Articles by RT
We found 4093 results.
Save Jeju Island
Robert Redford – TRANSCEND Media Service,
10 Sep 2012
From September 6-15 [2012], some 10,000 environmentalists gather in Jeju Island for the International Union of the Conservation of Nature’s World Conservation Congress. It will take place where the construction of a naval base is threatening coral forests, assaulting endangered species and destroying a 400-year old community of farmers and fishers. But instead of condemning the South Korean government’s actions, IUCN Director-General Julia Marton-Lafevre praised its seriously flawed “Environmental Impact Assessment.” This naval base is being built just 0.13 miles from a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve, Tiger Island.
→ read full articleTRANSCEND Peace University Online Courses – 2012
Erika Degortes - TRANSCEND Media Service,
10 Sep 2012
12-Week All-Online Courses
→ read full articleAn All-Clear for Bush’s Torturers
Marjorie Cohn – Comsortium News,
10 Sep 2012
Even as Nobel Peace Prize winner Desmond Tutu urges a war-crimes trial for George Bush and Tony Blair for invading Iraq, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder gives an all-clear to Bush’s subordinates for homicides that resulted from torture in Afghanistan and Iraq, a repudiation of U.S. law and principles.
→ read full articleTRANSCEND Peace University
Erika Degortes - TRANSCEND Media Service,
10 Sep 2012
– ONLINE and ONSITE COURSES September 2012
→ read full articleCalifornia Passes Resolution Defining Criticism of Israel as Anti-Semitism
Tom Carter – World Socialist Web Site,
10 Sep 2012
4 September 2012 – Last month, the California State Assembly passed a resolution urging state educational institutions to crack down on criticism of Israel on campuses, which the resolution defines as “anti-Semitism.”The resolution was drafted by Republican Linda Halderman and passed without public discussion. The vote on the resolution came when most students were between semesters and away from their campuses. The resolution is available here.
→ read full articleOn 9/11, Doubts Were Immediate
Paul Craig Roberts, Journal of 9/11 Studies – TRANSCEND Media Service,
10 Sep 2012
It is not credible that not only the CIA and FBI failed to detect the plot, but also all 16 US intelligence agencies, including the National Security Agency, which spies on everyone on the planet, and the Defense Intelligence Agency, Israel’s Mossad, and the intelligence agencies of Washington’s NATO allies. There are simply too many watchmen and too much infiltration of terrorist groups for such a complex attack to be prepared undetected and carried out undeterred.
→ read full article(Portuguese) Quem É Quem no Comércio Mundial de Armas
Antonio Martins, Outras Palavras – TRANSCEND Media Service,
3 Sep 2012
Estados Unidos já abocanham 78% das exportações mundiais — e são cada vez mais influenciados por seu próprio “complexo industrial-militar”. Por isso, mídia norte-americana prefere falar da China…
→ read full articleInside Daraya – How a Failed Prisoner Swap Turned Into a Massacre
Robert Fisk – The Independent,
3 Sep 2012
If these stories are true, then the armed men – wearing hoods, according to another woman, who described how they broke into her home and how she kissed them in a fearful attempt to prevent them shooting her own family – were armed insurgents rather than Syrian troops.
→ read full articleThe Western Onslaught against International Law
Paul Craig Roberts – TRANSCEND Media Service,
3 Sep 2012
The lawlessness that now characterizes the US and UK governments is a large threat to humanity’s finest achievement–the rule of law–for which the British fought from the time of Alfred the Great in the ninth century to the Glorious Revolution of the 17th century. Where are the protests over the Anglo-American destruction of the rule of law? Why Aren’t Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and Chatham House on the case?
→ read full articleGramsci and Nonviolence
Prof. Alberto L’Abate – TRANSCEND Media Service,
27 Aug 2012
Paper presented in Tamilnadu, at the Gandhigram University, and by the “Sarvodaya Talisman” Journal at Madurai. In the years 1955/6, I was working as a voluntary in Danilo Dolci’ project in Sicily. Danilo Dolci is called the”Italian Gandhi” because has used nonviolent action to improve the life of poor peoples, especially peasants, in the area of Palermo, Sicily.
→ read full article
Microwave Weapons (VIDEO OF THE WEEK)
Dr. Barrie Trower - International Center Against Abuse of Covert Technologies-ICAACT,
27 Aug 2012
During the two days of interview, we touched on many different topics, but the main theme was the abuse of microwaves as a secret and covert stealth weapon, that has been around for at least 50-60 years. This type of weapon has taken many different forms over the years and it is still used in many different types of targeting, even to the point of death around the world.
→ read full article‘They Snipe At Us Then Run and Hide In Sewers’
Robert Fisk – The Independent,
27 Aug 2012
Our writer was given exclusive access to the Assad Generals accused of war crimes as they seek to defeat the rebels in Aleppo. “They snipe at us and then they run and hide and in the sewers. Foreigners, Turks, Chechens, Afghans, Libyans, Sudanese.” And Syrians, I said. “Yes, Syrians too, but smugglers and criminals,” the general said.
→ read full articleHydropower Dam to Flood Sacred Amazon Indigenous Site
Fabiola Ortiz – Inter Press Service-IPS,
27 Aug 2012
The Sete Quedas or “seven waterfalls” on the Teles Pires River, which runs through the Amazon rainforest states of Mato Grosso and Pará in central Brazil, are a spiritual oasis venerated by several indigenous groups. But the 20-metre-high rocky falls are to be covered by a reservoir created by a hydroelectric dam that is to flood an area of 95 square km.
→ read full article(Portuguese) Carta às Esquerdas: As Últimas Trincheiras
Boaventura de Sousa Santos – Carta Maior,
27 Aug 2012
Faço um apelo aos governos brasileiro, equatoriano, venezuelano e argentino para que abandonem o projeto da reforma da Comissão Interamericana de Direitos Humanos (CIDH). E o apelo é especialmente dirigido ao Brasil dada a influência que tem na região.
