Actualité - Mass rioting reveals depth of Afghan opposition to US occupation

Franc-Parler publie un article sur l'actualité afghane. Depuis le 30 mai, à la suite d'inconduites scandaleuses de soldats américains, une série de manifestations de masse a balayé le pays forçant le président fantoche Hamid Karzai à réagir à la télévision nationale. La lutte du peuple afghan contre l'occupation, qu'elle soit canadienne ou américaine, est manifeste en Afghanistan. Troupes canadiennes et américaines, hors d'Afghanistan!

The mass rioting that broke out in the Afghan capital of Kabul Monday has exposed the intensity and breadth of popular opposition to the four-and-a-half-year US-led occupation of Afghanistan and the fragility of the hold on the country by Washington and the puppet regime of President Hamid Karzai.

According to official and press reports, at least 20 people died Monday in clashes between demonstrators, US troops and Afghan security forces, while more than 140 were wounded. A doctor at the Khair Hana Hospital in northern Kabul told the New York Times that a seven-year-old child was among the dead, while several other school children were severely wounded.

The upheavals were touched off by a traffic incident, in which a US military cargo truck, part of a convoy speeding to the capital from the US base at Bagram, slammed into cars caught in a traffic jam, killing at least one person. When an angry crowd gathered, witnesses said, the US troops, supported by Afghan police, opened fire, killing at least four more civilians. Some witnesses and at least one Afghan newspaper claimed that some of the US soldiers appeared drunk.

Ghulam Rauf, a shopkeeper, told the Los Angeles Times that he first saw the convoy of about six military vehicles racing towards a taxi that was crossing the intersection.

“As the first vehicle crashed into the taxi, two other [American] vehicles started hitting other cars on the sides of the road,” he said. “They destroyed all the vehicles that were standing there.

“And the soldier sitting on top was dancing and singing and shouting. Then they drove toward shops and into mobs of people standing there. They drove over them, and I saw people shouting, ‘Help!’ because their legs were cut open as the vehicles drove onto them.”

Rauf and other witnesses said that when Afghans crowded around the vehicles and attempted to block the US convoy from fleeing the scene, soldiers opened fire with roof-mounted heavy weapons.

News of the incident spread rapidly through Kabul, bringing crowds of thousands of young men and students into the streets chanting “Death to America,” “Down with Karzai” and “Down with Bush.”

The speed with which the demonstrations erupted reflected seething anger over the recent killing of civilians in US air strikes as well as growing unrest over the repressive character of the occupation and the impoverished social conditions for the masses of the Afghan people.

The rioting dwarfed similar outbreaks touched off a year ago over revelations of the desecration of the Koran by US guards at the Guantanamo prison camp in Cuba and again last February in response to the Danish cartoons depicting the prophet Muhammad. It marked the most intense violence in the Afghan capital since the US invasion in 2001 toppled the Taliban regime.

Some of the demonstrators were shot dead when the crowds attempted to march on the presidential palace and the US Embassy compound and were turned back by gunfire. Television news videos showed demonstrators ducking for cover amid the sound of gunfire as US military vehicles sped past them in the streets. Some of the protesters were reportedly armed and exchanged fire with foreign troops and Afghan security forces. The vast majority, however, were unarmed civilians, including many schoolboys carrying their book bags.

The protesters turned their rage on other targets, setting dozens of police posts on fire and attacking foreign aid organizations, the United Nations headquarters, offices of multinational companies and the Serena Hotel, a recently opened luxury hotel in Kabul that caters to foreign guests. The crowd attempted to storm the hotel, but was turned back by firing from inside. All of the hotel’s ground floor windows were smashed in the fighting.

The local office of Roshan, a mobile phone company, was burned down, as were the headquarters of CARE International’s Afghan operations, which put the damage in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. The offices of Oxfam and ACTED, a French non-governmental organization, were also looted.

“They attacked everything that was written in English,” Frederic Roussel, director of ACTED, told the French news agency AFP. “I saw them attack a pizzeria simply because it had a sign written in English.”

The attacks on aid agencies, however, were not merely a matter of anti-foreign sentiment. Large numbers of Afghans are bitterly angry over the failure of US-led aid and reconstruction efforts to spell any discernable improvement in the conditions of life for the masses of working and poor people.

More than 90 percent of the Karzai regime’s budget is funded by foreign aid. Yet many see this money flowing into the bank accounts of government officials and contractors. The official unemployment rate remains at more than 35 percent. Only 20 percent of the population has access to clean water, and barely 6 percent to electricity.

US and NATO troops evacuated American and European embassy personnel and aid workers to secure military bases during the rioting.

In the wake of the rioting, the US-backed regime deployed tanks at key intersections, and thousands of troops armed with automatic weapons and rocket-propelled grenade launchers roamed the streets of Kabul. A curfew was declared in the Afghan capital for the second night in a row Tuesday. A spokesman for the NATO “peacekeeping” force said that foreign troops were continuing to conduct patrols, but were maintaining a lower profile at the request of the Karzai government.

The Kabul upheavals were widely seen as a turning point in Afghanistan. Karzai has long been derided by his critics as the “mayor of Kabul,” because of the government’s inability to secure any territory outside of the capital. But now Kabul itself, long seen as an island of relative stability, has burst into flames.

“I have been in Kabul for nine months and there has never been anything like this before,” wrote Tim Albone,” correspondent for the Times of London, who narrowly escaped an attack by rioters. “There is a real feeling in the air that today Kabul changed. There has been fighting in the south but this has mainly been between the militias and the American forces.

“Today it was angry teenagers—kids who have got nothing else to do. They are angry because they see all of the money being pumped into Afghanistan but still have no jobs.

“They are angry at the Americans who they see driving around as if they own the place and appear to have caused this accident and then tried to drive away.

“I’ve spoken to friends who work in Iraq and they say that there was one day when it all changed. That could have been the case here. They have realized that they can take on the police and take on the Americans. They could easily do it again.”

The rioting in the capital has unfolded against the backdrop of intensifying violence throughout the country, particularly in the Pashtun heartland of the south, where guerrillas have mounted a major offensive against foreign occupation and Afghan government forces. Another five Canadian soldiers were wounded in the area Monday when their convoy was ambushed.

More than 400 people have been killed in counterattacks by US forces in the last two weeks alone. While the Pentagon routinely classifies all the victims of US-NATO bombing raids and other military operations as “Taliban,” many of those who have lost their lives are civilians, including women and children.

In the latest attack on Monday, warplanes dropped two 500-pound bombs on a mosque killing at least 50 people. While a spokesman for NATO claimed that all of the victims were Taliban fighters, the Taliban itself said that none of its members had died and that all of the victims were civilians.

The attack follows last week’s air strike on the southern village of Azizi, which claimed the lives of at least 34 civilians along with a number of Afghan resistance fighters.

Significantly, the rioting in the capital involved mainly ethnic Tajiks, the dominant population in Kabul. Some of those participating in the demonstrations carried posters bearing the image of Ahmed Shah Massoud, the Tajik Northern Alliance guerrilla commander, a bitter opponent of the Taliban, who was assassinated in 2001.

Violent attacks on US-led occupation forces as well as aid workers have also been reported in the north and east as well as in the western province of Heart, which borders on Iran. All are dominated by groups opposed to the Taliban. What is emerging is a nationwide movement of resistance to the US occupation.

Washington’s position is further complicated by the fact that it has aggressively antagonized two regional powers—Iran and Russia—that maintain substantial influence in Afghanistan and the ability to facilitate the growth of such a movement. It has likewise created an increasingly untenable position for its ostensible ally, the military regime in Pakistan, by cross-border military attacks that have stoked Pakistani anti-American sentiments.

With the situation in Afghanistan spinning out of control, the Pentagon has quietly reinforced the US occupation, raising the number of American troops deployed in the country from 19,000 to 23,000. Another 9,000 European and Canadian NATO-led troops are also supporting the occupation, but they operate under different rules of engagement than the Americans, with their governments having agreed to deploy them for “peacekeeping” and reconstruction, rather than waging full-scale counterinsurgency campaign.

Karzai delivered a televised address in the wake of the rioting, attempting to strike a hardline pose. He described the rioters as “opportunists and agitators,” calling them “enemies of Afghanistan.”

Yet, a measure of the crisis that the incident has created for the US-backed government is Karzai’s demand for an investigation into the accident and for those responsible to be held accountable. Likewise, Afghanistan’s parliament convened in a special session to pass a resolution demanding the immediate arrest of the US soldiers responsible for Monday’s deadly crash, while also denouncing the demonstrators.

The widow of a man killed in the incident, who was brought to parliament as a representative of the victims, was unimpressed by the gesture. Samira, a mother of two girls and a boy, told the Afghan news agency Pajhwok, “They asked us to come here just to tell us that they were sorry. This is all just a show.”

Another victim, whose 17-year-old brother was killed in the incident, told the news agency, “If the situation continues unchanged, the people may raise against them.”

Meanwhile, the independent Kabul daily Cheragh commented: “The 29th of May was a general day of mourning and tragedy for Kabul residents.... The incident was painful and shameful because the peacekeepers and protectors of people’s lives and properties carried out a terrorist act and killed dozens and injured hundreds of people.... Yesterday people learnt some new meanings of the terms like ‘cooperation’ and ‘human rights’.... [T]hey came to realize how much importance their international friends give to them....”

The pitched battles in Kabul erupted just two days after US President George W. Bush gave a speech to the graduating class at the US Military Academy at West Point proclaiming once again that the American military had brought “freedom” to the Afghan people.

“Difficult challenges remain in both Afghanistan and Iraq, but America is safer and the world is more secure because these two countries are now democracies and they are allies in the cause of freedom and peace.”

As the events in Kabul have once again demonstrated, however, the US-installed regimes in Afghanistan and Iraq have no genuine base of popular support and are viewed by the large sections of the population in both countries as stooges of US occupation.

(World Socialist Web Site)

Actualité - Easily Dispensable: Iraq's Children

Franc-Parler publie un rapport du journaliste indépendant Dahr Jamail à propos de la situation en Irak. Plus particulièrement, il trace un tableau sombre des résultats de l'occupation criminelle sur les enfants irakiens. La conception militariste et anti-conscience de l'armée d'occupation qui compte la mort de civils comme simple "dommages collatéraux" est criminelle.

Cherishing children is the mark of a civilized society. - Joan Ganz Cooney

If, as I would like to believe, the above quote suggests all children and not merely those born in Western democracies, I am no longer certain that we live in a civilized society.

That women and children suffer the most during times of war is not a new phenomenon. It is a reality as old as war itself. What Rumsfeld, Rice and other war criminals of the Cheney administration prefer to call "collateral damage" translates in English as the inexcusable murder of and other irreparable harm done to women, children and the elderly during any military offensive.

