Yemen

Every oppressive corrupt dictatorships with extreme poverty and food insecurity are vulnerable.  In the middle east or elsewhere.

This is one of the few journalists that tells it like it is, Ted Rall really gets it. But they tried to run him off as well. Fortunately his female editor stood by him.

SYNDICATED COLUMN: The New Face of Revolution

February 3rd, 2011

After Tunisia and Egypt, the World

From the British newspaper the Independent: "Like in many other countries in the region, protesters in Egypt complain about surging prices, unemployment and the authorities' reliance on heavy-handed security to keep dissenting voices quiet."

Sound familiar?

Coverage by U.S. state-controlled media of the revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt is too dim by half: they say it's an Arab thing. So it is. But not for long. The problems that triggered the latest uprisings, rising inequality of income, frozen credit markets, along with totally unresponsive government, span the globe. To be sure, the first past-due regimes to be overthrown may be the most brutal U.S. client states-Arab states such as Yemen, Jordan and Algeria. Central Asia's autocrats, also corrupted by the U.S., can't be far behind; Uzbekistan's Islam Karimov, who likes to boil his dissidents to death, would be my first bet. But this won't stop in Asia. Persistent unemployment, unresponsive and repressive governments exist in Europe and yes, here in the U.S. They are unstable. The pressure is building.

Global revolution is imminent.

The first great wave of revolutions from 1793 through 1848 was a response to the decline of feudal agrarianism. (Like progressive historians, I don't consider the 1775-1781 war of American independence to be a true revolution. Because it didn't result in a radical reshuffling of classes, it was little more than a bunch of rich tax cheats getting theirs.)

During the 19th century European elites saw the rise of industrial capitalism as a chance to stack the cards in their favor, paying slave wages for backbreaking work. Workers organized and formed a proletariat that rejected this lopsided arrangement. They rose up. They formed unions. By the middle of the 20th century, a rough equilibrium had been established between labor and management in the U.S. and other industrialized nations. Three generations of autoworkers earned enough to send their children to college.

Now Detroit is a ghost town.

http://www.rall.com/rallblog/2011/02/03/syndicated-column-the-new-face-o...

[url=http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2011/03/2011320123433298971...'s UN envoy resigns over killings[/url]

Quote:

Abdullah Alsaidi, Yemen's ambassador to the United Nations, has resigned over the killing of 52 protesters calling for the resignation of President Ali Abdullah Saleh. [...]

Saleh had declared Sunday a national day of mourning for the "martyrs for democracy," while blaming the opposition for "incitement and chaos" that had led to the killings.

The violence prompted condemnation from the UN and the US, which backs his government with hundreds of millions in military aid to battle an al-Qaeda offshoot based in Yemen's mountainous region.

Obama, Harper, Sarkozy, Cameron, Ignatieff, Layton, Duceppe, and our "make-war-to-protect-civilian" pro-imperialist babblers don't really give a shit about this story, so don't read it:

[url=http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/mar/23/yemen-approves-emergency-law... party in Sana'a assembly backs President Saleh's move to suspend constitution, ban protests and allow tougher powers of arrest[/url]

Quote:

Saleh, who has worked closely with a US offensive against the Yemeni branch of al-Qaida, has already dramatically stepped up the crackdown on anti-government demonstrators, with his security forces shooting dead more than 40 protesters on Friday in Sana'a.

He's not nearly as bad as Gaddafi, though, who has pulled hospital patients out of their beds, denied them Viagra, and personally tortured and executed them, I think I heard somewhere.

Fidel wrote:

[url=http://www.edmontonjournal.com/business/Greater+military+export+oversigh... selling weapons to Yemen: NDP[/url]

Thanks for the article, Fidel, but where in the article did the NDP say to stop selling weapons to Yemen? Can't find it.

[url=http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/middle-east/110322/yemen... fears Yemen instability could impact phony-baloney war on terror[/url]

Apparently they are not worried about fueling a civil war in oil-rich Libya though, a committed partner in the war against the invisible army of darkness.

Countering US taxpayer-funded false flag terrorism is for spies, whistleblowers and cops not soldiers.

Unionist wrote:

Fidel wrote:

Dewar and the NDP are saying it's not just Yemen but a number of oppressive regimes that are buying Canadian made weapons.

