Time for President Obama to Free Simon Trinidad
By Tom Burke | teleSUR | September 24, 2015
September 24 marks the day one year ago when the National Victims Table was set up as an important part of the Colombian peace process. Exactly one year later, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia – People’s Army (FARC-EP) and the Colombian government of Manuel Santos are announcing an agreement on victims and justice, a bilateral ceasefire, and a signing date for the peace agreement.
It is a big step forward for the Colombian peace process, with the issues of prisoners, setting aside arms, and then implementation to be agreed upon next. Although the number of Colombian political prisoners is around 7000, there is one prisoner who stands out because he is held under cruel and unusual circumstances. That is FARC negotiator Simon Trinidad (aka Ricardo Palmera).
Held for 11 years as a political prisoner of the U.S. Empire, the 65-year-old Trinidad is in solitary confinement at the Florence Supermax in Colorado, the “Guantanamo of the Rockies.” Trinidad is a good man who embodies the struggle of the Colombian people for freedom, and the FARC say that without him, they will not sign an agreement.
It is President Barack Obama who can set Simon Trinidad free, to take his rightful place at the Colombian peace negotiations. President Obama can send a loud and clear message that the U.S. backs the peace process. For President Obama, the time to act is now, and it is likely to add momentum to the peace process.
Earlier this week, I marched with thirty-five activists from nine U.S. cities on a rural highway in the Rocky Mountains to demand, “Free Simon Trinidad! Peace for Colombia!” We marched to the modern underground dungeon where prisoners can be held with no human contact for years on end. Across from the guardhouse of the Colorado supermax, we held signs saying, “President Obama free Simon Trinidad!” and “Send Simon Trinidad to peace talks!”
As we marched back up Highway 67 to the small town of Florence, I kept thinking how strange it is, surreal in fact, that our efforts to end the U.S. war and intervention brought us to this place. The scenery is beautiful and breathtaking, but when you think of the men being held underground with no access to sunlight or fresh air, and no other human to talk to, the prison seems doubly vicious, consciously dehumanizing. Only the strongest of people, someone like Simon Trinidad, can persevere under these conditions.
With September 24 being the starting date of the National Victims Table, that date has great significance for me and my friends who organize solidarity with Colombia and Simon Trinidad in particular. For I am one of the Antiwar 23, raided by the FBI in Chicago, Minneapolis, and Grand Rapids, five years ago today. Over 100 FBI agents raided seven homes, scaring our children, and taking away our computers, phones and boxes of whatever else they wanted. When I left our house to write a press release, I realized I was being followed. I drove to my wife’s job where the FBI subpoenaed us to the grand jury in Chicago. It was shocking. Like all of the Antiwar 23, we refused to appear. No witch hunts for us.
I don’t like to think of myself as a victim, but the U.S. government did target us because of our effective organizing. The U.S. government claimed the Antiwar 23 were sending money and providing material support to the FARC and PFLP. The FBI said we faced 15-year prison sentences. However, when the U.S. government spy could not find any evidence, she and her FBI handlers attempted to create a crime. It did not work. We are still organizing solidarity, such as the campaign for a Palestinian American women’s leader “Justice for Rasmea Odeh”.
Over time we learned that the U.S. government political repression began when we protested outside the four trials of Colombian revolutionary Simon Trinidad. Our small group of solidarity activists did our part to expose the injustice of the four trials of Simon Trinidad and the U.S. government was angry with us. We protested and reported to the media on the unfair procedures and rulings. We were there in the courtroom when the cheating Judge Hogan was forced to step down after the first trial. We helped turn what should have been the triumph of the Empire, into a shameful display of corruption.
Today, I find September 24 to be a day for reflection and for re-dedication to the cause of stopping U.S. war and intervention in Colombia and everywhere else too. Plan Colombia is a colossal failure and needs to be brought to an end. We will continue to act in solidarity with the people of Colombia for a lasting peace with justice. We say “Free Simon Trinidad! Peace for Colombia!” Now is the time for President Obama to act.
Tom Burke is the spokesperson for the National Committee to Free Ricardo Palmera (Simon Trinidad)
Background: Who is Simon Trinidad?
US Spies Await Terrorist Attack to Change Public’s Tune About Cyber Privacy
Sputnik – 26.09.2015
As the United States seeks backdoor encryption access, it faces strong pushback in the form of public opinion. But according to some intelligence officials, that perception could change if another terrorist attack were to occur on American soil.
