Twelfth Bough

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Archive for category Mr. Bibi N. & Friends

Lebanon, Cyprus, Turkey, Iran

Feb 22

Posted by A. Peasant in Cyprus, Israel, Lebanon, Military, Mr. Bibi N. & Friends, Oil, Psychopaths, Terrorism, Turkey | No Comments

1. Former military chiefs held in Turkey plot probe

ISTANBUL (Reuters) - Turkish police detained former heads of the air force and navy and other senior officers on Monday in an investigation into an alleged plot to undermine the Islamist-rooted government and trigger a military coup.

The swoop, one of the largest in European Union candidate Turkey against the secularist armed forces, further raised tensions between the ruling AK Party and the military, which has been implicated in several alleged plots in the past year.

Former Air Force Commander Ibrahim Firtina, former Naval Commander Ozden Ornek and ex-Deputy Chief of the General Staff General Ergin Saygun, were among those held, broadcasters said.

Current armed forces chief General Ilker Basbug delayed a trip to Egypt as a result, broadcaster CNN Turk reported. In total seven serving officers and seven retired officers were detained.

Interior Minister Besir Atalay, accompanying Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan on an official visit to Spain, said he was being kept informed of developments, state-run Anatolian news agency reported.

NTV said the suspects held in Ankara were being flown to Istanbul for questioning over the “Sledgehammer” plot after police raids in the cities of Istanbul, Ankara and Izmir.

Neither police or the military had any immediate comment.

Financial markets showed little reaction to the detentions, but Wolfango Piccoli from the Eurasia political risk consultancy said they looked set to trigger another escalation in the tense relations between the military and the AK Party.

“The government is now embroiled in an open and bitter power-struggle with the judiciary and the military, raising the risk of a head-on confrontation that would badly damage political stability,” Piccoli said.

Such detentions would have been unthinkable in the past for the military, which has ousted four governments in the last 50 years. However, its powers have waned in recent years due to democratic reforms aimed at securing EU membership.

Other senior military officers have been indicted on charges of planning a separate plot to overthrow the AK Party, which has its roots in political Islam.

SOWING INSTABILITY

According to previous media reports on the Sledgehammer plan, denied by the military, the army had plotted to provoke Greek fighter jets into shooting down a Turkish military jet.

Turkey and neighbouring Greece have longstanding territorial disputes and came close to war in 1996 over an islet in the Aegean, though relations have improved in the last decade.

The alleged plot also involved planting bombs in mosques and museums in Istanbul to stir chaos. Last month Taraf newspaper said it had obtained 5,000 pages of documents and tapes on the plan which was aimed at justifying an army takeover in 2003.

The military has said documents quoted by the paper were part of a military training seminar but were never meant to be carried out and were not part of a conspiracy.

The latest detentions coincide with rising political tensions due to a clash between Erdogan’s government and the secularist judiciary over the arrest of a prosecutor who had investigated Islamic groups.

That prosecutor has been accused of links to an alleged far-right militant network, “Ergenekon”. More than 200 people, including military officers, lawyers and politicians, have been arrested in the case since it came to light 2-1/2 years ago.

Critics of the government say the Ergenekon investigation has also been used to hound political opponents.

source

2. Lebanese PM Sleiman and Cyprus — time to implement agreements

During a press conference held Wednesday February 17, 2010 at the embassy headquarters in Beirut, the ambassador of Cyprus in Lebanon Mr. Kiriakos Koros said Michel Sleimane’s visit to Cyprus aimed, above all, to tighten bilateral relations, and namely to promote tourism in both countries. “Since the official establishment of the Cyprus Embassy was officially established in Beirut, several contracts have been signed between the island and the country of cedars. Today, it is time to implement these contracts”, the ambassador said.

…On the political level, Mr. Koros focused on the Lebanese support to the island in international forums. Lebanon, he said, should be alerted, and even sensitive on issues concerning Cyprus. “Being elected for the non-permanent seat within the Security Council but also as it is an integral part of the Arab League, Lebanon can now echo Cyprus requests in international forums,” Koros said.

The two countries also stressed the need to comply with UN resolutions and move the peace process forward in the Middle East. “The two countries share many political opinions, particularly concerning the need to freeze the settlement process in the Palestinian territories and the importance to establish peace in the Middle East” he added.

To conclude, Mr. Koros stressed the need to coordinate between Lebanon and Cyprus and exchange experiences so as to meet the interests of both the Cypriots and the Lebanese. He also praised the key role assumed by the Maronite community in Cyprus, as it was serving as a cultural bridge between the Lebanese and the Cypriot society.

more @ iloubnan

3. Ahmadinejad calls for independent states to be ready for changes in world

“Today that capitalism is collapsing, the independent states should prepare themselves for huge global developments, and this necessitates promotion of the level of mutual and all-out cooperation,” Ahmadinejad said in a meeting with the Democratic Republic of Congo’s National Assembly Speaker, Evariste Boshab, here in Tehran today.

Ahmadinejad described expansion of mutual and multilateral cooperation among independent states as the key to resistance against the pressures imposed by the bullying powers.

more @ fars

4. Iran to speak to IAEA about “unreal parts” of Amano’s report

“Unfortunately Amano’s report is two-sided and some unreal issues have been intermingled with real issues,” member of the parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Commission Esmae’il Kowsari told FNA….The latest report on Iran presented by Amano to the agency’s Board of Governors on Thursday vindicates the peaceful nature of Iran’s nuclear activities and confirms that Iran’s program is faced with no technical or legal problems.

Yet, Amano’s first report on Iran’s nuclear program, similar to ElBaradei’s reports, is comprised of technical and legal as well as political aspects. Those parts which deal with the legal and technical issues underline the technical success and legality of Iran’s nuclear program and the peaceful nature of the country’s nuclear activities.  However, a number of issues fabricated by the western media are stated in the report on Iran which Iranian officials say has no legal rationale.

Despite, Amano’s previous claims that he wants to focus on “the facts” and pursue a more technical approach than his predecessor Mohammad ElBaradei, he also complained about the level of Iran’s cooperation with the Agency. This is while the agency has repeatedly praised Iran’s full cooperation with the UN nuclear watchdog agency in is previous reports.

more @ fars

5. and where do those “unreal parts” come from? Israel urges Iran oil embargo even without UN approval

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called on Monday for an immediate embargo on Iran’s energy sector, saying the U.N. Security Council should be sidestepped if it cannot agree on the move.

…If the world “is serious about stopping Iran, then what it needs to do is not watered-down sanctions, moderate sanctions … but effective, biting sanctions that curtail the import and export of oil into Iran,” Netanyahu said in a speech.

STOPPING IRAN FROM WHAT YOU FUCKING WHACK JOB?

their arrogance knows no bounds

Feb 19

Posted by A. Peasant in Banks, CIA, Corruption & Crime, Identities, Iran, Israel, Lebanon, Mind-fucking, Mr. Bibi N. & Friends, NWO, Obama/Biden, Psychopaths, Terrorism, UK | No Comments

1. the UK knew in advance that Israel would use stolen UK passports for a hit. israel knew in advance that this little kabuki of the UK slapping israel’s wrist would have to take place and look believable.

The British MI6 intelligence agency was tipped off by Mossad that Israeli agents were going to carry out an ‘overseas operation’ using fake UK passports, the Daily Mail reported Friday morning.

According to the UK newspaper, a British security source quoted a Mossad agent as saying that “the British Government was told very, very briefly before the operation what was going to happen.” The source explained that the tip-off was not a request for permission to use British passports but more a ‘courtesy call’ to inform British security services that ‘a situation’ might blow up. “There was no British involvement and they didn’t know the name of the target. But they were told these people were traveling on UK passports,” he was quoted as telling the Daily Mail.

