Posts Tagged ‘Nobel Peace Prize’
Sunday, June 13th, 2010
Tags: barry mason, Censoring, Council, Debunked, dim prospects, ground, Israeli Jets, Murray Dobbin, Myths, Nobel Peace Prize, order, Ott, Proposal, russian diplomacy, russian peacekeepers, Sanctions, security council resolution, shower posse, thomas moriarty, video Posted in research | No Comments »
Add this post to Del.icio.us - Digg
Monday, April 12th, 2010
by Yvonne Ridley
Global Research, April 12, 2010
Cage Prisoners – 2010-04-11
The United States of America has reached a new level in its discredited War on Terror just when we thought it could not sink any lower.
And what makes this even more tragic is that the new depths being plumbed are on the express orders of Barack Obama … a US President who promised the world so much and has delivered on so little.
That he is a Nobel Peace Prize recipient makes this all the more shocking.
President Obama has authorized the assassination of a Muslim scholar by the name of Anwar al-Awlaki. But what is really breath-taking is that Al-Awlaki is an American citizen, born in Las Cruces in the state of New Mexico of Yemeni parents.
He has now become the first US citizen placed on a targetted killing list. His nationality should not really be an issue because in the eyes of most right minded people extra-judicial killing is wrong, it is an action which puts the killer above the law – and no one, not even the President of the United States should think himself above the law.
Wasn’t Obama supposed to be more principled than his predecessor?
I can almost hear the laughter ringing out loud from the Texan village of Crawford now that its idiot has been returned.
George W Bush brought us the War on Terror and during a bloody decade he brought us a new language with words like rendition and waterboarding becoming commonplace.
He quickly squandered the good will of the rest of the world after the horrific events of 9/11 by carpet bombing freedoms and liberties along with hundreds of thousands of innocent men, women and children who got in the way of his military in Iraq and Afghanistan.
When he left the White House it marked the end of an era and those of us who believe in equality, justice and human rights for all breathed a sigh of relief.
A new man was at the helm … a man who promised transparency, the closure of Guantanamo and an end to torture among many other things.
Yes, we all placed our trust in the new man sitting in the Oval Office. He had, after all, come from an honourable background as an ambitious civil rights lawyer. Such a man would have convulsed at the thought of anyone imposing an extra-judicial death penalties on anyone, let alone a US citizen who hasn’t had the chance of a trial.
What happened to that lawyer? On his journey to Washington what changed in him that he could squander the freedoms and liberties as set out in the American Constitution?
Surely the correct and honourable way of dealing with Imam Anwar al Awlaki would be to charge him in his absence and then ask the Yemeni government to arrest him and extradite him. This is the legal thing to do, this is the right thing to do and it is the civilized thing to do.
I have read rumours that al Awlaki is supposed to be an al-Qaida recruiter but like all of these rumours they are short on fact and evidence. I know that he has inspired a generation of converts around the world by his tapes. I have listened to one series and I can tell you that those tapes sound completely different to the ones released on the web today.
But I digress – we are not putting him on a trial by media for the truth is none of us has any concrete evidence although there’s lots of hearesay in the usual minor league blogs and chatrooms.
If the evidence was out there, he would have been charged – and extradited. The Yemeni authorities did have him locked away at the request of the US for a some time in 2007.
So we are now entering the world of secret evidence … a process so flawed and discredited in Britain already although there are still men in British jails who are being held without trial or charge because of it.
Could it be that Obama has simply signed off the Imam’s execution because there isn’t enough solid evidence to indict him and he doesn’t want to go down the embarrassing route of opening yet another Guantanamo?
And it seems he has signed off the order in the same casual manner that Bill Clinton signed off permission for the bombing of the aspirin factory in Khartoum, Sudan.
Who remembers that one? I’ve walked through the rubble of that factory where a night watchman, a family man, paid the ultimate price for merely doing his job.
