Dear Friend,
Police brutally beat up Jamia Millia Islamia students today. The police resorted to a lathi-charge on the protesters near Holy Family hospital which is within walking distance of Jamia Millia Islamia university. The students were holding an anti-CAA march from Jamia Millia Islamia to Parliament. The police had earlier denied permission to the protesters for the march.
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Police Brutally Beat Up Jamia Millia Islamia Students Again
by Countercurrents Collective
Police brutally beat up Jamia Millia Islamia students today. The police resorted to a lathi-charge on the protesters near Holy Family hospital which is within walking distance of Jamia Millia Islamia university. The students were holding an anti-CAA march from Jamia Millia Islamia to Parliament. The police had earlier denied permission to the protesters for the march.
Why Pakistan’s Islamists Don’t Want India’s CAA Repealed
by Subhash Gatade
There are umpteen reasons to oppose the CAA, NPR and NRC, but none as critical as the Islamists across the border feeling cheered and enthused. It is time Indians woke up to this truth.
Beyond Federalism: the protests against CAA-NRC should be broadened
by Badre Alam Khan
Contrary to the RSS-BJP combined, the ongoing protests mainly at Jamia and Shaheen Bagh are secular and democratic in nature and mode of protests are deeply attached with the Gandhian values like moral force, satyagraha, and non-violence as stated above. For me, it is too early to predict which direction protest will move, however, protests at various sites are every day educating, energizing the students and engaging with the masses as Chatterjee has also pointed out in his article.
Which State do Indians Want?
by Romi Mahajan
Indians have to make a call- and make it soon- on what nation they want to live in and what nation they want to bequeath to their children. This decision is incredibly important and is not an easy one. Both the negative propaganda and the blandishments of those in power obscure the
picture that should, after so much damage has been done, be clear.
Kicking The Habit
by John Scales Avery
The Industrial Revolution marked the start of a massive human use of fossil fuels. The stored energy from several hundred million years of plant growth began to be used at roughly a million times the rate at which it had been formed. The effect on human society was like that of a narcotic. There was a euphotic (and totally unsustainable) surge of growth of both population and industrial production. Meanwhile, the carbon released by the burning of fossil fuels began to duplicate the conditions that lead to the 5 geologically-observed mass extinction events during each of which more than half of all living species disappeared forever.
Our addiction to fossil fuels can kill us
The Industrial Revolution marked the start of a massive human use of fossil fuels. The stored energy from several hundred million years of plant growth began to be used at roughly a million times the rate at which it had been formed. The effect on human society was like that of a narcotic. There was a euphotic (and totally unsustainable) surge of growth of both population and industrial production. Meanwhile, the carbon released by the burning of fossil fuels began to duplicate the conditions that lead to the 5 geologically-observed mass extinction events during each of which more than half of all living species disappeared forever.
We all know that drug addicts can die from their addiction. The world’s scientists are unanimous in telling us that unless we take immediate action to kick the habit, our addiction to fossil fuels will kill human society and much of the biosphere.
Immediate action is needed to save the future
The central problem which the world faces in its attempts to avoid catastrophic climate change is a contrast of time scales. In order to save human civilization and the biosphere from the most disastrous effects of climate change, we need to act immediately. But it is difficult to mobilize public opinion behind urgently needed action because the most severe effects of global warming belong to the long-term future. Immediate action is needed because without it, feedback loops, such as the albedo effect and yjr drying out and burning of tropical rain-forests, will take over, making human efforts futile.
Greta Thunberg told to “study economics”
At the 2020 Davos Forum, teenage Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg urged business leaders to divest from the catastrophic activities of the fossil fuel industries. She was rebuked by the US Secretary of the Treasury, Steven Mnuchen, who said, “After she goes and studies economics in college, she can come back and explain that to us”. Thunberg’s response to tweet a UN graph showing that the world’s remaining carbon budget will be used up by 2027 unless emissions are curbed. “You don’t need a college education to understand the graph”, she said.