…The Daily Mail report came several hours after a 20-minute meeting in London between Israeli ambassador Ron Prosor and a senior British diplomat on Thursday, over the fake British passports apparently used in the assassination of Hamas military commander Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in Dubai. The report hinted that Israeli intelligence chiefs understood British authorities would have to ’slap them on the wrist’ and reportedly added: “The British government has to be seen to be going through the motions.”


jpost: http://www.jpost.com/International/Article.aspx?id=169139

2. daily mail story:

The Israeli agent rejected suggestions that intelligence-sharing between the two nations might be damaged.

He said Mossad was handling several sources within the UK Muslim community and added: ‘There is no question of jeopardising that information flow.’

The revelation of a ‘tip-off’ came after Israeli ambassador Ron Prosor was ‘invited’ to the Foreign Office and asked to co-operate fully with the inquiry into the forged passports by the Serious Organised Crime Agency.

Some people think that Mossad, MI6 and the CIA are trying to destabilise Dubai.Dubai’s aim is to make money from helping Iran to beat sanctions.

“Now the Americans (or the Israelis – you can take your pick) want to turn Dubai into the Beirut of the Gulf. That was actually a headline last week – in The Jerusalem Post, of course – which painted Dubai as dangerous as it was economically calamitous.” (Robert Fisk: Passport to the truth in Dubai remains secret )

3. meanwhile, in the most brazen display of greed and hubris i think i’ve ever seen, 85 victims of Hizbullah sue Iran’s top banks

In the first such case, 85 American, Israeli and Canadian victims of Hizbullah rocket attacks have filed a lawsuit against Iran’s leading banks.
The suit, Kaplan v. Central Bank of Iran, was filed in federal court in Washington, D.C. and seeks $1 billion in compensatory damages and an unspecified sum of punitive damages.

The plaintiffs, whose family members were killed or who were themselves injured by rockets fired at Israel by Hizbullah between July 12 and August 14, 2006, allege that Iran’s Central Bank and Bank Saderat provided the Shiite group with “over $50 million in financial support in the years prior to the attacks with the specific intent of facilitating Hizbullah terrorist attacks against American and Israeli targets,” the Israel Law Center, which helped bring the suit, said.

The plaintiffs rest their claims in part on an explicit October 25, 2007 finding by the U.S. Treasury that between 2001 and 2006 Bank Saderat transferred funds from the CBI via Bank Saderat, PLC in London to Hizbullah “to support acts of terrorism.”

naharnet

THIS IS STRAIGHT OUT OF THE JAMES WOOLSEY INTERVIEW AT HERZLIYA, AND HILLARY CLINTON’S SUBSEQUENT BABBLING ABOUT THE REVOLUTIONARY GUARD IN IRAN. IT ALL QUICKLY BECAME US POLICY IN ABOUT A WEEK’S TIME.

4. meanwhile, in a brazen insult to the world’s intelligence, the Ethiopian plane crash is officially caused by HUMAN ERROR. they give us the pilot’s last words. no mention of anything else he might have said up to that point. oh and the pilot ‘made a move’ that made him gradually lose control of the plane, and it remained intact until it hit the water.


A preliminary report said “human error” was the cause of the deadly Ethiopian Airlines plane crash into the Mediterranean Sea last month and that the last words the pilot said to his co-pilot: “We’re finished … God have mercy on us.”
Flight 409 bound for Addis Ababa crashed into sea off the coast of Naameh minutes after takeoff from Beirut airport early in the morning of Jan. 25, killing all 90 people on board.

Pending the outcome of the official report, which is to be announced by the Lebanese government sometime next week, the daily As-Safir on Friday uncovered outlines of the preliminary report.

As-Safir said the investigation team probing the plane crash incident retuned to Beirut from Paris on Thursday and handed over the report to Prime Minister Saad Hariri.

The plane’s two black boxes — data flight recorder and cockpit voice recorder – were separately retrieved among the wreckage and flown to France for analysis by BEA, a French agency that specializes in assisting with technical investigations of air crashes.

As-Safir quoted a reliable source at France’s Aviation Accidents Investigation bureau as saying that the cockpit voice recorder has revealed that the last words the pilot said were: “We’re finished … God have mercy on us.”

The pilot was speaking in Amharic, a Semitic language spoken in North Central Ethiopia.

Audio recordings revealed that the pilot asked the co-pilot to follow instructions by Beirut airport control tower, only to find out that his assistance either did not heed to the orders or did the opposite.

This prompted the pilot to take a move which made him gradually lose control of the plane, the voice recorder showed.

The report said the jet remained intact until it hit water.

Cabinet, furthermore, did not take any decision to close the file on the plane crash incident pending an official report from the Lebanese Army about the search for remains of the remaining victims.

naharnet

sickening

Feb 18

Posted by A. Peasant in Haiti, Human Trafficking, Israel, Mossad, Mr. Bibi N. & Friends, Organ Trafficking, UK | No Comments

1. Dubai 99% sure Mossad killed Mabhouh — Israeli response… SO?

Dubai police chief said he was 99 percent certain that the Mossad was responsible for the assassination of top Hamas official Mahmoud al-Mabhouh , Gulf News reported on Thursday. “Our investigations reveal that Mossad is involved in the murder. It is 99 percent, if not 100 percent, that Mossad is standing behind the murder,” police chief Dahi Khalfan Tamim told The National newspaper.

Earlier, a confidant of Mossad chief Meir Dagan told the Reuters News Agency that there was no reason to resign over the scandal-fraught assassination in Dubai, adding that Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is unlikely to ask him to. Resignation would be tantamount to taking responsibility, the confidant said. Dagan’s success in other and ongoing operations against Hamas, Hizbullah, Syria and Iran would outweigh any desire by Netanyahu to have him fall on his sword, said the confidant, who also hails from Israel’s intelligence community. “There are national priorities here,” the confidant added.

Dubai police this week released names, photos and passport numbers of 11 members of an alleged hit squad that killed Hamas military commander Mahmoud al-Mabhouh last month in Dubai. Dubai police said that all 11 carried European passports. But most of the identities appeared to be stolen, and a number matched up with real people in Israel who have claimed they were victims of identity theft. Only the British passports, however, were believed to have involved stolen identities.

The confidant anticipated that Mossad would quietly lobby counterpart agencies of the countries whose passports were used for the Dubai mission to mellow their governments’ scrutiny on Israel.

“This may not work, given the anger that some of these foreign ministries are signaling,” the confidant said. “But even if there’s only a process of internal deliberation, that might be enough to take the sting out of the recrimination,” said the confidant. On Wednesday, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said there was no reason to assume the Mossad was behind the operation simply because Dubai had released the information about the passports. “I don’t know why we are assuming that Israel, or the Mossad, used those passports,” Lieberman told Army Radio in Israel’s first official comments on the affair. But Lieberman did not deny involvement outright, saying Israel rightly maintained a policy of ambiguity where security operations were concerned.

“Israel never responds, never confirms and never denies,” he said. “There is no reason for Israel to change this policy.”

jpost: http://www.jpost.com/International/Article.aspx?id=169012

maybe israel can fuck off.

2. Milliband: israel must cooperate fully. !!!. i’m *serious* this time. we’ll see.

British Foreign Secretary David Miliband on Thursday demanded Israel’s full cooperation in investigating of the fraudulent use of U.K. passport by the killers of a Hamas official in Dubai.

Israel’s ambassador to Britain, Ron Prosor, met with Sir Peter Ricketts, head of the British diplomatic sevice, on Thursday after London asked him to clarify what it called an “identity theft” in which the passports of six British Israelis were used by assassins.

“The permanent secretary (Ricketts) said we wanted to give Israel every opportunity to share with us what it knows about this incident,” Miliband told British television. “We hope and expect they will cooperate fully with the investigation that has been launched by the prime minister [Gordon Brown],” he said.

He said he hoped to discuss the issue further with Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman when both men were in Brussels on Monday.

