Elections in Georgia: U.S. and NATO Lose their “Geopolitical Chess Queen”

Global Research
John Robles

It is no secret that Saakashvili is the “West’s man in the Caucasus” the darling of Hillary Clinton and Obama’s US State Department, NATO headquarters and the Pentagon and the intelligence services of the UK and the US. He is yet another despotic dictator that has murdered, oppressed, strangled, tortured and subjugated his people with the support of the West in exchange for advancing their geopolitical agenda in yet another region far removed from their own borders yet where they want control.

As there is no statute of limitations on war crimes, Saakashvili has a lot to worry about and had better stock up on ties.

Saakashvili was one of the crowning jewels in NATO’s and the West’s consolidation of power and control after the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union.

The loss by Mikheil Saakashvili’s party in parliamentary elections in Georgia may spell the end for his regime and a return to democracy in Georgia. It may also spell the warming of relations, soured by Saakashvili, between Russia and Georgia. For the West the elections may be the first step towards his removal from power, the loss of a queen, in their game of geopolitical chess.

Suffering an unexpected blow at the polls in the parliamentary elections, tie-eating Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili in the middle of the night conceded defeat, opening the trap-door beneath his own feet and paving the way for real change and real democracy in Georgia, but pundits and experts are already saying that he will undoubtedly find a reason to dissolve parliament and call for new elections.

The blow to the plutocratic despot is one that the West cannot allow to stand as they have too much to lose and have invested far too much to quietly just go away, lose their influence and simply mothball all of their plans for the integration of Georgia into the Western sphere.

It is no secret that Saakashvili is the “West’s man in the Caucasus” the darling of Hillary Clinton and Obama’s US State Department, NATO headquarters and the Pentagon and the intelligence services of the UK and the US. He is yet another despotic dictator that has murdered, oppressed, strangled, tortured and subjugated his people with the support of the West in exchange for advancing their geopolitical agenda in yet another region far removed from their own borders yet where they want control.

The VOR’s Dmitry Babich has already gone into the hypocrisy of the West with regard to Saakashvili, so I won’t go into that right now. Suffice it to say that the hypocrisy when it comes to Saakashvili is total and all-encompassing and characterizes total anti-Russian hysteria by the West, something they need to propagate to continue to have support for their intrusions on the sovereignty of the countries in the region and to justify their aggressive military build-up and the expansion of NATO into the Caucasus.

What the complete loss of power of the Saakashvili regime will mean for the West and for Saakashvili himself is hard to predict exactly: the opposition has shown leniency toward him, so it is possible he may remain in some sort of position of power for the mid-term. However, what few have focused on is that his loss may open the door to prosecution and punishment for the crimes he has committed against his own people and against innocent civilians.

These crimes include the recent revelations that his “security” apparatus was responsible for torturing and illegally detaining people opposed to his regime and a plethora of charges that could be brought in relation to how his regime has stifled dissent and cracked down on anyone opposed to his regime. But that would only be the start: there are those who have accused Saakashvili of crimes that could be tantamount to treason for selling out his country to the interests of the West. Although prosecution for such a crime is unlikely, that would be one possibility which would end in his execution.

The biggest worry for Saakashvili and his Western paymasters right now should be whether Saakashvili will end up having to face the war crimes tribunal in The Hague. According to an article regarding a European Union-Commissioned Report on the invasion of South Ossetia in 2008 by Russia Today, back in October of 2009, citing Interfax, Nestan Kirtadze, international secretary of Georgia’s Labor Party concluded that:

“The commission accused Saakashvili of war crimes. Namely, of unleashing active hostilities, of a massive, wide-scale military operation in the South Ossetian capital Tskhinval and the use of prohibited types of weapons, of shelling and destroying non-military facilities, and of attacking military personnel from the peacekeeping mission that was mandated by the United Nations.”

As there is no statute of limitations on war crimes, Saakashvili has a lot to worry about and had better stock up on ties.

The winners of the parliamentary elections have said that they will normalize relations with Russia, with the West screaming indignantly about “Russian influence” as they once again conveniently ignore their own attempts at influencing the country.

As we might recall, Georgia shares almost half of her borders with Russia and has classically fallen into Russia’s sphere of influence. We should also remember that until Saakashvili came to power Russia and Georgia shared a rich and proud history and very close ties and good relations in trade, economic and other areas of cooperation, education and more. This was beneficial for the peoples of both countries.

Saakashvili was one of the crowning jewels in NATO’s and the West’s consolidation of power and control after the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union. Who would have ever thought that the country that gave the world the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics’ Joseph Stalin would become a pawn of Western expansionism?

The fall of Saakashvili would mean many things for many people. For one, tens of thousands of refugees from Georgia that have fled to Europe and other countries could finally return home. It would also mean the utter failure of Hillary Clinton and the West’s plans at geopolitical domination in Russia’s backyard, a nice retirement present and the crowning failure of her diplomatic career.

