A Dead Herring

Elmer, Brian, Bear Head, Airbus, Peter, cash, Steve..Karlheinz, Challenger, 471 hours, Oliphant Inquiry, sleaze....

"The Integrity of Government

"The genesis of this Inquiry is a relationship between a former prime minister of Canada, the Right Honourable Brian Mulroney, and Karlheinz Schreiber, a German-Canadian businessman. The relationship spanned two decades and included a secret agreement between the two men made approximately two months after Mr. Mulroney left the office of prime minister and was sitting as a member of parliament. For many years Mr. Mulroney concealed the fact that, on three separate occasions, in three different hotels in two countries, he had received thousands of dollars in cash, in envelopes, from Mr. Schreiber. There was no contemporary documentation, as is normally found in legitimate business dealings, for any of these transactions. No invoices or receipts were provided, no correspondence or reporting letters were written. I conclude that the covert manner in which Mr. Mulroney and Mr. Schreiber carried out their transactions was designed to conceal their business and financial dealings."

Executive Summary
Report of the Oliphant Commission
May 31, 2010

If you happen to have a sense of humour like George Orwell's ("The Two Minutes' Hate"), you will appreciate the fact that the Oliphant Commission Report is damn near impossible to find on the web, whereas the apparently official website, with soothing pastoral scene, is a dead herring, a document that says nothing, means nothing, and leads nowhere.

Comment is free, facts are sacred, product is cheese.

There is a certain tendency to bash The Guardian to which I hope I'm contributing, on the grounds that like Obama, they should know better.

On the undeniable plus side, for those of us who are fans of the Magna Carta, is that The Guardian, unlike other British "news" sources like the BBC, have stuck to their guns in the hideous Murdoch buy-out of British politicians, media, and cops, and have been vindicated.

On the minus side, we have the whole tawdry WikiLeaks episode, that should have been a triumph for The Guardian, yet descended to the level of the gutter press, like the recent breathless coverage of some trial involving Michael Jackson who is dead. He is, admittedly, a celebrity, but he's very dead.

Defeat is snatched from the jaws of victory.

The mythical UNAMA torture report...

...is public. October 10, 2011

Report is posted by Matt Aikins

Save as Draft
So in the Secretary-General's UNAMA report of September 21, 2011, the word "torture" is not mentioned.

On the other hand, a so-far not released UN report on torture in the Afghan prison system was vigorously denied two weeks previously, by the people one might expect to have been the perpetrators, who were nevertheless given air time to defend themselves on the UNAMA web site.

Today's Afghan headlines, 8 September 2011

Interior Ministry and National Directorate of Security rebuff UN’s report on the torture of prisoners; Prisoners are tortured in Government jails and detention centres run by foreign forces; Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission expresses concern over release of prisoners by President Karzai; MPs accuse IEC head of national treason; Insurgent group surrenders in Badghis; Taliban-designated district chief detained in Badakhshan; Food items distributed to needy families in Ghazni; 18 prisoners released from Zabul jail; Afghan officials reject UN torture allegations.

AFGHAN TV NEWS

Tolo TV Headlines

In a joint press release, the Interior Ministry and the National Directorate of Security (NDS) rebuffed the UN’s report regarding the torture of prisoners by Afghan forces in the country and called it an incorrect report. Based on the UN’s report, some western media earlier accused Afghan security forces of torturing prisoners in the country.

Interior Minister, Bismillah Khan Mohammadi said that the Government emphasises that the security transition process is an irreversible process, but the suspension in transferring prisoners and prisons to Afghan forces under seriously harms the implementation of the process.

NDS Chief Ramatullah Nabil said that we have registered documents signed by them (UN officials) who have visited prisons in almost all provinces and said that we did not notice any prison’s law violation.

Meanwhile, NATO/ISAF Military Spokesperson General Carsten Jacobson said that NATO forces have suspended the transfer of prisoners to Afghan forces and NATO is awaiting the launch of the UN’s report in this regard.

None of this is a sign of guilt, but where is the fucking evidence? How is it that UNAMA shows the evidence to alleged perpetrators, but not to the rest of us who are paying their bloody salaries?

Ryan Crocker's incomprehensible Tet news conference

It's weird what you can't find on YouTube, like General Westmoreland's news conference on Tet, saying all was well.

Ryan Crocker says the Kabul high rise stand-off wasn't Tet.

"Mr. Crocker said the attack made for a hard day for him and his staff but did little to derail overall security in the capital. "A half a dozen RPG rounds from 800 meters away—that isn't Tet; that's harassment," he said, referring to the Tet Offensive in the Vietnam War."

According to Westmoreland, Tet wasn't Tet either: it was a comprehensive military victory for The Good Guys.

Tony Blair, getting rich for Christ...

http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/mark-steel/mark-steel-will-we-ever-be-rid-of-tony-blair-2361891.html

Getting a schizophrenic out of Bagram...

