3987-ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES? | View Thread

KABUL — A 22,000-pound bomb dropped by U.S. forces on an Islamic State hideout killed about three dozen militants in eastern Afghanistan, officials said Friday, raising further questions about the already controversial decision to use such powerful ordnance on the battlefield.

In comments Friday in Kabul, Gen. John W. Nicholson Jr., commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, defended the strike as "the right weapon against the right target," and he called the militant hideout "an extensive obstacle to our progress."

U.S. and Afghan troops went on the offensive against a local Islamic State branch in March. The group, which is based in Nangahar province, has staged deadly attacks on civilians but failed to break out of its stronghold in the east.

Nicholson said that the "chain of command allowed me the latitude to make assessments on the ground" and deploy the GBU-43, one of the largest non-nuclear bombs in the U.S. arsenal. Used for the first time in combat Thursday, the weapon "achieved its intended purpose," he said.

U.S. and Afghan officials said no civilians were reported killed and that U.S. and Afghan Special Operations forces reached the site of the attack to assess the damage. According to Afghanistan's Defense Ministry, the militant complex, which was a network of tunnels and bunkers, was destroyed. U.S. forces did not say how many militants might have been killed, but Afghan defense officials put the number at 36.

For its part, the Islamic State-linked Amaq News Agency denied that the bombing caused casualties among the militants, according to the SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors online postings from extremist groups and others. The Islamic State offered no evidence to support its claim.

[U.S. drops 22,000 pound bomb on Islamic State forces in Afghanistan]

"It was a powerful bomb; we felt it several kilometers away," said Khair Mohammad Safi, police chief of the Achin district where the strike took place. Safi, who operates from a neighboring district for security reasons, said he could see flames from the explosion.

"The wave caused by [the blast] was strong. There was a huge fire," he said. "This was the [Islamic State's] main stronghold. They were annihilated. We needed such a bomb for this place."

Achin, along the border with Pakistan, is a restive area where militants have long used the porous border to smuggle weapons and fighters. For nearly two years, it has been the site of fierce fighting between the Islamic State affiliate, known as Khorasan Province, and U.S. and Afghan forces.

Many of the district's roughly 100,000 residents have fled, officials and aid agencies said. Even fighters with the rival Taliban-led insurgency have battled the extremists, who Nicholson said are largely made up of Pakistani and Uzbek militants.

Last week, Army Staff Sgt. Mark R. De Alencar, 37, was killed in Achin by small-arms fire. But earlier this month, the U.S. military said it had already reduced Islamic State-controlled territory in Afghanistan by two-thirds. About half of the group's fighters had been killed, U.S. forces said.

Gen. John W. Nicholson, commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, said the 22,000-pound bomb dropped by U.S. forces on an Islamic State hideout on April 13 was “the right weapon against the right target." (Reuters)

"The use of drones turned out to be very effective against Daesh" in Afghanistan, said Aryan Youn, a lawmaker from Nangahar, using an Arabic acronym for the Islamic State. "If that was the case, why did the United States want to use such a sophisticated and powerful bomb?"

Local residents, she said, are worried about the impact of the explosion on their health and farmland. Achin is a heavily agricultural district.

The Taliban on Friday also issued a statement condemning the strike. Its fighters have been engaged in a years-long insurgency against the government and international forces in Afghanistan.

In a message distributed on the instant messaging app Viber, the Taliban said the United States had “no justification” for using such a powerful bomb during combat operations, calling it a “show” by U.S. forces to persuade the world it is battling the Islamic State.

Former Afghan president Hamid Karzai posted scathing criticism of the U.S. military Thursday on Twitter, calling the operation a “brutal misuse of our country as [a] testing ground for new and dangerous weapons” and calling on Afghans “to stop” the United States.

Brian Murphy in Washington contributed to this report.

(The Wahingto Post)

MOSCOW — Russia, Syria and Iran strongly warned the United States Friday against launching new strikes on Syria and called for an international probe into last week’s chemical attack there.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, who hosted his Iranian and Syrian counterparts at a trilateral meeting in Moscow, denounced last week’s U.S. attack on Syria as a “flagrant violation” of international law and warned that any further such action would entail “grave consequences not only for regional but global security.”

Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem said the meeting sent a “strong message” to Washington. Iran’s Mohammad Javad Zarif emphasized that the participants warned that any unilateral action by the U.S. is unacceptable.

The U.S. has blamed the Syrian government for launching a deadly chemical attack in Khan Sheikhoun that killed over 80 people on April 4, and responded by striking a Syrian air base. Russia has alleged that the victims were killed by toxic agents released from a rebel chemical arsenal and warned against putting the blame on Damascus until an independent inquiry has been conducted.

