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February 12, 2009

ANAGRAM WITCHCRAFT TORTURE ROBBERS DECLINE COCA-COLA

Filed under: australia,capitalism,government,human rights,irian jaya,new zealand,png,police,rampage,usa — admin @ 7:15 am

The government of Papua New Guinea must act now to end a rash of more than
50 killings related to allegations of sorcery, Amnesty International said.

It was a black day for the Nigerian Police Force as seven policemen met
their untimely deaths in three separate incidents as bandits went on the
rampage in Benin City, Edo state and in Abeokuta, Ogun State. The first
incident occurred along the Benin-Lagos road, with two policemen shot dead
while two others sustained gunshot injuries in a gun battle with armed
robbers.

Two rights commissions jointly called for the government to take steps to
halt torture in the country, including ratifying an international
convention against the practice.

Coca-Cola Amatil Ltd., Australia’s biggest soft-drink maker, increased
second-half profit 26 percent on higher soda sales and new drinks such as
Glaceau Vitamin Water.

The murder of a father and son in Ban village, a few kilometres from Mount
Hagen is the latest sorcery-related killing to come to light.

But the Police Public Relations Officer (PPRO), in charge of Zone 5, Benin
City, said that only one policeman died; however an eye-witness said that
two policemen were shot dead on the spot by the robbers who caught them
unawares.

“It has been 10 years since Indonesia adopted the Convention against
Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment [CAT]
but there has not yet been any significant progress,” said the National
Commissions on Human Rights, or Komnas HAM.

Net income rose to A$213.7 million ($140 million) in the six months ended
December from A$169.8 million a year earlier. The result was calculated by
subtracting first-half earnings from the A$385.6 million full-year profit
the Sydney-based company reported.

Local men shot dead 60-year old Plak Mel Doa and threw his body into a fire
whilst his son, Anis Dua, was dragged from his home and burnt alive. Local
people accused them of causing the death of a prominent member of the
community by sorcery.

His commission and the National Commissions on Violence Against Women, or
Komnas Perempuan, said in a joint statement that they were now waiting for
the government to ratify the Optional Protocol to the Convention against
Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, or
OPCAT, because it represented a more effective way to prevent torture in
the country.

The robbers who were said to be armed with AK-47 rifles also escaped with
gunshot injuries, but it was learnt that the policemen who were on patrol
could not withstand the firepower of the armed robbers when they attacked
the patrol van.

Takeover talks with brewer Lion Nathan Ltd. ended, raising prices by 5
percent as record summer temperatures in southeastern Australia stoke
demand. New drinks in Australia and revamped packaging in Indonesia are
boosting sales and limiting the impact of a recession in New Zealand.

When dozens of people have been killed after literal witch hunts, it’s
clear that the government is not doing enough to protect its own citizens
and maintain the rule of law.

They were on patrol to the Benin-Lagos express road after they got a
distress call that robbers were operating. They exchanged fire with the
robbers, who escaped with bullet wounds. One of the men was shot dead while
others sustained injuries and are currently receiving treatment at an
undisclosed hospital.

The country’s many human rights violation cases are well known, especially
those involving torture in areas far from public view, such as prisons,
state detention centers and social rehabilitation centers.

The result highlighted the underlying defensiveness of Coca-Cola Amatil’s
business, which is further characterized by strong domestic performance.
All segments delivered profit growth, with Indonesia a stand out, rating
the stock “hold.”

The police and judicial authorities have to step in immediately before
another person faces this kind of vigilante violence.

But we are on the trail of the robbers because we know they will still be
around with the wounds. It is a sad day for us but we are happy that our
men put up a spirited fight and we must get all of them.

Torture mostly happens in closed areas, and it is hard to prove it.

Coca-Cola Amatil shares rose 1.6 percent to A$8.51 at the close in Sydney.
The company is 30 percent owned by Atlanta-based Coca-Cola Co., the world’s
biggest soft drink maker.

The Royal Papua New Guinea Constabulary (RPNGC) is often unable to enforce
the law. For instance, after the killings, police reported they wanted to
visit the crime scene and confirm the men’s deaths, but heavily armed
locals prevented them from removing the bodies to hospital for autopsies.

Four police officers attached to the Ikpoba Hill Police Station were shot
dead when armed robbers attacked a bullion van along Ugoneki, Benin-Asaba
road, Benin City. Their rifles were also taken away by the dare-devil
robbers.

“We’re concentrating on torture of political detainees in some areas of
Papua [Province], such as Manokwari and Jayapura, and in Maluku. There are
a lot of political detainees in those areas, and torture is even more
intense against these types of detainees.”

Lion Nathan scrapped its A$7.5 billion offer after Coca-Cola Co., which has
the capacity to block the offer, ended talks on a deal. The offer valued
Amatil shares at A$10.21 each based on closing prices.

People often don’t trust the police or the judiciary and instead blame
events on supernatural causes and punish suspected sorcerers.

“Torture like physical and mental abuse, such as intimidation, have been
common practice in many prisons in Indonesia. It is difficult to control
unless the government pays more attention to this human rights violation.”

It was another case of a distress call, but the robbers laid an ambush for
them. We are in a mourning mood; we know that it is a syndicate. We must
get them. They are trying to get rifles to carry out other operations but
no matter what they do, we must get them.

“The price was unrealistically low. The CCA board was presented with a
proposal that was just not capable of being accepted.”

The Constabulary, the Public Prosecution Office and other relevant
authorities should step up efforts to curb vigilante violence and raise
awareness in communities about ways in which people can legitimately seek
justice.

CAT was an effective tool for responding to torture cases, while the OPCAT
was more of a preventive tool.

