The Conquest of Thieves

By Stanley Collymore

When Frankenstein decided to and ultimately created his monster he doubtlessly thought he was being quite clever, but what he clearly didn’t bear in mind while doing so and something that would highlight his astounding stupidity in the process, was the likelihood that his clever creation would in turn develop a mind and will of its own diametrically opposed to his own that would ultimately lead to it becoming not only his adversary but also his nemesis as well. But history shows just how short-sighted and completely wrapped up he was in himself over his personal achievement as well caught up in his own hubristic posturing that the possibility of his prized creation ever turning on him didn’t for a solitary second cross his mind let alone feature as a salient component in his arrogant thinking. Contemporary Frankensteins Nicolas Sarkozy, his co-conspirator David Cameron and their willing apprentices in the United States and the rest of NATO are similarly in for a rude awakening over the creation of their Libyan monster; and you heard it here first!

As I write, Monday 19 September 2011, a significant number of heavyweight and prominent French lawyers are preparing themselves to sue Nicolas Sarkozy for crimes against humanity that he has premeditatedly committed in Libya against the Libyan people. Chief among those in the vanguard of this popular opposition and utter abhorrence to what Sarkozy has done are Roland Dumas, former French Foreign Minister (1984-1986 and 1988-1993) who is not only implacably opposed to the appalling criminality of the incumbent French president, Nicolas Sarkozy but has also publicly pledged to personally defend Colonel Gaddafi in court were he to be captured and brought before the utterly biased ICC that has quite subjectively issued in tandem with a more than compliant and complicit Interpol a warrant for his arrest; though it’s the solid belief of Monsieur Dumas that despite their public posturing to the contrary neither the ICC, France, the UK, United States nor the other participating NATO countries that are themselves deeply mired in the calculated and horrific massacre of Libyans have any genuine wish to see Colonel Gaddafi brought before any court or tried for what they spuriously claim he has purportedly done; and quite frankly the only aim, and a well-rehearsed one at that, that they jointly have in mind is to extrajudicially murder him, primarily as an effective means of permanently shutting him up from exposing their own more feasible criminal undertakings.

Jacques Vergas, another renowned and very prominent French lawyer, likens the deliberately created situation in Libya by NATO member states, principally Britain and France, to that of Vietnam where the US on purpose sprayed tens of millions of litres of toxins on crops in the Sixties and Seventies causing multiple brain disorders, miscarriages and horrific birth defects that still linger to this day with the Vietnamese population. And he poignantly adds: “They’re using missiles with depleted uranium which causes cancer. In Tripoli I saw people crippled by NATO attacks; office workers who had nothing to do with the fighting, that’s why we’re suing President Sarkozy for crimes against humanity.”

In an RT report from Paris on the same theme Daniel Bushell recounted how in the bombing of a residence in which 13 civilians and 4 children were murdered NATO at initially denied it had anything to do with it, then changed its tune as the evidence of its involvement mounted to one of dishonestly claiming that the place was a military command centre. However, when respected journalists like Michel Collon visited the location in the immediate aftermath of the bombing and saw for themselves was actually in that house this is what he reported was fully on view in the rubble of NATO’s dispiriting but wilfully targeted civilian killing: “Videos by demand; toys and cultural books; nothing, nothing military!”

Marcel Ceccaldi another lawyer pulled no punches when he said that NATO is deliberately waging a campaign of terror, pointing out that “their bombings targeted the electricity, water and food supplies [of Libya]. After five months of day and night bombings and thousands of deaths people [understandably] will stop supporting the regime because they just can’t take it any more.”

Meanwhile, on the ground in Libya itself fighters backing the new leadership continue to pound what’s left of the old regime’s remaining holdouts; civilian causalities are still a very real possibility but countries quick to condemn Colonel Gaddafi’s threatened assaults on the so-called rebels back in March 2011 seem to have mysteriously gone quiet as Laura Emmett of RT reports: “David Cameron and Nicolas Sarkozy survey their handiwork; the most senior leaders to visit Tripoli since their countries began the NATO intervention in Libya they say their work is not yet done.” Total affirmation of this coming from David Cameron when he hubristically says: “We must keep on with the NATO mission until civilians are all protected and until this work is finished.”

Laura Emmett rejoins by vividly pointing out what David Cameron pointedly refuses to even countenance let alone acknowledge. “He’s right,” she says, “civilians are still being killed but now that Gaddafi is virtually powerless the people increasingly doing the killing are National Transitional Council forces together with NATO as they attack Bani Walid and other Colonel Gaddafi strongholds; on that Cameron and Sarkozy are silent.” A situation that induces John Laughland of the Institute of Democracy and Co-operation to pithily but rather sarcastically comment: “To paraphrase George Orwell in Animal farm some civilians are more equal than others.” Notwithstanding this NATO still persists in its transparently and utterly mendacious viewpoint that all of its attacks in Libya are specifically targeted ones, but as every reputable journalist, analyst and observer knows and as the weight of evidence against NATO patently shows this is a lie of monumental proportions as the plethora of NATO encouraged reprisal killings and black lynchings testify to.

Even so NATO and the NTC do have their supporters and one such still wet-behind-the airs and who hasn’t yet thrown off his maternal features is a nonentity that few if anyone has ever heard of before but as generally happens in such situations just emerge on cue like verminous cockroaches out of a pretty fetid sewer. His name is James Denselow (and the first part of his surname ought to give you an idea of his lack of intellectual rigour or commonsense) and he bills himself as a Middle East analyst. That’s equivalent, I would imagine, to a rather obscure and highly irrelevant desert camel driver billing himself as an English or EU analyst, which I don’t think any of you quite rightly would fall for; yet we persistently have no shortage at all of these limp-wristed, testosterone-deficient, pseudo males whose butch female counterparts plainly make them look and sound every bit like the pansies they are assuming that their skin colour, oftentimes quite privileged and cosseted backgrounds themselves buttressed by their colonialist nostalgia and imperialist designs unchallengably, in their eyes, designate them as spokespersons for every other race on planet earth in a manner that were this offensive boot on the other foot they would forcefully and vocally have something to say about it.

