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Reports say the explosion at Iranian nuclear plant had a criminal cause

By Lucas Leiroz | August 25, 2020

A new focus of tensions and uncertainties appears to be emerging in Iran. Recent reports from the Iranian authorities have concluded that the explosion at the Natanz nuclear plant had a criminal cause, most likely caused by a sabotage operation. Not many details have yet been provided about the completion of the investigations. The Iranian government has announced that more information about the case will be released soon but made clear the authorities’ certainty about the criminal nature of the plant’s fire.

In July, a major explosion hit the Iranian nuclear power plant at Natanz, used especially for enriching uranium – an essential activity for the development of nuclear technology. The explosion sparked a huge fire that caught the attention of the media around the world at the time. After the incident, no fatalities or leaks of radioactive materials were reported in the region, so the damage was considered low.

Immediately after the explosion, several rumors were spread about the real nature of the event, as it is common on such occasions. Some of the rumors claimed that Israel had triggered the explosion with the intention of damaging Iran in its nuclear development plans. At the time, all rumors were denied and no “conspiracy theory” was highlighted. Now, after the result of the investigations, such rumors have surfaced, but the Iranian government remains silent about them, stating that the investigations’ data will be revealed later.

Despite the uncertainties surrounding the case, the proximity of the date of the explosion in Natanz with other similar events in Iran brings us intriguing reflections and leaves many questions unanswered. In fact, since June, a series of repeated explosions at Iranian plants has been reported. In June, there was a major explosion at the nuclear power plant at Parchin’s military base in Tehran. This plant is the largest explosive factory for Iranian forces and is therefore a place of great strategic value for the country. Shortly thereafter, there was the event in Natanz, after which, in July, another major explosion occurred at the Isfahan power plant in central Iran. Still, not only plants have been victimized by mysterious explosions in Iran, but also several other facilities: on June 30, an explosion at a clinic in Tehran left 19 dead; in July, two people died in an explosion at a factory also in Tehran; also in July, a major fire in the port of Bouchehr destroyed several vessels, but left no victims. All these incidents have had no well-defined explanation and are therefore the subject of rumors.

The most curious thing is to note that the explosions occurred shortly after Iran intensified its uranium enrichment project. The withdrawal of the US from the 2015 nuclear agreement led Tehran to reconsider the national nuclear plan and to announce the resumption of the uranium enrichment program in the first half of June, on a date coincidentally close to the beginning of the series of explosions. Whether or not there is a causal relationship between both facts, the proximity of the dates is minimally interesting and justifies the suspicions and hypotheses raised by several experts. This is not a mere “conspiracy theory”: the possibility that foreign powers are sabotaging Iran’s nuclear program through some secret operations is quite plausible, regardless of whether it is factual or not.

Since the resumption of the uranium enrichment program, Iran has received several accusations from other countries, mainly from Israel, that it is planning to acquire an atomic bomb. Tehran vehemently denies such accusation, as it has done on many other occasions – according to various statements by Shiite religious leaders, the building of a nuclear bomb is condemnable according to the Islamic religion, so Iran, as an Islamic Republic, could not undertake such project. However, Iranian military progress remains intense and the results are visible. The country recently announced the development of a new long-range ballistic missile, causing even more negative reactions in the West and Israel, where the speech about a possible Iranian nuclear bomb is gaining strength.

In fact, we should expect the Iranian authorities to provide more information about the case and only then express opinions about it. For the time being, the most interesting thing to note is the war of narratives around Iran: even with several pronouncements denying the accusations, the United States and Israel maintain the claim that Tehran is building an atomic bomb as an official state discourse; on the other hand, the opinion of experts on possible sabotage against strategic installations of the Iranian government is classified as a “conspiracy theory” or “false rumor” and is immediately rejected.

There is, of course, an information war around the case. We do not know if it was foreign sabotage – and we may never know – but we do know that such subversive activities really exist and often happen.

Lucas Leiroz is a research fellow in international law at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro.

August 25, 2020 Posted by | War Crimes | , , | Leave a comment

After Hiroshima and Nagasaki: U.S. and Australian Brutalisation of Women on the Japanese Mainland

By A.B. Abrams for The Saker Blog | August 24, 2020

Over a year ago I published the book Power and Primacy: The History of Western Intervention in the Asia-Pacific, which was an attempt to fill what I saw as a gap in scholarship on the subject. I found that while several scholars had covered individual cases of Western powers intervening in the region, from David Easter and Geoffrey B. Robinson’s works on the Western-engineered coup and massacres in Indonesia of an estimated 500,000 to 3 million people[1] – to Bruce Cumings and Hugh Deane’s works on the Korean War, there were no major works assessing broader trends and consistencies in Western intervention. Power and Primacy was thus written to show the consistencies in Western designs towards the region and the means used to achieve them over a period of more than 70 years, from the Pacific War which began in 1941 to Western policies towards China and North Korea today.

