Hillary Clinton giving a speech at the International Crisis Group Award Dinner:
“US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton attends the In Pursuit of Peace Award Dinner by the Crisis Group at Pier Sixty at Chelsea Piers on December 16, 2011 in New York City. (Photo by Craig Barritt/Getty Images) mediachecker:->Hillary’s “old friend” Tom Pickering headed up the investigation on Benghazi-gate. One could forecast that he’d find no wrongdoing and that’s what happened.
“Thank you, Marc, and thanks to all of you for being part of this evening to support such an extraordinary, important organization that is relied upon certainly across the world, and that includes the State Department.
I want to thank Marc and Frank Giustra. I want to thank Louise [Arbor] for her leadership and everyone on the board; the chairman, an old friend, Tom Pickering; Wolf Blitzer, thank you for giving of your time; and all the generous supporters here tonight. Because for more than 15 years, you have helped policy-makers see the world more clearly and respond to conflict more effectively. So I thank you.
I also have a number of colleagues here from the diplomatic corps, two wonderful friends, Kati Marton, as we remember her extraordinary husband and our friend and colleague, and Queen Noor and the work that she’s done around the world.”
Hillary Clinton didn’t want to discuss anything with Oversight and Government Reform Committee until the investigative panel she’d established has made a complete report.
Update: The report has since been submitted and nothing onotoward was found, well fancy that, who’da guessed!
THOMAS R PICKERING
Mr. Pickering retired as Senior Vice President – International Relations and a member of the Executive Council of The Boeing Company on July 1, 2006 having served in the position for five and one half years. He was responsible for The Boeing Company’s relations with foreign governments and its globalization. He joined Boeing in January 2001. Mr. Pickering served as U.S. Under Secretary … of State for Political Affairs since May 1997. He held the personal rank of Career Ambassador, the highest in the U.S. Foreign Service. In a diplomatic career spanning five decades, Mr. Pickering has served as U.S. ambassador to the Russian Federation, India, Israel, El Salvador, Nigeria, and the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. He also served on assignments in Zanzibar and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. From 1989 to 1992, Mr. Pickering served as Ambassador and Representative to the United Nations in New York. He also served as Executive Secretary of the Department of State and Special Assistant to Secretaries William P. Rogers and Henry A. Kissinger from 1973 to 1974. Mr. Pickering serves as Co-Chairman of Board of Trustees at The International Crisis Group. He has been Vice Chairman of Hills & Company, International Consultants since December 2006. He serves as a Director at Taganrog Metallurgical Works Public Joint Stock Company. Mr. Pickering served as a Director of OAO TMK from June 30, 2009 to June 26, 2012. Mr. Pickering entered on active duty in the U.S. Navy from 1956-1959, and later served in the Naval Reserve to the grade of Lieutenant Commander. Between 1959 and 1961, he served in the Bureau of Intelligence and Research of the State Department, in the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, and from 1962 to 1964 in Geneva as political adviser to the U.S. Delegation to the 18-Nation Disarmament Conference. Mr. Pickering served briefly as the President of the Eurasia Foundation, a Washington-based organization that makes small grants and loans in the states of the former Soviet Union. In 1983 and in 1986, Mr. Pickering won the Distinguished Presidential Award and, in 1996, the Department of State’s highest award – the Distinguished Service Award. He is a member of the International Institute of Strategic Studies and the Council on Foreign Relations.
Currently, he is co-chair of the International Crisis Group, chairman of the American Academy of Diplomacy, and a member of the board of advisors of the Global Panel Foundation. Pickering also serves on the board of directors for the American Iranian Council and the Henry L. Stimson Center, and he holds advisory positions with several other organizations.
http://www.carnegiecouncil.org/people/data/thomas_r__pickering.html
Thomas Pickering – recently joined Hills and Co. as Vice Chairman. He retired after five and a half years as Senior Vice President International Relations of The Boeing Company in July 2006 but continues to consult for them.
http://www.stimson.org/about/board/thomas-pickering/
Diplomatic Career: His four decade long career in Foreign Service included ambassadorships in Russia (1993–1996), India (1992–1993), United Nations (1989–1992), Israel (1985–1988), El Salvador (1983–1985), Nigeria (1981–1983), and Jordan (1974–1978). Additionally, he served as Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs from 1997 to 2000. He holds the rank of Career Ambassador, the highest in the U.S. Foreign Service.[6]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ambassador_Pickering
THOMAS PICKERING: Co-Chair US – Middle East Project
The U.S./Middle East Project was established in 1994 by the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) under the direction of Henry Siegman, a senior fellow on the Middle East at the Council. In 2006, the U.S./Middle East Project became an independent policy institute. Its mission is to provide non partisan analysis of the Middle East peace process and to present policymakers in the United States, in the region and in the larger international community with balanced policy analysis and policy options to prevent conflict and promote stability, democracy, modernization and economic development throughout the region.
