by MATT KENNARD

So-called RAF bases filled with US military personnel are a tell-tale sign of Britain’s key role in US imperialism, writes Matt Kennard.

Four years after my book The Racket was first published, I started my own media outlet with historian and journalist Mark Curtis. It was a departure from what I had focused on before – the consequences of US imperialism around the world – because this new publication, Declassified UK, would cover British foreign policy.

Britain handed the mantle of world domination to the US after World War Two and the received history is that it then retired from any kind of imperial role. I found out pretty quickly at Declassified that this was a misunderstanding. The truth is the empire never died. Britain merely became a ‘junior partner’ to the US hegemon. London’s adjunct status did not mean it was insignificant, however. The City of London’s role as the world’s financial capital which spreads neoliberalism around the world, Britain’s vast network of military bases, alongside its corporate giants like BP and BAE Systems, showed the country still served a critical imperial role for its senior partner.

But a more interesting realization for me came when I started to look at the institutions that make up the US empire and their role in Britain. I had spent years looking at what institutions like the CIA, the National Endowment for Democracy, or the US military were doing in the Global South, where their power was exercised against often weak states. But I saw quickly that the infrastructure of the US empire which had colonized so much of the world had also colonized my home country, the country where I had lived nearly all my life. Britain, in fact, appeared to be more completely under the control of its American ally than any country I’d looked into around the world in The Racket.

The similarities did not stop there. Like the mainstream media could never mention the term ‘US empire’ or explain its real role in world affairs, those same establishment journalists did not touch US influence in Britain. This was, again, an invisible empire, hiding in plain sight. The work I began doing would have never made it into the pages of my old employer, the Financial Times, like so many truths in The Racket never could.

New Internationalist for more

by OSCAR LEON

Exclusive interviews and leaked messages reveal how a key ally of the US weaponized the fight against corruption and criminal organizations to selectively prosecute Ecuador’s heads of state, viciously persecuting Rafael Correa and his Revolución Ciudadana movement on flimsy evidence, while delaying investigations into much graver crimes allegedly committed by his successors.

Recently-leaked secret chats obtained by The Grayzone expose how Ecuadorian prosecutor Diana Salazar leaked information to a subject of an ongoing investigation, undermining the prosecution of associates of Ecuador’s current and previous US-aligned presidents, and acted hand-in-glove with the United States government, which essentially selected and controlled prosecutions from Washington.

The shocking revelations of corruption and US meddling in the geopolitically-crucial South American nation have been largely ignored by the US government and corporate media outlets.

A full transcript of this Grayzone documentary by Oscar Leon follows:

“Invading and occupying a country has historically come at a high cost, both financially and in terms of human lives. However, in the 21st century, where asymmetrical warfare prevails, dominating a nation can be achieved through more subtle means. Enter lawfare—an easier and less costly method of steering a key country in the geopolitical chess game.

Despite presiding over Ecuador’s decline from a country with functioning institutions to what some now call a narco-state, Attorney General Diana Salazar has recently been leading what many critics describe as a ‘witch hunt’ against the left-leaning Revolución Ciudadana Movement, under the guise of fighting corruption and narco-trafficking.

While a handful of instances of corruption during Revolución Ciudadana’s decade in power are well-documented, a number of high-profile cases fail to hold up under legal scrutiny. Meanwhile, major cases of corruption and narco-trafficking involving right-wing politicians who support global corporate interests have largely been ignored by the press and quietly ushered into impunity by authorities. The narrative propagated by media conglomerates, which are owned by those with clear stakes in the geopolitical battle, reinforces this bias—a factor that has helped the right-wing win the cultural and electoral battles.

As general elections approach, Attorney General Salazar now faces a trial in Congress. Salazar has publicly labeled the judicial action a ‘narco-trial,’ alleging that unspecified cartel-linked interests are behind the case. This narrative has gained traction in mainstream media, influencing electoral calculations. 

