Analysis, Side Feature

Views on the News – 8 July 2020

Headlines:

  • Britain Attempts to Regain Lost Ground in Saudi Arabia
  • Another Book on Donald Trump
  • UN Confirms What the Whole World Already Knows

Britain Attempts to Regain Lost Ground in Saudi Arabia

The UK has announced the resumption of arms sales to Saudi Arabia despite evidence of “possible” war crimes. International Trade Secretary Liz Truss made the announcement, saying the government regarded any breaches of international law as “isolated incidents”. She said the government had completed a review of how arms export licences were granted, complying with an earlier court ruling that suspended sales over rights abuse concerns. “The incidents which have been assessed to be possible violations of international humanitarian law occurred at different times, in different circumstances and for different reasons,” she said in a statement. With British influence virtually removed form Saudi Arabia since King Salman and his son, MBS, carried out a purge of their own family arms sales to Saudi’s National Guard is Britain’s last-ditch attempt to regain lost influence.

 

Another Book on Donald Trump

Former national security advisor Jon Bolton’s book revealed the inner workings of the Donald Trump regime, but now a tell-all memoir written by President Donald Trump’s niece claims that he is a “narcissist” who now threatens the life of every American. Mary Trump’s book, Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World’s Most Dangerous Man, describes her uncle as a fraud and a bully. Mary Trump, 55, writes that for her uncle, “nothing is ever enough” and that the US president exhibits all the characteristics of a narcissist.  “This is far beyond garden-variety narcissism,” his niece, who has a doctoral degree in clinical psychology, writes of Mr Trump. “Donald is not simply weak, his ego is a fragile thing that must be bolstered every moment because he knows deep down that he is nothing of what he claims to be.” She says the president was influenced by watching his father, Fred Trump Sr, bully her father Fred Trump Jr – who died from an alcohol related illness when she was 16 years old.

 

UN Confirms What the Whole World Already Knows

Syrian pro-government forces flagrantly violated the laws of war during the battle for Idlib province, UN investigators say. Civilians endured “unfathomable suffering” when the Syrian military launched a campaign late last year to retake the area, according to a report. They were subjected to indiscriminate air strikes and ground shelling, as well as arrests, torture and pillaging.

Hundreds of civilians were killed before a ceasefire was agreed in March. Almost one million were displaced by the fighting and many were forced to live in dire conditions in overcrowded camps or open fields.  Now, the investigators warn, “a perfect storm is in the making” as the war-torn country faces both the coronavirus pandemic and an economic crisis. The 29-page report released on Tuesday 7th July by the UN’s Independent Commission of Inquiry on Syria covers the period from November 2019 to June 2020. It catalogues 52 “emblematic attacks” by all parties that led to civilian casualties or damage to civilian infrastructure, including 47 attributed to pro-government forces. The UN has a history of stating the obvious ad writing reports about atrocities, but always backs the worlds powers in their crimes. It didn’t need a report to confirm the crimes of the al-Assad regime who for a decade massacred its own people.