Category Archives: The Denise Simon Experience

The World/Media Ignores Frozen to Death Syrian Children

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Anyone remember the war in Syria? Anyone? Does anyone report the humanitarian crisis in Aleppo and Idlib where bombing continues on schools and hospitals by Russia?
Anyone?
Turkey hold several Syrian refugee camps and since December yet another 1.0 Syrians have fled on foot or by riding on the back of flatbed trucks towards the Turkey/Syria border which is essentially closed.
Remember the refugee crisis a few years ago of millions flowing into Europe? It is about to happen again, Turkey and Jordan cant handle the current refugees much less another million. Are they just to die? This atrocity all belongs to Putin and Assad and Iranian militias.

Since Dec. 1, some 900,000 people have been uprooted by violence in Syria, according to the United Nations. Now, new satellite images give a sense of scale to that crisis.

Syrian troops and the Russian air force are attempting to retake the northwest province of Idlib, the last rebel-held province in Syria’s ongoing civil war. NPR’s Deb Amos reports the offensive has killed over a thousand civilians. Many others have sought shelter near the Turkish border, the U.N. says.

Photos collected by a commercial satellite company show the refugee camps that have popped up in and around three Syrian towns near the border.

The U.N. says the majority of those who have been displaced are women and children.

“They are traumatized and forced to sleep outside in freezing temperatures because camps are full,” U.N. Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Mark Lowcock said Monday. “Mothers burn plastic to keep children warm. Babies and small children are dying because of the cold.”

Turkey has taken in about 3.5 million refugees. But the country says it’s at its limits.

The U.N.’s Lowcock is urging a cease-fire, saying it would be the only way to avert “the biggest humanitarian horror story of the 21st Century.” Satellite images found here.

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A father clutching his sick daughter says they’ve been on the road for two days trying to reach safety. Where is that? He points ahead. “The camp,” he says, before rushing off.
Once independent from each other, the camps along the border with Turkey have sprawled into a massive city of semi-permanent structures. More than one million people, displaced from nine years of fighting, already live in the ever-expanding camps, which provide some semblance of security even as the freezing temperatures take their toll.
Sitting in the corner of the family’s tent, Samiya recalls the night when temperatures dipped below freezing as the last of their fuel ran out. Her seven-month-old baby, Abdulwahab, was warm when she changed his diaper and fed him that evening before putting him to sleep for the night.
Just after dawn, she woke up to the screams of her older kids. Abdulwahab’s little body was as cold and gray as the cement their tent sits on.
“I touched him and he was icy,” Samiya said. The family doesn’t own a phone, so there are no photos of Abdulwahab alive. They rushed the boy to the closest doctor, who told them he died of the cold, according to Samiya.
“It’s a hard thing, for a mother to wake up and find her son dead … I wouldn’t wish it on anyone,” she said. “I thought the children would be safe here.”

Conflict rumbles on

A short drive away, in a muddy makeshift camp near Sarmada, the conditions are miserable but a cheer goes up as people point to the sky and yell: “Regime aircraft down!”
In the distance there is an orange ball of fire falling through the sky, leaving a trail of black smoke as people look on, mesmerized.
It’s one Syrian government helicopter out of five that were in the air, and it’s been shot down by opposition fighters, according to activists from the area.
But it’s a small victory. Syrian government forces have captured most of the M5 highway that runs through the opposition-held area, which has shrunk to nearly half the size it was in 2018, when Turkey brokered a deal to set up military outposts to observe a ceasefire.
Back then it was called a de-escalation zone, but now schools and mosques have been converted into shelters, and families cram into tents as more relatives arrive. The physical claustrophobia is palpable, but it’s also psychological. More.
Once independent from each other, the camps along the border with Turkey have sprawled into a massive city of semi-permanent structures.

Iran to be Blacklisted as a Country

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Financial Action Task Force, a Paris based organization will take blacklisting action on Iran this week. Finally, it appears Europe is joining the United States in this effort even while former Secretary of State John Kerry and a democrat U.S. Senate delegation met with Iranian leaders in a secret setting.
The task force designation will encompass 39 member countries and organizations where this calls for sanctions on Iran due to money-laundering, financing of terror organizations, corruption politicians, international crime, illegal arms trade and drug trafficking. It is unclear if the United Nations has offered any resistance or comment. The only other country under this full designation is North Korea, yet another 12 countries are subject to the same scrutiny and punitive actions by the task force. Banking and access to international trade will be limited or terminated in many cases completely.

