Tuesday, June 10, 2008
BBC uncovers lost Iraq billions
A BBC investigation estimates that around $23bn (£11.75bn) may have been lost, stolen or just not properly accounted for in Iraq.
For the first time, the extent to which some private contractors have profited from the conflict and rebuilding has been researched by the BBC's Panorama using US and Iraqi government sources.
A US gagging order is preventing discussion of the allegations.
The order applies to 70 court cases against some of the top US companies.
While George Bush remains in the White House, it is unlikely the gagging orders will be lifted.
To date, no major US contractor faces trial for fraud or mismanagement in Iraq.
The president's Democrat opponents are keeping up the pressure over war profiteering in Iraq.
Henry Waxman who chairs the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform said: "The money that's gone into waste, fraud and abuse under these contracts is just so outrageous, its egregious.
"It may well turn out to be the largest war profiteering in history." (BBC)
Labels: Contractors, Iraq, Military Contractors, U.S.
European Leaders Support Bush on Iran Sanctions
Opening a farewell tour of Europe, President Bush won European support on Tuesday to consider additional punitive sanctions against Iran, including restrictions on its banks, if Iran rejects a package of incentives to suspend its uranium enrichment program.
President Bush at Brdo Castle in Kranj, Slovenia, with, from left, Jose Manuel Barroso, the president of the European Commission; Janez Jansa, prime minister of Slovenia; and Javier Solana, the European Union’s foreign policy chief.
Iran’s leaders, the Mr. Bush said, “can either face isolation, or they can have better relations with all of us if they verifiably suspend their enrichment program.”
Mr. Bush was speaking at a news conference after what was billed as his final summit meeting with European officials before his term ends in January.
The meeting was held in the same small mountainous country as he chose for his first foray into Europe as president seven years ago.
It was, he said, a “fitting circle” to return to Slovenia. One day he would return as a tourist, he said. “You know, I’m close to retirement.”
A joint statement after the meeting urged Iran to “comply with its international obligations concerning its nuclear activities.” (NY Times)
Labels: European Union, Iran, Nuclear Power, U.S.
Al-Maliki's Balancing Act Leaves Iran Cool
As Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki sought to alleviate neighbouring Iran's increasing concerns about a security deal between his country and the United States, he strove to keep a delicate balance with the two countries which are vying for hegemony over Iraq.
Speaking alongside Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki in Tehran last Saturday, al-Maliki pledged that "Iraq will not be used as a military launch pad'' against Iran. The remarks by al-Maliki come at a time when Iran is becoming ever more suspicious of U.S. intentions toward it, fearing the superpower might consider using Iraq either as a base or a corridor to attack Iran.
But his apparent reassurances to Iran over a contentious security deal can hardly be mollifying to Iranians and perhaps at worst, in their view, denote al-Maliki's determination to maintain a strong relationship with the U.S.
Even the defence deal al-Maliki signed with Iran, which was meant to signify the importance Iraq attached to relations with its neighbour, hardly nears the new agreement with the U.S., which is still being negotiated but was outlined in the Declaration of Principles (DoP) signed by Iraqi and U.S. leaders late last year. The DoP states clearly that the U.S. will protect Iraq in the face of "foreign aggression", which many say is a code phrase for Iranian intervention in Iraq, as alleged by Washington. Iran is not going to be pleased with that sort of attitude from al-Maliki, a Shia whom Tehran expects to be more attentive to its concerns in Iraq.
The Iraq-Iran-U.S. triangle is a highly complex and complicated web of relationships. (IPS)
US: Iraq security pact can be finalized in July
The U.S. State Department's top Iraq adviser said Tuesday he believes an agreement to establish a long-term security relationship between Iraq and the United States will be completed by the end of July.
"We're confident it can be achieved, and by the end of July deadline," David Satterfield told reporters in Baghdad's U.S.-guarded Green Zone.
The pact also would provide a legal basis for keeping American troops in Iraq after the U.N. mandate expires at the end of the year.
But tempering the optimism were recent reports in Iraq and Washington that the talks had stalled because of stiff Iraqi opposition, and it would not be finished before President Bush leaves office.
A senior Bush administration official close to the talks told The Associated Press on Monday that it was "very possible" the U.S. may have to extend the existing United Nations mandate.
Iran also has lashed out at the agreement, suggesting that if permanent U.S. military bases are established on Iraqi soil, the country could be used as a launching pad for attacks on the neighboring country.
Satterfield disputed that Tuesday, saying Washington "does not think Iraq should be an arena, a platform for attacks on other states." (AP)
Will it be 'Obama's war'?
Senator Barack Obama has repeatedly assured the public that, if elected to the presidency, he will withdraw US troops from Iraq, and in a manner more cautious than the way in which the US went in.
He is unclear as to how many troops he would withdraw, which leaves a suspicious amount of ambiguity. Nonetheless, the Democratic faithful believe that he will keep his word and that his word denotes large-scale withdrawal. There are, however, extraordinary obstacles to large-scale withdrawal, which make some doubt that this change is one in which we can believe in.
The next president, regardless of his party, will face powerful foreign pressures to keep a major US commitment in Iraq, perhaps only somewhat less than the troop level of 140,000 we will have soon. Saudi Arabia warned the US against toppling Saddam Hussein's government. Brutal and sometimes menacing though it was, Saddam's Iraq was at least a barrier to Shi'ite and Iranian expansion in the Middle East. His ouster created a vacuum, and geopolitics abhors a vacuum at least as much as nature does.
