CounterCurrents: A Major Leak In India’s Nuclear Plant On Fukushima’s 5th Anniversary, American Exceptionalism Presents An Election Made In Hell

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A Major Leak In India’s Nuclear Plant On Fukushima’s 5th Anniversary
By Kumar Sundaram

http://www.countercurrents.org/sundaram120316.htm

The Unit-1 of the the Kakrapar nuclear power plant in India’s Gujarat state underwent an accident 11th March, morning at 9.00 am. The operator of the nuclear plant, the govt-owned Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited (NPCIL), has declared an on-site emergency even as it has said there is no release or radioactivity in the accident. The NPCIL has said the leak happened in the Primary Heat Transport System. The NDTV news report has called it a major heavy water leak


Why I Bought Four Syrian Children Off A Beirut Street 
By Franklin Lamb

http://www.countercurrents.org/lamb120316.htm

This observer confesses to having purchased four children near Ramlet el Baida beach recently from a stressed –out Syrian woman. I am not sure if she was as she appeared to be or was from one of human trafficking gangs which operate widely these days in Lebanon as they market Syrian children or vulnerable adult women. The vendor woman claimed to have been the four children’s neighbor in Aleppo and that the they (two five year old twin girls, a boy about one year and a few months and his bigger brother eight years old-shown in the photo below on this observer’s motorbike a few days after he bought them) lost their parents in the war

Why I Bought Four Syrian Children Off A Beirut Street

By Franklin Lamb

12 February, 2016
Countercurrents.org

Beirut: This observer confesses to having purchased four children near Ramlet el Baida beach recently from a stressed –out Syrian woman. I am not sure if she was as she appeared to be or was from one of human trafficking gangs which operate widely these days in Lebanon as they market Syrian children or vulnerable adult women. The vendor woman claimed to have been the four children’s neighbor in Aleppo and that the they (two five year old twin girls, a boy about one year and a few months and his bigger brother eight years old-shown in the photo below on this observer’s motorbike a few days after he bought them) lost their parents in the war.

She and they ended up in Lebanon but she explained to me that she was afraid to register with the UNHCR because she is an illegal and has no ID. The woman told me that she could no longer take care of the shivering children, did not want to just leave them on the street and would give them all to me for $ 1000 or I could pick and choose from the sibling for $ 250 each.

Completely shocked, I started to get on my motorbike and said disgustingly “khalas!” and looked around for a police car. I looked backed over my shoulder and saw that the children were very frightened, soaked from the rain, very cold and appeared hungry. Without thinking, I instantly offered the seller $ 600 for all four brothers and sisters and she took it, saying she was going to Turkey and would try to get to Lebos Island, off Greece.

The lady gave me ten minutes to go to an ATM and get the $ 600 cash. She demanded dollars not Lebanese currency. The children seemed to understand what was happening and their eyes fixated on me.

What was racing through my mind as I mounted my motorbike and searched for an ATM were the expressions on the faces of these angels as their ‘caregiver’ bargained their fate.

Also I was acutely mindful of statistics that are well known around here these days. That nearly 14 million in Syria are in need of urgent humanitarian assistance. More than half are children who are at risk of becoming ill from malnourishment or, abused and exploited. Most of us here know of many horror stories from all over Syria and the villages just an hour’s drive from the Lebanon border, such as Madaya and Zabadani where children under vicious siege were forced to survive on animal feed and soup made of whatever weeds could be found. We read the media reports that more than 20 died of starvation in during 2015 and a dozen reported cases of babies dying because their mothers were too ill and weak to produce milk for them or if there was a local clinic it lacked, baby formula or ran out of infant IV’s. In Moadamiyeh, just a few miles from the capital Damascus, three newborn babies died last month after medical staff ran out of IV bags

I thought about the scale of exploitation faced by Syrian refugee children in Lebanon, of the tens of thousands sleeping rough these frigid nights and the countless thousands who every day are easy prey for abuse. I thought about the fact that Refugee relief efforts in Lebanon are chronically underfunded and that even UN high commissioner for refugees (UNHCR) has been forced to cut aid from all but the neediest of refugees due to insufficient funds.

I thought of that recent Save the Children report of their survey showing that more than a third of the 126 residents they interviewed reported that their children often go without a single meal a day and a quarter have seen children in their towns dying because of lack of food.

