PANW Editor's Note: Gen. Michael Hayden's Senate confirmation hearings for the position of Director of Central Intelligence (CIA) will take place amid new revelations about the massive and secrective National Security Agency (NSA) and Telecommunications industry spy program designed to monitor calling patterns of all people within the United States and beyond. This program represents the longstanding policy of the NSA which keeps track of communications ostensibly for security purposes. However, the real purpose is to channel information throughout the military and intelligence community designed to enhance and consolidate the repressive apparatus of the American government.
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May 12, 2006
Qwest's Refusal of N.S.A. Query Is Explained
By JOHN O'NEIL and ERIC LICHTBLAU
New York Times
WASHINGTON, May 12 — The
telecommunications company Qwest turned down requests by the National Security Agency for private telephone records because it concluded that doing so would violate federal privacy laws, a lawyer for the telephone company's former chief executive said today.
In a statement released this morning, the lawyer said that the former chief executive, Joseph N. Nacchio, made the decision after asking whether "a warrant or other legal process had been secured in support of that request."
Mr. Nacchio learned that no warrant had been granted and that there was a "disinclination on the part of the authorities to use any legal process," said the lawyer, Herbert J. Stern. As a result, the statement said, Mr. Nacchio concluded that "the requests violated the privacy requirements of the Telecommunications Act."
A Qwest spokesman, Robert Toevs, declined to discuss anything to do with security issues or the statement by Mr. Nacchio's lawyer.
Qwest was the only phone company to turn down requests from the security agency for phone records as part of a program to compile a vast database of numbers and other information on virtually all domestic calls. The program's scope was first described in an article published on Thursday by USA Today that led to an outpouring of demands for information from Congressional Republicans and Democrats. The article said that AT&T, BellSouth and Verizon had agreed to provide the information to the security agency.
On Thursday, those companies said they were following the law in protecting customers' privacy but would not discuss details of the report. Separately today Verizon issued a statement saying that it provided customer information to a government agency "only where authorized by law for appropriately-defined and focused purposes."_ The company cited unspecified "factual errors in press coverage,"_ about the way it the company handles customer information in general.
The statements came as Gen. Michael V. Hayden, who was the head of the National Security Agency at the time the program began, continued to seek support today for his nomination as C.I.A. director in meetings with senators on Capitol Hill.
Speaking to reporters with Senator Chuck Hagel, Republican of Nebraska, General Hayden declined to comment on the article about the National Security Agency program.
"Everything that the agency has done has been lawful," he said. "It's been briefed to the appropriate members of Congress."
Mr. Hagel, a member of the Intelligence Committee, which will conduct General Hayden's confirmation hearings, said that General Hayden was "the right choice" for the C.I.A.'s top post.
But he also said he supported plans announced Thursday by Senator Arlen Specter, the Republican chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, to hold separate hearings into the collection of phone records.
Mr. Hagel called that "appropriate."
"I think this issue needs to be clearly aired," he said. "I think people need to have confidence in their government."
Mr. Hagel said the confirmation hearings would certainly involve "tough questions" for General Hayden. Members of Congress have said they want information both about the collection of phone records and about a program of warrantless wiretaps on calls between people in the United States and people overseas suspected of having ties to terrorism.
The White House continued to express its support of General Hayden today and to sidestep questions about the program to collect telephone records.
Tony Snow, the White House press secretary, told reporters that "we're 100 percent behind Michael Hayden."
Mr. Snow also said that the White House was "confident that he is going to comport himself well and answer all the questions and concerns that members of the United States Senate may have in the process of confirmation."
On Tuesday, President Bush responded to an outcry over the article by assuring the country that "we're not mining or trolling through the personal lives of millions of innocent Americans."
One senior government official, who was granted anonymity to speak publicly about the classified program, confirmed that the N.S.A. had access to records of most telephone calls in the United States. But the official said the call records were used for the limited purpose of tracing regular contacts of "known bad guys."
"To perform such traces," the official said, "you'd have to have all the calls or most of them. But you wouldn't be interested in the vast majority of them."
The New York Times first reported in December that the president had authorized the N.S.A. to conduct eavesdropping without warrants.
The Times also reported in December that the agency had gained the cooperation of American telecommunications companies to get access to records of vast amounts of domestic and international phone calls and e-mail messages.
The agency analyzes communications patterns, the report said, and looks for evidence of terrorist activity at home and abroad.
The USA Today article on Thursday went further, saying that the N.S.A. had created an enormous database of all calls made by customers of the three phone companies in an effort to compile a log of "every call ever made" within this country.
Mr. Nacchio's statement today made a point of saying that the N.S.A. requests occurred "at a time when there was no investigation of Qwest or Mr. Nacchio." Mr. Nacchio, who left Qwest in 2002 amid allegations of fraud at the company, was indicted in December on 42 charges of insider selling.
Prosecutors say Mr. Nacchio did not make investors aware of warnings from his managers that the company's revenue and profit forecasts were too optimistic. They say Mr. Nacchio kept this information to himself yet also sold 2.5 million shares of Qwest stock over five months in 2001 that netted $100 million. The case could go to trial later this year.On Thursday, some Republicans, including Representative Peter Hoekstra of Michigan, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, defended the N.S.A.'s activities and denounced the disclosure. Mr. Hoekstra said the report "threatens to undermine our nation's safety."
"Rather than allow our intelligence professionals to maintain a laser focus on the terrorists, we are once again mired in a debate about what our intelligence community may or may not be doing," he said.
But many Democrats and civil liberties advocates said they were disturbed by the report, invoking images of Big Brother and announcing legislation aimed at reining in the N.S.A.'s domestic operations. Fifty-two members of Congress asked the president to name a special counsel to investigate the N.S.A.'s domestic surveillance programs.
Senator Arlen Specter, the Pennsylvania Republican who heads the Judiciary Committee, said the reported data-mining activities raised serious constitutional questions. He said he planned to seek the testimony of telephone company executives.
The House majority leader, John A. Boehner of Ohio, said he wanted more information on the program because "I am not sure why it would be necessary to keep and have that kind of information."
Mr. Bush did not directly confirm or deny the existence of the N.S.A. operation but said that "as a general matter, every time sensitive intelligence is leaked it hurts our ability to defeat this enemy."
Seeking to distinguish call-tracing operations from eavesdropping, the president said that "the government does not listen to domestic phone calls without court approval."
The phone records include numbers called; time, date and direction of calls; and other details, but not the words spoken, telecommunications experts said. Customers' names and addresses are not included in the companies' call records, though they could be cross-referenced to obtain personal data.
The law on data-mining activities is murky, and legal analysts were divided Thursday on the question of whether the N.S.A.'s tracing and analysis of huge streams of American communications data would require the agency to use subpoenas or court warrants.
Kate Martin, director of the Center for National Security Studies, said, "If they don't get a court order, it's a crime." Ms. Martin said that while the F.B.I. might be able to get access to phone collection databases by using an administrative subpoena, her reading of federal law was that the N.S.A. would be banned from doing so without court approval.
But another expert on the law of electronic surveillance, Kenneth C. Bass III, said that if access to the call database was granted in response to a national security letter issued by the government, "it would probably not be illegal, but it would be very troubling."
"The concept of the N.S.A. having near-real-time access to information about every call made in the country is chilling," said Mr. Bass, former counsel for intelligence policy at the Justice Department. He said the phone records program resembled Total Information Awareness, a Pentagon data-mining program shut down by Congress in 2003 after a public outcry.
The N.S.A. refused to discuss the report, but said in a statement that it "takes its legal responsibilities seriously and operates within the law."
AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth all issued statements saying they had followed the law in protecting customers' privacy but would not discuss details of the report.
"AT&T has a long history of vigorously protecting customer privacy," said Selim Bingol, a company spokesman. "We also have an obligation to assist law enforcement and other government agencies responsible for protecting the public welfare."
Mr. Specter said in an interview that he would press for information on the operations of the N.S.A. program to determine its legality.
"I don't think we can really make a judgment on whether warrants would be necessary until we know a lot more about the program," he said.
One central question is whether the N.S.A. uses its analysis of phone call patterns to select people in the United States whose phone calls and e-mail messages are monitored without warrants. The Times has reported that the agency is believed to have eavesdropped on the international communications of about 400 to 500 people at a time within the United States and of thousands of people since the Sept. 11 attacks.
Democrats said they would use the new disclosures to push for more answers from General Hayden at his confirmation hearing, set for May 18.
Senator Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California, predicted "a major Constitutional confrontation on Fourth Amendment guarantees of unreasonable search and seizure" and said the new disclosures presented "a growing impediment to the confirmation of General Hayden."
Scott Shane contributed reporting from Washington for this article.
May 12, 2006
Bush Is Pressed Over New Report on Surveillance
By ERIC LICHTBLAU and SCOTT SHANE
New York Times
WASHINGTON, May 11 — Congressional Republicans and Democrats alike demanded answers from the Bush administration on Thursday about a report that the National Security Agency had collected records of millions of domestic phone calls, even as President Bush assured Americans that their privacy is "fiercely protected."
"We're not mining or trolling through the personal lives of millions of innocent Americans," Mr. Bush said before leaving for a commencement address in Mississippi. "Our efforts are focused on links to Al Qaeda and their known affiliates."
The president sought to defuse a tempest on Capitol Hill over an article in USA Today reporting that AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth had turned over tens of millions of customer phone records to the N.S.A. since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. But Mr. Bush's remarks appeared to do little to mollify members of Congress, as several leading lawmakers said they wanted to hear directly from administration officials and telecommunication executives.
The report rekindled the controversy about domestic spying.
Several lawmakers predicted the new disclosures would complicate confirmation hearings next week for Gen. Michael V. Hayden, formerly the head of the N.S.A., as the president's nominee to lead the Central Intelligence Agency.
One senior government official, who was granted anonymity to speak publicly about the classified program, confirmed that the N.S.A. had access to records of most telephone calls in the United States. But the official said the call records were used for the limited purpose of tracing regular contacts of "known bad guys."
"To perform such traces," the official said, "you'd have to have all the calls or most of them. But you wouldn't be interested in the vast majority of them."
The New York Times first reported in December that the president had authorized the N.S.A. to conduct eavesdropping without warrants.
The Times also reported in December that the agency had gained the cooperation of American
telecommunications companies to get access to records of vast amounts of domestic and international phone calls and e-mail messages.
The agency analyzes communications patterns, the report said, and looks for evidence of terrorist activity at home and abroad.
The USA Today article on Thursday went further, saying that the N.S.A. had created an enormous database of all calls made by customers of the three phone companies in an effort to compile a log of "every call ever made" within this country. The report said one large phone company, Qwest, had refused to cooperate with the N.S.A. because it was uneasy about the legal implications of handing over customer information to the government without warrants.
Some Republicans, including Representative Peter Hoekstra of Michigan, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, defended the N.S.A.'s activities and denounced the disclosure. Mr. Hoekstra said the report "threatens to undermine our nation's safety."
"Rather than allow our intelligence professionals to maintain a laser focus on the terrorists, we are once again mired in a debate about what our intelligence community may or may not be doing," he said.
But many Democrats and civil liberties advocates said they were disturbed by the report, invoking images of Big Brother and announcing legislation aimed at reining in the N.S.A.'s domestic operations. Fifty-two members of Congress asked the president to name a special counsel to investigate the N.S.A.'s domestic surveillance programs.
Senator Arlen Specter, the Pennsylvania Republican who heads the Judiciary Committee, said the reported data-mining activities raised serious constitutional questions. He said he planned to seek the testimony of telephone company executives.
The House majority leader, John A. Boehner of Ohio, said he wanted more information on the program because "I am not sure why it would be necessary to keep and have that kind of information."
Mr. Bush did not directly confirm or deny the existence of the N.S.A. operation but said that "as a general matter every time sensitive intelligence is leaked it hurts our ability to defeat this enemy."
Seeking to distinguish call-tracing operations from eavesdropping, the president said that "the government does not listen to domestic phone calls without court approval."
The phone records include numbers called, time, date and direction of calls and other details but not the words spoken, telecommunications experts said. Customers' names and addresses are not included in the companies' call records, though they could be cross-referenced to obtain personal data.
General Hayden, making rounds at the Capitol to seek support for his confirmation as C.I.A. director, did not discuss the report but defended his former agency. "Everything that N.S.A. does is lawful and very carefully done," General Hayden said.
The law on data-mining activities is murky, and legal analysts were divided Thursday on the question of whether the N.S.A.'s tracing and analysis of huge streams of American communications data would require the agency to use subpoenas or court warrants.
Kate Martin, director of the Center for National Security Studies, said, "If they don't get a court order, it's a crime." She said that while the F.B.I. might be able to get access to phone collection databases by using an administrative subpoena, her reading of federal law was that the N.S.A. would be banned from doing so without court approval.
But another expert on the law of electronic surveillance, Kenneth C. Bass III, said that if access to the call database was granted in response to a national security letter issued by the government, "it would probably not be illegal, but it would be very troubling."
"The concept of the N.S.A. having near-real-time access to information about every call made in the country is chilling," said Mr. Bass, former counsel for intelligence policy at the Justice Department. He said the phone records program resembled Total Information Awareness, a Pentagon data-mining program shut down by Congress in 2003 after a public outcry.
The N.S.A. refused to discuss the report, but said in a statement that it "takes its legal responsibilities seriously and operates within the law."
AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth all issued statements saying they had followed the law in protecting customers' privacy but would not discuss details of the report.
"AT&T has a long history of vigorously protecting customer privacy," said Selim Bingol, a company spokesman. "We also have an obligation to assist law enforcement and other government agencies responsible for protecting the public welfare."
Mr. Specter said in an interview that he would press for information on the operations of the N.S.A. program to determine its legality.
"I don't think we can really make a judgment on whether warrants would be necessary until we know a lot more about the program," he said.
One central question is whether the N.S.A. uses its analysis of phone call patterns to select people in the United States whose phone calls and e-mail messages are monitored without warrants. The Times has reported that the agency is believed to have eavesdropped on the international communications of about 400 to 500 people at a time within the United States and of thousands of people since the Sept. 11 attacks.
Democrats said they would use the new disclosures to push for more answers from General Hayden at his confirmation hearing, set for May 18.
Senator Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California, predicted "a major Constitutional confrontation on Fourth Amendment guarantees of unreasonable search and seizure" and said the new disclosures presented "a growing impediment to the confirmation of General Hayden." Some members of Congress also reacted angrily to the news that the ethics office at the Justice Department had been refused the security clearances necessary to conduct a planned investigation of department lawyers who approved N.S.A.'s eavesdropping.
Mr. Specter called the denial of clearances to the department's own investigators "incomprehensible" and said he and other senators would ask that the clearances be granted to employees of the department's Office of Professional Responsibility.
Ken Belson contributed reporting from New York for this article.
Terrorism & Security
posted May 12, 2006 at 11:20 a.m.
Left and right question NSA spying program
Bush says there is no danger to privacy but many lawmakers want more information.
By Tom Regan
http://www.csmonitor.com
The uproar over the revelation that the National Security Agency (NSA) has been keeping a huge database of almost every phone number called by Americans inside and outside the country, brought a series of strong condemnations from both the left and the right Thursday, in both the media and by politicians. Editor and Publisher reports that editorials at the nation's leading newspapers, both from the left and the right, condemned the program and said what the goverment was doing
"undermines US freedoms and threatens us all."
From the right, the Chicago Tribune editorial page on Friday opined, "This sounds like a vast and unchecked intrusion on privacy. President Bush's assurance Thursday that the privacy of Americans was being 'fiercely protected'
was not at all convincing.....Based on the newspaper's reporting, this effort appears to go far beyond any surveillance effort that would be targeted at terrorist operations.
"At first blush this program carries troubling echoes of Total Information Awareness, a proposed Defense Department
'data-mining' expedition into a mass of personal information on individuals' driver's licenses, passports, credit card purchases, car rentals, medical prescriptions, banking transactions and more. That was curbed by Congress after a public outcry. It seems the people who wanted to bring you TIA didn't get the message."
The Boston Globe said it was time for the president to come clean with the American people, and for politicians to establish legal frameworks for collection of vast amounts of
information about Americans.
The lack of public outrage after the revelation that overseas calls were being tapped without the court warrants required by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act [FISA] suggests that Bush succeeded in persuading most Americans that the bugging was not aimed at them. The newly disclosed practice, however, does include the telephone records of ordinary Americans. Congress, which has so far acquiesced in skirting FISA, should now force the administration to explain this data-mining. If Congress decides it is worthwhile, it must establish a legal framework for it.
The Chicago Tribune reports that the White House reacted defensively to the news about the collection of domestic phone records. President Bush called a hasty news conference where he tried to assure the American people that "the NSA did not randomly invade the privacy of Americans who subscribe to AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth phone services."
"We're not mining or trolling through the personal lives of millions of innocent Americans," Bush said. "Our efforts are focused on links to Al Qaeda and their known affiliates
. . . .As a general matter, every time sensitive intelligence is leaked, it hurts our ability to defeat this enemy."
