A mob set ablaze eight buses and several shops after a schoolgirl was run
\nover by a bus at an unauthorized bus stand near Domjur police station. The
\ndeath of Riya Das, a Class-VII student of a local school, triggered mob
\nfury as locals alleged that the unauthorized bus stand was creating traffic
\nproblems in the area and started setting ablaze buses and shops. Rapid
\nAction Force (RAF) had to be called in to control the situation.<\/p>\n
Violent street battles killed at least 140 people and injured 828 others in
\nthe deadliest ethnic unrest to hit China’s western Xinjiang region in
\ndecades, and officials said the death toll was expected to rise. Police
\nsealed off streets in parts of the provincial capital, Urumqi, after
\ndiscord between ethnic Muslim Uighur people and China’s Han majority
\nerupted into riots. Witnesses reported a new protest in a second city,
\nKashgar.<\/p>\n
Venezuelan authorities found the bullet-ridden bodies of three Canadian
\nboys who had been kidnapped in the South American country, the justice
\nminister said. The bodies of 17-year-old John Faddoul, along with his
\nbrothers Kevin, 13, and Jason, 12, were found near an electrical tower in
\nYare, about 30 miles west of Caracas, Justice Minister Jesse Chacon said.
\nThe body of the boy’s driver, 30-year-old Miguel Ribas, also was found with
\nthem.<\/p>\n
A total of 816 people died of swine flu worldwide, with most of the deaths
\noccurring in South America, the World Health Organisation (WHO) said. So
\nfar, 707 people have died in the Americas, 44 in South-East Asia, 34 in
\nEurope, 30 in the Western Pacific region and one in the Eastern
\nMediterranean region.<\/p>\n
Many Strong Voices (MSV), unites indigenous peoples from the Arctic with
\nthose from the tiny coral isles sprinkled throughout the globe’s oceans,
\nknown in the parlance of climate change policy as Small Island Developing
\nStates, or SIDS. MSV was spawned on the heels of a 2005 United Nations
\nclimate policy meeting in Montreal and met for the first time in Belize two
\nyears later. The grounds its constituents call home are as diverse as the
\nplanet has to offer, but as the planet warms they share the same
\ncatastrophe.<\/p>\n
On many nights at sea off this Pacific port, Aaron Medina drops bombs that
\ncause dozens of fish to soar into the air. The 23-year-old fisherman
\nrubbernecks to ensure no police are around before pulling a 1-pound bomb
\nfrom his pocket. It’s an old sardine can wrapped in a cement bag filled
\nwith gunpowder, sugar and sulfur. It is lit with a waterproof wick. “It’s
\nthe only way to survive in fishing today,” said Medina, who has been
\nfishing with explosives off Corinto, Nicaragua’s largest port, since he was
\n12 years old.<\/p>\n
Already poverty kills 50 children each day in the Pacific, Papua New Guinea
\nand Timor-Leste – a figure likely to rise as the global financial crisis
\nhits. Many countries in the Pacific are yet to suffer the full impact of
\nthe global financial crisis but it is about to hit the region with all the
\ndevastation and suffering of a tsunami. There is a critical ‘window of
\nopportunity’ to act in preparation for its impact but it is an opportunity
\nthat is steadily slipping away. The central lesson learned from every
\nprevious economic crisis is that the poorest people in developing countries
\nsuffer the most and that not enough is done to help them.<\/p>\n
Travelers to Thailand have braved a variety of hazards in recent years but
\nforeign governments are now warning about a new and different one:
\nduty-free shopping at the airport. Several European tourists say they were
\nfalsely accused of shoplifting at the Thai capital’s main airport and some
\nrecount being taken to seedy motels where they were shaken down for
\nthousands of dollars by a shady middleman. A British couple paid the
\nequivalent of $11,000 to secure their release five days after being accused
\nof stealing a Givenchy wallet that was never found, say police, who along
\nwith airport authorities deny any wrongdoing.<\/p>\n
A violent crowd went on the rampage at Jyoti Chowk in Kondhwa damaging
\nshops and vehicles which forced many shops and commercial establishments to
\ndown their shutters. According to Kondhwa police, around 25 to 30 people,
\ncarrying saffron flags assembled at Jyoti Chowk; first they asked all shops
\nto close down and started pelting at shops and hotels that were open. Four
\ntwo-wheelers, a few cars, a Pune Mahanagar Parivahan Mahamandal Limited bus
\nand an ATM centre were damaged in the incident. As the situation grew
\ntense, commercial establishments in the area closed down for an hour. Soon,
\nthe Kondhwa police reached the spot. \u201cWe summoned two strike force to bring
\nthe crowd under control,\u201d said Deputy Commissioner of Police Jalinder
\nSupekar.<\/p>\n
For some time now, Carteret Islanders have made eye-catching headlines:
\n\u201cGoing, going\u2026 Papua New Guinea atoll sinking fast\u201d. Academics have dubbed
\nus amongst the world\u2019s first \u201cenvironmental refugees\u201d and journalists put
\nus on the \u201cfrontline of climate change.\u201d So perhaps you have heard how we
\nbuild sea walls and plant mangroves, only to see our land and homes washed
\naway by storm surges and high tides. Maybe you can even recognise the
\ntragic irony in the fact that the Carterets people have lived simply
\n(without cars or electricity) \u2014 subsisting mainly on fish, bananas and
\nvegetables \u2014 and have therefore not had much of a \u201ccarbon footprint\u201d.<\/p>\n
Columns of paramilitary police in green camouflage uniforms and flak vests
\nmarched around Urumqi’s main bazaar \u2014 a largely Uighur neighborhood \u2014
\ncarrying batons, long bamboo poles and slingshots. Mobile phone service was
\nblocked, and Internet links were also cut or slowed down. Rioters
\noverturned barricades, attacking vehicles and houses, and clashed violently
\nwith police in Urumqi, according to media and witness accounts. State
\ntelevision aired footage showing protesters attacking and kicking people on
\nthe ground. Other people, who appeared to be Han Chinese, sat dazed with
\nblood pouring down their faces.<\/p>\n
“We lament, despite the efforts that were made 24 hours a day since this
\nstarted, we have not been able to prevent this abominable homicide,” Chacon
\nsaid. “The three boys were identified by a relative.” Police have said that
\nthe brothers were abducted when unidentified men dressed as police stopped
\ntheir car at a roadside checkpoint in Caracas as the boys were on their way
\nto school. Authorities have not ruled out the possibility that the
\nkidnappers could in fact be police officers.<\/p>\n
In addition, more than 20 countries such as Afghanistan, Belize, Bhutan,
\nBotswana, Haiti, Namibia, Sudan, Tanzania, and Solomon Islands, among
\nothers, have confirmed swine flu cases. A total of 134,503 people worldwide
\nhave been affected by the influenza A(H1N1) virus, also called swine flu,
\nso far. The actual figure may be much higher, as countries are no longer
\nrequired to report swine flu cases.<\/p>\n
“We want to tell the world that the Inuit hunter falling through the ice