Regardless of all my musings it is too early to count our chickens. Saakashvili is still in power and will do everything possible, including killing his own people, to stay in power. We will probably see attempts to dissolve parliament, call for a recount of the vote, which he will win, and a massive crack-down on the Georgian opposition. Saakashvili has too much to lose to quietly acquiesce, and has shown he has no qualms about taking his country down into the abyss with him.
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Obama gives upon plan for 9/11 civilian trials

NewsObserver

WASHINGTON — In an about-face on the day President Barack Obama announced his re-election bid, Attorney General Eric Holder on Monday ordered that confessed 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other alleged co-plotters stand trial before a military commission at Guantanamo rather than in a civilian court.

It was an embarrassing reversal nearly a year and a half after Holder announced with much fanfare that the five men, who'd been held for years in secret CIA custody before being transferred to the Guantanamo military prison in 2006, would face justice in a courtroom in lower Manhattan.
Holder blamed the decision on Congress for prohibiting the transfer of Guantanamo detainees to the U.S., even for trial.

 
"We must face a simple truth, those restrictions are unlikely to be repealed in the immediate future. And we simply cannot allow a trial to be delayed any longer for the victims of the 9/11attacks or for their family members who have waited nearly a decade for justice," Holder said.

The Sept. 11, 2001, attacks killed 2,976 people when four hijacked airliners crashed into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and a field in southwest Pennsylvania.

Holder also revealed that a grand jury had secretly indicted the five men on Dec. 14, 2009, alleging, among other things, that Mohammed had trained the hijackers "by killing sheep and camels" with short-bladed knives similar to the box cutters used in the terror attacks.

That indictment, which was withdrawn Monday, came a year before Congress stepped in and blocked transfers of detainees to U.S. soil. But even before Congress acted, Holder said the Justice Department had delayed the transfer out of concern about security for a trial in Manhattan. At one time, he said, he considered staging the trial at the Otisville Federal Prison, 70 miles northwest of New York, near the Pennsylvania and New Jersey borders.

"The best venue for prosecution was in federal court," he said. "I stand by that decision today."
Families who lost loved ones to the attacks offered mixed reviews of the decision. Most members of Congress endorsed it.

At the Pentagon, the chief war crimes prosecutor, Navy Capt. John F. Murphy, said his lawyers would prepare charge sheets "in the near future" against Mohammed, 45, Ramzi bin al Shibh, 37, Walid bin Attash, 32, Ammar al Baluchi, 32, and Mustafa Hawsawi, 41.

All have been held at Guantanamo since September 2006, following years in secret CIA custody during which Mohammed was waterboarded 183 times. The five had been charged in the military commission system before, during the George W. Bush presidency, but that case was dismissed in November 2009 when Holder announced plans for a civilian trial.

Murphy declined to say whether he would seek the death penalty — a key issue. Mohammed has said previously that he'd confess to the plot and seek the death penalty as a fast-track to martyrdom. But it is unclear whether a military judge who accepts a guilty plea can also sentence someone to death.
The timing of the announcement was surprising: the day President Barack Obama launched his re-election bid. It also came one day before the House Judiciary Committee was to hold a hearing on military commissions where relatives of 9/11 victims were expected to hold up pictures of their dead loved ones to protest administration policy.

"It is my hope that today's announcement means that long-delayed accountability will finally be served on the terrorists who killed thousands of Americans on 9/11," said retired Navy Cmdr. Kirk Lippold, who was the captain of the USS Cole in October 2000 when an al Qaida suicide bomber attacked the destroyer off Yemen, killing 17 U.S. sailors.

Lippold, an architect of Bush-era Guantanamo policy, accused the Obama administration of "political waffling" rather than "fortitude and leadership."

The September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows group declared itself "profoundly disappointed" by what it called "a step backward in our hopes that justice will be served."

"The shame of Guantanamo will continue," the group said in a statement. "As families of those who were murdered on that day, we have waited nearly 10 years to see those who committed these savage criminal acts to be brought to justice."


Reaction from Congress, which had voted to block a U.S. federal trial through funding bans, ranged from triumph to relief that New York would be spared the trial.

"As I have been saying all along, these terror trials belong in a military commission at Guantanamo. I am absolutely shocked that it took Attorney General Holder 507 days to come to this realization," said New York Rep. Peter King, the Republican chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee.
Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., who helped create the military commission system, said he appreciated Holder's decision to use it for the trials.

"Military commissions have been used in wars throughout our history, and they should be used in this war," said Graham, a military lawyer who's served active duty in Iraq and Afghanistan. "The commission trials will be transparent, conducted by the same judges and jurors who administer justice to our own troops, and subject to civilian review. In addition, the military commissions system balances the interest of the accused with the safety of our nation as a whole in this time of war."

