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Peace Advocates Raise Voices in Denver
Just Foreign Policy is in Denver with the CodePink blogging team, promoting efforts by peace advocates to get their message out during the DNC.
Day 3 - “Audacious Hope: President Obama Will Respect the UN Charter”
Including video of Rep. Kucinich’s DNC speech in which he calls for U.S. compliance with international law and CodePink singing “No Blood for Oil” in the “protest cage.”
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-naiman/my-audacious-hope-preside_b_121789.html

Statement by the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) on Iran’s nuclear issue
At Iran’s request, the IAEA circulated a statement that was issued by the Non-Aligned Movement on Iran’s nuclear program. NAM “reaffirmed the basic and inalienable right of all states to develop research, production and use of atomic energy for peaceful purposes”; reaffirmed “that any attack or threat of attack against peaceful nuclear facilities…constitutes a grave violation of international law, principles and purposes of the Charter of the United Nations and regulations of the IAEA”; and stressed that “diplomacy and dialogue through peaceful means must continue to find a comprehensive and long term solution to the Iranian nuclear issue.”
http://www.campaigniran.org/casmii/index.php?q=node/6111

Summary:
U.S./Top News
1) In late 2001 and early 2002, McCain took the lead in pushing the neocon plan of a rapid pivot from the invasion of Afghanistan toward the invasion of Iraq, writes Robert Parry for Consortium News. But instead of calling McCain to account for his responsibility for this disastrous policy, news media are parroting his demand that Obama “acknowledge” the “success” of the “surge”; thus continuing to give cover to the Iraq war.

2) In the weeks since a Taliban prison break, security has further deteriorated in Kandahar, further undermining public confidence in the Afghan government and U.S.-led forces, reports Carlotta Gall in the New York Times. The collapsing confidence in the Karzai government is so serious that if the Taliban had wanted to, they could have seized control of Kandahar the night of the prison break, one Western diplomat said. The only reason they did not was they did not expect the government and the NATO reaction to be so weak, he said.

3) The Bush administration and its European allies “faced new pressure…to strike back” after Russia’s recognition of the independence of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, the Los Angeles Times reports. But penalizing Russia could be costly. Russia’s actions fulfill the threat it made when Western countries recognized Kosovo, notes the LAT.

4) Secretary of State Rice criticized the surge in Israeli settlement construction in the West Bank, the New York Times reports. She was responding to a question about the Peace Now report. The NYT notes the significance of Peace Now’s claim that more than half the new building is east of the separation barrier.

5) IVAW “brought Baghdad to Denver’s sidewalks,” to educate Americans about what it means to live under foreign military occupation, the Denver Post reports. The effort garnered support from Rep. Kucinich and Vietnam veteran Ron Kovic.

6) The World Bank said more people were living in extreme poverty in developing countries than previously thought, Reuters reports. The bank said there were 1.4 billion people - a quarter of the developing world - living in extreme poverty on less than $1.25 a day in 2005 in the world’s poorest countries. Excluding China, the world is not on track to the UN goal of halving the number of people in poverty by 2015. The poverty rate in sub-Saharan Africa has not changed in nearly 25 years.

Iraq
7) Iraq’s crackdown on former Sunni insurgents could send Iraq “back into chaos,” write Shawn Brimley and Colin Kahl in the Los Angeles Times. Much of Iraq’s dramatic security progress can be traced to decisions by Sunni tribal leaders in late 2006 to turn against Al Qaeda in Iraq and cooperate with US forces in Anbar [not the “surge” - JFP.]

8) In 2007, three US Army officers executed four Iraqi prisoners as the men stood handcuffed and blindfolded, two of the soldiers said in sworn statements, the New York Times reports.

Iran
9) McCain scorched Obama in a new ad Wednesday, accusing him of seeing Iran as only a “tiny” threat, AFP reports. The advertisement is based on out-of-context quotes from remarks on foreign policy by Obama, AFP notes.

Israel/Palestine
10) Police in Israel have arrested Jeff Halper on charges that he entered Gaza in violation of a military decree barring Israeli citizens from doing so, the BBC reports.

Pakistan
11) The Red Cross estimates 200,000 people from tribal areas bordering Afghanistan have been displaced since the Pakistani army launched a military operation this month in response to U.S. pressure to take action against the Taliban, the Washington Post reports. The political and economic fallout has widened into a major humanitarian crisis. Local news reports suggest more than 200 civilians have been killed in the military operations.

Colombia
12) The Los Angeles Times joins the NYT in calling on President Uribe to reject an effort to amend the constitution again to allow him to run for a third term. Uribe’s proposal to strip the Supreme Court of its power to investigate Congress exacerbates the sense that he and his supporters intend to subvert the democratic process, the LAT says.

Contents:
U.S./Top News
1) What a McCain Victory Would Mean
Robert Parry, Consortium News, August 26, 2008
http://www.consortiumnews.com/2008/082608.html
…
McCain has made clear he would continue and even escalate George W. Bush’s open-ended global war on Islamic radicals. McCain buys into the neoconservative vision of expending U.S. treasure and troops to kill as many Muslim militants as possible. McCain’s tough talk - for instance, his joking about “bomb, bomb Iran” and his vow to pursue Osama bin Laden “to the gates of hell” - is indistinguishable from Bush’s “bring ‘em on,” “smoke ‘em out,” “dead or alive” rhetoric.

Beyond the words, McCain’s global war strategy is as hawkish, if not more so, than Bush’s. In late 2001 and early 2002, McCain took the lead in pushing the neocon plan of a rapid pivot from the invasion of Afghanistan toward the prospective invasion of Iraq.

Even before the Taliban had been thoroughly defeated - and as the Bush administration was failing to chase bin Laden to the gates of Tora Bora or to the gates of northwest Pakistan - McCain was advocating a diversion of U.S. intelligence and military assets toward Iraq’s Saddam Hussein, who had nothing to do with 9/11.

