BY DAVID MACILWAIN
*On December 20, 2019, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe hosted a summit meeting and other events with H.E. Dr. Hassan Rouhani, President of the Islamic Republic of Iran, at the Prime Minister’s Office. Credit: Prime Minister’s Office of Japan
Increasingly it seems as though we are massaged with news stories that suit the prevailing agenda of the Western powers, either to build support for action against a chosen enemy or to divert attention from the actions of those opposing powers. While this may have been the case for years, the weeks since the UK general election have seen an alarming escalation in what could be called “fake news”, primarily focusing on Syria.
Syria, of course, IS in the news, or should be, as the fraudulent claims and US interference in the OPCW has penetrated the mainstream defenses, and produced some significant reactions from the perpetrators of the Douma hoax. The issue has the potential to upset the whole Imperial apple-cart, and should do – so we may expect both vicious denials of “Russian conspiracy theorists” as well as nuanced gatekeeping.
The mysterious fall of James Le Mesurier has combined with a resurgence in Helmet Whitening humanitarian exercises, just at the time when the Syrian Army looks set to liberate Ma’arat al Numan and its “hospitals” from the clutches of the terrorist mercenaries and their facilitators. Pictures of the deserted but relatively undamaged streets of this key insurgent base betray the lies about the Syrian advance – from which hundreds of thousands are alleged to be fleeing. In as far as those reports are true, genuine Syrian residents have obviously been getting their misinformation from foreign media. But as Eva Bartlett reports, others are begging the Syrian army to save them from the extremist tyranny.
But to return to the focus of my introduction, the last weeks have seen extraordinary developments on the Iran front, which the Western media has barely reported, and invariably mis-reported, omitting the most fundamental parts of the story. It is hard not to see one of these parts as something of a reckoning, as Ken Stone and Laurence Davidson review it in a Press TV report. It is unprecedented that Russia, China and Iran conduct joint naval exercises, leave alone in the Sea of Oman, and the message they are jointly sending is very clear.
This is however not the most significant development in the ongoing charade of propaganda and covert attacks on the Iranian Republic. While it was hugely misreported, misunderstood, and wilfully misrepresented at the time, the visit of Japanese PM Shinzo Abe to Tehran in June now looks like a significant turning point. In case it has been forgotten, be reminded that at the very time when Abe was meeting Ayatollah Khamenei there was a missile attack on a Japanese-owned tanker in the Sea of Oman, blamed by those responsible for it on Iran.
As Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif noted on Twitter –
“the timing of the attack seemed intended to undermine the “extensive and friendly talks” held this week with Abe. “Suspicious doesn’t begin to describe what likely transpired this morning,” Zarif said.As Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif noted on Twitter –
Filipino crew members on the ship, which was Japanese-owned but carrying a cargo of methanol from Saudi Arabia to Singapore, said they had seen missiles hit the ship, which made the subsequent US stories about Iranian “limpet mines” seem particularly stupid, at least to anyone with an open mind. Such must surely have been the case for Shinzo Abe, who had access to information from the shipping line as well as reassurance from Tehran that they had nothing to do with the provocation. Iranian boats actually rescued the crew from the ship, an operation described in the notorious US drone video as “removing an unexploded limpet mine”.
While Abe’s was the first visit to Iran by a sitting PM for 40 years, Japan has had a good relationship with Iran for many years, part of which involves being a major purchaser of Iranian Oil. Western governments and media demonstrated a near-pathological inability to admit to this surprising ‘detail’ this week, when Japan unexpectedly announced it would be sending naval assets to the Gulf to protect Japanese oil shipments, independently of the US-Australian operation. All the reports across a range of Western mainstream media had the same story, that:
“Japan sources 90% of its oil from the region”, and “is looking to launch its own naval operation rather than joining the US-led mission to protect shipping in the region.”
Inadequate as it was, this was the nearest the reports came to admitting that Japan intended to continue buying Iranian oil, and was prepared to defend its ships from hostile powers; the reports all faithfully repeated the Imperial propaganda line about the Iranian threat to ‘International shipping’. None mentioned the vital background to the story, involving two of Shinzo Abe’s recent meetings.
On the 22nd of December, President Rouhani traveled to Japan for talks with Abe, and evidently intent on finding a way to break US sanctions on Iranian oil exports. Khamenei had told Abe in June that:
“Japan is an important Asian country and if it wants to expand ties with Iran, it should show a firm stance, as other countries have done.”
Only a day later, Shinzo Abe held talks with the leader of one of those “other countries”, discussing greater cooperation with Xi Jin Ping at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing. The Japan Times, as one of the favored Western media that gets Google’s tick of approval, doesn’t mention one of the things that would surely have been discussed between the two leaders, and is equally surely being discussed behind closed doors in Washington and Canberra. It could hardly be a coincidence that Japan announced its highly unusual military deployment to the Sea of Oman at the very same time as the joint Chinese-Russian-Iranian exercises were being held there.
Because of Japan’s history, there is a constitutional prohibition on military deployments that are not in self-defense. This, as well as Japan’s solid opposition to nuclear weapons, tells us a lot about the depth of feeling and desire for cooperative engagement with Iran for whom these are also fundamental principles. Evidently Shinzo Abe does not believe US claims about Iran and is prepared to put its money where its mouth is, despite the problems this could cause with the US.
And as if to confirm the Japanese stance, the US has now launched one of the most blatant and illegitimate air attacks on Iraqi militia forces imaginable, killing an estimated 25 men “in response” to an alleged missile attack that killed one American mercenary. As with Israeli attacks on the same key area where the Euphrates crosses the Syrian-Iraqi border, the US objective is to stop Syrian-Iraqi military cooperation in fighting the ongoing occupation by the US and its IS affiliates. That the targeted group – Kataib Hezbollah – is part of the Iraqi Popular Mobilisation Units which were a major part of the fight against IS, may yet prove to be a turning point in Iraqi public opinion, shaming the Iraqi protesters demanding foreign forces leave the country but only attacking Iran linked groups while ignoring the dominating US presence.
But of course, the US is unrepentant and defiant, with the media doing their faithful duty, even while reporting the Iraqi government’s protests and Zarif’s pertinent remarks on Imperial Hubris:
Fruitful talks with FM Lavrov in Russia.
Unlike others who embark on “defensive” warmongering 1000s of miles from their own shores, Iran and Russia have cooperated for peace in Syria and are now presenting important proposals for peace in the Persian Gulf.
Next stop: China.
No comments:
Post a Comment