Moscow vetoed a Western draft U.N. resolution Wednesday, saying it failed to mention the need to inspect the area of the attack.

Lavrov on Friday accused the U.S. and its allies of what he described as attempts to stymie an international probe into the attack. He expressed strong skepticism about a preliminary investigation conducted by the U.N. chemical weapons watchdog, saying that its experts have failed to visit the site and it has remained unclear to Russia where the samples have been taken and how they have been analyzed.

In Russia’s view, the probe conducted by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons should be widened to include experts from many nations, he said.

“If our U.S. colleagues and some European nations believe that their version is right, they have no reason to fear the creation of such an independent group,” Lavrov added. “The investigation into this high-profile incident must be transparent and leave no doubt that someone is trying to hide something.”

Lavrov said the U.S. strike on the Syrian base has undermined peace efforts in Syria and reflected Washington’s focus on ousting Syrian President Bashar Assad’s government. “Such attempts won’t succeed,” Lavrov said.

The three ministers also discussed the beefing up of U.S. forces on Jordan’s border with Syria. Moallem said. He added that Russia, Iran and Syria have “common procedures against any aggression,” but wouldn’t offer any specifics.

Lavrov that Moscow has asked Washington about the purpose of the buildup and received assurances they were there to cut supply lines between the Islamic State group factions in Syria and Iraq.

“We will keep monitoring the issue, since the only possible reason for using military force on the territory of Syria is to fight terrorism,” Lavrov said.

Russia has staunchly backed Assad’s government throughout a civil war that has dragged into a seventh year. It has conducted an air campaign in Syria since September 2015, saving Assad from imminent collapse and helping reverse military fortunes.

Copyright 2017 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

(The Washington Post)

U.N. Peacekeepers Accused of 300 Child Sex Crimes, Most Never Punished

April 13, 2017 at 4:05 pm
Written by Derrick Broze

As the U.N. Security Council votes to remove peacekeepers from Haiti, a new investigation from the Associated Press reveals more than 2,000 cases of sexual abuse and exploitation by United Nations peacekeepers.

(ANTIMEDIA) The United Nations was formed following the second World War as an effort to unify the world and prevent another global war and catastrophe. Since its founding, the U.N. has been plagued with controversy and criticism. Early opponents of the organization feared it was one more step in the direction of a totalitarian world government ruled by criminal heads of state. Others have complained of being forced to fund an organization that seems incapable of preventing war, and in some cases, actually supports warmongers. However, a new report from the Associated Press details one of the most disturbing aspects of this unaccountable international organization: sexual exploitation of children from around the world by U.N. peacekeepers.

The AP investigation looked into U.N. missions from the last 12 years involving peacekeepers from 23 countries. The report reveals a level of depravity previously unheard of from within the U.N. and likely any other government agency. The AP reports that more than 300 of the 2,000 allegations involved children, and only a tiny percentage of the men accused of the crimes received prison sentences. The peacekeepers are not under the U.N.’s jurisdiction, so it is up to their home countries to punish the troops. But these men are rarely held accountable. Coincidentally, on Thursday the U.N. Security Council voted to remove the peacekeepers from Haiti by October 15. Still, the peacekeepers remain active in nations around the world.

“I did not even have breasts,” a young girl known as Victim No.1 told U.N. investigators when describing having sex with close to 50 U.N. peacekeepers when she was between the ages of 12 to 15. Her story is one of the hundreds documented by U.N. officials and investigators. AP interviewed victims and current and former U.N. officials in an attempt to get answers from 23 nations regarding the number of peacekeepers who face allegations of sex crimes and what was done to investigate the allegations.

“With rare exceptions, few nations responded to repeated requests, while the names of those found guilty are kept confidential, making accountability impossible to determine. Without agreement for widespread reform and accountability from the U.N.’s member states, solutions remain elusive,” APreports.

The AP obtained an internal U.N. report that states at least 134 Sri Lankan peacekeepers exploited nine children in Haiti in a sex ring from 2004 to 2007. Following the release of the U.N. report, 114 peacekeepers were sent home, but none of them ever saw the inside of a prison.

Other Haitian women told the U.N. investigators they were raped and/or participating in what is sometimes known as “survival sex” for little money. A young victim known as “Victim No. 7” actually received a phone call from a U.N. peacekeeper while being interviewed by investigators. V07 explained that soldiers share the numbers of their rape victims with incoming troops.

