My following piece appears in today’s ABC The Drum: In late September, the government of Sri Lanka released 1,800 former Tamil Tiger fighters. Colombo claimed they had been rehabilitated as President Mahinda Rajapaksa told them at a ceremony in the capital: “I hope you will work for peace and ethnic harmony in this nation of…
Showing all posts tagged Yemen
What legitimate civil disobedience against a war criminal looks like
Bravo: On Monday 26 September, three members of Veterans For Peace and a member of Code Pink confronted Donald Rumsfeld at a Boston stop of his book tour. I attempted to make a citizen’s arrest. Police hustled all four of us out, while a hostile rightwing crowd shouted and jeered. To get in, we had…
What US occupation looks like on the ground
My following lead book review appeared in Saturday’s Sydney Morning Herald: INFERNAL TRIANGLE Paul McGeough Allen & Unwin, $32.99 This unblinking collection of dispatches separates the rhetoric from the reality of the post-September 11 battlefields. The new US Defence Secretary and former CIA director, Leon Panetta, recently told journalists the Obama administration was ”within reach”…
Obama appoints pro-war Petraeus to run thuggish CIA
This Washington Post story accurately reflects the kind of world Barack Obama both inherited and expanded; he ain’t no peace President: Gen. David H. Petraeus has served as commander in two wars launched by the United States after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. If confirmed as the next director of the Central Intelligence Agency, Petraeus…
Tariq Ali: who is denying democracy to Arab world?
In many countries, the Western powers that back military dictatorships in places such as Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Algeria, Yemen and Libya:
Not all democratic movements are created equal
According to America. For example, if a brutal ally cracks down on protesters, well: For instance, while the Obama administration has been vocal about events in Iran, it has been relatively quiet about violence by pro-government forces in Yemen.
Notes from today’s speech in Sydney to support Wikileaks
Today’s rally in Sydney was a good event, attracting around 1000 people, all of whom wanted to show solidarity with what Wikileaks stands for; transparency and real free speech. My speech addressed the often complicity of the mainstream media in keeping government secrets away from the public. They want to be gate-keepers, close to power.…
Why does Washington make it so easy to dislike her?
“Any association with the (Yemeni) regime will only confirm al Qaida’s narrative, which is that America is only interested in maintaining corrupt and despotic rulers and is not interested in the fate of Arabs and Muslims,” warned Bernard Haykel, a Princeton University professor.