Bonjour Planet Earth

Wednesday, November 12, 2014

Brazilian cops killed more than 11,000 people in 5 years...

Brazilian police killed more than 11,000 people between 2009 and 2013 for an average of six killings a day, a public safety NGO said Tuesday.

The study by the Sao Paulo-based Brazilian Forum on Public Safety said police nationwide killed 11,197 people over the past five years, while law enforcement agents in the United States killed 11,090 people over the past 30 years.

"The empirical evidence shows that Brazilian police make abusive use of lethal force to respond to crime and violence," the report said.

There were 416 people killed last year in Rio de Janeiro state, giving it the highest per-capita rate for 2013.

The study also said 50,806 people were killed in all homicides last year, about one person every 10 minutes.

Nearly 70 per cent of the homicide victims were black and more than half were ages 15 to 29, it said.

In addition to using excessive force, Brazilian police frequently execute suspects, said Bruno Paes Manso of the University of Sao Paulo's Center for the Study on Violence. He called it "a practice rarely investigated." Source...

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Tuesday, November 11, 2014

Libya in utter chaos...

As Libya continues to descend into chaos as a result of the interventionist policies of President Barack Hussein Obama, it is hard to imagine it was once the most prosperous and stable country in north Africa.

Obama’s decision in 2011 to attack and ultimately assassinate former Libyan leader Colonel Muammar Qadaffi, who was once an American ally, led to the country being ripped apart.

Libya’s military and national police force were devastated and much of the country’s infrastructure, including its lucrative oil industry, was torn asunder.

The world even witnessed the torture and murder of Qadaffi and the killing of one of his sons, who was being held in custody.

Ever since then, militias, many of them allied to terrorists, have fought each other across the country, competing for political power, land and oil resources. They have created a hell for the nation’s 5 million people.

Before Obama unleashed the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) on Qadaffi’s government at the behest of chickenhawks in Washington and corporate entities keen on getting their hands on Libya’s oil, it was a stable, wealthy country. Full story...

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Italian scientists cleared of failing to predict L'Aquila earthquake...

Six Italian scientists who risked lengthy prison sentences after being accused of failing to give adequate warning of a 2009 earthquake that killed more than 300 people have been cleared by an appeals court.

In their initial trial two years ago, the experts were found guilty of multiple manslaughter charges and of failing to predict the devastating tremor, which affected the mountain city of L’Aquila and surrounding villages.

They were each sentenced to six years in jail.

But they appealed the convictions and had remained out of prison pending the outcome.

The appeals court in L’Aquila on Monday overturned the 2012 guilty verdicts, saying that no crime had been committed. Full story...

Guy in Cambodia gives free English classes and houses 132 orphaned children in a 2 room building...

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North Koreans say 'I do' with mobile phone...

Young North Koreans are choosing the mobile phone over engagement rings as the symbol of their engagement, according to a dissident newspaper

Exchanging smart phones has surpassed the more traditional giving and receiving of rings, the Japan-based Daily NK reported, quoting sources within North Korea.

"In small and medium-size cities, the top-ranking present for people trying the knot is the mobile phone, without questions," a woman living in North Hamgyung Province said. "Rings are the second most popular."

A symbol of the younger generation, mobile phones are popular because they enable young couples to stay in contact even though they may be apart, she said. And in the same way as a ring in other cultures signifies that a woman is getting married, showing off a new mobile phone conveys the same message in North Korea.

"Apart from women from affluent families, it's hard to own a mobile phone if you're from a poor family or single," the source said. "Women have so much to invest in - like household goods, cosmetics and clothes - that it's hard for them to think about getting one of those devices." Full story...

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8 women dead, 50 hospitalized after sterilization surgery in Chhattisgarh, India...

In yet another case of alleged negligence at government-run health camps, eight women have died and 50 others were taken ill after botched up sterilization surgeries in Takhatpur, Bilaspur.

According to reports, Janaki Bai (30), the first casualty in the case, had undergone sterilization at the health camp on Saturday and she fell ill soon after. Her condition deteriorated badly within 24 hours of the surgery and she was taken to Bilaspur district hospital where she succumbed on Monday morning.

Five of the other 50 women admitted to the hospital also succumbed to their ailments late on Monday evening. All the victims had similar symptoms, vomiting and acute pain in abdomen, and 50 of them are presently under treatment at various health centres, 30 reported to be in critical condition.

