Oil vs Gold or both?

watch judge comment think.Above all Think

Golden Dawn Immigrants-Fake NeoNazi’s

All those links were sent to me on Twitter and I am more than glad to post them,I do beleive I will find more on those people due time.No threats allowed according to the WP policy or the HR declaration. So please stay vigilant of what you are going to post :)I checked all blog categories so that the post can get the most views possible. Regards!

“##Spiros Macrozonaris## IMMIGRANT Golden Dawn Deputy leader in Montreal, Canada” :

Facebook profile :

INTERESTING FACEBOOK POST MR. MACROZONARIS, HE CANNOT EVEN WRITE GREEK! BAD NAZI BAD! :

His NON 100% PURE GREEK son’s Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/macrozonaris?ref=ts&fref=ts

1. Greek Immigrant who married a “foreigner” >>>>>French-Canadian Doris Morrissette, they bore a son, Nicolas Macrozonaris (World-Class Sprinter – CANADIAN Olympian 🙂 ..who unfortunately is not 100% Pure Greek…

2. Conversations with Nicolas on Twitter, lead to nothing, he is ‘pretending’ that he has NO knowledge of what Golden Dawn supports and believes YET he states that he does not condone his fathers “actions”

Twitter @Macrozonaris TWEETER CONVERSATIONS with Nicolas –>

###### MUST WATCH #####
Video from CBC Montreal, from week of Oct 12th – INTERVIEW with Spiros Macrozonaris – next to him sits LOOSER Ilias Hondronicolas : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v-3rbLI4K78

#Ilias Hondronicolas ———> on PHOTO second guy from the left :

#MORE HONDRONICOLAS:

(FRIENDS WITH ELENI ZAROULIA SHARING HER PHOTOS!)
( MUST SEE )

#MORE PAPAGEORGIOU:

Lawless Land : Libya



Uploader's description:

Published on Apr 23, 2012 by journeymanpictures

Divided Libya awaits election results amid ongoing violence

To see more go to http://www.youtube.com/user/journeymanpictures

Follow us on Facebook (http://goo.gl/YRw42) or Twitter (http://www.twitter.com/journeymanvod)

Gaddafi may be gone but Libya is now a country in chaos. Rebel groups are flush with weapons and taking the law into their own hands, persecuting those thought to have been allied to Gaddafi’s regime.

Libya’s power vacuum has been filled by heavily armed rebels who still control much of the war-torn nation. Images of the sprawling refugee camps reveal the extent of the country’s destroyed infrastructure. Mohammed Swehli, a commander of one of the major Misratan Rebel Brigades, denies the widespread allegations of torture and abuse. “They’re not bandits, they’re not militia groups”, he says of the rebels. But video after video has emerged of the torture of perceived Gaddafi loyalists, most of them far too gruesome to broadcast. In some cases the brutal treatment appears to be based solely on the colour of the victim’s skin. This report gained rare access to the prisons where thousands are being held indefinitely without charge. One former prisoner shows pictures of his injuries. “This is when they beat me with electric cables. They called me slave”, he says. With upcoming elections and new fears over a split between the country’s east and west, what does the future hold for post-revolution Libya?

A Film By SBS
Distributed By Journeyman Pictures
April 2012

US upset about Iran-Iraq-Syria alliance-US meddling fuels violence in Syria

Hezbollah Secretary-General Seyyed Hassan Nasrallah confirms the Lebanese resistance movement has sent a drone deep into the Israeli airspace evading radar systems.

The operation code-named Hussein Ayub saw Hezbollah’s drone fly hundreds of kilometers into the Israeli airspace and getting very close to Dimona nuclear plant without being detected by advanced Israeli and US radars, Nasrallah said during a televised speech late on Thursday.

“This is only part of our capabilities,” he stressed, adding that Israelis have admitted to their security failure despite being provided with the latest technologies by Western powers.

 

 

Hezbollah secretary-general stated that Hezbollah’s drones are made in Iran but assembled by the resistance movement.

Deliver Into ‘Friendly” Hands: The report 2012/6 US-Led Abuse and Rendition of Opponents to Gaddafi’s Libya

 

September 6, 2012
This report is based on interviews conducted in Libya with 14 former detainees, most of whom belonged to an armed Islamist group that had worked to overthrow Gaddafi for 20 years. Many members of the group, the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), joined the NATO-backed anti-Gaddafi rebels in the 2011 conflict. Some of those who were rendered and allegedly tortured in US custody now hold key leadership and political positions in the country.

