My world view changed forever when, after 20 years in the Foreign Office, I saw colleagues I knew and liked go along with Britain’s complicity in the most terrible tortures, as detailed stunningly in the recent Parliamentary Intelligence and Security Committee Report. They also went along with keeping the policy secret, deliberately disregarding all normal record taking procedures, to the extent that the Committee noted:
131. We note that we have not seen the minutes of these meetings either: this causes us great concern. Policy discussions on such an important issue should have been minuted. We support Mr Murray’s own conclusion that were it not for his actions these matters may never have come to light.
The people doing these things were not ordinarily bad people; they were just trying to keep their jobs, comforting themselves with the thought that they were only civil servants obeying orders. Many were also actuated by the nasty “patriotism” that grips in time of war, as we invaded Iraq and Afghanistan. Almost nobody in the FCO stood up against the torture or against the illegal war – Elizabeth Wilmshurst, Carne Ross and I were the only ones to leave over it.
I then had the still more mortifying experience of the Foreign Office seeking to punish my dissent by bringing a series of accusations of gross misconduct – some of them criminal – against me. The people bringing the accusations knew full well they were false. The people investigating them knew they were false from about day 2. But I was put through a hellish six months of trial by media before being acquitted on all the original counts (found guilty of revealing the charges, whose existence was an official secret!). The people who did this to me were people I knew.
I had served as First Secretary in the British Embassy in Poland, and bumped up startlingly against the history of the Holocaust in that time, including through involvement with organising the commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. What had struck me most forcibly was the sheer scale of the Holocaust operation, the tens of thousands of people who had been complicit in administering it. I could never understand how that could happen – until I saw ordinary, decent people in the FCO facilitate extraordinary rendition and torture. Then I understood, for the first time, the banality of evil or, perhaps more precisely, the ubiquity of evil. Of course, I am not comparing the scale of what happened to the Holocaust – but evil can operate on different scales.
I believe I see it again today. I do not believe that the majority of journalists in the BBC, who pump out a continual stream of “Corbyn is an anti-semite” propaganda, believe in their hearts that Corbyn is a racist at all. They are just doing their job, which is to help the BBC avert the prospect of a radical government in the UK threatening the massive wealth share of the global elite. They would argue that they are just reporting what others say; but it is of course the selection of what they report and how they report it which reflect their agenda.
The truth, of which I am certain, is this. If there genuinely was the claimed existential threat to Jews in Britain, of the type which engulfed Europe’s Jews in the 1930’s, Jeremy Corbyn, Billy Bragg, Roger Waters and I may humbly add myself would be among the few who would die alongside them on the barricades, resisting. Yet these are today loudly called “anti-semites” for supporting the right to oppose the oppression of the Palestinians. The journalists currently promoting those accusations, if it came to the crunch, would be polishing state propaganda and the civil servants writing railway dockets. That is how it works. I have seen it. Close up.
A brilliant piece Craig thank you! Are you familiar with Psychologist Phillip Zimbardo’s studies and work on the nature and mechanics of evil. Definitely ties in with your with yourobservations.
The only actual convictions for hate crimes so far were committed by the far right.
The only convictions for actual violence were the Jewish Defense League attacking a Palestinian literature fair.. and MP George Galloway being hospitalized by a Zionist thug.
Despite all the allegations of anti-Semitism, we really aren’t seeing any injuries. Just breaches of PC speech codes or indeed, arguments about what might constitute a speech code breach.
Apparently it isn’t a breach of speech code to call someone racist and or anti-Semitic because you kind of feel that way.
But besides the manifest absence of actual injury, or harm we could consider why the headlines are entirely devoted to the “plight” of Jews in Britain, compared with not just Muslims, but the disabled and the poor. I would much, much rather be an employed Jew in modern Britain than an unemployed anything else.
And there are a couple more reality checks – Who is making these allegations who actively supports other minority groups? Did right wingers who affect to be scandalized ever give a toss about Jewish rights in the past? Who is accusing Corbyn of anti-Semitism, the Blairites, the right, the Israel lobby, who is speaking who wouldn’t be pleased to see him fall under a bus?