Fearful that Iran might march west or at least incite the Shi'ites of Saudi Arabia and those in other Sunni states, the Saudis wish the US to stay in the region, indefinitely, as a guardian against Iran. Israel is also worried. It is not just the fear of an Iran with nuclear weapons; Israel also fears the expansion of Iranian influence in Lebanon, where Hezbollah is probably closer to Iran's Quds Force than ever. Iran has even gained influence with Hamas - a Sunni group - in Palestine. The Saudis and pro-Israel groups are exerting pressure on the US to maintain its troops in Iraq. Each of those groups wields considerable influence throughout Washington. Combined, their influence will be very difficult to overcome. (Asia Times)
Guantanamo inmates suffering mental damage: report
Over two-thirds of the detainees in the Guantanamo Bay prison are suffering from or at risk of mental problems because they are kept isolated in small cells with little light or fresh air, according to Human Rights Watch.
In a report entitled "Locked Up Alone: Detention Conditions and Mental Health at Guantanamo", the group says 185 of the 270 detainees at the U.S. military prison for terrorism suspects are housed in facilities similar to "supermax" prisons.
They spend 22 hours alone in cramped cells, have very limited contact with other human beings and are given little more than the Koran to occupy themselves, said the report, which is based interviews with government officials and attorneys.
Detainees held in this manner include many that have not been charged with crimes and have already been cleared for release or transfer, according to the report.
"Guantanamo detainees who have not even been charged with a crime are being warehoused in conditions that are in many ways harsher than those reserved for the most dangerous, convicted criminals in the United States," said Jennifer Daskal, senior counterterrorism counsel at Human Rights Watch.
More than six years after the United States began sending terrorism suspects to the naval base in Cuba, not a single case has gone to trial. (Reuters)
Labels: Guantanamo, Torture, U.S.
Applying Iraq’s Lessons in an Afghan Village
United States marines pushed the Taliban out of this village and the surrounding district in southern Helmand Province so quickly in recent weeks that they called the operation a “catastrophic success.”
Yet, NATO troops had conducted similar operations here in 2006 and 2007, and the Taliban had returned soon after they left. The marines, drawing on lessons from Iraq, say they know what to do to keep the Taliban at bay if they are given the time.
“There is definitely someone thinking out there,” said Capt. John Moder, commander of Company C of the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit, speaking of the Taliban. “That’s why we need these people to be at least neutral to us,” he said, gesturing to the farmers who have been slowly filtering back to harvest their fields.
Originally sent to Garmser District on a three-day operation to open a road, the marines have been here a month and are likely to stay longer. The extension of the operation reflects the evolving tactics of the counterinsurgency effort in Afghanistan, building on the knowledge accumulated in recent years in Anbar Province in Iraq. (NY Times)
Labels: Afghanistan, Iraq, U.S.
U.S. Official Cites 'Hardening' of Iraqi Detainees
U.S. combat commanders are currently sending about 30 prisoners a day to the main U.S.-run detention centers in Iraq, with more of the detainees likely to be held for longer periods as security risks than those prisoners taken when the U.S. troop buildup first began last year, according to Maj. Gen. Douglas Stone Jr., the former head of the Iraq detention program.
"We're seeing a hardening of the population where there are guys that are as bad as they come," Stone told reporters yesterday at a Pentagon news conference. "Division commanders have gotten much better at determining that the guy's a real, legitimate . . . imperative security risk," he added, saying "conditions are perhaps a little bit less chaotic on the ground, so you can collect more information" about the detainees and determine that they would not be released after their initial six-month review.
Stone, who is ending a 14-month tour in Iraq during which he transformed the U.S. detention program, said there are now less than 21,000 Iraqis being held in U.S. facilities, down from a high of around 25,000. He said the number is coming down slowly, with about 50 detainees leaving and 30 entering daily, for a net decline of 20 per day. (Washington Post)
POLITICS-US: Pledging Allegiance to AIPAC
With the Iranian nuclear "threat" in the crosshairs, discussion of Palestinians or a Syrian-Israeli detente was virtually non-existent. But then again, one should not expect many overtures for peace when attending the annual policy conference for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC).
As more than 5,000 Jewish-American activists ascended Capitol Hill last week, the most common word circulating through panel discussions, daily briefings, and remarks made by high-level officials and presidential candidates was "security" -- more accurately, Israel's security.
And most of the tough talk, whether substantive or merely stylistic, was directed at a nuclear Iran and its presumed proxies -- Lebanese Hezbollah, Palestinian Hamas, and even Syria.
The policy prescriptions, outlined in a draft proposal of AIPAC's policy agenda, urge, among other things, that the U.S. "take all appropriate measures to halt Iran's pursuit of nuclear and 152 other weapons of mass destruction and the means to deliver them."
The language remains unsettling for many Democrats and war-weary U.S. citizens, who view it as a license for the President George W. Bush administration to launch a military attack on Iran. (IPS)
Labels: Iran, Israel, Lebanon, Palestine, U.S.
Pentagon blocked Cheney's attack on Iran
Pentagon officials firmly opposed a proposal by Vice President Dick Cheney last summer for airstrikes against the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) bases by insisting that the administration would have to make clear decisions about how far the United States would go in escalating the conflict with Iran, according to a former George W Bush administration official.
