Croatia To Host 23 Nation NATO Exercise [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- Croatia to host international emergency rescue exercises Friday, 26-Apr-2002 10:20AMStory from AFP ZAGREB, April 26 (AFP) - Croatia's interior ministry announced Friday that the country would host an international civilian-military fire fighting and rescue exercise, under the auspices of NATO and the Balkans Stability Pact. The exercise, due to be held from May 22 until May 24 in the southern Adriatic region of Dalmatia, is aimed at developing cooperation and coordination in cases of disasters, the ministry said in a statement. Some 1,200 participants from 23 countries including members of NATO, its Partnership for Peace programme and the Balkans Stability Pact, will participate in the exercise, dubbed Taming the Dragon - Dalmatia 2002. It will be the largest exercise of its kind ever held in Europe, the ministry said. A team of NATO experts will evaluate all parts of the exercise, which is to include open air fire fighting, mountain and water search and rescue exercises as well as handling hazardous materials and evacuation. Croatia wants to show its readiness to meet the demands of civilian-military cooperation with other European countries in cases of disasters, Interior Minister Sime Lucin said. We want to show that (Croatia's) civilian part is also ready and can meet NATO demands and standards, Lucin said. Croatia joined NATO's Partnership for Peace programme, seen as the first step to joining the Alliance, in mid 2000, a few months after pro-Europeans defeated nationalists in general elections. __ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness http://health.yahoo.com --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
Britain Saber Rattles At Greece [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- [I suppose we're expected to believe that if Greek nationals had been apprehended intruding on and taking photographs of some 17 key British military installations they would have been invited for tea with Tony at 10 Downing Street and perhaps be granted an audience with the Queen...] http://www.abc.net.au/news/2002/04/item20020427104303_1.htm Sat, Apr 27 2002 3:18 PM AEST Plane-spotters sentences 'disproportionate': British politicians British politicians have reacted angrily to a Greek court decision to jail a group of so-called plane spotters, people whose hobby is to record the details of aircraft. The 14 plane spotters, from Greece's NATO allies Britain and the Netherlands, are appealing against sentences of between one and three years. A group of 14 British and Dutch plane spotters was arrested in November last year in southern Greece and charged with taking pictures in a military zone. The eight receiving jail sentences were found guilty of espionage although, amidst confusing scenes in the Greek courtroom, it appears they will be allowed to return home while they appeal against their sentences. The other six plane spotters were found guilty of aiding and abetting and have been given suspended sentences of one year in jail. British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw saysthe Greek response to the situation has been disproportionate. A Conservative MP who represents two of the plane spotters described their conviction as extraordinary and bizarre. __ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness http://health.yahoo.com --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
Bosnian Serbs Get A Few Marks For Recent NATO Destruction [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- SFOR compensates Bosnian villagers for damage in operation to get Karadzic Friday, 26-Apr-2002 SARAJEVO, April 26 (AFP) - NATO-led peacekeepers in Bosnia paid some 4,000 convertible marks (2,051 euros) to the Serb inhabitants of a village in south-east Bosnia to correct perceived wrongs in two raids aimed at arresting war-crimes indictee Radovan Karadzic, a press release said Friday. Soldiers from the NATO-led Stabilization Force (SFOR) visited the village of Celebici on Thursday in response to property damage claims made by villagers in the aftermath of the force's so-far fruitless search for Karadzic, SFOR said. SFOR conducted two consecutive raids in the area on February 28 and March 1 in a bid to arrest Bosnian Serb wartime leader, but both attempts ended in failure. The villagers were initially informed that their claims had been rejected, since claims arising out of combat-related activities are barred from payments under the Dayton peace agreement that ended Bosnia's 1992-95 war. However, the SFOR commander, General John Sylvester, had authorized payments unrelated to the villagers' claims, to aid them in repairing damage to their village. Meanwhile SFOR troops on Friday airdropped thousands of leaflets over four Serb-run towns in eastern Bosnia, offering a reward for information about Karadzic. The leaflets used in Friday's drop also outlined benefits that could be gained from bringing Karadzic and other war crimes suspects to justice such as the increase in aid and employment opportunities, SFOR said. Karadzic, the political leader of Bosnia's Serbs during the war, is the best-known figure still at large who is wanted by the UN's International Criminal Court for the former Yugoslavia, which sits in The Hague. He is notably wanted for the killing of some 7,000 Bosnian Muslims in the village of Srebrenica in August 1995, the worst single massacre committed in Europe since World War II. __ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness http://health.yahoo.com --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
ADL found guilty of spying by California court [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- http://www.arabnews.com/Article.asp?ID=14650 Thursday, April 25, 2002 / 12 Safar 1423 ADL found guilty of spying by California court By Barbara Ferguson, Arab News Correspondent WASHINGTON, 25 April The San Francisco Superior Court has awarded former Congressman Pete McCloskey, R-California, a $150,000 court judgment against the Anti-Defamation League (ADL). McCloskey, the attorney in the case, represented one of three civil lawsuits filed in San Francisco against the ADL in 1993. The lawsuit came after raids were made by the San Francisco Police Department and the FBI on offices of the ADL in both San Francisco and Los Angeles, which found that the ADL was engaged in extensive domestic spying operations on a vast number of individuals and institutions around the country. During the course of the inquiry in San Francisco, the SFPD and FBI determined the ADL had computerized files on nearly 10,000 people across the country, and that more than 75 percent of the information had been illegally obtained from police, FBI files and state drivers license data banks. Much of the stolen information had been provided by Tom Gerard of the San Francisco Police Department, who sold, or gave, the information to Ray Bullock, ADLs top undercover operative. The investigation also determined that the ADL conduit, Gerard, was also working with the CIA. Two other similar suits against ADL were settled some years ago, and the ADL was found guilty in both cases, but the McCloskey suit continued to drag through the courts until last month. In the McCloskey case, the ADL agreed to pay (from its annual multi-million budget) $50,000 to each of the three plaintiffs Jeffrey Blankfort, Steve Zeltzer and Anne Poirier who continued to press charges against the ADL, despite a continuing series of judicial roadblocks that forced 14 of the original defendants to withdraw. Another two died during the proceedings. The ADL, which calls itself a civil rights group, continued to claim it did nothing wrong in monitoring their activities. Although the ADL presents itself as a group that defends the interests of Jews, two of three ADL victims are Jewish. Blankfort and Zeltzer were targeted by the ADL because they were critical of Israels policies toward the Palestinians. The third ADL victim in the McCloskey case, Poirier, was not involved in any activities related to Israel or the Middle East. Poirier ran a scholarship program for South African exiles who were fighting the apartheid system in South Africa. At the time, the ADL worked closely with the then anti-apartheid government of South Africa, and ADLs operative Bullock provided ADL with illegally obtained data on Poirier and her associates to the South African government. But the conclusion of McCloskeys case does not mean the end to the ADLs legal problems. On March 31, 2001, US District Judge Edward Nottingham of Denver, Colorado, upheld most of a $10.5 million defamation judgment that a federal jury in Denver had levied against the ADL in April of 2000. The jury hit the ADL with the massive judgment after finding it had falsely labeled Evergreen, Colorado residents William and Dorothy Quigley as anti-Semites. The ADL is appealing the judgment. = Lake Merritt Neighbors Organized for Peace. Weekly peace walks around Lake Merritt in Oakland. Starts ends at the colonnade between Grand Lakeshore Avenues, 3 P.M., every Sunday. Info: (510)763-8712, [EMAIL PROTECTED] or http://www.webwm.com/LMNOP __ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness http://health.yahoo.com --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
China will protect nations from bullies, says Hu [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- from The News Internet Edition Thurs. April 25, 2002 WORLD NEWS http://jang.com.pk/thenews/apr2002-daily/25-04-2002/world/w9.htm China will protect nations from bullies, says Hu KUALA LUMPUR: China's heir apparent, Hu Jintao, said on Wednesday his country would retain an independent foreign policy and would resist any attempts by strong nations to force their interests on the weak. Hu, speaking in Malaysia en route to the United States, is the favourite to succeed Jiang Zemin as head of the Communist Party this year and as China's president in 2003. (China) opposes the strong lording it over the weak and the big bullying the small and has long pledged not to seek hegemony, not to join any military bloc, and not to pursue its own spheres of influence, Hu said in a speech to the Asian Strategy and Leadership Institute in Kuala Lumpur. He was to meet Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad and deputy Abdullah Ahmad Badawi for talks expected to address everything from trade and investment to terrorism. Both China and Malaysia joined the U.S.-led war on terror after the September 11 attacks on New York and Washington and have arrested Islamic militants at home. But they also share doubts about U.S. unilateralism. The 58-year-old Hu makes his first official visit to the United States from April 27 to May 3. He will visit Honolulu, San Francisco, New York and Washington, where he is expected to meet President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney. ASIAN PARTNERS: Before that, on April 26, he visits Singapore, the largely ethnic Chinese city state whose business community, like the sizable, wealthy ethnic Chinese minority in Malaysia, is looking for investment opportunities in the ancestral homeland. In his speech, Hu praised Malaysia's achievements brought about by Mahathir's policy of rapid industrialisation during his 21 years in power. He later went on a walkabout through Kuala Lumpur's ritziest shopping mall beneath the Petronas Twin Towers, the world's tallest building. Hu emphasised that China's emergence as an economic power should be viewed positively by Southeast Asian nations who have seen more foreign investors attracted to China. History has continued and will continue to prove that China is a positive force making for an economically stronger and more stable Asia, he said. China signed an accord with the 10-member Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) in November to establish a giant free-trade zone within 10 years. But the export-oriented ASEAN members fear being undercut by China's low-cost producers while China needs Southeast Asia's resources, notably oil, gas and forest products, to fuel its rapid industrialisation. Our conclusion, therefore, is clear: China's development would be impossible without Asia, and Asia's prosperity without China, Hu said. Southeast Asian firms are eyeing investment opportunities in China. Malaysian automaker Proton this year bought a 49 percent stake in China's Goldstar Heavy Industrial Co. Ltd, helping it gain a presence in the Chinese market. Hu visits Penang, the home of Malaysia electronics export industry, on Thursday. = Lake Merritt Neighbors Organized for Peace. Weekly peace walks around Lake Merritt in Oakland. Starts ends at the colonnade between Grand Lakeshore Avenues, 3 P.M., every Sunday. Info: (510)763-8712, [EMAIL PROTECTED] or http://www.webwm.com/LMNOP __ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness http://health.yahoo.com --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
Yet another Ugly American [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/200204/25/eng20020425_94700.shtml Interesting People's Daily commentary on rude behavior by foreigners in China the Chinese attitude towards them. I'm only sending the URL 'cause you won't want to miss the pics! - Steve = Lake Merritt Neighbors Organized for Peace. Weekly peace walks around Lake Merritt in Oakland. Starts ends at the colonnade between Grand Lakeshore Avenues, 3 P.M., every Sunday. Info: (510)763-8712, [EMAIL PROTECTED] or http://www.webwm.com/LMNOP __ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness http://health.yahoo.com --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
Oil giants Wild West fight over petrol stations in China [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- from chinabiz newsletter http://chinabiz.org/test/ticker.asp Oil giants Wild West fight over petrol stations 26/04/2002 Shanghai - China's two oil giants Sinopec http://www.sinopec.com.cn/english/index.jsp and Petrochina http://www.cnpc.com.cn/english/index_e.htm are involved in violent battles over control of petrol stations along important highways, Financial Times (FT) reported on Thursday. The companies, who have the exclusive rights to build new petrol stations in China, are using armed gangs to secure their position, FT writes. In the central Henan province, gangs backed by Sinopec attacked seven different stations and stopped work at sixteen others. One of the worst battles occurred late last month, when Sinopec employees with iron rods attacked Petrochina workers who were renovating 50 new stations along a new highway. A police officer who witnessed one of the battles at a petrol station told FT: It was the most violent scene I have ever seen in my life. The fighters smashed windows, doors, took away equipment and also drove construction workers out of their rooms with fire extinguishers and beat them with iron rods. According to the report, Sinopec is furious over an agreement between Petrochina and the local highway construction company to place its franchises along the road. Currently Sinopec rules the market in Henan, where it owns half of the province's 8,000 stations. The retail market is a promising market to both companies. Local media estimated sales had a potential annual net profit of around 200 million Renminbi (US$24 million) in the 50 stations, which were center of the fight in Henan. Sinopec and Petrochina, both listed in New York, together own about half of the 80,000 or more petrol stations in China. The firms are involved in setting up joint ventures with other international giants. Sinopec has agreements to build 500 stations with BP Amoco, Exxon Mobil and Royal Dutch Shell. A possible deal between Petrochina and BP Amoco, which are currently negotiating plans to manage 800 stations in a separate joint venture, might affect the Sinopec-BP Amoco agreement, FT reports. The government granted Petrochina and Sinopec sole rights to build new petrol stations before the market becomes open to foreign investors by 2005. The companies declined comment on the violent struggle, saying both the police and local and central government are investigating the incident. _ Copyright (C) 2002 Chinabiz.org. All rights reserved. http://www.chinabiz.org _ = Lake Merritt Neighbors Organized for Peace. Weekly peace walks around Lake Merritt in Oakland. Starts ends at the colonnade between Grand Lakeshore Avenues, 3 P.M., every Sunday. Info: (510)763-8712, [EMAIL PROTECTED] or http://www.webwm.com/LMNOP __ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness http://health.yahoo.com --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
Making stubborn prisoners talk /Army interrogation schools methods push tactica
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- http://www.msnbc.com/news/743825.asp?cp1=1 Making stubborn prisoners talk Army interrogation schools methods push tactical envelope By Jess Bravin THE WALL STREET JOURNAL FORT HUACHUCA, Ariz., April 26 Has anybody talked to you about lying? instructor John Giersdorf asks his freshman class. We expect you to lie a lot. Your job is to convince someone to do something that could get him executed for treason. THIS IS THE U.S. ARMYS interrogation school, and Staff Sgt. Giersdorf, a veteran intelligence-operative who speaks Arabic, Czech and Russian, is teaching new recruits to extract information from al Qaeda and other captive foes. The job, he tells his students, is just a hairs-breadth away from being an illegal specialty under the Geneva Convention. Interrogators the Pentagon renamed them human intelligence collectors last year are authorized not just to lie, but to prey on a prisoners ethnic stereotypes, sexual urges and religious prejudices, his fear for his familys safety, or his resentment of his fellows. Theyll do just about everything short of torture, which officials say is not taught here, to make their prisoners spill information that could save American lives. Each year, 200 to 300 students enter the 16-week program at Fort Huachuca, an outpost in the Sonoran Desert that once housed U.S. cavalrymen pursuing Geronimo and Pancho Villa. Tallmadge Hall, a drab classroom building named for a Revolutionary War officer who spied on the Redcoats, houses 21 interrogation booths, where students practice their art as instructors watch on video monitors and grade them. The U.S. is facing a shortage of experienced interrogators, as well as intelligence officers trained in Middle Eastern and South Asian languages. As of last September, says the forts deputy commander, Col. John M. Custer (a distant relative of Gen. George Custer), there were only a handful of instructors here who could speak Pashto or Urdu, languages common in Afghanistan and Pakistan. A DIFFERENT BREED Interrogators also are finding that al Qaeda and Taliban prisoners, with their fanatical hatred of the U.S. and apparent readiness to commit suicide for their cause, are a different breed than theyve encountered in past conflicts. Some have responded, including Abu Zubaydah, the reputed al Qaeda leader who officials say prompted last Fridays terrorism alert for Northeastern banks. But after months of interrogating prisoners in Afghanistan and at the U.S. Navy base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, officials concede that its difficult to obtain information they can corroborate. The Fort Huachuca course culminates in 10 days of field exercises using generic foreign powers: a fictitious U.S. ally, the Republic of Arizona, and its totalitarian nemesis, the Peoples Republic of New Mexico. On five outdoor acres, students recruit counteragents, interview sources and capture enemies and grill them, while occasionally dealing with distractions such as visiting reporters and human-rights groups all played by fellow soldiers. The students, many under 20 years old, often enter Fort Huachuca fresh from basic training. About 80% pass the course, and then go on to language school. Instruction begins by making students aware of the intelligence-gathering skills they already have. Sgt. First Class Anthony Novacek likes to use a romantic example: Youre down at Jimbos Beach Shack, approaching unknown females, he tells recruits. Success involves assessing the target, speaking her language, learning her needs and appearing to be the only way she can satisfy them. Soldiers then study 30 techniques to make prisoners crack. One is the simple incentive approach. Around the world, everyone smokes, Sgt. Giersdorf tells students. If youve ever talked to a captured Arab who hasnt smoked for two hours, a pack of smokes can get you a long way. Some incentives, however, can be pure deceptions. Sgt. Giersdorf says prisoners may be told they could be repatriated if they cooperate, or that their wounded friends might get the best medical care, even though interrogators know that neither would happen. Other techniques involve considerably more pressure. Fear-up employs heavy-handed, table-banging violence, an Army field manual says. The interrogator behaves in a heavy, overpowering manner with a loud and threatening voice and may throw objects across the room to heighten the sources implanted feelings of fear. THREAT: A U.S. PRISON Interrogators can suggest plenty of things to frighten prisoners. One Federal Bureau of Investigation official says likely scenarios include being sent to a U.S. prison, where inmates might view terrorists as lower than a child molester. Equally threatening: repatriation to Afghanistan, to face justice under the new regime in Kabul. Fear-down, in contrast, targets terrified