Nevertheless this is what Brains of Britain (I don’t think), James Denselow, had to say on the Libyan situation: “Clearly there are real problems on the ground and it’s the legacy of such a conflict that you will have human rights abuses taking part on both sides, and the NTC have promised to hold their own fighters to account; and I think that is a process we will see from now.” So there you have it then and right from the mouth of an expert that I’m perfectly sure, and I say this while trying to keep a straight face at the same time, whose measured sagacity and words of wisdom have markedly improved your own understanding a thousandfold, as it didn’t my own I must confess, about the intricacies of perpetual conflicts generally and the one in Libya in particular. How fortunate you are!

James Denselow’s opinion thankfully isn’t one that anybody with a functioning brain cell in his or her head would sensibly attach any credence to or come to that even remotely support. And among that are dubious about what he has to say on this issue is the absolutely brilliant and prescient-minded RT journalist and London correspondent, for whom I have the greatest of admiration and respect, Laura Emmett who perceptively remarks in relation to Denselow’s total hooey: “It doesn’t seem to be happening yet; the African Union alleges that transitional forces are hunting down and killing black Africans on the assumption that Gaddafi recruited them as mercenaries. That’s borne out by a report by Amnesty International [better late than never I suppose] which says the rebels are guilty of unlawful killings and torture.” She goes on to say; “It takes pains to point out that Gaddafi forces committed some terrible atrocities but [Amnesty International] also documented the brutal settling of scores by rebel forces that include the lynching of Gaddafi soldiers.”

At this point I would like to make an unequivocal comment of my own that anyone familiar with the rules of warfare and particularly bodies like NATO, its commanding officers and the leaders of its members states do know about, that it is a specific crime against humanity and the Geneva Conventions to subject regular combatants of an opposing army to degrading or cruel treatment let alone arbitrarily and sadistically kill them; and opposing soldiers captured on the field of battle must be treated as prisoners of war and accorded their due rights under the Geneva Conventions. Therefore, for the NTC with the blessing of NATO and particularly Britain, France and the United States that are fully aware of this, not least because they were instrumental in drawing up these rules and regulations themselves, to be a party to something like this that makes them culpable of what are basically war crimes, and one need not wonder what their reactions would be if the same treatment was being meted out to their servicemen and women or even elements of the SAS, CIA and others of their secret services operating clandestinely in Libya.

But I’m not alone of this point of view and credible political analysts on the Middle East like Dan Glazebrook commandingly make a very valid point when he says: “The problem for the west is that if Africa unites it will be able to break free from the colonial grip it’s been in for hundreds of years. And who was the leading force behind uniting Africa? It was Libya under Gaddafi’s rule. So NATO wants a government that will disunite Africa; that will draw North Africa away from its southern neighbours, so it’s very important for NATO that the regime is a racist one that will not continue with this Libyan project [sponsored by Colonel Gaddafi] of uniting Africa. So it’s no mistake that this uprising has been characterized by racist violence. This is part of [NATO’s] plan!”

Equally John Laughland, of the Institute of Democracy and Cooperation, also weighs in quite heavily on the issue stating unequivocally: “I don’t think that anyone bought the line that this intervention was about protecting civilians, that was merely the fig leaf, the legal fig leaf that France, Britain and America used to overthrow Gaddafi. The west by overthrowing Gaddafi wanted to maintain the fiction that the entire world is moving towards a western dominated model; a pro-western model. It [explicitly] wanted to show that the Arab Spring moment was a movement for liberal western-style democracy; and of course as soon as a regime stood in the way of that apparent wave, which is the case of Libya, its regime is brushed aside. That has now been achieved and that is why David Cameron and Nicolas Sarkozy have gone there [to Libya, 15 September 2011] today. It’s to demonstrate that fact, and it’s to publicly show to the world, to publicize their victory.”

Meanwhile Colonel Gaddafi’s hometown of Sirte is one of the last holdouts against the NTC. In a letter purportedly from the colonel himself he allegedly begs the UN Security Council to protect Sirte from being pounded by NATO air bombardments and to tackle what it describes as crimes repeatedly committed by the undisciplined forces of the NTC; a scenario in which civilian deaths are seemingly assured. So far there has been no admission of the receipt of this letter by the UN Security Council or any of the requests it purports to make to it. But one thing is manifestly obvious in all this. David Cameron and Nicolas Sarkozy were very quick to vocally and viciously condemn Colonel Gaddafi for allegedly killing innocent civilians in the hot-headed rush leading up to NATO imposing it’s no-fly zone over Libya; however no such rhetoric is being aimed at the NTC. In fact it’s very much the opposite as Laura Emmett categorically points out: “Britain sponsored a draft UN resolution to ease sanctions against Libya and against the national oil corporation in particular [so] getting the oil flowing again.” All the while though civilians in rebel seized cities fall through NATO’s life saving net.

In this stark analysis of the myriad double standards, hypocrisy and premeditated murder that have become the trademark of the imperialist minded regimes and racist, colonialist fantasies of David Cameron and Nicolas Sarkozy I would like to leave you with the thoughtful words of distinguished lawyer Marcel Ceccaldi: “Western leaders are poised for their first big legal challenge over Libya; if they stop the cases coming to court altogether it will prove once and for all that western justice is really run by politicians not the rule of law.”

Are you listening judges across the EU and particularly in Britain; more importantly do you have the nous to do something positive about it instead of being just lickspittles?