Disciplined and well-organized elections held in Venezuela yesterday, lead to a clear win for the ruling party. President Nicolás Maduro called it a ‘Historic Victory of the Revolution’.
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The attack bore all the hallmarks of a US-backed intervention, and it doesn’t take much digging to find the links between the murky hand of Washington and the dark forces behind the bloodshed on the streets and a cover-up by a compliant western media.
Last week’s killing of seven people in the Lebanese capital Beirut, widely believed to be carried out by a far-right Christian fascist militia, is a worrying sign that the US wants to provoke a new civil war to destabilize the country in a change in its Middle East strategy.
The attack bore all the hallmarks of a US-backed intervention, and it doesn’t take much digging to find the links between the murky hand of Washington and the dark forces behind the bloodshed on the streets and a cover-up by a compliant western media.
Supporters of the Shi’ite Amal and Hezbollah movements were fired upon as they made their way to the Palace of Justice for a peaceful demonstration against what they perceive as the politicization of a probe into last year’s devastating port explosion.
The judge heading up the investigations, Tarek Bitar, is being directed by the US Embassy they claim, accusing him of unfairly and disproportionately targeting their allies while ignoring those close to Washington.
They may have a point. But the debate over the fairness and transparency of the judicial report is a side issue to the events that took place in the Tayouneh district of Beirut last week.
A peaceful march that had been approved by the authorities was fired upon by snipers placed on buildings along its route. It was an ambush by US-backed fascists who are hell-bent on plunging Lebanon into chaos.
None of the seven people killed in the protest were armed. Among the dead was Meryem Farhat, a mother shot through the head as she was getting ready to collect her child from kindergarten. Delivery driver Ali Ibrahim was also killed by sniper fire.
Not that you would know any of this judging by how the incident was reported by the western press. Readers would be forgiven for thinking that it was a Hezbollah march that turned violent, with the movement seemingly responsible for the deaths of its own supporters.
Liberal British mouthpiece The Guardian explained to its readers: “The trigger for the clashes in neighborhoods near the justice courts, which left dozens more injured, was a protest by members of Amal and Hezbollah, two predominantly Shia political parties, against a judicial probe into the massive blast in the port last year.”
“…eyewitnesses said they heard at least two explosions near the site where a protest was supposed to be held by Iran-backed Shia militia Hezbollah against a judge who is investigating last year’s devastating blast at Beirut’s port. Thursday’s shootings mark the deadliest civil violence in Beirut since 2008,” reported the part Saudi-owned Independent.
It concluded in carefully chosen language: “The heavily armed Hezbollah has accused Mr. Bitar of conducting a politicized probe.”
The Independent failed to mention the Lebanese Forces at all. Instead, it opted to make vague references to ‘unidentified gunmen.’ The Guardian mentioned their name once, but only to say that Hezbollah ‘claimed’ to have been shot at by the Christian militia.
The rest of the article followed a similar pattern to that of The Independent, containing snippets such as ‘chants of “Shia, Shia, Shia’ were heard on the streets.
“Large numbers of men brandishing weapons took to the streets throughout the day, and gun trucks flying Hezbollah and Amal flags paraded through the Bekaa Valley in a show of strength not seen since Hezbollah overran west Beirut in May 2008…” it added, failing to mention that Bekaa is nowhere near the Lebanese capital. This was the crowning glory of The Guardian hatchet job, evoking images of violent Muslims seeking to overthrow Lebanon, no doubt to impose an Islamist caliphate.
France 24 went with: “Last week, Hezbollah led a protest to demand his dismissal. It sparked a gun battle in the heart of Beirut that left seven people dead and reignited fears of new sectarian violence.”
It continued with a paragraph about “hostage diplomacy and what it means for those imprisoned by Tehran” in an exceptionally tenuous attempt to link the shootings to Iran.
That they let the Lebanese Forces, a US-backed right-wing militia led by a war criminal, off the hook is no mere accident.
