Bonjour Planet Earth

Thursday, October 08, 2015

Most Americans have less than $1,000 in savings...

Americans are living right on the edge — at least when it comes to financial planning.

Approximately 62% of Americans have less than $1,000 in their savings accounts and 21% don’t even have a savings account, according to a new survey of more than 5,000 adults conducted this month by Google Consumer Survey for personal finance website GOBankingRates.com. “It’s worrisome that such a large percentage of Americans have so little set aside in a savings account,” says Cameron Huddleston, a personal finance analyst for the site. “They likely don’t have cash reserves to cover an emergency and will have to rely on credit, friends and family, or even their retirement accounts to cover unexpected expenses.”

This is supported by a similar survey of 1,000 adults carried out earlier this year by personal finance site Bankrate.com, which also found that 62% of Americans have no emergency savings for things such as a $1,000 emergency room visit or a $500 car repair. Faced with an emergency, they say they would raise the money by reducing spending elsewhere (26%), borrowing from family and/or friends (16%) or using credit cards (12%). And among those who had savings prior to 2008, 57% said they’d used some or all of their savings in the Great Recession, according to a U.S. Federal Reserve survey of over 4,000 adults released last year. Of course, paltry savings-account rates don’t encourage people to save either. Full story...

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Paedophile bishop escaped charges after MPs and royal family intervened, court told

A member of the royal family, a senior judge, cabinet ministers and public school headmasters all supported a Church of England bishop who escaped prosecution for sexual abuse 22 years ago, the Old Bailey has heard.

The scale of the backing of senior establishment figures when Peter Ball was first accused in 1993 by a vulnerable young man of sexual exploitation and abuse was revealed for the first time on Wednesday.

Ball, 83, was in court to be sentenced for 15 years of grooming, sexual exploitation and abuse of 18 vulnerable young men aged 17-25, who had come to him for spiritual guidance and inspiration between 1977 and 1992 when he was bishop of Lewes.

Jailing him for two years and eight months, Mr Justice Wilkie said Ball had abused his position as a senior member of the established church. “You pursued selected individuals to commit or submit to acts of physical or sexual debasement under the guise of it being part of an austere regime of devotion,” Wilkie said. “These acts were committed at your suggestion for your own sexual gratification.”

Ball, who counted the Prince of Wales as a loyal friend, had first been accused in 1993 by Neil Todd, who had attempted suicide three times as a result of his abuse, and went on to kill himself in 2012. Full story...

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Amnesty tells the US to stop selling arms to Saudi Arabia- The group cites "damning evidence" of war crimes involving American-made weapons in Yemen...

Citing "damning evidence of war crimes," Amnesty International has condemned America's continued support of Saudi Arabia's air war in Yemen. In a report released yesterday, the human-rights organization called on the United States to stop selling bombs, fighter jets, and combat helicopters to the Saudis

The nearly seven-month-old conflict, which pits Saudi Arabia and a coalition of allied states against anti-government rebels, has claimed thousands of civilian lives. More than two-thirds of those were killed by Saudi-led air strikes, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. While Saudi Arabia claims to only be targeting military targets, bombs have been dropped on power stations, water supplies, schools, hospitals, and a camp for displaced people.

The United States has been aiding the Saudi-led coalition with weaponry, logistics, and intelligence support. Washington and Riyadh inked $90 billion in arms deals between 2010 and 2014, and at least another $7.8 billion in new arms deals have been announced since Saudi Arabia's air campaign began in March. Among the remnants of American-made bombs Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have found on the ground in Yemen are two types of cluster bombs. Cluster bombs are banned by more than 100 countries because of the risk they pose to civilians. Full story...

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Wednesday, October 07, 2015

Scotland Yard accuses the BBC of hampering its investigations into historical child sexual abuse...

Scotland Yard has accused the BBC of undermining its investigation into historical child sex abuse, claiming that the corporation’s actions risked deterring victims from coming forward.

An hour-long Panorama investigation aired on BBC One last night, scrutinising allegations of a historical paedophile ring in Westminster.

On the programme, a man known only as David, claimed he may have been led by campaigners into making serious allegations against members of the establishment.

