Tags, 상세검색
응답: PJ#092 WALK A CROOKED ROAD WITH THE CROOKS
PJ 92CHAPTER 9
REC #2 HATONN
WED., APR. 13, 1994 12:54 P.M. YEAR 7, DAY 240
WED., APR. 13, 1994I said some time ago that I would share with you a reprint from FOREIGN AFFAIRS, March/April 1994 issue. Why would it be important? Because you have no REAL idea of what is actually going on in Russia these days. You are handed stories on silver platters according to what you are supposed to see and hear and you can't tell one end from the other in Russia. The Government is still run by the Bolsheviks (Khazarian Zionists--"Jews" by "their" terminology). This is the same "group" that also runs your nation and many, many other nations. There is, however, upheaval and a desire on the part of the "freedom" seeking Russians to again effort to overthrow that Bolshevik element. Along with that comes the high-riding criminal elements which are also networked across the nations--the so-called Mafia (In Russia called the Mafiya).
ON THE RUSSIAN 'FRONT'
In a time of supposed terrible hardships on the Russian people from all of the old East Bloc nations--comes the fact that well over $25 BILLION have been brought out of Russia and into Western Bankster systems. This is no small patty-cake dealing, readers, THIS IS BIG TROUBLE AND IT IS CONNECTED TO YOUR OWN BIGGER TROUBLE!
The article we will offer here is very good in explanation value. It has been sent to us by a reader in Missouri. I am going to give credit to the publication and to the author of the article in point. We are told that since this will be placed in a valid "newspaper" that we can use the material--IF we present it in full so that "context" is not subject to our own interpretation. We are very pleased to do so as it would detract from the investigating journalist's own summary to try to simply offer tid-bits of some sort. I SIMPLY CAUTION YOU TO READ THIS WITH ONE EYE OPEN TO THE FACT THAT MUCH OF IT IS NOT ACCURATE BUT IT IS THE TREND WHICH IS NOTABLE. YOU ALSO MUST REALIZE THERE IS A MAJOR PROBLEM WITH CHINESE MAFIA AS WELL--THE POINT IS THAT IT IS NOW WORLD-WIDE, OUT OF CONTROL, CONTROLLED IN MANY INSTANCES BY THE AGENCIES SET FORTH FOR CONTROL AND, THUS, YOU WILL ALL PAY DEARLY.
The article is entitled: The Russian Mafiya. It is presented by Stephen Handelman.
Mr. Handelman is a Visiting Scholar at Columbia University's Harriman Institute. He was Moscow Bureau Chief of the The Toronto Star from 1987 to 1992. He is in the process of completing a book on the subject of Russian crime so this is but a token of his work. He states: "I have spelled "Mafiya" using its Russian phonetic translation in order to distinguish it from its Western counterpart. All figures cited in this article, except where otherwise noted, come from the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs. Since facts about organized crime are still largely unpublished, much of the material presented here is based on private interviews with leading police officials, politicians and gangsters themselves".
To subscribe to FOREIGN AFFAIRS: U.S., $38.00, Canada $47.00, other countries via air $68.00 per year. Write Foreign Affairs, P.O. Box 420235, Palm Coast, FL 32142-0235.
THE RUSSIAN 'MAFIYA'QUOTING:
by Stephen Handelman
POLITICS BY OTHER MEANS
Organized crime is the most explosive force to emerge from the wreckage of Soviet Communism. The so-called Russian Mafiya has undermined reform, spawned extraordinary levels of violence in major cities, and helped fuel a growing ultranationalist backlash. Although it is considerably less organized than its Western counterparts, and for that reason often misunderstood or underestimated in the West, Russia's crime syndicate constitutes a serious threat to post-Soviet democracy.
The "Mafiya", Russian-style, is a hydra-headed phenomenon that feeds on the emerging market economy. Between 3,000 and 4,000 gangs operate in Russia, including several hundred whose activities span the territory of the Commonwealth of Independent States and cross the old Soviet borders in Central Europe and the West.
The definition of Russian organized crime is sometimes stretched for domestic political purposes. Police and politicians still fall into the Soviet habit of ascribing Mafiya connections to anyone who possesses what seems an unreasonable amount of money. Total active gang membership in Russia is estimated at less than 100,000 people. Nevertheless, the hazy boundary between criminal and legal business activity has allowed Mafiya groups to penetrate most areas of the Russian economy, giving them disproportionate influence.
According to the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD), organized crime controlled as much as 40 percent of the turnover in goods and services by 1993. Few entrepreneurs can expect to remain in business for long without being asked to pay money or provide shares in their companies to gun-toting "protectors". In the absence of government regulation, criminal cartels have infiltrated banks, real estate markets, stock exchanges and even the rock music industry. Meanwhile, more traditional criminal pursuits have transformed the economy of regions like Central Asia, which is fast becoming the newest hub of the world narcotics trade. Most unsettling of all, perhaps, is the involvement of organized crime groups in the marketing of stolen Red Army weapons, which then turn up in the . ethnic quarrels on Russia's southern borders.
What makes the Russian Mafiya distinctively menacing is its connection to key sections of the government bureaucracy. No criminal enterprise of this complexity could have succeeded without the support and encouragement of officials at every level. According to government investigators, more than half the country's criminal groups in 1992 had ties to government. A number of cartels are fronts for the former Soviet elites--the "nomenklatura capitalists", who have shed their party cards en route to becoming wealthy monopoly financiers. Mounting evidence indicates that nomenklatura capitalists use organized crime groups as instruments in the fierce struggle over the spoils of the former Soviet Union: the industries, banks, defense facilities, ports and factories once exclusively controlled by the Communist Party.
In one notorious 1992 case, Chechen mobsters were intercepted in an attempt to swindle about $350 million from private banks in Moscow and other cities by using promissory notes, a form of interbank transfer inherited from the Soviet era. [H: Could the "Chechen" actually refer to the CHEKA which is that incredibly vicious and dreaded Bolshevik secret police apparat and military intelligence which was the forerunner of the GRU? Do not be naive enough, readers, to believe that just by the change of a name or initials that much of anything ACTUALLY changes.] Four employees of the Russian State Bank were later accused of supplying the false promissory notes to the Chechens in return for a cut of the profits. Profit may not have been their only motive. The president of the country's largest commercial banking association believes the inspiration for the swindle came from senior Finance Ministry officials determined to undercut private commercial banking activity. Crime in the post-Soviet era, in other words, is often a continuation of politics by other means.
THE GREENING OF RED GANGSTo understand the Russian Mafiya's role in the nation's political wars, a brief look back is useful. Russia's criminal underworld has an impressive history. Societies of smugglers, thieves and highwaymen existed on the margins of national life for centuries. In the late tsarist era, outlaw bands were glamorous symbols of struggle against landowners and the oppressive state. The traditional gang structure, fortified by a code of honor and rituals that discouraged outsiders, became a model for the early Bolshevik clandestine organizations.
The future founders of the Soviet state not only admired the gangs' antiestablishment ethos. They also secured employment for them in the revolution. Bandits were recruited for so-called expropriations--bank heists and kidnappings--carried out in order to raise funds. The young Josef Stalin counted gang leaders among his closest associates, eventually recruiting some of them into his secret police. After the establishment of Soviet power, members of the criminal underworld were used as enforcers and informers against political dissidents in the gulag prison system.
But the most profitable form of cooperation emerged in the 1960s with the rise of the black market. Soviet gangsters acted as unofficial middlemen in the "gray" and "black" economies, circulating privately produced goods or state materials with the tacit cooperation of factory managers and apparatchiks. At the same time, the archaic structure of the old Russian gang began to change. Large criminal organizations surfaced in many Russian cities, led by mob chieftains known as vory v zakonye (thieves in law), who ran the equivalent of territorial monopolies in trade. As traditional underworld proscriptions against involvement with authorities weakened, many mob leaders began to operate in tandem with government officials in their regions. By the close of the Soviet era, more than 600 vory populated the length and breadth of the Soviet Union.
Communist authorities themselves, however, took second place to no one in criminal behavior. During the 1970s and 1980s, scandals such as the Cotton Affair, in which party bosses in Uzbekistan raked in huge profits by falsifying production reports, revealed a previously unsuspected talent for larceny beneath the puritanical exterior of the Soviet leadership. Russians first began to use the word "Mafiya" in those decades to describe the vast networks of corruption lurking inside regional and central ministries.
Perestroika did little to break the power of these networks. In fact, it brought various criminal strands of Soviet life together. "Perestroika was the real beginning of organized crime in our country," said one senior MVD investigator, a comment others repeated dozens of times. The secret wealth accumulated by underground tycoons and party barons found a legitimate outlet when the government expanded the permissible area of private commerce. Black and gray money poured into the stock exchanges, joint ventures, cooperatives, banks and joint stock companies that were otherwise celebrated abroad as harbingers of economic reform. At the same time, party bodies (and the KGB) quietly siphoned funds to trading companies and export-import firms that were being positioned to take advantage of the widely anticipated new era of "market socialism". Russian entrepreneurs who tried to operate by the rules found it impossible to survive in the face of both official and criminal competition. By the late 1980s, according to Russian analysts, the majority of small cooperative businesses established during perestroika was either controlled by or heavily in debt to criminal elements.
