November 29th, 2010
PressTv- Iran’s President has questioned the recent leaked documents obtained and published by the Wikileaks website, saying the US administration “released” material intentionally.
In response to a question by Press TV on Monday over the whistleblower website’s “leaks,” President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said “let me first correct you. The material was not leaked, but rather released in an organized way.”
“The US administration released them and based on them they pass judgment …. [The documents] have no legal value and will not have the political effect they seek,” the Iranian chief executive added at the press briefing in Tehran.
Ahmadinejad stressed that the Wikileaks “game” is “not worth commenting upon and that no one would waste their time reviewing them.”
“The countries in the region are like friends and brothers and these acts of mischief will not affect their relations,” he added.
Talks with the West
The president announced that aside from Brazil and Turkey a number of other countries may take part in the new round of talks between Iran and the P5+1 — Britain, China, France, Russia, the US, plus Germany.
Human rights
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“They (Western powers) trample on the dignity of man, their identity and real freedom. They infringe all of these and then they call it human rights,” Ahmadinejad said.
Earlier this month, the UN General Assembly’s Third Committee accused Iran of violating human rights regulations.
The 118-member Non-Aligned Movement and the 57-member Organization of the Islamic Conference have condemned the resolution against the Islamic Republic.
“In 2005, the human rights [issue] got a new mechanism in the United Nations … human rights was pushed away and human rights was used for political manipulation,” Secretary General of Iran’s High Council for Human Rights Mohammed Javad Larijani told Press TV following the vote on the resolution.
This is while the United Nations Human Rights Council reviewed the US human rights record for the first time in its history. The council then issued a document making 228 suggestions to the US to improve its rights record.
IAEA ‘leak’
The president said that Iran has always had a positive relationship with the International Atomic Energy Agency but criticized the UN nuclear agency for caving under pressure from the “masters of power and wealth.”
The president said due to this pressure the IAEA has at times adopted “unfair and illegal stances” against the Islamic Republic.
“Their recent one (IAEA report) is better than the previous ones and is closer to the truth but still all the facts are not reflected,” he added. “Of course the latest report also has shortcomings, for example all [of Iran’s nuclear] information has been released and these are secret and confidential documents belonging to the country.”
Ahmadinejad said since Iran was following a policy of nuclear transparency, it did not care about the leaks, but called the move ‘illegal.”
New world order
“The world needs order … an order in which different people form different walks of life enjoy equal rights and proper dignity,” the president said in his opening speech before taking questions form Iranian and foreign journalist.
The president added that the world was already on the path to setting up this order.
Iran isolation
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When asked to comment on the US and Western media claims that Iran has become highly isolated in the region despite an active diplomacy with Persian Gulf littoral states, the president said the remarks were part of the “discourse of hegemony.”
“In the hegemonic discourse, it seems that concepts and words take on different meanings than those offered by dictionaries,” Ahmadinejad said.
“When they say they have isolated Iran, it means that they themselves are isolated and when they say Iran is economically weak, it means that it has strengthened,” the president reasoned.
When they say there is a dictatorship somewhere, it means that country is really chosen by the people and vise a versa, the president further noted, adding, “I do not want to name names.”
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December 1st, 2010
WikiStink
Susan Abulhawa Dissidentvoice.org
Over a quarter of a million diplomatic cables, marked – “secret” , “confidential”, or “unclassified” – to and from the US State Department have been “leaked” to the public, presumably by a whistleblower. On the surface, it seems like the sort of thing that restores power to the people. It arms us all with knowledge and reminds those in power that they must answer to the public.
Then you pause to think. And that’s when the holes in this narrative become obvious.
Although WikiLeaks claims to provide a counter balance to the decades of disinformation served up in heaps by the “old media”, it chose to allow the vetting of these documents by these same outlets. Other highly respected media outlets, like al Jazeera and various independent media, were excluded. I find that odd, for starters.
If we take a look at the content of the cables themselves, the most remarkable thing to come out of these secret and confidential memos is what they do not contain. Granted, only 290 have actually been released so far. But it seems far from a coincidence that nearly every cable to and from Arab states released thus far has to do with villainizing Iran and mum’s the word on most major diplomatic hooplas of the past few years.
Take for example the bombshell briefing by a senior military officers to Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Admiral Michael Mullen earlier in the year. The team was dispatched by Commander General David Petraeus to brief the Pentagon on intelligence that Israeli intransigence in the peace process was jeopardizing American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan and that America was perceived as weak, ineffectual, and unable to stand up to Israel. Such political commentary from the highest echelons of the military was unprecedented and when news of this briefing broke, you can bet there was a significant diplomatic flurry. Yet a simple search of Petraeus’ name in the cablegate database on the Guardian website only turns up cables indicating that Arab countries were eager for an attack on Iran, which coincidentally happens to bolster Israel’s drumming for more war.
You can’t even find Vice President Joe Biden’s name in the keyword search even though Israel’s announcement of the construction of more illegal Jewish-only settlements in East Jerusalem on the eve of Biden’s visit to Tel Aviv amounted to an epic public spanking of Obama. Subsequent statements from the White House were as harsh as America ever dares to be with Israel, although they did not approach Obama’s reported ire over the matter. Thus far, there is not a single cable on the matter.
If you search cables originating in Dubai, all you’ll find are those denouncing and accusing Iran in titles like “Arab states scorn ‘evil’ Iran”, “AbuDhabi favors action to prevent nuclear Iran”, or “Emiratis fret over Iranian meddling”. This is quite amazing considering that the biggest diplomatic crisis this year occurred after a senior Hamas leader was assassinated in Dubai. The evidence and the world’s collective finger pointed at the Mossad and several diplomatic fallouts ensued when it was confirmed that Israel had forged foreign passports of the hitmen. And yet, there is not a word about this in any of the cables released so far. Instead, everything referencing the UAE or originating from Dubai only discusses “evil Iran”, much like the cables referencing Gen. Petraeus.
The list goes on. For all of Israel’s well known subterfuge (to put it mildly) – their espionage against the US; their persistent requests for money, weapons, special favors, and political cover; their well documented crimes against Palestinians; their mafia tactics of assassinating leaders, intellectuals, and scientists across the globe; and their US-based powerful lobby, AIPAC, which was the center of an FBI investigation that found their senior officers passing sensitive and classified US intelligence to Israel – there is nothing referencing any of this in the memos to and from the US State Department in the cables thus far released.
Something else to note.
Someone with access to hundreds of thousands of classified communications and with the ability to move them without detection must have exceptionally high security clearance. He or she must be on the far upper end of the ladder. Why would individuals like that risk their careers, possibly their lives, just to embarrass the US, presumably their own country?
Whistleblowers tend to be people who obey the call of their conscience and moral codes to expose crimes and injustices committed. But there is nothing of the sort in this “leak”. Even more absurd is the notion that Manning, a soldier, leaked all these documents while in custody and under surveillance.
Finally, does anyone find it odd that while most world leaders are quietly bracing themselves for embarrassment and diplomatic repercussions, Benjamin Netanyahu is confidently speaking and gloating about how Saudia Arabia has urged attacking Iran? I sure do.
There are still thousands more cables to be reviewed and redacted by the good old boy network of ‘old media’ and I hope that the cables they release in the coming days and months will prove my suspicions moot. I’m willing to keep an open mind until we’ve seen the full leak. In the meantime, what we know so far does not add up and frankly smells rotten.
Susan Abulhawa is the author of Mornings in Jenin, a work of historic fiction. Read other articles by Susan, or visit Susan’s website.