A senior health official said that 38 are admitted in district hospital and seven each have been referred to Apollo hospital and CIMS, Bilaspur as their condition started deteriorating in the evening.

The state health department, which had organized the camp, has ordered inquiry into the incident. Talking to TOI, director health services, Dr Kamalpreet Singh, said strict action would be taken if any negligence were found. Full story...

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Jesus 'married Mary Magdalene and had children', according to ancient manuscript...

Jesus married the prostitute Mary Magdalene and had children, according to a manuscript almost 1,500 years old unearthed at the British Library.

The so-called “Lost Gospel”, which has been translated from Aramaic, allegedly reveals the startling new allegations, according to The Sunday Times.

Professor Barrie Wilson and writer Simcha Jacobovic spent months translating the text, which they claim states Jesus had two children and the original Virgin Mary was Jesus’s wife and not his mother.

Many experts have downplayed the biblical figure’s historical importance but, according to the translators of the new gospel, she is of much greater significance than previously thought.

Mary Magdalene already features in the existing gospels and is present at many of the important moments recorded in Jesus’s life.

“The Lost Gospel” is not the first to claim that Jesus married Mary Magdalene. Full story...

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Pakistani schools network observes anti-Malala day...

Education campaigner Malala was shot in the head by the Taliban in October 2012 but recovered and went on to win this year's Nobel peace prize.

The 17-year-old has been hailed around the world for standing up for girls' rights to education, but the response to her in Pakistan has not been universally positive, with some seeing her as a “Western agent” on a mission to shame her country.

The All Pakistan Private Schools Federation last year barred its members from buying Malala's memoir “I am Malala” because of what the group said was its “anti-Pakistan and anti-Islam content.“

It said the book, written with British journalist Christina Lamb, was too sympathetic to British novelist Salman Rushdie.

Rushdie in 1989 became the target of an Iranian fatwa, or religious edict, calling for his murder for allegedly blaspheming Islam and the Prophet Mohammed (PBUH) in his book The Satanic Verses. Full story...

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Is Islam so weak that Malala’s book has to be banned in Pakistan’s schools?

Asylum-seeker conditions inhuman and unlawful, UN committee tells Australia...

Conditions on Manus Island and Nauru – the island states to which Australia sends asylum seekers – amount to “cruel, inhuman, and unlawful” punishment, the UN Committee Against Torture has told the Australian government, while new laws to make it easier to forcibly return asylum seekers to their homeland could breach the Convention Against Torture.

Australia appeared before the UN committee in Geneva on Monday, where the committee heard that a migration amendment bill that is before the Senate would make it easier for Australia to send people back to torture, in breach of international law.

Australia ratified the torture convention in 1989, and is legally bound by it. The convention not only outlaws torture, but prohibits forcibly sending someone to a place where they could be tortured.

Australia has a statutory “complementary protection” obligation for asylum seekers who fall outside the refugees convention but who are still fleeing persecution in their home country.

The migration amendment (protection and other measures) bill before the Senate would raise the threshold for complementary protection from a “real chance” of persecution to “more likely than not”. Full story...

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Australia offers new home to its would-be migrants… in Cambodia!!!

Monday, November 10, 2014

Bank whistleblower Alayne Fleischmann & Matt Taibbi on how JPMorgan Chase helped wreck the economy...

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The bullying of Hungary – the country that dared to disobey the US and EU...

25 years ago, Hungary was being toasted in the West for opening its border with Austria to East Germans, in a move which led to the fall of the Berlin Wall. Now the Western elites are not happy with Budapest which they consider far too independent.

The refusal of Prime Minister Viktor Orban and his ruling Fidesz party to join the new US and EU Cold War against Russia, which has seen the Hungarian parliament approving a law to build the South Stream gas pipeline without the approval of the European Union, in addition to the populist economic policies Fidesz has adopted against the largely foreign owned banks and energy companies, has been met with an angry response from Washington and Brussels.

Hungarian officials have been banned from entering the US, while the European Commission has demanded that the Hungarians explain their decision to go ahead with South Stream. That’s on top of the European Commission launching legal action against the Hungarian government for its law restricting the rights of foreigners to buy agricultural land.

The bullying of Hungary hasn’t made many headlines because it’s so-called “democrats” from the West who have been doing the bullying.

