Behind the Scenes at the UN Arms Trade Treaty Conference
By Alberto Estevez – 27 March, 2013 – Amnesty International

This post is part of a special series on the Arms Trade Treaty. From March 18-28, world leaders from more than 150 countries are gathering for the UN Conference on the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) in New York. An Amnesty International delegation with representatives from every world region is participating and will be pressing leaders to agree to a strong treaty that upholds international human rights law.

By Alberto Estévez, Advocacy Coordinator on the Arms Trade Treaty, International Secretariat of Amnesty International

It’s crunch time for human rights.

On Friday evening, the second draft of the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) was made public in the midst of the UN Final Conference on the ATT. The negotiations continued Monday and Tuesday and the final text will be made public sometime today.

The key issue for Amnesty International is whether the Treaty will have a preventive approach to prohibit an arms transfer when the State authorizing it knows that they will be used to commit atrocities. In legal jargon, this means whether it will prevent human rights violations constituting crimes under international law, i.e., extrajudicial executions, enforced disappearances and torture. This is what we in Amnesty International call the “Golden Rule.”

When I became an Amnesty member 26 years ago, above all I wrote letters – first handwritten, then on a typewriter and, years later, a computer – Urgent Actions to governments around the world about cases of extrajudicial executions, torture and disappearances.

At some point I wondered whether it would be better to prevent rather than cure the abuses I was writing about, in other words, how I could ensure that as time went by, I would need to write fewer letters and, at the same time, help save lives. That is how I learned about Amnesty’s position on military, security and police transfers, agreed in the 1980s in the organization’s International Council Meetings. In short, this policy is the “Golden Rule,” which will be the litmus test for the ATT.

Last Thursday in the negotiations room at the UN in New York, Finland submitted a proposal reflecting the Golden Rule in international human rights law. The UK supported this formulation. Spain and Liechtenstein made similar proposals on Friday morning, making clear their commitment to this principle. On the other hand, others like Norway, Japan and Costa Rica made proposals solely focused on the prohibition of transfers linked to violations of International Humanitarian Law during armed conflicts. We will continue to work to convince these and other States so that to put human rights first. In the meantime, the USA is waiting, listening and leaving itself open to discuss how to improve the text on the table, but with some limits. Other states, including some powerful ones, oppose the Golden Rule.

Amnesty International wants the treaty to include at least two basic principles:

a) No state will authorize arms transfers where such a transfer would aid or assist in the commission of genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes or a consistent pattern of violations of international human rights law constituting crimes under international law – such as extrajudicial executions, enforced disappearances and torture;

b) No state will authorize arms transfers where there is a real danger, or substantial risk, that those arms would be used to commit or facilitate serious violations of international human rights law or international humanitarian law.

We will also continue to lobby states to carry out rigorous risk assessments as part of their national export control systems, to control munitions, parts and components, and to control arms brokering and transport activities. The ATT should also include strong implementation mechanisms and comprehensive and regular public reporting by all States, to allow scrutiny of whether governments are carrying out their international arms transfers responsibly.

We will keep fighting as “keepers of the flame,” until the final draft text is made public because, as Amnesty International founder Peter Benenson said:

“The candle burns not for us but for all those whom we failed to rescue from prison, who were shot on the way to prison, who were tortured, who were kidnapped, who ‘disappeared’. That is what the candle is for.”

Bahraini man dies of inhaling tear gas fired by regime forces
27 March, 2013 – Shia Post

A 35-year-old Bahraini man has died due to inhaling tear gas fired by the Saudi-backed regime forces during a demonstration in the northeastern island of Sitra.

Reports say Jafar Jassem Ali al-Taweal lost his life when Bahraini forces fired toxic gas to disperse protesters during an anti-regime demonstration in Sitra on Monday.

Scores of Bahrainis, including children, have died due to asphyxia after inhaling poisonous tear gas fired by police.

Last year, Amnesty International warned about the Manama regime’s misuse of tear gas against protesters and called for an investigation into the tear gas-related deaths.

On February 15, Aminah al-Sayyed Mahdi, 35, also died a month after inhaling toxic tear gas in an anti-Al Khalifa protest in the village of Abu Saiba.

Also in January, Qasim Habib Ja’far, an eight-year-old child, and another Bahraini man, Haj Habib Ibrahim Abdullah, died the same way when regime forces fired toxic gas to disperse protesters near the capital, Manama.

Bahrainis have been staging demonstrations since mid-February 2011, demanding political reform and a constitutional monarchy, a demand that later changed to an outright call for the ouster of the ruling Al Khalifa family following its brutal crackdown on popular protests.

