Video - Iraqi federal police freed 11-years-old Yazidi girl from ISIS Captivity in west Mosul.

Video - Gruesome Syria photos may prove torture by Assad regime.

CNN cannot independently confirm the authenticity of the photographs, documents and testimony referenced in the report, and is relying on the conclusions of the team behind it, which includes international criminal prosecutors, a forensic pathologist, an anthropologist and an expert in digital imaging.

The bodies in the photos showed signs of starvation, brutal beatings, strangulation, and other forms of torture and killing, according to the report.

In a group of photos of 150 individuals examined in detail by the experts, 62% of the bodies showed emaciation -- severely low body weight with a hollow appearance indicating starvation. The majority of all of the victims were men most likely aged 20-40. A complex numbering system was also used to catalog the corpses, with only the relevant intelligence service knowing the identities of the corpses. It was an effort, the report says, to keep track of which security service was responsible for the death, and then later to provide false documentation that the person had died in a hospital.

One of the three lawyers who authored the report -- Sir Desmond de Silva, the former chief prosecutor of the Special Court for Sierra Leone -- likened the images to those of Holocaust survivors.

The emaciated bodies were the product of starvation as a method of torture, "reminiscent of the pictures of those [who] were found still alive in the Nazi death camps after World War II," he said in a CNN interview.

"This evidence could underpin a charge of crimes against humanity -- without any shadow of a doubt," de Silva told CNN's Christiane Amanpour. "Of course, it's not for us to make a decision. All we can do is evaluate the evidence and say this evidence is capable of being accepted by a tribunal as genuine."

Throughout the civil war in Syria, al-Assad's regime has denied accusations of human rights abuses and blamed "terrorists" for the deadly violence.

The report draws its evidence from the testimony of a Syrian government defector codenamed "Caesar" and almost 27,000 photographs he provided; in all 55,000 such images were brought out of the country.

According to the report, Caesar worked as photographer in the military police. Once the war broke out, his work consisted entirely of documenting "killed detainees."

He claimed to have photographed as many as 50 bodies a day.

At one point he took the unusual step of photographing a group of bodies to show that it "looked like a slaughterhouse," according to the report.The fact that all the bodies were photographed, the report's authors say, strongly suggests that "the killings were systematic, ordered, and directed from above."

"It's a callous, industrial machine grinding its citizens," Crane said to CNN. "It is industrial age mass killing."

British MPs condemn latest executions in 'Moderate' Iran as 'crimes against humanity'.

British MPs condemn latest executions in 'Moderate' Iran as 'crimes against humanity'.(NCRI).

The execution of 16 political prisoners in Iran is crime against humanity which should be investigated by the United Nations, British MPs have declared.

The death sentence bring the number of prisoners hanged in Iran under new 'moderate' president to more than 270, the British Parliamentary Committee for Iran Freedom said.
The committee added in a statement: "The BPCIF strongly condemns the execution of 16 political prisoners in Zahedan, Iran on October 4, 2013. The prisoners were executed collectively. According to Mohammad Marzieh, the prosecutor general of the city of Zahedan, all of the prisoners were executed in revenge for the killing of a number of revolutionary guards in Saravan.
"These arbitrary executions took place when no group has taken responsibility for the attack on the revolutionary guards."
The committee noted that Hedayatollah Mir-Moradzehi, Saravan’s representative in Iran’s Parliament, told the Qods Force's Tasnim news agency that information on who carried out the attacks was still 'sketchy'.
The BPCIF statement added: "The BPCIF draws attention to this clear case of collective punishment, which is in violation of international human rights law.
Nine of the 16 executed had said in a their own statement regarding the September 1 massacre at Camp Ashraf: "PMOI members were killed because they were defending the rights of the Iranian nation. They left their homes and homeland to defend justice and the rights of the Iranian nation.
"We, political prisoners, condemn this terrorist atrocity by the Qods Force that was implemented by the army under the command of Maliki and we call on supporters of human rights and UN member states to stop these terrorist operations by Iranian regime’s Qods Force and to punish perpetrators and sponsors of these operations."
The BPCIF added: "They were executed to strike fear in the people of Sistan and Baluchestan Province. These executions were politically motivated and constitute a crime against humanity.
"Since the inauguration of the new Iranian President, Hassan Rouhani, there have been over 270 executions in Iran.
"The BPCIF deplores the number of executions in Iran and supports the call by Mrs Maryam Rajavi, the President-elect of the National Council of Resistance of Iran, to refer the Iranian regimes human rights file to the UN Security Council and to the United Nations Human Rights Council for review."

Mass graves in Eastern Kurdish Turkey may hide chemical weapon victims.

Image claimed to depict Kurdish victims of Iraqi chemical warfare.

Mass graves in Eastern Kurdish Turkey may hide chemical weapon victims.(VOR).

