UN

An analysis of Obama’s speech at the UN, September 28

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By Barry Grey
Global Research, September 29, 2015
World Socialist Web Site
Addressing the United Nations General Assembly on Monday, President Barack Obama portrayed himself and the US government as the preeminent defenders of international law and diplomacy. He did so even as the catastrophic consequences of the illegal wars of aggression he has overseen continued to send waves of refugees fleeing the ruins of entire countries—including Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria and Yemen—and as Washington took new steps to turn Eastern Europe into a militarized zone for eventual war against Russia. 

With his trademark hypocrisy and contempt for the intelligence of his audience, Obama hailed “an international system that imposes a cost on those who choose conflict over cooperation.” He proclaimed his support for the “international principles that helped constrain bigger countries from imposing our will on smaller ones,” and denounced those who maintain “that might makes right; that strong states must impose their will on weaker ones; that the rights of individuals don’t matter; and that in a time of rapid change, order must be imposed by force.”

This from a man who asserts the right of his government to launch “preemptive” wars against any country or group deemed hostile to Washington’s drive for hegemony over the oil-rich Middle East and the rest of the world; who has killed untold thousands in drone missile assassinations; waged an unprovoked war against Libya and murdered its leader, Gaddafi; and armed and financed a sectarian civil war using Al Qaeda-linked killers as its proxy force, turning Syria into a chamber of horrors.

The main focus of Obama’s remarks was Syria, where the debacle of US policy had become so pronounced that Obama was obliged to pull back from his previous demand for the immediate removal of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. He has proposed talks with the Baathist regime’s main allies, Russia and Iran, on a “managed transition” that would likely retain elements of the current government while eventually easing Assad out of power.

Later on Monday, Obama met with Russian President Putin to discuss the possibility of engineering such a settlement of the four-and-a-half-year war. It was the first formal face to face meeting between the two since 2013, when the White House cancelled discussions with Putin in retaliation for Moscow’s decision to grant NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden temporary asylum. That was followed by a freeze on all high-level talks after the US-sponsored and fascist-led coup last year that overthrew Ukraine’s pro-Russian president, Viktor Yanukovych. Since it installed the ultra-nationalist and fascistic regime in Kiev, Washington has backed a brutal assault on pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine that has killed thousands and devastated entire cities.

The US finds its position in Syria and the broader region severely weakened, despite the mass killing in the country—estimated at 200,000 deaths in a country with a population of 23 million—caused by the sectarian civil war instigated by Washington and its regional allies, Turkey and the semi-feudal sheikdoms of Saudi Arabia and Qatar. Iraq’s announcement Sunday that it had signed an agreement with Syria, Iran and Russia to share intelligence and coordinate security in the battle against Islamic State forces in Syria and Iraq appeared to take Washington by surprise.

It was preceded by a series of developments exposing Washington’s failure to create a non-jihadist “moderate” force to fight both ISIS and Assad. These included the resignation of the top US commander in the anti-ISIS war; congressional testimony by a leading general admitting that after more than a year and the expenditure of hundreds of millions of dollars, the US had trained “four or five” fighters; reports that the ranks of ISIS fighters were rising despite months of US and coalition bombing; and other reports that forces trained by the US in Turkey had defected or turned over their weapons to Al Qaeda’s Syrian affiliate, the al-Nusra Front.

Moreover, recent weeks have seen an increase in Russian military support to the Assad regime, which Washington has been unable to block.

The net result of Washington’s reckless and murderous war for regime-change in Syria has been to turn the country into yet another geopolitical flashpoint where US and allied military forces face off against those of Russia, raising the very real danger of an armed clash and the eruption of a wider war between nuclear armed powers. On the eve of the UN assembly, France began its own bombing campaign in Syria, making clear that it was prepared to attack forces allied with Assad, potentially including Russian forces, as well as ISIS. Britain is lining up to begin bombing the country later this year.

It would be a dangerous mistake to believe that Washington’s decision to seek talks with Russia and Iran means the US is backing off from the use of military violence. On the contrary, with its economic and diplomatic position weakening, the response of American imperialism will be to ratchet up its bullying and military aggression.

This was clear from Obama’s speech. He denounced the main targets of US aggression, calling Assad a “tyrant,” accusing Russia of violating “the sovereignty and territorial integrity” of Ukraine, implied that China was attacking “the basic principles of freedom of navigation and the free flow of commerce” in the South China Sea and singled out Iran for continuing to “deploy violent proxies to advance its interests.” The chief backer of tyrants in the Middle East, violator of national sovereignty and territorial integrity in Ukraine, threat to freedom of navigation in East Asia and deployer of violent proxies is, of course, the United States.

