An Ecological Bomb in the Mediterranean
The Ships of Poison Cover-Up
By MICHAEL LEONARDI | January 21, 2011
While the global and Italian national media focuses on allegations of Berlusconi’s latest sexual exploits including reports of hedonistic orgies with teenage prostitutes at his luxurious villas, the much more devastating story of the intentional sinking of ships laden with radioactive and toxic materials into the Mediterranean Sea has quietly developed some new twists and turns in another of Italy’s notorious and grand cover-ups. Surely Berlusconi’s sexcapades make Bill Clinton’s impeachable blow job pale in comparison, but the the tabloid headlines could be replaced by the indignation of the Italian Media at least, with the intentional contamination of the beloved blue waters of the Mediterranean and the dismantling of the Italy’s social democracy rather than dedicating the entirety of their attention to prostitutes being paid to entertain one of our most sick and twisted world leaders.
We pick up this story in June of 2010 with the revelations that there is indeed what Italian state prosecutor Bruno Giordano called an “ecological bomb” in the valley of the Oliva river that flows down the mountains and past the towns of Aiello Calabro and Amantea on its way to the Tyrrhenian Sea. This is where it is believed that the cargo of the Jolly Rosso was intentionally dumped and buried. State agencies found the valley to be contaminated with thousands of cubic meters of industrial mud laced with very high levels of cobalt, nickel, mercury, lead, and other heavy metals. They found the presence of cesium 137, and they found more contaminated locations than previously anticipated, leading investigators to believe that not only was the cargo of the Jolly Rosso dumped here but that the area was then used as an illegal dumping grounds for years. There are no industries in this area that produce these materials so it is clear that they were produced and shipped in from other places. A formal request has been made to the minister of the environment Stefania Prestigiacomo to declare this zone an environmental disaster area and to begin cleaning it up. More than six months later there has been NO response.
State secrets still cloak the investigation into the case of what the Italian’s call the Navi dei Veleni Ships of Poison. State secrets still mask the murders of key investigators into the network of international business men, the Italian military, SISMI (the Italian secret service), NATO and state governments as they worked together to create and hide a network of waste and arms trafficking traversing the high Seas from the major Italian port of La Spezia to Alessandria, Egypt, Beruit, Lebanon and onward to Africa and Mogadishu in Somalia. Key investigators into the story of the Ships of Poison, Naval Captain Natale de Grazia, journalist Ilaria Alpi and cameraman Miran Hrovatin lost their lives for what many believe was their discovering of key truths that could expose an international network involving the Italian government that traded military weapons for the disposal of hazardous industrial wastes. Alpi and Hrovatin were gunned down in Mogadishu on the 20th of March 1994 by a Somali commando unit. Captain Natale de Grazia died of sudden cardiac arrest on the 13th of December 1995 only days before he was to deliver his report on his investigation into the Ships of Poison.
Now fast forward to 2011 and several recent developments that should be grabbing headlines. Two Italian journalists, Andrea Palladino, journalist for the communist daily il Manifesto and Vincenzo Mulè, journalist for Terra (Earth) News, have reported on a secret document that has come to the surface in the Parliamentary Commission on the Cycle of Garbage in Italy. This document dated December 11th 1995 describes financing by the Italian government under Lamberto Dini to the Italian Secret Service for the management of trafficking in arms and nuclear waste. While parts of this document have been acknowledged by the parliamentary commission, it still remains state secret. This document became state secret in 1995 and state secrets in Italy are supposed to be bound by a statute of 15 years that should have been up in 2010, however, this document still remains a secret.
Just this week, in an unexpected move from the Parliamentary Commission on the Cycle of Garbage in Italy, the investigation into the murder of journalist Ilaria Alpi and her cameraman Miran Hrovatin was reopened after being closed since 2006. It is believed that Italians paid the Somalis with weapons in exchange for using their sea and land as dumping grounds for toxic and radioactive wastes and that Alpi and Hrovatin had discovered too much. They were gunned down just days after Alpi had interviewed the Sultan of Bosaso, her notes from this interview were never found. Many believe that Alpi was killed because of what she had discovered about the ties between the Italian military and corrupt elements of the Somali leadership. This was all taking place during the time of Blackhawk down and the U.S. led occupation. According to the mafia turncoat Francesco Fonti, they had seen an exchange involving the Italian military and were assassinated for this reason. Their case was reopened because of a note about their deaths that was found among the belongings of Italian businessman Giorgio Comerio by Captain Natale de Grazia’s investigation.
This shady Italian businessman named Giorgio Comerio plays heavily into the reopening of this investigation. Comerio had come up with an idea for disposing of hazardous and radioactive wastes by torpedoing these wastes into the Sea floors. He was notorious for the trafficking of waste and part of a network intent on collecting insurance for old ships that were in need of disposal. His name has been associated with the purchase of the Jolly Rosso, the ship that beached on the shores of Amantea from the Messina shipping company. Old ships it seems are difficult and expensive to dispose of so Comerio and some mafia bosses came up with the bright idea of sinking them and collecting on their insurance policies while at the same time disposing of industrial wastes. Comerio has testified that “disposal at Sea was the only viable option for disposing of radioactive wastes at that time, as sending them off in the space shuttle was too dangerous because of the possibility of an explosion in the Earth’s atmosphere.”
In Captain Natale de Grazia’s investigation he found a report about the killing of Alpi and Hrovatin in Comerio’s files. It has been stated that De Grazia also found a copy of Ilaria Alpi’s death certificate at Comerio’s house on Lago di Como, but that this document disappeared from case files that were in the offices of state prosecutor Francesco Neri in Reggio Calabria. Neri says he remembers this document in the files and that De Grazia’s investigation had discovered it a Comerio’s house but that it has mysteriously disappeared.
