sanctions

The spheres and perils of U.S. hegemony

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Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China

US Hegemony and Its Perils

February 2023

Contents

Introduction

I. Political Hegemony—Throwing Its Weight Around

II. Military Hegemony—Wanton Use of Force 

III. Economic Hegemony—Looting and Exploitation

IV. Technological Hegemony—Monopoly and Suppression

V. Cultural Hegemony—Spreading False Narratives

Conclusion

Introduction

Since becoming the world’s most powerful country after the two world wars and the Cold War, the United States has acted more boldly to interfere in the internal affairs of other countries, pursue, maintain and abuse hegemony, advance subversion and infiltration, and willfully wage wars, bringing harm to the international community.

The United States has developed a hegemonic playbook to stage “color revolutions,” instigate regional disputes, and even directly launch wars under the guise of promoting democracy, freedom and human rights. Clinging to the Cold War mentality, the United States has ramped up bloc politics and stoked conflict and confrontation. It has overstretched the concept of national security, abused export controls and forced unilateral sanctions upon others. It has taken a selective approach to international law and rules, utilizing or discarding them as it sees fit, and has sought to impose rules that serve its own interests in the name of upholding a “rules-based international order.”

This report, by presenting the relevant facts, seeks to expose the U.S. abuse of hegemony in the political, military, economic, financial, technological and cultural fields, and to draw greater international attention to the perils of the U.S. practices to world peace and stability and the well-being of all peoples.

I. Political Hegemony — Throwing Its Weight Around

The United States has long been attempting to mold other countries and the world order with its own values and political system in the name of promoting democracy and human rights.

◆ Instances of U.S. interference in other countries’ internal affairs abound. In the name of “promoting democracy,” the United States practiced a “Neo-Monroe Doctrine” in Latin America, instigated “color revolutions” in Eurasia, and orchestrated the “Arab Spring” in West Asia and North Africa, bringing chaos and disaster to many countries.

In 1823, the United States announced the Monroe Doctrine. While touting an “America for the Americans,” what it truly wanted was an “America for the United States.”

Since then, the policies of successive U.S. governments toward Latin America and the Caribbean Region have been riddled with political interference, military intervention and regime subversion. From its 61-year hostility toward and blockade of Cuba to its overthrow of the Allende government of Chile, U.S. policy on this region has been built on one maxim-those who submit will prosper; those who resist shall perish.

The year 2003 marked the beginning of a succession of “color revolutions” — the “Rose Revolution” in Georgia, the “Orange Revolution” in Ukraine and the “Tulip Revolution” in Kyrgyzstan. The U.S. Department of State openly admitted playing a “central role” in these “regime changes.” The United States also interfered in the internal affairs of the Philippines, ousting President Ferdinand Marcos Sr. in 1986 and President Joseph Estrada in 2001 through the so-called “People Power Revolutions.”

In January 2023, former U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo released his new book Never Give an Inch: Fighting for the America I Love. He revealed in it that the United States had plotted to intervene in Venezuela. The plan was to force the Maduro government to reach an agreement with the opposition, deprive Venezuela of its ability to sell oil and gold for foreign exchange, exert high pressure on its economy, and influence the 2018 presidential election.

◆ The U.S. exercises double standards on international rules. Placing its self-interest first, the United States has walked away from international treaties and organizations, and put its domestic law above international law. In April 2017, the Trump administration announced that it would cut off all U.S. funding to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) with the excuse that the organization “supports, or participates in the management of a programme of coercive abortion or involuntary sterilization.” The United States quit UNESCO twice in 1984 and 2017. In 2017, it announced leaving the Paris Agreement on climate change. In 2018, it announced its exit from the UN Human Rights Council, citing the organization’s “bias” against Israel and failure to protect human rights effectively. In 2019, the United States announced its withdrawal from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty to seek unfettered development of advanced weapons. In 2020, it announced pulling out of the Treaty on Open Skies.

The United States has also been a stumbling block to biological arms control by opposing negotiations on a verification protocol for the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) and impeding international verification of countries’ activities relating to biological weapons. As the only country in possession of a chemical weapons stockpile, the United States has repeatedly delayed the destruction of chemical weapons and remained reluctant in fulfilling its obligations. It has become the biggest obstacle to realizing “a world free of chemical weapons.”

◆ The United States is piecing together small blocs through its alliance system. It has been forcing an “Indo-Pacific Strategy” onto the Asia-Pacific region, assembling exclusive clubs like the Five Eyes, the Quad and AUKUS, and forcing regional countries to take sides. Such practices are essentially meant to create division in the region, stoke confrontation and undermine peace.

◆ The U.S. arbitrarily passes judgment on democracy in other countries, and fabricates a false narrative of “democracy versus authoritarianism” to incite estrangement, division, rivalry and confrontation. In December 2021, the United States hosted the first “Summit for Democracy,” which drew criticism and opposition from many countries for making a mockery of the spirit of democracy and dividing the world. In March 2023, the United States will host another “Summit for Democracy,” which remains unwelcome and will again find no support.

II. Military Hegemony — Wanton Use of Force

The history of the United States is characterized by violence and expansion. Since it gained independence in 1776, the United States has constantly sought expansion by force: it slaughtered Indians, invaded Canada, waged a war against Mexico, instigated the American-Spanish War, and annexed Hawaii. After World War II, the wars either provoked or launched by the United States included the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Gulf War, the Kosovo War, the War in Afghanistan, the Iraq War, the Libyan War and the Syrian War, abusing its military hegemony to pave the way for expansionist objectives. In recent years, the U.S. average annual military budget has exceeded 700 billion U.S. dollars, accounting for 40 percent of the world’s total, more than the 15 countries behind it combined. The United States has about 800 overseas military bases, with 173,000 troops deployed in 159 countries.

According to the book America Invades: How We’ve Invaded or been Militarily Involved with almost Every Country on Earth, the United States has fought or been militarily involved with almost all the 190-odd countries recognized by the United Nations with only three exceptions. The three countries were “spared” because the United States did not find them on the map.

◆ As former U.S. President Jimmy Carter put it, the United States is undoubtedly the most warlike nation in the history of the world. According to a Tufts University report, “Introducing the Military Intervention Project: A new Dataset on U.S. Military Interventions, 1776-2019,” the United States undertook nearly 400 military interventions globally between those years, 34 percent of which were in Latin America and the Caribbean, 23 percent in East Asia and the Pacific, 14 percent in the Middle East and North Africa, and 13 percent in Europe. Currently, its military intervention in the Middle East and North Africa and sub-Saharan Africa is on the rise.

Alex Lo, a South China Morning Post columnist, pointed out that the United States has rarely distinguished between diplomacy and war since its founding. It overthrew democratically elected governments in many developing countries in the 20th century and immediately replaced them with pro-American puppet regimes. Today, in Ukraine, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria, Pakistan and Yemen, the United States is repeating its old tactics of waging proxy, low-intensity, and drone wars.

◆ U.S. military hegemony has caused humanitarian tragedies. Since 2001, the wars and military operations launched by the United States in the name of fighting terrorism have claimed over 900,000 lives with some 335,000 of them civilians, injured millions and displaced tens of millions. The 2003 Iraq War resulted in some 200,000 to 250,000 civilian deaths, including over 16,000 directly killed by the U.S. military, and left more than a million homeless.

The United States has created 37 million refugees around the world. Since 2012, the number of Syrian refugees alone has increased tenfold. Between 2016 and 2019, 33,584 civilian deaths were documented in the Syrian fightings, including 3,833 killed by U.S.-led coalition bombings, half of them women and children. The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) reported on 9 November 2018 that the air strikes launched by U.S. forces on Raqqa alone killed 1,600 Syrian civilians.

The two-decades-long war in Afghanistan devastated the country. A total of 47,000 Afghan civilians and 66,000 to 69,000 Afghan soldiers and police officers unrelated to the September 11 attacks were killed in U.S. military operations, and more than 10 million people were displaced. The war in Afghanistan destroyed the foundation of economic development there and plunged the Afghan people into destitution. After the “Kabul debacle” in 2021, the United States announced that it would freeze some 9.5 billion dollars in assets belonging to the Afghan central bank, a move considered as “pure looting.”

In September 2022, Turkish Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu commented at a rally that the United States has waged a proxy war in Syria, turned Afghanistan into an opium field and heroin factory, thrown Pakistan into turmoil, and left Libya in incessant civil unrest. The United States does whatever it takes to rob and enslave the people of any country with underground resources.

The United States has also adopted appalling methods in war. During the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Gulf War, the Kosovo War, the War in Afghanistan and the Iraq War, the United States used massive quantities of chemical and biological weapons as well as cluster bombs, fuel-air bombs, graphite bombs and depleted uranium bombs, causing enormous damage on civilian facilities, countless civilian casualties and lasting environmental pollution.