In the midst of his cynical paean to the international law and diplomacy, Obama issued an unambiguous threat to any nation that dared to get in America’s way, declaring: “I lead the strongest military that the world has ever known, and I will never hesitate to protect my country and our allies, unilaterally and by force where necessary.”

The preparations for a US military escalation against both Syria and Russia are well underway. Last week, Washington Post columnist David Ignatius reported that discussions are being held between US military officials and leaders of the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) in Syria for Washington to step up its military support, including close air support for YPG fighters on the ground.

Powerful factions within the US ruling elite and state are opposed to any talks with Russia or Iran and are demanding the creation of so-called “safe havens” policed by US and allied forces in Syria and an all-out drive for regime-change.

At the same time, the Pentagon and CIA are stepping up their war preparations against Russia. The upcoming US-NATO Trident Juncture 2015 war games, the largest held since the dissolution of the Soviet Union, are designed to prepare Western forces to engage in hybrid warfare operations in the Baltic region and beyond.

Last week, an article appeared in Foreign Policy magazine with the title: “The Pentagon is Preparing New War Plans for a Baltic Battle Against Russia.” The article stated, “For the first time since the collapse of the Soviet Union, the US Department of Defense is reviewing and updating its contingency plans for armed conflict with Russia.”

Finally, the US is planning to upgrade its nuclear arsenal in Europe with highly sophisticated B61-12 guided nuclear bombs, each one of which is more than three times as powerful as the atomic bomb that killed over 130,000 people in Hiroshima.

For decades, US imperialism has sought to overcome the decline in its global economic position by relying on its military supremacy. In response to its latest setbacks in the Middle East, this tendency will only be expressed with greater brutality and recklessness.

Two years ago: how the Syrian chemical weapons videos were staged (VIDEO)

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Detailed Video Analysis on Global Research TV — GRTV

By James Corbett, Mother Agnes Mariam, and Prof Michel Chossudovsky
Global Research, August 21, 2015
Global Research TV

August 21, 2013: Obama’s insidious and criminal objective in August 2013 was to use these attacks with a view to justifying a humanitarian war against Syria.

This GRTV report was first broadcast in September 2013 in the month following the East Ghouta Chemical Attacks

In the wake of the Syrian chemical weapons attack, shocking footage of the victims of that attack were widely circulated in an effort to raise the ire of the public and spur support for military intervention.

Now, a new report on that footage finds troubling inconsistencies and manipulation with the video that calls the official narrative of the attack and its victims into question.

This is the GRTV Backgrounder on Global Research TV.

Earlier this week, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon submitted the findings of the UN chemical weapons inspection team dispatched to Syria last month to gather evidence on the August 21st chemical weapons attack in Ghouta.

The report has been used as justification for the US and UK’s allegations that the attack originated from the Syrian government, but it does not in fact reach this conclusion. The inspection team’s mandate was limited to determining if an attack took place, not where it originated from, limiting their findings to a simple statement of fact:

“On the basis of the evidence obtained during our investigation of the Ghouta incident, the conclusion is that, on 21st August 2013, chemical weapons have been used in the ongoing conflict between the parties in the Syrian Arab Republic, also against civilians, including children, on a relatively large scale.”

The determination of where the attacks originated from is of course the key issue geopolitically speaking. If the attack originated with the Syrian government it would mark a serious escalation in the conflict, but if the weapons were launched by the terrorist insurgency it would mean the attack was a false flag provocation, designed to draw the US and its allies into armed military intervention in the country.

As analysts have been at pains to point out, the motive for such an attack has always suggested that it was more likely that the terrorists were the culprits in Ghouta, not the Syrian government. They have been losing the ground war against Syrian government forces for months, and they knew that the use of chemical weapons was the “red line” that Obama had set as the threshold for military intervention. Those who argue Assad’s culpability have to believe that not only did he suddenly and inexplicably resort to using chemical weapons on his own people for no strategic military reason, but that he waited until UN chemical weapons inspectors arrived in the country before doing so.

The background and history of the conflict also provide ample evidence that the terrorists have chemical weapons in their possession, and are trained and motivated to use them. Last December it was reported that US forces were training the terrorist forces in the the handling of chemical weapons. Also last December the insurgents released a video showing their chemical weapons operations and threatening to use them against government supporters. And in July of this year, Russia submitted an exhaustive 100-page report to the UN outlining how the terrorist insurgency was in fact to blame for the March 19th chemical weapons attack in Khan al-Asal on the outskirts of Aleppo.

