Corporate Thieves Run, but Cannot Hide

[An interesting exposure of the secret exemptions which large-scale capitalists and government officials have used to hide their monstrous accumulations of wealth in the midst of global hunger and poverty.  The embarassing (for capitalists and their state machineries) article and the responses to it, try to make it appear that these grotesque accumulations are exceptions, and not the rule, for the capitalist system.  And there are efforts to make it appear that capitalist governments can clean up these “blemishes” on their system.  The people will take note of these as the barely exposed “tips of the iceberg” of the crimes against humanity, requiring  the justice of people’s socialist revolution–not the fantasy of justice from the perpetrators, co-conspirators, and mouthpieces, of the criminal capitalist system. — Frontlines ed.]

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Leaks reveal secrets of the rich who hide cash offshore

Exclusive: Offshore financial industry leak exposes identities of 1,000s of holders of anonymous wealth from around the world

David Leigh, The Guardian, Wednesday 3 April 2013

[The British Virgin Islands, the world’s leading offshore haven used by an array of government officials and rich families to hide their wealth. Photograph: Duncan Mcnicol/Getty Images]

Millions of internal records have leaked from Britain’s offshore financial industry, exposing for the first time the identities of thousands of holders of anonymous wealth from around the world, from presidents to plutocrats, the daughter of a notorious dictator and a British millionaire accused of concealing assets from his ex-wife.

The leak of 2m emails and other documents, mainly from the offshore haven of the British Virgin Islands (BVI), has the potential to cause a seismic shock worldwide to the booming offshore trade, with a former chief economist at McKinsey estimating that wealthy individuals may have as much as $32tn (£21tn) stashed in overseas havens.

In France, Jean-Jacques Augier, President François Hollande’s campaign co-treasurer and close friend, has been forced to publicly identify his Chinese business partner. It emerges as Hollande is mired in financial scandal because his former budget minister concealed a Swiss bank account for 20 years and repeatedly lied about it.

In Mongolia, the country’s former finance minister and deputy speaker of its parliament says he may have to resign from politics as a result of this investigation.

But the two can now be named for the first time because of their use of companies in offshore havens, particularly in the British Virgin Islands, where owners’ identities normally remain secret.

Iraq, the American Mission, from the Beginning — “Falluja – The Hidden Massacre”

The Massacre that took place in the city of Falluja in 2004 and how the authorities respond to that.

The Legacy of the American ‘Mission’ — “Iraq: Living With No Future”

By Dahr Jamail, TomDispatch.com

26 March, 2013

Back then, everybody was writing about Iraq, but it’s surprising how few Americans, including reporters, paid much attention to the suffering of Iraqis. Today, Iraq is in the news again. The words, the memorials, the retrospectives are pouring out, and again the suffering of Iraqis isn’t what’s on anyone’s mind. This was why I returned to that country before the recent 10th anniversary of the Bush administration’s invasion and why I feel compelled to write a few grim words about Iraqis today.

But let’s start with then. It’s April 8, 2004, to be exact, and I’m inside a makeshift medical center in the heart of Fallujah while that predominantly Sunni city is under siege by American forces. I’m alternating between scribbling brief observations in my notebook and taking photographs of the wounded and dying women and children being brought into the clinic.

A woman suddenly arrives, slapping her chest and face in grief, wailing hysterically as her husband carries in the limp body of their little boy. Blood is trickling down one of his dangling arms. In a few minutes, he’ll be dead. This sort of thing happens again and again.

Over and over, I watch speeding cars hop the curb in front of this dirty clinic with next to no medical resources and screech to a halt. Grief-stricken family members pour out, carrying bloodied relatives — women and children — gunned down by American snipers.

One of them, an 18-year-old girl has been shot through the neck by what her family swears was an American sniper. All she can manage are gurgling noises as doctors work frantically to save her from bleeding to death. Her younger brother, an undersized child of 10 with a gunshot wound in his head, his eyes glazed and staring into space, continually vomits as doctors race to keep him alive. He later dies while being transported to a hospital in Baghdad.

CP of Greece (m-l): “The Zionists Will Pay for the Crimes They Commit”

*Communist Party of Greece (marxist-leninist) Press Statement*

*The Zionists will pay for the crimes they commit!*

The international criminals, leaders of the Israeli state, have hit again!
They have proved once more that they are equal successors of the Nazi-fascist crimes of the 20th century.

They murdered in cold blood unarmed supporters of the Palestinians’ struggle after they captured their ships, among them two Greek ships, which carried humanitarian aid and attempted to break the siege of Gaza Strip. They arrested hundreds members of the Free Gaza Movement, injured dozens of them and captured all the ships.

Not as common pirates, though! For the contemporary pirates, for example, on Somalia’s coasts and elsewhere have proved that they respect human life. They committed it as absolute sub-humans, and serial killer-terrorists. A modern Nuremberg trial is what they should be facing.