Clinton boasted to the world that US missiles had taken out an al-Qaida chemicals factory. There’s that noun again al-Qaida … which has essentially become a rubber stamp for the US doing whatever it likes.
Call it al-Qaida and no one will ask questions.
Yes, it seems the rules of the game are changing yet again, but what makes it more sinister is that the rules are now being written by an intelligent lawyer and not some monsyllabic Republican with the IQ of a baked bean.
The President’s men will no doubt justify the assassination of al-Awlaki by claiming that international law allows the killing of individuals who pose an imminent threat to a country.
You see, when it suits, international law is cited even though the US has run rough shod over it with alarming regularity since 9/11. However, I believe it is debatable if such an assassination would be legitimate under international law and it is certainly not permissible under the US Constitution.
Both the Sixth and 14th Amendments clearly require due process of law. The Fifth Amendment includes this: “No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger . .”
Apart from those ordinary decent Americans who will be appalled at what is being done in their name, what sort of message will Obama’s actions send to the rest of the world?
Islam Karimov, a leader who routinely boils alive pious Muslims in vats of scalding water, has already justified the work of those who torture for the Uzbekistan state by citing the actions of the Bush torturers and interrogators from Bagram, Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo.
The US President has, like Islam Karimov and other vile little tinpot dictators, set himself above the law and the American courts can not do a thing because judges will never be called upon to decide if such an extra-judicial killing is legal or not. Why? Because as I write this, al-Awlaki has not been indicted and charged and most certainly never will be.
And just in case you’re in any doubt that the US President has signed off his death warrant without realizing the full consequences, a few weeks ago Dennis Blair, the director of national intelligence told a congressional panel that there were certain counterterrorism cases that could involve killing an American citizen.
Then he emphasized that it would require a special process through the National Security Council — for safeguards after saying: "We take direct actions against terrorists in the intelligence community. If we think that direct action will involve killing an American, we get specific permission to do that."
For decades, the CIA was suspected of covertly plotting political assassinations, but the practice was stopped by President Gerald Ford.
No one would have been really surprised had George W Bush resurrected such a policy but the fact that the Obama Administration has just sanctioned state sponsored assassinations has left some human rights groups reeling.
This is not about the rights and wrongs of the alleged actions of some Muslim cleric in Yemen this has far wider repercussions like the moral issue of political assassination as official US policy for dealing with those perceived to be enemies.
Now that Obama has decided to dispense with judge and jury he is returning the US to the days of the Wild West … which could make him more of a cowboy president than Bush ever was.
British journalist and author Yvonne Ridley is also a patron of the London-based human rights NGO Cageprisoners – www.cageprisoners.com
Yvonne Ridley is a frequent contributor to Global Research. Global Research Articles by Yvonne Ridley
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=18621
Tags: Afghanistan, Al-Awlaki, American Citizen, anwar al awlaki, Bill Clinton, Britain, carpet bombing, citizen, Clinton, Crawford, evidence, George W Bush, Horrific Events, innocent men women, Iraq, Khartoum, Killing, Law, Lawyer, Man, mexico, muslim scholar, new, Nobel Peace Prize, President Obama, Qaida, state of new mexico, Sudan, trial, United States, United States Of America, US, Washington, world, Yemeni, yvonne ridley, Yvonne Ridley Global Posted in The soon to be former USA, nation, the former republic that was America, war, world | No Comments »
Add this post to Del.icio.us - Digg
Friday, April 2nd, 2010
Best of the Web: Arctic Sea Ice about to hit ‘normal’ – what will the news say?
Steven Goddard & Anthony Watts
Watts Up With That?
Wed, 31 Mar 2010 11:30 EDT
Melted by 2013? At this rate it’ll cover all North America and Europe
Forecasting The NSIDC News
Barring an about face by nature or adjustments, it appears that for the first time since 2001, Arctic Sea ice will hit the "normal" line as defined by the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) for this time of year.
