Month: April, 2011
The human rights record of the United States in 2010
| April 18, 2011 | 8:09 pm | Action | Comments closed

China’s Information Office of the State Council, or cabinet, published a report titled “The Human Rights Record of the United States in 2010” here Sunday. Following is the full text:

Human Rights Record of the United States in 2010

The State Department of the United States released its Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2010 on April 8, 2011. As in previous years, the reports are full of distortions and accusations of the human rights situation in more than 190 countries and regions including China. However, the United States turned a blind eye to its own terrible human rights situation and seldom mentioned it. The Human Rights Record of the United States in 2010 is prepared to urge the United States to face up to its own human rights issues.

I. On Life, Property and Personal Security

The United States reports the world’s highest incidence of violent crimes, and its people’s lives, properties and personal security are not duly protected.

Every year, one out of every five people is a victim of a crime in the United States. No other nation on earth has a rate that is higher (10 Facts About Crime in the United States that Will Blow Your Mind, Beforitsnews.com). In 2009, an estimated 4.3 million violent crimes, 15.6 million property crimes and 133,000 personal thefts were committed against U.S. residents aged 12 or older, and the violent crime rate was 17.1 victimizations per 1,000 persons, according to a report published by the U.S. Department of Justice on October 13, 2010 (Criminal Victimization 2009, U.S. Department of Justice, http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov). The crime rate surged in many cities in the United States. St. Louis in Missouri reported more than 2,070 violent crimes per 100,000 residents, making it the nation’s most dangerous city (The Associated Press, November 22, 2010). Detroit residents experienced more than 15,000 violent crimes each year, which means the city has 1,600 violent crimes per 100,000 residents. The United States’ four big cities – Philadelphia, Chicago, Los Angeles and New York – reported increases in murders in 2010 from the previous year (USA Today, December 5, 2010). Twenty-five murder cases occurred in Los Angeles County in a week from March 29 to April 4, 2010; and in the first half of 2010, 373 people were killed in murders in Los Angeles County (www.lapdonline.org). As of November 11, New York City saw 464 homicide cases, up 16 percent from the 400 reported at the same time last year (The Washington Post, November 12, 2010).

The United States exercised lax control on the already rampant gun ownership. Reuters reported on November 10, 2010 that the United States ranks first in the world in terms of the number of privately-owned guns. Some 90 million people own an estimated 200 million guns in the United States, which has a population of about 300 million. The Supreme Court of the United States ruled on June 28, 2010 that the second amendment of the U.S. Constitution gives Americans the right to bear arms that can not be violated by state and local governments, thus extending the Americans’ rights to own a gun for self-defense purposes to the entire country (The Washington Post, June 29, 2010). Four U.S. states – Tennessee, Arizona, Georgia and Virginia – allow loaded guns in bars. And 18 other states allow weapons in restaurants that serve alcohol (The New York Times, October 3, 2010). Tennessee has nearly 300,000 handgun permit holders. The Washington Times reported on June 7, 2010 that in November 2008, a total of 450,000 more people in the United States purchased firearms than had bought them in November 2007. This was a more than 10-fold increase, compared with the change in sales from November 2007 over November 2006. From November 2008 to October 2009, almost 2.5 million more people bought guns than had done so in the preceding 12 months (The Washington Times, June 7, 2010). The frequent campus shootings in colleges in the United States came to the spotlight in recent years. The United Kingdom’s Daily Telegraph reported on February 21, 2011 that a new law that looks certain to pass through the legislature in Texas, the United States, would allow half a million students and teachers in its 38 public colleges to carry guns on campus. It would become only the second state, after Utah, to enforce such a rule.

The United States had high incidence of gun-related blood-shed crimes. Statistics showed there were 12,000 gun murders a year in the United States (The New York Times, September 26, 2010). Figures released by the U.S. Department of Justice on October 13, 2010 showed weapons were used in 22 percent of all violent crimes in the United States in 2009, and about 47 percent of robberies were committed with arms (www.ojp.usdoj.gov, October 13, 2010). On March 30, 2010, five men killed four people and seriously injured five others in a deadly drive-by shooting (The Washington Post, April 27, 2010). In April, six separate shootings occurred overnight, leaving 16 total people shot, two fatally (www.myfoxchicago.com). On April 3, a deadly shooting at a restaurant in North Hollywood, Los Angeles, left four people dead and two others wounded (www.nbclosangeles.com, April 4, 2010). One person was killed and 21 others wounded in separate shootings around Chicago roughly between May 29 and 30 (www.chicagobreakingnews.com, May 30, 2010). In June, 52 people were shot at a weekend in Chicago (www.huffingtonpost.com, June 21, 2010). Three police officers were shot dead by assailants in the three months from May to July (Chicago Tribune, July 19, 2010). A total of 303 people were shot and 33 of them were killed in Chicago in the 31 days of July in 2010. Between November 5 and 8, four people were killed and at least five others injured in separate shootings in Oakland (World Journal, November 11, 2010). On November 30, a 15-year-old boy in Marinette County, Wisconsin, took his teacher and 24 classmates hostage at gunpoint (abcNews, November 30, 2010). On January 8, 2011, a deadly rampage critically wounded U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. Six people were killed and 12 others injured in the attack (Los Angeles Times, January 9, 2011).

