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US report hints at Saudi involvement in 9/11 attacks

July 16, 2016 By administrator

The US government has released 28 pages of a congressional report on the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, which show the Saudi government may have had a hand in the attacks.

“While in the United States, some of the September 11 hijackers were in contact with, and received support or assistance from, individuals who may be connected to the Saudi Government,” reads part of the report released on Friday.

“There is information, primarily from FBI sources, that at least two of those individuals were alleged by some to be Saudi intelligence officers.”

The Joint Inquiry also hints at Saudi Arabia’s support for terrorist activities in the US and other countries, but fails to show its extent.

“In their testimony, neither CIA nor FBI witnesses were able to identify definitively the extent of Saudi support for terrorist activity globally or within the United.”

The report also shows information indicating that “Saudi Government officials in the United States may have other ties to al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups.”

Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia has welcomed the release of the pages, saying there is no proof of Saudi involvement in the attacks.

“Since 2002, the 9/11 Commission and several government agencies, including the CIA and the FBI, have investigated the contents of the ‘28 Pages’ and have confirmed that neither the Saudi government, nor senior Saudi officials, nor any person acting on behalf of the Saudi government provided any support or encouragement for these attacks,” the Saudi Embassy in Washington said in a statement.

President Barack Obama, under pressure from Congress and the public, announced in April that the secret pages, which have been kept secret since 2002, would be declassified soon.

Former President George W. Bush and his vice president, Dick Cheney, reportedly told the commission that they would not be formally interviewed in relation to the 9/11 attacks, which killed nearly 3,000 people and caused about $10 billion worth of property and infrastructure damage.

source: http://presstv.com/Detail/2016/07/15/475365/US-911-attack-Saudi-Arabia

Turkey returns EU progress report over Armenian Genocide reference

June 18, 2016 By administrator

turkey-genocide return Permanent Delegation of Turkey to the European Union returned Friday, June 17 the European Parliament’s (EP) 2015 Turkey progress report over the mention of theArmenian Genocide, Daily Sabah says.

Diplomatic sources said that the report, which the EP passed in April by 375 votes in favor and 133 against, was rejected without even being opened due its request to recognize 1915 mass killings of Armenians at the hands of the Ottoman Empire as genocide.

Turkey also returned a previous report in spring 2015 for the same reason.

“Turkey will reject the European Parliament Progress Report on Turkey if it includes any mention of an Armenian Genocide,” Turkey’s then-EU Minister Volkan Bozkir said.

Photo. The Independent

The Armenian Genocide

The Armenian Genocide (1915-23) was the deliberate and systematic destruction of the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire during and just after World War I. It was characterized by massacres, and deportations involving forced marches under conditions designed to lead to the death of the deportees, with the total number of deaths reaching 1.5 million.

The majority of Armenian Diaspora communities were formed by the Genocide survivors.

Present-day Turkey denies the fact of the Armenian Genocide, justifying the atrocities as “deportation to secure Armenians”. Only a few Turkish intellectuals, including Nobel Prize winner Orhan Pamuk and scholar Taner Akcam, speak openly about the necessity to recognize this crime against humanity.

The Armenian Genocide was recognized by Uruguay, Russia, France, Lithuania, the Italian Chamber of Deputies, majority of U.S. states, parliaments of Greece, Cyprus, Argentina, Belgium and Wales, National Council of Switzerland, Chamber of Commons of Canada, Polish Sejm, Vatican, European Parliament and the World Council of Churches.

Turkey ranks bottom on child inequality: UNICEF report

April 15, 2016 By administrator

AA photo

Turkey ranks bottom out of 41 countries for child inequality in health and life satisfaction, according to a recent study by the United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF) measuring disparities between middle and low-income children.

In its report titled “Fairness for Children: A league table of inequality in child well-being in rich countries,” UNICEF measured how far the gap has widened between the “average” children and those with lowest household income levels, rather than focusing on the gap between the richest and the poorest. For the report, data from 41 countries of the EU and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) were studied across four dimensions: Income, education, health and life satisfaction.

The most drastic negative results for Turkey were noted in health and life satisfaction, where in both cases the country was listed in the bottom two of all compared nations.

