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Pakistan's former military ruler Musharraf sentenced to death for high treason


RFE/RL
Tue, 17 Dec 2019 08:24 UTC
Pervez Musharraf
Pervez Musharraf (file photo)
A Pakistani court has handed a death sentence to former military ruler General Pervez Musharraf on treason charges for suspending the country's constitution 12 years ago.

The 76-year-old ex-strongman is now living in exile in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates (U.A.E.).

The special court in Islamabad announced the verdict on December 17 with a 2-1 majority.

Musharraf, who ruled Pakistan between 1999 and 2008, is the first military ruler to stand trial in Pakistan for overruling the constitution.

In a video statement issued from his hospital bed earlier this month, Musharraf described the case against him as "baseless."

Comment: RT reports:
"The decision given by special court about General Pervez Musharraf, Retired, has been received with a lot of pain and anguish by [the] rank and file of Pakistan Armed Forces," it said.

The distinguished military man, "who has served the country for over 40 years, [who] fought wars for the defense of the country, can surely never be a traitor," the statement continued, adding that "[the] Armed Forces of Pakistan expect that justice will be dispensed in line with [the] Constitution of [the] Islamic Republic of Pakistan."


He is a divisive figure in Pakistani history. Critics call him a military dictator who may have facilitated the assassination in 2007 of his political opponent, Benazir Bhutto. Supporters see him as a venerable veteran who stood up to foreign and domestic threats and boosted Pakistan's international profile.
In Benazir Bhutto - A Warning To Us All Joe Quinn writes:
In 1998 Benazir went into self-imposed exile in Dubai where she remained until she returned to Pakistan on 18 October 2007 after reaching an understanding with CIA-asset President Musharraf, who took power in a military coup in 1999.

[...]

As the PPP party leader announced her death, the Pakistani people knew instantly where to look for the culprits as they erupted into shouts of "Musharraf is a dog". Let's not forget who his masters are.
Also check out SOTT radio's: NewsReal: What's The Problem With Nationalism?

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Bad Guys

Ukrainian oligarch paid $700,000 to husband of a house judiciary committee Democrat

Chrissy Clark
The Federalist
Mon, 16 Dec 2019 12:00 UTC
Mucarsel-Powell
Robert Powell, the husband of Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell, D-Fla., reportedly took $700,000 from a Ukrainian oligarch named Igor Kolomoisky. Mucarsel-Powell sits on the House Judiciary Committee, the committee that drafted two articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump for his alleged abuse of power with regards to Ukraine.

In 2018, the Daily Beast reported that a number of businesses linked to Kolomoisky hired Powell as an attorney. One of those firms paid Powell at least $700,000 over two years, according to public records.

The Miami Herald reported Powell was working for companies tied to Kolomoisky for 10 years. Powell made most of his money in the two years leading up to his wife's election in 2018.

Kolomoisky has been accused of contract killings and embezzlement in the past. Yet, in 2018 when Mucarsel-Powell was running for her seat, she did not see her husband's work as relevant to her campaign.

Comment: See also:

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Alarm Clock

4-month countdown to NATO's largest exercise in 25 years, Normandy Four meeting, and another false-flag in Syria?

Russell Bentley
russelltexasbentley.com
Sat, 14 Dec 2019 22:44 UTC
ukraine us nazi
U.S. AND UKROP FLAGS FLYING BELOW PRAVY SEKTOR NAZI FLAG IN UKRAINE 2019
It's all starting to make sense. All of a sudden, I get the picture. See right through the scam. Which ain't that hard to do, if you've been paying attention, which I have been. Paying attention is what you do when your life depends on it, as mine does, as those of my family and friends here do, and maybe, just maybe, as yours do too. So pay attention. These are dangerous times.

Let's connect the following dots - The punk Zelensky's smug, almost arrogant attitude at the recent Normandy Four meeting and his subsequent reneging on the agreement. Reliable info about another imminent false flag chemical attack by the White Helmets in Syria which may happen any day now. Again. Republican shit-hook Senator Cory Gardener's "SMART ACT" to designate Russia as a "State Sponsor of Terrorism", and "Russian-supported armed forces in the Donbas region of Ukraine as Foreign Terrorist Organizations" within the next three months. The largest NATO exercise in 25 years, "Defender Europe 20" with 60,000 soldiers (including 20,000 US soldiers to be shipped in) to begin in April 2020. Four months from now.

