Just Foreign Policy News
May 18, 2011
Support the Work of Just Foreign Policy
Go Straight to the News Summary
I) Actions and Featured Articles
*Action: Help Just Foreign Policy Get to Gaza:
Donate to support our participation:
https://www.justforeignpolicy.org/donate/audacityofhope
*Action: Tell Hillary to Ensure Safe Passage for US Boat to Gaza
Using Twitter and/or Facebook, urge Hillary to protect the Audacity of Hope.
https://www.justforeignpolicy.org/act/audacityofhope/urgehillary
Why We Must Sail To Gaza
A year ago, solidarity activists tried to break the blockade of Gaza with an international flotilla of ships. They failed, in the sense that the Israeli government attacked the flotilla, took control of the ships, and brought the ships to Israel. They succeeded, in the sense that the flotilla and the Israeli attack brought attention to the Israeli-U.S.-Egyptian siege of Gaza, dramatically increasing political pressure on the three governments, leading to a partial easing of the siege. Now an even larger flotilla, with the participation of more ships and more activists from more countries — including, crucially, the U.S. ship Audacity of Hope — is preparing to set sail in June.
http://www.truthout.org/why-we-must-sail-gaza/1305382992
Rep. Schakowsky, Am I a "Provocation"?
In a letter to the Turkish government, Illinois Rep. Jan Schakowsky characterizes the Gaza freedom flotilla as a provocation.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-naiman/gaza-flotilla-_b_863242.html
Kate Gould: Open Peace Road; Don’t Block Kids from Getting to School in Al Aqaba!
The Rebuilding Alliance is asking Senators and Representatives to press the Israeli government to re-open this road, so that children from throughout the Jordan Valley can reach school without delay.
https://www.justforeignpolicy.org/node/910
Ami Kaufman: Top cop smacks Arab lawyer in the face at Nakba demo
As more videos are surfacing and telling of Sunday’s events, one of them is going viral. In it you can see Kobi Bachar, deputy commander of the Galilee District Police, slapping an Arab lawyer roughly in the face after she asked him why he was arresting protesters.
http://972mag.com/top-cop-smacks-arab-lawyer-in-the-face-at-nakba-demo/
Israeli Troops Shoot U.S. Student in Head with High-Velocity Tear Gas Canister
"I was shot at close range with a high-velocity metal tear gas canister… When it hit me, it tore off a part of my scalp," says Christopher Whitman, a 25-year-old American student and activist who was seriously injured when he was shot by Israeli forces while attending a West Bank protest on Friday.
http://www.democracynow.org/2011/5/17/israeli_troops_shoot_us_student_in
Help Support Our Advocacy for Peace and Diplomacy
The opponents of peace and diplomacy work every day. Help us be an effective counterweight.
https://www.justforeignpolicy.org/donate
II) Summary:
U.S./Top News
1) Writing in the New York Times, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas makes his case for recognition of Palestinian statehood by the United Nations. Palestine’s admission to the UN would pave the way for the internationalization of the conflict as a legal matter, not only a political one, Abbas writes. It would also pave the way for the Palestinians to pursue claims against Israel at the UN, human rights treaty bodies and the International Court of Justice.
The Palestinians go to the UN now to secure the right to live free in the remaining 22 percent of their historic homeland because they have been negotiating with Israel for 20 years without coming any closer to realizing a state, Abbas writes. Once admitted to the UN, Palestine stands ready to negotiate all core issues of the conflict with Israel. A key focus of negotiations will be reaching a just solution for Palestinian refugees based on Resolution 194, which the General Assembly passed in 1948.
2) The Obama administration has accelerated direct talks with the Taliban that U.S. officials say they hope will enable President Obama to report progress toward a settlement of the Afghanistan war when he announces troop withdrawals in July, the Washington Post reports. The Taliban has transmitted its own list of demands, a US official said. They include the release of up to 20 fighters detained at Guantanamo – eight of whom are thought to be designated "high value" by the US and two of whom have been designated for trials by military commissions – withdrawal of all foreign troops from Afghanistan, and a comprehensive guarantee of a substantive Taliban role in the Afghan government.
3) Osama bin Laden had been dead only a few days when House Republicans began their efforts to expand, rather than contract, the war on terror, writes the New York Times in an editorial. Not content with the president’s wide-ranging powers to pursue the archcriminals of Sept. 11, 2001, Republicans want to authorize the military to pursue virtually anyone suspected of terrorism, anywhere on earth, from now to the end of time. This wildly expansive authorization would make the war on terror a permanent and limitless aspect of life on earth, along with its huge potential for abuse, the Times writes.
