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Mental health professionals protest decision to hold conference in Jerusalem

MEMO | March 2, 2016

palestinians-being-checked-at-the-beit-el-checkpoint-in-Ramallah-Oct-17-2015Over 140 psychotherapists, researchers and other mental health professionals have written an open letter to the Society for Psychotherapy Research (SPR) to express dismay at its decision to hold its next international conference in Jerusalem.

In the letter, the group of professionals called for the conference to move locations, explaining that Israel’s policies in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, including house demolitions, movement restrictions and imprisonment without trial, result in “insecurity, despair, helplessness and humiliation”.

“The calamitous impact of Israel’s occupation on the psychological health of the Palestinians is well documented,” read the letter.

The group expressed shock over the organiser’s response to their concerns, which included a promise to assist Palestinian psychotherapy researchers to attend the conference.

“This may ease SPR consciences but it is as nothing weighed against the political message they will be sending by meeting in this beleaguered city,” it added.

March 2, 2016 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Subjugation - Torture | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Meet the Bogus Technology the Government Will Use to Frame You

corbettreport | March 1, 2016

SHOW NOTES AND MP4: https://www.corbettreport.com/?p=18031

What happens if the facial recognition cameras get it wrong? Or the “visual microphone” detects the wrong sound? Or the emotion-reading or crime-predicting technology of the near future is just quackery, designed to frame anyone the government wants to convict? Sadly, this isn’t sci-fi fantasy; it’s the present and we’re already living through it. Just ask Steve Talley…

March 1, 2016 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Deception, Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular, Video | , | Leave a comment

Former Colombia President Alvaro Uribe’s Brother Arrested for Links to Death Squads

teleSUR | February 29, 2016

The brother of former Colombian President Alvro Uribe was arrested Monday accused of having ties with paramilitaries — also known as death squads — in the country as well as other crimes.

Santiago Uribe Velez was arrested in the coastal city of Medellin by officials from the attorney general’s office, who have long been monitoring the former president’s brother.

Velez is accused of forming and developing the paramilitary group known as “Los Doce Apostoles” (The Twelve Apostles) in the 1990s.

According to testimony by officials in the municipality of Yarumal in Velez’ home state of Antioquia, Velez was among a group of farmers who had the idea of forming an armed group to protect traders who were victims of extortion in the region.

The group then created an armed paramilitary unit in the 1990’s that committed various crimes, with the complicity of the Antioquia police department.

Juan Carlos Meneses, chief of police for Yarumal, said that when he arrived to the region in 1993, there was “a group of people doing cleaning, or social cleansing, or disappeared people who identify themselves as guerrillas, as thieves, as kidnappers, extortionists or even if they only had a vice, or vices. The only thing you have to do is, when that group goes to do a job, you have to collaborate with them.”

Meneses added that he would “collaborate” by giving Velez a sum of money every month and pointed out that Velez’ group had the full support of the state and national authorities, reported Colombian daily El Espectador.

While Uribe was president (2002-2010), his administration was tarnished by scandals. This included accusations of housing death squad members at his ranch in the 1980s — some of the most violent times in the country — when he was governor of Antioquia. He was accused of maintaining those ties while leading the country.

Paramilitary groups targeted not only guerrilla fighters, but also political opponents, left-wing activists, as well as academics and have been found guilty of committing numerous human rights abuses.

Even though these groups were technically demobilized between 2003-2006 under an agreement with the government, they continue to be a strong force across the country.

Human rights groups have long demanded that Uribe clarify his role, if any, in the formation of paramilitary groups. However, he has denied all allegations and continues to be active in politics, serving as a senator for the Center Democratic party.

March 1, 2016 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Subjugation - Torture | , , | Leave a comment

The FBI has been databasing suspicious memes and their creators for five years to silence political dissent

Blacklisted News | March 1, 2016

News has been making rounds across the internet that the FBI in collusion with the National Science Foundation has sunk nearly one million dollars into a program at the University of Indiana:

“The project is aimed at modeling the diffusion of information online and empirically discriminating among models of mechanisms driving the spread of memes. We explore why some ideas cause viral explosions while others are quickly forgotten. Our analysis goes beyond the traditional approach of applied epidemic diffusion processes and focuses on cascade size distributions and popularity time series in order to model the agents and processes driving the online diffusion of information, including: users and their topical interests, competition for user attention, and the chronological age of information. Completion of our project will result in a better understanding of information flow and could assist in elucidating the complex mechanisms that underlie a variety of human dynamics and organizations. The analysis will involve studying meme diffusion in large-scale social media by collecting and analyzing massive streams of public micro-blogging data.

