Think past oil, Rockefeller kin tell Exxon

15 descendants push for renewable energy, cuts in warming emissions

MSNBC News Services

NEW YORK - Members of the Rockefeller family, descended from the founder of what became Exxon Mobil Corp., challenged the oil giant Wednesday to focus more on renewable sources of energy.

They also seek to establish a task force study of the consequences of global warming on poor economies, and called on Exxon to reduce greenhouse gas emission at its own operations.

Exxon is "profiting in the short term from investments and decisions made many years ago by focusing on the narrow path that ignores the rapidly shifting energy landscape around the world, including developing nations," said Neva Rockefeller Goodwin, a great granddaughter of John D. Rockefeller.

The family members, who describe themselves as the company's longest continuous shareholders, said they are concerned that the Irving, Texas-based company is too focused on short-term gains from soaring oil prices and should do more to invest in cleaner technology for the future.

"They are fighting the last war and they're not seeing they're facing a new war," said Peter O'Neill, who heads the Rockefeller Family committee dealing with Exxon Mobil and is the great-great-grandson of John D. Rockefeller.

He said he had the support of more than 80 percent of family members over the age of 21. Family representatives said it was a significant holding for the Rockefellers but that they were not sure how much of the company they actually own collectively.

Exxon Mobil was formed by the combination of two offspring of John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil Trust. It is now the world's largest publicly traded oil company.

Members of the family said they have sponsored four proxy resolutions this year that raised concerns about the company's leadership under Chairman and Chief Executive Rex Tillerson. They also said they have spent years behind the scenes prodding the company to change its approach to the oil business.

'Trying to keep a giant ... from falling'
The family and its allies decided to take their case public, they said, because they believe future energy will come from sources other than oil and natural gas, and say the company needs to move more quickly into sustainable technology to secure its long-term viability.

"We all know the saying: The bigger they are, the harder they fall," said Connecticut State Treasurer Denise Nappier, who oversees a pension fund that holds $300 million in Exxon Mobil stock — its largest single equity investment. She spoke at a press conference alongside the Rockefellers.

"We are trying to keep a giant — and it truly is a giant in the oil and gas industry — from falling," Nappier said.

Goodwin called on Exxon to reconnect with the forward-looking vision of her great grandfather.

"Kerosene was the alternative energy of its day when he realized it could replace whale oil," she said. "Part of John D. Rockefeller's genius was in recognizing early the need and opportunity for a transition to a better, cheaper and cleaner fuel."

Huge profit expected
The calls for reform came one day before Exxon Mobil was expected to report first-quarter earnings of more than $11 billion, according to according to a survey by Thomson Financial. Thanks to rapidly rising oil prices, that is considerably more than the company earned a year earlier, and could even top Exxon Mobil's own record for the biggest quarterly profit in U.S. history.

The company's board is recommending shareholders vote against a proposal to split the role of chairman and CEO. In a recent proxy statement filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the board said "that the most effective leadership structure for Exxon Mobil Corporation at the present time is for Mr. Tillerson to serve as both Chairman and CEO."

Exxon Mobil spokesman Gantt Walton said the company has met with members of the Rockefeller family on multiple occasions and "respects the rights of all shareholders to make their views known," but that it does not comment on details of meetings with shareholders.

The stock is up more than 63 percent since Tillerson became CEO on Jan. 1, 2006, compared with a gain of 11.4 percent for the broad S&P 500 index over the same period.

Man sickened by ricin is arrested

Released from Las Vegas hospital, he faces toxin, weapons charges

AP

LAS VEGAS - An unemployed graphic designer who authorities believe was nearly killed by ricin was arrested Wednesday on federal charges that he possessed the deadly toxin as part of an "exotic idea," never carried out, to poison his enemies.

Roger Bergendorff, who authorities allege began making ricin a decade ago, was arrested upon his release from the hospital where he had been treated since Feb. 14.

He is charged with possession of a biological toxin and two weapons offenses stemming from materials authorities said were found Feb. 26 and Feb. 28 in his room at an extended-stay motel several blocks off the Las Vegas Strip.

"He was released from the hospital and he's in custody," said FBI agent Joseph Dickey, a spokesman for the bureau's Las Vegas office.

The charges carry a possible penalty of 30 years in federal prison and a $750,000 fine. Bergendorff, 57, was scheduled to appear Wednesday afternoon before a federal judge in U.S. District Court in Las Vegas.

Began making ricin a decade ago
Prosecutors said in a six-page complaint that Bergendorff told investigators he first made ricin in San Diego in the late 1990s, and later made the substance while living in Reno and in the basement of his cousin's house in Riverton, Utah.

