Showing posts with label War. Show all posts
Showing posts with label War. Show all posts

Thursday, May 3, 2018

The Philippines Genocide: 3 million Filipinos Killed

I guess "Holocaust Deniers" all over the world.

Just the excerpts from the reports during the period (Spanish American war of 1898).

General Bell
himself, who said “we estimated that we killed one-sixth of the population of the main island of Luzon—some 600,000 people.”
(There is another Bell, George who also fought in the Philippines ).  Also see Gore Vidals reply on comment questioning the numbers.
20 dead filipinosThe Philadelphia Ledger November 1901 their Manila correspondent wrote “The present war is no bloodless, opera bouffe engagement; our men have been relentless, have killed to exterminate men, women, children, prisoners and captives, active insurgents and suspected people from lads of ten up, the idea prevailing that the Filipino as such was little better than a dog…
“Our soldiers have pumped salt water into men to make them talk, and have taken prisoners people who held up their hands and peacefully surrendered, and an hour later, without an atom of evidence to show that they were even insurrectos, stood them on a bridge and shot them down one by one, to drop into the water below and float down, as examples to those who found their bullet-loaded corpses.”

Another Marine officer described his testimony.
“The major said that General Smith instructed him to kill and burn, and said that the more he killed and burned the better pleased he would be; that it was no time to take prisoners, and that he was to make Samar a howling wilderness. Major Waller asked General Smith to define the age limit for killing, and he replied “everyone over ten.”

Mark Twain wrote

“…I have seen that we do not intend to free, but to subjugate the people of the philippines. we have gone to conquer, not to redeem… and so i am an anti-imperialist. i am opposed to having the [american] eagle put its talons on any other land.”
On 15th of October 1900 Twain wrote the New York Times.
“We have pacified some thousands of the islanders and buried them; destroyed their fields; burned their villages, and turned their widows and orphans out-of-doors; furnished heartbreak by exile to some dozens of disagreeable patriots; subjugated the remaining ten millions by Benevolent Assimilation, which is the pious new name of the musket; we have acquired property in the three hundred concubines and other slaves of our business partner, the Sultan of Sulu, and hoisted our protecting flag over that swag. And so, by these providences of god — and the phrase is the government’s, not mine — we are a World Power.” — Mark Twain
 Please read the whole Post.  Interesting pictures.  Also President McKinley 's Christian reasons for the war.

https://britsinthephilippines.top/philippines-genocide-3-million-filipinos-killed/

Thursday, November 9, 2017

Geopolitical Update: The Drums of War in he Middle East

Geopolitical Update: The Drums of War in he Middle East

This is like watching hurricane track and hoping it wont hit you.

a) Saudi Arabia (SA) is running out of money. Foreign reserves have fallen dramatically. Low oil prices have been a big problem
b) Mohamed bin Salman (MbS) is doing a power grab. Made himself heir. Considered an unpopular move. Ousted many a couple months a year back.
c) SA population is growing fast as is the Royal Family. They all need to be paid off to keep them from revolting.
d) The war in Yemen started by MBS was to unite the country behind him. It was supposed to be a walkover. two years and counting and no victory for SA in Yemen.
e) Another purge and assets seized, estimated of 800 billion. Good for two years.
f) Purge is unpopular. So another war, Lebanon and Iran maybe to get the populace behind MBS.

The double cross, cynical view.

The US is self sufficient in oil. No longer dependent on SA oil.
The US would like Oil prices to rise which is not possible with SA pumping away.
The SA-Yemen war was approved by US and kind of backed MbS.
US probably hoped it would destabilize SA. Anyway sold a lot of Aircraft and weapons to SA
SA might buy the most fancy weapons, but dont have the people to operate them.
So US is giving SA more rope to hang themselves.
Kind of egging SA to open a second front with Lebanon/Iran with the expectation that SA will fracture from within.
Another war and/or SA has civil war: Increased Oil prices and probably SA assets in US being seized. Mission Accomplished.

Links
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-11-09/saudi-arabia-orders-its-citizens-leave-lebanon-immediately
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-11-08/how-broke-house-saud
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-11-08/saudi-purge-middle-east-verge-new-war
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-11-09/saudi-king-may-relinquish-throne-crown-prince-within-48-hours-reports
.

