A socio-political and cultural blog from the Republic of Ireland. The truth about the Celtic Tiger, it's demise and other related matters. Fír-eolas ar an Tíogar Cheiltigh, a thurnamh agus nithe gaolmhara eile.
When the UN Inspectors' report on chemical weapons use in
the Syria conflict was released on Monday, Samantha Power,
the US representative at the United Nations, immediately accused
the Syrian Government of being the culprit. Ms Power made
the following assertions:
“the
technical details of the UN report make clear that only the regime could have
carried out this large-scale chemical weapons attack”.
She said that the
US had evidence that regime forces had fired the type of rockets that the UN
said were used in the August 21 attack. She added: “We have reviewed thousands of
open source videos related to the current conflict in Syria and have not
observed the opposition manufacturing or using this style of rocket.”
This video uploaded on May 13, 2013, by the so-called "Free Syrian Army" (FSA), clearly shows the terrorists operating a BM-14 Soviet/Russian mobile rocket launcher of the type which uses the M-14 rockets which the UN Inspectors reported finding fragments of at the sites they investigated in Syria. This contradicts outright Ms Power's lying statement to the media on Monday that; “We have reviewed thousands of open source videos related to the current conflict in Syria and have not observed the opposition manufacturing or using this style of rocket.” Should have gone to Specsavers then! The BM-14 mobile rocket launcher was first introduced by the Soviet Union in 1952 and sold to most Middle East and north African countries since then. Countries which obtained the weapon are: Afghanistan, Algeria, Angola, Burkina Faso, Cambodia, Cuba, Egypt, Indonesia, Libya, Madagascar, Mongolia, Sudan, Syria, Vietnam, Yemen.
16 tube BM-14 mobile rocket launcher, Soviet Union (1952-90), Russia(1990-)
The BM-14 ( Boyevaya Mashina,
'combat vehicle'), is a compact lightweight unit mounted on a two-wheel trailer which can be attached to an ordinary automobile for transporting and moved quickly after firing to a different location avoiding detection by radars or scopes in conflict situations. It can also be mounted on a small pick-up truck (as in the FSA video) with wheelbase detached.
The BM-14 can
fire rockets fitted with chemical (MS-14), smoke (M-14D) or high-explosive
fragmentation (M-14-OF) warheads. It is similar to the BM-13
"Katyusha" and was partly replaced in service by the 122 mm BM-21
Grad.
The rocket has a
range of about 9.8 km and can carry a warhead of 8 kg weight.
Launchers were built in 16 and 17-round variants. The weapon is not
accurate as there is no guidance system, but it is extremely effective in saturation
bombardment.
There is also a Chinese variant designated T-63.
The presence of this weapon in the ordnance of Afghanistan, Libya, Syria and Yemen, all of which countries have active al-Qaeda jihadists means it is easily accessible to the terrorists despite US false claims to the contrary.
OBAMA FAILS AT G2O AS MAJORITY FOLLOW RUSSIA'S LINE ON SYRIA:
US President Obama failed to garner any additional support from world leaders at the G20 summit in Petersburg, Russia, as a forceful Russian President, Vladimir Putin, secured a majority of the leaders and delegations to support his line of opposition to unilateral military action against Syria in reprisal for alleged chemical weapons use by the Assad government in Damascus.
With unilateral military action against a sovereign state declared illegal by the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon, a stance fully supported by Russia, China, Brazil, South Africa, India, Indonesia, representing the majority of the world's population and only the usual suspects, Britain,Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar - the covert supporters of the Jihadist terror groups infesting Syria- lined up with Washington, Mr Obama was increasingly isolated in his demand for military action against Damascus as the summit proceeded. French President Hollande, all gung-ho for military action last week and making sly remarks on Britain's House of Commons decision to rule out military intervention, backed away from the Washington line and stated he would now wait for the UN inspectors reports on last month's chemical weapons incident in Damascus before taking any decision. EU President of Council, Rumpoy, also joined the Coalition of the Unwilling with a clear statement that the EU favoured using the United Nations process for dealing with the situation. A diplomatic disaster for the White House.
Domestically, public opinion in the USA is over 70% opposed to military strikes with phone calls to the White House reaching a record 500/1 against the Obama war plans. Likewise, the same high percentages, 60-70% opposition, are being recorded even in those countries like Britain and France whose leaders are backing Obama.
