Kofi Annan Mediates a Settlement in Kenya

allAfrica.com

Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki and opposition leader Raila Odinga have signed an agreement to end the country's post-election crisis. At a ceremony in Nairobi yesterday, the two men put their signatures to a power-sharing deal brokered by ex-UN head Kofi Annan. A coalition government comprising members of the current ruling party and opposition will now be formed.


Some 1,500 people died in political violence after Mr Odinga said he was robbed of victory in December's polls. International observers agreed the count was flawed. Violence has mostly receded, but tensions are still running extremely high.


Negotiations between the government and Mr Odinga's Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) lasted more than a month, stalling several times. Discussions centred on the creation of the post of prime minister, likely to be taken by Mr Odinga. Both sides agreed that there should be a prime minister, but had differed on what powers the new post would have.


Speaking after the deal was signed, Mr Annan said the division of posts in the new government would reflect the two rival political parties' strengths in parliament.

One in 99 Americans Behind Bars

AlterNet

According to a new study from Pew, 1 in 99 American adults are currently in jail. From the New York Times article on the report:

For the first time in the nation's history, more than one in 100 American adults is behind bars, according to a new report.


Nationwide, the prison population grew by 25,000 last year, bringing it to almost 1.6 million. Another 723,000 people are in local jails. The number of American adults is about 230 million, meaning that one in every 99.1 adults is behind bars.


Incarceration rates are even higher for some groups. One in 36 Hispanic adults is behind bars, based on Justice Department figures for 2006. One in 15 black adults is, too, as is one in nine black men between the ages of 20 and 34.

Military spending and incarceration rates are also both cornerstones of the booming Republican public sector economy:

In 2007, according to the National Association of State Budgeting Officers, states spent $44 billion in tax dollars on corrections. That is up from $10.6 billion in 1987, a 127 increase once adjusted for inflation. With money from bond issues and from the federal government included, total state spending on corrections last year was $49 billion. By 2011, the report said, states are on track to spend an additional $25 billion.

The Ethnology of a Chicago Gang

I have a new theory. Dirty money is spread so wide and deep that perhaps most of the wealthy families in this world started out in the underground economy, like drug and human trafficking. That would certainly explain the Kennedy's, Bush and the EU willing to look the other way in Kosovo where a gangster is running the government, and the history of the Iran Contra as well as seeding the start of Osama's Islamic jihad against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan funded by Reagan and the Saudi family. Here is a book review about a Chicago gangster that offers some confirmation of what I'm suspecting.
Salon Books

None of Robert Taylor residents really liked the gang, but it evolved to serve a purpose: As is often the case when civil order breaks down -- whether it happens in Afghanistan, Somalia or the South Side of Chicago -- strongmen emerge to provide security, at a cost. On the other hand, at least the residents of Robert Taylor knew exactly what they were getting for their "taxes."


[..]As soon as people start using the word "community," you can be pretty sure they're trying to put something over on you. In time, Venkatesh became just as disillusioned with Ms. Bailey, the neighborhood clergy, the director of the local Boys and Girls Clubs (inventor of the much-celebrated midnight basketball leagues of the 1990s) and the cops -- the ones with the "real power" in the ghetto, and in a few cases all too prone to abusing it. Everyone he met was jostling for influence, offering protection or resources, and distributing both to whoever had the most to offer them in return.


What the budding sociologist found, in the end, was not the depraved chaos that the political right imagines ghetto life to be, nor the left's tragic melodrama of a powerless, victimized population terrorized by its most hopeless members. (J.T., a gifted manager by Venkatesh's account, went to college on an athletic scholarship and gave up a job selling office supplies when he realized that white employees were receiving preferential treatment.) What he did find was an economy, and a rough social order that the residents had assembled out of the broken pieces left to them by society at large. Without meaningful police services, they cobbled together a security force of sorts. Without much in the way of social services, they figured out how to extract some of what they needed from the main economic engine in their environment: the gang. Within the borders of a major American city, they lived in the equivalent of a corrupt third-world nation.


At times, the creativity and ingenuity of the people Venkatesh meets are impressive, but they were still spent in getting what most of their fellow citizens take nearly for granted: a roof over their heads, food for their kids, protection from thieves and brutes. The Robert Taylor Homes have since been torn down, J.T. left the gang to manage a dry-cleaning business, and Venkatesh moved on to Harvard and to see his work featured in the bestselling book "Freakonomics." (He's currently writing a blog that gathers real-life gangsters' responses to the television series "The Wire.")


He writes that few of today's gangs are as extensive, stable and well organized as the Black Kings once were, and by the time you get to the end of "Gang Leader for a Day," it's hard not to wonder if that's such a good thing. Criminals though they were, the job they did wasn't always as dirty. And somebody's got to do it.

Court Attacks Free Speech

Los Angeles Times

A coalition of media and public interest organizations went to federal court in San Francisco on Tuesday urging a judge to reconsider his order to shut down a muckraking website that publishes leaked documents from businesses and government agencies worldwide.


Lawyers for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the American Civil Liberties Union, Public Citizen and several news organizations, told U.S. District Judge Jeffrey White that two orders he issued last week against wikileaks.org were prior restraints that violated the 1st Amendment.


Laura Handman, a Washington, D.C., attorney for the news organizations, said White's order was so expansive that the only way to describe it was as if a judge had shut down a newspaper because of controversy over one article.