Saturday, July 8, 2017

Obama on March 2011 said the following to Justify the war on Libya.
"For more than four decades, the Libyan people have been ruled by a tyrant -– Muammar Qaddafi. He has denied his people freedom, exploited their wealth, murdered opponents at home and abroad, and terrorized innocent people around the world –- including Americans who were killed by Libyan agents. (See complete speech here)
It turned out later in Obama had no evidence for his statement."

The 2016 UK Foreign Affairs Committee report says:
“We have seen no evidence that the UK Government carried out a proper analysis of the nature of the rebellion in Libya. … UK strategy was founded on erroneous assumptions and an incomplete understanding of the evidence.” “Despite his rhetoric, the proposition that Muammar Qadhafi would have ordered the massacre of civilians in Benghazi was not supported by the available evidence. While [he] certainly threatened violence against those who took up arms against his rule, this did not necessarily translate into a threat to everyone in Benghazi. In short, the scale of the threat to civilians was presented with unjustified certainty.”

Great, Nobel Peace prize wining president or what?

https://consortiumnews.com/2017/07/07/hiding-us-lies-about-libyan-invasion/

Wednesday, September 21, 2016

Milosevic exonerated

Hmm, wonder if there are parallels with Sri Lanka.  
The ICTY’s exoneration of the late Slobodan Milosevic, the former President of Yugoslavia, for war crimes committed in the Bosnia war, proves again we should take NATO claims regarding its ’official enemies’ not with a pinch of salt, but a huge lorry load.

For the past twenty odd years, neocon commentators and 'liberal interventionist' pundits have been telling us at every possible opportunity, that Milosevic (a democratically elected leader in a country where over 20 political parties freely operated) was an evil genocidal dictator who was to blame for ALL the deaths in the Balkans in the 1990s.

But the official narrative, just like the one that told us that in 2003, Iraq had WMDs which could be launched within 45 minutes, was a deceitful one, designed to justify a regime change-op which the Western elites had long desired.

The ICTY’s conclusion, that one of the most demonized figures of the modern era was innocent of the most heinous crimes he was accused of, really should have made headlines across the world. But it hasn‘t. Even the ICTY buried it, deep in its 2,590 page verdict in the trial of Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic.

Anyone who dared to challenge the NATO line was labeled a “Milosevic apologist”, or worse still, a “genocide denier”, by ‘Imperial Truth Enforcers’.

But amid all the blather and the hype surrounding the ’trial of the century’ it soon became apparent the prosecution was in deep, deep trouble. The Sunday Times quoted a legal expert who claimed that “Eighty percent of the prosecution’s opening statements would have been dismissed by a British court as hearsay.” That, I believe, was a generous assessment.

The indictment was clearly designed to exert pressure on Milosevic to cave into NATO’s demands.

The trouble for NATO was that by the time Milosevic’s trial was due to start, the Kosovo narrative had already unraveled. The lurid claims made by the US and its allies about genocide and hundreds of thousands being killed, catalogued by the great John Pilger here, had been shown to be false. In September 2001, a UN court officially held that there had been no genocide in Kosovo.

More at
https://www.rt.com/op-edge/354362-slobodan-milosevic-exonerated-us-nato/

Friday, June 3, 2016

US:Killing of 2 pregnant women: Tactical Mistake

Sometimes you wonder about the chutzpah of US.

So maybe the Sri Lankan government should have called Nandikaddal a “tactical mistake” and sent some goats to Jaffna.

In February 2010 a night raid by special operations forces in Afghanistan killed seven civilians including two pregnant women and two children.

Defense Department investigators concluded that “the amount of force utilized was necessary, proportional and applied at appropriate time.” The investigation did acknowledge that “tactical mistakes” were made.

U.S. soldiers dug the bullets out of the women’s bodies. “They were putting knives into their injuries to take out the bullets,” Sabir told me. I asked him bluntly, “You saw the Americans digging the bullets out of the women’s bodies?” Without hesitation, he said, “Yes.” Tahir told me he saw the Americans with knives standing over the bodies. “They were taking out the bullets from their bodies to remove the proof of their crime.”

