By Whitney Webb
A United Nations report has shed light on the world’s burgeoning crisis of displaced peoples, finding that a record 65.6 million were forced to vacate their homes in 2016 alone. More than half of them were minors.
The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), which drafted the report, put the figure into perspective, stating that increasing conflict and persecution worldwide have led to “one person being displaced every three seconds – less than the time it takes to read this sentence.”
UN High Commissioner Filippo Grandi called the figure “unacceptable” and called for “solidarity and a common purpose in preventing and resolving the crisis.”
However, what the UN report failed to mention was the role of U.S. foreign intervention, indirect or direct, in fomenting the conflicts responsible for producing most of the world’s refugees.
According to the report, three of the nations producing the highest number of refugees are Syria (12 million refugees created in 2016), Afghanistan (4.7 million) and Iraq (4.2 million).
Watch the UNHCR’s New Global Trends Report:
The conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan are known to be the direct result of U.S. military invasions in the early 2000s, as well as the U.S.’ ongoing occupation of those nations. Decades after invading both countries, the U.S.’ destabilizing military presence in Iraq and Afghanistan has continued to increase in recent years, with the Trump administration most recently announcing plans to send thousands of soldiers to Afghanistan in the coming months. It is worth noting that each U.S. soldier in Afghanistan costs U.S. taxpayers $2.1 million.
While the U.S. has yet to directly invade Syria, the U.S. role in the conflict is clear and Syria’s destabilization and the overthrow of its current regime have long been planned by the U.S. government. The U.S. and its allies, particularly Israel and Saudi Arabia, have consistently funded “rebel” groups that have not only perpetuated the Syrian conflict for six long years, but have also committed atrocity after atrocity targeting civilians in Syrian cities, towns, and communities – a major factor in convincing Syrians to leave their homes.
The U.S. must stop supporting terrorists who are destroying Syria and her people.https://t.co/Gngsh01XCB
— Tulsi Gabbard (@TulsiGabbard) January 26, 2017
The report ranks Colombia as the world’s second-largest producer of refugees, with 7.7 million Colombians displaced in 2016. Like Syria, the U.S. has not directly invaded Colombia, but is known to have extensively funded paramilitary groups, also known as “death squads,” in the country since the 1980s, when then-U.S. President Ronald Reagan declared a “war on drugs” in Colombia.
U.S. efforts have long helped fuel the civil war between the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and pro-government, U.S.-funded paramilitary groups. This conflict has lasted for more than half a century.
In 2000, then-President Bill Clinton’s administration funded the disastrous “Plan Colombia” with $4 billion in U.S. taxpayer funds, ostensibly to fight drug trafficking and insurgents. Almost all of this money was used to fund the Colombian military and its weapon purchases. “Plan Colombia” ultimately intensified armed violence, military deployments, human rights abuses by the Colombian military, and – of course – the internal displacement of Colombians. The legacy of U.S. policy in Colombia and its continuing support of the nation’s right-wing, neo-liberal regime have ensured that the chaos continues into the present.
In a destructive decades-long war that has been fueled & prolonged by billions of dollars from the US’ Plan Colombia https://t.co/50Wmy1eqGP
— Ben Norton (@BenjaminNorton) March 10, 2017
In addition to the above, U.S foreign policy is also to blame for the conflict in South Sudan, where the UN report found was home to the fastest-growing displacement of people in the world. In 2011, the U.S. pushed South Sudan to secede from Sudan, as South Sudan holds the vast majority of Sudan’s oil reserves — the largest oil reserves in all of Africa. The U.S.’ push for the creation of an independent South Sudan dislodged Chinese claims to Sudanese oil, as the Chinese had previously signed oil contracts with the (now Northern) Sudanese government.
But when nation-building efforts went awry and civil war broke out just two years later, some analysts suggested that the conflict only started when South Sudan’s president began to cozy up to China. According to the UN report, approximately 3.3 million people in South Sudan have fled their homes since the war began.
Grandi has called on the world’s nations to help prevent and resolve the global refugee crisis. But he would also do well to point out the common cause uniting many of the world’s worst conflicts – the U.S. military-industrial complex’s insatiable lust for conquest, power and profit.
Whitney Webb is a MintPress contributor, where this article first appeared, who has written for several news organizations in both English and Spanish; her stories have been featured on ZeroHedge, the Anti-Media, 21st Century Wire, and True Activist among others – she currently resides in Southern Chile.
Image Credit: Valentina Petrova/AP, posted at FT blogs
The ZioNa*i-controlled U*N is hopeless, as usual!
