Private Gloryhole Tampa

War crimes in Sri Lanka

When you hear bells in a war there have been war crimes, the reality is often actually been committed and that were much worse than the rumors say.

Sri Lanka's war ended in May 2009 had all the ingredients to commit atrocities: 1) facing two ethnic communities, which their leaders had spent years feeding with hate speech, 2) Both contendienteshabían demonstrated little concern for civilian casualties there, 3) The broken truces and negotiations over and over again had eliminated any degree of mutual trust and good will that might have the parts, 4) The decades of conflict had finished producing on both sides the desire not to leave the war until they had achieved their maximum goals. In recent years, neither the government nor the LTTE wanted a compromise peace.

had hardly finished the war in Sri Lanka, there was awareness in the international community that there were war crimes in its closing stages. Now, a report by a panel of UN experts tells us how serious were the atrocities that were committed.

The report begins by acknowledging both the government and rebels of having committed war crimes and crimes against humanity. Especially in the latter stages of the war, both sides threw away any qualms they might have and showed no concern for the fate of civilians.

The report alleges that between September 2008 and May 2009, government forces indiscriminately shelled the Vanni area, where 330 000 Tamil civilians were trapped. The government bombed even three safe areas where people were told to concentrate. No matter that its bombing hampered UN efforts to assist with food and medicine to civilians caught and his desire to crush the enemy, came to bomb hospitals.

Those lucky enough to escape the bombed area still had to go through other tests. Government forces were subjected to a screening process for possible LTTE guerrillas who were infiltrators among the displaced. There were summary executions, disappearances, rapes and other abuses. That passed the filter, were taken to overcrowded camps with terrible sanitary conditions and where some were tortured. The report charges that in these areas there were many unnecessary deaths because of the harsh conditions.

Abuses by government forces do not imply that the LTTE were some lambs. The LTTE used civilians as shields, preventing them from leaving the combat zone. He forced recruits for both its fighting forces for other tasks such as digging trenches. In the latter stages of the war, the LTTE came to kill the civilians trying to escape the combat zone. And to prove they were just assholes that the government, did not worry about indiscriminate shelling of civilians in the area were affected. The only difference is that they had fewer missiles than the government.

The UN report does not address, because it was his mission that the Sri Lankan government to operate with more comfort, began at that time efforts to ensure that civil society does not rechistaría: disappearances, silencing of journalists (some by the radical method of ensuring that would stop breathing forever), intimidation NGOs and even the staff of international organizations ...

The International Crisis Group estimates that between 30,000 and 75,000 people whose fate is unknown and most likely die in the last months of civil war. The calculation is done by subtracting the number of civilians caught in the combat zone of civilians in camps IDP government.

The Sri Lankan government has done what was done in these cases: to say that the whole report is a lie and that their authors have not been fair, but they were prejudiced against him and it went too far in the mission had. What more is coming to recognize that some civilians were killed as government troops went into the last strongholds of the LTTE.

Presumably, the report will end where it ends so many UN reports: on a shelf. Russia, China and India support the Rajapakse regime and prevent you from removing the UN colors. As for the West, with which it is falling Syria and Libya, I doubt that I really want to complicate life for things that happened two years ago on a small island in the Indian Ocean.

Quadriderm Cream Can Be Used For Baby

What if we lose in Afghanistan? Doctor at home

A U.S. cost him everything he readily agreed that he had lost in Vietnam and had to retire because of the domino theory. The domino theory had emerged during the Eisenhower Administration and said that communism is like the flu: once you pick a country, a matter of time your neighbors begin to spread.

Robert McNamara, who was Secretary of Defense during the Kennedy Administration Democrats and Johnson, defended to the hilt that the doctrine described perfectly what would happen in Southeast Asia if North Vietnam won the Vietnam War. This made winning the war should become a matter of life or death.

Domino Theory has many things going for it. It's very graphic, one can clearly imagine the dominoes falling. It is easy to understand. Fear creates fear and disables the ability for logic, what if it were true, and North Vietnam won? Then all of Southeast Asia would become communist.

Historically this theory has an advantage because North Vietnam won the war, we can see if it was successful or not. The North Vietnam's victory was accompanied by the victory of communism in Cambodia and Laos, but there it stopped. Neither Thailand nor the Philippines, and Malaysia, and Indonesia fell under the yoke of communism. That spot, it would seem that the theory had a point, although its scope had been exaggerated. Those who continue to defend the claim that if North Vietnam's victory did more countries come into the Communist orbit was because the U.S. helped them to resist the onslaught of communism.

I am more skeptical. Historical and strategic reasons, North Vietnam had interest in the other two countries that had been part of the Indochina French, Laos and Cambodia, but I doubt that had interest in extending community beyond those two countries. Moreover, the clumsy American intervention in Cambodia (support for the coup by General Lon Nol, massive bombing of rural areas ...) did more for the spread of communism in that country than anything I could have made North Vietnam.

However it was the domino theory to the U.S. strategists gave a clear idea of \u200b\u200bwhat would happen if they lost the war in Vietnam and gave them an incentive to continue it. And here's my question: Do we have a similar conceptual framework to estimate what would a defeat in Afghanistan? No. In the case of Afghanistan no one has come up with a hypothesis still gorgeous and seductive name. The only consensus among policy makers is that a defeat in Afghanistan would be something awful, but they disagree about how awful it would be this tremendous.

Pakistani President Zardari, who has just war next door, warns that a victory for the Taliban, which equates to the victory of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan, which for him are attached to, spread fundamentalist terrorism worldwide. It adds that a Taliban victory in Afghanistan also destabilize Pakistan. The warning comes later: Pakistan and is sufficiently destabilized even without the Taliban.

