War

[Montuno]

Las autoridades ucranianas investigan posibles torturas a soldados rusos


Primera modificación: 29/03/2022 - 13:00

Las autoridades ucranianas divulgan videos de jóvenes soldados rusos arrepintiéndose o mandando mensajes a sus padres, una práctica condenada por varias organizaciones por violar las Convenciones de Ginebra. © Captura de pantalla/Facebook Служба безпеки України (SBU)
Texto por:Vicenta Linares


Un video que muestra a supuestos soldados ucranianos torturando a prisioneros rusos, periodistas que denuncian la falta de libertad de prensa en Ucrania, publicación de las identidades de 620 personas acusadas de pertenecer al FSB... Las autoridades ucranianas, aunque destacan por sus esfuerzos de comunicación con los occidentales, se enfrentan a varios problemas.

Las autoridades ucranianas dicen que se toman muy en serio un video que ha aparecido en las redes sociales y que muestra a hombres armados, presentados como soldados ucranianos, disparando en las piernas de varios prisioneros de guerra.

El trato de los prisioneros de guerra cuestionado

¿Verdadero o falso? Todavía no lo sabemos, podría ser un montaje difundido deliberadamente por Rusia. El ejército ucraniano está investigando, pero en términos de propaganda, estas imágenes son lo suficientemente fuertes como para que el entorno de Volodimir Zelenski reaccione y recuerde a las tropas ucranianas que la tortura de un prisionero es un crimen de guerra.


Maria Dubovikova

@politblogme

18+ (21+) Ukrainian soldiers shoot Russian prisoners of war in the legs and afterwards give them a severe beating. At the beginning of the video, there are Russian POWs lying on the ground with bullet wounds in their legs, some of them have got leg bones broken. #WarCrimes
The following media includes potentially sensitive content.
View
9:00 AM · Mar 27, 2022


Read the full conversation on Twitter

Esto se suma a otro hecho denunciado hace unas semanas por el Comité Internacional de la Cruz Roja (CICR) y la organización Human Rights Watch (HRW). En efecto, las autoridades ucranianas han divulgado en repetidas ocasiones videos de jóvenes soldados rusos arrepintiéndose ante imágenes de bombardeos, o mandando mensajes a sus padres.

El CICR recordó que "los prisioneros de guerra y los civiles detenidos deben ser tratados con dignidad y protegidos en todo momento de los malos tratos y de la exposición al escrutinio público, incluidas las imágenes que circulan públicamente en las redes sociales". "Este trato a los prisioneros de guerra viola las protecciones previstas por las Convenciones de Ginebra para garantizar un trato digno a los combatientes capturados, independientemente de su bando", subrayó por su parte HRW.

Pero los videos no cesaron en las redes sociales del Servicio de Seguridad de Ucrania (SBU).

620 agentes del FSB

Luego, la inteligencia militar ucraniana publicó una lista que revela públicamente la identidad y los datos personales de 620 personas, designadas como agentes del FSB (Servicio Federal de Seguridad de la Federación de Rusia), en toda Europa.

Aparte de los servicios de inteligencia occidentales, nadie tiene los medios para verificar esta información y uno se pregunta por qué Ucrania no compartió estos datos de forma confidencial con sus aliados, en lugar de sacar a la luz cientos de perfiles a riesgo de ponerlos en peligro.

Periodistas enfadados

Por último, apareció en la prensa este lunes una tribuna firmada por decenas de periodistas ucranianos y extranjeros, denunciando el acoso a la prensa por parte de las fuerzas ucranianas.

Los periodistas reclaman un código de conducta porque, aunque los discursos del presidente Zelenski tienen una repercusión considerable en el extranjero, el trabajo de la prensa es cada vez más complicado y estas dificultades contradicen los esfuerzos diplomáticos de Ucrania hacia sus socios occidentales.
​​​​​​https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.rfi...soldados-rusos



A video has been published where, presumably, Ukrainian soldiers are shooting at the legs of captured Russians. Bastrykin ordered to start checking

Source: Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation

This message (material) was created and (or) distributed by a foreign media outlet acting as a foreign agent and (or) a Russian legal entity acting as a foreign agent.

Military censorship has been introduced in Russia, Meduza and other media have been blocked, but we continue to work. What are the ways to stay in touch with Meduza .
Meduza is an independent publication, and we work only in the interests of readers. We ask you to help our editors . Thank you!
Read Meduza's statement against this war and the editorial's appeal to Ukrainian readers .


The head of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation, Alexander Bastrykin, ordered "to establish all the circumstances of the ill-treatment of Ukrainian nationalists with captured military personnel" after the publication of a video in which, presumably, Ukrainian military personnel shoot captured Russian soldiers in the legs.
“According to some information, illegal actions took place at one of the bases of Ukrainian nationalists in the Kharkiv region,” the press release of the Investigative Committee said.
Journalists drew attention to the video on March 27. When, where and under what circumstances it was filmed is unknown. The earliest version Mediazone was able to find was uploaded to Reddit on Sunday morning. Eliot Higgins , founder of the Bellingcat investigative group, said that this "very serious incident needs to be investigated."

At the beginning of the video, several people in military uniforms are shown lying on the ground with their hands tied. Some have bags on their heads, wounds and injuries are visible. Armed men in uniform walk around and ask questions; accusations of attacking Kharkov are heard. At the end of the video, the operator approaches the minibus, from where several more people are taken out. A man approaches them and shoots them in the legs, after which they fall.
Mediazona found another video with the same prisoners, which mentions Olkhovka and Bisquitne, settlements east of Kharkov. On March 25, Ukrainian media, citing local Azov territorial defense cells, reported on the capture of Olkhovka by the Ukrainian side and the capture of 27 Russians.

Update. Aleksey Arestovich, an adviser to the head of the office of the President of Ukraine , said that what was happening on the video "has signs of a war crime" and that "the most serious investigation" will be carried out. At the same time, the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Valery Zaluzhny , announced the distribution on the Internet of “staged videos with the inhuman attitude of allegedly ‘Ukrainian military’ towards ‘Russian prisoners’.”​

https://meduza.io/news/2022/03/27/op...achat-proverku




The New York Times journalists confirmed the authenticity of the video in which Ukrainians kill wounded Russian soldiers

22:33, April 6, 2022
Source: The New York Times


This message (material) was created and (or) distributed by a foreign media outlet acting as a foreign agent and (or) a Russian legal entity acting as a foreign agent.

Military censorship has been introduced in Russia, Meduza and other media have been blocked, but we continue to work. What are the ways to stay in touch with Meduza .
Meduza is an independent publication, and we work only in the interests of readers. We ask you to help our editors . Thank you!
Read Meduza's statement against this war and the editorial's appeal to Ukrainian readers .


The New York Times has confirmed the authenticity of a video leaked on April 4 in which Ukrainian soldiers are shooting wounded Russians at point-blank range.
According to the publication, the video was filmed near the village of Dmitrovka, west of Kiev. Earlier, the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine reported on the destruction of the Russian convoy in these places.
In the video, one of the Ukrainian soldiers shoots twice at a Russian serviceman lying on the ground. Nearby lie several more prisoners with white stripes, their hands are tied. In the background is a BMD-2 type armored vehicle with a "V" symbol. The Ukrainian military can be recognized by their flag patches and blue armbands, and they repeat “Glory to Ukraine” over and over again.
Advisor to the Office of the President of Ukraine Mykhailo Podolyak, commenting on the video, said that if Kyiv receives evidence of "any wrongful actions" of the military, they will be "normatively returned to the legal field." At the same time, Podolyak said that the actions of the Ukrainians were due to an "emotional background."
On the other hand, I understand the emotional background of Ukrainian society and the army. I believe that, in principle, their actions are as harsh as possible in relation to Russian servicemen justified precisely by the corresponding emotional background.

On April 5, the head of the Investigative Committee Alexander Bastrykin instructed to investigate the circumstances of the murder caught on video.


https://meduza.io/news/2022/04/06/z...-ukraintsy-ubivayut-ranenyh-rossiyskih-soldat

 

[Montuno]

The photos of the atrocities in Ukraine horrify the world


The apparent execution of Ukrainian civilians by retreating Russian forces, with their bodies strewn across streets and yards, has focused attention on what constitutes a war crime.

Tatyana Petrovna, 72, in the garden of a home in Bucha where the bodies of three civilians lay on MondayCredit...Daniel Berehulak for The New York Times

ByRick Gladstone

April 5, 2022

Read in Spanish

Perhaps it was the way lifeless bodies, bloodied by gunshots and some with their hands tied, were left in the streets or moved to makeshift mass graves. Or the reality of seeing them so close in the widely circulated photos and videos .

​

Other atrocities have occurred in the weeks since Russia invaded Ukraine, concentrating much of its weapons power on sites where ordinary Ukrainians are homes and gathering points, but the international outrage they provoked has been overshadowed by the reaction in the face of revelations that retreating Russian soldiers left behind many civilians killed near the Ukrainian capital.
Some of the bodies that were found last weekend on the outskirts of kyiv were face down and others were curled up. Civilians were reportedly killed while riding their bicycles, walking in the streets or in the basements of houses. In Bucha, a suburb of kyiv where many of the dead were found, a woman discovered three bodies in her garden.

Many of the victims had been shot in the head. A coroner said his team had collected dozens of bodies in Bucha. During the first days of the war the Russians were shooting at anyone as their tanks rolled through the city, some residents said.
Russian officials denied any responsibility for the deaths and dismissed photos of the bodies as fabricated, but satellite images taken during the Russian occupation of Bucha, and other towns, disproved their claims.


An analysis of satellite images by The New York Times showed points at the exact coordinates where Ukrainian forces and journalists found the bodies in the newly liberated areas. That corroborated eyewitness accounts that many were there for weeks.



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1:07Satellite Images Rebut Russia's Claim on Bucha


Satellite images rebut Russia's claim that the killing of civilians in Bucha occurred after its soldiers had left town, a Times analysis found. Video contains graphic images.CreditCredit...Maxar Technologies

The summary killings of civilians add to mounting evidence of numerous flagrant violations of the laws of war by Russian forces, as outlined in the Geneva Conventions and the International Criminal Court's definitions of war crimes.

In war crimes cases, prosecutors have an uphill task. But international law experts say harrowing images of civilians gunned down in Bucha and other cities abandoned by the Russians, along with eyewitness accounts, could provide a wealth of documentation for investigations.
Unlike other horrors of the Ukrainian war, such as the bombing of a maternity hospital , the collapse of a theater where people were sheltering or the bombing of apartment buildings, the killings in Bucha cannot be presented as unintentional damage. nor can they be easily denied as propaganda by the Russians.
"What's different here is you have footage of civilians being executed with their hands tied, that's a completely different type of crime," said Alex Whiting , a visiting professor at Harvard Law School who has worked on international crime prosecutions. war. "This sounds a lot like a crime."
Rachel Denber, deputy director of the Europe and Central Asia division of Human Rights Watch, which has been collecting evidence of war crimes in Ukraine, said the killings have generated such shock in part because many of the other civilian deaths in the war they have been caused by indiscriminate attacks and shelling, although that does not make them any less heinous.
"I think one of the reasons people have a different reaction to the discovery of these bodies is the suspicion that these victims were not indiscriminate, but deliberate," he said.
When Russia began the invasion on February 24, there were widespread expectations that its superior force would swiftly subdue Ukraine. But when they encountered fierce Ukrainian resistance, the Russians soon resorted to full-scale missile strikes and bombardments, making little or no distinction between civilian and military targets, and leveling all or large parts of some cities and towns.
Somehow, according to legal experts, the images of civilians executed at close range convey a more personal malevolence.

"I guess on one level, seeing a city destroyed, you think this kind of thing happens in war," said Andrew Clapham , a professor of international law at the Geneva Graduate Institute who is one of the government's advisers. from Ukraine. "People suspend their horror and say that could happen in times of war."
But the deaths on the outskirts of kyiv, according to the academic, showed the intention to kill civilians.
"It's much more obvious that there are no excuses," Clapham said.
Here is a geographical breakdown of where some of the worst recorded atrocities of the war in Ukraine have been reported:

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A woman injured in a Russian missile attack on a maternity hospital in Mariupol last month later died, as did her baby.Credit...Evgeniy Maloletka/Associated Press



Mariupol

The southeastern port, one of the first targets of the Russian invasion, has been under siege for weeks with little food and cuts to water or power services. By some estimates, its former population of 450,000 has shrunk to 100,000 or fewer. On March 9, a missile attack by Russia severely damaged a maternity hospital , leaving an unknown number of victims. A Russian bombardment on March 16 destroyed the Mariupol Drama Theatre, where hundreds of civilians had sought refuge and where the word “children” had been written in large letters outside to deter air raiders. Ukrainian officials said 300 people inside were killed.. On March 21, Ukrainian officials said the Russian military had transferred some 4,500 residents of Mariupol to Russian territory, which, if confirmed as a forced relocation, would be a possible war crime.

picture

A destroyed school in Kharkiv in February.Credit...Sergey Bobok/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images



Kharkiv

The city of 1.5 million in eastern Ukraine, the country's second largest, has been the target of Russian airstrikes with missiles, artillery and cluster munitions, widely banned weapons that spread bombs over a wide area. According to residents and videos verified by The New York Times, Kharkov's destruction has included elementary schools and residences. Ukrainian authorities recently estimated that at least 500 people had died . And Human Rights Watch, in a report published Sunday on possible war crimes in Ukraine, said it had documented at least one case of rape by Russian soldiers in the Kharkov region on March 13.

picture

A residential building damaged by shelling last month in ChernigovCredit...Roman Zakrevskyi/Reuters






Chernigov

The northern city, near the border with Belarus, was a temporary refuge for many civilians seeking to escape Russia's initial advance to encircle kyiv. But Russian forces also subjected Chernigov to relentless airstrikes after Ukrainian defenders prevented the invaders from taking the city. Witnesses said the Russian strikes destroyed schools, damaged hospitals and hit civilians waiting in lines to buy bread.

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Anna Smetana, an orphanage caretaker, said she was traveling with her colleagues from Mykolaiv to a nearby town when Russian forces opened fire on her van.Credit...Tyler Hicks/The New York Times



Mykolayiv

The large southern industrial city of 500,000, which blocks the Russian army's path to the Black Sea port of Odessa, has withstood various Russian advances and airstrikes. One destroyed a marine military barracks killing dozens, others were more indiscriminate. Missile attacks have slammed into residential apartment buildings. And last week, a missile attack hit a government building, killing at least 36 people. Over the weekend and on Monday, other deadly attacks on vehicles and homes were reported in and around the city.

