Archives

Tagged ‘UN‘

Jun 26

2012

0

Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Humanitarian Agencies, Imperialist Wars/Occupations, The International Campaign to Destabilize Syria

Amnesty International Syria UN

AMNESIA INTERNATIONAL AND WESTERN NGOs: THE WHORES OF THE U.S.A.

 What are Western NGOs useful for?

by Luc MICHEL
2012 06 15
For Syria Committees with PCN-SPO & Le Monde

 

In full communication campaign of Hillary Clinton and the State Department against Russian support for Syria, the good soldiers of Western NGOs come into campaign. And directly attack Russia over “its arms shipments to Syria.” The speech is identical to that of the USA and NATO. And occurs within 24 hours of the Clinton attacks. “The His Master’s Voice” is set but not very smart this time in timing issue … →

Jun 21

2012

0

Humanitarian Agencies, Non-Profit Industrial Complex, The Occupation of Haiti

Capitalism Deparment of Defense Exploitation Haiti UN

NGOs Spend More Than 80 Percent of Donations to Haiti

Prensa Latina

Port-au-Prince, Jun 18 (Prensa Latina)

More than 80 percents of the reconstruction donations sent to overcome the aftermath of the January 2010 massive earthquake in Haiti are drained to meet the needs of NGOs from the USA, Canada and Europe, denounces the Conference “Post-Quake Work of NGOs in Haiti”, held in Canada.

Haitian Nancy Roc refuted allegations that Haiti squanders the international relief and wondered why none such officials were invited to the event while Prof. Stephane Pallag,of Canada, urged to reformulate the aid to Haiti for it remains ineffective near three years later.

In message to the colloquy, Prime Minister Laurent Lamothe warned their presence can now be called damaging since their operations never fund state projects, hence his call to the world to review their destination.

He also warned that his government plans to urge for more transparency from the NGOs -today some 595 but the exact numbers remain shady- and to channel every relief efforts and aid reaching Haiti to state-run institutions for it is the foreign companies who are managing the donations if they ever reach Haiti.

“The government is the best suited to channel this aid as long as it meets the rigour and act as transparent as the donors demand.”

President Michel Martelly denounced last January that his government has not seen one single cent from the international reconstruction donations and just one percent the four billion USD sent for the purpose were invested in social programs, obviously frustrating reconstruction.

The independent magazine Dissident Voices also blames NGOs, private contractors and some governments for the contradictory management mechanism and corruption that turned the US Administration into the largest recipient of the relief funds for Haiti.

Just after the quake, they assigned $379 million as preliminary relief budget but sent in troops, so 33 cents in every dollar returned to the mainland to refund their salaries or pay checks.

The magazine also quotes a report from the US Congress Investigations Office on more funds sent later ($655 million) which returned to the Deparment of Defense and $220 million refund to the Health and Human Services Deparment and the United Nations confirmed that Haiti just got half the aid request in 2011 and this year just 8.5 percent of the promised aid.

Jun 19

2012

0

Humanitarian Agencies

Capitalism IMF UN World Bank

Poverty Pimping

By Jun 19, 2012

Intercontinental Cry

Anyone who has observed politicians and developers in action knows that the quickest way to destroy community cohesion is through programs like the war on poverty. Under the myriad schemes by governments to use the plight of the poor to enrich themselves, the cover of moral sanctity is essential to success.

On the global scene, the UN Millenium Development Goals — auspiciously aimed at poverty reduction — contain the seeds of warfare, genocide, and ethnic cleansing–-all in the name of charity. Lined up against indigenous self-determination and sovereignty in this battle are the World Bank, IMF, and poverty pimps like William Jefferson Clinton, Bill and Melinda Gates.

Caught in the crossfire are native peoples whose idea of appropriate development does not include the extraction of their resources by transnational corporations backed by the armies of UN member states.

 

[Jay Taber is an associate scholar of the Center for World Indigenous Studies, an author, a correspondent to Fourth World Eye, and a contributing editor of Fourth World Journal. Since 1994, he has served as the administrative director of Public Good Project.]

