brad brace contemporary culture scrapbook

Kenyan authorities have seized almost 700kg of ivory worth millions of
dollars in a night-time raid at the country’s main airport. The Kenya
Wildlife Service says a similar amount was intercepted in the Ethiopian
capital, Addis Ababa. Both consignments – with a potential value of more
than $1.5m (£938,000) – were reportedly headed for Thailand. Poaching is on
the increase mostly owing to high demand for ivory in Asia. It is not yet
clear whether the ivory, recovered at Nairobi’s Jomo Kenyatta Airport, had
been trafficked from other parts of the continent or was from East Africa.
Twenty years ago the world’s elephant population was plummeting and the
trade in ivory was banned. But over the past decade the ban has been
periodically relaxed and occasional supervised ivory auctions have been
allowed.

A powerful earthquake measuring 6.8 on the Richter scale struck the remote
Kermadec Islands region. The quake occurred at a depth of 62 km and its
epicentre was about 260 km north east of Raoul Island. There were no
immediate reports of any damage or injuries. No tsunami warning was issued
following the quake. The islands, which are often hit by severe quakes,
have no permanent population except a small New Zealand Department of
Conservation team on Raoul Island.

Madagascar’s rival political parties have agreed on key posts in a
transitional government. Andry Rajoelina, who led a military coup that
ousted President Marc Ravalomanana, will remain as president. However, Mr
Rajoelina will not be allowed to run for the post in Madagascar’s next
elections, which must be held by November 2010 under the deal. The newly
appointed prime minister is Eugene Mangalaza, who is a member of the same
political party as another former president, Didier Ratsiraka, who was
ousted himself by Mr Ravalomanana in 2002. The deal is expected to end the
political crisis that has enveloped Madagascar since Rajoelina took power.
The political struggle has led to the deaths of more than 100 people and
hampered the island’s tourism industry.

The disasters this week show people on Pacific shores still lack basic
protection from tsunamis The official responses to this week’s double
disaster – first, the Samoan tsunami, and then the Sumatran earthquakes –
again reveal worrying flaws in the early warning systems that are the
first, and usually only, lines of defence against the natural hazards that
regularly afflict the world’s most seismically unstable regions. When the
8.3 magnitude undersea earthquake struck, 190km south of the Samoan
islands, it was registered instantly at the Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre
on Ewa Beach, Oahu, which then issued tsunami warnings to a number of
Pacific island groups, including New Zealand and Samoa.

The fencing project of India – Bangladesh border is expected to complete by
March 2010. The development of fence had been put off due to issues like
harsh topography and pending land acquisition case, cites a home ministry
statement. The other factors which delayed the fencing of the India –
Bangladesh border include need for realignment of fencing, presence of
human life within 150 yards of border, objections from Bangladesh Rifles
for the development of fences within 150 yards etc. The working season
available for the construction of the fence was also a very restricted one.
Approximately 2,649.74 km of the total 3,436.56 km have been fenced till
now. The project is now expected to reach completion by March, 2010, it
said. About 3,326.82 km of border roads of the sanctioned 4,326.24 km have
also been constructed. The 2,840 km India – Bangladesh border will be
floodlighted, which is expected to cost about Rs.1,327 crore. This is
expected to get over by 2011-2012. The work is being carried out by CPWD,
NBCC and NPCC.

With no outside help in sight, villagers used their bare hands to dig out
rotting corpses, four days after landslides triggered by a huge earthquake
obliterated four hamlets in western Indonesia. At least 644 people were
buried and presumed dead in the hillside villages in Padang Pariaman
district on the western coast of Sumatra island. If confirmed it would
raise the death toll in the 7.6-magnitude earthquake to more than 1,300,
with about 3,000 missing. The extent of the disaster in remote villages was
only now becoming clear. So far, aid and rescue efforts have been
concentrated in the region’s capital, Padang, a city of 900,000 people
where several tall buildings collapsed. But the quake was equally
devastating in the hills of Pariaman, where entire hillsides were shaken
loose, sending a cascade of mud, rocks and trees through at least four
villages. Vice President Jusuf Kalla said there was little hope of finding
anyone alive. “We can be sure that they are dead. So now we are waiting for
burials.”

Police in Uganda have arrested and extradited a man who is among the most
wanted suspects from the Rwandan genocide. The 100-day killing rampage led
to the loss of an estimated 10 percent of Rwanda’s population. The 100-day
killing rampage led to the loss of an estimated 10 percent of Rwanda’s
population. IIdephonse Nizeyimana was picked up at a hotel in Rubaga, a
suburb of the capital, Kampala, by the National Central Bureau of Interpol.
He was transferred to a U.N. detention facility in Arusha, Tanzania, where
the tribunal is based. Top officials who allegedly took part in the
genocide, such as army generals and politicians, are tried by the tribunal.
Nizeyimana is one of the four top accused who are earmarked by the
prosecutor to be tried by the tribunal in Arusha after their arrest as part
of the ICTR completion strategy. Of a list of 13 fugitives, he is the
second to be arrested in less than two months.

Three major earthquakes struck within an hour and 10 minutes near Vanuatu
in the South Pacific, prompting a tsunami warning that was quickly lifted.
The quakes struck near Vanuatu in the South Pacific. They were part of
series of nine moderate-to-major quakes that rattled the region in just
over four hours. The first quake, with a magnitude of 7.8, struck at 9:03
a.m. at a depth of 35 km (22 miles) and an epicenter 295 km (180 miles)
north-northwest of Luganville, Espiritu Santo, Vanuatu. A second quake,
with a magnitude of 7.7, struck 15 minutes later at the same depth and an
epicenter of 340 km (210 miles) north-northwest of Luganville. The third
quake, with a magnitude of 7.1, struck at 10:13 a.m. at about the same
depth and an epicenter of 280 km (175 miles) north-northwest of Luganville.
The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center issued and then quickly lifted a
regional tsunami warning and watch for parts of the Pacific near the first
earthquake’s epicenter. The first data from a buoy at Luganville on Vanuatu
detected a tsunami wave of 4 centimeters (1.6 inches) at Luganville on
Vanuatu.

One of the suspects in the killing of two Tobago teenagers was shot dead by
police officers in Moruga. Gary Mohammed was killed around 10.15 p.m. A
party of police officers approached a wooden structure in a forested area
in St Mary’s, Moruga, and were fired upon, officers said. In returning
fire, Mohammed was shot several times and died at the scene. The
32-year-old, of Ste Madeleine, San Fernando, last lived in Tobago. The
search continues for a second suspect, who was also shot. The battered
bodies of Kolen Salandy, 16, and Rondell Thomas, 15, were found in French
Fort, Scarborough, Tobago. Their bodies bore marks of violence to the neck
and throat, and both were found with their underpants and trousers pulled
down to their knees. Autopsies revealed the teens died as a result of
broken necks. A manhunt was launched for the suspects after they were
spotted in Princes Town. The men fled to Trinidad by boat after the
teenagers’ bodies were found, investigators said. They believed the men
were seeking assistance to leave the island by sea. As officers search for
the second suspect, medical institutions have been informed to be on the
alert for anyone needing attention for gunshot wounds.

Stepping off the plane, tourists are welcomed to Easter Island with a
garland of flowers. They find themselves on a tiny dot in the Pacific
Ocean, 3,700km west of Chile, to which the island belongs, and 2,000km east
of Pitcairn Island. All around are the white-flecked waves of the Pacific.
“What perfect peace,” exclaimed Thor Heyerdahl, a Norwegian explorer and
author when he arrived in the mid-1950s. He might not say so today. Some
70,000 visitors now arrive each year, up from just 14,000 in the mid-1990s.
Apart from the island’s utter remoteness, what attracts the tourists are
the moai, the mysterious giant stone statues erected by the ancestors of
the indigenous Rapa Nui people. They are testament to a complex society of
up to 20,000 people which later shrank to a shadow as a result of
calamitous environmental stress and deforestation, a cautionary tale
narrated in “Collapse”, a book by Jared Diamond, a polymath at the
University of California, Los Angeles. Today Easter Island once again faces
environmental threats. Food comes from Chile, either by ship or on the
seven weekly flights from Santiago (there are also two from Tahiti). The
visitors “all pull the chain,” Luz Zasso, the mayoress, notes acidly. The
absence of a sewage system is threatening the cleanliness of the island’s
underground water sources. But it would be hard to install one without
damaging archaeological sites. Electricity comes from diesel-powered
generators. Power cuts are frequent. Rubbish is piling up. Many Easter
Islanders are worried. Tourists should be limited to 50,000 a year and be
preferably well-heeled, argues Marcelo Pont, the vice-president of the
Council of Elders, an advisory body. Visitors from the Chilean mainland
attract particular resentment. “They’re interested in sun, sand and
swimming pools, not the island,” says Edgard Herevi of the local chamber of
tourism. Tourism has brought migrants from the mainland, too. The
population is now 5,000, up from 3,300 in 2002, of whom only half are now
of Rapa Nui descent. Locals complain that the incomers are competing in the
handicrafts trade, carving wooden moai and selling shell necklaces.

Thousands of Venezuelans congregated for candlelit rituals on a remote
mountainside where adherents make an annual pilgrimage to pay homage to an
indigenous goddess known as Maria Lionza. Along with Santeria, Venezuela is
home to other folk religions, such as the sect surrounding the Indian
goddess Maria Lionza, an indigenous woman who according to tradition was
born on Sorte Mountain and whose cult has spread to Colombia, Panama,
Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, and Central America.

The Global Hunger Index placed Kenya among the world’s most food deficient
countries. The report by International Food Policy Research Institute
(IFPRI), Concern Worldwide and Welt Hunger Hilfe ranks countries on a
100-point scale with 0 being the best score, but Kenya had only 20.1 per
cent. In ranking the country is placed 29th in the world among the
countries with poor food security. Kenya is a hotspot on hunger
vulnerability because of the perennial droughts and insecurity. The world
has been dealing with the food security since 1976. But today close to 900
million people are still food insecure and Kenya is placed among the dark
section of the report. Democratic Republic of Congo was ranked the worst
followed by Burundi, Eritrea, Sierra Leone, Chad and Ethiopia. Egypt,
Tunisia, Algeria and Libya were identified as the countries in Africa that
have shown consistency in food security.

