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Indigenous groups claim they have not consented to oil projects, as politicians visit Beijing to publicize bidding process.

 Ecuador plans to auction off more than three million hectares of pristine Amazonian rainforest to Chinese oil companies, angering indigenous groups and underlining the global environmental toll of China’s insatiable thirst for energy.

On Monday morning a group of Ecuadorean politicians pitched bidding contracts to representatives of Chinese oil companies at a Hilton hotel in central Beijing, on the fourth leg of a roadshow to publicise the bidding process. Previous meetings in Ecuador’s capital, Quito, and in Houston and Paris were each confronted with protests by indigenous groups.

Attending the roadshow were black-suited representatives from oil companies including China Petrochemical and China National Offshore Oil. “Ecuador is willing to establish a relationship of mutual benefit – a win-win relationship,” said Ecuador’s ambassador to China in opening remarks.

According to the California-based NGO Amazon Watch, seven indigenous groups who inhabit the land claim that they have not consented to oil projects, which would devastate the area’s environment and threaten their traditional way of life.

“We demand that public and private oil companies across the world not participate in the bidding process that systematically violates the rights of seven indigenous nationalities by imposing oil projects in their ancestral territories,” a group of Ecuadorean organised indigenous associations wrote in an open letter last autumn.

In an interview, Ecuador’s secretary of hydrocarbons, Andrés Donoso Fabara, accused indigenous leaders of misrepresenting their communities to achieve political goals. “These guys with a political agenda, they are not thinking about development or about fighting against poverty,” he said.

Fabara said the government had decided not to open certain blocks of land to bidding because it lacked support from local communities. “We are entitled by law, if we wanted, to go in by force and do some activities even if they are against them,” he said. “But that’s not our policy.”

Amazon Watch said the deal would violate China’s own new investment guidelines, issued jointly by the ministries of commerce and environmental protection last month. The third clause of the guidelines says Chinese enterprises should “promote harmonious development of local economy, environment and community” while operating abroad.

Fabara said he was not aware of the guidelines. “We’re looking for global investors, not just investors from China,” he said. “But of course Chinese companies are really aggressive. In a bidding process, they might present the winning bids.”

Critics say national debt may be a large part of the Ecuadorean government’s calculations. Ecuador owed China more than £4.6bn ($7bn) as of last summer, more than a tenth of its GDP. China began loaning billions of dollars to Ecuador in 2009 in exchange for oil shipments. More recently China helped fund two of its biggest hydroelectric infrastructure projects. Ecuador may soon build a $12.5bn oil refinery with Chinese financing.

“My understanding is that this is more of a debt issue – it’s because the Ecuadoreans are so dependent on the Chinese to finance their development that they’re willing to compromise in other areas such as social and environmental regulations,” said Adam Zuckerman, environmental and human rights campaigner at Amazon Watch. “The message that they’re trying to send to international investors is not in line with reality.”

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Last July the inter-American court on human rights ruled to prohibit oil developments in the Sarayaku, a tropical rain forest territory in southern Ecuador that is accessible only by plane and canoe, in order to preserve its rich cultural heritage and biodiversity. The court also mandated that governments obtain “free, prior and informed consent” from native groups before approving oil activities on their indigenous land.

A TV news report broadcast by the US Spanish-language network Tele’mundo showed members of Ecuadorean native groups – some wearing traditional face-paint and headdresses – waving protest banners and scuffling with security guards outside the Ecuadorean government’s roadshow stop in Houston.

“What the government’s been saying as they have been offering up our territory is not true; they have not consulted us, and we’re here to tell the big investors that they don’t have our permission to exploit our land,” Narcisa Mashienta, a women’s leader of Ecuador’s Shuar people, said in the report.
Source

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There have been hints throughout the media and various releases that a second Snowden may be lurking at the NSA. Whether he/she is still employed at the agency is the remaining question.

