Letter: Clinton unfairly maligned

Click on the link to get more news and video from original source:  http://www.concordmonitor.com/article/346011/clinton-unfairly-maligned

Published on Concord Monitor (http://www.concordmonitor.com)

Letter

Clinton unfairly maligned

Thomas Kerins, Contoocook

For the Monitor

August 3, 2012

In his letter, “What Clinton ignored in Laos,” (Monitor, July 21) Merrill Vaughan criticizes the secretary of state for visiting an exhibit of cluster bombs, while failing to discuss the question of American servicemen still missing in Laos. He writes: “I guess since she demonstrated against the war, she does not realize there are 318 Americans still listed as Missing in Action in Laos alone.”

In fact MIA were discussed during the visit.

The joint Lao-U.S. communique on the visit states that the two sides “agreed to improve and further facilitate the accounting operations for American personnel still missing from the Indochina War era.”

With respect to the exhibit, between 1964 and 1973 U.S. forces dropped an immense tonnage of bombs over Laos. About 30 percent of cluster bombs dropped did not explode. Since the bombing ended, some 20,000 people, about 40 percent of them children, have been killed or maimed by accidental detonation of unexploded cluster bombs.

Hillary Clinton’s support of increased funding for cleanup efforts, her empathy for others who have incurred war-related losses, and her willingness to go to Laos, the first official visit by any U.S. secretary of state in 57 years, are likely to enhance rather than hinder U.S. efforts to achieve a final accounting of American remains and to provide some kind of closure for those families who have been waiting for 40 years or more to put loved ones to rest.

THOMAS KERINS

Contoocook

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Source URL: http://www.concordmonitor.com/article/346011/clinton-unfairly-maligned

Anyone Can Protecting Buddhism not only to showed Up Your Face: Close Encounters of the Buddhist Kind (Wat Phra Dhammakaya)

 

An exclusive look inside a booming multimillion-dollar, evangelical, global Thai cult.

Click on the link to get more news and video from original source: http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/01/20/close_encounters_of_the_buddhist_kind?page=full

CAPTIONS BY RON GLUCKMAN, PHOTOS BY LUKE DUGGLEBY | JANUARY 20, 2011

Picture this: millions of followers gathering around a central shrine that looks like a giant UFO in elaborately choreographed Nuremberg-style rallies; missionary outposts in 31 countries from Germany to the Democratic Republic of the Congo; an evangelist vision that seeks to promote a “world morality restoration project”; and a V-Star program that encourages hundreds of thousands of children to improve “positive moral behavior.” Although the Bangkok-based Dhammakaya movement dons saffron robes, not brown shirts, its flamboyant ceremonies have become increasingly bold displays of power for this cult-like Buddhist group that was founded in the 1970s, ironically, as a reform movement opposed to the excesses of organized religion in Thailand.

Yet, despite the pageantry, the inner workings of this fast-growing movement are little known to Thailand’s general public, and certainly to the rest of the world, though its teachings loom large among the legions of devotees. The veil of secrecy parted briefly in late 1999, when two top Dhammakaya leaders were charged with embezzlement in what many considered a political ploy to suppress the temple’s growing power. The charges were dismissed in 2006 after the former abbot and a colleague returned some land and nearly 1 billion baht ($32 million) to temple control.

This obscurity is because — despite its 24-hour satellite TV station — Dhammakaya has diligently worked to avoid the limelight. Until now. Over the past year, photographer Luke Duggleby and reporter Ron Gluckman have been granted unrivaled access to the facilities and ceremonies of Dhammakaya, and they provide an exclusive look at this mesmerizing movement.

 

Ron Gluckman is a Beijing-based correspondent, and Luke Duggleby is a Bangkok-based photographer.

Unknown facts about Ayesha Gaddafi

View Original Source:  http://www.weeklyblitz.net/1730/unknown-facts-about-ayesha-gaddafi

by Fayha Asalah from Iraq
August 29, 2011

She is elegant, well educated; smart enough to cope with any international community, and above all, Ayesha Gaddafi [some say Aisha Gaddafi or Ayesha Qattafi], the only daughter of ‘former’ Libyan leader Muammar al-Gaddafi is truly possess an extremely seducing quality. People in today’s media or those angry mobs on the streets of Libya may call her “sexy woman” or “diva of luxury”, but reality is Ayesha is possibly one of the finest Arab daughters in today’s world, who has unimaginable courage and brilliance. A young woman, born in 1976, has accomplished so much in international arena, including lately courageously facing the most adverse days of her loving father. People may brand me as Gaddafi fanatic or wrongly fan of Ayesha – but the total reality is, Ayesha Gaddafi really deserves admiration from everyone, especially women, for showing to the world, when sons of a father mostly try hiding in holes during his bad times, the only daughter never did the same thing. She stood up and fought and still is fighting. Even in recent past, Ayesha Gaddafi was seen as the most potential successor to her father, in if that even turned true, she would be the only Muslim female head of the government in the Arab world.

