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North Korea 'back online' after internet outage

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US denies involvement after reported online-access disruption amid tensions over cyberattack on Sony Pictures.

North Korea is embroiled in a confrontation with US over the hacking of emails from Sony executives [EPA]

North Korea is embroiled in a confrontation with US over the hacking of emails from Sony executives [EPA]

by Al Jazeera

North Korea, at the centre of a confrontation with the US over the hacking of Sony Pictures, experienced a complete internet outage for hours before links were restored, according to a US company that monitors internet infrastructure.

Dyn, the New Hampshire-based internet monitor, said on Tuesday the reason for the outage was not known but could range from technological glitches to a hacking attack.

Several US officials close to the investigations of the attack on Sony Pictures said the US government was not involved in any cyber action against North Korea.

US President Barack Obama had pledged on Friday to respond to the major cyberattack, which he blamed on North Korea, “in a place and time and manner that we choose”.

Dyn said North Korea’s internet links were unstable on Monday and the country later went completely offline.

“We’re yet to see how stable the new connection is,” Jim Cowie, chief scientist for the company, said in a telephone call to Reuters news agency after the services were restored.

“The question for the next few hours is whether it will return to the unstable fluctuations we saw before the outage.”

North Korea is one of the most isolated nations in the world, and the effects of the internet outage there were not fully clear.

Internet dependence

Very few of North Korea’s 24 million people have access to the internet.

However, major websites, including those of the KCNA state news agency, the main Rodong Sinmun newspaper and the main external public-relations company went down for hours.

Almost all of the country’s internet links and traffic pass through China, except, possibly, for some satellite links.

“North Korea has significantly less internet to lose, compared to other countries with similar populations: Yemen [47 networks], Afghanistan [370 networks], or Taiwan [5,030 networks],” Dyn Research said in a report.

“And unlike these countries, North Korea maintains dependence on a single international provider, China Unicom.”

Meanwhile South Korea, which remains technically at war with the North, said it could not rule out the involvement of its neighbour in a cyberattack on its nuclear power plant operator.

It said only non-critical data was stolen and operations were not at risk, but had asked for US help in investigating.

Park Geun-hye, South Korean president, said on Tuesday the leak of data from the nuclear operator was a “grave situation” that was unacceptable as a matter of national security, but she did not mention any involvement of North Korea.

US seeks to overthrow Venezuela government: official

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Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. Photo: REUTERS

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. Photo: REUTERS

Caracas/AFP: Tighter new US sanctions against Venezuela are aimed to foment violent unrest to try to overthrow President Nicolas Maduro, his defense minister said Saturday.

“This US interference is aimed at promoting violence… against our institutions” to oust staunch US critic Maduro, Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino told Telesur television.

US President Barack Obama signed a law on Thursday to allow sanctions against senior Venezuelan officials accused of violating the rights of protesters during anti-government demonstrations that rocked the country earlier this year.

The text approved just over a week ago by both houses of the US Congress would freeze assets and deny visas to Venezuelan authorities responsible for violence and political detentions triggered by the protests.

Thousands of activists were arrested and more than 43 people were killed during mass demonstrations that raged from February to May against the government of Maduro, the elected successor of late leftist firebrand president Hugo Chavez.

Maduro has repeatedly accused the United States of fomenting the protests and seeking to overthrow and even assassinate him.

The Venezuelan leader condemned the sanctions law in a series of Twitter posts this week, calling it a “misstep” that resembled the US policy isolating Cuba, which was overturned Wednesday as Obama and Cuba’s leader Raul Castro announced a bilateral rapprochement.

“The background of all this is much more nuanced. It is dangerous because these are the steps they are taking so that they can try to have the world see the Venezuelan state as a failed one,” Padrino warned.

Caracas and Washington have had strained diplomatic ties since Chavez first came to power in 1999, leading to the withdrawal of ambassadors from each other’s countries in 2010.

Still, the United States is the main buyer of Venezuelan oil.

Raul Castro: U.S must respect that Cuba will remain Socialist

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Cuba's President Raul Castro greets members of the National Assembly at the start of a session in Havana, December 20, 2014. | Photo: Reuters

Cuba’s President Raul Castro greets members of the National Assembly at the start of a session in Havana, December 20, 2014. Photo: Reuters

by teleSUR

The President also announced he will attend the Summit of the Americas, a first for a Cuban head of State.