Bloomberg reports, however, that lawmakers from the left and the right are demanding more information from the White House about the program. They said they would also demand answers about the program from Gen. Michael Hayden, the White House's pick to head the CIA.
At a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing yesterday, Chairman Arlen Specter demanded that executives from the three phone companies testify before Congress about their agreement to turn over customer data. "I am determined to get to the bottom of this," said Specter, a Pennsylvania Republican, who added that he will subpoena the telephone companies if they decline to appear before his committee voluntarily. Specter said the report "does not raise concern in my mind about General Hayden, but I think it underscores the need for judicial review" of the NSA's domestic eavesdropping.
The White House strongly defended Gen. Hayden yesterday, saying "we're full-steam ahead on his nomination." The Associated Press also offers an analysis of what the White House and the NSA might do with the vast amounts of data it is collecting on Americans.
If the National Security Agency (NSA) is indeed amassing a colossal database of Americans' phone records, one way to use all that information is in "social-network analysis," a data-mining method that aims to expose previously invisible connections among people.
Social-network analysis has gained prominence in business and intelligence circles under the belief that it can yield extraordinary insights, such as the fact that people in disparate organizations have common acquaintances.
Companies can buy social-networking software to help determine who has the best connections for a particular sales pitch.
AP also reports that experts say that "who you are calling often says more than what you are saying." And while the NSA has refused to comment, these same experts believe that it's not only landline communications that the NSA is using to do social-network analysis. "Other forms of communication,
including cellphone calls, e-mail and instant messages, likely are trackable targets as well, at least on international networks if not inside the United States."
USAToday, who broke the original story Thursday about the massive datebase, reports Friday that the collection of the data may not violate the Fourth Amendment's privacy guarantees, but it could violate federal surveillance and tgelecommunications laws.
Despite all this, the Washington Post reports that a poll conducted Thursday night shows that a majority of Americans supports the NSA program to collect phone data information, perhaps believing that the dangers of terrorism matter more than personal privacy.
Friday, May 12, 2006
Thursday, May 11, 2006
Bob Marley, Pan-Africanism & The Struggle for World Peace
PANW Editor's Note: The following article was written in commemoration of the 60th birthday of Robert Nesta Marley which was celebrated in Ethiopia in February of 2005. It is being reprinted in memory of the 25th anniversry of the transition of Bob Marley which took place on May 11, 1981.
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Bob Marley, Pan-Africanism and the Struggle for World Peace
60th anniversary celebrations confirm the legacy of the late international poet and superstar
By Abayomi Azikiwe, Editor
Pan-African News Wire
February 6, 2005, represents the 60th anniversary of the birth of the late Robert Nesta Marley who was born in the Caribbean island-nation of Jamaica in 1945.
The year of Marley's birth was also the same as the conclusion of World War II, a period which ushered in the contemporary struggle of Africans and other oppressed peoples to emancipate themselves from the shackles of colonialism, apartheid, institutional racism and minortiy rule.
In October of 1945, the Fifth Pan-African Congress was held in Manchester, England, where activists such as George Padmore of Trinidad, Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana-Africa and W.E.B. Dubois of the United States came together to map out an international campaign aimed at national independence and socialism.
By 1947 Nkrumah was back in Ghana after 12 years as a student and activist in the United States and the UK. Only tens years later, 1957, he stood before the people of Ghana on the eve of their hard won independence and declared that "the independence of Ghana is meaningless unless it is linked with the total independence of the African continent."
At the beginning of the 1960s inside the United States, thousands of African-American students were taking an increasingly militant stance against segregation and the disenfranchisement of their people nearly 100 years after the legal abolition of slavery. This movement, which became known as the struggle for civil rights, influenced not only developments in America, but throughout the world. Those who saw that the sons and daughters of former slaves could effectively take a stand against centuries-old injustice and exploitation knew they could affect change in their own geo-political regions.
Bob Marley emerged from the independence struggles of the
Caribbean during the 1950s and 1960s, where the legacies of Paul Bogle, Marcus Garvey, Amy Jacques-Garvey, C.L.R. James, Fidel Castro and others provided inspiration to a new generation of activists and artists who sought with impatience to rapidly liberate their people from national oppression.
Although Marley never declared himself a politician or prophet, his music was very much reflective of the times. It inspired the people to not only recognize the continuation of the struggle for liberation and social justice but to take up the international call to reverse the social processes of colonialism and neo-colonialism. He adopted the Rastafari faith which emphasized the philosphy of Marcus Garvey and the deification of Haile Selassie I as symbols of the resistance of African peoples to white world supremacy and hegemony.
For a people in the Caribbean who had been stolen from their African homeland during the period of slavery from the 15th to the 19th centuries, to place the identification with Africa and its liberation and unity as the primary ideological point of departure, clearly signalled that the propaganda of the global elites had not totally obliterated the social consciousness and national will of the oppressed.
Bob Marley and the Pan-African Struggle
Marley's identification with Africa through the Rastafari movement coupled with a keen awareness of political developments during the 1960s, served to inspire the character and tone of his music. In addition, the impact of the African-American struggle for civil rights and black power influenced political currents in the Caribbean.
It was in the United States during the 1920s that the Jamaican born Marcus Garvey settled and gained his most significant support and organizational base. Garvey's Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA) recruited millions of members and supporters in the US and played a monumental role in changing the character of the social consciousness during the post World War I period.
The so-called "Harlem Renaissance" of the post World War I period intersected with Garveyism in the quest for cultural awareness among the African people. During the same time period, the activist scholarship of Dr. Carter G. Woodson, the founder of Black History Week, later named Black History Month, and the work of W.E.B. Dubois, enhanced the intellectual capital of the African peoples arming them with the knowledge they would need to carry on the fight for freedom.
After the deportation of Garvey from the United States on trumped-up charges in 1927, the struggle for pan-africanism would continue through the work of George Padmore who utilized the international workers movement to study and organize the people aimed at the destruction of colonialism.
C.L.R. James would chronicle the Haitian Revolution of the 19th century as an act of intellectual independence and to illustrate the relationship between the struggle of the slavery era and that of the mid-twentieth century. He would then draw a nexus between all struggles waged by the African peoples whether they be in the United States, the Caribbean or the African continent. All of these popular revolts were interconnected and would lead to a global movement that changed the course of human history and consciousness.
A further illustration of the pan-african character of the emergence of Marley, reggae and the rastafari movement as a social force is marked by the influence of US-based popular musicians such as Sam Cooke, Curtis Mayfield and the Impressions, James Brown, Aretha Franklin and Berry Gordy on the young emerging artists of Jamaica.
When Stokely Carmichael, who had Trinidadian roots, popularized the black power slogan in 1966, it had a profound impact on the youth of the Caribbean. By 1968 Jamaica would see the emergence of its own black rebellion under neo-colonialism. Guyanese-born scholar-activist Walter Rodney would be forced to leave Jamaica and return to Tanzania in 1968. In 1970 this black power movement would manifest itself throughout the Caribbean with mass revolt and the call for genuine liberation outside the ideological sphere of America and the United Kingdom.
By the 1970s the African liberation movements were in full force. A campaign of solidarity would emerge as a dominant political tendency in the United States and the Caribbean. The youth of South Africa in 1976 through their popular protests and rebellion would enhance pan-african solidarity and global support for majority rule throughout the sub-continent. This same year Bob Marley and Wailers released the legendary album "Rastaman Vibration."
On this LP the song "War" caught the attention of the youth of the western hemisphere and the world. This song included the words of a speech delivered by the then late Emperor Haile Selassie some years before at the United Nations. "We Africans will fight, we find it necessary...," Marley said.
By 1980 a major victory had been won in the struggle for national independence in Zimbabwe. Marley had released the "Survival" album in 1979 which included the song "Zimbabwe" that championed the armed struggle of the Patriotic Front as the real revolutionaries who deserved the
global support of the people. Marley would travel to Zimbabwe for the independence celebration in 1980, a milestone in his performance career being highlighted as the principle artist exemplifying the world's solidarity with the peoples of southern Africa.
Marley's Legacy and the Struggle for World Peace
The eradication of direct colonialism and apartheid in Africa by 1994 represented the culmination of the movement towards liberation that intensified after the 1945 Pan-African Congress at Manchester. Despite these victories the imperialist powers would seek new avenues of domination and
exploitation.
The first Gulf War of 1991 ushered in a new phase of imperialist war and hegemony. With the massive bombing of Iraq, the occupation of Saudi Arabia and Kuwait by the United States military, the lines were being drawn for the international forces of anti-colonialism and liberation. America's occupation of Somalia in 1992-93 was met with massive resistance forcing their unconditional withdrawl. During the 1990s hundreds of thousands of Iraqis would die as a result of the draconian economic sanctions imposed upon them by the United Nations at the aegis of the American government.
In Africa the economic hegemony of western nations would spark conflicts in Rwanda, the Democratic Republic of Congo, the horn of Africa and in the west African region in Liberia and Sierra Leone. Multitudes would succumb to the ravages of war and plunder. At the same time the unholy alliance of the United States and Israel would continue the occupation of Palestine and the denial of the people of their inherent right to self-determination.
The continuing economic crisis of US imperialism would lead them into an disastrous war against Iraq and Afghanistan. When Haiti should have been celebrating its 200th anniversary of independence from France, the Americans engineered a destabilization campaign and the later occupation of this Caribbean nation.
The concept of pre-emptive war would become the cornerstone of the new American foreign policy. Permanent war is the continued theme of the Bush administration. By starving the African and other oppressed peoples around the world, the US administration has set war and occupation as vital to its continued existence.
However, this policy of American aggression and occupation has been met with mass protest on an unprecedented scale. Between the spring of 2002 and the summer of 2004, tens of millions of people in the western capitals in solidarity with their allies throughout the so-called developing world have demonstrated their burning desire for world peace and the total elimination of American hegemony. The peoples of Afghanisan and Iraq have continued their resistance to these occupations by the American military and its allies.
Even prior to the occupation of Iraq, on February 15, 2003, the largest world demonstrations for peace occured. These demonstrations have continued throughout the course of the illegal occupation. In Iraq itself the Americans have suffered nearly 1,500 officially reported deaths, over 27,000
casualties and another 100,000 who will be inflicted for the rest of their lives with post traumatic stress disorder. All of this is occuring while the American economy suffers its worst decline since the great depression.
Marley's message of peace, solidarity and redemption is more significant today in the 21st century than in any period in recent history. There can be much inspiration gained from his lyrics and music. A rejection of crass materialism and consumerism, the upholding of the right of oppressed peoples to self-determination, the necessity for solidarity with the African continent and other developing regions, the continued struggle for civil and human rights in North America and the ability of the peoples of Africa to reclaim their historical identity and social equilibrium is the mandate left by Marley.
It is most appropriate that the 60th anniversary birthday commemorations were held in 2005 in Ethiopia. A nation and region which has been challenged with all of the questions that the legacy of Marley represents, will be forced to take notice of the unfinished business of national liberation and pan-african unity.
Marley therefore continues to speak to us from the grave. His legacy calls upon today's cultural and political warriors to emancipate ourselves from mental slavery, for no one else can free our minds. Consequently, we must liberate modern society from the legacy of slavery, colonialism, racism, war and apartheid. A new world must be created where humanity can define itself outside the boundaries of pre-emptive conflict and the hegemony of a elite minority bent on the destruction of the planet in the false pursuit of profit and global hegemony.
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Abayomi Azikiwe is the founder and editor of the Pan-African News Wire. In 2002 Azikiwe was a co-founder the Michigan Emergency Committee Against War & Injustice (MECAWI), an organization committed to the withdrawl of US troops from Iraq and Afghanistan. As a broadcast journalist and author, this activist's articles, opinions and commentaries have been made available to people throughout the international community.
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Bob Marley, Pan-Africanism and the Struggle for World Peace
60th anniversary celebrations confirm the legacy of the late international poet and superstar
By Abayomi Azikiwe, Editor
Pan-African News Wire
February 6, 2005, represents the 60th anniversary of the birth of the late Robert Nesta Marley who was born in the Caribbean island-nation of Jamaica in 1945.
The year of Marley's birth was also the same as the conclusion of World War II, a period which ushered in the contemporary struggle of Africans and other oppressed peoples to emancipate themselves from the shackles of colonialism, apartheid, institutional racism and minortiy rule.
In October of 1945, the Fifth Pan-African Congress was held in Manchester, England, where activists such as George Padmore of Trinidad, Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana-Africa and W.E.B. Dubois of the United States came together to map out an international campaign aimed at national independence and socialism.
By 1947 Nkrumah was back in Ghana after 12 years as a student and activist in the United States and the UK. Only tens years later, 1957, he stood before the people of Ghana on the eve of their hard won independence and declared that "the independence of Ghana is meaningless unless it is linked with the total independence of the African continent."
At the beginning of the 1960s inside the United States, thousands of African-American students were taking an increasingly militant stance against segregation and the disenfranchisement of their people nearly 100 years after the legal abolition of slavery. This movement, which became known as the struggle for civil rights, influenced not only developments in America, but throughout the world. Those who saw that the sons and daughters of former slaves could effectively take a stand against centuries-old injustice and exploitation knew they could affect change in their own geo-political regions.
Bob Marley emerged from the independence struggles of the
Caribbean during the 1950s and 1960s, where the legacies of Paul Bogle, Marcus Garvey, Amy Jacques-Garvey, C.L.R. James, Fidel Castro and others provided inspiration to a new generation of activists and artists who sought with impatience to rapidly liberate their people from national oppression.
Although Marley never declared himself a politician or prophet, his music was very much reflective of the times. It inspired the people to not only recognize the continuation of the struggle for liberation and social justice but to take up the international call to reverse the social processes of colonialism and neo-colonialism. He adopted the Rastafari faith which emphasized the philosphy of Marcus Garvey and the deification of Haile Selassie I as symbols of the resistance of African peoples to white world supremacy and hegemony.
For a people in the Caribbean who had been stolen from their African homeland during the period of slavery from the 15th to the 19th centuries, to place the identification with Africa and its liberation and unity as the primary ideological point of departure, clearly signalled that the propaganda of the global elites had not totally obliterated the social consciousness and national will of the oppressed.
Bob Marley and the Pan-African Struggle
Marley's identification with Africa through the Rastafari movement coupled with a keen awareness of political developments during the 1960s, served to inspire the character and tone of his music. In addition, the impact of the African-American struggle for civil rights and black power influenced political currents in the Caribbean.
It was in the United States during the 1920s that the Jamaican born Marcus Garvey settled and gained his most significant support and organizational base. Garvey's Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA) recruited millions of members and supporters in the US and played a monumental role in changing the character of the social consciousness during the post World War I period.
The so-called "Harlem Renaissance" of the post World War I period intersected with Garveyism in the quest for cultural awareness among the African people. During the same time period, the activist scholarship of Dr. Carter G. Woodson, the founder of Black History Week, later named Black History Month, and the work of W.E.B. Dubois, enhanced the intellectual capital of the African peoples arming them with the knowledge they would need to carry on the fight for freedom.
After the deportation of Garvey from the United States on trumped-up charges in 1927, the struggle for pan-africanism would continue through the work of George Padmore who utilized the international workers movement to study and organize the people aimed at the destruction of colonialism.
C.L.R. James would chronicle the Haitian Revolution of the 19th century as an act of intellectual independence and to illustrate the relationship between the struggle of the slavery era and that of the mid-twentieth century. He would then draw a nexus between all struggles waged by the African peoples whether they be in the United States, the Caribbean or the African continent. All of these popular revolts were interconnected and would lead to a global movement that changed the course of human history and consciousness.
A further illustration of the pan-african character of the emergence of Marley, reggae and the rastafari movement as a social force is marked by the influence of US-based popular musicians such as Sam Cooke, Curtis Mayfield and the Impressions, James Brown, Aretha Franklin and Berry Gordy on the young emerging artists of Jamaica.
When Stokely Carmichael, who had Trinidadian roots, popularized the black power slogan in 1966, it had a profound impact on the youth of the Caribbean. By 1968 Jamaica would see the emergence of its own black rebellion under neo-colonialism. Guyanese-born scholar-activist Walter Rodney would be forced to leave Jamaica and return to Tanzania in 1968. In 1970 this black power movement would manifest itself throughout the Caribbean with mass revolt and the call for genuine liberation outside the ideological sphere of America and the United Kingdom.
By the 1970s the African liberation movements were in full force. A campaign of solidarity would emerge as a dominant political tendency in the United States and the Caribbean. The youth of South Africa in 1976 through their popular protests and rebellion would enhance pan-african solidarity and global support for majority rule throughout the sub-continent. This same year Bob Marley and Wailers released the legendary album "Rastaman Vibration."
On this LP the song "War" caught the attention of the youth of the western hemisphere and the world. This song included the words of a speech delivered by the then late Emperor Haile Selassie some years before at the United Nations. "We Africans will fight, we find it necessary...," Marley said.
