U.S. is blockading Syria — a war crime

Global Research, September 25, 2015
New Eastern Outlook 24 September 2015

The news that the United States asked both Greece and Bulgaria to block Russian flights over their air space headed for Syria is a logical extension of the criminality of the aggression against Syria being conducted by the NATO powers and their allies in the region. The NATO alliance has been conducting a war of aggression against Syria since 2011 when it succeeded in destroying Libya and it was responsible for the waves of humanity who fled the NATO bombing and who now flee the Takfiri militants NATO used as their auxiliaries.

These actions are clearly war crimes of the highest order, contemptuous violations of the UN Charter, international law and of all morality. The resulting misery of the peoples of the countries under attack, who are forced to flee and become refugees in the heart of the very alliance that is attacking them, is beyond words. The images bombard us daily. But the images are not placed in the western media to create a call for peace in the region. Instead, as we see from the recent statements of the British, French and American leaders, they are used to manipulate the emotions of the citizens of the NATO countries to justify a call for more military aggression against Syria which will create more misery, more death and more refugees.

That the flood of stories in the western press about the Syrian refugees is being used as a propaganda tool to is easy to see when we compare the situation regarding refugees from Libya and Ukraine. The Libyan people have been fleeing the hell that NATO created for four years now, with thousands of people arriving in Europe, mostly on the shores of Italy. But there has been no call to attack the vicious thugs that NATO installed in place of the progressive socialist Libyan Republic, no call to bring back the civilized society that existed before Gaddafi was brutally murdered by the same forces, no call for regime change in Tripoli. Instead, chaos and gangsterism prevail, and all is well.

In Ukraine over a million people have fled the Kiev junta’s massive armed attacks on its own people, the type of attacks that NATO countries alleged Gaddafi had used on his own people to justify their attack on Libya. The US puppets in Kiev have used bombing raids on civilians, white phosphorus shells, cluster bombs and other banned weapons and they have used them not on military targets of the peoples resistance forces but on civilian houses, shops, schools, hospitals, power stations and other civilian infrastructure. Food and medical supplies are blockaded. The people of the Donbas are under siege. All these actions are war crimes and crimes against humanity. Yet the western media says not a single word about them. There is no call from Washington or London or Paris or Ottawa to bomb Kiev and remove Poroshenko. Instead they supply him and his Nazi friends with weapons, supplies and money and send in their own forces to assist in these criminal attacks. The double standards applied and the deep hypocrisy and cynicism displayed by the NATO governments and the western news media that provide the information flow to the people, must shake anyone’s belief in the viability of western civilization.

In stark contrast, Russia has taken in over a million refugees so far from Ukraine without complaint while the EU countries argue bitterly amongst themselves as to who should take the refugees they have created and while they fan the flames of xenophobia among their own populations. But then the motivations are completely different. The Russians want to help the people being attacked by NATO and its puppet regime in Kiev. The Europeans only want to use the refugees as a means of creating hysteria in Europe so that their people will support a combined NATO attack on Syria.

Since these EU countries in one way or another support the forces attacking Syria they are responsible under international law for receiving and caring for the refugees they have created. They must follow certain humane standards in the treatment of them, but instead we see images of them being fed like animals or being kicked and tripped up by the very media sent to report on the crisis.

But now the situation has escalated further with the United States demanding that Greece and Bulgaria block relief supplies from Russia from using their air space, an attempt to completely block these supplies. Greece has found the courage to refuse the request. Bulgaria to its shame has decided to lick their boots.

The Americans try to justify their demand by claiming that some of those flights are used to deliver military supplies to Syria. Yes, and so what? Russia has every right to support the Syrian government in its fight against the Nato-Saudi, Israeli auxiliaries who are fighting in Syria under the acronyms ISIS or ISIL or Al Qaeda and has been openly doing so since the beginning. There is no UN approved arms embargo against Syria and the United States and its allies are daily dropping supplies to these same groups and have let it be known that their special forces are operating on the ground alongside those forces. Just the other day another story broke of the Israeli Army airlifting wounded from these groups for treatment in Israeli occupied zones and one must wonder if those selectively helped are not indeed Israeli special forces themselves. The Americans and Bulgarians are not just worried about more Russian military supplies from being delivered. They also want the Syrian people to experience the maximum state of misery and despair to punish them for their support of their government and to try to force them to turn against it.

Indeed, the Russian and Syrian governments affirm that many of those flights are delivering much needed humanitarian relief including medical supplies, generators for hospitals, food, tents for internal refugees, and related supplies to relieve the distress of the Syrian people in the face of the American provoked attacks on them. One has to ask, where are the American and European relief supplies for the Syrian people? Where are the ships and planes that should be carrying the same supplies the Russians are delivering? If they had delivered them and if they had insisted that the attacks on Syria stop there would not be any refugees. But they want the refugees to generate war propaganda and so they do not want relief supplies to get through.