J Scott Carpenter, who was then deputy assistant secretary of state in the State Department's Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs, recalled in an interview that senior Defense Department (DoD) officials and the Joint Chiefs used the escalation issue as the main argument against the Cheney proposal.
McClatchy newspapers reported last August that Cheney had proposal several weeks earlier "launching airstrikes at suspected training camps in Iran", citing two officials involved in Iran policy.
According to Carpenter, who is now at the Washington Institute on Near East Policy, a strongly pro-Israel think-tank, Pentagon officials argued that no decision should be made about the limited airstrike on Iran without a thorough discussion of the sequence of events that would follow an Iranian retaliation for such an attack. Carpenter said the DoD officials insisted that the Bush administration had to make "a policy decision about how far the administration would go - what would happen after the Iranians would go after our folks". (Asia Times)
Monday, June 9, 2008
Rice to hold talks with Israeli, Palestinian teams
U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice plans to hold a three-way meeting next week with the chief Israeli and Palestinian negotiators, a senior Palestinian official said on Monday.
Marred by disputes over Jewish settlement expansion and violence in the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip, U.S.-backed peace talks have shown little sign of progress since they were launched at a conference in Annapolis, Maryland in November.
A corruption investigation of Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert could trigger new elections, dimming the chances of a deal this year, Israeli, Palestinian and Western officials say.
Palestinian officials said the three-way meeting between Rice and the chief negotiators -- Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and former Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qurie -- would take place on June 15 in Jerusalem, and not June 16 as previously stated.
"It is to review the negotiations in all its aspects," said Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat.
Rice, who will visit Israel and the occupied West Bank, convened a similar three-way meeting earlier this year. (Reuters)
Labels: Israel, Palestine, U.S.
Pentagon halted Cheney ploy to start war with Iran - ex-diplomat
Pentagon officials firmly opposed a proposal by Vice President Dick Cheney last summer for air strikes against Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) bases by insisting that the administration would have to make clear decisions about how far the United States would go in escalating the conflict, according to a former George W. Bush administration official.
J. Scott Carpenter, who was then deputy assistant secretary of state in the State Department's Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs, recalled in an interview that senior Defense Department (DoD) officials and the armed forces' Joint Chiefs of Staff used the escalation issue as the main argument against the Cheney proposal.
The McClatchy newspaper chain reported last August that Cheney had proposed several weeks earlier "launching air strikes at suspected training camps in Iran," citing two officials involved in Iran policy.
According to Carpenter, who is now at the Washington Institute on Near East Policy, a strongly pro-Israel think tank, Pentagon officials argued that no decision should be made about a limited air campaign against Iran without a thorough discussion of the sequence of events that would follow an Iranian retaliation for such an attack. Carpenter said the DoD officials insisted that the Bush administration had to make "a policy decision about how far the administration would go - what would happen after the Iranians would go after our folks." (IPS)
Iran Urges Closer Defense Ties With Iraq
Iranian officials advocated a close defense relationship with Iraq during meetings Sunday in Tehran with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and his subordinates.
The talks came as Tehran grows increasingly concerned that a proposed long-term security agreement between the United States and Iraq would pose a threat to Iran.
Iranian Defense Minister Mostafa Mohammad Najar said there were many possibilities for security and defense cooperation between Iran and Iraq, emphasizing what he called "the great strategic potential" of the two oil-rich countries.
"We believe that sustainable Iran-Iraq defense cooperation will play a positive role in promoting long-term peace, security and stability in the Middle East," Najar said in a meeting with his Iraqi counterpart, Abdul-Qadir Muhammed Jasim.
"Iraq's ambition to build a strong military calls for further cooperation with Tehran, and for Baghdad to draw on its neighbor's defense potential," Jasim said.
With a U.N. mandate authorizing the presence of U.S. troops in Iraq due to expire at the end of the year, the Bush administration has proposed a long-term security agreement that would allow American troops to remain in Iraq. (Washington Post)
Lawyer: Gitmo interrogators told to trash notes
The Pentagon urged interrogators at Guantanamo Bay to destroy handwritten notes in case they were called to testify about potentially harsh treatment of detainees, a military defense lawyer said Sunday.
The lawyer for Toronto-born Omar Khadr, Lt. Cmdr. William Kuebler, said the instructions were included in an operations manual shown to him by prosecutors and suggest the U.S. deliberately thwarted evidence that could help terror suspects defend themselves at trial.
Kuebler said the apparent destruction of evidence prevents him from challenging the reliability of any alleged confessions. He said he will use the document to seek a dismissal of charges against Khadr.
A Pentagon spokesman, Navy Cmdr. Jeffrey Gordon, said he was reviewing the matter Sunday evening.
The "standard operating procedures" manual that contained the purported instructions was made available to Kuebler last week as part of a pretrial review of potential evidence, the Navy lawyer said. (AP)
Labels: Guantanamo, U.S.
Iraq arrests Qaeda members, seizes explosive belts
Iraqi police have arrested 13 suspected members of al Qaeda and seized 58 explosive belts prepared for suicide bombings, a local official said on Sunday.
Hikmat Jubair, mayor of the town of Hit west of Baghdad, said the suspects were arrested on Saturday night in possession of 13 explosive belts and then led police to another 45 hidden in a house.
"Acting on a tip delivered to the police, 13 people from al Qaeda were arrested while they were gathering in a house in western Hit," Jubair said.
