Palestinians mourn Israel's creation amid outcry over funeral raid

AFP - Yesterday 


Palestinians rallied Sunday to mark the "Nakba," or catastrophe, 74 years after Israel's creation, with condemnation spreading over a police raid on the funeral of a slain journalist.


© STAFFMap of Israel and the occupied West Bank

The annual demonstrations across the occupied West Bank, annexed east Jerusalem and inside Israel came with tensions high over the killing of 51-year-old Al Jazeera reporter Shireen Abu Akleh.

The Palestinian-American was shot dead Wednesday during an Israeli raid in Jenin, a West Bank flashpoint. A Palestinian militant wounded in clashes there, Daoud al-Zubaidi, died from his injuries in an Israeli hospital Sunday.

Israeli police have vowed to investigate the chaos that marred the day of Abu Akleh's funeral, after television footage seen worldwide showed pallbearers struggling to stop the casket from toppling to the ground as baton-wielding police descended upon them, grabbing Palestinian flags.

The scenes Friday sparked international condemnation, including from the United States, United Nations and the European Union, with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Sunday calling for a "credible" investigation into Abu Akleh's death as he offered condolences to her family.


© Ahmad GHARABLI

Violence erupts between Israeli security forces and Palestinian mourners carrying the casket of slain Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh on May 13, 2022

Late South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu's foundation said Israeli police "attacking pallbearers" was "chillingly reminiscent of the brutality" seen at the funerals of anti-apartheid activists.


© ABBAS MOMANI

Palestinians wave flags as they march to mark the 74th anniversary of the "Nakba" or "catastrophe", in the occupied West Bank town of Ramallah, on May 15

- 'Unbridled brutality' -

Israeli commentators joined the chorus lambasting the raid as Abu Akleh's coffin emerged a Jerusalem hospital.

In leading Israeli daily Yediot Ahronot, Oded Shalom said the footage "documented a shocking display of unbridled brutality and violence".

"The Jerusalem District Police decided to come down like a tonne of bricks on anyone who dared to hold a Palestinian flag," Shalom wrote.

"As if holding up a flag -- a mere piece of cloth, for God's sake -- at a funeral procession for an hour or two could have had any impact whatsoever" on Israeli claims to control over Jerusalem, he added.


© ABBAS MOMAN

Palestinians march under a huge flag in the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah to mark the "Nakba", or catastrophe of Israel's creation 74 years ago

Israeli police regularly crack down on people holding Palestinian flags.

Thousands of Palestinians streamed through central Ramallah for the main Nakba rally, with crowds also turning out in Gaza City, in the Israeli-blocked strip.

At a student Nakba event at Tel Aviv University (TAU), police said three Arabs were arrested "for attacking demonstrators and police officers."

The arrests followed a confrontation with Im Tirtzu, a right-wing Israeli movement holding a counter rally.

Arab TAU student Aline Nasra said that demonstrators were assaulted by police as they moved to protect one of their members from Im Tirtzu threats.

The right-wing Israelis taunted the Arab students, including with calls that Israel is only for "Jewish people," Nasra said.

- Posthumous report -

Al Jazeera on Sunday posthumously aired a piece produced by Abu Akleh on the Nakba, which marks Israel's 1948 declaration of independence.

A highly respected reporter, she was killed while wearing a helmet and a bulletproof vest marked "Press".

Israel's army said an interim investigation could not determine who fired the fatal bullet, noting that stray Palestinian gunfire or Israeli sniper fire aimed at militants were both possible causes.

The Palestinian public prosecution said an initial probe proved Israeli troops were to blame.

Abu Akleh's posthumously aired piece retraced the fate of the Palestinian people since 1948, with a particular focus on refugees and the displaced.

More than 700,000 Palestinians fled or were forced from their homes during the conflict that surrounded Israel's creation.

One of the latest casualties of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Daoud al-Zubaidi, was the brother of Zakaria, who headed the armed wing of Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas's Fatah movement and briefly escaped from an Israeli prison last year.


© ABBAS MOMANIThis aerial view shows Palestinians marching in a rally to mark the 74th anniversary of the "Nakba" or "catastrophe", in the occupied West Bank town of Ramallah, on May 15

The most recent Israeli fatality was special forces police officer Noam Raz, 46, who was shot Friday in Jenin. He was being buried on Sunday.

bur-jjm/bs/pjm

‘Cold-blooded’ killing and funeral chaos leave West Bank in turmoil

Bethan McKernan and Sufian Taha in Jerusalem 

- Yesterday 
 The Guardian


Nahed Araf Imran and her husband Jamal were exhausted but excited on Wednesday morning: Nahed was in labour with their third child at a local hospital in Nablus, in the north of the occupied West Bank.

But when Jamal’s mother arrived at the hospital crying just before the couple’s daughter was born, he knew something was wrong.

“I asked her what happened and she told me that Shireen Abu Aqleh had been shot dead by the Israelis. Shireen had visited us in our town, Bureen, and covered demonstrations here many times. Everybody knows her,” the 29-year-old construction worker said.

