Brinkmanship Unwise in Uncharted Waters

03/30/07 "ICH" -- --

MEMORANDUM

FROM: Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS)

SUBJECT: Brinkmanship Unwise in Uncharted Waters

The frenzy in America’s corporate media over Iran’s detainment of 15 British Marines who may, or may not, have violated Iranian-claimed territorial waters is a flashback to the unrestrained support given the administration’s war-mongering against Iraq shortly before the attack.

The British are refusing to concede the possibility that its Marines may have crossed into ill-charted, Iranian-claimed waters and are ratcheting up the confrontation. At this point, the relative merits of the British and Iranian versions of what actually happened are greatly less important than how hotheads on each side—and particularly the British—decide to exploit the event in the coming days.

There is real danger that this incident, and the way it plays out, may turn out to be outgoing British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s last gesture of fealty to President George W. Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, and “neo-conservative” advisers who, this time, are looking for a casus belli to “justify” air strikes on Iran. Bush and Cheney no doubt find encouragement in the fact that the Democrats last week refused to include in the current House bill on Iraq war funding proposed language forbidding the White House from launching war on Iran without explicit congressional approval.

If the Senate omits similar language today, or if the prohibition disappears in conference, chances increase for a “pre-emptive” US and/or Israeli strike on Iran and a major war that will make the one in Iraq seem like a minor skirmish. The impression, cultivated by the White House and our domesticated media, that Saudi Arabia and other Sunni-majority states might favor a military strike on Iran is a myth. But the implications go far beyond the Middle East. With the Russians and Chinese, the US has long since forfeited the ability, exploited with considerable agility in the 70s and 80s, to play one off against the other. In fact, US policies have helped drive the two giants together. They know well that it’s about oil and strategic positioning and will not stand idly by if Washington strikes Iran.

Perfidious Albion/Tamed “Poodle”

Intelligence analysts place great store in sources’ record for reliability and the historical record. We would be forced to classify Tony Blair as a known prevaricator who, for reasons still not entirely clear, has a five-year record of acting as man’s best friend for Bush. If the president needs a casus belli, Blair will probably fetch it.

Is there, then, any British statesman well versed in both the Middle East and maritime matters, who is worthy of trust? There is. Craig Murray is former UK Ambassador to Uzbekistan (until he was cashiered for openly objecting to UK and US support for torture there) and also former head of the maritime section of the British Foreign Office, and has considerable experience negotiating disputes over borders extending into the sea.

In recent days, former ambassador Murray has performed true to character in courageously speaking out, taking public issue with the British government’s position on the incident at hand. He was quick to quote, for example, the judiciously balanced words of Commodore Nick Lambert, the Royal Navy commander of the operation on which the Marines were captured:

“There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that they were in Iraqi territorial waters. Equally, the Iranians may well claim that they were in their territorial waters. The extent and definition of territorial waters in this part of the world is very complicated.”

Compare the commodore’s caution with the infallible certainty with which Blair has professed to be “utterly confident” that the Marines were in Iraqi waters, and you get an idea of what may be Blair’s ultimate purpose.

Writing in his widely read blog (http://www.craigmurray.co.uk/weblog.html ), Murray points to a “colossal problem” with respect to the map the British government has used to show coordinates of the incident and the Iran/Iraq maritime border—the story uncritically accepted by stenographers of the mainstream press. Murray writes:

“The Iran/Iraq maritime boundary shown on the British government map does not exist. It has been drawn up by the British Government. Only Iraq and Iran can agree on their bilateral boundary, and they have never done this in the Gulf, only inside the Shatt because there it is the land border too. This published boundary is a fake with no legal force...Anyway, the UK was plainly wrong to be ultra-provocative in disputed waters...

“They [the British Marines] would under international law have been allowed to enter Iranian territorial waters if in “hot pursuit” of terrorists, slavers, or pirates....But they were looking for smuggled vehicles attempting to evade car duty. What has the evasion of Iranian or Iraqi taxes got to do with the Royal Navy?”

Ambassador Murray has appealed to reason and cooler heads. To state what should be the obvious, he notes it is not legitimate for the British government to draw a boundary without agreement of the countries involved:

“A little more humility, and an acknowledgement that this is a boundary subject to dispute, might actually get our people home. The question is are we really aiming to get our people home, or to maximize propaganda from the incident?”

Casus Belli?

What is known at this point regarding the circumstances suggests Royal Navy misfeasance rather than deliberate provocation. The way the UK and US media has been stoked, however, suggests that both London and Washington may decide to represent the intransigence of Iranian hotheads as a casus belli for the long prepared air strikes on Iran. And not to be ruled out is the possibility that we are dealing with a provocation ab initio. Intelligence analysts look to precedent, and what seems entirely relevant in this connection is the discussion between Bush and Blair on Jan. 31, 2003 six weeks before the attack on Iraq.

The “White House Memo” (like the famous “Downing Street Memo” leaked earlier to the British press) shows George Bush broaching to Blair various options to provoke war with Iraq. The British minutes—the authenticity of which is not disputed by the British government—of the Jan. 31, 2003 meeting stated the first option as:

“The US was thinking of flying U2 reconnaissance aircraft with fighter cover over Iraq, painted in UN colours. If Saddam fired on them, he would be in breach.”

Not to mention the (in)famous Tonkin Gulf non-incident, used by President Lyndon Johnson to justify bombing North Vietnam.

Saving Face

The increasingly heavy investment of "face" in the UK Marine capture situation is unquestionably adding to the danger of an inadvertent outbreak of open hostilities. One side or the other is going to be forced to surrender some of its pride if a more deadly confrontation is going to be averted. And there is no indication that the Bush administration is doing anything other than encouraging British recalcitrance.

Unless one’s basic intention is to provoke a hostile action to which the US and UK could “retaliate,” getting involved in a tit-for-tat contest with the Iranians is a foolish and reckless game, for it may not prove possible to avoid escalation and loss of control. And we seem to be well on our way there. If one calls Iran "evil,” arrests its diplomats, accuses it of promoting terrorism and unlawful capture, one can be certain that the Iranians will retaliate and raise the stakes in the process.

That is how the game of tit-for-tat is played in that part of the world. What British and American officials seem not to be taking into account is that the Iranians are the neighborhood toughs. In that neighborhood, they control the conditions under which the game will be played. They can change the rules freely any time they want; the UK cannot, and neither can Washington. Provocative behavior, then, can be very dangerous, unless you mean to pick a fight you may well regret.

Someone should recount to Tony Blair and Ayatollah Khameini the maxim quoted by former United Nations chief weapons inspector Hans Blix just last week:

"The noble art of losing face Will someday save the human race."

Ray Close, Princeton, NJ
Larry Johnson, Bethesda, MD
David MacMichael, Linden, VA
Ray McGovern, Arlington, VA
Coleen Rowley, Apple Valley, MN

Steering Group
Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS)

IRAQI GOVERNMENT ABOUT TO HAND OF OIL TO BIG US AND UK OIL FIRMS

George Bush’s Land Mine: If the Iraqi People Get Revenue Sharing, They Lose Their Oil to Exxon by Richard Behan