NSIDC puts out an article about once a month called the Sea Ice News. It generally highlights any bad news they can find about the disappearance of Arctic ice. Last month’s news led with this sentence.
In February, Arctic sea ice extent continued to track below the average, and near the levels observed for February 2007.
But March brought good news for the Polar Bears, and bad news for the Catlin Expedition and any others looking for bad news. Instead of ice extent declining through March like it usually does, it continued to increase through the month and is now at the high (so far) for the year.
If it keeps this trend unabated, in a day or two it will likely cross the "normal" line.
Read More…
Best of the Web: The Prince of Peace in His Bomber Jacket
Allen L Roland
People’s Voice
Wed, 31 Mar 2010 21:56 EDT
The prince of peace, Barack Obama poses in occupied Afghanistan for his obligatory warrior photo ~ dressed in his bomber jacket which fully reveals the hypocrisy of his recent and deeply tainted Nobel Peace prize.
As Holy Week unfolds in 2010 ~ we have the twin spectacles of the Vicar of Christ, Pope Benedict XVI, deservedly under attack for obstruction of justice while the Prince of Peace, Nobel Peace prize winner President Barack Obama, visiting illegally occupied Afghanistan in the dead of night for an on the run Photo Op with the troops ~ while posing in his macho bomber jacket. In essence, it was a six hour pro-war pep rally!
All we need is a Mission Accomplished Banner behind Obama to replicate the hypocrisy of the GW Bush Photo Op on May 1, 2003 on the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln where Bush declared that the Iraq war, which was also an illegal occupation and still continues today, was over.
Read More…
Best of the Web: CNN Loses Half Its Viewers In A Year As People Turn Away From Corporate Lies
Bill Cooper
New York Times
Mon, 29 Mar 2010 20:04 EDT
Time to wave goodbye to the television mind programming
CNN continued what has become a precipitous decline in ratings for its prime-time programs in the first quarter of 2010, with its main hosts losing almost half their viewers in a year.
The trend in news ratings for the first three months of this year is all up for one network, the Fox News Channel, which enjoyed its best quarter ever in ratings, and down for both MSNBC and CNN.
CNN had a slightly worse quarter in the fourth quarter of 2009, but the last three months have included compelling news events, like the earthquake in Haiti and the battle over health care, and CNN, which emphasizes its hard news coverage, was apparently unable to benefit.
The losses at CNN continued a pattern in place for much of the last year, as the network trailed its competitors in every prime-time hour. (CNN still easily beats MSNBC in the daytime hours, but those are less lucrative in advertising money, and both networks are far behind Fox News at all hours.)
 Read More…
Best of the Web: 911 Commissioner Bob Kerrey says 911 was a conspiracy 30 years in the making
islandonlinenews
Youtube
Tue, 09 Feb 2010 18:04 EST
911 Commissioner Bob Kerrey admits 911 was a conspiracy 30 years in the making
Read More…
Best of the Web: Sinéad O’Connor: The Pope’s Apology for Sex Abuse in Ireland Seems Hollow
Sinéad O’Connor
The Washington Post
Sun, 28 Mar 2010 06:00 EDT
Sinéad O’Connor, Irish singer and voice of conscience
When I was a child, Ireland was a Catholic theocracy. If a bishop came walking down the street, people would move to make a path for him. If a bishop attended a national sporting event, the team would kneel to kiss his ring. If someone made a mistake, instead of saying, "Nobody’s perfect," we said, "Ah sure, it could happen to a bishop."
The expression was more accurate than we knew. This month, Pope Benedict XVI wrote a pastoral letter of apology — of sorts — to Ireland to atone for decades of sexual abuse of minors by priests whom those children were supposed to trust. To many people in my homeland, the pope’s letter is an insult not only to our intelligence, but to our faith and to our country. To understand why, one must realize that we Irish endured a brutal brand of Catholicism that revolved around the humiliation of children.