“My mum was heartbroken. I said to myself, when the baby comes, we will call her Shireen, and my wife agreed.”

Shireen Abu Aqleh Jamal Imran came into the world at about noon on Wednesday. At dawn that morning, her namesake, a 51-year-old veteran Al Jazeera journalist, had been shot in the head and killed during an Israel Defence Forces (IDF) raid in the West Bank town of Jenin.

Israeli officials said they believed the dual Palestinian-American citizen had died after being hit by Palestinian fire during an altercation between IDF soldiers and Palestinian gunmen.

But the reporter’s colleagues at the scene said there were no militants near the small group of journalists – all wearing helmets and body armour clearly marked as “press” – when they came under fire from the direction of the Israeli unit. Ali Samodi, an Al Jazeera producer who was shot in the back, told the Observer from his hospital bed that even after Abu Aqleh had fallen to the ground and colleagues tried to reach her, the bullets kept coming. Video of the incident confirms this version of events.

Israel has firmly rejected allegations that its soldiers deliberately targeted the journalists, but the international community is demanding answers in what Al Jazeera, the Qatar-based TV network, has described as an “assassination” carried out “in cold blood”.

Unlike the killings of anonymous Palestinians that occur in the occupied West Bank on a regular basis, Abu Aqleh was a familiar face, broadcasting to millions across the Arab world and well known for her bravery during a 15-year television news career. She was also a US citizen. This time, an Israeli strategy of deflection and denial has backfired.

What is seen by the Palestinians as Israeli obfuscation also threatens to inflame a spate of violence that has surged across Israel and the Palestinian territories since late March.

Gallery: Mourning Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh (dw.com)

1 of 8 Photos in Gallery©AFP

A veteran journalist

Shireen Abu Akleh spent over 25 years working as journalist for Qatar-based news channel Al Jazeera. Abu Akleh, a Palestinian of Christian faith, lived and worked in East Jerusalem. Her coverage mainly focused on the Middle East conflict between Palestinians and Israelis. She often reported from dangerous places but was known for remaining calm and cautious.

A video released by the IDF of what it said were Palestinian militants engaged in a firefight in Jenin on the morning Abu Aqleh was killed has been heavily criticised: human rights group B’Tselem, which visited the two locations, found it was impossible for the shooting in the IDF-distributed video to be the same gunfire that hit Abu Aqleh and Samodi.

And the spectacle of Israeli police storming Abu Aqleh’s funeral procession in Jerusalem on Friday, causing pallbearers to drop her coffin, has added to Palestinian and international outrage.

The public display of Palestinian flags in occupied East Jerusalem is forbidden by the Israeli authorities under any circumstances, but many mourners arrived waving Palestinian banners. The journalist’s casket was also draped in the flag, followed by an orange stretcher bearing a flak jacket marked “press”.


© Provided by The Guardian

Israeli police confront mourners as they carry the casket of Shireen Abu Aqleh on Friday. Photograph: Maya Levin/AP

The EU said it was appalled by the “unnecessary” force used by the Israeli police, while the White House described footage of the scene as “deeply disturbing”.

Israel’s police said the mourners were “disrupting public order” by throwing stones at the heavy police presence, but on Saturdayyesterday said an investigation into the officers’ actions would be launched.

“I was horrified by what I saw on TV from the funeral. I think it shows how Shireen exposed [Israel], she succeeded in that not just in life but in death also,” Imran said. Not letting her funeral proceed with respect … they have publicly exposed themselves for the world to see.”

The battle of narratives sparked by Abu Aqleh’s death is far from over. Palestinian officials have rejected the Israeli offer of a joint investigation, saying “criminals cannot be trusted”, leading Israeli prime minister Naftali Bennett to accuse the Palestinians of denying Israel “access to the basic findings required to get to the truth”.

Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas said during a state memorial for Abu Aqleh in the Palestinian town of Ramallah on Thursday that the case will be referred to the international criminal court, of which Israel is not a member and whose jurisdiction the state disputes.

An interim Israeli army investigation “could not determine” who fired the fatal bullet, an IDF statement said on Friday, while an initial probe by the Palestinian public prosecution found that “the only origin of the shooting was the Israeli occupation forces”.

In the meantime, even more so than during her career, Abu Aqleh’s fame has grown. Outside the reporter’s home in Beit Hanina in East Jerusalem this week, neighbours and friends gathered daily to mourn her death despite a raid on the house on Wednesday by Israeli forces: many have put up pictures of her in their windows. On the quiet street outside, local children gather waving Palestinian flags.

“Shireen was a Christian and we are a Muslim family, but that didn’t matter,” one neighbour said. “She has united us.”

For the thousands of people who have thronged streets across the West Bank and Jerusalem this week in tribute, Abu Aqleh’s life and death has become a potent symbol.

“Shireen’s story is the story of the Palestinian people,” said Imran, the father of newborn Shireen. “She will never be forgotten, especially for our family. Every time we call her name we will remember.”

