Category Archives: Failed foreign policy

ISIS Kill List Targets American Civilians, But do They Know?

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Is anyone telling the civilians they are targets of Islamic State? Nope…Anyone explain why? The military? the FBI? The police? Is anyone collaborating, coordinating and protecting citizens?

 

ISIS ‘Kill Lists’ Increasingly Target U.S. Civilians

Report: Calls for random attacks by hacking groups illuminate ‘evolving terror threat’

FreeBeacon: Pro-ISIS hacking groups have started including American civilians along with military, government, and law enforcement personnel on “kill lists,” consistent with the terror group’s effort to expand attacks to random targets and instill fear in the public, according to a new report.

The SITE Intelligence Group, an organization that monitors jihadist propaganda, examined eight lists recently circulated online by pro-ISIS hacking groups, including some that name random civilian targets.

“These lists, with targets spanning drone operators to random civilians, appear to have achieved at least part of their presumed intentions: heightened alert by government workers, FBI visits to startled civilians, and significant media attention,” SITE wrote in its report.

Eight lists released over the course of two months this year have targeted federal government employees, military personnel, state and local government officials, and random residents of New York and Texas. While most of the kill lists have not been pushed through official ISIS channels, fighters and supporters of the terror group have promoted the targets through social media.

“This embrace of random targets, though new within the context of hackers’ kill lists, is nonetheless consistent with IS’ methodology, and demonstrates application of attack instructions from IS’ leadership and affiliates,” the report explained, using another name for the Islamic State, or ISIS.

ISIS has inspired self-radicalized terrorists who have launched attacks inside the United States. Omar Mateen, a U.S. citizen, pledged allegiance to the terror group during conversations with 911 operators during a gun attack that killed 49 victims at an Orlando gay club earlier this month. The couple who opened fire on a San Bernardino, California, holiday party last December are also believed to have pledged support to ISIS.

The FBI declined to comment specifically on investigative matters related to the kill lists but said that the agency routinely notifies people and organizations of information collected during investigations that could be “perceived as potentially threatening in nature.”

“Potential threats may relate to individuals, institutions, or organizations, and are shared in order to sensitize potential victims to the observed threat, and to assist them in taking proper steps to ensure their safety,” Matthew Bertron, a representative for the FBI’s National Press Office, told the Washington Free Beacon.

Kill lists from pro-ISIS hacking groups have become increasingly abundant since the so-called Islamic State Hacking Division called for attacks on 100 military personnel in March of last year, and later released lists targeting 10 Italian Army officers and over 1,000 military and government personnel. While this particular hacking group—once headed by ISIS fighter Junaid Hussain before he was killed in an airstrike—has focused on military and government personnel, others have emerged to target civilians and local officials.

A pro-ISIS group called the United Cyber Caliphate, for example, released five different target lists between March and May of this year. The lists publicized personal information about 11 Tennessee state county board members; 3,600 New York citizens; and 1,543 Texas residents, according to SITE’s report. Two lists each separately included information about 50 federal government employees, including workers from the Departments of State, Defense, and Navy.

While the list of New York residents was removed from the hosting site where it was posted, the lists with information on individuals in Tennessee and Texas remained online.

Another group named the Caliphate Cyber Army also released two lists, one of which called for attacks on 56 New Jersey state police staff and another that targeted 36 Minnesota state police officers.

While inactive between September 2015 and May of this year, the Islamic State Hacking Division also recently released names and personal information of 76 U.S. military personnel who work with drones.

“In just over a year, kill lists from pro-IS hacking groups have not only become more abundant, but have also expanded in terms of target selection,” the SITE report stated. “Between March and May of this year, kill lists by these groups have expanded beyond conventional criteria to random civilian targets, instructing to ‘shoot them down.’”

The lists are consistent with ISIS ideology supporting attacks on all non-Muslims living in countries at war with the terror group, according to SITE.

“This shift in target selection shows a new method in serving a long-standing function of IS and other jihadi groups: instill widespread fear into governments and the public,” the report stated. “As IS spokesman Abu Muhammad al-‘Adnani stated in a September 2014 speech, Muslims should kill any non-Muslim living in countries warring with the group, with no distinction of ‘whether he is a civilian or military.’”