Hit is 130 km (80 miles) west of Baghdad in Anbar province, once an al Qaeda base and bastion of Sunni Arab insurgents fighting U.S. and Iraqi troops.
Jubair said the 13 militants were suspected of involvement in a suicide bombing late last month that killed Hit's police chief, eight other policemen and four civilians.
U.S. and Iraqi military officials say al Qaeda is on the run in Iraq and that the group's networks in its last urban stronghold of Mosul in northern Iraq have been broken. (Reuters)
Iranian leader: US military is Iraq's top problem
Iran's supreme leader told the visiting Iraqi prime minister Monday that the U.S. military presence is the main cause of Iraq's problems, according to Iranian state television, making clear his opposition to a U.S.-Iraqi security pact.
Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's talks with Iranian leaders during his three-day visit here have focused on the proposed security agreement that Iran fears will keep the American military in neighboring Iraq for years.
Al-Maliki has tried to push Iranian leaders to back off their fierce opposition to the proposed pact, promising that Iraq will not be a launching pad for any attack on Iran.
But the agreement has become a point of contention as Baghdad tries to balance its close ties to rivals Washington and Tehran.
Iran, which has repeatedly said the way to end instability in Iraq is for U.S. forces to withdraw, believes the proposed pact could lead to permanent U.S bases on its doorstep amid fears of an eventual American attack. (AP)
Saturday, June 7, 2008
Iraqis condemn US defence pact plan
Thousands of Iraqis have taken to the streets in the Sadr City district of Baghdad, denouncing a proposed deal that would keep US troops in Iraq beyond 2008.
Protesters set fire to a US flag and to an effigy of George Bush, the US president, following Friday prayers.
The protests followed a call by Muqtada al-Sadr, the Shia leader, to reject a US-proposed "security alliance" that is reported would enable US troops to permanently occupy bases in Iraq.
Banners at the protest read: "The agreement with the Americans is an act of war against the Iraqi people."
Sattah al-Batat, who led Friday's prayers, told worshippers the agreement "would give full authority to the Americans as well as the right to do whatever they want".
"As long as Moqtada Sadr rejects the agreement, it will not be signed" by the government, Batat told worshippers.
Bush and Nuri al-Maliki, the Iraqi prime minister, have agreed in principle in November to sign the Status of Forces Agreement by the end of July. (Al Jazeera)
Labels: Iraq, Mehdi Army, U.S.
Hundreds of students still stranded in Gaza
They squander their days watching TV and surfing the Web instead of studying, but it's not for lack of discipline: Gaza students accepted at foreign universities are stuck at home because Israel and Egypt won't let them leave the blockaded territory.
The students' plight made headlines last week when Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice interceded with Israel on behalf of seven students with prestigious Fulbright scholarships awarded by the U.S. government. But hundreds without such powerful allies will likely lose their shot at a good education, given Gaza's sparse offerings.
The blockade, imposed after Hamas' violent takeover of Gaza a year ago, is meant to bring down the Islamic militants and inspire Gazans to opt for a more moderate leadership.
But critics say the closure, backed by the international community, is accomplishing the opposite.
Hamas has become more entrenched and Gazans are growing more angry at the West as isolation worsens the strip's poverty, say the critics, who include both Israelis and Palestinians. They add that Gaza is also being robbed of future leaders - the trapped students - because they can't get the necessary training. (AP)
Labels: Hamas, Israel, Palestine, U.S.
Robert Fisk: The West's weapon of self-delusion
So they are it again, the great and the good of American democracy, grovelling and fawning to the Israeli lobbyists of American Israel Public Affairs Committee (Aipac), repeatedly allying themselves to the cause of another country and one that is continuing to steal Arab land.
Will this ever end? Even Barack Obama – or "Mr Baracka" as an Irish friend of mine innocently and wonderfully described him – found time to tell his Jewish audience that Jerusalem is the one undivided capital of Israel, which is not the view of the rest of the world which continues to regard the annexation of Arab East Jerusalem as illegal. The security of Israel. Say it again a thousand times: the security of Israel – and threaten Iran, for good measure.
Yes, Israelis deserve security. But so do Palestinians. So do Iraqis and Lebanese and the people of the wider Muslim world. Now even Condoleezza Rice admits – and she was also talking to Aipac, of course – that there won't be a Palestinian state by the end of the year. That promise of George Bush – which no-one believed anyway – has gone. In Rice's pathetic words, "The goal itself will endure beyond the current US leadership."
Of course it will. And the siege of Gaza will endure beyond the current US leadership. And the Israeli wall. And the illegal Israeli settlement building. And deaths in Iraq will endure beyond "the current US leadership" – though "leadership" is pushing the definition of the word a bit when the gutless Bush is involved – and deaths in Afghanistan and, I fear, deaths in Lebanon too. (Independent)
Labels: Israel, Lebanon, Palestine, U.S.
Seizures in Iraq reveal militia's arsenal
Iraqi troops sweeping through the Baghdad stronghold of Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr have found large quantities of weapons, including helicopter missiles and an anti-aircraft gun, the U.S military said on Saturday.
Some 10,000 Iraqi government troops entered the sprawling slum of Sadr City unopposed on May 20 under a truce between Sadr's supporters and ruling Shi'ite political parties that ended weeks of fighting in which hundreds were killed.
A U.S. military statement itemizing the weapons seized in the last three weeks gave the first real glimpse of the formidable arsenal that Sadr's feared Mehdi Army militia has been building up.
