07 Other Atrocities – Page 396 – Public Intelligence Blog

Join us in Washington, DC on April 28 and 29 for an “International Drone Summit: Killing and Spying by Remote Control” hosted by CODEPINK, Reprieve, and the Center for Constitutional Rights.

US drone strikes have killed an estimated 3,000 people around the world, including hundreds of civilians, without any judicial process or meaningful oversight, and without any transparency or accountability. The summit's dual objectives are to better inform the public about the reality and significance of the US government's expanding use of both killer and surveillance drones, and to facilitate networks and strategies to resist this expansion.

The Saturday, April 28 program is open to the public and brings together human rights advocates, robotics technology experts, activists, lawyers, scholars and journalists, and shares the stories of people whose families and lives have been directly impacted by remote-controlled drone strikes. This is an all day event with multiple panels beginning at 9am at Mount Vernon Place United Methodist Church, 900 Massachusetts Ave. NW, Washington, DC. See this site for updates on the program, and register here today!

The Sunday, April 29 program is a strategy session for organizations and individuals to network and plan advocacy efforts focused on various aspects of drones, targeted killings and expanding US covert wars. If you are interested in attending this session, please email Ramah Kudaimi at rkudaimi(@ symbol)gmail.com.

Learn more.

2012/04/03

David Isenberg: US Taxes Funding Substantial Human Trafficking Schemes by DoD Contractors in War Zones

07 Other Atrocities, DoD

Some Things Are Just Unacceptable

David Isenberg

Huffington Post,

On March 27 the Technology, Informational Policy, Intergovernmental Relations and Procurement Reform Subcommittee of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee held a hearing, “Labor Abuses, Human Trafficking, and Government Contracts: Is the Government Doing Enough to Protect Vulnerable Workers?”

This is a subject of more than passing interest to me because last year I wrote a report, published June 14, and commissioned by the Project on Government Oversight, on the exploitation and abuse of the workers of a KBR subcontractor. I subsequently testified at a Nov. 2, 2011 hearing about that report before this very subcommittee.

That hearing, by the way, left me with a lingering sense of surrealism, even after five months, if only because it was revealed that the Pentagon official who had responsibility for this subject had never been to Iraq and Afghanistan.

And sadly, as was noted back then, there has virtually never been a prosecution on this charge, even though it was a widespread practice in both Iraq and Afghanistan with contractors, or subcontractor. And there have only been a very few debarments or suspensions of contractors even though it was well known as a widespread practice.

Continue reading “David Isenberg: US Taxes Funding Substantial Human Trafficking Schemes by DoD Contractors in War Zones”

2012/04/012012/04/01

Chuck Spinney: Cancer of Careerism – Final Word on Colin Powell’s Moral Suicide

07 Other Atrocities, Corruption, Government, Military

There is not much new here, other than Curveball's public admission, but note Colonel Wilkerson’s comment below. One the one hand, Wilkerson admits he was a party to the “sexed up” intelligence; on the other, he wants us to believe Powell (and by extension himself) was being used. Given that “Curveball” was suspected of being a liar by the German intelligence (BND) as well as the CIA, the most charitable interpretation of Powell’s enthusiastic imitation of Adlai Stevenson's speech to the UN during the Cuban Missile Crisis is that once the decision to attack Iraq was made, neither Powell nor Wilkerson had the courage to resign on principle, and both chose instead to be a party to the fabrication — or as we used to say in the Pentagon he chose to be “used” by going along to get along.

Defector tells how US officials ‘sexed up' his fictions to make the case for 2003 invasion

JONATHAN OWEN, Independent, 1 APRIL 2012

A man whose lies helped to make the case for invading Iraq – starting a nine-year war costing more than 100,000 lives and hundreds of billions of pounds – will come clean in his first British television interview tomorrow.

“Curveball”, the Iraqi defector who fabricated claims about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, smiles as he confirms how he made the whole thing up. It was a confidence trick that changed the course of history, with Rafid Ahmed Alwan al-Janabi's lies used to justify the Iraq war.

Continue reading “Chuck Spinney: Cancer of Careerism – Final Word on Colin Powell's Moral Suicide”

2012/03/302012/03/30

Steven Aftergood: New Policy on Mitigation Risks of Bio Research

02 Infectious Disease, 03 Environmental Degradation, 07 Health, 07 Other Atrocities, Earth Intelligence, Ethics, Government

NEW POLICY ON MITIGATING RISKS OF BIO RESEARCH

Certain types of life science research involving “high consequence pathogens and toxins” would be subject to new review and risk mitigation procedures which might include classification of the research or termination of the funding, according to a U.S. government policy issued yesterday by the National Institutes of Health.

The policy applies to research involving 15 specified biological agents and toxins which “pose the greatest risks of deliberate misuse with most significant potential for mass casualties or devastating effects to the economy, critical infrastructure or public confidence.”

Research that increases the lethality or transmissibility of the agent or toxin, or otherwise enhances its harmful consequences, will be subject to the new review procedures.

Based on the outcome of the review, a risk mitigation plan may be developed. If less restrictive measures were deemed inadequate, the new policy would allow for national security classification of the research or termination of government funding.

See “United States Government Policy for Oversight of Life Sciences Dual Use Research of Concern,” March 29, 2012.

