The Chant of the Barbie Dolls

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/dec/21/wikileaks-cables-british-police-bangladesh-death-squad

This is a fascinating article from today's Guardian (22-Dec-2010) courtesy of Wikileaks. In many ways, this is like a Mark Curtis style revelation, in REAL TIME! We don't have to wait 30 years to find it out.....

To quote from the piece:

"The US ambassador explains in the cables that the US government is "constrained by RAB's alleged human rights violations, which have rendered the organisation ineligible to receive training or assistance" under laws which prohibit American funding or training for overseas military units which abuse human rights with impunity."

So when the famous Goldstone report reveals that Israel committed war crimes in Operation Cast Lead, that has no impact on US funding of Israel (the US already doesn't fund, as Chomsky points out, Hamas)? Like that issue couldn't be raised in the article? Straight away you get an insight into the journalistic rigour attached to this article, but also you get an insight into the utter contempt for their own laws the US elite have...etc etc....

This is another absolute gem:

"It is understood that there have been disagreements within the Foreign Office about the British government's involvement with the RAB. Some officials have argued that the partnership with the RAB is an essential component of the UK's counter-terrorism strategy in the region, while others have expressed concern that the relationship could prove damaging to Britain's reputation."

How typical that everything is framed in terms of it being in the UK's interest: no matter what way it bounces, it's all about the UK! Either it's good, in that it helps with counter terrorism, or it's bad for the "reputation" of the UK. Never mind up to 1,000 people murdered (sorry "killed extra-judicially"). I mean, how obscene? Even if you try to argue "well, it may be immoral sounding, but the realities of geopolitics for statesmen and women, is that they must consider these issues from precisely that point of view - it is their job to think in those terms in the national interest", I don't buy it - how can it be in the national interest of the people of the UK to train death squads in Bangladesh - the only thing that's going to do (and you don't have to be an Intelligence Analyst to figure this out) is poison people against the UK and increase the risk of attacks. 

"In the most recent "crossfire" killings, the RAB reported that it had shot dead Mohammad Mamun, 25, in the town of Tangail, shortly after midnight on Monday, and that 90 minutes later its officers in Dhaka, 50 miles to the south, had shot dead a second man, Taku Alam, 30. Today the RAB announced it had shot dead a 45-year-old man, Anisur Rahman, said to be a member of the Communist party in the west of the country."

The reality is that this is exactly the same thing that went on in Indonesia where the US and UK facilitated the destruction of the opposition to the preferred regimes, which were friendly to the interests of British and American corporations - and if anyone thinks that the interests of British corporations and the British people are necessarily aligned they may need to think again.....

Finally there's this priceless doozy:

'In one cable, the US ambassador to Dhaka, James Moriarty, expresses the view that the RAB is the "enforcement organisation best positioned to one day become a Bangladeshi version of the US Federal Bureau of Investigation".'
That REALLY gives you a great insight into the origin and purpose of the FBI!