The statement said government forces had seized 100 caches of weapons, including 295 mortar rounds, 367 AK-47s, 109 anti-tank mines, 39 rocket-propelled grenade launchers, an anti-aircraft gun, six helicopter rockets, sniper rifles, improvised explosive devices, 123 grenades and artillery shells.
Sadr City, a bastion of Sadr's Mehdi Army, had been off-limits to U.S. and Iraqi forces since the fall of Saddam Hussein in the U.S.-led invasion in 2003. (Reuters)
Labels: Iraq, Mehdi Army, U.S.
Obama 'softens' Jerusalem stance
Barack Obama has appeared to soften comments he made on Jerusalem that provoked a wave of anger among Arabs.
The presumptive US Democratic presidential nominee had said during a speech to the American Israel Public Affairs Council (Aipac), a pro-Israeli US lobby group, Jerusalem "will remain the capital of Israel and it must remain undivided".
But he later told CNN, the US broadcast network, that the Israelis and Palestinians had to negotiate over the future of the city.
"Well, obviously, it's going to be up to the parties to negotiate a range of these issues. And Jerusalem will be part of those negotiations," Obama said on Thursday.
Obama's remarks to Aipac days earlier appalled Palestinians, who see occupied East Jerusalem as part of a future Palestinian state. (Al Jazeera)
Labels: Israel, Palestine, U.S.
Obama stands by controversial remarks backing Israeli claim to all of Jerusalem
Democratic White House candidate Barack Obama on Thursday defended his remarks that Occupied Jerusalem should not be divided under any Israeli-Palestinian peace pact, saying a divided city would be "very difficult to execute."A day after sparking outrage when he told a Jewish group that Jerusalem must be the "undivided" capital of Israel, Obama told CNN that the issue is still up to the two sides.
"Obviously it's going to be up to the parties to negotiate a range of these issues," he said, "and Jerusalem will be part of those negotiations."
However, he added: "My belief is that as a practical matter it would be very difficult to execute. And I think that it is smart for us to work through a system in which everybody has access to the extraordinary religious sites in old Jerusalem."
But, he said, "Israel has a legitimate claim on that city."
On Wednesday Obama pledged to a meeting of one of Washington's most powerful lobby groups, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), his "unshakeable commitment to Israel's security" if he is elected president in November, while making the statement that Jerusalem should not be undivided. (AFP)
Labels: Israel, Palestine, U.S.
US/IRAN: Fearing Escalation, Pentagon Fought Cheney Plan
Pentagon officials firmly opposed a proposal by Vice President Dick Cheney last summer for airstrikes against Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) bases by insisting that the administration would have to make clear decisions about how far the United States would go in escalating the conflict with Iran, according to a former George W. Bush administration official.
J. Scott Carpenter, who was then deputy assistant secretary of state in the State Department's Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs, recalled in an interview that senior Defence Department (DoD) officials and the Joint Chiefs used the escalation issue as the main argument against the Cheney proposal.
McClatchy newspapers reported last August that Cheney had proposal several weeks earlier "launching airstrikes at suspected training camps in Iran", citing two officials involved in Iran policy.
According to Carpenter, who is now at the Washington Institute on Near East Policy, a strongly pro-Israel think tank, Pentagon officials argued that no decision should be made about the limited airstrike on Iran without a thorough discussion of the sequence of events that would follow an Iranian retaliation for such an attack. Carpenter said the DoD officials insisted that the Bush administration had to make "a policy decision about how far the administration would go -- what would happen after the Iranians would go after our folks." (IPS)
US refuses to clarify stance on Iran
The White House refuses to clarify its official position on a war with Iran after Israel threatened to strike Tehran's nuclear facilities.
In a Friday press conference, White House spokesman Scott Stanzel accused Iran of pursuing a nuclear weapons program but evaded questions to clarify Washington's stance on what Israel calls an 'unavoidable' attack on the Islamic Republic.
"The world community, I believe, is united in the desire to make sure that Iran doesn't develop a nuclear weapon and have a severe threat that we don't want to see come to fruition," he said.
"I'm not going to talk about hypotheticals. I think we've been pretty clear in recent weeks and months about our approach on Iran," he added.
Israeli deputy prime minister Shaoul Mofaz claimed Friday that Israel has no choice but to strike Iran's nuclear sites as 'options are disappearing and sanctions have proven to be ineffective'. (Press TV)
At Peace Institute Groundbreaking, War Dominates the Proceedings
President Bush, whose administration has been dominated by wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the global battle against terrorism, helped break ground yesterday on a $185 million facility for the U.S. Institute of Peace -- a government-funded think tank with the mission of preventing conflict and helping promote postwar stability operations.
The institute is planning a spectacular addition to the National Mall at 23rd Street and Constitution Avenue NW, near the Lincoln and Vietnam Veterans memorials, and its organizers invited Bush, former secretaries of state and defense, and congressional leaders to mark the occasion. While outwardly polite, the speakers hinted at the deep disagreements over Bush's use of preventive war to head off what his administration considered a threat from Iraq.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) pointedly quoted from President John F. Kennedy's 1963 commencement address at American University to say that he would "look kindly" on the work of the institute.
"The United States, as the world knows, will never start a war," Kennedy told the crowd, as Pelosi recounted. "We shall be prepared if others wish it. We shall be alert to try to stop it. But we shall also do our part to build a world of peace where the weak are safe and the strong are just." (Washington Post)
Labels: U.S.