Global Research, March 30, 2007

Common Dreams

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George Bush has a land mine planted in the supplemental appropriation legislation working its way through Congress. The Iraq Accountability Act passed by the House and the companion bill passed in the Senate contain deadlines for withdrawing our troops from Iraq, in open defiance of the President’s repeated objections. He threatens a veto, but he might well be bluffing. Buried deep in the legislation and intentionally obscured is a near-guarantee of success for the Bush Administration’s true objective of the war-capturing Iraq’s oil-and George Bush will not casually forego that. This bizarre circumstance is the end-game of the brilliant, ever-deceitful maneuvering by the Bush Administration in conducting the entire scenario of the “global war on terror.” The supplemental appropriation package requires the Iraqi government to meet a series of “benchmarks” President Bush established in his speech to the nation on January 10 (in which he made his case for the “surge”). Most of Mr. Bush’s benchmarks are designed to blame the victim, forcing the Iraqis to solve the problems George Bush himself created. One of the President’s benchmarks, however, stands apart. This is how the President described it: “To give every Iraqi citizen a stake in the country’s economy, Iraq will pass legislation to share oil revenues among all Iraqis.” A seemingly decent, even noble concession. That’s all Mr. Bush said about that benchmark, but his brevity was gravely misleading, and it had to be intentional. The Iraqi Parliament has before it today, in fact, a bill called the hydrocarbon law, and it does call for revenue sharing among Sunnis, Shiites, and Kurds. For President Bush, this is a must-have law, and it is the only “benchmark” that truly matters to his Administration. Yes, revenue sharing is there-essentially in fine print, essentially trivial. The bill is long and complex, it has been years in the making, and its primary purpose is transformational in scope: a radical and wholesale reconstruction-virtual privatization-of the currently nationalized Iraqi oil industry. If passed, the law will make available to Exxon/Mobil, Chevron/Texaco, BP/Amoco, and Royal Dutch/Shell about 4/5’s of the stupendous petroleum reserves in Iraq. That is the wretched goal of the Bush Administration, and in his speech setting the revenue-sharing “benchmark” Mr. Bush consciously avoided any hint of it. The legislation pending now in Washington requires the President to certify to Congress by next October that the benchmarks have been met-specifically that the Iraqi hydrocarbon law has been passed. That’s the land mine: he will certify the American and British oil companies have access to Iraqi oil. This is not likely what Congress intended, but it is precisely what Mr. Bush has sought for the better part of six years. It is why we went to war. For years President Bush has cloaked his intentions behind the fabricated “Global War on Terrorism.” It has long been suspected that oil drove the wars, but dozens of skilled and determined writers have documented it. It is no longer a matter of suspicion, nor is it speculation now: it is sordid fact. (See a brief summary of the story at http://www.alternet.org/waroniraq/47489/ . ) Planning for the two wars was underway almost immediately upon the Bush Administration taking office–at least six months before September 11, 2001. The wars had nothing to do with terrorism. Terrorism was initially rejected by the new Administration as unworthy of national concern and public policy, but 9/11 gave them a conveniently timed and spectacular alibi to undertake the wars. Quickly inventing a catchy “global war on terror” theme, the Administration disguised the true nature of the wars very cleverly, and with enduring success. The “global war on terror” is bogus. The prime terrorist in Afghanistan and the architect of 9/11, Osama bin Laden, was never apprehended, and the President’s subsequent indifference is a matter of record. And Iraq harbored no terrorists at all. But both countries were invaded, both countries suffer military occupation today, both are dotted with permanent U.S. military bases protecting the hydrocarbon assets, and both have been provided with puppet governments. And a billion dollar embassy in Baghdad is under construction now. It will be the largest U.S. embassy in the world by a factor of ten. (To see it, go to http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=20070124&articleId=4579 .) It consists of 21 buildings on 104 acres, six times larger than the United Nations compound in New York city, larger than Vatican City. It will house a delegation of more than five thousand people. It will have its own water, electric, and sewage systems, and it is surrounded by a fortress wall of concrete fifteen feet thick. For an Administration committed to fighting terrorism with armies and bombs, that’s far more anti-terror diplomacy than a tiny country needs. There must be another purpose for it. In the first two months of the Bush Administration two significant events took place that preordained the Iraqi war. Vice President Cheney’s Energy Task Force was created, composed of federal officials and oil industry people. By March of 2001, half a year before 9/11, the Task Force was poring secretly over maps of the Iraqi oil fields, pipe lines, and tanker terminals. It studied a listing of foreign oil company “suitors” for exploration and development contracts, to be executed with Saddam Hussein’s oil ministry. There was not a single American or British oil company included, and to Mr. Cheney and his cohorts that was intolerable. The final report of the Task Force was candid: “… Middle East oil producers will remain central to world security. The Gulf will be a primary focus of U.S. international energy policy.” The detailed meaning of “focus” was left blank. The other event was the first meeting of President Bush’s National Security Council, and it filled in the blank. The Council abandoned abruptly the decades-long attempt to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and set a new priority for Middle East foreign policy instead: the invasion of Iraq. This, too, was six months before 9/11. “Focus” would mean war. By the fall of 2002, the White House Iraq Group-a collection not of foreign policy experts but of media and public relations people-was cranking up the marketing campaign for the war. A contract was signed with the Halliburton Corporation-even before military force in Iraq had been authorized by Congress-to organize the suppression of oil well fires, should Saddam torch the fields as he had done in the first Gulf War. Little was left to chance. The oil industry is the primary client and top-ranked beneficiary of the Bush Administration. There can be no question the Administration intended to secure for American oil corporations the rich petroleum resources of Iraq: 115 billion barrels of proven reserves, twice that in probable and possible resources, potentially far more than Saudi Arabia. The Energy Task Force spoke to this and the National Security Council answered. A secret NSC memorandum in 2001 spoke candidly of “actions regarding the capture of new and existing oil and gas fields” in Iraq. In 2002 Paul Wolfowitz suggested simply seizing the oil fields. These words and suggestions were draconian, overt, and reprehensible-morally, historically, politically and diplomatically. The seizure of the oil would have to be oblique and far more sophisticated. A year before the war the State Department undertook the “Future of Iraq” project, expressly to design the institutional contours of the postwar country. The ­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­”Oil and Energy Working Group” looked with dismay at the National Iraqi Oil Company, the government agency that owned and operated the Iraqi oil fields and marketed the products. 100% of the revenues went directly to the central government, and constituted about 90% of its income. Saddam Hussein benefited, certainly-his lavish palaces-but the Iraqi people did so to a far greater extent, in terms of the nation’s public services and physical infrastructure. For this reason nationalized oil industries are the norm throughout the world. The Oil and Energy Working Group designed a scheme that was oblique and sophisticated, indeed. The oil seizure would be less than total. It would be obscured in complexity. The apparent responsibility for it would be shifted, and it would be disguised as benefiting, even necessary to Iraq’s well being. Their work was supremely ingenious, undeniably brilliant. The plan would keep the National Iraqi Oil Company in place, to continue overseeing the currently producing fields. But those fields represent only 19% of Iraq’s petroleum reserves. The other 81% would be flung open to “investment” by foreign oil interests, and the companies in favored positions today-because of the war and their political connections-are Exxon/Mobil, Chevron/Texaco, BP/Amoco, and Royal Dutch/Shell. The nationalized industry would be 80% privatized. The investment vehicle would be the “production sharing agreement,” a long-term contract-up to 40 years-that grants to the company a share of the oil produced; in exchange, the company underwrites the development costs and oilfield infrastructure. Such “investment” is touted by the Bush Administration and its puppets in Iraq as necessary to the country’s recovery, and a huge benefit, accordingly. But it is not unusual for these contracts to grant the companies more than half the profits for the first 15-30 years, and to deny the host country any revenue at all until the investment costs have been recovered. The Iraqi oil industry does very much need a great deal of investment capital, to repair, replace, and upgrade its infrastructure. But it does not need Exxon/Mobil or any other foreign company to provide it. At a reduced level, Iraq is still producing oil and hence revenue, and no country in the world, perhaps, has better collateral against which to float bond issues for public investment. Privatization of any sort and in any degree is utterly unnecessary in Iraq today. The features of the State Department plan were inserted by Paul Bremer’s Provisional Coalition Authority into the developing structures of Iraqi governance. American oil companies were omnipresent in Baghdad then and have been since, shaping and shepherding the plan through the several iterations of puppet governments-the “democracy” said to be taking hold in Iraq. The package today is in the form of draft legislation, the hydrocarbon law. Only a handful of Iraqi officials know its details. Virtually none of them had a hand in its construction. (It was first written in English.) And its exclusive beneficiaries are the American and British oil companies, whose profits will come directly from the pockets of the Iraqi people. The Iraqi people do, however, benefit to some degree. The seizure is not total. The hydrocarbon law specifies the oil revenues-the residue accruing to Iraq-will be shared equally among the Sunni, Shiite, and Kurdish regions, on a basis of population. This is the feature President Bush relies upon exclusively to justify, to insist on the passage of the hydrocarbon law. His real reasons are Exxon/Mobil, Chevron/Texaco, BP/Amoco, and Royal Dutch/Shell. No one can say at the moment how much the hydrocarbon law will cost the Iraqi people, but it will be in the hundreds of billions. The circumstances of its passage are mired in the country’s chaos, and its final details are not yet settled. If and when it passes, however, Iraq will orchestrate the foreign capture of its own oil. The ingenious, brilliant seizure of Iraqi oil will be assured. That outcome has been on the Bush Administration’s agenda since early in 2001, long before terrorism struck in New York and Washington. The Iraqi war has never been about terrorism. It is blood for oil. The blood has been spilled already, hugely, criminally. More than 3,200 American military men and women have died in Iraq. 26,500 more have been wounded. But the oil remains in play. The game will end if the revenue-sharing “benchmark” is fully enforced. The land mine will detonate. Mission almost accomplished, Mr. President. Author’s Note: This article was written assuming the members of Congress were ignorant, when they passed the supplemental appropriation bills, of the clever origin, the details, and the true beneficiaries of the Iraqi hydrocarbon law. It was written assuming they did not know President Bush’s stated “benchmark” of revenue-sharing was fraudulently incomplete, intentionally obscuring the fully intended seizure, by military force, of Iraqi oil assets. The Bush Administration made every effort to mislead deliberately both the Congress and the American people. Ignorance of the circumstances was imposed. If any members of Congress acted with full and complete knowledge, however, then they have become complicit in a criminal war. Richard W. Behan lives and writes on Lopez Island, off the northwest coast of Washington state. He is working on his next book, To Provide Against Invasions: Corporate Dominion and America’s Derelict Democracy. He can be reached at rwbehan@rockisland.com (This essay is deliberately not copyrighted: it may be reproduced without restriction.)

