9/11 international conference, Paris reports

[xmasdale]

Vers la Vérité [Towards the Truth]

was the name given to the international get together of 9/11 activists in Paris during the weekend 9th - 11th October 2009. Here is a report from Debora Blake, co-organizer of this excellent event with Annie Machon.

On behalf of Annie and myself, I would like to thank you for attending the first Vers La Vérité event in Paris last weekend. I'd also like to thank the ReOpen911 France team who contributed to the success of the event. As you know, Vers La Vérité was a mix of public and private events where each sub-event was designed to facilitate communication between people who share common concerns on important issues, including 9/11.

We kicked off the event with a press conference on Friday morning attended by a journalist from a mainstream newspaper, France Soir and the independant TéléLibre. The mayor of Paris's second district introduced Cynthia who made a brief statement and took some questions. Annie Machon also spoke briefly.

On Friday night, in one of Paris's notorious all-night hang-outs, the Café Etincelle, activists from around the globe met up and began sharing ideas. This was also an opportunity to reach out to the general public and allow them the chance to talk with "the specialists" that you all are.

As the activists were having a drink together, just across the Seine river, at the restaurant Le Procope, Cynthia McKinney was having dinner in the company of the activist-sponsors who made generous donations in order to have a seat at the table (and defray the costs of organizing Vers La Vérité). Le Procope is the oldest restaurant in Paris and was where many great minds gathered to discuss important issues of the day. Benjamin Franklin worked on the US Constitution there. It was truly a special moment to be walking, or rather, "sitting, dining and discussing in their footsteps". We, too, are making history.

At noon on Saturday, we started with a healthy and delicious meal in the Olive Grove at La Bellevilloise. The atmosphere was light and friendly, and we were even treated to a brief, but beautiful, impromptu piano performance by talented activist Patrick McGuiness. Brunch was followed by the Strategy session that allowed everyone a chance to focus on how best to move forward as a movement. We will be posting the reports from the various work groups in the Vers La Vérité website very soon. Please keep your logins and passwords.

Saturday evening was the main event: 4 exemplary individuals with complementary experiences all on the same stage to help the public begin to understand the complexity of 9/11. Annie Machon briefly told the public about her work as a counter-terrorism officer for MI5 in London. A 17-minute version of American Blackout showed the public how the Bush administration openly colluded with private firms to steal the election that would ultimately put GWB in the White House and manipulate the one that would later take Cynthia McKinney out of Congress. Following the film, on stage, Cynthia made a speech inspired by the breaking news announcement of President Obama's being the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize. Her excellent speech is attached. Giulietto Chiesa, recently back from a trip to Siberia, broke the sad news to the audience that, over the past few years, Siberia has witnessed the formation of "lakes the size of France", and that diminishing resources will ultimately lead to a horrendous battle of survival of the fittest if we don't start changing our way of life immediately. We then showed ZERO and brought the other face of the 9/11 issue to the public's attention. Following some quick Q&A with Giulietto, Niels Harrit helped the audience understand the importance of his research and findings, namely the discovery of unexploded nano-thermite in the World Trade Center dust. To add a little levity to the evening, we auctioned off a dvd of the documentary, American Blackout, and to my surpise, the highest bidder turned out to be Mathieu Kassovitz, one of France's most famous film directors and actors. To those who thought or assumed it was planned, it was not! Mathieu didn't even know there would be an auction, nor did I until Ian Woods showed me the dvd when he was setting up the sales table. So that was for me an incredibly magical moment. To close out the evening, we showed a special 10-minute montage, a sort of "best of" French comic Jean-Marie Bigard's 9/11 video clips subtitled in English especially for the occasion. We had a good laugh and when the lights came back up, people had a hard time leaving the room, which was just as packed at the beginning as it was at the end. Proof that the night was a big success.

Sunday morning, about 50 activists assembled at Place de la République for Paris's first 9/11 Truth demonstration. As we waited for people to gather, I decided to bring a flyer over to our police escorts. I gave them a crash course on what's wrong with the official report. As the two plain clothes officers learned about each new anomaly, their faces revealed shock and surprise, and their words left no doubt. They were quickly in agreement with me (us) that something is very wrong. When they asked about Bin Laden, Giulietto Chiesa was just arriving for the march. So he came over and briefly explained to them what was wrong with the Bin Laden videos. We left Place de la République, and began to walk to Place de la Bastille. I led the procession carrying a 9/11 Truth Now sign that Diana brought from Spain and attached to a tree branch she found on the ground. As we walked, we shouted

"Onze septembre, coup monté! Nous voulons la vérité!
Onze septembre coup monté! Nous savons que vous mentez!"