 

May 10

2012

0

Human Rights Watch, Humanitarian Agencies

Afghanistan Center For American Progress CIA Human Rights Watch NATO UN

FLASHBACK: Samantha Power and the Weaponization of Human Rights

September 10, 2009

Care Tactics

by CHASE MADAR

Source: counterpunch

American liberals rejoiced at Samantha Power’s appointment to the National Security Council. After so many dreary Clintonites were stacked into top State Department positions—Dennis Ross, Richard Holbrooke, Hillary herself—here was new blood: a dynamic idealist, an inspiring public intellectual, a bestselling author of a book against genocide, a professor at Harvard’s Carr Center for Human Rights. And she hasn’t even turned 40. The blogosphere buzzed. Surely Samantha Power was the paladin, the conscience, the senior director for multilateral affairs to bring human rights back into U.S. foreign policy.

Don’t count on it. “Human rights,” a term once coterminous with freeing prisoners of conscience and documenting crimes against humanity, has taken on a broader, more conflicted definition. It can now mean helping the Marine Corps formulate counterinsurgency techniques; pounding the drums for air strikes (of a strictly surgical nature, of course); lobbying for troop escalations in various conquered nations—all for noble humanitarian ends.

The intellectual career of Samantha Power is a richly instructive example of the weaponization of human rights. She made her name in 2002 with A Problem From Hell: America and the Age of Genocide. In this surprise global bestseller, she argues that when confronted with 20th-century genocides, the United States sat on the sidelines as the blood flowed. Look at Bosnia or Rwanda. “Why does the US stand so idly by?” she asks. Powers allows that overall America “has made modest progress in its responses to genocide.” That’s not good enough. We must be bolder in deploying our armed forces to prevent human-rights catastrophes—to engage in “humanitarian intervention” in the patois of our foreign-policy elite.

In nearly 600 pages of text, Power barely mentions those postwar genocides in which the U.S. government, far from sitting idle, took a robust role in the slaughter. Indonesia’s genocidal conquest of East Timor, for instance, expressly green-lighted by President Ford and Secretary of State Kissinger, who met with Suharto the night before the invasion was launched and carried out with American-supplied weapons. Over the next quarter century, the Indonesian army saw U.S. military aid and training rise as it killed between 100,000 and 200,000 East Timorese. (The figures and the designation of “genocide” come from a UN-formed investigative body.) This whole bloody business gets exactly one sentence in Power’s book.

What about the genocide of Mayan peasants in Guatemala—another decades-long massacre carried out with American armaments by a military dictatorship with tacit U.S. backing, officer training at Fort Benning, and covert CIA support? A truth commission sponsored by the Catholic Church and the UN designated this programmatic slaughter genocide and set the death toll at approximately 200,000. But apparently this isn’t a problem from hell. →

May 09

2012

0

The International Campaign to Destabilize Syria

Brookings Institute CFR China Human Rights Watch Imperialism Libya LIFG Militarism NATO Russia Turkey UN

BROOKINGS INSTITUTE ANNOUNCES NEXT MOVE IN SYRIA – WAR

May 9, 2012

ESSENTIAL BACKGROUND >> TURKEY PREPARED TO INVOKE ARTICLE 5 REQUESTING NATO INTERVENTION IN SYRIA

After admitting UN peace plan was a ploy, Brookings predictably scraps it and begins promoting expanded military conflict.

by Tony Cartalucci

Land Destroyer

By the US policy think-tank Brookings Institution’s own admission, the Kofi Annan six-point peace plan in Syria was merely a ploy to buy time to reorganize NATO’s ineffective terrorist proxies and provide them the pretext necessary for establishing NATO protected safe havens from which to carry out their terrorism from. In fact, Brookings actually stated in a recent report, “Assessing Options for Regime Change” (emphasis added):

“An alternative is for diplomatic efforts to focus first on how to end the violence and how to gain humanitarian access, as is being done under Annan’s leadership. This may lead to the creation of safe-havens and humanitarian corridors, which would have to be backed by limited military power. This would, of course, fall short of U.S. goals for Syria and could preserve Asad in power. From that starting point, however, it is possible that a broad coalition with the appropriate international mandate could add further coercive action to its efforts.” –page 4, Assessing Options for Regime Change, Brookings Institution.


