Just Foreign Policy News
October 4, 2011
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I) Actions and Featured Articles
AFL-CIO: Stop the Colombia Trade Agreement
As Human Rights Watch reports (see #1 below), Colombian trade unionists continue to be killed with impunity. The AFL-CIO has provided a toll-free number to call your representatives in Congress to oppose Congressional passage of the agreement: 1-800-718-1008. Public Citizen’s statement is here:
http://www.citizen.org/pressroom/pressroomredirect.cfm?ID=3423
On October 6, Let’s Make a National Clamor for Peace
On October 7, 2011, the United States will have been at war for ten years. Let’s mark the occasion by making a national clamor for peace so loud that Congress, the president, and big media will have to pay attention. By making a national clamor for peace on October 6, we’ll pre-empt the media narrative that Americans don’t care about the wars.
http://www.truth-out.org/october-6-lets-make-national-clamor-peace/1317305972
Greg Grandin and Keane Bhatt: 10 Reasons Why the UN Occupation of Haiti Must End
There is no legitimate reason for a UN force; UN troops are granted broad immunity for crimes committed in Haiti; allegations of sexual exploitation and abuse have been frequent; UN troops were responsible for introducing cholera into Haiti, but the UN has refused to take responsibility; UN troops actively meddle in Haiti’s domestic affairs; UN troops have generated violence through repeated, indiscriminate use of force in densely populated urban areas.
http://www.thenation.com/article/163632/10-reasons-why-un-occupation-haiti-must-end
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II) Summary:
U.S./Top News
1) A Human Rights Watch study found "virtually no progress" in getting convictions for killings of labor activists in Colombia, challenging Obama Administration claims in support of the Colombia trade agreement, AP reports. HRW counted six convictions obtained by a special prosecutions unit from 195 slayings between January 2007 and May 2011, with nearly nine in 10 of the unit’s cases in preliminary stages with no suspect formally identified. At least 38 trade unionists have been slain since President Santos took office in August 2010, according to Colombia’s National Labor School. The White House is pushing for congressional approval of the Colombia agreement as early as this week.
Dan Kovalik of the United Steel Workers said the study’s findings and the continued killings "prove what labor is telling the White House: The labor rights situation in Colombia is not improving, and passage of the FTA is not appropriate." Rep. Jim McGovern said if the FTA were approved now, it would remove pressure from Colombia to improve the situation.
2) Friends of the Earth says emails between the State Department and TransCanada demonstrate State Department bias in favor of the Keystone XL pipeline, The Hill reports. The emails include exchanges between Paul Elliott, a top lobbyist at TransCanada and former aide to Secretary of State Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign, and Marja Verloop, a State Department official who works on energy and environmental issues at the U.S. embassy in Ottawa. In one email, Verloop cheers Elliott after he says he has secured Sen. Max Baucus’ support for the pipeline. "Go Paul! Baucus support holds clout," Verloop wrote.
Afghanistan/Pakistan
3) The U.S. has secretly met with a key member of the Haqqani network as part of efforts to find a political end to the war in Afghanistan, and Pakistan’s ISI helped set up the meeting, ABC News reports. The meeting suggests that the recent spat between the US and Pakistan is really about to what extent Pakistan will be allowed a say in efforts to end the war in Afghanistan, ABC says.
4) A BBC report quoted Afghan insurgent leader Siraj Haqqani as saying he’s been approached by the US to join the Afghan government and denying his group was behind the assassination of former Afghan President Burhanuddin Rabbani, AP reports. "Right from the first day of American arrival till this day not only Pakistani but other … countries including America, contacted us and they (are) still doing so," Haqqani said.
Israel/Palestine
5) US and Palestinian officials have criticized a freeze the US Congress has placed on $200m US aid to the Palestinian Authority as punishment for pursuing statehood at the UN, the BBC reports. The freeze has already halted two economic development projects, Palestinian economics minister Hassan Abu Libdeh told AP – adding that 50 people had already been sacked with a further 200 to follow in November. Other ministries were quoted as saying other projects were in jeopardy, including a five-year plan to improve Palestinian health services.