\nand the Pacific Islander fishing on rising seas are connected.” Four years
\nago the United States was indicted in front of the Inter-American
\nCommission on Human Rights for producing the greenhouse gas emissions that
\nwere warming the Arctic homeland at rates twice as fast as elsewhere on the
\nplanet. The warming hasn’t stopped but the network has increased, and the
\nworld they inhabit has become even more tenuous. “This is the start of the
\ndying of a civilization” warned an economic advisor to the president of the
\nSeychelles, an archipelago in the Indian Ocean just north of Madagascar.<\/p>\n
Medina is part of the nation’s booming blast fishing industry, which is
\nquickly spreading across Central America’s Pacific coast. The practice is
\nalso common in El Salvador and Honduras. Blast fishing is an illegal but
\nlucrative practice in which fishermen throw small homemade bombs into the
\nmarine habitat, killing entire schools of fish and wiping out everything
\nelse within the blast zone – including coral reef habitats – thus depleting
\nfisheries. “In a few years, blast fishing will be everywhere if it
\ncontinues like this,” said Reinaldo Bermuti of Nicaragua’s Fisheries
\nInstitute in the capital, Managua. Other authorities fear the practice is
\nfueling a black market for increasingly potent explosives that could fall
\ninto the hands of gangs or terrorist groups. “That’s why we’re constantly
\nworking on intelligence,” said police investigator Lester Gomez.<\/p>\n
Beneath the current financial crisis lies a development emergency with
\ncatastrophic implications if we fail to respond effectively. And those in
\nthe teeth of this economic storm are women and children. The Pacific
\nIslands countries are already burdened by poverty. One in four households
\nand almost one in three of the population are below the respective national
\npoverty lines. One in 10 Pacific Island children are underweight. Almost
\none in five children do not enrol in primary school and of those who do
\nenrol, one in 10 do not complete their primary level schooling. Of course
\nthe biggest sign of how well government action is protecting children is
\nthe death rate of under-five-year-olds. If we add Papua New Guinea and
\nTimor-Leste, 18,000 Pacific Island children under five die each year – 50
\nchildren per day. Yet forecasts based on the impact of the global financial
\ncrisis estimate the number of child deaths could rise by a further 800 each
\nyear.<\/p>\n
The Thai government has vowed a crackdown at Bangkok’s scandal-plagued
\nSuvarnabhumi Airport, which has barely recovered from its public relations
\ndisaster when anti-government protesters shut it for a week and stranded
\n300,000 visitors. The airport opened in 2006 and has been dogged by
\ncorruption allegations, taxi touts with “broken meters” and baggage thefts
\n\u2014 prompting a recent order for luggage handlers to wear uniforms without
\npockets. But the allegations of extortion take things to another level. “We
\nare quite concerned about this,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Vimon Kidchob
\nsaid. “The government of Thailand is doing everything we can to ensure the
\nsafety of tourists.”<\/p>\n
Apparently, the incident occurred after some miscreants showed disrespect
\nto Shivaji Maharaj. The police have so far arrested five people in
\nconnection with the incident and booked them for rioting and damaging
\npublic property. The police are looking of Amar Dhawane, Maharashtra
\nNavnirman Sena vice president, Hadapsar Unit, and around 20 unidentified
\npeople involved in the incident. Shrikant Surve (21), Nitin Kakde (23),
\nRamesh Patlelu (24) of Wanwadi, Sunil Patil (21) of Kondhwa and Amol Kad
\n(23) of Katraj are the five arrested<\/p>\n
You might know that encroaching salt water has contaminated our fresh water
\nwells and turned our vegetable plots into swampy breeding grounds for
\nmalaria-carrying mosquitos. Taro, the staple food crop, no longer grows on
\nthe atoll. Carterets Islanders now face severe food shortages, with
\ngovernment aid coming by boat two or three times a year. However, the story
\nyou have not likely read is the one of government failure and the strategy
\nwe developed in response, so as to engineer our own exile from a drowning
\ntraditional homeland. Carterets people are facing, and will continue to
\nface, many challenges as we relocate from our ancestral grounds. However,
\nour plan is one in which we remain as independent and self-sufficient as
\npossible. We wish to maintain our cultural identity and live sustainably
\nwherever we are.<\/p>\n
Riya was returning home in Domjur\u2019s Uttar Japardah locality and had barely
\nstepped down a private bus on route 63 when the driver accelerated the
\nvehicle to park it at the bus stand. At this, she fell and was crushed
\nunder the rear wheels. Angry locals gathered at the spot within moments and
\nset the bus ablaze. The mob then targeted three other buses on route 63
\nparked at the bus stand. Then, the mob went on the rampage, setting fire to
\nfive mini buses on the Domjur-Howrah route. The crowd also targeted all the
\nroadside shops, stalls and shade where bus drivers and conductors rest,
\nsetting these ablaze.<\/p>\n
There was little immediate explanation for how so many people died. The
\ngovernment accused a Uighur businesswoman living in the U.S. of inciting
\nthe riots through phone calls and “propaganda” spread on Web sites. Exile
\ngroups said the violence started only after police began violently cracking
\ndown on a peaceful protest complaining about a fight between Uighur and Han
\nfactory workers in another part of China. The unrest is another troubling
\nsign for Beijing at how rapid economic development has failed to stem \u2014 and
\neven has exacerbated \u2014 resentment among ethnic minorities, who say they are
\nbeing marginalized in their homelands as Chinese migrants pour in.<\/p>\n
“We really do not have words to express our pain to the Faddoul Diab family
\nand the Ribas Guerra family for the abominable and lamentable event today,”
\nChacon said. Officials have not revealed exactly how much in ransom the
\nkidnappers demanded, but they have said it was more than $4.5 million \u2014 a
\nfigure circulated in the Venezuelan media. A lawyer for the boys’ family,
\nSantiago Georges, said recently that the family was not in a position to
\npay the sum. The boys’ parents were both born in Lebanon, and their father,
\nJohn Faddoul, is a naturalized Canadian who has been a businessman in
\nVenezuela for more than 20 years.<\/p>\n
Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg defended a city program to send homeless
\nfamilies out of New York on planes, trains and buses, saying it \u201csaves the
\ntaxpayers of New York City an enormous amount of money.\u201d Speaking in the
\nBlue Room in City Hall to announce a new finance commissioner, Mr.
\nBloomberg was asked if the program simply shifts the homelessness program
\nto a different place, as some critics of the program have suggested. \u201cI
\ndon\u2019t know, when they get to the other places, whether they find jobs,\u201d Mr.