Some 300 mass graves have been discovered in eastern Turkey. Kurds, who died in an armed struggle between the Turkish army and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, are supposedly buried there. They may have been victims of chemical attacks, Raci Bilici, head of the Diyarbakir branch of the Human Rights Association, said in an interview with the Voice of Russia. According to Raci Bilici, human rights activists will insist on sending international experts to the site for a thorough investigation:

We did a colossal job to discover mass graves in Turkey’s Kurd-populated areas. We found around 300 mass graves containing the remains of thousands of people. Our work is continuing and the number of discovered graves is increasing. This is our part of an investigation.

Now experts such as forensics and criminologists should be involved. It’s a different story, a different kind of job requiring qualified professionals and what is important, highly qualified ones. As far as our Association is concerned, we’re ready to contribute in every possible way. We’ve reached a point, when the problem should be paid special attention. That’s why we’re planning to set up a foundation whose main activity will be identifying people whose remains we find in the graves. 
We’ve opened around 20 graves so far. It was not done properly enough as, for the most part, it was local people’s initiative and efforts as they hoped to find bodies of missing relatives. In a few cases building equipment was deployed. However, we can’t keep on working this way.

The information that was obtained during the excavations could prove helpful in the identification of the dead. However, all of them were affected by the bad weather as well as by the improper approach to the exhumation. Therefore, we have suspended this work. Post-mortem examinations will continue in full compliance with international rules and under the control of the foundation we are going to set up.

This foundation is expected to reveal how all these people in the graves died. Earlier several statements were made to the effect that all of them had fallen victim to the use of chemical weapons. At the moment one can neither confirm nor disprove these statements. 
However, there is reason to believe that everything will become clear soon. Then the legal aspect will emerge. Therefore, during the post-mortem examination the presence of representatives of international agencies is a must and we will insist on that.

We believe that the Turkish government will demonstrate interest in joint work in this field. All the victims in these graves must be identified, and all those who are responsible for these crimes convicted.

Hmmm......Erdogan:  :"Islam considers human beings the most sacred of all creatures regardless of their faith, sect or status, he said, adding that Turkey doesn't have any prejudice against any ethnic origin, religion or sect."  

Video - Syrian fighters: “Israel is a friend, not an enemy. The Israelis showed us their humanity.”

Video - Israel Treats Wounded al-Qaeda Militants and Syrian Christians Immigrate to Europe
Read the full story here.
This two-part report from Lebanese al-Mayadeen TV discusses in its first part how 106 wounded militants from Jabhat al-Nusra (al-Qaeda in Syria) are currently being treated at Nahariya Hospital close to Acre in northern Israel. The wounded militants are first moved to a specific location close to the Syrian-Israeli border in the Golan, and they get then transported to the hospital via ambulances that belong to the Israeli Army while being heavily guarded.

The second part of the report discusses how Syrian Christians are increasingly being targeted by hardline Jihadist militants in a war that has become more and more sectarian in nature. This is forcing many Christians to immigrate to Europe, where many European countries are facilitating their immigration.

Related: FSA rebels in Syria: “Israel is a friend, not an enemy. The Israelis showed us their humanity.”

The Israelis have kept a fairly low profile in regard to the civil war in Syria. They have rebutted the notion that their security would be compromised in any outcome of the conflict, but otherwise have tried to keep their mouths shut. That doesn’t mean that Israel has had no contact with the conflict, though. McClatchy reported earlier today that some of the moderate rebels have turned to Israeli medical care in a pinch — and that may be more influential in the end:

Syria and Israel are formally at war, and the idea of Syrians being treated in an Israeli hospital once would have been unthinkable. But the brutality of the Syrian civil war has driven some 200 wounded Syrians in the past six months to seek help at the Israeli frontier on the Golan Heights, according to the Israeli army.

Soldiers take them to a field hospital for treatment and triage, with more serious cases sent to hospitals in northern Israel. About 100 have been treated at the Nahariya hospital, with more arriving as news of the Israeli medical aid spreads by word of mouth.

For the man in the bed, who declined to be named for fear of retribution against his family back home, treatment in Israel has been a profoundly transforming experience.

“I thank the Israeli army,” he said. “Two and a half years of revolution have changed my opinion of Israel. Look what Bashar Assad” – Syria’s president – “has done to his people. Everything he says is a lie. He spreads hatred of Israel, but Israel is a friend, not an enemy. The Israelis showed us their humanity.”

It’s not an isolated case, either:

In one hospital room, a 22-year-old fighter from the Free Syrian Army was recovering from a gunshot wound in the shoulder. The Syrian army, he asserted, had committed atrocities, destroying mosques and raping women. “The Free Syrian Army will never fight Israel,” he said. “Assad’s army is the enemy, not the Israeli military.” …

A 17-year-old who entered the room in a wheelchair said that at the border he’d been frightened by Israeli soldiers pointing their rifles at him and ordering him to raise his hands. After an examination and transfer for medical treatment, he said he was surprised by the “compassion, sympathy and humanity” shown him at the hospital.

