China has released a report on human rights in the United States, slamming the country for its overseas drone attacks, state-sponsored spying and gun crime. ● The report, which was issued by China's State Council on Friday, said the US “concealed and avoided mentioning its own human rights problems,” such as a government-run intelligence program known as PRISM which it said “seriously infringes on human rights.” The report also denounced Washington’s deadly drone strikes in countries such as Pakistan and added that they have caused “heavy civilian casualties.” The US suffers from “rampant gun violence” while its agricultural sector employs a “large amount of child laborers,” Beijing said.

Ukrainian radical nationalist leader Aleksandr Muzychko went on with the rampage against regional authorities, lashing out at a local prosecutor with obscene language, punches and threats. The radical claimed the prosecutors were “sabotaging” their job. Muzychko, who is a member of the Right Sector radical movement, arrived at Rovno (Rivne) Oblast prosecutor’s office after he heard claims that a criminal investigation into a local murder is being delayed. The controversial “activist,” known for taking part in the Chechen conflict against Russian troops, for his recent Kalashnikov brandishing in front of regional authorities and for making openly anti-Semitic statements, decided to take the matter into his own hands. Without going into detail, Muzychko grasped a procedural prosecutor he found present at the workplace, nearly strangling the clerk with his own tie and shouting at him in dirty language. The prosecutor asked to be given a chance to explain the situation, but the heated radical did not want to hear any explanations. “Shut the f**k up, you b*tch! Your f**king time is over,” he uttered, threatening to rope the clerk like a dog and lead him to the people on Maidan.

RIA Novosti: Yanukovych Condemns Interim Ukraine Govt as Violent Usurpers
Paul Craig Roberts: Ukrainian Neo-Nazis Declare that Power Comes Out of the Barrels of their Guns
Robert Parry: Cheering a ‘Democratic’ Coup in Ukraine
Israel Shamir: The Brown Revolution of the Ukraine

Armed men took control of two airports in the Crimea region on Friday in what Ukraine's government described as an invasion and occupation by Russian forces, raising tension between Moscow and the West. ● Russia's Black Sea fleet, which is based in the region, denied its forces were involved in seizing one of the airports, Interfax news agency reported, while a supporter described the group at the other site merely as Crimean militiamen. Amid the confusion over the men's identity, acting president Oleksander Turchinov called an emergency session of his security chiefs, while parliament urged Moscow to halt any action that might encourage separatism and asked the United Nations Security Council to discuss the crisis. Tensions have been rising on the Black Sea peninsula, the only Ukrainian region that has an ethnic Russian majority and the last major bastion of resistance to the overthrow of Viktor Yanukovich as president almost a week ago.

The Guardian: Crimean parliament seized by unknown pro-Russian gunmen
BBC: Ukraine crisis: 'Russians' occupy Crimea airports
RT.com: Movement of Russian armored vehicles in Crimea fully complies with agreements - Foreign Ministry
RT.com: Watch LIVE on RT: Yanukovich to hold press-conference in Southern Russia

Anonymous Ukraine is battling the forces in Ukraine that are funded and directed from the West and attempting to overthrow the democratically elected government of the sovereign country of Ukraine. ● A member of Anonymous Ukraine who wishes to remain anonymous spoke to the Voice of Russia about the operations and the recent release of e-mails between Vitaly Klischko and the Lithuanian Presidential advisor. The e-mails show that Klitschko was intentionally planning to destabilize the country, is being instructed and funded from abroad and has his accounts in Germany.

Under a program code-named “Optic Nerve,” the British Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), working in coordination with the American National Security Agency (NSA), has been collecting webcam images in bulk and saving them to agency databases. ● According to documents obtained by the Guardian (“Yahoo webcam images from millions of users intercepted by GCHQ”), GCHQ targeted 1.8 million webcam users in a single six-month period in 2008. Collection of images has been carried out indiscriminately, without regard to whether users were targets of an intelligence investigation. The operations collected imagery from the webcams by saving screen shots every five minutes during live video chats. The GCHQ documents also mention possible surveillance efforts involving other web-based video technologies, including the Xbox 360 “Kinect” camera, and indicate that Optic Nerve was still active as of 2012.