David said he had provided the names of VIPs, including former home secretary Leon Brittan, "as a joke suggestion to start with", but that he later repeated them.

He also alleged that he called the police with concerns that Chris Fay, who worked for the now-defunct National Association of Young People In Care, was 'putting words in his mouth'.

Panorama claimed that Mr Fay had been investigated by police for perverting the course of justice but that charges were never brought.

Chris Fay denied putting words into 'David's mouth'. Full story...

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Bill Cosby sued by model over alleged sexual assault...

A 25-year-old model has sued US comedian Bill Cosby, alleging he sexually assaulted her at the Playboy Mansion in Los Angeles in 2008.

Chloe Goins claims Mr Cosby drugged and molested her when she was 17.

The civil lawsuit accuses Mr Cosby of "childhood sexual abuse" and demands damages of at least $75,000 (£49,000). Ms Goins is also seeking a jury trial.

Mr Cosby, 78, is facing a series of sexual assault accusations dating back decades. He has denied the claims.

The star is due to testify on Friday in a separate lawsuit brought by Judy Huth, who accused the comedian of sexually abusing her at the Playboy Mansion in 1974, when she was 15 years old. Full story...

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The radically changing story of the U.S. airstrike on Afghan hospital: from mistake to justification...

When news first broke of the U.S. airstrike on the Doctors Without Borders hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan, the response from the U.S. military was predictable and familiar. It was all just a big, terrible mistake, its official statement suggested: an airstrike it carried out in Kunduz “may have resulted in collateral damage to a nearby medical facility.” Oops: our bad. Fog of war, errant bombs, and all that.

This obfuscation tactic is the standard one the U.S. and Israel both use whenever they blow up civilian structures and slaughter large numbers of innocent people with airstrikes. Citizens of both countries are well-trained – like some tough, war-weary, cigar-chomping general – to reflexively spout the phrase “collateral damage,” which lets them forget about the whole thing and sleep soundly, telling themselves that these sorts of innocent little mistakes are inevitable even among the noblest and most well-intentioned war-fighters, such as their own governments. The phrase itself is beautifully technocratic: it requires no awareness of how many lives get extinguished, let alone acceptance of culpability. Just invoke that phrase and throw enough doubt on what happened in the first 48 hours and the media will quickly lose interest.

But there’s something significantly different about this incident that has caused this “mistake” claim to fail. Usually, the only voices protesting or challenging the claims of the U.S. military are the foreign, non-western victims who live in the cities and villages where the bombs fall. Those are easily ignored, or dismissed as either ignorant or dishonest. Those voices barely find their way into U.S. news stories, and when they do, they are stream-rolled by the official and/or anonymous claims of the U.S. military, which are typically treated by U.S. media outlets as unassailable authority. Full story...

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Kumbali and Kago, cheetah cub & puppy friendship...

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'Lynching' of execs only harms image of France...

The timing for embattled President François Hollande is his Socialist government could hardly have been worse.

Just as France is desperately trying to boost investment from abroad, images of half-naked Air France execs jumping over fences into the arms of riot police were seen around the world.

The sight Air France-KLM's human resources manager Xavier Broseta and exec Pierre Plissonnier, being "almost lynched" as they fled a small mob of angry workers will hardly be filling foreign investors with glee at the thought of setting up in France.

Of course, most international bosses will be fully aware of how “social dialogue” or labour relations and talks with workers can descend into militant action in France.

They will have heard all about the stories of “bossnappings” where workers effectively hold company chiefs hostage until they are satisfied they have got what they wanted. Full story...

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Doctors Without Borders airstrike: US alters story for fourth time in four days...

US special operations forces – not their Afghan allies – called in the deadly airstrike on the Doctors Without Borders hospital in Kunduz, the US commander has conceded.

Shortly before General John Campbell, the commander of the US and Nato war in Afghanistan, testified to a Senate panel, the president of Doctors Without Borders – also known as Médecins sans Frontières (MSF) – said the US and Afghanistan had made an “admission of a war crime”.