…Although Jerusalem has not taken responsibility for the January 20 hit on Mabhouh, the incident seems to have spawned a serious diplomatic rift between Israel and the United Kingdom.

more @ haaretz: http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1150675.html

authentic-drama-queen13. let’s see if Livni does her arrest experiment

Opposition leader Tzipi Livni reportedly indicated on Sunday that she would be willing to travel to the U.K. in order to provoke her own arrest, hoping thus to move London into changing a controversial law enabling the arrest of visiting politicians, the London Times reported on Monday.

“Britain has obligated itself to me personally that this subject will be taken care of and fixed,” she said. “Now is the time.”

Livni reportedly added that getting herself arrested was the only way to “shame” the British government into changing the law giving judges the power to arrest visiting Israeli politicians and generals.

Israel’s government confirmed late last year that Livni canceled a planned London trip after her office received news of a secretly issued arrest warrant awaiting her arrival.

Foreign Secretary David Miliband later announced that Britain would no longer tolerate legal harassment of Israeli officials in this fashion.

more @ haaretz: http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1149895.html

MEANWHILE:

4. focus on Israel: harvesting Haitian organs

By Stephen Lendman


On January 15, Haaretz reported that:

“The Israel Defense Forces’ aid mission to Haiti left Israel overnight (January 14) with equipment for setting up an emergency field hospital. Around 220 soldiers and officers (were) in the delegation, including 120 medical staff (to) operate the hospital in the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince.”

According to Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, it includes “40 doctors, 25 nurses, paramedics, a pharmacy, a children’s ward, a radiology department, an intensive care unit, an internal department and a maternity ward (able to) treat approximately 500 patients each day,” including in two surgery rooms.

On January 20, Lebanon’s Al-Manar TV reported on the mission, citing a damning You Tube video posted by an American named T. West from a group called AfriSynergy Productions.

“The video presents something to think about while exploiting the horrible tragedy that has befallen Haiti where Israeli occupation soldiers are engaged in organ trafficking.”

Israel faced these charges before. In November 2009, Alison Weir’s article in the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs headlined, “Israeli Organ Trafficking and Theft: From Moldova to Palestine.” She cited an August Donald Bostrom article in Sweden’s Aftonbladet suggesting that Israel illicitly removes body parts, including from Palestinians.

She stated:

“….Israeli organ harvesting - sometimes with Israeli governmental funding and the participation of high Israeli officials, prominent Israeli physicians, and Israeli ministries - have been documented for many years. Among the victims have been Palestinians.”

“Israel is at the top,” she states. “It has tentacles reaching out worldwide. (It has) a pyramid system at work that’s awesome….they have brokers everywhere, bank accounts everywhere; they’ve got recruiters, they’ve got translators, they’ve got travel agents who set up the visas.”

They pay “the poor and the hungry to slowly dismantle their bodies” or simply take what they want from fresh corpses. Body parts are commodities, to be harvested and sold to the rich, even though organ sales are prohibited in most countries, but not in international law.

read more @ after downing street


5. aangirfan: Israelis in Haiti for organ trafficking and child sex trafficking?

Jorge Puello, who has recently been in Haiti, is the Jewish gentleman who allegedly leads a child sex abuse network that recruited children for prostitution in Nicaragua, the Dominican Republic and El Salvador. (Jorge Anibal Torres Puello) ‘He served in the U.S. Army in a military intelligence unit. He worked undercover with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and the Department of Homeland Security.’ (Legal adviser for Americans in Haiti facing his own charges)

How did the Israelis get to Haiti so quickly?

In the days befor the Haiti quake, the Israelis, in Tel Aviv, were carrying out a conference and drill about ‘emergencies and disasters’

(First Emergency Response Conference opens in Israel 11-Jan-2010 / Drill Draws International Crowd / Twelfth Bough: the annals of logistical achievements)

Are the Israelis in Haiti to harvest the organs of children?

In November 2009, Alison Weir had an article in the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs headlined, “Israeli Organ Trafficking and Theft: From Moldova to Palestine.”

She stated: “….Israeli organ harvesting - sometimes with Israeli governmental funding and the participation of high Israeli officials, prominent Israeli physicians, and Israeli ministries - have been documented for many years.” (Focus on Israel: Harvesting Haitian Organs AfterDowningStreet.org)

The UK’s Liberal Democrat leader, Nick Clegg, has sacked Jenny Tonge, his health spokeswoman in the House of Lords, after comments she made about alleged organ trafficking in Haiti.

Jenny Tonge told the Jewish Chronicle there should be an inquiry into claims that Israeli troops sent there after the earthquake were trafficking organs.

read more @ aangirfan

the 11th commandment: thou shalt not make controversial comments about Israel

Feb 15

Posted by A. Peasant in Censorship, Clinton, Iran, Israel, Military, Mr. Bibi N. & Friends, Nuclear Weapons, Organ Trafficking, Russia, The West, UK | No Comments

1. UK lawmaker sacked for suggesting that Israel conduct an investigation to clear the names of their medical teams in Haiti. so to clarify: calling for an investigation to CLEAR NAMES is outrageous. she loses her job and has to apologize profusely. there will be NO INVESTIGATIONS! the very act of calling for an investigation LEGITIMIZES THE CLAIMS, see? which are scandalous. and nevermind that the Israelis have been caught with their hands in the organ jar before. that makes no difference. it is always scandalous to suggest such things even when there’s a criminal track record.

Party leader Nick Clegg removed Lady Tonge as a Lib Dem health spokeswoman in the Lords on Friday, describing her remarks as ”wrong, distasteful and provocative”.

It is the second time she has been fired for making controversial comments about Israel.

The latest row followed accusations in the online Palestine Telegraph - of which Lady Tonge is a patron - that members of the Israeli Defence Force (IDF) had been harvesting body parts in the aftermath of the Haiti earthquake.

She subsequently told the Jewish Chronicle: ”To prevent allegations such as these - which have already been posted on You Tube - going any further, the IDF and the Israeli Medical Association should establish an independent inquiry immediately to clear the names of the team in Haiti.”

Fellow Lib Dems were said to have complained to Mr Clegg about her comments.

In a statement issued this evening, the leader said the peer ”apologises unreservedly”.

more @ telegraph

2. Ehud Barak to Mike Mullen: friends overcome differences kiss kiss hug hug

Defense Minister Ehud Barak met with the chairman of the US Army’s Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, at his office at the IDF Headquarters in Tel Aviv.

…Mullen met earlier with IDF Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi and Military Intelligence chief Major-General Amos Yadlin. Before meeting Barak he said the relations between the US and Israel had always been good, and that they would forever be so. The admiral also met members of the Israeli delegation to Haiti during a ceremony held at the Tel Aviv headquarters. He said they “symbolized hope” and the possibility of saving lives whenever possible.

… He also stressed that the Israeli mission to Haiti was extraordinary, and that the quake-stricken country would not soon forget everything that had been done to for them. Ashkenazi said that the delegation showed Israel and the IDF’s true faces. “I am proud to be your commander,” he told the delegation members.

more hagiography @ ynet

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3849390,00.html

3. bibi to visit moscow today-wed.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will visit Moscow next week, the Kremlin said Thursday, after Russia toughened its stance on Iran’s nuclear program. Netanyahu will hold talks with President Dmitry Medvedev on Monday, the Kremlin said in a statement, providing no further detail on the Israeli leader’s program for the Monday-Wednesday visit.

Announcement of the visit came after Russia officially questioned the “sincerity” of Iran’s pledges not to develop nuclear weapons and, in a policy shift, said fresh UN sanctions on Tehran were a “realistic” option. It also followed an official visit to Moscow by Khaled Meshaal, leader of the radical Palestinian independence group Hamas that is classified by Israel, the European Union and the United States as a terrorist organization.(AFP)

naharnet

4. Clinton “fears” that Iran is moving toward a military dictatorship. where did this come from? Woolsey suggested it at Herzliya, and so basically after that they just start talking about it, and that makes it “true.” voila. the power of experts - no evidence required, just an echo chamber.

