[DAWN] After over two months of bloodshed in Yemen, the first serious signs of a negotiated settlement to the conflict are emerging. As reported on Saturday, both the Houthi ...a Zaidi Shia insurgent group operating in Yemen. They have also been referred to as the Believing Youth. Hussein Badreddin al-Houthi is said to be the spiritual leader of the group and most of the military leaders are his relatives. The Yemeni government has accused the Houthis of having ties to the Iranian government, which wouldn't suprise most of us. The group has managed to gain control over all of Saada Governorate and parts of Amran, Al Jawf and Hajjah Governorates. Its slogan is God is Great, Death to America™, Death to Israel, a curse on the Jews ... rebel militia as well as Yemen's exiled government have agreed to attend UN-sponsored peace talks scheduled for later this month in Geneva.
The fact that the Houthis have said they will attend without preconditions is encouraging.
The need for a negotiated settlement is essential. The Yemeni internal conflict -- which intensified after a Saudi-led coalition started bombing the Houthis and forces loyal to former president President-for-Life Ali Abdullah Saleh ... Saleh initially took power as a strongman of North Yemen in 1977, when disco was in flower, but he didn't invite Donna Summer to the inauguration and Blondie couldn't make it... in late March -- has claimed over 2,000 lives.
According to the UN, around half of the casualties are civilians while close to a million people have been displaced. Moreover, the global body says up to 80pc of the Yemeni population requires aid, which has been difficult to deliver due to the hostilities.
Of course, between now and June 14 -- the tentative date for the talks -- a lot can happen. For example, around the same time the news of the Geneva talks was emerging, there were reports that forces allied to Mr Saleh had attacked Saudi border positions.
Along with the Yemeni factions drawn into the conflict, it is equally important that the external players involved in this scenario -- Soddy Arabia ...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual hajj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. When the oil runs out the rest of the world is going to kick sand in the Soddy national face... and Iran who are supporting the government and the Houthis respectively -- are on board and support the grinding of the peace processor.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/08/2015 00:00 ||
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Let’s stop for a moment here. While the rape of the women was wrong, all four of them (and the nominally Catholic Liberation Theology orders three of them were associated with, the Maryknoll Ministries and the Ursuline Order) were unlawful combatants in the war, on the side of the Nicaraguan Sandinistas, the Salvadoran FLMN, and the ultimate power in both those movements, the KGB working through the Cuban DGI.
These movements, and, no doubt, these women, carried and concealed dispatches, supplies and weapons for the guerrillas, and conducted reconnaissance and espionage on a routine basis. There is no moral difference between servants of Communism and servants of Naziism or any other form of tyranny — by their deeds ye shall know them. We’ll say again, even spies and saboteurs shouldn’t be raped, but spies do not deserve to live. The world is a better place with these four traitors and tools of terrorism dead. While the manner of their death was horrible and the perpetrators should be held to account, you should feel no more sympathy for them than you do for Lord Haw-Haw, or Judas Iscariot, for that matter. snip
So why, you may ask, is Vides back in the news today?
Mr. Vides moved to the U.S. in 1989 because his safety in El Salvador could not be protected. He has since lived in Florida, and his children and grandchildren are all U.S. citizens.
Two cases, both filed in 1999, brought legal claims against him in American courts. The first was filed by the families of the murdered churchwomen. In 2000 a federal jury ruled that Gen. Vides was not liable for the killings. The second was brought by three people who had fled El Salvador after being tortured during the conflict. In 2002 a federal jury in that case did find Gen. Vides liable, under the theory of “command authority”—that as head of the military, he was ultimately responsible for the actions of nearly 55,000 soldiers and police.