Faced with a public outcry over privacy concerns and the tarnished reputation of American tech companies abroad, the Obama administration has found itself in a difficult spot. Many industry leaders are calling for the president to publicly disavow the idea of a law requiring tech companies to provide backdoor encryption access.
Intelligence officials, of course, are none-too-thrilled about such a move. Insistent on the notion that encryption access is vital for national security, many are eager for a law requiring companies like Apple to cooperate.
“Overall, the benefits to privacy, civil liberties and cybersecurity gained from encryption outweigh the broader risks that would have been created by weakening encryption,” reads the latest report from the US National Security Council.
But if public opinion remains a stubborn roadblock for such legislation, some officials have indicated that a terrorist attack could change the situation.
“… The legislative environment is very hostile today,” Robert S. Litt, a lawyer for the intelligence community, said in an email obtained by the Washington Post. “[But] it could turn in the event of a terrorist attack or criminal event where strong encryption can be shown to have hindered law enforcement.”
Litt isn’t the only one.
“People are still not persuaded this is a problem,” a senior official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told the Post. “People think we have not made the case. We do not have the perfect example where you have the dead child or a terrorist act to point to, and that’s what people seem to claim you have to have.”
While the US intelligence community seems to believe that a terrorist attack would prove the need for robust encryption, it’s already been proven that mass surveillance has done little to thwart such incidents. The National Security Agency’s data collection – unveiled by whistleblower Edward Snowden – was launched after the September 11 attacks, but failed to prevent future bombings, like that which occurred during the Boston Marathon in 2013.
A White House review panel formed two years ago recommended ending the domestic spying program after findings that the NSA’s bulk collection of telephone metadata had done nothing for national security.
Even if the Obama administration decides to publicly disavow encryption legislation, there’s no guarantee that the US government wouldn’t still carry forward with decryption plans. On Thursday, the Washington Post reported that the administration was looking into four distinct ways to force tech companies into compliance.
“We’re not promoting those as the way to go,” said another official, also speaking on condition of anonymity. “We’re just saying these are things that could be done.”
Arming Drones With Lasers to Increase Danger of Human Rights Abuses
Sputnik – 25.09.2015
WASHINGTON – Proposals to attach a high-energy laser on the Avenger, or Predator-C, drone will give the US armed forces and its contractors a cost-effective weapon to carry out widespread assassinations and intimidate domestic critics, experts told Sputnik.
“Arming drones with lasers is likely to increase the use of drones for harassment of individuals and populations in attacks that cause burning and terror but fall short of killing,” KnowDrones.com Coordinator Nick Mottern told Sputnik on Thursday. “Woundings are likely to increase, and assassinations may well increase.”
Mottern warned that laser drones would offer military forces and their private contractors a cheaper and more convenient means of conducting assassinations on a broad scale.
“Laser attacks may be less expensive in dollar terms than missile attacks, which also may bring an increase in injury and killing,” he said. “Casualties of all kinds are likely to increase. The advantage is only to weapons makers.”
Upstate Drone Action activist Ed Kinane told Sputnik that arming drones with lasers would make an already reprehensible weapon even more contemptible.
“Weaponized drones are vile; arming them with lasers is even viler,” he told Sputnik. “Corporations, like General Atomics, trying to develop such high-tech killing devices, should have their charters revoked; their executive officers and chief engineers should be prosecuted for being the intellectual authors of assassination and terrorism.”
Kinane argued that US Department of Defense officials working with mercenary contractors were likewise criminals and should be indicted.
“Like nuclear weapons, weaponized drones are instruments of terror, but also of diplomatic blackmail,” the activist warned, “Leaders of nations, when negotiating with the US, can’t help but know that they are doing so with a gun at their heads.”
Kinane warned that drones armed with lasers were weapons designed not for defense, but for global hegemony and that they would eventually be used to threaten and coerce American citizens too.
“Soon the people of the US will come under threat … from such high-tech weapon development,” he predicted. “These weapons may primarily be used to defend, not the nation, but the status quo power structure of the nation.”
Kinane also predicted that the new weapons would be used to intimidate and threaten domestic critics of US policies.