Croupiers plan to walk off the job at Montreal Casino for the second time in two days

 The Canadian Press


MONTREAL — Croupiers at the Montreal Casino say they will walk off the job once again today following a surprise four-hour strike on Saturday.

Employees stopped working on Saturday afternoon to denounce stalled negotiations over the new collective agreement, which came to an impasse last weekend.

The strike is set to resume today from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m.

The collective agreement that regulates the working conditions of 521 dealers expired on March 31, 2020, with salaries and schedules among the issues at stake.

Union representative Jean-Pierre Proulx said contract talks will resume on Tuesday with a mediator, adding he hopes this weekend's actions demonstrate the need to find a satisfactory deal.

Loto-Québec, which manages the province's casinos, said clients will still be able to access gaming tables during the temporary strike except in the poker room.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 15, 2022.

---

This story was produced with the financial assistance of the Meta and Canadian Press News Fellowship.

Project Moon Woman: Officer with Alberta's Blood Tribe fights human trafficking

STANDOFF, ALBERTA — It took a few years on the job for Const. Jennaye Norris to realize the Blood Tribe in southern Alberta has a human trafficking problem.



Norris, 29, has been with the Blood Tribe Police Service for almost nine years. The sprawling First Nation, also known as Kainai Nation, is the largest in size in Canada.

Located about 200 kilometres south of Calgary, it's home to nearly 13,000 band members who identify as Blackfoot.

Norris said a few years ago while working drug cases she learned about girls and women from the reserve being forced into the sex trade.

"People were starting to give me human trafficking intelligence — we know it's happening," Norris said in an interview.

She found out that people from outside the reserve were travelling there to sell drugs, then taking girls and women into nearby Lethbridge and trafficking them. Other times, women were meeting men at bars in cities across the province and beyond.

The men became their "boyfriends," Norris said. But the women were "actually getting trafficked through the main corridors of Alberta, which is Calgary, Red Deer, Edmonton and then even over to Vancouver."

Norris pitched to the police service the idea of creating a unit to combat human trafficking on the reserve. It was rejected at first but was recently approved by a new police chief.

Norris is now the coordinator, and one and only member, of the force's Project Kokomi-Kisomm Aakii, or Project Moon Woman. Its aim is to investigate human trafficking cases while raising awareness and training front-line officers.

"Indigenous women are more vulnerable to get trafficked," said Norris. "They think the men can give them a better life than what they have and then kind of lure them in that way."

It was important for the project to have a Blackfoot name, she added, so people will feel comfortable helping with the investigations.

"We've been told people from the reserve who have been trafficked just don't feel comfortable going to city police services. It's from the past mistrust of the police."

Norris, who is from Medicine Hat, isn't Indigenous. But she said as a woman she hopes victims will feel they can talk with her.

So far, Norris said, there haven't been any human trafficking charges laid on the reserve.

Staff Sgt. Brad Moore with the Calgary Police Child Abuse Unit said human trafficking is an under-reported crime. The city force had 23 reported human trafficking cases last year, up from 21 in 2020.

"The victims in these crimes sometimes don't even believe they're victims," Moore said.

"Some of them come from very troubled backgrounds, from living arrangements, and where they're going in their minds is sometimes better than where they came from.

"So how do you tell that person who feels better about where they currently are that they're being victimized, human trafficked or exploited? It's a tough sell."

Moore said for those with troubled backgrounds, the trafficker can appear to be heroic.

"Somebody slides in as kind of the Prince Charming, and says, 'Hey, come hang out with me. I'll treat you well and buy you some stuff.' And they treat them very well ... and then all of a sudden it's, 'Hey, all of this isn't for free.'"

Moore said trafficking victims are disproportionately Indigenous.

"A lot of these people come from very marginalized communities. The number of Indigenous folks across the country is four to seven per cent of the population, and they make up about 52 per cent of the people being exploited or trafficked."

On the Stoney Nakoda First Nation west of Calgary, Myrna Teegee said there needs to be more education for young people so they are aware of the risks.

"It's horrendous and it's tragic ... I don't think people understand that it needs to be put out into the schools and to let people know before they get out into the world," said Teegee, a social worker with the Mini Thni Crisis Support Team.

She said it can be a difficult issue to discuss.

"I think most are afraid to speak out because it's a hush, hush topic."

Sgt. Andrea Scott with the Winnipeg police said reports of human trafficking there have been on the rise in recent years, but that might be because the public is more aware of the crime.

"Our counter exploitation unit uses a similar approach as the Blood reserve in terms of education," Scott said.

"Our officers speak at the Salvation Army, Court Diversion Programs for offenders as well as offering education to the hospitality and hotel industry in the city."

Scott agreed getting victims to come forward can be challenging.

"The trauma victims experience can prove painful to revisit continually through the investigation and court process," she said.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 15, 2022.

Bill Graveland, The Canadian Press

Nunavut review board recommends against iron ore mine expansion on Baffin Island

 The Canadian Press

CAMBRIDGE BAY, Nunavut — The Nunavut Impact Review Board is recommending the proposed expansion of an iron ore mine on the northern tip of Baffin Island should not go ahead.

