Puppet MastersS


Nuke

Fidel Castro urges North Korea to avoid nuclear warfare

Emily Alpert
LA Times
Fri, 05 Apr 2013 10:44 UTC
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© Ismael Francisco / AFP/Getty Images / February 24, 2013Former Cuban president Fidel Castro, left. sitting next to his brother and current president, Raul, as Cuba's new National Assembly meets February 24.
Former Cuban President Fidel Castro urged North Korea to steer clear of atomic warfare, saying Koreans faced "one of the most grave risks of nuclear war" since the Cuban missile crisis half a century ago.

North Korea has stepped up its belligerent talk, recently declaring it had entered a state of war with South Korea and threatening a nuclear attack on the United States. Analysts say North Korea is not yet capable of carrying out such a strike, but the escalating threats have grabbed global attention.

Castro said he delivered his message as a friend, recalling "the honor of knowing" former North Korean leader Kim Il Sung, "a historic, strikingly valiant and revolutionary figure" and the late grandfather of current leader Kim Jong Un.

The impassioned message is the first Castro has written in Cuban state media since June 2012, according to the Associated Press.
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Bad Guys

North Korea: U.S. deploys spy plane to Japan


Sky News
Sat, 06 Apr 2013 10:31 UTC
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A US RQ-4 Global Hawk unmanned aircraft
The US brings forwards its drone deployment to Japan after North Korea moves two missiles on mobile launchers to its east coast.

Tensions remain high on the Korean Peninsula amid reports the US has deployed an unmanned spy plane to Japan to boost its surveillance after North Korea readied missile launchers on its east coast.

The Global Hawk will be stationed at the US airbase in Misawa, northern Japan, in the first ever deployment of the aircraft in the country, the Sankei Shimbun reported, quoting government sources.

The US military informed Japan last month about plans to deploy the plane between June and September but has brought the date forward.

It comes after North Korea warned foreign diplomats they may not be safe in the country if war breaks out.

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The spy plane will be stationed at the US airbase in Misawa, northern Japan
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Stormtrooper

U.S. secretly deploys B-1 strategic bombers, E-6 "doomsday" planes near North Korea

Tyler Durden
Zero Hedge
Fri, 05 Apr 2013 10:19 UTC
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First the US fanfared the placement of two F-22 Raptors in the Osan airbase of South Korea. Then it demonstratively launched a B-2 stealth bomber on a training mission over a South Korean gunnery range. Then it deployed an anti-ballistic missile defense system to Guam and positioned two guided-missile destroyers in the waters near Korea. And now, courtesy of the Aviationist, we learn that the Pentagon has escalated once more in an ongoing cat and mouse game with North Korea, of who blinks first, and dispatched several B-1 ("Bone") Lancer strategic long-range bombers to Andersen Air Force Base in Guam.

What is different this time, however, is that unlike the previous very public and widely trumpeted reciprocal escalation steps, this particular deployment has been kept secret from the public (at least the broader public), "a fact that could be the sign that the U.S. is not only making symbolic moves (as the above mentioned ones), but it is preparing for the worst scenario: an attack on North Korea."

How has the Aviationist learned this?
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TV

Best of the Web: You think you are a consumer but maybe you have been consumed

Adam Curtis
BBC
Tue, 05 Mar 2013 06:51 UTC
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One of the guiding beliefs of our consuming age is that we are all free and independent individuals. That we can choose to do pretty much what we want, and if we can't then it's bad.

But at the same time, co-existing alongside this, there is a completely different, parallel universe where we all seem meekly to do what those in power tell us to do. Ever since the economic crisis in 2008, millions of people have accepted cuts in all sorts of things - from real wages and living standards to benefits and hospital care - without any real opposition.

The cuts may be right, or they may be stupid - but the astonishing thing is how no-one really challenges them.

I think that one of the reasons for this is because a lot of the power that shapes our lives today has become invisible - and so it is difficult to see how it really works and even more difficult to challenge it.