The trial was brought on in part by newly-leaked secret chats, obtained by The Grayzone, which were written on an app known for deleting messages after a single viewing. The messages show Salazar leaking information to a subject of an ongoing investigation, refusing to prosecute associates of Ecuador’s current and previous US-aligned presidents, and acting hand-in-glove with the United States government.”

Are presidents being prosecuted selectively?

A.G. Salazar had a hand in cases involving the last 3 former presidents of Ecuador — cases that not only have decided the fate of those politicians but also the political destiny of the entire country. The following questions illustrate the disparity in treatment A.G. Salazar dispensed to each one of these cases.

Was the Correa case a solid case?

In April 2020, former President Rafael Correa was held responsible for up to a billion dollars in damages to the state and received a lifetime ban from holding political office. He was also sentenced to eight years in prison. This case marked a turning point in Ecuador’s political landscape, particularly because, despite the numerous legal battles against him, Correa has been consistently projected to win any election he participated in.

The Gray Zone for more

DEMOCRACY NOW

Israel announced Thursday it had killed Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar in Gaza, releasing a video allegedly showing Sinwar’s final moments before his death after Israeli forces in Rafah attacked the building he was in. After the announcement, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared “this is not the end of the war in Gaza.” In Tel Aviv, Israeli families called for Netanyahu to refocus efforts on negotiating a deal to free the hostages. “They are torn because they are clever enough to understand that the killing of Sinwar does not mean the release of their loved ones,” says Gideon Levy, award-winning Israeli journalist and author, who says Netanyahu will continue to act through sheer force as he sets his sights on Iran with the full support of the United States.

Transcript

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman.

The Israeli newspaper Haaretz is reporting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is meeting today with ministers and heads of security agencies at the military headquarters in Tel Aviv.

For more, we go to Tel Aviv, where we’re joined by Gideon Levy, award-winning Israeli journalist and author, columnist for the newspaper Haaretz, where he’s also a member of the editorial board.

Gideon, welcome back to Democracy Now! Can you talk about the response in Israel to Israel’s killing of the Hamas leader, Yahya Sinwar?

GIDEON LEVY: As you can imagine, Amy, there is a lot of sense of joy and pride. The media is encouraging it, obviously. The main headline of the most popular newspaper in Israel, Yedioth Ahronoth, says, “The Satan was assassinated.” The mood is of big content and of really feeling that justice prevailed and this Hitler was assassinated. Nobody asks what will be the day after. Nobody asks what did Israel benefit out of it. We are all celebrating the killing of the Satan.

AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about what the families of hostages are saying, where you are, in the city of Tel Aviv? It seems like there wasn’t — they didn’t skip a beat yesterday in their protest of Netanyahu as they demanded a ceasefire.

GIDEON LEVY: Yeah, they are torn, because they are clever enough to understand that the killing of Sinwar does not mean the release of their beloved ones. On the contrary, it might even postpone it or maybe even miss it totally, because as long as Sinwar was alive, there was a partner. Now with whom will Israel deal about any kind of hostage deal, if Israel is at all interested in?

The feeling is that Netanyahu, now he’s boosted by much more support in Israel after this success, this military success of assassinating Sinwar. For him, the hostages were and still are not the first priority. And why would it now happen after it didn’t happen for a whole year? I doubt it. Why would Hamas go for it now? When it’s so beaten and there is so little to lose, why would they now care about releasing the hostages, almost their last asset? So, I understand that the families — they don’t speak in one voice, and it shouldn’t be one voice. But at least part of them are really in anxiety that maybe the last chance for releasing their beloved one was missed.

AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about what we understand of how Yahya Sinwar was killed? He was not in the tunnels. The video that Israel is putting out of him sitting in a chair, he was in Rafah. Who the forces were who moved into that place, and the significance of that, Gideon Levy?

GIDEON LEVY: First of all, it was totally incidental. I must praise the Israeli information system of propaganda, or hasbara, as they call it. At least they admitted that it was not planned. They didn’t try to show it as if it was a very planned operation. It wasn’t. And he was killed. First they bombed this house where he was, and then a drone got into the house and showed him in his last moments. Quite pathetic video. And then they shot him in his head, as we saw, twice at least, because there are two holes in his head. And they killed him. He was masked, as you saw, trying to hide from being recognized.