By 1980 a major victory had been won in the struggle for national independence in Zimbabwe. Marley had released the "Survival" album in 1979 which included the song "Zimbabwe" that championed the armed struggle of the Patriotic Front as the real revolutionaries who deserved the
global support of the people. Marley would travel to Zimbabwe for the independence celebration in 1980, a milestone in his performance career being highlighted as the principle artist exemplifying the world's solidarity with the peoples of southern Africa.
Marley's Legacy and the Struggle for World Peace
The eradication of direct colonialism and apartheid in Africa by 1994 represented the culmination of the movement towards liberation that intensified after the 1945 Pan-African Congress at Manchester. Despite these victories the imperialist powers would seek new avenues of domination and
exploitation.
The first Gulf War of 1991 ushered in a new phase of imperialist war and hegemony. With the massive bombing of Iraq, the occupation of Saudi Arabia and Kuwait by the United States military, the lines were being drawn for the international forces of anti-colonialism and liberation. America's occupation of Somalia in 1992-93 was met with massive resistance forcing their unconditional withdrawl. During the 1990s hundreds of thousands of Iraqis would die as a result of the draconian economic sanctions imposed upon them by the United Nations at the aegis of the American government.
In Africa the economic hegemony of western nations would spark conflicts in Rwanda, the Democratic Republic of Congo, the horn of Africa and in the west African region in Liberia and Sierra Leone. Multitudes would succumb to the ravages of war and plunder. At the same time the unholy alliance of the United States and Israel would continue the occupation of Palestine and the denial of the people of their inherent right to self-determination.
The continuing economic crisis of US imperialism would lead them into an disastrous war against Iraq and Afghanistan. When Haiti should have been celebrating its 200th anniversary of independence from France, the Americans engineered a destabilization campaign and the later occupation of this Caribbean nation.
The concept of pre-emptive war would become the cornerstone of the new American foreign policy. Permanent war is the continued theme of the Bush administration. By starving the African and other oppressed peoples around the world, the US administration has set war and occupation as vital to its continued existence.
However, this policy of American aggression and occupation has been met with mass protest on an unprecedented scale. Between the spring of 2002 and the summer of 2004, tens of millions of people in the western capitals in solidarity with their allies throughout the so-called developing world have demonstrated their burning desire for world peace and the total elimination of American hegemony. The peoples of Afghanisan and Iraq have continued their resistance to these occupations by the American military and its allies.
Even prior to the occupation of Iraq, on February 15, 2003, the largest world demonstrations for peace occured. These demonstrations have continued throughout the course of the illegal occupation. In Iraq itself the Americans have suffered nearly 1,500 officially reported deaths, over 27,000
casualties and another 100,000 who will be inflicted for the rest of their lives with post traumatic stress disorder. All of this is occuring while the American economy suffers its worst decline since the great depression.
Marley's message of peace, solidarity and redemption is more significant today in the 21st century than in any period in recent history. There can be much inspiration gained from his lyrics and music. A rejection of crass materialism and consumerism, the upholding of the right of oppressed peoples to self-determination, the necessity for solidarity with the African continent and other developing regions, the continued struggle for civil and human rights in North America and the ability of the peoples of Africa to reclaim their historical identity and social equilibrium is the mandate left by Marley.
It is most appropriate that the 60th anniversary birthday commemorations were held in 2005 in Ethiopia. A nation and region which has been challenged with all of the questions that the legacy of Marley represents, will be forced to take notice of the unfinished business of national liberation and pan-african unity.
Marley therefore continues to speak to us from the grave. His legacy calls upon today's cultural and political warriors to emancipate ourselves from mental slavery, for no one else can free our minds. Consequently, we must liberate modern society from the legacy of slavery, colonialism, racism, war and apartheid. A new world must be created where humanity can define itself outside the boundaries of pre-emptive conflict and the hegemony of a elite minority bent on the destruction of the planet in the false pursuit of profit and global hegemony.
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Abayomi Azikiwe is the founder and editor of the Pan-African News Wire. In 2002 Azikiwe was a co-founder the Michigan Emergency Committee Against War & Injustice (MECAWI), an organization committed to the withdrawl of US troops from Iraq and Afghanistan. As a broadcast journalist and author, this activist's articles, opinions and commentaries have been made available to people throughout the international community.
Monday, May 08, 2006
Hayden Nomination To Head CIA Sparks Controversy, Opposition
Hayden named as Bush CIA choice
US President George W Bush has nominated Air Force General Michael Hayden as the new head of the CIA.
Mr Bush described Gen Hayden, the former head of the National Security Agency (NSA), as "the right man to lead the CIA at a critical moment".
Lawmakers have expressed concern at putting a military man in charge of a civilian agency, and civil rights groups are also raising objections.
Porter Goss unexpectedly resigned as head of the CIA on Friday.
His successor must face Senate confirmation hearings.
The American Civil Liberties Union has urged the Senate to question Gen Hayden vigorously about the NSA's programme of domestic surveillance without warrants when he was in charge.
"Hayden's approval of warrantless surveillance on Americans raises serious questions about whether the CIA would be further unleashed on the American public," ACLU Executive Director Anthony Romero said in a statement.
He called on the Senate to use the Hayden confirmation hearing to investigate other allegations against the US intelligence community, including the reported use of secret prisons and extraordinary rendition of terror suspects.
Some members of Congress - including some Republicans - have baulked at the prospect of a general leading the CIA, saying it could give the Pentagon too much influence in intelligence gathering.
The BBC's Justin Webb says it is a measure of how enfeebled the Bush administration has become that even before the formal announcement, the decision on a new CIA director was already the subject of heated debate.
Presidential praise
The president praised Gen Hayden, pointing to a long career in the US military and intelligence community, including time spent working as deputy to the current director of national intelligence, John Negroponte.
"Mike knows our intelligence community from the ground up. He has been both a provider and a consumer of
intelligence," Mr Bush said.
"He has demonstrated an ability to adapt our intelligence services to the new challenges of the war on terror."
Mr Negroponte also commended Gen Hayden, calling him "a very, very independent-minded person".
He said Gen Hayden was well qualified for the position.
Accepting the nomination, Gen Hayden struck a positive note.
"In the confirmation process I look forward to meeting with leaders of the Congress, better understanding their concerns and working with them to move the American intelligence community forward," he said.
"This is simply too important not to get absolutely right."
Earlier, National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley appeared on US breakfast television shows to defend Gen Hayden's expected nomination.
"The question is not military versus civilian. The question is the best person to do the job," he told CBS.
Bipartisan worries
The choice of Gen Hayden - who oversaw the controversial warrantless eavesdropping programme after 9/11 - has drawn some strong criticism among legislators.
"I do believe [Gen Hayden] is the wrong person, in the wrong place, at the wrong time," senior Republican Peter Hoekstra said.
Mr Hoekstra, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said there were already "ongoing tensions" between the CIA and the Pentagon.
His views were echoed by Democrat Senator Joe Biden who said the appointment could leave agents with the impression the CIA has been "just gobbled up by the defence department".
Porter Goss's resignation after less than two years as director, in which he was given the job of reforming the agency after a series of intelligence failures, came as a surprise.
He declined to comment on his departure,
telling CNN that "it's one of those mysteries".
The White House denied as "categorically
untrue" US media reports that the president had lost confidence Mr Goss.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr//2/hi/americas/4750357.stm
Published: 2006/05/08 16:26:58 GMT
Hayden could face trouble ahead
By Adam Brookes
BBC News, Washington
President Bush has nominated an Air Force general, Michael Hayden, to be the next director of the CIA.
The position came vacant at the end of last week, when Porter Goss resigned unexpectedly after less than two years in the role.
President Bush was effusive as he nominated Lieutenant General Michael Hayden to be the top man at the CIA.
"Mike has more than 20 years of experience in the intelligence field. He served for six years as director of the National Security Agency, and thus brings vast experience leading a major intelligence agency to his new assignment," he said.
Gen Hayden's experience is beyond question. His whole career has been spent in intelligence - as an air force officer, as a military attache in Bulgaria and as head of the super-secret National Security Agency (NSA).
Most recently he has acted as number two in the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. His role - to effect reform of the intelligence community and how its 15-member agencies interact. He is an espiocrat, par excellence.
But you can read Gen Hayden's resume from start to finish and still know very little about the man. Secrecy renders opaque most of his life and work.
As he accepted the nomination, the master spy spoke only briefly.
But Michael Hayden is in fact known as an engaging, slightly unconventional character.
And Washington insiders say he has impressed the Bush administration as a man adept at bridging the treacherous bureaucratic waters that lie between the spies, the military and the politicians.
But when the general comes to be questioned by the Senate - as he must if he is to be confirmed as head of the CIA the picture becomes political, and murky.
Surveillance scandal
When he was at the NSA, Gen Hayden oversaw a highly controversial surveillance programme.
The NSA listened to the international telephone calls of Americans without obtaining the normal permissions from a secret court. There was a scandal.
Gen Hayden faced tough public questions about the programme's legality. He defended himself and the surveillance programme robustly.
If senators choose to grill him about the NSA's domestic surveillance programme, his confirmation hearings could turn bloody.
"The odds still would suggest that Hayden will be confirmed in this position," said Norman Orenstein, of the American Enterprise Institute.
"But to get there, the president is going to have to use a very significant amount of political capital at a time when his capital bank is at its lowest ebb."
Republican concerns
Senators from the opposition Democratic Party may smell political advantage in opposing the president's candidate, and in publicly revisiting the NSA surveillance.
But they may also feel that opposing Gen Hayden makes them look weak or obstructionist on national security - a traditional point of vulnerability for the Democrats.
Perhaps the greater threat to Gen Hayden comes from the fact some Republicans have already expressed publicly doubts over his candidacy - not because of the surveillance programme, but because he is a serving officer.
They are concerned that the military should not lead a civilian agency.
Republican Senator Saxby Chambliss said Hayden's military background would be a "major problem".
The background to these concerns is complex. The Pentagon, say intelligence community sources, has over the last few years expanded its intelligence gathering, particularly in the field of human intelligence, or HUMINT.
HUMINT - the actual business of running agents - is traditionally the work of the CIA.
But Pentagon officials have, we're told, sought to expand the remit of Special Operations Command and the Defense Intelligence Agency to include more HUMINT operations.
These officials feel a need for faster, more relevant operational intelligence for America's 'war on terrorism'.
Morale low
The Pentagon's expansion has led to unease in other areas of the intelligence community.
And, say intelligence sources, maintaining a working equilibrium between the various agencies has been difficult for John Negroponte, the Director of National Intelligence and his deputy, Michael Hayden.
And if the general is confirmed to the CIA, his problems could be just beginning.
The Washington whisper is that morale at the agency is very low.
The failure to stop 911; the flawed intelligence in Iraq; these have left the CIA the butt of jokes - especially in the military.
One admiral recently told me: "If I'm looking for knowledge, I don't look to the CIA."
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/americas/4752745.stm
Published: 2006/05/09 00:26:26 GMT
Outcry as Bush Nominates Illegal Spying Advocate for CIA
The Progress Report
Posted on May 8, 2006
http://www.alternet.org/story/36014/
On Friday, Porter Goss unexpectedly resigned as head of the CIA, leaving behind an "utterly irresponsible" 18-month tenure at the agency and unanswered questions about his hurried departure. Today, the White House nominated deputy director of national intelligence Lt. Gen. Michael Hayden as Goss's successor. "Bottom line, I believe he's the wrong person, the wrong place, at the wrong time. We should not have a military person leading a civilian agency at this time," said House Intelligence Committee Chairman Peter Hoekstra (R-MI) yesterday on Fox News Sunday, voicing the bipartisan concerns of lawmakers.
Hayden has demonstrated a fundamental misunderstanding of the Constitution and has misled Congress under oath. His close ties to Vice Presidency Cheney, Director of National Intelligence John Negroponte, and the Department of Defense have led many members of Congress to conclude he is wrong man to gain the trust of the intelligence community and clean up the CIA after the "chaos" left by Goss.
'Under the sway' of Rumsfeld
Over the weekend, a bipartisan group of lawmakers spoke out opposing the nomination of a military officer to a civilian agency. If Hayden is confirmed, "military officers would run all the major spy agencies, from the ultra-secret National Security Agency to the Defense Intelligence Agency." One former intelligence official said, "It seems to me the Pentagon grows even stronger now.... Every time there's a change, it moves in that direction." "I think...putting a general in charge is going to send the wrong signal through the agency here in Washington, but also to our agents in the field around the world," said Hoekstra yesterday, who also added that there will "be the perception in the CIA" that Hayden would be under the sway of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
One of Goss's largest challenges at the CIA was gaining the trust of career officers, who resented that he brought in a group of his unqualified aides -- called "the Gosslings" by CIA insiders -- and appointed them to top positions. Even if Hayden retires from the military, he is unlikely to be trusted as the committed independent advocate that the CIA needs. "Now, just resigning commission and moving on, putting on a striped suit, a pinstriped suit versus an air force uniform, I don't think makes much difference," said Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-GA). Senate Intelligence Committee Pat Roberts (R-KS), who in 2005 called Hayden "outstanding," yesterday refused to offer his endorsement of the administration's nominee: "I'm not in a position to say that I am for General Hayden and will vote for him."
Hayden unfamiliar with the Fourth Amendment
Hayden has demonstrated an "astounding lack of knowledge" about his job as an intelligence official, fundamentally misunderstanding constitutional protections. In a speech on Jan. 23, Hayden boasted that he was knowledgeable on the Fourth Amendment: "[B]elieve me, if there's any amendment to the Constitution that employees of the National Security Agency are familiar with, it's the Fourth."
But in a question at that same speech, Knight-Ridder reporter Jonathan Landay noted that Hayden "repeatedly referred to the Fourth Amendment's search standard of 'reasonableness' without mentioning that it also demands 'probable cause'"; Hayden continued to deny that the amendment contained any such clause. When Landay asked Hayden if the amendment contains the phrase "probable cause," Hayden bluntly replied, "No."
Lying to Congress
In January, Karl Rove promised to make the midterm elections focus on wiretapping. Hayden -- as one of the administration's "most forceful" defenders of President Bush's warrantless domestic eavesdropping and director of the National Security Agency (NSA) when the program was implemented in 2002 -- will likely bring that issue to the forefront. "We have no concerns about a public debate over the terrorist surveillance program," said a senior White House official. Hayden misled Congress and the public about the administration's domestic spying. In his Oct. 17, 2002 testimony, Hayden told a congressional committee that any surveillance of persons in the United States was done consistent with the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which required a court-approved warrant for wiretapping. As American Progress Senior Fellow Morton Halperin pointed out, "At the time of his statements, Hayden was fully aware of the presidential order to conduct warrantless domestic spying issued the previous year," making Hayden's misleading statements to Congress illegal.
An Agency in Turmoil
Goss's chaotic departure encapsulated his chaotic tenure.
"A 'reform' that was supposed to improve coordination and coherence among our intelligence agencies has had the opposite effect," said Robert L. Hutchings, former National Intelligence Council chairman, about Goss's term. While the Bush administration has tried to spin Goss's resignation as a lost turf battle with Negroponte, there has been little indication that Goss ever fought hard against the administration for his turf.
In reality, Goss's tenure was noted for "bleeding talent" away from the struggling agency: "At least a dozen senior officials -- several of whom were promoted under Goss -- have resigned, retired early or requested reassignment. The directorate's second-in-command walked out of Langley last month and then told senators in a closed-door hearing that he had lost confidence in Goss's leadership." Now the agency has been drawn into a federal criminal investigation over Kyle "Dusty" Foggo, the CIA's third-ranking official, handpicked by Goss.
The CIA Inspector General has opened an investigation into Foggo's contacts with defense contractors accused of bribing lawmakers. Foggo has admitted that he attended poker games -- where prostitutes may have been present -- set up by Brent Wilkes, who is implicated in the bribery of former Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham. Additionally, Frank Bassett, a CIA agent identified as "Nine Fingers," was also at the poker parties and was a former Goss aide. "Supposedly the [Cunningham] scandal was the last straw [in deciding that Goss should resign].... This administration may be on the verge of a major scandal," said a congressional source involved in oversight of U.S. spy agencies.
2006 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/36014/
Potential Evidence Surfaces of Bush's Illegal Spying
By Onnesha Roychoudhuri, AlterNet
May 8, 2006
http://www.alternet.org/story/35807/
Five months after news of the NSA's warrantless spying program broke, and after we've learned numerous details of the program's extent, a Portland, Ore., attorney may have finally obtained hard evidence of illegal wiretaps by the government.
Thomas Nelson has been practicing administrative law for most of his professional life, but after Sept. 11 he first began offering pro bono work for immigrants detained in broad FBI terrorism sweeps. He is currently leading a little-discussed case that may contain the first documented evidence of an illegal wiretap and believes that, as a result, he himself has been subjected to warrantless -- and therefore illegal -- wiretaps and physical searches, the kind of clandestine operation that Nixon referred to as "black bag jobs." And as a result of extreme carelessness by the FBI, Nelson may have his hands on the only solid evidence of these searches.
The story begins in February 2004, when the Office of Foreign Assets Control froze all funds of the Oregon branch of the Saudi Arabian charity Al-Haramain. Attorneys Asim Ghafoor and Wendell Belew defended the charity against the government's allegations that Al-Haramain Oregon was taking part in terrorist activities.
