A Bahraini protester in Manama. Photograph: Mohammed Al-Shaikh/AFP/Getty Images
In late March 2011, as the Arab Spring was spreading, CNN sent a four-person crew to Bahrain to produce a one-hour documentary on the use of internet technologies and social media by democracy activists in the region. Featuring on-air investigative correspondent Amber Lyon, the CNN team had a very eventful eight-day stay in that small, US-backed kingdom.
By the time the CNN crew arrived, many of the sources who had agreed to speak to them were either in hiding or had disappeared. Regime opponents whom they interviewed suffered recriminations, as did ordinary citizens who worked with them as fixers. Leading human rights activist Nabeel Rajab was charged with crimes shortly after speaking to the CNN team. A doctor who gave the crew a tour of his village and arranged meetings with government opponents, Saeed Ayyad, had his house burned to the ground shortly after. Their local fixer was fired ten days after working with them.
The CNN crew itself was violently detained by regime agents in front of Rajab’s house. As they described it after returning to the US, “20 heavily-armed men”, whose faces were “covered with black ski masks”, “jumped from military vehicles”, and then “pointed machine guns at” the journalists, forcing them to the ground. The regime’s security forces seized their cameras and deleted their photos and video footage, and then detained and interrogated them for the next six hours.
Lyon’s experience both shocked and emboldened her. The morning after her detention, newspapers in Bahrain prominently featured articles about the incident containing what she said were “outright fabrications” from the government. “It made clear just how willing the regime is to lie,” she told me in a phone interview last week.
But she also resolved to expose just how abusive and thuggish the regime had become in attempting to snuff out the burgeoning democracy movement, along with any negative coverage of the government.
“I realized there was a correlation between the amount of media attention activists receive and the regime’s ability to harm them, so I felt an obligation to show the world what our sources, who risked their lives to talk to us, were facing.”
CNN’s total cost for the documentary, ultimately titled “iRevolution: Online Warriors of the Arab Spring”, was in excess of $100,000, an unusually high amount for a one-hour program of this type. The portion Lyon and her team produced on Bahrain ended up as a 13-minute segment in the documentary. That segment, which as of now is available on YouTube, is a hard-hitting and unflinching piece of reporting that depicts the regime in a very negative light.
Amber Lyon on CNN, commenting on the March 2011 repression in Bahrain
Abby Interviews former CNN Investigative Journalist, Amber Lyon, about CNN’s corrupt media empire, calling into question a media establishment where censorship can be bought.
Former CNN Reporter (Amber Lyon) threatened & silenced by CNN reveals CNN Lies & War Propaganda
Published on Oct 9, 2012
‘Real Arab Spring in Bahrain which West ignores’
Published on Aug 16, 2012
Bahraini Human rights activist Nabeel Rajab has been sentenced to three years in jail for “participation in an illegal assembly” and “calling for a march without prior notification.” – READ MORE http://on.rt.com/y95tqy
Patrick Henningsen, who’s a geopolitical analyst, believes human rights chaos in Bahrain is beneficial for Western states.
Bahrain uprising anniversary: Worst clashes in months
Published on Feb 14, 2013
http://www.euronews.com/ Two years after their Arab Spring uprising against Bahrain’s ruling family, protesters have been back on the streets in what they said was a day of civil disobedience.
Security forces fired warning shots to try to disperse a crowd of youths gathered in a village near the capital Manama.
They killed a teenager and several others were injured during the most violent clashes in months.
Thousands of people were arrested during the first uprising in early 2011. Dozens of political prisoners are still in jail.
Of those originally detained, seven prisoners have been interviewed by Amnesty International at Bahrain’s Jaw prison.
All of them say they’ve been jailed on false charges or under laws that repress basic rights. Many were allegedly tortured in the first weeks of their arrests.
Human rights groups also claim security forces used excessive force two years ago.
Bahrain Shouting in the dark البحرين تصرخ في الظلام
Uploaded on Aug 4, 2011
Bahrain: An island kingdom in the Arabian Gulf where the Shia Muslim majority are ruled by a family from the Sunni minority. Where people fighting for democratic rights broke the barriers of fear, only to find themselves alone and crushed.
This is their story and Al Jazeera is their witness – the only TV journalists who remained to follow their journey of hope to the carnage that followed.
This is the Arab revolution that was abandoned by the Arabs, forsaken by the West and forgotten by the world.
Shouting in the dark can be seen from Thursday, August 4, at the following times GMT: Thursday: 2000; Friday: 1200; Saturday: 0100; Sunday: 0600; Monday: 2000; Tuesday: 1200; Wednesday: 0100; Thursday: 0600.