...with help from the Access to Information Act


07KABUL3604

Amir Attaran, University of Ottawa

Common Article 3, Third and Fourth Geneva Conventions, 1949

Art 3. In the case of armed conflict not of an international character occurring in the territory of one of the High Contracting Parties, each Party to the conflict shall be bound to apply, as a minimum, the following provisions:

(1) Persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including members of armed forces who have laid down their arms and those placed hors de combat by sickness, wounds, detention, or any other cause, shall in all circumstances be treated humanely, without any adverse distinction founded on race, colour, religion or faith, sex, birth or wealth, or any other similar criteria. To this end the following acts are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever with respect to the above-mentioned persons:
(a) violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture;
(b) taking of hostages;
(c) outrages upon personal dignity, in particular, humiliating and degrading treatment;
(d) the passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court affording all the judicial guarantees which are recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples.

(2) The wounded and sick shall be collected and cared for.

An impartial humanitarian body, such as the International Committee of the Red Cross, may offer its services to the Parties to the conflict.

Terra Incognita - Chapter VII, UN Charter

So, we're into interesting territory, Burke and Wills etc., and nobody really knows the results of the exploration.

Chapter VII of the UN Charter seems clear on paper, but in practice, it's a zoo. We're dealing with the "responsibility to protect" - a new and nebulous concept - and "regime change", as exemplified in Kabul and Baghdad.

So "regime change" is a loser. The invasion of Iraq in 2003 had absolutely no legal basis, and resulted in a continuing humanitarian disaster. "Regime change" in Afghanistan likewise has no legal basis, other than the "self defence" clause of the NATO Charter, equivalent to Section 51 of the UN Charter, but it's a stretch.

And now, we're into "responsibility to protect" in Libya, which is interesting, but doesn't take into account the fact that peaceful demonstrators are being mortared in Syria by their own government.

Inner City Press: Investigative Reporting from the United Nations has some interesting interviews at the Security Council on the situation in Libya: it sounds like amateur hour. Nobody knows whether UNSC Resolution 1973 is still in force (which means there can be no civilian flights into Libya if there's still a "no fly" zone), or where the newly released money for Libya is going, since there is no government. Some of the countries that abstained from 1973 asked these elemental questions but none of the high-priced help from NATO and their allies knew the answers.

"To understand what is happening...

...it is important to tune out what NATO politicians and generals are saying."


Hurtling down Afghanistan's road to perdition
By Matthew Green
Financial Times, 25 September, 2011

"This entirely civilized and not unreasonable assumption proved ill-founded when the Idirans - thinking to make it very clear to all concerned who were the fanatical, invincible ultra-warriors in the matter and who represented the hopelessly decadent, simpering, irredeemably civilian bunch of martial no-hopers merely playing at war - attempted to traumatize the Culture straight back out of their newly begun war by attacking and attempting to destroy every Orbital its war-fleets could reach."

Iain M. Banks
Surface Detail

"Obama should quit."

"Empire of the Son"

"Obama should quit."
by Paul Street
Counterpunch, Sept 24-25, 2011
Totally. Then he could speak his mind.

"Yet Suskind, without stanching the flow of his tale, is able to elucidate how it came to pass that the Reagan-through-Bush II reign of financial deregulation, along with cybernetic chicanery, defective and incomprehensible financial “products,” and banking greed unmoored from social, personal, and fiduciary responsibility, created a monstrous “debt machine” that turbocharged inequality of wealth, inflated bubbles, diverted talent and investment from making things to making bets, bilked millions on the edge to enrich thousands on the heights, and ended—if it ended—by pushing the poor, the middle class, and the real economy into the abyss."
Hendrik Hertzberg
The Book on Barack
New Yorker
a review of:
Confidence Men: Wall Street, Washington, and the Education of a President
by Ron Suskind
Read more http://www.newyorker.com/talk/comment/2011/10/03/111003taco_talk_hertzberg#ixzz1Z5Mfnd6W

Return of the Phoenix

Night Raids in Afghanistan

See also: "Fragging Bob"
by Douglas Valentine
CounterPunch, May 17, 2001

Hockey Night in Palestine

If Stephen Harper’s against you,
you know you’re doing something right.

The Right Honourable Stephen Harper, Prime Minister of Canada and Usurper of All the Cabinet, has recently declared in a papal-like bull that the pursuit of Palestinian statehood by Palestinians at the United Nations would be “counter-productive.”

So, it doesn’t get better than that. By itself it doesn’t mean anything, but Palestinians should know that Harper has an almost perfect track record on being wrong. He’s like Paul the Octopus predicting World Cup results, except Paul was right.

Canada on the wrong side of history...

Harper rejects Palestinian statehood bid;

says Canada will oppose at the UN

...and Robin Cook on the right side. He was good at the time (March, 2003) and looks even better now.