"I can't think of another injunction that was so broad," said Matt Zimmerman of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a civil rights group that focuses on digital issues.


White acted in response to a lawsuit filed Feb. 6 by Julius Baer & Co., a Zurich-based bank, alleging that a disgruntled former employee had posted internal documents alleging money-laundering and tax evasion schemes at its Cayman Islands branch.


Wikileaks.org specifically urges readers to post leaked documents in an effort to discourage "unethical behavior" by corporations and government agencies. Among the 1.2 million documents that Wikileaks says it has posted over the last several years is an operations manual for the controversial U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.


Julius Baer, represented by the Century City firm Lavely & Singer, past lawyers for several celebrities in battles with news organizations, alleged that the postings violated privacy and bank secrecy laws of Switzerland and the Cayman Islands and posed a serious threat of identity theft.

Turkish Invasion of Iraq Threatens to Escalate to Full Scale

The Iraqi Government finally acknowledges the Turkish invasion. The Iraqi Cabinet condemned the Turkish military incursion in northern Iraq as a "violation" of its "sovereignty".
Meanwhile, the Kurds are rattling sabres and may be preparing a counter-attack which will clearly provoke a massive Turkish response. The Turks have massed over 140,000 troops near the border, as many troups as the US had before the surge.
Harpers

“The bombings are continuing by land and by air; the clashes are becoming heavier.” This was a Turkish military source quoted in a story today in the Guardian, referring to his country’s incursions into northern Iraq yesterday to pursue militants from the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). Hundreds of soldiers and rebel troops have died since fighting began last week. (I previously discussed last December’s attack by Turkey into Kurdistan.)


The Turkish offensive, which has been green-lighted by the Bush Administration, was criticized by the Iraqi government. “We know the threats that Turkey is facing, but military operations will not solve the PKK problem,” a government spokesman, Ali al-Dabbagh, told The Guardian. Meanwhile, Kurdish anger towards the United States is growing. “We are their friends and we thought we were their allies,” the newspaper quoted Muhammad Qadir, a shopkeeper in Irbil, as saying. “We don’t support the PKK, but we are angry that the Americans are allowing the Turks to wage war against our fellow Kurds.”


A former U.S. official who works in northern Iraq emailed me to say:

The United States is being skillfully handled by the Turks, who are dragging the U.S. into a policy disaster in Kurdistan. The Kurds have moved a lot of fighters and equipment quietly into the area, and are prepared to strike the Turks. Massoud Barzani, the Iraqi Kurdish leader [NOT PKK, Peshmurga, the best Iraqi soldiers!] has issued all the press comments he can to publicly warn that Kurdish patience is gone. The United States is either ignoring the signals or missing them…The Kurds can and will bloody the Turks badly in a fight.

This former official is close to Kurdish officials and hence an interested party, but his previous reports from the ground have been well-informed.

Russian FM warns NATO, EU mission not to use force against Serbs in Kosovo

The Russians seem to be trying to provoke a run on the border between Kosovo and Serbia. Warning the Kosovar Serbs that NATO might block their escape will inevitably increase those seeking to escape.
That can only serve a plan to start a guerrilla war.
International Herald Tribune

Russia's foreign minister claimed in remarks broadcast Monday that NATO and the EU have been considering using force to keep Serbs from leaving Kosovo following its declaration of independence.


Sergey Lavrov, in an interview on state-run Vesti-24 television, said that would undermine security in the Balkans and Europe.


Lavrov suggested that the EU's police and justice mission was seeking help from NATO forces to ease its deployment in Serb-populated northern Kosovo and to keep Serbs in the region.


"We have information that the EU mission, attempting to deploy in Serb enclaves — and the Serbs do not want this — is trying to draw the NATO forces for Kosovo onto its side," he said. He added that "the question of using force to hold back Serbs who do not want to remain under Pristina's authority ... is being seriously discussed."


Lavrov also said "there is information that NATO contingents are trying to use force" to close the borders between Kosovo and "the rest of Serbia." He did not say where he got his information.


"This will only lead to yet another 'frozen conflict' and will push the prospects for stabilizing Europe — and first of all for stabilizing the Balkans — far to the side," he said.


NATO spokesman James Appathurai, responding to Lavrov's comments, said the alliance would be evenhanded in its treatment of all Kosovo residents.


"NATO forces in Kosovo have a clear mandate from the U.N. Security Council to establish a safe and secure environment for all residents, majority and minority alike," he said. "They have done that task in a neutral and impartial way since the day they deployed in Kosovo and they will continue to do so."

The Ballot or the Bullet

The Black World Today

We don’t know what Barack will do [if elected President], but he has presented some thoughts which would mean some change in the ugliness of the policies of this country. He hasn’t spelled out an anti-poverty program like the one proposed by Martin Luther King, a program of full employment, guaranteed annual income, and 100,000 units of affordable housing each year. But he has spoken out about Social Security reform that rejects privatization and raises the income cap for imposition of the FICA tax, a move that would secure Social Security for decades to come. Obama speaks of removing tax credits for those companies that send our jobs overseas. He speaks of raising taxes on those who make more than $250,000 annually, and eliminating taxes for seniors who make less than $50,000 a year. Of course, he promises to end the war in Iraq, and bring the troops home by the end of 2009.


