( Not for publication , I shall work on this in a detailed article )
Dear Colleagues ,
I have read what eminent lawyer Francis Boyle has had to endure being
placed on a " Terrorist " list and his professional work being spied on for
appearing for Muslims and Arabs in the United States . In the contemporary
period of political and economic history plotted by 'Neocons" , not restricted
in their field of operation to the United States , operating in Europe, Asia
and on every continent ,having forged alliances across national boundaries
, are now being openly referred to as 'Neo-Nazi" even by respectable financial
analysts which is still an understatement ,as in some countries the
governments are outright 'Nazi 'bombing on behalf of Corporations other
societies for take over of resources . Even as these neoliberal policies which
are in fact on the pattern of the " Mussolini Business Model " , are being
implemented accompanied by diversionary hate campaigns or pogroms or attacks
against minorities , those of us lawyers who chose to speak up for affected
groups ,sections and individuals , opposing pogroms and exposing the attempt
to create a divide ,have endured unprecedented harassment and sabotage even of
our normal professional work, and are subjected to twenty-four hour illegal
surveillance by corporate intelligence agents and agencies , busybodies
working for foreign agencies and private interests and state agencies , not
one agency , but several and literally stalked for years . The reality is
that nothing was left without surveillance , nothing was sacrosanct , not a
single human relationship family or personal , with many Republics reduced to "
Banana Republics" and we endured it all .
However lawyers and Judges have endured even worse, though there is ad
nauseam talk of "democracy" , "freedom " and " liberty"; they have even been
murdered in cold blood, and assassinated including in the Philippines and
elsewhere . In Mumbai a young lawyer Shahid Azmi was assassinated as he was
defending innocent Muslim youth charged with being terrorists ( who were
acquitted ), respectable lawyers for corporate interests never tired of
extolling their own professional worth or filing public interest litigations on
other issues were silent ,even as Bar Associations were passing resolutions
that such accused generally from poorer classes should be denied defence
counsel. This lawyer in India was killed even though the organization which
briefed him were known supporters of the major party in government indicating
the operation of a State within a State .As seen in Norway , the oligarchy
operates above the heads even of government, and engineers false flag
operations and other acts against innocent citizens with no protection to
citizens against bomb blasts and collective killings , to create a divide
depending on the religious/ethnic composition of the society.A reading of the"
Manifesto" of the killer of the youth wing of the Labour Party in Norway has
references to other countries , however the net is much wider than revealed in
this fascist " Manifesto".
International Associations of Lawyers and Bar Associations dominated by
lawyers who support the status quo , have not done enough to protect their
colleagues . The conditions to which lawyers and a few Judges have been
subjected in this contemporary period entirely on account of their public
work and positions , establish the limitations of systems which call themselves
" democracies" and are in theory covertly fascist , whenever the covert action
is required , consequently hostile to those who uphold the law .
In some countries even Police and Intelligence officials who have been honest
and upright in their investigations have been similarly harassed or
assassinated as have inconvenient Heads of State or Ministers . However the
first targets have been public spirited citizens and lawyers .
The article of Petras on events in Norway at Countercurrents must be read
.However the composition of the covert fascist alliance depends on the nature
of the composition of a particular society .
Niloufer Bhagwat
----- Original Message -----
From: matthias chang
Sent: Sunday, July 31, 2011 1:23 PM
Subject: FBI & CIA Tried to Get Lawyer Prof Francis Boyle To Betray
ArabandMuslim Clients - By Sherwood Ross (31/7/11)
[FF Editiorial: Very, very few have the courage and the tenacity of my dear
friend and colleague, Prof. Francis Boyle who is an inspiration to us all at
Future Fastforward. His integrity and objectivity is beyond question and has
been in the forefront fighting against the war criminals of every hue.
Yet there are some people in my country who takes the view that he is bias
against war criminals, when he is fighting for the victims of the war
criminals. The dice is already loaded against the victims and few lawyers dare
venture into the arena where Prof. Boyle have often single handedly battled
against these criminals. In so far as Malaysian judges are concerned, none in
the entire history on the Malaysian judiciary has taken a public stand against
the atrocities inflicted on the victims of war crimes even when they are
Muslims. This is the sorry state of the judiciary and the legal profession in
Malaysia.]
Federal agents from the FBI and CIA/FBI Joint Terrorist Task Force tried to
get a distinguished international lawyer to inform on his Arab and Muslim
clients in violation of their Constitutional rights to attorney-client
privilege, this reporter has learned. When the lawyer refused, he said the FBI
placed him on a "terrorist watch list."
Law professor Francis Boyle gave a chilling account of how, in the summer of
2004, two agents showed up at his office (at the University of Illinois,
Champaign,) "unannounced, misrepresented who they were and what they were about
to my secretary, gained access to my office, interrogated me for about one
hour, and repeatedly tried to get me to become their informant on my Arab and
Muslim clients."
