Russia sells Syria weapons and has its only military base outside the former Soviet Union in the Syrian port of Tartus.

“The Russian government is not only unapologetically arming a government that is killing its own people, but also providing it with diplomatic cover,” Philippe Bolopion, UN director at Human Rights Watch in New York, said after the UN vote.

Russia’s alignment with Syria may put at stake the country’s relationship with oil-rich Gulf States led by Qatar that asked the Security Council to endorse their plan to convince Assad to delegate his powers to a deputy to pave way for elections.

“The Russians are doing this to help preserve their navy base in Tartus, their arms trade with Syria and their strategic position in the Eastern Mediterranean,” Sullivan said. “In the end Russia will lose its base. Russia has also in many ways lost the Arabs on this.”

"SCENES OF HORROR" = Syria = Middle East

Scratch the surface of any Middle Eastern nation and you will find scenes of horror.  Syria is merely capturing our attention today.  But change comes by cutting one piece of cancer at a time from the body human...

The mission hit more trouble when one monitor accused Syria of war crimes, saying the mission was a "farce," a day after the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations said a U.N. official had told the Security Council the killings had gathered pace since the monitors arrived.



The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said four people had been killed in Kafr Nabouda, in Hama province, where troops staging raids fought army deserters. The British-based group put Tuesday's civilian death toll at 27, including 15 in the city of Deir al-Zor and 10 in Homs, plus four army defectors.


The Arab League monitor, Anwar Malek, said he had resigned because the mission was powerless to prevent what he said were the "scenes of horror" he had seen in the restive city of Homs.


"The mission was a farce and the observers have been fooled," the Algerian told Al Jazeera English television. "The regime orchestrated it and fabricated most of what we saw to stop the Arab League from taking action against the regime ...

"The regime isn't committing one war crime but a series of crimes against its people," he added.

Bahrain: Police deny torturing human rights activist... claim he merely triped and fell...(next they'll claim he did it in the shower)

The United States called on its ally Bahrain on Saturday to investigate the case of a prominent Bahraini human rights activist who the opposition says was beaten by security forces.



Opposition activists said several security officers threw Nabeel Rajab, head of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights, to the ground and beat him on the head, neck and back after a protest march on Friday.

Bahrain's Interior Ministry has denied those accounts.


The Sunni-led island kingdom, home to the U.S. Fifth Fleet, last year sought to crush anti-government demonstrations mounted by the country's Shi'ite Muslim majority. Protest marches have continued in recent months, sometimes turning violent.

Officials from the U.S. embassy in Manama met for about an hour on Saturday with Rajab, who had a cut beneath one eye and bruising on his face, a senior U.S. official told Reuters on condition of anonymity.


"The United States is deeply concerned by continuing incidents of violence in Bahrain between police and demonstrators," State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said in a written statement.

Syria one step closer to civil war.

An Arab League advisory body called on Sunday for the immediate withdrawal of the organization's monitoring mission in Syria, saying it was allowing Damascus to cover up continued violence and abuses.



The Arab League has sent a small team to Syria to check whether President Bashar al-Assad is keeping his promise to end a crackdown on a nine-month uprising against his rule.

The observer mission has already stirred controversy. Rights groups have reported continued deaths in clashes and tens of thousands of protesters have taken to the streets to show the observers the extent of their anger.


The Arab Parliament, an 88-member advisory committee of delegates from each of the League's member states, on Sunday said the violence was continuing to claim many victims.

"For this to happen in the presence of Arab monitors has roused the anger of Arab people and negates the purpose of sending a fact-finding mission," the organization's chairman Ali al-Salem al-Dekbas said.

"This is giving the Syrian regime an Arab cover for continuing its inhumane actions under the eyes and ears of the Arab League," he said.


The Arab Parliament was the first body to recommend freezing Syria's membership in the organization in response to Assad's crackdown.

Syria next unavoidable step = civil war...

