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CORRUPTION UPDATES 122

Posted: October 16, 2007

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1) The Articles linked below were Abstracted from the sources cited. After the abstract there's analysis and commentary, links to related articles, and a link to the database with suggested search terms.

Phone Utilities Won’t Give Details About Eavesdropping

By ERIC LICHTBLAU

NYT, October 16, 2007

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/16/washington/

16nsa.html?ref=todayspaper&pagewanted=print

 

WASHINGTON, Oct. 15 — The three biggest phone carriers have refused to tell members of Congress what role, if any, they had in the National Security Agency’s domestic eavesdropping program. The utilities said it would be illegal to divulge classified information.

“Given the focus of your questions,” a lawyer for AT&T wrote to members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee in a letter released on Monday, “our company essentially finds itself caught in the middle of an oversight dispute between the Congress and the executive relating to government surveillance activities.”

The role of the carriers will be central to the debate in Congress this week over limiting the eavesdropping. The Bush administration has pressed Congress to give the carriers immunity for their cooperation, but House Democrats are balking.

Democrats on the panel had asked AT&T, Verizon and Qwest for detailed responses on the roles. Like AT&T, Verizon and Qwest declined to answer specific questions.

Representative Bart Stupak, a Michigan Democrat who leads the subcommittee on oversight, said, “While I recognize the unique legal constraints the telecommunications companies face regarding what information they may disclose, important questions remain unanswered about how the administration induced or compelled them to participate in the N.S.A.’s eavesdropping program.”

The carriers face a barrage of suits. The administration has sought to thwart the cases by invoking the “state secrets” privilege, and the utilities have said little because of the suits. Letters by the companies released Monday broadly defended the cooperation with law enforcement officials.

Verizon and the other companies have acknowledged that they routinely comply with what Verizon called “lawful demands” for call records and access to phone lines. In 2006, the Verizon letter said, it received 88,000 such requests, about 34,000 from federal officials and 54,000 from state and local officials. Through September of this year, it received 24,000 federal requests and 37,000 state and local requests.

Verizon also acknowledged that the Federal Bureau of Investigation had asked for records to identify what it termed “a calling circle” but said it had not been able to provide them.

Verizon indicated that the F.B.I. had sought records for a broader network of callers than the bureau itself had previously acknowledged by requesting records not just on original targets and the people they had called, but on everyone that those people in turn had called.

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THE COMMITTEE SAYS:

Criminal Corporations Assist Criminal Government

Alex Wierbinski, Berkeley, Ca., October , 2007

The specific words of the Fourth Amendment of The Constitution are:

“...and No warrant shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”

The president has no authority to interfere with this Constitutionally mandated standard. Nor does Congress, nor the Courts. Their jobs are to enforce the Constitution, not stand around stealing our treasure while Bush steals our Rights.

Congress has continued to fund the FBI, NSA and CIA despite clear evidence of criminal wrongdoing and the fact that none of them will allow Congressional oversight of their illegal spying, illegal detention, and illegal torture programs.

Now private corporations are refusing to disclose their participation in the President's criminal spying programs to Congress, while the President is lobbying Congress to imunize these same compainies against prosecution for illegally spying on their customers.

The phone companies have allowed the Feds to tap into, and record every digital and voice communication that goes over their networks. This data is tested for relationships with and between suspects, and all communications from anyone who had contact with anyone who had contact with a suspect is analyzed.

The government has the capability to type your name in a database and list every phone call conversation, all of your emails and their content, and every internet activity you have done for at least the last year.

The Secret Suspicion

 

Corruption Updates 123, #1, 10-18-07, Senate agrees to imunize phone companies who broke the law and violated our right to be secure in our effects

Top of Page

Also See:

NY Times, 10-14-07; Former Qwest Phone Chief Says Spy Agency Sought Surveillance Help Before 9/11

Frontline, homepage for Spying on the Homefront

Mark Klein, Transcript from Fronline, May 15, 2007

Mark Klein legal Deposition, pdf

The power of Naris survalliance, Wired, May 17, 2006

Comey testimony before Congress, Ashcroft hospital incident, UTube, 20 minutes. Very informative.

 

The final Solution: Congress passes illegal Domestic Spying law authorizing warrantless NSA searches within the US

New Illegal Domestic Spying Law gives President Unlimited Searching Powers

Corruption Updates 119, 7th article on the page, Bush Threatens to Veto new Spy Bill: Why veto it, when a signing statement will bend it to the President's will?

