Joseph Thomas — Vietnam Locks Up US-Funded Agitators

There is a growing understanding of US regime change strategies and tactics. It used to be that the CIA would work covertly to build opposition movements that would remove governments that did not cooperate with the United States and its corporate interests. This still occurs but many of those functions have been buttressed by the US Agency for International Development and the National Endowment for Democracy. Countries are catching on to this. The article below describes how Vietnam is responding to US funded and trained regime change activists.

Popular Resistance
Vietnam Locks Up US-Funded Agitators

Joseph Thomas, Asia-pacificresearch.com

RT — Cambodian PM calls US democracy 'bloody & brutal' in row over USAID-funded NGO

Political tensions have been rising between Phnom Penh and Washington, after Cambodia ordered a USAID-supported organization to halt its activity in the country. The Asian nation says it is defending its sovereignty, while Washington questioned its democracy.

In the latest development to the worsening dispute between the two nations, Cambodia's long-ruling leader, Prime Minister Hun Sen, accused Washington of interference in his country's domestic affairs.

"We wish to send a clear message again to the US Embassy that we defend our national sovereignty," the Cambodian government said in an open letter Thursday, as quoted by Reuters....

Earlier this week, the Cambodian Foreign Ministry announced it was expelling the US-funded National Democratic Institute (NDI) after a series of publications in local media suggesting that the non-profit organization attempted to act against the government. Phnom Penh said the NGO had violated national registration rules....

Although in its mission statement the institute, which has been operating in Cambodia since 1992, claims that it works with all political forces, some of its materials leaked online allegedly showed its political bias and moves to assist the opposition to overthrow the government.

The intentions of other NGOs operating in Cambodia and funded by USAID (US Agency for International Development) have also been questioned by the media, suggesting those organizations might be tools of the US State Department promoting Washington's foreign policy.

"There are... NGOs who also will want to create a color revolution and topple the government like they have successfully in other countries," one of the publications on Cambodia's Fresh News said.

Busted. Libya and Ukraine changed things.

RT
Cambodian PM calls US democracy 'bloody & brutal' in row over USAID-funded NGO

Adrian A. Basora and Kenneth Yalowitz — Democracy Promotion Is Smart Security Policy

Two former US ambassadors advocate for "democracy promotion" abroad to enhance US national security.

Excluded from these efforts will be countries like Russia and Uzbekistan, where the effort would be futile and/or discredit democracy promotion by validating regime propaganda that equates these programs with aggressive intrusion into domestic affairs.

The National Interest
Democracy Promotion Is Smart Security Policy

Adrian A. Basora, formerly U.S. ambassador to the Czech Republic and presently director of the Foreign Policy Research Institute Eurasia Program and Project on Democratic Transitions, and Kenneth Yalowitz, formerly U.S. ambassador to Belarus and Georgia, and presently director of the Conflict Resolution Program at Georgetown University and a Global Fellow at the Woodrow Wilson Center.

RT — US spent $585mn on ‘promoting democracy’ worldwide in past year

Fueling the beacon of freedom.

Washington invested $585 million in promoting democracy across the globe in the past year, the US Department of State’s financial report for fiscal year 2016 revealed.

But Confucian Institutes teaching Chinese language and culture in America as subversive and RT is a state-sponsored disinformation agent. NED and Radio Free Europe/Voice of America, not so much.

RT
US spent $585mn on ‘promoting democracy’ worldwide in past year