The exchange is interesting because it shows the stark contrast between the demands of our current economic system, and what has to be done to save human civilization. Economics has been called “the science of growth”, but growth is killing us. The size of the human footprint has become too large for our environment to support.
Our entire economic system is currently based on the use of fossil fuels, but our addiction to coal, oil and gas will surely kill us unless we can kick the habit in time. Mnuchen is saying, “You will damage the economy”. Thunberg is saying, “Perhaps so, but we have to stop emissions immediately to save the long-term future of human society and the biosphere”. We can gain hope from the fact that, if massive government subsidies to fossil fuels were removed, renewables would already be cheaper than fossil fuels, and the urgently-needed transition to renewables would be driven by economic forces alone.
Trump was tried for the wrong crimes
The impeachment trial of Donald Trump has now come to an end, with no witness allowed, and Republican senators voting along strict party lines to acquit the obviously guilty president. Many people, myself included, feel that Trump was tried for minor crimes, whereas he ought to have been tried for his major ones.
There is so much wrong with Donald Trump that one hardly knows where to start. He is a bully, braggart, narcicist, racist, mysogenist, habitual liar and tax evader, in addition to being demonstrably ignorant. He has contempt for both domestic and international law, as well as the US Constitution. In the words of Michael Moore, he is a “part-time clown and full-time sociopath”. However, it is Trump’s climate change denial, withdrawal from the Paris Agreement, and sponsorship of the fossil fuel industry that pose the greatest threats to human society and the biosphere. The general support of the Republicn Party for the fossil fuel industry is the reason why Prof. Noam Chomsky called the party “the most dangerous organization in history”.
Destroying the world for profit
Does it make sense to destroy the world for the sake of profit or personal advantage? This is exactly what our governments and business leaders are doing today. This is what very many ordinary people are doing. But does it make sense?
Does it make sense to saw off the branch on which you are sitting? Does it make sense to jockey for a place at the Captain’s table on board an iceberg-struck Titanic? Whoever contributes to the destruction of the world has to live in the world that they have destroyed.
Perhaps a short-term advantage can be gained; perhaps a small private Utopia can be created by acts that harm the general future; but all individual fates will sink like stones in a deep sea, if society as a whole sinks. Individual fates will be lost in the general fate. There will be no protection for anyone, if the world as a whole goes to pieces. We must hope that the world’s leaders will wake up and begin to think about the long-term future. After all, they too love their children and grandchildren.
John Scales Avery is a theoretical chemist at the University of Copenhagen. He is noted for his books and research publications in quantum chemistry, thermodynamics, evolution, and history of science. His 2003 book Information Theory and Evolution set forth the view that the phenomenon of life, including its origin, evolution, as well as human cultural evolution, has its background situated in the fields of thermodynamics, statistical mechanics, and information theory. Since 1990 he has been the Chairman of the Danish National Group of Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs. Between 2004 and 2015 he also served as Chairman of the Danish Peace Academy. He founded the Journal of Bioenergetics and Biomembranes, and was for many years its Managing Editor. He also served as Technical Advisor to the World Health Organization, Regional Office for Europe (19881997).
http://www.fredsakademiet.dk/ordbog/aord/a220.htm. He can be reached at avery.john.s@gmail.com. To know more about his works visit this link.
http://eacpe.org/about-john-scales-avery/
http://www.fredsakademiet.dk/ordbog/aord/a220.htm. He can be reached at avery.john.s@gmail.com. To know more about his works visit this link.
http://eacpe.org/about-john-scales-avery/
War in the Arctic?
by Michael T Klare
In early March, an estimated 7,500 American combat troops will travel to Norway to join
thousands of soldiers from other NATO countries in a massive mock battle with imagined invading forces from Russia. In this futuristic simulated engagement — it goes by the name of Exercise Cold Response 2020 — allied forces will “conduct multinational joint exercises with a high-intensity combat scenario in demanding winter conditions,” or so claims the Norwegian military anyway. At first glance, this may look like any other NATO training exercise, but think again. There’s nothing ordinary about Cold Response 2020. As a start, it’s being staged above the Arctic Circle, far from any previous traditional NATO battlefield, and it raises to a new level the possibility of a great-power conflict that might end in a nuclear exchange and mutual annihilation. Welcome, in other words, to World War III’s newest battlefield.
