URGENT ACTION REQUIRED: Protect Ecuadorian Community Activists

This is via the team blog to which I belong, Business & Human Rights in Vancouver. Please distribute widely.

Ecuadorian community activists are facing death threats and attacks for being against copper mining operations.

PUBLIC

AI Index: AMR 28/002/2007

UA 193/07

Fear for safety

25 July 2007

ECUADOR

Jaime Polivio Pérez Lucero (m), community leader in García Moreno parish

Mercy Catalina Torres Terán (f)

Others opposed to the Intag copper mining project

According to reports, community leader Jaime Polivio Pérez Lucero has been threatened and activist Mercy Catalina Torres Terán has been attacked, as a result of their opposition to a mining project close to their homes in the Intag area of Imbabura province, northern Ecuador. Their lives, and those of others who voice opposition to the mine, are in danger.

Jaime Polivio Pérez Lucero, from Garcia Moreno parish in Imbabura, a group of villages close to a site where the authorities and a mining company are planning to excavate for copper, has received a series of death threats in recent months. In December 2006, while he was taking part in a protest against the mining project, Jaime Polivio Pérez Lucero was reportedly approached by an armed civilian. The armed man told Jaime Polivio Pérez: “Si te sigues oponiendo a la minera vamos a tener que matarte” (if you continue to oppose the mining company we will have to kill you). According to reports, the armed civilians and security guards used tear gas and shot at the demonstrators, injuring several people. Among those injured was Jaime Polivio Pérez’s brother, Israel Pérez, who was shot.

Following the incident, Jaime Polivio Pérez reportedly received several anonymous calls on his mobile phone, in which the caller said, “Si no abandonas la dirigencia te vamos a matar. Deja de subir a Barcelona porque de caso contrario tendrás tu merecido” (If you do not quit the leadership [of a community organization in García Moreno] we are going to kill you. Stop going to Barcelona [one of the communities of the García Moreno parish] or you will get what you deserve).

On 23 June 2007, according to reports, another member of the community received an anonymous email referring to a plan to kill Jaime Polivio Pérez.

On 9 July, activist Mercy Catalina Torres was outside her home in Garcia Moreno when she was reportedly beaten by a man wearing a balaclava. She was cut and bruised in the attack. Mercy Catalina Torres had allegedly been threatened in her home two months before the attack, when a man apparently shouted at her: “porque ya vino el carro, te salvaste perra” (“because someone just arrived in a car, you saved yourself, bitch”).

Jaime Polivio Pérez and Mercy Catalina Torres reported the incidents to the local Attorney’s Office. However, to date, Amnesty International is not aware of any investigation being opened into the threats or the attack, and no protection has been granted to them.

Both Jaime Polivio Pérez and Mercy Catalina Torres have been very active and outspoken in their campaigning against the planned copper mine. They believe that the communities which will be affected by the mining project have not been consulted in a meaningful, open and transparent way by the authorities. Members of these communities are concerned about the environmental impact it might have on the area, a nature reserve where most inhabitants depend on agriculture.

BACKGROUND INFORMATION

During a visit to Ecuador in November 2006, Amnesty International visited Imbabura and met with some members of the communities affected by the mining project in Intag. The delegation received testimonies and reports of acts of intimidation, harassment and attacks against those who campaign against the mining project. Amnesty International wrote to the authorities asking for investigations to be opened into these incidents. However, to date, the organization is not aware of any investigations into these events.

RECOMMENDED ACTION: Using your own words, please choose a few of the suggestions below to create a personal appeal and send it as quickly as possible:

- expressing concern for the safety of Jaime Polivio Pérez Lucero, Mercy Catalina Torres Terán, and other inhabitants of the Intag area, Imbabura, who are opposed to the copper mining project;

- expressing concern that Jaime Polivio Pérez Lucero has been repeatedly threatened with death since December 2006, and that Mercy Catalina Torres Terán was beaten in July 2007;

- stating that these acts of intimidation appear to be linked to their campaigning actions to defend the rights of the communities in Intag to a meaningful, open and transparent consultation prior to the development of any mining project in the area;

- urging the authorities to take steps to guarantee the safety of Jaime Polivio Pérez Lucero and Mercy Catalina Torres Terán, in accordance with their own wishes;

- urging the authorities to carry out an independent and impartial investigation into the death threat received by Jaime Polivio Pérez Lucero and the attack against Mercy Catalina Torres Terán, making the results public and bringing those responsible to justice;

- asking to be informed of the results of these investigation.

APPEALS TO:

Minister of the Interior:

Dr. Gustavo Larrea

Ministro de Gobierno, Policía,

Justicia, Cultos y Municipalidades

Ministerio de Gobierno y Policía

Espejo y Benalcázar,

Quito- Ecuador

Fax: 011593 2295 5666 Ext. 155 or 011 593 2295 5666 Ext. 150 – 151 (ask for fax tone)

Salutation: Dear Minister/Señor Ministro

Attorney General:

Dr. Jorge Germán

Ministro Fiscal General del Estado

Fiscalía General del Estado

Av. Eloy Alfaro Nº 32-240 y República

Quito, Ecuador

Fax: 011 593 2255 8561 (may be difficult to reach)

Salutation: Dear Minister/Señor Ministro

Minister of Energy and Mines:

Econ. Alberto Acosta

Ministro de Energía y Minas

Ministerio de Energía y Minas

Juan León Mera Nº 26-220 y Orellana

Quito - Ecuador

Fax: 011 593 2290 6350

Salutation: Dear Attorney General/Sr. Ministro Fiscal

COPIES TO:

Human Rights Non-governmental Organization CEDHU:

Comisión Ecumenica de Derechos Humanos

Carlos Ibarra 176 y 10 de Agosto

Edif. Yuraj Pirca 9no. Piso,

Quito, Ecuador

Fax: 011 593 2258 9272

E-mail: denuncias@cedhu. org

His Excellency Fernando Ribadeneira Fernández Salvador

Ambassador for Ecuador

50 O'Connor Street, Suite 316

Ottawa, Ontario K1P 6L2

Email: mecuacan@rogers. com

Fax: (613) 235-5776

PLEASE EXPEDITE YOUR MESSAGES ON THIS CASE. THANK YOU.

A good news story for a change: a council of Elders

A council of Elders has been formed, pushed by Richard Branson and Peter Gabriel, and composed of Nelson Mandela, Archbishop Tutu, Jimmy Carter, Kofi Annan, Mary Robinson, andAung San Suu Kyi, symbolically represented by an empty chair:

The Elders have no formal role – nor, Mr. Mandela stressed, will they seek to replace or compete with any official or elected body. None of the group was willing to commit specifically to which issues they will take on, although former Irish president Mary Robinson said they are already at work. Darfur was mentioned repeatedly and a source who sat in on one of their meetings told The Globe that they have also made overtures to Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe, seeking to negotiate a way to have him leave office.

But former U.S. president Jimmy Carter said it would be fine with him if no one outside their council ever knew what issues they worked on. “The Elders neither want, nor will we ever have, any kind of authority except that that comes from common moral values,” he said. “We will be able to risk failure and we will not need to claim successes.”

The group's work is being funded with an initial infusion of $18-million (U.S.) by wealthy friends of Sir Richard.

Introducing him and Mr. Gabriel, the archbishop remarked that he should ask Mr. Gabriel to sing Biko – his iconic hymn about the murder of anti-apartheid activist Steve Biko 30 years ago. Sir Richard's head snapped up at that, and he shouldered his way back to the microphone, saying, “If you won't ask him, I will!” Moments later an abashed-looking Mr. Gabriel found himself in front of the crowd, clearing his throat.

It was a fitting place to sing this song: the gathering was held on the grounds of South Africa's Constitutional Court, which was once an apartheid prison. As the archbishop said, “This was a place of tears, of suffering, of humiliation. People were detained without trial here, people were tortured here. But they didn't buckle.”

So Mr. Gabriel squared his shoulders and sang Biko, every haunting word, and the audience – journalists and dignitaries and a row of South Africa's Constitutional Court justices – joined him with a low and rhythmic hum.

Tumultuous applause erupted as he finished, but then just as quickly died away, as people noticed the archbishop: He was hunched over, hands clutched in fists, weeping inconsolably.

“We stand on the shoulders of incredible people,” he choked out, taking off his glasses and wiping the tears. “We owe our freedom to incredible people.”

.Read the whole article here.

It's people and events like this that remind my why my activism is worthwhile, and that give me the strength to carry on.

Guardian: White House leaning toward attack on Iran.

It seems the struggle over White House policy toward Iran seems to be tilting toward military intervention:

The vice-president, Dick Cheney, has long favoured upping the threat of military action against Iran. He is being resisted by the secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, and the defence secretary, Robert Gates.

Last year Mr Bush came down in favour of Ms Rice, who along with Britain, France and Germany has been putting a diplomatic squeeze on Iran. But at a meeting of the White House, Pentagon and state department last month, Mr Cheney expressed frustration at the lack of progress and Mr Bush sided with him. "The balance has tilted. There is cause for concern," the source said this week.

Nick Burns, the undersecretary of state responsible for Iran and a career diplomat who is one of the main advocates of negotiation, told the meeting it was likely that diplomatic manoeuvring would still be continuing in January 2009. That assessment went down badly with Mr Cheney and Mr Bush.