This measure is unnecessary, the Times says. Democrats were right to demand the House conduct hearings on the measure, which was approved with little scrutiny. If it passes, the Senate should amend it out of existence, and President Obama should make clear he will veto it.
4) On Friday, under provisions of the War Powers Resolution, the 60-day period that began when the US committed forces to the mission in Libya will expire, writes the Boston Globe in an editorial. The Administration and Congress should comply with the WPR, the Globe writes; Congress demand more information about what the US is doing in Libya, and should vote US involvement up or down.
5) Developing nations began pressing Tuesday to strip Europe of its traditional hold on the top job at the International Monetary Fund, as pressure mounted on embattled managing director Dominique Strauss-Kahn to resign, the Washington Post reports. In China, Brazil and Turkey, officials used Strauss-Kahn’s arrest to argue that his successor be chosen by merit and not geography.
"Our hope is that in the coming period, IMF heads will come from developing countries like Turkey, like Russia," Turkish Finance Minister Mehmet Simsek said. "As far as myself, I don’t have even the tiniest shortage in terms of experience or knowledge."
Bahrain
6) Activists said seven anti-government protesters on trial before a military court received sentences ranging from one to three years Monday in connection with their participation in anti-government protests in Bahrain earlier this year, the Los Angeles Times reports. At a Monday court hearing, Abdulhadi Alkhawaja, former president of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights, said that he had been threatened with rape in custody after he refused to apologize to the king on camera, according to activists. He said he was also threatened that his daughter would be raped. The Bahraini judge had Alkhawaja removed from court, activists said.
Afghanistan
7) Four American soldiers serving with NATO forces in Afghanistan died Monday in an explosion in the country’s south, bringing home the human cost of the U.S.-led push into Taliban strongholds, AP reports. The latest deaths make a total of 16 NATO service members killed so far this month, and 167 so far this year.
Argentina
8) An effort to declassify U.S. documents on Argentina’s dictatorship failed in Congress, disappointing rights activists in Argentina who believe the secret files could help them identify young people stolen as babies by the military junta, AP reports. The amendment by Rep. Maurice Hinchey was rejected by a vote of 214-194. A similar amendment by Hinchey in 1999 resulted in the Chile declassification project under President Clinton, which led to the publication of more than 24,000 documents that helped prosecute crimes against humanity committed during the dictatorship of Gen. Pinochet.
Alan Iud, an attorney representing the rights group known as Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo, said, "I can’t understand how a country can proclaim itself a defender of human rights while its congress puts obstacles in the way of a grandmother reuniting with her grandchild."
Mexico
9) As a result of violence from the war on drugs, only half of the U.S. firms surveyed recently by the U.S.-Mexico Chamber of Commerce said they would go ahead with new investment plans in Mexico and several companies, including Whirlpool Corp., have recently announced they would put new factories elsewhere, citing concerns about safety, AP reports. One out of 10 companies reported kidnappings and 60 percent said their employees were beaten or threatened in 2010, according to the U.S.-Mexico Chamber of Commerce.
Haiti
10) Haitians living in the US under temporary protected status will be granted an 18-month extension of the program, the Washington Post reports.
Contents:
U.S./Top News
1) The Long Overdue Palestinian State
Mahmoud Abbas, New York Times, May 16, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/17/opinion/17abbas.html
[Abbas is chair of the PLO and the president of the Palestinian National Authority.]
Ramallah, West Bank – Sixty-three years ago, a 13-year-old Palestinian boy was forced to leave his home in the Galilean city of Safed and flee with his family to Syria. He took up shelter in a canvas tent provided to all the arriving refugees. Though he and his family wished for decades to return to their home and homeland, they were denied that most basic of human rights. That child’s story, like that of so many other Palestinians, is mine.
This month, however, as we commemorate another year of our expulsion – which we call the nakba, or catastrophe – the Palestinian people have cause for hope: this September, at the United Nations General Assembly, we will request international recognition of the State of Palestine on the 1967 border and that our state be admitted as a full member of the United Nations.
Many are questioning what value there is to such recognition while the Israeli occupation continues. Others have accused us of imperiling the peace process. We believe, however, that there is tremendous value for all Palestinians – those living in the homeland, in exile and under occupation.
