Washington is deliberately prolonging the Ukraine conflict and seeking to profit from it, while “smearing” Beijing with false accusations, the Chinese deputy envoy to the UN told the Security Council on Monday.
During the meeting about the Ukraine conflict, Ambassador Geng Shuang addressed US claims that China was supplying Russia with weapons components, calling them “groundless” and “totally unacceptable.”
“China is not the creator, or a party to the Ukraine crisis,” said Geng. “Nor have we provided lethal weapons to any party in the conflict. We have not done… what the US has done, which is to deliberately prolong the fighting and profit from the crisis. We will not do that.”
The Chinese diplomat warned that the fighting in Ukraine is being prolonged by large quantities of weapons and ammunition of “expanding variety and scope,” supplied to Kiev by the US and its allies. Meanwhile, Beijing has consistently advocated for a ceasefire and a diplomatic settlement of the crisis.
“Weapons may end wars, but they do not bring about lasting peace,” Geng told the Security Council.
He reiterated Beijing’s position that US and EU sanctions on Chinese companies doing business with Russia are unilateral and illegitimate.
“China has a right to carry out normal economic and trade cooperation with all countries in the world, including with Russia, and such cooperation should not be interfered with or undermined,” the diplomat said. “We urge the US to stop attacking, smearing, and slandering China and spreading fabrications, and stop unilateral sanctions against, and unreasonable suppression of, Chinese enterprises.”
While the US and its allies have poured over $200 billion worth of weapons, equipment and ammunition into Ukraine – while insisting that does not make them party to the hostilities – they have repeatedly accused China of helping the Russian military by exporting dual-use goods, and threatened Beijing with sanctions.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry addressed the accusations directly last week, telling Washington that “diverting attention and shifting the blame is not the right way” to solve the conflict.
On Monday, Geng added that the US needs to “stop taking advantage of the Ukraine crisis to advance its geopolitical strategy, provoke bloc confrontation, and serve its own agenda.”
May 20, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Economics, Militarism, Progressive Hypocrite | China, Russia, Ukraine, United States |
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Moscow will not carry out tests of its nuclear weapons as long as Washington refrains from doing so, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov said on Monday.
Ryabkov’s statement followed a US announcement last week that it had performed a successful subcritical nuclear experiment at the PULSE facility in Nevada. According to the National Nuclear Security Administration, the trials allowed it to collect “essential data” on atomic warheads “without the use of nuclear explosive testing.”
“We are looking closely at what is happening at the American nuclear test site. Of course, we register and monitor all public signals coming from the US administration in this area,” the deputy foreign minister said.
Russia understands that such subcritical experiments are being done “as part of testing of the performance of the relevant components and systems of the US nuclear arsenal,” the diplomat added.
Washington has previously said that subcritical experiments are not prohibited under the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT), which forbids nuclear test explosions in all environments. Both the US and Russia signed the 1996 accord, but stopped short of ratifying it.
“Our stance remains unchanged: as long as the US does not conduct actual nuclear tests, Russia will also adhere to this position,” Ryabkov stated.
However, the deputy foreign minister stressed that “signals” coming from Washington suggest the possible further development of American nuclear weapons “including not only delivery vehicles, but also the warheads themselves.” Moscow treats this information “seriously” and takes it into account while planning its actions.
Earlier this month, Russia announced plans to test its military’s ability to deploy tactical nuclear weapons “in the near future.” According to the Russian Defense Ministry, the exercises were ordered by President Vladimir Putin in response to the continued “power politics” pursued by the US and its allies against Moscow.
The ministry statement said the West openly declares its support for “terrorist acts” by Ukraine against Russia and “directly contributes” to such attacks. Increasingly powerful weapons are being supplied to Kiev by its foreign backers, the statement continued, singling out deliveries of US-made ATACMS missiles capable of “striking targets deep inside Russian territory.”
Moscow’s statement was preceded by a suggestion by Poland of potentially hosting US nuclear weapons, and remarks by French President Emmanuel Macron about the possibility of sending French and other NATO soldiers to Ukraine.
