Peace treaty that should end the civil war in southern Sudan is signed.
Sunday, January 09, 2005
After a Hezbollah attack in the occupied Shebaa area that killed one Israeli soldier, Israel bombs UN peacekeeper positions in Lebanon and kills one French peacekeeper.
Pentagon to establish and train death squads in Iraq?
Model would be the US trained death squads in El Salvador, that killed 40 000 people between 1981-84. That´s one of the reasons why the capital has been firmly in the hands of the left for years, as large part of the killings happened in there and in it´s neighbourhood.
Model would be the US trained death squads in El Salvador, that killed 40 000 people between 1981-84. That´s one of the reasons why the capital has been firmly in the hands of the left for years, as large part of the killings happened in there and in it´s neighbourhood.
Disaster Ignites Debate: ‘Was God In the Tsunami?’
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As surely as the tsunami followed the earthquake, the questions—the perennial, never-satisfactorily-resolved questions—of theodicy followed the tsunami. Theodicy, of course, is the subdiscipline of theology devoted to the attempt to reconcile the idea of an all-powerful, just and loving God who intervenes in history—the God most Western religions believe in—with the recurrence of catastrophic slaughter from "natural" causes such as tsunamis and man-made evils such as genocides.
Why do people spend so much time pondering, defending or critizing things that can´t be proved one way or the other?
Good article.
Quote:
As surely as the tsunami followed the earthquake, the questions—the perennial, never-satisfactorily-resolved questions—of theodicy followed the tsunami. Theodicy, of course, is the subdiscipline of theology devoted to the attempt to reconcile the idea of an all-powerful, just and loving God who intervenes in history—the God most Western religions believe in—with the recurrence of catastrophic slaughter from "natural" causes such as tsunamis and man-made evils such as genocides.
Why do people spend so much time pondering, defending or critizing things that can´t be proved one way or the other?
Good article.
Friday, January 07, 2005
Literary biographer Humphrey Carpenter has died at the age of 58. I have been reading his biography of the "angry young men" movement and it´s participants in the 1950´s Britain the last few weeks. So slowly, because even if Carpenter´s style is the kind I like - informative, a little bit dry and somehow very "British" - I don´t really like the book´s subjects. They were not especially nice nor politically bright men and the fact that every one of them failed more or less in their careers is a happy thing. One can´t say the same about Carpenter. He was succesful in his chosen field, and if not a great master (á la Plutarchos), then at least a master craftsman.
On this dark world falls an occasional ray of light, like the death of 9 US soldiers in Iraq, which rises the number of US dead in Iraq to 1350 and the whole number of "Coalition" casualties to 1500. So this is a happy day, a day to celebrate!
Zionists arrest Mustafa Barghouti again and forced him to leave East Jerusalem, which this all about. Stealing East Jerusalem. I don´t want to fall on stereotypes here, but the Israeli Jews are greedy bastards. They got 78% of the British Palestine. And now they want between 15% and 58% of the occupied areas.
Thursday, January 06, 2005
Devastation on the east coast of Sri Lanka
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While the government puts the death toll at 13,703, the actual figure is probably twice as high. Those we spoke to, including several divisional secretaries, estimated the number killed at nearly 25,000, with more than 2,500 still missing. It is a terrible tragedy: out of a population of 512,000, nearly 5 percent or 1 in 20 are dead. Many more people have been left homeless without food, clean water and medical care. In Ampara district alone, there are nearly 100 refugee camps housing over 80,000 people. At least 166,000 people have been affected by the disaster—one in three people in the district. In the wake of the tsunami, the east coast has also been hit by monsoonal flooding, cutting roads and leaving thousands of people stranded. The district itself is divided between areas under army control and those controlled by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). It will take weeks to establish the extent of the destruction in the district and the number of dead.
A new, cruel massacre of 18 children and young adults near Mosul.
14 year old Shia children working in a US military camp in a Sunni area where hundreds have died in fighting? Whose bright idea that was?
14 year old Shia children working in a US military camp in a Sunni area where hundreds have died in fighting? Whose bright idea that was?
US troops 'laughed as Iraqi died'
Quote:
"We started to beg them not to throw us in the water," he said through a translator.
"We said in English, 'Please, please', but it was in vain.
"The soldiers had their rifles aimed at us. They were laughing.
Quote:
"We started to beg them not to throw us in the water," he said through a translator.
"We said in English, 'Please, please', but it was in vain.
"The soldiers had their rifles aimed at us. They were laughing.
Wednesday, January 05, 2005
Russia, The Sick Man of Europe
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The Russian Federation today is in the grip of a steadily tightening mesh of serious demographic problems, for which the term "crisis" is no overstatement. This crisis is altering the realm of the possible for the country and its people—continuously, directly, and adversely. Russian social conditions, economic potential, military power, and international influence are today all subject to negative demographic constraints—and these constraints stand only to worsen over the years immediately ahead. Russia is now at the brink of a steep population decline—a peacetime hemorrhage framed by a collapse of the birth rate and a catastrophic surge in the death rate.
Quote:
The Russian Federation today is in the grip of a steadily tightening mesh of serious demographic problems, for which the term "crisis" is no overstatement. This crisis is altering the realm of the possible for the country and its people—continuously, directly, and adversely. Russian social conditions, economic potential, military power, and international influence are today all subject to negative demographic constraints—and these constraints stand only to worsen over the years immediately ahead. Russia is now at the brink of a steep population decline—a peacetime hemorrhage framed by a collapse of the birth rate and a catastrophic surge in the death rate.
Dump the checkpoints
Everybody knows what is needed for peace, but the leadership of Israel and US are not ready to accept that price.
Everybody knows what is needed for peace, but the leadership of Israel and US are not ready to accept that price.
Mars rover Spirit has been on Mars for a one Earth year. Hopefully either of the Mars rovers achieves a one full Mars year of operation. More.
When deadly force bumps into hearts and minds
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THERE is only one traffic law in Ramadi these days: when Americans approach, Iraqis scatter. Horns blaring, brakes screaming, the midday traffic skids to the side of the road as a line of Humvee jeeps ferrying American marines rolls the wrong way up the main street. Every vehicle, that is, except one beat-up old taxi. Its elderly driver, flapping his outstretched hand, seems, amazingly, to be trying to turn the convoy back. Gun turrets swivel and lock on to him, as a hefty marine sergeant leaps into the road, levels an assault rifle at his turbanned head, and screams: “Back this bitch up, motherfucker!” The old man should have read the bilingual notices that American soldiers tack to their rear bumpers in Iraq: “Keep 50m or deadly force will be applied”. In Ramadi, the capital of central Anbar province, where 17 suicide-bombs struck American forces during the month-long Muslim fast of Ramadan in the autumn, the marines are jumpy. Sometimes, they say, they fire on vehicles encroaching within 30 metres, sometimes they fire at 20 metres: “If anyone gets too close to us we fucking waste them,” says a bullish lieutenant. “It's kind of a shame, because it means we've killed a lot of innocent people.”
