Genocide Jemen: 5 jaar lang met opzet landbouwbedrijven bombarderen door Saoedi-Arabië drijft het volk richting hongerdood

Jemen bukt voor het vijfde jaar onder aanvallen van de Saoedische terreurcoalitie op niet alleen woonwijken, scholen, ziekenhuizen, energiecentrales en watertoevoerbedrijven (allen ernstige oorlogsmisdaden volgens het Verdrag van Genève), maar ook aanvallen op landbouwbedrijven....... Tussen maart 2015 en maart 2019 heeft deze terreurcoalitie maar 'liefst' 10.000 aanvallen uitgevoerd op landbouwbedrijven, 800 aanvallen op voedselmarkten en 450 aanvallen op silo's en pakhuizen met voorraden voedsel...... Bij de aanvallen op landbouwbedrijven worden niet alleen de dieren vermoord en gebouwen vernietigd, maar ook de akkers zijn doel van bombardementen, waarbij men rotzooi gebruikt die de grond giftig maakt en dus onbruikbaar voor het verbouwen van gewassen...... 

Deze terreurcoalitie,bestaat uit: Saoedi-Arabië, de Verenigde Arabische Emiraten (VAE), Egypte, de VS en Groot-Brittannië, al zou ook Frankrijk intussen middels wapenleveringen een bijdrage leveren aan de genocide in Jemen (Nederland levert 'alleen wapenonderdelen' aan S-A....')...... Deze coalitie heeft er haar specialiteit van gemaakt ook waterputten e.d. aan te vallen, zo werden er: 9.017 traditionele irrigatie kanalen getroffen, minstens 1.834 waterpompen, 109 oppervlakte waterputten en artesische bronnen, 1.170 moderne irrigatie netwerken, 33 op zonne-energie draaiende irrigatie apparatuur...... Hoe bedoelt u, je kan niet stellen dat de Saoedische terreurcoalitie bezig is met een genocide...?? Nog een paar cijfers: 940.400 boerderijen werden gebombardeerd en 359.944 bijenkorven werden vernietigd.......

Intussen moeten er rond de 500.000 mensen zijn omgekomen en niet enkele tienduizenden zoals de reguliere westerse media aangeven, althans als ze al aandacht aan deze genocide-oorlog schenken, wat men liever niet doet, daar die media ofwel in handen zijn van de overheid (in Nederland) dan wel in handen zijn van plutocraten en plorken die zich verenigd hebben in belastingontduikende investeringsmaatschappijen....... Figuren die geen kwaad woord, of althans zo min mogelijk kwaad willen horen spreken over de reli-fascistische terreurstaat Saoedi-Arabië en haar 'collega' reli-fascistische staten in de regio, staten waaraan deze investeerders en plutocraten dik geld kunnen verdienen........

Bijna 2 jaar geleden wist men al dat zo'n 80.000 Jemenitische kinderen zijn omgekomen door honger ,cholera en difterie, voorts behoren naast kinderen, de zwakkeren, dus chronisch zieken en ouden van dagen tot de slachtoffers.......

Zoals al zo vaak op deze plek verzucht, hoe is het godverdomme allemaal mogelijk?? Terwijl de westerse wereld na de genocide in Rwanda plechtig beloofde dat iets dergelijk niet nog een zou plaatsvinden.......

(Oh ja, zou ik het bijna weer vergeten: ons koningshuis onderhoudt vriendschappelijke banden met het psychopathisch moorddadige zootje in Saoedi-Arabië dat zich daar koningshuis noemt....... Ja ja....... Wellicht tijd voor W.A. en Maxima* om af te reizen naar Saoedi-Arabië en het koningshuis daar te feliciteren met het verloop van de genocide-oorlog....... )

Het volgende artikel komt van MintPress News en werd geschreven door Ahmed Abdulkareem

Five Years On, Saudi Attacks on Yemen’s Farmers Are Pushing the Whole Country into Famine

Between March 2015 and March 2019, the Saudi-led Coalition launched at least 10,000 airstrikes in Yemen that struck farms, 800 that struck local food markets, and about 450 airstrikes that hit silos and other food storage facilities.

November 01st, 2019

By Ahmed Abdulkareem

HODEIDA, YEMEN — The country of Yemen, known in the medieval period as “Green Yemen,” is one of the most extensively terraced areas of the world. There, Yemeni farmers transformed rugged mountain slopes into terraces and built dams like the Great Marib, a structure whose history spans long enough that it was mentioned in the Quran. During the medieval period, Yemen had one of the widest ranges of agricultural crops in all of the Middle East. 