UC/Berkeley suspends Students for Justice in Palestine [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- http://www.berkeleydaily.org/text/article.cfm?issue=04-26-02storyID=11582 UCB suspends pro-Palestine student group over Wheeler Hall takeover By David Scharfenberg, Daily Planet staff (04-26-02) UC Berkeley has suspended Students for Justice in Palestine while officials investigate the groups April 9 takeover of Wheeler Hall. Under the terms of the suspension the group, which has called on the university to divest from Israel, will lose certain privileges including the ability to reserve rooms for meetings and set up a table on Sproul Plaza at the heart of the campus. We think this is a specific attack on activists and free speech, said Snehal Shingavi, an SJP leader. Shingavi said the move was particularly disturbing on a campus with a history of student activism. This is Berkeley, for goodness sake, he said. In no way are we trying to silence the group or individuals, replied Dean of Students Karen Kenney, noting that SJP members will still have the right to speak out and distribute leaflets during the suspension. University police arrested 79 protesters April 9, including 41 students, several from SJP. Kenney said the students, after going through a lengthy student judicial process, could face penalties ranging from probation to a year-long suspension. Assistant Chancellor John Cummins said suspension is an appropriate penalty for SJP, and individual students, because they disrupted classes during the Wheeler Hall occupation. The basic mission of the university is to educate students, Cummins said. For any group, for any individual, no matter how noble the cause, to interfere with the rights of other students (is unacceptable). But Shingavi argued that the university has never suspended a group for civil disobedience in the past, even if that disobedience disrupted student life, and that targeting SJP is unfair. Cummins said university officials explicitly warned SJP leaders that suspension was a possibility if they violated university rules during their protest. He said the university had never provided that type of warning to another group, making SJP a special case. Adam Weisberg, executive director of Berkeley Hillel, a hub of Jewish student life, said he agrees with the universitys approach. Every student group has a right to demonstrate and articulate its concerns to the larger community, he said. But civil disobedience invites the kind of action that the university is now taking. Will Youmans, an SJP leader, said the group plans to stage a protest the first week of May, calling for university divestment from Israel. All attempts by the university to silence this movement are futile, because there is such widespread support on campus for divestment, he said. Kenney said the group will not be able to reserve Sproul Plaza in advance of the event, as a group with full privileges might. But she said the university will not block any attempt to march or protest. = Lake Merritt Neighbors Organized for Peace. Weekly peace walks around Lake Merritt in Oakland. Starts ends at the colonnade between Grand Lakeshore Avenues, 3 P.M., every Sunday. Info: (510)763-8712, [EMAIL PROTECTED] or http://www.webwm.com/LMNOP __ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness http://health.yahoo.com --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
Rumsfeld Firms Up US Military Buildup In Central Asia [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- Houston Chronicle April 25, 2002, 11:14PM Rumsfeld firming ties in Central Asia By MICHAEL HEDGES SHANNON, Ireland -- On a mission to shore up alliances that a decade ago were unimaginable, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld visits Central Asia today for meetings with leaders of former Soviet republics. The sessions are designed to further military ties made quietly, but aggressively, by the Bush administration as part of its war on terrorism. The 'Stans, as diplomats informally call the states, stretch across a sparsely populated region of steppes, deserts and mountains, but they have become a key crossroads where several U.S. interests converge. The United States has entered deals to build military facilities in Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. And earlier this month, Kazakhstan's defense minister announced that the Pentagon had agreed to a $5 million allocation to strengthen the security of oil pipelines and other facilities near the Caspian Sea. We care about Central Asia not just because of the war on terrorism, or even because of the oil and gas in the region, said Zeyno Baran, a scholar at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. It is important because of geography. In an interview en route to Central Asia on Thursday, Rumsfeld said, The countries on the periphery of Afghanistan are of course very important in and of themselves. They are also important to Afghanistan. A series of bases in the region could become critical in future crises from the Persian Gulf to the volatile border between India and Pakistan, experts said. But as the American presence grows in the area, countries such as Russia, China and Iran, which have considered Central Asia part of their sphere of influence, are getting nervous, experts said. There is building opposition in Russia to allowing the United States to develop and expand its presence in Central Asia, said Andrew Hess, a professor of diplomacy at Tufts University. The Chinese would be very concerned if the United States appeared to be an economic rival in the region, he said. And the Iranians have considered Central Asia as part of their sphere of influence since the fifth century B.C. Rumsfeld will be visiting several Central Asian states on his four-day trip, meeting with military and political leaders. He also will visit U.S. troops and Afghan officials, including interim leader Hamid Karzai, during a one-day trip to Afghanistan. He will meet with Russian defense officials at a stopover in Moscow to discuss nuclear arm cuts. Pentagon aides styled Rumsfeld's swing through Central Asia as a chance to express appreciation to nations that have helped in the war against terrorism and the search for terrorist Osama bin Laden. He will visit with some of our coalition partners in the region. It has been the strength of those coalitions, their willingness to participate, that has contributed so much to our success thus far. So he is also looking forward to that, said spokeswoman Victoria Clarke. Some analysts said the Pentagon hopes U.S. interest in Central Asia will be temporary and will remain grounded in the short-term tactical requirements of the war on terrorism. I suspect the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff want to get out of there as quickly as possible, said Anthony Cordesman, a senior analyst with the CSIS. We don't have any particular plans for permanent bases, Rumsfeld said Thursday. It is too soon to decide or characterize exactly how long we would want to keep a capability in a particular country. But Baran said it may not be simple for the United States to just leave the region once short-term goals are accomplished. All of the countries that are now cooperating with the United States have sought assurances that this will not just be about getting bin Laden and his top associates and pulling out, she said. They now feel they have a commitment from the United States. That commitment extends to helping fight Islamic fundamentalism, providing assistance in securing borders, and even economic assistance, she said. Experts said the murky future of the war on terrorism made it difficult for U.S. military and political leaders to predict how long a presence will be necessary in Central Asia. That has caused Russia, Iran and others to express some concern that a new Great Game was afoot -- echoing the 19th-century imperialist struggle between Great Britain and Russia in Central Asia. The struggle led to several small wars. The most concerned are Russian nationalists opposed to President Vladimir Putin's policy of working with the United States in the war on terrorism and accepting U.S. troops in the region, experts said. But in background interviews, U.S. officials said concerns in Russia, Iran and China that America has longer-term interests in the region are groundless. This is about winning the war on terrorism and aiding stability in the region, period, an official
Rumsfeld Gets Explosive Reception In Kabul [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- Saturday April 27, 3:50 PM Rumsfeld arrives in Afghanistan as bomb blasts rock Kabul airport US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld arrived in Afghanistan for talks with military leaders coordinating the war against remaining Taliban and al-Qaeda forces in Afghanistan. He was greeted by Major General Frank Hagenbeck, the US commander of coalition forces, at this former Soviet base some 50 kilometres (31 Miles) north of the Afghan capital Kabul where three explosions had rocked the international airport overnight. He was also met by Brigadier Roger Lane, the head of the British task force which began deploying here last month. Rumsfeld was due to address some of the 3,000 American troops based at Bagram and was then expected to fly to Kabul to hold talks with interim cabinet leader Hamid Karzai and Defence Minister Mohammad Qasim Fahim. It is his second trip to Afghanistan since the Taliban regime collapsed in November and came just hours after three explosions rocked Kabul's international airport. There were three explosions at the airport last night (Friday). There were no injuries, said Major Karen Daly, a British spokeswoman for the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan. Anonymous ISAF sources told AFP that the explosions were caused by three rockets launched close to the airport late Friday. The sources said the target of the attack was not clear, but British and French troops based near the airport had been put on full alert following the blasts. Two of the rockets, which were all fired within the space of five minutes, passed over an ISAF base, the sources said, adding that ballistic studies were underway to determine their origin. They probably came from several kilometres (miles) from the airport, they said. Rumsfeld had arrived in Afghanistan from Kyrgyzstan where he had thanked President Askar Akayev for his country's support to the US-led anti-terrorist operation in Afghanistan. Thank you for the wonderful cooperation we are receiving with the use of the base in Manas, Rumsfeld said, referring to the military airbase near the Kyrgyz capital Bishkek where 1,900 anti-terrorist coalition troops are based. The base, 1,000 kilometres (630 miles) north of Afghanistan, was particularly helpful as it allowed regular flight missions to make their way to that country, he added. From Manas, aircraft are able to fly to Afghanistan, refuel and conduct operations to prevent al-Qaeda and Taliban from threatening the Afghan government, he said. Akayev praised the anti-terrorist operation in Central Asia, which would make the new process (in Afghanistan) irreversible. This was an important aspect of regional security for Central Asia, he added. On Friday, Rumsfeld warned international troops based in Kyrgyzstan that the military effort in Afghanistan was far from over. Your task, I'm afraid, is going to last for a while. It is not to end soon, he told US and other troops deployed at the Manas air base. Rumsfeld said coalition forces would remain in the former Soviet republic as long as necessary. A total of 1,900 soldiers from the United States, Australia, France, South Korea, Denmark, Spain, Norway and the Netherlands are based in Kyrgyzstan, a Central Asian country near Afghanistan although they do not share a common border. US and coalition troops are also based in two other Central Asian states, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. __ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness http://health.yahoo.com --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
Rumsfeld Gets Explosive Reception In Kabul [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- Saturday April 27, 3:50 PM Rumsfeld arrives in Afghanistan as bomb blasts rock Kabul airport US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld arrived in Afghanistan for talks with military leaders coordinating the war against remaining Taliban and al-Qaeda forces in Afghanistan. He was greeted by Major General Frank Hagenbeck, the US commander of coalition forces, at this former Soviet base some 50 kilometres (31 Miles) north of the Afghan capital Kabul where three explosions had rocked the international airport overnight. He was also met by Brigadier Roger Lane, the head of the British task force which began deploying here last month. Rumsfeld was due to address some of the 3,000 American troops based at Bagram and was then expected to fly to Kabul to hold talks with interim cabinet leader Hamid Karzai and Defence Minister Mohammad Qasim Fahim. It is his second trip to Afghanistan since the Taliban regime collapsed in November and came just hours after three explosions rocked Kabul's international airport. There were three explosions at the airport last night (Friday). There were no injuries, said Major Karen Daly, a British spokeswoman for the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan. Anonymous ISAF sources told AFP that the explosions were caused by three rockets launched close to the airport late Friday. The sources said the target of the attack was not clear, but British and French troops based near the airport had been put on full alert following the blasts. Two of the rockets, which were all fired within the space of five minutes, passed over an ISAF base, the sources said, adding that ballistic studies were underway to determine their origin. They probably came from several kilometres (miles) from the airport, they said. Rumsfeld had arrived in Afghanistan from Kyrgyzstan where he had thanked President Askar Akayev for his country's support to the US-led anti-terrorist operation in Afghanistan. Thank you for the wonderful cooperation we are receiving with the use of the base in Manas, Rumsfeld said, referring to the military airbase near the Kyrgyz capital Bishkek where 1,900 anti-terrorist coalition troops are based. The base, 1,000 kilometres (630 miles) north of Afghanistan, was particularly helpful as it allowed regular flight missions to make their way to that country, he added. From Manas, aircraft are able to fly to Afghanistan, refuel and conduct operations to prevent al-Qaeda and Taliban from threatening the Afghan government, he said. Akayev praised the anti-terrorist operation in Central Asia, which would make the new process (in Afghanistan) irreversible. This was an important aspect of regional security for Central Asia, he added. On Friday, Rumsfeld warned international troops based in Kyrgyzstan that the military effort in Afghanistan was far from over. Your task, I'm afraid, is going to last for a while. It is not to end soon, he told US and other troops deployed at the Manas air base. Rumsfeld said coalition forces would remain in the former Soviet republic as long as necessary. A total of 1,900 soldiers from the United States, Australia, France, South Korea, Denmark, Spain, Norway and the Netherlands are based in Kyrgyzstan, a Central Asian country near Afghanistan although they do not share a common border. US and coalition troops are also based in two other Central Asian states, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. __ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness http://health.yahoo.com --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
Rumsfeld In Kyrgyz Colony: We were successful - to a certain extent [WWW.STOPNAT
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- The ghost of Robert McNamara must be haunting him. AFP Saturday April 27, 10:14 AM Rumsfeld visits central Asia troops, warns of long haul US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld flew to Kyrgyzstan at the start of a Central Asian tour and warned international troops based there that the military effort in nearby Afghanistan was far from over. Your task, I'm afraid, is going to last for a while. It is not to end soon, he told US and other troops deployed at the Manas air base in the former Soviet republic, 1,000 kilometres (630 miles) north of Afghanistan. Rumsfeld, who heads to Afghanistan on Saturday for talks with interim government leader Hamid Karzai, said coalition forces would remain in Kyrgyzstan as long as necessary. Your role is important. You stand against evil, mass murderers, the defense secretary told a meeting with 400 mostly American troops stationed at Manas, now renamed the Ganci Air Base after Peter Ganci, New York's former fire chief who was killed on September 11. Describing the US-led war against terrorism as a difficult task really, Rumsfeld told the troops in Kyrgyzstan: We were successful -- to a certain extent. A total of 1,900 from the United States, Australia, France, South Korea, Denmark, Spain, Norway and Holland, are based at the Manas base, which Rumsfeld hailed as a model of the new international partnership. We are working with coalition forces, literally all over the world, added the hawkish defense secretary, who was greeted with loud applause when he arrived at Manas in time to see six French Mirage jets and six F/A-18 Hornets take off for missions over Afghanistan. It is Rumsfeld's second visit to the region since the September 11 terrorist attacks on the United States, and the start of the military campaign in Afghanistan on October 7 which quickly brought down the Taliban regime. In December Rumsfeld was the first member of President George W. Bush's cabinet to go to Afghanistan and meet the new authorities. I hope to meet with elements and people working with that issue (security), he told journalists, referring to his talks Saturday with representatives of the interim Afghan government headed by Hamid Karzai. The Pentagon is concerned about possible stepped-up guerrilla activities by Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network and the Taliban in coming months, when winter snows melt in the region. My guess is as spring comes and the weather improves they will try to communicate with each other, they will try to attack the interim authority as well as US and coalition forces... they will try to create an environment which is inhospitable to anyone else (but themselves), Rumsfeld told journalists earlier. The Americans and their Afghan and foreign allies would continue to carry out raids, arresting people and seeking concentrations of al Qaeda and Taliban members, the defense secretary said. Rumsfeld did not want to comment on press reports about US military operations in Pakistan in regions bordering on Afghanistan, saying he would not speak about activities in other countries. However he indirectly confirmed that the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Central Intelligence Agency had taken part in raids on terror suspects in Pakistan which resulted in the arrest last month of bin Laden adjutant Abu Zubeida. Agencies of the US government are cooperating with agencies in Pakistan, coordinating... he explained. The New York Times reported that US advisors had been given the go-ahead to accompany local troops in Pakistan's tribal regions to look for enemy fighters. Clandestine operations by US special forces had started weeks ago, the Washington Post said Thursday, talking of a new strategy. It said elite commandos were trying to get fundamentalist militants to attack and thus unmask themselves. Rumsfeld was due to hold talks early Saturday with President Askar Akayev of Kyrgyzstan, which has pledged to host up to 5,000 coalition troops if necessary. The countries on the periphery with Afghanistan are very important to the US, and to the security of Afghanistan, the defense secretary said. Some are in the Partnership for Peace program with NATO and they authorize overflights. But there are no plans for permanent bases, he added. After visiting Afghanistan and Central Asia, Rumsfeld will meet Russian Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov in Moscow. __ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness http://health.yahoo.com --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