His foreign policy includes diplomatic overtures to Venezuela, Iran, and Cuba. Does this mean ending the rhetoric about bringing democracy to the world? This rhetoric is so hypocritical coming from a country that becomes more fascistic by the day, by the hour, by the minute.


Poverty is not confined solely to Black folks. So anything that addresses that evil does indeed have universal appeal. The belligerence of the united states causes pain to the majority of its citizens. Obama’s promise to bring the troops home reaches all corners of the u.s.


[..]I have looked to Barack’s web page to find information about his thoughts on the criminal justice system. Found nothing there, and of course the issue of Political Prisoners in the u.s. is a non-existent issue in this campaign, and seemingly a non-existent issue for Barack Obama. He has been a civil rights attorney, so I can’t believe he is completely unaware of the issue, as so many of our so-called black politicians like to claim. No point talking to him about this now. But, hopefully, we will be all over him on this matter after he is elected.


[..]We are not a stupid people. We know better than to expect miracles, freedom, or liberation if Barack Obama becomes president of the united states. But the huge turnout of the so-called African-American vote will be a major factor in placing Barack in the Oval Office. Obama will do well to take a lesson from the David Dinkins saga.


Don’t take our vote for granted; it is what will get him to the White House, and if he turns it off, it will mean his ticket out of the White House – no second term.


Michelle Obama says she doesn’t want people to vote for her husband just because he is Black. She knows better, and saying it is only being prudent. Easily 90% of the so-called African-american vote for Obama will be because he is Black. And because he is Black, a renewed hope will rise up in Black youth, the new constituency that Obama brings to the ballot box. If he crushes their hopes, plays “plantation politics,” he will leave millions in hopeless despair. That hopelessness can evolve into anger and rage, and Barack Obama, the Democratic Party, and the entire country may well face the reality of Brother Malcolm’s admonition, “the ballot or the bullet.”

Women and children in Gaza form human chain

Times Online

Thousands of Palestinians protesting against an international blockade on the Gaza Strip formed a human chain today, with Israel warning of an iron-fisted response if demonstrators tried to storm the country's border.


Men, women and children holding both Palestinian and Hamas flags turned out for the start of what organisers linked to the ruling Hamas movement claimed would be a peaceful protest eventually involving some 50,000 people.


The organisers said that the human chain - designed to link a 25-mile stretch of the main road traversing the centre of the coastal strip between the towns of Rafah and Beit Hanoun - would be designed to show up the plight of Gaza residents to the international community.


Schools were closed for the day, and thousands of pupils were taken in buses to participate. Many could be seen with banners stating: "The Siege of Gaza Will Only Strengthen Us, "The World Has Condemned Gaza to Death" and "Save Gaza".


The international community has largely boycotted Gaza since Hamas, which refuses to renounce terrorism or recognise Israel's right to exist, deposed the secular Fatah movement in a military coup to take control. Fatah, which is led by the Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, still controls the West Bank.


“This is a peaceful and civilised act to let the people express their rejection of the siege and of collective punishment,” Jamal al-Khudari, leader of the Popular Committee Against the Siege, the pro-Hamas organisers, said. "We are raising a cry to the world for it to act."

President Pervez Musharraf May Stepdown

The Hindu News

Having apparently run out of options, Pakistan's beleaguered President Pervez Musharraf "is considering stepping down in days" to avoid a showdown with the newly elected Parliament in that country.


"He (Musharraf) has already started discussing the exit strategy for himself. I think it is now just a matter of days and not months because he would like to make a graceful exit on a high," 'The Sunday Telegraph' quoted one of the President's close confidantes as saying.


According to senior aides, Musharraf would prefer to resign rather than waiting to be impeached and forced out of office by the victorious opposition parties who triumphed in last week's general election in that country and announced they would form a coalition government.


"He may have made many mistakes, but he genuinely tried to build the country and he doesn't want to destroy it just for the sake of his personal office," an unnamed official close to the President told the British newspaper.


Musharraf had last week said that he would not resign despite his allies suffering a crushing defeat in the election and had also asserted that he intends to stay in office to guide the democratic transition in Pakistan.


But the official said that he had considered resigning immediately after the election results were known, but was persuaded by party loyalists that his sudden departure could precipitate a crisis.

Putin Warns West Over Kosovo Dispute

The Russian are announcing a full return to the cold and sometimes neighboring hot wars in it's now shrunken sphere of influence. Putin is warning that Russia will consider an military option in dealing with it's immediate neighbors, not Kosovo. I believe he's also saying, if he had it to do again, he would have moved several divisions of the Russian Army into Serbia to prevent the secession of Kosovo. I don't believe he's threaten a war, but he is signaling a renewed arms race, one that oil rich Russia just might win.
The Associated Press

Putin used the meeting of presidents from the Commonwealth of Independent States — a loose, Russian-dominated organization of former Soviet states — to lambast Western nations that have recognized Kosovo's independence. Among those are the United States, Britain, Germany and France.


"The Kosovo precedent is a terrifying precedent. It in essence is breaking open the entire system of international relations that have prevailed not just for decades but for centuries. And it without a doubt will bring on itself an entire chain of unforeseen consequences," Putin said.


Governments that have recognized Kosovo "are miscalculating what they are doing," he added. "In the end, this is a stick with two ends and that other end will come back to knock them on the head someday."


