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Phantom investigation? France delays report on mystery cases of babies born without arms

RT | January 31, 2019

France’s public health agency has postponed the release of a report on an investigation into the abnormal numbers of babies being born without arms in rural regions — a medical mystery which has baffled experts.

Three infants were born with no arms between June and November 2016 within a 30km radius of Vitrolles in the Bouches-du-Rhône region. That followed another cluster of cases near the area of Ain, where eight babies were born with the defect within a 17km radius. Similar cases have also been observed in other regions of rural France.

A nationwide investigation into the phenomenon began last October and the government had promised an update by January 31, but that date was suddenly pushed back — and the parents of affected children are becoming impatient and suspicious.

In an open letter to public health officials, a group of parents expressed doubts about the ongoing investigation and said their questions have “never had clear answers.” They accused the government of focusing on explanations which have already been dismissed by another public health body which researches cases of malformation.

Santé Publique France, the national health agency, previously conducted an investigation before the latest spate of cases — but that investigation concluded that there had not been an excessive level of incidents in Ain and that no further investigation was needed. Other experts, however, said the number of cases in Ain was 58 times the normal statistical amount.

Remera, the health body which looks into instances of malformation, carried out its own investigation in 2018. As part of it, mothers were interviewed with a “very extensive questionnaire” about their lifestyles to see if there were any similarities between their pregnancies. This led doctors to dismiss genetics, drugs, and alcohol as potential causes for the missing limbs.

Emmanuelle Amar, the director of Remera in the south east of France concluded that the “only thing they have in common is that they all live in a very rural area.” Remera therefore dismissed the likelihood of the malformations as being down to chance — as the government agency previously suggested — as “more than infinitesimal.”

Remera believes that harmful pesticides in wide use in rural areas of France are the most likely culprit. The mystery remains unsolved, but the possible link to agriculture is given weight by the fact that around the same time the cases were observed in Ain, several calves and chickens were born with missing limbs in the area. Amar told RT that authorities didn’t want to listen to Remera’s concerns, however.

Aurelie Bingler, the mother of one girl born without her hand, also spoke to RT. “I want to know why she was born like that, because mothers blame themselves. We think it may come from us or that we did something wrong,” she said. Bingler believes, too, that there is probably a link to farming.

We are surrounded by agriculture, fields, so we naturally wonder about the use of pesticides. Why doesn’t it happen to people who live in the city? There must be a link to agriculture.

Former French environment minister Corinna Lepage told RT there was probably a “fear of discovering that the causes could endanger a number of economic interests.”

February 3, 2019 Posted by | Environmentalism | , | 2 Comments

UNSC: Russia Compares the Situation in Venezuela to the ‘Yellow Vests’ Crisis

Russian Representative at the United Nations Security Council, devoted to ‘The situation in Venezuela’, January 26, 2019.

Transcript:

President: I give the floor to the representative of the Russian Federation.

Russian Permanent Representative to the UN Vasily Nebenzya: Thank you, Mr. President.

The distinguished representative of Germany devoted a major part of his statement to a personal dialogue with me. I would like to comment on what he said.

The use of preventive diplomacy is indeed excellent. It is obviously better to prevent a crisis than to resolve it. But you (France and Germany) propose a very strange way to prevent this crisis, putting forward an absurd 8-days ultimatum. Some states didn’t even need 8 days to reject the recognition of the legitimate authorities of Venezuela.

You completely disregard the sovereignty of Venezuela,  imposing on it the decisions that you prefer and denying its people the right to resolve their own affairs. You’re not calling for the political forces of Venezuela to find a common understanding in the interest of achieving internal peace and stability. You’re calling on the legitimate authority to simply acknowledge their defeat and to transfer power to the opposition. What you’re doing is not prevention, but incitement.

How would you feel if the Russian Federation brought the situation in France and the ‘Yellow Vests’ protests to the Security Council? Just over the past weekend, some 22.000 people took to the streets. Would you consider that as prevention? I want to reassure the representative of France that we do not intend to bring this issue to the UNSC. Unlike you, we’re not trying to recognize or not recognize anyone, although we recognize the legitimate authorities of Venezuela.

We call upon:

a) respecting the legitimate authority;

b) not to interfere into the domestic affairs of the country;

c) not to impose on Venezuela solutions from the outside, but rather to help them resolve their own affairs peacefully.

Thank you.

Source: http://webtv.un.org/search/the-situation-in-venezuela-bolivarian-republic-of-security-council-8452nd-meeting/5994882843001/?term=&lan=english

Translation: unz.com/sayedhasan

February 3, 2019 Posted by | Timeless or most popular, Video | , , , | 1 Comment

Three Reasons Macron is a Hypocrite when it Comes to Venezuela

By Jim Carey | Geopolitics Alert | January 29, 2019

Paris – French President Emmanuel Macron recently voiced support for protesters in Venezuela as his own country has been ground to a halt by protests every weekend.

There is an overused saying that “people in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones.” While these few words may be cliche there is definitely one man that they can be applied to after this weekend: Emmanuel Macron.

Even though the French President is into the third month of protests against his government, he has decided to weigh in on the legitimacy of another country’s government and his latest outrageous statements just highlight the hypocrisy of Macron and Western leaders in general.

Macron: Maduro is ‘illegitimate’

Emmanuel Macron is a very unpopular man. Yet, if the French President is to be believed, there is a man who is more unpopular than him that needs to be removed from office immediately. This man is, of course, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro whose approval rating is estimated somewhere around twenty percent by Western media outlets (many with no journalists or pollsters in Venezuela).

The irony of Emmanuel Macron saying these approval ratings make a President “illegitimate” is that his own aren’t looking much better. Following the eleventh weekend of the ‘Gilets Jaunes’ protests, Macron has seen a slight bump in approval ratings (according to pro-Macron media) to a paltry thirty percent.

Thirty percent isn’t much better than 20 but there were also polls during the earlier stages of the Gilets Jaunes protests where just over seventy percent of French citizens polled did not have faith in Macron’s government. This means that at one point during the protests that are still sweeping through Paris every weekend, Macron was just as “illegitimate” as he claims Nicolas Maduro is.

Approval ratings aren’t the only thing Western powers use to paint Maduro as illegitimate. Another common tactic often deployed against the Venezuelan President is to claim that his latest electoral victory can’t be verified and this makes Maduro illegitimate.

One statistic cited to prove that the last Venezuelan election was “fraud” is the voter turnout. The voter turnout during last years presidential election in Venezuela was 46.1% but this statistic without context is misleading.

A key variable that has to be factored into the Venezuelan elections is that the now-“interim President” Juan Gauido’s own party called for a boycott. Apparently, most of the party got the message, listened to the leadership and just didn’t vote, meaning it’s impossible to tell if the re-election of Maduro would have gone differently.

One election that nobody was calling for a boycott of, is the French Presidential election in 2017 where only about 35% of the French electorate voted. This is the lowest turnout for any French election and modern history, and more than ten percentage points less than the turnout in Venezuela. If low turnout is the key to spotting a “rigged” election where the opposition is de facto barred from voting, perhaps international observers should examine the legitimacy of the French President.

Violence against protesters

Another major trope across western media used to try to characterize Nicolas Maduro as a tyrant is some of the responses of the Venezuelan security services to massive protests. At the same time, however, it seems strange for Emmanuel Macron to point to massive protests during “economic turmoil” as some kind of evidence a leader must step down.

