Saturday, October 31, 2015

First they jailed the bankers, now every Icelander to get paid in bank sale...

First, Iceland jailed its crooked bankers for their direct involvement in the financial crisis of 2008. Now, every Icelander will receive a payout for the sale of one of its three largest banks, Íslandsbanki.

If Finance Minister Bjarni Benediktsson has his way — and he likely will — Icelanders will be paid kr 30,000 after the government takes over ownership of the bank. Íslandsbanki would be second of the three largest banks under State proprietorship.

“I am saying that the government take [sic] some decided portion, 5%, and simply hand it over to the people of this country,” he stated.

Because Icelanders took control of their government, they effectively own the banks. Benediktsson believes this will bring foreign capital into the country and ultimately fuel the economy — which, incidentally, remains the only European nation to recover fully from the 2008 crisis. Iceland even managed to pay its outstanding debt to the IMF in full — in advance of the due date.

Guðlaugur Þór Þórðarson, Budget Committee vice chairperson, explained the move would facilitate the lifting of capital controls, though he wasn’t convinced State ownership would be the ideal solution. Former Finance Minister Steingrímur J. Sigfússon sided with Þórðarson, telling a radio show, “we shouldn’t lose the banks to the hands of fools” and that Iceland would benefit from a shift in focus to separate “commercial banking from investment banking.” Full story...

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Russian media take global warming cue from skeptical Putin...

Wildfires crackled across Siberia this summer, turning skies ochre and sending up enough smoke from burning pines to blot out satellite views of the 400-mile-long Lake Baikal.

To many climate scientists, the worsening fires are a consequence of Siberia getting hotter, the carbon unleashed from its burning forests and tundra only adding to man-made fossil fuel emissions. Siberia's wildfire season has lengthened in recent years and the 2015 blazes were among the biggest yet, caking the lake, the "Pearl of Siberia", in ash and scorching the surrounding permafrost.

But the Russian public heard little mention of climate change, because media coverage across state-controlled television stations and print media all but ignored it. On national TV, the villains were locals who routinely but carelessly burn off tall grasses every year, and the sometimes incompetent crews struggling to put the fires out.

While Western media have examined the role of rising temperatures and drought in this year's record wildfires in North America, Russian media continue to pay little attention to an issue that animates so much of the world. Full story...

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Blatter again points finger at Sarkozy over Qatar...

Suspended FIFA president Sepp Blatter has again accused former French president Nicolas Sarkozy of influencing the awarding of the 2022 World Cup hosting rights to Qatar rather than the United States.

Qatar controversially won the right to host the 2022 World Cup, a decision that has since sparked a series of corruption investigations surrounding FIFA and its officials.

Speaking to Friday’s edition of Britain’s Financial Times, Blatter repeated the claims he made on Wednesday to Russian news agency TASS that FIFA’s executive committee had originally agreed to award the 2018 tournament to Russia and the next World Cup to the US.

Blatter told the FT that there had been a “gentleman’s agreement” that the two World Cups in question would go to the “two superpowers” — although Moscow denies there was any such arrangement.

“It was behind the scenes. It was diplomatically arranged to go there,” said Blatter, who has found himself at the centre of a FIFA corruption storm ever since being re-elected to a fifth term in May. Full story...

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Indonesia is burning. So why is the world looking away?

I’ve often wondered how the media would respond when eco-apocalypse struck. I pictured the news programmes producing brief, sensational reports, while failing to explain why it was happening or how it might be stopped. Then they would ask their financial correspondents how the disaster affected share prices, before turning to the sport. As you can probably tell, I don’t have an ocean of faith in the industry for which I work.

What I did not expect was that they would ignore it.

A great tract of the Earth is on fire. It looks as you might imagine hell to be. The air has turned ochre: visibility in some cities has been reduced to 30 metres. Children are being prepared for evacuation in warships; already some have choked to death. Species are going up in smoke at an untold rate. It is almost certainly the greatest environmental disaster of the 21st Century – so far.

And the media? It’s talking about the dress the Duchess of Cambridge wore to the James Bond premiere, Donald Trump’s idiocy du jour and who got eliminated from the Halloween episode of Dancing with the Stars. The great debate of the week, dominating the news across much of the world? Sausages: are they really so bad for your health?