This month marks the 75th anniversary of the dismantling of the Japanese Empire, and the famous declaration by General Douglas MacArthur that, with the region’s only non-Western military power and the world’s only non-Western naval power now defeated, ‘The Pacific is now an Anglo-Saxon lake.’ While the U.S. and its allies portrayed themselves as a benevolent and democratising force in the region, the darker aspects of East Asia’s time under the new hegemon, which starkly contradict this, have seen very little discussion or coverage. It is notable, for example, that after the Japanese Empire’s fall not only did living standards in southern Korea fall dramatically after it was placed under the rule of an American military government, but mass rapes, the use of comfort women, and serious human trafficking – the very things used by many to justify the American embargo on Japan which had started hostilities in 1941 – not only continued but were expanded under U.S. control. The government of Syngman Rhee, the Princeton-educated Christian radical the U.S. placed in power, killed 2% of its population at the most conservative estimate within five years, placing hundreds of thousands more in concentration camps and exercising a level of brutality not seen even under the Japanese Empire.

With Japan today having seen 75 uninterrupted years with tens of thousands of Western soldiers based on its territory, where they appear set to remain indefinitely, this is a suitable time to reflect on the nature of the relationship between the country and the West – which is very far from that of equal sovereign powers with shared goals and ideals. Evidence for this has ranged from massive involvement of American intelligence in the political process, including funding pro-Western political parties and supporting their election campaigns,[2] to the testimonies of multiple officials. Former Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama, for example, noted regarding his country’s inability to reach a deal with Russia over the Kuril Islands due to an effective American veto over all major foreign policy decisions: “I think it represents a big problem that when making foreign policy decisions, Tokyo is always guided by the United States’ approach. Japan depends on America.” He further stated: “The Japanese media and government… always take America’s side. Tokyo is dependent on the US’ views … Japan will continue to side with America and the G7 countries.”[3] Prime Minister Ichiro Hatoyama, who in the 1950s had also sought to resolve the dispute with Moscow and sign a peace treaty on the basis that Japan would receive two of the four islands, was harshly threatened by the U.S. and was ultimately forced to concede to Washington’s demands not to go through with an agreement. Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori came to a similar conclusion regarding the country’s lack of effective sovereignty in an interview with Russian state media in 2018. [4]

Beyond these political indicators, however, are more human indicators of the nature of America’s place in post-war Japan which cannot be overlooked, and which contrast very strongly with portrayals in the vast majority of Western media including both documentaries and popular media. An extract from the book Power and Primacy, pages 66-69, given below, recently reached over 3 million viewers on social media and highlighted the true consequences for Japan’s population of subjugation by the United States. The full references are provided in the book itself. Perhaps most importantly, this is not presented as an isolated set of cases of U.S. and Western conduct towards an East Asian population placed under their power – rather it is part of a much wider trend which if anything was considerably more extreme in Vietnam and in both South and North Korea – the latter of which was briefly occupied by U.S. forces in 1950. An understanding of the past is key to comprehending the nature of Western involvement in the Asia-Pacific region today, which is why I found that this project was particularly essential now in light of the ‘Pivot to Asia,’ the North Korean nuclear crisis, the Trump administration’s recent ‘Tech War’ on China and other key events which have increasingly placed the region at the centre of determining the future of world order.

Text Start:

There was a far darker side to the U.S. and allied occupation of Japan, one which is little mentioned in the vast majority of histories – American or otherwise. When Japan surrendered in August 1945, mass rapes by occupying forces were expected… [despite setting up of a comfort women system which recruited or otherwise trafficked desperate women to brothels] such crimes were still common and several of them were extremely brutal and resulted in the deaths of the victims. Political science professor Eiji Takemae wrote regarding the conduct of American soldiers occupying Japan:

‘U.S. troops comported themselves like conquerors, especially in the early weeks and months of occupation. Misbehavior ranged from black-marketeering, petty theft, reckless driving and disorderly conduct to vandalism, assault, arson, murder and rape. Much of the violence was directed against women, the first attacks beginning within hours after the landing of advanced units. In Yokohama, China and elsewhere, soldiers and sailors broke the law with impunity, and incidents of robbery, rape and occasionally murder were widely reported in the press [which had not yet been censored by the U.S. military government]. When U.S. paratroopers landed in Sapporo an orgy of looting, sexual violence and drunken brawling ensued. Gang rapes and other sex atrocities were not infrequent […] Military courts arrested relatively few soldiers for their offences and convicted even fewer, and restitution for the victims was rare. Japanese attempts at self-defense were punished severely. In the sole instance of self-help that General Eichberger records in his memoirs, when local residents formed a vigilante group and retaliated against off-duty GIs, the Eighth Army ordered armored vehicles in battle array into the streets and arrested the ringleaders, who received lengthy prison terms.’

The U.S. and Australian militaries did not maintain rule of law when it came to violations of Japanese women by their own forces, neither were the Japanese population allowed to do so themselves. Occupation forces could loot and rape as they pleased and were effectively above the law.

