Once again, we are told those crazy Iranians have “stepped up” their enrichment program, and Israel has taken the opportunity to compare Iran to Nazi Germany.
War criminal Ehud Olmert, guilty of bombing Lebanese children while they slept in apartment buildings, used Yad Vashem, Israel’s national Holocaust memorial, to warn of Iranian “echoes of those very voices that started to spread across the world in the 1930s,” a reference to German fascism. Of course, Iranian nationalism and Islamic fundamentalism is hardly analogous to fascism, never mind the idiots on Fox News incessantly jabbering about “Islamofascism,” but this fact is lost on the ill-informed hordes tuned in to the corporate media Borg Hive.
Meanwhile, as the corporate media attempts to scare us into believing Iran will have nukes by the time I finish typing this sentence, the possibility Israel used uranium in Lebanon receives next to no coverage.
The Independent is reporting “that scientists were studying samples of Lebanese soil after Israeli bombing during the July-August war showed high radiation levels, suggesting that uranium-based munitions had been used. Samples taken from two Israeli bomb craters in the Lebanese villages of Khiam and aL-Tiri have been sent to the Harwell laboratory in Oxfordshire, southern England, for further analysis.”
According to the International Middle East Media Center, the “damage caused by such weapons inflict vicious wounds, which will burst into flames when exposed to air, even after the initial infliction. The threat does not end there as the particles of uranium released from the weapon remain in the land and air causing cancer for years to come.” In addition, notes IMEMC, there is “suspicion that Israel is also using illegal weapons in Gaza, during its ‘Summer Rains Operation’; the injuries that are being sustained by the weapons being used, according to the Rafah hospitals’ Director, are injuries that must be inflicted by a new weapon as he has not seen injuries like this before. They leave the victims torn apart and covered in burns, he stated.” A recent Italian “television report aired last week made a similar claim, raising the possibility that Israel had used a weapon in the Gaza Strip in recent months, causing especially serious physical injuries, such as amputated limbs and severe burns,” reports WAFA, the Palestinian News Agency.
Of course, this is scantly mentioned in the corporate media. A Google News search returns exactly a dozen results on the news story, ranging from the Khaleej Times in the United Arab Emirates to the Jerusalem Post in Israel, but as usual the American media, beyond the alternative media, is completely ignoring the story, a natural occurrence as such brutal revelations would inspire people to ask their government why it is sending billions of dollars a year to a country that nukes its neighbor (and using uranium-based munitions is indeed nuclear war, even if the signature mushroom cloud is absent).
Even Yedioth Ahronoth, a major Hebrew language tabloid newspaper published in Israel, reported the accusation, while its American counterparts remained silent. “We know that they drenched southern Lebanon with cluster bombs in the last 72 hours of the war, leaving tens of thousands of bomblets which are still killing Lebanese civilians every week,” YNet, the internet version of Yedioth Ahronoth, reports, quoting the Independent. “And we now know—after it first categorically denied using such munitions—that the Israeli army also used phosphorous bombs, weapons which are supposed to be restricted under the third protocol of the Geneva Conventions, which neither Israel nor the United States have signed.”
“Israel has a poor reputation for telling the truth about its use of weapons in Lebanon. In 1982, it denied using phosphorous munitions on civilian areas - until journalists discovered dying and dead civilians whose wounds caught fire when exposed to air,” writes Robert Fisk. “I saw two dead babies who, when taken from a mortuary drawer in West Beirut during the Israeli siege of the city, suddenly burst back into flames. Israel officially denied using phosphorous again in Lebanon during the summer—except for “marking” targets—even after civilians were photographed in Lebanese hospitals with burn wounds consistent with phosphorous munitions.”
Fisk then relates the fact Israel has admitted using internationally banned weapons. “Then on Sunday, Israel suddenly admitted that it had not been telling the truth. Jacob Edery, the Israeli minister in charge of government-parliament relations, confirmed that phosphorous shells were used in direct attacks against Hizbollah, adding that ‘according to international law, the use of phosphorous munitions is authorized and the (Israeli) army keeps to the rules of international norms.’”
Next, Mark Regev, the Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman, told the Independent, “Israel does not use any weaponry which is not authorized by international law or international conventions,” a response that prompted Fisk to write, “This, however, begs more questions than it answers. Much international law does not cover modern uranium weapons because they were not invented when humanitarian rules such as the Geneva Conventions were drawn up and because Western governments still refuse to believe that their use can cause long-term damage to the health of thousands of civilians living in the area of the explosions.”
As Fisk notes, the “American and British forces used hundreds of tons of depleted uranium (DU) shells in Iraq in 199—their hardened penetrator warheads manufactured from the waste products of the nuclear industry—and five years later, a plague of cancers emerged across the south of Iraq.” In addition, the United States and NATO used DU in the former Yugoslavia in the late 1990s, resulting in “new forms of cancer.”
Thanks to this continued and persistent psychopathic insanity, according to Dr. James Howenstine, in “the year 2005 there were 175,000 new cases of lung cancer in the United States,” an increase that cannot be attributed to cigarette smoking or second-hand smoke. “Following exposure to radioactive iodine particulate debris in the air from shells and bombs, between 2 to 5 years of time is needed to lead to the appearance of malignancies. Our bombing of Afghanistan began in October 2001 (four and a half years ago) and the new bombing in Iraq began in March 2003 (exactly three years ago). Aerial bombs are more effective than artillery shells in increasing airborne radioiodine because they release more dust into the atmosphere.”
Howenstine believes this unprecedented release of uranium into the atmosphere is deliberate. “A frightening aspect of depleted uranium warfare is that there is no way to protect oneself from this hazard. Clothing and gas masks are easily penetrated. The key persons running the New World Order are brilliant planners. They would not want themselves to die from lung cancer along with the rest of humanity. My guess is they have discovered methods to protect themselves from developing lung cancer. Certainly one has to be impressed with how effectively David Rockefeller, Zignev Brezinski and Henry Kissinger appear to have managed to avoid the infirmities of aging at least to outward appearances.”
Regardless, Israel’s use of a possible new uranium bomb in Lebanon, and its use of mysterious weapons in the Occupied Territories, indicate the small outlaw state will go to new and frightening lengths to kill its enemies, who are mostly women, children, and non-combatant men.
Tuesday, October 31, 2006
Cuban Medical Diplomacy: When the Left Has Got It Right
As an addendum to Dr. Feinsilver's article on Cuba's Medical Diplomacy, please note that in August the Bush Administration announced its intention to lure to the U.S. some of the 15 to 20 thousand doctors now providing medical aid mainly in Venezuela and Bolivia by making it easier for Cuban doctors participating in the island's medical program abroad to gain refugee status in the U.S. In her report, COHA Senior Research Fellow Julie Feinsilver analyzes the multiple aspects of Cuban medical diplomacy. A version of this article originally appeared in Foreign Affairs en Español Vol. 6 (Octubre-Diciembre 2006), pp. 81-94.
The Cuban Threat: Medical Diplomacy
Living in a hostile neighborhood led Fidel to look for allies elsewhere. Part of this process has included the conduct of medical diplomacy, which is the collaboration between countries to improve relations and simultaneously produce health benefits. Medical diplomacy has been a cornerstone of Cuban foreign policy and its foreign aid strategy since shortly after the triumph of the 1959 revolution. Despite Cuba’s own economic difficulties and the exodus of half of its doctors, Cuba began conducting medical diplomacy in 1960 by sending a medical team to Chile to provide disaster relief aid after an earthquake. Three years later, and with the US embargo in place, Cuba began its first long-term medical diplomacy initiative by sending a group of fifty-six doctors and other health workers to provide aid in Algeria on a fourteen-month assignment. Since then, Cuba has provided medical assistance to scores of developing countries throughout the world both on a long-term basis and for short-term emergencies.
And now, with help from his friend, Hugo Chávez, who is awash in oil wealth, Fidel is threatening to provide massive amounts of medical aid to improve the health of poor Latin Americans. Rather than a fifth column promoting socialist ideology, these doctors provide a serious threat to the status quo by their example of serving the poor in areas in which no local doctor wouldwork, by making house calls a routine part of their medical practice and by being available free of charge 24/7, thus changing the nature of doctor-patient relations. As a result, they have forced the re-examination of societal values and the structure and functioning of the health systems and the medical profession within the countries to which they were sent and where they continue to practice. This is the current Cuban threat.
Over the past forty-five years, Cuba’s conduct of medical diplomacy has improved the health of the less privileged in developing countries while improving relations with their governments. By the close of 2005, Cuban medical personnel were collaborating in 68 countries across the globe. Consequently, Cuban medical aid has affected the lives of millions of people in developing countries each year. And to make this effort more sustainable, over the years, thousands of developing country medical personnel have received free education and training either in Cuba or by Cuban specialists engaged in on-the-job training courses and/or medical schools in their own countries. Today, over 10,000 developing country scholarship students are studying in Cuban medical schools. Furthermore, Cuba has not missed a single opportunity to offer and supply disaster relief assistance irrespective of whether or not Cuba had good relations with that government. This includes an offer to send over 1000 doctors as well as medical supplies to the United States in the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Although the Bush administration chose not to accept the offer, the symbolism of this offer of help by a small, developing country that has suffered forty-five years of US hostilities, including an economic embargo, is quite important.
Symbolic Capital and Symbolic Politics: the Context for Medical Diplomacy
Because good health is necessary for personal well-being as well as societal development, the positive impact of Cuba’s medical aid to other countries has greatly improved both its bilateral relations with those countries as well as its standing and support in a number of multilateral forums. Therefore, as a consequence of its medical diplomacy Cuba has accumulated considerable symbolic capital (goodwill, prestige, influence, credit and power). The creation of symbolic capital requires an initial investment of material capital as well as time in a given project, such as the efforts mentioned above. The resulting symbolic capital may be accumulated, invested and spent just like material capital. Eventually, it can be converted into material capital, which in Cuba’s case has meant both bilateral and multilateral aid as well as trade, credit and investment. This is one of the rewards for the conduct of medical diplomacy.
From the outset of the revolution, Fidel has made the health of the individual a metaphor for the health of the body politic. Therefore, he made the achievement of developed country health indicators a national priority. Rather than compare Cuban health indicators with those of other countries at a similar level of development, he began to compare them to those of the United States. This was particularly true for the infant mortality and life expectancy rates. Both are considered to be proxy indicators for socioeconomic development because they include a number of other indicators as inputs. Among the most important are sanitation, nutrition, medical services, education, housing, employment, equitable distribution of resources, and economic growth. It is, therefore, symbolically important for Cuba to compare favorably with the US in an effort to demonstrate what Fidel sees as the moral superiority of Cuba’s social development policies.
This striving for first world health has been so important that in many of his major speeches, Fidel has dedicated considerable time to discussing his island’s health indicators. His annual July 26 speech this year, given right before his own serious illness was made known to the public, was no exception. In it, Fidel cited the latest data: Cuba’s infant mortality rate was 5.6 per 1000 live births, a figure less than that of the United States, which was 7.0 per 1000 live births according to the latest published data (NCHS 2005, data are for 2002). Life expectancy at birth in Cuba today is the same as for US citizens, 77 years. These achievements make Cuba a model and therefore make possible its medical diplomacy.
In the past thirty-five years Cuba has tripled its number of health care workers. Even more striking is the change in the ratio of doctors to population. This went from one doctor for every 1,393 people in 1970 to one doctor for every 159 people in 2005. This was part of Fidel’s 1984 family doctor plan to put a doctor on every block. Having accomplished this in both urban and rural areas, even isolated ones, Cuba is now exporting this model through its medical diplomacy initiatives.
Cuba’s accomplishments in health realms are not just in primary care or in the production of doctors. There was a simultaneous development of high tech medicine and biotechnology as well. Cuba shares its expertise through numerous international medical conferences that it holds every year and through scientific exchanges. Because research is also an important part of the operation of the health system, in the medical and public health field alone, Cuba publishes fifty-four professional journals.
As early as 1982, the US government recognized Cuba’s success in the health sphere in a report that affirmed that the Cuban health system was superior to those of other developing countries and rivaled that of many developed countries. Despite economic hardship during the 1990s after the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the subsequent loss of its preferential economic relations along with the tightening of the then three- decade-old US embargo, Cuba continuously increased its spending on domestic health as a percentage of total government spending in order to shield the most vulnerable population from the worst effects of the crisis. As a result, the initial deterioration in the population’s health status was short-lived and the health indicators quickly improved. Today, even some US analysts who oppose Fidel Castro agree that Cuba’s health system has produced impressive results despite the many material shortages that it always has faced. Some critics also recognize, albeit reluctantly that Cuban medical diplomacy is producing positive effects in the recipient countries.
Selected Examples of Cuban Medical Diplomacy
Perhaps as a portent of things to come, even during the 1970s and 1980s Cuba implemented a disproportionately larger civilian aid program (particularly medical diplomacy) than its more developed trade partners: the Soviet Union, the Eastern European countries and China. This quickly generated considerable symbolic capital for Cuba, which translated into political backing in the United Nations as well as material benefits in the case of Angola, Iraq and other countries that could afford to pay fees for professional services rendered, although the charges were considerably below market rates.
Early success with medical diplomacy and the accumulation of symbolic capital as well as the ability to convert it into material capital, led Fidel to announce in 1984 that Cuba would train 10,000 new doctors specifically to increase the volume of international medical aid. No country other than Cuba has developed doctors as an export commodity. This has paid off handsomely both for the government of Cuba and for the individual doctors involved, as they usually earn considerably more money abroad than in Cuba.
The Cuba-Venezuela-Bolivia Connection
It is, indeed, ironic that in 1959 Fidel unsuccessfully sought financial support and oil from Venezuelan president Rómulo Betancourt. It would take forty years and many economic difficulties before another Venezuelan president, Hugo Chávez, would provide the preferential trade, credit, aid and investment the Cuban economy desperately needed. This partnership is part of the Bolivarian Alternative [to the US] for the Americas (ALBA) to unite and integrate Latin America in a social justice-oriented trade and aid block under Venezuela’s lead. It also has created an opportunity to expand Cuba’s medical diplomacy reach well beyond anything previously imaginable despite Fidel’s three-decade-long obsession with making Cuba into a world medical power; an obsession which was analyzed and documented in my 1993 book, Healing the Masses: Cuban Health Politics at Home and Abroad.
By far the largest Cuban medical cooperation program ever attempted is the present one with Venezuela under Hugo Chávez. The symbolic and material payoffs for Cuba are clearly demonstrated, for example, by the oil-for-doctors trade agreements between the two countries. The accords allow for preferential pricing for Cuba’s exportation of professional services vis-à-vis a steady supply of Venezuelan oil, joint investments in strategically important sectors for both countries, and the provision of credit. In exchange, Cuba not only provides medical services to unserved and underserved communities within Venezuela (30,000 medical professionals, 600 comprehensive health clinics, 600 rehabilitation and physical therapy centers, 35 high technology diagnostic centers, 100,000 ophthalmologic surgeries, etc.), but also provides similar medical services in Bolivia on a smaller scale at Venezuela’s expense. And to contribute to the sustainability of these health programs, Cuba will train 40,000 doctors and 5,000 healthcare workers in Venezuela and provide full medical scholarships to Cuban medical schools for 10,000 Venezuelan medical and nursing students. An additional recent agreement includes the expansion of the Latin American and Caribbean region-wide ophthalmologic surgery program (Operation Miracle) to perform 600,000 eye operations over ten years.