\nBloomberg said. \u201cIt may be an easier place for them. If we don\u2019t \u2014 we
\neither have two choices. We can do this program or pay an enormous amount
\nof money daily to provide housing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Some islands in his homeland are composed of granite with spires that rise
\ninto the clouds while others rest on a porous coral platform barely visible
\nabove the ever-lapping waves. Should sea level rise just several feet, as
\nreports predict, these islands will be inundated. “Who will be prepared to
\nchuck away a 1,000 year-old album with the history of all their ancestors
\novernight?” The near-term goal of MSV is to garner support for the greatest
\nemissions reductions possible at the UN Climate Conference.<\/p>\n
Unlike many of Nicaragua’s coastal areas, Corinto’s rocky shoreline hasn’t
\nattracted international surfers or real estate investors. But over the past
\ndecade, blast fishing has grown because poverty is rampant, homemade bombs
\nare increasingly available and law enforcement is lax. Local authorities
\nestimate fishermen drop 40,000 homemade bombs into the sea every week.
\nOften working undercover, police confiscated about 1,000 bombs last year,
\nmost of which were seized at highway checkpoints. In 2007, Corinto police
\nconfiscated 650 bombs from a clandestine bomb factory. The Nicaraguan navy
\noften cruises Pacific waters at night with no lights, hoping to catch
\nfishermen red-handed. Last year, naval officials say they caught five boats
\nblast fishing, and seized about 400 bombs. Navy Capt. Francisco Gutierrez
\nconcedes that’s just a fraction of the hundreds of thousands of bombs used
\neach year.<\/p>\n
This tragic ‘headline figure’ would coincide with increased poverty in the
\nregion, falling school attendance, higher malnutrition and deteriorating
\naccess to healthcare. Yet the fact that the full impact of the global
\nfinancial crisis has not yet hit the Pacific means there is an opportunity
\nto brace for its impact. There is time for governments to readjust fiscal
\nand monetary policy to create a social protection (a safety net) for the
\nmost vulnerable. Investing in children and women is not just a moral
\nimperative, it is smart economics. Irrefutable evidence has now accumulated
\nto show the societal benefits of investing in children in good times, as
\nwell as in bad times such as the current global economic downturn.<\/p>\n
It’s hardly the image the self-proclaimed “Land of Smiles” wants to
\nproject, particularly as Thailand’s vital tourism industry faces its worst
\ncrisis in years after political instability, the global financial crisis
\nand swine flu scares. The scandal has spawned lengthy chatter on travel
\nblogs about other scams to watch for in Thailand and a string of overseas
\ntravel advisories on the perils of duty-free shopping in Bangkok. Ireland
\nis warning its nationals to “be extremely careful” when browsing at
\nSuvarnabhumi (pronounced “sue-WANNA-poom”).<\/p>\n
Seventy-nine undocumented migrants from Asia and Africa were arrested in a
\nNicaraguan port off the Caribbean Sea, local police said. The migrants from
\nEthiopia, Eritrea, Somalia and Nepal said they had arrived by boat at the
\neastern port of Bluefields, where their handlers led them to a hotel,
\ntelling them to wait there for a train. But there are no trains in
\nNicaragua.<\/p>\n
While we call on the Papua New Guinea government to develop policy, we are
\nnot sitting by. Instead, we now want to see the media headlines translate
\ninto practical assistance for our relocation program. And we hope our
\ncarefully designed and community-led action plan can serve as a model for
\ncommunities elsewhere that will be affected by climate change in the
\nfuture. Situated 86 km Northeast of Bougainville, the main island in the
\nautonomous region of which the Carterets form part, our atoll is only 1.2
\nmeters above sea level. They say evacuation of the islands was inevitable
\nas for many, many years erosion has been doing its work. \u201cKing tides\u201d, or
\nparticularly high tides, are now doing worse. Originally the Carterets were
\nsix islands, but Huene was split in half by the sea and so now there are
\nseven. In 1995 a wave ate away most of the shorelines of Piul and Huene
\nislands. Han island, has suffered from complete inundation.<\/p>\n
The mob resisted fire brigade officials and chased them away. Flames spread
\nas oil tanks of the buses began exploding. Though the bus stand lies along
\nthe boundary wall of Domjur police station, policemen were also prevented
\nfrom coming out to quell the mob. The crowd blocked the police station\u2019s
\nentrance. Fire engines could be sent to the spot only after the RAF lathi
\ncharged the crowd.<\/p>\n
Thousands of people took part in the disturbance, unlike recent sporadic
\nseparatist violence carried out by small groups in Xinjiang. The clashes
\nechoed the violent protest that rocked Tibet last year and left many
\nTibetan communities living under clamped-down security ever since. Tensions
\nbetween Uighurs and the majority Han Chinese are never far from the surface
\nin Xinjiang, a sprawling region rich in minerals and oil that borders eight
\nCentral Asian nations. Many Uighurs (pronounced WEE-gers) yearn for
\nindependence and some militants have waged a sporadic, violent separatist
\ncampaign.<\/p>\n
The victims were found with gunshot wounds in the head and neck area, and
\nit appeared they had been shot to death at least two days before their
\nbodies were found, judicial police chief Marco Chavez said on state
\ntelevision. “We’re certain that the evidence and the advancements already
\nmade in the investigation will allow us to conclude this investigation,”
\nChacon said. Relatives, friends and classmates of three boys had held
\nvigils and demonstrations in the streets to call for their release.<\/p>\n
It costs the city about $36,000 a year to provide shelter for a homeless
\nfamily. The average stay in shelter is about nine months. But Mr. Bloomberg
\nappeared sensitive to the image of flying homeless families to far-flung
\nplaces, as the program is set up to do. In the past two years, families
\nhave been provided one-way tickets to Haiti, Peru, Mexico City, St. Croix,
\nTrinidad and Tobago, Ukraine, Santo Domingo and Casablanca. (The most
\npopular destinations are Puerto Rico, Florida, Georgia and the Carolinas.)<\/p>\n
It was a theme echoed by many MSV participants. Paul Crowley, of the
\nClimate Law and Policy Project, was nearly moved to tears as he relayed
\nnews that President Obama has said he is willing to work towards a
\nsuccessful outcome in Copenhagen. But for groups like the Inuits of Alaska,
\neven a miracle in Copenhagen can’t reverse the damage already done.
\nPatricia Cochran, an Inupiat Eskimo born and raised in Alaska and current
\nchair of the ICC, presented a harrowing slideshow of her homeland. In
\nShishmaref, homes hug cliffs crumbling because of melting permafrost into
\nseas more likely to be beset by storm as rising temperatures reduce sea
\nice. The media has publicized this town’s problems, but there are half a
\ndozen other villages just like Shishmaref, noted Cochran. Ice that hunters
\nhave relied on for centuries is melting earlier and shifting in ways locals
\ndon’t understand. Last year a convoy of more than 200 snow mobiles had to
\nbe rescued by helicopter after sea ice unexpectedly broke up, said Cochran.
\n“There is not one of us without a friend who has taken their snow machine
\nout and not come back home again,” she said. “That’s what we face every
\nday. These, in my opinion, are climate related incidents.”<\/p>\n
Blast fishing is considered an environmental crime under Nicaraguan law,
\npunishable by up to four years in prison. Prosecutors can increase jail
\ntime by tacking on illegal weapons possession charges. But prosecuting
\ncases is difficult because evidence is easily destroyed at sea. Gutierrez
\nsaid five fishermen are currently being processed for alleged blast
\nfishing, but he couldn’t recall the last time anyone went to jail. “They
\nhave a system. It’s almost impossible to arrest them. When they see us
\ncoming, they just sink the bombs in the sea with rocks,” Gutierrez said.