That premature pivot from Afghanistan to Iraq may go down as one of the worst national security blunders in the history of the United States. It has bogged the U.S. military down in two indefinite wars while fueling anti-Americanism around the world and especially among the billion-plus Muslims.

Yet, McCain and his neocon allies have never acknowledged this serious error of judgment, nor has the mainstream U.S. news media demanded that McCain accept responsibility for this catastrophic mistake.

McCain instead gets away with boasting about the supposed success of the recent U.S. troop “surge” in Iraq. (Meanwhile, Big Media stars - many of whom backed the Iraq invasion in 2003 - hammer Barack Obama for refusing to accept the conventional wisdom about the “successful surge,” as Obama tries to offer a more nuanced analysis.)

So, as the U.S. press corps again gives cover to the Iraq War, the larger failure of U.S. policy goes substantially unaddressed.

2) Taliban Gain New Foothold In Afghan City
Carlotta Gall, New York Times, August 27, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/27/world/asia/27kandahar.html?ref=world

The Taliban bomber calmly parked a white fuel tanker near the prison gates of this city one evening in June, then jumped down from the cab and let out a laugh. Prison guards fired on the bomber as he ran off, but they missed, instead killing the son of a local shopkeeper, Muhammad Daoud, who watched the scene unfold from across the street.

Seconds later, the Taliban fired a rocket-propelled grenade into the tanker, setting off an explosion that killed the prison guards, destroyed nearby buildings, and opened a breach in the prison walls as wide as a highway. Nearly 900 prisoners escaped, 350 of them members of the Taliban, in one of the worst security lapses in Afghanistan in the six years since the United States intervention here.

The prison break, on June 13, was a spectacular propaganda coup for the Taliban not only in freeing their comrades and flaunting their strength, but also in exposing the catastrophic weakness of the Afghan government, its army and the police, as well as the international forces trying to secure Kandahar.

In the weeks since the prison break, security has further deteriorated in this southern Afghan city, once the de facto capital of the Taliban, that has become a renewed front line in the battle against the radical Islamist movement. The failure of the American-backed Afghan government to protect Kandahar has rippled across the rest of the country and complicated the task of NATO forces, which have suffered more deaths here this year than at any time since the 2001 invasion.

“We don’t have a system here, the government does not have a solution,” said Abdul Aleem, who fought the Taliban and helped to put some of its members in the prison. They are on the loose again, and he now faces death threats and sits in his garden with a Kalashnikov rifle on the chair beside him. He said that without the presence of international forces in the city, the situation would be even worse. “If we did not have foreigners here, I don’t think the Afghan National Army or police would come out of their bases,” he said.

A rising chorus of complaints equally scathing about the failings of the government can be heard around the country. The collapsing confidence in the government of President Hamid Karzai is so serious that if the Taliban had wanted to, they could have seized control of the city of Kandahar on the night of the prison break, one Western diplomat in Kabul said. The only reason they did not was they did not expect the government and the NATO reaction to be so weak, he said.

3) West struggles to counter Moscow’s move
The Kremlin’s speedy recognition of the independence of two breakaway republics of Georgia puts pressure on the U.S. and allies to come up with ways to punish Russia.
Paul Richter & Sergei L. Loiko, Los Angeles Times, August 27, 2008
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-russia27-2008aug27,0,2883732.story

The Bush administration and its European allies, stung by Russia’s formal recognition of two separatist Georgian enclaves, faced new pressure Tuesday to strike back diplomatically and politically against the Kremlin’s widening move to assert its power in the Caucasus.

U.S. officials, who have shunned a military response, did not publicly specify available options. But privately, they cited the possibility of excluding Russia from a number of international institutions, such as the World Trade Organization. They also could try to pressure Moscow through economic measures that pinch the wallets or limit the mobility of Russia’s wealthy elite and middle class, including restrictions on travel to the West.

Leading Western European members of the old Cold War coalition reached out Tuesday to reassure former Soviet republics following Moscow’s recognition of the independence of South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
…
The Russian recognition of the separatist Georgian republics came in a pair of decrees by President Dmitry Medvedev, who said on national television that the step had become necessary because it was clear that the people of the enclaves could no longer live peacefully with the Georgians around them after Georgian forces intervened in South Ossetia this month.

“This is not an easy choice, but it is the only way to save the lives of the people,” said Medvedev, who acted one day after the Russian parliament unanimously voted to accept the regions’ requests for independence. Medvedev later told a Russian television station that Moscow was willing to risk a new Cold War, and that it was the West’s choice whether to loosen its ties.

The U.S. and Europe, while regularly denouncing Russia’s advance into Georgia, an ally of the West, have taken few strong measures to counter it to avoid alienating Moscow while it could still withdraw its forces to positions it held before sending them into Georgia on Aug. 8. But Russian troops now are dug in, and by these decrees, Moscow has signaled that it wants to extend its military advance with political gains.
…
Russia is widely expected to move quickly to increase its military presence in the regions. Leaders of the territories were already talking Tuesday about signing defense agreements with Russia; the South Ossetian president said he would ask Moscow to build a military base in the republic.
…
Analysts said the move would also put added pressure on NATO to decide now whether its primary future role will be the defense of Eastern Europe’s borders, rather than operations such as that in Afghanistan, its current preoccupation.

Yet penalizing Moscow could be costly for the U.S. and Europe. Europe gets 40% of its natural gas and 20% of its oil from Russia, and the West dearly wants Moscow’s cooperation on such problems as terrorism, narcotics, nuclear proliferation, the Iranian nuclear program and Mideast peacekeeping.

Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, said in a statement issued by his campaign that “no one wants to see another Cold War” with Russia. “But Russia’s recent choices - not American or European decisions - are threatening this potential and reminding us all that peace and security in Europe cannot be taken for granted,” he said.

Republican presidential candidate John McCain’s wife, Cindy, was visiting Georgia on Tuesday, appearing at refugee centers. McCain himself said Moscow “must understand that its violations of international law carry consequences.”