 

Link List of Abstracts on Illegal Searching

 

Electronic Frontier Foundation, Oct 13, 2007; EFF Documents Detail Pentagon Demands for Financial Records

Electronic Frontier Foundation, Home Page

Search the Corruption Database under

Illegal Searches

Speak your Mind here! Send your Comments about the Topic Above for Posting!

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2) The Article linked below was Abstracted from the source cited.

Verizon Says It Turned Over Data Without Court Orders

Firm's Letter to Lawmakers Details Government Requests

 

By Ellen Nakashima

Washington Post Staff Writer

Tuesday, October 16, 2007; A01

 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/15/AR2007101501857_pf.html

 

Verizon Communications, the nation's second-largest telecom company, told congressional investigators that it has provided customers' telephone records to federal authorities in emergency cases without court orders hundreds of times since 2005.

The company said it does not determine the requests' legality or necessity because to do so would slow efforts to save lives in criminal investigations.

In an Oct. 12 letter replying to Democratic lawmakers, Verizon offered a rare glimpse into the way telecommunications companies cooperate with government requests for information on U.S. citizens.

The disclosures, in a letter from Verizon to three Democrats on the House Energy and Commerce Committee investigating the carriers' participation in government surveillance programs, demonstrated the willingness of telecom companies to comply with government requests for data, even, at times, without traditional legal supporting documents.

From January 2005 to September 2007, Verizon provided data to federal authorities on an emergency basis 720 times, it said in the letter. The records included Internet protocol addresses as well as phone data. In that period, Verizon turned over information a total of 94,000 times to federal authorities armed with a subpoena or court order, the letter said.

The letters were released yesterday by the lawmakers as Congress debates whether to grant telecom carriers immunity in cases in which they are sued for disclosing customers' phone records and other data as part of the government's post-September 11 surveillance program, even if they did not have court authorization. House Democrats have said that they cannot contemplate such immunity without first understanding the nature of the carriers' cooperation with the government.

Congressional Democrats have been largely stymied in their efforts to have the Bush administration disclose the scope and nature of its surveillance and data-gathering efforts after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Revelations have come through press reports, advocacy groups' Freedom of Information Act lawsuits and Justice Department inspector general reports.

In May 2006, USA Today reported that the National Security Agency had been secretly collecting the phone-call records of tens of millions of Americans, using data provided by major telecom firms. Qwest, it reported, declined to participate because of fears that the program lacked legal standing.

Last month, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a privacy group in San Francisco, obtained records through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit showing that the FBI sought data from telecom companies about the calling habits of suspects and their associates, the New York Times reported. Neither Qwest nor AT&T answered the lawmakers' question as to whether they had received such requests for information.

"The privacy concerns are exponential each generation you go away from the suspect's number," said Kurt Opsahl, senior staff attorney with the EFF. "This shows that further investigation by Congress and the inspector general is critical."

Michael Kortan, an FBI spokesman, said the bureau has suspended use of community-of-interest data "while an appropriate oversight and approval policy" is developed. He added that the inspector general is reviewing the use of those data.

The Senate Intelligence Committee could draft a bill this week that includes relief for the carriers. The administration is seeking blanket immunity, which would extend to anyone sued for assisting the government -- not just telecom carriers -- in its post-Sept. 11 surveillance programs.

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THE COMMITTEE SAYS:

Corporate Criminals Assist General Searches of American's Private Communications

Alex Wierbinski, Berkeley, Ca., October , 2007

The Corporate Charters of companies that violate our fundamental righs should be immediately suspended.

Top of Page

Also See:

New Illegal Domestic Spying Law gives President Unlimited Searching Powers, SF Chron, August 19, 2007

Pentagon and NSA using “Nat Sec Lets” to illegally spy on Americans, NY Times, October 14, 2007

House Approves General Search Warrants, Corruption Updates 131, November 15, 2007

Link List of Abstracts on Illegal Searching

 

Search the Corruption Database under

Illegal Searches

 

 

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3) The Article linked below was Abstracted from the source cited.