The promotion of the lists also highlights ISIS militants’ exploitation of social media to recruit and inspire attacks, regardless of the fact that the pro-ISIS hacking groups do not appear to be publicly coordinating with one another.

“Given the power and ease of social media, along with the increasing ubiquity of Internet access and smart phones, every IS supporter can act as their own online media group, recruitment office, or fundraising organization. Likewise, every IS-supporting hacker can use their skills to serve the group’s goals, whether they be a fighter or a supporter in non-combat zones,” the report stated.

The SITE Intelligence Group could not confirm that the groups obtained the information by hacking into government or other private systems but said that it was both possible and plausible. The report noted that some of the information on the lists is available through public channels though they “appear to be compiled via non-public sources, especially when factoring what would be immense labor and difficulty required to manually compile the information via those public sources.”

The Islamic State Hacking Division is believed to have obtained data for its list targeting over 1,000 U.S. military personnel from Ardit Ferizi, a Kosovo citizen who hacked into a U.S.-based company’s servers to harvest the information. The Justice Department charged Ferizi with computer hacking, identity theft, and providing material support to ISIS last October.

Benghazi: GOP Report 100+ Witnesses, No Video to Blame

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The full 800 page report is here.

During the first attack, the only focus the White House and the State Department was to concoct a blame, no one cared at the terrifying moments about a response or rescue while Panetta delivered the orders for a military response. Exactly how many lives were at risk at the time is still somewhat unknown, but rather estimated…simply put all their lives were in peril.

It shows that the State Department assessment of the situation in Benghazi in 2011 and 2012 noted rising crime levels, rampant firearm ownership, and a high risk of militia violence in the security vacuum left by the toppling of Libyan dictator Moammar Gaddafi. The precarious security situation, according to the report, was exacerbated by inadequate security at the Benghazi outpost, which was plagued by equipment failures, a lack of manpower and relied on an often-disorganized local militia for protection. Read more here from CNN and their summary.

*****

EXCLUSIVE –  The claim that the fatal 2012 Benghazi terrorist attacks were sparked by an anti-Muslim video was crafted in Washington by Obama administration appointees and reflected neither eyewitness nor real-time reports from the Americans under siege, according to the final report of the GOP-led Benghazi Select Committee.

The GOP report, released Tuesday, followed by less than a day a report by the Democrats on the panel saying that security at the Benghazi, Libya facility was “woefully inadequate” but former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton never personally denied any requests from diplomats for additional protection. More from FNC.

House Republicans’ Report Sheds New Light on Benghazi Attack

NBC: After a more than two-year investigation into the 2012 terrorist attack in Benghazi, House Republicans are set to release a lengthy report Tuesday recounting the events that led to the deaths of four American diplomats.

It sheds new light on the breakdown in the U.S. military’s response to the attack and offers new details about why U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens was at the compound in the Libyan city with only two State Department bodyguards, months after the British and others had evacuated the area.

NBC News obtained the first 175-page section of the full 800-page House Select Committee on Benghazi report that will be released later Tuesday. The Democratic minority released its own report Monday.

One section of the report seems to allege that U.S. officials fundamentally misunderstood who their allies were at the time. The Republican majority’s report found that 35 Americans were saved not by a “quasi-governmental militia” as previous reports concluded, or even a group the U.S. saw as allies. Instead, the report determines that the Americans were saved by the “Libyan Military Intelligence,” a group composed of military officers under the Moammar Khaddafy regime, the Libyan dictator who the U.S. helped topple just one year earlier.

The February 17 Martyr Brigade, “recommended by the Libyan Government and contractually obligated to provide security to the Mission Compound,” had fled, the report found. “In other words, some of the very individuals the United States helped remove from power during the Libyan revolution were the only Libyans that came to the assistance of the United States on the night of the Benghazi attacks,” the report states.

Last fall, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton testified before the Benghazi committee that Stevens had originally chosen to serve in Benghazi because “he understood America had to be represented there at that pivotal time.”

In previously unreported details, the Republican majority of the committee found that Stevens traveled to the U.S. mission that week to both fill a temporary staffing gap and to spearhead an effort to make Benghazi a permanent diplomatic post.