Syria is at risk of civil war or foreign intervention if the mission can’t end the unrest, said Burhan Ghalioun, leader of the Syrian National Council, the umbrella opposition group that seeks to topple Assad. In Homs, 70,000 people rallied Dec. 26 and 50,000 marched in Duma yesterday, Merei said.

The delegation is getting the “needed cooperation” from all sides, including Syrian government, the Arab League said today in an e- mailed statement.

Funny how all the radical Islamic countries have oil....could it be that the Mullahs & Imans like money too...all in the name of Allah/GOD/Ra/Yaweh/Krishna/Zeus of course

Islamist militants set off bombs across Nigeria on Christmas Day - three targeting churches including one that killed at least 27 people - raising fears that they are trying to ignite sectarian civil war.



The Boko Haram Islamist sect, which aims to impose sharia law across the country, claimed responsibility for the three church bombs, the second Christmas in a row the group has caused mass carnage with deadly bombings of churches. Security forces also blamed the sect for two other blasts in the north.



St Theresa's Catholic Church in Madala, a satellite town about 40 km (25 miles) from the center of the capital Abuja, was packed when the bomb exploded just outside.


"We were in the church with my family when we heard the explosion. I just ran out," Timothy Onyekwere told Reuters. "Now I don't even know where my children or my wife are. I don't know how many were killed but there were many dead."


Hours after the first bomb, blasts were reported at the Mountain of Fire and Miracles Church in the central, ethnically and religiously mixed town of Jos, and at a church in northern Yobe state at the town of Gadaka. Residents said many were wounded in Gadaka, but there were no immediate further details.


A suicide bomber killed four security officials at the State Security Service in one of the other bombs, which struck the northeastern town of Damaturu, police said. Residents heard two loud explosions and gunfire in the town.

A Reuters reporter at the church near Abuja saw the front roof had been destroyed, as had several houses nearby. Five burnt out cars were still smouldering. There were scenes of chaos, as shocked residents stared at the wreckage in disbelief.


"Mass just ended and people were rushing out of the church and suddenly I heard a loud sound: 'Gbam!' Cars were in flames and bodies littered everywhere," Nnana Nwachukwu told Reuters.

Father Christopher Barde, Assistant priest of the church, said: "The officials who counted told me they have picked up 27 bodies so far."


Police cordoned off the area around the church. Thousands of furious youths set up burning road blocks on the highway from Abuja leading to Nigeria's largely Muslim north.


Police and the military tried to disperse them by firing live rounds into the air with tear gas.

"We are so angry," shouted Kingsley Ukpabi, as a queue of hooting vehicles lined up behind his flaming barrage.

Iraq War Closed but Let's not forget...the 4,500 Americans who did not need to die!! The 30,000 Americans who did not need to be wounded and the 100,000 dead Iraqis...WOW

This month, nearly all U.S. troops in Iraq will come home — except, of course, for the 4,500 who died there.



George W. Bush and Dick Cheney launched the Iraq war in March 2003 based on lies and misinformation. Soon it turned into a brutal occupation. Besides the 4,500 troops killed, more than 30,000 Americans were wounded, and at least 100,000 Iraqis were killed, most of them civilians.

The war cost us more than $1 trillion, while the cost to our international relations and our own democracy is immeasurable. Think of the words that Bush and Cheney have added to our lexicon: Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib, extraordinary rendition, Blackwater, WMD, Halliburton, waterboarding and more.


Bush and Cheney now boast about their misdeeds in this misbegotten war.

Massacre by US Forces of Civilians at Haditha, Iraq…… ”Mission Accomplished,” said George W Bush

Iraqi civilians were being killed all the time. Maj. Gen. Steve Johnson, the commander of American forces in Anbar Province, in his own testimony, described it as “a cost of doing business.”
The documents — many marked secret — form part of the military’s own internal investigation, and co  nfirm much of what happened at Haditha, a Euphrates River town where Marines killed Iraqis, including a 76-year-old man in a wheelchair, women and children, some just toddlers.

