The Nobel Prize For Covering Up Torture

And note this judge is a former member of the US military and a Reagan appointee.

A federal court upheld Friday the US government’s decision to censor statements made by Guantanamo Bay detainees about their treatment at Central Intelligence Agency-run prisons.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), a human rights group, had argued that the government should declassify redacted information contained in statements that detainees made before tribunals at Guantanamo Bay.

But Judge Royce Lamberth of the US District Court for the District of Columbia on Friday declined the ACLU’s request, which was made under the Freedom of Information Act.

“The court finds that defendants have shown that damage to national security would reasonably result if the detainees’ statements were disclosed, and that defendants did not classify portions of the detainees’ statements to conceal violations of the law or prevent embarrassment,” Lamberth wrote.

Ben Wizner, a staff attorney with the ACLU’s National Security Project slammed the decision and the US government’s insistence on fighting declassification of the material.

More On The Iraq Deportation Flight

From NoBorders South Wales, somewhat jumbled accounts but clearly this was a shameful episode-

The Stop Deportation Network together with The International Federation of Iraqi Refugees have issued a press release with the following statements from those who have been returned to Brook House detention centre, Gatwick:

“when we landed in Baghdad an Iraqi man got on dressed in army uniform, with seven other guards with Kalashnikovs. He asked the immigration officers why they brought us here then asked us if we wanted to come back. He said those of you who want to come back you get off, the rest of you stay where you are.

He told the immigration officers to go away and not try to send people back by force again.

So they took us back to Italy and we had to change planes there. About three people refused to move plane and they were beaten by security guards. They’ve got injuries from that. There were 130 security guards on the plane. Why did they need so many? There were even some arguments between the British and Italian securities.

‘K’, who did get off in Baghdad, said this morning he did not do go voluntarily and did not want to be there, so more details are needed regarding how voluntary was the process through which the ten people who are now in Baghdad were taken off. He said this morning:

‘They forced ten of us to get off in Baghdad. They said the British Embassy would help us but they just gave us $100 and left us. I’m too scared to go to where I used to live. Everything they told us is a lie.’”

…and Now Their Torture Cover Up Is Failing

The High Court has ruled that US intelligence documents containing details of the alleged torture of a former UK resident can be released.
Ethiopian-born Binyam Mohamed, 31, who spent four years in Guantanamo Bay, claims British authorities colluded in his torture while in Morocco.

Mr Miliband said the government stood “firmly against torture and cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment or punishment”, but he vowed to continue to challenge the court’s ruling “in the strongest possible terms”. ”I am determined that the vigour with which we fight this case will maintain the confidence of and send a clear message to all our intelligence partners across the world,” he said.

“The United Kingdom will protect the information that you share with us and uphold the principle that it is for you, not us or our courts, to decide if and when to release such material in to the public domain.”

The US also denies any allegations of torture concerning Mr Mohamed.

Miliband, the cognitive dissonance is strong in this one, he will go far in the Sith New Labour.

New Labour, War Criminals To The Last

Iraqi asylum seekers sent back to Baghdad by the UK government have been refused re-entry to their homeland, and flown back to Britain. The flight, carrying about 40 asylum seekers, landed in Baghdad on Thursday. Ten were admitted but the rest were turned away and have now arrived back. Human rights group Refugee and Migrant Justice said this was “unprecedented”.

The Home Office said it was working with the Iraqi government to iron out issues that caused some to be returned. The reason for their return, it said, was a matter for the Iraqi authorities. It is understood that about 80 escorts were also aboard the government-chartered flight.

The asylum seekers are now at Brook House detention centre near Gatwick airport where they are being given legal advice, according to a Refugee and Migrant Justice spokeswoman.

She said: “One would have expected with such a high profile remove, the Home Office would have sorted this out with the Iraqi authorities. She added that the reason for the Iraqi authorities turning away some of the group was unclear, but suggested it may have been that certain documents were not in order.

The government’s plan to send the group back to Baghdad, where just this week at least eight were killed in attacks on a market in north-west Baghdad, met with criticism from human rights group.

There have been no returns to Iraq since 2008 and this would have been the first return to the capital city since the start of the Iraq war in 2003.

New Labour Oberleutnant Lin ‘vote rigging‘ Homer said-

“Having an enforced route for returns is an important part of our overall approach; however the government prefers the majority of returnees to leave voluntarily.”