Reem Khalifa: Court overturns twitter conviction for Nabeel Rajab but he still faces three years in prison for allegedly encouraging protesters to clash with security forces
Bio
Reem Khalifa writes on Bahraini matters for the Associated Press and weekly op-eds for Qatari Al Raya and Bahraini Al Wasat on Middle East and North Africa affairs.
Britain’s culture minister has denied having inappropriate contacts with Rupert Murdoch’s media empire in testimony before a public inquiry, as pressure continues to mount on Prime Minister David Cameron’s government over the issue.
Jeremy Hunt, appearing before the Leveson media standards inquiry on Thursday, admitted that he was “sympathetic” towards US-based News Corporation’s failed bid to control British satellite broadcaster BSkyB.
From the Majority Report, live M-F 12 noon EST and via daily podcast at http://Majority.FM:
Thousands upon thousands of eligible voters are being told they cannot vote in Florida…
‘ACTA could turn honest citizens into criminals by mistake’
Amazing how they can see through this move in Europe and no one can seem to see their way clear of the subterfuge hidden within this legislation here in the United States! Makes you wonder huh ?
The controversial ACTA anti-piracy agreement has been dealt a blow by the European Parliament. Three key committees have voted against the treaty, citing concerns over its legality. ACTA sparked Europe-wide protests, with activists saying online freedom of speech is being put at risk.
Rick Falkvinge from the Swedish Pirate Party says the treaty is confused at best.
On Thursday, US lawmakers discussed whether or not the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act should be renewed. FISA gives government the power to monitor phone calls, emails and other forms of electronic communication. Critics believe that FISA can now be used to target citizens all in the name of homeland security. Andrew Blake, RT’s web producer, joins us with more on the controversial legislation and discusses other legislation such as CISPA, SOPA and PIPA.
House rejects bill penalizing doctors for sex-selective abortions
By Pete Kasperowicz
The House on Thursday rejected a Republican bill that would impose fines and prison terms on doctors who perform abortions for the sole purpose of controlling the gender of the child, a practice known as sex-selective abortion.
The Prenatal Nondiscrimination Act (PRENDA), H.R. 3541, was defeated in a 246-168 vote. While that’s a clear majority of the House, Republicans called up the bill under a suspension of House rules, which limits debate and requires a two-thirds majority vote to pass. In this case, it would have required more support from Democrats.
Twenty Democrats voted for the bill, while seven Republicans opposed it. The bill would have needed 30 more yeas to pass.
Suspension votes are normally used for noncontroversial bills, but the GOP-backed measure was clearly controversial. Republicans have occasionally put controversial bills on the suspension calendar in order to highlight that Democrats oppose certain policies.
In some cases, Republicans have rescheduled these bills for regular consideration after they have failed, allowing for passage by a simple majority. But Republicans gave no sign that they would try again with PRENDA.
Earlier in the day, House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) indicated that the issue of stopping sex-selective abortion is important enough that they would try again, but he was not specific.
Democracynow.org – After years of rumors that mining companies were exploring in Haiti, Canadian and U.S. corporations now confirm they have permits to mine gold in more than 1,000 square-miles in northern Haiti. Haiti’s new prime minister says the estimated $20 billion worth of minerals in Haiti’s hills could help liberate it from dependency on foreign aid, and rebuild from the devastating 2010 earthquake. But many worry the mines will be a boom for foreign investors and a bust for local communities. We speak to Jane Regan, lead author of “Gold Rush in Haiti: Who Will Get Rich?” The report by Haiti Grassroots Watch was published Wednesday in The Guardian and Haïti Liberté. “You have a perfect storm brewing where you have giant pit mines in the north in a country that is already environmentally devastated and giant pit mines being run by Canadian and American companies,” Regan says. “Most of the money and gold dug up will go straight north.”
To watch the complete weekday independent news hour, read the transcript, download the podcast, search our vast archive, or to find more information about Democracy Now! and Amy Goodman, visit http://www.democracynow.org/
Moody’s Investors Service has cut its credit ratings for nine Danish banks, citing the impact of the ongoing eurozone crisis on bank loan quality and on their fund-raising capacity.
The ratings agency lowered the debt ratings of the banks, along with the Finnish subsidiary of one of the banks, by up to three notches on Wednesday, AFP reported.
The banks are Danske Bank, Jyske Bank, Sydbank, Spar Nord Bank, Ringkjobing Landbobank, Nykredit, Realkredit, DLR Kredit, and Danmarks Skibskredit. Moody’s also downgraded Danske Bank’s Finnish arm Sampo Bank.
“Danish financial institutions face sluggish domestic economic growth, weakening real estate prices, and higher levels of unemployment, as well as the risk of external shocks from the ongoing euro area debt crisis,” Moody’s said.
“Asset quality is deteriorating, and these pressures are expected to continue,” it added.