Viktor Orban is not a communist, he is a nationally-minded conservative who was an anti-communist activist in the late 1980s, but the attacks on him and his government demonstrate that it doesn’t matter what label you go under - if you don’t do exactly what Uncle Sam and the Euro-elite tell you to do - your country will come under great pressure to conform. And all of course in the name of “freedom” and “democracy.” Full story...

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British taxpayers fork out £13.5million a year to pay for EU subsidies for bullfighting in Spain...

British taxpayers are forking out £13.5million a year to pay for EU subsidies for bullfighting in Spain, it has been revealed.

Spanish farmers receive the handouts for breeding the animals killed in the controversial sport as part of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP).

Politicians are calling for Prime Minister David Cameron to refuse to make the payments immediately.

Labour’s Sir Alan Meale has tabled a Commons motion that says: ‘Bullfighting for fiestas is abhorrent as it involves the torture of animals in public display.’

The MP for Mansfield said it was ‘bizarre’ the Government is even contemplating paying for this and said ‘bullfighting is the last thing in the world we should be subsidising’. Full story...

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Woman in India paraded naked on donkey...

Members of a community panchayat in a tribal area of Rajsamand district blackened a 45-year-old woman's face, stripped her and paraded her on a donkey's back on Saturday evening. The panchayat members accused the woman of killing her nephew and held a meeting in which the shocking punishment was meted out to her.

As the matter came to light after the victim's husband lodged an FIR, the police on Sunday arrested 30 persons, nine of them from the victim's family. Senior police officers said that the woman has been shifted to a shelter home for the time being and she was being counseled.

The incident was reported from Thurval village, some seven km from Charbhuja town in Rajsamand district. "One Vardi Singh had died on November 2. The circumstances of his death are not known because the villagers cremated his body and didn't inform the police," said SP, Rajsamand, Sweta Dhankar.

The officer said that Vardi Singh's wife suspected that his aunt killed him.

"She approached the local community panchayat which decided to hear the case publicly. A meeting was held in the village in which it was declared that she had committed the crime, so she must be punished," said the officer.

The officer added that the woman was stripped at a place in the middle of the village. Source...

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Charities claim that the satanic abuse of children is rife...

CHILDREN have been the victims of satanic abuse including rape, murder and even the production of so-called snuff films which depict killings, two leading charities claimed last night.

One campaigner said he had heard of babies born but never registered, so they would not be missed when killed by secret paedophile networks.

The existence of such terrifying cults is said to have gone unchecked in Scotland for decades, with victims facing scepticism and outright disbelief.

Many incidents took place years ago but experts are sure ritual abuse rings still operate.

Police Scotland said yesterday they were taking the allegations “incredibly seriously” and would investigate any complaints.

The claims will put the Scottish government under intense pressure to announce a public inquiry into historic child sexual abuse, with Scotland now the only part of the UK without such a review. Full story...

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'Five nuclear engineers murdered near Damascus'

Unknown assailants killed five nuclear engineers Sunday while they were on a bus just north of Damascus, near the research center where they worked, a monitor said on Sunday.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which relies on a network of sources on the ground for its reports, was unable however to say how they were killed or supply their nationalities.

"Unidentified attackers murdered five nuclear energy engineers who worked in the scientific research centre near the neighbourhood of Barzeh, northern Damascus," said Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman.

"It was not immediately clear whether the bus that they were travelling on was hit by a bomb, or by gunfire," Abdel Rahman told AFP.

In July last year, six people who worked at the same center were killed in a mortar attack carried out by rebels seeking President Bashar al-Assad's ouster.

Another military research center, also near Damascus, was also hit by a deadly Israeli raid in May 2013. Source...

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85 richest now have as much money as poorest 3.5 billion...

"There's been class warfare going on for the last 20 years, and my class has won."

Billionaire investor Warren Buffett made that remark more than three years ago and it still holds true today — only the gap between the richest and the poorest has gotten even wider.

Here's how bad it is: Oxfam now calculates that the 85 richest billionaires on the planet, including the likes of Carlos Slim, Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg, have as much money as the 3.5 billion poorest people.

And for all the talk about the urgent need to address income inequality, the mega-rich just keep on getting richer.

How much richer?

Oxfam estimates that between March 2013 and March 2014, those same 85 billionaires saw their wealth grow by $668 million every day.

These people are so grotesquely rich that if Bill Gates, for example, spent $1 million every day, it would take him 218 years to exhaust his funds. Full story...