The internal U.N. report also showed that from 2004 to mid-October 2007, nine Haitian children were sexually exploited by around 134 current and former Sri Lankan military members. Another incident involved the rape of a mentally disabled 13-year-old by three Pakistanis working with the U.N. peacekeepers in Haiti. Peter Gallo, a former U.N. investigator familiar with the case, told AP that the U.N. officials went to Haiti to investigate the claim, but the young boy had been kidnapped by the Pakistanis and prevented from speaking.

These crimes against humanity, especially against children, are disgusting in the worst way. These individuals prey on children and other at-risk populations, force themselves upon them, and then get away with the full protection of the U.N. because of a lack of jurisdiction and an apparent lack of interest in pursuing justice. Unsurprisingly, the AP’s report this week is not the first to document similar crimes by peacekeepers.

“Imagine if the U.N. was going to the United States and raping children and bringing cholera,” Haitian lawyer Mario Joseph told the AP. “Human rights aren’t just for rich white people.” Joseph is currently trying to get child support for about a dozen Haitian women left pregnant by peacekeepers.

When confronted with the facts of the AP’s investigation, Atul Khare, head of the U.N. department in charge of peacekeeper discipline and conduct, said the U.N. believes it is “advancing in the right direction” and working to improve assistance provided to victims. Khare also claimed the U.N. is working with member states to hold the rapists and child predators accountable.

Ironically, while the Associated Press was breaking this story, U.S. Ambassador Nikki Haley stated that U.N. peacekeeping made “a great contribution” to Haiti in response to the 2010 earthquake. Haley made no mention of the role of the peacekeepers in sexual exploitation or the spread of cholera that killed 10,000 people due to peacekeeper negligence.

In late March, Betsy McCaughey, a senior fellow at the London Center for Policy Research, wrote an op-ed in the NY Post calling for an end to funding the U.N. peacekeepers. McCaughey noted that “past American presidents have poured billions into UN peacekeeping operations that have propped up autocratic regimes like those in Sudan and Angola.” She also notes that U.N. forces are “notorious” for raping women and children. “Sexual assaults by UN personnel have been documented in Bosnia, Burundi, Cambodia, Congo, Guinea, Haiti, Kosovo, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Ivory Coast, Mali and Sudan,” McCaughey wrote.

Even Voice of America, the propaganda outlet for the American establishment, admitted that many Haitians want the peacekeepers out of their country after 13 years of continuous occupation. Haitians will soon have their way now that the United Nations Security Council has voted to remove the peacekeepers. Unfortunately, the nation has had an issue with children being exploited and raped following the devastating 2010 earthquake. Just one month after the earthquake, 10 American missionaries were jailed for attempting to sell 33 Haitian children. The missionaries claimed they were starting an orphanage when, in fact, the story was a cover for an attempted abduction. Interestingly,former President Bill Clinton stepped in and pulled some diplomatic Jedi mind tricks to help the would-be kidnappers go free.

If United Nations officials, foreign governments, and a former American president refuse to investigate and punish these claims of child abduction, rape, and exploitation, how can we ever expect to put an end to these tragedies? The free hearts and minds of this world must be willing to question the people in power and accept that they do not have the public’s interest at heart.

Creative Commons / Anti-Media / Report a typo

WE WILL GO TO WAR IF TRUMP PROVOKES US, SAYS NORTH KOREA

ON 4/14/17 AT 6:53 AM

U.S. President Donald Trump is making North Korea more aggressive, said North Korea’s vice foreign minister on Friday.

In an interview with the Associated Press in Pyongyang, Han Song-ryol said Trump’s “aggressive” tweets were “making trouble” and creating a “vicious cycle” of tensions on the Korean Peninsula.

"We are comparing Trump's policy toward the DPRK with the former administrations and we have concluded that it's becoming more vicious and more aggressive," he said, referring to North Korea by its official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

“If the U.S. comes with reckless military maneuvers then we will confront it with the DPRK’s pre-emptive strike. We’ve got a powerful nuclear deterrent already in our hands, and we certainly will not keep our arms crossed” in the face of a U.S. pre-emptive strike, he said.

It’s unusual for North Korea to speak so openly about its plans, but tensions with the U.S. are mounting rapidly. The U.S. has sent an aircraft carrier to waters off the Peninsula and in an interview that aired Wednesday, Trump said he was sending an “armada” to North Korea. "We are sending an armada. Very powerful. We have submarines. Very powerful. Far more powerful than the aircraft carrier. That I can tell you,” Trump told Fox Business Network.