Comment: See also:

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Footprints

Former Belarusian police officer says he was involved in killing of President Lukashenko critics


RFE/RL
Tue, 17 Dec 2019 22:58 UTC
Viktar Hanchar Anatol Krasouski
For years, activists have highlighted the cases of opposition leader Viktar Hanchar (left) and businessman Anatol Krasouski, who both disappeared in 1999.
A former officer with a Belarusian police special unit said he participated in the murder of opposition activists and that he was now seeking political asylum in an unnamed European country.

The comments by Yury Harauski, made in an interview with Deutsche Welle published on December 16, added fuel to long-standing accusations that security forces overseen by President Alyaksandr Lukashenka were involved in the disappearance of opposition leader Viktar Hanchar, businessman Anatol Krasouski, and two other men in 1999 and 2000.

Harauski told the publication that in the late 1990s he served in a division of Belarus's Interior Ministry called the Special Rapid Response Unit (SOPR).
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Pirates

Last-ditch attempt to stop Nord Stream 2: US Senate passes $740 BILLION Pentagon budget that includes Russian pipeline sanctions


RT
Tue, 17 Dec 2019 17:40 UTC
nord stream
© Reuters / Anton Vaganov
The 2020 National Defense Authorization Act just approved by the US Senate includes a bill sanctioning companies involved in building the almost-finished Nord Stream 2 natural gas pipeline from Russia to Germany.

The "Protecting Europe's Energy Security Act of 2019" embedded in the 3,500 page NDAA was proposed by Senators Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Jeanne Shaheen (D-New Hampshire), who argued the pipeline would "vastly strengthen President Vladimir Putin at the expense of the rest of the free world."

Penalizing the companies involved in installing the pipeline will "have protected Europe's energy security and prevented Putin from leveraging billions of dollars that could be used to fuel Russian aggression," Cruz argued last week, when it was clear the bill would be included in the compromise version of the bill negotiated with the Democrat-controlled House of Representatives.

Comment: See also:

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Airplane

US defense chief fine with Afghan troop reduction 'with or without' peace deal


RFE/RL
Tue, 17 Dec 2019 22:00 UTC
esper
© REUTERS / Erin Scott
U.S. Defense Secretary Mark Esper on December 15 said he wants a drawdown of soldiers in Afghanistan "with or without" a peace deal, while voicing confidence that the head of the NATO mission in the country could carry out current tasks with fewer numbers.

The administration of President Donald Trump may announce a troop reduction of around 4,000 soldiers before the end of the year, according to U.S. media.

There are an estimated 12,000 to 13,000 U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan at any given time, depending on troop rotations.

Esper told reporters that Austin Miller, the commander of NATO's Resolute Support Mission and U.S. forces, "is confident that he can go down to a lower number" of soldiers, according to AFP.

Miller "believes he can conduct all the important counterterrorism missions and train, advise, and assist" the Afghan Army, Esper said.

The defense secretary added that he would like to see a political agreement sealed between the Afghan government and the Taliban to end the 18-year war.


Comment: It's 18 years too late, but at least it would be one step towards finally just getting out of Afghanistan completely. Give whatever propaganda you like in order to justify leaving - just leave. That's the only sane option, but you can be sure the people actually responsible for making the decisions will hold out as long as possible. They would be fine with another 18 years, and another, to be renewed with each new generation of Americans. Given the total lack of progress in the war, and the total lack of will to just leave, can anyone really argue otherwise?

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Whistle

SOTT Focus: MSM Journalist on Lies, Newsweek And Control of The Media Narrative: 'Freedom of The Press is Dead'

Tareq Haddad
tareqhaddad.com
Sat, 14 Dec 2019 21:43 UTC

Comment: The following first-hand account was first published on journalist Tareq Haddad's website. It details the corrupt inner workings of what passes for 'journalism' today...


A mafia runs editors. Freedom of the press is dead. Journalists and ordinary people must stand up.
newsweek opcw
© Caitlin Johnstone/Consortium News
Introduction

Until several days ago, I was a journalist at Newsweek. I decided to hand my resignation in because, in essence, I was given a simple choice. On the one hand, I could continue to be employed by the company, stay in their chic London offices and earn a steady salary — only if I adhered to what could or could not be reported and suppressed vital facts. Alternatively, I could leave the company and tell the truth.

In the end, that decision was rather simple, albeit I understand the cost to me will be undesirable. I will be unemployed, struggle to finance myself and will likely not find another position in the industry I care about so passionately. If I am a little lucky, I will be smeared as a conspiracy theorist, maybe an Assad apologist or even a Russian asset — the latest farcical slur of the day.