Democratic Candidates Keep Outraising Republicans

By MICHAEL COOPER and ARON PILHOFER

NYT, October 16, 2007

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/16/us/politics/16donate.html?_

r=8&ref=todayspaper&pagewanted=print&oref=slogin&oref=slogin&oref=slogin&or

 

The leading Democratic presidential candidates raised twice as much money as their Republican counterparts this summer, according to campaign finance reports filed yesterday, and several major candidates spent more money than they raised.

The Democrats were led by Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, who reported raising $23.7 million this summer for the primaries and whose campaign said it had about $35 million left for the primaries.

The leading Republican candidates, by comparison, raised much less and were left with much less for their primaries.

 

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THE COMMITTEE SAYS:

Corporate Democrats Surpass Republicans as Corporate Bitches:

Billery Cleaning Up in Bribery Race

Alex Wierbinski, Berkeley, Ca., October , 2007

Top of Page

Also See:

DEMS BIG CHANCE TO REAP THE REWARDS OF CORRUPTION POLITICAL VICTORY OPENS DOORS OF LOBBYING FIRMS TO DEMO INSIDERS: IT'S THE DEMS TURN TO ROB THE PUBLIC BLIND, AND BETRAY OUR DEMOCRACY, Corruption Updates 21, 8fh article on page, 11-1-06

LOBBYISTS SEE NO CHANGE UNDER DEMS CORRUPTION PRESENTED AS FORCE OF NATURE, DEM CORRUPTION NATURAL, Corruption Updates 26, 1st article on page, 12-8-06

LOBBYISTS HIRING-BRIBING DEMS SHIFTING FUNDS AND PERSONELL TO DEMS ASSURES NO REAL CHANGES, Corruption Updates 28, 1st article on page, 1-2-07

Murtha collects bribes from turkey, NY Times, 10-17-07

NYT, October 18, 2007; Accused Law Firm Continues Giving to Democrats: Dems Sell Themselves, Our Government, to Anyone with Two-Cents to rub together

AP, October 20, 2007; Edwards Warns of 'Corporate Democrats:' All the Dems are Corporate Democrats

SF Chronicle, October 26, 2007; De La Fuente's son sentenced to 14 years for sexual assaults: Pervert Son of Corrupted Political Hack Sentenced to Prison for multiple Rapes: Sr. has raped our Democracy, Jr. Rapes illegal whores: Let's do a family Reunion in Prison

NYT, October 29, 2007; Health Sector Puts Its Money on Democrats: Billery Bought to the Hilt by Corporate Medicine: Expect all Medical Costs to Continue Rising after Election

 

Dems sold themselves to the highest bidders

 

Search the Corruption Database under

Democrats

Bribery/contributions

 

 

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4) The Article linked below was Abstracted from the source cited.

$6 Billion in Contracts Reviewed, Pentagon Says

By ERIC SCHMITT and GINGER THOMPSON

 

NYT, September 21, 2007

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/21/washington/21

contract.html?ref=todayspaper&pagewanted=print

 

WASHINGTON, Sept. 20 — Military officials said Thursday that contracts worth $6 billion to provide essential supplies to American troops in Kuwait, Iraq and Afghanistan — including food, water and shelter — were under review by criminal investigators, double the amount the Pentagon had previously disclosed.

In addition, $88 billion in contracts and programs, including those for body armor for American soldiers and matériel for Iraqi and Afghan security forces, are being audited for financial irregularities, the officials said.

Taken together, the figures, provided by the Pentagon in a hearing before the House Armed Services Committee, represent the fullest public accounting of the magnitude of a widening government investigation into bid-rigging, bribery and kickbacks by members of the military and civilians linked to the Pentagon’s purchasing system.

At the hearing, a panel of high-ranking Defense Department officials described a war-zone procurement system in disarray. They said that the Pentagon failed to provide adequate training for contracting officers for their assignments, offered insufficient oversight of contracting officers’ activities and had not put in place early warning systems to catch officers who violated the law.

“The problems were so severe that I fear they could represent a culture of corruption,” said Representative Ike Skelton, Democrat of Missouri, the chairman of the committee. “I am extremely disappointed to learn that so many individuals violated their integrity and undermined the oaths they made to this country.”

Representative John Kline, a Minnesota Republican and retired Marine colonel, said he was “doubly, triply, quadruply appalled” at the “clear breakdown in leadership” that allowed some Army contracting officers to corrupt the procurement system. He said it was inexcusable that it took so long for the Army to put adequate checks in place.