“Hate crime” legislation is promoted by the same powerful lobby to protect them rather than vulnerable and soon morphs into “hate speech”. Under this legislation every comment about anything can be perceived as a “hate crime, incident, thought crime”! Once everyone is treading on egg shells about everything the powerful will use the legislation to denounce criticism of them under the guise of defending the weak and this double standard can be enforced because its the powerful who decide who gets prosecuted or fired from academia etc.
“Hate crime” is Orwellian and intended to ban free speech to avoid causing offence! Domestically its similar to the same nonsense promoted internationally by same lobby called Right 2 Protect, which allows for international law to be by-passed to allegedly protect civilians, but which in practice results in countless defenceless countries being destroyed in the name of human rights.
Yes, religionists, specially Muslims. No criticism allowed of Allah, Mohamed the Koran etc. Supported by the Graun, BBC and most other MSM.
GOING UNDERGROUND with Afshin Rattansi
In this episode, we speak to Danny Dorling, professor in the School of Geography and the Environment at the University of Oxford, about his new book ‘Peak Inequality.’ Rosie Oglesby from Feeding Britain explains how British children would starve without charities. Plus, law student and former gang member Kevin Munga talks about poverty and marginalization in a deprived Britain.
https://www.rt.com/shows/going-underground/434612-poverty-marginalization-inequality-britain/
Dorling has interesting things to say.
I think any person with a scrap of humanity would feel anger at the treatment of the Palestinian people by Israel ,just as they would any country under oppression . IT saddens me to see the suffering especially when the Jewish people should from experience know better .
From an e-mail today about the Freedom Flotilla boat seized by the Israelis as it attempted to break the siege on Gaza..
‘This is what happened to the NZ guy:
Unite Union UPDATE: Mike Treen repeatedly tasered by Israeli Occupation Forces, others injured and hospitalised
We have now received a direct report from Mike in Givon Prison.
He was tasered repeatedly by the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) while in the wheelhouse of the Al Awda and subsequently tightly handcuffed. He received injuries to his face and head and was bleeding but is now recovering.
Of Mike’s fellow flotilla members one was tasered in the head, a 69 year old female surgeon received a head injury (Swee Ang – the only Briton) and a senior Canadian passenger was received a foot injury and had to be treated in hospital.
The IOF takeover of the boat conducted by armed and masked soldiers was clearly violent with many passengers & crew assaulted, roughly handled and hit.
Local civil rights lawyers met with all those detained a few hours ago. All their belongings, including their passports have been seized and not returned, despite promises they would if they co-operated.
Despite KiaOra Gaza contacting the New Zealand Hon. Consul in Tel Aviv requesting assistance we are unaware of any contact, visit or action from the New Zealand Government or its representatives to assist. (Ditto about 10 other ‘governments)
The next flotilla boat, the “Freedom” continues to approach Gaza.’
Swee Ang is a British orthopaedic surgeon at Barts Hospital, She entered the camps at Sabra and Shatila and afterwards co-founded MAP. She is a tiny little woman but a force of nature.
https://www.map.org.uk/about-map/about-map MEDICAL AID FOR PALESTINIANS
Here she is on a video 7 years ago. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6WF5FuqS_bQ
Thanks for this. I’ve passed on some detail of this in twitter.
So much love, respect and support. Thank you for your decency and courage, courage to risk your job and “well being” I am really touched by your integrity. We need need enlightened people in journalism and in government and not self-serving parasites.
Unless example is set from the top – which is beyond redemption – there can never be an animal such as a ‘truly independent body’. They are always, without fail, co-opted or corrupted from within by those to whom they represent potential threat. NGOs do the opposite of what their name implies, vast quantities of donated monies are sucked into the vacuum by mega charities and additionally given to corrupt NGOs or politicos. Vast quantities of public monies in countries across the board disappear down the hole as politicians fight over one another to give contracts to pals and jobs to family, public money sucked up by private company after private company while public services go into meltdown – same on the local level. Off – watchers watch the public ans support the corporations. Publication such as medical, farming, science etc are fully behind big pharma not the grass namesake root. Corruption is endemic, pandemic, through the halls of education, academia, police, medicine, law, private and public sector.
And is it any wonder, when the political masters across Europe and the world set the tone. I am witnessing a disgracefully nauseating free for all. No, there is no chance of a truly independent body of any sort. What is truly required is a paradigm shift in consciousness and I believe it will happen, later or sooner. Nature will return to balance and the whole cycle will begin again.