As stated above, Macron is dealing with his own “pro-democracy” protests – or a bunch of Russian-manipulated fascists if western media is to believed – the Gilets Jaunes. While Macron has openly voiced his support for those protesters in the streets of Caracas, he has spent several weeks brutalizing and arresting protesters on the streets of Paris.

While networks all over the west love to point out the totals of dead or injured during riots in Venezuela, they usually fail to report when similar things happen in the west, and France is no different. Macron, much like what he says of Maduro, is also killing protesters and reached double-digit body count late last year.

Obviously, western media would like you to believe these two things are different, and obviously, they are in many ways. For instance, the Venezuelans protesting in Caracas work on behalf of western interests while those in Paris work against it.

There is also another key difference between the situations. In France, Macron has done nothing to hold any police accountable for the deaths of protesters in Paris. Unlike Macron, the Maduro government has actually prosecuted police found guilty of abuses against the opposition. Meanwhile, Macron’s police recently blinded a prominent Gilets Jaunes activist for life with their non-lethal weapons a day after the latest Venezuelan protests kicked off.

Counter-protesters

One thing you will not see in any western media coverage of Venezuela are those citizens of the country that do support President Nicolas Maduro. The western media has no problem repeatedly showing protests against the current government but almost no media covered the fact that thousands also mobilized in pro-Maduro protests to counter the opposition over the weekend.

While the media ignore these pro-PSUV protests over the weekend though, they did fall in love with another new group of “pro-order” protesters, the Foulards Rouge, or Red Scarves. Although this movement didn’t explicitly say they back Macron, they did support something mainstream media love even more, the “institutions” of liberal democracy.

Unlike the yellow vests, who the western media did their best to ignore for weeks, these red scarf protesters were blasted all over mainstream media. This coverage is despite the fact that the red scarves were estimated to have been around 10,000 strong whereas some yellow vest protests have drawn hundreds of thousands to Paris from around France.

These red scarf protests are being hailed as France’s silent majority, who may be unhappy with the state but still don’t wish for further instability. The same can likely be said about many of the pro-Maduro protesters who likely have some grievances but know much of this is caused by outside factors and anything besides the Bolivarian revolution will further destabilize Venezuela.

None of this matters to the western media or Emmanuel Macron who are still ramping up their anti-Maduro smear campaign at this very minute. Emmanuel Macron can “support” the protesters in Venezuela all he wants but he might want to worry about keeping his own house in order.

January 29, 2019 Posted by | Deception, Mainstream Media, Warmongering | , | 1 Comment

GILETS JAUNES: Civilians in Police Crosshairs as Macron Adopts Totalitarian State-Practices to Suppress Dissent

By Vanessa Beeley | 21st Century Wire | January 29, 2019

A 30-year-old volunteer fireman who joined the Gilets Jaunes protests in Bordeaux, France on the 12th January 2019, is in a coma after being shot in the back of the head by an LBD or “flashball” bullet fired by French security forces who are brutally suppressing public demonstrations in most major French cities. Olivier Beziade is a father of three who now has a “very serious brain injury” and is in an induced coma. As violence radiates across France, western media locks down and fails to report comprehensively or fairly on Police infractions against protestors.

The following is the video of this event, during which one of the police officers appears to say “they (protestors) don’t know it’s us” and instructs his colleagues to “pick up the casings”, after Beziade had been gunned down and was lying face down on the street.

WATCH:

The Gilets Jaunes or Yellow Vests

The Gilets Jaunes (GJs) or Yellow Vest movement began officially on the 18th November 2018 but according to some analysts this people’s initiative was being ignited long before and is a product of successive French government marginalisation of important sectors of the French population. Thomas Flichy de Neuville, academic and historian, wrote very recently about the socio-political alarm bells that preceded the Gilets Jaunes by at least five years.

In 2013, a deputy from the Pyrenees Atlantique department of France, Jean Lassalle, spent 8 months walking around France. He covered 5000 km on foot and spoke with the “forgotten” French people. Lassalle reported that the lasting impression from his experience was that most of those he encountered had a desire to “turn the tables, that they had had enough on many levels”.

Lassalle’s report was submitted to the presidents of the assemblees in April 2014. Lassalle warned that nine out of ten people in France were ready to “explode”, three out of ten were ready to mobilise if and when the “explosion” took place. Lassalle prophesied that  “Les réseaux sociaux sont prêts à agir comme une arme formidable de mobilisation” “social media is ready to to act as a formidable weapon of mobilisation”. 

According to Flichy, the one problem with Lassalle’s ground breaking report was that he predicted the imminent eruption of dissent “it is ten minutes before midnight”, Lassalle wrote. Nothing transpired as predicted in 2015 and the 196 page report was consigned to the archives, its prescient contents forgotten as France buried itself in a foreign intervention quagmire in Syria, Yemen and Mali and ignored the gathering storm at home.

GJ protestors being tear gassed in Bordeaux, January 12th 2019. (Photo: Nicolas Duffaure)

In 2014, Christophe Guilluy, a geographer, wrote a book entitled “La France Peripherique” which investigated the demographics of major French cities and highlighted the problems of wealthy, opulent city centers compared to the marginalised and poor suburbs where 60% of the “forgotten” population resided. Guilluy concluded that many of these communities would ultimately vote for more right wing or nationalist political parties in search of an antidote for their deteriorating living conditions.

Guilluy’s work is particularly relevant when we consider that the match to the touchpaper for the GJs was the hike in fuel prices by President Macron’s government. While this is not the sole reason for the unrest we see today, nationwide in France, it is an important factor for 60% of a population, many of whom subsist on the minimum wage (SMIC) – if those people travel 20km to work every day, they will spend 250 euros per month which is a quarter of the SMIC. It is easy to see why these people reacted so forcefully against a fuel tax that would impact them the most.

Why the Gilet Jaune? Analyst and author, based in France, Diana Johnstone put it most succinctly in an article for Unz Review :

“Every automobile in France is supposed to be equipped with a yellow vest. This is so that in case of accident or breakdown on a highway, the driver can put it on to ensure visibility and avoid getting run over. [..] The costume was at hand and didn’t have to be provided by Soros for some more or less manufactured “color revolution”. The symbolism was fitting: in case of socio-economic emergency, show that you don’t want to be run over.”

The GJs have distanced themselves from politics and politicians to protect their grass-roots identity. The leadership structure is horizontal, no leaders or identity politics. The spokespeople are not practiced public speakers, they are people from every walk of life and they represent a wide spectrum of French society. The manifesto is varied depending upon regional collectives but most demands nationwide appear to be in synch with minor differences.

One such manifesto was published by a number of media outlets in December 2018 and it listed a number of demands for reform in the economic, political, health and social security and environmental sectors. This manifesto also addressed the issue of Macron’s neoliberal foreign policy and included a call to end “France’s participation in foreign wars of aggression and exit from NATO” and to “cease pillaging and interfering – politically and militarily – in Francafrique which keeps Africa poor. Immediately repatriate all French soldiers. Establish relations with African states on an equal peer-to-peer basis”


Forces of “law and order” on the streets of Bordeaux during Acte X of GJ protests, 12/1/2019. (Photo: Nicolas Duffaure)

The fundamental message of the GJs is that they simply can’t make ends meet. The cost of living keeps going up and salaries keep being squeezed. The Government needs to listen to its people and to change course. Most europeans reading this will feel empathy with this expression of desperation. There has been a cover-up in France by the government and the media. These calls for help have been muted, filtered and ignored by the state-aligned media and government officials for some time now.