Image: Also out of the Brookings Institution, Middle East Memo #21 “Assessing Options for Regime Change (.pdf),” makes no secret that the humanitarian “responsibility to protect” is but a pretext for long-planned regime change.

As if to alleviate any lingering doubts, NATO’s “Alliance News Blog” has confirmed that the US is committed not to “peace,” but rather to the overthrow of Syria’s government and is “already committed to helping [President Bashar al-Assad] fall,” but is “merely looking for the least violent, lowest cost way to get there.” The April 9, 2012 blog entry features an op-ed titled, “US ‘already committed to helping Assad fall’,” and fully admits that the US is equipping the so-called “Free Syrian Army” which has received weapons, leadership, and cash from the NATO-backed Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) terrorists led by notorious mass-murderer Abdul Hakim Belhaj.


Image: NATO’s official “Alliance News Blog proudly reports that the US is already committed to helping “Assad fall” and is simply using the lull in fighting brought on by Kofi Annan’s disingenuous “peace plan” to rearm, reorganize, and redeploy their terrorist proxy forces against Assad. The op-ed featured on NATO’s blog was featured in the LA Times and written by CFR member Doyle McManus

And now, the Brookings Institution itself has predictably declared the Annan “peace deal” a failure and states that the time to “stretch” Syria’s military to the breaking point through expanded foreign-backed unrest has come. In an article titled, “Annan’s Mission Impossible: Why is everyone pretending that the U.N. plan in Syria has a prayer of suceeding?” Brookings Doha Center director Salman Shaikh insults the intelligence of his readership while handing out useful talking points surely to be parroted by the corporate-media over the next few days and weeks. Shaikh depicts the ceasefire’s failure as solely the result of the Syrian government’s belligerence and brutality, while mentioning nothing of the Syrian opposition’s documented and even admitted atrocities. →

Apr 27

2012

4

The International Campaign to Destabilize Syria

ACLU AT&T CIA Ford Foundation Gloria Steinem Google Lifetime NED | National Endowment for Democracy New York Life Open Society Foundations Syrian Observatory for Human Rights Tides Foundation UN US State Department Women Under Siege

CIA Asset Gloria Steinem’s “Women Under Siege” Joins Syrian Propaganda Campaign

CIA’S “WOMEN UNDER SIEGE IN SYRIA” CAMPAIGN EXPOSED

An early interview of Gloria Steinem detailing her time as an operative in the CIA:

April 14, 2012

Tony Cartalucci

 

Ironically, faux-feminist Gloria Steinem’s “Women Under Siege’s” latest campaign to demonize the Syrian government in tandem with the US State Department and its vast stable of media and intelligence assets, stands to set the stage for extremist ideologues to overrun Syria, ending its secular society and entirely stripping away the “women’s rights” Steinem claims to have spent a lifetime fighting for.


Image: “Women Under Siege – Documenting Sexualized Violence in Syria” attempts to demonize the Syrian government and raise the level of feigned humanitarian-hysteria ahead of NATO maneuvering to rearm and redeploy militant extremists sure to end all human rights in currently secular Syrian society – just as they’ve done in Libya.

Of course, when one understands that Steinem is an establishment asset merely leveraging/perverting legitimate concerns regarding women to manipulate, divide, and control people for a corporate-financier agenda, such hypocrisy makes perfect sense.

Women Under Siege is a project of Steinem’s “Women’s Media Center,” which is itself a spinoff of its umbrella organization, Ms Foundation. Steinem’s Ms Foundation is funded by convicted criminal and Wall Street speculator George Soros‘ Open Society Foundations, the Ford Foundation, Tides Foundation, New York Life, Google, the United Nations, AT&T, Lifetime, the ACLU, and many others featured in their 2011 Annual Report starting on page 27. So what appears to be a feminist crusade turns out to be yet another facade of Wall Street and London’s (ironically very male-dominated) charade of manipulating, exploiting, dividing, and controlling the population.