Meanwhile, the office of the Assistant Inspector-General of Police (AIG),
Zone 5, has described the day as a dark day for the police in the state.

Earnings before items totaled A$404.3 million, beating the A$400.9 million
average of ten analyst estimates. The company boosted its second-half
dividend to 22 cents from 20 cents earlier.

Amnesty International calls on the RPNGC to vigorously pursue
investigations of all cases and ensure that the perpetrators are brought to
justice.

It was learnt that the officers who were escorting a bullion van ran into
the robbers who attacked the bullion van with three vehicles, armed with
sophisticated weapons.

The government should list torture as a punishable crime in the Criminal
Code.

Earnings before interest and tax in Australia, where Coca- Cola Amatil gets
almost two-thirds of sales, rose 9.1 percent to A$269.3 million in the
second half after adding Vitamin Water and relaunching its Mother energy
drink.

There has been an increase in reports of sorcery related killings in Papua
New Guinea. A village court, comprising church pastors and local officials,
found a 40 year old man from a village in Unggai-Bena district in the
Eastern Highland province guilty of sorcery and sentenced him to death. A
group of local men then hacked him to death with bush knives. A group of
men stripped a woman naked, gagged and burned her alive at Kerebug rubbish
dump in Mount Hagen after she was suspected of practising witchcraft.

“There are many kinds of torture that the commissions should explain
further, such as ethnic cleansing, the cleansing of anti-social
individuals, military terror and discrimination against minority religions.
There is a lot of torture at several detention centers and prisons. But we
have no exact number regarding the cases. We only investigate some of the
important cases.”

“Our men are on the red alert now and we are advising everybody to be
careful. Some people are on a mission but we must stop them. You will
recall that some police officers were shot early this morning. One died
while others were hospitalized. This makes it five police officers to be
killed in one day. That is sad for us but we must get the killers no matter
where they run to.”

The company’s pre-mixed spirit drinks, which include Australian rights to
Jim Beam & Cola, had a “material decline” in sales as higher government
taxes pushed the retail price up more than 20 percent. Coca-Cola Amatil’s
nearest soda rival in Australia is Cadbury Schweppes Plc., the domestic
bottler of Pepsi. Asahi Breweries Ltd., Japan’s top-selling beer maker,
agreed to buy Schweppes in Australia. The purchase is subject to a
so-called right of negotiation granted to Coca-Cola Co., which gives the
world’s biggest soft-drink maker rights to negotiate a purchase of the
unit.

February 9, 2009

FLOODED POPPIES MINIMIZE SECURITY DROUGHT CRISIS

Filed under: australia,burma,capitalism,china,disaster,disease/health,fiji,government,human rights,irian jaya,kenya,png,police,solomon islands,thailand,usa,vietnam,wealth — admin @ 6:07 am

The Solomon Islands declared a national disaster after torrential rain and
flooding in the South Pacific nation killed eight people and left another
13 missing, destroying homes and bridges.

The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC)
is reporting that populations in large areas of Kenya and the Horn of
Africa are now facing an exceptional humanitarian crisis that requires
urgent food assistance. The combined effect of high worldwide food prices
and a crippling drought are seriously jeopardizing the lives, livelihoods,
and dignity of up to 20 million people in rural and urban communities.

Opium poppy cultivation inched up by 3 percent last year in Myanmar,
according to a United Nations report, the second consecutive annual
increase that appears to signal a reversal of years of declining opium
production in the so-called Golden Triangle.

Indonesian security forces attacked a group of one hundred tribal people
who were peacefully protesting about delays to local elections in Nabire,
West Papua.

“Containment of the problem is under threat. Opium prices are rising in
this region. It’s going to be an incentive for farmers to plant more.”

Twelve communities on the Solomons’ main island of Guadalcanal had been
assessed as disaster-hit and appealed for international assistance.
Australia and France have already promised emergency aid.

Papua New Guinea’s law and order problem is set to get worse if a
recommendation to increase the national minimum wage is approved by the
government.

The Golden Triangle, the area where the borders of Thailand, Laos and
Myanmar meet, once produced two-thirds of the world’s opium, most of it
refined into heroin. But pressure by the Chinese government to eradicate
opium in Myanmar helped lead to steep declines, with a low point of 21,500
hectares, or 53,000 acres, of poppies planted in Myanmar in 2006. Since
then, opium cultivation has bounced back by around 33 percent, to 28,500
hectares last year.

For the past 17 years Papua New Guinea’s lowest income earners, like
security guards, have brought home just $US13 a week. Government plans to
increase that to $US43 has business owners worried.

When police began attacking the crowd, the demonstrators called for Mr
Yones Douw, a respected human rights worker, to document the violence. When
Mr Douw arrived, the police attacked him – witnesses said he was kicked,
beaten on the side the head and punched in the face before being arrested,
along with seven protesters. The police also beat other protestors, and
fired rubber bullets into the crowd. Five people were seriously wounded,
and many others received minor bullet wounds.

Since December, flooding has also hit the Pacific island nations of Fiji,
Papua New Guinea, Micronesia and the Marshall Islands, with tens of
thousands of islanders abandoning homes.

UN officials warn that the global economic crisis may fuel an increase in
poppy production because falling prices for other crops may persuade
farmers to switch to opium. The UN Office on Drugs and Crime, said corn
prices had fallen by half over the past year. The price of opium, by
contrast, has increased 26 percent in Laos and 15 percent in Myanmar over
the same period.

Heavy rain and flooding on Guadalcanal and nearby Savo Island has caused
widespread damage and forced the evacuation of more than 70 villagers to
the capital Honiara.

The PNG Manufacturers Council said the economy cannot accommodate a higher
salary. “It’s not the fact that the private sector doesn’t want to pay, its
whether the economy can accommodate that high level of salary.”