Russia’s action fulfills the threat it made when Western countries recognized Kosovo, a breakaway province of Serbia, one of Russia’s closest allies. “It’s the ultimate revenge for the Russians,” said Joost Lagendijk, a Dutch member of the European Parliament’s foreign affairs committee. “It’s the politics of an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth - if you do this, the same thing will be done to you.”

4) Rice, in Israel, Criticizes Surge in Settlement Construction
Ethan Bronner, New York Times, August 27, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/27/world/middleeast/27mideast.html?ref=world

Peace Now, the Israeli advocacy group, said in a report released Tuesday that in the last year Israel had nearly doubled its settlement construction in the occupied West Bank, in violation of its obligations under an American-backed peace plan.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, in Jerusalem on a short visit to help Israeli and Palestinian leaders in their negotiations, said when asked about the report that she had told Israeli officials that such building did not advance the cause of peace.

“What we need now are steps that enhance confidence between the parties, and anything that undermines confidence between the parties ought to be avoided,” she said with the Israeli foreign minister, Tzipi Livni, at her side.

Ms. Livni said that settlement building should not influence the negotiations because the goal should be “not to let any kind of noises that relate to the situation on the ground these days enter the negotiation room.”

Earlier, Ms. Rice had made clear that neither Israelis nor Palestinians had fully lived up to their obligations. Israel is supposed to end all settlement building and remove illegal settlement outposts, while the Palestinians are supposed to dismantle terrorist infrastructures.
…
The Peace Now report on settlements, based on aerial photos, visits and government data, says that more than 1,000 buildings are going up in the West Bank, including 2,600 housing units. It says that for the first five months of 2008, construction in the settlements was 1.8 times greater than in the same period of 2007.
…
Its report says more than half of the building is beyond the separation barrier that Israel has built in recent years on the border of and inside the West Bank. This is significant, if true, because Israeli leaders have argued that ultimately a deal with the Palestinians will allow it to keep several settlement blocs and neighborhoods in East Jerusalem in exchange for land swaps. Therefore, they say, their building in East Jerusalem and close-in settlements on their side of the barrier should cause no concern.

5) Iraq Vets Bring Taste of War To Denver
The group’s scenes of what happens overseas startle passers-by.
George Watson, Denver Post, 08/27/2008 01:31:30 AM MDT
http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_10310817

Two dozen Iraq war veterans brought Baghdad to Denver’s sidewalks Tuesday, repeatedly staging guerrilla-style theater before a confused yet generally supportive audience of pedestrians. For the veterans, who aggressively engaged with 50 volunteers acting as Iraqi civilians, this was their personal version of shock and awe.

The goal of Iraq Veterans Against the War was to educate people about the reality of occupying a foreign land and the rigors faced by the U.S. military and the Iraqi people. To do so, the veterans broke into two squads, invisible weapons at the ready as they marched from street to street, facing off with loud, angry packs of pretend Iraqis. “It’s not everything that happens in Iraq, but it’s a piece of the reality,” said Geoffrey Millard, an organizer who served in Iraq. “It scares people, and it should. You should be scared when your country is occupied.”

The effort garnered support from two renowned members of the anti-war movement: U.S. Rep. Dennis Kucinich of Ohio and Vietnam War veteran Ron Kovic. “Thank you very much for standing for peace,” Kucinich told one of the squads that came across him outside a restaurant.

6) World Bank Finds More People Live in Steep Poverty
Reuters, August 27, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/27/washington/27worldbank.html

The World Bank said Tuesday that more people were living in extreme poverty in developing countries than previously thought as it adjusted the recognized yardstick for measuring global poverty to $1.25 a day from $1. The bank said there were 1.4 billion people - a quarter of the developing world - living in extreme poverty on less than $1.25 a day in 2005 in the world’s 10 to 20 poorest countries. Last year, the bank said there were 1 billion people living under $1 a day.

The 2005 figures, the latest available, are likely to put fresh pressure on big donor countries to move more aggressively to combat global poverty. Even so, the new estimates, based on updated global price data, show how progress has been made in helping the poor over the past 25 years. In 1981, 1.9 billion people were living below the $1.25 a day poverty line. The data are based on 675 household surveys in 116 countries.
…
While the developing world has more poor people than previously believed, the World Bank’s new chief economist, Justin Lin, said the world was still on target to meet a United Nations goal of halving the number of people in poverty by 2015.

However, excluding China from overall calculations, the world fails to meet the United Nations poverty targets, Mr. Lin said.
…
While most of the developing world has managed to reduce poverty, the rate in sub-Saharan Africa, the world’s poorest region, has not changed in nearly 25 years, according to data using the new $1.25 a day poverty line. Half of the people in sub-Saharan Africa were living below the poverty line in 2005, the same as in 1981. That means about 380 million people lived under the poverty line in 2005, compared with 200 million in 1981.

Iraq
7) Baghdad’s misguided crackdown on the Sons of Iraq
Prime Minister Maliki’s Shiite-dominated government risks security gains by taking on U.S.-backed Sunni forces.
Shawn Brimley & Colin Kahl, op-ed, Los Angeles Times, August 26, 2008
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-brimley26-2008aug26,0,4646204.story

[Brimley is at the Center for a New American Security. Kahl is at CNAS and an assistant professor at Georgetown.]

There is a gathering storm on Iraq’s horizon. Over the last several weeks, its central government has embarked on what appears to be an effort to arrest, drive away or otherwise intimidate tens of thousands of Sunni security volunteers - the so-called Sons of Iraq - whose contributions have been crucial to recent security gains. After returning from a trip to Iraq last month at the invitation of Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, the U.S. commander in Iraq, we are convinced that if Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki and his advisors persist in this sectarian agenda, the country may spiral back into chaos.