The stage was thus set for the shifting alliances and violent struggles that have come to characterize modern Russian organized crime. Russian mobsters have been as unwilling as their political counterparts to abide by the rules of compromise and consensus required of large organizations. This diffusion of Mafiya power across the country has had a devastating effect. Gangland murders, bomb explosions, kidnappings and gun battles have become part of daily life in dozens of Russian cities. This increased violence has been the most visible sign of underworld competition for a stake in the new economy--and of a criminal sophistication beyond anything seen before in Russia.
The Russian gang is arguably the only Soviet institution that benefitted from the collapse of the U.S.S.R. Once the powerful party machine that administered the old empire fell apart, the 15 new nations that emerged represented easy pickings for criminals who perceived the entire Eurasian continent as their natural domain. For instance, the smuggling trade flourished as enormous quantities of copper, zinc and other strategic metals were shipped from central Russia in unmarked trucks or military aircraft to Baltic ports and then to Scandinavia or Western Europe. The smugglers took brilliant advantage of the Commonwealth clash of sovereignties: products stolen from a Russian factory were regarded as legal goods the moment they left Russia's borders. So much illicit metal from Russian defense factories passed through Estonia on its way overseas--an estimated half a million dollars' worth a day in 1992--that the tiny Baltic republic earned the distinction of being one of the world's largest exporters of finished metal without operating a single metal plant.
Smuggling profits have formed the foundation of postcommunist Mafiya wealth and the basis for the working cooperation between criminals and the nomenklatura. By the time Commonwealth governments awoke to the dangers created by their porous borders, and hastily began signing (largely ineffective) customs treaties, the income from the illicit trade in Soviet resources was being plowed into real estate, privatization vouchers and financial institutions. It soon became difficult to separate the gangs from their government patrons.
Russian authorities readily acknowledge that the mixture of unbridled capitalism, organized crime and official chicanery had produced a crisis of governance. A frustrated Boris Yeltsin said last year that mob activity had "acquired such scale and character" that it threatened the future of the Russian state. He complained it was destroying the economy, destabilizing the political climate and undermining public morale. "Crime", he concluded, "has become problem number one for us". It was impressive rhetoric. But it sounded, unfortunately, like an admission of defeat.
CRIME AND PUNISHMENTThere has been much bluster in the Russian Parliament about crime prevention but, since casting aside communist rule in 1991, Russia's new leaders have failed to adopt any significant measures to curb organized crime. What's more, the reformers' most substantial achievements--demolishing the last vestiges of the police state and lifting most restrictions on private ownership--have had the perverse effect of creating the perfect environment for Mafiya growth.
Russian policymakers committed a fundamental mistake: they tried to develop a free market before constructing a civil society in which such a market could safely operate. As a result, businessmen, politicians and law enforcement agencies suffer at the mercy of the lingering ideological prejudices of Soviet jurisprudence. Many activities that are required for a market economy to function remain illegal or unprotected by legislation; other activities that are considered unlawful according to Western norms, such as organized crime, are not specifically prohibited.
Under the existing system, police may arrest a group of felons caught in a criminal act, but the lack of Western-style conspiracy laws means police cannot prosecute the mastermind if he or she stays off the scene. Under Soviet law, "racketeering" was considered a capitalist concept and therefore inapplicable to Soviet reality. [H: I wonder how long it will take for you-the-U.S. citizen to come into REALITY that you will have been shattered into typical Soviet type areas wherein no typical laws of any Constitution will apply as you have known them. Some states within the U.S. are really making an effort to regain sovereignty--but it is hard and you should look to Colorado this day as to how you might be going about reestablishing such sovereignty. This will not even begin to guarantee that you will survive intact but it will give you some kind of a pattern for action as other things come to the surface.] On the other hand, making a profit--"speculation," a serious offense under the old Soviet criminal code--remains an ambiguous area for post-Soviet law enforcement. Provisions for settling disputes between private companies have yet to be clarified, and no guidelines yet exist for establishing contracts or declaring bankruptcy. Russia has no independent judiciary and no way of tackling more sophisticated varieties of white-collar crime. Current laws offer no means of impounding the records of fraudulent companies or checking the criminal provenance of bank accounts. Even if such provisions existed, their enforcement would be doubtful. Russian policemen are so poorly equipped that some pursue criminals by bus and taxi. In such an environment, it is no wonder that crime flourishes.
Several ambitious plans to increase spending on police and security forces and replace the old Soviet criminal code languished in the last parliament. The new Russian constitution, approved by a narrow margin last December, establishes some important principles for reforming the justice system, such as an independent judiciary and the right to private property and business. But it remains to be seen whether those principles and plans will be translated into law. [H: Good grief, wherein is the author's head? Why would you establish laws which would then have to be hidden and overridden by the criminals in power? You would not have such problems in such as Singapore, would you? Or how about in China where they just executed an executive for taking money from his company? You have let the criminals take CONTROL and now there will be an entire World Order to insure their staying in power and control. And who do "they" control and take FROM? YOU! Are you beginning to understand?]
The greatest obstacle to a coherent anti-Mafiya policy remains perceptual. Many Russian policymakers (and some foreigners) believe that corruption and crime are the price that must be paid for Russia's experiment with free enterprise. They argue that other nations (including post-1917 Russia) also experienced high crime rates during periods of acute social and economic change. Today's smuggling tycoons and shady entrepreneurs are often compared to the robber barons of nineteenth-century America. Perhaps, too, it is only reasonable for those whose notions of order were shaped by Soviet authoritarianism to wonder whether the cure might not be worse than the disease. But arguments for accommodating the Mafiya break down at a critical point. It is one thing to tolerate the excesses of future Russian Carnegies, Vanderbilts and Morgans; it is quite another to grant them free grazing rights in the political system. [H: Please don't forget this author is a traditional "journalist", a "visiting" scholar at COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY'S HARRIMAN INSTITUTE. These are as ELITE as you can get, dear readers, so don't expect other than the "party line" of the ELITE. Yes indeed, these are the SAME ELITE that set up the whole criminal plan!]
THE MAFIYA'S CONNECTION TO GOVERNMENT[H: The key word in all this may well be "democracy". A democracy is a terrible way to function--as BAD as you can get. What a nation and people of the nation must acquire is a WORKING, EQUITABLE REPUBLIC!]
MAKES IT A DAGGER POINTED AT THE
HEART OF RUSSIAN DEMOCRACY
The Russian Mafiya's connection with government, born of its symbiotic relationship with the former communist establishment, makes organized crime a dagger pointed at the heart of Russian democracy. The danger is especially apparent outside the urban centers of Moscow and St. Petersburg, where local crime lords and their government allies have filled the vacuum created by the departure of communist authority. These alliances are joined for political as well as economic reasons. As regional leaders seek more power over resources, they share a common interest with black-marketeers and underworld figures in resisting central control. [H: Can you see WHY so many in the Russias and other freedom-seeking nations of the world who once flourished even under Czars and Kings WANT BACK THEIR SOVEREIGNS? THERE WAS TOTAL UNDERSTANDING OF FUNCTION AND THERE WERE NOT RAMPANT GANGS OF THUGS--EVEN THOUGH THE KING HIMSELF MIGHT WELL BE A BIG THUG. WHERE, HOWEVER, NATIONS ARE RUN BY LAWS ENFORCED--WITH EQUAL PUNISHMENT FOR EACH OFFENDER--EVEN IF IT BE FOR GUM (AS IN "CHEWING") VIOLATIONS, THERE IS ORDER AND JUSTICE. ALL KNOW THE LAWS AND THE CONSEQUENCES OF BREAKING THOSE LAWS. AS IT HAS BECOME IN YOUR "FREE" NATIONS--ONLY THE CRIMINALS ARE FREE. However bad you may believe the players in your government and judicial system may be--IT IS FAR WORSE!]
Organized crime has infected the central nervous system of Russian politics. Throughout 1993, successive corruption scandals paralyzed the Yeltsin government. No institution was left untainted: senior commanders of the Red Army were caught in smuggling rings; cabinet ministers and police officials were discovered working for shady commercial firms. In the most celebrated case, members of the ill-fated Supreme Soviet, led by then Vice President Aleksandr Rutskoi, forced several reform ministers out of office over charges of corruption. Government officials, in retaliation, released documents attempting to prove that Rutskoi and his political allies were guilty of money laundering and weapons smuggling. In February 1993, Russian Defense Minister Pavel Grachev announced that 46 generals and top officers were to be court-martialed on corruption charges and that an additional 3,000 officers were to be disciplined for "illegal business deals" ranging from smuggling weapons to black-market sales of military equipment. A few months later, Grachev himself was hit with corruption charges related to the acquisition of official cars from Germany.