6) Israel has infuriated its most reliable West European ally, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, by announcing expansion of an Israeli settlement in Jerusalem, The Independent reports. Merkel’s anger was all the greater because of the prodigious efforts she had made on Israel’s behalf to thwart the Palestinians’ UN recognition bid, The Independent says. An Israeli official was quoted as suggesting that a consequence of the row might be that Germany would change its mind and decide to support the proposal of French President Sarkozy to upgrade the Palestinians’ UN status to that of "a non-member state".
Iran
7) Secretary of Defense Panetta suggested he expected Israel to refrain from taking unilateral action against Iran, the Jerusalem Post reports. Panetta’s visit to Israel was focused on Iran, and he was expected to seek assurances that Israel will not take unilateral military action against Iran, the Post says. The combination of Panetta’s warning that Israel is "growingly isolated" and his calls for Israel to "work together" were understood within the Israeli government as carrying an underlying message that since Israel can only really rely on the US, it will not be able to surprise it with unilateral military action against Iran, the Post says.
Bahrain
8) Bahraini doctors and nurses sentenced to long prison terms for alleged links to anti-government protests appealed Saturday to the U.N. to investigate their claims of abuse and judicial violations in their trial, AP reports. The spokesman for the U.N. human rights office said Friday there are "severe concerns" about the sentences against the doctors and nurses.
Contents:
U.S./Top News
1) Study: Colombia Anti-Union Violence Undeterred
Associated Press, October 2, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2011/10/02/world/americas/AP-LT-Colombia-FTA-Labor-Killings.html
Bogota, Colombia – A new study challenges claims from the administration of President Barack Obama that Colombia is making important strides in bringing to justice killers of labor activists and so deserves U.S. congressional approval of a long-stalled free trade pact.
The Human Rights Watch study found "virtually no progress" in getting convictions for killings that have occurred in the past 4 1/2 years.
It counted just six convictions obtained by a special prosecutions unit from 195 slayings between January 2007 and May 2011, with nearly nine in 10 of the unit’s cases from that period in preliminary stages with no suspect formally identified.
Democrats in the U.S. Congress have long resisted bringing the Colombia trade pact to a vote, citing what they said is insufficient success in halting such killings.
The White House disagrees, and says Colombia has made significant progress in addressing anti-unionist violence.
It is pushing for congressional approval as early as this week of the Colombia agreement along with pacts with South Korea and Panama, something the Republicans endorse and that they say will increase U.S. exports by $13 billion a year and support tens of thousands of jobs.
[…] But in Colombia, the world’s most lethal country for labor organizing, the killings haven’t stopped. At least 38 trade unionists have been slain since President Juan Manuel Santos took office in August 2010, says Colombia’s National Labor School.
"A major reason for this ongoing violence has been the chronic lack of accountability for cases of anti-union violence," Human Rights Watch said in a letter sent Thursday to Colombian Chief Prosecutor Viviane Morales that details the study’s findings.
Convictions have been obtained for less than 10 percent of the 2,886 trade unionists killed since 1986, and the rights group said it found "severe shortcomings" in the work of a special unit of Morales’ office established five years ago to solve the slayings. The letter says the unit has demonstrated "a routine failure to adequately investigate the motive" in labor killings as well as to "bring to justice all responsible parties."
[…] Only in a handful of cases did prosecutors pursue evidence that the paramilitaries who confessed acted on the orders of politicians, employers or others, Human Rights Watch says.
Prosecutors "made virtually no progress in prosecuting people who order, pay, instigate or collude with paramilitaries in attacking trade unionists," the letter states. "What is at stake is the justice system’s ability to act as an effective deterrent to anti-union violence."
[…] In nearly half of 50 recent convictions reviewed by Human Rights Watch, the judges cited "evidence pointing to the involvement of members of the security forces or intelligence services, politicians, landowners, bosses or co-workers." Yet in only one of those cases was such an individual convicted.
[…] Dan Kovalik of the United Steel Workers said the study’s findings and the continued killings "prove what labor is telling the White House: The labor rights situation in Colombia is not improving, and passage of the FTA is not appropriate."
