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1. WikiLeaks Puts International Criminal Court's Credibility On The Line
Is whistle-blowing website Wikileaks putting the international war crimes tribunal in an uncomfortable position? Afghanistan war logs leaked by Wikileaks could eventually be used in a war crimes trial with Americans in the dock, according to Luis Moreno-Ocampo, prosecutor at the International Criminal Court (ICC). However, there’s huge scepticism over whether the ICC would actually have the guts to take on the US. So far only five proceedings have been launched – all relating to African countries. Afghanistan is a party to the treaty that established the ICC, which is based in The Hague. The ICC is thus empowered to prosecute war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide in Afghanistan when the national authorities are unwilling or unable to investigate themselves. ICC procedures are complex. For example, the ICC will not look at potential atrocities in Iraq because Iraq, like most Arab countries, is not a member state (only Jordan, Djibout i and Comoros are members). However, the ICC has issued a warrant against Sudanese president Omar Bashir on charges including genocide in Darfur. Sudan is not a party to the court, but UN Security Council Resolution 1593 referred Sudan to the ICC and obligates it to cooperate. The US is also not a party to the court. As a permanent veto-wielding member of the UN Security Council, it is unlikely ever to allow the 15-nation body to refer it to the ICC. So will any of this ever come to anything? Ocampo says: “We have to make a decision about what to do there.” Is the court’s credibility on the line?
Tom Spender, Freelance Journalist & Photographer In Beijing
2. Grassroots Unofficial WikiLeaks Central Website Launched
This site was started by a group of WikiLeaks supporters who got to know each other in recent months. Our aims are simple: (a) To provide a one-stop resource for WikiLeaks-related information, current and historical. (b) To build a community site for WikiLeaks supporters. (c) To counteract the many rumours and plain false information disseminated about WikiLeaks. We come from different countries and backgrounds, and our personalities are just as colourful. But we share the same ideals of truth and justice, the same respect for WikiLeaks and similar organizations, the same belief in individual responsibility and action. And last but not least, we are here because we believe in doing the right thing. We are not affiliated with WikiLeaks. We also don't work for any government agency. We are not paid by anyone for our work on this site. We are just kindred spirits volunteering our time for a cause we think is worthwhile.
Information Release, WL Central
3. Medical Journals Complicit In Corruption
For years, the Alliance for Human Research Protection has been disseminating news reports documenting the corrosive impact the intermingling of academic medicine and the pharmaceutical industry has had on the integrity of medical research and clinical practice. In 2002, I made a presentation about conflicts of interest at a symposium sponsored by the U.S. Army Medical Department, in which I included my "dirty dozen" corrupt research review practices that undermine both the safety of human subjects and the integrity of the research findings. When we observed that not only the pharmaceutical industry, but physician-scientists, academic institutions, and medical journals are all invested in "keeping up appearances" rather than preserving the integrity of science, and honest medicine, we were ridiculed or dismissed as being "anti-science." We are no longer "blowing in the wind." A growing number of prominent physician-s cientists, including several former journal editors, and New York Times columnists, have written sobering critiques about the corrupting impact pharmaceutical industry influence has had on medicine. That influence has debased the integrity of medical research, clinical practice and medicine's institutions.
Vera Hassner Sharav, AHRP
4. 100,000 March In Germany To Protest Social Provisions Cuts
Around 100,000 people took to the streets in cities across Germany on Saturday to demonstrate against cuts in social services, according to the German federation of trade unions, (DGB). Police counted around 30,000 demonstrators in Nuremberg, at least as many in Stuttgart and more thousands in Erfurt and Dortmund. They were calling for the provision or maintenance of a raft of social provisions including fair wages, a solidarity-based healthcare system, strong public services, abandonment of the increase in retirement age to 67 and better education. “People are currently having to bear the consequences of the crisis in the financial markets, with tax increases, job losses and cuts in social services. That has nothing to do with fairness,” said Berthold Huber, national chairman of the IG Metall trade union speaking in Stuttgart. “We do not want a republic in which the interest groups define policy with their money, their power a nd their influence.” France was recently thrown into chaos by strikes and demonstrations against plans to raise the retirement age there from 60 to 62.
