Biden must inspect America’s embrittled reactors

Biden must act to prevent what would constitute nuclear suicide in the United States.

By

 Karl Grossman and Harvey Wasserman

 -

February 3, 2021NationofChange

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Of all the daunting tasks Joe Biden faces, especially vital is the inspection of dangerously embrittled atomic reactors still operating in the United States.

A meltdown at any one of them would threaten the health and safety of millions of people while causing major impact to an already struggling economy. The COVID-19 pandemic would complicate and add to the disaster. A nuclear power plant catastrophe would severely threaten accomplishments Biden is hoping to achieve in his presidency.

The problem of embrittlement is on the top of the list of nuclear power concerns. The “average age”—length of operation—of nuclear power plants in the U.S., the federal government’s Energy information Agency, reported in 2019 was 38 years. 

 https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/nuclear/us-nuclear-industry.php#:~:text=At%20the%20end%20of%20December,commercial%20operation%20in%20December%201969 

Now, in 2021, the “average age” of nuclear power plants in the U.S. is 40 years—the length of time originally seen when nuclear power began in the U.S. for how long plants could operate before embrittlement set in. 

That’s why the operating licenses originally issued for the plants were limited to 40 years.

Here’s how Arnold “Arnie” Gundersen, a nuclear engineer with more than 44 years of experience in the nuclear industry, who became a whistleblower and is now chief engineer at Fairewinds Associates, explains embrittlement: “When exposed to radiation, metal becomes embrittled and eventually can crack like glass. The longer the radiation exposure, the worse the embrittlement becomes.”  

“A nuclear reactor is just like a pressure cooker and is a pot designed to hold the radioactive contents of the atomic chain reaction in the nuclear core,” continues Gundersen, whose experience includes being a licensed Critical Facility Reactor Operator. “And metals in reactors are exposed to radiation every day a plant operates”

“If the reactor is embrittled and cracks,” says Gundersen, “it’s ‘game over’ as all the radiation can spew out into the atmosphere. Diablo Canyon [a twin-reactor facility in California] is the worst, the most embrittled nuclear power facility in the U.S., but there are plenty of others that also could crack. Starting with Diablo, every reactor in the U.S. should be checked to determine they are too embrittled to continue to safely operate.” 

Metals inside a nuclear power plant are bombarded with radiation, notes Gundersen. The steel used in reactor pressure vessels—which contain the super-hot nuclear cores—is not immune. 

Every U.S. reactor has an Emergency Core Cooling System and a Core Spray System to flood the super-hot core in the event of a loss-of-coolant accident. 

Embrittled metal would shatter when hit with that cold water. 

The ensuing explosion could then blow apart the containment structure—as happened at the Chernobyl and Fukushima nuclear power plants—morphing into a radioactive plume moving into the atmosphere and be carried by the winds, dropping deadly fall-out wherever it goes.

This apocalyptic outcome was barely missed in Pennsylvania where, starting at 4 a.m. on March 28, 1979, fuel inside the Three Mile Island Unit Two nuclear power plant began to melt. 

Its Emergency Core Cooling System was activated. But only the year before—in 1978—did the plant receive a license to operate and begin operating.

Had TMI, like so many of U.S. nuclear power plants now, been decades old and its metal pressure vessel embrittled and had shattered—a far greater disaster would have occurred. The entire northeastern U.S. could have been blanketed with deadly radioactivity

The “fleet” of old, decrepit nuclear power plants in the U.S.—with embrittled metal components—must be inspected. And with embrittlement they must be shut down.

Biden must jump into the situation—for the sake of American lives, for the sake of the nation’s future. 

Nuclear power in the U.S. is under the jurisdiction of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, or NRC. That acronym NRC should really stand for Nuclear Rubberstamp Commission.  Whatever the nuclear industry wants, the NRC says yes to.

As the result of the series of globally infamous catastrophic nuclear power plant accidents—at Three Mile Island, Chernobyl and Fukushima—and the availability of safe, green, cost-effective, clean renewable energy, led by solar and wind, coupled with increasing energy efficiency, the nuclear industry is in its death throes. 

Only two nuclear power plants are being built now in the U.S., Vogtle 3 and 4 in Georgia.  At nearly $30 billion for the pair, they’re hugely over budget—and their construction costs are still rising.  In fact, virtually all operating atomic reactors are producing electricity at much higher base costs than solar and wind.   

The NRC is currently seeking to try to bail out the nuclear industry—to keep it going—by allowing nuclear power plants to operate for 100 years.

In recent years it agreed to let nuclear power plants to run for 60 years and then it upped that to 80 years.

On January 21 the Nuclear Rubberstamp Commission held a “public meeting” on its plan to now extend operating licenses for U.S. nuclear power plants and allow them to run for 100 years. Speaker after speaker protested this scheme.

“It’s time to stop this whole nuke con job,” testified Erica Gray nuclear issues chair of the Virginia Sierra Club, at the meeting. There is “no solution” to dealing with nuclear waste, she said. It is “unethical to continue to make the most toxic waste known to mankind.” And renewable energy” with solar and wind “can power the world.” 

“Our position… is a resounding no,” declared Paul Gunter, director of the Reactor Oversight Project of the national organization Beyond Nuclear, for letting nuclear power plants run for 100 years.

Speakers cited the greatly increased likelihood of accidents if nuclear plants were allowed to run for a century. 

Biden must step in and order the inspection for embrittlement of U.S. nuclear power plants.  

The “fleet” of old, decrepit nuclear power plants in the U.S.—with embrittled metal components—must be inspected. And with embrittlement and other likely age-induced problems, they must be shut down.  

Biden must act to prevent what would constitute nuclear suicide in the United States.