View this document on Scribd

Save Dr Saif Al Islam Qadhafi : Take Action Please

 

From a Friend on Twitter. Please click on the link and sign the petition.Together we can bring a change in this world

 

Sponsored by: Citizens  for Human Rights, Justice and Peace

Due to the professional misconduct of Luis Moreno-Ocampo, former ICC Prosecutor, Saif Al Islam Qadhafi has been the victim of a mass media campaign to implicate his guilt for crimes that he has not committed and for which there is no substantiating evidence.
In violation of International Law and Rules Of Ethical And Professional Conduct, Luis Moreno Ocampo gave numerous, widely publicized interviews where he cited crimes allegedly committed by Saif Al Islam Qadhafi, thus denying him his fundamental legal right of Presumption Of Innocence

Saif Qadhafi has been languishing in a makeshift prison in Zintan the last 8 months. He has been denied his fundamental human rights to legal council. The ICC defence team appointed by the International Criminal Court were illegally detained in Libya. The ICC issued an arrest warrant in June, 2011 accusing Saif of involment in the killing of protestors. It took 3 days to issue the arrest warrant without an investigation on the ground in Libya. The ICC issued an arrest warrant in June, 2011 accusing Saif of involment in the killing of protestors. It took 3 days to issue the arrest warrant without an investigation on the ground in Libya. Politically Motivated or could Saif be guilty? Having followed the conflict from the onset, this was an armed aggression. Tragically Saif is innocent and if we allow a mock trial in Libya he will be executed and the truth will never be told.

The following is an article posted on Libya360 website. Our petition as well as many of the articles are from this website which has an extensive library of articles on the current situation in Libya. There are also appeals of other political prisoners who are facing mock trials in Libya.

ICC Defense Respond To The Libyan Authorities’ Demand To Hold Saif Gaddafi’s Trial In Libya

Posted on August 25, 2012 by Alexandra Valiente

We Demand Saif Al Islam Gaddafi’s Immediate Transfer To The ICC – Revised Appeal With PDF Document

Urgent Action: Viva Libya Saif Al Islam Gaddafi File And Appeal

Alexandra Valiente
Viva Libya!
Libya 360°

On July 31, 2012, Mr. Xavier-Jean Keïta, Principal Counsel and Ms. Melinda Taylor, Counsel, submitted an application to the court requesting that Libya’s request to try Saif Al Islam Gaddafi in Libya be denied.

The 92 page document opened with unsigned statements from Saif Al Islam Gaddafi, where he outlined the gravity of his plight.

In an earlier article I described the process and challenges of the case, emphasizing the following critical facts:

Regarding political prisoners, international laws are clear and concise. There is no margin for error or misinterpretation regarding their enactment.
When the International Criminal Court demands the issuance of arrest warrants (based on a UNSC referral), it has a responsibility to ensure that the individuals subject to the warrant are lawfully protected from harm, granted a fair trial and not executed. This is especially critical in Libya, where the present regime is incapable of conducting “fair trials” and the country, mired in a state of utter chaos, is subject to militia rule.
The ICC have actively participated in violating international laws and norms with regards to the protection and treatment of political prisoners.
The former ICC prosecutor, Luis Moreno-Ocampo, stepped beyond professional and ethical boundaries when he entered into secret negotiations with the NTC and the Zintan militia, while denying he was trying to influence the outcome of Saif’s case.
While he (Luis Moreno-Ocampo) was engaged in these secret meetings, it was known that Saif Gaddafi was subjected to torture, denied medical treatment for his injuries, denied legal counsel of his choice, denied access to family and friends he trusts who could act on his behalf to appoint legal counsel.

In addition to the above, “Ocampo “gathered evidence of fault” against Saif Gaddafi in a few weeks without going to the place where the alleged crimes were committed. In other cases investigations lasted for years (7 years in the case of Cote d’Ivoire). Now Ocampo’s statements for the media fully coincide with the position of the Libyan authorities.” (Alexander Mezyaev)

Today the ICC published a response from Mr. Xavier-Jean Keïta and Ms. Melinda Taylor that was submitted on August 21, 2012:

SITUATION IN LIBYA IN THE CASE OF THE PROSECUTOR v. SAIF AL-ISLAM GADDAFI AND ABDULLAH AL-SENUSSI

“1. On 30 July 2012, Counsel for Libya filed a request for a Status Conference, and an extension of time to file their reply concerning the admissibility challenge. Counsel for Libya sought to justify the latter by reference, inter alia, to the inability of Counsel to obtain instructions during the period of Ramadan, and pending the appointment of a new Minister of Justice, and Prosecutor-General.

2. In a request to reply to the Defence and Registry submissions on this point, Counsel for Libya once again averred to the Chamber that Counsel for Libya were unable to obtain instructions in relation to either the allegations concerning the alleged misconduct of the Defence, or the admissibility of the case. Counsel for Libya also heavily implied that there was a lacuna concerning the existence of a prosecution team, with the authority to instruct Counsel on such matters.

3. On 9 August 2012, the Pre-Trial Chamber suspended the deadline concerning Libya’s reply to the admissibility challenge due to “the alleged inability of counsel to obtain instructions in the absence of a Minister of Justice”.

3. On 9 August 2012, the Pre-Trial Chamber suspended the deadline concerning Libya’s reply to the admissibility challenge due to “the alleged inability of counsel to obtain instructions in the absence of a Minister of Justice”.

4. On 14 August 2012, the Defence for Mr. Saif Al Islam Gaddafi respectfully requested the Pre-Trial Chamber to shorten the deadline for the reply, or in the alternative, suspend the operation of Article 95 (the Request). The Defence referred to the fact that there was no du jure or de facto impediment as concerns the ability of either the incumbent Minister of Justice, or Prosecutor-General to instruct Counsel for Libya in relation to the reply to the admissibility challenge.

