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US scraps ‘glossy propaganda’ plans for Afghanistan aid projects

RT | February 14, 2014

A US federal agency that sought to pay photographers for “positive images” of its work in Afghanistan has canceled the program. The project, created to combat negative news coverage, collapsed amid charges that the effort amounted to propaganda.

Using US$1 billion on aid programs in Afghanistan, the US Agency for International Development (USAID) solicited proposals on Monday for a project that aimed to “help inform Afghans about the assistance American taxpayers are providing,” an anonymous USAID official told USA Today of Thursday’s decision.

“The wording of the (request) did not appropriately articulate that purpose and is being re-evaluated,” the official said.

In addition to targeting Afghans, the program was intended to gather support in the United States for USAID initiatives in Afghanistan. Over 12 years old, the war in Afghanistan is highly unpopular with the American public, if the war can be called an issue of popular awareness at all. A CNN poll released at the New Year found record low 17 percent support for the ongoing efforts in Afghanistan.

The proposal was quickly criticized by a public advocacy group as a blatant hype campaign.

“USAID should instead be focusing on accomplishing mission goals, not glossy propaganda,” said Scott Amey, general counsel for the Project on Government Oversight, a non-partisan government watchdog organization. “Waste, fraud, and poor performance have already resulted in billions being lost, let’s not throw additional money down the drain.”

The agency called the budding program one that would serve to show positive influences of US aid in the war-torn country amid the “negative” images usually shown by news organizations.

“USAID is executing the most massive US international assistance campaign ever, and the gains particularly in health and education have been impressive, yet the overwhelming majority of pictures recording that effort are negative, and at least to some extent misleading,” the solicitation reads. “This is because professional photographers working for news agencies are the prime source of high-quality images of USAID work in Afghanistan. News photographs by their very nature focus on the negative.”

Top objectives of the project included countering negative representations of Afghanistan, distributing those images through USAID social media, and to establish a long-term contract that would continually provide such images “to conventional media and directly to the US public.”

USAID also sought to influence American thought on efforts in Afghanistan.

“The US and Afghan publics require accurate, well-balanced information about USAID work abroad,” the proposal states. “Currently, this requirement is not being met in Afghanistan.”

USAID did not disclose how much contract photographers would earn for the photos.

The announcement of the “positive image” proposal on Monday came alongside the unveiling of three new USAID development programs worth almost $300 million to wean Afghanistan off its ‘war economy,’ which is heavily subsidized today by opium exports – a trade that had been practically squashed while the country was under Taliban rule.

Under the USAID initiative, $125 million will go to reviving Afghanistan’s food and farm sector, and another $77 million to opening up the country to greater international trade and investment. The last program, valued at about $100 million, would seek to assist Afghanistan’s educational system.

A report released late last month by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) found that Afghanistan cannot be trusted to properly spend the millions of dollars it receives in aid from the United States. The report found that none of Afghanistan’s 16 ministries could be entrusted with USAID funds without high risk of that assistance being stolen or wasted.

In September, the SIGAR chastised USAID for poor oversight of money the agency spent there. A SIGAR report highlighted how USAID gave over $230 million to the Afghan Ministry of Health with little guidance for how the money was to be spent.

“Despite financial management deficiencies at the Afghan Ministry of Public Health, USAID continues to provide millions of US taxpayer dollars in direct assistance with little assurance that the (ministry) is using these funds as intended,” according to the SIGAR report.

Meanwhile, after a long, protracted struggle that sought to convince Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai to approve a security deal, the US is considering leaving the issue suspended until the Afghan presidential elections in April in order to address Karzai’s successor.

The Obama administration has long hoped to get the long-lasting bilateral security deal with Kabul signed by the end of 2013, yet Karzai has refused to take responsibility for leaving a several thousand-strong US military contingent in the country beyond 2014.

February 14, 2014 Posted by | Deception, Mainstream Media, Warmongering | , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

US Congress secretly approves sending small arms to ‘moderate’ Syrian rebels

RT | January 28, 2014

Congressional lawmakers have quietly authorized sending small arms, an assorted variety of rockets, and financial backing to so-called “moderate” rebels fighting in Syria’s civil war, according to a new report.