But in the light of this latest chemical weapons attack, the UK, the US and France have all released their own intelligence studies blaming Assad for the incident and calling on the “international community” to increase pressure on the Syrian government. The reports, however, contradict each other in numerous places, with wildly different estimates of casualties in the events suggesting that the intelligence agencies that produced the report cannot even agree on the most basic details of the attack.

Now, new evidence is emerging that the attacks were used and manipulated by the terrorists in order to provoke the US and its allies into armed intervention in Syria. This evidence suggests that the videos used by the US and its allies to conclude what happened in Ghouta were in fact carefully stage managed to portray a narrative that would pin the blame for the attacks on Assad.

The first indications of this plot emerged early on, when expert analysis of the videos suggested inconsistencies in the footage itself.

That analysis was later expanded on by a report from ISTEAMS, a Syria-based human rights group working in conjunction with the International Institute for Peace, Justice and Human Rights. In this thorough report, published on GlobalResearch.ca on September 16th, numerous discrepancies and inconsistencies in the footage are documented.

The report documents through eyewitness testimony and video evidence that the affected areas had been largely abandoned by local residents in the days prior to the attack. Yet in the footage of the aftermath, there are large numbers of child victims who are portrayed. There exists very little footage of parents with their children, and what little footage exists portrays some of the parents apparently “discovering” their children on multiple occasions in different locations. Other footage shows the same children arranged in different formations in geographically distant neighborhoods. The report concludes that the footage was carefully stage managed to create the greatest emotional impact on foreign audiences. These videos were then used by the Obama administration to convince the Senate of their case for military intervention.

ISTEAMS President and one of the key researchers on the report, Mother Agnes Mariam, joined The Corbett Report to discuss the problems with the official narrative of the chemical weapon attack emanating from Washington and its allies last month.

The ISTEAMS report raises many troubling questions about the scenes in the Ghouta videos. Were the victims of the attack local children? If so, why were they there after these areas had been largely abandoned? Where are their parents? In the days after the attack, Dr. Bouthaina Shaaban, an advisor to the Assad government, provided an equally troubling answer to these questions to Sky News.

These reports dovetail with videos posted by the Mujahedeen Press Office to YouTube just six days before the attack confirming that the terrorists had kidnapped hundreds of women and children from the rural villages of Alawite stronghold Lattakia to use as bargaining chips in the conflict. Were these kidnap victims moved to Ghouta to be killed in the chemical weapons attack? Is this why so many children were there in these largely-vacated areas, and why so few parents appear on video mourning their children?

Although further research and investigation is urgently needed by third-party organizations to establish the identity of the Ghouta attack victims and the whereabouts of the kidnapped Lattakian families, the reports, if true, are evidence of the most disgraceful war crimes imaginable and the most cold-blooded manipulations of evidence to suit an agenda. Earlier this month, Global Research Director Michel Chossudovsky appeared on GRTV to discuss the nature of the terrorist insurgency.

Now, the US and its allies are trying to use the UN’s new report in combination with the video “evidence” of the attack’s aftermaths to justify the use of military force to back up the Syrian chemical disarmament process. Some are even calling for Assad to face war crimes prosecution on the back of this and similarly manipulated evidence.

In order to prevent this war agenda from proceeding any further or these propaganda images from being used in the pursuit of military intervention, it is vital that this latest ISTEAMS report is downloaded from Global Research, widely disseminated, and thoroughly investigated.

Complete Report of the ISTEAM: The Chemical Attacks in East Ghouta Used to Justify a Military Intervention in Syria (pdf)

See also:

The Chemical Attacks in East Ghouta Used to Justify a Military Intervention in Syria By Mother Agnes Mariam, September 16, 2013

Syria: Fabricating Chemical Lies. Who is Behind the East Ghouta Attacks?By Prof Michel Chossudovsky, September 17, 2013

http://www.globalresearch.ca/how-the-syrian-chemical-weapons-videos-were-staged/5350471

Western values: French troops rape and sexually abuse children

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 “The regular sex abuse by peacekeeping personnel uncovered here and the United Nations’ appalling disregard for victims are stomach-turning, but the awful truth is that this isn’t uncommon. The UN’s instinctive response to sexual violence in its ranks – ignore, deny, cover up, dissemble – must be subjected to a truly independent commission of inquiry with total access, top to bottom, and full subpoena power.” — Paula Donovan, co-director of Aids Free World

From the Guardian, April 29, 2015
Sandra Laville

A senior United Nations aid worker has been suspended for disclosing to prosecutors an internal report on the sexual abuse of children by French peacekeeping troops in the Central African Republic.

Sources close to the case said Anders Kompass passed the document to the French authorities because of the UN’s failure to take action to stop the abuse. The report documented the sexual exploitation of children as young as nine by French troops stationed in the country as part of international peacekeeping efforts.