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Sunday, November 09, 2014

'Poorest president on earth' receives million-dollar offer for clapped-out VW Beetle...

The “poorest president on earth” has received a million-dollar offer to buy his clapped-out old blue 1987 Volkswagen Beetle, which became a symbol of his modest lifestyle.

Uruguayan president Jose Mujica claimed in an interview with local weekly newspaper Busqueda that an Arab Sheikh offered him $1 million for the vintage car during the G77 summit in Bolivia in June.

“That’s what they said to me,” Mr Mujica said when asked about the offer at a press conference. “But I didn’t give it any importance.”

The 79-year-old president, a former leftist Tupamaro guerrilla leader who was shot by police six times and spent 14 years in a military prison, said if he received the million-dollar offer he would give it all away – either to a homeless charity that he has long supported or to the local public health service in the form of trucks.

Although the president confessed he felt “no commitment” to the car, claiming he had only kept it for so long because of his three-legged dog Manuela, he said he understood why others might wish to buy it. Full story...

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Britain slammed for arms sales to Israel, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia...

A former British defense secretary has slammed the UK’s arms sales to Israel, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, saying they are using British weapons to suppress civilians.

According to a report published in the Guardian on Saturday, Sir John Stanley, who chairs the Commons committees on arms export controls, made the comments in a parliamentary debate on October 30.

During the debate Stanly said the British government had failed to come clean on a “significant change in policy” on arms sales to “countries of concern”.

According to recent figures, the British government sold over 95 million dollars (60 million pounds) worth of arms to these countries in 2014.

“The Government should apply significantly more cautious judgments when considering arms export license applications for goods to authoritarian regimes, which might be used for internal repression,” added Stanley. Full story...

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Tony Blair ‘signed secret contract with Saudi oil firm promising him £41,000 a month and a slice of any deals he helped broker’

Tony Blair signed a secret contract with a Saudi oil firm, which promised him £41,000 a month and commission on deals he helped broker, it has been claimed.

The former prime minister signed the agreement with PetroSaudi - founded by a senior member of the Saudi royal family - in November 2010 in a deal that would promote the firm to Chinese leaders.

It proposed fees of £41,000 a month and a two per cent cut on any successful negotiations for Blair, while the firm was told it was prohibited from disclosing his role without consent.

The 21-page leaked document, obtained by The Sunday Times, is the first time a detailed contract agreed by his office - Tony Blair Associates - has been revealed.

The newspaper claims it is also the first piece of evidence of his work for a Middle Eastern oil firm.

Mr Blair's role as a Middle East Peace Envoy is to hammer out a ceasefire in times of conflict between the Israelis and Palestinian

But it is thought the revelations will give rise to fresh criticism of his role and his private interests. Full story...

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Teaching them young: Tots in Mumbai learn to say ‘ni hao’ to Mandarin...

Hong se, huang se, lu se... (red, yellow, green)," two-and-a-half-year old Sriana rattles off the colours of the rainbow in Mandarin when her mother points to a picture at their Powai residence in Mumbai. Another Mumbai toddler, three-year-old Rishaan, can sing Zhuni shengri kuai le (Happy birthday to you) in Mandarin with ease. Kolkata boy Ved, 6, insists that his parents call him 'Da Ji'—a Chinese name he fancies.

Around the time they are learning to prattle in their mother tongue, quite a few urban tots are being enrolled in Mandarin classes. "These lessons are a gift to my daughter for her future," says Sriana's mother Chetna Kumar. The international business lawyer hired a tutor to teach Sriana the "language of the world's fastest growing economy" when she was just 19 months old.

When Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg wooed China with a 30-minute interview in Mandarin last week, Kumar felt vindicated. Apart from spending Rs 700 per session on the tutor, she has also filled their home with books and puzzles with Chinese characters. She even wishes she had Chinese children in the neighbourhood for Sriana to play with.

In Mumbai, around 200 kids under 16—90 of them between 3 and 6 years old—are attending after-school Mandarin classes conducted by 'Yeh China' institute at eight schools. Founded by Usha Sahoo in 2010, Yeh China offers a special 'Fun and Learn Chinese for Preschoolers' programme that introduces tots to Mandarin through singing, stories and craft. Full story...

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In 8 years, he has not taken a single day off...

In the last eight years, this government employee from Madhya Pradesh has not taken a single day off. Dr Bharat Bajpai, the head of the Mortuary in a government hospital in Indore, and two of his team members earned a special mention in the Limca Book of Records in 2011 for not taking a single day off for 1,200 days.