As of Sept. 12, the Army reported that it had 78 cases of fraud and corruption under investigation, had obtained 20 criminal indictments, and had uncovered over $15 million in bribes.

 

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THE COMMITTEE SAYS:

Alex Wierbinski, Berkeley, Ca., October , 2007

Top of Page

Also See:

So, Mr Bremer, where did all the money go?, The Guardian, July 7, 2005

Bribery Network to Bloat War Costs Is Alleged: Bush and Friends Robbing the US Blind, Corruption Updates 94, 6th article on the page

 

pentagon fraud out of control

Search the Corruption Database under

pentagon

fraud

 

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5) The Article linked below was Abstracted from the source cited.

Top Air Force Official Dies in Apparent Suicide

By ERIC SCHMITT and GINGER THOMPSON

NYT, October 16, 2007

 

October 16, 2007

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/16/us/16contract.html?

ref=todayspaper&pagewanted=print

 

WASHINGTON, Oct. 15 — The second-highest-ranking member of the Air Force’s procurement office was found dead Sunday in an apparent suicide, Air Force and police officials said Monday.

The civilian official, Charles D. Riechers, 47, came under scrutiny by the Senate Armed Services Committee this month after reports that the Air Force had arranged for him to be paid about $13,400 a month by a private contractor, Commonwealth Research Institute, while he awaited clearance from the White House for his selection as principal deputy assistant secretary for acquisition. He was appointed to the job, which does not require Senate confirmation, in January.

The Air Force’s procurement programs have been handicapped for years by accusations of favoritism, inefficiency and technical shortfalls, and Mr. Riechers’s new role in the procurement office was supposed to have been repairing the damage.

Instead, his death appears likely only to call renewed attention to those problems.

Payments to Mr. Riechers totaling $26,788 were confirmed by Mary Bevan, a spokeswoman for the Concurrent Technologies Corporation, the parent of Commonwealth Research, or C.R.I.

. In an interview with The Post, Mr. Riechers said: “I really didn’t do anything for C.R.I. I got a paycheck from them.”

The Air Force has defended the arrangement as routine. The matter raised enough questions, however, that the service asked the Defense Department’s inspector general several months ago to review the propriety of such consulting arrangements. A spokesman for the inspector general said Monday that the review was still under way.

In addition to the recent questions focusing narrowly on Mr. Riechers, the Pentagon and the Justice Department are conducting criminal investigations into the possibility of bribery and other offenses involving some $6 billion in contracts to provide essential supplies to American troops in Afghanistan, Iraq and Kuwait

Last year, the Pentagon canceled a $23 billion deal to lease tankers from Boeing, after the disclosure that the Air Force’s top procurement officer, Darleen Druyun, had favored Boeing in contracts before being hired by the company.

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THE COMMITTEE SAYS:

Alex Wierbinski, Berkeley, Ca., October , 2007

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Also See:

Corruption Updates , th article on the page,

Search the Corruption Database under


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6) The Article linked below was Abstracted from the source cited.

State Department Under Hill Scrutiny

 

By LOLITA C. BALDOR, Associated Press Writer

 

Tuesday, September 18, 2007

 

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/n/a/2007/09/18/national/w090451D01.DTL&type=printable

 

 

(09-18) 18:08 PDT WASHINGTON, (AP) --

 

A congressional committee has opened an investigation of the State Department's inspector general, alleging he blocked fraud investigations in Afghanistan and Iraq, including potential security lapses at the newly built U.S. Embassy in Baghdad.

Also under scrutiny is whether Blackwater USA, the private security firm banned this week from working in Iraq over the killing of civilians, was "illegally smuggling weapons into Iraq," according to a letter to IG Howard J. Krongard obtained Tuesday by The Associated Press.

The Democratic-led investigation accused Krongard of trying to protect the White House and the State Department.

"Your partisan political ties have led you to halt investigations, censor reports and refuse to cooperate with law enforcement agencies," said a letter from Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

Based on charges from a number of current and former senior investigators who worked for Krongard, the letter also questioned whether he adequately investigated illegal labor trafficking allegations involving the Kuwaiti company that was building the embassy in Baghdad.

Ralph McNamara, the former deputy assistant inspector general for investigations, said in an AP interview Tuesday that he came forward with the allegations against his former boss because he was concerned that State Department employees would be at risk when working in the new embassy.