Kompass, who is based in Geneva, was suspended from his post as director of field operations last week and accused of leaking a confidential UN report and breaching protocols. He is under investigation by the UN office for internal oversight service (OIOS) amid warnings from a senior official that access to his case must be “severely restricted”. He faces dismissal.

The treatment of the aid worker, who has been involved in humanitarian work for more than 30 years, has taken place with the knowledge of senior UN officials, including Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, the high commissioner for human rights, and Susanna Malcorra, chef de cabinet in the UN, according to documents relating to the case.

Related: France’s poisoned legacy in the Central African Republic The abuses took place in 2014 when the UN mission in the country, Minusca, was in the process of being set up.

The Guardian has been passed the internal report on the sexual exploitation by Paula Donovan, of the advocacy group Aids Free World, who is demanding an independent commission inquiry into the UN’s handling of sexual abuse by peacekeepers.

It was commissioned by the UN office of the high commissioner for human rights after reports on the ground that children, who are among the tens of thousands displaced by the fighting, were being sexually abused.

Entitled Sexual Abuse on Children by International Armed Forces and stamped “confidential” on every page, the report details the rape and sodomy of starving and homeless young boys by French peacekeeping troops who were supposed to be protecting them at a centre for internally displaced people in Bangui, capital of the CAR.

Donovan, the co-director of Aids Free World. said: “The regular sex abuse by peacekeeping personnel uncovered here and the United Nations’ appalling disregard for victims are stomach-turning, but the awful truth is that this isn’t uncommon. The UN’s instinctive response to sexual violence in its ranks – ignore, deny, cover up, dissemble – must be subjected to a truly independent commission of inquiry with total access, top to bottom, and full subpoena power.”

The UN has faced several scandals in the past relating to its failure to act over paedophile rings operating in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Kosovo and Bosnia. It has also faced allegations of sexual misconduct by its troops in Haiti, Burundi and Liberia.

The treatment of Kompass, a Swedish national, threatens to spark a major diplomatic row.

This month, the Swedish ambassador to the United Nations warned senior UN officials “it would not be a good thing if the high commissioner for human rights forced” Kompass to resign. The ambassador threatened to go public if that happened and to engage in a potentially ugly and harmful debate.

The abuses detailed in the internal report took place before and after Minusca was set up last year. Interviews with the abused children were carried out between May and June last year by a member of staff from the office for the high commissioner of human rights and a Unicef specialist. The children identified represent just a snapshot of the numbers potentially being abused.

Related: Sex abuse poses ‘significant risk’ to UN peacekeeping, says leaked report The boys, some of whom were orphans, disclosed sexual exploitation, including rape and sodomy, between December 2013 and June 2014 by French troops at a centre for internally displaced people at M’Poko airport in the capital Bangui.

The children described how they were sexually exploited in return for food and money. One 11-year-old boy said he was abused when he went out looking for food. A nine-year-old described being sexually abused with his friend by two French soldiers at the IDP camp when they went to a checkpoint to look for something to eat.

The child described how the soldiers forced him and his friend to carry out a sex act. The report describes how distressed the child was when disclosing the abuse and how he fled the camp in terror after the assault. Some of the children were able to give good descriptions of the soldiers involved.

In summer 2014, the report was passed to officials within the office for the high commission of human rights in Geneva. When nothing happened, Kompass sent the report to the French authorities and they visited Bangui and began an investigation.

It is understood a more senior official was made aware of Kompass’s actions and raised no objections. But last month Kompass was called in and accused of breaching UN protocols by leaking details of a confidential report, according to sources.

Kompass’s emails have been seized as part of the investigation into the alleged leak. One senior UN official has said of Kompass that “it was his duty to know and comply” with UN protocols on confidential documents.

Bea Edwards, of the Government Accountability Project, an international charity that supports whistleblowers, condemned the UN for its witch-hunt against a whistleblower who had acted to stop the abuse of children.

“We have represented many whistleblowers in the UN system over the years and in general the more serious the disclosure they make the more ferocious the retaliation,” said Edwards. ”Despite the official rhetoric, there is very little commitment at the top of the organisation to protect whistleblowers and a strong tendency to politicise every issue no matter how urgent.”

UN sources confirmed an investigation by the French was ongoing – in cooperation with the UN – into allegations of a very serious nature against peacekeepers in the Central African Republic.

A spokesman for the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights confirmed an investigation was under way into the leaking of confidential information by a staff member.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/apr/29/un-aid-worker-suspended-leaking-report-child-abuse-french-troops-car

Also:

http://rt.com/news/254205-french-soldiers-abuse-boys/