ISSUE NO. 12, JULY 2017
ASSASSINATION AS A TOOL FOR POWER PLAY
Dennis Munene In a world faced with power tussle amongst dictators, Presidents, Heads of State, Kings, Spearheads, Power-brokers and demagogues, assassination tactics which date back to the ancient history, has and still is, used as a tool for power play by these powerful plutocrats to settle their differences emanating from religious idealism, beliefs, worldview and continuous struggle for power. The end result always leads to death.
Recently, North Korea accused the U.S. Lumpur Airport as he was checking in for a Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the flight to Macau. One grabbed him while the South Korea’s Intelligence of conspiring to other covered his face with some kind of assassinate its country leader Kim Jong Un liquid. He died on the way to the hospital on with a biochemical weapon. February 13, 2017. In a statement released by the Ministry of Assassination Schemes State Security in North Korea, indicates that, Assassination tactics which date back to the "The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) of the ancient history and post-modern history have U.S. and the Intelligence Service (IS) of always been used as a tool for power South Korea, both hotbed of evils in the struggles between plutocrats/aristocrats, world, hatched a vicious plot to hurt the with the aim of silencing each other due to supreme leadership of the Democratic differences in religious idealism and beliefs. People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK)…” The end result always leads to death. quoted the North's KCNA news agency. Therefore, if the attempted assassination Thus, if the statement by the North Korea’s claims by the North Korean’s are true, then Ministry of State Security is to go by, then Kim Jong Un needs to be very afraid. This is why are the CIA and the South Korea’s because we have seen prominent leaders intelligence plotting to assassinate North who in the past have been silenced by the Korea’s leader? Is it because of Kim Jong Un assassin bullet or other bizarre means that aggressive and abrasive quest to marshal have left some of their deaths until to date more nuclear weapons? Or is Kim Jong Un unresolved. paying the price for assassinating his half- brother Kim Jong Nam as it is alleged? Kim For instance, John Fitzgerald “Jack” Jong Nam was attacked by two women, Kennedy who was the 35th President of the believed to be North Korean agents, at Kuala United States, was assassinated on
API Research Notes November 22, 1963, by an assassin’s bullets of Special Tasks” and used “executive as his motorcade drives through Dallas, actions” or “liquid affairs” (targeted Texas. assassinations) to eliminate threats to the Soviet state. Benazir Bhutto the once famous Pakistani woman, socialist-democratic politician and a Business Insider, reported that the former Prime Minister of Pakistan was directorate had two special labs that most assassinated on December 27, 2007. Bhutto officers didn’t know about – one for creating was killed while leaving a campaign rally for unique weapons and explosives, the other the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) at Liaquat for developing new poisons and drugs. National Bagh in the city of Rawalpindi, Poisons were a favorite for carrying out where she addressed a rally of PPP assassinations because they attracted less supporters for the run-up to the attention and were often confused for natural parliamentary elections in 2008. deaths. After entering her bulletproof vehicle, Bhutto For example, Lev Rebet was a Ukrainian stood up through its sunroof to wave to the nationalist writer, Nazi death camp survivor, crowds. At that point, a gunman fired shots and staunch anti-Communist. He was at her and subsequently, explosives were also the leader of the Ukrainian government detonated near the vehicle killing for a time. In 1957, Rebet died suddenly of approximately 20 people. Bhutto was “natural causes” while on a trip to Munich. critically wounded and was rushed to In 1961, a KGB agent named Bohdan Rawalpindi General Hospital but she was Stashynsky defected to the West and declared dead at 18:16 local time. revealed Rebet’s death was an In India, Former Prime Minister Indira assassination. The weapon he used was a Priyadarshini Gandhi was assassinated at gun that sprayed a cloud of cyanide gas. 9:20 AM on October 31, 1984, at Prime Stashynsky also killed Rebet’s party Minister’s Residence - No. 1, Safdarjung boss, Stepan Bandera, with the gas weapon. Road in New Delhi. She was murdered by Also, in 1978 communist defector from two of her Sikh bodyguards, Satwant Singh Bulgaria Georgi Markov was at a London Bus and Beant Singh. stop when a man next to him dropped his Another notable leader who was silenced by umbrella, hitting Markov in the leg. It hurt, but the assassin’s bullet was Martin Luther King, Markov barely noticed. The man apologized Jr, a vocal American Clergyman and a civil and they both went on their way. Markov died rights activist. four days later. Clandestine Tactics His autopsy revealed a pellet in his leg, likened to the size of a pinhead, containing However, other than the use of a bullet to the poison ricin, a deadly poison used in execute the assassination plot, there are chemical warfare. other covert means that are becoming a norm nowadays that leaves the death In regards to all covert assassination undetected or mysterious to solve. For schemes, a similar trend is beginning to instance, de-classified CIA documents in the emanate in Africa. In Kenya, on June 10, public domain revealed that during the time 2013, George Saitoti, former Vice-President of Soviet Union, the Komitet and Internal Security Minister amongst gosudarstvennoy bezopasnosti (KGB) had a others died in a plane crash. The pathologist department that was called the “Directorate who examined the bodies of the former
API Research Notes Internal Security minister George Saitoti and Failed missions his deputy Orwa Ojode a day after the crash However, one man will be remembered for said the deaths may have occurred before dodging all assassination attempts against the aircraft came down. him. Fidel Castro, former Cuban President Dr. Dorothy Njeru before the Justice Kalpana before he died on November 25, 2016, Rawal commission investigating the having attained the age of 90 years, had accident, said that the autopsies on the six previously survived not fewer than 634 victims of the June 10 Helicopter crash, attempts on his life, according to his former revealed “cherry pink” patches on their secret service chief. bodies, indicating that high levels of carbon Some of the ploys used in the failed monoxide were inhaled and the crash may assassination attempts on Fidel Castro’s life not have been “a normal aviation accident.” were; get Castro to smoke a cigar packed This notwithstanding, recently, another with explosives, wear a fungus-infected Kenyan Cabinet Secretary in charge of scuba-diving suit, and mafia-style shooting Internal Security died in mysterious and bizarre plans to undercut his prestige by circumstances. On July 8, 2017, Major- making his beard fall out. In total as per General Joseph Kasaine Ole Nkaissery died Cuba’s intelligence, an estimated 638 a day after he attended a prayer rally at assassination attempts were made towards Uhuru Park, Nairobi and Thirty days before Castro. the country goes for the general election. Once Castro commented that if evading Chants of assassination filled the online assassinations attempts were part of the platforms. However, a six-hour post-mortem Olympic Games, then he would have won conducted by a team of pathologists led by several gold medals. But then, how many Kenya’s chief government pathologist notable leaders whose fate has been pegged Johansen Oduor concluded that Major- on the Assassin antics will survive the ploy, General Nkaissery suffered a massive heart and if by chance they succumb to the foul attack in his house that killed him instantly. play, will the cause of their death been True or not, the death of Major-General known? Nkaissery will remain a mystery.
©Africa Policy Institute, July 2017
Dennis Munene is a Researcher on Governance and Security at Africa Policy Institute.
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API Research Notes Series publishes scientifically valid research outputs that cannot be considered as full research or methodology articles. Its aim is to provide a forum for sharing data, useful information and perspectives on topical issues of concern to the policy and research communities. Articles published under this series cut across disciplines, and include some short articles or opinion pieces that have already been published by the experts of the Africa Policy Institute. Some are brief publications, updates to previous work, abridged versions of research agendas or concept notes or brief reports of policy forums.
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