China Syndrome: Critics Say FIPA Trade Deal Opens Door to Canadian Sovereignty

 

The Most Disturbing Trade Deal in a Generation

 by Leadnow.ca

La version français suit.
 
Dear Friends,

In days, Prime Minister Harper could approve the China National Offshore Oil Company’s $15 billion takeover of Nexen, a Canadian oil company, and pass a sweeping Canada-China trade deal allowing China's companies to overturn Canadian laws in secret courts.  These deals would pave the way for a massive natural resource buyout and restrict Canadians' democratic control over our economy, environment and energy - even when Canadian lives are at stake. Tell PM Harper and your MP that Canada is not for sale.

In two weeks, Prime Minister Harper could pass the most secretive and sweeping trade deal of a generation. This deal would pave the way for a massive natural resource buyout and allow foreign corporations to sue the Canadian government in secret tribunals, restricting Canadians from making democratic decisions about our economy, environment and energy.¹

Most Canadians have never heard of FIPA, the Canada-China Foreign Investment Protection Agreement, because Prime Minister Harper is trying to sneak it through without a single vote or debate in Parliament.^2,3

Canadians have a right to determine our future, but this agreement will undermine our democratic rights and lock us into an inescapable path of foreign-ownership and resource extraction until at least 2040.

The Canada-China FIPA is set for automatic approval on October 31st unless we get the word out now that the Harper Conservatives are trying bypass Parliament and sneak this deal by Canadians. That’s why we partnered with SumOfUs.org on this campaign – if enough of us raise our voices now, we can create a massive public outcry to stop this devastating deal in its tracks.

Click here to send a message to Prime Minister Harper and your MP: 

Canada is not for sale, stop the Canada-China FIPA. 

When 50,000 sign, we will deliver your messages in Ottawa.

Alongside this deal, the Harper government is trying to speed through the sale of Nexen, a major Canadian oil and gas company, to the China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC), one of China’s massive state-owned oil companies.⁴ The $15 billion-dollar Nexen takeover will open the floodgates to a wave of foreign buyouts of Canada's natural resources.

If FIPA passes, China's companies can take over Canadian resources and then sue Canadian governments – provincial or federal – in secret, if the government does anything that threatens the company’s profits.

Any Canadian law or government decision – even ones that protect Canadian jobs, our environment, our economy and our families – could be fought in secret tribunals outside of our legal system. Arbitrators unaccountable to the Canadian public would have the power to award billions in damages to foreign corporations if we do anything that hurts corporate profits, like improve environmental standards or slow down the export of cheap, unprocessed resources.^1,5,6

Time is running out. We have two weeks before FIPA is set to pass into law, and the Nexen takeover could be approved at any time. Canadians, including many Conservative MPs, oppose the Nexen takeover, and Prime Minister Harper has just asked for a 30 day extension to regroup. We need a massive public outcry now.

Click here to send a message to Prime Minister Harper and your MP: Canada is not for sale, stop the Canada-China deal and the Nexen takeover.

http://www.leadnow.ca/canada-not-for-sale

Thanks for all you do.

With hope and respect,

Matthew, Jamie, Maggie, Emma, Ryan, Adam and
Sanna on behalf of the Leadnow team


Additional Information

The ability for corporations to sue foreign governments in private courts, called “investor-state arbitration,” is a controversial practice built into many trade deals like NAFTA that has cost Canada millions and over-ruled democratic decisions, but none impose the level of secrecy in the Canada-China FIPA.

Incredibly, if BC tries to regulate or block Enbridge’s Northern Gateway Pipeline, Sinopec, another of China's state-owned oil companies with investments in Canada’s natural resource infrastructure, could sue the BC government for damages, and we may never even hear about it the case or its results.^5,6

Other countries like India, South Africa and Australia are moving away from this kind of trade deal. Last year Australia rejected investor-state arbitration due to concerns that it would “constrain the ability of Australian governments to make laws on social, environmental and economic matters”.^7,8 Why is Canada moving backwards?


Sources

[1] Canada-China Investment Deal Allows for Confidential Lawsuits Against Canada (Toronto Star)
http://www.thestar.com/opinion/editorialopinion/article/1264290--canada-china-investment-deal-allows-for-confidential-lawsuits-against-canada

[2] Tories quietly table Canada-China investment treaty (Globe and Mail)
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/tories-quietly-table-canada-china-investment-treaty/article4573635/

[3] Battle over CNOOC’s proposed Nexen Takeover Heats Up In Ottawa (Financial Post)
http://business.financialpost.com/2012/09/17/battle-over-cnoocs-proposed-nexen-takeover-heats-up-in-ottawa/

[4] Ottawa extends it review of CNOOC’s nexen bid (The Globe and Mail)
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/industry-news/energy-and-resources/ottawa-extends-its-review-of-cnoocs-nexen-bid/article4604093/

[5] Chinese Companies Can Sue BC for Changing Course on Northern Gateway, says Policy Expert
http://www.vancouverobserver.com/sustainability/chinese-companies-can-sue-bc-changing-course-northern-gateway-says-policy-expert

[6] Chairman Harper and the Chinese Sell-Out (The Tyee)
http://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2012/10/11/Chairman-Harper/print.html

[7] Trading our way to more jobs and prosperity (Government of Australia)
http://www.dfat.gov.au/publications/trade/trading-our-way-to-more-jobs-and-prosperity.html#investor-state

[8] Multiple Countries Rejecting Investor State Dispute Settlement (Janet M Eaton, PhD)
http://www.sierraclub.ca/en/main-page/multiple-countries-rejecting-investor-state-dispute-settlement


Leadnow.ca is an independent community that brings Canadians together to hold government accountable, deepen our democracy and take action for the common good.

Please support the Leadnow.ca community! We're funded by people like you, and our small team and growing community make sure your donation goes a long way. Every dollar helps. You can donate online at http://www.leadnow.ca/en/donate

---

Chers amis/chères amies,

D’ici quelques jours, le premier ministre Harper pourrait approuver la vente de Nexen – une compagnie pétrolière canadienne – à la China National Offshore Oil Company (CNOOC) au prix de 15 milliards de dollars. De plus, il pourrait bientôt passer un accord commercial inclusif qui permettrait à des sociétés d’État chinoises de contourner des lois canadiennes par le biais de tribunaux internationaux secrets. Cet accord préparerait le terrain pour une exploitation encore plus abusive de nos ressources naturelles et compromettrait la souveraineté du Canada en ce qui a trait à la gestion de notre économie, de notre environnement et de notre énergie. Dites au Premier Ministre Harper et à votre député que le Canada n’est pas à vendre.

D'ici deux semaines, le Premier Ministre Harper pourrait conclure l'accord commercial le plus dévastateur notre époque. Cet accord, jusqu’à présent bien dissimulé par les conservateurs, ouvrirait la voie à la vente massive des ressources naturelles du Canada. Il permettrait par ailleurs à des entreprises étrangères de poursuivre le Canada en justice à huis clos tout en restreignant les décisions démocratiques que les Canadiens et Canadiennes sont en droit de prendre sur leur écomonie, leur environnement et leurs ressources énergétiques.¹

La plupart des citoyens n'ont jamais entendu parler de l’Accord de Protection des Investissements à l'Étranger (APIE) entre le Canada et la Chine puisque que le Premier Ministre Harper essaie de le faire adopter sournoisement, sans le moindre vote ou débat parlementaire.^2,3

Les Canadiens et Canadiennes ont le droit décider de leur avenir. Cet accord vise plutôt à bafouer nos droits démocratiques et à nous engager vers l'extraction de nos ressources naturelles au profit d’entreprises étrangères, et ce jusqu'en 2040.

L'APIE entre le Canada et la Chine est en voie d’être ratifié automatiquement le 31 octobre – à moins que l'on ne mette au grand jour les intentions des conservateurs, qui souhaitent prendre des décisions en ignorant le Parlement et la population canadienne. C’est pourquoi nous nous sommes alliés à SumOfUs.org pour cette campagne – ensemble, envoyons un message clair au gouvernement : nous ne voulons pas de l’APIE!

