[Biofuel] Syria conflict: Children 'targeted by snipers'
Unspeakable Horrors in a Country on the Verge of Genocide Militias in the Central African Republic are slitting children's throats, razing villages and throwing young men to the crocodiles. What needs to happen before the world intervenes? By David Smith Bossangoa November 23, 2013 http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article36937.htm Number of child soldiers in CAR has nearly doubled since March: UN By Jonathan Fowler (AFP) - 22 November 2013 http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5ga3KckbUiDkROf00R49k-r3Rg-fQ?docId=b790ef79-ce41-4fa3-b12a-d8b2f026a615 --0-- http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-25055956 24 November 2013 Syria conflict: Children 'targeted by snipers' More than 11,000 children have died in Syria's civil war in nearly three years, including hundreds targeted by snipers, a new report says. Summary executions and torture have also been used against children as young as one, the London-based Oxford Research Group think tank says. The report says the majority of children have been killed by bombs or shells in their own neighbourhoods. It wants fighters trained in how not to put civilians' lives at risk. Their report, Stolen Futures - the Hidden Toll of Child Casualties in Syria, examines data from the start of the conflict in March 2011 to August 2013. Of the 11,420 victims aged 17 and under, 389 were killed by sniper fire. Some 764 were summarily executed, and more than 100 - including infants - were tortured, the report says. Boys outnumbered girls among the dead by around two to one. Boys aged 13 to 17 were most likely to be victims of targeted killings, the report says. The highest number of child deaths occurred in the governorate of Aleppo, where 2,223 were reported killed. Report co-author Hana Salama said that the way children are being killed is disturbing. Bombed in their homes, in their communities, during day-to-day activities such as waiting in bread lines or attending school. Shot by bullets in crossfire, targeted by snipers, summarily executed, even gassed and tortured, she said.The data was provided by Syrian civil society groups recording casualties. The report only considers the deaths of named victims, and only cases where the cause of death could be identified. But it stresses the figures are incomplete as access is impossible in some areas. The figures should be treated with caution and considered provisional: briefly put, it is too soon to say whether they are too high or too low, the report says. The conflict in Syria has had a catastrophic effect on children in Syria, the report says, and calls for all sides to refrain from targeting civilians and buildings such as schools, hospitals and places of worship. Amongst its recommendations, the Oxford Research Group also calls for access and protection for journalists and others contributing to the recording of casualties. More than 100,000 people are estimated to have been killed in the conflict. More than two million Syrians have fled the country; around half of those are believed to be children. Analysis Lyse Doucet Chief international correspondent This report is the first major examination of how children are being killed in Syria. It confirms what has long been regarded as one of the most disturbing aspects of this brutal conflict. Syrian children are not just being caught in crossfire. They're being deliberately targeted, and even tortured. The very start of this uprising is usually traced to the arrest in March 2011 of schoolboys in Daraa who were reportedly tortured for painting anti-government graffiti. Nearly three years on, this report urges all sides in this conflict to spare the children, and calls for the threat of prosecution against those who commit the most egregious of atrocities. Casualties are only one part of what this report calls the war's catastrophic effect on children. With so many schools and neighbourhoods in ruin, and children making up half of the refugees, Syria's conflict is also a war on childhood. ___ Sustainablelorgbiofuel mailing list Sustainablelorgbiofuel@lists.sustainablelists.org http://lists.eruditium.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/sustainablelorgbiofuel
[Biofuel] Robert Fisk: He may huff and puff but Benjamin Netanyahu is on his own now as nuclear agreement isolates Israel
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article36967.htm Robert Fisk: He may huff and puff but Benjamin Netanyahu is on his own now as nuclear agreement isolates Israel Sudden offer by Tehran to negotiate a high-speed end to this cancerous threat of further war was thus greeted with almost manic excitement By Robert Fisk November 25, 2013 Information Clearing House - The Independent - It marks a victory for the Shia in their growing conflict with the Sunni Muslim Middle East. It gives substantial hope to Bashar al-Assad that he will be left in power in Syria. It isolates Israel. And it infuriates Saudi Arabia and Qatar and Kuwait and other Sunni Gulf States which secretly hoped that a breakdown of the Geneva nuclear talks would humiliate Shia Iran and support their efforts to depose Assad, Iran's only ally in the Arab world. In the cruel politics of the Middle East, the partial nuclear agreement between Iran and the world's six most important powers proves that the West will not go to war with Iran and has no intention - far into the future - of undertaking military action in the region. We already guessed that when - after branding Assad as yet another Middle Eastern Hitler - the US, Britain and France declined to assault Syria and bring down the regime. American and British people - those who had to pay the price for these monumental adventures, because political leaders no longer lead their men into battle - had no stomach for another Iraq or another Afghanistan. Iran's sudden offer to negotiate a high-speed end to this cancerous threat of further war was thus greeted with almost manic excitement by the US and the EU, along with theatrical enthusiasm by the man who realises that his own country has been further empowered in the Middle East: Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov. Assad's continued tenure in Damascus is assured. Peace in our time. Be sure we'll be hearing that Chamberlonian boast uttered in irony by the Israelis in the weeks to come. But there's no doubt that Geneva has called Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu's bluff. He may huff and puff, but if he wants to bash Iran now - on the basis that Israel must remain the only nuclear nation in the Middle East - he's going to be on his own when his planes take off to bomb Iran's nuclear plants. The Aipac attack dogs can be sent up to Congress again by that most infamous of Israeli-American lobby groups to harry Republicans in support of the Likudist cause, but to what purpose? Did Mr Netanyahu really think the Iranians were going to dismantle their whole nuclear boondoggle? When he said yesterday that the most dangerous regime in the world took a significant step towards obtaining the world's most dangerous weapon, many Arabs - and an awful lot of other people in the world, including the West - will have wondered whether Israel, which long ago obtained the world's most dangerous weapon, is now - in rejecting the Geneva deal - the world's most dangerous government. If Mr Netanyahu and his clique in the government decide to twit the world's major powers amid their euphoria, he may bring about - as several Israeli writers have warned - the most profound change in Israel's relations with the US since the foundation of the Israeli state. It would not be a change for Israel's benefit. But six months - the time it takes to solidify this most tangential of nuclear agreements - is a long time. In the coming days, Republicans in Washington and the right-wing enemies of President Rouhani will demand to know the real details of this febrile game at Geneva. The Americans insist that Iran does not have the right to enrichment. Iran insists that it does. The percentages of enrichment will have to be examined far more carefully than they were yesterday. Mr Rouhani - or Ayatollah Khamenei, the Supreme Leader whose dark wings hover over every elected Iranian leader - says that the fear of an Iranian nuclear weapon will be seen by future generations as a historical joke. Netanyahu says the whole shenanigans in Geneva will prove to be a historic mistake. The Sunni Saudis, always waiting to spot the winner before opening their mouths, have already sat down with their Sunni Qatari and Kuwaiti allies to commiserate with each other over Shia Iran's new victory. In Damascus, I suspect, Bashar, himself an Alawite-Shia, will tuck the kids into bed and share a glass with wife Asma and sleep well in his bed tonight. © independent.co.uk ___ Sustainablelorgbiofuel mailing list Sustainablelorgbiofuel@lists.sustainablelists.org http://lists.eruditium.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/sustainablelorgbiofuel
