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Thomas Paine

To argue with a person who has renounced the use of reason is like administering medicine to the dead.
Showing posts with label Human Rights and Liberties. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Human Rights and Liberties. Show all posts

Tuesday, October 5, 2010

5 October - Crime & Law : Words Without Effect

Axel Törneman 1925Image via Wikipedia

Crimes are Crimes no matter Who does them

Global Witness investigates and campaigns to prevent natural resource-related conflict and corruption.
http://www.globalwitness.org
A new ban on mining in eastern Congo could be a first step towards ending conflict and instability in the mineral-rich area. Competition to control the trade in minerals used to make electronics items is fuelling the war. Fundamental refoms are needed, including demilitarisation of the mines and better due diligence by companies.


Global Witness strongly welcomes the passing of the US Financial Reform Bill by the Senate on Thursday. The new Act includes a range of measures which will help to lift the curse of corruption and conflict from poor countries that are rich in oil and minerals by promoting greater public oversight and responsible trading practices.


Nigeria Torture Case Decision Exempts Companies From U.S. Alien Tort Law
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-09-17/u-s-corporations-aren-t-subject-to-alien-tort-law-appeals-court-rules.html
Companies including Royal Dutch Shell Plc’s Nigerian unit aren’t subject to U.S. lawsuits by foreigners seeking damages for human rights violations, a federal appeals court in New York ruled.
A panel of the court ruled 2-1 today that the Alien Tort Statute gives U.S. courts jurisdiction over alleged violations of international law by individuals only, not by corporations.
The decision dismisses claims by a group of Nigerians that Shell aided in the torture and murder of dissidents in Nigeria in the 1990s, including the playwright Ken Saro-Wiwa.
Circuit Judge Pierre N. Leval wrote a separate opinion in which he agreed that the case should be dismissed but disagreed that the Alien Tort Statute applies only to individuals.
“The majority opinion deals a substantial blow to international law and its undertaking to protect fundamental human rights,” he wrote. “According to the rule my colleagues have created, one who earns profits by commercial exploitation of abuse of fundamental human rights can successfully shield those profits from victims’ claims for compensation simply by taking the precaution of conducting the heinous operation in the corporate form.”
( One wonders what would have happened if the Nigerians had incorporated!)
Hat Tip : Multi-National Corporate Shock Troops: Coming Soon To A Neighborhood Near You
http://www.worldwidehippies.com/?p=12307
Bell officials arrested as prosecutors are set to file criminal charges [Updated]
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2010/09/bell-officials-arrested-as-prosecutors-are-set-to-file-criminal-charges.html
L.A. County Dist. Atty. Steve Cooley prepared to announce criminal charges in the municipal salary scandal
Beyond Victimhood: Recognizing Resilience in Social Justice Work
OSI-New York
September 16, 2010
slideshow AUDIO
Open Society Fellows Kung Li and Noy Thrupkaew argue that portraying marginalized communities as oppressed victims can blind us to their resilience.
Obama Takes the Lead on Transparency in Oil, Gas, and Mining Industries
Jed Miller and Joseph Williams
October 4, 2010
blog BLOG  
We commend President Obama for his powerful reminder that accountable government and extractive industry transparency are essential ingredients for economic development in rich and poor countries alike.
Soros and Open Society Foundations Give $100 Million to Human Rights Watch
September 7, 2010
The grant will be used to expand Human Rights Watch's global presence to enhance the protection and promotion of human rights around the world.

The old-fashioned way
http://obsidianwings.blogs.com/obsidian_wings/2010/09/the-old-fashioned-way.html
One of the things that doesn't really get examined enough in discussions of US economic inequality is inherited wealth. It's obvious to me, at least, that inherited wealth can be expected to be an *enormous* problem with any "level playing field" expectation -- after all, historically the rich have been aristocrats, who by definition inherit their positions.
But how much of an effect does it really have in the US? Don't most rich people get that way from money they collect during their careers?


Cassandras of the crisis: Krugman, Soros, Wolf and Shiller
http://clubtroppo.com.au/2010/10/05/cassandras-of-the-crisis-krugman-soros-wolf-and-shiller
Chapter Two – “The blessings and perils of liberal finance” – is as masterful an introduction and exposé of its subject as I’ve ever seen. Wolf expounds with regard to both the simplest first principles and the broad sweep of history, the profound significance of a financial system as a cultural, political and economic achievement. A financial system is a pyramid of promises. The trustworthiness of the state’s promises – in managing the monetary system and paying its debts – is the bedrock on which private promises can then, laboriously be built.

That’s why the take-off of modern finance dates to the late seventeenth century when Western sovereigns – in Holland and Britain – first became properly subject to the rule of law. The constraints this forced upon them rendered them creditworthy and so able to borrow vast amounts at modest interest. And, recent ideological enthusiasms notwithstanding, the central financial innovations of modernity were made by governments at around this time, most particularly bond markets, central banks and the legal infrastructure for joint stock companies. As Wolf explains, the resulting financial system “allows the creation of vast enterprises out of the combined capital, supplied at modest cost, of . . . millions of people; . . . it . . . reallocates risk; it allows people to time their spending . . . over their lifetimes; and it insures individuals against the big risks of life.”

Wolf counts US$145 trillion of financial promises held by the citizens of the world in 2005. And yet finance is beset by rottenness, indeed by all the failings and fragility of our species.