Cliquez ici pour envoyer un message au Premier Ministre Harper et à votre député: Le Canada n'est pas à vendre! Bloquez l’APIE! Dès que nous atteignons 50 000 signatures, nous envoyons votre message en personne à Ottawa.

Avec cet accord, le gouvernement Harper vise à accélérer la vente de Nexen – une grande entreprise canadienne de combustibles fossiles – à la China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC), l’une des plus grandes sociétés d’état chinoises.⁴ Les 15 milliards de dollars provenant du rachat de Nexen ouvriraient la porte à la vente de nos ressources naturelles à l'étranger.

Si l’APIE est ratifié, la CNOOC pourra s’emparer des ressources canadiennes et ensuite intenter secrètement des recours légaux contre les gouvernement provinciaux ou fédéraux si l'une ou l'autre des instances cherche à entraver ses profits.

Toute loi ou décision gouvernementale canadienne – même visant la protection d’emplois canadiens, de notre environnement, de notre économie ou de nos familles – pourrait faire l’objet d’une poursuite en tribunal à huis clos, et ce en dehors de notre juridiction nationale. Des arbitres n’ayant aucun compte à rendre au public canadien auraient le pouvoir d'allouer des millions de dollars en compensation financière à des compagnies étrangères si le Canada faisait quoi que ce soit entraînant une perte de profits – même s’il est question d’améliorer des standards environnementaux ou de ralentir l'exportation de ressources naturelles non-transformées à bon marché.^1,5,6

Il ne nous reste que deux semaines avant que l'APIE ne soit voté, et Nexen pourrait passer aux mains de la CNOOC à tout moment. Plusieurs Canadiens – incluant des députés conservateurs –  s'opposent à la vente de Nexen. Le Premier Ministre Harper vient de demander une extension de 30 jours pour mieux évaluer la situation. Nous nous devons d’envoyer un message clair au gouvernement : nous ne voulons pas de l’APIE!

Cliquez ici pour envoyer un message au Premier Ministre Harper et à votre député: le Canada n'est pas à vendre! Bloquez l’APIE! Dès que nous atteignons 50 000 signatures, nous envoyons votre message en personne à Ottawa:

 http://www.leadnow.ca/pas-a-vendre

Passez le mot dans votre entourage! Encore merci pour tout.

Avec espoir et respect,

Matthew, Jamie, Maggie, Emma, Ryan, Adam et Sanna au nom de l’équipe d'À l’Action.

Renseignements supplémentaires

Les corporations ont la possibilité de poursuivre les gouvernements étrangers par le biais d’une procédure appelée « l’arbitrage entre investisseurs et États », une pratique controversée intégrée à plusieurs traités tel que l’ALÉNA et qui coûte au Canada plusieurs millions de dollars et contourne les décisions démocratiques. Cependant, aucunes de ces pratiques n’atteint le niveau de confidentialité de l’APIE entre le Canada et la Chine.

Chose surprenante, si la Colombie-Britannique tente de légiférer ou de bloquer le projet Northern Gateway Pipeline d’Enbridge, Sinopec, une autre société d’État chinoise possédant des investissements au Canada, pourrait poursuivre le gouvernement provincial pour indemnisation, le dossier et le verdict pouvant rester totalement confidentiels.^5,6

D’autres pays comme l’Inde, l’Afrique du Sud et l’Australie ont mis de côté ce type d’accord. L’année dernière, l’Australie a rejeté l’arbitrage entre investisseurs et États signifiant que « cela empêcherait les gouvernements australiens de procéder librement à l’implantations de lois environnementales, sociales et économiques ».^7,8 Pourquoi le Canada fait-il marche arrière?

Références

Acquisition de Nexen: une porte ouverte à la Chine (La Presse)
http://affaires.lapresse.ca/opinions/chroniques/jean-philippe-decarie/201207/24/01-4558311-acquisition-de-nexen-une-porte-ouverte-a-la-chine.php

Murmurez: vive la Chine (La Presse)
http://www.lapresse.ca/debats/le-cercle-la-presse/actualites/201210/13/48-1352-murmurez-vive-la-chine.php

La vente de Nexen inquiète bien des conservateurs (Le Devoir)
http://www.ledevoir.com/economie/actualites-economiques/359498/la-vente-de-nexen-inquiete-bien-des-conservateurs

La vente de Nexen à la Chine soulève de difficiles questions, admet Harper (Radio-Canada)
http://www.radio-canada.ca/nouvelles/Economie/2012/10/05/001-harper-nexen-cnooc.shtml

Références (en anglais seulement)

[1] Canada-China Investment Deal Allows for Confidential Lawsuits Against Canada (Toronto Star)
http://www.thestar.com/opinion/editorialopinion/article/1264290--canada-china-investment-deal-allows-for-confidential-lawsuits-against-canada

[2] Tories quietly table Canada-China investment treaty (Globe and Mail)
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/tories-quietly-table-canada-china-investment-treaty/article4573635/

[3] Battle over CNOOC’s proposed Nexen Takeover Heats Up In Ottawa (Financial Post)
http://business.financialpost.com/2012/09/17/battle-over-cnoocs-proposed-nexen-takeover-heats-up-in-ottawa/

[4] Ottawa extends it review of CNOOC’s nexen bid (The Globe and Mail)
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/industry-news/energy-and-resources/ottawa-extends-its-review-of-cnoocs-nexen-bid/article4604093/

[5] Chinese Companies Can Sue BC for Changing Course on Northern Gateway, says Policy Expert
http://www.vancouverobserver.com/sustainability/chinese-companies-can-sue-bc-changing-course-northern-gateway-says-policy-expert

[6] Chairman Harper and the Chinese Sell-Out (The Tyee)
http://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2012/10/11/Chairman-Harper/print.html

[7] Trading our way to more jobs and prosperity (Government of Australia)
http://www.dfat.gov.au/publications/trade/trading-our-way-to-more-jobs-and-prosperity.html#investor-state

[8] Multiple Countries Rejecting Investor State Dispute Settlement (Janet M Eaton, PhD)
http://www.sierraclub.ca/en/main-page/multiple-countries-rejecting-investor-state-dispute-settlement

Countering "Austerity": Britons Take to the Street

Austerity and Counter-Austerity in Britain: Social Protest Movements and Political Organizing On the Rise

by Roger Annis - The Bullet

Britain is in the throes of a deepening class struggle prompted by attacks on social and democratic rights by the capitalist class. The economic elite is pressing forward with an austerity program of ever-deepening cuts to jobs and social services. A coalition government of Conservatives and Liberal-Democrats has been in power for the past two years and has cut billions of dollars from public services. With the country mired in economic stagnation, the two parties are aiming to cut billions more in government spending, most notably in the social sphere.


Demonstrators gather in central London on October 20, 2012.

The leading force in the Coalition, the Conservative Party, says it wants to cut a further 10-billion pounds ($15-billion) from welfare payments alone between now and 2015. Under consideration are denial of housing subsidies to people under 25 years of age and ending per-child welfare benefits to families that bear more than a yet-to-be announced fixed limit of children.

Wages of Britain's public service workers have been frozen since 2011. In March of this year, the UNISON union said the pay freeze and other attacks had reduced the purchasing power of health service workers by some 15 per cent. Further cuts are aimed at vacation benefits and family-friendly work schedules.

Previous Labour governments began the outsourcing of health services to private providers. The Conservatives have drawn up a list of 6,000 additional procedures to be outsourced. This is stoking tension with directors of the Nation Health Service. Its chief executive, Sir David Nicholson, recently warned against privatization “carpet bombing,” saying it could easily end in “misery and failure.