Friday, June 6, 2008
Morocco agrees $234 million deal for 24 F-16s
US defense contractor Lockheed Martin said Friday it had been awarded a 233.6-million-dollar contract to supply Morocco with 24 F-16 fighter jets.
The military jet contract was awarded by the US government. Washington has to clear the sale of advanced military equipment to foreign states.
"Morocco will acquire a Block 52 configuration of the F-16C/D aircraft tailored to meet the specific requirements of the Royal Moroccan Air Force (RMAF)," Lockheed said in a statement.
The deal includes the 24 fighter jets, mission equipment and a support package from Lockheed Martin and other US and international contractors, the defense contractor said.
The F-16 jet has been widely used by the US Air Force. It is an advanced fighter jet that can operate day and night in all environments and weather, according to Lockheed. (AFP)
U.N. experts rap U.S. "cruelty" to child prisoners
United Nations experts on child rights criticized the United States on Friday over detention of juveniles at Guantanamo, in Afghanistan and Iraq, and voiced concern that some may have suffered cruel treatment.
They also called for an end to recruitment of under-18s into the U.S. armed forces and for a halt to enlistment campaigns aimed specifically at young people from minority groups and poor or single-parent families.
The strictures were issued in a report from the 18-member Committee on the Rights of the Child, which monitors performance under U.N. pacts, including two signed by Washington on children and armed conflict and on child prostitution.
On under-18s -- defined by the U.N. as children -- held in U.S.-run prisons in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Committee said it was "concerned over reports indicating the use of cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment."
The 18 experts, nominated by governments but expected to be independent of them, said they had similar reports on abuse of young prisoners held for several years at the U.S. naval base in Cuba's Guantanamo Bay. (Reuters)
U.S. walking away from U.N. rights forum: diplomats
The United States has quietly informed Western allies of its intention to walk away from the U.N. Human Rights Council, diplomatic sources said on Friday.
The U.S. delegation has observer status, with the right to speak, in the 47-member state forum, which meets in Geneva, and has never stood for election to the Council since it was set up two years ago.
Diplomatic sources and rights activists said that U.S. officials had informed the European Union on Friday morning of its intention to halt its involvement in the Council.
"They said they were going to disengage totally," said one representative of a rights watchdog group.
In a Council debate on Friday on the situation in Myanmar, the United States failed to take the floor on a topic on which until now it has always been vocal, a possible sign that it had little further interest in the body.
The Council replaced the widely discredited U.N. Commission on Human Rights.
But it is seen by critics as having fallen under control of a bloc of Islamic and African countries, which have a majority when backed by their frequent allies Russia, China and Cuba.
There was no immediate comment from the U.S. diplomatic mission in Geneva, home to the U.N. European headquarters. (Reuters)
US to probe why Guantanamo detainees talked
U.S. military officers responsible for defending Guantanamo detainees said they will investigate why five men accused in the Sept. 11 attacks were allowed to talk among themselves at their arraignment, allegedly pressuring one of the defendants to reject his lawyers.
All five said they would represent themselves in the death penalty trial, the first U.S. attempt to prosecute those believed to be directly responsible for killing 2,973 people in the bloodiest terrorist attacks ever on U.S. soil.
None entered pleas, and two said they hope to become martyrs for their anti-American cause.
Lawyers for Mustafa Ahmad al-Hawsawi complained he was pressured by Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the former third-ranking al-Qaida leader and alleged mastermind of the 2001 attacks.
"It was clear Mr. Mohammed was trying to intimidate Mr. Hawsawi," said Army Maj. Jon Jackson, his lead military attorney. "He was shaking."
Jackson complained to the judge after an interpreter overheard other defendants asking al-Hawsawi questions like, "So, you're in the Army now?"
Al-Hawsawi, who allegedly helped Sept. 11 hijackers prepare for the attacks with money and Western-style clothing, looked thin and frail as he sat on a pillow on his chair. The others appeared to be in robust health. (AP)
Labels: Guantanamo, Torture, U.S.
US raids target al-Qaeda in Iraq
The US military says it has captured 32 suspected militants, including 10 on a wanted list, in a wave of arrests across Iraq.
The leadership of the al-Qaeda in Iraq group has been degraded, the military said after the arrests in Baghdad, Mosul and the Tigris river valley.
One of the 14 arrested in Mosul is believed to have been involved in car bombs and kidnappings.
The US also captured two suspected Shia militiamen near Kut, south of Baghdad.
The US military accused the two of being members of Iranian-trained "special groups" - Shia fighters who are not observing a ceasefire called by the Shia cleric and militia leader Moqtada Sadr.
The arrest of two other suspected Shia militiamen was announced on Thursday.
Correspondents say US allegations of Iranian support for Shia fighters are expected to be on the agenda when Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki visits Tehran on Saturday. (BBC)
Labels: Al Qaeda in Iraq, Iraq, U.S.
2 Shiite extremists surrender in Iraq
Two Shiite militia leaders surrendered to American soldiers Friday, while tens of thousands of supporters of hard-line Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr streamed out of mosques to protest against an agreement which could keep U.S. troops here for years.
The arrests and demonstrations occurred on the eve of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's trip to Shiite-dominated Iran, his second visit there in a year.
U.S. officials allege that Iran is arming and training Shiite militiamen and encouraging a public campaign in Iraq against the proposed U.S.-Iraq security agreement, which the Iranians oppose.
