05/02/2013
By Russia Today (RT)*, 4 February – A secret review has concluded that US President Obama has the authority to launch a preemptive cyber attack on any country on the basis that they are considered a ‘cyber threat’ – even if there is no concrete evidence of this threat.
Photo: Barack Obama and Joe Biden on Election Day – November 6th | Credit: Scout Tufankjian for Obama for America
It may not be long before the US conducts crippling attacks on foreign soil with little more than a mouse click, thereby sparing itself the effort of sending its military oversees or declaring war.
The Obama administration is currently drawing up a set of rules about how the US military can defend against or conduct cyberattacks, the New York Times reports.
The Obama administration is also allowing intelligence agencies to declare potential threats. But even if these threats are nothing more than a suspicion without evidence, the military now has the authority to attack foreign nations, regardless of whether or not the US is involved in a conflict with them.
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05/02/2013
By Jaya Ramachandran, IDN-InDepthNews*, Berlin – Crime, corruption, and tax evasion recorded near-historic highs in 2010, with illicit financial outflows costing the developing world $859 billion in 2010, just below the all-time high of $871.3 billion in 2008, the year preceding the global financial crisis. Besides, nearly $6 trillion (6000 000 000 000 000 000 U.S. dollars) were stolen from poor countries in the decade between 2001 and 2010, says a new report and urges world leaders to increase transparency in the international financial system.
Image credit: Lahore Times
“Astronomical sums of dirty money continue to flow out of the developing world and into offshore tax havens and developed country banks,” said Raymond Baker, Director of the Washington-based advocacy organization, Global Financial Integrity (GFI).
“Regardless of the methodology, it’s clear: developing economies are hemorrhaging more and more money at a time when rich and poor nations alike are struggling to spur economic growth. This report should be a wake-up call to world leaders that more must be done to address these harmful outflow,” he adds.
Co-authored by GFI’s lead economist Dr Dev Kar and economist Sarah Freitas, the study, Illicit Financial Flows from Developing Countries: 2001-2010 points out that as developing countries begin to relax capital controls, the possibility exists that the methodology utilized in previous GFI reports – known as the World Bank Residual Plus Trade Mispricing method – could increasingly pick-up some licit capital flows.
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05/02/2013
By John Scales Avery*, TRANSCEND – The principle of reciprocity is an ancient one in human history, and it is thus embedded in our emotions. It is an important part of human nature. Reciprocity is the basis of non-market economies, and also the basis of social interactions between family members, friends and colleagues.
**Reclining Buddha in Jade Temple, Shanghai | Photo by:Steve46814 | Wikimedia Commons
In hunter-gatherer societies, it is customary to share food among all the members of the group. “Today I receive food from you, and tomorrow you will receive food from me.”
Similarly, among friends in modern society, no payment is made for hospitality, but it is expected that sooner or later the hospitality will be returned.
According to Wikipedia, “Reciprocity in Social Psychology refers to responding to a positive action with another positive action, rewarding kind actions.
As a social construct, reciprocity means that in response to friendly actions, people are frequently much nicer and much more cooperative than predicted by the self-interest model; conversely, in response to hostile actions they are frequently much nastier and even brutal.”
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05/02/2013
Cairo, February 4, 2013 (Shahira Amin for RIA Novosti*) – A protester was shot dead and several others were injured when a rally outside Al Ittihadeya Presidential Palace in Cairo turned violent on Friday. A mob of young men, some of them masked, hurled rocks and Molotov cocktails into the palace grounds, charring trees and starting a small fire. Security forces set up barricades, using water cannon and tear gas to disperse the protesters. The sound of wailing sirens could be heard as ambulances ferried the injured to nearby hospitals.
**Photo: Gigi Ibrahim from Cairo, Egypt | Source: The Egyptian Liberal | Wikimedia Commons
Meanwhile, televised scenes of a man who was arrested, stripped naked, dragged and beaten by security forces served as a painful reminder that little had changed in the “new Egypt,” two years after a popular revolt that had been sparked by police brutality.
In a telephone call to the Egyptian Al Hayat independent TV channel, Interior Ministry spokesman Yasser Hawari admitted that a “mistake” had been made. He added that the police officers responsible for the violence would be immediately investigated and brought to justice.