Farhan Mohammed is one of the richest farmers in Qama’el, a rural village in the region of Baqim in northwestern Yemen. He owns 50 hectares of land which he uses to cultivate corn, pomegranates, and apples. Now, Farhan is struggling to keep his farm afloat after Saudi airstrikes targeted his fields, burning his crops and rendering the soil so toxic that it’s no longer able to sustain life. Saudi Arabia’s now nearly five-year-old project in Yemen has decimated the incomes of Farhan and most other Yemeni farmers. Fuel is hard to come by thanks to a Saudi-led coalition blockade and the fuel that is available has become prohibitively expensive. Airstrikes targeting farm fields and orchards have rendered large swaths of Yemen’s arable land too toxic to use.

Almost immediately after March 2015, when the war began, the Saudi-led Coalition began targeting Yemen’s rural livelihood, bombing farms, food systems, markets, water treatment facilities, transportation infrastructure, and even agricultural extension offices. In urban areas, fishing boats and food processing and storage facilities were targeted. 

Before the war began, over 70 percent of Yemen’s population lived in villages dispersed in the mountains and small towns with irregular, and at times torrential, summer rainfall. These rural residents relied on agriculture and animal husbandry and grew fruits and vegetables to feed their own families and to sell to markets. Yet that way of life has all but disappeared since the Saudi attacks began, undermining rural livelihoods, disrupting local food production, and forcing rural residents to flee to the city.

Now, Yemen’s nationwide level of household food insecurity hovers at over 70 percent. 50 percent of rural households and 20 percent of urban households are now food insecure. Almost one-third of Yemenis do not have enough food to satisfy basic nutritional needs. Underweight and stunted children have become a regular sight, especially amongst the holdouts in rural areas. Families that have fled to cities are often forced to beg or to pick through the trash for food scraps.  

According to a recent report by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), poverty in Yemen has jumped from 47 percent of the population in 2014 to a projected 75 percent by the end of 2019 because of the war. The report warned, “If fighting continues through 2022, Yemen will rank the poorest country in the world, with 79 percent of the population living under the poverty line and 65 percent classified as extremely poor.” 

The intentional targeting of agriculture 

The targeting of the Yemeni agriculture sector and rural livelihoods is not merely accidental collateral damage incurred while targeting military sites. Data from the country’s Ministry of Agriculture shows that in the period between March 2015 and March 2019, the Saudi-led Coalition launched at least 10,000 airstrikes that struck farms, 800 that struck local food markets, and about 450 airstrikes that hit silos and other food storage facilities in the country.

A man looks at cows killed in a Saudi airstrike on a dairy farm in Bajil, Yemen, January 2, 2016. Abduljabbar Zeyad | Reuters

According to the Ministry, crop-area cultivation declined an average of 40 percent and crop yields by 45 percent in rural areas. Many farmers in these areas reported that they could no longer produce yields at pre-war levels due to the extensive damage to infrastructure, the high cost of diesel fuel and other agricultural inputs, a collapse in markets and the destruction of roads and storage facilities.

According to a field survey carried out by the Ministry of Agriculture in the period between March 2015 and March 2018, Saudi attacks completely destroyed 270 agricultural buildings and facilities, 43 agricultural associations, 9,017 traditional irrigation canals, 54 agricultural markets, and 45 export centers.

High precision U.S. bombs dropped by Saudi-led coalition warplanes destroyed at least 1,834 irrigation pumps, 109 artesian and surface wells, 1,170 modern irrigation networks, 33 solar irrigation units, 12 diggers, 750 pieces of agricultural equipment, 940,400 farms, 7,531 agricultural reserves, 30 productive nurseries, 182 poultry farms, and 359,944 beehives.

Yemen has no major rivers like the Euphrates in Iraq and Syria or the Nile River, which supplies water to farmers in a number of African countries. This leaves farmers reliant on irrigation canals that channel rain and floodwaters into weirs and bunds built by local communities that are vulnerable to Saudi attacks. Attacks that have already completely destroyed at least 45 water installations (dams, barriers, reservoirs) and partially destroyed at least 488, including the ancient Marib Dam.

Yemen’s fishing sector has not been spared either. By the end of May 2019, every fish off-loading port in Yemen had been targeted by Saudi attacks. At least 220 fishing boats have been destroyed, 222 fishermen have been killed and 40,000 fishermen lost their only source of income. According to Yemen’s Ministry of Fishing Wealth, this has affected the lives of more than two million people living in coastal cities and villages.

Data shows that Saudi Coalition forces have stopped at least 4,586 fishing boats from leaving port in the directorates of Midi, Hajjah, Dabab, Bab al-Mandab, and in the Mukha districts in the Taiz governorate. Thirty fishing industry companies have left the country and about fifty fish factories have closed, causing catastrophic damage to Yemen’s fishing industry. Even before the war, Yemen’s fishermen were amongst the poorest segments of society.

