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The Chris Hedges Report Podcast with Patrick Lawrence Examines How the Western Press Has Become a Propaganda Tool of the War Industry and Ukrainian Government
The Chris Hedges Report Podcast with Patrick Lawrence Examines How the Western Press Has Become a Propaganda Tool of the War Industry and Ukrainian Government
The war in Ukraine has exacerbated the loss of credibility within the western press, inflicting, journalist Patrick Lawrence argues, irreparable damage.
The Ukraine conflict has plunged the world into a geopolitical crisis. But this is not, as the writer Patrick Lawrence points out, the only crisis. The war in Ukraine has exacerbated the crisis within the western press, inflicting damage that he believes is ultimately irreparable. The press in the U.S. and most of Europe slavishly echoes the opinions of a ruling elite and oversees a public discourse that is often unhinged from the real world. It openly discredits or censors anything that counters the dominant narrative about Ukraine, however factual. For example, on August 4, Amnesty International published a report titled “Ukrainian fighting tactics endanger civilians.” The report charged Ukrainian forces with putting civilians at risk by establishing bases and operating weapons systems in populated residential areas, including in schools and hospitals, a violating the laws of war. To call out Ukrainian for war crimes, however well documented, saw the press and the ruling elites come down in fury on Amnesty International. The head of Amnesty International’s Kyiv office resigned, calling the report “a tool of Russian propaganda.” In one of the many broadsides the Royal United Services Institute in London wrote that “The amnesty report demonstrates a weak understanding of the laws of armed conflict, no understanding of military operations, and indulges in insinuations without supplying supporting evidence.” It is nearly impossible to question the virtues of Ukraine’s government and military. Those that do are attacked and banned from social media. How did this happen? Why is a position on the war in Ukraine the litmus test for who gets to have a voice and who does not? Why should a position on Ukraine justify censorship? Joining me to discuss these questions is Patrick Lawrence who a correspondent and columnist for nearly thirty years for the Far Eastern Economic Review was, the International Herald Tribune, and The New Yorker. He is the author of Somebody Else’s Century: East and West in a Post-Western World and Time No Longer: America After the American Century.
…click on the link above to listen to the podcast…
Over 100 Protesters Killed In Iran Amid Largest Internet Shutdown In Nation’s History
Over 100 Protesters Killed In Iran Amid Largest Internet Shutdown In Nation’s History
Now five days into widespread protests in some one hundred Iranian cities after a dramatic gas price hike last Friday, Amnesty Internationalreports that at least 106 have been killed.
However, “The organisation believes that the real death toll may be much higher, with some reports suggesting as many as 200 have been killed,” Amnesty said in a statement.
This as the government has cut off internet access across much of the country, resulting in few videos of clashes with police reaching the West, as in the early couple of days of the unrest.
A statement from the global outage monitor Oracle’s Internet Intelligence called it the largest blockage ever observed in Iran:
Protesters took to the streets shortly after the government announced an increase in fuel prices by as much as 300%. Social media images showed banks, petrol stations and government buildings set ablaze by rioters. Some protesters chanted “down with Khamenei,” according to videos, referring to the country’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
The internet blackout started on Saturday evening and continued through Monday, according to internet watchdogs. Oracle’s Internet Intelligence called it the “largest internet shutdown ever observed in Iran.”
The United Nations is now urging Iran to lift the internet blockage and to show restraint after what the international body called the “clearly very serious” extent of casualties.
The UN high commissioner also acknowledged it is looking into reports of live ammunition being used on demonstrators, which activists say there’s ample video evidence for.
The government-imposed internet block began on Saturday, leaving some 80 million citizens without online access.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Amnesty International: Shell’s Claim Of Clean Up In Nigeria “Blatantly False”
Amnesty International: Shell’s Claim Of Clean Up In Nigeria “Blatantly False”
A new report from Amnesty International alleges that Royal Dutch Shell did not, in fact, clean up its oil spills in Nigeria despite company claims that the task was completed.
Shell is the largest oil company to operate in the Niger Delta, with over 5,000 kilometers of pipeline and investments in over 50 oil fields. Shell’s pipelines have been responsible for 1,693 oil spills since 2007, but Amnesty International says the true number is likely much higher. Moreover, the non-profit alleges that Shell’s claims that it has cleaned up the oil spills are “blatantly false.”