III. Economic Hegemony — Looting and Exploitation

After World War II, the United States led efforts to set up the Bretton Woods System, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, which, together with the Marshall Plan, formed the international monetary system centered around the U.S. dollar. In addition, the United States has also established institutional hegemony in the international economic and financial sector by manipulating the weighted voting systems, rules and arrangements of international organizations including “approval by 85 percent majority,” and its domestic trade laws and regulations. By taking advantage of the dollar’s status as the major international reserve currency, the United States is basically collecting “seigniorage” from around the world; and using its control over international organizations, it coerces other countries into serving America’s political and economic strategy.

◆ The United States exploits the world’s wealth with the help of “seigniorage.” It costs only about 17 cents to produce a 100 dollar bill, but other countries had to pony up 100 dollar of actual goods in order to obtain one. It was pointed out more than half a century ago, that the United States enjoyed exorbitant privilege and deficit without tears created by its dollar, and used the worthless paper note to plunder the resources and factories of other nations.

◆ The hegemony of U.S. dollar is the main source of instability and uncertainty in the world economy. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the United States abused its global financial hegemony and injected trillions of dollars into the global market, leaving other countries, especially emerging economies, to pay the price. In 2022, the Fed ended its ultra-easy monetary policy and turned to aggressive interest rate hike, causing turmoil in the international financial market and substantial depreciation of other currencies such as the Euro, many of which dropped to a 20-year low. As a result, a large number of developing countries were challenged by high inflation, currency depreciation and capital outflows. This was exactly what Nixon’s secretary of the treasury John Connally once remarked, with self-satisfaction yet sharp precision, that “the dollar is our currency, but it is your problem.”

◆ With its control over international economic and financial organizations, the United States imposes additional conditions to their assistance to other countries. In order to reduce obstacles to U.S. capital inflow and speculation, the recipient countries are required to advance financial liberalization and open up financial markets so that their economic policies would fall in line with America’s strategy. According to the Review of International Political Economy, along with the 1,550 debt relief programs extended by the IMF to its 131 member countries from 1985 to 2014, as many as 55,465 additional political conditions had been attached.

◆ The United States willfully suppresses its opponents with economic coercion. In the 1980s, to eliminate the economic threat posed by Japan, and to control and use the latter in service of America’s strategic goal of confronting the Soviet Union and dominating the world, the United States leveraged its hegemonic financial power against Japan, and concluded the Plaza Accord. As a result, Yen was pushed up, and Japan was pressed to open up its financial market and reform its financial system. The Plaza Accord dealt a heavy blow to the growth momentum of the Japanese economy, leaving Japan to what was later called “three lost decades.”

◆ America’s economic and financial hegemony has become a geopolitical weapon. Doubling down on unilateral sanctions and “long-arm jurisdiction,” the United States has enacted such domestic laws as the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act, and the Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act, and introduced a series of executive orders to sanction specific countries, organizations or individuals. Statistics show that U.S. sanctions against foreign entities increased by 933 percent from 2000 to 2021. The Trump administration alone has imposed more than 3,900 sanctions, which means three sanctions per day. So far, the United States had or has imposed economic sanctions on nearly 40 countries across the world, including Cuba, China, Russia, the DPRK, Iran and Venezuela, affecting nearly half of the world’s population. “The United States of America” has turned itself into “the United States of Sanctions.” And “long-arm jurisdiction” has been reduced to nothing but a tool for the United States to use its means of state power to suppress economic competitors and interfere in normal international business. This is a serious departure from the principles of liberal market economy that the United States has long boasted.

IV. Technological Hegemony — Monopoly and Suppression

The United States seeks to deter other countries’ scientific, technological and economic development by wielding monopoly power, suppression measures and technology restrictions in high-tech fields.

◆ The United States monopolizes intellectual property in the name of protection. Taking advantage of the weak position of other countries, especially developing ones, on intellectual property rights and the institutional vacancy in relevant fields, the United States reaps excessive profits through monopoly. In 1994, the United States pushed forward the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS), forcing the Americanized process and standards in intellectual property protection in an attempt to solidify its monopoly on technology.

In the 1980s, to contain the development of Japan’s semiconductor industry, the United States launched the “301” investigation, built bargaining power in bilateral negotiations through multilateral agreements, threatened to label Japan as conducting unfair trade, and imposed retaliatory tariffs, forcing Japan to sign the U.S.-Japan Semiconductor Agreement. As a result, Japanese semiconductor enterprises were almost completely driven out of global competition, and their market share dropped from 50 percent to 10 percent. Meanwhile, with the support of the U.S. government, a large number of U.S. semiconductor enterprises took the opportunity and grabbed larger market share.

◆ The United States politicizes, weaponizes technological issues and uses them as ideological tools. Overstretching the concept of national security, the United States mobilized state power to suppress and sanction Chinese company Huawei, restricted the entry of Huawei products into the U.S. market, cut off its supply of chips and operating systems, and coerced other countries to ban Huawei from undertaking local 5G network construction. It even talked Canada into unwarrantedly detaining Huawei’s CFO Meng Wanzhou for nearly three years.

The United States has fabricated a slew of excuses to clamp down on China’s high-tech enterprises with global competitiveness, and has put more than 1,000 Chinese enterprises on sanction lists. In addition, the United States has also imposed controls on biotechnology, artificial intelligence and other high-end technologies, reinforced export restrictions, tightened investment screening, suppressed Chinese social media apps such as TikTok and WeChat, and lobbied the Netherlands and Japan to restrict exports of chips and related equipment or technology to China.

The United States has also practiced double standards in its policy on China-related technological professionals. To sideline and suppress Chinese researchers, since June 2018, visa validity has been shortened for Chinese students majoring in certain high-tech-related disciplines, repeated cases have occurred where Chinese scholars and students going to the United States for exchange programs and study were unjustifiably denied and harassed, and large-scale investigation on Chinese scholars working in the United States was carried out.

◆ The United States solidifies its technological monopoly in the name of protecting democracy. By building small blocs on technology such as the “chips alliance” and “clean network,” the United States has put “democracy” and “human rights” labels on high-technology, and turned technological issues into political and ideological issues, so as to fabricate excuses for its technological blockade against other countries. In May 2019, the United States enlisted 32 countries to the Prague 5G Security Conference in the Czech Republic and issued the Prague Proposal in an attempt to exclude China’s 5G products. In April 2020, then U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced the “5G clean path,” a plan designed to build technological alliance in the 5G field with partners bonded by their shared ideology on democracy and the need to protect “cyber security.” The measures, in essence, are the U.S. attempts to maintain its technological hegemony through technological alliances.

◆ The United States abuses its technological hegemony by carrying out cyber attacks and eavesdropping. The United States has long been notorious as an “empire of hackers,” blamed for its rampant acts of cyber theft around the world. It has all kinds of means to enforce pervasive cyber attacks and surveillance, including using analog base station signals to access mobile phones for data theft, manipulating mobile apps, infiltrating cloud servers, and stealing through undersea cables. The list goes on.

U.S. surveillance is indiscriminate. All can be targets of its surveillance, be they rivals or allies, even leaders of allied countries such as former German Chancellor Angela Merkel and several French Presidents. Cyber surveillance and attacks launched by the United States such as “Prism,” “Dirtbox,” “Irritant Horn” and “Telescreen Operation” are all proof that the United States is closely monitoring its allies and partners. Such eavesdropping on allies and partners has already caused worldwide outrage. Julian Assange, the founder of Wikileaks, a website that has exposed U.S. surveillance programs, said that “do not expect a global surveillance superpower to act with honor or respect. There is only one rule: there are no rules.“

V. Cultural Hegemony — Spreading False Narratives

The global expansion of American culture is an important part of its external strategy. The United States has often used cultural tools to strengthen and maintain its hegemony in the world.

◆ The United States embeds American values in its products such as movies. American values and lifestyle are a tied product to its movies and TV shows, publications, media content, and programs by the government-funded non-profit cultural institutions. It thus shapes a cultural and public opinion space in which American culture reigns and maintains cultural hegemony. In his article The Americanization of the World, John Yemma, an American scholar, exposed the real weapons in U.S. cultural expansion: the Hollywood, the image design factories on Madison Avenue and the production lines of Mattel Company and Coca-Cola.

There are various vehicles the United States uses to keep its cultural hegemony. American movies are the most used; they now occupy more than 70 percent of the world’s market share. The United States skilfully exploits its cultural diversity to appeal to various ethnicities. When Hollywood movies descend on the world, they scream the American values tied to them.

◆ American cultural hegemony not only shows itself in “direct intervention,” but also in “media infiltration” and as “a trumpet for the world.” U.S.-dominated Western media has a particularly important role in shaping global public opinion in favor of U.S. meddling in the internal affairs of other countries.

The U.S. government strictly censors all social media companies and demands their obedience. Twitter CEO Elon Musk admitted on 27 December 2022 that all social media platforms work with the U.S. government to censor content, reported Fox Business Network. Public opinion in the United States is subject to government intervention to restrict all unfavorable remarks. Google often makes pages disappear.