Cuban President Raul Castro told the country’s legislators Saturday that the United States must respect the island’s socialist political and economic system.

“In the same way that we have never demanded that the United States change its political system, we will demand respect for ours,” Raul Castro told the National Assembly.

The U.S. and Cuba restored diplomatic ties earlier this week, after U.S. President Barack Obama admitted that his country’s half century attempt to defeat Cuba had failed.

Raul Castro added that he will participate in the Summit of the Americas in April, the first opportunity for the leader to meet with United States President Barack Obama following the historic announcement.

Cuba has never participated these summits due to the island’s exclusion from the Organization of American States in 1962.

The Government of Panama had previously stated that it intended to invite Cuba to the summit, while numerous leaders from the hemisphere having previously stated they would not attend unless Cuba was present.

Raul Castro also said Cuba faces a “long and difficult struggle” before the United States removes a decades-old economic embargo against the Caribbean island, in part because influential Cuban-American exiles will attempt to “sabotage the process” toward normalization.

The Cuban National Assembly announced on Friday that it would back the agreement of President Raul Castro and U.S to restore diplomatic ties. Yolanda Ferrer, President of the International Relations Commission of the National Assembly also warmly welcomed the return of three Cuban political prisoners held by the United States for more than 15 years for attempting to thwart terrorist attacks on the island by Cuban-expatriate extremists.

Leaked emails: Obama exerted influence over “The Interview”

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the interview

by Robert Barsocchini

Antiwar.com’s Dan Sanchez has just reported on leaked emails that reveal that the Obama regime exerted influence over the movieThe Interview “to encourage assassination and regime change in North Korea”.

Regarding the threats of bombings of theaters if the film was shown, Obama has been personally encouraging people to “go the movies” anyway, while hardliners like Mitt Romney have specifically encouraged people to go see The Interview.

This is not the first time strongman Obama has been closely involved with promoting or influencing Hollywood movies spouting negative propaganda about countries Obama and the US want to invade and conquer. Michelle Obama personally presented the Academy award for “best picture” for the filmArgo.

Argo whitewashed the history of US aggression and genocide against Iran. Since 1953, the US has been an accomplice in the torture and killing of over a million Iranian citizens, thousands with chemical weapons.

The Interview almost certainly whitewashes the history of US genocide against Korea, and apparently depicts US forces causing the North Korean leader’s head to explode.

In its aggressive attacks against North Korea in the early 1950s, the US intentionally targeted civilians and flattened entire villages and cities, including Pyongyang. The attacks killed up to 4 million people, mostly civilians, most of whom were killed by the US, many through direct and intentional targeting, such as the machine-gunning of women and children by US soldiers at No Gun Ri.

Scholar Chalmers Johnson finds the North Korea of today a proud, struggling nation that, unlike the US public, is very aware of what was done to it by the US, and sees the aggressive, threatening stance the US has since maintained towards that country.

Johnson also notes that the worst act committed against Koreans by a “Korean” government was the bayoneting of thousands of students by the US-backed South Korean dictatorship in the late ’80s.

The Interview would almost certainly be another exercise in genocide denial for the US, a country that has gotten away with all of the crimes, including multiple genocides, it has thus far committed.

However, though we may be happy when Holocaust deniers and the like decide to hold their tongues, it is extremely unfortunate that Sony’s decision not to release such a film was brought about not by free will but threats of violence from unknown sources, which are to be condemned as threats against speech itself.

According to the leaked emails, Sony was hesitant about depicting the assassination of the North Korean leader, but was “encouraged” by the Obama regime to go forward with it.

It may be useful to imagine how we would feel about the reverse: a slapstick buddy comedy about the infiltration of the country considered the most dangerous in the world – the USA, not North Korea – and the “comedic” assassination of Obama by having his head catch on fire and explode.

It is also relevant to note that North Korea’s official complaint about the film, that it incites terrorism against North Korea (which is what the Obama regime apparently intended), is the same reason the US government has given countless times over the course of its existence to justify brutally crushing free speech and protest – facts all but fully ignored or suppressed in dominant US discourse.