The stress of combat left some soldiers paralyzed, the testimony shows. Troops, traumatized by the rising violence and feeling constantly under siege, grew increasingly twitchy, killing more and more civilians in accidental encounters. Others became so desensitized and inured to the killing that they fired on Iraqi civilians deliberately while their fellow soldiers snapped pictures, and were court-martialed. The bodies piled up at a time when the war had gone horribly wrong.

That sense of American impunity ultimately poisoned any chance for American forces to remain in Iraq, because the Iraqis would not let them stay without being subject to Iraqi laws and courts, a condition the White House could not accept.

The military said it did not know from which investigation the documents had come, but the papers appear to be from an inquiry by Maj. Gen. Eldon Bargewell into the events in Haditha. The documents ultimately led to a report that concluded that the Marine Corps’s chain of command engaged in “willful negligence” in failing to investigate the episode and that Marine commanders were far too willing to tolerate civilian casualties.

Many of those testifying at bases in Iraq or back in the United States were clearly in the hot seat for not investigating an atrocity and may have tried to shape their statements to dispel any notion that they had sought to cover up the events.

One enlisted Marine testified: “I had Marines shoot children in cars…” The documents uncovered by The Times — which include handwritten notes from soldiers, waivers by Marines of their right against self-incrimination, diagrams of where dead women and children were found.

UAE Bloggers for Democratci Change sentenced to prison for 2-3 years

The five-month-long trial of the activists has been seen as a gauge of how the Gulf state, the world’s No. 3 oil exporter, with no tradition of organised political protest, responds to hints of political dissidence in the aftermath of the Arab Spring uprisings.



Ahmed Mansoor, a communications engineer and poet, was the main defendant, accused of running a website that gave the other defendants a venue to express anti-government views. He was sentenced to three years in jail.


“The website included insults that diminished the standing of His Highness the president and His Highness the vice president,” the state prosecutor said in October when he presented his case, without specifying the insults.


The other four – Nasser bin Ghaith, Fahad Salim Dalk, Hassan Ali al-Khamis and Ahmed Abdul Khaleq – were sentenced to two years.


The court also ordered the closure of the website. The five, who were arrested in April for urging public protest and disrupting public order, had been on trial since June.


The five have been on hunger strike for almost two weeks, lawyers and relatives said.


“Their health is deteriorating and they lost a lot of weight,” Mohammed al-Roken, one of two lawyers defending the five activists, told reporters. “But I don’t know if they will continue or not.”

One of the defendants had written an essay describing that approach as buying off citizens to avoid political reform.


Prosecutors also said in October one of the activists published a petition urging a boycott of elections in September for half of a 40-seat consultative council. Prosecutors said they had evidence the defendants incited citizens to “breach public order and stage demonstrations against the state”.


Three rights groups, including Human Rights Watch (HRW), accused the UAE government last week of failing to investigate what they described as a campaign of death threats, slander and intimidation against the five.

dICTATORS FOR DEMOCRACY = GET REAL!!!

KUWAIT CITY  — Kuwait media report that authorities have issued nearly 50 arrest warrants in connection with a protest mob that stormed parliament earlier this month.



The Kuwait Times reports Thursday that defense lawyers expect even more arrests linked to the Nov. 16 storming by dozens of protesters, angered by allegations of high-level corruption against government officials.

Kuwait's ruler has ordered tighter security measures across the oil-rich state.


The parliament melee came as opposition lawmakers called for the prime minister to be questioned over accusations that officials transferred state funds to bank accounts outside the country. The motion failed, but another attempt is expected next week.

It’s time for a 21st-century abolitionist movement in the U.S. and around the world.

Srey Pov’s family sold her to a brothel when she was 6 years old. She was unaware of sex but soon found out: A Western pedophile purchased her virginity, she said, and the brothel tied her naked and spread-eagled on a bed so that he could rape her.