[T]he purchasers of promises will know that the sellers normally know much more than they do about their prospects. The name for this is “asymmetric information.” They will also know that those who have no intention of keeping their word will always make more attractive promises than those who do. This is “adverse selection.” They will know that even those who are inclined to be honest may be tempted . . . not to keep their promises. The source of this is “moral hazard.” The answer to adverse selection and moral hazard . . . is to collect more information. But this too has a drawback: “free-riding”. . . [T]hose who have made no investment in collecting [information] can benefit from the costly efforts of those who have . . . . That will, in turn, reduce the incentive to invest in such information, thereby making markets subject to the vagaries of “ra¬tional ignorance.” If the ignorant follow those they deem to be better informed, there will be “herding.” Finally, where uncertainty is pervasive and inescapable – who, for example, knows the chances of nuclear terrorism or the economic impact of the internet? – the herds are likely both to blow and ultimately to burst “bubbles.”

This brief tour de force continues with a new paragraph beginning “Finance is a jungle inhabited by wild beasts.” So there you have it. A pyramid of promises, a miracle of sophistication and progress somehow delivered to us (are you feeling lucky?) on the back of wild beasts. 
George Soros
Revealing the evil deceptive ploys and tactics of George Soros, progressive liberals, Marxists, Communists, Socialists, et. al. all to create a One World Government of unrepresentative control, in the same manner Radical Islam wants to create a caliphate.
Be sure to see the George Soros accomplices and their supporting tactics: 1.  The Progressive Liberal Agenda, 2. The Progressive Politically Correct Dictionary of clever terms of contradiction used to dupe the unsuspecting "We the sheeple" into relinquishing the freedom and "Rights" of "We the People." 3. GEORGE SOROS-FUNDED COMMUNIST ORGANIZATIONS
Liberals Form Tea Party Tracking Website, Plan 10/2 Rally at National Mall, UPDATE: George Soros Fingerprints  Soros and the foundation left have launched a website designed to go after the growing Tea Party movement. Teapartytracker.org will post video interviews and blog entries gathered by folks on the false left who never grow weary of demonstrating their outrage over the very idea of a grassroots political effort overthrowing establishment Democrats and Republicans in the district of corporate criminals. Teapartytracker.org will be sponsored by the NAACP, Think Progress, New Left Media and Media Matters for America. Think Progress is a George Soros operation connected to John Podesta’s Center for American Progress. Podesta is Clinton’s former chief of staff. Media Matters for America is the brainchild of a MoveOn consultant and Podesta’s Center for American Progress. Soros is a major supporter of MoveOn.

http://www.earstohear.net/soros.html
 
( I trust that vile spew 'Radical Islam wants to establish a caliphate' would best be represented as the 'radical Islam' exported from Saudi Arabia to become the Taliban and similar organizations...which have the demonstrated capacity to frustrate 'western' corporate crime. Heinious ! )
In a March 14, 2003, Op-Ed, Soros likened the Bush administration's "pursuit of American supremacy" to "a boom-bust process or bubble in the stock market." Both, he argued, "have a solid basis in reality but reality is distorted by misconception. In this case, the dominant position of the US is the reality, the pursuit of supremacy the misconception. Reality can reinforce the misconception but eventually the gap between reality and its false interpretation becomes unsustainable. During the self-reinforcing phase, the misconception may be tested and reinforced. This widens the gap leading to an eventual reversal. The later it comes, the more devastating the consequences."
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=George_Soros
Jewish World Review Dec. 2, 2003 /7 Kislev, 5764

The sorry tale of George Soros
George Soros came under our microscope some time back when he and some other billionaires took out advertisements in the newspapers opposing the abolition, or even the lowering of, the Federal Estate Tax. We, on the other hand, believed that President Regan was on the right track when he expressed the thought that the estate tax was the unfairest of the panoply of taxes that we pay. When you make the money, you are taxed up to fifty per cent. Then if the government is lucky enough to have you die, they tax your estate, which is whatever you have left after a lifetime of paying income tax, once again up to fifty per cent. If a small businessman or farmer worked hard his entire life, paid his taxes in the hope of passing something to his children, perhaps even to keep the business or farm running when he is gone, at his death the government will swoop down to grab a substantial portion.  

( Now we come to one of the drivers to Incorporation - a felicitous state for any investor. Inheritance Tax is regarded by some - me included - as a 'victimless crime' which takes back the property of the state - fiat currency - after an individual is finished with it. But this precludes 'empire building' which threatens the power of the public. Therefore one fabricates an immortal,immoral,rapacious owner with no inherent limits nor responsibilities to evade this confiscation. 
That is Fascism. And you thought Robber Barons were free to 'rape and pillage' before !  And of course, currency is devalued for all by the process of limitless expansion. So no 'Inheritance Tax'....functionally taxes the state ! )

We're featuring new information on the dangers of drilling for methane gas (commercially labeled "natural" gas) in New York and other states. Visit our Water Portal for more on the toxic chemicals in "fracking" (hydraulic fracturing) and the threat massive new drilling poses to clean drinking water. http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Portal:Water
I have lived in Washington long enough to have realistic hopes; for example, given political realities, passing a single payer bill was not going to happen. But I also don’t think it’s my job, as a journalist or a citizen, to blindly repeat the mantra of the administration (and its supporters in the blogosphere), that we should “not let the perfect be the enemy of the good.” Fine, but let’s also not treat the administration’s health care plan as a grand achievement. The bill is widely unpopular, and not only because of the hyperbolic attacks on it by Republicans and Fox News. It’s unpopular because it’s a terrible piece of legislation.

The current GOP is truly a scary party, but if not for that it would be impossible to care about the midterm elections. When you’re reduced to rooting for soulless hacks like the current Senate majority leader—and he’s typical of today’s Democrats—you’ve lost something fundamental at the core of your humanity.
Every time I write a story I feel like I wrote it a year ago and five years ago and 10 years ago. Nothing ever changes here.
Tough Love For The Frail And Sick
http://digbysblog.blogspot.com
A new video today catches Rand Paul repeatedly supporting a $2,000 Medicare deductible on Kentucky seniors – despite his claims just last week that such a statement was a “lie.”
By the way, the average social security check is $1,000 a month.

