Egypt protests: America's secret backing for rebel leaders behind uprising (Wikileaks)

[indimuse]

Source: The Telegraph

By Tim Ross, Matthew Moore and Steven Swinford 9:23PM GMT 28 Jan 2011

The American government secretly backed leading figures behind the Egyptian uprising who have been planning “regime change” for the past three years, The Daily Telegraph has learned.

The American Embassy in Cairo helped a young dissident attend a US-sponsored summit for activists in New York, while working to keep his identity secret from Egyptian state police.
On his return to Cairo in December 2008, the activist told US diplomats that an alliance of opposition groups had drawn up a plan to overthrow President Hosni Mubarak and install a democratic government in 2011.
The secret document in full


And::http://www.google.com/hostedne...
Clinton convenes mass meeting of US ambassadors
(AP) – 5 hours ago

WASHINGTON (AP) — Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton is convening an unprecedented mass meeting of U.S. ambassadors.

The top envoys from nearly all of America's 260 embassies, consulates and other posts in more than 180 countries will be gathering at the State Department beginning on Monday. Officials say it's the first such global conference.

The gathering comes at a time of crisis in Egypt that could reshape dynamics in the Middle East, fallout from leaked diplomatic documents and congressional calls for sweeping cuts in foreign aid.

Although the meeting has been called to discuss U.S. foreign policy priorities for 2011, officials say Clinton plans to meet personally with ambassadors from front-line states to hear about developments on the ground. Officials also expect that specific concerns about the WikiLeaks revelations will be raised.

Read more: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/egypt/8289686/Egypt-protests-Americas-secret-backing-for-rebel-leaders-behind-uprising.html

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Could this be true? hmm..don't know what to believe half the time...


cool site!:: http://www.movements.org/ live feed ;)

[leveymg]

1. Telegraph headline misrepresents relationship between US and opposition. Not what cable says.

If you actually read the cable, it becomes clear that the US is not "running" the April 6 opposition group, or any of the formal opposition parties. Instead, the Egyptian activist -- xxxxxxxxxxxx -- quoted is actually complaining the US backs Mubarak, and has no real plan to remove him. Here's the relevant section of the cable. Judge for yourself:

(C) xxxxxxxxxxxx described how he tried to convince his

Washington interlocutors that the USG should pressure the GOE to

implement significant reforms by threatening to reveal CAIRO 00002572

002 OF 002 information about GOE officials' alleged \"illegal\"

off-shore bank accounts. He hoped that the U.S. and the international

community would freeze these bank accounts, like the accounts of

Zimbabwean President Mugabe's confidantes. xxxxxxxxxxxx said he wants

to convince the USG that Mubarak is worse than Mugabe and that the GOE

will never accept democratic reform. xxxxxxxxxxxx asserted that

Mubarak derives his legitimacy from U.S. support, and therefore

charged the U.S. with \"being responsible\" for Mubarak's \"crimes.\"

He accused NGOs working on political and economic reform of living in

a \"fantasy world,\" and not recognizing that Mubarak -- \"the head of

the snake\" -- must step aside to enable democracy to take root. 6.

(C) xxxxxxxxxxxx claimed that several opposition forces -- including

the Wafd, Nasserite, Karama and Tagammu parties, and the Muslim

Brotherhood, Kifaya, and Revolutionary Socialist movements -- have

agreed to support an unwritten plan for a transition to a

parliamentary democracy, involving a weakened presidency and an

empowered prime minister and parliament, before the scheduled 2011

presidential elections (ref C). According to xxxxxxxxxxxx, the

opposition is interested in receiving support from the army and the

police for a transitional government prior to the 2011 elections.

xxxxxxxxxxxx asserted that this plan is so sensitive it cannot be

written down. (Comment: We have no information to corroborate that

these parties and movements have agreed to the unrealistic plan

xxxxxxxxxxxx has outlined. Per ref C, xxxxxxxxxxxx previously told us

that this plan was publicly available on the internet. End comment.)

7. (C) xxxxxxxxxxxx said that the GOE has recently been cracking down

on the April 6 movement by arresting its members. xxxxxxxxxxxx noted

that although SSIS had released xxxxxxxxxxxx and xxxxxxxxxxxx \"in the

past few days,\" it had arrested three other members. (Note: On

December 14, we pressed the MFA for the release of xxxxxxxxxxxx and

xxxxxxxxxxxx, and on December 28 we asked the MFA for the GOE to

release the additional three activists. End note.) xxxxxxxxxxxx

conceded that April 6 has no feasible plans for future activities.

The group would like to call for another strike on April 6, 2009, but

realizes this would be \"impossible\" due to SSIS interference,

xxxxxxxxxxxx said. He lamented that the GOE has driven the group's

leadership underground, and that one of its leaders, xxxxxxxxxxxx, has

been in hiding for the past week. 8. (C) Comment: xxxxxxxxxxxx

offered no roadmap of concrete steps toward April 6's highly

unrealistic goal of replacing the current regime with a parliamentary

democracy prior to the 2011 presidential elections. Most opposition

parties and independent NGOs work toward achieving tangible,

incremental reform within the current political context, even if they

may be pessimistic about their chances of success. xxxxxxxxxxxx

wholesale rejection of such an approach places him outside this

mainstream of opposition politicians and activists.

[Cirque du So-What]

2. Typical misrepresentation on the part of the Torygraph

They're truly in the same league as FAUX News, as I'm convinced these misdirections are an attempt to torpedo regime change in Egypt or elsewhere in the Arab world, which is the neocons' greatest fear.

[jakeXT]

3. Of course it's true, revolutions don't happen spontaneously

BTW the article is old

[Ghost Dog]

4. What happened to the earth-moving BANK-related release

from wikileaks, promised by Mr. Assange for January, BTW?

[fasttense]

5. The criminals from the bush regime are afraid that their torture and

rendition operations along with some financial manipulations will come out if Mubarak is removed.

So, they are spinning their little lies in order to make the activists unsuccessful.

I have been watching the response from the WH, State Dept and Congress and you can tell they were surprised. They did not expect what is happening in Egypt. If the US had been helping the activists, then I think our federal government's response would have been better coordinated.

The Fox lies, Rupert spin, RepubliCON hate cycles and conservative rags are trying to change the narrative. But it is too little too late. They lost their chance to characterize the Egyptian activists as puppets or thugs. The world knows the truth and it is harder to cover up the truth once it is already out there. I think the activists had the element of surprise on their side which is why we got the truth instead of the spin the corporate government would feed us.

So you are going to get a lot of fake stuff and lies about the Egyptian protests come out of organizations who loved the bushes.

[ElsewheresDaughter]

6. disinformation