04/09/2012
The United Nations called for the development of national urban policies to ensure developing countries are not overwhelmed by urbanization, which he compared to a tsunami for its staggering growth which can surpass cities’ capacities to manage it.
Urban sprawl – a view of old Lijian city in China. Photo: UN-HABITAT
“What we are seeing now is a huge process of urbanization in the south which goes hand in hand with development. You cannot have one without the other. The problem is that the institutional architecture cannot keep pace with urbanization,” said the Executive Director of UN-Habitat, Joan Clos at the opening of the 6th World Urban Forum in Naples, Italy, on Sept. 3, 2012.
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03/09/2012
By Johan Galtung*, 3 Sep 2012, TRANSCEND – The Israeli attack seems imminent. Richard Silverstein circulates a leaked “shock and awe” strategy of Netanyahu‑Barak hard zionism to decapitate, paralyze Iran; and Alon Ben‑Meir (an expert on Middle East politics specializing in peace negotiations between Israel and Arab states) says Israel is not bluffing.
**Credit: Captain Blood | Wikimedia Commons
Israel may prefer an attack with the USA (Romney? Obama after elections?), but may go alone. Some people believe the nuclear bomb story, others believe that the purpose is Israel as a Jewish state from the Nile to the Euphrates, also promoted by Netanyahu’s late father. The two stories do not exclude each other.
Iran is a Shanghai Cooperation Organization-SCO observer. An attack will trigger responses from the Russia‑China core. What Israel may gain in Saudi Sunni support they may lose in more important parts of the world, in diplomatic and economic relations. The SCO is huge.
There is also the real danger of a world war of NATO against SCO, with nuclear powers divided 4‑4; USA‑Israel being indivisible as they came into being in the same way: by taking somebody else’s land.
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03/09/2012
Port Au-Prince, Haiti (ILO*) – The use of children as domestic workers is pervasive throughout Haiti. Though culturally accepted for generations, a new campaign has been launched to combat what is one of the worst forms of child labour.
Children in Haiti are victims of violence. Credit: UN
Her day starts at 4 a.m.
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She wakes up before everyone else in the household.
Silently, she empties the chamber pots and sweeps the floors. She draws several buckets of water from the pump down the street and carries them back to the house.
As the sun rises, she prepares coffee and heats the oil to make breakfast for the family – but not her family.
Each day is filled with endless household chores from the time she wakes up until the time she goes to bed.
She is 7 years old. She is a restavek.
The term ‘restavek’ in Haitian Creole means literally ‘to stay with.’ Today it is one of the worst names to be called in Haitian society.
Originally conceived as a system to send children to live with wealthier relatives in the city so they could receive an education and enjoy a better life, the restavek system has deteriorated in recent years.
It has become a form of domestic trafficking and modern-day slavery, particularly in the face of the country’s increased economic pressures following the January 2010 earthquake.
Middlemen recruiters, known in Creole as koutchye, are sometimes paid to find a restavek for host families.
In addition to working long hours, these children are often physically, sexually, and verbally abused.
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03/09/2012
By EurActiv* – Turkey is not moving away from Europe but it is diversifying its international relations, Wolf-Ruthart Born, a former German ambassador to Turkey, tells EurActiv in an exclusive interview.
Wolf-Ruthart Born
Wolf-Ruthart Born is a diplomat who was State Secretary for European Affairs in the German Ministry of Foreign Affairs from 2009 to 2011. Born will be one of the speakers at the
Krynica Economic Forum to be held from 4 to 6 September. He spoke to EurActiv’s founder and publisher Christophe Leclercq.
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Given the slow progress of negotiations with the EU, Turks don’t believe in joining the EU, and the country shifted its foreign policy focus towards the Middle East and more widely Central Asia, Africa, Asia. The process had already begun when you served as German ambassador in Ankara from 2003 to 2006. Is this process accelerating now, as the EU and the eurozone are in crisis, while Turkey keeps on having strong economic indicators?
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Full EU membership still is a political priority for Turkey. However Turkey has no illusions about the outcome. The negotiations and the reform process and pre-accession aid are helping the transformation and modernisation process in Turkey.
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The foreign policy shift from a fundamentally ‘West-only’ policy towards a policy with a larger regional and even global approach is a natural development after the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union. It reflects Turkey’s geographic-strategic position, neighbourhood, history, culture, religion, internal economic and political development under the AK Party and Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, as well as political and economic interests and ambitions in a globalised world.
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02/09/2012
By Paola Valeri*
The International Monetary Fund’s director, Christine Lagarde, caused outrage in May 2012 when she said that what Greeks should do is help themselves collectively by all paying their taxes. Few days after, The Guardian made public that her salary –$467,940 a year plus $83,760 additional allowance– is not subject to any taxes.
**Christine Lagarde | Credit: MEDEF [CC-BY-SA-2.0 |Wikimedia Commons
Some months later, on July 11th, Spanish Prime Minister, Mariano Rajoy, announced a series of severe budgetary adjustments, which implied a drastic reduction of unemployment benefits in a time where the country counted some 5 millions unemployed, 50,5% of them young people.