U.S. Department of Defense manipulates social media. In December 2022, The Intercept, an independent U.S. investigative website, revealed that in July 2017, U.S. Central Command official Nathaniel Kahler instructed Twitter’s public policy team to augment the presence of 52 Arabic-language accounts on a list he sent, six of which were to be given priority. One of the six was dedicated to justifying U.S. drone attacks in Yemen, such as by claiming that the attacks were precise and killed only terrorists, not civilians. Following Kahler’s directive, Twitter put those Arabic-language accounts on a “white list” to amplify certain messages.

◆The United States practices double standards on the freedom of the press. It brutally suppresses and silences media of other countries by various means. The United States and Europe bar mainstream Russian media such as Russia Today and the Sputnik from their countries. Platforms such as Twitter, Facebook and YouTube openly restrict official accounts of Russia. Netflix, Apple and Google have removed Russian channels and applications from their services and app stores. Unprecedented draconian censorship is imposed on Russia-related contents.

◆The United States abuses its cultural hegemony to instigate “peaceful evolution” in socialist countries. It sets up news media and cultural outfits targeting socialist countries. It pours staggering amounts of public funds into radio and TV networks to support their ideological infiltration, and these mouthpieces bombard socialist countries in dozens of languages with inflammatory propaganda day and night.

The United States uses misinformation as a spear to attack other countries, and has built an industrial chain around it: there are groups and individuals making up stories, and peddling them worldwide to mislead public opinion with the support of nearly limitless financial resources.

Conclusion

While a just cause wins its champion wide support, an unjust one condemns its pursuer to be an outcast. The hegemonic, domineering, and bullying practices of using strength to intimidate the weak, taking from others by force and subterfuge, and playing zero-sum games are exerting grave harm. The historical trends of peace, development, cooperation, and mutual benefit are unstoppable. The United States has been overriding truth with its power and trampling justice to serve self-interest. These unilateral, egoistic and regressive hegemonic practices have drawn growing, intense criticism and opposition from the international community.

Countries need to respect each other and treat each other as equals. Big countries should behave in a manner befitting their status and take the lead in pursuing a new model of state-to-state relations featuring dialogue and partnership, not confrontation or alliance. China opposes all forms of hegemonism and power politics, and rejects interference in other countries’ internal affairs. The United States must conduct serious soul-searching. It must critically examine what it has done, let go of its arrogance and prejudice, and quit its hegemonic, domineering and bullying practices.

https://www.fmprc.gov.cn/mfa_eng/wjbxw/202302/t20230220_11027664.html

Syria Support Movement statement on the disastrous 6 February earthquake on the Syrian/Turkish border

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We demand that equal aid be provided to Syria and Turkey (Based on need), and that aid to Syria be distributed by the legitimate government of Syria in Damascus and by the Syrian Red Crescent Society which was formed by the Syrian state some 70 years ago.

Statement from the Syria Support Movement

In the early morning hours of February 6, 2023, a 7.8 Earthquake struck in the vicinity of the Syrian Border with Turkey.   At the end of the day, February 5,  there were at least 1,700 dead, more than 20,000 injured, thousands more missing and hundreds of thousands displaced in Syria.  Victims and rescue crews are struggling with continuing aftershocks and sub zero temperatures.

Syria Support Movement wholeheartedly stands with the victims of this massive earthquake, and through our charitable engagement, we will participate in delivering aid.  At the same time, we condemn the hypocritical stance of the U.S. government and their European allies.   Due to  devastating U.S. Sanctions enacted under the Caesar Civilian Protection Act in December, 2019, there are few avenues of relief for majority of Syrians affected, who are living in the government held areas.   The United States has taken every opportunity to impede rebuilding Syria following their devastating decade long proxy war against the people of Syria, during which they spent billions of dollars supporting murderous terrorist groups who raped and pillaged throughout the land.

During the war, much of the country’s infrastructure was damaged or destroyed, many people were displaced and since then the U.S. Unilateral Sanctions combined with the U.S. occupation have made it difficult to rebuild.   This earthquake has brought a new round of death and devastation to northern Syria and the people who live there.

Following the devastating earthquake that occurred on February 6, Antiwar.com asked U.S. State Department spokesperson Ned Price if the government is considering lifting sanctions in light of the humanitarian disaster caused by the earthquake.  He replied that the U.S. engages with the government in Turkey, but only with NGOs in Syria.  The problem is that U.S. NGOs in Syria do not operate in government-controlled areas where the majority of the population reside, but only in Idlib, a small terrorist-controlled province in the north of Syria.  No aid will go through U.S. approved NGOs to Aleppo, a huge city where buildings are once again crashing on the people who live and work in them,  or Hama or  Latakia, a large province to the west of Idlib.  There cannot be an equitable disbursement of aid under these discriminatory circumstances.

With stone-faced hypocrisy, Price went on to say that

[it] would be quite ironic, if not even counterproductive, for us to reach out to a government that has brutalized its people over the course of a dozen years now.

Throughout those dozen years, the United States has continuously waged war on the Syrian people, while the Syrian government and the Syrian Arab Army fought valiantly to protect them.  Unlike many other governments in countries similarly attacked by the U.S., the Syrian government stayed the course.  Whether the U.S. likes it or not, that is why the Syrian people continue to support their government in a large majority.

Price went on to claim that the U.S. has given more aid to Syria over the last decade than any other country.  These remarks would be laughable if U.S.  policy towards Syria over the last decade were not so devastating for the Syrian people.

Beyond the sanctions, the United States has been occupying approximately a third of the country, in the east where Syria’s oil wells and Syria’s grain fields are located, using Kurdish militias to manage the region.   They have been pumping the oil and shipping it into Iraqi Kurdistan for sale, and using at least some of the proceeds to support their proxies in the region.   On more than one occasion, the wheat fields have been burned, though some of it is sold back to the Syrian government at high cost.

After Alena Douhan, the UN Special Rapporteur on the Negative Effects of Unilateral Coercive Measures, spent two weeks in Syria in late 2022, she wrote [1]

“I am struck by the pervasiveness of the human rights and humanitarian impact of the unilateral coercive measures imposed on Syria and the total economic and financial isolation of a country whose people are struggling to rebuild a life with dignity, following the decade-long war.”

Before this current tragedy struck, Ms. Douhan [2] said that 12 million people in Syria live with food insecurity.   She urged “the immediate lifting of all unilateral sanctions that severely harm human rights and prevent any efforts for early recovery, rebuilding and reconstruction.”

To this day, however, the United States continues its rapacious policy

Meanwhile, the the United States has a new round of sanctions in the works through the Captagon Act, which has passed the house and is scheduled to be included in the 2023 Defense Authorization Act, just as the Caesar Syrian Civilian Protection Act was embedded in the 2021 Defense Authorization Act so as to avoid debate on the details.   Like the Caesar Act, the Captagon Act enables the United States to place further Unilateral Coercive Measures, on the Syrian government, Syrian businesses and Syrian financial affairs, thereby undermining the economy of the country and the human right of dignity and free exchange, as well as the fundamental rights of food, medicine and building materials necessary to maintain a reasonable standard of living.

All this in the midst of a horrific natural disaster.

According to a report by SANA

“Syrians, while dealing with the earthquake catastrophe, are digging among rubble by their own hands or using simplest tools as the equipment of removing the rubble are banned because they are punished by the US.”

Syrian banks are disengaged from international channels of trade; Syrian businesses are unable to obtain basic materials necessary for the manufacturing goods, and the maintenance of manufacturing facilities, basic medicines and tools.  Meanwhile, the United States is occupying Syria’s primary region for producing grain and oil, forcing the government to buy food and power for survival of the people rather than invest in trade and the development of a self-sustaining economy.   Secondary sanctions hold those who violate these sanctions accountable to severe penalties, thereby enforcing the siege internationally, not so much on the Syrian government as on the Syrian people.

Now that the welfare of Syria’s population is further devastated by natural disaster, food, medicine, and building materials are more necessary than ever.  These Unilateral Coercive Measures are designed to impede reconstruction, after constraining immediate humanitarian assistance.  How is this protecting Syrian Civilians?

According to Syrian Journalist Steven Sahiounie, “Countries who have offered help to Syria [as of Feb 6] are: China, Russia, Iran, Egypt, Jordan, UAE, Iraq, Algeria, France, Spain, Germany, Sweden and Bahrain.”  At the moment, it is nearly impossible to get aid into Syria from western countries.