A press release published by NATO in Afghanistan soon after the raid asserted that a joint Afghan-international operation had made a “gruesome discovery.” According to NATO, the force entered a compound near the village of Khataba after intelligence had “confirmed” it to be the site of “militant activity.” As the team approached, they were “engaged” in a “fire fight” by “several insurgents.” The Americans killed the insurgents and were securing the area when they made their discovery: three women who had been “bound and gagged” and then executed inside the compound. The U.S. force, the press release alleged, found the women “hidden in an adjacent room.” The story was picked up and spread throughout the media. A “senior U.S. military official” told CNN that the bodies had “the earmarks of a traditional honor killing.” Documents provided to The Intercept contain substantial redactions, particularly in areas dealing with allegations of a cover-up of the circumstances of the killings.

 But the raid quickly gained international infamy after survivors and local Afghan investigators began offering a completely different narrative of the deadly events that night to a British reporter, Jerome Starkey, who began a serious investigation of the Gardez killings.

The Pentagon investigation stands in stark contrast to an independent investigation conducted by a United Nations team, which determined that the survivors of the raid “suffered from cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment by being physically assaulted by U.S. and Afghan forces, restrained and forced to stand bare feet for several hours outside in the cold.” The U.N. investigation added that witnesses alleged “that U.S. and Afghan forces refused to provide adequate and timely medical support to two people who sustained serious bullet injuries, resulting in their death hours later.” The Pentagon investigation did note that three of the survivors detained stated they had been “tortured by Special Forces,” but that allegation was buried below statements attributed to other survivors who said being held by the American forces “felt like home not like prisoner” and they were treated “very well.”

In the end, the commander of the Joint Special Operations Command, Vice Adm. William McRaven, visited the compound in Gardez accompanied by a phalanx of Afghan and U.S. soldiers. He made an offer to the family to sacrifice a sheep, which his force had brought with them on a truck, to ask forgiveness.



https://theintercept.com/2016/06/01/pentagon-special-ops-killing-of-pregnant-afghan-women-was-appropriate-use-of-force/


Tuesday, December 8, 2015

Human Rights Watch: Prosecute US war criminals including George Bush

This week, Human Rights Watch (HRW) issued a 159-page report titled, “No More Excuses: A Roadmap to Justice for CIA Torture.” This detailed report sets forth a compelling legal case for the criminal prosecution of senior US officials for their roles as conspirators and accomplices in the illegal Central Intelligence Agency torture program (2001-2009).

The report names names: “US officials who created, authorized, and implemented the CIA program should be among those investigated for conspiracy to torture as well as other crimes. They include: Acting CIA General Counsel John Rizzo, Assistant Attorney General for Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) Jay Bybee, OLC Deputy Assistant Attorney General John Yoo, an individual identified as ‘CTC Legal’ in the Senate Summary, CIA Director George Tenet, National Security Legal Advisor John Bellinger, Attorney General John Ashcroft, White House Counsel Legal Advisor Alberto Gonzales, Counsel to the Vice President David Addington, Deputy White House Counsel Timothy Flanigan, National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice, Defense Department General Counsel William Haynes II, Vice President Dick Cheney, and President George W. Bush. In addition, James Mitchell and Bruce Jessen, CIA psychologist contractors who devised the program, proposed it to the CIA, and helped carry it out, should also be investigated for their role in the initial conspiracy.”

“We believe there is also sufficient evidence to investigate others who were not necessarily part of the initial conspiracy but who later joined it,” the report states. “Others should not only be investigated for torture but also for offenses such as war crimes, assault, and sexual abuse.”
The report reads like a criminal indictment. It provides point-by-point highlights of the CIA program in all its depraved and sadistic detail. The report also covers the attempts by the Bush administration to provide a pseudo-legal cover for the program, as well as attempts by the Obama administration to cover it up and shield the perpetrators from liability.

The report identifies specific US officials, victims, dates, documents, and other particulars, with emphasis on the roles of the senior officials who orchestrated the program. The report brings together material from numerous sources, including the heavily redacted executive summary of the Senate Intelligence Committee’s report on the CIA torture program, media reports, internal executive department memoranda, investigations by Human Rights Watch and other institutions, and even chilling hand-drawn images of the implements of torture by the victims themselves.

