Navi Pillay is UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. She’s a reliable imperial tool. She betrays her mandate. She does so consistently.
She disgraces the office she holds. She twists vital truths irresponsibly. She substitutes misinformation rubbish.
She serves Western interests exclusively. She’s up to her old tricks again.
Her new report is titled “Report on the human rights situation in Ukraine.” It’s infested with lies. It whitewashes what’s most important to reveal.
In short, to be a successful corporate journalist with high public visibility, two of the most important attributes are to direct one’s scepticism in the required direction – towards state ‘enemies’ – and to overlook or play down Western crimes. But perhaps the most important asset is the ability to believe sincerely in the essential ideological framework that drives Western government policies and public pronouncements: that ‘we’ are committed to making the world a better place.
A popular truism is that “the world changed” following 9/11. But what has changed? According to the great whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg, a silent coup has taken place in Washington and rampant militarism now rules. The Pentagon currently runs “special operations” – secret wars – in 124 countries. At home, rising poverty and hemorrhaging liberty are the historic corollary of a perpetual war state. Add the risk of nuclear war, and the question begs: why do we tolerate this?
It’s becoming obvious that the global elite believe that they can act with total impunity. They understand that the western corporate media will never question, let alone report on, the obvious conflict of interest. They no longer feel the need to disguise efforts to gobble up Ukraine’s natural resources. The rabbit hole of corruption runs deeper by the day.
This is a common and disastrous theme in contemporary society. As long as we are willing to perceive, or deem ourselves responsible for, only one small part of our world, the suffering of the world as a whole can be overlooked, or declared beyond our job spec: ‘I’m an oil executive, it’s not my job to protect the climate.’ ‘I’m an arms manufacturer, it’s not my job to prevent people killing each other.’ ‘I’m a science writer, it’s not my job to comment on my government’s war crimes.’
Ultimately, this report contains so many contradictions that it is clear that it is no longer possible for Washington to hide its game. Why ignore the role of Abdelhakim Belhaj in Libya? If not to hide his role in the conquest of the country by NATO and in the attack on Syria. Why ignore the financing of Al-Qaeda by embezzled Turkish public funds by the Prime Minister? If not because this country is a NATO member. Why blame Hamas as a terrorist organization against Israel and ignore that it is domiciled in Qatar? If not because Washington’s policy vis-à-vis the Muslim Brotherhood is uncertain. Why ignore the collections of the Kuwaiti Minister of Justice? if not precisely because they finance Al- Qaeda in Syria. Why ignore the role of Prince Bandar bin Sultan, known as “Bandar Bush”? other than because he was acting on behalf of the CIA.
Why did the US media not report any of this? Because they did not want the American public to see any possibility other than the US government official line, which is that the post-coup government in Kiev and its supporters represent the legitimate and democratic will of the people and anyone who protests against that government or its supporters is a Russian agent and a terrorist.
War is Peace. What was known as a famous quote from George Orwell’s fiction 1984 has become a reality. Or maybe it is still fiction if you consider that the mainstream media is making up reality on a daily basis.
But what makes this propaganda utterly unforgiveable is that Vote No Borders is not a grassroots campaign at all but a government organized campaign which has mysteriously acquired start-up cash of 400,000 pounds with no declared origin.
We need to find some way to poke holes in the mainstream media, so our fellow citizens can be more fully informed before they are persuaded, a la Iraq, by intelligence “fixed around the policy,” to risk war with Russia. To borrow from a common Chinese expression: This would come to a no-good end.
The extraordinary thing is that Blair is somebody so hate-filled he wants to see yet more hatred, killing and violence. It is worrying that the establishment media are so happy to promote his view without providing any balancing opinion. I comfort myself that the real motive of this silly speech was that, other than his media acolytes, absolutely nobody cares what he is saying. It wasn’t so much a speech as a public display of ADD.
on the whole, the media critics boosted by big media — inward-facing ombudspersons and outward-facing journalists on a media beat — have been conformists who don’t step outside the shadows cast by the institutions paying their salaries. And they’re not inclined to question the corporate prerogatives of other media firms; people in glass skyscrapers don’t throw weighty stones.