→ read full articleIs Washington Deaf As Well as Criminal?
Paul Craig Roberts – TRANSCEND Media Service,
20 Aug 2012
The morons who rule the american sheeple are not only dumb and blind, they are deaf as well. The ears of the american “superpower” only work when the Israeli prime minister, the crazed Netanyahu, speaks. Then Washington hears everything and rushes to comply. Israel is a tiny insignificant state, created by the careless British and the stupid americans. It has no power except what its american protector provides. Yet, despite Israel’s insignificance, it rules Washington.
→ read full articleEcuador President Rafael “We Are Not A Colony” Correa Stands Up To The Jackbooted British Gestapo
Paul Craig Roberts – TRANSCEND Media Service,
20 Aug 2012
The once proud British government, now reduced to Washington’s servile whore, put on its Gestapo Jackboots and declared that if the Ecuadorean Embassy in London did not hand over WikiLeaks’ Julian Assange, British storm troopers would invade the embassy with military force and drag Assange out. Ecuador stood its ground. “We want to be very clear, we are not a British colony,” declared Ecuador’s Foreign Minister. Far from being intimidated the President of Ecuador, Rafael Correa, replied to the threat by granting Assange political asylum.
→ read full article(Italian) Animalismo, Specismo, Antispecismo e Diritti degli Animali
Roberto Russo, GraphoMania – TRANSCEND Media Service,
20 Aug 2012
Parliamo spesso di animali: ci stanno particolarmente a cuore e non è un mistero. Ma non vogliamo che sia un discorso sdolcinato: secondo noi è importante guardare agli animali come esseri viventi, al pari nostro, con i loro diritti. Il fatto che noi siamo animali appartenenti alla specie umana non ci autorizza certo a trattare male gli animali non umani.
→ read full articleNBC’s ‘Stars Earn Stripes’ Continues an Inglorious Tradition of Glorifying War
Nobel Peace Laureates Jody Williams, Desmond Tutu, Mairead Maguire, Shirin Ebadi, José Ramos-Horta, Adolfo Pérez Esquivel, Oscar Arias Sanchez, Rigoberta Menchú Tum and Betty Williams – TRANSCEND Media Service,
20 Aug 2012
As Nobel Peace Prize laureates, we call on NBC to cancel this reality TV show that likens military combat to Olympic athletics.
→ read full article(Portuguese) Libor: “É o sistema, estúpido”!
Carta Maior – TRANSCEND Media Service,
20 Aug 2012
Desde o dia 4 de julho [2012], noticia-se um escândalo envolvendo uma coisa chamada Libor. Chamar a manipulação da Libor de escândalo é desviar as atenções do fato de que se trata de mais uma forma normal de acumular capital. Em 1992, James Carville, estrategista da campanha do então candidato Bill Clinton à Presidência dos EUA, saiu-se com um dito que ficou famoso: “É a economia, estúpido”. Frente aos chamados escândalos, deveríamos dizer: “É o sistema, estúpido”!
→ read full articleInternational Flotilla Sets Sail to Break Gaza Blockade
Hend Kortam – The Daily News, Egypt,
13 Aug 2012
Estelle, a ship voyaging to break the Gaza blockade has begun its journey from Sweden. It is now in Norway after arriving there on Friday [3 Aug 2012]. The ship is expected to reach Gaza sometime within October. Throughout its journey the ship will raise awareness of the Gaza blockade. Estelle will make several stops on its way to Gaza in which there will be “speakers, concerts and public festivals providing information about the situation in Gaza.”
→ read full article
Surviving an Active Shooter Event
US Department of Homeland Security – TRANSCEND Media Service,
13 Aug 2012
RUN… HIDE… FIGHT…! Signs of the Times. Interesting advertisement by the city of Houston, Texas. Apparently mass-shooting has become common place in the Land of the Brave and the Free… The irony is in the ad itself.
→ read full article(Portuguese) Esquerda Paraguaia Nunca Esteve Num Melhor Momento, Diz Lugo
Igor Ojeda – Carta Maior,
13 Aug 2012
Em entrevista concedida à mídia alternativa brasileira, o presidente deposto do Paraguai analisa as origens do “golpe parlamentar” executado contra ele e diz que os movimentos e partidos progressistas do país estão se reunindo todos os dias para discutir um projeto nacional, o que antes não acontecia. “Nunca antes 12 partidos e oito movimentos sentaram juntos”, disse Lugo, referindo-se à Frente Guasú, concertação de esquerda e centro-esquerda formada em março de 2010.
→ read full articleInvestigation Exposes Cruelty at Foie Gras Farms
Carlota Cortes – Inter Press Service - IPS,
13 Aug 2012
Carter Dillard, director of litigation for the Animal Legal Defence Fund, told IPS, “They are literally willing to torture the animal just to make them taste better and that’s really barbaric. I think 50 years from now people will be horrified that we ever did this.”
→ read full articleSyria’s Ancient Treasures Pulverized
Robert Fisk – The Independent,
13 Aug 2012
The priceless treasures of Syria’s history – of Crusader castles, ancient mosques and churches, Roman mosaics, the renowned “Dead Cities” of the north and museums stuffed with antiquities – have fallen prey to looters and destruction by armed rebels and government militias as fighting envelops the country.
→ read full articleFinancial Crisis: 25 People at the Heart of the Meltdown – Where Are They Now?
Rupert Neate – The Guardian,
13 Aug 2012
In 2009 the Guardian identified 25 people – bankers, economists, central bankers and politicians – whose actions had led the world into the worst economic turmoil since the Great Depression. On the fifth anniversary of the credit crunch, what are they doing?