More at
http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2015/12/05/tort-d05.html

Sunday, November 15, 2015

Payback is a Bitch (Paris Massacre)

Indira Gandhi/India armed and trained the LTTE. They went on to assassinate Rajiv Gandhi.
The July 83 riots allowed the LTTE become become stronger and better funded and resulted in a 30 year war.

Europe and France were instrumental in overthrowing Gaddafi. Now Libya is a failed state and one of the gateways for migrants and refugees to enter Europe in the millions.

My heart goes out to the victims and families. The average Joe who is having to bear the consequences of the US and Europe's politicians support for terrorists in Syria.

What Preceded The Islamic State Attacks In France - Some Links

This happened last night: At least 120 dead in Paris attacks, Hollande declares emergency
Gunmen and bombers attacked restaurants, a concert hall and a sports stadium at locations across Paris on Friday, killing at least 120 people in a deadly rampage that a shaken President Francois Hollande called an unprecedented terrorist attack.
The Islamic State claims responsibility (English version) for the attack.
But who weaponized and financed the Islamic State or prior organizations in Syria and Iraq from which this terror attack grew? Is this cartoon justified?
Cartoon of the day by Carlos Latuff
Consider:
In 2012 - Hollande admits arming Syrian rebels in breach of embargo - book
The French president has admitted delivering weapons to the Syrian rebels during a period of EU embargo, a new book about to be published in France reveals. The deliveries took place in 2012, before the embargo was canceled in May 2013, according to François Hollande's last year interview with journalist and writer Xavier Panon. "We began when we were certain they would end up in the right hands. For the lethal weapons it was our services who delivered them," Hollande told the writer, ...
Okt 2012 - Rebel Arms Flow Is Said to Benefit Jihadists in Syria
WASHINGTON — Most of the arms shipped at the behest of Saudi Arabia and Qatar to supply Syrian rebel groups fighting the government of Bashar al-Assad are going to hard-line Islamic jihadists, and not the more secular opposition groups that the West wants to bolster, according to American officials and Middle Eastern diplomats.
Dec 2012 - France funding Syrian rebels in new push to oust Assad
France has emerged as the most prominent backer of Syria's armed opposition and is now directly funding rebel groups around Aleppo as part of a new push to oust the embattled Assad regime. Large sums of cash have been delivered by French government proxies across the Turkish border to rebel commanders in the past month, diplomatic sources have confirmed. The money has been used to buy weapons inside Syria and to fund armed operations against loyalist forces.
Aug 2014 - France delivered arms to Syrian rebels, Hollande confirms
President Francois Hollande said on Thursday that France had delivered weapons to rebels battling the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad “a few months ago.”
Nov 2015
Murad Gazdiev @MuradoRT
French APILAS rocket launcher supplied to #syria rebels fall into hands of #ISIS. Pics from #Deraa, Southern #Syria
12:09 PM - 6 Nov 2015


Jun 2014 - 'Thank God for the Saudis': ISIS, Iraq, and the Lessons of Blowback
[T]wo of the most successful factions fighting Assad’s forces are Islamist extremist groups: Jabhat al-Nusra and the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), the latter of which is now amassing territory in Iraq and threatening to further destabilize the entire region. And that success is in part due to the support they have received from two Persian Gulf countries: Qatar and Saudi Arabia. Qatar’s military and economic largesse has made its way to Jabhat al-Nusra, to the point that a senior Qatari official told me he can identify al-Nusra commanders by the blocks they control in various Syrian cities. But ISIS is another matter. As one senior Qatari official stated, “ISIS has been a Saudi project.”
France benefited from its support for the U.S.-Wahhabi regime change project in Syria and Iraq by getting huge orders for military equipment from the medieval Wahhabi regimes:
Apr 2015 - France and Qatar seal $7 billion Rafale fighter jet deal
Qatar has agreed to buy 24 Dassault Aviation-built Rafale fighter jets in a 6.3-billion-euro (4.55 billion pounds) deal, the French government said on Thursday, as the Gulf Arab state looks to boost its military firepower in an increasingly unstable region.
June 2015 - Saudi Arabia and France ink $12bln deal
Saudi Arabia and France agreed Wednesday to sign $12 billion of deals, Saudi Foreign Minister Adel Al-Jubair said during a landmark visit by Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to Paris.
Even after it became obvious for everyone that the regime change project in Syria has led to an expansion of terrorism Hollande was still demanding the end of the Syrian state.
Sept 2015 - François Hollande of France Says Assad Must Go
President François Hollande of France told the United Nations General Assembly on Monday that his country would “shoulder its responsibilities” in global efforts to end the fighting in Syria, but that the conflict could be resolved only if President Bashar al-Assad was removed from power.
Can Hollande now change his tune?