The agency also noted that the significant reliance of most of the financial institutions on market funding has enhanced their vulnerability to the eurozone crisis.
“Structural changes to that market have increased refinancing risk, posing a particular concern for mortgage credit institutions whose access to alternative funding is limited,” Moody’s stated.
Europe was hit by a serious financial crisis in 2008 and the situation has intensified over the past few months.
DemocracyNow.org – We go to Bahrain to speak with two recently released political prisoners, Zainab Alkhawaja and Nabeel Rajab, both jailed for protesting the U.S.-backed monarchy. Rajab, the president of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights, was released on bail after being held for nearly a month. “We always thought that America and Bahrain’s good relations would benefit our fight for freedom and democracy in our region, but it has turned out to be opposite,” he says. “They are supporting a dictator here, the oppressive regime. … We have to suffer for being a rich region.” Alkhawaja, who was jailed in April after protesting the detention of her father, Abdulhadi, vows: “We are going to carry on protesting … It doesn’t matter if we get arrested five, six, 10 times, it’s not going to stop. In the end, we have sacrificed a lot for democracy and freedom.”
To watch the complete weekday independent news hour, read the transcript, download the podcast, search our vast archive, or to find more information about Democracy Now! and Amy Goodman, visit http://www.democracynow.org/
A group of defectors fighting for the M23 rebel movement against the Congolese army say that they were recruited and trained in neighbouring Rwanda against their will.
The revelations come after weeks of fighting in the east of the country and would be the first direct evidence that Rwandan troops are involved in the fighting that has displaced thousands from their homes.
The allegations made by the rebel defectors across the border in Congo will strain relations with Rwanda, but so far officials from both sides have held back, and are talking about a joint investigation to get to the bottom of the matter.
The Syrian government says the massacre of more than a hundred people in the Syrian town of Houla was the work of armed terrorist gangs. This, as the U.S. Secretary of State admits military planning for action in Syria is already going ahead, but Moscow has vowed to block any moves for outside interference at the UN.
Activist Sara Flounders talks to RT. She says Washington was never interested in a diplomatic solution in Syria.
Mosaic News: Egypt’s Shafiq vows to crush revolution and restrain Islamists if he wins election
Egypt’s Shafiq vows to crush revolution and restrain Islamists if he wins the election, Sudan pulls troops from Abyei amid new bombing accusations by the South, prominent Bahraini activist Zainab al-Khawaja released on bail, and more.
Today’s headlines in full:
Egypt’s Shafiq vows to crush revolution and restrain Islamists if he wins election
Al-Alam, Iran
Sudan pulls troops from Abyei amid new bombing accusations by South
Dubai TV, UAE
Prominent Bahraini activist Zainab al-Khawaja released on bail
BBC Arabic, UK
Afghan rage over sharp increase in civilian casualties
Press TV, Iran
Israel lacks courage to wage war on Iran, says Supreme Leader’s aide
Press TV, Iran
Iran’s foreign ministry in talks with Saudi Arabia over jailed Iranians
Press TV, Iran
Iran hit by ‘Flame’ computer virus as Israel keeps mum on speculated involvement
IBA, Israel
Turkey authorizes arrest warrants for ex-IDF chiefs over 2010 flotilla deaths
IBA, Israel
Israeli forces turn Palestinian family home into prison
Palestine TV, Ramallah
Mood ‘deeply disturbed’ by executions in Syria
Future TV, Lebanon
Iraqis rally for national unity as government faces no-confidence vote
Al-Iraqiya TV, Iraq
Image: Flyers of Egyptian presidential candidate and former prime minister Ahmed Shafiq are seen on the ground outside his campaign headquarters in Cairo May 29, 2012:L REUTERS/Mohammed Salem
Mosaic is a Peabody Award-winning daily compilation of television news reports from the Middle East, including Egypt, Lebanon, Israel, Syria, the Palestinian Authority, Iraq and Iran. Watch more Mosaic at http://www.linktv.org/mosaic
Syrian rebels have given president Bashar al-Assad a 48-hour deadline to comply with an international peace plan otherwise they would renew their battle to overthrow him.
The ultimatum was issued after UN observers reported the discovery of 13 bodies bound and shot in eastern Syria, adding to the world outcry over the massacre last week of 108 men, women and children.
The latest developments emphasised how the peace plan drafted by UN-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan has failed to stem 14 months of bloodshed or bring the Syrian government and opposition to the negotiating table.
Col Qassim Saadeddine of the rebel Free Syrian Army said its leadership set a deadline of 9am tomorrow for Mr Assad to implement the peace plan, which includes a ceasefire, deployment of observers, and free access for humanitarina aid and journalists.
If it fails to do so “we are free from any commitment and we will defend and protect the civilians, their villages and their cities,” Mr Saadeddine said in a statement posted on social media.