Foxifying America
http://digbysblog.blogspot.com
NY magazine is featuring an unusually insightful article about the Foxification of our politics and makes a number of observations that add up to something quite frightening. Here's just one piece of it:


The game may be destroying American politics—but it’s the only game in town

What Actually Watching Beck Teaches You  
I have never been a great fan of Dana Milbank who has often seemed to have been competing for the chance to succeed Maureen Dowd as Queen Bee of the Mean Girls.But he is doing great work on Glenn Beck. (Perhaps it takes a special kind of snarky perspective to be able to get Beck right.) Milbank wrote this 


Sovereign Hotheads

by digby


Alternet is doing great work on the various strands of the right wing these days and it's essential reading every day if you are interested in following this riveting, unfolding story. Today Justine Sharrock takes a look at the "Sovereign Citizen" movement which I last heard of back in the 90s. These are a very American brand of wingnuts, a far right form of anarchism rooted in the "gold standard" conspiracy theories. And, as with all the far right groups, it appears to be growing smartly in the Obama era:

Their basic premise is, like so many things these days, based on an unorthodox interpretation of the 14th Amendment. They claim that when the nation was founded, citizens had prime authority and the government was set up to protect our God given “unalienable rights.” But the 14th Amendment created a new hierarchy: God, citizens, government, and then former slaves. Over time, through specific wording used in laws, forms and court rulings, the government has managed to trick all citizens into subservience. Now, every time you sign or register with the federal government, be it a driver's license, Social Security number, tax form, or even something as simple a construction permit, you are entering a contractual and legal relationship with the government, according to the sovereign citizen philosophy.
Anodyne 






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Friday, July 30, 2010

30 July - Quick Picks

Sand dunes near the sea, Gush Katif, Gaza Strip.Image via Wikipedia

Open Letter | Our Water is Not For Sale!
A broad range of organizations and individuals have already signed on to our open letter, showing their concern about the Alberta governmen'ts plan to move to a province-wide de-regulated market system for water allocation.

Egypt Punishes Gaza More
http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=52268
In mid-July, a Libyan ship bearing 2,000 tons of humanitarian aid arrived in Al-Arish after being prevented by the Israeli navy from reaching the Gaza Strip. The aid supplies were subsequently transported from Al-Arish to the Egypt-Gaza border, where some 700 tons of medical supplies were allowed to pass into the strip via Rafah.

The rest of the aid, however, consisting mostly of foodstuffs, had to be sent into the strip via the Egypt-Israel border crossing of Kerem Abu Salem.

The Libyan attempt was not the first aid convoy dispatched since Jun. 1 to run up against such restrictions.
Throughout June, several attempts to deliver humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip, organised by Egyptian opposition groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood, met with similar results: while medical supplies were allowed through Rafah, everything else was forced to enter the strip via the Egypt- Israel crossings of Kerem Abu Salem (10 kilometres south of Rafah) or Al- Auja (50 kilometres south of Rafah).

"We tried very hard to get the entire consignment through Rafah, but authorities were adamant in their refusal," Hamdi Hassan, a Muslim Brotherhood MP who accompanied one such aid convoy to the border, told IPS. "While people and medical supplies were allowed through Rafah, everything else was forced to pass through the Israel-controlled Al-Auja crossing."


Anger Rises Over U.S. Tax Dollars for Settlements
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=52259
Anger has arisen in Palestinian areas over reports that millions of tax-exempt dollars from the U.S. are being funneled towards Israel's illegal settlement building in the Palestinian West Bank -- in flagrant violation of international law.

This is happening under the nose of the U.S. administration despite its claims of support for a two-state solution and criticism of Israel's continued settlement building.

The Palestinian Authority (PA) based in Ramallah has expressed outrage. "Adhering to international law is a big step towards holding Israel accountable for its actions," PA spokesman Ghassan Khatib told IPS from the Muqata (government) headquarters in Ramallah.

"Settlements violate international law, and the United States is supposed to be sponsoring a two-state solution, yet it gives deductions for donation to the settlements," said Saeb Erekat the PA's chief negotiator.

According to a recent report in The New York Times 40 U.S. groups have raised more than 200 million dollars in tax-deductable donations for Jewish settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem during the last ten years. U.S. tax rules prohibit the use of charitable funds for political purposes at home or abroad.

But U.S. tax laws encourage citizens to support non-profit groups whose ideologies might diverge from official government policy as long as their missions are educational, religious or charitable. Religious groups have no obligation to divulge their finances, meaning settlements may be receiving sums that cannot be traced.

An Honest Look at Obama's First Year
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=SWA20100723&articleId=20245


Slow Food Makes Some Rapid Advances

http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=52267
Slow Food International is a non-profit eco-gastronomic organisation founded in 1989 to counteract fast food, the disappearance of local food traditions, and sensitise people to the impact of consumer choices.

The concept of slow food is catching on fast in the Balkans, where small- scale farming is severely threatened by the promotion of industrial agriculture and by commercial practices which keep small producers from selling directly to consumers.

A colourful contact lens may soon help people living with diabetes monitor their blood glucose levels
http://www.innovationcanada.ca/en/articles/seeing-red

Ignorance isn’t the problem.
http://boatrocker.wordpress.com/2010/06/14/ignorance-isnt-the-problem
They know Marcellus is a freshwater Gulf of Mexico disaster in the making, that there will be more toxic blowouts like the recent 16-hour, 75-foot, million-gallon blowout in the Clearfield County district of House Environmental Resources and Energy Committee chair Camille “Bud” George.
They know all that.
They just don’t care.
The people who know and care – but don’t drive public decisions – are the parents and grandparents of kids sickened by the chemicals; people who rely on truck-delivered water or expensive, energy-intense filtration machines because their wells are poisoned and their tap-water is flammable; and people who hear those stories and feel similar fear, anger and grief as our collective failure to stop fracking continues, and their private nightmare becomes our public one: the toxic industrialization, dewatering and death of our Pennsylvania home.
Get to know your neighbors.
Plant gardens.
And install cisterns.