Quote:
THERE is only one traffic law in Ramadi these days: when Americans approach, Iraqis scatter. Horns blaring, brakes screaming, the midday traffic skids to the side of the road as a line of Humvee jeeps ferrying American marines rolls the wrong way up the main street. Every vehicle, that is, except one beat-up old taxi. Its elderly driver, flapping his outstretched hand, seems, amazingly, to be trying to turn the convoy back. Gun turrets swivel and lock on to him, as a hefty marine sergeant leaps into the road, levels an assault rifle at his turbanned head, and screams: “Back this bitch up, motherfucker!” The old man should have read the bilingual notices that American soldiers tack to their rear bumpers in Iraq: “Keep 50m or deadly force will be applied”. In Ramadi, the capital of central Anbar province, where 17 suicide-bombs struck American forces during the month-long Muslim fast of Ramadan in the autumn, the marines are jumpy. Sometimes, they say, they fire on vehicles encroaching within 30 metres, sometimes they fire at 20 metres: “If anyone gets too close to us we fucking waste them,” says a bullish lieutenant. “It's kind of a shame, because it means we've killed a lot of innocent people.”
Tsunami's salt water may leave islands uninhabitable
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Some Indian Ocean islands could have been made permanently uninhabitable by the salt water that flooded them during the devastating Asian tsunami of 26 December. Water experts are now warning that, in the long run, the salt invasion may prove almost as destructive to the land as the tsunami itself. It could leave some communities dependent on outside aid for food and water for months or years to come. There are widespread reports from across the stricken region that seawater has filled wells, invaded the porous rocks on which communities depend for water, and poisoned soils.
Washington prepares international network of permanent detention camps
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The Bush administration is crafting a series of measures to secure the permanent detention without trial of alleged terrorists and those it designates as enemy combatants, the Washington Post reported Sunday. In gross violation of international law, detainees may soon be held in new US-constructed prisons in Guantanamo Bay, Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, and Yemen, without access to lawyers or family members.
4500 people are missing on Katchall island in the Andaman islands. UNICEF begins to register thousands of children left orphans in Aceh, and a lone survivor from Aceh is found on sea.
The sea took everything, says asylum-seeker who lost his wife and more than 100 relatives
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Sinnathamby Ponniah's family have lived in the southern Sri Lankan village of Alliyawalai for 15 generations. Traumatised after years of civil war, they thought it was their fellow man that posed the biggest threat. But it was nature that was their undoing. "The sea snatched everything," the former fisherman now living in Britain said yesterday as he explained how more than 100 of his relatives, including his wife, Nagalauxmy, 32, and two daughters, Yasintha, 13, and Yasotha, 11, were lost in the tsunami which followed the Indian Ocean earthquake on Boxing Day. His 15-year-old son, Thanis, was one of the extended family's few survivors, eluding death by grabbing hold of a tree. It was three days before his father knew he was safe and a further two before they could talk to each other. Gone, however, are brothers, sisters, parents, cousins and grandparents. From the village's population of 17,000, some 3,000 are confirmed dead. Another 2,500 are still missing, with little hope they will be found.
Quote:
Sinnathamby Ponniah's family have lived in the southern Sri Lankan village of Alliyawalai for 15 generations. Traumatised after years of civil war, they thought it was their fellow man that posed the biggest threat. But it was nature that was their undoing. "The sea snatched everything," the former fisherman now living in Britain said yesterday as he explained how more than 100 of his relatives, including his wife, Nagalauxmy, 32, and two daughters, Yasintha, 13, and Yasotha, 11, were lost in the tsunami which followed the Indian Ocean earthquake on Boxing Day. His 15-year-old son, Thanis, was one of the extended family's few survivors, eluding death by grabbing hold of a tree. It was three days before his father knew he was safe and a further two before they could talk to each other. Gone, however, are brothers, sisters, parents, cousins and grandparents. From the village's population of 17,000, some 3,000 are confirmed dead. Another 2,500 are still missing, with little hope they will be found.
Criminals may be trafficking orphans
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Fears are growing for children orphaned in the tsunami disaster after a senior UN official warned of credible reports that criminal gangs in Indonesia are offering them for adoption or exploitation.
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Fears are growing for children orphaned in the tsunami disaster after a senior UN official warned of credible reports that criminal gangs in Indonesia are offering them for adoption or exploitation.
Carol Bellamy, executive director of Unicef, said yesterday that organised syndicates were exploiting the crisis in Aceh province. "They have been using sophisticated technology such as SMS messages to people throughout this region offering children for adoption," she said, citing reports from Unicef's partner agencies in Indonesia.
She continued: "Whether it is [for] adoption or exploitation purposes or sex trafficking, these are criminal elements so it is very important not to let them get a foothold."
Zionists murder 7 children, aged 10-17, in Gaza, and wound 11 people, 4 of them critically. Israeli army spokeswoman lied like this:
"It's unacceptable that there should be attacks upon civilians. A group of six to eight masked men were spotted firing a mortar and preparing to fire another. We opened fire and we saw we had hit them."
Of course, what happened was that they summarily murdered children and then claimed that they fired at armed men. Disgusting statement from a disgusting entity. More.
"It's unacceptable that there should be attacks upon civilians. A group of six to eight masked men were spotted firing a mortar and preparing to fire another. We opened fire and we saw we had hit them."
Of course, what happened was that they summarily murdered children and then claimed that they fired at armed men. Disgusting statement from a disgusting entity. More.
Tuesday, January 04, 2005
State clampdown on `Saudi spring´.
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A few days before last week’s attack by armed militants on the US consulate in the port city of Jeddah, a scuffle was taking place outside a courthouse in the capital, Riyadh. Dozens attended the trial of the “Riyadh Triad”—the three pro-democracy activists jailed since March for calling for a constitutional monarchy. Several people, including journalists and relatives of the trio, were arrested and detained, and the trial proceeded behind closed doors. The trio’s lead attorney, Abdulrahman Al-Lahem, was also absent—he had been arrested and jailed a few weeks earlier for his criticism of judicial practices.
Quote:
A few days before last week’s attack by armed militants on the US consulate in the port city of Jeddah, a scuffle was taking place outside a courthouse in the capital, Riyadh. Dozens attended the trial of the “Riyadh Triad”—the three pro-democracy activists jailed since March for calling for a constitutional monarchy. Several people, including journalists and relatives of the trio, were arrested and detained, and the trial proceeded behind closed doors. The trio’s lead attorney, Abdulrahman Al-Lahem, was also absent—he had been arrested and jailed a few weeks earlier for his criticism of judicial practices.