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Bucha residents with the body of a civilian on Saturday.Credit...Daniel Berehulak for The New York Times



Kyiv suburbs

Many bodies of civilians have been found in the northern suburbs of kyiv, mainly in Bucha, but an exact count had not been determined as of Monday. In its report on Sunday, Human Rights Watch recounted the summary execution of a man from Bucha on March 4 by Russian soldiers and the murder of a mother and her 14-year-old daughter in another northern town, Vorzel, about days after.
Sexual violence by the Russian occupiers has also been reported. Last month, Ukraine's Prosecutor General Iryna Venediktova said in a Facebook post that a Russian soldier had killed an unarmed civilian and then repeatedly raped his wife in a Kiev suburb.
Laura A. Dickinson , a professor at the George Washington University School of Law who specializes in international law, said the photographs of bodies in the Kiev suburbs offer some of the most compelling signs that the Russian side has committed atrocities. , regardless of the Kremlin's denials.

"The evidence is pretty damning, I'd say," he said. "It's hard to dismiss it as fake."
Rick Gladstone is an editor and writer for International based in New York. He has worked at the Times since 1997, where he started as an editor in the Business section. @rickgladstone

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Bodies in Bucha lay for weeks, satellite images show
The photographs of dead civilians caused widespread outrage and skepticism. The Times Visual Investigations team verified the images.
April 4, 2022




Rick Gladstone is an editor and writer on the International Desk, based in New York. He has worked at The Times since 1997, starting as an editor in the Business section.@rickgladstone



More in World





VOENACHER via Telegram

Video appears to show Ukrainian soldiers killing captured Russian soldiers

3 hours ago​

Image by Armed Forces of Ukraine

New video shows Russian forces shooting at cyclist in Bucha

5th of April​

'It's like living in a horror movie': A Ukrainian village slowly dies

april 2​

Focke Strangmann/EPA via Shutterstock

These are the three women who will be responsible for the rearmament​

https://www.nytimes.com/es/2022/04/0...nia-bucha.html

 

[Montuno]

لشديدة ›
وحدات جيش التحرير الشعبي الصحراوي تستهدف تمركزات جنود الاحتلال بمنطقتي أكرارة لحديد وأكرارة الشديدة

واص 06/04/2022 - 16:49

بئر لحلو (الأراضي المحررة)، 06 أبريل 2022 (وأص)- شنت وحدات جيش التحرير الشعبي الصحراوي الاماجد هجمات مركزة استهدفت تخندقات قوات الاحتلال المغربي بمنطقتي أكرارة لحديد وأكرارة الشديدة بقطاع الفرسية ، مخلفة خسائر فادحة في الأرواح والمعدات .

وأبرز البلاغ العسكري رقم 499 الصادر عن وزارة الدفاع الوطني أن مفارز متقدمة من جيش التحرير الشعبي الصحراوي ، استهدفت بأقصاف عنيفة ومركزة تخندقات جنود الاحتلال بمنطقتي أكرارة لحديد وأكرارة الشديدة بقطاع الفرسية مخلفة هلع وخوف وسط جنود الاحتلال.

وكانت مفارز متقدمة من ضراغم جيش التحرير الشعبي الصحراوي قد ركزت هجماتها يومي الأحد والاثنين على تمركزات جنود الاحتلال بقطاعي المحبس وأم أدريكة ، مستهدفة مناطق الكايديات وأودي الظمران .

وتتوالى هجمات اسود جيش التحرير الشعبي الصحراوي مستهدفة معاقل قوات الاحتلال المغربي التي تكبدت خسائر فادحة في الارواح والمعدات على طول جدار الذل والعار .(واص)
090/105/500

Las unidades del ELPS bombardean las posiciones de las fuerzas de ocupación en las regiones de Gararat Lahdid y Gararat Achadida

Bir Lehlu (República Saharaui), 6 de abril de 2022 (SPS) – El Ejército de Liberación Popular Saharaui (ELPS) bombardean las posiciones de las fuerzas de ocupación marroquí atrincheradas en las regiones de Gararat Lahdid y Gararat Achadida.

Según el Parte de Guerra Nº 499 emitido por el Ministerio de Defensa Nacional, destacamentos de avanzada de nuestro ejército lanzaron fuertes e intensos bombardeos que provocaron miedo y pánicos en las filas de los soldados enemigos acantonados en las regiones de Gararat Lahdid y Gararat Achadida, en el sector de Farsía.

El Parte de Guerra informa también que unidades de avanzada del ELPS habían concentrado los fuegos de su artillería este domingo y lunes contra los posicionamientos de las fuerzas enemigas emplazadas en las regiones de AL-Gaidiyat y Udei Adamran, en los sectores de Mahbes y Um Dreiga, respectivamente.

Asimismo, los ataques y bombardeos de las unidades del Ejército de Liberación Popular Saharaui continúan asolando las posiciones del ejército de ocupación marroquí, dejando considerables pérdidas humanas y materiales en sus filas a lo largo del Muro de la Vergüenza. (SPS)

090/101


SPLA bombards occupation forces in Gararat Lahdid and Gararat Achadida regions
SPS 06/04/2022 - 20:17

Bir Lehlu (Sahrawi Republic), 6, April 2022 (SPS) – The Saharawi People Liberation Army (SPLA) bombards the positions of the Moroccan occupation forces entrenched in the Gararat Lahdid and Gararat Achadida regions.

According to War Report No. 499 issued by the Ministry of National Defense, forward detachments of our army launched strong and intense bombardments that caused fear and panic in the ranks of enemy soldiers in the Gararat Lahdid and Gararat Achadida regions, in Farsia sector.

The War Report also reports that advance units of the SPLA had concentrated their artillery fire Sunday and Monday against the positions of the enemy forces in the AL-Gaidiyat and Udei Adamran regions, in the Mahbes and Um Dreiga sectors.respectively.SPS

125/090/TRA


​​​​​
https://www.spsrasd.info/news/ar

 

[Montuno]

Video appears to show Ukrainian soldiers killing captured Russian soldiers


The images, verified by the Times, appear to show the result of a Ukrainian ambush on retreating Russian troops.

A still from a video posted online Monday shows Ukrainian soldiers at the site where Russian soldiers were executed around March 30. Credit...VOENACHER via Telegram



ByEvan Hill

April 6, 2022 at 16:51 ET

Read in Spanish

A video posted online Monday and verified by The New York Times appears to show a group of Ukrainian soldiers killing captured Russian soldiers outside a town west of Kiev.

​

"He is still alive. Record these rascals. Look, he's still alive. He is gasping,” a man says as a Russian soldier is seen with his jacket pulled over his head, apparently wounded, still breathing. A soldier then shoots the man twice. After the man continues to move, the soldier shoots him again and stops.
At least three other apparent Russian soldiers, including one with an obvious head injury who has his hands tied behind his back, can be seen dead near the victim. All are dressed in camouflage, and three have the white bands on their arms that Russian troops usually wear. There is equipment scattered around them and bloodstains near each other's heads.

The soldiers are lying on the road just meters from a BMD-2, an infantry fighting vehicle used by Russian airborne units. Some look like their jackets, shoes or helmets have been taken away. Further up the road, other destroyed vehicles can be seen.

The video was recorded on a road north of the town of Dmytrivka, some 11 kilometers southwest of Bucha, where the discovery of hundreds of bodies in civilian clothes has in recent days sparked accusations that Russian troops killed civilians in his withdrawal.
The killings appear to have been the result of a Ukrainian ambush on a Russian column that occurred around March 30, as Russian troops were withdrawing from small towns west of kyiv that have been the scene of heavy fighting for weeks. On April 2, freelance journalist Oz Katerji posted videos and images of the destroyed column on Twitter, writing that soldiers told him the Russians had been ambushed 48 hours earlier.

Ukraine's Defense Ministry also tweeted about the destruction of the Russian convoy, calling it "precise work" by Ukrainian forces. "These are not even human," a Ukrainian soldier says in the video as he walks among the wrecked vehicles, adding that two Russian lieutenants had been taken prisoner.
Ukrainian soldiers are identifiable by their flag patches and blue armbands, and they repeat "glory to Ukraine" several times. Their unit is unclear, but in the video of the massacre, one of the men refers to some of them as “Belgravia boys”, probably referring to a housing estate called Belgravia located a few hundred meters from the incident.

A Ukrainian news agency that published a video of the aftermath of the ambush on March 30 described it as the work of the "Georgian Legion," a paramilitary unit of Georgian volunteers that was formed to fight on behalf of Ukraine in 2014.
Evan Hill is a journalist with the Visual Investigations team, which combines traditional reporting with advanced digital forensics techniques. @evanchill

New video shows Russian forces shooting at cyclist in Bucha
April 5, 2022


The photos of the atrocities in Ukraine horrify the world
April 5, 2022


Bodies in Bucha lay for weeks, satellite images show
April 4, 2022


Evan Hill is a reporter on the Visual Investigations team. He was part of a team that won a Pulitzer Prize in 2020 for proving that the Russian military had bombed hospitals in Syria.@evanhill


https://www.nytimes.com/es/2022/04/0...er_new_arm_5_1

 

[Montuno]

New video shows Russian forces shooting at cyclist in Bucha

Aerial images from Ukraine add to the evidence of atrocities committed by the Russians against civilians and weaken their denials.

1:03Russian Soldiers Shoot Cyclist in Bucha

New video from Bucha, near Kyiv, adds to mounting evidence of atrocities committed while Russian soldiers occupied the town.CreditCredit...Armed Forces of Ukraine
ByMalachy BrownandDmitry Khavin



A new video adds to mounting evidence of atrocities committed while the Russian army occupied the suburban city of Bucha , northwest of Kiev.

The video shows a cyclist moving down a street in Bucha, carrying the bicycle in his hand and walking until he reaches the corner of a road occupied by Russian soldiers. As soon as the cyclist turns around, a Russian armored vehicle fires several high-caliber rounds. A second armored vehicle fires two rounds in the direction of the cyclist. A column of dust and smoke emerged from the place.
The video shows aerial footage shot by the Ukrainian military in late February, when Russian forces controlled the city. It has been independently verified by The New York Times.

A few weeks later, after Russia withdrew from Bucha, a body in civilian clothes was filmed next to a bicycle at the same location in a second video verified by the Times. The body, with a mangled leg, lies behind a concrete pole apparently collapsed in an attack. The damage seen on the post is consistent with high caliber ammunition. The person's clothing, a dark blue jacket and lighter pants, matches the cyclist's attire.

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CreditCredit...Kievskiy Dvizh via Instagram

In aerial images, the Russian armored vehicles seen on the street appear to be BMD-4 infantry fighting vehicles, which are typically equipped with a 100-millimeter gun and a 30-millimeter cannon, according to an analysis the Times made the video. Near the two vehicles that fired—both on the same street—were more than 20 Russian military vehicles, stretching for several blocks on a road that ran crosswise.

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A Russian convoy was stationed on Yablonska Street in Bucha in late February.Credit...Newsflare



The military convoy was parked at an intersection on Yablonska Street, where the Times on Monday documented the discovery of more than a dozen lifeless bodies . Satellite images confirmed that the people were killed in March while Russia controlled the city; the new video confirms that a Russian convoy was where many of those bodies were found.
John Ismay contributed reporting and David Botti contributed video editing.
Malachy Browne is a Senior Story Producer with the Visual Investigations team . He has received four Emmy Awards for his work and shared a Pulitzer Prize in 2020 for reporting that revealed Russia's culpability in the bombing of hospitals in Syria. @malachybrowne • Facebook
Dmitriy Khavin is a Senior Video Editor with the Visual Investigations team . @dim109

---

The photos of the atrocities in Ukraine horrify the world
April 5, 2022


Bodies in Bucha lay for weeks, satellite images show
April 4, 2022


Malachy Browne is a senior story producer on the Visual Investigations team . His work by him has received four Emmys, and he shared in a Pulitzer Prize in 2020 for reporting that showed Russian culpability in bombing hospitals in Syria.@malachybrowne • Facebook

Dmitriy Khavin is a senior video editor with the Visual Investigations team .@dim109


https://www.nytimes.com/es/2022/04/0...pgtype=Article

 

[Three Berries]

Kids are too busy practicing for the next school shooting to practice hiding from nuclear war.

How many nuclear wars did you survive by practicing under your desk?

You learned valuable lessons back then.

LOL More Deep State work. I see the Parkland shooter trial just started.

 

[Montuno]

Behind the scenes: the Saharawi people and the Spanish betrayal in the new geostrategic order.

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 06, 2022

Ahmed Zain. S. Mohamed.



ECS. Madrid. | Has
Sánchez acted voluntarily? It is the question that haunts analysts, politicians, lawyers and journalists. The answer can only be negative. Everything indicates that the nefarious position of Spain in allying itself with the aggressor and occupier of Western Sahara was under "coercion" within the framework of secret channels that far exceed the will of Spain and Morocco, since the change in Spanish attitude occurred without any debate in the organs of the PSOE, nor with those responsible for Foreign Affairs of the Saharawi dossier, nor in a Council of Ministers as dictated by the Constitution, and even less within the government coalition of which United We Can is a part. It is simply a decision that is beyond the control of the government in power. Western Sahara surrendered at the beginning of the 1978 regime and now.

In this letter, written in a script unworthy of a sovereign state, the head of the socialist party, Pedro Sánchez, betrays not only the Saharawi people, but also all the militants who have fought for decades against Franco's dictatorship, humiliates the people Spanish imploring the favors of a predatory king who floods Spain with toxic products and threatens to engulf the Iberian population by an immense clandestine migratory flow, which he scandalously uses as a means of blackmail. This letter is about "common destiny and friendship between the two peoples" and as ridicule does not kill, Spain and Morocco are even presented as two "brother countries".

Sánchez's turn is not, therefore, the result of a mature and thoughtful reflection by the authorities and institutions democratically elected by the Spanish people, but rather that of a secret strategic haggling forced by a sudden and unforeseen event that would have required an immediate response. Situation in which Spain and Morocco, according to shadow analysts, should be called upon to be allies and not adversaries, in the context of a possible large-scale military confrontation that could have broken out at any time.
This big sudden event is called the "Ukrainian war" and this confrontation could have pitted NATO and its allies on one side against Russia and other countries that reject hegemony and unilateralism on the other.

The weight of NATO:
Spain is a member of two politically entangled and very close political-military conglomerates: the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the European Union (EU). This means that geostrategic and military decisions made within NATO are generally transferred to the EU, which remains much more of a socio-economic bloc than a military one. Spain, as a member of these two organizations, is linked to economic logic and binding military defense processes, which are not communicated to public opinion, since they are matters of defense secrecy. The draconian public reactions loaded with hypocrisy and double standards of these two blocks against Russia after the invasion of Ukraine, seem to indicate that these processes have already been activated, both for the eastern flank Estonia, Poland, Romania and Turkey.