"Cheney has limited capital left, but if he wanted to use all his capital on this one issue, he could still have an impact," said Patrick Cronin, the director of studies at the International Institute for Strategic Studies.

The Washington source said Mr Bush and Mr Cheney did not trust any potential successors in the White House, Republican or Democratic, to deal with Iran decisively. They are also reluctant for Israel to carry out any strikes because the US would get the blame in the region anyway.

"The red line is not in Iran. The red line is in Israel. If Israel is adamant it will attack, the US will have to take decisive action," Mr Cronin said. "The choices are: tell Israel no, let Israel do the job, or do the job yourself."

Read the whole article.

Canada should stand up for one of its own in China

This is something the federal government should continue to raise a stink about this Interesting that if this was a country in which Canddian businessmen did not have dollar signs in their eyes, Canada would probably be making a strong diplomatic stand about this:

A high court in far west China on Tuesday rejected an appeal from Huseyin Celil, who was sentenced to life for terrorism in April in a case that has strained Beijing's relations with Canada.

The official Xinhua News Agency said the High People's Court in China's far western Xinjiang region had upheld the life sentence handed down by a lower court because the "facts were clear, evidence was reliable and adequate."

Celil was convicted of the crimes of "separating China" and "organizing, leading and participating in terrorist groups, organizations."

Celil's status has been a point of contention between Canada and China, which does not recognize Celil's Canadian citizenship and says his case is not subject to consular agreements.

The Canadian government has been upset because Celil appeared in court without a Canadian diplomat present — a violation of his rights as a Canadian citizen.

"We are examining the court's decision and will comment at the appropriate time," a Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs spokesperson, Rodney Moore, said by telephone from Ottawa.

Pressure PM Harper and Foreign Minister McKay to take stronger diplomatic action on this.

Segregationist racism alive and well in the US south

This is from Amy Goodman of Democracy Now: the case of six black youths from Jena, Louisiana who are basically being lynched by the racist legal system there:

AMY GOODMAN: Jena is a small town nestled deep in the heart of Central Louisiana. Until recently, you may well never have heard of it. But this rural town of less than 4,000 has become a focal point in the debate around issues of race and justice in this country.

Last December, six black students at Jena High School were arrested after a school fight in which a white student was beaten and suffered a concussion and multiple bruises. The six black students were charged with attempted second-degree murder and conspiracy. They face up to 100 years in prison without parole.

The Jena 6, as they have come to be known, range in age from fifteen to seventeen. Just over a week ago, an all-white jury took less than two days to convict seventeen-year-old Mychal Bell, the first of the Jena 6 to go on trial. He was convicted of aggravated battery and conspiracy charges and now faces up to twenty-two years in prison. Black residents say race has always been an issue in Jena, which is 85% white and that the charges against the Jena 6 are no exception.

The origins of the story can be traced back to early September, when a black high school student requested permission to sit under a tree in the schoolyard, where usually only white students sat. The next day, three nooses were found hanging from the tree

. In an interview Amy does with parents of the Jena 6, a mother suggest what we can do to help:

CASEPTLA BAILEY: I would like to leave this message to the people of the United States, that we are asking for a plea to the governor of Louisiana, Governor Kathleen Blanco, to come in and assist, investigate, and do as she needs to do on this case with Mychal Bell, as well as the other Jena 6.

AMY GOODMAN: I want to thank you all for being with us. And, finally, Catrina, one more time, that address that you gave out. Catrina Wallace, secretary of the LaSalle Parish NAACP.

CATRINA WALLACE: Yes, it’s the Jena 6 Defense Committee, PO Box 2798, Jena, LA 71342.

Olbermann: Bush, Resign!

Via Matthew Good.

This is the most powerful vocal indictment of Bush I think I've come across. Transcript and video also on Crooks and Liars.

Archbishop Tutu sets his sights on poverty and corruption

First, Tutu blasts the Mbeki government of South Africa for not keeping the AND promise of reducing economic inequality:

"Most [people] are languishing in the wilderness," the archbishop said of the slow pace of wealth redistribution since the end of white rule 13 years ago. Using a Biblical analogy, he said South Africans had crossed the Red Sea in their struggle against apartheid but that very few had reached the promised land.

The archbishop, one of the most inspirational leaders of the anti-apartheid movement, was, not for the first time in the eight-year-old presidency of Thabo Mbeki, wading into an acutely sensitive political debate. His warning came as the ruling African National Congress held its five-yearly policy conference against the backdrop of savage criticism from the left, which argues the government's pro-business policies have not helped the poor.

In the past, almost all the affluent were white, now they had been joined by a few black people, Archbishop Tutu said. But most of the people living in shacks before the end of white rule were still living in shacks.

"I'm really very surprised by the remarkable patience of people," he told the Financial Times at the launchof the Tutu Foundation in London on Wednesday. It was hard "to explain why they don't say to hell with Tutu, [Nelson] Mandela and the rest and go on the rampage."

Second, Tutu goes after liberation here-turned-tyrant Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe again:

South African Nobel peace prize laureate Desmond Tutu said on Wednesday Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe needed face-saving options for there to be a chance of him stepping aside.

Tutu said the replacement of Tony Blair by Gordon Brown as prime minister of Britain, Zimbabwe's former colonial ruler, could help the situation but much depended on negotiations to resolve the crisis being mediated by South Africa.

"A change of cast might have an important bearing on how things develop," Tutu told Reuters in an interview.

"I would hope that there might just be a way of providing face-savers that would enable people to exit without feeling that they had lost a great deal of personal stature," he said.

"We need to provide that for the sake of the people and it may be that [Britain's] new prime minister just might have a way of saying things that would be slightly more acceptable."

The man (Tutu) is a light in the dark, telling it like it is with dignity.

Fisk on envoy Blair

Tony Blair is the newly appointed envoy for the Middle East. I'm not sure exactly what the US, Russia, and the EU ewre thinking, but I don't think its a very good choice. I was already thinking, what does Robert Fisk think about it? Well, here we go:

Can this really be true? I had always assumed that Balfour, Sykes and Picot were the epitome of Middle Eastern hubris. But Blair? That this ex-prime minister, this man who took his country into the sands of Iraq, should actually believe that he has a role in the region - he whose own preposterous envoy, Lord Levy, made so many secret trips there to absolutely no avail - is now going to sully his hands (and, I fear, our lives) in the world's last colonial war is simply overwhelming.

Of course, he'll be in touch with Mahmoud Abbas, will try to marginalise Hamas, will talk endlessly about "moderates"; and we'll have to listen to him pontificating about morality, how he's absolutely and completely confident that he's doing the right thing (and this, remember, is the same man who postponed a ceasefire in Lebanon last year in order to share George Bush's ridiculous hope of an Israeli victory over Hizbollah) in bringing peace to the Middle East...

Not once - ever - has he apologised. Not once has he said he was sorry for what he did in our name. Yet Lord Blair actually believes - in what must be a record act of self-indulgence for a man who cooked up the fake evidence of Iraq's "weapons of mass destruction" - that he can do good in the Middle East.

For here is a man who is totally discredited in the region - a politician who has signally failed in everything he ever tried to do in the Middle East - now believing that he is the right man to lead the Quartet to patch up "Palestine".

Fisk concludes by drawing an unpleasant comparison to another certain historical figure:

I recall another man with Blair's pomposity, a certain Kurt Waldheim, who - no longer the UN's boss - actually believed he could be an "envoy" for peace in the Middle East, despite his little wartime career as an intelligence officer for the Wehrmacht's Army Group "E".

His visits - especially to the late King Hussein - came to nothing, of course. But Waldheim's ability to draw a curtain over his wartime past does have one thing in common with Blair. For Waldheim steadfastly, pointedly, repeatedly, refused to acknowledge - ever - that he had ever done anything wrong. Now who does that remind you of?

Read the entire article here.

New team blog from my offline existence

In my offline existence, I am chair of Amnesty International's Business and Human Rights working group in Vancouver.

We have a new team blog up and running.

Please check it out!!

It was 10 years ago today: OK Computer

Well OK, 10 years ago two days ago, arguably the greatest album of the '90, one of the greatest in the history of modern music. I realize a lot of people don't "get" Radiohead, and I respect that. It took me awhile to get them myself. When OK Computer first came out, loved Karma Police like everyone else did of course, but I didn't know what to make of the whole album. So, this is not a case of me just following an "in" crowd. Over time, I have been entranced with the dark,desperate lyrics, the incredibly moving medlodies, and the sometimes achingly raw sound of the album, to the point where I consider it one of the very best CD's in my collection.


PS, look for a new release from them later this summer.

Two takes on the conflict in Gaza

There are, in my mind, two equally important takes on the events in Gaza. One is a political one, as articulated by Robert Fisk:

How troublesome the Muslims of the Middle East are. First, we demand that the Palestinians embrace democracy and then they elect the wrong party - Hamas - and then Hamas wins a mini-civil war and presides over the Gaza Strip. And we Westerners still want to negotiate with the discredited President, Mahmoud Abbas. Today "Palestine" - and let's keep those quotation marks in place - has two prime ministers. Welcome to the Middle East.

Who can we negotiate with? To whom do we talk? Well of course, we should have talked to Hamas months ago. But we didn't like the democratically elected government of the Palestinian people. They were supposed to have voted for Fatah and its corrupt leadership. But they voted for Hamas, which declines to recognise Israel or abide by the totally discredited Oslo agreement.

