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MI6 'handing bundles of cash to Hamid Karzai'
By Damien McElroy, Foreign Affairs Correspondent
05 May 2013 British intelligence is handing 'bundles' of cash over to Afghanistan's President Hamid Karzai for special peace projects despite warnings that handouts are promoting corruption at the heart of his regime.
MI6 officials have acknowledged that the organisation has made direct cash payments to their Afghan counterparts periodically over the 12 years Britain has been at war in Afghanistan.
Mr Karzai declared handouts from the CIA and MI6 are an "easy source of petty cash" for his government as it attempts to seal alliances with powerful regional warlords and secure defections from the Taliban.
CIA tens of millions
The CIA support is believed to have amounted to tens of millions of dollars since 2001 while Britain has channelled a smaller fraction of that amount into 'special projects' undertaken by Karzai's officials.
MPs expressed concern that by simply handing over so-called "ghost money" to President Karzai and his lieutenants, British spies could not be sure that the money would not be lost to corruption.
Adam Holloway, a Conservative MP and member of the Defence Select Committee, warned that they could not be trusted even if the payments could be justified on the grounds that Taliban and other insurgents must be rewarded if they give up the fight against Nato troops.
Karzai and clique have interest in continuing the conflict
He told the Daily Telegraph:
"Every effort towards a political fix in Afghanistan must be made and those efforts welcomed but whether or not the money is well spent is a matter that must also be considered.
There is plenty of evidence that Karzai and his clique do not have an interest in a peace settlement but instead have an interest in continuing the conflict."
As Britain draws down troop numbers before withdrawing at the end of next year, there are fears that the pressure to seek a deal with insurgents to stop or reduce attacks will see increasing amounts of secret cash spent in Afghanistan.
Said Angus Robertson, the SNP MP and party defence spokesman:
"We also need to know more about how and where any cash from the UK is being used — how it is being monitored, and what benefits it is actually bringing to the people of Afghanistan.
It is enormously important to ensure that Afghanistan is as peaceful as it can be in the build up to withdrawal.
The terrible roadside attack on Royal Regiment of Scotland personnel last week shows the terrorist threat is still a very real one."
The revelation that Mr Karzai's office is awash with cash from his allies has caused a furore in the Afghan parliament where Mr Karzai's government has faced a barrage of corruption allegations.
Cash flow vital to Karzai grip on power
"Accepting such money is a big insult to Afghanistan. All those who accepted the cash payments have betrayed the nation," said Hidayatullah Rihaee, an MP from Bamyan province.
But Mr Karzai said the cash flow was vital to his grip on power and said he had begged the CIA station chief to continue making payments despite US political criticism.
Mr Karzai:
"This is nothing unusual.
I told him because of all these rumours in the media, please do not cut all this money, because we really need it."
He admitted that the money had been passed on to potential allies:
"Yes, sometimes Afghanistan's political elites have some needs, they have requested our help and we have helped them.
But we have not spent it to strengthen a particular political movement.
It's not like that.
It has been given to individuals."
Budget crisis because of corruption
The International Monetary Fund warned Kabul-based diplomats that the Afghan government was facing a budget crisis because of corruption within its ranks.
Saad Mustafa, a researcher at Transparency International, said it was inevitable that the cash, which was sometimes handed over by American spies in plastic bags, would by used corruptly if there was not oversight.
Mustafa said:
"Because the international community saw these warlords as an auxiliary force against the insurgents, certain allowances were made.
This sent the wrong message from the start and helped foster impunity."
© Copyright of Telegraph Group Limited 2013 |
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Afghan President Hamid Karzai confirms secret US cash 'help'
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29 April 2013
The Afghan president has admitted his office received secret payments from the US, but says the amounts were small and used legitimately.
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Hamid Karzai was responding to a New York Times report that alleged the CIA sent suitcases stuffed with cash to the president's office on a regular basis.
It said tens of millions of dollars 'came in secret' and cash was given on a vaster scale than previously thought.
The president said the money was for projects such as helping the sick.
Karzai said in a statement:
"It was used for different purposes: operational, assistance to injured people, rental costs and other goals.