The Guardian: Optic Nerve: millions of Yahoo webcam images intercepted by GCHQ

L'attaquant français de West Bromwich Albion Nicolas Anelka a été suspendu cinq matches jeudi par la fédération anglaise (FA) pour sa "quenelle" du 28 décembre, soit la peine minimum pour un geste considéré par certains comme antisémite. ● Une sanction plus importante aurait pu précipiter vers une fin de saison prématurée, voire une retraite anticipée, un joueur à la réputation encore plus sulfureuse en France qu'en Angleterre, où il a accomplit une grande partie de sa carrière. [...] La "quenelle" - un bras tendu vers le bas, l'autre bras replié touchant l'épaule - est au coeur d'une vive polémique en France et a été qualifiée de "salut nazi inversé" par la Licra (Ligue internationale contre le racisme et l'antisémitisme). Le débat a touché la Grande-Bretagne par ricochet. Il y a quelques semaines, le ministère de l'Intérieur britannique a interdit à Dieudonné, l'humoriste polémiste français qui en est l'inventeur, d'entrer sur le territoire. Anelka avait été accusé le 20 janvier dans un document de 34 pages d'avoir réalisé "un geste abusif et/ou indécent et/ou insultant et/ou incorrect en relation avec l'origine ethnique et/ou la race et/ou la religion". Le buteur de 34 ans encourrait au minimum cette suspension de cinq matches.

Two former Guantánamo Bay prisoners have asked a French judge to open a probe into claims of torture at the US prison. The allegations pertain to a retired commander of the facility accused of “war crimes and acts of torture inflicted on detainees.” French citizens Nizar Sassi and Mourad Benchallali, who were held in Guantánamo for late 2001 to 2004, have urged a French judge to issue a subpoena against former base commander Geoffrey Miller for torture. The two men submitted an expert report along with Khaled Ben Mustapha, another former Guantánamo inmate to the Criminal Court in Paris. The document is backed by rights groups The Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) and the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights (ECCHR) and details “an authorized and systematic plan of torture and ill-treatment on persons deprived of their freedom without any charge and without the basic rights of any detainee.”

Citing the need to preserve evidence related to pending lawsuits, the Obama administration is asking for permission to keep data on billions of U.S. phone calls indefinitely instead of destroying it after five years. ● In a motion filed Tuesday with the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, the Justice Department says the series of lawsuits over the program — including one filed by Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) — create a duty for the government to hang on to the so-called metadata currently in the National Security Agency’s computer systems. The NSA’s call metadata program [allegedly] is aimed at detecting "terrorist plots" affecting the U.S., but evidence of the effort’s success is murky. President Barack Obama has proposed ending the NSA’s collection of the data. Officials are considering storing it with the telephone companies themselves, creating a new entity to hold it, or reconstructing the program in some other way.

Russia’s ambassador to Canada says talk about the possibility of Russian troops invading Ukraine is nonsense. ● Russia’s ambassador to Canada says talk about the possibility of Russian troops invading Ukraine is nonsense. Georgiy Mamedov says it’s an insult to the intelligence of Canadians to even suggest that might happen in light of recent events in Kyiv. The comments came two days after the Harper government suggested that Canada could impose sanctions against Russia if it were to interfere in Ukraine. Immigration Minister Chris Alexander first raised the possibility of Canadian sanctions against Russia on Sunday in a televised interview. On Monday, Alexander appeared to play down speculation about Canadian sanctions on Russia, but a spokesman for Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird did not. However, Mamedov said there is no possibility of a Russian military deployment.

Alex Lantier ■ After pro-EU putsch in Ukraine, Russia puts military on alert || The Kremlin carried out large-scale military exercises along its border with Ukraine yesterday, amid rising tensions with the Western-backed Ukrainian regime that seized power in Saturday’s fascist-led putsch in Kiev. The military alert was billed as a “surprise comprehensive interoperability test” of armed forces in Russia’s western and central military districts and its air force command. Some 150,000 soldiers, 90 warplanes, 120 attack helicopters, 880 tanks, and 90 ships reportedly participated. Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu [also] said that Moscow was “carefully watching” the situation in the Crimean Peninsula, a Russian-majority region of Ukraine that includes a major Russian naval base at Sevastopol. [...] Anonymous Russian security officials told the Financial Times yesterday that, while they did not aim to break up Ukraine, they would feel “compelled” to militarily support the Crimean Peninsula if it decided to secede from the rest of Ukraine.

Regional parliament members in a Ukrainian city held a session at gunpoint when one of the radical nationalist opposition leaders came to them, armed to the teeth, as the law of power seems to be prevailing in the tumultuous post-coup country. A Kalashnikov appears to be the best argument in a debate for Aleksandr Muzychko, an activist of the nationalist "Pravy Sektor" (Right Sector) movement and one of the Maidan's most prominent and controversial leaders.