Toronto bike share seeks subscribers
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/toronto/story/2010/07/28/bixi-bike-share546.html

 

Details of 100m Facebook users collected and published
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-10796584

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Tuesday, January 26, 2010

26 Jan - Surfing Relief News

United Nations Human Rights Council logo.Image via Wikipedia
Cambodia: Close Compulsory Drug Detention Centers
http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2010/01/25/cambodia-close-compulsory-drug-detention-centers
People who use drugs in Cambodia are at risk of arbitrary detention in centers where they suffer torture, physical and sexual violence, and other forms of cruel punishment, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. Detention centers, mandated to treat and ‘rehabilitate' drug users, instead subject them to electric shocks, beatings with electrical wire, forced labor, and harsh military drills.

In the 93-page report, "Skin on the Cable," Human Rights Watch documents detainees being beaten, raped, forced to donate blood, and subjected to painful physical punishments such as "rolling like a barrel" and being chained while standing in the sun. Human Rights Watch also reported that a large number of detainees told of receiving rotten or insect-ridden food and symptoms of diseases consistent with nutritional deficiencies.

"Individuals in these centers are not being treated or rehabilitated, they are being illegally detained and often tortured," said Joseph Amon, director of the Health and Human Rights division at Human Rights Watch. "These centers do not need to be revamped or modified; they need to be shut down."

Derechos: Human Rights Listings
http://www.humanrightsblog.org/listings/2010/01/global_study_of_state_practice.html
Amnesty International has published six papers so far in its No safe haven series on universal jurisdiction in each of the 192 UN Member states (as well as links). The International Justice Project of Amnesty International is now engaged in a multi-year project to update, expand and revise its 722-page global study of state practice in 125 countries, Universal jurisdiction: The duty of states to enact and implement jurisdiction, AI Index: IOR 53/002 - 018/2001, September 2001, available at http://web.amnesty.org/pages/legal_memorandum.

Each paper includes information about:

- territorial and extraterritorial jurisdiction;

- whether the state has incorporated into national law crimes under international law (genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, torture, extrajudicial executions, enforced disappearances and aggression) and other crimes of international concern (such as hostage-taking, transnational organized crime);

- whether national courts can exercise universal criminal jurisdiction over crimes under international law, crimes under national law of international concern and ordinary crimes;

- whether victims can obtain civil reparations in civil suits or in civil claims made in criminal cases, such as the action civile in civil law countries;

- what obstacles exist to exercising universal criminal and civil jurisdiction, including statutes of limitation, ne bis in idem, bars on retrospective criminal law and immunities;

- what obstacles (such as dual criminality and political offence exceptions) and human rights safeguards (risk of unfair trial, death penalty, torture or other ill-treatment) exist with respect to extradition and mutual legal assistance;

- whether there is a specialized immigration unit to screen those seeking to enter the country with a view to identifying persons who should be investigated on suspicion of responsibility for crimes under international law and specialized police and prosecution units to investigate and prosecute such crimes; and

- whether there is any relevant jurisprudence.

Each paper then concludes with several pages of detailed recommendations for reform of law and practice.

The papers are all researched and drafted by volunteers from around the world, primarily in law firms, institutes of international criminal law and international law clinics in law schools, under the direct supervision of the International Justice Project, then checked by independent experts on the law of the state concerned and finally sent to police, prosecutors and ministries of justice, foreign affairs and defence for comment before publication.

Anyone interested in assisting Amnesty International in this exciting project should contact the International Justice Project at: ijp@amnesty.org.

Links to papers issued so far in the No safe haven series

Bulgaria (http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/EUR15/001/2009/en)

Germany (http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/EUR23/003/2008/en)

Solomon Islands (http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/ASA43/002/2009/en)

Spain (http://www.amnesty.org/es/library/info/EUR41/017/2008/es) (Spanish only)

Sweden (http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/EUR42/001/2009/en)

Venezuela (http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/AMR53/006/2009/en)


Canadian federal government defunds anti-Israel organizations
Ottawa told the United Nations it would no longer fund the world body’s Palestinian refugee agency. From now on, Canadian aid to Palestinians will be directed to specific projects. We will no longer give lump-sum aid to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNWRA), since most of that money simply goes straight into the Palestinian Authority’s (PA) general treasury, where it might be used for humanitarian projects or might be used to arm and train terrorists.




Reuniting and Replenishing the Two Afghanistans
http://war.change.org/blog/view/reuniting_and_replenishing_the_two_afghanistans
We have been coming to terms for some time with the many dualities of society. It evokes neither query nor sigh that vital aspects of Afghanistan's future may be decided by a group made up largely of Western upper and middle class men, with a select set of educated, relatively liberal elite as well as nominal tribalists from the country, in far away London this week. Meanwhile, the country itself is largely very conservative, very Islamic, and very poor.
There is simply no way to successfully address the bitter fights torturing Afghanistan without seriously bridging this enormous gap. If participants at the London Conference are to build the most important bridge, they must focus not only on NATO's shared goals with the Karzai Administration, but more specifically on the Karzai's Administration's shared goals with its enemies.
In London, talks will begin with a woman speaker, a big thanks, and a joke. In Zaranj, rural Afghanistan, talks will include only men, begin with an intense prayer, and be followed by news shared of each other's families. In London, small talk will bubble about entertainment and media over catered bagels with cream cheese and coffee. In Zaranj, small talk will simmer about health over homemade flat bread and tea. Both spheres will discuss war, partnerships, and irreconcilable differences in philosophy. But there is one specific common goal remaining still under-discussed and under-treated in Afghanistan which is irrefutably pulling on all sectors like a tempest -- migration.
Ten million people are shifting their careers, many abandoning once-productive farms, rural factories, and cooperatives, and moving to the cities.