US foreign policy in the Middle East manifests itself most starkly in its impact on the children of Iraq. It is they who continue to pay with their lives and futures for the brutal follies of our administration. Starvation under sanctions, and death and suffering during war and occupation are their lot. Since the beginning of the occupation, Iraqi children have been affected worst by the violence generated by the occupying forces and the freedom fighters.

While I had witnessed several instances of this from the time of my first trip to Iraq in November 2003, I was shaken by a close encounter with it, a year later, in November 2004.

In a major Baghdad hospital, 12-year-old Fatima Harouz lay in her bed, dazed, amidst a crowded hospital room. She limply waved her bruised arm at the flies that buzzed over the bed. Her shins, shattered by bullets when American soldiers fired through the front door of her house, were both covered in casts. Small plastic drainage bags filled with red fluid sat upon her abdomen, where she had taken shrapnel from another bullet.

She was from Latifiya, a city just south of Baghdad. Three days before I saw her, soldiers had attacked her home. Her mother, standing with us in the hospital, said, "They attacked our home and there weren't even any resistance fighters in our area." Her brother had been shot and killed, his wife wounded, and their home ransacked by soldiers. "Before they left, they killed all of our chickens," added Fatima's mother, her eyes a mixture of fear, shock and rage. A doctor who was with us as Fatima's mother narrated the story looked at me and sternly asked, "This is the freedom in their Disney Land are there kids just like this?"

The doctors' anger was mild if we consider the magnitude of suffering that has been inflicted upon the children of Iraq as a direct result of first the US-backed sanctions and then the failed US occupation.

In a report released by the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) on May 2nd of this year, one out of three Iraqi children is malnourished and underweight.

The report states that 25% of Iraqi children between the ages of six months and five years old suffer from either acute or chronic malnutrition. In addition, the Integrated Regional Information Network (IRIN) press release on the matter added, "A 2004 Living Conditions Survey indicated a decrease in mortality rates among children under five years old since 1999. However, the results of a September 2005 Food Security and Vulnerability Analysis - commissioned by Iraq's Central Organization for Statistics and Information Technology, the World Food Program and UNICEF - showed worsening conditions since the April 2003 US-led invasion of the country."

Also this month, on May 15th , a news story about the same UN-backed government survey highlighted that "people are struggling to cope three years after US-forces overthrew Saddam Hussein." The report added that "Children are ... major victims of food insecurity," and described the situation as "alarming." The story continued, "A total of four million Iraqis, roughly 15 percent of the population, were in dire need of humanitarian aid including food, up from 11 percent in a 2003 report, the survey of more than 20,000 Iraqi households found. Decades of conflict and economic sanctions have had serious effects on Iraqis. Their consequences have been rising unemployment, illiteracy and, for some families, the loss of wage earners."

But the hearts of small children are delicate organs. A cruel beginning in this world can twist them into curious shapes. - Carson McCullers

Iraq's ministries of Health and Planning carried out the survey with support from the UN World Food Program and UNICEF. A spokesman for UNICEF's Iraq Support Center in Amman, Jordan, David Singh, told Reuters that the number of acutely malnourished children in Iraq had more than doubled, from 4% during the last year of Saddam's rule to at least 9% in 2005. He also said, "Until there is a period of relative stability in Iraq we are going to continue to face these kinds of problems." UNICEF's special representative for Iraq, Roger Wright, commenting on the dire effects of the situation, said, "This can irreversibly hamper the young child's optimal mental/cognitive development, not just their physical development."

This past March, an article titled "Garbage Dump Second Home for Iraqi Children" addressed the appalling situation in the northern, Kurdish-controlled Iraqi city of Sulaimaniyah where young children assist their families in searching the city garbage dumps. It said that children as young as seven often accompany their parents to the dumps before school, in order to look for reusable items such as shoes, clothing and electrical equipment which is then resold in order to augment the family income.

This disturbing news is not really news in Baghdad. Back in December 2004 I saw children living with their families in the main dump of the capital city.

Poverty in Iraq has plummeted acutely during the invasion and occupation. Those who were already surviving on the margins due to years of deprivation have sunk further, and the children of such families have recourse to no nutrition, no health care, no education, no present and no future. Those from less unfortunate backgrounds are now suffering because the family wage earner has been killed, detained, or lost employment. Or the source of the family's income, a shop, factory or farm have been destroyed, or simply because it is impossible to feed a family under the existing economic conditions of high costs and low to nil income in Iraq.

As execrable as the current situation is for Iraqi children, most of the world media, appallingly, does not see it as a story to be covered. Even back in November 2004, surveys conducted by the UN, aid agencies and the interim Iraqi government showed that acute malnutrition among young children had nearly doubled since the US-led invasion took place in the spring of 2004.

A Washington Post story, "Children Pay Cost of Iraq's Chaos," read, "After the rate of acute malnutrition among children younger than 5 steadily declined to 4 percent two years ago, it shot up to 7.7 percent this year, according to a study conducted by Iraq's Health Ministry in cooperation with Norway's Institute for Applied International Studies and the U.N. Development Program. The new figure translates to roughly 400,000 Iraqi children suffering from "wasting," a condition characterized by chronic diarrhea and dangerous deficiencies of protein."

Not only is the US occupation starving Iraq's children, but occupation forces regularly detain them as well. It is common knowledge in Iraq that there have been child prisoners in the most odious prisons, such as Abu Ghraib, since early on in the occupation. While most, if not all, corporate media outlets in the US have been loath to visit the subject, the Sunday Herald in Scotland reported back in August 2004 that "coalition forces are holding more than 100 children in jails such as Abu Ghraib. Witnesses claim that the detainees - some as young as 10 - are also being subjected to rape and torture."

The story read, "It was early last October that Kasim Mehaddi Hilas says he witnessed the rape of a boy prisoner aged about 15 in the notorious Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. 'The kid was hurting very bad and they covered all the doors with sheets,' he said in a statement given to investigators probing prisoner abuse in Abu Ghraib. 'Then, when I heard the screaming I climbed the door and I saw [the soldier's name is deleted] who was wearing a military uniform." Hilas, who was himself threatened with being sexually assaulted in Abu Ghraib, then described in horrific detail how the soldier raped 'the little kid.'"

The newspaper's investigation at that time concluded that there were as many as 107 children being held by occupation forces, although their names were not known, nor their location or the length of their detention.

In June 2004 an internal UNICEF report, which was not made public, noted widespread arrest and detention of Iraqi children by US and UK forces. A section of the report titled "Children in Conflict with the Law or with Coalition Forces," stated, "In July and August 2003, several meetings were conducted with CPA (Coalition Provisional Authority) and Ministry of Justice to address issues related to juvenile justice and the situation of children detained by the coalition forces UNICEF is working through a variety of channels to try and learn more about conditions for children who are imprisoned or detained, and to ensure that their rights are respected."

Another section of the report added, "Information on the number, age, gender and conditions of incarceration is limited. In Basra and Karbala children arrested for alleged activities targeting the occupying forces are reported to be routinely transferred to an internee facility in Um Qasr. The categorization of these children as 'internees' is worrying since it implies indefinite holding without contact with family, expectation of trial or due process." The report went on to add, "A detention center for children was established in Baghdad, where according to ICRC (International Committee of the Red Cross) a significant number of children were detained. UNICEF was informed that the coalition forces were planning to transfer all children in adult facilities to this 'specialized' child detention centre. In July 2003, UNICEF requested a visit to the centre but access was denied. Poor security in the area of the detention centre has prevented visits by independent observers like the ICRC since last December [2003]."

A section of the report which I found very pertinent, as I'd already witnessed this occurring in Iraq, stated, "The perceived unjust detention of Iraqi males, including youths, for suspected activities against the occupying forces has become one of the leading causes for the mounting frustration among Iraqi youth and the potential for radicalization of this population group."

On December 17, 2003, at the al-Shahid Adnan Kherala secondary school in Baghdad, I witnessed US forces detain 16 children who had held a mock, non-violent, pro-Saddam Hussein the previous day. While forces from the First Armored Division sealed the school with two large tanks, helicopters, several Bradley fighting vehicles and at least 10 Humvees, soldiers loaded the children into a covered truck and drove them to their base. Meanwhile, the rest of the students remained locked inside the school until the US military began to exit the area.

Shortly thereafter the doors were unlocked, releasing the frightened students who flocked out the doors. The youngest were 12 years old, and none of the students were older than 18. They ran out, many in tears, while others were enraged as they kicked and shook the front gate. My interpreter and I were surrounded by frenzied students who yelled, "This is the democracy? This is the freedom? You see what the Americans are doing to us here?"

Another student cried out to us, "They took several of my friends! Why are they taking them to prison? For throwing rocks?" A few blocks away we spoke with a smaller group of students who had run from the school (in panic). One student who was crying yelled to me, "Why are they doing this to us? We are only kids!"

The tanks and Bradley fighting vehicles that were guarding the perimeter of the school began to rumble down the street beside us, on their passage out. Several young boys with tears streaming down their faces picked up stones and hurled them at the tanks as they drove by. Imagine my horror when I saw the US soldiers on top of the Bradleys begin firing their M-16's above our heads as we ducked inside a taxi. A soldier on another Bradley, behind the first, passed and fired randomly above our heads as well. Kids and pedestrians ran for cover into the shops and wherever possible.

I remember a little boy, not more than 13 years old, holding a stone and standing at the edge of the street glaring at the Bradleys as they rumbled past. Another soldier riding atop another passing Bradley pulled out his pistol and aimed it at the boy's head and kept him in his sights until the vehicle rolled out of sight.

One of the students hiding behind our taxi screamed to me, "Who are the terrorists here now? You have seen this yourself! We are school kids!"

The very next month, in January 2004, I was in an area on the outskirts of Baghdad that had been pulverized by "Operation Iron Grip." I spoke with a man at his small farm house. His three year old boy, Halaf Ziad Halaf, walked up to me and with a worried look on his face said, "I have seen the Americans here with their tanks. They want to attack us."

His uncle, who had joined us for tea, leaned over to me and said, "The Americans are creating the terrorists here by hurting people and causing their relatives to fight against them. Even this little boy will grow up hating the Americans because of their policy here."

The slaughter, starvation, detention, torture and sexual assault of Iraq's children at the hands of US soldiers or by proxy via US foreign policy, is not a recent phenomenon. It is true that the present US administration has been brazen and blatant in its crimes in Iraq, but those willing to bear witness must not forget that Bill Clinton and his minions played an equally, if not even more devastating role in the assault on the children of Iraq.

On May 12, 1996, Clinton's Secretary of State Madeleine Albright was asked by Lesley Stahl on "60 Minutes" about the effects of US sanctions against Iraq, "We have heard that a half million children have died. I mean, that's more children than died in Hiroshima. And, you know, is the price worth it?"

In a response which has now become notorious, Albright replied, "I think this is a very hard choice, but the price - we think the price is worth it."