\nWidespread corruption among local police officers hinders enforcement
\nefforts, police investigator Gomez said. Many fishermen say police officers
\nroutinely take bribes from bomb manufacturers and their distributors.<\/p>\n
Global research by UNICEF, the World Bank and UNESCO has shown we could not
\nonly save a young child from death but we could also help him or her
\ncomplete basic education by the age of 13 by investing altogether no more
\nthan $US2,200 per child. Likewise providing micronutrients for the world’s
\nchildren who lack essential vitamins and minerals would cost just $US60
\nmillion per year and yield annual benefits of more than $1 billion –
\nimplying a 1,500 per cent rate of return. For Pacific leaders this
\nillustration of the high returns – both in human lives and economic
\nproductivity – for relatively low financial outlays presents a strong case
\nfor paying particular attention to children in economic policy and fiscal
\nbudgets.<\/p>\n
“We have received reports that innocent shoppers have been the subject of
\nallegations of suspected theft and threatened that their cases will not be
\nheard for several months unless they plead guilty and pay substantial
\nfines,” says an Irish government travel advisory. It tells shoppers to keep
\nreceipts to avoid “great distress.” The advice was posted after a
\n41-year-old Irish scientist, who was visiting for an international genetics
\nsymposium, was accused of stealing Bobbi Brown eyeliner. The embassy
\ndeclined to discuss details of her case. Britain and Denmark have updated
\ntheir online travel advice to warn that Suvarnabhumi’s sprawling duty-free
\nzone has hard-to-detect demarcation lines between shops and patrons should
\nnot carry unpaid merchandise between them.<\/p>\n
“We suppose they were brought from Colombia to the island of San Andres”
\nand were then transferred to Bluefields, Nicaragua’s main Caribbean port,
\n“from which they had hoped to continue their journey to the United States
\nto pursue the American dream,” Deputy Commissioner Rolando Coulson told
\nreporters. The Colombian island of San Andres, located off Nicaragua’s
\nCaribbean coast, is used as a transit point for undocumented migrants
\nheaded toward the United States, but many are cheated of their money and
\nabandoned in Nicaragua, officials say. One of the undocumented migrants,
\nLexman Khaatri Chhetri, told the authorities he had spent much of his
\nsavings to reach the American continent.<\/p>\n
What climate change\u2019s exact role is, even experts are hard put to answer.
\nDebate has raged over whether the islands are sinking, if tectonic plates
\nplay a role, and whether sea levels are in fact rising. We do not know much
\nabout science, but we watch helplessly as the tides wash away our shores
\nyear in and year out. We also know that we are losing our cultural heritage
\njust as the sea relentlessly wipes out our food gardens. To relieve the
\nland shortage caused by eroding shorelines, in 1984 the government
\nresettled 10 families from the Carterets to Bougainville, but they returned
\nto the atoll in 1989 in flight from what began as a protest by landowners
\nagainst a mining company and escalated into civil war. Since that time, and
\ndespite many promises, very little has been done by the Bougainville or PNG
\ngovernment to assist Islanders\u2019 relocation efforts. Tired of empty
\npromises, the Carterets Council of Elders formed a non-profit association
\nin late 2006 to organise the voluntary relocation of most of the Carterets\u2019
\npopulation of 3,300.<\/p>\n
Locals have demanded the removal of the unauthorised bus stand repeatedly.
\nThey say rows of buses are parked on either side of the road \u2014 one of the
\nmain thoroughfares of Domjur. This, along with rows of unauthorised shops
\nand stalls have reduced the road\u2019s width to that of a narrow lane. Locals
\nallege that in spite of repeated complaints, Domjur police have allowed the
\nmenace to thrive right under its nose.<\/p>\n
Uighurs make up the largest ethnic group in Xinjiang, but not in the
\ncapital of Urumqi, which has attracted large numbers of Han Chinese
\nmigrants. The city of 2.3 million is now about overwhelmingly Chinese \u2014 a
\nsource of frustration for native Uighurs who say they are being squeezed
\nout. About 1,000 to 3,000 Uighur demonstrators had gathered in the regional
\ncapital for a protest that apparently spun out of control. Accounts
\ndiffered over what happened, but the violence seemed to have started when
\nthe crowd of protesters refused to disperse. The official Xinhua News
\nAgency reported hundreds of people were arrested and checkpoints ringed the
\ncity to prevent rioters from escaping. Mobile phone service provided by at
\nleast one company was cut to stop people from organizing further action in
\nXinjiang. Internet access was blocked or unusually slow in Urumqi. Videos
\nand text updates about the riots were removed from China-based social
\nnetworking sites such as Youku, a YouTube-like video service, and Fanfou, a
\nChinese micro-blogging Web site similar to Twitter. A Fanfou search for
\nposts with the key word Urumqi turned up zero results while Twitter, which
\nis hosted overseas, yielded hundreds of comments in Chinese and English.
\nMajor Chinese portals such as Sina.com, Sohu.com and 163.com relied solely
\non Xinhua for news of the event and turned off the comment function at the
\nbottom of the stories so people could not publicly react.<\/p>\n
The killings come just days after a prominent Italian-born businessman,
\n74-year-old Filippo Sindoni, was abducted and killed. That case prompted
\nItaly’s foreign minister to ask Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez’s
\ngovernment to do everything possible to end the kidnappings of Italians in
\nthe country. Officials in Italy said an Italian businesswoman and her
\n3-year-old son were freed two months after being abducted in Venezuela.
\nFour men were arrested for their roles in the crime, officials said.
\nViolent robberies, kidnappings and murders are frequent in Venezuela. There
\nwere 9,402 homicides reported in 2005, slightly down from 2004, according
\nto government statistics.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe average cost is trivial,\u201d Mr. Bloomberg said. \u201cMost go by bus. Very
\nfew go overseas, very few go long distances. Bus is the normal ways we pay
\nfor transportation, rather than air.\u201d In fact, the most common mode of
\ntravel for families in the program is air, not bus. Forty-eight percent
\ntravel by airplane; 37 percent by bus; and 15 percent by train, according
\nto city data.<\/p>\n
“We will not assume the role of powerless victims, we will do everything we
\ncan to ensure our people who have been here for centuries will be here for
\ncenturies more.” Nick Illauq, deputy mayor of the remote Baffin Island
\ncommunity of Clyde River, in Nunavut, an autonomous Inuit territory at the
\ntop of Canada, voiced concerns about another type of visitor. “We know the
\nEarth is changing,” said Illauq, “everyone is rushing to the Arctic to get
\nour resources. To me, that’s my biggest fear. We are very poor, we ask for
\nmoney and we don’t get it. We know we are destroying [the Earth] and yet we
\nrush to find resources. It’s not just the Inuit anymore, it’s not just the
\ncaribou, it’s the baby being born anywhere right now that is going to have
\nto face all this crap in the future. Imagine what they are going to have to
\nface! And it’s our fault.”<\/p>\n
But Gutierrez is hopeful that a one-year program to educate fishermen about
\nthe pitfalls of the practice is finally paying off. One month, for the
\nfirst time, fishermen turned in more than 311 bombs. “We’ve been trying to
\npersuade them in meetings,” Gutierrez said. But Medina believes blast
\nfishing is more widespread than authorities suspect. He says virtually
\nevery fisherman he knows has traded in traditional nets, lines and hooks
\nfor explosives. And the handful of clandestine bombmakers who sell
\nexplosives for about $2 apiece are making more powerful explosives, he
\nadds. Most recently, Nicaraguan police caught two fishermen with 10-pound
\nbombs wrapped in cement bags – more destructive and risky than the usual
\nsardine-can-size bombs. Medina says even 15-pound bombs are now available
\non the black market. Injuries and deaths Medina also says some bombs have
\nexploded while being handled by colleagues, causing loss of life and limbs.