The main medical aid programs are the provision of comprehensive health services throughout Venezuela through the Barrio Adentro programs (Barrio Adentro I and II). As of March 25, 2006, there were a total of 31,390 medical personnel (mostly doctors) providing services through Barrio Adentro I, the primary health care program. Of that number, 23,382 were Cubans and the 8008 were Venezuelan. These Cuban “medical diplomats” had conducted 171.7 million medical consultations, of which 67.9 million were carried out in the communities (schools, workplaces, and homes). They visited 24.1 million families at home, something previously unheard of on that scale and in those locales. Moreover, these personnel provided 103.1 million health educational activities as well.
During the same period, under Barrio Adentro II, which provides medical diagnostics and physical therapy and rehabilitation, 10,856 histological exams were conducted, 84.4 million clinical laboratory exams were done, 808,153 CAT scans and 47,454 nuclear magnetic resonance exams were performed, among others. The newly established Comprehensive Diagnostic Centers handled 886,609 emergency room visits and performed 7.2 million diagnostic exams; and the Comprehensive Rehabilitation Wards also established under Barrio Adentro II handled 520,401 rehabilitation consultations and applied 1.6 million rehab treatments.
The second largest medical cooperation program is with Bolivia, where in June 2006, 1,100 Cuban doctors were providing free health care, particularly in rural areas, in 188 municipalities, mainly in the departments of La Paz, Santa Cruz, Cochabamba and Chuquisaca. Cuba already has provided the National Ophthalmologic Institute in La Paz with modern equipment and specialized personnel who, along with Bolivian doctors and recent graduates from the Latin American Medical School (ELAM), have treated over 1,500 patients free of charge. New accords stipulate the opening of two additional ophthalmologic centers, one in Cochabamba and another in Santa Cruz. They each will be able to treat 50 patients a day and the La Paz center will allow doctors to attend to 100 patients a day. As a result, Bolivia will have the capacity to perform ophthalmologic operations on a minimum of 50,000 patients annually.
Cuban sources indicate that by the end of July their medical team had attended one million Bolivians free of charge (to the patient) and had performed 23,000 ophthalmologic operations. Additionally, Cuba offered 5,000 more full scholarships to educate doctors and specialists as well as other health personnel at ELAM in Havana. At present, there are some 500 young Bolivians studying at the school and another 2,000 have started the pre-med course there. The six-year medical school program is provided free for low-income students who commit to practice medicine in underserved communities in their home countries upon graduation.
During the ELAM’S first graduation last August, Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez announced that his country will establish a second Latin American Medical School, so that jointly with Cuba, the two countries will be able to provide free medical training to at least 100,000 physicians for developing countries over the next 10 years. The humanitarian benefits are enormous, but so are the symbolic ones. Moreover, the political benefits could be reaped for years to come as students trained by Cuba and Venezuela become health officials and opinion leaders in their own countries. Today, medical students whom Cuba trained as doctors in the 1970s, are now in positions of authority and increasing responsibility.
Other Western Hemisphere Examples
Cuban medical teams had worked in Guyana and Nicaragua in the 1970s, but by 2005 they were implementing their Comprehensive Health Program in Belize, Bolivia, Dominica, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Paraguay. Throughout the years, Cuba also has provided free medical care in its hospitals for individuals from all over Latin America and not just for the Latin American left. Please consult the bottom of this report for a list of countries for which Cuba has provided some type of medical assistance as of December 2005.
Under Haitian President Rene Préval, Cuba began its medical cooperation with Haiti in 1998. Currently, there are approximately 400 Cuban medical professionals working in Haiti on two-year assignments in 110 of the 164 comunes across the island. The program costs the Haitian government approximately US$1.8 million annually, which averages out to cost US$375 per month for each medical professional plus room and board, transportation and exemption for airport departure taxes. Because money is fungible, it is not evident which donor is providing the funding. Although very inexpensive by international standards, this program is relatively costly for the cash-strapped Haitian government and could become even more so if it is expanded as has been discussed recently.
Jamaicans, among others, with little means have been going to Cuba for free eye surgery as part of Operation Miracle. A spokesperson for the Jamaican Health Ministry has indicated that they had received positive feedback on the surgeries that had been administered. The number of patients reported with complications amounted to fewer than three per cent of the 1,854 patients who were treated in Cuba as of 2006.
As previously mentioned, Cuba has offered disaster relief over the years to every country that has experienced an emergency. And most often the offer has been accepted. A recent (2005) example is Guyana, where Cuba sent a team of 40 medical doctors and technicians to provide disaster relief after severe flooding had been recorded in the country.
Because Cuba has been successful in developing health programs at home and has provided medical aid abroad, often under difficult circumstances, some donor countries are willing to provide financial support for Cuban medical assistance in third countries in what is called triangular cooperation. Germany has provided funding for Cuba to develop health programs in Niger and Honduras. France provided some funding to execute a health program in Haiti. Japan provided two million doses of vaccines to vaccinate 800,000 children in Haiti and US$57 million to equip a hospital in Honduras where a Cuban medical brigade works.
Multilateral agencies, such as the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) also finance medical services provided by Cuba for third countries. Both organizations provided funding for Cuba’s medical education initiatives. Finally, Cuba’s Comprehensive Health Program, which is being exported to various countries that receive Cuban medical assistance, is supported by 85 NGOs and through triangular cooperation with both governments and NGOs, has received US$2.97 million in support. Although some of the amounts are small, it is clear that donors find that support for Cuba’s medical diplomacy makes professional sense.
Medical Diplomacy Outside of the Western Hemisphere
Cuba dispatched very large civilian aid programs in Africa to complement its military support to Angola and the Horn of Africa in the 1970s and early 1980s. With the withdrawal of troops and the later geopolitical and economic changes of the late 1980s and the 1990s, Cuba’s program was scaled back, but remained. Having suffered a post-apartheid brain drain (white flight), South Africa began importing Cuban doctors in 1996. Already in 1998 there were 400 Cuban doctors practicing medicine in townships and rural areas. By 2004, there were about 1200 Cuban doctors working in African countries, including in Angola, Botswana, Cape Verde, Côte d’Ivoire, Equatorial Guinea, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, Namibia, Seychelles, Zambia, Zimbabwe, and areas in the Sahara.
On the African continent, South Africa is the financier of some Cuban medical missions in third countries. This South African-Cuban alliance has been much more limited in scope than the Venezuelan-Cuban deal. Discussions on the extension of Cuban medical aid into the rest of the African continent and a trilateral agreement to deploy over 100 Cuban doctors in Mali with US$1 million in South African financing, were concluded in 2004. Rwanda was to be next in a similar agreement. Cuba also had deployed 400 medical doctors to Gambia. As of December 2005, Cuba was implementing its Comprehensive Health Program in Botswana, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Chad, Eritrea, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea-Bissau, Guinea-Conkary, Equatorial Guinea, Mali, Namibia, Niger, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Swaziland, and Zimbabwe.
Cuban medical teams also have worked in East Timor since 2004 to create a sustainable health system. Currently, 182 medical professionals are providing a variety of services in Cuba’s Comprehensive Health Program. At the same time, Cuba offered full medical school scholarships for 800 East Timorese students to begin work on the sustainability of their program.
Recent Cuban disaster relief medical missions are still providing assistance in post-tsunami Indonesia and post-earthquake Pakistan. Shortly after the tsunami, Cuba sent a medical team and equipment to provide disaster relief. At the time, the team was handling over 150 consultations daily in a military field hospital and a polyclinic. They also were providing some preventive as well as curative care on their visits to refugee camps. Less than a week after the devastating October 2005 earthquake in Pakistan, Cuba sent a team of highly experienced disaster relief specialists comprised of 2300 doctors, nurses and medical technicians. Part of the team worked in refugee camps and Pakistani hospitals. The rest worked in 30 field hospitals located across the earthquake-stricken zone. The team brought everything they would need to establish, equip, and run those hospitals. The cost to Cuba was not insignificant. Two of the hospitals alone cost half a million dollars each. Only recently (May 2006), Cuba sent 54 emergency electrical generators as well.
In the past Cuba has also provided aid to Armenia, Iran, Turkey, Russia, as well as to most Latin American countries that have suffered either natural or man-made disasters. This type of medical diplomacy in the affected country’s time of need has garnered considerable bilateral and multilateral symbolic capital for Cuba, particularly when the aid is sent to countries considered more developed.
In Search of Sustainability: Provision of Medical Education and Training in Cuba and Abroad
In an effort to have a more sustainable impact on the health of the aid recipient countries’ populations as well as a multiplier effect on the immediate aid given, medical education always has been an important part of Cuba’s medical diplomacy. Education and training consist of on-the-job training, seminars, courses and full medical education. As early as the 1970s, Cuban medical professors either established medical schools or taught in medical faculties in Angola, Ethiopia, Guinea-Bissau, Nicaragua, and Yemen. This has been a continuing process ever since.
Cuba has long provided total scholarships for students from other developing countries to study anywhere from secondary school (medical technicians) through post-graduate studies. From 1961 to 2001, almost 40,000 foreign scholarship students had graduated in various medical disciplines from Cuban schools. Of those, 16,472 graduated from institutions of higher education. These numbers peaked in the 1980s before the fall of the Soviet Union. Now, with an oil-for-services agreement with Venezuela, Cuba is vastly increasing its scholarship offerings.
The Latin American Medical School (ELAM) was established in 1998 specifically to train students from poor communities in Latin American and African countries. In exchange for full scholarships, these students must be willing to return to their countries and practice medicine in poor communities for at least five years. After meeting with members of the US Congressional Black Caucus a few years ago, Fidel announced a symbolically significant plan for medical diplomacy with the United States: 500 full scholarships to Cuba’s ELAM for US minority students. Half of the scholarships would be for African Americans and the other half divided between Hispanics and American Indians. So far only a few Americans have accepted the offer.
There were a total of 10,661 foreign medical students from 27 countries studying in Cuba at the ELAM during the 2005-2006 academic year. Of this total, 10,084 were enrolled in medicine, 67 in stomatology (dentistry), 134 in nursing, and 376 in health technology. This is triple the number of medical students enrolled in 2002. To train French-speaking Africans and Haitians, the Cuban Government established the Facultad Caribeña de Medicina (Caribbean Medical School) in Santiago de Cuba, where 254 Haitians and 51 Malian students were studying in 2002.
Graduates from these medical schools take the National Final Cuban Examinations (NFCE) at the end of their program and then do an internship in their home countries. After that, they must take their home country’s qualifying exam just as all other medical students must do to be licensed to practice medicine. Reports from Chile, which has one of the most highly developed health systems in Latin America and a rigorous university system and medical licensing requirements, indicate that the first seven Chilean medical students who have graduated from ELAM and returned to Chile have had their degrees validated by the University of Chile as required and have entered successfully into Chile’s public health system. This suggests that the quality of education provided at the ELAM is high. The fact that Cuban doctors who have found work in Chile on an individual basis have had their credentials validated by the University of Chile in what one Chilean official said was a complicated and demanding process, attests to the overall quality of Cuban medical education.
Medical Diplomacy Wins Friends But Also Makes a Few Enemies
Medical diplomacy primarily wins friends among the governments whose people receive the aid and the patients and students who directly and individually benefit from it. But not all are thrilled to have Cuban doctors in town. In particular, local medical associations and individual doctors have harshly criticized the Cuban presence because of their competition for jobs, their different manner of working and treating patients, and because of the perquisites they receive (principally, free room and board). In some cases, such as in Bolivia and Venezuela, these medical associations have gone on strike to protest the Cuban presence. In these and some other cases, such as in South Africa and Haiti, they have taken their complaints to the press. Despite protests (and strikes), numerous press and other reports from different countries extol the benefits to the patients, many of whom had never seen a doctor before, particularly living and working in their own neighborhood.
Not surprisingly, these medical associations sometimes seek to discredit the Cubans and use what appears to be a technical argument, the questioning of certification standards (credentials) and quality of care. Medical licensing is a standard practice in all countries, but it can be and is used by some who feel threatened by the competition of Cuban doctors willing to serve in areas that they themselves would not go, let alone work. On the other hand, standards are important and ideally, there should be a WHO or other supra-national independent accreditation agency that could establish criteria for and validate medical degrees and licenses or establish equivalences so as to eventually allow for global labor mobility. This, however, would be extremely difficult to negotiate and is unlikely to occur in the next few decades. Therefore, Health Ministries, or, in some cases, medical associations become the gatekeepers for entry into the profession. This is tricky when vested interests are in charge of the licensing or accreditation process or are politically strong enough to block it. In 2003, the Venezuela Medical Federation, which is ideologically opposed to the Chávez government and the Barrio Adentro medical program, filed a lawsuit to prohibit Cuban doctors from practicing medicine there. The court held in favor of the Medical Federation, but the Venezuelan government did not back down.
Similarly, in Bolivia, when the Colegio Médico de Bolivia and the association of unemployed doctors went out on strike to protest the presence of the Cuban doctors, President Evo Morales asserted publicly that the Cubans would stay as long as he is in office. He also exhorted the Colegio Médico to change its attitude and to “pay” with their professional services for their free medical education in public universities paid for by Bolivian taxpayers. Like in the case of Venezuela, the benefits to the host society far outweigh the costs to the local medical professions, which in these two cited cases are ideologically opposed to the government.
At the urging of the Haitian medical association, the previous government asked for a revision of the cooperation agreement to include better control by the Ministry of Health over the mix and quality of medical staff sent as well as the nature of their work in the field. However, this revision has yet to take place. Some malpractice accusations have been made against Cuban doctors in Venezuela, South Africa, Zimbabwe, and Haiti. A much-publicized case in Venezuela proved to be the fault of opposition doctors who refused to treat a patient referred to a hospital by a Cuban doctor. On the other hand, it is quite possible and, indeed, probable that there are some genuine cases that need to be addressed. This would be normal among all cohorts of practitioners and should be properly investigated and remedied.
Rewards For Medical Diplomacy
As stated at the outset of this article, Cuba’s rewards are symbolic and material capital. There is enormous prestige and influence in determining the direction of public health systems in the countries in which Cuba practices medical diplomacy. The training of future leaders in the medical field assures Cuba of on-site support in the future. More importantly, Cuba’s medical diplomacy contributes to the positive views held by other governments as translated into voting results at the United Nations on issues of particular importance to Cuba, such as an end to the US embargo of Cuba and the stressing of human rights issues. Importantly, Cuba was elected to the new UN Human Rights Council by direct, secret ballot in which all member states were elected individually and not in blocs.
In a press conference reported in the daily Última Hora, Paraguayan President Nicanor Duarte Frutos explained why his country would abstain rather than vote in favor of the US sponsored anti-Cuba resolution at the UN Human Rights Commission in Geneva, despite President Bush’s personal call in April 2004 asking for his support. The reason: a cooperation agreement with Cuba dating back more than six years, whereby Cuban doctors provide medical assistance in Paraguay and Paraguayan youths from very poor families are studying in Cuba on scholarships. At that time, there were 600 students involved in the program.