And, as Antiwar.com and Wired report, “North Korea almost certainly did not hack Sony”.

Robert Barsocchini focuses on global force dynamics and writes professionally for the film industry. He is a regular contributor to Washington’s Blog, and is published in Counter Currents, Global Research, State of Globe, Blacklisted News, LewRockwell.com, DanSanchez.me, Information Clearing House, Press TV, and other outlets. Also see: Hillary Clinton’s Record of Support for War and other Depravities. Follow Robert and UK-based colleague, Dean Robinson, on Twitter.

Raul Castro urges US to lift embargo on Cuba

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Cuban leader says Obama’s decision to renew ties deserves respect, but urges US to lift embargo against his country.

US President Barack Obama shakes hands with Cuban President Raul Castro during the official memorial service for former South African President Nelson Mandela (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

US President Barack Obama shakes hands with Cuban President Raul Castro during the official memorial service for former South African President Nelson Mandela (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

by Al Jazeera

Cuban President Raul Castro has hailed the mutual decision to re-establish the US-Cuban diplomatic relations, but urged Washington to lift the five-decade-long embargo against his country.

On Wednesday, the countries agreed to restore diplomatic ties that were severed more than 50 years ago, and US President Barack Obama called for an end to the economic embargo against its old Cold War enemy.

“President Obama’s decision deserves the respect and acknowledgement of our people,” Castro said in a televised address, while warning that the embargo, which he calls a “blockade”, must still be lifted.

“We have agreed to re-establish diplomatic relations, but this does not mean the principal issue has been resolved: The blockade which causes much human and economic damage to our country should end,” he said.

He challenged Obama to modify the policy, which is rooted in US law, with executive action.

Obama said on Wednesday that the US was changing its relationship with the people of Cuba.

“We will begin to normalise relations between our two nations. Through these changes, we intend to create more opportunities for the American and Cuban people and begin a new chapter,” he added.

Al Jazeera’s Patty Culhane, reporting from Washington, said the trade embargo imposed on Cuba after ties were severed can only be lifted by Congress.

“Senior administration officials tell me they don’t think Congress is going to lift the embargo. We have seen several members of Congress come out and call the president’s moves ‘outrageous’,” she said.

Republican condemnation

Republicans, who will control both houses of Congress from January, oppose normal relations with the Communist-run island.

“Relations with the Castro regime should not be revisited, let alone normalised, until the Cuban people enjoy freedom – and not one second sooner,” said House Speaker John Boehner.

“There is no ‘new course’ here, only another in a long line of mindless concessions to a dictatorship that brutalises its people and schemes with our enemies.”

A day earlier, after 18 months of secret talks, Obama and Castro agreed in a phone call on a breakthrough prisoner exchange, the opening of embassies in each other’s countries, and an easing of some restrictions on commerce.

Havana released a US citizen, Alan Gross, who had been jailed for five years in Cuba, and an intelligence agent who had spied for the US and was held for nearly 20 years.

Cuba’s jailing of Gross, convicted for importing banned technology and trying to establish clandestine internet service for Cuban Jews, had been a major obstacle in improving ties.

The US in return freed three Cuban intelligence agents who had served 16 years in US jails for spying on Cuban exile groups in Florida.

Castro said the Cubans’ release was a cause of “enormous joy for their families and all of our people”.

He also praised Obama for agreeing to the prisoner exchange and pushing for a new relationship with Cuba.

Castro thanked Pope Francis, the Vatican and Canada for helping Havana and Washington reach their historic accord.

Obama said he had instructed Secretary of State John Kerry to immediately initiate discussions with Cuba on the re-establishment of diplomatic relations with Cuba, which were severed in 1961.

“In the coming months, we will re-establish an embassy in Havana and carry out high-level exchanges and visits between our two governments as part of the normalisation process,” Obama said.

Bush 3.0? Jeb to 'actively explore' presidential run

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Former Florida Governor gives strongest hint yet on impending campaign for 2016

Jeb Bush, son of former President George H.W. Bush and brother of former President George W. Bush, announced Tuesday he would "actively explore" a presidential run. (Photo: World Affairs Council of Philadelphia/flickr/cc)

Jeb Bush, son of former President George H.W. Bush and brother of former President George W. Bush, announced Tuesday he would “actively explore” a presidential run. (Photo: World Affairs Council of Philadelphia/flickr/cc)

by Nadia Prupis, Common Dreams

Jeb Bush announced Tuesday morning that he will “actively explore the possibility of running for president of the United States.”

