(2020-06-18). Planet Earth Police Department Blew Up Seven Innocent Black People in Somalia, Including a Child. anti-empire.com 
The United States military has not adequately investigated two air raids in Somalia earlier this year that have killed at least seven civilians, including a child, according to the Human Rights Watch (HRW). [HRW is a major lobbyist for regime-change wars, and as such they're very tame on the Pentagon. If they say seven there was likely more.] | In a report released on Tuesday, the rights group said the killing of the civilians was in apparent violation of the laws of war. The HRW was referring to incidents on February 2 and March 10 in Jilib and Janaale, where no evidence of a military target involving the al-Sha…
(2020-06-18). America: Too Weak to Rein in Its Own Empire. anti-empire.com 
A grievous blow to international security has just been dealt. President Donald Trump has announced that American troops are to be withdrawn from…Germany. Yes, Germany. Why are American troops in Germany? Because we have to fight them over there so we don't fight them here, you see, and there are few generators of terrorism and chaos in the world today quite like the Berlin club circuit. | The real surprise isn't that we're pulling troops out of Germany; it's that they're still there 75 years after World War II ended. And according to the White House, they aren't even all being withdrawn, just a quarter of them…
(2020-06-18). Military COIN Experts Claim They Can End US Unrest in Just 17 Years. anti-empire.com 
Military experts in counterinsurgency and nation-building claim they can bring nationwide protests against police brutality under control in just 17 years, sources report. | "The unrest in our country is something we can fix, no problem," Bob Egon, CEO of the Center for Perpetual War, said today. "We have a civilian population upset at their government. They're overwhelmingly peaceful, and they have a positive view of the US Military. This is a situation we've dealt with many times before." | "If we send in the troops now, we can have these protesters making IEDs inside a week." | "We had some random guy in the o…
(2020-06-18). The Empire Declares a "Maximum Pressure" War of Economic Strangulation on Devastated Syria. anti-empire.com 
The United States has imposed a sweeping set of new sanctions against any country, individual or entity that provides support to the Syrian government – a campaign that experts warn may devastate the lives of ordinary Syrians trying to survive and rebuild after nine years of war. | The Caesar Act, passed in Congress
(2020-06-18). "Movements Work": As Activists Occupy Seattle's Capitol Hill, City Bans Tear Gas, Expels Police Union. democracynow.org 
In Seattle, the fight to demilitarize and defund the police continues as the King County Labor Council voted to expel the Seattle police union Wednesday, following weeks of protest. Seattle police sparked outrage for responding to massive protests against police brutality by using pepper spray, tear gas and flashbangs on demonstrators and reporters. Activists then formed an autonomous zone in response to the police department's abandonment of a precinct building. On Wednesday, President Trump threatened to send troops into Seattle to dismantle the community-run Capitol Hill Occupied Protest, which extends over se…
(2020-06-18). Rebellions against racism continue in Atlanta after police killing of Rayshard Brooks. liberationnews.org 
Patrick Munger and Monica Johnson On June 17, protests assembled across Atlanta in response to the police killing of Rayshard Brooks and in solidarity with all victims of racism and police violence. The night before, community members and local activists had mobilized immediately after learning that another Black man, Brooks, had been killed by the …
(2020-06-18). Justin Trudeau Continues the Conservatives Pro-Corporate/Empire International Policies. dissidentvoice.org 
The international community's rejection of Canada's bid for a seat on the United Nations Security Council isn't a surprise. In the below introduction to my recently published House of Mirrors: Justin Trudeau's Foreign Policy I detail how Liberal foreign policy has largely mimicked that of Stephen Harper who lost a bid for the Security Council …
(2020-06-18). Walking on Thin Ice: Can America's "Exorbitant Privilege" and King Dollar Survive a 17.9% Budget Deficit? anti-empire.com 