We are guilty of many errors and many faults but our worst crime is abandoning the children, neglecting the fountain of life. Many of the things we need can wait. The child cannot. Right now is the time his bones are being formed, his blood is being made, and his senses are being developed. To him we cannot answer "Tomorrow." His name is "Today." - Gabriela Mistral

To all Americans who, despite voluminous evidence to the contrary, continue to believe that they are supporting a war for democracy in Iraq, I would like to say, the way Iraq is headed it will have little use for democracy and freedom. We must find ways to stop the immoral, soulless, repugnant occupation if we want the children of Iraq to see any future at all.

(Dahr Jamail's Iraq Dispatches)

*Dahr Jamail is an independent journalist who spent over 8 months reporting from occupied Iraq

Actualité - US Conspiracy Gets Bolivian Attention

Franc-Parler publie une dépêche de Prensa Latina News Agency rapportant un appel du président bolivien Evo Morales. Dans le contexte de la révélation d'un vieux plan d'assassinat concocté par les États-Unis, il a affirmé que la clé est le peuple organisé. Après plusieurs tentatives de déstabilisations américaines au Venezuela et à Cuba, il n'y a aucun doute que la Bolivie, après avoir nationalisé les hydrocarbures, est une cible de l'impérialisme américain.

La Paz, May 31 (Prensa Latina) - Bolivian President Evo Morales´ call to the people to be alert for a foreign plot against the government got everyone´s attention Wednesday, especially with the revelation of old US plans to assassinate the president.

Morales said he recently learned that some years ago the US organized “teams to persecute and kill Evo Morales,” but said they “cannot do it now with the people organized to stop them.”

The leader expressed his confidence in the truth spoken by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, who affirmed that the Bush attacks on Bolivian democracy serve as a green light for a military takeover.

In response to this, high-level Bolivian military commanders ratified their loyalty to the Constitution and the president on Monday.

The statesman attributed the conspiracy to those who have historically favored privatization and handing over of natural resources to transnationals, and those sectors affected by the changes in process in Bolivia, such as the parceling out of unused land among poor farmer.

A network of 30 community radio stations have been installed in rural areas all over the country, he announced, and there will soon be a TV network as well, as an alternative to the private media hostile to the change process in Bolivia.

(Prensa Latina News Agency)

Actualité - Le terrorisme a provoqué des milliers de victimes à Cuba

Franc-Parler publie un article rapportant l'intervention de la délégation cubaine menée par Ileana Nuñez sur la question du terrorisme. Cuba a été la cible d'une quantité d'attentats terroristes et de sabotage commandités et dirigés du territoire américain. Actuellement, cinq patriotes cubains sont en prison aux États-Unis pour de lourdes peines au terme de procès qualifiés par plusieurs de mascarade. Les Cinq infiltraient des organisations terroristes aux États-Unis.

Nations Unis, le 30 mai, (Granma International) - Cuba a souligné aujourd’hui devant le Conseil de sécurité des Nations unies que pendant plus de 45 ans, les innombrables actions terroristes dirigées contre le pays et organisées depuis le territoire des Etats-Unis ont fait de nombreuses victimes.

L’ambassadrice Ileana Nuñez, chargée d’affaires de Cuba auprès de l’ONU, a pris la parole dans le cadre d’une réunion publique du Conseil de sécurité sur les menaces du terrorisme, indique une dépêche de Prensa Latina.

La diplomate a rappelé que ces actes ont causé la mort de 3 478 Cubains et que 2099 Cubains ont été blessés, ceci sans entrer dans les coûts économiques considérables occasionnés au pays.

Au lieu de prévenir et de réprimer le terrorisme contre Cuba, les autorités nord-américaines enferment dans leurs prisons cinq Cubains antiterroristes, même après qu’une Cour d’appel ait révoqué leur condamnation.

Avec un altruisme et un courage exemplaires, les Cinq n’ont rien fait d’autre qu’infiltrer les groupes terroristes de Miami pour prendre des mesures préventives contre leurs actes de violence et sauver ainsi des vies de citoyens cubains et nord-américains, a précisé l’Ambassadrice.

Elle a montré que pour les Etats-Unis et leur combat antiterroriste, il y avait bel et bien deux poids et deux mesures. En effet, Washington persiste à se dérober à ses obligations internationales en refusant de juger et d’extrader le terroriste international notoire Luis Posada Carriles.

(Granma International)

Actualité - C'est du peuple que vient le pouvoir et la paix

Franc-Parler publie un article de Mohawk Nation News à propos de la lutte des Six Nations pour leurs droits ancestraux à Caledonia. Malrgé la désinformation et les attaques de la police, les membres des communautés des Premières Nations, aidés par la population locale, tiennent fermement. La juste lutte des Six Nations pour ses droits ancestraux est un exemple et mérite l'appui de tous contre l'État canadien et ses officines racistes. Franc-Parler salue le courage et le fermeté des Six Nations dans leur lutte et condamne les actions de l'État et des agents provocateurs de tout acabit.

Au cours des 88 jours d'action des Six Nations pour réclamer nos terres près de Caledonia, en Ontario, nous avons reçu des milliers de courriels et d'appels de gens de partout dans le monde. Nous n'avons pas été en mesure de répondre à tous. Le soutien et les idées que nous avons reçus ont été extrêmement utiles et encourageant. Nous remercions tout le monde. Sans cette solidarité des autochtones et non-autochtones, la Police provinciale de l'Ontario aurait réussi le coup d'éclat qu'elle préparait. Le sang aurait été versé. Sans compter le retour de nos terres, bien que, là-dessus, nous attendons toujours.

Nous assistons à un renouveau de solidarité entre autochtones et non-autochtones. La promesse britannique de protéger les Six Nations sur le territoire de Haldimand que nous défendons avait commencé avec cette solidarité. Les Six Nations étaient des alliés des Britanniques. C'est cette alliance qui a mené à la création du Canada d'aujourd'hui. À cause de cette alliance avec les Britanniques, nous avons été repoussés de la Vallée des Mohawk par les Américains, vers ce qui est maintenant l'État de New-York, où notre peuple avait vécu depuis le début des temps. Les Mohawks furent de valeureux alliés des Britanniques durant la Révolution américaine. Ils ont toujours été sur les lignes de front à chaque fois que les Britanniques avaient besoin d'aide pour se défendre: durant la Bataille de Queenston Heights de 1813, durant la première et la deuxième guerres mondiales et à d'autres occasions. Le territoire de Haldimand est sur les terres traditionnelles Rotino'shon:ni/iroquoises. Il a été attribué aux Mohawks en 1784. Les Six Nations ont toujours été prêtes à se battre pour nos alliés canadiens. Il est bon de voir que la majorité soutient cette alliance et est prête à nous défendre.

La tradition, c'est que nous collaborons. Malheureusement, le gouvernement canadien, et en particulier le ministère des Affaires indiennes, a été usurpé par des gens qui ne veulent pas de cette collaboration. Ils veulent être rois et maîtres. Alors ils nous ont trahis et ont trahi le peuple canadien. Ils n'ont pas voulu nous traiter honorablement, comme des alliés. Ils ont volé nos terres, volé nos richesses, et ont manigancé le génocide. Ils nous ont traités comme des enfants incapables de s'occuper d'eux-mêmes. Ils ont épuisé nos fiducies avec des investissements illégaux dans des machinations financières douteuses qui profitaient à leurs amis.

Au lieu de nous traiter comme des alliés, ils nous ont traités comme des sujets britanniques. Vous vous demandez sans doute pourquoi nous n'avons pas protesté contre notre absence de droits au Canada. C'est parce que nous ne sommes pas des Canadiens. Nous nous mêlions de nos affaires. Nous nous sommes organisés sur nos terres et nous avons tout payé nous-mêmes.

Nous avons cru que le problème, c'était seulement ces personnes responsables aux Affaires indiennes et que notre relation avec la reine demeurait honorable. Nous avons eu tort.

La promesse originale concernant le territoire Haldimand était qu'il n'y aurait aucun empiétement. Bref, c'est au gouvernement canadien, pas au peuple canadien, que nous en voulons.

L'Ontario, comme le reste du Canada d'ailleurs, est déterminée à réduire les possessions territoriales indigènes, et pas seulement sur le territoire de Haldimand. Cela se fait carrément par le vol. Leur devise de ne pas nous remettre un pouce de terre, ce n'est pas pour le bénéfice des Ontariens. C'est pour servir les intérêts d'entreprises qui veulent exploiter nos ressources sans aucun égard pour l'environnement ou pour les générations présentes et futures de ceux qui doivent y vivre. Ce sont les milliardaires qui dirigent le gouvernement en réalité. Eh oui, c'est le faire-semblant de la démocratie canadienne.

Nous assumons maintenant l'intendance de nos terres illégalement occupées. Jusqu'à présent nous avons beaucoup investi dans la recherche historique et juridique des derniers 200 ans. À chaque coup, quand nous rappelons les faits, les représentants du Canada sont exposés: ils ont mal géré le Canada et maltraité les peuples autochtones. C'est toujours nous qui écopions. C'est fini maintenant! Ce squelette dans le placard affecte aussi les Canadiens. Leur gouvernement ne s'occupe pas d'eux et ne protège pas l'avenir de leurs générations futures. C'est ce qui est au coeur du problème.

Qu'est-ce que le gouvernement et quelles sont ses fonctions? Est-ce un véhicule pour la poignée d'individus qui parasitent sur le travail et les possessions des autres? Ou est-ce un moyen de réunir les personnes pour résoudre les problèmes d'un commun effort pour se créer une vie meilleure? La rupture fondamentale est entre notre philosophie indigène, qui provient de notre constitution, la Kaianereh'ko:wa/Grande Loi, et la philosophie des gestionnaires de l'État. Nous avons appris, par nos relations avec lui, que le gouvernement canadien ne représente pas le peuple canadien.

Nous n'avons jamais perdu la juridiction sur nos terres ancestrales. Nous avons le profond sentiment d'avoir été trahis et volés dans nos relations avec les colonisateurs et c'est source de colère et d'indignation pour notre peuple. Le retour de nos terres illégalement occupées serait-il trop demander pour les parasites qui noyautent le gouvernement canadien? C'est sans compter que le gouvernement a autorisé et encouragé ses propres citoyens à empiéter sur nos terres en les achetant comme propriété privée et qu'il a institutionnalisé les titres fonciers en violation de la loi. Il laisse les Américains venir acheter nos terres aussi! Tout cela fait partie de leur plans de 100 ans pour se défaire du «problème indien», comme le dit ce détraqué des Affaires indiennes, Duncan Campbell Scott. Bon nombre des premiers colons arrivés sur nos terres étaient des Américains qui nous avaient chassés de nos terres dans la Vallée des Mohawks. Ils sont venus, ils ont aimé le paysage et sont restés. Des squatteurs!