On January 27, Biden announced a climate change agenda transitioning the U.S. towards renewable energy. But taking action against fossil fuel is not enough. Nuclear power plants are also engines of global warming. The “nuclear fuel chain” which includes uranium mining, milling and fuel enrichment is carbon intensive. Nuclear plants themselves emit Carbon-14, a radioactive form of carbon. 

Biden must take the lead. NOW! 

Harvey Wasserman wrote the books Solartopia! Our Green-Powered Earth and The Peoples Spiral of US History. He helped coin the phrase “No Nukes.” He co-convenes the Grassroots Emergency Election Protection Coalition at www.electionprotection2024.org  Karl Grossman is the author of Cover Up: What You Are Not Supposed to Know About Nuclear Power and Power Crazy. He is the host of the nationally-aired TV program Enviro Close-Up with Karl Grossman (www.envirovideo.com)

Guns, memes and dreams of civil war: The background of the Boogaloo

“Go to the riots and support our own cause. Show them the real targets. Use their anger to fuel our fire. Think outside the box. We have mobs of angry people to use to our advantage.”

By

 Derek Royden

 -

January 29, 2021NationofChange

On May 28th of last year, in the midst of Black Lives Matter protests touched off by the police killing of George Floyd in the city, Minneapolis’ 3rd Police Precinct was burned to the ground. Many commentators, including the former U.S. president and the governor of Minnesota, blamed ‘far left’ protesters or ‘antifa’ for the blaze.

As we learned much later, the arson is alleged to have been the work of at least 4 people, one of whom, Ivan Harrison Hunter, is a self-proclaimed member of a loosely affiliated far right group, the Boogaloo Bois. The 26 year old is accused of driving 1200 miles from his home in south Texas to Minnesota with the seeming aim of creating chaos.

According to a press release from the U.S. Justice Department, Hunter, 26, was arrested on October 21st in San Antonio and charged with, among other things, travelling across state lines to participate in a riot. Cited as evidence in the release was a video of a person alleged to be Hunter firing thirteen rounds into the 3rd precinct while what were described as looters were still inside the burning building. Shell casings found at the scene from a rifle like the one he owns were also said by authorities to corroborate the charges.

This wasn’t the only arrest of a person claiming to represent the Boogaloos during the summer protests, let alone the most disturbing one. The group, or at least some of those who claim to be part of it, has evolved from its origins as a meme, ‘Civil War 2: Electric Boogaloo’ (itself a play on the title of the sequel to the 1984 movie “Breakin”) on 4Chan’s /k/ board, an already strange and often racist place devoted to discussions of firearms, military history and other weapons like combat knives.

Although numerous people who post to online Boogaloo groups and boards, which also change the name to similar sounding ones like ‘Big Luau’ and ‘Big Igloo’ to aid in the creation of new memes and stay ahead of purges by internet service providers and social media giants like Facebook, have ties to white supremacy, and at least some in the movement are open Neo-Nazis, those that seek to represent them in the real world, like Magnus Panvidya, are now presenting themselves as anti-racist, pro-LGBTQ libertarians.

In a nutshell, Michigan based Panvidya, who describes himself as an anarcho-capitalist, claims the Boogaloo’s main similarity to the far right militias that came before them and who they have associated with is their hatred of government, most visible in day to day life in the form of law enforcement. There seems to be an effort underway by those who want to speak for the still mostly online movement to walk back the open calls for war that are part of its origin story and likely motivated people accused of crimes like Harrison Hunter.

Hunter texted another self-proclaimed Boogaloo, Steven Carillo, after leaving the burning 3rd Precinct in late May, advising him to target buildings used by police.

Carillo, 32, who had made his way from Travis Air Force Base in Solano County, California and was already engaged in his own violent rampage in Oakland that Thursday reportedly replied, “I did better lol.”

The air force Sergeant was later charged with murdering two people, one a security guard at The Oakland Federal Building and the other a policeman he is said to have ambushed in his car, with Carrillo allegedly shooting at sheriff’s deputies and throwing explosives during the attack. Another man, Robert Alvin Justus Jr, known to share Boogaloo memes online, also faces federal charges; he is accused of driving the vehicle during the Federal Building attack, which also injured another guard.

Both incidents were also unfairly associated by many in media with BLM protests that were presumably used by these men as cover for their alleged crimes.

One of the most alarming things about the case is the fact that Carrilo was a military policeman employed by the air force and was a team leader of the Phoenix Ravens, an elite unit “charged with providing security to airlift and tanker aircraft traveling through highly dangerous areas.”

The age of people like Hunter and Carrillo and the online in-joke meme culture of the Boogaloo movement, in general, makes it more perplexing and in many ways more threatening than the provocations of more middle aged groups influenced by gang culture like the Proud Boys.

Although many of those who claim to speak for the Boogaloo movement say that they support BLM, it does seem that those who acted at the time saw the summer protests as an opportunity to work toward their wider ‘accelerationalist’ goal of creating widespread civil unrest, as Carillo reportedly wrote before his violent spree, “Go to the riots and support our own cause. Show them the real targets. Use their anger to fuel our fire. Think outside the box. We have mobs of angry people to use to our advantage.”

The idea of accelerationism is also usually associated with white supremacists, including the attacker who killed 11 at Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue in October of 2018 and is said to be central to the manifesto of the Australian man who killed 51 people at two mosques in New Zealand in March the following year.

There was also a t-shirt for sale online with a photograph of the man who killed 1 person and injured 3 others in the Chabad of Poway Synagogue in California with the word ‘Boogaloo’ underneath it.

One major aspect of the Boogaloo movement that has manifested in real life but has been overshadowed by the actions of Hunter and Carillo, is the involvement of members in earlier (and still ongoing) protests around public health mandates throughout the United States. Unless you knew how to spot them, which isn’t hard considering that they also wear uniforms usually consisting of body armor, helmets or balaclavas (the latter to represent ‘Big Igloo’) and Hawaiian shirts, which I don’t think I did at the time, you might have marveled at the strange level of cosplaying at work on the far right.