May 20, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Militarism | Russia, United States |
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As Ukraine’s defeat in the war moves closer, the neocons are desperate to draw the US further into the fight. Over the weekend, former US State Department official Victoria Nuland told ABC News that the US must help facilitate Ukrainian missile attacks deep inside Russian territory. The Biden Administration has to this point avoided involvement in such attacks, likely because Russian president Vladimir Putin has warned that Russia will strike any facility that supplies or facilitates strikes inside of Russia, wherever they may be.
It’s a clear warning from a nuclear power, but as Nuland and her fellow neocons see their Ukraine project failing, they demand escalation. This is just what they did in their previous disastrous projects like the Iraq War, the attacks on Syria and Libya, and the 20-year occupation of Afghanistan. For them the failure is never because it was a bad idea in the first place, but that not enough lives and resources were poured into that bad idea to create a good outcome.
But Russia is no Iraq nor is it Libya. This time they are playing with World War III and nuclear destruction and no one in DC seems concerned.
Last Thursday the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Charles Q. Brown, said that NATO trainers deployed within Ukraine was inevitable. “We’ll get there eventually, over time,” he said. This, of course, is exactly how we got the Vietnam War, but Russia in 2024 is hardly late -1950s Vietnam. Russia of today is a country that can fight back and can project military power all the way to the source, which means the United States.
Is Nuland’s Ukraine project worth dying in a nuclear war over?
The whole US involvement in this proxy war has been based on lie after lie. They said we had to help Ukraine defeat Russia because democracy itself was at stake. Then Ukrainian president Zelensky cancelled elections, so they told us we have to help Ukraine defeat Russia because Putin won’t stop there – he’ll soon be marching through Berlin, London, and maybe even New York!
Doesn’t it remind you of how the neocons were warning us that Saddam was going to attack the US mainland with drones and that he was operating mobile weapons labs? Anything to get the public on board for their war.
The fact is the neocons and warmongers lie constantly. They will do whatever it takes to get their wars and sadly we do not have an independent media in the US to challenge them on their lies. Our media is so closely tied to the military-industrial complex that it is also a stakeholder in war profits, so they aren’t about to rock the boat.
Anyone who thinks we cannot get sucked into another war like we were with George W. Bush’s lie that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction is not paying attention. It is happening again, in real time.
The fact is we live in a deeply corrupt society dominated by individuals who do not believe in truth. When you don’t believe in truth you will have no qualms about manipulating others to do your will. So unless they are stopped, neocons like Nuland will demand more attacks on Russia, more US troops in Ukraine, more escalation. Until Russia fights back. Then it will all be over. Is this what we want?
May 20, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Militarism | Russia, Ukraine, United States |
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For years, the Palestinian people, at all levels of organization and struggle, have been demanding that the leaders of the Zionist regime are held accountable in international courts, including and especially the International Criminal Court, for their ongoing genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity in occupied Palestine. Today, on 20 May 2024, ICC prosecutor Karim Khan announced his intention to seek arrest warrants against not only the Zionist war criminals Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant, but also against the Palestinian resistance leaders Yahya Sinwar, Mohammed Deif and Ismail Haniyeh.
Let us be clear: There is no equation to be made between the legitimate resistance of the Palestinian people and its leadership, including Yahya Sinwar, Mohammed Deif and Ismail Haniyeh, and the illegitimate Zionist colonizer. The attempt to equate victim and perpetrator is a fundamental injustice, not the pursuit of long-denied justice.
It is certainly true that the Palestinian resistance recognized this risk, especially given the powerful political interests involved and the track record of the ICC in prosecuting Africans and now, enemies of the imperialist West. In 2014, when the Palestinian Authority acceded to the Rome Statute, and again in 2024, the Palestinian resistance leadership, particularly Hamas, the Islamic Resistance Movement, has stated its openness to international investigations and its willingness to face the ICC if there is an attempt to meaningfully pursue justice against the occupiers and genocidaires of Palestine and their imperialist backers and accomplices.
However, the fact that the resistance is, as always, willing to sacrifice for Palestine, to be subjected to injustice so that their people may see freedom, does not make Khan’s actions any more just, acceptable or fair, nor does it make them legally valid.