Ok, Fidel. I don't mean to be harsh. But when you actually read the article that you linked to, you find that [b]Dewar is not calling for a halt to sales to ANYONE - [i]including Saudi Arabia[/i][/b].

He's not calling for a ban on exports to Tuvalu either but that's besides the point. Are you implying that our corrupt stooges in Ottawa are doing their jobs with respect to deciding which of Uncle Sam's proxies should buy weapons from Canadian manufacturers and which should not?

Unionist wrote:

And he certainly doesn't give a damn about the fact that the biggest market for Canadian arms is the U.K., which has used them in Iraq besides everywhere else.

No that's true. Apparently Dewar is more concerned about this thread topic than you, and he's not even posting here.

NDP MP Paul Dewar of the 4th party is saying our corrupt stooges in Ottawa have been turning a blind eye to Canadian weapons sales to oppressive regimes in Yemen, Saudi Arabia etc for too long.

What are you saying?

Sorry. Carry on with your anti-imperialist monologue while Canadian-made weapons are shipped to Yemen and Saudi Arabia to put down popular peoples rebellions against corrupt and intolerable US-backed regimes similar to the ones we enjoy in Ottawa. And FUCK Paul Dewar and the NDP!!!

Slumberjack wrote:

Fidel wrote:

Quote:

"In Libya's case, we have enacted sanctions that's supposed to stop the sale of arms to Libya . . . "but Canadian companies had a strong presence at the Dubai arms show where many autocratic governments in the region were shopping," Dewar said. "Again, this is not about banning export, but about accountability.

What does this even mean if it isn't a statement in favour of banning the export of arms to dictatorships?  Is he saying that the shipments will continue, but that an NDP government won't be shy about owning up to it?  Are we supposed to nod our heads in agreement with this promise of transparency?

Sure, and Dewar was surely not sincere when he wrote about the ongoing [url=http://www.pauldewar.ca/en/media/articles/154-congo-is-calling-will-cana... in the Congo[/url] since 1998.

Apparently accountability in federal government is a concept of ethical and moral behaviour which neither our corrupt stooges in Ottawa, nor a certain babbler whose handle rhymes with stumbleback, fully understand.

How can you put a stop to millions of dollars worth of Canadian weapons shipments to brutal US-backed military dictatorships in the Middle East during the period 2007 to 2009 if DFAIT only tabled the report in 2011, you moreanne? Those weapons were shipped some time ago, and it wasn't disclosed to Parliament until some time this year. Is that an example of federal accountability? No, it's not. Try dropping the knee-jerk anti-NDP frame of mind and reading the article being discussed for a change of pace.

And we'll just have to take your word for it that anyone in Ottawa, including our corrupt and unaccountable stooges themselves, would be able to ban weapons sales to countries which Parliament had no idea were buying from Canadian companies in the first place. At least, no one knew about it until DFAIT published a report two years too late.

Which leads us to another related issue - the scrapping of Foreign Investment Review Agency years ago. The NDP pushed for its creation, and a certain federal party dismantled it during the "lean years." Canadian Parliament had a much harder time stopping 12,000+ foreign takeovers of Canada's economy when StatsCan was left to figure it out by themselves and often publishing information on takeovers and foreign investment years too late for anyone in Ottawa to be able to object on time. Next thing you know, we've got absentee corporate landlords calling the shots from corporate board rooms and mostly in America. It's a lot harder negotiating labour and other issues with the owners of the means when they are in another country and mostly rich Americanos south of the border.

Bullshit. Show us where any of those bs web sites lists Canadian weapons sales to Yemen for the years 2007 to 2009 and published in those same years. 

I get the strong impression that one of us is apologizing for the corrupt stoogeaucracy in Ottawa here. I'll give you two guesses who, and the first one doesn't count.  

Why not just admit that all of you and our vicious toadies to Uncle Sam in Ottawa had no idea that millions of dollars in Canadian weapons sales to Yemen took place from 2007 to 2009 until Dewar and the NDP pointed it out to you in 2011?

