Taliban Takes Credit for Shooting Down US Plane in Afghanistan with 83 On Board — Including CIA Officers

A US military plane was shot down by the Taliban on Monday over Ghazni, in eastern Afghanistan, killing all on board including high ranking CIA officers: Taliban statement.

83 people were on the flight.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/01/breaking-taliban-takes-credit-for-shooting-down-us-plane-in-afghanistan-with-83-on-board-including-cia-officers/

OPCW cannot be influenced by outside actors, the watchdog needs to be salvaged, British general tells RT

The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) needs to salvage its reputation after whistleblowers offered credible evidence of deceitful reporting on the Douma incident, a former head of UK commandos has said.

The international chemical weapons watchdog is under increasing pressure to come clean about how it prepared its report into the April 2018 incident in the Damascus suburb. Several scientists from the watchdog blew the whistle, alleging that the findings by inspectors who went on a fact-finding mission to Syria had been distorted or ignored by the OPCW’s management, which was more concerned with putting the blame on the Syrian government than with uncovering the truth.

John Taylor Holmes, a retired major general who served as a director of special forces, was on a panel of experts which heard testimony from one of the whistleblowers, identified as ‘Alex.’ The general said the evidence provided by the scientist and the rest of the team “was very convincing”.

“Native English speaker, he was a senior member of the OPCW. He was extremely well-qualified for the job. And I cannot think of a reason why he became a whistleblower other than he felt very strongly that the final report had not reflected the findings,” Holmes told RT’s Going Underground program.

Following the incident and before OPCW inspectors could reach Douma, the US, the UK, and France conducted a nighttime missile raid against what they claimed were sites involved in Syria’s alleged chemical weapons program. Their public justification for this attack has seemed increasingly shaky as whistleblowers presented evidence which contradicted the claim that Syrian aircraft had dropped canisters with chlorine gas on jihadist-held Douma. Among other things ‘Alex’ reportedly described three US officials putting pressure on OPCW staff to produce a report, which would be in line with the accusations against Damascus.

Holmes said he believed OPCW’s credibility needs to be saved by a series of reforms that would prevent similar scandals in the future.

“Its value is its independence. It cannot be influenced by outside actors,” he explained.

He agreed that the scandal had been covered up. The scandal has been mostly ignored by Western media even despite another whistleblower, Ian Henderson, telling members of the UN Security Council that his technical report on Douma was suppressed. Homes said he didn’t recall another cover-up as scandalous as this one and his belief in the importance of an independent OPCW is one of the reasons he got involved in the first place.

https://www.rt.com/news/479289-opcw-reputation-douma-scandal/

‘Yellow Vests’ march for Julian Assange outside Belmarsh Prison

A group of protesters, clad in the yellow vests popularized by French demonstrators, have gathered at Belmarsh Prison to protest the detention of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. Assange has been held at the prison since April.

Wrapped up against the murky British January weather, demonstrators assembled outside Belmarsh on Saturday, calling on UK authorities not to extradite Assange to the US, where he faces nearly two centuries in prison.

One day earlier, Assange’s defense campaign revealed that the imprisoned publisher had been moved from solitary confinement into the general population at Belmarsh, following a series of petitions from supporters. Assange had languished in solitary since his arrest last April, ostensibly on charges of skipping bail in 2012. UN rapporteur Nils Melzer accused the British government last month of perpetuating Assange’s “exposure to psychological torture” by keeping him isolated, and warned that his health may soon reach a “critical” stage.

On top of the one-year jail term for skipping bail, Assange also faces extradition to the United States, where he has been charged with espionage for publishing leaked documents detailing potential American war crimes in Afghanistan and Iraq. If found guilty, he faces 175 years behind bars.

On Thursday, Westminster Magistrates’ Court postponed the bulk of Assange’s extradition hearing until May, with the remainder to take place in late February.

https://www.rt.com/uk/479184-assange-protest-belmarsh-prison/