Antroposofisch tijdschrift voor politieke en maatschappelijke vraagstukken van deze tijd
18-06-18 08:30:00,
STOCKHOLM INTERNATIONAL
PEACE RESEARCH INSTITUTE
SIPRI is an independent international institute dedicated to research into conflict, armaments, arms control and disarmament. Established in 1966, SIPRI provides data, analysis and recommendations, based on open sources.
18-06-18 08:27:00,
Eliot Higgins, praised by Western media as a bulwark against sinister Russian disinformation, has a persuasive, Atlantic Council-fellow retort for those who take issue with his Google Earth investigations: “Suck my balls.”
Higgins gave up his lucrative career as a payments officer at a women’s underwear company to create Bellingcat, a celebrated internet blog that specializes in using open-source information to blame Russia for every crime against humanity – real or imagined – committed so far this century.
Now a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, and a self-declared specialist in “social media & digital forensic research,” Higgins recently teamed up with NATO-funded compatriots to create DisinfoPortal, “an interactive online guide to track the Kremlin’s disinformation campaigns abroad.”
Valiantly fighting on the frontlines in the information war with Russia, Higgins has already shown himself to be a persuasive wordsmith with razor-sharp with:
Indeed, an invitation to moisten his scrotum has become Higgins’ go-to argument for those who dare to question his ironclad Instagram investigations. For example, his expertise on MH17 shines in the following Twitter exchanges [tweets in question have since been deleted]:
https://twitter.com/EliotHiggins/status/1006195367438929920
https://twitter.com/EliotHiggins/status/1006850045004705792
No wonder Higgins refused to debate Theodore Postol, professor emeritus of Science, Technology, and International Security at MIT, regarding Syrian chemical weapons attacks – Postol would have withered under Higgins’ underwear salesman oratory skills.
18-06-18 08:26:00,
When citizens began to ask questions about why Walmart stores were suddenly closing in in southern states in 2015, the mainstream media insisted that the closures were due to plumbing problems and that any suggestion of government involvement was a crazy conspiracy theory. Three years later, the MSM is finally admitting that several of those Walmart stores were converted into detention centers, which now house immigrant children who have been separated from their parents.
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At least 1,500 boys are currently being detained in Brownsville, Texas, where NBC News reported that they “spend 22 hours per day during the week (21 hours on weekends) locked inside a converted former Walmart,” where at least five boys are packed into rooms built for four. Many of those in prisons across the United States get more yard time than these children.
The boys range in age from 10 to 17 years old, and the average stay at the center is around 52 days. If the idea of imprisoning young boys as if they are felons for two months straight sounds agonizing and cruel, that is because it is. A small group of reporters was allowed inside the facility, and the report from NBC claimed that guard asked them to “smile at the hundreds of detained migrant kids in line for a meal because ‘they feel like animals in a cage being looked at.’”
SHADOW OF TEARS
by Ole Dammegard
What happened in Iran changed his life. His entire world, his viewpoints and values were turned upside down and the emotional turbulence he experienced tore down his inner walls leaving him naked and vulnerable – like an open wound. After a tragic murder, the situation became unbearale for one of his Iranian friends, so he ventured everything to help him get away and together the mad a dramatic escape from Iran via former Soviet and East Germany in a desperate attempt to reach Sweden. This book is a true and emotional description of real people in improbable world full of conflicts. It opens doors and spreads light on another Iran, its people and also, not least, the political and social conditions in the country. It is permeated by passion and tension as well as human ideals such as non-violence,
18-06-18 08:16:00,
Featured image: President Donald J. Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, walk together to their one-on-one bilateral meeting, Tuesday, June 12, 2018, at the Capella Hotel in Singapore. (Official White House Photo by Stephanie Chasez)
Tuesday’s Singapore summit between US President Donald Trump and North Korean Chairman Kim Jong-un has set the stage for the sharpening of disputes in the Asia-Pacific, particularly with China, despite the apparent relaxation of tensions.
During his press conference in Singapore, Trump mixed promises with veiled threats. He said crippling economic sanctions on North Korea would remain in place and there would be no reduction of the 32,000 US troops in South Korea—3,500 more than usually reported—notwithstanding his vague references to bringing the troops home.
Trump said
the US “will be stopping the war games (with South Korea), which will save us a tremendous amount of money, unless and until we see the future negotiation is not going along like it should.”
Like his other statements, this nebulous promise can be easily abrogated, should Pyongyang fail to toe Washington’s line.
The declaration apparently caught US allies by surprise. South Korea’s presidential spokesman Kim Eui-gyeom said:
“For now, there still is a need to find out the exact meaning and intention of President Trump’s remarks.”
South Korean President Moon Jae-in is scheduled to meet US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in Seoul on Thursday to discuss the summit. Pompeo will then head to Beijing.
Japanese Defense Minister Itsunori Onodera opposed Trump’s proposal, saying:
“The US-South Korean exercises and US forces in South Korea play significant roles for the security of East Asia.”
The massive war games send a regular threatening message to China, which is the true target of US and Japanese aggression.
US Forces Korea seemed to be taken by surprise, saying:
“In coordination with our ROK [South Korean] partners, we will continue with our current military posture until we receive updated guidance from the Department of Defense and/or Indo-Pacific Command.”
China’s response gave a clearer indication of the developing conflict. A Tuesday op-ed in China’s state-owned Global Times insisted that if North Korea was no longer a “threat,” then “there will be no grounds for the US and South Korea to continue large-scale military drills and for Washington to maintain its military presence in South Korea.”
Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang stated:
“China has consistently held that sanctions are not the goal in themselves.
18-06-18 08:16:00,
The Atlantic Council describes itself as:
…an essential forum for navigating the dramatic economic and political changes defining the twenty-first century by informing and galvanizing its uniquely influential network of global leaders. Through the papers we write, the ideas we generate, and the communities we build, the Council shapes policy choices and strategies to create a more secure and prosperous world.
The Atlantic Council seeks to create this “secure and prosperous world” for its corporate-financier sponsors which include weapons manufacturers like Airbus, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, and Boeing – big-oil interests like Chevron, BP, and ExxonMobil – big-banks like JP Morgan, Bank of America, and HSBC – and also governments and organizations like the US State Department itself, the UK’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office, and NATO.
Yet despite the scale and scope of both the Atlantic Council’s mission and resources, its ability to influence public perception appears to be diminishing.
It has been in Syria in particular where the Atlantic Council’s influence has reached all time lows in both credibility and effectiveness. This is owed mainly to the fact that Atlantic Council “experts” are confined to armchairs in offices scattered across the West while alternative media sources are on the ground in Syria.
A recent piece co-authored by one of these Atlantic Council “experts” – Aaron Stein – along with US Army reserve officer Luke J. O’Brien – serves as an example of how ineffective the Atlantic Council and its sponsors have become in communicating narratives to the public.
Alleged Rationale for Syrian CW Use is Illogical at Face Value
The article titled, “The Military Logic Behind Assad’s Use of Chemical Weapons” published in “War on the Rocks,” claims as its premise (emphasis added):
When Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime uses chemical weapons, as it has done on at least four different occasions in the past five years (August 2013, March 2017, April 2017, and April 2018), conspiracy theorists and Russian propaganda outlets immediately kick into gear to begin denying it. They posit that the Syrian regime would never use chemical weapons because, after all, it is already winning the civil war. Instead, these outlets suggest,