Further evidence exposing Steinem and her expansive propaganda empire as nothing more than a tool of special interests is the documented fact that she was at least for a time, an asset of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) as described in the New York Times article “CIA Subsidized Festival Trips; Hundreds of Students Were Sent to World Gatherings” (full text can be found here). Steinem’s “Independent Research Service” was anything but “independent,” as it was bankrolled by the CIA. While Steinem claims the CIA did nothing to influence her organization’s policy, a tenuous defense used by many operatives caught receiving dubious funding, it is clear that her activities dovetailed with the CIA’s agenda, making her at best what is called a “useful idiot.” →

Apr 26

2012

0

Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Humanitarian Agencies, Imperialist Wars/Occupations, The International Campaign to Destabilize Syria, The War on Libya - There Was No Evidence

Amnesty HRW Libya NATO Syria UN

NATO’s Slow Genocide in Libya: Syria is Next

What the world has to look forward to if NATO and the UN gets its way in Syria

April 19, 2012

by Tony Cartalucci| Land Destroyer

Global Civilians For Peace In Libya

 

April 19, 2012 – While Qatari government propaganda outlet Al Jazeera is busy whitewashing the NATO-led terrorist take-over of Libya with “documentaries” like “Gaddafi: The Endgame – State of Denial,” depicting the evisceration of one of Africa’s most developed nation-states as a pro-democracy revolution yielding a promising tomorrow – Libya in reality has been plunged into perpetual violence, destabilization, and division. And as militants battle each other while carving the once unified Libya into a myriad of fiefdoms, genocidal death squads continue a campaign of extermination nationwide.

http://en.cumhuriyet.com/medya.php?mn=79800

Image: The people of Tawargha are Libyans and have been Libyan for generations, settling there from sub-Saharan Africa. They have been brutally persecuted by the NATO-armed terrorists now running Libya. In Syria, expect these to be Alawite, Christian, and secular faces.

….

One group of Libyans hit hardest are the people of Tawargha – who were either exterminated or exiled from their city of 10,000-30,000 during the NATO-led destruction of Libya last year. Since then, their refugee camps have been raided, and survivors who have not yet fled Libya are being systematically imprisoned, tortured, and murdered.

Now, the very network of corporate-funded and directed NGOs charged with “human rights advocacy,” who assisted the Libyan rebels in willfully lying to the world over violations of “human rights” in the lead up to NATO’s military intervention, are finally reporting the widespread atrocities being carried out by the rebels themselves. In fact, organizations like Human Rights Watch (HRW) and Amnesty International, both funded by convicted criminal and Wall Street speculator, George Soros, began reporting such atrocities back in 2011, but only long after NATO bombs were already falling on Libya and the process of “regime change” was already irreversible. And, at critical junctures, such as the sieges of Bani Walid and Sirte, where NATO itself was committing systematic war crimes by air in tandem with terrorist forces on the ground – organizations like HRW and Amnesty International were altogether mute. →

Apr 26

2012

0

Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Humanitarian Agencies, Imperialist Wars/Occupations, NED | National Endowment for Democracy, Non-Profit Industrial Complex, The International Campaign to Destabilize Syria, The War on Libya - There Was No Evidence

Amnesty International HRC HRW ICC LLHR NED | National Endowment for Democracy UN

NGOs Promote Wars for Profit

Well-known NGO’s are profiteers earning big money

opednews.com

by Stephen Lendman 

 

Like better known war profiteers, NGOs also cash in. A Centre for the Study of Interventionism (CSI) report discussed it.

CSI challenges interventionist notions. Exponents believe “military violence” should enforce international law.

“These claims stand in contrast to” non-interventionist principles. UN Charter provisions and other international law enunciate them. CSI challenges current practice. Its new report discussed Libya.

It explains how lies promote war. It asked if “the case for R2P (responsibility to protect was) based on fraud.” It wasn’t on truth and international law. Its rage to fight spurned them.

