Syria's Major Supporters And Why

There has been a lot of press and talk about the Assad regime and the violence that is spreading slowly out of its borders. We have seen Iran as a major supporter of Bashar al-Assad. Today we need to look at the top three political and material supports that Assad has. Those three supporting nations, in ascending order, are China, Russia, and Iran. This analysts will not take into account UN votes, but financial and material support. China has its trade route and an ideolgue supporting some of their territorial views. Russia maintains a stronger military presence in the eastern Mediteranean, profits from arms sales, and has invested billions into Syrian infrastructure. Iran, we can easily state that they are knee deep in the hooplah and they are in it for the full range of what happens.

China has quite a financial interst with Syria. China, as of February this year, was Syria's third largest export country. Recall history, Syria was part of the Silk Road. Even today, china sees Syria as a trading and shipping hub. A rather important hub, at that. Ideologically, Hu Jintao and Assad have given support to each other on some views that have caused strong international angst over. Those views include Syrian support of China's claims and treatment of Taiwan, Tibet, Xinjang, and on China's application of human rights. China continues to support Assad on his claims over the Golan Heights.

China and Syria find mutually beneficial financial and ideological support for each other.

Russian support for the Assad regime includes military and financial interests as well. The depth of these interests goes far deeper than those of China.

Financially Russia is looking to recover financial interests are closely tied to its military interests in the region. The port at Tartus provides a strategic foothold. The Black Sea Fleet uses the port facilities for ship maintenance, supply, and logistics. The facilities at Tartus and the power grud in the surrounding area infrastructure has benefitted from Russia's investing $19.4 billion dollars in 2009. As of 2011 the facilities and piers at Tartus can, and have, supported guided missile cruisers and Kuznetzov class aircraft carriers. Russia continues to act in ways that undermine American interestts.

Russia may also be getting some isolationism ideas like the  methods used during the Cold War. At that time the West made strategic allies in order to surround Russian expansion and stop their geographic spread. Current examples include US support to Bahrain and Uzbekistan. I believe that this gambit is one that will completely fail for the West.

The Russian Liberal Democratic Party leader, Vladimir Zhimorovsky, has made some very strong statements againsty Western support to the rebels. Statements that indicate there is much more going on than is currently visible. Zhimorovsky has said that any US support to the rebels is "absolutely unacceptable" and would, in his eyes be, tantamount to violently toppling a regime.

Russia gains a naval forward support base and earns billions from arms sales. Commercially, Russia has earned $5 billion in weaponss sales to Damascus.

Iranian Support is all geared towards gaining a physical and very strategic position in the region. Iran has been so completely isolated from decent international contact for so long that the leadership is looking for any way to expand out of their isolation. By any means includes the blatant shipments by air and over land as well as the hardcer to see support through Hezbollah and in assisting Assad with the training and manning, as it were, of an army of children suicide bombers and fighters. This last group is known as the Basij, which Ahmedinijad claims to be. Judging by his age and grey hair, I openly declare him a failure in his service as a child soldier/suicide bomber. If Ahmedinijad could have done that right 40 years ago his poor judgement and mistakes wouldn't be an issue now.

Seriously, Iran already has missiles that can strike Israel from inside its borders, but, I am guessing that the guidance systems still leve something to be desired. Iran has successfully launched mutlistage rockets and put sattelites into orbit, but, they have yet to demonstrate the capacity to deliver their paylods at range. Every missilt that Iran has, buys, and makes can carry a nuclear payload. Iran is even working on its own independent re-entry vehicle. This IRV makes enough people at the IAEA to start investigations, not that any inspection will receive compliance from Ahmedinijad or Khameini.

Iran has the largest missile surplus in the Middle East. One of their missile production/storage sites was just bombed in Sudan earlier this week. Reports of this Israerli lead attack state that 300 Shahab III missiles there were destroyed. Iran is trying to put its own strike missile system in place in Syria. Why would they not expect to be allowed to? That is, should Assad not die in place.

Just imagine the changes that would most undoubtedly take place if Russia and Iran had missile silos in Syria while the US missile defense system, which Obama unplugged and dismantled, absent from the region. Could we ever again have allies in Eastern Europe? Could we carry on trade theough that region? No, not at all. The US Naval Fleet coverage and the protections it guarantees would be stripped away from the Mediteranean, through the Gulf of Aden, off the Somali pirate coast, and into the Indian Ocean.

UN Report on Child Soldiers

Bottom Line Up Front

There is now a report on the recruitment and use of child soldiers. It comes out while the International Criminal Court (a brand new offshoot of the UN) seeks to prove its legitimacy with prosecuting a warlord for his use of child soldiers. What is NOT stated overtly in the article is that most of the groups listed are primarily Islamic groups seeking to establish sharia law. Also, the states listed are standing UN members.