The complaint said that a June 2002 receipt for castor bean seed, purchased from a Michigan company, was found in an Utah storage locker rented by Bergendorff. The listed purchaser, "Roger's Patio and Garden," was apparently a fictitious business created by Bergendorff, the complaint said.

Cancer research is the only legal use for ricin, which has no antidote and can be lethal in amounts the size of the head of a pin.

Authorities do not allege Bergendorff's possession of ricin had anything to do with terrorism, according to court documents.

"Bergendorff characterized the production of ricin as an 'exotic idea,'" the complaint said.

Over the course of several interviews with the FBI, "Bergendorff admitted that there have been people who have made him mad over the years and he had thoughts about causing them harm to the point of making some plans," the complaint said. "However, he maintained that he never acted on those thoughts or plans."

Symptoms suggested ricin exposure
Officials say Bergendorff's symptoms were consistent with ricin exposure, but it may never be certain that the toxin sickened him because all traces of the substance are eliminated from the body within days, and the ricin in his hotel room was found well after he got sick.

Bergendorff's cousin Thomas Tholen, 54, was charged this month in Salt Lake City with misprision of felony, which means failing to report a crime.

The complaint said Tholen told investigators that Bergendorff had talked to him about how easy it would be to make ricin, and that Bergendorff showed him a vial or beaker with a powder he believed to be ricin in December 2005.

Tholen declined to comment when reached by telephone Wednesday. His lawyer Greg Skordas denied Tholen knew Bergendorff had ricin.

"Tom always maintained that he was unaware of Bergendorff ever producing or possessing or manufacturing ricin while they were together," Skordas said.

Roger Bergendorff's brother, Erich Bergendorff, said he spoke with him Tuesday by telephone.

"He just said he wasn't going to face charges, but I don't think that was based on fact," said Erich Bergendorff, who lives in Escondido, Calif. "It's my impression that he didn't understand the hazard he posed."

Erich Bergendorff said he did not know whether his brother had spoken to an attorney.

Four weeks in hospital
Bergendorff, who lived with his dog and two cats, summoned an ambulance to his Las Vegas motel room Feb. 14, complaining of respiratory distress. He spent almost four weeks unconscious at a Las Vegas hospital. Family members said he also was treated for kidney failure.

Tholen was collecting Bergendorff's belongings from the motel room Feb. 28 when he gave a motel manager a plastic bag containing several vials of what turned out to be ricin powder.

The complaint refers to the substance as "crude" and 2.9 percent "active ricin."

"That's not pure," said Andrew Ternay Jr., founder of the Rocky Mountain Center for Homeland Defense at the University of Denver and author of "The Language of Nightmares," a glossary of terms for chemical, biological and nuclear weapons.

"But it is deadly no matter," Ternay said. "It's just that it would take more to kill someone."

Police and homeland security officials have said they found no ricin contamination in any place Bergendorff stayed.

U.S. Attorney Gregory Brower said the charges of possession of unregistered firearms and possession of firearms not identified by serial number stemmed from the seizure by Las Vegas police of two .25-caliber pistols, a .22-caliber Ruger rifle and a .22-caliber Browning pistol with a silencer.

Operations Against China

GermanForeignPolicy.com

LHASA/WASHINGTON/BERLIN

(Own report) - Several front organizations of German foreign policy have for years been supporting the Tibetan exile structures in Dharamsala, India. This includes support for organizational measures enabling the "government in exile" in Dharamsala to orchestrate its activities against the People's Republic of China worldwide. Particularly the Free Democratic Party (FDP) affiliated Friedrich Naumann Foundation and the Heinrich Boell Foundation (affiliated with the Green Party) are cooperating with the "government in exile" and other exile Tibetan institutions. Front organizations of US foreign policy are working toward the same objectives. Already in the 1950s Washington was intervening in Tibet with millions of dollars, at the time, even supporting Tibetan armed uprisings against the People's Republic of China. German organizations took up the question of Tibet around the end of the 80s, at a time when China was beginning its rise to become a global competitor of the west. The current activities are apt to greatly weaken China. These supplement other German-US measures aimed at thwarting the rise of their East-Asian rival.