The US/NATO plans for regime-change in Syria based on a false extrapolation from their "victory" in Libya two years ago when they thought the Assad Government would fall like a ripe fruit with minimum effort by them, have fallen apart as Assad held on and succeeded in resisting the jihadist terrorists they exported to Syria via their bases in Kosovo and Turkey and cross-border from Qatar and Saudi Arabia. They are now using the chemical weapons slander to justify direct military intervention to topple Assad and complete their imperialist agenda for control of the Arab East. But, this has proved a huge miscalculation as world opposition by Russia, China and the bulk of non-NATO countries plus well organised peace movement protests in the US and NATO Europe has resisted the lies and propaganda which fooled some people previous to the invasion of Iraq and galvanised domestic political opposition like never before.
OUTFOXED BY PUTIN:
Russian President, Vladimir Putin, choreographed the whole show exactly as he wanted. Mr Obama was seated between Brazil and Mexico both of whom are severely pissed at Washington currently, not only because they oppose military interventions in Syria, but also because their Governments were targets for Obama's NSA spying activities as revealed by the Snowden files given to Wikileaks, making a distinctly uncomfortable position for Mr Obama. Brazilian President, Dilma Roussef, looked stern and unfriendly at the round table in Petersburg. Rousseff was furious over
the reported snooping into her personal communications and a senior government
official said on Wednesday that she might cancel the state visit to the White
House unless she got an apology. Brasilia even called off a trip by an advance
team to Washington to prepare for the visit. A report that the National Security Agency’s massive spy program directly
targeted Rousseff’s communications with top aides has brought the trip into
doubt and hiked tensions between the two nations. In Brasilia, Communications
Minister PauloBernardo said the answers given by the United States since the
first allegations emerged in July have been "false."
US
journalist Glenn Greenwald, who has access to secret documents leaked by
fugitive former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, told Brazil'sGlobo television
this week that the agency spied on Rousseff's Internet searches and Pena
Nieto's emails before his election last year. In July, Greenwald co-wrote
articles in Brazil's "O Globo" newspaper saying the NSA spied on
Latin American allies and rivals, using electronic espionage to monitor
military purchases in Venezuela, energy and drug issues in Mexico and rebel
movements in Colombia.
The Mexican
President had already made critical remarks about US spying activities on his
way to Petersburg:
"If it is proven that an action took place, with the use of espionage means, this is clearly not permitted and it is outside the law," Pena Nieto told reporters during a stopover in Canada before arriving in Petersburg. "There will surely be space at the G20 for some sort of meeting, either casual or informal, with the US president to make our position very clear," he said, recalling that his government has asked the United States to investigate the matter.
Before Pena Nieto was elected in July 2012, the NSA intercepted some of his phone calls, text messages and emails, including communications in which he discussed potential cabinet members, it is alleged.
Moscow’s
calibrated reaction largely stems from realisation that U.S. President Barack
Obama has got trapped into his own rhetoric about “red lines,” and whatever he
does now will play into Russia’s hands.
“Russia
doesn’t have to do anything, just sit back and relax, and we’ll end up the
winning side,” said Prof. Georgy Mirsky of the Moscow Institute of World
Economy and International Relations. Moscow stands to gain whatever course Mr.
Obama takes, Russian experts said.
“If Obama
attacks Syria he will be seen fighting on the side of al-Qaeda, whose militants
make up a third of the opposition forces, even according to U.S. military
commanders,” said analyst Yulia Latynyna. If the U.S. attack is “limited” and
“narrow,” as Mr. Obama has declared, it may even strengthen President Assad who
will be able to say he has stood up to the world’s most powerful nation. Other observers
think the U.S. may well slide down the slippery path of broader intervention in
Syria. “Having started to take part in this campaign, the United States will be
unable to get out of it without removing Bashar al-Assad. And considerations of
prestige will outweigh all the doubts of those who fear chaos after a change of
regime,” said Dr. Fyodor Lukyanov, chairman of the Russian Council on Foreign
and Defense Policy.