The U.S./Middle East Project pursues these goals under the guidance of an International Board chaired by General (Ret.) Brent Scowcroft (President, Forum for International Policy; former National Security Adviser to President Gerald Ford and President George H.W. Bush).
http://www.usmep.us/usmep/co-chair/thomas-r-pickering/
Senior Advisors and International Board Members
Carla Anderson Hills (partner w/ Pickering at Hills & Co.) and other significant names.
THOMAS PICKERING: Vice-Chairman Stimson
Stimson is a trusted source of independent, expert knowledge. We are a community of analysts devoted to offering pragmatic solutions to today’s most pressing security challenges. Stimson offers in-depth analysis, fair-minded criticism, and fresh perspectives focused on results for the policymaking community – executive and legislative branches, foreign governments and organizations – as well as the media and concerned citizens. Please click here to view a full listing of Stimson staff.
http://www.stimson.org/experts/
THOMAS PICKERING: Senior Vice President Boeing
International Relations and a member of the Executive Council of The Boeing Company on July 1, 2006 having served in the position for five and one half years. He was responsible for The Boeing Company’s relations with foreign governments and its globalization. He continues to consult for Boeing.
http://www.boeing.com/companyoffices/aboutus/brief.html
Thomas Pickering: U.S. Middle East Project, Inc.
President: Henry Siegman; Chairman Emeritus: Brent Scowcroft; Co-Chair: Thomas R. Pickering
Fouad M.T. Alghanim; Hanan Ashrawi; Shlomo Ben-Ami; Lakhdar Brahimi; Zbigniew Brzezinski; Lester Crown; Richard A. Debs; Chuck Hagel; Lee H. Hamilton; Carla Anderson Hills; Joseph Hotung; James L. Jones; Nancy Kassebaum-Baker; Hamza Al-Kholi; Said T. Khoury; Samer Khoury; Nemir A. Kirdar; Yosef A. Maiman; Fouad M. Makhzoumi; Musallam Ali Musallam; John C. Novogrod; Sam Nunn; Hutham Olayan; Stephen Robert; Mohammed Al-Sager; George R. Salem; Paolo Scaroni; Ramez F. Sousou; Peter Sutherland; Enzo Viscusi; Paul Volcker; James D. Wolfensohn
http://www.usmep.us/usmep/co-chair/thomas-r-pickering/
Thomas Pickering: Co-chair w/ Louise ICC – The International Crisis Group
The International Crisis Group is now generally recognised as the world’s leading independent, non-partisan, source of analysis and advice to governments, and intergovernmental bodies like the United Nations, European Union and World Bank, on the prevention and resolution of deadly conflict.
International Crisis Group – co-founded 1995 by Mark Malloch Brown (British) (Close associate of George Soros) – Brown was also a key architect of the Millennium Development Goals which was adopted at the UN Millennium Summit in December 2000.
The International Crisis Group was founded in 1995 by WORLD BANK Vice-President MARK MALLOCH BROWN former US diplomat MORTON ABRAMOWIZ and FRED CUNY, an international disaster relief specialist who disappeared in Chechnya in 1995. First Chairman was ex-Senator George Mitchell.
GOAL: create an organisation, WHOLLY INDEPENDENT FROM ANY GOVERNMENT, to assist governments, intergovernmental bodies and the international community at large in preventing deadly conflict.
LOUISE ARBOUR: International Crisis Group – president & CEO; International Center for Transitional Justice – director; Supreme Court of Canada – justice; United Nations – high commissioner for human rights; World Economic Forum 2010 – attendee
NOTE: Louise Arbour is the Former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and Chief Prosecutor for the International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda. Most influential linkage: Carla A. Hills (Thomas Pickerton); George Soros (Thomas Pickerton); Jessica Tuchman Mathews (Thomas Pickerton)
More on the International Crisis Group:
The International Crisis Group says it “is an independent, non-profit, non-governmental organisation committed to preventing and resolving deadly conflict.”