No one asked - on our side - which particular Israel Hamas was supposed to recognise. The Israel of 1948? The Israel of the post-1967 borders? The Israel which builds - and goes on building - vast settlements for Jews and Jews only on Arab land, gobbling up even more of the 22 per cent of "Palestine" still left to negotiate over ?

And so today, we are supposed to talk to our faithful policeman, Mr Abbas, the "moderate" (as the BBC, CNN and Fox News refer to him) Palestinian leader, a man who wrote a 600-page book about Oslo without once mentioning the word "occupation", who always referred to Israeli "redeployment" rather than "withdrawal", a "leader" we can trust because he wears a tie and goes to the White House and says all the right things. The Palestinians didn't vote for Hamas because they wanted an Islamic republic - which is how Hamas's bloody victory will be represented - but because they were tired of the corruption of Mr Abbas's Fatah and the rotten nature of the "Palestinian Authority"

Fisk is right. We in the West are upset with Palestinians because they voted for the wrong party. We have no right to commplain. Like it or lump it, Hamas is in control in Gaza, and we will have to deal with them.

So what will we do? Support the reoccupation of Gaza perhaps? Certainly we will not criticise Israel. And we shall go on giving our affection to the kings and princes and unlovely presidents of the Middle East until the whole place blows up in our faces and then we shall say - as we are already saying of the Iraqis - that they don't deserve our sacrifice and our love.

How do we deal with a coup d'état by an elected government?

As a human rights activist, I would be remiss if I didn't mention the other take on events in Gaza. This is expressed in a press release from Amnesty International, concerning violations of international law and disaregard for human life on the part of both Fatah and Hamas in the conflict in Gaza:

Amid unprecedented political violence in the Gaza Strip, both Fatah and Hamas security forces and armed groups have shown utter disregard for fundamental principles of international law and have committed grave human rights abuses.

The indiscriminate attacks and reckless gun battles in residential neighbourhoods have left a beleaguered civilian population, already suffering from a year of international sanctions and continuing Israeli military blockades, virtual prisoners in their own homes. Both parties have killed captured rivals, and have abducted scores of members of rival groups and held them hostage, to be exchanged for friends and relatives held by their rivals, Killing captured fighters and hostage-taking are war crimes.

Rival security forces loyal to the Fatah party of PA President Mahmoud Abbas and the Hamas party of Prime Minister Isma'il Haniyeh, have signally betrayed their responsibility to uphold and enforce the law and to protect the population. Instead, acting in concert with the armed groups which serve as their proxy militias, they have engaged persistently in armed clashes, killing and injuring civilians not involved in the clashes with complete impunity.

Now that Hamas has gained control of Fatah' security forces installations in Gaza and repudiated President Abbas' decision to dissolve the coalition government and impose a state of emergency in the OPT, fears are growing that the fighting will spill over into the West Bank. In recent days Fatah's gunmen have been abducting Hamas members and holding them as hostages and ransacking Hamas offices in Nablus, Ramallah and elsewhere in the West Bank, deepening concern that abuses will increase if the fighting escalates there.

Here is what Amnesty is calling for:

to take immediate action to ensure that their forces and the armed groups acting as their proxy militias cease endangering civilians and violating international law through their reckless, disproportionate and indiscriminate use of force in Gaza, and to prevent further abuses in the West Bank - notably:

* to assert control over the security forces and ensure that they uphold the law and respect human rights, including international standards relating to the use of force and treatment of prisoners, and ensure that members of their security forces who abuse human rights or fail to carry out their duty are held to account;
* end impunity, by establishing effective mechanisms to bring to justice those responsible for human rights abuses, irrespective of their political affiliation;
* instruct their security forces that the armed groups who commit human rights abuses or crimes must be apprehended and brought to justice, irrespective of their political affiliations, in accordance with international human rights law and standards;
* put in place a mechanism to ensure independent, impartial and non-partisan oversight of the security forces and ensure that all killings, abductions and other attacks on civilians are investigated and that those responsible are brought to justice.

Palast on Vulture fund companies

I urge every person of conscience to learn more about this. This is despicable.

Vulture fund companies are companies that buy up the debt of third world countries at very low prices and then sue for the full amount. Muckraking journalist Greg Palast has been following this issue for awhile now. I blogged about it first in February. Today, he was on Democracy Now! with Amy Goodman.

AMY GOODMAN: Greg Palast reporting. He joins us in studio now. Right now, where does it all stand, Greg. Who has the power and the damage that’s being done?

GREG PALAST: It’s all up to George Bush right now. This is what is driving the other members of the G8, that is, the incoming Prime Minister of Britain, Gordon Brown, has made this like number one priority. I mean, you have to understand, debt relief for Africa is real serious business for Europe. And about half – about half of the money for aid to Africa is being sucked up by these “Vultures” who are seizing the funds. It all comes down to George Bush. It’s also driving Congressman Conyers crazy. And he’s basically said, “Look. If Bush doesn't do the right thing, this is the next investigation. He just made a big splash with investigating the prosecutor firings. That ain't done yet. But as soon as that’s done, he moves right into “Vultures” if Bush doesn't act. Now what is it – what’s the deal with Bush? You see – under US – what’s happening is these “Vultures” are seizing the money from US bank accounts, principally. And George Bush can - of these poor nations. In other words, they’re given money to buy AIDS drugs, they have resources to, you know, for - basically earmarked for education, AIDS. They're sucking up the AIDS money. Bush can put a stop to it tomorrow morning. No one can sue a foreign government in the United States without the approval of the US government, in particular the President of the United States. Its under the Separations of Powers clause of our Constitution.

AMY GOODMAN: And what did Bush respond to, Conyers?

GREG PALAST: Well you know, it’s been the, he does that, you know: “I missed school that day. I don't know what’s going on.” You know, deer in the headlights. “I’ll check it out. I’ll do something about it.” Now, as you know, we had this dramatic situation, which both Congressman Conyers, the chairman, powerful chairman, and Don Payne, head of the Africa Committee, two powerful cats, were both heading to the White House for meetings, both of them listening to Democracy Now!. They both had the same idea: “We don't care what’s on the agenda with the President. This, the “Vultures” is what we have to talk about at – these billions of dollars. And, as Conyers said, until they heard the Democracy Now! report, a lot of members of Congress listen to this program! They had no idea that the money was being sucked up. They were voting for billions of dollars for Africa, and they didn’t know that Bush’s friends – now when I say Bush’s friends – you have to understand, the biggest single “Vulture Fund”, the biggest predator is, uh, operations owned by a guy named Paul Singer, who is the number one donor for George Bush and the Republican Party in New York. He’s also the big fund-raiser, he’s raising 10 million dollars for Rudy Giuliani. This isn’t the sidelight for this guy, this is the only way he makes money. So George Bush has to know that his big money is basically coming from kickbacks, from money taken from aid for Africa. If he didn't know before, Conyers and Payne, after hearing Democracy Now! put it right in his face. The reason is, they didn’t want they don't want the President to say “I don't know, it’s a lower-level thing.” The President knows. And the G8 members, personally. When I say G8 – these are the world leaders, Chancellor Merkel in Germany...

AMY GOODMAN: Did Bush do something about it at the G8 summit?

GREG PALAST: Um, I think he hid in the boy's room. He didn't come out when they were supposed to some discussions, you know. So it’s been this kind of, you know, duck and run operation.

Read the transcript here.

CIA secret relationship with Sudan.

The Los Angeles Times reports that despite US condemnations of the Sudanese government regarding the genocide in Darfur, the CIA has had a secret relationship with the Sudanese government in the war on terror:

And at a time when Sudan is being condemned in the international community, its counter-terrorism work has won precious praise. The U.S. State Department recently issued a report calling Sudan a "strong partner in the war on terror."

Some critics accuse the Bush administration of being soft on Sudan for fear of jeopardizing the counter-terrorism cooperation. John Prendergast, director of African affairs for the National Security Council in the Clinton administration, called the latest sanctions announced by Bush last month "window dressing," designed to appear tough while putting little real pressure on Sudan to stop the militias it is widely believed to be supporting from killing members of tribal settlements in Darfur.

"One of the main glass ceilings on real significant action in response to the genocide in Darfur has been our growing relationship with authorities in Khartoum on counter-terrorism," said Prendergast, a senior advisor to the International Crisis Group. "It is the single biggest contributor to why the gap between rhetoric and action is so large."

Read the whole article here.

Tiananmen Square 18 years later: Let us never forget

The Chinese government is still ruthless, autocratic, ignorant, and corrupt in so many ways. Let us never forget what those students died for.

A new arms race?

The Russian goverment has tested a new missile that it claims can overcome a missile defence system.

Russia's hawkish first deputy prime minister, Sergei Ivanov, said the country had tested both a new multiple-warhead intercontinental missile, the RS-24, and an improved version of its short-range Iskander missile.

He said the missiles were capable of destroying enemy systems and added: "As of today Russia has new missiles that are capable of overcoming any existing or future missile defence systems. In terms of defence and security, Russia can look calmly to the country's future."

The missile tests follow months of anger in Moscow over the Bush administration's determination to install parts of a controversial missile defence shield in eastern Europe.

President Vladimir Putin has been incensed by the Pentagon's plans to site missile interceptors and radar shields in Poland and the Czech Republic. The row has contributed to the worst relations between Russia and the west for 20 years.

