US Oil Espionage in Venezuela

Nil Nikandrov - http://en.fondsk.ru

US companies used to be the masters of Venezuelan oil reserves since the epoch of dictator Juan Gomez. He had a vague idea of the real worth of the natural riches of his «grand asienda» and sold «the devil's excrements» - the Indian name for oil - cheaply to the omnipresent Yankees. Throughout the XX century Washington regarded Venezuela's black gold as its own strategic reserve and invariably barred competitors from the sphere.

During World War II many of the US combat vehicles ran on gas derived from Venezuelan oil. When German submarines launched raids in the Venezuelan territorial waters and near the Curacao Island where a major refinery was sited, Washington used the developments as a pretext for reinforcing the network of US military bases in the Caribbean and along the eastern coast of South America. The FBI – authorized by President Roosevelt to carry out such operations abroad - searched for Nazi spies and saboteurs jointly with the US Army intelligence. The search produced no results, but in the process the US gained access to all oil-rich regions of Venezuela, as war-time allies were not supposed to be secretive with each other.

US agents in Venezuela faced no risk of unemployment when the war was over. Now they were confronted with the Soviet threat. Washington started to receive alarmist messages from Caracas about the Venezuelan communists' Moscow-backed plans to sabotage the oil infrastructures of the country.

In 1946, when the spy mania was reaching its highest point, Soviet ambassador to Venezuela Foma Trebin visited Zulia, Venezuela's main oil-producing province. The tour was accompanied by various official activities, media events, and ceremonial dinners with local elites. Governor P. Hernandez organized a reception for the Soviet visitor at a yachting club, during which he praised the USSR for its decisive contribution to the victory in World War II and for the successful post-war reconstruction, and also spoke warmly about Stalin.

Almost certainly, Soviet diplomats could only catch a glimpse of the oil fields operated by the US-owned Creole and Mene Grande during the tour. Moreover, they had no idea of the actual proportions of the US oil and espionage paranoia in Venezuela. The FBI accounts of Trebin's tour translated into a US State Department secret memo linking it to the preparation for a sabotage campaign aimed at destabilizing the oil supplies to the US. Washington's agents picked up any myths or rumors that came along to confirm the hypothesis. A US informer sent a message to Washington saying that a number of acts of sabotage targeting Venezuelan oil industry would be perpetrated upon the completion of the Conference of American States in Bogota and suggested penetrating the Soviet Embassy to obtain the secret plan of sabotage in Venezuela. He described the situation as critical and claimed that the Soviet diplomatic mission parallely served as a depot of arms to be distributed among the saboteurs.

In 1952 the CIA - with the help of its agent, secret police chief Pedro Estrada – managed to make Venezuela sever diplomatic relations with the USSR. Estrada was awarded an American medal for his role. After this, Washington could enjoy at lest some peace of mind – Soviet agents had to leave Venezuela and the oil supplies from the country to the US became immune to the threat allegedly posed by the USSR.

The 1970ies saw new problems arise when Venezuela decided to nationalize its hydrocarbon resources, and this time the job awaiting the CIA agents was truly tough. Venezuela's state owned oil company - Petroleos de Venezuela S.A. (PDVSA) – was heavily infiltrated by well-paid US agents.

A scandal erupted in 1983 when four PDVSA executives were arrested in Caracas and six others fled to the US. The group of spies had access to classified information which it sold for money. The investigation launched by Venezuela established that the leaders of the group were in touch with the US Embassy, but the story was hushed up. J. Lusinchi who was inaugurated as President in February, 1984 wanted to avoid a conflict with the US. The investigation's findings were squeezed within narrow confines – the group simply used access to classified information for personal enrichment, and no grounds for espionage charges existed.

The neoliberal tide of the 1980ies also swept across Venezuela. In that epoch the country's political leadership and the PDVSA execs prepared the privatization of the company. The process evolved in phases. As recommended by the CIA, agents of influence convinced the public via media and during round tables that PDVSA was an inefficient company and a burden for the national budget.

In 1996 PDVSA hired the US-owned Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC) to upgrade its information services, thus opening to SAIC broad access to sensitive information. The US was able to track via its satellite communications system the PDVSA upcoming transactions, revenues, pricing policies, reserves, etc. Jose Sant Roz , author of CIA in Venezuela (2004), listed some of the SAIC administrators. Among them were former Defense Secretaries William Perry and Melvin Laird, former CIA Directors John Deutch and Robert Gates, former defense policy coordinator for the National Security Council General Jasper Welch, and former National Security Agency Director Ray Inman.