Ayesha being trained in the Libyan army got promoted to the rank of Lieutenant General, which she is holding till date. She has been the goodwill ambassador of the United Nations, philanthropist, humanitarian and a lawyer by profession. She was appointed as the United Nations Development Program National ‎Goodwill Ambassador for Libya on July 24, 2009, primarily to address the issues of HIV/AIDS, poverty and women’s rights in Libya, all of which are culturally sensitive topics in the country. In February 2011 the United Nations stripped Ayesha of her role as a goodwill ambassador. She was placed under a travel ban on February 26, 2011, under United Nations Security Council Resolution 1970. This resolution by UNSC as well as her exclusion from being the goodwill ambassador was politically motivated, as United States and NATO were jointly supporting the anti-Gaddafi rebels in Libya and they were wholeheartedly looking for ouster of Muammar al-Gaddafi from the leadership in Libya.

Goodwill Ambassador is a collective term sometimes used as a substitute honorific title or a title of honor for an Ambassador of Goodwill; but, most appropriately for a generic recognition, it is a job position or description that is usually indicated following the name of the individual recognized in the position. Goodwill ambassadors generally deliver goodwill or promote ideals from one entity to another, or to a population. Ayesha has served as a mediator on behalf of the government with European Union corporations.

In 2000 after sanctions were imposed on Iraq, Ayesha Gaddafi arrived in Baghdad with a delegation of 69 officials. Shortly before the invasion of Iraq in 2003, she met with Saddam Hussein. In 2011, she strongly protested the policies of U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and U.S. President Barack Obama, calling for a mediation of the Libyan Civil War through an international organization which would exclude them. She vehemently opposed the anti-Saddam offensives of President George W Bush in Iraq and Ayesha had been consistently a supporter of Democrats in United States.

After the recently NATO bomb attack on the compound of Muammar al-Gaddafi, Ayesha sued NATO over the bombing of a building in Gaddafi’s compound that allegedly killed her brother, Saif al-Arab Muammar al-Gaddafi, and her own infant daughter among the three grandchildren of her father’s who were killed. See video here. She claims the attack was illegal, as it was a civilian building. Ms. Gaddafi’s lawyers filed the petitions in Brussels and Paris in June 2011.

However, on 27 July it was reported that Belgian prosecutors declined to investigate the war crimes complaint filed by al-Gaddafi against NATO [whose headquarters are in Belgium], saying that their country’s universal competence law [requiring a connection between the complaint and Belgium] does not apply in the case. Ayesha Gaddafi’s husband, Ahmed al-Gaddafi al-Qahsi, whom she married in 2006, was also killed by anti-Gaddafi rebels on 26^th July 2011. See Ayesha Gaddafi’s wedding video here, and here. When Muammar al-Gaddafi’s compound in Libya was occupied by the rebels, Ayesha Gaddafi’s house also became a target of attack and looting. Personal belongings and valuable of Ms. Ayesha were looted by the rebels. Some of the rebels drank and danced at the living room in the house and few of them went to her personal bedroom and had sex with a few Nigerian women they brought from Benghazi. While having sex with the Nigerian hookers, the rebels were making abusive words on Ayesha Gaddafi. At least 90 Nigerian girls were captured from several whore houses in Benghazi by the rebels, who are later forced to give sexual comfort to members of the anti-Gaddafi forces in Libya. Watch videos of rebels storming into compound of Muammar al-Gaddafi and his daughter Ayesha Gaddafi here and here. See the video of her personal bathroom inside her luxurious house here. Here is another video showing the house of Ayesha Gaddafi.

Here is the video of Ayesha Gaddafi giving lecture to the people asking them to support her father. And after the rebels starting getting stronger, when media continued to claim that Ayesha has already left Libya for another country, she gave a video statement saying she did not flee Libya.

But, now the question is, where is Ayesha Gaddafi? Some unconfirmed reports say, she has been brutally raped and murdered inside the compound by some of the rebel members in Libya and after murdering, her dead body was set on fire. No one can ever confirm this news. If she is alive, then the million dollar question remains unanswered – will this iron woman of the Arab world will retain the dignity and honor of her father? Or she will face the gallows being accused of “crime against humanity”?