What I’m discussing is a barbeque on a different scale. Fire is raging across the 5000-kilometre length of Indonesia. It is surely, on any objective assessment, more important than anything else taking place today. And it shouldn’t require a columnist, writing in the middle of a newspaper, to say so. It should be on everyone’s front page. Full story...

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Friday, October 30, 2015

Indonesia's deforestation-fueled wildfires may be world's worst climate crisis...

A rash of wildfires in Indonesia and the resulting toxic haze of smoke and smog may be the worst climate crisis on Earth right now, NASA scientists warned this week as Indonesian Vice President Jusuf Kalla announced that the administration was considering declaring a state of emergency.

Forest fires on the island of Sumatra, which were started in August as part of a "slash-and-burn" deforestation plan to clear land for palm oil plantations, have raged out of control for the past two months, sending thick plumes of smoke across the archipelago and much of southeast Asia, including Vietnam, Cambodia, and the Philippines.

Hundreds of thousands of people have reportedly fallen ill and 19 have died—some from battling the fires and others from exposure to the fumes. The smoke has also disrupted public transportation and forced school cancellations.

"The problem is too big," Kalla said Tuesday, a day after President Joko Widodo cut short his first official visit to the U.S. to visit the affected areas.

Indonesia has used slash-and-burn tactics for decades. "Most burning starts on idle, already-cleared peatlands and escapes underground into an endless source of fuel," explained David Gaveau of the Center for International Forestry Research. Full story...

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Czech charity helps homeless by turning them into WiFi hotspots...

A Czech charity has proposed an unusual way to help the homeless and integrate them back into society: They have been offered work as human WiFi distributors on the streets of the capital city of Prague.

The charity “WiFi4Life” is giving the homeless pocket WiFi hotspots and a power bank, so that passers-by can access free internet or charge the batteries of their gadgets. For their work, the homeless get meals, clothing, allowances and decent accommodation.

“We choose homeless people because they are already in the street and most of the time they have nothing to do and we want them to start working ... This, to provide internet, is one of the jobs they can do,” Lubos Bolecek, chairman of WiFi4Life, told RT’s Ruptly video agency.

Despite the fact that the WiFi is provided free of charge, “WiFi4Life” coordinators say the project will not be funded with taxpayers’ money. They have launched a crowdfunding campaign at Indiegogo to finance the first two months of the project.

Kamil Krtil, a homeless participant in the project spends eight hours near a metro station five days a week – except Monday and Tuesday which are his day-offs. More + video...

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Philippine legislators angered by Manila 'bullet scam'

Philippine legislators have called for an investigation into an alleged scam against passengers at Manila airport.

The "bullet scam" allegedly sees bullets dropped into the luggage of passengers as they go through security at the country's main airport.

Passengers are then required to pay a fine or face being charged with illegal possession of ammunition.

An overseas Filipino worker and Japanese tourist are the latest to complain.

"This is becoming an international embarrassment", said Sherwin Gatchalian, vice-chairman of the tourism committee in the House of Representatives. Full story...

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Silence as hospitals bombed in Syria, Yemen...

The first missile slammed into the field hospital in the rebel-held Syrian town of Sarmeen, killing a physiotherapist inside. Five minutes later, the aircraft returned, firing another missile that hit nearby just as the first responders were arriving. A total of 13 were killed, and the hospital organizers blamed Russian warplanes.

In Yemen, airstrikes by a Saudi-led coalition targeting rebels destroyed a hospital run by the international medical charity Doctors Without Borders this week. Although there were no deaths, the hospital was the latest casualty of a campaign that has claimed the lives of nearly 3,000 people since March.

But those strikes on hospitals brought little international outcry — a sharp contrast to an Oct. 3 American strike on a hospital in Afghanistan that killed 30 people and brought a firestorm of criticism on Washington.