Thursday, October 29, 2015

Iraq to US: We dont need troops

Now Iraq (you know the country the US liberated/occupied 13 years ago) says to the US, " This is an Iraqi affair and the government did not ask the U.S. Department of Defense to be involved in direct operations," spokesman Sa'ad al-Hadithi told NBC News. "We have enough soldiers on the ground."  Meanwhile the US has been considering sending more troops and Apache helicopters into Iraq.

i.e. Maybe Iraq will be asking Russia to help.  Time for the US to do a UNHCR investigation into "war crimes" and send UN observers/invasion into Iraq.  Oops, maybe that's out of the question, the US also might be implicated in "war crimes".

From NBC
The Iraqi government said Wednesday it didn't ask for — and doesn't need — the "direct action on the ground" promised by the Pentagon.

The revelation came a day after Defense Secretary Ashton Carter said the U.S. may carry out more unilateral ground raids — like last week's rescue operation to free hostages — in Iraq to target ISIS militants.

Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi's spokesman told NBC News that any military involvement in the country must be cleared through the Iraqi government just as U.S.-led airstrikes are.

"This is an Iraqi affair and the government did not ask the U.S. Department of Defense to be involved in direct operations," spokesman Sa'ad al-Hadithi told NBC News. "We have enough soldiers on the ground."
and in the US from the Wall Street Journal
The White House is seriously considering deploying a small squadron of Apache attack helicopters to Iraq as part of a package of new assistance programs to counter Islamic State, according to U.S. officials.

The move could ultimately require the deployment of hundreds more U.S. service members to Iraq. Among other proposals, U.S. officials said some in the military recommend openly deploying a small number of forces on the ground in Syria, embedded among moderate rebels or Kurdish forces there, for the first time.

Pressure is mounting on the regime to change course. Recent Russian intervention in Syria on the side of the regime, and the threat of Moscow intervening in Iraq next, has spurred the U.S. to step up its role, defense officials acknowledge.
via
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-10-29/iraq-washington-we-dont-need-your-help-fighting-terrorism
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-10-28/us-ground-troops-syria-illegal-big-mistake-russia-warns-obama-unpredictable-conseque

Thursday, October 8, 2015

US Hospital Bombing because Taliban was using Civilians as Human Shield

Initially the US defended the bombing of the Afghan Hospital as "Collateral Damage".  Now the latest justification is that “Taliban fighters are now hiding in ‘people’s houses, mosques and hospitals using civilians as human shields.'”  Isn't that the very same thing Sri Lanka was accused of; i.e bombing places where the LTTE was using human shields, which Sri Lanka denies.  This was considered a War Crime and the US wanted a International investigation.  So, will the US also agree to an International investigation.  I very much doubt it.  Definitely sauce for the goose is not sauce for the gander
U.S. military was predictable and familiar. It was all just a big, terrible mistake, its official statement suggested: an airstrike it carried out in Kunduz “may have resulted in collateral damage to a nearby medical facility.” Oops: our bad. Fog of war, errant bombs, and all that.

This obfuscation tactic is the standard one the U.S. and Israel both use whenever they blow up civilian structures and slaughter large numbers of innocent people with airstrikes.

But there’s something significantly different about this incident that has caused this “mistake” claim to fail. Usually, the only voices protesting or challenging the claims of the U.S. military are the foreign, non-western victims who live in the cities and villages where the bombs fall. Those are easily ignored, or dismissed as either ignorant or dishonest. Those voices barely find their way into U.S. news stories, and when they do, they are stream-rolled by the official and/or anonymous claims of the U.S. military, which are typically treated by U.S. media outlets as unassailable authority.