Moscow has heatedly protested the Kosovo declaration, which has sparked violent protests by Serbs and international squabbling over whether to recognize the fledgling nation.


Russia's NATO ambassador, Dmitry Rogozin, said the Russian military might get involved if all European Union nations recognized Kosovo as independent without United Nations agreement.


"If the European Union works out a single position or NATO goes beyond its current mandate in Kosovo, these organizations will conflict with the United Nations," Rogozin said in a televised hookup from NATO headquarters in Brussels, Belgium.


If that happens, Russia "will proceed from the assumption that to be respected, we have to use brute military force," he said, although he later said that Russia was not making plans for any such confrontation.


Rogozin's comments sparked quick reaction. Nicholas Burns, the State Department's third-ranking official, called them "highly irresponsible."

The Kurds Pretend Turkey Hasn't Invaded

How do the Kurd's deal with a major Turkish incursion? By denial. If it didn't really happen and was coordinated with Kurdish authorities to chase bandits, then there wasn't an invasion. You can hide 10,000 troops backed by tanks in the mountains. Turkish media warn a larger incursion is being prepared.
AlterNet

Turkish troops entered northern Iraq to hunt Kurdish separatist rebels after fighter jets struck at their bases, the Turkish army said Friday. Some 10,000 troops penetrated 10 kilometers (six miles) into the autonomous Kurdish northern Iraq, the NTV news channel said.


The operation started late Thursday when tanks were reported heading for the frontier and came as the region is in the thick of winter with sub-zero temperatures. The army did not state the number of troops involved but said the incursion followed eight hours of air and artillery strikes on Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) camps across the border on Thursday.


"Following this successful offensive, a cross-border ground operation backed by the Air Force was launched at 7:00 pm (1700 GMT)," said an army statement posted on the general staff Internet site. The army said troops "will return home as soon as possible after achieving their planned objective of incapacitating members of the terror organization and destroying their infrastructure." The statement highlighted that Turkish armed forces "attach special importance to Iraq's territorial integrity and stability."


[..]Iraq's Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari denied a large-scale Turkish raid had been launched but said tension was high and rising in the border region.


[..]In Baghdad, the foreign minister, a Kurd, denied there had been an incursion but said there had been intense Turkish air and artillery strikes and that forces loyal to northern Iraq's autonomous Kurdish government had been involved in a stand-off with Turkish forces. Turkey has bases of its own in Iraq's northern mountains and on Thursday attempted to launch a land operation, Zebari said. "They were prevented from doing this because this is not their mandate," he said, explaining that Turkish troops were allowed to operate inside Iraq only as observers. "There weren't any clashes. It was resolved peacefully," he said.


The Turkish army and Iraqi forces both denied media reports Thursday that fighting had broken out between Turkish troops and Peshmarga forces in northern Iraq.


Turkish media reported Thursday that the army was moving reinforcements and equipment to the border in preparation for a large-scale incursion.

Obama Threatened and Secret Service Drops Gun Checks

While Neo-Nazis and White Supremacists publish ominous threats to Obama's life, reportedly, Secret Service ordered an end to gun checks at Obama rally. Now what is up with this?

"The order to put down the metal detectors and stop checking purses and laptop bags came as a surprise to several Dallas police officers who said they believed it was a lapse in security," reported the paper's Jack Douglas, Jr. More than 10 days remain until the Texas primary and a key vote for president.


"Dallas Deputy Police Chief T.W. Lawrence, head of the Police Department's homeland security and special operations divisions, said the order -- apparently made by the U.S. Secret Service -- was meant to speed up the long lines outside and fill the arena's vacant seats before Obama came on. '"Sure,' said Lawrence, when asked if he was concerned by the great number of people who had gotten into the building without being checked. But, he added, the turnout of more than 17,000 people seemed to be a 'friendly crowd.'"


The Secret Service did not return a call from the Star-Telegram seeking comment.

Israel Bigoted Against Palestinians

M & C

Israel rejects nearly all Palestinian requests for building permits in those areas of the West Bank which are still under its full control, according to a report published Wednesday by Peace Now.


In the past seven years, only 91 of 1,624 requests submitted had been granted, the Israeli settlement watchdog said. That means more than 94 per cent of the Palestinian requests have been rejected.


Israel also issued demolition orders against 4,993 illegally-built Palestinian houses. One third of them have been executed.


By contrast, such demolition orders were issued against 2,900 houses built illegally by Jewish settlers, and less than 7 per cent of these had been executed, Peace Now said.


It added in all 18,472 new apartments had been built between 2000 and 2007 in Jewish settlements in 'area C' - those parts of the West Bank which under the 1993 Oslo interim peace accord are still under full Israeli military and civil control.


The figures proved Israel was 'clearly and bluntly' discriminating against the Palestinian population in area C, Peace Now charged.

The Secret of Obama's Success: He Listens to George Lakoff

AlterNet: Blogs

Why that is has befuddled many Democrats, particularly Clinton followers. How can Obama score so many wins by offering so little -- just hope -- and yet everything -- hope?


I can answer that question. It's because Obama gets it. He's been reading the George Lakoff and Rockridge Institute playbook, Thinking Points and skillfully applying it. Lakoff rewrote the progressive strategy with the concept of framing. Had my guy, John Edwards, followed Lakoff's advice and like Obama, gone lighter on the policies and heavier on the values, he might be where Obama is today. Dennis Kucinich would have won a primary or two. John Kerry might be president now. Al Gore would not have needed the Supreme Court in 2000.

