Meet the U.S.

[Armo77]

lol just change the subect of this thread to "Ji7ad". And uh.... "Allahu Akbar, there is no God but God and his prophet is M'7ammed.. Down to all infidels" to you (wow call to ji7ad makes you tired)... uhh I guess.. anything to make you peoples happy.

 

P.S. No need to make such long activist posts...

http://cagle.slate.msn.com/news/CagleBestof2001/CagleBestofYeargifs/374Santa-Osama.gif

Edited December 11, 2003 by Armo77

[Armo77]

7ijab anyone?

[Stormig]

7ijab anyone?

One more soul lost to the Amerikanski matrix, anyone?

 

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Young Americans may soon have to fight a war in Iraq, but most of them can't even find that country on a map, the National Geographic Society said Wednesday.

 

The society survey found that only about one in seven -- 13 percent -- of Americans between the age of 18 and 24, the prime age for military warriors, could find Iraq. The score was the same for Iran, an Iraqi neighbor.

 

Although the majority, 58 percent, of the young Americans surveyed knew that the Taliban and al Qaeda were based in Afghanistan, only 17 percent could find that country on a world map. A U.S.-led force attacked the Taliban and al Qaeda in Afghanistan in October 2001, and President Bush has said he is prepared to use force to rid Iraq of any chemical, nuclear or biological weapons programs.

 

The survey asked 56 geographic and current events questions of young people in nine countries and scored the results with traditional grades. The surveyed Americans got a "D," with an average of 23 correct answers. Mexico ranked last with an average score of 21, just three points from a failing grade.

 

Topping the scoring was Sweden, with an average of 40, followed by Germany and Italy, each with 38. None of the countries got an "A," which required average scores of 42 correct answers or better on the 56 questions.

 

"If our young people can't find places on a map and lack awareness of current events, how can they understand the world's cultural, economic and natural resource issues that confront us?" John Fahey, president of the National Geographic Society, said in a statement.

 

National Geographic is convening an international panel of policy makers and business and media leaders to find ways to improve geographic education and to encourage interest in world affairs, the society said.

 

Other findings from the survey:

• Thirty-four percent of the young Americans knew that the island used on last season's "Survivor" show was located in the South Pacific, but only 30 percent could locate the state of New Jersey on a map. The "Survivor" show's location was the Marquesas Islands in the eastern South Pacific.

 

• When asked to find 10 specific states on a map of the United States, only California and Texas could be located by a large majority of those surveyed. Both states were correctly located by 89 percent of the participants. Only 51 percent could find New York, the nation's third most populous state.

 

• On a world map, Americans could find on average only seven of 16 countries in the quiz. Only 89 percent of the Americans surveyed could find their own country on the map.

 

• In the world map test, Swedes could find an average of 13 of the 16 countries. Germans and Italians were next, with an average of 12 each.

 

• Only 71 percent of the surveyed Americans could locate on the map the Pacific Ocean, the world's largest body of water. Worldwide, three in 10 of those surveyed could not correctly locate the Pacific Ocean.

 

• Although 81 percent of the surveyed Americans knew that the Middle East is the Earth's largest oil exporter, only 24 percent could find Saudi Arabia on the map.

 

The international survey was conducted for the National Geographic by RoperASW. The results are based on face-to-face interviews with at least 300 men and women aged 18 to 24 in Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Sweden, Britain and the United States.

 

The questionnaires were in the local language, but the content was universally the same.

[Armo77]

One more soul lost to the Amerikanski matrix, anyone?

why else would I live in the USA? If I did not like the USA.. I would leave (plain and simple).. Or I could be spinless like some FOBs and continue to live in the USA, get all the benifits, then spit all over it. What kind of a person is that?

Edited December 11, 2003 by Armo77

[Stormig]

Then why not wear a uniform if you love it so much and defend "Amerikanski interests in Iraq" like you defend every absurd move your freaks at the top make??

[THOTH]

Armo - i too live in the US and love that i do. I think there are so very many upsides to living here. Just the same - I don't blindly buy into every position that our politico's and such attemtp to stuff down our throats. And isn't dissent and questioning of our Government and actions of such a fundemental part of what our nation is all about? It certainly is for me.

[Armo77]

Then why not wear a uniform if you love it so much and defend "Amerikanski interests in Iraq" like you defend every absurd move your freaks at the top make??

Im a lover not a fighter... does living in a certain country mean you should join the Army? No.. But in other countires you are FORCED into the Army.

[Armo77]

p.s. Dont get all mad now.. and enough with the Jareeda posts.

[Stormig]

Thing is, he's acting very much like one of the possible ways in which a FOB that he so much criticizes would. Either they criticize it so much that you wonder why they sought refuge there in the first place, or they idolize it to the high heavens, knowing only as much as an American does about their own history because they know nothing about America past the day they landed there. :|

[Stormig]

Im a lover not a fighter... does living in a certain country mean you should join the Army? No.. But in other countires you are FORCED into the Army.

Talk is cheap when your life is not at the end of the line!

With that logic, you'd make a good congressman who votes in favour of war, knowing his son is safe, as is his own skin.

[Armo77]

Talk is cheap when your life is not at the end of the line!

With that logic, you'd make a good congressman who votes in favour of war, knowing his son is safe, as is his own skin.

who is talking about war? Not once did I mention the word "war".. I am talking about having a brain and moving to another country if you dont like the one you are living in currently.. Thats what my family did..

[Stormig]

Who said I was living in America?

And jareeda posts to you, too. Level of seriousness in posts was constant until someone rushed in, shouting Allahu akbar. Stay out of my thread if you can't say anything beyond the "love it or leave it," which clearly doesn't apply to me!

[Armo77]

did I make you mad by my presences? Am I too much of an American citizen for you to love me? your no better than any other armenian hating on another armenian just because he/she is different from you.

[Stormig]

Does presence in America actually degrade reading comprehension? I said stay out IF you can't say anything other than love it or leave it - i.e. IF you have nothing serious to say. Clowns are not entertained!

[Stormig]

Controversial "Enola Gay" Exhibit: Interviews Available

Institute for Public Accuracy

915 National Press Building, Washington, D.C. 20045

(202) 347-0020 * http://www.accuracy.org * ipa@accuracy.org

___________________________________________________

 

PM Wednesday, December 10, 2003

 

Controversial "Enola Gay" Exhibit: Interviews Available

 

SAYURI MIYAZAKI, ujeac@igc.org; PAT ELDER, elder@chesapeake.net,

http://www.enola-gay.org

Miyazaki and Elder will accompany Japanese survivors of the atomic bomb

[Hibakusha] as they deliver signatures on a global petition to the

Smithsonian Museum. The petition states: "The Smithsonian National Air and

Space Museum has announced that it has completely restored the B-29 bomber

Enola Gay, which dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima.... The public

display devotes a great deal to the performance characteristics and the

like of the Enola Gay, but is said to restrict itself to a brief reference

to the dropping of the atomic bomb.... Of the 140,000 people estimated to

have died in Hiroshima within that year, 65 percent were women, children

and elderly people.... Deep wounds and radiation-induced handicaps ...

continue to afflict victims.... We request that you also exhibit

photographs and materials showing the damage inflicted by the atomic bomb

that was dropped from this airplane." The petition will be delivered

following a news conference at the National Press Club in Washington on

Friday, December 12 at 9:00 a.m.