This won’t change the face of the Middle East on its own … but it’s a start, and a good reminder of the differences between the regimes’ propaganda and reality in the region.


The Righteous Among The Nations. "“Whosoever saves a single life, saves an entire universe" - (Mishnah, Sanhedrin 4:5)

Turkish Ambassador: Turkey will prevent Armenia's holding of 100th anniversary of so-called ‘Armenian genocide’

Turkish Ambassador: Turkey will prevent Armenia's holding of 100th anniversary of so-called ‘Armenian genocide’(Taz).

Turkey will take all necessary measures to prevent activities in connection with the 100th anniversary of the so-called 'Armenian genocide' to be held by Armenia and the Armenian Diaspora, Turkish Ambassador to Azerbaijan Ismail Alper Joshgun told media today.

He was commenting on the activities that Armenia might hold in 2015 in connection with 100th anniversary of the so-called 'Armenian genocide'.

"Earlier, Armenians voiced far-fetched claims and such claims can be expected in the future," the ambassador added.

"Turkey will celebrate the centenary of the Battle of Canakkale in two years," he said.

He stressed that Armenia's state ideology is based on falsification of the 1915 events.
"I hope that all historical events will be considered from the point of view of archival material, as Turkey and Azerbaijan proposed," he said.

Bolivia to sue Obama for ‘crimes against humanity.”

Bolivia to sue Obama for ‘crimes against humanity.'(RT).

Bolivian President Evo Morales will file a lawsuit against the US government for crimes against humanity. He has decried the US for its intimidation tactics and fear-mongering after the Venezuelan presidential jet was blocked from entering US airspace.

“I would like to announce that we are preparing a lawsuit against Barack Obama to condemn him for crimes against humanity,” said President Morales at a press conference in the Bolivian city of Santa Cruz. He branded the US president as a “criminal” who violates international law.

In solidarity with Venezuela, Bolivia will begin preparing a lawsuit against the US head of state to be taken to the international court. Furthermore, Morales has called an emergency meeting of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) to discuss what has been condemned by Venezuela as “an act of intimidation by North American imperialism.” 

The Bolivian president has suggested that the members of CELAC withdraw their ambassadors from the US to send a message to the Obama Administration. As an additional measure he will call on the member nations of the Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas to boycott the next meeting of the UN. Members of the Alliance include Antigua and Barbuda, Cuba, Dominica, Ecuador, Nicaragua, Venezuela and Saint Lucia.

“The US cannot be allowed to continue with its policy of intimidation and blockading presidential flights,” stressed Morales.

The Venezuelan government announced on Thursday that President Nicolas Maduro’s plane had been denied entry into Puerto Rican (US) airspace.

“We have received the information from American officials that we have been denied travel over its airspace,” Venezuelan Foreign Minister Elias Jaua said, speaking to reporters during an official meeting with his South African counterpart. Jaua decried the move “as yet another act of aggression on the part of North American imperialism against the government of the Bolivarian Republic.”

President Maduro was due to arrive in Beijing this weekend for bilateral talks with the Chinese government. Jaua was adamant that the Venezuelan leader would reach his destination, regardless of any perceived interference.

The US government has not yet made any statement regarding the closing of its airspace to the Venezuelan presidential plane. Puerto Rico is an unincorporated territory of the US.  

“Boko-Haram” Terror: The slaughter Of 510 Igbo Christians Amounts To Systematic Ethnic Cleansing & Crimes Against Humanity.

“Boko-Haram” Terror: The Chilling Killing Of 510 Igbo Christians Out Of The 714 “Boko-Haram” Related Deaths In 12 Months (January 2011-January 2012) Amounts To Systematic Ethnic Cleansing and Crimes Against Humanity.(SaharaReporters).By Emeka Umeagbalasi.

The killing Of 510 Igbo Christians:

Other than the two reports particularly the chilling death of over 54,000 Nigerians outside the law since 1999, our further investigations show that up to 510 Igbo Christians may have been slaughtered by politically and ethnically backed “Boko-Haram” Terror Sect in different parts of the Northern Nigeria, from January 2011 to January 2012. This did not include the Jos killings of 2011, where it is believed that up to 400 Igbo Christian traders alone including 48 of them (killed on 8th day of January 2011 at Dilimi and Bauchi Road Markets in Jos) died, out of over 1000 people killed. According to the Associated Press account, at least, 510 people (most of them Igbo Christians) were killed by Boko-Haram Terror Sect in 2011. In the past three weeks that is to say between 22nd day of December 2011 and 13th day of January 2012, at least 300 innocent Nigerians have been killed. This includes about 60 people including Christmas returnees trapped and slaughtered on Enugu-Abakiliki Road on 31st day of December 2011 as well as 35 Nigerians (rights groups’ account) killed countrywide by over-zealous security forces during the national protests and strikes over “petroleum subsidy removal”. The Inspector General of Police claims that eleven people including two security operatives were killed during the protests.