Meanwhile, Russia and China have stepped in to provide more support and aid to Iran.
In an effort to preserve trade and revenue, Iran was construction a rail system into Central Asia connecting the Caspian countries of Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Russia, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan. Due to US sanctions, Iran has been in a financial tailspin and construction has essentially stopped and the costs were escalating due to the difficult mountainous regions and regional politics. Enter China and Russia.

source

The project is expected to cost 1.2 billion euros ($1.5 billion) and is being financed by an export credit that Moscow has extended to Tehran. It will involve the electrification of 495 kilometers of existing line, including 203 kilometers in mountainous areas, and the updating of 31 stations and 95 tunnels. This railway segment is projected to carry up to ten million tons of cargo annually upon completion, in 2024. Russian and Iranian officials are jubilant: “All this creates conditions for the growth of goods traffic along the International North–South Transport Corridor and the intensification of economic ties in the Caspian region,” they say (Casp-geo.ru, February 18). The reasons are obvious: if this rail project is completed, Russia and Iran will be able to control much of the trade coming through or out of Central Asia, thus limiting the freedom of action of the states of that region and giving Moscow and Tehran a greater voice in Chinese decisions there (Casp-geo.ru, November 28, 2019; Ru.irna.ir, November 13, 2019).

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Development of Xinjiang

For China, the project is extremely important due to several factors. First, it will stimulate the economic development of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region. This autonomous region of China plays a significant role in rail freight transportation on the New Silk Road. The majority of container trains from central, eastern and southern China to Europe run via Xinjiang. Its capital, Urumqi, is also an important railway hub on the corridor towards Europe.

Kashgar, one of the westernmost cities in China, could be another junction in Xinjiang. The Chinese government is discussing the construction of two railway lines from Kashgar: one westward to Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan, and another southward. The latter heads to Pakistan, where China Overseas Port Holding Company operates Gwadar Deep Sea Port, and where China intends to build its second, after Djibouti, overseas naval base.

New Silk Road

The second factor of success is the potential of the railway line for the New Silk Road. According to estimations, the Xinjiang – Kyrgyzstan – Uzbekistan route will shorten the route from China to Uzbekistan. Currently, containers going to this Central Asian country must cover long distances and cross the territory of neighbouring Kazakhstan.

Moreover, the railway link between China and Uzbekistan links to Iran (via Turkmenistan) and Turkey, as well as eventually to Europe, especially to Southeast Europe. With this, the route from China to Southeast Europe could be reduced up to 900 kilometres, equal to up to seven or eight days. At the same time, the new railway will allow China to better involve Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan into the New Silk Road.

Dem Senators Meet in Secret with Zarif/Iran Last Week

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Did you hear about Senator(s) Whitehouse and Murphy and their secret meeting and delegation?

*** “Murphy is a frequent speaker at the National Iranian American Council, a lobbying group with alleged links to the Islamic Republic of Iran.” He also criticized the killing of Soleimani, the world’s most notorious terrorist, who also killed more than 600 US soldiers in Iraq.

ImageImage source

Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut and other Democratic senators had a secret meeting with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif during the Munich Security Conference last week, according to a source briefed by the French delegation to the conference. Murphy’s office did not respond to repeated requests for comment by press time.

Such a meeting would mean Murphy had done the type of secret coordination with foreign leaders to potentially undermine the U.S. government that he accused Trump officials of doing as they prepared for Trump’s administration. In February 2017, Murphy demanded investigations of National Security Advisor Mike Flynn because he had a phone call with his counterpart-to-be in Russia.

“Any effort to undermine our nation’s foreign policy – even during a transition period – may be illegal and must be taken seriously,” Murphy said in 2017 after anonymous leaks of Flynn’s phone call with Russian ambassador Sergey Kisylak were published. He also strongly criticized the open letter some Republican senators sent Iranian leaders during the Obama administration’s campaign for a nuclear agreement.

However, Murphy has previously defended rogue meetings if they’re done by Democrats such as former Secretary of State John Kerry.

“Unless it was authorized by the president or secretary of state, conducting independent foreign policy sends mixed signals to our adversaries,” said Christian Whiton, former State Department senior advisor in the Trump and George W. Bush administrations. “It seems very unpalatable. If we want to talk to Iranians, they know how to reach us and they don’t need to go through an intermediary.”

A State Department official who spoke on background said that the State Department was not aware of any side meetings with Iranian officials that Murphy was engaged in.

The Munich Security Conference, an annual forum on international security policy, welcomes hundreds of world leaders each February. This year’s conference featured robust debate on the United States’ maximum pressure policy against Iran, China’s handling of the coronavirus and technology concerns, and the European alliance with the United States. Other Democrat senators at the conference included Sens. Robert Menendez of New Jersey and Chris Van Hollen of Maryland. Former Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts also attended.