Amnesty International also points the finger at the Nigerian government, which has failed to properly police the oil industry in the delta. “The quality of life of people living surrounded by oil fumes, oil encrusted soil and rivers awash with crude oil is appalling, and has been for decades,” said Stevyn Obodoekwe, the Director of Programmes for the Centre for Environment, Human Rights and Development (CEHRD), which partnered with Amnesty International on the report.
Related: OPEC Infighting Reaching Critical Levels
The report concludes that four sites in the Niger Delta “remain visibly contaminated,” areas where Shell says cleanup was completed. “This is just a cover up. If you just dig down a few metres you find oil. We just excavated, then shifted the soil away, then covered it all up again,” a contractor hired by Shell told Amnesty International.
A 2011 investigation by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) documented the contamination at Shell’s sites, prompting a promise from the Anglo-Dutch oil major to follow through on cleanup.
Shell has sought to reduce its holdings of Nigerian oil assets over the past two years, part of a divestment campaign to cut costs and raise cash. The company has moved to sell off at least four oil fields, plus a major pipeline that plagued the company.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
NYT Claims U.S. Abides by Cluster Bomb Treaty: The Exact Opposite of Reality
The New York Times today has a truly bizarre article regarding the U.S. and cluster bombs. The advocacy group Cluster Munition Coalition just issued its annual report finding that cluster bombs had been used in five countries this year: Syria, Libya, Yemen, Ukraine and Sudan. This is what The Paper of Record, in its report by Rick Gladstone, said this morning about the international reaction to that report (emphasis added):
The use of these weapons was criticized by all 117 countries that have joined the treaty, which took effect five years ago. Their use was also criticized by a number of others, including the United States, that have not yet joined the treaty but have abided by its provisions.
As Americans, we should feel proud that our government, though refusing to sign the cluster ban treaty, has nonetheless “abided by its provisions” — if not for the fact that this claim is totally false. The U.S. has long been and remains one of the world’s most aggressive suppliers of cluster munitions, and has used those banned weapons itself in devastating ways.
In December 2009 — just weeks after he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize — President Obama ordered a cruise missile strike on al-Majala in southern Yemen. That strike “killed 35 women and children.” Among the munitions used in that strike were cluster bombs, including ones designed to scatter 166 “bomblets.”
Although the U.S. at first refused to confirm responsibility, a Yemeni journalist, Abdulelah Haider Shaye, visited the scene and found irrefutable proof that it was done by the U.S., a finding subsequently confirmed by Amnesty International as well as a cable released by WikiLeaks.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Amnesty International Responds to UK Government Surveillance
Amnesty International Responds to UK Government Surveillance
A British tribunal admitted on Wednesday that the U.K. government had spied on Amnesty International and illegally retained some of its communications. Sherif Elsayed-Ali, deputy director of global issues for Amnesty International in London, responds:
Just after 4 p.m. yesterday, Amnesty International received an email from the Investigatory Powers Tribunal (IPT), which hears cases related to U.K. intelligence agencies. The message was brief: There had been a mistake in the tribunal’s judgment 10 days earlier in a case brought by 10 human rights organizations against the U.K.’s mass surveillance programs. Contrary to the finding in the original ruling, our communications at Amnesty International had, in fact, been under illegal surveillance by GCHQ, the U.K.’s signals intelligence agency.
Incredibly, the initial judgment had named the wrong organization — the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights — and it took 10 days to correct the mix-up. The news brought an unexpected and bizarre sense of relief: We strongly suspected that we were being spied on by GCHQ, but having it confirmed in court meant we weren’t just being paranoid.
Of course, GCHQ and likely its U.S. counterpart, the NSA, spy on a range of organizations besides Amnesty. The same IPT judgment revealed GCHQ’s unlawful surveillance of the South African Legal Resources Centre. Leaks by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden showed that GCHQ and the NSA have spied on Doctors of the World and UNICEF. And the fact that the IPT did not find in favor of the eight other organizations bringing the case does not necessarily mean their communications were left untouched — perhaps they were intercepted, but the tribunal considered it had been done legally.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Ukrainian Militias Are Beheading Hostages … Just Like ISIS
Ukrainian Militias Are Beheading Hostages … Just Like ISIS
In researching war crimes in Ukraine, I came across this disturbing report from Newsweek:
Groups of right-wing Ukrainian nationalists are committing war crimes in the rebel-held territories of Eastern Ukraine, according to a report from Amnesty International, asevidence emerged in local media of the volunteer militias beheading their victims.
