Pound-foolishness at work. A pardoned war criminal now ready to help with Venezuela coup.
- Because Ronald Reagan is what you think of when trolling for Latin America policy. They don’t just want to do what Kissinger did for Chile, they want something even more heinous.
- Because WH policy tries to make “the Libs” cry, this will not end well.
- Because it was too hard to find zombie Martin Bormann after his gig in the Russ Meyers films, this is an inspired choice to create fissures among so many historically opposed to neoliberal interventions in the South.
The Trump administration has announced that Elliott Abrams, a man who supported the use of paramiliarities and death squads in Latin America three decades ago, will lead the US’s efforts to press for democracy in Venezuela.
Secretary of state Mike Pompeo said the 71-year-old would oversee Washington’s outreach, after it declared it was recongising Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido, and not elected president Nicolas Maduro, as the nation’s legitimate ruler. www.independent.co.uk/...
For many Latin America watchers Abrams will be associated with his denial of a 1982 massacre at El Mozote in El Salvador of hundreds of civilians by the military. Mr Abrams told a Senate committee that the reports of hundreds of deaths at El Mozote “were not credible”.
In 1993, after a UN truth commission which examined 22,000 atrocities that occurred during the twelve-year civil war in El Salvador, attributed 85 per cent of the abuses to the Reagan-assisted right-wing military and its death-squad allies, Mr Abrams said: “The administration’s record on El Salvador is one of fabulous achievement.”
www.independent.co.uk/...
- During the Reagan administration, Manuel Noriega had opposition leader Hugo Spadafora tortured & then decapitated while Spadafora was still alive. Elliott Abrams led the efforts to make sure Noriega, then still a top US ally, faced no consequences. tinyrevolution.com/mt/archives/00…
- Via @stephenkinzer's book Overthrow, here's what Manuel Noriega did to Hugo Spadafora in 1985. This is what Elliott Abrams, now leading America's fight for human rights and democracy in Venezuela, defended and covered up. tinyrevolution.com/mt/archives/00…
- In 1982 the Salvadoran government massacred 500+ peasants in El Mozote. Government troops slit children's throats & raped girls as young as 10. Elliott Abrams, then the "Assistant Secretary of State for Human Rights and Humanitarian Affairs," played a lead role in covering it up.
- During the 1980s, the Salvadoran government slaughtered perhaps 70,000 people in.ways so ghastly there's no contemporary equivalent, except maybe for ISIS. Elliott Abrams was a key figure making it happen. He later said he considered this to be a "fabulous achievement.”
Saturday, Jan 26, 2019 · 4:26:36 AM +00:00
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annieli
Russia has reportedly sent a contingent of shadowy private military contractors to Venezuela to help President Nicolás Maduro fend off a challenge to his authority from the President of the country’s National Assembly, Juan Guaido. It’s unclear what their exact orders might be, but whether they’re in the country to protect Maduro himself, assist government security forces, stymy a U.S. military intervention, or something else, these mercenaries only add an additional layer of complexity to the still-evolving crisis.
On Jan. 25, 2019, Reuters reported that individuals linked to the now infamous Russian private military company Wagner were in Venezuela. The story cited Yevgeny Shabayev, the head of the Khovrino Cossack organization, who has his own background as a soldier of fortune and routinely speaks to the international press about Russian mercenary activities, as well as anonymous sources.
www.thedrive.com/...