Baffinland Iron Mines Corp. is seeking to expand its Mary River iron ore mine near Pond Inlet by doubling its annual output from six to 12 million tonnes.

The mine, considered one of the world's richest iron deposits, opened in 2015 and ships about six million tonnes of ore a year.

The mine says the expansion would more than double employment at the mine to more than 1,000.

The review board said Friday in a release that there is potential for the proposal to have significant and lasting negative effects on marine mammals, the marine environment, fish, caribou and other wildlife, vegetation and freshwater.

The board said these negative effects could also impact Inuit harvesting, culture, land use and food security.

"The Board has concluded that the proposal as assessed cannot be carried out in a manner that will protect the ecosystemic integrity of the Nunavut Settlement Area and that will protect and promote the existing and future well-being of the residents and communities of the Nunavut Settlement Area, and Canada more generally," the board said.

"As a result, the board has recommended to the Minister that the Phase 2 Development Proposal as assessed should not be permitted to proceed at this time."

Federal Northern Affairs Minister Dan Vandal thanked the board for its work and said the government will review the report and its recommendation.

"I will be taking time to review the report along with federal officials," Vandal said on Twitter. "A decision will be taken following appropriate due diligence and comprehensive analysis, including whether the duty to consult has been met or not."

The mine proposal has faced opposition, including from hunters and trappers in the community closest to the mine.

Inuit hunters said they feared an expansion of the mine could hasten the ongoing decline of a narwhal population that they rely on for food.

In a letter sent last week to the board, the Mittimatalik Hunters and Trappers Organization said the mine is already harming their ability to harvest the important food source.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 13, 2022

Liberal MPs to join fight against Quebec's controversial language bill

Daniel Leblanc - Yesterday 2:00 a.m.
CBC

A number of Montreal-area Liberal MPs will be participating in a protest on Saturday against the Quebec government's plans to reform its Charter of the French language.

While no federal minister is expected to join the march, the presence of Liberal MPs such as Anthony Housefather and Annie Koutrakis points to opposition to Quebec's Bill 96 in the Liberal caucus in Ottawa.

Organized by groups that represent the province's English-speaking minority, Saturday's protest is scheduled to start at Dawson College and end at the Montreal offices of Quebec Premier François Legault.

Liberal MP Francis Scarpaleggia, who represents the western-most riding on Montreal Island, voiced his opposition to Bill 96 in an interview Friday. He added he is "very likely" to take part in the demonstration on Saturday.

"It is not a bill that has consensus. The Quebec Council of Employers has many concerns about its impacts. What I want is a Quebec that is strong, that can move forward, that has a strong economy," he said.

The MP for Brossard-St-Lambert, Alexandra Mendès, said she cannot participate in the protest, but added she supports "most of the demands made by Quebec's anglophone and allophone communities."

Spokespeople for Housefather, who has been in close contact with protest organizers, and Koutrakis confirmed the MPs will be marching against Bill 96. The offices of other MPs who are expected to join the march did not respond to requests for confirmation.
Quebec's 'historic responsibilities'

The minister responsible for the French language in Quebec, Simon Jolin-Barrette, has vigorously defended Bill 96 in the face of criticism from English-speaking groups and Indigenous communities.

His office said the defence of the French language must above all be carried out in Quebec.


© Frederic Bissonnette/Radio-Canada

Simon Jolin-Barrette, the minister responsible for the Charter of the French Language, says there are no plans to exempt Indigenous students from requirements to take courses in French.

"The protection, enhancement and promotion of the French language are historic responsibilities of the government of Quebec that we fully intend to continue to assume," said Jolin-Barrette's press secretary, Élisabeth Gosselin-Bienvenue.

"It is up to the elected representatives of the Quebec nation to debate Bill 96."

Tabled a year ago, Bill 96 would make several changes to the 1977 Charter of the French Language (also known as Bill 101), by strengthening the status of French in "all spheres of society."

In order to ensure that French is "the official and common language of Quebec", the government would impose new obligations related to the use of French in companies with 25 to 49 employees. It would also control access to English colleges, and would regulate interactions in a language other than French between the Quebec government and the province's citizens and businesses.
Open letter

Housefather, who represents the federal riding of Mount Royal, criticized several elements of Bill 96 last year, including the fact that it restricts access to government services in English.

"Suddenly hundreds of thousands of people who considered themselves part of the English-speaking community of Quebec will no longer be eligible to receive certain services from the state in English," he said.

He also criticized the fact that Quebec has preemptively invoked the notwithstanding clause, which will limit the possibility of a legal challenge.

"The idea of insulating a bill from possible legal challenges is profoundly troubling. The public would have no way to find out whether a right has been violated," said Housefather.

Sources said he is also preparing an open letter against Bill 96 that would be published after Quebec's National Assembly has adopted Bill 96. The province's legislature will be on break next week and resume sitting on May 24.

