Cyprus-Forum.com

[Paphitis]

thats bullshit and you know it. if they were as isolated as you say how come they are so strong. especially with their amercian weapons. they have local support. it is also the saudimericans that are supplying them boy dont you worry your little mind now. america go home boys.

No it's not bullshit at all.

My wife gets invited to many things and one event she had the honour of attending on behalf of Ministers in absentia was the Vietnamese Veterans Association and the Vietnamese diaspora. You got to speak to them about their suffering and plight at the hands of the VC. It was brutal. Stories of torture, slavery, executions and genocide much like Bosnia or Rwanda.

My dad was a member of the Vietnamese Vets and now there is also another Cypriot National Guardsman who is a member because he suffers from the the same issues they have such as PTSD.

That is the price of our abandonment. Hundreds of thousands killed and millions of refugees.

The USA and Australia had the support of millions of Vietnamese.

[Tim Drayton]

More doubts being voiced about the Iraqi army, given the way they abandoned Ramadi. It is not what I want to hear at all, but we have to face facts, and they are that things are not going the right way.

(CNN) -The Iraqi army's willingness to let Ramadi fall to ISIS "surprised all of us," Deputy Prime Minister Saleh al-Mutlaq told CNN on Monday.

"It's not clear for us why such a unit, which was supposed to be trained by the Americans for years, and supposed to be one of the best units in the army, would withdraw from Ramadi in such a way."

"This is not the army that we are willing to see or we are expecting to see."

Al-Mutlaq, a Sunni who leads his own party and often criticizes Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, spoke with CNN's Frederik Pleitgen on "Amanpour," a day after scathing criticism of the Iraqi military by U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter.

http://edition.cnn.com/2015/05/25/world ... en-mutlaq/

[Tim Drayton]

Union members pay the cost of ISIS conquest of Ramadi

25 May 2015, By Owen Tudor

When ISIS takes over a city like Ramadi, near Baghdad in Iraq, the news bulletins are full of discussion about the future of Iraq, who’s to blame for the ISIS advance, how to reverse it and the horror facing the Sunni inhabitants, . We often forget that the human cost includes trade union members and activists, who have been targeted wherever ISIS takes over. Trade unionists are among the first to be targeted because they are secular, democratic and answer to a different authority – workers’ solidarity – to that promoted by ISIS.

Tonight we’ve heard from the Iraqi trade union movement that seven members of gas and oil unions in Ramadi have been executed by ISIS. We have sent our condolences, sympathy and solidarity to their unions, their colleagues and families.

Our dead colleagues are:
• Salih Salman, president of the oil union in al- Nabar province
• Mohammed Ahmed Mohammed, head of the union committee at the gas factory in Ramadi
• Nafih Yahor Hussein, union member
• Monier Farhan Mohammed, union member
• Mustafa Naji Abdullah, union member
• Hamid Jihad Mohammed, union member
• Moufagh Yahor al-Dilimi, member

It’s always important to remember that, whatever trade unionists face in countries like ours, in other parts of the world they pay for their activism with their lives. An injury to one is an injury to all.

http://strongerunions.org/2015/05/25/un ... of-ramadi/

[Lordo]

this is the reason why the amercians supported them, they hate the unions just as much.

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/06/who-killed-american-unions/258239/

[Tim Drayton]

A couple of conclusions from an interesting article:

Given everything we know about the Islamic State, continuing to slowly bleed it, through air strikes and proxy warfare, appears the best of bad military options. Neither the Kurds nor the Shia will ever subdue and control the whole Sunni heartland of Syria and Iraq—they are hated there, and have no appetite for such an adventure anyway. But they can keep the Islamic State from fulfilling its duty to expand. And with every month that it fails to expand, it resembles less the conquering state of the Prophet Muhammad than yet another Middle Eastern government failing to bring prosperity to its people.

...

Properly contained, the Islamic State is likely to be its own undoing. No country is its ally, and its ideology ensures that this will remain the case. The land it controls, while expansive, is mostly uninhabited and poor. As it stagnates or slowly shrinks, its claim that it is the engine of God’s will and the agent of apocalypse will weaken, and fewer believers will arrive. And as more reports of misery within it leak out, radical Islamist movements elsewhere will be discredited: No one has tried harder to implement strict Sharia by violence. This is what it looks like.

http://www.theatlantic.com/features/arc ... ts/384980/

[Lordo]

these are repeated failed policies of america to try to dominate the world by pretending to protect it. we were told if left unchecked the communists would overrun asia and beyond. after millions of deaths caused by american bombing they eventually left vietnam. all that was said was lies and double lies. no they are protecting us from the islamists. since the 50s they tried to control the middle east by supporting dictators and overthrowing legitimately elected governments to serve their own interests. it is now in a total mess. brother killing brother and neighbour killing neighbour. the sooner they leave the middle east the sooner the problem will be resolved. isil could not survive 5 minutes in the middle east if the sunis did not support it. america has to stop taking sides. yanks piss off home to mummy where you belong. stop drone attacks. obama should be ashamed of himself. what a crook.

[kurupetos]

these are repeated failed policies of america to try to dominate the world by pretending to protect it. we were told if left unchecked the communists would overrun asia and beyond. after millions of deaths caused by american bombing they eventually left vietnam. all that was said was lies and double lies. no they are protecting us from the islamists. since the 50s they tried to control the middle east by supporting dictators and overthrowing legitimately elected governments to serve their own interests. it is now in a total mess. brother killing brother and neighbour killing neighbour. the sooner they leave the middle east the sooner the problem will be resolved. isil could not survive 5 minutes in the middle east if the sunis did not support it. america has to stop taking sides. yanks piss off home to mummy where you belong. stop drone attacks. obama should be ashamed of himself. what a crook.

You are next.

[Tim Drayton]

Iraq has announced the launch of a military operation to drive Islamic State out of the western Anbar province, where the extremists captured the provincial capital, Ramadi, this month.

Iraqi state TV reported the start of the operation, in which troops will be backed by Shia and Sunni paramilitary forces, but did not provide further details.

A spokesman for Iraq’s Shia militias said the operation will “not last for a long time” and that Iraqi forces have surrounded the provincial capital, Ramadi, from three sides.

Ahmed al-Assadi, who is also a member of parliament, told reporters that new weapons are being used in the battle “that will surprise the enemy”.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/m ... sis-ramadi

Here goes. Keeping our fingers crossed.

[Lordo]

rhe xherodjehalo go away.

somebody described these people like a baloon. you squeeze one side and they pop up from another side. they will just dispensary and appear somewhere else.

the solution is staring you in the face, there is only one way to solve this. BBF with sunis able to run their own government.

[repulsewarrior]

...that's funny! Cyprus, the cradle of civilization, peace in the Middle East; what a template (if the politicians don't screw up).