Archive for category Oil

vultures in africa

Feb 22

Posted by A. Peasant in Africa, Angola, Bush/Cheney, China, Corruption & Crime, India, Iran, Media, Minerals, Nigeria, Oil, Psychopaths, Terrorism, UK | No Comments

1. China warns Zimbabwe: we are not ‘friends’ — pay back the money you owe us

Deputy Prime Minister Arthur Mutambara says the Chinese want all loans to be repaid before loosening its purse. According to the Mutambara the Chinese President Hu Jintao revealed to him during a brief meeting at the World Economic Forum in Switzerland that he considers Beijing relationship with Harare as ’business partners’ and not ’friends’.

The Chinese are quoted telling the Mr. Mutambara that: “We’ll not condemn you publicly but we’ll not give you cash”. And according to the Deputy Prime Minister, “unless we do the right thing the Chinese will not work with us.”

…The two countries have signed a series of agreements in infrastructure, tourism, energy and mining but the cooperation has largely not translated into an improved standard of living for ordinary Zimbabweans.

Zimbabwe has literally handed over control of most sectors of the economy to the Chinese during the past few years in return for short-term financial assistance to enable Mugabe’s government to ride one crisis after another.

more @ afrik.com

2. nice. about Mugabe…

Are the people of Zimbabwe really celebrating Robert Mugabe’s 86th Birthday? What is there to celebrate about this aberrant human form? Thirty years in power and nothing good to show for it. He is determined to cling on to power for the rest of his life despite embarrassingly losing an election to a more dignified and respectable opposition leader and refusing to hand over the reins of government. Mugabe is not only ruthless, he is incapable of showing remorse and lacks all human form of compassion. On close examination, it is possible that he has an inherent mental condition. Why? Because of all the abnormalities contained in his dispositions and behaviour. When the lust for power deprives anyone of a second thought faculty, you become your own victim. Because you lose control of your sanity as a result of your desperation to satisfy your ego-driven tendencies.

more @ newstime africa

3. Angola awards $340m deal to Daewoo Shipbuilding, S. Korea, to deliver 5 oil carriers to state-owned Sonangol (link)

mm hmm. Sonangol, Lev Leviev… see here: excitement always follows Lev Leviev, posted on January 28, 2010

1. Lev Leviev tied to Chinese intelligence, business interests in Angola — Sonagol

The suspicions were spelled out in a report recently compiled by the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, which was established by Congress in 2000 in order to “monitor, investigate and submit to Congress an annual report on the national security implications of the bilateral trade and economic relationship between the United States and the People’s Republic of China, and to provide recommendations, where appropriate, to Congress for legislative and administrative action.” The report noted, among other things, that the group of Chinese corporations has business ties with Israeli businessman and diamond magnate Lev Leviev.

2. India, Angola agree to cooperation for hydrocarbon sector — there’s Sonagol again

Luanda (Angola), Jan 27: India and Angola on Wednesday said that the two countries will enter into Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to provide an overarching framework for cooperation in the hydrocarbon sector.

…During the meeting a MoU was signed between ONGC Videsh Ltd. (OVL) and the National Oil Company of Angola namely, Sonangol, for cooperation in the exploration sector.

4. Nigeria: Obasanjo, corrupt ex-Nigerian president, pays tribute to Tony Blair, war criminal and alleged pedophile, for helping Nigeria, Blair also meets Goodluck Jonathan kiss kiss hug hug

Abuja — Former President Olusegun Obasanjo and former British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, who is in Nigeria for the THISDAY’s Nigeria at 50, 2010 Awards, yesterday relived the diplomatic interactions that contributed to the success of their administrations.

Speaking at an Inter-faith Malaria Initiative organised by the Nigeria Inter-faith Action Association with funding support from Federal Government, World Bank, Centre for Inter-faith Action on Global Poverty and the Tony Blair Faith Foundation held at the Kuje Town Hall in Abuja, Obasanjo said the former British premier made a significant contribution to Nigeria’s exit from the Paris Club and other creditor nations.

Obasanjo, whose entry into the venue of the event elicited wild, nostalgic cheers from the audience, said while he travelled round the globe to get Nigeria off the Paris Club debt yoke, he received promises from world leaders which were not fruitful thus prompting his government to search for a facilitator and a member of the Group of Seven industrialised nations (G7) which they found in Mr. Blair.

He said the debt relief allowed the country to channel resources into the Millenium Development Goals (MDGs) projects notably funds needed to fight infant mortality and morbidity occasioned by such diseases as malaria.

…Also yesterday, Blair visited Acting President Goodluck Jonathan at his Akinola Aguda residence, Presidential Villa, Abuja and commended him for holding the country together in the face of the daunting political leadership facing the country.

Blair also expressed concern about recent political developments in the country and thanked Jonathan for the skilful way he has handled the country.

more @ allafrica

5. George W Bush and Dear Condi also wish Goodluck Jonathan Good Luck i think he’s gonna need it

Nigeria’s Acting President, Goodluck Jonathan, yesterday evening in Abuja secured the support of the former President of the United States, George Bush who assured him of the world’s support in making his job a success. Mr. Bush and his entourage were in Nigeria for the ThisDay Nigeria at 50 awards….

“Terrorism is alien to Nigeria,” Mr Jonathan said. “Nigeria and US are strategic partners for global peace and development.” He also thanked the US government for its concern over the health of President Umaru Yar’Adua who is currently undergoing treatment in a Saudi hospital.

Mr Bush was accompanied on the trip by former US Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice and US Ambassador to Nigeria, Robin Sanders. On the Nigerian side were the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Ojo Maduekwe and his solid minerals counterpart, Diezeani Allison Maduekwe.

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?

sociopaths at work

Feb 15

Posted by A. Peasant in Afghanistan, Africa, Canada, Corruption & Crime, Germany, Latin America, Military, NWO, Oil, Psychopaths, UK | No Comments

1. R. Canup’s spectrum of evil personalities: excerpt:

Next up the ladder is the evil person of above average intelligence. These people have a similar goal to evil people of average intelligence; the production of human misery. However these people see the opportunity to do something that evil people of normal intelligence don’t see how to do; murder someone and get away with it. They understand that the way to murder someone and get away with it is to not care who they kill, how they kill them, or when they kill them. Such people set up conditions where someone will be ‘accidentally’ killed and wait for the circumstances to occur.

For example, I once worked for an evil person of above average intelligence who built up a company which did about twenty million dollars a year of business. He was only interested in his business as an instrument to his ends. He worked people long hours of overtime (without any extra pay) - he pushed people as hard as he could. What he was doing was setting up an environment as stressful as he could - secure in the knowledge that sooner or later - a death would be the result. Sure enough, a staff accountant driving home after a late night’s work was hit by a drunken driver and killed. The boss was stunned; his life’s goal had been accomplished - the guilt was obvious in his face the next day. He became very cheerful over the next several weeks, and lost interest in the company. Inside of a year and a half it was out of business.