 

TERUMI TANAKA, HIROTAMI YAMADA, MINORU NISHINO, TAMIKO TOMONAGA [via John

Steinbach], johnsteinbach@starpower.net

Tanaka is the president of HIDANKYO, the national organization of atom bomb

survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Yamada, Nishino and Tomonaga are

members of the delegation of atom bomb survivors.

 

GAR ALPEROVITZ, garalper@ncesa.org, http://www.bsos.umd.edu/gvpt/alperovitz

Alperovitz is the author of "The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb." He said

today: "The use of the atomic bomb, most experts now believe, was totally

unnecessary. Even people who support the decision for various reasons

acknowledge that almost certainly the Japanese would have surrendered

before the initial invasion planned for November [1945].... As the

criticism [of the bomb] grew, there was an organized, semi-official

response to put it [the criticism] down. The argument was that the bomb was

the least abhorrent choice we had available. The documents available show

that isn't true -- but it was an extraordinarily successful propaganda

effort.... One of the lessons from Hiroshima is how terribly small the

group of people was who made decisions that had incredible world-shaking

implications....[Another] is the way information can be manipulated so that

for 50 years a whole society is taught to believe a myth."

 

PETER KUZNICK, kuznick@american.edu, http://www.enola-gay.org/conference.pdf

Kuznick is a professor at the Nuclear Studies Institute at the American

University and an organizer of the upcoming "Hiroshima in the 21st

Century: Will We Repeat the Past?" conference [saturday, December 13]. He

said today: "We are not opposed to exhibiting the Enola Gay, we welcome any

exhibition that will spur an honest and balanced discussion of the atomic

bombings of 1945 and of current U.S. nuclear policy. Our greatest concern

is that the disturbing issues raised by the atomic bombings in 1945 will

not be addressed in the planned exhibit and that President Truman's use of

atomic weapons will legitimize the Bush administration's current effort to

lower the threshold for future use of nuclear weapons."

 

PHIL WHEATON, phil.wheaton@juno.com,

http://www.enola-gay.org/action/prayer_service.php

Wheaton, an Episcopal priest, will co-host the inter-faith/secular witness

liturgy, "Remembrance, Repentance and Re-Commitment," honoring [Hibakusha]

nuclear radiation survivors on Sunday, December 14 at 3 p.m., at the New

York Avenue Presbyterian Church, two blocks east of the White House.

 

For more information, contact at the Institute for Public Accuracy:

Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020; or David Zupan, (541) 484-9167

[Stormig]

'No President has lied so baldly and so often and so demonstrably'

 

uploaded 10 Nov 2003

 

 

"The intelligence process is a bit like virginity," says Ray McGovern, who worked as a CIA analyst for 27 years. "Once you prostitute it, it's never the same. Your credibility never recovers.

 

"Watching what has happened with Iraq over the past several months has been like watching your daughter being raped."

 

Such is an indication of the extraordinary depth of feeling within the US intelligence community as the Bush administration's basis for the war in Iraq - the weapons of mass destruction, the dark hint of links between Saddam Hussein and al-Qa'ida - has been shown to have been built on air.

 

Mr McGovern worked near the very top of his profession, giving direct advice to Henry Kissinger during the Nixon era and preparing the President's daily security brief for Ronald Reagan. Now he is co-founder of a group of former CIA employees called Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, or Vips for short.

 

What the Bush White House has done, he believes, is far worse than the false premise that dragged the United States into the Vietnam War - a reported second attack on a US destroyer in the Gulf of Tonkin which later turned out not to have taken place. "The Gulf of Tonkin was a spur-of-the-moment thing, and Lyndon Johnson seized on that. That's very different from the very calculated, 18-month, orchestrated, incredibly cynical campaign of lies that we've seen to justify a war. This is an order of magnitude different. It's so blatant."

 

Mr McGovern accuses Mr Bush of an extraordinary act of chutzpah - taking advantage of his authority as President of the United States to make people believe there must be something to his insistent allegations that Iraq possessed potentially devastating weaponry.

 

"Many of us felt there had to be something there ... If this had been another country, one would have written a convincing analysis that this guy is lying through his teeth, that there are no weapons in Iraq. But people thought, the President can't say he knows something if he doesn't. That was persuasive, in a way.

 

"Now we know that no other President of the United States has ever lied so baldly and so often and so demonstrably ... The presumption now has to be that he's lying any time that he's saying anything."

 

It will, Mr McGovern believes, take a change of president and a change of CIA director to even begin to repair the damage done by what he sees as an overt politicisation of the intelligence business. But even that may not be enough.

 

"Unless what has happened in the past year and a half is recognised as a scandal, in which the CIA has been badly abused, then there's no hope," he said. "I pin my hopes mostly on the press these days. Turns out, surprise surprise, that even the US press doesn't like to be lied to."

 

Source: Independent

[Armo77]

Does presence in America actually degrade reading comprehension?

Agian your no better than any other armenian hating on another armenian just because he/she is different from you.

[Stormig]

US wants democracy where it sends people for torture

 

uploaded 10 Nov 2003

 

 

When Ottawa computer expert Maher Arar arrived back in Canada this week after a year of captivity, his account of torture in Syria and Jordan shocked many.

 

Arar, who was seized by American officials in New York during a flight back from a family visit, has called for a full investigation of Canada's role in his ill-treatment, which he said included confinement in a dark, filthy cell, beating and psychological abuse.

 

Arar also encountered another Syrian-born Canadian, Abdullah Almalki, in the Syrian jail, and reported he had received even more severe treatment.

 

For Canada, accusations of complicity in offshore torture and abuse of people suspected of political crimes are unprecedented. And they are directly linked to the worldwide anti-terrorism crackdown following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.

 

But for the U.S., deportation of suspects to countries where torture is conducted by proxy — "rendition" as it is known in American intelligence circles — is part of a larger pattern that is causing alarm, and critics say it's damaging America's image in the international community.

 

"There have been a series of these renditions, mainly to countries in the Middle East," says Tom Malinowski, director of Human Rights Watch's office in Washington. "We don't really know how many people have been sent there, because it's kept highly secret."

 

In the United States, security services are barred from conducting torture on American soil, and the government officially denies any links with torture.

 

Both the United States and Canada are also bound by the International Convention Against Torture, which rules out surrendering citizens to countries that brutally violate human rights.

 

However, intelligence agents, including former CIA operative and author Robert Baer, have admitted in media interviews that turning over suspected terrorists to countries noted for their violent interrogation methods is now common practice in a no-holds-barred war on terrorism.

 

"We are doing a number of (renditions) and they have been very productive," says a Washington Post report this week, quoting a "senior U.S. intelligence official."

 

In a previous interview with the Post, another official was more explicit: "We don't kick the s--- out of them," he says. "We send them to other countries so they can kick the s--- out of them."

 

The most frequently used offshore torture depots are Jordan, Syria, Egypt and Morocco, human rights groups say.

 

Ironically, those countries are frequently criticized by the U.S. State Department in its annual surveys of international human rights.

 

Syria, according to the latest report, commonly uses such methods as "pulling out fingernails, forcing objects into the rectum, using a chair that bends backwards to asphyxiate the victim or fracture the spine."

 

In a speech promoting democracy in the Middle East, President George W. Bush likened Syria's leaders to Iraq's Saddam Hussein, accusing them of leaving "a legacy of torture, oppression, misery and ruin."