Fox News yesterday cited anonymous “defense officials” that while they “‘regret the loss’ of innocent life, they say the incident could have been avoided if the Taliban had not used the hospital as a base, and the civilians there as human shields.” In its first article on the attack, The Washington Post also previewed this defense, quoting a “spokesman for the Afghan army’s 209th Corps in northern Afghanistan” as saying that “Taliban fighters are now hiding in ‘people’s houses, mosques and hospitals using civilians as human shields.'” AP yesterday actually claimed that it looked at a video and saw weaponry in the hospital’s windows, only to delete that claim with this correction:
So now we’re into full-on justification mode: yes, we did it; yes, we did it on purpose; and we’re not sorry because we were right to do so since we think some Taliban fighters were at the hospital, perhaps even shooting at us. In response to the emergence of this justification claim, MSF expressed the exact level of revulsion appropriate (emphasis added):
“MSF is disgusted by the recent statements coming from some Afghanistan government authorities justifying the attack on its hospital in Kunduz. These statements imply that Afghan and US forces working together decided to raze to the ground a fully functioning hospital with more than 180 staff and patients inside because they claim that members of the Taliban were present. 
“This amounts to an admission of a war crime. This utterly contradicts the initial attempts of the US government to minimize the attack as ‘collateral damage.’

https://theintercept.com/2015/10/05/the-radically-changing-story-of-the-u-s-airstrike-on-afghan-hospital-from-mistake-to-justification/
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/u-s-airstrike-hits-doctors-without-borders-hospital-afghanistan/

Monday, September 28, 2015

Kissinger and Nixon support 1971 Genocide in East Pakistan

Bangaladesh is still having issues 40 odd years later because of civil war in 1971 fueled by American weapons.  Now they have a war tribunal that is authorized only to prosecute people living in Bangaladesh, but more a tribunal to go after the opposition.  No West Pakistani's the biggest perpetrators and their helpmates Nixon and Kissinger can be prosecuted.

Hope this stands as a warning to those who are looking for war crimes tribunals in Sri Lanka.  This is not for our good, it is to destabilize our country.

Nixon and Kissinger supported Pakistan’s (west)  fiercely anti-communist military ruler President Yahya Khan in his crackdown on East Pakistan (now Bangaladesh).  The weapons they supplied helped  the 1971 mass murder of mostly Hindu Bengalis who were seeking political autonomy and, ultimately, their own independent nation (i.e. East Pakistan into Bangaladesh). Large scale civilian suffering—mass shootings, rapes, village burnings, and a refugee crisis of almost unimaginable proportions. Members of the Pakistani military and supporting militias killed an estimated 300,000 to 3,000,000 people and raped between 200,000 to 400,000 Bangladeshi women in a systematic campaign of genocidal rape
.
Nixon and Kissinger supplied West Pakistan
a) weapons, ammunition, and other military despite a long-standing arms embargo (and against the wishes of the State Department),
b) Transferred advanced fighter aircraft through third countries like Iran and Jordan.  This was like the  Iran-Contra affair, by passing Congress opposition.

NY Times: Sept 29  2013 
Nixon and Kissinger were not just motivated by dispassionate realpolitik, weighing Pakistan’s help with the secret opening to China or India’s pro-Soviet leanings. The White House tapes capture their emotional rage, going far beyond Nixon’s habitual vulgarity. In the Oval Office, Nixon told Kissinger that the Indians needed “a mass famine.” Kissinger sneered at people who “bleed” for “the dying Bengalis.” 
Telegram from Archer Blood, the U.S. consul general in Dacca, East Pakistan
Our government has failed to denounce the suppression of democracy. Our government has failed to denounce atrocities. Our government has failed to take forceful measures to protect its citizens while at the same time bending over backwards to placate the West Pak[istan] dominated government and to lessen likely and deservedly negative international public relations impact against them... We, as professional public servants express our dissent with current policy and fervently hope that our true and lasting interests here can be defined and our policies redirected in order to salvage our nation’s position as a moral leader of the free world.
For his principled stand, Blood—a longtime civil servant not normally given to such activist behavior—earned the opprobrium of Nixon and Kissinger, was sacked for his “rebellion,” and saw his promising career derailed.

NY Times: Sept 29  2013
Bangladesh, despite its recent economic growth, is a haunted country. Part of the tumult centers on the fate of defendants like Abdul Quader Mollah, who face judgment in a series of national war crimes trials for atrocities committed in 1971 by local collaborators with West Pakistan. These trials are popular, but the court has often failed to meet fair standards of due process. 