Nor is the reporting down to lazy journalism. This would be to deny the role of the media as a propaganda tool used and manipulated by western imperialism to manufacture a consensus among the public.
That is that Hezbollah and Amal are the bad guys and it is up to the west, always the good guys in any situation, to step in and save the people of Lebanon from their evil clutches.
The use of descriptions such as ‘Iran-backed Shia militia Hezbollah’ is a not particularly subtle, but deliberate attempt to paint the movement – which is a legitimate political force with representatives in the Lebanese parliament – as a foreign-controlled entity.
The irony of this is, that it is, in fact, the very group responsible for the attack that is in hock to external forces, namely the US, “Israel” and Saudi Arabia who see the Lebanese Forces as its proxy inside the country.
It is perhaps best known in the west for its role in the brutal massacre of thousands of Palestinian men, women, and children on behalf of “Israel” at the Sabra and Chatila camps during the Lebanese civil war.
I visited the camps and met survivors of the three-day pogrom in Beirut earlier this year and they described how the Christian militia raped and executed more than three thousand defenseless people, as the camps were surrounded by Israeli soldiers.
The leader of the Lebanese Forces, Samir Geagea, has been convicted of war crimes, sentenced to life in prison for ordering four political assassinations, including that of former prime minister Rashid Karami in 1988.
For many, he will always be associated with the massacre of scores of people, including the bombing of Sayidat al-Najat church in Jounieh killing 10 people and wounding 54, with Christians also targeted by the bloodthirsty Geagea.
But he was released under an amnesty in 2005 following Lebanon’s so-called Cedar Revolution which took place after the assassination of prime minister Rafik Hariri, the perpetrators of which have never been brought to justice.
Geagea’s propulsion into the limelight once more comes with the US suffering a series of defeats across the Middle East, including its humiliating withdrawal from Afghanistan and its failure to dislodge Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
His reelection in May has led many Arab and European nations to restore diplomatic relations with Damascus, with border crossings reopening along with the return of ambassadors and consulates as they recognize political reality.
But Assad could not have held on to power without the explicit support of the Syrian people. No leader could have withstood the pressure exerted on him without it.
Not only has he defeated Washington’s regime-change operations – he has come out the other side stronger, having faced down five US presidents; Bill Clinton, George W Bush, Barack Obama, Donald Trump, and now Joe Biden.
The US now appears to be strengthening its relations with Kurds in the north of the country once more where its soldiers are based as an occupying force. The Biden administration recently announced there would be no troop withdrawal, reassuring Kurdish officials after the debacle in Afghanistan.
Despite Assad’s plans for decentralization announced in April, the Kurdish administration there is pursuing a policy that seeks political recognition from the US. It is a move that has alienated many of its supporters and undermines its dismissal of claims it acts as a “proxy force” in the region.
Having lost the military and now the political war on Syria, it seems logical that the US would change its strategy to foment further instability in Lebanon, with a return to civil war only serving to benefit Washington and Tel Aviv as they hope for the sectarian division of the country.
The hands of the US were all over the Tayouneh attack, which came straight out of the Washington/CIA copybook, mirroring its interventions and use of proxy forces to oust governments or prop up its client states in Latin America and across the world.
Geagea’s militia – many of whom have been trained by “Israel” – would be an obvious choice for the US given his previous overtures to Washington, confirmed in a 2008 Wikileaks cable.
He claimed that the Lebanese Forces had as many as 10,000 well-trained soldiers, telling the US embassy: “We can fight against Hezbollah. We just need your support to get arms for these fighters.”
But, speaking in a public address on Monday, Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah explained that the Shi’ite movement commands a 100,000 fighters-strong military structure, dwarfing that of the Lebanese Forces. The difference between the two, he pointed out, is that Hezbollah’s forces protect the Lebanese people.
It may be enough to concentrate the minds of the more pragmatic US officials, but the links between Washington and the Lebanese Forces run much deeper than that of Geagea who, despite his delusions of grandeur, remains a marginal figure and is unlikely to be trusted with a leading political role.