But in any case, it doesn’t matter much. The fact is that Israeli intelligence couldn’t find him for one year. The fact is that Israeli intelligence couldn’t find the hostages for one year in a very small piece of land, Gaza Strip, where Israel is controlling now for one year. And finally, they found him. I mean, it was so expected. How couldn’t he be found finally, when Israel is searching after him for so long and really destructing every building and every street in Gaza? So, finally, they succeeded, obviously. It’s not a hell of a success, but in Israel they are quite happy about it. And I can understand the sentiment.

AMY GOODMAN: So, where does what Israel plans to do with Iran fit into this story?

Democracy Now for more

WORLD SOCIALIST WEB SITE

During the evening of October 27, 1999, an armed band of Armenian nationalists stormed the country’s parliament building in Yerevan, the capital, killing Prime Minister Vazgen Sarkisyan and several other officials in a bid to topple the government.

Nairi Unanian, a former journalist and member of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation, led the attempted coup. Entering parliament, the gunmen approached Sarkisyan, accusing him of “drinking the blood of the people,” before opening fire only several meters away, killing him instantly. An additional seven people were killed in the attack: Karen Demirchyan, National Assembly Speaker; Yuri Bakhshyan, Deputy National Assembly Speaker; Ruben Miroyan, Deputy National Assembly Speaker; Leonard Petrosyan, Minister of Urgent Affairs; as well as three members of parliament, Henrik Abrahamyan, Armenak Armenakyan, and Mikayel Kotanyan. A total of 30 people were injured. 

After Unanian had gained control of the building, he proclaimed over local television that the attack was intended to spark a popular uprising across the country: “In this country, it is not possible to create a political organization,” he said.  “The people have no way to go… The country is in a catastrophic situation. People are hungry and the government doesn’t offer any way out.” The broadcast also stated the intended target was supposed to be only Sarkisyan, and the other killings were a “mistake.” 

Armenian President Robert Kocharyan, who had appointed Sarkisyan as prime minister, directed the response of military and police units after the killings. A standoff ensued for 18 hours, with the gunmen holding 50 people as hostage. After an agreement revolving around safe passage and a fair trial, Unanian and his accomplices surrendered. On December 2, 2003, the gunmen were sentenced to life in prison. 

The crisis in Armenia was, at root, the product of the Stalinist betrayal of the October Revolution and its restoration of capitalism throughout the former Soviet republics, which had taken place less than a decade before Unanian’s failed coup. The imperialist powers, led by the US, now fought over access to oil, raw materials, and geo-politics in regions wracked by political intrigue, economic turmoil and social deprivation. Within this context, the coup expressed right-wing nationalist sentiment, nurtured by sections of the Armenian ruling class, surrounding the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region, a largely Armenian-populated area controlled by neighboring Azerbaijan, another former Soviet republic. War between the states had only concluded with a 1994 ceasefire after an estimated 35,000 deaths on both sides.

WSWS for more

by ANIS SHIVANI

This is just a short essay to refute the fantastic claims of most on the podcast and commentariat left that Israel is losing the war in the Middle East. They said that since Day One, arguing that Hamas was ultimately undefeatable. They are making the same claim now about Hezbollah in Lebanon and about Iran. They were wrong at the start, and they will continue to prove themselves to be wrong.

We heard soon after the genocide was initiated that Israel was losing the narrative war. Yes, but I argued then, you can lose the narrative, but what if all your opponents end up dead, or for all intents and purposes extinguished as an entity? Young people—meaning really privileged young Americans—had turned against Israel for the first time in history, taking their woke anti-colonial lessons to heart. This was a sea change, we were assured, and it would be proved by the success of the BDS movement, the only way to get Israel to see the light. Finally, the student encampments really turned these analysts on, as a revival of the kind of spirit we hadn’t seen since Vietnam.