“They will surely be used domestically to intimidate and quell dissent, making a shambles of the First Amendment rights of freedom of speech and petitioning the government for the redress of grievances,” he stated.
General Atomics Aeronautical Systems (GA-ASI) the San Diego-based company that makes the Predator and Reaper drones, is undertaking a privately funded study to integrate a 150-kilowatt solid-state laser onto its Avenger (née Predator-C) drone.
If the company succeeds, a drone with a high-energy laser will be a reality at some point in 2017, company executives told DefenseOne.
Washington State Cops Who Killed Unarmed Mexican Man Return to Work
© Family Photo
Sputnik | 24.09.2015
In February, the Pasco police made global headlines after three officers were caught on camera firing 17 bullets at an unarmed man in the back as he ran away from them with his hands in the air.
Now, after the officers received seven months of paid administrative leave for the shooting of Mexican national Antonio Zambrano-Montes, who was 35, they have been cleared of any wrongdoing. Two of the officers will be reportedly returning to work effective “immediately,” while the third, Ryan Flanagan, has parted ways with the department for unknown reasons.
The incident took place on February 10, when police were called to an intersection because of a man allegedly throwing rocks at vehicles. The department claims that Zambrano-Montes, who has a history of mental illness, ran after hitting two of the officers with rocks, Fusion reported.
Zambrano-Montes was the fourth person killed by officers in the department in less than a year.
A video of the incident, filmed by Dario Infante Zuniga, 21, went massively viral, collecting over 1,600,000 views within nine days. It has now been viewed over two million times.
Approximately one week after the shooting, the Pasco Police Department announced that they had launched a “full investigation into their victim” — instead of the officers who shot him.
Ken Lattin, a spokesperson for the Kennewick Police Department, stated in February that he was trying to piece together what Zambrano-Montes was doing “hours, days, and weeks leading up to this incident.”
“It’s curious that when you ask them about the past of some of the officers, they say that information is not pertinent to the investigation,” Felix Vargas, chair of Consejo Latino, a local organization of Hispanic-owned businesses, said after a briefing, Fusion reported.
“But somehow what Zambrano was doing weeks before this incident is vital information.”
While activists and commentators have expressed remorse, anger, and sadness over the lack of charges and the officers returning to their duties, many have noted that it was to be expected, as the cops were never really the ones under investigation.
Syria drone strikes: ‘Pre-authorized targeted killings’ face legal challenge
RT | September 24, 2015
Legal action will be brought against Prime Minister David Cameron after he revealed an RAF drone was used to kill two British militants fighting for Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) in Syria. The attack went ahead despite parliament voting against strikes in 2013.
The Prime Minister disclosed the nature of the strikes in September, claiming they had been carried out as an “act of self-defense” and that he had sought parliament’s permission to kill the militants.
Reyaad Khan and Rahul Amin both died, along with another jihadist, who was not of British origin.
Now Green Party MP Caroline Lucas and Baroness Jones are working with human rights charity Reprieve to make the first steps toward a judicial review.
A pre-action letter to the Attorney General and the Defense Secretary states the government failed to publish its “targeted killing policy” which is in breach of international law.
“The Raqqa strike, and the intention of the government to pre-authorize targeted killings in the future in countries where the UK is not at war, is of concern to the claimants and many others,” they wrote.
“The concern is heightened by the lack of clarity about the circumstances in which the government reserves the right to kill British citizens outside of an armed conflict.”
The letter claims the way the government rationalized the attack has raised further questions about the legality of its military operations overseas.
It says the government claims the attack was justified due to “potential,” “direct,” “likely” or “imminent” threats to the UK.
“Such a lack of clarity as to the test which is being applied by the government in deciding whether to pre-authorize the targeted killing of British nationals or individuals overseas raises real and serious concerns over the lawfulness of the government’s past and expected resort to the use of lethal force,” it says.
“It is unclear what, if any, policies, procedures and/or safeguards are in place to ensure that this ‘new departure’ is only exercised in accordance with domestic and international law.”
The UK is currently taking part in US-led coalition airstrikes in Iraq against IS, but not in Syria.
However, the killing of Khan was justified, Cameron said, because he had been plotting “barbaric” attacks in Britain.
Cameron is expected to stage a second vote in the House of Commons to approve further action in the country, but will not do so until he is sure of victory after his embarrassing 2013 defeat.