This was efficient assistance and we appreciate it."
He added that the money had been delivered to Afghanistan's National Security Council, which is part of the president's office, during the last 10 years.
The New York Times report said:
"Wads of American dollars packed into suitcases, backpacks and, on occasion, plastic shopping bags have been dropped off every month or so at the offices of Afghanistan's president."
It quoted Khalil Roman, who was Mr Karzai's chief of staff from 2002 until 2005, as saying the cash was referred to as 'ghost money'.
Mr Roman is quoted as saying.
"It came in secret, and it left in secret."
The report cited unnamed US officials' assessments that there was little evidence the payment bought the influence the CIA sought, and said that the cash was not subject to the conditions placed on official US aid.
It added that much of the money fuelled corruption and went to paying off warlords and politicians with dubious connections.
The CIA declined to comment on the New York Times report, as did the US state department.
In 2010, Mr Karzai acknowledged that his office has received cash from Iran, but insists this was part of a "transparent" process.
He said the money was not for an individual, but to help run the president's office.
Afghanistan receives billions of dollars in aid, but remains one of the poorest countries in the world.
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US killing continues  US kill ten children and 2 women in Afghanistan airstrike in Kunar, April 7, 2013 |
Villagers protest against US NATO forces torture and murder  |
Afghanistan: Atrocity against Civilians By Richard Becker
March 5, 2013
No amount of lying Pentagon propaganda can hide the reality that the war has been an unmitigated disaster for the Afghan people and for the thousands of dead and tens of thousands of maimed troops sent to kill and die there in the interests of empire
On March 1, a U.S./NATO helicopter gunship killed two Afghan brothers, seven and eight years of age, as they tended cattle in Uruzgan province
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According to reports from residents, the boys were listening to a radio, which the helicopter crew interpreted as “radio signals” from Afghan resistance fighters.
The latest killing comes amidst a series of atrocities against civilians that has further enflamed opposition to the ongoing occupation.
On. Feb. 24, Hamid Karzai, the U.S.-installed “president” of Afghanistan, announced that he was demanding the withdrawal of all U.S. Special Forces troops from Wardak province within two weeks.
Wardak is a key strategic region and an area of active resistance to the U.S./NATO occupation.
Will NATO commanders pay any more attention to Karzai’s latest “order” than the many earlier ones that NATO forces ignored and Karzai quietly dropped?
Not likely.
What prompted Karzai’s latest proclamation was explained in a statement from his office, which read in part:
“After a thorough discussion, it became clear that armed individuals named as US special force stationed in Wardak province engage in harassing, annoying, torturing and even murdering innocent people.
A recent example in the province is an incident in which nine people were disappeared in an operation by this suspicious force and in a separate incident a student was taken away at night from his home, whose tortured body with throat cut was found two days later under a bridge.”
While U.S. commanders predictably denied the accusations, the level of popular anger in Wardak was made clear by street protests and threats by civilian groups to join the armed resistance if U.S. forces were not withdrawn.
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On February 26, 500 people marched in protest of the killings.
Protester Haji Abdul Qadim told the Reuters news service:
“If the situation remains like this, this province will collapse very soon
People will join the insurgency very soon because of the abuses of these forces.”
In another recent incident brought to international attention on February 26, 2013, a Swedish organization that operates health clinics in Afghanistan said that U.S. military forces occupied and damaged one of their clinics in Wardak on February 11.
The Swedish Committee for Afghanistan said in a statement:
“Foreign soldiers entered the health facility by force, tied up and blindfolded the guard on duty, and occupied the facility.”
Andreas Stefansson, director of SCA, said that it was the second time one of SCA’s clinics had been occupied by NATO troops.
The previous occupation lasted three days.
Stefansson said that NATO has promised that such an occupation would not happen again.
“What we are seeking is that they actually live up to what they say,” Stefansson told Reuters, February 26, 2013
On February 13, 2013, 10 people, men women and children were killed in a NATO air strike in Kunar province.
The grisly list of “accidental” killings stretches back a decade.