We were told throughout the Gaza genocide that Hamas’s victories were unseen but real anyway. Just be patient, and Israel’s defeat would be obvious. When Iran retaliated for the first time in April, it was praised for its “restraint.” The same praise was heard when it recently launched 200 ballistic missiles after Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah’s assassination, without causing any casualties. Iran is a civilized nation, we were told, and didn’t want to inflict civilian harm upon Israel. Just wait and be patient, and it would become abundantly clear that Israel could never defeat a nation like Iran, many times its size.

The Hamas catastrophe has more or less reached its conclusion. The annihilation of Hezbollah in Lebanon is well underway and will probably be accelerated dramatically, should Kamala Harris win, immediately after the election. The suspense with Iran continues but I am not holding my breath for any kind of victory, real or symbolic, on the part of Iran. Instead, if and when Iran’s nuclear and oil infrastructure are taken out, Iran won’t be able to do anything about it.

Who are the people painting these mostly delusional—or at best naively optimistic—scenarios of the wars in the Middle East? Mostly academics and journalists I more or less appreciate, even if I don’t agree with all their views, such as John Mearsheimer, Scott Ritter, Chris Hedges, Rashid Khalidi, Richard D. Wolff, and others of similar ilk in the American thinkspace, along with many Palestinian, Muslim, Arab, Jewish, and Christian activists both in the Middle East and the West. They insist that Israel cannot possibly sustain itself as an apartheid state in this day and age. They tell us that public opinion around the world has sharply turned against Israel, so in that sense Hamas’s initiative has been rewarded.

One of the notable aspects of the ongoing genocide for the last year has been the insistence of secular Jews in the American commentariat, such as Katie Halper and Max Blumenthal, that the state of Israel or Zionism do not in any way represent their own philosophy. They are vociferous in making an absolutely binary division with zero overlap between their belief system and all that Israel has come to represent. Not surprisingly, whether it is Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) or orthodox rabbis who never believed in the Israeli project, Palestinian and Muslim activists and thinkers have been eager to join forces with self-proclaimed non-Zionist Jews in peddling the by-now familiar narrative of eventual Israeli defeat, culminating in the one-state solution.

The subject of non-Zionist Jews making such an absolute distinction between Judaism and Zionism, as an act of self-preservation with many facets, is something I intend to return to in a more detailed essay, but among other facts, remember that more than nine out of ten Israelis support the Gaza genocide, and nearly two-thirds of American Jews do so as well.

These are well-meaning intellectuals who really believe that Israel is losing, even in the face of the annihilation of one-fourth of the population of Gaza, and the near-complete destruction of the infrastructure, making the area unlivable for the foreseeable future. These naïve projections remind me of the ecstasy that rippled among many Muslims when poor Saddam Hussein lobbed a few harmless Scud missiles over Israel during the first Persian Gulf War. He too was alleged to have taken the path of prudence when he transported his fighter jet fleet to Iran rather than deploying it in war when he had the chance to do so. We are now being told that Iran is likewise holding back its incredible arsenal of weapons, because as a rational country it doesn’t seek an all-out war, or that Israel has barely scratched Hezbollah’s awesome stockpile. I want to make some relevant points about the checkered histories of Hezbollah and Hamas in another essay, but my focus here is simply the misrepresentation of these forces as heralding the ultimate comeuppance for the state of Israel.

What is the real problem of analysis I’m getting at? If Israel were the arch-enemy of humanity as it is said to be, if Israel were indeed a free agent of evil incarnate, the optimism of these well-meaning commentators would have some substance behind it. But the analysts are viewing the whole matter upside down. It is not the power of the Israel lobby or the recalcitrance of Netanyahu or any Israeli political leader against world opinion that is the issue. Israel is simply the executing arm of America’s Middle Eastern foreign policy, which has been forcefully revived in the last year of the Biden regime after the earlier pull-out from Afghanistan forced upon it by the Trump administration.

