Showing posts with label Torture. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Torture. Show all posts
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Looking for "al Qaeda on Haiti" no doubt... CIA Contractor Drone Over Haiti
"Following the money" for US government Haiti Disaster Relief operations.
Evergreen International Aviation... They do the 'logistics' end of CIA 'renditions' and have a long history of covert ops for the CIA and Pentagon. The Wired article fleshes(sic) it out..
A controversial CIA contractor has found new work in Haiti, flying drones on disaster recovery duty.
When last we heard from Evergreen International Aviation, the Oregon-based firm was offering to post sentries at local voting centers during the 2008 election, ”detaining troublemakers” and making sure voters “do not get out of control.”
Now, company vice president Sam White tells Aviation Week that the firm is flying at least one ScanEagle surveillance drone over Haiti. ”The company has a fleet of 747s and a fleet of large and small choppers, and has begun ferrying in supplies to Port au Prince,” the magazine’s Paul McLeary notes. “White wouldn’t say who the company is moving cargo for, saying only that ‘we’re working with different agencies, and we have one plane coming in tomorrow full of humanitarian supplies.’”
Over the years, Evergreen has had all sorts of interesting clients over its five-plus decades in operation. Back in the late ’80s, the company “acknowledged one agreement under which his companies provide occasional jobs and cover to foreign nationals the CIA wants taken out of other countries or brought into the United States.” In 2006, Evergreen’s parent company flew Bill O’Reilly into Kuwait in 2006, according toSourceWatch. Last April, the company won a $158 million contract to supply the Air Force with helicopters in Afghanistan.
More @ Danger Room - Wired
Da Buffalo found Evergreen's NGO pricing for "Helicopters to Haiti":
"Bill Doonen, a representative of Evergreen Helicopters (Same Parent Co), said he could take the French team in. But it would cost about $7,000 an hour, with a four-hour minimum.
I'm at a loss for words." More @ OregonLive
The other day, Da Buffalo asked the question amongst friends:
The anti-terrorism operation, according to William Arkin of the Post, is stationed at Homestead AFB, current center of US "relief" operations for Haiti:
"The U.S. Special Operations Command (SOCOM), SOD-G is moving to an airbase in Homestead, Fla., where it will take up contingency counter-terrorism planning responsibilities for the region, seeking to characterize how al Qaeda and other terrorists might exploit drug trafficking routes and patterns or other gaps in American defense to infiltrate into the United States."
So how long could it be until the US finds "al Qaeda on Haiti"?
Someone has an answer:
"...they ‘found’ those links quite a while ago - the occupation forces (Haiti’s current occupation started on 29 February 2004) was accusing Lavalas (Aristide’s party) of beheading members of the Haitian National Police, and doing so in an alliance with Haiti’s tiny (3000) Arab minority. Of course, it has generally been the HNP that has done assassinations, e.g. Abdias Jean, (with MINUSTAH - after MINUSTAH assassinated Dred Wilme in Cite Soleil (early 07/lat 06, if memory serves), kidnappings there went up according to the economist, although they don’t tie the matter to the murder, even though MINUSTAH had been accusing Dred Wilme of being behind the kidnappings), and Lavalas has accused them of beheadings. One UN representative repeated the charges against Lavalas, but neither he nor the HNP can supply the names of anyone beheaded by Lavalas...
...have a look at Kill the Bandits and “Haiti, The Untold Story” by Kevin Pina."
Sunday, January 3, 2010
Dedicated To A Nation Of 'Adult Children' Who Want Terrorism To Disappear (but not their neighbor or themselves)
.Conservative Columnist David Brooks On America, A Nation Of Adult Children who believe that living in a police state beats having to do anything to ameliorate the conditions that lead to it:
(Quote context, in regard to the 'Underpants Bomber' and concurrent citizen attention on alleged 'flaws' in the New American Police State Apparatus.)
"Now we seem to expect perfection from government and then throw temper tantrums when it is not achieved. We seem to be in the position of young adolescents — who believe mommy and daddy can take care of everything, and then grow angry and cynical when it becomes clear they can’t [...]
H/t Firedoglake
Which is QUITE a change in the American attitude from 9 years ago:
"On December 22, 2001, Richard Reid, the 'shoe-bomber,' attempted to detonate explosives on an American airliner. On December 27, Usama Bin Laden issued a new, menacing videotape. How did the Bush administration respond to these dramatic events? How did CNN cover the response?
Bush's response was to plant a live oak tree and go for a jog, and follow 'through on his promise to get a little bit of rest and relaxation on this trip down here to Crawford.' CNN reported this as a good thing. Bush also declined to comment on the Bin Laden tape, and CNN helpfully explained this silence as a wise decision not to respond to someone who 'might be dead.'"
In Full @ Juan Cole's Informed Comment
Pop Quiz!
Analyze the childlike, mercurial, historically amnesiac, American socio-cultural traits, and hypothesize how they affect the reasons, rationales, and denials in regard to the persecution of worthless wars that create 'terrorism' in the first place.
