WORLD: An interview with Noam Chomsky — Nothing can justify torture

Professor Noam Chomsky is an Institute Professor and Professor (Emeritus) in the Department of Linguistics & Philosophy at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He was educated at the University of Philadelphia and at Harvard University as a Harvard Junior Fellow. He earned his PhD in Linguistics from the University of Philadelphia in 1955. He has spent the 57 years since then teaching at MIT. In addition to his academic work in linguistics, Professor Chomsky has been a noted political activist and philosopher, gaining national recognition in 1967 over his opposition to the Vietnam War and since then has regularly spoken out against US foreign and domestic policies and mainstream American mass media. Between his academic career and his work as a political activist and dissident, he has published over 100 books. Here with Eric Bailey and on the eve of the 2012 US presidential election, he discusses America’s human rights record under the administration of President Obama and the military intervention policies that have seen increased use during the Arab Spring. Prof. Chomsky recently communicated with Eric Bailey of Torture Magazine.

EB: The US presidential elections are almost upon us and the last four years have seen significant changes in American Federal policy in regards to human rights. One of the few examples of cooperation between the Democratic and Republican Parties over the last four years has been the passing of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) of 2012. This bill has given the United States military the power to arrest American citizens, indefinitely, without charge, trial, or any other form of due process of law and the Obama Administration has and continues to fight a legal battle in Federal Court to prevent that law from being declared unconstitutional. Obama authorized the assassination of three American citizens, including Anwar al-Awlaki and his 16 year old son, admittedly all members of Al Qaeda, – all without judicial review. Additionally, the Guantanamo Bay prison remains open, the Patriot Act has been extended, and the TSA has expanded at breakneck speeds. What is your take on America’s human rights record over the past four years and can you contrast Obama’s policies with those of his predecessor, George W. Bush?

NC: Obama’s policies have been approximately the same as Bush’s, though there have been some slight differences, but that’s not a great surprise. The Democrats supported Bush’s policies. There were some objections on mostly partisan grounds, but for the most part, they supported his policies and it’s not surprising that they have continued to do so. In some respects Obama has gone even beyond Bush. The NDAA, which you mentioned, was not initiated by Obama, (when it passed Congress, he said he didn’t approve of it and wouldn’t implement it) but he nevertheless did sign it into law and did not veto it. It was pushed through by hawks, including Joe Lieberman and others. In fact, there hasn’t been that much of a change. The worst part of the NDAA is that it codified – or put into law – what had already been a regular practice. The practices hadn’t been significantly different. The one part that received public attention is what you mentioned, the part that permits the indefinite detention of American citizens, but why permit the indefinite detention of anybody? It’s a gross violation of fundamental human rights and civil law, going all the way back to the Magna Carta in the 13th  Century, so it’s a very severe attack on elementary civil rights, both under Bush and under Obama. It’s bipartisan!

As for the killings, Obama has sharply increased the global assassination campaign. While it was initiated by Bush, it has expanded under Obama and it has included American citizens, again with bipartisan support and very little criticism other than some minor criticism because it was an American. But then again, why should you have the right to assassinate anybody? For example, suppose Iran was assassinating members of Congress who were calling for an attack on Iran. Would we think that’s fine? That would be much more justified, but of course we’d see that as an act of war. The real question is, why assassinate anyone? The government has made it very clear that the assassinations are personally approved by Obama and the criteria for assassination are very weak. If a group of men are seen somewhere by a drone who are, say, loading something into a truck, and there is some suspicion that maybe they are militants, then it’s fine to kill them and they are regarded as guilty unless, subsequently, they are shown to be innocent. That’s the wording that the United States used and it is such a gross violation of fundamental human rights that you can hardly talk about it.

The question of due process actually did arise, since the US does have a constitution and it says that no person shall be deprived of their rights without due process of law – again, this goes back to 13th Century England – so the question arose, “What about due process?” The Obama Justice Department’s Attorney General, Eric Holder, explained that there was due process in these cases because they are discussed first at the Executive Branch. That’s not even a bad joke! The British kings from the 13th Century would have applauded. “Sure, if we talk about it, that’s due process.” And that, again, passed without controversy.