But let us not be confused by typical ZioNazi’s MO because actually, the greatest core of evil, is ZioNazi-controlled NA*O, with the ultimate aims – to conquer the world 5 major oceans and all the major Straits, towards a fascist ZNWO; whilst destroying the strongest anti-ZNWO institutions of Islam & Catholicism, and their believers along the way, under the ZNWO’s increasing genocidal Depopulation agenda (including through their most evil terrorist cells, IS/ISIS/ISIL – which are created by MOSSAD/CIA as revealed by Snowden)!
And both ZioNa*i-controlled Lib/Consv Democ/Tr*mp’s regimes are part of this NA*O ‘s ZNWO’s beastly horns!
I mean absolutely no disrespect, but the Zionist movement and all the other “isms” including fascism (of fascia, freemasonic symbol), communism, Marxism, feminism, Nazism, et al, are creations of the Jesuit Order of the Papacy. Just to show you a little bit of proof, look at the SMOM, or the Sovereign Military Order of Malta, who answer to the Pope (all “Orders” including the NWO are Roman). This whole Zionist thing is nothing but another one of their psyops. Both Rockefellers and Rothschilds are on this list, along with US military leaders and politicians of both sides, Jewish, Protestant, and every other denomination is here, as they infiltrate and masquerade as something they aren’t. God bless!
Famous American Knights of Malta
George W. Anderson – Admiral in the United States Navy
James Jesus Angelton – Chief of the CIA’s Counterintelligence Staff from 1954 to 1975
Samuel Alito – Associate Justice of the Supreme Court
Joe M. Allbaugh – President George W. Bush’s Director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency
Michael Bloomberg – 108th Mayor of New York City
John Robert Bolton – 25th United States Ambassador to the United Nations
Charles Joseph Bonaparte – 37th United States Secretary of the Navy and father of the FBI.
Pat Buchanan – Senior advisor to American Presidents Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, and Ronald Reagan
William F. Buckley, Jr. – American conservative author[2] and commentator.
George H.W Bush
George W. Bush
Jeb Bush
Precott Bush, Jr.
Frank Capra – American film director
Frank Charles Carlucci III – 16th United States Secretary of Defense
William Casey – 13th Director of Central Intelligence
Dick Cheney — Devil Incarnate (lol)
Michael Chertoff – 2nd Secretary of Homeland Security
Noam Chomsky – MIT professor
Bill Clinton
(Senator) John Danforth – 24th United States Ambassador to the United Nations
John J. DeGioia – President of Georgetown University
Cartha DeLoach – Deputy director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation
Allen Dulles – 5th Director of the Central Intelligence Agency
Edwin J. Feulner – President of the conservative think tank the Heritage Foundation
Raymond Flyn n – 52nd Mayor of Boston
*Rudy Giuliani*– 107th Mayor of New York City
Alan Greenspan – 13th Chairman of the Federal Reserve
Alexander Haig – Army General, 7th Supreme Allied Commander Europe
William Randolph Hearst – American newspaper publisher
Richard Holbrooke – United States Special Envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan
J. Edgar Hoover – Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation
Lee Iococca – Former Chrysler Chairman
William J. Donovan – Father of the CIA
Joseph Kennedy – 44th United States Ambassador to the United Kingdom
(Senator) Ted Kennedy
Henry A. Kissinger
Henry Luce – A magazine magnate, was called “the most influential private citizen in the America of his day”
Robert James “Jim” Nicholson – 5th United States Secretary of Veterans Affairs
Oliver North – National Security Council staff member during the Iran–Contra affair
Francis (Frank) V. Ortiz – United States Ambassador to Argentina
Thomas ‘Tip’ O’Neill – 55th Speaker of the United States House of Representatives
George Pataki – 53rd Governor of New York
Peter G. Peterson – Chair of the Council on Foreign Relations
John Francis Queeny – Founded the Monsanto Company (GMO, poisoning the world)
John J. Raskob – Financial executive and businessman for DuPont and General Motors, and the builder of the Empire State Building
(President) Ronald W. Reagan
Nelson Rockefeller
David Rockefeller
Francis Rooney – United States Ambassador to the Holy See
Rick Santorum – Senate’s third-ranking Republican from 2001 until 2007
Antonin Scalia – Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court
Joseph Edward Schmitz (Blackwater) – Defense Department Inspector General
Frank Shakespeare – United States Ambassador to Portugal, United States Ambassador to the Holy See,
Clay Shaw – Head of the International Trade Mart; charged for being part of a conspiracy to assassinate President John F. Kennedy.
