US Violates Agreement; Punishes Iran

In its latest act of blatant hypocrisy, the Obama administration has sanctioned Iran over internet and media censorship.  The Administration’s pretentious concern for the Iranian peoples’ welfare is all the more offensive in light of the harsh, illegal, and life-threatening sanctions imposed on that nation, aptly described by The New England Journal of Medicine as a “war against public health” (Gowans).  The Obama administration would have us believe that it is concerned about human rights and freedom of expression where it has no regard for life itself, much less freedom.

President Obama is not alone or the first in this contradictory policy.   In one of the more recent events relating to the topic,  Mr. Obama’s champion during the 2012 presidential race,  Bill Clinton, revealed America’s lack of concern and compassion for human life during the Rwandan genocide when he refused to "neutralize" Radio Mille Collines  with "counter-broadcasts".   Well before the Rwanda genocide,  UN officials and other non governmental officials had asserted that radio transmissions were playing a central role in inciting ethnic tension and "ethno-political" murder.   Although these broadcasts were an important component of the implementation of genocide,  counter-broadcasts urging the perpetrators to stop never took place.

A reason given by Washington for the failure to interfere was state sovereignty and international law as it related to the broadcasts.  In other words, state sovereignty and international law were placed above human life.  In an about face,  Washington is further punishing Iran for not giving America a free hand in undermining its state sovereignty and international law, and the violation of a bilateral agreement.   

International Law & State Sovereignty

Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is a guarantee of freedom of expression:  “Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression. This right includes freedom to hold opinions, without interference, and to seek, receive and impact information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.”  

However, in the same Article, there are provisions for restrictions:

(a) For respect of the rights or reputations of others;

(b) For the protection of national security or of public order (ordre public), or of public health or morals.

Furthermore, Article 2(4) of the UN Charter states that “All members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations.”  

The United States has continuously violated the territorial integrity and the political independence of Iran, starting with the 1953 coup against the democratic government of Mossadegh.   The continuation of these policies,  another coup was attempted shortly after the Iranian Revolution to overthrow the newly formed government of Iran.  Faced with the failure of the Nojeh Coup in 1980, Washington started its broadcasts into Iran from neighboring countries.

The Carter administration’s clandestine radio broadcasts into Iran from Egypt at a cost of some $20-30,000 per month, called for Khomeini's overthrow in support of Iran’s last Prime Minister under the Shah – Shahpur Bakhtiar.  Later, under Reagan’s watch in 1986, the CIA pirated Iran's national television network frequency and transmitted Reza Pahlavi’s address “I will return” on Iranian television[i].

Piracy and broadcast not only violated Article 2(4) of the UN Charter, but also violated a bilateral agreement.

Bilateral Agreement

The January 19, 1981, the United States government and the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran concluded the Algiers Accords.  (Although the Accords was re-classified by George W. Bush, a review of it is accessible at Columbia Law Review, Vol. 81, No. 4 (May, 1981), pp. 822-90).   Article 1 of the agreement is as follows:

“I: Nonintervention In Iranian Affairs 1. The United States pledges that it is and from now on will be the policy of the United States not to intervene, directly or indirectly, politically or militarily, in Iran's internal affairs.”

Since its very inception, the United States has violated this bilateral agreement.  It has continued its relentless propaganda into Iran through the Voice of America, Radio Farda, and other State-funded media outlets such as BBC Persian which receives significant funding from the US government.   Launched in early 2009, the BBC Persian as well as Voice of America played a significant role in instigating violence post 2009 Iranian Presidential elections.

It is abundantly clear that America is not a ‘Good Samaritan’ State, and its policies are not driven by compassion.   Ironically, with drones spying on Americans,  network neutrality undermined, and internet censorship abound at home, the Obama administration demands that Iran open itself to further sabotage and subversion guised as compassion.   In other words, embrace the implementation of Donald Rumsfeld’s Information Operations Roadmap – namely, computer network attacks, psychological operations, "maximum control of the entire electromagnetic spectrum", and US ability to  "disrupt or destroy the full spectrum of globally emerging communications systems, sensors, and weapons systems dependent on the electromagnetic spectrum".   

One would be hard-pressed to believe that the newly imposed sanctions on Iran are a reflection of care and concern for the Iranian people, but rather, they are punishment for resisting the net war.  Edmund Burke was quite right to say that “As People crushed by laws, have no hope but to evade power. If the laws are their enemies, they will be enemies to the law; and those who have must to hope and nothing to lose will always be dangerous.”

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[i] Stephen Shalom – citing David Binder, “U.S. Concedes It Is Behind Anti-Khomeini Broadcasts”, New York Times, 29 June 1980, p.3 and . Tower Commission, p. 398; Farhang, "Iran-Israel Connection," p. 95

The Secret Government PBS 1987 Bill Moyers

Crimes of the government

RT Interview on UNGA

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/61994337/ulrich.asf

The Moslem World’s Rage; Justified or Misplaced?

