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310 thoughts on “The Quest for Somali Oil

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  • Uzbek in the UK

    @ Passerby
    .
    I am not type of person who looks at anything through pink glasses, including you.
    .
    The facts is that US current foreign policy is pretty much the same as Roman and British imperial policies which is typically divide and rule. The only slight but nonetheless important difference is that US wherever it is possible bring slight positive change at least in term of government legitimacy. One can solely blame US for death of Iraqies and overlook the fact that Iraq for instance was artificial state borders of which have been drawn decades before US invasion and thousand miles from Baghdad.
    .
    The fact is that although Putin opposes US foreign policy, but this is not because Putin is concerned with all those killed by US drone attacks or assassinated or tortured by US, but because he himself (and those KGB) possess the same objective as US, such as divide and rule. In fact Putin uses divide and rule more successfully than US, although on a smaller scale.
    .
    Therefore any appeals to Putin to come to rescue of the world from US reminds me somewhat arguments that were made by some in Britain and France at the start of 1930th when it was argued that Hitler would ensure that Germany remains non Communist (which turned out to be true for sometime) and that in future Germany would serve as good ally against Communist Russia (which turned out to be failure).

  • Ben Franklin

    Pouring through the Wikileaks on Stratfor…found this nugget.

    http://wikileaks.org/gifiles/docs/387684_-windows-1252-b.html
    An Al Jazeera English video report explained the Icelandic Modern Media
    Initiative in March.

    At 4 a.m. on Thursday, at the end of an all-night session, Iceland’s
    Parliament, the Althing, voted unanimously in favor of a package of
    legislation aimed at making the country a haven for freedom of
    expression by offering legal protection to whistle-blower Web sites like
    WikiLeaks, which helped to craft the proposal.

    As the Web site Ice News reports, “One of the inspirations for the
    proposal was the dramatic August 2009 gagging of of Iceland’s national
    broadcaster, RUV by Iceland’s then largest bank, Kaupthing.”

    One of the sponsors of the proposal in the Althing, Birgitta Jonsdottir,
    told my colleague Noam Cohen in February that Iceland hoped to become
    “the inverse of a tax haven,” by offering journalists and publishers
    some of the most aggressive protections for free speech and
    investigative journalism in the world. “They are trying to make
    everything opaque,” she said. “We are trying to make it transparent.”

    As Mr. Cohen explained in an article on the package of laws that passed
    on Thursday:

    The proposal, the Icelandic Modern Media Initiative, combines in a
    single piece of legislation provisions from around the world:
    whistle-blower laws and rules about Internet providers from the United
    States; source protection laws from Belgium; freedom of information laws
    from Estonia and Scotland, among others; and New York State’s law to
    counteract “libel tourism,” the practice of suing in courts, like
    Britain’s, where journalists have the hardest time prevailing. […]”