Of course since he was cloaked in plausible deniability no criminal charges could ever be brought against him. But, he could see that the death had come as a direct result of his deliberately malicious behavior; he willed it, and it happened. Most industrial accidental deaths and injuries can be traced back to the malicious behavior of those who are evil and of above average intelligence.

That leaves us those who are evil and of high intelligence. Most good people are also familiar with these kind of people; we call them leaders - both of industry and of government. It is the goal of such people to get away with mass murder. An example will show how they work their agenda.

more here

2. Vancouver’s quick descent from high ground - excerpts:

There is also the problem that while the investigating British Columbia Coroners Service, the Royal Mounted Police and officials of the International Luge Federation agreed that the cause of the tragedy was not the dangers of the track but the errors and inexperience of its victim, it was still swiftly decided to change utterly the conditions of the competition. This included the building up of the wall, and the changing of the “ice profile” at the fatal curve and moving the start line to the women’s mark, nearly 200 yards down the track.

The inconsistency of the ruling screamed at the mourners of the luger who had just 26 practice runs down the course – as opposed to the 200 enjoyed by the Canadians.

…The head of the American luge team, Ron Rossi, has been especially cutting. He says: “The Canadians have to be answerable for their position on training. A track like this demanded the weaker athletes get more time. I’m going to propose some changes, more training for the athletes. It’s a terrible tragedy that has happened here but I hope that maybe in the end we can change some rules and never see anything like this ever happen again.”

Adding to the force of Rossi’s complaints is his belief that a member of his team, Meg Sweeney, could so easily have shared Kumaritashvili’s fate. The day before the Georgian died, Sweeney had a near identical crash after “double-looping” the 16th curve. “It was almost the exact same crash,” said Rossi, “but she didn’t go so high.”

Sweeney says she has tried to wipe away the incident but conceded: “There’s something missing up here, I’m not going to lie to you.”

Her boss says it is a failure to read the gravest warning signs. “They knew they had problems from day one. They had people hitting the wall and going airborne. If you were already concerned about it and you already raised the wall, why didn’t you keep going? And why didn’t you protect the [metal] posts at the chance that maybe something could happen? I’m not the one to answer but that’s the kind of question that needs to be asked.”

why indeed. more @ independent

3. organized crime may have caused Cologne archive collapse — organized crime meaning the people in government who issued permits for construction and the people who planned and carried out the construction — ie: officials and businesspeople

Suspicion that organised crime may have been behind the deadly collapse of Cologne’s city archive grew on Monday as more falsified building protocols emerged.

An additional 28 falsified records for underground metro construction at various sites across the city have been discovered, an investigation insider told daily Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger. “We assume that it could be significantly more,” the source said. “For us it looks like systematic falsification.”

Over the weekend the paper reported fresh claims that shoddy work practices caused the collapse of the archive building, including a report that construction firms were skimping on concrete. …The paper reported that too little concrete may have been used on the tunnel under the Waidmarkt area – a possible reason for collapse of the tunnel that led to the destruction of the city’s historical archive in March 2009 and two neighbouring buildings, killing two people and destroying countless historical documents.

more @ the local

4. march in Cuidad Juarez against Mexican army

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico – Thousands of people belonging to civil organizations and residents of Ciudad Juarez marched peacefully Saturday through this city to commemorate the slaying of 15 youths last Jan. 31 and to repudiate the presence of the Mexican army in the town.
…The legislator Fernandez Noroña asked that the army leave the city, considered the most violent in Mexico, in the belief that the troops treat the people in an “undeserved, violent, arrogant, unconstitutional and abusive” way. “There is now more army in Juarez than ever, there are more federal police than ever…and today there is more crime than ever in Juarez,” the politician said.

more @ latin american herald tribune

5. new ‘ethical’ biofuel crop damages the poor people it was supposed to help

Five years ago jatropha was hailed by investors and scientists as a breakthrough in the battle to find a biofuel alternative to fossil fuels that would not further impoverish developing countries by diverting resources away from food production….

Millions of the plants have been grown in anticipation of rich returns, only for growers to be hit by poor yields, conflict over land and a lack of infrastructure to process the oil-rich seeds.

Oil giant BP, which planned to spend almost £32m on a joint venture to set up jatropha plantations, has now pulled out and the charity ActionAid today warns that jatropha needs to be cultivated on prime food-growing land to produce significant yields….ActionAid said its researchers found repeated cases of farmers being left with jatropha crops they could not sell and land previously used to grow food crops being taken over by sub-contractors who then employed locals on wages that could not compete with rises in the price of foodstuffs partially caused by biofuel production.

…A number of British companies are continuing to market jatropha as a “highly ethical and green” investment. One fund offers investors three packages for prices ranging from £7,500 to £15,600 in a brochure entitled “Money really does grow on trees”. That company says it has funded the planting of 32 million jatropha shrubs worldwide through a London-based provider called Carbon Credited Farming (CCF) Plc. Jeff Reeves, head of global operations for CCF, which estimates it will have 300 million jatropha shrubs planted on 120,000 acres worldwide by the end of 2010, admitted that there had been problems establishing the crop.

He told The Ecologist magazine: “In many cases it is government policy and people that are to blame, rather than jatropha itself. Well-managed, jatropha … can work. But there have been countries where poor management has meant this is not the case.”

more @ independent

6. Afghan civilian deaths a serious setback — first reports said the rockets were 1000 feet off course. seems like a very large error for our high-tech army.

Air Chief Marshal Sir Jock Stirrup said the incident had damaged efforts to win the support of local communities, but added that accidents were inevitable during conflict. The civilians died when two rockets from a high mobility artillery rocket system hit a house on the outskirts of the town of Marjah, in an area of Helmand province being targeted by a joint US and Afghan force.

more @ guardian

7. training/dehumanizing/debasing people before you give them deadly weapons: German Army ritual abuse scandal spreads

The hazing scandal in the German army, in which young recruits have reportedly been forced to eat raw animal liver until they vomited, has snowballed with more soldiers blowing the whistle on ugly rites of passage, reports said Sunday….The scandal began when a young soldier who trained at the camp in Mittenwald came forward to describe hazing that included recruits being forced to drink alcohol until they were sick, eat raw pig liver, and conduct climbing exercises in the nude before their fellow soldiers, daily Süddeutsche Zeitung reported last week.

more @ the local

8. man takes on corrupt UK police officer

THE brave informant who finally toppled Britain’s most corrupt cop today tells his own incredible story of monster Ali Dizaei’s chilling mafia-style regime. Humble website designer Waad Al Bagdhdadi, 24, refused to be bullied by the bent Scotland Yard commander. Now, with Dizaei jailed for four years, he reveals astonishing details of the shamed officer’s life of luxury funded by his grip on a terrified community.