With the recent leak of NSA (TAO) Tailored Access Operations tools being auctioned on the internet by a group calling itself The Shadow Brokers and Snowden making a cryptic call to action
just mere weeks prior, are we witnessing the beginning of a major operation to expose secret hacking practices and cyber weapon tools used to do so? Is someone trying to highlight how vulnerable software and hardware is to the NSA?

The release of the cyber equivalent of the Kraken was accompanied by a message in broken English and an auction of the tools that the Shadow Brokers group calls “Cyber weapons.”

The hack raises many questions but the obvious is – if it was state sponsored by Russia as the media has insisted, why auction the tools? Additionally if Wikileaks has the tools maybe the auction was a promotional thing and not legitimate.

The existence of a second Snowden-type leaker at the NSA has been hinted at before. Glenn Greenwald of The Intercept, the journalist and original reporter of Snowden’s files, has even said that there is a second Edward Snowden to Snowden himself in the documentary Citizen Four.

In October 2014, the FBI raided the home of the suspected second Snowden, who is presumed to have leaked how the U.S. puts people on suspected terrorist watch-lists, a classified 166-page document that was given to the intercept August 2014.

“So, what this individual did, this whistleblower, was done at great personal risk, but also has had an immediate impact on an issue that affects well over a million people, including many, many American citizens. What it also revealed is that the city of Dearborn, Michigan, population 96,000, which has the largest percentage of Arab Americans per capita and Muslim Americans per capita, is the number two city in the United States—the top five all consist of huge cities—New York City, Chicago, San Diego, Houston—but this small city outside of Detroit, Michigan, is the number two place where the U.S. intelligence community says there are known or suspected terrorists residing. It is abundantly clear that that is—it is religious and ethnic profiling at its core. And the only reason we know that is because of a whistleblower taking great personal risk to reveal this to the American public and to the world,” said Jeremy Scahill in Citizen Four, the Snowden documentary.

Additionally in June, 2015, Wikileaks released a trove of documents on former French president Nicolas Sarkozy and Jacques Chirac’s conversations between 2006 and 2012. The documents also featured conversations by current French president Francois Hollande. This prompted U.S. and European Intelligence officials to open up an investigation into this leak and suspected second Snowden.

Then in December 2015, another leak happened a leak of the NSA’s ANT Catalog, not attributed to Snowden by Wikileaks.

Wikileaks also added in that it’s received the Shadow Brokers release of NSA hacking tools prior and will be releasing them in due time.

So a second or even third or fourth Snowden isn’t out of the question and is highly likely with more and more people becoming tired of doing what they know is wrong more may emerge.

Alternatively these documents might have come from these documented NSA intelligence leakers.

The next piece of this current puzzle leading up to the recent hack of TAO “Equation Group” is a cryptic tweet by Edward Snowden himself saying “It’s time get in contact with me privately through a secure channel.” Accompanied by an equally cryptic tweet of a md5 hash or decryption password.

This tweet may have ultimately triggered someone to act on behalf of Snowden or to act on their own accord inspired by Snowden’s bravery. In either case, it’s a hell of a coincidence that a major hack came out of the NSA after this widely seen twitter statement.

Reuters reporter James Bamford also mentions that when he spoke to Snowden, Snowden wouldn’t answer questions on the ANT catalog, which was 50 pages of documented detailed tools at the NSA.

“In 2014, I spent three days in Moscow with Snowden for a magazine assignment and a PBS documentary. During our on-the-record conversations, he would not talk about the ANT catalog, perhaps not wanting to bring attention to another possible NSA whistleblower.

But going through this archive using a sophisticated digital search tool, I could not find a single reference to the ANT catalog. This confirmed for me that it had likely been released by a second leaker. And if that person could have downloaded and removed the catalog of hacking tools, it’s also likely he or she could have also downloaded and removed the digital tools now being leaked.”
~James Bamford

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Many dominoes are collapsing in on Hillary Clinton, now judicial watch has released a new email release on Hillary and Human Abedin which reveals the Clinton foundation’s pay to play scheme.