The UN Charter’s Chapter VI calls for resolving conflicts peacefully. Humanitarian intervention prohibits military force or other hostile acts.

Chapter VII permits justifiable boycotts, embargoes, blockades, and severed diplomatic ties. It prohibits war, except in self-defense until the Security Council acts. It has final say.

Libyan interventionists claimed doing so protected civilian areas from attack. In 2005, the General Assembly World Summit Outcome Document adopted the responsibility to protect (R2P).

Paragraph 138 states each nation must “protect (its) population from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing, and crimes against humanity.”Paragraph 139 grants the UN responsibility “to use appropriate diplomatic, humanitarian and other peaceful means, in accordance with Chapters VI and VIII of the Charter, to help protect populations from” these crimes.

Military force is excluded. UN Charter provisions prohibit it for humanitarian intervention. Justifying it under R2P is illegal. War crimes follow. So does profiteering. War is big business. NGOs like corporate predators cash in.

The web site ngo.org defines them as follows:

“A non-governmental organization (NGO) is any non-profit, voluntary citizens’ group which is organized on a local, national or international level.”

“Task-oriented and driven by people with a common interest, NGOs perform a variety of service and humanitarian policies and encourage political participation through provision of information.”

“Some are organized around specific issues, such as human rights, environment or health. They provide analysis and expertise, serve as early warning mechanisms and help monitor and implement international agreements.”

“Their relationship with offices and agencies of the United Nations system differs depending on their goals, their venue and the mandate of a particular institution.”

Other definitions call them non-political groups, advancing social/humanitarian objectives. In fact, most profiteer largely for themselves. They’re ideologically biased predators, not humanitarians.

Nearly all have entrenched bureaucracies. Their officials are highly paid. Their operating rules are secret. Their financing sources and amounts are undisclosed. They mostly come from domestic or foreign nations whose interests they serve. As agents, they perform PR, intelligence, and population control. Most don’t provide humanitarian services.

They all claim non-profit status, yet operate unethically. They collude with governments or business interests. Their profiteer handsomely, own unrelated businesses, and exploit people they claim to serve.

In many countries, they’re the preferred choice for Western aid and emergency relief. They provide cover for imperial intervention. They cash in handsomely from wars, floods, famines, earthquakes, and other disasters. “Non-profiteering” is big business.

Universal Periodic Review (UPR)

In 2006, General Assembly Resolution 60-251 established the Human Rights Council (HRC) and authorized UPR. Three adopted “mechanisms” were decisive for Libya:

(1) Paragraph 1 established HRC.

(2) Paragraph 8 opened HRC membership to all UN Member States based on their contribution to promoting and protecting human rights. The General Assembly, by a two-thirds vote, may suspend member rights based on gross, systematic violations.

(3) Paragraph 10 authorized regular HRC annual sessions, including special ones when needed on request from one member supported by one-third of the Council.

UPR periodically examines the human rights record of all Member States. In 2009, the Non-Aligned Movement stated:

HRC “should not be used as a tool to interfere in the internal affairs of States or to question their political, economic, and social systems, their sovereign rights, and their national, religious and cultural particularities.”

In October 2005, the General Assembly adopted the responsibility to protect (R2P) principle. On February 26 and March 17, 2011, the Security Council adopted two Libya resolutions.

Even though Tripoli wasn’t an International Criminal Court (ICC) member, the first gave the body jurisdiction over ongoing events. The second authorized “all necessary measures” to “protect civilians,” as well as no-fly zone cover. Doing so was an act of war. It followed almost immediately.

“The Libyan case is a very good example of (lawlessly) interfer(ing) in the internal affairs of a sovereign state.”

Armed insurgents were supported and legitimized. Libya had no say. Claims made before HRC about massacres and other atrocities were falsified. Nonetheless, UN resolutions followed. So did war, mass slaughter and vast destruction.

“NGOs and others invoke (R2P). But what responsibility do these bodies, and the states which use military force, have for the consequences of their acts?”