The attempt to blockade the delivery of humanitarian assistance amounts to a war crime under international law, including the the Geneva Conventions, the Nuremburg Principles and the Statute of Rome that sets out the definitions of war crimes under the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court. The attempted blockade of humanitarian assistance constitutes murder, inhuman treatment, collective punishment, an action designed to bring about the physical destruction of the population and the nation, and other related crimes committed against the Syrian civilian population. Every European leader who takes part in this criminal conspiracy should be charged with war crimes. The American president should be Number One in the dock. But international criminal law continues to be administered by criminals and we watch with disbelief the complete silence of the prosecutor at the International Criminal Court who sits in her office in The Hague and twiddles her thumbs while Damascus, Aleppo and Donetsk burn.

The cartloads of the dead overflow the cemeteries. The misery of the living mounts. The hope that is left for peace and security, even for a little kindness in this life, drips out of our veins with every drop of blood shed by the victims of these NATO wars. It is very easy to despair. I despair. But we must resist. We must demand these wars stop, We must stop sitting around face booking and surfing the internet, get out of these artificial worlds they have built to turn us into zombies of the living and get back on the streets where we still count, where they still fear us and where we can shout our demands so loud they will shake the walls of the state itself.

Christopher Black is an international criminal lawyer based in Toronto, he is a member of the Law Society of Upper Canada and he is known for a number of high-profile cases involving human rights and war crimes, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

Kiev regime is forcing death by starvation, freezing, and relocation in East Ukraine. Will we stand by and do nothing?

By George Eliason, December 17, 2014
Posted on Global Research
http://www.globalresearch.ca/kiev-regime-is-forcing-death-by-starvation-and-relocation-in-east-ukraine/5420460

Can the murder of 3 million people go unnoticed by the entire world? Yes it can and unfortunately it has before. More than likely you have never even heard about it. By the end of 1941 the German and Ukrainian nazis killed over 1 million Jews. This was the beginning of the Holocaust. We all know this.

By the end of 1941 the German and Ukrainian nazis killed 3 million Slavic and Soviet prisoners by using the method Ukrainian nationalists describe as Holomodor or starvation death.

The Nazi Plan to Kill Slavic Peoples

The Nazi Plan for the East was first tried out on the Slavic and Soviet prisoners. This was their plan to destroy Slavic peoples which included central and southeast Ukraine. Prisoners suffered in the cold and famine conditions so harsh they wrote petitions for the nazis to be merciful and just kill them.

According to Professor Timothy Snyder- In the German POW camps in occupied Soviet Belarus, Soviet Ukraine and Poland, prisoners were not even registered by name. As the German quartermaster general of the German army indicated, prisoners who could not work “were to be starved”.

In Ukraine and Belarus Bandera’s Ukrainian SS nationalists ran the camps and starved millions of Ukrainians, Russians, and Belorussians to death. The world never even blinked.

It was wrong for the Ukrainian nationalists in the diaspora to develop the myth of the 1932-33 Holomodor famine their own families never suffered to become the centerpiece of Ukraine’s nation-building program under Yushchenko after using it so effectively in 1941 against Ukrainians and starving 3 million prisoners to death.

This makes even the idea that Ukrainian nationalists in Kiev would conceive using this weapon again on the families of the same population criminal. It has been proven clearly that the nationalists were not in the Soviet Union in 1931-32. It has been clearly proven that the Ukrainian nationalists in service to the 3rd Reich used starvation as part of their genocide program in Ukraine and Belarus in 1941.

The population that suffered under both famines were the families in central Ukraine and Donbass today.

Ukraine- Is the 3rd Time the Charm?

In Pervomaisk today conditions are so bad that people are given ¼ of a loaf of bread per day to live on. Many areas are not even getting this. Starvation deaths in different cities now number 20 or 30 weekly. Within 20 days deaths from starvation and exposure/ freezing in Donbass is going to jump exponentially. The most vulnerable which includes the children and chronically ill will be hit the hardest.

Within 40 days without decisive humanitarian action the winter weather will take its toll on people in the hardest hit areas by ultra-nationalist shelling and rockets. Many live in the ruins or root cellars at what used to be their homes. Disease will follow. The nationalists are counting on them dying or relocating.

Will the world stand by while the Ukrainian nationalists use the slow method of genocide they perfected in WW2? Will the world allow the US and Europe continue to try to push Donbass to its knees, calling the victim a criminal?

The war criminal Olexandr Turchynov formerly post coup- acting president stated bluntly in an interview on December 17th that even he does not think the world will sit by and watch the total blockade finish its work. He doesn’t say he is against it. He just states there will be objections to it.

Contrary to the lie Ukrainian nationalists tell about fighting for a free and independent Ukraine today or fighting Nazis and Communists after 1941; both then and now they rely on the fact that you won’t believe human beings will do these things to other people. They don’t think you will believe they are doing these things to people.

