Cover Up Of US massacre of Yemeni civilians, as CIA asks permission to kill people at random

ACLU, CCR Request Information on US Drone Strike That Caused Al-Majalah Massacre

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) have filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for information on the legal basis for a strike that occurred in Yemen on December 17, 2009. The United States had been allegedly targeting Saleh Mohammed al-Anbouri, a “known militant who had allegedly been ‘bringing nationals from different countries to train them to become al Qaeda members. At least one cruise missile with cluster munitions was launched and killed not only Al-Anbouri but also forty-one civilians, including women and children.

The ACLU and CCR specifically seek details(pdf)on the following:

We seek information about the U.S. government’s legal basis in domestic, foreign, and international law for the U.S. military strike on the al-Majalah community,information about the U.S. government’s decision-making process and factual basis for ordering that strike, and information concerning any investigations or assessments of the strike by or at the behest of the U.S. government. We specifically seek records concerning the U.S. government’s knowledge that civilians, including women and children, were present in thecommunity, the measures taken to fulfill the United States’ legal obligation to limit civilian casualties, and any measures taken by or at the behest of the United States to compensate victims’ surviving family members for the loss of civilian life and property caused by the strike. Finally, we request information concerning U.S. government efforts to conceal its responsibility for the al-Majalah strike.

Weeks ago, the Bureau of Investigative Journalism (TBIJ), based in the United Kingdom, published a study of the US drone war in Yemen and highlighted the massacre. Twenty-two children were killed. A dozen women were killed. Five of the women killed were pregnant. [A complete list of the victims has been published by TBIJ.]

Yemen’s parliament convened a “Commission of inquiry into the security incidents in the Abyan province.” What the Commission found when visiting the cemetery was “grisly.” The victims were buried in “communal graves” because they could not be identified. “Their bodies had been completely torn into pieces during the attack.” Tribal leader, Sheik Saleh Ben Fareed, told journalist Jeremy Scahill anyone who had a “weak heart” would “collapse” if they saw the remains of those killed. “You see heads of those who were killed here and there. You see children,” Fareed added. “And you cannot tell if this meat belongs to animals or to human beings. Very sad, very sad.”

The US refused to speak about the civilians killed in this drone strike. A State Department spokesperson told TBIJ, “I don’t have any information for you with respect to the December 17, 2009 incident in question. I refer you to the Government of Yemen for additional information on its counterterrorism efforts.” It was a mendacious reference as the  ”counterterrorism efforts” have been and continue to be carried out by the Yemen government under the direction of the US government.

The ACLU and CCR also request information on the State Department’s diplomatic coverup of the massacre, which WikiLeaks exposed in its release of US State Embassy cables.

After the Al-Majalah massacre, US diplomats and military officers worked to cover up the attack. A January 2010 cable detailed a meeting between President Ali Abdullah Saleh and then-CENTCOM commander General David Petraeus. Saleh told Petraeus the Yemen government would continue to say “the bombs are ours, not yours.” The Yemen government would cover up the attacks to help the US keep them covert. And, though Saleh expressed concern about the inaccuracy of the missiles and the number of civilians killed, he promised to help the US avoid an investigation.

The Yemen government apologized to the victims. They “paid out compensation at local levels to affected families.” The US State Department and CENTCOM, which hold responsibility for the covert operation that killed the civilians, did nothing. That is why TBIJ asked the State Department what investigations the US carried out into the December 17 attack, what further investigations were conducted after the commission inquiry by the Yemeni parliament, what disciplinary measures have been taken against US personnel involved, and what compensation, if any, was paid by the US to surviving members of the families attacked on that day.

There is a level of urgency to the request for information. The number of attacks in Yemen has escalated; attacks there now occur more frequently than drone strikes in Pakistan. The US government, however, has withheld legal and factual information that justifies the use of lethal force in a country “with which the United States is not at war.” The secrecy suggests that much of the covert drone war violates international and domestic law. The refusal to address what happened with the al-Majalah strike makes it highly likely that this is another war crime the US has committed in the “war on terrorism.”

via ACLU Investigating Cover Up Of US Missile Massacre That Killed 21 Children And 14 Women.

