(2019-05-31). Chinese Intellectual Property Theft: The Indictment of Huawei Is an Embarrassment. counterpunch.org 
With its criminal indictment at the beginning of the year the US government has successfully made Huawei…
(2019-05-31). Venezuela asks Turkey to serve as a "protecting power…" uwidata.com While speaking at a press conference at UN Headquarters, Venezuela's UN representative Samuel Moncada commented on US authorities' demand that embassy employees loyal to Nicolas Maduro vacate the premises so that they can be handed over to employees working on behalf of us-backed self-declared interim president of Venezuela Juan Guaido.According to Moncada, the United States …
(2019-05-31). 149 refugees evacuated from Libya to Italy. cgtn.com 
Migrants are seen in a shelter after they were relocated from government-run detention centers, after getting trapped by clashes between rival groups in Tripoli, Libya August 30, 2018. REUTERS/Hani Amara | The UN Higher Commission of Refugees (UNHCR) said on Thursday that 149 refugees were evacuated from Libya to Italy, in cooperation with Libyan and Italian authorities. | "Amid violent clashes and a deteriorating security situation in Tripoli, 149 vulnerable refugees and asylum-seekers were evacuated to safety in Rome," UNHCR said in a statement. | The evacuated refugees are of different African nationalities, i…
(2019-05-31). World Food Programme accesses Yemeni frontline district for first time since conflict began. un.org Amid the world's largest humanitarian crisis still unfolding in Yemen, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) has gained access to the rebel-held northern district of Nihm, for the first time since the war between Houthis and the Saudi-backed Government coalition escalated in 2015.
(2019-05-31). Mass Demonstrations Against Saudi Summit and US "Deal" Mark Quds Day in Yemen. mintpressnews.com 
Quds Day demonstrations condemned the so-called U.S. Deal of the Century and vowed to support Palestinians facing the prospect of losing their rights under the U.S.-brokered plan.
(2019-05-31). U.S.-led Coalition Admission of 1,300 Civilian Deaths in Iraq and Syria. commondreams.org ______________________________…
(2019-05-31). NSA targeting system now deployed along Mexican border, leaked docs reveal. rt.com 
A top-secret NSA targeting system which dramatically increased the civilian death toll in Afghanistan and Iraq has made its way back home, according to leaked documents boasting of its use on the US-Mexico border.
(2019-05-31). WikiLeaks: Assange indictments 'the gravest attack on press freedom'. greenleft.org.au 
In response to the news on May 24 that the United States government is seeking to lay multiple espionage charges against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, the organisation accused US President Donald Trump's administration of launching "an unprecedented attack on the global free press". | The unsealed Espionage Act charges carry combined sentences of 175 years in prison and relate to disclosures of war crimes and human rights abuses by the US government, including the groundbreaking Collateral Murder video, Iraq War Logs, Afghan War Diaries, Cablegate, and the Guantanamo Bay Detainee Manuals, published in 2010 an…
(2019-05-31). Israeli 'Intelligence' Is Fostering US Bellicosity Toward Iran — But 'Quietly'. globalresearch.ca As the U.S. risks a major conflict with Iran, many have pointed out that the U.S. intelligence on alleged Iranian attacks is reminiscent of the faulty intelligence leading up to the Iraq war. And several mainstream sources have said that …
(2019-05-31). Ex Labour MP breaks open the heart of the antisemitism smear campaign on BBC Newsnight. thecanary.co Former Labour MP Clare Short got right to the heart of the antisemitism smear campaign against the Jeremy Corbyn-led movement on 28 May. | "Widening of the definition": | Short, who resigned from Tony Blair's front bench over the invasion of Iraq, told Newsnight host Emma Barnett: What's happened is there's bee…
(2019-05-31). US to investigate reports N. Korea executed senior diplomat after Hanoi summit failure — Pompeo. rt.com 
Following a slew of reports that North Korea had executed a senior envoy who participated in the Hanoi peace summit with US President Donald Trump, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has said he's 'checking it out.'
(2019-05-31). Syria Describes As Unacceptable Declaration of Arab Summit on Iran. plenglish.com Damascus, May 31 (Prensa Latina) The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Repatriated assured on Friday that Syria described as unacceptable the declaration of an Arab Summit in the Saudi capital on Iranian meddling and set out that the presence of Iran is legal since Damascus requested for it.
(2019-05-31). Here's How Trump Bypassed Congress to Sell Weapons to Saudi Arabia. theantimedia.com (MEE) — Schoolchildren in the United States are taught from a young age that a separation of powers is the backbone of American democracy. The system also comes with checks-and-balances meant to limit the power that the executive, judicial and legislative branches of government can wield — to prevent overreach. Last week, however, President Donald Trump threw …
(2019-05-31). Iranian Foreign Minister Condemns Statement Issued in Saudi Arabia. plenglish.com Tehran, May 31 (Prensa Latina) Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Yavad Zarif on Friday condemned an anti-Iran statement issued during a special summit of the Gulf Cooperation Council held in Mecca, Saudi Arabia.