In “Law Abiding Citizen,” a sociopath goes on a rampage, killing major
officials in Philadelphia and holding the entire city hostage. He
essentially is a character elevated out of the ranks of horror films who
instead of killing teenagers reacting to hormones or other socio-biological
imperatives destroys adults reacting to career dictates. As the title
insists, this is a law-abiding citizen who is irate with a justice “system”
that allowed one of the killers of his wife and daughter to get off with a
light sentence. Does a social message lurk within the context of rapes,
dismemberment, bomb explosions and political assassinations? No, of course
not. That’s just the cover for filmmakers F. Gary Gray and writer Kurt
Wimmer to indulge in calculated genre mischief that mixes horror elements
with a suspense thriller. The script does create sufficient tension and
intrigue to hook viewers, along with a photogenic, hard-working cast, so
“Citizen,” should stir some mid-October box-office action. Gerard Butler
(who also is a producer) plays a supposedly average guy who witnesses the
slaughter of his wife and daughter by home-invasion robbers. Curiously,
this pair seems more interested in being outrageously sadistic than in
grabbing anything worth fencing, but that’s so an audience will understand
these really are bad people who deserve to die. Jamie Foxx plays a Philly
assistant D.A. without much hard evidence who plea-bargains an agreement
with one sleaze ball to testify against the other to win at least a death
verdict against one and a murder plea from the other.

Incidents of Thai gangs harassing and robbing Burmese migrant workers in
Southern Thailand are on the rise, claim several migrant workers. A Mon
migrant worker, employed at a rural rubber plantation in Hat Yai district
in Trang Province in Southern Thailand, said that he and his wife were
robbed of by a gang of three Thai teenagers. The gang stole 440 baht and a
cell phone. Nai Myint Aung, aged 30, said that he and eight of his friends
are already paying 50 baht per month to a different Thai gang, and have
been doing so for the past eight months. Nai Myint Aung said that if he or
his friends fail to pay the monthly extortion fee, the gang follows them
back to their homes and harasses their families. Nai Myint Aung also said
that he left his boss’s home, where he had received his paycheck of 7000
baht, and entered the local market. The gang of Thai teenagers followed him
from the marketplace to his neighborhood. Nai Myint Aung claimed that the
gang stopped his motorbike and seized his wife who accompanied him,
threatening the pair with a knife. The gang then searched his wife’s body
and stole 440 baht and her cellular phone. A Thai neighbor of the pair,
a-35 year-old man, saw the Nai Myint Aung and his wife being attacked, and
phoned the police, causing the gang to scatter. Nai Myint Aung said that
his wife had luckily had the foresight to stow his paycheck in her
brassiere, and thus the pair managed to escape the attack without losing
the 7000 baht he’d just received.

Officials say the sales have fuelled demand for ivory in Asian countries,
especially China, contributing to a sharp increase in elephant poaching. So
far this year poachers in Kenya have killed 128 elephants for their ivory;
last year 98 were killed. In July, Kenyan authorities intercepted 16
elephant tusks and two rhinoceros horns being illegally exported to Laos
from Mozambique. Some wildlife experts have attributed the increase in
elephant poaching to the presence of Chinese workers in Africa. With demand
for ivory products increasing back home, some Chinese workers on low
salaries in Kenya are reported to have become middlemen in the ivory trade.
And because of the high demand for ivory across Asia, the price of ivory
has shot up and can fetch more than $1,000 a kilo.

A magnitude-5.8 earthquake struck central Italy, causing buildings to
collapse in the historic centre of L’Aquila and raising fears of
fatalities. Rome, Abruzzo and other parts of central Italy were hit by the
quake, whose epicentre was in the area of Abruzzo’s capital, L’Aquila, at a
five-km depth. L’Aquila residents were shaken from sleep and ran out in
panic onto the city’s streets. Emergency services authorities said the
quake struck at 3.32 a.m. with a magnitude of 5.8 on the Richter scale. The
US Geological Survey initially reported the strength of the quake at 6.7
before lowering it to 6.3. In the hours before the earthquake, two tremors
had occurred with magnitudes of 3.5 and 3.9.

Once such warnings are received, it is up to local authorities to pass them
on to their coastal inhabitants by whatever methods have been agreed, with
instant automated text messaging among the most widely used techniques.
Text messaging is of particular value in the event of locally generated
tsunamis, when the window of warning is usually a matter of minutes, rather
than hours. But those Samoans who felt the tremor and waited for the text
that would tell them whether to head inland waited in vain, for no message
was sent out. And had anyone turned down the radio or television so as not
to miss the incoming text alert, they would have missed the islands’ only
warning – given out on local radio just as the first of two giant waves
began battering the islands’ southern shores. On New Zealand’s North
Island, meanwhile, several hundred people received their “instant” text
alert some three hours late, by which time the tsunami warning had already
been cancelled. The messaging service has now been suspended, and an
inquiry is already under way. But technological failure is not the only
factor that contributed to the death toll, which currently stands at 169.
Many of those killed were caught by the morning’s second wave as they
headed to the beaches to pick up the fish that had been washed ashore by
the first wave. Given that tsunamis usually take the form of a series of
powerful waves, sometimes even hours apart, such a fatal lack of awareness
speaks of a wider failure to pass on even basic tsunami knowledge and
preparedness to the islands’ coastal inhabitants. Education remains the
only truly effective means of reversing the effects of disaster amnesia,
but the last island-wide safety drill took place in October 2007, in
response to a tsunami earlier that year that killed 22 people on the nearby
Solomon Islands. Ironically, a similar tsunami safety drill had been
scheduled for American Samoa but the real thing arrived unannounced
instead.

Where the villages once stood, there was only mud and broken palm trees —
the mountainsides appeared gouged bare as if by a gigantic backhoe. The
villages “were sucked 30 meters deep into the earth. Even the mosque’s
minaret, taller than 20 meters disappeared. In Jumanak village, some 200 to
300 wedding guests at a restaurant were buried alive, including the bride.
Ichi, 19, had come back to the village for her wedding. “When the landslide
came, the party had just finished. I heard a big boom of the avalanche. I
ran outside and saw the trees fall down,” said Iseh, who like many
Indonesians uses only one name. “I tried to get in front of the house with
my brothers. We were so afraid. Landslides started coming from all
directions. I just ran and then I waited,” he said. Iseh says he knows of
only 10 people from the village who survived. He doesn’t know the fate of
his parents or brothers. The adjacent villages of Pulau Aiya, Lubuk Lawe
and Limo Koto Timur were also swept away. Survivors in the area said no
government aid or search teams had arrived, even four days after the quake.
Only about 20 local policemen had come with a power shovel and body bags.
“My relatives were all killed, washed away by the landslide,” said Dola
Jambak, a 48-year-old trader, picking through the rubble of his house. “I
lost seven relatives. Now all I can do is wait for the search teams. But
they don’t come.” The landslides cut off all roads, and the villages were
accessible only by foot. Jumanak is reached after walking about four miles
(six kilometers) for 1 1/2 hours.

In the attacks that started in April 1994, Hutu militias and members of the
general population sought out Tutsis and moderate Hutus, and went on a
100-day killing rampage. Civilians and children got incentives to take part
in the atrocities, including promises of land belonging to their Tutsi
neighbors. It was one of the most brutal genocides in modern history. Some
figures put the number of dead at 1 million — 10 percent of the population
of the central African nation. Millions more were raped and disfigured. A
whole generation of children lost their parents. Nizeyimana was a captain
the Rwanda Armed Forces. He is accused of exercising authority over
soldiers and personnel through a chain of command, and allegedly sent a
section of soldiers to execute of Rosalie Gicanda, a former queen of Rwanda
who was a “symbolic figure for all Tutsis.” This marks the second time
Uganda has cooperated to make an arrest. The tribunal has commended the
Interpol and the Ugandan authorities for their close cooperation.”

Malaria in the Solomon Islands and Vanuatu has been dramatically reduced
through an effective control strategy. There were 50,000 fewer cases of
Malaria in the Solomon Islands in 2008 compared with 2003. An effective
prevention and control strategy comprising of long lasting insecticide
treated bednet distribution, focal point indoor residual spraying, early
diagnosis and treatment and active case detection has had dramatic impact
on the annual incidence rate of malaria in both the Solomon Islands and
Vanuatu. The annual incidence rate (which is a measure of number of
confirmed cases of malaria per 1,000 population) has been reduced from 198
/1,000 to 84/1,000 in the Solomon Islands over the five year period ending
December 2008, while in Vanuatu it has decreased from 74/1,000 to 14 /
1,000 in the same period. Both countries had now been able to move from
control to pilot elimination as a result of the success of the Global Fund
financed programs. The capacity of both countries to scale up interventions
has further been improved as a result of AusAID’s support to the national
malaria strategies, particularly in the area of elimination and treatment.
The measures in place resulted in a significant decrease in the number of
confirmed malaria cases in the Solomon Islands compared to 2003, easing the
burden on the national health systems and budget, and reducing production
time lost due to malaria, which is a contributing factor that constrains
economic growth. A particular emphasis will be on strengthening health
systems in Pacific Islands countries and territories (PICTs).

A second pulse of the wave was 10 centimeters. It looked like a very small
wave. There were no immediate reports of damage or injuries. The two major
quakes that followed the first one were aftershocks. When there’s a big
quake, the pattern they follow is after the first quake, a second and then
a third. Those are obviously related. At the Hotel Le Paris in Noumea, the
capital of New Caledonia, the manager said that she felt the shake but had
not seen any damage. On Espiritu Santo Island in Vanuatu, dive-shop owner
Rehan Syed said he was aware of no reports of damages or injuries. “We have
the sun out and winds are pretty normal. Pretty cloudy skies but nothing
more than that.” “We felt the quake (my chair and my keyboard moved) but
did not take too much notice as we live with shakes every week,” said John
Nicholls of Vanuatu Hotels in an e-mail. At the New Caledonia Hotel, guests
were evacuated to higher ground, General Manager Torani George said, adding
that he had felt “nothing, nothing at all.”