In fact, we might ask the same question about the murder of Osama Bin Laden. Notice I use the term “murder”. When heavily armed elite troops capture a suspect, unarmed and defenseless, accompanied by his wives, and then shoot him, kill him, and dump his body into the ocean without an autopsy, that’s shear assassination. Also notice that I said “suspect”. The reason is because of another principle of law, that also goes back to the 13th Century – that a man is presumed innocent until proven guilty. Before that, he’s a suspect. In the case of Osama Bin Laden, the United States had never formally charged him with 9/11 and part of the reason was that they didn’t know that he was responsible. In fact, eight months after 9/11 and after the most intensive inquiry in history, the FBI explained that it suspected that the 9/11 plot was hatched in Afghanistan, (didn’t mention Bin Laden) and was implemented in the United Arab Emirates, Germany, and of course the United States. That’s eight months after the attack and there’s nothing substantive that they’ve learned since then that does more than increase the suspicion. My own assumption is that the suspicion is almost certainly correct, but there’s a big difference between having a very confident belief and showing someone to be guilty. And even if he’s guilty, he was supposed to be apprehended and brought before a court. That’s British and American law going back eight centuries. He’s not supposed to be murdered and have his body dumped without an autopsy, but support for this is very nearly universal. Actually, I wrote one of the few critical articles on it and my article was bitterly condemned by commentators across the spectrum, including the Left, because the assassination was so obviously just, since we suspected him of committing a crime against us. And that tells you something about the significant, I would say, “moral degeneration” running throughout the whole intellectual class. And yes, Obama has continued this and in some respects extended it, but it hardly comes as a surprise.
The rot is much deeper than that.

EB: It has been just over 10 years since the publication of the Bush Administration’s “Torture Memos”. These memos provided a legal justification for the torture of detainees held by the CIA in connection with the “War on Terror.” The contents of the memos are chilling and have created new debate on torture internationally. Despite all of the promises given by President Obama to close those illegal detention centers, it seems that “black site” activities still occur. What are your views on these detention centers and CIA torture? Also, what do you think about Obama’s promise of CIA reforms in 2008 and how has the reality of his presidency stacked up to those promises?

NC: There have been some presidential orders expressing disapproval of the most extreme forms of torture, but Bagram remains open and uninspected. That’s probably the worst in Afghanistan. Guantanamo is still open, but it’s unlikely that serious torture is going on at Guantanamo. There is just too much inspection. There are military lawyers present and evidence regularly coming out so I suspect that that’s not a torture chamber any more, but it still is an illegal detention chamber, and Bagram and who knows how many others are still functioning. Rendition doesn’t seem to be continuing at the level that it did, but it has been until very recently.

Rendition is just sending people abroad to be tortured. Actually, that’s barred as well by the Magna Carta – the foundation of Anglo-American law. It’s explicitly barred to send somebody across the seas to be punished and tortured. It’s not just done by the United States, either. It’s done all over Western Europe. Britain has participated in it. Sweden has participated. It’s one of the reasons for a lot of the concerns about extraditing Julian Assange to Sweden. Canada has been implicated as was Ireland, but to Ireland’s credit it was one of the few places where there was mass popular protests against allowing the Shannon Airport to be used for CIA rendition. In most countries there has been very little protest or not a word. I don’t know of any recent cases so maybe that policy is no longer being implemented, but it wouldn’t surprise me if it was still in effect.

EB: Moving beyond the US, the Middle East has always been rife with human rights abuses, but the turmoil of the Arab Spring has intensified such abuses in many countries. While the dictatorships in Tunisia and Egypt were toppled without resorting to civil war, countries like Libya, Syria, and Yemen have seen heavy fighting. For America and NATO’s part, there has been yet another military intervention with the Libyan Civil War and only the stubbornness of Russia and China have prevented a similar  ntervention in Syria. In both cases, rebel forces have asked, even begged, for American and European help in their war efforts, but have proven to be absolutely uninterested in negotiated settlements with their dictatorial adversaries, even when outside help is not forthcoming. What is your take on military interventions, both the intervention that did occur in Libya and the one that is being called for in Syria?  Is it morally justifiable to send Texans and Louisianans into harm’s way to fight in the internal conflicts of Libyans and Syrians? Conversely, can refusing to intervene be justified when entire cities, such as Misrata, Benghazi, Aleppo, and Homs were or are being threatened with utter destruction and tens of thousands of civilians are being killed?