Iran: Radical Warmongers Drive US Policy [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- AFP Saturday April 27, 4:35 PM Khatami says radical warmongers drive US policy -Iran is thought to be alarmed at the foothold the United States has secured in Central Asia since September 11, with US and allied troops now stationed in Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. Iranian President Mohammad Khatami blasted US Middle East policy in an interview published here, saying it was driven by radical warmongers. Khatami, whose nation was lumped with Iraq and North Korea in George W. Bush's axis of evil, said the US president was acting against the best interests of the United States. After the tragic September 11 events the United States abused world sympathy, and Israel activated its lobby and took advantage of Bush's lack of experience, he told the International Herald Tribune. He said the Bush administration fell victim to this trap, against US interests. Bush's axis of evil speech in February appeared to put on a hold a thaw between Washington and Tehran's Islamic regime, who have not had diplomatic relations since 1980. Iran assisted the US drive to topple the Taliban regime in neighbouring Afghanistan as part of its war on terrorism after the September 11 attacks in the United States. But Khatami's comments reflected the outrage in the Muslim and Arab worlds over US backing for Israel's assault on the Palestinians, which Israel also calls a war on terrorism. The paper reported that he said a radical warmonger group was willing to risk an escalating conflict in the Middle East in order to back Israel and install US military power in the region. He said Bush's hardline stance against Tehran had hardened national solidarity in Iran, where Khatami has led a reform movement kept at heel by the regime's powerful conservatives. An Iranian opposition leader told AFP in Tehran earlier this month that Bush's axis of evil speech had set off national reconciliation between Iran's sparring political movements. Tehran has denied US allegations that it has been selling arms to the Palestinians or harbouring al-Qaeda fighters who fled Afghanistan. Khatami told the paper that Iran was ready for better relations with the United States if Bush would move away from the language of evil. He was speaking in Kazakhstan during a Central Asia tour as Tehran vies with the United States for influence over the region's vast gas and oil reserves. Iran is thought to be alarmed at the foothold the United States has secured in Central Asia since September 11, with US and allied troops now stationed in Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. __ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness http://health.yahoo.com --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
DEPLETED URANIUM IN BUNKER BOMBS [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- DEPLETED URANIUM IN BUNKER BOMBS America's big dirty secret (Le Mode diplomatique, March 2002) The United States loudly and proudly boasted this month of its new bomb currently being used against al-Qaida hold-outs in Afghanistan; it sucks the air from underground installations, suffocating those within. The US has also admitted that it has used depleted uranium weaponry over the last decade against bunkers in Iraq, Kosovo, and now Afghanistan. by ROBERT JAMES PARSONS * The immediate concern for medical professionals and employees of aid organisations remains the threat of extensive depleted uranium (DU) contamination in Afghanistan. This is one of the conclusions of a 130-page report, Mystery Metal Nightmare in Afghanistan? (1), by Dai Williams, an independent researcher and occupational psychologist. It is the result of more than a year of research into DU and its effects on those exposed to it. Using internet sites of both NGOs (2) and arms manufacturers, Williams has come up with information that he has cross-checked and compared with weapons that the Pentagon has reported indeed boasted about using during the war. What emerges is a startling and frightening vision of war, both in Afghanistan and in the future. Since 1997 the United States has been modifying and upgrading its missiles and guided (smart) bombs. Prototypes of these bombs were tested in the Kosovo mountains in 1999, but a far greater range has been tested in Afghanistan. The upgrade involves replacing a conventional warhead by a heavy, dense metal one (3). Calculating the volume and the weight of this mystery metal leads to two possible conclusions: it is either tungsten or depleted uranium. Tungsten poses problems. Its melting point (3,422°C) makes it very hard to work; it is expensive; it is produced mostly by China; and it does not burn. DU is pyrophoric, burning on impact or if it is ignited, with a melting point of 1,132°C; it is much easier to process; and as nuclear waste, it is available free to arms manufacturers. Further, using it in a range of weapons significantly reduces the US nuclear waste storage problem. This type of weapon can penetrate many metres of reinforced concrete or rock in seconds. It is equipped with a detonator controlled by a computer that measures the density of the material passed through and, when the warhead reaches the targeted void or a set depth, detonates the warhead, which then has an explosive and incendiary effect. The DU burns fiercely and rapidly, carbonising everything in the void, while the DU itself is transformed into a fine uranium oxide powder. Although only 30% of the DU of a 30mm penetrator round is oxidised, the DU charge of a missile oxidises 100%. Most of the dust particles produced measure less than 1.5 microns, small enough to be breathed in. For a few researchers in this area, the controversy over the use of DU weapons during the Kosovo war got side-tracked. Instead of asking what weapons might have been used against most of the targets
Possibilities for the future of Cyprus [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
Title: Message HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- The Washington Timeswww.washtimes.com Possibilities for the future of CyprusBenjamin TyreePublished 4/26/2002 The U.N.-monitored, cloaked-from-the-media, discussions regarding the divided island nation of Cyprus may yet provide an example of how estranged ethnic communities can become reconciled.At present, tiny Cyprus, with 3,500 square miles, or less than half the size of Israel, is making slow and uncertain but occasionally perceptible progress in a healing dialogue between the leaders of its once violently torn Orthodox Greek and Muslim Turkish groups, totaling less than 800,000 people.The internationally recognized Republic of Cyprus controls less than two-thirds of the island, and a large majority of its population, chiefly those of Greek origin and culture.The less populous Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) is officially recognized only by Turkey. Turkish troops have occupied this area as a protectorate for their Turkish Cypriot compatriots since 1974, following a decade of intermittent ethnic clashes between factions of the indigenous Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot communities.Four decades ago, many Greek Cypriots sought "enosis," or union with Greece. Today, the Republic of Cyprus seeks reunification of the island as a "bicommunal, bizonal, federated state," with a single international identity. The TRNC's Turkish Cypriot population has been diminished by emigration but augmented by citizens of Turkey (estimates range between 40,000 and 115,000) settled there over the objections of the Republic of Cyprus. The TRNC remains skittish about reunification, and has sought recognized sovereignty for itself and a looser confederation.Held out to Turkish Cypriots and to Turkey are the benefits of Turkish-speaking communities becoming part of the European Union, after the Republic of Cyprus is finally admitted perhaps by the end of this year. Trade, tourism and EU aid would flow to both Cypriot communities. The relationship between the two ethnic communities would be managed in the larger context of EU human-rights assurances and other rules.But Turkish Cypriots express worries about a reprise of the strife-ridden past and possible economic domination by the Greek Cypriots. Property-rights issues are another hurdle.Greek Cypriots argue that Turkey's prospects for eventual EU membership would be facilitated by Turkish becoming an official EU language (as one of the languages of Cyprus), and by ending the island's division. Resolving the Cyprus question would, moreover, augur well for continued, closer rapprochement between NATO members Greece and Turkey and could provide a democratic example for a civil settlement of the longstanding tensions between the Orthodox Christian and Islamic populations throughout the nearby Balkan region.Thus far, the Republic of Cyprus has held the cards of recognition and support by international organizations and has assumed a modern stance supportive of full rights for all citizens of Cyprus Greek and Turkish Cypriot alike.The TRNC has held the cards of old injuries and grievances and of support by Turkey. But these may be diminishing assets as all parties look expectantly toward accession to the pan-ethnic EU and a wider future.American sources familiar with the Cyprus question say key obstacles to its resolution include Turkey's security concerns plausible or not regarding any future role on the island by parties unfriendly to Turkish interests.One U.S. source agreed that the issues involving post-1974 Turkish settlers from Anatolia could prove more difficult than Cypriot officials like to think. The Republic of Cyprus views the settlers as part of an illegal and internationally opposed occupation of the north by Turkey.But Greek Cypriot officials display no disposition for wrenching expulsions. In recent discussions with journalists, former Cyprus President George Vassiliou emphasized financial incentives to facilitate repatriation of the settlers to Turkey. A right of settlement is evidently acceptable for those who have intermarried with the indigenous population.There have been vague suggestions, difficult to pin down, that place of birth might provide a basis for certain rights. However, Demetris Christofias, president of the Cyprus House of Representatives, emphasized during a mid-April Washington visit that parentage would be the decisive element in citizenship. Mr. Vassiliou earlier mentioned limited residency rights or work permits might be possible for settlers who prove to be economic assets.American observers note that financial commitments to Cyprus upon its accession to the EU involving hundreds of millions of euros will result in major development of the island's infrastructure with huge economic implications for a nation of its small size and population. Some of the present settlers, one U.S.
- Human Rights meeting ends amid criticism [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
Title: Message HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- 2002-04-27 05:07 MSK - Human Rights meeting ends amid criticism GENEVA - The annual six-week meeting of the U.N. Human Rights Commission wound down Friday amid criticism that it was protecting the oppressors rather than the oppressed. The U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mary Robinson, described the meeting as "very difficult" and "very worrying" and said she was concerned about trends within the 53-nation body to weaken its role as a defender of liberties. The commission - which is the top U.N. rights watchdog - failed even to discuss the situation in China. It dropped its criticism of Russian abuses in Chechnya; voted to end a long-running investigation into Iran; and blocked moves to examine allegations of abuses in Zimbabwe. "This is a time to remind ourselves of the essential role of the Commission on Human Rights in protecting human beings against gross violations through highlighting and publicizing those violations; providing a forum for victims to raise their grievances; heeding the voice of conscience from different parts of the world," Robinson said in a closing speech. She named no names, but made it clear that she disagreed with developing countries that argue they are unfairly singled out by rich countries. Non-governmental groups said they were scandalized. "The Commission on Human Rights has become hostage to human rights abusers," said Rory Mungoven of Human Rights Watch. "They're dedicated to protecting themselves from scrutiny rather than upholding human rights." "The Commission's most important tool - its capacity to name and shame human rights violators - is being eroded," Mungoven said. He said the European Union spent more time trying to find common ground among its 15 members than putting pressure on violators like China. The United States was not a member this year and so took a lower-profile role than usual, but still lobbied behind the scenes to undermine initiatives like protecting human rights in the war against terrorism, he said. Membership of the commission rotates, with each geographical region allocated a certain number of seats. This year included an unusually high number of countries which stand accused by advocacy groups of abusing their citizens' rights, including China, Cuba, Congo, Kenya, Libya, Nigeria, Russia, Saudi Arabia and Sudan. -AP --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
Re: People who equate Slobodan Milosevic with Ariel Sharon[WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- Dear Nancy, An enlightened and well read friend of mine and I were discussing this very topic earlier and we came to the following conclusions: Milosevic, as opposed to Sharon, was conducting legitimate anti-terrorist operations ON THE SOVEREIGN AND CONSTITUENT TERRITORY OF JUGOSLAVIA (Kosovo). Sharon, on the other hand, has been carrying out his bloody deeds ON OCCUPIED LANDS (in contravention of a plethora of UN resolutions) IN FURTHERANCE OF THAT ILLEGAL OCCUPATION AND THE FURTHER EXPANSION OF THE TERRITORY OF ISRAEL AT THE EXPENSE OF THOSE LANDS SO ILLEGALLY OCCUPIED. The charge against Milosevic was the 'indiscriminate "slaughter"' of Albanian 'civilians' during the above cited anti-terrorist operations. True, Albanian civilians were occasionally 'caught in the crossfire' during these anti-terrorist operations. However, Milosevic's anti-terrorist operations could hardly be said to have been aimed at THE COMPLETE DESTRUCTION OF THE KOSOVAR ALBANIAN CIVILIANS AND INFRASTRUCTURE. Sharon's bloody operations, on the other hand, are self-evidently DESIGNED TO COMPLETELY DESTROY THE CIVILIAN INFRASTRUCTURE OF THE PALESTINIANS MAKING THE ALREADY MARGINAL EXISTENCE OF THE PALESTINIANS IMPOSSIBLE. When Milosevic made an agreement with the 'murderous asshole' Holbrooke to withdraw JNA and Serbian anti-terrorist forces from Kosovo, he held to that agreement and with dispatch withdrew those forces. Sharon, on the other hand, HAS HEMMED, HAWED, DAWDLED AND DELAYED AT EVERY JUNCTURE. In spite of the Shrub's 'insistence' that Sharon withdraw his forces from the West Bank, every such 'withdrawal' hailed by the mainline media is nothing more than a strategic pullback to just outside the Palestinian towns and cities accompanied by numerous and repeated 'sweeps' through yet more Palestinian towns and cities. All without even the hint of any US military pressure (as opposed to virtually every step in the US initiated wars of Jugoslav dissolution). There I believe you have 3 rather dramatic and distinct points of difference between the policies of Milosevic and Sharon. Cossack - Original Message - From: "Nancy Hey" [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, April 26, 2002 08:22 Subject: People who equate Slobodan Milosevic with Ariel Sharon [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK] HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- Dear friends, I've noticed a very disturbing trend recently at pro-Palestinian rallies that I've been to, and that is the tendency of certain people to carry signs with slogans on them like "Sharon = Milosevic", and "Hitler, Milosevic, Sharon, United They Stand". I'm disturbed by this trend, because these people don't seem to realize that Slobodan Milosevic, unlike Ariel Sharon, never was a tool of American imperialism, in fact, he is a victim of it through his prosecution at the "kangaroo" court in the Hague, and whether or not one agrees with all of his policies, one should recognize this fact, and condemn that court more than Mr. Milosevic, for being a tool of American and NATO imperialism. I fear that people, by carrying these signs, are just giving legitimacy to the imperialists' campaign of demonizing Mr. Milosevic and by extension the whole Serbian people. When they claim to be opposed to American imperialism by opposing US support for Israel, they should not make their point by legitimizing imperialism in its other forms. Would they try to make their point that Ariel Sharon is bad by comparing him to Fidel Castro? I've tried to approach people carrying these signs, but they've always just responded by saying that they believe "Milosevic is a war criminal" or "he's killing Muslims". I'd like to know what can be done to make poeple like this see the light, any kind of literature we can give them that might clarify the error of this analogy? Any suggestions, anyone? Peacefully yours, Nancy Hey --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
CHEWING THE FAT WITH TERRORISTS?.....JOE BIDEN, OUT TO LUNCH IN NEW YORK [WWW.S
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK
---
CHRIS SODA wrote:
jpm preface:
Before the USA attack on Serbia in 1999, Joe Biden demanded on US TV :a
German-Japanese style occupation of Serbia.
CHEWING THE FAT WITH TERRORISTS?.JOE BIDEN, OUT TO LUNCH IN NEW
YORK
Date: Fri, 26 Apr 2002 11:39:08 -0700 (PDT)
From: CHRIS SODA [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Mr Biden, thank you for taking the time to read this
short note before attending to other obligations. Your
name has come to my attention regarding a 12th
anniversary dinner at the Sheraton Hotel sponsored by
the Albanian American Civic League this coming April
28, 2002, in which you are scheduled to be the
'keynote speaker'. This anniversary, apparently, marks
the twelfth year since a handful of people, sponsored
by the League, testified before Congress in 1990
concerning the Serbian province of Kosovo in
Yugoslavia.