As the war nears its fifth year, the Saudi-led coalition has continued to target the livelihoods of Yemen’s food producers. The coalition has expanded its military offensive to include large areas of agricultural lands and valleys in the K16, Durahami, Al-Jah, A-Tahita, Al-Faza, Jabaliya, Al-Mughrous, Al-Khokha and Hays countrysides.

Yemen’s breadbasket withers

With family in tow, Haddi Ibrahim Koba fled his family home in Al-Shaab in northwestern Tihama months ago after Saudi airstrikes destroyed his farm. The Koba family now struggles to eke out an existence 60 km away in the populous Hajjah province. Once proudly self-sufficient, relying on animal husbandry and farming for their livelihood, they now depend on handouts from humanitarian organizations, the meager bodies of their children already show signs of malnutrition. 

13-year-old Fatima Haddi Ibrahim Koba is pictured in a Hajjah hospital, October, 28, 2019. Riadh al Hussam | MintPress News

According to a study by the Sana’a University-based Water & Environment Centre (WEC) in collaboration with the Flood-Based Livelihoods Network issued in November 2017 to assess the impact of the current war on food security in Yemen, the war is already drastically aggravating Yemenis’ ability to earn a livelihood, rapidly deteriorating the availability of food and elevating the complexity of an already dire humanitarian crisis in the country.

The study, The War Impact on Food Security in the Tihama, (Tihama is a region of Yemen traditionally known to be the country’s breadbasket) showed how agriculture in Tihama, which sustains most of the country’s population, has been seriously disrupted by the war. This, the study’s authors say, is undermining the productivity and investment capacity of the entire country.

Wadi Zabid is one of Tihama’s main valleys located in the Houthi stronghold of Hodeida, the second-largest governorate in Yemen. It is the second-largest valley in Tihama, with an area of 4,639 square kilometers. Before the war, Wadi Zabid was a model of sustainable agriculture and food security, but as of June 2017, when the WEC study was released, 43 percent of the valley’s residents were going hungry every night. Land cultivation has decreased by 51 percent and crop yields per hectare have declined between up to 61 percent. The production of fruits and vegetables has been wiped out as has the livestock population. Today, conditions for farmers in Tihama are likely even more dire than they were when the study was released. 

Tihama’s woes are not due to climate change or local mismanagement. Instead, they are a direct result of the destruction of irrigation and water infrastructure resulting from Saudi attacks on the valley’s diversion dams and irrigation systems. Water in the irrigation canals in the downstream villages of both of Tihama’s main valley’s has decreased by about 60 percent since the war began, according to the study.

That damage has also created a massive impact on upstream areas that rely heavily on floodwater irrigation and has damaged irrigation systems and diversion dams affecting up to 75 percent of Tihama’s households.

Creating a toxic legacy

The Saudi-led coalition’s blockade on Yemen’s ports, airports and borders has only exacerbated the suffering of the country’s farmers and rural residents. The coalition has prevented the export of their products, especially to wealthy Gulf countries which imported thousands of tons of pomegranates and vegetables from Yemen before the war began. Importing pesticides, agricultural fertilizers and fuel has also become difficult due to the frequent seizure of seafaring vessels by the coalition. 

For 77 days, the coalition, led by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, has continued to hold ships loaded with oil derivatives at sea, preventing them from entering the port of Hodeida.  The four ships that were allowed in carried transport fuel, not the fuel needed to power generators on which farmers rely.

Like in Tahamah, the blockade and attacks on agricultural targets across Yemen have not only destroyed machinery and infrastructure, it has had acute ecological impacts that may take decades to reverse. The accumulation of sediment in flood channels due to damaged gates and automatic barriers has caused trees to begin to reclaim now-dormant stream beds and flood plains, hampering the arrival of much-needed floodwaters to agricultural fields. 


A Yemeni farmer tries to chase locusts off of his fields. Photo | UNFAO

Fertile soil, especially in the border areas in Saada and Hajjah, has become environmentally polluted due to the number of weapons dropped in more than half a million airstrikes. That pollution has not only affected the soil, experts fear it could genetically alter the pomegranates, grapes and coffee that were once staple crops in Yemen. Farmers and their families are at constant risk from unexploded ordnances, especially cluster bombs like the one that killed a young boy on his family farm in Hodeida last Thursday.

Agricultural and environmental experts that spoke to MintPress said that the effects of the Saudi coalition’s targeting of the agricultural sector will likely last for decades. The Director of Agricultural Extension in Yemen, Salah al-Mashreqi, said that more catastrophic effects will appear in the medium and long term, including genetic changes to pomegranates, for which Yemen is famous. 