Chinese President Xi Jinping called Trump Wednesday and urged him to seek a “peaceful resolution” to the tension.

Shinzo Abe, Japan’s prime minister, warned Thursday that North Korea might be capable of firing sarin-loaded missiles toward Japan. Sarin, an odorless, tasteless nerve agent, can cause death in minutes, and has been used in chemical warfare. In 1995, domestic extremists attacked the Tokyo subway, killing 12 people with the sarin agent and causing temporary blindness in 5,000 others. The Syrian regime stands accused of using sarin gas in the Ghouta suburb of Damascus in 2013, and in an April 4 attack that killed more than 80 people in Syria’s northern Idlib province. With the help of satellite images, experts believe that North Korea will mark the 105th birthday anniversary of the nation’s founder Kim Il-Sung on Saturday with a nuclear missile test, its sixth since 2006.

North Korea’s missiles can already reach Japan, with one landing 300 miles off its coast during a missile test in February.

(Newsweek)

Luis Miguel 1162 61587 Lima	RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES? 4/14/2017 5:58:15 PM
	Massive U.S. bomb in Afghanistan killed 36 from Islamic State, say local officials The Defense Department released aerial footage of the U.S. military dropping its largest non-nuclear bomb, called the GBU-43, on an Islamic State hideout in eastern Afghanistan on April 13. (U.S. Defense Department) By Erin Cunningham and Sayed Salahuddin April 14 at 10:06 AM KABUL — A 22,000-pound bomb dropped by U.S. forces on an Islamic State hideout killed about three dozen militants in eastern Afghanistan, officials said Friday, raising further questions about the already controversial decision to use such powerful ordnance on the battlefield. In comments Friday in Kabul, Gen. John W. Nicholson Jr., commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, defended the strike as "the right weapon against the right target," and he called the militant hideout "an extensive obstacle to our progress." U.S. and Afghan troops went on the offensive against a local Islamic State branch in March. The group, which is based in Nangahar province, has staged deadly attacks on civilians but failed to break out of its stronghold in the east. Nicholson said that the "chain of command allowed me the latitude to make assessments on the ground" and deploy the GBU-43, one of the largest non-nuclear bombs in the U.S. arsenal. Used for the first time in combat Thursday, the weapon "achieved its intended purpose," he said. U.S. and Afghan officials said no civilians were reported killed and that U.S. and Afghan Special Operations forces reached the site of the attack to assess the damage. According to Afghanistan's Defense Ministry, the militant complex, which was a network of tunnels and bunkers, was destroyed. U.S. forces did not say how many militants might have been killed, but Afghan defense officials put the number at 36. For its part, the Islamic State-linked Amaq News Agency denied that the bombing caused casualties among the militants, according to the SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors online postings from extremist groups and others. The Islamic State offered no evidence to support its claim. [U.S. drops 22,000 pound bomb on Islamic State forces in Afghanistan] "It was a powerful bomb; we felt it several kilometers away," said Khair Mohammad Safi, police chief of the Achin district where the strike took place. Safi, who operates from a neighboring district for security reasons, said he could see flames from the explosion. "The wave caused by [the blast] was strong. There was a huge fire," he said. "This was the [Islamic State's] main stronghold. They were annihilated. We needed such a bomb for this place." Achin, along the border with Pakistan, is a restive area where militants have long used the porous border to smuggle weapons and fighters. For nearly two years, it has been the site of fierce fighting between the Islamic State affiliate, known as Khorasan Province, and U.S. and Afghan forces. Many of the district's roughly 100,000 residents have fled, officials and aid agencies said. Even fighters with the rival Taliban-led insurgency have battled the extremists, who Nicholson said are largely made up of Pakistani and Uzbek militants. Last week, Army Staff Sgt. Mark R. De Alencar, 37, was killed in Achin by small-arms fire. But earlier this month, the U.S. military said it had already reduced Islamic State-controlled territory in Afghanistan by two-thirds. About half of the group's fighters had been killed, U.S. forces said. Gen. John W. Nicholson, commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, said the 22,000-pound bomb dropped by U.S. forces on an Islamic State hideout on April 13 was “the right weapon against the right target." (Reuters) "The use of drones turned out to be very effective against Daesh" in Afghanistan, said Aryan Youn, a lawmaker from Nangahar, using an Arabic acronym for the Islamic State. "If that was the case, why did the United States want to use such a sophisticated and powerful bomb?" Local residents, she said, are worried about the impact of the explosion on their health and farmland. Achin is a heavily agricultural district. The Taliban on Friday also issued a statement condemning the strike. Its fighters have been engaged in a years-long insurgency against the government and international forces in Afghanistan. In a message distributed on the instant messaging app Viber, the Taliban said the United States had “no justification” for using such a powerful bomb during combat operations, calling it a “show” by U.S. forces to persuade the world it is battling the Islamic State. Former Afghan president Hamid Karzai posted scathing criticism of the U.S. military Thursday on Twitter, calling the operation a “brutal misuse of our country as [a] testing ground for new and dangerous weapons” and calling on Afghans “to stop” the United States. Brian Murphy in Washington contributed to this report. (The Wahingto Post)
	"Choose a job you love and you will not have to work a day in your life" (Confucius)
	+1