 

In Egypt, meanwhile, the State Department noted that suspects are "stripped and blindfolded, suspended from a ceiling or door frame with feet just touching the floor, beaten with fists, whips, metal rods, subjected to electric shocks."

 

In Morocco, an Amnesty International report released this week cites testimony of victims who were "strung up and beaten with metal poles or wooden rods to extract confessions ..."

 

While there are numerous reports of suspects transported and tortured in Mideastern countries, there are also allegations of severe mistreatment of Al Qaeda suspects at the American detention centre of Guantanamo Bay.

 

"Statements made by U.S. officials suggesting that the U.S. government condones the mistreatment and possibly even the torture of prisoners and detainees gravely concerns Amnesty International," says a letter issued by London-based human rights group earlier this year.

 

However, the use of offshore torture for political ends is not new for Washington.

 

In the 1960s, the U.S. was accused of sponsoring a campaign of torture in Vietnam, carried out by local mercenaries against suspected Viet Cong guerrillas.

 

Investigative reports later spoke of a continuing program for "intelligence training for friendly foreign countries," which included torture techniques used against America's Cold War enemies, such as Latin American communist guerrillas. In the '70s, Washington-trained police and militaries were responsible for alleged human rights violations in the region.

 

In the 1990s, Washington reportedly began a covert practice of "rendition," using governments in Nigeria, the Philippines, Kenya and South Africa. After Sept. 11, the number of people shipped to offshore locations to extract information by means that are banned in the U.S. appears to have increased, although the secrecy surrounding the practice has prevented rights organizations from monitoring exact figures.

 

"Silence or indifference from the United States will be perceived as an indication that this country condones torture and other egregious abuses," says Amnesty International.

 

Source: Toronto Star

[Stormig]

World Socialist Web Site www.wsws.org

 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

WSWS : News & Analysis : North America

The Maher Arar case: Washington’s practice of torture by proxy

By Keith Jones

18 November 2003

Back to screen version | Send this link by email | Email the author

 

Maher Arar’s poignant account of his treatment by US, Jordanian and Syrian authorities constitutes a devastating exposure of the illegal, arbitrary and barbaric methods Washington is employing in the name of combating terrorism. It also raises vital questions as to the role that the Canadian government and its police and intelligence agencies played in delivering Arar into the hands of his torturers. (See: Canadian authorities complicit in Arar’s illegal detention and torture.)

 

A Canadian citizen of Syrian birth, Maher Arar was deported by the US government to Syria via Jordan, with the understanding that the Syrian regime would torture him on Washington’s behalf. The US codename for this practice of torture by proxy is “extraordinary rendition.”

 

Officially, US authorities deny that they place persons in the hands of regimes that engage in torture. To do so contravenes both international and US law. But in response to the outcry over the Arar case, US officials have vigorously defended Washington’s practice of contracting out interrogations to regimes notorious for their brutality.

 

A “senior US intelligence official” told the Washington Post that there have been “a lot of rendition activities” since September 11, 2001, “...and they have been very productive.” The Post cites another unnamed US official as saying, “Someone might be able to get information we can’t from detainees.” A third US official previously told the Post: “We don’t kick the s—- out of them. We send them to other countries so they can kick the s—- out of them.”

 

Torture, in any circumstances, is abhorrent and illegal. But in the case of Arar, the US had no credible evidence linking him to any terrorist organization. His torture by Syrian military personnel was a US state security-commissioned fishing expedition.

 

The 33-year-old computer and telecommunications technician was detained by US immigration officials at New York’s JFK Airport in September 2002, while returning to Canada from Tunisia, where he had been visiting his wife’s family. During his subsequent 12-day interrogation by immigration, New York City Police and FBI personnel, Arar was strip-searched, placed in shackles, denied food or sleep for a 28-hour stretch, injected with an unknown substance, and bullied into signing documents he was not allowed to read. For the first five days, Arar was not permitted to see a lawyer or inform anyone, including his family or the Canadian consulate, as to his whereabouts. “They told me I had no right to a lawyer,” says Arar, “because I was not an American citizen.”

 

Arar had frequently travelled to the US for his work, and only a few months earlier had had his US work-permit extended. He was thus shocked when his interrogators swore and screamed at him, demanding he confess to terrorist ties. The basis of their claim was guilt-by-association and wild extrapolation. Arar is an acquaintance of another Syrian-Canadian who is believed to know an Egyptian-Canadian whose brother was purportedly mentioned in an al-Qaeda document.

 

Throughout, Arar vigorously denied his interrogators’ allegations. When he realized he might be deported to Syria, he protested that as someone who had left that country so as not to have to perform compulsory military duty and who had family members who had been jailed for alleged ties to the Muslim Brotherhood, he was certain to be tortured if returned there.

 

What Arar soon found out was that torture was exactly what his US captors wanted.

 

Since the claim that Arar was implicated in terrorism was nothing more than innuendo, suspicion and anti-Arab prejudice, US authorities could not hold him indefinitely. After all, he had not been captured in Afghanistan, where the US has ignored the Geneva Conventions and applied its own rules for dealing with “enemy combatants.” Nor was he even technically in violation of US immigration rules, as were most of those caught up in the post-September 11 US government-dragnet.

 

Nonetheless, US authorities were determined not to cede to Arar’s request that he be deported to Canada, the country where he had resided for most of the past 15 years, where his wife and two children live, and whose passport he was travelling on. Had they done so, they undoubtedly could have called on the Canadian police and intelligence agencies, with whom they cooperate on a daily basis, to continue to investigate Arar. (Indeed, US government officials have said that it was on the basis of intelligence supplied by Canadian police and security agencies that they acted against Arar.) Instead, they chose to render him to Syria, so he could be detained indefinitely without trial and his interrogation could continue using other, more savage, methods.

 

In the absence of his lawyer and Canadian consular representation, an immigration “hearing” was held at which Arar was told he was being expelled to Syria. “They told me,” recalls Arar, “that based on classified information that they could not reveal to me, I would be deported to Syria. I said again that I would be tortured there. Then they read part of the document where it explained that INS was not the body that deals with Geneva Convention regarding torture.”

 

Arar was then transported to Washington, where he was placed in the hands of a “special removal unit” and flown in a small jet to Amman, Jordan.

 

Once in the custody of Jordanian security personnel, he was blindfolded, shackled and driven round for half a day, during which he was frequently physically attacked. “Every time I talked,” reports Arar, “they beat me.” Finally he was delivered to the Syrian border, from whence he was taken to a Syrian military prison.

 

Arar would spend a total of 10 months in captivity in Syria. For much of this time, he was held in solitary confinement in a tiny cell that he has likened to a grave. “It had no light, it was three feet wide, it was six feet deep, it was seven feet high... There was a small opening in the ceiling...and from time to time, the cats peed through the opening into the cell... I had moments I wanted to kill myself.”

 

Arar was repeatedly assaulted with an electric cable, threatened with even more severe forms of torture and forced to endure the screams of fellow prisoners. “Interrogators constantly threatened me with the metal chair, tire and electric shocks. The tire is used to restrain prisoners while they torture them with beating on the soles of their feet. I guess I was lucky, because they put me in the tire, but only as a threat.”

 

The full text of Arar’s November 4 press statement, which recounts his experience in harrowing detail, can be viewed at this address.

 

The chargé d’affaires at Syria’s US embassy, Imad Moustafa, has admitted that Syria imprisoned Arar at the US’s request: “They told us he was an al Qaeda activist, so we took him and put him in custody.”