[…] A U.S. congressman who has met with various Colombian presidents on human rights issues, Jim McGovern, a Democrat from Massachusetts, doesn’t think enough has been done to reverse what he called a "dismal" record. Said McGovern: "My worry is that if you approve the FTA at this particular point you remove all the pressure off the powers that be in Colombia to actually make a sincere, honest and concerted attempt to improve the situation."
2) Green group says TransCanada, State Dept. emails show ‘pro-pipeline bias’
Andrew Restuccia, The Hill, 10/03/11 08:58 AM ET
http://thehill.com/blogs/e2-wire/677-e2-wire/185021-emails-show-cozy-relationship-between-transcanada-lobbyist-and-state-department-official
Internal emails released Monday show a sometimes friendly relationship between a State Department official and a top lobbyist for TransCanada Corp., the company seeking federal approval to build a major Canada-U.S. oil pipeline.
The environmental group Friends of the Earth, which obtained the emails under a Freedom of Information Act request, said the documents are "deeply disturbing" and indicate "pro-pipeline bias and complicity at the State Department," the federal agency that is heading up a review of TransCanada’s application to build the Keystone XL pipeline.
The 1,700-mile pipeline – which would carry Canadian oil sands from Alberta to refineries in Texas – has ignited a firestorm in Washington, pitting environmental and public lands groups against the oil industry.
The emails released Monday include exchanges between Paul Elliott, a top lobbyist at TransCanada and former aide to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign, and Marja Verloop, a State Department official who works on energy and environmental issues at the U.S. embassy in Ottawa.
In one email, Verloop cheers Elliott after he says he has secured Sen. Max Baucus’s (D-Mont.) support for the pipeline. "Go Paul! Baucus support holds clout," Verloop wrote in a Sept. 10, 2010, email.
[…] Groups like Friends of the Earth, which released another series of emails last week, say the State Department’s review of the pipeline has been incomplete, alleging that it downplays the project’s potential impacts on the environment.
The State Department said in August that the project poses little environmental risk if managed properly and the administration expects to make a final decision on the pipeline by the end of the year. It is currently conducting a series of public meetings on the pipeline.
Friends of the Earth and other environmental groups have long criticized Elliott. Last month, the environmental group called on the Justice Department to investigate Elliott, alleging that he had lobbied the Obama administration for approval of the Keystone XL pipeline for more than a year without registering as a lobbyist.
[…]
Afghanistan/Pakistan
3) Before Lashing Out, U.S. and Pakistani Intel Reached Out to Insurgent Group
Nick Schifrin, ABC News, Oct. 3, 2011
http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/us-pakistan-struggle-haqqani-insurgents/story?id=14656079
Kabul – Eleven days ago, the United States’ top military official seemed to sum up Washington’s current relationship with Pakistan when he accused the country’s premiere intelligence service of supporting insurgents who attacked the U.S. embassy in Kabul.
But what Admiral Mike Mullen did not say is that the U.S. had secretly met with a member of that same insurgent group — known as the Haqqani network — as part of efforts to find a political end to the war in Afghanistan, and that the institution that helped set up the meeting was the same intelligence agency he had condemned: the Directorate of Inter Services Intelligence, or I.S.I.
The meeting, according to two current U.S. officials and a former U.S. official, was held in the months before the Sept. 13 attack on the U.S. embassy and NATO’s military headquarters, which U.S. officials have blamed on the Haqqani network. In his congressional testimony Sept. 22, Mullen called the Haqqanis a "veritable arm" of the I.S.I., but failed to mention that the I.S.I. facilitated the meeting between the U.S. and Ibrahim Haqqani, a son of founder Jalaluddin Haqqani and a major player in the group, according to a senior U.S. official.
The meeting suggests there is much more to the recent spat between Islamabad and Washington while the violence in Afghanistan has increased as U.S. troops have begun to withdraw. At stake, U.S. officials said, is how they will try to reduce the violence in Afghanistan and to what extent Pakistan will be allowed a say.