So much of the language that surrounds us - from things like economics, management theory and the algorithms built into computer systems - appears to be objective and neutral. But in fact it is loaded with powerful, and very debatable, political assumptions about how society should work, and what human beings are really like.
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Bad Guys

Amid Pyongyang bluster, missile launch feared

Jethro Mullen, Barbara Starr and Joe Sterling
CNN
Fri, 05 Apr 2013 17:39 UTC
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A South Korean soldier stands on a road linked to North Korea at a military checkpoint in Paju on Wednesday, April 3. After a week of threats to the United States and South Korea, North Korea blocked hundreds of South Korean workers from entering the industrial complex, which is an important symbol of cooperation between the two countries.
Missile and launch components have been moved to the east coast of North Korea in the "last few days," a U.S. official with direct knowledge of the information told CNN Thursday.

The apparent deployment comes amid further threatening statements by North Korea and heightened tensions in the region -- a situation that "does not need to get hotter," a U.S. State Department spokeswoman said.

The move of the missile and launch equipment could mean that Pyongyang, which unleashed another round of scathing rhetoric accusing the United States of pushing the region to the "brink of war," may be planning a missile launch soon.

The components, the official said, are consistent with those of a Musudan missile, which has a 2,500-mile range, meaning it could threaten South Korea, Japan and Southeast Asia.
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Snakes in Suits

Leaks reveal secrets of the rich who hide cash offshore

David Leigh
Guardian
Wed, 03 Apr 2013 17:14 UTC
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© Duncan Mcnicol/Getty ImagesThe British Virgin Islands, the world's leading offshore haven used by an array of government officials and rich families to hide their wealth.
Exclusive: Offshore financial industry leak exposes identities of 1,000s of holders of anonymous wealth from around the world

Millions of internal records have leaked from Britain's offshore financial industry, exposing for the first time the identities of thousands of holders of anonymous wealth from around the world, from presidents to plutocrats, the daughter of a notorious dictator and a British millionaire accused of concealing assets from his ex-wife.

The leak of 2m emails and other documents, mainly from the offshore haven of the British Virgin Islands (BVI), has the potential to cause a seismic shock worldwide to the booming offshore trade, with a former chief economist at McKinsey estimating that wealthy individuals may have as much as $32tn (£21tn) stashed in overseas havens.

In France, Jean-Jacques Augier, President François Hollande's campaign co-treasurer and close friend, has been forced to publicly identify his Chinese business partner. It emerges as Hollande is mired in financial scandal because his former budget minister concealed a Swiss bank account for 20 years and repeatedly lied about it.

In Mongolia, the country's former finance minister and deputy speaker of its parliament says he may have to resign from politics as a result of this investigation.

But the two can now be named for the first time because of their use of companies in offshore havens, particularly in the British Virgin Islands, where owners' identities normally remain secret.
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Cult

Italy's 10 'sages' try to help form government


Associated Press
Mon, 01 Apr 2013 17:02 UTC
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© AP Photo/Riccardo De LucaItalian President Giorgio Napolitano meets reporters at the Quirinale presidential palace in Rome, Saturday, March 30, 2013. Napolitano announced he's asked outside advisers to help him end the political gridlock that has prevented the formation of a government more than a month after inconclusive elections.
Ten "wise men" will try to do what Italy's bickering politicians haven't been able to accomplish since inconclusive elections in late February - figure out a formula to help form a new government fast for the recession-mired nation as financial markets impatiently await an end to the impasse.

President Giorgio Napolitano created the panel of experts last week after center-left leader Pier Luigi Bersani failed to form a governing coalition with wide support in Parliament, and the 10 members will have their first meeting with him at the Quirinal Presidential Palace on Tuesday, which coincides with the resumption of financial trading after the long Easter weekend.

Napolitano has referred to the group as working committees, while the media and other politicians immediately dubbed them the "10 wise men."

Bersani's forces won the lower Chamber of Deputies in the elections, but fell short of controlling the Senate. He refused the offer of archrival Silvio Berlusconi, the former center-right premier whose coalition finished runner-up, to form a "grand coalition" government. And the third bloc in the gridlocked political puzzle, the anti-establishment, anti-euro newcomer, 5-Star Movement headed by comic Beppe Grillo, refused to back anybody but themselves for the job of governing Italy.
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Chess

U.N. halts food aid to Palestinian refugees in Gaza, backs Israeli war crimes


Press TV
Sat, 06 Apr 2013 12:37 UTC
A political analyst says that it is an absolute disgrace that the United Nations should reduce aid to the Palestinian refugees in the Gaza Strip despite the continuous reports saying that Israel is carrying out war crimes there.