The deliberate targeting of food is prohibited by article 54 of the Geneva Conventions and the May 24, 2018, UN Security Council resolution 2417 on the protection of civilians in wartime, specifically reiterates this principle. Article 14 of the 1977 Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions clearly states that starvation as a means of combat is not allowed: ‘’It is prohibited to attack, destroy, remove, or render useless objects indispensable for the survival of the civilian population.” Yet the international community has done little to curb the Saudi-led coalitions use of starvation as a tactic of war in Yemen.

This, in large part, according to many Yemenis and legal scholars alike, is because Saudi Arabia enjoys the near-total diplomatic protection of the United States. Without that support, Saudi Arabia’s airstrikes, which rely on American contractors, targeting software, training, weapons, and technicians to target farmers that are concerned with little more than feeding themselves and their country, would not be possible.

Feature photo | 13-year-old Fatima Haddi Ibrahim Koba is pictured in a Hajjah hospital. The Koba family had to flee their farm in Tihama after it was attacked by the Saudi-led coalition, October 28, 2019. Riadh al Hussam | MintPress News

Ahmed AbdulKareem is a Yemeni journalist. He covers the war in Yemen for MintPress News as well as local Yemeni media.

Republish our stories! MintPress News is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 International License.
=========================================
* Zie o.a.: 'Maxima overlegt met de Saoedische massamoordenaar MSB' (nadat W.A. en ik dacht PvdA plork Koenders een paar jaar eerder de begrafenis van de oude dictator koning bezochten)

Zie ook:
'Saoedische piloot schoot 3 matrozen dood >> de reden daarvoor ligt in de stationering van VS militairen in S-A'

'Genocide Jemen: 5 jaar lang met opzet landbouwbedrijven bombarderen door Saoedi-Arabië drijft het volk richting hongerdood'

'Irak gevangen door VS agressie richting Iran en daarnaast een opstand in eigen land'


'VS stuurt 3.000 militairen en rond de 36 straaljagers naar Saoedi-Arabië voor een aanval op Iran'

'Jemen: de laatste ziekenhuizen moeten sluiten >> alle brandstof is op.....' (en zie de links in dat bericht, anders dan de hier getoonde)

'Jemen: Houthi's behaalden een grote overwinning op het Saoedische leger'

'Jamal Khashoggi één jaar geleden vermoord door Saoedi-Arabië, geen sancties en geen sluitingen van ambassades'

´Saoediërs bombarderen Jemen na aanbod Houthi's tot wapenstilstand´

'Duitsland, Frankrijk en Groot-Brittannië: Iran is de dader, er is geen andere plausibele verklaring voor de aanval op Saoedische olie-installaties '

'Iran dreigt met volledige oorlog bij vergeldingsaanval voor aanslag op Saoedische olie-installaties'

'Iran klaar voor oorlog tegen de VS'

'Houthi aanval op Saoedische raffinaderijen: een grote blunder van de VS'

'‘Maximum lies’: Iran rejects US’ claim it attacked Saudi oil facilities, warns it’s ready for war

'NYT 'bewijst' binnen een paar uur dat Iran achter aanval op Saoedische olievelden zit'

'VS opbouw in Perzische Golf doet Jemenitische Houthi rebellen zoeken naar Russische hulp'

'Groot-Brittannië verkocht na de moord op Khashoggi wapens ter waarde van 810 miljoen dollar aan S-A'

'Saoedische ambassadeur bij VN geeft Iran schuld van genocide in Jemen'

'VN stuurt bedorven voedsel naar Jemen en beschuldigt de Houthi's van het tegenhouden van voedselhulp'

'Blok (VVD minister BuZa) deelt volkomen onterecht VS zorgen over Iran'

'May (Britse premier) treedt af: de valse tranen van politiek en reguliere media'

'Theresa May: Nasty piece of work sad she won’t get paid to ruin lives anymore'

'Genocidepleger Saoedi-Arabië klaagt Houthi's en Iran aan bij VN Veiligheidsraad vanwege terreur'

'Frankrijk dreigt journalisten met gevangenisstraf voor openbaarmaking documenten Jemen'

'Activistische Franse burgers blokkeren met succes het laden van wapens voor Saoedi-Arabië'

'Strijd in Oost-Jemen waar lokale stammen de Saoedische import van militair materieel blokkeren'

'Meer bewijs voor VS betrokkenheid bij transport en bevrijding van IS leden'

'Al Qaida Jemen krijgt VS wapens van Saoedi-Arabië'

'Verenigde Arabische Emiraten bewapenen ISIS en Al Qaida' (in Jemen)

ISIL weapons traced to US and Saudi Arabia 

'VS heeft Saoedische terreurcoalitie getraind hoe Jemen te bombarderen'

'George W. Bush, 'vredesexpert en activist' waarschuwt dat 'VS isolationisme' een gevaar is voor de wereldvrede..... ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha!'