An example of such an incident was in April 1946, when approximately U.S. personnel in three trucks attacked the Nakamura Hospital in Omori district. The soldiers raped over 40 patients and 37 female staff. One woman who had given birth just two days prior had her child thrown on the floor and killed, and she was then raped as well. Male patients trying to protect the women were also killed. The following week several dozen U.S. military personnel cut the phone lines to a housing block in Nagoya and raped all the women they could capture there – including girls as young as ten years old and women as old as fifty-five.

Such behavior was far from unique to American soldiers. Australian forces conducted themselves in much the same way during their own deployment in Japan. As one Japanese witness testified: ‘As soon as Australian troops arrived in Kure in early 1946, they ‘dragged young women into their jeeps, took them to the mountain, and then raped them. I heard them screaming for help nearly every night.’ Such behavior was commonplace, but news of criminal activity by Occupation forces was quickly suppressed.

Australian officer Allan Clifton recalled his own experience of the sexual violence committed in Japan:

‘I stood beside a bed in hospital. On it lay a girl, unconscious, her long, black hair in wild tumult on the pillow. A doctor and two nurses were working to revive her. An hour before she had been raped by twenty soldiers. We found her where they had left her, on a piece of waste land. The hospital was in Hiroshima. The girl was Japanese. The soldiers were Australians. The moaning and wailing had ceased and she was quiet now. The tortured tension on her face had slipped away, and the soft brown skin was smooth and unwrinkled, stained with tears like the face of a child that has cried herself to sleep.’

Australians committing such crimes in Japan were, when discovered, given very minor sentences. Even these were most often later mitigated or quashed by Australian courts. Clifton recounted one such event himself, when an Australian court quashed a sentence given by a military court martial citing ‘insufficient evidence,’ despite the incident having several witnesses. It was clear that courts overseeing Western occupation forces took measures to protect their own from crimes committed against the Japanese – crimes which were largely regarded as just access to ‘spoils of war’ at the time by the Western occupiers.

As had been the case during the war, underreporting of rapes in peace- time due to the associated shame in a traditional society and inaction on the part of authorities (rapes in both cases occurred when Western militaries were themselves in power) would lower the figures significantly. In order to prevent ill feeling towards their occupation from increasing, the United States military government implemented very strict censorship of the media. Mention of crimes committed by Western military personnel against Japanese civilians was strictly forbidden. The occupying forces ‘issued press and pre-censorship codes outlawing the publication of all reports and statistics “inimical to the objectives of the Occupation.”’ When a few weeks into the occupation Japanese press mentioned the rape and widespread looting by American soldiers, the occupying forces quickly responded by censoring all media and imposing a zero tolerance policy against the reporting of such crimes. It was not only the crimes committed by Western forces, but any criticism of the Western allied powers whatsoever which was strictly forbidden during the occupation period – for over six years. This left the U.S. military government, the supreme authority in the country, beyond accountability. Topics such as the establishment of comfort stations and encouragement of vulnerable women into the sex trade, critical analysis of the black market, the population’s starvation level calorie intakes and even references to the Great Depression’s impact on Western economies, anti-colonialism, pan-Asianism and emerging Cold War tensions were all off limits.

What was particularly notable about the censorship imposed under American occupation was that it was intended to conceal its own existence. This meant that not only were certain subjects strictly off limits, but the mention of censorship was also forbidden. As Columbia University Professor Donald Keene noted: ‘the Occupation censorship was even more exasperating than Japanese military censorship had been because it insisted that all traces of censorship be concealed. This meant that articles had to be rewritten in full, rather than merely submitting XXs for the offending phrases.’ For the U.S. military government it was essential not only to control information – but also to give the illusion of a free press when the press was in fact more restricted than it had been even in wartime under imperial rule.

By going one step further to censor even the mention of censorship itself, the United States could claim to stand for freedom of press and freedom of expression. By controlling the media the American military government could attempt to foster goodwill among the Japanese people while making crimes committed by their personnel and those of their allies appear as isolated incidents. While the brutality of American and Australian militaries against Japanese civilians was evident during the war and in its immediate aftermath, it did not end with occupation. The United States has maintained a significant military presence in Japan ever since and crimes including sexual violence and murder against Japanese civilians continue to occur.”

Text End

For Full Manuscript of Power and Primacy

Facebook

https://www.facebook.com/100803698404263/photos/a.101111128373520/106347284516571/

For A. B. Abrams’ upcoming work, scheduled for publication in October 2018, titled Immovable Object: North Koreans 70 Years at War with American Power:

  1. ‘Indonesia’s killing fields,’ Al Jazeera, December 21, 2012. ‘Looking into the massacres of Indonesia’s past,’ BBC, June 2, 2016. ↑
  2. Weiner, Time, ‘C. I. A. Spent Millions to Support Japanese Right in 50’s and 60’s,’ New York Times, October 9, 1994. ↑
  3. ‘Stationing American troops in Japan will lead to bloody tragedy – ex-PM of Japan,’ RT, (televised interview), November 6, 2016. ↑
  4. ‘Ex-Japan FM: I Told Putin We Follow U.S. Policy as We’re Surrounded by Nuke States,’ Sputnik, May 22, 2018. ↑

August 24, 2020 Posted by | Full Spectrum Dominance, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , , | Leave a comment

Turkey’s Erdogan Cuts off Water to One Million Syrian Civilians in the Blazing Summer Heat

By Steven Sahiounie | Mideast Discourse | August 24 ,2020

Turkish President Erdogan has sought to create an image for himself as the champion of religion. The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) also tried to claim they were following a religion, yet both used water as a weapon of war.