The former governor of Florida and son of former President George H.W. Bush made the announcement on social media, posting messages to Twitter and Facebook that he had made the decision after consulting with his family over Thanksgiving.

“As a result of these conversations and thoughtful consideration of the kind of strong leadership I think America needs, I have decided to actively explore the possibility of running for President of the United States,” Bush wrote in a Facebook post published Tuesday.

He continued, “In January, I also plan to establish a Leadership PAC that will help me facilitate conversations with citizens across America to discuss the most critical challenges facing our exceptional nation. The PAC’s purpose will be to support leaders, ideas and policies that will expand opportunity and prosperity for all Americans. In the coming months, I hope to visit with many of you and have a conversation about restoring the promise of America.”

Reaction among progressives on Twitter was dismissive if not swift:

In a mid-October ABC poll, Bush had roughly 13 percent of support among conservatives, putting him in the same league as former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee and Kentucky Senator Rand Paul, who each received 12 percent support. He is a divisive figure in politics, even among Republicans, as David Weigel of Bloomberg points out. His legacy as Florida Governor is also punctuated by scandal and allegations of corruption.

Tuesday’s statement is not an official announcement of Bush’s candidacy, but a strong hint that he is planning on running. The New York Times writes:

The question that looms over yet another Bush candidacy, though, is if he can appeal to actual Republican primary voters as much as he does the party’s wealthy bundlers. Many of Mr. Bush’s would-be rivals are skeptical. So for them, Mr. Bush’s making such an early move is not entirely bad news. If it turns out that he cannot appeal to the party base or backs away from a run entirely, there will be time for them to make their move.

U.S feels the heat on Palestine vote at UN

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US Secretary of State John Kerry (L) meets with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at Villa Taverna in Rome, Dec. 15, 2014. (photo by REUTERS/Evan Vucci)

US Secretary of State John Kerry (L) meets with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at Villa Taverna in Rome, Dec. 15, 2014. (photo by REUTERS/Evan Vucci)

by Jonathan Cook

Nazareth: The floodgates have begun to open across Europe on recognition of Palestinian statehood. On Friday the Portuguese parliament became the latest European legislature to call on its government to back statehood, joining Sweden, Britain, Ireland, France and Spain.

In coming days similar moves are expected in Denmark and from the European Parliament. The Swiss government will join the fray too this week, inviting states that have signed the Fourth Geneva Convention to an extraordinary meeting to discuss human rights violations in the occupied territories. Israel has threatened retaliation.

But while Europe is tentatively finding a voice in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, silence reigns across the Atlantic. The White House appears paralysed, afraid to appear out of sync with world opinion but more afraid still of upsetting Israel and its powerful allies in the US Congress.

Now there is an additional complicating factor. The Israeli public, due to elect a new Israeli government in three months’ time, increasingly regards the US role as toxic. A poll this month found that 52 per cent viewed President Barack Obama’s diplomatic policy as “bad”, and 37 per cent thought he had a negative attitude towards their country – more than double the figure two years ago.

US Secretary of State John Kerry alluded to the White House’s difficulties this month when he addressed the Saban Forum, an annual gathering of US policy elites to discuss the Middle East. He promised that Washington would not interfere in Israel’s elections.

According to the Israeli media, he was responding to pressure from Tzipi Livni, sacked this month from Benjamin Netanyahu’s government, triggering the forthcoming election, and opposition leader Yitzhak Herzog, of the centre-left Labor party.

The pair recently made a pact in an effort to oust Netanyahu. Their electoral success – improbable at the moment – offers the White House its best hope of an Israeli government that will at least pay lip service to a renewal of peace negotiations, which collapsed last April. They have warned, however, that any sign of backing from the Obama administration would be the kiss of death at the polls.

US officials would like to see Netanyahu gone, not least because he has been the biggest obstacle to reviving a peace process that for two decades successfully allayed international pressure to create a Palestinian state. But any visible strategy against Netanyahu is almost certain to backfire.