You wouldn't expect to find the above bunch of “technocrats” in the ranks of the supporters of the Bolivarian government which took over in Venezuela in 1999. Still, the contract with SAIC was terminated only in the late 2002 - early 2003, when PDVSA found out that its enterprises had been subverted by electronic signals conveyed from the US via satellite and Venezuelan officials went on a failed strike.

After the strike, practically all of the PDVSA executives plus over 10,000 of its staff were fired for illegally leaving their workplaces, and the company was headed by a new team. It managed to neutralize the subversion and restore the production processes. PDVSA got rid of the fifth column which pushed for its privatization in accord with the scenarios of the CIA and the US oil grands. Practically all of the “opposition oil executives” flocked to the Gente de Petroleo, a Caracas-based NGO patronized by the CIA as an instrument of destabilizing the current Venezuelan regime. The trials of some of former PDVSA employees caused panic in Gente de Petroleo and quite a few of its members fled to the US, Canada, the Saudi Arabia, and the Emirates.

Those of them who became consultants of US companies dealing with the Venezuelan oil seem to be the luckiest. For example, former number one Louis Justi got a job with Shell and also became an adviser to the Strategic and International Studies Center. Justi and his like are unleashed whenever the CIA floats another round of disinformation about the alleged failures of PDVSA.

The plans of President Chavez concerning oil remain a US intelligence-gathering priority. US agents in other countries, Colombia in particular, are actively involved in collecting the pertinent information. The territory of Colombia is used by the US for spying on Venezuela's oil-producing provinces, which Washington plans to occupy in the case of an armed conflict between Venezuela and Colombia. The main target of the planned US intervention to be launched from the military bases in Colombia is the Orinoco Belt holding at least 250 000 mln barrels of heavy crude.

A war – or provoking a war – between Venezuela and Colombia is a recurrent theme in the scenarios churned out by the CIA and the Pentagon. There is information that US special forces went on ultra-secret reconnaissance missions under the pretext of searching for FARC bases in Venezuela. In a number of cases the US special forces encountered Venezuelan border guard patrols and opened fire. Deaths of Venezuelan servicemen in such clashes were reported in Zulia, Tachira, Apure, and Amazonas – the regions of Venezuela bordering Colombia.

Bases of AUC (The United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia) are set up in Venezuela's oil-rich provinces in contact with the CIA. The paramilitary groups are destabilizing Venezuela by means of criminal activities, extortions, and kidnappings for ransom. Extremist groups recruiting Venezuelan middle-class youths are being created following a similar pattern. Las Verdades de Miguel weekly says they are trained by CIA instructors in Colombia. Political analysts project that the paramilitary groups will be used to provoke an armed conflict at the border between Venezuela and Colombia, which will serve as a pretext for a Colombian counterstrike and a US intervention, partially with the objective of safeguarding the Venezuelan oil fields.

President H. Chavez and his government stated a number of times that they have reliable information sources in the US Embassy and even the CIA. To an extent, this should guarantee the security of PDVSA. Over the past several months, Venezuela's secret police DISIP and military counterintelligence service have a number of times arrested members of the paramilitary groups and seized their depots of ammunition and lists of potential targets and victims including the current PDVSA executives.

Caracas is fully aware that it must remain alert. Geopolitically, the US has always viewed the oil-rich Venezuela as its own backyard, and B. Obama's Administration is no exception from the rule.

http://www.tiwy.com/news.phtml?id=150

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Protesters Aim to Shame DLA Piper Over Ties to Dictator/Accused 9/11 Inside Trader "Buzzy" Krongard and the Piper Board, Blackwater

Click moi.

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UK: MI5 Tried to Bribe Terror Suspect

By Elham Asaad Buaras
The Muslim News | 30 October 2009

The UK’s secret service (MI5) is being accused of perverting the course of justice by offering a 33 year-old terror suspect inducements to drop a law suite against agents who colluded in his torture.

Rangzieb Ahmed, from Rochdale, says during his detention in Pakistan he had three of his fingernails ripped out by the Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) officers after MI5 and Greater Manchester police representatives forwarded questions to the ISI.