 The reasons are many, perhaps chief among them is general fatigue over the conflicts in Syria, now in its fifth year, and in Yemen, a relatively impoverished and isolated country mired in turmoil for more than a decade. Also, while the U.S. acknowledged relatively quickly that it carried out the strikes and President Barack Obama apologized to Doctors Without Borders, which also ran that facility, Russia and Saudi Arabia categorically deny that their campaigns hit civilians, and conditions on the ground make confirmations more difficult, muddying the waters for critics. Russia denied it hit the Sarmeen hospital, which was struck Oct. 20. Full story...

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Indonesia’s haze disaster could trigger reform...

The decision by President Joko Widodo to cut short an important trip to the United States to return to Indonesia early to take personal charge of attempts to quell wildfires and peatland hot spots could – if you’re an optimist – be the inflection point in the country’s unenviable direction in destroying its forest cover and blanketing the entire region in smoke.

As a fleet of airplanes from as far away as the US, Australia and Russia dive-bomb the flames with water and retardant, the crisis has grown so great that the choking smoke could delay local elections slated for Dec. 9 in Indonesia and has generated a public health crisis Jokowi, as the president is known, aborted a groundbreaking trip to the US to meet President Barack Obama to discuss liberalizing trade and investment between the two countries, including an agreement to join the long-stalled Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement. One of the topics discussed with the US chief executive was Indonesia’s problems with greenhouse gas production.

The fires this year, spurred partly by the El Nino phenomenon, which has brought drought to Southeast Asia’s forests, are said to be the worst since at least 2006 when half a million hectares were cleared by burning, for the first time spurring a regional consensus that something has to be done to stop the forest degradation and clean the region’s skies during the burning season, which isn’t expected to end until sometime in December.

Large areas of forest in Kalimantan and Sumatra have been cleared by multinational oil palm and pulp and paper companies, to be replaced by plantations, the timber from the clearings shipped to China and Japan. Although such agribusiness interests as Asia Pulp and Paper have caught most of the blame, much of the fires are started by smallholders as well. Fires often destroy carbon sinks, peat bogs which are some of the world’s most critical repositories of carbon. Full story...

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Top Indian artists and scientists return awards in protest at alleged ‘climate of intolerance’ under Narendra Modi...

Sir Anish Kapoor, the British-Indian sculptor, has launched an outspoken attack on the Indian government as he backed a wave of top Indian artists, writers and scientists who have returned prestigious national awards.

They have been sending back their honours in protest at what they have condemned as “growing intolerance” in the country following the murder of a well-known scholar and the lynching of a Muslim man.

The artists and scientists have accused the administration of Narendra Modi, the prime minister, of stoking Hindu nationalism and curtailing freedom of expression.

“Art can only have a home where there is tolerance,” said Sir Anish, who has lived in Britain since the 1970s.

 “All good-thinking Indians will recognise the atmosphere of intolerance and intimidation that prevails in our Indian society today. How then can we find creativity or the possibility of expression in this atmosphere of fear? Full story...

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China to end one-child policy and allow two...

China has decided to end its decades-long one-child policy, the state-run Xinhua news agency reports.

Couples will now be allowed to have two children, it said, citing a statement from the Communist Party.

The controversial policy was introduced nationally in 1979, to slow the population growth rate.

It is estimated to have prevented about 400 million births. However concerns at China's ageing population led to pressure for change.

Couples who violated the one-child policy faced a variety of punishments, from fines and the loss of employment to forced abortions. Full story...

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Thursday, October 29, 2015

China now worst in the world for internet freedom...

Global online freedom declined for a fifth consecutive year as more governments stepped up electronic surveillance and clamped down on dissidents using blogs or social media, a survey showed Wednesday.

The annual report by non-government watchdog Freedom House said the setbacks were especially noticeable in the Middle East, reversing gains seen in the Arab Spring.

Freedom House found declines in online freedom of expression in 32 of the 65 countries assessed since June 2014, with “notable declines” in Libya, France and Ukraine.

The researchers found 61 percent of the world’s population lives in countries where criticism of the government, military or ruling family has been subject to censorship.

And 58 percent live in countries where bloggers or others were jailed for sharing content online on political, social and religious issues, according to the “Freedom on the Net 2015” report. Full story...

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Inside the Japanese hotel staffed by robots...

Brazil officials evict families from homes ahead of 2016 Olympic Games...