The project stands to benefit both the research community and the public significantly. Our data will be made available via APIs and include information on meme propagation networks, statistical data, and relevant user and content features. The open-source platform we develop will be made publicly available and will be extensible to ever more research areas as a greater preponderance of human activities are replicated online. Additionally, we will create a web service open to the public for monitoring trends, bursts, and suspicious memes. This service could mitigate the diffusion of false and misleading ideas, detect hate speech and subversive propaganda, and assist in the preservation of open debate.

Using their system, dubbed Truthy, the group intends to track and differentiate memetic content made by normal everyday users and that of ‘professional political activists’ with the goal of eliminating false or misleading political information from social media ecosystems. Other research carried out by the project varies from analyses of meme propagation in specific geographical areas to understanding the viral nature of politically secular world affairs like the ongoing migrant crisis or the Occupy Wall Street movement when the average attention span of users is lower than that of a goldfish.

Even more suspiciously, one of the stated endgame goals of the project is to share the machine learning techniques gained from Truthy with future mass social media studies carried out by government and academia.

Curiously missing though from Truthy’s online dating profile is that she’s married to the FBI and LOVES sharing your dirty online secrets with her husband and his friends in Washington. Beginning in the Fall of 2014 Truthy began databasing not only suspicious memes but also the identity of their creators where the information will remain “forever, regardless of their innocence or guilt, or their intentions.” said lead FBI agent Paul Horner. “This database will be shared with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and other agencies.”

“forever, regardless of their innocence or guilt, or their intentions. This database will be shared with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and other agencies.”

Are we having fun yet?

March 1, 2016 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Timeless or most popular | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Five reasons why the TTIP talks are looking a bit wobbly

By Guy Taylor | TruePublica | February 26, 2016

Why TTIP negotiations are looking a bit like it might all fail

The twelfth round of negotiations for TTIP, the biggest trade deal of them all, started this week in Brussels. The impacts of TTIP are disturbing and well documented elsewhere on this site, but we are seeing signs of panic setting in on the pro-TTIP side of the fence. They’re right to panic.

1) TTIP is hugely behind schedule. It should have been signed off by now, and well into the ‘legal scrubbing’ stage where the lawyers tie up the legal loose ends and smooth of the rough edges. These negotiations are not open ended. Every delay, every extra month taken up at this stage is a threat to the entire project. We have the US elections looming, two of the frontrunners are against the new generation trade deals like TTIP and the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). There is no secret about the desperation of the Obama machine as they try to get the deal done and signed off before he vacates the White House at the end of the year. Obama is due to visit Germany in April to plead with all concerned to get a move on with the project. It is not impossible for the ratification vote in the European parliament to be held in 2019, after the next elections. That would make ratification in Europe very uncertain indeed.

2) There is a huge crisis over the proposals of corporate courts or ‘ISDS’ as it is often known. As the most contentious part of TTIP, it has attracted huge criticism and upset amongst members of the European parliament and in the public domain as well. In 2014, 150,000 responded to a European consultation on the issue and 97% of those responses were very negative. Since then, the trade commissioner in Brussels has dreamt up the Investor Court System as a proposed alternative. It has been made very clear that ICS is not alternative, more a repackaging of the dangerously flawed ISDS. Earlier this month,the largest association of German Judges completely slammed the ICS idea as undemocratic and undermining the sovereignty of domestic courts.  Slowly, our representatives in Brussels are beginning to realise this. We need to keep shouting about this

3) You might have noticed, but there is going to be a referendum on membership of the EU in the UK in June. Everything is up for grabs. If the UK votes to leave the EU, TTIP will probably still apply to us. In the horse-trading and arguments that will rage between now and the day of the vote, there will be concessions and deals struck – maybe, just maybe, TTIP could become a casualty. And in the run up to the referendum, the very idea of Brussels politicians signing off on such a far-reaching corporate power grab is adding a whole lot of fuel to the Brexit fire.