  • Mary

    There is a suggestion that Baroness Amos is sent in to Syria by the UN Security Council.
    The ante against Assad is well and truly being upped by USUKIsNATO.
    .
    Syria crisis: UN demands Valerie Amos (be) let into country
    The UN Security Council is demanding immediate access to Syria for its humanitarian chief, Valerie Amos.
    .
    Russia and China, who vetoed two previous Security Council resolutions on Syria, are also backing the call for Baroness Amos to be allowed in.
    .
    It comes as the rebel Free Syrian Army said it was withdrawing from the Baba Amr district of Homs, which has been under siege for nearly a month.
    .
    Activists say hundreds of people have died during the bombardment.
    .
    Earlier, the International Committee of the Red Cross said it and the Syrian Red Crescent had been given the green light to go to Baba Amr on Friday to deliver food and medical supplies.
    .
    In a statement, the council expressed its “disappointment” that Baroness Amos had not been granted authorisation to visit Syria.
    .
    The council’s 15 member countries also said in a unanimously agreed statement that they “deplore” the rapidly deteriorating humanitarian situation in the country.
    .
    On Wednesday, Baroness Amos, who heads the UN Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs, said she had been refused permission by the Syrian authorities to enter the country.
    .
    The UN estimates more than 7,500 people have died in an 11-month anti-government uprising.
    .
    ~~~~~~
    This is an extract of Craig’s account of her previous activities in an article entitled ‘NuLab Freeloaders Steal From The Starving’. http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2009/05/nulab_freeloade/
    .
    ‘Valerie Amos is the very antithesis of a democratic politician. One of the Blair inner circle, she rose to Cabinet rank despite never having faced the electorate. Never, ever, at any level of politics. Her entire career was based upon New Labour internal patronage after making a very good living out of complaining about discrimination against minorities in the UK. She opened up a substantial income gap between herself and those on whose behalf she was claiming to work, from a very early stage, and that gap has widened ever since.
    .
    All this came back to me as I looked at Baroness Amos quaffing champagne on that plane. So I did a bit of digging. Valerie Amos is indeed listed on their website as a non-executive director of Travant Private Equity, one of only five directors. There is nothing about developmental goals, ethics, or the environment on the website. There is a lot about real estate opportunities in West Africa (by which they do not mean housing for the urban poor), and a boast that they have “the largest fundraising from domestic investors in sub-Saharan Africa”. Remember what I said about the sources of local capital formation? Now Travant may have the most rigorous procedures for scrutinising the origin of the domestic money deposited with them. But if they do, they do not mention it on their website. Rather they emphasise that “we are deeply immersed in the business communities in which we invest”. Mmmm.’

    .

  • Franz

    Ruth:
    .
    “I don’t think Cameron’s and Hague’s activism on Somalia is so sudden. It appears the UK has been laying out plans for Somalia for quite a while.
    .
    http://szamko.wordpress.com/2009/05/11/somali-pirates-directed-by-british-consultants/
    .
    Ha – I’ve been saying for a couple of years that there was something fishy (excuse the pun) about these Somali “pirates”. I had no evidence, it just seemed improbable that in the modern age a bunch of knuckle-heads in trawlers could disrupt global oil supplies.
    .
    More and more, I’m trusting my hunches, even though as far as everyone I know is concerned I’m a paranoid conspiracy freak.

  • Jay

    Why cant we have censorship in Britain.
    .
    The Syrian government is fighting for the right to be able to give censorship for the good of its people.

    Look at Hollywood.
    Look at the papers and magazines
    Look at our society.
    Debauchery.

    I want Fascist censorship to protect my family.

    Our leaders can go `fuck` themselves they havent a clue.

  • Mary

    I concur the more I see hear of it.
    .
    More a concentration camp than an Olympic olive grove
    Published: 1 March, 2012
    .
    • I agree with Dan Carrier and Ian Sinclair (Review, February 23) that the poet William Blake would have been horrified by the Olympic Village at Stratford.
    .
    The electrified fence, the CCTV cameras, the checkpoints, the broken Eiffel Tower, the lack of broad cycle tracks, the lack of the sight of semi-naked, fleet-footed, runners on paths sweeping past ponds, groves of trees and grass banks leading down to the River Lee Navigation, would have made him weep.
    .
    The fence would have reminded him of Peterloo, George III, and all that he held most vile, The Olympic committees have had five years to plant trees and establish a beautiful environment along the Lee valley.
    .
    In their ignorance of the original Olympic site and its olive groves and the Greek desire to honour the gods with beautiful statues and temples, they have established an environment that looks something like a concentration camp.
    .
    It is to be hoped that at the end of this exercise Londoners will be able to claim back a good stretch of the Lee valley, and turn it into a park that we can all enjoy, before it is all grabbed by large companies.
    .
    Nicholas Wood FRGS, NW3
    .
    http://www.camdennewjournal.com/letters/2012/mar/more-concentration-camp-olympic-olive-grove

  • Ruth

    Franz,
    Once you know what the intelligence services get up to and how they operate, it’s really quite logical to assume they are directing the Somali pirates both for the acquisition of funds and preparing the ground for future intervention in Somalia to secure resources and the region.