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04/02/2013
By Lawrence Wittner, IPPNW*, February 4, 2013 – In a major address in Prague on April 5, 2009, the newly-elected U.S. President, Barack Obama, proclaimed “clearly and with conviction America’s commitment to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons.” On January 24, 2013, however, Senator John Kerry, speaking at Senate confirmation hearings on his nomination to become U.S. secretary of state, declared that a nuclear weapons-free world was no more than “an aspiration,” adding that “we’ll be lucky if we get there in however many centuries.”
**Photo: President George W. Bush and President-elect Barack Obama meet in the Oval Office of the White House Monday, November 10, 2008. Author: White House photo by Eric Draper
Has there been a change in Obama administration policy over the past four years? There are certainly indications that this might be the case.
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04/02/2013
By John Pilger, TRANSCEND* – A full-scale invasion of Africa is under way. The United States is deploying troops in 35 African countries, beginning with Libya, Sudan, Algeria and Niger. Reported by Associated Press on Christmas Day, this was missing from most Anglo-American media.
**Africa is the world’s second-largest and second-most-populous continent. At about 30.2 million km², it covers six percent of the Earth’s total surface area and 20.4 percent of the total land area. It is inhabited by more than 1.0 billion people | Author: Martin23230
The invasion has almost nothing to do with “Islamism”, and almost everything to do with the acquisition of resources, notably minerals, and an accelerating rivalry with China.
Unlike China, the US and its allies are prepared to use a degree of violence demonstrated in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen and Palestine.
As in the cold war, a division of labour requires that western journalism and popular culture provide the cover of a holy war against a “menacing arc” of Islamic extremism, no different from the bogus “red menace” of a worldwide communist conspiracy.
Reminiscent of the Scramble for Africa in the late 19th century, the US African Command (Africom) has built a network of supplicants among collaborative African regimes eager for American bribes and armaments.
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04/02/2013
A large-scale operation is under way in Syria to secure safe water supplies for more than 10 million people – close to half the population, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) said today 4 February 2013, amid reports that the quality and quantity of water is continuing to deteriorate with negative impacts for children’s health.
Syrian children outside their UNHCR tent at Jordan’s Za’atri refugee camp. Photo: UNHCR/M. Abu Asaker
“This shipment is very timely as supplies of chlorine in Syria have fallen dangerously low, making access to safe water challenging for many families,” said Youssouf Abdel-Jelil, UNICEF Representative in Syria.
“This puts the population – and children especially – at high risk of contracting diarrhoea and other water-borne diseases.”
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04/02/2013
“While France responded to Mali’s conflict by sending in 2,500 French soldiers, it largely ignored the Central African Republic’s calls for help.”
A rebel fighter in the Central Africa Republic. Photograph by hdptcar | Source: Think Africa Press
By Amit Singh, Think Africa Press*, 4 February 2013 – When France received requests from two of its former African colonies to intervene in their domestic conflicts these past couple of months, its replies could not have been more different.
Mali’s calls were answered with a swift and affirmative response, and France found itself intervening in Africa once again, having been involved in conflicts in Libya and the Ivory Coast in 2011.
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04/02/2013
Iga-Barrier, (IRIN*) – There is no refuge from the blistering heat at this artisanal gold mine in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Any trees that might have provided shade have been consumed by the mine, which covers an area the size of five or six football fields.
Photo: Guy Oliver/IRIN.
Artisanal gold miners form human chains to excavate near Iga-Barrière, about 25km east of Bunia
About a thousand people – men, women and some children – swarm across the open-cast mine near Iga-Barrière, about 25km east of Bunia, the administrative town of the Ituri Region.
The scene has all the trappings of a 19th century gold rush, apart from the hum of diesel generators powering pumps to drain water from the open shafts, while hawkers sell drinking water in translucent plastic bags.
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04/02/2013
If just one of the world’s 19,000 nuclear weapons was detonated, be it intentionally or accidentally, not only would it kill thousands of people instantly, says the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN).
Source: ICAN
“But, as the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has concluded, first responders would be unable to provide the emergency relief so urgently needed. This makes the continued existence and deployment of nuclear weapons one of the most serious humanitarian challenges of our time, ” it adds.
To demonstrate that a treaty banning nuclear weapons is both possible and urgently needed, ICAN will host the Civil Society Forum on 2-3 March 2013. We have invited hundreds of people from all corners of the world to give inspiring speeches, participate in informative workshops, engage in lively discussions and of course, to have fun.
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HUMAN WRONGS WATCH 