Walid Phares, a former leading light in the Lebanese Forces, now acts as a national security advisor and consultant on Middle Eastern politics in the US. Fleeing the country in 1990, he went on to advise the presidential election campaigns of Mitt Romney and then Donald Trump.
During the Lebanese Civil War, Phares told Christian militiamen that they were the vanguard of a war between the West and Islam. He justified the fight against Muslims by saying “we must have our own country, our own state, our own entity, and we have to be separate.”
Despite his peddling of far-right, Islamophobic conspiracy theories, he has rebranded himself as an academic and has testified to international bodies including the European Parliament and UN Security Council on international security matters and the Middle East.
He does not appear to have held any official government post, but his closeness to a former president and his movement in elite circles is clearly a cause for alarm.
The links do not end there. Soon after the shootings, journalist Hosein Mortada claimed to have identified one of the snipers as Shukri Abu Saab – who he said works as a security official at the US embassy.
Perhaps unsurprisingly there has been a blanket media silence over the revelations, while the embassy itself has not responded to the allegations, raising suspicions further.
US ambassador Dorothy Shea has long been accused of using the embassy as an outpost for the imperialist carve-up of Lebanon and opening the country up to the mercy of the World Bank and the IMF.
It may be passed off as a mere coincidence that under secretary of state Victoria Nuland was in the Lebanese capital at the time the ambush took place, pledging an additional $67 million to the country’s armed forces as she demanded economic reform and the need to hold elections as a prerequisite for continued US support.
It also may be a mere coincidence that the Lebanese army changed its narrative of events soon after the US cash boost to appear to blame Hezbollah for its own supporters being shot at. This is despite footage circulating that appears to show a Lebanese soldier shooting at protesters.
But the attempts to destabilize Lebanon came soon after the formation of a new government, ending 13-months of political deadlock, along with the US failure to disarm Hezbollah despite sanctions and other external pressure.
The US is also angered after Hezbollah smashed sanctions imposed by Washington on Iran and Syria, by importing oil to alleviate Lebanon’s fuel crisis. This slap in the face for imperialism was a humiliating defeat, breaking the siege of Lebanon with ease and at the same time rendering the restrictive measures meaningless.
It also exposed the declining power of the US on a global stage, with the dollar at risk of losing its position as the world currency and with it Washington’s ability to control global financial markets.
Solidarity among nations has proved vital in defeating the US, and it is solidarity among the Lebanese people that will help the country rise up once more and consign the likes of Geagea and the Lebanese Forces along with all those who seek to destroy Lebanon to the dustbin of history.
October 5, 2021
By Farah Hage-Hassan
The poisonous effects of American interference and failed policies are still affecting Iraq’s agricultural sector today. Here’s how.
“You lied!”
Those were the screams of former US Army veteran Mike Prysner echoing in the lecture hall during a speech by George W. Bush, and the lasting trauma still resonates in the ears of millions of Iraqis and Americans today, almost two decades later.
From a full-scale invasion under the pretext of overthrowing Saddam Hussein to the insurgence of ISIS, Iraq has been plagued with endless wars and destruction. This invasion and endless interventions aggravated the marginalization of sectors in Iraqi society and allowed the internal state of Iraq to crumble under sectarianism and violence.
The lasting effects of the US policies are especially present within the aftermath of the agricultural sector among others. Farmers across the country continue to be displaced and doubt remains overcast on Iraq’s environmental capabilities and the future of agricultural development.
One of the many false pretenses for the heavily documented war was the alleged harboring of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) by former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein. Former Secretary of State Colin Powell infamously claimed that the US was aware of Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction and their role in terrorism. Powell’s bold statements and deceptive assertions regarding the evidence that was available have ultimately haunted the US for what has become known as the very public “campaign of lies” the US tricked global citizens into believing.
For over 7 years, Iraq was invaded and bombed by the US and the coalition of the willing, not to mention their use of white phosphorous munitions. Although they claimed that white phosphorus was used whilst fully considering the incidental effects on civilians, the secondary effects on Iraq’s agriculture were most definitely not taken into account.