Heck, dunno how that happened, that was supposed to be a reply to Keith, post below….
Joanna,
My feelings exactly. Craig Murray is an honourable and courageous man and the majority of people on this board salute his efforts to keep us informed about the subterfuge, lying and cover-ups that seriously affect our lives. I no longer watch the BBC news – or any TV news, preferring to look at other channels, mainly online, before making up my own mind about what we’re NOT being told. Censorship by omission is alive and well. Craig does the digging and tells it how it is. Others, like John Pilger, Jonathan Cook, Jeffrey St. Clair, do so too. There are many writers who are prepared to put their heads above the parapet, but are ignored by the “usual channels”. We all know why.
Well said Craig, it’s yet more striking evidence that if we want to live in a “rules based system” we must have absolutely free and transparent whistleblowing procedures and truly independent bodies to investigate and prosecute those who are in breach of the “rules”. There can never be rules for them and different rules for us, otherwise we may as well accept that a rules based system is a nonsense and return to “might is right” and the rule of the sword/gun/nuke etc..(although in reality we still live by this maxim as the superpowers constantly remind us)
It was exactly the same with the conquistadors. Many where in dept, just trying to survive etc.
The only planning in this economy is to save the banks & financial institutions. Humans have less rights than animals. And if you treat them worse than animals ? Enact this brutal system where you are forced to sell yourself?
Society is kind of a prostitution machine, Education? preparation for how you’ll sell yourself in later life. What picture of civic duty does anyone expect form this? Of independent critical thought & action? & This is why the right ring so hollow nowadays. Nobody cares about “nation” really. And that lens is such a regressive way to try to organise beneficial human life.
It always amazes me hearing people “afraid of JC” ..One imagines over chaos etc. But the system atm IS chaos. The only planning is “save” the wealthy..
What is “western values” (enacted from above by those who are fine, and who this doesn’t apply to) but ‘Your on your own’. I’m alright jack, etc.
https://twitter.com/AaronBastani/status/1024008528896438272
meh, It sounds possible, but as Varoufakis pointed out you can’t have all export economies. The market economy is like some crazy balancing act. And if you stick to the basic principles you can’t do much.
& how do you compete with others who already produce? …It’s an insane way to organise human life. But it provides some with leverage to maintain it great for them. & to coerce people into acts like craig mentions above.
I realise many live in a totally different realm to the political or financial elite. Sure their are some messed up people, (most who have been in extended contact with state institutions). but people generally operate a each according to need among small groups locally (often isolated cliques that annoy me to hell, but still). It’s clear we’ll need more of this because the state ? Even “left” plans are going to be no magic bullet.
The plan seems to be (correct me if I’m wrong) save capitalism.?
J__ish power is clearly trying to destroy Jeremy Corbyn. The order has gone out, and the tribal hatred against him is rabid. What is the EU-Brexit angle? How does this relate to the upheavals that are expected in the near future both at Westminster and in the amount of food that people in Britain will get in their bellies?
I note that Emily Thornberry (wife of high court judge and daughter of NATO consultant, so basically someone with long experience drinking the blood of the working class) is in the Labour Friends of I__ael.
I forgot to post this link to Thornberry’s speech to the LFI.
“all the trips I’ve made to Israel down the years, it wasn’t just the sunshine that left its mark on me”
No? Your bank account says thank you, does it, Emily?
“for J__ish people, you do not have to live in I__ael, for I__ael to mean the world to you.”
“the rest of the Middle East has much to learn from I__ael.”
Readers will be unsurprised to learn that Thornberry doesn’t say a single thing about the millions of Arab refugees, about the state of I__ael being created by terrorists, about any Z__nazi massacre whatever, or about any other crime, or just a teensy little bit of injustice, that has ever been committed by the fascist state of I__ael. Yet she mentions the victims’ rocket attacks against their oppressors so many times I didn’t even bother to count.
Thornberry is a disgusting I__ael slurper, but she has her work cut out for her to be as big a one as Theresa May, long-term collaborator of the Community Security Trust when she was at the Home Office, and worse. Theresa May went to dine with the Chief Rabbi as soon as she knew she had won the Tory leadership election and would be prime minister. “A number of other guests were also present”, says the J__ish Chronicle. Who might they have been? Any guesses?
