Iran is at the top of the agenda at the UN Security Council meeting underway in New York right now. Strong statements have been made by the US, accusing Iran of supplying weapons to Syria. But Russia has criticized the US sanctions, calling them unilateral. For more on this, RT talks to American lawyer and professor of international law at the Geneva School of Diplomacy, Dr. Alfred de Zayas, from Geneva.
North Korea has announced it will launch a rocket next month, which will put a satellite into orbit. But the U.S. and its allies see the plans as counter to international diplomatic efforts to deal with the reclusive state’s nuclear programme – and are worried the technology could be used to develop long range missiles in the future. It could also potentially violate UN Security Council resolutions, and threatens last month’s deal between North Korea and the Washington. Under this, Pyonyang was to freeze its uranium weapons program and its long-range missile activities – in return for American food aid. Japan’s has responded by deploying its own missile defense system to shoot down any rocket threatening its territory. For more on this, RT talks to Executive Editor of Black Agenda Report, Glen Ford, from London.
Stephen Lendman
Activist Post
Coat of arms of Syria -- the "Hawk of Qureish" with shield of vertical tricolor of the national flag, holding a scroll with the words الجمهورية العربية السورية (Al-Jumhuriyah al-`Arabiyah as-Suriyah "The Syrian Arab Republic").
Last weekend’s anti-Assad Damascus and Aleppo terrorist violence reflects Washington’s violent pursuit of regime change.
Peaceful resolution efforts are subverted. Obama’s waging undeclared war. On March 19, Iran’s Russian ambassador, Mahmoud Reza Sajjadi, explained US-style democracy, saying:
There were the first signs that American democracy had come to Damascus (and Aleppo). We saw American puppets’ attempt to establish democracy in Syria by exploding (bombs) in Damascus (and Aleppo).
Dozens died. Many others were injured. Calling Washington’s regional allies “reactionary Arab regimes,” he said getting in bed with the devil has a price. Their Western support will backfire when their regimes are targeted.
On Monday morning, heavy Damascus fighting erupted. Witnesses said explosions and machine gun fire were heard in the al-Mezzeh district. It’s home for several government security installations. Russia Today reported one resident saying:
There is fighting near Hamada supermarket and the sound of explosions there and elsewhere in the neighborhood. Security police have blocked several side streets and the street lighting has been cut off.
Free Syrian Army leader Col. Riad al-Asaad refused comment, saying “(t)his is a sensitive military matter that we cannot comment about.”
Days of stepped-up violence reveals Washington’s real intentions. Assad is right to call insurgents “terrorists.” Syria’s Foreign Ministry said Western and regional states are supplying heavy weapons and munitions. It’s no secret Saudi Arabia is providing them. So are Qatar and Israel, among others.
Engdahl says that the arab spring is an pentagon movement for “re-create” the Arab’s world, a tactic to control the oil and the important groups of people in this zone.
The UN-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan has urged the UN Security Council to break the political deadlock on Syria. He said ‘unity over the crisis will help his peace mission’ – comments he made during his briefing to the body about his findings following his recent visit to Damascus. William F. Engdahl, researcher and author of “Full Spectrum Dominance: Totalitarian Democracy in the New World Order”
James Corbett
Global ResearchTV
As the scramble for Ugandan oil heats up, a documentary about Joseph Kony’s 20 year campaign of terror has become an online cause celebre and is once again energizing the public for military campaigns abroad. But what is the public not being told about the background of US involvement in the region, and what will come of the public’s growing support for military intervention? Find out more in this week’s GRTV Backgrounder
TRANSCRIPT AND SOURCES: http://www.corbettreport.com/?p=4217
When oil executives announced the discovery of the largest onshore oil reserves in the Lake Albert region of Uganda in July 2009, the landlocked, oft-neglected East African nation of Uganda went from relative obscurity to a key partner for multi-national oil conglomerates.