The burlesque of charge and countercharge politicized even the slender efforts the state was making to halt corruption and further reduced the government's credibility. Russians could easily remember how corruption cases during the Soviet era coincidentally affected only the losers in political battles. While Yeltsin himself was not linked to any scandals, the president plainly found it awkward to deal with evidence of wrongdoing among his political allies. Several of his top anticorruption investigators quit in disgust. As the euphoria of August 1991 faded, most people concluded that hardly anything had changed except the faces in power. "To tell you the truth", one prominent Moscow journalist admitted to me,
"if someone staged a new coup tomorrow, I would not know what or whom to defend".
To suggest to an increasingly disillusioned populace that crime is an unfortunate but unavoidable by-product of political and economic transition is an insult. The rising cost of living might be politically acceptable to ordinary Russians who, as they are the first to inform foreigners, have endured tough times before. But when economic discontent is joined to anger over official corruption, and criminal violence, it becomes a potent political force. The sight of the country's newly rich emerging from luxury restaurants and gambling casinos, of Western cars jamming the roadways, of gunmen strutting down the streets, intensifies the nationwide sense of betrayal and, more significantly, the loss of personal security.
Rising crime rates have turned what was once an ordered, communal society into a land of fearful strangers. In a 1992 survey, three out of four Muscovites admitted they were afraid to walk the streets at night. [H: So what else is new? Do you get the feeling this REALLY IS just a VISITING scholar?] And in 1993 another opinion poll found that 49 percent of Russians rated crime higher on their list of concerns than unemployment. In the first year after the fall of Communism, the Russian public prosecutor reported 2.7 million crimes, an increase of 33 percent over 1991. The rates for murder, rape and aggravated assault continued to climb during the first six months of 1993, along with categories of crime that had been negligible during most of the Soviet era, such as drug trafficking, embezzlement and theft of government property. [H: My, my--that good old Western democracy has really helped out those abused Russians, hasn't it? You have just spread wonders and miracles upon these poor hapless victims through the Bolshevik Khazarian Zionist commercial capitalistic system haven't you? Well, good friends, the Zionists developed Communism and now you are but a reflection of, already taken over by, this system and most of you still don't even see it.]
The strong support for the neofascist Vladimir Zhirinovsky in the December 12, 1993, parliamentary elections owed at least as much to the backlash against crime as to economic populism. The continuing appeal of both ultranationalist patriots and neocommunists is largely based on their invective against "Mafiya" (read "Western") values. Zhirinovsky, like many opposition candidates, campaigned on a harsh law-and-order platform. In his last television appearance before the election, he advocated a return to Russian civil war-era decrees ordering the shooting of criminals on sight.
Draconian solutions to the law-and-order crisis are now part of mainstream political thinking and will probably dominate the agenda of the new State Duma. [H: Sounds pretty bad to you? Why? If you are not a criminal doing unlawful acts and you are serving within the laws of God at all times under a just legal system of constitutional LAW
-- why would YOU be concerned? ONLY THE CRIMINALS WOULD BE CONCERNED, CITIZEN! My people think that sounds pretty good because they wouldn't ever again have to worry about being shot! YOU PONDER IT.] Having failed to develop a society guided by the rule of law, the first post-Soviet government is reverting to the habits of its predecessors. Retrograde attitudes emerged in the aftermath of Yeltsin's battle with Parliament during the crisis of October 1993. Shortly after the assault on the Russian White House, the government imposed a curfew on Moscow and sent squads of soldiers and police to patrol the streets. Not surprisingly, crime rates plummeted. [H: They did in Watts, also!] The incidental success of these temporary measures strengthened the advocates among police and politicians for a Soviet-style war on crime. Yeltsin ordered police to drive "unregistered aliens" out of the capital in an effort to cripple the powerful crime syndicates who move easily between Moscow and other cities across the Commonwealth. The measure was targeted primarily at gangsters from the Caucasus. Chechens and Azeris in particular are responsible for a large percentage of drug trafficking. [H: And who is the big dealer in the rest of the "Free" world? Enforced by who?]
But the blunderbuss approach resulted in the expulsion or beating of thousands of otherwise innocent traders. Such violence indicated growing racial intolerance among Russians as much as any serious determination to root out crime. [H: NOW, who does this sound like writing this article? We would be speaking about "anti-Semitic" racial intolerance, would we? What garbage--it is EXACTLY the same way in the U.S.A. and I would guess the Russians and most of the world have ample reason to call you the "Great Satan".] And, as some observers noted dryly, most of the Russian crime lords welcomed the move as a way of eliminating their biggest competitors.
There are also signs that the government is preparing to take a harder line against entrepreneurs, conforming to right-wing prejudices that identify private business with crime. The Ministry of Internal Affairs dusted off a KGB tactic used in the last year of the Soviet era--the search of commercial enterprises and confiscation of property without a warrant--and proposed it as part of an anticrime package. [H: No! Really? Readers, any of you sick to your stomachs yet? You've had this going on for a long, long time already, haven't you? Go back and read our video transcription of "America in Peril" which appeared in CONTACT Jan. 4, 1994, p. 10 and Jan 9, 1994, p. 2, about the troops coming over from the safety of Canada to raid and confiscate property in the U.S.] Yeltsin rejected the proposal after it was leaked to newspapers. But it surprised no one that the idea received sympathetic attention from nomenklatura capitalists and the right wing. [H: Right wing? Capitalists? And "Yeltsin rejected the proposal..?" ONLY "after it was LEAKED TO THE NEWSPAPERS"??]
A reversal or slowdown of reforms is the goal of the former Soviet establishment, which prefers a subsidized, corporate capitalism to the unlimited expansion of private property. [H: Whose private property? Who is actually getting all the property in your own nation? Please, readers, give us a break...!] It also happens to be the goal of the larger criminal syndicates, which are eager to transform their wealth into political influence. Gangsters ranked among the staunchest defenders of democracy during the August 1991 coup, partially because of their traditional antipathy toward Communists. But several have since confided that they no longer support reforms because of the "disorder" in the Russian economy. "In this kind of environment, who can do any business"? said one gangster without a trace of irony.
During the December campaign, some opposition candidates in the regions were believed to have received campaign contributions from Mafiya groups, and there are reliable reports that ultranationalist parties have used gangs to harass Caucasians and other ethnic minorities. Whether or not such reports can be believed, the maneuvering room of the Yeltsin government has already been narrowed.
GOOD COP. BAD COPWesterners underestimate the extent to which organized crime and corruption have hampered Russian political and economic reforms. Early assumptions that the introduction of free enterprise would smooth the way for democracy failed to take into account the lingering power of the former Soviet establishment. Organized crime has reinforced the old structures in their battle to retain control over key sectors of the economy and strengthened popular hostility toward the free-market democratic policies pursued by pro-Western reformers.
The West should take Russian organized crime far more seriously than it has up until now. The current situation poses a double dilemma to policymakers in Western capitals. While internal Russian developments have moved once again to the top of the international agenda, the West has increasingly less influence over Russia's domestic affairs. Western advice and financial assistance, albeit limited, have been discredited by Russia's bruising encounter with the chaos of the marketplace. Nationalist and authoritarian remedies are now ascendant. But important areas of influence remain unexplored.
The first area requires a conceptual change in economic aid policies and in strategies for developing the Russian market. [H: Oh, good grief, could this man mean to pattern it after your unsuccessful system?] Until recently, the West concentrated on helping Russia meet its international debt load while discouraging it to carry on with austerity policies. Since the December elections, opinion has shifted toward providing more overt support for social safety-net programs as a way of easing economic discontent. But these policies still do not address the central problem: the legal vacuum at the heart of the Russian economy. Western advice and assistance in creating a commercial infrastructure, including a viable banking system and regulatory agencies, and in developing a legal framework for business activities would go far toward meeting the security concerns of Russian and foreign investors.
If the obstacles in the Russian marketplace hamper Russian entrepreneurs, they have a chilling effect on foreigners, for whom the nexus between organized crime and politics exacerbates with cultural barriers between the ex-socialist East and capitalist West. [H: It certainly hasn't been a barrier to such as General Electric and Kissinger Associates (the first major mover-inner into Moscow following the so-called break-up!) Gorbachev was made President of Kissinger Associates' Moscow branch!] Bribery was always a hidden cost of doing business in the Soviet era. Today, the hapless foreign businessman can find himself the target of extortion demands or worse. And he finds little sympathy from already overworked police and courts. [H: B(alderdash S(askwatch)!]
International assistance in bringing Russia's justice and law enforcement system into the modern era is therefore crucial. This task involved more than familiarization courses in the principles of Western jurisprudence and police exchange programs. [H: Yes indeed--it requires total destruction of any goodness left in their system in copy of your own!] Russian police are deficient in just about every area, from police cars and computers to techniques of crime detection and prevention. Aid in reforming the hoary machinery of Soviet justice, with its bias toward prosecution and disregard for individual rights, would go a long way toward removing a principal factor behind the widespread Russian contempt for law. [H: As you might surmise--I am having one big problem just going on with this outright drivel and stupidity.]