…”He ate for free, he drank for free. In his world, he didn’t pay for anything. But I wasn’t going to let him get me for free.”

The two men fell out after Waad - who fled Iraq at 17 to escape the tyranny of Saddam Hussein - asked for payment for setting up Dizaei’s personal website. Instead of coughing up the swaggering cop tried to frame Waad for attacking him.

…”I’d heard about Dizaei before I met him. He was famous in the Middle Eastern community. They called him London’s top officer. They said he was f***ing the English, the only one they couldn’t take down, ‘untouchable’.

dibs on resources in the Western hemisphere

Feb 12

Posted by A. Peasant in Brazil, India, Minerals, Oil, Russia, Southeast Asia, The West, Venezuela | No Comments

1. Venezuela awards 2 blocks in massive oil region: India, Malaysia, Chevron (US), Japan, Spain

Venezuela assigned the rights to exploit the Carabobo 1 block to a consortium that included Repsol, India’s Oil and Natural Gas Corp., Oil India Ltd. and Indian Oil Corp. and Malaysia’s Petronas, while another block, Carabobo 3, was awarded to a consortium led by Chevron and that also included Japan’s Mitsubishi Corp. and Inpex Corp. and Venezuela’s Suelopetrol

…In both blocks, the winning consortium will have a 40 percent stake and the remaining 60 percent stake will be held by Venezuelan state oil giant Petroleos de Venezuela. According to official Venezuelan figures, the blocks have the potential to produce a combined total of at least 800,000 barrels of crude per day by 2016 and will require $30 billion in investment.

“This is something historic,” President Hugo Chavez said of the auction. “It is extremely important” and is the product of “a transparent bidding process” that began on Oct. 30, 2008, with the participation of 19 foreign companies….He also stressed the importance of foreign investment in developing the potential of that region, which the U.S. Geological Survey recently said is the world’s largest petroleum reserve with more than 500 billion barels of recoverable crude.

more @ tribune

2. India moving faster to tie up mineral supplies

Thus the Indian government is reportedly moving to fast track deals to secure future supplies for its ever-growing industrial base. According to a report in today’s Hindustan Times The Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) has decided that the country’s state-owned corporations need to be supported in aggressively pursuing the acquisition of strategic mineral resources through a dedicated fund - and it has set a 30-day deadline for such plans to be in place. According to Hindustan Times, an unnamed senior government official told it “The PMO has asked the Finance Ministry and the Planning Commission to work out the size and structure of the dedicated fund in 30 days.”

…The significance of the Indian move should not be underestimated. Indian growth is currently matching that of China and with the two Asian potential megapowers with enormous populations taking ever increasing volumes of raw materials from the global supply, the pressure on resources can only increase dramatically.

According to the report, India is also beginning to try and use diplomatic pressures to help secure supplies with the External Affairs Ministry tasked with a strategy to help acquire them, particularly in Africa which is seen as key area of potential supply with resources frequently directly controlled by government.

more @ mineweb

3. Brazil finds more oil, shallow water, low hanging fruit

RIO DE JANEIRO – Brazilian state-controlled energy giant Petrobras said Thursday that it has found oil at a well located in shallow waters of the Campos Basin. The find was made in waters just 200 meters (655 feet) deep and is near massive deposits in deeper areas of Campos, which is located off the coast of Rio de Janeiro state and is the basin where 80 percent of Brazil’s oil is extracted. Petrobras said the 4-PM-53 well contains an estimated 25 million barrels of recoverable heavy oil and is just 6 kilometers (3.7 miles) from the Pampo field, which is currently being developed.

…Petrobras, Brazil’s largest corporation and one of the world’s fastest-growing oil companies, produces an average of 2.5 million barrels of oil and natural gas equivalent in Brazil and abroad. An integrated energy company and a global leader in deepwater oil exploration and production, Petrobras operates in 27 countries in the Americas, Africa, Asia and Europe. Shares of the company trade on the Sao Paulo, New York, Madrid and Buenos Aires stock exchanges, but the Brazilian government retains control through a golden share. EFE

more @ tribune

4. Cuba, Russia confirm “strategic” nature of their relationship

HAVANA – The Russian and Cuban foreign minister emphasized on Thursday the “enormous potential” and the “strategic” nature of relations between their two countries. Sergei Lavrov arrived in Cuba for a three-day visit and presided at a meeting with Bruno Rodriguez, after which they signed three accords.

…Lavrov said that the relationship had transformed itself into a “truly strategic association” and confirmed to the Cuban government Moscow’s “unchanging” stance against the economic embargo the United States has maintained against the communist-ruled island since 1962.

…Besides the foreign minister, the Russian delegation to the fair includes Culture Minister Alexandr Avdeev and more than 200 publishers, writers, artists, officials, translators and journalists. Lavrov’s trip to Havana continues the frequent visits made by top Russian government officials to Cuba in the last two years, including those by Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin, who has traveled to the island on at least five occasions. Russian President Dmitri Medvedev traveled to Cuba in 2008 and Cuba’s president, Gen. Raul Castro, returned the visit in 2009. EFE

more @ tribune

latin america news

Feb 11

Posted by A. Peasant in Big Pharma, Brazil, CIA, Central America, Children, Colombia, Corruption & Crime, Diplomats, Drug Trafficking, Haiti, Human Trafficking, Identities, Military, NWO, Oil, Psychopaths | No Comments

1. charity vaccine clinic chief bagged in trafficking Haitian children — not many degrees of separation between “legitimate” and “criminal”

Admin boss Yis Jean Guerson is responsible for providing medical aid to victims of the January 12 disaster with respected local aid group AST (Association de la Santé Pour Tous - “health for all”).

But, unknown to dedicated colleagues, Guerson secretly heads a child trafficking ring and exploits his position of trust scouring camps for a stock of orphaned, lost and homeless youngsters.

Shockingly Guerson, 31, is also a TEACHER at a local school responsible for guiding and protecting children from the age of three.

But last week - as he gave our undercover reporters a tour of the devastated captal Port-au-Prince with the stench of decaying bodies still hanging in the air - Guerson told us: “Just tell me how many kids you need and what ages you want, boys or girls, and I’ll get them for you no problem.

…

On Wednesday he lined up eight youngsters ranging from a three-month-old baby to a 13-year old girl for our reporters to choose from. Not once in all our dealings did Guerson ask WHO we were or WHERE the children would end up. In fact he was eager to boost the price to £5,000 EACH by offering his gang’s services in SMUGGLING the kids out of the country. Warning of the danger of trying to do it without his help, Guerson said: “The big problem is you need papers.