Pakistan test-fires nuclear-capable missile

ISLAMABAD, March 31 (AFP) Mar 31, 2007
Pakistan on Saturday successfully test-fired its short-range nuclear-capable surface-to-surface ballistic missile, the military announced.

The Hatf II Abdali missile has a range of 200 kilometers (125 miles) and "can carry all types of warheads," the military said in a statement.

The test, aimed at "validation of the desired technical parameters," was a success, it added.

Last week, Pakistan tested a longer range version of its nuclear-capable, radar-dodging cruise missile, the Hatf VII Babur. It has a range of 700 kilometres.

Pakistan and India have routinely conducted missile tests since the nuclear-armed South Asian rivals carried out tit-for-tat nuclear detonations in May 1998.

However in 2004 they launched a slow-moving peace process aimed at ending six decades of hostility and resolving their dispute over the Himalayan territory of Kashmir, the cause of two of their three wars.

In February, Pakistan signed a historic deal with India to cut the risk of atomic weapons accidents.

All rights reserved. © 200

Gen. Tried to Warn Bush on Tillman

SCOTT LINDLAW
AP
Saturday, March 31, 2007

SAN JOSE, Calif. — Just seven days after Pat Tillman's death, a top general warned there were strong indications that it was friendly fire and President Bush might embarrass himself if he said the NFL star-turned-soldier died in an ambush, according to a memo obtained by The Associated Press.

It was not until a month afterward that the Pentagon told the public and grieving family members the truth _ that Tillman was mistakenly killed in Afghanistan by his comrades.

The memo reinforces suspicions that the Pentagon was more concerned with sparing officials from embarrassment than with leveling with Tillman's family.

In a memo sent to a four-star general a week after Tillman's April 22, 2004, death, then-Maj. Gen. Stanley McChrystal warned that it was "highly possible" the Army Ranger was killed by friendly fire. McChrystal made it clear his warning should be conveyed to the president.

"I felt that it was essential that you received this information as soon as we detected it in order to preclude any unknowing statements by our country's leaders which might cause public embarrassment if the circumstances of Cpl. Tillman's death become public," McChrystal wrote on April 29, 2004, to Gen. John Abizaid, head of Central Command.

White House spokesman Blain Rethmeier said Friday that a review of records turned up no indication that the president had received McChrystal's warning. Bush made no reference to the way Tillman died in a speech delivered two days after the memo was written. But Rethmeier emphasized that the president often pays tribute to fallen soldiers without mentioning the exact circumstances of their deaths.

The family was not told until May 29, 2004, what really happened. In the intervening weeks, the military continued to say Tillman died under enemy fire, and even awarded him the Silver Star, which is given for heroic battlefield action.

The Tillman family has charged that the military and the Bush administration deliberately deceived his relatives and the nation to avoid turning public opinion against the war.

Tillman's mother, Mary, had no immediate comment Friday on the newly disclosed memo.

The memo was provided to the AP by a government official who requested anonymity because the document was not released as part of the Pentagon's official report into the way the Army brass withheld the truth. McChrystal was the highest-ranking officer accused of wrongdoing in the report, issued earlier this week.

In the memo, McChrystal expressed concern that Bush and acting Army Secretary Les Brownlee might give speeches in which they misstated the facts about Tillman's death.

A former spokesman for Abizaid did not immediately return phone and e-mail messages.

As for Brownlee, he told investigators he did not recall learning Tillman was killed by his fellow Rangers until several weeks after the fact. He did not discuss the matter with the White House, he told investigators.

A spokesman for McChrystal said he had no comment.

McChrystal was, and still is, commander of the Joint Special Operations Command, head of "black ops" forces. He has since been promoted to lieutenant general. Abizaid was in charge of American forces in the Middle East and Central Asia.

In his memo, McChrystal said he had heard Bush and Brownlee "might include comments about Cpl. Tillman's heroism and his approved Silver Star medal in speeches currently being prepared, not knowing the specifics surrounding his death."

McChrystal said he expected an investigation under way "will find that it is highly possible Cpl. Tillman was killed by friendly fire."

At the same time, McChrystal said: "The potential that he might have been killed by friendly fire in no way detracts from his witnessed heroism or the recommended personal decoration for valor in the face of the enemy."

On Monday, the Pentagon released the findings of an investigation into the circumstances of Tillman's death, and into whether the military covered them up.

The investigators recommended that nine Army officers, including McChrystal, be held accountable for errors in reporting the friendly fire death to their superiors and to Tillman's family. McChrystal was found "accountable for the inaccurate and misleading assertions" contained in papers recommending Tillman get the Silver Star.

Some of the officers involved said they wanted to wait until the investigations were complete before informing the Tillman family.

The latest document obtained by the AP suggests that officials at least as high as Abizaid knew the truth weeks before the family.

Tillman was killed after his Army Ranger comrades were ambushed in eastern Afghanistan. Rangers in a convoy trailing Tillman's group had just emerged from a canyon where they had been fired upon. They saw Tillman and mistakenly fired on him.

The White House has been careful not to wade into the circumstances of Tillman's death. The day after Tillman died, a spokesman said Tillman "was an inspiration on and off the football field," but made no reference to the specifics of the episode.

In a speech given two days after McChrystal's memo, Bush made no mention of how Tillman died.

"The loss of Army Cpl. Pat Tillman last week in Afghanistan brought home the sorrow that comes with every loss, and reminds us of the character of the men and women who serve on our behalf," Bush said at the White House Correspondents' Dinner.

Detainee Alleges Abuse in CIA Prison

Josh White and Ann Scott Tyson
Washington Post
Saturday, March 31, 2007

A high-level al-Qaeda suspect who was in CIA custody for more than four years has alleged that his American captors tortured him into making false confessions about terrorist attacks in the Middle East, according to newly released Pentagon transcripts of a March 14 military tribunal hearing here.

Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, who U.S. officials believe was involved in the bombings of two U.S. embassies in East Africa in 1998 and who allegedly organized the attack on the USS Cole in Yemen in 2000, told a panel of military officers that he was repeatedly tortured during his imprisonment and that he admitted taking part in numerous terrorism plots because of the mistreatment.

"The detainee states that he was tortured into confession and once he made a confession his captors were happy and they stopped torturing him," Nashiri's representative read to the tribunal, according to the transcript. "Also, the detainee states that he made up stories during the torture in order to get it to stop."

Nashiri's allegations came just days after Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the self-confessed mastermind of the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, also alleged abuse during a similar hearing before a Combatant Status Review Tribunal (CSRT) at this island detention facility, though his claims were submitted on paper and have not been released.

It is impossible to confirm or evaluate Nashiri's allegations regarding his interrogation by the CIA. U.S. government officials often caution that terrorists are trained to allege abuse at the hands of their captors, and portions of the 36-page transcript that appeared to detail the locations and methods of the alleged abuse were redacted. But such allegations could call into question the veracity of Nashiri's interrogations and those of other detainees previously held at secret CIA prisons, and could make trying the men at military commissions difficult if the alleged coercion elicited misleading information.

Bryan Whitman, a Pentagon spokesman, said the CIA cited "national security concerns" regarding the locations of detention facilities, interrogation techniques and operational details as rationale for the redactions.

Abuse allegations are generally referred to the CIA inspector general's office, which investigates from within. Defense Department and intelligence officials said Friday that allegations made during the CSRT process will be forwarded to the government agency being accused of abuse.

"I'm not going to respond to those sorts of allegations other than to emphasize that the CIA's terrorist interrogation program has been conducted lawfully, with great care and close review, producing vital information that has helped disrupt terrorist plots and save lives," said Mark Mansfield, a CIA spokesman.

Nashiri, a Saudi national, is one of 14 detainees who were confined secretly for years and are undergoing a process to determine whether they are enemy combatants against the United States and whether they should be held indefinitely in maximum security at Guantanamo Bay. A spokesman for the International Committee of the Red Cross, which has interviewed all of the detainees, declined to discuss Nashiri's case.

U.S. officials allege that Nashiri is responsible for assisting the bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, and for taking a lead role in the Cole bombing. The report of the Sept. 11 commission identified him as "the mastermind of the Cole Bombing and the eventual head of Al Qaeda Operations in the Arabian Peninsula." In addition, Nashiri was named in a New York court as an unindicted co-conspirator in the Cole bombing and was sentenced to death in absentia in Yemen for his role in the bombing.

But Nashiri said he "confessed under torture" to those attacks. "From the time I was arrested . . . they have been torturing me," he said through an interpreter in answers to the tribunal officers' questions. "One time they tortured me one way, and another time they tortured me in a different way."

Nashiri said, according to the transcript, that he "invented" some information just to "make people happy" during his interrogations. One of those statements was that Osama bin Laden, whom he had met numerous times, had procured a nuclear weapon.

"They were extremely happy because of this news," he said, according to the transcript.

It has long been publicly known that the CIA used controversial interrogation techniques that went beyond those used by the military after the Sept. 11 attacks, including waterboarding (which simulates the sensation of drowning), exposure to extreme temperatures and prolonged forced standing. Detainees who think they have been in secret CIA detention facilities have reported serious abuse there.

John Sifton, a senior terrorism researcher at Human Rights Watch, decried the secrecy and said there is ample evidence that the CIA has used illegal tactics on detainees and is trying to hide it.

"It's a bit disingenuous for the CIA to refer allegations to the inspector general" after the agency itself approved questionable techniques, he said.

Nashiri acknowledged connections to the Cole bombers but said that he was involved in a fishing business with them and that he was unaware of the plot to attack a U.S. Navy warship. He said that he sent money to the men who carried out the bombing for a fishing "project" and that he is "not responsible for them or what they have in their heads."

"The cards are stacked against al-Nashiri," said Evan Kohlmann, a terrorism analyst. "There is too much testimony and evidence suggesting his long-standing role as an al-Qaeda operative and recruiter. Many people involved in the USS Cole have been interrogated, and everyone . . . has implicated Nashiri."

Nashiri said he made himself a millionaire by the age of 19 as a merchant and periodically went to Afghanistan to meet with bin Laden. He also said he traveled to battlefields throughout the Middle East "to help people by gathering information."

Nashiri denied being a member of al-Qaeda and said he is not an enemy of the United States, though he criticized U.S. foreign policy.

"If you think that anybody who wants the Americans to get out of the Gulf as your enemy, then you will catch about 10 million peoples in Saudi Arabia that have same opinion," Nashiri said, according to the transcript.

GAO: Looming Threat to US Oil Supply

NOW SEE, A RATIONAL PERSON WOULD READ THIS AND THINK, WELL, WE NEED TO REALLY AND HOLD HARDLY GET AWAY FROM USING OIL FOR MANY REASONS AND THE NEO-CONS CRAFT WAYS TO GET THE THE AMERICAN PEOPLE TO SUPPORT WARS, BY FUNDING TERRORIST GROUPS AND OTHER THINGS TO GAIN CONTROL OF RESOURCES OR MAKE DEALS WHILE NATIONS ARE IN TURMOIL.


By Matt Renner
t r u t h o u t | Report

Friday 30 March 2007

A report released Thursday by the non-partisan Government Accountability Office concludes that worldwide oil production will eventually grind to a halt and the United States has no strategy in place to deal with the possible catastrophic results.

The report, titled "CRUDE OIL - Uncertainty About Future Oil Supply Makes It Important to Develop a Strategy for Addressing a Peak and Decline in Oil Production," outlines the threat to oil supply posed by global political instability and the lack of new oil field discovery. According to the report, "More than 60 percent of world oil reserves, on the basis of Oil and Gas Journal estimates, are in countries where relatively unstable political conditions could constrain oil exploration and production." These countries include Venezuela, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Iran and Nigeria. Energy market analysts agree that the significant threat of instability in oil producing nations has inflated the price of oil.

As the report demonstrates, it is quite unclear when peak oil production will occur: "The amount of oil remaining in the ground is highly uncertain, in part because the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) controls most of the estimated world oil reserves, but its estimates of reserves are not verified by independent auditors." Despite a lack of reliable information, the report states that "most studies estimate that oil production will peak sometime between now and 2040." Some analysts think world oil production has already peaked.

"Today's report once again emphasizes our need to prepare for peak oil by implementing forward-thinking approaches and advance initiatives that will move our nation toward greater energy stability and independence," Congressman Tom Udall (D-NM) said during a joint press conference with his Republican counterpart after the GAO released its findings.

Congressman Roscoe Bartlett (R-MD) called the report "a clarion call for leadership at the highest level of our country to avert an energy crisis unlike any the world has ever before experienced."

Tensions with Iran pushed crude oil prices above $66 per barrel Thursday, a six-month high, as analysts fear that a confrontation with the regime could jeopardize exports from the country. In 2005, worldwide oil consumption surpassed 84 million barrels per day. By 2030, that number is expected to reach 118 million barrels per day, 40 percent of which would come from China and India, according to the report.

The report also addresses a need for significant investment in alternative fuels for transportation such as "ethanol, biodiesel, biomass gas-to-liquid, coal gas-to-liquid, natural gas ... and hydrogen." But investment in alternative fuels to offset expected crude oil shortages continues to lag. The report noted that within the next five years, ethanol produced from plant matter could be available commercially. Currently, ethanol production is limited to about 5 billion gallons per year because corn, the main ingredient used to produce ethanol, is needed to feed livestock, the report states. The report concludes by encouraging the Secretary of Energy and other relevant federal agencies to create and implement a plan to stave off peak oil.