Greenpeace today called for the arrest of the captain of the Japanese ship
Koyu Maru 3, which Greenpeace caught fishing illegally in the Exclusive
Economic Zone of the Cook Islands. “The Koyu Maru 3 and other pirate
fishing vessels are stealing fish for their own profit, depriving the
people of the Cook Islands of a vital source of income,” said Josua
Turaganivalu, Oceans Campaigner of Greenpeace Australia Pacific on board
the Esperanza. “These pirates of the Pacific must be stopped from
plundering ocean life and robbing local communities.” The Greenpeace ship
Esperanza, campaigning to end the destruction of the world’s oceans,
encountered the Koyu Maru 3 hauling in its longline and catching tuna
within Cook Islands waters, where they have no license to fish. Greenpeace
provided the Cook Islands Ministry of Marine Resources and the Fisheries
Agency of Japan with photographic evidence of the illegal activity.
Greenpeace demands the Japanese government order Koyu Maru 3, which is
owned by Tokyo-based World Tuna Co Ltd, to stop its illegal fishing
activities and sailto the nearest port for further investigation. Globally,
more than US $9 billion dollars is lost each year to pirate fishing fleets.
Pirate fishers, who reap their profits in European, American and Asian
markets, are threatening fish stocks as well as depriving Pacific
communities of much-needed income. Pirate fishing in the Pacific accounted
for an average of 36% of its total fisheries, much higher than the global
average of 19%. “The government of Japan must show leadership in tackling
illegal fishing by its vessels in the Pacific. Japan must also take the
lead among major fishing nations and support efforts by Pacific countries
to reduce fishing activities in the region by half and close all four
pockets of international waters to fishing to allow tuna stocks to
recover,” added Wakao Hanaoka, Oceans Campaigner of Greenpeace Japan.
Long-liners like the Koyu Maru 3 mainly target bigeye, yellowfin and
albacore tuna, destined for sashimi markets in Japan and other countries
where this food has become popular. Some Pacific tuna stocks, such as
bigeye and yellowfin tuna, are being fished beyond their limits.

There is almost no unemployment, and thanks to tourist revenues and
government spending, living standards are similar to those on the mainland.
But locals worry about the future. In response, Chile’s government is
proposing laws that would beef up the island’s government, give the Rapa
Nui more say in it and allow them to control immigration. It also plans to
raise the entrance fee to the Rapa Nui National Park, where most of the
main sights are, from $10 to $60 for foreigners. The Rapa Nui Parliament, a
radical group that split from the Council of Elders, is calling for
independence. Its supporters blocked the airport’s runway for two days in
August. It wants to expel Chileans, even those who have lived much of their
life on the island, unless they have a longstanding relationship with a
Rapa Nui or are the parent of a child with Rapa Nui blood. The group also
dreams of ditching Chile’s peso and forming a Polynesian currency union,
including Australia and New Zealand. Such claims are merely a sign of
economic frustration, argues Sergio Rapu, an archaeologist and former
governor of the island. Perhaps. But the question they raise is whether
greater autonomy to run their own affairs would help the Rapa Nui to avoid
a repeat of the ecological collapse they failed to prevent centuries ago.
Sometimes one has to take drastic steps in Chile (or elsewhere) to get
noticed. The protest entirely is about the Islanders wishing to control who
arrives and who does not, and their model is the Galapagos control, also
for eco reasons. The Interior Minister pushed through an on arrival
registration system after the protest, but the Supreme Court disallowed
that as unconstitutional. The problem is the number of Chileans from
poverty stricken – yes, very poor – Chile who see Rapanui as a place with
lots of money to be made. And it is. So, go to Rapanui, take up with a
local girl, produce a child and stay until things don’t work out and, then,
abandon the island, partner and child. Why would a local girl be interested
in a “roto chileno”, Chilean slang for any-old-common-bastard (rough
translation)? Simple: older islanders make it very difficult for Rapanui to
marry Rapanui since all are “related”, even if people really are not sure
what that kinship might be, which is when I get the odd pleading email for
advice. Not very nice what the Chileans do and you can see why the Rapanui
don’t like those “weeds”, as such Chileans are called. Normal tourists from
anywhere are fine, budget or rich: there is accommodation for all types.

Many smoked cigars in purification rituals, while others closed their eyes
lying face-up surrounded by candles and elaborate designs drawn on the
ground with white powder. Some calling themselves the “Vikings” pricked
their tongues with razor blades, drawing blood that ran down their chins
and chests. They said they could not reveal the esoteric secrets that
govern their traditions. The rituals are held every year in the name of the
indigenous goddess Maria Lionza, who according to legend came from the
mountain at Sorte, near the northwestern town of Chivacoa. Some repeated
the word “strength” while dancing atop flaming embers in a ceremony
honoring the goddess at the start of the annual rituals. Many camped in
tents while dedicating several days to the spiritual ceremonies. The
traditions centered on Maria Lionza are hundreds of years old and draw on
elements of the Afro-Caribbean religion Santeria and indigenous rituals, as
well as Catholicism. Believers often ask for spiritual healing or
protection from witchcraft, or thank the goddess for curing an illness.
Venezuela is predominantly Roman Catholic. The church disapproves of the
folk religion but has long since abandoned its attempts to suppress it. A
statue on a Caracas highway divider honors Maria Lionza, depicting her
naked and sitting astride a wild tapir. Followers of the sect regularly
leave offerings of flowers, liquor, coins or fruit at shrines honoring the
goddess or other folk saints.

Conflicts, climate change and poor policies are blamed for the hunger in
countries with food insecurity. The index ranks countries based on child
malnutrition, child death rates and calorie deficient population. High
rates of hunger are strongly linked to gender inequalities, especially in
terms of literacy and access to education. In Kenya, the report gives
special mention of the rural residents and the urban poor in the slums. Two
groups need nutritional interventions because of droughts and the global
financial crisis. There is no term to describe the water scarcity in Kenya
although it receives sufficient rains. Only four per cent of rainwater is
used while 96 per cent is left to flow to the ocean. The Government needs
to do much more to correct this. In Korogocho, about 150,000 people live in
an area of 1.5km2, making it one of the most densely populated slums in the
city. As a result, 3.5 per cent of children suffer from acute malnutrition
and 37.9 per cent from chronic malnutrition. Gender inequality In addition
to inadequate access to affordable foods, a poor health environment, and
low coverage of health services, the survey showed poor childcare practices
were underlying cause of malnutrition in the slum. Hunger is also related
to gender inequality. In rural Kenya, 75 per cent of women are doing much
work but with the ongoing drought, they have been weakened from looking for
water. Furthermore, men are able to move to towns leaving their wives
behind making them vulnerable. Women were encouraged to acquire education
and look for work to earn their own income. This would increase their
influence in making decisions about buying of food, health care, and other
essential needs for their children. The silent hunger crisis — affecting
one sixth of all of humanity — poses a serious risk for world peace and
security.

The audience is not allowed to understand much about the legal case — the
evidence or the pretrial rulings. Nor does one know much about either key
character, the attorney who agrees to the deal or the father and husband
who feels that justice is not served. But because the audience does witness
selected parts of the murder scene, they will understand that the greater
villain eventually will walk free. Tellingly, no judge, lawyer nor anyone
else — not even the husband who blacked out — has this God-like
perspective. Ten years roll by, and Butler’s revenge-minded victim is ready
for action. Oh, by the way, Butler is not an average guy, after all. He
actually is a secret weapon — no, better than that, he is a “Brain,” whom
U.S. spy agencies employ to kill people anywhere around the globe in a
ghostlike fashion. He’s going after anybody connected with the decade-old
case, which more or less means anybody who happened to be living in Philly
at the time. If you’ve seen the trailer, you’ve seen everything you need to
know about the murderous havoc this man rains down on the city. No attempt
is made to make either combatant credible. Foxx’s character goes along with
SWAT teams as they hunt bad guys. And Butler’s nut job couldn’t care less
about his dead wife and child. He’s having too much fun killing people. The
film is smoothly produced, though Brian Tyler’s score is too much like an
excitable cheerleader. Jonathan Sela’s photography and Alex Hajdu’s design
sustain a noirish Philadelphia that works well with the criminal mayhem.

Nai Myint Aung claimed that he fears that the gang will continue to cause
problems for his family, as the group likely remembers his motorbike
number. His Thai neighbor, who came to his rescue the day of his attack,
allegedly urged him to report the incident to the police, but Nai Mynit
Aung says he fears that reporting the gang to the Thai police will only
result in more violence. Reportedly, his fellow workers at the rubber
plantation where he is employed have heard rumors of a Thai gang killing a
family in the area who reported them to the authorities, and he does not
want his family to meet a similar fate. Mi Hlaing, Nai Myint Aung’s wife,
said, “The Thai gangs know that most of the Mon migrant workers go to the
market [once a week] to buy goods. That’s why the gangs perform a robbery
every week on the way [to the market].” Mi Hlaing added that she and her
family previously lived in Thailand’s Phanga Province, but that after an
incident 2 months ago where a 50-year-old Thai man attempted to rape her,
she and her husband decided to move to the Hat Yai area. A Mon worker named
Mi Mee, from Pattaya, also in Southern Thailand, claims that during the
last ten days, Thai gangs have stolen a gold necklace, 2000 baht, and three
mobile phones from migrant workers in the Pattya area; the rape of a
migrant woman in the area has also been attributed to gang activity. Mi Mee
explained that migrant workers in Southern Thailand feel that they must
face the abuse of Thai gangs in the area with patience, because the Burmese
workers need their jobs in Thailand too much to cause trouble.

Bangladesh rewarded a farmer who killed more than 83,000 rats, and the
government launched a nationwide campaign to kill millions more in an
effort to reduce destruction by the rodents and thus cut food imports.
Mokhairul Islam, 40, won first prize of a 14-inch color television for
killing 83,450 rats in the past nine months in the Gazipur district near
Dhaka, the capital. Islam said he used mainly poison to kill the rats at
his poultry farm, collecting their tails for proof. “This is an exciting
moment,” he said. “I will continue to kill them.” Bangladesh imports 3
million tons of food annually, and the Ministry of Agriculture estimates
that rodents destroy 1.5 million to 2 million tons of food annually. The
import of food can be cut by at least half if this year’s campaign is
successful.

Geoscientists have said that the 2007 Solomon Island earthquake may point
to previously unknown increased earthquake and tsunami risks because of the
unusual tectonic plate geography and the sudden change in direction of the
earthquake. On April 1, 2007, a tsunami-generating earthquake of magnitude
8.1 occurred East of Papua New Guinea off the coast of the Solomon Islands.
The subsequent tsunami killed about 52 people, destroyed much property and
was larger than expected. This area has some of the fastest moving plates
on Earth. It also has some of the youngest oceanic crust subducting
anywhere. Subduction occurs when one tectonic plate moves beneath another
plate. In this area, there are actually three plates involved, two of them
subducting beneath the third while sliding past each other. The Australia
Plate and the Solomon Sea/Woodlark Basin Plate are both moving beneath the
Pacific Plate. At the same time, the Australia and Solomon Sea/Woodlark
Basin Plates are sliding past each other. The Australia Plate moves beneath
the Pacific Plate at about 4 inches a year and the Solomon Sea Plate moves
beneath the Pacific Plate at about 5.5 inches per year. As if this were not
complicated enough, the Australia and Solomon Sea plates are also moving in
slightly different directions. The earthquake crossed from one plate
boundary – the Australia-Pacific boundary – into another – the
Solomon/Woodlark-Pacific boundary. The event began in the Australia Plate
and moved across into the Solomon Sea Plate and had two centers of energy
separated by lower energy areas. Normally we think earthquakes should stop
at the plate boundaries. Seismologists do not expect young sections of the
Earths crust to be locations of major earthquakes, so the Solomon Island
earthquake was unusual from the beginning. Other places along subduction
zones had this type of geography in the past and might show up
geologically. At present, there are locations along the margins of Central
America and southern South America that could potentially host similar
earthquakes. A better understanding of earthquakes zones like the Solomon
Islands may help residents along other complex plate boundaries to better
prepare for localized regions of unusually large uplift and tsunami
hazards.