\nIn the past three years, Corinto authorities have reported two deaths, nine
\ncases of lost limbs and two men who were blinded by explosions.<\/p>\n
Governments in the Pacific must not stray from their commitments to
\nchildren and women at this time of crisis. They must take all necessary
\nmeasures to enhance the role of women as economic agents and to protect
\nsocial sector budgets, especially to maintain and, if warranted, expand
\nessential social services for children and women. There are already
\nalarming signs that budget cuts have been made or are on their way. Budget
\ncuts are not necessarily bad, if there is greater efficiency and if the cut
\ndoes not impact on social protection measures, it can produce a benefit.
\nBut social protection budgets are all too often a victim of the budget
\nrazor.<\/p>\n
British couple Stephen Ingram, 49, and Xi Lin, 45, technology experts from
\nCambridge, took the alleged scam public. Their ordeal was pieced together
\nbased on accounts from police, airport and embassy officials and an
\ninterview the couple gave to British media. The couple was approached by
\nairport security before boarding a flight to London and told that security
\ncameras showed they had taken a Givenchy wallet. King Power, the company
\nthat owns the duty-free store, has posted CCTV footage on its Web site that
\nappears to show Lin putting her hand in her bag while browsing a wallet
\ndisplay. The security guards found nothing, but turned the couple over to
\npolice, said Sombat Dechapanichkul, managing director of King Power Duty
\nFree Co. “We are not aware of what happened next. It was then the job of
\nthe police to proceed with the case,” said Sombat. Ingram told The Sunday
\nTimes of London that they were questioned at an airport police office and
\nthen transferred to a nearby police station where their passports were
\nconfiscated and they spent the night in jail. The next morning they were
\nintroduced to a translator \u2014 a Sri Lankan named Tony \u2014 who said he could
\narrange bail and get their case dropped, warning it could otherwise drag on
\nfor months. Tony took them to a nearby motel, called the Valentine Resort,
\nIngram said. The couple managed a visit to the British Embassy but then
\nreturned to the hotel fearing Tony, who had warned they would be watched,
\nIngram said.<\/p>\n
The association was named Tulele Peisa, which means \u201csailing the waves on
\nour own\u201d. This name choice reflects the elders\u2019 desire to see Carteret
\nIslanders remain strong and self-reliant, not becoming dependent on food
\nhandouts for their survival. After much hard work, the first five fathers
\nmoved to Tinputz, onto land donated by the Catholic Church. These fathers
\nare already building gardens so that their wives and children can join them
\nlater when there is food. \u201cI have volunteered to relocate as I would like
\nmy family to be able to plant food crops like taro, banana, casava, yams
\nand other vegetables that we cannot grow on the island,\u201d said Charles
\nTsibi. \u201cI also want my family to grow some cash crops like cocoa to sustain
\nour future life here in Marau, Tinputz.\u201d According to a recent Tulele Peisa
\nsurvey, 80 other families would like to move immediately and 50 wish to
\nmove later on. Twenty families have already relocated on their own. Thirty
\nfamilies remain unsure about relocating.<\/p>\n
State-owned Trading Corporation of Bangladesh (TCB) has issued an
\ninternational tender to import 8,000 tonnes of whole, husked red lentils.
\nThe tendered cargo should include 3,000 tonnes of category A and 5,000
\ntonnes of category B whole, husked red lentils. TCB classified lentil
\ngrains measuring 1.50-3.00 mm commonly known as Nepali\/Indian variety and
\n3.50-4.50 mm Turkish variety as category A and category B respectively. A
\ntenderer may offer for both or either of the two items to supply the cargo,
\nto Chittagong port. Most of Bangladesh’s population of nearly 150 million
\neat lentils along with the country’s staple food, rice, every day. It is
\nnow sold at 110 taka ($1.60) per kg. Commerce ministry officials said more
\nessential commodities would be imported to keep prices stable especially
\nduring the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan. ($1=69.06 taka)<\/p>\n
The demonstrators were demanding justice for two Uighurs killed last month
\nduring a fight with Han Chinese co-workers at a factory in southern China.
\nUighur activists and exiles say the millions of Han Chinese who have
\nsettled here in recent years are gradually squeezing the Turkic people out
\nof their homeland. But many Chinese believe the Uighurs are backward and
\nungrateful for the economic development the Chinese have brought to the
\npoor region. Wu Nong, director of the news office of the Xinjiang
\nprovincial government, said more than 260 vehicles were attacked or set on
\nfire and 203 shops were damaged. She said 140 people were killed and 828
\ninjured in the violence. She did not say how many of the victims were Han
\nor Uighurs.<\/p>\n
The U.S. Coast Guard reported that it had seized 36 bales of cocaine valued
\nat $55 million off Venezuela\u2019s coast during a routine Caribbean patrol. The
\ncrew of a go-fast boat threw the drugs into the sea when they spotted the
\nCoast Guard personnel on board the British frigate HMS Iron Duke. The
\nBritish and U.S. forces had detected the boat some 40 kilometers (25 miles)
\nwest of Curacao, an island north of Venezuela. The Coast Guardsmen managed
\nto recover the drug packets from the water and, after boarding and
\ninspecting the go-fast boat, arrested four men, according to a communique.