He was later deported to the UK in 2007 and jailed for terrorism offences. Ahmed says he was visited in prison by an MI5 officer and a police officer who offered to secure a reduction in his sentence or a payment of money to withdraw his torture complaints when his appeal against conviction is heard later this year. His lawyer wrote to the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) to complain that the approach was “grossly inappropriate” and amounted to an attempt to pervert the course of justice.

A CPS spokesman confirmed receipt of the letter. He told The Muslim News, “I can confirm that we have received a letter about Mr Ahmed from his solicitors, we have acknowledged it and will be responding in due course.”

Ahmed, who is challenging his 2008 conviction, will sue the Government for damages. His lawyers will rely to on a judgment made after legal argument that preceded his trial, the details of which are being kept secret at the request of MI5 and Manchester police.

On July 7, Tory MP David Davis accused the Government of outsourcing torture, by allowing Ahmed to leave the country (even though they had evidence against him upon which he was later convicted) to Pakistan, where it is said the ISI was given the go ahead by MI5 to torture Ahmed. Davis also accused the Government of trying to gag Ahmed, “an alleged request to drop his allegations of torture: if he did that, they could get his sentence cut and possibly give him some money. If this request to drop the torture case is true, it is frankly monstrous. It would at the very least be a criminal misuse of the powers and funds under the Government’s Contest strategy, and at worst a conspiracy to pervert the course of justice.”

Rangzieb Ahmed

Ahmed claims he received a visit at Manchester prison last April from two men on identified himself as an MI5 agent the other Manchester police officer. “Then they said, ‘If you withdraw what you are saying about torture, we can make a deal with you to reduce your sentence, or if you want to take money we can give you money.’”

Ahmed’s solicitor, Tayab Ali said, “Any attempt to conceal evidence of torture would amount, in this case, to an attempt to pervert the course of justice, and I would expect the courts to take a very serious view of the matter.”

A Home Office spokesman told The Muslim News, “We don’t comment on matters of security. Security Service officers act within the law. The Government unreservedly condemns the use of torture as a matter of fundamental principle and works hard with its international partners to eradicate this abhorrent practice worldwide.”

He added. “The Security and Intelligence Agencies do not participate in, solicit, encourage or condone the use of torture or inhumane or degrading treatment. For reasons both ethical and legal, their policy is not to carry out any action which they know would result in torture or inhuman or degrading treatment.”

Ahmed had been under surveillance in Manchester and Dubai before travelling to Pakistan where he was picked up and tortured by the ISI. He was deported to Britain 13 months later and prosecuted on evidence gathered during the surveillance operation. His lawyers argued unsuccessfully that his trial should not proceed because of the torture he had suffered.

The court heard that two British intelligence officers questioned Ahmed while he was in ISI custody, and he says that the signs of the torture he was enduring would have been obvious to them.

The officers would have been operating in line with a government interrogation policy drawn up for MI5 and MI6 officers in the wake of the September 2001 al-Qaida attacks, which permitted them to question people whom they knew were being tortured, and to submit questions to the torturers, as long as they were not seen to condone what was happening.

The existence of the policy remained a secret until earlier this year, when the High Court released a transcript of the cross-examination of an MI5 officer who interrogated Binyam Mohamed, a British resident detained in Pakistan in 2002. The Attorney General has since called in Scotland Yard to investigate possible criminal conduct on the part of that officer and those who managed him.

He has been asked repeatedly what role he played in approving it and whether he was aware that it had led to people being tortured. His spokesman responded by saying that he had never authorised the use of torture.

Cageprisoners Director and former Guantánamo Bay detainee Moazzam Begg told The Muslim News [that] British intelligence services have been “complicit in the mistreatment of terror suspects.”

He added, “All too often, Muslim men are being detained at secret locations, without charge, trial or due process and, are subsequently subjected to very serious torture and abuse. During this period, the intelligence services will nearly always attempt to coerce or bribe the individuals to work for them, or offer them some kind of financial incentive to act as informers. The case of Rangzieb Ahmed is just one of many that highlights the way in which the UK authorities have been involved with arbitrary detention and torture - in Ahmed’s case, of the most horrific kind, after it was revealed that his fingernails had been pulled out.”