End the Sanctions Now  **  End the Siege  **  Immediate Aid for the Syria People 

We demand that equal aid be provided to Syria and Turkey (Based on need), and that aid to Syria be distributed by the legitimate government of Syria in Damascus and by the Syrian Red Crescent Society which was formed by the Syrian state some 70 years ago.

https://syriasupportmovement.org/2023/02/09/ssm-statement-on-the-occasion-of-the-disastrous-february-6-earthquake-on-the-syrian-turkish-border-2/

For information on the Syria Solidarity Movement and its mission:

https://syriasupportmovement.org/about/origins-of-the-syria-solidarity-movement/
https://syriasupportmovement.org/about/steering-committee/
https://syriasupportmovement.org/about/mission-statement/

[1] ohchr(dot)org/en/node/104160

[2] apnews(dot)com/article/middle-east-business-syria-civil-wars-bashar-assad-00832f11322da5be4947df261fd4dd8e

Earthquake disaster: National Union of Syrian Students urgent appeal to end sanctions and provide aid

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From Syria Support Movement

Published by the U.S. Peace Council, February 8, 2023

The National Union of Syrian Students in an appeal to international student and youth organizations:

A humanitarian catastrophe befell our homeland, Syria, at dawn on Monday, February 6, 2023, after it was exposed to a devastating 7.7 degree earthquake, resulting in an initial outcome of hundreds of deaths and thousands of injuries, the collapse of tens of residential buildings, the cracking of others, and severe damage to the infrastructure, which was followed by several tremors.

Despite the blockade and unjust sanctions against Syria and its people, the Syrian government and all unions, syndicates and civil society organizations responded from the first moments by putting all available financial, human and logistic capabilities in order to help and rescue citizens, treat the wounded and injured, and secure the afflicted families in adequate housing, in addition to all other assistance such as food, clothing, and others.

In the face of this devastating catastrophe and human tragedy, the National Union of Syrian Students and the masses of students and the youth inside and outside Syria, appeal to all sister Arab unions, organizations, associations, bodies and institutions and foreign friendly ones to move quickly and urgently to put pressure on governments to:

— Immediately end the siege and unilateral coercive economic sanctions imposed on Syria and its people for (12) years.

— Provide immediate and urgent aid to Syria and its people to mitigate the suffering and the impact of the earthquake and the siege.

—   Support and aid humanitarian situations in the world, and separate between humanitarian and official political stances.

— Meet the appeals of Syrian students and communities, in terms of facilitating the arrival of cash transfers for the benefit of those affected.

National Union of Syrian Students
Damascus 07/02/2023

https://syriasupportmovement.org/2023/02/13/national-union-of-syrian-students-urgent-appeal/

2023 International People’s Tribunal on U.S. Imperialism: Sanctions, Blockades, and Economic Coercive Measures – schedule and videos

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https://sanctionstribunal.org

Hearing schedule and registration: https://sanctionstribunal.org/hearing-schedules/

The launch of the International People’s Tribunal Jan 28, 2023 — sanctionstribunal.org/opening-event/

Webinar: ‘We Charge Imperialism: Sanctions Against the Global Majority’ December 20, 2022 — sanctionstribunal.org/2022/12/20/watch-the-full-video-of-we-charge-imperialism-us-sanctions-against-the-global-majority/

Taking Legal Action to Challenge U.S. Atrocities

Since the end of the Cold War, the world has witnessed an unprecedented proliferation of sanctions regimes, particularly by the United Nations Security Council, the European Union, and the United States. This is due in part to the collapse of the Soviet Union, which ended the deadlock between superpowers at the Security Council. Over the past few decades, sanctions were slowly reconfigured from war time weapons into peacetime policy instruments. In order for this effort to materialize, policymakers, legal scholars, and government officials campaigned to legitimate sanctions as a lawful weapon to punish nations who refuse to submit to the United States and Europe.

The International People’s Tribunal on U.S. Imperialism: Sanctions, Blockades, and Economic Coercive Measures approaches economic coercive measures as inherently violent, designed to maintain economic inequality, continue the theft of wealth from the Global South, and preserve racial hierarchy in the international system. Such measures are structurally incapable of reform, and cannot incorporate humanitarian concerns. The Tribunal is a collective effort to build systems of accountability—rooted in global cross-movement solidarity—both within and outside of the law, to challenge the violence of imperialism through sanctions. We interrogate sanctions not from the perspective of those who enforce them, but from the perspective of those most impacted by them, namely the peoples of Asia, Africa, and South America.

WHY HOLD A PEOPLE’S TRIBUNAL?

People’s Tribunals capture the ethos of self-determination and internationalism that was expressed through twentieth century anti-colonial struggles and was institutionalized in the 1966 Tricontinental Conference in Cuba. They bring together movement lawyers, scholars, and organizers from around the world and are designed by and accountable to the social movements and communities in which they are rooted. Operating outside of the logics and institutions of capitalist and imperialist law, People’s Tribunals make decisions that may not be binding and do not have the force of law, but their achievements in a political and discursive register inspire and provide the tools necessary for present and future organizing. People’s Tribunals allow the oppressed to judge the powerful, defining the content as well as the scope of the procedures, which reverses the norm of the powerful creating and implementing the law.

There is a long tradition of radical organizers and lawyers using the law to put capitalism and imperialism on trial. Organized by the Civil Rights Congress, and supported by the Communist Party as well as a host of Black leftist luminaries, including W. E. B. Du Bois, Claudia Jones, and Paul Robeson, We Charge Genocide: The Historic Petition to the United Nations for Relief of a Crime of the United States against the Negro People, indicted the political-economic system of capitalism and white supremacy for inflicting numerous forms of structural and physical violence on Black people in the U.S. as well as drawing parallels to U.S. imperialist violence abroad. The Russell Tribunal was set up in 1966 to judge U.S. military intervention and war crimes in Vietnam. The same format reemerged in later Russell Tribunals dealing with the U.S.-backed Brazilian and Argentinian military dictatorships (1964 and 1976, respectively), the U.S.-backed coup in Chile (1973), and the U.S.-European interventions against Iraq (1990, 2003). The 2016 International Tribunal for Democracy in Brazil critically examined the impeachment of President Dilma Rousseff and the role of the U.S. government. Organized in Brussels by both Philippine and international groups, the 2018 International People’s Tribunal on the Philippines exposed and condemned the multiple forms of state violence visited on the people of the Philippines since Rodrigo Duterte became president in 2016. And finally, the U.S. government was put directly on trial by a pair of innovative People’s Tribunals, including the 2007 International Tribunal on Katrina and Rita and the 2018 International Tribunal on U.S. Colonial Crimes Against Puerto Rico. 

SANCTIONS – A Wrecking Ball in a Global Economy — 2nd Edition released

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From Sanctions Kill

“What are thought of as mere limits on financial transactions are a form of warfare which kill as surely as bombs and bullets. Sanctions are war crimes, violating prohibitions against the targeting of civilian populations. 

 This book SANCTIONS – A Wrecking Ball in a Global Economy is vital to understanding how the United States and its allies create suffering around the world.”

— Margaret Kimberley, Executive Editor of Black Agenda Report

Order 2nd Edition just released 
SANCTIONS — A Wrecking Ball in a Global Economy: 
https://iacenter.org/sanctions-book

Podcast — Interview by Margaret Kimberley of Black Agenda Report on: SANCTIONS — A Wrecking Ball in a Global Economy 
https://www.blackagendareport.com/sanctions-wrecking-ball-global-economy-0

The anthology: SANCTIONS: A Wrecking Ball in a Global Economy challenges a deadly U.S. policy.

In 3 months time we had to rush to reprint this anthology. This book will change the way you see every international issue. 

Please help us continue this campaign! Help us continue printing this book. Now also available as an ePub.

Intensifying US sanctions, imposed on a third of humanity, are sending shock waves through the world economy. Now this brutal form of economic warfare on civilian populations is being contested. 

The demands are rising! End the sanctions on Syria. Thousands caught under the rubble. Tens of thousands homeless. Yet U.S. sanctions are blocking every form of relief.

The sanctions on Cuba and Venezuela are closing off every form of exchange.

 Sanctions have boomeranged back on the US and EU countries with inflation, supply chain shortages, and a looming recession causing hardship at home. But by far the greatest burden is borne by 40+ sanctioned countries. The US response is doubling down on harsher sanctions. What are the implications?

Order the book: https://iacenter.org/sanctions-book

EU threatens foreign observers of referenda in Donbass, Zaporozhye, and Kherson regions

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From RT

EU threatens foreign observers over Donbass referendums

The sanctions, if agreed, may also affect those monitoring votes on joining Russia in Zaporozhye and Kherson regions

The EU will slap sanctions on anyone involved in referendums on joining Russia in the Donbass republics, as well as in Zaporozhye and Kherson regions, according to Peter Stano, a spokesman for the bloc’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell.

“There would be consequences for all people, who participate in the illegal, illegitimate referendums,” Stano warned on Tuesday, the fifth and final day of voting.

Stano did not rule out the possibility of foreign observers, including EU citizens, also facing restrictions over any support they have given to the process. He said it would be up to member states to decide who falls under the sanctions regime.

Another high-ranking EU foreign policy official, Luc Devigne, also told European lawmakers on Tuesday that individuals who are “obviously linked” to the referendums would be targeted in the next sanctions package.