Washington’s difficulties are only underscored by the Palestinians’ threat to bring a draft resolution before the UN Security Council as soon as this week, demanding Israel’s withdrawal by late 2016 to the 1967 lines.

Given the current climate, the Palestinians are hopeful of winning the backing of European states, especially the three key ones in the Security Council – Britain, France and Germany – and thereby isolating the US. Arab foreign ministers met Kerry on Tuesday in an effort to persuade Washington not to exercise its veto.

The US, meanwhile, is desperately trying to postpone a vote, fearful that casting its veto might further discredit it in the eyes of the world while also suggesting to Israeli voters that Netanyahu has the White House in his pocket.

But indulging the Israeli right also has risks, bolstering it by default. That danger was driven home during another session of the Saban Forum, addressed by settler leader Naftali Bennett. He is currently riding high in the polls and will likely be the backbone of the next coalition government.

Bennett says clearly what Netanyahu only implies: that most of the West Bank should be annexed, with the Palestinians given demilitarised islands of territory that lack sovereignty. The model, called “autonomy”, is of the Palestinians ruling over a series of local councils.

The Washington audience was further shocked by Bennett’s disrespectful treatment of his interviewer, Martin Indyk, who served as Obama’s representative at the last round of peace talks. He accused Indyk of not living in the real world, dismissively calling him part of the “peace industry”.

Bennett’s goal, according to analysts, was to prove to Israeli voters that he is not afraid to stand up to the Americans.

Given its weakening hand – faced with an ever-more rightwing Israeli public and a more assertive European one – Washington is looking towards an unlikely saviour. The hawkish foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman used to be its bete noire, but he has been carefully recalibrating his image.

Unlike other candidates, he has been aggressively promoting a “peace plan”. The US has barely bothered examining its contents, which are only a little more generous than Bennett’s annexation option, and involve forcibly stripping hundreds of thousands of Palestinians in Israel of their citizenship.

Lieberman, however, has usefully created the impression that he is a willing partner to a peace process. At the weekend he even suggested he might join a centre coalition with Livni and Herzog.

Lieberman is cleverly trying to occupy a middle ground with Israeli voters, demonstrating that he can placate the Americans, while offering a plan so unfair to the Palestinians that there is no danger voters will consider him part of the “peace industry”.

That may fit the electoral mood: a recent poll showed 63 per cent of Israelis favour peace negotiations, but 70 per cent think they are doomed to fail. The Israeli public, like Lieberman, understands that the Palestinians will never agree to the kind of subjugation they are being offered.

The Israeli election’s one certain outcome is that, whoever wins, the next coalition will, actively or passively, allow more of the same: a slow, creeping annexation of what is left of a possible Palestinian state, as the US and Europe bicker.

Jonathan Cook won the Martha Gellhorn Special Prize for Journalism. His latest books are “Israel and the Clash of Civilisations: Iraq, Iran and the Plan to Remake the Middle East” (Pluto Press) and “Disappearing Palestine: Israel’s Experiments in Human Despair” (Zed Books). His website is www.jonathan-cook.net.

A version of this article first appeared in The National, Abu Dhabi.

Thousands march against U.S police killings

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Demonstrators gather in Washington and New York to rally against the killings of unarmed black men by police officers.

Thousands rallied in Washington in what was dubbed a 'Justice for All' march [Reuters]

Thousands rallied in Washington in what was dubbed a ‘Justice for All’ march [Reuters]

by Al Jazeera

Thousands of demonstrators have marched in Washington and New York to protest against the killings of unarmed black men by police officers and to urge politcians to do more to protect African-Americans.

Organisers said that Saturday’s marches in Washington DC and New York City would rank among the largest in the recent wave of protests against killings that have brought the treatment of minorities by police onto the national agenda.

Decisions by grand juries to not indict the police officers involved in the deaths of Michael Brown in Missouri and Eric Garner in New York have sparked weeks of protests in major cities across the country.

Al Sharpton, a leading civil rights activist, called for “legislative action that will shift things both on the books and in the streets”.

Sharpton, whose National Action Network organised the Washington rally, urged the US Congress to pass legislation that would allow federal prosecutors to take over cases involving police.

He said local district attorneys often work with police regularly, raising the potential of conflicts of interest when prosecutors investigate incidents, he said.