Luis Miguel 1162 61587 Lima	RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES? 4/14/2017 6:16:44 PM
	Russia, Iran and Syria issue warning to US Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, center, stands in the middle as Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem, left, and Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif shake hands after a shared press conference following their talks focused on Syria in Moscow, Russia, Friday, April 14, 2017. (Pavel Golovkin/Associated Press) By Vladimir Isachenkov \| AP April 14 at 8:07 AM MOSCOW — Russia, Syria and Iran strongly warned the United States Friday against launching new strikes on Syria and called for an international probe into last week’s chemical attack there. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, who hosted his Iranian and Syrian counterparts at a trilateral meeting in Moscow, denounced last week’s U.S. attack on Syria as a “flagrant violation” of international law and warned that any further such action would entail “grave consequences not only for regional but global security.” Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem said the meeting sent a “strong message” to Washington. Iran’s Mohammad Javad Zarif emphasized that the participants warned that any unilateral action by the U.S. is unacceptable. The U.S. has blamed the Syrian government for launching a deadly chemical attack in Khan Sheikhoun that killed over 80 people on April 4, and responded by striking a Syrian air base. Russia has alleged that the victims were killed by toxic agents released from a rebel chemical arsenal and warned against putting the blame on Damascus until an independent inquiry has been conducted. Moscow vetoed a Western draft U.N. resolution Wednesday, saying it failed to mention the need to inspect the area of the attack. Lavrov on Friday accused the U.S. and its allies of what he described as attempts to stymie an international probe into the attack. He expressed strong skepticism about a preliminary investigation conducted by the U.N. chemical weapons watchdog, saying that its experts have failed to visit the site and it has remained unclear to Russia where the samples have been taken and how they have been analyzed. In Russia’s view, the probe conducted by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons should be widened to include experts from many nations, he said. “If our U.S. colleagues and some European nations believe that their version is right, they have no reason to fear the creation of such an independent group,” Lavrov added. “The investigation into this high-profile incident must be transparent and leave no doubt that someone is trying to hide something.” Lavrov said the U.S. strike on the Syrian base has undermined peace efforts in Syria and reflected Washington’s focus on ousting Syrian President Bashar Assad’s government. “Such attempts won’t succeed,” Lavrov said. The three ministers also discussed the beefing up of U.S. forces on Jordan’s border with Syria. Moallem said. He added that Russia, Iran and Syria have “common procedures against any aggression,” but wouldn’t offer any specifics. Lavrov that Moscow has asked Washington about the purpose of the buildup and received assurances they were there to cut supply lines between the Islamic State group factions in Syria and Iraq. “We will keep monitoring the issue, since the only possible reason for using military force on the territory of Syria is to fight terrorism,” Lavrov said. Russia has staunchly backed Assad’s government throughout a civil war that has dragged into a seventh year. It has conducted an air campaign in Syria since September 2015, saving Assad from imminent collapse and helping reverse military fortunes. Copyright 2017 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. (The Washington Post)
	"Choose a job you love and you will not have to work a day in your life" (Confucius)
	+1