Macron’s government has used Climate Change and global warming as a damoclean sword brandished over the heads of the malcontent to distract them from their misery – suggesting the future of the planet outweighs the trivia of feeding your children or avoiding homelessness – the push back from the GJs was swift, while they may cherish their environment and are ecologically aware “they are more worried about the end of the month than the future of the world.”

In some cases, early on in the protests, the GJs are being systematically dehumanized. Gerard Darminin, the budget minister, described the GJs as the “peste brune – the brown plague” meaning fascists. In the dozens of interviews I have listened to, not one GJ has expressed a sentiment that could even remotely be described as right wing or fascist.  The GJs are an apolitical collective with a focus on socio-economic issues that directly affect their ability to survive in modern France which, in their view, is drifting dangerously away from the vision of a Republic that most of the demonstrators have grown up with.


Ingrid Lavavasseur, leading GJ candidate for May European Parliament elections. (Photo: Twitter)

In an effort to give their concerns and the movement a greater platform from which to challenge Macron, the GJs have recently nominated 10 candidates for the May 2019 European Parliament elections and are hoping to expand the list to 79 candidates. Leading contender is Ingrid Lavavasseur, a care worker raising two children alone in Normandy who believes that Macron’s government “despises the little people”.

The government response has been largely dismissive, repressive, condemnatory and increasingly inflammatory. Instead of “maintaining order” through genuine negotiation and reform, Macron appears to have unleashed an escalation of police violence against demonstrators which will provoke the GJs further, increasing dissent and the potential for counter-reactionary measures against the state.

Interior Ministry, State and Media Reaction to Gilets Jaunes


Christophe Castaner, Interior Minister. (Photo: Nicolas Messyasz)

Macron’s first choice Interior Minister was the socialist mayor of Lyons, Gerard Collomb who resigned his post in October 2018, despite Macron’s entreaties for him to stay, citing “immense difficulties” facing his successor. Collomb was replaced by Christophe Castaner as head of national police forces, among other responsibilities. Former socialist and with a degree in criminology, Castaner’s reputation is somewhat tarnished by his connections to a Marseilles mafioso, Christian Oraison, in the 1970s.

French Prime Minister, Edouard Phillippe introduced a new law to “better protect the right to demonstrate” in January 2019. Protestors who are labelled falsely as “agitators” “insurrectionists” or who demand that “President Macron resign” will effectively be collectively reprimanded by a law that introduces measures of heavy punishment of demonstration organisers whose time and place has not been given the official stamp of approval.

500 complaints against Castaner for restricing the right to protest were submitted to the Court of Cassation but were dismissed by Public Prosecutor, Francois Molins, who stated that he would not be prosecuting Castaner for his remarks that “participants in the GJ protests were complicit with those who had resorted to violence”.


Bordeaux police gather for GJ protests January 2019. (Photo: Nicolas Duffaure)

Castaner has consistently defended the police squads and their use of disproportionate force against unarmed demonstrators by claiming that the GJs are the ones to instigate violence, the police are acting in self-defense. The mounting number of cases of civilian mutilation and wounding by heavily armed police officers suggest that Castaner is distorting the truth.

Castaner’s only concession has been to equip the police forces with body cameras so they can record their own violations of the use of “proportionate force” in the maintenance of law and order. Doubts must be cast on the willingness of a police force already facing 100s if not thousands of claims against them, to provide the evidence that will further incriminate them. When Castaner was pressed to comment on the violence being meted out against civilians by the police, he responded:

I don’t know of one policeman or one gendarme who has attacked the Gilets Jaunes, on the other hand, I know many police or gendarmes who have taken defensive measures to defend the Republic, the order of the Republic – you know there is no “liberty” without public order [..] but naturally I have never seen a gendarme or a police officer attack a demonstrator or a journalist, on the contrary I have seen demonstrators systematically attack our security forces and journalists.


Police arrest a protestor. (Photo: Gilets Jaunes Facebook page)

Castaner is one of the chief promoters of the draconian and controversial “Loi Anti Casseurs – Anti-Breakers (looters) law”. Those who oppose adoption of the law have claimed it will further erode freedom of speech and liberty of expression in France. The law proposes security perimeters around protests, facial recognition, bag searches, body searches, 2-4 years in prison if found guilty of violence against the police and up to Euros 7,500 ($ 8580) fines for those who violate the law. It is worth noting that Castaner himself admits that the number of “casseurs” nationwide are negligible, numbering between “150 – 200/300 across all regions of France”.

The law states that protestors who hide their faces will be targeted – this measure is controversial as most protestors and journalists are forced to cover their heads and faces to protect themselves against tear gas and the risk of mutiliation by “flashball” rubber bullets or “grenades d’encerclement”” which contain 25g of TNT and can release hundreds of 10g rubber pellets at close range if used incorrectly, by the security forces. Macron’s government sees these measures as essential to crack down on violence against the state, the GJs will perceive it as a further instrument of oppression by the state against its own people. So far, 200 ammendments have been made to the law by those who are alarmed by the increased totalitarian measures being imposed upon France and its people by Macron’s ministers.

French state-aligned media and UK corporate media have followed Castaner’s narrative lead with little deviation, the following short clip from a report by France’s TF1 demonstrates the disinformation being presented about the GJs and the police violence. The TF1 presenter denies any police infractions and praises them for their “sang froid”, their composure.

Macron Response to Gilets Jaunes

After initially distancing himself from the protests, perhaps in the vain hope they would fizzle out, on the 10th December Macron finally appeared before his people on TV. During the broadcast an apparently chastened Macron agreed to delay the fuel tax hike, he offered an extra 100 Euros per month for minimum wage earners and tax cuts for pensioners among other measures. Even the Economist described Macron’s 10 billion-euro concession package as an attempt to buy off his critics. The broadcast was watched by a staggering 21m people. The reaction was mixed, perhaps 50% of the GJs and their supporters seeing it as an attempt to keep the people quiet rather than a genuine effort to change course and address the long-standing issues that had generated the protests in the first place.

Macron’s later New Year 2019 address to the nation which followed a terrifying increase in the violence seen on the streets of Paris and across France, was a much more aggressive affair. Having failed to appease the “crowds” with a few unconvincing political crumbs, Macron seemed to have decided to adopt the hardline approach. “These days I have seen unthinkable things and heard the unacceptable” Macron stated. Macron even took on the few opposition politicians who dared to empathise with the protestors. Macron berated those who pretend to “speak for the people”, calling them “spokespersons for hateful crowds” and denounced “those who have mingled with the Yellow Vest protesters to spread hate speech about “police forces, journalists, Jews, foreigners, homosexuals” as a “negation of France”. I am yet to find a recording of a GJ spreading hate speech about any of the factions mentioned by Macron.

Macron’s other concession was the so called “Grand Debate”, a series of town hall meetings where representatives of the communes and departments across France would meet to present grievances on behalf of their constituents and the GJs. In reality, anyone wearing a yellow vest in the vicinity of the meetings may be fined Euros 135 ( $154). At some meetings road blocks were erected some way from the meeting place and identity papers of drivers were photographed, anyone wearing a yellow vest was told to go back. So, from day one, the Grand Debate called to address the concerns raised by the GJs deemed the GJs as persona non grata.