Shifting the US account of the Saturday morning airstrike for the fourth time in as many days, Campbell reiterated that Afghan forces had requested US air cover after being engaged in a “tenacious fight” to retake the northern city of Kunduz from the Taliban. But, modifying the account he gave at a press conference on Monday, Campbell said those Afghan forces had not directly communicated with the US pilots of an AC-130 gunship overhead.

“Even though the Afghans request that support, it still has to go through a rigorous US procedure to enable fires to go on the ground. We had a special operations unit that was in close vicinity that was talking to the aircraft that delivered those fires,” Campbell told the Senate armed services committee on Tuesday morning. Full story...

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Monday, October 05, 2015

Beatings, Bagram and the hell of 'Gitmo'

I was first detained in Afghanistan in December 2001 by Afghan villagers, before being turned over to Northern Alliance irregulars. I was then sold for a bounty to the United States forces. I was flown by helicopter to Bagram Air Force Base. I arrived there on or around Christmas Eve in 2001. I have been detained in US custody continuously ever since.

I was abused by the US military from the day I arrived. I had to strip naked in front of 15 people or more, who were just standing watching me squat, and frisked at arrival. They put me in a cage with barbed wire around it. It was in a big hangar, and there were large cages on either side of a walkway. I had to use a hole in the ground with two big doors on the top of it as a toilet and I had to use one hand to clean myself.

There was no water allowed and all the MPs [military police guards] were watching me, both male and female. They would point their M-16 rifles at me while I used the toilet and force me to get up before I finished. Sometimes they refused to let us use the hole so I ended up peeing on myself.

Beating was common. Once, after a few days of sleep deprivation, they took me to the interrogation room. Intelligence team members started coming one after another until the room was full, with perhaps ten or more people there. One of them was a British agent. Full story...

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Sunday, October 04, 2015

‘Inexcusable, possibly even criminal’: UN rights chief says US Kunduz bombing may be war crime...

An air strike on a hospital in the Afghan city of Kunduz that killed at least 19 people is “utterly tragic, inexcusable, and possibly even criminal,” said the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, calling for a transparent investigation.

"This deeply shocking event should be promptly, thoroughly and independently investigated and the results should be made public," Zeid Ra'ad al-Hussein said in a statement on Saturday.

"The seriousness of the incident is underlined by the fact that, if established as deliberate in a court of law, an airstrike on a hospital may amount to a war crime."

He described the bombing as "utterly tragic, inexcusable, and possibly even criminal."

"International and Afghan military planners have an obligation to respect and protect civilians at all times, and medical facilities and personnel are the object of a special protection. These obligations apply no matter whose air force is involved, and irrespective of the location." Full story...

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Hundreds of Mauritanian women trafficked to Saudi Arabia trapped in 'slavery'

More than 900 Mauritanian women have been trafficked to Saudi Arabia in 2015, where they are trapped working in jobs they did not sign up for, a local activist has told Middle East Eye.

The women believed they were going to be employed as nurses or teachers, but on arrival in Saudi Arabia they were forced to work as domestic workers in homes across the kingdom, Elmehdi Ould Lemrabott, who is based in Mauritania’s capital Nouakchott, told MEE.

“Some of these women who objected were subjected to rape attempts, sexual harassment, physical abuse and starvation – as well as being confined to tiny rooms,” Lemrabott said.

Saudi Arabia began letting workers from Mauritania into the country at the beginning of 2015. Riyadh’s Ministry of Labour advertised jobs specified for men (drivers, waiters and domestic workers) and jobs specified for women (nurses, primary schoolteachers and domestic workers).

The opportunity attracted a high number of applications due to Mauritania’s high unemployment rate - currently above 30 percent - and widespread poverty, which is experienced by more than 40 percent of the North African country’s nearly four million people. Full story...