I thought about the intense vicious anti-refugee harangues from Lebanese politicians that Syrian refugees pose a threat to the country's security and economic stability even though the menial jobs they do find are not likely to replace many in any Lebanese job holders. Many fear mongering Lebanese politicians even make The Donald appear somehow compassionate.

I thought about the Syrian children I see daily begging as they wander Beirut’s streets selling chewing gum, flowers, or shining shoes. And I thought about the 11 and 12 year old girls, some of whom I have come to be acquainted with from my visits to the beach where I like to go to take a break and stare into the Mediterranean and just think about life and talk to those anti-social fiddler crabs who pop up from their homes along the beach, grab something and disappear quick.

These beautiful innocent children skip along or pace the Ramlet el Baida corniche waiting for cars with blackened windows to pull up. And they do regularly. Then the pedophiles molest the children for a few dollars before pulling off and disappearing into the traffic. Sometimes keeping the children with them. This observer has given the local police photos of some of their license plates but one supervisor at the Hamra police station regretted that the cops are too overwhelmed with other matters to get very involved in these cases. More than once I was given a shoulder shrug and upturned palms in reference to the case of a young girl “Leila” that I have reported more than once. One female police officer told me: “Well, at least she is earning some money for her family.”

This observer recently wrote some friends about the same “Leila” a twelve year old sweetheart who worked the Ramlet el Baida beach strip. Her friends on the strip have since reported to me that “Leila” never returned from “work” last week and they have no idea what has become of her.

Approximately one half of the Syrian women with children who have been forced to flee to Lebanon have lost their husbands and often their adult sons to the war. Most not having held jobs outside the home before are now forced, besides their role of working mother, into the additional roles of father, big sister, big brother, and best friend for her children. Manar, a Palestinian social worker in Shatila camp reports that “the mothers have become their children’s everything.”

Many Syria women who are able to find work are subjected to regular sexual harassment by employers and fellow male workers and sometimes deny to employers that there is no male in their household who would offer protection if she reported sexual abuse. Some less strong Syrian refugee women simply prostitute themselves for money and aid. It is estimated by a social worker at Shatila camp that women can earn on average $ 36 per day as a sex worker as compared to $8-10 for a 12-14 hour manual labor work day.

A social worker with ABAAD, a Lebanese NGO that challenges men to stop violence against women, reports that many widowed Syrian women encourage their children to perform child labor or marry (sell) their teenage daughters off to collect their muqaddam, (dowry) that the groom is supposed, but often fails, to provide to the bride's parents.

Without legal status under Lebanese law, or without any legal papers due to Kafkaesque nearly impossible visa renewal requirements, many women describe to the few NGO’s here who may want to help them, repeated assaults against them that they have not reported to the authorities. They do not report them due to lack of confidence that the police authorities would take action and the Syrian women fear reprisals by the abusers or arrest for not having a valid residency permit.

Meanwhile, while desperate Syrian refugees are being denied visas, this observer, a no-account American who has ample reason to daily hang his head in shame over his country’s dozen years wars in this region and the deaths of more than a million people his government has contributed to, and its deeply immoral policy toward Palestine, has no such problem. He is able to show up at the local police station (General Security) near Burj al Barajneh Palestinan camp, (which also houses hundreds of Syrian refugees these days) as he did this week, apply for and receive, because he is American and not a Syrian, another three-year resident visa. And by paying a $65 bribe he can get it the same day, rather than wait weeks or months. There is something very wrong with this picture.

I took the children to my flat and my friend from Addis Ababa, a lovely domestic worker, herself exploited, agreed stay at home and help care for them until we could get them some help, a proper home and the older boy “Khaled” in school. Over the next few hours and the next day I made several calls to get help for the children but other than promises to return calls and ‘try to find some organization to help” nothing came of my efforts for nearly one week. Most of the calls were never returned.

The children were well taken care of by my friend and me and they were soon cooking and eating American cuisine including baking fudge brownies, chocolate chip cookies, enjoying my country style home made Macaroni & Cheese, homemade banana pancakes with (fake) Aunt Jemima maple syrup from the local supermarket, and my chicken vegetable soup not to mention some very delicious Ethiopian food which they helped my friend make. They also became expert at playing ‘hide & seek” and met some Syrian kids from the neighborhood. The effect of meeting fellow Syrians and hearing their accents brought the darlings sheer joy and they soon were chatting and playing like chipmunks.