→ read full articleEscape From Economics
Paul Craig Roberts – TRANSCEND Media Service,
6 Aug 2012
The problem is that the discipline both lags an ever-changing world and got some things wrong at the beginning. Consequently, learning economics places one inside a box where some of the tools and understanding provided are outdated and incorrect. My advice to readers who wish to develop economic comprehension is to begin with the outside-the-box economists who are addressing real issues. As Lenin and others predicted, industrial capitalism has turned into finance capitalism.
→ read full articleThe Threat–Again–of Left-Wing Latin American Democracy
Peter Hart – Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting-FAIR,
6 Aug 2012
You can count on U.S. corporate media to express alarm about the threat posed by left-wing governments in Latin America. But how do you sound the alarm about left-wing threats to democracy when actual elected left-wing leaders are being removed in anti-democratic coups? That’s no easy feat, but some reporters are up to the challenge. In the Washington Post on July 22 [2012] (under the headline “Latin America’s New Authoritarians”), reporter Juan Forero explains…
→ read full article(Portuguese) Guerra de Mentiras
Robert Fisk – The Independent,
6 Aug 2012
Enquanto Qatar e Arábia Saudita armam e financiam os rebeldes sírios para derrubar a ditadura alauíta-baazista-xiíta de Bashar al-Assad, Washington não faz nenhuma crítica contra essas nações. O presidente Barack Obama e a sua secretária de Estado, Hillary Clinton, dizem que querem democracia para a Síria, mas o Qatar é uma autocracia, e a Arábia Saudita está entre os mais perniciosos califados ditatoriais do mundo árabe. Os governantes de ambos os Estados herdam o poder de suas famílias, assim como fez Bashar.
→ read full articleSyrian War of Lies and Hypocrisy
Robert Fisk – The Independent,
6 Aug 2012
While Qatar and Saudi Arabia arm and fund the rebels of Syria to overthrow Bashar al-Assad’s Alawite/Shia-Baathist dictatorship, Washington mutters not a word of criticism against them. President Barack Obama and his Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, say they want a democracy in Syria. But Qatar is an autocracy and Saudi Arabia is among the most pernicious of caliphate-kingly-dictatorships in the Arab world. Rulers of both states inherit power from their families – just as Bashar has done – and Saudi Arabia is an ally of the Salafist-Wahabi rebels in Syria, just as it was the most fervent supporter of the medieval Taliban during Afghanistan’s dark ages.
→ read full article(Portuguese) O Mercosul na Sua Segunda Geração
Jeferson Miola – Carta Maior,
6 Aug 2012
A entrada da Venezuela coloca o Mercosul em um novo estágio. O bloco fica ampliado nas dimensões econômicas, comerciais, culturais e demográficas. Consolida o domínio sobre as maiores reservas energéticas, minerais, naturais e de recursos hídricos do planeta. A partir de agora, o Mercosul passa a ser a região com a maior reserva mundial de petróleo.
→ read full article(Portuguese) A Falácia da Intervenção “Humanitária” na Síria
Larissa Ramina – Carta Maior,
6 Aug 2012
A questão internacional central, e também o principal embate da encruzilhada síria, está na perigosa articulação do conceito de “intervenção humanitária”. O intelectual e escritor belga Jean Bricmont, em recente fala na Unesco, chama a atenção para o que rotulou de “noção falaciosa de guerra humanitária”, e denuncia um condicionamento ideológico proveniente das mídias, que segundo ele visam a tornar uma intervenção militar na Síria aceitável aos olhos da opinião pública mundial.
→ read full articleReform and Change, Cuban Style
David Tebaldi – Americas Quarterly,
30 Jul 2012
Cuba’s 53-year-old revolutionary socialist system is in transition. Toward what, though, is anyone’s guess.
→ read full articleHumanitarian Interventionism Brazilian Style?
Matias Spektor – Americas Quarterly,
30 Jul 2012
Brazil tries to strike a balance between sovereignty and preventing atrocities. By November 2011, Brazilian officials began to circulate a concept paper at the UN entitled “Responsibility While Protecting,” or RWP. The paper argued that without limits on what the powerful may do, the emerging ideology of humanitarian intervention could easily become a tool for foreign manipulation.
→ read full articleCholera and the Road to Modernity: Lessons from One Latin American Epidemic for Another
Jonathan Weigel and Paul Farmer – Americas Quarterly,
30 Jul 2012
A bold, comprehensive campaign to control cholera in Haiti could save thousands of lives. So why the holdup?
→ read full articleSyria: Washington’s Latest War Crime
Paul Craig Roberts – TRANSCEND Media Service,
30 Jul 2012
One wonders what Syrians are thinking as “rebels” vowing to “free Syria” take the country down the same road to destruction as “rebels” in Libya. Libya, under Gaddafi a well run country whose oil revenues were shared with the Libyan people instead of monopolized by a princely class as in Saudi Arabia, now has no government and is in disarray with contending factions vying for power.
→ read full articleWar on All Fronts
Paul Craig Roberts – TRANSCEND Media Service,
23 Jul 2012
The Russian government has finally caught on that its political opposition is being financed by the US taxpayer-funded National Endowment for Democracy and other CIA/State Department fronts in an attempt to subvert the Russian government and install an American puppet state in the geographically largest country on earth, the one country with a nuclear arsenal sufficient to deter Washington’s aggression.
→ read full article(Portuguese) Lembrando da Memória de García Márquez
Eric Nepomuceno – Carta Maior,
23 Jul 2012
Gabriel García Márquez sempre foi dono de uma memória sem limites, e, agora, essa memória se desvaneceu. Disse, ao longo da vida, que não há uma só linha, em toda a sua obra, que não tivesse como ponto de partida um dado da realidade. Ou seja: um dado guardado, intacto, em sua memória. Assim ele escreveu tudo que escreveu. Bem: essa memória se acabou. E, com ela, se acabou a escrita mais luminosa das últimas muitas décadas da literatura feita na América de todos nós.