One of those who surrendered early Friday allegedly ordered attacks on U.S. troops, directed the kidnapping of Iraqis and helped smuggle Iranian weapons into Iraq, the U.S. military said in a statement.
The other tried to escape by wading through an irrigation canal before turning himself over to U.S. soldiers. (AP)
Labels: Iraq, Mehdi Army, U.S.
What it means when the US goes to war
Troops, when they battle insurgent forces, as in Iraq, or Gaza or Vietnam, are placed in "atrocity producing situations". Being surrounded by a hostile population makes simple acts, such as going to a store to buy a can of soda, dangerous. The fear and stress push troops to view everyone around them as the enemy. The hostility is compounded when the enemy, as in Iraq, is elusive, shadowy and hard to find. The rage soldiers feel after a roadside bomb explodes, killing or maiming their comrades, is one that is easily directed, over time, to innocent civilians who are seen to support the insurgents.
Civilians and combatants, in the eyes of the beleaguered troops, merge into one entity. These civilians, who rarely interact with soldiers or marines, are to most of the occupation troops in Iraq nameless, faceless and easily turned into abstractions of hate. They are dismissed as less than human. It is a short psychological leap, but a massive moral leap. It is a leap from killing - the shooting of someone who has the capacity to do you harm - to murder - the deadly assault against someone who cannot harm you.
The war in Iraq is now primarily about murder. There is very little killing. The savagery and brutality of the occupation is tearing apart those who have been deployed to Iraq. As news reports have just informed us, 115 American soldiers committed suicide in 2007. This is a 13% increase in suicides over 2006. And the suicides, as they did in the Vietnam War years, will only rise as distraught veterans come home, unwrap the self-protective layers of cotton wool that keep them from feeling, and face the awful reality of what they did to innocents in Iraq. (Asia Times)
Analysis: Growing talk of Iran attack
Last December American intelligence agencies said they had "high confidence" that in late 2003 Iran had stopped trying to build nuclear weapons.
That seemed to end much of the talk about an American - or Israeli - attempt to destroy the facilities that Iran has developed for what it insists is a purely peaceful nuclear programme.
Plenty of influential people in the Middle East, Europe and the United States think an attack on Iran would have consequences potentially as disastrous as the invasion of Iraq in 2003. It would also send oil prices, already through the roof, into orbit.
But the talk has started again. Negotiations with Iran - and sanctions against it - have not stopped it enriching uranium, which its critics say is being done to make a bomb.
In one of his first acts after he secured the Democratic nomination for president of the US, Senator Barack Obama told Aipac, America's most powerful pro-Israel lobby, that he would do everything in his power to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon.
He repeated the word "everything" several times. Even allowing for the fact that he was also trying to dispel the impression that he was soft on Iran, it was strong language. (BBC)
Iraq May Request Extension For U.S.
The Iraqi government may request an extension of the United Nations security mandate authorizing a U.S. military presence, due to expire in December, amid growing domestic criticism of new bilateral arrangements now being negotiated with the Bush administration, according to senior Iraqi officials.
Iraqis across the political spectrum have objected to Bush administration proposals for unilateral authority over U.S. military operations in Iraq and the detention of Iraqi citizens, immunity for civilian security contractors, and continuing control over Iraqi borders and airspace.
Failure to reach an agreement on the arrangements, which must be approved by the Iraqi parliament, would leave the negotiations over a future U.S.-Iraqi relationship and the role of U.S. forces in the country to the next American president.
Differences over Iraq policy are among the sharpest distinctions between the two U.S. presidential contenders. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) advocates continuing the current strategy, with no timetable for the withdrawal of what are likely to be about 133,000 troops remaining in Iraq by the November election. Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) has said he would begin an immediate withdrawal of combat troops, to be completed within 16 months. (Washington Post)
Justice Dept. Investigating Deportation to Syria
The Justice Department’s ethics office is reviewing a decision in 2002 by department officials to send a Canadian citizen to Syria, where he was tortured, American officials said Thursday.
A Justice Department spokesman, Peter A. Carr, said that its inquiry, by the department’s Office of Professional Responsibility, was begun in March 2007 and was examining the role of department lawyers in expelling Maher Arar to Syria, which has long been identified by the State Department as habitually using torture on prisoners.
The existence of the Justice inquiry was disclosed at a Congressional hearing on Thursday by Richard L. Skinner, the inspector general of the Department of Homeland Security.
Mr. Skinner told two House subcommittees that the Arar case involved “very questionable” actions by United States government officials and that he “could not rule out” that Mr. Arar was sent to Syria with the intention of having him questioned under torture about possible connections to terrorists. (NY Times)
U.S. Treasury targets three Gulf-based militants
The United States is freezing the assets of three Gulf-based militants on Thursday, saying they provided financial and material support to al Qaeda.
"These three dangerous individuals must be stopped from further facilitating terrorism," said Stuart Levey, Treasury's undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence.
"The global community should act swiftly to prohibit them from using the financial system and from traveling internationally," Levey said.
Any assets these men have under U.S. jurisdiction will be frozen, and Americans will be prohibited from doing business with them, the Treasury Department said.
The three include Khalifa Muhammad Turki al-Subaiy, a citizen of Qatar, described by Treasury as a financier and facilitator who has provided financial support to, and acted on behalf of, al Qaeda senior leadership.