In May 2010, the NGOs Freedom House and UN Watch campaigned against electing Libya but lost. Both organizations serve Western and Israeli interests. Former American Jewish Committee (AJC) honorary president, Morris Abram, founded UN Watch. AJC is a pro-Israeli front group

UN Watch wanted Libya expelled from HRC. On March 1, 2011, the General Assembly supported its campaign based on lies. HRC’s January 4, 2011 UPR was ignored.

It praised Gaddafi’s Jamahiriya governance. It said it protected “not only political rights, but also economic, educational, social and cultural rights.” It also lauded his treatment of religious minorities, and “human rights training” given his security forces.

On February 21, 2011, the Libyan League for Human Rights got 70 other NGOs to petition Obama, E.U. High Representative Catherine Ashton, and U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

They demanded international action against Libya. They cited R2P. Of the 71 petitioners, only 25 were human right groups. Others included UN Watch, the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), B’nai B’rith, and other anti-democratic organizations.

They demanded an emergency HRC Special Session “to address situations of gross and systematic violations of human rights.” They called for the General Assembly to suspend Libya’s Council membership.

On February 25, 2011, a Special Session was held. Libyan League for Human Rights (LLHR) head Sliman Bouchuiguir called for international community action against Gaddafi. LLHR is a member of the French-based International Federal of Human Rights (FIDH). It’s closely tied to NED.

Its claims later proved to be false. No documentation existed. The puppet National Transitional Council (NTC) provided them. They said Gaddafi slaughtered thousands, and mercenaries comprised 80% of his military.

Nonetheless, based on falsified NGO claims, Libya was expelled from HRC. At the same time, other nations supported its Jamahiriya government. Brazil cited its economic and social progress.

It acknowledged its promotion of rights for disabled persons, free health care, and high primary education enrollment. It also noted its cooperation with international organizations in areas of migrant rights, judicial reform, and curbing corruption.

Malta and Tunisia also expressed support. They acknowledged Jamahiriya Green Charter freedoms and achievements.

On March 14, 2012, when it was too late to matter, HRC adopted its report praising Gaddafi’s Jamahiriya government. UN Watch protested. It demanded it be rescinded. It said “Libya’s long-suffering victims deserve no less.” It ignored generous benefits NATO destroyed.

Amnesty International (AI) also called HRC’s decision “abhorrent.” Its head, Suzanne Nossel, served as Obama’s Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for International Organizations. She’s also a former Human Rights Watch (HRW) CEO.

Like AI, HRW’s record is notoriously tainted. Both supported NATO’s Libya’s campaign. It turned peace and stability into charnel house disaster. These organizations and others like them often back oppressors, not victims.

Media Complicity with Political and NGO Lies

On February 21, 2011, the government controlled French International News Network (France 24) broadcast a Libya special. It falsely claimed Gaddafi’s planes bombed civilian areas. At a later French parliament session, Sarkozy’s Tripoli ambassador refuted the account.

At the same time, falsified claims about “African mercenaries” comprising 80% of Gaddafi’s military were made. AI’s Genevieve Garrigos supported what she later said was based solely on unsubstantiated rumors.

Ashur Shamis is a National Front for the Salvation of Libya (NFSL) founding member. He was wanted by Interpol and Libyan police for years. He also was an NED Libyan Human and Political Development Forum director. He actively participated in regime change conferences.

Aly Abuzaakouk is another NFSL member with close NED ties. Like Shamis, he’s a wanted man. Among other anti-Gaddafi guests, Al Jazeera featured him during NATO’s campaign. Broadcasting falsified managed news, it shamelessly serves imperial interests.

In 2011, London-based Chatham House, a pro-corporate think tank, discussed NATO plans for attacking Libya.

A Final Comment

Libya was targeted based on falsified, undocumented NGO claims, as well as similar ones by NED and other pro-Western organizations.

“The lack of investigation, and the non-existence of any process to question (NGO assertions) inside the Council (became) one of the main causes for the events which cost the lives of thousands of Libyans” killed during NATO’s campaign.”Non-interventionism….is a way to guarantee Peace, Democracy and Freedom.”