Venezuela: niet Maduro maar de VS helpt dit land om zeep >> Maduro vraagt VN om medische hulpmiddelen

Op Venezuelanalysis.com werd vorige week woensdag een artikel gepubliceerd over het tekort aan medische apparatuur en medicijnen, daar deze zaken of veel te laat of on het geheel niet worden geleverd door de sancties die de grootste terreurentiteit op aarde, de VS Venezuela heeft opgelegd......

Schande, de manier waarop de reguliere media en veel zogenaamde Zuid- en Midden-Amerika deskundigen spreken over Venezuela: de ellende zou aan het beleid van Maduro liggen, terwijl de VS al jaren geleden begon met haar sancties tegen Venezuela...... In eerst instantie nog via de grote supermarkten in Venezuela, veelal in handen van eigenaren in de VS, die onder zware druk werden gezet door de Obama administratie hun winkels in Venezuela niet langer te bevoorraden.......

Nu is er een heel pakket van maatregelen opgetuigd, zo kan Venezuela niet langer beschikken over haar banktegoeden in Zwitserland, Canada, EU en Panama..... Bedrijven die handelen met Venezuela kunnen op maatregelen van wereldpsychopaat VS rekenen..... De VS, het gestolen land dat onbeschaamd denkt haar wet overal en nergens te kunnen laten gelden en dat daadwerkelijk probeert af te dwingen in wat niet andere gezien kan worden dan economische oorlogsvoering....... Daarom is het ook van het allerhoogste belang dat de wereld het SWIFT betalingssysteem laat vallen*, een systeem dat door de VS wordt misbruikt om landen naar de afgrond te dwingen.....

Het is onbegrijpelijk dat men de VS keer op keer laat begaan met haar meer dan schandelijke sancties (ronduit terreur), waardoor eerder al 500.000 kinderen in Irak om het leven kwamen (dat vond de 'democratische' oorlogsmisdadiger en psychopaat Albright de zaak meer dan waard....).

Naast Venezuela heeft de VS ook Iran sancties opgelegd, terwijl de rest van de wereld het niet eens is met de VS dat het nucleaire verdrag met Iran verscheurde..... Ook nu durven leden van de Trump administratie, zoals Pompeo te stellen dat deze sancties een groot aantal doden zal gaan 'opleveren' in Iran**, maar dat is dan de schuld van de regering in Teheran, ofwel 'de VS kan haar handen in onschuld wassen' (maar dan wel in de zwembaden met het bloed van de slachtoffers die de VS zelf heeft vermoord.....)....... De ongelofelijke kromheid van de redenering die Pompeo zich liet ontvallen, meer dan belachelijk!!

Maduro Calls on UN to Help Break US-led Blockade, Supply Medical Equipment

The Humanised Childbirth Program and Cuban medical mission are also to be expanded.

Maduro proposes to widen the reach of the Humanised Childbirth Program (Prensa Miraflores)

Merida, November 14, 2018 (venezuelanalysis.com) – Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has requested international assistance from the United Nations (UN) and, in particular, the UN Development Program (UNDP), to “break” the US-led economic blockade against the country and help supply vital medical equipment.

His call came at a gathering of health sector leaders and activists from the Humanised Childbirth Program in Caracas Tuesday.

“I ask for support from the UNDP, from the UN system, because as you know the imperialist government of the United States is persecuting and blockading us. If I want to buy some essential equipment somewhere in the world to protect our pregnant women, the US government persecutes us and impedes or delays [the purchase],” he stated. “We have a lot of work to do,” he continued.

His statements come amidst a polarising debate concerning international intervention in Venezuela. Opposition forces, as well as regional right wing governments, have been pushing international organisms to declare a humanitarian crisis in the country as justification for a direct foreign intervention.

Caracas has, however, has coincided with UN experts in denying that such a crisis exists, and claims that any direct foreign intervention is cover for regime change efforts.

For his part, the Maduro government has been open to international cooperation, previously requesting UN medical help, as well as for programs which facilitate the voluntary return of migrants. Caracas has also hosted international programs involving foreign specialists, often including Cuban doctors, Russian economists, or Chinese spacial or telecommunications technicians.

The economic blockade against Venezuela includes US financial sanctions, Swiss, EU, Canadian and Panamanian bank account freezes, trade embargos, unilateral measures against international trade payments, and persecution of foreign firms which trade with Venezuela.