Rigged Trials at Gitmo

The Nation

According to Col. Morris Davis, former chief prosecutor for Guantanamo's military commissions, the process has been manipulated by Administration appointees to foreclose the possibility of acquittal.


Colonel Davis's criticism of the commissions has been escalating since he resigned in October, telling the Washington Post that he had been pressured by politically appointed senior Defense officials to pursue cases deemed "sexy" and of "high interest" (such as the 9/11 cases now being pursued) in the run-up to the 2008 elections. Davis, once a staunch defender of the commissions process, elaborated on his reasons in a December 10, 2007, Los Angeles Times op-ed. "I concluded that full, fair and open trials were not possible under the current system," he wrote. "I felt that the system had become deeply politicized and that I could no longer do my job effectively."


Then, in an interview with The Nation in February after the six Guantánamo detainees were charged, Davis offered the most damning evidence of the military commissions' bias--a revelation that speaks to fundamental flaws in the Bush Administration's conduct of statecraft: its contempt for the rule of law and its pursuit of political objectives above all else.


When asked if he thought the men at Guantánamo could receive a fair trial, Davis provided the following account of an August 2005 meeting he had with Pentagon general counsel William Haynes--the man who now oversees the tribunal process for the Defense Department.


"[Haynes] said these trials will be the Nuremberg of our time," recalled Davis, referring to the Nazi tribunals in 1945, considered the model of procedural rights in the prosecution of war crimes. In response, Davis said he noted that at Nuremberg there had been some acquittals, which had lent great credibility to the proceedings.


"I said to him that if we come up short and there are some acquittals in our cases, it will at least validate the process," Davis continued. "At which point, [Haynes's] eyes got wide and he said, 'Wait a minute, we can't have acquittals. If we've been holding these guys for so long, how can we explain letting them get off? We can't have acquittals. We've got to have convictions.'"


Davis submitted his resignation on October 4, 2007, just hours after he was informed that Haynes had been put above him in the commissions' chain of command. "Everyone has opinions," Davis says. "But when he was put above me, his opinions became orders."


Reached for comment, Defense Department spokeswoman Cynthia Smith said, "The Department of Defense disputes the assertions made by Colonel Davis in this statement regarding acquittals."


"The fact that [Haynes] said there can be no acquittals will stain the entire [tribunal] process," says Scott Horton, who teaches law at Columbia University Law School and has written extensively about Haynes's conflicts with the Judge Advocate General's (JAG) corps, the judicial arm of the armed forces, which is charged with implementing the military commissions. According to Horton, Haynes tried to cut the JAG corps out of internal debates over the detention and prosecution of detainees, knowing it was critical of the Administration's views. In private memos and in public Senate testimony, high-ranking officers of the corps have repeatedly expressed concerns about the Administration's justification of "extreme interrogation techniques."


"The JAG corps consists of a group of rigorous professionals, but Haynes never trusted them to do their job," says Horton. "His clashes have always had the same subtext--they want to be independent; he wants them to do political dirty work."


Haynes, a political appointee and chief legal adviser to Defense secretaries Donald Rumsfeld and Robert Gates, was nominated in 2006 by the Bush Administration for a lifetime seat as a judge in the Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. But his nomination never got out of committee, primarily because of the opposition of Republican Senator (and former military lawyer) Lindsey Graham and other members alarmed over Haynes's role in writing, or supervising the writing of, Pentagon memos advocating the use of harsh interrogation techniques the Geneva Conventions classify as torture.


Currently, in his capacity as Pentagon general counsel, Haynes oversees both the prosecution and the defense for the Guantánamo commissions.


"You would think a person in that position wouldn't be favoring one side," says Colonel Davis.


Told of Davis's story about Haynes, Clive Stafford Smith, a defense attorney who has represented more than seventy Guantánamo clients, said, "Hearing it makes me think I'm back in Mississippi representing a black man in front of an all-white jury."


He adds, "It confirms what people close to the system have always said," noting that when three prosecutors--Maj. Robert Preston, Capt. John Carr and Capt. Carrie Wolf--requested to be transferred out of the Office of Military Commissions in 2004, they said they'd been told the process was rigged. In an e-mail to his supervisors, Preston had said that there was thin evidence against the accused. "But they were told by the chief prosecutor at the time that they didn't need evidence to get convictions," says Stafford Smith.

McCain's Holiday from History in Pakistan: Lies about Obama

Juan Cole in his Informed Comment takes McCain apart.

Senator John McCain could not get the independents out in Wisconsin, and the Republican turnout was lackluster. In politics, failure always produces bluster. McCain spoke after his primary victory in Wisconsin last night, casting himself as a voice of experience in foreign policy. He said things like this:

' I will fight every moment of every day in this campaign to make sure Americans are not deceived by an eloquent but empty call for change that promises no more than a holiday from history . . .


Today, political change in Pakistan is occurring that might affect our relationship with a nuclear armed nation that is indispensable to our success in combating Al Qaeda in Afghanistan and elsewhere. . .


Will the next President have the experience, the judgment experience informs, and the strength of purpose to respond to each of these developments in ways that strengthen our security and advance the global progress of our ideals? Or will we risk the confused leadership of an inexperienced candidate who once suggested invading our ally, Pakistan, and sitting down without pre-conditions or clear purpose with enemies who support terrorists and are intent on destabilizing the world by acquiring nuclear weapons?'

