I’ve just received this message from a refugee activist in Perth, Western Australia. It’s a release from the… Coordination of Hazara Refugees in Curtin immigration detention centre, a remote camp away from public view.… Freedom It is known to all and history has also proven that Hazaras have always and systemically been target of national, religious…
Showing all posts tagged Afghanistan
Calling anybody who knows how much US money being paid to insurgents?
No, didn’t think Washington has any real idea: The U.S. military has moved to stem the flow of contract money to Afghan insurgents, awarding at least 20 companies new contracts worth about $1… billion for military supply transport and suspending seven current contractors it found lacking in “integrity and business ethics.” The new contracts, which were…
Just how are merchants of death supposed to make a good living these days?
Are the good times really coming to an end, or will Western-led wars be increasingly privatised? The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are winding down, Osama bin Laden is dead, and the federal government is deeply in debt. This spells the end of what was a golden decade for the defense industry. In the decade…
How many companies are shafting America in its WOT?
Far too many and who really cares? A United Arab Emirates-based logistics contractor billed Defense Department authorities in Iraq for parts at prices marked up as high as 5,000 percent and 12,000 percent, according to a quarterly report released Saturday by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction. A review of a $119 million reconstruction…
What US occupation looks like on the ground
My following lead book review appeared in Saturday’s Sydney Morning Herald: INFERNAL TRIANGLE Paul McGeough Allen & Unwin, $32.99 This unblinking collection of dispatches separates the rhetoric from the reality of the post-September 11 battlefields. The new US Defence Secretary and former CIA director, Leon Panetta, recently told journalists the Obama administration was ”within reach”…
At least some in US Congress recognise toxic culture of mercenaries in war zones
As we learn that the US has wasted tens of billions on contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan since 9/11, few American politicians are opposed to this explosion of privatisation. Here’s a statement by Bernie Sanders, US Senator from Vermont: Sen. Bernie Sanders and Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.) today introduced legislation that would phase out private…
We’re funding the Afghan insurgency and we feel fine
The head of the World Bank says that the Afghan economy is in desperate need of support and the West should give more money to the corrupt Karzai regime. Good move. Here’s the reality of what that support has given in the last years: A year-long military-led investigation has concluded that U.S. taxpayer money has…
US wastes billions on dodgy contracting in Iraq and Afghanistan
The future of Western warfare is corporations making billions on the suffering of citizens under occupation: The United States has wasted some $34 billion on service contracts with the private sector in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to a study being finalized for Congress. The findings by a bipartisan congressional commission were confirmed…
The glorious Afghan war is money down the drain (into the pockets of thugs)
This is what US/Australian/British liberation looks like: A lack of U.S. coordination compounded by Afghan foot-dragging has stymied efforts to track billions of aid dollars poured into Afghanistan’s economy in the past decade, providing potential opportunities to launder money and finance the insurgency, according to Afghan officials and a new U.S. government audit. The audit,…
Private contractors now intergral to Afghan occupation
The US Congress may express concern at the cowbody behaviour of many mercenaries in Afghanistan (which, of course, lessens local support for the glorious liberation they’ve experienced since 2001), but such things don’t concern former IDF prison guard Jeffrey Goldberg. He writes a curious post about protecting these brave souls who are presumably doing America’s…