The war with Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank, with Lebanon, with Yemen, with Syria, and with Iran is American foreign policy, it is not fundamentally Israeli foreign policy. We are watching not the end game of Israel play itself out (although even if it is I am indifferent to the matter, just as I am indifferent about what non-Zionist Jews might or might not feel about the genocide, because it is ultimately irrelevant at best, and distracting at worst), but the end game of American empire play itself out, which also has a Eurasian and Asian frontier. To target the supposedly all-powerful Israeli “lobby” is easy, if beside the point; to explain the genocide as being enforced by the U.S., as is true of the escalations against Lebanon and Iran, is a whole different matter—which won’t get you views and likes and subscribes.

Counterpunch for more

by ANNE J. MANNING

Giant impact had silver lining for life, according to new study 

Billions of years ago, long before anything resembling life as we know it existed, meteorites frequently pummeled the planet. One such space rock crashed down about 3.26 billion years ago, and even today, it’s revealing secrets about Earth’s past.  

Nadja Drabon, an early Earth geologist and assistant professor in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, has questions about what our planet was like during ancient eons rife with meteoritic bombardment, when only single-celled bacteria and archaea reigned — and when it all started to change. When did the first oceans appear? Continents? Plate tectonics? How did all of those violent impacts affect the evolution of life?

Her new study in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences attempts to answer some of these questions, in relation to the inauspiciously named “S2” meteoritic impact of more than 3 billion years ago, for which geological evidence is found in the Barberton Greenstone belt of South Africa. Through the painstaking work of collecting and examining rock samples centimeters apart and analyzing the sedimentology, geochemistry, and carbon isotope compositions they leave behind, Drabon’s team paints the most compelling picture to date of what happened the day a meteorite the size of four Mount Everests paid Earth a visit. 

“Picture yourself standing off the coast of Cape Cod, in a shelf of shallow water. It’s a low-energy environment, without strong currents. Then all of a sudden, you have a giant tsunami sweeping by and ripping up the sea floor,” said Drabon. 

The S2 meteorite, estimated to have been up to 200 times larger than the one that killed the dinosaurs, triggered a tsunami that mixed up the ocean and flushed debris from the land into coastal areas. Heat from the impact caused the topmost layer of the ocean to boil off, while also heating the atmosphere. A thick cloud of dust blanketed everything, shutting down any photosynthetic activity. 

But bacteria are hardy, and following impact, according to the team’s analysis, bacterial life bounced back quickly. With this came sharp spikes in populations of unicellular organisms that feed off the elements phosphorus and iron. Iron was likely stirred up from the deep ocean into shallow waters by the aforementioned tsunami, and phosphorus was delivered to Earth by the meteorite itself and from an increase of weathering and erosion on land. 

Drabon’s analysis shows that iron-metabolizing bacteria would thus have flourished in the immediate aftermath of the impact. This shift toward iron-favoring bacteria, however short-lived, is a key puzzle piece depicting early life on Earth. According to Drabon’s study, meteorite impact events — while reputed to kill everything in their wake (including, 66 million years ago, the dinosaurs) — carried a silver lining for life.  

The Harvard Gazette for more

by JAWED NAQVI

For India’s ruling BJP, what will Aug 5 be most remembered for? It is, of course, the day that Sheikh Hasina Wajed was deposed by a mass uprising against her authoritarian government. The ousted Bangladesh premier was perhaps a rare close ally of Prime Minister Narendra Modi in a neighbourhood where India endures persistent Sino-phobic nightmares.

Or would the day be likelier remembered as the harbinger of bad news for Kashmiris, whose special rights Modi snatched on this day through a parliamentary motion in 2019? It was, coincedentally, also the day when China growled — and the sound continues to ricochet on the Himalayan borders. China was angered by India’s move to dismember Jammu and Kashmir and set up a separate entity of Ladakh, over which Beijing disputes Delhi’s claim.

Or would Aug 5 nurture memories of the hugely televised foundation ceremony of the temple in Ayodhya, by the leader of a still notionally secular country?