NC: Well, let’s start with Syria. The one thing I disagree with in what you said is that I doubt very much that Russia and China had anything to do with the lack of US or Western military intervention in Syria. In fact my strong suspicion is that the United States, Britain, and France welcomed the Russian veto because that gave them a pretext not to do anything. Now they can say, “How can we do anything? The Russians and the Chinese have vetoed it!” In fact, if they wanted to intervene, they wouldn’t have cared one way or the other about a Russian or Chinese veto. That’s perfectly obvious from history, but they didn’t want to intervene and they don’t want to intervene now. The military and intelligence strategic command centers are just strongly opposed to it. Some oppose it for technical, military, reasons and others because they don’t see anyone they can support in their interests. They don’t particularly like Assad, although he was more or less conformed to US and Israeli interests, but they don’t like the opposition either, especially their Islamist elements, so they just prefer to stay on the side lines. It’s kind of interesting that Israel doesn’t do anything. They wouldn’t have to do much. Israel could easily  obilize forces in the Golan Heights (Syrian territory that Israel illegally annexed). They could mobilize forces there, which are only about 40 miles from Damascus, which would compel Assad to send military forces to the border,  drawing them away from areas where the rebels are operating. So that would be direct  support for the rebels, but without firing a shot and without moving across the border.

But there is no talk of it and I think what that indicates is that Israel, the United States, and their allies just don’t want to take moves that will undermine the regime, just out of self-interest. There is no humanitarian interest involved.

As far as Libya is concerned, we have to be a little cautious, because there were two interventions in Libya. The first one was under the auspices of the United Nations. That’s UN Resolution 1973. That resolution called for a no-fly zone, a ceasefire, and the start of negotiations and diplomacy.

EB: That was the intervention for which the justification was claimed to be the prevention of the destruction of Benghazi?

NC: Well, we don’t know if Benghazi was going to be destroyed, but it was called to prevent a possible attack on Benghazi. You can debate how likely the attack was, but personally, I felt that was legitimate – to try to stop a possible atrocity. However, that intervention lasted about five minutes. Almost immediately, the NATO powers (France and Britain in the lead and the United States following) violated the resolution, radically, and became the air force of the rebels. Nothing in the resolution justified that. It did call for “all necessary steps” to protect civilians, but there’s a big difference between protecting civilians and being the air force for the rebels.

Maybe we should have been in favor of the rebelling forces. That’s a separate question, but this was pretty clearly in violation of the resolution. It certainly wasn’t done for a lack of alternative options. Gaddafi offered a ceasefire. Whether he meant it or not, nobody knows, because it was at once rejected.

Incidentally, this pact was strongly opposed by most of the world. There was virtually no support for it. The African Union (Libya is, after all, an African country) strongly opposed it, right away, called for a ceasefire, and even suggested the introduction of African Union forces to try and reduce the conflict.

The BRICS countries, the most important of the developing countries, (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) happened to be having a conference at the time and they strongly opposed the NATO intervention and called for moves towards diplomacy, negotiations, and a ceasefire. Egypt, next door, didn’t participate. Within NATO, Germany refused to participate. Italy refused too, in the beginning, though later they joined the intervention. Turkey held back. Later on they joined, but initially they opposed intervention. Generally speaking, it was almost unilateral. It was the traditional imperial powers (France, Britain, and the United States) which intervened.

In fact it did lead to a humanitarian catastrophe. Maybe it would have happened anyway, but it certainly led to that, especially in the end with the attacks on BaniWalid and Sirte, the last pro-Gadaffi holdouts. They are the main center of Libya’s largest tribe, the Warfalla tribe. Libya is a highly divided tribal society, they are a major tribe, and this was their home center. Many of them were pretty bitter about that. Could it have been resolved through diplomacy and negotiations the way the African Union and BRICS countries suggested? We don’t know.