Tour bus operator faces health and safety charges in deadly Icefield crash



Friday
The Canadian Press

JASPER, ALBERTA — A tour bus operator has been charged in a deadly rollover at the Columbia Icefield in Jasper National Park nearly two years ago and more charges could be on the way.

The Alberta government said Friday that Brewster Inc. faces eight charges under the provincial Occupational Health and Safety Act related to use and maintenance of seatbelts, failing to control hazards and failing to ensure equipment was in safe operating condition.

Three people were killed and 14 others had life-threatening injuries after the big-wheel red-and-white Ice Explorer lost control on the road to the Athabasca Glacier, about 100 kilometres southeast of Jasper, Alta., on July 18, 2020.

The bus with 27 people on board rolled about 50 metres down a moraine embankment before coming to rest on its roof.

Tours of the Icefield resumed last year. The tour bus operator said seatbelts had been added to the buses, and changes to driver training and road maintenance have been made.

Pursuit, the company that runs the Icefield bus tours, said in an emailed statement that it can't comment on specifics of the case because of legal proceedings.

"We continue to support a transparent and multi-agency investigation into this tragic accident," it said.

The case is to be in provincial court in Jasper on June 23.

A final RCMP report into the rollover has not been publicly released but was submitted to Alberta prosecutors in April.

The Crown will determine if the evidence warrants any criminal charges.

"The RCMP is aware of the charges that resulted from Alberta Occupational Health and Safety’s separate investigation. The RCMP have shared all requested investigative material gathered during the criminal investigation with the Ministry of Labour and Immigration as required by the Alberta OHS Act," the RCMP said in a release.

"The RCMP’s criminal investigation is independent, separate and parallel to the OHS investigation."

The RCMP said it will provide a further update to victims and families when the outcome of the criminal investigation can be shared.

There have been two civil lawsuits filed on behalf of people on the bus that day. Some plaintiffs have expressed concern about the delay in finding out what happened.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published on May 13, 2022.

Facebook Marketplace, Carousell get lowest anti-scam scores

May 15, 2022

CNA – Facebook Marketplace and Carousell were rated the lowest among six e-commerce platforms for their “critical” anti-scam measures, Singapore’s Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) said yesterday.

Facebook Marketplace and Carousell were awarded one tick and two ticks respectively, while Shopee received three ticks. Amazon, Lazada and Qoo10 were rated the full four ticks.

The e-commerce marketplace transaction safety ratings, a government initiative that was launched yesterday, serve to better inform consumers about the platforms’ anti-scam measures and create a safer online environment, Minister of State for Home Affairs Desmond Tan told reporters. “Essentially, it is a rating system to inform our consumers on what are the measures they have to look out for in transacting online, and when buying goods online,” he said on Friday.

“And at the same time, we also give them the information about the existing e-commerce platforms, and what are the measures they have in place to secure the transactions online.”

Tan chairs the Inter-Ministry Committee on Scams, which rates these platforms based on five measures: Seller identity verification, fraudulent seller behaviour monitoring, secure payment solutions, maintenance of transaction records and user data, as well as reporting and dispute resolution mechanisms.

Consumers can visit this microsite to see how the platforms perform in each measure.

Platforms with all the critical anti-scam measures in place will be awarded four ticks, MHA said, adding that the ratings will be reviewed annually.

Facebook Marketplace, for instance, does not offer secure payment solutions or seller identity verification, while Carousell makes these features optional.

The ratings system, first announced during the police’s annual statistics briefing this year, comes as SGD5.8 million was lost to e-commerce scams in 2021.

The 2,707 e-commerce scam cases reported last year made it the third-most prevalent type of scam, behind phishing scams and job scams.

The ratings system was developed together with the six e-commerce platforms, and covers major platforms with a significant local reach or a significant number of e-commerce scams reported, MHA said.

It does not cover businesses that have their own e-commerce platforms, like Courts or IKEA, as these have been assessed to be less susceptible to scams.

Beyond the ticks, consumers can refer to the microsite for general advisories that elaborate on the five safety features. These advisories will be refreshed every year.

The microsite also has platform-specific advisories, accessible by clicking on the platforms’ logos, that provide details on their safety features and the number of scam reports linked to each platform.

These will be updated every six months to allow the platforms to post more frequent updates on their latest safety features.

Secret British ‘black propaganda’ campaign targeted cold war enemies

An Israeli convoy passes Egyptian prisoners in the Sinai during the six-day war, June 1967. The Information Research Department put out fake Soviet comment on Egypt’s war effort. 

Photograph: Getty Images

Britain stirred up tensions, chaos and violence in Africa, the Middle East and Asia, according to declassified papers

Jason Burke
Sat 14 May 2022 

The British government ran a secret “black propaganda” campaign for decades, targeting Africa, the Middle East and parts of Asia with leaflets and reports from fake sources aimed at destabilising cold war enemies by encouraging racial tensions, sowing chaos, inciting violence and reinforcing anti-communist ideas, newly declassified documents have revealed.