Well, since we can't control our childish desires to accumulate "stuff" at the expense of environmental destruction and slave-labor conditions (Even your chocolate... ...and flowers, Luvr!) those demands place on the extractive and manufacturing countries of the world (ie. the "third world"), we can start by putting everyone we 'fear' in prison... or something LIKE a prison.
(This article appeared in the January 4, 2010 edition of The Nation.)
America's Secret ICE Castles
By Jacqueline Stevens
December 16, 2009
"If you don't have enough evidence to charge someone criminally but you think he's illegal, we can make him disappear."
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
Still "...hoping for change..." (but expecting none) - ARAR REDUX? (Bill Fisher)
(but expecting none)
Our new president, president Obama, has no major problem with 'rendition' either.
But in certain countries of Europe Justice trumps 'hope'.
See: "CIA verdict in Italy challenges Obama on renditions".
ARAR REDUX?
November 09 2009
By William Fisher
On the heels of a federal appeals court ruling that only Congress and the executive branch of government – not the courts -- can interfere with government-sponsored “extraordinary rendition, ” a U.S. citizen from New Jersey is asking another court to tell the government it wasn’t OK to secretly imprison and abuse him in three different African countries over a period of four months.
The citizen is Amir Meshal, 24, the son of Muslim immigrants from Egypt.
According to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), which filed the lawsuit in Meshal’s behalf, after fleeing hostilities in Somalia in 2006, Meshal was arrested, secretly imprisoned in inhumane conditions and subjected to harsh interrogations by U.S. officials over 30 times in three different countries before ultimately being released four months later without charge,
"This case challenges the US government’s effort to evade accountability for illegal detention and interrogations in counter-terrorism operations by masking and hiding its involvement," Jonathan Hafetz, a staff attorney with the ACLU National Security Project, told IPS.
According to the ACLU, Meshal was studying Islam in Mogadishu, Somalia, in December 2006, when hostilities broke out. With the airport disabled by bombing, Meshal fled to neighboring Kenya, where he wandered in the forest for three weeks seeking shelter and assistance before being arrested. Following his arrest, he was detained and repeatedly interrogated by U.S. officials who threatened to harm him, denied him access to counsel and accused him of receiving training from al-Qaeda, which Meshal denied.
Following his arrest and detention in Kenya, the suit says Meshal was illegally rendered to Somalia and then to Ethiopia where he was imprisoned in secret for over three months. There, U.S. officials subjected him to harsh interrogations while denying him due process and access to a lawyer, his family or anyone else in the outside world...
[In Full at 'The World According To Bill Fisher]
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
What do you call three crony DOJ lawyers at the bottom end of a taunt rope?
by Michael Isikoff
(Newsweek)
An internal Justice Department report on the conduct of senior lawyers who approved waterboarding and other harsh interrogation tactics is causing anxiety among former Bush administration officials.
H. Marshall Jarrett, chief of the department's ethics watchdog unit, the Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR), confirmed last year he was investigating whether the legal advice in crucial interrogation memos "was consistent with the professional standards that apply to Department of Justice attorneys."
According to two knowledgeable sources who asked not to be identified discussing sensitive matters, a draft of the report was submitted in the final weeks of the Bush administration. It sharply criticized the legal work of two former top officials—Jay Bybee and John Yoo—as well as that of Steven Bradbury, who was chief of the Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) at the time the report was submitted, the sources said. (Bybee, Yoo and Bradbury did not respond to multiple requests for comment.)
In Full @ Newsweek
Wednesday, April 9, 2008
Ex-Chief Prosecutor At The Hague Says Kosovo Incumbent Prime Minister Implicated In Torture Of Serbs
That's right... The US just gave an al-Qaeda affiliated terrorist/drug dealing group national recognition.
“Fireworks lit up the night sky over Kosovo’s capital Pristina, where thousands of giddy ethnic Albanians braved subfreezing temperatures to ride on the roofs of their cars, singing patriotic songs and chanting: “KLA! KLA!” the acronym for the now-disbanded rebel Kosovo Liberation Army.To put it in terms that most Americans can easily understand, if not easily comprehend:
[Source WAS Forbes, SPIKED!... Now HERE]
“During his stint as NATO Supreme Commander (1997-2000), Wesley Clark was in permanent liaison with the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA). Under Wesley Clark’s command, NATO directly sponsored a terrorist paramilitary army, with links to Al Qaeda and the trans-Balkan narcotics trade.” [source]
...and the pressure is ON!
Switzerland bans Del Ponte book
BELGRADE -- The Swiss Foreign Ministry has prohibited the promotion of Carl Del Ponte’s book “Hunt”. According to the ANSA agency, the former Hague Tribunal ... [Source]
More
The Ex-Chief Prosecutor of the Hague Tribunal, Carle del Ponte, has published a book in which she reveals that many top leaders of the Kosovo Liberation Army,
including the incumbent premier Hashim Tachi
...and (Former PM) Ramush Haradinaj
...were implicated in the torture of Serbs seized during the armed conflict in Kosovo.
After being murdered, the captives' bodies were used as donors to supply transplant organs.
Carle Del Ponte says the revelations are made post factum, because her attempt to launch an inquiry into crimes by Kosovo Liberation Army leaders received no backing [Source]
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