Khan’s repeated references to the “rights” of Zionist colonizers, while failing to address Palestinian rights, as well as his legally invalid reference to the so-called “right of ‘Israel’ to defend itself,” when an occupier and colonizer has no right to defend itself against the people it is occupying and colonizing, highlight the ongoing bias of the ICC Prosecutor and his embrace of an imperialist framework for the operations of the Court. He made no mention of the right of the Palestinian people to resist and to liberate themselves through armed struggle, despite its broad support in international law.
It is, in fact, only because of the Resistance, because of the willingness of the resistance fighters, surrounded and nurtured by its popular cradle, that these arrest warrants for the Zionist war criminals are even being proposed and considered. It is the bravery, creativity and revolutionary steadfastness of the Palestinian people and their Resistance, including and particularly through the armed struggle, that has reset the balance of power to the extent that the crimes of the occupier can no longer be greeted with pure impunity.
Every legal achievement has been brought about not by the objective power or application of law, but by the shifting of reality brought about by the Palestinian armed struggle, accompanied by the regional and global forces of Resistance, especially the Lebanese resistance, the Yemeni armed forces, people, government and AnsarAllah movement, stretching through Iraq, Syria and Iran. It also speaks to the growing international popular cradle of the resistance, from student encampments to mass demonstrations to direct actions at arms manufacturers, that are making it clear that business as usual inside the imperial core is impossible so long as the genocide continues.
It is clear that 7 October changed the world. While Khan seeks to pretend that history began on 7 October and ignore the lengthy history of colonialism, ongoing Nakba and ongoing genocide since 1948, the Palestinian resistance made clear on 7 October that the horizon of true decolonization was opened in Palestine, that it was possible not only to imagine but to achieve a Palestine liberated from Zionism and a region liberated from imperialism.
The choice to seek warrants against Netanyahu and Gallant, while not against Benny Gantz, Gadi Eisenkot, Itamar Ben-Gvir, Isaac Herzog, Herzi Halevi and other war criminals, also indicates its bias toward appeasing the political leadership of imperialist powers. Of course, Netanyahu and Gallant are genocidal war criminals whose direction of the current genocide in Palestine cannot be overstated. They have the blood of over 40,000 Palestinians on their hands in just the past seven months alone.
However, the omissions seem to seek to clear the road for a Gantz (or other similarly affiliated) prime ministership of the Zionist regime. The fact that various imperialist powers, and even a significant sector of the Zionist security establishment, think that Netanyahu is not good for the future of the Zionist and imperialist project is not a secret; they believe that other figures are far more trustworthy to secure their prime colonial project in the region. They believe that Netanyahu is securing his own political future and protection from prosecution at the expense of the future of the Zionist project in the region, and this has been one of the major causes of the growing unrest and internal disarray within the “Israeli” regime.
The application for arrest warrants indicates that imperialist powers, including the United States and the European Union, are very worried about the future of the Zionist colony in the region and recognize that it is on the road to its defeat, removal and dissolution.
It must be noted that these imperialist powers, especially the United States, which has threatened a war if its leaders are indicted, refuse to be held accountable before the ICC, a fate they have traditionally deemed acceptable only for the targets of imperialism, especially Africans. The Zionist colonial project in Palestine has always been genocidal. Its existence is a war crime and a crime against humanity. The ICC prosecutor’s application for arrest warrants do not even begin to touch the magnitude of its crimes in Palestine.
These omissions are particularly egregious given that the ICC’s limited mandate in Palestine extends back to 2014, yet no crimes before 7 October 2023 are considered in Khan’s decision to seek these arrest warrants. This comes alongside the decision to charge three Palestinian leaders (of the legitimate resistance) as opposed to two Zionist officials (of the illegitimate settler colony and imperialist outpost), and to proffer eight charges against Palestinians, vs. seven against Zionists; and to fail to seek any charges under Article 6 of the Rome Statute, which covers genocide, against the Zionist war criminals.
It is particularly outrageous that while Khan seeks to charge Palestinian resistance leaders with “torture,” he has failed to seek any such charges against the Zionist regime, which is currently imprisoning and torturing over 9,400 Palestinian prisoners. Sixteen Palestinian prisoners’ martyrdom has been documented since 7 October 2023, while at least 27 Palestinians have been martyred in the concentration and torture camps for Palestinian civilians kidnapped from Gaza at Sde Teiman. Palestinian and international sources – and even Zionist whistleblowers – have repeatedly documented and exposed the horrific conditions, medical abuse, brutal torture, forced amputations and starvation being used against Palestinian detainees in both these concentration camps and the Zionist prison system. The photos of Palestinian detainees released after months in prison – such as those of Omar Assaf and Imad Barghouti – underline the level of mistreatment and torture that has become standard in the Zionist jails.