Earlier that day, mere moments after the Tory leadership result was announced,she signed a pledge commemorating…can you guess?…commemorating the victims of crimes that Germans committed in Poland, mainly to people who were born in that country and never went outside it, 70 years ago. Did the Rwandans get a look in? Did they f*ck!
If you don’t like massacres of the innocent, look at the most recent ones, because then you might find out why they’re happening and how you can help stop them. Anything else is bullshit. The idea that J__ish people are in some kind of tribal danger today is bullshit to the power bullshit.
N_,
I have just found this link to the Labour Friends of Israel.
http://www.lfi.org.uk/in-parliament/
To be honest it makes me sick to the core.
Owen Smith, Fiend of Israel? Narrow miss there then!
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“FORMER LEADER OF THE LABOUR PARTY RT HON ED MILIBAND MP:
“Labour Friends of Israel plays an incredibly important role in the debate about a peaceful settlement in the Middle East. “They do fantastic work strengthening bilateral relations between Britain and Israel, building links with our sister party in Israel and supporting Israelis and Palestinians working towards a negotiated two state solution.”
That’s A+ for trying but D- for achievement.
I said that on here years back N_ about her being a supporter of Zionist Israel,referring to her as Lady Nugee. I was reprimanded by you know who! Thornberry speaks with forked tongue. Her mother, Sallie, was a lovely lady, very jolly and a one time Labour mayor in Guildford, which is usually a Tory stronghold. Her father departed for the UN in America and her mother brought up Emily and two other children in a council flat. I think her mother would be ashamed of her.
A few years ago I eagerly, there being so little literature on the subject, bought a second hand Oxford University Press publication, The Nazi Persecution of the Gypsies by Guenter Lewy. How annoying to find that it turned out be nothing more than a vehicle promoting the superior and unique suffering of Jews – who appear in the second sentence of the book and in the final sentence. What was really sickening was the persistent references to the ‘fact’ that the Gypsies were not subject to a holocaust – only the Jews were. Dismissive, scornful and utterly tasteless.
I note from the Guardian that it is proposed to geologically deep-bury Britain’s accumulated 750,000 cubic metres of highly radioactive nuclear waste under our National Parks.
No mention is made of Crown lands in this proposal, which is perhaps understandable, but we of course already have a ready-made hole dug for this very purpose, the Channel Tunnel.
After all, post-Brexit, it won’t be needed for anything else.
Apart from getting the train to the European mainland.
Well said. The continuing oppression of the people in Palestine and Gaza is shameful. As an exile from the bastard state called Northern Ireland cobbled together to protect English interests in 1922 I understand the plight of a people robbed of their land and proper democratic representation.
Apart from in bad horror movies, no one is taught to be evil.
Even the guy who goes on to be a murderer is brought up to do good, to seek praise and approval from teacher.
So what happens?
Solzhenitsyn nailed it: ’In order for men to do great evil, they must first believe they are doing good.’
When you have an ideology that tells you that the few must be sacrificed for the greater good, you can pack whole families off to the Gulag.
Some time ago Atlantic magazine ran a piece about British infiltration of the IRA during the troubles.
One of the double agents was Kevin Fulton.
He participated in many murders and bombings because, as he said, you can’t pretend to be a terrorist.
When he on occasion would express disquiet over the phone to his MI5 handler, the handler would always tell him ‘it’s for the greater good, for the greater good.’
Until the time Fulton realised his cover had been blown and he called his handler to arrange an escape. The number had been discontinued.
They’d thrown him to the wolves. Presumably for the greater good.
King of Welsh Noir
I totally agree with you.
Long ago I met an audio record on the web, a young woman called her female handler while their terrorist group was bloked in the house by special forces. That young woman told she was afraid, she hesitated, she was thinking to surrender because she recently knew she was pregnaht.
The female handler then said it is very good news, it is allah blessing and if she died pregnant then heavens are open for her.
Well said and well done!
Thank you, Craig, for an excellent article. It’s hard to be optimistic for the hope that the MSM will become impartial and that a majority of people will start acting for the common good rather than self interest.
I have recently been writing to my Tory MP about the terrible plight of Julian Assange, another one of the few voices speaking for the common good. You can imagine the response I have had from him (an MP with a practically unassailable 29,000 majority). Well, I suppose very important men are always very busy weaving webs and networking.