So realise 40 refugees and 80 ‘escorts’ that’s two thugs per refugee on this flight, yes Lin you are getting your ‘enforced returns’ on to a country we were a war criminal party to destroying. Exactly why is the UK Border Agency implementing the policies of the BNP? Except these are New Labour policies, hard to declare the war a success while your country has refugees terrified to return and claiming asylum (remember in the Cold War when those claiming asylum were welcome because it suited political ends, funny that), so their answer was apparently- lets kidnap them, lock them in prison then bodily drag them to a plane and fly them back. But then didn’t go well when the proxy puppet regime didn’t play ball, comes to something when they come out of this looking better than our own government.

Hip + Groovy

Hip Op went fine, mum is recovering slightly better than for the other one, the hospital is still hellishly warm and airless though (and what’s up with the water pipes -still!?). Meanwhile Patientline, not only a disgraceful rip off, but seriously has to be the worst interface I have seen since…um, maybe the old broken photocopier in the my old university’s library?!?! It gives Ceefax a run for its money, ugly and user hostile (in every sense). Oh to be home and have Snow Leopard fondling my eyeballs.

RAWA Thanks War Resisters

Solidarity statement to U.S. war resisters and Afghanistan occupation veterans from Zoya, Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA). October 10, 2009

Our message to all the soldiers who are fighting and veterans who were fighting in Afghanistan:

We thank you because we think that you believe that you are struggling and fighting in Afghanistan for bringing democracy and peace for our people. But unfortunately we think that you are also the victims of the wrong policy of your government. And that’s that reason that we think you should condemn this war, which is just bringing more sorrow and pain and blood for the majority of the population and the civilians of Afghanistan. And it’s not helping to bring democracy and security in the country.

And we also want to thank those soldiers who resisted and refused to go to Afghanistan and fight for this so-called “War on Terror”, which is more painful and which is more costly for our people than terrorists. We want to thank you and we think that you should come forward and give your solidarity with the people of Afghanistan, all the democratic organizations, and you should make aware your own people about the reality, about the real nature of this war.

And we think that all people of American and the West should condemn this war and pressurize your governments to stop this very failed and very unsuccessful war, which only our poor people and especially the women have to pay the price for, this war so-called “war on terrorism, and not the real terrorists.

Please also read this, war resistors in the US are being subjected to a horribly familiar regime-

…soldiers have been strip-searched while possibly being filmed. Bishop and Church have also been watched by female guards during strip-searches, while using the restroom as well as while in the showers. Both soldiers have been denied one in-person visit by their attorneys and all phone calls with their attorneys have been illegally monitored by guards.

Seth Manzel, a Fort Lewis Stryker Brigade veteran and executive director of the veteran support group G.I. Voice, said of the matter, “These techniques of sexual humiliation are far too similar to those practiced on foreign prisoners at Abu Ghraib in Iraq and Bagram in Afghanistan. Is the Army at Fort Lewis using enhanced interrogation techniques to break down American soldiers here at home?”

Church was imprisoned for having gone AWOL, which he did in order to prevent his wife and children from becoming homeless. He tried to get help from his unit, but was denied, and received eight months prison time. Church was eventually forced by this ordeal to give his newborn son up for adoption. According to Church, “With everything that was going on, from me leaving, even though it was to care for my family, because I could find no support from the Army, Amanda and I had to place our son, Austin in a loving home through adoption. We did not want him enduring the strife that we had endured and for him to end up being fatherless, because I would be living in prison.”

Andrew VanDenBergh, a Marine veteran of the Iraq war and a G.I. Voice staff member, said of Leo Church in a press release, “He joined the Army, found out his family was homeless, wasn’t allowed to keep his children from living on the streets, went to take care of his family, had to give a child up for adoption and is now locked in prison and being abused. Being abused for what? For taking care of his children?”

Stop the first mass deportation flight to Baghdad

Via Earwicga-

First demonstration at Communications House, London, on Wednesday 14th October, 5pm.

The Stop Deportation network and the International Federation of Iraqi Refugees, along with other groups and organisations, are demanding that the first mass deportation flight to southern Iraq, expected to leave on Wednesday, is suspended and the detainees threatened with forcible removal are released immediately. Over the last week, detainees in various immigration detention centres have been given ‘removal directions’ clearly stating they will be removed to Iraq, rather than the Kurdistan Regional Government-controlled region, which was stated in previous removals.