In August 2004, as a routine court procedure, the FBI provided the lawyers and defendants with documents relating to the trial. The FBI's lawyers accidentally released a document that showed the government had used logs of conversations between the lawyers and their clients, Soliman al-Buthi and the organization, to categorize Al-Haramain as a terrorist group. The catch is that the logs were obtained without a warrant.
Ghafoor and Belew initially assumed that the document was obtained through the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) -- which allows for warrantless wiretaps as long as a warrant is obtained within 72 hours. But they grew suspicious when the FBI requested the return of that document. The lawyers immediately complied, but the FBI failed to contact both Al-Buthi and Seda, both now living overseas, to get their copies back.
When the New York Times broke the news of the NSA spy program last December, Belew and Ghafoor realized that the logs obtained of their attorney-client communications were probably a result of the program. That's when they contacted Thomas Nelson, an attorney representing al-Buthi in a separate case.
Another missed 'slam dunk'
On May 6, 2004, Nelson's close friend, 37-year-old civil and immigration lawyer Brandon Mayfield, was arrested as a material witness in the Madrid train bombings. The linchpin in the case against Mayfield was a low-quality fingerprint from a bag in Spain that contained detonation devices.
Though Mayfield hadn't traveled abroad in nearly a decade, and although the Spanish authorities continually asserted their doubts regarding the print match, the Department of Justice held him for two weeks while they tried to compile evidence in the case.
While Nelson helped Mayfield put together a defense, he observed firsthand the lengths to which the government went to to justify Mayfield's detainment. After the fingerprint was mistakenly tied to Mayfield, Nelson says the FBI started following him to try to find any evidence against him.
As the Portland Oregonian reports:
Initially, Portland's squad of investigators had just a few pieces of information about Mayfield. They knew his birthday and Social Security Number, and that he'd served in the military from 1985 to 1994. Analysts checked FBI databases to see if Mayfield was the subject of any investigations. He wasn't, but a deeper search circumstantially connected Mayfield to "other suspected terrorists." Court records showed that less than two years earlier, Mayfield had represented Jeffrey Leon Battle in a custody dispute. Battle was a member of the Portland Seven, a group arrested in 2002 for plotting to fight with the Taliban against U.S. soldiers.
Mayfield's legal files were seized by the government, and he had to fight to have them reviewed by a third party that could provide sufficient protections of the privileged material. An Oregon judge agreed to this and, finding nothing suspicious, ordered the government to release them.
Even as Spanish officials questioned the fingerprint match, FBI officials in Washington urged Portland prosecutors to disregard them. An e-mail from an FBI counterterrorism supervisor reads, "I spoke with the lab this morning, and they are absolutely confident that they have a match on the print. -- No doubt about it!!!!"
These kind of "slam-dunk" pronouncements have a way of backfiring: On May 19, Spanish authorities conclusively determined that the print belonged to Ouhnane Daoud, an Algerian citizen. On May 20, Mayfield was released, and the judge in the case refused the government's request to continue monitoring Mayfield's communications.
Nelson's experience with Mayfield's case gave him a better sense of what was happening to him when he took on Soliman al-Buthi's case at the end of 2004. Soliman, remember, while currently overseas, is one of the few who was provided with a copy of the conversation logs accidentally released by the FBI. And while the FBI did not attempt to make contact with al-Buthi, he is, according to OFAC, a "specially designated global terrorist."
If they were looking for al-Buthi, he wouldn't be hard to find. Just this past month, the Washington Post covered the work al-Buthi is doing in Saudi Arabia: "Sulaiman al-Buthi, a Riyadh-based spokesman for the International Committee for the Defense of the Final Prophet, says this religious but peaceful activism could put an end to violence and drive groups like al-Qaida out of business."
When he isn't publicly speaking against al-Qaida, he is working as an assistant director of beautification in the city of Riyadh. "Basically, he's the flower guy," Nelson told Amy Goodman in an interview, "He is responsible for the second annual Riyadh Flower Festival."
Though the FBI knew that an alleged "terrorist" possessed a document containing information about the NSA program, they did not try to find al-Buthi, or contact his lawyer, Thomas Nelson -- at least not directly.
The black bag jobs begin
Nelson officially started representing al-Buthi in September 2004; soon after, the FBI document was inadvertently released. A few months later, Nelson observed inconsistencies when he came to his office: His computer would be left on, disks still in the drive, materials shifted. Fellow lawyers from the office, working late, noticed someone on at least three occasions posing as a member of the janitorial crew, trying to get into the office.
The Oregonian reported that attorney Jonathan Norling "was sleeping on a couch at their practice early one morning last May, when a man dressed as a custodian tried to enter Nelson's office. Norling startled the man twice one night in July, when he caught the man trying to enter the locked office." The man in question had what appeared to be a valid badge for the building. But Norling notes, "This person wasn't a cleaning crew. I know the cleaning crew. I've worked here seven years, and I've worked a lot of nights, and I never experienced anything like that until Tom was working (on this case)."
Though Nelson approached the security people at the building, they wouldn't talk to him. "They were very blunt," he told AlterNet in a phone interview. He then took his concerns to the building manager. "It was all very disconcerting and inconclusive," says Nelson. "There was no direct denial. At the end, I said, 'You probably couldn't tell me if something was going on anyway.' He said, 'That's probably right.'"
After these incidents, Nelson brought the al-Buthi files to his house. That's when he and his wife experienced lapses in his home alarm that the company monitors refused to explain. "They basically stonewalled us," says Nelson. "We kept calling people and they kept referring us around and saying 'We'll call you back,' but no one would ever call back."
Sensing that he may be experiencing the same kinds of searches as the FBI performed in Brandon Mayfield's case, Nelson wrote a letter to Karin Immergut, U.S. attorney for Oregon in September 2005, requesting she "look into the matter and to inform me if representatives … have engaged in these searches." Immergut said she was not aware of any warrantless searches. After the New York Times broke the NSA story, Nelson wrote Immergut again, stating that, based upon the report, he may be the target of searches outside of the scope of FISA. Immergut responded, "I was completely unaware of any NSA surveillance program until I read about it in the media," and suggested Nelson contact the NSA directly.
Which is exactly what Nelson did. But the only response he received reads like pure bureaucratic satire:
Rest assured that safeguards are in place to protect the civil liberties of U.S. citizens. However, because of the highly classified nature of the program, we can neither confirm nor deny the existence of records responsive to your request. The fact of the existence or non-existence of responsive records is a currently and properly classified matter in accordance with Executive Order 12598, as amended. Moreover, the third exemption to FOIA provides for the withholding of information specifically protected from disclosure by statute. Thus, your request is also denied because the fact of the existence or non-existence of the information is exempted from disclosure pursuant to the third exemption.
Nelson believes the clandestine searches of his home and office have ended. But he still feels a lingering sense of discomfort: "Every time I think about the possibility that they were in my home, I get very angry … My office is one thing, my home is something else. I don't want a bunch of spooks showing up there."
The fact that most frustrates Nelson is that no one ever tried to contact him or al-Buthi personally; rather, they resorted to what Nelson thinks must be illegal searches. "In retrospect," Nelson says, "I think they were trying to get the [leaked FBI] document back. If the searches were pursuant to FISA, it would be interesting to find out what they told the judge to get a warrant -- 'We've been conducting this illegal wiretapping program, we've embarrassed ourselves, there's this document out there that Nelson has, will you give us a warrant to get it back?'"
This is the circular logic that lies at the root of the debacle: In order to hide evidence of an illegal search program, the government is taking part in illegal searches.
Nelson has been cautious since he took on Asim Ghafoor and Wendell Belew's case against the NSA. Having intimately experienced the violation of law the government is willing to take part in to keep the NSA program under wraps, Nelson elected to put the classified document in the hands of the judge. Filing it under seal, Nelson hopes to keep the document safe and the case alive.
The formal legal complaint, filed in February, states clearly that Ghafoor and Belew's communications with their Al-Haramain charity clients were recorded without a warrant outside FISA: "Defendant National Security Agency did not obtain a court order authorizing such electronic surveillance, nor did it otherwise follow the procedures mandated by FISA."
Though the evidence is promising, the battle is far from won. The Department of Justice is fighting hard to get the classified document back under its control. Nelson and his co-counsel Steve Goldberg raised an objection -- pointing out to the judge that it might not be wise to hand evidence over to a defendant in the case, which led to this tense exchange:
U.S. District Judge Garr King: What if I say I will not deliver it (the document) to the FBI, Mr. Coppolino?
DoJ Attorney Anthony Coppolino: Well, your honor, we obviously don't want to have any kind of a confrontation with you; we want to work this out, but it has to be secured in a proper fashion. And I respect the court's, you know, authority, but on the other hand, I also would have to reiterate that it has to be secured properly.
Nelson fully expects the DoJ lawyers to pull out all the stops in order to justify the executive power behind the NSA program and for the president's right to keep the program from the public. The DoJ already filed a request explaining why the document, and hence the case, should never be made public. That explanation was unsurprisingly filed under seal, proving that even explaining why something should be classified has been deemed a classified matter. But despite the powers he's fighting against, Nelson believes that the fact that the document has seen the light of day means the fight will eventually be won.
The continued obfuscation of inquiries into the NSA program illustrates that the president's lawyers blur the distinction between protecting our national security and protecting the president's transgressions of the law from scrutiny.
There are a handful of individuals and organizations enduring intensive intimidation campaigns and spearheading legislation against the president and the NSA to put a stop to a program that is slowly undermining the basic tenets of our legal system.
Simply electing to represent someone designated a "terrorist" requires attorneys to obtain a license from OFAC or risk jail. As Nelson explained, "The purpose of OFAC is to keep an eye on 'terrorists' and, by extension, their attorneys … Frankly, I don't think this process could pass constitutional muster, but that's a fight for another day."
While the legal ins and outs of the NSA spy program may at times be complex, the essence of what Thomas Nelson is fighting for is simple: upholding the judicial tenet of "innocent until proven guilty" and the separation of powers laid out in the Constitution.
In the coming weeks, the government must file a response to Thomas Nelson's complaint. While the DoJ will inevitably try to push it from the courts, and from public attention, it is only a matter of time before the simplicity of what is at stake takes root. As Nelson explained, "It's a question of whether one man can, as commander in chief, ride roughshod over all the protections in the Constitution.
If this is our response to 9/11, we've lost. If this kind of practice can occur because of 9/11, Osama won."
Onnesha Roychoudhuri is an assistant editor at AlterNet.
2006 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/35807/
US President George W Bush has nominated Air Force General Michael Hayden as the new head of the CIA.
Mr Bush described Gen Hayden, the former head of the National Security Agency (NSA), as "the right man to lead the CIA at a critical moment".
Lawmakers have expressed concern at putting a military man in charge of a civilian agency, and civil rights groups are also raising objections.
Porter Goss unexpectedly resigned as head of the CIA on Friday.
His successor must face Senate confirmation hearings.
The American Civil Liberties Union has urged the Senate to question Gen Hayden vigorously about the NSA's programme of domestic surveillance without warrants when he was in charge.
"Hayden's approval of warrantless surveillance on Americans raises serious questions about whether the CIA would be further unleashed on the American public," ACLU Executive Director Anthony Romero said in a statement.
He called on the Senate to use the Hayden confirmation hearing to investigate other allegations against the US intelligence community, including the reported use of secret prisons and extraordinary rendition of terror suspects.
Some members of Congress - including some Republicans - have baulked at the prospect of a general leading the CIA, saying it could give the Pentagon too much influence in intelligence gathering.
The BBC's Justin Webb says it is a measure of how enfeebled the Bush administration has become that even before the formal announcement, the decision on a new CIA director was already the subject of heated debate.
Presidential praise
The president praised Gen Hayden, pointing to a long career in the US military and intelligence community, including time spent working as deputy to the current director of national intelligence, John Negroponte.
"Mike knows our intelligence community from the ground up. He has been both a provider and a consumer of
intelligence," Mr Bush said.
"He has demonstrated an ability to adapt our intelligence services to the new challenges of the war on terror."
Mr Negroponte also commended Gen Hayden, calling him "a very, very independent-minded person".
He said Gen Hayden was well qualified for the position.
Accepting the nomination, Gen Hayden struck a positive note.
"In the confirmation process I look forward to meeting with leaders of the Congress, better understanding their concerns and working with them to move the American intelligence community forward," he said.
"This is simply too important not to get absolutely right."
Earlier, National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley appeared on US breakfast television shows to defend Gen Hayden's expected nomination.
"The question is not military versus civilian. The question is the best person to do the job," he told CBS.
Bipartisan worries
The choice of Gen Hayden - who oversaw the controversial warrantless eavesdropping programme after 9/11 - has drawn some strong criticism among legislators.
"I do believe [Gen Hayden] is the wrong person, in the wrong place, at the wrong time," senior Republican Peter Hoekstra said.
Mr Hoekstra, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said there were already "ongoing tensions" between the CIA and the Pentagon.
His views were echoed by Democrat Senator Joe Biden who said the appointment could leave agents with the impression the CIA has been "just gobbled up by the defence department".
Porter Goss's resignation after less than two years as director, in which he was given the job of reforming the agency after a series of intelligence failures, came as a surprise.
He declined to comment on his departure,
telling CNN that "it's one of those mysteries".
The White House denied as "categorically
untrue" US media reports that the president had lost confidence Mr Goss.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr//2/hi/americas/4750357.stm
Published: 2006/05/08 16:26:58 GMT
Hayden could face trouble ahead
By Adam Brookes
BBC News, Washington
President Bush has nominated an Air Force general, Michael Hayden, to be the next director of the CIA.
The position came vacant at the end of last week, when Porter Goss resigned unexpectedly after less than two years in the role.
President Bush was effusive as he nominated Lieutenant General Michael Hayden to be the top man at the CIA.
"Mike has more than 20 years of experience in the intelligence field. He served for six years as director of the National Security Agency, and thus brings vast experience leading a major intelligence agency to his new assignment," he said.
Gen Hayden's experience is beyond question. His whole career has been spent in intelligence - as an air force officer, as a military attache in Bulgaria and as head of the super-secret National Security Agency (NSA).
Most recently he has acted as number two in the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. His role - to effect reform of the intelligence community and how its 15-member agencies interact. He is an espiocrat, par excellence.
But you can read Gen Hayden's resume from start to finish and still know very little about the man. Secrecy renders opaque most of his life and work.
As he accepted the nomination, the master spy spoke only briefly.
But Michael Hayden is in fact known as an engaging, slightly unconventional character.
And Washington insiders say he has impressed the Bush administration as a man adept at bridging the treacherous bureaucratic waters that lie between the spies, the military and the politicians.
But when the general comes to be questioned by the Senate - as he must if he is to be confirmed as head of the CIA the picture becomes political, and murky.
Surveillance scandal
When he was at the NSA, Gen Hayden oversaw a highly controversial surveillance programme.
The NSA listened to the international telephone calls of Americans without obtaining the normal permissions from a secret court. There was a scandal.
Gen Hayden faced tough public questions about the programme's legality. He defended himself and the surveillance programme robustly.
If senators choose to grill him about the NSA's domestic surveillance programme, his confirmation hearings could turn bloody.
"The odds still would suggest that Hayden will be confirmed in this position," said Norman Orenstein, of the American Enterprise Institute.
"But to get there, the president is going to have to use a very significant amount of political capital at a time when his capital bank is at its lowest ebb."
Republican concerns
Senators from the opposition Democratic Party may smell political advantage in opposing the president's candidate, and in publicly revisiting the NSA surveillance.
But they may also feel that opposing Gen Hayden makes them look weak or obstructionist on national security - a traditional point of vulnerability for the Democrats.
Perhaps the greater threat to Gen Hayden comes from the fact some Republicans have already expressed publicly doubts over his candidacy - not because of the surveillance programme, but because he is a serving officer.
They are concerned that the military should not lead a civilian agency.
Republican Senator Saxby Chambliss said Hayden's military background would be a "major problem".
The background to these concerns is complex. The Pentagon, say intelligence community sources, has over the last few years expanded its intelligence gathering, particularly in the field of human intelligence, or HUMINT.
HUMINT - the actual business of running agents - is traditionally the work of the CIA.
But Pentagon officials have, we're told, sought to expand the remit of Special Operations Command and the Defense Intelligence Agency to include more HUMINT operations.
These officials feel a need for faster, more relevant operational intelligence for America's 'war on terrorism'.
Morale low
The Pentagon's expansion has led to unease in other areas of the intelligence community.
And, say intelligence sources, maintaining a working equilibrium between the various agencies has been difficult for John Negroponte, the Director of National Intelligence and his deputy, Michael Hayden.
And if the general is confirmed to the CIA, his problems could be just beginning.
The Washington whisper is that morale at the agency is very low.
The failure to stop 911; the flawed intelligence in Iraq; these have left the CIA the butt of jokes - especially in the military.
One admiral recently told me: "If I'm looking for knowledge, I don't look to the CIA."