Residents of France, the Czech Republic, the Netherlands, Brazil and other countries have reportedly arrived to monitor voting in the Donetsk (DPR) and Lugansk People’s Republics (LPR), and the regions of Zaporozhye and Kherson, which are mostly controlled by Russian forces.

Ukraine and its Western backers have labeled the referendums a “sham,” vowing that they won’t recognize their results regardless of the outcome. The polls in the plebiscite closed at 4pm local time (1pm GMT) on Tuesday. The head of the LPR, Leonid Pasechnik, said preliminary results would be ready by this evening.

Russia sent its troops into Ukraine on February 24, citing Kiev’s failure to implement the Minsk agreements, designed to give the regions of Donetsk and Lugansk special status within the Ukrainian state. The protocols, brokered by Germany and France, were first signed in 2014. Former Ukrainian president Pyotr Poroshenko has since admitted that Kiev’s main goal was to use the ceasefire to buy time and “create powerful armed forces.”

In February 2022, the Kremlin recognized the Donbass republics as independent states and demanded that Ukraine officially declare itself a neutral country that will never join any Western military bloc. Kiev insists the Russian offensive was completely unprovoked.

https://www.rt.com/russia/563612-eu-referendum-donbass-sanctions/

Russian Federation remarks on 60th anniversary of US embargo against Cuba

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Briefing by Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova, Moscow, February 9, 2022

The 60th anniversary of the US economic, commercial and financial embargo against Cuba

February 3 marks the 60th anniversary of the odious phenomenon in modern history, which, unfortunately, has only worsened in recent years, namely, the US economic, commercial and financial blockade of Cuba. If previously it was only against Cuba, today sanctions, restrictions and unilateral measures are being imposed by the United States and its “partners and satellites” across the board on multiple countries. Today, I would like to discuss Cuba, which has been living under embargo for 60 years now. A great global power, one of the pillars of the world order, has thus settled accounts with a small country for it wanting to free itself from the colonial grip of its northern neighbour and embark on a path of independent development. Revenge. Exactly the same thing that we are now seeing with regard to Crimea residents who have made their choice. Our country did not turn them away and respectfully accepted their choice. And now they are retaliating with sanctions. There’s nothing new about it.

The entire international community believes that Washington’s anti-Cuban policy is inhumane and illegal. Just think of it: 60 years of sanctions. Then look at the map and compare the size of the United States and that of the island of Cuba. There were the UN General Assembly resolutions, the calls by international public organisations, business circles, and just people with common sense. There were numerous business calculations about self-inflicted damage. At some point there were even hints at common sense prevailing and, on the face of it, nothing seemed to stand in the way of finally embarking on the path of realism. But no such thing. With enviable tenacity worthy of a better cause (not in the sense that sanctions should be imposed on other geographical locations, but in the sense that developing and implementing them in circumvention of the UN Security Council is illegal), throughout decades, almost all US administrations, with an exception only during the “Obama thaw,” stick to the same discriminatory policy with the ever-exacerbating consequences. They are doing so contrary to common sense, in an unscrupulous and hypocritical manner, under the banner of protecting democracy and human rights, and subjugating their every move to domestic political bias and the fleeting and self-serving interests of their “political hawks.”

At the same time, no one in the United States seems to care about the fact that this policy impacts not the Cuban leadership, but ordinary Cubans. It strangles the life-supporting sectors of the economy, creates social problems and deprives these people of those very human rights that the American guardians of global democracy are so worried about in words only. Most interestingly, the economic performance is cited as proof of the inefficiency of the Cuban system. Listen, for 60 years now Cuba has not only survived, but lived and moved forward amid your sanctions. I often wonder what would become of the United States if similar sanctions were imposed on it for at least a year, or even a couple of months. That would be fun to watch. They would not just forget about democracy, there would simply be nothing left of the United States if at least a tenth of these restrictions had been imposed. Then, we would observe the competition of the systems. Washington is unlikely to run the risk of holding this experiment, isn’t it? You know, things like hidden resentment, revenge, delayed decision-making or retribution happen in history. Still, common sense must prevail in humanitarian situations, such as the pandemic. That is exactly what the world has been living through for the third year now.

Notably, many Cubans who live in the United States and other countries of that region have relatives in Cuba who are impacted by the embargo imposed amid the pandemic rather than the theoretical sanctions. However, no one in the United States seems to be worried about that. They are a different kind of “human rights” and do not need to be taken care of. So, instead of uniting efforts in the face of a common challenge and creating some kind of synergy and green corridors, the US authorities did everything the other way round: they tightened the screws by imposing more sanctions on the pharmaceutical industry in Cuba, that very Cuba that helps everyone in the region deal with the impact of the pandemic, and is the first to respond not even to requests, but to developments in neighbouring and outlying countries in connection with emergencies, man-made disasters, etc. Cuban doctors are always among the first responders. Sanctions were imposed on them, and an absurd campaign was unleashed to discredit the assistance that the Cuban health workers are providing to other countries. They even went as far as to call it “human trafficking.” However, in case the United States is unaware of what human trafficking is, we can tell them. It has nothing to do with Cuba whatsoever, and it’s just a flat-out offence.

Cuba is showing amazing fortitude and courage. It is decisively moving forward along a path of independence as it overcomes hardships and difficulties. It is reforming the economy, optimising production and management systems, and improving the efficiency of state regulation. It is promoting fundamental and applied research and development and attaining world-class achievements in medicine and pharmacology. At the same time, it remains politically active in the international arena, upholding its interests and finding ways to help others, as I have already mentioned, remaining a symbol of the struggle against the remnants of the post-colonial world order, and Cuba simply stands for freedom and independence with all its heart and soul.

This 60 year-old history of the anti-Cuban embargo is the history of the Cuban people’s selfless feat, a vibrant expression of national identity, pride and dignity, which have been honourably carried through generations. We pay tribute to the great fortitude of our Cuban friends. We wish them strength, patience, success, good health and we hope that they find a way to overcome the challenges that life has posed to all of us.

Your cause is just, hence the conclusion: you will come out a winner. In this regard, I would like to remind the audience about what Fidel Castro once said, “We must firmly fight against the blockade, since the blockade is the main obstacle to our progress and is more than a ban on trade with Cuba, but also a symbol of pressure that the United States is exerting on the world at large.”

https://www.mid.ru/en/press_service/spokesman/briefings/1797611/

2019: Venezuela speech to UN Security Council on U.S. coup d’état and “blatant and gross intervention,” reviews U.S. interventions in Latin America; Iran Contra’s Elliot Abrams speech, Russia and Venezuela response – transcript (VIDEO)

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Written speech of Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza: http://mppre.gob.ve/discurso/discurso-arreaza-en-el-consejo-de-seguridad-onu/

English dubbed videos:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mubL1aVaG8I
https://www.c-span.org/video/?457308-7/un-security-council-meeting-situation-venezuela

Unofficial translation, edited from UN and C-Span translations

Venezuela Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza:
“Thank you, Mr. President. At last we have a chance to speak.

We have a written text, but before that, I wanted to share some thoughts with you. Indeed, we can even thank Mr. Mike Pompeo because in the face of failure at the OAS Organization of American States on the 24th of January, they [the United States] didn’t have enough power to impose a resolution, and they convened a meeting of the Security Council of the United Nations. In fact, we, including President Maduro, thought of appealing to this body to debate not only the case of Venezuela but rather the blatant and gross intervention and gross mechanisms of interference by the United States in our country. We have to say, in this case, the United States is not behind the coup d’etat. It is in advance, it’s in the forefront of the coup d’etat. They give and dictate the orders, not only to the Venezuelan opposition but also to the satellite governments of the United States in the region, and it seems in Europe and other parts of the world.

As proof, we have tweets here from social media. We have appeals to the Bolivarian National Armed Forces to speak out against the legitimate authorities, against the constitutional government of President Nicolas Maduro, on the part of Secretary (of State) Mike Pompeo and from Vice President Pence. It was a tweet with a video of Vice President Pence on the 22nd. He in a tweet gave the green light for a coup d’état in Venezuela. And as Under Secretary Rosmary said, a citizen would proclaim himself. No one swore him in nor did any institution. There was no ceremony. It was self-proclaimed — self-proclamation by a member of Paliament at a public rally, at a peaceful public rally, one of many that there’ve been in Venezuela over the past few years.

Where is the legality? I ask you: let’s review the Constitution of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela. Read Article 133 word by word, provision by provision, sentence by sentence. Where is the legality? This is internal to our Constitution.

But where is the legality in terms of the fundamental principles of Public International law? Or are we simply setting aside international relations based on international law, and imposing international relations based on force, and instrumentalizing multilateral international organizations to achieve your commission and your goal. If any of you can tell me in which article and in which provision of the United Nations Charter you find the legal basis for the self-proclamation of a man who wasn’t elected by anyone as president of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, then we can open the legal debate. I think you won’t be able to do it.

