Australian PM Wants Asia-Pacific Union 'Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said Wednesday that he wants to see an Asia-Pacific Community by 2020 structured similar to the European Union. Rudd said there was a "brittleness" in bilateral ties, and that while regional bodies like ASEAN and APEC had achieved much, there was a need for a region-wide architecture to tackle the growing challenges of the Asia-Pacific century. "Terrorism in Southeast Asia will remain a continuing challenge. Across wider continental Asia, the rise of India and China represent great economic, environmental, energy policy and security reverberations for the future," Rudd said in a speech to the Asia Society Australiasia in Sydney. "I believe it is time that we started to think about where we want to be with our regional architecture in 2020. We need to have a vision for an Asia-Pacific Community," he said, adding the world could learn from Europe where centuries of animosity had been transformed into transnational cooperation.'
British Passports to be Given to a Record 220,000 Migrants This Year
'The number of British passports given to migrants is set to hit a record 220,000 this year. In the first three months of 2009, 54,615 citizenship applications were approved - up 57 per cent on the same period in 2008. At that rate, the number receiving passports - and with them the right to full benefits - this year will smash the record of 164,540 set in 2007. Last year the total was 129,310, and when Labour came to power in 1997, just 37,010 people were given citizenship. It means approvals have rocketed by almost 500 per cent under the current Government.'
Arrested for Asking For Police Officers Number
Destroying Indigenous Populations
'The Fort Laramie Treaty once guaranteed the Sioux Nation the right to a large area of their original land, which spanned several states and included their sacred Black Hills, where they were to have "the absolute and undisturbed use and occupation" of the land.
However, when gold was discovered in the Black Hills, President Ulysses S. Grant told the army to look the other way in order to allow gold miners to enter the territory. After repeated violations of the exclusive rights to the land by gold prospectors and by migrant workers crossing the reservation borders, the US government seized the Black Hills land in 1877.'
Are the Iranian Protests Another US Orchestrated 'Color Revolution?'
'A number of commentators have expressed their idealistic belief in the purity of Mousavi, Montazeri, and the westernized youth of Terhan. The CIA destabilization plan, announced two years ago (see below) has somehow not contaminated unfolding events. The claim is made that Ahmadinejad stole the election, because the outcome was declared too soon after the polls closed for all the votes to have been counted. However, Mousavi declared his victory several hours before the polls closed.
This is classic CIA destabilization designed to discredit a contrary outcome. It forces an early declaration of the vote. The longer the time interval between the preemptive declaration of victory and the release of the vote tally, the longer Mousavi has to create the impression that the authorities are using the time to fix the vote. It is amazing that people don’t see through this trick.'
Fabian Ed Balls Considers Ban on BNP Teachers
'The government is investigating a possible ban on British National party members working as teachers in schools in a move that could challenge the legitimacy of the far-right party. A source close to the schools secretary, Ed Balls, said there had been several meetings on the issue with teaching unions which are lobbying for a change in teachers' contracts to prevent them from working if they are members of far-right groups including the BNP. The issue was being "actively looked at", the source said.'
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