Guerrilla Attacks

The first western activities in Tibet began only a few years after the founding of the People's Republic of China. These activities are still today emblazoned in China's political memory and play no insignificant role in China's judgment of the current secessionist tendencies. The US logistical and military support for the armed Tibetan rebellions, beginning in 1957, was aimed at destabilizing the communist government.[1] The intervention outlasted the Dalai Lama's flight into exile in Dharamsala, India, where, after 1959, a Tibetan "government in exile" was called into being. According to official documents from the government in Washington, during the 1960s the CIA was paying up to $1.7 million per year to maintain "operations against China." Up to $180,000 was given directly to the Dalai Lama.[2] Isolated skirmishes continued up into the 1970s. According to the Tibet expert, Prof. Karenina Kollmar-Paulenz, "Guerrilla attacks, originating in Mustang, a Tibetan enclave in Nepal, persisted with US-American support until 1974, when the USA and the Nepalese government stopped their help."[3] Two years earlier, Washington had entered into a new cooperation with Beijing that defined their common efforts against Moscow to be top priority.

Green Alternative

German organizations have become intensively engaged in the Tibet question since the 1980s, when the People's Republic of China began an economic upswing that has now placed it in the top ranks of global commercial statistics. Already at that time political strategists were predicting the possibility of China's rise to becoming a major power and foresaw rivalry between China and western powers. Using contacts to Tibet by "alternative" political circles, who had converted to Buddhism, the Green parliamentary group, through hearings and parliamentary resolutions, placed the questions of autonomy and the demands for secession in that region of China on the political agenda of the Bundestag in 1985. Tsewang Norbu, a former assistant of the Dalai Lama, helped shape policy on Tibet, first as an employee of the Green parliamentarian Petra Kelly and, since 1992, as an employee of the Green Party affiliated Heinrich Boell Foundation. In addition, Norbu founded the German-Tibetan Cultural Society and, over an extended period of time, presided as its vice-chairman. He also works as a "special correspondent" for the US financed "Radio Free Asia" (RFA). RFA is among the news sources of western reporting on the recent uprising in Tibet.

Political Decision-Making Process

Two of the most influential German party-affiliated foundations are particularly engaged in Tibet-related activities. Former President of Germany, Roman Herzog, qualifies their work as "effective instruments of German foreign policy".[4] These foundations are mainly government financed. One, the FDP-affiliated Friedrich Naumann Foundation (FNSt) has been counseling the Tibetan exile parliament "in all questions of political education" since 1991. A few years ago the foundation claimed that this function will be "very important for the political decision-making process of Tibetan parliamentarians".[5] One of their project partners, the "Tibetan Parliamentary and Policy Research Center" (TPPRC) organizes workshops for the Tibetan exile communities that are mostly found in India or in Nepal.[6] It also teaches Tibetan students "how they can serve their country within and outside the government."[7] 500 students took part in the seminars between 2003 and 2007. The FNSt has also been organizing conferences since the mid-90s that are meant to "coordinate the work of the international Tibet groups and strengthen their links to the central Tibetan 'government in exile'," a complicated enterprise that facilitates the worldwide networking of Tibet militants with Dharamsala. The most recent of these conferences ended in May 2007 with agreement on an "plan of action" which would include the use of the summer Olympic Games to take place in Beijing for the exile Tibetan cause. (german-foreign-policy.com reported.[8])

Justification

Also active for the "Tibet cause" is the Green Party affiliated Heinrich Boell Foundation, which, like the FNSt works out of its branch office in India. According to its own indications, it "intensified the focus of its years long support for the exile Tibetan community at the turn of the year 2005/2006."[9] They are now concentrating their support on two organizations that have their headquarters in the exile Tibetan "capital" Dharamsala. They are the "Tibetan Center for Conflict Resolution" (TCCR) that mediates conflicts that arise within the community and more particularly the "Tibetan Center for Human Rights and Democracy" (TCHRD). The TCHRD publishes annual reports on Human Rights violations in Tibet and is very significant for the justification of Tibetan political demands. The Heinrich Boell Foundation writes that "taking into consideration the persisting - even though seemingly futile - demands for Tibetan self-determination, there still exists (...) an urgent need for documentation of human rights violations and the policy of assimilation carried out by the Chinese state authorities in Tibet, such as produced by the TCHRD."[10] The TCHRD is also being supported by the "National Endowment for Democracy" (NED), a front organization for US foreign policy that has become notorious for sponsoring the "color revolutions" in Eastern Europe and Central Asia.