That means "9/11 inside job! We want the truth! 9/11 inside job! We know you're lying!" As we advanced down the boulevard, our escorts stopped traffic at green lights so we could cross the street. How great to see Truthers getting the royal treatment! By the time we reached Bastille, our escorts had asked some activists in the group if they had any extras dvds. They did and graciously gave a few to the police officers. As the demo came to a close 2 hours later, the officers told me everything went perfectly and that they would file a positive report so that if, in the future, we want to organize another demonstration, there will be no problem. That was a beautiful moment as well.

Overall we had some press coverage, such as Libération, TéléLibre and Turkish Times. Cynthia also gave interviews with representatives from Amnesty International and Nexus magazine. Mainstream tv station M6 was on hand Saturday night gathering information for "60 Minutes" type program they're working on.

I know many of you filmed parts of the event. If possible, I would like to get copies of your best footage so I can begin making some videos to post in the website and on YouTube and possibly even make a dvd. Could you please send me your photos and videos, perhaps via a link to an FTP server, or by using a file transfer service such as megaupload, sendbox, etc. I'd like to get everything by the end of the week so I can start reviewing and editing the footage next week.

Thank you all so much for attending Vers La Vérité. You made it a success. Annie and I tried hard to pull it together, along with the ReOpen team and we hope that you found it useful and enjoyable. There were surely things we could have improved so your feedback is important and welcome. So please don't hesitate to send us your comments.

I very glad we were able to meet and get to know one another and I truly hope that what we started last weekend will be soon be recognized as some major steps towards the truth, otherwise stated, Vers La Vérité.

Kind regards,

Debora

[xmasdale]

Cynthia McKinney (former US congresswoman and former presidential candidate) guest of honour at the Vers la Verite conference made the following speech.

Cynthia McKinney
Vers La Verité
Paris
October 10, 2009

President Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize was not the only news yesterday. And in my opinion, it’s not even the biggest news. It’s not even the saddest news. But it does provide us with some critical information as we move forward. The three-part question for us, tonight however, is “What are we moving forward TO; is that the place we want to go; and if not, what do we do about it?

In other words, “What is our vision for the future and how do we define success?”

I have been and am still in deep pain over the institutional homicide of my aunt and in my grief, I’ve considered giving up.

But then, I wiped the tears from my eyes long enough to remember communities of people that I’ve been blessed enough to get to know, from Toronto, Canada to Cape Town, South Africa; from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia to Valdosta, Georgia, there are people struggling through their own pain, their own deep personal disappointments to reach a better place—not just for themselves, but for the global community of man. And I know deep in my own heart, as broken as it is, that I cannot give up. My brain tells me that the struggle for truth, justice, peace, and dignity is too important to lose because of heartbreak.

The one thing that probably best defines everyone in this room are our search for and activities on behalf of principles that are bigger than ourselves. We want our governments to tell us the truth; we want them to deliver justice; we want our global community to live in peace; and we want respect for the dignity of all humankind.

So if these are the ingredients of our vision, what tools do we need to produce the desired result?

Well, first of all, the desired result has to have definition.

I mentioned in one of my messages to a dear friend in response to the Nobel award to President Barack Obama that we needed to keep our eyes on the prize and then I erased it because I don’t think we’ve sufficiently defined what the prize is.

So there must be a small, cohesive, international group of rock-solid people feverishly working to redefine for all who want to be active, and a part of our vision, just what the prize is. And this “prize,” our vision, must be repeated and explained often so people can differentiate our vision, from their reality.

Here is where language becomes important. If we want policy instead of speeches, then this must be repeated early and often because what I’m alarmed by is that in the absence of us providing real definition, and there are reasons for that, people are beginning to think that a speech IS policy.
But, as I said earlier, there was a lot of news yesterday. Some of it even more important than the Nobel Peace Prize Award, but the award certainly overshadowed all other stories.

And I’m always searching for context. Because, as the U.S. military puts it, “perception management” is important. And we must understand the context of what happens and when it happens, in order to understand why.

I always say that we must see the invisible, hear the unspoken, and read the unwritten. That’s what some of the organizers of Vers La Verité were professionally trained to do, before they became whistleblowers, and now our leaders.

Now, what were some of those other interesting news items?

Well, at a Native American Lodge located next to Senator John McCain’s ranch, two people died and several others were hospitalized following a hazardous materials situation at the Sweat Lodge, which is like a spiritual retreat led by Native Americans. I’ve even been invited to participate in one upon my return to the U.S.