…

We were given Guerson’s name by a guard at a legitimate orphanage called Foundation Blessing Hands in the village of Cotart, 11 miles outside Port-au-Prince. The security man told us: “This place has strict rules for adoption, but there is a man locally who has children that you can take.

…

After being told we were interested in getting five children and taking them abroad, grasping Guerson quickly abandoned the £65-a-head price tag and demanded $40,000 (£26,000) all in.

When we said that was too much he immediately replied: “I can give you a discount, make it $30,000.” Balding Guerson explained that would include the cost of smuggling them across the border and paperwork appearing to show we had legitimately adopted the children.

...Guerson apologised that he had only managed to find three children to inspect because the rest were at a clinic being immunised. It was then he revealed his job with the AST charity which runs a vaccination programme for youngsters.

more @ news of the world

2. Spain, US want Latin America to assume ‘global role’

MADRID – Spain and the United States agreed Monday on the need for Latin America to assume a role of “global interlocutor” to participate in overcoming problems like the economic crisis and confronting challenges like climate change.

The Spanish secretary of state for Ibero-America, Juan Pablo de Laiglesia and Assistant U.S. Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs Arturo Valenzuela met in Madrid.

The two officials particularly discussed issues like the humanitarian situation in earthquake-stricken Haiti and the political crisis in Honduras, as well as cooperation between the United States and the European Union on Latin America.

more @ latin american herald tribune

3. four human heads found in Mexico

MEXICO CITY – The heads of four people were found in Mexico, but the bodies have not been recovered yet, state officials said.

Three of the heads were found in the northwestern state of Sinaloa and the fourth turned up in the southern state of Guerrero.

Three of the heads were discovered Tuesday at 7:00 a.m. in front of a restaurant and a school in Palmillas, a town in Sinaloa, a spokesman for the state Attorney General’s Office told Efe.

Initial indications are that the victims were three unidentified young men, the AG’s office spokesman said.

The killers only left behind the heads, shocking the town, a Palmillas police department spokesman told Efe.

…The head belonged to “a person of the masculine gender, with a dark complexion, whose hair was shaved off and his facial skin removed, and a piece of cardboard with a message was left,” the Guerrero Public Safety Secretariat said. The body has not yet been recovered and authorities have not released the contents of the message.

…Mexico has been plagued in recent years by drug-related violence blamed on powerful cartels that are battling for turf and control of the smuggling routes into the United States. Mexico’s most powerful drug trafficking organizations, according to experts, are the Sinaloa, Tijuana, Gulf, Juarez and Beltran Leyva cartels, and La Familia Michoacana. Los Zetas, a group of army special forces veterans and deserters who initially worked as hitmen for the Gulf cartel, may now be operating as a cartel, some experts say.

…
The state is currently the scene of a bloody turf war between Joaquin “El Chapo” (Shorty) Guzman and the Beltran Leyva cartel, whose leaders broke off from his Sinaloa cartel.

The Sinaloa organization, sometimes referred to by officials as the Pacific cartel, is the oldest drug cartel in Mexico and Guzman, considered extremely violent, is one of the most-wanted criminals in Mexico and the United States, where the Drug Enforcement Administration has offered a reward of $5 million for him. President Felipe Calderon, who took office in December 2006, has deployed 50,000 soldiers and 20,000 federal police nationwide to combat drug cartels and other criminal organizations. The anti-drug operation, however, has failed to put a dent in the violence due, according to experts, to drug cartels’ ability to buy off the police and even high-ranking officials. EFE

source: latin american herald tribune

Mumbai terrorists: unrecognizable faces

also see my post: unclaimed property for additional context

also see this long post by C. Story, which contains information allegedly given to Bob Chapman by a former, high-ranking member of the CIA, retired, which describes, among many other things, that peeling faces off of people is a calling card of certain intelligence operatives. scroll down to: THE CATASTROPHE, COURTESY OF THE CORRUPTION OF TENET, CHENEY AND BUSH

4. Colombian authorities nab 10 FARC rebels near Venezuelan border

BOGOTA – Colombian authorities captured 10 FARC guerrillas in several operations in Norte de Santander province, which borders on Venezuela, the Colombian government said Tuesday….All the people captured are accused of belonging to the financial and military network of the FARC and they will be turned over to the appropriate authorities to define their legal situation with an eye toward future prosecution or adjudication.

more @ latin american herald tribune

5. date unknown, maybe 2007: the mystery of Eugene Island 330 and self-renewing oil supplies

Look what i found on the Net about Self Renewing Oil Supplies Field. Quite an interesting articles and please share your thought.

Eugene Island is an oil field in the gulf of Mexico, 80 miles off the coast of Louisiana. It was discovered in 1973 and began producing 15,000 barrels of oil a day which then slowed to about 4,000 barrels in 1989.

But then for no logical reason whatsoever, production spiked back up to 13,000 barrels a day.

What the researchers found when they analyzed the oil field with time lapse 3-D seismic imaging is that there was an unexplained deep fault in the bottom corner of the computer scan, which showed oil gushing in from a previously unknown deep source and migrating up through the rock to replenish the existing supply.

Furthermore, the analysis of the oil now being produced at Eugene Island shows that its age is geologically different from the oil produced there after the refinery first opened. Suggesting strongly that it is now emerging from a different, unexplained source.

The last estimates of probable reserves shot up from 60 million barrels to 400 million barrels.

Both the scientists and geologists from the big oil companies have seen the evidence and admitted that the Eugene Island oil field is refilling itself.

Odd Reservoir Off Louisiana Prods Oil Experts to Seek a Deeper Meaning
By CHRISTOPHER COOPER
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

This completely contradicts peak oil theory and with technology improving at an accelerating pace it seems obvious that there are more Eugene Islands out there waiting to be discovered. So the scientific community needs to embrace these possibilities and lobby for funding into finding more of these deep source replenishing oilfields.

The existence of self-renewing oil fields shatters the peak oil myth. If oil is a naturally replenishing inorganic substance then how can it possibly run out?

source: offshoreman

depends who you know

Feb 10

Posted by A. Peasant in Africa, CIA, Corruption & Crime, Egypt, Media, Minerals, Nigeria, Oil, Terrorism, The West | No Comments

1. Sahara becomes desert of terrorism. CIA supported terrorism. also notice however, the illusion that France and the EU are presented as “opposite” to the US by the expert. the “good” West vs the “bad” West. haha! sorry the same people own all of The West.

Senegal’s president Abdoulaye Wade urged African leaders and the West to join forces in the fight against al-Qaeda’s North African branch, saying it has to be done to prevent the Sahara from becoming a “terrorism desert.” Abdoulaye Wade’s appeal came as African Union heads of state gathered to tackle the continent’s crises and conflicts at the bloc’s summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.Wade was supported by his colleagues from other African countries. They were united in their opinion that African counties could not fight al-Qaeda on their own. Wade said it was an “international issue.”