With regard to the US embargo of Cuba, the US State Department’s own data show that in the 2005 General Assembly votes, only Israel, the Marshall Islands and Palau supported the US position. This was the fourteenth consecutive time in which the US position was rejected, but to no material benefit to Cuba since the US has been going it alone for a long time now on this issue. Among Cuba’s trade and aid partners, voting coincidence with the US generally ranked only between 6 and 22 percent during 2005. The overall average coincidence for all countries was only 25%. The LAC average was 19.7%. The Asian group average was 18.7%; the African group averaged 13.5%; the Eastern European group averaged 40.4%; and the Western European and Others (Australia, New Zealand) came in at 46.7%. Cuba’s medical diplomacy should be seen as contributing to this pattern. Rather than isolating Cuba, it is the US that is becoming more isolated on this issue.
Far from being marginalized by Washington’s anti-Havana offensive, Cuba has remained an important member of the Non-Aligned Movement and once again has just hosted the summit of heads of state and government in September and has become the leader of the NAM for the next several years. Cuba previously hosted and led the NAM in 1979. Also Fidel attended the July 2006 MERCOSUR summit, which opened with the signing of a trade agreement with Cuba for mutual preferential market access. The agreement consolidates the already existing bilateral agreements on preferential tariffs that Cuba has had with each of the MERCOSUR members. Although the amount of trade between Cuba and MERCOSUR is not great, the agreement is significant for its timing: just before the release of the US-sponsored Commission for a Free Cuba’s tough report on tightening the US embargo and promoting regime change.
More importantly from an immediate standpoint are the export earnings deriving from medical diplomacy. Data on the amount paid for the various activities involved in Cuban medical diplomacy has always been difficult to establish. Rates paid for doctors have ranged from nothing where the country could not afford to pay, to some rate well below market prices. Nonetheless, rough estimates suggest that the amounts are truly significant and have surpassed earnings from tourism. The Economist Intelligence Unit estimates that the increase in non-tourism services exports between 2003 and 2005 was around US$1.2 billion for a total of US$2.4 billion, which puts non-tourism services ahead of gross tourism earnings (of US$2.3 billion) in 2005. Most of this is medical services.
Official data for export earnings from medical products (medicines and equipment) were below US$100 million in 2004, but there have been press reports citing a figure of US$300 million for such products. Cuba exports medical biotechnology products to 40 countries, but sales data were not available. Two important earnings streams not included in the export data come from the licensed manufacture of Cuban medicines in other countries and joint-venture production facilities abroad. Officials in Havana have indicated that these are significant, but no concrete data is available. Cuba has some licensing agreements, including one in the US for anti-cancer drugs, and even joint venture production facilities in China. Also, treatment facilities are being built in other countries, particularly in the field of ophthalmology, under agreement with Venezuela. The oil-for-doctors agreement is very lucrative for Cuba because of preferential pricing for Cuba’s professional services exports and because Venezuela absorbs the loss for any escalation of oil prices, a factor that has occurred to a considerable degree in recent months. Commercial trade between Venezuela and Cuba surpassed US$ 2.4 billion in 2005 and US$1.2 billon in the first trimester of 2006. Also, on the aid side between 2002 and 2006, Cuba has received some US$50 million for a range of physical development programs from the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries Fund. These rewards make medical diplomacy well worth the effort, not to also mention the important humanitarian benefits.
The Cuban Challenge
Taking medical diplomacy a degree further, at the recent MERCOSUR summit in Córdoba, Argentina, Fidel called for a social agenda to globalize solidarity in health and education. He offered Cuba’s experience in health and education to support that agenda. In these remarks, he laid down a gauntlet not only for MERCOSUR, but also for his adversary, the US government. It appears, however, that no one will take him up on it.
Post-Fidel Medical Diplomacy
Fidel transferred power to his slightly younger brother Raúl Castro just days before the Non-Aligned Movement meeting was convened in Havana. Indications are that although Raúl is the heir apparent, something approaching a de facto collective leadership most likely will govern Cuba in the near future. This leadership group probably will include not only Raúl, but also Ricardo Alarcón, who presides over the National Assembly of People’s Power; Carlos Lage, Vice President; and Foreign Minister Felipe Roque Pérez. None of these figures is expected to alter significantly Cuba’s practice of medical diplomacy in the near term. As long as the export of excess Cuban doctors continues to provide both material capital (e.g., oil-for-doctors) and symbolic capital (e.g., support in international forums), it is likely to be maintained. However, the scale of this program depends more on Hugo Chávez’s largesse than on Cuba’s willingness to continue it.
The temporary export of Cuban doctors also provides a safety valve for disgruntled medical professionals who earn much less at home than less skilled workers in the tourism sector. Their earning opportunities abroad are significant both within the confines of medical diplomacy and even more so, beyond it. This has led to a number of defections, allegedly around six hundred, although some say this figure is too high. This figure could grow if Cuban-American activist groups carry out their threats to assist these doctors serving in foreign lands if they defect. Should this number increase dramatically in this period of political change, the Cuban government may decide that the cost is too great to bear. In an effort to break the oil-for-doctors bond that supports the Cuban economy and create a medical brain-drain, the Bush Administration announced (on August 7) a possible change in its Cuba policy to ease immigration for Cuban doctors who participate in Cuba’s medical programs abroad. This is in sharp contrast to its tightening of policy regarding immigration of Cubans who enter the U.S. illegally. The lure of vastly increased earnings, easy access to high technology, and a much better material quality of life may lead doctors born, raised and trained at great expense in revolutionary socialist Cuba to cease helping those in need in developing countries and depart en masse. If they do, this is unlikely to break the ties that currently bind Cuba and Venezuela. But, this will raise questions about the consistency of US immigration policy. The fact that the Bush administration is trying to destroy Cuba’s medical diplomacy program indicates that the program works. Rather than attempt to destroy it, the Bush administration should emulate it.
Statistical Registers of the Central Medical Cooperation Units, 2005 Statistical Yearbook of the Cuban Ministry of Public Health
The Americas
Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Aruba, Bahamas, Belize, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominica, Ecuador, Grenada, Guatemala, Guyana, Haiti, Honduras, Jamaica, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Venezuela, Dominican Republic, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, St. Lucia, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago
Africa
South Africa, Angola, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cape Verde, Congo, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Equatorial Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Guinea, Lesotho, Mali, Mozambique, Namibia, Niger, Rwanda, Sao Tome and Principe, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Swaziland, Chad, Uganda, Zimbabwe, RASD, Algeria
Asia
Qatar, Yemen, Laos, Pakistan, East Timor, Indonesia
Europe
Italy, Switzerland, Ukraine
Source: Cuban Health Department 2005
Julie M. Feinsilver is the author of “Healing the Masses: Cuban Health Politics at Home and Abroad” (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993). Dr. Feinsilver is a Senior Research Fellow at the Council on Hemispheric Affairs in Washington, DC, and an international civil servant. The views expressed herein are solely her own and do not necessarily reflect those of any institution with which she is affiliated.
This analysis was prepared by COHA Senior Research Fellow Julie M. Feinsilver
October 30th, 2006
The Council on Hemispheric Affairs, founded in 1975, is an independent, non-profit, non-partisan, tax-exempt research and information organization. It has been described on the Senate floor as being “one of the nation’s most respected bodies of scholars and policy makers.” For more information, please see our web page at www.coha.org; or contact our Washington offices by phone (202) 223-4975, fax (202) 223-4979, or email coha@coha.org.
Israel's New Immoral and ILLEGAL Arsenal
What bizarre science-fiction horrors have to occur before the American media wakes up to the strange war that Israel is prosecuting against Palestinian and Lebanese civilians? People are still being maimed or killed every day in Lebanon thanks to unexploded cluster ordinance dropped massively by Israel in the 48 hours after a cease-fire had been negotiated but before it went into effect. Over 30 Palestinians in Gaza have been killed in October alone. As usual, however, Lebanon and Palestine have vanished from the newscycle (where Israel is currently represented by a president who refuses to step down despite an all-but-indictment for multiple rape charges and an openly fascist party joining the government ). But there has been a steady drumbeat of revelations, largely in the Israeli and British media, ignored entirely by the American media, about Israel's use of horrifying new weapons on civilian populations.
First came Italian television's Rai24News October 11 report on "inexplicable wounds and new weapons" in Gaza. Alongside a piece by Meron Rapoport in Ha'aretz, it details the growing evidence from Palestinian hospitals that Israel is testing a "dense inert metal explosive" (DIME) device in Gaza. It was followed a week later by an investigation in the British Guardian.
All three investigations feature doctors explaining horrific and mysterious new wounds appearing in Gaza hospitals after Israeli drone attacks:
"Bodies arrived severely fragmented, melted and disfigured," said Jumaa Saqa'a, a doctor at Shifa hospital, the main casualty hospital in Gaza City. "We found internal burning of organs, while externally there were minute pieces of shrapnel. When we opened many of the injured people we found dusting on the internal organs." ...
"You have complete burns that lead to amputation. You find shrapnel entering the body and leaving very, very small holes. We have never seen this before," said Khalid Radi, a spokesman at the health ministry.
Research on DIME weapons in the United States found that the tungsten fragments used in the bombs caused 92 out of 92 rats in a test to develop cancerous tumors (that's 100 percent for those of you following along at home). The Israeli army denies using DIME weapons with its standard claptrap:
Due to operational reasons, the IDF cannot specify the types and use of weapons in its possession. In addition it should be emphasized that the IDF only uses weapons in accordance with the international law.
Of course, new weapons that are still experimental aren't yet banned under international law. And the weight of Israeli denials is light. For anyone following the news longer than a brief media spin cycle should remember that mere months ago the Lebanese government accused Israel of dropping cluster bombs and using white phosphorous explosives against civilians. Bonus: the Italian team that uncovered the weapons experimentation in Gaza was the same team that uncovered that the U.S. Army had similarly used phosphorous weapons against civillians in Iraq, then denied it. And indeed, when being questioned by the Israeli Knesset over the DIME allegations in Gaza, the Israeli army admitted it had, indeed, been using white phosphorous—a horrific chemical weapon of mass destruction that causes wounds to burn when exposed to air—on Lebanese civilians despite initial denials.
"Any weapon that is not exact should not be used in areas where civilians can suffer. Phosphorous and clusters in some cases can be considered legal," Shabtai Gold, the spokesman for Physicians for Human Rights-Israel, told me. "The problem is that civilians are suffering, especially from the later, as they continue to blow up and harm civilians even after the fighting is over."
On top of all that, new allegations have come out that Israel used radioactive uranium explosives, also experimental, in an attacks on civilian targets in Lebanon. Soil samples processed by scientists studying the ecological impact of Israel's war against Lebanon found inexplicable radiation levels and the presence of uranium-235. The Israeli army again issued a non-denial, saying only that "All the arms and ammunition that we use are legal and conform to international laws."
Robert Fisk, one of the most experienced English-language reporters in the Middle East, offers the historical perspective and comments that this is neither the first time that Israel has lied about its weapons nor the first time it has used Lebanese civilians as live guinea pigs for its weapons:
Israel has a poor reputation for telling the truth about its use of weapons in Lebanon. In 1982, it denied using phosphorous munitions on civilian areas—until journalists discovered dying and dead civilians whose wounds caught fire when exposed to air.
I saw two dead babies who, when taken from a mortuary drawer in West Beirut during the Israeli siege of the city, suddenly burst back into flames. Israel officially denied using phosphorous again in Lebanon during the summer—except for "marking" targets—even after civilians were photographed in Lebanese hospitals with burn wounds consistent with phosphorous munitions.
I asked Ali Abunimah, a Palestinian-American journalist (and author of the new book One Country: A Bold Proposal To End The Israeli-Palestinian Impasse) to help me understand the context of Israel's use of experimental weapons on civilian populations and how it gets away with it.
"Lying is routine procedure for the Israeli army," he said. "Since the beginning of Intifada in excess of 4,000 Palestinians have been killed. Whenever a Palestinian is killed the Israelis say they were somehow causing a threat to Israel—but almost none of those deaths are investigated. In the rare cases where they are investigated they usually involve foreigners, like Tom Hurndall or Rachel Corrie, and when they are investigated the initial Israeli claims almost always turns out to be a lie."
I asked him whether he thought Israel was being held to "unfair" standards compared to other countries, and he pointed out that when Austria allowed Jorg Haider's freedom party to join its government, it faced diplomatic "sanctions" from the European Union, while not a peep has been raised about Avigdor Lieberman's Yisrael Beiteinu party.
"Look at the extreme example of Iraq," he said. "In 2003 Iraq was invaded and occupied because of the use of weapons of mass destruction against civilians. Leaving the invasion and occupation aside, the U.N. imposed the most stringent sanctions it could for decades on Iraq, which starved hundreds of thousands ostensibly to make Iraq comply with international laws."
My final question for him was the one I had been wrestling with myself: What conceivable reason could Israel have for using such tactics, clearly in violation of the Geneva conventions and international law, which require that the utmost care be used to protect civilians?
"I don't know, because I can't enter into the minds of such people, obviously. It's all beyond comprehension," he replied. "But one reason might be that the goal is to terrorize the population. By terrorizing them they hope to convince them to submit. Israel knows nothing it has done so far is getting people to submit. I'm speculating that reports of these new exotic and horrifying weapons will spread and have a terrorizing effect. That's consistent with Israel's statements that it bombards Gaza to convince the civilian population to remove their leadership."
Using weapons of mass destruction in attempt to convince civilian targets to change governments or political goals?
Hezbollah and al-Qaida and Islamic Jihad, of course, also do terrible things and comment acts of terror. But as Abunimah and others have pointed out, they don't do it with weapons not sold to the Israeli government but actually given them, in the form of $2.3 billion in U.S. taxpayer money that goes to outright grants of military aid to Israel—of which, by law, 74 percent must be spent right back on U.S.-manufactured arms.
The U.S. Arms Export Control Law expressly requires military items transferred to foreign governments by the United States be used solely for internal security and legitimate self-defense.
Is that really what's going on? Is anyone even asking whether our closest ally is violating U.S. law in addition to international law?
First came Italian television's Rai24News October 11 report on "inexplicable wounds and new weapons" in Gaza. Alongside a piece by Meron Rapoport in Ha'aretz, it details the growing evidence from Palestinian hospitals that Israel is testing a "dense inert metal explosive" (DIME) device in Gaza. It was followed a week later by an investigation in the British Guardian.
All three investigations feature doctors explaining horrific and mysterious new wounds appearing in Gaza hospitals after Israeli drone attacks:
"Bodies arrived severely fragmented, melted and disfigured," said Jumaa Saqa'a, a doctor at Shifa hospital, the main casualty hospital in Gaza City. "We found internal burning of organs, while externally there were minute pieces of shrapnel. When we opened many of the injured people we found dusting on the internal organs." ...
"You have complete burns that lead to amputation. You find shrapnel entering the body and leaving very, very small holes. We have never seen this before," said Khalid Radi, a spokesman at the health ministry.
Research on DIME weapons in the United States found that the tungsten fragments used in the bombs caused 92 out of 92 rats in a test to develop cancerous tumors (that's 100 percent for those of you following along at home). The Israeli army denies using DIME weapons with its standard claptrap:
Due to operational reasons, the IDF cannot specify the types and use of weapons in its possession. In addition it should be emphasized that the IDF only uses weapons in accordance with the international law.