Whatever be the course for historical memory, the essential thread running through the landmark events is that Modi may have missed the import of all three. He claimed his move against Kashmiris would end terrorism and bring prosperity to the region, neither of which has so far come true. He thought that his highlighting of the Ayodhya temple event would win him the election. That didn’t happen and, in fact, his third term leans on the vital support of two allies who had opposed the destruction of Babri Masjid.

Missing the imminent overthrow of his close friend, who came to applaud his swearing-in on all three occasions, must be an inconsolable blow to what seems like his waning run of luck. When Sheikh Hasina came to see him twice after his third swearing-in, Modi should have been aware of the rumblings in Dhaka, where she had won the sham January election that the opposition boycotted. If she was Modi’s prop to balance China, she was a vulnerable one.

Had Modi’s intelligence squad been focused at home rather than on chasing Sikh insurgents in distant lands, he would perhaps be in a better place to advise his friend to watch out. But diplomatic misjudgements are not Modi’s monopoly, and the malaise seems to be rooted in his ideological grooming with the habitual pro-West leaning that blinded his Hindutva forebears to the delicate needs of a world in flux, which Nehru had grasped with grace and ease.

The flight of the embattled Sheikh Hasina has echoes of the fall of the Shah of Iran for India, which again brings into stark relief the ineptness of the BJP’s parochial worldview that seeks to insert itself in the nuanced world of diplomacy. Almost like Hasina’s two quick visits to Delhi in June, the Iranian monarch is remembered for his last foreign trip, for which he chose India. He was warmly hosted by a government of which the BJP, in one of its previous avatars, was a key component, and in which A.B. Vajpayee was foreign minister.

There is screaming evidence from diplomatic history of how other foreign leaders whom this or that BJP leader embraced as some kind of diplomatic trophy would fall either to an electoral defeat, a popular uprising, or an old-fashioned coup. There’s little occult in these coincidences. If anything, they are likely rooted in the choices the BJP has made, often to court or please Washington. In doing so, the BJP ends up undermining India’s tested, honed and surefooted plank of non-aligned. In its craving for Western patronage, the party — currently offering itself as a bulwark against China — has thrown aside habits that endeared India to its neighbours and the entire Global South.

Dawn for more

by B. R. GOWANI

Nov 9, 2019 — a decision was made by CJI Ranjan Gogoi & other judges

one of the judges was DY Chandrachud (now Chief Justice of India or CJI)

Ram Mandir was to be built on the place where once Babri Masjid stood

(Babri Mosque was demolished by Hindu zealots on 6 December 1992)

October 20, 2024 — Chandrachud disclosed how he reached the decision

“Very often we have cases (to adjudicate) but we don’t arrive at a solution. Something similar happened during the Ayodhya (Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid dispute) which was in front of me for three months. I sat before the deity and told him he needs to find a solution.“

he then assertively claimed:

“Believe me, if you have faith, God will always find a way.”

Congress Party leader Udit Raj suggested CJI the following:

“Chief Justice Chandrachud ji said that he had prayed to God for the solution of the Ayodhya issue. If he had prayed for some other issues, they would have also been resolved, like a common man could get justice from the High Court and Supreme Court without money. Misuse of ED, CBI and IT would have stopped.”

now the question is: which God or god, not goddess, did he pray to?

I excluded “goddess” not out of misogyny but …

Chandrachud says “I sat before the deity and told him“

God has to exit too because he had invited Modi for Ganesh Chaturthi

Ganesh is one of the deity in the Hindu pantheon of gods and goddesses

India’s constitution states that India is a secular country

so one should expect the judges of the Supreme Court to be secular

but when CJI visits Hindu temples in saffron color clothes, question arises

is the CJI representing more than 1.4 billion Indians or just the Hindus?