Both sides in the conflict have violated a tenuous ceasefire over the past two months but Mr Assad’s forces have been by far the worst offender, according to UN monitors.
Outrage at last Friday’s massacre in the town of Houla, led a host of Western countries to expel senior Syrian diplomats on Tuesday and to press Russia and China to allow tougher action by the UN Security Council.
Major-general Robert Mood, the Norwegian head of the observer mission, said the 13 corpses found yesterday in Assukar, about 50 km (east of Deir al-Zor, had their hands tied behind their backs. Some had been shot in the head from close range.
Mr Mood called the latest killings an “appalling and inexcusable act” and appealed to all factions to end the cycle of violence.
He did not apportion any blame but Syrian activists said the victims were army defectors killed by Mr Assad’s forces.
Video footage posted by activists showed the bodies face down on the ground, hands tied behind their backs, with dark pools of blood around their heads and torsos.
UN peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous said in New York on Tuesday that the Syrian army and “shabbiha” militiamen supporting Assad were probably responsible for killing the 108 people in Houla with artillery and tank fire, guns and knives.
The government denied any responsibility and blamed Islamist “terrorists” – its term for rebel forces.
The uprising began last March with street protests against Mr Assad, who succeeeded his late, authoritarian father Hafez al-Assad 11 years ago to perpetuate the family dynasty.
While initially a pro-democracry movement, the struggle has grown into an armed struggle increasingly involving sectarian rivalries pitting the Sunni Muslim majority against the Alawite sect, to which the Assad clan belongs.
Mr Assad’s forces have killed 7,500 people since it began, according to a UN toll. The government, which says the unrest is the work of foreign-backed terrorists, says more than 2,600 soldiers or security agents have been killed.
Mr nnan, trying to save his peace plan from collapse, told Mr Assad in Damascus on Tuesday that Syria was at a tipping point.The pro-opposition Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said that more than 100 people were killed in Houla the same day.
Diplomats said the UN Human Rights Council would meet in Geneva on Friday to consider the Houla massacre, the fourth time Syria has faced such scrutiny since the anti-Assad revolt broke out in March 2011.
Mr Assad has so far proved impervious to international scolding and Western sanctions for his crackdown and has failed to return troops and tanks to barracks, as required by the Annan plan.
However, the UN observers sent in to monitor a notional ceasefire were able to verify the horrors in Houla, which produced a wave of world revulsion.
Mr Assad’s heavyweight international allies, China and Russia, stuck to their rejection of any intervention or UN-backed penalties to force him to change course.
The West is itself averse to military intervention, although French president Francois Hollande said on Tuesday this could change if the UN Security Council backed it. But that is not possible unless veto-wielding members Russia and China allow it.
Turkey joined other countries including the United States, Britain, France and Germany in expelling Syrian diplomats in protest at the Houla massacre, saying unspecified international measures would follow if crimes against humanity continued.
Stung by the expulsions, Syria told the Dutch chargee d’affaires to leave. She was one of the few senior Western diplomats left in Damascus.
Despite the diplomatic deadlock, Mr Annan, a former UN secretary-general and Nobel peace laureate, is pressing on with his mission.
“It is important to find a solution that will lead to a democratic transition in Syria and find a way of ending the killings as soon as possible,” he said after talks in Jordan yesterday.
New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg outlined a plan Wednesday to ban the sale of sugary soft drinks larger than 16 ounces at restaurants, movie theaters, street carts and other venues.
Reason.tv’s Anthony Fisher took to the streets to ask New Yorkers what they thought about Bloomberg and the ban.
Approximately 2 minutes.
Camera by Kaplan Akincilar. Produced by Anthony Fisher
A U.S. security institute has published satellite images which it said increased concerns that Iran was trying to “destroy evidence” of suspected past research relevant for developing a nuclear weapons capability, a charge Tehran dismisses.
The Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS) posted them on its website hours after diplomats said the U.N. atomic watchdog showed what appeared to be similar imagery at a closed-door briefing in Vienna.
Western envoys who attended Wednesday’s briefing earlier told Reuters that two small side buildings at the Parchin military facility had been removed, and ISIS said its pictures from May 25 showed that they “have been completely razed”.
The disclosure followed inconclusive talks between Iran and six world powers in Baghdad last week to address concerns about the nature of its nuclear activities, which Iran says are aimed at generating electricity.
The U.N. International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has repeatedly asked Iran for access to Parchin as part of a long-stalled probe into suspicions that Tehran may be seeking the ability to assemble nuclear bombs, should it decide to do so.
The Islamic state has so far refused to let inspectors visit the facility – which it describes as a conventional military complex – saying there must first be a broader framework agreement on how to address the IAEA’s questions.