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Saturday, October 03, 2015

BATTLES - The Yabba

Roger Waters to Jon Bon Jovi: “You stand shoulder to shoulder with the settler who burned the baby”

Letter to the pop group Bon Jovi:

Dear Jon Bon Jovi, David Bryan, and Tico Torres,

Often in the past I have written detailed, and sometimes even persuasive, letters to colleagues in the music business, encouraging them not to give succor to the Israeli government’s apartheid policies by performing in Israel. Having read Jon’s comments last week in Yedioth Ahronoth, I won’t waste my time drawing parallels with Apartheid South Africa and the moral stand that so many artists took then and that thousands are taking now in the face of decades of Israeli oppression of Palestinians.

So the die is cast, you are determined to proceed with your gig in Tel Aviv on October 3. You are making your stand.

You stand shoulder to shoulder

With the settler who burned the baby

With the bulldozer driver who crushed Rachel Corrie... Full story...

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A sewing machine, murder and the absence of regret...

How can all this be normal? How can life on the streets of Basehara village go on, as if nothing happened here, and whatever happened was not wrong? It has just been two days since a massive mob pulled someone out of his house and killed him. Before killing him, they made him run to the farthest corner of his home. They broke down his door with such beastly force that instead of giving way at its hinges, it cracked right down the middle. They smashed a sewing machine and used it to beat the man to pulp. There were not just violent, savage people in that mob, but also angry and powerful men. Their blood boiled in such seething rage, and that hot blood flowed into their hands, giving it such inhuman strength that they bent the grills that barred the top-floor windows as if they were made of flimsy wire. The bricks that had been used to raise the heavy wooden bed had been taken out.

The bloody sights inside that room tell the story of how deep-seated was the hatred in the hearts of those who killed Mohammad Akhlaq. Could such fury, such bestial savagery have ridden on just a rumour that Akhlaq had eaten beef? Basehara village has never had any history of communal tensions that can explain this killing. There are no history sheeters or criminals in this village. Mohammad Akhlaq's home sits right in the middle of a Rajput settlement. Surely this means there must have been a semblance of harmony here. Then how could one sudden rumour cause Akhlaq and his son to be dragged out of their home and beaten, their heads smashed with bricks? The son is fighting for his life on a hospital bed right now. Doctors say his condition is critical.

Everywhere, it is the same story that can at any moment set fire to our country. An announcement is made on a loudspeaker. WhatsApp is used to spread videos of cow slaughter. A calf goes missing. People get angry. Then pieces of meat are discovered - at times outside a temple, and sometimes strewn outside mosques. How many riots have these pieces of meat caused, how many people have they killed? Both Hindus and Muslims. We all know how this works, and yet, each time, we become violent over these same stories. Who are these people who manage to create this hatred inside us? Full story...

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Emergency nursery set up in Indonesian town amid hazardous haze...

In an air-conditioned room on the third floor of the Pekanbaru mayor's office, 35-year-old Apriyani watches over her sleeping four-month-old baby Gibran.

She is one of four mothers who have moved into this emergency nursery set up by the local government this week. Offered to all needy mothers in town, it is an attempt to protect babies from the toxic haze caused by forest fires that has covered the city for months.

"My baby is free from the haze here. It's not like at home," said Apriyani, who like many Indonesians goes by only her first name.

"At home my baby just coughs and coughs. Here the room is sealed and there is an air purifier - at home we don't have anything like that." Full story...

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500 Yemen children killed in 6 months of Saudi war: UN...

The United Nations says over 500 Yemeni children have been killed and nearly two million people are at risk of malnutrition, some six months into the Saudi regime’s military campaign against the impoverished Arab nation.

Christophe Boulierac, spokesman for the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), said on Friday that 505 children have been killed and 702 others wounded since late March, when Saudi Arabia unleashed deadly air raids on Yemen.

“The situation for children is deteriorating every single day, and it is horrific,” Boulierac said.

The UN official also warned of the dire humanitarian situation in the country, which has deteriorated since Riyadh started its military aggression in Yemen, with the aim of undermining the Houthi Ansarullah movement and restoring power to its ally, the country’s fugitive former President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi.

According to Boulierac, some 1.7 million Yemeni children are currently at risk of malnutrition. Full story...

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Saudi Arabia sinks UN war crimes probe in Yemen, Washington stays silent...