In addition to outlining a host of allegations against Krongard, who took over the State Department post in May 2005, the Waxman letter raises new questions about Blackwater. Although the security company is not named in the letter, several senior administration officials confirmed that Blackwater is the firm mentioned as being suspected of smuggling weapons into Iraq illegally.

According to a letter, a federal prosecutor asked Krongard's investigators to assist in the probe of the security contractor, but Krongard sent an e-mail to a senior staff member directing the assistance to "stop IMMEDIATELY" and to wait until he spoke to the prosecutor.

After weeks of delay, Waxman said, Krongard asked someone on his media relations staff — not an investigator — to assist the federal prosecutors. "This unorthodox arrangement has reportedly impeded the investigation," Waxman said.

A central theme running through the letter is that Krongard prevented his investigators from cooperating with Justice Department probes and refused to send his staff to Iraq and Afghanistan to look into allegations of fraud and wasteful spending involving the more than $3.6 billion the State Department has spent on contracts in the two countries.

Waxman also said he's been told Krongard censored inspection reports and audits to remove information critical of the State Department.

The letter cited e-mails between staffers talking about their frustrations at not being allowed to assist the Justice Department in investigations.

In one exchange, former assistant inspector general for investigations John DeDona told Krongard's deputy, William Todd, that the IG agents believe they should only work on "penny-ante" cases and "not rock the boat with other more significant investigations."

DeDona eventually quit to take another federal job. McNamara was forced out, and also took another federal job.


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THE COMMITTEE SAYS:

Honest Oversights forced out, allowing the Administration and its Minions to Steal Billions

Alex Wierbinski, Berkeley, Ca., October , 2007

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Corruption Updates , th article on the page,

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7) The Article linked below was Abstracted from the source cited.

Cases of Cholera Reach Baghdad

By ANDREW E. KRAMER

NYT, September 21, 2007

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/21/world/middleeast/

21iraq.html?ref=todayspaper&pagewanted=print

 

BAGHDAD, Sept. 20 — The first cases of cholera appeared in Baghdad on Thursday, in a sign the epidemic that has already sickened thousands in northern Iraq is now spreading more widely in a population made vulnerable by war to a normally preventable disease.

People contract cholera by ingesting water or food contaminated with the feces of an infected person.

While cholera can kill its victims in a matter or hours, it is easily controlled through basic water treatment and sanitation measures.

The cholera outbreak in Iraq this summer had been centered near Kirkuk and Sulaimaniya, in Kurdistan, where at least 10 people have died. In a report released Sept. 14, the W.H.O. said that cholera had been clinically confirmed in more than 1,055 cases so far in Kurdistan and was suspected in more than 24,500 cases of diarrhea and vomiting.

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THE COMMITTEE SAYS:

Failed War-Failed State
Iraq's failure was preordained the moment we destroyed Iraq's army and assumed authority in Iraq.

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Also See:

Corruption Updates 58, 6th article on the page, War-torn Iraq 'facing collapse'

Corruption Updates 79, 1st article on the page, "Iraq Ranks No. 2 of Failed States"

Corruption Updates 108, 2nd article on the page, Report Finds Iraqi Government Precarious

iraq war links

 

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8) The Article linked below was Abstracted from the source cited.

Russia, U.S. at odds over missile shield

Reuters, Fri Oct 12, 2007

By Andrew Gray and Arshad Mohammed

 

http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSN1146001620071012?

feedType=RSS&feedName=topNews&sp=true

 

MOSCOW (Reuters) - The United States and Russia failed to settle their differences on U.S. plans to place a missile defense shield in Europe on Friday, and Washington rejected a request from Moscow to freeze the project.

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, after talks in Moscow, also clashed publicly on how to tackle Iran's nuclear ambitions. Lavrov called Washington's tough stance unhelpful.

The talks took place against a backdrop of growing friction between the West and an increasingly assertive Russia seeking to restore its military might that has echoes of the Cold War.

"We believe that to make the joint work of Russian and U.S. experts most effective, plans on deploying ... (the missile defense system in Europe) should be frozen," Lavrov said.

Rice said talks with Poland and the Czech Republic on sitting elements of the shield -- a radar station and interceptor missiles -- on their soil would continue.

Putin kept Gates and Rice waiting for more than half an hour at the dacha before greeting them.