[…] The fact that the U.S. and Pakistani intelligence service set up the meeting with Haqqani and discussed how to stop a Haqqani attack suggests a much more nuanced — and very often, confounding — relationship with Pakistan’s intelligence service than Adm. Mullen and other military officials have publicly admitted in the last two weeks.
The Pakistanis, in turn, have tried to portray themselves as the victims of a smear campaign headed by Mullen. As Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari wrote in the Washington Post Friday, "While we are accused of harboring extremism, the United States is engaged in outreach and negotiations with the very same groups."
[…]
4) BBC: Haqqani Says US Wants Him to Join Afghan Gov’t
Associated Press, October 3, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2011/10/03/world/europe/AP-EU-Britain-Haqqani.html
London – A BBC report quoted Afghan insurgent leader Siraj Haqqani on Monday as saying he’s been approached by the United States to join the Afghan government and denying that his militant group was behind the killing of the top Afghan peace envoy.
The Pakistan-based Haqqani network is affiliated with both the Taliban and al-Qaida and has been described by U.S. and other Western nations as the top security threat in Afghanistan. The group has been blamed for hundreds of attacks, including a 20-hour siege of the U.S. Embassy and NATO headquarters last month. The group is led by Jalaludin Haqqani, but the ailing leader has relinquished most operational control to one of his sons, Siraj.
Last week, U.S. officials accused Pakistan’s spy agency of supporting the Haqqanis in attacks on Western targets in Afghanistan – the most serious allegation yet of Pakistani duplicity in the 10-year war.
The United States and other members of the international community have in the past blamed Pakistan for allowing the Taliban, and the Haqqanis in particular, to retain safe havens in the country’s tribal areas along the Afghan border – particularly in North Waziristan.
The outgoing chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Mike Mullen, has also claimed that Pakistan’s military spy agency helped the group.
However, Haqqani told the BBC Pashtu service that while the group had contacts with a number of spy agencies, including that of Pakistan, during the Soviet invasion, there are now "no such links that could be beneficial."
"Right from the first day of American arrival till this day not only Pakistani but other Islamic and other non-Islamic countries including America, contacted us and they (are) still doing so. They are asking us to leave the ranks of Islamic Emirates," he said referring to the Taliban leadership.
He said that the outsiders have promised an "important role in the government of Afghanistan," as well as negotiations.
Haqqani also denied that his group took part in the Sept. 20 assassination of former Afghan President Burhanuddin Rabbani. He headed the country’s High Peace Council, set up by Afghan President Hamid Karzai to work toward a political solution to the decade-long war. "We haven’t killed Burhanuddin Rabbani and this has been said many times by the spokespersons of Islamic Emirate," he said.
[…]
Israel/Palestine
5) US Congress freeze on $200m Palestinian aid criticised
BBC, 4 October 2011
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-15163640
US and Palestinian officials have criticised a freeze the US Congress has placed on $200m (£130m) US aid to the Palestinian Authority. US Defence Secretary Leon Panetta and a state department spokeswoman condemned the move as counterproductive.
A senior Palestinian official said the move would affect vital services and was a "great disappointment".
The freeze was imposed in response to a Palestinian application for UN membership as a fully fledged state. The partial aid suspension will mainly affect infrastructure and development programmes but will leave funding for training Palestinian security services intact. Over recent years, Palestinians have received about $500m annually from the US – making it the largest single country donor but second to the European Union overall.
The aid freeze affects funding earmarked for the fiscal year 2011, which ended in September.
The freeze has already halted two economic development projects, worth $55m and $26m, Palestinian economics minister Hassan Abu Libdeh told AP news agency – adding that 50 people had already been sacked with a further 200 to follow in November. Other ministries were quoted as saying other projects were in jeopardy, including an $85m five-year plan to improve Palestinian health services.
But Mr Panetta told reporters the US administration "opposes withholding those funds".
"This is a critical time. This is no time to withhold those funds, at a point in time where we are urging the Palestinians and Israelis to sit down and negotiate a peace agreement," he said, speaking at a news conference in Israel on Monday.