Natale de Grazia’s investigation was also focused on another Italian businessman linked to the waste trade from La Spezia. De Grazia was focusing on the major port of La Spezia where NATO operates its undersea research center NURC and where arms and waste shipments are a big business. Orazio Duvia was identified by De Grazia as a key figure in the trafficking of both arms and toxic and radioactive wastes. He was the owner and operator of a mega and quite possibly largest industrial hazardous waste dump in Italy, the landfill of Pittelli on one of the hills overlooking the gulf of La Spezia. According to the research of Andrea Palladino, the CIA looked to the corrupt and criminally operated Pittelli landfill as a model for industrial waste disposal. In May of 1995 De Grazia reported to a group of forest rangers that Duvia’s landfill was one of the logistical platforms for the shipping and sinking of wastes. In this presentation that he made under the code name “pinnochio” in order to protect his identity, he described the sinking of a ship called the Rigel said to be full of nuclear waste and sunk in the waters of the Ionian Sea off the coast of Calabria.
Captain Natale de Grazia was said to be in perfect health by his friends and family. He had however voiced concern about his investigation to his brother in law and had indicated that he may have been treading in dangerous waters as his discoveries led him to conclusions that would be highly uncomfortable for the entire Italian and possibly international power structure. His sudden cardiac arrest happened just days before he was to give his report.
All indicators point to a collusion of forces in this horrific saga of the Ships of Poison, a collusion between SISMI (the Italian secret service), the Italian government, big business, NATO and organized crime families from the Calabrian based crime syndicate l’ndrangheta. Many are now hoping that the reopening of the Ilaria Alpi/Miran Hrovatin case will finally bring the truth to light, but this is doubtful. The Parliamentary Commission on Italy’s Garbage Cycle is being led by a good friend and lawyer of Silvio Belusconi, Gaetano Pecorella. Pecorella began his political career as a radical communist but has moved sharply to the right over the years culminating in what is considered to be the legal mind of the Berlusconi phenomenon. Unless he’s being riddled by some kind of catholic guilt for a life of vile hypocrisy, things don’t bode well for a truly transparent investigation. Pecorella has also defended elements of the Neapolitan based mafia the Camorra noted for its traffic of garbage and creation of the continuing garbage crisis in Naples and surrounding areas.
Italy is at a very critical juncture and whether Berlusconi survives yet again or not is only part of the problem. The Italian economy is in turmoil, the public eduction system is being dismantled and the health care system is under attack while being wrought with corruption. Civil unrest over the past several months has led nowhere but to heightened tensions with an increasingly militarized police state. The country is divided and while a growing majority is crying out for change a large minority still supports the despicable leadership of the neo-fascists running the country. Only time will tell if the mass movement of the past months will bear the fruits of change toward a sustainable economy that are sorely needed. America’s military presence in Italy must be challenged and dismantled for any real change to happen and the center-left has traditionally rubber stamped America’s imperial presence on the peninsula.
Michael Leonardi is currently living in Toledo, Ohio and can be reached at mikeleonardi@hotmail.com
Previous coverage of the Ships of Poison saga.
http://www.counterpunch.org/leonardi09182009.html,
http://www.counterpunch.org/leonardi10092009.html,
http://www.counterpunch.org/leonardi11042009.html .
Related article
A State of Permanent Human Bondage
By Malcom Lagauche | January 19, 2011
The goal of Desert Storm was to destroy the country of Iraq under the guise of liberating Kuwait. In February 1991, during the height of U.S. bombing, former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark visited Iraq and reported his findings. At that time, few photos had come from Iraq showing the devastation. Most reporters left Iraq on the eve of the bombing campaign and spent their time in Saudi Arabia listening to the daily propaganda given by the U.S. military. They became so bored that they began to interview each other.
What Clark saw was not pretty. He stated:
The effect of the bombing, if continued, will be the destruction of much of the physical and economic base for life in Iraq. The purpose of the bombing can only be explained rationally as the destruction of Iraq as a viable state for a generation or more.
Clark’s message was not widely reported. After all, the U.S. version of events stated that the only reason for the aggression was to remove Iraqi soldiers from Kuwait. The lack of coverage of what was occurring in Iraq was convenient for the U.S. because it allowed the destruction of Iraq to continue with no world outcry.
After the bombing ceased, pictures began making their way to the outside world. When this information reached the U.S., the administration called it lies and propaganda. At other times, it accused Iraq of destroying its own institutions and blaming it on U.S. bombs. Once people from outside Iraq began to visit the country, the blatant U.S. lies were exposed. The following is a list of the numbers of facilities destroyed during the 42-day bombing campaign. It was compiled and published by the Iraqi Reconstruction Bureau:
· Schools and scholastic facilities — 3960
· Universities, labs, dormitories — 40
· Health facilities (including hospitals, clinics, medical warehouses) — 421
· Telephone operations, communication towers, etc. — 475
· Bridges, buildings, housing complexes — 260
· Warehouses, shopping centers, grain silos — 251
· Churches and mosques — 159
· Dams, pumping stations, agricultural facilities — 200
· Petroleum facilities (including refineries) — 145
· General services (shelters, sewage treatment plants, municipalities) — 830
· Houses — 10,000 to 20,000
In April 1991, a fact-finding team from Greenpeace visited Iraq and nobody was prepared for the display of massive devastation. When Greenpeace issued its report, it said Iraq had been bombed back to a pre-industrial era. The report added, “New technology did not make the U.S. military better at preventing destruction, it just made it more efficient at destruction itself.”
The U.S. press ignored most of the reports by various groups that visited Iraq after Desert Storm. The few words reported, along with the absence of photos, assured a lack of public outcry condemning the slaughter.