4) Procurement at all levels of government, both sides of the Atlantic is proving to be a sticking point. The EU wants access to state level procurement in the US – that’s a huge market to access. And at country level in the EU there’s an almost equally lucrative market to exploit for US corporations. The trouble is, this isn’t a deal being negotiated at state or nation state level. The US Trade Representative and the DG Trade in Europe are doing their utmost to keep scrutiny and influence at that level to a minimum, but agreeing stuff that is essential to their underlings at local level is part and parcel of TTIP and is inflaming opposition. Local authorities across the EU and in the UK are declaring their opposition to TTIP and CETA. In the States, there’s a similar move afoot. It was recently announced that the EU and USA were going to swap procurement market access offers at the end of this month and then hold a special intercessional meeting to discuss them.

5) And finally, one thing that cannot be ignored, is the growing movement of ordinary people across the EU & the US gaining knowledge and understanding about the deals (despite the best efforts of our governments and media). From the 3.2 million people who signed their opposition in the European Citizens’ Initiative last year, to the trade unions and community organisations saying ‘no’ to the deals, we are building a force that will be hard to resist. We can win this fight if we continue to step up the pressure.

More atglobaljustice.org.uk

February 28, 2016 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Economics | , , , , , | Leave a comment

California Cops Shoot and Kill Man and Woman Passed Out in Car

By Carlos Miller – PINAC – February 24, 2016

California cops shot and killed a man and woman Sunday after finding them unconscious in a car and spending 45 minutes trying to “deescalate the situation” before they “felt threatened,” according to Inglewood Mayor James Butts, a former police chief.

But Butts did not explain how Inglewood police felt threatened by an unconscious couple before opening fire on the couple.

All he said was that the woman, Kisha Micheal, had a gun in her right hand, which is what police have been saying all along.

However, Michael’s family said she did not even own a gun.

And as more details emerge from the incident, it certainly appears that things are just not adding up.

On Sunday, the Los Angeles Times described the incident as a “confrontation” with “suspects,” basing their report on information obtained from police.

On Monday, after attending a press conference and speaking to family members, the Los Angeles Times was no longer describing it as a confrontation but as a “mystery,” quoting Micheal’s sister, who stressed her sister did not even own a gun.

And on Tuesday, NBC Los Angeles reported that Mayor Butts admitted that the man and woman were not even awake – a tiny detail that was overlooked by police when they initially described their so-called confrontation.

For at least 45 minutes, police attempted “to rouse” them in an effort “to de-escalate the situation,” said Butts. It is the first public explanation for what transpired early Sunday morning during the time between the initial call and the shooting. Police previously had stated responding officers saw the woman had a gun, retreated to behind cover, and then gave orders for the couple to exit the vehicle.

“Obviously at some point they were conscious because somebody felt threatened,” said Butts, a retired law enforcement officer who previously had served as police chief in other cities. He said it is important for police to finish their investigation, and verify facts, before commenting further.

Other details emerging Tuesday was that Michael was out with a man named Marquintan Sandlin, a 32-year-old single father of four daughters. Michael was a single mother of three sons.

The two were apparently out on a date, having left their children in the care of family members. But it appears as if they had too much to drink and ended up passing out, which drew the attention of police, who claimed the woman was holding a gun.

That prompted them to call the SWAT team and at least one armored car, who began ordering them through a megaphone to wake up and exit the car.

At one point, the couple apparently did wake up, which led to the gunshots.

February 25, 2016 Posted by | Civil Liberties | , | Leave a comment

Israel’s Ethnic Cleansing of Its Parliament

By Jonathon Cook | CounterPunch | February 25, 2016

Nazareth – Benjamin Netanyahu’s government is drafting legislation that ought to resolve in observers’ minds the question of whether Israel is the democracy it proudly claims to be. The bill empowers a three-quarters majority of the parliament to oust a sitting MP.

It breathes new life into the phrase “tyranny of the majority”. But in this case, the majority will be Jewish MPs oppressing their Palestinian colleagues.

Netanyahu has presented the bill as a necessary response to the recent actions of three MPs from the Balad faction of the Joint List, a coalition of parties representing the often-overlooked fifth of Israel’s population who are Palestinian citizens.