The era of the U.S. dollar's "exorbitant privilege" as the world's primary reserve currency is coming to an end. Then French Finance Minister Valery Giscard d'Estaing coined that phrase in the 1960s largely out of frustration, bemoaning a U.S. that drew freely on the rest of the world to support its over-extended standard of living. For almost 60 years, the world complained but did nothing about it. Those days are over. | Already stressed by the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, U.S. living standards are about to be squeezed as never before. At the same time, the world is having serious doubts about the once widel…
(2020-06-18). Kim Jong Un's Well-Timed 'Surprise' Portends Another Nuke Crisis. anti-empire.com 
If there is one thing I have learned about making a career out of studying North Korea it is this: the Kim regime loves to tell those who pay attention to its unique propaganda many times what it is going to do before it does it—sometimes even telegraphing for us in clear language the next crisis it intends to start. | If that holds constant now, then Pyongyang seems once again hellbent on sparking
(2020-06-18). Cecil Rhodes' Project for a Renewed Single Anglo-Saxon Empire. Submission of the "Uncivilized World". "We are the Finest Race" globalresearch.ca In 1877, while laying out his agenda for the formation of a secret society to recapture Britain's lost colony of America and the submission of "inferior" races (ie. non anglo-saxon) under the control of a renewed British Empire, Cecil Rhodes,…
(2020-06-18). COVID-19: A Polygraph For These Times. popularresistance.org Like a lie detector, COVID-19 has made obvious at least two phenomena that have been taking place already over the past few years: the decline of the U.S. empire and the failure of capitalism. For a number of years now, the U.S. has been losing this super-power status, its economy has lost range, and the dollar has hit the skids. Its international reserves do not cover even 2% of the exorbitant external debt and it is not sufficient for even 2 months of imports (hence the desperation to re-open the economy in the midst of the pandemic.) for decades, the U.S. has imported more than it has exported, and its commerc…
(2020-06-18). From Dodgy Dossiers to the Sacking of Whitlam: The British Empire Stands Exposed. strategic-culture.org I used to believe as many do, in a story called "the American Empire". Over the last decade of research, that belief has changed a bit. The more I looked at the top down levers of world influence shaping past and pre…
(2020-06-17). Why Cuban doctors should receive the Nobel Peace Prize. zcomm.org Due to Cuba's extraordinary commitment to humanity, to public health and to internationalism, a group of human rights organizations and social movements across the world have launched a campaign to award the Nobel Peace Prize to Cuba's Henry Reeve medical brigade…
(2020-06-17). America: Too Weak To Rein In Its Own Empire? strategic-culture.org The real surprise isn't that we're pulling troops out of Germany; it's that they're still there 75 years after World War II ended. And according to the White House, they aren't even all being withdrawn, just a quarter of them, a reduction of 9,500 that will leave 25,000 American boots on German soil.
(2020-06-17). Battle of Belorussia — June 1944: The Greatest Victory That Still Shapes Our 21st Century World. strategic-culture.org On June 16 this year, U.S. President Donald Trump announced he was removing another 10,000 U.S. troops from Germany reducing American troop levels there to a derisory 24,500. | The move came only a week before the 76th anniversary of the start of the most decisive battle of World War II, the destruction of the heart of the fearsome and monstrous Nazi war machine — Army Group Center — in the Battle of Belorussia. It was an achievement that continues to shape our 21st century world. | The COVID-19 pandemic and George Floyd tragedy have at least shut up the usual childish fairy tales that flood the U.S.
(2020-06-17). Struggle Theater: Don't Let Theatrics Shroud the Reality of Systemic Oppression. mintpressnews.com 
America's power brokers are hoping murals, kente cloth, and a series of half-baked legislative reforms will appease activists into giving up the fight for real change.