“Where Does the Crime “Subversion of State Power” Come From?” by Woeser
http://blog.studentsforafreetibet.org/?p=14794
 Recently there was once again some bad news that Dhondup Wangchen was sentenced to 6 years in prison. Four days before the end of 2009, a sentence was handed out to him in secret in Xining. Neither he nor his relatives, no-one received the relevant procedures which must be carried out by the legal departments in China. The 35-year-old Amdo farmer, son to elderly parents, husband to a thin and vexed wife and father to four young children, had been detained since the end of March 2008 for making a 25 minute documentary and suffered such a heavy punishment, on average 3 months imprisonment for every minute. Moreover, if counting the sentence from the date he was tried, then the calculation would be as follows: 4 months for every minute!

UN Report on Afghanistan: What it Means for Afghan Women
http://womensrights.change.org/blog/view/un_report_on_afghanistan_what_it_means_for_afghan_women
an unsucky law eliminating violence against women, endorsed by Karzai, is currently under Parliamentary review.  A number of writers and commentators have argued the importance of Afghanistan's tribal society and the impracticality of strong central-government-style democracy. Why is this good news for women? it's often easier for women to participate in local government than on the national level, and there is evidence that women's involvement in local government leads to more equitable distribution of resources, which makes life better for everyone in the community. Now we need the power to shift away from the corrupt central government and to the provincial governments where women have a better chance of exerting influence and power.


New Orleans: Training: Aiding Survivors of Torture
http://www.humanrightsblog.org/listings/2010/01/new_orleans_training_aiding_su.html
Training: Aiding Survivors of Torture - Physical and Psychological Documentation of Asylum Seekers
Date: Saturday, February 6, 2010, 7:30 a.m.-4:30 p.m.
Location: Tulane University, New Orleans, LA

Physicians for Human Rights is pleased to invite you to a training for health professionals on how to diagnose, evaluate and document the physical and psychological after-effects of torture and other severe human rights violations.

There is no cost to attend this course. Registration is required to attend the course. Register at: http://actnow-phr.org/phr/events/nola_asylum_training/details.tcl

Registration is available online only. Registration deadline is Friday, January 29, 2010.

This educational activity is designated as a maximum of 6.5 AMA PRA Category 1 Credits. (Physicians should only claim credits commensurate with the extent of their participation in the activity.)

Scott Brown, the New "I Love Torture" Senator
http://war.change.org/blog/view/scott_brown_the_new_i_love_torture_senator

Anti-Choicers Demonstrate to Control Your Body
http://womensrights.change.org/blog/view/anti-choicers_demonstrate_to_control_your_body
A Washington Post article reports that young people have been seduced into opposing reproductive rights, with Catholic schools busing in a number of students. Hey, I never got to skip school to join protests! No wonder anti-choice groups have an edge: they get to have their own special religious schools that indoctrinate youth early, and then get to set-up up a "field trip" to sing anti-choice songs to a Miley Cyrus tune. I think those eighth-graders just ruined "Party in the U.S.A." for me.

US: A Big Step Toward Online Freedom
http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2010/01/22/opinion-big-step-toward-online-freedom
In a groundbreaking speech at the Newseum on Thursday, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton reset U.S. policy on Internet freedom, emphasizing the vital need for governments, companies and technology providers to ensure that the World Wide Web is a force for human rights. Of course, the real test will come in how the Obama administration puts the new policy into practice.

Clinton named and shamed not only the usual Internet suspects such as China and Vietnam, but U.S. allies Egypt and Saudi Arabia - the first for arresting bloggers, the second for censoring religious speech.

Google's stunning announcement last week that it is prepared to leave China because of government censorship and surveillance is the most recent reminder of the threat to human rights online. While the company deserves praise for sounding the alarm, its threat to withdraw from the Chinese market underscores the need for governments and companies to implement effective human rights protections online or risk ceding the Internet to states that want to censor and spy on users.

In 2006, U.S. congressional hearings and human rights groups revealed how Yahoo had turned over to Chinese authorities information that led to the imprisonment of online activists. Microsoft and Google also acknowledged that they censored their search engines and some users' blogs. Since then, other problems have emerged:

    * Burma's military government cut the telecommunications lines to the Internet during its brutal 2007 crackdown.
    * Moscow is trying to implement controls that would allow it to spy on users or cut off the Internet from the rest of the world.
    * Bloggers and online activists have faced pressure and harassment in Cuba, Egypt, Iran, Morocco and elsewhere.
    * Last month a Moroccan court sentenced Bachir Hazzam, a 26-year-old Moroccan blogger, to four months imprisonment for "spreading false information harmful to the kingdom's image." His crime? He posted a statement on his blog authored by university students who denounced police violence and arrests against protesters demanding better public services.

Despite the pattern of repressive authorities trying to control the Internet, other governments have been slow to act. The Bush administration launched a Global Internet Freedom Task Force but never adopted a coherent strategy to protect human rights online. 

Haiti and the perennial challenge of information lock-in
http://ict4peace.wordpress.com/2010/01/25/haiti-and-the-perennial-challenge-or-information-lock-in


Chinese citizens share their thoughts about Google
http://blog.studentsforafreetibet.org/?p=14769


The Nuts and Bolts Behind 4636 in Haiti
http://blog.ushahidi.com/index.php/2010/01/22/the-nuts-and-bolts-behind-4636-in-haiti
The 4636 emergency shortcode has been setup to run on the Digicel and the Comcel networks in Haiti. It has been running for six days now, with a great deal of usage taking a large amount of communication by the volunteers around the project. Rob Munro is one of the key figures in this process. This is his report on how things have come together.