The massacre should not have surprised those who followed incidents leading to Desert Storm. As early as September 1990, a high-up military person mapped the plans for the invasion. On September 16, 1990, General Dugan stated that the proposed plans for combat included the destruction of the Iraqi civilian economy and infrastructure. At that time, no one could envisage the U.S. attacking Iraq because the Iraqi soldiers were in Kuwait and the U.S. demanded their exit. Most people thought, if there was to be a war, it would be conducted in Kuwait, not Baghdad. General Dugan was immediately removed from office. The Bush administration negated Dugan’s claims and discredited him. In hindsight, we see that Dugan’s testimony was about the only truth we heard from the U.S. government or military at that time. He let the cat out of the bag, but government damage control quickly led the people to believe he made up the scenarios he predicted.
For the first week of Desert Storm, everyone seemed to be mesmerized by the “smart bombs” that were going down chimneys and smashing through the windows of weapons warehouses. When the odd person asked about civilians being hit, the standard response was, “We’re not targeting civilians.” What we were not told was that 93% of the bombs dropped were “dumb bombs” and the civilian infrastructure of Iraq was being destroyed. Only about 30 to 40% of the dumb bombs hit their targets. The others randomly created havoc by killing civilians and destroying Iraq’s cities and towns.
After Desert Storm, some military people admitted the real nature of the attacks. Air Force General Tony McPeak stated on March 20, 1991, “I’ve got photographic evidence of several where the pilot just acquired the wrong target.” When asked why that information had not come forth earlier, he added, “It ain’t my call. I made some recommendations about this; it got turned around, quite frankly.”
Those who questioned the U.S. government’s reports of only hitting military targets had their fears verified on January 22, 1991. Pictures of a destroyed baby milk factory in the region of Abu Ghraib were broadcast worldwide. Many people were aghast at the bombing of a civilian industry crucial for the existence of youngsters.
The Pentagon immediately went into high gear to try to dispel the protests of those who questioned such barbaric actions. The administration stated that it was a biological weapons plant. Colin Powell said”
It is not an infant formula factory, no more than the Rabta chemical plant in Libya made aspirin. It was a biological weapons facility, of that we are sure — and we have taken it out.
The administration came up with the excuse that “Baby Milk Factory” signs around the plant were written in English and Arabic and they had just been mounted after the bombing to try to make people think it was a baby formula factory. The American public bought the excuse.
The public never researched to discover that many signs in Iraq included both English and Arabic versions because of the substantial English-speaking population who worked in Iraq prior to Desert Storm. The sign at the baby milk factory had been in place for several years prior to its bombing. Peter Arnett of CNN stated after Desert Storm that the same factory and sign were evident in a documentary that CNN produced in the late 1980s.
Nestlé of Switzerland is a leading producer of infant foods. A spokesman for the company said, “We know this was a state-built infant formula plant.” Company officials said they had regularly observed its construction in the past, “because we like to be aware of the competition.”
U.S. audiences rarely heard or saw what other countries reported concerning Desert Storm. A British TV show, “Panorama,” was broadcast on March 25, 1991 which included an interview with General Leonard Perroots, a consultant to U.S. intelligence in Desert Storm. He addressed the bombing of the baby milk factory and he quickly put the matter to rest as he said, “We made a mistake.”
The bombing of the baby milk factory put the world on alert that the information broadcast at the daily military briefings was untruthful. At that time, those who opposed Desert Storm were shocked at the widespread destruction in Iraq. They wondered how the U.S. public, which usually would have treated such barbaric designs with disdain, had acquiesced to cheering such actions. The answer lies in the demonizing of Iraq and its president, Saddam Hussein.
In George Bush’s Thanksgiving speech to U.S. troops in Saudi Arabia in 1990, he stated:
Every day that passes brings Saddam one step closer to realizing his goal of a nuclear weapons arsenal, and that’s why more and more your mission is marked by a real sense of urgency. You know, no one knows exactly who they may be aimed at down the road, but we know this for sure, he’s never possessed a weapon he didn’t use.
At the time of his speech, Bush knew that Iraq was at least five years away from developing its first crude atomic weapon, yet he made it sound as though Iraq was on the verge of obtaining a comprehensive nuclear arsenal. In further speeches, he suggested that in six months, Iraq would be a nuclear threat to the world. The myth of an Iraqi nuclear warehouse was a prime excuse for Bush II invading Iraq in 2003. And, to this day, many U.S. citizens believe Iraq possessed nuclear weapons.
Even after the bombing of the baby milk factory, the U.S. denied bombing civilians or buildings used in civilian industries. When the Iraqi government stated that a village or suburb was hit, the U.S. government would say the Iraqis weren’t telling the truth. Because of the demonizing of Iraq, most Americans thought all Iraqi information consisted of lies.
On January 31, an independent source announced that the U.S. was bombing civilians. The Jordanian Foreign Ministry stated that coalition planes had bombed oil trucks and civilians moving along the highway from Iraq to Jordan. Again, the U.S. denied the allegations, but some eyes were being opened.
In Iran, reports were made stating that the bombing was so intense that the ground in Iran was shaking. On February 5, 1991, an official in Basra described “a hellish nightmare” of fires and smoke so dense that eyewitnesses say the sun had not been clearly visible for days at a time; that the bombing was leveling entire city blocks; and that there were bomb craters the size of football fields and an untold number of casualties.
On February 7, the military still denied that civilians were being targeted. When asked about the allegations, General Richard Neal told the press, “It’s a target-rich environment and there’s plenty of other targets we can attack.”