Both Murphy and Zarif spoke publicly during a two-hour session on Middle East policy, with Murphy and Zarif both fiercely criticizing U.S. policy.

President Donald Trump has reoriented American policy in the Middle East away from President Barack Obama’s friendly posture toward Iran. He departed from Obama’s Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, a nuclear arrangement with the Republic of Iran that was not ratified by the United States Senate.

Trump has exerted instead a “maximum pressure” campaign against the regime, with 12 demands on Iran before a new deal is reached. Those demands include a full account of its nuclear program, ending its proliferation of ballistic missiles, releasing all U.S. citizens held on spurious charges, ending support to terrorist groups, withdrawal of forces in Syria, and cessation of its threatening behavior against its neighbors.

The “maximum pressure” campaign of sanctions has devastated the Iranian economy, which is in recession and faces rising inflation. It has made it difficult for Iran to pay foreign fighters engaged in supported terror operations. Iranians have taken to the streets in protest.

Iran recently killed an American contractor in Iraq and the United States killed Iranian general Qassim Suleimani, a top Iranian leader who was responsible for the killing and maiming of thousands of U.S. soldiers. Iran’s retaliatory strike for that killing resulted in no U.S. deaths, but the country did shoot down a Ukrainian passenger plane then lied about it for days.

At the conference, Zarif said official retaliation for the killing of Suleimani had ended, although he suggested independent attacks from others in the country might follow.

Murphy is a frequent speaker at the National Iranian American Council, a lobbying group with alleged links to the Islamic Republic of Iran. Republican Sens. Mike Braun of Indiana, Tom Cotton of Arkansas, and Ted Cruz of Texas recently asked the Department of Justice for potential violations of the Foreign Agents Registration Act.

They wrote that the influential lobbying group “purports to improve understanding between American and Iranian people but in reality seems to spread propaganda and lobby on behalf of the Iranian government.” Evidence indicates that evidence Zarif himself was involved in founding the group. Hat tip/Federalist

Russia Got Crimea, Working on Ukraine, Belarus Next?

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Primer: The Minsk Agreement has not led to a peace deal. The agreement was first negotiated by a mere telephone call between Vladimir Putin and Petro Poroshenko in 2014. It has a few newer iterations. It was to stop the warring factions between Russia and Ukraine. The whole matter was and is a continued plot for Putin to consolidate his power.

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Belarus, Minsk and Schedrin Maps

The president of Belarus said Friday that Russia insisted on merging the two states during last week’s talks on further integrating the countries’ economies.

“They understand integration as swallowing up Belarus. This isn’t integration. It’s incorporation. I will never go for this,” President Alexander Lukashenko said during a visit to a paper plant in southeastern Belarus.

“I will always fight for our land to remain sovereign and independent. Your first president that you once elected will never be the last,” he added.

Tension has been running high between the neighboring ex-Soviet states for several months now. As negotiations on closer ties stalled, Russia halted oil supplies to Belarus and Lukashenko repeatedly accused the Kremlin of pushing for a merger of the two countries.

Lukashenko and Russian President Vladimir Putin sat down last Friday for yet another round of talks in Sochi, but failed to reach an agreement.

Merging with Belarus is seen by many as a strategy for Putin to stay in power well past the legally mandated end of his presidential term in 2024 by becoming the head of a new state.

As Lukashenko has resisted the integration effort, the Kremlin has increased pressure by halting oil supplies to Belarus, which relies on Russia for more than 80% of its energy needs.

Lukashenko has since vowed to find alternative oil suppliers and boasted about warming ties with the West in an apparent bid to win concessions from Russia. So far Belarus has been able to secure a shipment of oil from Norway and is negotiating supplies from Kazakhstan.

Lukashenko, who has ruled Belarus with an iron fist for more than two decades and is up for re-election this year, doesn’t want to become a governor in a single state with Russia, Minsk-based political analyst Alexander Klaskovsky told The Associated Press.

“The Kremlin has so far failed to scare Minsk by cutting subsidies ahead of the presidential race in Belarus,” Klaskovsky said.

Lukashenko said Friday that talks on closer ties between Russia and Belarus would continue, but only “the questions of integrating economies” would be on the table.

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This effort by Moscow has been going on at least since 2014. Trade and oil is at the core of the issues and Russia is strong arming the leadership of Belarus.