Read more: http://english.people.com.cn/90001/90776/90883/7345784.html

Cuba support in Ireland: Bay of Pigs Anniversary Celebration
| April 13, 2011 | 8:56 pm | Action | 1 Comment

Cuba Support Group Ireland
PRESS RELEASE, 12 April 2011

NATIONAL TOUR 14 – 21 APRIL: Bay of Pigs Anniversary Celebration
================================================================

Celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the Cuban Victory at the Bay of Pigs

10 towns, 8 days, 3 Cubans, 50 years of resistance: Cuba Support Group
Ireland, in conjunction with Irish Friends of Cuba Coalition, is pleased to
announce a major tour of Ireland by a high-level delegation from Cuba to
celebrate the victory of the Cuban Revolutionary Armed Forces over the CIA
back mercenary invasion of Cuba on 16 April 1961. This will be an event
that anyone with an interest in Cuba, world history, politics or journalism
will want to participate. The delegation will be lead by Col. Victor Dreke,
a highly decorated Cuban military commander and veteran of the Bay of Pigs
victory.

The tour will culminate with a day-long symposium in Liberty hall Dublin on
16 April examining the historical significance of the Bay of Pigs, the
enduring validity of the Cuban Revolution and the Challenges that Cuba is
facing today.

Symposium in Liberty Hall, Dublin
=================================

09:00 – 09:30
Registration

09:30 – 10:30
Documentary film: “66 Hours” – The True Story of Bay of Pigs.
Directed by Otto M. Guzmán, MUNDO LATINO

10:30 – 10:45
Introduction by Jack McGinley, Chair of the SIPTU Solidarity with Cuba
Forum.

10:45 – 11:45
Historical significance of the Bay of Pigs Victory.
Speakers: Víctor Dreke, Deputy Chairman of the Association of Combatants of
the Cuban Revolution, Bay of Pigs veteran.
Moderator: Gerry Grainger, Workers Party
Q&A

11:45 – 12:00
Coffee
12:00 – 13:00

Validity of the Cuban Revolution 50 years after declaring its socialist
character.
Speaker: Reinaldo Taladrid, journalist and political analyst
Moderator: Eugene Mc Cartan, Communist Party of Ireland
Q&A

13:00 – 14:00
Lunch

14:00 – 16:30
Solidarity with Cuba Presentations and adoption of Plan of Action
– The US blockade.
Speakers: Simon McGuinness and Dr. David Hickey, Cuba Support Group and
María Aleida del Riego, Cuban Institute of Friendship with the Peoples.
– EU Common Position on Cuba.
Speakers: Barbara de Brun MEP and Teresita Trujillo, Cuban Ambassador to
Ireland.
– The Miami Five.
Speakers: Reinaldo Taladrid, Finian McGrath TD and Jimmy Kelly, UNITE.

16:30
Closing remarks. Adoption of the Final Declaration.
Speaker; Jack O’Connor ICTU.

17:00
Laying of wreath at the memorial to Commandant James Connolly by Cuban
veteran

18:00
Internationale

Advanced registration for Dublin event recommended via email to
IrishFriendsofCubaCoalition@gmail.com

The Cuban Delegation
====================

Col. Victor Dreke Cruz
———————-
On 17 April 1961, the first day of the Bay of Pigs Invasion, Victor Dreke
assumed command of two companies of the 117th Battalion, taking part in a
clash with paratroops of US lead “Brigade 2506” under the command of
Comandante Che Guevara. On 19 April, he was wounded in combat and briefly
captured after driving towards Girón in a jeep ahead of his tanks.

Highly decorated in Cuba and Africa, he was to serve in Congo in 1965 under
Che, and later in 1966-8 in Guinea-Bissau, he retired in 1990.
More:
http://bayofpigs50.blogspot.com/2011/02/biography-of-victor-dreke-cruz.html

Reinaldo Taladrid
—————–
Award winning Cuban journalist TV presenter and broadcaster, Reinaldo
Taladrid has worked for most of the major news channels in the USA and
currently hosts a nightly “Round Table” political discussion on Cuban TV
which is broadcast to the whole of Latin America on the TeleSUR satellite.
He is one of the most recognised people in Cuba and has interviewed all of
the Cuban leaders and two US presidents. He is uniquely placed to provide
an overview of Cuba’s place in Latin America, its current economic
adjustments and the prospects of US-Cuban relations.

Maria Aleida del Riego
———————-
Coordinator for Ireland and Britain of the Cuban Institute of Friendship of
the Peoples (ICAP), Maria Aleida del Riego have visited Ireland before and
is familiar with all the groups in these Irelands who are active in support
of the Cuban Revolution. Maria coordinates the brigades on which Irish
people travel to Cuba and is an invaluable source of information and
assistance to visitors who want to understand the nature of Cuban society.

National Bay of Pigs Tour Programme
===================================

Limerick
——–
Thursday, 14 April, 18:00 hrs
Reinaldo Taladrid – Public meeting at the University of Limerick – Room
C1061 in Main Building
Cuba Support Group
Contact: Nina Blodau nblodauyahoo.com

Waterford
———
Thursday, 14 April 19:00 hrs.
Maria Aleida del Riego – Public meeting
Waterford Trades Council
Contact: Tommy Hogan
Ph: 086 1656818

Dublin
——
Saturday, 16 April 09.00 – 18.00
Liberty Hall Bay of Pigs Celebration
Day-Long Conference (see detailed programme below)
SIPTU / Cuba Support Group Contact: Simon McGuinness CubaSupport@eircom.net

Belfast
——-
Monday, 18 April, 19.00
Victor Dreke & Reinaldo Taladrid – Public meeting in Europa Hotel
With film, music and presentations
Sinn Fein
Contact Sean Murray
Sean.murraysinn-fein.ie