As if they were celebrating a significant step ahead on the road of social rights and welfare, the members of Parliament of the Spanish ruling party (Partido Popular) stood up to applaud, with evident enthusiasm, the measures that were in fact the hardest cuts ever in the public spending, limiting the access of millions of citizens to education, health and other fundamental public services.
During that surprising celebration, Andrea Fabra, member of the ruling party and daughter of an influential politician, shouted from her seat in the Parliament a resounding “f**k them!”
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01/09/2012
By RT*, 31 August, 2012 – The highest ranking officer in the United States military has announced that he is against American participation in any Israeli-led attack on Iran, even as pressure to destroy the Islamic Republic’s rumored nuclear program remain unrelieved.
**Middle East map. Author: W123 | Wikimedia Commons.
Gen. Martin Dempsey, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters in London on Thursday that an Israeli attack would “clearly delay but probably not destroy Iran’s nuclear program,” adding that he was against US cooperation in a unilateral assault.
“I don’t want to be complicit if they [Israel] choose to do it,” Dempsey told reporters.
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01/09/2012
In a message implicitly addressed to Iran for its repeated threats against Israel and which might also have been indirectly referring to Tel Aviv’s reported plans to launch a military attack on Iran, the UN chief condemned in Tehran “threats by any Member State to destroy or delegitimize another.”
Ban Ki-moon with Iranian Foreign Minister Aliakbar Salehi. UN Photo/E. Schneider
Taking note of the latest report by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on Iran’s nuclear programme, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has emphasized the need for diplomacy in resolving the country’s nuclear issue, a United Nations spokesperson said on 31 August.
“It is regrettable that Iran has yet to reach agreement with the IAEA on a plan to resolve all outstanding issues,” the spokesperson told a news briefing at UN Headquarters in New York.
“The Secretary-General emphasizes that there can only be a diplomatic and negotiated solution to the Iranian nuclear issue which should be pursued through a reciprocal, step-by-step process,” the spokesperson added.
“This must include measures by Iran aimed at building international confidence in the exclusively peaceful nature of its nuclear programme,” the UN reported.
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01/09/2012
The Israel public has been bombarded with hawkish statements regarding the situation with Iran and the drum roll of war is echoing in the ears of every Israeli citizen, according to local peace and disarmament campaigners.
Israeli protests | ICAN, International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons
The Israeli government has made it clear that war with Iran is at the doorstep, according to an International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons’ report.
“The image the government was portraying is of two options: either bomb Iran or accept Iran with the bomb. Those statements were supposed to create a favorable public opinion for a military strike.”
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01/09/2012
By Bernhard Schell, InDepthNews*, Dubai – Nearly one year after the launch of a nuclear fuel procurement competition in July 2011, the oil-rich United Arab Emirates (UAE) has started an ambitious atomic power program.
UAE nuclear power plant | Credit: Enec
The Emirates Nuclear Energy Corporation (Enec) has awarded six contracts related to the supply of natural uranium concentrates, conversion and enrichment services, and the purchase of enriched uranium product.
UAE was founded in 1971, comprising seven states, which were under British rule. The federation includes Abu Dhabi and Dubai. Abu Dhabi city is the federal capital of UAE, and Abu Dhabi emirate accounts for 86% of the land area of UAE, and 95% of its oil. Dubai is the UAE’s largest city.
Enec estimates that the contracts are worth some $3 billion and will enable the Barakah nuclear power plant to generate up to 450 terawatt-hours (TWh) of electricity over a 15-year period starting in 2017, when the first of four units at the plant is scheduled to begin operating.
Enec has signed agreements with both France’s Areva and Russia’s Techsnabexport (Tenex). They will provide services across the front-end of the fuel cycle, including the supply of uranium concentrates as well as conversion and enrichment services.
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01/09/2012
Syrian government forces have dropped bombs and fired artillery at or near at least 10 bakeries in Aleppo province over the past three weeks, killing and maiming scores of civilians who were waiting for bread, Human Rights Watch reports.
**Image: Burning house in Homs after Syrian army bombing. Credit: Bo yaser | Wikimedia Commons.
The attacks are at least recklessly indiscriminate and the pattern and number of attacks suggest that government forces have been targeting civilians, Human Rights Watch said. “Both reckless indiscriminate attacks and deliberately targeting civilians are war crimes.”
One attack in the city of Aleppo on August 16, 2012, killed up to 60 people and wounded more than 70, Human Rights Watch (HRW) adds. Another attack in the city on August 21 killed at least 23 people and wounded 30.
“Day after day, Aleppo residents line up to get bread for their families, and instead get shrapnel piercing their bodies from government bombs and shells,” said Ole Solvang, emergencies researcher at Human Rights Watch who has just returned from Aleppo. “Ten bakery attacks is not random – they show no care for civilians and strongly indicate an attempt to target them.”
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HUMAN WRONGS WATCH 