The largest relative health gaps, designated by comparing a child with frequent reporting of health symptoms and an “average” child at the median of the health scale, was found in Israel, with 38.9 percent, and Turkey, with 34.5 percent. However, Turkey performed worse than Israel in the frequency of health complaints from children at the bottom end, as some 53.3 percent of disadvantaged children reported one or more health symptoms a day. UNICEF also noted this pattern, remarking that “only Turkey shows both high bottom-end inequality and high frequency of reported health complaints.”

The country also ranked at the very bottom in terms of life satisfaction, where the relative gap between an average child and a disadvantaged child stood at 36 percent. Accordingly, the life satisfaction score of a child at the bottom is 36 percent lower than the average child.

Moreover, some 15.3 percent of Turkish children rate their life satisfaction below 4 on a scale of 0 (“worst possible life”) to 10 (“best possible life”). The figure is noteworthy as the second worst performer, Poland, only sees 10 percent of children report such high degree of dissatisfaction.

Income inequalities were also measured by comparing the household income of the median child and the household income of the child at the 10th percentile, who is poorer than 90 percent of children. The gap between the two was the indicator of income inequality between the average child and poorest children.
The data shows that 22.8 percent of Turkish children are members of households with incomes below 50 percent of the national median income, the highest ratio after Israel and Chile.

UNICEF noted that Turkey’s performance, along with that of Israel, was the worst among the 41 states studied.

“Israel and Turkey rank lowest in the overall league table. They have comparatively high bottom-end inequality in each of the four domains of child well-being for which they have valid data,” it said, arguing that social inequalities among children are unjustifiable as “merit cannot reasonably be advanced as justification for inequalities.”

April/15/2016

source: hurriyetdailynews

Newly-leaked report : Most smuggled ISIS oil goes to Turkey, sold at low prices – Norwegian report

December 20, 2015 By administrator

People talk as they stand next to oil barrels at a makeshift oil refinery site in al-Mansoura village in Raqqa’s countryside © Hamid Khatib / Reuters

A newly-leaked report on illegal oil sales by Islamic State (IS, previously ISIS/ISIL), which was ordered to be compiled by Norway, has revealed that most of the IS-smuggled oil has been destined for Turkey, where it is sold off at bargain low prices.

Norwegian daily Klassekampen leaked details of the report, which was put together by Rystad Energy, an independent oil and gas consulting firm, at the request of the Norwegian Foreign Ministry.

“Large amounts of oil have been smuggled across the border to Turkey from IS-controlled areas in Syria and Iraq,” Klassekampen cited the report as saying. “[The] oil is sent by tankers via smuggling routes across the border [and] is sold at greatly reduced prices, from $25 to $45 a barrel.”

The crude is reportedly sold on the black market at greatly reduced prices, while the Brent benchmark is currently trading at $35-$50 per barrel.

To compile the report, which is dated from July, Rystad Energy used its own database as well as sources in the region.

“Exports happen in a well-established black market via Turkey,” the report concluded. “Many of the smugglers and corrupt border guards, who helped Saddam Hussein avoid international sanctions, are now helping IS export oil and import cash.”

In the beginning of December, the Russian Defense Ministry released evidence which it said shows most of the illegal oil trade by IS going to Turkey.

Russia has earlier said it is aware of three main oil smuggling routes to Turkey, and Deputy Defense Minister Anatoly Antonov presented video evidence of operations, as well as detailed maps, at a briefing for journalists.“Today, we are presenting only some of the facts that confirm that a whole team of bandits and Turkish elites stealing oil from their neighbors is operating in the region,” Antonov said, adding that this oil “in large quantities” enters the territory of Turkey via “live oil pipelines,” consisting of thousands of oil trucks.

The data directly implicated Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the oil trade with IS. “According to our data, the top political leadership of the country – President Erdogan and his family – is involved in this criminal business.”

Ankara has denied the allegations. Erdogan said that nobody had a right to “slander” Turkey by accusing it of buying oil from Islamic State. Erdogan even claimed that he will resign if such accusations were proven to be true. Moreover, the US has defended Turkey, denying any ties between Ankara and IS.

