Negroponte Possible Ambassador to Baghdad

[Barrett808]

Negroponte Possible Ambassador to Baghdad
By BARRY SCHWEID, AP Diplomatic Writer

WASHINGTON - John D. Negroponte, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations who played a central role in trying to win support for war with Iraq, is emerging as the leading candidate for the sensitive job of ambassador to Baghdad.

Several Bush administration officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Negroponte's nomination would be announced soon, although others cautioned a final decision on an envoy to Iraq had not been made.

The administration plans to restore Iraqi self-rule by July 1, though will keep U.S. soldiers there.

The U.S. Embassy will be housed temporarily in a palace that belonged to deposed President Saddam Hussein and when fully manned will be the largest in the world.

(more)

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040413/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/iraq_ambassador&cid=542&ncid=1480

[ret5hd]

1. well, the only silver lining to this that i can see...

is maybe south america and the caribbean can catch a break.

[saigon68]

27. A new Viceroy to "replace" Viceroy Bremer

BRINGING THE UNINFORMED UP TO SPEED--- THE KEY PLAYERS



KRAZY KILLER KIMMITT enforcer for the Viceroy

His quote, " if you don't like watching women and children die, change the channel."



SORRY SANCHEZ consiglieri to the Viceroy





"Senor" Sleaze Senor mouth piece for the Viceroy



Viceroy Pontius Bremer (w/red tie, blue shirt) of the Amerikan Province of Eastern Iraq-Nam

With his Praetorian Mercenary Guard

Appointed by Cheney Caesar in the year of Our Lord 2003

[LiberalFighter]

32. You mean year of Our Lord 0001

[salin]

2. Iran contra... that Negroponte? Facilitate the lying to the UN

by Powell... that Negroponte? Oh yes, that will do a great deal of good for US credibility. :eyes: This administration is totally nuts - as evidenced by their amazing level of arrogance.

[peterh]

7. Next….we’ll have Oliver North replacing Negroponte…

What the heck….it’s a fit in the criminal lineage

[salin]

10. Nah... Ollie is waiting in the wings

for when we place an ambassador in the capitol of the neocon's next desired adventure... he already has such strong connections from former dealings with those in Tehran...

[0007]

22. I guess Orlando Bosch will rate a high ranking job in Iraq, 'eh?

What role will Kissinger play.

[nadinbrzezinski]

31. He truly is too old to "serve"

[0007]

40. Bosch or Kissinger is too old?

[IndianaGreen]

15. Bush still has Otto Reich and John Bolton in reserve

This is a criminal enterprise by our criminal government.

Why are some self-described "liberals" supporting the rape and pillaging of Iraq?

[Chicago Democrat]

3. Ambassador to who or what?? Negroponte - Professional Killer and Liar

[PfcHammer]

13. as lord bremer stated, "good question"

[Ganja Ninja]

4. Future President Kerry should pick ...

all of our ambassadors to Islamic countries from the ranks of the GOP. I can't think of a more qualified candidate for ambassador to Afghanistan than Rummy. Jeb would make a fine representative of our country in a place like Iran or Sudan.

[thebigidea]

5. oh goodie! He's done such GREAT work at the UN

fuckin' snake.

[hang a left]

6. What, is Kissinger busy?

[fertilizeonarbusto]

11. HAR!!!!!!!!!!!!

Good one!
I find it very telling that Ol' Negry will be housed in one of Saddam's old palaces. Don't these people have any tact, at the very least? We know they have no ethics or brains...

[jean]

8. Atrocity. He is a bloody human rights abuser from the IranContra

era. This link has the chilling story with graphic detail in short form:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Negroponte

...

From 1981 to 1985 Negroponte was US ambassador to Honduras. During his tenure, he oversaw the growth of military aid to Honduras from $4 million to $77.4 million a year. According to The New York Times, Negroponte was responsible for "carrying out the covert strategy of the Reagan administration to crush the Sandinista government in Nicaragua." Critics say that during his ambassadorship, human rights violations in Honduras became systematic.

Negroponte supervised the creation of the El Aguacate air base, where the US trained Nicaraguan Contras and which critics say was used as a secret detention and torture center during the 1980s. In August 2001, excavations at the base discovered 185 corpses, including two Americans, who are thought to have been killed and buried at the site.

Records also show that a special intelligence unit of the Honduran armed forces, Battalion 3-16, trained by the CIA and Argentine military, kidnapped, tortured and killed hundreds of people, including US missionaries. Critics charge that Negroponte knew about these human rights violations and yet continued to collaborate with the Honduran military while lying to Congress.

...

