"The risk of war is greater than the public appreciates. There’s a complacency surrounding this crisis, which has been kicked down the road by several American presidents. Now, with war more likely than ever, talks are even more urgent, and we hope this video can serve as a call for politicians on both sides to seek exit ramps for peace."
"Americans aren’t exactly itching for a new war. (A majority, in fact, believes the country would be better off staying in the nuclear deal with Iran.) So how can the Trump administration build a case for a pre-emptive strike? Those claims of a nefarious alliance with Al Qaeda might help."
"The Pentagon tried to block an independent assessment of child sex abuse crimes committed by Afghan soldiers and police, instead insisting on the creation of its own report offering a far less authoritative review of human rights violations perpetrated by U.S. allies, according to an aide to Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.). Afghan security personnel have been known to recruit young boys as servants, sometimes to use for sex. There is a broader practice in Afghan society to dress some boys as women and have them dance at gatherings. Known as bacha bazi, it was banned under the Taliban but revived after the U.S. invasion in 2001."
"SNP Westminster leader Ian Blackford said regime must 'stop killing children' as he condemned the Government for failing to suspend selling arms to Riyadh during the devastating three-year conflict in Yemen."
"Alfred McCoy was a young rebel academic who waded into the war zone in Southeast Asia to investigate the relationship between the CIA, crime syndicates, and local drug lords. The result, which the Agency tried unsuccessfully to suppress, was his classic The Politics of Heroin: CIA Complicity in the Global Drug Trade. In the 45 years since, McCoy has consistently probed the underside of American global power, analyzing how the United States uses covert interventions, local proxies, torture, and worldwide surveillance to maintain its global empire."
"The massive five-day annual exercise comes as Washington pushes what President Donald Trump has called a 'maximum pressure campaign' against Pyongyang over its nuclear programme. The exercise, named Vigilant Ace, starts on December 4 with 12,000 US personnel and an unspecified number of South Korean airmen flying more than 230 aircraft at eight US and South Korean military bases."
"As bad as the North Korean government is, it is does not go abroad looking for countries to invade. The designation is a political one, allowing Washington to ramp up more aggression against North Korea. What is terrorism? Maybe we should ask a Yemeni child constantly wondering when the next Saudi bomb overhead might kill his family. Or perhaps we might even ask a Pakistani, Somali, Iraqi, Syrian, or other child who is terrified that the next US bomb will do the same to his family. Perhaps we need to look at whether US foreign policy actually reflects the American values we claim to be exporting before we point out the flaws in others."
"US officials said on Friday that the Pentagon is expected to confirm concern that there are 'about 2,000' US ground troops in Syria, a major increase from the roughly 500 that they officially claim is the case. The US has overtly lied about troop levels in Syria consistently throughout their deployment. President Trump has made a point of troop levels needing to be kept secret from 'the enemy,' but consistent lies from the Pentagon about their deployments have made the figures less a closely guarded secret than a mockery of transparency."
"We are told that US foreign policy should reflect American values. So how can Washington support Saudi Arabia – a tyrannical state with one of the worst human rights record on earth – as it commits by what any measure is a genocide against the Yemeni people? US involvement in Saudi Arabia’s crimes against Yemen is a national disgrace. That the mainstream media fails to accurately cover this genocide is shameful. Let us join our voices now to demand that our US Representatives end US involvement in Yemen immediately!"
"Around seven million people are living on the brink of famine and four million have no access to clean water. Save the Children estimates that even before the blockade began around 130 children were dying each day and that more than 50,000 will have died by the end of 2017. The Saudi-led military coalition has also been bombing the Houthis for more than two years in support of the internationally-recognised Yemeni government, but there is no end in sight to the fighting. Both the US and UK have supported the Saudi-led coalition with logistics and intelligence, despite accusations that the coalition was guilty of war crimes for bombing civilian targets."