“In Kenya 80 percent of the territory is affected, with the northern and
lower eastern Kenya the most affected. We’re talking of a target population
of 1.6 million for the Red Crescent.”

Farmers in the isolated highlands of the Golden Triangle are also hampered
by bad roads and difficulties getting their crops to market. They often
find that small parcels of opium are easier to carry across the rough
terrain.

The Solomon Islands Red Cross had sent emergency staff and volunteers to
distribute relief supplies to communities in West Guadalcanal and Longu, in
the island’s east. The Solomon Islands is a nation of about 500,000 mainly
Melanesian people, spread across hundreds of islands, which gained
independence from Britain in 1978.

The global economic crisis is only just starting to short-change Papua New
Guinea, with the wage set to further undermine the local economy. “We
become less competitive, our prices go up and we don’t sell any goods.” It
could lead to thousands of workers being laid off, adding to the country’s
already high unemployment and crime rates.

Other areas are Djibouti with 50 thousand people in dire need. Ethiopia is
affected with an estimated 5 million need of food. The Red Cross is moving
in to start assisting the first 150 thousand people. The Red Cross and the
Red Crescent are also active in southern Somalia, as well as Somaliland and
Puntland.

Although opium is still grown in parts of Laos, Vietnam and Thailand, UN
officials say that about 94 percent of the region’s opium comes from
Myanmar. Most of the Golden Triangle heroin is sold within the region, but
small amounts also reach the United States and Australia. Recent seizures
of heroin thought to come from the Golden Triangle have been made on the
Thai resort island of Phuket, Ho Chi Minh City and Yangon, Myanmar’s
commercial capital.

“The key issue for PNG is more people working and that basically improves
the lifestyle of people and that without a doubt helps law and order
because when people can put food on the table there is harmony, you take
that opportunity away and you have unrest. Or, employers could head to the
labour black market, choosing instead to pay workers their current wage
under the table.”

Eyewitnesses say that a range of security forces were involved in the
attack, including Brimob, Indonesia’s notorious para-military police, plus
soldiers and Indonesia’s Intelligence Service.

The alarming spread of HIV by heroin users in southern China several years
ago persuaded the Chinese authorities to crack down on opium and heroin
trafficking. Western intelligence officials say Chinese spies are active in
anti-narcotics operations in Myanmar, especially in northern areas where
central government control is weak. “There’s strong collaboration with
Chinese intelligence.”

Last month 11 Fijians died and more than 9,000 people were forced into
evacuation centres after the worst floods in decades. Sugar is Fiji’s
second major industry following tourism and sugar farms in the west have
been devastated by the flooding, with damages estimated to be in the tens
of millions of dollars.

The UN report on opium poppy cultivation is based on surveys taken from
helicopters and on the ground. The United States relies more heavily on
satellite images to calculate opium cultivation, and its reports are
sometimes at odds with those of the United Nations. The UN report did not
cover methamphetamine production and distribution, which among some
criminal syndicates has displaced opium and heroin in the region.

“We have launched an appeal seeking 95 million dollars, now we have
received only 6 percent in the two months since we launched and this is not
enough to run an operation.”

In Thailand, methamphetamines remain a problem but longstanding efforts by
the royal family to substitute opium production with vegetables, coffee and
macadamia nuts have virtually wiped out opium production among the northern
hill tribes.

Floods ravaging northern Australia have washed crocodiles onto the streets,
where one was hit by a car. More than 60 per cent of the vast northeastern
state of Queensland has been declared a disaster area, and flooding after
two recent cyclones has affected almost 3,000 homes. The army has been
called in to help with rescue and recovery efforts, while three reports of
large crocodiles washed up from flooded rivers have come in from homes in
the Gulf of Carpentaria region.

The incident fuels concerns that repression and violence against the Papuan
people is increasing.

“Many employers are doing the right thing, but there are many unscrupulous
employers who will exploit their workers to gain maximum profit out of the
cheap labour.”

Afghanistan remains the world’s premier source of opium, producing more
than 90 percent of global supply. Afghan soil is also remarkably more
fertile than the rocky, unirrigated opium fields in the Golden Triangle.
The UN estimates in its 2008 report that one hectare of land yielded an
average of 14.4 kilograms, or 31.7 pounds, of opium in Myanmar but 48.8
kilograms in Afghanistan.

“The damage bill is estimated at $76 million and growing. But we won’t
really know the full extent of the damage until the water subsides, so that
figure could double, it could treble.” It was the worst flooding seen in 30
years. Fresh food supplies were flown into the westerly townships of
Normanton and Karumba, which had been cut off by flood waters. The flooding
comes amid a heatwave over in south-eastern Australia.

The situation has been exacerbated by the global and financial crisis.
However a small fraction of the billions of dollars being spent by
governments to bail out banks and financial institutions could help save
millions of lives in the Horn of Africa.

The death toll in Australia’s worst-ever bushfires has risen to 128 people,
as hundreds more flood community shelters after losing everything they own.
The state government in Victoria, where the fires have raged since
Saturday, is being advised to prepare for 230 fatalities. Police confirmed
128 deaths from the fires, many which officials suspect were deliberately
lit.

January 20, 2009

MIGRANTS ADRIFT WITH POWERFUL QUAKES SEIZING KILINOCHCHI KINGDOM

Filed under: bangladesh,burma,General,government,human rights,intra-national,irian jaya,military,png,sri lanka,thailand,weather — admin @ 5:52 am

A series of powerful earthquakes killed at least four people and injured
dozens more in remote eastern Indonesia, cutting power lines and destroying
buildings.