It seems we are indeed headed for a new arms race. I am not enthusiastic about any country adding to their nuclear arsenal. Putin, in many areas ervolving around human rights violations and all-around thuggery, leaves alot to be desired in my mind. That said, what did Bush think would happen? For years now, Russia and China has expressed concern about a proposed US missile defence system, and not without cause. It further destabilizes the balance of military power in the world. According to Bush:"

"The Cold War is over," Bush told foreign reporters in an interview Thursday that previewed an eight-day trip to Europe next week. "We're now into the 21st century, where we need to deal with the true threats, which are threats of radical extremists who will kill to advance an ideology and the threats of proliferation."

Well, the Cold War was over. Maybe it still is. It was entirely up to Bush. It still mostly is, and it is certainly his administration that has gotten us into the pickle we're in now. As I said, I don't like any example of nuclear proliferation, and certainly if the US reneges on missle defence, I would expect Putin to do likewise with respect to his new missile. However, in a unipolar world, other countries, including Russia, see it as a way of protecting themselves.

Iran: Which way will the US go?

It is certainly at least worth noting that the US and Iran have met, if only with respect to Iran. It's a start, but it's not nearly enough.

It is also worth noting that while there are talks, the Telegraph reports that

President George W Bush has given the CIA approval to launch covert "black" operations to achieve regime change in Iran, intelligence sources have revealed.

Furthermore, this from Reuters:

A large flotilla of U.S. ships entered the Gulf on Wednesday in a dramatic show of military muscle, adding to pressure on Iran to abandon its nuclear ambitions, which the West says are an attempt to develop atomic weapons.

Afghan officials say privately a U.S. attack on neighboring Iran would further destabilize Afghanistan where U.S. and NATO troops are fighting a resurgent Taliban.

Cindy Sheehan leaves the movement (or maybe it left her).

Thanks to Catnip, I found out about this; that is, Cindy Sheehan is leaving the US anti-war movement. Catnip provides excellent commentary on what Cindy had to say, so I'll just post an excerpt from her diary. I'll just say that I always felt that she was a figure that others in the movement could rally around, and that the manner in which partisan Democrats have viciously attacked her is disgusting, and says more about their narrow-mindedness and partisan political opportunism and shortsightedness than it says about her.

Best wishes and stay strong Cindy.

I have come to some heartbreaking conclusions this Memorial Day Morning. These are not spur of the moment reflections, but things I have been meditating on for about a year now. The conclusions that I have slowly and very reluctantly come to are very heartbreaking to me.

The first conclusion is that I was the darling of the so-called left as long as I limited my protests to George Bush and the Republican Party. Of course, I was slandered and libeled by the right as a "tool" of the Democratic Party. This label was to marginalize me and my message. How could a woman have an original thought, or be working outside of our "two-party" system?

However, when I started to hold the Democratic Party to the same standards that I held the Republican Party, support for my cause started to erode and the "left" started labeling me with the same slurs that the right used. I guess no one paid attention to me when I said that the issue of peace and people dying for no reason is not a matter of "right or left", but "right and wrong."

I am deemed a radical because I believe that partisan politics should be left to the wayside when hundreds of thousands of people are dying for a war based on lies that is supported by Democrats and Republican alike. It amazes me that people who are sharp on the issues and can zero in like a laser beam on lies, misrepresentations, and political expediency when it comes to one party refuse to recognize it in their own party. Blind party loyalty is dangerous whatever side it occurs on. People of the world look on us Americans as jokes because we allow our political leaders so much murderous latitude and if we don’t find alternatives to this corrupt "two" party system our Representative Republic will die and be replaced with what we are rapidly descending into with nary a check or balance: a fascist corporate wasteland. I am demonized because I don’t see party affiliation or nationality when I look at a person, I see that person’s heart. If someone looks, dresses, acts, talks and votes like a Republican, then why do they deserve support just because he/she calls him/herself a Democrat?

I have also reached the conclusion that if I am doing what I am doing because I am an "attention whore" then I really need to be committed. I have invested everything I have into trying to bring peace with justice to a country that wants neither. If an individual wants both, then normally he/she is not willing to do more than walk in a protest march or sit behind his/her computer criticizing others. I have spent every available cent I got from the money a "grateful" country gave me when they killed my son and every penny that I have received in speaking or book fees since then. I have sacrificed a 29 year marriage and have traveled for extended periods of time away from Casey’s brother and sisters and my health has suffered and my hospital bills from last summer (when I almost died) are in collection because I have used all my energy trying to stop this country from slaughtering innocent human beings. I have been called every despicable name that small minds can think of and have had my life threatened many times.

The most devastating conclusion that I reached this morning, however, was that Casey did indeed die for nothing. His precious lifeblood drained out in a country far away from his family who loves him, killed by his own country which is beholden to and run by a war machine that even controls what we think. I have tried every since he died to make his sacrifice meaningful. Casey died for a country which cares more about who will be the next American Idol than how many people will be killed in the next few months while Democrats and Republicans play politics with human lives. It is so painful to me to know that I bought into this system for so many years and Casey paid the price for that allegiance. I failed my boy and that hurts the most.

I have also tried to work within a peace movement that often puts personal egos above peace and human life. This group won’t work with that group; he won’t attend an event if she is going to be there; and why does Cindy Sheehan get all the attention anyway? It is hard to work for peace when the very movement that is named after it has so many divisions.

Amnesty USA on Democracy Now: 2007 Annual Report

Amnesty USA director Larry Cox, being interviewed by Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzalez of Democracy Now, said some things that I think are quite pertinent, in placing the importance of the US in the global human rights context:

AMY GOODMAN: What do you think are the most important issues you want to highlight right now?

LARRY COX: Well, I think you’ve already highlighted them. I think the most serious challenge we have to human rights in practice and to the idea of human rights is unfortunately the open defiance by the United States, not because it’s the worst country in terms of human rights violations, but because its example is so powerful. It is a superpower, and when it openly defies human rights in the way that it has, openly violates the most fundamental human rights and justifies those violations, it spreads around the globe. It has a terrible impact.

AMY GOODMAN: You start with the Military Commissions Act.

LARRY COX: Well, the Military Commissions Act sort of brings together many of these practices: holding people without access to a court, without charging them, without trying them; setting up military commissions that can use evidence that has been obtained through coercion, that no normal court would accept; denying habeas to people, one of the oldest protections and a very important protection against abuse and against torture around the world. These are all practices that historically the United States in recent decades has criticized severely, when other countries have carried it out. Now, we’re doing it.

So where is our moral authority? Where is our credibility, when we got to Egypt, for example, and say, “You should not have military commissions,” when we go to Egypt and say, “You should not be carrying out torture,” when we have, in fact, sent people to Egypt knowing that they would be tortured?

He also touches on the issue of fear, keeping people in a state of fear in order to justify restrictions of civil liberties:

JUAN GONZALEZ: You say in the report that far too many leaders are trampling freedom and trumpeting an ever-widening range of fears, fears of being swamped by migrants, fears of being blown up by terrorists, and fears of rogue states with weapons of mass destruction. What about this issue of fear and its impact on populations not raising questions about any of this?

LARRY COX: Well, this is the central reality of the world we’re now in, where fear, instead of being met -- and there are, of course, legitimate fears that people have -- but instead of meeting those fears with effective ways of dealing with the causes of that fear, fear is being manipulated. Fear is being used, fear is being exaggerated, in order to justify what is, in fact, unjustifiable. You see it around the globe. You see it in China, where, you know, every time someone is arrested now, it’s terrorism. You see it in Russia, where, again, the threat of the conflict in Chechnya is now being used to widely justify restrictions on civil society. This use of fear is one of the most frightening aspects of the world we’re now living in.

As well, he deals with a US State Department official who dismisses the Amnesty report as having been drivent by ideology.

AMY GOODMAN: Larry Cox, the Bush administration has been fiercely critical of Amnesty's findings. On Wednesday, State Department spokesperson, Tom Casey, was asked about the report.

REPORTER: Have you read the Amnesty International report, which suggests that in the war on terror the United States has been eroding human rights around the world?

TOM CASEY: Well, George, I think people will take a good look at the report. Certainly, I don’t think anyone’s had an opportunity to review it in depth. Pretty clear that Amnesty International thought that we’d make a convenient ideological punching bag, and that’s something that isn’t, unfortunately, new.

I think we personally wish that Amnesty International would have been a little more willing to do things like try and help out the Iraqis, as they dealt with the trials of some of the worst war criminals who have been around for the last fifty years. And I think if you look at the report, unfortunately, it reads quite a bit more like a political document than a sort of honest review of human rights throughout the world.

AMY GOODMAN: That was the Bush administration. Your response, Larry Cox?

LARRY COX: Well, there’s nothing unusual about these kinds of attacks. We’ve been getting these kinds of attacks from governments all around the world every time we criticize their human rights violations. We don’t engage in ideology. We engage in facts. Now, we have, unfortunately, a very sad collection of facts about the United States. The United States has openly admitted having secret detention sites, even said it boastfully, and that it will continue to have secret detention sites, where people are kidnapped and taken. No one knows where they are. These are not things that Amnesty International has invented. These are the words of the President of the United States.