Derry
—–
Monday, 18 April, 20.00
Maria Aleida del Riego – Public meeting in Sandino’s
Sinn Fein
Contact Daisy Mules

Galway
——
Tuesday, 19 April, 20.00
Victor Dreke & Reinaldo Taladrid – Public meeting in SIPTU Hall
Galway Trades Union Council
Contact: Pat Hardiman
Pathardiman99gmail.com

Letterkenny
———–
Tuesday, 19 April, 19.00
Maria Aleida del Riego – Public meeting in Station House (Ramada) Hotel;
with Cuban film “66 Hours”
Cuba Support Group
Contact: Bill O’Brien wobrien05eircom.net

Sligo
—–
Wednesday, 20 April
Maria Aleida del Riego Public meeting in Glasshouse Hotel, Hyde Bridge
Organized by Declan Bree dbreeeircom.net

Dundalk
——-
Wednesday, 20 April, 19.30
Reinaldo Taladrid – Public meeting venue Imperial Hotel
Sinn Féin
Contact: Emma McArdle
Emma.mcardlesinn-fein.ie

Cork
—-
Thursday, 21 April, 19.30
Victor Dreke, Reinaldo Taladrid & Maria Aleida del Riego Public meeting in
Connolly Hall.
Cuba Support Group contact: John Bowen johnbowen51gmail.com

__________________________________________________________
_______________________

Further information and to arrange media interviews with the delegation
contact:

Simon McGuinness,
National Coordinator,
Cuba Support Group Ireland,
15 Merrion Square, Dublin 2.

Ph: 087 6785842
www.CubaSupport.com

Statement of the Dutch Communist Party on military intervention in Libya
| April 13, 2011 | 8:10 pm | Action | Comments closed

Statement of the Central Committee of the New Dutch Communist Party

No military interference in Libya

Central Committee of the NCPN, Amsterdam, 17 March, 2011

The NCPN rejects the use of military force against the Libyan people’s uprising, but is strongly opposed to this new military intervention in a sovereign country.

The NCPN disapproves of the US Security Council’s resolution, which advocates a military interference of Libya. Instead of real solidarity with the People of Libya and the defense of their legimitate human rights, the resolution is meant to justify the agenda of the Western [imperialist] powers to directly intervene in the internal struggles of a sovereign state; they want geostrategic control of Libya’s natural resources, in particular, Libya’s oil.

The NCPN is against every aggressive action against Libya that will worsen their internal conflicts and that will eventually lead to even greater internal instability in the entire Maghreb region and the Middle East.

The NCPN condemns the US Secretary General’s conduct of supporting a strategy that prioritizes a war of the imperialist countries violating the UN Charter, namely, the promoting and supporting of diplomatic initiatives of countries such as Venezuela and the African Union to find a peaceful solution to the internal conflicts of Libya.

The NCPN critisizes the hypocrisy and false information campaign in the media that is only meant to conceal the warlike motives of the imperialist countries (which of course of part of NATO). This is reflected in the fact that the US Security Council supports military aggresion against a sovereign country in the name of a “defense of human rights”, while at the same time, one can perceive a total silence that these recent events clearly violate international law and the rights of the People. A few examples of this are the continuous crimes , provocations and unjust measures of Israel against the Palestinian people and the invasion of Bahrein by the Saudi Arabian military (which the United States entirely knew about) with the objective of crushing the People’s uprising in that country.

The NCPN condemns the slavish attitude of the Dutch government and the entire parliament, a new proof of their service and colaboration with the strategy of the big imperialist powers and NATO. The NCPN is against the participation of the Netherlands in the agression against Libya, whether by direct involvement of the military forces and military means, or through indirect involvement by means of logistic support for military operations in this current aggression.

The NCPN gives its support for any initiatives taken against the attacks against Libya, an attack that is essentially comparable to the aggression against Yugoslavia, Iraq, and Afghanistan in its objectives, media propaganda, and the ideology that it supports. The NCPN calls for unity in action of all peaceful, democratic, and progresive forces, with the slogan of rejecting a military intervention in Libya and for solidarity with the people of the Middle East that are still fighting for their social rights, labor rights, democracy, freedom, peace, and sovereignity.

Translated by Raskonikov Radek

(Original text from Manifest 3, http://www.ncpn.nl/ncpn/?a=libie.htm)

The Euro-US War on Libya: Official Lies and Misconceptions of Critics
| April 2, 2011 | 9:13 pm | Action | Comments closed

By James Petras and Robin E. Abaya

URL of this article: www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=24033

Global Research, March 30, 2011

Introduction

Many critics of the ongoing Euro-US wars in the Middle East and, now, North Africa, have based their arguments on clichés and generalizations devoid of fact. The most common line heard in regard to the current US-Euro war on Libya is that it’s “all about oil” – the goal is the seizure of Libya’s oil wells.

On the other hand Euro –U.S, government spokespeople defend the war by claiming it’s “all about saving civilian lives in the face of genocide”, calling it “humanitarian intervention”.

Following the lead of their imperial powers, most of what passes for the Left in the US and Europe, ranging from Social Democrats, Marxists, Trotskyists,Greens and other assorted progressives claim they see and support a revolutionary mass uprising of the Libyan people, and not a few have called for military intervention by the imperial powers, or the same thing, the UN, to help the “Libyan revolutionaries” defeat the Gaddafi dictatorship.