Haiti 48 hours later - Photos
http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2010/01/haiti_48_hours_later.html

Baha'i Faith in Egypt
http://www.bahai-egypt.org/2010/01/haiti-beyond-surface-of-catastrophe.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+BahaiFaithInEgypt+%28Baha%27i+Faith+in+Egypt+%26+Iran%29

Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Haiti: Beyond the Surface of Catastrophe

This is an outstanding interview that, not only examines the Haiti disaster, but goes way beyond the apparent surface of the country's catastrophic state.

Katie Couric of CBS News "speaks with Mark Schneider from the International Crisis Group, and Ophelia Dahl, Executive Director of Partners in Health about the disastrous earthquake in Haiti and the relief efforts to help Haitians in need." A must watch!


Graphic representation of a minute fraction of...Image via Wikipedia
Coordinating Software Developer Volunteers
http://blog.ushahidi.comOne of the things we know about software developers contributing to open source projects is that they don’t have a lot of time. Everyone has their day jobs, their personal projects, their families…in other words life. We like to support a relaxed, but structured atmosphere where there’s things that need to get done but no pressure on any one volunteer dev. 

We’re using the modular approach. Various components of our systems are built in various languages. The Swift River system itself is being built in PHP on Kohana, the same framework that Ushahidi uses. But SULSa (Swift User Location Services App) is written in Ruby using the Rails framework. Our taxonomy and natural language parsing program, SiLCC (Swift Language Computation Core), is being developed in Python. Ushahidi itself also has an API that anyone can use to pull or push data, using any programming language they want.

Internally, this modular approach allows us to scale, by distributing server load across many different nodes that each handle vertical tasks on their own. But when it comes to coordinating volunteer developers, it means that there’s always something someone can contribute to, which hopefully makes working with our community that much more inviting.

Interested in volunteering with us as a software developer? Check out the following links…

   Swiftriver Discussion Group
Swiftriver Public Skype
Swiftriver Github
Ushahidi Forums
Ushahidi Github
Ushahidi Public Skype
Ushahidi IRC

Ballots for Bullies: The Crimes Against Humanity Elections of 2010
http://genocide.change.org/blog/view/ballots_for_bullies_the_crimes_against_humanity_elections_of_2010
Taking a cue from my Change.org colleague Una, who put 2010 elections in Afghanistan, Sudan, Iraq, and the Palestinian Authority on her watchlist of polls that "could easily trigger, escalate or help resolve conflicts," I'd like to add two countries worth keeping an eye on, for the impact that elections might have on unresolved or ongoing cases of crimes against humanity: Sri Lanka and Burma.
Coming less than a year after the end of the country's long and brutal civil war, the January 26 presidential elections in Sri Lanka have made international headlines in recent weeks, as the incumbent president (who oversaw the war from on high) faces unexpected competition from a former army general (who oversaw the war from on the ground). The amount of mudslinging and dirty tricks would make Karl Rove blush.
The suffering of ethnic Tamil civilians, who were victims of abuse on the scale of crimes against humanity from both the Sri Lankan government and the Tamil rebel group, has received an ironic amount of attention as the opponents in the tight race vie for every possible vote. But given the involvement of both men in the long, bloody war, many observers caution that this political jockeying is unlikely to translate into real change for Tamils or accountability for the abuses committed against them. Many Tamils are skeptical themselves; still, Sri Lanka's main Tamil political party is backing the former general.
For Burma, what happens when a country with a ranking of "worst of the worst" on global ranking of world freedom holds elections? We should, at the very least, take promises of free and fair elections from the country's leadership with a grain salt, especially when said leadership issues thinly-veiled threats to its citizens about making "correct choices" at the ballot box. Such is the case of Burma -- or Myanmar, as it's also known - whose ultra-repressive military junta is so paranoid that it banned speculation over the cosmic meaning of last week's solar eclipse.


Business and Human Rights

ReliefWeb

Haiti - Health cluster update - Functioning health facilities and priorities (as of 25 Jan 2010)
Countries & Emergencies


See all Countries, Emergencies &
Natural Disasters:



EGYPT: Displaced flood victims still waiting for aid
http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/rwb.nsf/db900SID/AMMF-822SDV?OpenDocument&RSS20=18-P 
CAIRO, 25 January 2010 (IRIN) - Days after flash floods killed several people and forced hundreds of families out of their damaged homes in the Sinai Peninsula, government assistance is yet to arrive, survivors say.

"Our conditions are so desperate," Nuweiga Gemeiaa, a local resident whose home was destroyed in the 18 January floods, told IRIN. "We sleep in the open, but the government hasn't done anything effectual so far to give us either shelter or money to compensate [us] for what we've lost."

Gemeiaa was one of hundreds of people who clashed with Egyptian police on 20 January after accusing the government of neglecting them in the aftermath of the floods.

The government has promised to give 25,000 Egyptian pounds (US$4,545) to each household badly affected by the floods in al-Arish in northern Sinai and in Ras Sidr in the south.

South Sinai Governor Mohamed Abdel Fadil Shousha said on 23 January that he had formed five committees to assess the flood damage. Speaking on Egyptian TV, Shousha said his staff would go from home to home to assess damage and give proper compensation for victims.

Officials from several NGOs met politicians in Cairo on 23 January to discuss how they could offer help to the Sinai floods victims. They promised to send aid convoys with food and money. They also agreed to open telephone hotlines to receive donations from the public.

So far, only minimal rescue work has been carried out by the Egyptian army and small amounts of aid from the vicinity have been delivered.  