As a result of government attacks, social protests in Britain are on a marked upswing. A mass protest against austerity has been called by the trade unions to take place in London and Glasgow October 20th. Students will follow that with a national day of protest on November 21 against rising tuition fees, cuts to student living assistance and other restrictions on access to education.
A Tripartite Assault

The deepening austerity assault is supported by all three parties in the British Parliament. At the annual party conference in September, Labour Party leaders questioned aspects of the social service cuts by the Coalition. Party leader Ed Miliband said the party opposes further privatization of health services and will subsidize the construction of 100,000 private housing units. He wants companies to pay for training of its new workers, something he says will help reduce Britain's high rate of youth unemployment.

They also gave an appearance of challenging the ruling financial clique that brought Britain's financial system to its knees in 2008, with Miliband saying that a future Labour government will force the banks to separate their investment banking operations from commercial and consumer banking. That's hardly a radical position – it is shared by some bankers.

But Labour leaders are supporting the Coalition's freeze of public service wages (not withstanding the vote against it by conference delegates) as well as further privatizations of services (going so far as to support privatizing some policing services). Indeed, many of the Coalition policies are continuations of those begun by the Labour governments that ruled Britain from 1997 to 2010.

The political consensus also applies to Britain's military role in the world. Last year, the country spent £63-billion on its military. Two new-generation aircraft carriers are under construction, at a price tag of £5-billion each. The government plans to spend £2-billion in acquiring more drones over the next two years.

In his main address to the Labour Party conference, Miliband voiced the themes of Conservative parties past, including its “one nation” theme in the 2010 election. He concluded his main speech with a ringing call for, “One nation, a country for all, with everyone playing their part.”

The speech was hailed as a triumph by party leaders. The daily Scotsman thought differently, headlining its report, “Labour looks to the future with 140-year old Tory ideology.” That's a reference to the 19th century Conservative Party leader and prime minister Benjamin Disraeli whose career was marked by laments of the “two nations,” rich and the poor, into which Britain had become divided during the Industrial Revolution.

At the party conference, leaders of larger affiliated unions, notably UNISON and UNITE, voiced criticism of the party's support to public sector wage freezes and other austerity policies. But in the end, they expressed support for Miliband's leadership.
Women Hit Especially Hard By Austerity

Women and girls are among the hardest hit by the anti working-class policies of the Coalition government. A report published in The Guardian earlier this year showed that rising taxes and cuts to social spending have hit women three times as hard as men. Women aged 50-64 have been hit hardest by rising unemployment since the Coalition came to power, up 31 per cent compared to an overall increase of 4.2 per cent in the country (to 2.6 million people).

The deeply sexist character of the British ruling class and its governing institutions has been revealed in several hugely reported cases of sexual abuse and assault of women and girls. Police are investigating dozens of accusations of sexual interference and assault against teenage girls by former BBC music program host Jimmy Savile. The entertainer died last year. The accusations go back decades.

Many of the assaults took place in the BBC television studios where Savile worked and in hospitals where he routinely visited on behalf of his widely acclaimed charity. As a result, the BBC and the National Health Service and their managers are now being investigated for negligence or potential complicity, and possibly face legal action by victims.

As a result of the Savile revelations, Britain's large media outlets have come under the spotlight for failing to investigate or publish reports about his crimes over the years. Women media personalities have come forward to say that sexual groping by male colleagues or pressures from managers to perform sexual acts for career advancement have long been standard conduct in the industry. A study by Britain's Equal Opportunities Commission in 2000 found that 50 per cent of women suffer sexual harassment or worse in the workplace.

In parallel stories, police and social welfare authorities are accused of ignoring complaints about organized gangs preying on young girls in several communities in England. Some of the perpetrators have gone to jail following publicized trials, but the systemic and criminal neglect by police and social service authorities that allowed the crimes to be committed is now coming under public scrutiny.



Several political police agencies are facing legal action by women who were victims of sexual predation by undercover police during operations against environmental and other political movements.

Government ministers from the Conservative Party have chosen this moment to open an attack on abortion rights. Britain's Health Secretary says he wants abortion made illegal following the 12th week of pregnancy. Secretary for Women Maria Miller is chiming in that it should be 20 weeks.

Abortion has been legal in Britain since 1967, up to the 24th week of pregnancy. There are compelling reasons why an arbitrary cut-off timing of the service is dangerous for women, not to speak of a violation of their right to control their bodies.

An important exception to abortion availability is in the British enclave of Northern Ireland, where the law severely restricts access. A battle has begun there following the recent opening of the territory's first sexual reproductive clinic, to include abortion services. Protestant and Catholic church leaders have thundered against the clinic and hundreds of anti-abortion zealots have placed it under siege.
Scotland Independence

Miliband's “One Nation” theme fit the Labour-supported politics of austerity. But it was also aimed at the referendum on independence for Scotland that will take place in October 2014. British Prime Minister David Cameron has reluctantly agreed that it will go ahead.[1] The referendum was a promise of the Scottish National Party (SNP) that won a majority in the Scottish Parliament in the 2011 election.

The first of a planned series of mass demonstrations in favour of independence leading up to the referendum took place in Edinburgh on September 22. Ten thousand people took part.

This will be the second referendum in recent history. In 1997, a Scotland referendum revived the Scottish Parliament abolished by the Act of Union of the British Parliament in 1707. The Scottish Parliament exercises powers over delivery of social services and cultural policies, but importantly has no power of income taxation nor any say in foreign policy.

Polls show that a strong majority of Scotland's population would favour “maximum devolution” of powers from the central government in London to Holyrood (seat of the Scottish Parliament, in Edinburgh), whereas support for independence sits at 30 per cent.

Labour Party leaders took the initiative last June to create a “Better Together” alliance with the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats to campaign for a “no.” The party is positioning itself as the most reliable to fend off the independence challenge.

Anti-austerity sentiment is particularly deep in Scotland (population of 5.3 million, out of 63 million total in Great Britain – England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland) and is interwoven with the politics of the rising movement for independence. Working-class struggles in past decades have won free and universal benefits throughout Britain, including for winter fuel heating and prescription drugs, bus travel and television licenses for the elderly. These have gone further in Scotland, notably with free university tuition.

Free, universal services account for about ten per cent of the costs of social services provided by the Scottish government. Echoing its parent party, the Labour Party in Scotland has touched off a firestorm of controversy by saying it wants a review of many of these programs with a view to restricting access to all but the poorest.

The SNP is claiming a moral high ground on the issue, saying it will not touch universal programs. But the party leadership is acquiescing to the reductions of funding for public services that the Coalition government in London has imposed (£2.1-billion in 2012-13 alone). The Labour Party points to recently reduced financial support to poor students by the SNP as well as rises in all kinds of fees charged by local governments facing freezes on local tax revenues decreed by London and accepted by Holyrood.

The SNP is a decades-old pro-capitalist party that favours maximum devolution or, failing that, outright independence. It would leave the United Kingdom in control of foreign affairs, including the armed forces, and central bank policy, and would recognize the British monarchy as titular head of government.

The party took a left turn during the 1990s, coming out against austerity, the NATO military alliance and the presence of nuclear weapons on Scottish soil. Party leaders are now pushing back against this. They just won a narrow vote at the party's conference to reverse opposition to membership of an independent Scotland in NATO. While the party postures as pro-environment, The Guardian recently reported that the party's ambition to expand the extraction of oil from the North Sea will far outstrip any plans to reduce greenhouse gas emissions with renewable energy projects or dubious “carbon capture and storage” schemes.

A vital pro-independence force in Scotland is the Scottish Socialist Party. It criticizes the SNP for its pro-capitalist program and its timidity in not standing up to the policies of the Coalition. Writing in a recent issue of the party's biweekly newspaper, Scottish Socialist Voice, Ken Ferguson explains, “Our vision is of a Scottish republic pursuing socialist policies which place people before profit and break with the failures of neoliberalism and war backed by the Better Together parties of Labour, Liberals and Tories.”

The party has begun to organize a series of public forums across Scotland to debate the issue of independence, including one held in Edinburgh on September 12 attended by 70 people (watch a video of the forum here). It hosted a forum at the SNP national conference on October 19 and is participating in the recently launched Women For Independence.
Rising Social Protest

Conservative claims to be reliable managers of capitalism and the state budget – the bedrock of the party's claim to political credibility – have taken serious hits in recent years. Following the financial collapse of 2008, the party and its Coalition government have demonstrably refused to punish or even curb the financial and media oligarchs responsible for the economic mess.