We know that if we criticize strongly what a government is doing when a government is doing something wrong, that we’re going to get these kind of attacks. There’s nothing really new about them. It’s just a very sad comment that instead of responding to these concerns, which are not Amnesty’s concerns alone, but virtually every UN body -- every other independent human rights organization around the world has raised the same charges. So you have to attack the entire body of human rights experts around the globe if you’re the United States, because we're all saying the same thing.

Finally, he discusses the effect of a lack of US leadership on the ability of the United Nations to take action on troublespots around the world:

JUAN GONZALEZ: And in terms of the ability of the United Nations to have any kind of impact on the human rights situation around the world?

LARRY COX: Well, the United Nations depends upon leadership. And one of the reasons that we are so adamant about what the United States is doing is the way it has weakened the ability of multilateral organizations like the United Nations to play an effective role. That’s most striking in the case of Darfur, where the world has stood by and watched, as, you know, massive human rights violations take place, and issued statements, but has not been able to put troops on the ground that can protect people. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is another one, where, you know, there has been no really effective move to correct a situation which continues to deteriorate. And US leadership has been so undermined by US practice that it’s hard to imagine how the US can now play a constructive role.

Read the full Amnesty annual report here.

Bye Bye Wolf at the Door (with apologies to Radiohead)

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2007/05/18/wolfowitz_resigns_from_world_bank/

Chavez pulls out of IMF and World Bank

I do remember hearing something about this before, but this is interesting. Chavez is pulling Vensezuala out of the IMF and the World Bank.

"I want to formalize our exit from the World Bank and the IMF," Chavez said, adding that "We will no longer have to go to Washington, neither to the IMF nor the World Bank, not to anyone."

Chavez, who has often blamed lending policies of these organizations for perpetuating poverty, proposed earlier to establish a Bank of the South, which would be run by Latin American nations and it can help countries facing financial difficulties.

Also, Chavez has pledged to support it with Venezuela's oil revenues.

After Chavez took office in 1999, Venezuela has paid off all its debts to the IMF, and the country recently repaid its debts to the World Bank five years ahead of schedule.

The IMF closed its offices in Venezuela late last year.

For those hoping this backfires on Chavez, don't get your hopes too high. Chavez is a smart operator with a strong following. And, I came across this from Bloomberg:

Venezuela's dollar bonds rose the most in more than a week as concern eased that the South American country may trigger a default by pulling out of the International Monetary Fund.

Power sharing in Northern Ireland

I never thought I would see the day. I'm glad I have, though. Ian Paisley actually agreeing to work with Sinn Fein, that is!

Watched by dignitaries from Britain, Ireland, the United States and elsewhere, the Rev. Ian Paisley, leader of the Democratic Unionists, the dominant party among Northern Ireland’s Protestants, and Martin McGuinness, of the republican and mainly Catholic Sinn Fein party, were sworn in as leader and deputy leader, respectively, of the Northern Ireland executive government.

“Today, we will witness not hype but history,” Mr. McGuinness proclaimed.

Mr. Paisley, once the most strident voice of Protestant opposition to peace efforts, told reporters, “while this is a sad day for all the innocent victims of all the Troubles, yet it is a special day because we are making a new beginning.”

“I believe we are starting on a road to bring us back to peace and prosperity,” he added.

ICC issues warrants related to Darfur atrocities

Human Rights Watch issued a press release today indicating that the International Criminal Court has decided to issue arrest warrants regarding the atrocities in Darfur.

"Monitoring isn't the solution," said Alex Neve, Amnesty International spokesman. "It's a positive step forward compared to the former deal, but that's not the end point when torture is as rampant and systematic as it is in Afghanistan. No amount of monitoring will prevent something that is a secret, insidious practice that can inflict devastating harm and damage on prisoners in a few minutes."

Neve said NATO should jointly operate a detention facility with Afghan officials.

HRW also noted a call by the ICC for the Sudanese government to finally cooperate with it and hand over the defendants,

In its decision to issue warrants, the Pre-Trial Chamber noted the Sudanese foreign ministry’s public statement that Khartoum will not cooperate with the ICC. It also noted indications that Ahmed Haroun is concealing evidence, and the fact that Ali Kosheib is in Sudanese custody and thus unable to voluntarily appear before the court without a warrant.

The United Nations Security Council resolution 1593, which in March 2005 referred the situation in Darfur to the ICC’s prosecutor, requires Sudan to cooperate fully with ICC investigations.

“The Security Council has obligated Sudan to cooperate with the ICC, and Sudanese officials should stop flouting their responsibility to comply,” said Dicker. “The council needs to monitor Sudan’s conduct and insist that it hands over the suspects as required.”

The cooperation required from Sudanese authorities includes not only executing arrest warrants, but also responding positively to requests from the ICC prosecutor. The Arab League and the African Union should also take steps to ensure the Sudanese government complies with these obligations.

BBC: Nightmare in Somalia

I think we should become increasingly concerned with developments in Somalia. There have been 300 hundred deaths there recently:

It is a complicated and bloody struggle.

In the past few days more than 300 have been killed and since the turn of the year 2,000 have died, most of them civilians caught in crossfire.

Many thousands have been injured.

The appalling violence has led to one of the largest mass migrations in recent times.

Somali residents of Mogadishu pile their belongings onto a cargo truck
An increasing number of people continue to flee the volatile capital

Hundreds of thousands of people who were living in Mogadishu have grabbed what few possessions they could carry and headed for places of safety.

Some have moved to the outskirts of the capital away from the fighting.

Others have gone out into the Somali hinterland.

They have travelled into an environment that cannot sustain them, into villages dotted along dusty roads in the scrubby, scruffy bush of southern and central Somalia, into communities which were hit in the past year, first by drought and then by flooding.

There is little stored food, goat and cattle herds are only just recovering and the capacity to feed and care for thousands of displaced people does not exist.

And in the past few days the annual rains have started.

At the best of times Somalia poses huge problems for aid agencies.

Now it is, as one aid worker put it to me, "a total nightmare".

Fighting, poor infrastructure and flooded muddy roads are impeding the movement of food and medical supplies and the transitional government has been accused of deliberately blocking some aid because they feared it might end up in the hands of their enemies.

Cholera is now seeping through the displaced thousands, picking off the young and the weak.

In the rain and misery, hundreds have died.

And all because of foreign intervention in reaction to the Islamist presence in Somalia:

Just a few months ago, Mogadishu and much of Somalia were enjoying their most stable period for 16 years.

Under the brief control of the Islamic Courts Union, the grip of the warlords was loosened and some of the basic expectations of an organised life were being restored.

Schools were opening, police were being trained, roadblocks were removed and litter was even collected from the streets.

Many Somalis were unhappy with the more extreme rules of the Islamic Courts: closing down the cinemas, banning music and insisting women were veils.

But the Islamists were able to spread their power steadily through more of Somalia and this alarmed the government in neighbouring Ethiopia who have long feared a radical Islamic group in control of the country.

It worried the Americans too, who feared the Islamic Courts were harbouring al-Qaeda elements.

So with tacit American approval and with other international governments looking on, Ethiopia sent troops into Somalia to support the weak transitional government.

Ethiopia is now trapped.

It wants to get out of Somalia, but cannot go until what it calls the "Islamist threat" is eliminated.

But every moment Ethiopian troops spend in Somalia stirs up more resentment and their presence acts as a compelling recruiting sergeant for insurgents, who say they will die trying to rid their country of the Ethiopian invaders.

Darfur Rally in Vancouver, Sunday, April 29

Find the event in your area. Here's mine.

Global Day of Action for Darfur

Vancouver Art Gallery

April 29, 2007

2 pm-4 pm

The week of April 29 marks the grim 4-year anniversary of the conflict against innocent civilians in Darfur in Sudan. We need your voice to demand that the Canadian government pressure all sides to stop the violence, respect the ceasefire and encourage the UN-African Union force to be deployed in Darfur.

Join us on this Global Day of Action for Darfur to unite together to continue to send a strong message that concrete action must be taken in Darfur. Too little has been done for far too long and every second wasted, a young girl gets raped, a husband is murdered or a village is burned down.

SPEAKERS

1. Bob Waisman, Holocaust survivor

2. Ahmed Amit: Darfur and President of Sudan-Canada Association

3. A Liberal MP

4. Maria Ang, Heritage Wood Secondary

5. Melody Tabatabaian, Gleneagle Secondary School

6. Nadia Khan

7. Rod Downing

MUSICAL PERFORMERS

1. Edith Wallace

**More speakers and performers will be confirmed shortly**

We need your voice. Join us in an act of solidarity for the people of Darfur. Confirmed speakers and performers will be announced shortly.

In the mean time, find your MP here to urge the Canadian government to: 1. End the violence in Darfur and implement a robust-international protection force

2. Condemn the Government of Sudan for its flagrant disregard of past agreements

3. Condemn the Government of Sudan for failing to take seriously the recent ICC naming of two Sudanese suspects for war crimes and crimes against humanity

4. Significantly increase funding for Darfuri refugees and urge other countries to do the same.

Write to your MP and after 3 days when they don't respond, send a follow up, and keep following up until you hear back from their office. It's time to make our voices heard.

See also:
http://www.darfurconsortium.org
http://www.globefordarfur.org

Bill Moyers on Democracy Now!

Bill Moyers was on Democracy Now! today. He describes his new TV series on PBS, "Buying the War."