The loss of Kilinochchi, its capital, is a major blow to the Tamil Tiger
movement fighting for autonomy in the Sinhalese-dominated country. But the
army’s success in capturing the town does not mark the death of the
Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).

Thailand’s new prime minister was under pressure to answer allegations that
hundreds of Burmese and Bangladeshi migrants were set adrift at sea with
little food and water by the armed forces.

One of the quakes — a 7.3-magnitude tremor — sent small tsunamis into
Japan’s southeastern coast, but there were no reports of damage there and
no tsunami in Indonesia’s impoverished Papua area.

Kilinochchi was the LTTE’s political headquarters, strung out on the main
tarmac road from Colombo to Jaffna. The government could always strike it
at will by air, as it did when aircraft bombed the offices of SP
Thamilselvan, the man with whom foreign diplomats as well as the government
had frequently negotiated.

Abhisit Vejjajiva met with officials from the country’s human rights
commission amid claims that up to 1,000 migrants, mostly from the Rohingya
ethnic minority from western Burma, were towed out to sea and abandoned on
boats without engines. At least 300 remain unaccounted for. Human rights
groups allege four migrants were thrown into the sea to encourage others to
climb aboard the vessels.

The first 7.6-magnitude quake struck on land about 85 miles (135
kilometers) from Manokwari, Papua, at a depth of 22 miles (35 kilometers),
the U.S. Geological Agency said. It was followed by 10 aftershocks.

By advancing into the town by land the army has forced any remaining LTTE
politicians to withdraw altogether. But the movement’s military HQ and its
logistical bases are hidden well to the east near its coastal stronghold of
Mullaitivu. The whereabouts of the Tiger’s ruthless leader, Velupillai
Prabhakaran, has never been clear.

Vejjajiva stressed the alleged abuse of the migrants ran counter to
government policy, and that the military had confirmed to him that it
respected all migrants.

At least four people died in Papua, and the airport runway nearest the
epicenter was cracked, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono told reporters.
Commercial flights to the area were canceled.

Seizing Kilinochchi was done at a fearful human cost. Comparisons with Gaza
are not amiss, down to the censorship that prevented journalists entering
the area while the fighting was underway. Several days of unopposed
airstrikes and artillery fire killed civilians as well as Tiger militants,
and forced tens of thousands of families to flee into the jungle en masse.
Hundreds of troops have died on both sides in the offensive, which has
taken months to reach its goal.

However, Thailand’s foreign ministry has launched an inquiry into the
damning allegations that the navy and the army had imprisoned and
mistreated the migrants on the southern Thai island of Koh Sai Daeng before
abandoning them to die in the Indian Ocean.

“I’ve instructed emergency steps be taken to help our brothers and to
restore power and other vital utilities,” he said without commenting on how
widespread the damage might be.

Among the dead was a 10-year-old girl whose head was crushed, said local
hospital director Hengky Tewu.

If the survivors’ tales prove correct the expulsions are a reversal of a
policy Thailand followed for years, allowing the impoverished and stateless
Muslim Rohingya to land on their way to Malaysia. Many were said to have
been turned over to human traffickers.

“We have our ambulances picking up two more,” he said. Another 19 patients
at the hospital were treated for broken bones, cuts, crushed fingers and
other injuries.

Like Gaza too, this is asymmetrical warfare and the Tigers were quick to
take the shine off the government’s victory by sending a suicide bomber
into the heart of Colombo to kill two airmen at the air force headquarters.
This has always been the Tiger tactic in extremis, and they will probably
revert to more of it in the aftermath of losing Kilinochchi.

Indian authorities on the Andaman Islands say they have rescued 446
refugees lately.

Papua police chief Maj. Gen. Bagus Ekodanto said he received reports that a
hotel and rice warehouse had been “destroyed,” but he did not know if
anyone had died. A search for possible victims was under way.

Several stories of the Mutiara Hotel in the main city Manokwari collapsed,
said Ina, a nurse at a navy hospital treating 20 quake patients. Like many
Indonesians she goes by a single name.

In one incident, the Thai navy allegedly set adrift an open-topped,
engineless barge loaded with 412 people. Those aboard had just four barrels
of water and two sacks of rice.

Meanwhile, the government hopes to move on to capturing the Elephant Pass,
the last Tiger bastion on the road to Jaffna. If it falls, this will make
it easier to re-supply the island’s second largest town, which at the
moment has to get its provisions by sea and air. The army boasts of seizing
the ultimate prize, Mullaitivu.

Electricity was cut off and people in the coastal city of 167,000 fled
their homes in the dark fearing a tsunami, said Hasim Rumatiga, a local
health official. The Indonesian Meteorology and Seismology Agency issued a
tsunami alert, but it was revoked within an hour after it was determined
the epicenter of the main quake was on land.

After they drifted at sea for 15 days, the Indian coastguard rescued 107
people near the Andaman Islands, where they are being held in camps. But up
to 300 are missing after they tried to swim ashore.

Capturing it would certainly weaken the Tigers severely. But guerrilla
movements have the capacity to go underground and reemerge, as long as they
remain popular in their own communities. The government calls the LTTE
terrorists, and they have been designated as such by the European Union.
But the EU also recognises that they speak for many, if not most, Sri
Lankan Tamils in denouncing the discrimination that Tamils suffer on the
multiethnic and multicultural island. The Tamil diaspora is unlikely to end
its funding for the Tigers any time soon.

Japan’s Meteorological Agency said tsunamis of 4 inches (10 centimeters) to
16 inches (40 centimeters) in height splashed ashore in towns along the
coast. It also warned that bigger tsunamis were possible later.

In another incident just before new year, three overcrowded fishing boats
loaded with 580 Burmese migrants were intercepted off the Thai coast, but
were towed back out to sea after their engines had been removed, according
to minority rights group the Arakan Project.