Finally, I would like to ask a straight question to those big “bosses” sitting at NATO, United Nations and the UNSC. As Ayesha Gaddafi was the United Nations goodwill ambassador up to 2011, how the Westerners suddenly labeled her as a ‘murdered’ only after revoking her position? I am sure; those big “bosses” are also feeling shy of making such huge hypocrisy with the world just for the sake of serving the purpose of United States and some oil-monger countries. If you can accuse Muammar al-Gaddafi for torturing prisoners in prison, why not also accuse American presidents for notoriety at Guantanamo Bay Detention Centers? Or, whatever United States does is legal and anything others do is illegal? We clearly understand why White House and the entire forces and allies of America are continuing aggression in Arab and Muslim nations. They want to capture the Muslim world and put them under the feet of the Westerners. Shall we at all allow it to finally happen?

DISCLAIMER: Opinion expressed in this article is solely of the author and may not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Weekly Blitz.

Like father, like son in Cambodia

 

Cached:  http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Southeast_Asia/MC17Ae02.html

By Sebastian Strangio

Southeast Asia – March 2011

 

PHNOM PENH – On May 29, 1999, Hun Manet, the eldest son of Cambodia’s Prime Minister Hun Sen, mounted the dais at the United States Military Academy at West Point to collect his diploma from General Dennis J Reimer, the US Army’s former chief of staff. Clad in a traditional grey jacket and red sash, then 21-year-old became the first-ever Cambodian alumnus of the prestigious academy – one of just seven foreign cadets to graduate that year.

During the ceremony, television news cameras followed Hun Manet up to the podium, eager for a glimpse of the son of Cambodia’s war-tested strongman. His presence at the graduation had prompted controversy. Congressman Christopher Smith of New Jersey said in congress before the ceremony that Hun Sen was a “mass murderer” and that the US government “should be handing him an indictment, not a visa”.

While most of the graduates posed for photographs with their families in a nearby stadium, the New York Times reported that Hun Manet met his father and his entourage beneath shaded bleachers under close guard from US Secret Service agents.

In the years since, Hun Manet completed a PhD in economics at the University of Bristol in the United Kingdom. Throughout his time in the West, he maintained a low profile and rarely made public appearances. Recently, however, his inconspicuousness has masked a rapid rise through the country’s military ranks.

In September, Hun Manet was promoted to deputy commander of his father’s powerful personal bodyguard unit. Four months later, in January, he was appointed to the rank of two-star general and as deputy commander of the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces (RCAF) infantry. He also serves as director of the Ministry of Defense’s counter-terrorism department, which works closely with the US.

Hun Manet’s rapid rise has led to widespread speculation that he is being groomed to eventually succeed his father, one of Asia’s longest-serving leaders who has been in power in one form or another since 1985. Cambodian officials including Hun Sen have denied any hint of nepotism in Hun Manet’s meteoric ascent, frequently pointing out that his academic credentials are sound. At the age of 33 – the same as his father when he was first appointed prime minister – Hun Manet’s political star is only beginning to rise.

“If you have power, you try to maintain that power and you have to have someone you trust to continue [it],” said Son Soubert, a political commentator and former member of Cambodia’s Constitutional Council. “In the human sphere it’s quite natural, though not in a democratic system.”

Ou Virak, head of the Cambodian Center for Human Rights (CCHR), said that though he is unlikely to take over from his father any time soon – Hun Sen has said he wants to remain in power for at least the next decade – further promotions were a “distinct possibility” for Hun Manet.

Those signs grew clearer last month when deadly clashes broke out between Cambodia and Thailand close to Preah Vihear temple, an 11th century Angkorian temple perched on a cliff along the countries’ border. Hun Manet reportedly played a prominent role during four days of armed skirmishes in a disputed area adjacent to the temple, which killed at least 10 people and injured dozens on both sides.

The exact nature of his involvement remains unclear. Thai media carried unsourced reports that said he took a “leading role” in the fighting on the night of February 6. Hun Manet has since been credited with helping to negotiate ceasefire arrangements with his Thai counterparts, according to Thai media reports.

Some experts believe the appearance of Hun Manet, who has two brothers and three sisters, during the border skirmish could be part of a bid to boost his public profile. Carlyle Thayer, an analyst based at the Australian Defense Force Academy in Sydney, said Manet was clearly being prepared for a military career to provide Hun Sen with assurance that the army will remain loyal – a key concern in Cambodia’s highly-personalized political system.