Bank runs and benefits cut in August

The blockade announced in mid November is a lie. The reality in Donbas is this blockade has been in place for almost 6 months now. The bank runs happened in the late spring through the mid summer. I was there as thousands of people stood in line literally for days in front of bank ATMs.

During this time a surcharge was added to every deposit in Donbass banks and the funds went to buy the bullets used to kill people here. When Kiev lost ground in the east mid summer they closed the banks altogether. The banks closed without warning all deposits were stolen and used to buy more bullets.

How is it possible to have a bank run in November when banks haven’t been open for 4 months?

The vulnerable, the dying, and the dead

Pensions and benefits to the elderly and disabled were also cut off in mid summer. State and oligarch owned businesses functioning and reaping profits stopped paying salaries. By early July retirees across the countryside were surviving on leftovers from the last harvest, unripened fruit, and help from their neighbors.

In August I started hearing about the starvation among the most vulnerable people which were the shut-ins. People that were bed ridden or because of disabilities could no longer leave their apartments died of starvation and thirst. Where were their neighbors?

In early summer the Ukrainian army started targeting apartment buildings and homes. Throughout the summer this never let up. At first Kiev denied it but later it didn’t matter anymore in the news. Kiev suspended the human rights of people in Southeast early in the spring.

The shelling of civilian homes had the effect Kiev was hoping for. It created a flood of terrified refugees that simply ran and almost overwhelmed the capacity to take care of them in Belarus and Russia.

I have watched people come to this decision. They don’t talk about it out of fear. They quietly slip away. The neighbors of the shut-ins thought someone else was staying and would look after them. In a lot of cases no one could. No one talked to anyone else, they ran.

Ukrainian nationalists popped up everywhere. In the cities groups like Pravy Sektor did random shootings. Paranoia ran wild. It didn’t help that until recently most people never understood what was really happening. How do you comprehend the country where your family has always lived in and you are a part of deciding you are less than human? How do you come to grips with your country wanting to kill you?

The shock that your own neighbor might want you dead for some incomprehensible reason caused this. That fear became justifiable when people turned their neighbors in to the punishers to be tortured and killed. I know one too many stories about a town drunk spinning tales for another bottle. Ukraine is a place where being a 2nd cousin to the militia back in June was enough for a death sentence for your entire family including your children even if you never spoke with them.

Every town has people from across the political spectrum just like yours does. People confused patriots with nationalists and vice versa.

The social net that Poroshenko cynically cut off in November has not existed since late spring. Kiev destroyed it with shells not democracy.

Medications

Medications for chronic life threatening illnesses such as diabetes, heart disease, and basic antibiotics became in short supply in late spring. Early on medication was transported by clearly marked vehicles with red cross insignia or ambulances. These became the favored targets of mercenaries and para military forces like Donbass battalion. In every major city hospitals have been prime targets the entire time.

Until then most medications were distributed through warehouses in Kiev. As early as June publications such as the Telegraph reported on the humanitarian efforts which was caused by Kiev’s humanitarian blockade.

The reality since summer is people dying because the medications they needed were kept out of their reach. No matter how how much effort is put into the humanitarian effort the population of over 7 million people are in a war zone that is constantly bombarded with rockets and shells.

Creating Famine Conditions

Beginning in the late spring the Ukrainian army set landmines across the grain fields needed to support the area for human and livestock consumption. The landmines set in grain fields aren’t in contested areas. They are not marked and the locals weren’t told to stay away by the Ukrainian army.

These are the fields where farmers make their living and produce the grain needed for bread. One of my neighbors hit a mine trying to harvest his wheat. It destroyed his tractor and he was lucky to be thrown clear. He woke to see his tractor burning. In early summer another neighbor on his tractor was used for sniper practice.

The Ukrainian army burnt grain and corn fields that were under their control. This continued throughout most of the summer as noted across many articles.

The scorched earth policy was geared at creating the current situation which will soon be mass starvation and the sicknesses associated with it. Tens of thousands of acres could not be harvested.

To make the point a few short weeks ago Kiev’s appointed Governor in the occupied Lugansk region stated bluntly that Kiev’s humanitarian blockade of Lugansk and Donetsk was geared to reproduce the effects of the Soviet Union’s 1932-33 famine in which millions across central and southeast Ukraine perished from starvation and sickness.

Camps

When the refugee problem started getting international attention in mid-summer president Poroshenko made a big deal about how Donbass refugees would be welcomed by the Ukrainians and how much money was set aside for them. It is Kiev of course and the money was stolen of like the donations for the families of Kiev’s heavenly hundred.