He claims the MPs “sided with terror” this month when they visited Palestinian families in occupied East Jerusalem who have been waiting many months for Israel to return relatives’ bodies.

The 11 dead are among those alleged to have carried out what are termed “lone-wolf” attacks, part of a recent wave of Palestinian unrest. Fearful of more protests, Israel has demanded that the families bury the bodies in secret, without autopsies, and in plots outside Jerusalem.

There is an urgent moral and political issue about Israel using bodies as bargaining chips to encourage Palestinian obedience towards its illegal occupation.

But the three Palestinian MPs also believed they were under an obligation to help the families by adding to the pressure on the Netanyahu government to return the bodies.

Israel’s Palestinian minority has a severely degraded form of citizenship, but it enjoys more rights than Palestinians living under occupation.

When a video of their meeting the families was posted online, however, the Israeli right seized on the chance to defame the MPs. A parliamentary “ethics” committee comprising the main Jewish parties suspended the three MPs for several months. Now they face losing their seats.

This is part of a clear trend. Late last year the government outlawed the northern Islamic Movement, a popular extra-parliamentary political, religious and welfare organisation.

Despite Netanyahu’s statements that the movement was linked to “terror”, leaks to the Israeli media showed his intelligence chiefs had advised him weeks before the ban that there was no evidence to support such accusations.

At the time many Palestinians in Israel suspected Netanyahu would soon turn his sights on the Palestinian parties in the parliament. And so he has.

Balad, which decries Israel’s status as a Jewish state and noisily campaigns for democratic reform, was always likely to be top of his list.

In every recent general election, an election committee dominated by the Jewish parties has banned Balad or its leaders from standing, only to see the Israeli courts reverse the decision.

Now Netanyahu is legislating the expulsion of Balad and throwing down a gauntlet to the courts.

It won’t end there. If Balad is unseated, the participation of the other Joint List factions will be untenable. In effect, the Israeli right is seeking to ethnically cleanse the parliament.

For those who doubt such intentions, consider that two years ago the government raised the electoral threshold for entry to the parliament specifically to exclude the Palestinian factions.

The intention was to empty the parliament of its Palestinian representatives. But these factions put aside their historic differences to create the Joint List.

Netanyahu, who had hoped to see the back of the Palestinian parties at last year’s general election, inadvertently transformed them into the third biggest party. That was the context for his now-infamous warning during the campaign that “the Arabs are coming out in droves to vote”.

The current crackdown on Palestinian parties may finally burst the simplistic assumption – widely accepted in the west – that Israel is a democracy – and not least because its Palestinian minority has the vote.

This argument was always deeply misguided. After Israel’s creation in 1948, officials gave citizenship and the vote to the few Palestinians remaining inside the new borders precisely because they were a small and weak minority.

In exiling 80 per cent of Palestinians from their homeland, Israel effectively rigged its national electoral constituency to ensure there would be a huge Jewish majority in perpetuity.

A Palestinian MP, Ahmed Tibi, summed it up neatly. Israel, he said, was a democratic state for Jews, and a Jewish state for its Palestinian citizens.

In truth, the vote of Palestinian citizens was only ever meant as window-dressing. David Ben Gurion, Israel’s first prime minister, assumed that the rump Palestinian population would be swamped by Jewish immigrants flooding into the new state.

He miscalculated. The Palestinian minority had a far higher birth rate and maintained its 20 per cent proportion of the population.

None of that would matter had the Palestinian representatives quietly accepted their position as shop-window mannequins.

But in recent years, as Mahmoud Abbas’ Palestinian Authority has grown ever weaker, confined to small enclaves of the West Bank, the Palestinian MPs in Israel have taken up some of the slack.

That was why the Balad MPs met the Jerusalem families. The PA, barred by Israel from East Jerusalem, has been looking on helplessly as the families have been desperately trying to get their loved ones’ bodies back.

This month Mr Netanyahu said he would surround Israel with walls to keep out the neighbourhood’s “wild beasts”. In his view, there are also wild beasts to be found in Israel’s parliament – and he is ready to erect walls to keep them out too.