…Americans spent over 0.5 billion dollars for the anti-terrorism struggle. Yet, the situation has only worsened with the increased number of terrorist attacks.

The situation has particularly worsened in the past two years. These years were marked both with the increased frequency of attacks as well as their impudence, i.e., police station attacks and embassy shootings. The leaders of the Maghreb Muslims appeal for jihad against ruling governments of North African countries. All this attests to the fact that the officials cannot properly control the situation even in their own capitals.

Last year, media released alarming information stating that the Islamist group was developing biological weapons, and in particular, was experimenting with plague agents. The war on terror affects the well-being of local residents increasingly more each year. According to experts, the struggle with al-Qaeda caused rise in basic consumer goods prices in Algeria, including potatoes prices.

…In other words, the participants of the Pan African summit had good reasons to be alarmed. On the other hand, as mentioned above, so far the US military aid has not yielded positive results in the struggle against several hundred militants. Under the circumstances, the opinion of an Algerian expert Jamal Gessel shared with Pravda.ru was quite surprising.

He said that there was very reliable information suggesting that the Islamist group was supported by CIA. Analysts of the French and Algerian Special forces (e.g., DGSE, France) are convinced that this is done to destabilized the situation in North African countries rich in natural resources (both oil and uranium). The other goal is to force French and Spanish oil-extracting competitors out of the area. The expert believes this is precisely why the Islamist group’s attacks are aimed against the French and Spanish, and why the American presence in the region is not effective.

Additionally, the expert does not rule out the situation when the US declares the region its strategic zone, like it happened in the Persian Gulf, and instills its hegemony in the area. The conclusion is the following: the hopes of North African countries to receive aid from the West greatly depend on what they mean by “West”, the USA or EU.

more @ pravda

2. despite problems with al qaeda, not to worry! Algeria is connected: looking to cooperate with South Africa on nuclear technology. oh hey Algeria signed the NPT, so no problem. um, didn’t Iran sign that thing too? yes. but that’s different.

Algeria has shown a keen interest in South Africa’s pebble bed technology, South Africa’s Pebble Bed Modular Reactor (PBMR) company said on Monday.

CEO Jaco Kriek said in a statement that Algeria’s interest in PBMR technology “opens a real opportunity for two African countries to co-operate on nuclear.” The statement said a high-level delegation under the leadership of Mohamed Derdour, chairman of the Algerian Atomic Energy Commission (Comena), was in South Africa. “Algeria is, amongst others, exploring the possibility of building nuclear reactors the size of PBMR near inland villages to provide electricity and desalination,” Kriek said.

…According to Comena, Algeria was seriously pursuing nuclear technology as a means to diversify its energy sources and as a vehicle to reduce its dependency on a hydrocarbons economy….Derdour pointed out that Algeria, like South Africa, had signed the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty. “Algeria has atomic energy agreements with Argentina, China, France and the United States. “We also have two research reactors, which were built by Argentina and China respectively”. Kriek said South Africa had a long relationship with Algeria, including the signing in 2003 of a memorandum of understanding on co-operation in the field of nuclear and radiation sciences between Comena and South Africa’s department of science and technology.

more @ iafrica

3. Egypt recalls ambassador from Algeria for “consultations” after some sports fans get rowdy

CAIRO (AFP) – Egypt recalled its ambassador in Algeria for consultations on Thursday after attacks against Egyptian football fans in Sudan and businesses in Algiers, the foreign ministry said on Thursday. An Egyptian foreign ministry official confirmed to AFP that the ambassador was recalled for “consultations”. Earlier in the day, Egypt summoned the Algerian ambassador in Cairo to protest against the disturbances.

The foreign ministry said that it informed the ambassador of “Egypt’s extreme displeasure with the assaults on Egyptian citizens who went to Khartoum to support the Egyptian team.”

It was the second summons in a week for ambassador Abdel Qader Haggar, who was called to the foreign ministry last week after Algerian fans attacked Egyptian businesses and homes in Algiers.

more @ yahoo news

4. Nigeria finally transfers power to Goodluck Jonathan

NIGERIA’S parliament empowered vice- president Goodluck Jonathan to run Africa’s most populous nation in place of an ill and absent president. It is hoped the move will provide a political end to a crisis that has ground the government to a virtual halt and triggered the resumption of an insurgency in the vital oil sector. But the move is not contemplated in the constitution, legal experts say, and could cause more friction between the Christian south, which gains the presidency at least temporarily, and Muslim north, which finds itself out of the seat of power.

more @ scotsman

5. NEXT: we told you so

This newspaper took the bold step of publishing a daring story on January 10 that President Umaru Yar’Adua is brain damaged and will not return to office. Titled,”Yar’Adua is brain-damaged”, the story detailed how some people that surround Mr. Yar’Adua were preventing others including the vice president from having access to the president.

“President Umaru Yar’Adua is seriously brain damaged, is not able to recognise anyone… and can no longer perform the functions of the office of the president, according to multiple sources who have spoken to NEXT on Sunday,” the story declares.

While we double checked and confirmed our sources over and over, some newspapers went to town that our story was not true. Indeed there were stories that we spun a tale that cannot be substantiated. Amazingly, while these media houses buried their heads in the sand, NEXT stood up to be counted among the worthy elements of our society, and despite the furious denial even from some people in government, the story could not be counteracted.

Curiously, some folks in government were asking NEXT editors for what was going on with Mr. Yar’Adua showing the level of secrecy concerning his health.

Subsequently, a man claiming to be Mr. Yar’Adua granted an interview to the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) on January 13 on the eve of a planned protest by eminent Nigerians like Nobel Laureate, Wole Soyinka and Tunde Bakare, the pastor of Latter Rain Assembly under the aegis of Save Nigeria Group.

Thereafter, seeing that the game was up, others now shifted gear, and joined the train of those asking that the Constitution be upheld. We are happy we started this.

source: next

6. MEND rebels watching the ‘drama’ unfold..will they continue to warn the oil company personnel to get out of the way so they can “attack?” do they still need to attack? maybe not. we’ll have to wait and see what this Goodluck Jonathan fellow has in mind for divvying up Nigeria’s oil resources.

LAGOS, Feb 10 (Reuters) - The main militant group in Nigeria’s oil-producing Niger Delta said on Wednesday it was monitoring developments after Vice President Goodluck Jonathan assumed presidential powers, but declined to comment further.