EXCERPT:
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was the first official to explain this new strategic outlook at the Arctic Forum in Finland last May. In his address, a kind of “Pompeo Doctrine,” he indicated that the United States was shifting from benign neglect of the region to aggressive involvement and militarization. “We’re entering a new age of strategic engagement in the Arctic,” he insisted, “complete with new threats to the Arctic and its real estate, and to all of our interests in that region.” To better protect those interests against Russia’s military buildup there, “we are fortifying America’s security and diplomatic presence in the area… hosting military exercises, strengthening our force presence, rebuilding our icebreaker fleet, expanding Coast Guard funding, and creating a new senior military post for Arctic Affairs inside of our own military.”
The Pentagon has been unwilling to provide many details, but a close reading of the military press suggests that this activity has been particularly focused on northern Norway and adjacent waters. To begin with, the Marine Corps has established a permanent presence in that country, the first time foreign forces have been stationed there since German troops occupied it during World War II. A detachment of about 330 Marines were initially deployed near the port of Trondheim in 2017, presumably to help guard nearby caves that contain hundreds of U.S. tanks and combat vehicles. Two years later, a similarly sized group was then dispatched to the Troms region above the Arctic Circle and far closer to the Russian border.
From the Russian perspective, even more threatening is the construction of a U.S. radar station on the Norwegian island of Vardø about 40 miles from the Kola Peninsula. To be operated in conjunction with the Norwegian intelligence service, the focus of the facility will evidently be to snoop on those Russian missile-carrying submarines, assumedly in order to target them and take them out in the earliest stages of any conflict. That Moscow fears just such an outcome is evident from the mock attack it staged on the Vardø facility in 2018, sending 11 Su-24 supersonic bombers on a direct path toward the island. (They turned aside at the last moment.) It has also moved a surface-to-surface missile battery to a spot just 40 miles from Vardø.
The Tribulations of Truth-Teller Julian Assange
by Robert Snefjella
The Pentagon’s first hidden then explicit ambition of full spectrum domination included the attempted deployment and domination of the ‘information realm’. For those who plan aggressive domination, truth is a lurking nemesis, secrets that hide crimes or evil intent are sacred, and manipulation of the public the goal.
When it comes to accurate and responsible publication of vast numbers of secret or suppressed or censored documents, included those revealing state crimes, Julian Assange and Wikileaks have been preeminent since 2006. Not surprisingly, their vital and courageous work, on behalf of truth and transparency in the public interest, earned Julian Assange, and Wikileaks, powerful and dangerous enemies.
The focused attack on Assange himself has lasted for nearly a decade, forcing him to seek sanctuary for years in the Ecuadorian Embassy in England, and culminating in his arrest in April of 2019 on specious grounds, denial of bail, and his cruel incarceration in prison. For nine months now, since April of 2019, Assange has been a political prisoner in the UK. He has been held in solitary confinement and without access to proper legal representation or medical care. He has suffered greatly. Already weak, and in poor health from his years restricted to life inside the Ecuadorian Embassy, the British have imprisoned him under inhumane conditions, at further damage to his health. And who knows what British officials may have surreptitiously done, while he has been imprisoned, to further injure his mind and body?
Late in January of 2020, after growing pressure on the UK authorities, including several appeals by fellow prison inmates for humane treatment of Assange, his solitary confinement has apparently been relieved.
Consider that the inmates of the prison showed more empathy and mettle on behalf of a cruelly treated, persecuted, and heroic human being than nearly all the political leaders of the western world, and many thousands of his ‘fellow journalists’, combined.
