Shenali D Waduge Sri Lanka

 “Let him who is without sin among you cast the first stone“

 The US claims that it is losing patience with Sri Lanka for its slow progress on ‘accountability’. Within 4 years Sri Lanka has not only eliminated the world’s most ruthless terrorist group (LTTE), but given the people of Sri Lanka a country without bombs, assassinations, suicide bombings and development is taking place exclusively in the North worth $3billion. In a matter of just 4 years Sri Lanka’s achievement outshines and embarasses the lack of progress by the US/Allies in all of the countries they invaded/occupied and continue to control through their puppet leaders now installed. It is with these facts that we question how far the US is ‘without sin’ to cast any stones against nations given America’s heinous criminal record both past and present. The world does not want or need a Pax Americana imperialism enforced on the world by America.

The hypocrisy of double standards is what we now highlight which fellow nations of the UN and world need to seriously take cognizance of.

Is the U.S. “without sin” – does the US have any moral authority to “cast the first stone”? Hardly!

A country that used napalm, Agent Orange during the Vietnam War, that dropped atomic bombs twice with no qualms about the civilians they were targeting, a country that provided nerve agents to the Syrian rebels the US is openly funding and training to topple the Syrian Government has no right to be telling how countries should be governed. Nerve agents were given by the US to Iraq in the 1980s while US used white phosphorus in Fallujah, Iraq http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75DsfSOeBSQ

America used Agent Orange in Vietnam and 4.8million Vietnamese died, 400,000 children were born with birth defects and they continue to suffer birth defects and abnormalities and the US has yet to pay compensation for its crimes.

A country that violates international laws, customary laws, unwritten laws to launch unilateral attacks on countries creating bogus scenarios and making lies has no moral authority.

US/NATO Accountability : Iraq’s Children

·         Iraq’s child mortality rate has increased by a staggering 150% since 1990 – estimated 500,000 children died in the first 5 years of the embargo. Some 122,000 under-fives died in 2005 –  http://www.unicef.org/newsline/99pr29.htm

·         In 2008 only 50% of primary school-age children were attending class –  Approximately 1,500 children were known to be held in detention facilities –  Radhika Coomaraswamy, UN special representative of the Secretary General for children and armed conflict, 25 April 2008

·         In 2007 there were 5 million Iraqi orphans – www.alternet.org/world/70886/?page=entire#sthash.pFl8rPyh.dpuf

·         Child malnutrition rates have risen from 19% before the US-led invasion in 2003 to 28% in 2007 –  Oxfam, 29 July 2007, www.iraqslogger.com/downloads/oxfam.pdf

US/NATO Accountability : Refugees/Displaced Persons

·         33% – or 500,000 people – of the 1.5 million internally displaced people forced from their homes in 2006 and 2007 ‘live as squatters in slum areas’ –

·         50,000 Iraqi refugees have been forced into prostitution – Hana Ibrahim, founder of the Iraqi women’s group Women’s Will, 24 June 2007

·         According to Refugees International, the US accepted fewer than 800 Iraqi refugees from 2003 until 2007.

·         In the majority Sunni village of Abou Jabour, south of Baghdad, where US forces dropped 45,000 kg of explosives in 10 days in January 2008 as part of the ‘surge’, survivors were left to dig through the rubble with their bare hands – www.thenation.com/doc/20080225/engelhardt#sthash.pFl8rPyh.dpuf

It emerges that even US war veterans are now facing homelessness in the USA!

US/NATO Accountability : Infrastructure

·         8 million Iraqis require immediate emergency aid, with nearly half of the population living in absolute poverty

·         4 million people lack food and are in dire need of humanitarian assistance. – See more at: http://newint.org/features/2010/05/01/post-invasion-iraq-facts/#sthash.pFl8rPyh.dpuf

·         Only 60% of the 4 million people who depend on food assistance have access to rations from the public distribution system, down from 96% in 2004. – See more at: http://newint.org/features/2010/05/01/post-invasion-iraq-facts/#sthash.pFl8rPyh.dpuf

·         The number of Iraqis without access to adequate water supplies has risen from 50% to 70% since 2003. 80% of people in Iraq do not have safe access to effective sanitation. The most critical water shortage since Babylonian times is threatening to leave up to 2 million people in the south of Iraq without drinking water. Rampant waterborne diseases and the lack of electricity and clean drinking water have led Iraqis to take to the streets in Baghdad chanting: ‘No water, no electricity in the country of oil and the two rivers.’

US/NATO Accountability : Disappearances, Illegal Detention, Assassinations

·         At least 210 lawyers and judges have been killed since the 2003 invasion, in addition to dozens injured in attacks against them – Iraqi Lawyers’ Association, 30 April 2007

·         Based on studies undertaken by local NGOs, at least 15,000 Iraqis disappeared during the first four years of US occupation. – IRIN, 18 April 2007, www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=71668

·         According to the Brussels Tribunal, 437 Iraqi academics have been murdered since the invasion  www.brusselstribunal.org/pdf/academicsBT151108.pdf”>www.brusselstribunal.org/pdf/academicsBT151108.pdf”>www.brusselstribunal.org/pdf/academicsBT151108.pd#sthash.pFl8rPyh.dpuf

·         An estimated 30,000 untried detainees are currently being held by the Iraqi authorities. Most are housed in overcrowded and unsanitary facilities controlled by the Ministries of Justice, Interior and Defence.