KENYA: Thousands of flood-affected still need aid
http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/rwb.nsf/db900SID/FBUO-822JAN?OpenDocument&RSS20=18-P 
NAIROBI, 25 January 2010 (IRIN) - Thousands of flood-affected households still require assistance as ongoing rains in parts of Kenya continue to cause population displacement and destroy property and crops, according to humanitarian sources.
"Countrywide, 8,270hh [households or 40,165 persons], have been displaced and 40 people killed by floods. Livelihoods have been greatly interrupted and thousands are in dire need of relief aid," according to a recent update by the Kenya Red Cross Society (KRCS).
The National Disaster Operations Centre (NDOC) estimates that up to 58,000 people had been affected by the flooding in the October-December 2009 short rains, stated a 22 December 2009 to 22 January Kenya Humanitarian Update by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).
The latest to be displaced by the flooding, due to ongoing El Niño-related rains, include 53 families in the village of Dagamra in the coastal district of Magharini where 404ha of green maize were also destroyed.
According to the KRCS public relations manager, Titus Mung'ou, the flooding occurred just as "the farmers were ready to receive their harvest. Some [of the farmers] are [wading] through the water to pick [what] maize they can," said Mung'ou.
The flooding was caused by the River Sabaki breaking its banks on 13 January and going about 500m off its normal course, he said, adding that non-food items such as tarpaulins and mosquito nets had been provided to the affected families.
Heavy rainfall on 11 January in Tanzania caused flash floods in nine of Kenya's Taveta District's sub-locations, affecting 556 households whose houses were submerged and property damaged, according to OCHA.
Taveta lies along the border with Tanzania, where recent flooding has also affected thousands.
Mung'ou warned that thousands of people could be displaced along the Tana River delta, from the Northeastern Provincial capital of Garissa down to the coast, if rains continue. KRCS has prepositioned personnel and supplies in preparedness, he added.
aw/mw[END] A selection of IRIN reports are posted on ReliefWeb. Find more IRIN news and analysis at http://www.irinnews.org

Yemen: a serious humanitarian crisis in the making
http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/rwb.nsf/db900SID/EDIS-822R3X?OpenDocument&RSS20=18-P
The ICRC is stepping up efforts to respond to a worsening humanitarian situation in northern Yemen. Just back from a trip to Yemen where he met with tribal leaders and government authorities, Dominik Stillhart, the ICRC's deputy director of operations, explained at a press conference in Geneva how these efforts are severely hampered by security concerns.
Mr Stillhart spent two days in Sana'a meeting with government authorities, the heads of UN agencies and the leadership of the Yemeni Red Crescent and a further two days in the northern governorate of Amran, where he met a good number of the tribal leaders of the region. He had planned to take a trip further north, closer to the front lines and those civilians who are in greatest need of assistance, however this trip had to be cancelled at the last minute for security reasons.
Amran, situated south of Sa'ada, which is the governorate most heavily affected by the conflict in the north, is facing a serious influx of internally displaced persons (IDPs) from Sa'ada, where most of the fighting is taking place.
150,000 civilians directly affected by the fighting
"What I've seen is a serious humanitarian crisis in the making," declared Mr Stillhart. Since August 2009, when the conflict resumed, which, Mr Stillhart pointed out, was actually the sixth round of conflict between the government and the rebels, at least 150,000 civilians have been directly affected, or about one person in five living in the area.
"We are seriously concerned about the many communities that are believed to be trapped in areas that are not accessible to aid agencies," he continued. This is the case in areas located north-east of Wadi Khaiwan, the place Mr Stillhart was unable to visit due to security concerns.
Displacement putting huge strain on host families
He emphasized that the majority of displaced people had found shelter with host families, primarily relatives, and that this is putting a growing strain on host communities that were already living on the edge before fighting broke out.
"Socio-economic indicators in Yemen are among the worst in the world," he said. "A recent World Food Programme survey found that nearly half of the children under five are suffering from some sort of malnutrition."
Needs exceed humanitarian response
From his assessment after his short visit, Mr Stillhart said that the needs of the people clearly exceed the capacity of the humanitarian response.
"This capacity is seriously hampered by ongoing security problems," he continued. Due to the needs exceeding the humanitarian response, Mr Stillhart said that people are growing increasingly frustrated.
"One tribal leader that I met in Amran, for example, told me that 'it is bad enough to be displaced by the conflict and to have to flee your home, but what is even worse is the fact that today I am no longer in a position to protect my people and to provide for their needs.'"
Mr Stillhart said that this particular leader feels that he is failing his own people and that this makes him very ashamed.
Mr Stillhart went on to summarize the ICRC's assistance to the conflict-affected populations, which includes supplying clean water, food, shelter and essential household items. (see box - Response to humanitarian needs)
"From what I could tell from my discussions with community leaders and some displaced people, food is what appears to be most urgently needed," said Mr Stillhart.
Security concerns severely hindering food distributions
He described witnessing first-hand how challenging it is to organize food distributions to the affected communities. "In addition to the authorizations that you need from the authorities, the ICRC team needs to negotiate access with each and every single tribe along the way to the final destination of the distribution."
Mr Stillhart explained that, as most communities are suffering, at least indirectly from the conflict, they naturally all feel entitled to some sort of assistance and this makes the whole aid effort extremely complicated to organize. It involves multiple negotiations that can last from early morning until late at night, just to gain authorization for one distribution of food.
He explained that if just one community or community leader goes away from the table unhappy, it can result in a security incident.
"Each and every security incident slows down aid operations considerably, because one then has to negotiate access on a daily basis," Mr Stillhart added.