At this point, the reader may be wondering what is the relationship between the conflict in Western Sahara and the strategic alignments, and no less dangerous, of NATO? In effect, the Maghreb and Sahel region has occupied an important place for fifteen years in the scenarios of confrontation between the Atlantic Alliance and the Moscow-Beijing axis for control of the immense energy and mining resources that abound in this region -which the Neocolonial Europe considers its preserve- and for the control of the international transport routes of these resources and goods of all kinds. And here, the solution to the Saharawi conflict plays a crucial role as it is at the apex of the formation of the Arab Maghreb Union and the key to the full economic development of the region that prevents the Moroccan occupation; the only source of tension in the region, the only country in the world that does not have clear borders with all its neighbors; the Kingdom of Morocco. Regarding the latter: NATO, through French troops assisted by the Germans, has increased its presence in the last ten years in Mali, Niger, Chad, Burkina-Faso and the Ivory Coast.


Further north - specifically in the Strait of Gibraltar - the United States has developed a semi-permanent presence in Morocco where it regularly organizes military exercises together with NATO forces and the countries attached to it. But this presence in the western neighbor still does not seem satisfactory in the eyes of the military strategists of the Atlantic Alliance. For them, this country still needs to be more "Atlantized" to allow NATO forces to expand their logistics base and their range of action in a safe and efficient environment. For now, British and Russian submarines roam the Mediterranean region.

The dialectics and rhetoric displayed by NATO and its smaller partner, the EU, since February 24 - the date of the attack on Ukraine by Russian forces - leave no doubt that the Ukrainian crisis will upset world geopolitics and particularly on the European and African continents. The leader of this alliance, the United States immediately took the initiative to push the front against the Russia-China axis to the extreme according to Saint-Mathieu's motto: "He who is not with me, he is against me." Uncle Sam makes it obvious that when the boss does it wrong, he loses all authority.


The Beijing-Moscow axis:

On the other hand, Russia is trying to re-establish itself there by encouraging and supporting African countries to free themselves from this presence. The Russian rapprochement seems to be crowned with a certain success, the diplomatic effect of which became evident during the last two votes of the UN General Assembly on the Ukraine issue last March. Significant fact: During these two votes, most African countries refrained from condemning the Russian invasion of Ukraine (like Argelia and Morocco).

China, for the moment, is limited to setting up an efficient "softpower" diplomacy network with strategic investments without landing a single Chinese soldier somewhere on the continent.

And Algeria, which bases the doctrine of its international and diplomatic relations on non-alignment and “multipolarism”, and constantly advocates the application of international law without selective or distinctive criteria, is part of this last group of countries. For these strategists, Algeria is not only a major obstacle to Atlanticist expansion plans, something France has seen well, but also Russia's most important ally and Morocco's greatest adversary in the region. In order to leave no doubt about the obstacle posed by Algeria, the US army did not hesitate to simulate during the last US military maneuvers "African Lion" carried out in June 2021 in southern Morocco, an attack on a battery of S400 missiles stationed in a country east of Morocco. This country logically can only be Algeria although it was not mentioned in any statement. Despite all the message was understood in all its breadth.

In the eyes of Atlanticist strategists, diplomatically supporting Morocco is equivalent to weakening Algeria internationally and giving Morocco more weight in the region. Sánchez's surrender and the de facto acknowledgment of the alleged Moroccan identity must be framed within this strategy. It is likely that Spain has been under pressure from the United States for a long time, but the barriers put up by Spanish society against the Saharawi occupation by Morocco, difficult to break in the short and medium term, have delayed the announcement of such a decision. With the war in Ukraine, the Spanish government was forced to ignore these annoying obstacles to the development of NATO's strategy in the Western Mediterranean. As always, the "non-existent" Saharawi people in their public statements.


Precision diplomacy:

It is in this particularly tense context that the deputy head of US diplomacy, Wendy Sherman, made her visits to Spain, Morocco and Algeria between March 6 and 10, all concerned as an interested party or by neighborhood, of what was brewing in the basements of Brussels and the White House.
It was during this visit by Wendy Sherman to Madrid that Sánchez was urged to put an end to his hypocritical double game against the Saharawi people and Algeria to publicly join the US position, which recognizes the Moroccan nature of Western Sahara, for US interests. and not for the good view of the Moroccans, skipping as usual all international legality. Wendy Sherman had to coldly explain to him that the United States and NATO are determined to turn Morocco and Western Sahara into a barrier in their containment strategy against the Beijing-Moscow axis in the Maghreb and Sahel region, and that as a member of the Atlantic Alliance, Spain is obliged to sacrifice its confused "neutrality" in favor of the superior interests of this alliance.

A curiosity is that on March 18, the day that Sánchez announced the abandonment of neutrality in Western Sahara, the US immediately appointed its new ambassador to Morocco after a year; Puneet Talwar, Ambassador Plenipotentiary and member of the Foreign Relations Committee.


The US strategy:

The Americans do not say it openly, but their approach reflects that they have already included the Moroccan, Saharawi and Spanish maritime zones along the Atlantic Ocean in their operational strategy for military deployment. One of the objectives of such a deployment would be to secure and gain control of the oil, gas and phosphate deposits in occupied Western Sahara, using, on the one hand, the area between Agadir in Morocco and El Ayoun in Western Sahara. As well as the underwater treasure of Monte Tropic, which despite being from the silenced Saharawi people, Morocco and Spain secretly dispute it in the UN.

The recognition of the Moroccanness of Western Sahara by the White House, therefore, is not a gift to Morocco, but responds to US strategic requirements and a need for military "compliance". Morocco is again the pawn as it was in the ostentatious Abraham Accords. In fact, it allows the US Department of Defense to dispense with curious questions from the US Congress and Senate
Algeria and the Saharawi people, who are fighting the US sponsored and supported Moroccan occupation The EU, NATO and the Gulf monarchies are the undeclared targets of this Alliance in its new geostrategic order. Isolation will be the goal. The balance of power remains and will continue to be the game-changer on the ground.

https://www.ecsaharaui.com/

Images of protests against the Moroccan invasion and occupation of Western Sahara, in different Spanish cities:

 

[VerdantGreen]

Putin lovers? How about liberal NWO haters?

Truth ONLY comes from the NWO puppets on the television, right VG? And WTC 7 came down in sympathy for the two bigger towers. And bats in the Wuhan wet market were the cause of WuFlu.

I don't know about you VG, but I served in the USAF in the cold war, on nuke alert in theater, as an aircrew member. We had volunteered to be in the military, and now I think ours was a suicide mission, we weren't gonna survive after doing our task if they launched us for real. Never talked about that, but we did talk about how the Russian guys doing the same thing would probably be good guys to drink with and have fun. We shared Christian values, were mostly the same race, and their women are beautiful when they are young. We had SR-71s flying from our base and Russian spy trawlers offshore. LAL 007 was also shot down during that time, so it was real.

A guy named Viktor Belenko defected with a Mig-25. Ole Viktor turned out to be a pretty good guy, at least from the Amerikanski viewpoint. His Russian wife and son might disagree.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HiRfMP4AVgI

What do you have against the Russians? Why would you not want to be friendly with them?

Why are liberals so pro-war and pro-government these daze? The world is upside-down.

Dont be ridiculous, the Western media aren't really to be trusted.. they have a political slant and are highly selective about what they report... but i don't think they report complete lies and fabrications. You are absolutely right to be suspicious, but to align yourself with the Russian state owned propaganda machine as an alternative is a good example of 'out of the frying pan and into the fire ! ' (in Russia any 'equivalent' of Fox news would be shut down and the journalists thrown in jail )
The same with the conduct of the west, i have spent my life being critical and suspicious of that too, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Palestine etc are all shameful - but fortunately i am objective enough to know that there is worse out there, and Putin's brutal ground invasion of Ukraine is just that. Worse.
I have no hatred of Russians in general but I hate Putin's warmongering and i hate the Brutality of the Russian soldiers( that has been well documented in previous wars. )
There are always people who choose the wrong side, there was plenty of support for Hitler in Europe and also plenty in America:

""the threat of Nazism in the United States before World War II was greater than we generally remember today, and that those forces offer valuable lessons decades later — and not just because part of that story is the history of the “America First” idea, born of pre-WWII isolationism and later as a slogan for now-President Donald Trump."

https://time.com/5414055/american-nazi-sympathy-book/

VG

 

[Creeperpark]

Could this be the reason we are suffering from a fertilizer shortage? When I look at a photo of a blown-up building, I see a 500 lb to a ton amount of "easy to get" cheap chemicals the explosives are made from. Ammonium Nitrate, Potassium perchlorate, and many many more common fertilizers. The different countries may have stockpiled large amounts secretly with the intention of explosive manufacture. If you check the amounts manufactured, purchased, imported, and exported from 2020 to 2021 you may just see the one that has the most firepower. Here's a clip about fertilizer shortages. https://www.kcur.org/news/2021-10-2...tage-may-shape-what-farmers-plant-next-spring

 

[Creeperpark]

Where does US get its fertilizer?
Canada provides 83% of the potash used in the U.S.; Russia and Belarus provided 12% used in the U.S. in 2021. The American dependence on nitrogen and phosphate imports is much smaller, 12.5% and 9%, respectively.Mar 17, 2022 Google
Russia has their own potassium and must have plenty by the way they are using it up.?

 

[Montuno]

New relationship with Morocco


Saharan phosphate stands as defense against Russian agricultural threat


The Kremlin seeks to restrict exports of chemicals such as fertilizers only to friendly countries in response to Western sanctions.

• Mohamed VI invites Sánchez to visit Morocco for his new "roadmap"
• The US protected Spain's change over the Sahara after 'courting' Algiers and Rabat

MARIA LEÓN ESCRIBANO NEWS02.04.2022 - 04:30 a.m.

President Pedro Sánchez in a meeting with the King of Morocco Mohamed VI in 2018Borja Puig of Bellacasa
"Our Food Against Your Sanctions" . Russia has something to bargain with in the economic war against the West. After resorting to energy supply , the threat now moves to the food industry where it plays a key role because the country is an exporter of one of the most essential products: fertilizers . This is one more edge of the conflict that reveals the dependence on foreign countries, especially on Europe, and forces the search for new partners. Morocco already plays a key role in the sector, thanks to the reserves in Western Sahara , and now it could consolidate itself as an exporter just as Spain opens diplomatic relations with the African counttry.


Saharan phosphate stands as defense against Russian agricultural threat


The Kremlin seeks to restrict exports of chemicals such as fertilizers only to friendly countries in response to Western sanctions.

• Mohamed VI invites Sánchez to visit Morocco for his new "roadmap"
• The US protected Spain's change over the Sahara after 'courting' Algiers and Rabat

MARIA LEÓN ESCRIBANO NEWS02.04.2022 - 04:30 a.m.

President Pedro Sánchez in a meeting with the King of Morocco Mohamed VI in 2018B


orja Puig of Bellacasa
"Our Food Against Your Sanctions" . Russia has something to bargain with in the economic war against the West. After resorting to energy supply , the threat now moves to the food industry where it plays a key role because the country is an exporter of one of the most essential products: fertilizers . This is one more edge of the conflict that reveals the dependence on foreign countries, especially on Europe, and forces the search for new partners. Morocco already plays a key role in the sector, thanks to the reserves in Western Sahara , and now it could consolidate itself as an exporter just as Spain opens diplomatic relations with the African country.
From the Kremlin, companies have been urged to restrict Russian agricultural exports only to friendly countries. "The food security of many countries depends on our supplies ," said former Russian President and current Deputy Chairman of the Russian Security Council Dimitri Medvedev. If this strategy is fulfilled, part of the production of nitrogen (10.6%), phosphate (6.4%) or potash (20%) would be at stake, resources that are used to manufacture fertilizers. The sector was already dragging a crisis due to the prices of raw materials and now it is aggravated by the consequences of the war.


"The situation is going to have a significant impact on fertilizer suppliers, who are reducing their production ," say Eugenio Piliego and Klaus Kobold, analysts at Scope Ratings. In addition, the crisis posed by the threat from Russia comes when farmers are "at a crucial stage of the agricultural season and the most extreme calculations indicate that, if fertilizer is not added to the soil, crops can be reduced by 50% for the next harvest," warns Mark Lacey, also an analyst at Schroders.
Morocco's weight in the phosphate market is greater than Russian influence, with more than 17% of production , but it also has the largest reserves in the world under its control. According to the United States Geological Survey (USGS), the Moroccan Government has in its power to exploit more than 70% of all the resources that exist of this material in the world. Phosphate is a natural source of phosphorus, element. At the same time, it provides a quarter of all the nutrients that plants need for their growth and development.


see alsoPhosAgro... Russia's fertilizer 'king' defies stock market crashes


Khouribga, Youssoufia, Ben Guerir and Bucraa are the main Moroccan phosphate mines. However, the last one is in Western Sahara, in the territories that the Saharawi people, led by the Polisario Front, consider occupied. The resources of the area represent one of the parties to the geopolitical conflict in which Spain has been involved over the years. In fact, it was the Spanish government that discovered the Bucraa mine and the company that manages its exploitation is of Spanish origin.
The companies behind the phosphate market

After discovering the resources of the Sahara, Spain began to exploit them through the company Fosbucraa -currently Phosboucraa- , however the withdrawal of the territory in 1975 meant its transfer. "The Madrid Agreements established the transfer of 65% of the phosphate deposits to Morocco, which materialized in the sale of Fosbucraa shares in the hands of INI (predecessor of SEPI ) to the Moroccan public company Office Chérifien de Phosphates –OCP - ", explains a study by the Spanish Institute for Strategic Studies published in 2014 on the economic interests of the area. The total disengagement from Spain was completed in 2002.
Phosboucraa is currently integrated into OCP and in 2021 represented about 2.12% of the group's total revenue. It is in charge of managing the Bucraa mine, which has an extraction capacity of 4 million tons of phosphate rock per year , transported along a 102 km conveyor belt (the longest in the world) to the port from El Aaiún, in front of the Canary Islands, for processing and export.