After 75 years living in the same house in a busy neighbourhood in the heart of Rio de Janeiro’s North Zone, 88-year-old Arlette Rosa José struggled to adapt to life on the distant fringes of the city.

Along with another 385 families in the area, she and her daughter were forced from their home when city hall ordered their removal to make way for a high-speed bus lane linking the international airport with Barra da Tijuca, the neighbourhood that will host most of the 2016 Olympic Games venues.

Complications over the legal status of the property mean the Josés have yet to receive any compensation. And with no money, the family has moved to an area where the rent is affordable, over 30km away from their original home.

“We have no friends here,” said Arlette’s daughter, Elizabeth. “My mother spends a lot of time just sitting on the sofa, weeping.”

According to figures from Rio de Janeiro city government, 22,059 families have been resettled since 2009, either because of their homes being labelled “at risk” or to make way for transport and other infrastructure projects related to the Rio 2016 Olympic Games. Full story...

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Japan urged to ban manga child abuse images...

Japan must ban sexually abusive images of children in manga comics, despite claims that such a move would threaten freedom of expression, the UN’s special envoy on child protection has said.

Maud de Boer-Buquicchio praised Japan for passing a law last year that banned the possession of abusive images of children, but said it contained loopholes that allowed exploitation to continue.

“When it comes to particular, extreme child pornographic content, manga should be banned,” De Boer-Buquicchio said at the end of a week-long visit to Japan.

The UN’s special rapporteur on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography, acknowledged that artists and publishers faced difficulty in “finding the right balance” between artistic freedoms and the need to protect children. “I accept that the freedom of expression argument should prevail when it comes to adult pornography.” Full story...

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Wednesday, October 28, 2015

Parents sue school for son's illness caused by Wi-Fi electropollution...

A central Massachusetts boarding school is being sued by parents who claim their 12-year-old son has fallen ill due to the school's unusually strong Wi-Fi signal.

According to the parents, their son (referred to publicly as "G") has been diagnosed with Electromagnetic Hypersensitivity Syndrome (EHS). He began suffering headaches, nausea and nosebleeds shortly after the Fay School in Southboro upgraded to a stronger Wi-Fi signal in 2013. They are now asking the court to compel the school to either turn down its wireless signal or switch to a completely wired (Ethernet cable) Internet system, in addition to $250,000 in damages.

While some doctors deny the existence of EHS, the World Health Organization (WHO) categorizes it as a real health condition, although it warns that it may be caused by a variety of other factors.

EHS "is not a medical diagnosis, nor is it clear that it represents a single medical problem," the WHO says.

According to a letter sent to Fay School by Dr. Jeanne Hubbuch, who diagnosed G, "It is known that exposure to WIFI can have cellular effects. The complete extent of these effects on people is still unknown. But it is clear that children and pregnant women are at the highest risk. This is due to the brain tissue being more absorbent, their skulls are thinner and their relative size is small." Full story...

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UN Paris climate hypocrisy: Limos and learjets...

Time to get out your AGW hypocrisy meters. AGW, of course, stands for anthropogenic (human-caused) global warming. And the hypocrisy meters are about to ring off the charts, as the AGW alarmists descend in droves on Paris for COP 21 (21st Conference Of Parties), the United Nations’ much-ballyhooed climate summit, set to take place November 30-December 11.

It happens every time: the millionaires, billionaires, and “public servants” — Prince Charles, Al Gore, Ted Turner, Richard Branson, Hollywood celebs, presidents, prime ministers, etc. — swoosh into the confab in their tax-payer provided jets, or their own private Learjets and Gulfstreams, to preach to the rest of us on why we must reduce our “carbon footprints” and submit to a UN-mandated “carbon budget.”

While at the global gathering, these elites will occupy the luxury suites of the most expensive hotels, dine at the swankest 5-star eateries, and entertain themselves at the trendiest watering holes. Appropriately, the UN summit will be held at the Paris-Le Bourget Airport and conference site , which boasts the largest number of private jet terminals of any airport in the world.

The UN’s COP21 webpage says: “In order to give the best possible welcome to the 40,000 people expected, France has chosen the Paris-Le Bourget site for its hosting capacity (18 hectares) and its accessibility.”