RCP: John Kerry On Russia Mobilizing Troops: "This Is Not Rocky IV" [Puke Read]
Channel 4: Ukraine unrest: Russian fighter jets on 'combat alert'
The Guardian: Armed men seize Crimea parliament and hoist Russian flag
PressTV: Parliament seized in Ukraine’s Crimea region
RT.com: Crimea parliament announces referendum on Ukrainian region’s future
Oriental Review: The Ukraine: Neo-Nazi criminal state looming in the centre of Europe
The Moscow Times: Yanukovych Request for Protection in Russia Granted, Official Says

Dr. Paul Craig Roberts of PaulCraigRoberts.org joins us to discuss his take on recent events in Ukraine. We examine the historical roots of the crisis and look at the risks of further escalation in the current situation. We also take on the reluctance of those inside the beltway to point out the self-evident truths about the increasingly reckless actions of the American Empire.

Ukraine crisis portends apocalypse, by Dr Paul Craig Roberts (Notes and Comments by Lasha Darkmoon)
The Crisis In Ukraine
Democracy Murdered By Protest — Ukraine Falls To Intrigue and violence
Ukraine: Sleepwalking Again
Is Ukraine Drifting Toward Civil War And Great Power Confrontation?
US and EU Are Paying Ukrainian Rioters and Protesters
Washington Orchestrated Protests Are Destabilizing Ukraine
Washington Destabilizes Ukraine

Michael McFaul officially relinquished his position as U.S. ambassador to Russia on Wednesday morning, leaving one of the U.S.' most vital diplomatic posts empty amid political upheaval in neighboring Ukraine. McFaul, known for his active presence on Twitter, wrote goodbyes to Russian users of the microblogging service throughout the morning and tweeted a photo of himself with Sheila Gwaltney, the deputy chief of mission in Moscow, who will head the U.S. Embassy until McFaul's successor is appointed. The Kommersant report said that a decision on McFaul's successor could be made within the "next few days" but that the approval process for the new ambassador could take up to several months given that the candidate must be approved by the U.S. Senate.

Craig Murray ■ I first met Moazzam Begg in 2005 when he came to support my campaign in Blackburn against Jack Straw. I was immediately struck by how gentle he is. For somebody who has been through Guantanamo Bay and suffered torture and injustice, he is free of bitterness and rancour to a degree I find quite astonishing. It is an extraordinary spiritual quality, comparable to that of Nelson Mandela. He does not hate. That impression has only been reinforced every time I see him, and comes over well in his book. ● What the British state did to me for opposing their torture programme was bad enough, but nothing to what Moazzam suffered. Yet he is much less embittered than I am. ● The fall of Libya further revealed the terrible truth about the extraordinary rendition programme and undeniable evidence of British complicity in torture. This included of course the appalling case of the Belhadj family, orchestrated by criminal torturers Jack Straw and Sir Mark Allen. As Assad’s Syria was even more involved than Libya in the extraordinary rendition programme as a supplier of torture for the UK and US intelligence services, Moazzam sensibly concluded that evidence may now be available there to be recovered from the chaos. He has been to Syria to that end. ● Last week my friend Ray McGovern called on Moazzam and discussed Syria. Ray briefed me on the conversation, and Moazzam’s take was one of great regret at the bloodshed and despair at the ferocity of inter-Muslim rifts. It was the opposite of violent partisanship to support one side. ● Moazzam Begg has not been arrested for terrorism in Syria. He has been arrested to stop him digging for further evidence of complicity in torture by senior politicians and civil servants in the UK.

The freedom of press in guaranteed under the 1st Amendment–however, the White House sees it differently with new instructions for the FCC || As you may know, on many occasions president Barack Obama has addressed the public directly, saying that he supports the need for a “free press” in America. However, actions speak louder than words and recently the White House, under the Obama Administration, has taken action against the best interests of the American people with the release of a new white paper that instructs the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to send agents into news rooms to see how exactly the press agency determines what news stories to carry and why. While it’s no mystery that former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) interns, such as Anderson Cooper, are embedded into newsrooms nationwide, now it’s being openly admitted that the U.S. is moving toward a “radical new era of tyranny”, as pointed out by Fox News correspondent Judge Napolitano on a recent broadcast of Fox & Friends. Napolitano went on to point out how “chilling” this really is, it’s a direct “violation of the 1st Amendment”, said Napolitano.

Matthew Feeney ■ Last Sunday it was announced that Piers Morgan’s prime-time show on CNN was going to be canceled. The British Morgan had become best known to his new American audience for his anti-gun positions in the wake of the 2012 massacre at Sand Hook Elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut. Indeed, it has been pointed out that Morgan's comments on guns may have contributed to his show's sinking ratings. As a fellow Brit I understand Morgan’s bemusement at Americans’ fascination with guns. However, Morgan’s anti-gun crusade demonstrates not only an understandable anthropological confusion with the U.S., it also highlights a common misunderstanding of America’s relationship with violence.