 

That Arar was being held and tortured by the Syrians on behalf of Washington is underscored by the timing of his release. Arar was allowed to return home to Canada in mid-October, shortly after the US had endorsed an Israeli bombing raid against Syria.

 

Washington routinely levels accusations of torture against regimes that have run afoul of the US’s economic and geo-political interests. But, as the Arar case demonstrates, such condemnations are utterly hypocritical. The Bush administration feels no more bound by international and US laws that forbid torture and rendering persons into the hands of torturers, than it does by international and US constitutional prohibitions banning detention without trial and “pre-emptive” wars.

 

 

 

 

 

 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

Copyright 1998-2003

World Socialist Web Site

All rights reserved

[Stormig]

Canadian authorities complicit in Arar’s illegal detention and torture

By Keith Jones

18 November 2003

Back to screen version | Send this link by email | Email the author

 

Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chrétien has condemned US authorities for their treatment of Maher Arar—the Syrian-born Canadian citizen whom the US deported to Syria so he could be detained without charge and tortured. “It is completely unacceptable and deplorable,” declared Chrétien the day after Arar had held a press conference to explain how US officials had deported him to Syria over his vehement objections and how in Syria he had been held in a tiny cell and savagely beaten.

 

Washington’s treatment of Arar was abhorrent and criminal. (See Washington’s practice of torture by proxy: the Maher Arar Case.) Chrétien’s denunciation of the conduct of US immigration and security officials, however, fits to a tee the old adage, “he doth protest too much.” Especially since Chrétien has categorically refused to call a public inquiry into the role Canadian authorities played in Arar’s ordeal.

 

US officials, including Secretary of State Colin Powell, have said that the US only detained Arar because Canadian police and security agencies—the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) and probably also the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS)—had identified him as a terrorist suspect. Yet Chrétien has brushed this aside, saying anything that happened to Arar was the fault of US immigration, police and intelligence agencies.

 

Arar became suspicious that he had been fingered by Canadian authorities when his US interrogators revealed an extensive knowledge of his life in Canada. “They were consulting a report while they were questioning me,” Arar told a November 4 news conference, “and the information was so private, I thought this must come from Canada.”

 

Arar’s US interrogators confronted him with a copy of the lease he took out on an Ottawa house in 1997 that had been co-signed by another Syrian-born Canadian, Abdullah Almalki. They also told him that he had been observed eating a meal in an Ottawa fast-food restaurant with Almalki.

 

The subsequent conduct of Canadian authorities indicates that Canada’s security and diplomatic establishment, or at the very least important elements of it, condoned, if not actively sought, Arar’s deportation to Syria.

 

* Although the Canadian government ultimately protested against Arar’s detention in Syria, CSIS agents reportedly travelled to Damascus to obtain information from the Syrian regime about the “confession” its interrogators had beaten out of him.

 

* In recent weeks, information about Arar’s forced confession has been leaked to the Canadian media. The source of the leak has not been identified, but undoubtedly it can be traced back to elements within the RCMP and/or CSIS who are anxious to discredit Arar, the better to defend their own role in fingering him.

 

* According to the Toronto Star, the US Ambassador to Canada, Paul Cellucci, reportedly told a private audience that Canada wanted Arar detained in Syria.

 

* The Canadian consular official who met with Arar while he was being detained in New York dismissed his warning that he was in danger of being deported to Syria.

 

* In August, Canadian Foreign Minister Bill Graham reported that a Canadian representative had met with Arar in Syria and Arar had rejected suggestions he had been tortured. Arar says this is utterly untrue. In fact, he put himself in extreme danger by screaming to the Canadian representative that he was being abused and had been tortured. Graham has ordered an internal inquiry to determine why Arar’s account differs so radically from that of the representative who met with him.

 

Further questions about Canada’s role are raised by the fate of the aforementioned Abdullah Almalki. An engineer and Canadian citizen, he was arrested in May 2002 while visiting his family in Syria and has been held without charge by Syria ever since. Arar encountered Almalki while in detention in Syria and reports that he has been subjected to even worse treatment than he was.

 

There is every reason to believe that Almalki was arrested on the basis of suspicions raised by the Canadian intelligence authorities—suspicions the Canadian government now concedes were unwarranted. Writes Toronto Star columnist Thomas Walkom, “Abdullah Almalki, a Canadian citizen, is being tortured in a Syrian prison because the security services of his own country passes on unproven suspicions to Damascus—either directly or, more likely, through the US. ... If this is what intelligence sharing means, it must stop right now.”

 

Chrétien has tried to justify his refusal to call a public inquiry by saying that the Arar case has been referred to the RCMP’s Public Complaints Commissioner. Yet the Commissioner, Shirley Heafey, herself recently complained that the RCMP is not co-operating with her on terror-related enquiries, hiding behind the sweeping, new Anti-Terrorism Act.

 

 

 

 

 

 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

Copyright 1998-2003

World Socialist Web Site

All rights reserved

[Stormig]

Ashcroft defends US victimization and abuse of Maher Arar

By Keith Jones

4 December 2003

Back to screen version | Send this link by email | Email the author

 

US Attorney General John Ashcroft has unequivocally defended the US government’s treatment of Maher Arar—the Syrian-born Canadian whom US authorities seized, then delivered to Syria, where he was held without trial and repeatedly tortured.

 

At a November 19 meeting with Canadian Solicitor-General Wayne Easter, Ashcroft said US authorities have no reason to apologize to either Arar or Canada. Arar’s seizure—he was effectively kidnapped while transferring planes at New York’s JFK Airport during a return trip from Tunisia to Canada—and his deportation to Syria were, insisted Ashcroft, a necessary element in the Bush administration’s war on terrorism.

 

Ashcroft himself refused to meet with reporters at the conclusion of the meeting with his Canadian counterpart. Instead, he left it to Easter to explain the US position to the press: “Mr. Ashcroft assured us that, from his perspective ... there were no laws broken. He feels that they [uS authorities] were operating under their mandate in the interests of their laws and national security.”

 

In keeping with the role played by Canadian police and intelligence agencies throughout the Arar affair, Easter painted the actions of US authorities in the best light. While saying it was unfortunate that Arar’s rights as a Canadian citizen had been violated, he added, “I just wonder what kind of decision one would make given all the facts and information” the US authorities “had before them.”

 

The next day Ashcroft told reporters that prior to transferring Arar to Syria via Jordan, the US had obtained assurances from the Syrian government that Arar would not be mistreated. This is a transparent lie meant to cover up the abuse of Arar’s most elementary human rights and the Bush administration’s complicity in torture and its wanton disregard for the law.

 

Unnamed senior US officials have repeatedly told the Washington Post that since September 11, 2001, the US is routinely “rendering” terrorist suspects to countries that practice torture, including Egypt, Syria and Jordan, so as to obtain information that could not be elicited through less aggressive interrogation methods.

 

Such a practice is a flagrant violation of both international and US law, which expressly prohibits delivering someone into the hands of a government that practices torture. Yet shortly after Arar gave a press conference at which he detailed the torture to which he was subjected in Syria and charged the US with complicity, the Post again cited US officials defending the practice of “rendering.” According to a “senior intelligence official” the practice of torture by proxy has “been very productive.”

 

As proof of his claims that the US was in no way party to Arar’s torture, Ashcroft pointed to a statement by the chargé d’affaires at Syria’s US embassy denying Arar was in any way mistreated during his almost year-long incarceration in Syria.