DOHA - US SECRETARY of State Hillary Clinton said on Monday that she feared Iran is moving ‘toward a military dictatorship,’ with enterprises controlled by the Revolutionary Guard ’supplanting’ the government.

The US chief diplomat told students in Qatar that the United States was not seeking to use military action against Iran to curb its nuclear ambitions but rather seeking to use international pressure through the UN Security Council. Such pressure ‘will be particularly aimed at the those enterprises controlled by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, which we believe is in effect supplanting the government of Iran,’ Mrs Clinton said.

more @ straits times

5. the real reason for sanctions against Iran

The U.S.-sponsored drive to impose new economic sanctions on Iran has nothing to do with the noble cause of limiting proliferation of nuclear weapons on the planet. It is directly linked to the U.S. military doctrine of establishing ‘full spectrum dominance’ - i.e., military dominance on land, sea, air, and outer space over all other countries in the world. The logical extension of this doctrine is that only countries firmly allied to the U.S. government should be allowed to acquire nuclear weapons or to even develop the capacity to do so.

Israel , for example, is widely-believed to hold secret Nuclear weapons. Yet there is no call for sanctions or investigations of them. The reason is simple: They are a U.S. ally. India and Pakistan have declined to sign the nuclear non-proliferation treaty and have developed nuclear weapons. Yet there is no call for sanctions or investigations of them. The reason is simple: They are U.S. allies.

…As a signatory of the U.N. Nuclear non-proliferation treaty, Iran must not develop nuclear weapons.

However - and this is a crucial point - the non-proliferation treaty gives every signatory the sovereign right to voluntarily withdraw from the treaty on three months notice. After doing so, that country has the absolute right under international law to develop nuclear weapons on its own territory.

North Korea , which originally signed the treaty and later withdrew, has now the legal right to develop nuclear weapons. India, Pakistan, and Israel never signed the treaty and therefore also have had the legal right to develop nuclear weapons.

Instead of acknowledging these realities, western politicians and media have systematically concealed them from the public. In place of the truth they have repeated vague mantras like ‘defying the international community’ (i.e., not bending to the will of the U.S.).

In a typical example of this deceptive rhetoric, U.S. President Obama said a few days ago: “Despite the posturing that its nuclear power is only for civilian use … they in fact continue to pursue a course that would lead to weaponization, and that is not acceptable to the international community.”

The absence of any legal argument in this statement reflects the fact that there is no legal argument against Iran’s nuclear energy program, and that even development of weapons would be legal if Iraq withdraws from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation treaty. Of course, Obama invoking the ‘non-acceptance by the ‘international community’ does not mean the nations of the world; it’s code for ‘the U.S. and its allies’.

more @ pravda

6. attack on Iran ‘worries’ Mullen

JERUSALEM - THE chairman of the US military’s Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, said on Sunday he was concerned about the consequences of any attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities.

‘The outbreak of a conflict will be a big, big, big problem for all of us, and I worry a great deal about the unintended consequences of a strike,’ Admiral Mullen said.

Apart from saying that ‘it’s pretty hard to be specific about’ the issue, the top-ranking US military official did not expand on his comments.

more @ straits times


Woolsey offers advice for Bibi, a week later it becomes US policy

Feb 11

Posted by A. Peasant in Banks, CIA, Corruption & Crime, Iran, Israel, Mr. Bibi N. & Friends, Obama/Biden | No Comments

1. huh, look at that. ex CIA director James Woolsey gives some recommendations about how to handle Iran at the Herzliya conference…February 3. he suggests that no banks anywhere in the world can do any business with the Revolutionary Guard, which control about a third of the Iranian economy. that’s the idea… of course, big pharma can do business — that’s grandfathered.

2. lo and behold, a week later - February 11 - they happen! turns out the US is going after the Revolutionary Guard using their weapon of choice: BANKS. so the advice that Woolsey had for Bibi becomes the policy of Obama.

WASHINGTON - THE Obama administration narrowed in on Iran’s all-powerful Revolutionary Guard by imposing new sanctions on Wednesday on the force behind suspect nuclear work and urging the world to do the same.

It ordered a freeze on assets of an individual and four firms linked to the Revolutionary Guard - a unilateral US step toward what President Barack Obama has warned will be a ’significant regime of sanctions’ backed internationally.

The Treasury Department designated a Revolutionary Guard commander and four subsidiaries of a construction firm owned or controlled by the elite unit as ‘proliferators of weapons of mass destruction and their supporters.’

State Department spokesman Philip Crowley said the US is targeting the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps for its role in Iran’s nuclear and missile programs, alleged links to terrorism and crackdown on anti-government protests. The Revolutionary Guard, which has been hit by repeated sanctions in the past, is also a major business force in Iran.

Mr Crowley said US diplomats put ‘particular emphasis’ on the elite military branch when they consult with other powers about sanctions, but they were not yet ready to put a draft resolution on the table at the UN Security Council. ‘Our objective here is to try to put pressure on the government and those who are supporting its policies, without having undue impact on the Iranian people,’ Mr Crowley told AFP.

The United States has been consulting with Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany on Iran, but Beijing now appears to be the lone hold-out against sanctions and is calling for further negotiations. The six powers have been leading a multi-year effort to curb Iran’s uranium enrichment program, which the West fears masks a drive to build a nuclear bomb. Iran denies the charge, saying it is for peaceful use of energy. — AFP

Canada to use its G-8 presidency to press for Iran sanctions

OTTAWA - CANADA will use its G-8 presidency to press the club of world’s richest nations for more sanctions against Iran to try to curb its nuclear ambitions, Prime Minister Stephen Harper said Wednesday.

‘Canada will use its G-8 presidency to continue to focus international attention and action on the Iranian regime’ and ‘work with its allies to find strong and viable solutions, including sanctions, to hold Iran to account,’ Mr Harper said in a statement.

‘It is time for Iran to end its defiance of the international community, suspend its enrichment activity and take immediate steps toward transparency and compliance by halting the construction of new enrichment sites, and fully cooperating with the International Atomic Energy Agency,’ he said.

Mr Harper’s announcement came as the US Treasury Department ordered a freeze on assets of an individual and four companies linked to Iran’s Revolutionary Guard. US President Barack Obama on Tuesday called for a ’significant regime of sanctions’ against Iran for seeking to further enrich nuclear materials in defiance of UN Security Council resolutions actions.

In Moscow, the powerful head of Russia’s national security council, Nikolai Patrushev, said Teheran’s announcement that it had started work to produce 20 per cent enriched uranium cast doubt on its claims not to be pursuing weapons. Mr Patrushev indicated the Kremlin’s patience in trying to seek dialogue with Teheran was wearing thin. — AFP

source: straits times

not for nothing

Feb 10

Posted by A. Peasant in Afghanistan, Angola, Greece, Iran, Israel, Military, Mr. Bibi N. & Friends, NATO, NWO, Nuclear Weapons, Oil, Oligarchs, Russia, Saudi Arabia, UK | No Comments

1. heeeyy, good news….Russia’s top ten billionaires — TEH OLIGARCHS — doubled their wealth! turns out this crisis wasn’t so bad after all… PHEW! i dunno about you but i was really worried about those guys.

Russia’s top ten billionaires have almost doubled their aggregate wealth in 12 months to $139.3 billion, the Finans business magazine reported on Wednesday. The global economic crisis saw the combined fortunes of the top ten richest Russians fall from 221 billion to 75.9 billion in 2008, the magazine reported. Since then, however, massive state injections of funds into global financial markets and government support for companies owned by Russian oligarchs has seen the trend bucked.

The 2010 rating of Russian billionaires to be released by Finans next Monday includes 500 people with an estimated fortune of 3.3 billion rubles ($110 million) As many as 77 Russians have a wealth of over $1 billion each.