These arguments are without foundation and belie the true nature of US-UK-French imperial power, expansionist militarism, as evidenced in all the ongoing wars over the past decade (Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia, etc.). What is much more revealing about the militarist intervention in Libya is that the major countries, which refused to engage in the War, operate via a very different form of global expansion based on economic and market forces. China, India, Brazil, Russia, Turkey and Germany, the most dynamic capitalist countries in Asia, Europe and the Middle East are fundamentally opposed to the self-styled “allied” military response against the Libyan government – because Gaddafi represents no threat to their security and they already have full access to the oil and a favorable investment climate. Besides, these economically dynamic countries see no prospect for a stable, progressive or democratic Libyan government emerging from the so-called ‘rebel’ leaders, who are disparate elites competing for power and Western favor.

(1) The Six Myths about Libya: Right and Left

The principle imperial powers and their mass media mouthpieces claim they are bombing Libya for “humanitarian reasons”. Their recent past and current military interventions present a different picture: The intervention in Iraq resulted in well over a million civilian deaths, four million refugees and the systematic destruction of a complex society and its infrastructure, including its water supplies and sewage treatment, irrigation, electricity grid, factories, not to mention research centers, schools, historical archives, museums and Iraq’s extensive social welfare system.

A worse disaster followed the invasion of Afghanistan. What was trumpeted as a ‘humanitarian intervention’ to liberate Afghan women and drive out the Taliban resulted in a human catastrophe for the Afghan people.
The road to imperial barbarism in Iraq began with ‘sanctions’, progressed to ‘no fly zones’, then de facto partition of the north, invasion and foreign occupation and the unleashing of sectarian warfare among the ‘liberated’ Iraqi death squads.

Equally telling, the imperial assault against Yugoslavia in the 1990’s, trotted out as the great “humanitarian war” to stop genocide, led to a 40-day aerial bombardment and destruction of Belgrade and other major cities, the imposition of a gangster terrorist regime (KLA) in Kosovo, the near-total ethnic cleansing of all non-Albanian residents from Kosovo and the construction of the largest US military base on the continent (Camp Bondsteel).

The bombing of Libya has already destroyed major civilian infrastructure, airports, roads, seaports and communication centers, as well as ‘military’ targets. The blockade of Libya and military attacks have driven out scores of multi-national corporations and led to the mass exodus of hundreds of thousands of Asian, Eastern European, Sub-Saharan African, Middle Eastern and North African skilled and unskilled immigrant workers and specialists of all types, devastating the economy and creating, virtually overnight, massive unemployment, bread-lines and critical gasoline shortages. Moreover, following the logic of previous imperial military interventions, the seemingly ‘restrained’ call to patrol the skies via “no fly zone”, has led directly to bombing civilian as well as military targets on the ground, and is pushing to overthrow the legitimate government. The current imperial warmongers leading the attack on Libya, just like their predecessors, are not engaged in anything remotely resembling a humanitarian mission: they are destroying the fundamental basis of the civilian lives they claim to be saving – or as an earlier generation of American generals would claim in Vietnam, they are ‘destroying the villages in order to save them’.

(2) War for Oil or Oil for Sale?

The ‘critical’ Left’s favorite cliché is that the imperial invasion is all about “seizing control of Libya’s oil and turning it over to their multi-nationals”. This is despite the fact that US, French and British multinationals (as well as their Asian competitors) had already “taken over” millions of acres of Libyan oil fields without dropping a single bomb. For the past decade, “Big Oil” had been pumping and exporting Libyan oil and gas and reaping huge profits. Gaddafi welcomed the biggest MNC’s to exploit the oil wealth of Libya from the early 1990’s to the present day. There are more major oil companies doing business in Libya than in most oil producing regions in the world. These include: British Petroleum, with a seven-year contract on two concessions and over $1 billion dollars in planned investments. Each BP concession exploits huge geographic areas of Libya, one the size of Kuwait and the other the size of Belgium (Libyonline.com). In addition, five Japanese major corporations, including Mitsubishi and Nippon Petroleum, Italy’s Eni Gas, British Gas and the US giant Exxon Mobil signed new exploration and exploitation contracts in October 2010. The most recent oil concession signed in January 2010 mainly benefited US oil companies, especially Occidental Petroleum. Other multi-nationals operating in Libya include Royal Dutch Shell, Total (France), Oil India, CNBC (China), Indonesia’s Pertamina and Norway’s Norsk Hydro (BBC News, 10/03/2005).

Despite the economic sanctions against Libya, imposed by US President Reagan in 1986, US multinational giant, Halliburton, had secured multi-billion dollar gas and oil projects since the 1980’s. During his tenure as CEO of Halliburton, former Defense Secretary Cheney led the fight against these sanctions stating, “as a nation (there is) enormous value having American businesses engaged around the world” (Halliburtonwatch.com). Officially, sanctions against Libya were only lifted under Bush in 2004. Clearly, with all the European and US imperial countries already exploiting Libya oil on a massive scale, the mantra that the “war is about oil” doesn’t hold water or oil!

(3) Gaddafi is a Terrorist

In the run-up to the current military assault on Tripoli,the US Treasury Department’s (and Israel’s special agent) Stuart Levey, authored a sanctions policy freezing $30 billion dollars in Libyan assets on the pretext that Gaddafi was a murderous tyrant (Washington Post, 3/24/11). However, seven years earlier, Cheney, Bush and Condoleezza Rice had taken Libya off the list of terrorist regimes and ordered Levey and his minions to lift the Reagan-era sanctions.