Water in Islam

Turkey is almost 100% Muslim and has made world headlines converting Christian cathedrals into Mosques. Turkish President Erdogan has been converting a secular democracy in Turkey, founded by Ataturk, into a Muslim Brotherhood haven, which follows Radical Islam as a political ideology, which is the same ideology as ISIS.

Water in Islam is considered as a gift from God, belonging to all equally, which has to be distributed equally among all living beings, humans, animals, and plant life, according to Cherif Abderrahman Jah, an Islamic academic and humanist.

The ISIS terrorists have often used water as a weapon of war in Iraq and Syria by cutting off supplies to villages that resisted their rule and as a tool to expand their control over the region’s water infrastructure.

They wanted to seize the water to prove they were building an actual state. In 2014 ISIS besieged the Syrian town of Kobane to secure a piece of the border with Turkey.

6 years later, 2020, the same scenario plays out, and in the same area, but ISIS has been defeated, and the Erdogan regime in Turkey has taken their place. Many experts feel ISIS and Turkey have been connected in their use of Radical Islam as a political tool, devoid of any connection to Islam, which is a religion.

ISIS was using water as a weapon, according to Tobias von Lossow of Berlin’s Institute for International and Security Affairs. He said, “IS uses water systematically and consistently. IS uses the entire range of possibilities and variations of water warfare.”

Death without water

A person can survive without water for about 3 days; however, a person living in a very hot climate will sweat, causing them to lose more water, which leads to dehydration, causing extreme thirst, fatigue, and ultimately, organ failure and death. A person living in a hot place, like Hasaka, and having to perform laborious activities such as taking care of animals, or small children, could die in only a few days without water.

The role of the SAR in the crisis

Friday marked the ninth consecutive day without water in Hasaka.  The Turkish occupation forces, and their Radical mercenaries, are endangering the lives of more than a million civilians.

The SAR water authorities continue to try to provide clean drinking water, with cooperation from the Hasaka City Council and civil society groups, who used many water tankers to provide the locals with drinking water from Nafasha and al Himah Water Projects.

Chairman of Hasaka City Council Adnan Khajou, said that the daily quantity of water to be transported is 300,00 liters, which came from shallow wells dug by the locals, but is not drinkable and used only for cleaning.

The Turkish Army of occupation and its terrorist mercenaries in Ras-al-Ayn countryside continue to stop the operation of Alouk water project and to cut off the drinking water from Hasaka city, threatening one million persons with thirst and causing them to suffer from the spread of Coronavirus (COVID-19).

General Director of Hasaka Water Establishment Mahmoud Ukla said that since the Alouk Water Station was shut off by the Erdogan regime army, and their mercenaries, the summer temperatures have soared and water demand has increased, with the devastating additional threat of the COVID-19 pandemic, which needs water for hygiene.

Aziz Michael, geologist and water specialist, said that the Alouk water station is essential for water and it should be reopened.

The role of Turkey in the crisis

Turkey has a long history of using water as a weapon of war in Syria. In 1998 Erdogan had threatened to shut off water to Syria, which brought the two countries close to military conflict.

In May the water supply to 460,000 civilians in northeastern Syria was cut off by Turkey for the sixth time.

Syrian Observatory activists have reported Friday that residents have been protesting in Ras al-Ain, which is under Turkish Army occupation, and were calling for water, and electricity to be restored.

The role of the UN 

On Friday, Ambassador Bashar al-Jaafari, Syria’s Permanent Representative at the UN, called on the UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to intervene immediately and to exert all his efforts to stop the Erdogan regime’s crime of cutting off drinking water for nearly one million Syrian citizens in Hasaka. In the phone call between al-Jaafari and Guterres, the Ambassador stressed that the Turkish aggression constitutes a war crime and a crime against humanity.

He said that the situation caused by this crime is exacerbated by hot weather and the threat of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Guterres said that he has tasked the UN team in Syria and his Special Envoy Geir Pedersen with taking steps to address this matter, resolve it urgently, and deliver humanitarian aid to affected people. He said he will exert his best efforts by contacting the Turkish government to put pressure and resolve this matter.

Guterres has asked Pedersen to meet the representatives of the US, Russia, and Turkey in Geneva on Monday, as the committee for drafting a new Syrian constitution meets, which is part of the UN 2254 resolution which will pave the way to a peaceful solution to the Syrian conflict.

The SAR and AANES (Autonomous Administration of North and East of Syria)

The Northeast section of Syria is split by various groups. The SAR based in Damascus controls areas, and has forces, checkpoints, and provides free health care and education to those areas it controls. The AANES is a separate group of Kurds, following a communist political platform, and they have become known to foreigners as “Rojava”. They have a military wing, the SDF, which was aligned with the terrorist group PKK, and they were in a coalition with the US military, who are now illegally occupying parts of the region while tasked with stealing Syrian oil by the Trump regime.