Treasury named the others as Bahrain-born Adil Muhammad Mahmud Abd al-Khaliq, who it says has provided financial, material, and logistical support to al Qaeda and the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group; and Bahrain-born 'Abd al-Rahman Muhammad Jaffar 'Ali, a financier who it says facilitated the movement of money to a senior al Qaeda individual in Iran and also provided his personal funds for use by an al Qaeda recruit. (Reuters)
The assets were frozen just one week after British Banker Charles Ridley, was 'detained' in Dubai, allegedly in relation to investment funds in petro-chemical developments in Pakistan, and with no access to lawyers. As of yet, there is no connection between the two incidents. (Referenced: GDN)
Update: Charles Ridley was arrested for funds directed through the Dubai Islamic Bank. We have just gotten confirmation that the ex-VP of the bank, Rifat al-Islam Usmani, was also detained yesterday as part of a bribery Investigation. As of yet, there is no official connection between these incidents, though it seems on first glance that Ridleys arrest may have been part of a dragnet on the Dubai Islamic Bank. The freezing of assets of the alleged militants, as of yet, does not seem to be related. (Referenced: Gulf Times)
Labels: Al Qaeda, Bahrain, Qatar, U.S.
Thursday, June 5, 2008
It's a Mitzvah
Now, here's a change we can believe in.
A mere 12 hours after claiming the Democratic presidential nomination, Barack Obama appeared before the American Israel Public Affairs Committee yesterday -- and changed himself into an Israel hard-liner.
He promised $30 billion in military assistance for Israel. He declared that the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps' Quds Force has "rightly been labeled a terrorist organization." He used terms such as "false prophets of extremism" and "corrupt" while discussing Palestinians. And he promised that "Jerusalem will remain the capital of Israel, and it must remain undivided."
Vowing to stop Tehran from getting a nuclear weapon, the newly minted nominee apparent added: "I will always keep the threat of military action on the table to defend our security and our ally, Israel. Do not be confused."
How could they be confused? As a pandering performance, it was the full Monty by a candidate who, during the primary, had positioned himself to Hillary Clinton's left on matters such as Iran. Yesterday, Obama, who has generally declined to wear an American-flag lapel pin, wore a joint U.S.-Israeli pin, and even tried a Hebrew phrase on the crowd. (Washington Post)
Labels: Israel, Palestine, U.S.
Arabs shocked by Obama speech
Arab leaders have reacted with anger and disbelief to an intensely pro-Israeli speech delivered by Barack Obama, the US Democratic presumptive presidential nominee.
Obama told the influential annual policy conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Council (Aipac): "Jerusalem will remain the capital of Israel and it must remain undivided."
His comments appalled Palestinians who see occupied East Jerusalem as part of a future Palestinian state.
Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator, told Al Jazeera on Thursday: "This is the worst thing to happen to us since 1967 ... he has given ammunition to extremists across the region".
"What really disppoints me is that someone like Barack Obama, who runs a campaign on the theme of change - when it comes to Aipac and what's needed to be said differently about the Palestinian state, he fails."
"I say to Obama ... please stop being more Israeli than the Israelis themselves, leave the Israelis and Palestinians alone to make decisions required for peace."
Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, rejected the statement, saying: "We will not accept an independent Palestinian state without having Jerusalem as the capital.
"I believe that case is clear."
He said: "Jerusalem is part of the six points that are subjects on the negotiations' agenda.
"And the whole world knows that East Jerusalem, Arab Jerusalem and Holy Jerusalem were occupied in 1967." (Al Jazeera)
Labels: Israel, Palestine, U.S.
U.S. Not Seeking Permanent Iraq Bases, Ambassador Says
The United States ambassador to Iraq on Thursday dismissed any suggestion that the Bush administration is maneuvering to set up permanent military bases in Iraq.
“I’m very comfortable saying to you, to the Iraqis, to anyone who asks, that, no indeed, we are not seeking permanent bases, either explicitly or implicitly,” Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker said at a State Department news briefing.
Mr. Crocker commented at length, and sometimes disdainfully, on a London newspaper report of “a secret plan” whereby the United States would keep 50 permanent military bases in Iraq, keep control of Iraqi airspace and insist on legal immunity for American soldiers and contractors.
“Is this what you’re looking for?” a journalist asked.
“Well, as a matter of fact, it is not,” Mr. Crocker said, rejecting the suggestion of a hidden agenda in American negotiations with the Iraqi government on future relations between Washington and Baghdad. (NY Times)
Two 9/11 alleged plotters urge death penalty to be martyrs
Two alleged plotters in the September 11, 2001 attacks Thursday demanded to be sentenced to death so they could become martyrs as the US military hearing of five men got underway here.
"This is what I want, I'm looking to be a martyr for long time," Khaled Sheikh Mohammed, a Kuwaiti of Pakistani origin who is the alleged mastermind of the attacks, told the hearing at the US naval base in Guantanamo Bay, southern Cuba.
He was responding to military judge Colonel Ralph Kohlmann who reminded him that he and his four co-defendants face the death penalty if convicted of the charges.
"God is all sufficient for me," Sheikh Mohammed translated into English as he read verses from the Koran, the Muslim holy book. He also threw out his appointed military and civilian defense team, saying he would defend himself.
A second defendant, Wallid bin Attash, also then demanded to be given the death penalty as he too refused the help of his legal team. (AFP)