While Neal was making his statement, Ramsey Clark was traveling throughout Iraq but his assessment differed greatly from that of the general. In describing the reality in Iraq, Clark stated:
Over the 2,000 miles of highway, roads and streets we traveled, we saw scores, probably several hundred, destroyed vehicles. There were oil tank trucks, tractor trailers, lorries, pickup trucks, a public bus, a mini bus, a taxi cab and many private cars destroyed by aerial bombardments and strafing. We found no evidence of military equipment or supplies in the vehicles.
Along the roads, we saw several oil refinery fires and numerous gasoline stations destroyed. One road-repair camp had been bombed on the road to Amman (Jordan). As with the city streets in residential and commercial areas where we witnessed damage, we did not see a single damaged or destroyed military vehicle, tank, armored car, personnel carrier or other military equipment, or evidence of any having been removed.
Basra was probably the hardest-hit city during Desert Storm. There was evidence of weapons that are normally used against military personnel having been deployed in civilian areas of Basra: cluster bombs. Clark saw this evidence and reported:
Small, anti-personnel bombs were alleged to have fallen here (Basra) and we saw what appeared to be one that did not explode imbedded in the rubble. We were shown the shell of a “mother” bomb which carries the small fragmentation bombs.
When he left Iraq in February 1991, Clark gave an overview of the situation:
United States annual military expenditures alone are four times the gross national product of Iraq. The use of highly-sophisticated military technology with mass destructive power against an essentially defenseless civilian population of a poor nation is one of the greatest tragedies of our times.
A few days after Clark left Iraq, an incident occurred that astonished the world. On February 13, a pair of Stealth F-117 bombers dropped two 2,000-pound laser-guided bombs on a concrete building in the Amiryah section of suburban Baghdad. The case-hardened bombs were directed to penetrate the steel reinforced roof and detonate inside. It was a civilian bomb shelter.
The reports of the number of civilians killed in the building — more than half were children — ranged from 400 to more than 1,000. Because the bodies were so badly burned and melted, no one will ever know the exact total.
The U.S. administration first proclaimed that the target was an Iraqi command-and-control post and the dead were Iraqi military personnel. The cameras eventually showed charred bodies of women and children, so the U.S. story had to be revised. The administration then said that the building was a military target in which Saddam Hussein placed civilians to protect the military personnel. Dick Cheney, then the U.S. Secretary of Defense, stated, “Saddam might be resorting to a practice of deliberately placing civilians in harm’s way.”
The U.S. government scrambled to try to explain the massacre of so many people inside a civilian bomb shelter. General Neal stated the government’s case as he said, “From a personal point of view, I’m outraged that civilians might have been placed in harm’s way, and I blame the Iraqi leadership for that.” Unfortunately, many Americans believed Neal’s twisted excuse of blaming the Iraqi leadership for the incineration of hundreds of people by deadly superbombs.
Within a few hours, the truth emerged. The Amiryah bomb shelter was built for civilian defense during the Iran-Iraq War. The engineer who designed it appeared on television and told the world there was no way it could be a military asset.
After the lies were put to rest, it became evident that the U.S. had either mistaken the target as a military venue, or it had deliberately destroyed it knowing it was a bomb shelter. Since February 14, 1991, the subject of the bombing of the Amiryah bomb shelter has been left unspoken in the U.S.
Those inside the bomb shelter died horrific deaths. First, a 2,000-pound bomb crashed through the shelter, creating a massive tunnel in which the second 2,000-pound projectile entered. Then, both exploded, leaving a huge hole. Those who died saw the first bomb and had a few seconds of life left before the second burrowed its way into the shelter and discharged.
Despite the ensuing international outcry about the destruction of the Amiryah shelter, the U.S. did not cut back on the bombing. Actually, the bombing of the Iraqi infrastructure increased. According to Greenpeace in a report called On Impact::
Despite numerous statements of U.S. military leaders that the Iraqi army had been defeated, as well as some confidence that contact between Baghdad and the front in the south had been severed, communications targets, mostly serving civilian functions, continued to be struck and re-struck to the end. If fact, according to Air Force Times, during the final ground phase, “Baghdad was targeted for some of the heaviest bombardments since January 17.”
The cease-fire did not solve all the problems for the civilians of Iraq. Shortly after, George Bush called for the Iraqi people to “take matters into their own hands” in ridding Iraq of its government. For the next few weeks, some Shi’ites in the south, heavily aided and infiltrated by Iranians, wreaked havoc, while certain Kurdish factions started an insurrection in the north of Iraq. There was bloody fighting and at one time, the Shi’ite and Kurdish elements controlled 16 of Iraq’s 18 provinces. Both movements eventually were brought under control by the Iraqi government. Not content with destroying Iraq by bombing it back to a “pre-industrial era,” Bush prompted even more destruction by urging factions within Iraq to overthrow the government. He promised both groups military assistance from the U.S., but none came.
In April 1991, the outside world saw Iraq for the first time since it had been destroyed by U.S. bombs and missiles. The nightmarish pictures started to appear. They showed a country that was bombed so heavily that the most common sites were craters and twisted, melted and devastated structures.
Ramsey Clark made another trip to Iraq to document the devastation. Once there, he noticed an ongoing operation that was meant to terrorize the population:
On our second night there, and several other times, at about 2:30 a.m., U.S. jets flew over the city (Baghdad), deliberately creating an enormous sonic boom that sounded as if the bombing had started again. The next morning, people would describe how their children had awakened in terror.
Clark chronicled the civilian industries that were demolished during the bombing of Iraq:
Twenty minutes outside the city (Baghdad), in Al Taji, we saw the country’s largest frozen meat storage and distribution center; one of two main centers for the entire country, which also included a laboratory for testing meat quality. It had been completely obliterated by the bombing. The center held 14,000 tons of frozen meat. The plant had been bombed three times, at 8:00 a.m., 3:00 p.m., and 8:00 p.m., and workers inside the plant had been killed.