Conflagration

German foundations' activities around Tibet touch one of the most sensitive spots in Chinese policy. Not only do they represent interference into the domestic affairs of that nation, they also threaten the People's Republic's territorial integrity. "To a certain extent, Tibet is the cornerstone of a fragile multi-ethnic state," writes a policy advisor at the Institute of Asian Studies of the German Institute of Global and Area Studies (GIGA) in Hamburg. "A horror scenario for Beijing is that beginning with Tibet, a conflagration develops." One finds "designated on a map published in a 1990 autobiography of the Dalai Lama (...) alongside Greater Tibet also 'East Turkestan,' as the area where Moslem Uygurs settled, Inner Mongolia and Manchuria."[11] The secession of these regions would have drastic consequences: "the remaining Chinese settled areas would have shrunk to a third of the People's Republic."

Strategic, Rather Than Legalistic

In fact, the current Tibet campaign, with the participation of German organizations, is but an example of Berlin's and Washington's growing anti-Chinese policy. In Africa, Germany and the USA are now openly agitating against China.[12] Aggressive competition is being practiced also in Latin America [13] as well as in Central Asia [14]. India is seen as a possible counter-balance for the containment of the People's Republic. The west is wooing it accordingly.[15] Here, Tibet could also provide leverage for spurring New Delhi's reticent ruling circles on course. According to the declaration of a former official of the Indian Foreign Ministry, it is "high time for India" to give up its "timid rapprochement" with China and place Beijing "under pressure" also on the Tibet question. The relations with China must be developed "from a strategic, rather than legalistic perspective." The position paper has been put up for debate by the Heinrich Boell Foundation' Indian field office.[16]

Not Tolerated

Not least among the consequences, the Tibet campaign is also stimulating an anti-Chinese atmosphere in Germany leaving a dwindling amount of room for criticism. Opinions that are at variance with the anti-Beijing mainstream are, in the meantime, being punished. In Cologne a sinologist's lecture on the theme of Tibet had to be cancelled at the last minute. The organizers had criticized the one-sided western media reporting and sought to initiate a differentiated debate of the conflict.[17] This intention led to the cancellation on short notice of the rental contract for the location in the Cologne Community Center. Those responsible for the community center made it known that no "anti-Tibetan" events would be tolerated.

Please read also Strategies of Attrition (I), Strategies of Attrition (II), Strategies of Attrition (III), Strategies of Attrition (IV), The Olympic Lever and The Olympic Torch Relay Campaign.

[1] Karenina Kollmar Paulenz: Kleine Geschichte Tibets, München 2006
[2] CIA funded covert Tibet exile campaign in 1960s; The Age (Australia) 16.09.1998
[3] Karenina Kollmar Paulenz: Kleine Geschichte Tibets, München 2006
[4] see also "The Most Effective Instruments of German Foreign Policy"
[5] Buchbesprechung: "Tibet im Exil"; www.fnst-freiheit.org
[6] Intensive workshop for Tibetan Local Assembly Members; www.southasia.fnst-freiheit.org
[7] "The objective is to make the student understand oneself and the exile government, enabling them to know exactly how to serve their country by working within the government or outside it." Youth Leadership Training with a Difference; www.southasia.fnst-freiheit.org
[8] see also The Olympic Torch Relay Campaign
[9], [10] Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung: Politischer Jahresbericht Länderbüro Indien, 2005/2006
[11] "Der Dissens unter den Exiltibetern wächst". Interview mit China-Experten: Unruhen unterminieren pazifistisches Credo des Dalai Lama - Beijing fürchtet Vision eines Großtibet; GIGA News 20.03.2008
[12] see also Mr. Horst Koehler, Managing Director, Auf gleicher Augenhöhe, Hegemonic Rivalry and Näher an Afrika
[13] see also New strategic orientation, Schlüsselpositionen and To the Mines
[14] see also Spät, aber nachhaltig and Günstige Lage
[15] see also Military Partner, Friedensmächte and Der dritte Pfeiler
[16] "It is time for India to get out of its defensive mindset and timid approach in dealing with China. There are vital national security interests at stake. Relations with China must be handled from a strategic, not a legalistic, perspective. The approach India follows should be multi-dimensional. India does want better relations with China, but it must also evolve a calculated and calibrated policy to put China under some pressure to safeguard its interests and concerns." Rajiv Sikri: India’s Tibet Policy: Need for a Change; www.boell-india.org
[17] Für Informationen zu Tibet in der Alten Feuerwache kein Platz? www.salz-köln.de