→ read full articleThe Libor Scandal in Full Perspective
Paul Craig Roberts – TRANSCEND Media Service,
23 Jul 2012
The article about the Libor scandal, coauthored with Nomi Prins, received much attention, with Internet repostings, foreign translation, and video interviews. To further clarify the situation, this article brings to the forefront implications that might not be obvious to those without insider experience and knowledge.
→ read full article(Portuguese) O Lado Mais Sinistro do Sistema Bancário
Flávio Aguiar – Carta Maior,
23 Jul 2012
De crise em crise, de susto em susto, de revelação em revelação, vem à tona dia após dia o lado mais sinistro do sistema bancário internacional. Semanas atrás foi o caso da manipulação da taxa Libor da banca britânica, promovida pelo banco Barclays. Agora foi a vez do HSBC. Uma investigação de mais de ano, feita pelo Senado norte-americano, concluiu insofismavelmente que a seção norte-americana do banco lavou dinheiro dos cartéis mexicanos de narcotráfico de 2002 a 2009.
→ read full articleHuman Corpses Harvested in Multimillion-Dollar Trade
Kate Willson, Vlad Lavrov, Martina Keller, Thomas Maier and Gerard Ryle - The Sydney Morning Herald,
23 Jul 2012
A grisly trade in human body parts leaves relatives grieving and some recipients at risk of life-threatening disease. On February 24 [2012], Ukrainian authorities made an alarming discovery: bones and other human tissues crammed into coolers in a grimy white minibus.
→ read full articleGoodbye, Old Friend
Robert Scheer - Truthdig,
23 Jul 2012
Uncompromising, provocative, brilliant. There are many things to say about Alexander Cockburn, who died Friday [20 Jul 2012], and his critics and friends will have their day. He could be infuriating in his lust for truth and social justice as well as for the unparalleled sharpness of his polemics. But no serious student of our time can deny Cockburn’s importance as one of the most principled and insightful political journalists of the past half-century.
→ read full article(Portuguese) O Capitalismo Neoliberal Está Morto; Que Venha o Capitalismo Regulado
J. Carlos de Assis – Carta Maior,
16 Jul 2012
O coração do sistema, os bancos, já não funciona. E não há como fazê-lo voltar segundo a fórmula tradicional, antes da liberação financeira, de captação de recursos no mercado a curto prazo e financiamento do sistema produtivo a longo prazo. Para reconciliar o sistema produtivo com o sistema financeiro, alguém terá de pagar o custo da especulação exacerbada.
→ read full articlePar:AnoIA: Anonymous Launches WikiLeaks-like Site for Data Dumps
Quinn Norton - Wired,
16 Jul 2012
Frustrated by the lack of impact from Anonymous’ otherwise famous hacks and data dumps, and the slow pace of material coming out of WikiLeaks, participants in the Anonymous collective have launched a WikiLeaks-like site called Par:AnoIA (Potentially Alarming Research: Anonymous Intelligence Agency).
→ read full articleWaves of Lawsuits Pending: Barclays Affair Rocks European Banking Industry
Martin Hesse – Der Spiegel,
16 Jul 2012
The LIBOR rate-fixing scandal has sent a shock wave through the whole European financial industry. A number of other banks are suspected of having manipulated interest rates, and Deutsche Bank has already suspended two employees. Experts warn of a wave of lawsuits that could ruin some institutions.
→ read full articleThe Real LIBOR Scandal
Paul Craig Roberts and Nomi Prins – TRANSCEND Media Service,
16 Jul 2012
According to news reports, UK banks fixed the London interbank borrowing rate (Libor) with the complicity of the Bank of England (UK central bank) at a low rate in order to obtain a cheap borrowing cost. The way this scandal is playing out is that the banks benefitted from borrowing at these low rates. Whereas this is true, it also strikes us as simplistic and as a diversion from the deeper, darker scandal.
→ read full article(Portuguese) Uma Pausa Para o Luto
Flávio Aguiar – Carta Maior,
16 Jul 2012
O irmão mais moço, Jaime, de Gabriel Garcia Marquez (84 anos) confirma: o escritor está perdendo a memória, e não consegue mais escrever. É uma perda imensurável, para a literatura e para o jornalismo. Como se isso não bastasse, no fim de semana que passou morreu, aos 95 anos, Ernest Borgnine.
→ read full articleOccupy Buddhism – Or Why the Dalai Lama is a Marxist
Stuart Smithers, Tricycle – TRANSCEND Media Service,
16 Jul 2012
When the Dalai Lama announced his Marxist leanings last summer in Minneapolis, the only surprise was how surprising it was. The blogosphere was once again astir with this nonrevelation, which came by way of an Indian-born Tibetan journalist, Tsering Namgyal, who had tagged along when the Dalai Lama held a nearly three-hour meeting with 150 Chinese students.
→ read full articleThe Wall Street Scandal of all Scandals
Robert Reich – TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 Jul 2012
“Yes, just when you thought the Street had hit bottom, an even deeper level of public-be-damned greed and corruption is revealed. Sit down and hold on to your chair.”
→ read full articleOpen Letter to Honduran President Porfirio Lobo Sosa
Robert Shulman – TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 Jul 2012
Re: Alberto Castillo Hyde, pro-bono diplomat, president of Fundacion Vamos Panama, and thief of $1.5 million dollars. The US representative of Fundacion Vamos Panama was Herbert E. Caswell, S and H investment firm of Jacksonville, Florida… I am standing by for your response and you can be certain, I will not go away anytime soon, or in the future for that matter, until justice is served.