Not only were Boogaloo Bois among those who showed up for some of the earliest protests of this kind, including a widely covered one at the Michigan Capitol on April 30th of last year. A number of Boogaloos present at the protest, which ended with heavily armed protesters entering the building in a scene that mirrors the later attack on the U.S. Capitol Building on January 6th, were later arrested and accused of being part of a plot to kidnap the state’s governor, Gretchen Whitmer.

Despite everything we now know about this group, all of it on the public record, one Youtube commentator with over 800,000 subscribers gave a boost to the group by first uncritically reporting on a recent speech made by Magnus Panvidya at the Michigan State Capitol calling on BLM and antifa to join with the Boogaloos and rightwing militias to fight government overreach, including pandemic related lockdowns and then having him on his stream for a long interview.

This isn’t just about a few commentators growing their audiences by appealing to elements of the right, it’s about larger efforts to reframe the far right through populism as ideologically on the side of working people. It also allows the Boogaloo movement to draw new recruits from the left where they are desperately needed in this time of crisis.

Rather than relying on talk of a second American revolution or a civil war to deal with the very real struggles facing working people, the American left should look to workers like those at the Hunt’s Point Produce Market who won the largest concessions from ownership in decades through a week long labor action and those inspiring progressive politicians like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez who raised their voices in support of them.

This kind of action is how a united left brings change.

Germany: 1,200 right-wing extremists licensed to own weapons

Germany's domestic intelligence agency has revealed that more than 1,200 far-right extremists have a firearms licence. Authorities also reported that extremists attended shooting practices, mostly outside Germany.


Hundreds of Reichsbürger are among the known weapons owners in Germany

While monitoring known and presumed far-right extremists, Germany's BfV domestic intelligence agency discovered last December that 1,203 of them were licensed to possess firearms.

And, according to December 2019 data also released by the Interior Ministry, 528 license-holders were the so-called Reichsbürger — members of a right-wing organization which rejects Germany's democratic order.

Furthermore, 17 cases of single or multiple-series shooting practices attended by far-right extremists between early 2019 and late 2020 had "become known" to the BfV, three-quarters of them taking place in other parts of Europe.

Shooting range usage was in itself is "not a criminal offense," the ministry added, citing Germany's federal police.

Replying to a set of questions in parliament submitted by the opposition Left party, the ministry said a conclusive BfV count of rightist extremists with gun licenses in 2019 was not yet available. 

'Growing threat posed by neo-Nazis and racists'

During gun law debate in the Bundestag parliament in December 2019, the Left's interior affairs specialist Martina Renner gave an estimate that over 700 "neo-Nazis" still had weapons.

Speaking in the Bundestag in December 2019, Martina Renner urged changes to Germany's gun laws

In a special report last September, the BfV agency estimated that 13,000 violence-prone right-wing extremists were living in Germany. The agency also cited a "pronounced affinity" for weapons among the so-called "New Right."

Germany has two forms of licensing: one for hunters and sports shooters, and another one for people like bodyguards who need to be specially licensed to carry weapons in public. Recent law changes were intended to tighten ownership control for the previous group.

Renner, who has also been a Left appointee at past parliamentary commissions of inquiry into acts of terrorism, said Tuesday the latest data "proves the growing threat posed by neo-Nazis and racists."

"As expected, the involvement of the [BfV] intelligence service has not proven to be an effective measure against the arming of the right-wing scene," said Renner, who has personally faced far-right threats.
Far-right murders

In their parliamentary question submitted in December, Renner and other Left members had also asked for information on the use of weapons, both legal and illegal, in 2019 and 2020.

Germany's federal police recorded 176 acts of violence in 2019, replied the ministry, noting foremost the murder in 2019 of Kassel district administrator Walter Lübcke. The case resulted in the lifelong prison sentence for neo-Nazi Stephan Ernst — and a far shorter sentence for Markus H.*, for illegally possessing a handgun.

Both men had trained with handguns and long-barreled arms on shooting ranges of two clubs near Kassel, the ministry noted in its reply to parliament.

The perpetrator of last year's racist shooting in Hanau, Tobias R.*, had on three occasions in 2019 visited shooting ranges in Slovakia, the ministry added.

Twice he was refused admittance. On the third occasion he trained on his own, it said.

The 43-year-old German went on to murder nine people in Hanau last February, before killing his mother and himself.

A street mural in Frankfurt remembers three of the Hanau victims with the phrase 'Never forget'

Danger to asylum-seekers?

The authorities also replied to a question regarding the use of weapons in the proximity of hostels for asylum-seekers. The Interior Ministry listed 24 incidents of far-right "politically motivated crime" in 2019 — largely involving the use of air and gas-propelled guns and warning pistols.

Last year, seven such incidents were recorded, it said, in the nationwide LAPOS registry in which the affected category of "asylum-seekers/refugees" was added in 2019.

"A distinction between 'legal' and 'illegal' weapons is not possible on the basis of LAPOS," conceded thr ministry.

*DW has refrained from publishing certain last names in accordance with Germany's privacy laws.

ipj/dj (dpa, epd)

Opinion: No more illusions in Myanmar

Myanmar's military has staged a coup and detained civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi. The country's democratic experiment has failed, says Rodion Ebbighausen.



Many initially wondered how much power Myanmar's military would really be willing to cede, now we know

When Myanmar's military began withdrawing from civilian politics in 2011, one question was front and center — how much power would the military give up?

The skeptics didn't trust the generals, and only saw a military dictatorship in the guise of a democracy. Optimists, however, saw a genuine new beginning and opportunities for democratization.