UN Farce: Saudi Arabia to Head Human Rights Council
By Felicity Arbuthnot | Dissident Voice | September 23, 2015
All victims of human rights abuses should be able to look to the Human Rights Council as a forum and a springboard for action.
— Ban Ki-moon, UN Secretary-General, 12 March 2007, Opening of the 4th Human Rights Council Session.
Article 55 of United Nations Charter includes:
Universal respect for and observance of human rights and fundamental freedoms for all, without distinction as to race, sex, language or religion.
In diametrical opposition to these fine founding aspirations, the UN has appointed Saudi Arabia’s envoy to the United Nations Human Rights Council to head (or should that be “behead”) an influential human rights panel. The appointment was seemingly made in June, but only came to light on September 17th, due to documents obtained by UN Watch.
… Mr Faisal Bin Hassan Trad, Saudi Arabia’s Ambassador at the UN in Geneva, was elected as Chair of a panel of independent experts on the UN Human Rights Council.
As head of a five-strong group of diplomats, the influential role would give Mr Trad the power to select applicants from around the world for scores of expert roles in countries where the UN has a mandate on human rights.
Such experts are often described as the “crown jewels” of the HRC, according to UN Watch.
The “crown jewels” have been handed to a country with one of the worst human rights records in the world. Saudi Arabia will head a Consultative Group of five Ambassadors empowered to select applicants globally for more than seventy-seven positions to deal with human rights violations and mandates.
In a spectacular new low for even a UN whose former Secretary General, Kofi Annan, took eighteen months to admit publicly that the 2003 invasion of, bombardment and near destruction of, Iraq was illegal, UN Watch points out that the UN has chosen “a country that has beheaded more people this year than ISIS to be head of a key Human Rights panel …”
In May, just prior to the appointment, the Saudi government advertised for eight extra executioners to “… carry out an increasing number of death sentences, which are usually beheadings, carried out in public”.
Seemingly “no special qualifications are needed.” The main function would be executing, but job description “also involves performing amputations …”
The advert was posted on the website of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia Ministry of the Civil Service.
By June 15th this year executions reached 100, “far exceeding last year’s tally and putting (the country) on course for a new record” according to The Independent (June 15.) The paper adds that the Kingdom is set to beat its own grisly, primitive record of 192 executions in 1995.
The paper notes that “…the rise in executions can be directly linked to the new King Salman and his recently-appointed inner circle …”
In August 2014, Human Rights Watch reported nineteen executions in seventeen days – including one for “sorcery.” Adultery and apostasy can also be punished by death.
In a supreme irony, on the death of King Salman’s head-chopping predecessor, Salman’s half bother King Abdullah, in January (still current decapitation record holder) UK Prime Minister David Cameron ordered flags flown at half mast, including at the Houses of Parliament and Westminster Abbey, leading one MP to question: “On the day that flags at Whitehall are flying at half-mast for King Abdullah, how many public executions will there be?”
Cameron apparently had not read his own Foreign and Commonwealth Office Report citing Saudi as “a country of concern.”
Reacting to a swathe of criticism, a spokesperson for Westminster Abbey responded:
For us not to fly at half-mast would be to make a noticeably aggressive comment on the death of the King of a country to which the UK is allied in the fight against Islamic terrorism.
The Abbey’s representative appears to have been either breathtakingly ignorant or stunningly uninformed. In December 2009 in a US Embassy cable the then US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, wrote that:
While the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) takes seriously the threat of terrorism within Saudi Arabia, it has been an ongoing challenge to persuade Saudi officials to treat terrorist financing emanating from Saudi Arabia as a strategic priority.
Moreover:
… donors in Saudi Arabia constitute the most significant source of funding to Sunni terrorist groups worldwide … engagement is needed to … encourage the Saudi government to take more steps to stem the flow of funds from Saudi Arabia-based sources to terrorists and extremists worldwide.
At home women are forbidden “from obtaining a passport, marrying, traveling, accessing higher education without the approval of a male guardian.” (HRW Report, 2014.) Saudi is also, of course, the only country in the world where women are forbidden to drive.
The country is currently preparing to behead twenty-one year old Ali Mohammed al-Nimr. He was arrested aged seventeen for participating in anti-government protests and possessing firearms — the latter charge has been consistently denied. Human rights groups are appalled at the sentence and the flimsy case against him, but pointing out that neither “factors are unusual in today’s Saudi Arabia.”