This observer often receives emails asking his opinion of events in this region, posing various questions or even asking his 2-cents worth of advice about academic subjects a student somewhere might be engaged in or is contemplating.

To date I have never has he been asked about buying Syrian refugee children in Lebanon.

If and when this observer is asked, and if the facts were similar to those I happened across recently near Ramlet el Baida beach in Beirut, with the priceless four sibling beauties, for whom I am now deeply honored to be their ‘American uncle’, without doubt or fear of possible legal ramifications for encouraging what some may consider a felony of sorts, I would strongly urge good Samaritans to take the following steps.

To investigate as best they can on the scene and depending on how dire the situation appears to be, to immediately price bargain and ‘buy’ the children from the trafficker. I would counsel the Samaritan to discretely photograph the seller with their smart phone. In my case having only a $10 used old Nokia ‘dumb phone’ which does for me all that I need done-its dials and answers calls -I gave the police only a physical description of the woman as I keep an eye out for her along the beach or when I am in Hamra.

All of us must do what we can to get these children from Syria a safe environment, a chance to play and to be children. Dear reader, if you happen to be in this area and come upon by chance a need such as I did, please make these angels feel protected and safe, make them warm, get them clean clothes, feed them, get them a medical examinations, contact authorities or NGO’s buy them a doll to love. Knowing you may not get immediately assistance, inquire about schooling,

And most importantly find them a mother dear reader. And hopefully before long they will be in a loving home until the hell next door ends and, as their country’s future, they can return home and rebuild it.

Franklin Lamb’s recent book, Syria’s Endangered Heritage, an International Responsibility to Preserve and Protect is available on Amazon and other ebook outlets as well as at www.syrian-heritage.com. Lamb is reachable c/o fplamb@gmail.com.

Dealing With The European Refugee Crisis 
By Iqbal Alimohamed

http://www.countercurrents.org/ia120316.htm

In an unjust world, wars will happen and there will always be the unfortunate victims. If legal channels are not available to asylum seekers to secure passage to third countries, and their resentment grows, they risk exploitation by traffickers and, worse still, by criminal gangs and terrorists, such as ISIS. Our overarching sense of humanity should impel us, our civil societies and our leaders to give succour to these victims by protecting them and giving them hope, even as the international community pursues parallel efforts for the attainment of durable peace in the conflict zones


American Exceptionalism Presents An Election Made In Hell 
By William Blum

http://www.countercurrents.org/blum120316.htm

If the American presidential election winds up with Hillary Clinton vs. Donald Trump, and my passport is confiscated, and I’m somehow FORCED to choose one or the other, or I’m PAID to do so, paid well … I would vote for Trump

American Exceptionalism Presents An Election Made In Hell

By William Blum

12 March, 2016
Countercurrents.org

If the American presidential election winds up with Hillary Clinton vs. Donald Trump, and my passport is confiscated, and I’m somehow FORCED to choose one or the other, or I’m PAID to do so, paid well … I would vote for Trump.

My main concern is foreign policy. American foreign policy is the greatest threat to world peace, prosperity, and the environment. And when it comes to foreign policy, Hillary Clinton is an unholy disaster. From Iraq and Syria to Libya and Honduras the world is a much worse place because of her; so much so that I’d call her a war criminal who should be prosecuted. And not much better can be expected on domestic issues from this woman who was paid $675,000 by Goldman Sachs – one of the most reactionary, anti-social corporations in this sad world – for four speeches and even more than that in political donations in recent years. Add to that Hillary’s willingness to serve for six years on the board of Walmart while her husband was governor of Arkansas. Can we expect to change corporate behavior by taking their money?

The Los Angeles Times ran an editorial the day after the multiple primary elections of March 1 which began: “Donald Trump is not fit to be president of the United States,” and then declared: “The reality is that Trump has no experience whatsoever in government.”

When I need to have my car fixed I look for a mechanic with experience with my type of auto. When I have a medical problem I prefer a doctor who specializes in the part of my body that’s ill. But when it comes to politicians, experience means nothing. The only thing that counts is the person’s ideology. Who would you sooner vote for, a person with 30 years in Congress who doesn’t share your political and social views at all, is even hostile to them, or someone who has never held public office before but is an ideological comrade on every important issue? Clinton’s 12 years in high government positions carries no weight with me.