As Canadian climate realist Donna Laframboise explains in her blog, Paris-Le Bourget is “not just any airport.” Full story...

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EU roaming charges to finally end in June 2017...

On Tuesday Members of the European Parliament finally gave the green light to a ban on roaming charges.

But we’ll have to wait a while before our phone bills come down with the ban not set to come into force until June 15th 2017.

Roaming charges vary enormously between telecoms operators and many mobile phone users have ended up paying exorbitant rates – often without knowing in advance – to make calls, send texts or go online when travelling within the 28-nation European Union.

The extra costs have long been at the centre of a battle between EU officials backed by consumer groups, and mobile operators.

 There was anger earlier this year when the European Commission decided to drop plans to abolish roaming charges from 2016 after objections from telcos in smaller member states. Full story...

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‘Men gave their lives in vain in Iraq’ - father of UK soldier killed in war...

343 UK scholars pledge boycott of Israeli universities...

A group of 343 scholars in the UK called on their peers to boycott Israeli academic institutions in a advertisement they published in The Guardian on Tuesday.

“We will maintain this position until the State of Israel complies with international law, and respects universal principles of human rights,” the ad in the British daily said.

In the text of the petition, which is called “a commitment by UK scholars to the rights of Palestinians,” the academics pledged not to publicly cooperate with universities and colleges in the Jewish state, although they said they would continue to communicate with individual Israeli scholars.

They stated that they would refuse to visit Israeli academic institutions, referee any Israeli academic process and participate in any conference that was funded, organized or sponsored by them.

“As scholars associated with British universities, we are deeply disturbed by Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestinian land, the intolerable human rights violations that it inflicts on all sections of the Palestinian people, and its apparent determination to resist any feasible settlement,” the scholars said. Full story...

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Not enough women in China? Let men share a wfe, an economist suggests...

One wife, many husbands.

That’s the solution to China’s huge surplus of single men, says Xie Zuoshi, an economics professor at the Zhejiang University of Finance and Economics, whose recent proposal to allow polyandry has gone viral.

Legalizing marriage between two men would also be a good idea, Mr. Xie wrote in a post that has since been removed from his blogs. (He has at least three blogs, and his Sina blog alone has more than 2.6 million followers.)

By 2020, China will have an estimated 30 million bachelors — called guanggun, or “bare branches.” Birth control policies that since 1979 have limited many families to one child, a cultural preference for boys and the widespread, if illegal, practice of sex-selective abortion have contributed to a gender imbalance that hovers around 117 boys born for every 100 girls.

Though some could perhaps detect a touch of Jonathan Swift in the proposal, Mr. Xie wrote that he was approaching the problem from a purely economic point of view. Full story...

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Saudi actor arrested ‘for taking selfies with female fans in shopping mall’

An Saudi Arabian actor was arrested in a shopping mall after ‘ taking selfies with female fans’.

Actor Abdul Aziz Al Kassar, who is widely recognized in Saudi Arabia, was arrested at a shopping centre in Riyadh, a number of videos shows him being swarmed by dozens of fans, who were screaming trying to pose for a photograph.

The arrest happened on October 23 when members of the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice pulled him into a small room after the run in with the fans.

He was accused of disturbing the public order, mixing with women unrelated to him and abusing social media before being remanded in custody.

Al Kassar said: “I did not expect to find so many people waiting for me [at the mall].” Full story...

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Belgian Scientologists go on trial for fraud and extortion...

The Belgian branch of the Church of Scientology has gone on trial and faces a possible ban for fraud and extortion, charges it claims are meant to ruin its reputation.

The case opened in a packed Brussels courtroom on Monday where the prosecution demanded that the church, known internationally for celebrity members including Tom Cruise and John Travolta, explain where it got its financing.

“The church’s revenues were roughly €5,000 [£3,500] a week; €2,000 came from the sale of books and videos and €3,000 from courses and training,” the Belga news agency quoted the group’s treasurer as saying.

The treasurer, who worked for the church until 2005, said she was not paid but was not required to pay the church’s fees, while her husband contributed about €10,000 for training.

The church sharply divides opinion – critics say it is cult and a scam, while supporters say it offers much-needed spiritual support in a fast-changing world. Full story...