5. On 18 August 2012, at a time when Counsel for Libya had informed the Pre-Trial Chamber that there were no government officials capable of providing instructions concerning the case, an official for the Prosecutor-General provided clear and detailed information concerning the intention of the Libyan authorities regarding the progress of the domestic proceedings, and the admissibility challenge before the ICC.

6. For example, the official addressed the following issues, which are directly relevant to a putative reply to the admissibility challenge:”

They cite media reports that Saif Al Islam Gaddafi is to be tried in Libya in September.

“1 ICC-01/11-01/11-192
2 ICC-01/11-01/11-199, 9 August 2012, at paras. 4 and 13.
3 See for example, para 8.
4 ICC-01/11-01/11-200.
5 ICC-01/11-01/11-201.
6 N. Meo, ‘ Libya: Saif Gaddafi to go on trial next month’ Telegraph 18 August 2012, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/libya/9484459/Libya-Saif-Gaddafi-to-go-ontrial-next-month.html”

They asked the court to consider the fact that the Libyan authorities will not provide accurate information regarding:

1- The location of the trial.
2- The penalty that will be imposed.
3- The fact that Saif has no legal counsel in Libya and has not been granted the right to choose who will represent him.
4- The unwillingness to protect witnesses who would like to testify on behalf of Saif.
5- The exact date that Libya is seeking to set for the commencement of the trial.
6- The specific items that the “prosecution” intends to submit as evidence against Saif.

The defense challenged Libya’s intentions when they announced to the media that, “now Libya’s prosecutor has made clear that the ICC will play no role in the trial. The court’s relationship with Libya was poisoned after four of its personnel were detained for alleged spying during a visit to Saif.” (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/libya/9484459/Libya-Saif-Gaddafi-to-go-ontrial-next-month.html)

They accused the Libyan authorities of mounting “a public campaign to preemptively justify their non-cooperation with any future admissibility ruling from the ICC. In particular, the Interior Minister, who continues to exercise his functions and authority to speak on behalf of the Libyan government, has resorted to litigation by journalism rather than judiciary, using the press as a platform to publicly malign the credibility of the ICC Defence (and by association, the ICC).”

They highlighted the irregularities in the statements and actions of the Libyan authorities:

“Whereas two weeks ago, the Libyan authorities asserted that they had concerns that the Defence wished to assassinate or poison Mr. Gaddafi with the interpreter’s swatch watch, the Interior Minister now alleges that the Defence attempted to assist Mr. Gaddafi escape by providing him with “drawings showing places and times in Zintan”. The Interior Minister further asserted that the ICC has not “ denied the spying claims”.”

They addressed the credibility of all statements made by the Libyan authorities and reminded the court of their obligation under international law, not to permit the continued abuse of court proceedings.

“It would be an abuse of the court proceedings to use the admissibility reply as a vehicle for mounting a distinct admissibility challenge based on new circumstances, proposals, and allegations. To do so would be contrary to the clear Statutory injunction that States may only challenge admissibility once, as of right. It would also unfairly deprive the Defence, Prosecution, and OPCV of the ability to be heard on these new details and proposals.

The law requires certainty and specificity, and Mr. Gaddafi has a right to know the forum of his trial as soon as possible. Accordingly, in the absence of any legal or practical impediment to the immediate filing of a reply to the admissibility challenge, the Defence respectfully reiterates its request for the Honourable Pre-Trial Chamber to:

i. order Counsel for Libya to either file their reply to the admissibility challenge within four days of the issuance of the decision on this request, or waive their right to file such a reply; or,

ii. in the alternative, declare that Article 95 is no longer in effect during the current suspension of the admissibility proceedings, and order the Libyan authorities to immediately surrender Mr. Gaddafi to the custody of the ICC.“

The Libyan authorities are attempting to confuse and deceive the public when Taha Naser Bara announces that Saif’s trial will be held in Zintan in September, while Deputy Prime Minister Mustafa Abushagur continues to deny that there are any definitive plans at this time regarding Saif’s trial.

It is my hope that the ICC will act on this request and have Saif transferred to an ICC facility where he is safe from the murderous reach of the current regime and has a chance of receiving a “fair trial” where his defense can present evidence of his innocence and witnesses can testify on his behalf without fear of imprisonment or assassination.

The ICC is obligated under its own laws to protect those under its jurisdiction from irreparable harm.

As the ICC issued the arrest warrant for Saif Al Islam, (Refer to the original arrest warrant; Jurisdiction – F – 1 – 50) he is under their jurisdiction and is entitled to their intervention and the full protection of all of his human rights.

I encourage activists and human rights advocates to support Saif by demanding his immediate release, even if it is into the hands of the ICC.

If he is to survive he must be removed from Libya promptly.

Urgent Action: Viva Libya Saif Al Islam Gaddafi File And Appeal
ICC Officials, “There Is No Chance Saif Al Islam Gaddafi Will Have A Fair Trial”.
Saif Al-Islam Gaddafi’s Right To Fair Trial In Libya ‘Irrevocably Prejudiced’

© Copyright 2012 by Libya 360° and Viva Libya!. Republication is strictly forbidden. You are however permitted, encouraged and welcome to post the link to the original. On behalf of Libya’s political prisoners, we thank you for your support and cooperation.