  • DownWithThisSortOfThing

    That old black magic, witchcraft, is getting the media spotlight thrown upon it. Apparently it is very uncivilized and barbaric, in-human even. Part of the culture you understand. No doubt there will be some ‘news’ soon about Africa’s intolerance towards Gay people, their endemic corruption or their religious extremism.
    .
    I guess the message is that a few peace and democracy bombs are not to be objected to should the need arise to kill these ‘bad types’ of Africans.

  • Vronsky

    “as far as everyone I know is concerned I’m a paranoid conspiracy freak.”
    .
    I’ve coined a word: somnoia := the state of mind of people who think that nothing is a conspiracy, and fail to notice that the bastards really are out to get them.

  • DownWithThisSortOfThing

    @Mary More a concentration camp than an Olympic olive grove
    .
    I googled images for “olympic village Stratford fence” to see what it looked like. I clicked on the fifth or sixth image because it was one of the few street level images of the village that was not rendered by a computer. I was then taken to The Telegraph but the image has been replaced with one of the common aerial shots. However, you do get to see the full size original in the ‘preview’ box before the article is displayed, and it is looks very unimpressive.
    .
    It seems someone was not happy with the original image and so had it replaced. It’s odd how petty, and sensitive, media management is about the portrayal of reality concerning the Olympics. I’m starting to get a millennium domey feeling about these games.

  • inho

    The vilification of Lib Dem Jenny Tonge for her stance against the policies of Netanyahu’s rogue regime is going into full flow. The FoI are in full persecution mode and showiin g the extent of grip they already have over British foreign policy, cue next a few supportive words by Barak for Britains disproportionate responses over the latest Falkland spat.

    This reaction to her supportive words for Palestinian’s and their plight against the fascists responses Israel is dealing out to all and sundry, including children, have been criticised by many in the Lib Dem Party, the BBC and by a cacopheny of FoI stooges in and out of Government, making it officially the third fully nobbled party and leaving not a single choice at the next general election.

    I shall write to the FoI managers of the Today programme, not that my disapproving note will make a difference. Those of us who believe/d that the british public will wake up to this lolloby of insipid foreign intrusion into its affairs, have been dreaming.

    reports of a general waking up of the people to the mismanagment and take over of the FCO by Israels interest, before all others, have been grossly exagerated.

  • Mary

    The ArcelorMittal tower just about sums it up. The result of a chance encounter by Boris in a Davos cloakroom!
    .
    http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/blog/2010/apr/09/arcelormittal-anish-kapoor-orbit?intcmp=239
    .
    The entry points are long metal tunnels worthy of the checkpoints found in Occupied Palestine.
    .
    These were the instructions for arriving at the recent aqua centre event. The organisers are obviously very worried about terrorism. The whole thing seem to be brutalist.
    .
    ‘On arrival at the designated entry point, spectators
    will be asked to pass through a screening area before
    using the dedicated walking route. If, for any reason, a
    spectator refuses to go through the security screening
    area, they will not be permitted access into the Park and
    will not be offered a refund.
    .
    Any bags that are brought into the venue must be small,
    soft sided and be able to fit under seating. There are no
    cloakroom services available.
    .
    Reasonable quantities of food and un-opened drinks
    containers (not glass) in original packaging are permitted.’
    .
    Third Reich had nothing on Coe’s lot.

  • Mary

    I heard it too Ingo. Halfon is described as a Conservative MP in the blurb. No mention of Friends of Israel. He had the last word of course with the attack on Hamas and the rockets. I noted he used the phrase ‘conspiracy theories’ at least three times.
    .
    She did pretty well I thought.

    .
    The link usually becomes live at around 9.30
    .
    0733
    Liberal Democrat peer Baroness Tonge has resigned after provoking an outcry by saying that Israel “is not going to be there forever in its present form”. She explains why she is standing by her remarks, while Conservative MP Robert Halfon explains why it was right that she stepped down.
    http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/listen_again/default.stm

    .
    Halfon initially worked as Chief of Staff for the Conservative MP Oliver Letwin and as Political Director for Conservative Friends of Israel. He contested the Harlow seat in both 2001 and 2005, losing by just 97 votes on the second occasion. After the 2010 general election, he was elected to the executive of the 1922 Committee of backbench Conservative MPs. He made his maiden speech on 2 June 2010. On 19 July 2010 he hosted the launch of the Friends of Israel Initiative at the House of Commons.