At a recent
press conference on Syria, Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov lamented a
lack of “strategic thinking” in U.S. foreign policy. In contrast, Russia has
repeatedly demonstrated it has strategic vision, with the situation in Iraq,
Libya and Syria proving it right. Mr. Lavrov said Russia had “no plans to go to
war” over Syria, but,pointedly, he didn't say Russia would not react.
China
Russia will
continue to block any anti-Syrian moves at the U.N. Security Council, expose
the illegal nature of U.S. interference and the foolishness of siding with
Islamist radicals in Syria. Moscow will
also cement its ties with Iran and China. Iranian President HassanRouhani
placed a telephone call to Mr. Putin last week, with the two leaders calling
for resolving the Syrian crisis “exclusively through political and diplomatic
means.” The Russian and Iranian Presidents will have their first face-to-face
meeting on the sidelines of a Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit in
Kyrgyzstan in mid-September. Also, last week, China’s Ambassador to Russia,Li
Hui, called on Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov, Russia’s sentinel for
the Middle East, to discuss “further Russian-Chinese political and diplomatic
interaction in connection with a sharp aggravation of the situation around
Syria.”
Last, but
not least, Russia will continue to arm Syria. “Russia and Iran have far more
possibilities to help Assad than the other side can help rebels,” said Prof.
Mirsky. “We can ship him as many weapons as he needs, while Iranians can send
over its Islamic Revolution Guards as volunteers. America has no chance of
winning this war.”
Syria, September 5:
While Mr Obama was hand-wringing in Petersburg, the Jihadists infesting Syria mounted another attack on a Christian town in their campaign of murderous terror against the minority religious communities in the country.
The dawn assault on the Christian village of Maaloula, about 60km north of Damascus, was carried out by rebels from the al-Qaeda-linked Jabhat al-Nusra group. At the start of the attack, an al-Nusra fighter blew himself up at a Syrian Army checkpoint at the entrance to the village.
The historic Christian village of Maaloula, Western Syria.
Maaloula, a mountain village some 40 miles (60 kilometers) northeast of Damascus, is home to about 2,000 residents, some of whom still speak a version of Aramaic, the ancient language of biblical times believed to have been spoken by Jesus.
The suicide attack was followed by fighting between the jihadis and Syrian government forces, Eventually, the rebels seized the checkpoint, disabled two tanks and an armoured personnel carrier and killed eight Syrian soldiers in fighting. Heavy fighting around the village, which is on a UNESCO list of tentative world heritage sites – continued throughout the day, and heavy artillery echoed in the village. “The stones are shaking,” said a nun at the Mar Takla monastery. “We don’t know if the rebels have left or not, nobody dares go out.” She spoke with the Associated Presson condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals.
Frightened residents expected the militants to return to the Safir hotel, she said, adding: “It’s their home now.” The nun said the rebels took over the Safir hotel atop a mountain overlooking the village and fired shells at it from there. "It's a war. It has been going from 6 a.m. in the morning," she said. Some 80 people from the village took refuge in the convent, which houses 13 nuns and 27 orphans, she said. The attack highlights fears among Syrian Christians that the alternative to Assad’s regime,(made up mostly of Alawites – followers of an offshoot of Shiite Islam), being promoted by the US and NATO, would not tolerate minority religions. The nun who spoke to the AP said there were reports that the militants threatened villagers with death if they did not convert. The report could not be independently confirmed.
Maaloula has several churches and important monasteries, including Deir MarTakla, which is visited by many Christians and Muslim pilgrims. Inscriptions found in some of the caves in the mountainside on which the town sits confirm it as one of the earliest centres of Christianity in the world, and some residents can still speak Aramaic, the language of Jesus.
Later on Thursday, government warplanes launched three air strikes on the checkpoint held by the rebels. Syria's Sana state news agency meanwhile reported that an army unit "eliminated members of a terrorist group belonging to the al-Nusra Front" north-east of Maaloula and "destroyed the tools they use in their crimes".
Damascus:
In fighting in Damascus, a mortar shell fired by rebels hit a sports hall, killing a member of the national tae kwon do team, 27-year-old Mohammed Ali Neimeh. Neimeh had been training for an upcoming Islamic Solidarity Tournament in Indonesia this week. In the Daraya district, several fighters fired assault rifles from behind an earthen embankment. Smoke rose from the neighborhood of Barzek after the shelling.