Covid-19 danger

“Turkish authorities’ failure to ensure adequate water supplies to Kurdish-held areas in Northeast Syria is compromising humanitarian agencies’ ability to prepare and protect vulnerable communities in the COVID-19 pandemic,” Human Rights Watch said in a report published late March.

What is the solution?

The Kurdish leaders of the ‘Rojava’ area, and the central government of the SAR in Damascus, are in complete agreement that the solution of the water crisis in Hasaka must be the removal of all Turkish occupation forces, and their Radical terrorist mercenaries. The SAR is a secular government, and this is what the Kurdish leadership of ‘Rojava’ also claim as a core value of their administration. With so much in common, and both ‘Rojava’ and the SAR facing the same enemy, Turkey, and the possible resurgence of ISIS, it appears they may soon form renewed cooperation to re-take the land from occupation forces and defend the borders from all enemies.

Steven Sahiounie began writing political analysis and commentary during the Syrian war, which began in March 2011. He has published several articles, and has been affiliated with numerous media. He has been interviewed by US, Canadian and German media.

August 24, 2020 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, War Crimes | , , | Leave a comment

US Bombing of a Syrian Army Checkpoint in Hasaka Countryside Kills a Soldier

By Khaled Iskef | American Herald Tribune | August 17, 2020

A US army bombed a Syrian army checkpoint in the village of Tal al-Dahab, southeast of Qamishli in the countryside of Hasakah today’s morning, resulting in killing a soldier and wounding two others.

Private sources reported that the American warplane flew over the checkpoint on the outskirts of Tal al-Dahab for a short period, and bombed it, before immediately leaving the area.

The sources said that targeting the checkpoint came after its members prevented an American patrol from passing through it, as verbal affinities occurred at the checkpoint, before the patrol withdrew without passing, followed by the arrival of the aircraft that carried out the bombing.

The information received indicated that one of the wounded Syrian soldiers holds the rank of officer, without receiving confirmed information about the size of the injuries they suffered as a result of the US bombing.

In the past months, the countryside of Hasaka has witnessed a series of events related to the American presence in the region, especially in terms of preventing American patrols from moving in those areas through the Syrian army checkpoints, as those patrols have always tried to provoke the army checkpoints by insisting on passing, which was refused firmly by the Syrian checkpoints.

The Syrian army prevention of the American patrols passage was often accompanied by popular support in the countryside of Hasakah, who always supported the Syrian army in the face of American moves.

https://twitter.com/Partisangirl/status/1295319894733422593?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1295319894733422593%7Ctwgr%5E&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fahtribune.com%2Fworld%2Fnorth-africa-south-west-asia%2Fsyria-crisis%2F4353-us-bombs-hasaka-countryside.html

Khaled Iskef is a journalist working for Almayadeen TV.

August 17, 2020 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, War Crimes | , | Leave a comment

All Nuclear Weapons Are Illegal

Tales of the American Empire | August 13, 2020

Americans assume that only select nations can legally build and stockpile nuclear weapons. Corporate media and the US Government constantly warn of grave danger if nations like Iran illegally develop nuclear weapons. They cite the 1970 Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, commonly known as the NPT. This is an international treaty to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons, to promote cooperation in the peaceful uses of nuclear energy, and to achieve worldwide nuclear disarmament. This treaty means that Iran and the United States should not have nuclear weapons. Nearly every nation in the world signed the NPT because it promised to eliminate nuclear weapons worldwide. The core purpose of the NPT is to eliminate nuclear arms, not to perpetuate the nuclear monopoly of a few countries.

_______________________________  

“Nuclear Posture Review”; Office of the US Secretary of Defense; February 2018; https://media.defense.gov/2018/Feb/02…

“Initial analysis of new sub-launched nuclear cruise missile coming shortly”; Aaron Mehta; Defense News; June 1, 2020; https://www.defensenews.com/smr/nucle…

“China’s First Nuclear Test 1964”: William Burr; The National Security Archive; October 16, 2014; https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/nukevault/…

“U.S. Considered ’64 Bombing to Keep China Nuclear-Free”; Jim Mann; Los Angeles Times; September 27, 1998; https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-x…

“Arms Control Diplomacy Used To Be Serious – It Has Been Replaced With Stupid Stunts”; Moon of Alabama; June 22, 2020; https://www.moonofalabama.org/2020/06…

August 15, 2020 Posted by | Militarism, Timeless or most popular, Video, War Crimes | Leave a comment

Saudi king suggested ground invasion of Qatar to Trump in June 2017: Report

Press TV – August 9, 2020

A new report has revealed that Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud proposed a plan to US President Donald Trump to invade Qatar in the summer of 2017, as a bitter feud between Saudi Arabia and the Doha government escalated.

According to American news magazine Foreign Policy, the Saudi monarch put forward the proposal during a telephone conversation with Trump back on June 6, 2017, suggesting a ground invasion of Qatar.