The Western police establishment, for understandable reasons, has been gun-shy about working closely with its Russian counterpart. The recent decision by the FBI to open a liaison office in Moscow is a step forward, [H: Right here I want to point out the total stupidity of this prior statement. This little town in Kern County, California would be
a good example RIGHT NOW! From this little tiny township in California have gone SWAT team members, who have received honors and public pictures in the local paper, for GOING AND CROSS-TRAINING IN MOSCOW! There is a full exchange program going on and ones from 'their' police come and train in Los Angeles' academy
--what is this disinformation nut trying to do? Well, I think we all know what he is trying to do, don't we?] but several agents admit that widespread corruption inside Russian law enforcement has kept relations less than congenial. However, the West has more than an academic interest in forging a collaborative relationship with Russia's police agencies.
[H: Yes indeed--and just wait until you find out the truth about that statement.]
The old rhetoric of the "evil empire" has been replaced by fears of Russian Mafiya penetration of Western economies. Those fears are well grounded. Russian gangs have been responsible for a wave of violent crime in Central Europe and Germany. The smuggling of Russian resources abroad has depressed world prices for commodities such as aluminum. Weapons-grade uranium and other by-products of the Soviet nuclear arsenal have turned up for sale in West European capitals. [H: Well, you sell the stuff! Is this just a toss-up at trying to prevent that "competition"?]
Russia's criminal syndicates are also attracting unsavory partners in the West. [H: Oh my goodness--the government, do you suppose? By the way, your national debt number is not in the 4 or 40 TRILLION DOLLAR area, good buddies--the U.S.A. debt is now well over $140 Trillion and rising!] Gang leaders from Moscow and the Baltics have held "summits" with members of the Italian Mafia, and Russia's growing importance as a drug transit [H: Oh oh--getting close now, aren't we?] corridor has aroused interest from Colombian cartels. Post-Soviet gangsters have become active in the United States, as suggested by the growing number of murders, interceptions of smugglers and evidence of substantial capital transfers. The MVD estimates $25 billion was transferred from Commonwealth states to Western banks by organized crime structures in 1993. [H: Yes, and more
--all of which was facilitated by the governments and enforcers of the New World Order!] The sobering possibility that the former communist establishment, through its mob allies, could become a major investor in Western economies reinforces the need for closer attention to the West's own economic security. [H: What security? Did this man actually say "economic security"?]
Russia's internal conflicts have dampened the triumphant mood of the post-Cold War era. The turmoil of the past two years has shaken several assumptions made by the West after the fall of the Soviet Union: that the communist establishment has lost its grip on politics, that Russians would eagerly grasp democracy with both hands, and that capitalism would provide the engine of Russia's transformation. The uncertainty surrounding the third assumption is the most troubling. As Russians increasingly identify free-market democracy with organized crime and corruption, they will turn toward much less congenial forms of governing. Unchecked economic chaos and gang violence could well foster the rise of hostile, authoritarian power on the Eurasian continent, instead of the prosperous partner the West requires for a stable 21st century world.
END OF ARTICLE [H: Thank goodness.]
Now what do I REALLY think about this author and the message itself? I think that if you study FOREIGN AFFAIRS articles you will find the CFR written within EVERY MESSAGE and it will give you hints as to exactly WHAT IS COMING DOWN. It may be presented in its actual OPPOSITE (AS IN BACKWARDS) FORMAT BUT YOU CAN CERTAINLY SEE THE NEXT STAGES AS PLANNED BY THE NEW WORLD ORDER--SETTING YOU UP!
Let's get out of here, Dharma--enough already! Oh, I see--you thought it enough before we even began? Well, so much for another long day. Thank you.
APPENDIXTHE REMAINDER OF THIS JOURNAL IS A
COLLECTION OF TIMELY NEWS AND/OR
EDUCATIONAL ITEMSPJ 92CHAPTER 10CANADIAN-AMERICANEditor's note: The following is a transcription of an audio tape sent in to the office by a loyal CONTACT reader in Canada. This is an incredible interview in which you will hear about some of the more outrageous shenanigans which went on concerning the shaping of the so-called Free Trade Agreement by a career bureaucrat who was involved with the matter from the Canadian side of the dance floor. In the larger picture, the revelations are universal.
FREE TRADE DECEPTION
ALBERTA TALKNETWORKWith host. Dave RutherfordWe have here Shelley Ann Clark with the Federal Civil Service. She has some information from behind the scenes of the Free Trade Agreement. She was asked by her boss, she says, to do some very secretive midnight paper shredding, clause altering, skullduggery. She says the provinces were basically lied to. Her story hasn't reached the West, yet. I see it in one bit of media in the East, but so far very few media have picked up the story, so you are going to hear about it today, probably for the very first time. The free trade charade, she says.
We are finding out from somebody who was a career bureaucrat, who was indeed inside government, right there. Her name is Shelley Ann Clark and Shelley Ann Clark is joining me right now.
D: Hello, Shelley Ann.
S: Good afternoon, Dave.
D: Well you were indeed inside. Tell us the role you played, the positions you held in the federal government at the time of the free trade negotiations.
S: I was the executive assistant to the third in command, Germain Denis, who was the one reporting directly to Brian Mulroney, which was most unusual because the chain of command in federal government at those levels should have been Mulroney to Reeseman directly, which he did at times; but, the secrecy of the phone calls between the third in command and Mulroney made it possible for me to realize that something was going on that wasn't quite kosher right from the start.
D: Ok, so you know, Simon Reeseman, for those of you who have forgotten, chief negotiator for the Free Trade Agreement. Germain Denis was also on the negotiating team, was he?
S: Yes, he was the third down the line of command but he had the major areas of agriculture and subsidies.
D: Ok. In what department did you work for?
S: The Department of External Affairs, which is presently known as Foreign Affairs.
D: Ok, you're in external affairs. You're in the trade negotiation role. What was your job?
S: I was principally the main liaison between the trade negotiations office and the Prime Minister's office and the Privy Council. [A select group of individuals with more power than the Prime Minister and which functions as the Queen of England's direct means for controlling Canadian Parliament].
D: Did you speak with the PMO [Prime Minister's Office] and Privy Council people?
S: Yes, I did, indeed. They would come to me for directives at all times or any complaints they received from the provinces.
D: You couldn't get any closer to the heart of government. You were right there!
S: I was right there. Dead center. Yes, that's correct.
D: Now, some of what you've said about the free trade negotiations at this time back in the late '80s and '88, of course, in the election year when free trade was shown to us, given to us, rammed down our throats whichever way you want to perceive it. At that time what were you asked to do that you didn't like doing.
S: I was asked to come in at midnight to prepare the briefing books for the provinces. The first time around I didn't understand the midnight business until I got there and I was asked to bring up the text from what had been negotiated in Washington and create an entire different file on the computer and asked to delete certain paragraphs, especially where energy was concerned and our water supplies and subsidies. I was asked to delete entire paragraphs and to alter the figures. If we had given away 50% to the Americans, I was asked to show only 10% to the provinces.
D: Ok. Now you are dealing with...
S: I'm dealing with a computer screen and I've created a second file stemming from the main negotiating file which had been used in Washington.
D: So Simon Reeseman and his negotiators meet with the Americans. They agree to a certain section, bring it back, type it up.
S: They bring it back and give it to Germain Denis and we pull it up on the screen. And Germain Denis, who would be briefing particular members of each province, would ask me to create a separate briefing book. To create that separate briefing book which was presented to the provinces, I had to create a second file on the computer, make the changes, delete the paragraphs, change the figures, then promptly erase it from the network. That second file was always deleted from the network completely, so all I had left would be one version which I would then photocopy ten times for the ten provinces, which were presented to the provinces. I had total control. Each book was numbered. Alberta would have number one, New Brunswick number two, etc., etc., so that if any book would have gone missing after he had briefed them, we would know exactly who would have the book. These people were never given the time to photocopy anything. They were given the book five minutes before the briefing would start. The books would be picked up immediately afterwards.
D: Shelley Ann, this is deliberate deception of the provinces.
S: Absolutely, extremely deliberate plus what I took out to the...I was asked to sneak out the material to Germain Denis to the trunk of his car and all of this was reported to the Public Service Alliance on July 22, 1988. I put forth a complaint using them as the vehicle in order to bring it to someone's attention safely as to what had been done. My report is dated July 22, 1988, to the Public Service Alliance and in there it reports the entire story of everything that
I carried out to this official's car and I had to sneak out through a period of between 12:00 noon and 6:00 p.m. at night at particular intervals. Amongst the documents that went out to the trunk of that car was a particular document that is the one that is totally disastrous for this country. It is the one showing the implementation scheme to arrive at a point where Canada would have to "sell out" to the United States.
D: What do you mean "sell out"?
S: "Sell out", in the sense that they are, the first step that would have to occur would be that Quebec separates. That is why Lucien Bouchard is in place. The second was the Grand Canal project keeping all of our, containing all of our, damming the James Bay, keeping the water in such a way that it was rerouted through to the states and from there we would be short of water. So, if you take away all of our minerals and resources and separate Quebec, Canada would be in a very desperate economic situation and we would have to send an SOS to the United States for them to come and help out.
D: Shelley, I'm going to stop you there for a second. What you have said, we are going to take a couple of minutes to absorb this because there are so many questions springing from this. I'll take a commercial break and come back. Shelley Ann Clark is my guest. We are going to find out where you are now, what you are doing, and who else knew about this whole scenario. We are talking about her involvement,--she saw it happen, inside government, the heart of government during the free trade negotiations and what was told to the public in the provinces, and what really happened. We're back after this.