The Times continued about Trump: “He has shamefully little knowledge of the issues facing the country and the world.”

Again, knowledge is trumped (no pun intended) by ideology. As Secretary of State (January 2009-February 2013), with great access to knowledge, Clinton played a key role in the 2011 destruction of Libya’s modern and secular welfare state, sending it crashing in utter chaos into a failed state, leading to the widespread dispersal throughout North African and Middle East hotspots of the gigantic arsenal of weaponry that Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi had accumulated. Libya is now a haven for terrorists, from al Qaeda to ISIS, whereas Gaddafi had been a leading foe of terrorists.

What good did Secretary of State Clinton’s knowledge do? It was enough for her to know that Gaddafi’s Libya, for several reasons, would never be a properly obedient client state of Washington. Thus it was that the United States, along with NATO, bombed the people of Libya almost daily for more than six months, giving as an excuse that Gaddafi was about to invade Benghazi, the Libyan center of his opponents, and so the United States was thus saving the people of that city from a massacre. The American people and the American media of course swallowed this story, though no convincing evidence of the alleged impending massacre has ever been presented. (The nearest thing to an official US government account of the matter – a Congressional Research Service report on events in Libya for the period – makes no mention at all of the threatened massacre.) (1)

The Western intervention in Libya was one that the New York Times said Clinton had “championed”, convincing Obama in “what was arguably her moment of greatest influence as secretary of state.” (2) All the knowledge she was privy to did not keep her from this disastrous mistake in Libya. And the same can be said about her support of placing regime change in Syria ahead of supporting the Syrian government in its struggle against ISIS and other terrorist groups. Even more disastrous was the 2003 US invasion of Iraq which she as a senator supported. Both policies were of course clear violations of international law and the UN Charter.

Another foreign-policy “success” of Mrs. Clinton, which her swooning followers will ignore, the few that even know about it, is the coup ousting the moderately progressive Manuel Zelaya of Honduras in June, 2009. A tale told many times in Latin America. The downtrodden masses finally put into power a leader committed to reversing the status quo, determined to try to put an end to up to two centuries of oppression … and before long the military overthrows the democratically-elected government, while the United States – if not the mastermind behind the coup – does nothing to prevent it punish the coup regime, as only the United States can punish; meanwhile Washington officials pretend to be very upset over this “affront to democracy”. (See Mark Weisbrot’s “Top Ten Ways You Can Tell Which Side The United States Government is On With Regard to the Military Coup in Honduras”.) (3)

In her 2014 memoir, “Hard Choices”, Clinton reveals just how unconcerned she was about restoring Zelaya to his rightful office: “In the subsequent days [after the coup] I spoke with my counterparts around the hemisphere … We strategized on a plan to restore order in Honduras and ensure that free and fair elections could be held quickly and legitimately, which would render the question of Zelaya moot.”

The question of Zelaya was anything but moot. Latin American leaders, the United Nations General Assembly, and other international bodies vehemently demanded his immediate return to office. Washington, however, quickly resumed normal diplomatic relations with the new right-wing police state, and Honduras has since become a major impetus for the child migrants currently pouring into the United States.

The headline from Time magazine’s report on Honduras at the close of that year (December 3, 2009) summed it up as follows: “Obama’s Latin America Policy Looks Like Bush’s”.

And Hillary Clinton looks like a conservative. And has for many years; going back to at least the 1980s, while the wife of the Arkansas governor, when she strongly supported the death-squad torturers known as the Contras, who were the empire’s proxy army in Nicaragua. (4)

Then, during the 2007 presidential primary, America’s venerable conservative magazine, William Buckley’s National Review, ran an editorial by Bruce Bartlett. Bartlett was a policy adviser to President Ronald Reagan, a treasury official under President George H.W. Bush, and a fellow at two of the leading conservative think-tanks, the Heritage Foundation and the Cato Institute – You get the picture? Bartlett tells his readers that it’s almost certain that the Democrats will win the White House in 2008. So what to do? Support the most conservative Democrat. He writes: “To right-wingers willing to look beneath what probably sounds to them like the same identical views of the Democratic candidates, it is pretty clear that Hillary Clinton is the most conservative.” (5)

During the same primary we also heard from America’s leading magazine for the corporate wealthy, Fortune, with a cover featuring a picture of Mrs. Clinton and the headline: “Business Loves Hillary”. (6)