Il est intéressant de voir qu'un grand pourcentage de Canadiens considèrent que nous avons été volés et que nous méritons nos territoires, libres de toute juridiction coloniale. Dans le cas des Six Nations, le public au Canada, aux États-Unis et dans le monde nous a fortement appuyés. C'est à espérer, pour le bien de Terre mère, que c'est parce que beaucoup de Canadiens se rendent compte de l'importance de notre philosophie de la préservation de la terre.

Car de l'autre côté, nous sommes un obstacle au «progrès», dans la mesure où ce progrès signifie l'exploitation de nos terres et de nos ressources par une poignée d'étrangers agissant par l'entremise de sociétés étrangères. Ils agissent comme s'ils n'avaient de compte à rendre à personne et sans égard pour le peuple, autochtone et non autochtone. Nous sommes tous des pions dans leur jeu. La façon de leur faire échec est d'affirmer notre droit sur les terres de Turtle Island et d'en refaire une «terre d'abondance» pour le peuple.

Malgré le grand appui que nous recevons, il y a beaucoup d'opposition de la part des grandes entreprises qui agissent dans les corridors du pouvoir gouvernemental. Ils exercent des pressions sur les institutions établies pour que justice nous soit niée. Ils parviennent à manipuler les hyper-nationalistes pour faire beaucoup de tapage, avec leurs batailles de drapeaux, dans les médias contre nous. C'est ce qui s'est produit à la «Guerre pain et fromage» à Caledonia le 22 mai 2006: des émeutiers, à l'instigation du gouvernement, sont venus nous provoquer. Mais le public ne l'a pas accepté.

Leur argument est qu'il faut empêcher l'affirmation de la juridiction indigène, sinon nous allons l'étendre et devenir indépendants. Pourquoi croient-ils que l'extension de la juridiction indigène serait une mauvaise affaire? Est-ce bien grave si le ministère des Affaires indiennes n'a plus sa part du gâteau? Ont-ils peur que ce soit bon pour l'environnement et pour l'économie et pas juste pour nous?

Nous avons besoin d'une approche unifiée, autochtones et non-autochtones. Nous sommes tous perdants à l'heure actuelle. Nous devons collaborer. Mais il faut guetter ceux qui essaient de nous faire taire au nom de l'unité. Nous devons respecter nos lois et nous en tenir aux arrangements du début. Laissez-nous affirmer notre juridiction. Ne nous laissez pas patauger dans le marais des légalités sans fin qui consomment trop de temps et argent. Nous devons nous libérer des embarras inutiles.

Il faudrait peut-être une grande «Cérémonie de condoléances». Ce serait une occasion de nous essuyer les yeux avec un tissu de cuir pour mieux voir de quoi il s'agit; de nous nettoyer les oreilles avec une plume d'aigle pour mieux nous entendre les uns les autres; de boire un verre d'eau pour parler plus clairement et nous dire la vérité limpide. Souvent la solution à des problèmes difficiles est toute simple. Souvent tout ce qu'il faut, c'est une démonstration de respect mutuel.

Car en fin de compte, il n'est pas nécessaire de nous remettre les terres prises par Henco Industries. Elles nous appartiennent déjà. Elles nous ont toujours appartenues. Le gouvernement ontarien n'a qu'à le reconnaître. Nous devons affirmer les relations légales de gouvernement à gouvernement. Le public nous appuie. Nous devons faire ressortir la vérité. Nous devons faire en sorte que le Canada arrête de vivre dans le péché. Canada, cesse de faire l'enfant! Le colonialisme est terminé! Nous n'y retournerons jamais plus!

(Mohawk Nation News - Kahentinetha Horn)

Actualité - US Marines to stand trial for massacre of Iraqi civilians in Haditha

Franc-Parler publie un article à propos de l'implication des troupes d'occupation américaines dans un massacre à Haditha. Une série de révélations démontre que le Pentagone masque des massacres de civils irakiens. Au nom de justifications comme la "sécurité" et la "guerre au terrorisme" les droits humains sont systématiquement violés par les troupes d'occupation impérialistes au Moyen-Orient et partout dans le monde de Guantanamo à l'Afghanistan.

US Marines involved in a massacre of Iraqi civilians in Haditha last November will stand trial for murder and dereliction of duty. Twelve soldiers have been returned to Camp Pendleton to await charges in a military trial, and are forbidden to speak to the press.

As yet, no soldiers have been officially named or charged, but comments to the press by senior US military officials indicate that murder charges will soon be brought against three Marines, and dereliction of duty charges, for covering up the crime, will be brought against the others. Critical evidence against the Marines includes photographs taken by military intelligence officials immediately following the murders.

More than four months after the incident, and after numerous official statements lying about what occurred, the Pentagon has officially acknowledged that the massacre took place. Officials briefed selected members of Congress last week. John Warner, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, following a briefing, told reporters, “There are established facts that incidents of a very serious nature did take place.”

The legal proceedings could eventually find the lowest-ranking perpetrators guilty of murder, but as with previous US atrocities that have come to light in Iraq and Afghanistan, such as Abu Ghraib, the Bush administration and its loyal “opposition” in the Democratic Party will seek to ensure that none of the high-ranking military and civilian officials who plotted the wars, ordered the killing of tens of thousands in bombing raids, and sanctioned the use of torture are brought to justice.

The Pentagon began to back away from its previous whitewash of the killings in Haditha only after Time magazine reporters in January presented it with photographs they had acquired of the carnage as well as interviews with local residents who witnessed the slaughter.

Since then, a clearer picture has emerged of the events, which in their premeditated and homicidal character recall the infamous massacre carried out in March of 1968 by US soldiers against Vietnamese civilians in the village of My Lai.

At 7:15 a.m. on Saturday, November 19, 2005, a convoy of US Marines from Kilo Company, 3rd Batallion, 1st Marines was hit by a remote-controlled roadside bomb affixed to a propane tank. The driver of one Humvee, Lance-Corporal Miguel Terrazas, was killed instantly, while two other Marines in the vehicle were wounded.

After Marines confirmed that the bomb was detonated by remote control, a drone surveillance aircraft was launched, and Marines prepared to conduct house-to-house searches. The Los Angeles Times has reported that at this point, “jets dropped 500-pound bombs,” but is unclear where the bombs fell, why the bombs were dropped, and with what results.

The dozen Marines involved in the house-to-house searches split into four-man “fire teams.” One of these fire teams, led by a sergeant identified by ABC News as Frank Wuterich, began methodically killing innocent civilians over the course of the next five hours.

Five people in a nearby taxi were shot to death immediately, and then the fire team raided three houses. In each house, the Marines broke down the door, grouped the occupants together in a single room, and executed them. The victims included old women, children, men, and infants.

So many bullets were fired at close range that most of the head of one man was obliterated; another woman had both arms shorn off at the elbow. Almost all of the victims were shot point blank in the upper body, execution style. One man was then gunned down as he attempted to flee.

In all, 18 people were killed in the houses, one outside, and five in the taxi, bringing the total to 24.

Nine-year-old Eman Waleed and her younger brother Abdul Rahman survived the attack on their house, as all of the adults in the room shielded the children with their bodies. Hours after the massacre, Iraqi soldiers found the children under the pile of corpses—wounded but alive.

Eman has been quoted recalling the Marines shouting, breaking down doors, and murdering her terrified grandparents as they emerged in their nightclothes. Then, as the Marines turned to her, her parents and relatives leapt to shield her from the bullets. As her parents lay dying on top of her, and even though she had been shot herself, she knew to keep quiet. Abdul, one year younger, has been unable to communicate since November.

Following the massacre, the officer in charge reported to his superiors that his unit had been hit by a roadside bomb and had then come under attack by insurgents with small-arms from the nearby houses. Not long after the attack, a separate military intelligence unit arrived on the scene and photographed the bodies—a routine military procedure following any engagement. The cover-up began here.

It is likely that the Marines involved in the incident knew that they had not been attacked by insurgents. If nothing else, the Kalashnikov rifles commonly used by insurgents make a distinctive krak-krak sound, and US soldiers learn quickly to distinguish this report from the sounds of other rifles.

The intelligence unit that arrived later to photograph the bodies would have noticed the execution-style wounds, the absence of weapons or shell casings inside the houses, and the lack of bullet holes on the houses’ exteriors.

The unit’s photographs and a report were filed with a military official—most likely a battalion intelligence officer—who would have noticed the discrepancy between the official account and the photographs. Finally, the unmanned surveillance aircraft that was launched after the initial roadside bombing would have recorded from the air the entire battle, or lack thereof, and this footage would have been seen by officials high up in the chain of command.

Nonetheless, an official Marine communiqué from Camp Blue Diamond in Ramadi on November 20 claimed that “a US Marine and 15 Iraqi civilians were killed yesterday from the blast of a roadside bomb.... [I]mmediately following the bombing, gunmen attacked the convoy with small-arms fire.”

Lieutenant-Colonel Michelle Martin-Hing is among the military officials who evidently lied about the events of November 19. She claimed that the fault for the civilian deaths lay with insurgents who “placed noncombatants in the line of fire as the Marines responded to defend themselves.”

After the Marines had left the area, a local Haditha journalism student with a video camera arrived and recorded grisly images in the houses, on the streets, and at the hospital morgue. In January, reporters for Time magazine acquired these images, as well as interviews with witnesses, and presented them to Colonel Barry Johnson, a US Military spokesman, for comment. Following this exchange, an official military investigation was launched, and the families of those who were murdered were each paid $2,500.

On March 19, Time ran its report, called “One Morning in Haditha: US Marines killed 15 Iraqi civilians in their homes last November. Was it self-defense, an accident, or cold-blooded revenge?” Earlier this month, Congressman John Murtha (Democrat of Pennsylvania), who had been briefed on the events, publicly charged that the civilians had been killed “in cold blood.”

“I understand the investigation shows that in fact there was no firefight,” he said, “there was no explosion that killed the civilians on a bus. There was no shrapnel. There were only bullet holes inside the house where the Marines had gone in.”

In the past week, another murder and cover-up perpetrated by US Marines in Iraq has come to light. Military officials have charged that in Hamandiya, on April 26, US troops murdered a defenseless man and then planted a Kalashnikov and shovel on his body in an attempt to frame him as an insurgent. The alleged perpetrators have been returned to Camp Pendleton, and a military trial in their case is being prepared.

The men who were directly involved in these killings should stand trial for what they have done, but it is absurd to claim that their prosecution and punishment constitutes “justice” and absolves the political and military leaders who sent them to Iraq on the basis of lies and conditioned them to carry out atrocities in support of an illegal invasion and colonial-style occupation.

All crimes and atrocities in an aggressive war flow from the decision to wage war in the first place, and in a war of colonial occupation and mass oppression, atrocities such as the massacre of November 19 are inevitable. This was the legal principle established at Nuremberg and invoked against senior Nazi military and government officials who planned and carried out military aggression.