More than a third of the world’s child brides are from India, leaving
children at an increased risk of exploitation despite the Asian giant’s
growing modernity and economic wealth. Nearly 25 million women in India
were married in the year 2007 by the age of 18. Children in India, Nepal
and Pakistan may be engaged or even married before they turned 10. Millions
of children are also being forced to work in harmful conditions, or face
violence and abuse at home and outside, suffering physical and
psychological harm with wide-reaching, and sometimes irreparable effects,
the report said. A society cannot thrive if its youngest members are forced
into early marriage, abused as sex workers or denied their basic rights.
Despite rising literacy levels and a ban on child marriage, tradition and
religious practices are keeping the custom alive in India, as well as in
Nepal and Pakistan. More than half the world’s child brides are in south
Asia, which also accounts for more than half the unregistered births,
leaving children beyond the reach and protection of state services and
unable to attend school or access basic healthcare. Only 6 percent of all
births in Afghanistan and 10 percent in Bangladesh were registered from
2000-08, compared to 41 percent in India and 73 percent in the tiny
Maldives. Also, about 44 million, or 13 percent of all children in south
Asia, are engaged in labour, with more than half in India. Children in the
region have also been seriously affected by insurgency and instability, as
well as natural disasters. Especially in Afghanistan, Sri Lanka and Nepal,
past or ongoing conflicts have broken down most child protection systems,
leaving children especially vulnerable. Trafficking of children for labour,
prostitution or domestic services is widespread, especially within
Bangladesh and India, and within the region, as well as to Europe and the
Middle East. Insufficient emphasis has been placed on protecting child
victims of trafficking and ensuring that any judicial proceedings brought
against them are child sensitive.

The situation in Indonesia is just as bad. Although neither of this week’s
Sumatran earthquakes proved tsunami–genic, the authorities have to work on
the assumption that any powerful undersea earthquake is liable to generate
tsunamis (the epicentre of the 7.6 magnitude quake was around 50km offshore
from the city of Padang). This is, after all, the same faultline that
caused 2004’s Boxing Day disaster, and produces regular local tsunamis
every year. But there are only 22 detection buoys to monitor all 6,000
inhabited islands in the Indonesian archipelago, and none of those cover
northern Sumatra, Indonesia’s most vulnerable region and the scene of the
highest loss of life in 2004, where the death toll in Aceh province alone
exceeded 130,000. And even where there is detection equipment in place,
there are no guarantees it will stay there. In July 2006 a local tsunami
off the Javanese coast killed nearly 700 people; it later transpired that
the two detection buoys that monitor that stretch of coast had been removed
from the sea some months before, and were awaiting repairs in a dockside
warehouse. Given that these buoys cost about $250,000 each, and require at
least $125,000 worth of annual maintenance per unit, tsunami preparedness
is proving a costly undertaking for developing nations such as Indonesia.
This week’s earthquakes were severe enough – the official death toll is
715, though estimates put it closer to 1,100 – but had either been
tsunamigenic, the city of Padang would have been as unprotected as it was
in December 2004, despite the $30m that has been spent in developing the
region’s interim warning system. Sumatra will have to wait until 2010 for
its own detection buoys to be installed, but as the pantomime across the
far wealthier south Pacific demonstrated, installing the equipment is one
thing; getting it to do its job is quite another.

In what is believed to be the longest sentence ever handed down in a
white-collar case in this district, the mastermind of a Riverside-based
Ponzi scheme that collected well over $60 million from hundreds of
investors—and caused more than $39 million in losses—was sentenced to 100
years in federal prison. Richard Monroe Harkless, 65, who lived in
Riverside when he ran the scheme through a company he called MX Factors
from 2000 until late 2003, was sentenced by United States District Judge
Virginia A. Phillips in federal court in Riverside. During today´s hearing,
Judge Phillips said that Harkless caused “every kind of grief and loss
imaginable” and that the defendant demonstrated that he “would commit his
crimes all over again if given the chance.” In addition the prison term,
Judge Phillips ordered Harkless to pay $35,479,310 in restitution to the
approximately 600 victims who lost money as a result of the scam. Harkless
was sentenced after being convicted in July of three counts of mail fraud,
three counts of wire fraud and one count of money laundering. Harkless and
a team of salespeople at MX Factors raised funds by telling potential
investors that MX Factors provided short-term loans to commercial
construction companies that had guaranteed, government-backed contracts.
Harkless created the company, controlled its bank accounts, hired and paid
agents to solicit investors and created MX Factors promotional literature.
Investors were promised returns of up to 14 percent every two or three
months, at which time investors could either receive their investments back
or roll over their investments into the next investment period. The vast
majority of MX Factors investors were “reloaded,” meaning that they were
convinced to invest money more than once. At trial, several victims
testified that Harkless and his co-conspirators encouraged potential
investors to try out the MX Factors program, investing in one 60- or 90-day
cycle and then withdrawing their money to see if it worked. Once victims
felt more comfortable with the program, Harkless and his co-conspirators
encouraged them to invest even more and to get their families and friends
to invest as well.

Villagers gathered as men used their bare hands to slowly and cautiously
pull corpses from a tangle of roots and grit. The bodies were bloated and
mutilated, some unrecognizable. One man’s body was found because his hand
was sticking out of the mud. Women wept silently as bodies were placed in
bright yellow bags. Aid also had not reached Agam district, which is much
closer to Padang. Laila, a villager in Agam district, said she and hundreds
of others had no food, clothes and clean water. “Our house is gone …
everything is gone,” she sobbed. She said a helicopter dropped some instant
noodle packets. “But we need clean water to cook it,” said Laila, who also
uses one name. She said the local river had become dirty as people were
using it to wash. In Padang, rescuers have all but given up hope of finding
any survivors in the rubble of the 140-room, Dutch-colonial style Ambacang
Hotel. Some 200 people were in the hotel when it collapsed. Search teams
have found 29 bodies so far, and no one alive. “After four days … to find
survivors is almost impossible,” said Lt. Col. Harris, the chief of the
50-member rescue team, which comprises military, police and Red Cross
personnel. “The smell of decomposing bodies is very strong,” said Harris,
who uses one name. According to the National Disaster Management Agency,
83,712 houses, 200 public buildings and 285 schools were destroyed. Another
100,000 buildings and 20 miles of road were badly damaged, and five bridges
had collapsed. Meanwhile, hundreds of doctors, nurses, search and rescue
experts and cleanup crews arrived Saturday at the Padang airport from
around the world with tons of food, tents, medicine, clean water,
generators and a field hospital. But with no electricity, fuel shortages
and telecommunication outages, the massive operation was chaotic.

Suspected insurgents killed three people, including a toddler, and wounded
at least 34 in a grenade, gun and car bomb attack on two restaurants and a
hotel in Thailand’s south. The brutal violence brings the death toll over
the past two days to four and the number of casualties to more than 50 as a
result of militant attacks in the troubled Thai south, which is gripped by
a bitter five-year uprising. The rebels, travelling by car and on three
motorcycles, hurled a hand grenade into a restaurant at lunchtime in Sungai
Kolok, a border town in Narathiwat province, wounding four people. They
then opened fire on customers, shooting dead a Buddhist police officer and
injuring another four people. A three-year-old boy who suffered gunshot
wounds later died at hospital. The gunmen then began shooting at another
nearby restaurant, killing the owner, a 45-year-old Buddhist woman, and
wounding four people. A car bomb exploded in front of one of the town’s
hotels soon afterwards, wounding 23 people.

Rates of sexually transmitted infections in the Pacific remain as high as
they were in 2004. A programme to prevent mother to child transmission had
substantially reduced the risk of an unborn child being infected with HIV
from his/her mother during delivery. The SPC public health team had
responded to the H1N1 pandemic in 2009 in partnership with the World Health
Organisation (WHO) and the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention
(CDC), and played a critical role in providing technical advice, services
and capacity building to Pacific Islands countries and territories (PICTs).
It was also involved in the response to the recent cholera outbreak in PNG.
TB control supported PICT’s in implementing the regional Stop TB strategy
in close collaboration with WHO and CDC. The HIV and STI section was
responsible for coordinating and monitoring the implementation of the
Pacific Regional strategy on HIV and STI’s in close collaboration with
multiple other agencies and countries. The very high prevalence of
noncommunicable disease risk conditions – diabetes, high blood pressure and
obesity – is amongst the highest in the world. Hypertension is the most
common condition leading up to cardiac arrest which is the leading cause of
death in the Pacific. The risk factors of smoking, alcohol, low levels of
physical activity and consumption of fruits and vegetables were the perfect
recipe for NCDs.

Climate change is already wreaking havoc on the livelihoods of small-scale
tea and coffee farmers in some of the world’s poorest countries. Research
across four countries – Kenya, Mexico, Peru and Nicaragua – showed that
growers are already being forced uphill to higher altitudes, at a rate of
three to four metres a year on average, as temperatures rise. A huge number
of growers are now experiencing increased instances of pestilence and
disease from rises in temperature. They are also facing prolonged drought
and changing weather patterns. The priority for developed countries should
be helping the world’s poor to protect themselves against climate change.
What’s crucial is that there’s an option of sustainable adaptation to
safeguard the supply chain. Climate change is affecting those least able to
deal with it. We can’t underestimate that. Smaller producers, who are
reliant on a single crop and often cannot afford to install costly
irrigation equipment as temperatures rise, are worst affected. Some farmers
could see their incomes fall by up to 90% in the next fifteen years;
worldwide 30 million farmers will be affected.