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/americas/4752745.stm
Published: 2006/05/09 00:26:26 GMT
Outcry as Bush Nominates Illegal Spying Advocate for CIA
The Progress Report
Posted on May 8, 2006
http://www.alternet.org/story/36014/
On Friday, Porter Goss unexpectedly resigned as head of the CIA, leaving behind an "utterly irresponsible" 18-month tenure at the agency and unanswered questions about his hurried departure. Today, the White House nominated deputy director of national intelligence Lt. Gen. Michael Hayden as Goss's successor. "Bottom line, I believe he's the wrong person, the wrong place, at the wrong time. We should not have a military person leading a civilian agency at this time," said House Intelligence Committee Chairman Peter Hoekstra (R-MI) yesterday on Fox News Sunday, voicing the bipartisan concerns of lawmakers.
Hayden has demonstrated a fundamental misunderstanding of the Constitution and has misled Congress under oath. His close ties to Vice Presidency Cheney, Director of National Intelligence John Negroponte, and the Department of Defense have led many members of Congress to conclude he is wrong man to gain the trust of the intelligence community and clean up the CIA after the "chaos" left by Goss.
'Under the sway' of Rumsfeld
Over the weekend, a bipartisan group of lawmakers spoke out opposing the nomination of a military officer to a civilian agency. If Hayden is confirmed, "military officers would run all the major spy agencies, from the ultra-secret National Security Agency to the Defense Intelligence Agency." One former intelligence official said, "It seems to me the Pentagon grows even stronger now.... Every time there's a change, it moves in that direction." "I think...putting a general in charge is going to send the wrong signal through the agency here in Washington, but also to our agents in the field around the world," said Hoekstra yesterday, who also added that there will "be the perception in the CIA" that Hayden would be under the sway of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
One of Goss's largest challenges at the CIA was gaining the trust of career officers, who resented that he brought in a group of his unqualified aides -- called "the Gosslings" by CIA insiders -- and appointed them to top positions. Even if Hayden retires from the military, he is unlikely to be trusted as the committed independent advocate that the CIA needs. "Now, just resigning commission and moving on, putting on a striped suit, a pinstriped suit versus an air force uniform, I don't think makes much difference," said Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-GA). Senate Intelligence Committee Pat Roberts (R-KS), who in 2005 called Hayden "outstanding," yesterday refused to offer his endorsement of the administration's nominee: "I'm not in a position to say that I am for General Hayden and will vote for him."
Hayden unfamiliar with the Fourth Amendment
Hayden has demonstrated an "astounding lack of knowledge" about his job as an intelligence official, fundamentally misunderstanding constitutional protections. In a speech on Jan. 23, Hayden boasted that he was knowledgeable on the Fourth Amendment: "[B]elieve me, if there's any amendment to the Constitution that employees of the National Security Agency are familiar with, it's the Fourth."
But in a question at that same speech, Knight-Ridder reporter Jonathan Landay noted that Hayden "repeatedly referred to the Fourth Amendment's search standard of 'reasonableness' without mentioning that it also demands 'probable cause'"; Hayden continued to deny that the amendment contained any such clause. When Landay asked Hayden if the amendment contains the phrase "probable cause," Hayden bluntly replied, "No."
Lying to Congress
In January, Karl Rove promised to make the midterm elections focus on wiretapping. Hayden -- as one of the administration's "most forceful" defenders of President Bush's warrantless domestic eavesdropping and director of the National Security Agency (NSA) when the program was implemented in 2002 -- will likely bring that issue to the forefront. "We have no concerns about a public debate over the terrorist surveillance program," said a senior White House official. Hayden misled Congress and the public about the administration's domestic spying. In his Oct. 17, 2002 testimony, Hayden told a congressional committee that any surveillance of persons in the United States was done consistent with the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which required a court-approved warrant for wiretapping. As American Progress Senior Fellow Morton Halperin pointed out, "At the time of his statements, Hayden was fully aware of the presidential order to conduct warrantless domestic spying issued the previous year," making Hayden's misleading statements to Congress illegal.
An Agency in Turmoil
Goss's chaotic departure encapsulated his chaotic tenure.
"A 'reform' that was supposed to improve coordination and coherence among our intelligence agencies has had the opposite effect," said Robert L. Hutchings, former National Intelligence Council chairman, about Goss's term. While the Bush administration has tried to spin Goss's resignation as a lost turf battle with Negroponte, there has been little indication that Goss ever fought hard against the administration for his turf.
In reality, Goss's tenure was noted for "bleeding talent" away from the struggling agency: "At least a dozen senior officials -- several of whom were promoted under Goss -- have resigned, retired early or requested reassignment. The directorate's second-in-command walked out of Langley last month and then told senators in a closed-door hearing that he had lost confidence in Goss's leadership." Now the agency has been drawn into a federal criminal investigation over Kyle "Dusty" Foggo, the CIA's third-ranking official, handpicked by Goss.
The CIA Inspector General has opened an investigation into Foggo's contacts with defense contractors accused of bribing lawmakers. Foggo has admitted that he attended poker games -- where prostitutes may have been present -- set up by Brent Wilkes, who is implicated in the bribery of former Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham. Additionally, Frank Bassett, a CIA agent identified as "Nine Fingers," was also at the poker parties and was a former Goss aide. "Supposedly the [Cunningham] scandal was the last straw [in deciding that Goss should resign].... This administration may be on the verge of a major scandal," said a congressional source involved in oversight of U.S. spy agencies.
2006 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/36014/
Potential Evidence Surfaces of Bush's Illegal Spying
By Onnesha Roychoudhuri, AlterNet
May 8, 2006
http://www.alternet.org/story/35807/
Five months after news of the NSA's warrantless spying program broke, and after we've learned numerous details of the program's extent, a Portland, Ore., attorney may have finally obtained hard evidence of illegal wiretaps by the government.
Thomas Nelson has been practicing administrative law for most of his professional life, but after Sept. 11 he first began offering pro bono work for immigrants detained in broad FBI terrorism sweeps. He is currently leading a little-discussed case that may contain the first documented evidence of an illegal wiretap and believes that, as a result, he himself has been subjected to warrantless -- and therefore illegal -- wiretaps and physical searches, the kind of clandestine operation that Nixon referred to as "black bag jobs." And as a result of extreme carelessness by the FBI, Nelson may have his hands on the only solid evidence of these searches.
The story begins in February 2004, when the Office of Foreign Assets Control froze all funds of the Oregon branch of the Saudi Arabian charity Al-Haramain. Attorneys Asim Ghafoor and Wendell Belew defended the charity against the government's allegations that Al-Haramain Oregon was taking part in terrorist activities.
In August 2004, as a routine court procedure, the FBI provided the lawyers and defendants with documents relating to the trial. The FBI's lawyers accidentally released a document that showed the government had used logs of conversations between the lawyers and their clients, Soliman al-Buthi and the organization, to categorize Al-Haramain as a terrorist group. The catch is that the logs were obtained without a warrant.
Ghafoor and Belew initially assumed that the document was obtained through the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) -- which allows for warrantless wiretaps as long as a warrant is obtained within 72 hours. But they grew suspicious when the FBI requested the return of that document. The lawyers immediately complied, but the FBI failed to contact both Al-Buthi and Seda, both now living overseas, to get their copies back.
When the New York Times broke the news of the NSA spy program last December, Belew and Ghafoor realized that the logs obtained of their attorney-client communications were probably a result of the program. That's when they contacted Thomas Nelson, an attorney representing al-Buthi in a separate case.
Another missed 'slam dunk'
On May 6, 2004, Nelson's close friend, 37-year-old civil and immigration lawyer Brandon Mayfield, was arrested as a material witness in the Madrid train bombings. The linchpin in the case against Mayfield was a low-quality fingerprint from a bag in Spain that contained detonation devices.
Though Mayfield hadn't traveled abroad in nearly a decade, and although the Spanish authorities continually asserted their doubts regarding the print match, the Department of Justice held him for two weeks while they tried to compile evidence in the case.
While Nelson helped Mayfield put together a defense, he observed firsthand the lengths to which the government went to to justify Mayfield's detainment. After the fingerprint was mistakenly tied to Mayfield, Nelson says the FBI started following him to try to find any evidence against him.
As the Portland Oregonian reports:
Initially, Portland's squad of investigators had just a few pieces of information about Mayfield. They knew his birthday and Social Security Number, and that he'd served in the military from 1985 to 1994. Analysts checked FBI databases to see if Mayfield was the subject of any investigations. He wasn't, but a deeper search circumstantially connected Mayfield to "other suspected terrorists." Court records showed that less than two years earlier, Mayfield had represented Jeffrey Leon Battle in a custody dispute. Battle was a member of the Portland Seven, a group arrested in 2002 for plotting to fight with the Taliban against U.S. soldiers.
Mayfield's legal files were seized by the government, and he had to fight to have them reviewed by a third party that could provide sufficient protections of the privileged material. An Oregon judge agreed to this and, finding nothing suspicious, ordered the government to release them.
Even as Spanish officials questioned the fingerprint match, FBI officials in Washington urged Portland prosecutors to disregard them. An e-mail from an FBI counterterrorism supervisor reads, "I spoke with the lab this morning, and they are absolutely confident that they have a match on the print. -- No doubt about it!!!!"
These kind of "slam-dunk" pronouncements have a way of backfiring: On May 19, Spanish authorities conclusively determined that the print belonged to Ouhnane Daoud, an Algerian citizen. On May 20, Mayfield was released, and the judge in the case refused the government's request to continue monitoring Mayfield's communications.
Nelson's experience with Mayfield's case gave him a better sense of what was happening to him when he took on Soliman al-Buthi's case at the end of 2004. Soliman, remember, while currently overseas, is one of the few who was provided with a copy of the conversation logs accidentally released by the FBI. And while the FBI did not attempt to make contact with al-Buthi, he is, according to OFAC, a "specially designated global terrorist."
If they were looking for al-Buthi, he wouldn't be hard to find. Just this past month, the Washington Post covered the work al-Buthi is doing in Saudi Arabia: "Sulaiman al-Buthi, a Riyadh-based spokesman for the International Committee for the Defense of the Final Prophet, says this religious but peaceful activism could put an end to violence and drive groups like al-Qaida out of business."
When he isn't publicly speaking against al-Qaida, he is working as an assistant director of beautification in the city of Riyadh. "Basically, he's the flower guy," Nelson told Amy Goodman in an interview, "He is responsible for the second annual Riyadh Flower Festival."
Though the FBI knew that an alleged "terrorist" possessed a document containing information about the NSA program, they did not try to find al-Buthi, or contact his lawyer, Thomas Nelson -- at least not directly.
The black bag jobs begin
Nelson officially started representing al-Buthi in September 2004; soon after, the FBI document was inadvertently released. A few months later, Nelson observed inconsistencies when he came to his office: His computer would be left on, disks still in the drive, materials shifted. Fellow lawyers from the office, working late, noticed someone on at least three occasions posing as a member of the janitorial crew, trying to get into the office.
The Oregonian reported that attorney Jonathan Norling "was sleeping on a couch at their practice early one morning last May, when a man dressed as a custodian tried to enter Nelson's office. Norling startled the man twice one night in July, when he caught the man trying to enter the locked office." The man in question had what appeared to be a valid badge for the building. But Norling notes, "This person wasn't a cleaning crew. I know the cleaning crew. I've worked here seven years, and I've worked a lot of nights, and I never experienced anything like that until Tom was working (on this case)."
Though Nelson approached the security people at the building, they wouldn't talk to him. "They were very blunt," he told AlterNet in a phone interview. He then took his concerns to the building manager. "It was all very disconcerting and inconclusive," says Nelson. "There was no direct denial. At the end, I said, 'You probably couldn't tell me if something was going on anyway.' He said, 'That's probably right.'"
After these incidents, Nelson brought the al-Buthi files to his house. That's when he and his wife experienced lapses in his home alarm that the company monitors refused to explain. "They basically stonewalled us," says Nelson. "We kept calling people and they kept referring us around and saying 'We'll call you back,' but no one would ever call back."
Sensing that he may be experiencing the same kinds of searches as the FBI performed in Brandon Mayfield's case, Nelson wrote a letter to Karin Immergut, U.S. attorney for Oregon in September 2005, requesting she "look into the matter and to inform me if representatives … have engaged in these searches." Immergut said she was not aware of any warrantless searches. After the New York Times broke the NSA story, Nelson wrote Immergut again, stating that, based upon the report, he may be the target of searches outside of the scope of FISA. Immergut responded, "I was completely unaware of any NSA surveillance program until I read about it in the media," and suggested Nelson contact the NSA directly.
Which is exactly what Nelson did. But the only response he received reads like pure bureaucratic satire:
Rest assured that safeguards are in place to protect the civil liberties of U.S. citizens. However, because of the highly classified nature of the program, we can neither confirm nor deny the existence of records responsive to your request. The fact of the existence or non-existence of responsive records is a currently and properly classified matter in accordance with Executive Order 12598, as amended. Moreover, the third exemption to FOIA provides for the withholding of information specifically protected from disclosure by statute. Thus, your request is also denied because the fact of the existence or non-existence of the information is exempted from disclosure pursuant to the third exemption.
Nelson believes the clandestine searches of his home and office have ended. But he still feels a lingering sense of discomfort: "Every time I think about the possibility that they were in my home, I get very angry … My office is one thing, my home is something else. I don't want a bunch of spooks showing up there."
The fact that most frustrates Nelson is that no one ever tried to contact him or al-Buthi personally; rather, they resorted to what Nelson thinks must be illegal searches. "In retrospect," Nelson says, "I think they were trying to get the [leaked FBI] document back. If the searches were pursuant to FISA, it would be interesting to find out what they told the judge to get a warrant -- 'We've been conducting this illegal wiretapping program, we've embarrassed ourselves, there's this document out there that Nelson has, will you give us a warrant to get it back?'"
This is the circular logic that lies at the root of the debacle: In order to hide evidence of an illegal search program, the government is taking part in illegal searches.
Nelson has been cautious since he took on Asim Ghafoor and Wendell Belew's case against the NSA. Having intimately experienced the violation of law the government is willing to take part in to keep the NSA program under wraps, Nelson elected to put the classified document in the hands of the judge. Filing it under seal, Nelson hopes to keep the document safe and the case alive.
The formal legal complaint, filed in February, states clearly that Ghafoor and Belew's communications with their Al-Haramain charity clients were recorded without a warrant outside FISA: "Defendant National Security Agency did not obtain a court order authorizing such electronic surveillance, nor did it otherwise follow the procedures mandated by FISA."
Though the evidence is promising, the battle is far from won. The Department of Justice is fighting hard to get the classified document back under its control. Nelson and his co-counsel Steve Goldberg raised an objection -- pointing out to the judge that it might not be wise to hand evidence over to a defendant in the case, which led to this tense exchange:
U.S. District Judge Garr King: What if I say I will not deliver it (the document) to the FBI, Mr. Coppolino?
DoJ Attorney Anthony Coppolino: Well, your honor, we obviously don't want to have any kind of a confrontation with you; we want to work this out, but it has to be secured in a proper fashion. And I respect the court's, you know, authority, but on the other hand, I also would have to reiterate that it has to be secured properly.
Nelson fully expects the DoJ lawyers to pull out all the stops in order to justify the executive power behind the NSA program and for the president's right to keep the program from the public. The DoJ already filed a request explaining why the document, and hence the case, should never be made public. That explanation was unsurprisingly filed under seal, proving that even explaining why something should be classified has been deemed a classified matter. But despite the powers he's fighting against, Nelson believes that the fact that the document has seen the light of day means the fight will eventually be won.
The continued obfuscation of inquiries into the NSA program illustrates that the president's lawyers blur the distinction between protecting our national security and protecting the president's transgressions of the law from scrutiny.
There are a handful of individuals and organizations enduring intensive intimidation campaigns and spearheading legislation against the president and the NSA to put a stop to a program that is slowly undermining the basic tenets of our legal system.
Simply electing to represent someone designated a "terrorist" requires attorneys to obtain a license from OFAC or risk jail. As Nelson explained, "The purpose of OFAC is to keep an eye on 'terrorists' and, by extension, their attorneys … Frankly, I don't think this process could pass constitutional muster, but that's a fight for another day."
While the legal ins and outs of the NSA spy program may at times be complex, the essence of what Thomas Nelson is fighting for is simple: upholding the judicial tenet of "innocent until proven guilty" and the separation of powers laid out in the Constitution.
In the coming weeks, the government must file a response to Thomas Nelson's complaint. While the DoJ will inevitably try to push it from the courts, and from public attention, it is only a matter of time before the simplicity of what is at stake takes root. As Nelson explained, "It's a question of whether one man can, as commander in chief, ride roughshod over all the protections in the Constitution.
If this is our response to 9/11, we've lost. If this kind of practice can occur because of 9/11, Osama won."
Onnesha Roychoudhuri is an assistant editor at AlterNet.