Despite the historical link, the relevance of phosphate from the Sahara for Spain today is in the commercial relationship with Morocco, which after the turn of the Government is considered closer . Moroccan phosphate exports are carried out through the public company OCP, which last year entered more than 8,000 million euros, 50% more than the previous year. In addition, its prospects are positive as it recognized in the presentation of its annual results: "since the end of 2021, prices have had an upward trend, reflecting the tight supply/demand situation , as well as other supply restrictions related to the conflict between Russia and Ukraine and the sanctions of Belarus".
One of OCP's rival companies in phosphate exports is the Russian PhosAgro, the only one that has maintained profits on the Moscow Stock Exchange since the beginning of the year and despite the crashes caused by the sanctions against Russia. Since January it has risen more than 26%. In recent days, the price of its shares has recorded strong gains in a clear bet by investors in the country . It is a Russian chemical holding company, in the hands of oligarchs close to the Kremlin, which supplies different fertilizers -phosphate, urea, ammonia, among others- and controls its entire production process.


According to the criteria of More information

https://www.lainformacion.com/mercad...rusia/2863769/



The US strategy:

The Americans do not say it openly, but their approach reflects that they have already included the Moroccan, Saharawi and Spanish maritime zones along the Atlantic Ocean in their operational strategy for military deployment. One of the objectives of such a deployment would be to secure and gain control of the oil, gas and phosphate deposits in occupied Western Sahara, using, on the one hand, the area between Agadir in Morocco and El Ayoun in Western Sahara. As well as the underwater treasure of Monte Tropic, which despite being from the silenced Saharawi people, Morocco and Spain secretly dispute it in the UN.

https://www.ecsaharaui.com/

 

[h.h.]

Dont be ridiculous, the Western media aren't really to be trusted.. they have a political slant and are highly selective about what they report... but i don't think they report complete lies and fabrications. You are absolutely right to be suspicious, but to align yourself with the Russian state owned propaganda machine as an alternative is a good example of 'out of the frying pan and into the fire ! ' (in Russia any 'equivalent' of Fox news would be shut down and the journalists thrown in jail )
The same with the conduct of the west, i have spent my life being critical and suspicious of that too, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Palestine etc are all shameful - but fortunately i am objective enough to know that there is worse out there, and Putin's brutal ground invasion of Ukraine is just that. Worse.
I have no hatred of Russians in general but I hate Putin's warmongering and i hate the Brutality of the Russian soldiers( that has been well documented in previous wars. )
There are always people who choose the wrong side, there was plenty of support for Hitler in Europe and also plenty in America:

""the threat of Nazism in the United States before World War II was greater than we generally remember today, and that those forces offer valuable lessons decades later — and not just because part of that story is the history of the “America First” idea, born of pre-WWII isolationism and later as a slogan for now-President Donald Trump."

https://time.com/5414055/american-nazi-sympathy-book/

VG

The media is checked and cross checked. Don’t listen to their shit about not trusting the media. Simply remember the old adage. ‘Don’t believe everything you hear”. That includes all of their anti media bullshit as well as the medias bullshit. I’ll take the media over a lost sheep any day. This guys found some lame reasons for hating his country while supporting mass murder. A suspicious and critical life lead by a lie. What a waste.

 

[Montuno]

The fight for phosphate in El Ayoun: 1,250 million euros per year
​

Photo: Archive

• M. Claver

7:35 - 11/15/2010 Updated: 10:24 - 11/15/10


The fight that, for 35 years, Morocco began for the control of the Spanish Sahara has much more tangible causes than the collective ideology tends to grant it. A dense network of historical, economic and geostrategic interests allows Morocco a wide margin of impunity in its constant push for annexation of Western Sahara.

El Ayoun is just the latest episode in a long list of aggressions to seize the last broken piece of decolonization, for the control of some raw materials that report multimillion-dollar profits.
On the international board, geostrategic and economic interests often represent two sides of the same coin. For this reason, it is decisive to highlight the key role that the United States, with its total adherence to Morocco, has played and continues to play in the conflict for control of the Sahara.
From a historical perspective, the relationship between the Kingdom of Morocco and the United States has been in force for more than two centuries. In 1777, Morocco became the first country to recognize the independence of the United States of America. In fact, this good harmony materialized in the signing of an agreement, in 1783, between both countries, still in force today.
The letter that, in 1789, George Washington addressed to the Sultan Sidi Mohammed attests to the bonds of friendship between the two, "it gives me great pleasure to have this opportunity to assure His Majesty that I will not cease to promote all the measures that can lead to friendship and harmony, which thus easily subsist between your empire and us". In fact, the US consulate in Tangier was the first property acquired by Washington abroad. Thus materialized a union of interests that lasts to this day.


international lineups

But, in addition, the international alignments in two blocks caused by the Cold War contributed to further strengthen this alliance. The possibility of an independent Sahara, attached to the Soviet orbit and under the influence of Algeria, turned the United States into a main pro-Moroccan actor. The fall of communism has given way to the war against Islamic terrorism and positions have been further consolidated.
France has also been an unconditional ally of Morocco in its fight against the Polisario Front, determined not to lose influence in favor of the United States in the Maghreb. As a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council, it has vetoed the treatment of this issue as a "conflict", which would have meant the imposition of the so-called Settlement Plan, a solution approved in 1988 and never applied. To date, the so-called "third way" has not come to fruition either: the first and second Baker Plans.
The economic keys

But what lies behind the time bomb that Western Sahara has become is, as we said, Morocco's control of its abundant natural resources. And, among all of them, one stands out: phosphorite.
Phosphorites are rocks that contain phosphorus pentoxide, a fundamental component of phosphoric acid. This product is of great interest for agriculture, for the production of phosphates used in the manufacture of fertilizers.
Thus, when Spain in 1947 discovered the first phosphate deposits, it kicked off a war for its control. The appearance of the BuCraa mine (one of the largest in the world), in 1963, ended up attracting global interest. The Franco regime made very important investments for its exploitation. In fact, the still existing conveyor belt that moves phosphates from BuCraa to the port (the largest in the world, 100 km long) dates from those years. Currently, and despite the repeated complaints and denunciations of the Saharawis, the mine is exploited by a Moroccan state company in charge of extraction, processing and sale.
But what economic benefits are obtained from these deposits? It is difficult to know exactly the figure of income that, for the Moroccan coffers, supposes the extraction of the phosphatines.
Some approximations have been made and, according to the least ambitious calculations, between 1975 and 2006, a total of 40 million tons could have been extracted from BuCraa.
In recent years, this figure may have skyrocketed as it is estimated that there has been a very significant increase in production, reaching four million tons per year. Today, Morocco is the largest exporter of phosphates in the world (with an annual production of approximately 30 million tons).
And while Morocco is the main exporter, the United States is the main importer. In the last ten years, it would have been receiving 99 percent of its imports from Morocco and Western Sahara. The decline in phosphate deposits has caused the two major producers (USA and China) to prefer to curb their exports.
With the increase in the production of food and also biofuels, the change in the diet of the world population and the struggle for world reserves of phosphates, we will see its price rise to very notable levels.
According to estimates, the BuCraa deposits have a life ahead of 30 or 40 years. Then they will run out. But, at the current price, we know that the phosphates coming from these mines could be increasing the coffers of the Kingdom of Alaouí by around 1,250 million euros a year. A figure that would justify the fight for the annexation of the Sahara. Just considering the current price of phosphates, in three decades we would be talking about 38,000 million euros.
and other raw materials

But not only phosphates are a source of interest for Morocco, since the fishing industry is also a source of encouragement.
With the Mediterranean coastline especially overexploited, the Saharawi coast represents a strategic objective for Morocco. In fact, and according to some estimates, between 70 percent and 90 percent of Moroccan catches are shipped from the Sahara. Up to 100 foreign companies are currently involved in this sector.
But, in addition to phosphates and fishing, there are other industries in the Sahara that deserve a mention. For some time now, this region has become a major exporter of sand (used in construction). Also noteworthy is the exploration of certain metals and minerals (iron and zirconium), and even the recovery of uranium from the phosphate mines themselves.
Yesterday marked 35 years since Spain decided, in the Madrid Agreements, to cede the administration of the Sahara to Morocco and Mauritania. Also last week, talks began in New York between the Polisario Front and Morocco to try to reach a peace agreement. Morocco never respected the commitments made with Spain. We will see if, finally, he is able to give up the Saharawi cake.
Related

• Phosphates and the future of food

https://www.eleconomista.es/global/noticias/2602059/11/10/son-los-fosfatos-estupido-.html

 

[Montuno]

The ships and companies that plunder the phosphates of Western Sahara occupied by Morocco