We are entering the fifth year of this war. The casualties keep mounting. April was the deadliest month so far. The deadliest day occurred in April. And the press, which was very much responsible for creating the momentum for the war, has yet to understand it's role. So I wanted to look, with my producer Kathy Hughes, at what are the lessons we can learn from what happened in the build-up to the war, so that we might not see it happen again. This is an example of what happens when the press surrenders its independence and suspends its skepticism and becomes a cheerleader for an administration. And I don’t care what administration it is -- Democratic or Republican. When the press gives up its power to scrutinize what power is doing, then we’re all in trouble.

Read the whole interview.

Chomsky and Zinn on Democracy Now!

Fans of Howard Zinn and/or Noam Chomsky will be interested to know that Amy Goodman of Democracy Now conducted wide-ranging interview in two parts in Boston with Chomsky and Zinn. Here they are:

Part I
Part II

For those interested in hearing Chomsky on Pelosi's trip to Syria:

The only thing wrong with it, it was that it was the third person in line. I mean, if the United States government were sincerely interested in bringing about some measure of peace, prosperity, stability in the region instead of dominating it by force, now they would of course be dealing with Syria and with Iran. Pretty much the way the Baker-Hamilton report proposed except beyond what they proposed because they proposed, they should be dealing with it in matters concerning with Iraq. But there are regional issues. In the case of Syria, there are issues related to Syria itself, but also to Lebanon and to Israel. Israel is in control of, in fact has annexed in violation of Security Council orders, has annexed a large part of Syrian territory, the Golan Heights. Syria is making it very clear that they are interested in a peace settlement with Israel, which would involve, as it should, the withdrawal of the Israeli troops from occupied territories.

The arrest of Kasparov

The famous chess player Garry Kasparov was arrested among others at a protest in Moscow. They were arrested for holding a rally that had been banned because the space had been reserved for a pro-Kremlin group simply to block Hasparov's group from using it.

Kasparov and some other activists were detained near Pushkin Square almost upon their arrival and were placed on a police bus. As he was being driven off, Kasparov managed to shout out an open window, "This regime is criminal. This is a police state. They arrest people everywhere."

His lawyer later said Kasparov had been charged with "shouting anti-government slogans in the presence of a large group of people," the Russian news agency Interfax reported.

He was released late in the evening after being fined $39 for violation of public order.

Around the same time that Kasparov was arrested, other protesters began approaching the police who had cordoned off Pushkin Square.

"Why are you not allowing people to get together and hold rallies as the constitution provides?" one man, who later identified himself as Yevgeny Shimenkov, 67, said to an officer.

"The constitution is for you. For us, there are orders of our commander," the policeman replied.

"You must know your orders are criminal. Your commander is a criminal and you are his accomplices," Shimenkov said.

We hear your cries, Kasparov.

Noam Chomsky puts Iran in context.

From TomDispatch, here's Noam Chomsky, very aptly putting the whole US "should we go to war with Iran" line in context.

This "debate" is a typical illustration of a primary principle of sophisticated propaganda. In crude and brutal societies, the Party Line is publicly proclaimed and must be obeyed -- or else. What you actually believe is your own business and of far less concern. In societies where the state has lost the capacity to control by force, the Party Line is simply presupposed; then, vigorous debate is encouraged within the limits imposed by unstated doctrinal orthodoxy. The cruder of the two systems leads, naturally enough, to disbelief; the sophisticated variant gives an impression of openness and freedom, and so far more effectively serves to instill the Party Line. It becomes beyond question, beyond thought itself, like the air we breathe.

The debate over Iranian interference in Iraq proceeds without ridicule on the assumption that the United States owns the world. We did not, for example, engage in a similar debate in the 1980s about whether the U.S. was interfering in Soviet-occupied Afghanistan, and I doubt that Pravda, probably recognizing the absurdity of the situation, sank to outrage about that fact (which American officials and our media, in any case, made no effort to conceal). Perhaps the official Nazi press also featured solemn debates about whether the Allies were interfering in sovereign Vichy France, though if so, sane people would then have collapsed in ridicule.

In this case, however, even ridicule -- notably absent -- would not suffice, because the charges against Iran are part of a drumbeat of pronouncements meant to mobilize support for escalation in Iraq and for an attack on Iran, the "source of the problem." The world is aghast at the possibility. Even in neighboring Sunni states, no friends of Iran, majorities, when asked, favor a nuclear-armed Iran over any military action against that country. From what limited information we have, it appears that significant parts of the U.S. military and intelligence communities are opposed to such an attack, along with almost the entire world, even more so than when the Bush administration and Tony Blair's Britain invaded Iraq, defying enormous popular opposition worldwide.

He also places the issue of a nuclear armed Iran in context, and puts the hypothetical Iranian shoe on the American foot.

Doubtless Iran's government merits harsh condemnation, including for its recent actions that have inflamed the crisis. It is, however, useful to ask how we would act if Iran had invaded and occupied Canada and Mexico and was arresting U.S. government representatives there on the grounds that they were resisting the Iranian occupation (called "liberation," of course). Imagine as well that Iran was deploying massive naval forces in the Caribbean and issuing credible threats to launch a wave of attacks against a vast range of sites -- nuclear and otherwise -- in the United States, if the U.S. government did not immediately terminate all its nuclear energy programs (and, naturally, dismantle all its nuclear weapons). Suppose that all of this happened after Iran had overthrown the government of the U.S. and installed a vicious tyrant (as the US did to Iran in 1953), then later supported a Russian invasion of the U.S. that killed millions of people (just as the U.S. supported Saddam Hussein's invasion of Iran in 1980, killing hundreds of thousands of Iranians, a figure comparable to millions of Americans). Would we watch quietly?

It is easy to understand an observation by one of Israel's leading military historians, Martin van Creveld. After the U.S. invaded Iraq, knowing it to be defenseless, he noted, "Had the Iranians not tried to build nuclear weapons, they would be crazy."

Surely no sane person wants Iran (or any nation) to develop nuclear weapons. A reasonable resolution of the present crisis would permit Iran to develop nuclear energy, in accord with its rights under the Non-Proliferation Treaty, but not nuclear weapons. Is that outcome feasible? It would be, given one condition: that the U.S. and Iran were functioning democratic societies in which public opinion had a significant impact on public policy.

As it happens, this solution has overwhelming support among Iranians and Americans, who generally are in agreement on nuclear issues. The Iranian-American consensus includes the complete elimination of nuclear weapons everywhere (82% of Americans); if that cannot yet be achieved because of elite opposition, then at least a "nuclear-weapons-free zone in the Middle East that would include both Islamic countries and Israel" (71% of Americans). Seventy-five percent of Americans prefer building better relations with Iran to threats of force. In brief, if public opinion were to have a significant influence on state policy in the U.S. and Iran, resolution of the crisis might be at hand, along with much more far-reaching solutions to the global nuclear conundrum.

Share Power: Make Canadian companies respect human rights

I am a member of the Business and Human Rights working group of Amnesty International at the Pacific Regional office in Vancouver.

We promote respect for universal human rights standards on the part of Canadian companies. Our focus is usually on those who operate in other countries, especially those in developing countries. We engage in advocacy as well as awareness-raising and education to meet pursue this end. One of our key programs is called Share Power.

I have pasted some info from the Amnesty Canada site to explain the campaign. Tara Scurr, Business and Human Rights Camgaigner for the Pacific Region, you have the floor.

SHARE POWER is a project of Amnesty International’s Business and Human Rights campaign, which harnesses the powerful connection between individuals and companies to advance corporate responsibility for human rights.

SHARE POWER shows you what you can do to hold companies accountable for human rights.

No matter who you are, where you work, or where you study, you can find your connection to powerful multinational corporations and pressure change from the inside! Share Power helps you find this connection and use it to help end corporate abuses of human rights.

All members of the public have the right to send a direct message to the CEO of any company to raise concerns about their company. This is one technique that we can all use. For Share Power to be most effective however, we will use a variety of campaigning techniques.

By approaching companies indirectly, through our connection to other people and institutions that hold shares in those companies, we have a great potential for impact. This approach to corporate change is called shareholder activism and it is a key component of the Share Power campaign.

Please visit the site today to sign the letters on-line. For more information, please go to: www.amnesty.ca/campaigns/sharepower. The companies profiled in Share Power this year are:

1. Dow Chemical (AI-USA) issue: Bhopal
2. Chevron (AI-USA) issue: Environment
3. Power Corporation issue: Human Rights in China
4. Nortel Networks issue: Human Rights in China and Iraq
5. Weyerhaeuser issue: indigenous land rights in Canada
6. Canadian Natural Resources issue: Human Rights in Gabon and Ivory Coast 7. Ivanhoe Mines (2 resolutions) issues: Human Rights in Mongolia and Environmental clean-up in Burma

There is also a letter-writing action to the Canada Pension Plan, which invests significantly in each of these companies.

Please feel welcome to contact us with questions, suggestions or comments at bhr@amnesty.ca. We’d also love to hear your own stories of your campaigning efforts!

Many thanks,
Tara Scurr
Business and Human Rights Campaigner

IPCC summary for governments released

The International Panel on Climate Change released its summary report on climate change for policy makers. It makes it clear that climate Change real, it's happening and we're contributing to it, but that it can be mitigated.

New era of diplomacy?

Perhaps it is undue optimism. Perhaps it is highly premature. However, in light of events over the last couple of days, I have to wonder, or at least I have to hope, that we have entered a new era of international diplomacy on the part of Western nations in their dealings with the Middle East.