→ read full articleCrime of the Century
Robert Scheer - Truthdig,
9 Jul 2012
Forget Bernie Madoff and Enron’s Ken Lay—they were mere amateurs in financial crime. The current Libor interest rate scandal, involving hundreds of trillions in international derivatives trade, shows how the really big boys play. And these guys will most likely not do the time because their kind rewrites the law before committing the crime.
→ read full articleOur Quests Are Formidable
Lynne Stewart – Zspace,
9 Jul 2012
My name is Lynne Stewart and I am currently jailed by the US government at Federal Medical Center, a medical prison in Texas. I am serving a ten year sentence. Before this I was a top criminal defense lawyer in New York City for many decades. Many of you know that the U.S. came after me for being too good a lawyer for my clients, and when representing Dr. Omar Abdel Rahman, an Egyptian Muslim cleric, accused of terrorism on the word of a double agent, I made a press release to Reuters News on his behalf.
→ read full articleFinal Declaration of the People’s Summit Rio+20
Robert Pollard – Pressenza International Press Agency,
2 Jul 2012
Peoples’ Summit Rio +20 for Social and Environmental Justice in defense of the commons, against the commodification of life. The syntheses were approved in plenary integrate and complement this policy document for the people, movements and organizations can continue to converge and deepen their struggles and building alternatives in their territories, regions and countries all over the world.
→ read full articleNew Report to Expose How Corporations ‘Capture’ the U.N.
Friends of the Earth International – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 Jul 2012
The report presents a number of cases that clearly expose how UN policies and agencies have been excessively influenced by the corporate sector. It also shows how this damages the ability of the UN to solve the various problems it is tasked with, removing its willingness to address the role of major corporations in causing many of the environmental, social, food and economic problems that the world faces today.
→ read full articleA Cruel and Unusual Record
Jimmy Carter, Nobel Peace Laureate – The New York Times,
2 Jul 2012
Revelations that top officials are targeting people to be assassinated abroad, including American citizens, are only the most recent, disturbing proof of how far our nation’s violation of human rights has extended.
→ read full articleWhy Genetically Engineered Food Is Dangerous
Genetic Engineers, EarthOpenSource – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 Jul 2012
Aren’t critics of genetically engineered food anti-science? Isn’t the debate over GMOs (genetically modified organisms) a spat between emotional but ignorant activists on one hand and rational GM-supporting scientists on the other? The initiative for the report came not from campaigners but from two genetic engineers who believe there are good scientific reasons to be wary of GM foods and crops.
→ read full articleCan the World Survive Washington’s Hubris?
Paul Craig Roberts – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 Jul 2012
The process of surrounding Russia with military bases continued unabated through successor US administrations with various “color revolutions” financed by the US National Endowment for Democracy, regarded by many as a front for the CIA. Washington even attempted to install a Washington-controlled government in Ukraine and did succeed in this effort in former Soviet Georgia, the birthplace of Joseph Stalin.
→ read full articleConfirmed: US CIA Arming Terrorists in Syria
Tony Cartalucci – Global Research,
2 Jul 2012
As West berates Syria for “killing civilians” Western weapons flow into terrorist hands from NATO. The New York Times in their article, “C.I.A. Said to Aid in Steering Arms to Syrian Opposition,” confirms what many have already long known – that the West, led by the US and its Gulf State proxies, have been arming terrorists…
→ read full articleTRANSCEND Peace University – Summer 2012 Online Courses
Erika Degortes, TPU Courses Secretary,
25 Jun 2012
Term: July 16th – August 31st 2012. Six-Week All-Online Courses.
→ read full articleItaly: A Portrait
Erika Degortes and Johan Galtung,
25 Jun 2012
For quite some time now reading Italian newspapers or listening to news and radio broadcasts turned into an insult not only to information itself but to all Italians. National television channels are literally monopolized by football and all kinds of weather apocalyptic scenarios. In Italy the system of censorship is very sophisticated: they just talk about anything else, the discourse goes astray.
→ read full article(Portuguese) A Ausência de Uma Nova Narrativa na Rio+20
Leonardo Boff – Carta Maior,
18 Jun 2012
O vazio básico do documento da ONU para a Rio+20 reside numa completa ausência de uma nova narrativa ou de uma nova cosmologia que poderia garantir a esperança de um “futuro que queremos” lema do grande encontro. A narrativa atual é a da conquista do mundo em vista do progresso e do crescimento ilimitado.
→ read full articleU.S. Rejected 2005 Iranian Offer Ensuring No Nuclear Weapons
Gareth Porter – Inter Press Service-IPS,
11 Jun 2012
France and Germany were prepared in spring 2005 to negotiate on an Iranian proposal to convert all of its enriched uranium to fuel rods, making it impossible to use it for nuclear weapons, but Britain vetoed the deal at the insistence of the United States, according to a new account by a former top Iranian nuclear negotiator.
→ read full article(Portuguese) Rio+20: Em Busca de Um Civismo Planetário
Eduardo Febbro – Carta Maior,
11 Jun 2012
O coordenador executivo da Rio+20, Brice Lalonde analisa, em entrevista especial, os desafios e obstáculos que estão colocados para a conferência. “Uma das grandes dificuldades que temos hoje está em que dentro da cada país há pouquíssimos negociadores que pensam no planeta, na humanidade em seu conjunto. Eles pensam em seus países e em seus interesses nacionais. Há muito civismo nacional e pouco civismo planetário”, diz Lalonde.
→ read full article(Portuguese) Vandana Shiva: “Financeirização da Economia Está na Raiz da Crise”
Ana Paula Salviatti – Carta Maior,
11 Jun 2012
Em entrevista à Carta Maior, a ativista indiana Vandana Shiva fala sobre suas expectativas em relação a Rio+20. Ela não acredita que a conferência da ONU consiga firmar compromissos de mudanças mais significativas em função da influência das grandes corporações. Neste cenário, defende, o papel da Cúpula dos Povos adquire maior importância.