First, the FBI is investigating 15,000 new emails on Hillary Clinton. The existence of the emails proves that Hillary committed perjury when she testified that she had given the FBI all of her emails.

The FBI is also investigating the Clinton Foundation and it’s several lucrative deals to foreign donors in exchange for political favors.
Now, Hillary’s top aide Huma Abedin’s emails have revealed the bribery that took place at the State Department.

Judicial Watch released 20 new Clinton email exchanges that were not turned over to the State Department by Hillary Clinton.

The recent release shows that Huma Abdein served as a conduit between the Clinton Foundation and Hillary’s State Department.
In more than a dozen email exchanges between Abedin and Clinton Foundation top executive Doug Band, Abedin expedited direct access to Clinton for donors who contributed between $25,000 and $10 million to the Clinton Foundation. This system of bribery forced the Crown Prince Salman of Bahrain to go through the Clinton Foundation for an appointment with Hillary Clinton.

Abedin also advised Band that when she went through the “normal channels” at the State department, Clinton declined to meet. After Band intervened, however, the meeting was set up within forty-eight hours.

From: Doug Band

To: Huma Abedin

Sent: Tue Jun 23 1:29:42 2009

Subject:

Cp of Bahrain in tomorrow to Friday

Asking to see her

Good friend of ours

From: Huma Abedin

To: Doug Band

Sent: Tue Jun 23 4:12:46 2009

Subject: Re:

He asked to see hrc thurs and fri thru normal channels. I asked and she said she doesn’t want to commit to anything for thurs or fri until she knows how she will feel. Also she says that she may want to go to ny and doesn’t want to be committed to stuff in ny…

From: Huma Abedin [Huma@clintonemail.com]

Sent: Thursday, June 25, 2009 10:35:15 AM

To: Doug Band

Subject:

Offering Bahrain cp 10 tomorrow for meeting woith [sic] hrc

If u see him, let him know

We have reached out thru official channels

Additional email exchanges where the Clinton Foundation intervened with the state department include the following:

On Friday, June 26, 2009, Clinton confidant Kevin O’Keefe wrote to Clinton saying that “Kevin Conlon is trying to set up a meeting with you and a major client.” Clinton wrote to Abedin, “Can you help deliver these for Kevin?” Abedin responded, “I’ll look into it asap” Kevin O’Keefe donated between $10,000 and $25,000 to the Clinton Foundation. Kevin Conlon is a Clinton presidential campaign “Hillblazer” who has raised more than $100,000 for the candidate.

On Tuesday, June 16, 2009, Ben Ringel wrote to Abedin, “I’m on shuttle w Avigdor Liberman. I called u back yesterday. I want to stop by to see hrc tonite for 10 mins.” Ringel donated between $10,000 and $25,000 to the Clinton Foundation.

On Monday, July 6, 2009, Maureen White wrote to Abedin, “I am going to be in DC on Thursday. Would she have any time to spare?” Abedin responded, “Yes I’ll make it work.” White donated $75,000 to the Clinton Foundation.

In June 2009, prominent St. Louis political power broker Joyce Aboussie exchanged a series of insistent emails with Abedin concerning Aboussie’s efforts to set up a meeting between Clinton and Peabody Energy VP Cartan Sumner. Aboussie wrote, “Huma, I need your help now to intervene please. We need this meeting with Secretary Clinton, who has been there now for nearly six months. This is, by the way, my first request. I really would appreciate your help on this. It should go without saying that the Peabody folks came to Dick [Gephardt] and I because of our relationship with the Clinton’s.” After further notes from Aboussie, Abedin responded, “We are working on it and I hope we can make something work… we have to work through the beauracracy [sic] here.” Aboussie donated between $100,000 and $250,000 to the Clinton Foundation.