And what do we have in 2016? Fully 116 members of the Republican Party’s national security community, many of them veterans of Bush administrations, have signed an open letter threatening that, if Trump is nominated, they will all desert, and some will defect – to Hillary Clinton! “Hillary is the lesser evil, by a large margin,” says Eliot Cohen of the Bush II State Department. Cohen helped line up neocons to sign the “Dump-Trump” manifesto. Another signer, foreign-policy ultra-conservative author Robert Kagan, declared: “The only choice will be to vote for Hillary Clinton.” (7)

The only choice? What’s wrong with Bernie Sanders or Jill Stein, the Green Party candidate? … Oh, I see, not conservative enough.

And Mr. Trump? Much more a critic of US foreign policy than Hillary or Bernie. He speaks of Russia and Vladimir Putin as positive forces and allies, and would be much less likely to go to war against Moscow than Clinton would. He declares that he would be “evenhanded” when it comes to resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict (as opposed to Clinton’s boundless support of Israel). He’s opposed to calling Senator John McCain a “hero”, because he was captured. (What other politician would dare say a thing like that?)

He calls Iraq “a complete disaster”, condemning not only George W. Bush but the neocons who surrounded him. “They lied. They said there were weapons of mass destruction and there were none. And they knew there were none. There were no weapons of mass destruction.” He even questions the idea that “Bush kept us safe”, and adds that “Whether you like Saddam or not, he used to kill terrorists.”

Yes, he’s personally obnoxious. I’d have a very hard time being his friend. Who cares?

CIA motto: “Proudly overthrowing the Cuban government since 1959.”

Now what? Did you think that the United States had finally grown up and come to the realization that they could in fact share the same hemisphere as the people of Cuba, accepting Cuban society as unquestioningly as they do that of Canada? The Washington Post (February 18) reported: “In recent weeks, administration officials have made it clear Obama would travel to Cuba only if its government made additional concessions in the areas of human rights, Internet access and market liberalization.”

Imagine if Cuba insisted that the United States make “concessions in the area of human rights”; this could mean the United States pledging to not repeat anything like the following:

Invading Cuba in 1961 at the Bay of Pigs.

Invading Grenada in 1983 and killing 84 Cubans, mainly construction workers.

Blowing up a passenger plane full of Cubans in 1976. (In 1983, the city of Miami held a day in honor of Orlando Bosch, one of the two masterminds behind this awful act; the other perpetrator, Luis Posada, was given lifetime protection in the same city.)

Giving Cuban exiles, for their use, the virus which causes African swine fever, forcing the Cuban government to slaughter 500,000 pigs.

Infecting Cuban turkeys with a virus which produces the fatal Newcastle disease, resulting in the deaths of 8,000 turkeys.

In 1981 an epidemic of dengue hemorrhagic fever swept the island, the first major epidemic of DHF ever in the Americas. The United States had long been experimenting with using dengue fever as a weapon. Cuba asked the United States for a pesticide to eradicate the mosquito involved but were not given it. Over 300,000 cases were reported in Cuba with 158 fatalities.

These are but three examples of decades-long CIA chemical and biological warfare (CBW) against Cuba. (8) We must keep in mind that food is a human right (although the United States has repeatedly denied this. (9)

Washington maintained a blockade of goods and money entering Cuba that is still going strong, a blockade that President Clinton’s National Security Advisor, Sandy Berger, in 1997 called “the most pervasive sanctions ever imposed on a nation in the history of mankind”. (10)

Attempted to assassinate Cuban president Fidel Castro on numerous occasions, not only in Cuba, but in Panama, Dominican Republic and Venezuela. (11)

In one scheme after another in recent years, Washington’s Agency for International Development (AID) endeavored to cause dissension in Cuba and/or stir up rebellion, the ultimate goal being regime change.

In 1999 a Cuban lawsuit demanded $181.1 billion in US compensation for death and injury suffered by Cuban citizens in four decades “war” by Washington against Cuba. Cuba asked for $30 million in direct compensation for each of the 3,478 people it said were killed by US actions and $15 million each for the 2,099 injured. It also asked for $10 million each for the people killed, and $5 million each for the injured, to repay Cuban society for the costs it has had to assume on their behalf.

Needless to say, the United States has not paid a penny of this.