The invasion and destruction that accompanied the war did not only permanently damage arable lands with mines and cluster ammunition, but the suspension of government agricultural institutions and irrigation projects also caused disastrous results to the population.
From 2002 to 2008, agriculture’s contribution to the country’s GDP has decreased from almost 9% to 3.6% due to challenges created by war, social instability, and institutional and economic concerns.
In a final blow after causing significant damage to the agricultural sector, the US secured its monopoly over the Iraqi farming industry and the future of agriculture by issuing Order 81. The Order was described as an attempt to “rebuild” Iraq’s agriculture industry by the head of the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq, Paul Bremer.
After Coalition Provisional Authority Order 81 was implemented, farmers were forbidden from conserving, distributing, or propagating harvested seeds, resulting in a dependency on big businesses such as Monsanto, Cargill Inc., and Dow Chemical. As a consequence, Iraq has only been able to meet 4% of its seed demands since 2005. These distributors are known to patent their seeds and collect fees without considering if crops were proven to contain their proprietary genetic information.
Monsanto, an agrochemical and agricultural biotechnology corporation founded in 1901, is notorious for its contribution to the neutron initiators inside the atomic bombs dropped on Japan, as well as for producing Agent Orange. The US military used Agent Orange in Vietnam during the infamous operation Ranch Hand, destroying crops and ultimately causing half a million Vietnamese children to be born with birth defects and millions of others left with cancer and other serious health conditions.
Reconstruction efforts in Iraq also targeted the distribution of safe drinking water.
Millions of dollars were lost in the attempt and efforts failed, with only one-third of the objectives reached in the context of providing safe drinking water.
Iraq’s infrastructure was heavily bombed in the 1990s after the US-led coalition conducted massive airstrikes on the region during the gulf war. Water and sewerage treatment facilities were heavily damaged. As people suffered from a lack of access to clean water, diseases multiplied.
The US war has critically aggravated the water crisis. Water is scarcely passing through the Tigris and Euphrates as is, causing contaminated water to reach crops, and in turn poisoning much of the population. The UN Security Council described the effects of the war as returning Iraq to the “pre-industrial age”, and warned of the imminent catastrophe that would hit the Iraqi population.
The Tigris River is bordered by Iran, Iraq, Turkey, and Syria. Along with the Euphrates, they create a river system that encircles Mesopotamia known as the Fertile Crescent. The Tigris is an important source of transportation and irrigation, with a history dating back to the earliest known civilizations.
The catastrophic insurgence of ISIS ripped Iraq’s already suffering sectors into developmental and economic shreds.
The US policies created a weak state that resulted in the marginalization of considerable sectors of Iraqi society. ISIS militants, armed partially with CIA-funded weapons, developed into one of the goriest terrorist organizations of our time.
The world watched in horror as ISIS became globally renowned for unspeakable atrocities like beheadings, kidnapping of women and children, and numerous suicide bombings and terrorist attacks that not only affected the Middle East but many western countries, especially Europe.
ISIS used the burning tactic to terrorize inhabitants, laid landmines, and destroyed agricultural equipment. IEDs were frequently utilized to fortify their defense. They attempted to meticulously carry out a form of ecocide, as their “scorched earth” tactics took hold. Oil wells were set on fire and thousands of civilians came close to suffocation and others suffered respiratory complications.
In a final effort to devastate their targets, they booby-trapped escape routes, barns, and pump stations.
The presence of the terrorist group forced agricultural workers and farmers to evacuate their farmlands during the bloody conflicts. Numerous families retell their experiences of being forced to abandon their farming communities when ISIS militants surrounded the area in mid-2014. The same families who evacuated their homes reported returning to their homes post-ISIS and finding them heavily booby-trapped. Numerous families have lost children and relatives after bombs inexplicably detonated on their properties.