On the 18th January 2019, a Grand Debate was held in Souillac, south-west France. One of the attending Mayors gave an interview to a local media outlet after the debate had finished. Rene Revol, Mayor of Grabels (Department 34) said the meeting was nothing more than a “masquerade”, a farce, an election campaign for Macron. Gilets Jaunes were forbidden and threatened with fines if they were caught in the vicinity wearing their vests. Road blocks were set up on all roads leading to the venue. Security forces surrounded Macron’s cavalcade. Mayors were able to speak only if chosen by government ministers or Prefets – effectively controlled discourse. The meeting was ostensibly called to address the issues of the people. Nothing was discussed and the “people” were banned.

State Sanctioned Violence and Repression


Record of some of the appalling injuries inflicted upon unarmed civilians by police forces across France. (Photo: Desarmons.net)

Since the beginning of December the violence witnessed on the streets of cities across France has escalated dramatically. One French independent journalist, David Dufresnes, has been recording all infractions committed by police and security forces and tweeting them to the Interior Ministry while giving interviews to a huge number of French media channels to raise awareness of the police brutality during peaceful protests. In the tweet below, infraction number 362 dated 26/1/2019, an off duty soldier is reported to be hit in the head by a police LBD40 rubber bullet as he is leaving a restaurant in Montpelier on his way to the nightclub with two of his colleagues.

Dufresnes has recorded 157 injuries to the head including 18 who have lost an eye, fractures of the jaw and comas in the most severe cases. 11 hand injuries, in 4 cases resulting in the loss of a hand. 8 back injuries, 28 injuries to the upper body, 40 lower limb injuries, 3 injuries to the genital area, 48 unspecified injuries and 55 cases of intimidation, insults, repression of press freedom infractions. One eighty-year-old was murdered on the 1st December 2018 in Marseilles – Zineb Redouane was killed when a tear gas grenade was thrown in her face by the security forces. According to Dufresnes this is the list of the more serious injuries, an estimated 2000 – 3000 more GJs have been “lightly” injured during the protests since November 2018.


Chart produced by independent journalist, David Dufresnes and Mediapart showing injuries received by GJs and civilians from Police weapons and brutality during protests.

Dufresnes argues that the police have already lost control of the situation and can no longer be legitimately claiming to “maintain law and order”. In one interview Dufresnes points out that the use of 10,000 tear gas grenades on one day of protests points to a “panic” situation among the security forces. During “Acte XI” of the protests on the 26th January the elderly man, Eric, in the photo below was hit on the head by a police truncheon in Marseilles. He has three fractures and is forced to eat only liquid food from the left side of his mouth for three weeks, according to his brother.

Two students were recently inteviewed by independent French media channel, Mediapart. Antoine Boudinet lost his right hand when a GLIF4 grenade exploded close to him in Bordeaux, December 2018. Lola Villabriga was hit in the face by a LBD40 flashball bullet which triple-fractured her jaw in Biarritz, also December 2018.


Lola Villabriga, student, her jaw was fractured when she was hit in the face by a “flashball” bullet, December 2018 in Biarritz next to Antoine Boudient, student, who lost a hand during protests in Bordeaux December 2018.

Boudinet was actually taking part in a “climate” march which joined with the GJ march at one point during the protests. Boudinet has submitted a claim against Christophe Castaner for the police use of the GLIF4 grenade which has disabled him for life. Boudinet clearly states that he holds Castaner and the Interior Ministry responsible for the arms used by the police – “when such arms are available, it is certain that at some moment something will happen and there will be an incident. Explosives should never be thrown at people”

Villabriga had been standing on a bench filming the protests when she was hit by the flashball bullet. She describes a protest that was 100% peaceful, “there was no chaos at all. The use of force was totally disproportionate”. Villabriga suffered a triple fracture of her jaw, she has undergone one operation and a second operation is foreseen in the future to remove the metal pins. Commenting on Castaner’s denial of police brutality, Villabriga told the presenter:

“This is absolute denial (from Castaner) which I find totally alarming to see that we are ignored while what happened to us is so terrible. Nobody has come to talk to us.”

Watching the interviews, including one with Dominique Rodtchenki Pontonnier, a mother whose two sons were terribly injured by a GLIF4 grenade, one son losing three fingers in the blast – I was struck by the trauma and shock on the faces of the guests. At one point we are shown the film of the moment Pontonnier’s son is hit and is screaming that he has lost his hand. Boudinet is visibly shaken by the video, he explains that it brings back the memories of the moment he realised that he had been mutilated by the GLIF4 grenade fired by police into unarmed crowds of people that included children and families.

There is utter disbelief during the interview that France has been so rapidly reduced to a violent police state and that the trust between state and people has been so profoundly damaged. Another guest, Anaelle, a volunteer medic, describes the “profound lack of respect and complete rupture of dialogue” between state and people. All guests are horrified at the weapons being deployed to maintain “law and order”.


Record of injuries from police use of disproportionate force against unarmed civilians during GJ protests. (Photo: Desarmons.net)

Meanwhile, Interior Minister, Castaner maintains that the use of the Flashball bullet is necessary because:

“… in the face of extreme violence we need the means to defend ourselves and the simple fact of having a uniform (presence) for a long time has prevented the violence because the people respect that. Now there are people who come to provoke, to attack and to aggress, even to kill. If we consider what happened on the Champs Elysee or at the Arc De Triomphe, according to statements I have studied, there is a desire to kill members of the security forces, therefore they need to be able to defend themselves”


The moment GJ spox, Jerome Rodrigues, is targeted first by a GLIF4 grenade before being hit in the eye by a LBD40 Flashball bullet. Acte XI, 26th January 2019. (Photo: Twitter)

Paris, 26th January 2019, the forces of “law and order” targeted one of the GJ’s most popular spokespeople, Jerome Rodrigues, while he was filming events during the GJ march. During Rodrigues’ live video we can hear him cautioning GJs to withdraw from the scene as elements of the Black Bloc have arrived. Rodrigues does not want the GJs to get caught up in the Black Bloc violence. As he continues filming we see the police forces advancing but not confronting the few members of the Black Bloc who are responsible for much of the looting and damage to shops and buildings during the weekly protests. Instead, the police appear to open fire on the retreating GJs including Rodrigues who is suddenly struck down.

The following video shows the moments after Rodrigues is targeted first by a GLIF4 grenade and then by a Flashball bullet to the eye (according to later testimony from Rodrigues from his hospital bed).

WATCH:

Rodrigues is treated by the volunteer medics at the scene before being rushed to hospital. Two days after the incident, Rodrigues posted a live video to his Facebook page, from his hospital room. He calls for peace and calm, no violent reactions from the GJs. He feels that he was deliberately targeted by the police and this had also been claimed by a number of eye witnesses to the attack. Rodrigues also reminds people that his mutilation is one of many and that he should not be singled out among the GJs who have suffered at the hands of the police. Rodrigues urges GJs back onto the streets for Acte XII, Saturday 2nd February. It remains to be seen where the escalation of violence will progress from here as popular support for the GJs grows across France.

Rodrigues’ poster for Acte XII reads “The powerful will stop dominating when the little people stop crawling”

Weapons used to “Maintain Law and Order” 


Chart taken from the website of ACAT, an NGO arguing against increase in repressive laws in France, showing the weapons deployed by France during crowd control compared to other EU countries, November 2017.

The above chart shows the weapons used by French security forces against unruly crowds. There is a clear recommendation of steps and maintenance of proportionate force which is outlined in the national police instruction chart, below. Journalist, David Dufresnes, has clarified that the LBD40 Flashball rubber bullets and the GLIF4 grenade “d’encerclement” are not used anywhere else in Europe because of the risks to human life involved.