Al Jazeera’s Patty Culhane, reporting from Washington, said there had been impassioned speeches and that the crowd seemed overwhelmingly positive.

Families of Eric Garner and Akai Gurley, who were killed by New York police; Trayvon Martin, slain by a Florida neighbourhood watchman in 2012; and Michael Brown, killed by an officer in Ferguson attended the protest.

At a parallel march in New York tens of thousands of people braved cold weather to join the protest, Al Jazeera’s Courtney Kealy reported.

“Some of the protesters are calling for the police commissioner to resign, for the officer blamed for the death of Eric Garner to be fired and for an independent prosecutor’s office to be set up to look into police brutality,” Kealy said.

“They want to see change in the judicial system, not just take to the streets, but have actual political and judicial reform.”

Hundreds of protesters also took to the streets of California, Nashville and Boston, where state police arrested 23 people after clashes broke out.

Politicians have talked of the need for better police training, body cameras and changes in the grand jury process to restore faith in the legal system.

After Putin trip, U.S unhappy, but no change in Obama's India plans

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ModiPutin

Washington: The US is unhappy over India doing “business as usual” with Russia, but it will have no effect on President Barack Obama’s upcoming visit to India which remains an “important partner.”

“No. India remains an important partner,” State Department spokesperson Jen Psaki told reporters Friday when asked whether deals reached during Russian President Vladimir Putin’s just concluded visit to India would change Obama’s plans.

Obama has been invited by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to be the chief guest at India’s Republic Day parade on January 26. He will be the first US president to get that honour and the first one to visit India twice while in office.

“Obviously, our economic relationship is a big part of what we continue to work on,” Psaki said while repeating its caution to “allies and partners” that it was not time for doing business with Russian following its intervention in Ukraine.

The US, she said had seen reports about India and Russia signing agreements in oil exploration, infrastructure, defence and nuclear energy including construction of 12 Russia-built nuclear units in India over the next two decades,

“We continue to monitor it, but we haven’t looked at all the specifics of the contracts, for obvious reasons,” Psaki said. But “We continue to urge all countries not to conduct business as usual with Russia.”

Noting that “there are already sanctions in place” imposed on Russia by the US and its Western allies, Psaki said it was not calling for sanctions on other countries.

“In general, though, given the situation, it shouldn’t be business as usual,” she said.

Asked if the US had spoken to the Indians before Putin’s trip that it’s not the right time to do business with Russia, Psaki said: “Well, we’ve been engaged in that discussion.”

“I’d remind you India doesn’t support the actions of Russia and the actions – their intervention into Ukraine,” she said. “They’ve been pretty outspoken about that as well.”

On the presence of Sergey Aksyonov, prime minister of Crimea, the former Ukrainian territory annexed by Russia, in Putin’s delegation to India, which too has upset Washington, Psaki said: “I don’t have anything new to offer on that.”

Asked if the US had confirmed if he was there or not, she said: “There have been a range of reports.” But “I don’t have any US government confirmation. We’re obviously not in on the trip with them.”

Asked again if there’s any change in Obama’s trip to India, the spokesperson said emphatically: “No. No, no.”

(IANS)

The CIA’s torture orgy: 100 or more prisoners tortured to death in U.S detention

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CIA torture, crushing democracy and Britain’s new military base in Bahrain all deliver a toxic message

Guantanamo Bay

by Seumas Milne, The Guardian

We may have known the outline of the global US kidnapping and torture programme for a few years. But even the heavily censored summary of the US senate torture report turns the stomach in its litany of criminal barbarity unleashed by the CIA on real and imagined US enemies.

The earlier accounts of US brutality in Abu Ghraib and Guantánamo pale next to the still sanitised record of forced rectal “infusions” and prolapses, multiple “waterboarding” drownings and convulsions, the shackled freezing to death of a man seized in a mistaken identity case, hooded beatings and hanging by the wrists, mock executions, and sleep deprivation for up to 180 hours.

What has been published is in fact only a small part of a much bigger picture, including an estimated 100 or more prisoners tortured to death in US detention. Added to the rampant lying, cover-ups and impunity, it’s a story that the champions of America’s “exceptionalism” will find hard to sell around the world. And it’s hardly out of line with a CIA record of coups, death squads, torture schools and covert war stretching back decades, some revealed by an earlier senate report in the 1970s.