Luis Miguel 1162 61587 Lima	RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES? 4/14/2017 6:33:17 PM
	U.S.-led coalition accidentally bombs Syrian allies, killing 18 By Thomas Gibbons-Neff and Missy Ryan April 13 at 4:25 PM A Syrian Democratic Forces fighter rests near destroyed airplane parts at Tabqa military airport after taking control of it from Islamic State fighters. (Rodi Said/Reuters) A U.S. drone struck and killed at least 18 members of an allied Syrian force this week, the Pentagon said, in the worst friendly fire incident of the war against the Islamic State. The Tuesday strike south of Tabqa, a strategic town in northern Syria, deepens questions about American targeting procedures in its ongoing air campaign over Iraq and Syria, which activists allege has resulted in a surge in civilian deaths this year. The U.S.-led coalition said this week’s incident occurred after Syrian forces erroneously identified another allied unit as a group of Islamic State fighters. The incident comes a week after the Trump administration, promising a tough stance on a range of foreign policy issues, launched a barrage of missile strikes against Syrian government targets in retaliation for a chemical attack on Syrian civilians. The stand-off assault on Syrian military facilities, the first of its kind since the Syrian conflict began in 2011, appeared to be a momentary deviation from the campaign the United States and its Syrian allies are waging to defeat the Islamic State. The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), an opposition force the United States is backing in that fight, said that its fighters had fallen as “martyrs” during operations around Tabqa. “The general leadership of SDF in coordination with [the] international coalition will investigate the reasons behind the accident in order to prevent it happening again,” the SDF General Command said in a statement. The SDF is a Kurdish-dominated force that has proven to be a key partner for the United States in Syria. According to a U.S. official with knowledge of the accidental strike, a series of missteps contributed to the misguided strike. First, an SDF unit operating close to Islamic State lines incorrectly reported its own location to the U.S.-led coalition, the official said. Typically, friendly forces share their locations with the United States in order to keep them safe from foreign air power. Then, a separate SDF unit, which spotted the first unit from afar, mistakenly reported its fellow SDF fighters to be Islamic State, requesting an air strike on their location. Armed with what American officials believed were coordinates for a legitimate target, the drone then conducted the attack, with deadly results. The strike occurred at night and the SDF units did not have night-vision gear, the official said. In an email, the official said the U.S.-led coalition had a strong track record of supporting SDF operations with air power. “The Coalition is in close contact with our [Syrian] partners who have expressed a strong desire to remain focused on the fight against ISIS despite this tragic incident,” the coalition said in a statement. ISIS is another name for the Islamic State, the militant group the United States and its allied have been battling since 2014. The situation around Tabqa, however, is a particularly complex one, as Islamic State militants stage fierce battles in defense of positions near its defacto capital of Raqqa. U.S. officials say militants have used explosive vehicles, artillery and mortar attacks, and employed human shields in an attempt to slow forces advancing on Raqqa. As part of the operation, U.S. Special Operations forces and SDF troops landed behind Islamic State lines in the Tabqa area last month, aiming to capture the town as well as its strategic dam and airfield. “This was a very dynamic situation,” the official said. “The ground units and coalition forces involved in this strike are well experienced and communicate often. Unfortunately, this dynamic situation resulted in loss of detailed location understanding.” It’s not clear whether the incident involved Kurdish SDF forces, members of a smaller Arab component, or both. The U.S. partnership with the SDF has caused intense friction with NATO ally Turkey, which sees the Kurdish fighters as a threat to their own security and has pushed the United States to instead back Turkish-selected units. The rise of Kurdish militias in Syria has also created friction with Syrian Arabs, some of whom resent the Kurds’ attempts to consolidate territory under their control. The United States is planning to employ a smaller Arab component of the SDF to spearhead the assault into Raqqa, an Arab city. The Tabqa strike follows earlier, smaller friendly fire incidents in the Islamic State campaign. In December 2015, nine Iraqi soldiers were accidentally killed by coalition aircraft in the city of Fallujah. A month later, an Iraqi drone killed nine Shiite militiamen fighting near Tikrit. U.S. officials argue the incidents are a regrettable but unavoidable outcome in a war that has included around 20,000 U.S. and coalition air strikes. But the incidents illustrate the difficulties inherent to the U.S. strategy in Iraq and Syria, which relies on local ground forces to do most of the fighting and, often, to provide information used in complex air operations. Those challenges are made greater by the small scale of the U.S. presence in both countries, meaning fewer American forces on hand to verify targets first-hand. There are now roughly 500 U.S. Special Operations forces working with SDF throughout Syria and approximately 1,000 U.S. troops overall. As part of an elaborate process for developing and approving targets for aerial attack, U.S. officials say they use drone surveillance and other methods to cross-check information provided by ground forces, who often are requesting air power in fast-moving self-defense situations. But doing so is challenging in a crowded battlefield, and requests from local forces have played a role in some incidents of civilian casualties. Those include a strike in the Syrian village of Tokhar in July 2016, and another, larger attack last month in the Iraqi city of Mosul. [Panic spreads in Iraq, Syria as record numbers of civilians are reported killed in U.S. strikes] In both instances, U.S. forces said they used intelligence means to try to verify targets after receiving requests from local forces, but later acknowledged casualties. The Mosul strike, which local residents say killed at least 137 people, is now under U.S. military investigation. The Pentagon has struggled in recent weeks to explain why there has been a surge of reported civilian casualties in its air campagin against the Islamic State. Officials say the principle cause is that the fight against the Islamic State is entering a new, more intense phase. But activists have questioned whether changes to the military’s approval process for strikes may have contributed. Louisa Loveluck in Beirut contributed to this report. (Washington Post)
	"Choose a job you love and you will not have to work a day in your life" (Confucius)
	+1