The National Police in France should be following the recommendations shown in the infograph above. Step one: demand for the crowd to disperse followed by two clear announcements of the intention to use “force”. First level of force: firearms are strictly prohibited at this stage. Truncheons, water canon and hand thrown tear gas grenades. Level two of force: GLIF4 grenades and grenade launchers. Level three of force: if the police are met with violence. LBD40 Flashball bullets, grenade launchers firing non-metal projectiles and flashball bullets.

What we are seeing, from the footage that is being released, is the police bypassing the recommended steps and progressing almost immediately to the use of disproportionate force and the apparent deliberate targeting of unarmed protestors among the GJs. This is panic crowd control with horrifying consequences. More than 80,000 police are deployed to maintain order during the nationwide GJ marches every weekend. A mix of the BAC (Brigade Anti Criminalite) and the CRS (general reserve of the French national police) are the most prevalent security forces who police the marches.

Many appear not to have been properly trained in the use of the weapons provided to them. The LBD40 Flashball bullet should never be fired at head height, for example, yet we consistently see police officers standing and firing from the shoulder into crowds of Gilets Jaunes. On the saturday that Rodrigues was targeted, I took screenshots from the Ruptly TV live video coverage of the Paris marches which clearly show one police officer pointing a target out to another officer who fires the weapon at head height ten seconds later. The velocity of the Flashball bullet is ten times that of a paintball, its capacity to mutilate at close quarters has been proven by the horrifying injuries circulating on social media.

A recent article in the media outlet, Liberation, has revealed that a police report highlighted the risks of using the GLIF4 grenade for crowd control but the grenade is still being used by police in France. The GLIF4 contains 25g of TNT explosive, emits 165 decibels upon explosion which has permanently deafened one protestor and has caused inner ear problems for others. The GLIF4 can contain CS gas in powder form or 10g rubber pellets, lethal at close quarters with potential to tear into limbs and shred hands.

This report was picked up by journalist, David Dufresne, who highlighted the following paragraph:

Liberation had access to a Police scientific laboratory report carried out on this wound ( and submitted to the enquiry) before the Gilets Jaunes movement. The report concludes that the high risk of the (GLIF4) grenade has been underestimated by French authorities and the manufacturer. The Interior Minister (Christophe Castaner) still chose to use the grenades until “stocks were exhausted” without specifying the number of grenades remaining in stock.

The cavalier manner in which Castaner has put the lives of French civilians at risk must be considered reckless at best, criminally negligent at worst.

The following video is a compilation of just a few of the police infractions and violent responses to the GJ protests across France.

WATCH:

Conclusion – Chaos Strategy Unleashed? 


Alexandre Langlois, police violence and the Gilets Jaunes.

Alexandre Langlois, General Secretary of the Police Syndicate, VIGI, has accused Macron’s government of stoking confrontation and of favouring repression over dialogue. In a series of public interviews, Langlois blames the hierarchy within the Interior Ministry for the “manipulation” of the police forces already hugely under pressure and experiencing a climbing suicide rate since Macron’s rise to power in France. According to Langlois, the “hierarchy” direct the police working during the marches from remote control centers which disable the police’s ability to analyse events on the ground and avoid dangerous confrontation or provocation. Langlois demonstrates that this system has led to situations that have increased pressure on both the police and the Gilets Jaunes.

Langlois warns that Police are being forced to work blind. The state is pushing for confrontation and it is not avoiding repressive measures that will only increase the chances of violence not reduce them. Langlois laments the 75 suicides of police officers since Macron was elected, 17 since Castaner took over from Collomb who resigned after pressure from Langlois and his syndicate to address the issue of high suicide rates among the national police forces – “we called for the resignation of Collomb, now Castaner should go” .

The dismantlement of the “renseignments generaux” (RG – police intelligence branch) under Sarkozy in 2008 has contributed to the problems in 2019 according to Langlois. Langlois believes the RG would have developed relationships with GJ organisers and worked with them to ensure peaceful demonstrations. The police have been deliberately distanced from the people in order to enable the violence we are seeing since the 1st December 2018. Langlois stresses that many of the Police sympathise with the GJs but that the government is pushing the police to oppose the GJs which can only lead to catastophic consequences if allowed to continue.

Effectively the Gilets Jaunes have exposed Macron and his government for what it is. Macron is the President who was elected by the globalists, the capitalists and the ruling elite to protect their interests. A book recently published, authored by Francois-Xavier Bourmand, entitled “Emmanuel Macron the Banker who would be King” has investigated the corporatocracy who ensured Macron’s election win in order to expand their interests globally and to convert France from Republic into Plutocracy at the expense of the “dispensables”, the “little people”.

During one confrontation with a citizen at one of the Grand Debates, Macron is asked why he has failed his pre-election promise of “no more SDF (homeless) on the streets of France – 580 SDF died on the streets of France in 2018. Rather than show compassion for the poverty-stricken and homeless, Macron defends his policies with accountant-speak, informing the audience that the elite must be protected in order to provide jobs for the “poor”.

If indeed Macron’s coterie in government are pushing for confrontation between the people and the security forces and introducing increasingly repressive measures to up the pressure on the protestors rather than trying to defuse matters, it is really ten minutes before midnight in France. The insanity of Macron supporting the “uprising” in Venezuela while sanctioning vicious reprisals against his own people at home is glaringly obvious to all but Macron and his backers. That is because Macron is doing his job and his job is to manufacture the conditions in which the privileged, wealthy ruling elite can thrive and further their globalist ambitions which includes military adventurism and resource theft from target nations that include Venezuela and Syria.

Violence will escalate in France because it is state-sanctioned. Unless the police wake up to their manipulation by the state and join forces with the GJs there is a risk of a serious confrontation in the very near future. However, as historian Diana Johstone has said “For all the lamented decline in the school system, the French people today are as well-educated and reasonable as any population can be expected to be. If they are incapable of democracy, then democracy is impossible.”. There is still hope that the wave of discontent generated by the GJs may still bring down the globalist power structure and replace it with something more allied to the principles of the Republic of France.

***

Vanessa Beeley is an independent journalist, peace activist, photographer and associate editor at 21st Century Wire.

January 29, 2019 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Economics, Solidarity and Activism, Subjugation - Torture | , | Leave a comment

Will France pay for its nuclear testing in the Pacific Ocean?

By Sofia Pale – New Eastern Outlook – 28.01.2019

French Polynesia comprises a multitude of islands in the center of the Pacific Ocean, which are a part of France. The biggest and the most famous of these is the island of Tahiti. As in other “overseas” territories that remain under France’s dominion since colonial times, there is a powerful movement for independence in French Polynesia. Islanders take special issue with their parent country when it comes to numerous nuclear tests, which France conducted in the region in the second half of the 20th century.

Based on available data, during the period from 1966 to 1998, the French military performed 193 tests of nuclear weaponry in the atolls of Moruroa and Fangataufa, which comprise the Tuamotu Archipelago. It is public knowledge that 46 tests, conducted from 1966 to 1974, were atmospheric in nature, i.e. nuclear warheads were positioned in special towers on the Earth’s surface, on barges in lagoons, on aerostats in the air, and were also dropped from planes and detonated in the air. It is noteworthy that in 1963, the USSR, the USA and Great Britain signed the Treaty of Moscow, which banned nuclear weapon tests in the atmosphere, under water and in outer space, but France chose not to participate in this agreement.

The other 147 tests were performed underground from 1975 to 1998, with detonations taking place in 500 to 1,100-meter-deep closed vertical shafts.