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Tuesday, October 27, 2015

Human Rights Watch accuses Malaysian government of ‘climate of fear’

Human Rights Watch, in a hard-hitting 147-page report, has accused the Najib government of creating a “climate of fear,” citing a long litany of incidents in which government critics and the press are under attack from authorities using broad and vaguely worded laws use to arrest, harass and intimidate them.

The report, delivered at a Kuala Lumpur press conference this morning (Oct. 27) by Human Rights Watch’s Asia director Brad Adams and the author, Linda Lakhdhir, relates in punishing detail how government intimidation has cascaded upwards along with the use of religious tension in the always-fraught ethnic equation that has plagued the country for decades.

“Prime Minister Najib Razak and the Malaysian government have repeatedly broken promises to revise laws that criminalize peaceful expression,” Adams said in a prepared statement. “Instead, Malaysia has gone on a binge of prosecutions of critics. The government is making a mockery of its claims to democracy and fundamental rights by treating criticism as a crime. After the ruling coalition lost the popular vote in the 2013 elections, a crackdown on its critics began. That repression has intensified in the past year in the face of critical media coverage and rising public discontent over issues ranging from the imposition of a new Goods and Services Tax, to the government’s response to a spiraling corruption scandal involving the government-owned 1 Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB), whose board of advisers is chaired by Prime Minister Najib.

Use of draconian laws to shut down dissent has been a concern since 1987 when former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad ordered a roundup of opposition politicians, reporters and other critics under what was called “Operation Lalang” and jailed them under the colonial-era Internal Security Act. Full story...

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Romantic scene on Indian street... (18+)

India's only town with full public wi-fi...

Bhadra is an outlier in the Indian state of Rajasthan, better known for its forts and palaces and wide swathes of desert.

The sleepy and nondescript town of 40,000 people ringed by farms sees activity only around its bus stand. Just a couple of trains arrive at its deserted railway station every day.

But this unremarkable place, 275km (170 miles) from the Indian capital, Delhi, is in news these days: it is the first town in India to offer full and cheap wi-fi coverage.

A few cities in India - Bangalore, Pune, Cochin, Delhi - have some public free wi-fi hotspots, but their impact is low.

From the bus stand and railway station to the streets and town market, the residents of Bhadra are now connected to the internet. I tested it along the length of the town and experienced a seamless connection. Full story...

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Evidence mounts that US military knew they were bombing active hospital in Afghanistan...

The Associated Press provided new evidence Monday that the U.S. military knew that the Doctors Without Borders (MSF) hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan was an active medical facility before they bombed it, bolstering the aid agency's charge that the attack—which killed at least 30 people—amounted to a war crime.

"A day before an American AC130 gunship attacked the hospital, a senior officer in the Green Beret unit wrote in a report that U.S. forces had discussed the hospital with the country director of the medical charity group, presumably in Kabul, according to two people who have seen the document," reports journalist Ken Dilanian.

In addition, MSF spokesperson Tim Shenk told the AP that in the days leading up to the bombing, a U.S. official asked the aid agency whether their Kunduz hospital "had a large group of Taliban fighters in it." According to Shenk, the group "replied that this was not the case. We also stated that we were very clear with both sides to the conflict about the need to respect medical structures."

"Taken together, the revelations add to the growing possibility that U.S. forces destroyed what they knew was a functioning hospital, which would be a violation of the international rules of war," notes Dilanian. Full story...

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The end of the expat? Cities fight for 'Inpats'

These people aren’t defined by where they’re from, but where they’re going - and they don’t have a return ticket. They don't live on a compound or in a company apartment. They want to integrate in their new home countries – and cities are crying out to attract them. In this sense they’re not expats at all, but a new kind of immigrant: the Inpat.

Englishman Adam Webb is typical of this new kind of global mover. Following a career in the British Foreign Office, including a stint in Paris, he moved to Sweden with his then-girlfriend. Within a year he has co-founded a start-up, Gymgo, which has produced an app for finding gyms. The idea was partly inspired by Adam’s frustrations of moving to a new country as an expat.