It’s also worthy of note that the International Crisis Group, which is the main, non-state element that deals with continuing conflicts and crises throughout the world, and is very  highly respected, opposed intervention too. They strongly supported negotiations and diplomacy. However, the African Union and others’ positions were barely reported on in the West. Who cares what they say? In fact, if they were reported on at all, they were disparaged on the grounds that these countries had had close relations with Gaddafi. In fact, they did, but so did Britain and the United States, right to the end.

In any event, the intervention did take place and now one hopes for the best, but it’s not a very pretty picture. You can read an account of it in the current issue of the London Review of Books by Hugh Roberts, who was, at the time, the North African Director of the International Crisis Group and a specialist on the region. He opposed the intervention and described the outcome as pretty hopeless chaos that is undercutting the hopes for an eventual rise of a sort of sensible, democratic, nationalism.

So that wasn’t very pretty, but what about the other countries? Well, the countries that are most significant to the United States and the West, generally, are the oil dictatorships and they remain very stable. There were efforts to try and join the Arab Spring, but they were crushed, very harshly, with not a word from the Western powers. Sometimes it was quite violent, as in eastern Saudi Arabia and in Bahrain, which were Shiite areas, mostly, but it resulted in at most a tap on the wrist by the Western Powers. They clearly wanted the oil dictatorships to remain. That’s the center of their power.

In Tunisia, which had mostly French influence, the French supported the dictatorship until the very end. In fact, they were still supporting it after demonstrations were sweeping the country. Finally, at the last second, they conceded that their favorite dictator had to go. In Egypt, where the United States and Britain were the main influences, it was the same. Obama supported the dictator Mubarak until virtually the last minute – until the army turned against him. It became impossible to support him anymore so they urged him to leave and make a transition to a similar system.

All of that is quite routine. That’s the standard operating procedure for dealing with a situation where your favorite dictator is getting into trouble. There is case after case like that. What you do in that case is support the dictator to the very end, regardless of how vicious and bloody the he is. Then when it becomes impossible, say because the army or the business classes have turned against him, then ease him out somewhere, (sometimes with half the government’s treasury in his pocket) declare your love for democracy, and try to restore the old system. That’s pretty much what’s happening in Egypt.

Source: The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC)

Obama threatens to invade Syria

Yesterday US and NATO officials discussed plans for a US military invasion of Syria to bring down Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad, after US President Barack Obama announced that the US was contemplating a direct attack on Syria at a press conference Monday night.

A delegation led by Assistant Secretary of State for Near East Affairs Beth Jones discussed US military plans with Turkey. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said that Defense Department and US intelligence officials met their Turkish counterparts “to share operational pictures, to talk about the effectiveness of what we’re doing now, and about what more we can do.”

Senior US officials said that contingency plans for US intervention in Syria include scenarios requiring tens of thousands of American troops.

At a press conference at the White House Monday, Obama declared: “I have indicated repeatedly that President al-Assad has lost legitimacy, that he needs to step down. So far, he hasn’t gotten the message, and instead has double downed in violence on his own people. The international community has sent a clear message that rather than drag his country into civil war he should move in the direction of a political transition. But at this point, the likelihood of a soft landing seems pretty distant.”

Obama said that he would order “military engagement” if chemical or biological weapons are moved or used in Syria. He said that Syria’s alleged stockpile of chemical weapons “concerns our close allies in the region, including Israel. It concerns us. We cannot have a situation in which chemical or biological weapons are falling into the hands of the wrong people.”

Obama added that the US “have communicated in no uncertain terms with every player in the region, that that’s a red line for us, and that there would be enormous consequences if we start seeing movement on the chemical weapons front, or the use of chemical weapons.”

The cynicism with which Obama is seeking to justify the next US imperialist aggression in the Middle East is staggering. The main groups in Syria who could seize chemical weapons from Syrian government stockpiles are Al Qaeda forces promoted by the US and its allies as shock troops against Assad. (See also: “Washington’s proxy in Syria: Al Qaeda”)

Having armed Al Qaeda-linked groups and sent them into Syria to carry out bombings and assassinations, the US and its allies now plan to justify their invasion of Syria by citing the need to protect the world’s population from Al Qaeda’s terrorist atrocities!

The Obama administration advances its arguments today with total disregard for the fact that they clash with the lies used until now to justify its support for Sunni anti-Assad “rebels.”