Those who are ultimately responsible for the events of November 19 are the architects of the Iraq war itself—members of the Bush administration, beginning with the president, leaders of both houses of Congress, and the top military brass. They continue to wage war in the face of determined popular resistance in Iraq to foreign occupation and massive anti-war sentiment in the US. After Abu Grahib, Fallujah, Haditha and a death toll of more than a hundred thousand Iraqis and nearly 2,500 Americans, no high-ranking official has been held accountable.

For these same officials to lay their own crimes at the feet of the lowest-ranking perpetrators is utter hypocrisy. It is worth pointing out that Saddam Hussein is presently being tried for crimes carried out during his presidency, for which he is being held responsible whether or not it can be proved that he was directly responsible. The US-orchestrated prosecution is arguing that the crimes flowed from his policies, and that he therefore bears guilt.

(World Socialiste Web Site)

Actualité - Bush has turned the US into a Police State

Franc-Parler publie un commentaire de Prensa Latina News Agency sur la situation politique aux États-Unis. La création des conditions pour un État fasciste n'est pas une simple question rhétorique. Une série de scandales liés à l'espionnage illégal d'Américains par la NSA (National Security Agency) a été révélée récemment, sans parler du camp de torture de la base de Guantanamo et du profilage racial partout aux États-Unis.

Washington, May 26 (Prensa Latina) - From secret detention centers to warrantless wiretapping are only two signs of how the Bush administration has turned the country into a police state, says Allan Uthman of the alternative newsletter Buffalo Beast.

The author points to 10 signs that show that it may well be the case for the US. The Internet clampdown is number one in the list, followed by the War on Terror campaign, the US Patriot Act to back the latter and prison camps to keep the suspects of terrorism according to Bush standards.

Attempts to regulate and filter Internet content are intensifying lately, says Uthman. These come both from telecommunications corporations (who are gearing up to pass legislation transferring ownership and regulation of the internet to themselves), and the Pentagon (which issued an "Information Operations Roadmap" in 2003, signed by Donald Rumsfeld, which outlines tactics such as network attacks and acknowledges, without suggesting a remedy, that US propaganda planted in other countries has easily found its way to Americans via the internet).

As for prisons, this last January the Army Corps of Engineers gave Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg Brown & Root nearly $400 million to build detention centers in the United States, for the purpose of unspecified "new programs." Of course, the obvious first guess would be that these new programs might involve rounding up Muslims or political dissenters.

Touchscreen voting machines are fifth on the list of signs, according to Uthman, who says these contraptions are bound to perpetuate corrupt elections like the ones in 2000 and 2004.

The coming midterm elections will be an interesting test of voting integrity, especially if the Democrats don´t win substantial gains. Bush just suggested that his brother Jeb would make a good president, preparing the way for a next bout of grabbing at the polls.

Having a Republican majority Congress, Bush has never vetoed a bill. But he likes to simply nullify laws he doesn´t like with "signing statements", another sign of the Police State. Bush has issued over 700 such statements, twice as many as all previous presidents combined, said the Boston Globe.

Essentially, this administration is bypassing the judiciary system and deciding for itself whether laws are constitutional or not.

Massive wiretapping comes as the number seven sign, followed by free speech and high-ranking whistleblowers, referring to administration officials who resign in protest and criticize the White House en masse and are later cast as traitorous, anti-American and similar accusations.

Last, but not least comes the CIA shakeup in Uthman´s list. The author denies that Porter Goss was fired because he was resisting the efforts of Rumsfeld or Negroponte. Goss was probably canned, he affirms, due to a scandal involving a crooked defense contractor, his hand-picked third-in-command, the Watergate hotel and some hookers.

Everything is thus rigged, the Internet, enemies, elections and the spooks according to Bush´s view of the world and how it should be run. Remember the good old days, when the CIA were the bad guys?

(Prensa Latina News Agency)

Actualité - Le professeur philippin Sison placé arbitrairement sur une liste de terroristes

Franc-Parler publie un article à propos de la situation du Professeur José Maria Sison, une personnalité progressiste philippine en exil au Pays-Bas. Le gouvernement européen en a fait une cible de la soi-disant lutte antiterroriste. Pendant qu'au Philippine durant des décennies le professeur Sison a participé à la lutte du peuple philippin contre l'impérialisme et l'occupation américaine.

Les ministres des 25 peuvent-ils qualifier une personne de terroriste, et l'exclure de la vie économique sans preuves ni procès? C'est l'enjeu du recours contre l'inclusion de Sison dans une liste noire.

Né en 1939 à Cabugao, Ilocos Sur (Philippines), le professeur Sison s'est rendu célèbre comme enseignant, poète, politologue, et écrivain. Il a été président du Comité Central du Parti Communiste des Philippines (CPP) avant d'être arrêté par le régime dictatorial de Marcos en 1977. Il a été détenu jusqu'au 5 mars 1986 et a subi pendant plus de huit ans diverses formes de torture physique et mentale. En septembre 1988, le gouvernement philippin a annulé son passeport alors qu'il était à l'étranger pour une tournée de conférences dans différentes universités. Le professeur Sison a alors demandé l'asile aux Pays-Bas.

Le 28 octobre 2002, le Conseil de l'Union européenne a inclus dans la liste des organisations terroristes Jose Maria Sison comme personne physique et la Nouvelle Armée du Peuple (New People's Army, NPA) comme organisation prétendument liée à lui.

La décision du Conseil de l'UE, qui considère le professeur Sison comme une personne participant ou facilitant des actes terroristes ne repose sur aucun élément concret. José Maria Sison ne fait actuellement l'objet d'aucune condamnation ni même d'aucune poursuite pénale dans les pays qui l'ont placé sur la liste. Il est impossible de connaître les raisons et les éléments matériels qui ont amené le Conseil de l'Union européenne à le qualifier de terroriste. Les avocats du professeur Sison ont introduit plusieurs demandes d'accès aux documents, mais ce fut à chaque fois refusé, le Conseil considérant que leur divulgation pourrait mettre en cause la sécurité publique et les relations internationales de l'Union.

Suite à l'adoption de cette liste, le compte en banque conjoint de José Maria Sison et de son épouse a été gelé. Sur ce compte, il recevait depuis de nombreuses années une allocation sociale et les époux Sison utilisaient ce compte pour payer leurs achats quotidiens, payer leurs factures d'électricité, etc. Le solde du compte n'a jamais dépassé 2.000 euros. Le Conseil de l'UE n'a jamais pu expliquer en quoi le blocage de ce compte ou des droits d'auteur de ses ouvrages, la cessation de l'aide sociale perçue par Sison, l'interdiction de souscrire une assurance couvrant ses soins de santé ou sa responsabilité civile pouvait concrètement contribuer à contrer le financement du terrorisme...

Au nom de la lutte contre le terrorisme, une personne est donc privée de tous les droits sociaux les plus élémentaires et les autorités tentent de le réduire à l'état de mendiant et sans abri.

La décision de placer le professeur Sison sur cette liste et la procédure qui l'a précédé violent de manière flagrante les droits fondamentaux élémentaires (droit à un procès équitable, à la présomption d'innocence, droit de la défense). Les conséquences de cette décision mènent à la négation du droit de mener une vie conforme à la dignité humaine.

Le recours en annulation contre l'inclusion du professeur Sison dans cette liste, introduit en février 2003 sera examiné le mardi 30 mai 2006 devant la 2ème chambre du Tribunal de Première Instance de l'Union européenne de Luxembourg.

(www.solidaire.org - Jan Fermon)

Actualité - Pentagon Tries to Cover Up Massacre in Iraq

Franc-Parler publie une dépêche sur l'occupation de l'Irak. Une série de révélations démontre que le Pentagone masque des massacres de civils irakiens. Au nom de justifications comme la "sécurité" et la "guerre au terrorisme" les droits humains sont systématique violés par les troupes d'occupation impérialistes au Moyen-Orient et partout dans le monde de Guantanamo à l'Afghanistan.

Washington, May 28 (Prensa Latina) - Representative John Murtha, D-Pa., on Sunday denounced the Pentagon´s efforts to cover up the massacre of Iraqi civilians by US troops.

In statements to ABC, the war veteran and congressman said that the military is trying to cover up a case in which US soldiers appear as suspects of killing 24 Iraqi civilians.

Until March, when the British newspaper The Times published the story, no one knew what was going on, pointed out Murtha, an ex Marine who supports the withdrawal of US troops from Iraq.

On Saturday, CNN reported on denunciations by an Iraqi girl who told the British newspaper that US soldiers had massacred her family.

The case, which is being investigated by US authorities, took place in the town of Haditha, 200 kilometers northeast of Baghdad.

(Prensa Latina News Agency)

Actualité - U.S. Tries to Criminalize Palestinian People and Government

Franc-Parler publie un article sur le rôle du gouvernement américain dans la tentative de génocide contre le peuple palestinien. Le gouvernement canadien joue un rôle tout aussi criminel et honteux dans sa tentative de créer la zizanie et de déstabiliser le gouvernement palestinien. Malgré tout, le peuple palestinien continue sa résistance héroïque devant le chantage et les menaces.

The House of Representatives passed Resolution 4681 (HR4681) on May 23, 2006 by a majority vote. The bill serves to criminalize the Palestinian people and organizations that assist and support them, especially those providing humanitarian aid. HR4681 is an effort to not only starve and punish the Palestinians, especially women and children, for exercising their right to vote. It is also an effort to criminalize the many humanitarian and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) that support the Palestinians. The NGOs commonly fund orphanages, schools, hospitals, medicine, assistance for refugees, educational exchanges, and so forth.

The bill will essentially brand anyone supporting the Palestinians as supporters of terrorism and subject to having their resources frozen and leadership jailed. The justification being given by the government is that as a result of the Palestinian elections in January, where Hamas won a majority, the Palestine Authority, and all its ministries, is a terrorist organization and the occupied territories represent a “terrorist sanctuary.” As punishment for this election, the U.S. is striving to literally starve the Palestinians into submission.

HR4681 also attacks the voice and identity of Palestinians internationally by closing the Palestinian Authority diplomatic missions in the United States and refusing visas for Palestinian Authority officials. It does not permit the use of federal funds (including those of organizations that receive federal funds, such as many of the NGOs to establish any contacts with Hamas. It also withholds U.S. funds for the United Nations — already agreed to — on the basis that the UN has various bodies that give expression to the demands and needs of the Palestinian people. In this manner the U.S. is attempting to criminalize not only the Palestinian people and government, but NGOs and international bodies like the United Nations.

Attacks on the Palestinian Authority, the West Bank and Gaza

On the basis of an arbitrary definition of terrorism, the bill states under Section 2 that it shall be the government’s policy “to oppose those organizations, individuals, and countries that support terrorism and violence” and goes on to “urge members of the international community to avoid contact with and refrain from financially supporting the terrorist organization Hamas or a Hamas-controlled Palestinian Authority.” The U.S. has already taken action to stop assistance by banks worldwide, by using the blackmail that their U.S. assets will be frozen if they provide funds of any kind to Palestine.