 

That Ashcroft should tout this as evidence is extraordinary given the US government’s routine denunciations of the Syrian regime for lying and torture. Just two weeks prior, President Bush had derided the Syrian regime for “a legacy of torture, oppression, misery and ruin.”

 

Moreover Ashcroft’s is a case of highly selective citation, since in the very same interview the Syrian chargé d’affaires said that the US had repeatedly promised but failed to provide information tying Arar to Al Qaeda or any other terrorist group. Nonetheless, Ashcroft and US authorities continue to insist that their suspicions of Arar were well founded and to insinuate that he is an Al Qaeda operative.

 

If Ashcroft is now trying to disclaim any responsibility for Arar’s abuse it is because of a growing public outcry over the Bush administration’s flagrant disregard for elementary legal procedures and human rights in its purported anti-terrorist war and fears senior officials, possibly himself included, could be implicated in criminal wrongdoing.

 

Given the character of US-Syrian relations, the decision to transfer Arar necessarily had to involve senior members of the Bush administration. The order to deport Arar to Syria—rather than to Canada, the country on whose passport he was traveling and where his wife and children reside—was signed on Ashcroft’s behalf by the then deputy attorney general, Larry Thompson.

 

 

 

 

 

 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

Copyright 1998-2003

World Socialist Web Site

All rights reserved

[Stormig]

In the name of national security

 

If Maher Arar was in fact a threat to the US, why...

 

November 4, 2003

The Iranian

 

When times are hard and a society is overwhelmed with fear and uncertainty logic is often the first casualty. What was rationally explained yesterday loses transparency and becomes opaque and blind faith born out of insecurity replaces the need to know. The case of Syrian-Canadian Maher Arar and his yearlong ordeal is the case in point.

 

Last September Maher Arar, a Canadian citizen of Syrian decent, was stopped and taken into custody at New York's JFK airport by US immigration officials. Mr. Arar, en route to Montreal after vacationing in Tunisia, was anxious to get back to his family. Within days Arar was put on a plane and deported to Syria, a country he had not visited in nearly 18 years.

 

At no point he was charged or given an official reason as to his arrest. Arar and his wife were highly educated upwardly mobile new immigrants, not the kind of shadowy figures often painted of terrorist suspects. He has a master's degree in Computer Engineering and his wife is a PhD in Mathematics.

 

What was alarming about the Arar case for many Canadians of Middle Eastern descent was that his Canadian citizenship and passport bought him no protection. He was simply discarded like a piece of rubbish, his fate of no consequence to US Attorney General John Ashcroft and Home Land Security Secretary Tom Ridge.

 

The Canadian government made some noise and its Foreign Affairs Minister Bill Graham made some remarks publicly about putting questions to Colin Powel but Americans, poised for a confrontation with Iraq and wearing the cloak of indignation tightly around their collective selves were in no mood to bother with a puny nuisance like the Arar case.

 

For all intent and purposes Maher Arar was a forgotten man. In the months that followed Arar's wife, Monia Mazigh, with the help of some progressive lawyers, embarked on a one-woman crusade on Canadian media to make her husband's plight public. She asked pointed and disturbing questions, which mostly remained unanswered.

 

Syrian government had informed the Canadians that they intended to charge Arar with membership in the Moslem Brotherhood, a banned organization in Syria. Mr. Arar's wife categorically denied that her husband had any links to Al Qaeda or any other terrorist organization and demanded the Canadian government to secure his release from Syrian jail.

 

Last month Maher Arar was finally released to the custody of Canadian government and was reunited with her family. In a press conference, flanked by his lawyer and his wife, a tired and weary looking Arar recounted torture and interrogation in Syrian jail and demanded a public inquiry as to the hows and whys of his case.

 

So far no public inquiry is forthcoming. Mr. Ashcroft and Canadian solicitor General Wayne Easter met and discussed the issue but claiming national security, revealed little about the case. However it now appears that the Canadian government, at least its intelligence branch, played a part in Arar's deportation.

 

Certain intelligence reports about Arar were conveyed to the FBI by the RCMP (Royal Canadian Mounted Police), which may have played a part in his detention at the New York's JFK originally. All Mr. Ashcroft was willing to say was that it was deemed in the national security interest of US to send Arar back to Syria.

 

And here is were the break down in simple logic appears. If Maher Arar was in fact linked to Al Qaeda or the Moslem Brotherhood and a threat to the US (and so far no one has taken this officially back) why was he not put under custody in the US? It's true he is not a US citizen but neither are tens of so-called enemy combatants in Camp X. If Arar is to be deported to anywhere why not to a friendly country like Canada where he lives and is a citizen of.

 

The Canadian intelligence already had a file on Arar and could deal with him accordingly. Why would the Americans send a "terror suspect", someone who could potentially provide them with valuable information, to Syria, a "rouge state", one on US State department's list of so-called terrorist states providing financial support and military bases to Hezbaollah and Hamas? Is it possible that the Americans wouldn't at least notify Canadian officials before deporting one of their citizens to a potentially life threatening situation?

 

Any which way you look at it, there isn't much logic in all of this unless one is willing to have faith in the magic wand of "national security" to explain all. Because when we are scared we relinquish our right to know and to logic and are asked by the state to trust it completely.

 

The cynical conclusion is that neither the Americans nor the Canadians had conclusive evidence connecting Maher Arar to Al Qaeda or any other terror networks but decided to relieve themselves of his case by simply dumping him into Syrian hands. Let the Syrians do our dirty work. Torture may be a dirty word in the US and Canada but apparently common currency in Syria. Given the right set of "stimulants", either Mr. Arar would fess up or end up dead. Either way he's off our hands. Politics indeed makes strange bedfellows.[ii]

 

Notes

 

The single piece of incriminating evidence against Mr. Arar seemed to have been a rental agreement co-signed by a man currently in custody in Syria under suspicion of association with Al Qaeda. According to Arar, he had been friendly with the man's brother through a computer business he had owned at one point. As is the case with most ethnic groups doing business within the community is common practice. Originally the man's brother was supposed to be the co-signer on Arar's rental agreement, but that day the hand of fate interfered, he was held up by another business and sent his brother instead. The situation is best described, well... Kafkaesque.

 

[ii] A comprehensive view of the Arar case can be found on The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's site at www.cbc.ca/news/background/arar/

[Stormig]

Agian your no better than any other armenian hating on another armenian just because he/she is different from you.

Once again, you are sounding like that 15-year-old kid. I don't hate you and I don't hate people for being clowns. Just quit being clown enough to say that the opposite of being uncritical means going Allahu akbar. Dude, grow up, I'm not going to baby-sit you! Afford yourself a nanny!

[Stormig]

The US Terrorism Plot That the Media Ignores

 

http://www.thememoryhole.org/terror/tyler-terror.htm

 

>>> In May 2003, white supremacists in Texas were caught with a sodium cyanide bomb, other bombs, illegal weapons, hate literature, fake I.D., and chemicals, including hydrochloric acid and nitric acid. In mid-November, three people pleaded guilty to related charges, while seized documents indicate that there are other co-conspirators at large. The feds have served "hundreds of subpoenas across the country," and the plot has been included in the President's daily intelligence briefings.