Lying injured in Vaiola Hospital, 65-year-old Sulifa Losalu mourns the loss
of her beloved husband Heneli Losalu (69) who died helping her to escape
the September 30 tsunami wave they saw rushing toward their Hihifo,
Niuatoputapu, home engulfing everything in its path. The mother of eight
children said the couple had just returned to their home after attending an
early morning church service when the earthquake struck around 6:00 am.
Sulifa heard her husband yelling for her to get out and she hurried out of
the house, but then remembered her little statue of Mary, the mother of
Jesus, and she ran back inside to get it with her handbag. Sulifa vividly
remembered she then heard a strong roaring sound “like a machine” and
Heneli shouting from outside to “run, there is a huge wave coming!” “My
husband waited for me and as I ran out I saw the wave, which was above the
coconut trees coming towards us. It was a horrifying sight and I ran, and
my husband kept yelling for me to run fast. As I looked back at him that
was the last I saw of him as the wave struck him, then me. “I was
underwater swallowing water and was thrown around like a thin stick,
hitting debris, trees that came in my way. I just remembered praying to
Mary to please help me.” Sulifa said she was then flung onto a rooftop and
held tightly onto it and managed to get up from below the surging wave to
breathe. “I felt the wave subsiding and I remained there until my son
‘Osika, who was in the bush when the tsunami hit, rescued me. “He carried
me down and the ocean was still up to our waist but the waves had subsided.
It was not until 4:00 pm that my husband was found dead, kneeling down, at
another area. I was shattered,” she said. “I feel this aching hole in my
heart after loosing my husband because I know he could have made it but he
waited for me to come out of the house before running. I love him so much
and being apart from him is devastating.” The village children later found
Sulifa’s statue of Mary and her handbag and returned them to her.

The primary objective of the people is to stage a peaceful sit in at the
Mataveri International Airport on Easter Island. No airplanes will be
allowed to depart or arrive to Rapa Nui until discussions are held and
resolutions are made. The parliament of Rapa Nui is asking for the
following: 1. To regulate the entrance of all Chilean persons from the
mainland as well as foreigners to the territory of Rapa Nui. 2. For Rapa
Nui to become an independent nation. The Rapa Nui people are asking for
these regulations due to a recent surge of immigration to the island
resulting in depletion of resources, weakening of the infrastructure and
rapid destruction of one of the world’s most treasured archeological sites.
The island is part of Chile’s national territory belonging to the
Valparaiso region which is over 3,500km away. Chile annexed the Polenesian
island in 1888 by way of some treaty at a time when a newly independent
Chile joined the fashion of having its own overseas colony. At this stage
there were very few Rapa Nui natives left, only a little over 100 as
between 1862 and 1871 some 97 per cent were either killed through smallpox,
TB and slavery or were moved off the island by Christian missionaries. Just
as well because that meant more room for sheep and so the remaining
survivors were herded into Hanga Roa, the only town on the island while the
Williamson-Balfour sheep company ran the show until 1953. (The Chileans
graciously allowed the natives walk their own island in the 1960s.)
According to Pamela Hucke, a native doctor, as late as the 1950s the
Chilean authorities actively discouraged contact with the outside world by
claiming the island was a leper colony, making this claim credible by
injecting some natives with the disease. This has never been reported in
the Chilean press as far as she knows. Locals also point out that the
airport was built by the US government while it was a Japanese firm which
resurrected the moais on the island which had been toppled. Perhaps as a
result of the general economic downturn or some other reasons, more
Chileans are coming to live on the island which is now only 60 percent
native. Islanders point to the increase in crime such as burglaries which
never happened before and the increase in hard drugs being smuggled on to
the island. Locals place full blame on the Chilean immigrants and they want
this regulated. Of course they stress that they have nothing against
tourists, Chilean or otherwise, who are welcome to stay temporarily and
enjoy the “open air museum” that the island is.

Cases of both hemorrhagic dengue and classic dengue have been on the rise
in Nicaragua. A total of 1,706 cases of classic dengue and 46 of the
hemorrhagic variety have been registered in the Central American nation.
The figures were up sharply from the 1,480 classic dengue cases and 25
hemorrhagic dengue cases detailed in an earlier report. Eight people have
died in Nicaragua from dengue so far this year. Dengue is a serious viral
disease transmitted by the Aedes aegypti mosquito that is characterized by
high fever, intense headaches, muscle pain, gastro-intestinal problems and
rashes. Hemorrhagic dengue, in addition to having symptoms associated with
classic dengue, like fever, headaches and joint pain, can also produce
internal bleeding. Children between the ages of 5 and 14 have been the
group most affected by the disease, with the outbreak being especially bad
in Boaco, Leon, Managua, Masaya and Rio San Juan provinces. Public health
officials are working to prevent the mosquitoes that spread the disease
from breeding. A door-to-door dengue prevention campaign is being conducted
in Nicaragua’s 153 municipalities.

Another ship, the Alakrana, was recently captured in the Indian Ocean.
Somali pirates have seized a Singapore-flagged container ship in the Indian
Ocean. The MV Kota Wajar was headed to the Kenyan port of Mombasa when it
was commandeered 300 nautical miles north of Seychelles. Twenty one crew
are on board the 24,637-tonne container ship. At least five vessels are now
in the hands of Somali pirates. Pirate attacks around the world more than
doubled to 240 during the first six months of 2009 compared with the same
period in 2008. The rise in overall maritime hijacking is largely due to
the increase in Somali pirate activity.

A ground breaking ceremony to redevelop the Anuha Island resort in the
Central Province is being scheduled as well as announcing a tender for the
design and construction of a four star resort. “The island is a jewel of
the pacific and we want to build a resort that does Anuha and the Solomon
Islands justice,” the SITC said while working with local authorities,
international partners and key stakeholders to develop a resort that drives
tourism development and also takes into account local needs. As part of the
development, the runway on the island will shortly be cleared as the first
part of the early construction works process. Following on from the success
to date with developing a world class resort on Anuha Island, Solomon
Islands Tourism Company is now seeking an additional land site for its next
development in the Solomon Islands. Anuha Island is located 54 kilometers
or 12 minutes flying north-east of the international airport at Honiara.

The House of Representatives passed the fishery bill into law, effectively
allowing marine patrol boats to shoot at vessels poaching in Indonesian
waters. The ministry required the harsh law to legitimize a “shoot and
sink” policy against poachers to deter any future poaching. “*Shoot and
sink’ can now be ordered under certain conditions, and we will immediately
draw up standard operation procedures to enforce the measure,” said Aji,
who also chaired the government’s working committee for the fishery bill.
However, for human rights reasons, Marine patrols would only be allowed to
shoot at ships, not sailors, he said. Indonesian waters in North Sulawesi,
Maluku, Papua and West Papua have been prone to illegal fishing by foreign
fishing ships. “The implementation of the ruling should not breach human
rights or international laws,” Aji said at a press conference on the newly
endorsed law. The policy was needed to protect Indonesia’s sovereignty, he
said. Poaching has been a chronic problem for Indonesia, which loses an
estimated Rp 30 trillion (US$3.26 billion) to poaching each year. In the
past five years, Indonesia has seized more than 700 vessels, most of them
from Vietnam, Thailand, the Philippines and Malaysia, with a few from
further afield, including Taiwan and China.

At least 1000 people were killed and hundreds were trapped under collapsed
buildings after a powerful earthquake struck Indonesia’s West Sumatra
province. Vice President Jusuf Kalla said the mayor of Padang, the capital
of West Samatra, told him that the quake left at least 75 people dead. “The
number may increase because many are still trapped in buildings and
hotels,” Kalla said. Rustam Pakaya, the head of the Health Ministry’s
disaster centre, said hundreds of people were trapped under rubble in
Padang, where a hospital among other structures had also collapsed. The
state-run Antara news agency reported that hundreds of people were believed
to have been trapped in collapsed buildings and shops in Padang’s business
district and Chinatown. A hospital official in nearby Pariaman district
said that eight people in the district had been killed and hundreds more
hospitalized with serious injuries. The quake, measuring 7.6 on the Richter
scale, struck off the western coast of Sumatra at about 1016 GMT. A 6.2
magnitude aftershock followed about 22 minutes later. A medical team was
being dispatched to West Sumatra, the region worst-hit by the quake.
Telephone communications to Padang and nearby Pariaman district were cut
off following the quake.

As the scheme began to collapse, Harkless diverted millions of dollars of
investor money to Belize and Mexico. In the final months of the scheme,
once Harkless knew that he was under investigation by various state
regulators, he accelerated his fundraising and accelerated the transfer of
funds to his own accounts in Belize. During the scheme, the bulk of the
money raised from investors was used to pay off earlier investors, to pay
agent commissions, to fund Harkless´ crabbing business in Ensenada, Mexico
and to pay for various personal expenses. Over the course of the scheme,
approximately 600 victims invested and lost money with MX Factors. Harkless
fled to Mexico shortly after the Ponzi scheme collapsed and federal
authorities executed search warrants in February 2004. Harkless was
arrested by special agents with IRS-Criminal Investigation two years ago
when he traveled to Phoenix. At this summer´s trial, Harkless represented
himself in court. Three of Harkless´ sales agents—Daniel Berardi, Thomas
Hawkesworth, and Randall Harding—pleaded guilty and received sentences of
up to six years in federal prison. The investigation into MX Factors was
conducted by IRS-Criminal Investigation, the United States Postal
Inspection Service and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

Deliveries came on C-130 cargo planes from the United States, Russia and
Australia. Japanese, Swiss, South Korean and Malaysian search and rescue
teams scoured the debris. Tens of millions of dollars in donations came
from more than a dozen countries to supplement $400 million the Indonesian
government said it would spend over the next two months. The U.N. said
there are sufficient fuel stocks in the area for four days, but with the
road to a major depot cut off by landslides, gasoline prices had jumped
six-fold. Areas with “huge levels of damage to infrastructure were in need
of basic food and tents for temporary shelter,” it said. The quake
originated on the same fault line that spawned the 2004 Asian tsunami that
killed 230,000 people in a dozen nations. A 5.5-magnitude earthquake shook
the eastern province of West Papua. There were no reports of casualties.
The quake’s epicenter was 128 kilometers northwest of the provincial
capital of Manokawar, the only major center of inhabitation. The region is
about 3,500 kilometers from Sumatra.

The explosive weighed 30 to 50 kilograms and was hidden in a Honda Civic
with a fake licence plate, which had passed a screening by a bomb detection
machine. The bomb was hidden in the passenger car and detonated by radio
signal. Two of the wounded were in a serious condition. An explosive hidden
in a motorcycle went off in Pattani province close to where Buddhists were
attending a festival, wounding 17 — five of them seriously. Earlier in the
day, four gunmen on two motorcycles opened fire on a 34-year-old Muslim
rubber worker as he travelled to work in Narathiwat province. He died at
the scene. The bloody rebellion has claimed more than 3,900 lives since it
erupted in Thailand’s Muslim-majority southern provinces, bordering
Malaysia, in January 2004. The shadowy rebels, who have never publicly
stated their goals, target Muslims and Buddhists alike and both civilians
and members of the security forces, usually with shootings and bombings.
Recent attacks echoed a serious blast in August, which ripped through a
restaurant in Narathiwat packed with government officials, wounding at
least 42 people. Tensions have simmered since the region, formerly an
autonomous Malay Muslim sultanate, was annexed by predominantly Buddhist
Thailand in 1902.

