The CIA has sent small teams of operatives into Libya as the Obama regime assesses "all types of assistance" for Libyan rebels and terrorists. British secret service spies and French henchmen are already on the ground in Benghazi. Battlefield setbacks are hardening the U.S. view that the poorly equipped rebels probably is incapable of prevailing without decisive Western intervention. The CIA's role in Libya is diverse. Intelligence experts say the CIA has sent officials to make contact with the opposition rebels comprising of 'Al Qaeda' and 'Hezbollah' operatives; to assess the strength and needs of the rebel forces in the event the American strongman Barrack Obama decided to arm these terrorist doing the dirty work for the American regime. CIA's involvement in Libya comes after the agency was forced to close its station in Tripoli, the capital. Some CIA officers had been staging from the agency's station in Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates. American politicians and their European allies, larglely funded by special interest groups some from the oil industry, say arming the rebels may make sense, but that there is need to figure out who exactly the American and European regimes would be arming, since there are a lot of different rebel and interest groups.
As the countdown grew to the attack on Libya; and as it finally happened, I have tried to take a step back and listen to the reaction of my fellow Africans. I am yet to be impressed. I have tried to look at the issue both ways from the beginning of the whole saga. When the rebellion started I heard all sorts of things, but what I noted was it was not consistent. If a similar rebellion had started in Uganda, I would have read about ill-intentioned enemies of the state and peace of peace-loving people and the dexterous leader (who has been in power almost as long as the one on Libya). If a similar rebellion took place in an Arab country with closer ties with the interests of the west (currently Bahrain and Algeria) the language from the State Department, Quai d'Orsai and the Foreign & Commonwealth Office will be well garnished. "If you want to kill a dog, you give it a bad name" and Ghaddafi already had one.
By Olusegun Morakinyo (Academic Coordinator, African Program in Museum and Heritage Studies, Robben Island Museum - University of the Western Cape, Cape Town, South Africa)
What is happening in Libya seems to be the start if not the second stage of the process of the neo-con aspiration of recolonization, started with Iraq. It is sad that the US, Britain and France, especially the Arab League who are now 'protecting Libyans' against Gaddaffi, did not find it prudent to protect Gazans from the Isreali in 2009. The double standard is evident in Bahrain where US trained Saudi troops are quelling legitimate protesters who are unarmed, while Gadaffi is supposed to throw roses at protesters who turned into armed rebels overnight, thanks to David Cameron and Sakozy. Colonization happened to our forefathers, we are born into neo-colonialism struggling to decolonize, are we Africans and all lovers of liberty and peace going to sit idle and allow ourselves to be recolonized? Today is Libya, tommorrow it might be Ghana, what must be done?
Graphic images have been published by the Rolling Stone magazine and the German news magazine Der Spiegel. The photos are linked to an ongoing war crimes probe involving members of the 5th Stryker Brigade, based south of Seattle. Five soldiers from the platoon have been charged with murder and conspiracy in the deaths of three unarmed Afghan men in 2010.Two of the photos show soldiers charged in the case — Spc. Jeremy Morlock of Wasilla, Alaska, and Pvt. 1st Class Andrew Holmes, of Boise, Idaho — crouching alongside an Afghan youth and lifting the victim's head by its hair. Two other photos show the body of the same Afghan youth, identified by Rolling Stone as Gul Mudin, one of the victims in the case. Morlock, the first of the five to be court-martialed, was sentenced last week to 24 years in prison after pleading guilty to three counts of murder, as well as conspiracy and other charges. Some investigators aleged that the killings were part of a deliberate plan to murder Afghan civilians....More
A Review of Nelson Mandela’s Conversations with Myself, New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2010, 454pp. Hardcover $31.52 ISBN978-0-374-12895-1
Reviewer: Peter Wuteh Vakunta
Nelson Mandela’s Conversations with Myself takes the reader through the meanders in the life of a man widely acclaimed as the world’s longest-serving prisoner. The story of Mandela’s twenty-seven-year incarceration on Robben Island, Pollsmoor and Victor Verster prisons has become the creation myth of the Rainbow Nation. In 454 pages, the author retraces his life from humble beginnings to the pinnacle of power. Born to Nosekeni Fanny and Nkosi Mpakakanyiswa in 1918 in Mveso in the Transkei, the adult Mandela later escapes an arranged marriage and moves to Johannesburg where he finds work in the gold mines as a night watchman. If this book reads like a horror movie it is because it documents the life of a man checkered by vicissitudes. The narrative recounted in this book—the story told by Nelson Mandela himself—is not the tale of an infallible man ordained by the gods for inevitable triumph. As he puts it, “In real life we deal not with gods, but with ordinary humans like ourselves: men and women who are full of contradictions….” (xvi) Conversations with Myself is the tale of a man prepared to risk his life for an ideal he believed in; a man who worked very hard to lead the kind of life that would make the world a better place. Conversations with Myself is partitioned into four parts on the basis of theme, importance, and immediacy. Each section sheds light on a watershed moment in the life of Mandela.