It is worth mentioning that both atmospheric and underground nuclear tests were conducted on the two atolls of Moruroa and Fangataufa.

It is difficult to say which approach is more harmful to the environment and population’s health. A nuclear detonation in the atmosphere causes a rapid dispersion of radioactive substances over a large area, which soon have an effect on well-being of residents living in this area. After an underground test, a lot of harmful compounds could remain in a shaft, where the detonation took place, for quite a number of years. However with time, these substances, via various routes, such as underground waters, could pollute the surrounding area, and their effect may be more long-lasting and permanent than after-effects following a detonation in the atmosphere, which gradually subside with the help of winds and rains.

Either way, for a long time the French leadership asserted that the tests conducted in the Tuamotu Archipelago had no effect on either the environment or the residents of French Polynesia. However, even in the 1960s, many did not believe this to be true. For decades, the media have published increasingly frightening data about the state of the atoll environment and the fate of people who were in surrounding areas during nuclear testing. It was reported that French politicians and high-ranking military personnel often ignored warnings made by scientists about consequences of nuclear detonations. As a result, residents of near by areas were not evacuated, while French servicemen, who carried out these tests, did not have access to protective gear. In the 1980s the French military leadership attempted to convince the public that it possessed technology of a “clean bomb”, but few believed such statements. Even a stage-managed swim, taken by the French Defence Minister, Paul Quilès, in the lagoon of the Moruroa atoll 5 hours after yet another scheduled test in 1985 did not help matters (interestingly, he is alive and well at present).

In the end, the French Polynesian government managed to receive financial compensation from France, which makes annual payments for damage caused by nuclear testing. This money is a significant contribution to French Polynesia’s budget.

In addition, in 2001 two organizations were established in France. Their aims are to prove that the French government caused harm to a large number of people with its testing and to secure compensation for these people. These organizations are Association des vétérans des essais nucléaires (AVEN, Nuclear Test Veterans Association), which comprises French service personnel who took part in the testing, and Moruroa e tatou (Moruroa and us), which united workers from Moruroa testing sites together. For a number of years these bodies waged an information war against the French government, who continued to assert that the explosions in French Polynesia did not have any serious consequences.

In the end, France was forced to officially admit that thousands of people, including military personnel involved in nuclear testing as well as local residents, contracted serious diseases, including oncological, due to exposure to radiation.

In March 2009, France’s Minister of Defence, Hervé Morin, stated that overall, 150,000 residents of French Polynesia and France were affected by the French nuclear tests. In addition, he informed the public that the French Parliament was in the process of reviewing legislation on making annual targeted compensation payments to people who suffered from radiation exposure. France allocated 10 million euros for these disbursements per year. And individuals who happened to be near a nuclear testing site during detonations were no longer obliged to prove that their health problems stemmed from effects of radiation. The law was approved in 2010, however, according to data as of the end of 2018, only few people have been able to receive this compensation due to red tape. Based on some sources, in French Polynesia the number of such individuals is equivalent to dozens. Hence, the previously mentioned organizations with active support from the Assembly of French Polynesia (AFP, the local parliament) continued waging their battle.

As for the AFP, many of its members are supporters of independence of French Polynesia from France, and the damage sustained by the islands as a result of nuclear testing, is yet another trump card for them. The AFP organized numerous protests and information campaigns which demanded an admission that French Polynesia suffered from the actions taken by French military personnel. One of the key figures in this struggle became Oscar Temaru, a former President of French Polynesia, who held this post on five occasions and was the founder and leader of the party, the Front for the Liberation of Polynesia (FLP), currently known as Tavini Huiraatira (People’s Servant).

In 2013, France’s Ministry of Defence was forced to declassify a number of documents, which were immediately publicized by the media. These reports provide detailed descriptions of the effects of nuclear testing on the environment of the entire French Polynesia. For instance, the documents mention that after a series of nuclear tests, increased radiation levels exceeding safety limits were reported in Tahiti, an island in the center of French Polynesia, which is located more than 1,000 km from Moruroa and happens to be a popular international resort. Other islands of French Polynesia were reported to be in a similar situation. Furthermore, witnesses recall that there were instances when French authorities refused to evacuate residents from some French Polynesian islands that were within the fallout zone.

In November 2014, the AFP announced that it was determined to demand compensation from France for damage caused to the environment of French Polynesia, which it estimated to amount to more than 1 billion US dollars.

In October 2018, at the session of the UN Committee on Decolonization in New York, the previously mentioned politician, Oscar Temaru, affirmed that he and his allies had begun legal proceedings against France at the International Court of Justice in The Hague. France has been accused of crimes against humanity.

The same month, a court ruled to suspend Oscar Temaru from his duties within the AFP for a year as unexpectedly, fraudulent financial irregularities were uncovered during his election campaign. In November 2018, Oscar Temaru was detained for 12 hours in the course of an investigation on fund embezzlement from a local company that sponsored an opposition-friendly radio station. Now, the famous politician is awaiting trial, which will begin in June 2019. Members of the Front for the Liberation of Polynesia assert that evidence against Oscar Temaru was fabricated by the French authorities in order to ruin his reputation as a politician.

Regardless of whether these accusations are true or not, any focus on issues connected to nuclear testing in French Polynesia hurts France. As new facts about the events that transpired emerge, France’s actions in French Polynesia begin to look more and more unsightly. Environment-related crimes are among the most condemned in modern liberal European society. And the fact that France chose its “overseas” territory in the Pacific Ocean for its nuclear testing and failed to take necessary safety measures to protect local residents may be tied to even more deplorable acts, such as colonialism and racism.

Hence, France, long considered to be a bastion of European values, such as tolerance and multiculturalism, will most likely do everything in its power to reduce tensions surrounding Moruroa, Fangataufa and its nuclear program by, among other means, sidelining politicians such as Oscar Temaru.

In addition, it is important for France to dampen the separatist mood in French Polynesia so as not to lose dominion over the atolls of Moruroa and Fangataufa. After all, in order to accurately assess the environmental consequences of French nuclear testing in French Polynesia, and the potential threat to future generations of Polynesians, scientists need to conduct research in the cursed atolls. They need to determine quantities of harmful substances which remain underground, and to find possible routes that these compounds could use to spread from these two atolls to the rest of the region. Some also think that underground detonations could have resulted in appearance of cracks, which could connect the shafts where the tests were conducted with the ocean. However, scientists have not been able to access Moruroa and Fangataufa since France ratified the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) in 1998. Nuclear test sites have thus been sealed and are protected by armed security personnel who do not allow scientists and employees of environmental organizations to reach these areas.

Various experts have, on numerous occasions, expressed an opinion that France’s unwillingness to allow researchers to access these closed off testing sites is one of the reasons why France is trying to keep French Polynesia in its dominion.

It is well known that keeping these islands under France’s control is a significant expense for the French budget. The region is incapable of supporting itself even through tourism, which accounts for 25% of French Polynesia’s GDP and is a key economic sector for the nation. Paris is compelled to spend billions of euros on French Polynesia, which is why calls for its independence are even periodically echoed in France itself.

In addition, independence supporters who live in French Polynesia think that France is responsible for the region’s economic woes, as it prevents development of local businesses and sets high tariffs on imported and exported goods. Members of forces, opposing French rule, believe that the parent nation uses such means to artificially slow down economic development of French Polynesia for fear that, on gaining financial independence, the region will immediately attain political freedom. Then France will lose control over Moruroa and Fangataufa, and whatever secrets are hidden in these atolls will be revealed by the world media.