Of course, new weapons that are still experimental aren't yet banned under international law. And the weight of Israeli denials is light. For anyone following the news longer than a brief media spin cycle should remember that mere months ago the Lebanese government accused Israel of dropping cluster bombs and using white phosphorous explosives against civilians. Bonus: the Italian team that uncovered the weapons experimentation in Gaza was the same team that uncovered that the U.S. Army had similarly used phosphorous weapons against civillians in Iraq, then denied it. And indeed, when being questioned by the Israeli Knesset over the DIME allegations in Gaza, the Israeli army admitted it had, indeed, been using white phosphorous—a horrific chemical weapon of mass destruction that causes wounds to burn when exposed to air—on Lebanese civilians despite initial denials.
"Any weapon that is not exact should not be used in areas where civilians can suffer. Phosphorous and clusters in some cases can be considered legal," Shabtai Gold, the spokesman for Physicians for Human Rights-Israel, told me. "The problem is that civilians are suffering, especially from the later, as they continue to blow up and harm civilians even after the fighting is over."
On top of all that, new allegations have come out that Israel used radioactive uranium explosives, also experimental, in an attacks on civilian targets in Lebanon. Soil samples processed by scientists studying the ecological impact of Israel's war against Lebanon found inexplicable radiation levels and the presence of uranium-235. The Israeli army again issued a non-denial, saying only that "All the arms and ammunition that we use are legal and conform to international laws."
Robert Fisk, one of the most experienced English-language reporters in the Middle East, offers the historical perspective and comments that this is neither the first time that Israel has lied about its weapons nor the first time it has used Lebanese civilians as live guinea pigs for its weapons:
Israel has a poor reputation for telling the truth about its use of weapons in Lebanon. In 1982, it denied using phosphorous munitions on civilian areas—until journalists discovered dying and dead civilians whose wounds caught fire when exposed to air.
I saw two dead babies who, when taken from a mortuary drawer in West Beirut during the Israeli siege of the city, suddenly burst back into flames. Israel officially denied using phosphorous again in Lebanon during the summer—except for "marking" targets—even after civilians were photographed in Lebanese hospitals with burn wounds consistent with phosphorous munitions.
I asked Ali Abunimah, a Palestinian-American journalist (and author of the new book One Country: A Bold Proposal To End The Israeli-Palestinian Impasse) to help me understand the context of Israel's use of experimental weapons on civilian populations and how it gets away with it.
"Lying is routine procedure for the Israeli army," he said. "Since the beginning of Intifada in excess of 4,000 Palestinians have been killed. Whenever a Palestinian is killed the Israelis say they were somehow causing a threat to Israel—but almost none of those deaths are investigated. In the rare cases where they are investigated they usually involve foreigners, like Tom Hurndall or Rachel Corrie, and when they are investigated the initial Israeli claims almost always turns out to be a lie."
I asked him whether he thought Israel was being held to "unfair" standards compared to other countries, and he pointed out that when Austria allowed Jorg Haider's freedom party to join its government, it faced diplomatic "sanctions" from the European Union, while not a peep has been raised about Avigdor Lieberman's Yisrael Beiteinu party.
"Look at the extreme example of Iraq," he said. "In 2003 Iraq was invaded and occupied because of the use of weapons of mass destruction against civilians. Leaving the invasion and occupation aside, the U.N. imposed the most stringent sanctions it could for decades on Iraq, which starved hundreds of thousands ostensibly to make Iraq comply with international laws."
My final question for him was the one I had been wrestling with myself: What conceivable reason could Israel have for using such tactics, clearly in violation of the Geneva conventions and international law, which require that the utmost care be used to protect civilians?
"I don't know, because I can't enter into the minds of such people, obviously. It's all beyond comprehension," he replied. "But one reason might be that the goal is to terrorize the population. By terrorizing them they hope to convince them to submit. Israel knows nothing it has done so far is getting people to submit. I'm speculating that reports of these new exotic and horrifying weapons will spread and have a terrorizing effect. That's consistent with Israel's statements that it bombards Gaza to convince the civilian population to remove their leadership."
Using weapons of mass destruction in attempt to convince civilian targets to change governments or political goals?
Hezbollah and al-Qaida and Islamic Jihad, of course, also do terrible things and comment acts of terror. But as Abunimah and others have pointed out, they don't do it with weapons not sold to the Israeli government but actually given them, in the form of $2.3 billion in U.S. taxpayer money that goes to outright grants of military aid to Israel—of which, by law, 74 percent must be spent right back on U.S.-manufactured arms.
The U.S. Arms Export Control Law expressly requires military items transferred to foreign governments by the United States be used solely for internal security and legitimate self-defense.
Is that really what's going on? Is anyone even asking whether our closest ally is violating U.S. law in addition to international law?
Election Protection
After 2000 and 2004, the American people have little reason for faith in the integrity of our voting process. Still, with the undeniable knowledge that every single issue we care about is deeply effected by what happens at the polls November 7, folks are out there registering, educating and mobilizing voters. This is the time to stand up for the people's right to vote. We need to know: are you able to take action to protect voter's rights on Election Day? Sign up to be part of our Election Protection Rapid Response Team and we will text you if there is a need for action in your area. The best direct action experts in the country will be on call to create responsive media events. (Partners: Ruckus, Working Assets, Video the Vote, Music For America, NHHPC, League)
All video in this animation is from the amazing documentary "AMERICAN BLACKOUT"
After 2000 and 2004, the American people have little reason for faith in the integrity of our voting process. Still, with the undeniable knowledge that every single issue we care about is deeply effected by what happens at the polls November 7, folks are out there registering, educating and mobilizing voters. This is the time to stand up for the people's right to vote. We need to know: are you able to take action to protect voter's rights on Election Day? Sign up to be part of our Election Protection Rapid Response Team and we will text you if there is a need for action in your area. The best direct action experts in the country will be on call to create responsive media events. (Partners: Ruckus, Working Assets, Video the Vote, Music For America, NHHPC, League)
All video in this animation is from the amazing documentary "AMERICAN BLACKOUT"
Check it out at www.americanblackout.com
After 2000 and 2004, the American people have little reason for faith in the integrity of our voting process. Still, with the undeniable knowledge that every single issue we care about is deeply effected by what happens at the polls November 7, folks are out there registering, educating and mobilizing voters. This is the time to stand up for the people's right to vote. We need to know: are you able to take action to protect voter's rights on Election Day? Sign up to be part of our Election Protection Rapid Response Team and we will text you if there is a need for action in your area. The best direct action experts in the country will be on call to create responsive media events. (Partners: Ruckus, Working Assets, Video the Vote, Music For America, NHHPC, League)
All video in this animation is from the amazing documentary "AMERICAN BLACKOUT"
After 2000 and 2004, the American people have little reason for faith in the integrity of our voting process. Still, with the undeniable knowledge that every single issue we care about is deeply effected by what happens at the polls November 7, folks are out there registering, educating and mobilizing voters. This is the time to stand up for the people's right to vote. We need to know: are you able to take action to protect voter's rights on Election Day? Sign up to be part of our Election Protection Rapid Response Team and we will text you if there is a need for action in your area. The best direct action experts in the country will be on call to create responsive media events. (Partners: Ruckus, Working Assets, Video the Vote, Music For America, NHHPC, League)
All video in this animation is from the amazing documentary "AMERICAN BLACKOUT"
Check it out at www.americanblackout.com
Monday, October 30, 2006
A Call from the Zapatistas: Oaxaca Is Not Alone - Shut-Down of Roads, Highways and the Media on November 1; General Strike Called for November 20
By the Sixth Commission of the EZLN
The Other Mexico
October 30, 2006
Message from the
CLANDESTINE REVOLUTIONARY INDIGENOUS COMMITTEE-GENERAL COMMAND
of the
ZAPATISTA ARMY OF NATIONAL LIBERATION
MEXICO.
October 30, 2006.
To the people of Mexico:
To the people of the world:
To the Other Campaign in Mexico and the other side of the Rio Grande:
To the entire Sixth International:
Compañeros and compañeras:
Brothers and sisters:
It is now known publicly that yesterday, 29th of October 2006, Vicente Fox’s federal forces attacked the people of Oaxaca and its most legitimate representative, the Popular Assembly of the Peoples of Oaxaca (APPO).
Today, the federal troops have assassinated at least 3 people, among them a minor, leaving dozens of wounded, including many women from Oaxaca. Dozens of detainees were illegally transported to military prisons. All this comes in addition to the existing total of deaths, detainees and missing persons since the beginning of the mobilization demanding that Ulises Ruiz step down as Oaxaca’s governor.
The sole objective of the federal attack is to maintain Ulises Ruiz in power and to destroy the popular grassroots organization of the people of Oaxaca.
Oaxaca’s people are resisting. Not one single honest person can remain quiet and unmoved while the entire society, of which the majority are indigenous, is murdered, beaten and jailed.
We, the Zapatistas, will not be silent; we will mobilize to support our brothers, sisters and comrades in Oaxaca.
The EZLN’s Sixth Commission has already consulted the Zapatista leadership and the following has been decided:
First: During whole day of November 1, 2006, the major and minor roads that cross Zapatistas territories in the southwestern state of Chiapas will be closed.
Consequently, we ask that everyone avoid traveling by these roads in Chiapas on this day and that one make the necessary arrangements in order to do so.
Second: through the Sixth Commission, the EZLN has begun making contact and consulting other political and social organizations, groups, collectives and individuals in the Other Campaign, in order to coordinate joint solidarity actions across Mexico, leading to a nationwide shut-down on the 20th of November, 2006.
Third: the EZLN calls out to the Other Campaign in Mexico and north of the Rio Grande, so that these November 1st mobilizations happen wherever possible, completely, partially, at intervals or symbolically shutting down the major artery roads, streets, toll booths, stations, airports and commercial media.
Fourth: The central message that the Zapatistas send and will continue sending is that the people of Oaxaca are not alone: They are not alone!
Ulises Ruiz out of Oaxaca!
Immediate withdrawal of the occupying federal forces from Oaxaca!
Immediate and unconditional freedom for all detainees!
Cancel all arrest warrants!
Punish the murderers!
Justice!
Freedom!
Democracy!
From the North of Mexico.
For the Clandestine Revolutionary Indigenous Committee-General Command of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation.
For the EZLN Sixth Commission.
Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos
Mexico, October, 2006.
Translation: Radio Pacheco
-----------------------------------------------------------
COMUNICADO DEL COMITÉ CLANDESTINO REVOLUCIONARIO INDÍGENA – COMANDANCIA GENERAL DEL EJÉRCITO ZAPATISTA DE LIBERACIÓN NACIONAL.
MÉXICO.
30 DE OCTUBRE DEL 2006.
AL PUEBLO DE MÉXICO:
A LOS PUEBLOS DEL MUNDO:
A TODA LA OTRA EN MÉXICO Y AL NORTE DEL RÍO BRAVO:
A TODA LA SEXTA INTERNACIONAL:
COMPAÑEROS Y COMPAÑERAS:
HERMANAS Y HERMANOS:
COMO ES DE CONOCIMIENTO PÚBLICO, EL DÍA DE AYER, 29 DE OCTUBRE DEL 2006, LAS FUERZAS FEDERALES DEL GOBIERNO DE VICENTE FOX, ATACARON AL PUEBLO DE OAXACA Y A SU MÁS DIGNA REPRESENTANTE, LA ASAMBLEA POPULAR DE LOS PUEBLOS DE OAXACA, LA APPO.
HASTA EL DÍA DE HOY, LOS FEDERALES HAN ASESINADO A CUANDO MENOS TRES PERSONAS, ENTRE ELLAS UN MENOR DE EDAD; DEJADO DECENAS DE PERSONAS HERIDAS, ENTRE ELLAS VARIAS MUJERES OAXAQUEÑAS; Y DECENAS DE DETENIDOS QUE FUERON TRASLADADOS ILEGALMENTE A PRISIONES MILITARES. A TODO ESTO SE SUMAN LOS MUERTOS, DETENIDOS Y DESAPARECIDOS DESDE EL INICIO DE LA MOVILIZACIÓN QUE DEMANDA LA SALIDA DE ULISES RUIZ DEL GOBIERNO DE OAXACA.
LA ATAQUE FEDERAL NO TIENE MÁS OBJETIVO QUE MANTENER A ULISES RUIZ EN EL PODER Y DESTRUIR LA ORGANIZACIÓN POPULAR DE LOS DE ABAJO DE OAXACA.
EL PUEBLO DE OAXACA RESISTE. NINGUNA PERSONA HONESTA PUEDE PERMANECER EN SILENCIO E INMÓVIL MIENTRAS TODO UN PUEBLO, MAYORITARIAMENTE INDÍGENA, ES ASESINADO, GOLPEADO Y ENCARCELADO.
NOSOTROS, NOSOTRAS, LAS ZAPATISTAS, LOS ZAPATISTAS, NO CALLAREMOS Y NOS MOVILIZAREMOS EN APOYO AL PUEBLO HERMANO Y COMPAÑERO DE OAXACA.
LA COMISIÓN SEXTA DEL EZLN HA CONSULTADO YA A LA DIRECCIÓN ZAPATISTA Y SE HA DECIDIDO LO SIGUIENTE:
PRIMERO.- DURANTE TODO EL DÍA PRIMERO DE NOVIEMBRE DEL 2006, SERÁN CERRADAS LAS CARRETERAS Y CAMINOS QUE ATRAVIESAN LOS TERRITORIOS DONDE EL EZLN MANTIENE PRESENCIA EN EL SURORIENTAL ESTADO DE CHIAPAS.
EN CONSECUENCIA, EXHORTAMOS A TOD@S A QUE SE ABSTENGAN DE TRANSITAR POR LAS CARRETERAS DE CHIAPAS ESE DÍA Y TOMEN LAS PROVIDENCIAS NECESARIAS PARA ELLO.
SEGUNDO.- A TRAVÉS DE SU COMISIÓN SEXTA, EL EZLN HA INICIADO CONTACTOS Y CONSULTAS CON OTRAS ORGANIZACIONES POLÍTICAS Y SOCIALES, ASÍ COMO CON GRUPOS, COLECTIVOS Y PERSONAS DE LA OTRA CAMPAÑA, PARA INICIAR JORNADAS DE SOLIDARIDAD CON OAXACA Y CONVOCAR DE FORMA CONJUNTA A TODO EL MÉXICO DE ABAJO A REALIZAR UN PARO NACIONAL EL DÍA 20 DE NOVIEMBRE DEL 2006.
TERCERO.- EL EZLN HACE UN LLAMADO A LA OTRA CAMPAÑA EN MÉXICO Y AL NORTE DEL RÍO BRAVO, PARA QUE ESTE PRIMERO DE NOVIEMBRE DEL 2006 SE MOVILICE, DONDE SEA POSIBLE, CERRANDO DE MANERA TOTAL, PARCIAL O INTERMITENTE, REAL O SIMBÓLICAMENTE, LAS CALLES, CAMINOS, CARRETERAS, CASETAS, ESTACIONES, AEROPUERTOS Y CUALQUIER MEDIO DE COMUNICACIÓN.