American and European security officials told Reuters that the US will provide anti-tank rockets, but nothing as deadly as shoulder-launched surface-to-air missiles (known as MANPADs), which can be used to bring down military or civilian aircraft.

Legislators voted in closed-door meetings to fund the opposition forces through September 30, the end of the US government’s fiscal year. The decision is an about-face from congressional debates last year, in which the same committees were reluctant to supply arms over concerns that American weapons would wind up in the hands of radical Islamists fighting in the region, the Al-Qaeda-backed Al-Nusra being the most well known.

Now, though, those concerns appear to have lessened. Exactly when Congress approved the funding is not known, yet the sources speculated that it was signed in a classified section of a defense appropriations bill that was approved in December.

“The Syrian war is a stalemate,” said Bruce Riedel, a former CIA analyst and current foreign policy advisor to US President Obama with the Brookings Institution. “The rebels lack the organization and weapons to defeat Assad; the regime lacks to loyal manpower to suppress the rebellion. Both sides’ external allies…are ready to supply enough money and arms to fuel the stalemate for the foreseeable future.”

Despite the uncertainty remaining around the conflict, Western officials have asserted in recent weeks that “moderate” rebels have strengthened their positions in the south of Syria and have begun excluding Al-Qaeda sympathizers. Extremists are known to be in control of rebel forces in the north and east, however.

US and British officials temporarily suspended “non-lethal aid” (a category that includes communications equipment and transportation vehicles) in December, although officials now say they hope to resume providing assistance to the Supreme Military Council (SMC), which oversees rebel forces favored by the West.

“We hope to be able to resume assistance to the SMC shortly, pending security and logistics considerations,” one source told Reuters. “But we have no announcement at this time.”

News of the funding comes as the Syrian government and the external opposition in Geneva have reached an agreement that would see humanitarian aid enter the besieged city of Homs, and would allow women and children to leave its war-ravaged areas.

What makes the deal dubious, however, is that it’s not yet clear how it will be implemented on the ground. Currently, the Syrian government is promising – voiced on Sunday by Deputy Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad – that women and children can leave Homs safely. Another question is how rebels inside the city besieged by the army will react.

“If the armed terrorists in Homs allow women and children to leave the old city of Homs, we will allow them every access. Not only that, we will provide them with shelter, medicines and all that is needed,” he said, as cited by Reuters. “We are ready to allow any humanitarian aid to enter into the city through the arrangements made with the UN.”

US State Department spokesman Edgar Vasquez said that an evacuation is not a legitimate option because of how dire the need for aid is.

“We firmly believe that the Syrian regime must approve the convoys to deliver badly needed humanitarian assistance into the Old City of Homs now,” Vasquez said. “The situation is desperate and the people are starving.”

The results of a meeting in Geneva, Switzerland – where government officials sat across the negotiating table from representatives of the opposition on Monday – is so far unclear. Each side pledged its willingness to continue discussions, though progress so far has been nearly nonexistent.

United Nations envoy Lakhdar Brahimi told reporters after the meeting Monday that even though the talks “haven’t produced much,” another session was scheduled for Tuesday.

“Once again, I tell you we never expected any miracle, there are no miracles here,” he said in a news conference. “My expectation from this conference is that the unjust war will stop. But I know this is not going to happen today or tomorrow or next week.”

January 28, 2014 Posted by | Deception, Militarism, War Crimes | , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Obama’s foreign policy just as bad or worse than Bush’s – poll

RT | September 12, 2013

Nearly two-thirds of Americans say President Barack Obama’s handling of foreign policy is either equal to or worse than that of predecessor George W. Bush, a new poll reveals.

The results of a recent Reason-Rupe poll published on Tuesday this week suggest that a majority of Americans — 64 percent — consider the current commander-in-chief’s job performance with regards to international affairs to be no better than Pres. Bush, who kick-started wars in both Afghanistan and Iraq during his eight years in the White House.

According to the results of the poll, 32 percent of Americans polled said Obama’s handling of foreign policy is worse than that of his predecessor, with 32 percent also saying it was “about the same.”

Thirty-two percent of the 1,013 adults polled said they consider Obama’s handling of foreign policy better than that of Pres. Bush.