[…] The freeze was imposed by members of the US House Foreign Affairs Committee and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in response to the Palestinian application for UN recognition as a state within 1967 borders. It currently has permanent observer entity status.
[…] In an interview with the BBC, a member of the Palestinian legislative council, Mustafa Barghouti, said the US Congress move to withhold aid was a "great disappointment".
"The people who are under occupation, who are oppressed and who are deprived of their freedom are the ones who are being punished now in an act of collective punishment," he said, "while the oppressors – the ones who are blocking the possibility of peace in this region, which is the Israeli government – are being rewarded."
He said Mr Panetta’s criticism was no comfort, because the Obama administration had shown through its threat to veto the UN membership application that "the US administration and Congress are both working against the right of the Palestinian people to freedom, independence and prosperity".
Mr Barghouti said the Palestinians would not "sell our freedom for some aid", and said the move by Congress suggested aid "is nothing but an instrument of political manipulation and pressure on people".
"If that is the case, then I think we need an overall revision of the whole issue of aid, and we need to find ways to be self-reliant rather than dependent on foreign aid," Mr Barghouti told the BBC.
6) Angela Merkel reads Benjamin Netanyahu the riot act over settlement plan
Donald Macintyre, The Independent, Monday, 3 October 2011
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/angela-merkel-reads-benjamin-netanyahu-the-riot-act-over-settlement-plan-2364720.html
Jerusalem – Israel has infuriated its most reliable West European ally, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, by announcing expansion of a Jewish settlement in Jerusalem in defiance of a US-backed warning to both parties in the Middle East conflict to avoid "provocative actions".
Ms Merkel’s anger, expressed in unequivocal terms in a personal telephone call to Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, was all the greater because of the prodigious efforts she had made on Israel’s behalf to thwart the Palestinians’ UN recognition bid and persuade Palestinian President, Mahmoud Abbas, to re-enter direct negotiations.
Israel yesterday formally accepted – albeit with "some concerns" – the statement by the international Quartet of the US, EU, Russia and the UN calling on both sides to hold direct talks. But the decision to build around 1,000 new homes in the Gilo settlement came as the Palestinian leadership was still deliberating on whether to do so. In the event, the Palestinians have stuck to their line that while there were encouraging elements in the Quartet’s statement, they will not agree to return to negotiations without a settlement freeze. Mr Abbas’s spokesman, Nabil Abu Rudeineh, told the official Palestinian news agency Wafa yesterday that "returning to negotiations requires the commitment of Israel to halt settlement activities and to recognise the 1967 borders without any equivocation".
While that might have been the Palestinian position without the Gilo announcement, the expansion plan – condemned by the US and the EU – was widely seen by Western diplomats as a singularly ill-timed provocation, given the already extreme difficulty of persuading Palestinian leaders that talks with Mr Netanyahu would make any progress.
Ms Merkel was said by her spokesman Steffen Seibert, after her telephone call on Friday to Mr Netanyahu, to have had "absolutely no understanding" of how the expansion plan was allowed to go ahead. Mr Netanyahu had told the Jerusalem Post ahead of the Interior Ministry decision that he had no intention of intervening in it. An unnamed Israeli official was quoted in Haaretz yesterday as suggesting that a consequence of the row might be that Germany would change its mind and decide to support the proposal of French President Nicolas Sarkozy to upgrade the Palestinians’ UN status to that of "a non-member state".
One option remains for the Palestinians to seek such status through the UN General Assembly if it fails to command the required nine state majority at the UN Security Council for full membership.
While the Quartet statement did not call for a settlement freeze, it did reaffirm the 2003 internationally agreed Road Map which called for a complete halt to settlement building and also referred to the Arab Peace Initiative, which specified that a Palestinian state should be based on 1967 borders.
[…]
Iran
7) Panetta: Israel and International Community Need To Cooperate On Iran
US Secretary of Defense Panetta warns Israel of its growing isolation, urges bold action for peace, says Pollard will not be released
Yaakov Katz , Jerusalem Post, 10/04/2011 02:38
http://www.jpost.com/Defense/Article.aspx?id=240441
Warning that Israel is becoming growingly isolated in the Middle East, US Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta hinted on Monday he expected Israel to refrain from taking unilateral action against Iran and instead needs to work together with the US and other countries in the region.
