Trinicenter.com

France and the EU, Recognizing Yet Supporting Apartheid Reality in Palestine

By Ramzy Baroud
May 02, 2019

A recent statement made by the outgoing French Ambassador to the US regarding the nature of Israeli apartheid accentuates a larger ailment that has afflicted the European Uni0n foreign policy.

The EU is simply gutless when it comes to confronting Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine.

Ambassador Gerard Araud was, of course, right when he told the US magazine, the ‘Atlantic’, that Israel is already an apartheid state.

Noting the “disproportion of power” between Israel and the Palestinians, Araud said, “The strongest (meaning Israel) may conclude that they have no interest to make concessions.”

U.S. to ICC: We Will Break Your Legs

By Andre Vltchek
March 25, 2019 - opednews.com

Well, not exactly like that, but in a way, yes. Now, finally, ‘the gloves are off’. The U.S. is openly threatening the historically timid ICC (International Criminal Court) and its judges. And unexpectedly, the ICC is hitting back. It refuses to shut up, to kneel, and to beg for mercy.

Suddenly, even the Western mass media outlets cannot conceal the aggressive mafia-style outbursts of the U.S. government officials. On March 15, Reuters reported:

The United States will withdraw or deny visas to any International Criminal Court personnel investigating possible war crimes by U.S. forces or allies in Afghanistan, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Friday.

The court, which sits in The Hague, responded that it was an independent and impartial institution and would continue to do its work “undeterred” by Washington’s actions.

The Trump administration threatened in September to ban ICC judges and prosecutors from entering the United States and sanction funds they have there if the court launched a probe of war crimes in Afghanistan.

Jorge Martin takes recent Gabriel Hetland articles to task, questioning the liberal left's assessment of the current situation and the solutions proposed.

By Jorge Martin
March 17, 2019 - In Defence of Marxism

There is a certain trend of opinion amongst the liberal left, particularly in the US, which never felt very comfortable with the Bolivarian revolution. Now, in the midst of a serious and well-organised attempt by Washington to remove Maduro’s government, they insist on equally blaming both sides for the crisis, one which in their view can be resolved through “negotiations between the government and the opposition”. A chief representative of this point of view is Gabriel Hetland, who has written several articles on Venezuela for The Nation, Jacobin and other left-wing publications.

His latest article, “Venezuela’s Deadly Blackout Highlights the Need for a Negotiated Resolution of the Crisis”, sums up this argument neatly, so it is useful to analyse it in some detail. The article is full of inaccuracies and half-truths, but its main flaw is a mistaken analysis of the situation in Venezuela, one that avoids a class approach to the different forces involved, from which Hetland derives a completely utopian solution.

Pompeo Imposes Visa Ban on ICC Staff Probing US War Crimes

"It reeks of the very totalitarian practices that are characteristic of the worst human rights abusers."

By Jessica Corbett
March 15, 2019 - Common Dreams

"This is an unprecedented attempt to skirt international accountability for well-documented war crimes that haunt our clients to this day."
—Jamil Dakwar, ACLU

The move, Pompeo confirmed to reporters Friday morning, is a direct response to ongoing efforts by the ICC to probe allegations of war crimes and crimes against humanity tied to the seemingly endless war in Afghanistan.

Jamil Dakwar, director of the ACLU's Human Rights Program, was among those who spoke out against the decision. The ACLU currently represents Khaled El Masri, Suleiman Salim, and Mohamed Ben Soud, who were all detained and tortured in Afghanistan between 2003 and 2008.

U.S. Uses International Finance System to Strangle Venezuelan Economy

An Open Letter to the Washington Office on Latin America About Its Stance...

An Open Letter to the Washington Office on Latin America About Its Stance on US Effort to Overthrow Venezuelan Government

We believe that the Trump administration's regime change effort in Venezuela is wrong in every way: morally, legally, and politically.

By Collective
March 05, 2019 - commondreams.org

The following open letter, signed by 124 academics from around the globe, is addressed to the Washington Office on Latin America and voices serious concerns over WOLA's support for various components of the Trump administration's policy towards Venezuela.

We write out of concern for the direction that WOLA has taken with regard to a matter of life and death, and possibly war and peace, in Latin America. This letter is an attempt to engage with WOLA about your support for various components of the Trump administration's efforts to topple the government of Venezuela.

The War on Venezuela Is Built on Lies

"A war has been declared on Venezuela, of which the truth is 'too difficult' to report" - John Pilger has his take on Venezuela.

By John Pilger
February 24, 2019 – johnpilger.com

Travelling with Hugo Chavez, I soon understood the threat of Venezuela. At a farming co-operative in Lara state, people waited patiently and with good humour in the heat. Jugs of water and melon juice were passed around. A guitar was played; a woman, Katarina, stood and sang with a husky contralto.

"What did her words say?" I asked.

"That we are proud," was the reply.

The applause for her merged with the arrival of Chavez. Under one arm he carried a satchel bursting with books. He wore his big red shirt and greeted people by name, stopping to listen. What struck me was his capacity to listen.

But now he read. For almost two hours he read into the microphone from the stack of books beside him: Orwell, Dickens, Tolstoy, Zola, Hemingway, Chomsky, Neruda: a page here, a line or two there. People clapped and whistled as he moved from author to author.

How the U.S. Is Strangling Haiti as It Attempts Regime Change in Venezuela

A grassroots leader from the 23 de Enero barrio in Caracas looks at the historical forces operating behind the showdown unfolding right now in the Bolivarian Republic.

By Cira Pascual Marquina
February 16, 2019 - venezuelanalysis.com

Juan Contreras was born and raised in Caracas’s 23 de Enero barrio, famous for its revolutionary political activism and internationalism. A graduate of Venezuela’s Central University, Contreras was active in Bandera Roja, under the direction of Comandante Geronimo (Carlos Betancourt) in the late 1970s. Today he heads up the community organization, Coordinadora Simon Bolivar, in the heart of working class Caracas. In this exclusive interview with Venezuelanalysis, Contreras looks at the historical echoes of the current coup attempt and reminds us of all that is a stake.

The claim that politics inevitably involves a struggle over historical meanings received spectacular confirmation in recent weeks. That’s because the political crisis that we are in the midst of right now – following Juan Guaido’s declaring himself president – saw the opposition to trying evoke the memory of pro-democracy rebellion that began on January 23, 1958. How do you understand this effort of Juan Guaido and his imperialist masters to appropriate that historical event, which was essentially a leftist victory, in the name of a coup d’etat?