It is important to note that the last time the question of Palestinian statehood took center stage at the General Assembly, the question posed to the international community was whether our homeland should be partitioned into two states. In November 1947, the General Assembly made its recommendation and answered in the affirmative. Shortly thereafter, Zionist forces expelled Palestinian Arabs to ensure a decisive Jewish majority in the future state of Israel, and Arab armies intervened. War and further expulsions ensued. Indeed, it was the descendants of these expelled Palestinians who were shot and wounded by Israeli forces on Sunday as they tried to symbolically exercise their right to return to their families’ homes.
Minutes after the State of Israel was established on May 14, 1948, the United States granted it recognition. Our Palestinian state, however, remains a promise unfulfilled.
Palestine’s admission to the United Nations would pave the way for the internationalization of the conflict as a legal matter, not only a political one. It would also pave the way for us to pursue claims against Israel at the United Nations, human rights treaty bodies and the International Court of Justice.
Our quest for recognition as a state should not be seen as a stunt; too many of our men and women have been lost for us to engage in such political theater. We go to the United Nations now to secure the right to live free in the remaining 22 percent of our historic homeland because we have been negotiating with the State of Israel for 20 years without coming any closer to realizing a state of our own. We cannot wait indefinitely while Israel continues to send more settlers to the occupied West Bank and denies Palestinians access to most of our land and holy places, particularly in Jerusalem. Neither political pressure nor promises of rewards by the United States have stopped Israel’s settlement program.
Negotiations remain our first option, but due to their failure we are now compelled to turn to the international community to assist us in preserving the opportunity for a peaceful and just end to the conflict. Palestinian national unity is a key step in this regard. Contrary to what Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel asserts, and can be expected to repeat this week during his visit to Washington, the choice is not between Palestinian unity or peace with Israel; it is between a two-state solution or settlement-colonies.
Despite Israel’s attempt to deny us our long-awaited membership in the community of nations, we have met all prerequisites to statehood listed in the Montevideo Convention, the 1933 treaty that sets out the rights and duties of states. The permanent population of our land is the Palestinian people, whose right to self-determination has been repeatedly recognized by the United Nations, and by the International Court of Justice in 2004. Our territory is recognized as the lands framed by the 1967 border, though it is occupied by Israel.
We have the capacity to enter into relations with other states and have embassies and missions in more than 100 countries. The World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the European Union have indicated that our institutions are developed to the level where we are now prepared for statehood. Only the occupation of our land hinders us from reaching our full national potential; it does not impede United Nations recognition.
The State of Palestine intends to be a peace-loving nation, committed to human rights, democracy, the rule of law and the principles of the United Nations Charter. Once admitted to the United Nations, our state stands ready to negotiate all core issues of the conflict with Israel. A key focus of negotiations will be reaching a just solution for Palestinian refugees based on Resolution 194, which the General Assembly passed in 1948.
Palestine would be negotiating from the position of one United Nations member whose territory is militarily occupied by another, however, and not as a vanquished people ready to accept whatever terms are put in front of us.
We call on all friendly, peace-loving nations to join us in realizing our national aspirations by recognizing the State of Palestine on the 1967 border and by supporting its admission to the United Nations. Only if the international community keeps the promise it made to us six decades ago, and ensures that a just resolution for Palestinian refugees is put into effect, can there be a future of hope and dignity for our people.
2) U.S. speeds up direct talks with Taliban
Karen DeYoung, Washington Post, May 16
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/us-speeds-up-direct-talks-with-taliban/2011/05/16/AFh1AE5G_story.html
The administration has accelerated direct talks with the Taliban, initiated several months ago, that U.S. officials say they hope will enable President Obama to report progress toward a settlement of the Afghanistan war when he announces troop withdrawals in July.
A senior Afghan official said a U.S. representative attended at least three meetings in Qatar and Germany, one as recently as "eight or nine days ago," with a Taliban official considered close to Mohammad Omar, the group’s leader.
State Department spokesman Michael A. Hammer on Monday declined to comment on the Afghan official’s assertion, saying the United States had a "broad range of contacts across Afghanistan and the region, at many levels. . . . We’re not going to get into the details of those contacts."
The talks have proceeded on several tracks, including through nongovernmental intermediaries and Arab and European governments. The Taliban has made clear its preference for direct negotiations with the Americans and has proposed establishing a formal political office, with Qatar under consideration as a venue, according to U.S. officials.