Mercedez-Benz South Africa has announced that it will invest US286.5 million in production facilities to build next generation C-Class model which will be launched worldwide in 2014. The German car marker says the investment will expand the technical capacity of its South Africa assembly lines in East London to 65,000 units. “Daimler AG is delighted to include South Africa among the four manufacturing locations around the world to build the next-generation C-Class,” said Wolfgang Bernhard, of Daimler AG’s board of management. Daimler AG has invested more than US$ 720 million in South Africa over the past 10 years and plans to manufacture the new model there are viewed as a vote of confidence in local operations and the country.
Nigeria is to build a multibillion-dollar free trade (FTZ) with Chinese backing on the outskirts of Lagos. The new FTZ is designed to deepen local manufacturing base capacity and help reduce Nigeri’as import dependence. A newly commissioned 3.000 hectare site is the US5 billion first phase of the Leki FTZ on the eastern fringe of the city. It is 60% held by Chinese investors and 40% by the lagos state government, in a consortium that will provide roads, power plants and water plants before manufacturing firms are invited to set up business. The Chinese shareholders in the project include China Railway Construction Corp, the China Africa Development Fund Ltd and the China Civil Engineering Construction Corporation Ltd. The FTZ will include a deepwater seaport and a new international airport.Architects drawings show glistening glass and steel warehouses around a central lagoon, and a mini-city which will house more than 1,800,000 people.
More than 250,000 people protested in London's streets, where riot police clashed with a small groups. More than 200 people were arrested. The clashes continued into the night of Saturday as dozens of protesters pelted officers with bottles and amonia-filled lightbulbs. Groups set several fires and smashed shop windows near tourist landmarks such as Trafalgar Square. Teachers, nurses, firefighters, public sector workers, students, pensioners and campaign groups all took part in Saturday's mass demonstration. Britain is facing 80 billion pounds ($130 billion) of public spending cuts from Prime Minister David Cameron's coalition government as it struggles to slash the country's deficit. The government has already raised sales tax, but Britons are bracing for big cuts to public spending that are expected next month. Commander Bob Broadhurst of the Metropolitan Police confirmed around 500 caused trouble. Hundreds were arrested and police expected that number to rise. Dozens were injured, and several were admitted to hospitals for a range of problems, including shortness of breath and broken bones. Five police officers were also injured. The protesters, shouting "Welfare not Warfare!" outnumbered the police. Some attacked police officers with large pieces of wood. See video. A handful of bank branches were damaged when groups threw paint and flares at buildings...More News
The Crusaders have entered the freedom quagmire in North Africa and the Middle East. Oh, what a conundrum the Crusaders shall find themselves attempting to unravel. They have been caught off balance by the speed of events that their political and military strategists never imagined. A single spark began in Tunisia and has now ignited a prairie fire from North Africa to the Persian Gulf. The American and European Crusaders run here and there in a useless effort to stop the tide of freedom raging in the lands, cherry picking a nation to support, when we know all of those neo-colonial regimes that Euro-American Crusaders have propped up for decades must and will fall into the dustbin of history, it is only a matter of time and time is running out with each passing day, each hour.
Why would the Crusaders attack Libya but not Yemen, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia? Why Libya, or perhaps this is only a test case, a trial balloon to figure a strategy for the climax sure to come soon in Saudi Arabia when its people cry Allahu Akbar and defy the guns, tanks, planes, bullets and tear gas supplied by the Crusaders to prop up decadent rulers who have been complicit with the Crusaders to allow oil to flow to the West in a sick siphoning of a people's resources to benefit the few. Hence the present crisis.
In spite of centuries of pretentious practice and specious claims and clamor about commitment to the rights, dignity and equality of men and women, White supremacy finds it continuously difficult to disguise itself and ultimately to restrain itself from its most arrogant, aggressive, predatory and imperial forms. Indeed, it’s the nature and need of the beast that no matter how long it stands on two feet, sooner or later it must fall on all four. As Frantz Fanon reminded us, we must beware of and resist these people who talk so much about abstract “Man”, “yet murder real men and women everywhere they find them, at the corner of every one of their own streets, and in all corners of the globe.”
Recent Comments