For months it maintained the pretense that it would not directly attack Syria, and that the Syrian regime’s statements that it was fighting US-backed terrorists were “propaganda.” Now, the White House is admitting that terrorist groups play a major role in the anti-Assad forces, and citing this as a pretext for war.

By proceeding in this fashion, the Obama administration demonstrates its complete contempt for the American electorate, which voted him into office in 2008 in large part based on hopes he would stop the US military aggressions against countries in the Middle East. Today, as during the 2003 invasion of Syria’s neighbor, Iraq, Washington is preparing to invade a country based on cynical lies about weapons of mass destruction.

A US invasion of Syria would be a crime of historic proportions, like the war in Iraq—a country whose population is only slightly larger than Syria’s. This war led to the deaths of over a million Iraqis and thousands of US and allied soldiers. Iraq became a battleground for US occupation forces, as well as Sunni and Shiite death squads that carried out sectarian bombings and massacres.

A US invasion would threaten similar carnage inside Syria, which is already being torn apart by sectarian fighting in which Washington is working with right-wing regimes in Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar to back Sunni Islamist forces against Syria’s Alawite regime. However, the far greater tensions in a region already destabilized by a decade of US and Israeli wars in Iraq, Lebanon, Palestine, and Libya now threaten to spread the violence over the entire Middle East.

Sectarian bloodshed provoked by the intensifying US intervention in the region is already spilling over into Syria’s neighbors. On Tuesday four people were killed and more than 60 wounded in firefights between Sunni Muslims and Shiite Alawites in the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli. Tensions in Lebanon have been growing for months, with Western-backed forces seeking to provoke the Lebanese government which is led by the Shiite organization Hizbollah, a close ally of Syria and Iran.

A US war against Syria would be the next step in an ongoing campaign by US imperialism to deepen its hegemony over the energy-rich and geo-strategically vital regions of the Persian Gulf and Central Asia.

The Syrian regime responded to US threats with warnings and proposals for negotiations. Syrian Deputy Prime Minister Qadri Jamil described Obama’s statements about chemical weapons as a pretext for Western intervention in Syria. “The West is looking for an excuse for direct intervention. If this excuse does not work, it will look for another excuse.” He warned that an attack on Syria would turn the conflict into a regional war, saying: “Those who are contemplating this evidently want to see the crisis expand beyond Syria’s borders.”

Jamil announced that the Syrian regime is willing to talk with the opposition to work out a transition, however. He even declared that Assad’s presidency is negotiable, stating: “We are ready to discuss Assad’s resignation—but not as precondition.”

Obama’s war threats against Syria are also deepening tensions with Russia and China, who have already vetoed three UN Security Council resolutions backed by the US and its Western and Arab allies aiming to give a pseudo-legal fig leaf for US aggression against Syria.

Russia’s foreign minister Sergei Lavrov spoke at a meeting in Moscow with China’s State Councilor Dai Bingguo, who also met Russian President Vladimir Putin and his top security adviser, Nikolai Patrushev, on Monday. Lavrov said that both Russia and China base their diplomatic cooperation on “the need to strictly adhere to the norms of international law and the principles contained in the U.N. Charter, and not to allow their violation.”

Lavrov said that only the Security Council has the authority to approve the use of external force against Syria, warning against imposing “democracy by bombs.” Russian officials have reportedly stated that they hope to avoid a repetition of the attack on Libya last year. Moscow abstained from the Security Council vote on Libya, and a resolution was passed which was subsequently used by NATO to justify its bombing of the country.

Source: World Socialist Web Site

US, NATO allies join scramble for Libya’s oil

A US delegation arrived in the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi Tuesday for talks with the Transitional National Council, the political arm of the so-called rebels fighting against the regime of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi.

The visit follows the announcement Monday in Rome that the Italian government has recognized the council in Benghazi as the sole legitimate government of Libya. Italy is only the third nation to take this step, following recognition of the TNC by France and Qatar, the oil-rich Persian Gulf emirate.

In announcing the recognition, Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini also stated that Paolo Scaroni, the chief executive of the Italian oil and gas company, ENI, had visited Benghazi two days earlier for talks with the TNC. The foreign ministry subsequently corrected his remarks, saying that he had held a telephone conference with the leadership of the Benghazi council.