Three years later, Dr Bajpai continues to work without taking a single day off. He is the head of the Mortuary in the city's Gobind Ballabh Pant Government Hospital. In a career spanning two decades, he has conducted over 10,000 postmortems.

"We should be as useful as possible I believe, we should help people as much as we can. I have never worked with the expectation of any post, reward or honour. I do not even have a name plate at my home. I never seek any publicity for what I do; it is all God's will," he said.

But the infrastructure of the mortuary at this hospital is not quite as high as the commitment level of the team running it. The post-mortems are conducted in a room which used to be a public toilet. Another room, in which post-mortems are supposed to be conducted, has not been constructed completely. Full story...

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Pakistani Christians burned alive were attacked by 1,200 people...

A mob accused of burning alive a Christian couple in an industrial kiln in Pakistan allegedly wrapped a pregnant mother in cotton so she would catch fire more easily, according to family members who witnessed the attack.

Sajjad Maseeh, 27, and his wife Shama Bibi, 24, were set upon by at least 1,200 people after rumors circulated that they had burned verses from the Quran, family spokesman Javed Maseeh told NBC News via telephone late Thursday. Their legs were also broken so they couldn't run away.

"They picked them up by their arms and legs and held them over the brick furnace until their clothes caught fire," he said. "And then they threw them inside the furnace."

Bibi, a mother of four who was four months pregnant, was wearing an outfit that initially didn't burn, according to Javed Maseeh. The mob removed her from over the kiln and wrapped her up in cotton to make sure the garments would be set alight. Full story...

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Saturday, November 08, 2014

Putin's speech in Valdai that went unreported by US & British media...

Most people in the English-speaking parts of the world missed Putin's speech at the Valdai conference in Sochi a few days ago, and, chances are, those of you who have heard of the speech didn't get a chance to read it, and missed its importance. Western media did their best to ignore it or at best to twist its meaning. Regardless of what you think or don't think of Putin (like the sun and the moon, he does not exist for you to cultivate an opinion) this is probably the most important political speech since Churchill's “Iron Curtain” speech of March 5, 1946.

In this speech, Putin abruptly changed the rules of the game. Previously, the game of international politics was played as follows: politicians made public pronouncements, for the sake of maintaining a pleasant fiction of national sovereignty, but they were strictly for show and had nothing to do with the substance of international politics; in the meantime, they engaged in secret back-room negotiations, in which the actual deals were hammered out. Previously, Putin tried to play this game, expecting only that Russia be treated as an equal. But these hopes have been dashed, and at this conference he declared the game to be over, explicitly violating Western taboo by speaking directly to the people over the heads of elite clans and political leaders.

Russian blogger chipstone summarized the most salient points from Putin's speech as follows: Full story...

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Another fake bin Laden story...

RT, one of my favorite news sources, has fallen for a fake story put out by the Pentagon to support the fantasy story that a SEAL team killed Osama bin Laden, who died a second time in Abbottabad, Pakistan, a decade after his first death from illness and disease. http://rt.com/usa/202895-navy-seal-shot-binladen/This fake story together with the fake movie and the fake book by an alleged SEAL team member is the way the fake story of bin Laden’s murder is perpetrated. Bin Laden’s alleged demise at the hands of a SEAL team was a propaganda orchestration, the purpose of which was to give Obama a hero’s laurels and deep six Democratic talk of challenging his nomination for a second term.

Osama bin Laden died in December 2001 of renal failure and other health problems, having denied in his last recorded video any responsibility for 9/11, instead directing Americans to look inside their own government. The FBI itself has stated that there is no evidence that Osama bin Laden is responsible for 9/11. Bin Laden’s obituary appeared in numerous foreign and Arabic press, and also on Fox News. No one can survive renal failure for a decade, and no dialysis machine was found in the alleged Abbottabad compound of bin Laden, who allegedly was murdered by SEALs a decade after his obituary notices.

Additionally, no one among the crew of the ship from which the White House reported bin Laden was buried at sea saw any such burial, and the sailors sent messages home to that effect. Somehow a burial was held onboard a ship on which there are constant watches and crew on alert at all hours, and no one witnessed it.