D: Good afternoon. I'm Dave Rutherford. My guest is Shelley Ann Clark who has a story to tell. about her involvement in free trade negotiations. I say "involvement" like you were some sort of criminal. You actually did blow the whistle in July, 1988. What happened after that? Where is that report today at the Public Service Alliance?
S: The report was returned to me with a covering letter by the Public Service Alliance telling me to destroy this document immediately because, should it fall into the wrong hands, it would be highly dangerous. The document was returned to me and this is the document that was sent out and disclosed to the media and to all the premiers of every province across the country by my lawyer, Mr. Harold Funk, who was my lawyer at the time of the disclosure last June. So there have been several disclosures. On May 26, 1993, there was a first disclosure to the Prime Minister of Canada, Kim Campbell at the time, and to all the ten provinces and to the media across the country by my lawyer. Then on June 3, 1993, our local radio and television station CJ AWAKES, Charlie Greenwell's Insider's Report, was given a disclosure which they aired for approximately 45 seconds and after that I have been disclosing using the vehicle of the National Party and the last election.
D: Alright, I'll ask you about your political involvement in a second but I want to go back to what creating these separate files now, and the negotiator, Simon Reeseman, etc., bringing back what they had agreed to do with the Americans and you creating a secondary file, changing numbers, changing information, virtually destroying the original agreement and deceiving the provinces. At that point, who do you think knew about that?
S: I would have to say from what I observed that Germain Denis was in on it with Mulroney and perhaps, Gerald Shannon, who was the Deputy Minister of International Trade at the time.
D: The Prime Minister was aware of it?
S: Oh, yes, because there were conversations directly between Germain Denis and the Prime Minister.
D: Was it organized and engineered by the Prime Minister's office?
S: I'm sure that it was organized and engineered by Mulroney and whoever was instructing him.
D: Who do you think was instructing him?
S: Well, I guess it would be the, it would have to be the bankers who give all the money to support Mulroney in his campaign. They would have complete control over him.
D: You are suggesting, though, that the potential for virtually destroying Canada was there and agreed to and Mr. Denis had a copy of it that you spirited out to his car, this implementation agreement. Why would they do that?
S: They could not possibly afford to let the provinces see any of what had been done because the provinces, even though we didn't need the act governing all of this does not require the signature of the provinces to get the Free Trade through, they still needed the agreement of the provinces because it meant the provinces would have to change their trade rules to begin with. Indeed, they would have certainly made a humongous fuss at our having to sell out to the U.S. by the year 2005, which is when the implementation scheme is geared for.
D: 2005?
S: Yes. That's what is on the chart.
D: Those agreements on oil and water that you altered, do you remember what the originals said?
S: Well, I wouldn't remember exact figures at this point in time because, as I repeated many times to the (garbled) as they were investigating, I never, even though I had every opportunity, knowing the penalty for stealing a government, document, I never did take a copy for myself even though the opportunity was there.
I am going by what I wrote to the PSAC in 1988, plus memory, but I don't remember exact figures. I remember approximate figures but the year 2005 is something that is major and that I am not guessing at. That was an accurate figure on the chart.
D: There has been much concern about water in the Free Trade Agreement. People who don't like the free trade deal always raise water as this secret thing that's going to happen and the Americans are going to suck all the fresh water out of Canada.
S: Well, they are absolutely right. I have saved every article when we are talking about water and every study that I have read and all their assumptions are absolutely correct because water is one of the major things that they are planning to deprive us and to let the States have and then we would have to purchase it from the States.
D: Shelley, I want to talk a little more about you and your background because the reaction some people will say is, "You're a nut. This woman is a total nut and why should we believe her"?
S: Well, I guess I have been with the Department of Foreign Affairs since 1961. I've had a top secret clearance and to obtain a top secret clearance, which I still have to present day and which has never been removed, and I've been an employee.
I would have to say that the investigative work and all the investigation carried out by CESUS and RCM before you can obtain a top secret clearance should take care of any assumption that I am nuts or unbalanced. They even research back into almost 100 years of your family background when you get top secret clearance to see if there has been anyone that has been mentally ill in your family. And if your grandmother had been mentally ill in your family, they would hesitate before giving anyone a top secret clearance. The fact that today I am an employee of the Department of External Affairs still and that nothing has been removed speaks for itself.
D: Where are you now? Are you working in government anywhere now?
S: I have been on paid leave for exactly one year, right up until December 23. After the new government was in place on December 23, I received a call and I'm in a high profile position within the Department of External Affairs.
D: Does the change in government then...
S: Yes, I would say that it had an impact because before we had a change in government
I was staying home on full-paid leave.
D: Shelley Ann, I want to talk to you some more about this. Frankly, it is chilling. There are huge repercussions to what you say.
S: The repercussions are just so enormous. That's why I tried to use the Public Service Alliance to submit, to disclose, believing that I would get their protection because I know the enormity of what I am saying. Unfortunately, they left the decision with their number one as to whether to report it or not and the number one decided not to say a word.
D: Shelley Ann, stay with me please. We are talking about the free trade negotiations and Shelley Ann Clark's knowledge of what really happened.
D: I'm Dave Rutherford of the Alberta Talknetwork. My guest is 32-year veteran of the Civil Service, Shelley Ann Clark, who is telling us the story that has tremendous proportions. I'm going to have to say if true, Shelley Ann, because there is no way we can really verify this ourselves until something happens, and then we can say, "Oh, my gosh, she was right"! What about the RCMP, [Royal Canadian Mounted Police ] what is their role? They looked at it. Are they going to fully investigate?
S: No, they're not. They officially decided that because I didn't have any documents to back it up and that it did not require the signature of the provinces, that there wasn't sufficient evidence to proceed with an investigation. But I must say that I have written a letter to the Liberal ministers imploring them to have the canisters opened up where the Free Trade Agreement is locked up outside of Ottawa. The Free Trade Agreement, all the negotiating documents should have been in the archives for the Canadian public to view but they are not.
D: They are not now.
S: They are not now and even if a person or anyone, even someone like myself--I went there with a researcher and asked if I put in an access to information request, exactly what would
I get. I was told that the act governing the access to information had declared the free trade negotiation documents, approximately 95% of it, a threat to Canada's national security.
D: You mean revealing them would be a threat to national security?
S: Yes, to Canada's national security. That I have evidence of: that I was told by the person, a Mr. Paul Marsden, that is the person in charge of all the free trade negotiating documents said to me, in front of a witness, a Mr. Bruce Campbell, who is a researcher and wrote the book, TAKE BACK THE NATION with Maude Barlow, who is the chairperson of the Council of Canadians. He was with me and he heard it also. I was told that approximately 95% of the documents could not be released because they had been declared a threat to Canada's national security and when we asked, we both asked immediately the same question as to when Canadians would get to see the document, we were told in approximately 30 years time.
D: Ok. If, in fact, and I'm not that familiar with how computers work, if you were there and were revising documents and made a hard copy, you printed it, is it not saved somewhere in that system electronically?
S: No. We had the key word that would delete everything even though someone has come forward, there is a newspaper that was carrying and following my story every single month. Apparently at Christmas time on December 22, they put out a further story on me and someone came forth, who would not reveal their name, but apparently this person, who was transferring material from the computer files to the archive stated to this journalist that I was telling the absolute truth and that he or she had seen what I was talking about.
D: So the revised documents then are somewhere.
S: This is what this person is saying. This person is saying that somewhere in the computer files she (he or she) has seen exactly what I'm talking about.
D: Ok. I guess that must mean that they have seen the original and the revised ones, which are the ones that are in the hands of the provinces, in fact, are fraudulent.
S: Everything that's in the hands of the public or the provinces is totally the incorrect version. Two versions came out. The first version that came out which I personally carried and gave to the Prime Minister in his hands was carried by me. On October 4, 1987, I brought to the Prime Minister of Canada the 33 paged summarized version of what had been agreed to on that famous weekend of October 2 and 3, 1987, in Washington. This was the weekend where Reeseman was left out in the hallway and the negotiations went on with James Baker all by himself in the star chamber but with Carney, and Wilson, and Derrick Burney from Canada. That version that came out was delivered to the Prime Minister on the Monday morning after that famous weekend by me. Now the second version that came out was the legal version. Then there is a third version that's the real version.
D: Now the one you gave the Prime Minister is not.
S: That was just a summary. What I gave to the Prime Minister was a summary and that is what he tabled that Monday morning at the House of Commons.
D: Are you saying that summary two is fraudulent?
S: Well the summary has absolutely no details. It's 33 pages compared to the legal version that is 1500.
D: Shelley Ann, stay with me. I need one more break. We have to take a newsbreak from the newsrooms here in Alberta and we'll come back with your story, Shelley Ann Clark. If you are on the phone lines waiting to talk to her, I know many people are. They'll have questions I have not asked. We are talking about the free trade negotiations, the paper work that is different. In external affairs in her role, you have heard her tell her story and it really is a chilling story, if you think of the ramifications of what this means. Shelley Ann has told us there is the legitimate, the real agreement between Canada and the U.S. for the Free Trade Agreement from 1987, '88. The real one has some very, very scary implications in it including the wholesale, is it sale or giveaway of our water, Shelley?