The oil executive, Frattini said, “had contacts with the Libyan National Transitional Council to restart cooperation in the energy sector and get going again the collaboration with Italy in the oil sector.”

Last month, on the eve of the US, France and Britain launching their missile and bombing attacks on Libya, Scaroni had derided economic sanctions against the Gaddafi regime as “shooting ourselves in the foot” and stressed ENI’s desire to resume operations in the North African country “whatever political system there is in the future.” The company, which has been active in Libya since 1955, is the top foreign oil operator and the country’s largest foreign investor, having reached a $28 billion deal with the Libyan government in 2007 to extend its contracts for oil production until 2042.

ENI is extremely close to the Italian government. Its turn to the “rebels” may merely be a matter of the company hedging its bets. On the other hand, it could reflect insider knowledge as to US-NATO plans either to escalate the war or to effectively partition Libya, with eastern oil fields and facilities under the nominal control of the TNC.

The Italian recognition and ENI’s forging of ties to the Benghazi council came just a day before a Liberian-registered oil tanker, owned by a Greek shipping conglomerate, docked at the Libyan crude export terminal of Marsa el-Hariga, near Tobruk.

The tanker, the Equator, is capable of carrying 1 million barrels of crude, which would sell for over $100 million on the world market. Its shipment will represent the first export of oil from Libya since the country was plunged into civil war six weeks ago. The Greek shipping company carrying the oil has refused to say who is paying for it or where it is going.

There are reportedly three million barrels of crude stored at the terminal, which belongs to the Arab Gulf Oil Corporation (AGOCO), a subsidiary of Libya’s National Oil Corporation. The Transitional National Council has claimed that AGOCO’s fields in the east are producing up to 120,000 barrels a day, roughly one third of the output before the civil war broke out. Libya as a whole was producing 1.6 million barrels a day and exporting 1.3 million before the fighting.

Energy analysts are highly skeptical of these claims. As the business information company IHS noted, “the exodus of foreign skilled workers as well as most Libyan workers, who abandoned the country’s often remote desert oilfields in order not to either be caught out by fighting or left stranded as water and food supply chains broke down, this meant that production in AGOCO fields, as at all other fields in Libya, has fallen to almost zero.”

Nonetheless, the Benghazi council has announced its intention to sell what oil it has to fund its operations and to buy arms, with Qatar acting as a middleman in getting the oil onto the world market.

Asked about Qatar’s role, in an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Libya’s energy minister, Shukri Ghanem commented bitterly, “Rather than calling for unity and reconciliation, everyone would like to participate in the loot.”

Ghanem insisted that the priority should be a cease-fire and warned that continuation of the fighting could lead to the “strangling” of Libya’s oil industry.

Last week, the European Union’s foreign affairs representative, Catherine Ashton, stressed that “there is an oil embargo against the whole of Libya” which applied equally to areas held by the Gaddafi regime and those under control of the armed opposition.

Washington took the opposite position, insisting that so long as the money for the oil exports was not funneled into the state-owned National Oil Corporation, the exports from eastern Libya would be allowed.

The United Nations special envoy for Libya, Abdul Ilah al-Khatib, delivered a report to the Security Council April 4 in which he said that the council in Benghazi had “raised concerns about the lack of funds, as well as issues relating to the marketing and sale of oil and gas in Libya.” He also said that the council wanted to begin securing “loans guaranteed against oil and gas sales and [Libya’s] frozen overseas assets.”

By Tuesday, the EU reversed its position on the Libyan sanctions, with a foreign affairs spokesman insisting, “The oil and gas embargo is specifically targeted against the Gaddafi regime” and so long as revenues did not go to the government in Tripoli, “we have no issues with oil and gas commercial practices.”

The abrupt turnaround, combined with the discussions between the Italian oil giant ENI and the “rebels,” suggests that a scramble by the major Western powers and energy conglomerates for control of Libyan oil is well under way.