There is of course nothing exceptional about states that preach human rights and democracy, but practise the opposite when it suits them. For all the senate’s helpful redactions, Britain has been up to its neck in the CIA’s savagery, colluding in kidnapping and torture from Bagram to Guantánamo while dishing out abuses of its own in Iraq and Afghanistan.

So you’d hardly think this reminder of the horrors unleashed in the name of the war on terror was the time for Britain to announce its first permanent military base in the Middle East for four decades. The presence of western troops and support for dictatorial Arab regimes were, after all, the original reasons given by al-Qaida for its jihad against the west.

The subsequent invasions, occupations and bombing campaigns led by the US, Britain and others have been endlessly cited by those who resisted them in the Arab and Muslim world, or launched terror attacks in the west. But last week, foreign secretary Phillip Hammond proudly declared that Britain would reverse its withdrawal from “east of Suez” of the late 1960s and open a navy base “for the long term” in the Gulf autocracy of Bahrain.

The official talk is about protecting Britain’s “enduring interests” and the stability of the region. But to those fighting for the right to run their own country, the message could not be clearer. Britain, the former colonial power, and the US, whose 5th Fleet is already based in Bahrain, stand behind the island’s unelected rulers. No wonder there have already been protests against the base.

Bahrainis campaigning for democracy and civil rights, in a state where the majority are Shia and the rulers Sunni, were part of the Arab uprisings in 2011. With US and British support, Saudi Arabia and the UAE crushed the protests by force. Mass arrests, repression and torture followed.

Three years later, Bahrain’s human rights situation has got worse, and even the US government voices concerns. But British ministers purr about the “progress” of the monarchy’s “reforms”, praising phoney elections to a toothless parliament, boycotted by the main opposition parties. Last week Bahraini activist Zainab al-Khawaja was sentenced to three years in jail for tearing up the king’s photograph. Her father, Abdulhadi, is already serving a life sentence for encouraging peaceful protest.

In reality, the British base’s main job won’t be to prop up the Bahraini regime, but to help protect the entire network of dictatorial Gulf governments that sit on top of its vast reserves of oil and gas – and provide a springboard for future interventions across the wider Middle East. British troops never really left the region and have been part of one intervention after another.

The US itself controls an archipelago of military bases across the Gulf: in Kuwait, Qatar, Oman and the UAE, as well as Bahrain. And despite Barack Obama’s much-heralded pivot to Asia, they are also clearly there for the long haul. After the US accepted the overthrow of the Egyptian dictator Mubarak three years ago, the Gulf autocrats are looking for extra security, which Britain and France are glad to provide. For the London elite, the Gulf is now as much about arms sales and finance as about oil and gas – and a web of political, commercial and intelligence links that go to the heart of the British establishment.

So the British military is also looking to beef up its presence in the UAE, Oman, Qatar and Kuwait. The crucial thing is that these colonial creations remain in the grip of their ruling families and democratisation is put on the back burner. That’s the only guarantee that this corrosive relationship will endure – on the back of disenfranchised populations and armies of grotesquely exploited migrant labour.

On a larger scale, the return of western-backed dictatorship in Egypt, the Arab world’s most important country, has helped re-establish the conditions that led to the war on terror in the first place. Obama has traded the CIA’s Bush-era kidnap-and-torture programme for expanded special forces and CIA drone killings, often of people targeted only by their “signatures” – such as being males of military age. And British forces have this week been accused of training and providing intelligence for Kenyan death squads targeting suspected Islamist activists.

The impact of all this – the revelations of the CIA’s torture orgy, the growing western military grip, the vanishing chances of democratic change – on the Arab and Muslim world should by now be obvious, along with the social backlash in countries such as Britain.

But with its new commitment to station troops in Bahrain, we can have no doubt where the British government stands: behind autocracy and “enduring interests”. Just as the refusal to hold previous US governments to account for terror and torture laid the ground for what happened after 9/11, the failure of parliament even to debate the decision to garrison the Gulf is an ominous one. Britain’s new base isn’t in the interests of either the people of Britain, Bahrain or the Middle East as a whole – it’s a danger and affront to us all.

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