قيادات الثورة طالبت المجلس العسكري بوضع دستور جديد يمهد لجمهورية برلمانية Leaders of the revolution demanding from the military council the establishment of a new constitution intended to prepare for a parliamentary republic.
خطوات أولى لتنظيم الانتقال بمصر
First Steps on the Way to Transition in Egypt
عين المجلس العسكري الأعلى الذي يدير مصر مؤقتا مساء أمس رئيسا للجنة صياغة التعديلات الدستورية التي يتوقع استفتاء الشعب عليها خلال شهرين، بما يمهد لإرساء حكم مدني ديمقراطي, وأقال مسؤولين أمنيين بارزين على خلفية إطلاق النار على المتظاهرين
The supreme military council for the administration of Egypt yesterday evening determined the president of the commission (in charge) to provide constitutional reforms (within a certain time) that should be subject to a plebiscite within two months, such facilitating the firm establishment of civil and democratic administration. The dismissal of former security (officers) responsible for the shooting of protesters (was announced as well).
Yemen: Students taking to the streets on February 12, 2011.
Today, the resignation of the Egyptian president Mubarak finally took place after almost 30 years of despotic rule and many days of nationwide uprise. In the end, it was the military that put an end to the presidency of Mubarak in order to keep the Republic of Egypt together amidst of turmoil.
Whatever political currents within the Egyptian people might now begin to compete for legal power after the revolution, all foreign nations regarded as partners of Egypt, even though for different reasons, will have to face an independent country that will be less likely to follow the route of appeasement, a feature that made Egypt under the Mubarak administration such a valuable ally when it came to close all eyes on Israel's militant policy towards the Palestinians and their wish to establish an independent state of Palestine.
And if the flame of revolution was spreading from Tunis and Cairo to other nations of the Arabic world, the behaviour of Israel, seen by the Arabs (and not only by them) as the top aggressor in the Middle East, might finally lead to an anti- Israeli alliance based on the common will of the Arabic peoples and tribes and powerful enough to reduce Israel in its regional influence and perhaps in its borders as well...
As can already been seen in Algeria where public turmoil began at about the same time as in Tunisia, this point of view is not too far from reality. Even influential jews within the U.S.A. might then be unable to stop the predicted development under a President Obama who is decided to accept the spreading of democracy whereever it appears.
Al-Jazeera reporting live from Cairo after the resignation of president Mubarak:
When Algerian citizens took to the streets in December 2010, at a time when the Tunisian people already demanded an end to the long- lasting dictatorship of their president Ben Ali, the Egyptian revolution was not yet in sight:
According to the political bureau of the ruling National- Democratic Party (المكتب السياسي للحزب الوطني الديمقراطي الحاكم), its leadership has stepped down (February 5, 2011).
صفوت الشريف وعن يمينه جمال مبارك Picture showing Safut Sharif and, at his right, Djamal Mubarak, both leaders of the ruling National-Democratic Party in Egypt.
Mubarak - Private Assets Abroad
ذكرت صحيفة غارديان البريطانية أن ثروة الرئيس المصري حسني مبارك وعائلته تتراوح بين 40 و70 مليار دولار، وفقًا لتحليل خبراء في الشرق الأوسط
The British Journal Guardian remembers that private assets of the Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak and his family comprise about 40-70 million Dollar and are allegedly deposited in the Middle East (February 5, 2011).
On Feb. 1, 2011, the end of Mubarak's 30-year-presidency is finally in sight. This seems to prove the truth delivered by Al-Jazeera's recent opinion poll (below).
Online opinion poll of Al-Jazeera published on their Arabic website for the period from January 28 till January 31, 2011 :
Do you consider that (all these) protestations of the Egyptian people are having an effect on the realization of their demands ?
voting YES : 177.267 (85,9%)
voting NO : 29.117 (14,1%)
total number of participants in this enquiry: 206.384
"In almost every successful social movement of the last century, from Gandhi's campaign against British rule to the Solidarity movement in Poland to the antiapartheid movement in South Africa, democracy was the result of a local awakening." [Barack Obama, "The Audacity of Hope"]
By the way, such numbers remind me of the early days of Al-Jazeera opinion polls, at the beginning of the war against Iraq and when thousands and thousands of Arabic speaking voters on Al-Jazeera already gave an idea of what would happen in the years to follow. The increasing number of participants finally began to annoy U.S. friendly elements who then tried to manipulate the outcome of one important poll. Without success, as Al-Jazeera quickly blocked the attack and made it the news subject of the day. Since then, I haven't heard of further incidents of the kind, maybe because times and opinions have changed even in the U.S.A.. [Ulysses]
Suite of videos covering the development of the current situation:
Some years ago, I recorded the above video on the Egyptian National TV. Together with an add I produced myself, it is now showing how different the art of Arabic writing is being practised by military forces under the guidance of Hosni Mubarak and by the ordinary people of Egypt.