SPS 02/17/2018 - 15:04
By: Luis Portillo Pasqual del Riquelme |


This commercialization and export constitutes a violation of international humanitarian law defined by the Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949 and the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court of 1998. The purchase of such resources does not provide any legal security or enforceable title over them. The maritime transport of these resources aids and abets the war crime of pillage defined in the Convention and in the Statute. In recent years, the SADR Government has informed shipowners, shipping companies, ship charterers, companies and other economic operators that any involvement in the export of Western Sahara's natural resources carries legal and reputational risks." The purchase of such resources does not provide any legal certainty or executive title over them. The maritime transport of these resources aids and abets the war crime of pillage defined in the Convention and in the Statute. In recent years, the SADR Government has informed shipowners, shipping companies, ship charterers, companies and other economic operators that any involvement in the export of Western Sahara's natural resources carries legal and reputational risks." The purchase of such resources does not provide any legal certainty or executive title over them. The maritime transport of these resources aids and abets the war crime of pillage defined in the Convention and in the Statute. In recent years, the SADR Government has informed shipowners, shipping companies, ship charterers, companies and other economic operators that any involvement in the export of Western Sahara's natural resources carries legal and reputational risks." Thus reads the beginning of the Political Declaration of the Government of the Saharawi Republic on the risk and responsibility of ships that transport natural resources from occupied Western Sahara . [1]
Faced with the brazen plundering of their natural resources, the Saharawis are not silent . The continuous protests of the Saharawi population are systematically and violently repressed by the Moroccan occupation forces. Recently, several Saharawi human rights associations have sent a letter to the President of France, Emmanuel Macron, to ask him to use his influence and put an end to the injustices perpetrated by Morocco in the territories of Western Sahara. In their letter they recall that, in accordance with the peace plan approved by the UN and the African Union, a self-determination referendum for the Saharawi people was planned, but after 25 years it has not been held, and the demonstrations that claim this right "are systematically repressed with violence"; the Moroccan authorities deprive the Saharawi people of their right of association; "Hundreds of Saharawi citizens, activists, journalists, bloggers and trade unionists have been arrested, imprisoned, tortured and humiliated in public and in the premises of police and judicial administrations", the letter indicates. In addition, prohibit the access of international observers to the territory of Western Sahara who attempt to document human rights violations, and that in 2014 alone, Morocco expelled 120 observers of different nationalities. In addition, the letter denounces that Rabat does not respect the right of the Saharawis to fair justice, and cites as an example the case of those arrested after the Gdeim Izik riots in El Aaiun, in 2010. It adds that Saharawi citizens are arbitrarily dismissed from his job for his activism, which constitutes a violation of the right to work. And it underlines that the Moroccan State persists in its policy of depleting natural resources of occupied Western Sahara, in particular phosphates, with a production of up to 3 million tons per year, employing Moroccan workers, instead of Saharawis. [two]
In this regard, the Observatory of Natural Resources of Western Sahara ( Western Sahara Resource Watch , WSRW) has published a new and documented monographic report, for the fourth consecutive year, on the looting that Morocco is perpetrating by exporting phosphates to the whole world. of occupied Western Sahara. We refer to the report entitled " P for Plunder. Morocco's exports of phosphates from occupied Western Sahara " ( " P for Plunder. Morocco's exports of phosphates from occupied Western Sahara "), which is available on the Internet at the WSRW website ( www.wsrw.org ), and from which we have extracted the data and translated much of the text of this article. [3]
WSRW is a totally independent international non-governmental organization, based in Brussels, which works in the field of solidarity with the people of Western Sahara, conducting research and campaigns against the plundering of the natural resources of the Saharawi territory by Morocco.
With this looting, Morocco contravenes, once again, the UN doctrine on the use of the natural resources of the Non-Self-Governing Territories (TNA), the Corell opinion [4] , the judgment of the Court of Justice of the European Union , CJEU, of December 21, 2016 (recognizing and ruling that Western Sahara is not part of Morocco), for not referring to the ruling of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague, of 1975, which declared the inexistence of links territorial sovereignty of Morocco and Mauritania over Western Sahara. [5] And as if that were not enough, very recently (January 10, 2018) the European Justice has put questioning the validity of the EU-Morocco Fisheries Agreement , for affecting the looting of the fishing resources of Western Sahara and violating the right of the Saharawi people to self-determination. [6]
But it would not even be necessary to point out all of the above, since it would suffice to refer to the simple breach, by Morocco, of the very same Tripartite Agreements of Madrid , signed on November 14, 1975, at the end of the Franco dictatorship, and considered null, immoral and illegal by experts in international law. Indeed, the Alawite monarchy not only deceived its people (its "subjects") into believing that the ICJ had recognized Morocco's claims to the territory of Western Sahara (when precisely the ICJ ruled the opposite), but also It also seized the part of the Saharawi territory abandoned by Mauritania in 1979 after the Mauritanian government signed peace with the POLISARIO Front, recognized the Saharawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR) and gave up any claim on the territory.
Recently, the French organization ACAT (Christian Action for the Abolition of Torture) has publicly denounced the war crimes committed by Morocco in Western Sahara -the last colony in Africa-, which Morocco has been illegally occupying for more than 40 years: the massive settlement of settlers, the looting of natural resources and the torture of Saharawi militants. And he also criticizes the "partial" position of France in this conflict. [7]
WSRW Report Summary
Life on our planet, like agricultural production, depends on phosphorus (P). This element is found in phosphate rock, which is turned into fertilizer. Phosphate is an essential component, along with nitrogen and potassium, of fertilizers, on which much of food production and world food security depends. There is no substitute for phosphate for agriculture. [8] But for the Saharawi people, phosphates (that "P" in the WSRW English report) have not translated into benefits, but quite the opposite, says WSRW.
This is the fourth time that WSRW has published a detailed analysis (only partially covered in this article) of the companies involved in buying phosphate from occupied Western Sahara. This illegally exploited phosphate mineral is the main source of income that the Moroccan Government obtains from the territory it occupies in contravention of International Law. The representatives of the Saharawi people have clearly declared themselves against this trade, both before the United Nations in general and addressing specific companies.
WSRW presents in its report a complete list (see Annex , at the end of this article), for the year 2016, which includes all shipments of phosphate from occupied Western Sahara and imputes the purchase of Moroccan production in Western Sahara in that year to eight identified importing companies from as many countries (there is another unidentified company). [9]
The total volume of phosphate exported from Western Sahara, in 2016, reached the figure of 1.86 million tons (Mt.), with an estimated value of 213.7 million dollars , being transported in ships. The main importer was the Canadian company "Agrium Inc".
In that year, several international companies stopped carrying out these controversial imports (an aspect not dealt with in this article). A noteworthy event that same year is the entry into the business of a subsidiary of the Moroccan parent Office Chérifien des Phosphates SA (OCP) in India. The OCP exported to its own company in India a volume of 334,000 Mt of phosphate ore, worth 39.6 million dollars, which makes this Indian joint venture of the OCP the second largest importer of exports of the OCP from Western Sahara.
Of the nine importing companies mentioned, three are listed on the Stock Exchange or are majority owned by companies registered on international Stock Exchanges. All of them are blacklisted by ethical investors for making that trade. [10]
Of the other six companies not listed on any stock, two are New Zealand agricultural cooperatives, another two are fully or partially owned by the Venezuelan government, one is partially owned by the Indian government and one is privately owned.
WSRW calls on all companies involved in this trade to immediately cease all purchases of phosphate from Western Sahara, until a solution to the conflict is found. And likewise, it asks investors to commit and divest, unless appropriate measures are taken.
International Law and the natural resources of non-autonomous territories
The Moroccan claim to sovereignty over Western Sahara is not recognized by the United Nations or by any country in the world. Moroccan arguments to claim that territory were rejected by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) [11] , as stated above.
The Department of Legal Affairs of the United Nations studied the question of the legality of oil prospecting and exploitation in Western Sahara, that is, an activity of extracting natural resources -currently in the prospecting phase- similar to the extraction of phosphates. And it ruled that "if new prospecting and exploitation activities were to be carried out without taking into account the interests and wishes of the people of Western Sahara, this would constitute a violation of the principles of International Law applicable to mining activities in the Non-Self-Governing Territories. ".
Based on subsequent judgments of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) and on the opinion of the Department of Legal Advice of the African Union (AU), International Law considers that the consent of the people of Western Sahara is a requirement prior to any activity related to the occupied territory, even without it being necessary to determine whether such activity would harm or benefit said people. [12]
However, just a few weeks after Morocco invaded the territory in 1975, phosphate from the Bu Craa deposit in Western Sahara was already being exported to fertilizer companies in North America, South America, Europe and Australasia. The Bu Craa mineral deposit is controlled by the Office Chérifien des Phosphates SA (OCP) , the Moroccan national phosphate company, currently responsible for Morocco's main source of income from Western Sahara.
Phosphates de Boucraa SA (Phosboucraa, Fosbucraa) is a subsidiary of the OCP. Its main activities are the extraction, processing, transportation and marketing of phosphate ore from the Bu Craa deposit, including the operation of a loading dock and a treatment plant located on the Atlantic coast of El Aaiún. The OCP estimates the production capacity in Western Sahara at 2.6 million tons. year. [13] Although the OCP assures that the Bu Craa mine represents only 1 percent of the total phosphate reserves exploited by Morocco, the truth is that no less than 25 percent of its phosphate ore exports come from El Ayoun . [14] The exceptionally high quality of Western Saharan phosphate makes it a highly coveted raw material for fertilizer manufacturers.
However, that situation may be coming to an end. Indeed, the Bu Craa deposit consists of two layers or strata. Until 2014, only the first stratum or upper layer had been exploited. This first layer contained phosphate rock of the highest quality from all the reserves controlled by the OCP. But in 2014, ore was already extracted from the second layer, which is of lower quality. Thus, according to WSRW, Morocco has sold all the high-quality phosphate that should have been available to the Saharawi people once their right to self-determination materialized.
The OCP affirms that Fosbucraa is the main private employer in the area, with some 2,100 workers [15] , more than half of them –it assures- recruited locally. It also alleges that Fosbucraa provides important economic viability and well-being to the inhabitants of the region. OCP also boasts of Fosbucraa 's social impact , providing pensions to retirees, health care and social benefits to its employees and their families. [16]
In short, the OCP presents the supposed economic and social benefits to try to justify its exploitation of the phosphate deposits in the territory of Western Sahara, beyond the internationally recognized border of Morocco. [17]
Morocco also uses the phosphate from Bu Craa for its political lobbying aimed at gaining support from third countries for its illegal occupation. Indeed, an official Moroccan government document leaked in 2014 literally states that Western Sahara's natural resources, including phosphates, must be used "to involve Russia in activities in [Western] Sahara." And he adds that "in exchange, Russia could guarantee the freezing of the Sahara dossier in the UN". [18]
It should be remembered that, in addition to phosphates, the territory of Western Sahara has many other natural, terrestrial and marine resources: iron, copper, uranium (3 million potential tons), ammonia, lead, cement, plaster, methanol, nitrate, silica sand, sulfur, zinc, helium, calcite, clay, silver metal, marble, pozzolans and, of course, all fishery products. [19]
The seizure of the Bu Craa deposits by Morocco (chronology)
1947.- The deposits of Western Sahara (at that time Spanish Sahara) are discovered, 130 km southeast of El Aaiún, in a place called Bu Craa. The discovery of these phosphate reserves would constitute the first potential source of income from mineral resources for the colonial power, Spain. [twenty]
1962.- To exploit these deposits, the National Mining Company of the Sahara (ENMINSA) is created, owned by the then National Institute of Industry (INI), a Spanish industrial public corporation.
1968.- The company is renamed "Phosfatos de Bu Craa, SA", also known as "Fosbucraa".
1972.- Spain begins to exploit the deposits. Many Spaniards find work there, as do the Saharawis, the native population of the then Spanish Sahara, as the territory was known at that time.
1975.- The growing international pressure in favor of decolonization forced Spain to prepare a strategy to withdraw from the Spanish Sahara. The UN mission sent to the territory before the planned referendum points out that Western Sahara could very well become the world's second largest exporter of phosphates, behind Morocco. [21] The then King of Morocco, Hassan II, once his authority was recovered after two failed coup attempts, ordered the Moroccan Army to invade Western Sahara. Hassan II apparently hoped that this would give Morocco the same ability to determine world phosphate prices that OPEC had over oil prices. [22] For the colonial power, Spain, it was essential to maintain its participation in the phosphate deposits. Not having carried out the decolonization of the territory, allowing the population of Western Sahara to exercise their right to self-determination, the Spanish Government negotiated a pact: through the Madrid Agreements, it illegally transferred the administration of the territory to Morocco and Mauritania, while while holding a 35 per cent stake in the Bu Craa fields. No country in the world - nor the UN nor, of course, the people of Western Sahara - recognizes this transfer of power from Spain to those two countries. Mauritania, however, withdrew from the territory in 1979, acknowledging its mistake in claiming and occupying it. As has been said before, Morocco also invaded the "
1976.- On January 1, the Madrid Agreements came into force and, after a transitory period of 16 months, the OCP would take control of the exploitation of the phosphate deposits. [23]
2002.- Spain sells its 35 percent stake in Bu Craa.
2014.- The OCP registers on the Irish Stock Exchange, for public subscription, an inaugural bond issue of 1.55 billion dollars. [24] And a year later, a similar debt financing prospectus is registered in the Stock Exchange. [25]
2017.- Morocco continues to exploit the phosphate deposits in occupied Western Sahara. Among the plans of the OCP is the investment in new infrastructure to exploit deeper strata of phosphates [26] and the expansion of the industrial capacity of Phosboucraa . [27]
The export of phosphates from Bu Craa

Year	2016	2015
Exported volume (Tm.)	1,858,000	1,410,000 [28]
Value (millions $)	213.7	167.8
Production cost ($ million) (est.)	80	80
Income obtained by the OCP (millions of $)	130	90
Value of the largest shipment made (millions $)	8.3	8.6
Value of the smallest shipment made (millions $)	1.7	1.8
Number of ships that left the territory with phosphate	37	30
Average volume of phosphate exported in each ship (Tm.)	50,000	47,000
Average value of phosphate exported in each ship (millions of $)	5.6	5.5
Annual average price of Bu Craa ore ($/Tm.)	112	118

Source : WSRW, New report on global phosphate trade from occupied Western Sahara... , 04/24/2017
" P for Plunder. Morocco's exports of phosphates from occupied Western Sahara " , p. 10 - Download here
WSRW has prepared its report with data obtained through the systematic tracking of ships; and considers that it has detected, tracked and accounted for all the ships that left the port of El Aaiún in 2016, although it does not exclude the possibility that some may have gone unnoticed.
In general, the WSRW calculations for the year 2016 have been confirmed by the OCP's own reports. [29] As of 2006, phosphate ore exports averaged 1.1 million metric tons per year, considerably less than production capacity. [30] In the last years of the 1970s, production was paralyzed for three years during the war in the territory, to gradually reach 2 million MT at the end of the 1990s. WSRW began its daily monitoring work in 2011. Its first report put OCP exports of phosphate mined from Bu Craa at 1.8 million metric tons in 2012 and 2.2 million metric tons in 2013. The WSRW forecast of 2.1 million metric tons of ore of phosphate exported from Bu Craa in 2014, was confirmed at the volume of 'processed' phosphate indicated in the OCP Prospectus registered on the Irish Stock Exchange. [31] And after the unusually low export level in 2015, the 2016 volume is more in line with levels seen in the past.
Bu Craa's production represents about 7 percent of the total volume mined by the OCP [32] and about 25% of its total sales of phosphate ore. [33] The OCP estimates Bu Craa's reserves at 500 million MT. [3. 4]
Main Importing Countries
(Thousands of tons.)

Year	2015		2016
United States	474	Canada	579
Canada	442	New Zealand	349
New Zealand	204	India	344
Lithuania	113	United States	287
Others*	182	Australia	105
		Lithuania	68
		Venezuela	68
		Colombia	58

(*) Australia, Venezuela and Ukraine.
Source : " P for Plunder. Morocco's exports of phosphates from occupied Western Sahara " , p. eleven.
Main clients, by nationality of the parent company
(Thousands of tons.)

Year	2015		2016
Canada	916	Canada	866
New Zealand	204	New Zealand	349
Venezuela	94	India / Morocco	344
Others*	201	Venezuela	126
		Australia	105
		Russia / Switzerland	68

(*) Switzerland, Russia, Australia and others
Source : " P for Plunder. Morocco's exports of phosphates from occupied Western Sahara " , p. eleven.
Value of Imports, by country
(Millions of dollars)

Year	2015		2016
United States	56	Canada	66.6
Canada	52	New Zealand	40.1
New Zealand	25	India	39.6
Lithuania	13	United States	33.0
Others*	21.5	Australia	12.1
		Lithuania	7.8
		Venezuela	7.8
		Colombia	6.7

(*) Australia, Venezuela, Colombia and Ukraine.
Source : " P for Plunder. Morocco's exports of phosphates from occupied Western Sahara " , p. eleven.
Importing Companies, 2016

Rank	Business	Parent company country	Import destination	Number of shipments	Volume of imported phosphate (Tm)	Value of imported phosphate (Millions of $)
1	Agrium Inc.	Canada	Vancouver, Canada	10	579,000	66.6
two	paradeep Phosphates Ltd.	India/Morocco	Paradip, India	6	344,000	39.6
3	Potash Corporation of Saskatchewan Inc.	Canada	Geismar, USA	4	287,000	33.0
4	Ravensdown Fertilizer Co-op Ltd.	New Zealand	Napier, New Zealand	4	88,000	21.6
5	Balance Agri Nutrients Ltd.	New Zealand	Tauranga/Bluff Cove/Invercargill, New Zealand	3	161,000	18.5
6	Incitec Pivot Ltd.	Australia	Portland, Australia	3	105,000	12.1
7	Lyphose AB	Switzerland/Russia	Klaipeda, Lithuania	1	68,250	7.8
8	unknown (Venezuelan Government)	Venezuela	Puerto Cabello, Venezuela	3	68,000	7.8
9	SA monomers	Venezuela	Barranquilla, Colombia	3	58,000	6.7