The new satellite images will add to Western suspicions that Iran is “sanitizing” the site of any incriminating evidence before allowing the IAEA to go there.
Iran’s IAEA envoy, Ali Asghar Soltanieh, dismissed such accusations by Western officials, telling reporters after the briefing at IAEA headquarters that “this kind of noise and allegations are baseless”.
ISIS, which tracks Iran’s nuclear programme closely, said there were visible tracks in the images “made by heavy machinery used in the demolition process”, adding that the two buildings had been intact in early April.
No Parchin Access?
“Heavy machinery tracks and extensive evidence of earth displacement is also visible throughout the interior as well as the exterior of the site’s perimeter,” the think-tank said.
The Parchin complex is at the centre of Western allegations that Iran has been conducting research and experiments that could serve a nuclear weapons development programme. The Islamic Republic has repeatedly denied any such ambition.
Last week, the IAEA said in a report issued to member states that satellite images showed “extensive activities” at the facility southeast of Tehran.
Western diplomats said this was an allusion to suspected cleaning at Parchin. They have earlier cited other images showing recent activity at the site, including a stream of water, as suggesting Iran is trying to remove evidence.
Iran, which denies Western accusations it is seeking to develop nuclear weapons capability, has dismissed charges aired about Parchin as “childish” and “ridiculous”.
“The newest image raises concerns that Iran is attempting to raze the site prior to allowing an IAEA visit. The razing of the two buildings may also indicate that Iran has no intention to allow inspectors access soon,” ISIS said.
An IAEA report last November said Iran had built a large containment vessel in 2000 at Parchin in which to conduct tests that the U.N. agency said were “strong indicators of possible (nuclear) weapon development.”
It said a building was constructed around a large cylindrical object, a vessel designed to contain the detonation of up to 70 kg of high explosives. Diplomatic sources say the suspected tests likely took place about a decade ago.
Last week, a senior Iranian official was quoted as saying the IAEA had not yet given good enough reasons to visit Parchin.
Comment: Images and words about tracks in dirt made by heavy machinery is offered as proof. No mention of earlier International Atomic Energy Agency Reports where the IAEA clearly said Iran is not a nuclear threat and has no nuclear ambitions in any military capacity.
Things are starting to take a repeat roll of Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya. The obvious target: Iran.
By the way, construction in and around nuclear sites is not uncommon. In simple terms; a construction company who did work inside the facility leveled the lunchroom they built for their workers, since work at the site was complete. Leave it to the West to always conclude (for us) the worst, while bastardizing free decent people, whose resources the 1% intend on plundering.
Britain’s Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange can be extradited to Sweden, but put his deportation on hold to give his lawyers a final chance to reopen the case.
The court, which handed down its decision after an 18-month legal marathon, rejected Assange’s argument that the Swedish prosecutor who issued the arrest warrant over sex crime allegations was not entitled to do so.
“The request for Mr Assange’s extradition has been lawfully made and his appeal against extradition is accordingly dismissed,” Supreme Court president Nicholas Phillips said as he delivered the ruling to a hushed courtroom.
The seven judges were split five to two but their majority ruling was that the prosecutor was a rightful judicial authority, and therefore allowed to issue the warrant for the Internet whistleblower.
But in a new twist, Assange’s lawyer Dinah Rose asked for 14 days to consider whether to apply to reopen the case, on the grounds that the judgment referred to material that was not mentioned during the last hearing in February.
The judge granted the request, which is highly unusual in the three-year history of the Supreme Court.
“With the agreement of the respondent, the required period for extradition shall not commence until 13th June 2012,” the Supreme Court said in a statement.
Assange, a 40-year-old Australian national, was not in the central London court for the judgment. One of his supporters, journalist John Pilger, said he was “stuck in traffic” with his mother, who flew in from Australia for the verdict.
The Swedish lawyer for the two women who accuse Assange of rape and sexual assault said he would be extradited eventually.
“The decision was what we expected . . . It’s unfortunate that it has been delayed further, but he will ultimately be extradited,” Claes Borgstroem told AFP.
Assange is at present wanted for questioning over the sex crime allegations, but Borgstroem said he expected an indictment perhaps within a month after he gets to Sweden.
Australia said it would closely monitor the case and added that consular officials were available to help him if he wished.
“The Australian government cannot interfere in the judicial processes of other governments but we will closely monitor the proceedings against Mr Assange in Sweden,” said a spokeswoman for Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs.
Assange, whose website enraged Washington by releasing a flood of state and military secrets, has been living under tight restrictions on his movement for 540 days, including wearing an ankle tag and reporting daily to police.
He has said he fears his extradition would eventually lead to his transfer to the United States, where U.S. soldier Bradley Manning is facing a court-martial over accusations that he handed documents to WikiLeaks.