See also “U.S. Requires New Dual-Use Biological Research Reviews” by David Malakoff, Science Insider, March 29.

Phi Beta Iota: Nice but inadequate. The government is paying lip service to this necessary precautionary principle. If they were really serious, such a policy would encompass all agricultural and industrial processes without exception.

See Also:

Charles Perrow, The Next Catastrophe: Reducing Our Vulnerabilities to Natural, Industrial, and Terrorist Disasters (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2011)

2012/03/28

Eagle: Judge shreds case against 7 Michigan militia members

07 Other Atrocities, Corruption, Government, Law Enforcement

All might find this interesting from the perspective that a Judge did not buy into a government claim that clearly showed a lack of integrity on its part. While the Administration can bluster all it wants about other people, it appears that it doesn't want that right extended to its population…..

Judge shreds case against 7 Mich. militia members

Ed White

Associated Press, 28 March 2012

DETROIT – A federal judge on Tuesday gutted the government's case against seven members of a Michigan militia, dismissing the most serious charges in an extraordinary defeat for federal authorities who insisted they had captured homegrown rural extremists poised for war.

U.S. District Judge Victoria Roberts said the members' expressed hatred of law enforcement didn't amount to a conspiracy to rebel against the government. The FBI had secretly planted an informant and an FBI agent inside the Hutaree militia starting in 2008 to collect hours of antigovernment audio and video that became the cornerstone of the case.

“The court is aware that protected speech and mere words can be sufficient to show a conspiracy. In this case, however, they do not rise to that level,” the judge said on the second anniversary of raids and arrests that broke up the group.

Roberts granted requests for acquittal on the most serious charges: conspiring to commit sedition, or rebellion, against the United States and conspiring to use weapons of mass destruction. Other weapons crimes tied to the alleged conspiracies also were dismissed.

“The judge had a lot of guts,” defense attorney William Swor said. “It would have been very easy to say, ‘The heck with it,' and hand it off to the jury. But the fact is she looked at the evidence, and she looked at it very carefully.”

The trial, which began Feb. 13, will resume Thursday with only a few gun charges remaining against militia leader David Stone and son Joshua Stone, both from Lenawee County, Mich. They have been in custody without bond for two years.

Prosecutors said Hutaree members were antigovernment rebels who combined training and strategy sessions to prepare for a violent strike against federal law enforcement, triggered first by the slaying of a police officer.

But there never was an attack. Defense lawyers said that highly offensive remarks about police and the government were wrongly turned into a high-profile criminal case that drew public praise from Attorney General Eric Holder, who in 2010 called Hutaree a “dangerous organization.”

Read full article.

2012/03/28

DefDog: US Ignominious Collapse in Afghanistan II

07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, Corruption, Government, IO Impotency, Military

This effort destroys any trust that may have been left…..days are numbered (to aid in an election also)…..

New security for U.S. troops in Afghanistan

By Lolita C. Baldor and Pauline Jelinek

Associated Press, 28 March 2012

WASHINGTON — U.S. military commanders in Afghanistan have assigned “guardian angels” — troops that watch over their comrades even as they sleep — and have ordered a series of other increased security measures to protect troops against possible attacks by rogue Afghans.

The added protections are part of a directive issued in recent weeks by Marine Gen. John Allen, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, to guard against insider threats, according to a senior military official. And they come in the wake of a spike in attacks on U.S. and coalition forces by Afghans, including the point-blank shooting deaths of two U.S. advisers in Afghanistan's Ministry of Interior.

Some of the changes have been subtle, others not so much.

Continue reading “DefDog: US Ignominious Collapse in Afghanistan II”

2012/03/282012/03/28

DefDog: US Ignominous Collapse in Afghanistan I

07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, Corruption, Ethics, Government, IO Impotency, Military

Responding to Mini-Me: Obama Impeachable Over Afghan Massacre Cover-Up?

Sayed Ishaq Gillami (should be Gillani): Sayed Ishaq Gailani (born 1954) represents Paktika in the Wolesi Jirga, Afghanistan's lower house of parliament.[1] He is the founder and chairman of the National Solidarity Movement of Afghanistan and currently serves on the Wolesi Jirga's International Relations committee. While still an influential member of the Gailani family, he has claimed leadership of the family and adopted the title Pir. However, most of his family recognizes his uncle, Ahmad Gailani, as the leader of the family and the Qadiriyya Sufi order. (Pir is a title for a Sufi master equally used in the nath tradition. The title is often translated into English as “saint” and could be interpreted as
“Elder”. In Sufism a Pir's role is to guide and instruct his disciples on the Sufi path.) This means his credentials are impeccable (outside the discord within the family over the title Pir) and nobody in Afghanistan would accuse him of falsehood.

General Sher Mohammed Karimi: (from the article – of the Afghan Army) He is not just from the Afghan Army, he is in fact Chief of Staff. I know the man personally and he bears no ill-will toward the US. I would put much stock in what he says. These two individuals, although not understood by our leadership, represent two of the most unbiased people in Afghanistan. This alone lends great credence to their stories. For ISAF/NATO and this Administration to be 180 degrees out will only serve to see a significant increase in attacks on ISAF/NATO personnel, all because of their position and not related to anything the ISAF/NATO personnel did.

Category: 07 Other Atrocities

Event: 28-29 Apr Washington DC International Drone Summit: Killing and Spying by Remote Control