Witnesses told the committee Stevens was laying the groundwork for a visit by Secretary Clinton just one month later and “the hope was to establish a permanent consulate in Benghazi for the Secretary to present to the Libyan government during her trip.”

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Discussions were already underway in Washington for how to fund the upgrades, and one month before the end of the fiscal year there was pressure to assemble a package before available funds were lost.

The report highlights the military’s failure to carry out Defense Secretary Leon Panetta’s order to deploy forces to Benghazi and the lengthy delay that prevented the military assets from arriving at the embassy in Tripoli until 2 p.m. the day after the Benghazi attack.

“What was disturbing from the evidence the Committee found was that at the time of the final lethal attack at the Annex, no asset ordered deployed by the Secretary had even left the ground,” the report states.

Previous accounts blamed the “tyranny of time and distance” plus the failure to have airplanes ready for the significant delay in moving military assets. But the report states conflicting orders from State Department and Pentagon officials over whether Marines should wear military uniforms or civilian attire also played a role.

In a newly revealed two-hour secure video conference on the night of the attacks led by White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough and attended by Clinton and others, State Department officials raised concerns about the diplomatic sensitivities of the attire to be worn by assets launched.

In an interview with the Committee, Patrick Kennedy, the under secretary or Management at State, described the department’s sensitivity as wanting to “make sure that the steps we were taking would enhance the security of our personnel, not potentially diminish the security of our personnel.”

According to one commander, the report states, as forces prepared to deploy, “during the course of three hours, he and his Marines changed in and out of their uniforms four times.”

Further, several witnesses told the committee that despite Panetta’s orders, the operating plan was not to insert any asset into Benghazi. “Their understanding was that the assets needed to be sent to Tripoli to augment security at the Embassy, and that the State Department was working to move the State Department personnel from Benghazi to Tripoli.”

Republicans on the committee were critical of high-level officials in Washington for mistakenly thinking that the attacks were over and the crisis had passed by the time the emergency video conference convened, which the report alleges contributed to the confusion.

The report also finds that then-Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral James Winnefeld, did not participate in the secure call because “he had left to return to his residence to host a dinner party for foreign dignitaries.” He received one update during the dinner on the attacks.

The section of the report devoted to the Benghazi assault concludes “the response to the attacks suffered from confusion and miscommunication circulating between agencies.”

A total of 107 witnesses were interviewed for the report, including 81 never before questioned by Congress and 9 eyewitnesses to the attacks, Republicans on the committee told NBC News. The committee also received and reviewed more than 75,000 new pages of documents.

Democrats on the House Select Committee on Benghazi had a sharply different view even before seeing the Republicans’ report. The minority version released Monday concludes that “the U.S. military could not have done anything differently on the night of the attacks that would have saved the lives of the four brave Americans killed in Benghazi.”

Ranking Member Elijah Cummings early Tuesday called the Republican report “partisan” but could offer no additional comment because “we haven’t read it because Republicans didn’t want us to check it against the evidence we obtained.”‎

Democrats also attacked Republicans over the committee’s process, including what they describe as “grave abuses,” such as excluding Democrats from interviews, concealing exculpatory evidence, withholding interview transcripts, leaking inaccurate information, issuing unilateral subpoenas, sending armed Marshals to the home of a cooperative witness, and even conducting political fundraising “by exploiting the deaths of four Americans.”

The Democrats chastised committee chairman Trey Gowdy who they said “personally and publicly accused Secretary Clinton of compromising a highly classified intelligence source.”

Democrats did acknowledge, as had been previously determined, that “security measures in Benghazi were woefully inadequate as a result of decisions made by officials in the Bureau of Diplomatic Security.” But their report concluded, “Secretary Clinton never personally denied any requests for additional security in Benghazi.”

Reacting to the GOP report early Tuesday, State Department deputy spokesman Mark Toner said: “We have made great progress towards making our posts safer since 2012. We have been working to respond to the extensive findings and recommendations of the independent Accountability Review Board, closing out 26 out of its 29 recommendations.”

A Select Committee spokesman dismissed the Democrats’ report as “rehashed, partisan talking points” aimed at defending Hillary Clinton.

NBC News was awaiting comment from the White House on the report released by the Republican majority on the committee.