My first question to you, Mr Biden, is this: when US
Customs in 1990 allowed that handful of people to
enter your country, what 'point of origin/departure'
or 'country of citizenship' do you suppose was listed
on their respective passports? (I'm presuming up to
this point, of course, that those handful of people
were carrying authentic documents, left their own
country legally and entered the US legally, and were
in fact registered citizens of an actual country, with verified
borders, under relevant and applicable international statutes and
treaties, when they left to make this trip. If I have erred in my
assumption, Mr Biden. please feel free to correct me)
Since the current advertisement from the Albanian
American Civic League lists those handful of people
from 1990 as credible eye-witness testifiers on actual circumstances
in Kosovo at that time (and since your Congress thought similarly in
1990 by making time to hear them), the only logical conclusion is to
infer that for many of these 'witnesses', their 'point of
origin/departure' and/or their 'country of
citizenship' would have to have been Yugoslavia. And
as you know, Mr Biden, the corroborated historical
record is quite clear and unambiguous- the actual
circumstance of Kosovo in 1990 was that it was a
province of Serbia in the country of Yugoslavia.
As this is in fact the case, Mr Biden, I am wondering
how the Albanian American Civic League in 1990, and
those handful of people who testified then before
Congress, yourself, Joe DioGuardi, and others (all
then and now) refer to 'Kosova' rather than Kosovo.
You see, Mr Biden, that handful of travellers must
ALSO have recognized the territorial sovereignty and integrity of
Yugoslav borders in 1990. (if not, why were these people carrying
documentation issued from a country that they do not accept or
recognize?) I'm sure Mr Biden that you realize that one cannot
willingly accept or recognize documentation from a
country while at the same time refusing to accept or
recognize what that country is composed of, especially
in terms of latitudinal and longitudinal borders.
Since it is universally recognized and corroborated by
all persons of sound mind that the province of Kosovo
was an integral part of both Serbia and Yugoslavia in
1990 (verified by many atlases, encyclopaedias and
international treaties), I'm wondering why no one in
Congress, the League, nor yourself and Mr DioGuardi,
have questioned the usage of the term 'Kosova'. No one
in the world in 1990 (nor now) can travel on
documentation registered with 'Kosova' any more than
someone could travel with documentation registered
with Canado' or The United States of Americo'- or
The Third Reich' for that matter
It is puzzling to see a reference to a fictitious
political entity (Kosova') being accepted as an
actual existing place with defined borders. It is
equally puzzling to believe that the US Congress in
1990 would not have asked the same questions being
asked here. Perhaps you can provide an answer for me,
Mr Biden. How is accepting and using documentation
from a country consistent with not recognizing the
exact and corroborated borders of that country??
Equally puzzling is the fact that Congressmen/women
would hear testimony from people who literally 'don't
know where they are coming from- or going to'.
('kosova' being listed in encyclopediae as an African
tribe in Kenya, rather than an imaginary, nonexistent political or
geographical entity. See here, Mr Biden, for a brief analysis by one
of the world's leading linguists and historians in this regard:
http://opinionleaders.htmlplanet.com/koskosova.html)
Many people of similar mind have been locked up in institutions for
their own, and the general public's, safety. Apparently, many more are
somehow left uninstitutionalized, finding their way into the
highest levels of your government, as well as finding
their way into Congressional meetings and keynote
speakers' lists...
My second question
Tens of Thousands Due in Anti-Le Pen Rally in Paris [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
Title: Message HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- Published on Saturday, April 27, 2002 by Agence France Presse Tens of Thousands Due in Anti-Le Pen Rally in Paris With a week to go to the second round of France's presidential election, tens of thousands of people were expected to take to the streets of Paris for a new demonstration against the far-right candidate Jean-Marie Le Pen. The march, organized by around 60 left wing organizations, human rights groups, political parties and trade unions, was to leave the Place de la Republique on the capital's right bank at around 3.00 p.m. (1300 GMT). Other demonstrations were planned in cities round the country. In the southern town of Montauban around 1,000 people marched Saturday morning, chanting, "Montauban, awake! Fascism will not pass!" Saturday's protests were being seen by police as a dry-run for the demonstrations for and against Le Pen due to take place in the capital on May 1, which the authorities fear could easily descend into violence. "It is a good-natured movement," said an unnamed police commander in the Liberation daily, "but all these young people in the street -- no one is controlling them, and the gangs from the suburbs could come and join in. It could easily degenerate." Officials warned that violence at the demonstrations would play into the hands of Le Pen, who is running a campaign based round the themes of crime and immigration. The 73 year-old leader of the National Front (FN) stunned France on Sunday when he won through to the second round of the presidential election against incumbent President Jacques Chirac, beating Socialist Prime Minister Lionel Jospin into third place. Throughout the week high-school and university students have led a campaign of protests against Le Pen, culminating Thursday when more than 300,000 people were on the streets. But Le Pen accused his political opponents of orchestrating the protests and said they might even be illegal. "They are not in the least spontaneous," he said. "The political superstructure is making use of our youth and our children as a political shield. I am not sure it is very legal to allow children to be launched in demonstrations that are built around slogans of hate." The first opinion poll to be published since last Sunday gave a clear victory in the May 5 second round to Chirac, with 81 percent to Le Pen's 19. According to the CSA survey for Le Parisien newspaper, 29 percent of those questioned said they would abstain or spoil their ballot papers. French polling institutes have been widely attacked for failing to predict Le Pen's victory over Socialist Prime Minister Lionel Jospin. Critics said polls indicating Chirac and Jospin were the only two with a chance of qualifying encouraged a sense of complacency which led to high abstention and let Le Pen squeeze through. And they warned that a similar phenomenon could recur in round two if Chirac is consistently shown to be uncatchable in the polls. On Friday one leading company BVA said it would publish no opinion samples before the second round because of the "extraordinarily fluid" situation. Copyright 2002 AFP ### --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
Spies get off easy in Greece... [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- Court Convicts Euro Aviation Buffs By DEREK GATOPOULOS .c The Associated Press KALAMATA, Greece (AP) - Fourteen aviation buffs were convicted on misdemeanor espionage charges Friday and ordered to serve one to three years in prison for taking notes on aircraft at Greek military bases. But the court suspended the sentences after the ``plane spotters'' appealed, ending - at least for the time being - a case that caused considerable friction between Greece and Britain. The 12 British and two Dutch aviation enthusiasts were released pending an appeals hearing. As no hearing was immediately scheduled, all 14 planned to leave Greece on Saturday. The group was arrested after an air show on Nov. 8 in Kalamata, about 150 miles southwest of Athens, and accused of being spies. They said they were merely practicing their hobby but spent five weeks in prison before they were freed on bail. Originally charged with a felony carrying a maximum of 20 years in prison, the charges were later reduced to a misdemeanor. Police initially said they were photographing aircraft but during the trial, prosecution witnesses admitted the group had taken no pictures at any of the six air bases they visited. A three-judge panel, however, dismissed the defendants' arguments, and convicted them Friday on the basis of the notes found in their possession. Eight were convicted of gathering illegal information and the six others of complicity. The eight were then sentenced to three years in prison; the six others to one year. Richard Howitt, a British member of the European Parliament, who testified on the group's behalf, called the result ``diabolical'' and pledged to take the case to the European Court. Other British lawmakers in London also expressed their shock. ``It just seems absolutely incredible and unbelievable that a Greek court should come to this decision,'' said Conservative deputy Gerald Howarth, a pilot for 35 years. ``It is a very popular occupation in this country among people interested in aviation. I just cannot believe that the Greeks have taken this attitude toward them.'' Plane spotters, as they are known in Britain, observe, photograph and take notes such as the serial numbers of military and civilian aircraft. The hobby is virtually unknown in Greece, which has a tradition of tight military controls because of long-standing territorial disputes with neighboring Turkey. British Prime Minister Tony Blair ``continues to follow this case closely,'' his spokesman said, adding that Blair has in the past brought it up with his Greek counterpart Costas Simitis. ``The government has always believed that the response to this case has been disproportionate and will continue to give the defendants and their families as much help as it can,'' the spokesman said on customary condition of anonymity. Defense lawyers and witnesses argued that the information they were accused of gathering on the planes was freely available in books and on the Internet. But prosecutor Panagiotis Poulios said the group knew the information was supposed to be secret. ``They knew they gathered it illegally, and they knew that it could damage national security if it fell into the wrong hands,'' he said in his closing statement. 04/26/02 15:51 EDT --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
Fwd: The Development Set [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- In a message dated 26/04/02 13:56:29 Eastern Daylight Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: The Development Set Excuse me, friends, I must catch my jet- I'm off to join the Development Set; My bags are packed, and I've had all my shots, I have travellers' cheques, and pills for the trots. The Development Set is bright and noble, Our thoughts are deep and our vision global; Although we move with the better classes, Our thoughts are always with the masses. In Sheraton hotels in scattered nations, We damn multinational corporations; Injustice seems so easy to protest, In such seething hotbeds of social rest. We discuss malnutrition over steaks And plan hunger talks during coffee breaks. Whether Asian floods or African drought, We face each issue with an open mouth. We bring in consultants whose circumlocution Raises difficulties for every solution- Thus guaranteeing continued good eating By showing the need for another meeting. The language of the Development Set Stretches the English alphabet; We use swell words like 'epigenetic', 'Micro', 'Macro'. and 'logarithmetic'. Development Set homes are extremely chic, Full of carvings, curios and draped with batik. Eye-level photographs subtly assure That your host is at home with the rich and the poor. Enough of these verses -- on with the mission! Our task is as broad as the human condition! Just pray to God the biblical promise is true: The poor ye shall always have with you. Ross Coggins --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^ ---BeginMessage--- The Development Set Excuse me, friends, I must catch my jet- I'm off to join the Development Set; My bags are packed, and I've had all my shots, I have travellers' cheques, and pills for the trots. The Development Set is bright and noble, Our thoughts are deep and our vision global; Although we move with the better classes, Our thoughts are always with the masses. In Sheraton hotels in scattered nations, We damn multinational corporations; Injustice seems so easy to protest, In such seething hotbeds of social rest. We discuss malnutrition over steaks And plan hunger talks during coffee breaks. Whether Asian floods or African drought, We face each issue with an open mouth. We bring in consultants whose circumlocution Raises difficulties for every solution- Thus guaranteeing continued good eating By showing the need for another meeting. The language of the Development Set Stretches the English alphabet; We use swell words like 'epigenetic', 'Micro', 'Macro'. and 'logarithmetic'. Development Set homes are extremely chic, Full of carvings, curios and draped with batik. Eye-level photographs subtly assure That your host is at home with the rich and the poor. Enough of these verses -- on with the mission! Our task is as broad as the human condition! Just pray to God the biblical promise is true: The poor ye shall always have with you. Ross CogginsJoin the worlds largest e-mail service with MSN Hotmail. Click Here ---End Message---
The case against the Hague court [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
Title: Message
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK
---
MILOSEVIC IN THE
DOCK
The case against the
Hague court
by CATHERINE
SAMARY
"We knew the Milosevic trial was going to be
difficult but who could have imagined that, from the very beginning, it would be
such a disaster for the International Criminal Tribunal?" This comment from
Stojan Cerovic, a reporter on the weekly news magazine Vreme
(1), well known in Belgrade for hostility to Slobodan Milosevic, confirmed what
people were saying, not without pride, on the streets of the Serbian capital
after the first few days of what was to be a "historic trial".
Until the trial opened on 12 February, it had looked
as though Milosevic and his defenders were going to challenge the legal standing
of the tribunal and boycott the trial (2). Milosevic had been held in Belgrade
at the time and his supporters claim that his forcible removal to The Hague was
unlawful. Indeed, the Yugoslav constitutional court had just refused to grant
extradition on the ground that there was - and still is - no legal basis for
cooperation with the ICTY.
In the event, Milosevic opted to use this public
arena to present his own defence, declaring that "the people and public opinion
should be his judges." In Belgrade, there was intense interest in the opening of
the trial. The proceedings were broadcast live on three channels, viewers kept a
daily tally of the points scored by the defendant and his popularity began to
recover. But it was not to last.
CNN stopped broadcasting when he produced pictures
of the collateral damage caused by the Nato bombing. Since 19 February, when he
undermined the principal witness for the prosecution, Mahmut Bakalli, in
cross-examination, even the ICTY website no longer publishes transcripts of the
proceedings. The Serbian radio and television service Radiotelevizija Srbije
(RTS) stopped broadcasting the trial on 8 March, on the ground that it was too
costly, and the federal TV channel YuInfo followed suit on 13 March. The
independent radio station B92, which has good technical links with the ICTY,
still covers the trial, but subscribers may decide to call a halt at any time.
President Vojislav Kostunica's view is that "much of
the evidence is true but much is also superficial, truncated and manipulated. It
is being politicised and there is an element of hypocrisy" (3). In fact, despite
the tribunal's attempts to appear impartial, the prosecutor, Carla del Ponte,
has largely helped to bring the ICTY into disrepute by refusing to investigate
the claim that Nato was guilty of war crimes against civilians. And the
defendant, Milosevic, whatever one may think of his policies and his one-sided
interpretation of events, has been helped by the paranoid theory - rightly
condemned by Stojan Cerovic - that "the whole disaster in former Yugoslavia was
the result of a criminal conspiracy among members of his entourage" (4).
Sociologist Srdjan Bogosavljevic, interviewed in
Belgrade during the first week of the trial, explained the general unwillingness
to admit that crimes had been committed in the name of Serbia: "Most people say
they could not bring themselves to commit a crime and they believe the same is
true of Serbs in general. But the main reason for this collective blind spot is
that there are about 600,000 Serbian refugees from Croatia and Bosnia in the
country, so people are more aware of the crimes of others."
The jokes circulating in Belgrade about the Kosovar
Albanian witnesses are sometimes thought to be a bit racist. In fact, Mahmut
Bakalli, a former apparatchik of the League of Communists, was president of
Kosovo in 1981 and in that sense he is emblematic of the prosecution's
weaknesses. He made a very poor showing as a witness for the prosecution because
he was desperately anxious to attribute the start of the crisis in Kosovo to a
speech Milosevic made in 1989. He was equally poor as a spokesman for the
Albanian cause because, as the defendant did not fail to point out, this was the
man who had ordered the tanks out in 1981 to crush demonstrations by young
Kosovars seeking republican status for the province. Milosevic quoted an
interview with Bakalli at the time, in which he had rejected their claim.
