Occupation/Preoccupation: June 2011

6.30.2011

"President Obama’s support and understanding regarding Bahrain’s forthcoming national..."

from ProPublica's "Officials Say The Darndest Things":

“President Obama’s support and understanding regarding Bahrain’s forthcoming national dialogue were most welcome, as were his comments on the circumstances required to ensure its success.”

- Bahraini Crown Prince Salman bin Hamad Al-Khalifa, on the meeting he had yesterday with President Obama at the White House. Despite Bahrain’s continued crackdown on pro-democracy protesters, the Obama administration made nice with the Crown Prince and urged him to use dialogue—rather than force—going forward.

6.29.2011

YouTube - Ustad Mohammad Omar plays the rubab

YouTube - Ustad Mohammad Omar plays the rubab: "

props to David for contributing this one!

Manno Charlemagne

Manno Charlemagne - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: "Manno (Emmanuel) Charlemagne, born 1948, is a Haitian political folk singer, songwriter and acoustic guitarist, lifelong political activist and former politician. He recorded his political chansons in both French and in Creole. He lived abroad in exile twice, both during the 1980s and again during the years 1991-1994, when the country was ruled by a military junta led by Raoul Cédras. In 1995, Charlemagne was elected mayor of Port-au-Prince after running as an independent candidate, while Oganizadyon Politik Lavalas (OPL), J.B. Aristide's political party at the time, did not present a mayoral candidate for Port-Au-Prince, many considered this decision by OPL as a sign that Aristide had supported Manno's candidacy. He was mayor until 1999."

YouTube - وطن النهار - عبدالكريم عبدالقادر

YouTube - وطن النهار - عبدالكريم عبدالقادر: ""

YouTube - Junoon on CNN

YouTube - Junoon on CNN: ""

WikiLeaks Haiti: The Earthquake Cables | The Nation

WikiLeaks Haiti: The Earthquake Cables | The Nation
http://www.thenation.com/article/161459/wikileaks-haiti-earthquake-cables
Washington deployed 22,000 troops to Haiti after the January 12, 2010, earthquake despite reports from the Haitian leadership, the US Embassy and the UN that no serious security threat existed, according to secret US diplomatic cables.

Washington’s decision to send thousands of troops in response to the 7.0 earthquake that rocked the Haitian capital and surrounding areas drew sharp criticism from aid workers and government officials around the world at the time. They criticized the militarized response to Haiti’s humanitarian crisis as inappropriate and counterproductive. French Cooperation Minister Alain Joyandet famously said that international aid efforts should be “about helping Haiti, not about occupying Haiti.”

cables also show that Washington was very sensitive to international criticism of its response and that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton mobilized her diplomatic corps to ferret out “irresponsible journalism” worldwide and “take action” to “get the narrative right.”

On January 17, Haitian President René Préval issued a “joint communiqué” with Clinton, in which Haiti requested that the United States “assist as needed in augmenting security,” helping to diminish the appearance of a unilateral US action and providing the rationale for what was to be the third US military intervention of Haiti in the past twenty years.

Meanwhile, the UN claimed that its 9,000 occupation troops and police officers had the situation under control.

President Préval laid out priorities: “Re-establish telephone communications; Clear the streets of debris and bodies; Provide food and water to the population; Bury cadavers; Treat the injured; Coordination” among groups amid the destruction, a January 16 cable explains. Préval did not mention insecurity as a major concern. He did not ask for military troops.

The US government had already initiated the deployment of considerable military assets to Haiti, according to the secret State Department cables--before the Haitian government, it appears, formally requested assistance. At its peak, the US military response included 22,000 soldiers--7,000 based on land and the remainder operating aboard fifty-eight aircraft and fifteen nearby vessels, according to the Pentagon. The Coast Guard was also flying spotter aircraft along Haiti’s coast to intercept any refugees from the disaster.

A January 14 cable from Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to US Embassies and Pentagon commands worldwide said that the US Embassy in Haiti “anticipates significant food shortages and looting in the affected areas.” But subsequent dispatches from Ambassador Merten in Haiti repeatedly describe "only sporadic” incidents of violence and looting.