The Olympic Torch Relay Campaign

GermanForeignPolicy.com

LHASA/BERLIN

(Own report) - Conference reports and the research of a Canadian journalist reveal that a German Foreign Ministry front organization is playing a decisive role in the preparations of the anti-Chinese Tibet campaign. According to this information, the campaign is being orchestrated from a Washington based headquarters. It had been assigned the task of organizing worldwide "protests" at a conference organized by the Friedrich Naumann Foundation (affiliated with the German Free Democratic Party - FDP) in May 2007. The plans were developed with the collaboration of the US State Department and the self-proclaimed Tibetan Government in Exile and call for high profile actions along the route of the Olympic Torch Relay and are supposed to reach a climax in August during the games in Beijing. The campaign began already last summer and is now profiting from the current uprising in the west of the People's Republic of China that is receiving prominent coverage in the German media. The uprising was initiated with murderous pogrom-like attacks by Tibetan gangs on non-Tibetan members of the population, including the Muslim Chinese minority. Numerous deaths of non-Tibetans provoked a reaction of the Chinese security forces.

According to the research by a Canadian journalist, a conference organized by the Friedrich Naumann Foundation (FNSt) gave the impetus to the current anti-Chinese Tibet campaign that violently forced the interruption of the Olympian Torch Relay in Paris last Monday.[1] The conference was the fifth "International Tibet Support Groups Conference," that was held from May 11 - 14, 2007 in Brussels. According to FNSt information this conference was supposed to do nothing other than the four preceding conferences [2] - "coordinate the work of the international Tibet groups and consolidate the links between them with the central Tibetan Government in Exile."[3] The German foundation, which is largely state financed, began the conference preparations in March 2005, and coordinated its plans with the Dalai Lama at his headquarters in the self-proclaimed Tibetan Government in Exile in Dharamsala, India. More than 300 participants from 56 countries, 36 Tibetan associations and 145 Tibet support groups were represented at the conference.

Roadmap

After several days of consultations the conference ended with a concerted "plan of action". The paper is entitled "Roadmap for the Tibet Movement for the Coming Years" covering four areas of interest: "political support for negotiations", "human rights", "environment and development" and "the 2008 Olympic games in Beijing." The results of the conference are directed to the Tibetan people as well as "their supporters around the world."[4] Rolf Berndt, a member of the FNSt's executive council in Brussels, declared that the Olympic Games "are an excellent opportunity" to publicly promote the cause of the "Tibet Movement".[5] The conference participants agreed to make the Olympics the single focus of attack for their activities for the next 15 months.[6] They hired a full-time organizer for their campaign, who has since been directing the worldwide Tibet actions from their Washington headquarters.

State Department

The decisions taken at the conference in Brussels, prepared by the Friedrich Naumann Foundation, are particularly significant not only because of the large number of participants but also because of the influential politicians who helped in their formulation. For example the self-proclaimed Tibetan Government in Exile, which enjoys much prestige among separatists, was represented by its "Prime Minister" Samdong Rinpoche. Also attending was another eminent politician from the Indian Himachal Pradesh state, bordering on the People's Republic of China, where the town Dharamsala is located, the "seat" of the Tibetan "Government in Exile." A brisk interchange takes place between Himachan Pradesh and the Chinese autonomous region of Tibet. Paula Dobriansky, the Undersecretary of State in the US State Department and special coordinator for Tibet questions also participated. She was a member of the National Security Council already in the Reagan Administration, continued her career in the State Department during the administration of President Bush Sr. and since 2001 was again in the US foreign ministry. Ms Drobriansky is considered to be one of the members of the neo-conservative inner circle in the Bush Administration and ranks as a hard-liner capable of imposing policy.

Every Day

As a Canadian journalist learned through his research, the campaign headquarters in Washington, that had been decided upon at the conference in Brussels, has been able to develop rather successful activities. Already at the beginning of August 2007, exactly one year before the opening of the Olympics, a close associate organized a high profile action at the tourist filled Great Wall to the north of Beijing. She maintains close contact to the Tibetan "Government in Exile".[7] Another close associate recently orchestrated the disturbance of the Olympic Torch Relay in Greece, seen on television around the world. The Washington headquarters is orchestrating other "protests" intended to disturb the Torch Relay. The campaign will reach its climax during the Olympic games in August. "We are determined to have non-violent direct action in the heart of Beijing, inside the Games, every day," one activist declared.[8]