2006 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/35807/
Former South African Deputy President, Jacob Zuma, Acquitted on Rape Charges
South Africa's Zuma acquitted of rape
Mon May 8, 2006 9:39 AM EDT
By Manoah Esipisu and Rebecca Harrison
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - A South African judge on Monday acquitted former Deputy President Jacob Zuma on charges he raped an HIV-positive family friend, keeping alive the political hopes of a man until recently seen as the country's next president.
"I find that consensual sex took place between the complainant and the accused," Judge Willem van der Merwe told a packed courtroom as more than 2,000 Zuma supporters massed outside the Johannesburg courthouse exploded in wild cheers.
Zuma's rape trial has fanned tensions in the ruling African National Congress (ANC), where he remains a widely popular figure and was until recently seen as the frontrunner to succeed President Thabo Mbeki in 2009.
Despite his broad appeal, political analysts say he has been badly wounded by the rape trial.
The 64-year-old anti-apartheid veteran had pleaded not guilty to raping his accuser at his Johannesburg home last November. But his lawyers said he did have consensual sex with the woman, a 31-year-old AIDS activist.
Conviction for rape could have brought a jail sentence of up to 15 years.
Van der Merwe, who under South Africa's non-jury trial system decided the case, said the state had failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Zuma had intended rape, and questioned the credibility of the complainant.
"It would be foolish for any man with a police guard at hand and his daughter not far away to surprise a sleeping woman and to start raping her without knowing whether she would shout the roof off," he said.
The rape trial, the most sensational case in South Africa since the end of white rule in 1994, has transfixed the public with graphic sexual testimony and rival protests by Zuma supporters and women's rights groups.
Defense lawyers sought to undermine the credibility of the accuser -- who under South African law cannot be named -- by delving into her sexual history and depicting her relationship with Zuma as flirtatious.
Zuma, an ethnic Zulu, was hit with the rape charge following a separate graft scandal last year which prompted Mbeki to sack him as the country's second-highest official.
He is due to go on trial in July on the corruption charges, which he has denied and described as part of a shadowy political plot by his enemies in the ANC to end his presidential hopes.
Political analysts said the rape case has done serious political damage to Zuma, particularly because he conceded that he had unprotected sex with the woman despite knowing that she was infected with HIV.
AIDS activists criticized Zuma -- who said he took a shower to prevent possible HIV infection -- as spreading misinformation about the disease in South Africa. The country is at the heart of Africa's HIV/AIDS pandemic with some 5 million of its 45 million people infected.
But Zuma supporters remained undaunted, a sign of the power of his folksy grassroots appeal when contrasted with the chillier technocratic image often projected by Mbeki.
"He is our hero we're going to support Zuma until he becomes president," said Patrick Seiphalo, who along with other cheering Zuma supporters thronged through central Johannesburg after the verdict.
S Africa's Zuma cleared of rape
Former South African Deputy President Jacob Zuma has been acquitted of raping a 31-year-old family friend.
There were jubilant scenes in central Johannesburg as Mr Zuma addressed the crowd, and accused the media of finding him guilty before the trial started.
Mr Zuma was once seen as a future president and remains popular, but analysts say evidence aired in the rape trial has badly damaged his reputation.
He still faces a separate charge of corruption, to be heard in July.
Delivering judgement, Judge Willem van der Merwe said the state had not proven the case beyond reasonable doubt.
He also referred to evidence given by the defence, suggesting that the complainant had a history of making false accusations of rape.
"The complainant was inclined to accuse men of raping her or attempting to rape her," the judge concluded.
Probabilities
Mr Zuma, who played a key role in the fight against apartheid, admitted having had sex with the woman, but insisted it was consensual.
Referring to their contradictory versions of the events of the night of 2 November 2005, the judge declared "the probabilities favour the accused's version".
He said Mr Zuma would not have risked forcing himself on the woman when his own daughter was in the house and police were on guard outside, who would have heard the accused if she had cried out.
Because of public interest in the case, Judge van der Merwe allowed his four-hour ruling to be broadcast live on radio and television.
The judge began his ruling by expressing his regret that "some pressure groups and individuals found the accused guilty and some found him not guilty" while the trial was under way.
'Bad dreams'
A significant police presence, along with rolls of razor wire and police trucks, had moved in to cordon off the court house overnight.
A crowd of several hundred supporters was present as proceedings began, but had grown to more than 1,000 by midday.
Women demonstrating against rape outside the court wore "kangas", or wrap-around cloths, in protest at the defence's argument that the complainant had provoked the sexual encounter by wearing such a cloth while a guest at Mr Zuma's house.
The woman demonstrators left quietly as the judge approached his verdict, and the much larger crowd of Mr Zuma's supporters became rowdy.
Mr Zuma addressed the crowd in nearby Beyers Naude Square, with angry words for the media and political analysts who have criticised him.
"A person who is charged remains innocent until proven otherwise - this is one of the golden rules of our constitution but the press broke this rule," he said.
"Today the bad dreams have evaporated."
'Unacceptable'
While deputy president, Mr Zuma was also head of South Africa's National Aids Council and the Moral Regeneration Movement.
His views on HIV prevention, which were aired in court, have shocked Aids activists.
Mr Zuma said he had had a shower after sex to prevent HIV transmission and believed that a healthy man was unlikely to catch HIV from a woman.
Judge van der Merwe said such behaviour was "totally unacceptable", reports the AFP news agency.
"This trial has really damaged his reputation, his credibility," political analyst William Mervin Gumede told the BBC's Focus on Africa programme.
In July, he faces another trial on the corruption charges that led to his dismissal as deputy president last year. He denies the charges.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr//2/hi/africa/4750731.stm
Published: 2006/05/08 14:32:00 GMT
Wounded Zuma wins first round
Jacob Zuma may have emerged victorious from round one of his battle with South Africa's criminal justice system but his ambitions of becoming president have been damaged, probably fatally.
He has been acquitted of the rape charge brought against him late last year, but he still faces trial on the corruption charge that has been under investigation since June.
The corruption charge prompted President Thabo Mbeki to fire Mr Zuma as the national deputy president in June.
Later, allegations of rape led to the decision by the ANC's National Working Committee to suspend Mr Zuma from his party duties, though he formally retains the title of ANC deputy president.
Only the party congress has the power to strip Mr Zuma of this title.
Damage
Now that he has been cleared of rape, Mr Zuma and his supporters will feel vindicated in their belief that he is the victim of a political conspiracy.
This will increase the pressure on the ANC from the pro-Zuma faction, yet the party dare not reinstate a man who still has a corruption charge pending against him.
In any case, the acquittal does not change the fact that rape trial has done tremendous damage to Mr Zuma.
In the government and at high levels of the ANC, as well as among the wider South African public, people are shocked by the behaviour that Mr Zuma admitted to in court.
Few South Africans would consider it acceptable to have sex with the daughter of a close and long-standing friend - even if it was consensual - and most would find it hard to maintain any respect for a political leader who did so.
Mr Zuma's admission that he had not used a condom, and had then taken a shower after having sex with a woman who knew to be HIV-positive, in order to reduce the risk of infection, prompted outrage from Aids activists and a flood of satire from the country's cartoonists.
As the accuser delivered her testimony about the events of the evening of 2 November 2005, the public was part appalled, part intrigued by the graphic description of what, according to her version, sounded like a rape by a man who was both arrogant and lacking in self-control.
But as the trial drew on, South Africans became increasingly doubtful about whether the prosecution would secure a conviction.
Divergence
Testifying in his own defence, Mr Zuma presented a version of events that had little in common with the testimony of his accuser.
Most crucially, he said the two had had sex in his own bedroom, and not in the guest room at his home as the accuser claimed.
Combined with questions about the complainant's sexual history and psychological condition, the defence strategy seemed to be to paint a picture of a woman who was either deluded, or a persistent liar.
With such wide divergence on the details, and no witnesses available to corroborate either version of events, the prosecution failed to prove beyond reasonable doubt that the woman had not consented to sex.
Many South Africans are likely to remain unconvinced by Mr Zuma's defence - particularly those who believe that the current sexual violence legislation, which is soon to be changed, puts rape complainants at an unfair disadvantage.
The corruption trial is scheduled to begin in July - until that trial is over, the ANC will remain in the same uncomfortable position as it has been in for nearly a year: the position of having a deputy leader who commands the support of a vocal faction within the party, but whose reputation has taken a battering and who could yet turn out to be a criminal.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr//1/hi/world/africa/4983758.stm
Published: 2006/05/08 13:14:13 GMT
Mon May 8, 2006 9:39 AM EDT
By Manoah Esipisu and Rebecca Harrison
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - A South African judge on Monday acquitted former Deputy President Jacob Zuma on charges he raped an HIV-positive family friend, keeping alive the political hopes of a man until recently seen as the country's next president.
"I find that consensual sex took place between the complainant and the accused," Judge Willem van der Merwe told a packed courtroom as more than 2,000 Zuma supporters massed outside the Johannesburg courthouse exploded in wild cheers.
Zuma's rape trial has fanned tensions in the ruling African National Congress (ANC), where he remains a widely popular figure and was until recently seen as the frontrunner to succeed President Thabo Mbeki in 2009.
Despite his broad appeal, political analysts say he has been badly wounded by the rape trial.
The 64-year-old anti-apartheid veteran had pleaded not guilty to raping his accuser at his Johannesburg home last November. But his lawyers said he did have consensual sex with the woman, a 31-year-old AIDS activist.
Conviction for rape could have brought a jail sentence of up to 15 years.
Van der Merwe, who under South Africa's non-jury trial system decided the case, said the state had failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Zuma had intended rape, and questioned the credibility of the complainant.
"It would be foolish for any man with a police guard at hand and his daughter not far away to surprise a sleeping woman and to start raping her without knowing whether she would shout the roof off," he said.
The rape trial, the most sensational case in South Africa since the end of white rule in 1994, has transfixed the public with graphic sexual testimony and rival protests by Zuma supporters and women's rights groups.
Defense lawyers sought to undermine the credibility of the accuser -- who under South African law cannot be named -- by delving into her sexual history and depicting her relationship with Zuma as flirtatious.
Zuma, an ethnic Zulu, was hit with the rape charge following a separate graft scandal last year which prompted Mbeki to sack him as the country's second-highest official.
He is due to go on trial in July on the corruption charges, which he has denied and described as part of a shadowy political plot by his enemies in the ANC to end his presidential hopes.
Political analysts said the rape case has done serious political damage to Zuma, particularly because he conceded that he had unprotected sex with the woman despite knowing that she was infected with HIV.
AIDS activists criticized Zuma -- who said he took a shower to prevent possible HIV infection -- as spreading misinformation about the disease in South Africa. The country is at the heart of Africa's HIV/AIDS pandemic with some 5 million of its 45 million people infected.
But Zuma supporters remained undaunted, a sign of the power of his folksy grassroots appeal when contrasted with the chillier technocratic image often projected by Mbeki.
"He is our hero we're going to support Zuma until he becomes president," said Patrick Seiphalo, who along with other cheering Zuma supporters thronged through central Johannesburg after the verdict.
S Africa's Zuma cleared of rape
Former South African Deputy President Jacob Zuma has been acquitted of raping a 31-year-old family friend.
There were jubilant scenes in central Johannesburg as Mr Zuma addressed the crowd, and accused the media of finding him guilty before the trial started.
Mr Zuma was once seen as a future president and remains popular, but analysts say evidence aired in the rape trial has badly damaged his reputation.
He still faces a separate charge of corruption, to be heard in July.
Delivering judgement, Judge Willem van der Merwe said the state had not proven the case beyond reasonable doubt.
He also referred to evidence given by the defence, suggesting that the complainant had a history of making false accusations of rape.
"The complainant was inclined to accuse men of raping her or attempting to rape her," the judge concluded.
Probabilities
Mr Zuma, who played a key role in the fight against apartheid, admitted having had sex with the woman, but insisted it was consensual.
Referring to their contradictory versions of the events of the night of 2 November 2005, the judge declared "the probabilities favour the accused's version".
He said Mr Zuma would not have risked forcing himself on the woman when his own daughter was in the house and police were on guard outside, who would have heard the accused if she had cried out.
Because of public interest in the case, Judge van der Merwe allowed his four-hour ruling to be broadcast live on radio and television.
The judge began his ruling by expressing his regret that "some pressure groups and individuals found the accused guilty and some found him not guilty" while the trial was under way.
'Bad dreams'
A significant police presence, along with rolls of razor wire and police trucks, had moved in to cordon off the court house overnight.
A crowd of several hundred supporters was present as proceedings began, but had grown to more than 1,000 by midday.
Women demonstrating against rape outside the court wore "kangas", or wrap-around cloths, in protest at the defence's argument that the complainant had provoked the sexual encounter by wearing such a cloth while a guest at Mr Zuma's house.
The woman demonstrators left quietly as the judge approached his verdict, and the much larger crowd of Mr Zuma's supporters became rowdy.
Mr Zuma addressed the crowd in nearby Beyers Naude Square, with angry words for the media and political analysts who have criticised him.
"A person who is charged remains innocent until proven otherwise - this is one of the golden rules of our constitution but the press broke this rule," he said.
"Today the bad dreams have evaporated."
'Unacceptable'
While deputy president, Mr Zuma was also head of South Africa's National Aids Council and the Moral Regeneration Movement.
His views on HIV prevention, which were aired in court, have shocked Aids activists.
Mr Zuma said he had had a shower after sex to prevent HIV transmission and believed that a healthy man was unlikely to catch HIV from a woman.
Judge van der Merwe said such behaviour was "totally unacceptable", reports the AFP news agency.
"This trial has really damaged his reputation, his credibility," political analyst William Mervin Gumede told the BBC's Focus on Africa programme.
In July, he faces another trial on the corruption charges that led to his dismissal as deputy president last year. He denies the charges.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr//2/hi/africa/4750731.stm
Published: 2006/05/08 14:32:00 GMT
Wounded Zuma wins first round
Jacob Zuma may have emerged victorious from round one of his battle with South Africa's criminal justice system but his ambitions of becoming president have been damaged, probably fatally.
He has been acquitted of the rape charge brought against him late last year, but he still faces trial on the corruption charge that has been under investigation since June.
The corruption charge prompted President Thabo Mbeki to fire Mr Zuma as the national deputy president in June.
Later, allegations of rape led to the decision by the ANC's National Working Committee to suspend Mr Zuma from his party duties, though he formally retains the title of ANC deputy president.
Only the party congress has the power to strip Mr Zuma of this title.
Damage
Now that he has been cleared of rape, Mr Zuma and his supporters will feel vindicated in their belief that he is the victim of a political conspiracy.
This will increase the pressure on the ANC from the pro-Zuma faction, yet the party dare not reinstate a man who still has a corruption charge pending against him.
In any case, the acquittal does not change the fact that rape trial has done tremendous damage to Mr Zuma.
In the government and at high levels of the ANC, as well as among the wider South African public, people are shocked by the behaviour that Mr Zuma admitted to in court.
Few South Africans would consider it acceptable to have sex with the daughter of a close and long-standing friend - even if it was consensual - and most would find it hard to maintain any respect for a political leader who did so.
Mr Zuma's admission that he had not used a condom, and had then taken a shower after having sex with a woman who knew to be HIV-positive, in order to reduce the risk of infection, prompted outrage from Aids activists and a flood of satire from the country's cartoonists.
As the accuser delivered her testimony about the events of the evening of 2 November 2005, the public was part appalled, part intrigued by the graphic description of what, according to her version, sounded like a rape by a man who was both arrogant and lacking in self-control.
But as the trial drew on, South Africans became increasingly doubtful about whether the prosecution would secure a conviction.
Divergence
Testifying in his own defence, Mr Zuma presented a version of events that had little in common with the testimony of his accuser.
Most crucially, he said the two had had sex in his own bedroom, and not in the guest room at his home as the accuser claimed.
Combined with questions about the complainant's sexual history and psychological condition, the defence strategy seemed to be to paint a picture of a woman who was either deluded, or a persistent liar.
With such wide divergence on the details, and no witnesses available to corroborate either version of events, the prosecution failed to prove beyond reasonable doubt that the woman had not consented to sex.
Many South Africans are likely to remain unconvinced by Mr Zuma's defence - particularly those who believe that the current sexual violence legislation, which is soon to be changed, puts rape complainants at an unfair disadvantage.
The corruption trial is scheduled to begin in July - until that trial is over, the ANC will remain in the same uncomfortable position as it has been in for nearly a year: the position of having a deputy leader who commands the support of a vocal faction within the party, but whose reputation has taken a battering and who could yet turn out to be a criminal.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr//1/hi/world/africa/4983758.stm
Published: 2006/05/08 13:14:13 GMT
Sunday, May 07, 2006
Sudan Update: Government Says UN Troops Can Enter Darfur Amid Peace Treaty
Sudan agrees to UN troops for Darfur as treaty signed
From Mohamed Osman in Khartoum
Sunday Herald, 07 May 2006
A spokesman for the Sudanese government has confirmed that United Nations peacekeepers will now be welcome in Darfur after a peace agreement between Khartoum and the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA), the main rebel group involved in the conflict.
Bakri Mulah, secretary-general for external affairs in the information ministry, issued the invitation on behalf of the Khartoum government after the agreement was reached on Friday in Abuja, the Nigerian capital.