The Healthy Pacific Lifestyle (HPL) section at SPC provides an integrated
approach in the promotion of tobacco and alcohol control, physical activity
and good nutrition. The SPC-WHO joint 2-1-22 (two organisations, one
programme, 22 countries) approach funded by AusAID and NZAID was being
implemented under the Pacific Framework for the prevention and control of
NCDs. In January to June 2009, grants amounting to 23 million CPF
(approximately US$270,000) were provided to three PICT’s in support of NCDs
national strategy implementation. It will feed into a high-level,
multi-sectoral regional food security summit in early 2010. Meanwhile,
relatively neglected diseases in the Pacific were dengue and other vector
borne diseases like leptospirosis (except malaria), rheumatic heart
disease, mental health and environmental health. There were also funding
gaps for secondary prevention for noncommunicable diseases such as
diabetes, cancer and high blood pressure. Gaps were also emerging in
maternal and child health, sexual and reproductive health, on the
consequences for health of climate change, urbanisation and poor housing,
and on infant diarrhoea, water and sanitation.

Small-scale growers in Peru have seen yields fall by 40% since last year,
compared to 30% across the country as a whole; small producers in Mexico
have seen yields halve, against a national decline of 7%. Tea and coffee
are on the climate change front line because they only grow in a relatively
narrow temperature range. All four of the countries involved would see the
quantity and quality of their crops decline sharply over the coming years.
In Kenya, growers diversify into new crops such as passion fruits; in Peru,
farmers were able to use their land to sell carbon credits; and elsewhere
they planted native tree species to help bind the soil and prevent
mudslides. The government said that it will donate £12m to the Fairtrade
Foundation, with the hope of doubling the number of developing country
farmers who are awarded the Fairtrade mark. Fairtrade products pay a
premium to relatively small-scale growers, helping to protect them from the
vicissitudes of global commodity markets and the buying power of vast
multinationals. The Fairtrade mark is celebrating its 15th birthday, and
now covers a wide range of products, from bananas to chocolate. Sales of
Fairtrade products were up by 43% in 2008. The Fairtrade market as a whole
is expected to treble, to £9bn, by 2013. In the current economic climate,
it’s the poorest communities who are hit the hardest, and so positive
business models like Fairtrade, which deliver increased development
benefits from trade, are more important than ever.

Sulifa was one of the first four patients that were first flown down to
Nuku’alofa for urgent treatment. “Most of my children live here in
Tongatapu and some overseas, they are all here now and we are having a
memorial for my husband tonight in Puke where my son lives.” The mother
said when she gets better she is going back to Niuatoputapu. “Although
there is nothing there with no house left, I want to be with my husband who
is buried there,” she said. Sulifa is doing very well in the hospital and
can manage to sit up and stand up on her own for a few minutes. But she
mainly uses the wheelchair to get around while her knees are healing.

Greenlight Radio is a pirate radio station that has been broadcasting in
Boulder for just over a year. G-Girl arrives at the interview. She looks
tiny with her arms so full: a laptop, a hand mic, a notepad and pen. She
leans over the keyboard and begins pecking the keys, her cell phone stuck
to her ear. She speaks with a relaxed, almost surfer-girl accent. She
doesn’t look like a criminal. And she’s not, as far as she’s concerned;
she’s one of the last free American radio journalists. But as far as the
Federal Communications Commission is concerned, she’s an airwave thief.
Unregulated and against the law. A pirate. “Connected,” G-Girl announces to
a mysterious voice on the other line. It’s a bit “Charlie’s Angels;” we’ll
never know who this voice is. We won’t know G-Girl’s real name either, or
the names of the other KGIR radio personality “Helix” interviews Ian Nissen
about unlicensed radio at Bart’s CD Cellar. They hope they don’t have to
hide forever. After all, they say the ultimate goal of their illegal
Boulder radio station is to connect the community, and that’s hard to do
when you’re a shadow. But for now, they hide. Greenlight is still young.
This month marks its first birthday. Boulder’s airwaves aren’t new to
poaching. Boulder Free Radio, KBFR, has been stirring up the scene since
2000, in between the FCC occasionally shutting down the signal. KBFR,
started by a notably more antagonistic voice known as Monk, touted “B.S.
Free Radio,” with unedited, uncensored — and uncommercialized — music and
opinions. KBFR’s radio waves are once again static. But Boulder Free
Radio’s ship hasn’t sunk. The station has a live stream at
boulderfreeradio.com, and active Myspace, Facebook and Twitter pages.
Greenlight Radio isn’t associated with KBFR — or Boulder’s third
occasional techno-music pirate who pops up occasionally on 103.9 FM.
Greenlight is also not connected with a Fort Collins-based religious pirate
— who sometimes steals Greenlight’s stolen airwaves during the day.

Tired of not being listened to, they occupied the airport runway to grab
the attention of Santiago, causing all flights between the mainland and
Tahiti to be postponed for two days. During the protest there were many red
and white Rapa Nui flags visible, symbolising their desire of independence
for the island. Whether the island could actually survive full independence
with a population of under 4,000 is open to debate. Listening to the
locals’ concerns but also seeing the standard of life on the island we are,
however, reminded of the Monty Python satirical comedy Life of Brian where
the character Reg, urging resistance against the Roman occupation, admits:
“All right, but apart from the sanitation, medicine, education, wine,
public order, irrigation, roads, the fresh water system and public health,
what have the Romans ever done for us?” For a start the Rapa Nuis don’t pay
tax – so don’t expect a receipt for anything you buy. They also get
generous grants to study on the mainland at any university of their
choosing. The island also does not know poverty and the gap between rich
and poor is minimal. In part this is because almost all of them own land
(Chileans are not allowed buy land here), while the state provides a large
number of administrative jobs and wages are high. For example a Chilean
teacher said that she could make almost three times as much on the island
as in Santiago. But on the cultural front, they probably do have to worry a
little more. Their own language Rapa Nui is spoken about 50 50 alongside
Spanish and while most can speak the native tongue there are some younger
people who can not. Many of these people too prefer the sights and sound of
the mainland and prefer the new to the old. The island is also not immune
to the effect of globalisation which may be more of a threat than the
Chilean State in the long run. Plastered all along the main street is Coca
Cola’s image of the moais as part of its marketing strategy for the island
or the sight of Jennifer Tuku, a cultural ambassador for the island
sporting two mobile phones around her neck. Agriculture and fishing remain
strong on the island, although tourism provides some 80 percent of the
local economy and the sheer numbers of tourists arriving every day has
ensured that the modern world is firmly entrenched in Rapa Nui.

The Papua New Guinea stock exchange again surged, this time by huge 11 per
cent, as two big firms – probably responsible for the rise in confidence –
had big wins. Papua New Guinea’s biggest gold company, Lihir Gold, is
suggesting the precious metal could rise to $US1,500. And the Bank of South
Pacific took over Fiji’s 130-year-old Colonial National Bank and associated
firms.

The central bank of Bangladesh has relaxed its rules and allowed money
changers to sell a maximum US$350 to a Hajj pilgrim this year. Under the
existing regulations, each pilgrim, who will go to perform Hajj through
both public and private agencies, can take a maximum US$350 or equivalent
of other foreign currencies, if he wants. “The money changers, for the
first time, are allowed to sell the foreign currencies to pilgrims that
will help achieve their annual transactions limit, fixed by the central
bank earlier. The central bank re-fixed yearly transaction limit to
US$350,000 from $500,000 earlier for the money changers, which are
operating business across the country, excluding Dhaka and Chittagong
metropolitan areas. However, the annual transactions limit of money
changers, located in two metropolitan areas, remain unchanged at $500,000.
The money changers license will not be renewed for the next tenure if they
fail to fulfill the yearly transactions limit. Currently, 240 money
changers are operating across the country.

The fisheries ministry has been working with the Navy and the National
Police to keep poachers out of Indonesian waters. The ministry had long
sought legal endorsement for the “shoot and sink” policy, saying poachers
had shown a clear disdain for Indonesia’s outnumbered and poorly equipped
marine patrol boats. Aji added that shooting and sinking poachers’ vessels
while at sea would be more feasible than seizing their boats and towing
them to land. “Can you imagine these small, plastic patrol boats dragging
large fishing vessels to shore?” he said. “Sometimes the vessels are made
of wood and are in very poor condition, bringing with them diseases; the
locals protest against having them near their beaches.” The newly revised
law also authorizes the ministry’s civilian patrols to investigate alleged
poaching in Indonesia’s exclusive economic zone. That task previously fell
under the Navy’s authority. The need for fishing vessels to secure
operating permits before sailing is another new aspect of the law. While
lawmakers had previously rejected the policy fearing illegal fees, the
government had managed to convince them that the ruling was necessary to
control fishing activities in Indonesia’s sea waters, which were suffering
from declining fish stocks as are other parts of the globe. The law
provided clearer time limitations for investigation, prosecution and trial
processes for poaching cases, and allowed the ministry to make use of
confiscated vessels.

Fires also broke out in Padang. Padang’s Minangkabau airport was ordered
closed because roofs were damaged. The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center
issued an Indian Ocean tsunami alert after the quake, but later cancelled
it. The quake was also felt strongly in North Sumatra, Riau in eastern
Sumatra as well as Bengkulu province in southern Sumatra, residents.
Indonesia, the world’s largest archipelago, sits on the so-called Pacific
‘Ring of Fire’, the edge of a tectonic plate prone to seismic upheaval. A
major earthquake and subsequent tsunami struck in December 2004, leaving
more than 170,000 people dead or missing in Indonesia’s Aceh province and
half a million people homeless. This quake occurred along the same fault
line. Geologists have said that Padang, a low-lying city of 900,000 people,
risks being swallowed by a tsunami in the event of an earthquake similar in
size to the one that triggered the giant waves of 2004.