Media outlets are abuzz with news of the Moslem world’s rage over the release of the provocative film “Innocence of Moslems”.  Pundits are quick to condemn the protests across 20 nations, and the gullible and callous citizens of the “West”, mimicking pundits who are paid to mislead and misinform,  are placing the blame on the aggrieved Moslem community – they simply don’t understand how “free speech” works in America.  But those who are not intellectually blind see a different reality – the fallacy of free speech.   

There is a precedent to curbing free speech when deemed harmful.  In a landmark Supreme Court hearing -- Schenck v. United States, 249 U.S. 47 (1919), the actions of Schenck, an anti-war individual who had printed and distributed leaflets in order to  discourage enlisting servicemen, was not afforded protection under the First Amendment.   The issue before the court was whether Schenck's actions (words, expression) were protected by the free speech clause of the First Amendment.   The Court ruled:

 "The most stringent protection of free speech would not protect a man in falsely shouting fire in a theatre and causing panic.” Holmes argued that “The question in every case is whether the words used are used in such circumstances and are of such nature as to create a clear and present danger that they will bring about the substantive evils that Congress has a right to prevent.”

Since the events of  9/11, the whole Moslem community has been engulfed in panic, death, and destruction through such provocative expressions of “free speech”.    The United States government, in defiance of this  precedent has decided not to prevent such “substantive evils”.    

The desecration of the Koran in 2002 by Guantanamo prison guards revealed in 2005, caused riots globally and took the lives of 15 people.   The lack of inaction by the authorities may have given Florida pastor Terry Jones reason to be encouraged and to burn a Koran on March 20, 2011.  Pictures which were posted on his church’s website.    Shortly thereafter, protests broke out in Afghanistan where a U.N. building was attacked and 12 people killed.   The government inaction continued.  As such, it did not come as a surprise that in February 2012,  US forces in Afghanistan burnt copies of Korans at U.S. bases.   Angry protests ensued resulting in 30 deaths.  There were no criminal charges against the troops, only unspecified administrative punishment.

While the First Amendment enabled insults to be hurled at Moslems, Moslems living in the United States were deprived of “free speech”.  Moslem students at California State University in Irvine (UCI) were suspended for a year for interrupting the speech of the Israeli Ambassador to the U.S., Michael Oren.  The same state allowed the censorship of professors who spoke out against the bombing of Gaza and slaughtering of the Palestinians (see link).         

On October 16, 2004, President George W.  Bush signed the Israel Lobby's bill, the Global Anti-Semitism Review Act. This legislation requires the US Department of State to monitor anti-Semitism world wide.  (It is noteworthy that 4 years later, Republican candidates ran on a platform of promoting hatred of Islam - -see HERE).   In line with policies of selective “free speech”, and in the same month that no criminal charges were brought  against troops in Afghanistan for burning Korans and urinating on Afghan corpses, August 2012, California passed a resolution  (House Resolution 35) against criticism of Israel.    What is perhaps more revealing than the Resolution itself, is the desire and the power to curb “free speech” (read Resolution).     

In light of the recent examples, is the Moslem world’s anger at the United States misplaced when clearly the United States government has the power to curb speech (the most recent case in point being the State of Georgia’s denial of KKK group's application to “Adopt a Highway”)?   Perhaps for the protestors, it is hard to understand that the President’s kill list allows  the assassination of American individuals ‘based merely on patterns of behavior”  yet he is not able to exercise power to curb speech denigrating Islam.   

Why has there been no will to put a stop to these insults and the ensuing violence?  One may never know the answer.   What is clear is that although the Moslem countries have been grossly violated, their cities bombed, their men, women, and children killed, their spirit has not been crushed.  As was brilliantly depicted in a different kind of movie -- Gillo Pontecorvo’s 1965 production of “The Battle of Algiers”, bombs and guns can crush a man’s frail body but not his resistant spirit; ideology will always prevail over bullets.

NAM Summit in Tehran - August 2012

Interview with RT

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_u2LdVi8os0

Terrorists Supported by NATO Target Syria and Algeria

Superb Global Research article by Tony Cartalucci
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=32560

Terrorists Supported by NATO Target Syria and Algeria

by Tony Cartalucci

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=32560

Western policy makers admit that NATO's operations in Libya have played the primary role in emboldening Al Qaeda's AQIM faction (Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb). The Fortune 500-funded Brookings Institution's Bruce Riedel in his article, "The New Al Qaeda Menace," admits that AQIM is now heavily armed thanks to NATO's intervention in Libya, and that AQIM's base in Mali, North Africa, serves as a staging ground for terrorist activities across the entire region.