The refugees were set up in summer camps without utilities and for the most part no humanitarian aid. What humanitarian aid isn’t stolen goes to the soldiers. The men that ran from the war found themselves conscripted and sent back. The families sent to the summer camps still sit there in December with no heat. Many will perish from exposure.

Refugees that thought they were fortunate enough to make it to Kiev or other nationalist cities are denied jobs and benefits because they are from Donbass. They ran from the referendum, thought they were good Ukrainians, and yet are still Moskal. Kiev’s new laws take the children from their mothers so they can be raised in orphanages and become good Ukrainian nationalists.

Genocide by Conscription

When Kiev’s ATO started they were sure that the nationalists from Maidan and what became the core punisher groups would quickly pacify Donbass based on just enthusiasm. It took a while for them to realize the skills they learned at Maidan and the Odessa Trade Union Building wasn’t combat.

The nazi’s only succeeded in developing a taste for murder. In both well published cases as well as the rampant murder in smaller cities the victims were not combatants. They could not and did not fight back. At Maidan, the Berkut were unarmed and ordered to stand and take the punishment. The footage after the initial and controversial beginning says it all.

After this Kiev’s deployment policy to the ATO regions changed dramatically. Conscripts were questioned on their nationalist leanings and deployed according to their answers. People from cities like Odessa which suffered under mass murder in the spring and stood against nationalism were threatened, jailed, and sent into the ATO.

People that expressed Ukrainian nationalist leanings were sent in behind them or to areas where the there was no conflict.

This tactic was developed in the 1930′s by Stepan Bandera to make both his enemies and people that may eventually rise against Ukrainian nationalism fight and kill each other. This is happening today to the refugee conscripts from Donbass. It is the case today when the conscript is from the wrong city or gives the wrong answer when they enlist or get drafted.

The tactic is the same one used in WW2. The Ukrainian nationalists stood behind conscripts during WW2 and killed them when they refused to fight. The same then as is the case today, families were threatened so conscripts won’t refuse to fight.

The battle is truly brother to brother, cousin to cousin; with few ways out for the conscripts. The nationalist groups themselves get medals and positions for combat they never participate in.Kiev, Ukraine rewards are for the torture, murder, and sodomy they committed against civilians and conscripts.

What the World won’t Allow

The filtration or concentration camps at this point sit idle and more are under construction. The reason is Kiev forces don’t control enough of Donbass to make using them worthwhile. While the world sits by and cheers and jeers Kiev’s inept and thwarted attempts at mass genocide; having large scale bloody executions of normal people in anything called “a camp” broadcast worldwide would quickly dampen the enthusiasm in Europe and the US.

History has taught the nationalists what the world hasn’t learned. They know the world won’t stand by and allow the bloody or mass execution of millions without eventually demanding a price from someone. While the civilized nations will allow it to happen, the cost will be like the Nuremberg trials when the outrage that could have stopped it is belatedly expressed and acceptable.

Enough of the Double Talk Already

If the government in Kiev had any notion of reintegrating Donbass they would not have bombed, shelled, and murdered entire villages. They would not have allowed mass torture of civilians, or the rape and murder of women and children. These are not things a legitimate government allows for, never mind bestows medals on monsters that do these things to its own people.

If they were not nationalists, they would have stopped the ultras from the murders and calls for destroying every life in Donbass. Instead they rewarded it. Commanders guilty of mass murder and torture sit in the Ukrainian Senate and meet with the US Congress and the executive branch. Mass starvation in Donbass is a tactic to make people run, die slowly, or submit to the government that murders them.

The argument that the separatist rebels are getting what they deserve is intellectually retarded. Donbass wasn’t trying to separate, Kiev forced it through atrocity. The Ukrainian government made it impossible for Donbass and other areas to remain under their control.

The argument that there are no nazis in Kiev is a leap into the bizzarre. The people in Kiev’s government were educated in ultra-nationalist/nazi universities. Many had David Duke as a professor of history.

Ukrainian nazi ideology is so rigid it was easy to predict the brutality of the cleansing battalions before Maidan was over and the Coup leaders actually took government. It is so rigid it was easy to predict the turn it would take in Donbass which entails a regional cleansing of people. It was easy to predict how the conscription would be used to get rid of “others” that even remotely may be Moskal also.

It was easy to predict winter starvation would be used as a tactical weapon in June when I first wrote it would happen. Read Bandera’s ideological material. They follow it zealously and religiously. Ukrainian nazi’s are nothing if not predictable. They are also intractable liars. That’s part of the ideology too.

The nonstop shelling during the peace has done its work. Too many people’s homes are destroyed that were never involved in any fighting. Too many people cannot afford to purchase bread even it were available to them. The cold and snow of winter has set in.

The humanitarian effort needed is now monumental to stop mass death across the region. It will never come in fast enough or be enough. This time, which is the third time in less than 100 years the people of Donbass have suffered through forced starvation through callousness and as weapon of war- please consider helping.