A centerpiece of Conservative policy dating back to the years of Margaret Thatcher (the 1980s) – the privatization of the passenger rail network – recently imploded over the renewal of the operating license on one of the country's more lucrative lines. Rail privatization has been exposed as a cash grab, a form of taxation against users costing billions of pounds in increased fares and operating subsidies while providing handsome profits to operators. Rail unions have renewed calls for the renationalization of railway operations.[2]

The Coalition government is not as stable and strong as Tory bravado suggests. The weak partner in the arrangement, the Liberal Democrats, risks political annihilation in the next election as a result of its participation. It has lost 20 per cent of its members since 2010.

Anger against the decades-old privatization and austerity drive is prompting a scale of protest not seen in decades. Last November, two million public sector workers went on strike to defend pension benefits. Sectional strikes of public service and other workers have continued, including teachers and rail workers. Union branches and some national unions have voted in favour of a general strike against austerity.

Student mobilizations are renewing after significant protests involving tens of thousands of students across England in late 2010. Heightened police violence contributed to a dip in protest following the repression of the mass Millbank protest in November 2010 where students occupied the Conservative Party headquarters.

The toxic sexualization of culture and life has sparked the rise of a new and militant feminist movement. Kat Banyard, a founder in 2010 of UK Feminista, explains in an October 15 feature article in The Guardian:

“Throughout the 1990s and much of the 2000s, we were sold a lie on an almighty scale. That equality had been won, that the battle was over, and now was the time to enjoy our rights. I think what really helped contribute to that was how institutions and corporations who rely on sexism, who rely on women's inequality, adapted and changed. And co-opted the language of feminism very, very cleverly.”

At a day-long conference of the Counterfire political group on October 13, Kate Connelly gave a hard-hitting overview of the challenges and opportunities for women's rights advocates today. “We are seeing a wholesale assault on the rights of women that was entirely predictable when the Coalition government embarked on its austerity program,” she argued, and women and their supporters are fighting back.

A key front of struggle that is deepening is defense of the right to protest. Political protests are routinely harassed or broken up by police. Since 1990, 1500 people have died in police custody. But a fightback is deepening.

A day-long conference of the “Defend the Right To Protest” coalition took place on October 14. A leading force in it is the Socialist Workers Party. The conference was marked by broad participation, including from trade union and student groups, Black rights organizations and activists from some of the main historical battles for civil rights in Britain. Speakers included MP John McDonnell, Sheila Coleman of the Hillsborough Justice Campaign and Janet Alder, sister of Christopher Alder, a former British soldier killed in police custody in 1998.



Today's Conservatives carry on the same class warfare policies as during the years of Thatcher, but it's a tough go. They don't necessarily bring the same set of political skills. They showed some weakness during the 2010 election by presenting themselves as undergoing moderation in an effort to shuck their image as the ‘nasty party,’ though the recent party conference visibly put an end to that pretense. Most importantly, privatization and austerity programs now have a track record of failure to create economic and social progress for the majority of society.

All of a sudden, the working-class protests and political advances in the countries of southern Europe are looking less distant from the shores of Britain. The working-class has an opportunity to organize to give the fragile Coalition government the boot long before its 2015 electoral mandate is up.
Postscript: A Day of Anti-Austerity Protest in the UK

Some 200,000 people marched in London, Glasgow and Belfast on October 20 against the austerity programs of the UK government led by Prime Minster David Cameron. According to the trade unions that called the actions, the numbers of participants were: London 150,000, Glasgow 10,000 and Belfast 10,000. Marchers were of all ages and backgrounds – trade union members, students, families affected by cuts to health and social services, women's rights advocates, etc. The Socialist Worker weekly has a string of reports on the day's actions.

Some union leaders speaking at the London march voiced calls for a general strike against austerity. They included Mark Serwotka, general secretary of the biggest civil service union, the PCS, Bob Crow, general secretary of the RMT rail union, and Unite general secretary Len McCluskey. At the annual conference last month of the Trade Union Congress, delegates voted to conduct a consultation with members on a general strike. McCluskey asked marchers in Hyde Park if they were ready for a general strike and received huge cheering. “We won't get what we want just by asking,” he said.

On March 26, 2011, as many as half a million people marched against austerity in London. The Guardian reported on that day's action.

Amidst all this, the Cameron government's woes are deepening. Its Chief Whip has been obliged to resign following a verbal altercation weeks ago with police in which he swore at them and called them “plebs.” Its finance minister, who has pleaded “we're all in this together” as he carries out draconian cuts to social spending, has been outed in the “Great Train Snobbery.” During a train trip on October 19, he moved from a standard class to a first class coach without paying the additional fare, assuming the railway workers on board would turn a blind eye. A former Thatcher cabinet minister has written an open letter in The Observer saying, “This government has earned a bad name for being a government of toffs (privileged) who neither know, nor care, how the other half lives.” •

 

Roger Annis is a retired aerospace worker in Vancouver BC.



Endnotes:

1. In contrast, Spain says a referendum on independence for Catalonia would be illegal, as would be a referendum in the Basque country should pro-independence forces win an upcoming election, as anticipated.

2. Track maintenance was also privatized by the Thatcherites, but it was such a fiasco that it was renationalized in 2001. Meanwhile, the privatization by Thatcherism of electricity generation has produced the irony that today, one of the major producers of electricity in Britain is the state-owned electrical utility in France, EDF. Natural gas and electricity prices to consumers have risen by 50 per cent since 2007.

Message from Paul Manly Regarding Father Jim Manly Jailed in Israel

Jim Manly in Good Health but Still in Jail

by Paul Manly

Hello Friends:  Many thanks to all of you who have sent best wishes, letters of support and letters to politicians in support of my father Jim Manly.

My dad, a 79 year old (he turns 80 on Oct 29th) retired United Church Minister and former NDP Member of Parliament, was taking part in a humanitarian aid mission to Gaza with the Gaza Ark flotilla aboard the Estelle. The ship was boarded and seized in international waters by Israeli Defence Forces and the passengers and crew were taken to Israel where they are now in detention. I have heard that Canadian consular officials have seen my father and reported that he is in good health and is receiving his daily medication but that he is very tired. 

There were citizens and members of parliament from a number of European countries on board the Estelle. The Spanish, Greek and Italian governments have all applied diplomatic pressure and sent ambassadors to secure their citizens releases. The Canadian government has not done this for my father. Nobody from the Canadian government or from the official opposition has spoken out about this illegal seizure in international waters. 

My father is being forced to sign a false confession stating that he entered Israel illegally even though this is not true. The facts are that he was seized illegally in international waters and taken to Israel against his will. My father refuses to sign this false confession and even if he did it would not guarantee his immediate release. Other people who have signed these false confessions in the past have remained in detention for up to a week.

See Jim Manly's pre-recorded video message: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8egYBdf-Zo 

As per his request please contact the Prime Minister and your local member of parliament and ask them to insist that the Israeli government respect the human rights and legal rights of those aboard the Estelle.

- Stephen Harper (Prime Minister of Canada)
613-992-4211
stephen.harper@parl.gc.ca 
- John Baird (Minister of Foreign Affairs)
613-996-0984
john.baird@parl.gc.ca 

thanks

Paul Manly

paul@manlymedia.com

*please circulate*

This is a message written by my mother

Why is Jim Manly sailing to challenge Gaza blockade?

Why did Jim accept the invitation to be the Canadian on board the Estelle, the Freedom Flotilla boat sailing for Gaza to break the blockade? 

Our decision was a joint one, a result of 53 years of working together as a team and supporting each other in both individual and joint pursuits. I have always been attracted to Jim’s sense of humour, his ability to think “outside the box” and the fact he did not fit my stereotype of clergy! After all these years we still make each other laugh and are still able to surprise each other.