In fact it is an inner circle of the World’s global elites including members from the Council on Foreign Relations, The Trilateral Commission, Chatham House (Royal Institute of International Affairs) and the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs. Rather than resolving deadly conflict, ORGANIZATION MEMBERS WORK TOGETHER TO CREATE TENSION and CONLICT ALL OVER THE GLOBE. The result is the generation of tremendous profits for the Global military industrial complex they control.
The Global Elites latest psycho-political operation is the War on Terror. This week the war on Terror was escalated with unrest throughout the middle east.
In the center of the Egyptian revolution are the Muslim Brotherhood and Mohamed El Baradei. The ICG says “Mr. ElBaradei suspended his membership from the Board of Crisis Group concurrent with his January 2011 return to Egypt.”
On February 2nd an article entitled U.S. reexamining its relationship with Muslim Brotherhood opposition group appeared in the Washington Post.
The article states
“As it braces for the likelihood of a new ruler in Egypt, the U.S. government is rapidly reassessing its tenuous relationship with the Muslim Brotherhood, an opposition movement whose fundamentalist ideology has long been a source of distrust in Washington….”I do think that having contacts with the Muslim Brotherhood was not a bad idea,” said Robert Malley, an official in the [Council on Foreign Relations member] Bill Clinton administration who directs the Middle East and North Africa program for the International Crisis Group. “They are an important constituency in Egypt. They’re very likely to play a role in any future arrangements there…
In Egypt, the Brotherhood has been officially banned for decades, and many of its leaders have been imprisoned and tortured. Mubarak has warned U.S. officials for years that the group wants to establish a theocracy modeled on the Islamic Republic of Iran, although he has relaxed restrictions on the group’s political activities at times.” http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/02/02/AR2…
On February 4th an article entitled Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood eyes unity gov’t without Mubarak was posted on Haaretz.com.
The article tells us Mohammed ElBaradei is working with the Muslim Brotherhood :
“The Muslim Brotherhood, Egypt’s largest opposition group, is in talks with other anti-government figures to form a national unity government without President Hosni Mubarak, a group official told DPA on Sunday.
Although the Muslim Brotherhood is officially banned from running for elections for parliament, some movement members have presented candidacy for parliament as independents.
Gamal Nasser, a spokesman for the Brotherhood, told DPA that his group was in talks with Mohammed ElBaradei – the former UN nuclear watchdog chief – to form a national unity government without the National Democratic Party of Mubarak.
The group is also demanding an end to the draconian Emergency Laws, which grant police wide-ranging powers The laws have been used often to arrest and harass the Islamist group.
Nasser said his group would not accept any new government with Mubarak. On Saturday the Brotherhood called on President Mubarak to relinquish power in a peaceful manner following the resignation of the Egyptian cabinet.
Speaking to CNN later Sunday, ElBaradei said he had a popular and political mandate to negotiate the creation of a national unity government.
“I have been authorized — mandated — by the people who organized these demonstrations and many other parties to agree on a national unity government,” he told CNN.
“I hope that I should be in touch soon with the army and we need to work together. The army is part of Egypt,” the opposition leader added.
Opposition figure Mustafa el-Naggar stated that ElBaradei “will be joining protesters in Tahrir,” adding he would come to the square later on Sunday, his first visit to the hub of the protest since returning to Egypt on Thursday… (http://www.haaretz.com/news/international/egypt-s-muslim-brotherhoo… )
The Council on Foreign Relations has been promoting the Muslim Brotherhood for years. In 2007 their Magazine Foreign Affairs wrote…
“Over the past year, we have met with dozens of Brotherhood leaders and activists from Egypt, France, Jordan, Spain, Syria, Tunisia, and the United Kingdom. In long and sometimes heated discussions, we explored the Brotherhood’s stance on democracy and jihad, Israel and Iraq, the United States, and what sort of society the group seeks to create. The Brotherhood is a collection of national groups with differing outlooks, and the various factions disagree about how best to advance its mission.
But all reject global jihad while embracing elections and other features of democracy. There is also a current within the Brotherhood willing to engage with the United States. In the past several decades, this current — along with the realities of practical politics — has pushed much of the Brotherhood toward moderation.”
http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/62453/robert-s-leiken-and-st…
Please tell me they’re not that stupid!