Independent estimates report US $6 billion of lost oil revenue as a result of sanctions, whilst government sources have denounced the freezing of payments of imported medical supplies such as anti-malaria or HIV treatments. The vast majority of Venezuela’s medical supplies and equipment are imported, and thus vulnerable to blockading policies by foreign agents.

Humanised Childbirth Program to be expanded

Despite the difficulties caused by the blockade, the government continues to attempt to expand social welfare in Venezuela, announcing Tuesday that the number of local attention centres of the Humanised Childbirth Programis due to be amplified from 124 to 1,000 within six months. The number of professional program ‘promoters’ will also grow from 10,000 to 30,000 in the same time period.

The program, launched in July 2017, looks to promote natural gestational and birthing practices as well as provide sexual education and support to especially young women. It emerged as a result of an increasing trend in Venezuelan hospitals of doctors forcing pregnant women to undergo caesarean sections, both as a means of generating profits in the private clinics, as well as to avoid the extra workload which could be generated by birthing complications.

At the Caracas gathering, President Maduro indicated that the Humanised Childbirth Program is also to be upgraded to ‘social mission’ status.

Venezuela’s social missions are government run welfare programs. It is expected that they will be given constitutional status in the new magna carta currently being drafted by the Constituent Assembly.

Independent report on women's rights

The announcements coincided with the publishing of a comprehensive and independent report on female rights in Venezuela, including access to healthcare and sexual and reproductive rights, by the Entrompe de Falopio (Fallopian Tubing) collective.

The report, which indicates that women have suffered disproportionately from the current economic situation, describes the Humanised Childbirth Program as “very valuable.”

It also informs that 20 percent of Venezuelan women under 20 have gone through a pregnancy, as well as 62 percent of women under 25.

The authors identify maternal death rates, backstreet abortion practices, and income-based poverty which restricts access to overpriced medical supplies as on-going problems.

Cuban medical mission enlarged

A day after Maduro requested international assistance from the UNDP, support also arrived from Venezuela’s anti imperialist ally, Cuba, who sent 500 more specialist doctors to the country, Havana based media outlet Granma reports. This latest instalment brings the total number of Cuban doctors based in Venezuela to 21,700.

The doctors, who arrived in planes from the respective Cuban and Venezuelan state airlines, will strengthen both the leadership and base work of the Cuban mission in the country, and comes as part of the health plan approved by Maduro in the recent congress of health workers.

“As always, Cuba will strengthen the work of its brigade with an eye to building a health system envisaged by the commanders of our revolutions [Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez]. Public healthcare is a priority and a bastion of the Bolivarian Revolution and we will defend it side by side with this people,” stated Dr Fernando Gonzalez, head of the Cuban healthcare mission in Venezuela.

The new doctors will, he stated, focus on health promotion and illness prevention and will be spread across the country.

Cuba has played a leading role in the development of Venezuelan public healthcare during the Bolivarian Revolution. Both the ‘Barrio Adentro’ mission, which seeks to bring healthcare to poor and remote communities, as well as the Jose Gregorio Hernandez mission, which designs prosthetic limbs for disabled people, include a large Cuban contingent of doctors who help plan and run the mission.

Edited by Ricardo Vaz for Venezuelanalysis.com

This work is licensed under a Attribution Non-commercial No DerivativesCreative Commons license

TOPICS: BOLIVARIAN PROJECT ECONOMY INTERNATIONAL MEDIA WATCH SOCIAL MOVEMENTS

================================
*  Zie: 'SWIFT betalingssysteem raakt monopolie (gelukkig) kwijt' en 'The New Tyranny of the Dollar' 

** Zie: 'Ron Paul maakt gehakt van Pompeo's uitspraak dat sancties een paar miljoen dode Iraniërs waard zijn.....' (zie ook de links in dat bericht)

De VN ondersteunt de VS, het Vierde Rijk..........

De VN is een verlengstuk geworden van de VS, dat je met het grootste gemak het Vierde Rijk kan noemen, gezien de ongeremde agressie en terreur die dit land over een flink deel van de wereld uitstort.

Wel vreemd, als je in ogenschouw neemt, dat de opvolgende VS regeringen en een groot deel van haar gehersenspoelde burgers vinden dat de VN de VS financieel leegzuigt....... Echter als je de geschiedenis van de VN bekijkt, zie je dat de VN keer op keer de terreur van de VS van een legitieme rand voorziet....