The aid operation for the victims of the earthquakes and the tsunami progresses slowly. But how much of the promised cash in the end will be really paid? Sri Lanka´s fishing fleet has been obliterated by the tsunami.
US plans permanent Guantanamo jails.
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The United States is preparing to hold terrorism suspects indefinitely without trial, replacing the Guantanamo Bay prison camp with permanent prisons in the Cuban enclave and elsewhere, it was reported yesterday. The new prisons are intended for captives the Pentagon and the CIA suspect of terrorist links but do not wish to set free or put on trial for lack of hard evidence.
Isn´t American democracy great? The greatest country in the world! At least when it comes to the greatest number of bastards with heads full of piss.
Quote:
The United States is preparing to hold terrorism suspects indefinitely without trial, replacing the Guantanamo Bay prison camp with permanent prisons in the Cuban enclave and elsewhere, it was reported yesterday. The new prisons are intended for captives the Pentagon and the CIA suspect of terrorist links but do not wish to set free or put on trial for lack of hard evidence.
Isn´t American democracy great? The greatest country in the world! At least when it comes to the greatest number of bastards with heads full of piss.
Sunday, January 02, 2005
The politics of disaster.
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On Wednesday the hacks on the New Light of Myanmar, the junta's mouthpiece, admitted that 43 people had died and 25 were missing. Few believed them. Ever since Boxing Day, opponents of the regime who produce the Democratic Voice of Burma website have been receiving leads from scattered sources. An anonymous naval officer told them that a military installation on Coco Island in the Indian Ocean had been washed away. Magye Island in the Gulf of Bengalmay also had been swamped, other sources said. There were reports of the Maubin University building being torn apart, possibly by an earthquake which hit after the waves, of fishermen never returning from the sea and of villages losing dozens of inhabitants. One rumour doing the rounds says that 500 died in one district alone, and it sounds plausible. Like everyone outside the military, the opium barons and the Chinese plutocrats who have bought up much of the country, the inhabitants of the coastal districts are desperately poor. Their flimsy shacks never looked as if they could withstand a raging sea.
Quote:
On Wednesday the hacks on the New Light of Myanmar, the junta's mouthpiece, admitted that 43 people had died and 25 were missing. Few believed them. Ever since Boxing Day, opponents of the regime who produce the Democratic Voice of Burma website have been receiving leads from scattered sources. An anonymous naval officer told them that a military installation on Coco Island in the Indian Ocean had been washed away. Magye Island in the Gulf of Bengalmay also had been swamped, other sources said. There were reports of the Maubin University building being torn apart, possibly by an earthquake which hit after the waves, of fishermen never returning from the sea and of villages losing dozens of inhabitants. One rumour doing the rounds says that 500 died in one district alone, and it sounds plausible. Like everyone outside the military, the opium barons and the Chinese plutocrats who have bought up much of the country, the inhabitants of the coastal districts are desperately poor. Their flimsy shacks never looked as if they could withstand a raging sea.
Before the Next Catastrophe.
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Let’s imagine for a moment that the huge tidal waves had hit the western shores of Europe, that more than a hundred thousand English, Irish, Dutch, Belgian, French, Spanish and Portuguese had fallen victim to the tsunami, and that the east coast of the United States had also suffered. How the world would have sprung into action! How the governments would have been galvanized! What huge sums of money would have materialized within hours to save what could be saved and prevent the epidemics that threatened millions!
Quote:
Let’s imagine for a moment that the huge tidal waves had hit the western shores of Europe, that more than a hundred thousand English, Irish, Dutch, Belgian, French, Spanish and Portuguese had fallen victim to the tsunami, and that the east coast of the United States had also suffered. How the world would have sprung into action! How the governments would have been galvanized! What huge sums of money would have materialized within hours to save what could be saved and prevent the epidemics that threatened millions!
Bodies rot into the soil and poison the water in the land of death.
Quote:
Emergency supplies, meanwhile, are stacked up in a hangar at the military airfield in the provincial capital, Banda Aceh, while the homeless go hungry and the sick beg for medicines. A strange air of inactivity pervades Aceh, located in the far north-west of the Indonesian archipelago, near the epicentre of the earthquake that triggered the tsunamis across the region. After a catastrophe that killed at least 80,000 people in the province and created tens of thousands of refugees, you would expect volunteers and equipment to be pouring in from all corners of a country of 200 million people and a large army and police force. But in Krueng Raya, a once pretty fishing village, locals have been left to excavate bodies from the ruins of their homes, with the help of one mechanical digger. "We need 10," says Jabar bin Yasim, the village head. More than half of the town's 7,000 inhabitants lost their lives in the disaster, which flattened Krueng Raya. Survivors are living in three crowded refugee camps, existing on the meagre hand-outs that have reached them in recent days. "This is our daily ration," says Norkyalis bin Ibrahim, angrily shaking a blue plastic mug filled with rice. "I'm hungry. The children have no milk. We are short of clean water and medicines. We are using petrol to treat infected wounds.''
Quote:
Emergency supplies, meanwhile, are stacked up in a hangar at the military airfield in the provincial capital, Banda Aceh, while the homeless go hungry and the sick beg for medicines. A strange air of inactivity pervades Aceh, located in the far north-west of the Indonesian archipelago, near the epicentre of the earthquake that triggered the tsunamis across the region. After a catastrophe that killed at least 80,000 people in the province and created tens of thousands of refugees, you would expect volunteers and equipment to be pouring in from all corners of a country of 200 million people and a large army and police force. But in Krueng Raya, a once pretty fishing village, locals have been left to excavate bodies from the ruins of their homes, with the help of one mechanical digger. "We need 10," says Jabar bin Yasim, the village head. More than half of the town's 7,000 inhabitants lost their lives in the disaster, which flattened Krueng Raya. Survivors are living in three crowded refugee camps, existing on the meagre hand-outs that have reached them in recent days. "This is our daily ration," says Norkyalis bin Ibrahim, angrily shaking a blue plastic mug filled with rice. "I'm hungry. The children have no milk. We are short of clean water and medicines. We are using petrol to treat infected wounds.''
Aid begins to reach Aceh, in whose capital, Banda Aceh, 3500-4000 bodies are buried every day. In Sri Lanka, foreign aid concentrates on some areas, leaving others without aid. UN secretary general Kofi Annan warns that recovery could take 10 years in the worst hit countries.
Saturday, January 01, 2005
Somalia wave victims 'forgotten'.
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Aid workers have described a scene of devastation on the Somali island of Hafun, a fishing community of 2,500. The floods killed 120 in Somalia with 35 missing and some 50,000 displaced, its prime minister said on Thursday. Displaced families on Hafun desperately need aid as they have no clean water, food, medicine or shelter as most of their homes and possession were swept away. "Cases of diarrhoea and other diseases are already being reported," the UN's World Food Programme said in a statement.
