Vital role: An Afghan interpreter, his face masked for security purposes, pictured with Prince Harry in 2008. Up to 600 Afghans who have worked as interpreters are to be given the right to move to Britain Up To 600 Afghan Interpreters Who Risked Their Lives To Help British Forces To Get Right To Live In The UK — Daily Mail * Interpreters will get visas for themselves and their ‘immediate dependents’ * They will get free travel to the UK and accommodation for first three months * Those eligible will have had to serve for at least 12 months on the front line Up to 600 Afghans who have risked their lives to act as interpreters for British troops and officials are to be handed the right to move to Britain. Interpreters who have regularly served on the front line will get visas for themselves and their ‘immediate dependents’ to come to Britain for a period of five years. Under a £40 million package being thrashed out in Whitehall, those who come to the UK they will get free travel to the UK and accommodation paid for their first three months. Read more …. More News On 600 Afghan Interpreters Being Given The Right To Live In The UK Afghan interpreters to get right to live in UK — BBC Some Afghan interpreters to be allowed to settle in Britain — The Guardian UK eyes giving visas to 600 Afghan interpreters — Bloomberg Businessweek/AP Six hundred Afghan interpreters win right to live in Britain — The Australian Afghan interpreters offered refuge in Britain, Denmark — Toronto Star Afghan interpreters: ‘No life for us here’ — BBC
Vultures — Washington Free Beacon AP, AFP reporters trash Israel in secret Facebook group. A “secret” Facebook group of foreign correspondents and human rights activists quickly devolved into an anti-Israel hate-fest on Tuesday following the release of a new Israeli government report that cleared the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) of wrongdoing in the 2000 death of a Palestinian boy. The Israeli government report contests the claim that the IDF killed a Palestinian boy, Muhammad al-Durrah, in a famous 2000 incident in Gaza that helped ignite the Second Intifada. Journalists and activists mocked the report, attacked the IDF, and claimed pro-Israel lobbyists were influencing the media coverage, in a private Facebook group for foreign correspondents known as the “Vulture Club.” Read more …. My Comment : Bias in the media …. nah ….
Musicians from the military bands of China’s People’s Liberation Army and the U.S. Army take photos during a rehearsal for their joint concert at the National Centre for the Performing Arts in Beijing, in this October 29, 2012 file photo. REUTERS/China Daily/Files Analysis: From Opera To Exercises, U.S. And China Deepen Military Ties — Reuters (Reuters) – Even as the United States accuses China of military espionage and worries about Beijing’s more strident posture in the Asia-Pacific region, the ties between the armed forces of the two nations have been getting closer. Direct contact between China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) and some of its potential adversaries has increased dramatically in the last two years. The first major public sign of the thaw was a joint concert by the U.S. Army band and its Chinese counterpart in 2011 at Washington’s Kennedy Center where a female U.S. sergeant and a well-known male Chinese singer in a PLA uniform belted out a duet in Italian from the opera La Traviata. Read more …. My Comment : What was completely unthinkable 25 years ago is now …. acceptable and expected.
Military veterans demonstrated in Beijing on May 20; over 1000 ex-servicemen gathered before the General Political Department Bureau for Letters and Calls. Veterans from Chengdu, Lanzhou, Jinan, Beijing, Guangzhou Military Regions came to petition for their pensions and promised veterans’employment. (Human Rights Campaign in China) Retired Military Officers, Broke and Desperate, Protest in Beijing — Epoch Times Around a thousand retired military officers from all over China gathered in Beijing’s heat on May 20, appealing to the regime for their pensions and veterans’ employment; they were soon rounded up and thrown into a makeshift “black jail,” which operates outside the law, for the night. Protests by retired military officers are an embarrassment for the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), so groups are monitored strictly in an effort to prevent mass petitions or demands for their rights. However, they continue to organize demonstrations despite official efforts to silence them. Veteran officers from Chengdu, Lanzhou, Jinan, Beijing, Guangzhou, and Shenyang, protested in front of the Central Military Commission General Political Department, calling attention to the appalling living conditions caused by failed veterans’ policies. Read more …. My Comment: I am surprised by this report. These Chinese military officers would also be members of the Communist party …. and to be treated like this by their own government and Party is unprecedented. I guess China is changing even more quickly than I thought, and I am one who has been there at leas at 30 times since the mid 1980s …. including even living there in 1988-1989.
Military Not Created Equal Under Sequestration — US News and World Report U.S. prioritizes funding for China, North Korea threats despite growing dangers from Venezuela, Iran. Not all military units are in the same boat under sequestration, as the across-the-board cuts target some missions more than others. East Asia is the new focus of the White House, which means U.S. Pacific Command is a favored breadwinner among the regional commands. It enjoys money to address North Korea’s nuclear missile program and some form of threat from China. Only one ship has been cut from deployment to that region, and the primary missions for ground troops are fully funded, a top officer says. The same is not true for troops in America’s backyard. The regional command for Central and South America has received only a fraction of its requested resources, despite what experts and military officials say is a growing and underreported threat from countries such as Venezuela. Read more …. My Comment : It is not easy to run an empire …. especially when you are running out of money. The U.S. military and their political masters must face facts (which I am sure that they are) …. if you do not provide the money to support your military …. they are not going to be able to fulfill your domestic/foreign policy objectives. Sequestration will mean some services are going to be cut more than others …. and funding will be prioritized according to what the White House believes is the priority …. not the military.