Another thing drew me to Jim: he has the courage to follow his convictions and the guts to act on them – even when these actions are unpopular. He is also one of the least confrontational people I know.

Jim and I have worked together on many human rights issues. We are grateful to the Haisla people of Kitamaat, with whom we spent the first four years of our married life and whose friendships and influence we still cherish, for opening our eyes to the issues facing First Nations people and other indigenous peoples. This led indirectly to our involvement with other human rights struggles: Mexican American farm workers, refugees from the coup in Chile, the people of Nicaragua and El Salvador, the Maya of Guatemala, and refugees from Colombia and Nigeria among other places. It also led to our involvement in Church Sanctuary for refugees and accompaniment of people facing death threats. Through all this we avoided the issue of Palestine/Israel, accepting the line that “it is too complex”, too divisive and likely to alienate friends.

So, people ask, when and how did that change? We read Drinking the Sea at Gaza by Amira Haas, the Israeli journalist who lived in Gaza and reported for the Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz. We heard Jeff Halper, founder of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions, and for the first time we began to understand the true nature of the “Separation Wall”, known among Palestinians as the “Annexation Wall”. We learned all we could on the issue (much of it written by Jewish Israelis) and helped form Mid-Islanders for Justice and Peace in the Middle East, and more recently in the United Network for a Just Peace in Palestine/Israel. We participated in a Pilgrimage of Solidarity, visiting Israelis and Palestinians who work together for a just and peaceful future. They inspire us to work with them.

Jim has always avoided the limelight (strange for someone who went into politics). It was only his strong engagement with this issue that led him to agree to sail. He is on the Estelle to bring attention to the suffering of the Palestinians of Gaza.

He is there out of a commitment to human rights and social justice. He hopes to bring awareness to Canadians about what is being done to the Palestinians in the name of Israeli security.

He is there in the hope that his actions may bring Canadian MPs from all parties, but especially the NDP and particularly the younger generation of NDP MPs who were elected with the hope for change, to break the walls of silence and speak out.

If there was room for another Canadian I would be there with Jim. There is no other place I would rather be now. May he come home safe.


Eva Manly of Nanaimo B.C. is married to retired NDP MP and United Church minister Jim Manly who is sailing to challenge the Gaza blockade. For updates please see http://www.gazaark.org/category/follow-jim-manly-on-the-estelle/

Gorilla Radio with Chris Cook, Jon Elmer, Janine Bandcroft Oct. 22, 2012

  

This Week on  GR

by C. L. Cook

Over the weekend, the Finnish-flagged M/S Estelle attempted to ferry aid into the besieged Gaza Strip, and like previous attempts was intercepted by the Israeli navy in international waters, its crew and passengers taken into port at Ashdod and imprisoned.

As of Sunday October 21st, there is little word of the conditions of captivity for former Canadian MP Jim Manley, though a release from organizers of the Freedom Flotilla Coalition confirms: Some of the Estelle's crew has been deported to Greece and Italy.

Listen. Hear.

Reports from Israeli activists on the ship claim passengers were "tasered" by the Israeli boarding party. For its part, Israeli authorities lied about the cargo on board the Estelle, maintaining the ship contained "no humanitarian aid."

The Estelle's attempt to break the years-old blockade of Gaza comes on the heels of last week's publication of Israeli documents confirming that state's practice of a calorie counting regimen restricting the amount of food allowed into the Gaza enclave based on an estimated minimal caloric intake per person necessary to avoid wide-spread starvation. Also known as the "Gaza Diet," the revelation is not news to Palestinians, or most Israelis, but does present an international embarrassment to the government, which has always denied such a policy existed.

Jon Elmer is a Canadian photo-journalist who has reported from the Occupied Territories for more than a decade. Jon's work has taken him to some of the region's, and the world's, most troubled areas, filing reports for the Inter Press Service, Al Jazeera English, The Progressive, and Le Monde Diplomatique among others. His work can also be found at his website, JonElmer.ca. Jon Elmer in the first half.

And; the long-awaited October 22 manifestation is happening even now in downtown Victoria. The event, in part organized by the newly formed, Defend Our Coast coalition, and supported by a variety of international Environmental Non-Government Organizations is hoped to rally British Columbians and others concerned about the Enbridge Gateway project, a massive pipeline proposal to sluice Tar Sands condensate-soaked bitumen to the port of Kitimat on its way to a trans-pacific voyage to the Asian market, into opposition.

The format and nature of this demonstration is unique in my experience, and it has sparked some heated debate within the environmental community. I went down there this morning to record my impressions and those of the participants. Defending Our Coast in the second segment.

And; Victoria Street Newz publisher and CFUV broadcaster, Janine Bandcroft will join us at the bottom of the hour to bring us her take on Defend Our Coast and other manifestations in and around our city. But first, Jon Elmer on blockades and other doings in and around Occupied Palestine.

Chris Cook hosts Gorilla Radio, airing live every Monday, 5-6pm Pacific Time. In Victoria at 101.9FM, and on the internet at: http://cfuv.uvic.ca. He also serves as a contributing editor to the web news site, http://www.pacificfreepress.com. Check out the GR blog at: http://gorillaradioblog.blogspot.ca/

G-Radio is dedicated to social justice, the environment, community, and providing a forum for people and issues not covered in the corporate media.

The Arrest of the M/S Estelle

Israel Still Holding Gaza-Bound Passengers, Including Parliamentarians; Some Tasered

by Robert Naiman on 21 October 2012 - 3:53pm

Israel Still Holding Gaza-Bound Passengers, Including Parliamentarians; Some Tasered Video Disproves Israeli Government Claims on Estelle Cargo; 3 Israelis, 18 Internationals Held

New York, October 21, 3pm EDT - More than 24 hours after their illegal detention in international waters at 10 AM local time Saturday, Israeli authorities are still holding 21 passengers who were on board the Estelle which was sailing to Gaza when intercepted by Israeli forces, of whom three are Israeli and eighteen are internationals. There were originally 30 on board the boat from eight countries: Israel, Canada, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Greece, and Spain. Six have been deported and at this writing three are in the process of being deported.

Passengers on the Estelle, including Israeli combat veteran Yonatan Shapira, have reported that the passengers were tasered when Israeli forces commandeered the ship.

Israeli officials have claimed that there were no humanitarian goods onboard. In fact, the items in the cargo room of Estelle were: 2 olive trees; 41 tons of cement; wheelchairs; walkers; crutches; midwifery stethoscope; children's books; toys; 300 footballs; musical instruments; theatrical equipment; VHF radio (for a ship); 1 anchor (the last two items were for the Gaza's Ark project.) The ship was inspected at many ports. A video of the cement being loaded onto the ship is here.

"We call on the U.S. to use its influence with the Israeli government to ensure the Estelle passengers and crew are treated with dignity, that their rights as non-violent protesters are respected and that they all be released immediately,” said Jane Hirschmann, organizer of the U.S. Boat to Gaza.

Rashid Khalidi, Edward Said Professor of Arab Studies at Columbia University, said today: "It's striking that while the Swedish Foreign Affairs Ministry has the moral clarity to say that it agrees with the Ship to Gaza that the border crossings must be opened and that the ship should have been allowed through, the U.S. State Department is silent about this gross violation of human rights and international humanitarian law."

"I should say that every time Israel stops a boat, that's another blow to its diminishing legitimacy and another element of support, both to the those who are resisting internally and to those who are opposing the policies outside, and sooner or later the wave will sweep over the barriers," Noam Chomsky, who was visiting Gaza, told a news conference at Gaza port.