The subtext to these legal actions, that the two diplomats who wrote this Wall Street Journal op-ed so diplomatically leave unmentioned, is that they were carried out as lawfare, by the same far-left interests that still bemoan the defeat of the FMLN and El Salvador’s deliverance from the shackles of slavery. More at the link
[DAWN] The convictions took the country by surprise: an anti-terrorism court operating in secrecy inside a military-controlled internment centre in Swat ...a valley and an administrative district in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province of Pakistain, located 99 mi from Islamabad. It is inhabited mostly by Pashto speakers. The place has gone steadily downhill since the days when Babe Ruth was the Sultan of Swat... had handed life sentences to 10 individuals involved in the attack on Nobel laureate Malala Yousafzai ...a Pashtun blogger and advocate for girls' education from Mingora, in Swat. She started blogging at age 11-12. She was 15 when a Talib boarded her school bus and shot her in the head in 2012. She was evacuated to a hospital in Britain and the Pak Taliban vowed to kill her and her father. Among other awards, she received the 2014 Nobel Peace Prize, which she deserved more than Barack Obama, Jimmy Carter, Al Gore, Yasser Arafat, or Rigoberta Menchu...
News of the convictions in April was the first public indication that a trial was even being held to begin with.
Now, there is widespread outrage and disbelief at the news that eight of the 10 men allegedly convicted for the attack that shook the country -- and moved the world -- were never actually convicted and instead were exonerated for lack of evidence.
Surprise that gave way to satisfaction that has now turned into outrage -- perhaps the truly troubling aspect of this episode is how little information has been released to the public. Who were the 10 accused? What was the evidence against them? What did the defence argue? Where are the exonerated men now? What of the two men convicted?
There are no answers and, worse yet, there is still no indication from either the government or military that answers will be provided, whether now or at all.
If ever there has been an unacceptable state of affairs, it is the circumstances surrounding the trial of Malala Yousafzai's alleged attackers.
Eight men have been exonerated by an ATC operating in the bowels of a detention centre that is secretive and opaque in a trial that resulted in the conviction of two other men.
That alone raises questions about just how flimsy the prosecution's evidence may have been or possibly about how poorly organised or overconfident the prosecution was.
Surely, this is a dramatic, shocking revelation that cannot be ignored by the relevant powers-that-be.
If failure is possible in a case as high-profile as the one involving Ms Yousafzai's alleged attackers, what does that say about the quality of the evidence and investigative and prosecutorial competence in hundreds of other, less high-profile cases?
But the silence continues -- adding to the growing impression that neither the government nor the military authorities take their constitutional and legal responsibilities seriously when it comes to the criminal justice system.
The system increasingly appears to be about focusing on public relations victories rather than actual justice. Were it not for a British newspaper that broke the news of the exonerations on Friday, would the authorities here have ever revealed the truth themselves? Troublingly, the answer appears to be 'probably not'.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/08/2015 00:00 ||
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On May 21, I headlined "Secretary of State John Kerry v. His Subordinate Victoria Nuland, Regarding Ukraine," and quoted John Kerry's May 12 warning to Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko to cease his repeated threats to invade Crimea and re-invade Donbass, two former regions of Ukraine, which had refused to accept the legitimacy of the new regime that was imposed on Ukraine in violent clashes during February 2014. (These were regions that had voted overwhelmingly for the Ukrainian President who had just been overthrown. They didn't like him being violently tossed out and replaced by his enemies.)
Kerry said then that, regarding Poroshenko, "We would strongly urge him to think twice not to engage in that kind of activity, that that would put Minsk in serious jeopardy. And we would be very, very concerned about what the consequences of that kind of action at this time may be."
Also quoted there was Kerry's subordinate, Victoria Nuland, three days later, saying the exact opposite, that we "reiterate our deep commitment to a single Ukrainian nation, including Crimea, and all the other regions of Ukraine." I noted, then that, "The only person with the power to fire Nuland is actually U.S. President Barack Obama." However, Obama instead has sided with Nuland on this.
#5
Sure. Health reasons. Broken legs can be serious for a man of his advanced age. Maybe Champ saw an opportunity, where others only saw a (health) crisis.
Posted by: Bobby ||
06/08/2015 13:02 Comments ||
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#6
More likely, Kerry jumped from the Senate because he wanted to be a "big deal." (Don't all Senators dream of that?) Upon finding out he was carrying obooboo's socks, he went from being merely self-deluded to becoming became disillusioned.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
06/08/2015 13:12 Comments ||
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#7
Kerry's statements sound like the diplomatic way to say we aren't gonna get dragged in if you kick the hornets nest. Of course he could just say that straight out. Stupid politicians.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[DAWN] The convictions took the country by surprise: an anti-terrorism court operating in secrecy inside a military-controlled internment centre in 