The effort, run from the mid-1950s through to the late 70s by a unit in London that was part of the Foreign Office, was focused on cold war enemies such as the Soviet Union and China, leftwing liberation groups and leaders that the UK saw as threats to its interests


The campaign also sought to mobilise Muslims against Moscow, promoting greater religious conservatism and radical ideas. To appear authentic, documents encouraged hatred of Israel.

Recently declassified British government documents reveal hundreds of extensive and costly operations.

“These releases are among the most important of the past two decades. It’s very clear now that the UK engaged in more black propaganda than historians assume and these efforts were more systemic, ambitious and offensive. Despite official denials, [this] went far beyond merely exposing Soviet disinformation,” said Rory Cormac, an expert in the history of subversion and intelligence who found the material when researching his new book, How to Stage a Coup: And Ten Other Lessons from the World of Secret Statecraft, to be published next month.

The Information Research Department (IRD) was set up by the post-second world war Labour government to counter Soviet propaganda attacks on Britain. Its activities mirrored the CIA’s cold war propaganda operations and the extensive efforts of the USSR and its satellites.

Alec Douglas-Home, who asked the IRD to target Ghana in 1964.

 Photograph: Express/Getty Images

The Observer last year revealed the IRD’s major campaign in Indonesia in 1965 that helped encourage anti-communist massacres which left hundreds of thousands dead. There, the IRD prepared pamphlets purporting to be written by Indonesian patriots, but in fact were created by British propagandists, calling on Indonesians to eliminate the PKI, then the biggest communist party in the non-communist world.

But the thousands of declassified documents studied by Cormac give by far the most extensive insight yet into the IRD’s disinformation operations.

“The British were only one actor among many, and a fairly minor actor too, compared with the quantity of material being produced and disseminated by the bigger players,” said Cormac, professor of international relations at Nottingham University.

“The UK did not simply invent material, as the Soviets systematically did, but they definitely intended to deceive audiences in order to get the message across.”

The IRD employed 360 people at its height in the mid-60s. However, its highly secretive Special Editorial Unit, responsible for the black propaganda effort, was much smaller. From its base in a nondescript office in Westminster, the unit used a variety of tactics to manipulate opinion.

One was to produce “reports” sent to warn other governments, selected journalists and thinktanks about “Soviet subversion” or similar threats.

The reports comprised carefully selected facts and analysis often gleaned from intelligence provided by Britain’s security services, but appeared to come from ostensibly independent analysts and institutions that were in reality set up and run by the IRD. One of the first of these, set up in 1964, was the International Committee for the Investigation of Communist Front Organisations.

Another tactic was to forge statements by official Soviet institutions and agencies. Between 1965 and 1972, the IRD forged at least 11 statements from Novosti, the Soviet state-run news agency. One followed Egypt’s defeat in the 1967 six-day war against Israel and underlined Soviet anger at Egypt’s “waste” of so much of the arms and materiel Moscow had supplied to the country.

The IRD also forged literature purporting to come from the Muslim Brotherhood, a mass Islamist organisation that had a significant following across the Middle East. One pamphlet accused Moscow of encouraging the 1967 war, criticised the quality of Soviet military equipment, and called the Soviets “filthy-tongued atheists” who saw the Egyptians as little more than “peasants who lived all their lives nursing reactionary Islamic superstitions”.

The IRD also created an entirely fictive radical Islamist organisation called the League of Believers, which attacked the Russians as non-believers and blamed Arab defeats on a lack of religious faith, a standard trope among religious conservatives at the time.

“Why is the Arab nation at this time afflicted by so much sorrow and disaster? Why were the brave forces defeated in the jihad by the evil heathen Zionists?… The answers are [easily] to be found … we are departing fast from the right path, we are following the course chosen for us by the communist-atheists for whom religion is a form of social disease,” it read.

Such claims became increasingly widespread in Egypt in the ensuing years, as a resurgence of religion swept the key strategic state.

Nor was the IRD above encouraging opposition to Israel if it made its forgeries more convincing, Cormac told the Observer.

Yemeni fighters belonging to the British protectorate in the south of the country, in the early 1960s. Photograph: Getty Images

A statement released by the IRD in February 1967 also purported to come from the Muslim Brotherhood, and attacked Egypt for using chemical weapons in its battle against a coalition of religious conservatives and tribes in Yemen backed by Britain and Saudi Arabia.

The IRD’s leaflets echoed other claims made by radical Islamists, arguing that military misdeeds should not be blamed on “the atheists or the imperialists or the Zionist Jews” but on “Egyptians who are supposed to be believers”.

“These Egyptian murderers have gone too far in their hypocrisy unpunished, but they can no longer pretend to be believers in God and in His Prophet and in His sacred book,” a leaflet read, asking: “If the Egyptians have to go to war and fight, why don’t they direct their armies against the Jews?”

Cormac said that, as with much of the IRD’s output, the claims made were factually accurate, but the tone and fake source were designed to mislead. The leaflets about Yemen aimed to put pressure on the Egyptian leadership to accept a ceasefire.