For immediate release:
contact: US Boat to Gaza, Robert Naiman, naiman@justforeignpolicy.org;
Richard Levy,

Finnish Minister of Foreign Affairs Erkki Tuomioja writes in his blog post that the blockade of Gaza must end:

http://www.tuomioja.org/
Tuomioja:
Estelle and the Gaza blockade

The Israeli navy has this morning stopped M/S Estelle on its way to Gaza, captured it and taken the ship and its crew and passengers to the Port of Ashdod in Israel, where we will provide consular assistance to the Finnish citizens. It seems that all people onboard will soon be deported from Israel. The Ministry for Foreign Affairs and the Finnish Transport Safety Agency have followed closely the passage of the ship and have been in contact with the Finnish master of the ship after having received confirmation that the ship, which is under Swedish ownership is still in the Finnish vessel register. Following Israel's contacts to Finland we have conveyed to the ship the message that Israel will not allow the ship to sail to Gaza and may enforce this with the use of force. Warning of this kind was necessary because there was a significant danger that an eventual use of force could have led to personal injuries.

We have studied carefully the legal questions related to this issue and have concluded that Finland, in the capacity of the so called flag state, has neither an obligation nor a possibility or a reason to act in a different way. Sweden, as the home country of the owner of M/S Estelle and of the Ship to Gaza organization is more directly involved in the situation, but has declined to act as enforcer of the Israeli blockade nor to act as an advocate for those breaking it.

Finland will also in this situation rely on international law, but the legal issues involved are not, however, unambiguous. The international fact-finding mission that reported to the Human Rights Council on the tragic Flotilla incident causing a loss of many human lives concluded that the Gaza blockade was contrary to international law. The so called Palmer Report of the UN Secretary-General's Panel of Inquiry came to the conclusion that the maritime blockade was in line with international law. The latter view has been the one many states have felt obliged to live with.

Regardless of the differing answers provided by international law, the Gaza blockade is politically unacceptable like the European Union has clearly stated when calling for it to be lifted. The purpose of equipping M/S Estelle has been to provide humanitarian assistance to Gaza as well as to express a strong political opinion in favour of the rights of the Palestinians. Although, this aim is by no means contrary to the views of Finland, it is equally clear that we cannot recommend to anyone to participate in undertakings which may even place their lives in danger.

Colombia's Uribe Implicated by Former Death Squad Capos

Teflon President? Noose Tightens Around Uribe as Former Death Squad Leaders Spill the Beans

by Tom Burghardt  Antifascist Calling...

Last month's capture of Colombian drug lord Daniel "El Loco" Barrera by Venezuelan police was hailed as a "victory" in the "War on Drugs."

Barrera, accused of smuggling some 900 tons of cocaine into Europe and the U.S. throughout his infamous career, was described by Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos, who announced the arrest on national television, as "the last of the great capos."

But what of the "capo" who enjoyed high office, is wined and dined by U.S. corporations and conservative think-tanks, owns vast tracks of land, is a "visiting scholar" at a prominent American university (Georgetown) and now sits on the Board of Directors of Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation?

When will they be brought to ground?

A Family Affair

To clarify the questions above, one need look no further than the kid-gloves approach taken by the media when it comes to former Colombian President, the U.S. "Presidential Medal of Freedom" recipient Álvaro Uribe.

Accused by human rights organizations over his role in the forced disappearance of thousands of Colombians during two terms in office (2002-2010), Uribe may still land in the dock as a result of ongoing investigations by Colombia's Supreme Court into official corruption, drug trafficking and mass murder.

Recent arrests by Colombian authorities and revelations by the president's former allies however, are beginning to draw a circle around Uribe and the U.S. secret state in some of the hemisphere's worst human rights abuses of previous decades.

As the net tightens, members of the president's own family are sharply focused in the cross-hairs of investigators. Back in June, Antifascist Calling reported on the arrest of Ana Maria Uribe Cifuentes and her mother, Dolly Cifuentes Villa on drug trafficking and money laundering charges. The U.S Treasury Department froze their assets last year.

Accused by the Justice Department of having trafficked some 30 tons of cocaine into the U.S. as business partners of Sinaloa Cartel boss Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán, the women, members of the Cifuentes Villa crime family led by Dolly's brother, Jorge Milton Cifuentes Villa, are prominent members of Colombia's jet-setting narco-bourgeoisie.

According to the Justice Department, the investigation revealed that "the Cifuentes Villa drug trafficking organization was using sophisticated drug trafficking routes to distribute multi-ton cocaine loads from Colombia through Central America, for ultimate distribution in Mexico and the United States." In 2009, some 8.3 tons of cocaine which the family were attempting to export to Mexico were seized by law enforcement officials in Ecuador.

Federal prosecutors charged that the Cifuentes Villa family owns or controls 15 companies operating in Colombia, Mexico and Ecuador involved in a variety of ventures that supported their narcotrafficking enterprise.

Among the firms targeted were Linea Aerea Pueblos Amazonicos S.A.S., a newly-created airline operating in eastern Colombia, Red Mundial Inmobiliaria, S.A. de C.V., a real estate company located near Mexico City, along with Gestores del Ecuador Gestorum S.A., a consulting firm located in Quito, Ecuador.

It is also worth noting that the Cifuentes Villa organization, as the Center of Public Integrity reported, have also profited from illegal mining operations that traffic rare-earth minerals destined for the world market.

Accordingly, the Cifuentes Villa clan employed the same smuggling routes that trafficked cocaine to move precious metallic ores such as coltan and tungsten, used by the communications industry and weapons manufacturers, onto the international market. When the Treasury Department placed family members onto its drug kingpin list they identified their mining fronts as "a money-laundering operation in support of a cocaine-smuggling enterprise."

While U.S. media were mesmerized by the extradition of Sandra Ávila Beltrán, whom the press had dubbed "La Reina del Pacífico" (The Queen of the Pacific), over her lavish lifestyle and family ties to legendary Mexican drug lord Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo, onetime godfather of the Guadalajara Cartel, Uribe's relatives inexplicably "disappeared" from "court records and authorities were unable to pinpoint the pair's whereabouts," Colombia Reports informed us.

Imagine that.

For his part, the former president denied allegations leveled against his brother Jaime, who died in 2001, and claimed that unnamed "criminals," who conducted "business" from his brother's car phone had cloned it. He also "denied any knowledge of his brother's relationship with Cifuentes or the existence of his niece, despite a birth certificate that was uncovered proving Jaime Uribe was her father," Colombia Reports averred.

What Uribe continues to gloss over however, is the inconvenient fact that brother Jaime had been arrested and interrogated by the Colombian Army after investigators recorded calls \made from his phone to none other than Pablo Escobar, the Nuevo Arco Iris political research center in Bogotá disclosed.

Among the unanswered questions surrounding these recent arrests, investigative journalist Daniel Hopsicker wondered: "Did Álvaro Uribe okay the loading of 3.6 tons of cocaine at an airport he controlled in Rio Negro Colombia onto a 'former' CIA Gulfstream (N987SA) jet from St. Petersburg Florida that crashed in the Yucatan in 2007?"

That fateful crash eventually led to the deferred prosecution agreement between the U.S. federal government and Wachovia Bank, fined $160 million for laundering some $378 billion for Mexico's Sinaloa Cartel, "business associates" of the Cifuentes Villa clan.

More pointedly Hopsicker asked: "Why did two successive U.S. Administrations lavish billions of dollars to stop drug trafficking on a President of Colombia who was himself involved in the drug trade?"

As the investigative net is drawn around the family of the former president, another Uribe brother, Santiago, "is facing a criminal investigation for the alleged founding and leading of a paramilitary group," Colombia Reportsdisclosed.

Investigations into that group, the notorious death squad the 12 Apostles, again surfaced when The Washington Post revealed that a former police chief, Juan Carlos Meneses, charged that Santiago "led a fearsome paramilitary group in the 1990s ... that killed petty thieves, guerrilla sympathizers and suspected subversives."

Meneses, who fled to Venezuela with his family, disclosed that the "group's hit men trained at La Carolina, where the Uribe family ran an agro-business in the early 1990s." For services rendered, Meneses told the Post "he received a monthly payment of about $2,000 delivered by Santiago Uribe."

The former police official said he came forward "because associates in the security services warned him he would soon be killed for knowing too much."