Luis Miguel 1162 61587 Lima	RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES? 4/15/2017 12:19:33 AM
	U.N. Peacekeepers Accused of 300 Child Sex Crimes, Most Never Punished April 13, 2017 at 4:05 pm Written by Derrick Broze As the U.N. Security Council votes to remove peacekeepers from Haiti, a new investigation from the Associated Press reveals more than 2,000 cases of sexual abuse and exploitation by United Nations peacekeepers. (ANTIMEDIA) The United Nations was formed following the second World War as an effort to unify the world and prevent another global war and catastrophe. Since its founding, the U.N. has been plagued with controversy and criticism. Early opponents of the organization feared it was one more step in the direction of a totalitarian world government ruled by criminal heads of state. Others have complained of being forced to fund an organization that seems incapable of preventing war, and in some cases, actually supports warmongers. However, a new report from the Associated Press details one of the most disturbing aspects of this unaccountable international organization: sexual exploitation of children from around the world by U.N. peacekeepers. The AP investigation looked into U.N. missions from the last 12 years involving peacekeepers from 23 countries. The report reveals a level of depravity previously unheard of from within the U.N. and likely any other government agency. The AP reports that more than 300 of the 2,000 allegations involved children, and only a tiny percentage of the men accused of the crimes received prison sentences. The peacekeepers are not under the U.N.’s jurisdiction, so it is up to their home countries to punish the troops. But these men are rarely held accountable. Coincidentally, on Thursday the U.N. Security Council voted to remove the peacekeepers from Haiti by October 15. Still, the peacekeepers remain active in nations around the world. “I did not even have breasts,” a young girl known as Victim No.1 told U.N. investigators when describing having sex with close to 50 U.N. peacekeepers when she was between the ages of 12 to 15. Her story is one of the hundreds documented by U.N. officials and investigators. AP interviewed victims and current and former U.N. officials in an attempt to get answers from 23 nations regarding the number of peacekeepers who face allegations of sex crimes and what was done to investigate the allegations. “With rare exceptions, few nations responded to repeated requests, while the names of those found guilty are kept confidential, making accountability impossible to determine. Without agreement for widespread reform and accountability from the U.N.’s member states, solutions remain elusive,” APreports. The AP obtained an internal U.N. report that states at least 134 Sri Lankan peacekeepers exploited nine children in Haiti in a sex ring from 2004 to 2007. Following the release of the U.N. report, 114 peacekeepers were sent home, but none of them ever saw the inside of a prison. Other Haitian women told the U.N. investigators they were raped and/or participating in what is sometimes known as “survival sex” for little money. A young victim known as “Victim No. 7” actually received a phone call from a U.N. peacekeeper while being interviewed by investigators. V07 explained that soldiers share the numbers of their rape victims with incoming troops. The internal U.N. report also showed that from 2004 to mid-October 2007, nine Haitian children were sexually exploited by around 134 current and former Sri Lankan military members. Another incident involved the rape of a mentally disabled 13-year-old by three Pakistanis working with the U.N. peacekeepers in Haiti. Peter Gallo, a former U.N. investigator familiar with the case, told AP that the U.N. officials went to Haiti to investigate the claim, but the young boy had been kidnapped by the Pakistanis and prevented from speaking. These crimes against humanity, especially against children, are disgusting in the worst way. These individuals prey on children and other at-risk populations, force themselves upon them, and then get away with the full protection of the U.N. because of a lack of jurisdiction and an apparent lack of interest in pursuing justice. Unsurprisingly, the AP’s report this week is not the first to document similar crimes by peacekeepers. “Imagine if the U.N. was going to the United States and raping children and bringing cholera,” Haitian lawyer Mario Joseph told the AP. “Human rights aren’t just for rich white people.” Joseph is currently trying to get child support for about a dozen Haitian women left pregnant by peacekeepers. When confronted with the facts of the AP’s investigation, Atul Khare, head of the U.N. department in charge of peacekeeper discipline and conduct, said the U.N. believes it is “advancing in the right direction” and working to improve assistance provided to victims. Khare also claimed the U.N. is working with member states to hold the rapists and child predators accountable. Ironically, while the Associated Press was breaking this story, U.S. Ambassador