All over Iraq, Clark saw the same mindless destruction. In Babylon, he visited a textile weaving plant that was totally destroyed. The plant was bombed at 3:00 in the afternoon and two women were killed working at their stations. According to the plant manager, Mr. Hassan, the factory was built by an Italian company and the new structure next door, containing no equipment, was untouched.
Dr. Al Qaysi, an Iraqi medical official, put everything in perspective when he stated:
No home remained untouched, no family unharmed, if not through death in the war, through malnutrition, disease, or new-found poverty. This is a return to colonialism. The U.S. is asking for terms like another Treaty of Versailles. Iraq is dependent on the outside world to repair its infrastructure and I fear Iraq will be in a state of permanent human bondage.
The Iraqi Minister of Trade, Mohammed Mahdi Saleh, realized the enormity of the task of trying to rebuild Iraq, particularly with the encompassing trade embargo in place. Despite the U.S. administration maintaining that Iraq was able to import humanitarian goods, there was virtually no way to obtain food, medicine, and parts to repair destroyed machinery. Saleh stated, “If it was possible, the Bush administration would have prevented the air from coming in.”
UN Security Council: An organization for injustice
By Kourosh Ziabari | The People’s Voice | January 19, 2011
Since its very inception in 1946, the United Nations Security Council demonstrated that it cannot be trusted as a podium of justice for the world countries, specially the oppressed and defenseless nations which eye the assistance and patronage of the powerful and economically influential nations for tackling their political predicaments and crises, and showed that it merely pursues the interests of its small bloc of five permanent members and undemocratically discriminates against a multitude of countries who don’t have a say in the policies which directly affects them.
United Nations Security Council is said to be one of the principal organs within the operative system of the United Nations and is “allegedly” charged with the maintenance of international peace and security. The authorities possessed by UNSC are the establishment of peacekeeping missions, imposition of international sanctions and authorization of military actions whenever necessary.
UNSC has five permanent members: China, Russia, Britain, France and the United States. What’s the reason? Why should the UNSC have permanent members which cannot be removed from power and must wield an unyielding and resolute authority to make decision over the international affairs? The answer is simple: these five countries are the victorious powers of the Second World War. Their victory in a war which took place and was concluded more than half a century ago minimally accounts for the eternality and endlessness of the power which they possess.
UNSC has also 10 non-permanent members which are elected on a rotating basis and through the vote of the members of United Nations General Assembly.
According to the Article 27 of the UN Charter, a draft resolution on non-procedural matters is adopted if nine or more of the fifteen members of the UNSC vote for the resolution, provided that none of the permanent members veto it.
What is the veto power? The answer is simple. It’s a discriminatory and biased privilege given to five countries to dictate their own will to some 200 countries as they wish. If a draft resolution, put forward by one of the fifteen members of the UNSC, is vetoed by any of the five permanent members, its adoption will be precluded. Veto power, seen by many as the most unfair and inequitable law of the world which enables a powerful and authoritative minority to determine the fate of an indispensable and subjugated majority, is unquestionably an insult to the insight and perception of the international community.
The permanent members of the UNSC are free to exercise their right of veto whenever they wish to, and nobody can question the legitimacy or justifiability of this approach. Several international organizations, lawyers and lawmakers, journalists, politicians and even statesmen have put forward alternatives to the right of veto wielded by the Big 5, but all of their efforts have been in vain, as the United Nations Security Council has showed the least flexibility with regards to the reformation of its autocratic and undemocratic structure.
Interestingly, all of the permanent members of the UNSC are the countries which we’ve long got used to hearing their claims of being the pioneers of democracy and freedom; nevertheless, in the very approach which they’ve implemented over the past fifty years and the manner of their interaction with the other countries of the world, one can hardly trace the footsteps of democratic and civilized behavior.
Unfortunately, the United Nations Security Council has become an instrument for the five superpowers to further their political will in the arena of international politics and alter the political equations according to their interests. They put forward a draft resolution whenever their interests are jeopardized and pressure the rest of members to vote for it, and veto the resolutions in which the interests of their allies are endangered.
Since its establishment up to now, the UNSC has adopted 1966 resolutions. Now the question lies: how many of these resolutions have become operative and come into effect? How many of these resolutions have been fair, lawful and defendable? Whose interests are met through these resolutions? Is the will of five nations more valuable or worthy than the will of 200 countries who don’t have access to UNSC?
Let’s bring up some examples. UNSC’s treatment with Iran is a notable and clear example of discrimination and prejudice exercised by the Security Council against an independent nation which wants to stride on its own path towards self-sufficiency and progress, free from the pressure of bullying powers. Since 2006 UNSC has adopted seven resolutions against Iran’s civilian nuclear activity and imposed four rounds of sanctions against the country for what it claims to be “Iran’s failure to halt its uranium enrichment program”. The imposition of four rounds of sanctions against an independent country which tries to achieve a scientific breakthrough is an ironic drama. All of the reports published by the International Atomic Energy Agency attest to the legality and rightfulness of Iran’s nuclear program. There has been not a single paper of evidence signifying that Iran wants to develop nuclear weapons. All the international community knows about Iran’s nuclear program is that Iran enriches uranium, and enriched uranium, to some certain extents, might be used to fuel a nuclear bomb! At the same time, the international community is well aware of the fact that the regime of Israel possesses 170 to 200 nuclear warheads, and this is a figure which is confirmed by the Federation of American Scientists, an organization within the country which is the staunchest ally of Israel. So why did the UNSC, being headed by the Big 5, impose four rounds of crippling sanctions and pass seven resolutions against Iran instead of condemning Israel and imposing sanctions on it?