 

Eventually We All Will Have To Move,But You,Yes you.. Where are you now?

 

The time that YOU weren’t moving has passed.Now it’s the time to move, It is the time to take some action along with citizens from all over the world.Just take a look around you you are surrounded by wires,cables and remotes Just as they wanted you to be.. or me.. well throw them away and let’s get on the streets to demand what IT has always been ours! OUR rights and OUR lives!




 

You Can't Prove A Man Innocent If You Have Killed Them Already

 

ABOLITIONIST FOR ALL CRIMES
Countries whose laws do not provide for the death penalty for any crime
ALBANIA
ANDORRA
ANGOLA
ARGENTINA
ARMENIA
AUSTRALIA
AUSTRIA
AZERBAIJAN
BELGIUM
BHUTAN
BOSNIA-HERZEGOVINA
BULGARIA
BURUNDI
CAMBODIA
CANADA
CAPE VERDE
COLOMBIA
COOK ISLANDS
COSTA RICA
COTE D’IVOIRE
CROATIA
CYPRUS
CZECH REPUBLIC
DENMARK
DJIBOUTI
DOMINICAN REPUBLIC
ECUADOR
ESTONIA
FINLAND
FRANCE
GABON
GEORGIA

GERMANY
GREECE
GUINEA-BISSAU
HAITI
HOLY SEE
HONDURAS
HUNGARY
ICELAND
IRELAND
ITALY
KIRIBATI
KYRGYSTAN
LATVIA
LIECHTENSTEIN
LITHUANIA
LUXEMBOURG
MACEDONIA (former Yugoslav Republic)
MALTA
MARSHALL ISLANDS
MAURITIUS
MEXICO
MICRONESIA (Federated States)
MOLDOVA
MONACO
MONTENEGRO
MOZAMBIQUE
NAMIBIA
NEPAL
NETHERLANDS
NEW ZEALAND
NICARAGUA
NIUE
NORWAY

PALAU
PANAMA
PARAGUAY
PHILIPPINES
POLAND
PORTUGAL
ROMANIA
RWANDA
SAMOA
SAN MARINO
SAO TOME AND PRINCIPE
SENEGAL
SERBIA
SEYCHELLES
SLOVAKIA
SLOVENIA
SOLOMON ISLANDS
SOUTH AFRICA
SPAIN
SWEDEN
SWITZERLAND
TIMOR-LESTE
TOGO
TURKEY
TURKMENISTAN
TUVALU
UKRAINE
UNITED KINGDOM
URUGUAY
UZBEKISTAN
VANUATU
VENEZUELA

ABOLITIONIST FOR “ORDINARY CRIMES” ONLY
Countries whose laws provide for the death penalty only for exceptional crimes such as crimes under military law or crimes committed in exceptional circumstances
BOLIVIA
BRAZIL
CHILE EL SALVADOR
FIJI
ISRAEL KAZAKHSTAN
PERU

ABOLITIONIST IN PRACTICE
Countries which retain the death penalty for ordinary crimes such as murder but can be considered abolitionist in practice in that they have not executed anyone during the past 10 years and are believed to have a policy or established practice of not carrying out executions. The list also includes countries which have made an international commitment not to use the death penalty
ALGERIA
BENIN
BRUNEI DARUSSALAM
BURKINA FASO
CAMEROON
CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC
CONGO (Republic)
ERITREA
GAMBIA
GHANA
GRENADA

KENYA
KOREA (SOUTH)
LAOS
LIBERIA
MADAGASCAR
MALAWI
MALDIVES
MALI
MAURITANIA
MONGOLIA
MOROCCO
MYANMAR
NAURU

NIGER
PAPUA NEW GUINEA
RUSSIAN FEDERATION
SIERRA LEONE
SRI LANKA
SURINAME
SWAZILAND
TAJIKISTAN
TANZANIA
TONGA
TUNISIA
ZAMBIA

RETENTIONIST COUNTRIES
Countries which retain the death penalty for ordinary crimes
AFGHANISTAN
ANTIGUA AND BARBUDA
BAHAMAS
BAHRAIN
BANGLADESH
BARBADOS
BELARUS
BELIZE
BOTSWANA
CHAD
CHINA
COMOROS
CONGO (Democratic Republic)
CUBA
DOMINICA
EGYPT
EQUATORIAL GUINEA
ETHIOPIA
GUATEMALA GUINEA
GUYANA
INDIA
INDONESIA
IRAN
IRAQ
JAMAICA
JAPAN
JORDAN
KOREA (North)
KUWAIT
LEBANON
LESOTHO
LIBYA
MALAYSIA
NIGERIA
OMAN
PAKISTAN
PALESTINIAN AUTHORITY
QATAR
SAINT KITTS & NEVIS
SAINT LUCIA
SAINT VINCENT & GRENADINES
SAUDI ARABIA
SINGAPORE
SOMALIA
SOUTH SUDAN
SUDAN
SYRIA
TAIWAN
THAILAND
TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO
UGANDA
UNITED ARAB EMIRATES
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
VIET NAM
YEMEN
ZIMBABWE