As a counter to the failure to seek to indict Gantz, his fellow members of the “war cabinet” and IOF chief Halevi – let alone all of the Zionist officials responsible for the crimes against humanity and genocide in Palestine since 2014, let alone 1948 — we see the indictment of Ismail Haniyeh, as a political leader of the Palestinian resistance. The pursuit of an indictment against Haniyeh appears to be an attempt to undermine Palestinian presence in current ceasefire negotiations and to add another level of pressure to the Palestinian resistance to accept permanent Zionist and imperialist occupation in Gaza.
It also makes clear that the indictments of Zionist war criminals are selective, while Palestinian resistance leadership is to be targeted in total. We have all confidence in the resistance’s willingness to sacrifice, ability to defend itself brilliantly in court and to win decisively in any fair trial.
The choice of charges against the resistance leaders (exceeding by one those against the Zionists in all cases), invoking numerous debunked and propagandistic Zionist claims, including “rape” and “extermination,” while failing to pursue charges of genocide and apartheid against the Zionist war criminals, further underlines this bias.
We all look forward to seeing Netanyahu and Gallant in the dock and appreciate this clear crack in the armor of impunity for the Zionist regime. We know that it is they who constantly travel around the world to receive billions of dollars in support from their imperial sponsors. At the same time, it is also clear that the ICC Prosecutor is not acting as a truly neutral party and is instead carrying out the directives of imperialist powers who would not accept any charges against the Zionist leadership without a “both sides” clause targeting the already criminalized and repressed Palestinian resistance. The equation of the indigenous resistance with the illegitimate colonizer is part of the minimization of genocide rather than its prosecution.
It is further clear that the ICC is not an institution into which we can place trust, as evidenced by its own history and failures to hold accountable any of those responsible for the horrific attacks on Iraq and Afghanistan, Libya and Syria; the starving of Venezuela through sanctions and blockades, the extraction of wealth in Africa, the attempted mass starvation and genocide in Yemen, the ongoing destabilization and destruction of Haiti.
The ICC has served for too long as a weapon of colonialism rather than a tribunal of justice. We trust the revolutionary justice of the victorious Palestinian people. There can be no equation of colonizer and colonized, of the executioner and the victim.
Glory and victory to the Palestinian resistance, to the Lebanese and Yemeni resistance, to all of the forces of resistance in the region and the world.
Imperialism and Zionism will be defeated, and from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.
May 20, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Progressive Hypocrite, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | European Union, Human rights, ICC, Israel, Palestine, United States, Zionism |
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One person has been killed and “many” others wounded in a Ukrainian drone strike on a minibus carrying civilians in Russia’s Kherson Region, Governor Vladimir Saldo said on Sunday.
The attack took place in the village of Radensk on Sunday morning, Saldo wrote on Telegram. The UAV targeted a vehicle with workers on their way to harvest strawberries, he added.
“The explosion killed one person. There are many wounded, who are receiving necessary medical assistance,” the governor said.
Russian regions have seen several attacks on buses by Ukrainian drones since the start of this month.
On May 6, seven people were killed and dozens wounded after UAVs targeted two minibuses carrying farmers near the village of Beryozovka in Belgorod Region.
Two days earlier, two people were injured when a drone struck a bus in the village of Voznesenka, also in Belgorod Region.
Russia’s Defense Ministry said on Sunday that “a number of attempts by the Kiev regime to carry out terrorist attacks” on Russian territory with the use of US-supplied ATACMS missiles and drones were prevented overnight.
Nine ATACMS were shot down by air defenses over Crimea, while a total of 57 drones were intercepted in the Krasnodar Region, the ministry said. Three UAVs were destroyed in Belgorod Region, it added.