Additionally, the White House story of the alleged murder of bin Laden changed twice within the first 24 hours. The claim that Obama and his government watched the action transmitted live from cameras on the SEALs’ helmets was quickly abandoned, despite the release of a photo of the Obama regime intently focused on a TV set and alleged to be watching the live action. No video of the deed was ever released. To date there is no evidence whatsoever in behalf of the Obama regime’s claim. Not one tiny scrap. Just unsubstantiated self-serving claims. Full story...

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JP Morgan Chase paid $9 billion to keep this woman silent about its crimes...

She tried to stay quiet, she really did. But after eight years of keeping a heavy secret, the day came when Alayne Fleischmann couldn't take it anymore.

"It was like watching an old lady get mugged on the street," she says. "I thought, 'I can't sit by any longer.'"

Fleischmann is a tall, thin, quick-witted securities lawyer in her late thirties, with long blond hair, pale-blue eyes and an infectious sense of humor that has survived some very tough times. She's had to struggle to find work despite some striking skills and qualifications, a common symptom of a not-so-common condition called being a whistle-blower.

Fleischmann is the central witness in one of the biggest cases of white-collar crime in American history, possessing secrets that JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon late last year paid $9 billion (not $13 billion as regularly reported – more on that later) to keep the public from hearing.

Back in 2006, as a deal manager at the gigantic bank, Fleischmann first witnessed, then tried to stop, what she describes as "massive criminal securities fraud" in the bank's mortgage operations.

Thanks to a confidentiality agreement, she's kept her mouth shut since then. "My closest family and friends don't know what I've been living with," she says. "Even my brother will only find out for the first time when he sees this interview."

Six years after the crisis that cratered the global economy, it's not exactly news that the country's biggest banks stole on a grand scale. That's why the more important part of Fleischmann's story is in the pains Chase and the Justice Department took to silence her. Full story...

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Singapore PM wins defamation case against blogger...

Singapore's High Court ruled yesterday that an activist defamed Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong by accusing him in a blog of misappropriating state pension funds.

In the first such ruling in the city-state over a purely online article, a judge issued a summary judgment against Roy Ngerng, a 33-year-old former government employee.

Ngerng, who writes a blog called Heart Truths, was seeking trial to defend himself but High Court Judge Lee Seiu Kin ruled there was "no triable defence against the plaintiff's claim".

"There is no doubt that it is defamatory to suggest that the plaintiff is guilty of criminal misappropriation," the judge said in a written ruling.

Damages will be set at a later date generally such civil suits are launched in the High Court when the value of claims is above S$250,000 (HK$1.5 million).

Ngerng has already admitted his May 15 blog accusing the prime minister, who is also chairman of state investment fund GIC, of misusing the Central Provident Fund (CPF) was false and without foundation. Full story...

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Hollywood takes on corporate giants over Bhopal gas disaster...

Hollywood movie star Martin Sheen will join Amnesty International's battle to finally hold Union Carbide accountable for what is widely considered to be one of the world's worst industrial disasters as he launches his latest film in Los Angeles on Friday.

'A Prayer for Rain' is a compelling account of the events that led to more than half a million people being poisoned by toxic gas leaking from Union Carbide's pesticide plant in Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh, on December 2, 1984.

Mischa Barton and Kal Penn, best known for their roles in 'The O.C.' and 'Harold & Kumar', also star in the drama.

"Those who survived have faced long-term health problems, but received little medical help. For 30 years the survivors of Bhopal have campaigned for justice, for fair compensation, health care and for Union Carbide, now owned by Dow Chemicals, to be held to account," Martin Sheen told Amnesty International which issued an official release in the matter. Full story...

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In a land without clean water, corruption is bleeding Zimbabwe dry...

In the darkness before dawn, the people of Mabvuku trudge to the nearest borehole and place their buckets in a line. It will take many hours of patient queuing before they can get the water they need for their daily survival.

At home, their taps have been dry for more than four years. As Zimbabwe’s crisis continues, the daily struggle for water is exhausting. It’s a symptom of a collapsing state, where political infighting and corruption are keeping its people in poverty and misery.

“We were expecting that one day our taps would work, but there’s nothing,” says Tobias Gumboreshumba, a resident of this low-income suburb on the outskirts of Harare.

“We’re getting tired now. It really hurts. All of our brains are spent on where and how are we going to get water today. It’s stressing us very much.”

The 56-year-old grocery-warehouse supervisor had been helping his wife queue for water since 3 a.m., and after six hours they were still waiting.