There is so much truth in this short essay. M. Scott Peck elaborates on several of the points made here in his book: People of the Lie, which examines the dynamics of group evil via the Mai Lai massacre during the Vietnam War.
Until our societies reintroduce morality into business dealings, human interactions and government regulatory procedures for example via education and training from infancy on up, we are doomed as a species.
Now the CST (trustees anonymous on the Charity Commission site) is after dear old Moshe.
https://azvsas.blogspot.com/2018/07/israeli-professor-moshe-machover-is.html
His son, Daniel, is a partner in a firm of solicitors. He has performed pro bono work in the human rights field and fighting injustice.
https://www.hickmanandrose.co.uk/site/people/profile/daniel.machover
‘Machover represents the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights, a Gaza-based NGO, which, according to Anne Herzberg, legal adviser to NGO Monitor, is “leading the lawfare strategy.”[4] He was involved in obtaining a warrant on behalf of Palestinians to arrest Israeli General Doron Almog on a visit to London for alleged war crimes, but was never acted upon by British police.[5]
Machover was also involved in obtaining a warrant from a British court to arrest Tzipi Livni, the foreign minister of Israel, when she visited London. This action failed as Livni received a warning that she would be arrested if she entered Britain.’
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Machover
There was an obvious tip off here.
‘Daniel Machover, a solicitor involved in gaining the warrant on behalf of Almog’s alleged Palestinian victims, said police did not need permission to board the plane. He said they should have told the airline: “You’re on British soil, we’re coming aboad.”
Machover said police could also have stopped the plane taking off until Almog emerged.
The document reveals that before the planned arrest, Scotland Yard consulted West Midlands police and a special police unit called the national Communities Tensions Team, for advice on reaction in the British J.wish community. A “trusted partner” of the police, a J,wish contact, also made inquiries about finding a lawyer for Almog and raising his bail money, once he was arrested. The document says the inquiries were made “discreetly” without Almog’s name being mentioned.
But Machover said it would have been obvious that the inquiries were about Almog: “If you go about making inquiries of this kind, it is easy for someone to put two and two together and work out the inquiries are to do with Almog.”
The arrest warrant was issued at Bow Street magistrates court, central London. It was believed to be the first warrant for war crimes of its kind issued in Britain against an Israeli national over conduct in the conflict with Palestinians.
The attorney general would have had to sanction the war crimes prosecution before it went ahead.
Speaking days after avoiding the arrest, Almog told the Guardian that as he prepared to leave the plane, he was advised to wait by the cabin crew. Israel’s then military attaché in London arrived on the plane to inform him that he faced arrest.’
https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2008/feb/19/uksecurity.israelandthepalestinians
The Tories changed the universal jurisdiction law. Criminals from Israel can come to the UK with impunity now.
CST demands Labour ‘take action’ over anti-Zionist activist’s ‘disgusting slur’ of British J.ws
Moshe Machover accuses ‘pro-Israel lobby’ of driving attacks on Jeremy Corbyn
https://www.thejc.com/news/uk-news/cst-demand-labour-take-action-over-anti-zionist-activists-disgusting-slur-to-british-j.ws-1.467536
The US Congress has been working on a plan to “secure” funding for the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine, but only on the basis that by definition there is a grand total of 40,000 Palestinian refugees in existence. The logic being that “refugee status is not something that can be handed down from generation to generation”.
https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20180731-us-only-40000-palestinian-refugees-left-today/
The initiative is the brainfart of Republican Congressman, Doug Lamborn (Colorado Springs). Typical hard right spectrum Republican. Career highlights; heading up attempts to withdraw funding from National Public Radio (leaving the field free for private, far right propagandists), referring associating with Obama as “like touching a tar baby”, oh, and he supports dog fighting.
If refugee status can’t be handed down from one generation to another, how can a certain country in the Middle East be handing automatic citizenship to Russian nationals (of a specific religious persuasion) with a melanin content such that they would get skin cancer from looking at a holiday brochure.
Evil indeed:
Manchester Arena suicide bomber rescued from Libya by Royal Navy before attack – report :
https://www.rt.com/uk/434701-manchester-bomber-royal-navy/
A government source told the Daily Mail:
“For this man to commit such an atrocity on UK soil after we rescued him from Libya was an act of utter betrayal.”