Following the beheading, al-Nimr’s headless body will be allegedly mounted “on to a crucifix for public viewing.”
What was that mantra issued unceasingly from US and UK government Departments in justification for blitzkriegs, invasions and slaughters in countries who “kill their own people”?
Numerous reports cite torture as being widespread, despite Saudi having subscribed to the UN Convention Against Torture.
There are protests at Saudi embassies across the world highlighting the case of blogger Raif Badawi, sentenced to a thousand lashes – fifty lashes a week after Friday prayers – and ten years in prison for blogging about free speech.
Since March, Saudi Arabia has been bombing Yemen — with no UN mandate — destroying schools, hospitals, homes, a hotel, public buildings, an Internally Displaced Persons camp, historical jewels, generating “a trail of civilian death and destruction” which may have amounted to war crimes, according to Amnesty International. “Unlawful airstrikes” have failed to distinguish between military targets and civilian objects. “Nowhere safe for civilians”, states Amnesty.
Further, the conflict … has killed close to 4,000 people, half of them civilians including hundreds of children, and displaced over one million since 25 March 2015. There has been:
… a flagrant disregard for civilian lives and fundamental principles of international humanitarian law (killing and injuring) hundreds of civilians not involved in the conflict, many of them children and women, in unlawful (disproportionate and indiscriminate) ground and air attacks.
It is alleged that US-supplied cluster bombs have also been used. One hundred and seventeen States have joined the Convention to ban these lethal, indiscriminate munitions since December 2008. Saudi Arabia, of course, is not amongst them.
Saudi was also one of the countries which bombed Iraq in 2003, an action now widely accepted as illegal. It is perhaps indicative of their closeness to the US that the bombardment of Yemen is mirror-named from the Pentagon’s Silly Titles for Killing People lexicon: “Operation Decisive Storm.” Iraq 1991 was, of course, “Operation Desert Storm”.
Saudi is also ranked 164th out of 180 countries in the 2015 Reporters Without Borders press freedom index. All in all, Saudi leading the Human Rights Council at the UN is straight out of another of George Orwell’s most nightmarish political fantasies.
Oh, and, of course, we are told that nineteen of the hijackers of the ‘plane that hit the World Trade Centre were Saudis – for which swathes of Afghanistan and region, Middle East and North Africa are still paying the bloodiest, genocidal price for the “War on Terror”– whilst Saudi’s representatives stroll into the sunlight of the UN Human Rights body.
On the UN Human Right’s Council’s website is stated:
The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) represents the world’s commitment to universal ideals of human dignity. We have a unique mandate from the international community to promote and protect all human rights.
Way to go, folks!
Parents of Saudi juvenile set for ‘crucifixion’ plead for mercy, amid UK and US silence
Reprieve | September 24, 2015
The family of a juvenile sentenced to ‘crucifixion’ in Saudi Arabia have appealed to the Saudi authorities to spare him, as pressure mounts on the US and the UK to intervene.
Speaking to AFP, Mohamed al-Nimr said he hoped the King would save his son, student Ali al-Nimr, who was 17 when he was arrested in 2012 in the wake of protests in the Eastern Province. Ali was tortured into signing a false ‘confession’, which was then used to convict him, and it emerged last week that the unusually harsh sentence had recently been upheld without Ali’s knowledge. With legal avenues now exhausted, Ali could be executed at any moment, with no prior notification of his family. Mr al-Nimr said “we hope that the king will not sign” the execution order for his son.
The appeal comes as the UK and the US – strong allies of the Saudi government – faced questions on their failure to speak out about the case. Questioned yesterday by AP, US State Department spokesman Mark C Toner refused to say he’d welcome a commutation of the sentence, saying that he was “not aware of the case.”
The UK government has so far limited itself to a brief statement last week that “We continue to raise our human rights concerns with the Saudi authorities, including their use of the death penalty.” The Ministry of Justice has also faced criticism after it indicated that it would continue with an ongoing bid to provide prison services to the Saudi government.
In contrast, the French government yesterday joined UN experts in calling for the death sentence to be commuted, because Ali was a juvenile at the time of his arrest. The French Foreign Ministry said it was “concerned by the situation of Ali Mohammed al-Nimr, who was sentenced to death even though he was a minor at the time of the events […] We call for the execution to be called off.” The group of independent United Nations human rights experts on Tuesday asked the Saudi authorities “to immediately halt the scheduled execution”, and to ensure a “fair retrial” of Ali.
