EGYPT - Days of Violence

Updates embedded !

Leadership of the ruling party of Egypt resigns

استقالة قيادة الحزب الحاكم بمصر

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.

AFGHANISTAN - Drugs and Trade

Recommendation of a brandnew website
on another blog of mine:
Afghanistan - Production and Traffic of Opium

CUBA 1961 - How CIA Tried to Kill Fidel

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. ...

VENEZUELA - Chavez on Economy

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.

TUNISIA - Dictator Fleeing the Country

الهرب من الرئيس التونسي بن علي


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.

EGYPT - Bombing of Christian Church

الهجوم على الكنيسة المسيحية في المصر بالمدينة الاسكندرية



سُوۡرَة 82.5

۞ لَتَجِدَنَّ أَشَدَّ ٱلنَّاسِ عَدَٲوَةً۬ لِّلَّذِينَ ءَامَنُواْ ٱلۡيَهُودَ وَٱلَّذِينَ أَشۡرَكُواْ‌ۖ وَلَتَجِدَنَّ أَقۡرَبَهُم

مَّوَدَّةً۬ لِّلَّذِينَ ءَامَنُواْ ٱلَّذِينَ قَالُوٓاْ إِنَّا نَصَـٰرَىٰ‌ۚ ذَٲلِكَ بِأَنَّ مِنۡهُمۡ قِسِّيسِينَ وَرُهۡبَانً۬ا وَأَنَّهُمۡ لَا يَسۡتَڪۡبِرُونَ

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.

Military Focus on Santa Claus

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.

First Commercial Space Launch

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.

Obama in Afghanistan

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).

EGYPT - Muslim Brotherhood

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.

WIKILEAKS ويكيليكس - Latest News

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

Viktor Bout - Master of War

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]

AFGHANISTAN - Reduction of Foreign Troops Demanded

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.

PAKISTAN - Bombing Karachi into Ruins

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.

G 20 Summit 2010 - Saving Western Economy

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.

G.W.Bush on Terrorism - Torture OK !

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 ?

Islamic Terror - Bloody Harvest

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.


Arabic source

U.S.A. - Republicans Win The House

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.

U.S.A. - Where did all the jobs go ?

Globalization and U.S. Employment

It's time for the U.S. Midterm Elections, and President Obama
finds himself in an akward position. Even though he has reached
a compromise in his healthcare reform and brought initiatives on
their way to stop the financial crisis, he is steadily losing voters,
due to increasing unemployment that is above all hitting his Afro-
American supporters. Even the "American Dream" seems to be
damaged for those who are desperately looking for a job in one
of the most developed countries in the world.


But jobs did not simply vanish; instead, they have gone abroad to
all those people who are willing "to work more for less". That effect
of globalization could be predicted and handled if it had not been
accelerated by an unexpected global financial crisis and by national
development in China and India where an own infrastructure of
highly skilled workers and employees came into being.
It's a CNN feature that makes us understand what has happened in
the U.S. and what might influence European economy as well sooner
or later. Four CEOs, representing powerful U.S. companies like
Coca Cola, IBM, the world's greatest Aluminium smelter Alcoa and
Google, tell us what has happened in the frame of an unrestricted
globalization.



Another feature, produced by AL-Jazeera, is dealing with Obama's
Federal Stimulus Act that was intended to boost small enterprises
in areas characterized by high unemployment. Here, it seems that
government stimulus helped in some cases while others are doomed
because the stimulus plan ended too early for them after the U.S.
Congress showed itself unwilling to extend that program.



Further News of the Day:

As both, the U.S.A. and the European Union, are on the alert
because of explosive parcels from Jemen reaching their countries
via UPS cargo planes, the Jemenite government now decided to
investigate that affair. On October 30, the Jemenite president
declared that the residence of one suspect has been besieged
by Jemenite security forces (picture 1 below). The UPS office
in Sanaa, capital of Jemen, has been closed (picture 2 below).
In the meantime, the German government decided to stop all
passenger and cargo flights from Jemen and ordered to search
every item that has already arrived.
Latest news from November 1st have it that a 22-year-old woman
and who had been arrested as a suspect the day before has been
released only some time later. Jemenite efforts are now concentrated
on hunting Ibrahim Hassan al-Asiri (picture 3 below), regarded as
"Al-Qaeda's senior bombmaker" in Jemen while he is still at large
in an area of the country that is difficult to be controlled by regular
security forces.

IRAQ - Murder and Torture

U.S. cover up Iraqi torture

Al-Jazeera gains access to nearly 400.000 Wikileaks' files
forming part of the biggest military leak in history. Those
files, covering the 2004-2009 war period in Iraq, reveal
1.300 recent cases of abuse and torture of Iraqi prisoners.
Obviously, U.S. military authorities of the Bush era ordered
troops not to intervene in cases of prisoner abuse by Iraqi
forces. The documents show that Iraqi forces sodomised and
electrocuted prisoners. According to Amnesty International,
no Iraqi personnel have been jailed for abusing prisoners.