Trump, however, roundly dismissed the idea, and requested Kuwait to mediate between Saudi Arabia and Qatar to resolve the conflict.

Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Egypt severed diplomatic and trade ties with Qatar on June 5, 2017, after the quartet officially accused Doha of meddling in regional affairs and supporting terrorism.

Qatar’s Foreign Ministry condemned the decision to cut diplomatic ties as unjustified and based on false claims and assumptions.

That year, Saudi Arabia and its allies issued a 13-point list of demands, including the closure of al-Jazeera television news network and downgrade of relations with Iran, in return for the reconciliation.

The document also asked Qatar to cut all ties with the Muslim Brotherhood and the Lebanese resistance movement Hezbollah. Qatar rebuffed the demands as “unreasonable.”

Director of the Information Office at the Qatari Foreign Ministry, Ahmed bin Saeed bin Jabor al-Rumaihi, reacted to the report, stating that charges that Saudi Arabia and its allies have been trying to level against his country since June 2017 are meant “only to create justifications to achieve other targets that gamble with the future of the region and its people.”

“The military option, which was considered by the blockading countries, violates international law and all international conventions, which we have approved as a member country of the UN, to resolve disputes peacefully. It also clearly indicates a ‘gambling irresponsible policy’, similar to that which led the region to a state of instability in the beginning of the 1970s,” Rumaihi said in a series of Arabic posts published on his Twitter page.

He underlined that Saudi Arabia’s decision up until now not to deny the report of the US magazine “indicates the reality of what had happened.”

“The military option proposal, as revealed by the magazine, corroborates remarks made by Emir of Kuwait Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad al-Jaber al-Sabah at a joint press conference with US President Donald Trump on September 7, 2017 at the White House, where he said the Kuwaiti mediation successfully stopped military invasion of Qatar,” he pointed out.

Back in May 2019, US daily The Wall Street Journal revealed that the Saudi army prepared in 2017 to invade Qatar.

The newspaper quoted American, Saudi and Qatari officials as saying that the Saudi plan included the seizure of the North Field, which is the largest single, non-associated gas reservoir in the world.

August 9, 2020 Posted by | War Crimes | , , , | Leave a comment

Belgian court suspends issuing arms export licenses to companies dealing with Riyadh

Press TV – August 8, 2020

Belgium’s highest administrative court has suspended issuing arms export licenses for a number of Belgian companies in a bid to block the flow of arms to Saudi Arabia over its poor human rights record and the bloody campaign against Yemen.

On Friday, the Council of State decided on the move by an emergency ruling, which overturned the decision by the Wallonian minister-president, Elio di Rupo, who had granted licenses to two arms companies FN Herstal and CMI Defence.

Back in early July, Di Rupo had given authorization to the two Wallonia-based companies to sell weapons to the Saudi Arabia’s National Guard and Royal Guard. The licenses were meant to replace previous authorizations canceled by the same court.

“It cannot be excluded that there is a real risk for the weapons … to be used in the context of the conflict in Yemen or to contribute to internal repression,” the Friday ruling said.

The Saudi regime is the most important client of Wallonia’s arms industry. In 2018, Riyadh purchased weapons for $267 million from local arms companies, based in Belgium’s southern region, representing one-quarter of Wallonia’s total arms export.

Wallonian arms company John Cockerill, whose arms export license was suspended by a previous court ruling, gave military training to the Saudi army in eastern France two years ago, Amnesty International says.

Saudi Arabia has violated the very basics of human rights by killing tens of thousands of civilians in its war on Yemen, besides its other rights violations against its own citizens.

The Yemen conflict, which began in earnest in March 2015, has devastated large swathes of the country and triggered multiple humanitarian disasters, including famine and the internal displacement of millions of people into disease-infested camps and areas.

August 9, 2020 Posted by | War Crimes | , | Leave a comment

Pentagon issues report on Syria war, condemns recruitment of children by SDF

MEMO | August 8, 2020

The Pentagon confirmed in a report on the war in Syria and Iraq that the militia of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) continues to recruit children through forcible detention.

On Thursday, the Lead Inspector General issued a report on Operation Inherent Resolve (OIR), launched by a US-led international coalition against Daesh in Syria and Iraq, indicating that the SDF militia continues to arrest and recruit children from refugee camps in the areas it controls in north-eastern Syria.

The report pointed out that the SDF militia did not fulfil its pledges to international organisations to not recruit children, stressing that youngsters are still being forcibly recruited.

The United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) published in its report issued on 16 January, new evidence about the exploitation and recruitment of children by SDF militia.

On 29 June, 2019, Virginia Gamba, the UN Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict, signed an action plan with SDF leader Ferhat Abdi Shahin, known as Mazloum Abdi, to release child fighters in the militia ranks.

August 9, 2020 Posted by | War Crimes | , , | Leave a comment

Hiroshima, Nagasaki 75 Years On, Washington Still Playing Terror Card

Strategic Culture Foundation | August 7, 2020

Seventy-five years ago this week the world crossed an infernal threshold, with the dropping of two atomic bombs on Japan by the United States. Humankind had gained the technological capability for inflicting mass, instantaneous annihilation.

The destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki along with over 200,000 lives – 90 per cent of whom were civilians – was not a military act to end the Second World War, as the official American narrative would have us believe. It was a political act to begin the Cold War, deliberately carried out by American leaders to assert U.S. hegemony against the Soviet Union and all others. It was an act of fiendish, premeditated mass murder – genocide – with the political objective of instilling terror against all perceived adversaries of American ambitions for global dominance.

Many historians, including respected American scholars, have verified that the atomic bombing of Japan had nothing to do with swiftly ending the Pacific War and “saving U.S. lives”. It was simply an act of unspeakable barbarism for political aims to do with winning the anticipated Cold War. The bombs were dropped just as the Soviet Red Army entered the Korean Peninsula to augment the fight against Japanese imperial forces, as was previously agreed by Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill at the Yalta conference of war-time allies back in February 1945. However, by the time of August 1945, Washington and London had moved considerably to adopt a more hostile position against Moscow, with a view to challenging the Soviet Union for spheres of influence in the postwar world.

There is no doubt that the indiscriminate mass murder of Japanese civilians with a new weapon of unprecedented savagery was carried out as a demonstration of psychopathic power by the United States. It was to be the ultimate warning. In short, it was a supreme act of terrorism. The earlier British-American aerial bombing of German cities and the U.S. firebombing of Tokyo inflicted more accumulated deaths, but the instantaneous destruction at Hiroshima and Nagasaki introduced a new terror lever, one that spelt total annihilation with single bombs.

By 1949, Washington’s terror monopoly lost its ace value when the Soviet Union developed its own atomic weapon. For over seven decades, the world has lived under the shadow of nuclear catastrophe, sometimes coming perilously close, as in the Cuban missile crisis of 1962.

Today, the U.S. and Russia each possess an estimated 6,000 nuclear weapons – accounting for over 90 per cent of the world’s total arsenal. Existing stockpiles are much reduced in number compared with past decades. Nevertheless, each one of these contemporary devices has an explosive power many times that of the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It is inconceivable that human life and the planet as we know it would survive a nuclear war. For that onerous reason, and to avoid “mutually assured destruction”, Washington and Moscow had cooperated historically to draw up several arms control treaties. But over the past two decades, the U.S. side has revoked treaty after treaty. The Trump administration is threatening to scrap the last remaining one, the New START accord which is due to expire in February next year unless it is renewed, which Washington seems ambiguous about. A policy of calculated ambiguity, it may be averred.

There can be little doubt that the Cold War is back with a vengeance as far as the American government and its propagandist corporate news media are concerned. In recent years and indeed weeks, the vilification and smears heaped upon both Russia and China have intensified to a frenzy. The week-in, week-out paranoia and hostility emanating from Washington towards Moscow and Beijing is on par with the unhinged red-baiting ravings of the McCarthyite era in the 1950s. The return of Cold War mindset in Washington is a concomitant of political and economic crises besetting American power as its presumed global empire lurches towards collapse.

In this context, the remembrance of Hiroshima and Nagasaki takes on an altogether more urgent purpose. It has to be recognized that Washington used nuclear annihilation as a terror weapon and it continues to play the same nefarious tactic to this day. There has never been an official apology out of Washington for the monstrous crime it committed in August 1945 because the American rulers have always wanted to maintain the “right” to terrorize others. The current warmongering out of Washington towards Russia and China amid baseless, provocative accusations, as well as military force build-up in sensitive regions, against the backdrop of unfettered arms development, all can only mean one thing: Washington is trying to use the terror card to subjugate others while running the diabolical risk of inciting a nuclear war.

The world should know that American politicians and their media boosters are collectively acting as a madman. American power ultimately relies on coercive terror. But Russia and China will not tolerate such psychopathic conduct, and, thankfully, have the defensive means to counter-threat. The American pretense of virtue is finally being exposed for the ugly reality that lies beneath.

August 7, 2020 Posted by | Militarism, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | | Leave a comment

US Senators Reportedly Threaten German Port Operator With ‘Financial Destruction’ Over Nord Stream 2

Sputnik – 06.08.2020

The Nord Stream 2 project is set to carry up to 55 billion cubic meters (1.942 trillion cubic feet) of gas per year from Russia to Germany, passing through the territorial waters or exclusive economic zones of Denmark, Finland, Germany, Russia and Sweden.

US Senator Ted Cruz together with Senators Tom Cotton and Ron Johnson have threatened the management of Mukran Port in Germany, involved in the Nord Stream 2 project with “financial destruction”, if they continue their work on the venture.

In a three-page letter, obtained by Handelsblatt newspaper, the lawmakers called on Sassnitz GmbH, which operates the port, to discontinue logistical support for the project.

“If you continue to provide goods, services, and support for the Nord Stream 2 project, you will destroy the future financial survival of your company”, the letter read.