  • Mary

    Lorna bids a sudden farewell to Bicom
    March 1, 2012
    .
    The chief executive of the UK’s top Israel pressure group is to step down to “pursue new opportunities”, after almost six years at the helm
    http://www.thejc.com/news/uk-news/64385/lorna-bids-a-sudden-farewell-bicom
    .
    I see that she is being held accountable for the loss of Israel’s popularity. The unnamed ‘community leader’ forgets about Cast Lead, the Mavi Marmara and the everyday atrocities perpetrated on the Palestinians which receive more coverage than used to be the case.

  • ingo

    Half on and half off, thats Roberts greatest problem, he is a mouthpiece for the conspirators that are diverting Britains foreign policy goals, who value Israels foreign policy goals before ours or that of our allies in NATO or EU partners and are willing to let British soldiers die for these goals.

    This is what will not appear on the Guardian blog, shall send a copy to the Today programme as well.

    “Jenny Tonge’s vilification by the friends of israel in all three parties opens the questions as to who is running our foreign policy. William Hagues membership of this illusive but powerfull lobby group within all three main parties, since he was 15 years old, speaks volumnes, so does the disappearance of Adam Werritty and/or the lack of debate over his unprecedented high access to all parties, or his many meetings he had with ambassador Gould, Britains first ever appointed jewish ambassador to Israel. Sadly G’oD’s report over these meetings was inaccurate and has left out many important meetings betwen the two.
    Jenny Tonge is right to question those who malign and divert the course of Britains foreign policy and its resolve, who consider israels foreign policy goals before our own and that of our allies in NATO or that of our European partners.”

  • TFS

    Off Topic: worth a read, goto Orfder-order.com.

    check out the article Justice must be seen to be done’. You will find a pdf, related to a super injunction related i believe to the sultan of Brunei.

  • Mary

    Trivial but indicative of the man that, several days later, he owns up. An example of his ability to mislead too.
    .
    Trying to hide your close assocations with the Murdoch crowd David? And what is Andy Coulson doing nowadays?
    .
    David Cameron: I did ride police horse loaned to Brooks
    Mr Cameron says he has no plans to get back in the saddle
    .
    Brooks loan horse in ‘poor’ state
    Police lent horse to Sun editor
    .
    David Cameron has confirmed he did ride a horse which police lent to former Sun editor Rebekah Brooks.
    .
    He apologised for allowing a “confusing picture” over the issue to emerge after days of speculation.
    .
    News that London’s police force lent Mrs Brooks a horse emerged as inquiries continue into the relationship between News International and the Met.
    .
    Mr Cameron joked that he did not think he would be “getting back into the saddle any time soon.”
    /..
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-17231308

  • copWatcher

    One of the Sultan’s ex-wives, according to the witness statement, alleges that her former hubby funded Al Quaeda [whatever that is] & that he had prior warning of the 7/7 bombings.

    I wish to ask, since nobody else seems to have done so:
    .
    Were Messrs Hayman, Yates & Clarke — or anyone else for that matter involved in waging on our behalf the War on Terror — able to spare any time off from their strenuous investigations of the Michelin & Good Food Guides detailed in such lip-smacking detail before Lord Justice Leveson yesterday, in order to interview the purveyor of these most astonishing allegations concerning national security? And if not, why not??
    .
    http://bit.ly/AjVnBf

