soldiers stand accused of “taking drugs while on duty and beating up a fellow soldier who complained to superior officers.” 

MARCH 26 

The attack occurred on Friday.  A number of civilians died and suffered wounds when NATO conducted an air raid targeting two vehicles that coalition forces believed to be carrying Taliban fighters. The attack happened in southern Afghanistan, the Naw Zad district of Helmand province.

Civilian casualties in military operations in Afghanistan are rampant. Earlier in the month, Al Jazeera reports, “nine civilians Afghan officials said were children collecting firewood” died in a NATO air raid in eastern Kunar province, near the Afghanistan-Pakistan border.

In 2010 in Afghanistan an estimated 2,777 civilians have died in the fighting of foreign and internal combatants, according to the most recent UN report.

MARCH 28 

Engineers, construction workers, security guards were among the dead following an explosion at a construction company in an eastern province on the border with Pakistan. Twenty people are estimated to have died and 50 suffered wounds Sunday in the Bermel district of Paktika province.

Civilian deaths continue rising as people are “caught up in the violence that has blighted Afghanistan since a US-led invasion in 2001 ousted the Taliban, triggering an insurgency whose intensity has increased in recent years.”

U.S.’s PAKISTAN

PAKISTANIS WON’T FORGET MERCENARY-CIA-U.S. GOVERNMENT OPERATIVE RAYMOND DAVIS

“Money talks,” Chris Arsenault posts at Al Jazeera, but the footprint of Raymond Davis “will last, as anti-American protests spread across Pakistan, with people demanding more accountability from foreign forces operating on Pakistani territory.”

Notwithstanding denials by the U.S. State Department, blood money of $2.3 million, much greater than what the U.S. usually pays family members when U.S. forces kill innocents in Iraq or Afghanistan, journalists Jeremy Scahill said, illustrates the importance of this case of mercenary-CIA-US involvement in cold-blooded murder. And the whole truth may never come to light.

U.S.’s LIBYA

COMPOUNDING REFUGEES CAUGHT IN DERANGED FOREIGN INVASION

The first wave of a massive migration arrived Saturday on the tiny Italian island of Lampedusa. These people had already been displaced by conflict, ended up in Libya and were in limbo, shuttled about by Europe and North Africa.

The European Voice reports local authorities saying an estimated “2,000 African migrants fleeing violence in Libya” arrived this weekend on Lampedusa. Italy’s interior minister said last week that the government expected as many as 50,000 refugees from Libya.

Before the weekend’s refugees, Lampedusa had already received an estimated “5,000 Tunisians, part of a wave of nearly 20,000 who have arrived since mid-January.” However, “unlike most of the Tunisians who have made it to Italy, the Africans from Libya are thought to be refugees from persecution in Eritrea, Ethiopia and Sudan. …

“Under a bilateral 2009 deal with Libya, Italy deported Africans intercepted at sea to Libya without checking their protection needs. It is unclear whether the arrivals this weekend include such cases. Aid agencies had been warning since 2009 that the refugees lived in perilous conditions in Libya. Black Africans have been attacked by Libyan insurgents on suspicion of being mercenaries.”

U.S.'s BAHRAIN

Two hundred and fifty (250) people reportedly have been detained in this home of the U.S. fifth fleet. Forty-four (44) are reported missing since the government’s security crackdown on protests. The crackdown banned all public gatherings and spread masked security forces across the city to operate checkpoints.

In separate incidents reported today, “military prosecutors banned media from reporting about suspects and cases linked to the martial law.” Bahrain’s 60 percent Shiites are calling for a constitutional monarchy.

U.S.'s KUWAIT

Pirates have hijacked a Kuwaiti oil tanker, the MV Zirku, en route from Sudan to Singapore. The pirates were reportedly in two skiffs armed with rocket-propelled grenades and guns. 


Among the 29-member crew were 17 Pakistanis as well as Egyptians, Jordanians, Ukrainians, an Indian, a Filipino, an Iraqi and a Croatian. Kuwait’s state oil company, the Kuwait Petroleum Corporation, denies the hijacking.

U.S.’s SAUDI

Three Idaho members of the United States House and Senate who had opposed the building of an Islamic cultural center two blocks from the fallen World Trade Center “have come out in favor of hosting hundreds of Saudi military personnel and their families at a U.S. air force base in Idaho.”  

At the U.S. site, the Saudis “will be trained by U.S. air force personnel to fly advanced fighter aircraft and learn the fundamentals of aerial combat.”