Image: NATO's intervention in Libya has resurrected listed-terrorist organization and Al Qaeda affiliate, LIFG. It had previously fought in Iraq and Afghanistan, and now has fighters, cash and weapons, all courtesy of NATO, spreading as far west as Mali, and as far east as Syria. The feared "global Caliphate" Neo-Cons have been scaring Western children with for a decade is now taking shape via US-Saudi, Israeli, and Qatari machinations, not "Islam." In fact, real Muslims have paid the highest price in fighting this real "war against Western-funded terrorism."

AQIM, like their Libyan counterparts, the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) are both listed by the US State Department as "Foreign Terrorist Organizations." Likewise, both the UK Home Office (.pdf, listed as GSPC) and the UN recognize both organizations as terrorists. 

Despite this, military intervention in Libya was pursued by the West and condoned by the UN with full knowledge that the militants leading so-called "pro-democracy uprisings" were in fact merely the continuation of decades of violent terrorism carried out by Al Qaeda affiliates. The West had full knowledge of this, primarily because it was Western intelligence agencies arming and supporting these militants for the last 30 years, in Libya's case, while coddling their leaders in Washington and London.

Additionally, the US Army itself meticulously documented foreign terrorists fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan, noting that the highest percentage per capita emanated from Libya's cities of Benghazi and Darnah, the so-called "cradle" of 2011's "pro-democracy uprisings" in Libya.

What unfolded was a premeditated lie - where placard waving "activists" overnight turned into battle-hardened heavily armed, tank driving, jet flying militants waging a nationwide battle against Libyan leader, Muammar Qaddafi. In reality, it was the fruition of 30 years of covert support the West has poured into militant groups across the region - support that would not end with the fall of Qaddafi.

LIFG terrorists promptly turned both east to Syria and west to Mali beyond their borders - a logistical matter they had perfected during their operations in Iraq and Afghanistan over the past decade. LIFG commander Abdul Hakim Belhaj, as early as November 2011, arrived on the Turkish-Syrian border to provide cash, weapons, and LIFG terrorist fighters, overseen by Western intelligence along with US funding and arms laundered through Gulf Cooperative Council (GCC) members such as Qatar and Saudi Arabia. Since then Libyan militants have been confirmed to be leading entire brigades of foreign fighters inside Syria.

And as Bruce Riedel of Brookings concedes, these weapons went west to Mali as well. Algeria had feared just such a scenario unfolding with NATO's intervention in Libya - a fear now fully realized. Ironically, Riedel, in August 2011, had tried to make a case for Algeria being "next to fall" in an article titled literally, "Algeria Will Be Next to Fall."

A year ago, Riedel attempted to argue that it would be the so-called "Arab Spring" that would spread into Algeria after having taken root in neighboring Libya. He had eluded to, and it has now become abundantly clear, that by  "Arab Spring," Riedel meant, US-backed subversion, and more specifically NATO-armed Al Qaeda-brand militancy and terrorism.

With the US now openly arming, supporting, and literally "cheering" Al Qaeda in Syria, it is clear that the "War on Terror" is an unprecedented geopolitical fraud perpetuated at the cost of millions of lives destroyed and an incalculable social and economic toll. NATO, with full knowledge of the consequences is literally carving out of North Africa and the Middle East, the so-called "Caliphate" Western leaders had held over their impressionable people's heads as the impetus to perpetually wage global war. Torn from the pages of Orwell's 1984, an artificial war has been created to carry forward corporate-financier machinations both abroad and domestically. The so-called threat to Western civilization is in fact a foreign legion of Western corporate-financier interests, executing Wall Street and London's foreign policy on a global scale where and in a manner traditional Western forces cannot.

NATO's terrorist blitzkrieg across the Arab World will not end in Syria. It will continue, if allowed, into Iran, through the Caucasus Mountains and into Russia, across China's western borders, and even across Southeast Asia. The price for ignorance, apathy, and complicity in supporting the West's so-called "War on Terror" will ironically reap all the horrors and then some in reality, that were promised to us if we didn't fight this "Long War."

Our support of both the political gambits of our politicians, as well as our daily patronage of the corporate-financier interests driving this agenda have already reaped an unprecedented and still growing regional safe haven for terrorists - and as moderate secular governments continue to be undermined and toppled, we can only imagine the blowback, retaliation, and other consequences as this destructive foreign policy unfolds. To imagine that such meddling will not end up being visited back upon us, even if in the form of a false flag attack dwarfing 9/11, would be folly.

Already, we are suffering economic devastation and an increasingly stifling security apparatus at home, and as long as we capitulate to this current agenda instead of asserting a more rational one of our own, it will only get worse.


Tony Cartalucci is a frequent contributor to Global Research.  Global Research Articles by Tony Cartalucci

Interview with RT on US missile tranfer to Persian Gulf countries

There are two versions of the interview -- a full one and a shorter clip.

short clip
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6DcpqSdIDE
full version
http://www.rt.com/news/iran-us-missile-defense-315/