Deporting people to a war zone like Iraq would put the lives of many deportees at risk. As recently as the 11th October, three car bombs exploded in the western Iraqi city of Ramadi, killing at least 19 people. Violence and bloodshed continue throughout the country, which saw 1,891 civilian deaths in the first six months of this year alone. There are also widespread food shortages, lack of access to clean drinking water and other grave humanitarian crises in many areas.

The British government, through its participation in the war on and occupation of Iraq since 2003, is responsible for these crises and the consequent displacement of millions of Iraqis. Instead of helping accommodate refugees fleeing war and violence, it is now is planning to send them back en masse to face their possible death.

Deportation charter flights limit refugees’ access to due legal process. The UK Border Agency states that “charter flights may be subject to different arrangements where it is considered appropriate because of the complexities, practicalities and costs of arranging an operation.” Charter flight deportees are told that “removal will not necessarily be deferred in the event that a Judicial Review is lodged.” The emphasis, thus, is on filling the flight rather than ensuring the appropriate legal avenues have been exhausted. Detainees have also lost the right to know the date and time of their removal, making it more difficult for their legal representatives to act properly and leaving deportees in fear and uncertainty for days or weeks.

Iraqi refugees have been forcibly deported to Iraqi Kurdistan (northern Iraq) since November 2005. Mass deportation flights to Kurdistan have been removing 50-60 men almost once a month since June 2008, with the Home Office arguing that, unlike the rest of the country, the Kurdistan area is ’safe’. The International Federation of Iraqi Refugees estimate 1,000 people have been deported to Kurdistan from the UK since 2005. Despite these claims of safety, however, several people have died or disappeared following their forcible return, including Hussein Ali who killed himself two days after his arrival in 2008. Many others have been forced into hiding.

The Stop Deportation network and the International Federation of Iraqi Refugees call upon all groups, organisations and individuals opposed to this brutal action by the UK government to stand with us in calling for all deportations to Iraq to be stopped. Join us on the first public demonstration against mass deportations to Iraq this Wednesday, at 5pm, at the local immigration reporting centre, where many deportees are first arrested without prior warning whilst signing on (Communications House, Old Street, London, EC1).

If you would like to add your or your organisation’s name to this statement, or for any further information, please email stopdeportation[at]riseup.net.

Other things you can do to help stop this flight:

Contact your local MP and ask them to put pressure on the UK Border Agency to cancel the deportation. You can find your local MP at http://findyourmp.parliament.uk

Contact the UKBA directly to demand the deportation be cancelled:
Privateoffice.external@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk
UKBApublicenquiries@UKBA.gsi.gov.uk
CITTO@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk

Contact the minister for borders and immigration Phil Woolas:
House of Commons phone number: 020 7219 1149
House of Commons fax number: 020 7219 0992
Constituency phone number: 0161 624 4248
Constituency fax number: 0161 626 8572

Please copy stopdeportation[at]riseup.net in your email correspondence.

The Military Parasite

…as Tom Engelhardt recently reminded us, that Obama’s “civilian” advisors include “Karl W. Eikenberry, a retired lieutenant general who is the U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan, Douglas Lute, a lieutenant general who is the president’s special advisor on Afghanistan and Pakistan (dubbed the “war czar” when he held the same position in the Bush administration), and James Jones, a retired Marine Corps general, who is national security advisor, not to speak of Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, a former director of the Central Intelligence Agency”? Are we surprised, then, that when we “turn crucial war decisions over to the military, [we] functionally turn foreign policy over to them as well”? And that they, in turn, always opt for more troops, more money, and more war?

Stop Welsh Fascists

Hope Not Hate- The Welsh Defence League – a violent group of anti-Islamic football hooligans – plan on holding an event in Swansea this Saturday and in Newport a week later.  A few weeks ago racists attacked worshippers at a mosque in Swansea, culminating in a pitched battle involving sixty people. Now the WDL want to have another go.

Such actions shame us all – and we must do all that we can to stop this violence occurring again.

Our Welsh organisation, Searchlight Cymru, have just written a letter to the Western Mail stating that we all reject the fear and intimidation of the Welsh Defence League.