U.S.’s YEMEN

More than 100 people died Sunday and scores suffered wounds, among them women and children, many burned bodies unrecognizable, after a munitions factory they had entered exploded and ignited raging fires. The dead will be buried in mass graves. The incident happened in the southern Yemeni town of Jaar, a site of pro and anti government forces.

The government of President Ali Abdullah Saleh (U.S. allied), Reuters reports, has been “alternately conciliatory and defiant, [vowing] in public to make no more concessions to opponents who are demanding he step down after 32 years of authoritarian rule.”

U.S.’s ISRAEL

Primitive rockets — often fired by groups including Hamas, which controls Gaza— have evaded Israel’s high-tech weaponry, in part because their short flight path, just a few seconds, makes them hard to track.

Now Israel is reported to have “deployed a cutting-edge rocket defiance system" — the Iron Dome system just north of Beersheba, a southern city twice hit by rockets during this month’s flare-up of cross-border violence— to try to halt a recent surge in attacks from the neighboring Gaza Strip.

The Iron Dome, which uses sophisticated cameras and radar to track incoming rockets, determine where they will land, and intercept and destroy them far from their targets, was approved in 2007 by Israel’s government.

U.S.-led

WAR DEAD

Casualty sites reporting March 28, 2011

(accurate totals unknown)

Anti-war dot com Casualties in Iraq since March 19, 2003

[U.S. war dead since the Obama inauguration January 20,

2009: 213] Information out of date

•

Wounded 32,992-100,000

U.S. veterans with brain injuries 320,000

Suicides estimated: 18 a day

Latest update on this site: January 26, 2011

http://www.antiwar.com/casualties/

•

Iraq Body Count

The worldwide update on civilians killed in the Iraq war and occupation

Documented civilian deaths from violence

100,149 – 109,422

http://www.iraqbodycount.org/

•

ICasualties figures:

AFGHANISTAN: 1514 U.S.; 2381 coalition

IRAQ: 4441 U.S.; 4759 Coalition

http://icasualties.org/oif

Sources and notes

MALALAI JOYA in interview, March 28, 2011,

http://www.democracynow.org/2011/3/28/obama_administration_relents_and_grants_visa

“Murder in Afghanistan— Court Sentences ‘Kill Team’ Soldier to 24 Years in Prison: An American soldier has been sentenced to 24 years in prison by a military tribunal after pleading guilty to murdering innocent civilians in Afghanistan. Jeremy Morlock admitted to being part of a gruesome ‘kill team,’ and is testifying against his fellow soldiers as part of a plea bargain.” March 24, 2011, http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,752918,00.html

“NATO air raid kills Afghan civilians — Coalition pledges investigation after attack targeting two vehicles leaves several people dead and wounded,” March 26, 2011, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2011/03/2011326123719286979.html#

“Deaths in Afghan suicide blast — At least 20 people killed and some 50 wounded after attack in country's eastern Paktika province.” March 28, 2011, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2011/03/20113285349638581.html#

“Spy game: The CIA, Pakistan and ‘blood money’— CIA contractor and former Blackwater employee Raymond Davis flees Pakistan after killing two men” (Chris Arsenault), March 17, 2011, http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/features/2011/03/2011317131348571552.html#

“Libya refugees arrive in Lampedusa (Toby Vogel, European Voice), March 28, 2011, http://www.europeanvoice.com/article/2011/march/libya-refugees-arrive-in-lampedusa/70669.aspx

“Bahrain opposition says 250 detained, 44 missing” (Erika Solomon | Reuters).March 28, 2011, http://sg.news.yahoo.com/bahrain-opposition-says-250-detained-44-missing-20110328-113201-475.html

“Kuwaiti oil tanker ‘hijacked’ in Gulf of Aden — EU naval force says MV Zirku and 29 crew were seized off coast of Oman, but Kuwaiti oil company denies the claim,” March 28, 2011, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2011/03/2011328173342841503.html#

“A plan to train Saudi air force pilots in Idaho is turning former allies into bitter enemies” (Nick Turse), March 19, 2011, http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/features/2011/03/2011316131230188238.html#

“Yemen handover talks stall but deal ‘within reach’” (Cynthia Johnston and Mohammed Ghobari, Reuters), March 28, 2011, http://ca.reuters.com/article/topNews/idCATRE72R1UJ20110328
 “Israel deploys ‘Iron Dome’ rocket shield — Long-anticipated rocket defense system deployed early in bid to counter recent surge in attacks from Gaza Strip,” March 27, 2011, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2011/03/201132718224159699.html#