When President George W. Bush announced Negroponte's appoint to the UN shortly after coming to office, it was met with widespread protest. However, the Bush administration did not back down and even went so far as to try to silence potential witnesses. On March 25, the Los Angeles Times reported on the sudden deportation from the United States of several former Honduran death squad members who could have provided damaging testimony against Negroponte in his Senate confirmation hearings. One of the deportees was General Luis Alonso Discua, founder of Battalion 3-16. In the preceding month, Washington had revoked the visa of Discua who was Honduras' Deputy Ambassador to the UN. Nonetheless, Discua went public with details of US support of Battalion 3-16.

...

[Lydia Leftcoast]

9. Ambassador? Gauleiter is more like it.

:grr:

[David__77]

12. They mean crypto-viceroy.

The US's governor general over the Iraqi protectorate...

[Judi Lynn]

14. Thanks to Jean's info, I looked for more on Negroponte

Negroponte:

But it was during his tour as ambassador to Honduras that Negroponte earned his reputation for being soft on human rights abuses. From 1981 to 1985, Negroponte was U.S. ambassador to Honduras, where he helped prosecute the contra war against Nicaragua and helped strengthen the military dictatorship in Honduras. Under the helm of General Gustavo Alvarez Martínez, Honduras's military government was both a close ally of the Reagan administration and was disappearing dozens of political opponents in classic death squad fashion. Negroponte's predecessor, Ambassador Jack Binns, had repeatedly warned Washington to take a stand to stop the killings. In one cable, Binns reported that General Alvarez was modeling his campaign against suspected subversives on Argentina's "dirty war" in the 1970s. Indeed, Argentine military advisers were in Honduras, both advising Alvarez's armed forces and assembling and training a contra army to fight in Nicaragua. President Reagan responded by removing Binns and putting in Negroponte, who, writes Eric Alterman in an MSNBC.com piece, "turned a deliberate blind eye to a murderous pattern of political killings."

On Negroponte's watch, diplomats quipped that the embassy's annual human rights reports made Honduras sound more like Norway than Argentina. Former official Rick Chidester, who served under Negroponte, says he was ordered to remove all mention of torture and executions from the draft of his 1982 report on the human rights situation in Honduras. In a 1982 letter to The Economist, Negroponte wrote that it was "simply untrue to state that death squads have made their appearance in Honduras." The Country Report on Human Rights Practices that the embassy submitted to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee took the same line, insisting that there were "no political prisoners in Honduras" and that the "Honduran government neither condones nor knowingly permits killings of a political or nonpolitical nature."

Yet, according to a four-part series in the Baltimore Sun, in 1982 alone the Honduran press ran 318 stories of murders and kidnappings by the Honduran military. In a 1995 series, Sun reporters Gary Cohn and Ginger Thompson detailed the activities of a secret CIA-trained Honduran army unit, Battalion 316, that used "shock and suffocation devices in interrogations. Prisoners often were kept naked and, when no longer useful, killed and buried in unmarked graves." In 1994, Honduras's National Commission for the Protection of Human Rights reported that it was officially admitted that 179 civilians were still missing.
(snip)

In 1996, when Negroponte was sent to Panama as the U.S. negotiator regarding military bases, the Human Rights Research Center of Panama objected. Negroponte, they said, covered up human rights abuses and, according to the BBC, "knew about the CIA-trained Honduran army unit that tortured and killed alleged subversives." In a 1997 roundtable gathering at the Center for International Policy, Sun reporter Cohn noted that Negroponte was central to the human rights violations. Said Cohn, "He was ambassador when the worst of the abuses were taking place. He knew everything that was going on." "Not exactly the moral sensibility you want in a UN ambassador," notes New Republic's Wildman.
(snip)

http://www.fpif.org/republicanrule/officials_body.html

[ultramega]

16. "soft on human rights abuses". Perfect for Iraq! Peachy!

[daleo]

17. They are like a mindless, self-replicating machine of evil

n/t

[chookie]

18. They'll need a good "look away" guy

If the American people are stupid enough to elect George Bush to the Presidency, we are guaranteed a prolonged undeclared regional war in the middle east -- against a very ambiguously defined foe which is going to make it VERY hard for people to measure if the war is being waged "successfully" or not. I will go further to say that I fear the Bush Adminstration *wants* to bring on WWIII -- to not only reconfigure the Middle East, but to frighten our allies back onto their knees in front of His Chimperial Highness, and subservient to unquestioned American power.

They have gambled EVERYTHING on this election. If they succeed -- all bets are off. They WANT war. Their supporters WANT war. They are open about this.

Still, the ads "softening" Bush will run all year, showing him with Laura and Barney, soft and sweet in their resolves, and stupid people will buy this shit -- when people should be seeing and understanding Bush within the context of Wolfowitz, Perle, Cheney, Strauss, Bolton, and Negroponte, etc.