So you're saying that you knew full well so many Canadian-made weapons to the part number and penny were being sold and shipped off to Yemen from 07-09 and said nothing about it to anyone on the internet in the years leading up to street rebellions in Yemen in 2011. You've been holding out on us all this time. tsk tsk

That means YOU are as guilty as our corrupt and unaccountable stooges in Ottawa who also knew in spite of the dog eating DFAIT's homework all that time in between. And you kept that information to yourself while you knew all along Yemenis were oppressed and downtrodden by the heavy hand of the state using Canadian made weapons. And you said nothing to anyone. Or at least, I can't find where you warned us after a quick google search of babble. Nothing.

Your voluntary confession here is duly noted. But I must say I am very disappointed, SJ. I thought more of you before this. I held you in the highest regard as a defender of basic human rights.

 I feel nothing now. You're ded to me.

Okay now youre off of the "which country exactly" was buying Canadian made weaponry specifically and on to the more flexible "we shouldn't be surprised" that US-backed Yemeni dictators were filling purchase orders for weapons from [s]2007[/s] 2003 to 2009. Because, and afterall, our stooges  were "doing business" in general with them beginning in 2003. It should have been obvious to everyone involved, including the fourth and effective opposition party in Ottawa, you say.

We should have gleaned from this that weapons were part of "business as usual" in another of Uncle Sam's many third world capitalist bastions for gross violations of basic human rights. 

Let's send some maple sugar, beavertails, semolina flour, guns and ammo, two-by-fours etc to Yemen. It was all there plain as day.

And no thanks to the NDP for pointing it out to us in 2011.

Because all of you and our corrupt and unaccountable stooges in the Librano-Harper governments knew all along and said nothing.

I should remind you that you're still on the hot seat here for having said nothing about the weapons to Yemen from 2003 now to 2009. Now you're TWICE as guilty as our corrupt and unnaccountable stooges in Ottawa over the period of THREE governments not one. 

What do you have to say for yourself now? 

Okay, slippery, you're free to go this time. But don't be afraid to stand up in Canada's Parliament and object to things they should know years in advance of, like social unrest in certain countries like Yemen specifically. And don't forget to hold up a very generalized internet report about Canada's overall weapons exports to no particular country specifically as your point of contention. You'll be a lot more credible than Paul Dewar and the NDP for it.

Baloney. Apology not accepted. No thank you.

Slumberjack wrote:

Fidel wrote:

And don't forget to hold up a very generalized internet report about Canada's overall weapons exports to no particular country specifically as your point of contention. You'll be a lot more credible than Paul Dewar and the NDP for it.

There's plenty of detail in the tables I provided.  None of it of course supports your contention that the Sherlocks within the NDP have just unearthed the evidence.

Ya your table says $465 dollars worth were sent to Yemen from 2003-2005. That's the price of a cheap target pistol nowadays. And maybe a second-hand one at that.

You nailed up several links, and none of them mention Canadian weapons sales to Yemen for the period 2007 to 2009 when weapons exports were increased significantly. DFAIT didn't publish data for that perioid until 2011.

Just so you know.

[url=http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/2007/10/29/military-exports.html]Canada's military exports soar as numbers go unreported: CBC investigation(2007)[/url]

cbc wrote:

Low transparency on arms control
The government's silence is troubling at a time when the defence industry is growing so rapidly, said Janice Stein, director of the Munk Centre for International Studies at the University of Toronto.

"In its public foreign policy, Canada calls for transparency on this issue," Stein told CBC News. "It has supported an arms register, yet our own government hasn't released good, reliable data about who it's exporting to." A spokesperson for the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade blamed the four-year silence on "technical glitches" in a new online export reporting system.

But arms control experts said the explanation is just the latest in a string of excuses stretching back to when the Liberals were in power.

There's only one thing I loathe as much as our vicious toadies in Ottawa, and that's a sub-toady to the vicious toadies.

Slumberjack wrote:

No one is trying to hang DFAIT's inability to produce figures from 07 to 09 on the NDP.  They weren't in government after all, and are ultimately not accountable for missing links in the documentation, except that they damn well could have made inquiries on our behalf from their station in opposition during those years.  Or is that kind of thing above and beyond what Canadians pay them for?