Progress at first

Initially, positive signs prevailed. The military, led by Thein Sein, the former general and reformist president, got serious about opening up the country. Aung San Suu Kyi was released from house arrest, as were many imprisoned National League for Democracy (NLD) politicians. Restrictions on press freedom were also eased.

When the NLD won a landslide victory in the country's 2015 parliamentary elections, the military and its Union Solidarity and Development Party accepted defeat. There wasn't much risk involved in the move: According to the constitution, the military controls a quarter of all parliamentary seats as well as the ministries of defense, border security and the interior. Still, there were signs that the military was willing to compromise.

Watch video 02:16 How can the intl. community respond?

Electoral triumph, then setbacks

Legitimized in the 2015 elections, the NLD outmaneuvered the military and succeeded in making Aung San Suu Kyi a state counselor, a kind of prime minister in a position not provided for in the constitution.

The architect of this move, a lawyer by the name of Ko Ni and a vocal critic of the military, was shot dead in the street in front of the Yangon airport soon after. The perpetrator was caught, but the masterminds behind the attack were never identified. But it seemed that the military was sending a message to the NLD: Do not challenge us. The military, which sees itself as the guarantor of the country's stability and unity, did not want to accept that someone else would determine the rules of the game.

The NLD, however, continued to focus on confrontation. Rather than tackling reforms that would have benefited the population, it invested much energy focusing on unpromising constitutional changes — which were hindered by the military with the help of a blocking minority guaranteed by the constitution.

The relationship between Suu Kyi and armed forces commander-in-chief Min Aung Hlaing deteriorated visibly. Suu Kyi's controversial appearance before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague, where she defended the country against accusations of genocide against ethnic Rohingya — which was also a defense of the military — did nothing to change that fact.


AUNG SAN SUU KYI: FROM FREEDOM FIGHTER TO PARIAH
Darling of democracy



Aung San Suu Kyi, the daughter of Myanmar's assassinated founding father Aung San, returned to her home country in the late 1980s after studying and starting a family in England. She became a key figure in the 1988 uprisings against the country's military dictatorship. Her National League for Democracy (NLD) was victorious in 1990 elections, but the government refused to honor the vote.

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Elections were a turning point

In another landslide victory, Suu Kyi and the NLD won 83% of the vote in Myanmar's November 2020 elections. This time, the military disputed the results and argued the election was rigged. An election commission installed by the civilian government rejected the accusations. A lawsuit filed by the military before the Supreme Court of Myanmar is still pending.

Now, the military has staged a coup and wants to take the reins of government for a year in order to reform, among other things, the electoral commission. Article 417 of the constitution justifies the coup, allowing the military to take power if a state of emergency threatens the sovereignty or unity of the country. The military considers itself to be in the right. However, the coup amounts to the improbable principle of the military having to abolish democracy in order to save it.

And so, how much power is the military ultimately willing to give up? The unmistakable answer: none.

This article has been translated from German by Dagmar Breitenbach.

#BLM  #BLMEU

Belgium staggers toward decolonization

Months after Belgium's Black Lives Matter protests, the country's reckoning with its past has come under scrutiny. But some Belgian activists feel that tackling race and colonialism-related issues needs a bigger push.


Despite widespread protests like this one in June 2020, Belgium has been slow to address its colonial past

Ibrahima, a 23-year-old Black Belgian man, died in police custody in Brussels on January 9. Riots broke out a few days later.

Angry citizens clashed with police officers and even attacked the Belgian king's car with the monarch inside.

Local media reported around 150 arrests related to the night's incidents.

TOPPLED MONUMENTS: A SELECTION OF CONTROVERSIAL FIGURES
Edward Colston: slave trader and philanthropist
Controversy over the statue of Edward Colston in Bristol was rife for years. On June 7, demonstrators removed the bronze from its pedestal and tossed it into the water. While Colston was working for the Royal African Society, an estimated 84,000 Africans were transported for enslavement; 19,000 of them died along the way. But he went down in history as a benefactor for his donations to charities. PHOTOS 1234567

Fearing the unrest would continue, Brussels' security forces were placed on high alert throughout January.

Cruel history

A few months earlier, Belgium had revived efforts to reckon with its colonial past, following the global Black Lives Matter protests.

Belgian authorities made a number of decisions aimed at tackling the country's long-standing race-related issues: the history of cruel colonialism and the present systemic racism that continues to affect its Black citizens. 

Belgium’s economy was immeasurably improved by the takeover of Congo, starting in the late 19th century. Leopold II ruled the land as his personal fiefdom, looting ivory and rubber,
and murdering millions.

Still, a 2020 survey showed that half of Belgians thought colonialism did more good than harm in Congo. 

Watch video 02:11 The real history of Belgium's King Leopold II

Reconciling the past

The unrest that followed Ibrahima's death showed that Belgian authorities have yet to gain society's trust on the issue of combating racism and addressing its historical causes.

Weary of the elite's reluctance to push for fundamental changes, local activists and diaspora groups have taken it upon themselves to do so.

Last summer, after widespread anti-racist and decolonization protests in Belgium, the country's federal parliament set up a commission to study its colonial past.

In July, King Philippe sent a letter to the president of the Democratic Republic of Congo expressing his ''deepest regrets'' for the ''acts of violence'' committed by Belgium, and linked that to racism today.

Having rejected the calls for a long time, Flemish schools finally announced that lessons in colonialism, neo-colonialism and decolonization will be included in their school curricula. 

For many, the small steps Belgium took were necessary, yet insufficient to bring about fundamental changes.  

Activists gather in Brussels to commemorate the murder 

ASASSINATION of Patrice Lumumba

One example was the very commission set up to examine Belgium's colonial past.

Once it was launched, criticism rained down: Not one historian or expert of Congolese, Rwandan, or Burundian origins was included. 