Meet the Group Behind Letter Demanding AG Barr Resign

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Sanctimony at its peak…

AG Barr to testify - Iola Register AG Barr
Let us go back several years shall we? Anyone remember Sandy Berger? He was the cat that went to the National Archives and stole classified documents. At the time he was a national security advisor to President Clinton. He was found guilty and the recommended sentence was no jail time, a $10,000 fine and he would lose his security clearance for three years. His actual sentence was $50,000 fine, 100 hours of community service and two years probation and no loss of his bar license.

We also have so many others like James Comey, James Clapper, illegal criminal immigrants, Bradley Manning, Bowe Bergdahl among so many others including those given clemency like Marc Rich.

*** The letter signed by so many former Department of Justice officials demanding AG Barr resign reads as follows: (the list of signatures are found at the end of the link)

We for sure now have confirmed activist media –> Eight legal analysts for CNN and MSNBC are among the signatories of the letter. This letter/action is coming from the left that does not want people sentenced for misdemeanors nor a whole host of felonies. Which is it people?

DOJ Alumni Statement

We, the undersigned, are alumni of the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) who have collectively served both Republican and Democratic administrations. Each of us strongly condemns President Trump’s and Attorney General Barr’s interference in the fair administration of justice.

As former DOJ officials, we each proudly took an oath to support and defend our Constitution and faithfully execute the duties of our offices. The very first of these duties is to apply the law equally to all Americans. This obligation flows directly from the Constitution, and it is embedded in countless rules and laws governing the conduct of DOJ lawyers. The Justice Manual — the DOJ’s rulebook for its lawyers — states that “the rule of law depends on the evenhanded administration of justice”; that the Department’s legal decisions “must be impartial and insulated from political influence”; and that the Department’s prosecutorial powers, in particular, must be “exercised free from partisan consideration.”

All DOJ lawyers are well-versed in these rules, regulations, and constitutional commands. They stand for the proposition that political interference in the conduct of a criminal prosecution is anathema to the Department’s core mission and to its sacred obligation to ensure equal justice under the law.

And yet, President Trump and Attorney General Barr have openly and repeatedly flouted this fundamental principle, most recently in connection with the sentencing of President Trump’s close associate, Roger Stone, who was convicted of serious crimes. The Department has a long-standing practice in which political appointees set broad policies that line prosecutors apply to individual cases. That practice exists to animate the constitutional principles regarding the even-handed application of the law. Although there are times when political leadership appropriately weighs in on individual prosecutions, it is unheard of for the Department’s top leaders to overrule line prosecutors, who are following established policies, in order to give preferential treatment to a close associate of the President, as Attorney General Barr did in the Stone case. It is even more outrageous for the Attorney General to intervene as he did here — after the President publicly condemned the sentencing recommendation that line prosecutors had already filed in court.

Such behavior is a grave threat to the fair administration of justice. In this nation, we are all equal before the law. A person should not be given special treatment in a criminal prosecution because they are a close political ally of the President. Governments that use the enormous power of law enforcement to punish their enemies and reward their allies are not constitutional republics; they are autocracies.

We welcome Attorney General Barr’s belated acknowledgment that the DOJ’s law enforcement decisions must be independent of politics; that it is wrong for the President to interfere in specific enforcement matters, either to punish his opponents or to help his friends; and that the President’s public comments on DOJ matters have gravely damaged the Department’s credibility. But Mr. Barr’s actions in doing the President’s personal bidding unfortunately speak louder than his words. Those actions, and the damage they have done to the Department of Justice’s reputation for integrity and the rule of law, require Mr. Barr to resign. But because we have little expectation he will do so, it falls to the Department’s career officials to take appropriate action to uphold their oaths of office and defend nonpartisan, apolitical justice.

For these reasons, we support and commend the four career prosecutors who upheld their oaths and stood up for the Department’s independence by withdrawing from the Stone case and/or resigning from the Department. Our simple message to them is that we — and millions of other Americans — stand with them. And we call on every DOJ employee to follow their heroic example and be prepared to report future abuses to the Inspector General, the Office of Professional Responsibility, and Congress; to refuse to carry out directives that are inconsistent with their oaths of office; to withdraw from cases that involve such directives or other misconduct; and, if necessary, to resign and report publicly — in a manner consistent with professional ethics — to the American people the reasons for their resignation. We likewise call on the other branches of government to protect from retaliation those employees who uphold their oaths in the face of unlawful directives. The rule of law and the survival of our Republic demand nothing less.

If you are a former DOJ employee and would like to add your name below, click here. Protect Democracy will update this list daily with new signatories.