 

TREATY WARNING

Putin also said Russia might pull out of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty unless it was expanded to include limits on other countries' armaments.

The treaty was signed at the end of the Cold War to scrap U.S. and Russian nuclear missiles which, although they did not have the range to cross the Atlantic, could be used for nuclear strikes within Europe.

Pulling out of the treaty would theoretically restore to Russia the capability to strike European targets.

Defense analysts say Russia is reviewing the treaty because it feels threatened by growing arsenals in states such as Iran, India and Pakistan, and wants the missiles to counter that.

Putin will travel next week to Tehran, where he is expected to meet Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, suspected by Western powers of trying to develop a nuclear bomb. Putin says he sees no evidence of a bomb-making program.

Lavrov said the U.S. policy of unilateral sanctions and not ruling out military action was not helping persuade Iran to be open about its nuclear plans.

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THE COMMITTEE SAYS:

 

Alex Wierbinski, Berkeley, Ca., October , 2007

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Also See:

Corruption Updates 36, 1st article on the page, "Russia prepares to revise military doctrine in response to USA's missile defense plans"

Corruption Updates 53, 10th article on the page, "Russia to Suspend Compliance With Key European Pact"

Corruption Updates 64, 8th article on the page, "Russia, Putin: US imperialists start new round of arms race"

Corruption Updates 66, 3rd article on the page, "Gorbachev criticizes US 'empire'"

PUTIN in IRAN: Putin Warns Against Attacks on Iran, Associated Press, October 16, 2007

Putin wants US date to quit Iraq, BBC NEWS, 18 October 2007

Russia begins arms treaty freeze, BBC, 12-12-07

 

Polish doubts put US defence system in jeopardy, guardian, January 10, 2008

 

Russia links

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Russia


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9) The Article linked below was Abstracted from the source cited.

Respect Iran sanctions, US warns

By Tony Barber in Brussels

Financial Times, October 12 2007 17;

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/ee250b00-78df-11dc-aaf2-0000779fd2ac.html?nclick_check=1

The US on Friday warned China, Russia and other countries opposed to tougher economic sanctions against Iran not to seize business opportunities left open by the departure of those respecting the sanctions regime.

Robert Kimmitt, US deputy treasury secretary, said he understood the concerns of private-sector companies that commercial rivals might snap up their business in Iran.

European Union foreign ministers meet on Monday to discuss proposals to impose unilateral EU sanctions on Iran without waiting for the United Nations Security Council to adopt new measures of its own.

Austria, Germany and Italy are among EU countries that oppose a French proposal for EU sanctions without a new UN mandate.

They contend that departing European companies, which collectively conduct billions of euros in business with Iran, would simply leave the field open for Russian, Chinese and other Asian competitors.

 

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THE COMMITTEE SAYS:

Bush Committing Economic Suicide While Killing Global Freedom

Alex Wierbinski, Berkeley, Ca., October , 2007

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Uneasy allies in historic summit

By Jon Leyne

BBC News, Tehran

Story from BBC NEWS: 2007/10/15

 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/europe/7045713.stm

 

When President Vladimir Putin arrives in the Iranian capital he will be the first Kremlin leader to visit Tehran since Stalin sat down with Winston Churchill and Franklin D Roosevelt there in 1943.

"The mere fact of Putin's presence on Iranian soil is evidence that the West's policy of isolation is a failure and can be interpreted as a victory of Iranian diplomacy," the newspaper Iran News declared at the weekend.

This visit is all the more intriguing in the light of President Putin's deteriorating relationship with the West.

At a meeting with President Nicolas Sarkozy of France last week, President Putin said there was "no real data" to show that Iran was pursuing a nuclear weapons programme.

 

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THE COMMITTEE SAYS:

Iran Secures Northern Border Anticipating hostilites from all other Quarters

Alex Wierbinski, Berkeley, Ca., October , 2007

Iran needs Russian support pretty badly right now. Their situation, surrounded by enemies in an environment of rising hostilities, requires they secure at least one of their borders from attack. It appears that Iran has just covered its Northern, Russian flank, both militairly and diplomatically.

This is a significant movement in the Middle-Eastern Balance of Power, and is of vital importance for both Iran and Russia. If Russia and Iran reached a new understanding of their strategic relationship, this visit portends yet another manifistation of the rise of new balance of power in the Middle-East, and the world.