“We are monitoring the unfolding drama and will react at the appropriate time,” the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) said in an email to Reuters. The group last month said it was ending a unilateral ceasefire and threatened renewed attacks on Africa’s biggest oil and gas industry amid delays to an amnesty programme caused partly by the absence of President Umaru Yar’Adua.

reuters

7. polluted water in Niger Delta — home of OIL COMPANIES — the cause of estimated 60% of deaths and 90% of disease in local communities. yes they can get oil out of a swamp but they can’t deliver clean water to poor people who insist on being IN THE WAY of their amazing oil production feats of engineering

Lack of access to safe water is a major source of poor health for millions of residents of Nigeria’s Niger Delta region, a NEXT investigation has shown. Majority of the citizens of the area affirm one of their most critical needs is safe drinking water.

Public health officials say water accounts for an estimated 80 per cent of all diseases and one-third of all deaths in the developing world. In the Niger Delta area, where the natural water sources have been polluted by oil production activities, they estimate that water could account for over 60 per cent of all deaths in the oil communities, and some 90 per cent of all diseases there.

Although the oil region is largely riverine, oil production activities appeared to have polluted the region’s natural water sources, making them increasingly unsafe for human consumption.

more @ next

8. Al Jazeera floats video of police killing unarmed civilians, from seven months ago. picked up widely. kind of confusing — if you don’t pay close attention you might think this is happening now.

google results show major coverage

Aster Van Kregten, a Nigeria expert with rights group Amnesty International, told Al Jazeera that the group’s research suggested extra-judicial killings were widespread in Nigeria.

“Our research shows that the Nigerian police are getting away with murder, they killed hundreds of people a year without any investigation - any investigation on whether the use of force was lawful or not,” she said. “What we saw on the footage happened seven month ago and we haven’t heard anything from the government whether they have arrested anyone and how far the investigation is going.”

Among those killed in the aftermath of the clashes between Boko Haram and the police, was Boko Haram leader Mohammed Yusuf.

more @ al jazeera

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

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/

continuing chaos in West Africa

Feb 1

Posted by A. Peasant in Africa, Corruption & Crime, Guinea, Nigeria, Oil, Terrorism | No Comments

1. North Africa al qaeda offers to help Nigerian Muslims fight the Nigerian Christians in Jos

An al Qaeda group in North Africa has offered to give Nigerian Muslims training and weapons to fight Christians in the West African country, where more than 460 people were killed in sectarian clashes last month.

Vice President Goodluck Jonathan sent in the military to halt the violence after four days of clashes between Christian and Muslim mobs armed with guns, knives and machetes in the area round the city of Jos in central Nigeria. “We are ready to train your people in weapons, and give you whatever support we can in men, arms and munitions to enable you to defend our people in Nigeria,” the statement by al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) said.

more @ next

2. Niger Delta: MEND claims it is “not directly” responsible for the sabotage of Royal Dutch Shell oil pipeline

The sabotage on Saturday came hours after the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) ended a three-month old cease-fire and threatened to unleash “an all-out assault” on Africa’s biggest oil and gas industry. While MEND said the attack was the work of a militant group it backed, one security source, who declined to be identified, said the sabotage on Shell’s pipeline, in Bayelsa state in the Niger Delta, might have been carried out by oil thieves trying to tap into it. “MEND was not directly responsible,” the group said in an email to Reuters. “It was certainly a response to our order to resume hostilities by one of the various freelance groups we endorse.”

more @ yahoo news

3. Nigerian senate totally in the weeds over Yar’Adua’s absence, debating the wording of the Nigerian constitution and how to resolve the crisis

4. expressions of outrage in Sierra Leone — EU, AU called out for supporting corrupt former president

It has come to the attention of this press, that civil servants appointed to key positions of authority and influence by the previous SLPP government in Sierra Leone, are alleged to have gone on the rampage to sabotage, destroy and ruin the economic framework that the President and government of Sierra Leone are instituting to return the country to a sound economic footing. If the allegations are true, then this is an economic crime against humanity. It is reported that these civil servants may have been directed by the opposition party’s machinery to unleash an agenda of sabotage to bring the economy of the country to a halt by failing to institute fiscal policies that will stimulate growth in the economy. And by diverting necessary funds meant for infrastructural development to their pocket, these civil servants are ill-bent on causing chaos and tarnish the important work the present government led by Dr Ernest Bai Koroma is doing to salvage the opposition-battered economy presided over by former President Ahmed Tejan-Kabbah.

…Some of Sierra Leone’s finest military officers were executed in cold blood by President Ahmed Tejan-Kabbah in the previous SLPP government. Their only crime? They did not accompany him to Guinea when soldiers overthrew his government in a coup d’état. On returning from Guinea after ECOMOG helped restore his government, Tejan-Kabbah ordered the arrest and detention of all whom he thought were not loyal to him and without a single evidence of complicity in the coup, he ordered the execution and continued detention of some of the most gallant men and women of the country’s military. In fact for him to be restored back into power, he ordered ECOMOG fighter jets to bomb Freetown, the capital, at random, without any regard for human life, in his quest to get the rid of rebels in the city and regain power. Thousands of innocent civilians were killed and homes destroyed. This is indeed a crime against humanity. And for this reason alone, I detest any attempt by international organisations like the U.N. or A.U. to employ the services of this brutal dictator in any mediation efforts across the continent. Tejan Kabbah is not worthy of holding any public office anywhere in the world. Even prior to his election victory there were reports of him being convicted of corruption when he worked as a civil servant in the Siaka Stevens administration.

more @ newstime africa

5. threat of another military intervention in Guinea as top junta official is arrested

Dadis Camara’s closest confidante in Guinea’s military junta, Colonel Moussa Keita, has been arrested and taken into custody. There is clear indication from reports coming out of Guinea, that officers loyal to exiled Junta leader Dadis Camara, are determined to sabotage the peace agreement signed in Burkina Faso as long as their leader is kept in isolation….The acceptance of Guinea’s Interim Leader Sekouba Konate, to sign up to the Ouagadougou agreement had raised suspicion of a sell-out in Dadis Camara’s mind as reports late last year from Morocco, indicated that Western Diplomats made a lucrative offer to Konate to sign up to a plan hatched by the U.S. to remove Dadis Camara from Guinea’s political life.

more @ newstime africa

while you were out

Jan 30

Posted by A. Peasant in Africa, Angola, Clinton, Corruption & Crime, France, Identities, Minerals, Money Laundering, Nigeria, Oil, Oligarchs, Terrorism | No Comments

Joint Statement on Nigeria by the US and the EU, January 30, 2010

We express our deep regret at the recent violence and tragic loss of lives in Jos, and extend our sympathies to the bereaved and injured.

We urge all parties to exercise restraint and seek peaceful means to resolve differences between religious and ethnic groups in Nigeria.