Source : " P for Plunder. Morocco's exports of phosphates from occupied Western Sahara " , p. 12.
Companies that help the OCP in the exploitation of the Bu Craa deposits
SIEMENS
The German multinational SIEMENS built the Fum el-Uad wind farm in occupied Western Sahara in 2013, commissioned by the Moroccan national electricity company, ONEE. Siemens worked in collaboration with the Moroccan wind power company NAREVA, owned by the King of Morocco. The Fum el-Uad wind farm, with 22 windmills, currently supplies 95 percent of Phosboucraa's electricity needs; that is to say, practically all the energy required for the exploitation and transport of phosphate ore in Western Sahara is generated by the wind turbines supplied by Siemens. So the production of "green energy" is making Morocco's plundering of the territory even more lucrative. [35]
ATLAS COPCO
In 2008, the Swedish industrial company Atlas Copco sold large drilling rigs to the OCP for use in the Bu Craa fields, also committing to its maintenance and the supply of spare parts for this equipment. WSRW does not know how many years Atlas Copco is bound by that contract. In May 2013, WSRW first questioned Atlas Copco about these supplies. [36] Although at first it seemed that the company was willing to discuss the matter with WSRW, it later refused. WSRW wrote to the company again, by letter, on March 21, 2017, detailing its concerns and questions, but the company refused to respond. [37]
CONTINENTAL
A subsidiary of the German Continental company, ContiTech, plays a key role in maintaining the OCP's long belt that transports phosphate ore from the mine to the shore. This company claims to have supplied the OCP with systems that allow a load on the belt of "2,000 tons per hour and a speed of more than four meters per second" . [38] In a letter to WSRW, dated April 10, 2017, Continental explains that it receives continuous orders for the conveyor belt from Bu Craa. And in the same month, the company began producing components for the tape at its own plant in Morocco. [39]
In short, the largest conveyor belt in the world carries the mineral from the deposits, in the interior of Western Sahara, to the Atlantic coast, in the port of El Aaiún. The companies "Continental" and "Siemens" are the key partners in such ore transportation infrastructure. Windmills installed by "Siemens" in 2013 provide all the electricity needed by the complex on the ribbon.
However, the German Government has made it clear very recently (at the Bundestag session on December 18, 2017 ) that it does not support the projects of German companies in Western Sahara: "The Federal Government does not support the economic activities of German companies in Western Sahara and does not guarantee its business through export credit and investment guarantees", stated the State Secretary of the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy, Matthias Machnig. [40]
Law Firms Lobbying for Morocco
In defense of their imports of phosphates from Western Sahara, several companies refer to the reports ( legal opinions ) of various law firms hired by the Office Chérifien des Phosphates SA (OCP).
Those legal opinions are systematically used by international phosphate importers to legitimize their imports before their shareholders. Apparently, these confidential reports maintain that the native population – the Saharawis – benefits from this productive activity. However, the indigenous population – the real owners of the phosphate deposits – are not allowed to see these reports and therefore cannot assess their veracity. So the Saharawis cannot question any aspect related to the terms of reference, methodology or conclusions.
Given that these legal opinions presumably conclude that the exploitation of the natural resources of the Saharawi people by Morocco is legal, WSRW considers that there is no reason for them to hide these documents from the Saharawis.
Behind those secret reports there are four law firms that are dedicated to international lobbying:
Covington & Burling LLP is an international law firm, with offices in Europe, the United States and China, that advises international corporations. Among its clients is the OCP.
Both the Belgian importing company BASF and the Spanish FMC Foret refer to the aforementioned legal opinion prepared by Covington & Burling for the OCP, but neither of them wanted to reveal that report. At the time (November 2008), BASF suggested to WSRW that it contact Covington & Burling for more information. WSRW had already contacted the company in February 2008, but received no response. When WSRW called the law firm for an appointment, Covington & Burling responded: "We have absolutely nothing to discuss with you on any matter. You are not our clients and, as far as we can see, you have no business with us at all. interest or involvement in our company ."
It should be noted that Covington & Burling travels to any part of the world to defend this unethical trade before shareholders willing to divest from any of the companies that import phosphate from Western Sahara. [42]
More recently, the DLA Piper law firm associated with the Palacio y Asociados law firm to provide the OCP with one more legal opinion with which to justify this business. Based on representations from the importing companies, this second legal opinion appears to follow the reasoning of the Covington & Burling opinion, citing potential benefits to "local people" as a justification for exploitation and subsequent trade.
DLA Piper is an international law firm with offices in over 30 countries in the Americas, Asia Pacific, Europe and the Middle East. For its part, the Palacio y Asociados law firm is directed by the former Minister of Foreign Affairs and former MEP Ana Palacio , and has offices in Madrid, Brussels and Washington.
WSRW contacted both companies asking them to share their opinion with the Saharawi people. DLA Piper replied that it could not share this legal opinion, which "was drawn up for the benefit of Phosphates de Boucraa SA and its parent company, Office Chérifien des Phosphates SA" , due to professional secrecy. [43] And Ana Palacio, director of Palacio y Asociados, replied expressing her disagreement with the WSRW analysis and also referring to the aforementioned professional secrecy. [44]
In November 2015, PotashCorp appointed Dechert LLP and Palacio y Asociados as co-authors of a legal opinion. Dechert LLP is an international law firm, headquartered in Philadelphia, United States, with offices in 14 countries. Until August 2014, PotashCorp had designated DLA Piper as a partner of Palacio y Asociados. It is unclear whether the Dechert-Palacio ruling is different from the DLA Piper-Palacio ruling. The connection between the two could be Myriam González Durántez, wife of former British Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, who represented the OCP when she worked at DLA Piper, but who is said to have signed the contract with the OCP when she moved to Dechert. According to the information available, the OCP would have paid 1.5 million dollars for the work carried out by Dechert and DLA Piper. [Four. Five]
Dechert responded to the WSRW letter, dated February 8, 2016, saying that he could not disclose the opinion prepared for the OCP due to the confidentiality due to his client. [46] WSRW asked Dechert and Palacio y Asociados if their client would agree to waive that legal privilege, given that the confidentiality of those legal reports had already been lifted when their existence was made public. WSRW never received a response to that request. For your part. The OCP has also not deigned to answer the requests of the Saharawis in the sense that it provide them with a copy of these legal reports.
Moroccan lobbying in the EU institutions
The WSRW Report also points to pressure from Morocco to favor its phosphate exports to the EU. Which implied increasing the toxicity in the agriculture of the Community. Indeed, one of the law firms hired by the OCP, Dechert LLP, was instructed to lobby against the European Commission's proposed Cadmium Regulation. Based on several risk assessment studies, the European Commission wants to limit the exposure of the EU population to this heavy metal, due to its adverse health effects, in particular as it causes various types of cancer. In 2016, the Commission proposed a Regulation for fertilizers produced with phosphate rock, foreseeing the phased reduction of the cadmium content to 20 mg/kg over a period of 12 years. [47]
Currently, phosphate fertilizers are responsible for 60 percent of cadmium emissions to soil and crops in the European Union, as documented in the European Parliament (EP) Policy Department study, February 2017. [48 ]
The phosphate rock under control of the OCP – thus including the rock from Western Sahara – contains on average between 29.5 and 72.7 mg/kg. [49] And the EP Policy Department paints an even bleaker picture, citing levels of 38-200 mg Cd/kg P2O5 [phosphorus content of fertilizers].
The OCP sells 32 percent of its production in Europe. Since the proposed regulation would result in the gradual reduction of that sales figure, the OCP launched an intense campaign to pressure against that regulation. The OCP argues that there is not enough scientific evidence to support the idea of ​​limiting cadmium levels, and even suggests that the EU raise cadmium levels to 80 mg/kg, much higher than the EU Commission's proposal.
On May 11, 2016, the OCP sent a letter to the Commission indicating that it did not agree with its proposal. And he also complained that "the main fertilizer producers [...] had not been consulted." [50] And that was said by the OCP itself, which refuses to seek the consent of the people of Western Sahara and loots the phosphate ore from its own territory. What sarcasm! [51]
The SADR Government warns..., and acts
The Saharawi people and their representative organisations, starting with the SADR Government itself, have been protesting from the beginning against the illegal extraction and export of phosphate rock from the area militarily occupied by Morocco. The Saharawi population continues to demonstrate tirelessly and heroically in the occupied areas against the plundering of the natural resources of a territory that belongs to them. But the repression of the occupation forces is systematic, brutal and daily, and tries to extinguish and hide any source of resistance , often with serious consequences for those who dare to resist the occupation and looting, punished sometimes even with life imprisonment! (Gdeim Izik). The Moroccan occupier tries to maintain silence and ignorance of the situation, prohibiting the entry into the territory of journalists and the media, European and national deputies, international observers, teachers, trade unionists, members of solidarity organisations..., who are frequently not even allowed to get off the plane, being returned to their place of origin, unceremoniously. And the illegal trade continues to this day, with a handful of companies involved in it, despite the commitment of the United Nations , in 1991, to guarantee the people of Western Sahara a process of self-determination, just like the one carried out in the rest of Africa. But the Saharawi people continue to resist and move towards their liberation with the exclusive recourse to justice, legality and international solidarity.[52]
The "big press" is silent and Morocco blackmails Spain and Europe , when it suits it, with immigrant boats, drug trafficking, terrorism or business. The military occupation of Western Sahara has led Morocco to become, in fact, a blackmailing state . As a renowned Spanish newspaper points out: "The Moroccan government has traditionally used agreements with the EU to achieve recognition of its presence in the former Spanish colony, forcing things to force European jurists to touch the limits of international jurisprudence" . [53]
The Saharawi government has warned importing companies, shipping companies and other economic operators of the legal and reputational risks involved in trading in natural resources stolen from the occupied Saharawi territory, in this particular case, the Bu Craa phosphates. [54] The warning is a real warning to boaters, looters and traffickersincluding insurance companies. The damage that the reputation of those involved in such plundering may suffer comes from the public disclosure of their participation in the export of resources, renewable or not, from a territory widely known as the last colony in Africa. Knowledge of these facts by public opinion can negatively affect the businesses and projects of the companies and investors involved, and even commercial relations between governments or countries, as happened with the apartheid regime in South Africa. Regarding the legal risks, there have already been recent cases of filing lawsuits before national courts, to intercept, detain, seize and/or recover shipments of illegally exported Saharawi resources; Extendable demands, where appropriate, to repair the damage caused. [55] Suffice it to cite here the judicial interception, in South Africa and Panama, of two ships, in May 2017, loaded with phosphates from occupied Western Sahara. [56] Saharawi leaders explained it to the press like this: "The Saharawi people wanted their government to act. We could not continue to tolerate the myth that the extraction and export of phosphate rock was somehow of benefit to that part of our people who live in occupied Western Sahara. And our people in the refugee camps has also seen none of that trade. The sale of high-quality phosphate rock for agricultural fertilizer is profitable, benefiting children's nutrition in countries like Canada and New Zealand. Meanwhile, the rightful owners of that resource including Sahrawi children, face severe food insecurity in refugee camps. The injustice of this situation could not be more apparent (...)". " [57]
After these legal precedents at the international level, the POLISARIO Front and the SADR Government have wanted to make things very clear, with the Political Declaration cited at the beginning of this article (see Note 1). Taking into account the risks mentioned above, the Saharawi Government urges the different economic operators not to get involved in the export and/or transport of Saharawi resources, reminding them that, in addition to the aforementioned legal and reputational risks in the international arena, the Illegal export and trade of Saharawi natural resources are also punishable under national law. European workers, however, they do not have to be harmed if they meet a single condition: to demand the consent of the Saharawi authorities. [58]
For its part, the WSRW Report on the looting of Saharawi phosphates concludes with the following RECOMMENDATIONS:
To the Government of Morocco:
- Respect international law and immediately cease the production and export of phosphates in and from occupied Western Sahara until a solution to the conflict is found.
- Respect the right to self-determination of the people of Western Sahara, through cooperation with the UN to carry out a referendum for the natives of the territory.
- Compensate the Saharawi people for the benefits obtained from the sales of phosphate rock from the illegally occupied territory.
- Respect the opinion of the African Union on Western Sahara, published in October 2015, which states, among other things, that any prospecting or exploitation of the natural resources of the territory is illegal, because it violates the right of the Saharawi people to self-determination and to permanent sovereignty over its resources.
To the buyers of phosphates from the Bu Craa deposits:
- Immediately cease all purchases of illegally exported phosphates from occupied Western Sahara.
To the Governments of Venezuela and India:
- Refrain from making new purchases of phosphate rock from Western Sahara.
To the governments of Australia, Canada, Colombia, Lithuania, New Zealand and the USA:
- Quantify the trade in phosphate originating in Western Sahara and commit to the companies involved to put an end to this trade.
To investors:
- Engage with the named companies and divest unless they take action to stop such purchases.
- Refrain from buying bonds from the Office Chérifien des Phosphates (OCP).
To the law firms Covington & Burling, Dechert, DLA Piper, KPMG and Palacio y Asociados:
- Make public the reports prepared for the OCP in order to justify

the activities of the OCP in occupied Western Sahara and the illegal export of Saharawi phosphates.
- Refrain from defending the looting of the territory by Morocco and stop carrying out orders to legitimize the continuation of the looting.
To the European Union and its Member States:
- Quantify the trade of products originating in Western Sahara and adopt

policies that guarantee that said trade is compatible with the Judgment of the Court of

Justice of the European Union of December 21, 2016 and with the obligation of the States, under international law , of not recognizing Morocco's sovereignty

over occupied Western Sahara.
- Develop business advisory guidelines that warn of the legal and reputational risks involved in doing business with Moroccan interests in the territory.
- Ensure that European companies comply with the principles established in the Judgment of the Court of Justice of the EU of December 21, 2016, guaranteeing that EU companies do not buy phosphates from Western Sahara.
To the United Nations:
- Create a UN administration to supervise or, where appropriate, manage

the natural resources of Western Sahara and the income from them, until the self-determination of the Saharawi people takes place.
GRADES

---

[1] Political Declaration of the Government of the Saharawi Republic on the risk and responsibility of ships that transport natural resources from occupied Western Sahara. Bir Lehlu, Western Sahara (June 21, 2017).
https://www.spsrasd.info/news/es/dossier/declaraci%C3%B3n-pol%C3%ADtica-del-gobierno-de-la-rep%C3%BAblica-saharaui-sobre-el-risk- and the
http://www.usc.es/export9/sites/webinstitucional/gl/institutos/ceso/descargas/RASD_Declaracion-sobre-el-Riesgo-y-laResponsabilidad_21-06-2017.pdf


[2] Saharawi NGOs write to Macron to stop the "injustices" in Morocco,
http://www.lavanguardia.com/internacional/20180123/44236749500/ong-saharauis-escriben-a-macron-para-que-pare-las-injusticias-de-marruecos.html
Saharawi Human Rights NGOs write to Macron to put an end to the injustices committed by Morocco in Western Sahara | Sahara Press Service
https://www.spsrasd.info/news/en/articles/2018/01/23/13179.html
Repression and censorship not only in the occupied Sahara:
Siege on freedom of the press in Morocco due to social protests in the Rif...
http://www.tlaxcala-int.org/article.asp?reference=22605


[3] " P for Plunder. Morocco's exports of phosphates from occupied Western Sahara "
http://www.wsrw.org/files/dated/2017...r_2016_web.pdf
The WSRW website can be read in five languages ​​As indicated in the original English text, the report can be freely disseminated both on the Internet and in print media (as can this article). And any comments or questions can be directed to [email protected] . To improve investigative work and intensify international campaigns, WSRW needs your help. www.wsrw.org explains how you can contribute.


[4] Advisory Opinion of the Undersecretary General for Legal Affairs ...
Letter dated January 29, 2002 addressed to the President of the Security Council by the Assistant Secretary General for Legal Affairs, Legal Advisor: http://www.usc.es/es/institutos/ceso/advisory_opinion_corell.html , ( S/ 2002/161 ), http://www.usc.es/export9/sites/webinstitucional/gl/institutos/ceso/descargas/S_2002_161_es.pdf


[5] "The Court's conclusion is that the materials and information presented to it do not establish any tie of territorial sovereignty between the territory of Western Sahara and the Kingdom of Morocco or the Mauritanian entity. Thus the Court has not found legal ties of such a nature as might affect the application of General Assembly resolution 1514 (XV) in the decolonization of Western Sahara and, in particular, of the principle of self-determination through the free and genuine expression of the will of the peoples of the Territory." International Court of Justice, 16 Oct 1975.