But perhaps even more remarkable remains the protracted and unresolved story surrounding the murder of Congo's first democratically elected leader, Patrice Lumumba, one of the challenges Belgium needs to surmount in order to deal with its past and face what it did in Congo.

Statues of Leopold II have been attacked and sabotaged several times

Unresolved case of Lumumba

On a rainy January 13, dozens of people gathered to honor the memory of Patrice Lumumba.

In 1961, the US and Belgian governments plotted his assassination and threw his body into acid after he was killed.

There is a direct link between Belgium's nonchalant attitude toward Lumumba's murder and "the colonial mentality" that continues to prevail in Belgian society to the present day, according to Brända Audima, who heads the Congo department of Intal Solidarity, an NGO working to raise awareness about the ongoing aspects and impacts of colonialism.

"What led to the assassination of Patrice Lumumba was the perception of supremacy — the mentality of 'we are better than you, we can come to your countries, take your resources and kill your leaders,'" Audima said

Watch video 01:53 Patrice Lumumba, uncompromising independence fighter

In September 2020, Belgium agreed to facilitate the repatriation to Congo of the only part of Lumumba's body that was left and had secretly been kept by former police officer Gerard Soete: his tooth.

Sixty years after his assassination, Lumumba's family still seeks justice.

In 2000, the Belgian Parliament established a commission to "determine the exact circumstances of the assassination of Patrice Lumumba and the possible involvement of Belgian politicians."

Still, nobody has been tried yet. Most of those suspected of being involved in Lumumba's death have died of old age.

Etienne Davignon is one of the only remaining suspects. The 88-year-old is chairman of the Brussels' Bozar Museum. 

A collective of Belgian rights groups and cultural and academic figures has released a statement refering to Davignon's presidency as the imposition of a Eurocentric and colonial cultural orientation that leads to a censoring of the truth.

Launching an online petition, the collective has demanded that the authorities replace him with a "person who would allow artists to tell everyone's story, not just those of the ruling classes."

Activists have called on authorities to dismiss Etienne Davignon, the head of Bozar Museum

"It was clear for me that [Davignon] was a collaborator of the powers in place at the time in Belgium," said Christophe Lacroix, Belgian parliamentarian and member of the Committee on Equality and Non-Discrimination.

"This issue has to be addressed at some point," he said.

"We need to take responsibility for that dark period of Belgium's history ... [when] certain members of the Belgian government wanted to keep control of this colony [Congo] even though it had been granted independence," he added.

Brända Audima believes the efforts to even up the past should primarily focus on preventing similar brutalities from happening. "There should be consequences [for colonial crimes]; it is not enough to say what happened was bad," she said.

Audima points out the fact that none of the companies that extracted Congo's resources for decades have agreed to pay reparation yet, despite the fact that historians — and Belgian authorities — have confirmed their engagement in the destabilization of the country and crimes such as violent repression and using forced labor. 

Activists have called for actions that brings substantial change

Glimmers of hope

In Brussels, Lumumba Square — and the small sign there that recounts his story — are among the few monuments that showcase the brutality of Belgium's colonial rule in Africa. The little square that hosts the murdered leader's memorial was named after him only in 2018.

The rest of the city is adorned with statues and memorials meant to glorify Belgium's past. For example, figures of and references to the controversial King Leopold II — whose ruthless conquests in the Congo ultimately killed an estimated 10 million people — are plentiful.

"I remember the extensive investigations into Lumumba's murder ... despite prolonged debates and clamor nothing actually happened," said Dr. Karel Arnaut from the University of Leuven.

"That makes people skeptical about the decisions that the authorities make."

For Arnaut, who teaches and researches interculturalism, migration and minorities, the picture is not all grim, however.

"What we can see these days in Belgium is the emergence of plenty of local and grassroots initiatives aimed at combating the legacies of colonialism," Arnaut said.

He sees a renewed wave of intellectual struggle organized by researchers in Belgian universities.

These researchers intend to bring to light what has been left out of the official history of colonialism so far. "In addition to them, there are young and vibrant African diaspora groups who have recognized sustained activism as the only way to claim their rights," Arnaut said.

Just last month, Ghent City Council positively responded to an initiative that called for renaming Leopold II Street. The Belgian tourist hotspot had already gotten rid of a Leopold II statue following a local campaign.

"This keeps me hopeful," Arnaut said.

VIDEO Belgian letter of 'regret' to DR Congo 15 min

SOFT POWER; ONCE USED BY USA

Opinion: China uses coronavirus vaccine to expand influence

COVID-19 vaccines are scarce in Europe, and China is using that to its advantage. There's no misunderstanding the effect of sending

 1 million doses to Serbia, writes DW's Miodrag Soric.

Serbia's health minister let the media watch him get a shot of China's Sinovac vaccine

For autocrats, the best truths are the truths they invent themselves. When the coronavirus hit Europe early last year, Serbia's president, Alexander Vucic, was quick to play it down. Then when he discovered that the situation was actually dangerous, he initiated a lockdown stricter than almost anywhere else in Europe. He declared victory over the coronavirus a few months later, which coincidentally was just ahead of the country's upcoming parliamentary elections. Go figure.

The Serbian president has once again taken up the fight against COVID-19, and the country's government-friendly media is making sure that everyone knows it. They're also reminding everyone that Serbia is doing better than the rest of Europe — all thanks to Vucic's wise leadership!

The protector of the people

If the pandemic weren't so serious —deadly serious, in fact — it would actually be funny to watch all of the missteps and made-up figures the government has issued. A walk through the Serbian capital almost gives one the impression that everything is just fine, that COVID-19 sidestepped Serbia on its way elsewhere. Cafes and restaurants are open for business. People continue to crowd into local shopping malls. Most of them seem to have forgotten their masks. And those wearing them are doing so incorrectly, with their noses fully exposed.