First, there is the British hostage crisis in Iran (even though they're technically not hostages). US Marines have said that if they were in place of the Britons, they would have gone down fighting. Indeed, of course, they would have gone down. John Bolton has harshly criticized the British government for its diplomatic approach. We have since learned that the hostages have been released without harm, and Tony Blair uttered the following words:

To the Iranian people I would simply say this, we bare you no ill will. On the contrary, we respect Iran as an ancient civilisation, as a nation with a proud and dignified history. And the disagreements we have with your government we wish to resolve peacefully through dialogue.

Second, there is Nancy Pelosi's trip to Syria, to meet with the president of Syria, with the good wishes of Israeli president Olmert. BBC says of the comments made by Pelosi:

Speaking in Damascus after the talks, Ms Pelosi praised Mr Assad's attitude towards Israel.

"We were very pleased with the assurances we received from the president that he was ready to resume the peace process," she said.

"He's ready to engage in negotiations for peace with Israel. The meeting with the president enabled us to communicate a message from Prime Minister Olmert that Israel was ready to engage in peace talks as well."

She said that she and other members of her congressional delegation raised concerns about Israeli soldiers held captive by Hamas and Hezbollah.

Syria's relationship with the militant Islamist groups was also discussed, she said, as well as the issue of fighters illegally entering Iraq from Syria.

Earlier, Ms Pelosi met Foreign Minister Walid al-Moualem and Vice President Faruq al-Shara.

The trip to Syria of course occurred over the predictable objections of the Bush administration, and moreso John Bolton. Also predictable is the reaction of the conservtive media, saying she is giving a gift to the enemies.

While I'm on the subject, Conor Clark of the Guardian does and excellent piece on the reaction oof the neoconservative right to Pelosi's visit:

It isn't surprising. Attempts to score political points usually aren't. But it is confusing: the conservatives' fury comes in two flavours, and neither makes much sense. First, the right seems to be upset because Pelosi wore a headscarf when she visited a Syrian mosque. Like clockwork, the conservative blogosphere has transformed itself into an army of feminists and taken to the battlements. "This picture disgusts me. What message is Nancy Pelosi trying to send?" writes the New Editor. "The modern Democratic leadership," telegraphs Little Green Footballs, over a picture of Pelosi's sartorial choice. "How ... quaint."

They're grasping at straws. For one, Pelosi's critics ignore the inconvenient fact that First Lady Laura Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice have also, on several occasions, worn headscarves while visiting mosques. I suppose you could make a fetish of consistency and say that all of these women are wrong for engaging in flights of multiculturalism. But why? No one would argue that elected officials should indulge every cultural peccadillo on a trip abroad. (Genital mutilation? Cannibalism?) But it would be equally foolish to argue that culture is totally non-negotiable: Sometimes the benefits outweigh the harms, and, in the grand scheme of things, the headscarf seems trivial. It's both silly and desperate to say, as one blogger did, that she could have just worn a hat.

The second flavour of conservative ire is that Pelosi's trip makes for bad foreign policy. National Review argues that the speaker's congressional majority is doing "its best to raise the white flag over the Middle East" by indulging a murderous regime like Assad's. "We can't believe that a majority of Americans - impatient though they are with the Iraq War - thought they were voting for this last November."

Well, believe it. In a poll released in December 2006 - just after the election the National Review cites - the Program on International Policy Attitudes found that three out of four Americans - including seven in ten Republicans - supported holding talks with both Iran and Syria. And, of course, diplomatic engagement with the two countries was also the centrepiece of the Iraq Study Group's report - an exercise in ostentatious bipartisanship if there ever was one. You can still make the argument that engaging with Syria is a mistake, or that the message of Pelosi's visit is the wrong one. But please, don't pretend that most Americans agree with you, or that the trip is the work of a crazed radical.

In fact, such trips happen all the time. Three Republican congressmen met with Assad over the weekend. Yesterday's papers reported that New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson - a Democratic presidential candidate! - will soon head a bipartisan mission to North Korea. Nor do these visits always happen at the president's pleasure: When Jimmy Carter, Sam Nunn and Colin Powell visited Haiti to broker a last-minute peace deal in 1994, President Clinton was furious. He even ordered a military strike - called off in the nick of time - while the three were still in the country.

But partisan football isn't a game that's played with facts. "Nancy Pelosi tends to forget that there is an executive branch," chortles the National Review. Well, America's executive branch tends to forget that there's this thing called diplomacy. Which is worse?

Now, my optimism is certainly tempered by a consideration of reality. I recognize that these events in themselves do nothing to diminish the power of the military-industrial-complex. Indeed, it has, and will continue to have, its slimy tentacles all around both major US politcal parties. Until it crumbles, the peaceful and just world I envision will never be realized.

Nevertheless, these events provide hope that the extremely aggressive militaristic posture of the Bush administration will soon be a thing of the past.

Robert Fisk "America is not at war"

Robert Fisk argues, elequently as ever, and better than I could, that it is fear of an imagined enemy that is consuming America. The seminar to which he refers is at Valdosta, Georgia:

Dr Michael Noll's students at Valdosta are as smart and bright-eyed as Dr El-Baradei's in Cairo. They packed into the same lecture I had given in Egypt and seemed to share a lot of the same fears about Iraq. But a sullen seminar that same morning was a miserable affair in which a young woman seemed to break down in anger. If "we" left Iraq, she said in a quavering voice, the jihadists, the "terrorists", could come here to America. They would attack us right here.

I sighed with frustration. I was listening to her voice but it was also the voice of the woman on Fox TV, the repeated, hopeless fantasy of Bush and Blair: that if we fail in Iraq, "they", the monstrous enemy, will arrive on our shores. Every day in the American papers now, I read the same "fear" transformed into irrationality. Luke Boggs - God, how I'd love that byline - announces in his local paper: "I say let the terrorists rot in Guantanamo. And let the Europeans ... howl. We are a serious nation, engaged in the serious business of trying to kill or capture the bad guys before they can do us more harm." He calls Guantanamo's inmates "hardcore jihadists".

And I realise that the girl in Dr Noll's seminar isn't spouting this stuff about "jihadists" travelling from Iraq to America because she supports Bush. She is just frightened. She is genuinely afraid of all the "terror" warnings, the supposed "jihadists" threats, the red "terror" alerts and the purple alerts and all the other colour-coded instruments of fear. She believes her president, and her president has done Osama bin Laden's job for him: he has crushed this young woman's spirit and courage.

But America is not at war. There are no electricity cuts on Valdosta's warm green campus, with its Spanish style department blocks and its narrow, beautiful church. There is no food rationing. There are no air-raid shelters or bombs or "jihadists" stalking these God-fearing folk. It is the US military that is at war, engaged in an Iraqi conflict that is doing damage of a far more subtle kind to America's social fabric.

Read the enire article.

Plame testimony

Here is a partial transcript of Valerie Plame's testmony to the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform yesterday. I think it speaks for itself.

I worked on behalf of the national security of our country, on behalf of the people of the United States until my name and true affiliation were exposed in the national media on July 14, 2003, after a leak by administration officials.

Today, I can tell this committee even more. In the run-up to the war with Iraq I worked in the counter proliferation division of the CIA -- still as a covert officer whose affiliation with the CIA was classified.

I raced to discover solid intelligence for senior policymakers on Iraq's presumed weapons of mass destruction programs.

While I helped to manage and run secret worldwide operations against this WMD target from CIA headquarters in Washington, I also traveled to foreign countries on secret missions to find vital intelligence.

I loved my career because I love my country. I was proud of the serious responsibilities entrusted to me as a CIA covert operations officer and I was dedicated to this work.

It was not common knowledge on the Georgetown cocktail circuit that everyone knew where I worked.

But all of my efforts on behalf of the national security of the United States -- all of my training, all of the value of my years of service -- were abruptly ended when my name and identity were exposed irresponsibly.

In the course of the trial of Vice President Cheney's former chief of staff, "Scooter" Libby, I was shocked by the evidence that emerged.

My name and identity were carelessly and recklessly abused by senior government officials in both the White House and the State Department.

All of them understood that I worked for the CIA and, having signed oaths to protect national security secrets, they should have been diligent in protecting me and every CIA officer.

Neil Young: Live at Massey Hall

I just bought the new Neil Young CD, Live at Massey Hall

It is a solo acoustic performance -- just the man, his guitar, and a piano. Not even his harmonica. The sound quality is excellent for a 35 year old recording. Taken from a 1971 performance signifying Neil'as return to Canada after five years in the States, his voice is clear and strong, at the peak of its powers. His guitar playing is complex and passionate. Contains many of my favourite Neil Young standards, including Old Man, Needle and the Damage Done, Don't Let It Bring You Down, and I Am a Child.

The package I purchased contained a DVD as well for only about two dollars extra. I haven't seen it yet. You can also buy the CD alone.

I highly recommend this release for any casual Neil Young fan.

Sudan response to ICC charges

This from Human Rights Watch, on the government of Sudan trying lower level officials who have been charged for war crimes by the International Criminal Court.

“The decision to try Ali Kosheib immediately following the ICC prosecutor’s announcement is obviously an attempt to pre-empt the international court case,” said Sara Darehshori, senior counsel in Human Rights Watch’s International Justice program. “Sudan should let independent international monitors into the country to observe the trial in if it wants to show that it’s anything other than window dressing.”