“The Libyan case shows the reality behind” R2P.  The doctrine destroyed peace. Thousands died. Vast destruction was caused. Libyan sovereignty was lost.

NATO committed war crimes. HRC betrayed its mandate. So did the Security Council, General Assembly and ICC. R2P is “an instrument of domination.” International bodies are imperial tools.

Stronger states crush weaker ones. International law’s a non-starter. “Russia’s recent position on Syria is a step in the right direction.” It bought “breathing space” to slow another march to war. Stopping it’s another matter.

The same NGOs behind Libya’s war want another on Syria. Their earlier pattern’s repeated. It features undocumented allegations, spurning dialogue, and enlisting UN support.

“How can such interference and lack of rigor bring peace to international relations? How can these ideas claim to” support humanitarianism? How can UN bodies go along? How can they contemptuously dismiss their inviolable mandate to support peace?

These and other questions deserve answers. Complicit Member States and NGOs provide none. One war leads to another. Syria’s turn is next. Like Gaddafi, Saddam, and other Washington targets, vilifying Assad’s based on lies.

How long before bombs away repeats? How many more deaths will follow? How much more can be tolerated? When will most Member States say no more? When will peacemakers triumph? Humanity wants to know. Time’s running out for answers.

 

Apr 06

2012

0

The International Campaign to Destabilize Syria

CIA Ford Syria UN United Nations

Kofi Annan: black skin, white masks

by Thierry Meyssan

Although Kofi Annan’s track record at the UN is an indisputable success in terms of management and efficiency, he has been sharply criticized for his political shortcomings. As Secretary General, he aspired to bring the Organization into line with the unipolar world and the globalization of U.S. hegemony. He called into question the ideological foundations of the UN and undermined its ability to prevent conflicts. Notwithstanding, he is today in charge of resolving the Syrian crisis.

Voltaire Network

JPEG - 28 kb
© SANA
Former UN Secretary General and Nobel Peace Prize, Kofi Annan, has been designated by Ban Ki-moon and Nabil El Arabi as joint special envoy to negotiate a peaceful solution to the Syrian crisis. With Annan’s extraordinary experience and shiny brand image, his appointment was welcomed by all.

What does this top international official really represent? Who propelled him to the highest-ranking positions? What were his political choices, and what are his current commitments? These questions are met with a discreet silence, as if his previous functions were in themselves a guarantee of neutrality.

Handpicked and trained by the Ford Foundation and the CIA

His former colleagues praise him for his thoughtfulness, his intelligence and subtlety. A very charismatic personality, Kofi Annan left a strong imprint behind him because he did not behave simply as the “secretary” of the UN, but more like its “general,” by taking initiatives that revivified an organization that was mired in bureaucracy. All that is known and has been repeated ad nauseam. His exceptional professional qualities earned him the Nobel Peace Prize, although this honor in theory should have been bestowed for personal political commitment, not a management career.

Kofi and his twin sister Efua Atta were born on 8 April 1938, into an aristocratic family of the British colony of the Gold Coast. His father was the tribal chief of the Fante people and the elected governor of Asante province. Although he opposed British rule, he was a faithful servant of the Crown. With other notables, he took part in the first decolonization movement, but looked upon the revolutionary fervor of Kwame Nkrumah with suspicion and anxiety.

In any event, Nkrumah’s efforts led to the independence of the country in 1957 under the name of Ghana. Kofi was then 19 years old. Though not involved in the revolution, he became vice-president of the new National Student Association. It was then that he was spotted by a headhunter from the Ford Foundation who incorporated him into a program for “young leaders.” From there, he was invited to follow a summer course at Harvard University. Having noticed his enthusiasm for the United States, the Ford Foundation offered to sponsor his complete studies, first in economics at Macalester College in Minnesota, followed by international relations at the Graduate Institute of International Studies in Geneva.

After the Second World War, the Ford Foundation, created by famous industrialist Henry Ford, became an unofficial instrument of U.S. foreign policy, providing a respectable facade for the activities of the CIA [1].