COUNTRIES THAT HAVE ABOLISHED THE DEATH PENALTY SINCE 1976
1976 PORTUGAL abolished the death penalty for all crimes.
1978 DENMARK abolished the death penalty for all crimes.
1979 LUXEMBOURG, NICARAGUA and NORWAY abolished the death penalty for all crimes. BRAZIL, FIJI and PERU abolished the death penalty for ordinary crimes.
1981 FRANCE and CAPE VERDE abolished the death penalty for all crimes.
1982 The NETHERLANDS abolished the death penalty for all crimes.
1983 CYPRUS and EL SALVADOR abolished the death penalty for ordinary crimes.
1984 ARGENTINA abolished the death penalty for ordinary crimes.
1985 AUSTRALIA abolished the death penalty for all crimes.
1987 HAITI, LIECHTENSTEIN and the GERMAN DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC1 abolished the death penalty for all crimes.
1989 CAMBODIA, NEW ZEALAND, ROMANIA and SLOVENIA2 abolished the death penalty for all crimes.
1990 ANDORRA, CROATIA,2 the CZECH AND SLOVAK FEDERAL REPUBLIC,3 HUNGARY, IRELAND, MOZAMBIQUE, NAMIBIA and SAO TOMÉ AND PRíNCIPE abolished the death penalty for all crimes.
1992 ANGOLA, PARAGUAY and SWITZERLAND abolished the death penalty for all crimes.
1993 GUINEA-BISSAU, HONG KONG4 and SEYCHELLES abolished the death penalty for all crimes. GREECE abolished the death penalty for ordinary crimes.
1994 ITALY abolished the death penalty for all crimes.
1995 DJIBOUTI, MAURITIUS, MOLDOVA and SPAIN abolished the death penalty for all crimes.
1996 BELGIUM abolished the death penalty for all crimes.
1997 GEORGIA, NEPAL, POLAND and SOUTH AFRICA abolished the death penalty for all crimes. BOLIVIA and BOSNIA-HERZEGOVINA abolished the death penalty for ordinary crimes.
1998 AZERBAIJAN, BULGARIA, CANADA, ESTONIA, LITHUANIA and the UNITED KINGDOM abolished the death penalty for all crimes.
1999 EAST TIMOR, TURKMENISTAN and UKRAINE abolished the death penalty for all crimes. LATVIA5 abolished the death penalty for ordinary crimes.
2000 COTE D’IVOIRE and MALTA abolished the death penalty for all crimes. ALBANIA6 abolished the death penalty for ordinary crimes.
2001 BOSNIA-HEZEGOVINA 7 abolished the death penalty for all crimes. CHILE abolished the death penalty for ordinary crimes.
2002 TURKEY abolished the death penalty for ordinary crimes. The FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF YUGOSLAVIA (now two states SERBIA and MONTENEGRO 9 ) and CYPRUS abolished the death penalty for all crimes
2003
ARMENIA abolished the death penalty for ordinary crimes
2004
BHUTAN, SAMOA, SENEGAL and TURKEY abolished the death penalty for all crimes
2005
LIBERIA 8 and MEXICO abolished the death penalty for all crimes.
2006
PHILIPPINES abolished the death penalty for all crimes.
2007
ALBANIA6 abolished the death penalty for all crimes. and RWANDA abolished the death penalty for all crimes. KYRGYZSTAN abolished the death penalty for ordinary crimes.
2008
UZBEKISTAN, CHILE and ARGENTINA abolished the death penalty for all crimes.
2009 BURUNDI and TOGO abolished the death penalty for all crimes.
2010 GABON removed the death penalty from its legislation.
2012 LATVIA abolished the death penalty for all crimes.

Notes:
1. In 1990 the German Democratic Republic became unified with the Federal Republic of Germany, where the death penalty had been abolished in 1949.
2. Slovenia and Croatia abolished the death penalty while they were still republics of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. The two republics became independent in 1991.
3. In 1993 the Czech and Slovak Federal Republic divided into two states, the Czech Republic and Slovakia.
4. In 1997 Hong Kong was returned to Chinese rule as a special administrative region of China. Amnesty International understands that Hong Kong will remain abolitionist.
5. In 1999 the Latvian parliament voted to ratify Protocol No. 6 to the European Convention on Human Rights, abolishing the death penalty for peacetime offenses.
6. In 2007 Albania ratified Protocol No. 13 to the European Convention on Human Rights, abolishing the death penalty in all circumstances. In 2000 it had ratified Protocol No. 6 to the European Convention on Human Rights, abolishing the death penalty for peacetime offences.
7. In 2001 Bosnia-Herzegovina ratified the Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, abolishing the death penalty for all crimes.
8. In 2005 Liberia ratified the Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, abolishing the death penalty for all crimes.
9. Montenegro had already abolished the death penalty in 2002 when it was part of a state union with Serbia. It became an independent member state of the United Nations on 28 June 2006. Its ratification of Protocol No. 13 to the European Convention on Human Rights, abolishing the death penalty in all circumstances, came into effect on 6 June 2006.

http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/abolitionist-and-retentionist-countries

 

8 Stories Buried By the Corporate Media That You Need to Know About

 

December 15, 2011 |

 

As 2011 comes to a close, we will see lists of the year’s most memorable events and most important people, as is the pattern every year. But not all stories are created equal. When the corporate media bury significant developments in the back pages of the paper or the second to last paragraph of an article, it’s easy for stories to go unnoticed.