Other material highlighted the poor view that Moscow took of the Palestine Liberation Organisation and the limited aid offered by the Soviets to Palestinian armed nationalist groups. This was contrasted with the more supportive stance of the Chinese, in a bid to widen the split between the two communist powers.

One major initiative focused on undermining Ian Smith’s regime in Rhodesia, the former colony that unilaterally declared its independence from the UK in 1965 in an attempt to maintain white minority rule.

The IRD set up a fake group of white Rhodesians who opposed Smith. Its leaflets attacked him for lying, creating “chaos” and crippling the economy. “The whole world is against us … We must call a halt while we can still save our country,” one said.

Attempts to isolate African nationalists sometimes involved incitement of racial tension. In early 1963, the IRD forged a statement from the World Federation of Democratic Youth, a Soviet front organisation, which denounced Africans as uncivilised, “primitive” and morally weak. The forgery received press coverage across the continent, with many newspapers reacting intemperately.

Ian Smith, Rhodesia’s premier, centre, in 1965, another target of IRD’s activities.

 Photograph: Bettmann Archive

A similar forgery in 1966 underlined the “backwardness” and “political immaturity” of Africa. Another, a statement purportedly from Novosti, blamed poor academic results at an international university in Moscow on the quality of the black African students enrolled there. The IRD sent more than 1,000 copies to addresses across the developing world.

Cormac said there is little doubt that senior British policymakers knew about the IRD’s work.

In 1964, the Conservative prime minister, Alec Douglas-Home, told the IRD to target Ghana over fear that its mercurial president, Kwame Nkrumah, was tilting towards Moscow. Months later, the new Labour foreign secretary, Patrick Gordon Walker, encouraged the Foreign Office to maintain a “black propaganda potential and from time to time produce black material”. Walker was particularly interested in fomenting racial tensions between Africans and the Chinese.

As with most such efforts, the impact of the IRD’s campaigns was often difficult to judge. On one occasion, IRD officials were able to report that a newspaper in Zanzibar printed one of their forgeries about Soviet racism, and that the publication prompted an angry response. This was seen as a major achievement. Officials were also pleased when Kenyan press used fake material about the 1967 six-day war, and when newspapers across much of the Islamic world printed a fake Novosti bulletin on the conflict. Occasionally, western newspapers unwittingly used IRD materials, too.

Though the IRD was shut down in 1977, researchers are now finding evidence that similar efforts continued for almost another decade.

“The [new documents] are particularly significant as a precursor to more modern efforts of putting intelligence into the public domain.

“Liz Truss has a ’government information cell’, and defence intelligence sends out daily tweets to ‘pre-but’ Russian plots and gain the upper hand in the information war, but for much of the cold war the UK used far more devious means,” Cormac said.

Demo in Rome against Turkish attacks in Kurdistan

Kurds and their friends continue their protests against the increasingly ongoing attacks of the Turkish state in Kurdistan.


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ANF
ROME
Saturday, 14 May 2022,

Kurdish and Italian youths staged a civil disobedience action in Rome, Italy in protest at the Turkish state’s genocidal attacks in various parts of the Kurdistan territory.

During the demonstration at Fiumicino Airport, the activists also protested against the betrayal of the Iraqi Kurdistan government’s ruling party KDP, which cooperates with Turkey in its invasion operation against guerrilla-held Medya Defense Zones in southern Kurdistan (northern Iraq), ongoing since April 14.







British delegation heads to OPCW with report on Turkey’s use of chemical weapons in Iraqi Kurdistan

A delegation from Britain is heading to the headquarters of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) in The Hague to press for action from the watchdog.

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LONDON
Saturday, 14 May 2022, 09:40

A delegation from Britain is heading to the headquarters of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) in The Hague on Tuesday to press for action from the watchdog.

The delegation has requested an appointment with the OPCW on the afternoon of Tuesday May 17.

Steve Sweeney, who has spent more than a year documenting Turkey’s alleged use of chemical weapons in Iraqi Kurdistan, will launch a report into his findings which includes damning testimonies from Kurdish villagers, medics and security forces.

He will deliver this, along with soil samples, video footage and other evidence, directly to the OPCW which has so far ignored letters, petitions and requests from Kurdish organisations and politicians.

A letter calling for a fact-finding team to be sent to the region as a matter of urgency will be hand-delivered.

Steve will be joined by Margaret Owen OBE, Andi Kocsondi and Melanie Gingell who will also address a rally at a protest event organised by local Kurdish groups at 1pm.

He said: “Turkey is alleged to have used chemical weapons hundreds of times since it launched its illegal invasion codenamed Operation Claw Lightning in April 2021.

“Banned munitions have been used in guerrilla tunnels and also against Kurdish villagers for more than a year, many of whom I met and are clearly suffering the effects of exposure to chemicals months after exposure.

“Medics and peshmerga have also confirmed this to me but have been threatened by both Turkish intelligence and security forces affiliated to the regionally dominant Kurdistan Democratic Party.