The responsibility for evidence of this type lies
with the tribunal machinery, which has tried to justify bringing a case against
Milosevic for the events in Kosovo during the Nato bombing, while glossing over
the nature of the real conflicts that were tearing the province apart and
overlooking the civil war underlying the expulsions, which was made worse by the
bombing. Will the ICTY be accused of "revisionism" because it withdrew the
charge relating to the notorious Operation Horseshoe (5), which turned out to be
a fabrication? The constant bombardment, actual and verbal, ("Auschwitz",
"genocide", "deportation") has caused intoxication; a cool look at the evidence
is
NATO: Boondoggle For Death Merchants [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- [For anyone still in doubt about the true purpose of the expanded, post-Cold War NATO alliance, this feature will put any such doubt to rest. The small Czech Republic, which needs 24 supersonic fighters (at a cost of $2billion) like Afghanistan needs a navy, backs out of an arms purchase contract with Sweden because - Sweden is not yet a NATO member. What is the ineluctable message given to Gripen and other Swedish firms, ones with great influence over Sweden's elected officials?] The Washington Times www.washtimes.com Analysis: Big Czech arms deal on hold Martin Walker Chief international correspondent Published 4/27/2002 PRAGUE, Czech Republic, April 27 (UPI) -- One of Europe's biggest and most controversial arms deals, the Czech government's decision to buy 24 supersonic Gripen fighters from Sweden at a cost of nearly $2 billion, is on hold after the Czech parliament this week refused to approve the spending commitment. Officials say the deal may not survive scheduled June elections. The purchase has contained some oddities from the beginning. The Czechs decided to buy the planes as a symbol of their commitment to the NATO alliance, which the country joined in 1999. But the Swedes who manufacture the Gripen are not NATO members, and there is some question how well the fighters would operate within the rest of NATO's air fleet. The three other bidders for the deal, the American Lockheed-Martin group offering F-16s, the Eurofighter group whose aircraft is being bought by Britain and Germany, and the French Dassault company, all made the unusual decision to withdraw their offers at the last minute, amid swirling rumors of questionable procurement practices. The Czech government has dismissed the concerns, saying that the Gripen is a joint venture of the Swedish group and Britain's BAe group, whose 35 percent participation in the Gripen deal is sufficient guarantee that the fighter will be able to operate with other NATO air forces. But although British prime minister Tony Blair made a strong pitch for the Gripen deal on a recent visit to Prague, raising some eyebrows back home, the fact remains that Britain's Royal Air Force has no intention of buying the Gripen. The deal has far-reaching implications for NATO, because all three new members, Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic, have decided to upgrade and Westernize their formerly Soviet-made air forces at the same time. The prospect of a major sales bonanza attracted massive interest from the world's combat aircraft manufacturers. So far, the Hungarians and Czechs have gone for the Gripen, and the Poles remain undecided. With NATO now expected to bring in seven additional new members from Eastern Europe at the alliance summit in Prague in November, the promise of the enlarged NATO arms market is even more tempting. But the high cost of advanced fighter jets is a major problem for the Eastern European economies still making the difficult transition from Soviet-style central planning to free enterprise. Czech critics of the Gripen deal say the cost will derail more urgent plans to modernize the military. The purchase will only add to the present paralysis of the Czech military budget -- with effects on the procurement system that will continue for the next three decades, Petr Vancura, director of the Prague Institute for National Security, told United Press International. The real Czech priority is to modernize the army, not to buy a small number of high-performance fighters. The net result could be net weakening of the Czech military contribution to NATO -- which makes the British aspect of the deal all the harder to understand. BAe is the only non-American defense group to be treated by the Pentagon as virtually a U.S. national in defense procurement matters, and is a close partner of Lockheed-Martin in the development of the new joint strike fighter. The BAe role in the Gripen deal has provoked some tension in the relationship between BAe and Lockheed-Martin, industry sources have told UPI. The Czech Republic is already lagging in the fulfillment of its NATO obligations to modernize the army because of previous irresponsible purchases and other financial commitments of the Ministry of Defense, Vancura added. The Gripen team made a highly attractive offer, which included promises to invest more money into the Czech economy than the initial purchase price of the fighters, including promises to transfer technology that would upgrade the small Czech aeronautic industry. This aspect of the deal convinced the Social Democrat-led government to go ahead with the deal. The government has so far been unable to get parliamentary approval for the first batch of payments, however, and looks to be running out of time before scheduled elections, now just two months away. One factor in the parliament's reluctance to approve the deal
News, 27.4.2002, 16:00 UTC [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- Deutsche Welle English Service News April 27th, 2001, 16:00 UTC -- Today's highlight on DW-WORLD: Germany Mourns After Friday's school massacre in the eastern German city of Erfurt, a time of soul searching has begun. The Gutenberg High School shooting left 17 people dead. To read this article on the DW-WORLD website, just click on the internet address below: http://dw-world.de/english/0,3367,1430_A_507765_1_A,00.html -- Germany in shock as 17 die in school shooting German police said that 19-year-old pupil Robert Steinhaeuser responsible for the country's worst post-war mass killing was a registered gun club member. The recently expelled young man had returned to his local school with a pump-action shotgun and a handgun and killed 13 teachers, two pupils, a police officer and then himself. Police said that Mr. Steinhaeuser, dressed in black and masked had access to enough ammunition to kill hundreds of people. His rampage was ended when a teacher grabbed and unmasked him and pushed him into a room, locking the door. It was then that he took his own life. Mr. Steinhaeuser had to repeat his final year, but was expelled before the school-leaving examination, required for university studies, because he forged absentee excuse notes. Flags through-out Germany are flying at half-mast this weekend. Gunmen kill 5 in Jewish settlement after UN Middle East mission is delayed Five people have been killed when gunmen attacked an Israeli settlement in the West Bank in the first such assault since Israel launched a four-week-old military sweep through Palestinian-ruled cities. The attack on Adora, northwest of the divided city of Hebron, came a day after U.S. President George W. Bush again insisted Israel immediately end its military offensive, after another Israeli raid defied his earlier demands. In another development the United Nations has agreed to delay a mission to the West Bank Palestinian refugee camp of Jenin, where it will now arrive on Sunday. U.N. Secretary- General Kofi Annan agreed to the delay at the request of Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres, who said it would give the Israeli cabinet time to discuss the mission before its arrival. Afghan warlord kill at least 25 people An Afghan warlord rained hundreds of rockets on the main east Afghan city of Gardez on Saturday killing at least 25 people in the biggest outbreak of fighting between rival Afghan forces for several months. Governor Taj Mohammad Wardak of Paktia province, scene of the biggest U.S.-led ground battle of the Afghan war last month, blamed the attack on former governor Khan Zadran, who was ousted from power in February. He said the former governor was trying to take over Gardez. The fighting broke out on the day U.S. Defense Secretary Rumsfeld visited Kabul and several hours after the Afghan capital's airport was hit by several rockets. There were no casualties in the airport attack. Madagascar governors threaten to split the island Five of Madagascar's six governors loyal to embattled Madagascan President Ratsiraka said on Saturday they would set up an independent state if a recount of disputed December polls declared rival Marc Ravalomanana the winner. The island off southeast Africa has been in political crisis since the elections, which Ravalomanana, the popular mayor of the capital, says he won. Mr. Ratsiraka denies that the election was rigged and says neither man won. The two men, who both now claim to be president, agreed in Dakar earlier this month to allow a recount of the polls to determine the victor. If neither was shown to have a majority, a referendum would be held to let the people decide. The High Constitutional Court began re-analysing the votes last week and says it will announce the results on Monday. Pakistan Supreme Court upholds Musharraf's referendum A nine member bench of the Pakistan Supreme Court Saturday unanimously rejected a host of petitions questioning the legality of the referendum being held on April 30th to extend President Pervez Musharraf's term by five years. The Court held that the referendum is legal. The referendum has been termed as unconstitutional and illegal by the mainstream political and religious parties. North Korean asylum seekers leave China Three North Koreans who entered Western embassy compounds in Beijing in the latest in a series of asylum bids have left China. A North Korean man climbed over a wall into the German Embassy grounds on Thursday. The next day, two North Koreans entered the U.S. Embassy compound seeking asylum. Diplomatic
KOSOVO-NATO'S FATAL ERROR -ANNIVERSARY OF SHAME [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG
Title: Message HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- KOSOVO-NATOS FATAL ERROR ANNIVERSARY OF SHAME: MARCH 1999-MARCH 2002 Ambassador Bissett http://www.deltax.net/bissett ANNIVERSARY OF SHAME: MARCH 1999-MARCH 2002 Bayronica, March 2002 On March 24 Serbian people around the world will recall with horror the shameful destruction of their country by the US led NATO Alliance. Three years ago, for 78 days and nights, NATO aircraft pounded Yugoslavia inflicting terrible damage on the civilian infrastructure of the country. The use of cluster bombs and weapons containing depleted uranium caused hundreds of civilian deaths and injuries. The psychological scars inflicted on the people may never be reconciled. This was an illegal and unjustified act of blatant aggression. That it was carried out by the democratic nations of Western Europe and North America only added to the bewilderment and horror. The ongoing trial of the former Serbian President, Slobodan Milosevic, can only be seen as a desperate attempt to justify NATOs criminal actions. It will not succeed. The legacy of Madeline Albrights war will be the dishonour it has brought to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Kosovo was NATOs fatal error. For more than forty years, The North Atlantic Treaty Organization protected the West from the very real threat of aggressive Soviet communism. It was an organization respected and admired by all free men. NATO was more than just a powerful military alliance. It was founded on a bedrock of morality and high principle. It stood for the principles of the United Nations Charter. It stood for democracy, for the rule of law and for all of those things our fathers and grandfathers had fought for in two cataclysmic World Wars. All of this changed in the spring of 1999 when NATO bombers launched its unprovoked and illegal assault against the sovereign state of Yugoslavia. The idea for NATO grew out of a suggestion proposed in 1948 by the Canadian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Louis St. Laurent, that the European Defense Alliance of five European countries be expanded to include the United States and Canada. A year later in April 1949 the treaty was signed in Washington and NATO was born. NATO was a defensive alliance. The first article of the Treaty made this clear. Article 1 read in part, The parties undertake, as set forth in the Charter of the United Nations, to settle any international dispute in which they may be involved, by peaceful means in such a manner that international peace and security and justice are not endangeredand to refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force in any manner inconsistent with the purposes of the United Nations. After the collapse of the Soviet Union and the demise of the Warsaw Pact forces in Eastern Europe the reason for NATOs continuing existence began to come under serious scrutiny. Why maintain such a large and expensive military organization in Western Europe when any threat from the former Soviet Union had evaporated? Before this question could be resolved, however, a new role for the Alliance was discovered. The violent breakup of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in the early 1990s provided NATO with a new mission- that of peace keeping. As violence and bloodshed spread in Croatia and Bosnia, the peacekeeping role turned into direct military action. Under the leadership of the United States, NATO intervened in the civil war in Yugoslavia and carried out air strikes against Serbian forces in Croatia and Bosnia. These air strikes were not conducted for defensive purposes. None of the NATO countries was threatened by the Yugoslav conflict. However, the strikes were carried out with the authority and approval of the Security Council of the United Nations. Therefore, while clearly in violation of the spirit of Article 1 of NATOs Treaty, it could be argued the military action was in keeping with the purposes of the United Nations. After Bosnia there was no further talk about dismantling NATO. On the contrary, the air strikes had given
Closer US Military Ties Could Threaten Canadian Sovereignty, Lives [WWW.STOPNATO
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- Canadian Press April 27, 2002 Closer military ties to U.S. threaten sovereignty, even lives: report JOHN WARD OTTAWA (CP) - Closer military ties to the United States could threaten Canada's sovereignty and even the lives of its soldiers, says an academic report released Friday. The document was written by Michael Byers, a Canadian who teaches law at Duke University in North Carolina. It was done for the Liu Centre for the Study of Global Issues, a Vancouver think-tank led by Lloyd Axworthy, the former foreign affairs minister. It looks at America's new Northern Command, a military headquarters to be set up next fall to co-ordinate defence of North America. Byers says that if Canada is drawn into Northern Command and tighter links with the American military command, it will be risking a lot. He questions whether Canada might lose its freedom of action on the international scene. He suggests Canada might become a puppet of American foreign policy and be forced into massive defence spending under American pressure. Defence Minister Art Eggleton dismissed the concerns, saying there's no intention of integrating the military of the two countries. A lot of these comments are 'if we're doing this,' or 'if we're doing that,' there's a concern about this, he said. There's a lot of ifs. He said the Northern Command is purely an internal command structure for the American military. Canadian officials have held informal talks on the new command but only to look for practical ways of co-operation, he added. Axworthy, though, said the whole issue of closer military links needs to be thoroughly debated. This is an issue . . . that carries with it the same weight and significance, in fact, as the free trade debate did over 10 years ago, he said. It needs to be carefully looked at, prudently considered and publicly debated. Byers, who said he considers himself pro-American, said there are many potential dangers in moving into a closer military relationship. One has to examine, in careful detail, through rigorous analysis, all of the various implications for Canadian policy, both domestic and foreign, of any move of this kind, he said. This report is designed to pose some of the questions that Canadians need to ask. Among his questions: -Could Canadian Arctic jurisdiction be threatened? -Might a unified command prevent Canadian troops from taking part in a peacekeeping mission Washington dislikes? -Might American commanders use Canadian troops as cannon fodder to protect their own soldiers? In the Commons, the Bloc Quebecois fretted about closer ties with the United States. Michel Guimond said this might hamper Canadian efforts to promote nuclear disarmament. We have a lot of differences with the Americans, he said. Stephane Bergeron wondered if Canada might be pushed into far higher defence spending. Foreign Affairs Minister Bill Graham waved off these concerns. Right now, there is no threat to sovereignty, to Canadians or Canada because we have no agreement with the United States on this topic, he said. The Americans have established certain provisions for their own security. We will examine them and we will take the measures necessary to protect ourselves. Eggleton said the informal talks with the United States don't contemplate any sort of military integration. Let's not try to confuse day-to-day operational improvements with something that relates to the integration of the two militaries, he said. We're not talking about that. While Byers seems leery about a closer defence relationship, another study released this week by the Institute for Research on Public Policy, praises the way the Canadian navy has been able to mesh with American sea operations. The world-class capabilities of the Canadian Navy, combined with careful and continual political oversight can make interoperability with the United States navy a mainstay of Canada's national security policy, says the report by Joel Sokolsky, of the Royal Military College. __ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness http://health.yahoo.com --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
Yemeni Protesters Demand US Military Leave [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- Yemen Protesters Want U.S. Ties Cut By AHMED AL-HAJ : Associated Press Writer Apr 26, 2002 : 9:12 pm ET SAN'A, Yemen (AP) -- Yemeni police dispersed about 2,000 anti-American demonstrators who called on their government Friday to break diplomatic ties with the United States. The protesters gathered following noon prayers in the capital, San'a, and began to march on the U.S. Embassy, but police blocked their path. Demonstrations against the United States and Israel also took place in Jordan, Bahrain and Egypt. The Yemeni protesters carried signs that read We ask for the expulsion of American military experts doing anti-terrorism work. Organizers distributed a statement in the name of Supporters of Palestine that condemned Yemen's cooperation with the United States in security matters and the U.S. training of Yemeni military and anti-terrorism units. The statement asked for the U.S. Embassy to be closed, its ambassador to be expelled and for the recall of Yemen's ambassador to the United States. Yemen and the United States are cooperating in a number of security fields, including training and the exchange of intelligence information. The United States is helping Yemen to modernize its immigration computer system. Security in Yemen, a poor nation at the southern tip of the Arabian peninsula, has been a top concern of the United States since the attack on the destroyer USS Cole in October 2000 that killed 17 American sailors in Aden harbor. U.S. investigators believe the al-Qaida terrorist group was responsible for both the Cole bombing and the Sept. 11 attacks on New York and Washington. Yemen's government has said there may be members of al-Qaida in the country, but says their number is limited. __ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness http://health.yahoo.com --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