And I’d like you to co-sign the letter as well – the WDL may be focusing their attacks on the Welsh Muslim community but by doing so they attack us all:

http://action.hopenothate.org.uk/standupforwales

In truth, this isn’t about religion. It’s about figures on the far right trying to create fear and tension within and between communities – and then capitalise on this division.

But as we understand what they are trying to do, you, I and the thousands of people who view each of us as equals can organise against their hatred and send a clear message: we reject your hate, we reject your fear, we are stronger together than apart.

If you agree with this sentiment please co-sign my letter – and then pass it to all of your friends to co-sign as well:

http://action.hopenothate.org.uk/standupforwales

Together we can make a difference.

Unemployment In Wales Jumps 72%

Alarming figures (and these are the registered claimants, so true numbers will be larger)

THE number of people claiming job seeker’s allowance in Wales soared by 72% in the last 12 months. The largest rise came in the over 50 age group, which increased by 79%.

There was also an 78% rise in those aged between 25-49 seeking to work, and 62% for those who are between 18 and 24 years old. The job seekers benefit count, which had been around 40,000 during every August since 2005, jumped from 45,975 in 2008 to 79,155 in August 2009.

But in contrast, the number of unfilled vacancies across Wales in the same month stood at less than 11,000. The largest proportion of jobcentre vacancies in Wales were in Swansea West constituency at 10% of live unfilled vacancies.

In North Wales, Alyn and Deeside had the highest proportion of unfilled vacancies at 3.8%, followed by Wrexham at 3.6%. Clwyd South has the lowest proportion of similar unfilled vacancies at just 0.6%, compared to 1% in Cynon Valley and 1.1% in Rhondda, Ogmore and Merthyr & Rhymney, and 1.2% in Ynys Môn.

On Anglesey, 1,695 claimants were looking at 131 vacancies, compared to 1,845 claimants and 394 vacancies in Wrexham, and 1,945 claimants and 412 vacancies on Deeside.

The figures were obtained by Plaid Cymru AMs Leanne Wood and Chris Franks, who argued that it would be wrong to expect unemployed people to chase jobs that did not exist. Leanne Wood said: “Any attempt to reduce the overall benefit budget will be disastrous for Wales. These figures show that you cannot force people into jobs that don’t exist.

nb. the use of accepted newspeak jobseekers, seeking work etc. these are government created linguistic scams, the only thing we can objectively say is people are unemployed and that should be the language the media use. There is an ongoing pressure to make unemployment -which neoliberalism relies upon to maintain a ‘flexible’ labour market, ie without protections or a living wage- an unacceptable state of being in order to facilitate cutting welfare, introducing workfare & further terrorising workers into a submissive pliable ‘human resource’. You either work or are desperately trying to work, the fact the jobs do not exist does not mitigate this stigmatising of an ‘undeserving poor’ for our political and media class.

Andrew J. Bacevich: Afghanistan – The Proxy War

Somewhat cold and calculated but nevertheless an interesting dissection of the issues in the US establishment-

No serious person thinks that Afghanistan – remote, impoverished, barely qualifying as a nation-state – seriously matters to the United States. Yet with the war in its ninth year, the passions raised by the debate over how to proceed there are serious indeed. Afghanistan elicits such passions because people understand that in rendering his decision on Afghanistan, President Obama will declare himself on several much larger issues. In this sense, Afghanistan is a classic proxy war, with the main protagonists here in the United States.

The question of the moment, framed by the prowar camp, goes like this: Will the president approve the Afghanistan strategy proposed by his handpicked commander General Stanley McChrystal? Or will he reject that plan and accept defeat, thereby inviting the recurrence of 9/11 on an even larger scale? Yet within this camp the appeal of the McChrystal plan lies less in its intrinsic merits, which are exceedingly dubious, than in its implications.

If the president approves the McChrystal plan he will implicitly:

■ Anoint counterinsurgency – protracted campaigns of armed nation-building – as the new American way of war.

■ Embrace George W. Bush’s concept of open-ended war as the essential response to violent jihadism (even if the Obama White House has jettisoned the label “global war on terror”).

■ Affirm that military might will remain the principal instrument for exercising American global leadership, as has been the case for decades.