Last October, US Under Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence David Cohen said IS was earning $1 million a day from oil sales. “According to our information, as of last month, ISIL was selling oil at substantially discounted prices to a variety of middlemen, including some from Turkey, who then transported the oil to be resold. It also appears that some of the oil emanating from territory where ISIL operates has been sold to Kurds in Iraq, and then resold into Turkey,” he said.

According to Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, the middlemen in Turkey are not only entrepreneurs, but also Ankara officials. Turkey is protecting IS because of “direct financial interest of some Turkish officials relating to the supply of oil products refined by plants controlled by ISIS.”

These revelations come as the UN Security Council has passed a resolution strengthening legal measures against those doing business with terrorist groups. It stems from a UNSC action taken in February against illegal trafficking of antiquities from Syria, which threatened sanctions on anyone buying oil from IS or the Al-Qaeda-linked Al-Nusra Front and urged that no ransoms be paid to terrorists.

Source: RT

European Parliament Report Calls on Turkey to Recognize Armenian Genocide

June 11, 2015 By administrator

European Parliament members vote

BRUSSELS—The Plenary session of the European Parliament in Strasbourg (France) adopted the 2014 Turkey progress report on Wednesday calling on Turkey to recognize the Armenian Genocide, reported the European Armenian Federation for Justice and Democracy.

The report in general records a negative review on Human Rights situation in Turkey, freedom of expression, decline in democracy, worries on minority rights, aggressive attitude against Greece, and refusal over the existence of the Republic of Cyprus.

The report greets the wide participation at the elections of 7 June 2015 in Turkey, and the presence of the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) in the newly formed parliament. Moreover, the report welcomes the sheltering of 1,600,000 Syrian refugees in Turkey.

The preamble of the report mentions: ‘having in regard the European Parliament resolution on the centenary of the Armenian Genocide’. After Turkey becoming a candidate country to the EU in 2005, the Armenian Genocide stopped being an issue in the reports. It should be noted, that in the above mentioned resolution there is the explicit call on Turkey to reconcile with its past and recognize the Armenian Genocide.

Article 49 repeats the call to Armenia and Turkey to establish diplomatic ties and open the border between the two countries without preconditions.

President of the European Armenian Federation for Justice and Democracy (EAFJD) Kaspar Karampetian welcomed the call to Turkey to recognize the Armenian Genocide, as well as to open the border without preconditions. Karampetian stressed the fact, that the European Parliament once again showed, that it doesn’t succumb to Turkish pressure, recalling, the threats by Volkan Bozkir, EU Minister and chief negotiator of Turkey, that Turkey will not accept the report, if there will be any reference to the Armenian Genocide. Rapporteur Kati Piri (Socialists and Democrats, the Netherlands) already reacted, saying that the European Parliament can’t deny documents which have already been adopted.

The report, leaves Turkey’s accession to the EU open; a political process that is getting harder and harder over the years.

“Reparations for the Armenian Genocide” final report issued

March 31, 2015 By administrator

The Armenian Genocide Reparations Study Group on Monday, March 30, issued its final report, entitled “Resolution with Justice—Reparations for the Armenian Genocide,” offering an unprecedented comprehensive analysis of the legal, historical, political, and ethical dimensions of the question of reparations for the Armenian Genocide.

The AGRSG was formed in 2007 by four experts in different areas of reparations theory and practice. The group’s mission was to produce the first systematic, comprehensive, in-depth analysis of the reparations issues raised by the Armenian Genocide. Funded initially by a grant from the Armenian Revolutionary Federation, the AGRSG members are Alfred de Zayas, Jermaine O. McCalpin, Ara Papian, and Henry C. Theriault (Chair). George Aghjayan has served as a special consultant.

The AGRSG prepared a preliminary report, which was released for limited distribution back in 2009. Completion of the draft was followed by three symposia. The first was a panel discussion featuring three of the report authors, held on May 15, 2010 at George Mason University in the United States, in conjunction with the university’s Institute for Conflict Analysis and Resolution. The second was a major day-long symposium featuring the four co-authors and a number of other experts on reparations for the Armenian Genocide, conducted at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) School of Law through its International Human Rights Law Association, on October 23, 2010. The third was a panel by two of the report authors held in Yerevan, Armenia, on December 11, 2010.