Lampedusa Island

In the Mediterranean Sea between Malta and Tunis, 105 miles (170 km) southwest of Licata, Sicily,  Lampedusa Island — (Italian  Isola di Lampedusa,  Latin  Lopadussa largest island)  — is 8 square miles or 21 square kilometers of the Isole (islands) Pelagie (which include Linosa and Lampione islets)

Administratively the group is part of Agrigento province, Sicily, Italy. Lampedusa’s greatest length is about 7 miles (11 km), its greatest width about 2 miles; it rises to 436 feet (133 meters) above sea level [Lampedusa Island.  (2008). Encyclopædia Britannica. Deluxe Edition.  Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica].

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Bennett's books available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY]; Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]; LONGS’ Cards and Books: http://longscardsandbooks.com/ [Penn Yan, NY]

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Why not Bahrain, Burma, Israel, Sudan, Turkey, Zimbabwe?

West in Libya — Questions of time, target, motive
Transcribed, edited by Carolyn Bennett

This is some of what trade unionist Bob Crow said Friday in responding to questions about the West’s (France-Britain-USA-led) invasion of Libya.

Why of a sudden is there such an escalation, expediency for a no-fly position over Libya? It is not the first time crimes have been committed against working people.


Why is it that when people were crying out in Zimbabwe, there was no position taken • Why is it when Turkey invaded Cyprus • Why is it when the crimes if Israel against Palestine • [What about] Sudan • Burma?


Why was it that [former British Prime Minister] Tony Blair while Middle East Envoy was cuddling Qaddafi only a few months ago? People should ask the question what [Blair’s] doing to resolve the problems in the Middle East… Perhaps he’s running Qaddafi’s camp in the desert. 

Aggression to 'save civilians' from Qaddafi?

Why weren’t they saying this 12 months ago? Colonel Qaddafi was torturing people 12 months ago, 12 years ago, 24 years ago; and people were happy about it because, as far as they were concerned, he was their dictator. That’s the difference.


If you’re a dictator that supports the West, you’re fine.

Why not then, why not Israel, Bahrain?

What were you doing 25 years ago?

Why aren’t you bombing Israel? They are doing the exact same thing Qaddafi’s doing.

Invasion prompts homegrown retaliation — World War II “Germans,” contemporary “terrorists” 

You start by calling Qaddafi a terrorist, [then invade], then you let him retaliate. In World War II, people in Briton were told — and my father told me — that if the Germans invade and you see them, eventually, throw a hand grenade through the window.

[Qaddafi] will be telling people now to take your retaliation back out on British and American people; and you’ve [Britain’s] got the Olympics next year…

Domination motive and the neglected
 

…Why has there been an escalation of militarization? Why is it that you can get aircraft carriers out to the Mediterranean, why you can get an army out to the Mediterranean — but there are Japanese people who can’t even get food or water. The first thing we should do is look after the Japanese people.

…What this is about is policy over control over Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, and Bahrain. It is about one thing and one thing only, it’s about oil.
 

Source and notes

RMT General Secretary Bob Crow appeared on BBC Radio 4’s March 25, 2011, edition of the “Any Questions” program broadcast from Kingston, Surrey. With Crow on the show’s panel were: London Mayor Boris Johnson, Shadow Justice Secretary Sadiq Khan, journalist Ann Leslie, with moderator Jonathan Dimbleby

Robert (Bob) Crow (b. 1961, Shadwell, London) is a British trade union leader, the General Secretary of the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers (RMT) and a member of the General Council of the Trade Union Congress (TUC). During Crow’s tenure, “RMT’s membership increased from around 57,000 (2002) to more than 80,000 (2008), making it one of Britain’s fastest growing trade unions. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Crow

Founded in 1868, the TUC is the national organization of British trade unions. Three related bodies are the Scottish Trades Union Congress, the Wales Trade Union Council, and the Irish Congress of Trade Unions (including the Northern Ireland Committee). Ref: Britannica.