Armed volunteers who refer to themselves as the Aidar battalion “have been involved in widespread abuses, including abductions, unlawful detention, ill-treatment, theft, extortion, and possible executions”, Amnesty said.
The organisation has also published a report detailing similar alleged atrocities committed by pro-Russian militants, highlighting the brutality of the conflict which has claimed over 3,000 lives.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Amnesty International urges Europe to come clean in CIA terror cooperation
Amnesty International urges Europe to come clean in CIA terror cooperation
European governments are being urged by Amnesty to spill the beans over their alleged cooperation in terror operations with the CIA. The human rights organization wants the guilty to be brought to justice and the practice to stop.
Amnesty is adamant that had it not been for various European governments, the US would have been unable to detain so many people, often without trial, for so many years. These calls come after a US Senate report published in December seemed to implicate a number of European nations in implementing terror programs.
Amnesty International says its research shows Poland, Romania and Lithuania allowed secret CIA detention sites on their soil, while UK agents were involved in torture. The human rights group says practices such as waterboarding, sexual assault and mock executions were some of the torture processes detainees suffered.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Saudi blogger receives first 50 lashes of sentence for ‘insulting Islam’
Saudi blogger receives first 50 lashes of sentence for ‘insulting Islam’
A Saudi blogger convicted of insulting Islam was brought after Friday prayers to a public square in the port city of Jeddah and flogged 50 times before hundreds of spectators, a witness to the lashing said.
The witness said Raif Badawi’s feet and hands were shackled during the flogging but his face was visible. He remained silent and did not cry out, said the witness, who spoke to the Associated Press on condition of anonymity fearing government reprisal.
Badawi was sentenced last May to 10 years in prison and 1,000 lashes. He had criticized Saudi Arabia’s powerful clerics on a liberal blog he founded. The blog has since been shut down. He was also ordered to pay a fine of 1m riyals or about $266,600.
Rights activists say Saudi authorities are using Badawi’s case as a warning to others who think to criticise the kingdom’s powerful religious establishment from which the ruling family partly derives its authority.
London-based Amnesty International said he would receive 50 lashes once a week for 20 weeks. The US, a close ally of Saudi Arabia, has called on authorities to cancel the punishment.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Situation in Ukraine ‘nearing humanitarian catastrophe’ – Amnesty Intl
Situation in Ukraine ‘nearing humanitarian catastrophe’ – Amnesty Intl
Eastern Ukraine is nearing a humanitarian catastrophe, as residents struggle to get food and medicine, rights group Amnesty International told Reuters. The UN refugee watchdog added that the elderly in the region could be severely hit by Kiev’s policies.
People in the southeastern Lugansk and Donetsk regions are struggling financially and are barely scraping by, according to the deputy director of Europe and Central Asia at Amnesty International, Denis Krivosheev.
“While it may be too early to call this a humanitarian catastrophe, it’s clearly progressing in that direction,”Krivosheev said, adding that pensioners are the most vulnerable part of the population.
READ MORE: Ukraine in ‘full-blown financial crisis’ – National Bank head
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) also expressed major concern for the elderly, pointing to Kiev’s dangerous decision to transfer payouts of social benefits and pensions to government-controlled areas.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Amnesty International: Tories’ Resources-Over-Human-Rights Approach Mistaken
Amnesty International: Tories’ Resources-Over-Human-Rights Approach Mistaken.
OTTAWA – Amnesty International’s Canada branch has issued a wide-ranging attack on the Harper government for making economic development a higher priority than human rights — especially in resource development.
Alex Neve, Amnesty’s director general, said the organization wants human rights issues to be on the agenda for the expected federal election in 2015.
Canadians will be talking about jobs and economic prosperity during next year’s election, and those issues are inextricably linked to questions of human rights, said Neve.
Amnesty is accusing the government of doing too little to ensure that the rights of aboriginal people are adequately protected in the hundreds of major resource projects that are planned for the next decade.
“With all the attention that will be on jobs and the economy, we have to recognize how important it is to deal with indigenous people’s land rights, corporate accountability and a trade policy that is grounded in human rights,” said Neve.