The Manama regime has arrested many rights activists, doctors and nurses since the uprising began.

Bahrainis say they will continue holding anti-regime demonstrations until their demand for the establishment of a democratically-elected government and an end to rights violations is met. …more

Rockefellers, Crown Cocaine & Haitian Slavery
By Dean Henderson – 26 March, 2013 – Veterans Today

With 2,100 people dead from cholera since the devastating January 2010 Haitian earthquake and another 650,000 expected to contract the disease within the next six months, the last thing Haiti needed was another rigged election. But the nation’s role as wage floor for multinational corporations, combined with its geographic importance to the CIA-orchestrated Columbian cocaine trade, made the November 28th 2010 election fraud which provoked fiery protests all too predictable.

The shortest route from Columbia’s San Andres Island to Miami passes through the island of Haiti, where Bank of Nova Scotia subsidiary Scotia bank dominates finance. The Zionist Bronfman family-controlled Bank of Nova Scotia is the leading gold dealer in the cocaine-infested Caribbean Silver Triangle. It owned the 200 tons of gold recovered beneath the rubble of the World Trade Center in late 2001. Gold is the currency of choice in the British Crown-controlled global narcotics trade.

From the 1970′s until 1986 Haiti was ruled by Jean-Claude (Papa Doc) and son Baby Doc Duvalier. The dictators were propped up by the US, which sent them over $400 million. What didn’t end up in Duvalier pockets was used by US corporations to set up factories to take advantage of super-cheap Haitian labor. Haiti was the centerpiece of the Caribbean Basin Initiative, launched by David Rockefeller’s International Basic Economy Corporation, which aimed to create a low-wage manufacturing platform in the Caribbean for its multinational corporate tentacles.

Real wages in Haiti declined 56% from 1983-1991 after the Caribbean Basin Initiative kicked in. Haitian exports boomed with companies like Rawlings sending sweat shop manufactured baseballs to the US. Dallas oilman and Intercontinental Hotels owner Clint Murchison operated meat packing plants in Haiti, which he entrusted to the watchful eye of the later-assassinated CIA agent and Lee Harvey Oswald handler George de Mohrenschildt. The devastated US textile industry has been largely outsourced to Haiti. Nowhere in the world is labor cheaper.

Baby Doc Duvalier fell after a popular revolt in 1986 and retired on the French Riviera, alongside other US tin cup dictators. That year the CIA created the Haitian National Intelligence Service (SIN). The acronym, which it shares with Peruvian intelligence, is likely a tongue-in-cheek M16 Freemason joke. SIN was created under the guise of fighting drug trafficking, but its officials simply took over the Columbian coke transshipment trade from Duvalier’s cronies- the Tonton Macoutes. Haitian gangs took over the drug trade in many US cities.

Despite a US Congressional ban on aid to Haiti, SIN received $1 million/year from the CIA, while the Company set about training and equipping the new Haitian military. The CIA was trying to put a lid on the leftist revolution which swept Baby Doc from power- the Lavalas Family Movement. SIN set about on a reign of terror against the Haitian left, taking over where Duvalier’s Tonton Macoutes left off. In 1989 the head of SIN Colonel Ernesto Prudhomme led a brutal interrogation of progressive Port-au-Prince Mayor Evans Paul. Former SIN chief Colonel Leopold Clerjeune was also present. Mayor Paul came away with five broken ribs and serious internal injuries.

A US Embassy official said of SIN, “It was a military organization that distributed drugs in Haiti. SIN never produced drug intelligence. The Agency gave them money under counter-narcotics and they used their training to do other things in the political arena.” …more

Shia Saudi cleric Sheikh Nimr charged with instigating unrest
26 March, 2013 – PressTV

A court in Saudi Arabia has charged prominent Shia cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr with “instigating unrest” and “seeking foreign meddling” in the kingdom.

Sheikh Nimr appeared in court on Tuesday, nearly eight months after he was arrested for criticizing the ruling Al Saud family and demanding the release of political prisoners, AFP news agency quoted a witness as saying.

The prosecutor also accused the cleric of supporting uprising in Bahrain, where Saudi troops are assisting the ruling Al Khalifa family in its brutal crackdown on demonstrations.

The court panel adjourned the hearing until a lawyer is appointed.

Sheikh Nimr was shot and arrested by regime forces in Awamiyah in July 2012 after he demanded the “release of all those detained in anti-regime protests, and all prisoners of conscience.

His family members said he was badly tortured in jail. Nimr’s sister has recently said through her Twitter account that prison authorities are denying her brother medical care.