A ‘president’ in name only
These atrocities and the daily abuses that inevitably accompany imperialist occupation are the source of burning anger among the Afghan people.
In the eyes of the population, Karzai shares blame with the occupiers for these outrages.
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Thus, Karzai’s repeated “orders” forbidding Afghan army units from calling in U.S./NATO air support and for U.S. troops to withdraw from Wardak and stop the hated “night raids” on people’s homes.
But the Karzai proclamations continue to be disregarded by the occupation forces, exposing the actual power relationship in the country.
In reality, the lowest level U.S. commander has greater military authority than does the “president” of the country.
Further illuminating both this relationship and the U.S. intention to maintain a dominant role in Afghanistan was a February 3 joint interview with then-Secretary of Defense Leon E. Panetta and chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Martin Dempsey.
Panetta and Dempsey reaffirmed that the United States would sustain a “strategic partnership” with Afghanistan, citing a decision by the NATO heads of state during a 2012 summit meeting in Chicago to maintain a long-term presence in the country despite a drawdown in the number of U.S. ground troops in the country.
“We’re committing to an enduring presence,” Mr. Panetta said on Feb. 3.
“Strategic partnership” and “enduring presence” are more Washington weasel words for continuing colonial domination over Afghanistan.
On February 26, it was revealed that claims of resistance attacks inside the country declining by 7 percent in 2012 were just one more Pentagon lie.
The 7 percent figure was posted on the International Security Assistance Force (the official name of the U.S./NATO force in Afghanistan) website in January, to bolster the administration’s “positive track” line about the war.
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When the Associated Press made inquiries about the statistics, NATO officials in Kabul immediately backtracked, stated that they had “erred,” and admitted that in fact, there was no decline at all.
Remains one of the very poorest countries
Eleven and a half years of U.S./NATO war and occupation have been a disaster for all but a tiny sliver of the Afghan population.
Despite tens of billions of dollars in U.S.-funded “reconstruction aid,” Afghanistan remains one of the very poorest countries on the face of the Earth.
The total U.S. budget for the Afghanistan war is over $640 billion and counting. (Center for Strategic and International Studies)
While U.S. and other NATO-country contractors, and elements of the Afghan elite, have become incredibly rich from this “aid,” the Afghan government presently spends a miniscule $46 per year on health care per person. (GlobalHealthFacts.org)
Afghanistan ranks as the worst country in the world for infant mortality, with a shocking 122 infant deaths per 1,000 live births. (CIA World Factbook 2013)
By way of comparison, the infant mortality rate is 6 per 1,000 in the U.S. and 4.8 per 1,000 in Cuba.
Life expectancy is just 49 years.
Afghanistan is listed as 172nd out of 187 countries in the Human Development Index, with the average adult having 3.3 years of schooling.
In addition to the tens of thousands killed and hundreds of thousands wounded in the war, more than 2.7 million Afghans remain external refugees, most in Pakistan and Iran, and 425,000 are internally displaced. (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees 2012
No amount of lying Pentagon propaganda can hide the reality that the war has been an unmitigated disaster for the Afghan people and for the thousands of dead and tens of thousands of maimed troops sent to kill and die there in the interests of empire.
Images inserted by TheWE.cc
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Villagers protest against US NATO forces torture and murder  |
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Sailor who refused to learn how to fire a gun because of 'immoral' Afghan war jailed for seven months
6th July 2011
A Royal Navy medic was jailed for seven months today after he refused to draw a gun because he disagreed with the war in Afghanistan.
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Leading Medical Advisor Michael Lyons disobeyed the order by an officer to pick up an SA80 as part of rifle training on the grounds that it was 'against his moral beliefs.'
Lyons, 25, told a court martial he became disillusioned with the service after reading about troops killing civilians on whistle-blowing website Wikileaks.
He had already applied for, but had been denied, conscientious objector status when he was ordered to undertake the rifle training before a tour to Afghanistan.
Lyons was due to begin a two-week rifle course at HMS Excellent, a shore base in Portsmouth, last September but requested to be re-listed in a non-combative role.