UN Report: Use of Child Soldiers Still Widespread in 2010/2011

As a UN list proves, children are still being recruited and used in warfare while schools are repeatedly being attacked and closed with a UN official saying this was "another tragic year" for the world's youngsters.

New additions to the list include the Philippines' Moro secessionist movement in the south, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), which was among the 61 rebel groups that targeted children recruitment in the 22 countries the report focuses on. Other groups such as the al-Shabab militia in Somalia, and the Afghan National Police in Afghanistan are also listed.

In Afghanistan however, the Government recently agreed to release children from the Afghan national security forces and to put in place more efficient age verification measures to prevent under-age recruitment.

The report also reveals that the UN Security Council also found the New People's Army and the Abu Sayyaf Group of being actively engaged in recruiting children as fighters.

As details of the list emerged however, the MILF repeatedly denied the recruitment of child warriors, with member Muhammad Ameen insisting his group and its military wing, the Bangsamoro Islamic Armed Forces (BIAF), do not participate in the recruitment of children and have even prohibited it.

As the use of child soldiers is still widespread, In June, the Security Council unanimously adopted a resolution which expended the criteria for listing parties to conflict in the Secretary-General's annual report, including parties who attack schools and hospitals.

The resolution strictly prohibits the "recruitment and use of children, killing and maiming, rape and other sexual violence, attacks on schools and/or hospitals."

"The promise of this resolution is very real. During my visits to conflict areas, I have personally seen the devastation -- schools completely destroyed, bombed or burnt to the ground. Attacks on hospitals are two-fold atrocities. Not only do they kill and wound girls and boys, but they leave children without access to treatment," said Radhika Coomaraswamy, the Special Representative of the Secretary General for children and armed conflict.

The annual report finds that out of 22 conflicts that were monitored, attacks against schools and hospitals were reported in at least 15, with reports of damage, destruction and closing of schools appearing to be a pattern.

 "The infrastructure of schools have been physically destroyed by armed actors, and students and educational personnel have been attacked, threatened or intimidated," the report states.

"In some situations, girls and girls' schools have been specifically targeted. The use of schools by armed elements has, in certain circumstances, compromised the civilian nature of schools and put students at risk."

Other entries on the list include Yemeni groups pro-Government tribal militia and al-Houthi rebels, both for recruiting and using child soldiers and the Iraqi groups the Islamic State of Iraq, and Al-Qaida in Iraq, including its armed youth wing known as the Birds of Paradise.

The report examined armed conflicts last year in Afghanistan, Burundi, the Central African Republic (CAR), Chad, Colombia, Côte d'Ivoire, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Haiti, India, Iraq, Lebanon, Myanmar, Nepal, the occupied Palestinian territories and Israel, Pakistan, Philippines, Somalia, Sri Lanka, Sudan, southern Thailand, Uganda and Yemen.

http://uk.ibtimes.com/articles/213572/20110914/un-report-use-of-child-soldiers-still-widespread-in-2010-2011.htm

First ICC Prosecution Moving Forward

Lubamga, the criminal in this first case, has been awaiting justice since about 2006. Wow; it has only taken five years for the case to come to a point where the defense (if there is any) can say that the evidence is tainted or the witnesses irrelevant. Five years. How much longer before the victims of his crimes see this vile creature in prison? He will nto be put to death or harmed in any way. No, he will serve time in a prison cell. He will eat, sleep, drink, shower, read, and continue to live in a prison cell paid for by other people. Damn! I am so glad the UN is hot on this.

Prosecution says evidence in International Court’s first trial enough to convict Congo warlord

By Associated Press, Updated: Thursday, August 25, 10:44 AM

THE HAGUE, Netherlands — Prosecutors began wrapping up the International Criminal Court’s landmark first trial on Thursday by urging judges to convict a Congolese warlord of recruiting hundreds of child soldiers and sending them to fight and kill in his country’s brutal conflict.

Deputy Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda told judges that evidence in the trial that began in January 2009 gave voice to children that militia leader Thomas Lubanga had “transformed into killers; those girls that Mr. Lubanga offered to his commanders as sexual slaves.”

( Michael Kooren, Pool / Associated Press ) - Congolese warlord Thomas Lubanga sits in the courtroom of the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, Netherlands, Thursday, Aug. 25, 2011. Prosecution lawyers are wrapping up the ICC’s landmark first trial by urging judges to convict Lubanga of recruiting child soldiers and sending them to fight in his country’s brutal conflict. Lubanga’s trial was the first international case to focus exclusively on child soldiers.