These remarks were aimed at Barack Obama, and they are lies. McCain has repeatedly made this false charge, warning against sending troops to Waziristan. But Obama never advocated invading Pakistan with US ground troops. He said that the US should strike at al-Qaeda if it had actionable intelligence about its whereabouts in Pakistan, even if the Pakistani authorities refused to give permission.


This stance is US policy. In fact, George W. Bush implemented it with a Predator attack on an al-Qaeda leader in Pakistan just a couple of weeks ago, an attack that the Pakistani government declined to authorize.
[..]I mind McCain pulling a Rove and making hay with a policy stance of his opponent that he actually agrees with. And I think there is good reason to ask whether McCain helped create al-Qaeda and the mess in Pakistan to begin with. It is time for someone to start holding the Cold Warriors who deployed a militant Muslim covert army against their leftist enemies accountable for the blow-back they created.

NATO checks Serbs' Kosovo border challenge

Kosovo has shaped into a classic East/West challenge. Russia, in particular is concerned about insurgencies within. Just how provocative the politicians will be at the expense of the people of Kosovo has yet to be seen.
Reuters

NATO thwarted overnight a bid by Kosovo Serbs to assert their authority in a northern slice of the newly independent republic, restoring control on the border with Serbia where crowds had burnt down two crossing points.


"I just want everybody to be fully aware of my determination to maintain, restore a safe and secure environment wherever in Kosovo," said General Xavier de Marnhac, commander of the NATO-led peacekeeping force, KFOR. He said Kosovan and U.N. authority would be restored at the crossings, known as Gate 1 and Gate 3-1, which would reopen once the destroyed customs and police buildings had been repaired.


The test of Western resolve to back up Kosovo's independence with military force came on Tuesday, two days after Pristina declared its secession from Serbia, a step the West has backed.


NATO said the attacks were clearly an organised challenge.


Destroying the border posts was "perhaps not pretty, but legitimate", said Serbia's Minister for Kosovo, Slobodan Samardzic, who added that Serbia planned to take over customs authority in northern Kosovo.


Kosovo's U.N. administrator Joachim Ruecker said the action was no legitimate at all. "The Serbian government is bound by their commitment to refrain from all acts that could be seen as encouraging violence and this was really violence so I disagree with that statement," he told a news conference with KFOR commander de Marnhac.


The crossings were empty for some hours on Tuesday after Kosovo and U.N. police pulled out and called NATO for help. Some 40 French and U.S. troops moved in and put coils of razor wire across the Jarinje post, where Serbs had burnt down the buildings and pushed official vehicles over a ravine. The peacekeepers were harassed by stone-throwing Serb men but held the position without major incident, backed by Polish U.N. riot police. NATO also secured the other crossing near Zubin Potok town. The NATO force commander accused "some local leaders" in the Serb-dominated north of putting women and children at risk. "Everybody has been very lucky, the way it went. But the leaders should think very deeply on their responsibility when they trigger this type of demonstration," de Marnhac said.


Kosovo Prime Minister Hashim Thaci said the comments by the Serbian minister Samardzic "belong to the past and do not at all fit with the current situation". Pristina's declaration of independence from Serbia, quickly recognised by the United States and EU powers, was denounced by Serbia and Russia as an illegal violation of a U.N. resolution on Kosovo, whose population is mainly Albanian.


Serbia has recalled envoys and plans a mass protest march in Belgrade for Thursday but says it will not resort to violence. The border attacks highlight the challenge facing an EU law-enforcement mission deploying soon to Kosovo, which has been under U.N. administration for nearly nine years following NATO's air war to push out Serb forces.


The EU mission does not have a U.N. mandate. Serbia does not recognise its authority, and Serb ally Russia has warned it will not permit any attempts at "repressive measures should Serbs in Kosovo decide not to comply". "The EU's unilateral decision to send a mission ... to Kosovo ... is in breach of the highest international law," Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Wednesday.


Russia, which has no troops in the Balkans, says Western recognition of Kosovo will open a "Pandora's Box" of separatist tension across Europe. Pieter Feith, the EU's new special representative in Pristina, told a news conference Kosovo Serbs should stay and feel welcome in the new republic but the Serb-dominated north would not be permitted to opt out. "It is the intention of the European Union to deploy its presences ... the rule-of-law mission, for police, judges, prosecutors ... that we will deploy all over Kosovo," he said. "And all over the territory of Kosovo includes the north." "It should be clear to the Serb community that we are not a threat to their way of life and they should not feel afraid."


EU defence ministers will review security arrangements in the Balkans on Thursday. NATO says it has no immediate plans to reduce the strength of KFOR, which is about 17,000 made up by contingents from 35 countries led by Germany, Italy, France and the United States. (Writing by Douglas Hamilton; edited by Richard Meares)

BBC NEWS

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has declared the EU's police and justice mission to Kosovo illegal. He told reporters that Brussels' "unilateral decision... is in breach of the highest international law".


[..]Students in the Serb-dominated town of Mitrovica are organising daily protests at 12.44 pm, referring to UN Security Council resolution 1244 under which Serbia insists it still has sovereignty of Kosovo under international law.