That remark is sheer, obfuscating evil in itself; it should have been:
“For this man to be enabled to commit such an atrocity on UK soil by rescuing him from Libya was an act of utter betrayal.”
The same betrayal is being perpetrated even as we speak, with the rescue of those lily White Helmets.
Just more of the aftermath of Agent Cameron’s and Sarko’s war on Libya and the destabilization of yet another ME country in the style of Oded Yinon – The Plan for a Greater Israel.
Who knows? Perhaps he was probably working for the UK government all along..
BBC rush to the defence of MI5 with the usual pro-establishment rubbish. Completely miss out the whole LIFG past of Salman Abedi’s extremist father and how he ended up in Manchester. Or why his parents were now in Libya. Or who gave his father a passport so he could leave the UK to get to Libya. But instead opt for a few lines of meaningless waffle followed by a conclusion that MI5 couldn’t have done a thing to stop the Manchester bomber: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-45021513
“Jeremy Hunt warns prospect of no deal Brexit is ‘increasing by the day’ and tells EU Britain will not ‘blink'”.
Dig that word “prospect”. A word like “risk” or “danger” wouldn’t have gone well with the image of the hard man “not blinking” in single combat. Bravo, headline writer at the Torygraph! Nice seeing you at Downing Street this morning. See you at the club later!
Translation: “We’ll starve the British population Biafra-style before we allow Frankfurt to take even 0.01% of the multi-trillion money-fiddling trade away from the City.”
Brexit is, in this sense, a continuation. Except that it will be a lot more than industry that gets sacrificed to the City this time.
The unblinking Hunt has been battle hardened in fighting the terrible enemy within, the notorious junior doctors of the NHS.
I refuse to believe that there are persons on this earth, that are so unique, that they are beyond being held accountable for hurting their fellow human beings.
Don’t mention “gods chosen” that would be anti-Semitic.
Thanks you Craig for some common sense in a world of Fake News.
The Daily Mirror ‘recorded’ what was supposed to be a Radio Four puff-piece about an Edinburgh festival attraction, but it turned into a fairly accurate world-view minute of rant!
https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/996652/Brexit-news-BBC-John-Cleese-Today-UK-media-corrupt-tax
a huge rant from a not evil Python, off to live on an island
Dear Theresa
Brigitte and I would love to see you and Philip down here in our holiday home. Would Friday be OK with you?
Love and kisses
Emmanuel
PS we must get this Brexit thing sorted pdq.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6011373/Emmanuel-Macron-invites-Theresa-holiday-home-south-France-Brexit-talks.html
PDQ, Please Don’t Quit? 😉
or Pretty dammed quick! 🙂
Preach.
Ms Burley and Jon Craig have been giving full welly to the Willsman incident. Luciana Berger commented unfavourably and Yvette Cooper and Tom Watson were quoted. They all say he has to be disciplined, flogged, beaten and hung.etc etc. It’s the worst crime known this century.
Even Eddie Izzard. Only Uncle Tom Cobley is missing from the tirade.
@eddieizzard
58m
I was shocked by Pete Willsman’s outburst and also as a very new member of the NEC surprised that he was allowed to speak that way and that it wasn’t called out. Here’s my statement on reports on the recent NEC meeting.’
https://mobile.twitter.com/eddieizzard/status/1024298525822210048/photo/1
I see Carole Codswallop has had to issue another apology and retraction today.
https://apnews.com/04151c1579724d46a2bda546cb37368d
Last week, Natalia Veselnitskaya, the Russian lawyer who met with President Donald Trump’s son during the 2016 presidential campaign saw her ties to senior Russian government officials laid bare in an Associated Press investigation.
The man behind the disclosures tells the AP that more are coming.
“We have no shortage of material we’re currently evaluating,” Russian opposition figure Mikhail Khodorkovsky said in a television interview last week from his office in central London.
The venue for these recent stories has been Khodorkovsky’s new project, dubbed the “Dossier Center” and launched in November. The center bills itself as an investigative unit and its website features a sprawling, interactive diagram of interconnected Russian officials described as the “main beneficiaries” of Russian corruption.