“I was so scared,” she recalled. “I was crying and asking, ‘Why are you doing this to me?’ ”

After that, the girl was in huge demand because she was so young. Some 20 customers raped her nightly, she remembers. And the brothel twice stitched her vagina closed so that she could be resold as a virgin. This agonizingly painful practice is common in Asian brothels, where customers sometimes pay hundreds of dollars to rape a virgin.

Most girls who have been trafficked, whether in New York or in Cambodia, eventually surrender. They are degraded and terrified, and they doubt their families or society will accept them again. But somehow Srey Pov refused to give in.

Repeatedly, she tried to escape the brothel but she said that each time she was caught and brutally punished with beatings and electric shocks. The brothel, like many in Cambodia, also had a punishment cell to break the will of rebellious girls.

As Srey Pov remembers it (and other girls tell similar stories), each time she rebelled she was locked naked in the darkness in a barrel half-full of sewage, replete with vermin and scorpions that stung her regularly. I asked how long she was punished this way, thinking perhaps an hour or two.

“The longest?” she remembered. “It was a week.”

Yet this is a story with a triumphant ending. At age 9, Srey Pov was able to dart away from the brothel and outrun the guard. She found her way to a shelter run by Somaly Mam, an anti-trafficking activist who herself was prostituted as a child. Somaly now runs the Somaly Mam Foundation to fight human trafficking in Southeast Asia

In Somaly’s shelter, Srey Pov learned English and blossomed. Now 19, Srey Pov can even imagine eventually having a boyfriend.

Srey Pov, Lithiya and Somaly encountered a form of oppression that echoes 19th-century slavery. But the scale is larger today. By my calculations, at least 10 times as many girls are now trafficked into brothels annually as African slaves were transported to the New World in the peak years of the trans-Atlantic slave trade.


So for those of you doubtful that “modern slavery” really is an issue for the new international agenda, think of Srey Pov — and multiply her by millions. If what such girls experience isn’t slavery, that word has no meaning. It’s time for a 21st-century abolitionist movement in the U.S. and around the world.

Trying to define Bravery, learn about these three 'peaceful' Freedom Fighters

Jabbar Savalan was jailed after calling for protests against the Azerbaijan government on Facebook.


A day after posting a Facebook message calling for protests against the government, Jabbar Savalan was brought to a police station for questioning. Police conveniently "discovered" marijuana in his outer coat pocket, and after reportedly hitting and intimidating Jabbar without a lawyer present, they coerced him into signing a confession. Jabbar maintains he does not use drugs and that the marijuana was planted on him. Authorities in Azerbaijan have a history of using trumped-up drug charges to jail those seen as critical of the government. Amnesty International believes the charges against Jabbar were fabricated, and considers him a prisoner of conscience.

Behareh Hedayat and Majid Tavakkoli

Iran
Behareh Hedayat and Majid Tavakkoli are serving long prison sentences for seeking for greater freedom in Iran. Majid was arrested and reportedly beaten by authorities in December 2009, after addressing a university rally in Tehran. Behareh was arrested later that month and charged with several offenses, including "insulting the leader" and "insulting the president." The two student leaders last year issued a joint statement from prison, encouraging others to continue to push for change in Iran. In response, authorities extended each of their prison sentences by another six months.

UAE Sign an on-line petition and death by bunga bunga!!!! (Get Real!!!)

Five pro-democracy activists on trial in the United Arab Emirates returned to court yesterday, two days after the oil-rich Gulf nation held elections for an advisory council that wields no power.

The activists, including a blogger and an academic, were detained in April after they signed an online petition demanding constitutional changes and free elections.
They were charged in July with insulting the country's rulers and using an online
forum to conspire against the state.

Among the five, all of whom have pleaded not guilty, are blogger Ahmed Mansour and economics professor Nasser bin Ghaith, who lectured at the Abu Dhabi branch of Paris's Sorbonne university.

The five activists briefly attended yesterday's closed-door proceedings in Abu Dhabi's Federal Supreme Court.