The United States has embarked on a “new crusade” war on democracy across the globe, an analyst writes in a column for the Press TV website. ● “On the eve of the 100th anniversary of World War I, the US has embarked on a new crusade – to make the world unsafe for democracy,” Kevin Barrett wrote on Wednesday. He said the US is determined to “destroy democracy in Iran, Russia, and Latin America”, due to the failure of the “international bankers” running the US government to “buy enough votes to impose their will on every country.” “So democracy is fine – as long as voters elect the New World Order candidate. But if they vote for a candidate who doesn't suit the oligarchs, get ready for a coup!” wrote Barrett. He said the US slaughtered 3.5 million Vietnamese and nearly one million Cambodians under cover of defending democracy in Southeast Asia. He said the “smiling Mickey Mouse mask” of the New World Order has fallen away and that “the bloodthirsty grin of satanic banksters bent on establishing an Orwellian one-world dictatorship” has been revealed.

Bottles, stones and flags flew in the air as thousands of pro- and anti-Russian demonstrators clashed in front of the parliament building in Simferopol, the capital of Ukraine's autonomous Crimea region. ● Tension between the rival groups rallying next to one another intensified after hours of demonstrating, with people wielding Russian, Ukrainian, Crimean and Crimean Tatar flags getting involved in clashes. Demonstrators slammed each other with flags and threw stones as leaders on both sides urged their followers to avoid provocations. The rival groups are protesting for and against the new national authorities in Kiev. Part of the residents proclaimed that Crimea are not going to obey Kiev, while the local Muslim community of Crimean Tatars expressed support for the new Ukrainian authorities. Two separate rallies, consisting of several thousands of protesters, are facing each other. Russians are shouting “Russia-Russia!” and “Berkut!”, the name of the special police task force disbanded yesterday by the new Ukrainian authorities, who blame them for heavy-handed policing of opposition activists in recent months in central Kiev. The Muslim community protesters are shouting “Ukraine-Ukraine!” and “Crimea is not Russia!” Pro-Russian demonstrators are holding Russian flags, while Tatars are holding Ukrainian flags and flags of their own nationalist organizations. Video footage from the scene appears to show that both sides are preparing for a clash. The police officers who temporarily left the scene have now returned to the square and are attempting to separate the two sides.

Russian Troops Take Up Positions In Sevastopol As Ukraine Teeters On The Brink Of Civil War
RT.com: Putin orders ‘combat readiness’ tests for western, central Russian troops
События возле Верховной Рады Крыма 26.02.2014
Israel Shamir: The Brown Revolution of the Ukraine
Pepe Escobar: Will NATO annex Ukraine?

The UK has spent over $8 million on monitoring the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, where Julian Assange has been holed up for 20 months. His stay is having a knock-on effect on British taxpayers, reportedly costing them over $16,000 a day. In response to a Freedom of Information request filed by the Huffington Post UK, the London Metropolitan Police revealed the financial consequences of Assange’s stay in the Ecuadorian Embassy. The WikiLeaks founder entered the Embassy in June 2012 in a desperate plea to avoid his extradition to Sweden, where he is wanted for questioning over accusations of "sexual Assault".

SMS from Swedish woman at centre of Assange case say police "made up the charges" against Assange
VoR: UK wastes $8 million to keep an eye on Julian Assange

World-renowned Spanish guitarist Paco de Lucia has died aged 66 in Mexico, reportedly of a heart attack while playing with his children on a beach. He is said to have died in the Mexican resort of Cancun. ● The death of one of the most celebrated flamenco guitarists was announced by the mayor's office in Algeciras, southern Spain, where he was born. ● Famous for a series of flamenco albums in the 1970s, he also crossed over into classical and jazz guitar. He also worked on films by Spanish director Carlos Saura, notably appearing in his 1983 version of Carmen, which won a UK Bafta award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1985. Algeciras is to hold two days of official mourning. Its mayor, Jose Ignacio Landaluce, called the musician's death an "irreparable loss for the world of culture and for Andalusia". He had lived both in Mexico and in Spain in recent years. ● 'I knew every rhythm' - He was born Francisco Sanchez Gomez on 21 December 1947, the son of flamenco guitarist Antonio Sanchez, who was of Gypsy origin. He took his stage name in honour of his mother, Lucia Gomes. It is believed he had played the guitar from the age of five. "My family grew up with the Gypsies," the guitarist was quoted as saying in a 1994 article in Guitar Player. "My father and all my brothers played guitar, so before I picked it up, before I could speak, I was listening. Before I started to play, I knew every rhythm of the flamenco. I knew the feeling and the meaning of the music, so when I started to play, I went directly to the sound I had in my ear." - ¡En paz descanse, Paco!