AFGHANISTAN: "Humanitarian aid" not something the military can do - experts
http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/rwb.nsf/db900SID/ASAZ-823C2S?OpenDocument
- Belligerent parties in Afghanistan should not call the aid they distribute "humanitarian", because this is to confuse neutral, impartial and needs-based assistance with "hearts and minds" projects designed to achieve specific ends. 
( IRIN article cited by many is not available : an inconvenient truth ? )


Foreign bosses flee after bad year, leaving workers unpaid
http://www.thanhniennews.com/society/?catid=3&newsid=54852
Hason Ltd didn’t miss a paycheck through the economic crisis in 2008,in August last year, Trinh heard that general director Oh Young Hwan and his deputy Park Joung An had gone home to South Korea before paying June and July’s salaries.

The Hason bosses were just two of ten company heads that left foreign-owned companies in Binh Duong last year. The group owed a total of 2,800 workers’ salaries, social insurance contributions and other allowances worth VND12.6 billion (US$682,000) in total.

The Ghanaian Earthquake Hoax
http://www.ethanzuckerman.com/blog/2010/01/19/the-ghanaian-earthquake-hoax
a demonstration of the power of well-meaning people, social media and the infinite human capacity for misunderstanding

Community-led sanitation brings great promise for Eritrea
http://www.unicef.org/infobycountry/eritrea_52289.html
CLTS is a revolutionary low-cost approach to rural sanitation where communities are facilitated to assess their own sanitation situation, analyze and take action to stop open defecation and build their own latrines without any subsidy and using locally available materials. In 2010, the Ministry of Health, with the support of UNICEF, plans to enable the 60,000 households countrywide to stop open defecation.

According to the latest estimates, only five per cent of Eritrea’s population has access to improved sanitation facilities. The CLTS project bears great promise and could position the country towards achieving the MDG target on sanitation.

Better toilets, better hygiene

The household of villager Amna Abdela Mussa, age 45, was the first to be visited.  She paused from her laundry to welcome the team and show them her toilet. “I heard the message from Ministry of Health on the importance of sanitation and I took it upon myself to construct my own toilet,” she said.

The toilet also serves as a bathroom and has two off-site pits. On one side is the toilet and on the other side is the seat for bathing and a pit for dirty water. To ensure good hygiene, a small jerry can is positioned at the door. It is tied to a wooden post, with a rope extending from its mouth to a small peg on the ground. The idea behind this is that one does not have to touch the jerry can, but on stepping on the rope, it automatically tilts the jerry can downwards to enable hand washing. A bar of soap is positioned next to it.

Ms. Mussa is just one of the many Eritreans who have enthusiastically embraced the CLTS. In 2008, one village was declared and certified to be open defecation free (ODF). In 2009, a momentous community mobilization initiative geared towards collective behaviour change to give up open defecation and take up safe hygiene practices took off, with a total of 11,000 households having stopped open defecation and 11 villages now ODF.


CLIMATE CHANGE: ‘Copenhagen Accord Not Legal, Kyoto Protocol Is’
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=50104
While the BASIC bloc countries - Brazil, South Africa, India and China - will submit their plans for voluntary mitigation actions by the Jan. 31 deadline stipulated by the Copenhagen Accord, they have taken care to emphasise that the agreement, reached at the end of the December climate change summit in the Danish capital, has no legal basis.


ENVIRONMENT: Indian Glaciologist Fires Back at Climate Sceptics
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=50103
( I'm going to retitle this to say : "Objects to journalistic misrepresentation/sensationalization of his conclusions." )
His report sums up scientific research done in the last decade, proving that the Himalayan glaciers are receding.

For Lower Blood Pressure, Low-Carb Diet May Be Best
http://news.yahoo.com/s/hsn/20100126/hl_hsn/forlowerbloodpressurelowcarbdietmaybebest;_ylt=AqDE26h3_r3_VO9uon7VoXfVJRIF;_ylu=X3oDMTNmYTNubWt2BGFzc2V0A2hzbi8yMDEwMDEyNi9mb3Jsb3dlcmJsb29kcHJlc3N1cmVsb3djYXJiZGlldG1heWJlYmVzdARwb3MDNwRzZWMDeW5fYXJ0aWNsZ
 (HealthDay News) -- A low-carbohydrate diet helps people shed as many pounds as a low-fat diet plus the weight-loss drug orlistat does, and the low-carb plan may be better at helping lower blood pressure, researchers report.

Their study, published in the Jan. 25 issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine, found that both diets helped participants lose almost 10 percent of their body weight.

"Weight loss was similar but substantial in both groups we studied, but blood pressure improved more in the low-carb dieters," said study author Dr. William Yancy Jr., an associate professor of medicine at Duke University Medical Center and a staff physician at the Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Durham, N.C.

"There are options out there. Pick a diet you think you could stick to better, and work with your physician to help you target the right intervention for you," he advised. Two other studies in the same issue of the journal look at the effectiveness of the anti-hypertension DASH diet and a physician-supervised plan.

Obesity is a significant contributor to many illnesses, including heart disease, stroke, diabetes and many cancers, according to an editorial in the same journal by Dr. Robert Kushner of Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine. More than one-third of American adults are obese, and the incidence of obesity has gone up 140 percent over the past decade.

 US not ready to lift ban on Scottish haggis
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8480795.stm
To open the path for Transatlantic trade in true haggis, two rules will have to be changed, and as far as the BBC has been able to determine, only one is currently even being reviewed.
Even supposing the US were to lift all haggis trade barriers, it's not clear how big a hit the dish would be with US consumers. The New York Times once wrote that it had "an august reputation for repulsiveness".
Haggis in ox intestine casing
Haggis was once stuffed in a sheep's stomach, but this is now uncommon
"They don't have the same culture of eating offal," points out Jo Macsween.
"In Europe there is respect for the whole animal and nothing should be wasted, in America it's more prime cuts, fillet and sirloin."
When Americans try it, she says, they invariably love it and cannot understand their government's import ban.
( Robert Burns Day traditional Scottish dish. )
  

 
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