 

But most of us have never heard about it. The only media that saw fit to report about this terrorist plot within the US were a few newspapers and TV stations in Texas. The Web-based news outlet WorldNetDaily ran a story about it, but Google News shows that there hasn't been a word in the New York Times, Washington Post, LA Times, CNN, Fox News, MSNBC, or any other big media outlet. Why have the media decided that this is a non-story? It's hard to say, but we can say with certainty that if Muslims had been caught with these weapons of mass destruction, fake I.D., gas masks, and books on making explosives, it would've been front-page news for days.

 

Below, we've collected every article about this ignored plot that we could find. All images come from CBS 11 in Dallas/Fort Worth.

 

WorldNetDaily story | watch Texas TV news report at this page

 

check Google News for latest on William Krar

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CBS 11 Investigates Poison Gas Plot

Nov 26, 2003, 3:30 pm US/Central

CBS 11, Dallas/Fort Worth [Link, includes video]

By Robert Riggs

With Investigative Producer Todd Bensman

 

Federal authorities this year mounted one of the most extensive investigations of domestic terrorism since the Oklahoma City bombing, CBS 11 has learned.

 

Three people linked to white supremacist and anti-government groups are in custody. At least one weapon of mass destruction - a sodium cyanide bomb capable of delivering a deadly gas cloud - has been seized in the Tyler area.

 

Investigators have seized at least 100 other bombs, bomb components, machine guns, 500,000 rounds of ammunition and chemical agents. But the government also found some chilling personal documents indicating that unknown co-conspirators may still be free to carry out what appeared to be an advanced plot. And, authorities familiar with the case say more potentially deadly cyanide bombs may be in circulation.

 

Since arresting the three people in May, federal agents have served hundreds of subpoenas across the country in a domestic terror investigation that made it onto President Bush’s daily intelligence briefings and set off national security alarms among the country’s most senior counter-terror officials.

 

William J. Krar, originally from New Hampshire, last week pleaded guilty in Tyler federal court to possession of a chemical weapon near the East Texas town of Noonday. He faces up to ten years in prison. His common-law wife, Judith Bruey, pleaded guilty to lesser weapons charges and faces up to five years in prison.

 

Also arrested this past Spring was Newark, New Jersey resident Edward Feltus. The New Jersey Militia member has pleaded guilty to attempting to purchase fake United Nations and Department of Defense identity cards from Krar.

 

All three have steadfastly maintained their silence, even though talking could reduce their prison sentences, and the investigation has stalled for now. Evidence seized and the fact that none of the defendants will talk has given rise to speculation that unknown conspirators may be still be involved in a broader plot to use Krar’s home-built chemical weapons, government officials say.

 

“One would certainly have to question why an individual would feel compelled to stockpile sodium cyanide, hydrochloric acid, nitric acid, acetic acid, unless they had some bad intent,” said Assistant U.S. Attorney Wes Rivers, who is prosecuting the case. “They certainly had the capacity to be extremely dangerous.”

 

Terrorism investigators suspect that Krar, who has paid no federal income taxes since 1988, made his living as a traveling arms salesman who pedaled illicit bomb components and other weapons to violent underground anti-government groups across the country.

 

Sources familiar with the investigation say authorities especially fear that Krar may have manufactured more than one sodium cyanide bomb and sold them. After a traffic stop earlier this year while Krar was traveling through Tennessee, state troopers seized sodium cyanide among other weapons, one government source confirmed.

 

During the same stop, troopers found notes in Krar’s car.

 

One of the notes titled “Trip” recommends, “You will need cash, pre-charged phone card, spare gas can and all planning in place.”

 

Another note titled “Procedure” appears to represent instructions for carrying out some kind of covert operation. It lists code words for cities where meetings can take place at motels. Other codes appear to be warnings about how close police might be to catching the plotters. “Lots of light storms are predicted,” for instance, means “Move fast before they look any harder. We have a limited window remaining.”

 

The same note goes on to recommend ways to divert pursuers and suggests, “We want all looking in the wrong direction.”

 

Since the attacks of September 11, 2001, counter-terrorism agencies have been consumed by national efforts to ferret out U.S.-based foreign terrorist cells whose members hail from the Middle East. Federal investigators were not looking for white supremacist groups when they stumbled across Krar by accident.

 

He drew the FBI’s attention when he sent a package of counterfeit ID’s for the United Nations and Defense Intelligence Agency to Feltus’ New Jersey home earlier this year. The package was mistakenly delivered to a Staten Island man, who opened it and called police.

 

A note found inside and signed by Krar stated, “Hope this package gets to you O.K. We would hate to have this fall into the wrong hands.”

 

The discovery led to surveillance operations in and around Tyler, and then search warrants that turned up the Sodium cyanide bomb and other illegal weapons at locations controlled by Krar.

 

Little is known about Krar and Bruey.

 

Two years ago, the couple quietly set up business as a gun parts manufacturer at a remote storage locker in Noonday, Texas. Krar apparently has similarly operated his businesses under the radar for years in other states before coming to Texas. As he did in Tyler, Krar rented local post office boxes and storage units.

 

In one affidavit for a search warrant, an FBI agent noted that Krar was “actively involved in the militia movement…a good source of covert weaponry for white supremacist and anti-government militia groups in New Hampshire.”

 

Until now, the little town just south of Tyler was best known locally for the sweet onions grown there.

 

Teresa Staples, who owns the storage facility, said Krar pretended to buy and sell army surplus goods at flea markets. Only later, when FBI agents swarmed the place, did she learn that the surplus goods hid dangerous chemicals and weapons.

 

“Why did they pick such a small storage facility? Why did they pick this town, because I know they’re from up north,” she said. “How did they find us?”

 

This was not the first time that Krar has drawn the attention of federal investigators. In 1995, the ATF investigated Krar and another man on weapons charges. The other suspect told authorities at the time that he and Krar shared an abiding hatred of the federal government and had been planning to bomb government facilities, court records show. But the suspect later recanted the story about plotting terror attacks with Krar. Krar denied the allegation and was not arrested, according to records.

 

According to a more recent FBI affidavit, on the day of the 9-11 terrorist attacks, Krar raised suspicion at a New Hampshire storage unit he was renting. An employee called the FBI that day and reported that Krar was “wicked anti-American.”

 

While authorities work for a new break in the case, some counter-terrorism experts question whether the government might be overlooking dangers closer to home while fighting the War on Terror in the Middle East.

 

The Southern Poverty Law Center, which monitors domestic hate groups, says the number of openly violent groups dropped from more than 1,000 to about 100 after the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing because of negative public sentiment. Groups that call East Texas home include the Ku Klux Klan, the Aryan Nations and Christian Identity.

 

In 1997, the Dallas FBI broke up a terror plot by members of the Ku Klux Klan to blow up a Wise County power plant.

 

Former Dallas FBI Special Agent in Charge Danny Coulson was involved in the nation’s first stand-offs with domestic anti-government groups and mounted some of the first intensive domestic terror investigations. He cautioned that authorities should take care not to forget about domestic groups while concentrating on foreign ones.

 

“It’s scary when you look at their capabilities,” he said. “Look at the vulnerabilities of our society. We don’t have to concern ourselves only with foreign terrorists, but we need to concern ourselves with domestic terrorists too. And these guys are very dangerous.”

 

 

(MMIII, Viacom Internet Services Inc. , All Rights Reserved)

 

 

 

Judith Bruey

William J. Krar

 

 

 

 

 

TYLER MAN, COMPANION PLEAD GUILTY IN FED COURT

 

By: ANNE WRIGHT, Staff Writer, November 13, 2003

Tyler Morning Telegraph, Link

 

A Tyler man linked to anti-government and white supremacist groups pleaded guilty Thursday to possessing the chemical weapon sodium cyanide, and his female companion admitted to possessing a cache of illegal weapons.