“All the gyms would sell was monthly membership. And you always needed a personal number, address and bank account,” he says. The rules made it hard for newcomers to Sweden to use gyms, so Gymgo helps users find more flexible deals.

After just a year, Adam and co-founder Paul Stallwood have seen the idea praised by Stockholm’s STING start-up incubator, and offers of investment have followed. Full story...

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Students seek sugar daddies to fund courses...

Thousands of British students are funding their way through university on so-called "sugar daddy" websites.

The sites advertise themselves as a way for "beautiful, ambitious people to graduate debt free" through "arrangements" with older "sponsors".

One site, SeekingArrangement.com, claims 12,600 UK students have signed up with proof of university enrolment.

A 20-year-old student on the website told us she earns £2,000 a month from her "arrangement", which has become sexual.

 She said: "I've saved quite a lot. It pays for my travel, my books, I haven't had to take out a student loan. I've been quite well off." Full story...

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India: 13-year-old girl beheads rapist's 5-year-old son...

A 13-year-old rape victim allegedly kidnapped her rapist's five-year-old son, beheaded him, burnt the body and buried it under bricks. The murder came to light when the body of the child was dragged out by dogs. Subsequently, the family of the boy were informed of the murder.

According to reports, the 13-year-old girl wanted to seek revenge from the accused rapist. She was allegedly raped on 18 October. The incident occurred in the tiny village of Khair, in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.

The girl said in her statement that she was lured by the man identified as Rinku, who offered her whitener -- a chemical used to erase print from paper, which is often misused as an intoxicant -- and raped her.

She added that she wanted to seek revenge from the man, which is why a few days later she led the rapist's son away from his home where he was playing and beheaded him. The police have registered a case of murder against the girl and have sent her to a juvenile home. The father of the boy has been booked for raping a minor. Full story...

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Korean guy's video compilation...

Monday, October 26, 2015

Potraits of Singapore...

Singapore is in the middle of celebrating its Golden Jubilee, the 50th anniversary of the country's status as an independent republic. Since its founding in 1965, the city-state has grown from a tiny trading port to a bona fide economic power. Its also acquired a reputation for strict laws—chewing gum is banned, for instance, and in 1994 the American student Michael Fay was caned for committing vandalism—along with its cleanliness and wealth.

To find out a little more about this elusive place I asked four photographers who hail from Singapore to contribute images and statements on youth culture and how they avoided canings while clubbing.

I moved to Singapore from Jakarta, Indonesia after the riots in 1998. Our family had visited Singapore a lot, as it was a popular vacation destination for the region. Unlike most of Southeast Asia, Singapore was stable and modern.

I became a resident of Singapore rather unwillingly. My parents had decided for me that I should go to school in a country that was not actively trying to kill us every couple of decades. Most of my time in Singapore was spent during the night. We drank a lot (mostly beer, liquor was and is too expensive), went clubbing a lot (only bands like Hoobastank would come play, but I saw Linkin Park that one time), and played a lot of DOTA in LAN shops even though I was really bad at it.

A home that isn't really home, Singapore has maintained a dear place in my memory. For better or worse, the city-state, even with it's glaring issues, has allowed me to walk the streets at night without worry. I made friends who told me about Descartes, went to punk shows with Malay skinheads, and threw up all over the inside of a cab. More + photos...

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Blair accused of ‘passing the buck’ over Iraq. Army families' fury as ex-PM says he's sorry for mistakes of OTHER people over Iraq War...

Tony Blair was last night accused of a ‘cynical spin operation’ after offering a feeble half-apology for the Iraq War.

Bereaved families and critics of the war said the former prime minister was ‘passing the buck’ after he offered a series of selective apologies for the conflict.

In an interview with US television, he said he apologised for the fact the intelligence on which the conflict was based was wrong.

He also said sorry for ‘some of the mistakes in planning’ and for mistakes in handling the aftermath of the conflict. And he admitted that he had ‘some responsibility’ for the rise of Islamic State in Iraq in recent years.

But he continued to justify his actions, saying he found it hard to apologise for removing Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein. Full story...

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Presstitutes at their work...

The Western media has only two tools. One is the outrageous lie. This overused tool no longer works, except on dumbshit Americans.