We were also reviewing, because we have to ask ourselves, Since when? Secretary Rex Tillerson, before he was dismissed, and then President Trump himself, himself, here in the General Assembly, members, the first day of the debate before this sacred podium of multi-lateralism, he announced sanctions that are not only coercive unilateral measures which are not based on international law, but he actually, he had the nerve to announce a series of measures against Venezuela in flagrant violation of the United Nations Charter – the sacred charter of multilateralism.

How is it possible that a president that threatened the use of military force – he wasn’t John Bolton who did it; it wasn’t Marco Rubio – it was Donald Trump himself who threatened the use of military force directly against the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela – how is it that he wasn’t even challenged by the world’s entities of multilateralism? And that you pretend to sit in judgment on the accused — the republic of Venezuela — because its people and its government have fully complied with its constitution and respected international law. How is that possible? I mean, we can speak for a long time.

Here we have 1911 in Mexico, an invasion

1912, U.S. Marines invade Nicaragua, my dear neighbor here, and they began an occupation that continued until almost 1933; Augusto Cesar Sandino and the Nicaraguan people threw them out.

1914 Mexico

1915 Haiti

1916 Dominican Republic

1918 Panama

1924 Honduras

1925 Panama

1926 Nicaragua

1927 Nicaragua

1930 Dominican Republic

1933 Nicaragua

1934 Nicaragua

1941 Panama

Then, the School of the Americas,

In Cuba, 1952

1954, the overthrow of Jacobo Arbenz in Guatemala

1956 Nicaragua

In 1960 the President of the United States authorized the execution of covert actions on a great scale to overthrow the government of Fidel Castro. and after, the Bay of Pigs in 1961

That is to say, we can go on, João Goulart 1964 in Brazil.

In 1965, dear President of the Security Council, how many died in the Dominican Republic by the invasion endorsed by the OAS to overthrow a government that they didn’t agree with, because they didn’t ideologically like the government of the great Dominican that was Juan Bosch?

The Monroe Doctrine. It should be the United States that should be evaluated and subjected to a permanent investigation for its disrespect for international laws, interference, meddling, and invasions, behind the coup d’etats.

Next came the coup d’etat in 1973 against Salvator Allende, then Guatemala as well. In 2002 President George Bush in Venezuela. They denied it but they recognized the dictator Carmona. This has precedents. What is occurring today in Venezuela has a direct precedent.

In 2002 they were behind the coup d’etat. They weren’t as much in the forefront as this time, They recognized Carmona, the dictator, who lasted for 47 hours, and afterward, an investigation by North American experts proved with declassified documents the participation of the United States in that foolhardy attempted coup.

Or 2004 in Haiti, Jean Bertrand Aristide

Or 2009, in Honduras, that in the beginning, it wasn’t even suspected that the United States was behind it until Hillary Clinton admitted through a book that she had given the orders to overthrow the president of Honduras because she wanted to call a national election.

Meanwhile, other presidents were selected in Central America without the authority of being candidates [or], having lost elections. There were reports from the European Union, from the Organization of American States that said there was fraud, but afterward Donald Trump called. They promised that they would move their embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and they are recognized not only by Trump but by all the satellite governments in the region.[uncertain translation]

Look, I wanted to show you (holds up chart) the trend in social media just from Twitter (I’m not going to other social media) – the official spokespersons of the United States. See how the trend in January was going up on the 22nd, the 23rd (January 2019), that day they expected a coup and a military uprising that is not considered in Venezuela because the National Bolivarian Armed Forces defend with their life this Constitution. They (the United States government) could neither finance nor extort, nor provoke, nor convince our military to overthrow President Nicolas Maduro. They won’t be able to do it. They won’t be able to do it.

Once again, the United States has taken a false step and which is summed up at once — look, it is incredible — when President Trump tweeted, that was the recognition. It was like the United Nations’ deposit of a recognition of a state. President Trump tweeted that he recognized the member of Parliament as dictator of Venezuela. Automatically, Argentina, Colombia, Chile [followed suit]; that is, they waited for the order so that they could also start recognizing him.

This coup d’etat is too obvious. It is too shameless by all parties. That cannot be accepted by the United Nations. Better still, it must be condemned. I hope to have a meeting of the Security Council to evaluate who was behind this coup d’etat. And it wouldn’t be necessary to have much wisdom because there’s excessive evidence proving it on social media, on the declarations, in the communications. This very day, here comes proof in their own Wall Street Journal, like was last year in September in the New York Times, that showed there were meetings of Venezuelan soldiers who were supposedly going to overthrow President Nicolas Maduro, with United States, with United States government officials.

It wasn’t the intelligence agencies of Venezuela, or of Cuba, or of Russia. It was the New York Times and newspapers of Spain. Today it is the Wall Street Journal.

A North American agency examines very clearly information that this member of Parliament traveled to Colombia clandestinely, traveled to the United States, met with officers and these are very clear strategies but not very well executed. It was very harmful. There is much evidence [of involvement by] satellite governments in the region, governments with business, presidents subject to the interests of the United States, subordinates. Not like the dignified governments, the small states of the Caribbean. Many dignified governments that have not yielded to the United States nor have let the United States extort from them nor in the OAS nor in the UN or anywhere else despite public threats even from Vice President Pence or of the Secretary of State or from some congressmen. It is understandable that satellite governments in Latin America could cede their power in this way. But Europe get in line behind the United States? Not so much the United States, but the government of Donald Trump? Europe, giving us 8 days of what?

From where do you obtain equal power to give deadlines or ultimatums to a sovereign nation? Where does such an interventionist action occur? I would say it’s almost infantile.

Why doesn’t President Pedro Sanchez hold elections, as President Nicolás Maduro said yesterday. Or who elected Pedro Sanchez? Hold elections in the United Kingdom (Great Britain and Northern Ireland). Interfere!

Why does President Macron, instead of dedicating himself to the permanent protests of the yellow vests of the French working people, dedicate himself to attacking Venezuela? Today a worker in a yellow vest near the Elisee Palace, and the guards come out practically scared because they are afraid of their people. Dedicate yourselves to your affairs. We do not meddle in your affairs. Respect, comply with the Charter of the United Nations. Respect the self-determination of nations.

Here last year was the candidate Henri Falcon (Venezuelan, in presidential elections of May 20, 2018); Henri Falcon was the president of the electoral campaign of Henrique Capriles (Venezuelan, presidential candidate) in 2012. Henrique Capriles lost with Commander Hugo Chávez. Henri Falcon was the candidate of the year 2018, but as they pressured Henri Falcon to withdraw his candidacy, all the way to presidents of Europe and of course all the spokespeople of the USA, he did not withdraw. But do you know what he did? He came to the United Nations and told Secretary General, Antonio Guterres that an observation by the United Nations in the elections was needed. He did not grant that. Why wasn’t this observation carried out? He even communicated with Federica Mogherini; I myself sent an invitation to Federica Mogherini, to come as observers of the elections in Venezuela. They refused outright. Because already the plan was underway, the process was already clear. Three months before the elections were held, Under Secretary Sullivan was the first to say that those elections would be fraudulent, and then the presidents of Colombia, of Chile, of Europe came to say “we will not recognize the results of the elections.”

When have you seen something like that? Months before the elections.

How many challenges are there of the Venezuelan elections? Go ahead. Show that there was fraud of a single vote in Venezuela. Mr. Duncan said that manual votes were being sold. Venezuela has an electronic voting system, automated. Its accounting is not in Venezuela. The vote is not manual; simply (the machine prints) a voucher to then check with the electronic vote, and in 100% of the cases, the comparison perfectly matches.

The United States wants to build a wall with Mexico. It’s building an ideological wall; A good part of the intercession of Secretary Pompeo today corresponds to the language of the Cold War of Nixon. He is bringing back the Cold War. They are bringing back the Monroe Doctrine of 1823 of which the Liberator Simón Bolívar said in 1829: “The United States seems destined by fate to plague America with misery in the name of freedom.” That was a fulfilled prophecy; that is, it was a prediction, because that is what the United States has done.

Do you know how much it has been estimated to have cost Venezuela since the implementation of unilateral coercive measures that are in breach of International Law in Venezuela? In 2017 until December of 2018, the cost to Venezuela is 23 billion dollars, thanks to the blockade, to the persecution against the goods of Venezuela, to undermining our resources. The Venezuelan economy would not be in the problematic situation it is in if it had had these resources. 20 million dollars was offered to the OAS, which they took from us. Nothing more in Euroclear in Belgium, Mr. Ambassador of Belgium, there are 1.2 billion dollars frozen, blocked, Venezuelan gold, assets. We cannot conduct any banking transaction, any banking transaction that passes through New York or London does not happen. It ends up returning the money or freezing the money. Is that just to the Venezuelan nation?

The representative of Russia was very clear here, but the others believe that the blockades do not exist, that it is a lie … these 18, 19 rounds of sanctions against Venezuela don’t exist. I think that reflection has to take place. It is an ideological wall you are constructing against Venezuela.

