4 strong rulings in Sonnenfield's favor by Argentine Federal & Supreme Court backed up by the Denver District Court's 2002 dismissal of the case against him show that the US's pursuit of him isn't based on 'justice' but is vindictive & reactionary, intending to destroy his credibility & ruin him for daring to speak-out against the lies, contradictions & cover-up maintaining the official theory.
Just saying there's no proof doesn't make abundant evidence of the mountains of obvious 911 lies, evidence planting, evidence tampering, obstruction of justice and perjuries disappear.
10 SEPTEMBER 2010
9/11, nine years later
Kurt Sonnenfeld: A witness for the persecution
by Thierry Meyssan*, Gaia Edwards*
Kurt Sonnenfeld’s case is outstanding for at least two reasons. He is in possession of official documentation that contradicts the U.S. Government’s account of the 9/11 events. He is a high-profile U.S. citizen forced to seek refugee status because of his government’s dogged persecution. Any relation between these two facts is not purely coincidental. Voltaire Network’s second exclusive interview of Kurt Sonnenfeld, conducted in Buenos Aires, is presented below.
Excerpt:
VN: As you suggest, the latest extradition request from Interpol Washington is totally groundless and completely out of line. Could it be seen as an attempt to undermine Argentina’s sovereignty and override the previous court rulings in your favor?
KS: Absolutely! It wasn’t so much a request as it was an order to just go ahead and ignore the Argentine legal process and send me to the US. The Interpol agency has no place whatsoever in making such an order — their role is merely to act as a liaison. In fact, their own constitution prohibits them from intervening in any way in the judicial process of a sovereign nation.
What’s most disconcerting is that it was very insidiously introduced during a period of recess in the courts, obviously with the hope of catching some inexperienced stand-ins off guard and pressuring them to concede to their demand. Of course, that didn’t happen. They also introduced it outside of the proper channels, violating legal protocol, and marked it “confidential” — in a court process where transparency is the rule.
Incidentally, Interpol has a rather sinister background. Former presidents of Interpol include Otto Steinhäusl and Ernst Kaltenbrunner (both generals in the SS of Nazi Germany), Reinhard Heydrich (also a general in the Nazi SS, and chief executor of the "Final solution to the Jewish question"), and Arthur Nebe (yet another general in the Nazi SS and leader of the Einsatzgruppen, under whose command at least 46,000 people were exterminated). Very recently (July 2010), Interpol President Jackie Selebi was found guilty of corruption for accepting bribes from a drug trafficker.
Excerpt:
VN: It should be crystal clear by now that what Washington really wants is your Ground Zero footage which it fears may contain evidence countering it’s version of 9/11.
Not only does that single you out as the most credible witness in a position to testify against the United States, but also as one of the few, if not the only, U.S. citizens, who has formally applied for refugee status vis-à-vis the world’s most powerful nation. That’s quite a burden!
KS: It’s obvious to me by their actions that they’re equally as motivated by vengeance at this point. I am sure there are many people (entire nations even!) who wish to be protected from unjust persecution by the United States. I am not sure how many there are who could be actual citizens of the United States. But nationality should not be factored in to the decision to grant a person refugee status. If a person is being unjustly persecuted by any government, he or she should be granted permanent refugee status, regardless of which country he or she is from. The problem is that the entities involved in granting refugee status are closely tied to the United Nations, which is completely under the financial and political control of the United States.
VN: Have you ever envisaged the possibility that you could be used as a bargaining chip between the two countries?
KS: Knowing how America operates, of course I have. But my wife Paula, knowing full well Argentina’s commitment to the protection of Human Rights (the result of being subjected to a US-backed dictatorship a few decades ago), completely discounts that possibility and affirms that the current administration of President Cristina Kirchner would never use a human being as a “bargaining chip”. Rejecting my extradition is a testament to the Argentine government’s independence and commitment to human rights.
Aside from that, there are two different edicts written by the highest authorities of Argentina’s National Ministry of Human Rights establishing that the extradition cannot be conceded due to the “international responsibility that this would imply for the Nation of Argentina” and stipulating that my “migratory situation” must be regularized as well — as I have an Argentine wife and two Argentine daughters and we therefore comprise an Argentine family, deserving of protection.