The damage in Indonesia was still be being assessed.

Sri Lanka needs a just political settlement. There is no military solution.
Yesterday’s army success is producing a triumphalist mood in Colombo, and
President Mahinda Rajapakse, who already holds the portfolios of defence,
finance and nation-building, has just made himself minister of the media as
well – an apparent sign that he wants even tighter control over the
country’s reporters. Sinhalese politicians will be in no mood for
concessions for many months to come. Sri Lanka faces a grim new year.

Two of the boats reached the shore; one with 152 people aboard landed on
the Andaman Islands while another reached Aceh in Indonesia. One boat is
missing. Another boatload of 46 migrants arrived on Thailand’s southern
coast was seized by the military along with the occupants.

“My son’s head was wounded when a cabinet fell on him,” said Ferry Dau, a
father of two who said the walls in his house were cracked. “It was very
strong and scary. The power and phones went dead after the utility lines
fell down.”

A Thai court sentenced Mr. Nicolaides, an Australian, to three years in
jail for offending the monarchy, a criminal offense in the Kingdom of
Thailand. He had pleaded guilty, earning a sentence at the lower end of the
prescribed range for lèse-majesté.

Rahmat Priyono, a supervisor at the National Earthquake Center, said there
was no immediate information on casualties or damage. “But since the
epicenters were on land, they have a potential to cause significant
damage.”

The Rohingya are stateless and mostly have no rights in Burma, where they
are at the mercy of the military junta that curtails their movement while
using them as forced labor.

Quakes centered onshore pose little tsunami threat to Indonesia itself, but
those close to the coast can still churn up large waves emanating out to
other countries like Japan.

The crime was committed in a single paragraph in “Verisimilitude,” a 2005
novel set in Thailand that is salted with social commentary. At the
sentencing, the judge read out the offending section to the court, which
was packed with foreign reporters. The judge said the author had insulted
the king and crown prince in the passage.

Relief agency World Vision Indonesia was flying in 2,000 emergency
provision kits, including canned food, blankets and basic medical supplies,
said spokeswoman Katarina Hardono.

Papua is the Indonesian portion of New Guinea island, located about 1,830
miles (2,955 kilometers) east of the capital Jakarta. It is among the
nation’s least developed areas, and a low-level insurgency has simmered in
the resource-rich region for years. It is off limits to foreign reporters.

Indonesia straddles a chain of fault lines and volcanoes known as the
Pacific “Ring of Fire” and is prone to seismic activity. A huge quake off
western Indonesia caused the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami that killed about
230,000 people, more than half of them on the western Indonesian island of
Sumatra.

January 15, 2009

Corporate Tax Havens as California Cops Kill

Filed under: corporate-greed,government,police,usa — admin @ 4:16 pm

A former transit officer has been charged with murder in the shooting death of an unarmed black man that set off violent protests, officials said.

Johannes Mehserle, 27, was arrested Tuesday in Nevada and on Wednesday appeared briefly in court, where he waived extradition to California. He was expected to be returned to California.

Witnesses said Mehserle, who is white, fired a shot into the back of 22-year-old Oscar Grant while the man was lying face down on a train platform at a station in Oakland. Grant and others had been pulled off a train after reports of fighting, as New Year’s Eve revelers were shuttling home after midnight.

Alameda Country District Attorney Tom Orloff said he would not speculate on whether the charge would end up being first-degree murder or second-degree murder.

“At this point, what I feel the evidence indicates, is an unlawful killing done by an intentional act and from the evidence we have there’s nothing that would mitigate that to something lower than a murder,” Orloff said at a news conference announcing the charge.

Mehserle’s attorney, Christopher Miller, planned a news conference later at his office in Sacramento.

The shooting, captured on cell phone cameras and widely viewed on the Internet, has inflamed long-running tensions between law enforcement authorities and many African-American residents.

Hundreds of people have taken to the streets calling for the prosecution of Mehserle, with one rally last week spiraling into violence that resulted in more than 100 arrests and damage to dozens of businesses.

Another demonstration was planned Wednesday afternoon.

Mehserle surrendered without incident Tuesday at a family friend’s house in an upscale neighborhood on the east shore of Lake Tahoe in Douglas County, Nev., law enforcement officials said.

Douglas County Undersheriff Paul Howell said he believes Mehserle went to Nevada for his own safety.

“He just wanted to get out of the Bay Area due to the magnitude of the incident,” Howell said. “He wasn’t trying to run.”

John Burris, the attorney for Grant’s family, said the news of the charge was “terrific.”

“It is consistent with the evidence I have seen. I think the family will be pleased,” Burris said.

Mehserle had refused to talk to Bay Area Regional Transit investigators before resigning last week.

“I want to know why he did it,” said BART board member Carole Ward Allen. “We’ve heard from everybody else but him. While I can’t speak for the entire BART board, we want to make this process as transparent as possible.”

State Attorney General Jerry Brown assigned a prosecutor to monitor the case, and the U.S. Department of Justice sent mediators to help avert additional violent demonstrations.

•••

Most of the 100 largest U.S. companies, including big banks that recently received federal bailouts, have foreign subsidiaries that may help the corporate parent avoid paying U.S. taxes, according to a report released by congressional auditors.

Hundreds more companies operate tax havens under strict secrecy laws in places such as Switzerland, Hong Kong, Panama and Mauritius.

Tax havens are typically jurisdictions that have low or no taxes, provide high levels of client confidentiality, and do not exchange information with foreign tax authorities.