CIA seeks to expand Yemen drone campaign against random people

The CIA is seeking authority to expand its covert drone campaign in Yemen by launching strikes against terrorism suspects even when it does not know the identities of those who will be killed, U.S. officials said.

Securing permission to use “signature strikes” would allow the agency to hit targets based solely on intelligence indicating patterns of suspicious behavior, such as imagery showing militants gathering at known al-Qaida compounds or unloading explosives.

The practice has been a core element of the CIA’s drone program in Pakistan for several years. But Director David Petraeus has requested permission to employ the tactic against the al-Qaida affiliate in Yemen, which has emerged as the most pressing terrorism threat to the United States, officials said.

If approved, the change would probably accelerate a campaign of U.S. airstrikes in Yemen that is already on a record pace, with at least eight attacks in the past four months.

from the seattle times, via the washington post

organ harvesting from condemned prisoners may be behind china’s ruling party factional squabbles

On April 15, The Epoch Times News Group published an exclusive report that revealed an insider’s shocking information behind Xi Jinping’s succession.

It states that what is happening now within the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is not only about internal CCP power struggle, but also about important truth to be uncovered, which is closely related to each Chinese.

The Epoch Times report states that the intensive CCP power struggle is actually around Xi Jinping. In fact Jiang Zemin secretly chose Bo Xilai to be the CCP’s next leader at the CCP’s 18th Congress, not Xi Jinping. But due to various factors within the CCP circle, Jiang Zemin was forced to choose Xi Jinping as a transition.

According to the report, the focus of the current struggle between Jiang and Hu’s factions, as well as the focus of power struggles of CCP’s 16th, 17th and 18th Congresses, are all to cover up Jiang’s faction 13-year persecution of Falun Gong, and their crimes of anti-humanity and genocide.

Wen Zhao (News analyst): “Jiang’s faction and the CCP utilized the state apparatus to conduct years of brutal persecution against Falun Gong. Instead of eliminating Falun Gong, they are now stuck in this situation.”

Wen Zhao: “Since the so-called ‘self-immolation’ case, CCP’ official media did not attack for a long time Falun Gong. In fact Falun Gong has always been here.

Since CCP’s persecution did not succeed, Falun Gong issue has become an important factor to consider for the CCP in taking any big decision. Its successor is bound to be tied with the bloody persecution of Falun Gong.”

News analyst Lan Shu pointed out that Jiang’s faction revealed “the information”to Bo Xilai long time ago, in order to seek a way out.

Lan Shu: “According to reports, Jiang Zemin spoke to Bo Xilai at private occasions about this, and that to continue progressing in politics he (Bo) must have a clear position on the issue of Falun Gong’s persecution. So Bo spared no effort in the persecution of Falun Gong. Therefore, Jiang’s fraction considered to use Bo Xilai to pass down the power.”

However, Bo Xilai was sent to Chongqing due to Wen Jiabao. And this got him out of the picture to be a successor. In addition, Hu Jintao prefers his team member Li Keqiang. So Jiang Zemin was in a difficult position before the 17th CCP Congress.

Wen Zhao: “Jiang Zemin was very anxious. If the successor he chose changes on him, then the persecution can’t continue. Especially if he is someone from his opponent’s group, whom he is not familiar with or cannot control. Then he will face judgment, which he is very afraid of.”

WikiLeaks also revealed recently that some retired CCP leaders also like Xi Jinping, who is very cautious in his deeds.

So Xi Jinping was suddenly pushed up during the 17th CCP Congress.

The Epoch Times reported the inside information on how Jiang Zemin forced Qiao Shi to retire, after imposing new retirement rules on the CCP’s Politburo. It also revealed, Jiang Zemin planned “to use Deng Xiaoping’ method to retire Hua Guofeng and eliminate Xi Jinping.”

Wen Zhao: “Xi Jinping was not directly involved in crimes against human rights. So Jiang Zemin was not at ease.”