I experienced this personally. When I was a young girl, my mother — an abusive, less-than-perfect parent — encouraged me to shoplift. After being caught once too often, I spent 18 months in An Grianán Training Centre, an institution in Dublin for girls with behavioral problems, at the recommendation of a social worker. An Grianán was one of the now-infamous church-sponsored "Magdalene laundries," which housed pregnant teenagers and uncooperative young women. We worked in the basement, washing priests’ clothes in sinks with cold water and bars of soap. We studied math and typing. We had limited contact with our families. We earned no wages. One of the nuns, at least, was kind to me and gave me my first guitar.
Read More…
Read More SOTT Focus / Read More Best of the Web
Latest World News
U.S. News
— More Recent News —
UK & Euro-Asian News
— More Recent News —
Around the World
— More Recent News —
Big Brother
— More Recent News —
Axis of Evil
— More Recent News —
Middle East Madness
— More Recent News —
Grand Theft Economics
— More Recent News —
The Living Planet
— More Recent News —
Health & Wellness
— More Recent News —
Science & Technology
— More Recent News —
Our Haunted Planet
- Australia: Bureau of Meteorology images show mysterious patterns on radar system
- US: Parent-teen give chase to star-shaped UFO over Stow, Ohio
- US: Triangle UFO hovers over Oregon for 20 minutes
- US: Florida couple questions green fireball under 1,500 feet: Meteor or UFO?
- US: ‘Giant metallic tube’ seems to shrink and disappear over Las Vegas, Nevada sky
- US: ‘Cluster of lights’ over Sanford, Maine, could be massive-size UFO
- US: Spherical UFO hovers 30 feet over railroad track at Rome, Georgia
- Orange balls of light seen over Enderby, Leicestershire, England
- Blue-white colored object over Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada
- Disk-shaped UFO hovers over field in Springfield, Illinois, USA
— More Recent News —
Don’t Panic! Lighten Up!
— More Recent News —
Tags: Afghanistan, america, Anthony Watts, arctic sea ice, Arizona, Barack Obama, Benedict XVI, bishop, Commissioner Bob Kerrey, Dublin, Fbi, Flashback, France, Gaza Strip, Haiti, India, Indiana, Iran, Iraq, Ireland, Israel, ist, Jamie, Jane, Jane Had, Japan, Jerusalem, Jihad, Laws New, letter, London, Lt. Col. Chris Gough, Magdalene, Male, Middle East, Moscow, news, Nobel Peace Prize, Nobel Peace Prize Winner, Ohio, Pakistan, peace nobel, Peace Prize Winner, pep rally, Pope, pope benedict xvi, Quot, Read More, Russia, sea ice extent, Sharif Mobley, South Kurils, terr, U.S., UK, US, Vatican, world Posted in research | No Comments »
Add this post to Del.icio.us - Digg
Thursday, March 4th, 2010
by Rannie Amiri
Global Research, March 4, 2010
“He [Vanunu] has written letters to us this year and last year also, where he stated explicitly that he did not want to be a candidate for the Nobel Peace Prize. The reason he gave was that Simon Peres had received the Nobel Peace Prize, and Peres he alleged was the father of the Israeli atomic bomb and he did not want to be associated with Peres in any way.” – Geir Lundestad, Director of the Norwegian Nobel Institute and Secretary of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, 24 February 2010.
For the first time in the history of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, a preemptive request to withdraw a nomination—by the nominee—was made.
It was revealed last week that in a letter to the Committee, Mordechai Vanunu had asked for his candidacy to be rescinded. It was unusual enough for Geir Lundestad to acknowledge that a nomination had even been received, let alone publicly disclose Vanunu’s request. But for Vanunu—a man who should have been awarded the Peace Prize long ago—it was in full keeping with the dignity, integrity and uncompromising nature of one to whom the world owes a great debt.