Yemeni Protesters Demand US Military Leave [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- Yemen Protesters Want U.S. Ties Cut By AHMED AL-HAJ : Associated Press Writer Apr 26, 2002 : 9:12 pm ET SAN'A, Yemen (AP) -- Yemeni police dispersed about 2,000 anti-American demonstrators who called on their government Friday to break diplomatic ties with the United States. The protesters gathered following noon prayers in the capital, San'a, and began to march on the U.S. Embassy, but police blocked their path. Demonstrations against the United States and Israel also took place in Jordan, Bahrain and Egypt. The Yemeni protesters carried signs that read We ask for the expulsion of American military experts doing anti-terrorism work. Organizers distributed a statement in the name of Supporters of Palestine that condemned Yemen's cooperation with the United States in security matters and the U.S. training of Yemeni military and anti-terrorism units. The statement asked for the U.S. Embassy to be closed, its ambassador to be expelled and for the recall of Yemen's ambassador to the United States. Yemen and the United States are cooperating in a number of security fields, including training and the exchange of intelligence information. The United States is helping Yemen to modernize its immigration computer system. Security in Yemen, a poor nation at the southern tip of the Arabian peninsula, has been a top concern of the United States since the attack on the destroyer USS Cole in October 2000 that killed 17 American sailors in Aden harbor. U.S. investigators believe the al-Qaida terrorist group was responsible for both the Cole bombing and the Sept. 11 attacks on New York and Washington. Yemen's government has said there may be members of al-Qaida in the country, but says their number is limited. __ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness http://health.yahoo.com --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
Returning To The Scene Of The Crime [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- [Operation Desert Storm, Operation Allied Force. Fighting for, then against terrorism; to preserve and then to override national sovereignty; to drive the Yugoslavs out of Yugoslavia; to preserve order in Kosovo by turning the Serbian province over to crime syndicate and ethnic cleansing KLA auxilliaries. Must be hard for the poor GIs to sort out. Good thing all the black and green suit brigades back in Washington have time between press conferences and white tie and tail dinner parties to think these things through.] Stars and Stripes Saturday, April 27, 2002 1st ID is first infantry unit to return to Kosovo By Steve Liewer, Würzburg bureau European edition, Saturday, April 27, 2002 SCHWEINFURT, Germany With a bit of ceremony and a pep talk from its commander, the first infantry unit to enter Kosovo three years ago is now the first unit to return to the battle-scarred region. The soldiers of the 1st Infantry Division's 1st Battalion, 26th Infantry Regiment formed near the flagpole at Schweinfurt's Ledward Barracks on Tuesday afternoon. They listened as their officers handed out awards and saluted as a color guard lowered the flag. Lt. Col. Wayne Grigsby, the battalion commander, told the troops they are well prepared for their six-month peacekeeping mission in the Balkan province. He praised them for their performance during three months of rigorous training, the quality of the unit's noncommissioned officers and the work of their family readiness group in helping to care for loved ones left behind. There's a lot of pride, Grigsby said. We're not going to let the Big Red One down. The first few soldiers left Tuesday night, Grigsby said, and most of the rest of the unit will fly to Kosovo in the next week. About 10 percent of the battalion will stay in Germany as a rear detachment to guard the posts at Schweinfurt and to keep families in touch with the deployed soldiers. The deployment is another historic moment for the unit. On D-Day, its soldiers stormed Omaha Beach. Three years ago, it was the first U.S. unit to arrive in Kosovo after the end of the NATO bombing campaign that drove Yugoslavian forces from the province. Now, it is the first infantry unit to return. One big difference between the two missions: In 1999, the battalion had only three days' notice before it left for Kosovo. Its members have known about this one for more than a year. Because we knew we were in the rotation, we started [preparing] six months early, said Jo Eells, director of Schweinfurt's Army Community Service Center, which trains the family readiness groups. Following Tuesday's ceremony, Grigsby and unit leaders briefed the troops one final time about the deployment. Grigsby said the unit's rear detachment will send daily e-mail updates to every family. The readiness group has also established a free cyber cafe in Schweinfurt so families can keep in touch via e-mail even if they don't have home computers. When I was in Desert Shield, the first contact I had with my loved ones was after 90 days. Ninety days! Grigsby said. In Kosovo, immediately we have connectivity with our loved ones. That is huge. Still, no one doubts a six-month separation will be stressful. Pfc. Luis Aguilo, 23, has served in the Army for eight months. He arrived in Germany with his wife and two children just two weeks ago. This is his first deployment. I'm a little nervous, Aguilo said. [My wife] has adapted very quickly. There's always the feeling like 'I miss you,' but I know she's pretty tough. She understands, and she knows it's my job. The battalion will take over for the 10th Mountain Division's 1st Battalion, 30th Infantry Regiment at Camp Monteith, in Gjilane. During the next two weeks, more 2nd Brigade units from Schweinfurt will join them: the 1st Battalion, 77th Infantry Regiment; the 1st Battalion, 77th Armored Regiment; the 1st Battalion, 7th Field Artillery Regiment; the 9th Engineering Battalion; and the 299th Field Support Battalion. A team of medical personnel from the Würzburg-based 67th Combat Surgical Hospital has been downrange since early April. Some members of the 1st ID staff and the 101st Military Intelligence Battalion, both from Würzburg, also will head downrange in May to join Task Force Falcon. So will elements of the 121st Signal Battalion from Kitzingen, the 2nd Battalion 1st Aviation Regiment from Katterbach, and the 709th Military Police Battalion from Hanau. These units are scheduled to remain in Kosovo until late November, when more 1st ID units this time from the 3rd Brigade, based in Vilseck, Germany are scheduled to relieve them. __ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness http://health.yahoo.com --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE
John Pilger: VENEZUALA - THE LIES GO ON [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
Title: Message HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- VENEZUALA - THE LIES GO ONIn his newest piece for The New Statesman, John Pilger examines the response of Britain's media to the conspiracy in Venezuela. The coverage provided an object lesson in how censorship works in free societies: an 'unbiased' media has once again been used to promote the interests of the powerful. The episode was a journalistic disgrace. : John Pilger : 26 Apr 2002 Last month, I wrote about Venezuela, pointing out that little had been reported in this country about the achievements of Hugo Chávez and the threat to his reforming government from the usual alliance of a corrupt local elite and the United States. When the conspirators made their move on 12 April, the response of the British media provided an object lesson in how censorship works in free societies. The BBC described Chávez as "not so much a democrat as an autocrat", echoing the Foreign Office minister Denis MacShane, who abused him as "a ranting demagogue". Alex Bellos, the Guardian's South America correspondent, reported, as fact, that "pro-Chávez snipers had killed at least 13 people" and that Chávez had requested exile in Cuba. "Thousands of people celebrated overnight, waving flags, blowing whistles . . ." he wrote, leaving the reader with the clear impression that almost everybody in Venezuela was glad to see the back of this "playground bully", as the Independent called him. Within 48 hours, Chávez was back in office, put there by the mass of the people, who came out of the shanty towns in their tens of thousands. Defying the army, their heroism was in support of a leader whose democratic credentials are extraordinary in the Americas, south and north. Having won two presidential elections, the latest in 2000, by the largest majority in 40 years, as well as a referendum and local elections, Chávez was borne back to power by the impoverished majority whose "lot", wrote Bellos, he had "failed to improve" and among whom "his popularity had plummeted". The episode was a journalistic disgrace. Most of what Bellos and others wrote, using similar words and phrases, turned out to be wrong. In Bellos's case, this was not surprising, as he was reporting from the wrong country, Brazil. Chávez said he never requested asylum in Cuba; the snipers almost certainly included agents provocateurs; "almost every sector of society [Chávez] antagonised" were principally members of various oligarchies he made pay tax for the first time, including the media, and the oil companies, whose taxes he doubled in order to raise 80 per cent of the population to a decent standard of living. His opponents also included army officers trained at the notorious School of the Americas in the United States. In a few years, Chávez had begun major reforms in favour of the indigenous poor, Venezuela's unpeople. In 49 laws adopted by the Venezuelan Congress, he began real land reform, and guaranteed women's rights and free healthcare and education up to university level. He opposed the human rights abuses of the regime in neighbouring Colombia, encouraged and armed by Washington. He extended a hand to the victim of an illegal 40-year American blockade, Cuba, and sold the Cubans oil. These were his crimes, as well as saying that bombing children in Afghanistan was terrorism. Like Chile under Allende and Nicaragua under the Sandinistas, precious little of this was explained to the western public. Like the equally heroic uprising in Argentina last year, it was misrepresented as merely more Latin American chaos. Last week, the admirable Glasgow University Media Group, under Greg Philo, released the results of a study which found that, in spite of the saturation coverage of the Middle East, most television viewers were left uninformed that the basic issue was Israel's illegal military occupation. "The more you watch, the less you know" - to quote Danny Schechter's description of American television news - was the study's conclusion. Take US
Gaza braces for Sharon to send in tanks in next phase of war [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.U
Title: Message HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- Gaza braces for Sharon to send in tanks in next phase of war Palestinians build sand barricades as Israel again defies Bush By Robert Fisk in Gaza 27 April 2002 Internal links Freed youths tell of hunger and death in Church of the Nativity David Horovitz: Don't blame Israel. All we ever wanted was peace They are coming. That's what most Gazans tell you. The Israelis are coming. But the sand barricades are pathetic. Even a mile from the Erez "safe crossing'' point constructed during the early days of the mad dream of Oslo, the best that Yasser Arafat's legions can do is erect a 15ft rampart of earth and sandbags, with a 12ft gap for local cars and for Israeli Merkava tanks when Ariel Sharon decides to drive in. But the cops go on waving the donkey carts past the traffic lights, and the Palestinian Authority guards slumber with their Kalashnikov rifles in their tin shack, ready for part two of the Sharon War on Terror. The odd thing is that if the Israeli Prime Minister really wants to dismantle the "network of terror'' of which he speaks so frequently, Gaza the one place the Israeli army has not yet dared to reoccupy should perhaps have been his first target. For here are militias aplenty, Palestinians who know how to destroy Merkava-3 tanks, who can manufacture short-range rockets and mortars and know the principles of booby traps better than the refugee gunmen of Jenin. As one local put it yesterday: "This place is wired.'' Its people are certainly preparing for the worst. The banks report massive withdrawals. Human rights groups are duplicating their files. Everyone knows what happened to the computerised archives of the Palestinian ministries in Ramallah and Nablus and Jenin; they were stolen by the Israeli soldiers because, in the imperishable words of one Israeli officer: "Documents have a very important value.'' But this is "Palestine". "They say they've copied all their papers,'' a western human rights worker said. "But I don't think they've finished making CDs of all the files in our office and the paper archives are too large to photocopy now. They simply haven't started to get the work done.'' Yet there is a grim determination to accept the future. Raja Sourani, a human rights lawyer with the most eloquent, if pessimistic, view of the coming weeks or days has few illusions. "I think it's going to be bleak, black and bloody and I can see the blood that will be shed will be Israeli as well as Palestinian. The Palestinians are not ready to be good victims any more. They have nothing to lose. "The Israelis have opened Pandora's Box. I never in my life have felt our morale and determination to be as high as it is now. I'm very proud and I'm scared to death.'' So are the women of Gaza. Many are burying their jewels in their gardens or backyards. "We heard what happened to women in Ramallah who had thousands of dollars of jewellery stolen by the Israeli troops who entered their homes,'' a middle-class married woman in Gaza City said without emotion. "One friend of mine in Ramallah hid thousands of dollars in a big bowl of rice in the kitchen when the Israelis came to take over his house. He reckoned he would lose the money when he was searched. But when he came back, the rice was overturned and the money had gone.'' The graffiti warns of reoccupation. A hand grenade on one wall, a drawing of a wired bomb on another predict the doom of occupiers. Homes I entered were stuffed with food, water, blankets, in some cases sandbags. As the sea flopped on to the Gaza beach in the sultry afternoon, a few fishing boats glided over the water. But the catch doesn't count for much when four-hour power cuts unannounced as usual by the corrupt Palestinian Authority cut off deep freezes and fridges. As one Palestinian militant remarked how easily one falls into these categories to avoid identifying someone who may soon be in a prison cage an Israeli assault is "as certain as I am seeing you". It was a matter of time, he said. "I don't trust the Arabic news. I listen to the news in Hebrew from Israel. Gaza sets the tone there the Israelis can't complete their objectives without Gaza. It's here that Palestinian history has been decided for the past 54 years.'' True, up to a point. The Palestine National Council first proclaimed Palestinian independence in Gaza on 1 October 1948, adopting the old green, white, black and red banner of the Arab Revolt as the flag. But then the Gaza Strip became a slum backyard of Egypt while the Mayor of Hebron handed over the West Bank to the Jordanian monarchy at a ceremony in Jericho. If Gaza is the last bit of unoccupied "Palestine" left, it's a midden. "I think everything depends on three things,'' Mr Sourani said. "It's about what's going on back in Washington. It's about how far the Europeans will involve themselves. And it's about how
David Horovitz: Don't blame Israel. All we ever wanted was peace [WWW.STOPNATO.O
Title: Message HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- David Horovitz: Don't blame Israel. All we ever wanted was peace 27 April 2002 Internal links Gaza braces for Sharon to send in tanks in next phase of war Freed youths tell of hunger and death in Church of the Nativity Today, in a world turned upside-down, Israel stands accused by the international diplomatic and journalistic community of war crimes; the European Parliament votes for trade sanctions against it; and purported humanitarians call for Yitzhak Rabin's fellow peace trailblazer not Yasser Arafat, but the Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres to be stripped of his Nobel prize. But the real cause of the collapse of the Oslo process, and the root cause of Israel's unprecedented military incursions into areas of the West Bank it had long since relinquished to Mr Arafat's control, is terrorism the terrorism that Mr Arafat initially chose not to confront and, more recently, encouraged, initiated and financed. Contrary to the pervasive myth now routinely peddled by too many ill-informed Middle East commentators, Ehud Barak offered Mr Arafat everything short of Israeli national suicide in his failed attempt to secure that accord at the July 2000 Camp David summit and subsequent rounds of negotiations. It is an astounding testament to Israelis' desire for peace that even now, after the month of March saw 126 of its people killed in acts of terrorism stoked by Mr Arafat, a majority are telling pollsters that they support the Saudi peace initiative which envisages "normal ties" between Arab states and Israel after a complete Israeli withdrawal from territory it captured in the 1967 war. Israel is desperate to end the occupation. It just needs a Palestinian partner, unlike Mr Arafat, who doesn't seek to end Israel. Slick Palestinian spokesmen assert daily, from the platforms granted to them by the deferential news channels, that Ariel Sharon's aggression is the cause of the current Middle East malaise trusting interviewers and viewers alike to overlook the fact that the intifada was hatched under Mr Barak's watch. They blame Mr Sharon for the curfews and the blockades and the incursions trusting interviewers and viewers to forget that there were no such crippling long-term curfews or blockades or incursions before the intifada was ignited and Israel searched for ways to intercept the bombers. Had Mr Arafat, armed by Israel with what must be the highest proportion of security personnel of any regime in the world, chosen to frustrate terrorism rather than fund it, Israel would have had no need and certainly no desire to re-enter areas, such as the Jenin refugee camp, which it happily relinquished in late 1995. Yet in a world turned upside-down, again, it now finds itself charged with the "massacre" of terrorists from Hamas and Islamic Jihad and Mr Arafat's own Fatah faction who had despatched 23 suicide bombers from the camp. Terrorists who had publicly bragged that they would fight to the last bullet, and who publicly delighted in ambushing 13 Israeli reservists fathers and husbands called to the battle against the extremists that the cowardly Mr Arafat refused to fight, heads of families who will never return. Thousands of civilians in the Jenin camp have, appallingly, lost their homes because Israel was left with no choice but to confront the bombers where they thought they were immune, where Mr Arafat had allowed them to flourish. In a world turned upside-down, Israel is now pressured by the international community to "act with restraint" when the bombers blow up its civilians in restaurants and buses and wedding halls and branded the aggressor when, betrayed by Mr Arafat, it attempts to thwart the bombers itself. The extent of Israeli disillusionment with Mr Arafat is such that even Mr Peres, his fellow Nobel Peace laureate, can no longer find words for his defence. At an address on Sunday night in Washington, Mr Peres sighed with utter despair as he recounted that the US Secretary of State Colin Powell had merely asked Mr Arafat to pick up a microphone and denounce terrorism, and make a phone call to the heads of the 30,000 or more men he still has under arms to tell them to start clamping down on the bombers. But Mr Arafat was not prepared even to do this. He has reverted utterly to type. Financing the Karine A shipment of Iranian arms, captured by Israel in January. Signing off on payments to murderers like Raed Karmi, the self-acknowledged killer of two Israelis whose crime was to sit down and eat at a Tulkarm restaurant. Using his tightly controlled media to broadcast on TV the Friday sermons of radical preachers urging the killing of Jews "everywhere". Exhorting his own people to "martyrdom". Again, not because Israel is intransigently rejecting compromise. He knows how untrue that is, even if the naïve journalists and governments do not. But because he is