We support the initiatives of dialogue as at the time was the initiative of the Dominican Republic. It didn’t come out of nowhere. President Nicolás Maduro – allow me to speak in first person- I was appointed Foreign Minister in August of 2017, and two days later, I was meeting at the home of Mr. Miguel Vargas, and afterwards at the Governmental Palace with the president, Danilo Medina, calling the opposition leaders (from Venezuela), calling President Maduro, to accomplish dialogue in Venezuela. And what happened? We reached an agreement. You know it. There is a record that is guarded securely in some archive of the Dominican Republic presidency where he has signed a pre-accord. And when they had to go to sign the agreement, they made President Danilo Medina look like a fool, they made the former president (Spanish, José Luis) Rodriguez Zapatero look like a fool; they made a fool of the foreign ministers they supported, and made their followers in Venezuela ridiculous. And they did not sign the agreement. And strangely enough, Rex Tillerson was in Bogota at the time, and it’s said from a reliable source that the Chief of the Venezuelan delegation, who today is hiding in Colombia, received a telephone call to not sign and to complicate the situation in Venezuela. These are truths, dear companions. Further, let me tell you that what has been discussed here is without a sturdy foundation.

There are many lies that have been said here, and I tell you this with respect, ask the International Monetary Fund about information that Venezuela provided. Those figures do not come close, not even remotely, to the inflation numbers that you have given here today. Ask the Director of the International Monetary Fund. Be a little more rigorous in investigations in order to discuss this in this authoritative international body which is the essential forum for the future, peace and the security of humanity.

But also ask from those 3 million migrants. There is a new migratory situation that we did not have before. It has a lot to do with the economic blockade, has a lot to do with the financial restrictions against Venezuela and with the economic situation in Venezuela, that we do not deny and that we are going to recover from with the nation and with the Economic Recovery Plans that already are underway.

But how many times have we requested data from the governments of Colombia, Peru, Chile, Ecuador, Argentina? How many times have we told them, send it (the data)? If a Venezuelan leaves by a bridge to Colombia and ends in Chile, how do I know? In these days, do you know what happened? Ecuador’s President Lenin Moreno called for brigades to be established to persecute the Venezuelan migrants in Ecuador, and the embassy (from Venezuela in Quito) was filled with Venezuelans. And we help them leave Ecuador because of the xenophobic and racist persecution against them.

In the city of Ibarra in the north of Ecuador and do you know what happened on Wednesday? On the same Wednesday, three planes, including the presidential plane (Venezuelan), went to search for more than 230 Venezuelan migrants. Today three planes were also going because the Embassy was paying for accommodation in hotels, with the difficulty of sending resources due to the blockade to our Diplomatic Missions. And they did not give overflight authorization to these planes that had the humanitarian goal of going to search for Venezuelans who were going to return to their home and their families in the face of persecution.

How are you dealing with this war against Venezuela? We are waiting for the visits of: Mr. Eduardo Stein, which should take place this week. We are waiting for the visit of the former president and friend Michelle Bachelet.

Violence. You say here that “the dictatorship is repressing and killing”. Please study the history of Venezuela in recent years. The insurrectional marches of the opposition with deaths put on by them (the Venezuelan opposition, which) gave rise to and facilitated the coup d’etat in the year 2002, using snipers. Research how many people died in those days, died at truly peaceful demonstrations. Who assassinated them? There are investigations of Venezuelan Court of Justice, the agencies of Venezuelan Citizen Power, the Prosecutor’s Office, which have sovereign authority, which does not need any intervention from any independent body. We will tell the truth about each one of the deceased because Venezuela is respected. I tell you who sponsored the coup on January 23, you were pursuing a tragedy in Venezuela, of deaths, that blood ran through the streets of Caracas, and it did not happen, because measures were taken, despite the fact that in the night, there were outbreaks in the popular sectors of Caracas. Groups of 10, 12, 13 people went to plunder, to destroy private property, and those were situations we prevented. We prevented another tragedy like the one on April 11. Another tragedy happened like that in 2014. Another tragedy like that happened in 2017, when the Venezuelan opposition took to the streets financed by some countries that are sitting here, to overthrow by means of a coup, by means of force, President Chavez at the time, and now President Nicolas Maduro.

We support dialogue initiatives as we support that of Dominican Republic at that time. We support that Mexico, Uruguay and Caricom have expressed their willingness for Venezuelans to sit down with their facilitation and achieve our own way out without any imposed solutions. Here no one is going to give us deadlines nor are they going to tell us if elections should be held or not. The decisions that are made will be made by Venezuelans, those of the opposition and the government, sitting together.

On January 22, the president of the National Constituent Assembly, Diosdado Cabello, met with this member of Parliament Juan Guaido, to open a channel of dialogue. From there, they reached agreements, and on another day, Mr. Juan Guaido did everything the opposite because, well, he was under pressure. He had Pence’s tweets, Trump’s tweets, all the pressure from his people that what they want to ttigger civil war in Venezuela. You won’t achieve it. The North American presidents call for war when they have domestic problems and wars. Look, President Trump has already repented, has said that Iraq was better off with Saddam Hussein. He has said that Libya was better off with Gadaffi that they overthrew and brutally assassinated and laughed at that assassination, the Secretary of State (American) at the time.

The savagery, the force — that cannot be allowed in today’s world. And the United States is even withdrawing its troops from Syria. What is Venezuela? A war trophy of Mr. Trump? We are not going to give Donald Trump a war in Venezuela. In Venezuela, peace is going to prevail. Stability and understanding will prevail between Venezuelans, despite many of the countries seated here that are pursuing war.

I also wanted to tell you that the deadline Europe is trying to give us, we also remember the Liberator Simon Bolivar in 1818, the first argument he had with an agent of the United States. You remember that the United States did not support the fight for freedom of our countries. Factually, they had already been independent by their own means and winning a war against the British Empire, but when the colonies of South America confronted the Spanish Empire, they declared themselves neutral. Interesting, no? Then afterwards, they not only declared they were neutral but they helped the royalists, the Spaniards clandestinely. And in one of those clandestine aids in the (Rio) Orinoco in Venezuela, they went against the legitimate government of then president Simon Bolivar. They sent boats, United States vessels with ammunition, preparations that were stopped and a controversy arose and the Liberator finally told the agent of the United States: “… it is the same thing for Venezuela to fight against Spain as to fight the whole world if the whole world offends her”. And we can repeat that here today. Fortunately we have great friends. But whoever ill-treats Venezuela will have to deal with the people of Venezuela, President Nicolás Maduro, the Communal Councils, the People’s Power standing up, to defend our sovereignty and our integrity.

I want you to read (article of the Venezuelan Constitution) 233 — with this I close — because you have tried to give a constitutional varnish, developed in the laboratories of Washington, of course, to the self-proclamation of this gentleman (Juan Guaido) that even in Venezuela his name is known. These days the president of Paraguay could not pronounce his surname. But let me read article 233:

“The absolute offenses/defects of the President of the Republic would be” … listen … “his death, his resignation or his dismissal decreed by the Supreme Tribunal of Justice, his permanent physical or mental incapacity certified by a medical board appointed by the TSJ and with the approval of the National Assembly, the abandonment of his position declared as such by the National Assembly as well as recall by popular vote “… that in Venezuela there is a recall referendum in the middle of the period if the people are not happy; that occurred in 2004 with Commander Hugo Chávez and was ratified … “when an elected president becomes permanently unavailable to serve before the inauguration, a new, direct, and secret universal election will be held within the 30 consecutive days. Pending election and inauguration of the the new president, the president of the National Assembly will be in charge of the presidency of the Republic “

In Venezuela there was no takeover. In Venezuela there were no elections. If there is a discrepancy of one of the powers — there are five legitimate powers in Venezuela — if there is a disagreement of the National Assembly, well then, go to the other institutions, go to the Supreme Tribunal of Justice. But what is this self-proclaiming a Member of Parliament as “interim president” and the governments in the world begin to recognize him? These are serious governments, that have legal departments in the chancelleries, that are attached to this Charter (of the United Nations) and that know the constitutions of the States, recognizing him. You are imposing force against the Law. That is very dangerous for humanity, and we have to stop that today in the United Nations.

I think it is enough with what we have outlined, and we want to tell you that the people of Venezuela are listening to us. And it’s been shown here that Venezuela is not alone and this will continue to be demonstrated in this debate and as demonstrated in other international organizations: the Movement of Non-Aligned Countries, which we chair. Venezuela is not alone. And do you know why it is not alone? Because Venezuela is upholding its Constitution and the Charter of the United Nations. We will continue advancing along the path of our democracy. We will not allow anyone to impose on us any decision or any order. The Secretary told them that this member of Parliament “self-proclaimed”. Where is a self-proclamation in the Constitution (of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela)?. I ask them, where? Look for it and show me, and we can debate it.