Section 620K, under the same heading, “Limitation on Assistance to the Palestinian Authority (PA),” establishes numerous guidelines pertaining to how and when “assistance” may be provided to the PA. It states in part, “assistance may be provided under this Act to the Palestinian Authority only during a period for which a certification described in subsection (b) is in effect.”

A certification is essentially an -authorization or determination made by the president. For example, “assistance” cannot be provided unless the president determines that, “no ministry, agency, or instrumentality of the Palestinian Authority is controlled by a foreign terrorist organization and no member of a foreign terrorist organization serves in a senior policy making position in a ministry, agency, or instrumentality of the -Palestinian -Authority.”

Certifications are made solely by the president although they will be “reviewed periodically” by various Congressional committees, including the Committee on International Relations and the Committee on Appropriations of the House of Representatives; the Committee on Foreign Relations and Committee on -Appropriations of the Senate.

The same section stipulates that audits of “United States assistance to the Palestinian Authority under the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961” will be undertaken by “the Department of State, the United States Agency for International Development, and all other relevant departments and agencies of the Government of the United States.”

Section 620L, “Limitation on Assistance for the West Bank and Gaza,” stipulates that “assistance may be provided under this Act to nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) for the West Bank and Gaza only during a period for which a certification” is in effect. This means that only the president can authorize such assistance and that the NGOs cannot provide it absent such authorization. Several other rules and guidelines establish circumstances under which “other types of assistance” may be provided, for example, for purposes of “national security” as determined by the president in consultation with the appropriate committees.

Under a subsection of 620L titled “Oversight and Related Requirements,” it states that prior to providing any “assistance” to nongovernmental organizations for the West Bank or Gaza, the secretary of state shall “ensure that such assistance is not provided to or through any individual or entity that the Secretary knows, or has reason to believe, advocates, plans, sponsors, engages in, or has engaged in, terrorist activity. The Secretary shall, as appropriate, establish procedures specifying the steps to be taken in carrying out this paragraph and shall terminate assistance to any individual or entity that the Secretary has determined advocates, plans, sponsors, or engages in terrorist activity.” Further, no “assistance” may be provided “for the purpose of recognizing or otherwise honoring individuals or the families of individuals who commit, or have committed, acts of terrorism.” This is directly aimed at the families engaged in resistance to the U.S.-backed Israeli occupation.

Under the subsection called “Audits,” the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is given responsibility for ensuring that “independent audits of all contractors and grantees, and significant subcontractors and subgrantees, that receive amounts for assistance to nongovernmental organizations for the West Bank or Gaza under the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 are conducted to ensure, among other things, compliance with this subsection.”

Section 5 of the bill stipulates that during non-certified periods, which at present is all the time, “the territory controlled by the Palestinian Authority should be deemed to be in use as a sanctuary for terrorists or terrorist organizations.” This means that those organizations, like NGOs and religious groups, who attempt to provide aid apart from the Palestine Authority can be criminalized for providing material support to terrorists.

Given that the U.S. has branded Hamas, which now heads the Palestinian government as a “terrorist” organization, any aid that is associated with the Palestinian government will be considered “sponsoring terrorist activity.” It is also well known that Hamas has long been a main provider of local social services, such as healthcare, and that these too will be impacted.

In addition, trade will also be impacted as businesses will need special export licenses for most goods destined for the Occupied Palestinian Territories and more generally for conducting business there.

The overall impact of these requirements is that the NGOs, those who receive federal funds of any kind as well as those who do not, must submit to these demands or face being branded terrorists or supporters of terrorists and criminalized in this manner. The government is organizing to arbitrarily brand various NGOs as supporters of terrorism and seize their assets and/or shut them down, just as they did earlier with the various Muslim charities. The bill serves to directly harm the Palestinians as a people, imposing collective punishment, while also robbing the international movements in support of Palestine of funds and organized assistance.

Attack on Palestinian Organizations Within the United Nations

HR4681 also empowers the president to arbitrarily “withhold funding” from entities within the United Nations that defend the claims and demands of the Palestinian people. These include: The United Nations Division for Palestinian Rights; The Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People; The United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process and Personal Representative to the Palestine Liberation Organization and the Palestinian Authority; The NGO Network on the Question of Palestine; and the Special Committee to Investigate Israeli Practices Affecting the Human Rights of the Palestinian People and Other Arabs of the Occupied Territories. All are being targeted, with the U.S. planning to withhold funds to the United Nations, something it is obligated to do and has already agreed to do. Instead of meeting its responsibility, the bill provides justification for using its financial resources to blackmail not only these organizations but also the UN itself and all the countries that participate in it.

Sections 6 and 7 severely restrict the movement of Palestinian officials to the United States and within the country. Section 8 prohibits Palestine Authority representation in the United States, meaning they will be blocked from participation at the UN, in international conferences organized in the U.S., as well as travel through the U.S. to other locations.

Blackmail of Banks Worldwide

Section 9 directs U.S. representatives at “international financial institutions” to “use the voice, vote, and influence of the United States to prohibit assistance to the Palestinian Authority unless a certification described in subsection (b) is in effect with respect to the Palestinian Authority.” Already tens of millions of dollars destined for the Palestinians have been prevented from reaching them, greatly exacerbating the extreme hardships faced by women, children and all Palestinians.

This section of the bill is an effort to make the U.S. blackmail “legal” and also require the implementation of the threats.

HR4681 is itself criminal and sanctioning crimes against humanity. It must be vigorously opposed. At this point, the Senate is considering its own bill on the matter. If the Senate passes a bill the two must then be reconciled through a Joint Committee and then passed by both Houses in a Joint Resolution. It would then go to the president. At present, it is unlikely that any bill will be acted on until after the summer recess, begriming May 27, 2006, is over.

(Voice of Revolution)

Actualité - Les maîtres du Canada accueillent les maîtres d'Australie

Franc-Parler publie un article sur la visite du Premier ministre australien et chef de file de l'oligarchie financière John Howard au Canada. Le gouvernement d'Howard a poussé à un niveau encore plus dramatique son offensive antisociale pour organiser un assaut contre les droits des travailleurs, la classe ouvrière et le peuple. Fait intéressant, deux proches conseilleurs d'Howard ont encadré la dernière campagne électorale de Stephen Harper. Le gouvernement australien dirige actuellement une série d'opérations impérialistes dans des îles du Pacifique Sud.

Le Parti conservateur au pouvoir à Ottawa, dirigé par Stephen Harper, le représentant de l'oligarchie financière internationale au Canada, a reçu une visite officielle du chef du parti au pouvoir en Australie, John Howard, le représentant de l'oligarchie financière de ce pays. Harper a déclaré que Howard est le premier représentant officiel d'un État à visiter le Canada. C'est un affront au président nouvellement élu d'Haïti, René Préval, qui fut à toutes fins pratiques ignorés par les autorités officielles du Canada lors de sa visite au pays ce mois-ci.

Les chef du parti au pouvoir en Australie s'est vu accorder l'honneur de parler au parlement canadien. Il en a profité pour livrer un message de guerre, appelant les Canadiens à se rallier à l'agression militaire menée par les États-Unis contre l'Afghanistan et à l'occupation coloniale de ce pays.

Le gouvernement Howard a mis une partie importante des ressources de son pays à la disposition de l'agression et de l'occupation armées dans le monde. En plus de sa participation comme partenaire junior de l'impérialisme américain aux guerres criminelles contre l'Irak et la Corée, le parti au pouvoir en Australie a récemment renforcé sa participation à l'invasion et l'occupation armées des îles Solomon dans le Pacifique Sud. Howard a ordonné l'ajout de centaines de soldats lourdement armés pour soutenir le pouvoir colonial face à la révolte populaire et l'intensification de la rivalité inter-monopoliste.

Le Pacifique Sud est en train de devenir un terrain de rivalité intense pour les matières premières entre les vieux occupants coloniaux et le nouveau pouvoir montant de la Chine et de l'Inde. Les habitants de la région sont pris entre deux feux et leurs droits sont attaqués. Les gouvernements coloniaux dysfonctionnels et les systèmes politiques post-coloniaux eurocentriques imposés par les impérialistes sont conçus exprès pour diviser les peuples et monter les citoyens les uns contre les autres. Toute tentative des peuples autochtones et autres habitants, souvent esclaves quand ils sont arrivés dans la région, souvent travailleurs migrants des îles avoisinantes, de régler leurs différents et faire progresser leur pays est sabotée par les grandes puissances et leur insistance à imposer au monde entier leur démocratie multipartite à l'occidental. Le fait que cette démocratie ne permette de résoudre aucun des problèmes que connaissent les nations modernes, surtout les États multinationaux et multi-ethniques, est prouvé et bien établi. Mais le chaos inévitable et l'impasse de la démocratie de style occidental, dominée par les partis, servent ensuite de prétexte pour déclarer que le pays est «un État échoué» et pour imposer l'occupation militaire étrangère.

Les îles Solomon ont été déclarées «État échoué» il y a longtemps et subissent les conséquences brutales de l'intervention et de l'occupation militaires sous commandement australien. Celui-ci est là pour protéger certains intérêts impérialistes de l'Australie et de ses alliés contre les concurrents qui montent en force et, surtout, contre les peuples qui s'insurgent. En plus, les peuples anciens et diversifiés des nombreuses îles qui remontent à 30 000 ans ont souffert les pires atrocités des affrontements inter-impérialistes de la Seconde Guerre mondiale, notamment les affrontements entre les forces britanniques et américaines et les forces japonaises à Guadalcanal.

Impitoyable maître colonial et exploiteur

Des sociétés minières canadiennes sont très impliquées dans les rivalités inter-impérialistes pour les abondantes richesses naturelles des îles et des eaux du Pacifique Sud. Inco, par le biais d'un outil d'exploitation coloniale appelé Goro Nickel Mine, s'est arrogé le droit de possession et d'exploitation des vastes réserves de nickel de Kanaky (la Nouvelle-Calédonie). En opposition à toute définition moderne, la France occupe le Kanaky à titre de colonie comme cela se faisait au XIXe siècle et refuse mordicus de reconnaître les droits ancestraux des peuples autochtones ou les droits des habitants de la région. Inco se sert du pouvoir militaire et juridique de l'État français et de sa possession coloniale de la Nouvelle-Calédonie pour brutalement réprimer toute opposition à son exploitation du sol et du travail des habitants du Kanaky.

Par ailleurs, le Conseil canadien des chefs d'entreprises a rappelé qu'il a reçu le premier ministre Howard à Vancouver en 1997 à l'occasion du fameux Sommet de l'APEC où le Parti libéral au pouvoir à l'époque aurait ordonné à la police d'attaquer les manifestants.