·         As of 2007, Baghdad had earned the title ‘Kidnapping Capital of the World’  – www.counterpunch.org/cockburn09302004.html#sthash.pFl8rPyh.dpuf

US/NATO Accountability : Women

·         An Oxfam-designed survey of Iraqi women aged 21 to 65 was carried out by Iraqi NGO Al-Amal in 2008.  ‘In Her Own Words’, an Oxfam-designed, Iraqi Al-Amal Association-instigated survey, March 2009

·         33% of women surveyed had received no humanitarian assistance since 2003.

·         52% of respondents were unemployed.

·         55% had been displaced since 2003.

·         55% had been subjected to violence since 2003: 25.4% as victims of random street violence, 22% domestic abuse, 14% violence inflicted by militias, 10% targeted abuse or abduction, 9% sexual abuse and 8% violence inflicted by the Multi-National Forces.

·         40% reported that they could not access healthcare without the threat of insecurity.

·         30% of those with children said they could not reach school without security threats.

·         31% said they could not move freely in their area (to visit the market and so on) without risking their safety.

In the Yugoslavia campaign to create Kosovo and ensure a pro-US/West satellite state was created the war crimes are clearly given with examples – http://www.counterpunch.org/1999/06/15/who-nato-killed/

Bush lied to occupy Iraq, Clinton lied to invade and create an independent Kosovo in 1999. No WMDs in Iraq, No mass graves in Serbia, no ‘ethnic-cleansing’ by Serbian troops as alleged. Even civilians being forced to vacate cities due to evils of Serbian police was also proved false. Civilians did flee but they fled due to NATO aerial bombing that took place every day through 3 weeks. The bombings were specifically targeted at infrastructure to destroy Serbia’s economy. Obama lied to invade and occupy Libya and now the entire Middle East/parts of Africa is in chaos.

According to a report released by the U.N. Environmental Program and the U.N. Commission on Human Settlement across Yugoslavia “81 civilian industrial facilities were attacked and/or destroyed in the bombings by NATO forces.” Among the targets NATO hit were oil refineries, petrochemical plants, chemical fertilizer factories, fuel storage tanks, and power plants. Thousands of tons of explosives were dropped by NATO warplanes on Yugoslavia.  Among those were internationally outlawed cluster bombs, gravity and graphite bombs. According to Dr. Rosalie Bertell – DU can travel in air tens of kilometers from the point of release, or be stirred up in dust and resuspended in air with wind or human movement. It is very small and can be breathed in by anyone: a baby, pregnant woman, the elderly, the sick.

The Atomic Agency Authority in England predicted that if 50 tons of DU dust were released in Iraq, 500,000 would die of cancer. Between 700-900 tons were actually dropped, leading to a seven-fold increase in leukemia and a massive rise in the incidence of certain rare cancers  (11) according to an investigator, Felicity Arbuthnot.

http://www.iacenter.org/warcrime/5_envir.htmhttp://www.iacenter.org/warcrime/5_envir.htm gives further details of how US/NATO destroyed Serbia’s environment.

US is preaching to Sri Lanka about law and order while it is holding over 27,000 foreign nationals in secret prisons across the world and some of these prisoners have no access to even lawyers, their families do not know where they are. http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article19960.htm

US is preaching to Sri Lanka about sexual violence having hardly any cases to show against the Sri Lankan military (hardly 20 cases in over 5 years with over 200 committed by Tamils upon Tamils) http://www.defence.lk/new.asp?fname=Human_Rights_Watch_2013_Sri_Lanka_Sexual_Violence_20130223_05

However in US occupied Philippines alone 52000 Filipino women made pregnant by US troops are fighting for their children’s rights. Moreover, the Status of Forces Agreement forcing nations to host US military camps and large contingents of US military personnel has seen rise in crimes committed by US troops including rape. With over 50,000 US troops occupying over 75% of Okinawa, Japan the rapes and other crimes committed by US troops have led to the people demanding the removal of US troops from Okinawa.

With this dark past of criminal history behind US and all of its regime change motivated incursions upon nations and continents, does the US have a moral ground to be pointing fingers?

It is a question that the entire UN General Assembly nations needs to seriously ask themselves.

Is the world without peace today primarily due to the conflicts that find their roots to the US and its Allies? Given, this scenario should the nations allow the US to even sponsor Resolutions which are merely to enable US and Allies through the UN to carry out its nefarious campaigns to subjugate nations and people.

If the US manual for regime change in Ukraine forms the basis of the current unrest planted and engineered through groups and individuals sponsored and funded by the US should this not make other nations next wonder when their own nation will become the next target? If so, by agreeing to vote alongside the US in its bogus Resolutions are Member nations of the UN and UNHRC not doing a great injustice to humanity?

These are serious questions that the members voting for US-sponsored Resolutions in the United Nations need to think about and address for all of the world’s conflicts get connected to the arms manufacturing industry and a handful of industries who desire to control the world and make profit denying the people any rights – these rights are slowly being taken away and put under the stewardship of the UN and we all know that the UN is working in connivance with the US and Allies. It is time that the Third World nations arose against the mechanizations at play before they find that the control of their nations are run through the UN using bogus UN country representative panels/teams and offices.

Therefore, domestic matters and internal affairs of nations must never be handed over or outsourced to the UN for it will eventually end up being controlled by a handful of people who are controlling Governments of the US/West and it is through these UN entities that nations are finding themselves slaves of IMF/World Bank loan/interest scams while attempts are afoot to drastically reduce world populations through foul methodology.

 Countries need to start waking up and saying they will have no part in the ugly games that the US and Allies are playing.

 Shenali D Waduge

Sri Lanka