His family, and three neighbouring families, have 46 buckets that they need to fill every day. They take turns in the queue, moving a bucket forward to hold their place. But the borehole is more than 25-metres deep, the water from the pump is barely a trickle, and it takes a lot of pumping to fill the buckets. Fights sometimes erupt among the frustrated people in the queue. Full story...

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North Koreans working as ‘state-sponsored slaves’ in Qatar...

Thousands of migrant labourers from North Korea are toiling for years on construction sites in Qatar for virtually no pay – including on the vast new metropolis that is the centrepiece of the World Cup – in what may amount to “state-sponsored slavery”.

According to testimonies from workers and defectors, labourers from the reclusive state said they receive almost no salaries in person while in the Gulf emirate during the three years they typically spend there.

They work in the expectation they will collect their earnings when they return to North Korea, but according to a series of testimonies from defectors and experts, workers receive as little as 10% of their salaries when they go home, and some may receive nothing. One North Korean worker at a construction site in central Doha told the Guardian: “We are here to earn foreign currency for our nation.”

The North Korean regime, led by Kim Jong-un, is currently subject to international sanctions as it continues to defy calls to end its nuclear programme and address severe human rights abuses. A recent UN report accused the regime of crimes against humanity. The foreign currency earned by its overseas workforce is a crucial tool for propping up the isolated country’s fragile economy. Full story...

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Friday, November 07, 2014

More than half of British people believe religion does more harm than good...

More than half of people in the UK believe religion does more harm than good, while less than a quarter believe faith is a force for good, a new survey has revealed.

And the viewpoint even applies to those with strong faiths – one fifth (20 per cent) of Britons who describe themselves as being “very religious” said religion was harmful to society.

The findings from the study for The Huffington Post, which was carried out by Survation, challenge widely held beliefs about religion and its place in modern British society.

They show that only eight per cent of Britons describe themselves as very religious, while more than 60 per cent said they are not religious at all.

And the majority (55 per cent) believe that being religious does not necessarily make you a better person. One in eight Britons said atheists tend to be more moral, compared to just six per cent who said atheists are less moral. Full story...

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The bizzare electromagnetic after effects of near-death experiences...

(...)

In addition to these notable after effects, the research of P.M.H. Atwater revealed another, more bizarre pattern, indicating that many people undergo rather remarkable changes to their body’s electromagnetic field. Called ‘electro-sensitivity’ this can bring on puzzling, frightening, and even dangerous situations for some of the most sensitive of NDE survivors.

“Since beginning my research of near-death states in 1978, I have consistently noticed that a large majority of experiencers (both as part of my study and in general conversation with them) reported becoming more sensitive to electrical and magnetic fields – disturbances, equipment, devices, wrist watches – after their episode.” – P.M.H. Atwater

This strange and lasting physiological change is seen by the majority of those who experience NDE’s. Most commonly, those who experience electro-sensitivity after a NDE report ‘interference’ with potentially anything electronic in the external environment. Some examples are:
Lights flickering on and off when entering room, and especially so when there is a high intensity situation occuring:

Computers and other electronics malfunctioning when near
Light bulbs exploding
Disruptions in recording equipment leading to unusual or distorted photos and videos
Wrist watch batteries die quickly, or watches stop for no reason at all
Feeling ‘drained’ when near anything electronic
Receiving television or radio channels that shouldn’t be picked up in that location
Feeling more ‘connected’ to electronics and being able to use them better than before the NDE
Extreme sensitivity to earth changes such as thunder storms, earthquakes, lightening, and tornados.
Full story...

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It seems nuts, but the Swiss may go back to a gold standard...

The British pound hasn’t been linked to gold since 1931. The US snipped the cord in 1971. But the Swiss only fully severed ties to gold in 1999, when voters approved a revamped constitution.

Now, a good chunk of them seems to want to go back.

On Nov. 30, Swiss voters will cast ballots on a number of issues including the “Save our Swiss Gold” initiative launched by the right-leaning Swiss People’s Party. The ballot measure would instantly ban the Swiss National Bank from selling gold. It also would require that the national bank keep 20% of its assets in gold within five years. (It currently has about 8% in gold.) Oh, and it would demand that all the gold be stored in Switzerland itself. (About 30% is parked abroad right now.)

“It’s really an attempt to return to some kind of gold standard, for those who don’t trust paper money and who want gold backing it up,” UBS strategist Beat Siegenthaler told Reuters. Full story...