All of that is in ADDITION to two strong rulings in my favor by the Argentine Federal Court and two by the Argentine Supreme Court. If you include in that number the initial decision by the Denver court to dismiss the case against me back in 2002, you have a total of FIVE impartial courts that have now looked at the true evidence and have subsequently ruled in my favor.
VN: Sticking to the same logic, have you taken any steps to release your material?
KS: In fact, I have released photos, documents and videos to important investigators around the world — in the US, Argentina, Western Europe, Central Europe, etc. I’m in contact with many analysts, investigators and documentary producers, whose names, of course, I cannot reveal.
I’ve read a lot of commentaries asking why I don’t just upload everything on YouTube. But I have some moral issues with that. It’s not for entertainment and should not be treated superficially. Secondly, you have to remember that the first time I agreed to show some of my footage and talk about my experiences on television back in 2004, I was arrested just days before the show was to air and imprisoned for 7 months. Since then my life and the lives of those close to me have been consumed by this fight against injustice and the world’s only superpower. We are in the midst of an ongoing legal battle. It’s like walking on a razor’s edge. I’m not in a position to just throw it out and see what happens.
VN: Have you heard from any of your former FEMA colleagues who were with you at Ground Zero?
KS: Initially, many of my colleagues rallied in my support and we were in frequent contact — through telephone, e-mail and even face-to-face. But one by one, they’ve dropped away. In a way, I expected that. I do know that at least one of them was recently awarded a fat “anti-terrorism” contract with the FBI. Still, I have many supportive and loyal friends in the United States outside of government.
Bunker containing M55 rockets armed with Sarin VX.
VN: As a U.S. Government employee, you were also detailed to a number of secret military and laboratory facilities where you filmed things which your government would certainly want you to keep quiet about. Is it part of the material that you are likely to release?
KS: Although many of my large format tapes were stolen during my first imprisonment, I still have some videos that were in a box of junk cassettes marked “recyle” that I kept under the stairs in my basement. They were not just from FEMA assignments. Some were from other contracts I had. Jobs I did for the Department of Defense, Department of Energy, etc. etc. For example, I still have footage of bunkers full of sarin VX and GB warheads, “tonne” containers full of neurotoxins and mustard gas, all of which were banned by the Chemical Weapons Ban Treaty. In addition I have footage of the disassembly of a nuclear weapon, nuclear transport vehicles, Department of Defense radars along the Bering Strait in Alaska, etc., etc. I’ve been to all of the national laboratories created in relation to the Manhattan Project, proving grounds, test sites and a lot of other very interesting places in addition to the World Trade Center.
Aerial view of enigmatic WTC6 cavity.
VN: When it comes to Ground Zero, the majority of experts have focused exclusively on WTC1, WTC2 and WTC7. Yet, you also referred to a bizarre phenomenon relating to WTC6 which few appear to have paid attention to. What was so strange about it?
KS: Building Six struck me (and many others) as bizarre from my first days inside Ground Zero, and there are still no answers. Looking at aerial and satellite photos, you can see that there is a huge, nearly-empty crater from the roof all the way down to the ground floor. It looked like a gigantic crane had scooped out the insides. What happened to all the rubble that should have been inside that crater? I can’t explain it.
Some of the toasted cars lining FDR Parkway, half a mile from Ground Zero.
VN: In addition to Building 6, there were a wide range of anomalies within the Ground Zero perimeter and beyond, which few people have actually dwelled on, but which could have a strategic value for a future investigation. For example, the tons of unburned paper when everything else had turned to dust and the cars that literally melted as far as a half-mile away from the site of the actual attacks. Were you struck by any of these phenomena at the time?
KS: There were many things even to the casual observer that didn’t seem to make much sense. I’m not the one to make educated observations about many of the physical anomalies, though. I studied International Relations and Economics and not a lot of hard science.
more
22 JUNE 2009
Kurt Sonnenfeld : Exclusive interview
9/11 FEMA videographer at Ground Zero goes public
Excerpt:
Voltaire Network: What type of events are you referring to?