Merciless

The anti-Chinese Tibet campaign, initiated under the direction of a German Foreign Ministry front organization (Friedrich Naumann Foundation) and a high-ranking representative of the US State Department, is developing its full efficacy in the aftermath of the uprisings in West People's Republic of China that began only a few days before the start of the Torch Relay. Whereas the German media mainly reported on brutal attacks of the Chinese security forces, eye-witness accounts provide a different picture of what happened. The British journalist, James Miles ("The Economist"), who was in Lhasa from March 12 - 19, reports of pogrom-like attacks by Tibetan gangs on non-Tibetan members of the population of the city, among them the Muslim minority. According to Miles, the shops of Tibetan merchants were marked and left unscathed while all other shops were plundered, destroyed or set afire.[9] In one building alone five textile saleswomen were burned to death. Besides Miles, western tourists also described the attacks on non-Tibetans. One Canadian saw how a group of Tibetans beat a Chinese motorcyclist and proceeded to "mercilessly" stone him. "Eventually they got him on the ground, they were hitting him on the head with stones until he lost consciousness. I believe that young man was killed,'' reported the tourist.[10]

Manipulations

Whereas Miles was describing the reluctant reactions of the Chinese security forces in an interview broadcast over CNN, the German media is using the uprisings as a backdrop to represent brutal Chinese repression. Facts obviously play a subordinate role. In the meantime, television channels and daily journals have had to admit manipulations of pictures. Film sequences with Nepalese policemen beating demonstrators were sold as documentation of alleged Chinese police attacks.[11] The security forces' saving a boy from an attacking Tibetan mob was coarsely labeled a violent arrest. Even Miles' report was editorially presented in a context to focus on Chinese repression. For the purpose of comparison, german-foreign-policy.com documents excerpts of a CNN interview with the British journalist as well as the corresponding passage from a renowned German daily.[12] (Click here.)

Anticipation

The pogrom-like mob-violence not only created the necessary media profile for the current Tibet campaign, initiated with the help of the Friedrich Naumann Foundation, it also permits an insight into the character of Tibetan separatism. The "prime minister" of the Tibetan "Exile Government," who had participated in the formulation of the plan of action at the May 2007 Tibet Conference in Brussels, had already at the end of the 1990s, expounded in the German media on his views of the future of non-Tibetans, who had immigrated to Tibet over the past 50 years. In the case of a successful secession, they will have to "return to China, or if they would like to remain, be treated as foreigners." He explained the planned measures: "they will, in any case, not be allowed to participate in the political life."[13] The prospect of discrimination against all non-Tibetan members of the population was anticipated in mid-March by mobs in their bloody attacks on Chinese and members of the Muslim minority.

Please read also Strategies of Attrition (I), Strategies of Attrition (II), Strategies of Attrition (III), Strategies of Attrition (IV) and The Olympic Lever.

[1] Doug Saunders: How three Canadians upstaged Beijing; Globe and Mail 29.03.2008. Die Konferenz wurde von der Friedrich-Naumann-Stiftung in Zusammenarbeit mit der selbsternannten tibetischen Exilregierung und einem interfraktionellen Zusammenschluss des belgischen Parlaments durchgeführt.
[2] Die ersten vier "International Tibet Support Groups Conferences" fanden 1990 (Dharamsala), 1996 (Bonn), 2000 (Berlin) und 2003 (Prag) statt. Bereits die zweite Konferenz wurde von der Friedrich-Naumann-Stiftung organisiert.
[3] Gerhardt kritisiert Belgien nach Absage des Dalai-Lama-Besuchs; www.fnst-freiheit.org 11.05.2007
[4] Brussels Tibet conference roadmap for peace in Tibet; www.tibet.com 14.05.2007
[5] Valedictory Speech, International Tibet Support Groups Conference 5th, Dr. h.c. Rolf Berndt, Executive Director, Friedrich-Naumann-Stiftung fuer die Freiheit,Brussels, 14th May 2007
[6], [7}, [8] Doug Saunders: How three Canadians upstaged Beijing; Globe and Mail 29.03.2008
[9] Transcript: James Miles interview on Tibet; CNN 20.03.2008
[10] Chinese beaten mercilessly - tourists; Herald Sun 19.03.2008
[11] Fotos aus Tibet; Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung 24.03.2008
[12] see also Augenzeuge
[13] "99 Prozent der Tibeter vertrauen in Seine Heiligkeit"; Berliner Zeitung 20.10.1997. Ähnlich hat sich erst kürzlich der Dalai Lama geäußert. "Alle Chinesen, die Tibetisch sprechen und die tibetische Kultur respektieren, können bleiben", sagte er einer deutschen Zeitung - mit einer Einschränkung: "sofern es nicht zu viele sind". "China mischt sich auch in Deutschlands Angelegenheiten ein"; Süddeutsche Zeitung 21.09.2007

China reveals Iran's nuclear secrets to UN

by Damien McElroy

THE TELEGRAPH

China has betrayed one its closest allies by providing the United Nations with intelligence on Iran's efforts to acquire nuclear technology, diplomats have revealed.