It is in this context that the visit to Benghazi by the US delegations—and by French and British ambassadors before it—is taking place. The US envoy, Chris Stevens, the former number-two official at the now-closed embassy in Tripoli, is to discuss, among other matters, “the financial needs of the council” and “how the international community can assist,” an administration official told the Associated Press. No doubt, such “assistance” will be tied to lucrative contracts for the American branch of Big Oil.

Washington, Paris and London had expected to secure unfettered control over Libyan oil by means of regime change, forcing the downfall of the Gaddafi regime. However, this task has proven more difficult and protracted than anticipated.

The “rebels” have been incapable of mobilizing forces able to defeat the military units loyal to Gaddafi. On Wednesday, they were once again driven out of Brega, site of an oil refinery and Mediterranean port, despite NATO air strikes early in the day that demolished vehicles used by the Gaddafi forces. The panicked retreat by the opposition forces took them at least 15 miles east toward Ajdabiya.

The new setbacks led to a protest by one of the commanders of the armed opposition that NATO was not supplying sufficient air cover. Abdel Fattah Younes, who was previously Gaddafi’s interior minister, condemned NATO for acting too slowly in delivering bombardments and warned, “Either NATO does its work properly or I will ask the national council to raise the matter with the Security Council.”

NATO rejected the complaint, insisting that it has maintained the same pace of operations since assuming nominal command of the Libyan intervention. “The pace of operations since NATO took over has not abated,” said a spokesman for the US-led alliance. “We have conducted 851 sorties in the past six days ... we are fulfilling our mandate.”

Meanwhile, Brigadier General Mark van Uhm, a senior NATO staff officer, said in Brussels, “The assessment is that we have taken out 30 percent of the military capacity of Gaddafi.”

Washington and NATO have claimed to be operating under the mandate of a UN Security Council resolution authorizing “all necessary measures” to protect civilians. But the obvious implication of van Uhm’s statement is that continuous bombardments have been carried out with the aim of obliterating Libya’s military and defending the so-called rebels.

This air war, however, has proven insufficient, given the US and NATO-backed opposition’s disorganization and lack of forces.

A report from Libya by Al Jazeera reveals that covert measures are being taken in an attempt to change this situation. Citing the testimony of a member of the armed opposition, the network reported that oppositionists are being trained at a secret facility in eastern Libya by both US and Egyptian special forces units.

The “rebel” also said that weapons are being funneled in across the Egyptian border, in violation of a UN arms embargo, including “state-of-the-art” heat-seeking missiles.

The report further exposes the lies told by the Obama administration. The US president has publicly assured the American people that there will be no “boots on the ground” in Libya, and that arming the “rebels” is something that has neither been ruled in or out. It is now evident that both have already taken place as Washington escalates the predatory war.

A poll released Tuesday pointed to rising popular opposition within the United States to the war launched by the Obama administration against Libya. Only 25 percent believed that the intervention is worth the nearly $600 million spent thus far on the US military action, according to the poll, conducted for The Hill. The same poll indicated only 19 percent support for arming the so-called rebels. A separate Quinnipiac University survey found that 47 percent of registered voters are against the war compared to 41 per cent who support it.

Source: World Socialist Web Site

Print Leaflet Feedback Share » NATO forces carry out massacre of Afghan civilians

Official estimates of the civilian death toll from NATO air strikes in southern Afghanistan on October 24 are disputed, but some sources report up to 85 killed.

NATO planes carried out bombing raids in the Panjwayi district near Kandahar. Scores of people were killed in the village of Nangawat, some in their own homes while celebrating the Eid al-Fitr festival that marks the end of Ramadan. Many of the dead were women and children. The bombed district is in the region where NATO forces carried out Operation Medusa in September. This was a “significant success,” according to a senior NATO commander, in which upwards of 500 Taliban fighters were killed. NATO officials claimed to have completely flushed out or killed all Taliban militants in the area.

Reports also suggest at least 40 civilians died during the recent bombing raids when a nomad camp was hit in the district. NATO command has conceded only 12 civilians deaths in the recent air strikes, adding that 48 Taliban fighters were killed in the area. The Taliban has denied losing any men.