→ read full articleAnother Day, More People Drone-Bombed
Jim Albertini – TRANSCEND Media Service,
11 Jun 2012
We now know that, after our leaders decide who should be killed from photos and flimsy evidence, they then follow up by bombing the funerals of those they’ve killed, assuming that whoever shows up for the funeral must also be a terrorist. How low can the U.S. Go? It is unlikely that, from the most powerful nation on earth, the leaders will ever be hauled off to the International Court of Justice for trials, and so we have a world in which the hatreds are compounded daily.
→ read full articleNuclear Tuna and NPR’s Trivialization
Robert Alvarez – Institute for Policy Studies,
4 Jun 2012
Yesterday [30 May 2012], National Public Radio (NPR) ran a story asserting that cesium-137 from the Fukushima nuclear accident found in Bluefish tuna on the west coast of the U.S. is harmless. It’s not harmless. The Fukushima nuclear accident released about as much cesium-137 as a thermonuclear weapon with the explosive force of 11 million tons of TNT. In the spring of 1954, after the United States exploded nuclear weapons in the Marshall Islands, the Japanese government had to confiscate about 4 million pounds of contaminated fish.
→ read full articleWashington’s Hypocrisies
Paul Craig Roberts – TRANSCEND Media Service,
28 May 2012
The US government is the second worst human rights abuser on the planet and the sole enabler of the worst–Israel. But this doesn’t hamper Washington from pointing the finger elsewhere. The US State Department’s “human rights report” focuses its ire on Iran and Syria, two countries whose real sin is their independence from Washington, and on the bogyman- in-the-making–China, the country selected for the role of Washington’s new Cold War enemy.
→ read full articleDan, Rather Outspoken
Leslie Griffith - Reader Supported News,
28 May 2012
In “Rather Outspoken,” one of broadcast journalism’s elder statesmen reflects on the state of the news business, and a career that spans from the glory days to what many of us see as the bitter end. Sadly, Rather’s latest book reminds us that reporters had best be careful when they set about the business of digging up news. And they damn-well better make sure the media corporations for which they work are ready and willing to stand by them.
→ read full articleHow the US Press Lost Its Way
Robert Parry - Comsortium News,
21 May 2012
People often wonder what happened to the American press after it distinguished itself in the 1970s by exposing the Pentagon Papers and Watergate. How did the U.S. news media lose its way over the past four decades, a question addressed by Robert Parry at a conference on information and secrecy.
→ read full articleThe Case of the Missing Terrorists
Paul Craig Roberts – TRANSCEND Media Service,
21 May 2012
If there were any real terrorists, Jose Rodriguez would be dead. Who is Jose Rodriguez? He is the criminal who ran the CIA torture program. Most of his victims were not terrorists or even insurgents. Most were hapless individuals kidnapped by warlords and sold to the Americans as “terrorists” for the bounty paid.
→ read full article(Portuguese) A Urgência da União Sul-Americana
Mauro Santayana – Carta Maior,
21 May 2012
A América do Sul terá que unir-se com urgência, para que não se torne território aberto à disputa feroz pelos seus recursos naturais, no futuro que se apressa a chegar. Ao lado da África, a América Latina sempre foi vista como um território de todos, menos de seus próprios habitantes.
→ read full articleWhy Tibet Matters
Bianca Jagger - Reader Supported News,
21 May 2012
His Holiness the Dalai Lama is in London today [14 May 2012] to receive the Templeton Prize in recognition of his outstanding achievements and spiritual wisdom. Since Feb 2009, 35 Tibetans have sacrificed themselves, in an act of desperation, which emerges from the anguish of oppression. Tibetans who have self-immolated include monks, nuns, a 19-year old female student, a widowed mother of four, and a Tibetan reincarnate lama in his forties.
→ read full articleKoodankulam Protests are Fully Justified
Prashant Bushan, Senior Lawyer Supreme Court of India – TRANSCEND Media Service,
14 May 2012
The Koodankulam protestors are therefore fully justified in agitating against the plant. It is imperative that the government respects their sentiments and fears and immediately suspends work at the plant. It must constitute a credible independent expert committee to examine all the safety issues which have been raised, in a transparent manner with public hearings and not resume work on the plant till all safety issues have been credibly addressed.
→ read full articleBrazil Forging Strategic Alliance with Africa
Fabíola Ortiz – Inter Press Service-IPS,
14 May 2012
The Brazilian government of Dilma Rousseff is taking firm steps towards stronger relations with Africa, such as the creation of a special fund to finance development projects together with multilateral lenders like the World Bank. Ex-President Lula said, “Africa cannot be looked at like it used to be seen, as a simple supplier of minerals and gas…We have to find African partners. We don’t want hegemony; we want strategic alliances.”
→ read full articleThe Children of Fallujah – The Hospital of Horrors
Robert Fisk – The Independent,
30 Apr 2012
Special Report day two: Stillbirths, disabilities, deformities too distressing to describe – what lies behind the torments in Fallujah General Hospital? In al-Hadidi’s office, there are now photographs which defy words. How can you even begin to describe a dead baby with just one leg and a head four times the size of its body?
→ read full article“There Are Marxists in India?”
Robert Jensen – TRANSCEND Media Service,
30 Apr 2012
While there certainly are no shortages of capitalists, there are still lots of Marxists in India, as well as communist parties that have won state elections. Patnaik represents the best thinking and practice of those left traditions — both the academic Marxism that provides a framework for critique of economics, and the political Marxism that proposes public policies — which is why I was so excited to talk with him about lessons to be learned from the current economic crisis.