Four of the defendants, including Mansour and bin Ghaith, walked out of the courtroom after the judges refused to consider their demand to open the hearing to the public and release them from custody on bail.

Political activity is severely restricted in the UAE, an alliance of seven semi-autonomous states, each ruled by a hereditary sheikh. There are no official opposition groups and political parties are banned.

UAE: Kenyan workers murdered, raped and abused

The Kenya National Commission on Human Rights (KNCHR) has strongly condemned gross violation of human rights of immigrant workers by their employers especially in the UAE.


KNCHR commissioner Omar Hassan said that gross violations such as murder and racism will not be condoned.

Hassan said that reports on violations have been on the increase as over 400 Kenyans from United Arab Emirates (UAE) have been repatriated to Kenya over the last four months which is alarming.

The commissioner said that the report of the lady found murdered and stored in a freezer for two months is shocking and the matter should be addressed urgently.

Speaking at an immigrant workers forum in Mombasa, Hassan said that KNCHR was able to document around 70 statements during a fact finding mission recently.

Around 30,000 registered Kenyans work in the UAE, but the number may be more, said Commissioner Hassan, adding that the government should ensure rights of the citizens working in foreign lands is upheld.

The KNCHR commissioner noted that MUHURI (Muslims for Human Rights) has so far documented 25 cases and the organization will be used as the vocal point to collect information on such matters.

Hassan also recommended that the government vet all recruitment agencies and hold them accountable, and the suspects be charged in court and ordered to compensate victims.

A book must be the ax for the frozen sea within us. (Kafka)

Nobelprize.org


All countries in the world claim they are democracies with the exception of four countries!

-They are Vatican City, Saudi Arabia, Burma and Brunei

While the above 4 are not democracies; there are more than 100 countries that are not democratic.

Liu Xiaobo was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2010 for his 2 decade struggle for human rights in China. He was a leading author behind Charter 08, the manifesto of such rights in China which was published on the 60th anniversary of the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the 10th of December 2008.

In 2009, Liu was sentenced to 11 years in prison! His crime….wielding a pen tied to thoughts.

UAE Unlawful Arrest

The ongoing ordeal of a U.S. businessman who has been rotting in a Emirate’s jail for more than three years, deprived of his civil rights, should serve as a warning to Americans and Westerners alike doing business with Emirate’s, a constituent monarchy of United Arab Emirates (UAE).


Shahin, a U.S. citizen, is just one of many foreigners who make up 80-95% of Emirate’s's 2.3 million residents. Until his arrest, Shahin was CEO of Deyaar Realty, once Emirate’s's second largest real estate developer, which, like Emirate’s's entire real-estate sector, was hit hard by the global economic recession.

Shahin was arrested without warrant or indictment in March 2008. Sources familiar with the case reported that he was held incommunicado for over two weeks, while his house and office were ransacked and his documents confiscated. He was deprived of food, water, sleep and access to a toilet for days. The brutality inflicted on Shahin caused his poor health to worsen, requiring him to undergo two major surgeries. After thirteen months he was charged with bribery, fraud and embezzlement

Shahin was forced to sign documents he did not understand, because of threats that his wife will be jailed and his children will be sent to a shelter. When finally "released" on bail, Shahin was promptly rearrested on newly trumped-up charges and still languishes in jail. Meanwhile, the Emirate’s government and its autocratic ruling family have ignored entreaties by the State Department, the U.S. Ambassador and members of Congress to discuss Shahin's plight. A letter from Senator Sherrod Brown (D-OH) to UAE's Ambassador asking him to intervene to ensure Shahin's health and safety while in prison remains unanswered nearly two years since it was delivered.

Shahin's Kafkaesque detention is not unusual in Emirate’s, where a growing number of foreigners are being subjected to the country's arcane Islamic legal codes and stripped of Western consideration for civil and human rights. The U.S. Department of State 2009 Human Rights Report for U.A.E., states: "while the constitution prohibits arbitrary arrest and detention... there were reports that the government held persons in official custody without charge or a preliminary judicial hearing...[and] There were also reports of prison guard brutality." Moreover, the report notes: "court decisions remained subject to review by the political leadership."