And as a potential United States-led military strike against Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad’s regime remains a very real possibility in the days to come, Reason’s Emily Ekins wrote that Obama — who famously said he opposes “dumb wars” — could launch the US into a situation that wouldn’t be supported by a majority of Americans.

“Nearly three-quarters of Americans, 74 percent, say it would be ‘unwise’ for the United States to launch airstrikes on Syria without the support of the United Nations or Great Britain,” Ekins wrote of the results.

Additionally, only 17 percent of those polled said it would be a wise move to attack Assad’s regime to reprimand the Syrian leader for the alleged use of chemical weapons last month outside of Damascus. The White House said previously that Assad’s army deployed chemical warheads on August 21 and in turn eradicated more than 1,400 people.

The same proportion of Americans who put Bush’s foreign policy record at-or-above that of Pres. Obama — 64 percent — told pollsters that US airstrikes against Syria are not necessary to protect America’s credibility and national security, despite the administration arguing otherwise.

Pres. Obama had been considering a unilateral military strike against Assad without approaching Congress for authorization, but has in recent days formalized his request with the House and Senate and has since postponed voting while diplomatic options are considered by the UN and international community.

Foreign policy aside, however, the Obama administration isn’t winning much support among the Americans polled by Reason and Rupe. According to their questioning, 61 percent said they believe the US is heading in the “wrong direction,” compared to 28 percent who say America is, “generally speaking,” on the right path.

Forty-three percent of those surveyed said they disapprove of Obama’s overall job performance. Before the US ramped-up its interest in the Syrian civil war, a similar poll conducted in May found that exactly half of Americans polled approved of the president’s job, signaling a 7 percentage point drop in a matter of months.

At a press briefing on Wednesday, White House press secretary Jay Carney acknowledge the president’s reluctance to use military force in Syria after more than a decade of wars started under the Bush administration.

thumbs_obama-face“He knew and knows and understands that the American people are extremely reluctant to get the United States involved again militarily in the Middle East — not just in the Middle East, but anywhere,” Carney told reporters. “But as someone who deeply understands that, and who has spent four and a half years as president getting us out of wars, he believes in the case that he made last night, and I think he understands why there’s reluctance and why there’s anxiety about potentially striking Syria in response to the use of chemical weapons.”

Full poll

Related article

September 12, 2013 Posted by | Militarism, Progressive Hypocrite | , , , , | Leave a comment

US snub of Syria talks ‘proof of weakness in position’ – Duma speaker

RT | September 6, 2013

State Duma speaker Sergey Naryshkin has told the press that no Russian parliamentary delegation is going to the United States to discuss the Syrian issue, adding that the US refusal to meet was regrettable.

“The unwillingness to listen to arguments on inter-parliamentary level testifies to the fact that our American partners themselves understand the weakness of their positions. In addition, this step characterizes their attitude to the norms of international law,” he said.

Naryshkin added that “the United States is used to considering the most important issues of other nations and of whole world’s regions to be their internal affairs, despite the fact that the current system of international law and the UN’s global security architecture have been built by the lengthy and thorough efforts of the whole international community on the basis of the results of WWII.”

He emphasized that it was extremely dangerous to neglect the valuable institutions and the system of guarantees built on the lessons taught by the greatest disaster of the 20th century. He again reminded that the international political organizations were created in order to save the world from future global disasters.

On Monday this week the heads of the both chambers of the Russian parliament suggested that President Vladimir Putin hold bilateral talks with US lawmakers in order to find a solution to the crisis in Syria. Putin supported the initiative, calling it timely and correct, and adding that direct talks might help US politicians to hear firsthand arguments and understand Russian motives in the standoff.

By Tuesday, Federation Council Speaker Valentina Matviyenko had sent a letter to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid suggesting a meeting be called without delay to find a peaceful solution to the Syrian problem by common effort and as soon as possible.

According to Russian Senator Ilyas Umakhanov, initially the US official said that he was ready to assist the consultations between Russian and US lawmakers. However, by the end of the week CNN reported that Reid had turned down the Russian proposal.

House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner also turned down the Russian embassy’s request to directly meet with the parliamentary delegation.

September 6, 2013 Posted by | Militarism | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

DOJ wants Bush, senior cabinet members exempt from Iraq War trial

RT | August 22, 2013

The United States Department of Justice has requested that former President George W. Bush and the highest figures in his administration receive full exemption from being tried for the Iraq War, which the DoJ says was in line with international law.