S: We'd be giving it away and we would have to purchase it back from the States.
D: The water has been a key concern of critics of free trade. Before I get to my phone calls are you motivated by--you mentioned Maude Barlow, the Council of Canadians which have been anti-free trade for a long time and Maude Barlow has been in the studio talking about her objections to free trade, or are you motivated by the fact that you saw illegal subversive things going on?
S: Illegal subversive things which are destroying the country because I have children who are part of this country, who will be severely affected by the time this is in place.
D: The RCMP won't pursue it any further because you don't have hard documentation. Do you think that's the real reason?
S: No, I don't believe that that is the real reason. I know that the commissioner of the RCMP was a Mulroney appointee. Surely, that has affected the decision to an enormous degree. Perhaps, we'll have more hope when his term is up.
D: What have you heard, or have you heard anything from the provinces, the recipients of the doctored version?
S: I have heard from the provinces of Manitoba and Saskatchewan who thanked us for the documentation and said they would carry out an investigation.
D: Nothing from those yet, that you know of?
S: No, nothing at all. What I am counting on is that Canadians would start calling or writing to the Prime Minister's Office requesting that they break into the cannisters and have a look at what's there.
D: These cannisters are containing what?
S: These cannisters, apparently, all the negotiating documents are in sealed cannisters 16 miles outside of Ottawa.
D: Where are they held? In a bunker somewhere?
S: I have to assume that they are in our bunkers that are out there and I have already put in a request to our federal Liberal ministers that something be done about entering those sealed cannisters. But, I think it would be far more effective if instead of just me asking, that the rest of the country started writing in to the Prime Minister demanding that they get into those sealed cannisters.
D: Even though this was negotiated under the Mulroney government, the Liberal government has proclaimed it. I mean it's a done deal. What motivation is there by the Chretien government to open things up again?
S: Because if Chretien means it, that he cares for this country, he should want to have a look at what I'm saying is the truth because if he can find the evidence that I'm telling the truth, perhaps he can do something about it before we are sold out to the States. Or perhaps Chretien wants us to be part of the U.S. It all depends on how he feels personally. I have no idea. Does Chretien want us to be part of the U.S., therefore he won't open the cannisters?
D: Well some would say he proclaimed North American Free Trade rather quickly. We were the first country to endorse it so I don't know. We don't know what the motivation of either of these governments is at the moment.
S: Exactly. Especially since they are funded by the same people. So one has to have a serious concern about that.
D: Shelley Ann, my listeners want to talk to you. Is that alright?
S: Yes, absolutely.
D: Ok. Let's go to phone calls from across the province. First to Steve. Hi, Steve, go ahead.
Steve: Good afternoon, Dave and Shelley. I was just wondering. There are a couple of things you ought to be aware of. It's amazing that you are not a hit-and-run yet, Shelley.
S: Absolutely amazing, you are right.
D: But, on that point. Obviously, we've all thought of that, Shelley Ann. Are you taking protective measures?
S: No. I have not taken any protective measures even though I have had my life threatened twice, because I feel that it is in the hands of others and if I am meant to die, I could die crossing the street tomorrow, so if they want to get to me there are no protective measures that I could take that would guarantee my safety. I have learned to accept the fact that they could get me at any time.
D: And your family.
S: Yes, absolutely.
Steve: Ok, Shelley. What about the generation of jobs or the actual job loss in this country. Has some paperwork been manipulated on that as well? I'm just wondering that if--like the way we have to increase our company productivity in this country, we have to buy new equipment which would automatically displace all kinds of workers. I'm thinking of, like a backhoe. Every time the city company buys a backhoe it probably displaces 20 or 30 ditchdiggers, let's say.
D: Are you concerned about the information that comes out of the government generally, Steve?
Steve: Yes. Is that correct that we are going to get more jobs or are we actually going to lose a whole pile of jobs?
S: Oh, you are not going to get more jobs. Absolutely not.
Steve: I'm aware of that. I'm just wondering why the media and a lot of the government keeps pushing that we are going to get more jobs than we can shake a stick at. I can't buy that as truth at all.
S: Ok. Well, the media, first of all, are owned by several of Mulroney's friends, therefore, the media is controlled. That's why here in Ottawa no one has printed up on the Free Trade story.
D: Shelley, let's be clear. When you say the media, primarily, do you mean the print media?
S: Yes. I'm talking about the print media plus, of course, CBC, [Canadian Broadcasting Corporation] which is owned by government.
D: Has the CBC done anything with your story?
S: Absolutely not. They won't touch it.
D: Private television has CJOH in Ottawa.
S: CJOH did one month's worth of investigation and the lawyers cleared that they could go ahead.
D: And obviously, we're doing it today. Have you done many of these interviews?
S: I've done Montreal. CJAD, a main radio station in Montreal, and I have done many other private interviews for secondary newspapers.
D: Steve, thanks. I've got to move along. There are a lot of questions about this. But the media, generally, has not picked up the story, sensational as it is. Had this been in the U.S. you'd be on the front page of every newspaper in America.
S: Exactly, because I was interviewed by a major radio station in New York City in November.
D: So the control, you think, the arms of the political and financial control reach into the media so deeply your story is being ignored.
S: Absolutely. There is no shadow of a doubt about that, especially that the Ottawa Citizen here, our main newspaper. People were putting extreme pressure on them to write up on Shelley Ann Clark and after several months of pressure they came up with a story on a Shelley Ann Clark that was blind and was a social director for the John Howard Society. So now when someone says you haven't written up on Shelley Ann Clark, they can say they have.
D: Alright, we'll go to Dan. Thanks for waiting. Go ahead.
Dan: Good afternoon. First I'm going to assume that everything you are saying is totally true. Now, I'm going to make a few comments. You are saying Quebec is going to be leaving. Well, first of all, the people of Quebec have to vote in referendum to leave. Let's say they vote to leave. Now, financially, the rest of Canada would be much better off if Quebec left because all those billions and trillions of dollars that we've been pouring into their economy to keep them afloat wouldn't be going in there anymore. Now, another thing that you mentioned, that sounds totally absurd is the damming of James Bay. Why would they dam James Bay when just a few hundred miles to the south you have five Great Lakes. The only areas of the United States that actually need water is Southern California, parts of Arizona and eastern Texas. This is absurd.
S: If it seems absurd, then I have to ask you why Simon Reeseman was the head of that project in 1985 and was making plans for it already two years prior to, one year prior to becoming the ambassador for the free trade negotiations. Simon Reeseman was already discussing the project of the Grand Canal and secondly, by re-routing the water from James Bay out into the Great Lakes and out into the ocean beyond that would provide you with only salt water at this end and we would have to purchase our fresh water.
Dan: Ok, now the water in James Bay is practically fresh water. There is very little salt in there and it would probably cost at least a trillion U.S. dollars to build it and...
S: But Canada is planning to do this.
Dan: Well I don't think that we could afford to do that. We are talking at least, this is about 150 kilometers across at least.
S: I have the plan. I have the plan. I know exactly about the cost.
D: But Shelley, what do you mean you have the plan?
S: Well there is a map showing exactly where this Grand Canal will be built. I have a copy of that.
Dan: Ok, you may have this, but I think it is in somebody's deluded mind that they can realistically do this.
S: Well then you should be speaking to Simon Reeseman because he was the one selling the idea.
Dan: Well, fine. He may try to sell an absurd idea. Anybody can do that but what is driving me crazy is that this is a typical Canadian attitude that my God, we have these resources, let's keep them in the ground forever. Let's not sell them.
D: But, Dan, despite your agreement or disagreement about the sale of water, that really is secondary. It is whether or not you and I were told the truth about what's in the Free Trade Agreement.
Dan: Now, that's the only thing that bothers me. But, everything really sounds so absurd if it was totally true.
S: That's why they have labeled those negotiations a threat to Canada's national security, is because what they have done is absolute treason.
Dan: By disguising documents, I would agree.
D: Thank you for your suspicions because we should be suspicious of what Shelley Ann is telling us, but based upon everything you've said so far, it's impossible for us to verify one way or other. You were inside, we weren't, and that's the story. Larry, go ahead.
Larry: Shelley Ann, first of all, I think you are a very brave person and the epitome of a patriot. I'm wondering, on the Access To Information Act, when you say that 95% would be declared for national security, is there any way to expedite it so that you could re-list it to them and have it made available for the court's eyes only? Surely, the judges are...
S: The judges are Mulroney appointed judges, most of them.
Larry: Surely they can't say the judges are a threat to our national security, and thereby they could look at it. We wouldn't have to or you wouldn't have to. If I were a judge and they refused to let me look at it, I would be pretty upset.
S: Well, somebody would have to take this to court to demand that the judges take a look.
D: Based on that, who would you trust to look at it?
S: Exactly; there is no one I would trust to look at it.