Now that the case has been taken to the International Court of Justice, France will need to do its best to maintain control of French Polynesia. If the AFP estimates damages, caused by nuclear testing, at 1 billion US dollars, then, most likely, France will pay this sum out. From now onwards, France will probably start making compensation payments due to veterans, affected by nuclear testing, and to common residents of French Polynesia, in accordance with the 2010 law, with much more effort. However, it is uncertain whether these measures will help France’s case, as this issue has already gained notoriety world-wide. For far too long, France ignored demands from people who suffered from consequences of nuclear tests. Perhaps if it had started making generous compensation payments to these individuals several years earlier, there would not be a court case against France at The Hague. As things stand now, the global community will have to make a legal and environmental assessment of the actions taken by France from 1966 to 1998. And it can not be ruled out that soon France will not only lose control over French Polynesia but its reputation as well.

Sofia Pale, PhD, Research Fellow of the Center for South-East Asia, Australia and Oceania of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

January 28, 2019 Posted by | Deception, Militarism, Timeless or most popular | , | Leave a comment

Iran Defies French Sanctions Threat, Accuses Paris of Destabilising Mideast

Sputnik – January 26, 2019

Iranian authorities have said repeatedly that the country’s rocketry and missile testing activities were in full compliance with international treaties, including the UN Security Council resolution governing the 2015 Iran nuclear deal.

Tehran will be forced to reconsider its relations with European powers if they impose any new sanctions against Iran over its missile testing activities, Foreign Ministry spokesman Bahram Qassemi has said.

“Iran has always sought to consolidate peace and stability in the region, and believes the mass sale of sophisticated and aggressive weapons by the US and some European countries, including France, have undermined stability and balance in the region,” the diplomat indicated, according to PressTV.

Qassemi’s remarks follow comments by French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian on Friday that Paris would impose fresh sanctions against Tehran if talks over Iran’s missile program don’t pan out. “We are ready, if the talks don’t yield results, to apply sanctions firmly, and they know it,” Le Drian said.

Emphasizing that Iran’s military capabilities were governed by a defensive “doctrine of deterrence,” Qassemi said that Iran had “designed its defence capabilities based on a realistic assessment of existing threats,” and would strengthen these capabilities if necessary.

“Iran’s missile capability is not negotiable, and this has been brought to the attention of the French side during the ongoing political dialogue between Iran and France,” Qassemi stressed.

Earlier, diplomats speaking to Reuters said that the EU was mulling new sanctions against Iran over its missile program, with the possible restrictions including asset freezes and travel bans on members of the Revolutionary Guards and individuals connected to the country’s missile program. The US, which unilaterally withdrew from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) Iran nuclear deal last May, has warned Iran not to engage in testing activities, and lobbied the EU to sanction Tehran.

Iranian officials have repeatedly indicated that their missile program was in line with the terms of the JCPOA and the UN resolution governing it, and indicated that Iran’s missile capabilities were not up for negotiation. Iran has amassed a large arsenal of conventional short, medium and long-range missile systems which it insists are purely defensive in nature. Last week, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo accused Tehran of “defying” the international community, and alleged that Iran was “pursuing enhanced missile capabilities that threaten Europe and the Middle East.”

January 26, 2019 Posted by | Wars for Israel | , , | Leave a comment

French Riot Police Deploy Semi-Automatic Weapons Against Yellow Vests As Macron Loses Grip On Country

By Tyler Durden – Zero Hedge – 01/15/2019

French riot police were pictured brandishing Heckler & Koch G36 semi-automatic rifles with 30-round magazines near the Arc de Triomphe in Paris on Saturday afternoon, reports the Daily Mail.

French riot police brandishing H&K G36 semi-automatic rifle

The deployment of rifles with presumably live ammunition visible through the magazine is an intimidating escalation as President Emmanuel Macron continues to lose his grip over France following nine weeks of country-wide protests by the Gilet Jaunes (Yellow Vest) movement.

The Gilet Jaunes began as a demonstration against a climate change-linked fuel tax, which quickly morphed into a general anti-government protest against the Macron administration and the world’s highest taxes. We’re sure France’s plege to send 1 billion euros to rebuild Iraq will help calm them down.

Yellow Vest demonstrator Gilles Caron told the Mail “The CRS with the guns were wearing riot control helmets and body armour – they were not a specialised firearms unit,” adding “Their job was simply to threaten us with lethal weapons in a manner which is very troubling. We deserve some explanations.”

A French National Police spokesman confirmed that the CRS were equipped with H&K G36s on Saturday, but would not discuss their operational use ‘for security reasons’.

A G36 was stolen from inside a police van during a similar Yellow Vest demonstration by the Arc de Triomphe on December 1.

A number of vehicles belonging to the 21stIntervention Company of the Paris Prefecture were stormed, suggesting that the theft was an opportunistic one during a day of intense violence, when the Arc de Triomphe itself was vandalised. –Daily Mail

Former French conservative minister Luc Ferry called for live rounds to be used against the Yellow Vest “thugs” who “beat up police,” such as this former pro heavyweight boxer, 37-year-old Christophe Dettinger who was arrested after squaring off with several French police officers.

#GiletsJaune très forte mobilisation à #Paris le peuple en colère force les barrages de police #Acte8 #ActeVIII #05janvier #05janvier2019 pic.twitter.com/BSnVj6glKL

— LINE PRESS (@LinePress) January 5, 2019

Ferry – a full time philosopher now, said: “What I don’t understand is that we don’t give the means to the police to put an end to this violence.” When challenged with the suggestion that the guns might lead to bloodshed, Ferry said: “So what? Listen, frankly, when you see guys beating up an unfortunate policeman on the floor, that’s when they should use their weapons once and for all! That’s enough.”

What the H&K G36 looks like in action:

January 15, 2019 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Subjugation - Torture | , | 1 Comment

Tehran calls on Paris to ‘stop repeating irresponsible claims’ on Iran’s missile program

Press TV – January 12, 2019

Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Bahram Qassemi has criticized the French Foreign Ministry’s provocative comments about Iran’s ballistic missile program, urging Paris to avoid repeating such “irresponsible and incorrect” claims regarding the Islamic Republic’s defensive programs.

“It is expected from France to stop echoing incorrect claims made by those who are against the JCPOA,” the senior diplomat further said, referring to Iran’s nuclear deal with world power in 2015, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, and in a clear reference to the United States that unilaterally withdrew from the landmark accord last year.

The Iranian diplomat made the remarks on Friday, hours after French Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Agnes von der Muhll called on Tehran to “immediately cease all ballistic missile-related activities designed to carry nuclear weapons, including tests using ballistic missile technology.”

“Contrary to the French Foreign Ministry spokeswoman’s claim, Iran’s missile program has neither been established for non-conventional purposes, nor the country’s natural right to strengthen its scientific and defensive capabilities as developed in the form of missile program is in violation of [UN Security Council] Resolution 2231,” said Qassemi.

The statement from the French ministry came just a day after Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said that Iran’s domestically-manufactured rockets would carry two new satellites into orbit in the coming weeks.

Earlier this month, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo claimed that Iran’s planned launch of space rockets and missiles breaches Resolution 2231 that endorsed the JCPOA.

Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif dismissed Pompeo’s claim, saying Washington has already violated that resolution and thus cannot “lecture” Tehran on it.

“We strongly believe that any attempt to induce and impose a wrong interpretation of Resolution 2231 regarding Iran’s missile program is an irresponsible act,” Qassemi further said, stressing that in any part of the resolution the Islamic Republic has not been prevented from developing defensive and conventional missile program and those with scientific application.