As before, tycoon and Chelsea football club owner Roman Abramovich is among Russia’s three richest people. His fortune will enable him to keep the club afloat for another 100 years, Finans reported.

The identities of the top two richest Russians will be revealed by the magazine on Monday.

MOSCOW, February 10 (RIA Novosti)

2. Saudi Arabia, Angola, Iran remain top 3 oil suppliers for China

Saudi Arabia, Angola and Iran remained the three largest oil sources for China in 2009, with the three supplying 47.7 percent of China’s total imports, according data released Wednesday by the General Administration of Customs (GAC).

GAC figures showed that China’s oil imports from the three nations last year stood at 41.86 million tonnes, 32.17 million tonnes and 23.15 million tonnes, respectively. They represented a year-on-year increase of 15.1 percent, 7.6 percent and 8.6 percent, respectively.

…Saudi Arabia, the largest oil supplier to China, accounted for 20.5 percent of China’s total imports in 2009. Angola supplied 15.8 percent while Iran contributed 11.3 percent, according to GAC data.

Other main oil suppliers to China included Russia, Oman and Sudan.

more @ people’s daily online

3. Greeks protest as government slashes public spending

Mervyn King, the governor of the Bank of England was asked about Greece at a press conference on the BoE’s latest inflation report. His second statement could be translated as - their problem, not mine.  “I don’t think you can compare UK with Greece. We have different policies. We have very good track record and most importantly, the maturity of UK debt is much longer.” “This is an issue they’ll deal with within the euro area. It should be for my colleagues in the euro area to decide.”

…For a “I told you so” piece, here is Andrew Alexander of the Daily Mail, no friend of anything to do with the EU. His argument will be familiar to eurosceptics.

A particular flaw in having a ‘one-size-fits-all’ currency covering the rich and the poor, the cautious and the feckless, is that no member nation has its own currency which it can devalue or revalue in an attempt to extricate themselves from this crisis.

more @ guardian, many links

EU fear Greek ’spillover’ - “serious and persistent internal and external imbalance ‘threatens stability’ in the country. This in turn presents a ’serious risk of spillover into other parts of the euro area,’”

Berlin eyes ‘firewall’ to contain Greece debt crisis — “We are thinking about what we should do if the crisis spills from Greece into other euro countries,” said the official. “So it’s more about finding firewalls, containing the problem, than principally about helping the Greeks.”

nice. the EU: one big happy family.

4. Danny Ayalon faces hostile crowd in UK

(VIDEO) LONDON – Despite securing a promise by the UK’s Foreign Office that he would not be arrested upon arrival there, Deputy Foreign Minister Daniel Ayalon was not exempt from the rage of pro-Palestinian demonstrators waiting for him both outside and inside a lecture hall in London. One protestor at the Oxford University hall, where Ayalon spoke Tuesday, waved the Palestinian flag and interrupted Ayalon’s lecture for several long minutes, during which he did not stop yelling at the Israeli minister and called him a “racist” and “a war criminal.”

more @ ynet

http://www.ynet.co.il/english/articles/0,7340,L-3846746,00.html

5. Marines gear up for assault - “hailed by officers as the biggest offensive in the eight-year-old war.” great. what could possibly go wrong?

Thousands of Afghan, US and Nato forces are expected to launch Operation Mushtarak (Together) in a bid to clear the Taleban out of Marjah, home to some 80,000 people, and expand the control of the Western-backed Afghan government. A US Marines officer said late on Tuesday that the operation, to be led jointly by Marines and the Afghan army had not yet begun. ‘The Marines have not started the operation in Marjah,’ he said, adding: ‘The operation will be led by the Marines and their Afghan partners.’  Officials and witnesses say families have fled, loading goats, furniture and clothes on to vehicles and heading to safety in Lashkar Gah, the capital of Helmand province around 20 kilometres to the north.

more @ straits times

6. bases in Afghanistan indicate permanent presence

Today, according to official sources, approximately 700 bases of every size dot the Afghan countryside, and more, like the one in Shinwar, are under construction or soon will be as part of a base-building boom that began last year.

Existing in the shadows, rarely reported on and little talked about, this base-building program is nonetheless staggering in size and scope, and heavily dependent on supplies imported from abroad, which means that it is also extraordinarily expensive. It has added significantly to the already long secret list of Pentagon property overseas and raises questions about just how long, after the planned beginning of a drawdown of American forces in 2011, the US will still be garrisoning Afghanistan.

…The Pentagon’s most recent inventory of bases lists a total of 716 overseas sites. These include facilities owned and leased all across the Middle East as well as a significant presence in Europe and Asia, especially Japan and South Korea. Perhaps even more notable than the Pentagon’s impressive public foreign property portfolio are the many sites left off the official inventory. While bases in the Persian Gulf countries of Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, and the United Arab Emirates are all listed, one conspicuously absent site is al-Udeid air base, a billion-dollar facility in nearby Qatar, where the US Air Force secretly oversees its ongoing unmanned drone wars.

The count also does not include any sites in Iraq where, as of August 2009, there were still nearly 300 American bases and outposts. Similarly, US bases in Afghanistan - a significant percentage of the 400 foreign sites scattered across the country - are noticeably absent from the Pentagon inventory.

more @ asia times

7. Russia: large-scale war less possible, but threats remain

MOSCOW, February 10 (RIA Novosti) - Russia’s military policies are aimed at avoiding an arms race and military conflicts, but they should also correspond to real threats which the country faces, Russia’s security chief Nikolai Patrushev said in an interview with the Russian government daily.

On February 5, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev announced that he has approved the country’s new military doctrine, which allows preventive nuclear strikes against potential aggressors.

The Rossiyskaya Gazeta published on Wednesday the full text of the doctrine.

“The unleashing of a large-scale war is becoming less possible… At the same time, regions, where conflicts are possible, remain,” Patrushev told the paper, adding “these conflicts could lead to a war with the use of both ordinary and nuclear weapons.”

Among the threats which could destabilize the situation in the world, the Russian security chief named the expansion of NATO, the Iranian nuclear program, and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

more @ ria novosti

hasbara: FAIL

Feb 9

Posted by A. Peasant in Censorship, Diplomats, Hasbara, Iran, Israel, Mossad, Mr. Bibi N. & Friends, Palestinians, Psychopaths, Resistance, Turkey | 2 Comments

1. Michael Oren heckled. professor appears to be practically in tears at the outrage, verbally attacks students and threatens to fail them all for disrupting the important speech of busy man Michael Oren.

2. Elie Wiesel repeats a bunch of lies and misquotes attributed to Ahmadinejad, then suggests it wouldn’t be so bad if he were assassinated. jpost puts headlines thusly, with quote marks: ‘i wouldn’t cry if he was killed’  EXCEPT that’s not what Elie Wiesel said. Elie Wiesel used the assassination word.

“I wouldn’t cry if I heard that Ahmadinejad was assassinated,” he quipped, calling the Iranian president “a pathological danger to world peace.”

http://www.jpost.com/Israel/Article.aspx?id=168217

3. Lieberman whines about Turkey

Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman on Tuesday leveled criticism at Turkey for what he called “weekly” condemnations of Israel.

Speaking during a visit to Azerbaijan’s capital Baku, Lieberman said that Israel had been “supporting close relations with Turkey for 10 years.” He said that the recent change in Ankara’s stance, since Operation Cast Lead against Hamas terrorists in Gaza, was “unexpected.”

Turkey can’t keep repeating this “sharp anti-Israel line” every week, the foreign minister told an Azerbaijani television station.

Nonetheless, he said, Israel is doing everything in its power to maintain ties and coordinate closely with Turkey.

“We hope Turkey will make certain amendments to its foreign policy,” he added.

Lieberman’s comments came some two weeks after Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdo?an said Israel “should give some thought to what it would be like to lose a friend like Turkey in the future,” in an interview with the Euronews channel.

