Ex-Thai PM to remain in UK
Thaksin Shinawatra, former prime minister of Thailand has told Thai media he intends to remain in the UK, and will not return home to face corruption charges. Mr Shinawatra, who owns Manchester City football club and who spent two years in exile in the UK before, was due to appear... [continued]
Cambodia and Thailand on the brink of war 
2006: the billionaire who lost his country
Russia ignores ceasefire as refugees flee
A tide of refugees is leaving towns and villages ruined by bombing as the US has condemned Russian military intervention in South Ossetia and Georgia. Russia has ignored a ceasefire declared by Georgia's president Mikhail Saakashvili, and continued air strikes against targets near the Georgian capital, Tbilisi. The city's international... [continued]
Russia knew the West wouldn't dare step in
Spectre of war threatens Putin's Olympics
Georgia: the army that likes to go to Iraq
South Ossetia: The Georgians with a passion for Putin
Banks make £500m extra in UK
British high-street banks have been accused of taking advantage of their customers after it was revealed that five of the biggest had made £500m extra profit in six months in the UK, despite incurring massive losses with bad investments elsewhere in the world. Figures from five retail banks show that... [continued]
How the West will rise from the financial ashes
The Bank must cut interest rates now
Mugabe: power talks ‘inconclusive’
Zimbabwe's embattled president Robert Mugabe has said that 14 hours of power-sharing talks with the country's opposition leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, which began yesterday morning and are being mediated by South African president Thabo Mbeki, were "inconclusive". However, he said discussions would continue and he was "confident" a deal could be... [continued]
Exclusive reports from Moses Moyo in Harare
Double murder of Chinese students
A double murder inquiry has been launched in Newcastle-upon-Tyne after the bodies of two Chinese students were found in a flat. The head injuries the students had received were so severe that police have not yet been able to work out what the weapon was. The victims have not... [continued]
Isaac Hayes dies aged 65
Soul singer Isaac Hayes has died at the age of 65. The pioneering musician, whose Theme From Shaft won an Oscar was found dead yesterday by a family member. He had collapsed near a treadmill in his home, but the cause of death has not been announced. Mr Hayes suffered... [continued]
Georgian fighting pushes up crude
The heavy fighting in Georgia has pushed the price of crude oil up by more than a dollar per barrel. Georgia does not produce oil, but the world's second-largest pipeline passes through southern Georgia as it takes oil from Azerbaijan to Turkey. The Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipe can move up to 1.2m... [continued]
Russia knew the West wouldn’t dare step in
2006: Beware Russia, energy superpower
Water firms reveal price plans
UK water firms have announced their pricing intentions for the five-year period starting from 2010. Welsh Water says its average bills will only rise at the rate of inflation, Thames water anticipates rises of about 3 per cent above the rate of inflation, and Northumbrian water expects rises of 1.3... [continued]
Russia tramples on Georgia
If the Kremlin can, to all intents and purposes, annex South Ossetia, what is to stop it absorbing other parts of the former Soviet Union with Russian populations, asks a Telegraph leader? Might Russia not claim the right to act in defence of ethnic Russians in the Baltic states, or demand a land corridor to Kaliningrad, or the secession of the Russophile parts of Ukraine, or formal union with Belarus? In retrospect, the West mishandled relations with Russia in the 1990s. As with Germany after 1918, we went from unconscionable harshness to appeasement, with almost no intermediate stage. Had we been a little less triumphalist at the end of the Cold War, a bruised Russian population might not have responded to the strongman appeal of Mr Putin. Leader Daily Telegraph
Full article: War in Georgia needs to be stopped before it spreads further
Russia knew the West wouldn't dare step in
There are troubling signs in some of the victory statements coming out of Moscow yesterday that Russia may feel emboldened to impose a punitive settlement, perhaps by annexing territory, writes David Clark. This is not something that the EU and its allies should be prepared to tolerate. As so often with bullies, the Russian government's behaviour disguises deep insecurity and a craving for respect. This makes it more susceptible to our opinions than we often think. Further aggressive steps against Georgia would certainly be a reason to reconsider whether Russia should continue to enjoy the prestige that comes with membership of the G8. David Clark The Guardian
Full article: The west can no longer stand idle while the Russian bully wreaks havoc
Tskhinvali is not Sarejevo in 1914, says Bruce Anderson. South Ossetia will not be the start-line of the Third World War. But it is a ghastly mess. Rather than waiting for the Russians to instil the fear of death, the West should have taught Georgia the facts of life. We ought to have reminded them that they were living in a dangerous neighbourhood. A small nation that has only recently become independent from a neighbouring superpower still resentful at many of the changes which have overtaken it must tread warily. Eighty per cent of Georgians would like to join Nato. One suspects that a similar percentage of Taiwanese would like to become fully independent. Neither country is in the position to conduct its foreign affairs by writing letters to Santa Claus. Bruce Anderson The Independent
Full article: The West must share the blame for war in Georgia
How should we ration health?