The pinpoint accuracy of the Russian cruise missiles and air attacks has the Pentagon shaking in its boots. But according to the Western presstitutes the Russian missiles fell out of the sky over Iran and never made it to their ISIS targets.

According to the presstitute reports, the Russia air attacks have only killed civilians and blew up a hospital.

The presstitutes fool only themselves and dumbshit Americans.

The other tool used by presstitutes is to discuss a problem with no reference to its causes. Yesterday I heard a long discussion on NPR, a corporate and Israeli owned propaganda organ, about the migrant problem in Europe. Yes, migrants, not refugees. Full story...

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Sunnier days in Canada?

I used to call Canada ‘the land that time forgot.’ While the rest of the world lurched from crisis to crisis, Canada remained peaceful, humane, prosperous, progressive and famously polite, a sort of North American Scandinavia.

Polls showed that Canada, for all its blandness and low profile, was one of the world’s most respected nations. The ethos of Canada was to make nice to everyone, aid less fortunate nations, shine at the UN and make peace-keeping a national cause.

That was, of course, until the old political order broke down after a series of scandals in Quebec. The Conservatives, an insurgent party made up of farmers and other reactionaries from the western provinces (aka ‘Canadian Republicans), gained power as first a minority government, then majority.

For ten years, the rightwing Conservatives political leader from Alberta, Stephen Harper, held power in Ottawa. He rapidly turned once easy-going Canada into something resembling a dictatorship-light in which Parliament was reduced to a rubber stamp, the courts were often cowed, and parts of the media brought under Harper’s control. Nastiness replaced politeness.

The Harper government was effective at economic management, notably deficit control, but over reliant on income from oil. But foreign and social policies changed dramatically. Harper was reported to be a member of an obscure Christian fundamentalist church that appeared to be close to America’s Bible Belt religious fundamentalists. Unfortunately, Canada’s media never dared broach this subject. Full story...

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A tea-seller who travelled the world...

Sri Lanka: Routine police torture devastates families...

Sri Lanka’s police forces regularly torture and ill-treat criminal suspects in custody, Human Rights Watch said in a new report released today. The authorities should create an independent oversight authority and adopt concrete steps to end police abuse that has had such corrosive effects across Sri Lankan society.

“The Sri Lankan police treat the use of torture as an ordinary way of obtaining confessions,” said Brad Adams, Asia director. “The police regularly get away with using torture to falsely ‘resolve’ cases that really aren’t being resolved.”

The 59-page report, “‘We Live in Constant Fear’: Lack of Accountability for Police Abuse in Sri Lanka,” documents various torture methods used by the Sri Lankan police against criminal suspects, including severe beatings, electric shock, suspension from ropes in painful positions, and rubbing chili paste in the genitals and eyes. Victims of torture and their families may spend years seeking justice and redress with little hope of success.

Human Rights Watch conducted research in greater Colombo and other parts of Sri Lanka in 2014 and 2015. Previous Human Rights Watch reports have focused on wartime abuses, including torture of minority Tamil civilians. This report documents how torture and police abuse are entrenched and devastating to the majority Sinhalese population as well. Full story...

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Hundreds of women prosecuted for extramarital sex in UAE...

Hundreds of women, some of them pregnant or domestic servants who are victims of rape, are being imprisoned in the United Arab Emirates every year under laws that outlaw consensual sex outside marriage, according to a BBC Arabic investigation.

Secret footage obtained by BBC Arabic show pregnant women shackled in chains walking into a courtrooms where laws prohibiting “Zina” – or sex outside marriage – could mean sentences of months to years in prison and flogging.

“Because the UAE authorities have not clarified what they mean by indecency, the judges can use their culture and customs and Sharia ultimately to broaden out that definition and convict people for illicit sexual relations or even acts of public affection,” said Rothna Begum, women’s rights researcher at Human Rights Watch in London.

While both men and women could in theory be imprisoned for having sex outside marriage, the investigation – which will air at the opening of BBC Arabic festival on 31 October – found that in reality pregnancy is often used as proof of the “crime”, with domestic female migrant workers – numbering about 150,000 in the UAE – left most vulnerable. Full story...

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