The following two videos have been recorded on Al-Jazeera during the last days (January 29/30, 2011):
A terrible increase of violence took place after Mubarak's speech. Street fighting between protesters on one side and followers of Mubarak as well as police agents on the other side (Feb. 2, 2011):
In order to fully understand how recent turmoil came into being, you should watch the following video. It is about the rigged parliamentary election in December 2010 where opposition candidates lost almost all of their seats even though enjoying broad public support.
While Western media are just about to remember the notorious attempt on behalf of the former Soviet Union to install some of their nuclear missiles on Cuba, CUBAVISION, the satellite channel of Cuba, has just broadcast a documentary showing how the U.S. tried to kill Fidel Castro and such destabilize his government in early 1961.
Of course, U.S. President Kennedy's harsh response in October 1962 to the installation of nukes in the neighbourhood of his country was a mere necessity and could not be praised enough for the sake of worldwide peace.
Nevertheless, it should not be ignored that U.S. efforts to kill Cuba's revolutionary leader and overthrow his young government from the very beginning left no real choice for the Cubans than to make friends with the Soviet Union. The economic blockade that followed and held for many decades until now made things even more difficult for Fidel Castro and drove him into a far-reaching dependency on Moscow.
I can't guarantee that every single fact included in the following documentary has its truth, but the proven facts are sufficient enough to blame the U.S. for their policy of intolerance which earned them many enemies during the last decades, not only from within such countries behind the Iron Curtain that once separated Cold War enemies, but from independent countries as well. Even today, U.S. treatment of the Cuban people and their government is enraging Cuba's Latin American friends. Maybe it's time now for the United States to come to terms with their old enemy Cuba which they are still treating like a Caribbean ship of pirates whose legendary captain refuses to die.
As to the documentary itself, it recalls the killing attempt of the Cuban leader with the help of some insiders, a former military commander who served under Fidel and a member of cabinet of his first government after the Cuban revolution. The plannings on behalf of the CIA became known to Cuban authorities, 16 participants were arrested with 5 CIA agents among them, and lots of weapons, ammunition, explosives and communication material were confiscated.
Historic pictures are showing how enemies of the revolution used bombs to destroy a building in Havana. The bombing of Cuban airports that left many civilian losses and, finally, the CIA invasion that failed are documented as well. All these incidents took place in 1961 and within a short time. Apparently there should have been another incident when Fidel was to be infected with anthrax, a biological weapon.
Other attempts to kill Castro on behalf of the CIA are not included. There's for instance the mysterious case of that German girl Marita Lorenz who came to Cuba, fell in love with Fidel and became pregnant, was abducted and dragged to the U.S.A. where she was brainwashed and sent back in order to kill the Cuban leader. I think that was the case with the poisoned cigars, the only point I'm unable to remember any longer. Marita Lorenz obviously failed as well. Even though being brainwashed, she seemed to be unable to kill her ex-lover. She then returned to the U.S.A. where she worked for the CIA in different secondary positions. According to her, she belonged to a kind of "hitting squad", following the traces of people who were on a CIA black list. One day when she was in Dallas, together with her group, a certain Lee Harvey Oswald was with them. Nobody objected when he disappeared for some hours: It was the day he shot President Kennedy from a nearby building. Later, Mrs. Lorenz was interrogated by a commission of the U.S. Congress that had to explore the Kennedy murder, and she told them all she new about L.H. Oswald. Nevertheless, her statement was regarded as of less importance, maybe because of her earlier brainwashing background. As L.H. Oswald was shot himself immediately after his arrest, nobody remained to relate the Kennedy murder with the CIA any longer. Instead, another theory came into being, relating Fidel Castro with the Dallas incident. Postscript: Many years later, a pitiful elderly lady arrived in Havana, together with her son who had to care for her and a West-German television team. Marita Lorenz was unable to see her ex-lover but was warmly received by Fidel Castro's private secretary who spoke to her behind closed doors. ...
As Venezuela's president Hugo Chavez has become the inofficial speaker of a Latin American Alliance (*) that comprises some of the continent's most important countries ruled by socialist governments and in the frame of Venezuela holding the greatest reserves of crude oil worldwide, it should be interesting to hear what Chavez says about the latest development of his country's economy. Here are some quotations from his speech held before the National Assembly of Venezuela [TELESUR, Caracas, Jan. 18, 2011; Translation Spanish- English by Ulysses]
"It is necessary to achieve control over [national] expenses in order to fight speculation." This is hinting at, both, the market prices of food stuff and, as well, all expenses on behalf of the government.