 

Clinton, for her part, has repeatedly denounced the committee’s purpose. “There have been seven investigations led mostly by Republicans in the Congress and they were non-partisan and they reached conclusions that, first of all, I and nobody did anything wrong but there were changes we could make,” Clinton said during a TODAY town hall on Oct. 5, 2015. “This committee was set up, as they have admitted, for the purpose of making a partisan political issue out of the deaths of four Americans. I would have never done that.”

Democrats Release Benghazi Report With a Big Ooops

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In an effort to get out ahead of the Republicans Benghazi report, the Democrats cleared Hillary and the White House of responsibility. But, the ooops in this case is some parts of testimony from Sidney Blumenthal.

Report, related reading: Dems: Clinton never personally denied Benghazi security 

 

The Washington DC relationships go far and wide and have some real history, missions and lots of money.

Related reading: Clinton’s State Dept. calendar missing scores of entries 

House Democrats mistakenly release transcript confirming big payout to Clinton friend Sidney Blumenthal

LATimes: The Democrats on the House Benghazi committee released their final conclusions from the inquiry into attacks on Americans in that Libyan city in 2012, and in the report they say, once again, that the investigation is a politically motivated sham aimed at damaging the reputation of Hillary Clinton.

But the report, which the Democrats published as a preemptive strike before the Republican majority releases findings likely to charge ineptitude and deception by the former secretary of State, also revealed, apparently unintentionally, details about the eye-popping amount of money a close Clinton friend and advisor made in a contract with a pro-Clinton nonprofit.

Democrats released but redacted a transcript of Clinton confidant Sidney Blumenthal answering the committee’s questions to make the point that Republicans do not want the public to know what went on during the his interrogation, during which GOP members arguably used their subpoena power to conduct political opposition research unrelated to Benghazi.

But the redaction marks are easily erased by anyone able to use a computer’s cut-and-paste function. Once the marks are lifted, the transcript portion reveals some unflattering things for any partisans on the committee, Republican or Democrat. It shows that Republicans did, indeed, leverage their subpoena of Blumenthal for political gain, digging into his financial contracts with David Brock and forcing him to reveal the details of a lucrative financial arrangement that congressional sources would ultimately leak to Fox News.

And for Democrats, the exchange exposes once again the absurd amounts of money people in the orbit of the Clintons sometimes seem to rake in just for, well, being in the orbit of the Clintons. “I’d say it’s about $200,000 a year,” Blumenthal said when asked by a committee member how much the part-time work offering up advice and ideas was worth.

“Redacted due to Chairman Gowdy’s refusal to allow release of transcript,” says a footnote to the pages of thick black redaction marks. “If released, the transcript would show that Republicans asked Mr. Blumenthal questions about his relationship with Media Matters, David Brock and Correct the Record.” Brock is a longtime Clinton loyalist, and Correct the Record and Media Matters are among the nonprofits he uses to attack Clinton opponents.

 

And how did Blumenthal get such a contract? “I have had a very long friendship with the chairman of Media Matters, whose name is David Brock, from before he founded this organization, and I have sustained that friendship. And he asked me to help provide ideas and advice to him and his organizations,” Blumenthal said.

Actually, the two got to know each other during the impeachment of Bill Clinton, during Brock’s former incarnation as a right-wing “hit man” journalist. He was starting to undergo his political conversion and in the process was feeding then-White House aide Blumenthal intelligence about what the right was plotting against Bill Clinton. Both men wrote about it in their books.

Below is the full transcript excerpt that Democrats intended not to publish. It is unclear who the questioner is in the first section.

Q: Did you ever receive any payment from an organization called Media Matters?

A: Oh, yes. I did — I did receive payment in that period from Media Matters.

Q: Okay. And what was your relationship with Media Matters at that time period?

A: I was a consultant to Media Matters. I’m sorry I—

Q: That’s okay.

A: I overlooked that.

Q: When did you become a consultant for Media Matters?

A: I would say the very end of 2012.

Q: Okay. And how did that come about, that you became a consultant for Media Matters?

A: I have had a very long friendship with the chairman of Media Matters, whose name is David Brock, from before he founded this organization, and I have sustained that friendship. And he asked me to help provide ideas and advice to him and his organizations.

Q: So you began your relationship, your paid relationship, with Media Matters at the end of 2012.

A: Right.