(2019-05-31). Activists protest John Bolton's commencement speech at U.S. Coast Guard Academy. liberationnews.org 
Bolton has been unabashed in his campaign to launch new wars against Iran, North Korea, and now Venezuela.
(2019-05-31). John Bolton's Absurd 'Troika Tyranny'. consortiumnews.com The real tyrants are U.S. allies in the Middle East (not Venezuela, Cuba or Nicaragua), writes Danny Sjursen. By Danny Sjursen TomDispatch.com American foreign policy can be so retro, not to mention absurd. Despite being bogged down in more military… Read more →
(2019-05-31). Condemning Trump's "Racist Attacks on Immigrants," Sanders Calls for Bans on Mass Raids and For-Profit Detention Centers. commondreams.org "We have to end the dehumanization of undocumented people," the Vermont senator and presidential candidate said during a rally in Nevada | www.commondreams.org/sites/default/files/styles/cd_special_coverage/public/headline/thumbs/bernie_sanders_immigration.jpg…
(2019-05-31). US activists vow to protect Venezuelan embassy. greenleft.org.au 
At 9.30am on May 16, police officers illegally entered the Venezuelan embassy in the Georgetown neighbourhood of Washington DC and arrested four activists lawfully living in the building since April 10, as guests of the legitimate Venezuelan government of Nicolás Maduro. | The four activists arrested were Margaret Flowers and Kevin Zeese (with the group Popular Resistance), Adrienne Pine (an academic) and David Paul (a CODEPINK member). They are part of a group called the Embassy Protection Collective. | According to the Embassy Protection Collective's attorney Mara Verheyden Hilliard, the activists were charged…
(2019-05-31). Opposition Demand for Maduro's Resignation a Non-Starter, Says Norwegian Official. therealnews.com 
An unnamed Norwegian official with inside knowledge of the talks between the Venezuelan opposition and government in Oslo said the opposition "needs to be more realistic." We discuss the talks with Norwegian Venezuela specialist Eirik Vold…
(2019-05-31). US Hints at Sanctions Against Venezuela CLAP Food Programme. Bolivarian Militia to Protect CLAP. globalresearch.ca Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has announced the incorporation of the National Bolivarian Militia into the subsidised CLAP (Local Supply and Production Committees) food programme. | The move comes as rumours circulate of upcoming US-led sanctions against the leaders of the programme, …
(2019-05-31). U.S. Imperialism and the Struggle for Venezuela's Future. indybay.org Starry Plough Pub | 3101 Shattuck Ave, at Prince St in Berkeley | Near Ashby BART…
(2019-05-31). Canada's Trudeau Government Supportive of Venezuela Anti-democratic Hardline Elements. globalresearch.ca Not only has Canada financed and otherwise supported opposition parties in Venezuela, Ottawa has allied with some of its most anti-democratic, hardline elements. While the Liberal government has openly backed Voluntad Popular's bid to seize power since January, Ottawa has …
(2019-05-31). Venezuelan Government Invites EU Special Advisor to Visit the Country. plenglish.com Caracas, May 31 (Prensa Latina) Venezuelan Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza has officially invited the European Union"s (EU) Special Advisor for Venezuela, Enrique Iglesias, to visit Venezuela in the near future.
(2019-05-31). Venezuela Seizes More Than 8,000 Kilograms of Drugs in 2019. plenglish.com Caracas, May 31 (Prensa Latina) The president of the National Antidrug Office (ONA), Juan Grillo, said on Friday that in the first semester of 2019, Venezuelan authorities seized 8,985 kilograms of different narcotics.
(2019-05-31). Canada Supports Most Hardline, Anti-Democratic Elements of Venezuela's Oppposition. dissidentvoice.org Not only has Canada financed and otherwise supported opposition parties in Venezuela, Ottawa has allied itself with some of its most anti-democratic, hardline elements. While the Liberal government has openly backed Voluntad Popular's bid to seize power since January, Ottawa has supported the electorally marginal party for years. Juan Guaidó's VP (Popular Will in English) …
(2019-05-31). Minnesotans say "No coup! No war! Hands off Venezuela!" fightbacknews.org Minneapolis, MN – 30 people held signs reading "Hands off Venezuela" and a big banner saying "No coup – no sanctions – no war – hands off Venezuela" on a bridge from Loring Park to the Walker Sculpture Garden over Interstate 94 in Minneapolis during rush hour, May 30. Ten lanes of traffic filled with rush hour traffic traveled underneath. The protesters heard hundreds of honks of agreement that the U.S. shouldn't intervene in Venezuela. | Afterwards protesters gathered to hear from Tracy Molm, a member of the MN Anti-War Committee, to hear an update from Venezuela, "Today we were seen by thousands of people in Mi…
(2019-05-31). Venezuela Moves Toward Delivery of Three Million Homes. plenglish.com Caracas, May 31 (Prensa Latina) Venezuelan government is still delivering homes through the Gran Mision Vivienda Venezuela (GMVV), to reach the goal of three million.