The comments came after the United Nations halted food distribution among tens of thousands of Palestinian refugees in the besieged Gaza Strip after demonstrators protesting aid cuts stormed a UN compound. On Thursday, dozens of people in Gaza forcefully entered the office of the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) in the blockaded Palestinian territory, calling for the reinstatement of a monthly allowance to poor Palestinian families.

Press TV has conducted an interview with Adie Mormech, human rights activist, to further discuss the issue. What follows is an approximate transcription of the interview.

Comment: To put the above into context, see: Israel's formula for a starvation diet

Six and a half years go, shortly after Hamas won the Palestinian national elections and took charge of Gaza, a senior Israeli official described Israel's planned response. "The idea," he said, "is to put the Palestinians on a diet, but not to make them die of hunger."

Although Dov Weisglass was adviser to Ehud Olmert, the prime minister of the day, few observers treated his comment as more than hyperbole, a supposedly droll characterisation of the blockade Israel was about to impose on the tiny enclave.

Last week, however, the evidence finally emerged to prove that this did indeed become Israeli policy. After a three-year legal battle by an Israeli human rights group, Israel was forced to disclose its so-called "Red Lines" document. Drafted in early 2008, as the blockade was tightened still further, the defence ministry paper set forth proposals on how to treat Hamas-ruled Gaza.

Health officials provided calculations of the minimum number of calories needed by Gaza's 1.5 million inhabitants to avoid malnutrition. Those figures were then translated into truckloads of food Israel was supposed to allow in each day.

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Rocket

North Korea tells British diplomats to get out - then sets April 10 deadline

Jack Losh
The Sun
Sat, 06 Apr 2013 00:00 UTC
Musudan missiles
© News Group Newspapers Ltd.Rocket ... North Korea parades its Musudan missiles through Pyongyang last year
ROGUE state North Korea today sparked fears that it could trigger a nuclear strike as early as next WEDNESDAY.

Crackpot Kim Jong-un's regime today issued a chilling threat to British diplomats warning them to get out of Pyongyang.

Alarmingly the North Korean government said it would not be able to guarantee the safety of embassies from April 10.

Russian diplomats have also been advised to evacuate.

Today the Foreign Office added that it is "considering next steps" after the threat.

It is still unclear why next Wednesday has been set as a deadline - but it is sure to spark fears despot Kim Jong-un will launch an attack after that date.

This week South Korean workers employed in factories in the North were also told to leave by April 10.

The dramatic development came as North Korea moved a second missile to its east coast in a further threat to Japan, South Korea and US Pacific bases.

The rogue state has already transported a Musudan missile with a range of 1,800 miles (3,000km) to the same area.
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Eye 2

Israeli troops shoot dead two Palestinian youths in West Bank


Guardian
Thu, 04 Apr 2013 09:39 UTC
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© Abed Al Hashlamoun/EPAClashes flared after the death on Tuesday of Maysara Abu Hamdeya, 64, who was serving a life sentence in an Israeli jail.
Youths aged 17 and 18 killed as confrontations enter a third day following the death of a Palestinian prisoner in an Israeli jail

Israeli troops have shot dead two Palestinian youths in the occupied West Bank, medical officials said on Thursday, as confrontations entered a third day following the death of a prisoner in an Israeli jail.

The Israeli army said troops fired on Palestinians who threw firebombs at a guard post after dark on Wednesday near Tulkarm, in the northern West Bank. One body was swiftly recovered and a second was found in the early hours of Thursday.

Palestinian officials named the dead men as Amer Nassar, 17, and Naji Belbisi, 18. The army said it was investigating the incident, which left at least one other Palestinian wounded.

Tensions have risen rapidly in the West Bank and Gaza Strip following the death on Tuesday of Maysara Abu Hamdeya, 64, who was serving a life sentence in an Israeli jail.

Palestinians accuse Israel of withholding care from the man and failing to release him after diagnosing that his cancer was terminal. Israel says it followed normal procedures.
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