CUARTO.- EL MENSAJE QUE LOS ZAPATISTAS, LAS ZAPATISTAS MANDAMOS Y MANDAREMOS AL PUEBLO DE OAXACA ES UNO SOLO: NO ESTÁN SOLOS, NO ESTÁN SOLAS.
¡FUERA ULISES RUIZ DE OAXACA!
¡RETIRO INMEDIATO DE LAS FUERZAS FEDERALES DE OCUPACIÓN EN TERRITORIO OAXAQUEÑO!
¡LIBERTAD INMEDIATA E INCONDICIONAL A TOD@S L@S DETENID@S!
¡CANCELACIÓN DE TODAS LAS ÓRDENES DE APREHENSIÓN!
¡CASTIGO A LOS ASESINOS!
¡JUSTICIA!
¡LIBERTAD!
¡DEMOCRACIA!
Desde el norte de México.
Por el Comité Clandestino Revolucionario Indígena – Comandancia General del Ejército Zapatista de Liberación Nacional.
Por la Comisión Sexta del EZLN.
Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos.
México, Octubre del 2006.
------------------------------------------------------
Appello dell'EZLN: Oaxaca non è sola
Chiusura di strade, autostrade e mezzi di comunicazione il 1 novembre; sciopero nazionale il 20 novembre
di Commissione Sesta dell'EZLN
L'Altro Messico
30 ottobre 2006
COMUNICATO DEL COMITATO CLANDESTINO RIVOLUZIONARIO INDIGENO – COMANDO GENERALE DELL’ESERCITO ZAPATISTA DI LIBERAZIONE NAZIONALE
MESSICO
30 OTTOBRE 2006
AL POPOLO DEL MESSICO:
AI POPOLI DEL MONDO:
A TUTTA L’ALTRA IN MESSICO E AL NORD DEL RÍO BRAVO:
A TUTTA LA SESTA INTERNAZIONALE:
COMPAGNI E COMPAGNE:
SORELLE E FRATELLI:
COME È DI CONOSCENZA PUBBLICA, IERI, 29 OTTOBRE 2006, LE FORZE FEDERALI DEL GOVERNO DI VICENTE FOX HANNO ATTACCATO IL POPOLO DI OAXACA E LA SUA PIÙ DEGNA RAPPRESENTANTE, L’ASSEMBLEA POPOLARE DEI POPOLI DI OAXACA, LA APPO.
FINO AD OGGI, I FEDERALI HANNO ASSASSINATO ALMENO TRE PERSONE, TRA ESSE UN MINORENNE; LASCIATO DECINE DI PERSONE FERITE, TRA LE QUALI DIVERSE DONNE OAXAQUEÑAS; E DECINE DI ARRESTATI CHE SONO STATI TRASFERITI ILLEGALMENTE IN PRIGIONI MILITARI. A TUTTO QUESTO SI SOMMANO I MORTI, ARRESTATI E DESAPARECIDOS DALL’INIZIO DELLA MOBILITAZIONE CHE CHIEDE LE DIMISSIONI DI ULISES RUIZ DAL GOVERNO DI OAXACA.
L’ATTACCO FEDERALE NON HA ALTRO OBIETTIVO CHE QUELLO DI MANTENERE ULISES RUIZ AL POTERE E DISTRUGGERE L’ORGANIZZAZIONE POPOLARE DI QUELLI CHE STANNO IN BASSO A OAXACA.
IL POPOLO DI OAXACA RESISTE. NESSUNA PERSONA ONESTA PUÒ RESTARE IN SILENZIO ED IMMOBILE MENTRE TUTTO UN POPOLO, IN MAGGIORANZA INDIGENO, VIENE ASSASSINATO, PICCHIATO ED IMPRIGIONATO.
NOI, ZAPATISTE, ZAPATISTI, NON TACEREMO E CI MOBILITEREMO IN APPOGGIO AL POPOLO FRATELLO E COMPAGNO DI OAXACA.
LA COMMISSIONE SESTA DELL’EZLN HA CONSULTATO LA DIREZIONE ZAPATISTA E SI È DECISO QUANTO SEGUE:
PRIMO.- PER TUTTO IL GIORNO PRIMO DI NOVEMBRE 2006 SARANNO CHIUSE TUTTE LE STRADE CHE ATRAVERSANO I TERRITORI DOVE L’EZLN MANTIENE LA SUA PRESENZA NELLO STATO SUDORIENTALE DEL CHIAPAS.
IN CONSEGUENZA DI QUESTO, ESORTIAMO TUTT@ AD ASTENERSI DAL TRANSITARE PER LE STRADE DEL CHIAPAS PER QUEL GIORNO E PRENDANO LE MISURE NECESSARIE PER CIÒ.
SECONDO. – ATTRAVERSO LA SUA COMMISSIONE SESTA, L’EZLN HA INIZIATO CONTATTI E CONSULTAZIONI CON ALTRE ORGANIZZAZIONI POLITICHE E SOCIALI, COSÌ COME CON GRUPPI, COLLETTIVI E PERSONE DELL’ALTRA CAMPAGNA, PER LANCIARE GIORNATE DI SOLIDARIETÀ CON OAXACA ED INVITARE IN MANIERA CONGIUNTA TUTTO IL MESSICO DEL BASSO A REALIZZARE UNO SCIOPERO NAZIONALE IL GIORNO 20 NOVEMBRE 2006.
TERZO. – L’EZLN RIVOLGE UN APPELLO ALL’ALTRA CAMPAGNA IN MESSICO E AL NORD DEL RÍO BRAVO, AFFINCHÉ QUESTO PRIMO DI NOVEMBRE DEL 2006 SI MOBILITI, DOVE SIA POSSIBILE, CHIUDENDO IN MANIERA TOTALE, PARZIALE O INTERMITTENTE, REALMENTE O SIMBOLICAMENTE, STRADE, AUTOSTRADE, CASELLI, STAZIONI, AEROPORTI E QUALUNQUE MEZZO DI COMUNICAZIONE.
QUARTO. – IL MESSAGGIO CHE GLI ZAPATISTI, LE ZAPATISTE, MNDIAMO E MANDEREMO AL POPOLO DI OAXACA È UNO SOLO: NON SIETE SOLI, NON SIETE SOLE.
FUORI ULISES RUIZ DA OAXACA!
RITIRO IMMEDIATO DELLE FORZE FEDERALI DI OCCUPAZIONE IN TERRITORIO OAXAQUEÑO!
LIBERTÀ IMMEDIATA ED INCONDIZIONATA DI TUTT@ I/LE DETENUT@!
CANCELLAZIONE DI TUTTI I MANDATI DI CATTURA!
PUNIZIONE PER GLI ASSASSINI!
GIUSTIZIA!
LIBERTÀ!
DEMOCRAZIA!
Dal nord del Messico.
Per il Comitato Clandestino Rivoluzionario Indigeno – Comando Generale dell’Esercito Zapatista di Liberazione Nazionale.
Per la Commissione Sesta dell’EZLN.
Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos
Messico,Ottobre 2006
The Other Mexico
October 30, 2006
Message from the
CLANDESTINE REVOLUTIONARY INDIGENOUS COMMITTEE-GENERAL COMMAND
of the
ZAPATISTA ARMY OF NATIONAL LIBERATION
MEXICO.
October 30, 2006.
To the people of Mexico:
To the people of the world:
To the Other Campaign in Mexico and the other side of the Rio Grande:
To the entire Sixth International:
Compañeros and compañeras:
Brothers and sisters:
It is now known publicly that yesterday, 29th of October 2006, Vicente Fox’s federal forces attacked the people of Oaxaca and its most legitimate representative, the Popular Assembly of the Peoples of Oaxaca (APPO).
Today, the federal troops have assassinated at least 3 people, among them a minor, leaving dozens of wounded, including many women from Oaxaca. Dozens of detainees were illegally transported to military prisons. All this comes in addition to the existing total of deaths, detainees and missing persons since the beginning of the mobilization demanding that Ulises Ruiz step down as Oaxaca’s governor.
The sole objective of the federal attack is to maintain Ulises Ruiz in power and to destroy the popular grassroots organization of the people of Oaxaca.
Oaxaca’s people are resisting. Not one single honest person can remain quiet and unmoved while the entire society, of which the majority are indigenous, is murdered, beaten and jailed.
We, the Zapatistas, will not be silent; we will mobilize to support our brothers, sisters and comrades in Oaxaca.
The EZLN’s Sixth Commission has already consulted the Zapatista leadership and the following has been decided:
First: During whole day of November 1, 2006, the major and minor roads that cross Zapatistas territories in the southwestern state of Chiapas will be closed.
Consequently, we ask that everyone avoid traveling by these roads in Chiapas on this day and that one make the necessary arrangements in order to do so.
Second: through the Sixth Commission, the EZLN has begun making contact and consulting other political and social organizations, groups, collectives and individuals in the Other Campaign, in order to coordinate joint solidarity actions across Mexico, leading to a nationwide shut-down on the 20th of November, 2006.
Third: the EZLN calls out to the Other Campaign in Mexico and north of the Rio Grande, so that these November 1st mobilizations happen wherever possible, completely, partially, at intervals or symbolically shutting down the major artery roads, streets, toll booths, stations, airports and commercial media.
Fourth: The central message that the Zapatistas send and will continue sending is that the people of Oaxaca are not alone: They are not alone!
Ulises Ruiz out of Oaxaca!
Immediate withdrawal of the occupying federal forces from Oaxaca!
Immediate and unconditional freedom for all detainees!
Cancel all arrest warrants!
Punish the murderers!
Justice!
Freedom!
Democracy!
From the North of Mexico.
For the Clandestine Revolutionary Indigenous Committee-General Command of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation.
For the EZLN Sixth Commission.
Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos
Mexico, October, 2006.
Translation: Radio Pacheco
-----------------------------------------------------------
COMUNICADO DEL COMITÉ CLANDESTINO REVOLUCIONARIO INDÍGENA – COMANDANCIA GENERAL DEL EJÉRCITO ZAPATISTA DE LIBERACIÓN NACIONAL.
MÉXICO.
30 DE OCTUBRE DEL 2006.
AL PUEBLO DE MÉXICO:
A LOS PUEBLOS DEL MUNDO:
A TODA LA OTRA EN MÉXICO Y AL NORTE DEL RÍO BRAVO:
A TODA LA SEXTA INTERNACIONAL:
COMPAÑEROS Y COMPAÑERAS:
HERMANAS Y HERMANOS:
COMO ES DE CONOCIMIENTO PÚBLICO, EL DÍA DE AYER, 29 DE OCTUBRE DEL 2006, LAS FUERZAS FEDERALES DEL GOBIERNO DE VICENTE FOX, ATACARON AL PUEBLO DE OAXACA Y A SU MÁS DIGNA REPRESENTANTE, LA ASAMBLEA POPULAR DE LOS PUEBLOS DE OAXACA, LA APPO.
HASTA EL DÍA DE HOY, LOS FEDERALES HAN ASESINADO A CUANDO MENOS TRES PERSONAS, ENTRE ELLAS UN MENOR DE EDAD; DEJADO DECENAS DE PERSONAS HERIDAS, ENTRE ELLAS VARIAS MUJERES OAXAQUEÑAS; Y DECENAS DE DETENIDOS QUE FUERON TRASLADADOS ILEGALMENTE A PRISIONES MILITARES. A TODO ESTO SE SUMAN LOS MUERTOS, DETENIDOS Y DESAPARECIDOS DESDE EL INICIO DE LA MOVILIZACIÓN QUE DEMANDA LA SALIDA DE ULISES RUIZ DEL GOBIERNO DE OAXACA.
LA ATAQUE FEDERAL NO TIENE MÁS OBJETIVO QUE MANTENER A ULISES RUIZ EN EL PODER Y DESTRUIR LA ORGANIZACIÓN POPULAR DE LOS DE ABAJO DE OAXACA.
EL PUEBLO DE OAXACA RESISTE. NINGUNA PERSONA HONESTA PUEDE PERMANECER EN SILENCIO E INMÓVIL MIENTRAS TODO UN PUEBLO, MAYORITARIAMENTE INDÍGENA, ES ASESINADO, GOLPEADO Y ENCARCELADO.
NOSOTROS, NOSOTRAS, LAS ZAPATISTAS, LOS ZAPATISTAS, NO CALLAREMOS Y NOS MOVILIZAREMOS EN APOYO AL PUEBLO HERMANO Y COMPAÑERO DE OAXACA.
LA COMISIÓN SEXTA DEL EZLN HA CONSULTADO YA A LA DIRECCIÓN ZAPATISTA Y SE HA DECIDIDO LO SIGUIENTE:
PRIMERO.- DURANTE TODO EL DÍA PRIMERO DE NOVIEMBRE DEL 2006, SERÁN CERRADAS LAS CARRETERAS Y CAMINOS QUE ATRAVIESAN LOS TERRITORIOS DONDE EL EZLN MANTIENE PRESENCIA EN EL SURORIENTAL ESTADO DE CHIAPAS.
EN CONSECUENCIA, EXHORTAMOS A TOD@S A QUE SE ABSTENGAN DE TRANSITAR POR LAS CARRETERAS DE CHIAPAS ESE DÍA Y TOMEN LAS PROVIDENCIAS NECESARIAS PARA ELLO.
SEGUNDO.- A TRAVÉS DE SU COMISIÓN SEXTA, EL EZLN HA INICIADO CONTACTOS Y CONSULTAS CON OTRAS ORGANIZACIONES POLÍTICAS Y SOCIALES, ASÍ COMO CON GRUPOS, COLECTIVOS Y PERSONAS DE LA OTRA CAMPAÑA, PARA INICIAR JORNADAS DE SOLIDARIDAD CON OAXACA Y CONVOCAR DE FORMA CONJUNTA A TODO EL MÉXICO DE ABAJO A REALIZAR UN PARO NACIONAL EL DÍA 20 DE NOVIEMBRE DEL 2006.
TERCERO.- EL EZLN HACE UN LLAMADO A LA OTRA CAMPAÑA EN MÉXICO Y AL NORTE DEL RÍO BRAVO, PARA QUE ESTE PRIMERO DE NOVIEMBRE DEL 2006 SE MOVILICE, DONDE SEA POSIBLE, CERRANDO DE MANERA TOTAL, PARCIAL O INTERMITENTE, REAL O SIMBÓLICAMENTE, LAS CALLES, CAMINOS, CARRETERAS, CASETAS, ESTACIONES, AEROPUERTOS Y CUALQUIER MEDIO DE COMUNICACIÓN.
CUARTO.- EL MENSAJE QUE LOS ZAPATISTAS, LAS ZAPATISTAS MANDAMOS Y MANDAREMOS AL PUEBLO DE OAXACA ES UNO SOLO: NO ESTÁN SOLOS, NO ESTÁN SOLAS.
¡FUERA ULISES RUIZ DE OAXACA!
¡RETIRO INMEDIATO DE LAS FUERZAS FEDERALES DE OCUPACIÓN EN TERRITORIO OAXAQUEÑO!
¡LIBERTAD INMEDIATA E INCONDICIONAL A TOD@S L@S DETENID@S!
¡CANCELACIÓN DE TODAS LAS ÓRDENES DE APREHENSIÓN!