Although I am a British citizen, the irony is that I'm half Arabic and half Russian. (Bellingcat: I'm happy to answer any requests.)

It is a terribly sad state of affairs when perfectly loyal people who want nothing but the best for their countries are labelled with such preposterous accusations. Take Iraq war veteran and Hawaii congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard for example, who was the target of such mud slinging for opposing U.S. involvement in Syria and for simply standing up to the Democratic Party's most corrupt politician, Hillary Clinton. These smears are immature for a democracy — but I, in fact, welcome such attacks.
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2 + 2 = 4

SOTT Focus: Surprise! Greta Thunberg BIOPIC Reveals Cameras Were Rolling From Day One of her 'Viral' Rise

Helen Buyniski
RT
Tue, 17 Dec 2019 20:55 UTC
Greta
Teenage environmental activist Greta Thunberg is the subject of a forthcoming documentary film - made by a crew that has followed her since the early days of her school strike. Still believe her rise to fame was an accident?

Thunberg, recently crowned Time magazine's Person of the Year, can add documentary film subject to her burgeoning resumé. The film, tentatively titled 'Greta,' was announced by Deadline on Monday for a 2020 Hulu premiere. Director Nathan Grossman has followed the young climate prodigy to the ends of the Earth, from her school-striking on the sidewalk in front of the Swedish Parliament, to the high seas aboard the $4mn racing yacht Malizia II. Grossman's only other IMDB credit to date is a Swedish film titled "Köttets lustar" (or "Lusts of the Meat"), which, while it sounds pornographic, purports to be the story of one man "looking over his life as a carnivore."
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Star of David

Jewish National Fund UK: How Britain dresses up crimes in Israel as 'charitable acts'

Jonathan Cook
Middle East Eye
Mon, 16 Dec 2019 15:11 UTC
JNFcertificate
© JNFBritish JNF Tree Fund Certificate
When is a war crime not a war crime? When, according to British officials, that war crime has been given a makeover as a "charitable act".

The British state is being asked to account for its financial and moral support for a UK organisation accused of complicity in the ethnic cleansing of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their homeland. So far, it appears determined to evade answering those questions.

The target of the campaign is the Jewish National Fund UK (JNF UK), which describes itself as "Britain's oldest Israel charity". Noting its role in "building Israel for over a century", the organisation boasts: "Every penny raised by JNF UK is sent to a project in Israel."

In fact, donations to JNF UK were used to buy some of the 250 million trees planted across Israel since 1948, the year when 750,000 Palestinians were forced out at gunpoint from their homes by the new Israeli army. Those expulsions were an event Palestinians call their Nakba, or "catastrophe".

Afterwards, the Israeli army laid waste to many hundreds of Palestinian villages, turning them into rubble. Forests planted over the villages were then promoted as efforts to "make the desert bloom."

Comment: Just about everything underlying, or attached to, or coming out of Israel is, in one form or another, a deception. Our countries would rather believe the lie than challenge it. Instead we give it power.

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Jet3

With US-Turkey relations souring, what's behind Erdogan's threat to shutter Incirlik Air Base?


RT
Mon, 16 Dec 2019 18:15 UTC
Incirlik
© incirlik.af.milIncirlik Air Base, Turkey
When Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan threatened to close a vital airbase used by American forces, he wasn't bluffing, and Washington should take his threats at face value, or risk losing a NATO ally, analysts say.

The Turkish leader announced on Sunday that Incirlik Air Base - a vital hub for US and NATO forces stationed in the Middle East - could close its doors if US lawmakers press ahead with sanctioning Turkey for its acquisition of the Russian-made S-400 air defense system.

Incirlik is not a backwater airstrip, the kind the United States utilizes for its drone missions in Africa, for example. Instead it's a massive base in Adana, a city of 1.7 million people. Here, just 250km from the Syrian border, nearly 5,000 US airmen are stationed, as well as several hundred Turkish airmen. More than 50 hardened aircraft shelters hide American jets, while the base also hosts an estimated 50 American nukes.

Erdogan has also threatened to close the Kurecik Radar Station, an isolated facility on a scorched hill in southeastern Turkey that performs a vital function as an early warning against ballistic missile attacks.

Comment: Turkey has long ridden the fence between the NATO crowd and its regional pals. Erdogan is more willing than adept to play both sides against the middle. So far, he has managed to further Turkey's goals and interests by offering each side selective usefulness with 'location' as the ace in his pocket. Can he continue this acrobatic diplomacy, or will it come down to choosing a permanent side?

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