Every major European power quickly followed suite: Gaddafi was welcomed in European capitals, prime ministers visited Tripoli and Gaddafi reciprocated by unilaterally dismantling his nuclear and chemical weapons programs (BBC, 9/5/2008). Gaddafi became Washington’s partner in its campaign against a broad array of groups, political movements and individuals arbitrarily placed on the US’ “terror list”, arresting, torturing and killing Al Qaeda suspects, expelling Palestinian militants and openly criticizing Hezbollah, Hamas and other opponents of Israel. The United Nations Human Rights Commission gave the Gaddafi regime a clean bill of health in 2010. In the end Gaddafi’s political ‘turnabout’, however much celebrated by the Western elite, did not save him from this massive military assault. The imposition of neo-liberal ‘reforms’, his political ‘apostasy’ and cooperation in the ‘War on Terror’ and the elimination of weapons of mass destruction, only weakened the regime. Libya became vulnerable to attack and isolated from any consequential anti-imperialist allies. Gaddafi’s much ballyhooed concessions to the West set his regime up as an easy target for the militarists of Washington, London and Paris, eager for a quick ‘victory’.

(4) The Myth of the Revolutionary Masses

The Left, including the mainly electoral social democrat, green and even left-socialist parties of Europe and the US swallowed the entire mass media propaganda package demonizing the Gaddafi regime while lauding the ‘rebels’. Parroting their imperial mentors, the ‘Left’ justified their support for imperial military intervention in the name of the “revolutionary Libyan people”, the “peace-loving” masses “fighting tyranny” and organizing peoples’ militias to “liberate their country”. Nothing could be further from the truth.

The center of the armed uprising is Benghazi, longtime monarchist hotbed of tribal supporters and clients of the deposed King Idris and his family. Idris, until he was overthrown by the young firebrand Col. Gaddafi, had ruled Libya with an iron fist over a semi-feudal backwater and was popular with Washington, having given the US its largest air base (Wheeler) in the Mediterranean. Among the feuding leaders of the “transitional council” in Benghazi (who purport to lead but have few organized followers) one finds neo-liberal expats, who first promoted the Euro-US military invasion envisioning their ride to power on the back of Western missiles .They openly favor dismantling the Libyan state oil companies currently engaged in joint ventures with foreign MNCs. Independent observers have commented on the lack of any clear reformist tendencies, let alone revolutionary organizations or democratic popular movements among the ‘rebels’.

While the US, British and French are firing missiles, loaded with depleted uranium, at the Libyan military and key civilian installations, their ‘allies’ the armed militias in Benghazi, rather than go to battle against the regime’s armed forces, are busy rounding up, arresting and often executing any suspected members of Gaddafi’s “revolutionary committees”, arbitrarily labeling these civilians as “fifth columnists”. The top leaders of these “revolutionary” masses in Benghazi include two recent defectors from what the ‘Left’ dubs Gaddafi’s “murderous regime”: Mustafa Abdul Jalil, a former Justice minister, who prosecuted dissenters up to the day before the armed uprising, Mahmoud Jebri, who was prominent in inviting multi-nationals to take over the oil fields (FT, March 23, 2011, p. 7), and Gaddafi’s former ambassador to India, Ali Aziz al-Eisawa, who jumped ship as soon as it looked like the uprising appeared to be succeeding. These self-appointed ‘leaders’ of the rebels who now staunchly support the Euro-US military intervention, were long-time supporters of the Gaddafi’s dictatorship and promoters of MNC takeovers of oil and gas fields. The heads of the “rebels” military council is Omar Hariri and General Abdul Fattah Younis, former head of the Ministry of Interior. Both men have long histories (since 1969) of repressing democratic movements within Libya. Given their unsavory background, it is not surprising that these top level military defectors to the ‘rebel’ cause have been unable to arouse their troops, mostly conscripts, to engage the loyalist forces backing Gaddafi. They too will have to take ride into Tripoli on the coattails of the Anglo-US-French armed forces.

The anti-Gaddafi force’s lack of any democratic credentials and mass support is evident in their reliance on foreign imperial armed forces to bring them to power and their subservience to imperial demands. Their abuse and persecution of immigrant workers from Asia, Turkey and especially sub-Sahara Africa, as well as black Libyan citizens, is well documented in the international press. Their brutal treatment of black Libyans, falsely accused of being Gaddafi’s “mercenaries” , includes torture, mutilation and horrific executions, does not auger well for the advent of a new democratic order, or even the revival of an economy, which has been dependent on immigrant labor, let alone a unified country with national institutions and a national economy.

The self-declared leadership of the “National Transitional Council” is not democratic, nationalist or even capable of uniting the country. These are not credible leaders capable of restoring the economy and creating jobs lost as a result of their armed power grab. No one seriously envisions these ‘exiles’, tribalists, monarchists and Islamists maintaining the paternalistic social welfare and employment programs created by the Gaddafi government and which gave Libyans the highest per-capita income in Africa.