As usual, this year was packed with critical, newsworthy and insufficiently covered stories that should have, but didn’t, make the front page. Below are eight explosive must-read stories of 2011 that you may have missed.

1) Our Planet Saw the Largest Increase in Carbon Emissions Since the Industrial Revolution

Global emissions of carbon dioxide increased 5.9 percent in 2010, the largest increase on record, according to Global Carbon Project, an international group of scientists tracking the numbers. This increase, reports the New York Times, is “almost certainly the largest absolute jump in any year since the Industrial Revolution, and the largest percentage increase since 2003.”

Another study, published in the journal Nature Geoscience, traces an estimated three-quarters of the planet’s warming since 1950 to human activities. On top of that, the World Meteorological Organization warned that 10 of the hottest years ever recorded have occurred in the last 15 years, with temperatures this year registering as the 10th highest on record.

It’s obvious that the world is getting warmer at an accelerating rate and it’s our fault. What are world leaders going to do about it? Wait another eight years to cut emissions.

These statistics were released before last week’s United Nations Climate Change Conference in Durban, South Africa, which ended with an agreement to kick the can down the road – they will negotiate a new climate treaty by 2015, which would postpone emission cuts until 2020.

To avoid the most devastating effects of climate change, we must limit the earth’s warming to 2°C. For that to happen, emission volumes cannot exceed 450 parts per million (ppm) of carbon dioxide. Since emissions have already reached 390 ppm, higher than any other time in recorded history, the International Energy Agency warns that action cannot be delayed past 2017. Based on the Durbin agreement, emissions won’t be cut until 2020.

Unless something drastic pushes our leaders to change the destructive path we’re on, 2011 may go down in the history books as the year that humans irreversibly screwed themselves and the planet.

2) Widespread Trafficking Of Iraqi Women And Girls Thanks To The Iraq War

Since the 2003 US invasion of Iraq, over 100,000 Iraqis have been killed and another 4.4 million displaced, leaving many women and girls widowed or orphaned.

As a result of the conflict more than 50,000 Iraqi women find themselves trapped in sexual servitude in Syria and Jordan, giving rise to a lucrative and growing sex industry that feeds off the chaos from the Iraq war.

Women and girls inside Iraq fare no better, often working in brothels run by female pimps. In an interview with the Inter Press Service, Rania, a former trafficker who now works as an undercover researcher for a women’s support group in Iraq, detailed a visit to “a house in Baghdad’s Al-Jihad district, where girls as young as 16 were held to cater exclusively to the U.S. military. The brothel’s owner told Rania that an Iraqi interpreter employed by the Americans served as the go-between, transporting girls to and from the U.S. airport base.”

Although human trafficking is illegal in Iraq, the country lacks a robust criminal justice system to enforce the law. Sadly, the victims of trafficking and prostitution are often the ones who are punished.

3) More Iraq Veterans Committed Suicide Last Year Than Active-Duty Troops Died In Combat

In 2010, 468 active duty and reserve troops committed suicide while 462 died in combat, marking the second year in a row that more US soldiers killed themselves than died at war, according to Congressional Quarterly’s John Donnelly.

Over the past decade, over 2,000 soldiers have taken their own lives, yet they receive little attention in our corporate media. In August the New York Times ran a story with the celebratory headline, “Iraq War Marks First Month With No U.S. Military Deaths.” That same month, the Department of Defense reported19 possible suicides among active-duty soldiers. In July, that number reached a record high of 32. America’s decade-long wars in Iraq and Afghanistan leave troops with deep emotional scars that can be just as dangerous as a combat wound. Perhaps it’s time we gave them the attention they deserve.

4) Drone Strikes Kill Innocent Civilians, Not Just ‘Militants’

After Jon Brennan, President Obama’s top counterterrorism adviser, claimed in June that no civilians had been killed in US drone attacks in nearly a year, the Bureau of Investigative Journalism reported that at least 45 civilians were killed in 10 US attacks during that period.

Overall, drone strikes in Pakistan have killed 780 civilians, including 175 children. The bureau documents 309 CIA drone strikes carried out since 2004 that have killed as many as 2,997 people. Over 85 percent were launched by the Obama administration, an average of one strike every four days. Yet the casualties of the US drone war rarely receive mention in the corporate media, except when described as “Islamic militants” or “suspected terrorists.” This is challenged not only by the bureau’s data, but also by gruesome photographs of drone victims taken by local journalists.

The Guardian described the images captured by Noor Behram, a journalist from the North Waziristan region of Pakistan, whose work appeared in an exhibition at London’s Beaconsfield gallery in August:

The photographs make for difficult viewing and leave no doubt about the destructive power of the Hellfire missiles unleashed: a boy with the top of his head missing, a severed hand, flattened houses, the parents of children killed in a strike. The chassis is all that remains of a car in one photo, another shows the funeral of a seven-year-old child. There are pictures, too, of the cheap rubber flip-flops worn by children and adults, which often survive: signs that life once existed there. A 10-year-old boy’s body, prepared for burial, shows lipstick on him and flowers in his hair – a mother’s last loving touch.