Now, I find this interesting and a story that should be followed up on and I will be doing that because I want to make sure there’s no bigger story hidden in an important cultural ritual of the Native Americans who are victims of a genocide in North America that continues to this day.

On the day that the Nobel Prize was announced, we also learned that the U.S. bunker buster bomb will be ready in a few more months.
This is the bomb that holds over 5,000 pounds of explosives and is designed to penetrate hardened facilities, including those underground. Some brilliant people in the U.S. even want to put nuclear tips on bunker buster bombs. However, in announcing the near deployment of the project that pays McDonnell Douglas to adapt the B-2 bomber so it can deliver the Boeing-made bomb to its intended target, the Pentagon press secretary said,

"The reality is that the world we live in is one in which there are people who seek to build weapons of mass destruction and they seek to do so in a clandestine fashion."

The article noted that the Obama Administration had not ruled out military action against Iran.

Another story noted that hours after winning the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize, President Obama met with his military advisors about troop levels in Afghanistan. The troop increase requested by the U.S. Commander ranged, it is reported, from 10,000 to 60,000—although the top number isn’t listed in that news report. One has to go to another news item to see the true top number. At any rate, it seems that the choices confronting U.S. and European leaders is whether to increase the current 68,000 U.S. boots on the ground in Afghanistan or to merely increase the number of drone attacks. Decreasing death and destruction and bringing our young men and women home is not on the Nobel Peace Prize winner’s agenda for discussion.

The last article of note is about a restaurant in west Georgia that is using the “N-word” on its marquee to describe President Obama. It reminds me of the Atlanta area restaurant that put on its marquee that I was Buckwheat with Boobs. Now, those of you who are from the U.S. will know what that means and the depth of insult that was intended. The article notes that I’ve made this restaurant’s marquee, too. Both restaurant owners claim to not be racists and to be protected by free speech.

My point in including this particular news item is that we still have so far to go just in terms of our human relations. It is imperative that we do what we can to spread our message and our vision and reach those who can be reached.

Which brings me to who can be reached. Those with enough discernment to know that what is being pronounced from on high is not their reality. And rather than accept or discount the contradictions, we want them to join us and struggle for a better reality for everybody.


I am saddened beyond belief that on the day of the Peace Prize award, a struggling democracy in Honduras was besieged with U.S. supplied weapons and U.S.-trained paramilitaries and snipers in support of coup leaders over the democratically-elected people’s leaders. In fact, the latest dispatch from Honduras is that many of the snipers and paramilitaries—now descending on Honduras from all over Latin America—were trained in my home state of Georgia.

More and more people are experiencing cognitive dissonance and rightly so. Our leaders and respected organizations are lying to us! One friend and former Congressional Staffer of mine puts it this way: we need a democratic military instead of a militarized democracy.
The United States, with the help of its European and Asian allies maintains over 700 bases around the world. The number is increasing under President Obama.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. said that we must combat racism, poverty, and militarism. Our movement cannot struggle against militarism and fail to address racism. We must be comprehensive and to racism, militarism, and poverty, we must now add gaining control of a media that will allow us to communicate to a broader community and not just within our small spheres, and regaining control of education so that people are not so dumbed down that they actually believe that war is peace, slavery is freedom, ignorance is strength, and lies are truth.

And if we are right, then others will join us. They will share with us their dreams and their passions and we will help to empower them.
Global resistance combined with local action, organization, vision, commitment, and resources will allow us to have significant victories in the future.

Vers La Verité understands that the foundation of all of this action, attainment of the prize, can only happen with truth as our foundation.
It’s already a brave new world, let’s get busy and make it ours!!!

[fish5133]

Tres bon .Viva la frogs.

[Annie]

It was a great weekend of events - and lovely to see so many activists from across Europe and North America in Paris.

Videos and a film of the weekend will be posted soon on www.verslaverite.org.

[Annie]

My report on the Paris weekend:

http://bit.ly/41hd9E

[TonyGosling]

More of Annie here

Annie Machon is a former MI5 (British Security Service) Intelligence Officer and whistleblower. She left the Service at the same time as her partner, David Shayler, due to Shayler's disclosures about crimes committed by the intelligence agencies. Annie is a prominent member of 9/11 Truth Movement, and in 2005 she wrote a book called "Spies, Lies and Whistleblowers: MI5 and the David Shayler Affair". This talk is a basic overview of the story from her book (which she gave at the 911Truth conference in Chicago, 2006.)
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=e9b_1221182366