Au nom du CCCE, Thomas d'Aquino a loué le rôle joué par Howard dans la protection du pouvoir de l'oligarchie financière en défendant une vision eurocentrique de la politique -- exploitant les «liens ancestraux de l'Australie avec l'Europe» pour construire un État qui sert à supprimer les droits ancestraux des peuples autochtones, fouler aux pieds les droits de la classe ouvrière et des immigrants et nier la conception moderne des droits qui dit que tous les êtres humains ont des droits du fait de leur existence en tant qu'humains.

(Le Marxiste-Léniniste)

Actualité - Israel Attacks Palestinians in Lebanon

Franc-Parler publie une dépêche de Prensa Latina News Agency rapportant un bombardement de l'armée israélienne au sud du Liban. Cette attaque visait des Palestiniens refugiés au Liban. Ce genre d'assaut contre la souveraineté des peuples est régulière pour les sionistes et les impérialistes sous les couvert de la "sécurité" et de la soi-disant lutte contre le terrorisme.

Beirut, May 28 (Prensa Latina) - Israeli planes bombed Palestinian positions in Lebanon on Sunday, after an attack on a military base in northern Israel.

The bombs hit the city of Sultan Yacub, some 5 kilometers from the Syrian border, and the Naame Hills, some 20 kilometers from here.

According to Lebanese sources, the number of casualties and the magnitude of material damage were still unknown.

Anuar Raja, a representative of the Palestinian Liberation Front, pointed out that Israel attacked one of its positions in the western sector of the Bekaa Valley.

The attack took place a few hours after alleged Palestinian guerrillas in Lebanon shot rockets against a military base in Mount Meron, in northern Israel, slightly wounding two soldiers, the Israeli Army reported.

So far, no Palestinian faction has claimed responsibility for the attack

(Prensa Latina News Agency)

Actualité - New Caledonia : Indigenous people take on mining giant

Franc-Parler publie un article sur la situation en Nouvelle-Caledonie, une île de l'océan Pacifique. Le peuple Kanak lutte depuis des décennies pour la reconnaissance de leurs droits ancestraux. Le monopole minier canadien Inco est impliqué dans des activités minières destructrices pour l'environnement naturel et des actions contre les peuples indigènes.

The New Caledonian islands lie 1200 kilometres off the east coast of Australia. A French territory that is co-governed by a provincial New Caledonian parliament and the French government, New Caledonia (or Kanaky) is a biodiversity hot-spot.

The main island, Grand Terre, is bounded by a barrier reef that is second only to Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, and which is home to an immeasurable number of marine species, many of which are found nowhere else on Earth.

The indigenous Kanak people of New Caledonia have fought for decades to protect this unique environment from the degradation caused by mining and for the recognition of their rights as indigenous people.

On March 25, management for the Inco-operated Goro Nickel mine, situated in the Southern Province, acknowledged a huge landslide that affected the nearby marine lagoon, the oldest and largest protected marine area in New Caledonia and an area soon to be nominated for World Heritage listing.

The Kanaks living near the Goro Nickel project have been struggling for years to have Inco heed their calls for negotiations about the mine’s environmental and social impacts.

On March 29, tensions between the locals and Goro-Nickel erupted again with a blockade established at the site that forced mining operations to stop. The blockade was a response to the company’s plans to construct a pipeline that would release mine waste water into the sea and to use nearby Lake Yate as a source of water for mining operations.

Opponents of the plans argue that the marine environment will be degraded and the local community’s access to clean, fresh water from Lake Yate will be affected.

The provincial government responded by deploying riot police and troops to remove the blockade, at times using tear gas and live ammunition to disperse protesters, and invoking “anti-terrorist” measures against one Kanak leader.

Goro Nickel says the overall cost of the blockade and the damage caused to heavy machinery by protesters amounts to US$10 million — although no evidence has been made public backing this assertion. Eight protesters were arrested and many other activists have been in hiding.

Jacques Boengkih, spokesperson for the Agency for Kanak Development, says the ensuing police search for these activists has been brutal. “This morning they sent some police to search the house of Raphael Mapou, who has been hiding for the last month, and in that house only the mother and some minor kids are living there and so it was once again a brutal police search of the house”, he said.

Mapou is former president of the Rheebu Nuu committee, a Kanak organisation established as a local monitoring body over the Goro Nickel project to protect indigenous rights. The committee was responsible for organising the March blockade.

The Rheebu Nuu committee has been accused by New Caledonia’s Southern Province President Philippe Gomes of misleading the public. In a comment made to a New Caledonian television broadcaster, Gomes said he believes the reasons behind the Rheebu Nuu committee’s actions were not environmental, and that their real motive is mining royalties.

But according to Boengkih, “Environmental issues have been always first on the list of claims from the chiefs from the south. They have been always saying that the company should be careful because some areas are sacred sites and in the sea are fishing grounds and they have always been calling for tough measures to protect the environment.”

Boengkih also alleged that the provincial government has misrepresented the Kanak claim for royalties. The Rheebu Nuu committee has stated that royalties should be paid to the government, and not to the individual indigenous groups concerned.

Furthermore, Boengkih said that New Caledonia is way out of step with other countries on the issue of mining royalties. “Everywhere else, in Australia or Canada, people have experienced access to benefit sharing from the exploitation of their resources and this is no more than what people are asking for and they are asking for that being paid to the government and not to themselves.”

Inco has repeatedly declined negotiations with Rheebu Nuu on the basis that French law does not recognise Indigenous rights. However, the preamble to the Les Accords De Noumea, signed in 1998, recognised the Kanak peoples as distinct from other citizens of the French republic.

On November 8, 2004, the French Tribunal in Noumea found that the political and cultural rights of the indigenous people of New Caledonia exist and are protected by law.

Goro Nickel has not obtained the free, prior and informed consent of the Kanak people for its plans to further develop the mining project. The Senat Coutumier (Kanak Customary Senate) specifically withheld consent in 2002.

The Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination and the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights have both called on governments to ensure the participation of indigenous people in decisions affecting their lives and their natural resources. It is on this basis that the Kanaks seek a negotiated and legally binding settlement regarding royalties and the social and environmental impacts of the Inco Goro-Nickel mining project.

Despite much opposition, Boengkih says the Kanaks will continue to push for roundtable negotiations with Goro Nickel, the French government, the New Caledonian government, the Senat Coutumier and the Rheebu Nuu committee.

A series of peaceful demonstrations took place on May Day in Kanak communities up and down the east and west coasts of Grande Terre. They aimed to show Inco Goro Nickel and the French and New Caledonian governments that the Kanak communities directly affected by the Goro Nickel mine are not alone in their opposition to the proposed development of the site.

And their message is clear: the French and New Caledonian governments and the mining industry must recognise and respect their rights as indigenous people.

(Green Left Weekly)

Actualité - Bolivia : Venezuela Industrialize Gas

Franc-Parler publie une dépêche annonçant un accord bilatéral entre le Venezuela et la Bolivie. Cet accord permettra de développer les ressources d'hydrocarbures boliviens recemment nationalisés. Les impérialistes ont brandi sur toutes les tribunes le spectre que le gaz nationalisé ne pourrait être développé en Bolivie. Ces accords démontrent au contraire qu'une voie souveraine en économie est possible.

La Paz, May 27 (Prensa Latina) - Industrialization of gas in Bolivia, supposedly impossible without the transnationals, is among Bolivia-Venezuela bilateral agreements.

Presidents Evo Morales (Bolivia), Hugo Chavez (Venezuela) and Cuban Vice President Carlos Lage signed the accords that include mining, financial aid and agribusiness, among others.

The state-run companies Yacimientos Petroliferos Fiscales Bolivianos and Petroleos de Venezuela signed six agreements, including a letter of intent to boost the gas industry.

A 100 million dollar loan from Venezuela will help expand education, the plastic industry, mining, science and technology, reforestation and telecommunications.

The first credits will also back textiles, timber, leather and dairy industries, small food companies, boost the production of honey and quinua (cereal) and a tourist resort.

Others include a Venezuelan acquisition of over 100 million dollars in bonds from the Bolivian Treasury to cover its fiscal deficit and avoid negotiations with the IMF.

The accords will help Bolivia transform from a simple raw material exporter into something neoliberalism tried to render impossible without transnational capital.

(Prensa Latina News Agency)

Actualité - Les gouvernements européens couvrent les enlèvements illégaux de la CIA

Franc-Parler publie un article exposant la complicité des gouvernements européens dans l'enlèvement d'individus soupçonnés de terrorisme par la CIA. De nombreux exemples de ces complicités directes et de couverture des activités terroristes de la CIA sont mis à jour, notamment l'implication du gouvernement allemand.

Des personnes soupçonnées de terrorisme ont été enlevées en Union européenne par la CIA et transférées dans des pays tiers où elles ont été torturées. Les gouvernements européens étaient au courant de ces pratiques illégales et y étaient même partiellement impliqués.

Telle est la conclusion tirée par la commission d'enquête du Parlement européen dans un premier rapport intermédiaire examinant les activités illégales de la CIA en Europe. Dick Marty, enquêteur du Conseil de l'Europe, était arrivé à la même conclusion en février. Au total, quarante-six États européens font partie du Conseil de l'Europe; le Parlement européen comprend des représentants des vingt cinq États-membres de l'Union Européenne.

La commission de l'Union européenne examine depuis quatre mois si et dans quelle mesure la CIA s'est livrée à des opérations d'enlèvements et de transferts de personnes dans des prisons secrètes. Elle dispose à présent de pièces justificatives concernant plus d'un millier de vols non déclarés que la CIA a effectués en Europe depuis 2001.

Le rapport intermédiaire conclut que «La CIA a été, à plusieurs reprises, clairement responsable de l'enlèvement et de la détention illégaux de terroristes allégués sur le territoire des États membres ainsi que de restitutions extraordinaires, et qu'il s'agiss[ait] dans plusieurs cas de ressortissants européens.»

Ces transferts extraordinaires ou «restitutions» sont caractérisés comme une violation claire du droit international. Comme le note le rapport, ces «restitutions» ont pour objectif que «les suspects ne soient pas soumis à procès.» La CIA a «enlevé, détenu et restitué secrètement des personnes suspectées de terrorisme.» Elles auraient été confiées à d'autres pays (parmi lesquels l'Egypte, la Jordanie, la Syrie et l'Afghanistan), «qui utilisent fréquemment, comme le reconnaît également le gouvernement des États-Unis lui-même, la torture lors des interrogatoires.»

L'auteur du rapport, Giovanni Fava, (député italien du Groupe parlementaire du Parti socialiste européen (PSE) au Parlement européen, a remarqué qu'il «ne s'agit pas d'incidents isolés», mais «de groupes organisés qui ont agi à plusieurs reprises en plusieurs lieux du territoire européen.» Entre autres, il souleva le fait qu'il s'agissait de manière étonnante toujours des mêmes agents qui étaient à bord des avions de la CIA et que les plans de vols à eux seuls auraient dû éveiller des soupçons.