"The revelations," according to the Post, "threaten to renew a criminal investigation against Santiago Uribe and raise new questions about the president's past in a region where private militias funded with drug-trafficking proceeds and supported by cattlemen wreaked havoc in the 1990s. The disclosures could prove uncomfortable to the United States, which has long seen Uribe as a trusted caretaker of American money in the fight against armed groups and the cocaine trade."

"Uncomfortable" perhaps, but not surprising given the U.S. track record in support of drug-trafficking death squads, especially those which advanced corporate America's geopolitical interests throughout Latin America.

"Meneses," the Post averred, "is the first close collaborator of the 12 Apostles to speak publicly about the group's inner workings. His declarations are also the most extensive recounting by a security services official of how Colombia's militarized police and its army worked in tandem with death squads in one community--a model that investigators of the paramilitary movement say was duplicated nationwide."

For his part, the former president accused human rights' activists who have leveled charges against his family "of being guerrilla stooges who disseminate false accusations against his government."

However, Nobel Peace Prize laureate, Adolfo Pérez Esquivel, who was present when Meneses recounted his story during a taped interview in Buenos Aires, told the Post that the former police chief "'incriminates himself and also the brother of the president who managed the paramilitary group, but also President Uribe'."

Interestingly enough, Uribe's appointment to News Corp's board came while the former president is under investigation for illegally wiretapping human rights activists, journalists, Supreme Court justices and opposition politicians.

His former chief of staff is currently in jail awaiting trial on criminal wiretapping charges and his former secret police chief, Maria Pilar Hurtado, fled Colombia and sought asylum in Panama before similar charges could be filed against her.

And with two more senators now under investigation for suspected ties to paramilitary death squads Colombia Reports averred, Uribe's teflon armor is slowly being chipped away.

Parapolitical Scandal

If, as Voltaire once said, "the history of the great events of this world are scarcely more than the history of crime," what of the powerful actors who have looted entire nations and did so while serving the interests of their imperialist overlords?

Dubbed the "parapolitical scandal" by Colombian media, the investigation was set in motion when leftist opposition politician, Clara López Obregón, formally denounced and provided evidence in 2005 to the Supreme Court of links between drug trafficking organizations, the military/intelligence apparatus, right-wing death squads and members of Congress, including prominent officials of Álvaro Uribe's then-governing coalition.

That investigation gathered steam when a laptop was seized by authorities in 2006 from Rodrigo Tovar Pupo, alias Jorge 40, a leader of the Northern Bloc of the Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia (United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia, or AUC).

The origins of the AUC can be traced to the take-down of the Medellín Cartel and murder of "cocaine king" Pablo Escobar by rival drug organizations, principally the Cali Cartel run by the Rodríguez Orejuela brothers, who were provided logistical support and firepower by the CIA and U.S. Delta Force commandos to eliminate the competition.

An umbrella group comprised of far-right militants and drug capos aligned with Colombia's ruling class, the AUC and splinter groups such as the Águilas Negras, or Black Eagles, and the Ejército Revolucionario Popular Antiterrorista Colombiano (Popular Revolutionary Anti-Terrorist Army of Colombia, ERPAC), derive the bulk of their income from drug trafficking as they wage war against the leftist Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC), trade unionists and land reform activists.

Readers will recall that during the 1980s both the Medellín and Cali cartels were given a leg up by the Reagan administration's CIA as funds derived from the drug trade were diverted to the Nicaraguan Contras as part of the administration's anti-Communist crusade in Central America.

In fact, as the Agency was forced to admit in the wake of "suicided" journalist Gary Webb's "Dark Alliance" investigation, the CIA and Reagan's Justice Department agreed to a Memorandum of Understanding that handed their dope-dealing Contra assets get-out-of-jail-free cards.

As political fallout from the latest "War on Drugs" scandal--the "gun walking" Fast and Furious affair that put thousands of high-powered weapons into the hands of cartel killers in Mexico--hovers like a radioactive cloud over the Justice Department, the old watchword of the 1980s, "drugs in, guns out," is all the more timely.

And like the Contras, the AUC were more than simply an enforcement arm of Colombia's narco-elites; they served as an unofficial though deadly instrument, to preserve the status quo. For Washington policy makers, this meant continued access by U.S. petroleum corporations, mining and agro-business interests to Colombia's vast wealth. If thousands of tons of cocaine entered the United States as the price for stamping out "leftist subversion," then so be it.

Along with incriminating evidence that linked Tovar's gang to 550 murders, it later emerged that Tovar was a close political associate of Jorge Noguera, the former head of DAS, the Departamento Administrativo de Seguridad(Administrative Department of Security), the Colombian equivalent of the CIA.

Noguera's links to Tovar came to light when his deputy, Rafael García Torres, DAS's former chief of Information Technologies, was arrested and charged by Supreme Court investigators of accepting bribes from right-wingsicarios (assassins) and drug traffickers in exchange for erasing their criminal histories, along with those of the Cifuentes Villa clan, from the state intelligence database.

In his testimony, García charged that Noguera, a Uribe crony, collaborated with Tovar's Northern Bloc in a coordinated move by the AUC to support local, regional and national candidates for office who supported their hardline against the left.

More recently, the not-so-hidden hand of the United States emerged.

The Washington Post reported that "American cash, equipment and training, supplied to elite units of the Colombian intelligence service over the past decade to help smash cocaine-trafficking rings, were used to carry out spying operations and smear campaigns against Supreme Court justices, Uribe's political opponents and civil society groups."

Post reporters Karen DeYoung and Claudia J. Duque disclosed that despite billions of dollars of aid supplied by U.S. taxpayers under Plan Colombia, "the DAS under Uribe emphasized political targets over insurgents and drug lords."

In fact, Colombia prosecutors told the Post that the "Uribe government wanted to 'neutralize' the Supreme Court because its investigative magistrates were unraveling ties between presidential allies in the Colombian congress and drug-trafficking paramilitary groups."

Based on "thousands of pages of DAS documents and the testimony of nine top former DAS officials, the prosecutors say the agency was directed by the president's office to collect the banking records of magistrates, follow their families, bug their offices and analyze their court rulings."

These black operations however, were not the work of a few proverbial "bad apples" but were a direct result of projects designed by the CIA.

"Some of those charged or under investigation have described the importance of U.S. intelligence resources and guidance," the Post disclosed, "and say they regularly briefed embassy 'liaison' officials on their intelligence-gathering activities."

"'We were organized through the American Embassy,' said William Romero, who ran the DAS's network of informants and oversaw infiltration of the Supreme Court. Like many of the top DAS officials in jail or facing charges, he received CIA training. Some were given scholarships to complete coursework on intelligence-gathering at American universities."

As with the previous Clinton and Bush regimes, the Obama administration vociferously denies any knowledge of corrupt practices by Colombian officials and in fact, "anti-drug" programs such as Plan Colombia "are viewed as so successful that it has become a model for strategy in Afghanistan," the Post reported.

By 2012 however, some 139 members of Congress were under investigation; five governors and 32 lawmakers, including President Uribe's cousin, Mario Uribe Escobar, a former President of Congress, were convicted of paramilitary ties and subsequently jailed.

In late August, former Colombian senator Jorge Visbal, a Uribe ally, "was charged with the promoting and financing of paramilitary groups, held responsible for tens of thousands of human rights violations," Colombia Reportsdisclosed.

"Former AUC leader Salvatore Mancuso testified before Colombian prosecutors that Visbal had an 'identical ideology' to the extreme-right paramilitaries and, on behalf of the cattle ranchers, brought 'information and suggestions' to meetings with paramilitary leaders to secure the expansion of paramilitary power in the north of Colombia."

Mancuso, who took over the AUC when Israeli-trained narcotrafficker and death-squad führer Carlos Castaño "disappeared" in 2004, said during recent court proceedings that Uribe was aware that the organization supported his campaign for president in 2002 "economically and logistically," according to Colombia Reports.

Prior to his arrest, the human rights organization Equipo Nizkor reported that Mancuso, the son of Italian immigrants, along with being an AUC "godfather," was also a member of the 'Ndrangheta, "the powerful Calabrian mafia which according to Italian police, exceeds the Sicilian Cosa Nostra in both strength and size."