Apart from Bush, the names listed in the paper the DoJ filed on Tuesday are former Vice President Richard Cheney, former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, retired four-star General Colin Powell, former Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice and former Deputy Secretary of Defense and President of the World Bank, Paul Wolfowitz.

Sundus Saleh, an Iraqi single mother of three who became a refugee, filed a complaint in March in the San Francisco federal court, claiming that the war in her country can be judged as a ‘crime of aggression’, according to the same legal standards that the Nuremberg Tribunal used for convicting Nazi war criminals of World War II.

Saleh is the lead plaintiff in this class action lawsuit.

The reason for the decision is connected with the ‘Westfall Act’ certification. The 1988 law gives the Attorney General the power to personally decide whether the United States is actually a defendant in the case. This in turn allows the granting of absolute immunity to politicians for actions carried out while in the government’s employ.

Inder Comar of Comar Law has agreed to take the case. The San-Francisco-based firm normally specializes in support to private companies, particularly those in the tech industry. Comar met with Saleh at her home in Jordan to discuss the case.

Chief counsel Comar wrote on the War Is a Crime website explaining that, “The DoJ claims that in planning and waging the Iraq War, ex-President Bush and key members of his Administration were acting within the legitimate scope of their employment and are thus immune from suit.”

The lawsuit filed by Saleh says that Cheney, Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz orchestrated the Iraq War in 1998 as part of their involvement with the ‘Project for the New American Century’, a Washington DC-based non-profit organization that pushed for the overthrow of Iraq’s former leader, Saddam Hussein.

Salleh then alleges that the tragedy of September 11, 2001, was pitched to other members of the Bush cabinet as the perfect excuse to scare the American public into supporting the war in Iraq. The lawsuit also claims that the United States failed to obtain United Nations approval for the invasion, making it an illegal and aggressive act of war.

According to Corey Hill, who is a member and outreach coordinator for Global Exchange, an international human rights organization, Comar Law is invoking something called the Alien Tort Statute, which is a 1789 law that permits a foreign national to sue the US federal court for injuries “committed in violation of the law of nations or a treaty of the United States.” Hill explained this in his article for YES! Magazine, for which he also writes.

All the defendants in the case have been summoned to appear in accordance with the usual legal proceedings. The trial is expected to start in early 2014.

There are, however, several problems that could arise with the allegations. As Paul Stephen, who teaches law at the University of Virginia and is former international law consultant for the Department of State told YES! Magazine, that it would be difficult to sue a government employee for acting “under the scope of employment” in this case, because of the modified nature of the Westfall Act, giving officials more scope for action.

The second problem may arise from the fact that their actions did not take place on US soil, making it difficult to validate the accusation.

And lastly, “courts aren’t open to ruling on matters of a political nature”, Hill said in reference to a doctrine in US Constitutional Law that separates clear-cut court cases with those better left to the legislative and executive branches of the government. This doctrine then means that the invasion of Iraq is a political case – not a legal one.

“If the expectation is that a federal court will declare that the invasion, although duly authorized by Congress, violated international law and thus violates U.S. law, I would respond that we walked up and down that hill with respect to Vietnam… No federal court ever has recognized such a claim,” Hill explained.

But Comar is optimistic in so far that in order for the Westfall Act to work in this case, the US government would have to prove that the act of preparing the invasion through a non-profit organization took place within office. But since that was not the case, the law cannot be invoked here. He further explained to Hill that separating a political matter from a purely legal one will also not be easy for the US government, as it may often be a very blurry line.  Comar expanded on this position to the ‘War Is a Crime’ website.

“The good news is that while we were disappointed with the certification, we were prepared for it,” he said. “We do not see how a Westfall Act certification is appropriate given that Ms. Saleh alleges that the conduct at issue began prior to these defendants even entering into office. I think the Nuremberg prosecutors, particularly American Chief Prosecutor Robert Jackson, would be surprised to learn that planning a war of aggression at a private non-profit, misleading a fearful public, and foregoing proper legal authorization somehow constitute lawful employment duties for the American president and his or her cabinet.”

August 22, 2013 Posted by | Militarism, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , , , , | Leave a comment

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