Ayuntamiento de Algeciras:
Algeciras Llora En Silencio La Muerte De Paco De Lucía
Tres Días De Luto Oficial Por La Muerte De Paco De Lucía

Why is the Pentagon developing and controlling vaccines? Will our troops become human guinea pigs for MIT's emerging vaccine to block stress and fear? ● In the aftermath of 9/11 and the 2001 anthrax attacks, the federal government decided not to let that crisis " go to waste." Allegedly to "better protect" civilians and troops against biochemical attacks, germ warfare, or pandemics (including normal, seasonal flu), it put the Pentagon squarely in the vaccine business.

The number of homeless families seeking shelter in the Washington, DC has risen by 135 percent from the same time last year, surging past earlier official expectations of a 10 percent increase, according to various news sources. The growing rate of homeless families seeking shelter is almost unprecedented, bringing the entire family shelter system to maximum capacity by late January. Nearly 300 individuals fill DC General, a former hospital-turned-family shelter, with another 125 families filling up the District’s only other family shelter. In fact, the city has had to put an additional 436 families with a combined 849 children in motels in the District and in the neighboring Maryland suburbs.

What is surprising is that where the FT article once was, readers
can now find only this.

Global gold prices may have been manipulated on 50 per cent of occasions between January 2010 and December 2013, according to analysis by Fideres, a consultancy. ● Two days ago the FT released a clear, informative and fact-based article, titled simply enough "Gold price rigging fears put investors on alert" in which author Madison Marriage, citing a report by the Fideres consultancy, revealed that global gold prices may have been manipulated on 50 per cent of occasions between January 2010 and December 2013. ● To those who hve been following the price action of gold in the past four years, gold manipulation is not only not surprising, but accepted and widely appreciated (because like the Chinese those who buy gold would rather do so at artificially low rather than artificially high fiat prices) and at this point, after every other product has been exposed to be blatantly and maliciously manipulated by the banking estate, it is taken for granted that the central banks' primary fiat alternative, and biggest threat to the monetary status quo, has not avoided a comparable fate. ● And since we can only assume the article has been lost to FT readers due to some server glitch, and not due to post-editorial consorship or certainly an angry phone call from the Bank of England or some comparable institution, we are happy to recreate it in its entirety. Just in case someone is curious why gold price rigging fears should put investors on alert.

Sibel Edmonds ■ I just finished reading a ridiculous hit piece published at Eurasianet accusing the Turkish people of being conspiracy theorists for believing that the imperial US and EU are engaged in schemes towards regime change around the world. According to the article and its sources, one must be ignorant, uninformed, uneducated and a big time conspiracy theorist in order to believe that the US-EU are engaged in political manipulations and regime change operations around the world.

Spy Agencies Manipulate and Disrupt Web Discussions to Promote Propaganda and Discredit Government Critics. ● The alternative media has documented for 5 years that the government uses disinformation and disruption (and here) on the web to discredit activists and manipulate public opinion, just like it smears traditional television and print reporters who question the government too acutely. We’ve long reported that the government censors and manipulates social media. New Edward Snowden documents confirm that Britain’s spy agency is doing so.

G. Greenwald: How Covert Agents Infiltrate the Internet to Manipulate, Deceive, and Destroy Reputations

Glenn Harlan Reynolds/USA Today ■ America's ruling class has been experiencing more pushback than usual lately. It just might be a harbinger of things to come. First, in response to widespread protests last week, the Department of Homeland Security canceled plans to build a nationwide license plate database. Many local police departments already use license-plate readers that track every car as it passes traffic signals or pole-mounted cameras. Specially equipped police cars even track cars parked on the street or even in driveways. The DHS put out a bid request for a system that would have gone national, letting the federal government track millions of people's comings and goings just as it tracks data about every phone call we make. But the proposal was suddenly withdrawn last week, with the unconvincing explanation that it was all a mistake. I'm inclined to agree with TechDirt's Tim Cushing, who wrote: "The most plausible explanation is that someone up top at the DHS or ICE suddenly realized that publicly calling for bids on a nationwide surveillance system while nationwide surveillance systems are being hotly debated was ... a horrible idea."