Bush has "softly" warned us about a "generational challenge" -- but what people need to know is that is code speak for "Big War." All War All the Time. World Quagmire 1.

The American people have to decide if this is what they want, while they still have that chance.

The whole fucking world is opposed to Bush! The same world that cried with us on Sept 11. Just as we need to be cooperating more in order to catch the small mobile bands of terrorists, they will be further repelled by Bush. *Electing Kerry* will be the beginning of the end of this nightmare. When elected, the whole fucking world is going to heave a huge sigh of relief, and be totally delighted to be able to offer every support to the United States again and cooperate in bringing an end to this awful age of hatred and despair.

[Mika]

30. Yep. * wants war

Kinda makes you wonder when the tables will turn.. days? months? years?

:-(

[maddezmom]

19. "..who played a central role in trying to win support for war with Iraq,"

key words...trying to win. Failed at that mission, next?

[President Jesus]

20. Negroponte campaign contribution detail

http://www.newsmeat.com/fec/bystate_result.php?first=John&last=Negroponte&st=

[moondust]

21. He's part of the problem, not the solution.

He was a ringleader of the gang at the U.N. along with Jack Straw that summarily dismissed everything the Iraqi ambassador had to say about no WMD, etc. The guy is a thug.

[Snellius]

23. When they asked for volunteers, he was the only one ...

to step forward. Only a rabid reactionary like Negroponte would willingly stick his foot in that bear trap. He even looks like Chalabi.

[Gin]

26. Good...send him there with no mercinaries to guard him...let him be a

man of the people. Make him live in the city and not in the green zone. Give him a Humvee with no armor. Treat him with the same respect our family members are getting.

[Snoggera]

24. Shouldn't it be Ambassador to Iraq?

When did the US begin appointing ambassadors to particular cities? Maybe my brain is just too tired right now to comprehend, but do we have an ambassador to Toronto?

[radwriter0555]

25. ***SPIT TAKE*****

holy shit.

[Solly Mack]

28. Stunned

Completely stunned.............

[anarchy1999]

29. Just shoot me!

I've been working all day on press release and contacting media for weekly vigil being launched on Tax Day in front of Halliburton offices in Dallas and I get back to DU for this.

This has just got to be a mistake.

It would be like all the criminals in Haiti and are now running the show. JEEZ!

What's next?

[American Renaissance]

33. what the hell?

What the fuck does it take to get thrown out of Washington?

Are G. Gordon Liddy, Jeb McGrudder and Bud Kroag working for the re-election campaign?

Is Orlando Bosch going to be appointed head of the Iraqi FAA?

[American Renaissance]

34. what the hell?

What the fuck does it take to get thrown out of Washington?

Are G. Gordon Liddy, Jeb McGrudder and Bud Kroag working for the re-election campaign?

Is Orlando Bosch going to be appointed head of the Iraqi FAA?

[Aidoneus]

35. the rumour has reached Iraq; Baghdad has a streetlight with his name on it

Despite all of my jaded and drippingly bitter cynicism about these things, I can't imagine why infectious human wastes with a record like Negroponte are even allowed to wear a uniform that doesn't have his prisoner number on it, let alone in such a prestigious position of power. In any decently run universe, that might be more appallingly received.

[markus]

36. His experience organizing deatth squads should serve him well

in the final stage of the pacification.

[Barrett808]

37. He's just the man to rebuild the Mukhabarat

Cut his teeth on terrorist death squads in Central America.

[kskiska]

38. But…he's just had a $600,000 kitchen installed in his apartment

Imagine what the Republicans would have done with this story: An old crony of Bill Clinton's dad -- a man accused in his day of lying to Congress to cover up the murderous escapades of a CIA-equipped-and-trained gang of bandits -- gets a cush government job; and then decides to bill us taxpayers $600,000 to fix up his apartment. Wouldn't the entire right side of the Congressional aisle leap to its feet in indignation at such a sordid spectacle? After all, didn't the spiciest allegations about Whitewater hinge on about $100,000 in Hilary Clinton's commodity trading?