  • Passerby

    Mary, Ingo,
    It is really infuriating to see Jenny heckled by a bunch of numskulls, who are pretty aggressive in trying to shut her up. This is the reason I cannot stand the ziofuckwit, these evil operatives have no humanity about them. Their hive mentality is totally shut off to the outside world, and their inane hostility towards any outsider cannot be breached in any way.
    ,
    As Jenny rightly started by poi8nting out the all too worn out “anti sem…” label used as the weapon of choice to shut up the opponents of the apartheid theocratic regime and discredit these, the aggressive little twerp pipping from the background to ask; “who are they?” is the stuff that sets the ziofuckwit aside.
    ,
    It is truly lamentable to see that even on this board people fall for the dog and pony show of the ziofuckwits who are perceived to be engaged in debate and exchange of Ideas. No zoifuckwit will ever change their view, or snap out of their hive minds, these can only regurgitate the plethora of the material (Hasbara Handbook, films, stories, GIUYS, etc) that has been prepared for them to spew in any meeting/board/gathering/demonstrations to supplement the immersion propaganda lines that is fed to the people at large in a bid for continuance of the illegitimate theocratic apartheid regime for a while longer.
    ,
    The shit bag who was heckling and calling Jenny a liar, and accusing her of spreading lies, has the audacity to do so and get away with it, because the world has allowed itself to be cowed by these fuckwits. The ziofuckwit have figured that goyim are too stupid to learn and they can be manipulated to the ends of time.

  • angrysoba

    Uzbek: You might also want to look up organization and execution of bombings of two residential apartment blocks in Moscow in 2001 (that some in Russia consider to be planned and executed by KGB) to lay foundations to second military campaign in Chechnya.

    .
    I’ve heard a bit about this stuff and some of it does sound compelling. I think that Patrick Cockburn also reported on the strangeness of these apartment bombings and he is a reporter I have a lot of respect for. And yet… and yet… just like the accusations that Assad was behind “false flag” attacks in Damascus recently, I have to be skeptical. These types of things are crossing a major line even for most “patriots” who may need their reasons for conducting a war and they seem to me to be far too unreliable in their consequences for sane people to enact. The death of Anna Politkovskaya, on the other hand, is something that I can well believe that either he or a friendly gangster of the Kremlin or of its Chechen puppet is behind. Then again, Politkovskaya had pissed off a LOT of very dangerous people in Russia and there could well have been others who were behind it. I do wonder how fervently the Russian state is investigating her death. Anyone know?

  • angrysoba

    Vronsky: I’ve coined a word: somnoia := the state of mind of people who think that nothing is a conspiracy, and fail to notice that the bastards really are out to get them.

    .
    If it doesn’t take off you can blame “THEM” for suppressing it! 😛

  • copWatcher

    So much for crime & the causes of crime. Again:
    .
    Indication comes via top cop that Blair & internal security boss Reid connived in massive crime coverup. And that fear-filled NuLab cabinet ministers Blunkett, Prescott & Jowell refused to help police with their ‘enquiries’:
    .
    http://bit.ly/ADprAJ

  • Uzbek in the UK

    @ Angrysoba.
    .
    Well, there are many more serious crimes that KGB has committed (and most of them against its own citizens) than blowing up few residential building.
    .
    If you look carefully at this particular one you see that bombings occurred in one months in several locations and followed Basaev’s invasion to Dagestan and start of second Russian war in Chechnya. Bombings of those building is not similar to other terror acts (bombings in underground, airport etc) and required large amount of explosives not only to be prepared but also delivered and stuffed in apartments buildings basements. Doing this in Moscow in particular without alerting KGB is virtually impossible even considering concentration of Chechen criminals in Moscow and also considering that all of them from the start of first Russian was in Chechnya have been closely monitored (and often used) by KGB. But the most convincing argument in support of KGB involvement is that it was very well played by Putin to stipulate his image as strong leader (remember his phrase “if we find terrorist in the loo we will kill him even there”) and also gave Kremlin moral excuse and encouragement in support of Second war in Chechnya (particularly considering unpopularity of first war amongst Russians).
    .
    As for Politkovskaya’s case investigation is has not changed since assassins’ name have been revealed. The case which is to be heard soon will be concentrated on statements from former Moscow Criminal Police officer who was found guilty in coordinating assassination. His statement is that assassination was ordered by Boris Berezovskiy (former Russian oligarch and now sworn enemy of Putin) who thought that assassination of high profile critic such as Politkovskaya would action the same wave of protests against Putin as took place in Urkaine after the assassination of Gongadze which culminated in Orange Revolution. Go figure.

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