Quote:
Aid workers have described a scene of devastation on the Somali island of Hafun, a fishing community of 2,500. The floods killed 120 in Somalia with 35 missing and some 50,000 displaced, its prime minister said on Thursday. Displaced families on Hafun desperately need aid as they have no clean water, food, medicine or shelter as most of their homes and possession were swept away. "Cases of diarrhoea and other diseases are already being reported," the UN's World Food Programme said in a statement.
Never Again?
Without urgent action, we'll be watching Hotel Congo in 2014.
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In order to succeed in Congo, the United Nations needs a robust troop presence to disarm the militias, secure Congo's borders and natural resources, and keep the peace. U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan has requested 23,900 troops. So far, he's received 16,700. It's not clear if the international community (particularly the United States) is still blinded by it´s guilt and sympathy for the Tutsis of Rwanda, if it can't deal with complexity, or if it just doesn't want to deal with Africa.
Without urgent action, we'll be watching Hotel Congo in 2014.
Quote:
In order to succeed in Congo, the United Nations needs a robust troop presence to disarm the militias, secure Congo's borders and natural resources, and keep the peace. U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan has requested 23,900 troops. So far, he's received 16,700. It's not clear if the international community (particularly the United States) is still blinded by it´s guilt and sympathy for the Tutsis of Rwanda, if it can't deal with complexity, or if it just doesn't want to deal with Africa.
The number of dead in the earthquakes and the tsunami are nearing 150 000. In Aceh, the coast is a scene of utter devastation. Entire towns have vanished.
Prime minister of Thailand promises inquiry on why no warning was issued even when the authorities knew a tsunami was a possible result of the earthquake. But to many these inquiries will come too late.
Our authorities have said that the ambulance flights have been the last chance for our injured, because they wouldn´t have survived in Thailand. Thinking of this, I have to wonder how many thousands of people have died and will die because they will not get the kind of treatment that the evacuated foreigners will get in their homelands. There´s no justice in this. Injured tourists fly home and to possible salvation, the locals are left to die. And those in Thailand are still in a far better circumstances than those in Sumatra.
Prime minister of Thailand promises inquiry on why no warning was issued even when the authorities knew a tsunami was a possible result of the earthquake. But to many these inquiries will come too late.
Our authorities have said that the ambulance flights have been the last chance for our injured, because they wouldn´t have survived in Thailand. Thinking of this, I have to wonder how many thousands of people have died and will die because they will not get the kind of treatment that the evacuated foreigners will get in their homelands. There´s no justice in this. Injured tourists fly home and to possible salvation, the locals are left to die. And those in Thailand are still in a far better circumstances than those in Sumatra.
A new year. Hopefully better than 2004.
2005 was once a year far in the future, unimaginable really. And now it´s here and it´s not looking pretty. The planet is in trouble and humanity is as inept as ever. The compassion of last few days is probably a false hope. We are very emotional beings with a short memory.
2005 was once a year far in the future, unimaginable really. And now it´s here and it´s not looking pretty. The planet is in trouble and humanity is as inept as ever. The compassion of last few days is probably a false hope. We are very emotional beings with a short memory.
Thursday, December 30, 2004
South Asia: India says reclusive aborigines safe on remote islands
Quote:
Five tribes numbering 989 people were safe after Sunday's onslaught, including the 100-member Onge, 250 of the fiercely independent Sentinelese, 39 of the almost extinct Andamanese, 350 of the Jarawa and 250 of the hunter-gatherer Shompen.
Quote:
Five tribes numbering 989 people were safe after Sunday's onslaught, including the 100-member Onge, 250 of the fiercely independent Sentinelese, 39 of the almost extinct Andamanese, 350 of the Jarawa and 250 of the hunter-gatherer Shompen.
They were located by helicopter and some were reached by boat and provided with supplies and medical treatment, Coast Guard director general Arun Kumar Singh said Thursday.
In Senegal, the government and the rebels of Casamance area in the country´s south sign a ceasefire agreement which ends 22 years of fighting that has killed 3500 people.
Fallujah residents return to a destroyed city.
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The Integrated Regional Information Networks (IRIN), a humanitarian information unit of the United Nations, interviewed a number of those who have returned to Fallujah. IRIN states that despite some reports to the contrary, most of those who returned “found their homes destroyed, with the remainder finding extensive damage inside their homes. Windows, television sets and other household items had been shattered by bullets.” Fadhe Kubaissey told IRIN, “Fallujah is nothing but destruction and empty areas. It’s a new desert inside Iraq. Those who have returned to their homes in the past few days lack the minimum conditions—the city is uninhabitable.” Abbas Jumaili, another Fallujah resident and father of five, said, “We are three brothers and all of us have lost our homes. I really don’t know how we will start our life again inside this city.... This city cannot offer a minimum of living conditions for a year. It’s a complete disaster.” Dr. Saleh Hussein Iswawi of the Fallujah General Hospital told the British Broadcasting Corporation, “About 60 percent to 70 percent of the homes and buildings are completely crushed and damaged, and not ready to inhabit at the moment. Of the 30 percent still left standing, I don’t think there is a single one that has not been exposed to some damage.” He reported ongoing fighting. “I was in Fallujah hospital last night [December 23] and I heard a lot of fighting and bombing, which continued for about three or four hours. I heard very loud explosions inside the city.” Another resident, Ali Mahmood, told Reuters: “I saw the city and al-Andalus destroyed. My house is completely destroyed. There is nothing left for me to stay for.” Yasser Satar said: “What do they want from Fallujah? This is the crime of the century. Is this freedom and democracy that they brought to Fallujah?” Included in the destruction are not only civilian homes, but the basic facilities necessary for providing minimal public services. The American military has apparently deliberately targeted any structures relied upon by ordinary citizens. The two main hospitals, including Fallujah General Hospital, are no longer operable. The general hospital was one of the first targets of the invasion in November because the US military wanted to cut off any reports of civilian casualties. According to IRIN, “In the city as a whole, the two main library buildings have been burned and schools and medical clinics have been all but destroyed and are unable to function.” The US military also targeted electrical and water treatment facilities, and sewage has flooded some areas. Most mosques have also been destroyed or damaged. Sheik Hareth Suliman Al-Dari told IslamOnline that Fallujah “has become uninhabitable with no water, electricity or wastewater facilities. The rotten smell of the dead is widespread and smokes of internationally banned weapons cover its sky.” There have been widespread reports that the US military has used chemical weapons—including napalm—against remaining Iraqi fighters in the city. In addition to destruction, returning residents have also encountered death on a large scale. Al Jazeera reports that according to one resident, Abd al-Rahman Slim, “Charred and half-eaten corpses littered the streets.” Stray dogs are reported to roam the streets, eating decaying bodies. Salim said that he “entered my neighbor’s house and found him, after identifying him from an identity card. His body was lying on the ground, nothing left of him but some bones. The scene was very shocking and I could not stay as the smell in the houses and the street was intolerable.” It is impossible to say how many Iraqis have been killed in Fallujah during the last month and a half. The Iraqi Red Crescent gave one estimate of 6,000 dead. Much of the evidence is being destroyed, as the US has reportedly been clearing the streets of bodies and burying them in mass graves. Most of the city, moreover, remains off limits to anyone but the US military.