On Saturday, May 16, 2009, mobile communications executive and political activist Jill Iscol wrote to Clinton, “Please advise to whom I should forward Jacqueline Novogratz’s request [for a meeting with the secretary of state]. I know you know her, but honestly, she is so far ahead of the curve and brilliant I believe she could be enormously helpful to your work.” Clinton subsequently sent an email to Abedin saying, “Pls print.” Jill and husband Ken Iscol donated between $500,000 and $1 million to the Clinton Foundation. Clinton subsequently appointed Novogratz to the State Department’s Foreign Affairs Policy Board.

This release shows that Hillary Clinton only met with foreign leaders once there was money in her pocket. This is bribery, this is unethical and this is criminal beyond a shadow of a doubt.

In addition to the email exchanges between Abedin and Douglas Band, newly released emails show a memorandum sent to Cheryl Mills from State Department White House liaison Laura Pena revealing that Rajiv Fernando, who donated $1 million to the Clinton Foundation and was appointed to the International Security Advisory Board without any experience, was fingered for the appointment as far back as June 2009.

“These new emails confirm that Hillary Clinton abused her office by selling favors to Clinton Foundation donors There needs to be a serious, independent investigation to determine whether Clinton and others broke the law.”
~Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said.

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Melania Trump has filed a legal action against the Daily Mail and other outlets over a defamatory story accusing her of previously being an escort, and has hired Hulk Hogan’s lawyer who famously took down Gawker.

Melania Trump

The article in question was originally published by the Daily Mail and contained allegations that Trump was an escort in the 1990’s and questions the legitimacy of her entire modeling career. The problem for the Daily Mail – the story was based entirely on speculation and heresay without any actual evidence.

The outlets that received the notice include The Daily Mail, The Week, Politico, Inquisitr, Tarpley, Bipartisan Report and Before It’s News. Democratic Party support blogs Liberal America and Winning Democrats were also among the recipients.

Until a lawsuit is filed, the notices serve as warnings to the recipients to remove, retract, or correct their stories.

“Aside from the facts not being 100 percent accurate, we deeply regret reporting on a story of such a ‘low brow’ nature. Melania Trump is a private citizen and deserves the privacy and respect that any one of us would want and expect. We sincerely apologize to her for stooping to such a level and will not do so again in the future,” Bipartisan Report wrote in an apology post.

Trump is now being represented by Charles Harder, the attorney who represented Hogan in his successful lawsuit against Gawker over publication of a sex tape featuring the wrestler. In an email to Politico, Harder informed them that the action is not limited to the Daily Mail, or even the United Kingdom where the newspaper is based.

“Mrs. Trump has placed several news organizations on notice of her legal claims against them, including Daily Mail among others, for making false and defamatory statements about her supposedly having been an “escort” in the 1990s,” Harder said in the email. “All such statements are 100% false, highly damaging to her reputation, and personally hurtful. She understands that news media have certain leeway in a presidential campaign, but outright lying about her in this way exceeds all bounds of appropriate news reporting and human decency.”

Out of all the outlets that were put on notice, the Daily Mail — who happen to be the originators of the rumors — will have the biggest legal burden due to being located in the United Kingdom. In the U.S., libel laws put the burden on Trump to prove that the allegations are false, whereas in the U.K. the burden will be on the Daily Mail to prove that they are true.

Neither Politico or the Daily Mail have commented on the notices.

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The Cincinnati Zoo has announced that they are “not amused” by the wave of memes celebrating their deceased silverback gorilla Harambe, after a hacker took over their director’s Twitter account in honor of the majestic animal.

Screen shot of Maynard’s hacked account

The Twitter account belonging to zoo director Thane Maynard was hacked on Saturday evening and was quickly morphed into a shrine to Harambe. This included replacing Maynard’s photo with one of the beloved gorilla and sending out several tweets with the popular hashtags “#DicksOutForHarambe” and “#JusticeForHarambe.”