Serbia looks east to fill coronavirus vaccine shortage

The million-dose shipment from China and promises of more vaccines from Russia have bolstered the spirits of many in Serbia. This sentiment hasn't been lost on the Serb leader himself, who's been quick to tell anyone and everyone about his COVID-related accomplishments.

He continues to portray himself as the protector of the Serbian people, a selfless civil servant working around the clock to secure as much of the needed vaccines as possible.

But his tone and style in front of the cameras are factually wrong, not to mention highly inappropriate. He talks about a "war" among countries to stockpile doses of the coronavirus vaccines. In doing so, his goal seems to be to portray himself as the hero of the people.

Some leaders are just plain narcissists who do what they do to feed their egos. It becomes embarrassing when they, in the process, look down on other countries as if they were somehow better.

Serbia has no reason to boast or put itself on a pedestal considering the fact that its health system is in utter disarray, with many holding the president as primarily responsible. As far as Belgrade's official coronavirus statistics are concerned, there's no one willing to put any faith in those numbers.

European solidarity?

The Russian and Chinese vaccines do not have regulatory approval in Western countries. And that's why the difficulties the EU and Washington are that much harder to take. These delays will cost lives, and governments across Europe are under pressure to deliver for their citizens.

Yet, that cannot be allowed to happen at the expense of others within the EU. Solidarity within the bloc is non-negotiable. Germany, as the richest and biggest member of the EU, won't move to the head of the line if doing so comes at the expense of smaller EU countries.

Serbia isn't a member of the EU, but together with other western-Balkan countries it has received millions from Brussels to fight the pandemic. That's a fact that Belgrade often happily ignores.

One would have to be shockingly naive to think that the vaccines from China come with no strings attached, that they are only sent for humanitarian reasons or as an apology from the country where the pandemic is thought to have started.

China is a country that thinks long-term. While it has had difficulties buying its way into companies in Germany, Britain and the United States, it can do so much more easily and cheaply in places like Serbia or Hungary. In doing so, those countries become both economically and politically dependent on China -- as has been the case in Latin America and Africa in the recent past.

The West's strategic mistake

The fact that the West is sitting around and allowing this to happen is an error that can and must be criticized. The communist government's standing in the region is on the rise for all to see. By delivering vaccines, it's not only promising help but also providing it in a very practical way.

It would be a great strategic mistake if the West were to allow Russia and China to increase their influence in the western Balkans. At the very least, the EU should support Montenegro'sefforts to join the bloc. The people there have already overthrown parts of the country's communist past.

If the goal is showing the promoting democracy pays off, then Montenegro is a place where the EU can make that point for the region.

THAT ONLY THE US HAS

The Government Wants To Protect Troops From Microwave Weapons, Which Trump Officials Considered Using On Immigrants

A December request for contract proposals calls microwave weapons “a growing threat on the battlefield.”

Dan Vergano BuzzFeed News Reporter
Posted on February 2, 2021,

Barcroft Media / Getty Images
Soldiers line up during military drills of the Special Operations Forces (SOF) of the Ukrainian Armed Forces and the US Army Europe.

After being dismissed for decades, microwave weapons are beginning to be viewed as a serious military threat — prompting the Defense Department to issue a request to outfit US soldiers with detectors for what it called “a growing threat on the battlefield.”

The weapons, some of which cause burning sensations, have already been considered for use on US soil. In June, a federal police officer had requested a truck-sized microwave heat ray to disperse Black Lives Matter protests. The Trump administration considered using that same device against asylum seekers in 2018.

Now, the Defense Department wants US soldiers outfitted with microwave weapon detectors. That was laid out in a Dec. 9 contract solicitation for “a low cost, low weight, small size wearable radio frequency (RF) weapon exposure detector,” specifying high-frequency microwaves, that came from the Defense Department’s Defense Health Program.

The Defense Department’s interest in detecting microwave weapons comes as Israel, China, and Russia are reportedly inventing their own versions of a microwave heat ray “Active Denial System” that the US pioneered two decades ago. The US continues to develop the technology: An Air Force Research Laboratory is rolling out a “counter-swarm electromagnetic weapon,” called THOR, to fry drones in mid-flight. A Navy microwave weapon prototype mounted on a standard gun mount was unveiled in 2018. The need to disable drones became more real with the autumn war between Azerbaijan and Armenia, which the former won with fleets of drones decimating the latter’s defenses.

Then, in December, a new report suggested these weapons could cause neurological injuries. The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine’s criticized report suggested the weapons were the “most plausible” explanation for puzzling neurological injuries seen in at least 15 diplomatic personnel and their families in Cuba in 2016 and 2017.

“Without known patterns of [radiofrequency] injury to guide diagnosis, it will be difficult to differentiate [microwave] injury from other common sources of illness and injury such as heat stroke,” says the defense agency’s microwave weapon detector program request, which closes in about two weeks. “This ambiguous symptomology is aggravated by the transient nature of RF energy. Without a sensor it is possible that no residual evidence of RF attack will be available.”

The Defense Department declined to comment on the detector contract. However, experts contacted by BuzzFeed News suggested that the burgeoning military interest in microwave weapons might spring from the advent of drone-zapping weapons and the NASEM report. The technology, they added, is noteworthy as a new battlefield concern in the 21st century.

“I suppose that although the US has never deployed these weapons in a theatre of war, there’s a fear that other actors will,” Andrew Wood of the Australian Centre for Electromagnetic Bioeffects Research said by email. They can easily be concealed behind cloth screens, he added, so US military personnel experiencing burning sensations, for example, might need a detector to tell if someone else is pointing a microwave weapon at them.

The contract’s demand for a wearable sensor that can fit into a rifle magazine pouch and can be clipped to a vest also points to concerns about accidental exposure to microwaves by military test site workers, environmental epidemiologist Marloes Eeftens of the Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute told BuzzFeed News by email.