The Netherlands dropped their bid to establish an independent UN-led probe into alleged war crimes in Yemen, yielding to an alternative resolution proposed by Saudi Arabia, which stands accused of causing most of the civilian deaths in the conflict.

The Saudis are leading a coalition of countries, whcih since late March has been using their military to attack Houthi rebels in Yemen in an attempt to put ousted President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi back into power. According to UN numbers published on Tuesday, at least 2,355 civilians have been killed during the six months of the conflict. The majority of them died in Saudi attacks.

The latest of alleged atrocities in the Yemen war is an apparent Saudi airstrike that killed 131 guests at a wedding party. The Saudis, who have air superiority in Yemeni airspace, denied any involvement.

According to Amnesty International, many civilian killings in Yemen can be considered war crimes. In September, UN human rights chief Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein called for an independent, international inquiry into alleged war crimes in the country. The Netherlands submitted a draft resolution to the UN Human Rights Council (HRC) shortly after, which among other things called for UN experts to be sent to Yemen to investigate allegations of crimes committed by all parties involved. The proposal was backed by a number of European countries. Full story...

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Indian government built 8.9 million (89 lakh) public toilets in just a year...

Showing remarkable progress, 89 lakh individual household latrines have been built in rural areas in the past one year. According to government figures, the big Swachh Bharat push in rural areas has increased the access of toilets to 46.9% from only 32.6% in 2011 across the country. However, urban areas in poll-bound Bihar and Uttar Pradesh have built only 927 and 862 household latrines respectively since the sanitation mission was launched last October.

Urban development minister M Venkaiah Naidu said that the rural development ministry has surpassed the target of building about 60 lakh toilets while he is confident of the target in urban areas would also be met by March 2016. Claiming that Swachh Bharat is the "mother of all new missions" he said that changing the mindset and attitude of people remains the biggest challenge.

Stating that the message of complete sanitation has gone down well with people and has sensitized people, Naidu said the mission is "demand driven" in nature. "A clean India is the most profound statement that the county can make to the world which is keenly watching us in the context of various initiatives launched during the last over one year," he added. Full story...

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Coca-Cola calls for FIFA's Sepp Blatter to step down immediately...

Top sponsors of FIFA called for Joseph “Sepp” Blatter to step down immediately as president of soccer’s governing body following a sweeping scandal involving allegations of bribes and kickbacks dating back decades.

Shortly after Coca-Cola Co. issued a demand for Blatter to go on Friday afternoon, FIFA’s other U.S.-based backers -- Visa Inc., Anheuser-Busch InBev NV and McDonald’s Corp. -- followed suit, all saying that meaningful reform is impossible under the current leadership.

Blatter’s departure would allow a “credible and sustainable reform process” to begin, Coca-Cola said in its statement. “Every day that passes, the image and reputation of FIFA continues to tarnish.”

The moves follow the announcement last week by Swiss prosecutors that they have opened a criminal probe into the 79-year-old Blatter, who has led FIFA since 1998. He has denied any wrongdoing and said on Friday that he wouldn’t leave office before a scheduled special election in February. Full story...

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Thursday, October 01, 2015

Your chocolate candy bar was made by child slaves...

The Milton Hershey School in Pennsylvania is one of the wealthiest education centers in the world. Founded in 1909 as an orphanage for “male Caucasian” boys, it was awarded 30 percent of the company’s future earnings by Milton S. Hershey upon his death. Thanks to the success of Kit-Kats, Reese’s, and Whoppers, the school is worth a staggering $7.8 billion.

Now home to more than 2,000 students, it owns a controlling interest in the $22.3 billion Hershey company—a chocolate maker with roots in child protection and education that, in the worst form of irony, allegedly relies on cocoa harvested by child laborers in West Africa.

It is this irony that serves as the motivation behind a class action lawsuit filed Monday against Hershey and two of its competitors, Mars and Nestle. The complaints, filed by three California residents, allege that the companies are guilty of false advertising for failing to disclose the use of child slavery on their packaging. Without it, the plaintiffs claim, the companies are deceiving consumers into “unwittingly” supporting the child slave labor trade.

