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British anthropologist jeremy keenan on the dark sahara americas56in Africa

British Anthropologist Jeremy Keenan on “The Dark Sahara: America’s56in Africa”
Dark-sahara-web

As Secretary of State Hillary Clinton continues her seven-nation tour of Africa, we hear from British anthropologist Jeremy Keenan. He traces AFRICOM, the US military command in Africa, to a 2003 kidnapping of European tourists. The hostage taking was widely blamed on Islamic militants thought to be affiliated with al-Qaeda, but Keenan argues that the Bush administration and the Algerian government were the ones responsible.

Guest:

Jeremy Keenan, Professor of social anthropology at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London. His latest book is The Dark Sahara: America’s56in Africa. Its sequel, The Dying Sahara, will be released next year.

AMY GOODMAN: Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has emphasized that her seven-country tour of Africa is intended to promote democracy, fight corruption, and boost US investments in African trade and agriculture.

We turn now to another issue that’s widely expected to be discussed on every stop: AFRICOM, the US military command in Africa, which has been publicly opposed by every country on the continent except Liberia.

Now Secretary Clinton will not be visiting the countries in and around the oil- and gas-rich Sahara desert—Mali, Niger, Chad, Algeria and Mauritania. But a new book by British anthropologist Jeremy Keenan argues this area is crucial to understanding the birth of AFRICOM and the Bush administration’s expansion of the global56into Africa.

Keenan is a professor of social anthropology at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London and has spent over four decades working in and writing about this region. He traces AFRICOM and the US military concern over al-Qaeda’s presence in Africa back to the February 2003 kidnapping of thirty-two European tourists in Algeria’s Sahara desert. The hostage taking was widely blamed on Islamic militants thought to be affiliated with al-Qaeda, but Professor Keenan argues that the Bush administration and the Algerian government were the ones to blame.

His latest book is called The Dark Sahara: America’s56in Africa. Its sequel is called The Dying Sahara, will be released next year.

Anjali Kamat and I spoke with Professor Keenan last week and asked him to lay out the story.     

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Gush shalom appeals to the supreme court

(source: Press Release (29-06-2010), gush-shalom.org)

Today, Wednesday June 30, the Supreme Court will hear our appeal to dismantle the Tirkel Committee and replace it with a Judicial Commission of Inquiry.

Uri Avnery: "Even if the United States government was convinced to agree to a powerless, meaningless investigation, we as Israeli citizen concerned for the future of our country absolutely don’t agree."

Today, Wednesday June 30, at 9am Judges Naor, Meltzer and Dantziger of the Supreme Court in Jerusalem will hear the appeal of the Gush Shalom movement to dismantle the "Tirkel Committee" and replace it with a Judicial Commission of Inquiry, independent of the government and fully empowered to investigate the circumstances of the Israeli Navy takeover of the Gaza Flotilla. The appeal is signed on behalf of Gush Shalom by former Knesset Member Uri Avnery, and the movement’s spokesperson Adam Keller. It i represented by lawyers Gaby Laski, Lymor Goldstein and Neri Ramati.

The main argument in the state’s answer, presented to the Supreme Court, is that the government has an unlimited power to decide whether or not to investigate a certain event at all, in whose hands to place the investigation and what powers to give the investigators, and that in the past the Supreme Court rejected appeals seeking to impose on the government the creation of a Judicial Commission of Inquiry.

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Flotilla attack reinforced the campaign to de legitimize Isarael

By Richard Falk

(source: Intifada Palestine.com / Richard Falk’s Zspace Page)

Richard Falk is the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967. In 2001 Falk served on a United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Inquiry Commission for the Palestinian territories with John Dugard. He is also an American Professor Emeritus of International Law at Princeton University with a long and distinguished career in academics, politics and law. He recently gave this exclusive and revealing interview to Intifada Palestine’s Elias F. Harb.

Navi Pillay, the UN Human Rights Chief described the Israeli blockade on Gaza as “illegal and must be lifted” and accused Israel of Violating International Humanitarian Law, Also the head of UNRWA operation in Gaza, John Ging, had called upon the UN itself to begin defying the blockade and deliver humanitarian assistance since the blockade is a flagrant direct violation of Article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention that prohibits collective punishment. The state of Israel has stated that the blockade of Gaza is for security purposes; although it is imposing Collective Punishment on 1.5 million, which is a breach of international law and a war crime – Editor Elias Harb

EH: Professor Falk, what is the legality of the Israeli blockade in Gaza in accordance with the San Remo Manual on International Law applicable to armed conflicts at Sea?

RF: The San Remo Manual was drafted by a series of experts and former diplomats over a period between 1987 and 1994 to provide guidance as to the use of force on the oceans and other international waters. The Manual is not a legal document, but represents an informed opinion of specialists as to the agreed content of customary international law applicable to combat situations. The announced intention of the Manual was to be partly declaratory of existing international law and to a degree expressive of desirable developments to deal reasonably with belligerent activities on the seas not addressed in law by past international practice. Because there is no treaty law on the subject the San Remo Manual has been quite influential in filling the gap, a kind of soft law that if accepted by states becomes customary international law over time.

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