Much of Iraq’s dramatic security progress can be traced to a series of decisions made by Sunni tribal leaders in late 2006 to turn against Al Qaeda in Iraq and cooperate with American forces in Anbar province. These leaders, outraged by Al Qaeda’s brutality against their people, approached the U.S. military with an offer it couldn’t refuse: Enter into an alliance with the tribes, and they would turn their weapons against Al Qaeda rather than American troops.

Throughout 2007, U.S. commanders capitalized on this Sunni movement, the so-called Awakening, to create an expanding network of alliances with Sunni tribes and former insurgents that helped turn the tide and drive Al Qaeda in Iraq to near extinction. There are now about 100,000 armed Sons of Iraq, each paid $300 a month by U.S. forces to provide security in local neighborhoods throughout the country. In recognition of the key role the Awakening played in security improvements, President Bush met with several Sunni tribal leaders during his trip to Anbar last September, and Petraeus, who cites the program as a critical factor explaining the decline in violence, has promised to “not walk away from them.”

But Iraq’s predominantly Shiite central government seems intent on doing precisely that. Maliki and his advisors never really accepted the Sunni Awakening, and they remain convinced that the movement is simply a way for Sunni insurgents to buy time to restart a campaign of violence or to infiltrate the state’s security apparatus. In 2007, with Iraq’s government weak and its military not yet ready to take the lead in operations, the Maliki government acquiesced to the U.S.-led initiative and grudgingly agreed to integrate 20% of the Sons of Iraq into the Iraqi security forces. Now, a newly confident Maliki government is edging away from this commitment.

8) US Soldiers Executed Iraqis, Statements Say
Paul von Zielbauer, New York Times, August 27, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/27/world/middleeast/27abuse.html

In March or April 2007, three noncommissioned United States Army officers, including a first sergeant, a platoon sergeant and a senior medic, killed four Iraqi prisoners with pistol shots to the head as the men stood handcuffed and blindfolded beside a Baghdad canal, two of the soldiers said in sworn statements.

After the killings, the first sergeant - the senior noncommissioned officer of his Army company - told the other two to remove the men’s bloody blindfolds and plastic handcuffs, according to the statements made to Army investigators, which were obtained by The New York Times.

The statements and other court documents were provided by a person close to one of the soldiers in the unit who insisted on anonymity and who has an interest in the outcome of the legal proceedings.

After removing the blindfolds and handcuffs, the three soldiers shoved the four bodies into the canal, rejoined other members of their unit waiting in nearby vehicles and drove back to their combat outpost in southwest Baghdad, the statements said.

The soldiers, all from Company D, First Battalion, Second Infantry, 172nd Infantry Brigade, have not been charged with a crime. However, lawyers representing other members of the platoon who said they witnessed or heard the shootings, which were said to have occurred on a combat patrol west of Baghdad, said all three would probably be charged with murder.

Iran
9) McCain hammers Obama on Iran
AFP, Wed Aug 27, 1:12 pm ET
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20080827/pl_afp/usvoteobamaisraeliran_080827171203

Republican John McCain scorched his rival Barack Obama in a new ad Wednesday, accusing him of seeing Iran as only a “tiny” threat and arguing he is dangerously unprepared to be president. The Obama campaign fired back immediately, angrily charging McCain with distorting the Democrats’ positions and using “tired” Republican strategies of playing politics with grave national security questions.
…
“Obama says Iran is a ‘tiny’ country, “doesn’t pose a serious threat,” said the narrator as evocative pictures of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the Israeli flag flash across the screen. “Terrorism, destroying Israel, those aren’t “serious threats”? “Obama - dangerously unprepared to be president.”

The McCain campaign has castigated Obama for his offer to sit down for talks with the leaders of US foes like Iran and Syria if he is elected president, and has adopted a hawkish foreign policy.

The advertisement is based on out-of-context quotes from remarks on foreign policy by Obama in May, in which he said Iran, Cuba and Venezuela were “tiny” countries compared to the Soviet Union. “They don’t pose a serious threat to us the way the Soviet Union posed a threat to us. And yet we were willing to talk to the Soviet Union at the time when they were saying, ‘We’re going to wipe you off the planet.’”

Israel/Palestine
10)  Israeli police hold Gaza activist
BBC, Tuesday, 26 August 2008
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7583391.stm

Police in Israel have arrested an Israeli citizen who entered Gaza with a group of pro-Palestinian activists. Jeff Halper, a US-born Israeli citizen, was arrested after he entered Israel through the Erez border crossing. He is accused of breaking Israel’s law forbidding its citizens from entering the Gaza Strip.

Mr Halper was part of an international group of protesters who entered the Gaza Strip by boat to challenge Israel’s blockade of the territory. Israel imposed a blockade on Gaza in June 2007 when the militant group Hamas took control of the territory by force.

Since then, Israel has allowed in little more than basic humanitarian aid as a means of isolating Hamas and persuading militant groups to stop firing rockets into Israel. The closure of Gaza’s borders by the Israeli and Egyptian authorities has also meant that very few Gazans have been able to leave.

Mr Halper spent three days in Gaza with the group of about 40 activists from 17 countries before crossing into Israel. “He is being questioned at the police station in Sderot for entering the Gaza Strip in defiance of a military decree banning Israeli citizens from doing so,” said Israeli police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld.

Pakistan
11) Pakistani Push In Tribal Areas Triggers A Flood Of Refugees
Candace Rondeaux, Washington Post, Wednesday, August 27, 2008; A08
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/08/26/AR2008082603419.html

Lal Bahadur walked down from the mountains about two weeks ago. With his back to Afghanistan and his wife and five children alongside, he descended steep inclines through the northern edge of Pakistan’s tribal areas as artillery fire boomed around them. It was nearly a full day before the family found a place to rest. By the time they reached the district of Nawagai, the price of a ride to safety in the nearby city of Peshawar had already increased 10-fold.