(5) Al Qaeda

The greatest geographical concentration of suspected terrorists with links to Al Qaeda just happens to be in the areas dominated by the “rebels” (see Alexander Cockburn: Counterpunch, March 24, 2011). For over a decade Gaddafi has been in the forefront of the fight against Al Qaeda, following his embrace of the Bush-Obama ‘War on Terror’ doctrine. These jihadist Libyans, having honed their skills in US-occupied Iraq and Afghanistan, are now among the ranks of the “rebels” fighting the much more secular Libyan government. Likewise, the tribal chiefs, fundamentalist clerics and monarchists in the East have been active in a “holy war” against Gaddafi welcoming arms and air support from the Anglo-French-US “crusaders” – just like the mullahs and tribal chiefs welcomed the arms and training from the Carter-Reagan White House to overthrow a secular regime in Afghanistan. Once again, imperial intervention is based on ‘alliances’ with the most retrograde forces. The composition of the future regime (or regimes, if Libya is divided) is a big question and the prospects of a return to political stability for Big Oil to profitably exploit Libya’s resources are dubious.

(6) “Genocide” or Armed Civil War

Unlike all ongoing mass popular Arab uprisings, the Libyan conflict began as an armed insurrection, directed at seizing power by force. Unlike the autocratic rulers of Egypt and Tunisia, Gaddafi has secured a mass regional base among a substantial sector of the Libyan population. This support is based on the fact that almost two generations of Libyans have benefited from Gaddafi’s petroleum-financed welfare, educational, employment and housing programs, none of which existed under America’s favorite, King Idris. Since violence is inherent in any armed uprising, once one picks up the gun to seize power, they lose their claim on ‘civil rights’. In armed civil conflicts, civil rights are violated on all sides. Regardless of the Western media’s lurid portrayal of Gaddafi’s “African mercenary forces” and its more muted approval of ‘revolutionary justice’ against Gaddafi supporters and government soldiers captured in the rebel strongholds, the rules of warfare should have come into play, including the protection of non-combatants-civilians (including government supporters and officials), as well as protection of Libyan prisoners of war in the areas under NATO-rebel control.

The unsubstantiated Euro-US claim of “genocide” amplified by the mass media and parroted by “left” spokespersons is contradicted by the daily reports of single and double digit deaths and injuries, resulting from urban violence on both sides, as control of cities and towns shifts between the two sides.

Truth is the first casualty of war, and especially of civil war. Both sides have resorted to monstrous fabrications of victories, casualties, monsters and victims.

Demons and angels aside, this conflict began as a civil war between two sets of Libyan elites: An established paternalistic, now burgeoning neo-liberal, autocracy with substantial popular backing versus a western imperialist financed and trained elite, backed by an amorphous group of regional, tribal and clerical chiefs, monarchists and neo-liberal professionals devoid of democratic and nationalist credentials – and lacking broad-based mass support.

Conclusion

If not to prevent genocide, grab the oil or promote democracy (via Patriot missiles), what then is the driving force behind the Euro-US imperial intervention?

A clue is in the selectivity of Western military intervention: In Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Jordan, Qatar and Oman ruling autocrats, allied with and backed by Euro-US imperial states go about arresting, torturing and murdering unarmed urban protestors with total impunity. In Egypt and Tunisia, the US is backing a conservative junta of self-appointed civil-military elites in order to block the profound democratic and nationalist transformation of society demanded by the protesters. The ‘junta’ aims to push through neo-liberal economic “reforms” through carefully-vetted pro-Western ‘elected’ officials. While liberal critics may accuse the West of “hypocrisy” and “double standards” in bombing Gaddafi but not the Gulf butchers, in reality the imperial rulers consistently apply the same standards in each region: They defend strategic autocratic client regimes, which have allowed imperial states to build strategic air force and naval bases, run regional intelligence operations and set up logistical platforms for their ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as their future planned conflict with Iran. They attack Gaddafi’s Libya precisely because Gaddafi had refused to actively contribute to Western military operations in Africa and the Middle East.

The key point is that while Libya allows the biggest US-European multi-nationals to plunder its oil wealth, it did not become a strategic geo-political-military asset of the empire. As we have written in many previous essays the driving force of US empire-building is military – and not economic. This is why billions of dollars of Western economic interests and contracts had been sacrificed in the setting up of sanctions against Iraq and Iran – with the costly result that the invasion and occupation of Iraq shut down most oil exploitation for over a decade.

The Washington-led assault on Libya, with the majority of air sorties and missiles strikes being carried out by the Obama regime, is part of a more general counter-attack in response to the most recent Arab popular pro-democracy movements. The West is backing the suppression of these pro-democracy movements throughout the Gulf; it finances the pro-imperial, pro-Israel junta in Egypt and it is intervening in Tunisia to ensure that any new regime is “correctly aligned”. It supports a despotic regime in Algeria as well as Israel’s daily assaults on Gaza. In line with this policy, the West backs the uprising of ex-Gaddafites and right-wing monarchists, confident that the ‘liberated’ Libya will once again provide military bases for the US-European military empire-builders.

In contrast, the emerging market-driven global and regional powers have refused to support this conflict, which jeopardizes their access to oil and threatens the current large-scale oil exploration contracts signed with Gaddafi. The growing economies of Germany, China, Russia, Turkey, India and Brazil rely on exploiting new markets and natural resources all over Africa and the Middle East, while the US, Britain and France spend billions pursuing wars that de-stabilize these markets, destroy infrastructure and foment long-term wars of resistance. The growing market powers recognize that the Libyan “rebels” cannot secure a quick victory or ensure a stable environment for long-term trade and investments. The “rebels”, once in power, will be political clients of their militarist imperial mentors. Clearly, imperial military intervention on behalf of regional separatists seriously threatens these emerging market economies: The US supports ethno-religious rebels in China’s Tibetan province and as well as the Uyghur separatists; Washington and London have long backed the Chechen separatists in the Russian
Caucuses. India is wary of the US military support for Pakistan, which claims Kashmir. Turkey is facing Kurdish separatists who receive arms and safe haven from their US-supplied Iraqi Kurdish counterparts.