The first step, however, is figuring out exactly when world oil production will peak.

Matt Simmons is the president and founder of Simmons and Company International, one of the largest investment banks serving the oil industry. Simmons's company has invested billions of dollars in oil-related technology and played a major role in the development of new technologies over the past thirty years. He says the industry "doesn't have any new technology coming on line," adding that "the idea new oil extraction technology can save us is a complete fallacy." Simmons thinks that world oil production may have peaked in 2005 and said "the odds of us not peaking in the next five years are zero." Simmons called the work of Congressmen Udall and Bartlett "a heroic effort to awaken our country to this threat to the survival of our economy."

Bob Gallagher, president of the New Mexico Oil and Gas Association, has a more conservative view of the current situation. He said market forces will drive the production of alternative fuels quickly enough to supplement crude oil. However, he finds this report encouraging. "If this report serves as a wake-up call to Congress and the American public, it will be well served. The government has failed the American public with regard to energy policy." His concern is over our reliance on imported oil from unstable regions such as the Middle East.

Phil Flynn, vice president and senior energy analyst for Alaron Trading, agrees that the tensions in global oil supply are distressing. He speculates: "If people take [the GAO] report as gospel, it alone could drive oil prices up. We may see oil hoarding by companies and even countries. It could create a panic situation." He adds, "If Venezuela cuts off exports or China begins hoarding, or the Middle East becomes more unstable, we could have severe problems."

---

Go to Original

Oil Above $66 On Iran Fears
By Janet McBride
Reuters

Friday 30 March 2007

London - Oil rose above $66 on Friday on global supply worries caused by tension centered on OPEC member Iran and a strike in France that threatens to crimp summer fuel supplies to Europe and the United States.

U.S. crude climbed 27 cents at $66.30 a barrel by 1214 GMT, having jumped 3 percent to a six-month closing high the previous day.

London Brent rose 64 cents at $68.52 a barrel. Earlier in the session, the European benchmark rose briefly above $69 for the first time since September 2006.

A week after Iran detained 15 British sailors and marines in the Gulf, Britain is still trying to secure their release. It plans to urge the European Union to help isolate Iran at a meeting of EU ministers starting on Friday.

On Thursday, the U.N. Security Council expressed "grave concern" at the situation and supported calls for the crew's release.

The issue, coupled with new U.N. sanctions imposed on Tehran at the weekend over its nuclear program, fed traders' fears about a disruption in exports from Iran, the world's fourth-largest exporter, or through the Strait of Hormuz, conduit for roughly two-fifths of all globally traded oil.

"Prices quickly escalated given increased tension in the Middle East. It shows the underlying tightness in the market despite a period of seasonally low demand," said Gerard Burg, an analyst from National Australia Bank.

At a time of increased sensitivity, the United States sent two carriers to the Gulf but said "they are not there to provoke any kind of conflict with Iran".

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US military tests ground-penetrating monster bomb

Lewis Page
The Register
Friday, March 30, 2007

The US military's effort to build what may become the largest conventional bomb ever used is making progress.

Boeing announced on Monday that its Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP) demo weapon had successfully completed a "static tunnel lethality test" at the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico.

The MOP, which also goes under the names "Big BLU" and "Direct Hard Target Strike Weapon", is a 30,000-pound brute, intended for delivery by B-52 Stratofortresses or B-2 stealth bombers against deeply buried or heavily protected targets.

It's being developed under the auspices of the US military's interestingly-named Threat Reduction Agency, which normally does things like verifying nuke disposals. The MOP is intended to reduce the threats faced by the USA only, of course, by pulverising them. From the viewpoint of other countries the new bomb could be described more as a threat enhancement.

Even so, to some the MOP seems like a relatively delicate tool. The US originally had a plan to deal with enemy bunkers, WMD facilities or whatnot using a special ground-penetrating nuke. The "Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator" programme was axed by the Senate in 2005, however, leaving the MOP as America's last best hope for taking out difficult targets.

Bomb spotters may care to note that the MOP won't be the heaviest conventional bomb ever made by the US. The 1940s era T-12, at almost 44,000lb, was a substantially bigger brute. The T-12 was one of the final developments of the World War II Allies' "earthquake bomb" programmes, developed to knock out German V-weapon sites and U-boat pens. Famed British bomb boffin Barnes Wallis, inventor of the dam-busting "bouncing bomb", was an early innovator, designing the "Tallboy" and "Grand Slam" penetrators.

The T-12 didn't arrive in time for wartime use, and is now obsolete. The US does have some pretty hefty ordnance in current service, most famously the 21,700-lb GBU-43B Massive Ordnance Air Blast (MOAB) job – perhaps better known under its media nickname "Mother Of All Bombs".

The MOAB isn't any good for knocking out bunkers, however. It's a pure blast weapon, essentially a massive lump of explosive without penetrating abilities. It was developed to replace the old 15,000lb "Daisy Cutters" which US forces used to flatten jungle and create helicopter landing zones in Vietnam.

The MOP, however, should be just the ticket for deep bunkers. Most of its weight is actually in the hardened metal casing, which will strike the earth at several times the speed of sound after falling from high altitude. This should enable the MOP to drill a long way down before exploding.

There must be a lot of planners at the Pentagon scratching their heads right now over the Iranian nuke facility at Natanz, parts of which are said to be 75 feet underground and covered by metres of reinforced concrete. They'll be very keen to see the MOP ready for use.

A monstrous war crime

With more than 650,000 civilians dead in Iraq, our government must take responsibility for its lies

By Richard Horton

03/28/07 "The Guardian" -- - -Our collective failure has been to take our political leaders at their word. This week the BBC reported that the government's own scientists advised ministers that the Johns Hopkins study on Iraq civilian mortality was accurate and reliable, following a freedom of information request by the reporter Owen Bennett-Jones. This paper was published in the Lancet last October. It estimated that 650,000 Iraqi civilians had died since the American and British led invasion in March 2003.

Immediately after publication, the prime minister's official spokesman said that the Lancet's study "was not one we believe to be anywhere near accurate". The foreign secretary, Margaret Beckett, said that the Lancet figures were "extrapolated" and a "leap". President Bush said: "I don't consider it a credible report".
Scientists at the UK's Department for International Development thought differently. They concluded that the study's methods were "tried and tested". Indeed, the Johns Hopkins approach would likely lead to an "underestimation of mortality".

The Ministry of Defence's chief scientific adviser said the research was "robust", close to "best practice", and "balanced". He recommended "caution in publicly criticising the study".

When these recommendations went to the prime minister's advisers, they were horrified. One person briefing Tony Blair wrote: "Are we really sure that the report is likely to be right? That is certainly what the brief implies?" A Foreign and Commonwealth Office official was forced to conclude that the government "should not be rubbishing the Lancet".

The prime minister's adviser finally gave in. He wrote: "The survey methodology used here cannot be rubbished, it is a tried and tested way of measuring mortality in conflict zones".

How would the government respond? Would it welcome the Johns Hopkins study as an important contribution to understanding the military threat to Iraqi civilians? Would it ask for urgent independent verification? Would it invite the Iraqi government to upgrade civilian security?

Of course, our government did none of these things. Tony Blair was advised to say: "The overriding message is that there are no accurate or reliable figures of deaths in Iraq".

His official spokesman went further and rejected the Johns Hopkins report entirely. It was a shameful and cowardly dissembling by a Labour - yes, by a Labour - prime minister.

Indeed, it was even contrary to the US's own Iraq Study Group report, which concluded last year that "there is significant underreporting of the violence in Iraq".

This Labour government, which includes Gordon Brown as much as it does Tony Blair, is party to a war crime of monstrous proportions. Yet our political consensus prevents any judicial or civil society response. Britain is paralysed by its own indifference.

At a time when we are celebrating our enlightened abolition of slavery 200 years ago, we are continuing to commit one of the worst international abuses of human rights of the past half-century. It is inexplicable how we allowed this to happen. It is inexplicable why we are not demanding this government's mass resignation.