Away from the nightmares that haunt Iraq, as one of many initiatives, Iraq’s holy shrines have begun to establish massive farms for relying on agricultural production and providing national agricultural products that are distinguished by quality, as well as meat at subsidized prices.
Agricultural cities are being established to provide the cultivation of wheat, barley, yellow corn, fodder, jet, and cattle, as well as raising sheep and cows.
Despite the seemingly irreversible effects of America’s assaults and intrusion on Iraq’s wellbeing have undoubtedly damaged the country, things can still be turned around. With Iraq’s Parliamentary elections looming, the crucial vote of the youth may have the power to carry Iraq out of decade-long darkness and into the light.
Member of Hezbollah’s “Loyalty to the Resistance” Parliamentary Bloc Sayyed Ibrahim Al-Moussawi asserted that “The American administration is practicing a policy of dictation, where the blatant American interference in the Lebanese affairs has reached its maximum, as it is permeating all the levels, amid the silence of some parties about the American violations.”
MP al-Moussawi condemned the “The US blatant breach to decimate Lebanon” in a radio interview, inviting the Lebanese foreign minister to take a stance that condemns this interference.
He also stressed that the bet in this context is on those who have wisdom and reckon the nature of the United States.
Regarding the cabinet affairs, Sayyed al-Moussawi said that “the cabinet should fully take its chances,” adding in the context of the ministerial committee that aims at negotiating with the International Monetary Fund: “Let’s give the cabinet a chance as long as we are part of it and we support it.”
Regarding the “Biqaa Nitrate”, MP al-Moussawi underscored that “there is a big conspiracy that is being gradually revealed,” stressing that “it’s the right of the victims’ families to learn the truth of the Beirut Port blast.”
On the other hand, Sayyed al-Moussawi stressed that “Hezbollah is going for the initiative of distributing the Iranian diesel oil”, considering that “the unity of the Lebanese people is being renewed today in this regard.” He added that “we are working on alleviating the suffering of people as much as possible, and we stress that we aren’t an alternative to the government.”
“Hezbollah is currently studying a plan regarding offering a special help regarding transportation to schools, notably official schools, through providing as much as possible diesel oil supply,” he added.
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Hezbollah Secretary General His Eminence Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah delivered on Sunday a speech during the memorial ceremony of martyr Hajj Abbas Al-Yatama.
At the beginning of his speech, Sayyed Nasrallah offered condolences to the family of martyr Al-Yatama as well all his beloved people, congratulating them for the fact that this prominent leader has reached his goals. “I personally know martyr Al-Yatama, who belongs to the generation of Hezbollah’s establishment in 1982,” he said, noting that “When speaking about people like Hajj Abbas Al-Yatama, I like to recall the founding generation of the Islamic Resistance, they’re the people of 1982.”
On the characteristics of the martyr, His Eminence highlighted that “Martyr Abbas had a beautiful soul, like his beautiful appearance. He was brave and courageous.”
He recalled that Abu Maitham “joined this resistance at the age of 17, and soon his personal characteristics became evident in front of his brothers. Martyr Abbas started as a fighter, then a trainer and later assumed various leadership responsibilities. He was personally present in the field operations.”
According to the Resistance Leader, “Among the personal characteristics of the martyr Abbas were faith, etiquette, forbearance, patience and good behavior. He further possessed excellent leadership capabilities.”
“Martyr Abbas was one of the military leaders in the South. He is from Hermel and he was as a resistance’s military leader in the South,” he stated, pointing out that “Martyr Abbas, like his brothers, the rest of the martyrs are witnesses that the honorable people of this region embraced the resistance and sacrificed it with the best of their youth.”
In addition Sayyed Nasrallah unveiled that “Abu Maitham was among the military leaders who took part in the July war in South Lebanon, and he was the one who wrote the letter of the Mujahideen [for me] during the war, which conveys his loyalty to the resistance.”