There were new signs of rivalry among rebel groups that have been fragmented from the start. The two main camps are the Western-backed so-called "Free Syrian Army", which portrays itself as the largest fighting group, and jihadist fighters, including thousands from outside Syria, who have become increasingly dominant, particularly in the north and sparsely populated east.
Among the jihadists, there have been several splits in recent months, particularly between those loyal to commanders in Syria and those who pledge allegiance to al-Qaeda-linked groups in Iraq. In an amateur video posted online Wednesday, a foreign fighter was seen standing among other bearded men who he says have come to Syria from Russia and the Caucasus to wage jihad, or holy war.
"Our brigade is called the Mujahedin of the Caucasus and the Levant, and we have our brothers from all over the world with us," he said in halting Russian translated into Arabic. He said his men had broken away from one of the jihadi blocs, known as ISIS, and that the group is also "independent from Jabhat al-Nusra and others."
OBAMA TO ATTACK SYRIA REGARDLESS OF CONSEQUENCES: KERRY STATEMENT A CLOWNISH DIATRIBE OF SYRIA:
The determination of the Obama government to mount a military strike on
Syria on the basis of spurious allegations on use of chemical weapons will have grave consequences for world peace and security and only exacerbate the tragic civil war
there with more death and destruction in the name of "humanitarian intervention".
US Secretary of State,John Kerry, went on public media today with a
prepared statement of purported "evidence" possessed by the US that
the Assad Government in Syria had carried out a chemical attack on civilians in
Damascus last week.
No such thing. Kerry's meandering statement of abuse of the Syrian Government
laced with references to dubious You Tube videos, anecdotal reports by
unidentified "medical sources", "reporters on the ground" and
unverified "intelligence" was a farrago of stale propaganda being
peddled by his new Al Qaeda jihadist friends for months now and contained no
concrete evidence from any independent reliable sources to prove anything other
than the Washington Government is using these discredited and false flag
concoctions as an excuse to join the civil war in Syria with an attack on the
military assets of the Syrian Government and assist the rag-tag collection of
terrorists causing mayhem and murder in Syria for the past two years.
Deprived of the fig-leaf of "international" action by yesterday's
democratic decision by the House of Commons in London to disallow British
forces to participate in military aggression against Syria, Washington's
Imperialist agenda of regime change in Damascus, like Libya previously, is
exposed to full view. Discounting the efforts of the United Nations as they did
in Iraq in 2003 and accusing Russia and China of "obstructionism"
although both allowed the resolution on Libya to pass, Kerry ignores the US
veto on every single resolution of the Security Council condemning Israeli war
crimes against the Palestinian people including the use of chemical weapons
such as white phosphorous against the civilian population of Gaza in 2009. No
bombing missions or condemnations allowed on Zionist Israel.
Kerry's deviant logic in claiming that Iran was developing nuclear
weapons because of being attacked with chemical weapons by Saddam Hussein in
the Iraq-Iran war of the 1980's (weapons supplied to Iraq by US companies in a
savage irony to Kerry's condemnation of Syria) is worthy of a Dr Goebbels
propaganda outburst.
Kerry's statement would be laughable except that it is the preliminary to
an aggressive military strike on Syria for political gain in which unknown
numbers of people in Damascus will be killed to advance US imperialist aims and
to save face for Mr Obama's "red line" speech last year. The
stultifying hypocrisy of this shows how far the NATO war criminals will go to pursue
their imperialist agenda.
Irish Foreign Minister and Deputy Prime Minister, Eamon Gilmore said yesterday
that a solution to the Syrian crisis should be sought by diplomatic means; Mr
Gilmore said “the appropriate place” for an international response to the
alleged use of chemical weapons by the Assad regime was “through the United
Nations and particularly through the United Nations Security Council”.
Answering press queries on the safety of Irish peacekeeping troops in the UN GolanHeights mission Mr Gilmore said: "The safety and security of Irish troops in the Middle East region has
been paramount in the Government’s discussions with the United Nations on the
Syrian crisis".
Mr Gilmore said the matter
had been a central point when he spoke to UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon
about the situation in Syria. “We have been assured by the United Nations that every arrangement that
is possible will be put in place to ensure their safety and security. But it is
obviously something that we will continue to discuss with the UN,” he said.