“We have important ongoing agreements between us. How can these agreements be kept going in this climate of mistrust? I think Israel had better take another look at its relations with its neighbors if it believes it is a world power,” Erdo?an said in the interview.The Turkish premier said that the humiliation of Turkish Ambassador to Israel Oguz Celikkol by Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon had “no place in international politics.”

Earlier in January, Aylaon called Celikkol in for a public dressing down over a Turkish television show that depicted Mossad agents as baby snatchers. At that meeting, Ayalon instructed the camera crews, in Hebrew and in the ambassador’s presence, not to film them shaking hands, to show that the Turkish envoy was sitting on a lower sofa, to show that there was only an Israeli flag on the table and not to film them smiling.

When asked by Euronews if Turkey could have handled relations with Israel more diplomatically, Ergodan answered that “I am telling the truth…And I will keep telling the truth.”

http://www.jpost.com/International/Article.aspx?id=168212

a resurrected post from december

Feb 7

Posted by A. Peasant in Afghanistan, Censorship, China, Iran, Israel, Kazakhstan, Minerals, Mr. Bibi N. & Friends, Oil, Putin, Russia, Terrorism, The West | No Comments

here are some links i had gathered together on 12/13/09, and posted at my news blog, which has since been quarantined as a spam blog by google. somebody in india reviews it about once a week and puts it back in quarantine. this particular page has also been erased from the google cache, for some unknown reason.

1. Kazakh uranium boss trial to proceed - 12/10/09

Prosecutor’s office spokesman Nurdaulet Suindikov commented, “The investigation charges former Kazatomprom president Mukhtar Dzhakishev with theft by way of embezzling a state company’s property.” Suindikov added that Dzhakishev would be charged with embezzling 100 million tenge ($600,000) from Kazatomprom.

Dzhakishev, who was earlier credited with making Kazakhstan a top global uranium producer while overseeing Kazatomprom, has denied all charges against him.

Kazakhstan contains the world’s second-largest uranium reserves, estimated at 1.5 million tons. The country in 2006 produced 5,279 tons of uranium, but as part of its plans to increase output boosted uranium output in January-September to 9,535 tons.

upi asia

2. Chinese president to visit Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan - 12/9/09

BEIJING, Dec. 9 (Xinhua) — Chinese President Hu Jintao will pay a working visit to Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan from Dec. 12 to14 at the invitation of President Nursultan Nazarbayev and President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Jiang Yu said here Wednesday.

chinaview

3. Kazakhstan urged to lift visa requirement for Iranian traders - 12/8/09

TEHRAN (FNA)- Iran called on Kazakhstan to lift visa requirements for those Iranian businessmen willing to run trade activities in the Central Asian country.

“…if lifting visa requirements comes on both countries’ agenda, then visits by traders and businessmen will be facilitated and the ground will be prepared for the expansion of cooperation,” Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Ramin Mehman Parast said at a round table dubbed as ‘Trade Opportunities of Iran and Kazakhstan’ here in Tehran on Tuesday.

Mehman Parast reiterated that the Iranian foreign ministry is striving to prepare the necessary grounds and conditions for those traders interested in making investments in target markets.

Noting that the trade volume between Iran and Kazakhstan has increased in recent years, he stressed that in case existing problems are resolved, the two countries can boost the volume of annual trade to $10 bln.

Mehman Parast also referred to the strategic situation of Iran and Kazakhstan in the region, and said today the world supplies its needs through importing either the goods and products manufactured by Iran and Kazakhstan or the other countries’ products which should again pass through Iran or Kazakhstan.

fars

4. International Space Station astronauts land safely on Kazakhstan steppes - 12/1/09

BEIJING, Dec. 1 (Xinhuanet) — Three astronauts landed safely on the Kazakhstan steppes Tuesday after spending six months on the International Space Station.

The Russian Soyuz TMA-15 capsule landed as planned at 10:17 a.m. Moscow time (07:17 GMT) about 85 km north of the town of Arkalyk in Kazakhstan.

chinaview

5. Yunnan Copper mulls buy in Kazakhstan - 12/1/09

BEIJING, Dec. 1 (Xinhua) — Yunnan Copper Co., China’s third-largest copper producer, is thinking of acquiring a copper mine in Kazakhstan next year, China Daily reported Tuesday.

The company is also considering investing in Southeast and South Asian countries including Laos and Indonesia, the newspaper said, quoting the company’s general manager Yang Chao.

Besides investment in the overseas market, the copper producer is also scouting for more copper reserves in the Inner Mongolia and Tibet autonomous regions. The company’s copper reserves would touch 9 million tonnes by 2012, according to Yang.

He predicted that copper prices might even surpass 70,000 yuan (10,294 U.S. dollars) per tonne in 2010, although prices are likely to remain volatile over the next year, and copper demand will increase next year

Copper is widely used in home appliances, wires and cables; it can also be used in water pipes, largely increasing the need for copper in the future, Yang said.

chinaview

6. Kazakhstan: Israel’s Partner in Eurasia by Ariel Cohen in Jerusalem Viewpoints Sept-Oct 2009

http://tinyurl.com/yfw6d8h

The June 2009 visit by Israeli President Shimon Peres to Kazakhstan once again focused Israel’s attention on energy-rich, secular Muslim states of the Caspian and Central Asia: Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. This was not Peres’ first visit to the steppe country in the heart of Eurasia: he visited Kazakhstan several times before as foreign minister and deputy prime minister. This was a good long-term investment:

Kazakhstan is as large as the entirety of Western Europe, but with a population only 1.5 times larger than the population of the city of Moscow. It is one of the most sparsely populated countries on Earth.

7. 11/16/09 - Germans ID convert, 27, as terrorist suspect

BERLIN — Authorities have identified a 27-year-old German convert to Islam as an al-Qaida associate suspected of traveling to Afghanistan and planning to attack German targets. The report could fuel concerns about European converts being recruited by Islamist terrorist groups for attacks. The Federal Criminal Police Office confirmed a Spiegel Online report Sunday that it had posted notices across Afghanistan warning that Jan Schneider, a Kazakhstan-born ethnic German, may plan attacks on German military or civilian institutions in Afghanistan.

…Schneider, who is also known as Hamza, has recently traveled to the border region between Afghanistan and Pakistan, Spiegel reported. He left Germany in 2004 to study Arabic in Saudi Arabia. He was seen in his hometown of Saarbruecken several times after his departure from Germany.

…Spiegel also wrote that the criminal office has warned of several other German extremists who supposedly have traveled to Afghanistan in recent months. More than five million ethnic Germans have immigrated to the country from the former Soviet Union, Poland, Romania and other Eastern European countries since the 1950s under a special migration law for persons who can prove German ancestry.

DEFUNCT LINK: http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gRbmVOhddpRWJo-KpO06aa6sHQRwD9C03L2O1

alternate link (cache): http://74.125.47.132/search?q=cache:hJxPAOZqPHsJ:www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33949307/ns/world_news-europe/+BERLIN+%E2%80%94+Authorities+have+identified+a+27-year-old+German+convert+to+Islam+as+an+al-Qaida+associate&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a

8. 10/12/09 - Avigdor Lieberman visits Kazakhstan among other countries to discuss Iran

By Roni SoferY Net NewsOctober 12, 2009

Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman is set to leave for a round of visits abroad this week, after recently returning from Africa, South America, and the Balkans. This time Lieberman will visit Austria, Kazakhstan, Holland, and Denmark, mainly in order to discuss the topic of Iran.

Lieberman says he wants to “invest effort in nations that have not received attention from Israel until now”….The foreign minister is also scheduled to meet with his French counterpart, Bernard Kouchner, following the latter’s request. Lieberman has clarified that the object of this meeting, as well as those in Holland and Denmark, is “to bolster Israel’s status by widening the wingspan of its foreign policy”.