The Sudanese government initially rejected calls for UN peacekeepers to replace the thousands of African Union peacekeepers currently in Darfur.
“We heard the appeal of the UN secretary-general Kofi Annan [for UN peacekeepers to join those of the African Union] ... Now there is no problem,” a spokesman said.
The government of Sudan and the main Darfur rebel faction expressed hopes that three years of fighting could now come to an end. Tens of thousands of people have fallen victim to the conflict, which began in 2003. Rebels took up arms against the government-backed janjaweed Arab militia, claiming they were neglected and oppressed by the Arab-dominated central government.
The janjaweed responded with a campaign of arson, beatings and rape. Since then some two million people have been forced to flee their homes, including more than 200,000 who poured across the border into neighbouring Chad.
Two other rebel groups – a rival faction of the SLA and the smaller Justice and Equality Movement – are still adamently opposed to the deal and have rejected the peace accord, which is backed by the African Union, the United States, the UK, the European Union and the Arab League.
Optimism was muted by these rejections and by a historic failure to live up to agreements struck over two years of negotiations in the Nigerian capital.
In the refugee camps, hope that the conflict has ended was cautious yesterday, with many of those affected by the fighting insistent that UN troops must arrive before they will feel safe.
“I’m all for peace, but the deal has to be a realistic one or we’ll end up back home facing the same violence that caused us to flee in the first place,” said Adam Dingila, a community leader at the Gaga refugee camp in eastern Chad. Dingila has lost 15 members of his family to the conflict in Darfur.
The refugees living at Gaga, the newest of 12 camps strung across the region, had suggestions of their own about what they would like to see happen before they considered returning home.
“It’s not just a peace deal that we need. As refugees, we have our own problems. We had our animals and goods stolen, our houses burnt, we need to be reimbursed,” said 48-year-old Ali Yaya Omar, voicing a concern raised by many other refugees.
Others were still worried about janjaweed soldiers and were unconvinced about pledges to disarm them.
“What guarantee do we have of our security if we were to go back now? I want to see UN forces on the ground to protect us before I return,” said 30-year-old Abdelrahman Yaya.
At the United Nations headquarters in New York, American ambassador John Bolton welcomed the agreement but said that UN peacekeepers would become essential if the agreement were to hold.
“Recognising that this is a very positive development in Abuja, we now would like the government in Khartoum to follow through and give the necessary visas and other arrangements to allow the UN planners to go in,” Bolton said. He added that such a gesture would lead to the strengthening of the African Union force during the transition.
In Cairo, Arab League secretary- general Amr Moussa welcomed the agreement and urged the rebel groups who have opposed the deal to reverse their decision. Their refusual is seen as an illustration of the deep divisions between rival ethnic groups in Darfur which have yet to be addressed.
Many analysts doubt the sincerity of the government, because Khartoum has undermined several agreements in the past, and because not all the groups agreed to end the conflict.
“The other rebels [who refused to sign] would love to be spoilers. That is why the peace deal is only a first step and a robust force in Darfur is a must,” said Leslie Lefkow, a researcher at Human Rights Watch.
UN secretary-general Kofi Annan said yesterday that he would press Sudan to let UN planners into the region to prepare for deployment and urged donors to contribute humanitarian aid.
The United Nations was forced to halve its food aid to more than six million people in Sudan this month, half of them in Darfur, because donors came up with only one-third of the UN’s $746 million appeal this year.
Darfur conflict seen continuing despite pact
Sat May 6, 2006 5:52 PM EDT
By Tom Ashby
LAGOS (Reuters) - A peace deal signed by the largest rebel faction in Darfur and the Sudanese government will not end the 3-year-old conflict, but could bring more protection for millions of refugees.
The refusal of two rebel factions to join in the agreement on Friday, which marked the end of two years of talks in the Nigerian capital, illustrates that divisions between rival ethnic groups in Darfur have not been addressed.
Many analysts doubt the sincerity of the government, which holds the key to implementing the deal, because Khartoum has undermined so many agreements in the past.
"The government would make a mistake if they think that signing with one party will make peace," Hassan Abdallah Ahmed, deputy leader of Islamist opposition Popular Congress Party, told Reuters.
A faction of the rebel Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) led by Minni Arcua Minnawi signed the peace deal with Khartoum under intense pressure from Western powers, who are exasperated by their impotence in the face of an onslaught on Darfur by government-backed militia that Washington called genocide.
Some commanders from a different SLA faction also signed, but rival factional leader Abdel Wahed Mohammed al-Nur and another rebel group, Justice and Equality Movement, refused.
"Signing an incomplete deal guarantees that there will be no peace in Darfur and that suits the government," said John Prendergast, senior adviser to the International Crisis Group.
"I am sure the government will look to exploit divisions in the rebels to fuel fighting in Darfur. They are not interested in peace, only deflecting international criticism and pressure."
President Bush called the leaders of Nigeria and the Congo Republic to congratulate them on the peace deal, White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said.
He told Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo, who hosted the talks, "We need to work together to transition with the United Nations."
Bush also thanked Congo Republic President Denis Sassou Nguesso, who is chairman of the African Union. "He stressed that this is a significant step forward in a long process to end the conflict and suffering in Darfur and bring peace to the region," Perino said.
Rebels took up arms against government-backed Arab militias in 2003 over what they saw as neglect and oppression by the Arab-dominated central government.
The camel-riding Janjaweed militias embarked on a campaign of arson, looting and rape which drove 2 million people into refugee camps, and tens of thousands died.
"The Darfur conflict will not be resolved until there is a dialogue between all the ethnic groups in Darfur," said an analyst in Khartoum, asking not to be named.
"There is a real problem between nomads and urban groups," he said, adding that neighboring Eritrea and Chad were also fuelling the war.
PROTECTION FOR REFUGEES
Analysts were more optimistic about better protection for the millions of refugees, who are still exposed to attacks, and said the deal could speed the arrival of United Nations peacekeepers to the desert region the size of France.
Washington has been pushing to install U.N. peacekeepers with powers to intervene in the fighting, to replace a 7,000-strong African Union force which has proved too small and toothless to enforce a ceasefire.
Khartoum had insisted that a peace deal with the rebels was a precondition for any U.N. force.
"The other rebels (who refused to sign) would love to be spoilers. That is why the peace deal is only a first step and a robust force in Darfur is a must," said Leslie Lefkow, a researcher at Human Rights Watch.
The United States said it would ask Rwanda to increase the AU presence by 1,200 troops, while waiting for the U.N. to assume control of a stronger force before the end of this year.
U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said he would press Sudan to let U.N. planners into the region to prepare for deployment and urged donors to contribute humanitarian aid.
The United Nations was forced to halve its food aid to more than 6 million people in Sudan this month, half of them in Darfur, because donors came up with only one-third of its $746 million appeal this year.
Additional reporting by Opheera McDoom in London and Caren Bohan in Washington
UN aid chief due to visit Darfur
Top UN humanitarian official Jan Egeland has arrived in Sudan to review the situation in the Darfur region.
His five-day visit comes amid signs the government may allow a UN peacekeeping force into the war-torn area.
On Friday Khartoum and the largest rebel group in Darfur signed a peace deal. Two smaller rebel groups rejected the agreement, after talks in Nigeria.
The three-year conflict has killed about 200,000 people and left about two million homeless.
'New willingness'
UN Emergency Relief Co-ordinator Mr Egeland is due to go to Darfur on Sunday, in the first visit by a UN official to the region since the peace deal was signed.
He is expected to visit southern Darfur, where fighting has broken out recently.
Mr Egeland will have talks with local leaders and visit refugee camps before heading to Khartoum on Monday for meetings with Sudanese officials, according to French news agency AFP.
He said prior to his visit that access for aid workers in Darfur was at its worst level in two years.
The trip came amid hopes Khartoum might accept a UN force to take over from African Union (AU) troops in Darfur.
Khartoum has said in the past it would only consider inviting in UN troops if a peace deal was reached.
But on Saturday the US welcomed Khartoum's "new willingness".
Citing comments by government representatives indicating they were now willing to accept the UN force, US Ambassador to the UN John Bolton said they viewed "this as... the first positive outcome from the Abuja peace agreement", according to the AFP news agency.
Earlier UN Secretary General Kofi Annan urged Khartoum to issue visas to his team of assessors so they could begin planning for the arrival of an international peacekeeping force to replace the 7,000 African troops later in the year.
Peace deal
The peace plan, brokered by the African Union, creates a temporary regional government for Darfur, in which rebels will take part.
---------------------------------------------------
DARFUR DRAFT PEACE PLAN
Pro-government Janjaweed militia to be disarmed
Rebel fighters to be incorporated into army
One-off transfer of $300m to Darfur $200m a year for the region thereafter Compensation for those forced to flee their homes
Regional government, if approved in a vote
----------------------------------------------------
The pro-government Janjaweed militia are to be disbanded and the rebels incorporated into the security forces.
Deadlines came and went in recent days, as diplomats exerted pressure on parties after all the rebels had rejected the original draft.
In the end the Khartoum government and the Sudanese Liberation Movement (SLM) said they were willing to sign, despite reservations on both sides over power sharing and security.
But the smaller faction of the SLM would not budge, blaming a lack of trust in the security arrangements.
The smallest rebel group, the Justice and Equality Movement (Jem), called for fundamental changes to the document.
Its chief negotiator reiterated the rebels' demands for the post of vice-president in the Khartoum government and for Darfur to have a greater share of national wealth.
'Genocide'
Aid organisations say the conflict has created one of the worst humanitarian crises in the world.
The rebels took up arms in 2003, accusing the government of discriminating against the black African residents of Darfur.
Pro-government Arab militia then launched a campaign, described as "genocide" by the US.
The Sudan government denies backing the Janjaweed militias accused of mass killing, rape and looting.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr//2/hi/africa/4981304.stm
Published: 2006/05/06 21:54:41 GMT
From Mohamed Osman in Khartoum
Sunday Herald, 07 May 2006
A spokesman for the Sudanese government has confirmed that United Nations peacekeepers will now be welcome in Darfur after a peace agreement between Khartoum and the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA), the main rebel group involved in the conflict.
Bakri Mulah, secretary-general for external affairs in the information ministry, issued the invitation on behalf of the Khartoum government after the agreement was reached on Friday in Abuja, the Nigerian capital.
The Sudanese government initially rejected calls for UN peacekeepers to replace the thousands of African Union peacekeepers currently in Darfur.
“We heard the appeal of the UN secretary-general Kofi Annan [for UN peacekeepers to join those of the African Union] ... Now there is no problem,” a spokesman said.
The government of Sudan and the main Darfur rebel faction expressed hopes that three years of fighting could now come to an end. Tens of thousands of people have fallen victim to the conflict, which began in 2003. Rebels took up arms against the government-backed janjaweed Arab militia, claiming they were neglected and oppressed by the Arab-dominated central government.
The janjaweed responded with a campaign of arson, beatings and rape. Since then some two million people have been forced to flee their homes, including more than 200,000 who poured across the border into neighbouring Chad.
Two other rebel groups – a rival faction of the SLA and the smaller Justice and Equality Movement – are still adamently opposed to the deal and have rejected the peace accord, which is backed by the African Union, the United States, the UK, the European Union and the Arab League.
Optimism was muted by these rejections and by a historic failure to live up to agreements struck over two years of negotiations in the Nigerian capital.
In the refugee camps, hope that the conflict has ended was cautious yesterday, with many of those affected by the fighting insistent that UN troops must arrive before they will feel safe.
“I’m all for peace, but the deal has to be a realistic one or we’ll end up back home facing the same violence that caused us to flee in the first place,” said Adam Dingila, a community leader at the Gaga refugee camp in eastern Chad. Dingila has lost 15 members of his family to the conflict in Darfur.
The refugees living at Gaga, the newest of 12 camps strung across the region, had suggestions of their own about what they would like to see happen before they considered returning home.
“It’s not just a peace deal that we need. As refugees, we have our own problems. We had our animals and goods stolen, our houses burnt, we need to be reimbursed,” said 48-year-old Ali Yaya Omar, voicing a concern raised by many other refugees.
Others were still worried about janjaweed soldiers and were unconvinced about pledges to disarm them.
“What guarantee do we have of our security if we were to go back now? I want to see UN forces on the ground to protect us before I return,” said 30-year-old Abdelrahman Yaya.
At the United Nations headquarters in New York, American ambassador John Bolton welcomed the agreement but said that UN peacekeepers would become essential if the agreement were to hold.
“Recognising that this is a very positive development in Abuja, we now would like the government in Khartoum to follow through and give the necessary visas and other arrangements to allow the UN planners to go in,” Bolton said. He added that such a gesture would lead to the strengthening of the African Union force during the transition.
In Cairo, Arab League secretary- general Amr Moussa welcomed the agreement and urged the rebel groups who have opposed the deal to reverse their decision. Their refusual is seen as an illustration of the deep divisions between rival ethnic groups in Darfur which have yet to be addressed.
Many analysts doubt the sincerity of the government, because Khartoum has undermined several agreements in the past, and because not all the groups agreed to end the conflict.
“The other rebels [who refused to sign] would love to be spoilers. That is why the peace deal is only a first step and a robust force in Darfur is a must,” said Leslie Lefkow, a researcher at Human Rights Watch.
UN secretary-general Kofi Annan said yesterday that he would press Sudan to let UN planners into the region to prepare for deployment and urged donors to contribute humanitarian aid.
The United Nations was forced to halve its food aid to more than six million people in Sudan this month, half of them in Darfur, because donors came up with only one-third of the UN’s $746 million appeal this year.
Darfur conflict seen continuing despite pact
Sat May 6, 2006 5:52 PM EDT
By Tom Ashby
LAGOS (Reuters) - A peace deal signed by the largest rebel faction in Darfur and the Sudanese government will not end the 3-year-old conflict, but could bring more protection for millions of refugees.
The refusal of two rebel factions to join in the agreement on Friday, which marked the end of two years of talks in the Nigerian capital, illustrates that divisions between rival ethnic groups in Darfur have not been addressed.
Many analysts doubt the sincerity of the government, which holds the key to implementing the deal, because Khartoum has undermined so many agreements in the past.
"The government would make a mistake if they think that signing with one party will make peace," Hassan Abdallah Ahmed, deputy leader of Islamist opposition Popular Congress Party, told Reuters.
A faction of the rebel Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) led by Minni Arcua Minnawi signed the peace deal with Khartoum under intense pressure from Western powers, who are exasperated by their impotence in the face of an onslaught on Darfur by government-backed militia that Washington called genocide.
Some commanders from a different SLA faction also signed, but rival factional leader Abdel Wahed Mohammed al-Nur and another rebel group, Justice and Equality Movement, refused.
"Signing an incomplete deal guarantees that there will be no peace in Darfur and that suits the government," said John Prendergast, senior adviser to the International Crisis Group.
"I am sure the government will look to exploit divisions in the rebels to fuel fighting in Darfur. They are not interested in peace, only deflecting international criticism and pressure."
President Bush called the leaders of Nigeria and the Congo Republic to congratulate them on the peace deal, White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said.
He told Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo, who hosted the talks, "We need to work together to transition with the United Nations."
Bush also thanked Congo Republic President Denis Sassou Nguesso, who is chairman of the African Union. "He stressed that this is a significant step forward in a long process to end the conflict and suffering in Darfur and bring peace to the region," Perino said.
Rebels took up arms against government-backed Arab militias in 2003 over what they saw as neglect and oppression by the Arab-dominated central government.
The camel-riding Janjaweed militias embarked on a campaign of arson, looting and rape which drove 2 million people into refugee camps, and tens of thousands died.
"The Darfur conflict will not be resolved until there is a dialogue between all the ethnic groups in Darfur," said an analyst in Khartoum, asking not to be named.
"There is a real problem between nomads and urban groups," he said, adding that neighboring Eritrea and Chad were also fuelling the war.
PROTECTION FOR REFUGEES
Analysts were more optimistic about better protection for the millions of refugees, who are still exposed to attacks, and said the deal could speed the arrival of United Nations peacekeepers to the desert region the size of France.
Washington has been pushing to install U.N. peacekeepers with powers to intervene in the fighting, to replace a 7,000-strong African Union force which has proved too small and toothless to enforce a ceasefire.
Khartoum had insisted that a peace deal with the rebels was a precondition for any U.N. force.
"The other rebels (who refused to sign) would love to be spoilers. That is why the peace deal is only a first step and a robust force in Darfur is a must," said Leslie Lefkow, a researcher at Human Rights Watch.
The United States said it would ask Rwanda to increase the AU presence by 1,200 troops, while waiting for the U.N. to assume control of a stronger force before the end of this year.
U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said he would press Sudan to let U.N. planners into the region to prepare for deployment and urged donors to contribute humanitarian aid.
The United Nations was forced to halve its food aid to more than 6 million people in Sudan this month, half of them in Darfur, because donors came up with only one-third of its $746 million appeal this year.