 

In a plea bargain between his attorney and the government, William Krar, 62, admitted in Tyler federal court to possession of sodium cyanide and other chemicals for the purpose of creating a dangerous weapon.

 

FBI agents, tipped off last year by a cross-country mailout, raided a Noonday storage facility, where they found the chemicals and numerous firearms, as well as literature detailing the use of sodium cyanide to make a chemical weapon.

 

The literature described the making of highly toxic, poisonous cyanide gas, Assistant U.S. Attorney Wes Rivers said in court. Other materials found in the warehouse depicted white supremacist and militant beliefs, authorities said.

 

Krar faces 108 to 135 months in prison, according to federal sentencing guidelines and a plea bargain between Rivers and the defendant's attorney, Tonda Curry.

 

"You understand, you will probably go to prison for around 10 years," U.S. Magistrate Judge Judith Guthrie told Krar, as he nodded in acknowledgement.

 

"I hope after you serve your time and are back in society, you'll find peace to be here," Judge Guthrie said.

 

Krar and co-defendant Judith Bruey, 54, who faces up to five years in federal prison, will be sentenced by U.S. District Judge Leonard Davis after pre-sentence investigations by the U.S. probation office.

 

Ms. Bruey, also of Tyler, pleaded to information and waived indictment for conspiracy to possess machine guns, firearms not registered by the government and a 9 mm semi-automatic gun with an obliterated serial number, and the interstate transport of those weapons, as well as silencers for them. The defendant also agreed to give up 78 firearms and ammunition to the government.

 

Attorney Johnny Ward, sitting in for Ms. Bruey's court-appointed lawyer Eric Albritton, told the judge his client was told she faced 57 to 60 months in prison and is prepared for sentencing. When asked by Rivers, Ms. Bruey said she had intended "to accomplish the same purpose in the conspiracy" as Krar. She told Judge Guthrie that Krar never coerced her into conspiring with him.

 

"I hope that when this part of your life is over, the rest of your life is more productive and law-abiding," Judge Guthrie told Ms. Bruey.

 

A third co-defendant, Edward Feltus, 56, of New Jersey previously pleaded guilty to aiding and abetting the transportation of false documents and also awaits sentencing. A batch of false documents Krar mailed to Feltus alerted federal agents who began investigating the trio last year.

 

The package contained false identification documents, including North Dakota and Vermont birth certificates, a Social Security card, a Defense Intelligence Agency ID and a United Nations Multinational Force ID card.

 

Federal agents intercepted the package after it accidentally ended up at a household in Staten Island, N.Y.

 

On Thursday, Matthew Orwig, U.S. attorney for the Eastern District, complimented the FBI; the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives; the Army Criminal Investigation Division and the Defense Department Criminal Investigative Service.

 

"We live in a safer world because of the efforts of these agencies," Orwig said.

 

Anne Wright covers Smith County government and courts. She can be reached at 903.596.6284. e-mail: news@tylerpaper.com

 

©Tyler Morning Telegraph 2003

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tyler resident admits having chemical weapons

 

Associated Press, in Fort Worth Star-Telegram [Link]

Posted on Thu, Nov. 13, 2003

 

TYLER, Texas - A 62-year-old Tyler man pleaded guilty Thursday to one count of possessing a dangerous chemical weapon after investigators discovered the components needed to make lethal cyanide gas at a storage facility he rented.

 

William J. Krar was charged with possessing sodium cyanide, a toxic chemical. Investigators also found strong acids in Krar's storage facility, which, when mixed with sodium cyanide, form extremely lethal cyanide gas, the U.S. Attorney's office said in a release.

 

Krar's co-defendant, Judith L. Bruey, 54, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to possess illegal weapons.

 

Prosecutors said they found a large quantity of sodium cyanide and hydrochloric, nitric and acetic acids in the storage room Krar shared with Bruey.

 

Investigators also found numerous illegal firearms, literature detailing the use of sodium cyanide to make a chemical weapon and literature depicting white supremacist and militant beliefs, the Tyler Morning Telegraph reported in its Friday editions.

 

Investigators found the chemicals and other materials in April while investigating Krar on an unrelated incident in which a package he mailed to an address in New Jersey was accidentally delivered to a residence in Staten Island, N.Y., in January 2002. The package contained false identification documents and was reported to authorities.

 

Krar faces nine to 11 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. Bruey faces a maximum of five years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

 

 

 

 

 

 

FBI Reveals Guns, Chemicals, Fake ID's

 

Tyler Morning Telegraph/April 14, 2003 [Link]

By Angela Macias

 

A Tyler man accused of selling false identification cards and keeping suspicious materials in a local storage facility will remain in jail pending his trial.

 

U.S. Magistrate Judge Harry McKee ordered William J. Krar, 62, to be detained after hearing testimony from an FBI agent regarding the defendant's questionable activities, including the alleged sale of fake United Nations Multinational Force Observer and Defense Intelligence Agency identification cards.

 

Last week's search of a Noonday storage facility frequented by Krar unearthed multiple containers of chemicals and prompted local officials to contact agents in Washington, D.C.

 

Authorities believe they found nitric acid in the storage unit. A package labeled sodium cyanide and several other chemicals could not be positively identified, said FBI Special Agent Bart LaRocca. Sodium cyanide could be mixed with acid to produce a deadly gas, he said.

 

Ten containers were taken back to Washington for further examination and won't be confirmed until later this week, he said.

 

Machine guns, more than 100,000 rounds of ammunition, pipe bomb materials, binary explosives and reading materials, including "The Turner Diaries," "Anarchist Cookbook" and articles from white supremacist groups, were also found in the storage unit, LaRocca said.

 

A search of a U-Haul truck found at Krar's home on Oak Spring Road also led authorities to more guns, a silencer, powder sodium cyanide and blank identification forms. Despite finding the unusual items, agents don't believe Krar was planning to commit terrorism, LaRocca said.

 

"I have no specifics of a plot," he said.

 

Defense attorney Greg Waldron attempted to show the weapons and military-related materials were used in Krar's business.

 

Krar runs IDC America, which makes gun parts and sells weapons. Although agents monitoring a mailbox rented by Krar's employee found legitimate business transactions being made, the defendant hasn't reported an income to the Internal Revenue Service since 1988, LaRocca said.

 

Authorities began watching the Tyler mailbox used by Krar after a package allegedly intended for a New Jersey militia member landed in other person's hands.

 

A parcel containing bogus birth certificates, a social security card, United Nations Multina-tional Force Observer and Defense Intelligence Agency identification cards were delivered to the wrong person, who notified police, LaRocca said.

 

Enclosed with the items was a letter allegedly from Krar, which read, "hope this package gets to you okay, we would hate to have this fall into the wrong hands," according to court documents.

 

The militia member told authorities he sent photos of himself to Krar. Krar then created the false documents for the militia member, an affidavit states.

 

Authorities seized a computer they believe Krar used to created the fake forms of identification. They are analyzing the hardware, LaRocca said.

 

Suspicious activity involving Krar has been noticed by officers around the country.

 

A Tennessee state trooper found atropine injections, a nerve gas antidote, on Krar when the defendant was arrested in January.