Ironically, 118 members of the Non-Aligned Movement and 57 members of the Organization of Islamic Conference unconditionally backed Iran’s peaceful nuclear program; however, the country should face financial sanctions because 5 countries like this way. Is it fair, not? Five is bigger than 118!
World superpowers don’t tolerate the emergence of a new political and scientific power. Iran is an inspiring example for the developing world and should be obstructed at any rate, so the UNSC can effectively function as an impediment on the way of Iran and any country such as Iran which looks for improvement and progress.
However, UNSC’s treatment with Iran was a simple example of the discriminatory approach of this unfair and unjust organization with the world nations. Hundreds of unfair and unjust resolutions have been passed against the oppressed nations of the world, from the Latin America to Africa, adding to the pains and problems of these impoverished nations.
UNSC needs a drastic reformation. The veto power should be dissolved as soon as possible. There should be a permanent seat for the representative of the Islamic world with more than 1.5 billion population. The power to authorize sanctions or military expeditions should be handed over to the UN General Assembly rather than the Security Council. The members of UNSC should be held accountable for the decisions which they make. Their responsiveness to the international community should be built up. The impunity of UNSC members should be abolished. They should not be able to make any decision which they want and get away with it. It’s only with the implementation of such reforms that we can be hopeful for a successful future for the UNSC; otherwise, this organization will forever remain an organization of injustice and bias.
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– Kourosh Ziabari is an Iranian freelance journalist
Watch the Watchers
Hallmarks of Spook Behavior
By JENNIFER VAN BERGEN | CounterPunch | January 14, 2011
This was not the first time I was approached by a spook, or the first time I have pegged one in my midst, but it was the first time I was approached by a man claiming to be an Iraqi-American. In the rush that usually occurs after one speaks publicly with several people waiting to chat, I tried to listen politely as I offered Nabil my attention. After five minutes, though, I found myself feeling bad for getting a little annoyed at him. He carried on about loving America and loving Iraq and seemed to be trying to hint at something beyond this — making vague references to what the U.S. was doing to Iraq. Finally I said to him, “Why are you telling me this?” After all, I speak publicly about these things, why did he feel he needed to tell me what I was already speaking about?
Unfortunately, I rarely recall specifics of what people say to me after I make a speech – or perhaps Nabil was being purposefully vague, because it seemed to me that he really wasn’t saying anything. Yet, he wouldn’t let me go. I told him several times that I needed to leave, as I had a long drive ahead of me. Several other people wanted to speak to me, yet Nabil continued to follow me around and try to talk to me — about what, I could not discern. Finally, I said that if things continued as they were in this country, it would eventually collapse. This seemed to deeply satisfy him. He said that people here didn’t care what happened in Iraq. They would care only if it happened to them.
I left him then and only the next morning did it occur to me that what Nabil was trying to do was to goad me into making a declaration of some unlawful or violent intent. That was when it occurred to me that Nabil was a spook: a paid informant or an undercover operative.
My first thought was that the FBI must not keep very good records or train their operatives very well because they had sent numerous others on the same or similar missions. They had to know that I am a staunch believer in nonviolence and in the rule of law — not to mention the United States Constitution. Anyone reading my multitude of articles must know this.
But more importantly, Nabil’s activities reveal a government policy that post-9/11 activists have long suspected exists: the FBI is not only monitoring peace activists but is working to entrap such people. Several recent cases offer further proof of this conclusion: the outing of paid FBI informant, “Anna,” in the West Coast “Green Scare” cases and the arrests of the Miami “Liberty City Seven” on the basis of an affidavit by an FBI operative.
In both of these cases, the FBI clearly did more than infiltrate and monitor groups that they believed might pose a threat to national security. In each case, the FBI goaded, provoked, provided funding and materials, and in the Liberty Seven case, even demanded the individuals sign a loyalty oath to al-Qaeda. In fact, so desperate was the FBI to capture the Miami miscreants that arrests were made despite the fact that the seven had all already walked away from the alleged conspiracy, which makes the case almost a sure loser for the government.
The FBI has monitored me at least since I first spoke out (post-9/11) at a town meeting in front of a panel of Muslim community members and overt FBI agents. A few weeks after this, a markedly taciturn and unfriendly man showed up at a Unitarian Universalist church meeting at which I was asked to speak about the PATRIOT Act. This was a congregation of mostly senior citizens who all knew each other, yet nobody knew the man, who avoided looking at or speaking to anyone, but sat and listened intently to my every word – leaning forward in his chair, all his antennae up — and then rapidly disappeared thereafter.
Spooks have infiltrated groups I’ve chaired. One handsome man of uncertain ethnic origins showed up at a start-up meeting for the Bill of Rights Defense Coalition in South Florida. I was facilitating the meeting and caught this young man staring at me in rapt fascination more than once. Why would he be so interested in me? My youthful beauty? Sorry. My charming and electric personality? Right.
Well, when he saw me see him looking at me, he stopped his appreciative stares. Although he said he was from Pittsburgh, another member of the group who hailed from there found he knew nothing about the city. He never returned to our group. But he did start showing up at another group allied with ours and he continued to monitor that group for quite a while, until he showed up in new all-black duds (imitating the Black Block anarchists, we supposed) at the 2003 FTAA protests in Miami and thereafter was never seen again.
These are hallmarks of spook behavior. Mark them.
Another young man joined the volunteers for a large Forum on Dissent Since 9/11 we had planned. He professed no interest in politics, was completely ignorant of most of the issues which concerned us, and disappeared shortly before the event, claiming he had decided to relocate and start a new life. Meantime, he had access to lists of speakers and volunteers.
Both of these men had never been seen before and were never seen thereafter.