Implementing the McChrystal plan will perpetuate the longstanding fundamentals of US national security policy: maintaining a global military presence, configuring US forces for global power projection, and employing those forces to intervene on a global basis. The McChrystal plan modestly updates these fundamentals to account for the lessons of 9/11 and Iraq, cultural awareness and sensitivity nudging aside advanced technology as the signature of American military power, for example. Yet at its core, the McChrystal plan aims to avert change. Its purpose – despite 9/11 and despite the failures of Iraq – is to preserve the status quo.

Hawks understand this. That’s why they are intent on framing the debate so narrowly – it’s either give McChrystal what he wants or accept abject defeat. It’s also why they insist that Obama needs to decide immediately.

Yet people in the antiwar camp also understand the stakes. Obama ran for the presidency promising change. The doves sense correctly that Obama’s decision on Afghanistan may well determine how much – if any – substantive change is in the offing.

If the president assents to McChrystal’s request, he will void his promise of change at least so far as national security policy is concerned. The Afghanistan war will continue until the end of his first term and probably beyond. It will consume hundreds of billions of dollars. It will result in hundreds or perhaps thousands more American combat deaths – costs that the hawks are loath to acknowledge.

Hip Op & You Don’t Stop

Once again it is hip arthroplasty time! If I look back it was January ’08 when mi madre had her left hip done and as is often the case it soon became apparent the pain was not just from that naughty joint, the right needed doing too, so factor in enough recovery from first op and schedules and here we are about to embark on it again. This time it is to sunny Ysbyty Gwynedd we go for our socialised medicine. Despite occasional horror stories about the hospital (thanks internal market and outsourcing!) the surgeon seems good and me and my sister and assembled nieces will be on hand to keep things kopasetic (the theatre is ‘ring fenced’ against infection they trumpet, but then you think, erm, surely all theatres are/ should be?!?! They’re not likely to say ‘yeah the St. MRSA suite is smeared in shit, blood and pus but hey whadya gonna do? Clean it?! We’ve got management consultants to pay you know.’). Anyways, things like this require a leap of faith in society, you cannot be everything and do it all yourself (thus libertarian’s juvenile narcissism breaks down) we pay tax into a common pot, we have medical staff trained, we have hospitals, time to see if people still care enough about other people to do a good job despite the best efforts of the atomising ‘free market’ and its political & corporate shills.

‘…a series of suspicious deaths of Iraqi citizens.’

“I believe that I was serving in something that was party to covering up quite serious allegations of torture and murder,” said the former Royal Military Policeman of his time in the corps.

“I’ve seen documentary evidence that there were incidents, running into the 100s, involving death and serious injury to Iraqis,” he claims. “It is the actions of a few who have been shown to be bad apples. But the system is so flawed and some of the decision making has been so perverse that it is fair to say that the barrel is probably rotten.”

See the interview, podcast and read more.

I’m Shocked…

Boris Johnson, who is leading the fight against a European crackdown on City financiers, faced accusations of being “bought off” today, when it emerged that more than half the money donated to his mayoral campaign came from the financial sector including hedge funds and private equity.

Johnson has criticised the EU’s so-called “hedge fund directive,” draft rules published in the spring which would limit debt levels for alternative investment managers, such as hedge funds, and force them to be more transparent.

Concentration Camps ARE Popular

This also makes it hard to argue there is not deep rooted racist animus against Tamils amongst the population that is being stirred by demagogues under the guise of the War on Terror,

(Reuters) – Sri Lanka’s ruling coalition won the latest in a string of provincial elections this weekend, a strong result which analysts said is likely to spur its leader to call early national and presidential polls. With a popularity boost from his defeat of Tamil Tiger rebels after a 25-year war, President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s coalition won 38 seats in the 55-member council of his native Southern Province in Saturday’s election.

The United Peoples Freedom Alliance won 68 percent of the vote, less than the 70-80 percent it had forecast in the province where Rajapaksa has started massive development projects including work on the country’s largest port. The margin was still strong enough that Rajapaksa is now likely to call early national elections, analysts and supporters said.

While those in the camps are massively at risk-

Pointing out that “[d]eteriorating conditions, including a shortage of water since October 5, 2009, combined with the prospect of flooding during the imminent monsoon season, have led to rising tensions among camp residents and clashes with the military,” New York based rights watchdog, Human Rights Watch (HRW), called on international donors Japan, the United States and European Union member states “to send a clear message to the Government of Sri Lanka that continued detention of the displaced will have serious consequences for Sri Lanka’s relationship with the international community.”