And then of course, there's Cindor Reeves...

Ryan Crocker's future

Corbis

Three Years of Denial

Neither the highly credentialed economists, nor the economics and business reporters at top news outlets, could say that the guy they had revered had problems with basic arithmetic. And – let's be really really clear – he had problems with basic arithmetic.

It took nothing more than third-grade arithmetic to recognise a housing bubble that had grown hugely out of line with the fundamentals of the housing market. There was no explanation that passed the laugh test for the fact that house prices had diverged sharply from their long-term trend, and from rents – creating a housing bubble that peaked at more than $8tn. This was recognisable at least as early as 2002.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2011/sep/12/lehmanbrothers-financial-crisis/print

Lost in Transition

The International Criminal Court should move to Nuremberg

So I’m fed up with the whole pussy-footing, walking-on-eggshells approach to International Criminal Law, as practiced in The Hague. Don’t get me wrong: I’m a huge fan of the ICC.

The problem is the huge, glaring discrepancy between the ICC preaching and practice. We have the ICC pursuing people in Africa and the “former Yugoslavia”. And yet, obvious criminal behaviour – like the whole Baha Mousa disaster – is somehow not within the purview of the Court. Of course, the Statute of Rome specifically says that war crimes should be prosecuted within the court system of the nations that might be implicated. So we’ve seen where that led in the United Kingdom – nowhere. The most obvious perpetrator got a year in jail, and everybody else got a free ride.

He's got a fabulous name, this perpetrator: "Don Payne", The Assistant Asshole to the Asshole-in-Chief. Who knows where he is now? A "private contractor" in Iraq or Afghanistan? Uzbekistan presidential chief of security? An east London hood? The good news is that it’s not over yet.

You know, that’s not the way the Nuremberg Principles were formulated, and it’s not the way the London Charter of 1945 was formulated either. Furthermore, we have the words of Robert H. Jackson to spell out the principles:

"It is much too early to appraise the influence of Nuremberg. But I would disclaim any expectation that it alone is enough to prevent future wars. When stakes are high enough and chances of success look good enough, I suppose reckless leaders may again plunge their people into war, just as men still resort to murder, notwithstanding the law’s penalty. But I do think that we have forever laid to rest in the minds of statesmen the vicious assumptions that all war must be regarded as legal and just, and that while the law imposes personal responsibility for starting a street riot, it imposes none for inciting and launching a world war."

If there was any doubt about this, Canadian law spells it out further in the Crimes Against Humanity and War Crimes Act of 2000.

Breach of responsibility by military commander

7. (1) A military commander commits an indictable offence if
(a) the military commander, outside Canada,
(i) fails to exercise control properly over a person under their effective command and control or effective authority and control, and as a result the person commits an offence under section 4, or
(ii) fails, before or after the coming into force of this section, to exercise control properly over a person under their effective command and control or effective authority and control, and as a result the person commits an offence under section 6;
(b) the military commander knows, or is criminally negligent in failing to know, that the person is about to commit or is committing such an offence; and
(c) the military commander subsequently
(i) fails to take, as soon as practicable, all necessary and reasonable measures within their power to prevent or repress the commission of the offence, or the further commission of offences under section 4 or 6, or
(ii) fails to take, as soon as practicable, all necessary and reasonable measures within their power to submit the matter to the competent authorities for investigation and prosecution.

Breach of responsibility by a superior

(2) A superior commits an indictable offence if
(a) the superior, outside Canada,
(i) fails to exercise control properly over a person under their effective authority and control, and as a result the person commits an offence under section 4, or
(ii) fails, before or after the coming into force of this section, to exercise control properly over a person under their effective authority and control, and as a result the person commits an offence under section 6;
(b) the superior knows that the person is about to commit or is committing such an offence, or consciously disregards information that clearly indicates that such an offence is about to be committed or is being committed by the person;
(c) the offence relates to activities for which the superior has effective authority and control; and
(d) the superior subsequently
(i) fails to take, as soon as practicable, all necessary and reasonable measures within their power to prevent or repress the commission of the offence, or the further commission of offences under section 4 or 6, or
(ii) fails to take, as soon as practicable, all necessary and reasonable measures within their power to submit the matter to the competent authorities for investigation and prosecution.

Conspiracy, attempt, etc.

(2.1) Every person who conspires or attempts to commit, is an accessory after the fact in relation to, or counsels in relation to, an offence referred to in subsection (1) or (2) is guilty of an indictable offence.

Jurisdiction

(3) A person who is alleged to have committed an offence under subsection (1), (2) or (2.1) may be prosecuted for that offence in accordance with section 8.

Punishment

(4) Every person who commits an offence under subsection (1), (2) or (2.1) is liable to imprisonment for life.