The AGRSG is now issuing for broad distribution its final report, an extensive revision and updating of the 2009 preliminary report.

The report examines the case for reparations from legal, historical, and ethical perspectives (Parts 4, 5, and 6, respectively), offers a plan for a productive reparative process drawing on transitional justice theory and practice (Part 7), and proposes a concrete reparations package (Parts 3 and 8). The report also includes background on the Armenian Genocide (Part 1) and the damages inflicted by it and their impacts today (Part 2). Through its broad dissemination, this report fills a crucial gap in the scholarly work and policy discourse on the Armenian Genocide. It will give Turkish and Armenian individuals as well as civil society and political institutions the information, analysis, and tools to engage the Armenian Genocide issue in a systematic manner that supports meaningful resolution.

With the Genocide Centennial fast approaching, heightened international political, academic, media, artistic, and public interest in the Genocide has already been witnessed in 2015.

In addition, in the past few years, reparations for the Genocide have gone from a marginal concern to a central focus in popular and academic circles. Much of that focus has been on piecemeal individual reparation legal cases. This report represents a decisive step toward a much broader and all-embracing process of repair that is adequate to resolve the extensive outstanding damages of the Genocide. Furthermore, genuine, non-denialist engagement with the legacy of the Genocide is growing in Turkey. Finally, in the past decade, there has emerged a global reparations movement involving numerous victim groups across an array of mass human rights violations. The Armenian case has a place within that movement.

Tert.am: Հրապարակվել է Հայոց ցեղասպանության փոխհատուցման վերաբերյալ համապարփակ զեկույցը

The Armenian Genocide

The majority of Armenian Diaspora communities were formed by the Genocide survivors.

CIA torture report: human rights groups call for prosecutions

December 10, 2014 By administrator

by Matthew Weaver theguardian
CIA torture report: the world reacts

The world reacted Wednesday morning to the startlingly detailed picture of CIA torture delivered by the Senate on Tuesday. Allies expressed support mixed with regret, while regimes that the United States has sought to isolate by detailing their human rights abuses took the opportunity to turn the criticism back on the US. We have gathered the reactions here.

The list includes United Nations, Britain, Iran, China, North Korea, Poland, Guantánamo, Yemen, Egypt, Malaysia, Russia, France and more. A Twitter account associated with Iran’s supreme leader called out the United States for hypocrisy on human rights and got in a lump about Ferguson, Missouri, for good measure:

The UN has led international condemnation of the CIA’s interrogation and detention programme laid bare by the Senate’s intelligence committee. Its special rapporteur on counter-terrorism and human rights has called for the criminal prosecution of Bush-era officials involved.

Ben Emmerson, UN special rapporteur on counter-terrorism and human rights

It is now time to take action. The individuals responsible for the criminal conspiracy revealed in today’s report must be brought to justice, and must face criminal penalties commensurate with the gravity of their crimes.

The fact that the policies revealed in this report were authorised at a high level within the US government provides no excuse whatsoever. Indeed, it reinforces the need for criminal accountability.

International law prohibits the granting of immunities to public officials who have engaged in acts of torture. This applies not only to the actual perpetrators but also to those senior officials within the US government who devised, planned and authorised these crimes.

As a matter of international law, the US is legally obliged to bring those responsible to justice. The UN convention against torture and the UN convention on enforced disappearances require states to prosecute acts of torture and enforced disappearance where there is sufficient evidence to provide a reasonable prospect of conviction. States are not free to maintain or permit impunity for these grave crimes.

The heaviest penalties should be reserved for those most seriously implicated in the planning and purported authorisation of these crimes. Former Bush Administration officials who have admitted their involvement in the programme should also face criminal prosecution for their acts.

President Obama made it clear more than five years ago that the US government recognises the use of waterboarding as torture. There is therefore no excuse for shielding the perpetrators from justice any longer. The US attorney general is under a legal duty to bring criminal charges against those responsible.

Torture is a crime of universal jurisdiction. The perpetrators may be prosecuted by any other country they may travel to. However, the primary responsibility for bringing them to justice rests with the US Department of Justice and the attorney general.