The Preah Vihear fighting, one of the first times Hun Manet had emerged onto the public stage, was likely intended to establish his credibility as a military commander – whatever his exact role during the clashes.

“I see his emergence as part of a process of taking responsibility for defense matters first, demonstrating competence, and then embarking on a political career all the while under the tutelage of his father who will remain as prime minister,” Thayer said.

Western reform hopes
Hun Manet’s education at West Point symbolized the tentative resumption of ties between the US and Cambodia following years of Cold War estrangement. Barely two years earlier, Hun Sen had ousted his main rival, Prince Norodom Ranariddh, in a series of pitched battles in the streets of the capital Phnom Penh.

Dozens of members of Ranariddh’s royalist Funcinpec party were butchered in a July 1997 coup, which brought international opprobrium down on Hun Sen’s regime and strained Phnom Penh’s nascent relations with Washington. So, too, did a grenade attack against an opposition rally in Phnom Penh that same year, which killed at least 16 people and injured 100 more, including a US citizen. The incident was later investigated by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation.

Since Hun Manet received his PhD and returned to Cambodia, however, relations with Washington have blossomed. In August 2005, restrictions on US military assistance to Cambodia were lifted and the following year Defense Minister Tea Banh paid a visit to the US Pacific Command to request American military support.

In 2007, the US resumed direct foreign assistance to Phnom Penh, making it the third-largest recipient of foreign assistance in East Asia after Indonesia and the Philippines. The blossoming relationship was capped off in June 2009 when the US removed Cambodia and Laos from a Cold War-era blacklist of Marxist-Leninist nations, paving the way for US Export-Import Bank support for American companies to do business with the two countries.

At a time of rising Chinese influence in Southeast Asia – Cambodia has received billions of dollars in aid and investment in recent years – all this raises the question of whether an increasingly prominent Manet, well connected to the US through his West Point connections, could help cement Cambodia’s relationship with Washington. Others wonder whether Hun Manet would in a leadership role prompt some liberalization of the country’s ossified political system, which his father has presided over in authoritarian fashion.

At the time of Hun Manet’s graduation, the New York Daily News quoted an unnamed government official as saying granting West Point educations to the children of foreign leaders gave Washington “an automatic in” with those nations. Hun Manet’s recent promotions have also prompted calls for him to act as a fifth column of reform within the Cambodian armed forces.

Phil Robertson, deputy director of Human Rights Watch’s Asia division, told Radio Free Asia after Manet’s promotion in January that his group would welcome any attempts to reform the military – especially Hun Sen’s bodyguard unit, which has been accused of complicity in a range of rights abuses, including the bloody grenade attack of March 1997.

Other observers say it is unclear how much influence Hun Manet will be willing or able to wield. Thayer believes defense ties with the US will likely continue to improve, with Manet’s West Point education acting as “a conduit” for the development of a more robust military relationship. As his career progresses, however, Hun Manet is expected to be more attuned to the vagaries of domestic politics than to any external loyalties, heading off the possibility of significant reforms.

“West Point teaches civilian control over the military, which is not the case in Cambodia,” Thayer said. Getting too close to the US could also “expose” Hun Manet in the event of a cooling of bilateral relations. “He is likely to be a more professional military commander but Cambodia’s political culture and existing political system will mitigate against rapid liberalization,” he added.

Though he is believed by some to be more sympathetic to Western-style liberal democracy and human rights than the stalwarts of his father’s ruling Cambodian People’s Party and the armed forces, CCHR’s Ou Virak discounted the potential for Hun Manet to enact deep-reaching structural or political change. He compared Hun Manet to the sons of Libya’s Colonel Muammar Gaddafi and North Korea’s Kim Jong-il, neither of whom has shown signs of departing from their fathers’ authoritarian ways.

Son Soubert said that he witnessed a previous generation of enlightened, French-educated Cambodians – including many members of the Funcinpec party – cast democratic ideals aside and willingly engage in the corruption of Cambodian politics once they returned home. “I think the whole atmosphere of the country is what is at stake,” he said of Hun Manet’s chances of engineering reform. “If he can maintain his credibility and what he has learned in the US then that would be the best for Cambodia.”

Sebastian Strangio is a journalist based in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. He may be reached at sebastian.strangio@gmail.com

(Copyright 2011 Asia Times Online (Holdings) Ltd. All rights reserved.

Hmong waiting for new leaders to emerge

 

Cached:  http://www.bellinghamherald.com/2011/02/08/1856544/hmong-waiting-for-new-leaders.html

By BONHIA LEE – McClatchy Newspapers

FRESNO, Calif. The death of Gen. Vang Pao leaves a void in the Hmong community worldwide, with many wondering who will advocate for expatriates and lead the fight for the thousands who still live in the jungles of Laos.