Jonathan Cook won the Martha Gellhorn Special Prize for Journalism. His latest books are “Israel and the Clash of Civilisations: Iraq, Iran and the Plan to Remake the Middle East” (Pluto Press) and “Disappearing Palestine: Israel’s Experiments in Human Despair” (Zed Books). His website is www.jkcook.net.

February 25, 2016 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Timeless or most popular | , , , , | Leave a comment

US marshals shoot innocent man in back ‘execution style’ during raid on wrong address: attorney

By David Edwards | Raw Story | February 24, 2016

A New Mexico attorney accused U.S. marshals this week of shooting a 23-year-old man in the back “execution style” when they arrived at the wrong address to make an arrest.

According to KOB, marshals were attempting to execute an arrest warrant for George Bond in Albuquerque on Saturday, but mistakenly opened fire on a home three trailers away from the suspect’s.

The family of 23-year-old Edgar Alvarado confirmed that he was fatally shot by agents.

“They said that they had made a mistake because he was out there at the wrong time. No such a mistake by killing somebody. There’s no accident,” Perla Alvarado, cousin of the victim, told KOB.

At a press conference on Monday, an attorney for the family accused federal agents of shooting Alvarado four times in the back, the Albuquerque Journal reported.

“It’s almost inexplicable, but we have evidence … that Edgar was dragged from the house, after having been struck multiple times, taken outside, given commands to give up a weapon, as he’s gurgling and flailing his arms, and shot a fourth time,” attorney Robert Gorence said. “Almost what you would call ‘execution style.’”

According to Gorence, multiple eyewitnesses had said that Alvarado was shot in the back the fourth time when he was not able to respond to agents’ commands.

“When you do things in the middle of the night, and go to the wrong address, when you don’t know the individual’s name or have a picture of the person you are looking for, is it any surprise you have catastrophic and horrific outcomes?” Gorence noted. “At 3:30 in the morning, when you go to the wrong place in a lock-and-load mentality, it’s kind of easy to see what happens.”

The attorney said that he had sent a letter to Damon Martinez, U.S. Attorney for the District of New Mexico, asking for more details about the case to be released. He said that a federal tort claims notice would be filed by the end of the week.

“All we’re asking right now is to get answers,” Gorence insisted. “So far that has been completely stonewalled.”

New Mexico State Police are investigating the incident, and have only stated that U.S. marshals shot Alvarado during a “confrontation.”

February 24, 2016 Posted by | Civil Liberties | , , | Leave a comment

‘Don’t demonize Israel’: Canada passes anti-boycott motion

RT | February 23, 2016

Canada has passed a motion to condemn “any and all attempts” to promote the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel both at home and abroad.

The motion passed on Monday by a 229-51 vote, CIJ News reports. The bill was introduced by members of the Conservative Party and won support from Liberal Party members. The motion calls on the government to condemn attempts by Canadian organizations, groups, and individuals to promote the BDS movement, claiming it “promotes the demonization and delegitimization” of Israel.

BDS is a global grassroots movement that is trying to pressure Israel to “comply with international law and Palestinian rights” through the boycott of products and companies that profit from violating Palestinian rights. It also includes Israeli cultural and academic institutions.

Inspired by the successful BDS movement that aided in ending South African apartheid, its supporters believe the movement is the only way to push for a solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

Speaking after the vote, the National Council of Canada Arab Relations said, “At its core, the vote on the anti-BDS motion would go against the spirit of Freedom of Speech, a right enshrined in Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Democratic governments do not ordinarily attempt to dictate the political views of their citizens. NCCAR Chair, Gabriel Fahel, reminds us that ‘freedom of speech and conscientious objections to buying products from countries that contravene international law are core values of a free and democratic society.’”

The CEO of the Center for Israel and Jewish Affairs, Shimon Fogel, however insisted that the boycott movement “does not contribute to peace and is not pro-Palestinian.”

“It is discrimination based on nationality, and it harms both Israelis and Palestinians alike by driving the two sides further apart. The BDS movement is a fringe movement and is outside genuine peace efforts,” Fogel said, as quoted by The Times of Israel.

Liberal Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is likely to continue former Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s close ties with Israel. He is against the BDS movement, and tweeted his opinion in March of last year.

Students at McGill University in Montreal passed a pro-BDS motion on Tuesday.