When they arrived in Peshawar from the volatile tribal area of Bajaur, Bahadur found that apartment rents in the city had almost tripled, putting them well beyond his reach. So the family came here to this refugee camp about 45 miles east of Peshawar, where nearly 1,000 residents of Bajaur have recently sought shelter in the wake of a massive military offensive against Taliban insurgents.

An estimated 200,000 people from the tribal areas bordering Afghanistan have been displaced since the Pakistani army launched the Bajaur operation early this month in response to growing U.S. pressure to take action against the Taliban in the region, according to the International Committee of the Red Cross. Local officials say the flood of refugees into northwestern and central Pakistan has overwhelmed cities such as Peshawar. And as the army began to push into the tribal area of Kurram last week, government officials in cities as far away as Karachi were bracing for more waves of people.

The political and economic fallout from Pakistan’s push against the Taliban and al-Qaeda has widened into a major humanitarian crisis, analysts and local officials here say. Yet a week after the resignation of President Pervez Musharraf, the government has announced no specific plans to address the refugee problem in the border regions, which now appears to be spilling over into the rest of the country.

Last week, the crisis grew so acute that Pascal Cuttat, head of the Red Cross in Pakistan, called urgently for shelter, medical treatment and food for Bajaur refugees. The aid agency estimates that the military operations in Bajaur and neighboring tribal areas have driven about 14,000 people westward across the border into the troubled Afghan province of Konar, where last month nine U.S. soldiers were killed in a well-coordinated Taliban-led attack.

In Peshawar, a city of more than 3 million, the waves of new arrivals have brought with them numerous problems. Last week, migrants held several protests in the city over the Bajaur offensive and the lack of government assistance. Peshawar’s 5,000 police officers have struggled to contain the violence stemming from the protests and from clashes between refugees and local residents. And the influx of people has driven up prices for basic goods across the city, officials said.

“All around Peshawar, on every side, the situation is volatile because of the people coming from Bajaur, Bara, Dera Adam Khel and the people from Swat and Waziristan,” said Ghulam Ali, the mayor. “All of this is impacting the infrastructure in Peshawar. The schools, the health system - everything is overloaded.”

Bahadur, 40, said he had little choice but to leave Bajaur. Pakistani troops have been pounding the area with bombs dropped from helicopter gunships and fighter jets since Aug. 10. He and dozens of refugees at the camp said they received no warning of the operation. “We had no idea it was going to happen. The government didn’t tell us anything, and we didn’t see them anywhere,” Bahadur said.

Pakistani army officials have said that dozens of Islamist insurgents have been killed in the Bajaur operation. Little, however, has officially been said about the civilian toll. Local news reports suggest more than 200 people have been killed.

Colombia
12) Colombia’s Uribe problem
Editorial, Los Angeles Times, August 27, 2008
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/editorials/la-ed-uribe27-2008aug27,1,6622703.story
…
Now, Uribe’s supporters are urging him to seek a third term; they have amassed 5 million petition signatures, enough to begin the process of amending the Constitution to permit him to run in 2010. Uribe himself has been quiet on the subject, but it’s time for him to speak out and say: No, thank you. Colombia’s Constitution already was amended to allow Uribe to seek a second term in 2006 - the legitimacy of which is now being questioned by the Supreme Court. Another such effort casts doubt on the president’s commitment to democracy, sliding him into the same unsavory category as Hugo Chavez, who makes no secret of longing to be Venezuela’s president in perpetuity.

Progress against leftist rebels should not be the sole measure of Uribe’s tenure. Also crucial is his ability to strengthen the governing institutions on which Colombia’s struggling democracy depends. For all its improvement, the country is still rife with corruption and violence, and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia is not the only culprit; almost a third of the Congress, including members allied with the president, is either in jail or under investigation for links to right-wing death squads and/or narco-traffickers. Uribe’s proposal to strip the Supreme Court of its power to investigate Congress only exacerbates the sense that he and his supporters intend to subvert the democratic process. We applauded Uribe for not attempting to sway the court when it indicted his cousin, former Sen. Mario Uribe, hopeful that it was a sign of a maturing democracy.

-
Robert Naiman
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Peace Advocates Raise Voices in Denver
The editor of the Just Foreign Policy News is in Denver with the CodePink blogging team, documenting efforts by peace advocates to get their message out in Denver.
Day 1 - CodePink: “This Should Be a Peace Convention!”
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-naiman/codepink-this-should-be-a_b_120996.html

Summary:
U.S./Top News
1) U.S. officials said they are investigating allegations by Afghan officials that a U.S.-led bombing raid killed at least 70 civilians in western Afghanistan in the past week, the Washington Post reports. Some local Afghan officials said US forces struck the area without warning, while others denied there had been Taliban activity in the area.

2) The U.S. military suffered its 101st death of the year in Afghanistan last week, AP reports. “The U.S. is now losing the war against the Taliban,” said Anthony Cordesman, of CSIS. Republican Rep. Shays called for an increase in the use of “soft power” like aid work and “some sort of effort in reconciliation.”

3) In the wake of an aggressive U.S. counter-terrorism program that has alienated many Somalis, there are signs that Al Qaeda may have its best chance in years to win over Islamic hard-liners in Somalia, the Los Angeles Times reports. Some worry a more radical agenda in Somalia has been aided by U.S. counter-terrorism efforts during the last two years, including half a dozen airstrikes against suspected terrorist targets that often killed civilians.

4) Boats carrying dozens of human rights activists reached Gaza Saturday after the Israeli navy decided not to hinder the challenge to Israel’s blockade, the Washington Post reports. Thousands of Palestinians turned out to welcome the group, which brought token humanitarian aid, including hearing aids for children. Jeff Halper said the Free Gaza movement had broken the siege of Gaza. “Now that we’ve come through, what’s the excuse to keep the third boat out or the 10th boat or the 100th?”