The report stated that Jiang and Zeng’s plan was being smoothly carried out by Bo and Zhou. But Wang’s defection to the U.S. consulate exposed it, and the whole plan collapsed.

Wang Lijun exposed that Bo Xilai had been forcing his team to do various kinds of “unimaginable things.” Lan Shu analyzed that, based on Wang Lijun’s resume and his many papers on organ transplants, what he mentioned as “unimaginable things” are not merely power struggles and corruption.

Lan Shu: “I think what he meant by “unimaginable things’ include live organ harvesting from Falun Gong practitioners.

Once this is exposed, the CCP will be on the opposite side of the entire international society.”

An investigation report “Bloody Harvest” was published in 2007, on the live organ harvesting from Falun Gong practitioners.

The authors of the report are David Matas, Esq, a Canadian independent investigator and international human rights lawyer, and Hon. David Kilgor, Esq., Former Canadian Secretary of State (Asia-Pacific) and Member of Parliament. They concluded that based on their 52 kinds of evidences, such “unprecedented evil on this planet” does occur in China. The Epoch Times reported that once the Jiang Zemin group loses its absolute control over China the truth will be exposed immediately, and upheavals will unfold in China.

from alexander higgins blog 

Julian Assange’s lawyer needed “official approval” to return to australia

british media and aussie government work together to make fools of assange and his lawyer

A lawyer for the WikiLeaks founder, Julian Assange, has said she was stopped at Heathrow airport and told she was on a watch list requiring official approval before she could return to her native Australia.

Jennifer Robinson said a member of airport security told her she “must have done something controversial” and that they would have to contact the Australian high commission in London before letting her on her flight.

The Australian human rights lawyer was later allowed on to a plane bound for Sydney, where she is due to speak at the Commonwealth Law Conference on Friday.

Australia’s department of foreign affairs said it was not aware of any restrictions on Robinson’s travel and added that its high commission in London had no record of receiving a call from the British authorities about her movements.

Robinson wrote on Twitter at 9.30pm on Wednesday night: “Just delayed from checking in at LHR [London Heathrow] because I’m apparently ‘inhibited’ – requiring approval from Australia House @dfat [department of foreign affairs] to travel …

“Security guard: ‘you must have done something controversial’ because we have to phone the embassy. ‘Certain government agencies’ list.”

She met Assange – who is fighting extradition to Sweden to face sex crime allegations – on Monday, according to a Tweet from the official WikiLeaks account.

The Commonwealth Lawyers Association (CLA), which is organising the conference at which Robinson will appear, voiced concerns about the incident.

It said in a statement: “If these reports are accurate, then the CLA believe they raise profound issues concerning the independence of lawyers and their clients.

“The CLA points out that Article 13 of the UN principles on the role of lawyers sets out clearly that ‘lawyers shall not be identified with their clients or their clients’ causes as a result of discharging their functions.”

An Australian department of foreign affairs spokesman said: “We are aware of claims by Jennifer Robinson, a member of Julian Assange’s legal team, that she was prevented by UK border authorities from boarding a flight in London because her travel was in some way ‘inhibited’, and that she would not be able to travel without prior approval from Australian officials.

“As the department of immigration and citizenship confirmed publicly earlier today, no Australian government agency prevented Ms Robinson from boarding her flight at London’s Heathrow airport. We are not aware of any Australian government restrictions applying to Ms Robinson’s travel.

“As an Australian with a valid passport, Ms Robinson would be free to return to Australia at any stage.

“The Australian high commission in London has no record of a call being received from UK authorities concerning her travel.

“We understand Ms Robinson has today departed London on a flight to Australia. We are seeking to verify Ms Robinson’s claims with relevant UK authorities.”

Assange, an Australian former computer hacker, made headlines around the world with revelations from secret US military files and diplomatic cables released by his whistleblowing website WikiLeaks.