\n\u201cThis is an outstanding example of the partnership between the U.S. and our
\nregional and NATO colleagues to stem the flow of illegal narcotics to
\nEurope and North America,\u201d said Capt. Steven A. Banks, the head of Law
\nEnforcement for District Seven.<\/p>\n
Kenya will register SIM cards to fight crime. The problem of criminals
\nusing unregistered numbers became apparent last year during post-election
\nviolence. After several months of battling criminals who have been using
\nuntraceable mobile-phone numbers, the Kenyan government has given a
\nsix-month ultimatum to mobile service operators to streamline registration
\nof SIM (Subscriber Identity Module) cards. The challenge of criminals using
\nunregistered numbers became apparent last year during post-election
\nproblems when people used SMS (Short Message Service) messages to instigate
\nviolence. The police had no way of identifying the culprits because there
\nwas no registration information linked to the phones used.<\/p>\n
The heaviest rainfall in 53 years left at least 10 people dead and
\nthousands stranded in floods across Bangladesh’s capital. Dhaka residents
\nwere still escaping the rain while traffic ground to a halt with 80 percent
\nof roads underwater. The national weather office said more than 33cm of
\nrain fell in the city within 12 hours – the most in a single day since
\n1956. Thousands in low-lying areas of the city were isolated, while 10
\npeople were electrocuted by broken power lines in their homes. Some
\nresidents are frustrated at the situation. [Shakina Begum, Resident]: “We
\nare now stuck in rain water. The whole area is flooded. We are facing a
\nserious shortage of drinking water, our children can’t go to school, and we
\ncan’t go shopping. We are facing a serious problem and can’t go anywhere.”
\nForecasts are for more rain in the next few days. Flooding caused by
\nmonsoon rains is common in Bangladesh, a delta nation of 150 million
\npeople.<\/p>\n
Medina only works at night, where he and his colleagues stick a flashlight
\ninto the water to attract fish – usually sardines – before dropping bombs
\nanchored by rocks. The explosion, which kills everything within a 10-foot
\nradius, sends a few dozen sardines into the boat that are later used as
\nbait to attract larger fish such as snapper. Fishermen jump in with snorkel
\nmasks to net remaining fish that float around the boat. Bigger explosives
\ncause an even greater radius of dead or stunned fish and require scuba gear
\nto dive deep into the ocean. “They go out to sea with one bomb and bring in
\n400 kilos (880 pounds) of fish,” Medina said of fishermen who use larger
\nbombs. As the resource is depleted by blast fishing, fishermen are now
\nlucky to bring in 100 kilos of fish on a given trip instead of 400 kilos a
\ndecade ago, Medina says. While Medina and other local fishermen claim they
\nhave little choice but to use explosives, Helen Fox of the World Wildlife
\nFoundation says they are motivated by making a quick buck. “It’s a case of
\ngreed rather than need,” said Fox. But Medina says he has little recourse
\nin a nation with the second-lowest annual per capita income in the Western
\nHemisphere at $3,000. “We’re deteriorating the fauna,” he said. “But
\nthere’s no other way to bring money home.”<\/p>\n
Of course the budget of many Pacific countries lack the reserves to respond
\nfully to such an economic crisis. It is therefore important that donors
\nmaintain their aid commitments to the Pacific and ensure investments
\nbenefit those most in need. To the Australian Government’s credit it has
\nmaintained, even slightly increased, its aid budget. It is now hoped
\nAustralia – as host of this year’s Pacific Island Forum – can also
\nfacilitate a policy response across the Pacific that is going to shield the
\nmost vulnerable – children and women – from the ravages of this economic
\ncrisis.<\/p>\n
An investigation found that the couple transferred into Tony’s bank account
\n400,000 baht ($11,800) \u2014 half for bail and the other half for Tony’s
\n“fees,” said police Col. Teeradej Panurak, who oversaw the case. “Tony came
\nin to translate for us. We can’t control what the accused agree to with a
\ntranslator,” said Teeradej. He said the couple was released because there
\nwas not enough evidence to press charges. A visiting British government
\nofficial recently raised the case with Thai authorities, and the British
\nEmbassy was consulting other embassies about the alleged scam.<\/p>\n
Turning to crime, home invasions: it\u2019s the term for armed attacks on
\nfamilies in the confines of their homes. And these types of crimes seem to
\nbe getting more frequent throughout the country. There was the most recent
\ninvasion upstairs of Tow Tow Grocery on Fairweather Street in Belize City.
\nThe victims were elderly mother and her daughter \u2013 both Belizean Americans
\nvacationing from Los Angeles. The incident happened quite early in the
\nnight, while seventy-two year old Olive Arnold was in her bed watching the
\nlocal news. Her daughter, Rose Holland, was on the front porch with a
\ncousin while the thieves entered through the back door. The mother and
\ndaughter just arrived in town and have been returning to Belize every year
\nsince 1985. Holland feels the culprits had been planning to pounce since
\nthe day they arrived and the experience has shaken them up so much that
\nthey are not coming back home in a hurry.<\/p>\n
Tulele Peisa\u2019s plan is for Carteret Islanders to be voluntarily relocated
\nto three locations on Bougainville (Tinputz, Tearouki and Mabiri) over the
\nnext 10 years. Our immediate need is for funding so that we can accomplish
\nthe initial 3-year phase of our Carterets Integrated Relocation Programme.
\nThe list of objectives is long and challenging but our plan is holistic so
\nwe have faith it will succeed. Firstly, the three host towns have a
\npopulation of 10,000 and we are cognisant of the many complexities involved
\nin integrating the Carteret people into existing communities that are
\ngeographically, culturally, politically and socially different. Therefore
\nexchange programs involving chiefs, women and youth from host communities
\nand the Carterets are in progress for establishing relationships and
\nunderstanding. While this is going well, the next urgent steps include
\nsecuring more land and surveying and pegging site boundaries. Next comes
\nconstructing housing and infrastructure for 120 families. With the help of
\nthe Catholic Church in Bougainville, the relocation programme aims to
\nprovide design and carpentry services and local materials for basic housing
\nfor these families. We also need to get on with implementing agricultural
\nand income generation projects (like the rehabilitation of cocoa and
\ncoconut blocks), as well as education, health and community development
\ntraining programmes.<\/p>\n
Xinhua said several hundred people had been arrested in connection with the
\nriot and police were searching for about 90 other “key suspects.” It also
\nquoted a local police chief as saying the death toll was expected to rise.
\nUighur exiles condemned the crackdown. “We are extremely saddened by the
\nheavy-handed use of force by the Chinese security forces against the
\npeaceful demonstrators,” said Alim Seytoff, vice president of the
\nWashington, D.C.-based Uyghur American Association. “We ask the
\ninternational community to condemn China’s killing of innocent Uighurs.
\nThis is a very dark day in the history of the Uighur people,” he said. The
\nassociation, led by a former prominent Xinjiang businesswoman now living in
\nAmerica, Rebiya Kadeer, estimated that 1,000 to 3,000 people took part in
\nthe protest. Xinjiang Governor Nur Bekri said in a televised address early
\nMonday that Uighur exiles led by Kadeer of caused the violence, saying,
\n“Rebiya had phone conversations with people in China in order to incite,
\nand Web sites such as Uighurbiz.cn and Diyarim.com were used to orchestrate
\nthe incitement and spread propaganda.” A government statement quoted by
\nXinhua said the violence was “a pre-empted, organized violent crime. It is
\ninstigated and directed from abroad and carried out by outlaws in the
\ncountry.”<\/p>\n
Later, the government also admitted defeat in an SMS scam believed to be
\nperpetrated by death-row inmates. The scheme tricked unsuspecting
\nsubscribers into thinking they had won prizes and were required to send
\nmoney through the mobile M-Pesa service in order to collect the winnings.