(2019-05-31). MintCast Interviews Filmmaker Robbie Martin: The Neoconservative Endgame. mintpressnews.com MintCast co-hosts Alan MacLeod and Whitney Webb recently spoke to Robbie Martin ( @FluorescentGrey), a filmmaker whose recent documentary series A Very Heavy Agenda explores how prominent Bush-era neo-conservatives have continued to dominate the Washington foreign policy debate and have been instrumental in creating and fomenting Russiagate and Cold War 2.0. | Neoconservatives, or Neocons, have been a key force in Washington for decades and seem to maintain their…
(2019-05-31). Venezuela Is on the Peace Path in Dialogue, Maduro Says. plenglish.com Caracas, May 31 (Prensa Latina) Today, dialogue represents the only way for stability in Venezuela within the Constitution, President Nicolas Maduro said.
(2019-05-31). Sri Lankan Refugee Family That Hid Snowden in Hong Kong Now Trapped in Limbo. counterpunch.org Hong Kong. The bipartisan vengeance of the US government and it's pervasive intelligence apparatus, on display currently in its rabid hounding of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, appears to know no bounds. But as ugly as the full-court effort to bag Assange, already trapped by US the combined efforts of complicity government in Britain and Sweden More
(2019-05-31). Russiagate Trumps Environmental Catastrophe for the Dismal Democrats. counterpunch.org 
If historians still exist years from now, some of them will be struck by how Donald Trump's Democratic Party critics and their media allies obsessed over the 45th United States President's real and alleged connections to Russia while saying comparatively little about his enactment of a soulless anti-environmental agenda that accelerated humanity's march towards extinction in service to the United States' own homegrown corporate polluters. More
(2019-05-31). WWII Lessons for the Climate Emergency. counterpunch.org "The bad news is that if history teaches us one thing, it is that there never has been an energy transition….The history of energy is not one of transitions, but rather of successive additions . . ." Bonneuil and Fressoz, The Shock of the Anthropocene The New Deal and World War II are reminders of More
(2019-05-31). Global Rebellion to Save Our Planet. counterpunch.org "The greatest threat to the Earth is thinking someone else will save it." The responsibility is ours; politicians and governments are complacent, dishonest and buried in the ideology of the past. Despite repeated warnings nothing substantial has been done and time is running out. No one else is going to Save Our Planet; a global More
(2019-05-31). May Plot? Did U.S. Concerns Over Huawei Hasten Theresa May's Departure? counterpunch.org Britain's PM Theresa May spent the last two years fighting off numerous Brexit-related coup attempts from within her Conservative (Tory) party. But the sudden announcement of her departure came just two weeks after US officials cautioned May not to award contracts to China's Huawei. Was this May's Gough Whitlam moment? GOUGH WHITLAM AND THE FIVE More
(2019-05-31). The Bush Leagues: the College Admissions Scam. counterpunch.org 
When I hear the phrase "college admission scam" I reach for my copy of George W. Bush's resume. This gem started to circulate not long after his first interviews when he ran for President, straining to recall the names of foreign leaders and stuttering through a series of painful contortions about the issues of the More
(2019-05-31). Society Is In Decay — When the Worst is First and the Best is Last. counterpunch.org Plutocrats like to control the range of permissible public dialogue. Plutocrats also like to shape what society values. If you want to see where a country's priorities lie, look at how it allocates its money. While teachers and nurses earn comparatively little for performing critical jobs, corporate bosses including those who pollute our planet and More
(2019-05-31). Dealing With Climate Fear. counterpunch.org I don't think I'm alone in feeling this way, but here goes: I can't deal with climate change. I can't read about it, I can't watch documentaries on it, and I can't think about it. I feel too powerless, and it hurts too much. The result feels like apathy, but it's not that I don't More
(2019-05-31). Lessons From Yellowstone. counterpunch.org As we ponder the future of public lands in Montana, including what areas deserve protection as wilderness, it is worthwhile to look back in history to see how past protective measures were viewed. In 1872, with the establishment of Yellowstone National Park many Montana citizens were outraged. For example, the Helena Gazette opined: "We regard More
(2019-05-31). Roaming Charges: Intimations of Imbecility. counterpunch.org 
+ Every reporter, editor and publisher who used or cited any document published by Wikileaks should file an amicus brief opposing his indictment and extradition, since Assange is being indicted on their behalf. + Out of a total eleven prosecutions under the Espionage Act against government officials accused of providing classified information to the media, More