Nils Melzer, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture, has recently been interviewed pertaining to the Julian Assange affair. Published by Republik AG, the interview was conducted by Daniel Ryser and translated by Charles Hawley and date 31.01.2020. Melzer’s responses to the interviewer were remarkably lucid and forthright and illuminating. [1]
Melzer confessed to having been influenced, in effect duped, by the media’s campaign of disparaging depictions of Julian Assange, and so Melzer had long resisted bringing his appropriate and close professional attention to the actual facts of the matter.
Once Melzer was finally convinced to study the Assange issue, Melzer’s fluency in Swedish enabled him to personally and effectively examine a trove of official documents from Sweden, pertaining to the preliminary criminal investigation of Assange for the possible crime of rape. From the interview:
“It quickly became clear to me that something was wrong….The Swedish authorities … intentionally left [Assange] in limbo… for nine years … [and he was never] given the chance to defend [himself] because no charges [of rape] had ever been filed.”
“I could hardly believe my eyes. “A rape had never even taken place….”
“The number of breeches of law that accumulated in Sweden within just a few weeks during the preliminary criminal investigation is simply grotesque.”
Melzer found that the Swedish police had falsified testimony to make it seem as though a rape had taken place. This false accusation was then cultivated in the media and by hostile officials, and was left hanging in the air for nine years, poisoning public perception of Julian Assange, without Assange being given the chance to defend himself.
Melzer, in summarizing why the Assange affair was precisely relevant to his position as UN Special Rapporteur on Torture, noted that Assange through Wikileaks had exposed systemic state torture; Assange himself had been persecuted and ill treated by state power for years subsequent to his imprisonment without bail; was now being subject to serious mistreatment amounting to torture in prison; and was at risk of further torture, and a life sentence, if he was extradited to the United States.
The entire interview is extraordinary and important, and Nils Melzer has done a tremendous service by being forthright and illuminating about the many state power misdeeds, and official and media misrepresentations, pertaining to the Assange affair.
Melzer gives the impression of being somewhat naive when he states that he couldn’t believe his eyes upon discovering numerous instances of dishonesty and sleaze and illegality in the Swedish documents. What would one expect from Sweden today? They are now dedicated vassals and useful idiots to the American Imperial agenda, which is intrinsically, inherently, dishonesty dependent, and pathologically criminal.[2]
And when Melzer warns us that “a murderous system is being created before our very eyes”, well, rabid criminal aggression of just about every variety has been on the loose and actively attacking people and entire countries and spreading its infection for decades now. An international system of pathological criminality is long since well established.
When Wikileaks became preeminently effective as a responsible and integrity-based means by which whistleblowers could get their information to the public, it became the enemy of corrupt state power, as well as the leading symbol of, and inspiration for, the battered ideal of journalistic excellence.
The ongoing degrading, spiteful, punitive mistreatment of Assange was intended to break him, to destroy his body and amazing mind and if possible his very essence. Furthermore, that venomous persecution is a message to us all: here is what happens if you effectively expose high crimes, and embarrass with transparency and the truth a system based on secrecy and lies and hypocrisy and organized state criminality. [3]
But the malicious attack on Assange, including disparaging distortions pertaining to his very personality, was also motivated by the attempt to deflect attention towards him and away from the message, the documents, the revelations, that whistleblowers via Wikileaks had given us.
People who ‘go rogue’ and reveal secrets about the institution or organization of which they have been a part, place themselves at potential great risk The whistleblower must try to find a proficient ‘megaphone’, and a trustworthy one that safeguards their identity. Wikileaks has steadfastly attempted to do just that, but when exposing the secrets of corrupt or murderous power, ensuring the anonymity and securing the safety of the whistleblower will always be a challenge.
Despite the challenges, Wikileaks in an unsurpassed way became the contemporary journalistic giant on behalf of whistleblowers.