You know what my reaction to all this is? I wonder why my government is spending my tax dollars to monitor me, an upright, loyal citizen who believes more deeply in the Constitution and laws of this country than do most U.S. officials sworn to uphold them. I was a patriot before it was popular to say so. I will defend free speech more strongly and at greater personal risk than most members of the ACLU (and I have proof of that). (I actually take the time to answer hate mail!)
If there really are so many horrible, dangerous terrorists out to get us, why, then, is the FBI wasting time and resources trying to provoke me into making some unlawful statement? Why are our intelligence agencies infiltrating meetings of peace groups, like the one in Lake Worth, Florida that NBC News discovered was attended by the DOD?
I attended that meeting and was one of its organizers and presenters. The subject was counter-recruitment. Is that a national security threat? Am I? The only threat I or these other peaceful persons could possibly pose would be to government officials themselves engaged in violent or unlawful activities, in lying to the public, in engaging in wars of aggression, in unlawfully detaining and torturing people, many of whom have been shown to be completely innocent, and in evading and intentionally violating federal laws. Why is the FBI not banging on their doors? Why is not the DOJ bringing charges against them?
This piece was originally published in the 9/21/2006 print edition of CounterPunch.
Jennifer Van Bergen, J.D., M.S.I.E., is the founder of the 12th Generation Institute, and author of THE TWILIGHT OF DEMOCRACY: THE BUSH PLAN FOR AMERICA (Common Courage Press, 2004) and Archetypes for Writers: Using the Power of Your Subconscious (Michael Weise Productions, 2007). She is currently working under contract with Bucknell University Press on a biography of Leonora Sansay, an early American novelist who was involved in the Aaron Burr Conspiracy, and on a screenplay about the conspiracy. She can be reached at jennifer.vanbergen@gmail.com.
Obama’s Comfort Zone: King of Collaboration
By Glen Ford | Black Agenda Report | January 12, 2011
No matter what Barack Obama says in his State of the Union Address later this month, it is clear where he is headed: ever rightward. His appointments tell the tale. Obama also gave the game away – that he would govern from the center-right and attempt a grand consensus with the GOP – in the weeks before he was first sworn into office, January 20, 2009. That is, his appointments of Bill Clinton’s Wall Street deregulation crowd to head economic policy and his retention of George Bush’s Secretary of Defense to guard and expand the empire, should have signaled to every sober observer that Obama’s political orientation might differ dramatically from his predecessor’s in tone, but not in substance. The problem was, there were very few sober Left political observers around two years ago, and nearly all Black folks were falling down drunk on ObamaL’aid – a brain-softening condition that persists among many, to this day.
In the intervening 24 months, the Right has achieved a near-miraculous comeback, a reversal of fortune that could not have happened without considerable assistance from Mr. Obama. By positioning his administration to the Right of center from the vey beginning, becoming more intimately identified with Wall Street bankers even than Bush, and waging relentless war on the Left half of his party, Obama reduced fellow Democrats to a state of demoralized confusion, leading to catastrophic defeat. Defeat, that is, for the party, but not for the president, who has at last arrived in his comfort zone.
Indeed, in order for Obama to reach his comfort zone, it was necessary that the Democrats be defeated. Only then could New Democrat Obama’s collaboration with the GOP in furtherance of corporate rule appear to be an act of statesmanship, a grand compromise (as the tax deal was pitched) in the interest of orderly government by the “grownups.”
With Obama’s appointment of JP Morgan Chase executive William Daley as his chief of staff and Gene Sperling to head the National Economic Council, the White House is tooled to coordinate even more seamlessly with Wall Street. Both are seasoned operatives in subverting government to private purposes, having made their bones in Bill Clinton’s administration, where Daley was the indispensable man in passing the Clinton/Republican NAFTA bill despite the opposition of 60 percent of Democrats in the House. Both are now rich banksters specializing in moving effortlessly from the boardroom to wherever the public’s money is kept.
Economist Dean Baker, of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, doesn’t mind the money Sperling made from Goldman Sachs. His problem with Obama’s new top economic advisor is:
“Sperling saw nothing wrong with the stock market bubble that laid the basis for the 2001 recession. The economy did not begin to create jobs again until two and a half years after the beginning of this recession and even then it was only due to the growth of the housing bubble. Gene Sperling also saw nothing wrong with the growth of that bubble. Gene Sperling also saw nothing wrong with the financial deregulation of the Clinton years which, by the way, helped make Goldman Sachs lots of money. And, he saw nothing wrong with the over-valued dollar which gave the United States an enormous trade deficit. This trade deficit undermined the bargaining power of manufacturing workers and helped to redistribute income upward.
“In short, Sperling has a horrible track record of supporting policies that were bad for the country and good for Wall Street.”
Which makes him perfect for Barack Obama, who is Wall Street’s guy by choice, and always has been. In fact, it is disrespectful to Obama to argue that his consistent appointment of Clinton’s clique of deregulating Wall Street warriors as his economic generals is not reflective of the president’s own worldview. Either Obama is his own man, or he is a hireling, a whore, and a mere figurehead.
I operate on the assumption that Obama is a purposeful, talented, and extremely effective center-right politician straight out of the Clinton Democratic Leadership Council mold who is determined to shape all of the public sector to finance capital’s advantage. He has chosen the best men for the damnable job.
With Wall Street’s hegemony at the commanding heights of the world’s sole superpower unchallenged, the crisis of finance capital has become a crisis of the U.S. state and a threat to every other capitalist economy and state on the planet. But of course, Wall Street calls that an opportunity. Not an opportunity, mind you, to invest in anything remotely productive. The team that brought us NAFTA in order to export the U.S. manufacturing sector, and destroyed the financial regulatory infrastructure of the New Deal so that Wall Street could dominate every aspect of American economic and political life, has no interest in productive enterprise or good jobs creation.