(2019-05-31). Edward Who? The Snowden Affair Ends with a Whimper. counterpunch.org "Do not send to those who tout secure drops, Tor, crypto-comms — these are traceable, diagrammable via basic net transmission tech." —Cryptome It's been more than six years since Edward Snowden went public. After all the breathless headlines, Hollywood movies, book deals, Pulitzer prizes, and glossy primetime biopics. What, pray tell, has come of it? More
(2019-05-31). Values Are Weapons as Cuba Defends Doctors against US intervention. counterpunch.org 
The George W. Bush administration initiated the Cuban Medical Professional Parole Program (CMPP) in 2006. The idea was to persuade overseas Cuban doctors to abandon their posts and relocate to the United States. Cuba's medical solidarity programs, in place for half a century, would suffer. President Obama ended the CMPP in January, 2017. Now the More
(2019-05-31). What Would Democratic Candidates Do About Syria? counterpunch.org Something peculiar happened along the way to stopping a war: in order to prevent U.S. soldiers from marching on Damascus—a real possibility according to people who don't seem to follow such things—some decided that the cause of what they call "peace" required turning a blind eye to several wars that already existed. Neoconservatives, forever on More
(2019-05-31). Modi's Escalating War Against India's Forests and Tribal People. counterpunch.org 
The result of the biggest election in history, India 2019, is terrible news for tribal peoples in the world's biggest democracy. Politicians with authoritarian nationalist inclinations like India's newly invigorated Narendra Modi are in vogue around the world, and while many minority groups are feeling the impact of this surge to the right, the past More
(2019-05-31). White Nationalism and the Neoliberal Order. counterpunch.org 
Two related tendencies have sown confusion over the crisis of liberalism that continues to unfold across the U.S. and Europe. On the one hand, the forces of the political right are ascendant. Right-wing leaders are being elected as an apparent rebuke of the serial failures of neoliberalism. On the other, the will of the polity is increasingly irrelevant to the formulation and concerns of nominally public policies.In the U.S., the political establishment continues to put forward candidates which its functionaries appear to believe can best perpetuate this illusion of democracy. Befuddlement at the rise of reaction…
(2019-05-31). Ozone-Depleting CFCs Return. counterpunch.org 
In August of 1987 the world came together after a panic-attack over ongoing depletion of atmospheric ozone, aka: The Ozone Hole. Subsequently, global agreements to stop ozone depletion became the first ever "universally ratified treaties in UN history." The world banned CFCs. Thereafter, an era of good feelings about ozone restoration swept the world community More
(2019-05-31). Burlington, Vermont, Jared Kushner and the Conspiracy of Capital. counterpunch.org There's a hole in the heart of Burlington, Vermont's downtown. The result of a currently halted project to build a new shopping mall, it is currently a muddy hole that might well end up taking millions of dollars to fill. Many of those millions could well end up coming from the pockets of Burlington residents. More
(2019-05-31). Chutzpah, Corporate Media Style. counterpunch.org 
American politics is awash in hypocrisy. It always has been, but the problem has become worse in recent years, mainly, but not only, since Donald Trump became president of the United States. The level of hypocrisy surrounding, say, charges of Russian "meddling" in the 2016 election is staggering, but it seldom rises to the level More
(2019-05-31). Turkey: Leyla Gàºven ends hunger strike. greenleft.org.au 
Peoples Democratic Party MP, Leyla Gàºven ended her 200-day hunger strike on May 26. Gàºven had been consuming only sugar and salt solutions and vitamins. | Gàºven, a member of the Turkish parliament, began her hunger strike in prison. She was arrested for criticising the Turkish invasion of Afrin, a predominantly Kurdish area of northern Syria. | Gàºven's hunger strike was a protest against the isolation of imprisoned PKK (Kurdistan Workers' Party) leader Abdullah àñcalan, who has been imprisoned since 1999 and has not been allowed visitors, including family members and lawyers, f…
(2019-05-31). Victorian budget: Billions for prisons but nothing for housing. greenleft.org.au 
The Andrews' Labor government allocated $1.8 billion in the state budget on May 27, to build 1600 new prison cells in Victoria and less than one sixth of that amount — $209 million — for 1000 social housing units. | But the capital expenditure is just the tip of the iceberg. The annual recurrent cost of imprisoning a person in a Victoria is about $125,000, while housing a family in a public housing dwelling costs about $6400. | Victoria is in an acute housing crisis with more than 24,000 people homeless and 84,000 on waiting lists for social housing. At the same time, prisons are bursting at the seams…
(2019-05-31). We Must Prevent War with Iran. progressive.org It is time for Congress and this administration to recommit to the deal between the United States, our allies, and Iran, to prevent unnecessary destruction, suffering, and death.