Iran expects to be attacked on all diplomatic and military fronts. Diplomatically, Iran stands with Cuba as the recipient of economic independence bred by decades of economic and diplomatic boycotts.

Militairly, Iran is surrounded, and expects trouble from all quarters. On their Eastern border, Iran faces military threats from the American forces in Afghanastan. Hostilities are already happening on Iran's South Eastern border. According to Iran, America is funding and supporting Balluch bombings that are terrorizing South Eastern Iran. Another potential threat comes from America's dictator in Pakistan, who has been well paid to host American military power.

The major threats to Iran come from the American forces in Iraq, and finally, the massive air power that can be launched from the decks of the three aircraft carriers stationed off the Southern coast of Iran.

Besides offering Iran one peaceful flank, the deal with Russia reaches across the fundamental issues that have torn Chechnya apart, and prevented Russia from acting against our adventures in Iraq and Afghanastan, the same way we did when we created Osama and the Taliban to torture Russia.

That favor, arming Muslim extremists against Russia, is still threatening to tear apart the whole south cacsus region of "Russia."

Russia's Muslim problem has crippled their ability to act forcefully in the Middle-East. It manifested itself with the crippling failure of their misguided Afghan adventure (Dwarfed by Bush's Iraq attack blunder), and spread as Muslim independence movements across the Southern Russian Muslim "Republics," and then across the independent Caspian states.

Russia has destroyed Chechyna, and driven Western influences out of the Caspian "Stan" states, replacing it with Russian power.

Our "victory" against the Russians in Afghanastan was more problamatic than we anticipated, producing Osama Bin-Laden, 9/11, and all. But it created a big, ongoing domestic problem for the Russians, and had severely limited Russia's diplomatic and military options to counter and capitalize on our Iraqi and Afghan blunders.

The problem for the Russians is that  a significant percentage of any weaponry or money Russia gives to anti-American Sunni insurgents in Iraq will end up being used against Russians in the Cacasian Mountain Republics.

The rapproachment with Iran may offer the Russians a path to finally end their domestic Muslim problem, and reenter the Middle-Eastern power struggle with diplomatic and military muscularity.

America has framed the problems in the Middle-East as consisting of "moderate" American-backed dictatorial states being threatened by "immoderate" "terrorist" states, This is not altogether accurate.

The fundamental regional issue, aside from Israel, is the Sunni-Shite divide. Accentuating their theological differences are the different trajectories each sect's state relationships with the West have followed

The Shites have fought for, and found post-colonial independence in Iran, and are on their way, with our help, to consolidating Iraq as an allied independent Shite State.

American allied states are still held under the American version of British Colonialism. Look at our "Allies."

Our allies are the "moderate" secular Sunni States, the most significant of which are composed of Jordan, Egypt, and (Pakistan). But The Crown Jewel of American dictatorships in the Middle-East, Saudi Arabia, is dominated by radical Islam, the same vein of Islam that motivates Osama and the Taliban.

Our Saudi Arabian "Allies" are the center of radical Sunni Wahabbism, or Salafism.

Osama has dedicated himself to to the same religious sect, and his theological goals are roughtly the same as those of the King, Royal Family, and the Religious elite of Saudi Arabia. Hold on tight, this gets even more complicated.

There are two types of radical Salafists. The first hates Americans, Jews, Shites, and the Saudi Ruling Family. The second type hates Americans, Jews, and Shites, but believes in the Saudi Ruling Family. Osama is from the former group of Salafists. The Sunni insurgency in Al Anbar is from the latter group.

Although The Saudis are funding the Al Anbar Sunni insurgents against what they call our illegal occupation of Iraq, the Saudis were still able to craft a Machavellian deal between the Al Anbar Sunni Ex-Baathists and the Americans.

The key is our common enemy, which we created: An independent Shite Iran, and the transformation of Iraq from a Sunni Fascist State to an Iran-leaning Shite-dominated government. Our common enemy, an independent Iran, is acceptable to neither the US, the Baathists fascists, or the Saudis.

Bush has our troops patrolling alongside the same Sunnis who were the backbone of Saddam's Fascist State. You can bet that when they see us as a greater threat than the Shite they will turn on us in a hot second.