The North African precedent of an imperial invasion of Libya on behalf of its separatist clients worries the emerging market-powers. It is also an ongoing threat to the mass-based popular Arab freedom movements. And the invasion sounds the death knell for the US economy and its fragile ‘recovery’: three ongoing, endless wars will break the budget much sooner than later. Most tragic of all, the West’s ‘humanitarian’ invasion has fatally undermined genuine efforts by Libya’s civilian democrats, socialists and nationalists to free their country from both a dictatorship and from imperial-backed reactionaries.

Communist Party of Brazil on Obama’s imperialist policy
| April 1, 2011 | 9:55 pm | Action | Comments closed

From: Communist Party of Brazil
Secretaria de Relações Internacionais email to:
Date: 2011/3/31

Obama represents the old US’s imperialist policy

President Barack Obama started in Brazil a visit to three Latin American countries and announced a “new stage” in the relations between the United States of America and our continent. To PCdoB, US’s imperialism will not change the essence of its policy with the Obama administration. The concrete initiatives of US’s government contradict its rhetoric and discourses.

Many interests of the USA motivate the visit of Barack Obama, but it is mainly aimed at: trying to neutralize Brazil and the recent role of its independent and progressive foreign policy; increasing the already great asymmetry in bilateral relations in the economic, commercial and defense fields and stimulating contradictions between Brazil and other countries such as China in the economic and commercial fields; ensuring the supply of energy, especially oil from pre-salt layer; and taking actions to “clean the image” of imperialism using Obama’s charisma and the “soft power” diplomacy to launch a supposedly “new policy” for Brazil and Latin America with demagogic speeches in Brazil, Chile and El Salvador.

It is understandable that governments such as that of President Dilma Rousseff, counting with the support and participation of PCdoB, maintain diplomatic relations with sovereign countries, among which the USA. President Lula hosted President Bush twice in Brazil. However, Brazilian communists have no illusions regarding what President Obama represents. He is the chief of state of the main imperialist power, the main enemy of the peoples of the world.

Since the election of Barack Obama, the USA announced a “new policy” that in fact does not exist. Actually, it is a new formulation of the goal of recovering and broadening the world hegemony of the USA. There is now a different rhetoric, symbolic gestures amplified by efficient propaganda and a different tactics as compared to the George H. W. Bush and George W. Bush administrations, aimed at neutralizing opponents and beguiling allies, especially NATO, in order to maintain the US’s leadership even in face of its own difficulty in dealing with several conflicts simultaneously.

That does not match Obama’s speeches in defense of peace, democracy and human rights. Also there are no “common values” uniting the Brazilian people and the government of President Dilma Rousseff, in one side, and the policy of Yankee imperialism, in the other side. Why torture is still going on in Guantanamo? How many wars of occupation aggression to the people the USA promoted in the last decades and are promoting at this very moment? How many dictatorships and coups d’état were – and still are – financed and supported by the USA, such as the current monarchic and despotic regimes of Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, protected by Washington?

The new military and homeland security strategies of President Obama rhetorically promise cooperation and multilateralism. In practice, however, they follow the beaten path of imposing their interests by means of force and war.

Facts contradict rhetoric. After more than two years of the Obama administration, it is increasingly clear that the interests of that imperialist power outweigh campaign speeches. Even after recently announced cuts, the USA will spend on its armed forces in 2011 the largest budget since the end of World War II – more than the military spending of all the other countries of the world.

The USA insists in maintaining hundreds of military bases all over the globe. Together with their European allies, they change NATO’s character, which now covers all continents and seas.

There is a strong military presence of the USA in Europe, the Middle East, Asia and Latin America. The USA and their NATO allies are still in Afghanistan and Pakistan, prolonging a war that is now longer than the aggression against Vietnam, and extending the military occupation in Iraq. Notwithstanding, they have not been able to curb the national and popular resistance in those countries.

At this moment the USA and NATO members are doing a military intervention in Libya after imposing on the UN Security Council a resolution that makes the aggression against the sovereignty of Libya “multilateral.” Revolutionary and progressive forces of all continents must condemn any kind of intervention or foreign military action in Libya, which will not bring a solution to the conflict and will only aggravate it. In case of the civil war unfolding in Libya, a politic and peaceful solution is necessary, one that respects the independence and territorial integrity of that country.

Obama’s policy is against the interests of Brazil and Latin America

As a general democratic and progressive trend thrives in Latin America, the decline of the influence of the US’s hegemony in the region becomes more pronounced. Although the USA still possesses great influence, it is facing a decline in face of the new political reality in Latin America.

In every country, the USA supports right-wing forces that maintain pro-imperialist stances and opposes projects of southern and Latin American integration and democratic, progressive and left-wing governments.

In Latin America, the USA reinforced media campaigns and pressures against the Cuban Revolution and threats to Venezuela, viewed by Washington’s intelligence organizations as the “main threat” against the USA in the Americas. In the meanwhile, the Colombian government follows the line drawn by the USA to become the Israel of Latin America and the Caribbean, sponsoring the murdering of popular leaders and maintaining thousands of political prisoners. Diplomatic cables from the American embassy in Brazil revealed by WikiLeaks made clear what everybody already knew – the USA did not want President Dilma Rousseff to win the election and right-wing candidate José Serra promised to realign the Brazilian foreign policy to US’s interests.