We call on the federal government to ensure that the perpetrators of acts of violence are brought to justice and to support interethnic and interfaith dialogue.
Nigeria is one of the most important countries in sub-Saharan Africa, a member of the UN Security Council, a global oil producer, a leader in ECOWAS, a major peacekeeping contributing country, and a stabilizing force in West Africa. Nigeria’s stability and democracy carry great significance beyond its immediate borders.We therefore extend our support to the people of Nigeria during the current period of uncertainty, caused by President Yar’Adua’s illness. We extend our best wishes to the president and his family, and join the Nigerian people in wishing him a full recovery.
Nigeria has expressed its resolve to adhere to constitutional processes during this difficult time. We commend that determination to address the current situation through appropriate democratic institutions. Nigeria’s continued commitment and adherence to its democratic norms and values are key to addressing the many challenges it faces, including electoral reform, post-amnesty programs in the Niger Delta, economic development, inter-faith discord and transparency. The gubernatorial elections in Anambra on 6 February will be a milestone in the journey towards electoral reform and a signal of Nigeria’s commitment to the principles of democracy.
We are committed to continue working with Nigeria on the internal issues it faces while working together as partners on the global stage.

Signed: US Secretary of State, Hillary Rodham Clinton; British Foreign Secretary, David Miliband; French Foreign Minister, Bernard Kouchner; EU High Representative Catherine Ashton, London, United Kingdom

Translation: You are going down. Make it look believable. Kiss kiss hug hug, your friends at the NWO. Our motto: One big happy family!

^^^^^^^

First let’s review what our esteemed leaders cite as the CAUSE of Nigeria’s problems: Yar’Adua’s illness.

As reported in The Guardian on January 8, 2010, Nigeria’s president has literally been missing for 45 days (now 68 days). Allegedly he went to Saudi Arabia for treatment of a health problem, without telling anyone, and he hasn’t been heard from since. Just up and left, he did. His absence has paralyzed the Nigerian government at a time of severe crisis. A constitutional crisis at the worst possible time, dragging on interminably. Nobody seems to have any power to unstick the problem.

How convenient is that? I suggest that it is exceedingly convenient for some people — who you might guess would be the sorts of people who like chaos and instability — while being impossibly inconvenient for Nigerians.

After all, Nigeria is a critically important country in West Africa, and West Africa is a critically important component in various contrived narratives driving our world to the brink of destruction. One need only look at the joint US and UN statement to realize that if Nigeria falls apart politically, it becomes a blow-up doll for the NWO mind-fuckers. That is why Hillary and friends very properly encourage the Nigerians to cross every democratic t and dot every democratic i, and color within the lines at all times please (rule of law rule of law), while they hope and pray for Yar’Adua’s “full recovery.” Surely they have also heard that:

President Umaru Yar’Adua is seriously brain damaged, is not able to recognise anyone, including his wife Turai, and can no longer perform the functions of the office of the president, according to multiple sources who have spoken to NEXT on Sunday.

That was two weeks ago. For all we know he may not even be alive.

But nobody wants to talk about that. They might loosen the log-jam. And the log-jam happens to be useful because it breeds chaos.

^^^^^^^

Yesterday in Nigeria, a militant group called MEND called off a truce with the paralyzed Nigerian government. I guess that was to be expected, given the log-jam.

The main militant group in the oil-rich Niger Delta called off its cease-fire with the government Saturday morning, dealing a potential death blow to a presidential amnesty program aimed at ending violence that has crippled production in the West African nation.

The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta issued a statement saying it would no longer abide by the unconditional Oct. 25 cease-fire President Umaru Yar’Adua had negotiated with the group. The militants warned oil producers with pipelines and personnel working in the creeks and swamps of the Delta that it would wage an “an all-out onslaught” against them.

The MEND “warns all oil companies to halt operations as any operational installation attacked will be burnt to the ground,” the statement read. “Oil companies are responsible for the safety and welfare of their workers and will bear the guilt should any harm come upon their staff in the event of an attack.”

The group added: “Nothing will be spared.”

Militants in the Niger Delta have attacked pipelines, kidnapped petroleum company employees and fought government troops since January 2006. They demand that the federal government send more oil-industry funds to Nigeria’s southern region, which remains poor despite five decades of oil production.

In response, Shell has decided to sell off some assets in the Niger Delta. Chevron announced that 20,000 barrels of oil per day had been shut i n due to sabotage threats.

According to Reuters:

The rebel group [MEND] was severely weakened after its senior leaders and thousands of others accepted clemency and disarmed under a presidential amnesty which ended last October. It is unclear who is now running the group.

Candidates include:

Ateke Tom: A former gang leader in Rivers State in the eastern Niger Delta for around a decade, Ateke Tom set up the Niger Delta Vigilante (NDV), one of several groups to enjoy strong backing from politicians who used them to help rig elections….Security sources say he was also heavily involved in oil bunkering, a lucrative trade in industrial quantities of stolen crude smuggled onto the international market.

Farah Dagogo: Also based in Rivers state, Dagogo started out as a top commander loyal to former militant leader Mujahid Dokubo-Asari, whose Niger Delta People’s Volunteer Force turned over thousands of weapons in return for amnesty in 2004.

Government Tompolo: He was responsible in particular for attacks on Chevron and thought to be a major oil bunkerer. Security forces used helicopters and gunboats to attack his camps around Warri, capital of Delta state, last May.

Well, it was awfully good of those chaps to give such clear and menacing warnings so that the oil company people can get out of the way. Let’s give credit where credit is due. I mean, *some* terrorists would just go right in there and start firing away, bombing wedding parties and marketplaces, and killing a bunch of innocent people. You know what I’m saying?

All the same, Something Must Be Done.

^^^^^^^

Actually, there was a peculiar incident last week in the Niger Delta. (map from wikipedia, click to enlarge)

A helicopter flying from Bonny to Port Harcourt crashed on Tuesday afternoon at Isiokpo, near Port Harcourt, the Rivers State capital, killing all four persons aboard….The zonal coordinator of the Nigerian Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), Emenike Umesi, said the four occupants comprised two pilots and two engineers, said to be of Lieutenant Commander Rank.

The NEMA chief, in charge of the south-south zone, said the aircraft took off from Bonny, which is home to the Liquefied Natural Gas plant….Security agents at the accident scene however said naval personnel recovered “some vital documents” at the scene.

Vital documents?

Addressing journalists on the incident, Naval spokesperson, Commodore David Nabaida, said the names and identities of four dead naval officers were the Pilot of the Helicopter, Lt Commodore Ahmed Tijani Yusuf with official number NNL/2071; Co-Pilot, Lt Commodore Ahmadu Yahaya; Lt Commodore Mailafia Ibrahim, who is the Base Intelligence Officer, Delta and Seaman Illiya Uyuhili, the aircraft’s technician.