Yet when John Negroponte, once upon a time the Reagan Administration point man to the Nicaraguan Contras, now Bush junior's envoy to the UN, decides to bill us more than a half-million dollars to fix up a 10-foot-by-17-foot (!) kitchen in his official residence in New York's Waldorf Astoria Hotel, it's barely news. And it certainly ain't a scandal. "Yeah, it's a lot of money, but it's a lot of work and it's worth it," a State Department official tells Agence France Presse. Negroponte says the kitchen's too small to accommodate all of his guests -- though the same kitchen in the same residence was fine for the entertaining done by Madeleine Albright, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, Henry Cabot Lodge, Adlai Stevenson and other UN envoys. But then again, the State Department says Negroponte's $600,000 kitchen upgrade is no more no less than heartening evidence of the United States' deep commitment to the United Nations. (Is this the same UN we've been spying on?) "We're in this for the long haul," the State Department official says. But as The Nation has noted, this Administration's selection of Iran/contra operative Negroponte to represent us to the UN suggests otherwise. No matter how lavishly he entertains.

http://www.thenation.com/outrage/index.mhtml?bid=6&pid=553

[krkaufman]

39. Negroponte? What the flying frog are they thinking?!?!?

I just can't believe that the Bush Admin is so frazzled that they'd appoint Negroponte as ambassador to Iraq, since it *SHOULD* reopen the issue of Bush's having lied to the UN in his rush to war. And, in an environment where we need -- MORE THAN ANYTHING -- someone who can gain the trust of the International community, the Bush Administration appears to be trying to sabotage any possible turnaround in this spiraling disaster.

For those not aware, the Bush Administration leaked on Tuesday night that they will be appointing the current UN Ambassador, John Negroponte, to be the new US Ambassador to Iraq, come the transition. Aside from the fact that Negroponte was already a controversial figure before his appointment as US Ambassador...

-----
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Negroponte
His appointment to the UN post was a controversial one because of his involvement in covert funding of the Contras and his covering up of human rights abuses in Honduras in the 1980s.
-----

... Negroponte is also directly linked to the Bush Administration lying to and manipulating the UN in their rush to invade Iraq.

-----
http://www.geekmuffin.com/archives/000054.html

America's Lie to the UN

Joe Conason points out today that the United States promised to seek a second resolution with the UN Security Council before any military action was taken.

He writes:

As Josh Marshall points out in a valuable post this morning, the interpretation of that document must rely, like with any law, on the stated intentions of those who approved it. Our historic allies and other nations on the Security Council believed that a new resolution would be required for military enforcement of 1441. And our UN Ambassador, John Negroponte, agreed on the day the resolution passed.

"There's no 'automaticity' and this is a two-stage process, and in that regard we have met the principal concerns that have been expressed for the resolution. Whatever violation there is, or is judged to exist, will be dealt with in the council, and the council will have an opportunity to consider the matter before any other action is taken."

The article quoting Negroponte goes on to say:

The compromise reassured diplomats who have suspected that despite engaging in negotiations at the United Nations, the U.S. will ultimately attack Iraq with or without the sanction of the Security Council. If the U.S. is sincere about involving the U.N., said Russia's ambassador, Sergei V. Lavrov, then the process has been valuable.
-----

[himself]

41. Write your Reps

Maybe one way to stop the appointment of Big John is to write our reps and demand a public hearing re. his alleged crimes against humanity.

I know, I know. Silly me, believing we can do much about it. But why not try? Remind them this is the fine fellow who is said to have looked the other way while nuns were being pushed out of helicopters. A Reagan/Bush apparatchik for decades, his payoff should be serious jail time for lying to Congress and more, not an ambassadorship.

But maybe I overstate. He could be a saint. His Yale buddies asked him to speak at a dinner awhile ago, and my Yale final club invited him to become an honorary member - I resigned when they voted him in, which didn't seem to slow his meteoric rise.

Write your reps today.

[Octafish]

42. If you like death squads, you'll love Negroponte.

The guy could give Operation PHOENIX a bad name.

From a site that tried to stop this apologist for murderers, at best, from working in Bush II:

Help Defeat John Negroponte's Confirmation as Ambassador to the U.N!

Excerpt...

The Bush Administration recently nominated former Honduran ambassador John Negroponte as U.S. Ambassador to the UN, despite his notoriety for having played a key role in the CIA-sponsored terrorism of Hondurans during the Nicaraguan Contra War.  The Senate Foreign Relations Committee has scheduled Negroponte's confirmation hearing for next Thursday, September 6.  In spite of the recent shift to Democratic leadership in the Senate, Negroponte's confirmation seems likely without a strong grassroots message to the committee against that confirmation.  In fact, Senator Joseph Biden (D-DE), Chair of the Foreign Relations Committee, has publicly announced that Negroponte's confirmation is "a done deal."  Biden made this announcement despite the fact that neither he nor most of the Senators poised to confirm Negroponte's confirmation have read the largely classified 1997 CIA Inspector General's 211-page report entitled "Selected Issues Relating to CIA Activities in Honduras in the 1980's," which details Negroponte's intentional cover-up of human rights abuses in Honduras.  Senators and staff with security clearance can read the report in its entirety. The Democratic Senators on the Committee wrote the President asking for that document.  It is absolutely critical that each Senator read and consider the entire report before approving Negroponte's confirmation.

Continued...

http://www.nisgua.org/articles/urgent_action.htm