"Venezuela must turn into a power of agriculture [ and such enlarge its power as a country that is providing crude oil ]." As to the planned development of agriculture, livestock breeding and the fishing industry have been particularly named.
Referring to the decay of economy during the last two years 2009 and 2010, Chavez said:
"We finally regained the path of economic growth."
"I did not forget the four years of 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2008 when Venezuela was the number one place of economic growth in Latin America if not one of the first places worldwide. What came then, was the impact of dropping prices for crude oil, the dropping of oil production, the climatic effect. - And facing such situation, now, some are saying that the reason of economic decay is nationalization or rather socialism. - No, this is not the reason !" When hinting at the climatic effect, he was referring to latest enormous floodings and earlier consequences of the notorious climate effect called El Niño.
Finally, Chavez pointed out that minimum wages of workers in his country have risen for about 20% this year.
The following video contains additional information on Venezuela's recent economic development in the frame of an interview TELESUR held with Orangel Rivas, an expert of Venezuela's National Institute of Statistics. It's about consumption and employment during the last two years.
(*) At present, that alliance of Latin American states is including Argentine, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Cuba, Ecuador, Nicaragua and Venezuela, all countries being ruled by left- wing governments.
Pictures above: "Ben Ali, you killed (y)our people !" - "Ben Ali, get out !"
Tonight, Tunisia's president Ben Ali fled the country after days of uprising in the capital of Tunis. As he was expected to seek asylum in France, the international press was surprised when Ben Ali's plane headed for the Arabian peninsula where he finally landed in Djedda in the middle of the night.
It is considered that French authorities were unable to arrange something for Ben Ali because of his urgent flight that made any preparations impossible. Nevertheless, France should still be seen as the dictator's first choice because of manifold relations between Tunisia and its former colonial power. Furthermore, personal relations between French president Sarkozy and Ben Ali have always been regarded as fine.
After the president's retreat, the Tunisian prime minister immediately declared his intention to serve as an interim president. He promised to stick to the constitution and prepare for general elections in the very next future. Some hours later, another politician, the president of parliament, was definitely installed as the interim president of Tunisia.
Meanwhile, fierce fighting is taking place between Tunisian riot police and civilian protesters while at least parts of the military are tending to take sides in favor of the people. For example, military vehicles have been observed that accompanied protesters who were engaged in clashes with the police.
Pictures below: - The true purpose of police in a totalitarian state. - Military sympathizing with the people.
Certainly you will find the most violent of people in enmity for those who believe (to be) the Jews and those who are polytheists, and you will certainly find the nearest in friendship to those who believe (to be) those who say: We are Christians; this is because there are priests and monks among them and because they do not behave proudly.
Today, CNN revealed that, both, U.S. and Canadian military are tracking Santa Claus on his way to America. Using satellite, GPS and jet fighters they are now ensuring Santa's safe arrival. Barbara Starr, CNN political correspondent reporting from Washington DC while NORAD is feeding in life pictures from Santa Claus.
Two hours ago, a new era in space travel began when, for the first time, a commercial space launch took place. The Falcon 9 carrier and the attached Dragon capsule are intended to provide the International Space Station ISS with all goods needed and then return safely to earth. On later flights, the Dragon capsule should carry astronauts as well. One single mission is expected to last about two days, two orbits before landing included. This comes at a time when the U.S. national space shuttle program is expected to end.
Yesterday, U.S. President Obama unexpectedly appeared in Afghanistan where he held an encouraging speech in front of U.S. troops. One year after his announcement of an increase in U.S. military presence, he said that Afghanistan had become more safe and that U.S. troops controlled more Afghan regions than before such that a handing-over of power to the Afghan security forces had already come in sight.
UPDATE from Dec. 6, 2010:
German Troops in Afghanistan as Evaluated by the Afghan People
The following polls have been carried out in Afghanistan and published by German National TV Channel 1 (ARD). They are showing a significant drop of trust into German military presence as seen by Afghan civilians:
"Your estimation of the German Federal Republic ?" The 2007 poll showed an overwhelming positive estimation of Germany of 75% that turned into a mere 46% in the December 2010 poll.
"Do you consider any attack on foreign troops to be justified ?" While in January 2010 an overwhelming 87% said "no" to this option with only 2% answering "yes", the December 2010 poll showed only 57% "no" votes in comparison with 39% "yes" votes.