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Bennett's books available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY]; Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]; LONGS’ Cards and Books: http://longscardsandbooks.com/ [Penn Yan, NY]

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Fake feminist bona fides

HRClinton’s State Department strikes again — bans Afghan MP/women’s rights activist until pushed to lift ban

Re-reporting, comment, editing by Carolyn Bennett

The U.S. Embassy last week denied famed Afghan women’s rights activist and Afghan Member of Parliament Malalai Joya a visa to the United States. Joya had planned an extensive U.S. speaking tour to have been launched last Saturday, according to the U.S.-based Afghan Women’s Mission.

“Americans are being denied the right to hear from an on-the-ground activist how the war is affecting ordinary Afghans, especially women,” the AWM said.

Matt Jones wrote two years ago in the Montreal Mirror, “The life of Afghan MP Malalai Joya has become an inconvenient truth about the war in Afghanistan.

“Rather than showing that Afghan women have been liberated since NATO tanks and troops rolled into the country, Joya has had to brave censorship, threats of violence and four assassination attempts under the new regime. In 2007, she received a three-year suspension from parliament for claiming [the parliament] was ‘a stable’ filled with warlords and drug barons. …

“Malalai Joya thinks two things need to happen before peace can come to Afghanistan —  

the departure of foreign troops and

the prosecution of warlords.

“‘Your government says that if the troops leave Afghanistan, civil war will happen but nobody’s talking about today’s civil war. The longer troops stay in Afghanistan, the worse the civil war will be.

“‘[M]y people are squashed between two powerful enemies. From the sky, occupation forces are bombing, killing civilians. On the ground, Taliban and warlords continue their faction fighting.’”

Today’s Democracy Now program reports, “The U.S. Department of State has reversed a decision to deny a travel visa to Afghan women’s and democracy activist Malalai Joya.” Joya had planned a three-week U.S. tour to promote a new edition of her memoir when the U.S. imposed a ban but after coming under heavy protest, HR Clinton’s State Department reversed its decision. Joya will appear tonight in the U.S. state of Massachusetts.

Malalai Joya speaks unspeakable truths. Among the inconvenient truths she reveals in her interview with Matt Jones, “Rape, domestic violence, attacks, killing of women are increasing rapidly and all of these crimes are happening under the name of democracy.”

Sources and notes

“Four things you can do about Malalai Joya’s Visa Denial,” (ACTION ALERT: AWM News, Campaigns), March 18, 2011, http://www.afghanwomensmission.org/?p=1258

Afghan Women’s Mission

The Afghan Women’s Mission was founded in January 2000 by a small group of Americans to support the humanitarian and political work of RAWA. Projects include many programs run by Afghan women including Malalai Clinic, schools, orphanages, agricultural programs, demonstrations and functions in support of women’s and human rights. We are an all-volunteer organization based in the United States.

The Afghan Women’s Mission was founded in response to the compelling need for adequate hospital facilities near Afghan refugee camps in Pakistan. Their first undertaking was the re-opening of the Malalai Hospital in Rawalpindi, Pakistan. This flagship project was effectively started in late 2001. In 2005, Malalai Hospital was transitioned into Malalai Clinic in Khewa refugee camp, http://www.afghanwomensmission.org/?page_id=2

Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA)

RAWA is the oldest political/social organization of Afghan women struggling for peace, freedom, democracy and women's rights in fundamentalism-blighted Afghanistan since 1977, http://www.rawa.org/index.php

“Speaking truth to warlords Banned Afghan MP Malalai  Joya on her country’s corruption, the bravery of women and being squashed between two powerful forces,”

http://www.montrealmirror.com/2009/111909/news1.html

“U.S. Reverses Visa Denial to Afghan Activist,” March 25, 2011, http://www.democracynow.org/2011/3/25/headlines

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Bennett's books available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY]; Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]; LONGS’ Cards and Books: http://longscardsandbooks.com/ [Penn Yan, NY]
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Today is World TB Day

West at WAR, but not for health or against disease
Editing, re-reporting by Carolyn Bennett

More than two billion people carry tuberculosis-causing germs. TB is contagious. It spreads through the air and, if not treated, each person with active TB can infect an average of 10 to 15 people a year.

World TB Day marks Dr. Robert Koch’s 1882 discovery of the TB bacillus (disease-producing bacterium) that causes tuberculosis.  More than a hundred years after Koch’s discovery, the United Nations World Health Organization (WHO) finds one-third of the world’s peoples infected with a disease that should have been stamped out at least a hundred years ago.

As the United States, France, and Britain wage endless wars on Africa and Asia (countries leading in this disease), the world languishes in a pandemic. Among the 15 countries World Health found to have the highest estimated TB incidence rates, 13 are in Africa. A third of all new cases are in India and China.