May 19, 2024
Posted by aletho |
War Crimes | Human rights, Russia, Ukraine, United States |
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CEO of the Center for Integrated Unmanned Solutions spoke to Sputnik and explained that Ukrainian drone operators with combat experience will be highly sought after by American private military companies, as well as even more sinister organizations such as global terrorist networks.
The transfer of operating experience of FPV drones from Ukrainian troops to American private military companies and beyond will be a key factor of the global terrorist threat, Dmitry Kuzyakin, the general director of the Center for Integrated Unmanned Solutions, told Sputnik.
“The release of a huge number of Ukrainian servicemen with combat experience on FPV systems, which will ultimately lead to an increase in the global terrorist threat, is a major challenge to international security. They may already be transferring their [combat] experience to US private military companies, and further recipients are hard to predict – international terrorist organizations, criminal networks and so on,” Kyzyakin said.
The expert recalled that during his last visit to Kiev, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken inspected the drone production facility due to the fact that Ukrainian troops have extensive experience with FPV drones combat use.
“The FPV drone itself does not require any special know-how. We have dismantled US, European, Ukrainian drones, and we produce drones ourselves. Actually, any country from the US to Somalia can produce drones… Having combat experience is quite different, no one in the world except Russia and Ukraine actually has it,” he stressed.
Kuzyakin believes that the US is considering evacuating Ukrainian FPV drone operators from the front lines to train American troops.
“The experience of fighting not on a proving ground, but in blood and dirt. The experience of survival and victory. And more importantly, the experience of failure and loss. Apart from anything else, Blinken came for FPV drone operators, who will be evacuated by American private military companies so that they can train [US soldiers],” Dmitry Kuzyakin summed up.
May 19, 2024
Posted by aletho |
False Flag Terrorism, Militarism | Ukraine, United States |
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The West only risks further escalation by arming and encouraging Kiev to strike Russian territory, the Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Friday.
The warning comes as Ukrainian strikes against Russian cities intensify on the backdrop of Kiev losing ground in the Kharkov Region.
“The profile of the American and British handlers of the [Ukrainian President Vladimir] Zelensky regime is clearly visible behind these barbaric attacks,” Zakharova told reporters. “They are not only providing longer-range missiles and heavy weapons, but are giving a green light to their use against Russia.”
“Once again, we would like to unequivocally warn Washington, London, Brussels and other Western capitals, as well as Kiev, which is under their control, that they are playing with fire. Russia will not leave such encroachments on its territory unanswered,” the spokeswoman stressed.
On Thursday and Friday, the Ukrainian troops launched a combined assault on Crimea, Krasnodar and other Russian regions using UAVs and naval drones. According to the Russian Defense Ministry, more than 100 drones were intercepted mid-air, while six unmanned boats were destroyed by the Black Sea Fleet.
During its briefing on Friday, the MOD added that over the course of the week Russian troops had intercepted dozens of US-made ATACMS missiles, as well as nearly 200 rockets, including projectiles fired from US-made HIMARS and Czech-made Vampire launchers. The Hammer guided bombs delivered by France, the Storm Shadow cruise missiles made by the UK, and nearly 330 UAVs were also used in the attacks, it said.
A total of 19 civilians were killed in Russia’s Belgorod region on May 12 alone, Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said. On Friday, Gladkov wrote on Telegram that a Ukrainian drone hit a civilian car, killing a mother and her four-year-old daughter.
On Friday, Russian President Vladimir Putin reiterated that the shelling of residential areas is pushing Moscow to create a buffer zone along the border with Ukraine. “If this continues, we will be forced to create a security zone. This is what we are doing,” he said during his trip to China.
Last month, the New York Times cited senior Pentagon officials as saying that the US had allowed Ukraine to use ATACMS missiles against targets in Crimea. British Defense Secretary Grant Shapps confirmed to journalists on Tuesday that London allows Kiev to strike Crimea with UK-supplied weapons.
The largely Russian-speaking peninsula voted in 2014 to leave Ukraine and join Russia following the Western-backed coup in Kiev that took place earlier that year.
May 18, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Militarism, War Crimes | Russia, UK, United States |
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Around 48,000 workers at 10 universities affiliated with the University of California system and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in the state of California, USA, voted to begin a strike in defense of the right to protest for Palestine.