Some 115 Irish troops are to be sent to the Golan Heights area, between Israel
and Syria, next month to join three others serving the area. A further 360
Irish troops are stationed in Lebanon as part of a UN force and there are
concerns military personnel could be at risk from reprisal attacks should the
US and other allies launch air strikes on Syria.
ALLIES DECLINE TO SUPPORT ILLEGAL
WARFARE; GERMANY,
ITALY AND SPAIN DECAMP;
CYPRUS PROTESTS USE OF
BRITISH BASES FOR ATTACK ON
SYRIA:
The plans for an attack on Syria
by the US and Britain began to unravel today as mounting popular opposition
domestically and political forces demanded evidence be provided to back up Washington
and London's crude propaganda attempts to slander the Damascus government with responsibility
for an alleged chemical attack in east Damascus last week which supposedly
caused several hundred civilian casualties in the rebel opposition controlled
suburb of the city.
Anti-War coalitions in the US
and Europe have begun mobilisation against the criminal intent of the
Washington and London elites and demonstrations have already been mounted in Times
Square, New York,London, Glasgow, and several European cities which will be
reinforced this coming weekend by further events in opposition to a new war in
the Middle East with horrendous unforeseen consequences for the entire region
and global peace and security.
In London, British Premier,
David Cameron, faced an open revolt by as many as 70 Conservative Party Mp's who
demanded more time and further evidence be presented to parliament before a vote
would be taken and the British opposition Labour
Party leader, Ed Miliband, scuttled
Cameron's plans by announcing just after 5pm today that he would instruct his
MPs to vote against the government motion if a separate Labour amendment –
calling for any action to be delayed – was defeated.
House of Commons, Westminster.
Within two hours, Downing Street issued a statement, as it published its
motion for the debate, that a second vote would have to be held before Britain
joins any military action. The motion states: "Before any direct British
involvement in such action a further vote of the House of Commons will take
place."
An enraged Cameron turned on Miliband accusing him of having suffered a
giant "wobble" after he had appeared to indicate on Tuesday night
that he would be prepared to support military action, subject to legal
approval. But Labour hit back and said that the Prime Minister had been
resisting a second vote until Miliband tweeted his plan to table his own
amendment.
A Labour source said: "We will continue to scrutinise this motion but
at 5.15pm David Cameron totally ruled out a second vote, an hour and a half
later he changed his mind. EdMiliband was determined to do the right thing. It has
taken Labour forcing a vote to force the government to do the right
thing."
Downing Street spinners immediately said Cameron offered a
second vote because he wants to act in a consensual way. A spokesperson said:
"The Prime Minister is acutely aware of the deep concerns in the country
caused by what happened over Iraq. That's why we are committed to taking action
to deal with this war crime – but taking action in the right way, proceeding on
a consensual basis."
"So this motion endorses the government's consistent approach that we
should take action in response to Assad's chemical weapons attack; reflects the
need to proceed on a consensual basis, taking account of the work done by weapons
inspectors; and reflects the Prime Minister's respect for the UN process –
something he made clear to President Obama several days ago."
The Government move is likely to take the heat out of Thursday's parliamentary
debate that will be opened by Cameron at 2.30pm and wound up by Nick Clegg (Liberal Democrat), the
Deputy Prime Minister, at 10pm. The debate will be preceded by a meeting of the
cabinet that will receive a recommendation from the National Security Council
that Britain should join the military strikes. Dominic Grieve, the British
Attorney General, advised the NSC that such action would be legal under
international law. The shadow of War Criminal Blair's calculated deception of the House of Commons in 2003 over the preparations for War in Iraq loomed large over events in London today with newspaper polls reporting 74% of voters opposed to any new war in the Middle East.
The National Security Council reportedly also discussed a specific plan for
a British contribution to military action. This focused on a "limited
one-off" operation and the measures that might have to be taken to protect
British interests in the region, including the defence of the UK's sovereign
base in Cyprus, which is thought to be potentially within range of President
Assad's Scud missiles. The Cyprus Government is extremely alarmed at the
possibility of longer range Syrian missiles being fired at the British bases in
Akrotiri and hitting cities and towns in Cyprus by random off-target events.