Lieberman will also meet with Israeli ambassadors to Britain, France, Germany, Italy, and Spain, as well as the ambassador to the EU.

via aletho news - LINK DEFUNCT


9. 9/10/09 - Caspian sea states shut Iran out of summit

Iran is peeved at its northern neighbors over a decision to exclude the Islamic Republic from a meeting ofCaspian Sea states on Thursday.
Iran’s top diplomat, Manouchehr Mottaki, said today he was outraged that Russia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan plan to meet in the Kazakh city of Aktau without Iran, according to the website of Iran’s state-owned English-language Press TV satellite news channel.
“In our view the meeting runs contrary to Iran’s national interests,” Mottaki said.
Iran has stewed for years as Russia and its former Soviet satellite states gobble up more and more of the Caspian Sea’s resources.
The four countries attending the Aktau meeting, described as an “informal” summit to discuss “subregional cooperation,” say they don’t plan to make any decisions on the status of the sea or the division of the seabed, an official representative of the Kazakh Foreign Ministry told Azerbaijan’s Trend news agency.

there are no sunglasses

10. 12/2008: Michael Parenti

“While claiming to be fighting terrorism, US leaders have found other compelling but less advertised reasons for plunging deeper into Afghanistan. The Central Asian region is rich in oil and gas reserves. A decade before 9/11, Time magazine (18 March 1991) reported that US policy elites were contemplating a military presence in Central Asia. The discovery of vast oil and gas reserves in Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan provided the lure, while the dissolution of the USSR removed the one major barrier against pursuing an aggressive interventionist policy in that part of the world. US oil companies acquired the rights to some 75 percent of these new reserves. A major problem was how to transport the oil and gas from the landlocked region. US officials opposed using the Russian pipeline or the most direct route across Iran to the Persian Gulf. Instead, they and the corporate oil contractors explored a number of alternative pipeline routes, across Azerbaijan and Turkey to the Mediterranean or across China to the Pacific.”

11. 11/3/08 - Putin: we must end monopoly in world finance

The Russian Prime Minister, Vladimir Putin, has called for a complete overhaul of the world’s financial system in order to guarantee stability and ensure progress. He was speaking in Astana in Kazakhstan, where the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation is meeting to in discuss the global financial crisis.
The organisation, which comprises Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, China, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, is widely seen as a counter-weight to NATO’s influence in Eurasia. It is primarily concerned with security issues. This time, however, the sides are discussing how to develop social and economic cooperation.
At the beginning of his speech at the SCO Council of Prime Ministers, Vladimir Putin stressed the role the SCO countries should play in the changing world political and economic landscape.
“We now clearly see the defectiveness of the monopoly in world finance and the policy of economic selfishness. To solve the current problem Russia will to take part in changing the global financial structure so that it will be able to guarantee stability and prosperity in the world and to ensure progress,” he said.
He also named projects in transportation, telecommunications and modern technology as priorities of the SCO and spoke in favour of mutual space programmes.
While in Kasakhstan, the Russian prime minister is also expected to discuss the formation of a customs union between Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan with Kazakh leader Nursultan Nazarbayev.

russia today

12. 11/13/08 - Kazakhstan and the financial crisis

The financial crisis that began in the United States has made its presence felt around the globe and Central Asia is no exception. How is Central Asia’s greatest economic power, Kazakhstan, handling this economic crisis and how is the economic downturn effecting the stability, security, and development of the region. These were the main topics of a conference between many regional experts in Astana last month called “New Challenges and Kazakhstan’s Contribution to Stability and Security.” [link defunct]
Muriel Mirak-Weissbach, a scholar of the region’s economic and strategic outlook attended the conference and not only summarizes the major issues and policies discussed, but also provides a historical perspective of past economic crisis’s in Kazakhstan. Here is an excerpt of what Nurbakh Rustemov, the keynotespeaker and Chairman of the hosting parliamentary committee, had to say of the economic downturn and its consequences:

“He bluntly stated that the world financial crisis was leading to a “misunderstanding” among geopolitical forces, and carried the danger of a direct threat to humanity, through hunger and poverty.(1) He called for uniting forces internationally, to overcome the financial-economic crisis, which he dubbed the “number one priority.” Rustemov mentioned the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, of which Kazakhstan is a founding member, as well as the OSCE, which Kazakhstan will chair beginning 2010, as bodies his government would like to utilize to find solutions to the crisis. Two concrete means that his country could use to impact the crisis, would be in securing energy resources, and providing grain and meat exports to alleviate food shortages.”
Rustemov is correct in stating that this economic crisis may lead to following and connected geopolitical disruptions and he’s also right in arguing that regional and multilateral groups, such as the SCO and OSCE, will be crucial in helping the world get through this mess in one stable piece. Another important aspect of his comments is the positive role Kazakhstan can play in impacting the crisis in a productive way and that is in securing energy resources and in providing food stuffs to alleviate shortages in other countries, specifically in harder hit CA states, such as Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Afghanistan.
Kazakhstan’s abundance of energy supplies, combined with President Nazarbayev’s prudent planning, have left the nation in good condition despite the tough times. Nazarbayev announced last month that the government would spend $2 billion to stimulate the economy, mainly targeting banks and the construction industry, funds drawn from the nation’s oil fund. Unfortunately, not all CA or world states have an oil fund to fall back on.
What the whole of Central Asia can hope for is sturdy economic stewardship by its regional leader,Kazakhstan, and help from regional bodies, both from the East and West to weather what will most likely be a lengthy recession. During this time, it will be vital to keep the region from falling into disrepair as poverty and extremism would both be on the rise and this may lead to conflict. The US, Russia, China, and the EU all have roles to play in mitigating negative ramifications of this crisis in the region, but a strong and active Kazakhstan is crucial. As Muriel Mirak-Weissbach concludes:
“Kazakhstan has become the foremost interlocutor in Central Asia, not only for Eurasian giants Russia and China, but also for the two major economies of western Europe, Germany and France. If the current world crisis can be overcome through participation of major Eurasian nations, Kazakhstan can become the linchpin in the region for stability and security.”
In addition, the US State Department announced a nuclear safety cooperation with Kazakhstan. Read Below. [link defunct]
The United States and the Republic of Kazakhstan reached a new milestone in a multiyear joint project to irreversibly decommission the Soviet-era BN-350 fast breeder reactor located at the Kazakhstani port of Aktau on the Caspian Sea. The participating governments completed a sodium processing facility that will be used to dispose of coolant from the reactor core. This action demonstrates and reinforces the strength of the U.S.-Kazakhstani strategic relationship, and our joint commitment to preventing the proliferation of nuclear materials.

source: foreign policy blogs

http://centralasia.foreignpolicyblogs.com/2008/11/13/kazakhstan-and-the-financial-crisis/

damage control: you’re doing it wrong

Jan 14

Posted by A. Peasant in Diplomats, Hasbara, Israel, Mr. Bibi N. & Friends, Stupidity, Turkey | No Comments

Oh dear…

“This is not diplomacy, but rather a mistake by one person. It is good that this man, the deputy foreign minister, fixed his mistake,” the president said at an event in Tel Aviv. “This must not be attributed to the entire country and to all diplomats. We must learn not to make such mistakes,” Peres reportedly said.

Earlier Thursday, Kadima Council chairman and former MK Haim Ramon said

that Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s government should send a letter of apology

to all the Israeli citizens

for humiliating Israel in an unnecessary confrontation with Turkey.

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1263147892230

Also:

Turkey’s main Jewish group on Thursday said the row between their country and Israel must be solved courteously, and warned that continued tensions could inflame anti-Semitism.

…“We continue to be concerned about a new environment in Turkey which permits and even encourages extreme expressions regarding Jews and Israel,” Abraham H. Foxman of the Anti-Defamation League said in a statement released Wednesday.

“While we have celebrated Turkey’s history of coexistence with Jews and the protection Turkish society provides for its Jewish community, we cannot ignore this new atmosphere and its potential consequences.”

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1142658.html

No no, keep talking. You’re doing just great.