Sassnitz is where a ship called Rossini is docked for several weeks now which reportedly serves as a base to some 140 workers who work on the pipeline, including nationals of Italy, Russia, the United Kingdom and Ukraine. According to reports, these workers are shipped daily to the Mukran port, the logistical headquarters of the construction of Nord Stream 2’s segment in the Baltic Sea.

The €9.5 billion, 1,230-kilometre (or 715-mile) long pipeline was hit with sanctions by the United States back in December 2019 under the US’ 2020 National Defence Authorisation Act, which caused the Swiss pipelay company Allseas to quit the project with just 100 miles of the pipeline left to put down. Russia is now completing the pipeline on its own.

While Washington cited security concerns for its sanctions, both Russia and Germany, which are involved in the project, stressed that it is an example of unfair competition that runs counter to international law.

August 6, 2020 Posted by | War Crimes | , , | Leave a comment

Failing upward? After botched Venezuelan regime-change, Elliott Abrams picked as Iran rep

RT | August 6, 2020

The US is putting Iran on regime-change notice, appointing Iran-Contra convict Elliott Abrams as Special Representative for Iran in addition to his duties as Special Representative for Venezuela, a State Department release shows.

Abrams, who oversaw a series of failed coups in Venezuela both in the past year and during the botched 2002 coup against then-President Hugo Chavez, will take over from Brian Hook, who has “decided to step down,” according to a press release from Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

Pompeo lauded Hook’s efforts in the statement, declaring he had “achieved historic results countering the Iranian regime.” The outgoing official oversaw the Trump administration’s “maximum pressure” campaign against Tehran, leveling sanction upon sanction against the Islamic Republic after withdrawing the US from the JCPOA nuclear deal in 2018. Hook praised his own record to the New York Times on Thursday, declaring that “by almost every metric, the regime and its terrorist proxies are weaker than three and a half years ago.”

“We have been very successful,” he said.

Tensions between the two countries nearly spiraled into war in January after a US airstrike killed Quds Force leader Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani, provoking a barrage of missiles from Iran targeting two coalition bases in Iraq. The US has also flooded the Persian Gulf with military assets and placed bounties on Iranian ships and other military assets.

Abrams has been a ubiquitous presence in the US’ regime-change efforts in Latin America, helping to replace left-leaning governments with right-wing dictatorships in El Salvador and Guatemala and attempting similar makeovers in Nicaragua and Venezuela. In 1991, he pleaded guilty to two minor criminal counts regarding the Iran-Contra scandal, in which the CIA illegally funneled weapons to the Nicaraguan Contras. However, he was subsequently pardoned by then-President George HW Bush and went on to continue undermining democratically-elected governments under George W. Bush and Donald Trump.

The promotion comes ahead of a hotly-anticipated UN Security Council vote on extending the arms embargo on Iran. If the measure does not pass, the US has threatened to trigger “snapback” sanctions agreed upon as part of the 2015 nuclear deal – despite having pulled out of the deal years ago and therefore lacking an ability to enforce its provisions as a “participating nation.”

August 6, 2020 Posted by | War Crimes | , , , | Leave a comment

SDF militants kill civilian protesting against US military presence in Syria

Press TV – August 5, 2020

A civilian has lost his life and several others sustained injuries during a rally in Syria’s northeastern province of Dayr al-Zawr to demand the withdrawal of US military forces and their allied militants affiliated with the so-called Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) from the region.

Syria’s official news agency SANA, citing local sources, reported that residents of Diban town demonstrated on Tuesday afternoon to express their opposition to the presence of American soldiers and the arbitrary practices of SDF militants.

The US-backed militants responded by firing live bullets at the protesters, killing one of them and injuring several others.

SANA added that locals managed to expel SDF militants out of their checkpoints and the schools which they had been using as bases following the clashes.

Similar protests were held in other Dayr al-Zawr towns and villages, including al-Hawaij, Jadeed Ekedat, Tayaneh, al-Sobhah, Abu al-Nitel, al-Shuhayl and Shinan, where people called for the immediate pullout of SDF militants and US forces.

The militants reportedly brought in reinforcements from the towns of al-Shaddadi, al-Susah and al-Baghouz in order to bring the situation under control.

The Arabic service of Russia’s Sputnik news agency, citing sources speaking on condition of anonymity, reported that SDF militants, supported by military aircraft belonging to the US-led coalition, raided the towns of al-Shuhayl and al-Hawaij later in the day, triggering fierce clashes with locals.

Security conditions are reportedly deteriorating in areas controlled by the SDF in Hasakah and Dayr al-Zawr provinces amid ongoing raids and arrests of civilians by the militants.

Locals complain that the SDF’s constant raids and arrest campaigns have generated a state of frustration and instability, severely affecting their businesses and livelihoods.

Residents accuse the US-sponsored militants of stealing crude oil and refusing to spend money on services sectors.

Local councils affiliated with the SDF have also been accused of financial corruption. They are said to be embezzling funds provided by donors, and failing to provide basic public requirements.

August 5, 2020 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, War Crimes | , , | Leave a comment

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