Additional reporting by Opheera McDoom in London and Caren Bohan in Washington
UN aid chief due to visit Darfur
Top UN humanitarian official Jan Egeland has arrived in Sudan to review the situation in the Darfur region.
His five-day visit comes amid signs the government may allow a UN peacekeeping force into the war-torn area.
On Friday Khartoum and the largest rebel group in Darfur signed a peace deal. Two smaller rebel groups rejected the agreement, after talks in Nigeria.
The three-year conflict has killed about 200,000 people and left about two million homeless.
'New willingness'
UN Emergency Relief Co-ordinator Mr Egeland is due to go to Darfur on Sunday, in the first visit by a UN official to the region since the peace deal was signed.
He is expected to visit southern Darfur, where fighting has broken out recently.
Mr Egeland will have talks with local leaders and visit refugee camps before heading to Khartoum on Monday for meetings with Sudanese officials, according to French news agency AFP.
He said prior to his visit that access for aid workers in Darfur was at its worst level in two years.
The trip came amid hopes Khartoum might accept a UN force to take over from African Union (AU) troops in Darfur.
Khartoum has said in the past it would only consider inviting in UN troops if a peace deal was reached.
But on Saturday the US welcomed Khartoum's "new willingness".
Citing comments by government representatives indicating they were now willing to accept the UN force, US Ambassador to the UN John Bolton said they viewed "this as... the first positive outcome from the Abuja peace agreement", according to the AFP news agency.
Earlier UN Secretary General Kofi Annan urged Khartoum to issue visas to his team of assessors so they could begin planning for the arrival of an international peacekeeping force to replace the 7,000 African troops later in the year.
Peace deal
The peace plan, brokered by the African Union, creates a temporary regional government for Darfur, in which rebels will take part.
---------------------------------------------------
DARFUR DRAFT PEACE PLAN
Pro-government Janjaweed militia to be disarmed
Rebel fighters to be incorporated into army
One-off transfer of $300m to Darfur $200m a year for the region thereafter Compensation for those forced to flee their homes
Regional government, if approved in a vote
----------------------------------------------------
The pro-government Janjaweed militia are to be disbanded and the rebels incorporated into the security forces.
Deadlines came and went in recent days, as diplomats exerted pressure on parties after all the rebels had rejected the original draft.
In the end the Khartoum government and the Sudanese Liberation Movement (SLM) said they were willing to sign, despite reservations on both sides over power sharing and security.
But the smaller faction of the SLM would not budge, blaming a lack of trust in the security arrangements.
The smallest rebel group, the Justice and Equality Movement (Jem), called for fundamental changes to the document.
Its chief negotiator reiterated the rebels' demands for the post of vice-president in the Khartoum government and for Darfur to have a greater share of national wealth.
'Genocide'
Aid organisations say the conflict has created one of the worst humanitarian crises in the world.
The rebels took up arms in 2003, accusing the government of discriminating against the black African residents of Darfur.
Pro-government Arab militia then launched a campaign, described as "genocide" by the US.
The Sudan government denies backing the Janjaweed militias accused of mass killing, rape and looting.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr//2/hi/africa/4981304.stm
Published: 2006/05/06 21:54:41 GMT
Friday, May 05, 2006
Institute For Race Relations Gives Library to Warwick University
IRR gifts its library to Warwick University
By A. Sivanandan
3 May 2006, 10:00am
A. Sivanandan, in a speech at the launch of the Institute of Race Relations' library at Warwick University on 27 April 2006, explains how the collection (1956-2005) reflected the movements of the times - decolonisation, Black Power and globalisation.
-----------------------------------------------------------
I am honoured that Warwick University should name the Institute's library after me. And I thank those members of the IRR's Council of Management and staff who, in a moment of weakness, thought I deserved it.
But I cannot take all the credit for it. It was the times: the breakdown of Empire, decolonisation, and the emergence of neo-colonialism - the new order in which the ruling classes of the ex-colonies and the mother country entered into a mutually beneficial partnership under the rubric of the New Commonwealth to expropriate the resources and labour of native peoples. This new arrangement between the rulers and the ruled then predicated a re-alignment in race relations from 'superior white' and 'inferior black' to 'equal but different', from believers and heathens to 'we are all God's children'. But what it failed to say was that the whites would continue to play God.
And it is that understanding on the part of big business, that, if they wanted to make any headway in the newly independent countries, they would have to change the relations between the races, that led to the setting up of the IRR (in 1956) as a department firstly of the Royal Institute of International Affairs (Chatham House) - by ex-Kenyan Highlanders, owners of sugar plantations in the Caribbean and various ex-administrators of the British Raj. In fact the founding director of the IRR, Philip Mason, visionary, missionary and author, had himself served as a magistrate in India.
Hence the library they set up was a private library to cater to the research needs of big business who were the backers of the Institute - such as BP, Shell, Rio Tinto Zinc, Roan Selection Trust, South African Gold Mines and later Nuffield and Ford.
But the race riots of 1958 in Notting Hill and Nottingham brought the race relations chickens home to roost, and the IRR was cast off from the Royal Institute for International Affairs to become an independent body in its own right, and began to concentrate on race relations in Britain. (Most of its publications hitherto had to do with Africa, Asia and the Caribbean). And it was the riots, perhaps, that got me the librarian's job at the Institute in 1964 (They had now to put a black face on things).
The Institute, I was told was an independent educational charity set up to carry out objective research that would inform public opinion and government policy and so improve race relations. The librarian's role was not only to aid such research but to carry out the empirical work of examining day-to-day happenings in race relations all over the country through daily perusal of the nationals and provincial press cuttings.
Unfortunately, I took my bosses' words seriously - and, in pursuit of the objectivity they professed, fed information from all sides of the race relations spectrum to the Survey of Race Relations in Britain - an ongoing work consisting of forty-one pieces of research and spread over seven years. In the process, I began to see that the way the researches were being conducted was top-down, with society as a given, whereas the breakdown in race relations in Britain, in Rhodesia, in South Africa, in Sri Lanka (I had come to Britain in 1958 from the Sinhala/Tamil riots in Sri Lanka and walked straight into the Notting Hill riots) questioned the very nature of these societies and, more particularly, their power structures, and how such power was distributed among the various peoples of those societies in terms of western economic and political interests, relayed through the IMF and the World Bank on the pretext of aid and development.
The study of race relations, therefore, could not be taken out of its social, economic and political milieux. It was not an isolate, a specialisation, a discipline in its own right. It was a complex of disciplines. There was the sociology of race, the political economy of race, the biology of race, the geo-politics of race and so on. And then there were the historical connections between race and religion, race and slavery, race and empire which also needed to be examined in order to understand the nature of contemporary race relations. Which in turn necessitated the study of social theory: capitalism, socialism, liberalism, fascism, etc.
All of which was given a boost by the setting up of the Institute's International Research Unit (we were quite big in those days - about forty to fifty staff - spread over three buildings - all in the Fortnum and Mason belt - not the handful we have now, located in the precincts of Pentonville).
As the library collection grew, it came to be known as a rich resource not only for writers, journalists, historians and dramatists - Paul Foot's great political analyses of racism were researched there, as were Stephen Castle's first book on migrant workers in Europe, Amrit Wilson's path-breaking 'Finding a Voice' on Asian women, Peter Fryer's monumental black history, Martin Walker on the NF, David Edgar's anti-racist plays - but for black activists and grassroots organisations as well. And they in turn, in the questions they asked me and the knowledge they sought, sent me in search of literature that would inform them and me - and the library ended up stocking the movement publications from the USA such as the Black Panther Newspaper and Muhammed Speaks, the works of Malcolm X and Stokely Carmichael, Martin Luther King, Nyerere and Nkrumah, Amilcar Cabral and Samora Machel, Fidel Castro and Ho Chi Minh, as well as black ephemera in Britain such as notices of meetings and conferences, hand-outs on strikes and demonstrations, manifestos and slogans and even the day-to-day published mutterings of the fascists.
That is what I mean when I say that it was the times that influenced the library collection, which in turn influenced the thinking of the staff and the researchers of the Institute, which in its turn led to the overthrow of the management council in the palace revolt of 1972 - in which your own Professor John Rex, a member of the IRR, took the side of the staff, as did Lee Bridges, now one of your professors, but then one of the American students who refused to fight in Vietnam and had to flee his country. But ours was a Pyrrhic victory: we had the day, but the bosses left with the money. The main body of the IRR was moved to a warehouse in Pentonville Road and our staff reduced to three, Hazel Waters, Jenny Bourne and me. With assistance from the World Council of Churches, however, and a couple of other charities, we managed to keep going and changed the study of race relations into a study of racism in all its avatars.
The academic side of the Institute had already been taken into Sussex University by Professor Fernando Henriques, a member of IRR's Council, to be followed later by Professor Michael Banton's unit at Bristol, also of the Institute's Council, and Professors John Rex and Robin Cohen at Warwick. You see there is a family connection between Warwick and us. And it is no accident, therefore, that, thanks to the good offices of Lee Bridges, Bob Carter, Anne Bell and others, the Institute's collection should end up in the excellent hands of Lynne Wright. (I apologise to the librarians for the messy classification scheme they have inherited. But in my defence, it was the one I inherited too.)
But the times are a-changing again. The computer age has altered both the inscape and outscape of libraries and the way they function. The shape and contours of racism, too, have changed under the impact of globalisation. Not race relations but migration and ethnicity are accepted as the legitimate field of study and there's a growing literature on the subject. A charity like the Institute cannot afford to keep up with these changes. But it can put its grassroots connections and collections to use on behalf of the asylum seekers and refugees that globalisation has thrown up on Europe's shores.
What better home for the IRR's library, then, than the Ethnicity and Migration Collection of Warwick University?.
Thank you.
The Sivanandan Collection of the Institute of Race Relations and the collection of the Centre for Research in Ethnic Relations (CRER) have been brought together into the Ethnicity and Migrations Collections, housed on the fifth floor of the University of Warwick Library.
To find out about using the collection email:
ethnicityandmigration@warwick.ac.uk or phone 024 7652 3605.
The Institute of Race Relations is precluded from expressing a corporate view: any opinions expressed are therefore those of the authors.
Institute of Race Relations 2006
https://www.irr.org.uk/2006/may/ha000007.html
By A. Sivanandan
3 May 2006, 10:00am
A. Sivanandan, in a speech at the launch of the Institute of Race Relations' library at Warwick University on 27 April 2006, explains how the collection (1956-2005) reflected the movements of the times - decolonisation, Black Power and globalisation.
-----------------------------------------------------------
I am honoured that Warwick University should name the Institute's library after me. And I thank those members of the IRR's Council of Management and staff who, in a moment of weakness, thought I deserved it.
But I cannot take all the credit for it. It was the times: the breakdown of Empire, decolonisation, and the emergence of neo-colonialism - the new order in which the ruling classes of the ex-colonies and the mother country entered into a mutually beneficial partnership under the rubric of the New Commonwealth to expropriate the resources and labour of native peoples. This new arrangement between the rulers and the ruled then predicated a re-alignment in race relations from 'superior white' and 'inferior black' to 'equal but different', from believers and heathens to 'we are all God's children'. But what it failed to say was that the whites would continue to play God.
And it is that understanding on the part of big business, that, if they wanted to make any headway in the newly independent countries, they would have to change the relations between the races, that led to the setting up of the IRR (in 1956) as a department firstly of the Royal Institute of International Affairs (Chatham House) - by ex-Kenyan Highlanders, owners of sugar plantations in the Caribbean and various ex-administrators of the British Raj. In fact the founding director of the IRR, Philip Mason, visionary, missionary and author, had himself served as a magistrate in India.
Hence the library they set up was a private library to cater to the research needs of big business who were the backers of the Institute - such as BP, Shell, Rio Tinto Zinc, Roan Selection Trust, South African Gold Mines and later Nuffield and Ford.
But the race riots of 1958 in Notting Hill and Nottingham brought the race relations chickens home to roost, and the IRR was cast off from the Royal Institute for International Affairs to become an independent body in its own right, and began to concentrate on race relations in Britain. (Most of its publications hitherto had to do with Africa, Asia and the Caribbean). And it was the riots, perhaps, that got me the librarian's job at the Institute in 1964 (They had now to put a black face on things).
The Institute, I was told was an independent educational charity set up to carry out objective research that would inform public opinion and government policy and so improve race relations. The librarian's role was not only to aid such research but to carry out the empirical work of examining day-to-day happenings in race relations all over the country through daily perusal of the nationals and provincial press cuttings.
Unfortunately, I took my bosses' words seriously - and, in pursuit of the objectivity they professed, fed information from all sides of the race relations spectrum to the Survey of Race Relations in Britain - an ongoing work consisting of forty-one pieces of research and spread over seven years. In the process, I began to see that the way the researches were being conducted was top-down, with society as a given, whereas the breakdown in race relations in Britain, in Rhodesia, in South Africa, in Sri Lanka (I had come to Britain in 1958 from the Sinhala/Tamil riots in Sri Lanka and walked straight into the Notting Hill riots) questioned the very nature of these societies and, more particularly, their power structures, and how such power was distributed among the various peoples of those societies in terms of western economic and political interests, relayed through the IMF and the World Bank on the pretext of aid and development.
The study of race relations, therefore, could not be taken out of its social, economic and political milieux. It was not an isolate, a specialisation, a discipline in its own right. It was a complex of disciplines. There was the sociology of race, the political economy of race, the biology of race, the geo-politics of race and so on. And then there were the historical connections between race and religion, race and slavery, race and empire which also needed to be examined in order to understand the nature of contemporary race relations. Which in turn necessitated the study of social theory: capitalism, socialism, liberalism, fascism, etc.
All of which was given a boost by the setting up of the Institute's International Research Unit (we were quite big in those days - about forty to fifty staff - spread over three buildings - all in the Fortnum and Mason belt - not the handful we have now, located in the precincts of Pentonville).
As the library collection grew, it came to be known as a rich resource not only for writers, journalists, historians and dramatists - Paul Foot's great political analyses of racism were researched there, as were Stephen Castle's first book on migrant workers in Europe, Amrit Wilson's path-breaking 'Finding a Voice' on Asian women, Peter Fryer's monumental black history, Martin Walker on the NF, David Edgar's anti-racist plays - but for black activists and grassroots organisations as well. And they in turn, in the questions they asked me and the knowledge they sought, sent me in search of literature that would inform them and me - and the library ended up stocking the movement publications from the USA such as the Black Panther Newspaper and Muhammed Speaks, the works of Malcolm X and Stokely Carmichael, Martin Luther King, Nyerere and Nkrumah, Amilcar Cabral and Samora Machel, Fidel Castro and Ho Chi Minh, as well as black ephemera in Britain such as notices of meetings and conferences, hand-outs on strikes and demonstrations, manifestos and slogans and even the day-to-day published mutterings of the fascists.
That is what I mean when I say that it was the times that influenced the library collection, which in turn influenced the thinking of the staff and the researchers of the Institute, which in its turn led to the overthrow of the management council in the palace revolt of 1972 - in which your own Professor John Rex, a member of the IRR, took the side of the staff, as did Lee Bridges, now one of your professors, but then one of the American students who refused to fight in Vietnam and had to flee his country. But ours was a Pyrrhic victory: we had the day, but the bosses left with the money. The main body of the IRR was moved to a warehouse in Pentonville Road and our staff reduced to three, Hazel Waters, Jenny Bourne and me. With assistance from the World Council of Churches, however, and a couple of other charities, we managed to keep going and changed the study of race relations into a study of racism in all its avatars.
The academic side of the Institute had already been taken into Sussex University by Professor Fernando Henriques, a member of IRR's Council, to be followed later by Professor Michael Banton's unit at Bristol, also of the Institute's Council, and Professors John Rex and Robin Cohen at Warwick. You see there is a family connection between Warwick and us. And it is no accident, therefore, that, thanks to the good offices of Lee Bridges, Bob Carter, Anne Bell and others, the Institute's collection should end up in the excellent hands of Lynne Wright. (I apologise to the librarians for the messy classification scheme they have inherited. But in my defence, it was the one I inherited too.)
But the times are a-changing again. The computer age has altered both the inscape and outscape of libraries and the way they function. The shape and contours of racism, too, have changed under the impact of globalisation. Not race relations but migration and ethnicity are accepted as the legitimate field of study and there's a growing literature on the subject. A charity like the Institute cannot afford to keep up with these changes. But it can put its grassroots connections and collections to use on behalf of the asylum seekers and refugees that globalisation has thrown up on Europe's shores.
What better home for the IRR's library, then, than the Ethnicity and Migration Collection of Warwick University?.
Thank you.
The Sivanandan Collection of the Institute of Race Relations and the collection of the Centre for Research in Ethnic Relations (CRER) have been brought together into the Ethnicity and Migrations Collections, housed on the fifth floor of the University of Warwick Library.
To find out about using the collection email:
ethnicityandmigration@warwick.ac.uk or phone 024 7652 3605.
The Institute of Race Relations is precluded from expressing a corporate view: any opinions expressed are therefore those of the authors.
Institute of Race Relations 2006
https://www.irr.org.uk/2006/may/ha000007.html
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