 

Marijuana, various weapons, a false birth certificate and credit card issued to "William Franco" also were found in his rental car. Notes detailing what authorities believed could be a covert operation were also discovered, according to court documents.

 

Krar told authorities the notes were to help his girlfriend escape her ex-husband. He also dismissed the fake certificate, saying it was made as a joke.

 

The credit card was issued under his mother's last name, because Krar didn't want salesmen to harass him, court documents state.

 

A fire in a New Hampshire storage locker led officers to Krar, who had weapons and ammunition stored there, court documents state.

 

An employee with another New Hampshire storage facility Krar stored items in described him as "wicked anti-American," an affidavit states.

 

"She said Krar used to say things to her such as the United States government was corrupt and he hated the United States government and all of the cops," court documents state.

 

Before Krar moved to Texas, federal agents in New Hampshire noticed known militia members frequenting his business.

 

LaRocca said Krar was holding militia meetings there. But on cross-examination, LaRocca said Krar's relations with militia member may be related to business since they are usually associated with the purchase of weapons.

 

Assistant U.S. Attorney Wes Rivers said he would present Krar's case to a grand jury in May.

[Stormig]

US media, Ashcroft silent on conviction of right-wing terrorists in Texas

Conspirators built chemical bomb

By Bill Vann

9 December 2003

Back to screen version | Send this link by email | Email the author

 

The US government and media continuously bombard the American public with scare stories about terrorist threats. The “war on terrorism” is invoked by the Bush administration to justify every facet of its policy—from the war in Iraq, to the abrogation of civil liberties, to economic measures designed to further enrich America’s financial elite.

 

Bush has declared that the fight to eradicate terror around the globe is the overriding mission of his administration. Yet, a recent study has found that in the more than two years since September 11, 2001, the number of defendants receiving substantial jail sentences on terrorism-related charges has actually declined compared to the two previous years.

 

According to the study by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC), a nonpartisan research center at Syracuse University, of the 184 people convicted of terrorism over the last two years, 171 received either no prison time or less than one year in prison.

 

The median jail sentence for all those convicted on such charges was just 14 days. For the most part, the light sentences reflect a lack of evidence linking the indicted individuals to actual terrorist acts or conspiracies to carry out such acts. In case after case, prosecutors have had to accept pleas on minor charges.

 

Given this unimpressive track record, one would think that the conviction of two individuals in a terrorism-related case involving actual “weapons of mass destruction” and a conspiracy to carry out large-scale terrorist attacks on US soil would be major news.

 

The threat was serious enough to be included regularly in the presidential daily briefings and to trigger a nationwide FBI manhunt. Yet, outside of Texas, the case remains virtually unknown. The reason for the silence is clear.

 

The convicted individuals were not Arab or Muslim immigrants, nor could they be linked to any Islamist groups. Rather, they were native-born US citizens connected to the extreme right.

 

William J. Krar, 62, pleaded guilty last month in a Texas federal court to possession of a chemical weapon, a charge punishable by up to life in prison. He received an 11-year sentence. His common-law wife, Judith Bruey, pleaded to a lesser charge of conspiracy to possess illegal weapons and faces up to five years in prison.

 

A third individual, Edward Feltus of New Jersey, is in custody in connection with the case, accused of receiving false identification cards for the United Nations and the US Defense Intelligence Agency from Krar. Feltus has also pleaded guilty and is awaiting sentencing.

 

According to a statement by the US Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Texas, “Krar accumulated a large quantity of sodium cyanide and acids such as hydrochloric, nitric and acetic acids.” It noted that the chemicals are “extremely lethal.” Under the proper conditions, a chemical bomb using these materials could kill hundreds. The statement said in addition that a search of Krar’s home turned up “multiple illegal weapons including machine guns, silencers, destructive devices, thousands of rounds of ammunition and a handgun with an obliterated serial number.”

 

An affidavit submitted by the FBI to obtain a search warrant described Krar as someone “actively involved in the militia movement ... a good source of covert weaponry for white supremacists and anti-government militia groups in New Hampshire.”

 

According to KTVT, the CBS affiliate in Dallas-Fort Worth, federal authorities seized “at least one weapon of mass destruction—a sodium cyanide bomb capable of delivering a deadly gas cloud” as well as “at least 100 other bombs, bomb components, machine guns, 500,000 rounds of ammunition and chemical agents.”

 

The station reported that Krar had been the subject of government attention since 1995, when he and another man were investigated on weapons charges. The second suspect told the authorities that Krar had planned to bomb federal facilities. This was the same year that right-wing militia-connected conspirators used a truck bomb to demolish the federal building in Oklahoma City, killing 168 people. After the second suspect recanted this claim, the government dropped the case.

 

It was evident from the quantities of chemicals and other materials recovered by the authorities that Krar and his collaborators were running a bomb-making facility out of a storage facility in the small east Texas town of Noonday. Federal investigators told KTVT that they suspected Krar may have been selling chemical weapons and bomb components to extreme right-wing groups around the country. Neither he nor the other two people in custody divulged any information about their activities to authorities.

 

The television station reported: “Evidence seized and the fact that none of the defendants will talk has given rise to speculation that unknown conspirators may still be involved in a broader plot to use Krar’s home-built chemical weapons, government officials say.” Included in the material seized in the case were copies of far-right literature as well as detailed notes indicating planning for attacks with other co-conspirators.

 

Federal authorities have reportedly issued hundreds of subpoenas nationwide in an attempt to track down other chemical weapons that may have originated with Krar.

 

The silence of the media on this case echoes that of the Bush administration itself. Had the defendants been Arab or Muslim immigrants, there is little doubt that the administration would have organized a nationally televised press conference by US Attorney General John Ashcroft and Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge to claim credit for foiling a major terrorist plot.

 

Publicizing a conspiracy by the extreme right, however, cuts across the administration’s aims on two counts. First, it diverts from the principal tactic pursued by the Bush White House ever since September 11: exploiting alleged terrorist threats to justify US military aggression first against Afghanistan and then against Iraq. Second, the fascistic politics of the defendants present a major problem because of the political ties of the Bush administration and the Republican Party to extreme right-wing elements, including militia fanatics and white supremacists.

 

The virtual blackout of the Texas case follows a pattern established with the anthrax attacks that claimed five lives beginning in October 2001. Initially, the media devoted blanket coverage to the attacks, as attempts were made to attribute them to either Osama bin Laden or Iraq.

 

As the facts began to emerge, however, it became clear that the principal targets of the deadly anthrax letters were the media and the Democratic leadership in Congress, suggesting that their most probable source was the homegrown fascistic right. Tests on samples of the anthrax further indicated that whoever was responsible had obtained the materials from a US military facility. The media’s response was to drop the story. Two years later, no one has been charged with these fatal terrorist attacks.

 

The case in Tyler, Texas constitutes a serious warning. It demonstrates that fascistic elements like Krar and his associates have both the capability and motivation for carrying out a major terrorist attack in the US.

 

Moreover, the blackout of this case suggests that if such an attack were to take place, both the government and the media could well attempt to blame it on foreign terrorists in order to further the administration’s foreign policy agenda and provide the pretext for even more sweeping attacks on democratic rights.

 

Given the affinity between the politics of these terrorists and those of extreme right-wing layers within the Republican Party, the question arises: could such an attack be in preparation as part of a provocation aimed at keeping the Bush administration in power?

 

 

 

 

 

 

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