Sayyed Nasrallah further revealed that “When the events in Syria began, martyr Abbas was one of the first leaders who joined the battle and was present in the most dangerous places. Abu Maitham has been to the most dangerous zones from Aleppo, to the besieged city and airport, as well as the road of Ethriya-Khanaser.”
“Martyr Al-Yatama was a field commander next to senior Syrian Army commanders, resistance leaders such as Haj Mustafa Badriddine, and Iranian Generals in Syria, atop of whom was martyr leader Hajj Qassem Soleimani,” His Eminence added.
Emphasizing that “The secret of the resistance’s strength is that it has never sought gains here or there,” Sayyed Nasrallah lamented the fact that “Since the establishment of the state, the Bekaa region has received nothing but deprivation and negligence, but return it has offered honesty, the best of its youth and pure blood.”
“These people spared nothing, neither in confronting the Zionist scheme nor the American project. The people of Baalbek-Hermel did not wait for anyone to defend their villages and all of Lebanon,” he said.
Moving to the political front, Hezbollah Secretary General explained that “The Americans do believe that we are people who seek the worldly life, as if by threatening us with this life they might be able to change our stance. They didn’t understand until now what does it mean to belong to the Islam pf Prophet Mohammad [PBUH] and the Karbala of Imam Hussein [AS].”
In parallel, His Eminence clarified that “The battle that is being waged in Lebanon against the resistance and the true national forces has been run by the American embassy since 2005. However, they have failed.”
On this level, he uncovered that “Tens of billions of dollars have been spent since 2005 in order to distort the image of the resistance, and they failed.”
“The US seeks to set Lebanon under its control so that it does not pose any threat to “Israel”,” Sayyed Nasrallah reminded, warning that “The US embassy in Lebanon is responsible for targeting the livelihood of the Lebanese people as it interferes in every single aspect.”
He also underscored that “The US and Saudi embassies have been working in the past years to ignite a civil war in Lebanon. The American embassy wants to make Lebanon move into chaos. It seeks to strike the Lebanese society and the Lebanese person with his dignity and family.”
Meanwhile, Sayyed Nasrallah reiterated that “After spending $30 billion for political parties that were not able to serve them, they turned to the civil society.”
Urging the Lebanese state to shoulder its responsibility in facing the current crisis, he viewed that “It is not Hezbollah that can open the country in front of Chinese and Russian companies for investment. This is the state’s duty. We urged them to buy from Iran by the Lebanese pound, and they replied that the Americans would put us on the sanctions list. We offered the state options and proposals for which it turned a deaf ear, and Lebanon continued in the path of declining.”
Amid this negligence, Sayyed Nasrallah clearly announced: “Our second ship will sail from Iran within days, and other ships will follow.”
He further stressed that “It is not a matter of one ship or two; this is a path which we will keep moving on as long as Lebanon needs it,” noting that “The goal is to help all the Lebanese people and ease their sufferings.”
However, His Eminence assured that “We-in Hezbollah- are neither a substitute for the state nor for importing companies or stations. We do not want to compete with anyone.”
“We will bring in fair amounts of oil derivatives to ease the pressure against companies, gas stations and the black market,” he said, noting that his party seeks “to break the greedy prices and ease the people’s sufferings.”
In this context, Sayyed Nasrallah went on to say: “We are not supposed to bring Lebanon’s full demand of gasoline and diesel but rather good quantities that alleviate pressure off the companies and the stations.”
Once again, he urged the government to alleviate the suffering of the people and assume its responsibilities.
In parallel, Sayyed Nasrallah denounced “Those monopolizing oil derivatives” calling for arresting and imprisoning them.
Regarding US ambassador Dorothy Shea’s initiative towards Lebanon, His Eminence welcomed the Egyptian gas, the Jordanian electricity project and anything that might help Lebanon.
However, His Eminence reminded that “If the US seeks to help Lebanon, it should lift its veto on providing support to Lebanon.”
To the Lebanese people, he elaborated that “What is important for the Lebanese to know is that the proposal of the American ambassador requires a period between 6 months and 1 year to be done. The US project needs negotiations with Syria and could not be performed in the dark night.”