He also reiterated that Iran’s home-grown missile program is defensive, national and conventional, adding that it is not only legitimate but also “the Iranian nation’s natural right.”

Since its JCPOA exit in May, the administration of US President Donald Trump has unleashed its “toughest ever” sanctions against Iran. It has also warned of severe penalties for companies that evade the bans and engage in business dealings with the Islamic Republic.

January 12, 2019 Posted by | Wars for Israel | , | Leave a comment

Trudeau’s vacuous Haiti declaration ignores revolution, slavery

By Yves Engler · January 9, 2019

Justin Trudeau likes making high-minded sounding statements that make him seem progressive but change little. The Prime Minister’s declaration marking “Haiti’s Independence Day” was an attempt of the sort, which actually demonstrates incredible ignorance, even antipathy, towards the struggle against slavery.

In his statement commemorating 215 years of Haitian Independence, the Prime Minister failed to mention slavery, Haiti’s revolution and how that country was born of maybe the greatest example of liberation in the history of humanity. From the grips of the most barbaric form of plantation economy, the largely African-born slaves delivered a massive blow to slavery, colonialism and white supremacy.

Before the 1791 revolt the French colony of Saint Domingue was home to 450,000 people in bondage. At its peak in the 1750s the ‘Pearl of the Antilles’ provided as much as 50 per cent  of France’s GNP. Super profits were made from using African slaves to produce sugar, cocoa, coffee, cotton, tobacco, indigo and other commodities.

The slaves put a stop to that with a merciless struggle that took advantage of divisions between ‘big white’ land/slave owners, racially empowered though poorer ‘small whites’ and a substantial ‘mulatto’ land/slave owning class. The revolt rippled through the region and compelled the post-French Revolution government in Paris to abolish slavery in its Caribbean colonies. Between 1791 and 1804 ‘Haitians’ would defeat tens of thousands of French, British and Spanish troops (Washington backed France financially), leading to the world’s first and only successful large-scale slave revolution. The first nation of free people in the Americas, Haiti established a slave-free state 60 years before the USA’s emancipation proclamation. (It wasn’t until after this proclamation ending slavery that the US recognized Haiti’s independence.)

The Haitian Revolution’s geopolitical effects were immense. It stimulated the Louisiana Purchase and London’s 1807 Act for the Abolition of the Slave Trade. The revolutionary state also provided important support to South American independence movements.

Canada’s rulers at the time opposed the slave revolt. In a bid to crush the ex-slaves before their example spread to the English colonies, British forces invaded Haiti in 1793. Halifax, which housed Britain’s primary naval base in North America, played its part in London’s efforts to capture one of the world’s richest colonies (for the slave owners). Much of the Halifax-based squadron arrived on the shores of the West Indies in 1793, and many of the ships that set sail to the Caribbean at this time were assembled in the town’s naval yard. Additionally, a dozen Nova Scotia privateers captured at least 57 enemy vessels in the West Indies between 1793 and 1805. “Essential tools of war until the rise of large steam navies”, the privateers also wanted to protect the British Atlantic colonies’ lucrative Caribbean market decimated by French privateers. For a half-century Nova Scotia and Newfoundland generated great wealth selling cheap, high-protein cod to keep millions of “enslaved people working 16 hours a day”.

A number of prominent Canadian-born (or based) individuals fought to capture and re-establish slavery in the French colonies. Dubbed the “Father of the Canadian Crown”, Prince Edward Duke of Kent departed for the West Indies aboard a Halifax gunboat in 1793. As a Major General, he led forces that captured Guadalupe, St. Lucia and Martinique. Today, many streets and monuments across the country honour a man understood to have first applied the term “Canadian” to both the English and French inhabitants of Upper and Lower Canada.

Other “Canadians” played a part in Britain’s effort to corner the lucrative Caribbean slave plantations. Born into a prominent Québec military family, Charles Michel Salaberry “was part  of successful invasions of Saint-Dominique [Haiti], Guadeloupe and Martinique.” A number of monuments commemorate Salaberry, including the city in Québec named Salaberry-de-Valleyfield.

To commemorate Haitian independence the Secretary General of the Caribbean Community, Irwin LaRocque, also released a statement. Unlike Trudeau, LaRocque “congratulated” Haiti and described the day as “a timely reminder of the historic importance of the Haitian Revolution and its continued significance as a symbol of triumph over adversity in the quest for liberty, equality and control of national destiny.”

Trudeau should have said something similar and acknowledged Canadians’ role in the slave trade and crimes against the free people of Haiti.

January 10, 2019 Posted by | Progressive Hypocrite, Timeless or most popular | , , , | 1 Comment

France Moves To Ban All Protests As PM Announces Major Crackdown On Yellow Vests

By Tyler Durden – Zero Hedge – 01/09/2019

France is signaling it’s making preparations for a massive new crackdown on the gilets jaunes or “yellow vests” anti-government protests that have gripped the country for seven weeks. A new law under consideration could make any demonstration illegal to begin with if not previously approved by authorities, in an initiative already being compared to the pre-Maiden so-called “dictatorship law” in Ukraine.

In the name of reigning in the violence that has recently included torching structures along the prestigious Boulevard Saint Germain in Paris, and smashing through the gates of government ministry buildings, the French government appears set to enact something close to a martial law scenario prohibiting almost any protest and curtailing freedom of speech.

Prime Minister Edouard Philippe presented the new initiative to curtail the violence and unrest while targeting “troublemakers” and banning anonymity through wearing masks on French TV channel TF1 on Monday. He said the law would give police authority crack down on “unauthorized demonstrations” at a moment when police are already arresting citizens for merely wearing a yellow vest, even if they are not directly engaged in protests in some cases.

PM Philippe said the government would support a “new law punishing those who do not respect the requirement to declare [protests], those who take part in unauthorized demonstrations and those who arrive at demonstrations wearing face masks”.

Philippe’s tone during the statements was one of the proverbial “the gloves are off” as he described the onus would be on “the troublemakers, and not taxpayers, to pay for the damage caused” to businesses and property.

“Those who question our institutions will not have the last word,” he added.

However, if anything the protests have grown fiercer in response to any police crackdown or violence against demonstrators. Should all protests be banned under the new law, it could be the start of more violent riots gaining steam, as what began Nov. 17 as anger over fuel tax hikes has now turned into rage at President Emmanuel Macron and policies that seem to favor the urban elite.

Other yellow vest inspired protests previously broke out across Europe, and in perhaps a sign of things to come a video from The Netherlands of a woman pushing her baby in a stroller being arrested by police apparently for merely wearing a yellow vest is going viral.

In the video, police confront the woman in what appears a quiet neighborhood far away from any visible protest. Police were photographed alongside the baby on the street as the mother was dragged away.

Image via journalist Sotiri Dimpinoudis

With the French prime minister now announcing coming draconian measures banning all protest, this is precisely the horrific scene that could begin to be repeated across France and the EU.

In total at least six people have died and over 1,400 people injured during the French protests, with thousands arrested weekly, according to international reports. Over the weekend some 50,000 protesters continued demonstrating in multiple cities, leading to significant clashes in Paris, Bordeaux and Rouen. A number of commentators have noted that though there appear fewer demonstrators compared to December, there appears a serious uptick in violent acts on the part of both demonstrators and police response.

January 9, 2019 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Solidarity and Activism | , , | 1 Comment

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