Mordechai Vanunu – more than just a whistleblower
Vanunu worked as a technician at Israel’s Dimona nuclear plant in the Negev Desert from 1976-1985. In a 1986 interview with The Sunday Times, he courageously exposed, for the first time, his country’s clandestine nuclear activity. A week prior to the interview’s publication, he was lured by a Mossad agent from London to Rome, where he was apprehended and whisked off to Israel. In secret proceedings, Vanunu stood trial for treason, was swiftly convicted, and sentenced to 18 years behind bars. He spent more than 11 of them in solitary confinement.
Vanunu was released from Ashkelon’s Shikma prison in April 2004, unapologetic and unrepentant. “I am proud and happy to do what I did,” he said.
As for enduring nearly two decades of incarceration?
“I said to the Shabak [Shin Bet], the Mossad, ‘you didn’t succeed to break me, you didn’t succeed to make me crazy.’”
Conditions of his parole prohibited him from speaking with journalists, supporters, or non-Israelis of any kind. He was restricted from travelling within the country and barred altogether from leaving it.
In 2007, Vanunu was found to be in violation of his parole, in part for attempting to travel from Jerusalem to Bethlehem, and it landed him in jail for another three months. Being a convert to Christianity and an advocate for Palestinian rights did not help his case, but only served to increase the scorn heaped upon him by his countrymen.
Although the term “whistleblower” is usually appended to Vanunu’s name, the description is weak and understated. He was more like the “siren” that alerted the world to Israel’s undeclared nuclear bombs and the introduction of weapons of mass destruction to the Middle East.
Shimon Peres – architect of Israel’s nuclear weapons program
In 1953, Israeli Prime Minister David Ben Gurion appointed a young Shimon Peres to become Director-General of the Ministry of Defense. Acting in this capacity, Peres helped draw up the 1956 Protocol of Sèvers (in the run-up to the British, French and Israeli attack on Suez). Those meetings led him to enlist France’s help in constructing the Negev Nuclear Research Center.
Peres’ critical involvement in developing Israel’s nuclear capability was detailed in “Shimon Peres – The Biography” by historian Michael Ben-Zohar. According to Reuters, “The book divulges new details of how Peres served as a behind-the-scenes architect of Israel’s military might, securing weapons secretly and buying an atomic reactor from France.”
It was specifically because Peres had pioneered Israel’s nuclear weapons program that Vanunu asked his name be taken off the list of Nobel candidates. He wanted no association with the alleged “dove,” who as foreign minister was the recipient of the 1994 Peace Prize along with Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Palestinian National Authority President Yasser Arafat.
Shimon Peres – apologist for a massacre
It was during Israel’s “Grapes of Wrath” campaign in Lebanon that the April 1996 Qana massacre took place. At a United Nations compound near the village of Qana, 800 Lebanese civilians had sought refuge from the fighting. Showing utter disregard for both the U.N. and the civilians they sheltered, the compound was shelled by the Israelis, killing 106 innocents and injuring more than 100.
Israel first said Hezbollah positions and not the U.N compound was their target (although they were aware of its exact coordinates). They later said the facility was inadvertently hit due to “incorrect targeting based on erroneous data” and the use of outdates maps (the ever-shifting explanations offered by the Israelis for a deliberate strike of a U.N. facility would later be repeated in the 2008-2009 Gaza War).
It was then Prime Minister Peres who finally justified the attack by blaming Hezbollah for it, using the tired, discredited, and oft-repeated “human shield” excuse (yet another tool used again by the Israel Defense Forces to rationalize the massacre of civilians in the Gaza War).
A subsequent U.N. investigation concluded it was unlikely that the shelling of the Qana compound was due to gross technical or procedural errors. An investigation conducted by Amnesty International found that the attack was “intentional and is condemned.” Human Rights Watch’s report similarly stated, “We have declared this a massacre that was intentional using very highly accurate missiles and explosives.”