(2020-06-17). Housing activists: 'End evictions and provide rent relief'. greenleft.org.au 
(2020-06-17). Vaccine Developers Have a Problem: the Virus Is Going Away Too Quickly on Its Own. anti-empire.com 
Related:
| The top teams rushing to develop coronavirus vaccines are alerting governments, health officials and shareholders that they may have a big problem: The outbreaks in their countries may be getting too small to quickly determine whether vaccines work. | A leader of the Oxford University group, one of the furthest ahead with human trials, admits the reality is paradoxical, even "bizarre," but said the declining numbers…
(2020-06-17). North Korea Blows Up Joint Liaison Office Building With South Korea After Announcing End of Interest in US Relations. anti-empire.com 
Andrei Lankov: "Pyongyang has long resented Seoul's failure to live up to its grandiose promises. The North scoffs at mere symbolic exchange, but the South risks angering the U.S. by pursuing anything more substantial." |
| North Korea blew up a liaison office building it operates with South Korea, officials in Seoul said Tuesday, as
(2020-06-17). After the Lockdowns, a Global Hunger Crisis (And the Mother of All Migrant Crises). anti-empire.com 
The [irrational response to the] coronavirus pandemic and its punitive economic effects are about to set off the next global hunger crisis. | In the last four years, conflicts, climate change and economic instability raised the number of people suffering acute hunger — when the absence of food endangers people's livelihoods and, in some cases, their lives — from 80 million to 135 million people. The pandemic could drive 130 million more people into that state by December. More than a quarter of a billion people are likely to be acutely hungry in 2020. | Rising Hunger: | The [irrational respons…
(2020-06-17). China Claims Quantum Supremacy With Satellite Test, Sends Secure Message Over 1200 Kilometers. anti-empire.com 
Chalk up another amazing achievement for Chinese scientists. | A Chinese team has successfully established a satellite-based network using quantum entangled photons that can send passwords 1,120 kilometers away. | The distance is about 10 times further than the old, optic fiber-based quantum tech could do, according to a study published in the The experiment shows quantum entanglement, described by Albert Einstein as a "spooky action," still exists at such a distance. | Experts said this represents a major milestone in building a practical global-s…
(2020-06-17). COVID Lockdowns Have Sped Up the Spread of Other Diseases, a Measles Explosion Feared. anti-empire.com 
As poor countries around the world struggle to beat back the coronavirus, they are unintentionally contributing to fresh explosions of illness and death from other diseases — ones that are readily prevented by vaccines. | This spring, after the World Health Organization and
(2020-06-17). 2020 Voters' Calendar—The General Election Starts in August. commondreams.org Activists are winning no-excuse mail voting and COVID-19-excuse mail voting in many states. (Photo by JASON REDMOND/AFP via Getty Images) | www.commondreams.org/sites/default/files… …
(2020-06-17). America: An Empire Eating Itself. globalresearch.ca The United States finds itself in a less-than-unique position of an empire in terminal decline. With nations around the globe standing up economically, militarily, and politically — closing off once lucrative avenues of exploitation — the US finds itself turning …
(2020-06-17). FBI Misled Congress: Black Activists Still Under Investigation. popularresistance.org As Black activists around the country lead protests for racial justice, following the police murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and other Black people, MediaJustice and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) today reveal that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is still surveilling Black activists using a dated designation they testified to Congress was no longer in use. Of one million pages of documents, responsive to a FOIA request filed by MediaJustice and the ACLU, up to one-third of the pages are on open investigations of Black people as "domestic terrorist" threats for potential "Black identit…
(2020-06-16). Bigotry and the War Machine. progressive.org Violence against Black people mirrors U.S. foreign policy.