Although buoyed by the news, the people of Uganda were naturally cautious, having seen how oil finds in Nigeria and Angola have brought more violence, bloodshed and instability than peace or prosperity.
Or, a look into Syria’s potential future after UN/NATO operations
Tony Cartalucci
Activist Post
Here we see Libyans enjoying their NATO-granted “freedom” — putting black men from the purged city of Tawergha in a zoo-like enclosure and feeding them green Libyan flags. The city of Tawergha was literally emptied out by Libya’s NATO-backed “revolutionaries” who vowed never to allow its residents to return to their property, claiming they had forfeited it by supporting Qaddafi during the 2011 NATO operation. Refugee camps containing the tens of thousands of exiled residents have been regularly attacked (another report can be found here, in The Globe & Mail).
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Defenders of the degenerate foreign-backed revolution are quick to accuse any persecuted, tortured, or imprisoned man with a dark countenance as being “hired mercenaries,” but in the above video the men can be heard calling the imprisoned, humiliated men “Tawergian,” as in residents of the Libyan city of Tawergha — not foreign mercenaries.
This video comes amid reports, including those from Amnesty International, that Libya’s “freedom fighters” have predictably turned out to be the genocidal racists geopolitical analysts, including Dr. Webster Tarpley, had warned about since the onset of unrest in Libya over a year ago.
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Tony Cartalucci’s articles have appeared on many alternative media websites, including his own at
Land Destroyer Report. Read other contributed articles by Tony Cartalucci here.
RT
Published: 29 February, 2012
Edited: 01 March, 2012
A general in the opposition militia known as the Free Syria Army has told journalists that the rebels have received French and American military assistance, amid reports of worsening violence in the stricken nation.
In Homs on Tuesday, a general claiming to be from the rebel group appeared on camera and told a journalist from Reuters news agency that “French and American assistance has reached us and is with us.” When asked to elaborate on the nature of the assistance he added, “We now have weapons and anti-aircraft missiles and, God willing, with all of that we will defeat Bashar [President Assad].”
The international community maintains it is committed to finding a political solution to the conflict and had rejected the idea of military intervention. However, there are growing suspicions that it has been supplying the opposition with weapons indirectly.
This is not the first report of the US covertly supplying the opposition with arms. In December, FBI translator turned whistleblower Sibel Edmonds said she believed the US had been training the Syrian opposition in neighboring Turkey and supplying arms to the country from Incirlik military base close to the Turkish-Syrian border.
In addition, Qatar and Saudi Arabia reportedly held secret meetings to offer financial support to the Syrian rebels to buy weapons.
Thus far the international community has been unable to reach agreement on a resolution to the Syrian conflict. At an emergency meeting called by the UN in Brussels on Tuesday, the Syrian ambassador accused the UN Security Council of purposely stalling and fueling the flames of terrorism in the country.
The UN has shown consistent support for the opposition movement, with both the Security Council and General Assembly repeatedly calling for the ouster of President Assad.
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The video, below… (Source: The Excavator)
The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) is one of the most powerful lobby organizations in the country. On March 4-6, AIPAC will hold its annual policy conference in Washington, D.C. The speakers include Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, U.S. President Barack Obama, Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, Republican candidate Newt Gingrich, and a host of other powerful politicians.
AIPAC has tremendous clout, but its influence has been disastrous for U.S. foreign policy and U.S. democracy. Here are 10 reasons why AIPAC is so dangerous.
1. AIPAC is lobbying Congress to promote a military confrontation with Iran. AIPAC — like the Israeli government — is demanding that the United States attack Iran militarily to prevent Iran from having the technological capacity to produce nuclear weapons, even though U.S. officials say Iran isn’t trying to build a weapon (and even though Israel has hundreds of undeclared nuclear weapons). AIPAC has successfully lobbied the U.S. government to adopt crippling economic sanctions on Iran, including trying to cut off Iran’s oil exports, despite the fact that these sanctions raise the price of gas and threaten the U.S. economy.