An attempt to open talks with the insurgent group failed late last year when an alleged Taliban leader, secretly flown by NATO to Kabul, turned out to be a fraud. "Nobody wants to do that again," a senior Obama administration official said.
Other earlier meetings between Afghan government representatives and Taliban delegates faltered when the self-professed insurgents could not establish their bona fides as genuine representatives of the group’s leadership.
But the Obama administration is "getting more sure" that the contacts currently underway are with those who have a direct line to Omar and influence in the Pakistan-based Quetta Shura, or ruling council, he heads, according to one of several senior U.S. officials who discussed the closely held initiative only on the condition of anonymity.
The officials cautioned that the discussions were preliminary. But they said "exploratory" conversations, first reported in February by the New Yorker magazine, have advanced significantly in terms of the substance and the willingness of both sides to engage.
Rumors of the talks have brought a torrent of criticism in recent weeks from Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s political opponents, who say that he will ultimately compromise Afghan democracy. In one indication of U.S. eagerness to get negotiations moving, however, administration officials described the criticism in positive terms as evidence that Afghans were starting to take the idea of negotiations seriously.
The Taliban, one U.S. official said, is "going to have to talk to both the Afghans and the Americans" if the process is to proceed to the point that it would significantly affect the level of violence and provide what the Taliban considers an acceptable share of political power in Afghanistan.
Such an outcome is likely to be years away, officials said. They said that the United States has not changed its insistence that substantive negotiations be Afghan-led. "The Afghans have been fully briefed" on U.S.-Taliban contacts, an American official said, and "the Pakistanis only partially so."
Officials said representatives from the Haqqani network, a group of Afghan fighters based in Pakistan’s North Waziristan tribal region whom the administration considers particularly brutal and irreconcilable, have had no part in the discussions.
Although U.S. officials have said that Osama bin Laden’s killing by American commandos early this month could facilitate progress, initiation of the discussions predate bin Laden’s death. During a Feb. 18 speech, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said the United States and the Afghan government would no longer insist on a public break between the Afghan Taliban and al-Qaeda as a precondition for talks. Instead, such a declaration could be made at the end of negotiations.
The U.S. and Afghan governments also insist that any settlement process result in an end to Taliban violence and a willingness to conform to the Afghan constitution, including respect for the rights of women and minorities and the rule of law.
Asked what Obama hoped to announce in July, an official said the president would not offer details of any talks. "It would be something like this," the official said. " ‘Here’s my plan on troops, here’s my overall vision for Afghanistan. The secretary [Clinton] said we were going to produce some diplomacy and laid out our desire to speak to the enemy. … I want to tell the American people … we’re making that policy real.’ "
The Taliban has transmitted its own list of demands, most of them long-standing, another official said. They include the release of up to 20 fighters detained at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba – eight of whom are thought to be designated "high value" by the United States and two of whom have been designated for trials by military commissions – withdrawal of all foreign troops from Afghanistan, and a comprehensive guarantee of a substantive Taliban role in the Afghan government.
The Taliban proposal of a formal office has raised two immediate questions, one U.S. official said. "One, where is it? Second, what do you call it? Does it say ‘Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan’ across the door? No. Some people say you can call it a U.N. support office and the Taliban can go sit there.’ "
"If the Afghans want it in Kabul, that’s okay," the official said. "If they would support it in Qatar, that’s fine."
Events over the past six months have contributed to the administration’s determination to get substantive talks underway as well as its belief that a successful political outcome is possible, even if still years away.
In a November meeting, NATO contributors to the 140,000-troop coalition in Afghanistan – all under economic and political pressure to end the long-running war – set the end of 2014 as the deadline for a complete withdrawal of combat troops. By that time, they said, enough Afghan government forces would be recruited and trained to take over their country’s security.
Obama had announced that he would begin drawing down U.S. forces, who form about two-thirds of the international coalition in Afghanistan, in July. The U.S. budget crisis, which prompted the election of more deficit hawks last fall, brought increasing political pressure on the administration to decrease the $10 billion monthly bill for the war.
On the ground in Afghanistan, Gen. David H. Petraeus, the coalition military commander, has cited increasing progress against Taliban fighters in the south, although there is some disagreement with the U.S. military’s conclusion that heavy losses have made the Taliban more amenable to negotiations. U.S. intelligence officials have offered a slightly different interpretation, saying that replacement commanders inside Afghanistan have made the Pakistan-based leadership nervous of losing control over its fighters and more anxious to make a deal.