Sous couvert de clauses restrictives, le rapport reconnaît la participation et la complicité des gouvernements européens et juge «invraisemblable () que certains gouvernements européens n'avaient pas connaissance des activités de restitution extraordinaire qui avaient lieu sur leur territoire et dans leur espace aérien ou leurs aéroports.»

Le gouvernement suédois notamment est critiqué pour avoir livré à la CIA deux ressortissants égyptiens, Mohammed Al-Zary et Ahmed Agiza et ce en toute connaissance de cause des «risques de torture et de traitement cruels, inhumains ou dégradants» que ces deux personnes seraient susceptibles d'endurer en Egypte.

Selon le rapport, l'enlèvement par des agents de la CIA du ressortissant égyptien Abu Omar à Milan en février 2003, aurait difficilement pu être organisé et effectué «en l'absence d'information préalable aux autorités gouvernementales ou aux services de sécurité italiens.»

Le gouvernement allemand au courant depuis 2003

Le rapport mentionne également le cas de six ressortissants bosniaques d'origine algérienne qui ont été livrés à la CIA par les autorités bosniaques en janvier 2002 et qui sont depuis incarcérés à Guantánamo sans inculpation. Ce cas illustre le rôle joué par les forces d'occupation des Nations unies SFOR et qui sont placées sous l'égide de l'OTAN et révèle une complicité dès la première heure du gouvernement allemand.

Selon la déclaration de l'avocat américain des six détenus algériens, Stephen Oleskey, ces derniers avaient été arrêtés par les forces de sécurité bosniaques en octobre 2001 comme suspects de terrorisme. En janvier 2002, la Cour suprême de la Fédération de Bosnie et Herzégovine les avait acquittés par manque de preuves et les juges avaient ordonné leur libération. Cependant, dans la nuit du 17 au 18 janvier, les six furent remis aux soldats américains de la SFOR et ce bien que la Cour avait expressément interdit, pour quatre des acquittés, leur remise aux autorités américaines.

De façon illégale et arbitraire, les autorités bosniaques avaient retiré à ces hommes leur citoyenneté afin de pouvoir les remettre aux forces de sécurité américaines. Devenus ainsi apatrides, ils avaient été présentés comme des suspects ayant l'intention de commettre des attentats contre des bâtiments américains en Bosnie-Herzégovine.

De toute évidence le transfert illégal aux forces de sécurité américaines avait eu lieu suite à une pression massive exercée par le gouvernement Bush. Oleskey a déclaré lors de son audition devant la commission: «Des fonctionnaires américains ont informé le gouvernement bosniaque que l'aide américaine pour la Bosnie serait supprimée si les six hommes n'étaient pas arrêtés.» Oleskey est convaincu que l'ordre de transfert, considéré comme illégal par la loi bosniaque et la loi internationale, émanait du plus haut niveau hiérarchique du gouvernement bosniaque.

On ne sait toujours pas quel rôle ont joué les troupes de la SFOR lors du transfert. Il est remarquable que Paddy Ashdown, le haut représentant de la communauté internationale en Bosnie-Herzégovine depuis 2002, n'a rien fait pour prévenir le transfert illégal et n'a pas réagi aux efforts entrepris par les avocats des six hommes pour faire avancer l'affaire.

Six mois plus tard, en été 2003, les troupes de la Bundeswehr (l'armée allemande) stationnées en Bosnie se mêlèrent à l'affaire. Contre toute réglementation, des soldats allemands se firent passer pour des journalistes pour faire du travail de renseignement. Ils rendirent visite aux familles des six hommes et eurent accès au dossier.

La presse allemande a relaté le subterfuge concernant l'identité des soldats de la Bundeswehr, mais rien du résultat de leur enquête explosive. Le fait que le gouvernement n'ait pas réagi est un scandale de bien plus grande envergure.

Un capitaine de la Bundeswehr a rédigé un rapport sur le transfert des six hommes lequel se trouve en la possession de l'ARD, la première chaîne de télévision allemande. Il y est dit que l'enquête a confirmé le soupçon «qu'au moins certains des 'six' avaient été victimes d'une injustice.» Leur «éventuelle arrestation injustifiée» et «déportation hautement douteuse» signifie que les informations obtenues devraient «être soumises aux spécialistes en question à l'ambassade d'Allemagne».

Par la suite, le rapport a effectivement été remis au ministère de la Défense à Berlin, ce qui signifie que le gouvernement fédéral était au courant dès juillet 2003 des pratiques illégales auxquelles s'adonnaient les États-Unis en Europe, donc six mois avant l'enlèvement de Khaled al-Masri, ressortissant allemand d'origine libanaise.

Al Masri avait été enlevé fin 2003 par la CIA en Macédoine et transféré en Afghanistan où il fut torturé. Le gouvernement Rouge-Vert (sociaux-démocrates et Verts) de l'époque clame n'en avoir eu connaissance qu'après coup. A présent le ministère de la Défense prétend aussi ne pas connaître le rapport des troupes allemandes de la SFOR concernant le cas des six Algériens. Dans une interview au journal de 20 heures de la télévision allemande, le ministère déclara laconiquement qu'il lui était impossible de trouver le rapport dans les archives.

Quelques unes des photos contenues dans le rapport ont fait surface, mais les légendes y ayant trait restent toujours introuvables. Au comité de défense du parlement au sein duquel l'affaire est maintenant également débattue, d'importants documents ont été retenus pendant plus d'un mois par le secrétaire d'État responsable, Friedbert Pflüger (Parti chrétien démocrate ­ CDU) qui ne les a transmis que sur demande expresse.

Le gouvernement réagit aussi nerveusement parce que les six hommes avaient été transférés à Guantánamo dans un avion qui avait décollé de la base militaire américaine de Ramstein en Allemagne. Ces récentes révélations montrent de plus en plus clairement que le gouvernement était au courant très tôt des activités illégales de la CIA et qu'il tient à balayer sous le tapis sa complicité dans la violation des droits de l'homme.

Les dénégations du gouvernement britannique

Le gouvernement britannique essaie lui aussi de tromper l'opinion publique. Confronté au rapport intermédiaire du Parlement européen, Jack Straw, ministre des Affaires étrangères britannique qui a été renvoyé dernièrement, déclarait au quotidien britannique The Guardian ne pas disposer de preuves que les États-Unis avaient utilisé l'espace aérien ou les aéroports britanniques pour transporter des prisonniers. Il dit être sûr que Washington l'aurait informé le cas échéant.

Cependant, l'ancien ambassadeur britannique en Ouzbékistan, Craig Murray, a fourni la preuve au comité que le service de renseignement britannique MI6 a collaboré étroitement avec la CIA durant des années et qu'un échange d'information permanent a lieu. Il a également soumis un document émanant de l'ancien conseiller juridique de Straw, Michael Wood, partageant l'opinion que les informations obtenues par la torture pouvaient être utilisées juridiquement dans la mesure où les Britanniques n'avaient pas torturé mais simplement reçu les informations par le biais d'un pays tiers. Cette position fut alors adoptée par le gouvernement britannique dans le but de pouvoir utiliser des confessions obtenues par la torture en Ouzbékistan.

La vaste documentation qui a été soumise jusque-là par la commission permet de conclure que non seulement les États-Unis avaient systématiquement violé les conventions internationales relatives aux droits de l'homme, mais que les gouvernements européens s'étaient rendus tout aussi coupables de fautes graves en violant les règles de la convention anti-torture internationale et celles de la convention européenne des droits de l'homme, soit par leur silence, soit par leur inaction ou par leur duplicité ouverte avec la CIA.

Dans les mois à venir, la commission envisage d'enquêter pour savoir s'il existe également des prisons secrètes de la CIA en Europe. Giovanni Fava a déclaré lors d'une conférence de presse: «Si l'on tient compte du nombre de vols de la CIA, l'on pourrait conclure qu'il était aussi question de transférer des personnes dans des prisons en Europe.»

Ce point de vue correspond également à une information parue début avril dans le magazine allemand Stern, et selon laquelle la CIA aurait questionné des suspects de terrorisme quelque part près de la ville polonaise de Kiejkuty. Le bâtiment est censé être un centre d'entraînement des services de renseignement polonais qu'ils partagent avec les Américains. Une zone interdite aux agents des services secrets polonais est supposée exister dans le camp. Le Stern écrit à ce sujet: «Des fourgonnettes aux vitres teintées stationnaient dans le camp, précisément les modèles de voitures que les agents de l'aéroport Szymany avaient signalés comme étant ceux qui avaient toujours rejoint les avions de la CIA après leur atterrissage.»

Bruxelles inactif

La commission d'enquête du Parlement européen est un tigre de papier édenté au sein de la bureaucratie bruxelloise. Les gouvernements européens n'ont pas à redouter de conséquences directes suite au rapport. La commission ne peut ni forcer les gouvernements européens à l'autoriser à examiner le dossier ni exiger que des collaborateurs gouvernementaux ou des agents des services secrets fassent des dépositions. Le Parlement européen n'est habilité qu'à faire des recommandations car seule la Commission européenne ou un tiers au moins des États-membres peut intenter une action contre des gouvernements individuels.

Le coordinateur anti-terroriste de l'UE, Gijs de Vries, tout comme le haut représentant pour la politique étrangère et de sécurité commune de l'UE, Javier Solana, ont respecté l'esprit du rapport de la commission.

De Vries n'a vu«aucune preuve» de transports illégaux de prisonniers par la CIA en Europe. Questionné au sujet de la complicité des gouvernements européens, il a répondu, «Je crois que cela n'a pas encore été prouvé». Il a admis que les services secrets européens et la CIA jouissaient d'une «coopération mutuelle bénéficiaire» mais ceci n'était pas de la compétence de l'Union européenne.

Javier Solana qui a été auditionné le 2 mai, a adopté une position similaire. Il a dit, «Je n'ai pas d'informations qui me disent avec certitude que les accusations, les affirmations, les rumeurs qui ont courus correspondent à la vérité. Je n'ai pas non plus l'autorité de demander à ces pays [membres] comment ils traitent ces questions et ils n'ont aucune obligation à mon égard à me rendre des comptes.»

Alors que les autorités bruxelloises s'immiscent bien volontiers dans les «affaires intérieures» dans le but de sauvegarder les intérêts des investisseurs, des groupes et des banques internationaux, elles affirment n'avoir aucune autorité quand il s'agit de droits de l'homme. Ce désintéressement feint est en contradiction frappante avec le fait que c'est justement le domaine de la justice et des affaires intérieures qui fait partie du champ d'activité politique dans lequel la collaboration entre les États de l'Union européenne est sans cesse intensifiée.

(World Socialist Web Site)