Q: Does that continue to this day?

A: It does.

Q: Okay. And what is your salary or your contract with Media Matters?  How much money are you earning from them?

A: I’d say it’s about $200,000 a year.

Q: And has that been roughly consistent from when you began receiving payment from Media Matters?

*[redacted due to Chairman Gowdy’s refusal to allow release of transcript].

A: I would say it’s — I’d have to check. I think it’s increased a little bit. It’s increased some.

Q: Okay. Are you familiar with the organization American Bridge?

A: Yes.

Q: Have you received any compensation from American Bridge over the last five years?

A: Yes.

Q: Okay. And how much compensation have you received from American Bridge?

A: Well, when I talk about that amount of money, I mean all of those organizations.

Q: So all of David Brock’s entities —

A: Right.

Q: — combined are 200,000?

A: About.

Q: Okay.

A: Something like that.

Q: Okay. So there’s American Bridge.

A: Yes.

Q: There’s Media Matters. 

A: Right.

Q: Are there any other organizations on which you have done work for Mr. Brock?

A: Correct the Record

Q: Okay.

A: — is another organization.

Q: Okay. 

A: And then there’s the American Independent Institute, which is a journalistic foundation.

Q: So, when you receive your paycheck, who signs the paycheck? Where does that come from?

A: It’s deposited directly. I imagine it comes from David Brock.

Q: Okay. Not David Brock personally but one of his —

A: Whoever — whoever is responsible for that payment.

Blumenthal and Republican Select Committee Member Mike Pompeo had the following exchange about Correct the Record:

Q: Fair enough. I’m going to jump around a little bit. You said I think earlier this morning that you still are working for Correct the Record?

A: I am.

Q: And tell me what the mission of Correct the Record is.  

A: Correct the Record is pretty much what it says, to correct — it’s a nonprofit organization to correct the record about public misstatements about prominent Democrats.

Q: Including this committee. If this committee said something, Correct the Record might comment on things that it said incorrectly and indeed it has?

A: That may well be so.

Q: Have you written any of that?

A: No.

Q: Yeah. So you haven’t made any comments as part of your role in Correct the Record related to this committee’s work?  You haven’t written any —

A: I have not written those.

The Covert Russian Influence, Targets Europe/USA

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What if Russia does have Hillary’s emails? When the KGB/FSB hacked into the DNC, the Kremlin does have an army of people cultivating and assessing all American politics moving ahead for the next 4 years. That is a trove of data for political warfare and coupled with Europe, Putin’s sights on global expansion is becoming a simple game of checkers.

Russian intelligence and security services have been waging a campaign of harassment and intimidation against U.S. diplomats, embassy staff and their families in Moscow and several other European capitals that has rattled ambassadors and prompted Secretary of State John F. Kerry to ask Vladimir Putin to put a stop to it.

At a recent meeting of U.S. ambassadors from Russia and Europe in Washington, U.S. ambassadors to several European countries complained that Russian intelligence officials were constantly perpetrating acts of harassment against their diplomatic staff that ranged from the weird to the downright scary. Some of the intimidation has been routine: following diplomats or their family members, showing up at their social events uninvited or paying reporters to write negative stories about them.

But many of the recent acts of intimidation by Russian security services have crossed the line into apparent criminality. In a series of secret memos sent back to Washington, described to me by several current and former U.S. officials who have written or read them, diplomats reported that Russian intruders had broken into their homes late at night, only to rearrange the furniture or turn on all the lights and televisions, and then leave. One diplomat reported that an intruder had defecated on his living room carpet. A real terrifying set of Russian aggressions explained more in detail here. It has been going on for some time, where now diplomats are being trained to handle Russian aggression.  More here from the Washington Post.

Let’s examine some other symptoms and facts:

Primer #1, 1948: Preventive Direct Action in Free Countries.

Purpose: Only in cases of critical necessity, to resort to direct action to prevent vital installations, other material, or personnel from being (1) sabotaged or liquidated or (2) captured intact by Kremlin agents or agencies. 

Description: This covert operation involves, for example, (1) control over anti-sabotage activities in the  Venezuelan oil fields, (2) American sabotage of Near Eastern oil installations on the verge of Soviet capture, and (3) designation of key individuals threatened by the Kremlin who should be protected or removed elsewhere. 