During the decade long tribulations of Julian Assange, many of his ‘fellow journalists’ in conventional mass media, and even in a large swath of alternative media (more accurately termed faux-alternative media), have been missing in action in terms of clearly explicating his circumstance, have largely not been defending him, or have actually been piling on, with lies and snide insinuations and the like. A large part of the media inattention to or attack upon Assange was prescribed by state powers. As noted, Nils Melzer himself was taken in by that propaganda. And the Melzer interview itself has largely been suppressed in mass media.
But, in addition to the prescribed role of damaging Assange, there is something else going on with the media’s display of inattention or hostility. Assange and Wikileaks have been journalistic giant slayers, have expedited illuminating, devastating, voluminous political exposés, including war crimes; have been doing what good journalism would aspire to. Gnawing away at the presstitutes is the stark contrast between Assange’s courageous excellence, and their own role as bootlicking little poseurs scurrying around with press passes and trying to give a dignified veneer to their kept and sometimes sordid role.
Assange has thus made enemies of several connected powers: corrupt corporate and criminal state power, and its indispensable partner in sleaze, pathetic or vile so-called journalism.
Wikileaks has been carrying out the critically important function of doing the dangerous illuminating journalism that most mass media news outlets have abandoned.
The post WW2 era saw the conjunction of four major global-reach information-control ambitions. These have caused an interlinked process of informational degradation globally, and especially in the west.
For one, the CIA initiated a vast global attempt to control what information people received. This included not just the ambition to influence or control mass media news, as ‘Operation Mockingbird’ is typically depicted as attempting, but also even politically-relevant academic information. So, for example, it was disclosed by the Senator Frank Church led investigations in the United States in the 1970s that the content of 1200 unnamed books had been written with CIA involvement. The CIA’s attempt at ‘public perception management’ continues to this day.
Also, the very disproportionate ownership of, and management positions in, global mass media by persons identifying as Jewish, enabled extreme bias in information relating to Jewish and Israeli financial and political and broadly societal, interests.
And the Pentagon’s first hidden then explicit ambition of full spectrum domination included the attempted deployment and domination of the ‘information realm’. For those who plan aggressive domination, truth is a lurking nemesis, secrets that hide crimes or evil intent are sacred, and manipulation of the public the goal.
Finally, the increasingly concentrated private corporate ownership of, and power over, communication meant that the profit motive and other corporate, including political, considerations severely handicapped the search for, and disclosure of, and discussion of, that which was contrary to corporate interests. That exclusion zone removed a lot of important informational territory from public view.
These forces together constituted a deadly squeeze play on integrity and disinterested journalism in mass media, and the ‘collateral damage’ has been just about all encompassing: you can’t get to common sense, or to reliably good science, or to sensible public policy, or to countless other beneficial places, through a fog of disinformation and manipulation and trivial distraction intended to manipulate.
It is only in recent years, with the Internet and modern communication technology giving honest intention a prolific and more effective means of broadcasting information, that there has been an increasingly effective counterforce to systematic public manipulation via disinformation. The renaissance, to the extent that it has been accomplished, has included many ‘amateurs’, ‘citizen journalists’, and enhanced ‘whistleblowing’. The whistleblower now has a better chance than ever of reaching a large audience.
There is large irony in the relentless attack on unfettered free speech and communication by the United States. The first amendment to the US Constitution stipulates robust legal protection for freedom of speech and the right to publish freely.
The particular circumstances of Julian Assange’s tribulations are of course unique to him, but his mistreatment as a political prisoner [4] is also part of the pattern of abuse for opponents of the American-led global domination project. Of the many examples that could be given, let us just remember the mistreatment of Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic. He was imprisoned and languished and died through neglect or was murdered in prison. During that time he was subjected to a two years long kangaroo-court trial which was not a pursuit of justice, as advertised, but palpable injustice by representatives of the war criminals who had waged aggressive war on the remnants of Yugoslavia. The book Travesty, The Trial of Sobodan Milosovic and the Corruption of International Justice, by John Laughland, gives eloquent testimony to the injustices ‘achieved’ by the ‘winners’ of the war upon Serbia.