Officials said senior diplomat Marc Grossman, who was appointed as the administration’s special representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan after Richard C. Holbrooke’s death in December, was told that the White House expected him to concentrate his efforts on a negotiated settlement.
At the same time, U.S. relations with Pakistan – the home base for the leading Afghan Taliban groups – have become increasingly frayed. The endgame in Afghanistan clearly requires Pakistani cooperation, and Grossman began trilateral discussions on the subject with top Afghan and Pakistani diplomats in Islamabad, the Pakistani capital, this month. Officials said that he has also visited other regional players interested in talks, including India and Saudi Arabia, and that Iran has been approached through intermediaries.
The administration now thinks that talks with the Quetta Shura and other groups do not necessarily require Pakistan’s cooperation. "Some people who have met with the Taliban say that among the reasons [the insurgents] want to establish their own office is so they can get out from under the Pakistanis," one senior administration official said.
[…]
3) A Conflict Without End
Editorial, New York Times, May 16, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/17/opinion/17tue1.html
Osama bin Laden had been dead only a few days when House Republicans began their efforts to expand, rather than contract, the war on terror. Not content with the president’s wide-ranging powers to pursue the archcriminals of Sept. 11, 2001, Republicans want to authorize the military to pursue virtually anyone suspected of terrorism, anywhere on earth, from now to the end of time.
This wildly expansive authorization would, in essence, make the war on terror a permanent and limitless aspect of life on earth, along with its huge potential for abuse.
The Authorization for Use of Military Force, approved by Congress a week after Sept. 11, 2001, gives the president the power to go after anyone who committed or aided in the 9/11 attacks, or who harbored such people, to prevent acts of terrorism. It was this document that authorized the war in Afghanistan and the raid on Bin Laden’s compound.
A new bill, approved last week by the House Armed Services Committee and heading for the floor this month, would go much further. It would allow military attacks against not just Al Qaeda and the Taliban but also any "associated forces that are engaged in hostilities against the United States." That deliberately vague phrase could include anyone who doesn’t like America, even if they are not connected in any way with the 2001 attacks. It could even apply to domestic threats.
It allows the president to detain "belligerents" until the "termination of hostilities," presumably at a camp like the one in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. Since it does not give a plausible scenario of how those hostilities could be considered over, it raises the possibility of endless detention for anyone who gets on the wrong side of a future administration.
The bill, part of the National Defense Authorization Act, was introduced by the committee chairman, Howard McKeon of California, who said it simply aligns old legal authorities with current threats. We’ve heard that before, about wiretapping and torture, and it was always untrue.
These powers are not needed, for current threats, or any other threat. President Obama has not asked for them (though, unfortunately, the administration has used a similar definition of the enemy in legal papers). Under the existing powers, or perhaps ignoring them, President George W. Bush abused his authority for many years with excessive detentions and illegal wiretapping. Those kinds of abuses could range even more widely with this open-ended authorization.
As more than 30 House Democrats protested to Mr. McKeon, a declaration of "global war against nameless individuals, organizations, and nations" could "grant the president near unfettered authority to initiate military action around the world without further Congressional approval." If a future administration wanted to attack Iran unilaterally, it could do so without having to consult with Congress.
This measure is unnecessary. The Bush administration demonstrated how dangerous it could be. The Democrats were right to demand the House conduct hearings on the measure, which was approved with little scrutiny. If it passes, the Senate should amend it out of existence, and President Obama should make clear he will veto it.
4) Obama Should Give Congress A Full Report On Libya Mission
Editorial, Boston Globe, May 17, 2011
http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/editorials/articles/2011/05/17/obama_should_give_congress_a_full_report_on_libya_mission/
On Friday, under provisions of the War Powers Act, the 60-day authorization that went into effect when the United States committed forces to the mission in Libya will expire. Despite the longstanding disagreement between Congress and the executive branch over the legality of the law, both sides would do well to comply: The American public deserves the fullest possible explanation of the American role in Libya.
The 1973 Act, written with the lessons of the Vietnam War in mind, gives a president 60 days to commit forces without authorization by Congress. After that time, a president cannot introduce armed forces without a "declaration of war, a specific statutory authorization, or a national emergency created by attack upon the United States, its territories or possessions, or its armed forces."