Despite the burning sensation one might feel when they are in the beam of a “heat-ray-like” weapon, Eeftens warned that it would be hard to determine whether a concentrated microwave field was to blame. “You will come out with no marks, so it's difficult to objectively determine if and how much someone was really exposed to,” she said.

There are detectors for other kinds of radiofrequency waves than the microwaves described in the Department of Defense’s contract solicitation, Paul Elliot of Magnetic Sciences Inc. in Acton, Massachusetts, told BuzzFeed News. They are usually intended for people who work with electronics.

“The things we sell are the size of bricks, or at least half a brick,” he said. “You wouldn’t wear one.”

While high-temperature-inducing microwaves, like the ones found in ovens, can cook food and cause burns, the question of whether neurological health effects can result from less powerful ones has long lacked evidence and has been subject to the kinds of conspiracy theories seen today about 5G cellphones.

US Air Force experiments set limits on human microwave exposures in the 1970s during studies of electromagnetic pulses seen from nuclear explosions. Those standards have widely been adopted since, but a 2018 NATO technical report called those limits scientifically unjustified, saying they weren’t backed by any experiments showing injuries. A report by French researchers last year that low-power pulsed microwaves were associated with cancer and behavior changes in rats raised the health effects question once more, especially with systems such as THOR now contemplated for field use against drones.

“I don't expect major safety problems for people in the beams, but on the other hand, the amount of research on bioeffects from such pulses is limited,” bioengineer Ken Foster, of the University of Pennsylvania, said. “If the military is going to field these weapons, they jolly well better do good safety studies.”

MORE ON THIS

Medical Records Can’t Explain “Havana Syndrome,” A Buried CDC Report Says

Dan Vergano · Jan. 15, 2021

Dan Vergano is a science reporter for BuzzFeed News and is based in Washington, DC.

A Whistleblower Alleges A Top Trump Official Signed A Last-Minute Agreement With ICE’s Union That Could Hamstring Biden’s Immigration Policies

The agreement could give the union “unprecedented veto authority in many areas," the group representing the whistleblower wrote in a letter to Congress.

Hamed AleazizBuzzFeed News Reporter
Posted on February 1, 2021,

Tom Williams / AP
Ken Cuccinelli during a Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee hearing on Sept. 24, 2020


A whistleblower alleged Monday that a top Trump administration official abused his authority by entering into a series of last-minute agreements with the union for Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers that could hamstring President Joe Biden’s sweeping policy changes.

The letter released by the Government Accountability Project, which was sent to congressional committees and the Department of Homeland Security's inspector general, alleges that Ken Cuccinelli, the department's former acting second-in-command, signed a set of agreements with the ICE union, which endorsed former president Donald Trump in 2016 and 2020.

“The agreements grant [the union] extraordinary power and benefits — far more than what DHS agreed upon with its other employee unions which did not endorse President Trump. The agreements confer on the union the ability to indefinitely delay changes to immigration enforcement policies and practices as well,” the letter, written by David Seide, an attorney with the Government Accountability Project, states. “Moreover, under the agreements, ICE expressly waives statutory management rights which negotiating parties know better than to waive. Even more shockingly, the agreements attempt to prohibit any challenge to their validity for eight years.”

According to the Government Accountability Project, the agreement could give the ICE union “unprecedented veto authority in many areas” and increase the use of agency resources. The letter was first reported by the New York Times.

The group says it is representing the whistleblower, who is a current government official and “possesses information concerning significant acts of misconduct committed” by Cuccinelli.

The controversial former acting deputy secretary also signed a series of agreements that required DHS to provide notice of immigration policy changes to local jurisdictions to give them six months to review and submit comments. The state of Texas, which signed one of the agreements, eventually sued DHS over its implementation of a deportation moratorium, claiming it violated the contract.

The letter states that the government has 30 days to officially disapprove of the union agreement.

A representative for the union did not immediately return a request for comment.

Cuccinelli told the New York Times that the agreement "is entirely legal and appropriate, or we wouldn’t have executed it.”

“I absolutely deny any mismanagement, waste of government funds and any misuse of authority,” he said.

In its first week, the Biden administration issued new priorities for ICE officers as of Feb. 1, including that they should focus on immigrants who have been deemed a national security threat, were arrested at the border after Nov. 1, 2020, or have been convicted of an aggravated felony.

“This abuse of authority is shocking,” the whistleblower letter concludes. “When the evidence is collected — the agreements’ last second timing, their out-sized conveyance of power and benefits, their purported invulnerability and Mr. Cuccinelli’s extraordinary involvement — it is clear that they are another example of the prior administration’s effort in its waning hours to cement a legacy at taxpayer expense. We urge you to investigate immediately and promptly act as you deem warranted.”


MORE ON THIS
The DHS Has Signed Unusual Agreements With States That Could Hamper Biden’s Future Immigration Policies  Hamed Aleaziz · Jan. 15, 2021

Trump Had A Mandate To Target All Undocumented Immigrants For Arrest. ICE Has A New Plan To Change That.  Hamed Aleaziz · Jan. 27, 2021

Trump Announced He Withdrew The Nomination Of Chad Wolf To Run DHS After He'd Criticized The Capitol Riot  Hamed Aleaziz · Jan. 7, 2021

Hamed Aleaziz is a reporter for BuzzFeed News and is based in San Francisco.

Records Pried Loose By BuzzFeed News Have Prompted A Demand For The Investigation Of Former Trump Health Officials

Under Trump, health officials sought to control the message and limit interactions with the media as the pandemic raged through America, raising questions about violations of anti-gag rules.

Jason Leopold BuzzFeed News Reporter

Posted on February 2, 2021

Getty Image   Michael Caputo

Citing documents obtained by BuzzFeed News, two independent government watchdog groups are calling for an investigation into whether a top health official in the Trump administration violated federal anti-gag laws in trying to silence members of the CDC and the Department of Health and Human Services.