\nThe police recovered phones believed to be used in the scam in a
\nmaximum-security prison, but could not pin down who the owners were due to
\na lack of registration information. “To guard against these tendencies, I
\nam directing the Ministry of Information and Communication to put in place
\nan elaborate databank that will ensure all mobile telephone subscribers are
\nregistered,” said Vice President Kalonzo Musyoka. Mobile service providers
\nZain and Safaricom embraced the idea but noted that registration is not a
\npanacea to fighting crime. “The issue of subscriber registration has been
\noversimplified by the political class and, in itself, it is not a panacea
\nfor addressing rising incidents of crime,” said Michael Joseph, Safaricom
\nCEO.<\/p>\n
Blast or dynamite fishing stuns or kills fish for easy gathering. This
\nillegal practice indiscriminately kills large numbers of fish and other
\nmarine organisms and can damage or destroy surrounding ecosystems such as
\ncoral reefs. Although outlawed, the practice remains widespread in some 40
\nnations in Central America, Southeast Asia, the Aegean Sea and Africa,
\nenvironmental groups say. In the Philippines, blast fishing dates to before
\nWorld War I. During World War II, dynamite-wielding Japanese troops
\npopularized the practice in Indonesia. Nicaraguan fishermen say the
\npractice was introduced by bomb-wielding rebels of El Salvador’s Farabundo
\nMarti Liberation Front seeking a new livelihood after a 12-year civil war
\nin that country ended in 1992. Fishermen typically use commercial dynamite
\nor homemade bombs with glass bottles or cans layered with powdered
\npotassium nitrate and pebbles or ammonium nitrate and a kerosene mixture.<\/p>\n
But one lawyer has taken issue with the directive, arguing that the
\ngovernment’s approach is wrong because registration of subscribers is all
\nabout capturing personal information, which is one of the most vexing legal
\nissues in the information technology sector. “What we need is very clear
\nlaw governing the collection and use of personal information. We failed to
\ninclude such a law in the Kenya Communications Amendment Act, and now we
\nwant to patch it up with a presidential directive,” said Michael Murungi, a
\nNairobi lawyer. Murungi says there is need to identify the subscribers of
\nmobile phones in order to deter phone-aided crime, but there is an even
\nmore compelling need for a clear legal framework for the collection, use of
\nand management of personal information.<\/p>\n
A husband and wife from Britain were seriously wounded in a machete attack
\nin Tobago, police said, comparing the home invasion to a similar one last
\nyear that killed a Swedish couple on the Caribbean island. Authorities
\nidentified the victims as Peter Greene, 65, and his wife, Marion, 59, but
\ndeclined to provide details about them or the attack on an island that has
\nbeen considered the safer part of the twin-island nation of Trinidad and
\nTobago. “It’s a matter of serious concern, this is another serious attack
\non tourists,” police superintendent Nadir Khan said. The couple were
\nairlifted to a regional medical center in Trinidad, but authorities did not
\nrelease details about their condition.<\/p>\n
Olive Arnold, Victim of Home Invasion \u201cThis person come over me and tell me
\nbe quiet. Now I\u2019m not going to be quiet, then he go like \u2013 I couldn\u2019t see
\nhis face, he have on a brown cap and a brown shirt and ih gun. And ih tell
\nme be quiet and I tell him I\u2019m not going to be quiet and I scream. I holler
\nfor them out there and by the time they come to the door, one in a white
\nt-shirt follow the other one and they all run downstairs.\u201d Rose Holland,
\nVictim of Home Invasion \u201cI heard my mom screaming so I thought maybe she
\nfall so I ran in here and when me and Ms. Carol get to the door the guy
\nstanding here and point the gun so we took off back. And they ran behind us
\nand start chasing us. All three of us fall down on the ground and they jump
\non me and say give me everything you got. They tried to pull my bracelet
\noff and they scratched my hand. When they couldn\u2019t get this off they popped
\nmy Rolex chain off my neck. And they tackled my girlfriend. And she tell
\nthem do you guys know who I am. I\u2019m the mother of so and so. And they say
\nthey don\u2019t care and they popped her chain off too. And then they hopped the
\nfence back and they left.\u201d Olive Arnold \u201cFirst, I was gonna come back home
\nand live, now I tell them no I cannot because the younger generation them
\nis scandalous. I cannot come back home to live. They take guns like you\u2019re
\nbirds in the air \u2013 pop, you know, I\u2019m scared for my life. I\u2019m not coming
\nback in a hurry right now but I have to come back, but not to live.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe plan is slow to achieve but covers all areas dealing with human
\nrelations and has adaptation alternatives, such as small cash income
\nactivities for relocated families,\u201d said elder Tony Tologina, chief of the
\nNaboin clan. On the long term, we want to build the capacity of Tulele
\nPeisa to be certain it can carry out its objectives and also develop it as
\na resource agency for the Carterets and host communities on Bougainville.
\n\u201cTulele Peisa is our own initiative and will continue to co-ordinate and
\nfacilitate the relocation of our island people. After the relocation, TP
\nwill continue to provide monitoring and evaluation skills and further focus
\non development options available to our people,\u201d said Rufina Moi, woman
\nchief. An important part of the programme is that it will also set up a
\nConservation and Marine Management Area that will let Carteret Islanders
\nmake sustainable use of our ancestral marine resources. To keep the links
\nbetween the relocated Carterets people and their home island, sea resources
\nand any remaining clan members (who are not yet relocated), the plan
\nincludes developing an equitable sea transport service for freight and
\npassengers. \u201cIn the future, we will keep coming to these reefs and manage
\nthem as our fishing ground,\u201d explained community youth leader Nicholas
\nHakata. \u201cWhen our children come back, they will have a connection to their
\nheritage.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ilham Tohti, a Uighur economics professor at Central Nationalities
\nUniversity in Beijing and founder of Uighurbiz.cn \u2014 one of the implicated
\nWeb sites \u2014 said “the relevant authorities” were questioning him about his
\nWeb site. His site has become a lively forum for many issues about Chinese
\nrule in Xinjiang. Xinjiang’s top Communist Party official, Wang Lequan,
\ncalled the incident “a profound lesson learned in blood” and said
\nauthorities “must take the most resolute and strongest measures to deal
\nwith the enemies’ latest attempt at sabotage.” “We also must expose Rebiya
\nand those like her \u2026 we must tear away Rebiya’s mask and let the world see
\nher true nature.” Seytoff dimissed the accusations against Kadeer. “It’s
\ncommon practice for the Chinese government to accuse Ms. Kadeer for any
\nunrest” in Xinjiang, he said.<\/p>\n
Trinidad & Tobago’s Newsday reported that Marion Greene was in serious but
\nstable condition and that her husband was in critical condition after being
\nplaced in a medically induced coma to treat severe head injuries. Deputy
\nBritish Commissioner Jeff Patton described the attack as a “horrible crime”
\nbut declined to discuss it further. Originally from Reading, England, the
\ncouple had been living in the town of Bacolet along Tobago’s southern coast
\noff-and-on for 10 years. Khan told reporters that robbery has not been
\nruled out as a motive and said it was similar to the unsolved killing in
\nOctober of Anna Sundsval, 62, and Oke Olsoon, 73, at their home in the Bon
\nAccord area of Tobago, about 7 miles (10 kilometers) from where the latest
\nincident occurred. Authorities detained a suspect in that case but released
\nhim for lack of evidence. Khan said his department is “working assiduously”
\non the case, but complained of a lack of leads.<\/p>\n
Rose Holland \u201cI came in and I guess when they saw me came in, they saw my
\ncar and saw my jewelry and stuff cause I usually wear a lot of jewelry when
\nI come to Belize. But for one time this year I decided only to wear a few.