Outside court, Assange’s principal lawyer Gareth Peirce confirmed that the extradition was stayed while his legal team considers whether to apply to reopen the case, although the judgment still stands.
The point in question is the interpretation of the Vienna Convention on the law of treaties, “which was never addressed in the hearing, one way or another, by either side,” Peirce added.
If Assange fails to have the case reopened in Britain, he still has the option of a last-ditch appeal to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg.
The white-haired Assange does not deny that he had sex with two WikiLeaks volunteers in Sweden while attending a WikiLeaks seminar, but insists the sex was consensual and argues there are political motives behind the attempts to extradite him.
Assange’s mother Christine told Australian television ahead of the judgment: “It’s a 24-hour nightmare because we know he is not safe and the biggest governments in the world are gunning for him.”
The former computer hacker has been fighting deportation since his arrest in London in December 2010 on the European arrest warrant issued by Sweden.
The Supreme Court is his final avenue of appeal under British law, after two lower courts ruled he should be sent to Sweden for questioning.
The British Medical Association has decided to delay non-urgent patient care on June 21 after doctors voted with an overwhelming majority for the first industrial action in the profession in 40 years.
The BMA said in an open letter published in UK newspapers that the “reluctant” day of action is not meant to harm anyone and those with the most severe situations will still have access to medical care.
“On that day, doctors will be in their usual workplaces but providing urgent and emergency care only”, wrote the BMA.
“We will be postponing non-urgent cases and although this will be disruptive to the NHS, rest assured, doctors will be there when our patients need us most and our action will not impact on your safety,” it added.
The letter said the doctors are keen to have their “voice heard by the government.”
The action comes after BMA warned ministers against pushing ahead with “totally unjustified” pension contribution rises and a simultaneous increase in doctors’ retirement age.
The move puts doctors alongside a host of other public sector workers including teachers, civil service personnel and even police officers who have already announced or launched strikes in reaction to the austerity measures and changes to their pension schemes.
“We are taking this step very reluctantly, and would far prefer to negotiate for a fairer solution,” said chairman of council at the BMA, Dr Hamish Meldrum.
“But this clear mandate for action – on a very high turnout – reflects just how let down doctors feel by the Government’s unwillingness to find a fairer approach to the latest pension changes and its refusal to acknowledge the major reforms of 2008 that made the NHS scheme sustainable in the long term,” Meldrum added.
Rocker taps into anger at financial world, dedicating anti-bank song to ‘those who are struggling in Europe and Berlin’
Bruce Springsteen has touched on a nerve of widespread discontent with financiers and bankers while performing a concert in Berlin.
Springsteen played to a sold-out crowd at Berlin’s Olympiastadion, singing from his album Wrecking Ball and speaking about tough economic times that have put people out of work worldwide and led to debt crises in Greece and other countries.
“In America a lot of people have lost their jobs,” said Springsteen, 62, who performed for three hours to 58,000 fans in the stadium that hosted the 1936 Olympics and 2006 World Cup final.
“But also in Europe and in Berlin, times are tough,” he said, speaking in German. “This song is for all those who are struggling.” He then introduced Jack of All Trades, a withering attack on bankers that includes the lyrics: “The banker man grows fat, working man grows thin.”
Europe has been especially hard hit since 2008′s financial meltdown that sparked an enduring sovereign debt crisis. Unemployment on the continent has risen to levels not seen since the 1990s.
Springsteen’s Wrecking Ball tour began on 13 May in Spain, which is struggling with its crushing debt load, and runs for two and a half months with 33 stops in 15 countries before concluding on 31 July in Helsinki.
Berlin has been a special place for Springsteen since his July 1988 concert behind the old Iron Curtain in East Berlin.
Watched by 160,000 people, it was the biggest rock show in East German history, and The Boss spoke out against the “barriers” keeping East Germans prisoners in their country. Some historians have said the concert fed into a movement gaining moment at the time that contributed to the tearing down of the Berlin Wall 16 months later in November 1989.
“Once in a while you play a place, a show that ends up staying inside of you, living with you for the rest of your life,” he told the crowd on Wednesday after being handed a poster from a fan thanking him for the 1988 concert. “East Berlin in 1988 was certainly one of them.”
Germany has weathered the financial crisis well so far but Berlin itself is struggling with double-digit unemployment, low wages and a high incidence of poverty.
“The financial world has caused us all a lot of our problems and Springsteen has always been a critical spirit – that’s what I like about him,” said Kathleen Wapp, a 42-year-old doctor’s assistant from Wolfsburg who was at the show. “I like the way he’s not afraid to put a critical light on the key issues.”
“I think it’s great the way he’s taking on the banking industry – he’s got it dead right,” said Matthias Beck, 46, a carpenter from Leipzig. “There’s hardly anything good about banks. They take advantage of the little people and it’s always hard to find someone who’ll take responsibility when it all goes wrong.”