Mohammed ElBaradei’s UN nuclear connection was as “Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), an inter-governmental organisation under the auspices of the United Nations, from December 1997 to November 2009.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohamed_ElBaradei
“The IAEA was started by Council on Foreign Relations member President Eisenhower in 1953. Council on Foreign Relations member Professor William Potter, the Director of the Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Monterey Institute of International Studies, kindly agreed that the Institute would join the IAEA in sponsoring the project and sharing its cost. Lawrence Scheinman’s The International Atomic Energy Agency and World Nuclear Order provides a history of the IAEA. Under Council on Foreign Relations member Eisenhower’s Presidency the US nuclear arsenal grew from 1200 war heads in 1952 to 18 700 in 1960; the Soviet arsenal grew from 50 to 1700. And in 1953–1954, Secretary of State Council on Foreign Relations member John Foster Dulles enunciated the policy of “massive retaliation”, in other words the USA would use its growing nuclear arsenal to counter any attack on its allies as well as the USA itself, even an attack by ‘conventional’ weapons. (http://www-pub.iaea.org/MTCD/publications/PDF/Pub1032_web.pdf pgs v, 9,11,)
Nuclear expert Mohammed ElBaradei is one of the CFR global elites and is closely tied to the CFR controlled intelligence community. The CFR & Chatham House (RIIA) have been in contact with the Muslim Brotherhood for years.
Have CFR & ChathamHouse run CIA & MI5 operatives infiltrated and taken control the group? Will the uprising in Egypt shift power to an Islamist government much like the one in Iran, where ayatollah-led factions elbowed aside other groups to seize control of the country in 1979?
On February 1st a leading member of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt told the Arabic-language Iranian news network Al-Alam that he would like to see the Egyptian people prepare for war against Israel. Does that sound like moderation to you? http://www.jpost.com/Headlines/Article.aspx?id=206130
Soros fingerprints on Mideast chaos
Billionaire tied to opposition leader, funded groups opposing U.S. allies.
by Aaron Klein
JERUSALEM – Philanthropist billionaire George Soros has funded opposition organizations in Egypt and throughout the Middle East, where anti-regime chaos has already toppled the pro-Western leader of Tunisia and is threatening the rule of President Hosni Mubarak, a key U.S. ally.
Mohamed ElBaradei, one of the main opposition leaders in Egypt, has also sat on the board of an international “crisis management” group alongside Soros and other personalities who champion dialogue with Hamas, a violent offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood.
The Brotherhood, which seeks to spread Islam around the world in part by first creating an Islamic caliphate in Egypt, now backs ElBaradai, who has defended the group in the news media the last few weeks.
ElBaradei suspended his board membership in the International Crisis Group, or ICG last week, after he returned to Egypt to lead the anti-Mubarak protests.
Soros is one of eight members of the ICG executive committee.
U.S. board members include Zbigniew Brzezinski, who was national security adviser to Jimmy Carter; Samuel Berger, who was Bill Clinton’s national security adviser; and retired U.S. ambassador Thomas Pickering, who made headlines in 2009 after meeting with Hamas leaders and calling for the U.S. to open ties to the Islamist group.
Another ICG member is Robert Malley, a former adviser to Obama during the 2008 presidential campaign who resigned after it was exposed he had communicated with Hamas. WND first reported Malley had long petitioned for dialogue with Hamas.
The ICG defines itself as an “independent, non-profit, multinational organization, with 100 staff members on five continents, working through field-based analysis and high-level advocacy to prevent and resolve deadly conflict.”
Radio talk show host Michael Savage spent his entire show Friday discussing the ICG’s ties to the current Islamic uprising in Egypt. Savage also wrote a 13-page paper outlining Obama’s links to the Egypt chaos.
Soros also has other ties to opposition groups in the Middle East.
His Open Society Institute’s Middle East and North Africa Initiative has provided numerous grants to a wide range of projects that promote so-called democratic issues across the region, including in Egypt, where the Muslim Brotherhood stands to gain from any future election.
Soros’ Open Society also funded the main opposition voice in Tunisia, Radio Kalima, which championed the riots there that led to the ouster of President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.
In September, Soros’ group was looking to expand its operations in Egypt by hiring a new project manager for its Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, which is run in partnership with the Open Society Justice Initiative. The group is seeking to develop a national network of legal empowerment actors for referral of public-interest law cases. Such organizations in the past have helped represent Muslim Brotherhood leaders seeking election or more authority in the country.
Soros himself on Friday made public statements in support of the protests in Egypt, which the Mubarak government has warned will result in the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood in the country.