5) A U.N. spokeswoman said many of the teams clearing cluster munitions scattered by Israel in Lebanon will have to stop work this month for lack of funds, Reuters reports. Some donor countries had not kept their promises and others had lost interest two years after the war, she said. She said 43% of the land contaminated by cluster munitions had been fully cleared and another 49% had been surface-cleared

Iran
6) Supreme Leader Khamenei praised President Ahmadinejad’s dogged defense of the country’s nuclear program, the New York Times reports. Khamenei praised the government’s defense of its enrichment of uranium for nuclear fuel, calling it a symbol of the country’s “national identity,” newspapers reported.

7) Iran might for the first time offer production sharing contracts to develop its Caspian Sea oil fields, in a bid to attract foreign investors to a region with high exploration costs, AFP reports. Iran’s buyback system skirts around the constitution which prohibits foreign companies from taking equity stake in its oil and gas sector.

Iraq
8) Out of the more than 151,000 families who had fled their houses in Baghdad, just 7,112 had returned to them by mid-July, according to the Iraqi Ministry of Migration, the New York Times reports. In most cases, Iraqis say they feel safe with their neighbors but are not sure about other residents.

9) Iraq’s Prime Minister said Iraq and the US have agreed on a date for the departure of all US troops, the New York Times reports. But the Bush Administration stressed that the agreement had not been finalized.

Colombia
10) Colombia’s President Uribe should say he does not want a third term, writes the New York Times in an editorial. His backers want to modify the constitution so Uribe can run again. Dozens of his Congressional allies have been investigated for alleged ties to right-wing paramilitaries; Uribe has proposed reforms that would remove the investigation of members of Congress from the Supreme Court’s jurisdiction. About a fifth of the Congress’s members are under investigation or have been arrested in the cases.

Ecuador
11) Thousands marched to back President Correa who polls show is inching closer to winning a September 28 vote to pass a new constitution, Reuters reports. Three polls showed support for the new constitution is nearing the more than 50% majority needed to pass the document.

Bolivia
12) President Morales said he put all of Bolivia’s gas and oil installations under military protection, as protesters geared up in three energy-rich provinces, AFP reports. The move followed protest plans to throw up major roadblocks in the energy-rich eastern provinces of Santa Cruz, Chuquisaca and Tarija starting Monday.

Contents:
U.S./Top News
1) US Probes Afghan Assertions That Raid Killed 70 Civilians
Candace Rondeaux & Javed Hamdard, Washington Post, Sunday, August 24, 2008; A16
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/08/23/AR2008082300948.html

U.S. military officials said Saturday that they are investigating allegations by Afghan officials that a U.S.-led bombing raid killed at least 70 civilians in western Afghanistan in the past week.

Lt. Col. Rumi Nielson-Green, a spokeswoman for the U.S. military, said 30 Taliban insurgents were killed in the operation, which targeted a compound occupied by a local Taliban commander. “We’re confident that we struck the right compound,” she said.

But Afghan President Hamid Karzai said in a statement that about 70 civilians were killed in the raid. He vowed to take measures to prevent further civilian casualties.

Afghan military officials in Herat said an investigation of the site revealed that about 90 people were killed in the operation. Raouf Ahmedi, a spokesman for the western regional command of the Afghan army in Herat, said Afghan military officials who inspected the site Saturday found the bodies of 60 children and 19 women among the dead. “We couldn’t and we haven’t found any identification showing they are Taliban,” Ahmedi said.

According to the officials in Herat, the bombing began late Thursday as dozens of villagers in the district of Azizabad gathered for a memorial ceremony for a villager who was killed last year.

Ahmed Dehzad, one of the province’s parliamentary representatives, said that local officials received reports of Taliban activity in the vicinity several days before the ceremony but that coalition forces did not issue a warning before the attack on a compound near where the ceremony was held.

Shah Nawaz, a member of the Shindand district council, disputed reports of recent Taliban activity in the area, saying the attack on the compound was unprovoked. He said the bombing prompted widespread protests in the district. “The coalition forces have made mistakes so many times and killed so many civilians. We are asking President Karzai to come here” to investigate, Nawaz said.

Karzai has come under increasing public pressure to address the rising number of civilian casualties resulting from coalition operations. This year has been one of the deadliest for civilians since U.S.-led military operations began in Afghanistan in 2001.

Last month, U.S. officials said they would investigate three separate airstrikes that Afghan officials said killed at least 78 civilians. In one of the cases, Afghan officials say 47 women and children were killed when coalition forces bombed a wedding party in the eastern province of Nangahar.

2) US deaths reach 101 for the year in Afghanistan
Jason Straziuso, Associated Press, Monday, August 25, 2008; 1:07 AM
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/08/24/AR2008082400949.html

Taliban insurgents once derided as a ragtag rabble unable to match U.S. troops have transformed into a fighting force - one advanced enough to mount massive conventional attacks and claim American lives at a record pace.

The U.S. military suffered its 101st death of the year in Afghanistan last week when Sgt. 1st Class David J. Todd Jr., a 36-year-old from Marrero, La., died of gunfire wounds while helping train Afghan police in the northwest. The total number of U.S. dead last year - 111 - was a record itself and is likely to be surpassed.

Top U.S. generals, European presidents and analysts say the blame lies to the east, in militant sanctuaries in neighboring Pakistan. As long as those areas remain havens where fighters arm, train, recruit and plot increasingly sophisticated ambushes, the Afghan war will continue to sour.

“The U.S. is now losing the war against the Taliban,” Anthony Cordesman, of the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, wrote in a report Thursday. A resurgent al-Qaida, which was harbored by the Taliban in the years before the Sept. 11 attacks, could soon follow, Cordesman warned. Cordesman called for the U.S. to treat Pakistani territory as a combat zone if Pakistan does not act. “Pakistan may officially be an ally, but much of its conduct has effectively made it a major threat to U.S. strategic interests.”

An influx of Chechen, Turkish, Uzbek and Arab fighters have helped increased the Taliban’s military precision, including an ambush by 100 fighters last week that killed 10 French soldiers, and a rush on a U.S. outpost last month by 200 militants that killed nine Americans.