Larry: But, in order to get the cannisters out, you are going to have to go through the courts to do it.
S: Exactly, but can you imagine the sums of money it would take from me to take this to court! I don't have that kind of money to take it to court myself and that's why I have been appealing, even though I could be appealing to the wrong government to do something about it. If the Chretien government refuses to do anything about this, it should tell Canadians where they stand because if I did not ask them you would never know where the Chretien government stands.
D: Thank you, Larry. What about the other side of the deal, the American side? Are they as secretive, have they done the same thing to states and to other people?
S: Well, I was told by some people in my writing, some researchers that have gone into Washington to try, when I first brought out the story, to try and locate some documents, thinking that there they would find something but, they did not. They've been just as secretive.
D: So is there then a public version and the real version in the U.S.?
S: That's correct.
D: Nancy, go ahead. This was related to me by these researchers that went down to Washington.
Nancy: I will but please don't cut me off because I've got some juicy information about this too. I really appreciate what Shelley Ann is doing. We were working with David Orcheck against the Free Trade Agreement and the little version that Mulroney was dragging around during the campaign was just for the public. The other is supposed to be a secret one. Now I have one of these and you know what I heard ...
D: You have one of what?
Nancy: The Free Trade Agreement. The original one, the good one and the short one, too.
D: Ok.
Nancy: But you see, when the fellow was talking with Mr. Chretien, Mr. Chretien demanded he see some revision of, you know, NAFTA, but the American guy on TV said, "No. Everything's good". And I knew why, because this about the water is what Chretien was worried about. It didn't have to be in NAFTA because it is in the Free Trade Agreement. It was made and I've got that in my book. It says Canadians are obliged to provide U.S.A. with water, ice, and snow. I wish they'd come and take it today from Edmonton. They are supposed to provide it and even at the same cost or even lower than the Canadians.
D: Ok, but the people who interpreted that would say that's bottled water. That's not free-flowing rivers.
S: That's not free-flowing, that's correct. That is bottled water.
Nancy: Why snow? Why snow?
S: Because that can be self-contained.
Nancy: I see, but, anyway I took this out when Mr. Mulroney didn't know about it. I duplicated that and I wrote to him. I wrote a letter. It applies to the energy as well. Even if the United States got into war, Canada is supposed to provide energy for them even if it is short in Canada.
S: That is part two because the energy chapter was only included on the famous weekend of October 2-3, 1987. Before then they were refusing to include it as a separate chapter.
D: But Nancy, you've got the NAFTA agreement, North American Free Trade, not the original Free Trade?
Nancy: No, I haven't got that one. But I'll tell you what I did. I duplicated copies and I sent copies about this energy to Mr. Chretien, personal, I wrote. I sent it to Paul Martin, the Finance Minister. I sent it to Mr. Manning and the leader of the Party of the Reform Party,
all four of them and months ago, and now on the first one I hear that Mr. Mulroney's government accepted the Free Trade Agreement as is, God have mercy on us.
D: No response from anybody, no response from any of the leaders of the party?
Nancy: No response from any of them.
S: I believe her! I believe her!
D: Nancy, thanks.
Nancy: You're doing an awful good job and we'll protect you 100%.
S: Well, thank you very much.
D: Shelley Ann Clark is my guest. We are talking to you about the Free Trade Agreement and what Shelley Ann has seen going on behind the scenes. We're back with your calls after this quick break on the Alberta Talknetwork.
D: Good afternoon. I'm Dave Rutherford on the Alberta Talknetwork. My guest is Shelley Ann Clark who has a story of incredible intrigue, subversion, a conspiracy theory. Shelley Ann, the people who'd know about this must be quite extensive on the inside of the core of power. You're the only leak, is that it?
S: Yes, that's correct. I'm the only leak.
D: Shelley Ann, to be perfectly blunt, I don't know why you are allowed to walk around.
S: I don't know, either, except that there must be people who are against it and I am convinced that certain things were done in order to put me in a position that I would indeed leak the information for them.
D: Alright. The conspiracy is even broader then. There are those working behind the scenes controlling you as you leak the information, in opposition to those behind the scenes who are controlling the other side.
S: One is assuming that I have been put in position to do such a thing and that's why nothing has been done to me. You have to assume that there are many who have found out about this that wanted it out. That I was the person to do it, because there has to be a reason why nothing has happened.
D: Yes, there does have to be a reason. Stan, hi! Good afternoon.
Stan: Good afternoon. Very, very interesting. I've studied things like this now for a number of years. I was wondering if Shelley Ann could tell the people of Alberta who actually controls the government. We always assume that the people vote the politicians into power and that they're the ones that control what's going on but in her position she actually knows that it's big money, it's business, the shadow government that controls the politicians. If she could just kind of maybe enlighten the Albertans about that?
S: Yes. The government. whatever government is in power is controlled. We will take the Conservatives and the Liberals as an example, that they are both being funded by the same bankers. The leaders are being controlled by the same bankers. They are funded, there is a funding for the PCs [Progressive Conservative Party, also called Conservatives and the PCs] and the Liberals and all the funds are being provided by the same people.
D: But you're saying this is not money that is obviously reported to anybody.
S: No, this is secret money and by having that kind of control they are able, they pull the strings like it's the leaders' republic, they tell them what they want and what to do.
D: Alright, Stan, thanks for questioning. I have to move along to one more quick call. I know our time is short. It goes by so quickly. Barbara, hi!
Barbara: I wanted to thank you, Dave, for having this program. I also wanted to thank Shelley Ann. She must be a very brave and courageous lady.
D: This is Barbara Baxter, Council of Canadians. Barbara, Good afternoon.
Barbara: And what Shelley Ann is saying fits with much of what we know about the Free Trade Agreement, and as I understand, of course I didn't hear the whole program, but what she is really saying is, "Don't take my word for it but have it checked out".
D: But even checking, though, we're not going to find out anything, Shelley Ann, are we?
S: No, not unless those cannisters are opened. I can't believe that the documents that I saw are not somewhere. They must be.
Barbara: Or there should be other people who could verify that they saw what you saw.
S: See, there is already one person who saw it in the transfer of the files to the archives. That's from sources without a name.
Barbara: Of course, I didn't hear everything that you and Dave discussed earlier. Have you written a book?
S: Well, two people are writing a book. There is a journalist from Montreal and one right here in Ottawa that are writing a book and someone else is coming forth from Montreal, a producer who is thinking of a movie.
D: (Chuckle) I don't want to see the movie. Barbara, when I know about it I will tell you and I'll tell everybody on the air. Thank you very much, Barbara.
Barbara: I wanted to add one thing that I know in talking to Dennis Mills, who is an MP [Member of Parliament ] from Toronto, is that he has a copy of a 600 page thesis written by Crayton Yoiter, who was the American chief negotiator, Reeseman's counterpart, describing how water could be re-diverted within North America.
D: Barbara, thanks for the call. Shelley Ann, do you have to go, or can you stay for a little bit?
S: Shelley Ann, I can stay for a little bit, no problem.
D: I'm overtime now. I have to go to a newsbreak across the province but I'm going to come back with you. Shelley Ann Clark, my guest, if you want to talk to her. I'm going to keep her for the next few minutes because it's an incredibly interesting topic. David Cox, the Canadian Center for Global Security on Bosnia, also standing by and we'll get to him briefly. * * * Good afternoon, I'm Dave Rutherford on the Alberta Talknetwork. My guest is Shelley Ann Clark and we are going to continue our discussion with Shelley Ann past the time we had allotted because of the incredible interest expressed by you, obviously, and by all Canadians in what's going on. My scheduled guest, David Cox, the Canadian Center for Global Security. We are going to be talking about our peace-keeping efforts in Bosnia and it's time to get us out of there. We just have to come home. We'll talk to David Cox in just a few minutes. But, I do want to give you some more time to talk to Shelley Ann Clark about her story. Let's go to Peter. Thanks for waiting, Peter, go ahead.
Peter: Hi! First of all, congratulations! You are doing much more than what any soldier could do in the very front line of a war. You are jeopardizing not only your life like the soldier, but also your family. You are really, truly a super Canadian citizen. God bless you! Your forecast is very very true. I've been saying this for ages. The States want Canada more than anything. And if Quebec is broken and the rest of Canada is separated, etc., Canada is a wounded and an easy prey. Water deprivation disaster will finish Canada in no time and it is happening with our gas. Look: we are sitting on gas and we are paying twice as much for the damn thing as what U.S. citizens do.
S: That's correct.
D: Yeah, but we are in contracts that we apparently control that price, though, in the delivery of that natural gas.
Peter: We are being told to get rid of it by the bankers. It's all arranged. It's George Orwell. The Indians are being killed already in Mexico and it will be just a short while that the war,
I wouldn't call it free trade, I'd call it slave trade.
D: One of the difficulties of the name of it, it should not be called free trade, but anyway, you say it's slave trade, Peter...
Peter: But regardless whether we agree or not, we can't resist. It's not even whether we agree or disagree on the free trade. The point is that there were gross injustices happening and unless we can somehow reveal this in front of the world, not only to Canada and the States but the whole world, the U.N., we are dead ducks! I came to Canada 40 years back believing in freedom, in justice, and liberty but George Orwell is doing it all. He stole it all.