[In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit, for research and/or educational purposes. This constitutes 'FAIR USE' of any such copyrighted material.]
A commonly used herbicide called atrazine is a suspected carcinogen, but legal nonetheless.
The herbicide atrazine is in the news for multiple reasons these days, as Tom Philpott explains below. In addition to concerns that this widely used pesticide may cause cancer, evidence has recently surfaced showing that, for more than a decade, Syngenta has spent millions of dollars to pay scientists and journalists to deny and deflect the growing documentation of the human health dangers posed by atrazine. Plus, cancer is not the only concern with this chemical; a new report from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences names atrazine among a group of endocrine-disrupting chemicals that are “obesogens” — meaning they are suspected of contributing to the obesity epidemic now underway in this country. Here are links to these important stories:
The worst drought in 30 years in Brazil’s poor north-eastern region has destroyed crops and prompted officials to limit water use in the 266 districts that have declared a state of emergency.
Lakes have dried up, forcing thousands of families who live in remote areas to walk miles in order to pick up water.
The agriculture secretary in the town of Maracas, Gilmar Rocha, said the drought problems have become constant in the region.
“The local neighborhood of Porto Alegre, is located close to the Contas’ river, and we use the river’s water in our homes. But the river is drying up and the problems are constant now,” he said.
As a result of the drought, ranchers have been struggling to feed and water cattle while farmers have been left to watch their crops shrivel into the dusty soil.
Forty-two-year-old Jose Oliveira de Sousa, who works at a raft station in the district of Maracas, said many of his colleagues have been left unemployed as a result of the drought.
“Everyone is going through a big crisis because of the drought. Our jobs have been taken away from us, from the fishermen to the farmers to the boat and raft operators,” he said.
According to weather experts, the drought may last up to October.The drought in the Southern hemisphere is caused by La Nina, which is cooling equatorial Pacific waters.
Facebook has nearly 1 billion users, but a good chunk of them are clueless when it comes to using the social network safely, a new study conducted by Consumer Reports has found.
Consumer Reports projected its findings after questioning Facebook, security experts, privacy lawyers, app developers, and victims of security and privacy abuse as well as surveying 2002 online households, including 1340 that use Facebook.
The findings are pretty telling.
Oversharing is common. A projected 4.8 million Facebook users have publicly indicated where they planned to go on a certain day even though doing so could tip-off thieves, stalkers, or others with nefarious intent. Another 4.7 million “liked” a Facebook page about health conditions or treatments, in spite of the fact that insurers could use that data against them.
Millions don’t use privacy controls. Nearly 13 million users have never set or don’t know about the social network’s privacy tools. And more than a quarter of users have shared their wall posts with an audience broader than their friends.
Data is a premium to Facebook. “It is very likely that no government or corporation has ever managed to gather such a huge amount of personal and often highly sensitive data,” said Max Schrems, an Austrian law student who retrieved 1222 pages worth of his personal information last year from Facebook. Among them he found wall posts, messages, e-mail addresses, and friend names that he had previously deleted from his account.
Third parties can see your data. Many Facebook apps garner data about users’ friends. That means even if you don’t use a particular app it could have access to your data just by way of one of your friends who is using it.
Maude, speaking on a visit to Estonia, pointed out that the Beijing Olympics in 2008 experienced 12 million cybersecurity attacks, and said that hackers would be looking to “disrupt” this year’s Games as well.
He said: “We have rightly been preparing for sometime. A dedicated unit will help guard the London Olympics against cyber attack.
“We are determined to have a safe and secure Games.”
Foreign intelligence agencies, or groups working on their behalf, also continue to target UK government networks, Maude said.
He added: “We know that the threat is accelerating.”
FB PAC, Facebook’s new political action committee, spent its first-ever quarter of activity hewing to a more or less bipartisan donation strategy with emphasis on the House and Senate Judiciary committees, the PAC’s first quarter disclosure form shows.
Facebook’s PAC was formed at the end of 2011, but the company’s strong revenues and high valuation in the run up to its initial public offering allowed executives it raises funds from plenty of resources to donate. CEO Mark Zuckerberg, COO Sheryl Sandberg, and several board members including LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman and Netscape founder and venture capitalist Marc Andreessen contributed the maximum allowable $5,000 to the committee.
Some of Facebook’s Washington-based employees contributed comparatively small amounts, including public policy manager Adam Conner. Conner, who was an aide to Rep. Louise Slaughter (D-N.Y.) before becoming Facebook’s first D.C. hire, kicked in $300 to help get the PAC off the ground.
But the Washington office’s real contribution to the PAC – strategy – becomes clear after a read of its first quarter disclosure for 2012.