Kurt Sonnenfeld: I’ve suffered false accusations for “crimes” that demonstrably did not happen, abusive imprisonment and torture as a result of those accusations, as well as outrageous calumnies against my reputation, death threats, kidnap attempts and several other violations of civil and human rights as denounced by numerous international accords. My return to the United States would not only be a continuation of those violations, but would be aggregated by the separation - perhaps permanent - from my wife and three-year old twin daughters, the only thing remaining that I have to live for. And then, after the impossibility of receiving a fair trial for a crime that did not happen, I could be subject to the death penalty.
Voltaire Network: In 2005, the U.S. Government lodged a request to have you extradited, which was turned down by a Federal Judge. Then, in 2007, the Argentinean Supreme Court – in a show of integrity and independence - turned down the U.S. appeal, but your Government persisted. Can you shed some light on the situation ?
Kurt Sonnenfeld: In 2008, the US government appealed again, this time with absolutely no legal foundation, to the Supreme Court, which will surely uphold the two already unassailable rulings made by the Federal Judge.
In one of those rulings, it was also noted that there were too many “sombras”, or shadows, surrounding my case. There were many, many obvious fabrications in the extradition order sent here by US authorities, and, thankfully, we were able prove that. The fact that there were so many fabrications has actually served to support my request for asylum. We were also able to show that we had been subject to a prolonged campaign of harassment and intimidation from US intelligence services. As a result, since my family has been assigned round-the-clock police protection. As one senator has noted about my case: “It is their behavior that belies their true motivations”.
Sonnenfeld and his family are frequently harassed, followed, and photographed, as shown in this photo.
Voltaire Network: They want you pretty badly for a “crime that did not happen”! How do you account for such doggedness? As a FEMA official, you must have been trusted by your government. At what point did the situation capsize?
Kurt Sonnenfeld: In hindsight, I realize now that the situation had capsized some time before I actually became aware that it had capsized. Initially, the false accusation against me was completely irrational, and I was totally destroyed by it. It is incredibly difficult to have suffered the loss of someone you love to suicide, but to then be accused of it is too much to bear. The case was dismissed based on a mountain of evidence that overwhelmingly absolved me (Nancy, my wife, had left behind a suicide note and a journal of suicidal writings ; she had a family history of suicide ; etc.). The prosecution was 100% sure of my innocence before requesting the dismissal of charge.
But the sustained incarceration even AFTER it was indicated that I was to be freed was what proved to me that something was happening under the surface. I was held in jail for FOUR MONTHS after my lawyers were informed that the case was to be dismissed and was finally released in June 2002. During that time, an amazing series of strange events began to occur. While still being held, I had a telephone conversation with FEMA officials in an effort to resolve the issue, but I realized that I was considered “compromised”. I was told it had been agreed that “the agency had to be protected”, especially in light of the upheaval that was threatening with the implementation of the “Patriot Act” and the expected usurpation that would come with the new Department of Homeland Security. After all the dangers I had risked, all hardship and difficulties I had endured for them for almost 10 years, I felt betrayed. It left a void in my soul.
Because of their abandonment, I told them I didn’t have the tapes, that I gave them to “some bureaucrat” in New York, and that they would have to wait until I was released to retrieve any other documents in my possession. Soon after that conversation, my house was “seized”, the locks were changed, and men were observed by neighbors entering my house, though there is no record in the court of their entry, as would be required. When I was finally released, I discovered that my office had been ransacked, my computer was missing, and that my tape library in my basement had been dug through and several were missing. Men were constantly parked on the street near my house, my security system was “hacked” more than once, outdoor security lights were unscrewed, etc., to the point that I went to stay with some friends at their condo in the mountains, which was then ALSO broken into.
Anyone who looks for the truth recognizes that there has been an amazing series of irregularities in this case and that an appalling injustice is being carried out on me and my loved ones. This intense campaign to return me to American soil is a false pretext for other darker motives.
Voltaire Network: You have suggested that you observed things at Ground Zero that did not tally with the official account. Did you do or say anything to arouse suspicion in this respect?
Kurt Sonnenfeld: In that same telephone call I said that I would “go public”, not only with my suspicions about the events surrounding September 11, 2001, but about several contracts I had worked on in the past.