In fact, when Italian anti-Mafia prosecutor Nicola Gratteri flew to Bogotá to investigate the 'Ndrangheta's Colombian drugs network, Gratteri was told by Mancuso he had spied on him the entire time.

"I was in the center of Bogotá, with lots of security protecting me. I didn't know that all the armored cars that I could see around my hotel belonged to Mancuso," Gratteri told The Daily Beast. "He told me his protection consisted of 600 men! Not even the U.S. President has such an escort. Can you imagine how much money he had?"

Mancuso claimed Uribe was aware of the AUC's backing. "There were previous meetings with members of Álvaro Uribe's campaign, including those delegates that asked us to decrease military operations because it was affecting the campaign and image of the candidate," Mancuso said.

During those same proceedings, another former AUC leader, Jorge Ivan Laverde, alias "El Iguano," said that "no evidence exists of these financial transactions because the groups burned all of their paramilitary records before they demobilized."

Rather conveniently, one might say.

"According to El Iguano," Colombia Reports disclosed, "the support of the ex-president all began when the righthand man of AUC creator Carlos Castaño called all groups to give them the order that they must support the Uribe campaign and spend money where necessary."

The former president denounced these claims and said he would launch "a criminal complaint against the former paramilitary for libel."

However, former Congressman Miguel Alfonso de la Espriella, who was part of Uribe's coalition government and later sentenced for ties to the AUC, told prosecutors in September that Uribe "knew he was receiving support from paramilitary groups during his 2002 election campaign," Colombia Reports disclosed last month.

The now-disgraced politician said that Uribe "never objected" to meeting with the AUC-backed politicians, but "simply maintained a prudent silence."

In a recent interview, de la Espriella told El Espectador that the AUC had donated some $134 thousand to Uribe's 2002 presidential campaign.

The former senator told the paper that Mancuso said "our participation in the self defense forces was to seek a deal with his [Uribe's] government. He [Uribe] did not explicitly reject this possibility or the support. What he did say was that we wait and if he got elected we would talk again."

More recently, Uribe's jailed ex-security chief, Mauricio Santoyo Velasco, accused of illegally ordering driftnet surveillance over electronic communications and the forced disappearance of human rights workers in Medellín, "is willing to officially testify against his old boss and other senior officials," according to Colombia Reports.

Santoyo is presently jailed in the U.S. for collaborating with the AUC and "previously acknowledged accepting bribes from paramilitary members in exchange for giving them information about police operations being carried out against them."

According to "highly credible sources" cited by Colombia Reports, Santoyo "is willing to implicate the ex-president and other top officials," in exchange for a "reduced sentence."

Although U.S. prosecutors previously said that the Santoyo case was the "tip of the iceberg" and an opposition senator accused the former president of bringing "a criminal apparatus" to the presidential palace in 2002, the current director of Colombia's National Police, General José Roberto León Riaño, denied that the U.S. is investigating anyone other than Santoyo.

"Yesterday I personally interviewed the toughest prosecutor of the United States on the matter of drug trafficking, Neil MacBride, who is running the case against [retired general Mauricio] Santoyo," Colombia Reports averred. "He indicated: 'there are bad apples in every institution, Santoyo is an apple that acted on his own, but that can't affect the whole organization'."

While evidence has yet to emerge that Uribe met with Mancuso as the former AUC chief testified, ubiquitous "facts on the ground" in the form of thousands of tons of exported dope, forced "disappearances" and the mass murder of peasants and left-wing activists tell a different tale and point to official complicity amongst Colombian elites and their U.S. "drug war" sponsors.

Back to the Future: U.S. Complicity and Cover-Up

The sordid history of collaboration between Colombian elites, drug gangs, the military and right-wing death squads was known for years by U.S. secret state agencies and federal prosecutors but was covered-up in the interest of "national security."

In declassified documents published by the National Security Archive in 2004, we learned that then Senator "Álvaro Uribe Vélez of Colombia was a 'close personal friend of Pablo Escobar' who was 'dedicated to collaboration with the Medellín [drug] cartel at high government levels,' according to a 1991 intelligence report from U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) officials in Colombia."

Researcher Michael Evans revealed that the "newly-declassified report, dated 23 September 1991, is a numbered list of 'the more important Colombian narco-traffickers contracted by the Colombian narcotic cartels for security, transportation, distribution, collection and enforcement of narcotics operations'."

The former president, a "key U.S. partner in the drug war" and a major recipient of billions of dollars of taxpayer-supplied funds for Plan Colombia, "was linked to a business involved in narcotics activities in the United States" and "has worked for the Medellín cartel."

Evans disclosed that "The document is marked 'CONFIDENTIAL NOFORN WNINTEL,' indicating that its disclosure could reasonably be expected to damage national security, that its content was based on intelligence sources and methods, and that it should not be shared with foreign nationals."

One cannot help but ask: whose "national security" was threatened by the disclosure? Certainly not that of thousands of Colombian citizens murdered by drug-linked paramilitary gangsters or the hundreds of thousands of "drug war" victims incarcerated in American gulags for drug use or low-level sales.

"Uribe," the Archive informed us, was "the 82nd name on the list," and appeared "on the same page as Escobar and Fidel Castaño, who went on to form the country's major paramilitary army, a State Department-designated terrorist group now engaged in peace negotiations with the Uribe government. Written in March 1991 while Escobar was still a fugitive, the report was forwarded to Washington several months after his surrender to Colombian authorities in June 1991."

"Most of those on the list are well-known drug traffickers or assassins associated with the Medellín cartel," Evans averred. "Others listed include ex-president of Panama Manuel Noriega [and] Iran-contra arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi."

Four years later in another release of previously classified documents, the Archive revealed that "U.S. espionage operations targeting top Colombian government officials in 1993 provided key evidence linking the U.S.-Colombia task force charged with tracking down fugitive drug lord Pablo Escobar to one of Colombia's most notorious paramilitary chiefs."

"The documents," Evans wrote, "reveal that the U.S.-Colombia Medellín Task Force, known in Spanish as the Bloque de Búsqueda or 'Search Block,' was sharing intelligence information with Fidel Castaño, paramilitary leader of Los Pepes (Perseguidos por Pablo Escobar or 'People Persecuted by Pablo Escobar'), a clandestine terrorist organization that waged a bloody campaign against people and property associated with the reputed narcotics kingpin."

After Escobar's take-down, Los Pepes morphed into the AUC and led to a strategic realignment "between Colombian intelligence agencies, rival drug traffickers and disaffected former Escobar associates like Castaño, the godfather of a new generation of narcotics-fueled paramilitary forces that still plagues Colombia today."

"The collaboration between paramilitaries and government security forces evident in the Pepes episode is a direct precursor of today's 'para-political' scandal," said Evans. "The Pepes affair is the archetype for the pattern of collaboration between drug cartels, paramilitary warlords and Colombian security forces that developed over the next decade into one of the most dangerous threats to Colombian security and U.S. anti-narcotics programs. Evidence still concealed within secret U.S. intelligence files forms a critical part of that hidden history."

In this context, as Peter Dale Scott observed in Drugs, Oil, and War, "The true purpose of most of these campaigns has not been the hopeless ideal of eradication. It has been to alter market share: to target specific enemies and thus ensure that the drug traffic remains under the control of those traffickers who are allies of the Colombian state security apparatus and/or the CIA."

"Allies" like Álvaro Uribe.

Tom Burghardt is a researcher and activist based in the San Francisco Bay Area. In addition to publishing in Covert Action Quarterly and Global Research, an independent research and media group of writers, scholars, journalists and activists based in Montreal, he is a Contributing Editor with Cyrano's Journal Today. His articles can be read on Dissident Voice, Pacific Free Press, Uncommon Thought Journal, and the whistleblowing website WikiLeaks. He is the editor of Police State America: U.S. Military "Civil Disturbance" Planning, distributed by AK Press and has contributed to the new book from Global Research, The Global Economic Crisis: The Great Depression of the XXI Century.