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Egypt: Man's 'drugs test trick' foiled by pregnancy!!!

An Egyptian bus driver who tried to avoid a drugs test by using his wife's urine has been busted after it turned out his wife was pregnant, it's reported.

The man had been selected for a standard drugs test along with other public bus drivers, but did not submit his own urine sample, instead using his wife's, the Al-Yawm al-Sabi website reports. What he didn't know was that his wife was two months pregnant. Before revealing the news, officials asked the driver to confirm the sample was in fact his own, according to Tamer Amin, a presenter on the political talk show Bottom Line. After the driver said it was, the officials reportedly responded: "Congratulations, you're pregnant."

"This story despite being funny has several lessons," Mr Amin says. "First, that drugs have become available to many and have become as common as cigarettes. This is a calamity." In future, the transport authority will require a blood test as well as urine tests to prevent people giving fake samples, a source at the Public Transportation Authority Hospital tells Al-Yawm al-Sabi.

About 12,000 people are killed on Egypt's roads each year, a rate of 42 deaths per 100,000 people, according to the World Health Organisation. Drug use has also been on the rise in recent years, with the painkiller tramadol proving particularly popular as a cheap - but addictive - energy booster. Source...

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752 people have exercised their right to die in Oregon—why you’ve only heard about Brittany Maynard...

She was a truly beautiful woman: Slender, button-nosed, with a wide and vivacious smile and dancing, sea-green eyes.

That’s the image we’ll remember of Brittany Maynard, the 29-year-old who became the face of the “Death With Dignity” movement last month after writing an op-ed for CNN detailing her choice to end her life after being diagnosed with a Stage 4 glioblastoma tumor—a malignant blob with a corona of invasive tentacles digging ever deeper into the healthy parts of her brain. On Saturday, Nov. 1, Maynard followed through with the decision she’d made, leaving behind a grieving husband, her loving family and friends and a slew of headlines and broadcast segments that brought voluntary euthanasia to the forefront of the news for the first time since the 1990s.

The pictures running alongside the features are the ones of Maynard in her prime, not as Maynard was just before her death, her face and body swollen by water retention due to the impact of steroids, her features drawn, her eyes heavy-lidded and her hair dull. That’s not a coincidence. When Maynard decided to become a public advocate for the right to die, it was immediately recognized that she could be a singularly mediagenic speaker for a cause that has long been relegated to the fringes.

As New York University hospital system Division of Medical Ethics chief Arthur Caplan told The Oregonian, the debate over voluntary euthanasia was “really an argument among older people. You didn’t really hear voices from anybody under 35, [and Maynard was] almost irresistible. She’s attractive, articulate, a newlywed. She’s just a media magnet.” Full story...

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Brussels burns as more than 100,000 protesters clash with police during march against EU austerity measures...

Violence broke out on the streets of Brussels today as more than 100,000 people marched against EU-enforced austerity.

Water cannons and tear gas were used in the centre of the Belgian capital as riot police tried to bring the situation under control.

Fighting broke out soon after the end of a largely peaceful march organised by trade unions and left wing politicians.

'Metal barriers were thrown at the police, together with stones, and then the situation rapidly got worse,' said demonstrator Gilles Broussard.

'Hundreds of riot police were involved in trying to bring the situation under control - it all got very nasty.'

A new government was elected in Belgium last month and immediately pledged to raise the retirement age, cancel wage rises and cut social security benefits. This was all in line with strict guidelines from Europe, which views austerity as the key to the trading bloc's future. More + photos...

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Japanese restaurant chain ordered to pay £320,000 in damages for overtime suicide...

A Japanese court has ordered a restaurant chain and two personnel to pay more than half a million dollars in damages to the family of a man who killed himself after being forced to work nearly 200 hours overtime a month.

Tokyo District Court said the president of Tokyo-based Sun Challenge, a steak house chain, and another official had been culpable in failing to stop the unidentified employee from working excessive hours.

"With only one holiday given to him every several months, the psychological load of prolonged work and power harassment caused his mental disorder," said presiding judge Akira Yamada, according to a Kyodo News report.

Mr Yamada ordered the company and its two officials to pay a total of 58 million yen (£320,000) to the parents of the man, who was 24 when he took his own life in November 2010.

The employee began working for Sun Challenge in 2007 and was appointed restaurant manager in July 2009. Full story...

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