On arrival he claimed it was his right not to take part in any combat training while he appealed the decision not to grant him conscientious objector status.
A panel of five Naval officers at a court martial at HMS Nelson, in Portsmouth, Hampshire, today found Lyons guilty of wilfully disobeying a lawful order.
Lyons, who joined the Navy at 18 and denied the charge, was only the third sailor in history to use conscientious objector as a defence at court martial.
He was demoted to the rank of Able Seaman, dismissed from the service and sentenced to seven months at the Colchester Military Corrective Training Centre in Essex.
Judge Advocate Alistair McGrigor told him:
‘The service bond is based on the equal sharing of risk and danger.
‘The consequences of your action meant that someone else's life was put in danger as they replaced you on that tour.
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‘We are undecided if your views are genuine or if you grasped them because you did not want to serve in Afghanistan.
‘You had engineered the decision so you would not be sent on tour.
‘Service personnel who fail to do their duty create a situation where other soldiers who might also have misgivings about dangerous situations could also disobey orders.
‘Members of the armed forces cannot pick and choose which orders they want to carry out.’
Prosecutor Commander Darren Reed told the hearing today:
‘What distinguishes a military force from an armed mob is discipline.
‘Lyons was given a lawful order which he was capable of carrying out and should have obeyed but he did not.
‘His own personal political view of the war in Afghanistan does not offer a defence.
‘Like all other serving personnel, he doesn't get to pick and choose which orders he obeys.’
In December 2009 married Lyons became the first person to appear before the Advisory Committee on Conscientious Objectors since 1996.
His attempts to be discharged failed because the committee ruled his reasons were political rather than moral.
Defending Fiona Edington told the hearing:
‘We have to look at this man and ask 'should you accept blind obedience in uniformed service?'
‘He's quietly gone about his business and been discreet and enquiring.
‘There's been no grandstanding, he's given his evidence from his heart and his conscience.’
During his evidence Lyons, wearing his Navy medic's uniform, said he had become a conscientious objector after reading the Wikileaks reports of civilian casualties.
He said:
‘My initial objections started with Afghanistan and I wanted to investigate the reasons why we were at war.
‘At the time Wikileaks came along and mentioned about Iraq and Afghanistan.
‘The reports said there had been some civilian casualties that nobody knew about and they were being covered up.
‘After a lot of deliberation I decided I was a conscientious objector.
‘I have never attempted to influence people, I've had lively debates with my co-workers but I have never thrust my beliefs on people.
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‘If I felt the war was right I could have carried out my job as a medic, but without a weapon.
‘I could not obey the order because I had my appeal coming up and it would not look good if I had trained to become an expert with an SA80.
‘There was no medical reason why I could not serve and if I had no inner thoughts or emotions I could have carried out the order.
‘The Geneva Convention says medics are non-combative and we are only allowed to protect our patients if we have to.’
Lyons, of Plymouth, Devon, who denied the charge of disobeying a lawful command, added:
‘I approached the instructor and straight away I told him I could not take part.
‘He gave me the order to attend the armoury with him, but my reply was that I was unable to because I am a conscientious objector.
‘I was respectful of his rank and we made conversation in his office. He did not quite know what to do with me and said he'd never heard anything like this.
‘I consider medical officers not to have a combative role. We had a chat and then he ordered me back to my unit.’
Military police later interviewed Lyons and he told them:
‘My political and moral beliefs since I joined the Navy at 18 have changed considerably.
‘I feel I do not want to carry a weapon and I think the war in Afghanistan is morally and politically wrong.’
After the sentence Lyons' supporters stood on their feet and clapped as he was marched from the court martial.
Emma Sangster, from military support group Forces Watch, said on behalf of Lyons' wife Lillian:
‘She is horrified at the decision.
‘It is an extremely harsh sentence that has been given not only to punish Michael for disobedience, but to deter others from taking that action.
‘I think he is extremely courageous and is the one person who is willing to put their hands up and say 'I do not believe in this.'
‘To go through that whole process and to stick to his conscience is totally admirable.