[6] CONCLUSIONS OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL MR. MELCHIOR WATHELET filed on January 10, 2018 , Case C‑266/16, http://curia.europa.eu/juris/document/document.jsf?text=&docid=19836 2&pageIndex=0&doclang=ES&mode= req&dir=&occ=first&part =1&cid=760832 . The document contains six maps showing the fishing areas of Morocco and Western Sahara (Point 66 of the "Conclusions").
The general lawyer of the EU does not see the fishing agreement with Morocco for Western Sahara as valid :
http://www.tlaxcala-int.org/article.asp?reference=22441
EU Legal Adviser: EU-Morocco Fisheries Deal is Invalid :
http://www.smalgangen.org/a146x1124
https://curia.europa.eu/jcms/upload/docs/application/pdf/2018-01/cp180001en.pdf
http://www.smalgangen.org/a146x1124
https://curia.europa.eu/jcms/upload/docs/application/pdf/2018-01/cp180001en.pdf


[7] L'Acat dénonce les crimes de guerre commis par le Maroc au Occidental Sahara ...
https://www.algeriepatriotique.com/2018/01/19/lacat-denonce-crimes-de-guerre-commis-maroc-sahara-occidental/
Crimes of war in plein desert, https://www.acatfrance.fr/actualite/crimes-de-guerre-en-plein-desert
Western Sahara: the derniere colonie d'Afrique
https://www.acatfrance.fr/actualite/la-derniere-colonie-d-afrique


[8] United States Geological Survey 2013, Mineral Commodity Summary 2013, http://minerals.usgs.gov/minerals/pu...13/mcs2013.pdf
The growing global need for phosphate ore and fertilizers was one of the factors that contributed to the strong fluctuation in commodity prices in 2008. With the increase in global demand for food and its rising prices, there has been also an increase in the demand for phosphates. In this report, the average price of phosphate in 2016 has been calculated at an average of $112/Tm.


[9] In this article, given its length, the specific analysis made by WSRW of the companies that traffic (and those that have already stopped trading) with Saharawi phosphates has not been included. See the "P for Pluner" report , pp. 14-31. In the report entitled "Carriers of Conflict" , published in July 2017, WSRW provides data on almost a hundred shipping companies and ship operators that have transported phosphates from Western Sahara to clients in various countries between January 2016 and June 2017 The ' Carriers of Conflict' report can be downloaded here :
http://wsrw.org/files/dated/2017-06-16/carriersofconflict_16.06.2017_ web.pdf
New report reveals the companies transporting conflict phosphate rock
http://wsrw.org/a105x3927
Download the 36-page report 'Carriers of Conflict' here (pdf).
http://wsrw.org/files/dated/2017-06-16/carriersofconflict_16.06.2017_ web.pdf


[10] See All Members | EIA - Ethical Investment Association , http://ethicalinvestment.org.uk/financial-adviser/all-members/


[11] ICJ, Advisory Opinion, 16 Oct 1975, Western Sahara, Paragraph 162,
http://www.icj-cij.org/docket/index....4&case=61&p3=5


[12] UN Legal Office, S/2002/161, Letter dated 29 January 2002 from the Under-Secretary-General for Legal Affairs, the Legal Counsel, addressed to the President of the Security Council. http://www.un.org/Docs/journal/asp/ws.asp?m=S/2002/161
Court of Justice of the European Union, Case C-104/16 P, Council/POLISARIO Front, paragraph 106 http://curia.europa.eu/jcms/upload/docs/application/pdf/2016-12/cp160146en.pdf
African Union, Legal Opinion, 2015, http://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=S/2015/786&referer=/english/&Lang=E


[13] OCP SA, Prospectus – 20 April 2015, p.91


[14] Ibid, p. 98.


[15] Ibid, p. 123.


[16] OCP, Annual report 2015, p. 154-159, http://www.ocpgroup.ma/sites/default/files/alldocs/RA%20OCP%202015%20VUK...


[17] OCP SA, Prospectus – 20 April 2015, p. 33.


[18] WSRW.org, 11.25.2014, Morocco admits to using Saharawi resources for political gain, http://www.wsrw.org/a105x3070


[19] Territoires occupés : le Maroc uses le blackmail et menace l'Europe de représailles...
https://www.dreuz.info/2018/01/19/territoires-occupes-le-maroc-utilise-le-chantage-et-menace-leurope-de-represailles/


[20] Pedro Fernández Barbadillo - The phosphates of Western Sahara... (2012), http://www.libertaddigital.com/opinion/historia/los-phosphates-del-sahara-occidental-1276239940.html
Shelley, T. (2004), Endgame in the Western Sahara.


[21] Morocco, whether Western Sahara is included or not, controls the world's largest phosphate reserves and is the world's third largest producer. United States Geological Survey, 2013, Mineral Commodity Summary 2013, http://minerals.usgs.gov/minerals/pu...13/mcs2013.pdf


[22] Hodges, T. (1983), Western Sahara: The Roots of a Desert War.


[23] France Libertés, January 2003, Report: International Mission of Investigation in Western Sahara.
http://www.arso.org/FL101102e.pdf


[24] OCP SA, OCP Inaugural bond issue to the amount of 1.85 billion US dollars in two parts with a maturity of 10 years and 30 years,
http://www.ocpgroup.ma/sites/default...FR_2_EN-GB.pdf


[25] Business Wire, 04.15.2015, OCP successfully prices a US $1 billion offering with a 10.5 year maturity at a 4.5% coupon, http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20150415006850/en/OCP-Successfully -Prices-1-Billion-Offering-10.5


[26] OCP, Phosboucraa: Investing in the Future of Phosphates in the Sahara Region, January 2013, http://www.ocpgroup.ma/sites/default...website-en.pdf


[27] Phosboucraa, https://www.recrute-phosboucraa.ma . See also Medias24, OCP will invest 18.8 milliards of DH to Phosboucraa et dans sa region, 8 November 2015,
http://www.medias24.com/ECONOMIE/ENT...sa-region.html


[28] There is a slight difference between the Bu Craa figures provided by WSRW and those of the OCP for 2015. The WSRW estimate for 2015, of 1.41 million te MT exported, as reported in the 2016 report, is be more conservative than the OCP figures regarding the volume extracted at the Bu Craa mine, 1.6 million MT according to the OCP (OCP SA, Annual report 2015, p. 185). The WSRW report indicates the possible causes of this difference, as well as the methodology followed:
http://www.wsrw.org/files/dated/2017...r_2016_web.pdf (p. 10).


[29] OCP SA, Prospectus, p. 108.


[30] OCP SA, Prospectus, p. 90.


[31] OCP SA, Prospectus, p. 93.


[32] OCP SA, Prospectus, p. 90.


[33] OCP SA Prospectus, p. 108.


[34] OCP SA, Prospectus, p. 89.


[35] WSRW, 02.11.2016, report "Powering the Plunder" , http://www.wsrw.org/a106x3614


[36] WSRW, 05.26.2013, WSRW protests Swedish supplier for BouCraa, http://www.wsrw.org/a217x2591


[37] WSRW.org, 04.10.2017, Letter correspondence with Atlas Copco, 2017, http://www.wsrw.org/a131x3801


[38] Mainland, STAHLCORDR ST 2500, Phosboucraa (Morocco),
http://www.wsrw.org/files/dated/2017...10.04.2016.jpg


[39] Continental to WSRW, 04.11.2017, http://www.wsrw.org/files/dated/2017...ental-wsrw.pdf
See also letter WSRW to Continental, 03.29.2017, http://www.wsrw.org/files/dated/2017...ontinental.pdf


[40] German government not supportive of business in Western Sahara, http://www.wsrw.org/a105x4045 ,
The government allemand and support for business in the Sahara, http://www.wsrw.org/a111x4048
German government says not to support economic activities in Western Sahara ,
http://porunsaharalibre.org/2018/01/german-government-says-no-support-economic-activities-western-sahara/


[41] WSRW.org, 11.24.2008, US law firm refuses Western Sahara dialogue, http://www.wsrw.org/a128x940 , http://www.wsrw.org/a106x940


[42] WSRW.org, 08.12.2011, US law firm continues pro-occupation lobby, http://www.wsrw.org/a204x2181


[43] WSRW.org, 03.06.2015, WSRW correspondence with DLA Piper, http://www.wsrw.org/a240x3182


[44] WSRW.org, 03.06.2015, WSRW correspondence with Palacio y Asociados, February 2015, http://www.wsrw.org/a240x3181


[45] Daily Mail, 14.04.2012, Myriam Clegg paid ￡400 an hour by mining giant accused of trampling on rights of Saharan tribesmen, http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2129900/Miriam-Clegg -paid-400-hourmining-giant-accused-trampling-rights-Saharan-tribesmen.html


[46] WSRW to Dechert, 02.08.2016, http://www.wsrw.org/files/dated/2017-03-29/2016.02.08_wsrw-dechert.pdf
Dechert to WSRW, 02.11.2016, http://www.wsrw.org/files/dated/2017-03-29/2016.02.11_dechert-wsrw.jpg


[47] European Commission, 17.03.2016, Proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council laying down rules on the making available on the market of CE marked fertilizing products and amending Regulations (EC) No 1069/2009 and (EC ) No 1107/2009, https://ec.europa.eu/transparency/regdoc/rep/1/2016/EN/1-2016-157-EN-F1-1.PDF
The Plenary of the EP approves its position on the regulation of ...
https://www.agrodigital.com/2017/10/25/el-pleno-del-pe-approves-its-position-on-the-regulation-of-fertilizers/


[48] ​​European Parliament Policy Department, Economic and Scientific Policy, February 2017, Scientific aspects underlying the regulatory framework in the area of ​​fertilizers – state of play and future reforms, http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes /IDAN/2016/595354/IPOL_IDA(2016)595354_EN.pdf


[49] TelQuel, 10.10.2016, Union europeenne: menace sur les phosphates marocains, http://www.telquel.ma/2016/10/10/union-europeennemenace-les-phosphates-marocains_1517842


[50] WSRW, 03.10.2017, Morocco lobbies for toxic metals in EU agriculture, http://wsrw.org/a105x3771


[51] To work with Dechert, the public relations firm Edelman was hired, a company that had already worked for the Moroccan government in the past, appearing on the payroll of the Moroccan-American Center for Policy (MACP), registered agent of the Kingdom from Morocco.
Africa Intelligence , 23.03.2017, MOROCCO : OCP prepares cadmium offensive in Brussels , https://www.africaintelligence.com/MCE/businesscircles/2017/03/23/ocp-prepares-cadmium-offensive-inbrussels,108227133-ART
Africa Intelligence , 20.07.2017, MOROCCO : The OCP loses first round of cadmium war in Brussels
https://www.africaintelligence.com/m...,108255333-brc
In this regard, you can see the MACP press releases, which end with the following disclaimer (at least, when WSRW consulted the website): "This material is distributed by DJE, Inc. and the Moroccan-American Center for Policy on behalf of the Government of Morocco. Additional information is available at the Department of Justice in Washington, DC." /"This material is distributed by DJE, Inc. and the Moroccan-American Center for Policy on behalf of the Government of Morocco. Additional information available from the Department of Justice in Washington, DC." DJE stands for Daniel J. Edelman. See, for example,
http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/morocco-pursues-a-4th-round-ofpeaceful-negotiations-despite-polisario-stalling-56929402.html


[52] Resist for forty years
https://www.heraldo.es/noticias/internacional/2018/02/04/resist-from-forty-years-ago-1221997-306.html
http://www.tlaxcala-int.org/article.asp?reference=22629
Announcement of the International Conference of Civil Resistance "Sahara on Foot" for a new strategy of international civil resistance against Morocco
https://www.spsrasd.info/news/en/articles/2018/01/31/13329.html
Disappeared in the [Western] Sahara
https://www.heraldo.es/noticias/internacional/2018/02/05/disappeared-sahara-1222014-306.html


[53] ABC: Varapalo to Spain before the possible annulment of the EU fishing agreement with Morocco
http://www.abc.es/internacional/abci...9_noticia.html
Sweden recognizes the Polisario and Morocco vetoes Ikea | Public
http://www.publico.es/internacional/...lisario-y.html
Sweden withdraws support for Western Sahara so that Ikea can open stores in Morocco
http://www.eldiario.es/desalambre/Su...474902692.html
The Blackmail of Morocco. The Provinces
http://www.lasprovincias.es/comunita...6003008-v.html
'Morocco blackmails Spain to withdraw from the Sahara process...
https://elpais.com/diario/2002/01/23...13_850215.html
Western Sahara: Morocco begins a new blackmail against Spain
http://blogs.periodistadigital.com/d...s-comienza-un-
The Government of Spain gives in to the blackmail of Morocco and avoids talking about the conflict in Western Sahara... http://porunsaharalibre.org/2015/06/el-gobierno-de-espana-cede-al-blackmail-de-marruecos- and-avoids-talking-about-the-western-sahara-conflict/
Morocco uses blackmail and threatens Europe with retaliation...
http://es.maroc-leaks.com/2018/01/23/marruecos-utilizes-blackmail-amenaza-europa-retaliation/
Morocco is a serious problem for Spain and Europe
https://www.votoenblanco.com/Marruecos-es-un-serious-problema-para-Espana-y-Europa_a5731.html


[54] For example: The Polisario Front warns the Canadian company Nutrien Ltd for its illegal activities in Western Sahara: https://www.spsrasd.info/news/es/articles/2018/01/31/13332 .html
Full text in English : https://www.spsrasd.info/news/en/art.../31/13337.html
More specific cases of legal and reputational risks:
Swedish bank excludes phosphates industry in Western Sahara
http://www.wsrw.org/a105x3909
Protest in the port of Palma de Mallorca against the looting of sand from the occupied city of El Aaiún
http://www.spsrasd.info/news/es/arti...5/24/8906.html
The Government requires the Civil Guard to block the cargo ship with sand in the port
http://www.diariodemallorca.es/mallorca/2017/05/24/govern-exige-guardia-civil-blocke/1217594.html
The ship 'Southwester' denounced in the port of Palma de Mallorca, Balearic Islands for transporting sand from the occupied Western Sahara.
http://larealidadsaharaui.blogspot.co m.es/2017/05/el-buque-southwester-denunciado-en.html#!/2017/05/el-buque-southwester-denunciado-en.html
They ask the consul in Amsterdam to search a ship with possible cargo from the Sahara. The Diplomat in spain
http://thediplomatinspain.com/equo-pide-al-consul-en-amsterdam-que-register-a-ship-with-possible-products-of-the-sahara/
The French Key Bay ship denounced in France for its illegal cargo from Western Sahara
http://larealidadsaharaui.blogspot.co m.es/2017/01/la-agencia-de-prensa-argelina-aps.html#!/2017/01/la-agencia-de-prensa-argelina-aps.html
The importation of Saharawi sand, a plunder that goes unnoticed
http://www.eldiario.es/canariasahora/politica/Arena-saharaui-expolio-pasa-desapercibido_0_704130399.html
They denounce the Spanish company "ANFI TAURO" for looting of ...
http://porunsaharalibre.org/2016/05/denuncian-la-empresa-espanola-anfi-tauro-saqueo-arena-saharaui/
Amics del Poble Sahrauí studies raising the complaint about the sand to Europe
https://ultimahora.es/noticias/local/2017/05/26/269776/amics-del-poble-sahraui-estudia-elevar-europa-denuncia-sobre-arena.html
Canada bound ship with conflict minerals released from detention
http://www.wsrw.org/a105x3892
The detention of a vessel carrying a charge of phosphate rock destined for Canada from occupied Western Sahara.
http://www.saharauptod8.org/2017/05/the-detention-of-vessel-carrying-cargo.html
Fertilizer producer Incitec Pivot is Australia's last importer of 'illegal' phosphate from disputed Western Sahara
http://www.ibtimes.com.au/fertiliser-producer-incitec-pivot-australias-last-importer-illegal-phosphate-disputed-western-sahara
The SADR Petroleum and Mines Authority protests the import by the Lithuanian company "Lifosa" of phosphates from the occupied territories
http://www.spsrasd.info/news/es/articles/2016/10/05/4506.html
'Biggest importer' of phosphate rock is pulling out
http://www.wsrw.org/a105x4051
SADR / PR/ SHIPPING COMPANY ANNOUNCES END TO INVOLVEMENT IN WESTERN SAHARA
https://es.groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/sahara-info/conversations/messages/8532