Other victimized foreigners are Canadians Karen and Daniel Andrews. The husband, Daniel, a senior executive at a multinational company, was lured to Emirate’s in 2005 by the promise of "paradise in the desert." They had a rude awaking when they lost everything. In a sobering account in The Independent, in April 2009, on "The Dark Side of Emirate’s," Karen noted, "The thing you have to understand about Emirate’s is -- nothing is what it seems. Nothing. This isn't a city, it's a con-job. They lure you in telling you it's one thing -- a modern kind of place -- but beneath the surface it's a medieval dictatorship."

These accounts are far from revealing the full array of substantive and procedural violations of due process and of basic decency Emirate’s has perpetrated on Shahin, the Andrews, and many other foreigners. Lured by the glitzy façade, Westerners have not been contemplating the Emirate's lack of transparency and its growing abuse of foreigners.

The number of foreign businessmen detained in Emirate’s is unknown, as the local authorities do not release such information. But media reports from Europe, the U.S., and other countries that supply the bankers, businessmen, engineers and others who labor to further Emirate’s's riches, reveal that such arrests have spiked since the Emirate's economic bubble burst in 2008. Foreigners should be especially wary, as Emirate’s's banking and economy are still on the decline, contrary to repeated assurances from local officials.

Still, Emirate’s's Western trappings and its well-crafted façade of the golden city in the desert continue to lure foreigners. But like every Arabian Desert mirage, many wake up with a mouthful of sand, and their life in shambles.

Ramadan TV soap operas: Now starring former dictator and torturer Hosni “Ozymandias” Mubarak of EGYPT

Mubarak appeared inside the courtroom in a caged defendants' box, along with his sons, Gamal and Alaa, who face corruption charges.

Mubarak, who is charged with conspiring in killing of protesters and abusing his power to amass wealth, answered, "present", when the judge called his name.

Hundreds of riot police stood guard outside the court surrounded by those demanding that Mubarak be held responsible for those killed in the final weeks of his rule.

Defence lawyers have called for hundreds of witnesses to testify in the case, including the head of Egypt's ruling military council, Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi, who was Mubarak's defence minister for two decades.

Tantawi's possible testimony on the former president's role in trying to suppress the 18-day uprising, in which about 850 people were killed, is considered critical by many to the outcome of the case.

"Tantawi's testimony would help the court determine whether Mubarak gave orders to interior minister Habib al-Adly to fire at protesters or whether Adly was acting independently," said one member of the defence team, who asked not to be named.

Lawyers for the families of those killed have also demanded Tantawi testify in the trial.

"The defence team sees Tantawi as a compurgator, or a witness whose testimony would exonerate Mubarak," another lawyer handling the case said.

"The plaintiffs' lawyers, however, expect him to testify that he received orders to fire, which is necessary to convict Mubarak."

Meanwhile, Mubarak laid on the stretcher looking composed and stern, with hands clasped over his chest.

Amr Shalakany, a professor at Cairo University's law school, said the trial scenes were a "circus" full of drama often seen on "Ramadan TV soap operas".

"One, he does not look that sick and the whole stretcher business is once again, like what you see on Ramadan TV soap operas," Shalakany told Al Jazeera.

"[Mubarak's] hair is being dyed black, which doesn't indicate any kind of deep depression that he has said he suffers from.

"His facial expressions are those of not just defiance but fundamentally looking down at the entire process."

Mubarak made his first court appearance on August 3 in a case that has gripped the Arab world.

The first Arab head of state to stand trial in person since popular uprisings swept the Middle East, the former air force commander faces charges that could carry the death penalty.

Mind control?… do you mind? I mind!

The suppression of human rights – when will the governments get a clue?

According to researchers from Citizen Lab, a web censorship watchdog at the Munk School of Global Affairs, at the University of Toronto, Netsweeper currently provides filtering tools to state-owned telecommunications companies in Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Yemen.