One of the most common Yankee criticisms of the state of human rights in Cuba has been the arrest of dissidents (although the great majority are quickly released). But many thousands of anti-war and other protesters have been arrested in the United States in recent years, as in every period in American history. During the Occupy Movement, which began in 2011, more than 7,000 people were arrested in about the first year, many were beaten by police and mistreated while in custody, their street displays and libraries smashed to pieces. (12) ; the Occupy movement continued until 2014; thus, the figure of 7,000 is an understatement.)

Moreover, it must be kept in mind that whatever restrictions on civil liberties there may be in Cuba exist within a particular context: The most powerful nation in the history of the world is just 90 miles away and is sworn – vehemently and repeatedly sworn – to overthrowing the Cuban government. If the United States was simply and sincerely concerned with making Cuba a less restrictive society, Washington’s policy would be clear cut:

>> Call off the wolves – the CIA wolves, the AID wolves, the doctor-stealer wolves, the baseball-player-stealer wolves.

>> Publicly and sincerely (if American leaders still remember what this word means) renounce their use of CBW and assassinations. And apologize.

>> Cease the unceasing hypocritical propaganda – about elections, for example. (Yes, it’s true that Cuban elections never feature a Donald Trump or a Hillary
Clinton, nor ten billion dollars, nor 24 hours of campaign ads, but is that any reason to write them off?)

>> Pay compensation – a lot of it.

>> Sine qua non – end the God-awful blockade.

Throughout the period of the Cuban revolution, 1959 to the present, Latin America has witnessed a terrible parade of human rights violations – systematic, routine torture; legions of “disappeared” people; government-supported death squads picking off selected individuals; massacres en masse of peasants, students and other groups. The worst perpetrators of these acts during this period have been the military and associated paramilitary squads of El Salvador, Guatemala, Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Peru, Mexico, Uruguay, Haiti and Honduras. However, not even Cuba’s worst enemies have made serious charges against the Havana government for any of such violations; and if one further considers education and health care, “both of which,” said President Bill Clinton, “work better [in Cuba] than most other countries” (13) , and both of which are guaranteed by the United Nations “Universal Declaration of Human Rights” and the “European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms”, then it would appear that during the more-than-half century of its revolution, Cuba has enjoyed one of the very best human-rights records in all of Latin America.

But never good enough for American leaders to ever touch upon in any way; the Bill Clinton quote being a rare exception indeed. It’s a tough decision to normalize relations with a country whose police force murders its own innocent civilians on almost a daily basis. But Cuba needs to do it. Maybe they can civilize the Americans a bit, or at least remind them that for more than a century they have been the leading torturers of the world.

William Blum is the author of:
Killing Hope: US Military and CIA Interventions Since World War 2
Rogue State: A Guide to the World's Only Superpower
West-Bloc Dissident: A Cold War Memoir
Freeing the World to Death: Essays on the American Empire

Portions of the books can be read, and signed copies purchased, at www.williamblum.org

Previous Anti-Empire Reports can be read at this website.

Email bblum6 [at] aol.com

Notes

1. “Libya: Transition and U.S. Policy”, updated March 4, 2016.

2. New York Times, February 28, 2016

3. Mark Weisbrot, “Top Ten Ways You Can Tell Which Side The United States Government is On With Regard to the Military Coup in Honduras”, Common Dreams, December 16, 2009

4. Roger Morris, former member of the National Security Council, Partners in Power (1996), p.415. For a comprehensive look at Hillary Clinton, see the new book by Diane Johnstone, Queen of Chaos.

5. National Review online, May 1, 2007

6. Fortune magazine, July 9, 2007

7. Patrick J. Buchanan, “Will the Oligarchs Kill Trump?”, Creators.com, March 08, 2016

8. William Blum, Rogue State: A Guide to the World’s Only Superpower (2005), chapter 14

9. Ibid., p.264

10. White House press briefing, November 14, 1997, US Newswire transcript

11. Fabian Escalante, Executive Action: 634 Ways to Kill Fidel Castro (2006), Ocean Press (Australia)

12. Huffington Post, May 3, 2012

13. Miami Herald, October 17, 1997, p.22A

http://www.countercurrents.org/blum120316.htm

Bloody US Establishment Honors Wife Of 'The Great Facilitator' 
Of The Murder of 1/2 Million Central Americans 
By Jay Janson

http://www.countercurrents.org/janson120316.htm

In week long show of pseudo-Christian reverence, the profitably genocidal criminal US establishment has had its controlled news media and government use the passing of a former first lady to promote the stature of a simple minded, good-for-billionaires, US President, who got away without being prosecuted for overseeing the brutal death of at least a half million men, women and children in Guatemala, El Salvador and Nicaragua during his eight years in office