Het is intussen al zo zot, dat zelfs de vertegenwoordigingen van China en Rusland in de VN zich nog amper durven te verzetten tegen de ongebreidelde agressie van de VS, zie bijvoorbeeld de sancties die tegen Noord-Korea werden genomen......... Nogal wiedes dat Noord-Korea een atoomwapen wil hebben als bescherming tegen de VS, zeker als je ziet dat de VS dit land tijdens de Koreaanse oorlog volkomen heeft platgebombardeerd (men had op een geven moment geen doelen meer over om te bombarderen...)....

De schrijver van het volgende artikel (van Anti-Media, oorspronkelijk geplaatst op Consortium News), JP Sottile betoogt dat de VS  de VN gebruikt als een regering voor de wereld, een regering waarin de VS de dienst uitmaakt (en mocht die regering niet doen wat de VS wil, grijpt de VS zelf in waarna de VN alsnog haar goedkeuring geeft........)....

Nooit werd de VS gestraft door de VN, behalve dan 'een gevalletje mijnen leggen' voor de havens van Nicaragua, waarvoor de VS alleen werd veroordeeld in de VN, maar niet werd gestraft...... Nu komt de VS zelfs weg met illegale oorlogen en duizenden (illegale) standrechtelijke executies, waarbij meer dan 90% van de vermoorde slachtoffers, veelal vrouwen en kinderen, niet eens werden verdacht...... Het Internationaal Strafhof in Den Haag is te schijterig om ook maar één zaak tegen de VS te beginnen....... Vergeet niet dat de VS sinds het eind van WOII meer dan 22 miljoen mensen ongestraft heeft kunnen vermoorden......

Lees het uitstekende artikel van Sottile, vol met nog veel meer feiten:

How the United Nations Supports the American Empire

September 21, 2017 at 8:19 am
Written by JP Sottile

For decades the American Right has decried the U.N. for encroaching on American sovereignty, but the truth is that the U.N. is a chief U.S. accomplice in violating the sovereignty of other nations, notes J.P. Sottile.

(CN) — President Trump opened his big United Nations week … and his famous mouth … with a predictable plug for one of his properties and some playful glad-handing with French President Emmanuel Macron. Trump also scolded the U.N.’s unwieldy scrum for “not living up to its potential.” He made a passing reference to the U.N.’s wasteful use of American money. And he called for “reform” of the much-maligned international forum.

It was a stolid prelude to what will no doubt be “must-see” TV when he speaks to the UN General Assembly on Tuesday about North Korea and Iran. And it was a far cry from the way America’s leading “America Firster” spent the campaign lamenting how unfair the U.N. is to the poor schlemiel we call Uncle Sam.

He is likely to use his speech to throw a little bit of that same red meat to his base, but his call for reform falls well short of what his supporters want … which is an abrupt end of U.S. involvement in the international body. They are motivated by a grab-bag of reasons that point to the U.N. being a threat to their guns, their bank accounts and their God-given freedom.

Oddly enough, these conspiratorial narratives have been around for decades and they mostly center on a grand plan by U.N. elites to abscond American sovereignty and dissolve the U.S. into a U.N.-led world government. And the evidence of this is the way the U.N. harasses and restricts Uncle Sam while siphoning-off America’s wealth. At least, that’s what some think.

Most ominously, many object to the way U.N. funds are being used to quietly deploy gun-grabbing U.N. soldiers in advance of the big takeover. But like so much of Trump’s intoxicating irredentism … this is a grievance more likely rooted in a three-day meth bender in a Tallahassee trailer park than it is from shocking evidence gathered from well-traveled observation. It’s paranoia. But really, it’s worse than that.

Why? Because the U.N. has basically been the complete opposite of what its angriest critics claim. It is not out to get the U.S. Rather, it has largely been America’s tool since its inception and, in particular, it has repeatedly covered Uncle Sam’s overly-exposed butt as he (a.k.a. “the royal we”) has gone around the world on a three decade-long military bender since the end of the Cold War.

Yes, the Gulf War was U.N. approved and the whole world got behind it because (April Glaspie’s backstory notwithstanding) the prima facie case was strong and it was a fairly clear-cut example of unwarranted aggression. That was an easy call.

Global Violence

But since then, the calls have been nothing short of murky as the U.S. has bombed and droned and deployed and invaded and covertly-acted and regime-changed all around the globe. And the unspoken truth is that the United Nations has been America’s all-too silent partner as Uncle Sam traipsed around the planet with a loaded gun, remote control assassination machines and paper-thin rationales for intervention.

Although the U.N. occasionally puts a bug up Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu’s ass on the issue of the slow-motion ethnic cleansing in the West Bank … what other issue is there where the U.N. has taken a real stand against the U.S. or U.S. policy objectives?

Where is the U.N.’s punishment for being lied to by then-Secretary of State Colin Powell?  And where is the punishment for destroying a bystander nation under false pretenses? Where is the punishment for Abu Ghraib or Gitmo?