In 2014, Trudeau spoke out in favor of Israel’s right to defend itself during Operation Protective Edge, acknowledging the suffering of Israelis, but not that of the Palestinians, 2,200 of whom were killed during the 50 day conflict.

Israel has pushed back against BDS efforts, accusing its promoters of “anti-semitism.” AP recently revealed that the Israeli government had allotted $26 million for a covert cyberattack on the BDS movement, which would include “flooding the internet” with pro-Israel content and monitoring Muslim activists online.

Read more:

Boris bows to Bibi: UK obeys Israel’s demand to remove pro-BDS posters from London Tube

February 23, 2016 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Full Spectrum Dominance, Illegal Occupation, Solidarity and Activism | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Against Correctness and the Taming of People

By Joseph Hickey | Dissident Voice | February 23, 2016

Correctness is a set of rules and mores constraining the form of public discourse and social behaviour. There is no place in a democratic society for “correctness” of any sort, least of all a correctness regarding politics: political ideas, speech and other expression. Let us reject standards of form in our debates, exchanges, interventions and criticisms.

The goal of political life is to influence society and be influenced by it. This can only happen through free exchange between individuals, where the form and content of the expression is decided by the speaker, for the speaker’s own purposes as an individual. For example, if a speaker’s goal is to provoke, enrage, excite, or otherwise move his or her audience, it is the individual’s right to attempt to do so. (That such communication tactics may or may not be effective in achieving some desired influence is a separate matter.)

Individuals who hold views that are not the same as dominant views often say things that are perceived to be insensitive or “hurtful”. These individuals may then be sanctioned under the rubric of political correctness with punishments such as public shaming, banishment from social groups, loss of employment, criminal charges, or extravagant lawsuits. The notion that societal correctness must not be breached is so strong that public institutions are permitted to take part in the punishments through public condemnations, enforcement of laws that criminalize expression of ideas, and use of public resources including financing lawsuits or refusing to provide services to individuals who choose to confront or who run afoul of the dominant standard.

One effect of this widespread imposition of correctness is a taming of the people – like the trained house pet that waits at the open door, not stepping outside until the master attaches the leash, people become trained not to step out independently into the wilderness of ideas and expression. Whereas once we may have spontaneously expressed our emotions and spoken our minds in public, to the community, now we tiptoe around potential sensitivities and threats of repercussions for being incorrect. We are chilled to the bone.

Who or what is the master? Societal (including “political”) correctness appears to be directed by peer-group mobbing that gets amplified in the media and is tolerated and encouraged by employers, lawmakers, and courts. Employers respond to and encourage mobbing by firing targeted employees, lawmakers respond through the passing of new laws to sanction incorrect expression, and the courts apply these laws to convict and sentence correctness offenders, thus sending a message to the entire society informing individuals of the limits, beyond which mobbing can be sure to draw blood. In addition, special interest groups lead the development of new taboos or act to reinforce old ones, by influencing public opinion at all levels.

Individuals who would participate in this type of mobbing by enforcing correctness standards in their political interactions should have regard for the harmful response of power (employers, government, courts, etc.) to the movements of the mob. Power today is happy to enforce contemporary correctness standards, just as it was happy to impose other correctness standards at other times (e.g. Victorian, religious, racist, homophobic, etc.), because such enforcement of the evolving superficial status quo permits the maintenance of the structural status quo and all its essential features (wage slavery, class hierarchy, military capability for war and conquest in other territories, etc.). Importantly, tamed and trained pets don’t bite the master’s hand. Rather, trained pets learn to accept and love the master, and to defend him to the bitter end.

Societal “correctness” is a control mechanism that maintains unjust hierarchy and precludes democratic social organization. Acts of incorrect expression are vital to challenging this societal ordering, and reveal the degree to which powerful groups have control over individuals’ lives. No individual expression can be taboo, off limits or “incorrect” in a real democracy. Likewise, a population tamed by the enforcement of correctness cannot create democracy.

Joseph Hickey is a PhD student (Physics) and Executive Director of the Ontario Civil Liberties Association (OCLA).