The Local, Germany's News In English
Related Links:
* Student & Lecturer Riot Marks End Of UK ConDem Coalition Government Era Of Consensus
Andy McSmith, Richard Garner, Oliver Wright & Rebecca Gonsalves, The Independent
5. Corrupt British MP To Pocket £500,000
Margaret Moran showed no remorse
Disgraced former MP Margaret Moran stoked outrage yesterday as it emerged she is set to receive a £500,000 nest egg from two homes renovated at taxpayers’ expense. Police are investigating Moran's expenses documents after she tried to claim £22,500 to treat dry rot at a South Coast property 100 miles from her Luton South constituency. Now she has sold her house in Luton for a profit of more than £185,000. She is understood to be keen to sell her flat in Westminster, too. That could yield her a profit of more than £300,000. Ms Moran, 55, repeatedly “flipped” properties to obtain Commons allowances. She bought her semi-detached home in Luton for £72,995 in 1995. As an MP, she claimed £14,085 for a new boiler, £2,350 for garden improvements, £1,823 for work on a bathroom and did up her bedroom and claimed £1,725. She showed no remorse when challenged by constituents. One Clic k Note: Why is it that with Legal Aid cuts being publicised left and right, our corrupt and wealthy MPs are given Legal Aid to defend their alleged criminality at every turn? These politicians rip off the electorate and then force us to pay for their defence in court. Our British Parliament is rotten to the self-interested core.
Daily Express Reporter, Daily Express
Related Links:
* Our British Parliament Is Rotten To The Core
Peter Oborne, Daily Telegraph
* UK Supreme Court Rules Expenses Piggies MPs To Face Criminal Trial
Polly Curtis, The Guardian
* Another Eight UK MPs In Expenses Storm - Police Called In
Jason Groves, Daily Mail
* Secret Deals Being Offered To Expenses Abuse MPs
Rosa Prince, Daily Telegraph
* Abusive UK MPs Brand Expenses Staff As Fucking Idiots & Monkeys
Macer Hall, Daily Express
* Expenses Scandal MPs Granted Legal Aid
Big Pond
6. Disabled UK Claimants To Be Starved Into Obedience
The welfare reform white paper published is not just about the new universal credit. It is also about imposing a harsh new regime of sanctions on existing employment and support allowance claimants before the new benefit is even introduced. Under the new regime, claimants in the work-related activity group of employment and support allowance (ESA), and the hundreds of thousands of sick and disabled claimants being forced onto JSA by increasingly harsh medical tests, face potentially indefinite 100% cuts in their benefit for minor ‘offences’. Members can find out more about the coalition’s plans for a ‘fairer’ system of starving claimants into submission (Members only) now and we’ll be doing a full write up of the universal credit in the near future. Meanwhile, if you’re feeling angry about the cuts then do bear in mind that according to the minister for disabled people the plan to kick one in five claimants off DLA is in order to stop the media attacking claimants and branding them as workshy scroungers. Oh and she also says that it’s ‘not particularly helpful’ to blame the government for anti-claimant propaganda when it’s really all the fault of the media.
Steve Donnison, Benefits & Work
7. Beware Spooky Spokeo Database USA
Over the course of the weekend, a Big Brother Watch supporter wrote bringing news of the new American website Spokeo. Spokeo, which markets itself as "not your grandma's phonebook" draws together your contact details (including your phone number, e-mail and postal address), information about your personal wealth, your spouse and any social networks you might be a member of. In compiling the data, the website searches databases including "phone books, marketing surveys, business databases, ecommerce stores, and other public databases". Spokeo was able to tell me that two of my friends lived in a single house built in 2004, the estimated value of their home, the fact they have children and both of their star signs. Further to this, I could also find out that they own an RV (a camper van), have cats, are collectors and enjoy travelling. Alongside all this information was a photograph of the isolated plot of land their home is loca ted on - a clear gift to any burglar looking to research access routes to and from a home in order to steal the aforementioned collectables and vehicles. Upon payment of a further fee, I could have accessed information about their personal wealth level, political affiliations and religion. This website is currently only operative in the United States, yet it has plans to extend overseas. If you are in the United States and would like to have your profile removed from this website, contact details are published.
Daniel Hamilton, Big Brother Watch
8. Codex NRVs Are Thrown Back In The Oven For Reheating
At last year’s meeting of the Codex Committee on Nutrition and Foods for Special Dietary Uses (CCNFSDU) in Dusseldorf, Germany, the National Health Federation was able to stop the advance of those Guidelines on Nutrient Reference Values (NRVs) that would have set low numerical values for vitamins and minerals. Had they gone forward at that time – as they very nearly did – then we would now be looking at well-advanced Codex NRVs of, for example, 45 milligrams for Vitamin C and 200 IUs for Vitamin D as providing 100% of an adult’s daily nutritional needs. This week of November 1-5, 2010, the CCNFSDU met once again to debate this and other NRV texts. Some 250 delegates from 80 countries were in attendance, comprised of country functionaries and international non-governmental organizations (INGOs) representatives. The Committee covered other topics too, such as draft guidelines on the addition of essential nutrients t o foods and formulated supplementary foods for older infants and children. The latter was a hotly-debated topic.
Press Release, National Health Federation
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