→ read full articleThe Fukushima Nuclear Disaster Is Far From Over
Robert Alvarez - Reader Supported News,
23 Apr 2012
Spent reactor fuel, containing roughly 85 times more long-lived radioactivity than released at Chernobyl, still sits in pools vulnerable to earthquakes.
→ read full articleUnplugging Americans from the Matrix
Paul Craig Roberts – TRANSCEND Media Service,
23 Apr 2012
Americans, the British, and Western Europeans are accustomed to thinking of themselves as the representatives of freedom, democracy, and morality in the world. The West passes judgment on the rest of the world as if the West is God and the rest of the world are barbarians in need of chastisement, invasion, and occupation.
→ read full articleThis Is Politics Not Sport. If Drivers Can’t See That, They Are the Pits
Robert Fisk – The Independent,
23 Apr 2012
Supposing it was Assad shelling out £40m for a race. Would Ecclestone be happy to give him a soft sporting cover for his repression? When the Foreign Office urges British motor racing fans to stay away from Bahrain, this ain’t no sporting event, folks, it’s a political one. The Bahraini authorities prove it by welcoming sports reporters but refusing visas to other correspondents who want to tell the world what’s going on in this minority-run, Saudi-dominated kingdom.
→ read full articleBritain Destroyed Records of Colonial Crimes
Ian Cobain, Owen Bowcott and Richard Norton-Taylor - The Guardian,
23 Apr 2012
Review finds thousands of papers detailing shameful acts were culled, while others were kept secret illegally.
→ read full articleCISPA, aka SOPA 2.0, Pushed Forward by For-Profit Spying Lobby
Lee Fang – Republic Report,
23 Apr 2012
A cyber security bill moving swiftly through Congress would give government intelligence agencies broad powers to work with private companies to share information about Internet users.
→ read full articleAFRICOM Overheard by Lacville
Robert Lacville – TRANSCEND Media Service,
16 Apr 2012
The neocolonial scramble for Africa has led to a declaration of the Independent Republic of Azawad – According to the National Intelligence Council, “the United States is likely to draw 25% of its oil from West Africa by 2015. The interests of the USA could be assured by using local allies to fight American battles.” During a recent virtual trip he did not make to Stuttgart, writer Robert Lacville virtually overheard the following briefing of a senior U.S. army general by Senior C.I.A. Agent Jack and a certain Colonel W.:
→ read full articleUnderstanding the Sanusi of Cyrenaica: How to Avoid a Civil War in Libya
Akbar Ahmed and Frankie Martin – Al Jazeera,
2 Apr 2012
Emerging from the nightmare of dictatorship, Libya has a new challenge – to fully accommodate its own people. This article is the seventh in a series by Ambassador Akbar Ahmed, a former Pakistani high commissioner to the UK, exploring how a litany of volatile centre/periphery conflicts with deep historical roots were interpreted after 9/11 in the new global paradigm of anti-terrorism – with profound and often violent consequences.
→ read full articleEmpires Then and Now
Paul Craig Roberts – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 Apr 2012
Great empires, such as the Roman and British, were extractive. The empires succeeded because the value of the resources and wealth extracted from conquered lands exceeded the value of conquest and governance. In his book, The Rule of Empires (2010), Timothy H. Parsons wonders whether America’s is really an empire. After eight years in Iraq, all Washington has for its efforts is several trillion dollars of additional debt and no Iraqi oil. After ten years of trillion dollar struggle against the Taliban in Afghanistan, Washington has nothing to show for it except possibly some part of the drug trade that can be used to fund covert CIA operations.
→ read full articleFighting Fire in Haiti
Alexis Erkert – Toward Freedom,
2 Apr 2012
Camp Kozbami is the fifth camp to be arsoned in two months. As landowners and the government push to close camps inhabited by those displaced by the earthquake that rocked Haiti 26 months ago, a reported 94,632 individuals are facing forced eviction. Residents of the 660 displacement camps scattered throughout the Port-au-Prince area are experiencing increasing levels of threats and violence.
→ read full articleThe Corporate Media Crisis: Everything Old Is New Again
Robert Jensen, Litwin Books – Truthout,
2 Apr 2012
These days, there’s one political point on which one can usually get consensus: Mainstream journalists are failing. In common parlance, most everyone “hates the media.” But there is little agreement on why journalism might be inadequate to the task of engaging the public in a democratic society. More than ever, it’s important to understand the forces that constrain good journalism.
→ read full articleWhy Germany Is Phasing Out Nuclear Power
David Roberts, grist – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 Apr 2012
The most controversial aspect of this power overhaul is Germany’s post-Fukushima decision to completely phase out nuclear power by 2020, which caused the heads of Very Serious People to explode on multiple continents. To many, passing ambitious low-carbon energy goals and then axing a good chunk of your low-carbon energy seems irrational and self-defeating.
→ read full articleProject Brings Peace Journalism to Uganda
Steven Youngblood, Peace Portal – TRANSCEND Media Service,
26 Mar 2012
As I taught Peace Journalism in Uganda for five weeks in 2009, I kept hearing from the journalists in my seminars that they liked and needed what I was teaching. However, they emphasized that Uganda needed many more peace journalism lessons. At their urging we put together a proposal for a comprehensive Peace, Development, and Electoral Journalism project for 2010-2011. It’s our hope that this model can replicated elsewhere, since it proved to be such a powerful tool for peace and reconciliation in Uganda.
→ read full articleSri Lanka Angered By U.N. Vote to Investigate War Abuses
Emily Alpert – Los Angeles Times,
26 Mar 2012
In a step that infuriated Sri Lankan leaders, the country was urged to investigate alleged war crimes from its bloody civil war, in a resolution passed Thursday [22 Mar 2012] by the chief human rights body at the United Nations.
