Wednesday, December 3, 2014

US mostly kills innocents with DRONES (video)

Ashley Wells, CC Liu, Wisdom Quarterly; Amy Goodman (DemocracyNow.org)
U.S. military-industrial complex kills with drones and sells them to the UAE (latimes.com)


1203_seg1-geneva01As demonstrations and protests continue over the police killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, the United States is facing pressure internationally over its failure to put a halt to flagrant police brutality. In a new report, the United Nations Committee Against Torture expresses deep concern over the "frequent and recurrent police shootings or fatal pursuits of unarmed black individuals." The Committee also criticizes a number of other U.S. practices on torture and imprisonment, Guantánamo Bay, and the custody of migrants including children in "prison-like detention facilities." Democracy Now! discusses the report’s findings with Dr. Jens Modvig, member of the Committee against Torture and one of two rapporteurs for its report.
 
Drone Warfare (codepink)
1203_seg2-reprieve-reportA new report finds U.S. drone strikes kill 28 unidentified people for every intended target. While the Obama administration has claimed its drone strikes are precise, the group Reprieve found that strikes targeting 41 people in Yemen and Pakistan have killed more than 1,000 unnamed people. In its attempts to kill al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri alone, the CIA killed 76 children and 29 adults; Al-Zawahiri remains alive. DN! is joined by Jennifer Gibson, staff attorney at Reprieve and author of the new report, "You Never Die Twice: Multiple Kills in the U.S. Drone Program."

Why do we, the USA, kill so many innocent civilians? It's profitable to use drones whatever it takes. Just ask Droney (Tom Tomorrow/thismodernworld.com).
  
1203_seg3_mark-colvilleA longtime peace activist was sentenced today to one year conditional discharge for demonstrating outside the gates of New York’s Hancock Field Air National Guard Base, which is used to remotely pilot U.S. drone attacks. Mark Colville faced up to two years in jail stemming from his arrest last December. More than 100 people have been arrested over the past five years as part of nonviolent campaign organized by the Upstate Drone Coalition. Hours before he learns his fate, Colville joins DN! to discuss his activism and why he opposes the U.S. drone war. [Editor’s Note: this summary has been updated to reflect today’s sentencing, which occurred after the broadcast.] 

Mexican flag flutters during Cinco de Mayo liberation festivities (AP/huffingtonpost.com).

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1203_seg4_studentsprotestProtests at federal buildings in at least 43 U.S. cities today will call for halting American aid to military and police forces in Mexico until human rights abuses are addressed. Organizers in the United States are working with the grassroots movement in Mexico triggered by the disappearance of 43 students in September. Protesters are using the hashtag #UStired2 -- the English-language counterpart to the hashtag #YaMeCansé, a campaign in Mexico to protest state violence and human rights abuses. U.S. military and security aid to Mexico totals more than $3 billion since 2008. DN! is joined by two guests, Clemente Rodriguez, whose 19-year-old son Cristian Alfonso Rodriguez is one of the 43 missing students, and Roberto Lovato, a writer and visiting scholar at the U.C. Berkeley Center for Latino Policy Research, and one of the organizers behind the #UStired2 initiative.

1203_seg5_ecuadorbus03v2A caravan of environmental activists traveling to the United Nations climate summit in Lima, Peru, has been stopped by authorities in Ecuador and had their bus seized. Activists with the group Yasunidos departed from Quito on Monday to denounce the extraction of oil from Yasuni National Park, an area of the Amazon renowned for its biological diversity. The group says they were subjected to seven or eight stops in the first 24 hours of their trip, and ultimately stranded by the side of a highway last night, when authorities seized their bus. DN! goes to Cuenca, Ecuador, where they’re joined by two guests, Elena Gálvez, coordinator of the climate caravan and a member of Yasunidos, a group that opposes oil drilling in Yasuni National Park, and Ariel Goodman, a journalist traveling with the caravan. More

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