(2020-06-16). Good vibes by day, wild west by night: CHAZ is an anarchist camp with a split personality (VIDEO). rt.com 
The Left says it's a peaceful community of activists and rebels. The Right says it's an anarchic dystopia ruled by a warlord. The truth is that the experience in Seattle's Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone differs from day to night. | For more than a week now, a collection of Antifa types, anarchists, 'Black Lives Matter' activists and leftists of all stripes have occupied a six-block area around an abandoned police precinct in downtown Seattle. The 'Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone,' or CHAZ, is a district without police, in which the ideas of the radical Left can bloom, and in which the occupiers hope to demonstrate…
(2020-06-16). Trump to Undermine Treaty That Keeps Russia From Selling Missiles to Iran to Sell Drones to Saudi Arabia. anti-empire.com 
Editor's note: Trump wants to keep the missile part which is so crucial for the US to limit proliferation of missiles, but not the drone part where at the moment the US has a technology lead and there's a little money to be made for a sector that is already highly privileged in the American system. Russia has upheld the agreement, for example the range of the BrahMos anti-ship missile that Moscow developed for India was limited to 300 kilometers. |
| The Trump administration plans to reinterpret a Cold War-era arms agreement between 34 nations with the goal of allowing U.S. defense contractors to sell more A…
(2020-06-16). Trump Hammers Cuba While Cuba Cures the Sick. mintpressnews.com 
Not content to sabotage Cuba's domestic health sector, the Trump administration has been attacking Cuba's international medical assistance, from the teams fighting coronavirus to those caring for underserved communities in 164 countries.
(2020-06-16). Mind Virus-19 and the Government Killed 35,000 Americans and That's a Conservative Estimate. anti-empire.com 
Editor's note: A conservative estimate because the author's suggestion that deaths *with* Covid overcount deaths *from* Covid (based on a revision by Colorado which likely removed only the most egregious cases) is a very, very conservative one. |
| The cure is worse than disease may be literally true for much of the country, including Colorado. While it is clear the worldwide response to coronavirus has created unprecedented economic devastation, there is also reason to believe many of the excess deaths that have occurred over the last couple of months were not caused by coronavirus, but by our response to c…
(2020-06-16). The Fed's Grand Bargain Has Finally Imploded. anti-empire.com 
Though the Federal Reserve never stated its Grand Bargain explicitly, their actions have spoken louder than their predictably self-serving, obfuscatory public pronouncements. Here's the Grand Bargain they offered institutional investors and speculators alike: | We're taking away your low-risk, high-yield investments by slashing interest rates to near-zero, but we're giving you endless asset bubbles as a new way to notch reliable gains. This trade-off has worked for 20 years as the Fed hyper-inflated one asset bubble after another until they finally inflated everything to precarious extremes: The Everything Bubble…
(2020-06-16). India Confirms 20 Soldiers Killed in Border Clash With Chinese Forces. anti-empire.com 
Earlier in the day In an official follow-up statement, the Indian Army
(2020-06-16). Senate Committee Approves Funding for Live Nuclear Testing. anti-empire.com 
The amendment says at least $10 million "shall be made available to carry out projects related to reducing the time required to execute a nuclear test if necessary." Accordi…
(2020-06-16). Food Sovereignty Activists See The Pandemic Crisis As Pivotal For Change. popularresistance.org Disaster brings change, however. Many grassroots organizations and movements are trying to seize the moment to propose alternatives, and in some cases, to begin implementing them. Some are breathing new life into proposals made before the COVID-19 crisis began. It has been a chance for this alternative system to prove its value. "Conventional farmers lost their crop because they lost their market when restaurants closed and the distribution chains broke down," Garcia explains. "Puerto Rico still gets most of its food from outside, so the supply problems meant the supermarkets didn't have food on the shelves. Pric…
(2020-06-15). Do Palestinians' Lives Matter? ahtribune.com 