The calls for a proper debate about health rationing go on, writes Libby Purves. Governments freeze at the very idea. Who wants to be in charge - and facing the artfully heartbreaking media tales of deserving cases - at the moment when such rules are laid down? Imagine yourself PM when it is firmly stated that IVF can't be funded because infertility is not life-threatening whereas cancer is; that drunkards, smokers and addicts are required to get clean before any but emergency treatment; that stomach-banding is subject to co-payment in arrears since you'll be eating less; or that life-extending (as opposed to palliative or Alzheimer's) treatments cease at 85? Imagine being the hard-hearted monster who rules that under-50s, breadwinners and parents of young families get formal priority with new cancer drugs. Libby Purves The Times
Full article: NHS rationing is a reality we should deal with
The end of living and start of survival
The idea that we could adapt to a 4 degree temperature rise is absurd and dangerous, says Oliver Tickell. Global warming on this scale would be a catastrophe that would mean, in the immortal words that Chief Seattle probably never spoke, "the end of living and the beginning of survival" for humankind. Or perhaps the beginning of our extinction. The collapse of the polar ice caps would become inevitable, bringing long-term sea level rises of 70-80 metres. All the world's coastal plains would be lost, complete with ports, cities, transport and industrial infrastructure, and much of the world's most productive farmland. Weather would become extreme and unpredictable, with more frequent and severe droughts, floods and hurricanes. The Earth's carrying capacity would be hugely reduced. Billions would undoubtedly die. Oliver Tickell The Guardian
Full article: On a planet 4C hotter, all we can prepare for is extinction
In Brief
Racism in fashion
For those who make and break images, decide who is gorgeous and who is not, light skin and hair and eyes easily please the eye, affirm superior human status. Racism is a given, an understanding infused through the business. Top model agencies will tell you that eager Asian, Arab and black models may look exquisite and flawless, but find it almost impossible to enter, survive or let alone thrive in that hostile habitat.
Yasmin Alibhai-Brown The Independent
Full article: When your skin is just too dark
White mischief: Was Beyonce retouched for L'Oreal ad?
Tooth rot children
It is hard to think of any apparently shocking story pertaining to the growing generation that does not have a direct corollary with the grown one. Junk food, salt and obesity are spoken of in exactly the tones used on us for fizzy drinks, sugar and tooth rot. There were, we were darkly warned, council estates where all the 12-year-olds had false teeth! Carol Sarler The Times
Full article: Haven't we seen all this before?
Filthy China hasn't changed
China has 16 of the world's 20 filthiest cities. The Gobi desert is expanding at a rate of 1,900 square miles a year because of deforestation and over-farming. Approximately 660 cities have less water than they need and 110 of them suffer severe shortages. Effluent, human and industrial, has driven one third of the native species of the Yellow River to extinction. About 190 million Chinese are sick from drinking contaminated water. Nick Cohen The Observer
Full article: Don't be fooled. China hasn't changed
Olympic latest: Censorship charge after murder
The forgotten Gulag
The Gulag, into which Alexander Solzhenitsyn estimated 60 million people vanished, is by some odd accord fading from the memory. In the Western consciousness, it has never occupied anything like the same place as the Holocaust. Even in Russia, the Gulag is being omitted from the school curriculum and is less and less mentioned by members of the intelligentsia. Henry Porter The Observer
Full article: I refuse to dismiss writers who inspired me, even if others do
Solzhenitsyn's iconic book that fatally wounded Communism
Frogmarching joyriders
A friend who was one of a group of wild teenagers on a council estate in the 1970s says their attempts at shoplifting, joyriding or fighting were constrained by grown-ups who shouted at them, frogmarched them out of trouble or reported them to their parents. The social pressure on them encouraged them to grow out of it. That has all changed. Jenni Russell Sunday Times
Full article: Adults have surrendered to the Lords of the Flies
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