Local police and officials have rejected NATO accounts. Afghan Interior Ministry spokesman Zmarai Bashir told the BBC that 40 civilians and 20 Taliban militants were killed, while another government official, who asked not to be named because “it would cause me problems,” said at least 60 had died. Kandahar provincial council member Bismallah Afghanmal told the Associated Press that up to 85 civilians had been killed. Other local officials put the death toll at between 60 and 85.

Residents in Panjwayi say the bombing continued into the night. Local people as well as district officials have described buildings destroyed by aerial bombings. One local man said, “The planes came and were bombing from 3 a.m. And in the morning they started hitting our village with mortars and rockets. They didn’t allow anybody to come to our help.”

Witnesses told Reuters that 25 homes were demolished during four to five hours of bombing. People told the BBC that the bodies of many locals had been pulled from the rubble of their homes and buried.

One of the surviving nomads, who are among the poorest of Afghanistan’s citizens, said 20 members of his family had been killed and 10 injured. He said their camp, with no connection to the Taliban, had been attacked: “There are no Taliban here. We live outside the village in an open area in tents. Anyone can come here to see our homes and area. There are no Taliban here. We all are nomads living in tents.

“Each time they say that it was a mistake. They have destroyed us all in such mistakes. For God’s sake, come and see our situation.”

This was echoed by Kandahar provincial councilor Afghanmal, who said, “These kinds of things have happened several times, and they only say, ‘Sorry.’ How can you compensate people who have lost their sons and daughters? The government and the coalition told families that there was no Taliban in the area anymore. If there are no Taliban, then why are they bombing the area?”

Major Luke Knitig, a spokesman for NATO’s International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), said NATO troops had been engaged in heavy fighting against insurgents in three separate incidents in Panjwayi that day and the battle included air strikes.

Hundreds attended a mass funeral for the dead villagers two days after the NATO bombing raids. Many of the mourners condemned both NATO and the Karzai government for the deaths.

One mourner, Abdul Aye, who claimed 22 members of his family were killed in the NATO raids, said, “Everyone is very angry at the government and the coalition. There was no Taliban.”

Taj Mohammad, another villager, said there were no militants and innocent people were killed. Mohammad said 10 of his relatives had been killed in the latest incident.

A NATO officer later said the wild variance in the death toll estimates may stem from insurgents “being misidentified as innocent bystanders.” The unnamed officer stressed that NATO bombs did not go off course.

The UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan said it was “very concerned.”

The latest atrocity against Afghan civilians follows the killing of at least 26 people less than a week before in NATO operations in Kandahar and neighbouring Helmand province.

President Hamid Karzai announced an inquiry by a body to include NATO officers along with a few tribal and community elders. Karzai’s office said his investigators would make suggestions on how to prevent such “unfortunate” incidents in future and ensure “better coordination with foreign forces.” The inquiry is to report in a week’s time.

At a press conference he did not attempt to give a figure of those killed, speaking only of “numbers” of civilian deaths. But he did admit that foreign pilots did not always manage to distinguish between Taliban fighters and civilians.

To shore up the pretense of a sovereign government in Kabul, the press conference was closely followed by a statement from NATO spokesman Mark Laity, who said, “We’ve got tight rules of engagement but sometimes things go wrong.... President Karzai quite understandably and correctly wants us to show maximum care. That’s what we do.”

The prostration of Karzai before the United States is being exploited by Islamist militias. An alleged statement by the Taliban leadership dismissed Karzai’s offer for talks on October 27 and called his administration a “puppet government.”

“We say even today that there is no possibility of any talks when the country is under occupation,” the statement said. “Any talks with aggressors would amount to selling the country.”

Karzai had reiterated to reporters that he was ready to negotiate with the fugitive Taliban leader Mullah Omar if he stopped receiving support from neighboring Pakistan. Karzai says Omar is hiding in the Pakistani city of Quetta, while Pakistan says Omar is in Afghanistan.

Over the past two years hundreds of Taliban supporters, including some senior officials, are believed to have reconciled with the government, but there have apparently been no high-level talks with the Islamist group’s leadership.

NATO forces have relied extensively on attack aircraft in Afghanistan in the past year. According to the New York-based Human Rights Watch, in June the US Central Command confirmed 340 air strikes in Afghanistan, double the 160 strikes in Iraq in the same month.

Source: World Socialist Web Site