CIA Chief Pompeo Awards Saudis with Medal for Combating Terrorism
Dispatches from
STEPHEN LENDMAN
Y ou can’t make this stuff up. Truth is stranger than fiction. On February 10 in Riyadh, CIA director Mike Pompeo awarded the Middle East’s leading Arab state proliferator of state terrorism at home and abroad with the George Tenet Medal for its “intelligence work in the fight against terrorism.”
Tenet was CIA director from July 1997 to July 2004. His rap sheet includes involvement in Clinton’s rape of Yugoslavia, GW Bush’s aggression on Afghanistan and Iraq, along with establishing and running America’s global torture prisons, Guantanamo the tip of the iceberg. The agency prioritizes covert extrajudicial killings and other dirty tricks, operating beyond checks and balances, unaccountable to Congress, mindless of the public interest.
It’s incompatible with fundamental freedoms. The late Chalmers Johnson said its existence “shorten(s) the life of the American republic.”
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Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Nayef, serving as deputy prime minister and minister of interior received the George Tenet Medal. Other Saudi princes and officials attended the ceremony. In accepting the award, prince Nayef turned truth on its head, saying “Saudi Arabia rejects and denounces strongly terrorism in all its forms and manifestations. The kingdom has been keen to combat terrorism based on its conviction that terrorism has no identity and no religion, and from its belief that the terrorists are committing these acts stemming from their deviant ideologies and evil thought.”
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Israel and Saudi Arabia are the region’s leading sponsors of terrorism. Riyadh’s absolute monarchal rule is despotic, lawless and brutal. It’s a police state practicing state terrorism internally and regionally. Along with America, it’s the leading backer of ISIS and other Middle East terrorist groups, responsible for the rape and destruction of Syria. For nearly two years, Riyadh waged genocidal war on Yemen, responsible for tens of thousands of deaths, mostly civilians, far greater numbers than officially reported – millions of Yemenis endangered by war, related violence, preventable diseases and starvation.
The kingdom is a close US ally. One rogue state supports another.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
STEPHEN LENDMAN lives in Chicago. He can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net. His new book as editor and contributor is titled "Flashpoint in Ukraine: US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III." ( http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html ) Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.
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