Tsunamis and Death-Toll Pornography
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The bigger the number of victims, and the further away they live from us, of course, the easier it becomes to distance ourselves from what we are watching. We can accept video of hundreds of anonymous bodies washing up onto the shores of southern India, but would we accept video of the corpse of a young girl floating in a neighborhood swimming pool being shown on our local news? Through the news, we have become accustomed to seeing people in the developing world as victims: victims of war, victims of famine, victims of disease, and victims of natural disasters. In their eternal state of victim-hood, these people have had their right to individuality and dignity stripped, and thus their corpses are fair game for the evening news.
Quote:
The bigger the number of victims, and the further away they live from us, of course, the easier it becomes to distance ourselves from what we are watching. We can accept video of hundreds of anonymous bodies washing up onto the shores of southern India, but would we accept video of the corpse of a young girl floating in a neighborhood swimming pool being shown on our local news? Through the news, we have become accustomed to seeing people in the developing world as victims: victims of war, victims of famine, victims of disease, and victims of natural disasters. In their eternal state of victim-hood, these people have had their right to individuality and dignity stripped, and thus their corpses are fair game for the evening news.
Susan Sontag´s death was announced yesterday. She died of cancer at the age of 71, after winning her first battle against cancer in the 1970s, when the doctors said that she would die. A news article of her death and an obituary from the British Guardian newspaper.
She was the kind of writer that I could stand even when her view of things was not the same as mine. As I have grown older and older, I have become less and less understanding of people whose views are not the same as mine. When I was younger, there was little that could make me angry. Nowadays I usually have no time for those views that I don´t agree with. Time´s running out, you know. And one day it stops for all of us. It stopped for Susan Sontag and it stopped for 130 000 victims of the South Asian catastrophe. And it will stop for me and you.
She was the kind of writer that I could stand even when her view of things was not the same as mine. As I have grown older and older, I have become less and less understanding of people whose views are not the same as mine. When I was younger, there was little that could make me angry. Nowadays I usually have no time for those views that I don´t agree with. Time´s running out, you know. And one day it stops for all of us. It stopped for Susan Sontag and it stopped for 130 000 victims of the South Asian catastrophe. And it will stop for me and you.
Release of children should be a priority
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Amid the fanfare surrounding Israel's 27 December release of 159 Palestinian prisoners as a "goodwill gesture" to Egypt's President Mubarak, the fate of Palestinian child detainees is all but forgotten. Some 350 Palestinian children currently remain in Israeli jails, detention centers, and interrogation centers. Under international law, their release should be a priority. As it is, not one child has released as part of this initiative.
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Amid the fanfare surrounding Israel's 27 December release of 159 Palestinian prisoners as a "goodwill gesture" to Egypt's President Mubarak, the fate of Palestinian child detainees is all but forgotten. Some 350 Palestinian children currently remain in Israeli jails, detention centers, and interrogation centers. Under international law, their release should be a priority. As it is, not one child has released as part of this initiative.
Five million in dearth of food, water
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Up to 5 million people around the Indian Ocean are waiting for food and clean water as nations hit by one of the biggest tsunamis on record rush to bury their dead and avert the threat of disease.
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Up to 5 million people around the Indian Ocean are waiting for food and clean water as nations hit by one of the biggest tsunamis on record rush to bury their dead and avert the threat of disease.
Latest toll from the Indian ocean catastrophe stands at 80936.
When I think what people remember of this year in 2104, there probably will be only two things commonly known:This catastrophe and the war in Iraq.
When I think what people remember of this year in 2104, there probably will be only two things commonly known:This catastrophe and the war in Iraq.
As the death toll from the earthquake and the tsunami continue to rise, the destruction in Aceh is being revealed. In Thailand´s Khao Lak, where large part of my missing countrymen were, the death toll could reach 3000.
Two Palestinians have died in an Israeli attack on the Khan Younis refugee camp in Gaza. This shows how eagerly the Israeli leadership wants peace...
Israeli government plays it old tricks and has declared that 120 000 Palestinians can´t vote in East Jerusalem and that they must travel outside the city to vote. 5367 Palestinians can vote in East Jerusalem, say the leaders of the übermensch.
I can´t put in words how much I hate these bastards, who think that they are so cunning... And who think that they have won.
So, either the Palestinians don´t arrenge the presidential elections or they give East Jerusalem on a plate to the high and mighty Jews. This is the Israeli plan. Because if the people in East Jerusalem don´t vote or travel outside the city to vote, that would in the Israeli eyes mean that the Palestinians aknowledge the illegal Israeli usurpation of the eastern part of the city.
I would just hope that the Israelis would stop their dirty tricks, their plans to steal as much land as they can, and their constant attacks against the Palestinians and would give the peace a chance. But no hope. When you head is full of piss, you are not capable of doing anything good.
And the western countries stand by - or, more precisely, are on their knees before Israel - pretending that everything is going well or that if they happen to admit that things are not looking good, they claim that they can´t do nothing to force Israel to stop it´s illegal actions. There´s no Yasser Arafat to be blamed anymore, so they are now chosen the denial of reality as their new reason not to intervene in Palestine.
I can´t put in words how much I hate these bastards, who think that they are so cunning... And who think that they have won.
So, either the Palestinians don´t arrenge the presidential elections or they give East Jerusalem on a plate to the high and mighty Jews. This is the Israeli plan. Because if the people in East Jerusalem don´t vote or travel outside the city to vote, that would in the Israeli eyes mean that the Palestinians aknowledge the illegal Israeli usurpation of the eastern part of the city.
I would just hope that the Israelis would stop their dirty tricks, their plans to steal as much land as they can, and their constant attacks against the Palestinians and would give the peace a chance. But no hope. When you head is full of piss, you are not capable of doing anything good.
And the western countries stand by - or, more precisely, are on their knees before Israel - pretending that everything is going well or that if they happen to admit that things are not looking good, they claim that they can´t do nothing to force Israel to stop it´s illegal actions. There´s no Yasser Arafat to be blamed anymore, so they are now chosen the denial of reality as their new reason not to intervene in Palestine.