Frank Sinatra
Frederick W. Smith – Founder of FedEx
Myron Taylor – American industrialist, and later a diplomatic figure involved in many of the most important geopolitical events during and after World War II.
George Tenet – 18th Director of Central Intelligence
Ted Turner – founder of TBS and CNN
Thomas Von Essen – Fire department Commissioner of the City of New York. He quit 4 months after 911.
Robert Ferdinand Wagner, Jr – 102nd Mayor of New York City
Vernon A. Walters – 17th United States Ambassador to the United Nations
Gen. William Westmoreland – Commander of U.S. military operations in the Vietnam War
Gen. Charles A. Willoughby – General Douglas MacArthur’s Chief of Intelligence during most of World War II and the Korean War.
Robert Zoellick – 11th President of the World Bank Group
Gen. Anthony Zinni – Nickname “The Godfather” Special envoy for the United States to Israel and the Palestinian Authority
Famous non-American Knights of Malta (not included in this list yet are royal family members of all nations with royalty)
Amschel Mayer von Rothschild
Kurt Waldheim – 4th Secretary-General of the United Nations
Silvio Berlusconi – 50th Prime Minister of Italy
Tony Blair
King Juan Carlos of Spain
Heinrich Himmler – Hitler’s Chief of German Police in the Reich Ministry of the Interior
Nelson Mandela
Rupert Murdoch
Juan Perón – 29th & 40th President of Argentina
As usual, anti-Catholic illogical ranting! The ZNWO agents will infiltrate all religious organizations; including posing as believers; in order to destroy the institutions from WITHIN! So get a grip!
You have it backwards, but I’m not going to insult you like you’re insulting me. I still don’t understand how you can’t see, with all that evidence I’ve shown you, that the people sitting in the Vatican are freemasonic Luciferians trying to usher in their NWO, and their agents are disguised and infiltrate all faiths, not the other way around. Can you really not consider anything I wrote, or even look into it?
Vatican translated is Vatis-Divining, and Can-Serpent. This is easily researched. They worship Lucifer, they claim to own everything (I’ve even posted ecclesiastical law here), and they even admit it in their Easter Mass. It’s right there on tape, them singing praises to Lucifer. These are not men of God, they are evil, and they have been trying to resurrect the Holy Roman Empire into their New World Order (Orders are Roman, not Hebrew, how do you explain that one away?) since the last one fell.
The Catholic congregation are victims, like you and like me, and people of every faith. We’re all victims, and they like nothing more than this division we’re demonstrating that they planned and executed (they did a pretty good job). This plan has been going on for centuries, and I’ve been researching this for many years, the least you could do is be civil about interacting with me. God bless you 😉
Jeez, racist and fascist sociopath ZioNa*i liars having a field day bashing Catholics/Catholicism/Pope (and Islam/Muslism of course, simultaneously)! Among the ZioNazi’s ultimate goal is to achieve Lucifer’s ZNWO, where Evil supposedly equals to Good and Lucifer supposedly equals to God -thus is why anti-ZNWO Catholicism and Islam are these Luciferians’ greatest enemies!
Because any religion or any moral values, especially if anti-abortion/free sex pornography/bestiality/cannibalism etc. are simply not acceptable to these Satanists!
The Heart of Darkness: How Visceral Hatred of Catholicism Turns Into Genocide
newoxfordreview.org
May 2004 By Anne Barbeau Gardiner
Sexual and Masonic Ideology in French Revolution and Implications in Zionist World (Part I)
VT, By Jonas E. Alexis on March 12, 2014
U want to stop my freedom of speech whilst u keep bashing Cath**lism/Po*e!
Among the ZioNazi’s ultimate goal is to achieve Lucifer’s ZNWO, where Evil supposedly equals to Good and Lucifer supposedly equals to God -thus is why anti-ZNWO Catholicism and Islam are these Luciferians’ greatest enemies! See –
The Heart of Darkness: How Visceral Hatred of Catholicism Turns Into Genocide
newoxfordreview.org
May 2004 By Anne Barbeau Gardiner
Sexual and Masonic Ideology in French Revolution and Implications in Zionist World (Part I)
VT, By Jonas E. Alexis on March 12, 2014
I’m sick of this stu**yAP censoring my freedom of speech!
gbf, Uwant to stop my freedom of speech whilst u keep bashing Cath**lism/Po*e!