Spencer Ackerman recently featured a number of Behram’s disturbing photographs at Wired, which can be seen here.

5) Record Number Of US Kids Face Hunger and Homelessness

A report released by National Center on Family Homelessness finds that one in 45 US children (1.6 million) are homeless, the majority under the age of seven. The Christian Science Monitor reports, “The number of homeless children in 2010 exceeded even the total in 2006, when thousands of families displaced by hurricanes Katrina and Rita produced a historic spike in homelessness.”

It doesn’t stop there. According to recent figures released by the USDA, 17.2 million American households (14.5 percent) are “food insecure,” one of the highest recorded rates since surveys were first conducted in 1995. As a result, 16.2 million American children – one in five– face the threat of hunger. According to emergency room doctors in cities around the country, this is leading to a dramatic spike in malnourishment in babies.

Over the summer, the Boston Globe reported on shocking levels of infant malnourishment in Massachusetts. Doctors at the Boston Medical Center (BMC) reported seeing “more hungry and dangerously thin young children in the emergency room than at any time in more than a decade of surveying families.” Pediatricians in other large cities, including Baltimore, Little Rock, Minneapolis, and Philadelphia, have also seen a rise in infant and child malnourishment since 2008.

BMC doctors also warn that “rising chronic hunger threatens to leave scores of infants and toddlers with lasting learning and developmental problems.”

The Globe likened child malnourishment and hunger among Boston’s poor to levels seen in the “developing world.”

6) Prisoners Are People Too

This summer, more than 6,000 California prison inmates went on a month-long hunger strike in solidarity with those held in solitary confinement at the Secure Housing Unit in California’s Pelican Bay State Prison. Pelican Bay is notorious for holding nearly half of its 1,111 prisoners in solitary confinement for longer than 10 years. The strike was suspended in July when inmates entered negotiations with the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR). They expected change, but prisoners who organized and participated in the strike were instead retaliated against by prison guards.

By September 26, the strike was back on, with 12,000 inmates throughout California and out-of-state facilities participating. But those numbers quickly dwindled as the CDCR disciplined those involved by limiting access to visiting family members and isolating participants from other prisoners. A string of prisoner suicides committed by inmates who participated in the hunger strikes followed. Colorlines’ Julianne Hing reported:

In recent months Alex Machado and Johnny Owens Vick, who were both housed in Pelican Bay’s notorious solitary confinement Security Housing Unit, and Hozel Alanzo Blanchard, who was incarcerated at Calipatria State Prison’s Administrative Segregation Unit, all committed suicide. Prisoner advocates say all three participated in a statewide hunger strike this summer to protest, among other things, prison discipline policies intended to identify prison gang members which punish innocent, unaffiliated inmates with decades of confinement to segregated units.

7) US Deports 46,000 Parents, Kids Left Behind In Foster Care

Under the Obama administration, deportations of immigrants have skyrocketed, with a record 397,000 people removed in 2011 alone and families torn apart as a result. According to an investigation carried out by Colorlines, the United States deported over 46,000 parents whose children were U.S. citizens between January and June of this year. With their parents detained or deported, at least 5,100 children have been placed in foster care, and many may never see their parents again. Our draconian immigration system is creating orphans. Investigative reporter Seth Freed Wessler writes:

These children, many of whom should never have been separated from their parents in the first place, face often insurmountable obstacles to reunifying with their mothers and fathers. Though child welfare departments are required by federal law to reunify children with any parents who are able to provide for the basic safety of their children, detention makes this all but impossible. Then, once parents are deported, families are often separated for long periods. Ultimately, child welfare departments and juvenile courts too often move to terminate the parental rights of deportees and put children up for adoption, rather than attempt to unify the family as they would in other circumstances.

8) FBI Teaches Agents That Muslims Are Violent Radicals

In September, Spencer Ackerman reported some disturbing findings about the FBI’s counterterrorism training materials. He revealed, among other things, that the FBI’s Training Division depicts all Muslims as potential terrorists. Ackerman writes:

The FBI is teaching its counterterrorism agents that “mainstream” American Muslims are likely to be terrorist sympathizers; that the Prophet Mohammed was a “cult leader”; and that the Islamic practice of giving charity is no more than a ‘funding mechanism for combat.

At the Bureau’s training ground in Quantico, Virginia, agents are shown a chart contending that the more “devout” a Muslim, the more likely he is to be “violent.” Those destructive tendencies cannot be reversed, an FBI instructional presentation adds: “Any war against non-believers is justified” under Muslim law; a “moderating process cannot happen if the Koran continues to be regarded as the unalterable word of Allah.”

Ackerman also came upon an alarming description of Sunni Muslims, which is included in the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Forces mandatory online orientation material:

Sunni Muslims have been prolific in spawning numerous and varied fundamentalist extremist terrorist organizations. Sunni core doctrine and end state have remained the same and they continue to strive for Sunni Islamic domination of the world to prove a key Quranic assertion that no system of government or religion on earth can match the Quran’s purity and effectiveness for paving the road to God.