2. AIPAC promotes Israeli policies that are in direct opposition to international law. These include the establishment of colonies (settlements) in the Occupied West Bank and the confiscation of Palestinian land in its construction of the 26-foot-high concrete “separation barrier” running through the West Bank. The support of these illegal practices makes it impossible to achieve a solution to the Israel/Palestine conflict.
3. AIPAC’s call for unconditional support for the Israeli government threatens our national security. The United States’ one-sided support of Israel, demanded by AIPAC, has significantly increased anti-American sentiment throughout the Middle East, thus endangering our troops and sowing the seeds of more possible terrorist attacks against us. Gen. David Petraeus on March 16, 2010, admitted that the Israel-Palestine conflict “foments anti-American sentiment, due to a perception of U.S. favoritism for Israel.” He also said that “Arab anger over the Palestinian question limits the strength and depth of U.S. partnerships with governments and peoples in the [region] and weakens the legitimacy of moderate regimes in the Arab world. Meanwhile, al-Qaeda and other militant groups exploit that anger to mobilize support.”
Iran’s alleged nuclear ambition may be high in the headlines. The US intelligence community, whose job is to assess the threat, is skeptical about it. Same as it has been for five years. The latest report accusing Iran of trying to make a nuclear weapon came Friday from the UN’s nuclear watchdog IAEA, which reported that Iran has significantly ramped up its uranium enrichment program.
However the consensus among US spy agencies remains that Iran had stopped nuclear weapons research years ago, as evidenced by latest statements, reports The New York Times. The agencies believe that Tehran may militarize its nuclear program, but it has not done it. James Clapper Jr., the director of national intelligence and David Petraeus, the CIA director, testified so before Senate on January 31.
Other senior US officials, including Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Gen. Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, have made similar statements in recent television appearances. US intelligence agencies believed that Iran pursuit nuclear capability up to 2005, but in 2007 they made a u-turn on the issue. That year’s National Intelligence Estimate said that Iran had stopped nuclear weapons research in 2003.
The change of heart came as shock to the Bush administration and drew criticism from Israel and some European capitals. Some critics said the CIA and colleagues are too conservative about Iran fearing an embracement similar to that if faced with Iraq. Intelligence reports on Baghdad’s alleged weapons of mass destruction was the key argument for the US invasion of the country, but eventually proved false. In 2006 US spy agencies introduced stricter procedures on analyzing and interpreting intelligence reports to avoid such botches. Critics believe the agencies may have become overly cautious.
“It’s true the evidence hasn’t changed very much” since 2007, he added. “But that reflects a lack of access and a lack of intelligence as much as anything.”
The surge of tension over Iranian nuclear program started last November, when an IAEA report said circumstantial evidence pointed to Iran’s developing nuclear weapon. The report was criticized for using old facts and presenting them in a way to make case for the allegation rather than providing any new evidence.
Middle East consultant, Peter Eyre, believes that Iran has no intention to go down the road of creating nuclear weapons.
“This stand-off with Syria, Iran, and all the rest of the Middle Eastern concerns is basically a geopolitical plan for regime change,” Eyre told RT.
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Madison Ruppert*
Activist Post
Patrushev and Putin (credit: http://www.kremlin.ru)
The push for foreign intervention in Syria has been going on for quite a while now and never seems to relent in ferocity. I have been writing about this issue for months now, so if you would like to get a strong background on this topic I highly recommend you scroll down to the end of the article to find a list of related reading materials.
Despite the large conglomeration of Western nations and allied nations in the Arab League’s relentless full-court press, some countries continue to resist this effort.
The most glaring example is, of course, Russia.
Russia has not only been a vocal opponent of sanctions and resolutions in the United Nations Security Council, indeed they have actually backed up their rhetoric with muscle; something which China has yet to do.
I previously reported on Russia moving complete advanced anti-aircraft missile systems and all that is required to operate them into Syria, a move which was likely an attempt to dissuade the West and/or Arab League from moving to establish a no-fly zone over Syria.