And neither does Barack Obama – or else he wouldn’t have appointed Daley and Sperling or the 2009 crew. All of which should be perfectly obvious, except to the mush-brains who are still sipping from vinegary old bottles of ObamaL’aid.
BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at Glen.Ford@BlackAgendaReport.com
A Profound and Jarring Disconnect
01/04/2011 – Dave Lindorff – This Can’t be Happening
Democracy: de-moc-ra-cy, government by the people; the common people of a community, as distinguished from any privileged class
According to the latest poll conducted by CBS “60 Minutes” and the magazine Vanity Fair, 61 percent of Americans want to raise taxes on the wealthy as the primary way to cut the budget. The same poll finds that the second most popular first choice for cutting the nation’s budget deficit, at 20 percent, is cutting the military budget. That is, 81 percent of us–four out of five–would cut the deficit by taxing the rich and/or slashing military spending.
Only four percent of those polled favored cutting Medicare, the government-run program that provides health care for the elderly and disabled, and only three percent favored cutting Social Security.
President Obama meanwhile, appointed a so-called National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform (quickly dubbed the “Catfood Commission” by critics) to come up with proposals to cut the budget deficit. He named as co-chairs former Republican Senator from Wyoming Alan Simpson, a troglodyte sworn enemy of Social Security who publicly declared it to be “a milk cow with 310 million tits,” and Erskine Bowles, a retired investment banker and former chief of staff to President Clinton who says he want to cut spending, not raise taxes, which, when it comes to Social Security, means lower benefits for retirees.
The writing on the wall appears to be that the White House, and Democrats and Republicans in Congress, are looking to raise the retirement age, currently 66, to 68 or 69, to reduce or at least limit the inflation adjustment in Social Security benefits, and perhaps also to increase the payroll tax on current workers. What they want to do is balance the budget by screwing with our retirement. What they do not want to do is raise taxes on the rich and on investment income, two steps which, if taken, could fully fund Social Security indefinitely into the future.
Already, the president and Congress have agreed to extend tax breaks for the rich, even though the vast majority of the American public wants the rich to pay higher taxes.
A second poll, this time by CNN, reports that 63 percent of Americans oppose the US War in Afghanistan and want it ended. Only 35 percent say they support the war (now in its ninth year).
Yet the president, who originally promised he would end US involvement in 2011, is now saying the US will “end combat operations” in that war-torn country in 2014–a turn of phrase that doesn’t even mean the war would be ended that year (US combat operations allegedly ended in Iraq last summer, but some 50,000 American troops and many more private mercenaries are still there today and will be next year too, unless they are thrown out by the Iraqi government).
Even on the matter of cutting military spending, and with the US currently at war, a Financial Times/Harris poll found in November of last year that a third of Americans thought cutting the Pentagon budget was a good idea, and another third said it would not be a bad thing, with only just over a third saying it was a bad idea. Only 30 percent said that they were concerned that cutting military spending might pose a security risk. Instead of cutting though, the Obama administration with Congressional backing has continued to raise military spending to record levels not seen since World War II, when the US was in a state of all-out war and full national mobilization.
Last April, while Congress was considering the Dodd-Frank Financial Reform bill, a Pew poll found that 64 percent of Americans favored regulations placing a maximum limit on the permissible size of a bank. Only 27 percent opposed such a limit. Yet Congress passed, and the president signed into law, a bill that allows banks to grow even larger, without any constraint on size.
A Pew Charitable Trust poll released last March found that 52 percent of Americans favor setting limits on carbon emissions by vehicles and power plants, even if such limits meant higher energy prices. Only 35 percent opposed such limits on emissions. And yet Congress and President Obama have refused to offer up with any plan to limit CO2 emissions.
Finally, for decades, a majority of Americans have favored some kind of national healthcare system, whether a fully socialized plan such as that in the UK, or a so-called single-payer type plan where the government is the insurer of all citizens, as in Canada. In May 2009, as the battle over health care reform was heating up, a CNN poll found Americans favored a government health plan by 69-29%.
What polls showed Americans didn’t want was a system of private insurers with a government mandate that everyone had to buy insurance or pay a penalty. Guess what kind of “health reform” Congress and the President gave them? Hint: It wasn’t socialized medicine.
What’s wrong with this picture?
On every key issue of public concern–protecting Social Security, reforming and universalizing health care, re-regulating the banking industry, ending America’s endless wars, cutting the military budget, and taking serious steps to combat global climate change, the government in this supposed democracy has gone against the wishes of the majority of the public.
Clearly, whatever it is, this is no democracy we are living in today.
No wonder the American government is so busy figuring out new ways to spy on and monitor us citizens, to militarize police departments, to construct ever bigger prisons, to restrict access to information, and to control and intimidate the media! Instead of being of, by and for the public, it has become the public’s enemy.
Revolution: rev-uh-loo-shun, an overthrow or repudiation and the thorough replacement of an established government or political system by the people governed.
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From the Archives
Newly Released FBI Docs Shed Light on Apparent Mossad Foreknowledge of 9/11 Attacks
By Whitney Webb | MintPress News | May 17, 2019
NEW YORK — For nearly two decades, one of the most overlooked and little known arrests made in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks was that of the so-called “High Fivers,” or the “Dancing Israelis.” However, new information released by the FBI on May 7 has brought fresh scrutiny to the possibility that the “Dancing Israelis,” at least two of whom were known Mossad operatives, had prior knowledge of the attacks on the World Trade Center. … continue
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- If Americans Knew
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- New Report: Israel Killed nearly 21,000 Palestinian Students and Education Workers in Past Three Years
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- 2025 Nature Paper Claiming Worsening Global Drought Gets RETRACTED …Heavily Flawed
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