Multi-direction attacks, flawlessly executed ambushes and increasingly powerful roadside and suicide bombs mean the U.S. and 40-nation NATO-led force will in all likelihood suffer its deadliest year in Afghanistan since the 2001 invasion.
…
Rep. Chris Shays, a Republican member of the House Homeland Security committee, said it appears the United States is making some of the same mistakes in Afghanistan that it did in Iraq, such as underfunding the training of the Afghan army. He also called for an increase in the use of “soft power” like aid work and “some sort of effort in reconciliation.” “I don’t pretend to know enough about how that would be involved,” he said in a visit to Kabul last week, “but the bottom line is that as I look at this issue, I don’t see how we can succeed on our present track.”

3) Conditions May Be Ripe For Al Qaeda In Somalia
U.S. counter-terrorism efforts have alienated many Somalis, and a leader of the hard-line Islamic group Shabab says it is ready to unite with Bin Laden’s organization.
Edmund Sanders, Los Angeles Times, August 25, 2008
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-shabab25-2008aug25,0,1932841.story

Conventional wisdom long held that Somalia was so inhospitable that even Al Qaeda gave up trying to gain a foothold amid feuding clans, erratic warlords and a wily population hardened by years of anarchy. Now, in the wake of an aggressive U.S. counter-terrorism program that has alienated many Somalis, there are signs that Al Qaeda may have its best chance in years to win over Islamic hard-liners in the Horn of Africa nation.

After once denying or downplaying links to the terrorist network, a senior leader of Somalia’s most notorious Islamic militia now acknowledges that his group has long-standing ties to Al Qaeda and says he is seeking to forge a closer relationship. “We are negotiating how we can unite into one,” said Muktar Robow, a top military commander of Shabab, which the U.S. State Department designated a terrorist organization this year. “We will take our orders from Sheik Osama bin Laden because we are his students.”

Merging with Al Qaeda operatives in the region makes sense, he said, given the recent U.S. crackdown, including a May 1 airstrike that killed Shabab’s previous commander. “Al Qaeda is the mother of the holy war in Somalia,” he said. “Most of our leaders were trained in Al Qaeda camps. We get our tactics and guidelines from them. Many have spent time with Osama bin Laden.”

U.S. officials said it’s unclear whether Shabab’s threat is real or just anti-Western rhetoric intended to rattle U.S. intelligence officials. Analysts note that Al Qaeda faces the same challenges that prevented it from establishing a Somalia base before, including power struggles among the country’s Islamists, competition from local clan networks and differences between those seeking to focus attacks in Somalia and those favoring Al Qaeda’s global agenda.

U.S. Ambassador Michael E. Ranneberger acknowledged growing links between Shabab and Al Qaeda, but said ties remained in the early stages. “There are indications of a fairly close Shabab-Al Qaeda connection, though it’s not clear to what extent they’ve been operationalized,” he said. “Is Shabab taking orders from Al Qaeda? I would say no. They are still running their own show.”
…
Analysts say such talk highlights a growing radicalization of Somalia’s Islamists. Although Somalia has long had hard-liners, most of the population practiced a moderate form of Islam, and even extremists limited attacks to inside the country or against Ethiopia, a longtime rival.

But some worry a more radical agenda in Somalia has been aided by U.S. counter-terrorism efforts during the last two years, including half a dozen airstrikes against suspected terrorist targets that often killed civilians.

Somalia’s citizens are also outraged by the ongoing occupation of Mogadishu by Ethiopian troops, who came in 2006 to defeat a short-lived Islamic government that had taken power largely with help from Shabab fighters.

“For Al Qaeda, the projection seems good now,” said Richard Barno, counter-terrorism analyst at the Institute for Security Studies in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia’s capital, noting that Somalia’s U.N.-backed transitional government has been weakened by infighting.

But Barno cautioned that Al Qaeda still faced resistance from Somalia’s major clans, which so far have been less interested in radical anti-Western attacks and frown upon Al Qaeda’s signature large-scale attacks, particularly when they result in civilian casualties. Clan leaders also have been reluctant to send their men to fight with Al Qaeda outside Somalia, he said. “Any moving to Al Qaeda might alienate the clans,” Barno said. “And they can’t afford to do that because the clans provide their foot soldiers.”

4) Activists Break Blockade of Gaza
Israel Allows Boats to Deliver Symbolic Shipment of Aid
Linda Gradstein, Washington Post, Sunday, August 24, 2008; A12
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/08/23/AR2008082301855.html

Two wooden boats carrying dozens of human rights activists reached the Gaza Strip on Saturday afternoon after the Israeli navy decided not to hinder the challenge to Israel’s blockade of the Palestinian enclave. Thousands of Palestinians turned out to welcome the group, which brought token humanitarian aid, including hearing aids and balloons.

“It was really amazing - there were kids swimming out to see us and boats sailing out to meet us,” said Jeff Halper, head of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions and the only Israeli Jew on board. “It took us a day and a half to get here, and most of the activists got seasick, but the people here were so happy when we arrived.” Halper, speaking by phone from Gaza, said the U.S.-based Free Gaza movement had worked for two years to arrange and finance the voyage.

He said he was surprised that the Israeli navy did not interfere with the boats, which left Cyprus on Friday. On board were 46 activists from 17 countries, including an 81-year-old Catholic nun and former British prime minister Tony Blair’s sister-in-law, Lauren Booth. Blair is currently the envoy for the Quartet, a group of Middle East peace mediators comprising the United States, the European Union, Russia and the United Nations.

Israel continues to control the territorial waters off Gaza and has sharply limited the amount of goods allowed into the strip since the Islamist Hamas movement, which Israel and the United States consider a terrorist group, seized power there last year. Israeli officials say that they have allowed food and medicine into the territory but that they hope to encourage residents to overthrow Hamas. Since June 19, Israel and Hamas have observed a cease-fire, although about 40 rockets have been fired from Gaza into Israel.

Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Aryeh Mekel said Israel had decided not to stop the boats from landing in Gaza to diminish media attention. “We took away the drama,” Mekel said. “They came, they were welcomed, but what will they do tomorrow? They were hoping for a long confrontation with Israel - now they won’t have it.” Mekel said that the decision did not set a precedent and that future cases will be examined on their merits.

But Halper said he believed the Free Gaza movement had in fact broken the siege of Gaza. “Now that we’ve come through, what’s the excuse to keep the third boat out or the 10th boat or the 100th? We did break the economic siege of Gaza,” he said.

Halper said at least one of the boats will sail back to Cyprus in the next few days, adding that activists hope to take with them Palestinian students who have permission to study in U.S. universities but were unable to obtain exit permits from Israel. It is Halper’s first visit to Gaza since the summer of 2000, before the beginning of the second Israeli-Palestinian intifada. It is illegal for Israeli citizens to enter Gaza or the West Bank without permission, and he said he is likely to be arrested when he returns to Israel.

5) Cash crisis hits Lebanon cluster bomb clearance
Reuters,  Fri Aug 22, 8:26 am ET
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080822/wl_nm/lebanon_israel_cluster_dc_1

Many of the 44 teams clearing cluster munitions scattered by Israel in south Lebanon during its 2006 war with Hezbollah will have to stop work this month for lack of funds, a U.N. spokeswoman said on Friday. Donors have failed to come up with a promised $4.7 million needed to fund the program in 2008, according to Dalya Farran of the U.N. Mine Action Coordination Centre (UNMACC).

“A very large number of the clearance teams will be stopping by the end of this month if we don’t get funds before that,” she said, adding that some donor countries had not kept their promises and others had lost interest two years after the war.

UNMACC has led efforts to clear thousands of unexploded cluster bomblets left over after Israel’s war with Lebanese Hezbollah guerrillas. Israel fired or dropped most of the munitions in the last 72 hours before an August 14 ceasefire.

Since then 27 civilians have been killed and 234 wounded by unexploded ordnance, mostly cluster munitions, while 13 bomb disposal experts have been killed and 39 wounded, Farran said.

Any reduction in clearance work would lead to a higher accident rate because past experience shows that villagers will attempt to deal with the bomblets themselves if they believe that no disposal teams will do the job, Farran said.

UNMACC has identified 1,058 cluster strike locations across the south. The United Nations says Israel has not responded to repeated requests for detailed data on the strikes.

Farran said 43 percent of the estimated 51 million square yards of Lebanese land contaminated by cluster munitions had been fully cleared and another 49 percent had been surface-cleared, removing the immediate threat.

Iran
6) Chief Cleric of Iran Defends President
Nazila Fathi, New York Times, August 25, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/25/world/middleeast/25iran.html

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme religious leader, responded to mounting domestic criticism of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad with a strong statement of support, praising his internal policies and his dogged defense of the country’s nuclear program, Iranian news media reported Sunday.

Senior clerics and politicians have intensified their criticism of Ahmadinejad, especially over Iran’s worsening economic conditions. Inflation recently hit 26 percent.

The ayatollah has publicly backed Ahmadinejad on several occasions, but his support for the government over the weekend was exceptional because of its detailed look at domestic issues and his categorical statements that he and the president were in ideological accord.

“The tone Khamenei used to support Ahmadinejad suggests that his intention was more than defending him against the attacks,” said Ahmad Zeidabadi, a political analyst in Tehran. “It appears that Ahmadinejad and Khamenei share the same views over major policies and ideological values, such as resisting the West and the nuclear policy.”

During a meeting with the president and his cabinet ministers on Saturday, Ayatollah Khamenei praised the government’s defense of its enrichment of uranium for nuclear fuel, calling it a symbol of the country’s “national identity,” newspapers reported.

“Some bullying and demanding countries wanted to impose their will on our country,” Ayatollah Khamenei was quoted as saying about Western insistence that Iran give up uranium enrichment. “But our people, and the president and his ministers, stood up to such demands.”

7) Iran mulls production sharing contracts for Caspian oil: report
AFP, Mon Aug 25, 4:45 am ET
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20080825/wl_mideast_afp/iranenergyoilinvestment_080825084518

Iran might for the first time offer production sharing contracts to develop its Caspian Sea oil fields, in a bid to attract foreign investors to a region with high exploration costs, a report said on Monday.

The head of investment in the National Iranian Oil Company, Hojatollah Ghanimi Fard, said Iran could make the Caspian region exempt from buyback contracts, the Sarmayeh newspaper reported. “If parliament and Iranian officials agree, Caspian projects could be done in the form of production sharing contracts because of their high costs,” Ghanimi Fard said.

He added that the NIOC had discussed Caspian oil development with “the foreign activities branch of the Indian oil company and it has also had negotiations with the Chinese.” The report identified the Indian firm as the giant Oil and Natural Gas Corporation.

Iran is the number two producer in OPEC and the number four worldwide, but its ability to reach oil production targets has been hampered by a lack of international investment.

Iran’s buyback system skirts around the constitution which prohibits foreign companies from taking equity stake in its oil and gas sector. Instead, it enables foreign companies to explore and develop a project for a set time and at a fixed cost, after which they are paid by the government in oil or gas revenues at market prices.

Iraq
8) Fear Keeps Iraqis Out Of Their Baghdad Homes
Sabrina Tavernise, New York Times, August 24, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/24/world/middleeast/24baghdad.html

When Jabbar, an elderly Shiite man, stormed out of his house here in June wanting to know where all his furniture had gone, the sharp look of the young Sunni standing guard on his street stopped him cold. The young man said nothing, but his expression made things clear: Jabbar had no home here anymore.

After Iraq’s sectarian earthquake settled, his neighborhood had become a mostly Sunni area. Instead of moving back, he is trying to sell the house while staying in a rented one less than a mile away in an area that is mostly Shiite.

It is not an unusual decision. Out