On behalf of President Nicolas Maduro, on behalf of the Venezuelan public powers, the People’s Power of Venezuela, the communities and community leaders, we want to insist that Venezuela is as the Constitution says: irrevocably free, independent, and no power, however powerful it may be, can dictate to our country its destiny and its steps to follow.

Thank you.

United States Ambassador Elliot Abrams:
I cannot [respond] to every attack that was made on every country here, the insults that were made by calling many countries here satellites.

In fact, it was interesting that every country here that was attacked or criticized was a democracy. Every single one that was criticized was a democracy.

It was just a series of insults that reflected that today. There is a satellite here — that is Venezuela which is unfortunately which has become a satellite of Cuba and Russia.

The regime is hiding and its spokesman is hiding behind the laws and Constitution of Venezuela while imprisoning opponents, preventing free elections, and killing Democrats like Fernando Albay.

This is not about foreign intervention in Venezuela. It is not an attempt to impose result on the Venezuelan people. Democracy never needs to be imposed. It is tyranny that has to be imposed.

This discussion in the council is about the right of the Venezuelan people to direct their own internal affairs and the future of their country democratically. Thank you.

Russian Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia:
Perhaps I will surprise you, distinguished representative of the United States, but when we discuss certain issues in the Security Council, we never try to force any country to behave as we wish it to behave, as we need, as it is in our interest for it to behave. We always respect the sovereignty of any country, whether it’s a member of the Security Council or whether it speaks in this room.

We respect its own opinions, its own policy. But that policy or those views that correspond to our policy, then we’re happy. If not, we basically respect that any member of the council or any member of the UN can have its own views or positions. It is their sovereign right to have their own foreign policy.

But unfortunately, we know many of, many, many episodes that the country that you represent not only uses its satellite states to promote its own interests but in fact, forces them to be in lock-step with you.

So to discuss who has satellites and who doesn’t, I wouldn’t suggest you get into that. Thank you.
….

Venezuela Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza:
Now we’re involved in many difficult negotiations for our part, but I would recall that Mr. Abrams represents a tradition that has been tried and duly indicted for similar such attempts in the past, such as the Iran-Contra affair. He is the face of a well-worn path of interfering in democracy. Perhaps a fresher face could have been chosen to have spoken on behalf of the United States of America.

And we see it as being part of the same, parroting the same line, permanent insults leveled against Venezuela – whether there are dictators, drug traffickers, I mean, what are you trying to convince us of?

I think all that these people have to do is all of them focus their attention on Venezuela. Is there nothing else going on in the world other than the one situation in Venezuela? There are other things you could be doing, probably in Venezuela, and we would like to make the point here, bluntly and we would have made it if Pompeo were still here in his face, we make it abundantly clear, we echo a point that President Maduro has made, and it is our intention to establish communication and dialogue with the government of President Trump. That offer stands, and it’s still on the table.

That is what we have sought to do since the very first day of office, since Commandant Chavez took office in February 1999. It’s an approach we’ve attempted to continue since President Maduro took the reins of power. Either the response to our offer of dialogue has been blockade, prosecution, persecution, sanctions, violence, aggression, insults, interventions, interference, and now, this attempted coup d’etat. To date, despite all these insults that we have suffered, that offer still stands on the table. We stand ready to dialogue to keep the peace if you would treat us as civilized partners and equals as indicated in the charter of the United Nations we all have to respect and uphold.

Thank you.

US – Hands Off Cuba : Statement by the United National Antiwar Coalition

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November 18, 2021

Cuba, a small island with a population of only 11 million people and few resources has been the target of US imperialism since its revolution in 1959.  It has been subject to invasions such as that at the Bay of Pigs, many assassination attempts of Fidel Castro, and the US has imposed a crippling blockade for years.  However, under the Trump and Biden administrations these attacks have been stepped up.  Trump greatly increased the sanctions against Cuba and labeled it as a terrorist country.  This further hindered its ability to trade with other countries as banks and markets were closed to Cuba causing severe shortages and hardships for the Cuban people.  The Biden administration maintained these increased sanctions and the terrorist label and is trying to organize demonstrations against the Cuban government based on dissatisfaction with the shortages.  This is especially criminal during the COVID-19 crisis, during which the US sanctions have not allow medicine or medical equipment into the country.

A crowd of people in front of a statue Description automatically generated with medium confidence
Pro-government protest in Cuba that the corporate media said was anti-government

The US does not fear Cuba militarily or as economic competition.  It fears Cuba because of its example to the rest of the world, especially to Latin American countries, as they move forward in breaking away from US imperialism and its neo-liberal economic policies.  While the US will not provide healthcare for all, even during this pandemic, Cuba provides free healthcare and education for all.  Even with the sanctions-imposed limitations on medicine and medical equipment, Cuba has done remarkable well in containing the virus and even sent doctors to help out in other countries.  It prioritizes the needs of the Cuban people not the corporations, banks, and billionaire class.  The example of people over profit is one that the US cannot tolerate, and so they attack Cuba.

On November 15, Cuba started opening up after restrictions due to the COVID pandemic. Biden used this day to call for demonstrations in Cuba against the government. This call has proven to be a failure as demonstration did not materialize anywhere on the island. While the Cuban people and Cuban government will have to deal with this intervention and the discontent due to shortages and the pandemic, we in the US must show our solidarity with Cuba and oppose our government’s interference in the internal affairs of Cuba and other countries throughout the world.

Demonstration were called in a number of US cities on November 15 to express solidarity and help inform the people of the US of the criminal role the US government plays in Cuba.  This crisis will not end on November 15.  We must step-up our efforts to show solidarity and stay the hand of US imperialism.

Hands off Cuba!

End the Blockade!

End all Sanctions!

End US meddling in the affairs of other countries!

https://nepajac.org/handoffcuba.htm

Top Democrat proposes bill to stop Trump from relaxing sanctions on Russia, with GOP McCain and Graham support

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“[Obama] wanted to make sure that [Trump] had grave difficulty in maintaining any normal strategic policy at all and particularly with regard to Russia. So he left that time bomb if you like…Schumer himself is a rabid, and I use this word advisedly, rabid, political advocate concerned only with domestic political outcomes. He’s certainly not looking at the strategic picture, he’s absolutely trying to undermine the Trump administration.”
Gregory Copley, editor-in-chief of the Defense & Foreign Affairs journal

From RT

January 23, 2017

A top Senate Democrat is planning to introduce bipartisan legislation designed to stop President Trump from relaxing US sanctions on Russia. Critics argue that the bill is a “rabid and short-sighted” move to undermine the new administration.

President Donald Trump’s cautious statements about the desirability of working towards rapprochement with Moscow, which could include easing economic sanctions on Russia, have not gone unnoticed by some in the US establishment.

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Vice President-elect Mike Pence © Lucas Jackson
Trump ready to look at currently ‘terrible’ US-Russia relations with ‘fresh eyes’ – Pence

Shortly after Trump’s inauguration, Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer (D-New York) said on Sunday that a bipartisan group of US Senators was preparing to introduce a bill that would significantly restrict the president’s ability to lift the sanctions that Washington imposed on Russia in 2014 after Crimea voted to leave Ukraine and rejoin it in a referendum.

The bill would demand that any changes to the restrictions be put to a vote in the US Congress, thus preventing the president from acting unilaterally.

“We repeal sanctions, it tells Russia, ‘Go ahead and interfere in our elections and do bad things;’ it tells China; it tells Iran. That would be terrible,” Schumer told ABC’s This Week show, adding that he has secured support from GOP Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham.

“We need more sanctions against Russia. We should not relax them,” McCain said on the same program, adding “if we don’t keep those sanctions on and even increase them, it will encourage Vladimir Putin, who is a war criminal.”

Earlier in January, Trump floated the idea of lifting the sanctions as part of a new nuclear weapons reduction deal.

“For us to repeal sanctions, given what Russia has done in Ukraine and threatened the Baltics, and now they have clearly tried to intervene in our election – whether it had an effect or not – that is something, that’s a danger that we have never faced to this extent in American history,” Schumer went on.

However, Gregory Copley, editor-in-chief of the Defense & Foreign Affairs journal, told RT that the bill was surely designed “as a part of the legacy that the then-president Obama wanted to leave for President Trump.”

Republicans will try to stop Trump from getting close with Moscow – fmr asst US def sec

“[Obama] wanted to make sure that he had grave difficulty in maintaining any normal strategic policy at all and particularly with regard to Russia. So he left that time bomb if you like,” Copley asserted.

Allegations that Russia interfered in the US elections are unsubstantiated, the expert continued, while noting that Washington itself has waged “political warfare” against other countries in the past.

“There’s a lot of material around to show that the Obama administration interfered with the election processes in Ukraine, in Israel and in other countries,” he said.

“Schumer himself is a rabid, and I use this word advisedly, rabid, political advocate concerned only with domestic political outcomes. He’s certainly not looking at the strategic picture, he’s absolutely trying to undermine the Trump administration,” Copley concluded.

https://www.rt.com/usa/374745-senators-trump-russia-sanctions/