Two hundred years from now, the Iraq war will be mourned as the moment when Britain violated its delicate democratic constitution and joined the ranks of nations that use extreme pre-emptive killing as a tactic of foreign policy. Some anniversary that will be.

· Richard Horton is a doctor and the editor of the Lancet - Richard.Horton@lancet.com

© Guardian News and Media Limited 2007

American Kangaroo Court Claims Its First Victim

By Amy Goodman

03/28/07 "ICH " -- -- It is appropriate that a person from Australia, home of the kangaroo, should be the first one dragged before the kangaroo court at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay. David Hicks, imprisoned there for more than five years, pleaded guilty Monday to providing material support for terrorism.

The case of Hicks offers us a glimpse into the Kafkaesque netherworld of detentions, kidnappings, torture and show trials that is now, internationally, the shameful signature of the Bush administration. Hicks’ passage through this sham process affords us all an opportunity to demand the closure of Guantanamo and an end to these heinous policies. Conditions may soon exist to shutter the prison, with George Bush’s lame-duck status, the Democratic takeover of Congress, the possible departure of Guantanamo’s arch-defender and architect, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, and, if recent reports are true, a desire to close the prison on the part of Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. These bogus military commission trials amplify global contempt for the Guantanamo prison.

The Pentagon claims that Hicks was in Afghanistan fighting against the United States, then was apprehended by the Northern Alliance in late 2001 while fleeing to Pakistan. After transfer to U.S. military control, he was moved around various detention facilities and, he says, brutally beaten and sodomized. By January 2002 he was in Guantanamo. He was subjected to repeated interrogations. He witnessed other prisoners being beaten and terrorized with dogs. He was at times kept in total darkness, at times in continual bright light (he has grown his hair to chest length so he can cover his eyes to allow him to sleep). He had no access to a lawyer for more than a year or knowledge of the charges against him. Others, those lucky enough to have lawyers or to have actually gotten out, tell similar tales of continual cold, of desecration of the Quran and of sexual humiliation designed specifically to torture Muslim men.

During his five years of detention, people fought for Hicks. His father, Terry Hicks, traveled to the U.S. He donned an orange jumpsuit, like the one his son was forced to wear, and stood in a 6-foot-by-8-foot cage on Broadway in New York while fielding questions from the press.

Even the U.S. Supreme Court, the body that appointed Bush president in 2000, agreed that the prisoners must have some access to habeas corpus, the right to challenge one’s imprisonment. This central tenet of Western law, established in the Magna Carta in 1215, has been thrown out the window, along with the Geneva Conventions, by Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Gonzales and others.

Guantanamo has sparked one of the United States’ major growth industries: protesting against Guantanamo. From campuses to churches, the anger has driven regular citizens to action. Cindy Sheehan and members of the Catholic Worker Movement went to Cuba and marched overland to Guantanamo to challenge the illegitimate prison and its jailers in person.

Even in Hicks’ brief moment in the controversial “trial,” the government did what it could to strip him of the few rights it claims he has. The presiding military judge, Marine Col. Ralph Kohlmann, dismissed his civilian lawyer, Joshua Dratel, and a Navy reservist attorney, Rebecca Snyder, who was assisting Hicks’ government-appointed attorney. Hicks was stunned, and at first refused to plead. Hours later, after the trial was reconvened, he pleaded guilty to his one remaining charge. Having no hope for a fair trial, he reportedly believed that pleading guilty would allow him to serve his sentence in Australia—his only hope of escaping Guantanamo.

There are still more than 380 prisoners at Guantanamo. Almost none have been charged. Those ultimately charged with murder could be sentenced to death by the military commission. The decider of the death penalty after appeals are exhausted is none other than George Bush, who as governor of Texas oversaw the most active death chamber in the United States. Back then his lawyer was Alberto Gonzales.

The U.S. attorney scandal is threatening to take down Gonzales. But it is his condoning of torture from Guantanamo to Abu Ghraib that should seal his fate.

The grim Guantanamo experiment is reaching its climax. The house of cards that has been erected to support this immoral, criminal enterprise is poised to collapse. Call, shout, sit down, march, donate, write, protest … demand that Guantanamo be closed.

Amy Goodman is the host of “Democracy Now!,” a daily international TV/radio news hour airing on 500 stations in North America.

© 2007 Amy Goodman

Rumsfeld torture suit dismissed

THIS IS CLEARLY HYPOCRISY AT IT HIGHEST. THIS SO CALLED JUDGE RULED THAT THE IRAQIS AND AFGHANS DO NOT HAVE US CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS AND CANNOT SUE RUMSFELD AND THE MILITARY COMMANDERS. THE THING THAT MAKES THIS DOUBLE SIDED IS THAT THE US CAN CHARGE FOREIGN PEOPLE UNDER US LAWS EVEN IF THEY ARE NOT IN US TERRITORY, BUT OF COURSE NO MEDIA OUTLET WILL COVER THIS, AND NO ONE WILL ASK ANY QUESTIONS AND MOST DON'T EVEN KNOW THAT THE LAWSUIT EXIST. AND THE BIGGER QUESTION THAT NEEDS TO BE ASKED IS IF A US CITIZEN GETS TORTURED AND TAKEN SOMEWHERE CAN HE SUE. DID THE LAWYER FROM LA SUE AFTER BEING FLOWN TO A TORTURE CAMP IN ANOTHER NATION.

A US court has dismissed a lawsuit against former US defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld over claims prisoners were tortured in Iraq and Afghanistan.

By BBC

03/27/07 "BBC" -- - The court accepted that the nine men who sued had been tortured - and detailed the torture in its ruling.

But Judge Thomas Hogan ruled the five Iraqis and four Afghans did not have US constitutional rights, and also that Mr Rumsfeld was immune from such suits.

Two human rights groups brought the suit against him and three officers.

Judge Hogan threw out the claims against retired Lt Gen Ricardo Sanchez, the former commander of US military forces in Iraq, Col Thomas Pappas and former Brig Gen Janis Karpinski, both former commanders at Abu Ghraib prison.

In a ruling stretching to nearly 60 pages, the chief judge of the US district court for the District of Columbia said the allegations of torture were "horrifying".

Details of abuse

The nine men suffered abuse including being:

• hung upside-down and slapped until they lost consciousness
• stabbed with knives
• subjected to electric shocks
• deprived of sleep by loud noises and bright lights
• grabbed by aggressive dogs

They also were subjected to sexual humiliation.

None was ever charged with a crime.

All were released after detentions of one month to one year. Some were detained multiple times.

The complaint alleged that the three officers knew torture and abuse were occurring and were present when officers under their command were committing torture and abuse.

The complaint against Mr Rumsfeld - brought by the American Civil Liberties Union and Human Rights First - focused on an order he signed in December 2002 authorising new methods for interrogating prisoners at Guantanamo Bay.

Both groups say he later ignored overwhelming evidence that the policies resulted in prisoner abuse.

Mr Rumsfeld has apologised for the abuse scandals.

He was removed as defence secretary following the defeat of President Bush's Republican party in elections last year.

15yo AA Girl gets 7 years in Prison for Pushing Teacher

By Tracy Stokes, BET.com News Staff & Wire Services

Posted March 28, 2007 – In Paris, Texas, last year, a 14-year-old White girl burns down her family's home. Her punishment? Probation. In the same town three months later, a 15-year-old Black girl, Shaquanda Cotton, is sentenced to seven years in prison for pushing a hall monitor at her high school.

Shaquanda had no prior arrests, and the monitor, a 58-year-old teacher’s aide, was not hurt, according to Black leaders in the northeast Texas town of about 26,000 residents. But in March 2006, the same judge, Lamar County Judge Chuck Superville, who let the White teenage girl go on probation, convicted Shaquanda of "assault on a public servant" and sent her to prison at least until she turns 21.