In a Washington Post editorial entitled, “Why Obama Has to Get Egypt Right,” Soros recognized that if free elections were held in Egypt, “the Brotherhood is bound to emerge as a major political force, though it is far from assured of a majority.”
He stated the U.S. has “much to gain by moving out in front and siding with the public demand for dignity and democracy” in Egypt.
He claimed the “Muslim Brotherhood’s cooperation with Mohamed ElBaradei … is a hopeful sign that it intends to play a constructive role in a democratic political system.”
Soros did not mention his ties to ElBaradei.
Soros did, however, single out Israel as “the main stumbling block” in paving the way toward transition in the Middle East.
“In reality, Israel has as much to gain from the spread of democracy in the Middle East as the United States has. But Israel is unlikely to recognize its own best interests because the change is too sudden and carries too many risks,” he wrote.
The information comes as Secretary of State Hillary Clinton today tentatively welcomed Muslim Brotherhood involvement in the next Egyptian elections, saying Washington would “wait and see” how talks develop.
“Today we learned the Muslim Brotherhood decided to participate, which suggests they at least are now involved in the dialogue that we have encouraged,” Clinton told National Public Radio from Germany.
“We’re going to wait and see how this develops, but we’ve been very clear about what we expect.”
“The Egyptian people are looking for an orderly transition that can lead to free and fair elections. That is what the United States has consistently supported,” said Clinton.
“The people themselves, and leaders of various groups … will ultimately determine if it is or not meeting their needs.”
She added: “I want to make very clear we have set forth the principles we support. We are adamant about no violence.
“We want to see peaceful protests that are, so far anyway, embodying the aspirations that are in our view very legitimate.
“And we want to see an orderly, expeditious transition.”
With research by Brenda J. Elliott
http://www.wnd.com/2011/02/260577/
RECENT EVENTS – ONGOING:
THOMAS PICKERING: Independent Director – 2009 – until JUNE 2012 – OAO TMK – MOSCOW
OAO TMK, together with its subsidiaries, engages in the manufacture, distribution, and supply of seamless and welded pipes. The company’s products are used in the oil and gas, chemical and petrochemical, energy and machine-building, construction and municipal housing, shipbuilding, aviation and aerospace, and agriculture sectors. It sells its products through distribution networks and dealers in Russia, the United States, the Middle East, Europe, North Africa, south and southeast Asia, and the CIS countries. The company was founded in 2001 and is based in Moscow, the Russian Federation. OAO TMK is a subsidiary of TMK Steel Limited.
Read more: http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/snapshot/snapshot.asp?ticker=TRMK:RM
Why did he leave in July of this year?
THOMAS PICKERING: Director – Taganrog Metallurgical Works Public Joint Stock Company – MOSCOW
Taganrog Metallurgical Works Public Joint Stock Company engages in the manufacture and sale of various steel pipes in Russia and internationally….
THOMAS PICKERING: Advisory Council of NCP ENERGY CAPITAL MANAGEMENT
Since 1988, NGP Energy Capital Management ( NGP ECM) …through our $13 billion family of funds… private equity and venture capital firm specializing in investments in seed/start-ups, emerging growth, middle markets, later stage, growth capital buyouts, industry consolidation, recapitalization, and PIPEs…
NGP Global Adaptation Partners (NGP Energy subsidary)
FEBUARY/MARCH 2010, NGP Energy Capital Management initiated the formation of NGP Global Adaptation Partners, which focuses its investment opportunities in Water Resources & Services and the Food & Agriculture industries.
NGP has also sponsored the Global Adaptation Institute; a non-profit organization formed to enhance the understanding of the world’s pressing need for Adaptation and to assist those in developing economies to Adapt to the changing world. Learn More »
http://www.ngpenergycapital.com/investment
2010 – getting into Water, Food and Agriculture Resources. Whose resources? The co-founder is Phil Deutch…used to work at Persesus!
JULY 7th, 2012: IRVING, Texas- – Energy Capital Management (“NGP”), one of the leading private equity investors in the natural resources industry, announced today that AMBASSADOR PAUL D. WOLFOWITZ has joined the firm’s Strategic Advisory Council. Formed in 2006, the Strategic Advisory Council brings together leaders in the fields of natural resources, international politics and economics and serves as a unique resource to NGP. more »
http://article.wn.com/view/2012/07/13/NGP_Energy_Capital_Management_Announces_Paul_D_Wolfowitz_Has/
Pickering steps down from Chair in June and Wolfowitz replaces him in July – interesting.