He is awaiting the outcome of his appeal to the supreme court, the highest court in the UK, against being extradited to Sweden.

via Julian Assange’s lawyer ‘prevented from boarding flight at Heathrow’ | Media | guardian.co.uk.

also see this piece of journalistic garbage, from the guardian, uk:

The World Tomorrow: Julian Assange proves a useful idiot

13 arrested during Pussy Riot court hearing in Russia

Russian police have detained at least 13 people demonstrating outside a court against the arrests of three members of a women’s punk rock group, witnesses say.

The court was to decide whether to extend the detention of the three women, part of the Pussy Riot group that performed a protest song against the president elect, Vladimir Putin, in Moscow’s Christ the Saviour Cathedral in February.

About 60 of the group’s supporters chanted: “Freedom! Freedom!” outside the beige brick Moscow courthouse, and some released green, pink and yellow balloons with Pussy Riot’s trademark masks drawn on them.

Scuffles broke out when a Russian Orthodox bystander threw an egg at the husband of one of the three detainees. A Reuters reporter saw police drag at least 13 people off into police vans, two of them for throwing a smoke bomb.

The three women could face seven years in jail on hooliganism charges but deny taking part in the protest. No date has been set for the trial and the court was expected to extend their pre-trial detention.

Anger over their arrests has fuelled criticism of the Russian Orthodox church, whose status has improved vastly since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 and which has played an increasingly active role in politics since then.

Russians are divided over Pussy Riot’s “punk prayer” protest. Many believers were offended by the protest but some are also upset that church leaders have called for tough sentences in the case.

via Russian police arrest 13 outside Pussy Riot court hearing | World news | guardian.co.uk.

indigenous communities asserting themselves across the americas

Indigenous politics tend to be understood as local anecdotes, rather than political events of international significance. So it is of little surprise that the funeral of Bernardo Vásquez in San José del Progreso, Oaxaca, Mexico, generated little international attention. Vásquez was the second anti-mining activist shot dead in the past two months in the small Zapotec community, while many other opponents have been seriously injured in the Ocotlán Valley.

Mine-related violence is certainly distressing but far from rare, extending from Chile to the Arctic. What is less ordinary is the extent and intensification of anti-mining mobilisation across Latin America. The past month in particular has seen a swell in protests defending land and water resources. Between World Water Day, annually celebrated on March 22, and the International Day of Peasant Struggles on April 17, this spring has seen resistance against mega-projects gain solid ground.

The incidents in Ocotlán, simultaneous with larger mobilisations in other locations, are indicative of a broader turn in which indigenous movements are leading coordinated efforts to defend natural resources. Indigenous movements may be locally rooted, yet as its contest reframes governmental agendas, it ineluctably impacts transnational politics as well.

‘Conga won’t go’ in Peru

On World Water Day, thousands of people gathered around the Blue Lagoon in the Peruvian highlands of Cajamarca to protect their water resources from mining exploitation and contamination. The Conga Mine, a $4.8bn project involving US-based Newmont Mining Corporation and Peruvian company Minas Buenaventura, would be the second largest gold mine in the world and affect five sources of drinking water.

Residents of Cajamarca have been insistently protesting the Conga Mine project, approved in 2010. Neither President Humala’s 60-day state of emergency and increased military presence nor the external review of the environmental impact study were able to undermine the intensifying civil unrest. In fact, mobilisations gained momentum since Cajamarca’s regional vice president, César Aliaga Díaz, issued regional ordinance 036, declaring the Conga project unviable, thereby lending official support to the mobilisations. The uncontroversial alliance between local protesters and Cajamarca’s government against the Peruvian state and international mining interests suggests a multi-layered, and certainly transnational, political scenario.

via The significance of indigenous mobilisations – Opinion – Al Jazeera English.

more:

Resilience in Ecuador

Ecuador’s March for Life, Water, and the Dignity of Peoples was as extensive as it was enduring, gathering marchers for more than 400 miles from International Women’s Day (March 8) to World Water Day. When CONAIE’s[Esp] president Humberto Cholando led thousands of indigenous peoples into the capital on March 22, thousands of non-indigenous protesters had also joined in. The government, in turn, organised pro-government countermarches, accusing the march of being fomented by prior coup participants, and to be supported by the country’s right for electoral motives.