¡CASTIGO A LOS ASESINOS!
¡JUSTICIA!
¡LIBERTAD!
¡DEMOCRACIA!
Desde el norte de México.
Por el Comité Clandestino Revolucionario Indígena – Comandancia General del Ejército Zapatista de Liberación Nacional.
Por la Comisión Sexta del EZLN.
Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos.
México, Octubre del 2006.
------------------------------------------------------
Appello dell'EZLN: Oaxaca non è sola
Chiusura di strade, autostrade e mezzi di comunicazione il 1 novembre; sciopero nazionale il 20 novembre
di Commissione Sesta dell'EZLN
L'Altro Messico
30 ottobre 2006
COMUNICATO DEL COMITATO CLANDESTINO RIVOLUZIONARIO INDIGENO – COMANDO GENERALE DELL’ESERCITO ZAPATISTA DI LIBERAZIONE NAZIONALE
MESSICO
30 OTTOBRE 2006
AL POPOLO DEL MESSICO:
AI POPOLI DEL MONDO:
A TUTTA L’ALTRA IN MESSICO E AL NORD DEL RÍO BRAVO:
A TUTTA LA SESTA INTERNAZIONALE:
COMPAGNI E COMPAGNE:
SORELLE E FRATELLI:
COME È DI CONOSCENZA PUBBLICA, IERI, 29 OTTOBRE 2006, LE FORZE FEDERALI DEL GOVERNO DI VICENTE FOX HANNO ATTACCATO IL POPOLO DI OAXACA E LA SUA PIÙ DEGNA RAPPRESENTANTE, L’ASSEMBLEA POPOLARE DEI POPOLI DI OAXACA, LA APPO.
FINO AD OGGI, I FEDERALI HANNO ASSASSINATO ALMENO TRE PERSONE, TRA ESSE UN MINORENNE; LASCIATO DECINE DI PERSONE FERITE, TRA LE QUALI DIVERSE DONNE OAXAQUEÑAS; E DECINE DI ARRESTATI CHE SONO STATI TRASFERITI ILLEGALMENTE IN PRIGIONI MILITARI. A TUTTO QUESTO SI SOMMANO I MORTI, ARRESTATI E DESAPARECIDOS DALL’INIZIO DELLA MOBILITAZIONE CHE CHIEDE LE DIMISSIONI DI ULISES RUIZ DAL GOVERNO DI OAXACA.
L’ATTACCO FEDERALE NON HA ALTRO OBIETTIVO CHE QUELLO DI MANTENERE ULISES RUIZ AL POTERE E DISTRUGGERE L’ORGANIZZAZIONE POPOLARE DI QUELLI CHE STANNO IN BASSO A OAXACA.
IL POPOLO DI OAXACA RESISTE. NESSUNA PERSONA ONESTA PUÒ RESTARE IN SILENZIO ED IMMOBILE MENTRE TUTTO UN POPOLO, IN MAGGIORANZA INDIGENO, VIENE ASSASSINATO, PICCHIATO ED IMPRIGIONATO.
NOI, ZAPATISTE, ZAPATISTI, NON TACEREMO E CI MOBILITEREMO IN APPOGGIO AL POPOLO FRATELLO E COMPAGNO DI OAXACA.
LA COMMISSIONE SESTA DELL’EZLN HA CONSULTATO LA DIREZIONE ZAPATISTA E SI È DECISO QUANTO SEGUE:
PRIMO.- PER TUTTO IL GIORNO PRIMO DI NOVEMBRE 2006 SARANNO CHIUSE TUTTE LE STRADE CHE ATRAVERSANO I TERRITORI DOVE L’EZLN MANTIENE LA SUA PRESENZA NELLO STATO SUDORIENTALE DEL CHIAPAS.
IN CONSEGUENZA DI QUESTO, ESORTIAMO TUTT@ AD ASTENERSI DAL TRANSITARE PER LE STRADE DEL CHIAPAS PER QUEL GIORNO E PRENDANO LE MISURE NECESSARIE PER CIÒ.
SECONDO. – ATTRAVERSO LA SUA COMMISSIONE SESTA, L’EZLN HA INIZIATO CONTATTI E CONSULTAZIONI CON ALTRE ORGANIZZAZIONI POLITICHE E SOCIALI, COSÌ COME CON GRUPPI, COLLETTIVI E PERSONE DELL’ALTRA CAMPAGNA, PER LANCIARE GIORNATE DI SOLIDARIETÀ CON OAXACA ED INVITARE IN MANIERA CONGIUNTA TUTTO IL MESSICO DEL BASSO A REALIZZARE UNO SCIOPERO NAZIONALE IL GIORNO 20 NOVEMBRE 2006.
TERZO. – L’EZLN RIVOLGE UN APPELLO ALL’ALTRA CAMPAGNA IN MESSICO E AL NORD DEL RÍO BRAVO, AFFINCHÉ QUESTO PRIMO DI NOVEMBRE DEL 2006 SI MOBILITI, DOVE SIA POSSIBILE, CHIUDENDO IN MANIERA TOTALE, PARZIALE O INTERMITTENTE, REALMENTE O SIMBOLICAMENTE, STRADE, AUTOSTRADE, CASELLI, STAZIONI, AEROPORTI E QUALUNQUE MEZZO DI COMUNICAZIONE.
QUARTO. – IL MESSAGGIO CHE GLI ZAPATISTI, LE ZAPATISTE, MNDIAMO E MANDEREMO AL POPOLO DI OAXACA È UNO SOLO: NON SIETE SOLI, NON SIETE SOLE.
FUORI ULISES RUIZ DA OAXACA!
RITIRO IMMEDIATO DELLE FORZE FEDERALI DI OCCUPAZIONE IN TERRITORIO OAXAQUEÑO!
LIBERTÀ IMMEDIATA ED INCONDIZIONATA DI TUTT@ I/LE DETENUT@!
CANCELLAZIONE DI TUTTI I MANDATI DI CATTURA!
PUNIZIONE PER GLI ASSASSINI!
GIUSTIZIA!
LIBERTÀ!
DEMOCRAZIA!
Dal nord del Messico.
Per il Comitato Clandestino Rivoluzionario Indigeno – Comando Generale dell’Esercito Zapatista di Liberazione Nazionale.
Per la Commissione Sesta dell’EZLN.
Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos
Messico,Ottobre 2006
FILMING HIS OWN DEATH IN OAXACA - MEXICO.
It always hits me that first a 'white' woman or man like now Brad Will has to be killed in a local struggle anywhere on earth, and preferably a journalist or similar, before the mainstream propaganda media move. Even if they mostly distort reality: 'Fix the facts around the inhuman policy' - as they say.
FILMING HIS OWN DEATH IN OAXACA - MEXICO.
by Henk Ruyssenaars
FPF - October 30th 2006 - When working as an independent correspondent in Chile, I saw the zooming in on a killer for the first time when cameraman Leonardo Henrichsen was filming his own death. He was shot during the failed military coup on June 29, 1973, shortly before Washington's war machine and CIA/Kissinger's coup on the 11th of September 'suicided' democratically elected President Salvador Allende.
And the US war machine and it's mercenaries - apart from at least 30.000 other victims - at the same time killed the hopes for a more humane future for the Chilean people until now. The US as usual started the dictatorship and ensuing massacres by Gen. Augusto Pinochet and his killers, and kept profiting. But I've seen the corpses. In the streets and on the slabs in the morgue, in the Mapoche river too, with their hands tied behind their backs with barbed wire. That is the system which kills for profit, and kills journalists and cameramen to cover their criminality. Everywhere on earth.
AND TODAY I SAW IT AGAIN: US FILMMAKER BRAD WILL FILMING HIS OWN DEATH.
On June 29th in 1973, Leonardo Henrichsen, a TV cameraman from Argentina, like many journalists/correspondents was outside La Moneda, the presidential palace in Santiago, Chile, trying to film an attempted military coup against President Salvador Allende. His lens zoomed in on one soldier, who was aiming a pistol directly at him. "Don't shoot," Henrichsen cried out, as his sound technician's audio recorder captured the words. "Don't you see that we're journalists?" Moments later, Henrichsen lay sprawled on the pavement with a fatal bullet lodged in his chest, while his camera pointed up at a blank sky.
FILMING HIS OWN DEATH
In this case the local 'police' in Oaxaca - which everywhere on earth, like all armed forces in state service, is armed and dangerous - last Friday shot and killed Indymedia film reporter Brad Will , and the names and pictures of the state killers are public.*
One thing however, for those optimists and/or ignorants which still think it's different in Melbourne or Montreal, in New York or Nagasaki: from Kiruna to Cape Town this dangerous and repressive system is everywhere the same, and the bullets that hit Brad Will and many others have our name on them too. That goes for the bombs as well.
The 655.000 dead in Iraq should be enough evidence for everybody to confirm this. As well as the millions of others which ended their days enduring the US made deadly freedom they never asked for. But which is supported by collaborators of many nationalities in many countries. The fact that they all are guilty of crimes against humanity - according to international law and conventions - doesn't matter to the state's mercenaries.
WHEREVER YOU LIVE: IF YOU AND THE PEOPLE IN A COUNTRY REJECT THIS SYSTEM, THE KILLING SOON WILL BE IN A WAR THEATER NEAR YOU.
A COLLEAGUE WHO ALSO INVESTIGATED THIS REPRESSIVE SYSTEM IN THE US/ISRAELI COLONY THE NETHERLANDS WAS KILLED A YEAR AGO, 300 METERS FROM WHERE THIS IS WRITTEN.
Merciless the US war machine killers all claim the right and 'license to kill' and the only choice - apart from joining the growing resistance everywhere - is to shut up and pay up. To go on being forced to finance their war crimes for profit. Human beings - even by the millions - do never count, only profit and power does.
It would be a very good thing if people the world over better remember that resistance against invaders is not only a legal universal right, but also a plight: you've got to fight to defend your family, yourself and your country when the US or any other war machine as usual wants to wreck and kill everything.
The chance that the same human disaster is possible in your country and corner of our world may look far away to many, but this is our life nowadays to which we must react. And why should we use words when they use guns?
When law is valid again they will be punished in every country where this is possible, and certainly those murderes in mexico too, but most important is the group managing the US war machine: they are the origin of all global misery and massacres. They are the bad geniuses behind the killings of millions. And they'll gladly kill you and yours if it's profitable.
Time indeed has come for all brave people to join the resistance and fight.
And not only on Internet or with a camera.
HENK RUYSSENAARS
THE KILLERS IN OAXACA: JUAN CARLOS SORIANO VELASCO (RED T-SHIRT), A POLICE OFFICER KNOWN AS "THE GRASSHOPPER"; MANUEL AGUILAR (DARK JACKET), CITY PERSONNEL DIRECTOR; AND PUBLIC SAFETY CHIEF AVEL SANTIAGO ZÁRATE (RED SHIRT) - Photo: D.R. 2006 - El Universal - Url.: http://www.narconews.com/Issue43/article2223.html
Brad Will (1970-2006): Final Report - Final Moments Captured by the Slain Journalist’s Camera - (1:34) - October 29, 2006 - Watch/download the video - Url.: http://salonchingon.com/cinema/brad.php?city=ny
Last story by Brad Will: Death in Oaxaca - ''Another Death in the Months Long Resistance in Oaxaca, Mexico'' - Url.: http://nyc.indymedia.org/en/2006/10/77343.shtml
APPO - (Association of Oaxaca people) - Reports Two Dead in Confrontations with Federal Police in Oaxaca - by Dan Feder - Posted on Sunday Oct. 29th, 2006 - Url.: http://narcosphere.narconews.com/story/2006/10/29/233030/04
In The Netherlands journalist/researcher Louis Sévèke was liquidated November 15th 2005 - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/yzx2ed
The latest reliable news from Latin America - Url.: http://www.narconews.com/en.html
Focussing on reliable news from Venezuela - Url.: VHeadline.com/
NOW IS, INDEED, THE TIME FOR ALL GOOD MEN TO COME TO THE AID OF THEIR COUNTRY."
JOHN PROTEVI - 2006-10-01 - Story Url.: http://projectbraintrust.com/blog.html?p=84
'BLACK TUESDAY' - OCTOBER 17 - 2006 - AFTER TWO STOLEN ELECTIONS GEORGE BUSH - AS THE SO CALLED 'PRESIDENT' OF THE US - SIGNED THE TOTALITARIAN ''MILITARY COMMISSIONS ACT OF 2006'' INTO LAW.* - Wikipedia - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/ydkywt
* THE UNITED STATES IS DEFIANT OF ANY LAW ANYWHERE - The bill signed signed by would-be 'emperor' George Busholini into law also: ''legalizes U.S. war crimes committed before December 30, 2005.'' - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/yjaqkk
* US HENCHMAN PINOCHET ALSO THOUGHT HE COULD "LEGALIZE" TORTURE - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/y9p2vs
* PENTAGON KILLING JOURNALISTS - FPF/HR - Granma - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/bkzum
* AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL CONDEMNS US FOR VIOLATIONS OF UN CONVENTION AGAINST TORTURE - Url.: www.wsws.org/articles/2000/may2000/tort-m12.shtml
* US "Death Squad Protection Act" - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/6xdfw
* THE LAW ON FREE EXPRESSION - Aryeh Neier - American Civil Liberties Union - ACLU - "Defending My Enemy" - "The law on free expression covers everybody, and thus that in defending it for anybody you defend it for everybody." - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/ymz2mv
* US PROPAGANDA: R.I.P. AL JAZEERA - DAVID FROST 'FRONT MAN' AT AL-JAZEERA INTERNATIONAL - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/y6us8n
*THROW OUT WAR PROPAGANDISTS LIKE THE BBC, FOX, CNN ETC.! - Url.: http://www.cemab.be/news/2006/07/1632.php
* THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM: "The huge omnivorous herd consumes everywhere on our earth as much as it can grab, and tramples millions of human beings to death. That doesn't seem to matter. The 'elephant boys' don't speak about the bloody pulp underneath the feet of the big animals: instead they give them a bath in the mainstream." - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/np823
* MORE LINKS & BACKGROUND LINKS TO THOSE RESPONSIBLE - If after checking a factual error is found, pls. send an email so it can be corrected. - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/fhln9
* The Dutch author this far has lived and worked abroad - never in an English speaking country - for more than 4 decades for international media as an independent foreign correspondent, of which 10 years - also during Gulf War I - in the Arab World and the Middle East. Seeing worldwide that every bullet and every bomb breeds more terrorism!
* FPF-COPYRIGHT NOTICE - In accordance with Title 17 U. S. C. Section 107 - any copyrighted work in this message is distributed by the Foreign Press Foundation under fair use, without profit or payment, to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the information. Url.: http://liimirror.warwick.ac.uk/uscode/17/107.html
FOREIGN PRESS FOUNDATION
Editor: Henk Ruyssenaars
http://tinyurl.com/gpr4j
The Netherlands
fpf@chello.nl
US lackey Alvaro Uribe to spark destabilization in both Colombia and Venezuela By Les Blough
On Thursday October 19th a car bomb exploded in the heart of the Colombian military headquarters in Bogotá. The so called War Academy houses the Schools of the Infantry, Artillery and Intelligence; the Superior War School; the training center for the High Military Command; and the Installations of the XIII Brigade and 5th Army Division. The damage to the installations was extensive but no one was killed and 23 people were left injured.