JULY 11th, 2012 – Irving energy fund company NGP Energy Capital Management raised $3.586 billion for a new fund.
http://www.ngpenergycapital.com/investment
4 days after Wolfowitz arrives at NGP – they get investors for over 3 billion!
SEPTEMBER 7th, 2012 – OAO TMK Signs Contract with Halliburton
OAO TMK signed a contract with Halliburton International Inc. to provide threading services. TMK Central Pipe Yard (Buzuluk, Orenburg Region), which is part of TMK Oilfield Services, will be responsible for fulfilling the contract by threading components of casing equipment for Halliburton’s Russian division. It is expected that in the future, along with standard threads, TMK Central Pipe Yard will thread the entire line of TMK Premium Connections for Halliburton. The signed contract is valid for three years. TMK Central Pipe Yard is part of TMK Oilfield Services and specializes in repairing tubing, drill pipe, and sucker rods, as well as in producing elements for pipe strings.
http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/snapshot/snapshot.asp?ticker=TRMK:RM
2 months later TMK (where Pickering was Chair until June 2012) TMK signs a contract with Halliburton.
And a few months later The Carlyle Group enters the scene…
December 20, 2012: NCG ENERGY CAPITAL MANAGEMENT – THE CARLYLE GROUP
December 20, 2012 – The Carlyle Group Adds Cornerstone to Global Natural Resources Investing Platform – Acquires Stake in NGP Energy Capital Management – Premier North American Natural Resources Investor.
Strategic Partnership to Benefit Carlyle’s and NGP’s Limited Partners – Global alternative asset manager The Carlyle Group (NASDAQ: CG) today announced it has added significant capability to its growing global natural resources investment platform. Carlyle has acquired a 47.5 percent revenue interest in NGP Energy Capital Management, an Irving, TX–‐‑ased energy investor with $12.1 billion in assets under management. Carlyle will pay, at closing, $424 million to acquire Barclays Natural Resource Investments’(“NRI” 40 percent stake and 7.5 percent from NGP’ management. The transaction, which will be funded with cash and Carlyle Holdings partnership units, has closed today, December 20.
http://www.ngpgap.com/downloads/1373457162.46124000_3d07380e8a/NGP%20News%20Release.pdf
Notre Dame to be new home of climate change index
Move includes $2 million gift – (mediachecker->from guess who? – yeah, NGP!)
The University of Notre Dame will become the new home base of the Global Adaptation Index, a tool showing which countries are best prepared to deal with droughts, storms and other natural disasters that may be caused by climate change.
GAIN is being given to Notre Dame by the Global Adaptation Institute with the support of its primary founding sponsor, NGP Energy Capital Management, an investment fund based in Irving, Texas.
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October 29, 2004
Notes from the Pentagon – ElBaradei’s revenge
Defense officials tell us the disclosure this week of the 380 tons of missing high explosives from Iraq was the work of International Atomic Energy Agency director Mohamed ElBaradei, who is said to be opposed to the United States.
Officials speaking on condition of anonymity said they believe Mr. ElBaradei, an Egyptian, sought to influence the outcome of the presidential election when his agency called on the new Iraqi government to account for the stored high explosives at Al-Qaqaa.
“There’s no question that most people here think the whole [Iraqi explosives] thing was cooked up,” one official said.
The IAEA wrote a letter to Iraqi Science and Technology Minister Rashan Mandan Omar, who then had his chief monitor, Mohammad Abbas, write back. It was Mr. Abbas who claimed that the explosives were looted after the U.S.-led invasion, a claim defense officials dispute.
The Bush administration has been frustrated that Mr. ElBaradei has been slow to deal with the growing crisis over Iran’s nuclear program and the refusal of Tehran to halt uranium enrichment in violation of IAEA rules.
Mr. ElBaradei also has not been tough on North Korea, for its rogue nuclear program.
An IAEA spokesman could not be reached for comment.
The speed with which the campaign of Sen. John Kerry exploited the issue also has raised suspicions in the Pentagon that U.S. intelligence agencies helped the Kerry campaign with the story, at least until it began to fall apart shortly after the report appeared in the New York Times on Monday.