[…] At a press conference Monday afternoon with Barak, Panetta said Israel needed to coordinate its Iran policy with the international community.
As reported last week in The Jerusalem Post, Panetta’s visit to Israel was focused on Iran, and he was expected to seek assurances that Israel will not take unilateral military action against Iran. In 2009, Panetta was also dispatched to Israel on a similar mission during his term as director of the CIA.
[…] The combination of Panetta’s warning that Israel is "growingly isolated" and his calls for Israel to "work together" were understood within the government as carrying an underlying message that since Israel can only really rely on the US, it will not be able to surprise it with unilateral military action against Iran.
"By saying that we are isolated is a different way of saying that the only country we can really depend on is the US," one government official explained.
[…]
Bahrain
8) Convicted Bahraini doctors, nurses urge UN to investigate their protest-linked jail sentences
Associated Press, October 1
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle-east/convicted-bahraini-doctors-nurses-urge-un-probe-of-their-protest-linked-prison-sentences/2011/10/01/gIQAaLmzBL_story.html
Manama, Bahrain – Bahraini doctors and nurses convicted of links to anti-government protests and sentenced to long prison terms appealed to the U.N. chief Saturday to investigate their claims of abuse and judicial violations in the trial.
The medical professionals – whose sentences range from five to 15 years – are appealing the security court’s ruling and speaking out against the wider crackdown by the Gulf kingdom’s Sunni rulers against protests for greater rights by the Shiite majority.
The trial has been closely watched by rights groups that have criticized Bahrain’s prosecution of civilians at the special security court, which was set up under martial law-style rule that was lifted in June. The U.N. human rights office and the U.S. State Department are among those questioning the use of the court, which has military prosecutors and both civilian and military judges.
The doctors and nurses worked at the state-run Salmaniya Medical Center close to the capital’s Pearl Square, which became the epicenter of Bahrain’s uprising, inspired by other revolts across the Arab world. The authorities saw the hospital’s mostly Shiite staff – some of whom participated in pro-democracy street marches – as protest sympathizers, although the medics claimed they treated all who needed care.
"During the times of unrest in Bahrain, we honored our medical oath to treat the wounded and save lives. And as a result, we are being rewarded with unjust and harsh sentences," said a statement released by the medics after the court’s ruling.
The group was convicted Thursday on charges that include attempting to topple the Gulf kingdom’s rulers and spreading "fabricated" stories. In a separate trial, the security court sentenced a protester to death for the killing of a police officer during the clashes that began in February.
Shiites account for about 70 percent of Bahrain’s population, but claim they face systematic discrimination such as being blocked from high-level political and military posts. Bahrain’s rulers say they are ready to discuss reforms and have proposed changes such as giving parliament approval power over government appointments. But they appear unwilling to meet protest demands for a fully elected leadership.
[…] Hundreds of people have been arrested or purged from jobs since the unrest began. More than 30 people have died in clashes on the strategic island nation, which is home to the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet.
"Our sentences were preordained," said another statement from the doctors and nurses. "The trials we have been going through are nothing but a playing card in a game of politics. … Our only crime was that during the unrest earlier this year we were outspoken witnesses to the bloodshed and the brutal treatment by the security forces."
The group appealed to U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon for an investigation into their case and claims of abuse while in custody. Ban’s spokesman, Martin Nesirky, said Friday the U.N. chief is expressing "deep concern" over the harsh sentences and calling for the release of all political detainees.
[…] In Geneva, the spokesman for the U.N. human rights office, Rupert Colville, said Friday there are "severe concerns" about the sentences against the doctors and nurses and their opportunities to fight the charges in the security court.
U.S. State Department spokesman Mark Toner urged Bahrain to "abide by its commitment to transparent judicial proceedings, including a fair trial, access to attorneys, and verdicts based on credible evidence."
[…]
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