Commenting, Maya Foa, director of Reprieve’s death penalty team, said: “Saudi Arabia’s plans to behead and crucify Ali al-Nimr, a juvenile, for attending a protest are an outrage – the French government and UN experts are right to be calling for it to be cancelled. It’s deeply troubling that the UK and the US – both close allies of the Saudi government – are staying silent. The international community must stand firm against this utterly unjustified sentence, and call on the Saudi authorities to change course.”
The West Suppresses Report on Ukraine’s Suppression of Journalists
OSCE Squelches Ukrainian Commission on Human Rights Speaker
By Eric Zuesse | Aletho News | September 23, 2015
At a 21 September 2015 meeting of the OSCE (Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe), which is run by the Western powers and which is the leading organization concerning security and cooperation in Europe, a courageous speech against Ukraine’s imprisonment and killing of independent journalists was made by Alexey Tarasov, the Chairman of the All-Ukrainian Commission on Human Rights. Nearly halfway through the prepared text of his intended 6-minute summary description of the main cases, his speech was terminated by the Chairperson. It was cut off at 2:31 in this video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=malosUt-9jc
However, in this video of it, the termination is at 2:38:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=161&v=RxeCM_EBZdE
Here, then, is the complete printed text, as it was posted at Fort Russ on September 22. I have additionally placed a mark at the point where Tarasov’s speech was cut short:
Dear colleagues,
Please allow me to welcome this meeting.
Probably everyone knows that today’s Ukraine is the most problematic European country in terms of human rights and fundamental freedoms.
Especially where it concerns the tragic situation with the freedom of speech and freedom of expression, the situation of access to information, limitation of journalists’ activity and the mass media in general.
According to information by the Institute of Mass Media, since the beginning of 2015 in Ukraine, there has been recorded 224 violations of the rights of journalists. According to the Institute’s reports, almost every day journalists in Ukraine are beaten or intimidated.
The worst thing is the continuation of journalists’ murders. For example, last year the talented journalist Oles’ Buzina was killed right near the entrance of his house. He was a consistent supporter of the Ukraine’s unity, at the same time fundamentally opposing to the war in the Donbass, which contradicted the official doctrine. The suspects of the murder of Buzina were arrested. They are under investigation. Human rights defenders are very concerned with the political pressure on the investigation and law enforcement agencies. They are afraid that the real killers will escape punishment.
In Kiev this year, journalists Sergei Sukhobok and Margarita Valenko, were killed in Cherkassy region – Vasily Sergienko.
In Ukraine there is political pressure on opposition media, harassment, illegal criminal searches and arrests of journalists became a reality. There are varied forms of violence against dissent in the Ukrainian media.
State officials are trying to illegally shut the license of the popular opposition 112 TV channel and of the metropolitan newspaper Vesti. There were a great number of provocations, criminal searches, etc. Ukrainian authorities are forcibly trying to substitute owners of the mass media. Employees of the Odessa opposition website “Timer” for “prevention” were summoned for questioning at the office of the Ukrainian security service (SBU). There were some searches in journalists’ houses.
Ukrainian authorities always have standard charges on “separatism” with following arrests for those media professionals who are disagree with the state policy. The Chief Editor of the Internet newspaper “Vzapravdu” Artem Buzila, for the last five months has been imprisoned in Odessa on such fabricated accusations.
The Editor of the newspaper “Rabochiy class”, Alexander Bondarchuk has been illegally jailed for the last six months in the Kiev prison. And I can continue this list. There are dozens of journalists who are jailed or are in the wanted list of the SBU for their opposition publications.
Also, I want to draw your attention to the problem with the freedom of expression and regulation of the rights of conscientious objectors (COs) in Ukraine. They are individuals who have claimed their right to refuse to take military service, who have special ideological and moral convictions. …
[CUT SHORT HERE BY CHAIRMAN]
… This is a normal practice for the European countries to protect rights of conscientious objectors, but not for the Ukraine. Nowadays the position of Ukrainian COs, who are not members of any religious organization, violates the law of the country. Authorities criminally prosecute even those journalists who are COs.