It would seem that the time is now fully ripe for the creation of a covert political warfare operations directorate within the Government. If we are to engage in such operations, they must be under unified direction. One man must be boss. And he must, as those responsible for the overt phases of political warfare, be answerable to the Secretary of State, who directs the whole in coordination. (More from Political Warfare, in the Gray Zone)

Primer #2: (2014)When Central and Eastern Europe threw off the Communist yoke and the Soviet Union collapsed, Europe and the United States transformed their Soviet policy of isolation and containment to one of political and economic integration with the Russian Federation.

This approach had been largely successful over the past 25 years. Russia joined the Group of Eight (G8) in 1998, the World Trade Organization in 2012, and was considered for membership in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). In the past 10 years alone, the value of Russia’s global trade has nearly quadrupled from $210 billion in 2003 to $802 billion in 2013. Last year, Russia’s trade with the EU represented 48.5 percent of its total. Although U.S.-Russian trade ties remained subdued by comparison, the two former superpowers developed a measurable degree of economic interdependence, as evidenced by the International Space Station and Russian-made titanium for Boeing’s 787 fleet. This transatlantic policy of integration came to an abrupt halt on March 18, 2014. (More here from Heather Conley)

Political warfare is cheap and effective when dupes are willing accomplices.

So, in 2016 we are seeing the following:

 Putin and Ortega

The Russian government is building an electronic intelligence-gathering facility in Nicaragua as part of Moscow’s efforts to increase military and intelligence activities in the Western Hemisphere.

The signals intelligence site is part of a recent deal between Moscow and Managua involving the sale of 50 T-72 Russian tanks, said defense officials familiar with reports of the arrangement.

The tank deal and spy base have raised concerns among some officials in the Pentagon and nations in the region about a military buildup under leftist Nicaraguan leader Daniel Ortega.

Disclosure of the Russia-Nicaraguan spy base comes as three U.S. officials were expelled from Nicaragua last week. The three Department of Homeland Security officials were picked up by Nicaraguan authorities, driven to the airport, and sent to the United States without any belongings.

State Department spokesman John Kirby said the expulsion took place June 14 and was “unwarranted and inconsistent with the positive and constructive agenda that we seek with the government of Nicaragua.”

“Such treatment has the potential to negatively impact U.S. and Nicaraguan bilateral relations, particularly trade,” he said.

The action is an indication that President Obama’s recent diplomatic overture to Cuba has not led to better U.S. ties to leftist governments in the region. More here.  

*****

Silicon Valley’s hostility to U.S. intelligence and law enforcement reached a new low last week when Twitter rejected the Central Intelligence Agency as a customer for data based on its tweets—while continuing to serve an entity controlled by Vladimir Putin.

The Wall Street Journal broke the news that Twitter decided U.S. intelligence services could no longer buy services from Dataminr, which has a unique relationship with Twitter. (More from the WSJ)

Russia accused of clandestine funding of European parties as US conducts major review of Vladimir Putin’s strategy
Exclusive: UK warns of “new Cold War” as Kremlin seeks to divide and rule in Europe

Telegraph: American intelligence agencies are to conduct a major investigation into how the Kremlin is infiltrating political parties in Europe, it can be revealed.

James Clapper, the US Director of National Intelligence, has been instructed by the US Congress to conduct a major review into Russian clandestine funding of European parties over the last decade.

The review reflects mounting concerns in Washington over Moscow’s determination to exploit European disunity in order to undermine Nato, block US missile defence programmes and revoke the punitive economic sanctions regime imposed after the annexation of Crimea.

The US move came as senior British government officials told The Telegraph of growing fears that “a new cold war” was now unfolding in Europe, with Russian meddling taking on a breadth, range and depth far greater than previously thought.

“It really is a new Cold War out there,” the source said, “Right across the EU we are seeing alarming evidence of Russian efforts to unpick the fabric of European unity on a whole range of vital strategic issues.”

A dossier of “Russian influence activity” seen by The Sunday Telegraph identified Russian influence operations running in France, the Netherlands, Hungary as well as Austria and the Czech Republic, which has been identified by Russian agents as an entry-point into the Schengen free movement zone.

