United States

US Immunity to Top Bill at Afghan Assembly

On November 10, hundreds of people took part in a demonstration in Kabul organized by a group calling itself the Front for National Unity and Opposition to US Military Bases. A spokesman for the movement, Wahid Mozhda, told IWPR that Afghans were being led unawares into a wholly one-sided arrangement.

The Chilcot Inquiry Sinks into the Sand

There is no more serious decision that a government can take than a declaration of war, and there is no more serious test of a democracy than the ability to hold its leaders to account over why and how such decisions are taken, especially when a war is declared on false pretences and results in a tragic and bloody disaster of the magnitude of the Iraq War.

US Atrocities in Afghanistan

US drones murder Afghan civilian men, women and children. American grounds forces do it up close and personal.

US inflicted death, torture and other atrocities reflect daily life. Ordinary Afghans suffer most. They struggle to survive. American aggression is one of history’s greatest crimes.

War criminals remain unpunished. Accountability is denied. Conflict persists. It’s Washington’s longest war. It’s longer than WW I and II combined. It shows no signs of ending.

Trillions of dollars go mass slaughter and destruction. They’re spent for unchallenged global dominance.

Quitting Over Syria

The release of the White House “Government Assessment” on August 30, providing the purported evidence to support a bombing attack on Syria, defused a conflict with the intelligence community that had threatened to become public through the mass resignation of a significant number of analysts. The intelligence community’s consensus view on the status of the Syrian chemical-weapons program was derived from a National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) completed late last year and hurriedly updated this past summer to reflect the suspected use of chemical weapons against rebels and civilians.

Friends in high places

You won’t have heard of the British-American Project, but its members include some of the most powerful men and women in the UK. Officially it exists to promote the ‘special relationship’, but it has been described as a Trojan horse for US foreign policy. Even its supporters joke that it’s funded by the CIA. Should we be worried?

US blocks publication of Chilcot’s report on how Britain went to war with Iraq

Although the Cabinet Office has been under fire for stalling the progress of the four-year Iraq Inquiry by Sir John Chilcot, senior diplomatic sources in the US and Whitehall indicated that it is officials in the White House and the US Department of State who have refused to sanction any declassification of critical pre- and post-war communications between George W Bush and Tony Blair.

Reflecting on Rescuing Stranded Starfish and Abolishing Medical Debt

Ah yes, the medical industry: the complex that generates enough unpaid debt for its “clientele” that fully 60% of all bankruptcies can be attributed, in large part, to unpaid medical services. One in seven Americans is presently being pursued by bill collectors – and the bulk of their work is that of chasing after medical debt.

Why Iran Nuclear Talks Failed and Why They Will Get Tougher

The chance for a first preliminary agreement between Iran and the six powers (US, UK, France, Germany, Russia and China) to resolve the decade-long conflict over Iran’s nuclear program was lost during the weekend because of a deliberate French policy of preventing agreement at the behest of Israel and the Obama administration’s lack of commitment to reaching a comprehensive settlement of the issue.