Sixty-nine (69) countries report at least one case of Drug-Resistant Tuberculosis. Reporting at least one case of Extensively Drug-Resistant TB (XDR-TB) by the end of 2010 are these countries:

Argentina, Armenia, Australia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Belgium, Botswana, Brazil, Burkina Faso, Bhutan, Cambodia, Canada, Chile, China, Colombia, Czech Rep, Ecuador, Egypt, Estonia,  France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, India, Indonesia, Islamic Rep of Iran, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lesotho, Lithuania, Mexico, Mozambique, Myanmar,  Namibia, Nepal, Netherlands, Norway, Pakistan, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Qatar, Rep of Korea, Rep of Moldova, Romania, Russian Fed, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, Swaziland, Sweden, Tajikistan, Thailand, Togo, Tunisia, Ukraine, UAE, UK, USA, Uzbekistan, Viet Nam

Drug-resistant TB is widespread and found in all countries surveyed by the World Health Organization (WHO). MDR-TB emerges as a result of treatment mismanagement. It is passed from person to person in the same way as drug-sensitive TB. Multidrug-resistant TB (MDR-TB) is a form of TB that does not respond to standard treatments using first-line drugs.

Bacteria resistant to the most effective anti-TB drugs (isoniazid and rifampicin) cause Multidrug-resistant TB (MDR-TB). MDR-TB results from either primary infection or may develop in the course of a patient’s treatment. MDR-TB is present in virtually all countries surveyed by WHO and its partners.

There were an estimated 440,000 new MDR-TB cases in 2008 with three countries accounting for over 50 percent of all cases globally: China, India and the Russian Federation.

Extensively drug-resistant TB (XDR-TB) occurs when resistance to second-line drugs develops. It is extremely difficult to treat. Cases have been confirmed in more than 58 countries. Extensively drug-resistant TB (XDR-TB) is a form of TB caused by bacteria that are resistant to isoniazid and rifampicin (i.e. MDR-TB) as well as any fluoroquinolone and any of the second-line anti-TB injectable drugs (amikacin, kanamycin or capreomycin).

World Health’s additional World TB Day facts

1.7 million died from TB in 2009 (including 380,000 people with HIV) — equal to about 4,700 deaths a day

TB is a disease of poverty. It affects mostly young adults in their most productive years.

The developing world sustains the vast majority of TB deaths. More than half occur in Asia.

Among people living with HIV, their immune systems weakened, TB is a leading killer

9.4 million New TB cases occurred in 2009 — 80 percent of these were in just 22 countries.

The global TB incidence rate per capita is falling but the rate of decline is very slow — less than 1 percent.

Tuberculosis is a worldwide pandemic. World TB Day draws attention to tuberculosis and efforts to eliminate this global epidemic.

Sources and notes

“WHO progress report 2011 —towards universal access to diagnosis and treatment of multidrug-resistant (MDR) and extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis ( XDR-TB) by 2015,” http://www.who.int/tb/en/index.html

“Progress is being made but the response is far from sufficient given the MDR-TB threat facing the world. Two years from the Beijing declaration — endorsed by all 27 high-burden countries featured in the report — some countries’ commitments are “too slow off the mark or simply stalled.” 

“41 million TB patients have been successfully treated in DOTS programs and up to 6 million lives saved since 1995.  Five million more lives could be saved between now and 2015 by fully funding and implementing The Global Plan to Stop TB 2011-2015…”

The World Health Organization (WHO) is the directing and coordinating authority for health within the United Nations system. It is responsible for providing leadership on global health matters, shaping the health research agenda, setting norms and standards, articulating evidence-based policy options, providing technical support to countries and monitoring and assessing health trends.

“In the 21st century, health is a shared responsibility, involving equitable access to essential care and collective defense against transnational threats,” http://www.who.int/about/en/

“World TB Day 2011: Spotlight on diagnosis and treatment,” March 24, 2011,

http://www.trust.org/alertnet/news/world-tb-day-2011-spotlight-on-diagnosis-and-treatment

AlertNet

AlertNet is a free humanitarian news service run by Thomson Reuters Foundation covering crises worldwide. Our award-winning website provides trusted news and information on natural disasters, conflicts, refugees, hunger, diseases and climate change.

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Bennett's books available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY]; Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]; LONGS’ Cards and Books: http://longscardsandbooks.com/ [Penn Yan, NY]

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