The US intelligence review will examine whether Russian security services are funding parties and charities with the intent of “undermining political cohesion”, fostering agitation against the Nato missile defence programme and undermining attempts to find alternatives to Russian energy.

Officials declined to say which parties could come into the probe but it is thought likely to include far-right groups including Jobbik in Hungary, Golden Dawn in Greece, the Northern League in Italy and France’s Front National which received a 9m euro (£6.9m) loan from a Russian bank in 2014.

Other cases of possible Moscow-backed destabilisation being monitored by diplomats includes extensive links in Austria, including a visit by Austrian MPs to Crimea to endorse its annexation, as well as cases of Russian spies discovered using Austrian papers.

 

A Hotel in Texas for Immigrants?

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Immigration officials consider bid for new ‘hotel-like’ detention center

Stratton Oilfield Systems seeks to turn former Texas work camp into 500-bed facility with improved living conditions, which activists say would still be ‘prison’

 

Guardian: Federal immigration officials are moving forward with plans for a new 500-bed family detention center to house migrant women and children, even as many advocates and politicians have called for the closure of such facilities altogether.

Officials in Dimmit County, 45 miles from the Texas border with Mexico, say they’ll consider a bid on Monday from a firm who says their facility in a 27-acre former work camp for oil workers would provide dramatically better conditions than two other family detention centers in the state.

Those facilities have faced complaints of poor food, inadequate medical care and allegations of sexual abuse from detainees, activists and the US Civil Rights Commission.

“Our facility offers a community-based alternative that will allow children to live in a home setting, attend school, and access critical legal and social services,” Stratton Oilfield Systems said in a pitch to potential partners.

“They want to have it with no fence,” said Mike Uriegas, a commissioner in Dimmit County, who says he first met with Stratton Oilfield Systems two weeks ago. “They don’t want to appear like a prison or detention center.”

But Cristina Parker, Immigration Programs Director for Grassroots Leadership, said she and other advocates object inherently to the concept of a detention center for families fleeing violence, regardless of the purported conditions.

“If you are not free to leave, then it doesn’t matter how nice it is,” Parker said. “It’s a prison.”

The Obama administration’s use of family detention centers that hold children and mothers has become one of the most contested elements of America’s border protection program.

Advocates have called on the Obama administration to pursue alternatives for families who are waiting for courts to hear pending asylum and immigration claims.

“Our families have witnessed their loved ones killed before their eyes, they have been the victim of rapes and robberies simply because of who they are,” said Jonathan Ryan, executive director of the Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services. “Our refugee families need protection, not jail.”

Related reading: SERCO, Global Corruption

Related reading: Orlando Terrorist, Omar/G4S and SERCO

Earlier this month, a nearby Texas county had considered a bid with British firm Serco, which has a history of immigration detention center scandals in the UK and Australia. Jim Wells County voted not to bid on the contract, after some officials voiced concern over past abuse allegations against the firm.

Uriegas said he and other officials are undecided on the Stratton bid and will learn more at a meeting on Monday, which immigration advocates also plan to attend. One group had already heard of the company.

Last July, Stratton’s vice-president, Shannon A Stratton, tried to pitch the same idea for the closed worker housing in a letter to Grassroots Leadership, an Austin-based organization that opposes the prison industry.

A glossy proposal accompanying Stratton’s letter showed hotel-like two-bedroom studios with a living room, kitchenette and full bathroom. Stratton noted a federal judge has said women and children should be released from other detention centers where they are being held in “deplorable” conditions.

“The Studios in Carrizo Springs offers an excellent solution and is distinctly different from the facilities that are so highly criticized in the media and by human rights groups,” Stratton wrote. “Families could be free to come and go while they await immigration hearings, receive education about their rights and responsibilities, and pursue permanent relocation and employment.”

“It shows they don’t quite know what is going on,” said Cristina Parker, immigration programs director for Grassroots Leadership. “They’re confused about other things too, because it is blanketly untrue that the families will be free to come and go.”

Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s other two family residential centers in Texas are surrounded by razor wire and high fences.

The proposal emerges just days after the US supreme court blocked Obama’s plan to spare millions of immigrants from deportation. He vowed afterward: “What was unaffected by today’s ruling, or lack of a ruling, is the enforcement priorities that we’ve put in place.”