See: the full monty:

Ayalon’s associates responded that the messages of praise he had received from inside and outside his party outnumbered the condemnations by a ratio of eight to one. They stressed that everything he did was coordinated with Lieberman.

UPDATE: No no…see, Ayalon meant to threaten the Turkish ambassador, not humiliate him. Sheesh you people are so hyper-sensitive. He tewtally deserved it.

In the interview, Ayalon also said that the incident in which he reportedly ‘humiliated’ the Turkish ambassador by making him sit in a lower chair was intended to send the Turks a threatening message, not humiliate the ambassador. [SEE? Threatening, humiliating...not the same. -ed.]

“The story with the cameras wasn’t planned, I didn’t think it was being recorded, and if it was - I didn’t think it would be aired with sound. [ie: I though I would get away with it... - ed.] My intention wasn’t to humiliate, but to send a visual message. The ambassador didn’t feel humiliated either - only once reporters started calling him. The picture was aimed at the Turks, to send them a message. I think what Erdogan did to Peres in Davos is humiliation, not this,” said Ayalon….During the meeting, Turkey’s ambassador was seated in a low sofa, and facing him, in higher chairs, were Ayalon and two other officials - an arrangement carried out at Lieberman’s orders. [But that doesn't mean it was, you know, "planned." - ed.]

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1142969.html

Donde los clown pants?

the full monty

Jan 13

Posted by A. Peasant in Diplomats, Hasbara, Israel, Mr. Bibi N. & Friends, Psychopaths, Turkey | No Comments

Israel displays its petty and sophomoric nature with the Turkish diplomatic incident and subsequent fallout. Behold.

Background: Israel needs Turkey. Turkey doesn’t need Israel. Turkey has been making friends all over the place. Erdogan stood up to Peres last year at Davos over Operation Cast Lead. In typically myopic Israeli style, everything is always about Israel and Israel’s glass feelings. So when a Turkish television drama depicted Israeli security forces kidnapping children and shooting old men — a depiction supported by conspiracy facts on the ground, lest we forget Operation Cast Lead and organ stealing, just two recent examples of genocidal behavior — Israel’s Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon could not resist behaving like a seventh grader while meeting Turkish ambassador Ahmet Oguz Celikkol in Jerusalem.

At the beginning of the conversation with the Turkish envoy on Monday, Ayalon told cameramen in Hebrew: “Pay attention that he is sitting in a lower chair … that there is only an Israeli flag on the table and that we are not smiling.”

One Turkish source said that Ayalon “set a trap” for Celikkol, and that the envoy had no idea that he was being humiliated until afterward when Ayalon’s words to the cameramen were broadcast. The source also mentioned that Ayalon did shake his hand, but not in front of the cameras.

And does anyone have the sense to say, you know, maybe that’s not a good idea? NO! In fact they all seem to think this is a splendid smack-down. The Israeli dailies splashed the news all over the front pages. We hazed that fucker, boo-yah! High fives.

TEL AVIV - Israeli newspapers on Tuesday played up what they called the “hazing” of Turkey’s ambassador by Israel, in an incident likely to ratchet up already high tensions between the two allies.

The media highlighted the fact that Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon made Ambassador Ahmet Celikkol sit on a low couch while the Israelis sat on high chairs.

Rather than summoning Celikkol to the ministry as is the norm, Ayalon saw him in his parliamentary office after making him wait in the corridor and telling staff to remove the Turkish flag and refreshments that were on the table. “The important thing is that people see that he’s sitting low down and we’re high and that there is one flag,” Israeli television aired Ayalon as telling invited photographers and camera crews.

Israeli dailies all splashed the story on the front page, with Maariv headlining: “The ambassador gets a hazing” above a picture showing the Turkish envoy sitting much lower than Ayalon and looking uncomfortable.

Some people in Ayalon’s party, sensing the faux pas, say he ruined his career. http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1263147877256

“He is finished politically,” an Israel Beiteinu official said. “This ruins his reputation as a diplomat. It is a stain that cannot be erased. He damaged Lieberman and first and foremost himself. It is too soon to say if it will completely disqualify him, but people in the party will no doubt remember this if a decision would be made on who should be acting foreign minister. This erases the notion that he is the obvious front-runner.”

…”We have enough problems with the Muslim world without picking a fight with a country that has 72 million Muslims,” Ben-Eliezer told Israel Radio from India, where he is on an official visit. “When I met with the Turks [in November], I told them what needed to be said privately. This is not the way [to do things]; it is the way to get the entire Muslim world against us. Whoever wants the entire Muslim world against us, well, the best of luck to him.” Former deputy foreign minister Majallie Whbee of Kadima called for “the diplomat Ayalon to fix the damage of the politician Ayalon as soon as possible, apologize to the ambassador, and promise to put the agenda of the country ahead of that of his party from now on.”

Labor MK Daniel Ben-Simon called upon Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to summon Ayalon to his office and put him on a low chair, “so he will see how low Israeli diplomacy has stooped.” He said Netanyahu should replace Lieberman before he does even more damage to Israel’s image internationally.


But *those* people make up a small minority! Far MORE people consider Ayalon da bomb!

Ayalon’s associates responded that the messages of praise he had received from inside and outside his party outnumbered the condemnations by a ratio of eight to one. They stressed that everything he did was coordinated with Lieberman. “The party seems to be behind him on this,” an Ayalon associate said. “Our phones and fax were ringing off the hook, he got great support on Facebook, and he was received very warmly on a lunch visit to a humous restaurant in the [capital's] Mahaneh Yehuda market. There has of course been criticism, but the support has been overwhelming.”

Not enough rope? Wait there’s more. There’s the non-apology apology — actually several:

Ayalon, before the statement was released, told Army Radio that he would not apologize. “It’s the Turks who should - for what [Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip] Erdogan said and for the television series,” Ayalon said. “We are merely setting boundaries.”

…“The prime minister believes that the foreign ministry’s protest to the Turkish ambassador was just in its essence but should have been conveyed in an acceptable diplomatic manner,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said.

So there. Neener neener to you too. And the truth of the matter: Israel does not like Turkey’s friends. Israel decided to give Turkey a little spanking.

Netanyahu expressed concern at the deterioration of relations between Israel and Turkey. In talks behind closed doors, he said that during the past two years “Turkey has been steadily and systematically slipping eastward toward Syria and Iran,” instead of westward, toward Europe and the United States. “This is a trend that should really trouble Israel,” Netanyahu was quoted as saying.

Sources in the Israeli Prime Minister’s Bureau said Tuesday the decision to invite the Turkish ambassador for a reprimand by Ayalon was made together with Lieberman. They noted that the Israeli PM was not aware of the way the reprimand would be carried out, “but the minute it happened the prime minister [gave] the foreign minister his full backing.”

Official sources in Tel Aviv said Erdogan had changed his attitude towards Israel since Operation Cast Lead. “This process started when Erdogan abandoned a debate with President Shimon Peres (in Davos), so actually what is being done in Jerusalem is less important than what is happening in Ankara,” one source said.

Aha, still smarting over Erdogan standing up to Peres in Davos. And now Barak has to go to Turkey and make all kiss kiss hug hug. Ha good luck with that.

BEIRUT- Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak will head to Ankara over the weekend for talks with Turkish leaders including Turkish President Abdullah Gul, Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, Defense Minister Vecdi Gonul and senior military officials , an official in Barak’s office told AFP on Tuesday, as tension between the longstanding allies again spike.

He added that the visit would take place despite the rising tension, which erupted on Monday after [SPIN:] Israel complained to Ankara over the broadcasting of a television series portraying Mossad agents as baby snatchers.

“We give this visit much importance. The ties between the two countries are important, and they must be maintained even if there are ups and downs,” the official said.

Clarification: The tensions erupted after Israel’s obnoxious leaders could no longer maintain diplomatic protocols and revealed their true petty nature for the world to see.

They dropped the mask.