Nikki Haley stated that U.N. peacekeeping made “a great contribution” to Haiti in response to the 2010 earthquake. Haley made no mention of the role of the peacekeepers in sexual exploitation or the spread of cholera that killed 10,000 people due to peacekeeper negligence. In late March, Betsy McCaughey, a senior fellow at the London Center for Policy Research, wrote an op-ed in the NY Post calling for an end to funding the U.N. peacekeepers. McCaughey noted that “past American presidents have poured billions into UN peacekeeping operations that have propped up autocratic regimes like those in Sudan and Angola.” She also notes that U.N. forces are “notorious” for raping women and children. “Sexual assaults by UN personnel have been documented in Bosnia, Burundi, Cambodia, Congo, Guinea, Haiti, Kosovo, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Ivory Coast, Mali and Sudan,” McCaughey wrote. Even Voice of America, the propaganda outlet for the American establishment, admitted that many Haitians want the peacekeepers out of their country after 13 years of continuous occupation. Haitians will soon have their way now that the United Nations Security Council has voted to remove the peacekeepers. Unfortunately, the nation has had an issue with children being exploited and raped following the devastating 2010 earthquake. Just one month after the earthquake, 10 American missionaries were jailed for attempting to sell 33 Haitian children. The missionaries claimed they were starting an orphanage when, in fact, the story was a cover for an attempted abduction. Interestingly,former President Bill Clinton stepped in and pulled some diplomatic Jedi mind tricks to help the would-be kidnappers go free. If United Nations officials, foreign governments, and a former American president refuse to investigate and punish these claims of child abduction, rape, and exploitation, how can we ever expect to put an end to these tragedies? The free hearts and minds of this world must be willing to question the people in power and accept that they do not have the public’s interest at heart. Creative Commons / Anti-Media / Report a typo
	"Choose a job you love and you will not have to work a day in your life" (Confucius)
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Luis Miguel 1162 61587 Lima	RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES? 4/15/2017 12:55:51 AM
	WE WILL GO TO WAR IF TRUMP PROVOKES US, SAYS NORTH KOREA BY ELEANOR ROSS ON 4/14/17 AT 6:53 AM U.S. President Donald Trump is making North Korea more aggressive, said North Korea’s vice foreign minister on Friday. In an interview with the Associated Press in Pyongyang, Han Song-ryol said Trump’s “aggressive” tweets were “making trouble” and creating a “vicious cycle” of tensions on the Korean Peninsula. "We are comparing Trump's policy toward the DPRK with the former administrations and we have concluded that it's becoming more vicious and more aggressive," he said, referring to North Korea by its official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. “If the U.S. comes with reckless military maneuvers then we will confront it with the DPRK’s pre-emptive strike. We’ve got a powerful nuclear deterrent already in our hands, and we certainly will not keep our arms crossed” in the face of a U.S. pre-emptive strike, he said. It’s unusual for North Korea to speak so openly about its plans, but tensions with the U.S. are mounting rapidly. The U.S. has sent an aircraft carrier to waters off the Peninsula and in an interview that aired Wednesday, Trump said he was sending an “armada” to North Korea. "We are sending an armada. Very powerful. We have submarines. Very powerful. Far more powerful than the aircraft carrier. That I can tell you,” Trump told Fox Business Network. Chinese President Xi Jinping called Trump Wednesday and urged him to seek a “peaceful resolution” to the tension. Shinzo Abe, Japan’s prime minister, warned Thursday that North Korea might be capable of firing sarin-loaded missiles toward Japan. Sarin, an odorless, tasteless nerve agent, can cause death in minutes, and has been used in chemical warfare. In 1995, domestic extremists attacked the Tokyo subway, killing 12 people with the sarin agent and causing temporary blindness in 5,000 others. The Syrian regime stands accused of using sarin gas in the Ghouta suburb of Damascus in 2013, and in an April 4 attack that killed more than 80 people in Syria’s northern Idlib province. With the help of satellite images, experts believe that North Korea will mark the 105th birthday anniversary of the nation’s founder Kim Il-Sung on Saturday with a nuclear missile test, its sixth since 2006. North Korea’s missiles can already reach Japan, with one landing 300 miles off its coast during a missile test in February. (Newsweek)
	"Choose a job you love and you will not have to work a day in your life" (Confucius)
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U.N. Peacekeepers Accused of 300 Child Sex Crimes, Most Never Punished

WE WILL GO TO WAR IF TRUMP PROVOKES US, SAYS NORTH KOREA