[Here the Globe seems to muddy the requirements of the War Powers Resolution; the WPR does *not* give the President authority to introduce US armed forces into hostilities for 60 days in the absence of an attack on the US or Congressional authorization, as this text appears to suggest and as many people falsely believe – JFP.]
There are currently no plans for either a committee hearing or a vote on a resolution based on the War Powers Act. Senators John Kerry and John McCain are still working on "consensus" language for a resolution expressing support for the military engagement.
Many books and articles have been written about the legality of the War Powers Act, and the courts have steadfastly refused to rule on the constitutionality of a law that attempts to divide the power to commit troops to battle between the two other branches of government: Congress and the president.
The White House has hinted it is prepared to comply with the act, or, in the words of Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg, "to act consistent with the War Powers Act." It may be that due to NATO’s lead in the effort, the Administration believes the War Powers Act does not apply. If that is the case, then they ought to say so.
But that by no means absolves Congress. Whatever the legal debates, the War Powers Act was intended to provide the American public, through Congress, with an opportunity to be fully informed about the use of military action. As refugees die, food runs out, Libyan rebels are accused of revenge killings, and the United States continues to fund part of the operation, Congress should require from the administration more details about US goals, more transparency about the costs, and some metrics for success in the absence of Moammar Khadafy’s removal – which is still not a stated reason for the military intervention.
Members of Congress ought not to neglect their duty to vote up or down on continuing involvement in Libya. Their silence can only be seen as willful abdication of their responsibility in a military action whose rationale that seemed so pure just 60 days ago.
5) After Dominique Strauss-Kahn’s arrest, emerging economies eye top IMF job
Howard Schneider, Washington Post, May 17
http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/in-europe-a-first-call-for-strauss-kahn-to-quit/2011/05/17/AFOhVp5G_story.html
Testing their new clout in the world economy, developing nations began pressing Tuesday to strip Europe of its traditional hold on the top job at the International Monetary Fund, as pressure mounted on embattled managing director Dominique Strauss-Kahn to resign.
[…] In China, Brazil and Turkey, officials of the three large, fast-growing and influential emerging economies used Strauss-Kahn’s arrest to argue that his successor be chosen by merit and not geography, setting the tone for a potentially divisive battle over the IMF’s executive suite. European officials, struggling through a continental debt crisis and relying on the IMF for help, insist they retain the managing director’s job at least for the next few years.
But both the Brazilian and Chinese foreign ministries issued statements Tuesday saying it was time to end the World War II-era "gentleman’s agreement" that guaranteed Europe the managing director’s post. Turkey’s finance minister, meanwhile, said he felt fully qualified to succeed Strauss-Kahn, a Frenchman, and said many other economists and finance officials from developing nations could say the same.
"Our hope is that in the coming period, IMF heads will come from developing countries like Turkey, like Russia," Turkish Finance Minister Mehmet Simsek said in an interview on the Kanal 24 television station, according to wire service reports. "As far as myself, I don’t have even the tiniest shortage in terms of experience or knowledge."
[…]
Bahrain
6) Bahrain: Seven protesters sentenced; defendant details alleged rape threats in custody
Molly Hennessy-Fiske, Los Angeles Times, May 17, 2011, 6:05 am
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/babylonbeyond/2011/05/bahrain-seven-protesters-sentenced-defendant-complains-of-rape-threats-in-custody.html
Cairo – Seven anti-government protesters on trial before a military court received sentences ranging from one to three years Monday in connection with their participation in anti-government protests in the Persian Gulf kingdom earlier this year, activists said.
Majad Ali Mohamed and Ibrahim Salman Abdullah each received one-year sentences. Mohammed Mullah Ahmed, Haitham Shobar Sharaf and Hassan Mansour Hussein were each sentenced to two years, and Hussein Ali Ahmed and Jafar Mohammed Ibrahim received three-year sentences, according to human-rights activists.
The Bahrain Youth Society for Human Rights released a statement saying the organization was "deeply concerned" about the sentencing by the National Safety Court set up under the country’s emergency law, due to be lifted June 1.
The defendants were charged with, among other things, participating in illegal demonstrations and rallies and inciting the public against the government.
They were among 21 opposition figures charged, seven in absentia.
At a Monday court hearing, one of the other defendants, Abdulhadi Alkhawaja, former president of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights, said that he had been threatened with rape in custody after he refused to apologize to the king on camera, according to activists. The Bahraini judge responded by having Alkhawaja removed from court, activists said. Other activists have said they were tortured while in custody.