Lately, anti-racism activists and their fellow-travelers have been vandalizing statues in the UK, including a memorial to Winston Churchill. Even Nelson is threatened. And Robert Peel, like Churchill, has been boarded up for protection from the loonies. Incredibly Robert the Bruce, king of Scotland 1306-1329, hero of Bannockburn and bringer of independence, has been branded a racist by graffiti scribblers. Bruce (or de Brus), Earl of Carrick and 7th Lord of Annandale, was of Norman descent I believe. So, is our entire medieval history and culture — 1066 and all that – condemned? If it's the feudal system…
(2020-06-15). The Empire Is Knowingly Boosting Al-Qaeda in Yemen (Which Is Its Branch Most Fond of International Terrorism). anti-empire.com 
In April, an exclusive report published on Mintpress News laid bare an "unholy alliance" between al-Qaeda and the displaced government of Abdurabbuh Mansur Hadi that a coalition led by Sunni Gulf monarchies has been unsuccessfully seeking to reinstall with the help of the West since 2015. | These revelations come on top of previous investigations that have further exposed how the relentless Western-backed war in Yemen has emboldened al-Qaeda militants responsible for multiple terrorist attacks on Western targets in the last two decades. Even if the war is drawing to a close, a strengthened al-Qaeda in the Arabian…
(2020-06-15). US Supreme Court greenlights pipeline cutting through Appalachian Trail in decision activists say could put other land at risk. rt.com 
The US Supreme Court has handed a victory to the Trump administration, ruling that construction can continue on a $7.5 billion gas pipeline, which would run under the Appalachian Trail, in a major defeat for environmentalists. | The The pipeline would run approximately 600 miles from West Virginia to North Carolina. About half a mile w…
(2020-06-15). Seattle's anarchist utopia breaks down, residents report 'screams of terror' on the streets. rt.com 
"An anarchist is someone who doesn't need a cop to make him behave," American anarchist Ammon Hennacy once wrote. Based on the scenes playing out in Seattle's Antifa-occupied 'autonomous zone', Hennacy was dead wrong. | A ragtag collective of Antifa types, anarchists, socialists, and 'Black Lives Matter' activists have occupied a six-block area around an abandoned police precinct in downtown Seattle for a week now. Roads into the 'Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone' (CHAZ) have been blockaded, and the would-be revolutionaries inside have set in motion a bold experiment: to prove that a cop-free society, based on "mu…
(2020-06-15). Activists Paint 'Defund Police' In Front Of Baltimore City Hall. therealnews.com 
Black Lives Matter activists are demanding Baltimore cut half its police budget to fund schools and violence prevention programs.
(2020-06-15). Guerrilla artists use the Houses of Parliament as their agit-prop canvas. thecanary.co 
UPDATE: This article was amended at 10.45am on 16 June to clarify the roles of the groups involved and add some additional detail on the action in Santiago.Guerrilla artists and activists have used iconic buildings in central London as their canvasses. On Saturday evening, they projected an image of a riot police officer in a helmet with his index finger pressed against his lips. A member of independent art curators
(2020-06-15). Black people are 'terrified' of US cops who can pull trigger & walk free due to 'qualified immunity' — activists to RT. rt.com 
The black community in the US lives in constant fear of trigger-happy officers who routinely avoid responsibility for misconduct, activists told RT, insisting that real change can only be brought by action, not words and retweets. | "We keep hearing about how difficult the jobs of the officers are, but we don't hear enough about how scared black people are right now… What's getting lost in all this is the fact people are hurting right now," community advocate Dontaye Carter told RT. | We're terrified. | "I don't condone these riots, I don't condone these acts, but the reality is there's a lot of pain," he s…
(2020-06-15). Activists re-establish Kangaroo Point blockade after police break it up. greenleft.org.au 
(2020-06-15). Activists re-establish Kangaroo Point protest blockade after police break it up. greenleft.org.au
(2020-06-15). Divesting From a Distance. progressive.org Students were winning the fight for a fossil fuel-free campus—then the pandemic happened.
(2020-06-15). New Online Database of Police Brutality Videos Highlights 'Casual Cruelness' of Law Enforcement. sputniknews.com As attempts to collect videos of police violence quickly became unwieldy, two activists created a public database comprising what has become hundreds of cases. However, one technologist told Sputnik the list is just a drop in the bucket, and the practice is much older than cellphone videos.