January 14, 2009

700 from Irian Jaya repatriated

Filed under: global islands,government,intra-national,irian jaya,png — admin @ 5:04 am

Human rights group says move a publicity stunt

More than 700 West Papuans living in Papua New Guinea are choosing to return home to the Indonesian side of the border despite claims they face human rights abuses.

The Indonesian Embassy in PNG’s capital Port Moresby next month will begin flying the West Papuans to Vanimo in Sandaun Province on PNG’s north-east coast, before driving them across the border to their former homes.

Hakim Abdul from the embassy said the voluntary repatriations were happening because conditions in West Papua had steadily improved since 2001.

“The Indonesian government has made West Papua a special province, there is more autonomy than ever before. It’s very different now,” he said.

“The West Papuans living in PNG have realised conditions are better there.

“It’s good news as they now want to go home after learning about life in West Papua from friends and family, even reading the internet.”

The Indonesian government would pay for the repatriation and was working with the PNG government on the issue, he said.

But Felix Meraudje from the West Papua National Congress based in Port Moresby said it was a publicity stunt.

“It’s publicity to show Indonesia is good,” Mr Meraudje said.

“They promise them a lot and give a little pocket money.

“These people who have chosen to go back are frustrated with the lack of results from the United Nations to place us outside of PNG.

“The reality for most West Papuans is not good, most are scared and can’t be West Papuan.”

Meraudje said 10,000 to 20,000 West Papuans who fled their homes on the Indonesian side because of persecution by authorities lived throughout PNG.

Hundreds had settled in a refugee camp near the border in PNG’s Southern Highlands region while a majority lived and worked in the country’s major centres.

West Papuans fled their province following alleged human rights abuses by Indonesian authorities and security forces.

Indonesia’s hardline security measures, including arrests of activists who try to fly the outlawed Morning Star flag, have helped quell the West Papua separatist movement.

November 20, 2008

OVER OUR BURNING IVORY PIG BODIES

Filed under: brazil,congo,General,government,kenya,nicaragua,rampage,vanuatu,wildlife — admin @ 3:58 am

The last time rival political forces fought one another street by street
for control of the Nicaraguan capital was three decades ago, in July 1979,
at the culmination of the Sandinista insurrection that overthrew the
Somoza dictatorship. The streets of Managua were once again aflame amid
the boom of mortar rounds, as the Sandinistas and their rivals battled for
control — but it was the erstwhile revolutionary movement that now stands
accused of being a dictatorship.

An undercover investigation of the illegal wildlife trade in five African
nations led to the seizure of about a ton of ivory along with hippo teeth
and cheetah, leopard and python skins, the Kenya Wildlife Service said.

In Vanuatu, a Chief pleads for forgiveness on behalf of his errant
jail-breaking son in an unprecedented custom ceremony, in the tropical
islands of Vanuatu, in the South Pacific.

The prize, this time, is not control of the Nicaraguan state, but simply
the mayorships in 146 municipalities, which were up for election on
November 9. But allegations of massive vote fraud and conflicting claims
of victory have set off several days of violence between rival political
bands, leaving Nicaragua’s fledgling institutional democracy struggling
for its life.

A four-month investigation coordinated by Interpol, an international
police association based in Lyon, France, led to the arrest of 57 suspects
in the Republic of Congo, Ghana, Kenya, Uganda and Zambia, the Kenyan
conservation agency said in a statement. Undercover agents tracked
suspects and illegal products to local ivory markets, airports, border
crossings and smuggling points.

Vanuatu, a peaceful tropical island nation in the South Pacific, witnessed
an never-before-seen kustom ceremony when, Chief Joshua Batakoro Vanua,
father of Lee Tamata, a high risk escapee, from the local jail,
ceremonially offered ten pigs to the community heads, in a plea for
forgiveness for the misdemeanors of his son.

The Supreme Electoral Council (CSE) has announced a partial recount of
votes from last Sunday’s mayoral polls, in which it has yet to declare
winners in several hotly contested cities, including the capital. But the
mobs of activists of the ruling Sandinista party and the opposition
Liberal Constitutional Party (PLC) aren’t waiting idly to hear the
outcome.

The operation, which ended Saturday, was a blessing for countries whose
elephant populations “have declined tremendously over the years,” Wildlife
Service Director Julius Kipng’etich said.

Ten pigs were handed over to the community leaders during a custom
ceremony held at the Chief’s Nakamal. The leaders included the newly
elected Prime Minister of Vanuatu, Edward Natapei. This was the highest
price ever paid for peace, in the traditional custom system of the island
of Pentecost.

Downtown banks and businesses have been forced to close early for several
days and both the British and U.S. Embassies have warned their citizens to
remain vigilant and avoid any large crowds as political gangs clash on the
streets, destroying public and private property and turning parts of the
capital into a virtual war zone.

“Co-operation among countries in East, West and Southern Africa against
wildlife crime has set an inspired example,” said Giuliano Zaccardelli, an
Interpol program director. “Similar operations could also be conducted in
Asia, the Americas and in any other region where criminal interests,
including trafficking in illegal wildlife products, are common.”

Earlier this year, before the general elections, a Pentecost chief
demanded that Jenny Ligo,a woman candidate, pay 10 pigs in a kustom
ceremony for her right to continue to contest the elections. Jenny had
already performed a 10 pig-killing kustom ceremony, just to enter the male
dominated arena of politics.

The violence broke out after opposition leaders accused the Sandinistas of
turning the election into a fraudulent sham in order to take control of
the country’s most important cities, including Managua. The poll, in which
the government refused to allow monitoring by any credible outside
electoral observers, was riddled with alleged irregularities that began
months before election day when several opposition parties were banned
from participating, and continued after the vote, with stacks of ballots
found mysteriously dumped in the woods.