Russia has already objected to Kosovo's declaration of independence, agreeing with Belgrade's interpretation of the UN resolution and raising the prospect of the established world order being destroyed.


[..]Foreign Ministry spokesman Mikhail Kamynin said that by "pursuing the unilateral scenario of solving the Kosovo problem... the European Union encourages separatism in the world".

STANCE ON RECOGNITION

• For: Norway, Denmark, Finland, Sweden, Germany, Italy, France, UK, Austria, US, Turkey, Albania, Afghanistan


• Against: Russia, Spain, Romania, Slovakia, Cyprus

The Rise and Fall of the Neocon American Empire

Thank you George Bush, for squandering America's political and economic capital, and it's bright future, on a useless war in Iraq, a war that will haunt us for many years to come.
IPSNEWS.net

What a difference five years and an invasion and bungled occupation of Iraq make! References to the Roman Empire at this point are more likely to refer to its decline than to its power -- an observation confirmed even by Donald Kagan, a dean of neo-conservatism and Kennedy’s colleague at Yale, whose sons, Robert and Frederick, have been champions of the Bush Doctrine and the Iraq War.


"I’ve argued that not since the Roman Empire has anyone had such extraordinary power as the United States after the Cold War," Kagan told Kitfield. "But all of the elements of our strength are now being challenged, and it’s perfectly possible that we are seeing a relative decline in U.S. power that will prove lasting."


Indeed, that possibility has been transformed into a probability, if not a certainty, by a growing number of policy analysts who see major structural shifts in the distribution of global power -- both "hard" and "soft" -- none of which are likely to lead to the maintenance, let alone the enhancement of Washington’s post-Cold War dominance.


Not only have both Iraq and Afghanistan shown the world the limits of U.S. military power, but they are also exacting an increasingly fearsome toll on Washington’s ability to wage war.


Despite gains in the security situation in Iraq over the past year, top Pentagon brass and independent experts are warning that the current pace of deployments is creating a "hollow force" both in terms of personnel and equipment. In an echo of Kennedy 20 years ago, "overstretched" is the adjective most frequently associated with the U.S. military.


Just as Kennedy had warned against the deadly long-term impact on empires of budgetary deficits, the Bush years have seen an explosion not just of government debt -- currently more than nine trillion dollars -- but also of trade and balance-of-payments deficits. Much of this is due to the high price of oil and gas imports -- which a growing number of experts now believe has become a permanent fixture of the international economy.


The results of the evolving global geo-economy include a much-weakened dollar and increased reliance by both the U.S. government and U.S. business on foreign creditors. Among these creditors are state-controlled agencies (or sovereign wealth funds) some of which -- notably those of China, Russia, and oil-exporting Gulf states -- are not enthralled, to say the least, with Krauthammer’s unipolar vision.


If, for commercial or political reasons, any of these creditors decided to dump their hundreds of billions of dollars of dollar-denominated assets -- or in the case of key energy exporters, for example, to price their commodities in a currency other than the dollar -- the economic impact would be "grave", according to Charles Freeman, retired U.S Ambassador to Saudi Arabia. Freeman’s point was echoed for the first time last week in the U.S. intelligence community’s annual review of the major global threats facing the nation.


The possibility that some combination of those creditors, whose own commercial ties have been growing at an accelerating rate, could decide to act in concert in order to constrain Washington’s freedom of action -- in Central Asia or Iran, for example -- is the emerging nightmare of U.S. policy- makers.


Some analysts, including the director of the Geopolitics of Energy Initiative of the New America Foundation (NAF), Flynt Leverett, profess to see the emergence of a potential counterweight to U.S. power -- one, significantly, that does not depend on the co-operation of Washington’s western allies.


"A ‘community’ of largely non-democratic manufacturing powers and energy exporters is already laying the groundwork for real strategic collaboration, aimed at limiting America’s ability to carry out [its] hegemonic agendas," Leverett, who served in the National Security Council under Bill Clinton and Bush, wrote recently in the ‘National Interest’ journal published by the Nixon Centre.


As a result, the degree to which Washington can slow its decline and preserve its primacy will depend increasingly on its willingness to suppress its unilateralist reflexes and "to take account of the perceptions and interests of others in its foreign-policy decision-making," according to Leverett.

The Nuclear Espionage Media Cover-up

Hat tip to The Brad Blog.
This story smells like Cheney all over. There may be a good reason why the Sibel Edmunds allegations were covered up. I wonder if the Bush Administration ordered a violation of treaty obligations, and very likely a violation of US and International law. Bush could have authorized passing nuclear secrets to Turkey as a counter to Iran and to persuade it to support the invasion of Iraq. But those same sources may have leaked nuclear secrets to Pakistan as well, perhaps deliberately, to buy Musharraf's cooperation in the "War on Terror."
Dallas Morning News: Philip Giraldi

Most Americans have never heard of Sibel Edmonds, and if the U.S. government has its way, they never will.


The former FBI translator turned whistle-blower tells a chilling story of corruption at Washington's highest levels – sale of nuclear secrets, shielding of terrorist suspects, illegal arms transfers, narcotics trafficking, money laundering, espionage. She may be a first-rate fabulist, but Ms. Edmonds' account is full of dates, places and names.


And if she is to be believed, a treasonous plot to embed moles in American military and nuclear installations and pass sensitive intelligence to Israeli, Pakistani and Turkish sources was facilitated by figures in the upper echelons of the State and Defense Departments. Her charges could be easily confirmed or dismissed if classified government documents were made available to investigators.