→ read full articleChallenging the Ruling Global Corporate Conglomerates – Regaining the Real Economy
Prof. John McMurtry – Global Research,
19 Mar 2012
As Adam Smith says in a little-known overview of the market’s supply-demand system, “among the inferior ranks of people the scantiness of subsistence can set limits to the further multiplication of the human species; and it can so in no other way than by destroying a great part of the children which their fruitful marriages produce”. This is why market-capitalist ideology has been so long bent on assimilating the system to natural laws. It drapes the monstrous mechanism in a macro alibi of ‘natural struggle for existence.’
→ read full articleMadness Is Not the Reason for This Massacre
Robert Fisk – The Independent,
19 Mar 2012
I’m getting a bit tired of the “deranged” soldier story. It was predictable, of course. The 38-year-old staff sergeant who massacred 16 Afghan civilians, including nine children, near Kandahar this week had no sooner returned to base than the defence experts and the think-tank boys and girls announced that he was “deranged”. Not an evil, wicked, mindless terrorist – which he would be, of course, if he had been an Afghan, especially a Taliban – but merely a guy who went crazy.
→ read full articleThe Fukushima Syndrome
Martin Freer – Project Syndicate,
12 Mar 2012
The dramatic events that unfolded at Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear-power plant after last year’s tsunami are commonly referred to as “the Fukushima disaster.” We need look no further than this description to begin to understand the significant misconceptions that surround nuclear energy.
→ read full articleCancer of the Spirit
Robert Koehler – TRANSCEND Media Service,
12 Mar 2012
Can we squeeze the glory out of the word “war”? Can we talk about savage irrationality and lifelong inner hell instead? Can we talk about the wreckage of two countries? Can we talk about spiritual cancer? In the extraordinary documentary On the Bridge — an unstinting look at the reality of war and the terror of PTSD.
→ read full articleTroubled Waters: How Mine Waste Dumping is Poisoning Our Ocean, Rivers, and Lakes
Earthworks & MiningWatch Canada – TRANSCEND Media Service,
12 Mar 2012
A new investigative report from Earthworks and MiningWatch Canada documents how mining companies are using the world’s waterways as dumping grounds for their toxic mine wastes. These mine wastes, or tailings, can contain up to three dozen dangerous chemicals, including arsenic, lead, mercury, and cyanide. Each year, mining companies dump over 180 million tonnes of these hazardous mine wastes into rivers, oceans, and lakes – that’s more than 1.5 times the amount of waste that US cities send to landfills each year.
→ read full articleA Look at the World’s Most Powerful Mercenary Armies
Luke McKenna and Robert Johnson – Business Insider-Military & Defense,
5 Mar 2012
Business is booming for a growing army of private military contractors, who take their military training and offer it to the highest bidder. Modern-day mercenaries are stationed throughout the world fighting conflicts for governments that are reluctant to use their own troops. Security giant G4S is the second-largest private employer on earth.
→ read full articleThe Heroic Myth and the Uncomfortable Truth of War Reporting
Robert Fisk – The Independent,
5 Mar 2012
Like other correspondents, Robert Fisk has risked his life to ‘witness history’. But after almost four decades, he feels ambivalent towards his profession. – “Funny, though, that the newsrooms of London and Washington didn’t have quite the same enthusiasm to get their folk into Gaza as they did to get them into Homs. Just a thought. A very unhappy one.”
→ read full articlePsychologists and Torture, Then and Now
Laura Melendez-Pallitto and Robert Pallitto – Foreign Policy in Focus,
5 Mar 2012
Psychologists’ involvement in torture has done damage to the reputation of the profession, and the boards’ unwillingness to act undermines the integrity of ethics rules. It is both unconscionable and absurd that a psychologist can lose his or her license for Medicaid fraud but not for involvement in torture.
→ read full articleKeiser Report: D.I.C.s and Hackers
Max Keiser and Stacy Herbert – Russia Today,
5 Mar 2012
The Stratfor bimbo and the bank that is in bed with it. WikiLeaks as the modern day Gutenberg press.
→ read full articleThe Fearful Realities Keeping the Assad Regime in Power
Robert Fisk – The Independent,
5 Mar 2012
Once a Roman city, where the crusaders committed their first act of cannibalism – eating their dead Muslim opponents – Homs was captured by Saladin in 1174. Under post-First World War French rule, the settlement became a centre of insurrection and, after independence, the very kernel of Baathist resistance to the first Syrian governments. By early 1964, there were battles in Homs between Sunnis and Alawi Shia. A year later, the young Baathist army commander of Homs, Lieutenant Colonel Mustafa Tlas, was arresting his pro-regime comrades. Is the city’s history becoming a little clearer now?
→ read full articleThe Emperor’s Messenger Has No Clothes: Belén Fernández Dresses Down Thomas Friedman
Robert Jensen - Truthout,
27 Feb 2012
What’s scary about Thomas Friedman is not his journalism, with its underinflated insights and twisted metaphors. Annoying as his second-rate thinking and third-rate writing may be, he’s not the first – or the worst – hack journalist. What should unnerve us about Friedman is the acclaim he receives in political and professional circles. Although his work is stunningly shallow and narcissistic, Friedman is celebrated as a big thinker.
→ read full articleHappy Savages
Robert Koehler – TRANSCEND Media Service,
20 Feb 2012
“John is a savage, but a happy, amenable savage.” Thus intones the voice on a ’50s-era newsreel clip in the documentary, showing footage of seven male Marshall Islanders who have been brought to the United States for radiation testing. “John is mayor of Rongelap Atoll. John reads, knows about God and is a pretty good mayor.” The film does a stunning job juxtaposing examples of our smug ignorance of South Sea culture with the reality of what we did to it. John the happy savage is actually John Anjain, who is one of many former residents of Rongelap Atoll interviewed in the film. He talks about his thyroid cancer, the thyroid cancer of three of his children and one grandson, and about the death of another son from leukemia.
→ read full article