All three clients use the software to block political, religious and same-sex content, Citizen Lab has reported. In its promotional material, Netsweeper boasts it can block websites “based on social, religious or political ideals.”

Reporters Without Borders currently ranks Yemen 170th out of 178 countries listed according to severity of internet censorship.

Two of Netsweeper’s other clients, Qtel and du, provide internet services in Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, which are ranked 87th and 121st on the same list.

In the U.A.E, the ongoing trial of Ahmed Mansoor, a blogger and human rights advocate, and four other pro-democracy activists, has drawn condemnations from Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International.

Netsweeper refuses to address allegations its products are being used to suppress free speech abroad.

Sites blocked by Netsweeper clients

Qatar:

Arabtimes.com, a U.S.-based political satire website

Qatarsucks.com, a news site critical of human rights standards in Qatar

Secularislam.org, the website for the U.S.-based Institute for the Secularization of Islamic society

Islamreview.com, a site that offers critical review of Islam

Glas.org, official website for the Gay and Lesbian Arabic Society, an organization for gays and lesbians of Arab descent or those living in Arab countries.

Tumblr.com, one of the world’s most popular blog sites

U.A.E.:

Arabtimes.com, a U.S.-based political satire website

Localnewsuae.com, a news website in the U.A.E.

Uaehewar.net/Forums, a popular discussion forum known as a hangout for U.A.E. opposition writers

Sites showing non-erotic gay and lesbian content

Tumblr.com, one of the world’s most popular blog sites

Yemen:

Tumblr.com, one of the world’s most popular blog sites

Jilliancyork.com, the personal website of OpenNet Initiative researcher Jillian C. York

Iran: You overthrew the Shah because of human rights violations; and now???

Iran has executed an average of almost two people a day in the first six months of this year.
A disturbing video of the public execution of three men in Iran has sparked anger among human rights activists.

The graphic video, released by Amnesty International on Thursday, showed guards standing on top of buses draping ropes around necks of three convicts sentenced to death by hanging after being convicted. The men were later hanged from an overhead bridge after the vehicles drove away.

The executions, which took place on 19 July in the western city of Kermanshah, home to Iran's Kurd minority, attracted significant crowds, including children. Some of the crowds appear to be filming hangings by mobile phones. Many of the people in the crowds are forced to attend and cheer support or risk being ‘listed’ by internal security forces as anarchists. In all cases, family and friends of those hanged must cheer in support. If there is a show of sorrow or anger, then they too make the anarchist list.

The video, which was supplied to Amnesty by an Iranian human rights activist, Fazel Hawramy from kurdishblogger.com, highlights the use of public executions, in which officials publicly hang convicts from a large crane or a high place in front of crowds.

"What is so alarming about this video is the apparent normality of the event. Thousands of people are watching as if it were a football match. People are shouting and cheering. But what is most shocking is the participation of children in this barbaric 'spectacle'," Hawramy said.

The release of the video follows human rights groups' alarm over the sharp escalation in capital punishment in Iran.

WORLD....the victims of these mass executions are murdered twice, the second by the silence and anonymity surrounding their executions, which robbed them of a meaningful and acknowledged death.

These people did in fact exist.  They deserve our oturage!

The Monarch who feared Doughnuts

Bahrain: (proposed Tourist Bureau advert): A small Gulf of Arabia (or is it Persia) state home to mass firings, arrests of peaceful dissidents, destruction of Shia mosques, torture of medics, and blackmailing schoolchildren. And “No” Doughnut giving either!!!!
For the first time in its history, Bahrain has embarked on mass military trials of hundreds of civilians on fatuous charges of crimes against the state. While more than 1,000 remain in detention, the opposition estimates that 400 are going through the process of military trials and 100 have been convicted so far. The swift summary justice churned out in these tribunals are a throwback to early 20th century Stalin show trials, designed to punish and humiliate dissenters.