\nAnd one of my neighbours told me be careful because they are watching you,
\nbe careful. She told me that the morning, which was yesterday morning. Then
\nin the night, that\u2019s what made me went on the porch, they called me again,
\nbe careful because I guess they hear the plot of what\u2019s going on, so
\nthey\u2019re advising me. How could they have the audacity to just walk in a
\nperson\u2019s home with a gun and look and an ageable lady, be quiet. That is
\nwrong.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have fully documented our process since beginning our plan and will
\ncontinue to, for the sake of developing a model relocation programme,\u201d said
\nThomas Bikta, a chief from Piul Island. \u201cAt the same time, we are
\ndeveloping and formulating a Carterets relocation policy that we will
\nadvocate to the Autonomous Bougainville Government and the rest of the
\nworld,\u201d Bikta added. We also intend to build an alliance of vulnerable
\nPacific communities impacted by climate change who can lobby and advocate
\nfor justice and policies that recognise and support those affected. We
\nthink the Papua New Guinea government must set an example of such policies
\nby re-developing the Atolls Integrated Development policy and beginning a
\nrecognized financing mechanism similar to REDD (Reducing Emissions from
\nDeforestation and Forest Degradation in Developing Countries). The
\ncommittee or board of which must include all relevant stakeholders,
\nincluding community representation and other expertise, not just government
\nofficials.<\/p>\n
The clashes in Urumqi echoed last year’s unrest in Tibet, when a peaceful
\ndemonstration by monks in the capital of Lhasa erupted into riots that
\nspread to surrounding areas, leaving at least 22 dead. The Chinese
\ngovernment accused Tibet’s exiled spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, of
\norchestrating the violence \u2014 a charge he denied. Seytoff said he had heard
\nfrom two sources that at least two dozen people had been killed by gunfire
\nor crushed by armored police vehicles just outside Xinjiang University.
\nMamet, a 36-year-old restaurant worker, said he saw People’s Armed Police
\nattack students outside Xinjiang University. “First they fired tear gas at
\nthe students. Then they started beating them and shooting them with
\nbullets. Big trucks arrived, and students were rounded up and arrested,”
\nMamet said. Wang Kui, an official with the Foreign Affairs Department at
\nthe university, said she aware of no such incident. She said no students
\nfrom the university were among those killed or injured. “We are not
\nallowing students to come and go because the situation is chaotic at the
\nmoment,” Wang said. “All the students are at school, and we are taking care
\nof them. But we are not clear about what’s been going on outside.”<\/p>\n
A renowned Scottish gemstone expert was brutally murdered in Kenya by a mob
\narmed with machetes, clubs, spears \u2014 even bows and arrows \u2014 in what police
\nbelieve was the final fight in a years-long mining dispute. A group of at
\nleast 30 men attacked Campbell Bridges, 71, his son Bruce, and four Kenyan
\nemployees near the Tsavo National Park, a popular tourist site in the
\nKenyan bush known for its lions. \u201cMy men were cut to ribbons and I took a
\npanga [machete] to the neck. It was an ambush.\u201d said Bruce Bridges. The
\nmurder was the bloody culmination of a three-year battle between squatters
\nand Bridges \u2014 a senior jewel consultant with Tiffany and Company in New
\nYork. The squatters have reportedly stolen rare tsavorite gems from
\nBridges’ team in the past. Bridges’ son charges the local miners with
\nillegally digging for gems on the family\u2019s 600-hectare property. He also
\nadds that the Bridges family has received repeated death threats, the most
\nrecent one coming just two weeks ago. \u201cAs we drove towards our mining camp
\nwe found huge thorn trees blocking the road. Eight men with machetes,
\nspears, clubs, knives, bows and arrows appeared shouting \u2018We\u2019re going to
\nkill you all!\u2019 Then more people came down the mountain like ants, 20 or 30
\nof them,\u201d Bridges said. According to his son, Campbell Bridges was attacked
\nby two men and was stabbed in the side.<\/p>\n
Four Uighur detainees at the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba were
\nrecently released and relocated to Bermuda despite Beijing’s objections
\nbecause U.S. officials have said they fear the men would be executed if
\nthey returned to China. Officials have also been trying to transfer 13
\nothers to the Pacific nation of Palau. The men were captured in Afghanistan
\nand Pakistan in 2001, but the U.S. later determined they were not “enemy
\ncombatants.” Previous mass protests in Xinjiang that were quelled by armed
\nforces became signal events for the separatist movement. In 1990, about 200
\nUighurs shouting for holy war protested through Baren, a town near the
\nAfghan border, resulting in violence that left at least two dozen people
\ndead. In 1997, amid a wave of bombings and assassinations, a protest by
\nseveral hundred Uighurs in the city of Yining against religious
\nrestrictions turned into an anti-Chinese uprising that left at least 10
\ndead. In both cases pro-independence groups said the death tolls were
\nseveral times higher, and the government never conducted a public
\ninvestigation into the events.<\/p>\n
The women say they don\u2019t know who their attackers were but they feel they
\nwere held up by two men in their twenties who live in the same area.
\nHolland said the thieves also stole her cell phone which was in her bedroom
\nnear the back door. While police have not yet retrieved any of the stolen
\nitems, they have detained four suspects. Police believe that while only two
\ncommitted the robbery, it was planned by the four suspects. And while they
\nare in custody now, they are concerned that there will be retaliation
\nbecause the other victim who was visiting the home at the time is the
\nmother of a notorious George Street character.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A mob set ablaze eight buses and several shops after a schoolgirl was run over by a bus at an unauthorized bus stand near Domjur police station. The death of Riya Das, a Class-VII student of a local school, triggered mob fury as locals alleged that the unauthorized bus stand was creating traffic problems in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"","spay_email":""},"categories":[3,50,51,5,56,58,8,11,12,14,16,17,19,26,30,31,32,34,35,38,67,65,64,46],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bbrace.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1378"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bbrace.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bbrace.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bbrace.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bbrace.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1378"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/bbrace.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1378\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1379,"href":"https:\/\/bbrace.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1378\/revisions\/1379"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bbrace.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1378"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bbrace.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1378"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bbrace.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1378"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}