“The US ambassador is talking illusions, but in case her project could be achieved we won’t be annoyed as this means breaking the siege on Lebanon and Syria.”
To the US administration and its ambassador in Lebanon, Sayyed Nasrallah said: “If you want to help Lebanon, tell your administration to stop preventing other countries from helping Lebanon, and we wouldn’t want neither your initiative nor your money.”
On another level, Sayyed Nasrallah asked “Who will shoulder the responsibility for the Tuleil incident in Akkar, and where did the investigations reach?”
To the Lebanese government, Hezbollah Secretary General said: “If you accept, we have companies that are able to extract oil and gas and sell it. The companies that I mentioned are not afraid of the “Israeli” bombing, and they can extract gas and oil and sell it. If the companies fear “Israel” and the sanctions, we are willing to bring an Iranian drilling company to extract offshore oil and gas, and let “Israel” bomb it.”
“The Resistance after July 2006 war became stronger and after every battle it maintained its existence and ended stronger than before,” he said, concluding that “The enemy and the Americans, and their affiliates, will discover that their popular and political losses will be very huge.”
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Dear friend,
Today I am starting a new kind of post – a short news update. This is not an open thread where everybody shares all the latest information during a crisis, nor is it a full analysis. In this new category, I plan to include several small news which are relevant to what was discussed in the past or factoids/developments which might be discussed in a full analysis in the near future. I will include links to my sources only when I have them readily available, otherwise you will have to wait until my analyses to get the full sources. Note that this new category will appear under the “Saker Analyses and Interviews” section to give it maximal visibility. Finally, and just to make this clear, the regular rules of moderation will apply to this new section too. I hope that you will find this feature useful (by all means, let me know).
Cheers
PS: please feel free to also contribute short news items in the “short news update” section!
This is how the Soviet Forces left Afghanistan:
And this is how the “greatest military force in the Milky Way” left Afghanistan:
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has dismissed as “impossible” the EU’s suggestion to postpone the country’s December 6 election to meet the bloc’s conditions to dispatch an observer mission, blaming the idea on US pressure.
“It is impossible because there is a very clear constitutional mandate,” Maduro said Thursday in a nationally televised address. “We want to have a good relationship with the European Union, but Washington does not let them.”
Maduro has repeatedly maintained that the administration of hawkish US President Donald Trump is persistently plotting to topple his government in a coup to seize control of the oil-rich nation’s huge crude oil reserves.
Relations between Caracas and Washington have drastically deteriorated in recent years amid multiple efforts by the US government to impose sanctions on Venezuela’s state oil company and other industries in its bid to destabilize the country.
Venezuela’s constitution requires a new poll every five years while US-backed opposition parties have vowed to boycott the election.
European and Latin American ministers in the International Contact Group (ICG) declared after their video conference on Thursday that conditions were not ripe to send observers to Venezuela’s parliamentary elections next December.
“ICG members concluded that conditions are not met, at the moment, for a transparent, inclusive, free and fair electoral process,” the group announced in a statement following the conference chaired by EU’s top diplomat Josep Borrell.
The ICG groups European countries including Britain, France, Germany, Spain and Italy as well as a number of Latin American countries. Argentina is back in the group while Bolivia has left it.
Venezuelan Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza invited observers from the United Nations and the European Union, in letters addressed to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and Borrell early this month, to monitor the upcoming parliamentary elections in the country.
In the letters, Arreaza outlined “the broad electoral guarantees agreed for the upcoming parliamentary elections.”
Maduro pardoned over 100 legislators and associates of US-sponsored opposition figure Juan Guaido to promote national reconciliation ahead of the congressional elections in December.
Guaido pushed Venezuela into political turmoil by dismissing the results of the 2018 presidential election after Maduro won nearly 70 percent of the votes. The opposition figure declared himself “interim president” of Venezuela in January last year and later launched a US-backed abortive coup to oust Maduro’s elected government.
Source: Agecnies
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