Cageprisoners report published earlier this year - Fabricating Terrorism II - highlights 29 cases where British intelligence, namely MI5, has been complicit in such practices and was offering bribes to individuals whilst they were undergoing - or under the threat of - such treatment

http://www.muslimnews.co.uk/paper/index.php?article=4327

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On the Hill, No One Wants to Talk About CIA Briefings re Karzai’s Brother

By Spencer Ackerman
Washington Independent
10/28/09

It seems like only yesterday that members of Congress bitterly determined that the CIA didn’t sufficiently or accurately brief them about various important secret activities. But today is a new day, and no one on the Hill wants to talk about whether they’ve been briefed on the small matter of the CIA paying Ahmed Wali Karzai, the powerful Kandahar rainmaker/druglord/Roger Clinton.

I hope other reporters have better luck. But I’ve been in contact with a number of congressional offices that work on intelligence matters, and I have gotten an affirmative response from exactly none. I’ve gotten off the record responses that there won’t be any comment or any clarification. Why aren’t I identifying these offices? Because I’ve got to deal with them down the road. Life is unfair.

As I say, I hope other reporters have better luck. I’ll link to you!

http://washingtonindependent.com/65535/meta-post-no-one-wants-to-talk-about-cia-briefings-on-karzais-brother

ALSO SEE: Video: Re "Karzai Brother 'on CIA Payroll'"

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White Supremacist was Leader of Death Squad, says Prosecution

Defense attorney says defendant was product of prison system.
By LARRY WELBORN
The Orange County Register
October 7, 2009

SANTA ANA - An Orange County prosecutor told a jury Wednesday that a heavily tattooed white supremacist was the leader of a death squad who executed a gang member for violating gang code by divulging secrets in a television interview.

Deputy District Attorney Ebrahim Baytieh said defendant Billy Joe Johnson, 46, showed a "complete and utter disregard for human life" when he led Scott Miller, one of the founders of the Public Enemy Number One gang, to his death in an Anaheim alley on March 8, 2002.

Co-conspirators and fellow gang members Michael A. Lamb and Jacob Rump were waiting in the darkness when Johnson showed up with Miller, 38 under the pretense of buying drugs, Baytieh said in opening statements. Lamb then popped out from a hiding spot and shot Miller once at near point-blank range in the back of the head.

In an unusual move, defense attorney Michael Molfetta then told the jury in his opening statement of Johnson's death penalty trial that he agreed with everything the prosecutor said.

Molfetta said Johnson is a product of a violence-prone prison system and that he did not have any choice but to participate in Miller's murder for violating PEN1 gang rules by appearing on a Fox television news show.

Johnson is charged with first-degree murder plus the special circumstances of committing a murder for the benefit of a gang, murder-by-lying-in-wait and committing multiple murder. He is already serving 45 years to life term in prison for a separate gang-related murder in 2004.

Molfetta said Johnson – who sat smiling and chatting in the ninth floor courtroom during the opening statements – wants to receive the death penalty rather than a sentence of life without parole. Johnson feels that life on Death Row at San Quentin prison would be preferable to life in a maximum security prison, Molfetta said in an interview.

Lamb and Rump were both convicted of Miller's murder in 2007. Lamb, the triggerman, was sentenced to death. Rump got life without parole.

Johnson, who has a Mohawk style haircut, was not charged with killing Miller until 2007 when he got on the witness stand in Lamb and Rump's trial and testified that he acted alone in the execution-style slaying.

But Baytieh told the jury today that Johnson lied on the witness stand in order to make himself a "martyr" for his gang.

Miller was murdered 13 months after Fox 11 News profiled Public Enemy Number One in February 2001, focusing on a pending criminal case against two top leaders of the Huntington Beach-based gang. Miller, who was called "Scottish" by the gang, appeared on the episodes with his voice and face disguised or blurred out. By his colleagues immediately identified him by his distinctive tattoos and his unique pit bull.

The jury in Superior Court Judge Frank F. Fasel's court must first decide if Johnson is guilty of special circumstances murder before it hears additional evidence in a penalty phase to decide if he should receive the death penalty or life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Johnson also has three prior strike convictions for a 1983 residential burglary, a 1989 robbery, and for beating an inmate in prison in 1995.

http://www.ocregister.com/articles/johnson-gang-miller-2597140-murder-death

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Chernin, Other Ex-Murdoch Executives Shaping Comcast

Friendly fascist Peter Chernin

By Brett Pulley | Bloomberg | Oct. 21, 2009

Oct. 21 (Bloomberg) -- Peter Chernin, who recently stepped down as Rupert Murdoch’s second-in-command, tops a growing list of former News Corp. executives shaping Comcast Corp.’s effort to become a major entertainment company.