BuzzFeed News has reported that Michael Caputo, a controversial Republican operative handpicked last year by then-president Donald Trump to control messaging around the coronavirus pandemic, lambasted CDC and HHS personnel for discussing COVID-19 response plans with reporters and demanded to know how an interview conducted with an HHS official was approved.

In addition, Caputo’s science adviser at the time, Paul Alexander, sent a lengthy email last August to Caputo, former CDC director Robert Redfield, and other health officials encouraging them to suppress and edit the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. “CDC to me appears to be writing hit pieces on the administration and meant at this time to impact school re-openings and they then send it to the media knowing it is deceiving. I ask it to be stopped now!” Alexander wrote in the email, which was first obtained by Politico.

On Tuesday, the two watchdog groups — Open the Government and the Government Accountability Project — sent a letter requesting action from the Office of Special Counsel, a federal agency that protects government employee rights. The groups argued that Caputo’s and Alexander’s edicts were aimed at stifling HHS and CDC employees’ free speech rights and violated the anti-gag provision in the 2012 federal Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act, which states that any restriction on employees' speech has to be accompanied by language informing them of their rights to blow the whistle.

“Separate Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests by BuzzFeed News and our organizations recently returned records evidencing these violations in primary documents, including email correspondence and agency communication policies,” the letter to Henry Kerner, head of the Office of Special Counsel, states

Referencing protections for federal workers and the dire consequences of a deadly pandemic, the letter says: “The alarming violations of these rights by HHS leadership require a strong response. Otherwise, a workforce chilled from disclosing substantial and specific threats to public health and safety may never thaw. This chilling effect can be especially deadly during a historic health emergency.”

Because Caputo and Alexander have left the government, they can't face any repercussions. The Office of Special Counsel could still order HHS to rescind the orders Caputo issued and remind employees of their whistleblower rights, the watchdog groups said.

The groups have previously been successful in getting the Office of Special Counsel to probe similar incidents aimed at silencing federal employees at the CDC and the US Citizenship and Immigration Services.

Lisa Rosenberg, executive director of Open the Government, told BuzzFeed News in a statement: “It is unconscionable that the public's right to information is hampered at a time when the need for accurate and timely scientific data could not be more urgent.”

“These revelations underscore the need for more transparency at HHS and for the Biden Administration to repeal autocratic gag orders,” she said.







HHS / via FOIA



Mark Weber, who succeeded Caputo, told BuzzFeed News that HHS issued a new media policy this month that appears to unwind restrictions Caputo implemented. In response to questions from BuzzFeed News about Caputo and whether he ran afoul of the anti-gag law, Weber quoted the new media guidance, which says:

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“HHS is committed to a culture of openness with the media and public that values the free exchange of ideas, data, and information and doing so in a manner that is timely, responsive, and accurate. In keeping with the desire for a culture of openness, HHS employees may, consistent with this policy, speak to members of the press about their work.”

Caputo, who was also a campaign aide to Trump during his 2016 presidential bid and is a close confidant of political strategist Roger Stone, was tapped by Trump last April as assistant secretary of public affairs at HHS. Soon after, Caputo hired Alexander, a Canadian health researcher. The two have been accused of politicizing the agency and undermining the work of scientists; more than 100 pages of emails obtained by BuzzFeed News highlighted some of those actions.

The letter cites Caputo’s reaction to reporting last summer by CNN senior medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen, who sent an email to Caputo trying to confirm that HHS’s vaccine initiative, dubbed Operation Warp Speed, was “working on a vaccine education campaign for the public to increase the chances that people will get the COVID vaccine when it comes out.”

Caputo, the watchdogs’ letter says, “sought to squash the story,” suggesting to Cohen her source was wrong and “does not have actual visibility of the issue.”

“I’d hate to see CNN put out an [sic] wildly incorrect story,” he wrote.

Cohen responded saying her sources were Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and Kristen Nordlund, a CDC spokesperson. Caputo then fired off an angry email to then–CDC director Robert Redfield, Nordlund, and other HHS and CDC officials.



HHS / via FOIA



A month later, in July, Caputo sent an email to Nina Witkofsky, then the acting chief of staff at the CDC, and other HHS and CDC officials stating that “according to longstanding policy, no media interviews are permitted” without HHS clearance. “No exceptions.”

The next day Caputo sent an email to Redfield, Witkofsky, and other CDC officials demanding to know the name of the press officer who approved three NPR interviews.


HHS / via FOIA



“I need to know who did it and we will look into the matter,” Caputo wrote.

Irvin McCullough, the deputy director for legislation with the Government Accountability Project and one of the signers of the letter calling for an investigation, told BuzzFeed News Caputo’s emails are a textbook example of illegally gagging a federal employee.

“Someone reading that might get the impression they can't blow the whistle or disclose information to the media during a public health emergency,” said McCullough, who has recently published four op-eds about federal workers rights under the Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act. “It’s a clear-cut violation of an employee’s anti-gag rights.”

Alexander, meanwhile, sent politically charged emails to numerous officials about masks and about allegations of racism at the agency. In one email he asserted that the media has “no concern for lives lost” due to COVID-19.

Neither Caputo nor Alexander could be reached for comment.

Caputo’s tenure at HHS ended on Sept. 16, 2020, a couple of days after he posted a video on his Facebook page accusing CDC scientists of “sedition” and being part of a “resistance unit” that was plotting against Trump. Alexander exited shortly thereafter.


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Jason Leopold is a senior investigative reporter for BuzzFeed News and is based in Los Angeles. He is a 2018 Pulitzer finalist for international reporting, recipient of the IRE 2016 FOI award and a 2016 Newseum Institute National Freedom of Information Hall of Fame inductee