.http://www.gertzfile.com/gertzfile/ring102904.html
Iran’s Nuclear Program: What Is Known and Unknown
The Heritage Foundation ^ | March 26, 2010
…Moreover, on December 14, 2009, The Times of London reported that Western intelligence agencies had uncovered Iranian documents indicating that Iranian scientists had tested a neutron initiator, the component that triggers a nuclear weapon. A neutron initiator has no peaceful application. This discovery directly contradicts the U.S. intelligence community’s position that Iran halted nuclear weapons-related work in 2003.[3] On December 18, Iran announced that it was testing more advanced centrifuges, which could enrich uranium faster.
Since 2002, the IAEA has bent over backwards to give Iran the benefit of the doubt, in large part due to the politicized leadership of IAEA Director General Mohammed ElBaradei, who was an outspoken critic of the Bush Administration and often acted as an apologist for Iran. In November 2009, ElBaradei was replaced by Yukiya Amano of Japan.
Under Director General Amano’s leadership, the IAEA appears to be taking a more objective look at the Iranian nuclear program. On February 18, it issued a confidential report that warned for the first time of evidence that Tehran is working on a nuclear warhead for its missiles.[4] This warning contradicts the controversial 2007 U.S. National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), which concluded that Iran had stopped working on a nuclear weapon in 2003.[5]…
http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2484396/posts
Egypt Protests: Will the Real Mohammed ElBaradei Please Stand Up?
By Anne Bayefsky
Published February 01, 2011
FoxNews.com
In the name of democratic reform, Mohammed ElBaradei is doing his best to appear as the annointed one to succeed Egyptian President Hosni Mubarek, should the government fall. In reality, ElBaradei has more in common with Iranian demagogue Mahmoud Ahmadinejad than anything remotely resembling democracy. He is the former Director-General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), where his primary legacy was running interference for Iran and ensuring that Iran is now on the verge of acquiring nuclear weapons.
Year-after-year for a decade, ElBaradei used his position at the IAEA to stall for time on behalf of Iran. In September 2005 ElBaradei helped push the issue off the Security Council table and bragged: “I am encouraged that the issue has not been referred to the Security Council, precisely to give time for diplomacy and negotiation.” Typical of his foot-dragging was his February 2006 report: “Although the Agency has not seen any diversion of nuclear material to nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices, the Agency is not at this point in time in a position to conclude that there are no undeclared nuclear materials or activities in Iran. The process of drawing such a conclusion … is a time consuming process.”
In January 2007, in the midst of growing calls for sanctions against Iran, ElBaradei suggested a “time-out.” In September 2007, with stiffer sanctions on the horizon, ElBaradei again called for a “time-out.” In January 2008 the IAEA reported: “ElBaradei has repeatedly noted that … the IAEA has not seen any diversion of material to nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices.”
As soon as ElBaradei was finally replaced as IAEA head early last year, his successor Yukiya Amano attempted to distance himself from the obvious cover-up. He issued a report in which the IAEA, for the first time, said things like – on the basis of “extensive” and “credible” information the IAEA now has “concerns about the possible existence in Iran of … current undisclosed activities related to the development of a nuclear payload for a missile,” and “concerns about possible military dimensions to Iran’s nuclear program.’’
If El Baradei were ever to become President of Egypt, not only would he have helped Iran acquire nuclear weapons, he would undoubtedly turn around and lead the charge for an Egyptian nuclear weapon. Nobel Prize notwithstanding, his calling card is to cast nuclear proliferation as some kind of equal rights game between developed and developing countries.
Here is the frightening interview he gave to the Financial Times on February 19, 2007 that indicates the kind of Iranian look-alike which is in the making: “Iran sees enrichment… as a strategic goal because they feel that this will bring them power, prestige and influence…[A] lot of that is true. A nuclear capability is a nuclear deterrent in many ways…When you see here in the UK the programme for modernising Trident, which basically gets the UK far into the 21st century with a nuclear deterrent, it is difficult then for us to turn around and tell everybody else that nuclear deterrents are really no good for you…”
Reports out of Egypt directly connecting ElBaradei’s political ambitions with Tehran surfaced last September via a political rival, Abdul Mabboud. A story translated from Egyptian Newspaper Al Youm Al Sabeh last September said: “in a communication to the Attorney General of Egypt, Dr. Yasser Najib Abdel Mabboud, has accused Dr. Mohamed ElBaradei…of receiving funds exceeding $7 million (US) from Iran’s leadership as support for ‘political reform in Egypt’.” The story claimed that “the check in the amount of $ 7 million is said to be meant to cover the financial costs of the election campaign and the activities of the Front for Change.”