This follows campaigns of arrests and attacks on students in tents, who are demanding an end to the Israeli aggression on Gaza, following the university administration’s failure to address complaints regarding the handling of pro-Palestinian protests.
Activists promised that the union vote on starting the strike next Monday represents a historic decision that may push unions in other universities and labor unions to strike in defense of students’ right to protest for the Palestinian cause.
The announcement of the strike comes two days after the vote of the academic workers at the University of California, where the union considered it a result of changes to the university system’s policies regarding freedom of expression and discrimination in pro-Palestinian speeches, and allowing attacks on protesters during their sit-ins.
In this context, high schools in the state of Wisconsin joined schools in the state of Illinois in student protests at American universities, by walking out of classrooms after the second or third period, and organizing marches inside schools to demand an end to the aggression on Gaza.
May 18, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Full Spectrum Dominance, Solidarity and Activism | Israel, Palestine, United States, Zionism |
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Embroiled in coast to coast lawsuits from the alleged harms of their COVID vaccine, Astrazeneca is receiving massive public backlash after admitting their shot can cause blood clots in court proceedings. Jefferey Jaxen also reveals payments made by the pharma giant to doctors in the UK, including celebrity pediatrician, Dr. Ranj Singh who strongly advocated for the now pulled product.
This week, ICAN lead counsel, Aaron Siri, Esq. filed a historic lawsuit on behalf of Utah mother, Brianne Dressen, a patient who participated in the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine clinical trial. The lawsuit states she was severely injured and is now suing the drug manufacturer in a lawsuit that is the first of its kind in the U.S.. Hear how the progressive neuropathy she developed from the drug trial has shattered her life, and the organization she launched to advocate for those like her.
May 18, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Deception, Video | COVID-19 Vaccine, European Union, UK, United States |
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A longtime aide to former National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Director Anthony Fauci allegedly boasted in emails about his ability to evade public records requests and his intention to delete any potential “smoking guns,” a congressional hearing revealed Thursday.
Former National Institutes of Health Acting Director Lawrence Tabak testified before the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic, which has been investigating an American research organization at the center of suspicions that the COVID-19 pandemic may have resulted from a lab accident in Wuhan.
The hearing follows an announcement Wednesday that this organization — EcoHealth Alliance, helmed by President Peter Daszak — has had its federal funding suspended and could be on track to be debarred from federal funding for years. The enforcement action stems from EcoHealth’s failure to adequately oversee the research it subcontracted to the Wuhan Institute of Virology. This research included experiments that made SARS-related coronaviruses more dangerous. Daszak testified before the committee earlier this month.
EcoHealth’s research was underwritten by NIAID — placing Fauci and his aides in the spotlight too. The scrutiny of EcoHealth and NIAID has revealed that Daszak had a close connection to Fauci’s inner circle in the senior advisor to the NIAID director, David Morens.
Morens told the committee in a transcribed interview that Daszak is one of his oldest friends.
Now evidence has surfaced suggesting that Morens evaded the Freedom of Information Act — which requires that records from federal agencies be made public with limited exceptions — and that an unidentified public records official with the NIH helped him to do so.
NIH and NIAID did not immediately reply to request for comment.
Morens boasted about the ability to “make emails disappear” even after a FOIA request had been submitted, according to the committee.
The emails were revealed in questions by House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer, R-Ky.
“Dr. David Morens, a senior advisor to Fauci for decades, wrote in an email to Dr. Daszak, ‘I learned from our FOIA lady here how to make emails disappear after I am FOIA’d but before the search starts. So I think we are all safe. Plus I deleted most of those earlier emails after sending them to Gmail,’” Comer said Thursday. “Is that consistent with NIH document retention policies?”
“It is not,” Tabak answered.
Asked if the NIH FOIA office instructs employees on how to evade FOIA, Tabak answered, “I certainly hope not.”
U.S. Right to Know is among the organizations that have submitted FOIAs to the NIH for emails from Morens about information with potential relevance to the origins of COVID-19 and is litigating against the NIH over its failure to comply with a January 2022 FOIA request for Morens’s records.
In a separate email, Morens said that he intended to delete any records or emails that might constitute a “smoking gun.”