Application before coming into force

*(5) Where an act or omission constituting an offence under this section occurred before the coming into force of this section, subparagraphs (1)(a)(ii) and (2)(a)(ii) apply to the extent that, at the time and in the place of the act or omission, the act or omission constituted a contravention of customary international law or conventional international law or was criminal according to the general principles of law recognized by the community of nations, whether or not it constituted a contravention of the law in force at the time and in the place of its commission.
*[Note: Section 7 in force October 23, 2000, see SI/2000-95.]

Definitions

(6) The definitions in this subsection apply in this section.
“military commander”
« chef militaire »
“military commander” includes a person effectively acting as a military commander and a person who commands police with a degree of authority and control comparable to a military commander.

“superior”
« supérieur »
“superior” means a person in authority, other than a military commander.



So there you have it. Ordinary soldiers are expected to know the difference between right and wrong. Commanding officers are responsible for acts committed by soldiers under their command. The laws concerning prisoners taken in actions “sanctioned” by the United Nations are those of the Geneva Conventions of 1949, which are crystal clear in stating that the “Detaining Power” that takes prisoners is responsible for their care, and in particular responsible for knowing that the care such prisoners receive after transfer to a “Transferring Power” meets the standard of the Third Geneva Convention.

Part II. General Protection of Prisoners of War

Art 12. Prisoners of war are in the hands of the enemy Power, but not of the individuals or military units who have captured them. Irrespective of the individual responsibilities that may exist, the Detaining Power is responsible for the treatment given them.

Prisoners of war may only be transferred by the Detaining Power to a Power which is a party to the Convention and after the Detaining Power has satisfied itself of the willingness and ability of such transferee Power to apply the Convention. When prisoners of war are transferred under such circumstances, responsibility for the application of the Convention rests on the Power accepting them while they are in its custody.

Nevertheless, if that Power fails to carry out the provisions of the Convention in any important respect, the Power by whom the prisoners of war were transferred shall, upon being notified by the Protecting Power, take effective measures to correct the situation or shall request the return of the prisoners of war. Such requests must be complied with.

If you take prisoners, they’re yours. NATO's prisoners in Afghanistan are ours.

The Basra Choir

Bring back Nuremberg

So we're lucky we've got Fisk, and we're lucky we've got the bloody-minded lawyers, and we're lucky we've got jurists who inquire without fear of favour.

Otherwise, we're at the mercy of assholes who feature prominently in history, most recently in the person of Dick Cheney. The Ministry of Defence doesn't look very good either.

The Right Honourable Islamicism Doorknob, Prime Minister of Canada

It's embarrassing, but not unexpected. Weasels don't change their spots.

A psychopath in Palestine

Tony Blair fronts the Middle East Quartet

So, maybe I'm being a bit hard on Tony, but I don't think so.

Ken Clarke and the Feral Overclass

"It is much too early to appraise the influence of Nuremberg. But I would disclaim any expectation that it alone is enough to prevent future wars. When stakes are high enough and chances of success look good enough, I suppose reckless leaders may again plunge their people into war, just as men still resort to murder, notwithstanding the law’s penalty. But I do think that we have forever laid to rest in the minds of statesmen the vicious assumptions that all war must be regarded as legal and just, and that while the law imposes personal responsibility for starting a street riot, it imposes none for inciting and launching a world war."

Nuremberg In Retrospect: Legal Answer To International Lawlessness

By Robert H. Jackson
Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States
Article originally appeared at 35 ABAJ 813 (1949).

So Ken Clarke, enduring Conservative politician of decades, was mysteriously absent during all critical votes regarding the invasion of Iraq 2003, but he now is keen on using the penal system to teach people a lesson about riots.

Talk about a slow learner.

NATO shoots self in foot

Every secret cloud has a funny lining.

New York Times, Sept. 3, 2011

The "Old World War 2 Allies" subsidiary of NATO has conducted a 6 month air war in support of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1973, an almost completely opaque operation with regard to objectives and responsibility. Now as a result, evidence has turned up in Tripoli for collusion among the CIA, MI6, and Libya's Mukhabarat_el-Jamahiriya, for interrogation of prisoners in return for favours. Human Rights Watch has the evidence, which will presumably also be provided to the International Criminal Court, the Court's jurisdiction in Libya having been only recently recognized by the United States in UN Security Council Resolution 1970. Weirdly, by bombing Libya, NATO might have ensured publication of evidence for war crimes committed by its member states, evidence that otherwise might have been destroyed or kept secret from the public, like the evidence from Egypt apparently was, and might be still.

It could of course be a clever disinformation campaign by the very clever Gadaffi in order to discredit his persecutors, and like bin Laden, bring down the USSR and now possibly, NATO. Bin Laden wins in a walk. NATO might as well have given Wikileaks its own air force.

Bev Oda has a dam she'd like to sell you.

Afghan Independence Day