In the case of Wikileaks, Chelsea Manning via Wikileaks, along with a massive cache of other documents, exposed horrific war crimes by the United States. Made available was a video of laughing United States soldiers in a helicopter in Iraq slaughtering innocent people including children. The soldiers involved and their commanders or the politicians who precipitated that war of aggression against Iraq based on lies, have not been put on trial for those unmistakable crimes. That massacre constituted one appalling heart-wrenching episode of very many hidden atrocities inflicted on the Iraqis by the United States, for more than a generation. And the crimes against Iraq are a mere subset of the American Empire’s atrocities, many hidden, in the period since the 2nd World War. [5]
Notes
[2] Sweden’s sustained dishonesty in the Assange affair is indicative of Sweden’s process of political-culture deterioration. The downward spiral began after the Second World War, when Sweden ditched long-standing policies of peaceful co-existence and neutrality for the dubious security of the American Empire. After the murder of Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme in 1986, which was a coup d’état involving Swedish officials, and never yet officially acknowledged, official dishonesty became reflexive, Sweden’s default position. Link to my article on the subject: https://countercurrents.org/2020/01/success-as-trickster-sweden-as-cautionary-tale
[3] The common assertion that publishing classified and secret documents is a threat to ‘national security’ is often specious. Secrecy under the rubric of national security is a handy cover for corruption, crime, and stupidity. Another primary goal is to leave the public in the dark and open to extreme exploitation and manipulation, which is what we see in all directions.
[4] The United Nations Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment contains a robust prohibition of Cruel or degrading treatment.
Article 2.2. asserts categorically that “No exceptional circumstances whatsoever … may be invoked as a justification of torture.” And here torture includes degrading treatment. Many citizens of Sweden, the UK, and the United States are complicit in the torture of Julian Assange, through word and deed.
Robert Snefjella, a retired Canadian organic farmer and contractor
Can the Democratic Party in the United States Recover From the Impeachment Process Wreckage?
by Dan Lieberman
The lack of the Democrats ability to focus on a process and actuate the correct mechanism to gain removal of President Trump, and the ingenuous attitude of the Republicans to the serious matter, disturb the political environment. Were these elected representatives to the United States government, members of a congress dedicated to protecting the interests of the American people, which performed an impeachment process that
ended in strengthening the impeached president and weakening the conventional candidates of the Democratic Party?
Menace on the Menu in Post-EU Britain
by Colin Todhunter
Environmentalist Dr Rosemary Mason has just written the report ‘Bayer CropScience rules Britain after Brexit – thepublic and the press are being poisoned by pesticides’. It has been sent to editors of major media outlets in the UK. In it, she outlines her concerns for pesticide regulation, health and the environment in a post-Brexit landscape. This article presents some of the report’s key points.
Celebration of Sant Guru Ravidass Birthday
by Dr Rahul Kumar
There is no use of celebrating the birth of Sant Guru Ravidass Ji unless or until the Dalits follows his revolutionary teachings. There is no use of celebrating the birth of Sant Guru
Ravidass Ji unless or until the Dalits remains united and follow the legacy of Baba Sahib Dr B.R. Ambedkar. There is no use of celebrating once in a year the birth of Sant Guru Ravidass Ji unless or until the youths from the Dalit community read and understand the philosophy of Sant Guru Ravidass Ji and Baba Saheb Dr B. R. Ambedkar.
Misconceptions Of Indians Over Sexuality!
by Kabir Deb
Suppression of women over sexual intercourse can be fought by opening up the biology of women. Idea of homosexuality can be kept with more clarity only when the filmmakers won’t show the kneeling of Homosexuals before patriarchy to show its rise only for a short moment. Similarly, equality would be established in professional work and daily chores only when the world would crave for old mentality of forcefully strengthening women. It is not just about feminism or the homosexuals. The idea is to fight for a world which
is less dominating and believes in decoding everything that is against equality.
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