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Unaccountable Hackers: The CIA, Vengeance And Joshua Schulte

The release of the Vault 7 files in the spring of 2017 in a series of 26 disclosures, detailing the hacking tools of the US Central Intelligence Agency, was one of the more impressive achievements of the WikiLeaks publishing organisation. As WikiLeaks stated at the time, the hacking component of the agency’s operations had become so sizeable it began to dwarf the operations of the National Security Agency.  “The CIA had created, in effect, its ‘own NSA’ with even less accountability and without publicly answering the question as to whether such a massive budgetary spend on duplicating the capabilities of a rival agency could be justified.”

US DEA Used Criminals To Spy On, Destabilize Venezuela, Mexico, Bolivia

Numerous reports in major media outlets have documented how the US government has used the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) in order to spy on and try to destabilize left-wing governments in Latin America. DEA meddling schemes have targeted Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro, Bolivia’s former President Evo Morales, and Mexico’s President Andrés Manuel López Obrador. In these scandals, the DEA has collaborated with known criminals, including drug traffickers and money launderers, to launch sting operations against leftist politicians. The Associated Press revealed this February that the DEA “sent undercover operatives into Venezuela to surreptitiously record and build drug-trafficking cases against the country’s leadership”.

US Government Treats Use Of Privacy Tools As Criminal Activity

In Espionage Act prosecutions involving leaks, attorneys at the United States (DOJ) consistently treat the use of privacy tools as evidence of criminality. This tendency should alarm journalists and news media organizations that rely on such tools for newsgathering. A jury convicted former CIA programmer Joshua Schulte of disclosing CIA cyber warfare materials to WikiLeaks in July 2022. Schulte is scheduled to be sentenced in the U.S. Southern District Court of New York on February 1. The U.S. government’s sentencing memo [PDF] asserted that “between April 18 and May 5, 2016, Schulte took a number of steps to transmit the stolen CIA files to WikiLeaks.

An Ex-CIA Agent Looks Back At 22 Years Of Torture At Guantanamo Bay

January 11 marks the 22nd anniversary of the founding of the prison component of the U.S. military base at Guantánamo Cuba. The U.S. military has been at Guantánamo for decades, of course, but the idea to use the isolated base as a prison where men — and in some cases boys — who had never been formally accused of a crime could be held forever, came from the office of Vice President Dick Cheney in 2002. In the intervening years, presidents and members of Congress of both parties have ignored civil rights, civil liberties and human rights to keep this abomination open. It’s up to the rest of us to demand its destruction.

20 Years Too Many, Free Simon Trinidad Now!

On January 2, 2004, under the orders of the U.S. government and the CIA, Ecuadorian and Colombian forces kidnapped and arrested Colombian revolutionary Simon Trinidad. 20 years detained and imprisoned is 20 too many. That needs to change immediately, and conditions are better than ever for activists in the U.S. and Colombia to push for his freedom. A member of the revolutionary organization and army of the people, the FARC, since 1987, Trinidad was a leading thinker and peace negotiator. Acting in that role, Trinidad’s and the FARC’s peace-seeking efforts have been routinely sabotaged by the U.S. government and the far-right Colombian oligarchy.

CIA Loses Motion To Dismiss Lawsuit Against It

Lead attorney Richard Roth of The Roth Law Firm, along with plaintiffs Margaret Ratner Kunstler, a civil rights lawyer, and media lawyer Deborah Hrbek, held a ZOOM press conference Friday, Dec. 22 at 1:00 pm EST to answer journalists’ questions regarding their lawsuit against the C.I.A. for allegedly violating their Fourth Amendment rights. Judge John G. Koeltl of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York in Manhattan rejected a C.I.A. motion to dismiss the lawsuit brought by four American citizens alleging they were wrongfully spied on while visiting Julian Assange at the Ecuadorian embassy in London in an illicit scheme to seize the plaintiff’s electronic devices.

Update On Lawsuit Against Alleged CIA Spying On Assange Visitors

A United States court held an extraordinary hearing on November 16, where a judge carefully considered a lawsuit against the CIA and former CIA director Mike Pompeo for their alleged role in spying on American attorneys and journalists who visited WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. Judge John Koeltl of the Southern District of New York pushed back when Assistant U.S. Attorney Jean-David Barnea refused to confirm or deny that the CIA had targeted Americans without obtaining a warrant. He also invited attorneys for the Americans to update the lawsuit so that claims of privacy violations explicitly dealt with the government’s lack of a warrant.

A Look At Assange From Inside The CIA, State Department And US Military

You may have heard of Julian Assange, but chances are that you haven’t heard about him from inside the CIA, State Department and US military. In this special episode, Eleanor first talks with former CIA counterterrorism officer and whistleblower John Kiriakou about what Assange would face if extradited to the United States, as Kiriakou himself has sat in the very same court that awaits Assange. Kiriakou also discusses the CIA’s rabid stance against Assange and inside workings that allowed the CIA to plan Assange’s murder with total abandon and without any accountability. Next up, former Marine Corps captain and State Dept officer Matthew Hoh joins the show again to walk us through exactly what classified information is, and why that’s important in understanding the files that wikileaks shared. Matthew debunks the popular trope that the Wikileaks publications put any US lives at risk, pointing out that the true harm was to the empire itself.