"This would have violated their (clients) Constitutional rights and my
ethical obligations as an Attorney," Boyle explained. "I refused. So they put
me on all of the United States government's 'terrorist watch' lists."
Boyle said his own lawyer found "there are about five or six different
terrorist watch lists, and as far as he could determine, I am on all of them."
Despite a legal appeal to get his name removed, Boyle said, "I will remain on
all of these terrorist watch lists for the rest of my life or until the two
Agencies who put me on there remove my name, which is highly unlikely."
"Whatever people might think about lawyers, we are the canary-birds of
democracy. When the government goes after your lawyer soon they will be going
after you," Boyle warned.
"Indeed," he added, "the government goes after your lawyer in order to get to
you, which is what happened to me. This is what the so-called 'war against
terrorism' is really all about. It is a war against the United States
Constitution."
Boyle is a leading American professor and practitioner of international law.
He holds doctorates in both law (cum laude) and Political Science from Harvard
and has more than two decades of experience representing pacifist anti-war
resisters, suspects in the so-called "War on Terror" and foreign governments
such as Bosnia and Herzegovina. He is the author of numerous books, including
"Protesting Power," (Rowman & Littlefield), "Biowarfare and
Terrorism,"(Clarity) and "Destroying World Order"(Clarity).
Writing of the attorney-client privilege, the American Bar Association has
defined it as "the right of clients to refuse to disclose confidential
communications with their lawyers, or to allow their lawyers to disclose them."
It further states the privilege "is viewed as fundamental to preserve the
constitutionally based right to effective assistance of legal counsel, in that
lawyers cannot function effectively on behalf of their clients without the
ability communicate with them in confidence."
The attempt by the government to destroy the Constitutional right of
privileged communication between lawyer and client began in earnest after 9/11
when the Justice Department initiated a wave of such illegal actions. According
to an article in "Criminal Justice Magazine," Summer, 2002, "Immediately
following the September 11 terrorist attacks, U.S. Attorney General John
Ashcroft issued a controversial order that permits the government to monitor
all communications between a client and an attorney when there is 'reasonable
suspicion' to 'believe that a particular inmate may use communications with
attorneys or their agents to further or facilitate acts of violence or
terrorism." That order "raises a wide range of constitutional concerns under
the First, Fourth, Fifth, and Fourteenth Amendments," authors Paul Rice and
Benjamin Saul wrote.
As if to mock the very concept of attorney-client privilege, military
interrogators at Guantanamo prison posed as "lawyers" to trick illegally held
suspects into providing them with information, according to a report in "The
Catholic Worker" newspaper.
And "Newsday," the Long Island, N.Y., daily, reported a wholesale invasion of
lawyer-client privilege, as when lawyers at Guantanamo are forced to turn over
their interview notes to guards, who send them on to the Pentagon facility in
Virginia that is the only place lawyers can go to write their motions and where
the Pentagon attempts to edit out detainees' claims of mistreatment from the
public record. What's more, "Newsday" reported, "The military has set up a
system that delays legal correspondence (between lawyers and prisoners) for
weeks," adding that "Detainees have alleged that interrogators have tried to
turn them against their lawyers."
According to "Newsday," guards and interrogators peruse prisoners' private
legal papers and warn them that prisoners who have lawyers will wait longer to
get out! Tom Wilner, a lawyer for 12 Kuwaiti detainees, said an interrogator
asked one of his clients, "Did you know your lawyers are Jews?"
The U.S. government is "not only trying to deny counsel to the prisoners, but
is actively trying to remove Guantanamo from any scrutiny, legal or otherwise"
as well as "marginalizing the lawyers representing the prisoners," "The
Catholic Worker" said.
Placing attorney Boyle on the Terrorist Watch List is a form of punishment
that is being ever more widely applied. According to "USA Today" the list grew
from 288,000 names in 2005 to 1-million in March, 2009, according to an article
of March 10th of that year. "People put on the watch list...can be blocked from
flying, stopped at borders or subjected to other scrutiny," reporter Peter
Eisler wrote.
The attorney-client privilege is the oldest such privilege enshrined in
Anglo-Saxon law and was commonly respected even under the British crown during
the reign of Queen Elizabeth 1. That it is being flouted by the U.S. government
today when a constitutional lawyer occupies the White House represents an
incredible stain on what remains of the fabric of American democracy.
Author's Bio: Sherwood Ross worked as a reporter for the Chicago Daily News
and contributed a regular "Workplace" column for Reuters. He has contributed to
national magazines and hosted a talk show on WOL, Washington, D.C. In the
Sixties he was active as public relations director for a major civil rights
organization.
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