Before he was removed from court, Alkhawaja was allowed 10 minutes with relatives and his lawyer. They said he told them that last Friday he was taken in a white sedan to an unknown location where a man who said he was a representative of the king questioned and videotaped him, urging him to apologize to the king. After Alkhawaja refused, he said he was taken to another room where four men cursed and threatened to rape him and his daughter, activist Maryam Alkhawaja.
He said the men began to undress, flash and touch him inappropriately. When they tried to take off his pants, Alkhawaja said he collapsed and started bashing his head until he almost passed out. Eventually, he said the men returned him to his prison cell. He said he had seen a doctor and was scheduled to have an X-ray for possible head injuries.
Alkhawaja had testified during previous court hearings that he and other defendants had been tortured by their captors, but his comments were removed from the record.
On Monday, another defendant, Mohammed Hassan, also said he had been tortured, raising his pant legs to show the marks, activists said.
Four protesters have died in Bahraini police custody since anti-government demonstrations began in February. The Bahrain Youth Society for Human Rights and Bahrain Centre of Human Rights said in a statement that they "fear for the safety and security of the defendants in general and in particular those that choose to speak out about their conditions and treatment in prison, especially considering the four deaths."
The two groups called for the immediate release of Alkhawaja and the other 20 detainees, an immediate investigation into torture allegations, and international pressure on the Bahraini authorities to guarantee the safety of human-rights activists.
The trial for the rest of the protesters was postponed Monday until Sunday, according to the state news agency.
Afghanistan
7) 4 US soldiers killed in blast in Afghanistan
Patrick Quinn, Associated Press, Mon May 16, 3:34 pm ET
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110516/ap_on_re_as/as_afghanistan
Kabul, Afghanistan – Four American soldiers serving with NATO forces in Afghanistan died Monday in an explosion in the country’s south, NATO and a defense department official said, bringing home the human cost of the U.S.-led push into Taliban strongholds.
The official said they were hit by an improvised explosive device. He spoke on condition of anonymity because relatives of those killed were still being notified. The latest deaths make a total of 16 NATO service members killed so far this month, and 167 so far this year.
[…]
Argentina
8) Argentina: US Shows Hypocrisy on Human Rights
Michael Warren, Associated Press, May 13, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2011/05/13/world/americas/AP-LT-Argentina-Secret-US-Files.html
Buenos Aires, Argentina – An effort to declassify U.S. documents on Argentina’s dictatorship failed Friday in the U.S. Congress, disappointing rights activists in the Argentine capital who believe the secret files could help them identify young people stolen as babies by the military junta.
The amendment by Rep. Maurice Hinchey, a Democrat from New York, was rejected by a vote of 214-194. It would have compelled U.S. intelligence agencies to declassify their files on the 1976-1983 dictatorship, which was closely monitored by U.S. security and intelligence forces.
A similar amendment by Hinchey in 1999 resulted in the Chile declassification project under President Bill Clinton, which led to the publication of more than 24,000 documents that helped prosecute crimes against humanity committed during the dictatorship of Gen. Augusto Pinochet.
Most of the U.S. files on Argentina still remain secret, and some of those voting against the measure said it’s best they stay that way. House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Mike Rogers, a Republican from Alabama, said declassifying them would distract U.S. spies from the fight against al-Qaida.
But Alan Iud, an attorney representing the rights group known as Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo, said, "I can’t understand how a country can proclaim itself a defender of human rights while its congress puts obstacles in the way of a grandmother reuniting with her grandchild."
The rights group has helped 104 people, now adults between 30-35 years old, recover their identities after being stolen at birth from detainees who were later killed. They’re still searching for 400 others who may have been born in clandestine torture centers and adopted illegally. Two former dictators are on trial in the baby thefts. All together, as many as 30,000 people were killed or disappeared, activists say. "For the Grandmothers, it’s very important to be able to access this information that can help find the grandchildren," Iud said.
Hinchey called it a missed opportunity. "The United States can play a vital role in lifting the veil of secrecy that has shrouded the terrible human rights abuses of the despotic military regime that ruled Argentina," he said in a statement. "Our intelligence community may hold the key to helping unlock some of the mysteries behind the identities of hundreds of Argentine citizens who were separated from their biological families as a result of the atrocities."