Another sees the bulls up close is Lt. Gen. Shir Mohammad Karimi, chief of operations staff of the Afghan Army. To him a Taliban victory would turn the country into a platform from which to promote radicalism in the region and eventually the world. It also would be an ideological victory for the fundamentalists, who have exposed the weakness of democracies.

Pakistani journalist Ahmed Rashid, who has spent years following the Afghan situation, believes that if you lose the war in Afghanistan and the country, and perhaps also Pakistan on the road becomes a failed state, the consequences for global stability will be devastating. U.S. and NATO will lose credibility.

Former NATO Secretary General George Robertson said that if we are not going to Afghanistan, Afghanistan will come to us. That is, if not defeat the Taliban at home, tomorrow we will keep knocking on our door and not just to bring us milk. Robertson also points to the geopolitical effect would be that a group of ragged guerrillas defeated the world's main military alliance. To Anders Rasmussen, Robertson's successor at the head of NATO, leave Afghanistan with their tails between their legs would mean that the country would to become a sanctuary for al-Qaeda.

General Petraeus, who is the third American general who charged him in nine years to end the war, think that a defeat would result in a bloody civil war and the eventual domination of the country by extremists.

My impression is that, as happened to the domino theory, all these theories exaggerate a little. The Vietnam War was lost and found we could live with that loss. Could it be the same with Afghanistan?

If coalition forces do not win, I think there are three possible scenarios from most to least likely: 1) The Taliban are strongest in the regions Pashtun majority, which is located in the east and south. The rest of the country is divided among warlords, 2) The country is parceled between the Taliban and warlords. The difference with the previous scenario is that the Taliban do not get it cover all the Pashtun areas and fail to become the strongest power in the country, but they are one of several, 3) The Taliban take control of throughout the country, except some border areas and marginal return to a situation similar to that which existed in 2001. In all three scenarios, Afghanistan becomes a failed state and a source of instability for the region. In none of the three scenarios the Karzai regime survives.

What I think is an exaggeration to think that al-Qaeda in Afghanistan revived as if nothing had happened since 2001. True that the country would become a recruiting ground for terrorists of all stripes, but I think the logistics capabilities of al-Qaeda has suffered a lot over the years. Furthermore, we know the organization better and not Pillari us by surprise as early XXI century.

As we discovered in 1975 that we could live with a victorious North Vietnam, we would discover that we can live with Afghanistan become a failed state, that is what has been for the last forty years. But Afghanistan is a failed what should concern us, but the possibility that the effects of his failure as a state from getting into Pakistan. A failed Pakistan is definitely a prospect to lose sleep.

Anne Klein Petite Coat

The hyperactive Mahathir voluntarily left Mohamad Prime Minister of Malaysia in 2003, after spending 22 years having the time of breast, telling Malaysians how they should be. After retirement, he discovered he was bored and went to tangle, was a director of two large Malaysian company, Petronas and Proton, put all the sticks in the wheels could the new Prime Minister, Abdullah Badawi, whom he had appointed paradoxically, opened a blog to rant about how bad it was Malaysian politics since
he was gone ...

guess the result of that boredom is the book "House Doctor", published in March. 800 pages of book. More than the two parts of "Don Quixote" printed edition for people with eyestrain.

The book is many things. First is a memoir. But I suspect that's the least relevant. And I suspect Mahathir, who warns in the preface: " This is the story of Malaysia as I see it. This is my story. " is, who expect objectivity, which is go somewhere else.

Second, is a testimony and a justification to history. It is his political testament, the image you want to leave to history. Third, is the occasion to settle scores with some of his enemies. Maybe that's why the book is so long: Mahathir has created many enemies during his long career.

For example, Tengku Razaleigh, who tried to move his seat in 1987 and nearly succeeds, accuses him of trying to bribe members of the party and have tried to play dirty, false accusations of adultery (that said the same to be swept away Anwar Ibrahim on charges of sodomy). Else who wants is the founder of Singapore, Lee Kuan Yew, whom he accuses of addressing the Malaysian Parliament on bullies and the plan says: " Lee saw Malaysia as their chance to dominate a nation and become his substantial Prime Minister, " going to Singapore is too small and wanted to send something larger. But the arch-enemy, to which you have sworn and you suspect that has a complicated love-hate relationship is Anwar Ibrahim, who for nearly a decade was the dolphin. " Anwar is undoubtedly a charismatic and knows how to get people to support him. All I did for Anwar in the past has been cast aside. Is considered to have made him a victim and that I have gone to prison, as if there had been a process. Every time you mention my name in an article or a book describing me as the prime minister who put her second in jail. The fact that he was properly charged and prosecuted before a court is never mentioned. " In the first part of this quote Mahathir sounds like a jilted lover and the second a tricky politician who knows how to twist the hand to the truth. It is true that Anwar was tried and convicted of corruption and sodomy. The second charge was later annulled. While it is likely that he was indeed guilty of corruption, the key question is: why was he out of all Malaysian politicians? Why him and not Mahathir? There, Mahathir, I have recognized that he was thrown into prison with all the Law and yet my sense of justice is that something is wrong. The Anwar himself thinks that Mahathir has called "a liar flagrant" suffering from "selective amnesia ."

Mahathir may be a liar and a cynic and suffers from selective amnesia, but At 85 years gives the impression that he is back in all but the trial of history. Asked about the title he chose for the book, said: " had many titles for the book, such as" Mahathir's Napoleon, "Mahathir the Great" and my favorite was "Mahathir the Magnificent." But in the end I chose something that was not too extravagant and that is "Doctor at home." It is first and foremost of all my titles. Always be a doctor [Mahathir is a medical doctor]

If after this post someone wants to read the book, my advice is to sit until you pass and then read "War and Peace", which is also a work of fiction, but is better written.