Anyway, who ever said NATO was the world community? It's the North American Treaty Organization, meant to fight against half the world by design....and therefore by definition NOT the world community. That's what makes it especially lame.

I assume you meant North *Atlantic* Treaty Organization.

once again krellin showing he doesn't know what he's talking about.

Ban Ki Moon... you know, the UN Secretary General. Have you heard of him? ;P

as an aside [[tank]] [[fleet]] i want to be able to use the symbols for tanks and fleets in posts... likely better than 5

krellin, I think the author is referring to a tendency for the press and the West to refer to themselves as "the international community" when really, well, it just means the West.

However I think it is fair to use the term for the West, depending on the context. Ban Ki Moon's quote is a stretch, but I can see why he would think that way - when you're talking to a bunch of world leaders all day about Afghanistan it can be easy to forget about those not present.

I agree that it is a problem when people too flippantly refer to NATO or the West as "the international community."

The contexts in which I think it's use is appropriate is when more than one supranational organization is involved. Like in Somalia, with the AU and UN - that's the international community, even if it's not every state in the world and even if some states oppose what's being done.

Just like if China, Russia, and the Arab League invaded Iran, that would be "an international intervention" even if the US protested.

ok, another article, this one's interesting: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-18201077

from a much more western perspective... Firstly, i'd just like to point out, if at some point when the British Empire was still the worlds biggest super-power (1870s say) they were running air strikes out of Canada against suspected (mexican) militants in Arizona, and running special forces operations to kill military targets, I am sure the American position would be pretty extreme (even compared with the Pakistani one, where they arrested someone for violating Pakistani law... i mean, that's what governments do, right?)

meanwhile pravda isn't talking about it, but the voice of russia says this:
http://english.ruvr.ru/2012_05_24/75839236/

basically the same story, which i'm glad to hear, though they mention the US oppression of Pakistan which isn't anywhere to be found in the BBC article...

meanwhile the CNN article gets the same story: http://edition.cnn.com/2012/05/23/world/asia/pakistan-bin-laden-doctor/index.html
for some reason doesn't mention the 33million USD in aid to pakistan which the senate cut off in responce...

The only page I go to anymore - solidnet.org

The western media is completely rancid with stark raving mad lies. There isn't a worthwhile media voice out there.

Oh crap, the page expired :(

Oh....I know it's officially the North *ATLANTIC* Treaty Organization.....but seriously...without the North AMERICAN country at the heart of it....it would not exist.

sigh....it's too bad people can't accept sarcasm and the intentional "really don't care...I will mock this now..." attitude that I have, instead of taking me seriously. lol

Ultimately it boils down to whether you view your first duty as to humanity or to your country. This dude clearly doesn't value Pakistan over the human race as a whole, and I would have done just the same in his position, even as an American.

Technically speaking he may have broken the law but if you think states punish every law breaker they are made aware of you have another thing coming.

People who have some slavish devotion the letter of the law really bug me. This is why I could never enter the legal system - too much bullshit like this.

Indeed, where was the letter of the law when Pakistani government officials knew of Bin Laden's location, a known mass murderer?

It was Pakistan's blind eye to the letter of the law that necessitated illegal action to bring the pig to justice in the first place. Ideally he would have been tried in court.

krellin you have to realize that if your intended sarcasm won't come across like that on the internet.... so yeah

@Atomic - First of all - who are you anyway? And why do i give a fuck about you? The only thing I *ever* see from you is the occassional post attacking me....but never an original thought or a real contribution to the discussion...so...uh....yeah. STFU until you grow a pair and few curlies and are man enough to have an opinion you are willing to express.

Second, I think the very nature of my initial post...which was more directed at mocking Putin then any serious attempt to actually discuss the retarded, useless article should have given anyone with two brain cells to rub together enough information to grasp that I wasn't really attempting to comment on the article. i.e. I was trolling, dumbass. Now shew....shew....go away, you silly 'tard. Next time, try expressing an actual opinion instead of just chasing me around attacking me. I'm starting to think you have a hard-on for me...and sorry, home-boy...I don't go that way.

Krellin:

"My post was only made to mock Putin, not expressing my opinion... All you do is try to mock me, so try to express an opinion."

Drunks are funny

the word is "shoo."

dumbass

Honestly, just scanning the headlines of pravada.ru should tell you that it isn't an ideal news source, with so many articles on UFO's and the curious "Jimmy Carter - Mass Murderer" (which gives more space to Carter's facial features than accusations that he helped prop up dictatorial and genocidal regimes).

That said, the article orathaic originally posted is pretty good. I agree with most of what it says except for much of its comments concerning Libya and the random discrediting of the entire UN near the end.

What most annoys me about some 'liberal' news sources (granted, this is not a perfect example) is how they somehow manage to make something that is very true sound unbelievable or suspicious

If you want decent liberal news sources try FSTV (https://www.freespeech.org/) and Link TV (http://www.linktv.org/). I haven't had much time to see them in the last few years, but I can't imagine that they've changed that much.

@thucy, have you a source to backup the ascertian that pakistan knowingly and illegally protected Bin Laden?

Anything to prove the knew he was there.

