Earlier this year, a US drone strike killed two innocent hostages, one American and one Italian citizen near the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.

The incident spurred outrage across the media, resulting in Obama having to apologize for the grave error.

If only one could expect the same apology for the thousands of drone victims across the Muslim World since the advent of the War on Terror, most of whose names were never so much as uttered by those who sealed their deaths.

In today’s globalized world almost everything is interconnected. When it comes to war, conflicts are often interlocked in disturbing ways. For example, every death by way of drone wouldn’t be possible without turning a blind eye to the ongoing genocide from resource wars in the Democratic Republic of the Congo or DRC.

While people rightly demand that “Black Lives Matter” in America, black lives have been forgotten in the Congo, where nearly six million people have died just in the last fifteen years.

Media Roots Radio is joined by Kambale Musavuli, Spokesperson for Friends of the Congo, to talk about how Congo’s resource curse feeds the military industrial complex and why anti-drone activists need to organize with the Congolese to disrupt cobalt extraction.

 

**

Kambale came on Breaking the Set to discuss the cobalt connection to the civil war in the Congo, and Media Roots covered this issue in depth. He also visited BTS during the last Africa Summit to break down backlash against US military policy in the continent.

 

How the US Military Took Over the African Continent

**

Many DRC soldiers are trained and equipped in the United States. Breaking the Set expands upon a UN report bringing to light crimes against humanity committed by a US-trained Congolese battalion.

 

US Sponsors Rape in the Congo

**

This Media Roots podcast is the product of many long hours of hard work and love. If you want to encourage our voice, please consider supporting us as we continue to speak from outside party lines. Even the smallest donations help us with operating costs.

Listen to all previous episodes of Media Roots Radio here.

Follow Abby @abbymartin & @kambale.

http://www.friendsofthecongo.org/

Saudi Arabia’s American backed war in Yemen continues, yet it is massively failing to achieve its stated objectives.

The Houthis continue to advance in the region, and the instability is causing Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula to gain more ground.

Bombing civilians in the poorest country in the Arab World is only exacerbating the crisis. Before the bombing campaign even started, two thirds of Yemen’s population was already in need of aid, and almost half food insecure.

Since the assault started on March 26, more than 1,000 people have been killed, half of which are civilians, according to the United Nations. At least 115 of the victims have been children, according to UNICEF. 

Despite the recent collaborative wave of aggression, the US government has already been carrying out covert operations in Yemen for over a decade. Many have pointed out that the ongoing destabilization of Yemen is a direct result of US’ drone bombing there since the advent of the War on Terror.

Director of the Institute for Gulf Affairs, Ali Al-Ahmed, talks to Media Roots Radio about the American backed war in Yemen and unyielding partnership between the two countries; the Saudi export of terrorism and ultra orthodox Wahhabism; and the political bribery on behalf of Gulf States to maintain a culture of silence.

 

**

After the death of King Abdullah, Ali came on Breaking the Set to discuss the oppressive Saudi Arabian monarchy and dissect why the corporate media covered him as a great reformer.

 

King Abdullah’s Saudi Arabia: Slavery, Terror & Women as Property

**

In the past four months, Saudi Arabia has already beheaded 71 people. Amnesty International has called the upswell in executions a “macabre spike”, having already ranked the country among the top three executioners in the world in 2014.

Last year, I gave an extensive outline of the country’s extensive human rights record and repressive theocracy by discussing the open discrimination against women, public executions for petty crimes and harsh sentencing for government critics.

 

Saudi Arabia’s Tyrannical Death State

**

The toxifying partnership between the US and Saudi Arabia exemplifies the utter hypocrisy of the War on Terror, and the faster it’s exposed as the fraud it is, the faster we can galvanize to stop it.

Abby

Follow @AbbyMartin | @AliAlAhmed_en

Photo by flickr user Tribes of the World

Lawmakers pushing through the next bloated war budget have received millions in campaign contributions from defense contractors, according to Open Secrets.

While the military industrial complex churns unabated and bombs drop across the Middle East in our names, citizens in America continue to be victimized by economic warfare and terrorized by militarized police forces.

On this episode of Media Roots Radio, Eugene Puryear, organizer with the ANSWER coalition and author of Shackled and Chained, connects the war at home and abroad on a systems level while deconstructing the toxic neoliberal ideology that dominates global policy in the 21st century.

If you want to directly download the podcast, click the down arrow icon on the right of the soundcloud display.

To hide the comments to enable easier rewind and fast forward, click on the icon on the very bottom right.

This Media Roots podcast is the product of many long hours of hard work and love. If you want to encourage our voice, please consider supporting us as we continue to speak from outside party lines. Even the smallest donations help us with operating costs.

Listen to all previous episodes of Media Roots Radio here.

Follow @AbbyMartin and @EugenePuryear

Photo by flickr user Moyan Brent