At least five former News Corp. executives are involved with Philadelphia-based Comcast, the largest U.S. cable TV service. Chernin, who started his own film and television production company in July, is consulting on the company’s efforts to buy a controlling stake in General Electric Co.’s NBC Universal, according to people with knowledge of his role.

“That’s who’s available,” said Laura Martin, an analyst at Soleil Securities in Pasadena, California, who rates Comcast shares “hold” and doesn’t own them. “There are only three people who can fix the NBC network: Peter Chernin, Bob Iger and Les Moonves, and Iger and Moonves are not available.”

Chernin has a long record running entertainment businesses, like Walt Disney Co. Chief Executive Officer Iger and Moonves, CEO of CBS Corp., Martin said. He was News Corp.’s chief operating officer and Murdoch’s No. 2 for 12 years when he left in July.

Chernin is also friends with Comcast CEO Brian Roberts. They own summer homes near each other on Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts. Chernin and Stephen Burke, Comcast’s chief operating officer, have homes next to each other along the ski slopes of Montana.

News Corp. Veterans

In addition to Chernin, Comcast is being advised by Peter Liguori, 49, the former head of Fox Broadcasting Co. who oversaw entertainment at that network, according to people with knowledge of his role.

Peter Liguori

Liguori, who left News Corp. in March in a management shake-up, became a Comcast consultant prior to the cable company’s pursuit of New York-based NBC Universal, said the people, who insisted on anonymity because the relationships haven’t been announced publicly.

News Corp. spokeswoman Julie Henderson declined to comment. Liguori, reached by e-mail, also declined to comment.

Comcast’s head of programming, Jeff Shell, arrived in May 2005 from News Corp.’s Fox cable networks, where he oversaw the FX, Fox Sports and National Geographic cable channels. Jamie Davis, the president of Versus, a Comcast sports network, was an 11-year News Corp. veteran prior to joining Comcast in 2005. Neal Tiles, the president of Comcast’s G4 video-game channel, was senior vice president of marketing at Fox Sports.

Network Revenue

Comcast fell 25 cents to $15.11 at 4 p.m. New York time in Nasdaq Stock Market trading. The stock has declined 10 percent since Sept. 30, when the company’s interest in NBC Universal was first reported. GE, based in Fairfield, Connecticut, lost 5 cents to $15.53 on the New York Stock Exchange and is down 4.1 percent this year.

“I don’t think it’s coincidental,” said Jack Myers, a New York-based media consultant. “I think it speaks to the lack of experience within Comcast. They have to get a real understanding of where the network business is today.”

Revenue from cable networks including E! Entertainment Television and the Golf Channel contributed 4.3 percent of Comcast’s $8.94 billion in second-quarter revenue, or $384 million, and $65 million in operating profit. The company’s flagship cable service earned $1.91 billion on $8.45 billion in sales providing television, Internet and phone service.

With about 25 percent of the U.S. cable subscriber market, Comcast has called obtaining programming assets a priority.

“Content channels are good businesses,” Burke said at a September investor conference in Los Angeles. “We wouldn’t be doing our job if we didn’t try to figure out a way to get bigger in those businesses.”

No Permanent Role

News Corp. veterans including Chernin, 58, may encourage Comcast to manage NBC’s cable and broadcast operations as Murdoch has. ...

To contact the reporter on this story: Brett Pulley in New York at bpulley@bloomberg.net

FULL STORY

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=a5Toa.vd51ng

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Documents Detail Conditions Found at Secret C.I.A. Jails

Also see: "The Suppressed Fact: 100 Deaths by U.S. Torture" and "NYT Editorial re Torture: 'The Cover-Up Continues'"

By SCOTT SHANE and CHARLIE SAVAGE | NY Times | October 31, 2009

F.B.I. agents who arrived at a secret C.I.A. jail overseas in September 2002 found prisoners “manacled to the ceiling and subjected to blaring music around the clock,” and a C.I.A. official wrote a list of questions for interrogators including “How close is each technique to the ‘rack and screw,’ ” according to hundreds of pages of partly declassified documents released Friday by the Justice Department. ...
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/01/us/01justice.html?_r=1

CONTINUED

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