Any pakistani laws you think he may have broken (or an extradition treaty between Pakitstan and the US - though i suspect the US wouldn't like to have their soildiers threatened with extradition to Pakistan for the murder whenever a civilian is accidentally targeted...)

My point is that the doctor did the right thing, knowing it was illegal. I suppose the system has to punish him, but it's always too bad to see people fall victim to our unfortunate, but necessary, rigid systems.

I have not researched it at all, ora, so it could go either way. The appearance is that some in Pakistan knew and hid him, and others assisted the Americans, and some from each side pretended to be on the other to get in the good graces of the West and the hardliner voters in Pakistan, respectively. It's all gray, really, but it doesn't change that it was pretty fishy.

From what i gathered it is entirely possible the doctor performed fake medical practices in order to provide dna samples to the CIA; most likely in exchange for money. (nowhere did i see claims thay he actually knew what exactly they were looking for - hypothetically there is no reason to assume the CIA would have wanted to spread information about what they were looking for, so it is entirely possible he didn't know)

In that case, arresting a doctor for lying to his patients to provide a fake vaccine in exchange for foreign intelligence agency monies; selling genetic samples from a local town. I'm pretty sure i want the relevant law to prosecute any doctor willing to do such...

I admit this is a hypothetical situation and i'll never know all the facts.

As for the protection offered.

IF he was being hid in a government secret compound in an attempt to shelther while not evoking a US invasion, i'm pretty sure that breaks no laws.

The whole issue with Pakistan and bin Laden is simply not reported in the mainstream media of the United States. The U. S. has been killing civilians, border guards and members of the Pakistani army on Pakistani soil for years now. First it was by sending helicopters over, sometimes even landing troops, then by more long-distance means such as missiles and drone strikes. All the while, the U. S. has as a rule refused to comment when these reports come out, or otherwise reported all the deaths as Taliban (or even al Qaeda) militants. While I'm sure it is true that some of these strikes have in fact killed a group of Taliban from now and then, reports of innocent men, women and children have pored out continuously from Pakistan, reaching U. S. news sources as extremely short clippits that always say the same thing ('civilians reported killed by U. S. strike', 'DoD refuses to comment/DoD'), with there virtually never being a mention of previous incidents and only rarely a mention of the effects these killings have on the Pakistani war effort against the Taliban (that tribal outrage in regions held by the Taliban dangerously adds to the Taliban's support and legitimacy). At one point, in response to a particularly devastating helicopter raid, a high-ranking official in the Pakistani army threatened that he would shoot down any U. S. helicopter that violated Pakistani airspace again. This was several years ago now, but you'd think it would be an important enough incident for me to be able to dig up again – nope. Around that time, and I don't know if this is related, you started hearing more reports about missile strikes than Apache helicopters; before long drones strikes were being reported. The Pakistani government has repeatedly, monotonously and incessantly denounced these violations of its sovereignty and massacres of its citizens (4 hours ago: http://uk.reuters.com/article/2012/06/04/uk-pakistan-usa-drones-idUKBRE8530TF20120604), as well as lamented the counter-productive effects the attacks were having on the ground. Pakistani civilians, of course, are no less outraged. When the Navy SEALS killed Osama bin Laden last year the initial reaction of Pakistan was positive. Then came the accusations leveled by the States on Pakistan for failing to have arrested him years ago, with some even claiming that the Pakistani government tried to hide him. I wouldn't be very surprised if somebody in the ISI had known about bin Laden's whereabouts, but that the government was propping him up is both ludicrous and extremely insulting. The Pakistanis immediately lash back, condemning the transgression on their soil. Then, last November, the United States kills no less than 24 Pakistani servicemen in a Pakistani military base. That's several months after the Osama bin Laden was finally swept aside and no less than ten years after the initial invasion of Afghanistan. Pakistan has since been extremely hostile, at least rhetorically, to the United States. I wonder why.

orathaic: I haven't researched it either, but an article I skimmed claimed he was unaware that he was tracking bin Laden, yet it still praised his service to humanity.

In a perfect world the trial would be about whether he knew he was helping catch bin Laden. If he was just doing espionage for cash from the US, that is different, yes.

However my gut says that Pakistan is prosecuting this guy to abate those who are pissed about the American intervention to kill bin Laden, not to mention those who are upset that Pakistan allowed bin Laden to be killed. There are plenty of those too, in Pakistan.

In an ideal worldmhe court system in Pakistan would be trying to prove that he had broken Pakistani law.

I imagine providing information to the US either for money or ideological reasons is a violation of the law (possibly treason) though personally i'm more offended by the apparent fraud committed by a doctor misleading many local residents.

Whether what he did was morally right/wrong is not a question i'm claim to address.

@thucy, you may be right, but it think it is cynical to think that all actions at all levels are influenced by wha is politically convienant for the powers that be.

Its a shame for the doctor, but Pakistan needed a scapegoat.

But that original website you posted must be run by a lunatic, orathaic. I read another article which claimed that the US ran the Taliban, that the Occupy movement isn't real, that males are inherently superior to females and basically that America is evil and everywhere and in control of everything.

So I went to another article, which claimed that the Greek crisis could be the start of Europe's salvation. I stopped after that one.

goldfinger0303: One person's lunatic is a Russian's propaganda machine.