A striking confirmation of this problem is the prosecution of journalist Ruslan Kotsaba, who is CO. For his public conscientious objection, Ruslan Kotsaba has been jailed and his case has been considered for several months by the Ivano-Frankivsk City Court. The authorities consider the open position of the honest journalist as “obstruction of the lawful activities of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and other military formations during the special period.” Such behavior of the authorities is difficult to imagine in a normal democratic society. Now, according to the information of Ukrainian prosecutors thousands of COs have been prosecuted, and hundreds of them have been jailed. Therefore, in our country there is a total process of transformation of ideological Ukrainian COs into real prisoners of conscience.
In addition, there is another issue. Between Ukraine and the European Union the Association Agreement was signed, which was simultaneously ratified in September 16, 2014 by the European Parliament and the Parliament of Ukraine. According to the Agreement, particular attention is paid to the observation of human rights. Article II (two) states: “Respect for democratic principles, human rights and fundamental freedoms, as defined in particular in the Final Act of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (1975) and the Charter of Paris for a New Europe (1990) …”.
This Agreement has not yet entered into force, and the Parliament of Ukraine on May 21, 2015 has adopted a resolution “On the withdrawal from certain obligations, certain International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the Convention on the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms.” This resolution also violates Helsinki Final Act obligations. Ukrainian Deputies motivated their decision to adopt the resolution by the tragic events in Donbass.
By the way, our Ukrainian Human Rights Commission issued a report “Undeclared war at the center of Europe”. It concerns the observance of human rights during the so called «anti-terrorist operation» in Donbass by Ukraine’s state officials. You can see and have it near the conference hall.
So, the Ukrainian state instead of focusing on the implementation of international humanitarian law and the protection of civilians during the armed conflict in Donbass, has substituted these concepts and instead withdrew itself from the obligations of the state to respect international human rights, to protect them, and the exercising of rights of millions of inhabitants of Donetsk and Lugansk regions.
By the adoption of such a decision, the Ukrainian state has applied to a part of its citizens discriminatory measures based on their residence, and has restricted their human rights and fundamental freedoms, including their right to liberty and security, freedom of residence and movement, the right to fair trial and effective means of legal protection, social protection etc.
There is a question to the EU countries, who ratified the Association Agreement between Ukraine and the EU, the main elements of which are based on international and European standards of human rights without any exceptions:
Will these countries suspend the entry into force of the Association Agreement between Ukraine and the EU before the termination of the violations of human rights and fundamental freedoms of millions of citizens in Ukraine? Or will they want to support Ukraine’s position of double standards, and not to extend the requirements of this Agreement to particular regions of Donetsk and Lugansk?
We hope that the international community will stop the ignorance of massive and systematic violations of human rights and fundamental freedoms in Ukraine, first of all, in matters of freedom of speech and the rights of journalists, and will put pressure on the Ukrainian authorities in order to force them into complying with their international obligations in the field of human rights.
Investigative historian Eric Zuesse is the author, most recently, of They’re Not Even Close: The Democratic vs. Republican Economic Records, 1910-2010, and of CHRIST’S VENTRILOQUISTS: The Event that Created Christianity.
Data sharing deal with US must end due to ‘mass surveillance’ – EU court advisor
RT | September 23, 2015
The European Court of Justice’s top legal aid has said that a 15-year-old agreement that eases the transfer of data between the EU and the US should be ended, accusing American intelligence services of conducting “mass, indiscriminate surveillance.”
The ECJ’s advocate-general, Yves Bot, said on Wednesday that the Safe Harbour agreement does not do enough to protect the private information of EU citizens once it arrives in the US, adding that it should have been suspended.
Safe Harbour allows US firms to collect data on their European customers. The system is used by Google, Facebook, and more than 4,000 other companies.
However, it also allows the NSA to use the Prism surveillance system exposed by Snowden to wade through the personal data, communication, and information held by nine internet companies.
Using Facebook as an example, Bot said that users “are not informed that their personal data will be generally accessible to the United States security agencies.”
“Such mass, indiscriminate surveillance is inherently disproportionate and constitutes an unwarranted interference with the rights guaranteed by articles seven and eight of the charter [of fundamental rights of the EU],” he said, adding that European internet users have no effective judicial protection while the data transfers are happening.
Bot added that if any EU country believes that transferring data to overseas servers undermines the protection of citizens, it has the power to suspend those transfers “irrespective of the general assessment made by the [EU] commission in its decision.”