But Congress has refused to act, and the Justice Department has shrouded Ms. Edmonds' case in the state-secrets privilege, a rarely used measure so sweeping that it precludes even a closed hearing attended only by officials with top-secret security clearances. According to the Department of Justice, such an investigation "could reasonably be expected to cause serious damage to the foreign policy and national security of the United States."


After five years of thwarted legal challenges and fruitless attempts to launch a congressional investigation, Sibel Edmonds is telling her story, though her defiance could land her in jail. After reading its November piece about Louai al-Sakka, an al-Qaeda terrorist who trained 9/11 hijackers in Turkey, Ms. Edmonds approached the Sunday Times of London. On Jan. 6, the Times, a Rupert Murdoch-owned paper that does not normally encourage exposés damaging to the Bush administration, featured a long article. The news quickly spread around the world – but not in the United States.


[..] After exhausting all appeals through her own chain of command, Ms. Edmonds approached the two Department of Justice agencies with oversight of the FBI and sent faxes to Sens. Chuck Grassley and Patrick Leahy on the Judiciary Committee. The next day, she was called in for a polygraph. According to a DOJ inspector general's report, the test found that "she was not deceptive in her answers."


But two weeks later, Ms. Edmonds was fired. Her home computer was seized. Her family in Turkey was visited by police and threatened with arrest if they did not submit to questioning about an unspecified "intelligence matter."


When Ms. Edmonds' attorney sued to obtain the documents related to her firing, Attorney General John Ashcroft imposed the state-secrets gag order. Since then, she has been subjected to another federal order, which not only silenced her but retroactively classified the statements she eventually made before the Senate Judiciary Committee and the 9/11 commission.


[..] Ms. Edmonds alleges to have heard evidence linking him to bribery from an ATC contact, to his intervening with the FBI to halt the interrogation of four Turkish and Pakistani intelligence operatives, and helping seed U.S. nuclear facilities with Turkish and Israeli Ph.D. students who in turn sold nuclear secrets abroad, primarily to Pakistan. The accused, who emphatically denies Ms. Edmonds' charges, is now a senior executive at a Washington lobbying firm.


A low-level contractor might seem poorly positioned to expose major breaches of national security, but the FBI translators' pool, riddled with corruption and nepotism, was key to keeping these secrets from surfacing. Ms. Edmonds' claims that the section was infiltrated by translators who should never have received security clearances and who were deliberately failing to translate incriminating material are supported by the Justice Department inspector general investigation and by an FBI internal investigation, which concluded that she had been fired after making "valid complaints."


Ms. Edmonds' revelations have attracted corroboration in the form of anonymous letters apparently written by FBI employees. There have been frequent reports of FBI field agents being frustrated by the premature closure of cases dealing with foreign spying, particularly when those cases involve Israel, and the State Department has frequently intervened to shut down investigations based on "sensitive foreign diplomatic relations."


Curiously, the state-secrets gag order binding Ms. Edmonds, while put in place by DOJ in 2002, was not requested by the FBI but by the State Department and Pentagon – which employed individuals she identified as being involved in criminal activities. If her allegations are frivolous, that order would scarcely seem necessary. Under the Bush administration, the security gag order has been invoked to cover up incompetence or illegality, not to protect national security.

Woman sues Ohio sheriff's deputy over 'outrageous' strip search

The Raw Story

Hope Steffey's night started with a call to police for help. It ended with her face down, naked, and sobbing on a jail cell floor. Now, the sheriff's deputies from Stark County, Ohio who allegedly used excessive force during a strip search 15 months ago face a federal lawsuit, and recently released video won’t help their case.


Steffey's ordeal with the Stark County sheriff's deputies began after her cousin called 9-1-1 claiming Steffey had been assaulted by another one of their cousins. When a Stark County police officer arrived, he asked to see Steffey's driver's license. But instead of handing over her own ID, she mistakenly turned over her dead sister's license, which she contends she keeps in her wallet as a memento. That's when the situation became complicated.


"Hope was not treated as a victim," her lawyer told WKYC News. "The officer said to her 'shut up about your dead sister.'"


Eventually, Steffey was arrested and taken to the Stark County Jail, charged with disorderly conduct and resisting arrest. But once in custody, her attorney says seven jail workers, male and female, forcibly removed Steffey of all her clothes, including her undergarments, while she lay face down in handcuffs. Local news footage shows Steffey wailing, asking "What are you doing?!?"


"And you have to ask yourself, what was the purpose of the strip search?" said Steffey's lawyer. "What was the necessity of it? This was a disorderly conduct claim."


The lawsuit says that Steffey remained in the cell for six hours and wrapped herself in toilet paper to stay warm. During that time, she was not allowed to use a phone or seek medical assistance for injuries she accrued that night, including a cracked tooth, bulging disc, and bruises.


Although the sheriff's policy requires officers conducting any strip search to be of the same sex, the sheriff contends that the tactic used on Steffey was not actually a strip search. He also questions the validiy of the events leading up to Steffey’s arrest.


Once shown the exclusive video, Steffey’s husband was in disbelief. "You don't treat people like this," he said. "I don't think murderers are treated like this."

This video is from WKYC News, broadcast February 1, 2008