from the International Justice Network 

New York, NY - On June 4, 2012, National Public Radio (NPR) reported on the growing alarm among Afghans over the unlawful implementation of an administrative detention regime by the Afghan government patterned on US detention operations commonly associated with Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.

What is far less commonly known is that the US has been indefinitely detaining prisoners without charge or trial since 2002 in Afghanistan.  Today at Bagram Air Base north of Kabul, the US has approximately 3,100+ Afghan prisoners and 50+ non-Afghan prisoners in its sole custody.

From A World to Win News Service

War Supply Route Reopened 

US-Pakistan relations have been very bumpy over the last few years. The US government claims that Pakistan is helping the Taliban and other Islamist forces fighting in Afghanistan, and Pakistan is outraged and embarrassed by blatant and repeated American aggression. Washington feels it has a right to interfere in Pakistan and that any sort of protest is baseless.

The Nato summit in Chicago revealed the extent of US bitterness when President Barack Obama refused to have a private meeting with Asif Ali Zardari, Pakistan's president. For his part, Zardari expressed frustration about US drone strikes and urged the summit to find a "permanent solution". The US responded by launching four more drone strikes in North Waziristan, killing 30 people over the following week.

by Ann Wright and Coleen Rowley 

The new Executive Director of Amnesty International USA (AI) – Suzanne Nossel – is a recent U.S. government insider. So it’s a safe bet that AI’s decision to seize upon a topic that dovetailed with American foreign policy interests, “women’s rights in Afghanistan,” at the NATO Conference last month in Chicago came directly from her.

Nossel was hired by AI in January 2012. In her early career, Nossel worked for Ambassador Richard Holbrooke under the Clinton Administration at the United Nations. Most recently, she served as Deputy Assistant Secretary for International Organizations at the U.S. Department of State, where she was responsible for multilateral human rights, humanitarian affairs, women’s issues, public diplomacy, press and congressional relations

by Glen Greenwald

In February, the Bureau of Investigative Journalism documented that after the U.S. kills people with drones in Pakistan, it then targets for death those who show up at the scene to rescue the survivors and retrieve the bodies, as well as those who gather to mourn the dead at funerals: “the CIA’s drone campaign in Pakistan has killed dozens of civilians who had gone to help rescue victims or were attending funerals.” 

As The New York Times summarized those findings: “at least 50 civilians had been killed in follow-up strikes after they rushed to help those hit by a drone-fired missile” while “the bureau counted more than 20 other civilians killed in strikes on funerals.” 

This repellent practice continues.

by Glenn Greenwald

The Authoritarian MInd 

Yesterday, I wrote about the rotted workings of the Imperial Mind, but today presents a tragic occasion to examine its close, indispensable cousin: the Authoritarian Mind. From CNN today:

A suspected NATO airstrike killed eight civilians — including six children — in eastern Afghanistan, a provincial spokesman said.

The airstrike took place Saturday night in Paktia province, said Rohullah Samoon, spokesman for the governor of Paktia. He said an entire family was killed in the strike.

"The winds in Chicago
Have torn me to shreds;

Reality has always
Had too many heads."

-- Bob Dylan, "Cold Irons Bound"

So now we know the grand plan of the Peace Laureate (and his wag-tail pack of lapdogs in NATO) for the people of Afghanistan: civil war.

by Larry Everest

“Money for Jobs and Education! Jobs and Education, Not War and Occupation!”  This is the slogan the ANSWER Coalition is raising this month at the forthcoming anti-NATO protests in Chicago, and other groups are putting forward similar demands.

This slogan is profoundly wrong and harmful—both in terms of morality that’s actually in the interests of humanity, and in terms of a scientific understanding of imperialism and war.

by David Swanson

Is staying in Afghanistan OK with you as long as we call it leaving?

President Obama has signed an agreement with President Karzai to keep a major U.S. military presence in Afghanistan (currently about three times the size Obama began with) through the end of 2014, and to allow a significant unspecified presence beyond that date, with no end date stipulated.  Obama stresses that no permanent U.S. bases will be involved, but his agreement requires Afghanistan to let U.S. troops use "Afghan" bases.

by Kathleen Barry 

For two weeks after the March 11, 2012 Afghan massacre, its 17 dead victims and several wounded were anonymous to the world. Americans read daily about their alleged killer, Staff Sergeant Robert Bales, his multiple deployments, his wife's worries, her pregnancies—even in the few days before we learned his name. 

At the end of March, Afghan born Australian journalist Yalda Hakim found her way to the villages where the massacres took place. The Afghan Army working with the U.S. military was reluctant to let her in. She prevailed.

Report by the Australian TV Show Dateline; appeared March 27, 2012.

Communities in Oakland have been struggling against police violence, surveillance, criminalization, and incarceration for generations. Police here are becoming more and more militarized daily, there are joint trainings between local police, the US military, IDF, and Bahrainy security forces. Soldiers, trained killers returning from war, are joining the local police forces. Local police departments are investing in and using military grade weapons for low intensity warfare upon civilians here. We experienced the raids and night raids here in Oakland. We saw people get beat the hell out of, got shot by rubber bullets, bean bags and tear gas canisters. Now imagine that becoming live rounds, grenades and bombs.