Wednesday, December 29, 2004
"New Iraq´s" National Guard has been defeated by the insurgents and it´s remnants will be merged with the "army" - which is pretty much nonexistent at this point - on 6 January 2005.
Red Cross estimates the death toll could be over 100 000. In Indonesia alone, there could be 80 000 dead. Children are overpresented among those that have died.
Up to half the 60,000 victims of the tsunami are children, says UN. Tens of thousands more are orphaned, and face threat of disease.
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The walls of water sent crashing onto the coasts of south Asia by the biggest earthquake in 40 years took a disproportionate number of young lives. It may have been as many as half of the victims - the toll stood at 60,000 last night. As the calmer waters return a steady flow of bodies, communities are coming to terms with a lost generation.
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The walls of water sent crashing onto the coasts of south Asia by the biggest earthquake in 40 years took a disproportionate number of young lives. It may have been as many as half of the victims - the toll stood at 60,000 last night. As the calmer waters return a steady flow of bodies, communities are coming to terms with a lost generation.
Mike Kiernan, a spokesman for Save the Children in Washington, said: "The death toll among children in these disasters is always high, especially in the poorest parts of the world - that is one of the tragedies. In villages such as Cuddalore in India we know that more than half of the 400 victims were children. There will also likely be many thousands of children orphaned." Waterborne diseases such as typhoid and cholera, as well as malaria, would take their toll on the youngest and weakest survivors, he warned.
A spokesman for the United Nations children's fund Unicef said that up to half of those killed could have been children. Communities were suffering a double loss: dead children, and orphaned boys and girls. He said: "Our major concern is that the kids who survived, now survive the aftermath. Children are the most vulnerable to disease and lack of proper nutrition and water.
The earthquake and the tidal waves in Indian ocean have killed at least 68 000 people and left millions homeless. The number of dead will likely continue to rise, as the remotest areas are reached by rescue workers. At least 14 of my countrymen have died and over 200 are missing. There seems little chance that many of them are alive, as most of them were in the heaviest hitten areas in Thailand. Terrible end for a terrible year.
Tuesday, December 28, 2004
As the biggest Sunni party withdraws from the planned January elections, problems mount for Iraqi vote.
US dollar continues to tumble down against the other major currencies, making a new record against the euro. I just hope that it fall continues so that the weak dollar don´t help US economy but instead works against it and drives foreign investors away from the US. At least as far the weak dollar has done nothing to help US exports according to statistics.
Zionists arrest Mustafa Barghouti again. One wonders are they trying to ensure the victory to Abbas - even when Mustafa Barghouti is no danger to him, according to polls - or are they trying to make Abbas look like a collaborator. Or maybe they are just being themselves, aka bastards.
It´s a curious thing otherwise. The Zionists and their pet westerners have been shouting about the claimed corruption in the Palestinian authority, and when Mustafa Barghouti is saying the same, he ends twice arrested and beaten by the Zionists.
It´s a curious thing otherwise. The Zionists and their pet westerners have been shouting about the claimed corruption in the Palestinian authority, and when Mustafa Barghouti is saying the same, he ends twice arrested and beaten by the Zionists.
At least 25 000 people have died in Southern Asia and the coast of East Africa as a result of the earthquake and the tidal waves it caused, but the number of death in Sri Lanka could be twice as high as the now known number of 12 000 casualties, in Indonesia 25 000 people may have died and in the Andaman and Nicobar islands, that belong to India, 30 000 people are missing.
Terrible, terrible cataclysm. The sad thing is, that part of these deaths were not unavoidable . If the information of the tidal waves would have reached the governments of those countries that were not near the earthquake, and if they would have put warning to television and radio, the coastal regions in countries like India and Sri Lanka could have been at least partly emptied.
Terrible, terrible cataclysm. The sad thing is, that part of these deaths were not unavoidable . If the information of the tidal waves would have reached the governments of those countries that were not near the earthquake, and if they would have put warning to television and radio, the coastal regions in countries like India and Sri Lanka could have been at least partly emptied.
Monday, December 27, 2004
In Uzbekistan, parlamentary elections were held, and only those parties that declared their loyalty to the US backed dictator Islam Karimov - famous for boiling dissidents alive - were allowed to take part. It´s a curious thing that US says it´s fighting for democracy in Iraq and it´s demanding democratic reforms from Arab regimes and declares that the Palestinians must make democratic reforms if they will have any chance of ending the cruel Israeli occupation, but in Central Asia US is happily training Islam Karimov´s troops....
Asia wakes to tidal catastrophe.
Over 12 000 people have died as a result of the earthquake in Indonesia and the tidal waves that reached as far as the east coast of Africa. 4500 have died in both Sri Lanka and Indonesia, over 3000 in India, 400 in Thailand etc.
Yesterday was the first anniversary of the earthquake that destroyed the historic city of Bam in Iran and killed over 41 000 people.
Over 12 000 people have died as a result of the earthquake in Indonesia and the tidal waves that reached as far as the east coast of Africa. 4500 have died in both Sri Lanka and Indonesia, over 3000 in India, 400 in Thailand etc.
Yesterday was the first anniversary of the earthquake that destroyed the historic city of Bam in Iran and killed over 41 000 people.
Sunday, December 26, 2004
The great earthquake, 8.9 on the Richter scale, at Indonesia and the deadly tidal waves - that have reached India, Sri Lanka, Malesia and Thailand - have been reported to have killed hundreds and hundreds are missing, but reading the reports it seems that the number of the dead are more likely to be in the tens of thousands than in the thousand or so that the numbers of dead and missing stand now.
Friday, December 24, 2004
Viktor Yushchenko:Not Quite Ready for Sainthood.
A former banker? When would they be? But seriously, he may not be squeaky clean, but he´s better than Yanukovitsh, who would steer Ukraine to the tight embrace of Czar Vladimir, the autocrat of all Russia, so his victory is to be hoped for. And that´s enough for me now.
A former banker? When would they be? But seriously, he may not be squeaky clean, but he´s better than Yanukovitsh, who would steer Ukraine to the tight embrace of Czar Vladimir, the autocrat of all Russia, so his victory is to be hoped for. And that´s enough for me now.
New galaxies were still forming 2-4 billion years ago, billions of years after the highest point of star formation in the universe has been thought to have occurred.
Blair's peace talks take back seat.
PM tones down efforts after warning not to interfere by US and Israelis shun plan.
PM tones down efforts after warning not to interfere by US and Israelis shun plan.
Blair bowed to Israel, say Palestinians.
I knew quite well before that Tony Blair would be humiliated by the Israeli fascists during his visit and that he would then claim this humiliation as a great achievement. And so it did happen and Tony Blair thanked Ariel Sharon of destroying his proposal of a peace conference and declared how happy he was that Sharon had demanded and that he had submitted on changing it to a one more conference where western countries would demand "reforms" from the Palestinians.