The FBI immediately apologized for the derogatory training materials, promising to comprehensively review all training materials. But it turns out that the FBI’s counterterrorism culture is soaked in Islamophobia, as demonstrated by the inclusion of books by Islamophobic authors Robert Spencer and Daniel Pipes in the FBI Quantico library.

This comes on top of a troubling pattern in counterterrorism law enforcement training — the use of Islamophobic ”terrorism consultants” to school agents on the Islamic faith. According to the Washington Monthly, this “growing profession” of consultants rakes in taxpayer cash to educate our cops about evils of Islam. One example is Walid Shoebat, who reportedly told an audience at a counterterrorism conference last year that the way to solve the threat of Islamic extremism is to “kill them…including the children.” Shoebat’s extreme denunciations of Islam helped fuel the paranoia of right-wing terrorist Anders Breivik, who massacred some 90 people in Norway earlier this year. According to the American Prospect, Shoebat is cited in Breivik’s manifesto 15 times.

 

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Big Pharma's Latest Insanity? A "PolyPill" Combining Five Different Drugs Into One Pill

7/18/2012 What do you get when you combine cholesterol medication, three different blood pressure drugs and aspirin into a single pharmaceutical pill? If you believe the drug company that funded its own study on this chemical cocktail, you get a wonder drug that has all the “benefits” of five different drugs with no more side effects than a single drug! That’s the story from Bangalore, India, anyway, where 2000 citizens of India were recruited into a clinical trial to test these drugs. The use of low-income citizens in developing nations as guinea pigs is now a common Big Pharma practice, by the way. It’s cheaper than using Americans as guinea pigs, and the risk of lawsuits from harm or death is much lower in such countries. According to the results of this study which was funded by the pharmaceutical company hoping to sell this drug, the study subjects taking the five medications in combination had no more side effects than those taking each medication individually. And thus, it was declared that the more pharmaceuticals you take, the safer they become! Is the MSM on drugs, too? The Associated Press gushed all over this news, saying the Polypill has been “a dream for a decade,” and that this company-funded clinical trial “proved the skeptics wrong.” The AP even quoted a doctor (Dr. Robert Harrington, spokesperson for the American College of Cardiology) as saying this Polypill should be part of President Obama’s health care reform plan. How do they know the Polypill actually improved health? They don’t, really: They only know that it changed some numbers on laboratory reports: Blood pressure numbers and cholesterol numbers, namely. But did people actually live longer? Did they suffer fewer heart attacks? Did they experience improved circulation or bloodflow? Of course not. Big Pharma almost never measures real-world effects in its studies — it only measures “biomarkers” that greatly oversimplify the true causes of disease. High blood pressure, for example, is not a disease all by itself; it’s merely a symptom of an imbalance that needs to be corrected on a fundamental level. Artificially lowering blood pressure does absolutely nothing to make a person healthier in the long run. In fact, it can cause greatly reduced circulation throughout the body. Want more health? Take more drugs That Big Pharma and the Mainstream Media (MSM) now think the answer to poor health is to combine multiple synthetic chemicals into one “medication cocktail” is a disturbing sign of the dangerous dissociation the industry has with the real world. And why stop at five drugs in combination? Why not combine twenty drugs? I can see the headlines now: “Twenty Drugs Proven as Safe as One Drug!” Of course, we all know it’s easy to prove anything — no matter how ludicrous — in the corrupt world of for-profit medicine. Yesterday, I wrote about how the Department of Health and Human Services approved a fictitious medical review panel led by a dead dog named “Truper Dawg.” (http://www.naturalnews.com/025955.html) If they can get a dead dog to head up a government-approved medical review board in the United States, I suppose it’s not so amazing that an industry-funded clinical trial operated out of Bangalore, India would declare five drugs to be no more dangerous than any one of them alone. It’s not really safe, it’s just no more dangerous than any other drug Seriously, I sometimes wonder if these researchers deserve some sort of award for being the Dumbest People In the World. As if single-drug pharmaceuticals weren’t killing enough people already, now they want to combine multiple drugs into one pill and claim it has the exact same safety as the very same drugs killing hundreds of thousands of people around the world each year! Is this really something to tout in your marketing materials? If herbs were as dangerous as pharmaceuticals, they’d be immediately banned by the FDA. If soft drinks were as dangerous as pharmaceuticals, they’d be pulled from the shelves. Peanuts aren’t even close to the danger levels of pharmaceuticals, and yet they were pulled from store shelves as if they carried the Bubonic Plague. But when it comes to drugs, no measure of safety is really required, and new drugs are labeled “safe” as long as they kill no more people than the old drugs that have already killed so many! But hey, why stop at five drugs in a single pill? Why not just add pharmaceuticals to food? Why not “fortify” salt with antidepressants? Or make loaves of bread with cholesterol drugs? Or drip fluoride into the water supply?…. Oops, they already do that, don’t they? You get my point. More chemicals are not the answer to our global health problems. And the only combination medicine you’ll ever see me swallowing is a large glass full of fresh juice made from living, organic garden vegetables and delicious fruits. That living beverage contains more than 10,000 medicinal compounds made by Mother Nature, not some spooky med lab in Bangalore playing “Pharmaceutical Frankenstein.” Source – http://www.naturalnews.com