In a case of “serious administrative error”, an Australian resident was
locked up in a detention facility for three years. An egregious error
highlights the need for a revamping of federal laws, which have unlawfully
deprived this man of his liberty. Wrongful detention for over three years
is a matter of grave concern, and it is equally a matter of concern that
the legal framework does not confer powers necessary to address problems
and disadvantage of this kind. In 1989, Vietnamese-born Van Phuc Nguyen was
granted refugee status as an 18 year old, after fleeing Vietnam and
spending four years in a refugee camp in the Philippines. Sydney airport
immigration officials failed to recognize his visa in 2002. As a result,
he was detained from November 2002 to February 2006 in Villawood
Immigration Detention Centre. Nguyen’s residency was inadvertently
cancelled upon his return to Australia from a trip to Vietnam in 1995, when
an immigration official issued him a one month visa. Located in the suburbs
of Sydney, Villawood serves mainly as a facility for any individual who has
over-stayed his visa, failed to comply with his visa, or has been denied
entry to Australia. It has been at the center of controversy over human
rights abuses over the last several years. The Human Rights and Equal
Opportunity Commission found the Centre’s conditions deplorable and
“inhospitable” and recommended that it be closed immediately.

Malaria in the Solomon Islands and Vanuatu has been dramatically reduced
through an effective control strategy. There were 50,000 fewer cases of
Malaria in the Solomon Islands in 2008 compared with 2003. An effective
prevention and control strategy comprising of long lasting insecticide
treated bednet distribution, focal point indoor residual spraying, early
diagnosis and treatment and active case detection has had dramatic impact
on the annual incidence rate of malaria in both the Solomon Islands and
Vanuatu. The annual incidence rate (which is a measure of number of
confirmed cases of malaria per 1,000 population) has been reduced from 198
/1,000 to 84/1,000 in the Solomon Islands over the five year period ending
December 2008, while in Vanuatu it has decreased from 74/1,000 to 14 /
1,000 in the same period. Parr said both countries had now been able to
move from control to pilot elimination as a result of the success of the
Global Fund financed programs implemented co-jointly by both countries’
national vector borne disease control programs, WHO and SPC. The capacity
of both countries to scale up interventions has further been improved as a
result of AusAID’s support to the national malaria strategies, particularly
in the area of elimination and treatment. The measures in place resulted in
a significant decrease in the number of confirmed malaria cases in the
Solomon Islands compared to 2003, easing the burden on the national health
systems and budget, and reducing production time lost due to malaria, which
is a contributing factor that constrains economic growth.

Greenlight started as Internet radio, which is not regulated. The two
Boulder brothers who founded it eventually built their own transmitter and
figured out how to poach one of the few unoccupied frequencies in the area.
Their belief: The broadcast spectrum belongs to the public — not
corporations and media conglomerates shaped by strangers who know nothing
about Boulder. By nature, radio waves are only strong enough to span a
small geographic community. So the station founders said that it only seems
logical that each community has control over what appears on its waves.
They’re not talking about anarchy, or even about the desire to spout curse
words on the radio without being bleeped out. They’re talking about
“relocalization.” “Bringing resource and regulation control back to the
local community,” says one DJ and Boulder native who goes by the on-air
name Rocky Flats. He says a community radio compliments the trend of
increasingly more people growing their own food, shopping at local farmer’s
markets and co-ops and setting up online blogs and personal Web pages. “The
world is going through a huge shift right now. Boulder is doing well in
this recession because we localize a lot,” Rocky Flats says. “Localization
is the key to survival.” Rocky Flats thinks it’s also the key to overcoming
what he calls the current “media crisis,” where Paris Hilton gets
precedence over political turmoil in Pakistan, and a handful of
corporations control the news and views that Americans are fed. Rocky Flats
says he’s passionate about politics, as well as music and information. When
he’s not volunteering at Greenlight — none of the 30 DJs and members are
paid — he works in a customer service job. Rocky Flats looks clean-cut and
well put-together, and his tone is focused and professional. “Our direction
is for the community to believe the airwaves are a local resource,” he
says. “We try to provide an example of that. Eventually through enough
actions, we can take the airwaves completely back.”

Oceanic Airlines is the fictional airline that operated Flight 815 which
crashed on the Island. According to Oceanic Airlines’ website, the company
was founded in 1979 and served other destinations such as Costa Rica,
London, and Seoul. After the events of Flight 815, it ceased operations due
financial difficulties. But the company was returning to the airways. It
was established that Oceanic Airlines had cancelled all flights whilst
conducting an investigation into Flight 815’s disappearance. After failing
to find anything, the company was pushed to close the case so that they
could resume flights and recover from loss of business. This decision to
conclude all passengers dead with no solid proof resulted in opposition
from individuals such as Sam Thomas, the main protagonist in the second
Lost alternate reality game that focused specifically on Oceanic Airlines,
Find 815. A video advertisement aired at Comic-Con 2009 ostensibly stated
that Oceanic Airlines had been running since 1979 with a 30 year perfect
safety record. The canonical status of this video, and how it contradicts
all previously established fact, is presently unclear.

President Hugo Chavez’s government has begun taking over management of a
Hilton-run hotel on Venezuela’s Margarita Island. A 20-year concession
granted to the company had expired and the government “has taken legitimate
control of an asset that belongs to all the people of Venezuela”. Mr Chavez
issued a decree last week ordering the “forced acquisition” of the
Margarita Hilton & Suites and its marina. A Hilton Worldwide spokeswoman
said the company was analysing the move to determine how its interest in
the hotel would be affected.

It now seems that passengers flying in and out of Papua New Guinea are
being terrorized by an underpants thief. Women travelers who are flying
with the national carrier Air Niugini are fed up with one or more baggage
handlers taking their underwear. Four women, who do wish to remain nameless
due to the nature of the event, said that some of their best undergarments
have been stolen from their luggage while traveling on domestic flights
when leaving the capital Port Moresby. It may come at no surprise that some
reports point out that only “attractive” women have been hit by this so
called thief, and the ones that are hit only have their sexier
undergarments stolen. Another tourist that was on a brief stay in Papua New
Guinea said that her bag has a lock on it; however, when she got it back
the lock bad been broken. The only items that she found missing from her
bag were her lace hipster briefs and her g-strings. She went on to say that
she just could not believe it. She noted that she has traveled all over the
world, and this is the very first time something like this has ever
happened. In a different case, a woman that was visiting her mother in
Papua New Guinea was shocked to find that her favorite pair of pink panties
were missing. She went on to say that what is so weird about the whole
thing is that she had much more valuable items in her bag besides her
underpants, and those remained untouched. Despite all of this, Air Nigugini
said that they will get to the bottom of the women’s undergarments thief.
One spokesperson said that they were unaware that such particular items
were being targeted.

Travelers to Southeast Asia beware: there’s a new strain of malaria in
town. Researchers have recently figured out that the Plasmodium knowlesi
strain of malaria, which used to be confined to Malaysian macaque monkeys,
can kill humans too. The especially nasty part about this new human strain
of malaria is that doctors have a hard time recognizing it. Symptoms and
disease progression look scarily similar to other less serious forms of
malaria, so you might end up dead before the doctors realize they should’ve
done something differently. You can pick up this malaria from mosquito
bites across the region, but especially in Borneo and Malaysia. You should
be extra sure to use mosquito repellent in these areas to prevent bites,
and head straight to the doc if you get fever and body aches and pains.

The world’s eighth largest economy is still finding its feet after
suffering multiple economic shocks, including a housing slump, mortgage
crisis and recession. Employers in California, the most populous US state,
are expected to keep cutting staff in 2010 as the wider US jobs market
recovers. As industries in other US states prepare to rehire on signs of
recovery, firms in California are still waiting for their economy to
rebound. The state has 12.2 percent unemployment, above the national US
level of 9.8 percent, and at odds with California’s image as an oasis of
opportunity in hard times. California’s economic engines – Silicon Valley,
Hollywood and gateway ports to Asia – remain the envy of other US regions
but seem incapable of reducing Rust Belt-like unemployment rates. That is
largely because of the Golden State’s housing and home building crisis. In
the 12 months through August, California’s construction industry shed
142,000 jobs, or 18.5 percent of its work force, marking the largest
decline on a percentage basis over the period of surveyed industry groups.
Those workers are struggling to find new jobs in construction or other
trades, according to analysts. House prices soared higher in California
than in most other US states earlier this decade and have crashed harder
amid the credit crunch. Developers are trying to unload unsold new homes
and real estate agents are relying on selling foreclosures for a large
share of business. Tight credit and steep job losses have slimmed ranks of
prospective home buyers, with many waiting for prices to drop further. At
the same time, a number of other states are beginning to see home prices
stabilize.

Featuring old Papua New Guinea necklaces of human teeth and ivory
nose-rings as well as the extravagant designer suits paraded in poor Congo
by today’s “sapeur” movement, a show opening in Paris revisits men’s finery
through the ages. In Brazzaville and Kinshasa, as well as in the slums of
Paris and Brussels, men who barely eke out a living have been forking out
their savings since the 80s on the most luxurious, elegant and expensive
menswear on the market. The craze known as “Le Sape” was introduced by pop
star Papa Wemba’s throwback at the time to a look of 1930s elegance —
tapered trousers, brogues, trimmed hair and tweed hats worn at a rakish
angle — but in a wider brighter range of colours.

Nguyen’s is the longest case of wrongful detention in recent history. This
“bureaucratic bungle” caused Nguyen to suffer unnecessarily, as he is now
burdened with severe mental health issues. He witnessed many traumatic
events, from stabbings and suicide attempts to widespread drug abuse, while
inside Villawood. The situation was a “very bad event, a serious
administrative error and a terrible circumstance”. In its settlement
discussions, the government has offered Nguyen’s $70,000, a sum which would
be reduced to $58,000 once the Government’s legal fees are taken out. This
amount breaks down to less than $50 a day for each day that Nguyen spent in
Villawood. A attorney for this Sydney resident, has rejected the
Commonwealth’s offer as inadequate. The Government admits only that
officials made a mistake with respect to 108 of the 1137 total days that
Nguyen spent in detention.

Responding to the needs of Pacific Islands countries and territories and
recognising that there are wide social determinants in health, SPC’s health
division is modifying its strategy from a disease-based approach to a
whole-of-health approach. A particular emphasis will be on strengthening
health systems in Pacific Islands countries and territories (PICTs). Rates
of sexually transmitted infections in the Pacific remain as high as they
were in 2004 and a comprehensive review of the strategies was being
commissioned. A programme to prevent mother to child transmission had
substantially reduced the risk of an unborn child being infected with HIV
from his/her mother during delivery. The SPC public health team had
responded to the H1N1 pandemic in 2009 in partnership with the World Health
Organisation (WHO) and the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention
(CDC), and played a critical role in providing technical advice, services
and capacity building to Pacific Islands countries and territories (PICTs).
It was also involved in the response to the recent cholera outbreak in PNG.
TB control supported PICT’s in implementing the regional Stop TB strategy
in close collaboration with WHO and CDC. There is a very high prevalence of
noncommunicable disease risk conditions – diabetes, high blood pressure and
obesity – being among the highest in the world.