Henry Kissinger: Hero or villain? [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- Friday, 26 April, 2002, 15:04 GMT 16:04 UK Henry Kissinger: Haunted by his past He was arguably the most influential architect of US foreign policy since the war, but, as Bob Chaundy of the BBC's News Profiles Unit reports, attempts to question Henry Kissinger about terrorist crimes have put the darker side of his career under the spotlight. Henry Kissinger once said that "90% of politicians give the other 10% a bad reputation". Throughout his career, this German Jewish emigré who began his working life in a shaving brush factory in New York, rose to become a Harvard professor and then assumed control of America's foreign policy under Presidents Nixon and Ford, has bitterly divided opinion over which of these two percentage categories he belongs to. He had a hold over President NixonKissinger became Richard Nixon's national security adviser in 1969. It was testament to his mastery of political in-fighting and his increasing hold over the president that, in all but the final year of the Nixon presidency, he ran foreign policy over the head of the Secretary of State, William Rogers. By this policy, say his supporters, he made the world a safer place. He was the man who effected détente with the Soviet Union. He opened up the way to Nixon's visit to China. He negated the Communist threat in America's back yard, most notably in Chile. With his famous "shuttle diplomacy" after the 1973 Yom Kippur war in the Middle-East, he brokered the peace treaty between Egypt and Israel. He was the secret negotiator at the Paris peace talks which ended the Vietnam War for which he was awarded the 1973 Nobel Peace Prize. And he was the man who kept American foreign policy on the rails after the Watergate scandal and maintained its momentum under President Ford. He assumed almost complete control of foreign affairs during the Nixon yearsHis wisdom is still sought after. His punditry on the current state of American foreign policy is aired by TV networks everywhere, and he is a regular on the highly lucrative lecture circuit. Of course, say his defenders, there were times when American policy under Kissinger was more motivated by global balance of power and national interest at the expense of human rights, but, as the Times put it in a recent editorial, "the world was polarised, and fighting communism involved hard choices and messy compromises". This messy business, though, is what has made him a highly controversial figure. His critics refer to Kissinger's complicity in the illegal carpet-bombing of neutral Cambodia, designed to deprive North Vietnam of troops and supplies, but which sowed the seeds for the murderous Pol Pot regime. Pulitzer Prize-winning author, Seymour Hersh, in a 1983 biography, Kissinger, the Price of Power, argued that this bombing, moreover, jeopardised America's atomic security. Kissinger sanctioned the illegal bombing of CambodiaBritish writer, Christopher Hitchens, in his recent book The Trial of Henry Kissinger, argues that Kissinger is a war criminal. He claims he connived with brutal regimes, allied to the US, most notably Pakistan, Greece and Indonesia, to embark on savage acts of repression. Most notably, charges relating to Latin America have returned to haunt Henry Kissinger. The CIA's involvement in the coup which toppled the elected Chilean leader Salvador Allende and brought General Pinochet to power, has been long well-documented. "I don't see why we need to stand by and watch a country go Communist due to the irresponsibility of its people," Kissinger once famously uttered. But a number of factors have brought these old chestnuts back into public prominence. Chileans demonstrating against the brutality of the Pinochet regimeDocuments recently released by the CIA, strengthen previously-held suspicions that Kissinger was actively involved in the establishment of Operation Condor, a covert plan involving six Latin American countries including Chile, to assassinate thousands of political opponents. At the same time, the success of international tribunals in bringing suspected war criminals such as Yugoslavia's former leader
Hu Jintao: Mystery man, ordinary guy [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- AFP. 27 April 2002. Mystery man or just ordinary guy? Hu Jintao keeps the world guessing. BEIJING -- Less is known about Hu Jintao, the likely next leader of China, than any prospective head of a major power since Kremlinologists pored over top-level reshuffles in the Soviet empire. As the current vice president visits the United States this week in a diplomatic coming-of-age, the hopes are he will start showing the man behind the youthful looks and the modest smile. During the Malaysian leg of his trip, Hu took a first step in the direction of more candor by depicting himself as just an ordinary guy and dismissing portrayals of him as mysterious. That description is not fair to me, he told reporters while sightseeing on the Malaysian resort island of Penang. Maybe not, but precious little is known about the 59-year-old who is expected to be put at the helm of the Chinese communist party this fall and become his nation's president about a year from now. Even the place where Hu was born in December 1942 remains open to dispute. The official Chinese biography lists him as a native of eastern Anhui province, a claim now largely taken to mean this is his ancestral home. Other sources say his place of birth is Shanghai, and others again point to the city of Taizhou, 200 kilometers (125 miles) from Shanghai. Sir Winston Churchill's famous description of the Soviet Union as a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma could be usefully applied to Hu. If the riddle is the opaque political system that plucked Hu from the communist ranks, the mystery is his personality. The enigma -- and the biggest question of all -- is what he intends to do with China once in power. The first part of the story, on how Hu was elevated to the highest rungs of power from among thousands of potential candidates, had very little to do with his personal qualities, according to observers. What happened, observers say, was that one day in 1992, three communist party bigwigs, including Jiang Zemin, went to see then-paramount leader Deng Xiaoping with a list of promising middle-aged cadres. New members of the standing committee of the party's politburo -- the handful of people who decide virtually everything in China -- had to be picked, and when Hu's name came up, Deng's reaction was simple, but decisive. He is a good comrade, the aging patriarch reportedly said. That settled it. Many rumors have circulated as to why Deng was so sure he had found the right man to lead the world's most populous nation for at least a decade. One explanation is that Hu was friendly with Deng's children, powerful representatives of the princeling faction of spoiled offspring produced by China's revolutionary generation. The second big question -- Who's Hu? -- usually elicits answers that offer little solid fact. He is very good, outstanding, said Wang Dazhong, president of Qinghua University in Beijing, where Hu graduated with a degree in hydraulic engineering in 1965. He is very methodical and has a remarkable memory, said a diplomat who has met him. He has a firm grasp of international culture and great facilities on the economic level. Although Hu's formative years were in the turbulent 1960s, when the Cultural Revolution swept across China, this has not made him a dogmatic politician, experts say. He is cautious, but open-minded, said Cheng Li, a professor at New York's Hamilton College, who recently published a book on China's leaders. He is very realistic, which means both liberals and conservatives and even the military like him, he said. Which leads to the third question, about what kind of place will China become as Hu serves out his likely two five-year terms at party general secretary and president. Foreign observers have tried to glean nuggets about Hu's political views, but with little success, a phenomenon observers say is intentional. He is very cautious with the Western media, said Li. If the Western media portray him as a hardliner, that's not good for him, but if they depict him as China's Gorbachev, it would be downright disastrous. One of the few clues is provided by the Central Party School, a secretive institution in the northern outskirts of Beijing designed to groom senior cadres, which Hu has headed for almost a decade. Ancient Chinese art, not busts of Marx and Lenin, greets the visitors to the campus' brand new auditorium, where students get lectures in capitalism and the intricacies of World Trade Organization rules. You can pick market economics as an optional course, a student recently told AFP. According to observers, the school is a miniature version of what all of China may look like under Hu -- culturally conservative, but willing to use modern ideas to improve the economy. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Barry Stoller http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ProletarianNews --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST
Somalia: German Military Vessel Fired On [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2002 THE TIMES OF INDIA -Some 1,300 German Marines, along with a dozen boats, medical corp personnel and paratroopers are involved in the US-led campaign off the Horn of Africa German frigate comes under fire off Somalia AFP [ SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2002 2:22:40 AM ] BERLIN: A German Navy frigate taking part in the US-led campaign against terrorism off the coast of Somalia came under fire earlier this month from two small ships, the Welt am Sonntag newspaper reported Sunday. The two boats were apparently involved in illegal activities on the night of April 3, when the Emden frigate happened upon them as it was patrolling the coastal waters of Somalia, the weekly paper reported. The frigate turned on its searchlights and subsequently came under fire from the boats, and responded with a warning shot across their bows. The two boats then fled the area. The paper said the German defense ministry had confirmed the information. A spokesman for the German army told the paper that the shots clearly targeted the frigate. Some 1,300 German Marines, along with a dozen boats, medical corp personnel and paratroopers are involved in the US-led campaign off the Horn of Africa, notably to oversee shipping traffic in the area. Somalia has in the past been mentioned as a possible target in the campaign because of alleged connections to Osama Bin Laden's al-Qaeda organisation, blamed for the September 11 attacks in the United States. __ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness http://health.yahoo.com --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
Palestinian flag flies at Euro bank chief's home [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- http://www.gulf-news.com/Articles/news.asp?ArticleID=49109 Dubai:Saturday, April 27, 2002 Palestinian flag flies at Euro bank chief's home Amsterdam |Reuters | 27-04-2002 A Palestinian flag flew from the home of the European Central Bank president yesterday, raised by his wife in protest against Israel's actions in the West Bank. The red, black, green and white standard was draped over the railings of Wim Duisenberg's second-floor balcony in Amsterdam, clearly visible from the street in the affluent neighbourhood where the ECB chief lives when not at work in Frankfurt. Gretta Duisenberg made no excuses for a gesture that is unlikely to go down well in Israel and is at odds with the officially even-handed approach being taken to the Middle East conflict by her husband's employers at the European Union. My main feeling is that Europe and especially Holland are terrible because we all sit still and no one does anything and (Israeli Prime Minister Ariel) Sharon can get away with it and I don't like it, she said in a television interview. So I want to show what my feeling is and that is why I hang the flag in my study on my balcony. My husband has a position but it is not my position. I am a free woman and I am allowed to do whatever I like and he agrees with that, she said. Duisenberg, who was also present at the interview on the couple's terrace, declined to comment. The EU, keen to mediate in the Middle East alongside the United States, condemns violence on both sides. But Israel has long complained of what it sees as Europe's pro-Palestinian bias, particularly among politicians on the left who have been critical of Israel's latest West Bank offensive. As head of the independent central bank, Duisenberg tends to keep his political opinions to himself though he was previously a socialist minister. His wife has a reputation in the Dutch media as an outspoken and feisty campaigner for charity. At ECB headquarters in Frankfurt, a bank spokesman said the issue was a private matter for Gretta Duisenberg. = Lake Merritt Neighbors Organized for Peace. Weekly peace walks around Lake Merritt in Oakland. Starts ends at the colonnade between Grand Lakeshore Avenues, 3 P.M., every Sunday. Info: (510)763-8712, [EMAIL PROTECTED] or http://www.webwm.com/LMNOP __ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness http://health.yahoo.com --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
Re: Good Morning Nuremberg [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- Nuremberg, is that where a certain country was punished for war crimes and yet no mention was made of Hiroshima, Nagasaki, the fire bombing of Dresden... Courtly, Bill. --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
NYT: US plans 'big invasion' in Iraq in 2003 [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- NYT. 28 April 2002. U.S. Blueprint to Topple Hussein Envisions Big Invasion Next Year. Excerpts. WASHINGTON --The Bush administration, in developing a potential approach for toppling President Saddam Hussein of Iraq, is concentrating its attention on a major air campaign and ground invasion, with initial estimates contemplating the use of 70,000 to 250,000 troops. The administration is turning to that approach after concluding that a coup in Iraq would be unlikely to succeed and that a proxy battle using local forces there would be insufficient to bring a change in power. But senior officials now acknowledge that any offensive would probably be delayed until early next year, allowing time to create the right military, economic and diplomatic conditions. These include avoiding summer combat in bulky chemical suits, preparing for a global oil price shock, and waiting until there is progress toward ending the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Until recently, the administration had contemplated a possible confrontation with Mr. Hussein this fall, after building a case at the United Nations that the Iraqi leader is unwilling to allow the kind of highly intrusive inspections needed to prove that he has no weapons of mass destruction. Now that schedule seems less realistic. Conflict in the Middle East has widened a rift within the administration over whether military action can be undertaken without inflaming Arab states and prompting anti-American violence throughout the region. In his public speeches, President Bush still sounds as intent as ever about ousting Mr. Hussein, making it clear that he will not let the Middle East crisis obscure his goal. But he has not issued any order for the Pentagon to mobilize its forces, and today there is no official war plan. Instead, policy makers and operational commanders are trying to sketch out the broad outlines of the confrontation they expect. Among the many questions they must address is where to base air and ground forces in the region. Even before Mr. Bush's tense meeting with Crown Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia on Thursday, the Pentagon was working on the assumption that it might have to carry out any military action without the use of bases in the kingdom. The planning now anticipates the possible extensive use of bases for American forces in Turkey and Kuwait, with Qatar as the replacement for the sophisticated air operations center in Saudi Arabia, and with Oman and Bahrain playing important roles. As to any war plan itself, the military expects to be asked for a more traditional approach than the unconventional campaign in Afghanistan. Such an approach would resemble the Persian Gulf war in style if not in size and would be fought with even more modern weapons and more dynamic tactics. The president has not made any decisions, a senior Defense Department official said. But any efforts against Iraq will not look like what we did in Afghanistan. In terms of diplomatic reaction from the region, Vice President Dick Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and their senior aides contend that Arab leaders would publicly protest but secretly celebrate Mr. Hussein's downfall -- as long as the operation were decisive -- and that ousting him would actually ease the job of calming violence between Israel and the Palestinians. It has been the consistent drumbeat from our friends in the region that if we are serious, they will be with us, said one administration official in this camp. Senior administration, Pentagon and military officials say that consensus has emerged that there is little chance for a military coup to unseat Mr. Hussein from within, even with the United States exerting economic and military pressure and providing covert assistance. Officials said the nascent plans for a heavy air campaign and land assault already included rough numbers of troops, ranging from a minimum of about 70,000 to 100,000 -- one Army corps or a reinforced corps -- to a top of 250,000 troops, which still would be only half the number used in the gulf war. Other than troops from Britain, no significant contribution of allied forces is anticipated. The military requirements for changing the government in Baghdad would be vastly different than the gulf war mission, which was to drive an entrenched enemy from a large occupied area, senior military officers said. We would not need to hold territory and protect our flanks to the same extent, one officer said. You would see a higher level of maneuver and airborne assault, dropping in vertically and enveloping targets -- less slogging mile by mile through the desert. Even so, officers said, moving tens of thousands of troops to a region with access more limited than in the gulf war could be a logistical challenge. The modern American military has never fought the kind of dangerous and complicated urban battles that might be needed to oust the Hussein
Shocks and Stares! [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- Dow Slides Below 10,000, Nasdaq Plunges 2.9%. Stocks plunged Friday, shoving major market gauges toward the biggest weekly losses since the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks, as dreary forecasts from companies intensified fears of a tepid recovery in corporate profits. Stocks plunged Friday, shoving major market gauges toward the biggest weekly losses since the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks, as dreary forecasts from companies intensified fears of a tepid recovery in corporate profits. Investors ignored news that the economy snapped back in the first quarter, sending the Dow Jones industrials below 10,000 for the first time in more than two months. Tech stocks had the biggest losses in volatile trading, with the Nasdaq composite index closing at levels not seen since October. The Dow closed down 124.34, or 1.2%, at 9910.72. The index last closed lower on Feb. 21, when it stood at 9834.68. The technology-centered Nasdaq plunged 49.81, or 2.9%, to 1,663.89 ¡ª the lowest finish since Oct. 18 when the index 1,652.72. The Standard Poor's 500 index dropped 15.16, or 1.4%, to 1,076.32. The decline capped a dismal week for stocks, and extended a losing streak that has seen the Dow fall six out of the last eight sessions, and the Nasdaq, seven out of eight. For the week, the Dow fell 3.4%; the blue chips have now closed down five of the last six weeks amid investors' ongoing disillusionment with company earnings and outlooks. The Nasdaq lost 7.4% for the week. It last closed lower on Oct. 31, at 1,059.78. The SP lost 4.3% over the week. . . Matter in Motion through Space and Time ... http://www.egroups.com/group/Communist-Internet ] [Subscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ] . . --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