Strictly speaking Your Excellency, in the past three weeks (22-12-2011-13-01-2012), according to respected local and international media, up to 204 innocent Nigerian Christians including, at least, 150 Igbo Christians have been murdered by “Boko-Haram” Islamist Sect. And out of at least 510 people murdered by the violent Islamist Sect in 2011 (Associated Press), at least 350 of them are Igbo Christians. The targeted and systematic killing of Igbo Christians stems from age-long ethnic hatred, disproportionate police protection, and gross insecurity in the Igbo residential and trading areas of the North as well as Igbo pastoralism (migration). Available statistics from the media concerning the 204 “Boko-Haram” Sect’s killings in the past three weeks show that on 22nd day of December 2011, at least six people (Igbo Christians) were slaughtered in Damaturu, Yobe State, Northeast Nigeria; on 23rd day of December 2011, at least 68 people including (many) Igbo Christians, police personnel and soldiers were killed in bomb blasts believed to have been detonated by violent “Boko-Haram” Sect in Damaturu, Yobe State.
On 25th day of December 2011, at least 35 parishioners including over 25 Igbo Christians and two passers-by (Muslims) were massacred at St Theresa’s Catholic Church, Madalla in Suleja, Niger State, North-central Nigeria. The chilling deaths resulted from bombs detonated by the violent “Boko-Haram” Islamist Sect. At least ten more people mainly Igbo Christians were killed in bomb blasts that hit churches in Jos, Plateau State, North-central Nigeria and Gadaka, in Yobe State, Northeast Nigeria.

Lastly Your Excellency, as a party to the Statute for International Criminal Court, which Nigeria ratified in 2001, we demand that Your Excellency writes and invites the new Chief Prosecutor for International Criminal Court, Madam Fatou Bensaida and her team to Nigeria to commence investigations into these chilling killings, particularly the slaughtering of Igbo Christians in the North, as well as the Jos killings, so as to truly unmask those involved, whether they are in government, ethnic or religious enclaves. This is in line with the recent public statement issued by Madam Navanethen Pillay, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. It is also in accordance with relevant provisions of the ICC Statute and the Charter of the United Nations. Read the full story here.

Related : Boko Haram And The Threat Of Political Islam.(SaharaReporters).By By Leo Igwe.
Nigeria’s most deadly islamic sect, Boko Haram, has just exploded mutiple bombs in the city of Kano. Curfew has been imposed and the city- the state and the entire nation is engulfed in tension, fear and uncertainty with some 80 corpses in a morgue and bodies in the streets on Saturday .This group appears unrelenting in its murderous campaign.
Kano has joined the ranks of northern states-Bornu, Yobe, Adamawa, Plateau, Niger where the terror of Boko Haram holds sway. Religious crisis orchestrated by muslim fundamentalists is not new to this northern city but these attacks have brought a frightening dimension to islamic militancy in the region.Unfortunately, most analysts continue to shy away from the truth- the bitter truth that Boko Haram is an islamist group with a political agenda. Boko Haram is a jihadist organization that has declared war against anybody that is really or imagined to be opposed to its cause. Even when the group has made it clear that they are opposed to western education and want sharia implemented in Nigeria. Boko Haram militants are not asking for jobs. They are not agitating for any finacial reward or compensation. Their cause is religious. Thier agenda is islamists.
They are just a bunch of islamic militants and nihilists who want to turn Nigeria into an islamic empire by force.We in Nigeria must stop decieving ourselves by saying that the Boko Haram attacks have nothing to do with religion. Or that they have nothing to do with Islam. This is not true. Though people can carry out such heinous attacks for other reasons, or be motivated by other secular causes. From the pattern of their attacks, the Boko Haram phenomenon has a lot to do with religion particularly islam. It is the Nigerian version of al Qaeda. The militants are not bombing police stations, UN building and churches for the sake of it. They are not agitating for sharia law for the fun of it. The Boko Haram militants are fighting a holy war. They are prosecuting a jihad for which they expect to be rewarded abundantly in the hereafter with some virgins. That is why the group has not run out of suicide bombers. That is why they have their operational base in the muslim majority states.
Boko Haram militants have been brainwashed by few islamic clerics to believe that they are 'Hezbollah'- the army of Allah. They have been deluded to think that these suicide bomb attacks and other murderous acts they carry out are religious duties in line with the will of Allah and in furtherance of Islam. Nigerian authorities must acknowledge and address the ‘islamic’ roots of the Boko Haram menace now, before it is too late. Read the full story here.