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/09/28/bloody-bloody-richard-nixon-s-role-in-a-forgotten-genocide.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/30/opinion/nixon-and-kissingers-forgotten-shame.html

Sunday, September 27, 2015

Fox News: Iranian and Russian Military in Iraq

Fox News reports that "Russian, Syrian and Iranian military commanders have set up a coordination cell in Baghdad in recent days to try to begin working with Iranian-backed Shia militias fighting the Islamic State (ISIS).   However, The  Russian embassy in Iraq denies role in any anti-ISIS ‘coordination cell’ based in Baghdad.

So far none of the Main Stream Media (MSM) such as  NY Times, CNN, BBC have reported the docking of a Chinese Aircraft Carrier and Guided Missile Cruiser in Tartus, Syria.

Chinese Military and Aerial Assets to Syria

Chinese PLA in Yemen
Things are becoming interesting, Game Changer ?.  

Apparently a pro Assad newspaper reports that Chinese Military personnel and Aerial assets are on the way to Syria.  (Update: Sep 26th: Debka reports that Chinese aircraft carrier and a guided missile cruiser have docked in Tartus, Syria.  Pravda also reports China Joining Russia in Syria)

As far as I know this is the first time the Chinese have sent troops to a war zone.  That is other than the rescue operation by the Chinese PLA in Yemen.  Also other minor issues of sending 5 Navy ships of the coast of Alaska while Obama was visiting the state and getting read to deploy nuclear sub that can hit the US mainland.
On Tuesday morning, a Chinese naval vessel reportedly traveled through Egypt’s Suez Canal to enter the Mediterranean Sea; its destination was not confirmed.

However, according to a senior officer in the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) that is stationed inside the Syrian coastal city of Latakia, Chinese military personnel and aerial assets are scheduled to arrive in the coming weeks (6 weeks) to the port-city of Tartous – he could not provide anymore detail.
Apparently the Chinese are in Syria to stop Turkestan Islamic Party, Uighur Islamists who were smuggled by Turkey from China to Syria.
 
 Here's what China had to say at the May 22, 2014 meeting about the war in Syria: Note the bold words, in context of Sri Lanka. Probably a little to late now.
Mr. Wang Min (China) (spoke in Chinese): For over three years, the escalation of the conflict in Syria has inflicted deep suffering on the Syrian people and posed a serious challenge to the countries of the region and the international community. China has always maintained that all parties in Syria should respect human rights and international humanitarian law and prevent innocent people from being harmed during the conflict. China is firmly opposed to all violations of international humanitarian law or serious violations of human rights committed by all parties to the conflict in Syria. However, with regard to draft resolution S/2014/348, on which the Council voted earlier, China has some serious reservations. First, China believes that any action to seek recourse to the International Criminal Court (ICC) to prosecute the perpetrators of serious violations should be conducted on the basis of respect for State judicial sovereignty and the principle of complementarity. China is not a State party to the Rome Statute. China always has reservations concerning the referral by the Security Council of particular country situations to the ICC. This is our principled position.

What is most urgently needed now is to urge the Government of Syria and the opposition to immediately implement a ceasefire and put an end to the violence in order to start a third round of negotiations in Geneva so as to advance the political process and embark on a political transition. In the current circumstances, to forcibly refer the situation in Syria to the ICC is not conducive either to building trust among all parties in Syria or to an early resumption of the negotiations in Geneva. It will only jeopardize the efforts made by the international community to push for a political settlement. 

Thirdly, for some time now, the Security Council has maintained unity and coordination on the question of Syria, thanks to efforts by Council members, including China, to accommodate the major concerns of all parties. At a time when seriously diverging views exist among the parties concerning the draft resolution, we believe that the Council should continue holding consultations, rather than forcing a vote on the draft resolution, in order to avoid undermining Council unity or obstructing coordination and cooperation on questions such as Syria and other major serious issues. Regrettably, China’s approach has not been taken on board; China therefore voted against the draft resolution.

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-09-24/chinese-military-personnel-aerial-assets-allegedly-en-route-syria
http://www.almasdarnews.com/article/chinese-military-personnel-expected-to-arrive-in-syria/