Visit our website: HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --------------------------------------------- {For full text with hyperlinks, see: http://emperors-clothes.com/letters/alm.htm www.tenc.net [Emperor's Clothes] ======================================= For Nicaragua, Read Belarus A Letter to 'The Guardian' by Mark Almond [3 September 2001] ======================================= The Guardian seems to have a split personality when it comes to assessing US covert operations. On one page, you decry the "return to power" in Washington of key figures like Elliott Abrams from the Iran-contra scandal (Iran-contra men return to power, August 20), while on the next page you report on Belarus (Opposition unites in Belarus poll), without mentioning that the US ambassador, Michael Kozak, was also a key activist in the anti-Sandinista campaign under Reagan and Bush Sr and is an expert in ensuring Washington's favoured candidate wins elections (see Nicaragua, February 1990). The late William Casey, director of the CIA 1981-87, apparently nicknamed Elliott Abrams the "Snake", but his petname for Kozak was the "Weasel". The only essential difference between the two men seems to be that Abrams is a Bush retread, while Kozak was a Clinton appointee. It is odd how much of our press repeats uncritically the spin put out by ex-Central American hands, from William Walker about Kosovo in 1999 (despite his role in El Salvador in the 80s) to ambassador Kozak in Belarus today. Any bright kid with internet access can find out about them. Instead of writing indignantly about murky US deeds from two decades ago, the public would get a better understanding of underlying factors in recent crises in the Balkans and eastern Europe if you reported on the current role of so many veterans of the dirty wars of Latin America before 1990 in current US policy-making towards eastern Europe and the Balkans. For instance, at the end of June, many European newspapers claimed that 17 ex-US servicemen employed by Military Professional Resources Incorporated (the CIA's favourite "deniable" military assistance firm) had been among the Albanian guerrillas escorted out of the Macedonian village of Aracinovo by US troops. Will we really have to wait 15 years before you write an indignant piece about how Bush Jr's boys are treating eastern Europe as his Dad's men treated Latin America? Mark Almond Oriel College, Oxford [EMAIL PROTECTED] __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Get email alerts & NEW webcam video instant messaging with Yahoo! Messenger http://im.yahoo.com ------------------------------------------------- This Discussion List is the follow-up for the old stopnato @listbot.com that has been shut down ==^================================================================ EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9spWA Or send an email To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] This email was sent to: [email protected] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================