Tony Blair´s great problem is his lack of spine in foreign affairs. He acts tough only towards oppressed peoples and the homefront. He doesn´t care if tens of millions citizens of the United Kingdom oppose him, but if a fat war criminal opposes him, he cracks instantly and crawls at his feet. He´s a pitiful bastard.
I knew quite well before that Tony Blair would be humiliated by the Israeli fascists during his visit and that he would then claim this humiliation as a great achievement. And so it did happen and Tony Blair thanked Ariel Sharon of destroying his proposal of a peace conference and declared how happy he was that Sharon had demanded and that he had submitted on changing it to a one more conference where western countries would demand "reforms" from the Palestinians.
Tony Blair´s great problem is his lack of spine in foreign affairs. He acts tough only towards oppressed peoples and the homefront. He doesn´t care if tens of millions citizens of the United Kingdom oppose him, but if a fat war criminal opposes him, he cracks instantly and crawls at his feet. He´s a pitiful bastard.
Huygens ready to go.
As a pessimist I think that the likeliest scenario is that Huygens will be separated succesfully and then nothing more is of heard of it á la Beagle 2. 21 days without contact is quite a huge number of days in a relatively unknown place like the Saturnian system.
It´s a sad thing that a Titan orbiter will be on orbit no earlier than the 2020´s. Hopefully some day in the future we could have a web of satellites around all the planets and the major moons of the solar system. After all, we have thousands of nuclear weapons ready to annihilate higher life forms from Earth and flotillas of spy satellites, so a hundred or so spacecrafts around distant planets and moons wouldn´t really be asking too much... New telescopes with adaptive optics and space telescopes are good in monitoring changes in the giant planets, but the closer the better, and specialized missions beat occasional peeks.
As a pessimist I think that the likeliest scenario is that Huygens will be separated succesfully and then nothing more is of heard of it á la Beagle 2. 21 days without contact is quite a huge number of days in a relatively unknown place like the Saturnian system.
It´s a sad thing that a Titan orbiter will be on orbit no earlier than the 2020´s. Hopefully some day in the future we could have a web of satellites around all the planets and the major moons of the solar system. After all, we have thousands of nuclear weapons ready to annihilate higher life forms from Earth and flotillas of spy satellites, so a hundred or so spacecrafts around distant planets and moons wouldn´t really be asking too much... New telescopes with adaptive optics and space telescopes are good in monitoring changes in the giant planets, but the closer the better, and specialized missions beat occasional peeks.
War crimes.
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For now the appalling truth is that there has been no remedy for the documented torture and killing of foreign prisoners by this American government.
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For now the appalling truth is that there has been no remedy for the documented torture and killing of foreign prisoners by this American government.
Thursday, December 23, 2004
Pictures from Mars Express show possible remnants of glacial ice on the slopes of Olympus Mons and crater count implies the volcano was active as late as 2 million years ago.
US press review: Mosul blast.
The US press reacts with shock and anguish to one of the deadliest attacks on American troops in Iraq after a bomb killed 18 soldiers in a mess hall near the northern city of Mosul.
Did the Yankees think that they wouldn´t suffer any casualties? They start a war and then whine that they soldiers get killed? One would think that their attitude would be a little bit more realistic.... Of course, they model themselves in Iraq on the Israeli model in Palestine, where when Israeli soldiers from the occupying troops get killed the Israeli military openly talks of revenge when it then attacks civilians... Proving that they are not soldiers, but terrorists. Armies don´t exact revenges. When soldier dies in his or her duty in combat, how can there then be "revenge"? And the Americans should just accept these casualties without whining. They started this war, they support this war, they don´t care about Iraqi casualties, so they should just stop whining and accept their own casualties or else withdraw from Iraq.
The US press reacts with shock and anguish to one of the deadliest attacks on American troops in Iraq after a bomb killed 18 soldiers in a mess hall near the northern city of Mosul.
Did the Yankees think that they wouldn´t suffer any casualties? They start a war and then whine that they soldiers get killed? One would think that their attitude would be a little bit more realistic.... Of course, they model themselves in Iraq on the Israeli model in Palestine, where when Israeli soldiers from the occupying troops get killed the Israeli military openly talks of revenge when it then attacks civilians... Proving that they are not soldiers, but terrorists. Armies don´t exact revenges. When soldier dies in his or her duty in combat, how can there then be "revenge"? And the Americans should just accept these casualties without whining. They started this war, they support this war, they don´t care about Iraqi casualties, so they should just stop whining and accept their own casualties or else withdraw from Iraq.
Wednesday, December 22, 2004
Amid the smoke and screaming, soldiers turned their lunch tables over to be used as stretchers.
Now they were in the receiving end of a "shock and awe" attack.
Now they were in the receiving end of a "shock and awe" attack.
Senior MPs warn British troops will be in Iraq for a decade, as Blair in Baghdad proclaims: 'We are not a nation of quitters'.
Considering that the British lost the world´s largest empire in the last century, I would say that they are a nation of quitters... British troops retreating for some country was quite a common sight.
Considering that the British lost the world´s largest empire in the last century, I would say that they are a nation of quitters... British troops retreating for some country was quite a common sight.
Fallujah assault still exacting heavy toll on mental health of US marines
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The US-backed government put rebel losses at more than 2,000, although unit commanders later revealed their troops had orders to shoot all males of fighting age seen on the streets, armed or unarmed, and ruined homes across the city attest to a strategy of overwhelming force.
I wouldn´t be overly concerned by the the mental health of modern Nazis. These US bastards... First they commit war crimes, then they whine.
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The US-backed government put rebel losses at more than 2,000, although unit commanders later revealed their troops had orders to shoot all males of fighting age seen on the streets, armed or unarmed, and ruined homes across the city attest to a strategy of overwhelming force.
I wouldn´t be overly concerned by the the mental health of modern Nazis. These US bastards... First they commit war crimes, then they whine.
Yesterday saw a good attack against an US base in Mosul. 24-26 dead, of which 19 are US soldiers. That teaches them to invade other countries. Good that some guerillas do what they ought to do - killing foreign occupiers - instead of cowardly attacking Iraqi civilians. Analysis.
Tuesday, December 21, 2004
Paradise is paper, vellum and dust
Libraries will survive the digital revolution because they are places of sensuality and power
Libraries will survive the digital revolution because they are places of sensuality and power
Settlers 'to resist' Gaza pullout
No doubt they will, remembering Israeli army´s defeats in the hands of settlers in the West Bank.
No doubt they will, remembering Israeli army´s defeats in the hands of settlers in the West Bank.
America's war on itself .
Bush's wrecking tactics over climate change follow an established pattern of self-destruction.