Concern over Tehran's secretive research programme has increased in recent weeks after officials at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the UN's nuclear watchdog, discovered that Iran had obtained information on how to manufacture nuclear-armed weapons.

China reveals Iran's nuclear secrets to UN inspectors
A heavy-water nuclear facility in Arak and a security guard at an Iranian nuclear enrichment facility

Beijing is believed to have decided to assist the inspectors after documents seized from Iranian officials included blueprints for "shaping" uranium metal into warheads, the testing of high explosives used to detonate radioactive material and the procurement of dual-use technology.

Much of the new material was presented to the governors of the Vienna-based IAEA in February. That meeting is said to have triggered China's change of heart.

President Ahmadinejad on National Nuclear Day: China reveals Iran's nuclear secrets to UN inspectors
Ahmadinejad on National Nuclear Day

Diplomats described Beijing's decision to provide material related to Iran to the IAEA as a potentially significant breakthrough.

Chinese designs for centrifuges that refine uranium into a "weaponised" state have been found in Iran but these are thought to have come through a network controlled by the disgraced Pakistani scientist AQ Khan.

John Bolton, the former American ambassador to the United Nations, said suspicions over the leakage of technology from China to Iran had long centred on uranium enrichment technology and their bilateral ballistic missile trade.

A spokesman for the IAEA said it did not comment on intelligence it received from its members.

Beijing has long-established ties with Iran's clerical regime and has emerged as one of the country's biggest customers for oil and gas.

It has allied itself with Tehran's attempts to prevent the IAEA referring Iran to the UN Security Council, which can impose sanctions.

China has not used its veto powers to block US and British sponsored sanctions but it has ensured the measures were watered down.

The council has levied three rounds of financial sanctions on Iran in an attempt to force the country to declare all its nuclear activities.

IAEA weapons inspectors report that Iran has not provided full co-operation.

An American intelligence assessment judged it likely that Iran stopped efforts to produce a nuclear weapon in 2003 but there are strong fears it has resumed the work under President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Michael Hayden, the director of the CIA, said this week that he believed that Iran is still developing a nuclear bomb.

Meanwhile, Israel has accused Iran of setting up listening stations in Syria to eavesdrop on its military communications network.

Saudi Arabia is prime source of terror funds, U.S. says

Treasury official expresses frustrations with the administration's efforts to force action by the kingdom. A Senate panel orders a review.

by Josh Meyer

LOS ANGELES TIMES

WASHINGTON -- Saudi Arabia remains the world's leading source of money for Al Qaeda and other extremist networks and has failed to take key steps requested by U.S. officials to stem the flow, the Bush administration's top financial counter-terrorism official said Tuesday.

Stuart A. Levey, a Treasury undersecretary, told a Senate committee that the Saudi government had not taken important steps to go after those who finance terrorist organizations or to prevent wealthy donors from bankrolling extremism through charitable contributions, sometimes unwittingly.

"Saudi Arabia today remains the location where more money is going to terrorism, to Sunni terror groups and to the Taliban than any other place in the world," Levey said under questioning.

U.S. officials have previously identified Saudi Arabia as a major source of funding for extremism. But Levey's comments were notable because, although reluctant to directly criticize a close U.S. ally, he acknowledged frustration with administration efforts to persuade the Saudis and others to act.

"We continue to face significant challenges as we move forward with these efforts, including fostering and maintaining the political will among other governments to take effective and consistent action," Levey said, later adding: "Our work is not nearly complete."

Levey was the sole witness before the Senate Finance Committee, which Tuesday ordered an independent review of the efforts to choke off financing used by Al Qaeda and other extremist groups.

Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.), the committee chairman, announced the review at the end of the hearing held to assess the money-tracking campaign by Treasury's Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence, headed by Levey.

The Bush administration created the office in 2004 to spearhead efforts to disrupt the flow of money to extremist causes, primarily from wealthy donors in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere in the Persian Gulf.

However, U.S. officials and counter-terrorism experts have said that international support for the effort has waned while terrorist groups have found ways around the financial restrictions. At the same time, there have been turf battles among the 19 federal agencies that work on the problem.

Senators praised work done by Levey but expressed concerns about the overall U.S. effort. The committee's Democratic and Republican leaders cited a Los Angeles Times report last week detailing problems undermining the effort.

Sen. Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, the ranking Republican, said extremist groups had adapted to changing U.S. investigative methods: "We are simply not prepared right now to keep up with them and put them out of business once and for all."