In one case, when Kenya Wildlife Service officers tried to arrest a Kenyan
and a Tanzanian man found with two pieces of ivory weighing 13 kilograms
(29 pounds), the men resisted and a wildlife officer fired in
self-defense, grazing one of the suspects in the head.

When Chief Joshua discovered how much fear and damage his son had caused
to members of the local community in Port Vila, he felt duty-bound to
offer the pigs on behalf of his son, asking for the leader’s forgiveness.

The U.S. State Department this week noted reports of “widespread
irregularities taking place at voting stations throughout the country,”
and said the Supreme Electoral Council’s decision to “not accredit
credible domestic and international election observers has made it
difficult to properly assess the conduct of the elections.”

In another case, a suspect who had been arrested escaped in the darkness.
In two separate instances, officials caught suspected smugglers
transporting several pieces of elephant tusks on motorbikes.

While Chief Joshua spend three months in the capital Port Vila, away from
his island home and family, he counseled his son. Chief Joshua had to sell
kava and taro to raise the funds to buy the pigs for the peace ceremony.

Business groups, church leaders and opposition parties have called for an
internationally audited nationwide recount, and the PLC has threatened to
paralyze the national legislature by walking out and denying it a quorum.

The elephant populations of many African countries were being decimated
until the U.N. Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species
banned the ivory trade in 1989. Since then the elephant population of
Kenya, for example, has grown from 16,000 to 27,000. But that is far fewer
than the estimated 167,000 elephants that lived in Kenya in 1973.

Ten mature pigs are not only highly prized, but a very expensive exercise
for the father as pigs are the wealth of a village. Curled pig tusks are
used as currency in some areas of the Vanuatu islands, with the Tari Bunia
Bank having 14 branches. The bank issues cheque books, has reserves and
gives loans, all on the currency of pig tusks. While there is a vault to
the bank there are no need for locks. “The bank is protected by spirits
and snakes,” says the bank manager.

The day after the vote, despite trailing by five percentage points in the
official count to Sandinista candidate and former boxing champ Alexis
Arguello, the PLC’s Managua mayoral hopeful Eduardo Montealegre declared
himself the winner based on his party’s own tabulation of the vote tallies
released to the parties at each balloting station. Montealegre, a former
finance minister who has adopted the cartoon image of Mighty Mouse after
opponents dubbed him “the rat,” called on his supporters to take to the
streets to “celebrate” the victory and “defend the vote at whatever
consequence.”

A plane equipped with body-heat sensors will be used by the Brazilian
government to locate and protect isolated Indian tribes in the Amazon. The
heat sensors will be mounted on a government plane normally used to
monitor deforestation. It is not clear when the effort will start.

Chief Joshua said “My son has erred and I ask for your forgiveness,” said
Chief Joshua, who spent time counseling his errant son while in Vila. The
Chief will now return home with assurances from his son that he will serve
the full term of his sentence and act with respect towards the law. Lee’s
name means peace in the language of his home island, Pentecost.

October 28, 2008

Polarised Thailand to barter rice for oil

Filed under: government,resource,thailand — admin @ 3:55 am

THAILAND said it planned to barter rice for oil with Iran in the clearest example to date of how the triple financial, fuel and food crisis is reshaping global trade as countries struggle with high commodity prices and a lack of credit.

The United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organisation said such government-to-government bartering – a system of trade not used for decades – was likely to become more common as the private sector was finding it hard to access credit for food imports.

“Government-to-government deals will increase in number,” said Concepción Calpe, a senior economist at the FAO in Rome.

“The lack of credit for trade could lead also to a resurgence of barter deals between countries,” she added. Officials and traders noted, however, that Iran was not typical because the US-led sanctions against its banks meant the country was facing difficulties financing agricultural trade even before the financial crisis.

Bangkok’s commerce ministry yesterday said it was sending a delegation to Tehran to discuss the barter deal. Thailand is the world’s largest rice exporter, controlling a third of the global market, while Iran is one of the top 10 importers.

Last year Iran bought some 600,000 tonnes of rice from Thailand, but so far this year it has bought only 60,000 tonnes as it has waited for prices to fall.

The price of Thai medium-quality white rice soared to an all-time high of above $1,000 (€ 798) a tonne in May but has since dropped to $660 a tonne.

These days, former premier Thaksin Shinawatra is being blamed for everything that is wrong with Thailand.

In polarised Thailand, the colour “yellow” symbolises the PAD (an anti-government movement that sees red in anything connected to Thaksin Shinawatra, the former Thai premier who was ousted in a 2006 coup) while “red” represents the pro-government supporters.

The PAD crowd has a jaundiced opinion of Thaksin, blaming him for anything negative that happens to them or their country.

In case of a coup (which is highly likely after army chief Anupong went on television on Oct 16 to urge Somchai to resign), army major-general Khattiya Sawasdiphol vowed to welcome tanks with Molotov cocktails instead of roses that were offered to the soldiers after they deposed Thaksin without any bloodshed.

This will be the first and only time that the people have threatened a counter-coup, if tanks roam Bangkok streets. Tanks usually used in military coups, attached to the Fourth Cavalry Battalion, are old and vulnerable to catching fire.

The anti-PAD crowd said that in Thailand, the second “c” in “democracy” has been replaced with “z” – democrazy.

October 8, 2008

Two Die In Day-long Street Protest In Thailand

Filed under: government,police,thailand — admin @ 8:38 am

Two people died and more than 380 others were injured in the day-long street battle between Thai police and thousands of anti-government supporters in the capital.

The first casualty was a man who was killed instantly in an explosion at the vehicle he was standing near, not far from the Parliament building where police started firing tear gas at 6.20am to disperse supporters of the People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD).