Some sources in London speculated that it was possible the US would act
without British support – which would be a huge embarrassment for Cameron. It
would also be politically difficult for the White House. US officials have previously
been at pains to stress that the US would not act unilaterally, but in concert
with partners. The US claims that "it knows" that the Assad
government was the author of a chemical attack, as stated by Vice-President
Biden and Secretary of State John Kerry yesterday in bellicose statements
threatening use of force against Syria, is based on the dubious and partisan
reports from Israeli "intelligence" of alleged interception of Syrian
military cables discussing such an event. The US has failed to produce any concrete evidence from independent sources to back up it's slanderous claims. Not much different from the kind of "intelligence" presented to the
UN in 2003 as justification for the War and invasion of Iraq and later found to
be entirely spurious.
UNITED NATIONS:
Russia and China
refused to collaborate today with British attempts to rush the UN Security Council
into making a premature decision on using military force against Syria.
The permanent
representatives of Russia and China to the United Nations left the closed
meeting of the Security Council on Syria after its end, there was no demarche,
the Russian Permanent Mission to the UN told waiting Press representatives.
It was reported
earlier in the day that the Russian and Chinese officials had walked out of the
UN Security Council meeting in New York after US Permanent Representative
Samantha Power had called for an immediate action in Syria. The permanent members
of the UN Security Council – Russia, Britain, China, the US and France –
had been invited to the closed meeting. An hour later the Russian and Chinese
diplomats left the meeting and headed to the Security Council’s main conference
room where debates on Haiti was taking place.
Western countries
could have, until the end of the day, submitted to the Security Council a draft
resolution that would give the green light to an armed operation in Syria.
Russia and China, which have the right of veto in the Security Council, have
spoken up strongly against the use of force. However some Western countries have
made it clear that they might take measures without waiting for the U.N.
Security Council’s decision as they did in 1999 in Kosovo.
Russian Deputy
Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov said this would be a gross violation of
international law. “Certain states are ready to use force even before UN
experts make public the results of their investigation. Our country will be
committed to international law,” he said. “Modern international law allows the
use of force only in exceptional cases: for self-defence and if so authorised
by the UN Security Council. Some states see priorities in a distorted way.”
Meanwhile, Syria
has formally asked the UN to investigate three chemical attacks which the Syrian Government believes were carried
out by rebels in the suburbs of Damascus on August 22, 23 and 24.
Syrian Bishop
warns intervention could spark ‘world war’ :
A Syrian Chaldean
Catholic bishop on Monday warned that an armed intervention in Syria could
unleash a “world war”, while the Vatican’s official newspaper called for more
“prudence” from Western powers. “If there is an armed intervention, that would
mean, I believe, a world war. That risk has returned,” Monsignor Antoine Audo
of Aleppo told Vatican Radio.
“We hope that the
pope’s call for real dialogue between the warring parties to find a solution
can be a first step to stop the fighting,” he said. Bishop Audo is also the
head of the Syrian arm of the international Catholic charity Caritas and has
repeatedly warned about the human cost of the war.
Monsignor Antoine Audo of Allepo, Syria.
The Vatican daily,
L’Osservatore Romano, meanwhile criticised Western powers in an editorial. “The
drumbeat of an armed intervention by Western powers is becoming ever more
insistent and ever less restrained by prudence,” it said. “Several
representatives of these countries say they are convinced that the accusation
that the Syrian Army used chemical weapons is founded – a question which the
United Nations is investigating,” it said.
Pope Francis on
Sunday called for the international community to help find a solution to the
civil war.
“I launch an
appeal to the international community to be more sensitive to this tragic
situation and to commit itself to the maximum to help the dear Syrian nation
find a solution to a war which spreads destruction and death,” he said. Attacks on Christians, Chaldeans, Copts and other religious minorities are daily occurrences in Syria, Iraq and Egypt with no expressions of outrage from either Washington or London.
LIES, HYPOCRISY, WAR CRIMES:
The Union of Liars, Hypocrites and War Criminals =
NATO, were planning their own chemical attack in Syria according to the London
Daily Mail last January:
"London, Jan 30 (ANI): The Obama administration gave
green signal to a chemical weapons attack plan in Syria that could be blamed on
President Bashir al Assad's regime and in turn, spur international military
action in the devastated country, leaked documents have shown.