D: Shelley Ann, listen, what is happening and Peter is maybe on the leading edge of that, it's this belief that the entire country, the world being run by this grand conspiracy. We've resigned ourselves to the fact that the bankers are running the world. Have we given up, if we succumb to that kind of thinking?
S: Yes. We have given up if we stop doing anything about it. If you keep living with the illusion that you are under control and that we are under control, then you are giving up.
D: But is it that grand, is it that immense, is it that broad?
S: I can only speak for what I know because I've only seen what's happening here in Canada and I can only assume that the same thing is happening elsewhere, in Europe, etc, etc. Whether it is a worldwide scheme, I have no way of knowing and I wouldn't even want to pronounce myself on that but I do know that we used to have freedom here in this country, freedom of the press, freedom of choice and that is something that we no longer possess.
D: How do we know that? How do we know we had freedom, I mean, at some point this conspiracy began. I'm sure it's long...
S: Oh, I mean, there's been corruption going on in politics for hundreds of years, sure, but it never has controlled our freedom to the extent that it does now. I remember in the '80s I was the executive assistant to Doris Anderson, who was the president of the Status of Women and she and I uncovered a major story with one of our Liberal ministers and certainly the freedom of the press was existing because at that time, Doris Anderson and I were in every major television station and newspaper in the country for eighteen months solid. Nothing was hidden from Canadians. I believe that there was more freedom at that time.
D: Ok. Joanna, go ahead.
Joanna: I think my question might have been answered. I was going to ask if past Prime Ministers like Pierre Elliott Trudeau were controlled to this extent and if the populist elected Prime Minister, maybe like Manning or someone, in the future would be controlled also if they were elected by a populist movement?
S: From what I know I would say that with Trudeau it was to a certain extent but with Manning it would be the same as it is with... His hands would be tied.
D: Well, don't take that as gospel, Joanna. That's an assumption.
Joanna: That's right. I just wanted an opinion.
D: George, go ahead. Hi, George. (No answer.) Let's try this one.
Ken, go ahead.
Ken: Yes, hello Dave. Thanks for having Shelley on this afternoon. I'm stunned at what she's revealed here. Shelley, I'm wondering whether this disclosure document is going to be made available publicly by you?
S: Yes, it has certainly gone public and anyone who wishes to have it can certainly have it to confirm what I'm saying, that indeed the disclosure was made in 1988.
Ken: And where can it be accessed from?
S: By simply writing to me.
D: Well, I guess if people want to do that, Shelley Ann, we are not here to promote your book or your potential movie but tell us where to write anyway.
S: You can write to...
D: Do you want to put it on the radio?
S: Yes. The Canadian Institute for Political Integrity, P. 0. Box 1634, Station B, Kax, Quebec K8X 3XF
D: I have the address here so if the caller misses it I have it.
Ken: Dave, one last question. It is obvious that this story needs greater circulation and exposure. Is the Talknetwork planning to make a tape and a transcript of this interview available?
D: Tapes and transcripts are something that we really haven't gotten into in a large way yet. It is an expensive process to distribute transcripts and tapes so the short answer is, no, we don't have them available. The procedure itself, though, is always being examined as to whether we will do it but, no we won't be making them available.
Ken: Sorry to hear that.
D: Yes, so am I but it is such a labor-intensive costly business to do it that we haven't got the resources at the moment to do it unless we can find somebody that's in the business doing it cheap but I don't know. But thank you.
Ken: Maybe things will change with this story.
D: One more break. Thank you for staying with us, Shelley Ann. * * * Good afternoon. I'm Dave Rutherford on the Alberta Talknetwork and my guest is Shelley Ann Clark. We're talking about the free trade charade as it has been billboarded in one publication called THE MIRROR which we have. What town is that from, is that from Ottawa?
S: No, that's in Montreal.
D: That story about you in August is what I'm referring to. Let's go back to our calls, Shelley Ann. Leticia, go ahead.
Leticia: Hi there, Shelley Ann. I have to congratulate you on bringing this. For those people who are probably a little bit skeptical about how any of this happens, there is a more recent author who wrote a book, CAPTAINS AND KINGS by Taylor Caldwell. I think if people read this they would find they have far more insight as to the major conspiracy that Shelley Ann is talking about and thank you so much for bringing this out.
D: Alright, thanks Leticia. Let's go to George. Are you there?
George: Yes, I agree with what the callers have all said that, Shelley Ann, it is a tremendously brave thing you are doing. I can't believe and yet I can because you are probably aware of the crusading that Glen Keeley does against this very thing too. He was in Edmonton a while back and we heard a lecture and he revealed some of the things you are telling us at that lecture.
S: Yes, because as a matter of fact he was asked to market the Grand Canal Project at the time that it was brought forth. So, I am very well aware of Mr. Keeley's...
George: He reiterated the importance of Quebec being removed from the confederation so that the James Bay water would be much more easy to negotiate through Dontel.
D: For those of you who are interested, Glen Keeley is going to be on my program next week, so, we will talk to him then.
George: A lot of the people who were at that meeting poohooed it as being crackpot, you know, but look how politics have unfolded.
S: Hey, that's why I have been able to confirm that what he has said is accurate.
George: Oh, I'm sure it is. But it's one thing that bothers me, Shelley Ann, that shouldn't bother me knowing the capabilities of some of these elected politicians we have, how could a man like Mulroney do what he did in full knowledge of what he is doing, what does it take to commit treason? What is the definition of treason?
S: A stream of money, I would say.
George: Well, I suppose we are all--Glen Keeley also told us about the homes that Mulroney owns and how did he get the money to own these homes, the beautiful home in Florida.
S: Exactly, because where he began it would be absolutely impossible.
George: He couldn't do it with the money he earned. No, we know that. Does anyone actually know 55 O'Conner Street? I think it's 50 O'Conner Street in Hull, Quebec and the goings on in that place?
D: What is that?
George: That's where a lot of government offices are. That's where a lot of the contractors are domiciled. That's also where the BCCI bank was that was revolving money that was going to Luxembourg. He told us all this stuff. Nobody believed anything he told us.
D: Alright, George, we've got to thank you. Let's go to Mike.
Mike: Hey, Dave. I'd like to ask your guest one question pertaining to the Free Trade the original, the first one. What about the six-month clause that we can get out of the deal if it is not to our satisfaction?
D: Alright, Shelley Ann, what about the six-month clause?
S: That clause expires this month and that's why I've been pushing so hard to see if the Liberals would do anything about it.
D: But, it expires this month. It was a five-year duration and it's over this month?
S: That's right, at the end of the month, to my recollection.
D: So there is no more out, from the Free Trade Agreement.
S: Yes, if it goes beyond the end of January, that's correct.
D: I don't know if the five-year time limit was as well known as you say it is. You know, I don't know if we knew it was expiring in five years. We thought it was always in existence.
S: No, there is an expiring date to that, which is January 30, 1994.
D: Jerry, hi, go ahead.
Jerry: Hi, Dave, how are you?
D: Well, I don't know yet.
Jerry: Thanks for extending the program. I only have a couple of things I want to say. Shelley Ann, I want to ask you one quick question. Is this type of documentation and stuff you are talking about here, is it available to all the Members Of Parliament?
S: What documentation exactly are you talking about?
D: You mean the original one, the real one?
Jerry: Yeah.
S: Well, the real version...
Jerry: Wouldn't the opposition have had a chance to see this?
S: No. I would have to say "no" because I'm sure that even within the Mulroney ranks there would have been desertion.
Jerry: I guess, Shelley, I hope you don't mind me being skeptical. I'm not going to call you a dishonest person or anything like that and credibility is one that I've got to say the whole story is lacking a little bit of credibility because you don't have the evidence and I understand that so I think you are very articulate and well educated; I believe in you. I'd like to mention this to you and the rest of the listeners that I did stop by Grant Hill's, my MP, and I told him to tune in and I believe with the Reform Party being as strong as it is now in the government and I've also made a call to Preston Manning and I'd like the rest of the callers in Alberta to do the same thing. Phone your MP and demand them to research it and get to the answers.
S: I agree completely and I thank you for doing that.
Jerry: Ok. As the people of Canada, this is what these people are there for and if the pressure is put on the Reform Party--I believe in the Reform, I voted for them and they've got to get this thing out in the open.
S: There was certainly belief in me at the all-candidate meeting this past election. There were a lot of Reform people that came up to me and had no shadow-of-a-doubt about what I was saying.
Jerry: I hope Preston gives you a call. I asked him to, and I also asked Grant Hill to give you a call.
D: Jerry, that's a good note to end it on. Your right about going to your MP. That's the way to go even though I think that Shelley Ann, I think, is on the other side of the spectrum.
D: Ok, Shelley Ann. Thank you for being here. It has been a compelling story and, you know, I hope it's not true.
S: Yes, well, there are a lot of people--I hope that it has disappeared somewhere and can't be reinforced but I'm afraid that is not the case.
D: And Shelley Ann, we will keep track of you and will talk to you very soon.