However, in the elections held in last October, the Brazilian people decided that Brazil must move forward and maintain its independent and sovereign, pro Latin America foreign policy, defending peace and the peoples’ right to development.

Imperialism is not willing to cede power without resistance. The USA, surprised by the success of the Brazil-Iran-Turkey agreement regarding the Iranian nuclear program and frustrated by the foreign policy of President Lula in several issues, such as in the resistance to the coup d’état in Honduras, resorted to all measures to isolate Brazil. Hillary Clinton, Obama’s Chief of Staff, led a tough diplomatic reaction against Brazil.

The foreign policy actions of the Obama administration is aimed at maintaining the current system of world power that is characterized by the hegemony of the USA and suffocating multipolar trends and new international roles that countries such as Brazil could play. One cannot judge political leaders such as Barack Obama by his personality or style but by what they objectively represent. Obama is the current representative of the old and well-known imperialist policy of the USA, which has always been and always will be fought by communists and democrats, patriots and internationalists in Brazil.

Renato Rabelo – National President of PCdoB

Ricardo Alemão Abreu – Secretary of International Relations of PCdoB

On Stalin
| April 1, 2011 | 9:29 pm | Action | Comments closed

From the National Guardian
March 16, 1953

On Stalin
By W.E.B. DuBois

Joseph Stalin was a great man; few other men of the 20th century approach his stature. He was simple, calm and courageous. He seldom lost his poise; pondered his problems slowly, made his decisions clearly and firmly; never yielded to ostentation nor coyly refrained from holding his rightful place with dignity. He was the son of a serf but stood calmly before the great without hesitation or nerves. But also – and this was the highest proof of his greatness – he knew the common man, felt his problems, followed his fate.

Stalin was not a man of conventional learning; he was much more than that: he was a man who thought deeply, read understandingly and listened to wisdom, no matter whence it came. He was attacked and slandered as few men of power have been; yet he seldom lost his courtesy and balance; nor did he let attack drive him from his convictions nor induce him to surrender positions which he knew were correct. As one of the despised minorities of man, he first set Russia on the road to conquer race prejudice and make one nation out of its 140 groups without destroying their individuality.

His judgment of men was profound. He early saw through the flamboyance and exhibitionism of Trotsky, who fooled the world, and especially America. The whole ill-bred and insulting attitude of Liberals in the U.S. today began with our naive acceptance of Trotsky’s magnificent lying propaganda, which he carried around the world. Against it, Stalin stood like a rock and moved neither right nor left, as he continued to advance toward a real socialism instead of the sham Trotsky offered.

Three great decisions faced Stalin in power and he met them magnificently: first, the problem of the peasants, then the West European attack, and last the Second World War. The poor Russian peasant was the lowest victim of tsarism, capitalism and the Orthodox Church. He surrendered the Little White Father easily; he turned less readily but perceptibly from his ikons; but his kulaks clung tenaciously to capitalism and were near wrecking the revolution when Stalin risked a second revolution and drove out the rural bloodsuckers.

Then came intervention, the continuing threat of attack by all nations, halted by the Depression, only to be re-opened by Hitlerism. It was Stalin who steered the Soviet Union between Scylla and Charybdis: Western Europe and the U.S. were willing to betray her to fascism, and then had to beg her aid in the Second World War. A lesser man than Stalin would have demanded vengeance for Munich, but he had the wisdom to ask only justice for his fatherland. This Roosevelt granted but Churchill held back. The British Empire proposed first to save itself in Africa and southern Europe, while Hitler smashed the Soviets.

The Second Front dawdled, but Stalin pressed unfalteringly ahead. He risked the utter ruin of socialism in order to smash the dictatorship of Hitler and Mussolini. After Stalingrad the Western World did not know whether to weep or applaud. The cost of victory to the Soviet Union was frightful. To this day the outside world has no dream of the hurt, the loss and the sacrifices. For his calm, stern leadership here, if nowhere else, arises the deep worship of Stalin by the people of all the Russias.

Then came the problem of Peace. Hard as this was to Europe and America, it was far harder to Stalin and the Soviets. The conventional rulers of the world hated and feared them and would have been only too willing to see the utter failure of this attempt at socialism. At the same time the fear of Japan and Asia was also real. Diplomacy therefore took hold and Stalin was picked as the victim. He was called in conference with British imperialism represented by its trained and well-fed aristocracy; and with the vast wealth and potential power of America represented by its most liberal leader in half a century.

Here Stalin showed his real greatness. He neither cringed nor strutted. He never presumed, he never surrendered. He gained the friendship of Roosevelt and the respect of Churchill. He asked neither adulation nor vengeance. He was reasonable and conciliatory. But on what he deemed essential, he was inflexible. He was willing to resurrect the League of Nations, which had insulted the Soviets. He was willing to fight Japan, even though Japan was then no menace to the Soviet Union, and might be death to the British Empire and to American trade. But on two points Stalin was adamant: Clemenceau’s “Cordon Sanitaire” must be returned to the Soviets, whence it had been stolen as a threat. The Balkans were not to be left helpless before Western exploitation for the benefit of land monopoly. The workers and peasants there must have their say.

Such was the man who lies dead, still the butt of noisy jackals and of the ill-bred men of some parts of the distempered West. In life he suffered under continuous and studied insult; he was forced to make bitter decisions on his own lone responsibility. His reward comes as the common man stands in solemn acclaim.

http://www.mltranslations.org/Miscellaneous/DuBoisJVS.htm