Of the $128,900 the PAC took in, it quickly gave away $119,000, distributing the donations on a mostly bipartisan basis. Uncharacteristic for most tech companies, the final tally of contributions favored Republicans $65,500 to $53,500.
Typical leadership cash magnets like House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Senate Majority and Minority leaders Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) were FB PAC recipients.
But despite the almost bipartisan final breakdown, many of the PAC’s donations seemed to ignore party labels altogether, going instead either to tech favorites like Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-Calif.), Greg Walden (R-Ore.) and Fred Upton (R-Mich.) or Judiciary committee veterans like Reps. Darrel Issa (R-Calif.), Mary Bono Mack (R-Calif.) Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.), James Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.) and Sens. John Cornyn (R-Texas), Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.).
Make your own condensed soups from food storage! You’ll save a ton of money and have more control over the ingredients! For more information about magic mix and cooking with your food storage, visit http://everydayfoodstorage.net/about-food-storage/magic-mix
Making Cheese with Dehydrated MIlk
You might have noticed I am a big guy; almost all of my excess padding comes from my love of cheese, meat, and mayo. I don’t eat a lot of sweets, but I will eat cheese by the pound. This led me to begin learning how to make my own cheese, and researching raising livestock for milk production. At this time, we have decided not to raise milk goats due to the small size of our fenced yard, but I still like making cheese. From a TEOTWAWKI or a grid down catastrophic disaster making fresh cheese is still possible even if you don’t have access to fresh milk as long as you have stored some dry powdered milk.
This article documents my first attempt at making cheese in this manner, I have read about it for some time, but finally decided to step up and try it. It is supposed to be pretty easy – It’s basically the same as making ricotta cheese. We will start with a simple curd cheese, which can be used in the place of ricotta in recipes.
In a later article we will also show how to take this recipe and further process it to make a mock Parmesan cheese that you can either use alone or mix with actual Parmesan to make it last longer. Read Full Article Here
Food contamination scares and global warming worries are making people think about where exactly their produce comes from. More Americans are now deciding to get it straight from the farmer — not by going to a farmer’s market, but through buying a “share” of a small farm’s harvest up front.
A Pentagon report has revealed that the US Defense Department has failed to protect whistleblowers, who have reported misconduct and wrongdoing.
The Washington Post reported officials in the Department of Defense’s Office of Inspector General have systematically ignored Pentagon rules provided to protect those responsible of reporting fraud, abuses and the waste of taxpayer money.
A nonprofit watchdog group, Project on Government Oversight, obtained the May 2011 report under the Freedom of Information Act.
The document was based on an investigation that evaluated the performance of the Inspector General’s Directorate for Military Reprisal Investigations. The report disclosed that the directorate frequently disregarded evidence of grave punishments against those in the service who complained.
The reprisals contained demotions, threatened or real discharges, dismissals, trial and mental health referrals.
The investigating team argued the office’s plans to disregard more than half of the 152 cases it studied, and urged it to improve its procedures and start implementing the protective regulations.
Following the report, Marguerite C. Garrison, the Defense Department’s deputy inspector general for administrative investigations, reorganized the office last year and began a revamp of its manual.
However, independent experts voiced doubts about the effectiveness of the move.
“This devastating report proves one of our worst fears – that military whistleblowers have systematically been getting a raw deal,” said Danielle Brian, executive director of the Project on Government Oversight.
‘Nabeel Rajab arrested after tweeting about Assange’s RT show’
ished on May 7, 2012 by RussiaToday Bahrain authorities have arrested the country’s most prominent human rights activist and harsh critic of the state’s ruling family. Nabeel Rajab was detained just days before his appearance on Julian Assange’s show here on RT. In the programme, which airs on Tuesday, the whistleblower gets an insight from him, and a fellow Egyptian activist, into the uprisings in the Arab States. RT spoke with London-based author and journalist Afshin Rattansi, who believes that Nabeel Rajab and his fellow activists have a lot of challenges to face in the future.
Last week, the FBI thwarted a plan of five self-proclaimed anarchist who were plotting to blow up a bridge near Cleveland, Ohio. The mainstream media has been on a campaign to associate the five individuals to the Occupy movement and are now questioning the entire movement. An undercover FBI agent allegedly sold the group explosives and many critics believe the government is attempting to discredit the movement. Here is our report.
The Cleveland Five, a group of five men who are self-proclaimed anarchists were caught by the FBI after allegedly planning to blow up a bridge in Ohio. The plot which was intercepted on May Day, the day of Occupy Wall Street’s resurgence, has the media quickly connecting the five individuals to the Occupy movement. Lynne Jackson, co-founder and president for Project Salam, helps us take a closer look at this case and these controversial tactics.
[In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit, for research and/or educational purposes. This constitutes 'FAIR USE' of any such copyrighted material.]