one expects chief justice to be very logical, intelligent, and wise person

a person who could make decisions by using his own intellect

plus his knowledge of previous cases not only in India but elsewhere too

instead he takes the short route of talking with deity

did he tell his deity that he wants a fair judgement on the Ram Mandir issue

or he just said: I’m scared of Modi & his goons and so please save my ass

why didn’t he wear green clothes & begged Allah to find some solution

the decision would have been totally different & unacceptable to Modi

while visiting Somnath, Dwarka, and other temples in Gujarat CJI said

“I was inspired this morning by the dhwaja [flag] at Dwarkadhish ji, very similar to the dhwaja which I saw at Jagannath Puri. But look at this universality of the tradition in our nation, which binds all of us together. This dhwaja has a special meaning for us. And that meaning which the dhwaja gives us is — there is some unifying force above all of us, as lawyers, as judges, as citizens. And that unifying force is our humanity, which is governed by the rule of law and by the Constitution of India.”

it’s an unadulterated bullshit; pure crap

the Hindu flag is not an unifying force — it the most divisive force

God, gods, goddesses understand the language of their believers

or as Peter O’Toole said in the film Ruling Class

“When I pray to Him, I find I am talking to myself.”

DY Chandrachud talked to himself — thinking that he was talking to deity

then he himself provided a solution — thinking a deity was offering one

B. R. Gowani can be reached at brgowani@hotmail.com

by DR. CHINTA SIDHARTHAN

New research reveals that the brain’s failure to self-monitor motor signals plays a key role in schizophrenia-related hallucinations, offering fresh insights into the mechanisms behind these perceptual distortions.

In a recent study published in the journal PLOS Biology, researchers investigate how impaired self-monitoring linked to dysfunctions in motor signal copies contributes to auditory hallucinations in schizophrenia.

Perception vs. reality

Our perceptions about the surrounding environment originate from external sensory stimuli like sights, sounds, imagination, and recalling memories. Monitoring the different sources of these perceptions is vital, with hallucinations arising when these fail, and the brain is unable to separate the source from the perception.

This self-monitoring of different sources of perception is achieved through internal forward models, in which copies of motor signals such as corollary discharge (CD) or efference copy (EC) are involved in inhibiting or enhancing sensory processing. These copies of motor signals either enhance or suppress sensory processing, which allows internally generated sensations to be distinguished from external sensory stimuli.

In mental health diseases like schizophrenia, patients often experience auditory hallucinations. Recent evidence suggests that distinct dysfunctions in CD and EC, rather than a single inhibitory failure, might be disrupted and, as a result, cause auditory hallucinations in these patients.

About the study

In the present study, researchers examine specific impairments in the inhibitory function of CD and the enhancement function of EC that contribute to auditory hallucinations experienced by individuals with schizophrenia.

A total of 40 schizophrenia patients were divided into two groups based on whether the patient did or did not experience auditory verbal hallucinations. General preparation and specific preparation tasks were utilized to determine how speech preparation affects perception. These tasks were designed to explore how CD and EC influence auditory responses during different stages of speech preparation.

In both tasks, study participants were shown visual cues and were required to speak while hearing auditory probes in the form of tones or syllables.

The general preparation task involved a visual cue with no linguistic information; therefore, the participants were not aware of what they would say. Auditory probes, which were introduced in half of the trials, consisted of one of four auditory syllables ‘ba,’ ‘ka,’ ‘ga,’ or ‘pa’ or a pure tone of one kHz.

In the specific presentation task, the visual cue consisted of a specific syllable that the participants prepared to speak with auditory probes that either matched or were different from the syllable in the visual cue.

Baseline trials included speaking without preparation and passive listening to the probes without speaking. The reaction times for speaking were recorded for each participant and analyzed to determine how different task conditions impacted the response times.

Brain activity was also recorded using an electroencephalogram (EEG), with all data filtered to remove artifacts such as eye movements. Brain responses to the auditory probes were then analyzed to explore the influence of motor signals on sensory processing.

Clinical and demographic data were also analyzed using various statistical tools.

Study findings

Dysregulation of motor signal copies involving the inhibition of CD and enhancement of EC caused errors in self-monitoring, leading to auditory hallucinations in schizophrenia patients. The study’s computational modeling revealed that the combination of a “broken” CD and a “noisy” EC in patients with auditory hallucinations could explain their inability to accurately distinguish between internal and external auditory signals.

News-Medical for more