Slovenia: 'Freedom in, NATO out' [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- Sunday, Apr. 28, 2002 April 27, 2002 'Freedom in, NATO out': Slovene view of alliance sours LJUBLJANA (AP) -- It's been a Slovene political mantra for more than a decade: the ultimate goal is to join NATO. Now, just when membership seems like a sure thing, Slovenes are no longer certain they want to tie their future to the alliance. Freedom in, NATO out! says fresh graffiti in the capital Ljubljana. Slovene news media have begun openly questioning the benefits of NATO membership and anti-NATO activists are regularly being given a say in public debates and television shows. For the first time, support for NATO membership has dropped below 50 per cent, said a government-financed survey last month. It's all happening just six months before the former Yugoslav republic may finally be invited to join the alliance at a November summit on NATO expansion in Prague. Up to 10 Baltic and East European countries are expected to join the alliance, which took in Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic in 1999. Slovene Foreign Minister Dimitrij Rupel calls the sudden shift a striking paradox. We are one of the top candidates for entry, yet we seem to have the least public support for this goal, he said recently. Ever since gaining independence in 1991, Slovenia's pro-western leadership has worked hard to make the country of two million people, bordered by Italy, Hungary and Croatia, a part of the European Union and NATO. For Balkan and southern European countries, the EU and NATO long have been seen as a ticket to wealth, success -- and the West. Slovenia's first victory came with associate membership in the EU in 1996; the first blow with NATO rejection a year later. Since then, Slovenia has initiated a flurry of measures and diplomatic efforts in hopes of making sure an invitation to join is a sure thing in November. The last thing the government needed -- or expected -- was to see public support erode. Rupel acknowledged anti-NATO activists have created a noise that's heard far away. NATO's member states and its leadership are now asking us whether we really want to become a member, he said. Opponents of NATO membership are not well-organized. There are some students and professors and several prominent journalists and sociologists. They haven't staged a single demonstration -- but they're speaking up and the mainstream media have given them a stage. But opponents of membership insist it's too expensive because the government will have to spend money on weaponry and military reorganization and they contend tiny Slovenia will never be heard among the big NATO players. Others wonder: what's the point? Slovenia enjoys peaceful relations with its neighbours, they argue and not even NATO could thwart the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Miso Alkalaj an anti-NATO activist, said the attacks on the United States, a mighty NATO force, showed there was no real defence against terrorism, the No. 1 threat of today's world. In many ways, Slovenia already belongs to the West. It has a vigorous economy and a stable government. Support for the EU, which unlike NATO promises concrete economic benefits, remains high. Even so, the government has realized it must fight to ensure NATO membership doesn't slip from its grasp. Rupel has publicly urged President Milan Kucan to engage opponents. Government officials are preaching the benefits of membership at every opportunity. The NATO question dominates TV talk shows and a special phone line has been set up to give Slovenes more information about the alliance. We haven't used all our ammunition yet, Rupel said. __ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness http://health.yahoo.com --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
Afghanistan: Fireworks Celebrate Pax NATOana [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- Afghan warlord rains hundreds of rockets on Gardez Sat Apr 27,11:56 AM ET By Sayed Salahuddin KABUL (Reuters) - An Afghan warlord rained hundreds of rockets on the main eastern Afghan town of Gardez on Saturday killing 25 people in the biggest outbreak of fighting between rival Afghan forces for several months, the governor of the area said. Governor Taj Mohammad Wardak of Paktia Province, scene of last month's biggest U.S.-led ground battle of the Afghan war, blamed the attack on former governor Padshah Khan Zadran who was ousted from power last February. He has fired about 500 rockets into Gardez today, Wardak told Reuters by telephone from the city. There are at least 25 dead and more than 100 wounded. They are all civilians. He is trying to take over Gardez. The fighting broke out on the day U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld visited Kabul and several hours after the Afghan capital's airport was hit by several rockets. There were no casualties in the airport attack. In late January, around 50 fighters were killed in fighting between Padshah Khan and rival commander Haji Saifullah Khan who heads Gardez's tribal council. Padshah Khan, who has thousands of troops under his control, had been considered one of the main allies of U.S. forces in Paktia and neighbouring Khost province, once major strongholds of the Taliban near the Pakistan border. The rivalry between Padshah Khan and Saifullah became so intense that interim Afghan leader Hamid Karzai appointed Wardak as governor in February to try to calm the situation. On Wardak's appointment, Padshah Khan retreated to the outskirts of Gardez but has vowed to take back the city. His attack on Gardez on Saturday was regarded as the biggest challenge to Karzai's authority since he took over as Afghanistan's interim leader last December with the ouster of the Taliban by U.S.-led forces. Padshah Khan's brother, himself a minister in Afghanistan's interim government, offered a dramatically different view of events, blaming remnants of the Taliban and al Qaeda for attacking his brother. DIFFERENT VERSION Amanullah Zadran, Minister for Frontiers and Tribal Affairs, told Reuters that his brother had fought off an attack on Saturday morning by Taliban and al Qaeda forces and captured several tanks and armoured personnel carriers. His (Padshah Khan Zadran) posts came under the attack of the Taliban and al Qaeda. The attack was launched from south of Gardez town, Amanullah Zadran said. Gardez was a main staging base for Afghan forces during heavy U.S.-led fighting in the region against the Taliban and al Qaeda last month. In a two-week-long battle, the U.S. military said hundreds of Taliban and al Qaeda rebels were killed. However Afghan officials said many escaped to adjacent areas of Pakistan. Padshah Khan has already been accused of calling in U.S strikes on his rivals in neighbouring Khost province, by claiming they were al Qaeda or Taliban. More than 50 people were killed in the Khost bombing at the end of last year. Tension is also high this week in the town of Khost, capital of the province. On Saturday, residents said a tense stand-off was in effect after fighting between Padshah Khan and a rival warlord earlier in the week killed four people. An Afghan Defence Ministry spokesman said they were closely monitoring the situation in Khost and Gardez but had no plans at this stage to intervene. The U.S. military has a special forces camp on the outskirts of Khost which has been the target of at least two rocket attacks in recent weeks. __ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness http://health.yahoo.com --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
Democracy Strangled in Pakistan [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- [This is pretty macabre. Musharaff is holding an "election" to legitimate his military rule and to enforce a "constitutional role for the military...not unlike in Turkey." Note AP can't get the spin right even: is it an election, a poll, or a referendum? What do you call a one party, one man election that will be unmonitored? BTW note the following passage: "Musharraf has decreed that each voter is to receive a mark with an indelible pen on a thumbnail. The mark is supposed to take two weeks to wear off, government officials say." While there will be no voter rolls, I've noticed that this "marking" technology is being pushed in the Third World countries by neoliberal regimes engaged in pivotal election contests. I don't know what the purpose of it is exactly other than to scare off voters who mistrust anything that is imposed by the West (thus helping to reduce the anti-Western vote presumably and establishing a precedent for "marking" or "tagging" Third World peoples maybe?). In fact I remember that this technology - never applied in the West to date to my knowledge - caused quite a bit of controversy in Yugoslavia when it was first applied in the DOS-administered elections for the government of Serbia in December 2000. Many refused to be "marked" and where thus denied the right to vote. After being bombed with depleted uranium, and having toxic substances released in the atmosphere and water as a result of NATO bombing (expressly prohibited by the Geneva Conventions - EVEN IF SUCH TARGETS ARE MILITARY IN NATURE!) is it wonder that many Yugoslav's mistrusted such a technology? Anyway, the AP dispatch below says everything pretty clearly, although the moral outrage over the subversion of democracy so evident in its dispatches on Zimbabwe in March is notable for its absence...] Pakistanis Ready for Key Referendum By KATHY GANNON .c The Associated Press ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) - When voters go to the polls on Tuesday they will be deciding more than just whether Gen. Pervez Musharraf will be Pakistan's president for the next five years. A vote for Musharraf, a strong ally of the United States in its war against terrorism, is also certain to guarantee the military a more permanent role in civic affairs, probably one enshrined in the constitution. It's no coincidence that Musharraf is seeking his five-year mandate as president while still in uniform as army chief of staff, the implication being that a vote for him is also a vote for the army. His banners drive home that point. ``Be Patriotic. Vote Musharraf,'' reads one, accompanied by a picture of the presidential candidate in full uniform resplendent with his many medals. Musharraf took power in a bloodless coup in 1999, throwing out democratically elected Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. From the outset Musharraf has been clear that he wants a more constitutionally authorized role for the army -- a setup not unlike Turkey's. Pakistan's army has ruled this poor nation of 140 million people for more than half of the country's 55-year history. Each time Pakistan's democratically elected government falls into chaos, the army either outright takes power or orchestrates a change of government from behind the scenes. Usually the military takes over in the name of saving the country from collapse. It was no different this time. Musharraf charged widespread corruption by Sharif, whom he exiled to Saudi Arabia. He also has prohibited another deposed prime minister, Benazir Bhutto, from participating in October's general elections. But in this referendum, Musharraf has made it easy for ordinary Pakistanis to vote. There are no election rolls or voters' lists. Any citizen 18 years old or over can vote anywhere in the country. The lack of voters' registration raises the possibility that one person might vote more than once, but Musharraf has decreed that each voter is to receive a mark with an indelible pen on a thumbnail. The mark is supposed to take two weeks to wear off, government officials say. There will be more than 100,000 polling stations at a cost of more than $28 million. That figure doesn't include the cost of the security forces being deployed for the referendum conducted by an administration that is completely in the hands of the army. An army officer even runs state-owned corporations such as those that provide power and light. The military government justifies the expense. ``The referendum will end uncertainty about the reform process, bring stability and restore investors' confidence,'' said Nisar Memon, information minister in Musharraf's government. ``Compared to the expenses, the positive economic fallout of referendum would be much higher.'' The last two bouts of military rule have been strongly condemned by the United States only to be later embraced by Washington, both times because of Afghanistan. Gen. Zia-ul Haq, who seized power in 1977 and hanged the deposed
Bush Letter to Kostunica Read on RTS... [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- Bush Presses Yugoslavia on Tribunal By SCOTT LINDLAW .c The Associated Press CRAWFORD, Texas (AP) - President Bush said Saturday that Yugoslavia's president should cooperate more fully with the U.N. war crimes tribunal and said such help is critical to the country's integration with Europe. Bush praised recent steps by Yugoslavia ``to meet its international obligations'' but appealed for President Vojislav Kostunica, a moderate nationalist who opposes the tribunal, to do more. ``To continue on the path to European integration, Yugoslavia's full cooperation with the court and your leadership on the issues is essential,'' Bush wrote in a letter dated Saturday, sent to mark the country's Statehood Day. White House officials declined to release a copy. Excerpts were provided by a Bush administration official. A translation of the letter was read Saturday evening on Serbian state television. A law adopted by the Yugoslav government this month allows for the extradition of suspected war criminals to the tribunal in The Hague. Authorities last week delivered a list of suspects to a Belgrade court in preparation for arrests and handovers. Some 24 Serbs are wanted by the U.N. court for alleged Balkan war crimes. Former army chief of staff Col. Gen. Dragoljub Ojdanic pleaded innocent to war crimes charges Friday. Five other Serb suspects have promised to surrender, while 18 other suspects included on the Yugoslav government list now face arrest and extradition. The United States has threatened to withdraw millions of dollars in badly needed aid unless Yugoslavia extradites the suspects. Bush typically sends letters to government leaders to mark national holidays, but such letters do not usually carry the kind of demands Bush made to Yugoslavia, an administration official said. When they do, Bush offers the type of ``carrot and stick'' approach in Saturday's letter - an expression of gratitude for action on the one hand, pressure for more action on the other, the official said. In the letter, Bush praised Yugoslavia for ``great progress'' over the past year and a half. ``Only a short time ago, the leadership in Belgrade was a major source of suffering and war in the Balkans,'' Bush said. ``Today, Yugoslavia is increasingly a force for peace, stability and economic development.'' Nonetheless, ``Important strides in terms of economic reform need to be matched by progress in such areas as democratic control of the military,'' Bush said. The cable was sent while Bush was spending a long weekend on his Crawford, Texas, ranch. Government offices were closed in Belgrade Saturday, and no officials were available to respond. By ``European integration,'' Bush meant greater links with Europe's economic, political and transportation institutions, and possibly eventual membership in the European Union, an administration official said. There is also financial aid at stake. Yugoslavia has applied to join the Council of Europe, the continent's top human rights-monitoring body, and hopes membership will be approved by this summer. Bosnia, Macedonia, Croatia and Slovenia are already members. This is the first step toward eventual membership in the European Union, and possibly NATO. Yugoslavia also has outstanding loans from the Slobodan Milosevic era and earlier. It is seeking favorable treatment, such as easier repayment terms, from the International Monetary Fund, World Bank and other major international finance groups. Bush's letter came two weeks after his administration failed to block the creation of the United Nations' first permanent war crimes tribunal. Despite U.S. opposition, the tribunal this month received the necessary international backing to come into force on July 1. The United States fears American citizens would be subject to frivolous or politically motivated prosecutions. It is the only vocal opponent of the court. The United States campaigned unsuccessfully to exempt U.S. soldiers and officials from the court's jurisdiction. The administration is currently reviewing its position on the court. 04/27/02 17:28 EDT --- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^
Observer: How To Save The Imperialist Alliance [WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK]
HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --- [From the ostensibly 'leftist' Guardian/Observer. The Euro-elites have their tongues stuck deeply up the arse of Washington and Brussels yet complain because their voices aren't heard. Small wonder. Their major complaint? They aren't cut in for a big enough share of the new global colonial carve-up. These comic opera imperialists deserve each other. Good riddance to the whole lot.] The World Today Essay How to save the western alliance Washington and Europe's disagreements are weakening and endangering NATO. But America's trend toward unilateralism and Europe's preference for coalition-building are both necessary parts of an effective western strategy. Henry R. Nau Sunday April 28, 2002 The Observer Washington is vilified for acting alone on a range of issues. Europe is being asked to do more on defence. This peevish debate risks weakening NATO just at the moment it should be agreeing to create a stronger alliance to fight terrorism. Europe is once again outraged by American unilateralism. Since George Bush entered office early last year, Europeans have carpet-bombed Washington with charges of unilateral action on, among other things, the development of missile defences, global warming, banning landmines, the international criminal court, the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, the biodiversity treaty, a verification mechanism for controlling biological weapons, the 'axis of evil' speech, and, most recently, steel import restrictions. Psychological infirmity The North Atlantic allies have been through this battle many times before. One might wonder if the charges and countercharges have more to do with the psychological infirmities of the western allies than the issues that divide them. America needs to shatter the moral lassitude it associates with western Europe, and Europe needs to ridicule the lack of subtlety and sophistication it associates with America. Politics, of course, adds fuel to the firestorm. Republican President George Bush crashed the cosy party of 'third way' social democrats that governed the major western countries throughout much of the 1990s. The allies should get beyond their emotions and politics. America's trend toward unilateralism and Europe's preference for multilateralism are not in opposition to one another. Indeed, both are necessary to carry out an effective alliance strategy. America's unilateralism expresses the need of free nations within a democratic alliance to act independently when their vital interests are at stake. Just as national democracies depend on the initiatives of individual citizens and groups, international democratic communities depend on national initiatives. Such initiatives are inherently unilateral. At least initially, they fly in the face of conventional wisdom and prevailing consensus. Otherwise, there would never be any change or innovation. On the other hand, Europe's tendency toward multilateralism expresses the place where free people and free nations are committed to end up. They make decisions by consensus, or in some cases, as democratic countries grow closer - for example the European Union (EU) - by the will or vote of the majority. Democracy requires both leadership and eventual consensus or majority decision-making. Paradoxically, the unilateral/multilateral debate is a sign of democratic development within the North Atlantic community, not demagogic neurosis. In the lead America acts unilaterally more often than Europe because its military forces are more prominent and vulnerable around the world. And Europe acts multilaterally more often than the United States because it lacks independent military capabilities and thus seeks to influence the use of US might. America is the first target in the crosshairs of terrorist groups and states. When conflicts turn nasty around the world, it is American forces that are exposed on the frontline in Korea, Taiwan, Southeast Asia, the Gulf and now Southwest Asia. European forces are not available to deploy in large numbers around the world or to fight sustained conflicts outside Europe. They play a more central role after the serious fighting is over, as in Bosnia and Kosovo. Until Europe spends far more on defence and convinces its people to support action beyond the continent, it will have to acknowledge America's greater vulnerability to terrorist resentment and concede a leadership role to Washington. If Europe provided the major forces for the defence of Saudi Arabia and the Gulf, would it be as relaxed as it is today about Iraq and Saddam Hussein? If Europe had thirty seven thousand troops on the 38th parallel in Korea and another forty thousand in Japan, would it be as eager to appease North Korea, abolish landmines, which protect US ground forces there, or forego theatre missile defence to protect American forces abroad? Europe had a substantial military role in the NATO area during the Cold War. But it has since played a much