But despite allegations from Bot, Facebook has denied accusations that it provides ‘backdoor’ access to its servers.
Sally Aldous, a spokeswoman for the social media giant, said on Wednesday that the company “operates in compliance with EU Data Protection law. Like the thousands of other companies who operate data transfers across the Atlantic we await the full judgment.”
“We have repeatedly said that we do not provide ‘backdoor’ access to Facebook servers and data to intelligence agencies or governments,” she said.
Although Bot’s opinions are not binding, they are typically followed by the ECJ’s judges, who are considering a complaint about the arrangement in the wake of US surveillance revelations from former NSA contractor Edward Snowden.
The EU court’s decision is expected in the next four to six months.
The European Commission has been in talks with the US for two years, discussing ways to strengthen the Safe Harbour framework amid calls for its suspension.
Meanwhile, many US companies have praised the 2000 Safe Harbour deal, saying it helps them avoid complicated checks to transfer vital data, including payroll and human resources information.
An end to the agreement would cause a headache for US companies operating in the EU, as well as bring about the potential for a varying of national approaches, lawyers said, as cited by Reuters.
It comes just six months after 27-year-old Austrian law student Max Schrems filed a complaint against Facebook, alleging the social media site was helping the NSA harvest email and other private data by forwarding European data to servers in the US.
Millions of job seekers’ fingerprints will now be searched for criminal investigations, says FBI
PrivacySOS | September 21, 2015
For years the FBI has performed federal criminal background checks for employers and state governments, amassing tens of millions of biometric records on people accused of no crime. If you want to be a lawyer, teacher, or even bike messenger in many parts of the United States, you’ll need to submit your fingerprints to the FBI. Every single federal employee must submit their prints before employment. Until recently, the FBI claimed it would not search these civil prints when conducting criminal print matching; a wall between the civil and criminal fingerprint databases kept these distinct sets of information separate, the Bureau claimed. But in February 2015, that all changed—very quietly.
EFF‘s Jennifer Lynch:
The change, which the FBI revealed quietly in a February 2015 Privacy Impact Assessment (PIA), means that if you ever have your fingerprints taken for licensing or for a background check, they will most likely end up living indefinitely in the FBI’s [Next Generation Identification] database. They’ll be searched thousands of times a day by law enforcement agencies across the country—even if your prints didn’t match any criminal records when they were first submitted to the system.
This is the first time the FBI has allowed routine criminal searches of its civil fingerprint data. Although employers and certifying agencies have submitted prints to the FBI for decades, the FBI says it rarely retained these non-criminal prints. And even when it did retain prints in the past, they “were not readily accessible or searchable.” Now, not only will these prints—and the biographical data included with them—be available to any law enforcement agent who wants to look for them, they will be searched as a matter of course along with all prints collected for a clearly criminal purpose (like upon arrest or at time of booking).
This seems part of an ever-growing movement toward cataloguing information on everyone in America—and a movement that won’t end with fingerprints. With the launch of the face recognition component of NGI, employers and agencies will be able to submit a photograph along with prints as part of the standard background check. As we’ve noted before, one of FBI’s stated goals for NGI is to be able to track people as they move from one location to another. Having a robust database of face photos, built out using non-criminal records, will only make that goal even easier to achieve.
The FBI’s decision to start using civil prints in criminal investigations demonstrates that we should be very skeptical of all government efforts to collect and retain sensitive information about us. Today they say they won’t do X, Y, or Z with that information. But that can change very easily, and without many of the millions of people affected taking much notice.
Read more about the FBI’s plans to amass biometric information on all of us.
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The Balfour Declaration – A Century of Jewish Power
By Gilad Atzmon | May 17, 2017
This year, Palestinians and their supporters mark the 100th anniversary of The Balfour Declaration, a written statement from the United Kingdom’s Foreign Secretary, Arthur James Balfour, to Walter Rothschild, a leader of the British Jewish community, in favour of the establishment of a Jewish national home in Palestine.
For Palestinians, The Balfour Declaration was the beginning of their plight: a century of ethnic cleansing at the hands of European newcomers who claim Palestine as their historic home. Yet, for some reason, supporters of the Palestinians are desperate to suppress discussion of the motivation for the Balfour Declaration – how and why did it come about? … continue
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