Now, a leader, or group of leaders, is needed to help the Hmong community grow stronger, many say.

“We need leaders – not just one, but leaders – who can foster Hmong values and culture,” said Christopher T. Vang, associate professor of education at California State University, Stanislaus.

While the Hmong culture traditionally is fragmented, Vang tapped his unique background to create a new, iconic leadership role in the community.

His military alliance with the U.S. during the Vietnam War was key; he later became a patriarch for refugees in America.

In recent years, his leadership role became one of a respected father who offered guidance on community issues. His death of pneumonia Jan. 6 in a Clovis, Calif., hospital now opens the door for a successor, if one emerges.

“People accepted (Vang’s) role without question,” Christopher Vang said. “But the next leader who will come out has to have some type of background that the community will be able to embrace.”

No one names any potential leaders in the community, but some will say there are people who could rise to the task.

Some already have played high-profile roles. One is Paula Yang, a Hmong activist who organized rallies in support of Gen. Vang when he was arrested in 2007 on suspicion of plotting to overthrow the Lao government.

Some wonder if any of Gen. Vang’s sons will take his seat.

Whoever it is, the new Hmong leadership will have to find a way to bridge the gap between the young and old and unite the divided clans, Christopher Vang said.

There is no need to worry about the human rights issues in Thailand, which the Human Rights Watch organization will continue to fight for, Vang said.

“I think there are capable people right now in the community who can do it, but they are not willing to reveal themselves to the public for many reasons,” Vang said. “I think when the time comes, they will emerge and say they had a vision or had an idea that can help to lead the Hmong.”

The central San Joaquin Valley has one of the largest Hmong populations in the country. Many Hmong settled here after fleeing Laos during the Vietnam War.

While some Hmong have achieved high accolades and community leadership positions, many still struggle with American life.

Newly arrived Hmong immigrants face challenges finding jobs, learning English and living in poverty.

Those who have lived here for years now find it hard to maintain the culture while their children grow up speaking only English.

“We cannot let the culture go,” Vang said.

Historically, Hmong leadership has been fractured.

The Hmong, an ethnic minority from Laos who were recruited by the CIA to fight during the Vietnam War, have depended on the 18 Clan organization, according to Thomas S. Vang, author of “A History of the Hmong.”

The organization, made up of the 18 Hmong clans, was designed to provide social support, legal authority and economic security to Hmong families.

“The 18 Clan organization was originated by Vang Pao and it is very primitive and ineffective, not suitable to the modern society,” said Vang in an e-mail before traveling to Fresno for the funeral. “It is an organization of tribes rather than a nation.”

When there is a dispute, the clan leaders are called on to meet and discuss the problem before rendering a solution. Many times the clan organization merely offers support to fellow clan members.

The Hmong need to select a new leadership in a democratic way and maybe have a governing body of representatives different from the 18 Clan, Vang said.

Kong Her, an account executive at radio station KBIF, agrees. Change is needed to keep the Hmong headed in the right direction, he said.

“We’re going to have leaders in all different fields from medicine to social work, and education, but in terms of a central leader for the Hmong community, I think it’s going to take an organization, like a board, who can elect a chairman that makes decisions on an honorable basis,” Her said.

 

Serious conversations about a new Hmong leader have not been discussed formally, but many have voiced their opinions on Hmong radio since the general’s passing.

It’s not easy for the Hmong to talk about leadership, said Chai Kao Lee, a soldier who served with Gen. Vang.

“Hmong will argue about it,” said Lee, who spoke in Hmong. “Hmong don’t know how to love each other. They argue a lot. The path of love, the path to your land and to a leader is not easy.”

 

A critical part of a new leader’s job would be to preserve Hmong culture and to embrace western ideas about such things as democracy, education, technology and politics, some contend.

That also means including the youth and women into discussions that are important to the community, Christopher Vang said.

“For 35 years we have left the younger generation alone,” Vang said. “We need to include them into the community leadership role.”

 

Mai Chou Thao, vice president of the Hmong Student Association at Fresno State, welcomes the opportunity for the youth voice to be heard in the community.

She hopes whoever emerges as the new Hmong leader will be able to connect to the young people. Thao said she and her sister have spoken about who could be the next Hmong leader.

“We think there will be people who want to be the next GVP,” Thao said. “We believe there will be those people who want to compete for it, but there will always be that natural leader who will rise up.”