This attack occurred while the Colombian government of Alvaro Uribe Vélez is negotiating with the National Liberation Army (ELN) in Havana in a search for a peace formula to end the 60 year old civil war. Negotiations were progressing with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) in an effort to bring about a humanitarian exchange of hostages held by the FARC for Colombian guerrillas held in government jails, as a first step of negotiating peace with the FARC.
Uribe was reelected in May in a landslide victory (63% of votes cast) and started his second term in August. His election platform had been to bring peace to Colombia through negotiations, in complete contrast to his 2002 campaign which was based on defeating the ELN and the FARC militarily.
As all international observers are aware, this policy failed miserably. The ELN and FARC remained as strong as ever. Even with an average of US$600 million per year sent by the US in the context of Plan Colombia since 2000 - accompanied by US military advisers and some troops - the number of acres for planting of coca is up by around 30% despite mass fumigation to kill off the crops. Little is reported in the so called “free press” about the damage being done to human beings and wildlife since the fungicide chemicals used and manufactured by Monsanto are illegal in the US and Europe.
In the context of these negotiations the bomb attack on the War Academy could not have come at a more surprising time. Two days later on Saturday October 21st, Uribe gave a speech accusing the FARC of planting the bomb citing proof of an intercepted e-mail allegedly sent from Bogotá to a high ranking FARC Commander, Mono Jojoy in the jungle, informing him of the success of the operation. On the basis of this proof, Uribe announced that he was breaking off negotiations with the FARC, ordered all the hostages held to be rescued in military operations and declared an all out war on the FARC.
The Colombian Attorney General, being far more cautious than Uribe, stated that there was no conclusive proof that the FARC had carried out the attack. Nevertheless, Uribe stuck by his guns and has effectively and irresponsibly run roughshod over the official investigations by taking this decision.
Colombia has reacted with horror, especially the hostages’ families, since if there are military operations to rescue the hostages, they will most certainly be executed by the FARC as the internal war escalates. Even the conservative Colombian media, run by the local oligarchy and transnational interests were up in arms about Uribe’s decision, as doubts were cast upon the veracity of the authors of the attack.
Let’s be clear about one thing – placing a car bomb in the heart of the Colombian military headquarters and not killing anyone sounds almost like a miracle. The FARC are experienced in planting bombs, blowing up electricity pylons and oil pipelines. Did they really manage to breach the most heavily secured installations in Colombia, place a car bomb and then not kill anyone? It sounds rather unlikely to say the least and this is why the media has its doubts about Uribe’s “discovery” of the incriminating email sent to Commander Jojoy.
Dick Emanuelsson, a seasoned progressive writer on Colombia and who interviewed FARC Commander Raul Reyes in 2003 maintains that the interception of such an email is impossible. The FARC uses short wave radios and not GSM so as to avoid their troops being tracked. In addition, all messages are encrypted in a program called PGP-DOS and sent by short wave. According to Emanuelsson, not even the fabled supercomputers can decode these messages, and Uribe would have us believe that the Colombian military managed to do this in 24 hours?
In other words, the Colombian Attorney General is correct – there is no proof that the FARC and Commander Jojoy were behind this attack. Could it be that this was an internal “black op” to create a pretext to break off negotiations unilaterally with the FARC? Remember, no one was killed. Why did not Uribe allow the investigations to continue to discover the real culprits of the attack before taking a decision which will cost even more lives?
The answer to this question is rather complex. However, one coincidence stands out like a sore thumb. On Thursday October 26th, Nicolas Burns, Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs arrived in Bogotá and confirmed that Colombia was one of the US main allies in the region, that the Free Trade Agreement would be ratified and that more military aid would be available for Plan Colombia in the fight against drugs and terrorism. This was very convenient for Uribe who had just declared all out war on the FARC. Burns applauded Uribe’s decision to take the war to the FARC which he labeled a “terrorist organization”.
For readers information, the FARC were only labeled a “terrorist organization” by the US after the attacks on the World Trade Center is September 2001. Previously, the FARC and ELN were fighting a civil war for nigh on 60 years against the Colombian governments of the day. Uribe has now unilaterally decided to join the US led “war on terror” flying in the face of Colombian public opinion and the Colombian Congress and Senate. Looking at Colombia’s bloody history since 1830 – 9 civil wars in the 19th century plus the 1000 day war from 1899-1902, without mentioning the ongoing 60 year war – more blood is about to be shed.
Plan Colombia has been running since 2000 with many commentators observing that the long term aim is to use this plan as a beach head, so that the US can dominate South America to feed the interests of the Global Corporate Empire. Plan Colombia could soon change its name to Plan Patriota. Sounds familiar?
The US has lost a great deal of influence in the region since 1999 when Hugo Chávez came to office in Venezuela and the Bolivarian Revolution started to spread and awaken oppressed people in this most unequal of all continents. Chávez is a real problem for the US despite two attempts to overthrow him in the April 2002 coup d’état and the civic strike and oil industry sabotage from end 2002 till February 2003.
The US is aware that it cannot defeat Chávez at the ballot box. With elections in December pointing to a landslide victory for Chávez, the Venezuelan people and the Bolivarian Revolution, the only way to stop Chávez is by destabilizing Venezuela. Most observers believe that a Chávez reelection is a foregone conclusion unless “anything out of the ordinary” happens.
This is where Colombia comes into the mix. An all out war on the FARC could push not only more refugees over the Colombo-Venezuelan border (all 1400 miles of it) fleeing the violence and adding to the second largest refugee problem in the world after Dafour, but also columns of FARC guerillas fighting the Colombian army. This would be a real problem for Chávez since he has always tried to solve conflicts by peaceful means and negotiations. Venezuela could well be dragged into the Colombian internal conflict, and as this is a “war on terror” which has no limits set by the UN, Colombian troops would no doubt pursue the FARC into Venezuelan territory.
This is one scenario which cannot be dismissed. Chávez has stated that any irregulars or troops entering Venezuelan territory will be repelled. If this is the policy then Venezuelan troops could end up fighting FARC guerrillas and even Colombian regulars violating Venezuela’s territorial sovereignty.
If the Venezuelan army does not repel any invaders, then the cry will go out from the US that Venezuela is supporting a “terrorist organization” and all the old rumors and lies will be recycled about FARC camps in Venezuela; Chávez arming, financing and in cahoots with the FARC; Al Qaeda or Hezbollah training camps on Margarita Island; Chávez supporting “terrorist regimes” in Iran, Cuba, North Korea and so on.
Over the last three years Colombia has strengthened its armed forces to around 300,000 troops preparing for the final conflict. At best the FARC has 18,000 men under arms and the regular Venezuelan army is around 120,000 troops, 40,000 of which are stationed on the Colombo-Venezuelan border. If there is any sort of armed conflict on the border, this could well have a destabilizing effect internally in Venezuela since around 3 million Colombians live throughout Venezuela.
In the light of such a scenario, the Venezuelan private media lined up against Chávez and the Bolivarian Revolution will almost certainly support Uribe’s efforts to defeat the FARC. For example, if the FARC is forced over the border into Venezuela, the hue and cry will be that “Chávez is harboring “terrorists” in Venezuela”. The next step will be the international media and then the US making some sort of pronouncements saying that Venezuela is not doing enough to fight “international terrorism and drug trafficking”.
The timing to create this crisis in Colombia by Uribe is perfect. Destabilize the border before the December 3rd elections; manufacture a crisis with Venezuela dragging it into the Colombian internal conflict. To all intents and purposes, this looks like Plan Colombia, Phase # 2, as has always been suspected by progressive observers, but dismissed as a paranoid fantasy by the corporate media and “sensible” official observers.
This scenario smells like a plan hatched in the dirty war rooms in Langley and there is no doubt that the CIA will be involved in this plan, its strategy and execution. If the US gets more actively involved in rooting out the FARC, troops could be drafted in from other friendly countries to Colombia. El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala come to mind as all these countries sent troops to Iraq in the “war on terror”. The US will fight this war by proxy, selling more military equipment and funding Colombia.
After all, if Venezuela is destabilized and oil shipments threatened upon which the US depends, then the US could moot some sort of intervention to safeguard the oil. This is the prize which the US is seeking and which it failed to secure using its lackeys in Venezuela in 2002 and 2003. At the same time, the aim is to weaken and eventually destroy the Bolivarian Revolution and get Chávez out of office or into the tomb.
There could be difficult days ahead in the coming months and let’s hope and pray that this Machiavellian scenario does not develop, pitting brother against brother in an unnecessary bloody conflict from which the only winner to emerge will be the US and its controlling stockholders – the Global Corporate Empire.
This attack occurred while the Colombian government of Alvaro Uribe Vélez is negotiating with the National Liberation Army (ELN) in Havana in a search for a peace formula to end the 60 year old civil war. Negotiations were progressing with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) in an effort to bring about a humanitarian exchange of hostages held by the FARC for Colombian guerrillas held in government jails, as a first step of negotiating peace with the FARC.
Uribe was reelected in May in a landslide victory (63% of votes cast) and started his second term in August. His election platform had been to bring peace to Colombia through negotiations, in complete contrast to his 2002 campaign which was based on defeating the ELN and the FARC militarily.
As all international observers are aware, this policy failed miserably. The ELN and FARC remained as strong as ever. Even with an average of US$600 million per year sent by the US in the context of Plan Colombia since 2000 - accompanied by US military advisers and some troops - the number of acres for planting of coca is up by around 30% despite mass fumigation to kill off the crops. Little is reported in the so called “free press” about the damage being done to human beings and wildlife since the fungicide chemicals used and manufactured by Monsanto are illegal in the US and Europe.
In the context of these negotiations the bomb attack on the War Academy could not have come at a more surprising time. Two days later on Saturday October 21st, Uribe gave a speech accusing the FARC of planting the bomb citing proof of an intercepted e-mail allegedly sent from Bogotá to a high ranking FARC Commander, Mono Jojoy in the jungle, informing him of the success of the operation. On the basis of this proof, Uribe announced that he was breaking off negotiations with the FARC, ordered all the hostages held to be rescued in military operations and declared an all out war on the FARC.
The Colombian Attorney General, being far more cautious than Uribe, stated that there was no conclusive proof that the FARC had carried out the attack. Nevertheless, Uribe stuck by his guns and has effectively and irresponsibly run roughshod over the official investigations by taking this decision.
Colombia has reacted with horror, especially the hostages’ families, since if there are military operations to rescue the hostages, they will most certainly be executed by the FARC as the internal war escalates. Even the conservative Colombian media, run by the local oligarchy and transnational interests were up in arms about Uribe’s decision, as doubts were cast upon the veracity of the authors of the attack.
Let’s be clear about one thing – placing a car bomb in the heart of the Colombian military headquarters and not killing anyone sounds almost like a miracle. The FARC are experienced in planting bombs, blowing up electricity pylons and oil pipelines. Did they really manage to breach the most heavily secured installations in Colombia, place a car bomb and then not kill anyone? It sounds rather unlikely to say the least and this is why the media has its doubts about Uribe’s “discovery” of the incriminating email sent to Commander Jojoy.
Dick Emanuelsson, a seasoned progressive writer on Colombia and who interviewed FARC Commander Raul Reyes in 2003 maintains that the interception of such an email is impossible. The FARC uses short wave radios and not GSM so as to avoid their troops being tracked. In addition, all messages are encrypted in a program called PGP-DOS and sent by short wave. According to Emanuelsson, not even the fabled supercomputers can decode these messages, and Uribe would have us believe that the Colombian military managed to do this in 24 hours?
In other words, the Colombian Attorney General is correct – there is no proof that the FARC and Commander Jojoy were behind this attack. Could it be that this was an internal “black op” to create a pretext to break off negotiations unilaterally with the FARC? Remember, no one was killed. Why did not Uribe allow the investigations to continue to discover the real culprits of the attack before taking a decision which will cost even more lives?
The answer to this question is rather complex. However, one coincidence stands out like a sore thumb. On Thursday October 26th, Nicolas Burns, Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs arrived in Bogotá and confirmed that Colombia was one of the US main allies in the region, that the Free Trade Agreement would be ratified and that more military aid would be available for Plan Colombia in the fight against drugs and terrorism. This was very convenient for Uribe who had just declared all out war on the FARC. Burns applauded Uribe’s decision to take the war to the FARC which he labeled a “terrorist organization”.
For readers information, the FARC were only labeled a “terrorist organization” by the US after the attacks on the World Trade Center is September 2001. Previously, the FARC and ELN were fighting a civil war for nigh on 60 years against the Colombian governments of the day. Uribe has now unilaterally decided to join the US led “war on terror” flying in the face of Colombian public opinion and the Colombian Congress and Senate. Looking at Colombia’s bloody history since 1830 – 9 civil wars in the 19th century plus the 1000 day war from 1899-1902, without mentioning the ongoing 60 year war – more blood is about to be shed.
Plan Colombia has been running since 2000 with many commentators observing that the long term aim is to use this plan as a beach head, so that the US can dominate South America to feed the interests of the Global Corporate Empire. Plan Colombia could soon change its name to Plan Patriota. Sounds familiar?
The US has lost a great deal of influence in the region since 1999 when Hugo Chávez came to office in Venezuela and the Bolivarian Revolution started to spread and awaken oppressed people in this most unequal of all continents. Chávez is a real problem for the US despite two attempts to overthrow him in the April 2002 coup d’état and the civic strike and oil industry sabotage from end 2002 till February 2003.
The US is aware that it cannot defeat Chávez at the ballot box. With elections in December pointing to a landslide victory for Chávez, the Venezuelan people and the Bolivarian Revolution, the only way to stop Chávez is by destabilizing Venezuela. Most observers believe that a Chávez reelection is a foregone conclusion unless “anything out of the ordinary” happens.
This is where Colombia comes into the mix. An all out war on the FARC could push not only more refugees over the Colombo-Venezuelan border (all 1400 miles of it) fleeing the violence and adding to the second largest refugee problem in the world after Dafour, but also columns of FARC guerillas fighting the Colombian army. This would be a real problem for Chávez since he has always tried to solve conflicts by peaceful means and negotiations. Venezuela could well be dragged into the Colombian internal conflict, and as this is a “war on terror” which has no limits set by the UN, Colombian troops would no doubt pursue the FARC into Venezuelan territory.
This is one scenario which cannot be dismissed. Chávez has stated that any irregulars or troops entering Venezuelan territory will be repelled. If this is the policy then Venezuelan troops could end up fighting FARC guerrillas and even Colombian regulars violating Venezuela’s territorial sovereignty.
If the Venezuelan army does not repel any invaders, then the cry will go out from the US that Venezuela is supporting a “terrorist organization” and all the old rumors and lies will be recycled about FARC camps in Venezuela; Chávez arming, financing and in cahoots with the FARC; Al Qaeda or Hezbollah training camps on Margarita Island; Chávez supporting “terrorist regimes” in Iran, Cuba, North Korea and so on.