What the Nobel Committee and Vanunu should do
As the person who exposed Israel’s nuclear weapons program, Vanunu’s conscientious, principled position of requesting his name be removed from consideration for the same Peace Prize won by the man who fathered it, is admirable.
The Nobel Committee should not only continue to consider Vanunu however, but award its Peace Prize to him, if for no other reason than to redeem itself as a body recognizing deeds, not hopes.
An ignominious spotlight would then shine on Israel for preventing Vanunu from traveling to Norway to accept it, although he would still likely decline the Prize. If permitted to hold a press conference, it would give Vanunu the opportunity to tell the world of Peres’ shameful role in introducing nuclear weapons to the Middle East, to talk of the massacre at Qana that occurred under his leadership, to speak about the war crimes committed in Gaza and of Israel’s brutal occupation of East Jerusalem and the West Bank.
It is time once again for the Siren to sound.
Rannie Amiri is an independent Middle East commentator. He may be reached at rbamiri@yahoo.com.
Rannie Amiri is a frequent contributor to Global Research. Global Research Articles by Rannie Amiri
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=17923
Tags: Bethlehem, committee, compound, Dimona, Director General, France, Geir, Israel, Jerusalem, LEBANON, London, Michael Ben-Zohar, Middle East, mordechai vanunu, Negev Desert, Nobel, Nobel Peace Prize, Norwegian, norwegian nobel committee, norwegian nobel institute, Peace, President Yasser Arafat, Prime Minister Peres, Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, Prize, qana, research, Rome, secret proceedings, shabak, shikma prison, Shimon Peres, Shin Bet, Simon Peres, solitary confinement, U.N-, Vanunu, year Posted in Humanity, Israel, activism, nation, world | No Comments »
Add this post to Del.icio.us - Digg
Friday, February 12th, 2010
The Jerusalem Post
Tue, 09 Feb 2010 14:47 EST
Wiesel speaks of petition against Ahmadinejad, signed by 50 Nobel laureates.
Auschwitz and Buchenwald survivor Eli Wiesel, 81, spoke out against both the Iranian regime and the Goldstone Report on Tuesday, in an interview with Army Radio.
The prolific author and 1986 Nobel Peace Prize laureate has put together a petition denouncing Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, signed by about 50 other Nobel prize winners, which will run as a full page advertisement in newspapers such as The New York Times.
"We’re sure that the president of Iran, the world’s No. 1 Holocaust denier, plans to destroy and annihilate the Jewish state, and bring disaster to the entire world," he said. "We plan to distribute the petition… so that it reaches as many people as possible."
Ahmadinejad is "dangerous because he openly claims that he wants to annihilate the State of Israel, to exterminate another six million Jews," Wiesel said.
"I wouldn’t cry if I heard that Ahmadinejad was assassinated," he quipped, calling the Iranian president "a pathological danger to world peace."
Wiesel also leveled fierce criticism at the Goldstone Report, which accuses both Israel and Hamas of war crimes and possible crimes against humanity.
"One thing is clear to me, that document was unnecessary," he said.
Of the report’s main author, South African jurist Richard Goldstone, Wiesel said, "That man has a good name, and I’ve known him for years… He should have refused to head the committee, because of the anti-Israel mandate under which it was established."
"I can’t believe that Israeli soldiers murdered people or shot children. It just can’t be, and Goldstone certainly should have thought twice before taking a role in such a body," Wiesel said.
http://www.sott.net/articles/show/202846-I-Can-t-Believe-that-Israeli-Soldiers-Murdered-People-or-Shot-Children-
Tags: Ahmadinejad, author, eli wiesel, Hamas, holocaust denier, Iran, iranian president mahmoud, iranian president mahmoud ahmadinejad, Israel, Jerusalem, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Nobel, nobel laureates, Nobel Peace Prize, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, nobel prize winners, Peace, petition, President, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Quot, report, Richard Goldstone, Wiesel, world Posted in Israel, war criminals, world | No Comments »
Add this post to Del.icio.us - Digg
|
|