“Harambe – 1 Cincinnatizoo – 0,” one of the now-deleted tweets read.

By Sunday, Maynard still had not regained control over his account and the hacker claimed to be Twitter user @prom, who goes by the name “Bones” on the platform.

“Okay. If @CincinnatiZoo want their directors twitter back, they can dm me on @prom. I’ve had my fun,” the account tweeted.

When asked by the New York Daily News why he hacked the account, Bones stated that at “the time when it actually happened I was kinda angry at the dude who shot him,” and that he had “been sorta planning it here and there.”

The Cincinnati Zoo is not amused, however, and Maynard has stated that the jokes are very upsetting because the “zoo family is still healing” from the loss.

Harambe has managed to become an internet legend, with no signs of slowing down. He is currently tied in the presidential race with Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein in Texas and a petition to rename the Cincinnati Bengals to the Cincinnati Harambes has amassed over 20,000 signatures.

In fact, Google searches for Harambe are back to being nearly equal to what they were during the first week of June when he was killed.

“We are not amused by the memes, petitions and signs about Harambe,” Maynard told the Associated Press. “Our zoo family is still healing, and the constant mention of Harambe makes moving forward more difficult for us. We are honoring Harambe by redoubling our gorilla conservation efforts and encouraging others to join us.”

Harambe was brutally shot and killed at the Cincinnati Zoo in May after the child’s parents failed to supervise their toddler and he fell into the glorious creature’s enclosure. The incident was captured on video by a witness and rapidly went viral.

As for the chances of people listening to Maynard’s plea and ceasing to meme Harambe? Let’s just say he must be new here.

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Mere hours after the news broke that the rape warrant for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange’s arrest was canceled, an unknown intruder tried to break into the Ecuador’s embassy in London where Assange has been living in asylum. Assange Assassin?

At approximately 2.47 a.m., an unknown male intruder tried to scale the embassy wall, then fled after being caught by security climbing.

Again, this comes just as Assange’s warrant on a dubious rape allegation was canceled in Sweden.

So who could this unknown male intruder be? Wikileaks hasn’t confirmed the reason for the intrusion.

Twitter responded by speculating it was a hit on Assange by Hillary Clinton, who likely has a rather large body count this year alone. Clinton can’t afford another high profile death – according to sources Hillary is under investigation for dozens of charges of fraud in regards to the Clinton Foundation by the IRS and U.S. Attorney’s office.

Additionally, WikiLeaks tweeted out that Hillary Clinton Campaign Chairman John Podesta was being probed by the FBI and DOJ.

Wikileaks later tweeted out a document dump on John Podesta saying “114 emails from #Podesta Group to Stratfor showing foreign government lobbying in action”

Wikileaks has previously said they have way more on Hillary Clinton that will be released leading up to the election, including her deleted emails she thought were gone.

Assange has previously said that he has emails that Hillary funded an ISIS front company in France.

The Clinton’s can’t be that stupid can they? Are they that much in their own little world so daft to believe that they can go around assassinating their enemies? Sure they’ve gotten away with it for years, but there is a growing consensus that the Clinton hit list is real and they run a huge risk if they kill one too many people.

One of the more blatant cases is the case of Vince Foster, where experts even said the suicide note found was a forgery. Besides Foster, several staffers of the Clintons have mysteriously ended up dead including – Ron Brown, Barbara Wise, Charles Meissner, Hershell Friday, Ed Wiley, Luther Parks, Paula Grober, Paul Tully, Suezanne Coleman, Daniel A. Dutko, Mary Mahoney, Duane Garrett, Christine M. Mirzayan, John Glasgow.

Now you can add Seth Rich onto that list – shot dead, nothing taken same as what happened to Mary Mahoney at a coffee shop.

Several twitter users called for Assange to be safe and stay alive. Wikileaks is a huge resource and Assange has done a hero’s work in bringing journalism into the digital age.

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