U.S. units reporting probable detainee abuse by Iraqi police or army
(2006/2009) [Names of civilians and military units have been omitted]:
















US shooting Iraqi civilists

Wikileaks now revealed the facts: Hundreds of unarmed civilians
have been shot at different checkpoints in Iraq. Al-Jazeera is
citing the up-to-now secret U.S. documents.




UPDATE, 25 Oct. 2010:
Wikileaks: Prime Minister Maliki abused power




Report on harassment of business owner
and family by local Iraqi authorities

Names of civilians and military units involved
in this case have been omitted by Wikileaks.




Barack Obama - Iraqi Memories

In January 2006, Barack Obama, then Senator of Illinois,
made a short visit to Baghdad. Here, an excerpt of what
Obama wrote about that trip in his book "The Audacity of
Hope". I think this might be an adequate add to the
Wikileak documents we are just facing:

"And now, three years later [after the toppling of Saddam
Hussein] - as the number of American deaths passed two
thousand and the number of wounded passed sixteen
thousand; after $250 billion in direct spending and
hundreds of billions more in future years to pay off
the resulting debt and care for disabled veterans;
after two Iraqi national elections, one Iraqi constitutional
referendum, and tens of thousands of Iraqi deaths; after
watching anti-American sentiment rise to record levels
around the world and Afghanistan begin to slip back into
chaos - I was flying into Baghdad as a member of the
Senate, partially responsible for trying to figure out just
what to do with this mess.
..........

That night, our delegation accompanied Ambassador
Khalilzad for dinner at the home of Iraqi interim President
Jalal Talabani. ... where we were greeted by the president
and several members of the Iraqi interim government. They
were all heavyset men, most in their fifties or sixties, with
broad smiles but eyes that betrayed no emotion. I recognized
only one of the ministers - Mr. Ahmed Chalabi, the Western-
educated Shi'ite who, as a leader of the exile group the
Iraqi National Congress, had reportedly fed U.S. intelligence
agencies and Bush policy makers some of the prewar information
on which the decision to invade was made - information for
which Chalabi's group had received millions of dollars, and
that had turned out to be bogus. Since then Chalabi had fallen
out with his U.S. patrons; there were reports that he had
steered U.S. classified information to the Iranians, and that
Jordan still had a warrant out for his arrest after he'd been
convicted in absentia on thirty-one charges of embezzlement,
theft, misuse of depositor funds, and currency speculation.
But he appeared to have landed on his feet; immaculately
dressed, accompanied by his grown daughter, he was now
the interim government's acting oil minister.

I didn't speak much to Chalabi during dinner. Instead I
was seated next to the former interim finance minister.
He seemed impressive, speaking knowledgeably about Iraq's
economy, its need to improve transparency and strengthen
its legal framework to attract foreign investment. At the
end of the evening, I mentioned my favorable impression
to one of the embassy staff.
"He's smart, no doubt about it," the staffer said . "Of
course, he's also one of the leaders of the SCIRI Party.
They control the Ministry of the Interior, which controls
the police. And the police, well ... there have been problems
with militia infiltration. Accusations that they're grabbing
Sunni leaders, bodies found the next morning, that kind of
thing ..." The staffer's voice trailed off, and he shrugged.
"We work with what we have."

I had difficulty sleeping that night ...
..........

The following morning, we took a Black Hawk to the Marine
base in Fallujah, out in the arid, western portion of Iraq
called Anbar Province. Some of the fiercest fighting against
the insurgency had taken place in Sunni-dominated Anbar, and
the atmosphere in the camp was considerably grimmer than in
the Green Zone; just the previous day, five Marines on patrol
had been killed by roadside bombs or small-arms fire. The
troops here looked rawer as well, most of them in their early
twenties, many still with pimples and the unformed bodies of
teenagers.
The general in charge of the camp had arranged a briefing,
and we listened as the camp's senior officers explained the
dilemma facing U.S. forces: With improved capabilities, they
were arresting more and more insurgent leaders each day,
but like street gangs back in Chikago, for every insurgent
they arrested, there seemed to be two ready to take his
place. Economics, and not just politics, seemed to be feeding
the insurgency - the central government had been neglecting
Anbar, and male unemployment hovered around 70 percent.
"For two or three dollars, you can pay some kid to plant
a bomb," one of the officers said. "That's a lot of money
out here." ..... "


ATTENTION:
For recent information on AFGHANISTAN, like BAGS OF MONEY
from IRAN and about KARZAI'S DEAL with TALIBAN members
and Afghan WARLORDS, please, refer to another blog of mine
Afghanistan and Iraq - The Beginning of the End
that contains further information adds about both countries.