“While all eyes are on Ukraine. Nato’s second-largest army is committing war crimes in Iraqi Kurdistan.

“33 years ago the world remained silent and 5,000 Kurds were gassed by Saddam in Halabja.

“Now history is repeating itself once more. The OPCW must investigate as a matter of urgency and the international community must break its silence on the attempted genocide of the Kurds.”

Turkey blasts Swedish, Finnish support for rebels at NATO meeting

Turkey’s foreign minister described Swedish and Finnish support for Kurdish rebels as ‘unacceptable and outrageous’.

Turkey's Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu in Berlin, 

Germany, on Saturday, May 14, 2022 [Michael Sohn/AP]

Published On 14 May 2022

Turkey’s foreign minister has described as “unacceptable and outrageous” the support that prospective new NATO members Sweden and Finland give to the PKK, a Kurdish rebel group designated a “terrorist” organisation by Ankara and its Western allies.

The PKK (Kurdistan Workers’ Party) has waged a rebellion against the Turkish state since 1984 that has claimed the lives of tens of thousands of people, and Ankara’s criticism of Sweden and Finland has potentially complicated plans for NATO’s enlargement.

“The problem is that these two countries are openly supporting and engaging with PKK and YPG [People’s Protection Units],” Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said on Saturday as he arrived in Berlin for a meeting with his NATO counterparts.

“These are terrorist organisations that have been attacking our troops every day,” Cavusoglu said.

“Therefore, it is unacceptable and outrageous that our friends and allies are supporting this terrorist organisation,” he said.

“These are the issues that we need to talk about with our NATO allies, as well as these countries [Sweden and Finland].”

Latvian Foreign Minister Edgar Rinkevics said that NATO will find a “sensible” solution to Finland and Sweden’s acceptance as new members despite Turkish concerns.

“We have had those discussions in the alliance many times before. I think that we have always found sensible solutions, and that we will find one this time also,” he told reporters in Berlin.

“Swedish and Finnish membership is of paramount importance to the whole alliance, and ultimately also to Turkey,” he said.

Al Jazeera’s Step Vaessen, reporting from Berlin, said Sweden and Finland’s application to join NATO is expected in the coming days.

“It’s a big historical moment for both nations who have been neutral for such a long time,” Vaessen said, adding that Russia’s action in Ukraine had “pushed them towards NATO”.

All 30 NATO members must approve their application and the acceptance process is likely to take several months, Vaessen said, explaining that it is during the “so-called grey period”, between application and membership, that is most concerning for both countries. During this period, Sweden and Finland will not have the collective defence protection of NATO’s Article 5, which stipulates that “an attack on one, is an attack on all”, she said.

Negotiations

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s spokesman, Ibrahim Kalin, said earlier on Saturday that Turkey had not shut the door to Sweden and Finland joining NATO, but negotiations are needed with the Nordic countries and a clampdown on what Ankara views as terrorist activities.

Turkey considers YPG, the US-backed Kurdish fighters based in Syria, a “terrorist” organisation. Ankara views YPG as a PKK affiliate.

“We are not closing the door. But we are basically raising this issue as a matter of national security for Turkey,” Kalin, who is also the president’s top foreign policy adviser, told Reuters in an interview in Istanbul.

Kalin said the PKK was fundraising and recruiting in Europe and its presence was “strong and open and acknowledged” in Sweden, in particular.

“What needs to be done is clear: They have to stop allowing PKK outlets, activities, organisations, individuals and other types of presence to … exist in those countries,” he said.

“We will see how things go. But this is the first point that we want to bring to the attention of all the allies, as well as to Swedish authorities,” he added.

Erdogan surprised NATO members and the two Nordic countries by saying on Friday that it was not possible for Turkey to support enlarging the military alliance when Finland and Sweden are “home to many terrorist organisations”.

Any country seeking to join NATO requires the unanimous support of member states. The United States and other member states have been trying to clarify Ankara’s position on Finland and Sweden.

Sweden and its closest military partner, Finland, until now have remained outside NATO, which was founded in 1949 to counter the Soviet Union in the Cold War.

The two countries are wary of antagonising Moscow, but their security concerns have increased since Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24.

‘Mutual point of view’

Turkey, the second-largest military in NATO, has officially supported enlargement since it joined the US-led alliance 70 years ago.

Turkey has criticised Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, helped arm Kyiv, and has tried to facilitate talks between the sides, but has opposed sanctions on Moscow.

Asked whether Turkey risked being too transactional at a time of war, and when Finnish and Swedish public opinion favours NATO membership, Kalin said, “If they [Finland and Sweden] have a public concerned about their own national security, we have a public that is equally concerned about our own security,” he said.

Kalin said Russia’s sharp criticism of Finland and Sweden for their plans to join NATO was not a factor in Turkey’s position.

Russia’s President Vladimir Putin told his Finnish counterpart on Saturday that joining NATO would be “a mistake”.

“Putin stressed that the end of the traditional policy of military neutrality would be a mistake since there is no threat to Finland’s security,” the Kremlin said in a statement on Saturday.