Saudis have staged several demonstrations in the Eastern Province to demand the release of Sheikh Nimr since he was arrested.

Saudi activists say there are more than 30,000 political prisoners, mostly prisoners of conscience, in jails across the Kingdom.

According to the activists, most of the detained political thinkers are being held by the government without trial or legitimate charges and that they were arrested for merely looking suspicious.

Some of the detainees are reported to be held without trial for more than 16 years. Attempting to incite the public against the government and the allegiance to foreign entities are usually the ready-made charges against political dissidents. …more

Malaysia Invaded – 100′s of Terrorists Land on Beaches, Western Media Mute
Tony Cartalucci – 25 March, 2013 – Liberty Roundtable

(LD) – Hundreds of heavily armed terrorists have crossed from the Philippines and landed in the eastern Malaysian state of Sabah. Dozens are already dead, and the Malaysian military has brought in aircraft and armor to confront the audacious, bizarre invasion, scattering militants into the jungles of Borneo island. A seemingly headline news event, the invasion has been downplayed and spun by the Western media, many calling militant Al Qaeda-linked terrorists, an “armed Filipino clan.”

The West’s woeful, irresponsible coverage of a burgeoning region-wide destabilization, fits in nicely with its coverage of US-Saudi funded/armed terrorism around the world, including in Syria where US-funded terrorists of the so-called “Free Syrian Army” have just taken dozens of UN peacekeepers hostage in the Golan Heights – just days after the US announced it would fund the terrorists further, to the tune of $60 million and the West’s Arab partners have just granted the terrorist faction Syria’s seat at the “Arab League.”

Terrorists are US-Saudi Funded Extremists – Part of Engineered Destabilization.

While the West pleads ignorance over the identity of the militants held up in the jungles of Malaysia’s Sabah state, the militant organizations themselves have declared thousands more in reinforcements are being arranged in the Philippines to join and exasperate the conflict. The Free Malaysia Today newspaper reported in its article, “10,000 Tausugs to sail to Sabah,” that :

Thousands of Tausug from Basilan, Sulu and Tawi-Tawi have sailed to Sabah to reinforce members of the so-called royal army of the sultanate of Sulu who are fighting it out with Malaysian security forces, a Moro National Liberation Front official said Tuesday.

The Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) of course, is one of several of Al Qaeda’s franchises in Southeast Asia, and spun off the notorious terrorist organization, Abu Sayyaf, a US State Department-listed foreign terrorist organization with direct ties to Al Qaeda.

The Philippines’ terrorist organizations, located amongst the country’s southern islands have long held ties to Al Qaeda and receive funding and support from Saudi Arabia. AFP reported in their 2010 article, “WikiLeaks: US suspected Saudi ambassador to the Philippines of terror link,” that:

The United States suspected a Saudi Arabian ambassador to the Philippines of potential involvement in funding terrorists, according to US diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks this week.

The report would also state:

Francis Townsend cited Waly’s intervention to secure the release of two members of an Islamic charity detained in the Philippines, the cable showed.

The group was suspected of funnelling funds to Al-Qaeda-linked groups based in the southern Philippines.

It continued stating:

The February 24, 2007, US embassy cable named the charity suspected of terror financing in the Philippines as IIRO, which stands for the International Islamic Relief Organisation.

Intelligence agencies have said IIRO was set up by Muhammad Jamal Khalifa, a brother-in-law of Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden.

The report concluded by stating:

Overall, the WikiLeaks cables singled out Saudi Arabia as the key source of funding for radical Islamist groups including Al-Qaeda, the Taliban, Lashkar-e-Taiba and Hamas.

Saudi Arabia is of course is the chief financier of Al Qaeda, and is currently leading efforts to fund, arm, and fill the ranks of Al Qaeda’s franchises from Mali and Libya, to Syria and Iraq. A multitude of reports from across the West have identified Saudi Arabia as the lynch pin in Al Qaeda’s global terror campaign, including the US Army West Point Combating Terrorism Center.

Its reports “Al-Qa’ida’s Foreign Fighters in Iraq” and “Bombers, Bank Accounts and Bleedout: al-Qa’ida’s Road In and Out of Iraq,” identify a vast terrorist network maintained by the Saudis that recruits, arms, and funds terrorists from across the Muslim World, and can funnel a mercenary army into any desired nation. At the time, the desired nation was Iraq. In 2011, it was Libya. Today it is Syria. The same network that US soldiers fought in Iraq is verifiably in use today, in support of US regime-change operations in Syria. …more