Khodorkovsky said the center, which the exiled former energy executive is funding out of his own pocket, was born out of frustration with the inability of journalistic investigations to lead to real change in a Russia dominated by his foe, President Vladimir Putin. He wanted the Dossier Center to go beyond the occasional story and gather enough actionable information on the Kremlin’s leadership to bring its members, eventually, to court.
“We understand it’s a long-term ambition,” he said with a smile.
By Khodorkovsky’s telling, the center gets its data from a series of anonymous digital drop boxes. The leaks carry evidence not only of high-level corruption in Moscow but also of the Kremlin’s “illegal attempts to influence Western public opinion and Western politicians,” he said.
If Khodorkovsky’s business model — to receive leaked data anonymously and share it with journalists — sounds a bit like the early days of WikiLeaks, Dossier Center staffers bristle at any comparison.
The Dossier Center says it rejects the indiscriminate information dumps that made WikiLeaks notorious. Its five full-time staff members cross-reference incoming data to verify it and sift through files with an eye toward what might help build a legal case or feed a news story.
great news Ben, I remembered that her name came up in Browder related emails a year or so ago.
is there a possibility that everyone involved is a multi-hatted-secret-squirrel for all sides?
https://disobedientmedia.com/2017/07/leaked-state-department-emails-reveal-connection-to-donald-jr-meeting/
The email, filename 00002215.eml, was sent by Hermitage Capital Management Founder and Director William Browder to the State Department’s Russia Domestic Affairs Division Chief Robert Otto and House Committee on Foreign Affairs staffer Kyle Parker appearing to show the three sharing an image of Veselnitskaya’s house. It is unclear why the individuals were discussing Veselnitskaya’s place of residence, although Browder is renowned for leading calls to establish the 2012 Magnitsky Act, which Veselnitskaya was lobbying against.
Email between State Department employee Robert Otto, a senior staff member from the Committee on Foreign Affairs and the co-founder of Hermitage Capital Management
Since the New York Times July 10 report exposing the meeting, online observers have noted a number of details which they claim shows evidence that Donald Trump Jr. was baited into speaking with Veselnitskaya in order to give his father’s political opponents leverage. The Independent has highlighted Veselnitskaya and publicist Rob Goldstone’s ties to Fusion GPS, the lobbying firm responsible for the notorious dossier of wild and unproven allegations about President Trump which has also been involved with lobbying against the Magnitsky Act. Anatoli Samochornov, the translator who accompanied Ms. Veselnitskaya to the meeting is also a former employee of the FBI according to a press release from 2010.
The Independent link is still here at http://www.independent.co.uk/News/world/americas/us-politics/trump-jr-russian-lawyer-steele-dossier-natalia-veselnitskaya-gps-fusion-a7834541.html it doesn’t mention Skripal or foretell the novichok madness, but it does mention “the phony Steele dossier” a few times
sigh, one day all of this news will be clear, until then we have to wonder who/why is pushing evil fake bovine kaka
Most of these data dumps will probably be with ‘Greetings from Langley’.
Will there be a civil war here in the UK?
I expected the army to be brought into the mix of propaganda and lo and behold! I keep telling everyone I know on Facebook that england will not let go of Scotland and will go to any lengths regardless of any form of collateral damage caused in the process. Uk is not in my mind a democracy it is a plutocracy.
It’s a scarey time and I feel this is steadily getting worse to the point even the BBC aren’t spending any effort on showing their bias. It’s beyond apologies now.
What do you expect to happen as in a chain of events?
The oncoming Brexit disaster, a no deal will see the Emergency Powets act enacted. As civil unrest due to the lack of supplies breaks out.
The army will be moblised and the devolved parliaments will be suspended, and Westminster will take control.
After Brexit we’ll ditch EU laws, erode civil/working rights, dissolve devolved parliaments, deport non Brits, as many as possible, and privatise as much as possible.
It’s all down hill from there on.
A link to the act would help.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergency_Powers_Act_1964
Yes the army had got a role in the post Brexit agenda. Firstly, to distribute food/ration cards, secondly? Shoot all riff raff that dares to raid the walled gardens of the establishment/the Duchy of Cornwalls vast estate.
Yep, we have a problem with mass dissemination of information (actually the mass production, and distribution of spatiotemporal patterns).
At present, it seems that it is possible for the ‘individual’ to have too much influence over the ‘group’ [of individuals].
But what the hell is to be done about it…?