This is not the first time Hinchey has sought to make public the U.S. intelligence agencies’ role in and knowledge of human rights abuses in Latin America. His Argentina amendment won House approval three times before, only to fail in the Senate.
The Chile files revealed that the United States government had been deeply involved in the destabilization of Chile’s government and economy for nearly two decades.
Mexico
9) U.S. businesses reluctant to open in Mexico
Martha Mendoza, Associated Press, 05/17/2011 01:37:14 AM PDT
http://www.montereyherald.com/business/ci_18078410
McAllen, Texas – Dozens of Mattel Inc. employees were on their way to another day of work making Power Wheels in Mexico’s industrial heartland when gunshots erupted around them and a grenade ripped into one of their buses, killing one worker and wounding five.
The battle between drug traffickers and the army near Monterrey last week was the sort of violence that is frightening U.S. companies away from new investments south of the border, where organized criminals are increasingly turning to kidnappings, extortion and cargo thefts despite a government offensive against drug cartels.
"These acts of violence are not happening in a vacuum; they’re happening in the street that could be right out in front of your building. Bullets get shot and they have to stop somewhere," said Dan Burges, a senior director at Freightwatch Inc., an Austin-based cargo security firm.
As a result, only half of the U.S. firms surveyed recently by the U.S.-Mexico Chamber of Commerce said they would go ahead with new investment plans in Mexico and several companies, including Whirlpool Corp., have recently announced they would put new factories elsewhere, citing concerns about safety.
More than 35,000 people have died in drug-related violence since President Felipe Calderon deployed thousands of federal security forces four years ago to fight traffickers. In recent months, nearly 400 bodies have been pulled from mass graves in the northern states of Tamaulipas and Durango.
There are near-daily reports of drug-gang executions, kidnappings and extortion.
The army said the Mattel workers were apparently caught in crossfire on May 6 when attackers believed to be working for the Zetas cartel assaulted a military convoy with guns and a grenade launcher from a highway overpass on the outskirts of Monterrey.
[…] But battles between government and cartel forces are increasingly common, and companies and their workers are inevitably affected.
One out of 10 companies reported kidnappings and 60 percent said their employees were beaten or threatened in 2010, according to the U.S.-Mexico Chamber of Commerce.
[…] Businesses in Mexico factor in payments to organized crime syndicates as part of the cost of doing business. "It’s a well-known practice that many Mexican producers and shippers pay a certain percentage so they can get their goods through parts of Mexico without having them ripped off," said a senior U.S. official in Mexico, speaking on condition of anonymity because of security concerns.
[…] So many steel rolls, steel plates, aluminum and copper have been stolen on the Monclova-Monterrey highway this year that some insurance companies are suspending insurance, said Freightwatch.
Despite the losses, most U.S. companies already operating in Mexico say they have no plans to leave a place with $3 an hour labor, lax environmental standards, tax incentives and a location conveniently close to the U.S. market.
[…]
Haiti
10) Haitians’ temporary protected status in U.S. since quake to be extended 18 months
Tara Bahrampour, Washington Post, May 17
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/haitians-temporary-protected-status-in-us-extended-for-18-months/2011/05/17/AFD8Dv5G_story.html
Haitians living in the United States under temporary protected status will be granted an 18-month extension of the program, the Department of Homeland Security announced Tuesday, allowing them to remain here through Jan. 22, 2013.
The program, which gives temporary legal status to foreign nationals whose homelands are in crisis, was extended to Haitians after the Jan. 12, 2010, earthquake in their country. Those with proof of continuous residence in the United States since that date could apply to remain here legally for 18 months, regardless of their status when they applied.
The department also said it would extend eligibility to include Haitians who arrived before Jan. 12, 2011, a year after the earthquake, including those who came seeking medical treatment or were fleeing difficult conditions in Haiti.
About 48,000 Haitians in the United States have temporary protected status. Many others who were eligible did not apply, because they could not afford the $470 application fee or they were afraid of putting themselves on the radar of immigration authorities once the status ends. A new deadline for applying will be announced soon, a department spokesperson said.
The status can be extended repeatedly if a country’s crisis is ongoing. Nicaraguans, Salvadorans, Hondurans, Somalis and Sudanese who received the status dating as far back as 1999 have had theirs extended multiple times.
–
Just Foreign Policy is a membership organization devoted to reforming US foreign policy so it reflects the values and interests of the majority of Americans. The archive of the Just Foreign Policy News is here:
https://www.justforeignpolicy.org/blog/dailynews