Officials at the Texas Youth Commission declined to discuss the case with BET.com, citing Texas law.

"State law forbids us from acknowledging whether we have any youths are in our system, despite the 50 million issues of print that's been run," said Jim Hurley, a spokesman for the Texas Youth Commission. "We’d have to break the law to talk about it."

:: AD ::

Civil Rights Uproar

While the U.S. Department of Education is investigating the incident, the case has civil rights groups in an uproar.

"I don't understand the judge's rationale for his decision," Dr. Howard Anderson, president of the San Antonio Branch of the NAACP, told BET.com.

In highlighting what he called an egregious miscarriage of justice in a town with a long history of civil rights abuses, Anderson pointed to the case of the 14-year-old convicted arson (whose name was not released because of her age), who was slapped with probation, and the case of a 19-year-old White man in Paris, convicted of killing a 54-year-old Black woman and her 3-year-old grandson with his truck. The latter, he said, was also sentenced to probation and told to send the family a Christmas card every year.

"Then you have Shaquanda's case,” Anderson said. “She pushed a hall monitor, and she gets seven years confinement? If I look at all three of these sentences, and I'm not a lawyer, I have to wonder what the judicial system is doing. In this particular case, what is this judge doing?"

Gary Bledsoe, an Austin attorney who heads the state NAACP branch, told BET.com that Shaquanda was merely trying to defend herself.

"All she (Shaquanda) did was grab the aide to prevent a strike,” Bledsoe said. “It's like they are sending a signal to Black folks in Paris that you stay in your place in this community, in the shadows, intimidated.”

Sad History

And keeping Blacks in their place is nothing new in Paris, say leaders, who remind that it’s the site of the first highly publicized lynching of a Black by a large White mob. In 1893, fugitive Henry White was captured in Arkansas and brought to Paris, where he was tortured and burned alive on a train bed as more than 10,000 angry townsfolk cheered and jeered.

Activists say that the Shaquanda sentence is nothing more than a modern-day lynching.

Cotton has been incarcerated at a youth prison in Brownwood, Texas, for the last year on a sentence that could run until her 21st birthday. But like many of the other youths in the system, she is eligible to earn early release if she achieves certain social, behavioral and educational milestones while in prison.

But according to The Chicago Tribune, officials at the Ron Jackson Correctional Complex repeatedly have extended Shaquanda's sentence because she refuses to admit guilt and because she reportedly was found with contraband in her cell – an extra pair of socks.

"She's not admitting any guilt, because she doesn't feel that she did anything," Anderson told BET.com. "Not to mention, who saw the pushing, if it did occur?"

Cotton's mother, Creola, who Anderson describes as "strong-willed," said her daughter was singled out because she accused the school district of racism on several occasions.

In fact, 12 discrimination complaints have been filed against the Paris Independent School District in recent years. District officials dispute the charges, but the U.S. Department of Education, which is still investigating the case, has reportedly asked the U.S. Department of Justice to get involved.

In 1998, Paris, Texas, was named the "Best Small Town in Texas" by Kevin Heubusch in his book The New Rating Guide to Life in America's Small Cities.

Gulf economies to 'drop the dollar'

Al Jazeera.net
Tuesday, March 27, 2007

Gulf economies will move away from a dollar currency peg and shift foreign exchange reserves away from dollar to other currencies, including the Chinese yuan, the chief executive of Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) has said.

Nasser al-Shaali noted that the UAE central bank had already started buying euros - part of its strategy to move about 10 per cent of its reserves into the single European currency before the end of the year.

"We've seen, for example in the case of the UAE central bank, a movement into the euro," al-Shaali told the Reuters Middle East Investment Summit.

"In the future, most likely, we predict some of the economies in the region will adopt the Chinese yuan currency as well," he said, noting that he was not aware of that happening at the moment.

He said the appetite of the region as a whole was to increasingly diversify exposure.

"The investment strategies of Dubai Holdings entities, Kuwait Investment Authority and so on ... you will see a lot of these bodies start looking at Eastern Asia more aggressively along with a lot of institutional and private investors in the region," he said.

Deadlines

Saudi Arabia, the largest Gulf Arab economy, as well as Qatar, Oman and Bahrain have ruled out changes to their dollar pegs, adopted in preparation for a monetary union planned for 2010.

But the UAE and Kuwait, the third largest economy, have questioned the peg after the dollar fell about 10 per cent against the euro last year.

A Reuters poll of 15 analysts last week showed Gulf Arab states will probably not meet the deadline for currency union as member nations grapple with inflation and budget criteria, but Kuwait may revalue its currency before then.

Twelve of the 15 analysts, surveyed between March 16-20, said it was unlikely or very unlikely that the six members of the Gulf Corporation Council (GCC), representing the world's biggest oil exporting region, would meet its single currency target in three years.

Accept peace plan or face war, Israel told

David Blair
London Telegraph
Tuesday, March 27, 2007

The "lords of war" will decide Israel's future if it rejects a blueprint for peace crafted by the entire Arab world, Saudi Arabia's veteran foreign minister warned yesterday.

As leaders began gathering in the Saudi capital, Riyadh, for today's summit of the Arab League, Prince Saud al-Faisal told The Daily Telegraph that the Middle East risks perpetual conflict if the peace plan fails. Under this Saudi-drafted proposal, every Arab country would formally recognise Israel in return for a withdrawal from all the land captured in the war of 1967.

This would entail a Palestinian state embracing the entire West Bank and Gaza with East Jerusalem as its capital. Every Arab country will almost certainly endorse this blueprint when the Riyadh summit concludes tomorrow. Prince Saud said Israel should accept or reject this final offer.

"What we have the power to do in the Arab world, we think we have done," he said. "So now it is up to the other side because if you want peace, it is not enough for one side only to want it. Both sides must want it equally."

Speaking inside his whitewashed palace, surrounded by luxuriant lawns and manicured flower beds resembling a green oasis in the drabness of Riyadh, Prince Saud delivered an unequivocal warning to Israel.

"If Israel refuses, that means it doesn't want peace and it places everything back into the hands of fate. They will be putting their future not in the hands of the peacemakers but in the hands of the lords of war," he said.

Prince Saud dismissed any further diplomatic overtures towards Israel. "It has never been proven that reaching out to Israel achieves anything," he said.

"Other Arab countries have recognised Israel and what has that achieved?

"The largest Arab country, Egypt, recognised Israel and what was the result? Not one iota of change happened in the attitude of Israel towards peace."

Israel has numerous reservations about the Arab peace plan - which was previously proposed at a summit in 2002. Israel fears any hint that Palestinian refugees would have the right to return to their homes in the event of a peace settlement.

Prince Saud is the 66-year-old son of the late King Faisal. Relieved of the need to seek re-election, he has held office for 32 years.

Flush with oil money, Saudi Arabia is playing a more assertive role in Middle Eastern diplomacy. As well as securing the Arab peace plan, the Kingdom brokered the agreement between Hamas and Fatah - the two Palestinian factions - to form a unity government.

But western diplomats in Riyadh believe this resurgence in Saudi diplomacy stems from more than the kingdom's oil boom.

The menacing spectre of Iran, the rising Shia power with nuclear-tipped ambitions for regional dominance, looms large across the waters of the Gulf.

Saudi Arabia is quietly moving to contain its bellicose neighbour. Prince Saud offered conciliatory words to Iran, laced with coded criticism. "We have no inhibitions about the role of Iran," he said. "It is a large country. It wants to play a leading role in the region, and it has every right to do so. It is an historic country. But if you want to reach for leadership, you have to make sure that those you are leading are having their interests taken care of and not damaged."

Saudi Arabia has privately urged Iran to stop enriching uranium, in compliance with United Nations resolutions and lay to rest any suggestion that it is seeking nuclear weapons. Prince Saud called for a "Middle East free of nuclear weapons" with "no exceptions for anybody, be it Israel or Iran".