[url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3gcAaIBQYQ][color=orange]NDP:[/color] Dawn Black on Arms Sales[/url] It's all Black in the House! [size=16][color=red]2007[/color][/size] (YouTube) 

Slumberjack wrote:

And I believe we're both aware of your attempts to obfuscate with trivialities,...

There's only one sub-toady to a bunch of vicious toadies around here, and I'll give you two guesses as to who he is. The first one doesn't count.

[IMG]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v697/rabblerabble/the-toadie-200709260...

Careful with that boomerang, Toadie.

Slumberjack wrote:

I'll give you Dawn Black from four years ago, just for the laugh.  Dewar himself pointed out that there's nothing wrong with selling arms so long as you have accountability, for which you need policy to even begin addressing.  

But accountability in Ottawa is lacking. That's the whole point behind Janice Stein's comments and all those other critics of Ottawa's arms exports policy or lack thereof dating back to when the Liberals were in power. The NDP were among those critics then and still are today. Your false claim above that the NDP are only mentioning it now is falsified before your eyes above. IOWs, youre full of baloney. Every time you try to make a false comment about the NDP, you're proven wrong by the facts. 

Slumberjack wrote:

However, I think they're using industrial strength aluminum wrap for party toques over your way Fidel, because it obviously hasn't sunk in yet.  In 2006 they had access to a report outlining arms sales to some very shady customers indeed, and we didn't hear much if anything about it at the time.

That lightweight 2006 report from DFAIT under our corrupt and unaccountable stooges of the day does not say anything about weapons sales to Yemen. And as we are able to glean from DFAIT's report for the years 2007 to 2009, which wasn not published until 2011, weapons sales to countries like Yemen increased markedly. 

 I wonder how many more of Uncle Sam's third world capitalist hellhole client states our corrupt and not very transparent at all stoogeaucrats were turning a blind eye to when purchasing Canadian made weaponry? 

There is only one thing I can't stand more than our vicious toadies in Ottawa, and it's a relentless junior toadie to the colonial administrative army of vicious toadies.

[url=http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2011/04/27/yemen-clashes.html]Yemeni security forces open fire on protesters[/url]

Quote:

A Yemeni doctor says 12 protesters have been killed and some 190 wounded when security forces opened fire on a huge anti-government demonstration in the Yemeni capital, Sanaa.

The violence broke out as about 100,000 government opponents filled a landmark square at the epicentre of the uprising, spilling into the streets around the state TV building.

Witnesses said security forces, including members of the elite Republican Guard, fired live ammunition and tear gas into the crowd to break it up. Snipers were seen on nearby rooftops aiming at the crowd.

[url=http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/sep/19/yemens-bloodiest-day-yet]22 killed and 350 injured on bloodiest day yet[/url]

While Obama's drones murder "militants", his buddy Saleh continues to murder peaceful protesters:

[url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-15324296]Yemen security forces kill protesters in capital Sanaa[/url]

Quote:

Security forces in Yemen have shot dead at least 12 people and wounded 80 others during protests against President Ali Abdullah Saleh in the capital, Sanaa.

Tens of thousands marching to the city centre were met with live rounds, tear gas and water cannon.

US Airstrikes Kill 64

Quote:

A member of the military committee -- Yemen's highest security authority -- confirmed that strike, and said the Yemeni government was given no advance warning of it.

"The United States did not inform us on the attacks. We only knew about this after the U.S. attacked," the committee member told CNN.

The strike was the third such attack on suspected al Qaeda targets in less than three days, according to Yemeni officials.

The United States was also involved in two other major attacks on Friday and Saturday, which killed at least 58 suspected al Qaeda insurgents, two senior Yemeni defense ministry officials said

For the criminal Obamanation in the white house, why let unsubstantiated political charges of foreign weakness stand, when offering up the lives of any old Yemeni citizen, or bunches of them all at once, suffices to dispel any such assertion.

Another Middle East War Breaks Out: US-Supported Saudi Arabia Begins Bombing Yeman

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-03-25/another-middle-east-war-breaks-...

"...To summarize: Saudi Arabia is now bombing a rebel force that has been armed by the US and is backed by Iran, even as the US is bombing an enemy of Iran in Iraq with the blessing of Saudi Arabia. All in a day's work in the Middle East..."