Over the last three years Colombia has strengthened its armed forces to around 300,000 troops preparing for the final conflict. At best the FARC has 18,000 men under arms and the regular Venezuelan army is around 120,000 troops, 40,000 of which are stationed on the Colombo-Venezuelan border. If there is any sort of armed conflict on the border, this could well have a destabilizing effect internally in Venezuela since around 3 million Colombians live throughout Venezuela.
In the light of such a scenario, the Venezuelan private media lined up against Chávez and the Bolivarian Revolution will almost certainly support Uribe’s efforts to defeat the FARC. For example, if the FARC is forced over the border into Venezuela, the hue and cry will be that “Chávez is harboring “terrorists” in Venezuela”. The next step will be the international media and then the US making some sort of pronouncements saying that Venezuela is not doing enough to fight “international terrorism and drug trafficking”.
The timing to create this crisis in Colombia by Uribe is perfect. Destabilize the border before the December 3rd elections; manufacture a crisis with Venezuela dragging it into the Colombian internal conflict. To all intents and purposes, this looks like Plan Colombia, Phase # 2, as has always been suspected by progressive observers, but dismissed as a paranoid fantasy by the corporate media and “sensible” official observers.
This scenario smells like a plan hatched in the dirty war rooms in Langley and there is no doubt that the CIA will be involved in this plan, its strategy and execution. If the US gets more actively involved in rooting out the FARC, troops could be drafted in from other friendly countries to Colombia. El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala come to mind as all these countries sent troops to Iraq in the “war on terror”. The US will fight this war by proxy, selling more military equipment and funding Colombia.
After all, if Venezuela is destabilized and oil shipments threatened upon which the US depends, then the US could moot some sort of intervention to safeguard the oil. This is the prize which the US is seeking and which it failed to secure using its lackeys in Venezuela in 2002 and 2003. At the same time, the aim is to weaken and eventually destroy the Bolivarian Revolution and get Chávez out of office or into the tomb.
There could be difficult days ahead in the coming months and let’s hope and pray that this Machiavellian scenario does not develop, pitting brother against brother in an unnecessary bloody conflict from which the only winner to emerge will be the US and its controlling stockholders – the Global Corporate Empire.
Dirty Bombs Over Lebanon Did Israel Use Uranium Weapons? By ROBERT FISK
Did Israel use a secret new uranium-based weapon in southern Lebanon this summer in the 34-day assault that cost more than 1,300 Lebanese lives, most of them civilians?
We know that the Israelis used American "bunker-buster" bombs on Hizbollah's Beirut headquarters. We know that they drenched southern Lebanon with cluster bombs in the last 72 hours of the war, leaving tens of thousands of bomblets which are still killing Lebanese civilians every week. And we now know--after it first categorically denied using such munitions--that the Israeli army also used phosphorous bombs, weapons which are supposed to be restricted under the third protocol of the Geneva Conventions, which neither Israel nor the United States have signed.
But scientific evidence gathered from at least two bomb craters in Khiam and At-Tiri, the scene of fierce fighting between Hizbollah guerrillas and Israeli troops last July and August, suggests that uranium-based munitions may now also be included in Israel's weapons inventory--and were used against targets in Lebanon. According to Dr Chris Busby, the British Scientific Secretary of the European Committee on Radiation Risk, two soil samples thrown up by Israeli heavy or guided bombs showed "elevated radiation signatures". Both have been forwarded for further examination to the Harwell laboratory in Oxfordshire for mass spectrometry--used by the Ministry of Defence--which has confirmed the concentration of uranium isotopes in the samples.
Dr Busby's initial report states that there are two possible reasons for the contamination. "The first is that the weapon was some novel small experimental nuclear fission device or other experimental weapon (eg, a thermobaric weapon) based on the high temperature of a uranium oxidation flash ... The second is that the weapon was a bunker-busting conventional uranium penetrator weapon employing enriched uranium rather than depleted uranium." A photograph of the explosion of the first bomb shows large clouds of black smoke that might result from burning uranium.
Enriched uranium is produced from natural uranium ore and is used as fuel for nuclear reactors. A waste productof the enrichment process is depleted uranium, it is an extremely hard metal used in anti-tank missiles for penetrating armour. Depleted uranium is less radioactive than natural uranium, which is less radioactive than enriched uranium.
Israel has a poor reputation for telling the truth about its use of weapons in Lebanon. In 1982, it denied using phosphorous munitions on civilian areas--until journalists discovered dying and dead civilians whose wounds caught fire when exposed to air.
I saw two dead babies who, when taken from a mortuary drawer in West Beirut during the Israeli siege of the city, suddenly burst back into flames. Israel officially denied using phosphorous again in Lebanon during the summer--except for "marking" targets--even after civilians were photographed in Lebanese hospitals with burn wounds consistent with phosphorous munitions.
Then on Sunday, Israel suddenly admitted that it had not been telling the truth. Jacob Edery, the Israeli minister in charge of government and parliament relations, confirmed that phosphorous shells were used in direct attacks against Hizbollah, adding that "according to international law, the use of phosphorous munitions is authorised and the (Israeli) army keeps to the rules of international norms".
Asked by if the Israeli army had been using uranium-based munitions in Lebanon this summer, Mark Regev, the Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman, said: "Israel does not use any weaponry which is not authorised by international law or international conventions." This, however, begs more questions than it answers. Much international law does not cover modern uranium weapons because they were not invented when humanitarian rules such as the Geneva Conventions were drawn up and because Western governments still refuse to believe that their use can cause long-term damage to the health of thousands of civilians living in the area of the explosions.
American and British forces used hundreds of tons of depleted uranium (DU) shells in Iraq in 1991--their hardened penetrator warheads manufactured from the waste products of the nuclear industry--and five years later, a plague of cancers emerged across the south of Iraq.
Initial US military assessments warned of grave consequences for public health if such weapons were used against armoured vehicles. But the US administration and the British government later went out of their way to belittle these claims. Yet the cancers continued to spread amid reports that civilians in Bosnia--where DU was also used by Nato aircraft--were suffering new forms of cancer. DU shells were again used in the 2003 Anglo-American invasion of Iraq but it is too early to register any health effects.
"When a uranium penetrator hits a hard target, the particles of the explosion are very long-lived in the environment," Dr Busby said yesterday. "They spread over long distances. They can be inhaled into the lungs. The military really seem to believe that this stuff is not as dangerous as it is." Yet why would Israel use such a weapon when its targets--in the case of Khiam, for example--were only two miles from the Israeli border? The dust ignited by DU munitions can be blown across international borders, just as the chlorine gas used in attacks by both sides in the First World War often blew back on its perpetrators.
Chris Bellamy, the professor of military science and doctrine at Cranfield University, who has reviewed the Busby report, said: "At worst it's some sort of experimental weapon with an enriched uranium component the purpose of which we don't yet know. At best--if you can say that--it shows a remarkably cavalier attitude to the use of nuclear waste products."
The soil sample from Khiam--site of a notorious torture prison when Israel occupied southern Lebanon between 1978 and 2000, and a frontline Hizbollah stronghold in the summer war--was a piece of impacted red earth from an explosion; the isotope ratio was 108, indicative of the presence of enriched uranium. "The health effects on local civilian populations following the use of large uranium penetrators and the large amounts of respirable uranium oxide particles in the atmosphere," the Busby report says, "are likely to be significant ... we recommend that the area is examined for further traces of these weapons with a view to clean up."
This summer's Lebanon war began after Hizbollah guerrillas crossed the Lebanese frontier into Israel, captured two Israeli soldiers and killed three others, prompting Israel to unleash a massive bombardment of Lebanon's villages, cities, bridges and civilian infrastructure. Human rights groups have said that Israel committed war crimes when it attacked civilians, but that Hizbollah was also guilty of such crimes because it fired missiles into Israel which were also filled with ball-bearings, turning their rockets into primitive one-time-only cluster bombs.
Many Lebanese, however, long ago concluded that the latest Lebanon war was a weapons testing ground for the Americans and Iranians, who respectively supply Israel and Hizbollah with munitions. Just as Israel used hitherto-unproven US missiles in its attacks, so the Iranians were able to test-fire a rocket which hit an Israeli corvette off the Lebanese coast, killing four Israeli sailors and almost sinking the vessel after it suffered a 15-hour on-board fire.
What the weapons manufacturers make of the latest scientific findings of potential uranium weapons use in southern Lebanon is not yet known. Nor is their effect on civilians.
Robert Fisk is a reporter for The Independent and author of Pity the Nation. He is also a contributor to CounterPunch's collection, The Politics of Anti-Semitism. Fisk's new book is The Conquest of the Middle East.
We know that the Israelis used American "bunker-buster" bombs on Hizbollah's Beirut headquarters. We know that they drenched southern Lebanon with cluster bombs in the last 72 hours of the war, leaving tens of thousands of bomblets which are still killing Lebanese civilians every week. And we now know--after it first categorically denied using such munitions--that the Israeli army also used phosphorous bombs, weapons which are supposed to be restricted under the third protocol of the Geneva Conventions, which neither Israel nor the United States have signed.
But scientific evidence gathered from at least two bomb craters in Khiam and At-Tiri, the scene of fierce fighting between Hizbollah guerrillas and Israeli troops last July and August, suggests that uranium-based munitions may now also be included in Israel's weapons inventory--and were used against targets in Lebanon. According to Dr Chris Busby, the British Scientific Secretary of the European Committee on Radiation Risk, two soil samples thrown up by Israeli heavy or guided bombs showed "elevated radiation signatures". Both have been forwarded for further examination to the Harwell laboratory in Oxfordshire for mass spectrometry--used by the Ministry of Defence--which has confirmed the concentration of uranium isotopes in the samples.
Dr Busby's initial report states that there are two possible reasons for the contamination. "The first is that the weapon was some novel small experimental nuclear fission device or other experimental weapon (eg, a thermobaric weapon) based on the high temperature of a uranium oxidation flash ... The second is that the weapon was a bunker-busting conventional uranium penetrator weapon employing enriched uranium rather than depleted uranium." A photograph of the explosion of the first bomb shows large clouds of black smoke that might result from burning uranium.
Enriched uranium is produced from natural uranium ore and is used as fuel for nuclear reactors. A waste productof the enrichment process is depleted uranium, it is an extremely hard metal used in anti-tank missiles for penetrating armour. Depleted uranium is less radioactive than natural uranium, which is less radioactive than enriched uranium.
Israel has a poor reputation for telling the truth about its use of weapons in Lebanon. In 1982, it denied using phosphorous munitions on civilian areas--until journalists discovered dying and dead civilians whose wounds caught fire when exposed to air.
I saw two dead babies who, when taken from a mortuary drawer in West Beirut during the Israeli siege of the city, suddenly burst back into flames. Israel officially denied using phosphorous again in Lebanon during the summer--except for "marking" targets--even after civilians were photographed in Lebanese hospitals with burn wounds consistent with phosphorous munitions.
Then on Sunday, Israel suddenly admitted that it had not been telling the truth. Jacob Edery, the Israeli minister in charge of government and parliament relations, confirmed that phosphorous shells were used in direct attacks against Hizbollah, adding that "according to international law, the use of phosphorous munitions is authorised and the (Israeli) army keeps to the rules of international norms".
Asked by if the Israeli army had been using uranium-based munitions in Lebanon this summer, Mark Regev, the Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman, said: "Israel does not use any weaponry which is not authorised by international law or international conventions." This, however, begs more questions than it answers. Much international law does not cover modern uranium weapons because they were not invented when humanitarian rules such as the Geneva Conventions were drawn up and because Western governments still refuse to believe that their use can cause long-term damage to the health of thousands of civilians living in the area of the explosions.
American and British forces used hundreds of tons of depleted uranium (DU) shells in Iraq in 1991--their hardened penetrator warheads manufactured from the waste products of the nuclear industry--and five years later, a plague of cancers emerged across the south of Iraq.
Initial US military assessments warned of grave consequences for public health if such weapons were used against armoured vehicles. But the US administration and the British government later went out of their way to belittle these claims. Yet the cancers continued to spread amid reports that civilians in Bosnia--where DU was also used by Nato aircraft--were suffering new forms of cancer. DU shells were again used in the 2003 Anglo-American invasion of Iraq but it is too early to register any health effects.
"When a uranium penetrator hits a hard target, the particles of the explosion are very long-lived in the environment," Dr Busby said yesterday. "They spread over long distances. They can be inhaled into the lungs. The military really seem to believe that this stuff is not as dangerous as it is." Yet why would Israel use such a weapon when its targets--in the case of Khiam, for example--were only two miles from the Israeli border? The dust ignited by DU munitions can be blown across international borders, just as the chlorine gas used in attacks by both sides in the First World War often blew back on its perpetrators.
Chris Bellamy, the professor of military science and doctrine at Cranfield University, who has reviewed the Busby report, said: "At worst it's some sort of experimental weapon with an enriched uranium component the purpose of which we don't yet know. At best--if you can say that--it shows a remarkably cavalier attitude to the use of nuclear waste products."
The soil sample from Khiam--site of a notorious torture prison when Israel occupied southern Lebanon between 1978 and 2000, and a frontline Hizbollah stronghold in the summer war--was a piece of impacted red earth from an explosion; the isotope ratio was 108, indicative of the presence of enriched uranium. "The health effects on local civilian populations following the use of large uranium penetrators and the large amounts of respirable uranium oxide particles in the atmosphere," the Busby report says, "are likely to be significant ... we recommend that the area is examined for further traces of these weapons with a view to clean up."
This summer's Lebanon war began after Hizbollah guerrillas crossed the Lebanese frontier into Israel, captured two Israeli soldiers and killed three others, prompting Israel to unleash a massive bombardment of Lebanon's villages, cities, bridges and civilian infrastructure. Human rights groups have said that Israel committed war crimes when it attacked civilians, but that Hizbollah was also guilty of such crimes because it fired missiles into Israel which were also filled with ball-bearings, turning their rockets into primitive one-time-only cluster bombs.
Many Lebanese, however, long ago concluded that the latest Lebanon war was a weapons testing ground for the Americans and Iranians, who respectively supply Israel and Hizbollah with munitions. Just as Israel used hitherto-unproven US missiles in its attacks, so the Iranians were able to test-fire a rocket which hit an Israeli corvette off the Lebanese coast, killing four Israeli sailors and almost sinking the vessel after it suffered a 15-hour on-board fire.
What the weapons manufacturers make of the latest scientific findings of potential uranium weapons use in southern Lebanon is not yet known. Nor is their effect on civilians.
Robert Fisk is a reporter for The Independent and author of Pity the Nation. He is also a contributor to CounterPunch's collection, The Politics of Anti-Semitism. Fisk's new book is The Conquest of the Middle East.
Sunday, October 29, 2006
Bill Paparian & James Adomian as George
Bill Paparian, (lawyer, candidate for Congress, former mayor of Pasadena) details the many laws that George Bush has broken. He then introduces James Adomian as George "the devil" Bush who attempts to defend himself.
Adomian starts at about 3:35. He has the Bush mannerisms and incoherent speaking style down pat and reminds us that "You folks are the oppositione
Bill Paparian, (lawyer, candidate for Congress, former mayor of Pasadena) details the many laws that George Bush has broken. He then introduces James Adomian as George "the devil" Bush who attempts to defend himself.
Adomian starts at about 3:35. He has the Bush mannerisms and incoherent speaking style down pat and reminds us that "You folks are the oppositione
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