“America’s largest and most profitable food conglomerates should not tolerate child labor, much less child slave labor, anywhere in their supply chains,” the complaint reads. “These companies should not turn a blind eye to known human rights abuses... especially when the companies consistently and affirmatively represent that they act in a socially and ethically responsible manner.” Full story...

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This 1926 eugenics exhibit sums up what the elite think about you and your family...

According to eugenics, “some people are born to be a burden on the rest”.

You see, the eugenics movement — which steadily gained popularity for the first nearly 40 years of the 20th century and is the direct reason for forced sterilization laws implemented across America — sought to “breed out” people the elite that ultimately funded and promoted it (the Carnegie Institute and the Rockefeller Foundation, etc.) determined were genetically defective “riff raff” by way of pseudoscience parading as science.

Victims of eugenics included minorities, the children of Caucasians who interbred with minorities, poor people, people with physical disabilities or who were considered “feeble-minded,” those who were deemed “delinquent,” and really, the list goes on and on (the slope got more and more slippery over time). Eugenics only disappeared from public view when the PR disaster of World War II forced it to. Guess it looked pretty bad after the Nazis began so heavily promoting it.

Aside from the Eugenics Record Office set up at Cold Spring Harbor on Long Island, the movement would train and send field workers around the country to take family pedigrees and compile data used to argue who had good breeding or not and who deserved the right to reproduce or not. They set up exhibits at county fairs for “public education” on eugenic matters. They would even sponsor contests called “Better Baby” and “Fitter Family” at these fairs to judge “human stock” the way other organizations attending county fairs judged other things like prize pigs and heirloom tomatoes. Full story...

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Anti-India anger in Nepal as essential supplies dry up...

Nepal feels like it is being choked. It's running out of gasoline. Medical supplies are becoming scarce. All because of an unofficial economic blockade imposed by neighboring India from where Nepal gets almost all its essential supplies.

Many Nepalese believe that India has been retaliating against their government since Sept. 20, when it approved a new constitution seen by New Delhi as discriminatory to an ethnic Indian community — the Madhesi — living in Nepal's border districts.

For months as Nepalese lawmakers were debating the draft constitution, these areas witnessed violent protests by the Madhesis during which at least 45 people were killed. Hours after the constitution was passed by an overwhelming majority of lawmakers, the violence escalated.

Soon after, Indian trucks — which trundle daily across the borders, through the plains and up Nepal's hills toward the capital, Kathmandu — stopped. While 100 or so trucks crossed over on Wednesday, more than 1,000 were left waiting at the border with shipments including medicine, gasoline, cooking fuel and produce going to rot. By Thursday afternoon, nothing more had moved. Full story...

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Why India man was lynched over beef rumours...

It was around 10.30pm on Monday night and the nine-member Akhlaq family had been preparing to go to bed after dinner.

Mohammad Akhlaq, a farm worker, was already asleep in a room next to his 22-year-old son, Danish, when a frenzied mob, wielding sticks, swords and cheap pistols burst into their home, accusing the family of having slaughtered a cow and consuming it.

"They came from everywhere. Over the walls, through the gate...They just barged into the house, shouting that we had slaughtered a cow," says his 75-year-old mother, Asghari Akhlaq.

"I asked them how can we bring a cow into the house without anyone seeing? We are the only Muslim family in this neighbourhood."

Some meat found in the fridge, that the family insists is mutton, was held to be proof. Full story...

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Thavil and Tamil: the twin passions of a Japanese...

Learning a foreign language has an added advantage. In the case of Hidenori Ishi, Tamil language skills not only secured him a job in the customer relations section of Nippon Express, a Japanese Logistics Services Company, but also provided a reason to stay in Chennai to pursue his passion for thavil playing.

On Sunday, he accompanied nagaswaram player Tirupampuram S.H. Ramanathan at the festival of Vedanta Desikar temple in Mylapore. He will be playing in the mornings and evenings during the festival.

“I came to India to learn kanjira . The majestic sound of thavil , however, captivated me,” says 33-year-old Ishi, a native of Kamakura, a town located 50 km from Tokyo.