Among the ZioNazi’s ultimate goal is to achieve Lucifer’s ZNWO, where Evil
supposedly equals to Good and Lucifer supposedly equals to God – thus is
why anti-ZNWO Catholicism and Islam are these Luciferians’ greatest
enemies! See –
The Heart of Darkness: How Visceral Hatred of Cath*licism Turns Into Genocide
May 2004 By Anne Barbeau Gardiner; and
Sexual and Masonic Ideology in Fre*ch Revolution and Implications in Zionist World (Part I)
By Jonas E. Alexis on March 12, 2014
This written response is just another anti Israeli rant by you foggydew (nickname suggests your brain is in a real fog because of illogical thinking) . The United Nations always finds something wrong with the west and especially America which is blamed for all the worlds ills. Most immigration is a result of people of a nation wanting to escape the horrendous life (civil war, starvation ,homelessness, Islamic hatred, lack of opportunity, zero safety, etc). they experience in their native country. You blame it on zionism . The blame is on the despots that brutalize the people they rule in the countries these immigrants and/or refugees are fleeing from. Some of the most successful countries in the world, Germany, Japan, South Korea) are a direct result of American intervention after WW2. Every failed country is run by despotic rulers who actually enslave their population with fear and intimidation,
Get off with yr lying brainless ranting – it is just pathetic and idiotic! I am against the most savage and inhumane colonial power of ZNWO IS-ra*l/NA*O – and u have a problem with my freedom of speech?!! And what about the ever and predatory genocidal Zionism hatred – especially towards the Indigenous Palestinian Catholics/Muslims, in their NATIVE Palestine country?!!
Only psychopaths would think that non-Wezztern world should be invaded/mass murdered/raped/robbed in order to ‘succeed’ as a nation!! It shows that the ZNWO ever predatory and carnivorous mass murderer/rapist/robber invaders, are the ones who are failed and evil beasts, who can only pathetically survive by enslaving the non-Wezztern world, especially our poor Indigenous masses!
Your response once again is a typical anti Israeli rant. I wonder if you practice Israeliophobia. Your rant suggests this. You are blaming Israel for the problems of the world. Please go get some help.
Ranting ZioNazi Racist and Supremacist sociopaths; need to be institutionalized; because their typical cowardly MO is to stop any anti-ISra*l free speech! In order to normalize the ever savage, carnivorous, predatory and genocidal colonial power of IS-ra*l!
Now, how about Palestiniansophobia, Iraniansophobia; Syriansophobia etc. by the ZNWO predator beasts?!! Psychopaths keep blaming Muslims/Islam for the evils of IS-ra*l/ZNWO savage colonization of Palestine, Syria, Libya; Iraq and elsewhere!
This is a heartbreaking report. Can we even begin to imagine a world where financial resources which have been “blown” for decades, even centuries, on relentless efforts by psychopaths to rule the world were spent on positive endeavors that would benefit humanity and the planet rather than destroying everything in their hegemonic path? How to stop this inhuman behavior is the question for those of us who believe that a better world is possible, but can only be accomplished after their defeat and with their total demise.
And since your expertise or lack thereof is the cause of you losing out to them, the likelihood that your demise will precede theirs is almost certain. There can be nothing inhuman about the behavior of humans. A better world is only possible through better educated and more moral human behavior.
Don’t I recall a prior comment from you that “Those who can, do; and those who can’t, teach”? So, who gets to choose the teachers/educators and who makes the determination of what is moral? You? You contradict yourself in your own comments. In one instance you say that we should rely on the law (which is often made and enforced by immoral and unethical bureaucrats) with no mention of morality or ethics, and now you claim that only teachers and preachers can help us learn a better way. Which is is? You obviously have little respect for those of us who are teachers which is evident by your lack of reading comprehension. I can state this because you did not comprehend that I equated the behavior of psychopaths with “inhuman” behavior which infers that they lack basic human traits. Next, you made two faulty assumptions with your ad hominum attack on my “expertise”, for which I made no claim, and that I have suffered a loss “to them”, which I have not. I only stated an opinion with which you are entitled to disagree, but you did not. Instead you totally neglected to answer my query and opted to retreat into name-calling and labeling. Buh-bye!
What does morality have to do with teaching ability. Wouldn’t a mass murder be highly qualified to teach genocide?
Well Tulsi Gabbards Bill only got 13 votes out of 365 which means AMERICA SUPPORTS FUNDING AND SUPPLYING TERRORISTS. Quite amazing after all the BS they say about fighting terrorism.
The other surprising thing is has it even been reported by the unbiased MSM?
We would be a lot better off with Tulsi Gabbards in the Whitehouse than Trump.