Sonnenfeld at Ground Zero, investigating a “void” beneath fallen steel beams.
Voltaire Network: What are your suspicions based on?
Kurt Sonnenfeld: There were many things, in hindsight, that were disturbing at Ground Zero. It was odd to me that I was dispatched to go to New York even before the second plane hit the South Tower, while the media was still reporting only that a “small plane” had collided with the North Tower — far too small of a catastrophe at that point to involve FEMA. The Agency was mobilized within minutes, whereas it took ten days for it to deploy to New Orleans to respond to Hurricane Katrina, even with abundant advance warning! It was odd to me that all cameras were so fiercely prohibited within the secured perimeter of Ground Zero, that the entire area was declared a crime scene and yet the “evidence” within that crime scene was so rapidly removed and destroyed. And then it was very odd to me when I learned that FEMA and several other federal agencies had already moved into position at their command center at Pier 92 on September 10th, one day before the attacks!
We are asked to believe that all four of the “indestructible” black boxes of the two jets that struck the twin towers were never found because they were completely vaporized, yet I have footage of the rubber wheels of the landing gear nearly undamaged, as well as the seats, parts of the fuselage and a jet turbine that were absolutely not vaporized. This being said, I do find it rather odd that such objects could have survived fairly intact the type of destruction that turned most of the Twin Towers into thin dust.
What happened with Building 7 is incredibly suspicious. I have video that shows how curiously small the rubble pile was, and how the buildings to either side were untouched by Building Seven when it collapsed. It had not been hit by an airplane; it had suffered only minor injuries when the Twin Towers collapsed, and there were only small fires on a couple of floors. There’s no way that building could have imploded the way it did without controlled demolition. Yet the collapse of Building 7 was hardly mentioned by the mainstream media and suspiciously ignored by the 911 Commission.
When the North Tower fell, the US Customs House (Building 6) was crushed and totally incinerated. Much of the underground levels beneath it were also destroyed. But there were voids. And it was into one of those voids, recently uncovered, that I descended with a special Task Force to investigate. It was there we found the security antechamber to the vault, badly damaged. At the far end of the security office was the wide steel door to the vault, a combination code keypad in the cinderblock wall beside it. But the wall was cracked and partially crumbled, and the door was sprung partially open. So we checked inside with our flashlights. Except for several rows of empty shelves, there was nothing in the vault but dust and debris. It had been emptied. Why was it empty? And when could it have been emptied?
Voltaire Network: Is this what set alarm bells ringing for you?
Kurt Sonnenfeld: Yes, but not immediately. With so much chaos, it was difficult to think. It was only after digesting everything that the “alarm bells” went off.
Building Six was evacuated within twelve minutes after the first airplane struck the North Tower. The streets were immediately clogged with fire trucks, police cars and blocked traffic, and the vault was large enough, 15 meters by 15 meters by my estimate, to necessitate at least a big truck to carry out its contents. And after the towers fell and destroyed most of the parking level, a mission to recover the contents of the vault would have been impossible. The vault had to have been emptied before the attack.
I’ve described all of this extensively in my book, and it’s apparent that things of importance were taken out of harm’s way before the attacks. For example, the CIA didn’t seem too concerned about their losses. After the existence of their clandestine office in Building Seven was discovered, an agency spokesman told the newspapers that a special team had been dispatched to scour the rubble in search of secret documents and intelligence reports, though there were millions, if not billions of pages floating in the streets. Nevertheless, the spokesman was confident. “There shouldn’t be too much paper around,” he said.
The bizarre hollowed-out vestiges of The US Customs House (WTC6).
And Customs at first claimed that everything was destroyed. That the heat was so intense that everything in the evidence safe had been baked to ash. But some months later, they announced that they had broken up a huge Colombian narco-trafficking and money-laundering ring after miraculously recovering crucial evidence from the safe, including surveillance photos and heat-sensitive cassette tapes of monitored calls. And when they moved in to their new building at 1 Penn Plaza in Manhattan, they proudly hung on the lobby wall their Commissioner’s Citation Plaque and their big round US Customs Service ensign, also miraculously recovered, in pristine condition, from their crushed and cremated former office building at the World Trade Center.
moreFortunately this is still a developing story