A Maidan 2.0 Color Revolution Looms In Georgia

On September 29, in a disclosure ignored by the entire Western media, the US government-run Radio Free Europe’s Russian-language portal Slobodna Evropa revealed that three foreign operatives had been summoned for questioning by the Georgian Security Service, for allegedly assisting opposition elements prepare a Maidan-style regime change scenario in Tbilisi. The operatives were staffers of the Center for Applied Nonviolent Actions and Strategies (CANVAS) and had been “temporarily staying in Georgia.” CANVAS is a US government-funded organization with close CIA ties which has trained regime change activists from Eastern Europe to Venezuela.

Unreliable Sources: News On North Korea, Brought To You By The CIA

Remember when Kim Jong-un died? Back in 2020, corporate media was awash with reports that the North Korean leader had died or was in a “vegetative state.” Yet, just days after the media frenzy, he appeared alive and well. So how did the likes of CNN, MSNBC and The Economist get the story so disastrously wrong? By relying on hearsay from outlets funded by the CIA cutout organization, the National Endowment for Democracy (NED). As The Washington Post explained, rumors about Kim’s health first hit the headlines after The Daily NK, a South Korean website known for “gossip and rumors,” published a report based on an anonymous source.

I Was The Only US Official Imprisoned Over The Torture Program

I was the only person associated with the CIA’s torture program who was prosecuted and imprisoned.  I never tortured anybody. But I was charged with five felonies, including three counts of espionage, for telling ABC News and the New York Times that the CIA was torturing its prisoners, that torture was official U.S.  government policy, and that the policy had been approved by the president himself.  I served 23 months in a federal prison.  It was worth every minute. There is certainly no easy fix to this situation.  The New York Times reported in March 2022 that prosecutors had opened talks with attorneys representing Khalid Shaikh Muhammad and four co-defendants to negotiate a plea agreement that would drop the death penalty in exchange for sentences of life without parole and promises that the men would be allowed to remain in Guantanamo.

Guantanamo Bay Detainee Sues Former Psychologists In New Torture Case

A man tortured two decades ago by the CIA for his suspected role as a terrorist has sued two former Spokane psychologists, who made millions of dollars from the government for developing the techniques used during the brutal interrogations. Zayn Al-Abidin Muhammad Husayn, also known as Abu Zubaydah, says he underwent extreme torture, including prolonged extreme solitary confinement, waterboarding, mock executions and lack of medical attention that cost him his left eye. Zubaydah is suing psychologists and former CIA contractors Bruce Jessen and James Mitchell, who he says tortured him.

Leaked: CIA Front Preparing Color Revolution In Indonesia

Documents passed anonymously to MintPress News reveal the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), a notorious CIA front, is laying the foundations for a color revolution in Indonesia. In February 2024, citizens will elect their President, Vice President, and both legislative chambers. Current maverick leader Joko Widodo, widely beloved by Indonesians, is ineligible for a third term, and NED is preparing to seize power in the wake of his departure. This operation is conducted despite the leaks indicating Jakarta’s foremost intelligence agency has expressly warned U.S. officials to stay put. The paper trail is a stunning insight into how NED operates behind the scenes, from which obvious inferences can be drawn about its activities elsewhere, past and present.

Playbook For RCMP’s Wet’suwet’en Raids Provided By Former CIA Director

The RCMP’s Community-Industry Response Group (C-IRG), a special unit that polices Indigenous resistance against resource extraction in British Columbia, has adopted the playbook from former CIA director David Petraeus, according to a presentation at a summit held on Wet’suwet’en territory this week. Kai Nagata, communications director at Dogwood BC, spoke at the third annual Peace and Unity Summit for Wet’suwet’en and Gitxsan hereditary chiefs, elders and allies from human rights organizations from around the world. Looking around the room, those in attendance sat in shock at what they were hearing and seeing.

CIA Fingerprints Are All Over Brazil’s Indigenous Genocide

From April 1964 to March 1985, a military junta ruled Brazil with an iron fist. Its crimes against humanity throughout this period were extensive, including institutionalized torture, imprisonment, forced disappearances and mass murder. Typically, the victims were political opponents of the regime, although the country’s indigenous population was a specific, dedicated target. In most cases, their crime was objecting to economic “reform” projects that destroyed their homes or simply living in the wrong place at the wrong time. With the backing and direction of the World Bank, the junta forcibly displaced indigenous people and desecrated their lands to extract valuable natural resources for Western capital.

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Urgent End Of Year Fundraising Campaign

Online donations are back! 

Keep independent media alive. 

Due to the attacks on our fiscal sponsor, we were unable to raise funds online for nearly two years.  As the bills pile up, your help is needed now to cover the monthly costs of operating Popular Resistance.

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