Pirating unregistered radio waves is surprisingly simple. All DJs need is a
microphone, Internet connection and computer. They broadcast their reports
and stream their tunes online, to greenlightradio.com, according to another
DJ, who goes by an especially pirate-y name, Treeson Bloodbeard. “Anyone
can do Internet radio. Anyone can listen to Internet radio,” he says. “In
our case, a separate computer is also listening, with a headphones jack
plugged into the transmitter.” Of course, he can’t disclose where this
transmitter is stationed. Rumor was that Boulder Free Radio used to
broadcast out of a van, but Treeson says that’s unlikely because the signal
would fluctuate too much. “We have a hot air balloon,” he says with a
smirk. Treason, who has lived in Boulder for eight years, calls himself a
“techno-shaman, actively trying to bring spirituality to the new punk,
now-apathetic generation.” Greenlight typically broadcasts FM 4 p.m.-4 a.m.
weekdays and wall-to-wall weekends, with no commercials. When the station
isn’t shut down, that is. In its first year, the FCC has already canned
Greenlight three times. When the FCC triangulates Greenlight’s signal, the
FCC leaves a warning saying Greenlight must shut down because it’s not
registered. But the DJs aren’t hostile about it. They say it’s part of the
game. “We don’t hate the FCC,” Treeson says. “The laws they’re going by are
just outdated, and they need help changing them. The FCC was created in
1934.” Treeson believes there should instead be a modern Boulder
Communications Commission, to distribute and protect the airwaves. DJ Rocky
Flats agrees there is a need for a radio regulation commission; the FCC
finds out what is wrong with signals and helps stations clean up. In fact,
the FCC has helped Greenlight improve its signal each time before shutting
it down. “Instead of fighting fire with fire (like Boulder Free Radio),”
Rocky Flats says, “when the FCC pushes, we pull and redirect their energy
where we want it to go.”

Photos and video clips of rival sapeurs doing battle, flashing labels and
stripping down to their silks socks and underwear, are on view at the show
at Paris’ Dapper museum, titled “The Art of Being A Man, Africa, Oceania.”
The sapeurs underline contemporary man’s taste for finery. They revisit the
western suit through African eyes. One non-sapeur fashionista visitor, a
tall poney-tailed African in a red tartan skirt carrying a helmet, was
stunned by an old Dinka corset from Sudan, a torso-sized piece made of red
beads, metal and fibre. “It just shows,” he said. “Men’s corsets are now
coming back in fashion yet existed long ago.” From corsets to penis sheafs
from the Pacific, as well as pendants, ear-rings, nose-rings and bracelets,
the exhibition brings together some 150 pieces from specialist museums from
across the world. These objects help show how men develop their male
identity. Some were used in sexual and social rituals or to provide
protection, others were worn to show a man’s status, or underline his
position through finery. The porcupine hat from Cameroon accessorises a
porcupine tunic, highlighting the sacred impact of different animals or
materials in different societies. Other show-stopper head-pieces include
hats in cat-teeth, tiny antelope horns or scaly anteater and leopard-skin.
Hair-cuts too vary from place to place as does body art practised to
accompany mutilation and circumcision rites.

In another instance of wrongful detention, the Commonwealth paid
German-born Australian Cornelia Rau $2.6 million. She was locked up in 2004
for 10 months. Even more recently, the Supreme Court of the Australian
Capital Territory last month awarded $55,000 to a man who was wrongfully
detained for 29 days. Nguyen’s situation has prompted officials to consider
an overhaul of the system, acknowledging there are major deficiencies with
current legislation. The Migration Act lacks a “safety net provision”.
Accordingly, the Department of Immigration lacks the express power to
remedy earlier decisions. In Nguyen’s case, the Department engaged in heavy
legal debate, thus causing significant delay in resolving the matter.

Hypertension is the most common condition leading up to cardiac arrest
which is the leading cause of death in the Pacific. The risk factors of
smoking, alcohol, low levels of physical activity and consumption of fruits
and vegetables were the perfect recipe for NCDs. The SPC-WHO joint 2-1-22
(two organisations, one programme, 22 countries) approach funded by AusAID
and NZAID was being implemented under the Pacific Framework for the
prevention and control of NCDs. Grants amounting to 23 million CPF
(approximately US$270,000) were provided to three PICT’s in support of NCDs
national strategy implementation. Meanwhile, relatively neglected diseases
in the Pacific were dengue and other vector borne diseases like
leptospirosis (except malaria), rheumatic heart disease, mental health and
environmental health. There were also funding gaps for secondary prevention
for noncommunicable diseases such as diabetes, cancer and high blood
pressure. Gaps were also emerging in maternal and child health, sexual and
reproductive health, on the consequences for health of climate change,
urbanisation and poor housing, and on infant diarrhoea, water and
sanitation.

The Greenlight DJs make great effort to present themselves in a
non-confrontational light. So why break the rules at all? Why not just be a
donor-funded community radio station, like Boulder’s KGNU, 88.5 FM? Beyond
simply the principle belief that the FCC needs reshaped, DJ Treason says a
station like Greenlight is even more independent than KGNU. A donor-funded
station can’t upset too many listeners, because the station needs their
donations. “They do a necessary part of the battle by playing by the rules,
so they can do things we can’t do because we don’t have money or
licensing,” Treason says. “But we are doing our part of the battle by not
playing by the rules, and there are things we can do because we don’t rely
on donors.” Like Greenlight’s newest show, “Reefer Madness,” all about the
positive aspects of pot. Plus, as another DJ who goes by The Hair puts it:
“There’s too much going on out there to not need multiple stations.” The
Hair gets his name because he has long blond hair. He says Greenlight has
its own unique music tastes and opinions. “And we’re pirates, so we have to
speak like sailors,” The Hair says with a laugh. It’s true, DJ Treeson
admits. Greenlight is “raunchier” than KGNU. “But there is a distinction
between free speech and responsible speech. Responsibility comes with the
consequences,” he says. And he accepts that. “There’s a level of danger in
what we do,” Treason says. “But no American has ever been sent to jail for
this.” The real crime is turning on the transmitter, he says. When the FCC
shut down Boulder Free Radio, the warning was shut down or be punished by
up to $11,000 per day and one year in jail. Greenlight has never been
fined. So Treason says he refuses to be clouded by fear. “Fear distracts
you from your ultimate goal,” he says. “If you define yourself in
opposition to something, you’re not defining yourself, period.” Yet still,
he hides.

Another home invasion, this time in Belize City. It is getting apparent
that burglars are getting more abrasive and their new trend is to invade
while the victims are still inside. There were home invasions in San Pedro
and another in Hattieville where an elderly Canadian woman was also raped.
Two African men living in Belize City were the next victims to experience
the terrifying ordeal. Twenty-six year old Samuel Benguna and twenty-four
year old Ismail Conteh, both of Nigeria, were at their apartment on the
Northern Highway when they were surprised by three men with rags covering
their faces. These two African gentlemen were at home when they heard a
knock on their door and they were accosted by three men who robbed them at
gunpoint. Stolen from them were computer accessories and cell phones and an
amount of cash in both US and Belize currency. There are no suspects yet as
police investigations continue into this matter. With the increasing number
of Aggravated Burglaries that we are witnessing is concerning and the
police will be delivering pamphlets shortly advising residents on measures
to protect themselves. The ultimate protection is the neighbourhood watches
and the community policing that the police department is trying to promote.
The cash stolen from the men totaled four thousand, two hundred dollars.

A passenger train bound for Bangkok derailed in Thailand’s Hua Hin coastal
resort district in heavy rain, killing at least five people and injuring up
to 50. About six of the train’s 16 cars went off the tracks and some people
were believed trapped.

Seven new glowing mushroom species have been discovered in Belize, Brazil,
Dominican Republic, Jamaica, Japan, Malaysia and Puerto Rico. Four of the
species are completely new to scientists, and three previously known
species were discovered to be luminescent. All seven species, as well as
the majority of the 64 previously known species of luminescent mushrooms,
are from the Mycena family. Within Mycena, the luminescent species come
from 16 different lineages, which suggests that luminescence evolved at a
single point and some species later lost the ability to glow. The new
discoveries might help scientists understand when, how and why mushrooms
evolved the ability to glow. Luminescence might attract nocturnal animals,
which would then help the mushrooms spread their spores. Mycena
silvaelucens (forest light) was collected in the grounds of an Orangutan
Rehabilitation Center in Borneo, Malaysia and was found on the bark of a
standing tree. The mushrooms are tiny with each cap measuring less than 18
millimeters in diameter. Mycena luxaeterna (light eternal) was collected in
Sao Paulo, Brazil and was found on sticks in an Atlantic forest habitat.
These mushrooms are tiny with each cap measuring less than 8 millimeters in
diameter and their stems have a jelly-like texture. The species’ name was
inspired by Mozart’s Requiem. Mycena luxarboricola (light tree dweller) was
collected in Paraná, Brazil and was found on the bark of a living tree in
old growth Atlantic forest. These mushrooms are tiny with each cap
measuring less than 5 millimeters in diameter.

The Solomon Islands police chief and his wife have been robbed in a
frightening home invasion by 12 young men in the capital Honiara, where a
spate of similar burglaries has occurred recently. New Zealander Peter
Marshall, the Solomon Islands police commissioner, and his wife Pamela
barricaded themselves in their bedroom after being woken by the thieves at
1am. They were not targeted for political reasons. “It was pretty
frightening,” he said. “We barricaded ourselves into the bedroom with a
cupboard and wardrobe against the door. There was a fair bit of commotion
and kicking against the door,” he said. “There has been four similar
robberies like this in the last six weeks,” he said. Laptops, cash, a
digital camera and other personal effects were taken but most of the goods
had been returned. “The suspects were arrested shortly afterwards and are
now in police custody.” The attack is part of a growing trend among
unemployed youth in the lead up to Christmas. “We’ve identified who it is,
there is a trend of robberies by the same unemployed youths who live in
squatter settlements.” Honiara mayor Andrew Mua said he feared rising crime
and unemployment was a threat to peace and security in the city. But
Marshall rejected those claims, adding that crime rates had dropped 12 per
cent during 2009 and most crime in the Solomons was petty. “We’ve had no
firearm incidents in two and a half years, we’ve had a scattering of
burglaries,” he said. The Regional Assistance Mission to Solomons Islands
(RAMSI) is made up of Australian, New Zealand and Pacific Islands police,
troops and public officials, who arrived in 2003 to restore law and order
and good governance following years of ethnic unrest.