…He said the aircraft was on a routine patrol, to investigate a case of illegal bunkering around Akasa and had left from its Warri base and after carrying out its surveillance, was to go to Port Harcourt Airport to refuel before returning to its base but crashed a few kilometers to the airport.

Asked whether there was any connection of the crash with the remnant of militants still operating in the creeks, Nabaida said: “Absolutely not; as I told you, we were at the site of the aircraft accident, the President’s amnesty programme has been working, beside, there is nothing that shows that the crash is connected with anything militancy”.

Riiight. So even though two of the three possible suspected candidates who might be running MEND have been involved in oil bunkering in the past, there’s absolutely no reason to suspect that a naval helicopter investigating oil bunkering would be shot down by said militants, a couple of days before they called off their truce no less.

^^^^^^^

In February 2007, National Geographic published a piece about the Niger Delta.

Nigeria had all the makings of an uplifting tale: poor African nation blessed with enormous sudden wealth. Visions of prosperity rose with the same force as the oil that first gushed from the Niger Delta’s marshy ground in 1956….
Everything looked possible—but everything went wrong.

Dense, garbage-heaped slums stretch for miles. Choking black smoke from an open-air slaughterhouse rolls over housetops. Streets are cratered with potholes and ruts. Vicious gangs roam school grounds. Peddlers and beggars rush up to vehicles stalled in gas lines. This is Port Harcourt, Nigeria’s oil hub, capital of Rivers state, smack-dab in the middle of oil reserves bigger than the United States’ and Mexico’s combined. Port Harcourt should gleam; instead, it rots.

Beyond the city, within the labyrinth of creeks, rivers, and pipeline channels that vein the delta—one of the world’s largest wetlands—exists a netherworld. Villages and towns cling to the banks, little more than heaps of mud-walled huts and rusty shacks. Groups of hungry, half-naked children and sullen, idle adults wander dirt paths. There is no electricity, no clean water, no medicine, no schools. Fishing nets hang dry; dugout canoes sit unused on muddy banks. Decades of oil spills, acid rain from gas flares, and the stripping away of mangroves for pipelines have killed off fish.

Nigeria has been subverted by the very thing that gave it promise—oil, which accounts for 95 percent of the country’s export earnings and 80 percent of its revenue.

…The sense of relentless crisis has deepened since last year, when a secretive group of armed, hooded rebels operating under the name of the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, or MEND, intensified attacks on oil platforms and pumping stations, most operated by Shell Nigeria.

…With each disruption, the daily price of oil on the world market climbed. According to the Brussels-based International Crisis Group, escalating violence in a region teeming with angry, frustrated people is creating a “militant time bomb.”
…Isaac Asume Osuoka, director of Social Action, Nigeria, believes that callousness toward the people of the delta stems from their economic irrelevance. “With all the oil money coming in, the state doesn’t need taxes from people. Rather than being a resource for the state, the people are impediments. There is no incentive anymore for the government to build schools or hospitals.”I can say this,” Osuoka said firmly. “Nigeria was a much better place without oil.”

Well, that’s just it. The poor people happen to be in the way, from the perspective of the very important people who would like to go about extracting Nigeria’s natural resources in peace and quiet, thank you very much.

No one can deny the sheer technological achievement of building an infrastructure to extract oil from a waterlogged equatorial forest. Intense swampy heat, nearly impenetrable mangrove thickets, swarming insects, and torrential downpours bedevil operations to this day. But mastering the physical environment has proved almost simple compared with dealing with the social and cultural landscape. The oil firms entered a region splintered by ethnic rivalries.

Ahh, yes, the impossible to please poor people and their interminable “ethnic rivalries.” That’s always a good justification. That way when the oil companies go in there to take over the natural resources and make life next to impossible for people who lived off the land, without providing any consolation prizes like electricity or clean water or schools or medicine, those damn poor people are bound to get all uppity and start causing trouble. Happens every time.

Who could have predicted??

“After 50 years, the oil companies are still searching for a way to operate successfully with communities,” says Antony Goldman, a London-based risk consultant. The delta is littered with failed projects started by oil companies and government agencies—water tanks without operating pumps, clinics with no medicine, schools with no teachers or books, fishponds with no fish. “The companies didn’t consult with villagers,” says Michael Watts, director of the African Studies Program at the University of California, Berkeley. “They basically handed out cash to chiefs. It wasn’t effective at all.”

A fifty fucking years learning curve? How about they know exactly what they’re doing. How about they do this on purpose. It’s a critical part of the business model to make the land inhospitable so that the people die or leave. The People Are In The Way. OK? That’s what’s going on. And everybody involved knows it. That’s why Hillary Clinton had to complain about all the corruption in Nigeria just this last week. It’s UNBELIEVABLE she says, making sure to mention patsy underpants. Yes, those corrupt Africans. Where do they get off?

^^^^^^^

Well, it’s like this. Those corrupt African leaders hook up with corrupt leaders from The West. One big happy family. Even Lev Leviev.

1. Former Nigerian leader Olusegun Obasanjo came under fire for selecting Yar’Adua, knowing him to be sickly. He vehemently denied this. Perish the thought.

2. But, last May US investigators asserted that Obasanjo and others took millions of dollars in bribes from American and European contractors, including Halliburton, to allow the companies to build a liquid natural gas plant in Bonny. This scandal goes back years and ensnares various countries and Important People of The West.

3. Another of the accused in that very scandal, Sani Abacha, has been fighting Swiss authorities for ten years over an estimated three billion dollars misappropriated from Nigeria and stashed in Swiss bank accounts. The money laundering case has dragged on for so long with the help of people in London and elsewhere (see time line here). The Swiss authorities ordered $350 million to be returned to Nigeria last week. An unnamed person in Monaco has been charged.

4. France would like to invest in Imo state (look at the map), to help Nigeria branch out from their dependence on oil and gas. More like a twig than a branch…

5. Nigeria and Angola vie for top petroleum producer spot, and Angola has been able to pull ahead in 2009 due to the violence in Nigeria. Lucky break for the Angola investors.

6. Angola hydrocarbon sector investors: Lev Leviev, China, India…

7. To insure that all these deals will go along smoothly, Angola’s parliament prepares to expand the powers of the president, making him head of state, head of government, and head of the armed forces. The new constitution eliminates the position of prime minister and adds a vice president. VPs are always very useful. And the president may serve two five year terms. All of which contrasts markedly from the situation in Nigeria.

So it looks like Nigeria will be violently dismantled and reassembled somewhere down the road, after the “militants” take over the place and wreck havoc, and tie into some drug smuggling or terrorist operations against The People of The West, justifying some military intervention or something.

And Angola will go on to a brighter future, perhaps marred by the occasional terrorist incident but otherwise firmly in the grip of a sponsored dictatorship.

That’s how it goes in the big happy family.

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