The shoe sure seems to fit. ElBaradei told CNN’s Fareed Zakaria Sunday that: “The Muslim Brotherhood …has nothing to do with extremism…[T]hey have a lot of credibility…And I have been reaching out to them.” Actually, ElBaradei’s comrade-in-arms is a viciously antisemitic and anti-Western organization that would send Egyptian women back to the stone ages and rupture peace agreements with Israel as a warm-up act.
If the Obama administration throws Mubarek overboard in the immediate future with nothing but an ElBaradei-Muslim Brotherhood front man in the wings, Egyptians will be farther away from democracy than they ever were and the rest of the world will be a far more dangerous place.
The shoe sure seems to fit. ElBaradei told CNN’s Fareed Zakaria Sunday that: “The Muslim Brotherhood …has nothing to do with extremism…[T]hey have a lot of credibility…And I have been reaching out to them.” Actually, ElBaradei’s comrade-in-arms is a viciously antisemitic and anti-Western organization that would send Egyptian women back to the stone ages and rupture peace agreements with Israel as a warm-up act.
If the Obama administration throws Mubarek overboard in the immediate future with nothing but an ElBaradei-Muslim Brotherhood front man in the wings, Egyptians will be farther away from democracy than they ever were and the rest of the world will be a far more dangerous place.
Anne Bayefsky is a Senior Fellow at the Hudson Institute and director of the Touro Institute on Human Rights and the Holocaust….
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2011/02/01/egypt-protests-real-mohammed-elbaradei-stand/#ixzz29n6VeYrZ
Thomas L. Friedman: Getting to Know You … (January 15, 2012)
Mohamed ElBaradei, the Nobel-Prize winning diplomat who helped galvanize the demands for democracy here, said on Saturday that he was dropping his presidential bid in protest over the military’s continued hold on power nearly a year after the ouster of the strongman Hosni Mubarak.
He helped found an umbrella group, the National Association for Change, which became a rallying point for many of the young activists who later helped lead the uprising against Mr. Mubarak.
Mr. ElBaradei appears to have been one of the few who publicly anticipated the revolt that forced out Mr. Mubarak. In a widely circulated online video he released weeks before the revolts broke out in Tunisia and then Egypt, Mr. ElBaradei bluntly told the Mubarak government that it faced its “last chance,” predicting “there will be violence.”
“A day of reckoning will come,” he said. “And I am asking the Egyptian people to keep a record of every case of torture and oppression and the violation of personal liberty.”
In an interview in December 2010, about a month before the uprising began, he repeatedly invoked his visits to the Tehran Hilton on the eve of the Iranian revolution in 1979. “Things were boiling underground, and that is what I see here in Egypt,” he said. “I would not be surprised if you saw violence in a couple of weeks, or in a month or two.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/15/world/middleeast/mohamed-elbaradei-pulls-out-of-egypts-presidential-race.html?_r=0
ElBaradei is a front man for the Muslim Brotherhood, he’s also a board member of the International Crisis Group where Thomas Pickering (Hillary’s pick to head-up their Libya Attack Investigation) is Chair (along with Louise Arbor ICC (she was the prosecutor of the Serbs). Soros is also a board member – he had a part in setting up the ICG but his friends and frontmen Mollach Mark Brown (UN, oil for food – International Rescue…), and Mort Abramowitz – Century Institute, Carnegie Peace International…put their names to it)
ElBaradei knew a little too much on what was going to happen in Libya, Cairo etc., he’s either a prophet or in it up to his neck. These committees are made up of the usual suspects. Track back to the Balkans. I had stuff on each of them but computer trouble erased the file had trouble with my computer but will do another search time permitting.
ICG Board Members:
http://www.crisisgroup.org/en/about/board.aspx
ICG Advisors:
http://www.crisisgroup.org/en/about/%7E/link.aspx?_id=AFAAD992BC154C93B71B1E76D6151F3F&_z=z
International Rescue Committee (IRC):
http://www.rescue.org/board-and-overseers
And while the International Crisis Group (ICG) claims to be “committed to preventing and resolving deadly conflict,” the reality is that they are committed to offering solutions crafted well in advance to problems they themselves have created in order to perpetuate their own corporate agenda.
Update: Pickering resigns from Carla Hills firm (see ICG link below for Carla Hills) and joins the Brookings Institute:
mediachecker 