[55] EUROPA PRESS (01/30/2018), "The Polisario will claim 240 million annually in compensation for exports to the EU without its consent" :
The Polisario Front will claim 240 million euros per year as compensation for "damages and interest" for exports of products from Western Sahara to the European Union without its consent and will also sue specific European companies to demand direct payments if they do not regularize their situation with the legitimate representative of the Saharawi people .
The Polisario Front's lawyer, Gilles Devers , in an interview with Europa Press, has assured that they are "very generous" by not claiming compensation for exports of products from the Saharawi territory prior to December 21, 2016 , when the Court of Justice of the European Union ruled that the agricultural agreement between the EU and Morocco is not applicable to Western Sahara and that the Saharawi people must consent to the exploitation of their natural resources.
The representative of the Polisario Front in Europe, Mohamed Sidati , confirmed during the interview that this figure "may constitute reparation and damage" although the damage caused "is much more". "It's almost 40 years of occupation."
http://www.europapress.es/internacional/noticia-polisario-reclamara-240-millones-anuales-compensacion-exportaciones-ue-consent-20180130211744.html
The Polisario Front, after hearing the conclusions of the ETJ General Advocate, calls on the European institutions to respect judicial decisions and not sign agreements with Morocco that include Western Sahara
http://www.spsrasd.info/news/es/articles/2018/01/10/13028.html


[56] As an example of legal risks, it is enough to cite the judgment of the Supreme Court of South Africa in the case between the SADR and the ship "NM Cherry Blossom". On May 1, 2017, a South African court ordered the provisional embargo of the phosphate transported by the Marshall Islands-flagged ship "NM Cherry Blossom", which was calling at Port-Elizabeth, South Africa, en route to New Zealand. . The court thus responded to the petition filed by the Saharawi authority (the Polisario Front and the SADR) against the Moroccan state company OCP ( Office Chérifien des Phosphates SA ). And subsequently, the Supreme Court of South Africa, in a judgment of June 15, 2017, confirmed the decision to embargo the shipment of phosphates (54,000 tons) carried by the ship "NM Cherry Blossom". The judgment is worth reading. See in this regard:
South Africa seizes shipment of phosphate from Western Sahara illegally exported by Morocco
http://blogs.periodistadigital.com/desdeelatlantico.php/2017/05/04/p399564#more399564
Seizure of a charge of phosphate rock destined for Australia from occupied Western Sahara
http://www.saharauptod8.org/2017/05/seizure-of-cargo-of-phosphate-rock.html
http://porunsaharalibre.org/2017/06/sudafrica-maintains-saharaui-phosphate-retention-determine-property/
South Africa maintains retention of Saharawi phosphate to determine its ownership
http://www.lavanguardia.com/vida/20170615/423418870352/sudafrica-maintains-retention-of-phosphate-saharaui-para-determinar-su-propiedad.html
The SADR wins legal battle in South Africa in defense of its natural resources | Sahara Press Service
https://www.spsrasd.info/news/fr/node/9740
The ruling of the Supreme Court of South Africa, "Saharawi Arab Democratic Republic and Another v Owner and Charterers of the MV 'NM Cherry Blossom' and Others (15/06/2017) [2017] ZAECPEHC 31; 2017 (5) SA 105 (ECP ); [2018] 1 All SA 593 (ECP) (15 June 2017)", is available on the Internet: http://www.saflii.org/za/cases/ZAECPEHC/2017/31.html
http://www.usc.es/export9/sites/webinstitucional/gl/institutos/ceso/descargas/SA-High-Court-Judgement_15-june-2017.pdf
Morocco phosphate ship held in Panama over Western Sahara
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-westernsahara-morocco/morocco-phosphate-ship-held-in-panama-over-western-sahara-challenge-officials-idUSKCN18E2YA


[57] Danish vessel with plunder cargo detained in Panama , http://www.wsrw.org/a106x3886


[58] In the interview granted to EUROPA PRESS (01/30/2018), the representative of the POLISARIO Front for Europe, Mohamed Sidati , assured that " the Saharawis do not represent any threat to the interests of European fishermen" , but they must demand the consent of the Polisario Front to exploit the resources of Western Sahara". "Spanish fishermen can fish in the waters of Western Sahara with the only condition that it is not through the agreement that authorizes the occupation ", he warned, referring to the fisheries agreement between the EU and Morocco.
http://www.europapress.es/internacional/noticia-polisario-reclamara-240-millones-anuales-compensacion-exportaciones-ue-consent-20180130211744.html
POLISARIO calls on international companies to respect international law regarding Saharawi natural resources... , http://www.spsrasd.info/news/es/articles/2018/02/05/13408.html


https://www.spsrasd.info/news/es/articles/2018/02/17/13599.html

 

[buzzmobile]

"Bomb Math" was written in 1973.


Bomb Math
By Russell Baker

• May 12, 1973

Credit...The New York Times Archives
See the article in its original context from
May 12, 1973, Page 33Buy Reprints

WASHINGTON, May 11 —Wearing his Secretary of Defense hat, Elliot Richardson gave Congress the other day a fascinating glimpse into the mathematics of saving the hearts and minds of remote peoples from whatever our bombers save them from when they bomb their countries.
During one quarter of this year (February, March, April), he said, the United States dropped 145,000 tons of bombs on Cambodia and Laos.
Population of the two countries is about ten million persons.
Changing tons to pounds, we begin to see light. Territory containing ten million people has been struck with 290 million pounds of bombs, or, to put it another way, the United States has been bombing at the rate of 29 pounds per person per quarter.
Extrapolating over a full year, we get a more useful mathematical formulation; to wit, that the United States is bombing the average Laotian/ Cambodian at the rate of 116 bomb pounds per year.

The interesting question then arises, what is the weight of the average Laotian/Cambodian?
Here we lack data. We know them to be small people physically. We can only guess at what proportion of them is too young to have attained adult weight. Conceding these data deficiencies, it is still not unreasonable to hypothesize that our average Laotian/Cambodian weighs 87 pounds —or three‐quarters of the annual bomb poundage used by the United States to save his heart and mind.
Secretary Richardson suggested that the bombing has done its job (which is to preserve the Government of a man named Lon Nol) and says it must go on in order to continue preserving this Government. Thus, for those of us interested solely in the mathematics of the thing, Mr. Richardson may fairly be said to have stated the proposition that the present bombing level is sufficient for the saving of hearts and minds.

If so, then we may state a general mathematical formula for determining the bomb poundage the United States will have to drop to save the hearts and minds of any given nation.
This formula is: HM=‐‐‐‐(4W/3)P, where HM represents hearts and minds, W represents weight of the average body containing the heart and mind to be saved, and P represents total population of the bombed country.
Example: Suppose it is necessary to save the hearts and minds of Italy. How many pounds of bombs will we need? To get the answer we multiply the average Italian's weight (111 pounds) by 4 and divide the result (444) by 3, which gives us the heartsand — minds — winning factor number, 148.


To save the hearts and minds of Italy we would have to drop 148 pounds per year per Italian, of whom there are about 55 million. This means we would have to drop 8.14 billion pounds of bombs or, to put it more manageably, about four million tons.
“All very well,” the taxpayer will say, “but what will it cost me?” Here Mr. Richardson's figures are helpful.
The 63,000 tons dropped on Laos in three months, he reported, cost $99.2‐million, or $1,574 per ton.
In Cambodia 82,000 tons were dropped at a cost of $159.5 million, or $1,945 per ton.
In short, it costs 97 cents a pound to bomb Cambodia, but only 79 cents a pound to bomb Laos.
Of the two countries, Cambodia Is relatively more advanced economically and has much the larger population. Thus, it appears that per‐pound bombing cost must increase in proportion as size and economic complexity of the target country increases.
The bombing of Italy, which is much more advanced than Cambodia and much more populous, might cost as much as $2.50 a pound. At this price the four million tons needed to save Italy's hearts and minds for one year would cost slightly over $20 billion. Expensive perhaps, but who would say it is not worth it to save Venice for the free world?
These figures may improve taxpayer morale, for they give a clear idea of the useful tasks performed with the money we pay our Government.


If, for example, you have paid Miff of $1,000, you may very reasonably tell yourself that your contribution has made it possible to drop 1,266 pounds of bombs (at 79 cents per pound) on Laos, thereby saving the hearts and minds of ten and 53/58 Laotians for a whole year. (It takes 116 bomb pounds per year, remember, to save a single heart and mind there.)
With figures like these, you do not have to ask your country what it will do for you. You can tell Laos Cambodia what you have done for them.

 

[flylowgethigh]

You have to spread a little iron if you want to grow democracy. And (white) Phosporous, and Carbon/Sulpher/Potassium Nitrate. just look at how lush the SE Asia jungles are.

/sarc

 

[Three Berries]

Kids are too busy practicing for the next school shooting to practice hiding from nuclear war.

How many nuclear wars did you survive by practicing under your desk?

You learned valuable lessons back then.

Maybe we better go back to hiding under the desk?

 

[HempKat]

When I was in first grade we practiced hiding under the desk incase of a nuclear war. Now they don't even mention it but sure are concerned with kids sex. Or I wonder what an all out nuclear war would do to the CO2 or sea levels??????

I don't care what the reason. To retaliate is suicide, insanity. The don't call it MAD for nothing. There is no more paramount question for today. Mankind is being brought to the Precipice of the extinction of Mankind, on purpose. But there is two forks in the road ahead.

Some theorize that this is the point mankind has been at before and blew it all up, only to start the whole thing over again every 4 or 5 billion years......

Given how long radiation lingers I doubt mankind blew it all up the same way, it would be likely we would have found evidence of that by now if we did. I wouldn't be surprised however if we learn one day that mankind has reached this level of development in the past and managed to destroy it all somehow, putting mankind back to square one.

As far as the practice of hiding under a desk in the case of a nuclear attack, it's likely more accurate to say they don't practice that anymore because it is a pointless thing to do. Hiding under a desk might be helpful in an earthquake or maybe a hurricane or tornado but in the event of a nuclear strike it's about as useful as covering yourself with a towel soaked with gasoline to protect yourself from a fire. Plus back when they did that we were only worried about Hiroshima type bombs and even then hiding under a desk was pointless but know a days the nukes are so many times more powerful that comparing todays nukes to the atom bomb is like comparing a stick of dynamite to a firecracker. As for teaching sex in school well to be honest I have no idea of what they teach but I'm confident it's likely as useless as what they taught back in the 70's which was next to nothing. "Boys have a penis and girls have a vagina."

I agree retaliating in a nuclear attack is insanity, the only thing even more insane is to use nuclear weapons at all whether it's a first strike or a retaliatory strike. However you are pretty naïve to expect a nation to allow itself to be destroyed and just let their destroyers get away with it, with no repercussions. The mistake you keep making though is you think it all comes down to just the nation being attacked to decline and that's not how it is because the effects of a nuclear strike on a country the size of the US is going to have negative consequences for much more then just the USA. First of all the effects such as radiation and nuclear fallout don't confine themselves just to the area attacked a nuclear attack able to destroy the US would seriously impact Canada, Mexico, Central America and the northern part of South America as well as Greenland, Iceland and likely the most NW portions of Europe. Then depending on the weather patterns at the time it could also negatively impact China as well as most of SE Asia and maybe even New Zealand and the Eastern half of Australia, perhaps even some of the eastern portions of the Russian territories. Or if the weather was favoring the other direction it could impact the western side of Europe and possibly Africa and maybe even all of Europe and the Western half of the Mid East. That's just talking about the effects directly related to nuclear explosions. Given the role the US plays in the World Economy being the biggest Economic power in the world it would totally collapse the world economy and seriously degrade the world's ability to manufacture and ship products that give us the Modern life style most of the world now enjoys. So because of these realities there are a number of nations that might want to retaliate because of the harm they would experience. On top of that you have to consider things like NATO and article and is the reason anyone using nukes anywhere, at anytime for any reason is insane 5 which says an attack on one is an attack on all. So even if thru the use of hypersonics, Russia manage to take out the US before the US could respond and lets say Russia got lucky and manage to take out the US's nuclear subs too. All the nuclear capable nations of NATO would return a strike and with that many nukes going off you can pretty much count on people like that fat little fucker in N. Korea launching some nukes just so he could say he got a few off. So your fantasy of a nuclear strike without a response is just that a fantasy and it's that very reality that makes Mutually Assured Destruction what it is and therefore whoever launches first anywhere, at any time and for any reason is the one who is insane and who will be blamed for the outcome. Except there won't really be anyone left and because of that while the impact of all out nuclear war would certainly be a major contributor to increased CO2 levels and or sea levels it's all irrelevant because nobody will be left to experience what it does to CO2 and Sea Levels.

You might think that dancing on the precipice of the extinction of mankind thru nuclear war leaves tow forks in the road but you would be wrong, the only sane path forward when it comes to nukes is for them to never be used and for every nuke in the world to be deactivated and the ability to make more be completely destroyed so that mankind never has to make a choice to use or not use nukes.

 

[HempKat]

If Russia loved their children , they’d keep them home.

If Russia loved it's children they wouldn't let them grow up to be soldiers and then have them digging trenches in the area where the worst radiation from Chernobyl is buried

https://www.newsweek.com/ukraine-cl...-russians-dug-trenches-near-chernobyl-1695721

"Video proof," claimed the caption of the video posted to Twitter by the Ukrainian army on Wednesday. "Russian command did order its soldiers to dig fortifications near the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in the radioactive Red Forest in March, 2022. Complete neglect of human life, even of one's own subordinates, is what a killer-state looks like."

 

[HempKat]

How many American kids have died for Bankers wars?

Well since you say all wars are banker wars, that's a pretty stupid question. Based on that opinion, every kid who grew up, became a soldier, went to war and died, died for Bankers wars regardless of what country those kids came from.