The Shia’s call the Sunni’s dangerous. The Sunni’s call the Shia’s dangerous. Sounds remarkably like the historic Protestant-Catholic divide – and we Christians all know who is right!

Anyway – a pragmatic view of the world. The Iranian revolution (Shia) has failed to deliver any of its promises to its people. In fact, it’s making the Shah’s regime look like the banner child for Human Rights Watch. So let’s give the people some hope.

The West is working fine with Sunni and Shia regimes around the world. Why not Iran? Let’s get the religion thing off the table and keep the focus on constitutional democracy with a separation of executive, legislative and judicial branches of government. Not because it’s perfect but it’s less flawed than the despotism that plaques the Middle East.

If the USA wants a regime change in Iran support democratic reform for the Shia in Bahrain --- what a concept!!!

And realism…the world needs Iran! Iran, however, which has suffered from years of sanctions, is expected to struggle to increase oil supply and its capacity will fall below Iraq's, the IEA said. "An adverse investment climate sees Iranian crude capacity decline by 0.8 million bpd to 3.1 million bpd, falling below Iraq's capacity by 2014." As supplies rise more slowly than demand, OPEC's margin of surplus oil that can be quickly added to the market if needed is "uncomfortably thin" at around 3.3 million bpd.
Let’s not act like a doughnut soaked in coffee – i.e. flaky. Speaking of flaky how do we – the USA – think recalling Mr. Hood is a ballsy move? To catch you all up:

US is "recalling" Ludovic Hood, US diplomat, from Bahrain for the crime of Doughnut Giving!!!

During March, Bahraini protesters agitated for their rights in broad daylight outside the US embassy in Manama. They carried signs that said "Give me liberty or give me death" and "Stop supporting dictators". Ludovic Hood, a human rights specialist in the political section of the US embassy, offered doughnuts to the protesters - American hospitality at its finest. In response, a local cleric opined: "These sweets are a good gesture, but we hope it is translated into practical action."

What would that action look like? Three choices, I think “2” is what most Americans would agree is the right outcome:

1. US pressure on its ally, the Khalifa family-ruling the island kingdom of Bahrain to create jobs; or

2. USA & international community would use its leverage to force Bahrain's government to establish a true constitutional democracy, figurehead monarchy and create jobs for unemployed Shia citizens; or

3. Remove Khalifa.

But those protesters did not expect that, just two months later, Hood would be shipped back to the US from his post in Manama - prematurely, some say - after having been threatened on Bahraini pro-government websites.

US secretary of state Hillary Clinton, Hood's boss, reportedly complained to Bahrain's foreign minister in May about the threats.

The Bahraini government declined to comment on Hood's departure.

US state department and Bahraini opposition members have told Al Jazeera that Hood was "just doing his job".


Preserving good relations with the government allows the Fifth Naval Fleet to remain in Bahrain as a counter-balance to Iran across the Gulf.

But I ask who does that counterbalance serve best? Yes our Fleet would have to sail to a different port but Bahrain’s ruler would have to worry about a regime change if Iran moves in. He and his family would be picking out real estate in Mayfair, London.

In short, Bahrain needs the USA far more than the USA needs Bahrain….let’s act that way.

Compromising American values for American’s is not an option. The cloud of diplomacy is an easy distraction to our moral compass – recalibrate!!!

US policy cannot be tied to a specific administration in a foreign country; it must be driven by US and Global Citizen interests (Human Rights). The US is the order state for the globe. What rights many citizens have around the world have been driven in part because of the model (however imperfect) the US and Western democracies represent to people’s around the planet who lack rule of law and a right to fair and equal representation in their government.

The Fifth Fleet provides security not only of the oil consuming nations of the world but also the producing nations of the Arabian/Persian Gulf. The Fifth Fleet carries the hope of civilization that can only be achieved by the US & the West standing behind the Truths “We Hold To Be Self Evident.”

Someday soon we made be joined by the vibrant democracies that flower from Iraq and the Arab Spring…