One January 19 cable said that the “security situation in Haiti remains calm overall with no indications of mass migration towards North America.” Another cable that day said, “Residents were residing in made-shift [sic] camps in available open areas, and they had not yet received any humanitarian supplies from relief organization. Nonetheless, the residents were civil, calm, polite, solemn and seemed to be well-organized while they were searching for belongings in the ruins of their homes.”

On January 19, Democracy Now!’s crew along with Haïti Liberté’s Kim Ives arrived at the General Hospital around 1 pm, shortly after troops from the 82nd Airborne Division. They found the soldiers, guns in hand, standing behind the hospital’s closed main gate. The troops had orders to provide “security” by denying entrance to a crowd of hundreds, including injured earthquake victims and family members of patients bringing them food or medicine.

“Here were people who were going in and out of the hospital bringing food to their loved ones in there or needing to go to the hospital, and there were a bunch of...US 82nd Airborne soldiers in front yelling in English at this crowd. They didn’t know what they were doing. They were creating more chaos rather than diminishing it. It was a comedy, if it weren’t so tragic.... They had no business being there.”

The enormous influx of US military personnel, weapons and equipment into the airport prompted a chorus of protest from mid-level French, Italian and Brazilian officials, as well as the aid group Doctors Without Borders. They were outraged that planes carrying vital humanitarian supplies were being prevented from landing, or delayed, sometimes for days.

“We had a whole freaking plane full of the friggin’ medicine!” Douglas Copp, an American rescue worker, said outside a UN base not long after the quake. The US military, which had taken over the Port-au-Prince airport, would not give clearance for the Peruvian military plane to land. It had to divert to the Dominican capital, 150 miles away. “In Santo Domingo, we got a bus, and we came into Haiti with just the things we could fit in the bus,” Copp exclaimed.

Haitian business owners were the most worried about security, especially for their factories, according to the cables. Five days after the quake, Ambassador Merten met with representatives of Haiti’s business sector, who said “their major concern is security at all levels, to include security of goods, at marketplaces, and for ports of entry.” Later, they asked the UN occupation troops “to provide security for reopened factories, and pledged to re-open in weeks.” Embassy officers met again with Haitian business leaders one week later.

WELCOME TO POLAND WHERE CIA TORTURES PEOPLE

(via Amnesty Blogs: Bahoot dhanyavad! : WELCOME TO... - Occupation-Preoccupation (notes)

(via Amnesty Blogs: Bahoot dhanyavad! : WELCOME TO POLAND WHERE CIA TORTURES PEOPLE)

YouTube - خير النساء - تضامنا مع المعتقلات البحرينيات

YouTube - خير النساء - تضامنا مع المعتقلات البحرينيات: ""

YouTube - وطن النهار - عبدالكريم عبدالقادر

YouTube - وطن النهار - عبدالكريم عبدالقادر: ""

thanks to birds at daybreak for recommendations, translation help, and tireless aggregation of EN news regarding the situation in Bahrain.

- ثورة البحرين : ندعوا بـسلمِ ومحبه .. وجيشنا يقتلُ شعبه

ثورة البحرين : ندعوا بـسلمِ ومحبه .. وجيشنا يقتلُ شعبه: "

This song was recommended to me by Bahraini Activist Zainab Alkhawaja as one of her father’s favorites. I ~~am getting~~ had some very generous translation help and ~~working on~~ have completed a cover.

(*)

Birds at daybreak

"I Am Willing to Give My Life": Bahraini Human Rights Activists Risk Lives to Protest U.S./Saudi-Backed Repression →

...

AMY GOODMAN: Finally, the fact that the U.S. Navy is there, that the Fifth Fleet is based there, the extremely close relationship between Bahrain and the United States—your message for President Obama?
NABEEL RAJAB: Well, until recently, a month, I used to think it is a positive thing to have a strong relation with the United States, but now I realize it is—it is difficult. It is not a positive one, because now we are not supported by United States for our democracy, democratic movement, because we have an American base, and our ruling family have guaranteed them that they—they will guarantee their interests, and they will guarantee their military presence. And that’s why Obama administration are not supporting us, but supporting the government. So, this base is becoming too hard for us, too difficult for us, making our job more difficult. The interest of United States, as they believe, it lies with those dictators and the repressive regime in the region, but not with any democratic. But this is not good for Obama administration, not good for United States government. They are losing the heart and mind of people here. And I don’t think it is a positive thing that they lose the heart and mind of people here.