Bensouda said the armed wing of Lubanga’s Union of Congolese Patriots political party trained hundreds of children in 20 camps scattered across the Ituri region of eastern Congo in 2002-2003.

“They were used to fight in conflicts. They were used to kill, rape and pillage,” she added.

Actress Angelina Jolie, who is a goodwill ambassador for the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, was among dozens of people who watched proceedings from the court’s public gallery. She made no comment to reporters.

Lubanga’s defense lawyers are expected to tell judges on Friday that the prosecution evidence was flawed by false witness testimony and that Lubanga in fact tried to liberate child soldiers, not recruit them.

Lubanga’s trial has been hailed as a significant step in the development of international law. It was the first international case to focus exclusively on child soldiers and the opening trial at the world’s first permanent war crimes tribunal.

However, it also was overshadowed by delays and by friction between prosecutors and judges.

The trial was put on hold in June 2008 — just 10 days before it was scheduled to start — when judges ruled that Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo had not given lawyers evidence that could have helped Lubanga. He refused to turn over some 200 documents because they came from organizations including the United Nations on condition that they not be disclosed to others.

Judges said the confidentiality agreements meant, “the trial process has been ruptured to such a degree that it is now impossible to piece together the constituent elements of a fair trial.”

Moreno-Ocampo eventually got consent from all the organizations and disclosed the material to defense attorneys, allowing the trial to get under way.

But judges halted it in July 2010 and ordered Lubanga released from custody when prosecutors defied a court order to reveal the identity of an intermediary who had helped prosecutors contact witnesses.

Prosecutors appealed the decision and Lubanga remained in his cell, but the incident underscored simmering tensions between prosecutors and the judges over disclosure of sensitive evidence.

Faced with the prospect of the case collapsing, prosecutors revealed the identity of their intermediary to the defense and appeals judges ruled that the trial could resume.

The tensions resurfaced Thursday when Presiding Judge Adrian Fulford refused to let Moreno-Ocampo answer a question addressed to one of his team of lawyers.

“Mr. Ocampo, can we please have some order,” Fulford said. When Moreno-Ocampo tried again to answer, Fulford sternly told the prosecutor: “Mr. Ocampo, not at the moment.”

Lubanga was arrested in March 2006, the first suspect to come into the custody of the International Criminal Court, which became operational in 2002.

The court has since issued indictments in high profile flashpoints such as the Darfur conflict in Sudan and the Gadhafi regime’s brutal but unsuccessful campaign to stamp out dissent.

Lubanga is accused of leading a rebel group called the Union of Congolese Patriots which used child soldiers in savage fighting in the Ituri province in 2002-2003.

While welcoming his prosecution and the groundbreaking child soldier charges, human rights groups have criticized prosecutors for the narrow scope of the trial, saying they should also have charged him for the numerous rapes that victims say members of his militia perpetrated in a region notorious for widespread sexual violence.

“It was shocking to many of us that the announcement in 2006 of the case against Mr. Lubanga did not include charges for such crimes and overlooked the suffering of thousands of women,” said Brigid Inder, executive director of a group called Women’s Initiatives for Gender Justice.

However others applauded the likely deterrent effect of the Lubanga trial.

The U.N. special envoy for children in armed conflicts, Radhika Coomaraswamy, said leaders in conflict zones have often asked her about the ICC and the Lubanga prosecution.

“I found that fear of the ICC a healthy development in international law,” Coomaraswamy told The Associated Press. “Nobody can measure how many children have been saved because of deterrence. That’s not something you can measure, but hopefully that will be the case.”

Copyright 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/prosecution-says-evidence-in-international-courts-first-trial-enough-to-convict-congo-warlord/2011/08/25/gIQA2VnWdJ_story.html

Week In Review, August 19

Due to technical and health issues, this one is a day behind. Late, but still here, The Week In Review

Sanctioned Murder Honor Killings and Child Soldiers

These are, and will continue to be, a regular topic. Until they love their children more than they hate us, there will be no peace with the Middle East.

While I was working, and writing this past week, authorities in NJ charged a Pakistani muslim, Kashif Parvaiz, with having his wife murdered. He claims that his now dead wife had spoke badly about the family. So, for honor, he had her killed. What rot! He murdered his wife because he was angry and offended that a woman should use her freedom of speech in America to voice her complaints.

It has continued and will continue even likely increase in America.

Child Soldiers

I am going to also include Theft of Aid in this portion as this week it turns out to all pertain to Somalia. Yes, there are child soldiers being used in Sudan. That is coming up as Sudan is a heap of its own. We have sent trillions of dollars to aid agencies, through development, other donations, as well as direct government payments from the US to Somalia. This has been going on since before the fall of the Siadd Barre regime. We are paying to have aid sent into an area where the government steals it for its own use. Stolen aid is sold openly in the market place. Aid is extorted from refugees who then watch their children get recruited into al-Shabaab.