‘For the judge to throw doubt on whether his objection was genuine illustrates that the military do not take conscientious objectors seriously.’
Dail Mail story click here
© Associated Newspapers Ltd |
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Killed by US NATO airstrike Illuminati — US UK war games< |
'The photos published by Rolling Stone are disturbing and in striking contrast to the standards and values of the US Army,' US Army statement.
You mean the standards of disclosing US military killings!
Right on that! The US Army indeed would prefer not to have photos of its mass war crime killings spread around!
You can see many photos of US military killings of children and their parents as you scroll down the page!
These are however a miniscule number of images of actual US military killings and injuries!
Phoros below are those that have managed to escape traps and money pockets the US military have set to prevent release of such images!
US war crimes have now reached such a monstrous level in Afghanistan that on the various dimensions involved it needs vast tomes to record!
Kewe |
US Staff Sgt. Gibbs in the back of a Stryker vehicle, a pair of scissors visible in the top pocket of his uniform.
Dead fingers are tossed around within the company.
Gibbs is said to have used a pair of medic shears to cut the finger off at least two Afghan civilians murdered by members of his platoon. |
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How U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan murdered innocent civilians and mutilated their corpses
— and how their officers failed to stop them.
Rolling Stone article click here |
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Remains on payroll of US military
click here |
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The boy’s right pinky finger appears to have been severed.
US Staff Sargent Calvin Gibbs reportedly used a pair of razor-sharp medic’s shears to cut off the finger which he presented to Holmes as a trophy for killing his first Afghan. |
How U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan murdered innocent civilians and mutilated their corpses
— and how their officers failed to stop them.
Rolling Stone article click here |
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| Afghanistan Part III US forces in Afghanistan on Tuesday have killed 123 Afghanistan men, women and children The criminal heart of a very dirty, dirty war, being run by the coalition in the conquered land Whose ultimate aim is nothing more than the aggrandizement of a predatory elite STEEL RAIN Photos of Afghanistan people being killed and injured by NATO |
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50 minute discussion on psychotronic mind control with Dr. Nick Begich and Alex Jones
for mp3 — right click here |
The Dark Side Initiates — Click here Dark path initiates depend on the denial The five-percent manipulator class is composed of those on the dark path |
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Israel agents stole identity of New Zealand cerebral palsy victim. (IsraelNN.com July 15, 2004) The Foreign Ministry will take steps towards restoring relations with New Zealand. New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark today announced she was implementing diplomatic sanctions after two Israelis were sentenced on charges of attempting to obtain illegal passports. Despite Israeli refusal to respond to the accusations, the two are labeled in the New Zealand media as Mossad agents acting on behalf of the Israeli intelligence community. Foreign Ministry officials stated they will do everything possible to renew diplomatic ties, expressing sorrow over the "unfortunate incident". Projected mortality rate of Sudan refugee starvation deaths — Darfur pictures Suicide now top killer of Israeli soldiers Atrocities files - graphic images 'Suicide bombings,' the angel said, 'and beheadings.' 'And the others that have all the power - they fly missiles in the sky. They don't even look at the people they kill.' The real Ronald Reagan — Nicaragua, Guatemala, El Salvador, South Africa Follow the torture trail... Photos May 2004 When you talk with God were you also spending your time, money and energy, killing people? Are they now alive or dead? Photos July 2004 US Debt Photos June 2004 Lest we forget - Ahmed and Asma, story of two children dying More photos May 2004 American military: Abu Gharib (Ghraib) prison photos, humiliation and torture - London Daily Mirror article: non-sexually explicit pictures Photos April 2004 The celebration of Jerusalem day, the US missiles that rained onto children in Gaza, and, a gathering of top articles over the past nine months Photos March 2004 The Iraq War - complete listing of articles, includes images Photos February 2004 US missiles - US money - and Palestine Photos January 2004 Ethnic cleansing in the Beduin desert Photos December 2003 Shirin Ebadi Nobel Peace Prize winner 2003 Photos November 2003 Atrocities - graphic images... Photos October 2003 Aljazeerah.info Photos September 2003 |
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