Sen. Patrick Leahy, the Vermont Democrat who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee, lamented the reversal. He called the American justice system "the envy of the world" and with hundreds of terror convictions already "more than capable of trying high-profile terrorism and national security cases."
"The record in military commissions pales in comparison, with only a handful of convictions, and the ground rules still in flux," he said.

The decision resurrects a long-standing dispute about whether a military commission would be as fair as a civilian trial and whether its verdict would be as respected.

The National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers worried that the military wouldn't provide adequate funding to hire civilian defense lawyers with death-penalty experience. The group also said Obama-era reforms hadn't gone far enough in ensuring the evidence used in a case meets civilian court standards.

"Despite some cosmetic changes since the Bush-era commissions, the commission rules still permit the government to introduce secret evidence, hearsay and statements obtained through coercion," said Norman Reimer, the group's executive director.

As a candidate and senator, Obama had condemned the commissions. As president, he worked with Congress to reform them.

"It's devastating to the rule of law," said Anthony Romero, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union, blaming "politics" for the decision and arguing that the military commissions aren't capable of keeping away from the trial evidence gleaned from the CIA interrogations, often under harsh conditions.

"The very Defense Department that enabled the torture is now going to be the adjudicator of justice," he said.

The Justice Department's Dean Boyd countered that during the Obama era "among the key reforms to the Military Commissions was a ban on the admissibility of statements obtained by the use of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment."

Holder also endorsed the commissions. "I believe they can deliver fair trials and just verdicts," he said.
)(Rosenberg reports for the Miami Herald. James Rosen, Lesley Clark, Greg Gordon, Margaret Talev and Marisa Taylor contributed to this report.)

Egypt blogger gets 3 years for criticizing army

 BusinessWeek
 

An Egyptian military tribunal has convicted a blogger of insulting the army after he publicized reports of abuses by the military, and sentenced him to three years in prison, human rights groups said Monday.

The military court issued the sentence against Maikel Nabil Sanad, 26, a day earlier in the absence of his lawyers, according to a statement by seven Cairo-based rights groups.
It was the first trial of a blogger by Egypt's military rulers, who took charge of the country after former president Hosni Mubarak was ousted by anti-government protests Feb. 11 after an 18-day popular uprising.

Rights lawyers say the sentence has wide implications for freedom of expression in post-Mubarak Egypt, and could set a precedent for anyone seeking to expose wrongdoing or abuses by the military.
A member of the military council, Maj. Gen. Mohammed al-Assar told an Egyptian private TV station, ONTV, Monday, the armed forces is open to criticism.

"There is a difference between criticism with good intentions from a citizen, a journalist or a broadcaster, who mean the public good. There is no problem with that," he said. "The problem is in questioning the intentions (of the army)."

Paris-based Reporters Without Borders said it was "shocked" by the three-year jail sentence, asking the authorities to review it and free him "without delay."

The case against Sanad, who was arrested two weeks ago at his home, was based on a blog post titled "The people and the army were never hand in hand," questioning the military's continued allegiance to Mubarak; as well as Facebook postings reporting allegations of abuse.

"Maikel was posting on his blog news published by rights groups, and newspaper clippings" among other things, said Adel Ramadan, Sanad's lawyer. "The danger extends to all bloggers, rights activists and journalists."

Rights groups have criticized the new military rulers for arbitrary arrests and speedy trials for civilians, saying their activities were reminiscent of those of the former regime.
Ramadan said more than 10,000 civilians have been convicted and sentenced by military tribunals since the army took over two months ago.

Military trials are swift, do not follow the procedures and rules of evidence of civil courts and their sentences cannot be appealed.

Ramadan was quoting official court records and military statements and included cases involving minor theft, land disputes, as well as demonstrating and weapons possession.
Most Egyptians expressed joy when the military stepped in to remove Mubarak, chanting the slogan "the military and the people go hand in hand," but tension has since crept into the army's relations with the population.

In the early hours of the morning Saturday, soldiers forcefully stormed a protest camp on to break up a sit-in, killing at least one demonstrator and wounding dozens. The protesters had been critical of the military.

Volleys of gunfire rang through the streets of downtown Cairo for hours until the military withdrew at sunrise.

Soldiers arrested 42 civilians, including two foreigners, all of whom are now facing military tribunals. Eleven were later released, including the foreign nationals.

Around a thousand protesters have now started a new sit-in at the country's iconic Tahrir Square in Cairo demanding the resignation of the minister of defense and head of the army, Field Marshal Mohammed Hussein Tantawi.

Heba Morayef, a researcher with Human Rights Watch, said Sanad's case also shows that the military cannot be criticized.

"It sets the military up as an establishment beyond criticism and beyond being held accountable," she said. "It sends exactly the wrong signal at a time when you are supposed to be transitioning away from abusive practices combined with official denial and failure to investigate."

It was also the harshest sentence against a blogger since 2004, when one was convicted of insulting the former president and offending Islam and sentenced to four years in prison.