Levey said the campaign has succeeded in disrupting terrorist financing by freezing suspicious assets and in gathering intelligence that could be used to identify extremists and disrupt their activities.

But under questioning by senators, Levey also spoke of difficulty in getting Saudi Arabia to take the steps U.S. officials consider necessary.

Levey said the Saudis had been aggressive in going after terrorist cells. But he said they had not lived up to promises to establish the kind of financial intelligence unit needed to trace the money trails of terrorists. Another problem is that the Saudi government has not set up a charity oversight commission to track whether donations end up in the hands of extremists.

Levey said the Saudi government has not moved to publicly hold accountable those within the kingdom who have been the subject of enforcement actions by the U.S. and other authorities.

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) said the Saudi failures mean that Americans who pay more than $100 a barrel for oil are in effect bankrolling extremism because wealthy Saudis "back-door" their profits into charities that fund extremist causes.

Nail Jubeir, press attache for the Saudi embassy in Washington, dismissed those concerns, saying the Bush administration has repeatedly praised Saudi Arabia for its efforts to combat terrorism.

"We have been very vigilant in our campaign against terrorism financing," Jubeir said. "We have come a long way since 9/11 on this issue."

Jubeir confirmed that Saudi Arabia has not set up the financial intelligence unit or charity commission, but said it was cracking down on the financiers of terrorism in other ways, such as making it illegal for anyone to send money outside the kingdom "without going through official government channels."

Alleged financiers of terrorism identified by the United States are being investigated, and their assets have been frozen, Jubeir said. "But unless we have evidence to try them . . . we don't parade them in public," he said. "What if it turns out they are innocent?"

At the hearing, senators also expressed concern about disputes among U.S. agencies and other administrative and investigative functions of Levey's office. Baucus and Grassley asked that the Government Accountability Office review its internal efficiency and effectiveness as well as its cooperation with foreign governments.

Levey said he had not seen the request from Baucus and Grassley, but added: "We welcome any source of advice as to how we can improve."

Arabs, Muslims battle US, Europeans over free speech at UN

AP

GENEVA: Arab and Muslim countries defended Tuesday a resolution they pushed through at the United Nations to have the body's expert on free speech police individuals and news media for negative comments on Islam.

The United States, Canada and some European countries criticized the role reversal for Kenyan legal expert Ambeyi Ligabo, who has reported to the global body on measures by dictatorships and repressive governments to restrict free speech.

The U.S. and other Western nations warned that the Muslim-backed resolution at the U.N. Human Rights Council could curtail freedom of expression and help dictatorial regimes block dissenting views.

"The resolution adopted attempts to legitimize the criminalization of expression," said Warren W. Tichenor, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N. in Geneva.

The statement proposed by Egypt and Pakistan, which passed 32-0 last week at the council, seeks to impose "restrictions on individuals rather than to emphasize the duty and responsibility of governments to guarantee, uphold, promote and protect human rights," Tichenor told the 47-nation body.

The United States is not a member of the council but has the right to speak as an observer. European countries and others abstained from voting last week.

The resolution was the latest move initiated by the Arab and Muslim countries dominating the council to protect Islam from religious hatred and defamation. Islamic groups have been demanding limits on free speech ever since a Danish magazine published caricatures of Muhammad, provoking riots across the Islamic world in 2006.

Muslim countries also have cited the recent release of an anti-Islamic Dutch film and the Pope's controversial comments on the religion in demanding tighter controls on free expression.

The council has no enforcement powers but is supposed to act as a moral conscience. Last week, it adopted a separate resolution urging countries to enact anti-defamation laws specifically to protect Muslims.

Slovenia's ambassador, Andrej Logar, speaking on behalf of the European Union, warned that Ligabo's role as an independent expert was shifting from protecting free speech toward limiting it.

Terry Cormier, a member of the Canadian delegation, said, "The job of a special rapporteur is not to police the action of individuals."

Pakistan's ambassador, Masood Khan, speaking on behalf of the 57-nation Organization of the Islamic Conference, denied the resolution would limit free speech. It only tries to make freedom of expression responsible, he said.

Egypt's Ambassador Sameh Shoukry said there was a growing trend to erode human rights law, permitting "some of the worst practices that incite racial and religious hatred."

Ligabo told the Associated Press in an interview last month that he was against any incitement of hatred based on religious belief. But he said, "We advocate the rights of individuals, not of a particular belief or ideology."

The New York-based Human Rights Watch condemned the amendment.

"It turns someone who is supposed to defend freedom of opinion into a prosecutor whose job is to go after those who abuse this freedom," Paris-based Reporters Without Borders said.