February 23, 2016 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Timeless or most popular | , , , | Leave a comment

Jamaica: Judge Orders ‘Death Squad’ Records Turned Over

teleSUR – February 23, 2016

Jamaica’s Police Commissioner Carl Williams has been ordered by a justice of the country’s Supreme Court to turn over the personnel records of officers accused of forming part of a “death squad,” The Gleaner reported Monday.

Jamaica’s Independent Commission of Investigations, took Commissioner Williams to the Supreme Court in order to obtain the records of 11 officers charged with murder in connection to suspicious deaths at the hands of police.

The investigation stems from homicides in the Clarendon Parrish, which had originally been reported as civilian deaths.

The commission had been trying to negotiate the release of the records but faced stiff opposition from Williams, who argued that the officers were entitled to professional privilege and protected by a constitutional right to privacy.

“Between the (national police force) and us, there was a respectful disagreement as regards what information we could get regarding the disciplinary records of their men, of reviews done of shootings, of plans for planned operations,” commission head Terrance Williams told The Gleaner.

The commission is interested in the records in order to determine if superior officers were complicit or connected to the alleged murders of civilians.

“That is, did they plan the operations properly? Did they review the operations properly? Did they select members of teams properly?” asked Terrance Williams.

Supreme Justice Bryan Sykes said Commissioner Williams has 120 days to hand over the files.

Organizations such as Jamaicans for Justice have denounced brutality and the widespread use of what has been described as “extra-judicial killings” at the hands of Jamaican police.

The Independent Commission of Investigations was established in 2010 in response to these allegations.

February 23, 2016 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Subjugation - Torture | , | Leave a comment

Nigeria: Soldiers committing extrajudicial killings, citizens disappearing after arrest

American Herald Tribune | February 21, 2016

It seems that Nigerians have to fear not only the extremist group Boko Haram, but also official soldiers who have proved to carry out extrajudicial killings, where the soldiers act as merciless as insurgents that have been spreading death and destruction in the African country.

According to the Associated Press, farmers and villagers across Nigeria are being arrested upon allegations that they belong to the extremist group Boko haram. The stunning part of the story is that many of these detained people disappear and do not return.

According to the source, Nigerian soldiers detained a teacher and two middle-aged farmers in Duhu village. Some residents, who knew the men, insisted they did not belong to the extremist group, and marched to a nearby military base to demand their release.

The military denied detaining elementary school teacher Habu Bello and farmers Idrisa Dele and Umaru Hammankadi even though several villagers told the news agency they watched as the men were taken away by uniformed soldiers.

“If you have a problem with someone, you can influence the military to pick them up and then you will never hear about them again,” human rights lawyer Sunday Joshua Wugira told AP from his offices in the northeastern city of Yola, where police are investigating the January killings of three brothers from the Fulani tribe.

In one act of terror, AP reported that a teenager said she was captured last year by Boko Haram fighters who attacked her village and killed her father.

“Soldiers arrived to hunt down extremists, but interrogated my three brothers instead. Vigilantes then seized and killed them,” she said.

The girl did not only suffer from Boko Haram’s terror, but even worse from the terror of the Nigerian soldiers as well. The 16-year old girl was kidnapped by Boko Haram at 16 and raped in captivity; she was freed in November when soldiers attacked the extremist camp where she was being held. She tried to return to her home village, but had to flee again because vigilantes threatened to kill her unborn child, calling it a “terrorist baby,” she said.

“I don’t have any figures, but I can confirm to you that there have been a series of complaints about extrajudicial killings,” Duhu district leader Mustapha Sanusi said.

Since 2011, the military has been responsible for the deaths of some 8,000 detainees who were shot, starved or tortured, which counts more than a third of the estimated 20,000 people killed during the 6-year-old insurgency.

The AP report also said that refugees panicked in January when they found the trussed-up body of a refugee with his head bashed in at the Shettima Ali Monguno Teachers Village camp on the outskirts of Maiduguri.

“We now fear more for our safety because we cannot tell who is good or bad among us,” said one young refugee, insisting on anonymity for safety. “Our camp is well fenced and secured, yet one of us was murdered over the night.”

“People are living in fear and believe that at the end of the day they will never get justice,” said lawyer Wugira, who underlined that he has been offering free services yet due to this fear most disappearances go unchallenged.

February 22, 2016 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Subjugation - Torture, Timeless or most popular | , , , | Leave a comment

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