Despite obstacles and shortcomings, this national mobilisation symbolises the re-unification of all indigenous groups in Ecuador around one common political agenda, echoing the massive mobilisations of the 1990s. Using the same slogan as the anti-Conga movement: “Life is worth more than gold,” the march emphasised protecting water and opposing mega-mining projects. The 19-point demand, however, was broader and included other issues, including opposing the expansion of oil frontiers and demanding labour rights as well as the respect of sexual rights.

This march did not achieve formal negotiations with the state. Yet it did achieve another important goal: to demand – and to practice – the de-criminalisation of social protest. In that sense, this mobilisation represents the resilience as well as the agility of an indigenous movement that has remained the leading force of opposition over the years, surviving political censorship and intimidation, as well its own internal fractures.

Thousands enter Guatemala City

Days after Ecuador’s march, more than 10,000 people entered Guatemala City - an impressive crowd for a capital of about one million inhabitants. The march lasted nine days, covered much of the country, and involved a diverse array of social sectors. Called the “Indigenous, Campesino, and Popular March for the defence, dignity and of the Earth and Territories”, this mobilisation was explicitly national and geared to address social concerns beyond indigenous concerns. The agenda encompassed land rights and territoriality as well as fundamental civil rights such as a Law for Community Media to legalise community radios. Just like in Ecuador, Guatemala’s anti-mining march is relevant because it is embedded in politics at large.

Leaders issued a declaration of the march for resistance and dignity in defence of the earth and territory, in which they demand, among others things, the cancellation of concessions for mining, petroleum and hydroelectric plants, and mono-culture agriculture – as well as the end to persecution and criminalisation of indigenous people fighting for their rights (eight indigenous women in San Miguel Ixtahuacán have arrest orders against them for speaking out against the Marlin Mine). Such forceful mobilisation convinced President Otto Perez Molina to negotiate the demands posited in the protesters official declaration.

TIPNIS redux

In Bolivia, indigenous mobilisation is also at a peak. The protests that brought international attention to the construction of a highway through the Indigenous Territory and National Park Isiboro Sécure (TIPNIS) are far from over. The 61-day march in the autumn of 2011 generated widespread support for originary peoples, pushing the government to abide by a law protecting the TIPNIS and interrupting the construction more than once. As conflict over the TIPNIS holds, political strategies grow increasingly complex, intricate, and transnational. The UN offered to mediate the stand-off, whereas the Brazilian National Bank for Social and Economic Development (which is financing most of the project) is demanding that the construction firm and the Bolivian government reframe the contract.

Despite political retaliation against protesters and harassment against leaders – such as against the president of the Bolivian Confederation of Indigenous Peoples (CIDOB), Adolfo Chávez, and the president of the TIPNIS, Fernando Vargas – coordination strengthened and even expanded to urban areas. In fact, Bolivia’s IV Indigenous National Commission just ratified the start of the IX March in Defence of the TIPNIS for April 25, from Chaparina to La Paz. It will reiterate resistance against the road construction through protected territories, as well as to defend natural resources at large, respect for constitutional rights, and insist on the democratic practice of consultation.

The various marches in defence of the TIPNIS evolved beyond a mobilisation for and by indigenous interests. It made tangible a national political discontent beyond protected territories, bringing international visibility to the internal fissures of the Morales government.

The smaller and larger indigenous mobilisations taking place simultaneously across Latin America are inevitably local, in that they contest projects in their communities, but they cannot be trivialised as isolated or anecdotal incidents. These mobilisations are of international relevance because they have successfully mobilised thousands of peoples, indigenous and non-indigenous, over long periods of time and across territories, crafting political demands, and often forcing governments to reframe policies. Most importantly, indigenous mobilisation has been able to bring environmental politics to the streets, turning natural resources, water, and consultation into public political issues. The growing constellation of mobilisations across the region points towards deeper societal changes in the making.

 see pushing back for more about indigenous people’s struggles against resource extraction