Jean-Claude Juncker Damns Obama’s Plan For Ukraine 
By Eric Zuesse

http://www.countercurrents.org/zuesse120316.htm

Jean-Claude Juncker, the most powerful person in Europe, the chief of the European Commission and therefore Europe’s closest equivalent to America’s President, said, in a little-noticed comment on March 3rd, "Ukraine will definitely not be able to become a member of the EU in the next 20-25 years, and not of NATO either.” The article reporting this, at europeonline.magazine, also observed that, "The commission, the EU‘s executive, plays a leading role in accession negotiations between the bloc and aspiring members."


Understanding The fundamental Roots Of Conflict And Suffering 
In Israel/Palestine: An Interview With Rich Forer 
By Katie Miranda

http://www.countercurrents.org/miranda120316.htm

Rich Forer is a former member of AIPAC who has orthodox relatives living in West Bank settlements. Still, after a dramatic spiritual awakening in 2006, he was transformed into an advocate for Palestinian rights. He is the author of Breakthrough: Transforming Fear into Compassion A New Perspective on the Israel-Palestine Conflict which presents an important viewpoint that is all but ignored in the Palestine solidarity movement. I chose to interview him after reading Eckhart Tolle’s A New Earth which taught me the concept of how “ego-identification” drives conflict between individuals and nations. In Rich’s book and his interviews online he discusses “ego identification” in the framework of Israel/Palestine. I cannot emphasize how important Rich’s “psycho-spiritual roots of conflict” are towards understanding why Israel-identifiers think and behave the way they do. We can take the easy route and brush them off as crazy and racist. It’s much harder to look at
  the
roots and even to identify similar qualities in ourselves


A Debacle In Pakistan, A Lesson For Bangladesh 
By Taj Hashmi

http://www.countercurrents.org/hashmi120316.htm

Islamist extremism does not drop from the heavens or sprout up from the ground. Secular leaders – over the years – prepare the groundwork for Islamist takeover, terrorism, or insurgency through corruption, despotism, hypocrisy and opportunism. This has happened in Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, Egypt, Syria, Pakistan, and elsewhere. Bangladesh can’t remain immune to Islamist extremism, for an indefinite period. Since Islamism is an ideology-driven extremist ideology – not a law-and-order-problem – even highly efficient police and military are no match for Islamist extremism. Pakistan’s experience should be an eye-opener. Bangladesh must realize neither opportunistic politics nor political hypocrisy, but democracy and the rule of law are the only anti-dotes to Islamist extremism


Why Men In Uniform Enjoying Legal Impunity For Rapes Should Not Shock Us.. 
By Surabhi Singh

http://www.countercurrents.org/ss120316.htm

The soldiers are not alien entity. Neither are they born as rapists or killers. We make them that, by exhorting religion, Mahabharata, Ramayana, Manusmirti, Shariya- each one of them, anti-women, anti-Dalits, anti-Adivasi


“Special Refugees” And India’s Obsession With Detention 
By Sreekumar Kodiyath

http://www.countercurrents.org/sk120316.htm

On 5th May, 2014 nine refugees arrived from Sri Lanka by boat on the shores of Tamilnadu and were promptly taken by the infamous Q-Branch of Tamil Nadu police to the erstwhile transit camp for Sri Lankan refugees, a highly guarded facility in Mandapam of Tamil Nadu. A relic of the post Rajiv Gandhi Assassination days, the special refugee camps now exist as an instrument for harassment and oppression of the refugees in regular camps by the Q-Branch of Tamil Nadu Police


If Buildings Can Be Regularized, Why Not Slums?
By National Alliance of People’s Movements

http://www.countercurrents.org/napm120316.htm

The Maharashtra government’s decision to regularize 2 lakh illegal buildings in the urban areas of the state without mentioning slums has again shown its apathetic attitude towards its poor citizens. Large number of slum dwellers living in Mumbai without documentary proof that they have been lived there before the year 2000, live under constant threat of eviction