Asked whether the kingdom would consider seeking nuclear weapons of its own if Iran managed to acquire a bomb, Prince Saud replied: "We have made it very clear that we are not going down that road under any circumstances."

He paused for a moment, before adding, "under any foreseeable circumstances".

China shifts to euros for Iran oil

Chen Aizhu
Reuters
Tuesday, March 27, 2007

China's state-run Zhuhai Zhenrong Corp, the biggest buyer of Iranian crude worldwide, began paying for its oil in euros late last year as Tehran moves to diversify its foreign reserves away from U.S. dollars.

The Chinese firm, which buys more than a tenth of exports from the world's fourth-largest crude producer, has changed the payment currency for the bulk of its roughly 240,000 barrels per day (bpd) contract, Beijing-based sources said.

Japanese refiners who buy about 500,000 bpd of Iranian crude, nearly a quarter of Iran's 2.2 million-bpd shipments, continue to pay in dollars but are willing to shift to yen if asked, industry sources and officials said separately.

Iranian officials have said for months that more than half the OPEC member's customers switched their payment currency away from the dollar as Tehran seeks to diversify its reserves, but news of the Zhenrong change is the first outside confirmation.

The price of the oil is still based on dollar quotes.

The shift, being watched closely by foreign exchange traders, comes amid an extended row between Tehran and Washington over Iran's nuclear programme.

China, which depends on Iran for about 12 percent of its imported crude oil, has at times used the threat of its United Nations veto to blunt Western measures.

The UN imposed new sanctions on Iran on Saturday as Tehran refused to halt its nuclear programme, targeting arms exports and 28 Iranian individuals and entities.

Iran's central banker told Reuters earlier on Tuesday that Tehran had cut its holding of U.S.-dollar assets to a minimum level of around a fifth of its foreign reserves in response to U.S. hostility, still enough to handle major shocks.

CHINA SWITCHES EARLY

"Most of China's purchases have shifted to euro. It's not difficult so long as our banks can handle that," said a Chinese state oil trader.

Hojjatollah Ghanimifard, head of international affairs at the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC), told Reuters last week that around 60 percent of its oil income was in non-dollar currencies as almost all of Iran's European clients and some of its Asian customers had agreed to make non-dollar payments.

Iran is China's third-largest crude supplier with daily volume of 335,000 barrels last year. Sinopec Corp. <0386.hk>, Asia's top refiner but a minor lifter of Iranian oil, is still paying in U.S. dollars, said a Sinopec trader.

Japanese buyers, including top refiner Nippon Oil Corp. <5001.t>, said they had all received inquiries from Iran to pay on non-U.S. dollar terms, but were awaiting an official request.

"We are looking at it so that we can switch the currencies any time, but we have not gotten any official requests from them (NIOC). We are doing the transactions in dollars (now)," Nippon Oil chairman Fukuaki Watari told reporters last week.

Sources with other majors refiners concurred.

Iran ranks as Japan's third-largest crude supplier so far this year with daily rate of just under 500,000 bpd.

Tokyo has cautioned world powers against including oil in sanctions they may impose on Iran for its refusal to suspend atomic work, which the U.S. says is aimed at developing a nuclear weapon, but Tehran insists is for generating electricity.

Iran's major European customers include Royal Dutch Shell , France's Total and Spain's Repsol . The United States has banned imports of Iranian crude since 1995.

(Additional reporting by Ikuko Kao in Tokyo)

Globalists Love Global Warming

Trilateral Commission, chairman of British Petroleum, CFR, Club of Rome fan hysteria to achieve world government Paul Joseph Watson Prison Planet Wednesday, March 28, 2007

A common charge leveled against those who question the official orthodoxy of the global warming religion is that they are acting as stooges for the western establishment and big business interests. If this is the case, then why do the high priests of the elite and kingpin oil men continue to fan the flames of global warming hysteria?

The Trilateral Commission, one of the three pillars of the New World Order in alliance with Bilderberg and the CFR, met last week in near secrecy to formulate policy on how best they could exploit global warming fearmongering to ratchet up taxes and control over how westerners live their lives.

At the confab, European Chairman of the Trilateral Commission, Bilderberger and chairman of British Petroleum Peter Sutherland (pictured top), gave a speech to his elitist cohorts in which he issued a "Universal battle cry arose for the world to address “global warming” with a single voice."

Echoing this sentiment was General Lord Guthrie, director of N.M. Rothschild & Sons, member of the House of Lords and former chief of the Defense Staff in London, who urged the Trilateral power-brokers to "Address the global climate crisis with a single voice, and impose rules that apply worldwide."

Allegations that skeptics of the man-made explanation behind global warming are somehow doing the bidding of the elite are laughable in the face of the fact that Rothschild operatives and the very chairman of British Petroleum are the ones orchestrating an elitist plan to push global warming fears in order to achieve political objectives.

We have a similar situation to the Peak Oil scam, which was created by the oil industry as a profit boon to promote artificial scarcity, and yet is parroted by environmentalists who grandstand as if they are in opposition to the oil companies.

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In his excellent article, Global warming hysteria serves as excuse for world government, Daniel Taylor outlines how the exploitation of the natural phenomenon of "global warming" was a pet project of the Club of Rome and the CFR.

"In a report titled "The First Global Revolution" (1991) published by the Club of Rome, a globalist think tank, we find the following statement: "In searching for a new enemy to unite us, we came up with the idea that pollution, the threat of global warming, water shortages, famine and the like would fit the bill.... All these dangers are caused by human intervention... The real enemy, then, is humanity itself."

"Richard Haass, the current president of the Council on Foreign Relations, stated in his article "State sovereignty must be altered in globalized era," that a system of world government must be created and sovereignty eliminated in order to fight global warming, as well as terrorism. "Moreover, states must be prepared to cede some sovereignty to world bodies if the international system is to function," says Haass. "Globalization thus implies that sovereignty is not only becoming weaker in reality, but that it needs to become weaker. States would be wise to weaken sovereignty in order to protect themselves..."

Taylor also points out future British Prime Minister Gordon Brown's admonishment that only a "new world order" (world government) can help fight global warming.

Other attendees at the recent Trilateral meeting raised the specter of climate change as a tool to force through tax hikes.

Calling on the United States government to adopt a "carbon monoxide control policy," former CIA boss and long term champion of creating a domestic intelligence agency to spy on Americans John Deutch, argued that America should impose a $1-pergallon increase in the gasoline tax under the pretext of fighting pollution.

The lapdog media have proven adept in the past at taking their orders from the elitists in pushing higher taxes in the name of saving the environment.

"When the TC called on the United States to increase gas taxes by 10 cents at a meeting in Tokyo in 1991, The Washington Post, which is always represented at TC and Bilderberg meetings, called for such an increase in an editorial the following day," reports Jim Tucker.

Tucker writes that an essential means of achieving global government by consent over conquest, as has long been the ultimate goal of the elite, is by "fanning public hysteria" over climate change, encouraging further integration by forcing countries to adhere to international law on global warming. Such restrictions have prevented the development of third world nations and directly contributed to poverty, disease and squalor by essentially keeping them at a stone age level of progress, as is documented in The Great Global Warming Swindle documentary.

People who still trust the platitudes of politicians and elitists who implore us to change our way of life, cough up more tax money, and get on board with the global warming religion save being linked with Holocaust denial, are as deluded and enslaved as the tribes of Mesoamerica who, unaware of the natural phenomenon of a solar eclipse, thought their high priests could make the sky snake eat the Sun, and therefore obeyed their every demand.

Globalists love global warming! Oil industry kingpins, Bilderbergers and Rothschild minions have all put their weight behind it. This is a fraud conceived, nurtured and promulgated by elite, and to castigate individuals for merely questioning the motives behind climate change fearmongering by accusing them of being mouthpieces for the establishment is a complete reversal of the truth.