“He also later wrote Dr. Daszak, ‘We are all smart enough to know to never have smoking guns. And if we did we wouldn’t put them in emails. And if we found them we would delete them,’” Comer said. “Is that consistent with NIH document retention policies?”
“It is not,” Tabak again replied.
According to Comer, Daszak and Morens also collaborated in crafting public messages in response to emails set to be released by NIH under FOIA.
The emails described by Comer undermine Tabak’s prepared testimony at the hearing in which he claimed the NIH is committed to transparency and following the science on the question of the origin of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Tabak’s testimony sets the stage for Morens to testify next week. Morens supplied the committee with 30,000 emails the day before Daszak testified before the committee on May 1.
Morens wrote in an email to Daszak in 2021 that he communicates on Gmail “because my NIH email is FOIA’d constantly,” The Intercept previously reported.
“Just send to any of my addresses and I will delete anything I don’t want to see in the New York Times,” Morens wrote.
Looped into this email chain were several virologists who have cast the lab origin hypothesis as a conspiracy theory in the press. These virologists included University of Sydney virologist Edward Holmes, Scripps Institute virologist Kristian Andersen, and Tulane University virologist Robert Garry, who have also been investigated by the committee for their role in an influential paper that dismissed the idea SARS-CoV-2 could have been engineered without disclosing the involvement of Fauci and former NIH Director Francis Collins.
The committee released emails earlier this month showing that Daszak informed Morens of his intention to voluntarily release only enough records to stave off a subpoena for more. The committee is now demanding more documents from Daszak, according to Subcommittee Chair Brad Wenstrup, R-Ohio.
The committee’s investigation is building up to the testimony of Fauci on June 3.
Tabak confirmed Thursday that the NIAID did indeed fund gain-of-function research on coronaviruses in Wuhan through EcoHealth Alliance according to the colloquial understanding.
According to the policy in place from 2014 to 2018 — the “U.S. Government Gain-of-Function Deliberative Process and Research Funding Pause on Selected Gain-of-Function Research Involving Influenza, MERS, and SARS viruses” — the definition of gain-of-function research at the time of the experiments involving the Wuhan Institute of Virology included “research that improves the ability of a pathogen to cause disease.”
Grant reports demonstrate that “chimeric” or combined coronaviruses studied by EcoHealth and the Wuhan Institute of Virology caused more severe disease in mice engineered to express human receptors than the backbone virus.
However, Tabak downplayed the risk posed by these chimeric viruses because they were bat coronaviruses, though the public literature described one of these viruses as “poised for human emergence.”
Fauci repeatedly denied that NIAID funded gain-of-function research in Wuhan in high-profile exchanges with Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., in 2021.
“Sen. Paul, you do not know what you are talking about, quite frankly, and I want to say that officially,” Fauci said in a July 2021 hearing.
Tabak confirmed in the hearing Wednesday that in October 2021 the NIH communications office changed the definition of “gain-of-function research” on the NIH website.
Asked to identify which scientist at NIH made or vetted the decision, Tabak could not identify any particular official.
May 17, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Deception | Covid-19, EcoHealth Alliance, NIAID, NIH, United States |
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Sonoma State University’s President, Mike Lee, has been placed on administrative leave for announcing an agreement with pro-Palestinian activists to pursue an academic boycott of Israeli institutions and divestment strategies.
California State University Chancellor Mildred Garcia said yesterday that Mike Lee was put on leave for accepting the demands of protesting students without obtaining “proper approvals.”
She added in a statement published on the website of the University of California, to which Sonoma University is affiliated: “For now, because of this insubordination and consequences it has brought upon the system, President Lee has been placed on administrative leave.”
This decision is considered the harshest disciplinary action imposed on the president of any of the US universities that have witnessed anti-war protests.
Since April, US, Canadian, British, French and Indian universities have witnessed protests rejecting the Israeli war on Gaza and demanding university administrations stop their academic cooperation with Israeli academic institutions.
Protesters also demand that their universities withdraw their investments from companies that support the occupation of Palestinian territories and arm the Israeli army.
In New York riot police were sent into campuses to disperse protesters and remove encampments set up in support of Palestinians in Gaza.
May 17, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Solidarity and Activism, War Crimes | Human rights, Israel, Palestine, United States, Zionism |
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