But for his physical features, Mr. Ishi, clad in dhoti and a shawl around his shoulder to cover his bare chest and to carry thavil , will pass as a seasoned thavil player. He prefers conversation in Tamil and carefully avoids using English words.

“Naan Parangimalail veedu vaadagaikku eduthu irukkiern (I have rented a house in St Thomas Mount). I do not eat non-vegetarian during purattasi month,” he says. Full story...

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Mayor of Indonesian city orders all babies to be evacuated due to extreme air pollution ('haze') caused by raging man-made forest fires...

Singapore and Malaysia are currently suffering from severe haze caused by raging forest fires taking place in the Indonesian regions of Sumatra and Kalimantan, which has led to school closures, flight cancellations and, most seriously, health damage due to incredibly high air pollution levels.

Politicians from neighboring countries are angry at the Indonesian government not doing enough to stop the the haze that is hurting their citizens. But many Indonesians are also suffering greatly from the intense pollution, not the least of which are the citizens of Pekanbaru, in Sumatra’s Riau province, where air pollution levels have been recorded at a staggering 1000 PSI (PSI levels of 300 are already considered hazardous to health)

Nobody is more vulnerable to the effects of air pollution than infants, which is why Pekanbaru Mayor Firdaus yesterday ordered that all of the city’s infants under six months of age, particularly those from poor families, be evacuated to the Mayor’s Office, where a special emergency nursery has been set up.

Firdaus said the babies of poor families were especially at risk, as their homes tended to provide little protection against the air pollution. Full story...

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France threatens to walk away from TTIP negotiations...

France’s junior trade minister Matthias Fekl has threatened “outright termination” of his country’s involvement in the EU-US Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) negotiations, saying a "total lack of transparency" in TTIP talks poses a "democratic problem".

In an interview with the French newspaper Sud-Ouest published on Monday, Fekl said he believes the negotiations favour American interests.

"Europe has offered many compromises, in all areas, and has received no serious offers from the Americans in return. Neither for access to their public markets, nor for access to their agricultural and food markets, which remain closed," Fekl said.

Access to negotiation texts is not guaranteed even for politicians, Fekl added. "American members of parliament have access to a much higher number of documents than we do in Europe.”
If approved, TTIP would create the largest free-trade area in the world.

Facing pressure from the country’s powerful agricultural lobby, French politicians are especially keen to get a deal that avoids upsetting farmers. Full story...

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Wednesday, September 30, 2015

Living in fear of female genital mutilation in Sierra Leone: 'I'm not safe in this community'

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Near Delhi, mob kills 50-year-old, injures son over ‘rumours’ they ate beef ...

A 50-year-old man, Mohammad Akhlaq, was beaten to death and his 22-year-old son severely injured on Monday night in UP’s Dadri, allegedly by residents of Bisara village, after rumours spread in the area about the family storing and consuming beef, police said.

Six people were arrested in connection with the attack, around 45 km from Delhi, sparking protests that led to police firing, damage to vehicles and injuries to a 20-year-old welder who works for the National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) facility in the area.

Police said they have sent samples of meat taken from Akhlaq’s home “to the forensics department for examination”. Akhlaq’s daughter, Sajida, said the family had “mutton in the fridge” and not beef.

The attack on Akhlaq and his family took place around 10 pm in Bisara after an announcement about the family consuming beef was allegedly made at a local temple, police said. Full story...

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Saudi royal calls for regime change in Riyadh...

A senior Saudi prince has launched an unprecedented call for change in the country’s leadership, as it faces its biggest challenge in years in the form of war, plummeting oil prices and criticism of its management of Mecca, scene of last week’s hajj tragedy.

The prince, one of the grandsons of the state’s founder, Abdulaziz Ibn Saud, has told the Guardian that there is disquiet among the royal family – and among the wider public – at the leadership of King Salman, who acceded the throne in January.

The prince, who is not named for security reasons, wrote two letters earlier this month calling for the king to be removed.

“The king is not in a stable condition and in reality the son of the king [Mohammed bin Salman] is ruling the kingdom,” the prince said. “So four or possibly five of my uncles will meet soon to discuss the letters. They are making a plan with a lot of nephews and that will open the door. A lot of the second generation is very anxious.”