A new report, that contains an email exchange
between two senior officials at British-based contractor Britam Defence, showed
a scheme 'approved by Washington'.
As per the scheme 'Qatar would fund rebel forces in
Syria to use chemical weapons,' the Daily Mail reports.
Barack Obama made it clear to Syrian president
Bashar al-Assad last month that the U.S. would not tolerate Syria using
chemical weapons against its own people.
According to Infowars.com, the December 25 email
was sent from Britam's Business Development Director David Goulding to company
founder Philip Doughty.
The emails were released by a Malaysian hacker who
also obtained senior executives resumes and copies of passports via an
unprotected company server, according to Cyber War News.
According to the paper, the U.S. State Department
has declined to comment on the matter. (ANI)"
Italian Foreign Ministery, Rome. Italian Foreign Minister Emma Bonino says Italy will not support force in Syria without UN mandate:
"Italy will not take part in any military solutions without a UN
Security Council mandate," Foreign Minister Emma Bonino told
parliamentarians in Rome.
"
Even the option of a limited intervention risks becoming
unlimited," the minister said, adding that Italy was "already
stretched and even over-stretched" militarily in other parts of the
world.
"There is no military solution to the Syrian conflict. The only
solution is a negotiated political solution," she said, calling for
"great determination" in pursuing negotiations between the
warring sides. LONDON
National demonstration: No attack on Syria
Stop the War
Coalition, 31 August 2013.
National
Demonstration: assemble Saturday 31 August, 12 noon, Temple Place, London
(nearest tube Temple)
The national
demonstration on Saturday will gather at Temple Place (near Temple tube) and
march via Parliament and Downing Street, ending in central London for a
political rally to say No attack on Syria.
Called by Stop the
War and CND.
Statement on Syria
Stop the War Coalition, 27 August 2013.
The Stop the War Coalition strongly opposes any military
attack on Syria. While we oppose all use of chemical weapons, the latest
alleged such attack in Damascus should not be used as a pretext for further
exacerbating an already bloody civil war.
It seems that the Western governments have already made up
their minds about this attack before it has even been reported on by UN weapons
inspectors. They are demanding that ‘something must be done’ even though their
record of ‘doing something’ has been nothing short of catastrophic.
There have been numerous western interventions in the Middle
East and South Asia over the past 12 years. While the attacks on Afghanistan,
Iraq and Libya were all argued for on humanitarian grounds, they have all
increased the levels of killing and misery for the ordinary people of those
countries. They were in reality all about regime change. This is also what
Syria is about.
PARIS French National assembly will debate Syria crisis:
French President, François Hollande
The French
parliament will hold an emergency session to debate the Syria crisis on
September 4, minister Alain Vidalies said on Wednesday.
The announced
debate comes as France and US/UK threaten a potential military
intervention in Syria following an alleged chemical weapons attack last
week in the Damascus suburbs that the governments in Washington and London are blaming on the Assad regime.
"There will
be a special debate in the (lower house) National Assembly and in the
(upper house) Senate," said Vidalies, who is in charge of
relations between the Government and parliament.
It is as yet
unclear whether a military operation will take place over last Wednesday's
alleged attack and if it does, when it will happen. But, under French
law, a one-off military intervention does not need parliamentary approval.
French President François
Hollande gave a militant speech on Tuesday warning the Syrian regime of Bashar
al-Assad that France was "ready to punish" those responsible for the
chemical weapons attack. Hollande further
warned that the Syrian civil war posed "a threat to world peace." Stressing a
"responsibility to protect civilians," Hollande also said that
"chemical massacre cannot remain without a response from France." Neither Hollande or the French Government have produced any evidence associating the Assad regime with a chemical attack in Damascus but, have seen fit only to parrot Washington and London's disputed claims.
Hopefully, more sober elements of French politics will come to the fore in the debate.
IN WHOSE INTEREST?
Stock shares of perennial Defence
contracting powerhouse Raytheon hit nearly $77 apiece Tuesday as news of a
possible US strike in Syria intensified. The US has said if it strikes Syrian
government targets for alleged use of chemical weapons, it would likely use
Tomahawk cruise missiles from warships positioned in the Mediterranean.
Raytheon is responsible for making and selling the bulk of the long-range,
subsonic missiles to the US government.