Here's the deal: If hostilites break out between Iran and the US, look for Russia and Iran to cut a deal with the Taliban (in Afghanastan and Pakistan) to drive the US influence out of both. If the Russians, Persians, and Sunni Radicals in Afghanastan can find unity against us, this offers a model for rapproachment between Iran, and Saudi Arabia and Egypt.

The logical soulution is for the Saudis, Egyptians, and Iranians to each offer the other sovereign and religious legitimacy in return for mutural support in expelling the military and political influence of the united states from the region. It's a win-win-win deal.

Russia will instantly jump on board with political, economic and military support, if they can solve their Muslim problem. China is already down for the deal. Where do you think Saddam's "Scuds" came from?

Hang on, it's going to be a wild ride.

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Also See:

Stark Differences on Arms Threaten U.S.-Russia Talks: Bush, Fool of the Ages, Continues to Abuse Treaties, the Rule of Law, and Russia, NYT, October 10, 2007

Respect Our Authority, US warns: US sounds like Cartman, Financial Times, October 12 2007

Russia, U.S. at odds over missile shield, Reuters, Fri Oct 12, 2007

Uneasy allies in historic summit: Iran Secures Northern Border with Russia Anticipating hostilites from all other Quarters, BBC News, Oct 15, 2007

PUTIN in IRAN: Putin Warns Against Attacks on Iran, Associated Press, October 16, 2007

Putin wants US date to quit Iraq, BBC NEWS, 18 October 2007

 

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11) The Article linked below was Abstracted from the source cited.

Ethnic conflicts in Russia become larger and bloodier with every year

 

10.10.2007      Source: Pravda.Ru        URL:

 

http://english.pravda.ru/russia/history/98545-ethnic_conflicts-0

 

Ethnic conflicts have become a common event in present-day Russia. The bloodiest clashes between ethnic Russians and so-called individuals of Caucasian nationalities occur in March-April and August-September. As a rule, such conflicts start with one single murder, which triggers massive pogroms against Russian Caucasians.

A young Russian man was killed in a night club in the town of Kletskaya (the Volgograd region of Russia) in August of 2000. His funeral service quickly turned into a mass meeting of local citizens who demanded all Chechens be expelled from the town. The funeral ended with spontaneous arsons of houses where people of Chechen nationality lived.

Cossacks caused serious damage to Chechen property in Russia’s Rostov region in March 2001 after a massive fight in the village of Bogoroditskoye.

About 200 people participated in a pogrom at a Moscow market on April 21, 2001. Ten people suffered various injuries as a result of the attack; most of them were vendors from Azerbaijan.

The next massacre took place on October 30 2001. A crowd of 300 young men wielding metal bars attacked street vendors of Caucasian origin at three markets in Moscow. Four were killed in the attack, over 80 were injured.

Ethnic conflicts continued to intensify in 2002. A massive fight between Russians and Chechens with the participation of about 400 men took place in May of that year in the town of Chastozerye, the Kurgan region. Another conflict took place in the town of Uglich, the Yaroslav region, after Chechens killed a Russian teenager at a local dance party. In the Moscow region, young men attacked several Armenian families and asked the local authorities to clean the town of non-Russians after an elderly Armenian man stabbed a 26-year-old Igor Samolyuk in a bar.

Two massive fights took place in the city of Nalchik in September 2003. The local population fought with Chechen students. Over 50 were injured in the fight of 200-300 people. Everything started with a dispute in a local bus, when several Chechens brutally beat a local Russian resident.

About 200 Cossacks smashed several shops and cafes owned by natives of Armenia in the city of Novorossiisk in March 2005.

The year 2006 marked the crucial point in the history of ethnic conflicts in Russia. About 540 people suffered as a result of ethnic strife and national hostility; 54 of them were killed, official statistics says. National diasporas in Russia have their own information. According to the Migration Service of Tajikistan, 206 natives of the republic were killed in Russia in 2006.

Young nationalists blew up a bomb on Moscow’s largest market on August 21, 2006 killing 13 people. Another large-scale ethnic conflict took place in the town of Kondopoga the Karelia Republic, when local residents attacked Caucasian town-fellows.

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Also See:

Corruption Updates 52, 2nd article on the page, "Dozens Arrested as Riot Police Beat Anti-Kremlin Protesters in St. Petersburg"

At Asian Security Meeting, Russian and Iranian Criticize the U.S., NYT, August 17, 2007

 

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