Increasing mistrust into German military presence in Afghanistan
Personal Remark by Ulysses: As Obama stated in his speech at Bagram Airbase, the alliance of nations cooperating with the U.S. in Afghanistan (ISAF) has risen to 49 members (*). Unfortunately, this fact doesn't necessarily imply an improved military efficiency in the fight against their common enemy, the Taliban and Al-Qaeda. Indeed, we are now being confronted with an increasing mistrust of the Afghan people into all ISAF operations and even more into the presence of any foreign troops in Afghanistan.
(*) = This passage at the beginning of Obama's speech was not recorded because of technical reasons (restriction to 15 min. of duration).
The Muslim Brotherhood of Egypt (الزاوية الإسلامية في المصر), representing the most powerful opposition group in Egypt's General Elections, is now launching their candidates. As the Brotherhood is officially forbidden and, therefore, excluded from the elections, their members are acting as "independent" candidates who, nevertheless, don't hide their real origin. An interesting feature by Al-Jazeera [Nov. 26, 2010].
Another video: Two days before the 2010 General Elections, a spokesman of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt describes the situation of Egypt's most powerful opposition group. Its all about how to resist the dictatorship of President Mubarak's National Democratic Party that is expected to sweep parliament with the help of ruling power and secret police, ignoring, both, the basic rules of democracy and the outcome of earlier lawsuits on election fraud [Nov. 26, 2010].
UPDATE after General Elections: Outcome of the first round of elections in Egypt. "Independent" candidates related to the Muslim Brotherhood lost all their seats in parliament. As the Brotherhood is known to enjoy broad public support in Egypt, the elections should be considered as rigged. Al-Jazeera report from December 1, 2010.
موقع ويكيــــليكس يعتزم نشر وثائـــــق جديدة يقول إنها أكبر سبع مرات من الوثائق السابقة
الـسفـيـر الأمريكــي في بغداد يقول إن نشر وثائق سرية جديدة أمرسيئ للغاية
Wikileaks announced its decision to publish a new set of documents that should include seven times more documents than those earlier published.
U.S. ambassador in Baghdad is considering the latest Wikileaks publication as extremely serious.
Yesterday, November 26, and in its feature "Behind the News", the Arabic channel of Al-Jazeera broadcast a discussion including two correspondents from Washington and Beirut on the impact which latest publications by Wikileaks, expected to come this weekend, might have on diplomatic relations between the U.S. and their international partners like Russia and China. Above all, regional relations have been discussed that are considered to be extremely difficult. As to the Iraqi subject, for instance, U.S. relations with Turkey and Iraqi Kurds might be affected. The same problem might arise for the negotiations between Israel and Palestine, now being pushed forward by the Obama administration at a very critical state.
The British daily "The Guardian" which is among the few papers of international repute that got an exclusive taste of Wikileaks' upcoming release, already wrote about an expected publication of secret cables from U.S. diplomats in their November 27 edition.
To get an idea of the range of subjects Wikileaks is dealing with, here a screenshot of Wikileaks' table of contents extracted from an earlier release, dating back to October 22, 2010. Click to the image and load the attached pdf file !
UPDATE from December 2, 2010: Further news from the WikiLeaks release of U.S. diplomatic cables. This time it's about Russia. Different U.S. sources hold Russia as a Mafia state where organised criminals and parts of the government are working "hand in hand".
UPDATE from December 3, 2010:
ويكيليكس و المخطط الحرب ضد الايران من العربية السعودية
The famous Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout has been surprisingly extradited from Thailand to the U.S.A. on behalf of the Thai government.
After two years in a Bangkok prison, he is now facing charges of supporting terrorism by selling all kinds of arms to Africa, Central Asia and Central America. It is namely his arms delivery to the Latin American rebels of FARC organization that makes him wanted by U.S. authorities. He had been captured by Thai troops under the guidance of U.S. specialists in March 2008.
Despite accusations against the Thai prime minister made by Bout's wife Ala and angry comments from the Russian government, Viktor Bout has already been flewn out on a U.S. military plane and accompanied by several U.S. agents. Nevertheless, it seems that some Thai laws have been "bended" in this case.
By the way, it's the same Viktor Bout that served as a model for the 2005 motion picture "Master of War" or "El Señor de la Guerra", starring Nicholas Cage as the main character.
[Source: RUSSIA TODAY TV, Spanish service]
UPDATE, November 18, 2010: [Source: Al-Jazeera TV, English service]
President Karzai recently urged the reduction of foreign troops in his country. As well, he demanded that foreign units should refrain from military activity at night. Source: Al-Jazeera.