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The Kyoto protocol is flawed, the Bush team says, because countries such as China and India are currently exempted from cutting their emissions. But instead of helping to design a treaty that would eventually bring them in, the US teamed up with them in Buenos Aires to try to sink all international cooperation. It even supported Saudi Arabia's demand that oil-producing countries should be compensated for any decline in the market caused by carbon cuts.The result is that the talks very nearly collapsed. On Saturday, 36 hours after they were due to have ended, and while workmen were dismantling the rooms in which the delegates were sitting, the other countries managed to salvage the barest ghost of an agreement. The US permitted them to hold an informal meeting in May, during which "any negotiation leading to new commitments" is forbidden. According to the head of the US delegation, the time to decide what happens after 2012 is "in 2012". It's like saying that the time to decide what to do about homeland security is when the plane is flying into the tower. Wrecking these talks is pretty good work for a country which, as it refuses to ratify the protocol, doesn't even have negotiating rights... The US has every right to beat itself up. But unfortunately, while chasing itself around the world, it tramples everyone else.
Bush's wrecking tactics over climate change follow an established pattern of self-destruction.
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The Kyoto protocol is flawed, the Bush team says, because countries such as China and India are currently exempted from cutting their emissions. But instead of helping to design a treaty that would eventually bring them in, the US teamed up with them in Buenos Aires to try to sink all international cooperation. It even supported Saudi Arabia's demand that oil-producing countries should be compensated for any decline in the market caused by carbon cuts.The result is that the talks very nearly collapsed. On Saturday, 36 hours after they were due to have ended, and while workmen were dismantling the rooms in which the delegates were sitting, the other countries managed to salvage the barest ghost of an agreement. The US permitted them to hold an informal meeting in May, during which "any negotiation leading to new commitments" is forbidden. According to the head of the US delegation, the time to decide what happens after 2012 is "in 2012". It's like saying that the time to decide what to do about homeland security is when the plane is flying into the tower. Wrecking these talks is pretty good work for a country which, as it refuses to ratify the protocol, doesn't even have negotiating rights... The US has every right to beat itself up. But unfortunately, while chasing itself around the world, it tramples everyone else.
Why Blair's trip will not succeed
The US is too partisan to see that the Palestinians cannot give more
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If the Palestinians were to secure the redress that other colonised peoples have, there would either be no Israel - as there is no Algérie Française - or a bi-national state, like South Africa, in which it would lose its exclusively Jewish character.
(One could wonder why Christians in the western countries couldn´t show as much love for the Jews when they really were the victims. Why people have to be first the victims of a genocide AND then find other people to oppress before they get the backing of the West? What has this changed?)
Add this to the fact that the usual American state of knowledge on Palestine´s current situation and history is distorted, to put it mildly, and the worship of Israel´s arrogance and it´s cruel policies which are seen by the neoconservatives as a model which the US should follow - typically fascist worship of the righteousness of power - and the growing religious fanaticism in the US, which sees the state of Israel as a sign of the end of the world as we know it, when Americans drive their SUVs straight through the Gates of Heaven.
And now the Americans believe that Mahmoud Abbas is the man who will give Israel all land west side of the wall, including East Jerusalem, forfeit the rights of the refugees and in the end kneel before His Highness Ariel Sharon and praise him for his kindness and mercy, or something like that. The Jews and Israel simply are too big taboos for the Americans. They might not know that much about them, but they worship them the more intensely. In the US mainstream media, critising Israel is about as frequent as criticism of the Soviet Union was in the countries of the Soviet bloc. Pretty rare and when it exists, it has to be made more acceptable by long tirades against the Palestinians and the Arab countries and positive praises of Israel on other accounts and sad claims that we help Israel if we don´t let it do whatever it wants to do to the Palestinians. Sad because this tells much what the writers think of their audience. Just doing the right thing isn´t the right thing to do, if it isn´t done for Israel.
The US is too partisan to see that the Palestinians cannot give more
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If the Palestinians were to secure the redress that other colonised peoples have, there would either be no Israel - as there is no Algérie Française - or a bi-national state, like South Africa, in which it would lose its exclusively Jewish character.
But the Palestinians are not demanding that. They have committed themselves, via Oslo, to the loss of 78% of their original homeland. If there ever is a settlement, this concession will rank as the greatest single contribution to it. It was under Arafat's auspices that they made it. Yet the US called him an "obstacle" to peace who had to be replaced by a "moderate" leadership that would persuade its people to give yet more.
But a new Palestinian leadership won't do that, least of all if it is clean and democratic, because, reflecting the popular will, it simply couldn't. That Sharon is no less an obstacle to peace than Arafat ever was, and Israeli "moderation" as necessary as Palestinian, is a thought that might occur to Bush, but it isn't one which, as similar thoughts in his first term taught him, he will find politic to act upon. US Middle East policies have always been shaped more by domestic politics than realities on the ground, and never more distortingly than today.
To the Americans, the Israeli Jews are the victims, after all, according to the view of mainstream US: Jews = Victims, so the Jews must be the real victims in Palestine too, whatever their actions. This cult of the eternal victimhood of the Jews, which is now cherished by the religious right of the Christians and liberal bleeding hearts and also part of the Jews themselves, who are not neither dicriminated nor oppressed more than the average minorities in the west, and usually less because antisemitism simply is for historical reasons far less easy to swallow for most of the people in the western countries, even if they then held racist views of other peoples.(One could wonder why Christians in the western countries couldn´t show as much love for the Jews when they really were the victims. Why people have to be first the victims of a genocide AND then find other people to oppress before they get the backing of the West? What has this changed?)
Add this to the fact that the usual American state of knowledge on Palestine´s current situation and history is distorted, to put it mildly, and the worship of Israel´s arrogance and it´s cruel policies which are seen by the neoconservatives as a model which the US should follow - typically fascist worship of the righteousness of power - and the growing religious fanaticism in the US, which sees the state of Israel as a sign of the end of the world as we know it, when Americans drive their SUVs straight through the Gates of Heaven.
And now the Americans believe that Mahmoud Abbas is the man who will give Israel all land west side of the wall, including East Jerusalem, forfeit the rights of the refugees and in the end kneel before His Highness Ariel Sharon and praise him for his kindness and mercy, or something like that. The Jews and Israel simply are too big taboos for the Americans. They might not know that much about them, but they worship them the more intensely. In the US mainstream media, critising Israel is about as frequent as criticism of the Soviet Union was in the countries of the Soviet bloc. Pretty rare and when it exists, it has to be made more acceptable by long tirades against the Palestinians and the Arab countries and positive praises of Israel on other accounts and sad claims that we help Israel if we don´t let it do whatever it wants to do to the Palestinians. Sad because this tells much what the writers think of their audience. Just doing the right thing isn´t the right thing to do, if it isn´t done for Israel.
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