YouTube - HANA (Flower) - A Japanese song from Okinawa

YouTube - HANA (Flower) - A Japanese song from Okinawa: ""

Two Compositions - “Drone Attack”

We receive some submissions which, while they don’t specifically meet the project’s defined goals of covering existing pieces of music from foreign regions where we have military occupations, are still quite related to the intentions of the project.

Charles Joseph Smith of California has submitted these two original compositions. His description is also included below.

Charles Joseph Smith - "Logarithm Fantasma 5ths / Drone Attack"

“The actual piece was first named “Logarithm Fantasma 5ths”, composed during the Workshop for Algorithmic Computer Music Workshop at the U. of California/Santa Cruz in 2007.

I had decided to make this piece with a new title: “Drone Attack.” This algorithmic/electroacoustic piece is a witty avant-garde homage of how people in the newest anti-war protests are protesting the use of drone planes, especially in Iraq and Afghanistan.

In my opinion, a drone plane used in recent wars is a little new twist of the “shock and awe” campaign when we had the war in Iraq in 2003.

The compositional concept of “Drone Attack” depicts a drone plane constantly seeking a target, then destroying the target, and then, reloading to seek another target and destroying that other target….and the cycle continues.

For this project…I had sent you 2 version of this piece…..

1. The 1st version uses a piano track from GarageBand (Mac) with a pattern of resembling the “seek and destroy” cycle of a drone plane.

2. The 2nd version is like the 1st version uses a real Fantasma 5ths preset from GarageBand. Much more electroacoustic than the former….and louder, which depicts not only the awful cycle, but the loudness will remind one of Iraq’s “shock and awe” campaign.”

Suggested Covers from Radiodiffusion Internasionaal

Great news!

Stuart from Radiodiffusion Internasionaal is helping us out with some good ideas for songs to cover from regions where there are U.S. bases. Here are a couple from Afghanistan & Kuwait.

Kuwaiti TV Band - "Al Ziman Dawar"

Ahmad Zahir - "Ashiq Royat Man"

YouTube - Shoukichi Kina, Ry Cooder - Jing Jing

YouTube - Shoukichi Kina, Ry Cooder - Jing Jing: ""

Dozens slaughtered by US forces in Afghanistan-Pakistan air attacks - Occupation-Preoccupation (notes)

...

Dozens slaughtered by US forces in Afghanistan-Pakistan air attacks
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2011/feb2011/afpa-f23.shtml
General David Petraeus, the commander of the US forces in Afghanistan, expressed the colonial-style hostility of the occupation force’s senior command toward the Afghan population, reportedly accusing local residents of burning their children to fake evidence of civilian casualties.

Petraeus’s comments on coalition attack reportedly offend Karzai government
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/02/21/AR2011022103256.html
Gen. David H. Petraeus suggested Sunday at the presidential palace that Afghans caught up in a coalition attack in northeastern Afghanistan might have burned their own children to exaggerate claims of civilian casualties, according to two participants at the meeting.

Article: Pentagon Building Bases in Central America and Colombia - Occupation-Preoccupation (notes)

Article: Pentagon Building Bases in Central America and Colombia - Occupation-Preoccupation (notes):

Pentagon Building Bases in Central America and Colombia

http://upsidedownworld.org/main/news-briefs-archives-68/2892-pentagon-building-bases-in-central-america-and-colombia

occupationpreoccupation-{{{at}}}-gmail-{{{dot}}}-com

Bulgarian-American Joint Military Facilities - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia - Occupation-Preoccupation (notes)

Bulgarian-American Joint Military Facilities - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia - Occupation-Preoccupation (notes): "Bulgarian-American Joint Military Facilities - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Bulgarian-American Joint Military Facilities - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Bezmer Air Base in Yambol Province;
Novo Selo Range in Sliven Province;
Aitos Logistics Center in Burgas Province; and
Graf Ignatievo Air Base in Plovdiv Province.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulgarian-American_Joint_Military_Facilities"