Yesterday, a huge blast hit the center of Karachi, Pakistan's most important center of commerce and industry. An enormous crater has been formed by the detonation of a truck loaded with about 1.000 kilograms of explosives. This happened on a police compound housing a crime investigation unit of the Pakistani anti-terror squad. The building itself has been totally ruined and about one square kilometer of the town has been affected as well. Even in distant houses lots of windows have been knocked out by an enormous wave of pressure. The incident left at least 15 dead and 100 wounded, most of the victims being security personnel.
U.S. President Obama's speech at the end of the actual G20 Summit in Seoul has two crucial points: How to restore U.S. trade balance and urging China to allow their currency being driven by the laws of the market. In fact, there are dark clouds in the sky when it comes to the relation between western markets and eastern expansion.
In his 481-page memoirs "Points of Decision", former U.S. president George Bush jun. now justifies the use of a special torture called "waterboarding" when it comes to harvest information from detained suspects of terrorism. Seen in the frame of widespread international mistrust against the U.S. way of dealing with that matter and of fruitless efforts by the Obama administration to imme- diately close the detainee camp at Guantánamo, such stances are not really helpful to restore U.S. credibility in the world. But what else did you expect from the Bush league ?
Today, 70 persons died in two different bomb explosions in Peshawar province in north-western Pakistan while about 120 were injured. UN secretary general Ban Ki Mun expressed his concern about these attacks that had two mosques as their targets. Similar attacks in the past have been related either to the Taliban or Al-Qaeda. As more and more "foreign mercenaries" are closing the ranks of the Taliban, it is difficult to decide from the outside which element of Islamic resistance is now dominating each operation of the Taliban forces. Arabic source
Another Arabic source is analyzing the position and performance of Al-Qaeda in Pakistan in the frame of regional political relations and tensions in Central Asia: طالبان و القاعدة في باكستان شكلت طالبان باكستان ما يشبه درعا لكل من القاعدة وطالبان أفغانستان ووفرت لهما ملاذا آمنا رغم كل الضربات التي كالتها لها أميركا بنفسها أو من خلال الضغط على الجيش الباكستاني لتنفيذ عمليات عسكرية في منطقة وزيرستان والمناطق الحدودية. لكن ما لعب لمصلحة طالبان والقاعدة معا هو أن باكستان تدرك أنه ليس من مصلحتها القضاء على طالبان أفغانستان والقاعدة نهائيا، لكون ذلك يصب في نهاية المطاف لصالح الهند والأحزاب والأفغانية الموالية لها. كما أن إسلام آباد لا تثق بالنوايا الأميركية، خاصة وأنها سمحت سابقا للتحالف الشمالي الموالي لإيران والهند بالسيطرة على كابول وفرض رؤيته الخاصة، وقامت راهنا باستقبال رئيس الوزراء الهندي مانموهان سنغ في البيت الأبيض قبل إعلان الرئيس الأميركي باراك أوباما لإستراتيجيته الجديدة في أفغانستان
أوباما و سنغ
Obama backing permanent membership of Pakistan's arch-enemy India in UNO Security Council (Nov.2010)
The same day, it was published by the Arabic service of Al-Jazeera that the crash of a UPS cargo plane in Dubai on September 3 has to be related to Al-Qaeda because Bin Laden's organization took over responsibility for bombing that plane in a video recently found on the internet. Now, the United Arab Emirates UAE will review the possibility that a bomb caused the UPS plane to crash in Dubai although no proof has emerged so far. Read more !
Earlier information on "UPS explosive parcels" is available on another blogspot of mine (=> look at further news of the day).
Latest news (November 9, 2010): Now, the Jemenite government decided to hunt down Awalaki (picture below) who is seen as one spiritual leader of Al-Qaeda terrorists in Jemen, deemed to be responsible for building and mailing parcel bombs.
Just minutes ago, CNN prejected that U.S. Republicans are going to win over the House of Representatives on Capitol Hill in the 2010 Midterm Elections. Such elections in the middle of a presidential term are putting about one third of the House's seats at stake. At the same time, there are new senators to be voted to the second chamber of Congress. In addition, some states are voting for new governors this night.
Bad luck for President Obama whose healthcare program and economy stimulus plan are being rejected by the Republicans and their pacemakers, the Tea Party Movement, their common neoliberal position being: "Too much involvement of state endangers freedom of individual enterprise."
Yet, distribution of seats in the Senate is still undecided at this time. Maybe, the majority in Senate held by Obama's Democratic Party will turn out to remain solid.
قيادات الثورة طالبت المجلس العسكري بوضع دستور جديد يمهد لجمهورية برلمانية