“The public are also pushing this very hard, all kinds of people, tribal leaders,” the prince added. “They say you have to do this or the country will go to disaster.” Full story...

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Tuesday, September 29, 2015

Fifa scandal: Jack Warner banned for life...

Jack Warner has been banned for life by Fifa, more than four years after quitting football.

The governing body’s ethics committee today announced the outcome of an investigation into Sepp Blatter’s disgraced former vice-president, who is also facing criminal charges in the United States over an alleged £100 million fraud.

Warner’s ban begins at the same time as Fifa’s ethics committee examines evidence that could lead to the suspension of Blatter and Michel Platini over a £1.3m suspected criminal payment to the Uefa president.

The ethics committee previously chose not to pursue a case against Warner, the former president of Concacaf, because he was no longer involved in football.

But a change of policy saw it go after Trinidad and Tobago’s former minister of national security, even though any ban would be merely symbolic for a man who had little prospect of returning to the game. Full story...

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39 manly uses for coconut oil in your bushcraft kit...

When it comes to packing for an outdoor adventure, leave the single-purpose items at home unless you have a pack mule to carry it all. Each item in your camping/bushcraft/survival kit should be able to perform at least three different tasks beyond its intended purpose.

Manly woodsmen, listen up. The women folk are more aware of the benefits and well ahead of us in using this stuff. Time to catch up!

It may not be as sexy as an ax or knife, but smart woodsmen should pack this non-sexy stuff in all their kits – bushcraft, EDC, Get Home Bag, camping, etc. I rarely go to the woods without it. As a utilitarian resource, I also keep a small container in my shop, bathroom, kitchen, school desk, and truck.

Here’s your multi-tasking resource… Full story...

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Norwegian comic strip likens Israel to Nazis, North Korea...

The Israeli embassy in Norway condemned the Scandinavian country’s third-largest paper for publishing a cartoon that calls Israel a nation of “murderers” comparable to Nazi Germany and North Korea.

Dagbladet on Thursday ran the comic strip, which shows a woman at an organic supermarket unsuccessfully searching for ethically made food products.

“Organic food, huh?” the text in the first panel reads, according to a translation on Hebrew news site Ynet. “But what’s the point if the food is produced unethically?”

The next panel shows the woman holding up an orange saying: “These oranges are from Israel. You are supporting murderers.”

Next, she picks up a box of pasta to examine its label. “This macaroni was manufactured in North Korea? How did you even get this?” she asks.

In the last panel, the woman holds a box of frozen pizza marked with a swastika bearing a “Made in Nazi Germany” label and incorporating the logo of the Nazi SS organization. She says: “And this pizza is from N… What is this store, anyway?” Full story...

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Yemen conflict: Deadly attack on wedding party, 38 killed...

At least 38 people are reported to have been killed in an air strike on a wedding party in south-western Yemen.

Medics said women and children were among those who died in Wahijah, a village near the Red Sea port of Mocha.

The Saudi-led coalition, which began an air campaign in March to defeat the Houthi rebel movement, denied it was responsible for the attack.

However, witnesses said warplanes targeted the celebration and Yemeni officials acknowledged a "mistake".

The UN says almost 4,900 people have been killed in the past six month, including 2,200 civilians. Full story...

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Iran’s president blames U.S. for Middle East violence...

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani on Monday offered to help root out terrorism in the Middle East and said the United States and its support for Israel are a major cause of the violence.

Rouhani told the U.N. General Assembly that terrorists excuse their brutality as a reaction to military interventions and occupations by what he termed “newcomers” to the region.

“If not for the U.S. military invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq, and its unwarranted support for the inhumane actions of the Zionist regime against the oppressed nation of Palestine, today the terrorists would not have an excuse for the justification of their crimes,” he said.

Rouhani’s speech was closely watched because it was his first address to the world body since Iran finished a landmark nuclear agreement with the United States and five other nations. He said the deal, finalized in July, marked a “new chapter” in Iran’s dealings with the world, so his swipe at the United States was striking. Full story...