While we are squeezing dimes to but our own food and gas to take care of our needs, our government wants to raise our taxes higher in order to send more money to states like Somalia; to pay for more child soldiers. How do Somalis thank the generosity of Americans? Do you recall two weeks ago when three Somalis tried to get a fake bomb onto an airplane? I do.

UNPotence, the Impotence of the Aged

Human Rights Watch wrote "far from condemning repression, Ban sometimes went out of his way to portray oppressive governments in a positive light". China, Burma, Sri Lanka have benefited from Mr Ban's lax hand. UN Peacekeepers have been involved in rape, torture, and extortion themselves.

With the most powerful voting bloc in the UN being Islamic, what else is going on that the power base in the UN would want us to not see?

Attacks on Churches

• Egypt: Muslims angered by the installation of a church bell—under Sharia, churches must not offend Muslims by ringing bells—went on a violent spree, attacking among others a 5-month pregnant Christian woman and others who were “beaten with iron rods and pipes.”
• Indonesia: Christians were forced out of a church building and hounded even as they tried to worship at the side of the road.
• Nigeria: Two churches were bombed simultaneously; at least three Christians died, several were injured.
• Pakistan: Under accusations of “blasphemy,” and with the help of a local politician, Muslims attempted to annex a Christian hospital established in 1922 by missionaries.
• Tanzania: Muslims burned down two churches to cries of “away with the church—we do not want infidels to spoil our community,” and vows not to befriend “infidels.”

Sexual Abuse of Christian Women and Misogyny:

• Egypt: Muslims “severely sexually harassed” a Christian woman in front of her husband at a bus terminal; when her husband tried to defend her honor, he was violently beaten.  Soon afterwards, thousands of Muslims in the region began looting and torching Christian property, screaming “Allahu Akbar!” and “cursing the cross.”  Also, a Muslim ring using sexual coercion to convert Christian girls was exposed.
• Pakistan: Newlyweds run for their lives, because the man is Christian, the woman Muslim.  Under Sharia, the leader of the household, the man, must be Muslim.  Says a Pakistani Muslim scholar: “I condemn this marriage, I call it illegal, these two could be killed for what they did.”

Apostasy and Proselytizing

• Iran: A Christian pastor faces the death penalty for “convert(ing) to Christianity” and “encourag(ing) other Muslims to convert to Christianity.” Even if he is found innocent of apostasy, the charge of evangelizing Muslims will still carry a severe penalty.
• Saudi Arabia: A captured Christian pastor is set to be deported to Muslim Eritrea, where he faces the death penalty.

General Killing of Christians

• Ivory Coast: Muslims crucify two Christian brothers on “the example of Christ” and in accordance to Koran 5:33: “The pair were badly beaten and tortured before being crudely nailed to cross-shaped planks by their hands and feet with steel spikes.”

Foreign Aid

Yet, again, we continue to raise taxes on Americans in order to send that money to our enemies, like China.

"We started looking at the contracts and it was rather amazing that the No. 1 recipient of these taxpayer dollars were Chinese-state owned corporations," said Sen. Jim Webb, D-Virginia, referring to $320 million dollars worth of U.S. government contracts let to China. "I think we can take a good hard look where we're giving foreign aid."

The U.S. provided $47 million in "development aid" to China in 2010, even though the nation is already a military and economic giant and the world's only other true superpower.

Sudan no longer terroristic, but still terrifying

Clinton and Obama are now in the 45 day process to remove Sudan from the list of Sponsors of terrorism. This is still a genocidal state, mind you. South Sudan has oil, bit deal. North Sudan has buddied up with Iranian president Mahnood Ahmedinijad, who slaughtered his people in 2009. By coming off that list, North Sudan is going to be able to purchase some “restricted” technologies and items. What do you want to bet these will go straight to Iran? These items are just as likely to be used against the South Sudanese people. The people of Darfur will regret this decision of Obama.

Thank Obama

The Middle East has long been annoyed that the West exists. The status quo of “Buy our oil and we will be kind to your face” has changed. No longer does the East see the West in that light. They see the West as the next errant servant who needs to step into line behind the East. I say they always have, but until now, had not the gall or courage to say it. Why do they have the courage to say it now? Because they see Obama as powerless, impotent, and completely ineffective and, as our leader, this is also how they see America and all Americans. Make no mistake, the East and the West are diametrically opposed. We are each other's antithesis.