Kofi Annan’s overseas study period (1959-1961) coincided with the most difficult years of the African-American civil rights movement (the start of Martin Luther King’s Birmingham campaign). He saw it as an extension of the decolonization he had witnessed in Ghana, but once again did not get involved.

Impressed with Annan’s academic achievements and political discretion, his U.S. mentors opened for him the doors of the World Health Organization, where he landed his first job. After three years at WHO headquarters in Geneva, he was appointed to the Economic Commission for Africa based in Addis Ababa. However, not sufficiently qualified to pursue a career at the UN, he returned to the United States to take up management studies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) (1971-1972). He then attempted a comeback in his home country as director of tourism development, but found himself perpetually at odds with the military government of General Acheampong; he gave up and returned to the United Nations in 1976. →

Apr 06

2012

0

Imperialist Wars/Occupations

Africa ASI ECOWAS Imperialism Libya Mali Neocolonialism TSCTI Tuareg UN

Coup in Mali Exposes All Opportunists Which Feed Off African Resources

Apr 6, 2012
What began as a mutiny on March 22, 2012 at Kati’s army barracks near Bamako quickly became a coup against the former general, Amadou Toumani Touré.

Public speculation has it that the reason for the overthrow was Touré’s incompetence. Captain Amadou Sanogo, a coup leader, argued that the ousted government had failed to provide the national army with adequate means to defeat the rebellion against the Taureg people in the north of Mali.

At no point have coup leaders spoken out against imperialism or neocolonialism. History has shown us that military coups are a quick way for elements of the military sector of the African petty bourgeoisie to seize power and secure large chunks of resources for themselves.

Touré himself came into power in a coup against the former neocolonial dictator, Moussa Traore, in March 1991.

Today, the constitution of Mali has been suspended, its borders closed, and several ministers arrested.

The deposed president is currently in hiding.

Neocolonialism benefits only the parasitic imperialists in Mali

The neocolonial state was created to repress the toiling masses, for the benefit of parasitic French rulers and black collaborators.

The country of Mali is a former French colony landlocked between Algeria, Guinea, Niger, Senegal, Côte D’ivoire, Burkina Faso and Mauritania — artificial borders created by white rulers at the 1884-85 Berlin Conference, with neither the consent nor the participation of African people.

Some observers feel there is evidence of a U.S.-led white imperialist scheme to carve up Africa and recolonize it at the expense of Africans.

Mali is vulnerable to severe drought conditions and hunger. Its most important mineral export is gold, but the reality is that Mali cannot develop economically within its present context, which is determined by imperial powers that are lining up to exploit its vast resources, including increasing U.S. influence.

The U.S. provides “military and economic aid of $70 million each year and another $70 million for food and other humanitarian needs.”

As a result of this U.S. intrusion, Mali has now been brought into a U.S.-led military program known as the Trans-Saharan Counter Terrorism Initiative (TSCTI).

Colonial borders represent the status quo: tear them down!

Despite the coup, power remains in the hands of the African petty bourgeois, class-enemy-from-within that rules at the expense the African working class and the poor peasantry.

The liberal democratic rights that we saw in Mali were actually a political space for sectors of the African petty bourgeoisie to compete for access to State power — not a space where imperialism could be fought.

We must turn our backs on both coup leaders and the deposed government.

We need a transformation of Mali — powered by the people — to satisfy the material needs and legitimate aspirations of the people of Mali.

Workers, peasants and honest progressive forces, including progressives in the armed forces in Mali, must fight for a people’s State.

The people’s State must be based on struggle for a revolutionary national democratic program that will sweep away all remnants of the neocolonial State, which is rotten to the core.

This type of State, created to repress the toiling masses for the benefit of parasitic French rulers and black collaborators, must go.

The democratization of Mali must mean that the people come to power anchored around a new revolutionary State, which must be born against parasitic capitalism and Berlin conference-created nationality, which does not serve the African working class in Mali or anywhere else.

Any news or “aid” coming from the African Union, Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), United Nations or coup leaders represents the status quo. →