Where is the punishment for America’s summary execution of “suspected militants” around the Muslim world simply because they are of “military age” and in the wrong place at the right time … and for the CIA, it is always the right time to kill a suspect no matter how wrong the place many be. And where is the condemnation of America’s destabilizing role as the world’s leading supermarket of military hardware?

How about mounting civilian causalities from an ever-widening widening bombing campaign? The U.N. can say the killings are “unacceptable,” but does it really matter if there is no sanction? There haven’t been any sanctions after children were killed in a “U.S.-backed raid” in Somalia.  Go figure, right?

Or what about America’s complicity in the catastrophe of Yemen? Where are those sanctions? And what exactly has the U.N. done to punish any number of extra-legal maneuver by a succession of American presidents over the course of the “Global War on Terror”? The simple answer is nothing.

Instead, the Secretary General is largely beholden to the disproportionate influence of the United States. The Security Council’s agenda is basically set by the United States … and that’s particularly true since the Soviet Union collapsed. At the same time, the U.N.’s occasionally contentious debates do little more than offer the imprimatur of international approbation or well-noted disdain despite the functionally inconsequential nature of those debates.

A Fig Leaf for Empire

Either way it is a win for Uncle Sam because the presence of a neutered United Nations provides the United States with a fig leaf just big enough to cover the dangly parts of America’s otherwise naked empire.

The money that does go from the U.S. Treasury into the minutia around the margins … like UNESCO programs and United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and the World Health Organization (WHO) and all the other little crumbs that get thrown around the world … these are payoffs. This is what the world gets for mostly keeping its mouth shut in the face of America’s globe-spanning empire. The tiny amount of aid that trickles down past the bureaucracy … much like the bureaucracy itself … is not an example of America “getting played” by wasteful foreigners with hidden agendas. This is America paying to play the world like organ grinder with a hurdy-gurdy monkey.

Frankly, the “28.5% of the overall peacekeeping bill” that Trump calls “unfair” (about $2.2 billion of the $3.3 billion the U.S. gives to the UN annually) is a pittance … particularly if you want the unchecked right to tell Persians what they can and cannot do in the Persian Gulf, to tell the Chinese what they can and cannot build in the South China Sea, and to tell every other power on the face of the earth why they cannot have the same nuclear capability America not only has … but is currently “upgrading” to the tune of $1.5 trillion.

Even more amazingly, the U.S. wants to deny these nations the only real insurance policy against U.S.-led regime change. And why is that? Because there ain’t a Curveball’s chance in Hell that the U.N. will ever be able to stop Uncle Sam from marching where he wants, when he wants and for whatever reason he wants to cook-up. That’s a historically provable fact.

The only real check on U.S. power is the ability of an asymmetrical power to go nuclear. And let’s admit it, they are ALL asymmetrical powers when compared to America’s gargantuan, trillion-dollar national security beast. And this is why the U.N.’s “partnership” with International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is the only U.N.-associated agency that really matters. They can’t do much, but they can throw a wrench into another WMD snipe hunt … like they are doing now with the Iran Nuclear Deal.

But like it was tested by Team Bush, the IAEA is going to be tested again as Trump and Netanyahu make their bogus case … without a hint of irony … that Iran is the world’s greatest threat. But that’s really just par for a course that’s riddled with falsified flags haphazardly stuck into the shallow holes of a back nine that’s actually been built by and for a club-wielding Uncle Sam.

A Cult of Grievance

And therein lies the truly pernicious part of the Trumped-up case against the U.N. … because, like so much of America’s growing cult of grievance, it reflects an ever-widening gap between America’s stated ideals and its self-serving behavior around the world.

As we are learning almost daily, Americans tried to square that circle by electing a profligate liar who fully embodies America’s insatiable desire to take credit, particularly where none is due … and to outsource the blame to scapegoats like the U.N., particularly when the only alternative is a long look into the mirror.

And in the case of the U.N., that projected guilt is in spite of the fact that it is often tasked with quietly cleaning up some of the collateral damage wrought by their main accuser. They just have to do so without any real power or the funds to do the job. That’s the simple truth you won’t hear in Trump’s speech … or any speech, for that matter.

It’s the fact that the U.N.’s meager amount of “wasteful spending” doesn’t even begin to cover the cost of doing business when your business depends of paying the world to look the other way while you get away with murder.

JP Sottile is a freelance journalist, radio co-host, documentary filmmaker and former broadcast news producer in Washington, D.C. He blogs at Newsvandal.com or you can follow him on Twitter.

By JP Sottile / Republished with permission / Consortium News