The Ramathipbodi Hospital announced Tuesday night that a 25-year-old woman identified as Angkana Radubpunyawut died from serious injuries sustained during the clash between police and protesters at noon.

According to the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration’s emergency centre, the number of injured rose to more than 380, including 48 who were admitted to hospital.

Most of them had injuries suffered from being hit by tear gas canisters fired by riot police who have been battling the protesters since morning, with clashes continuing at press time around the roads leading to the Parliament building and the Metropolitan Police headquarters.

PAD, which had seized the country’s administration centre at the Government House on Aug 26, led the siege to Parliament last night in an effort to block the government under new prime minister Somchai Wongsawat from giving its policy speech this morning.

Elsewhere in the capital, the situation remained calm, but workers at the Bangkok Port have announced that they would go on strike tomorrow to support PAD.

The PAD’s main tactic appears to be create anarchy in Bangkok to the point that it triggers extra-constitutional intervention either by revered King Bhumibol Adulyadej or the military.

September 30, 2008

NZ official: Melanesian states still suffering

Filed under: fiji,global islands,government,png,solomon islands,trobriand islands,tuvalu,vanuatu — admin @ 5:04 am

Corruption, disease and poverty threaten the futures of Melanesian countries that are home to 85 percent of Pacific Islands people, a top New Zealand official said Tuesday.

The populations of Fiji, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands and Vanuatu are rising at a pace that is outstripping economic growth, Pacific Island Affairs Minister Winnie Laban said at the opening of a symposium on Melanesia in the New Zealand capital, Wellington.

The countries also suffer from youth unemployment, law-and-order “problems,” and adverse effects of global warming, Laban said. All these conditions together represent a “toxic mix” undermining growth and stability in these countries, she said.

“In combination, these factors pose clear and present danger to the ability of states in the region to provide for their people and ensure national viability,” Laban said at the event, sponsored by the Pacific Cooperation Foundation.

HIV, AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis are a brake on the region’s potential, while education trends are also troubling, she said.

Four years of communal fighting in the Solomon Islands have left education services “in tatters,” with only 70 percent of children able to access limited education, Laban said.

“To be blunt, corruption seems endemic and undermines governance at almost every turn,” she said.

Melanesian countries play a major role in the Pacific tuna fishery, currently worth around US$3 billion a year. But overfishing of a number of tuna species means reductions in catches are urgently required to preserve the industry’s sustainability, she said.

Laban praised Melanesian countries New Guinea, Vanuatu and Solomon Islands for maintaining a unified front in pressuring Fiji’s military government to honor its pledge to hold elections by March 2009.

Melanesian leaders last month joined other Pacific Islands’ Forum states in expressing disappointment at Fiji’s delays in restoring a democratic government.

September 29, 2008

Drinking at the Public Fountain

Filed under: corporate-greed,government,resource,usa — admin @ 3:43 am

The New Corporate Threat to Our Water Supplies
http://waterconsciousness.com/

In the last few years, the world’s largest financial institutions and pension funds, from Goldman Sachs to Australia’s Macquarie Bank, have figured out that old, trustworthy utilities and infrastructure could become reliable cash cows — supporting the financial system’s speculative junk derivatives with the real concrete of highways, water utilities, airports, harbors, and transit systems.

The spiraling collapse of the financial system may only intensify the quest for private investments in what is now the public sector. This flipping of public assets could be the next big phase of privatization, and it could happen even under an Obama administration, as local and state governments, starved during Bush’s two terms in office, look to bail out on public assets, employees, and responsibilities. The Republican record of neglect of basic infrastructure reads like a police blotter: levees in New Orleans, a major bridge in Minneapolis, a collapsing power grid, bursting water mains, and outdated sewage treatment plants.

Billions in private assets are now parked in “infrastructure funds” waiting for the crisis to mature and the right public assets to buy on the cheap. The first harbingers of a potential fire sale are already on the horizon. The City of Chicago has leased its major highway and Indiana its toll road. Private companies are managing major ports and bidding for control of local water systems across the country. Government jobs are also up for sale. For the first time in American history, the federal government employs more contract workers than regular employees.

This radical shift to the private sector could become one of history’s largest transfers of ownership, control, and wealth from the public trust to the private till. But more is at stake. The concept of democracy itself is being challenged by multinational corporations that see Americans not as citizens, but as customers, and government not as something of, by, and for the people, but as a market to be entered for profit.

How the Water Revolt Began

And a huge market it is. About 85% of Americans receive their water from public utility departments, making water infrastructure, worth trillions of dollars, a prime target for privatization. To drive their agenda, water industry lobbyists have consistently opposed federal aid for public water agencies, hoping that federal cutbacks would drive market expansion. So far, the strategy has worked. In 1978, just before the Reagan-era starvation diet began, federal funding covered 78% of the cost for new water infrastructure. By 2007, it covered just 3%.

As a result, local and state governments are desperately trying to figure out how to make up the difference without politically unpopular rate increases. A growing number of mayors and governors, Republicans and Democrats, are turning to the industry’s designated solution: privatization.

Providing clean, accessible, affordable water is not only the most basic of all government services, but throughout history, control of water has defined the power structure of societies. If we lose control of our water, what do we, as citizens, really control?

The danger is that most citizens don’t even know there’s a problem. Water systems are generally underground and out of sight. Most of us don’t think about our water until the tap runs dry or we flush and it doesn’t go away. That indifference could cost us dearly, but privatization is not yet destiny.

A citizens’ water revolt has been slowly spreading across the United States. The revolt is not made up of “the usual suspects,” has no focused ideology, and isn’t the stuff of headlines. It often starts as a “not-in-my-backyard” movement but quickly expands to encompass issues of global economic justice.

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