NY Times: Canada regains high ground

In response to the Canadian parliament voting to bring down two elements of anti-terrorist legislation, one that permits detention without charge, and one that allows coerced testimony, the NY Times wrote an editorial supporting the decision of the Canadian parliament, saying

The United States was not the only country to respond to the horror of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks with policies that went much too far in curtailing basic rights and civil liberties in the name of public safety. Now we see that a nation can regain its senses after calm reflection and begin to rein back such excesses, but that heartening news comes from Canada and not the United States.

Read more:

Housing and homeless in Vancouver, and 2010

I live in Vancouver, BC, where the gap between the very rich and the extreme poor is all to apparent. In the same day that I see droves of people drive to work in their fifty thousand dollar SUVs, I see more droves of people barely surviving in the Donwtown Eastside. One thing that really gets me as much as anything is the relentless ignorance of those who would believe that the extreme poor are in that state by choice, leave them to their own devices, and demand that they just "get a job." Well, it's not as simple as that.

Choices are very important in life, but they don’t exist in a vacuum. They are constrained by the social, economic, environmental, societal, and biological context within which one exists. If you have a mental illness, you have the inability to make rational choices from the start. The cards are stacked against you. Alot of the mentally ill on the streets are there because of the de-institutionalization by the Socred government in the 80s. if you come from a poor background, you have the cards stacked against you. If you have a disability, you have the cards stacked against you. If you come from an abusive background, you have the cards stacked against you. If you are an aboriginal, you have the cards stacked against you.

And, if you live in a society that doe not look after the weakest of the citizens, as we do, and you are already homeless, you virtually don’t have a chance. It is a trap that is extremely, extremely difficult to escape. How are they going to do that? They don’t have a place to sleep, a place to shower or change, let along anything to change into. All they probably have are the smelly, torn clothes on their back. Their nutritional intake is extremely poor. And that’s assuming that they’re even capable of working, as opposed to having a mental illness or some undiagnosed physical disability?

Recent events are a symptom of this continual ignorance. First is the government money spent on a countdown clock for the 2010 Winter Olympics, money that could easily have been spent instead on helping the homeless. Second is this past week's provincial government budget, proudly promoted by Carole Taylor as the housing budget. There were shelter beds for the homeless promised, but not nearly enough, and decent affordable housing rather than shelter beds would have been much better.

With the 2010 Olympics coming, the well-known prediction from the Pivot Legal Society that homelessness may triple between now and 2010, and the lack of sufficient response from all levels of government to the issue of housing and homelessness, I am very concerned about what the future is going to hold for the homeless. Are the fears that the Downtown Eastside will be gentrified and the extreme poor pushed even further into the margins of society actually likely to materialize?

At this point, my temptation is to say that this is a crossroads for our city and we have to decide which path we will take: continued self-absorbtion and ignorance, or a new enlightenment recognizing social as well as personal responsibility.

However, society doesn't change that much in three years, so I will put it this way: Our governments can go one of two ways on this problem. Either way, the end result must be that visitors to our fine city in 2010 to not perceive a homelessness problem. The tact that I'm afraid will materialize is to push the homeless even further into the margins of society; this will backfire, as crime will increase. The better long-term approach is to show visitors that we are a conscientious, inclusive society, and feed, house, and clothe our homeless citizens.

Vulture Funds

This is disgusting. I have to say I was completely unaware of this phenomenon.

On Thursday 15 February a high court judge in London will rule whether so-called vulture fund can extract more than $40m from Zambia for a debt which it bought for less than $4m.

There are concerns that such funds are wiping out the benefits which international debt relief was supposed to bring to poor countries.

Martin Kalunga-Banda, Zambian presidential adviser and a consultant to Oxfam told Newsnight, "That $40m is equal to the value of all the debt relief we received last year."

Vulture funds - as defined by the International Monetary Fund and Gordon Brown amongst others - are companies which buy up the debt of poor nations cheaply when it is about to be written off and then sue for the full value of the debt plus interest - which might be ten times what they paid for it.

Mockery

Caroline Pearce from the Jubilee Debt campaign told Newsnight it makes a mockery of all the work done by governments to write off the debts of the poorest.

"Profiteering doesn't get any more cynical than this. Zambia has been planning to spend the money released from debt cancellation on much-needed nurses, teachers and infrastructure: this is what debt cancellation is intended for not to line the pockets of businessmen based in rich countries."

As it turns out, Zambia lost the vulture funds case.

Amy Goodman of Democracy Now had an excellent interview with Greg Palast on vulture funds today, which initially drew my attention to the issue.

URGENT: Hunger Strike in Kingston reaches 80 days.

Mohammad Mahjoub, Mahmoud Jaballah, and Hassan Almrei have been held for six years in Kingston on security certificates without charge. To protest this, is well as poor treatment, they have held a hunger strike for the last 80 days. During this strike, they have been refused doctor's visits. From Verbani-19, here is their letter.

We are the undersigned Mohammad Mahjoub, Mahmoud Jaballah, and Hassan Almrei. We have been imprisoned over six years under so-called security certificates. We have never been convicted of any crime, much less charged with one. We have been told we are dangerous to the security of Canada and a threat to the public, without even seeing anything in evidence against us. Neither our lawyers or ourselves have the right to challenge or see what the government claims they have on us. These rights everybody takes for granted in this country or in any country that applies the rule of democracy.

Since our arrests we have been thrown in solitary confinement for years without any explanation, surviving in a small, concrete, frozen cell.

We faced many difficulties in practicing our religion, or contacting our families, and countless nights without sleeping from hunger.

On April 24, 2006, the government decided to move us to a new facility after the provincial government’s refusal to keep us in their detention centre. From that time we are detained in a small trailer parked in a parking lot on the grounds of Millhaven.

Shortly after our arrival here we realized that we are in a no-man’s land and everybody applies his own rules: guards, supervisors, directors. We don’t know whose rules we should follow. Policies change by the shift. We thought our life at this facility will be better than Toronto West Detention Centre. Were we wrong in our thoughts?

This is all humiliating and insulting not only for ourselves but to our families as well.

We requested repeatedly that these unjust treatments be changed and to be treated as adult human beings. When all our requests and complaints have been rejected by the director to cover up her staff’s wrongdoing, we decided to engage in a hunger strike, which is the last option for us to change our conditions.

We are on a hunger strike for the last 80 days for Mahjoub, 69 days for Jaballah and Almrei. Until recently, we have never seen a doctor to treat us, not even one single time, even though we requested daily to see a doctor and get treatment. We would only see a nurse behind the closed door through a small glass window. We are unable to get to the so-called treatment room because of our fear of our own safety from the guards because we have been abused by them many times.

There were many many media reports about our hunger strike and 2 visits by Members of Parliament and several questions put to the government in the House of Commons about our conditions and hunger strike. Only then did the CBSA [Canadian Border Services Agency] decide to send a doctor to see us on February 7, 2007, for the first time, and order a supervisor to escort us to the treatment room to see a doctor and a nurse. We have requested a supervisor to escort us any time we have to move in the facility. The supervisor is only now being provided temporarily. This is not a solution.

We feel some small changes have happened here because of pressure from the public and MPs. But we still need your help to fix the big problems here.

We may not have much more time, so please keep up the pressure in standing for our rights.

We thank you for all of your kindness and support. May Allah bless you and reward you for all of your efforts.

Mahmoud Jaballah, Mohammad Mahjoub, Hassan Almrei.

(letter dictated by phone to the Campaign to Stop Secret trials in Canada)

For more details, and tips on how to take action, see Verbani-19

Chirac on Iran.

Gwynne Dyer is bang on in the Straight this week, basically arguing that Iran is not a threat, that its purpose in acquiring nucelar weaponry is basically defensive in nature, and that

the danger is not that Iran would be irresponsible with its nuclear weapons but that they would lead to a general proliferation of such weapons in the Middle East.

Now, I'm not always the biggest Chirac fan. He acts purely out of self-interest, whether its opposing the war in Iraq, or selling arms to China. Here I am sure there must be self-interest involved as well. Nevertheless, that does not change the fact that his is right.

Dyer concludes:

The truth may be that Iran is for the moment seeking only a “threshold” nuclear-weapons capacity: a level of technological expertise from which it could, in an emergency, develop actual nuclear weapons in only six months or so. Such a position is entirely legal, and some 40 countries currently occupy it.

The truth may also be that the nuclear-armed neighbour Iran really worries about is not Israel but Pakistan, whose 1998 nuclear tests scared Iranian strategists half to death. They don’t worry about the intentions of Pakistan’s current dictator, General Pervez Musharraf, but they know that it is a one-bullet regime and they worry a great deal about what kind of fanatics might succeed him in power.

IPCC report; fossil fuel industry responses

The International Panel on Climate Change Report has been released, providing us with the strongest evidence yet that signifigcant climate change is caused by human activity, and that it is a threat to life on this planet.

Of course, the fossil industry hacks are disputing this finding:

The American Enterprise Institute is offering $10,000 to scientists prepared to write papers opposing findings of the IPCC report.

The Fraser Institute will be giving a press conference in London on Monday to give their reaction to the findings. Media Identification will be required for admission.

George Bushes hedges taking action on the issue.

For info as it comes in on this issue, read the DeSmog Blog.