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Latest Articles: International News
A Primer On Belgian Company(Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication) Key To Iran Sanctions
Post Date: 2012-02-23 15:38:35 by Brian S
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(02-23) 12:22 PST NEW YORK, (AP) -- A little-known company based in Belgium that facilitates many of the world's financial transactions has become central to the West's plan to prevent Iran from selling oil and other goods to raise money to fund its nuclear ambitions. The company is called SWIFT, which stands for the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication. It is a secure private network used by nearly every bank around the world to send payment messages to each other that then lead to the transfer of money across international borders. The Obama administration wants Iran evicted from SWIFT, which said last week it would comply with European Union rules to cut ...
Toyota's FCV-R hydrogen concept car heads to Europe
Post Date: 2012-02-23 12:27:01 by jwpegler
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Toyota's hydrogen-powered concept car slated for production in 2015 will make its European debut in Geneva.
On the second stop of its world tour, the Toyota FCV-R fuel cell concept vehicle will make its European premiere at the Geneva auto show next month.
The hydrogen-powered concept debuted at the Tokyo Motor show late last year. Few details about the FCV-R were shared, but the compact car seats four and has a cruising range of about 434 miles on a full tank.
Toyota is currently holding field trials of the Highlander Fuel Cell Hydrogen Hybrid Vehicle (FCHV) in the U.S. Although it's not clear what will become of the hydrogen-powered SUV, the FCV-R concept is expected to enter ...
Paul Mason of BBC on How Austerity is Reducing Greece to Developing Country Status
Post Date: 2012-02-23 11:02:56 by lucysmom
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The BBC’s Paul Mason, fresh back from Greece, gives a report on Democracy Now of how living conditions have deteriorated as a result of the imposition of austerity measures. One of the stunners, mentioned in Atlantic Wire (hat tip Lambert), is that not only will some Greeks have to work without pay, some will have to pay for their jobs (yes, that is not a typo). The euphemism is a “negative salary.” Mason also discusses how this program is radicalizing the public. Communists, Trotskyists and other extreme-left groups are polling at 43%. That’s a strikingly high number. This plus the level of dissent on the street suggests Greece is on its way out of the eurozone. But ...
Russia Seeks ‘Foothold’ in Asian Wheat Market, Challenging U.S., Australia
Post Date: 2012-02-22 11:36:10 by Brian S
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Russia, set to be the third-largest wheat shipper, aims to secure a “foothold” among buyers in Asia, increasing competition for U.S. and Australian supplies. “One of the new and promising directions for Russian grain exports is the Asia-Pacific region,” Andrey Klepach, the deputy minister of economic development, said in a message to delegates at a conference in Singapore. The segment “is now rapidly evolving and Russia has all the chances to gain a foothold.” Futures dropped 20 percent in the past year as global crops and stockpiles headed for records and trade rose to the second- highest level in at least in five decades. The U.S., the biggest exporter, ...
Why the UK Is Ditching Socialized Medicine
Post Date: 2012-02-21 19:11:07 by We The People
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There is more than a little irony attached to the Obama administration's determination to pursue socialist, EU-style "solutions" to America's problems, even as the European Union is coming to grips with the bitter realities such socialism produces. And while Greece and its financial problems receive some media coverage in the United States, there is a much bigger story flying under the mainstream media radar: in Britain, Prime Minister David Cameron has introduced a bill seeking to partially privatize the National Health Service (NHS). Why? Because the British government is "hoping to avoid a Greek-style financial meltdown." The system's defenders are upset. ...
S. Korea Ignores Threat from Pyongyang to Retaliate for Artillery Drill
Post Date: 2012-02-20 12:43:45 by Brian S
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South Korea went ahead with an artillery drill Monday near a disputed maritime border despite an unusually explicit threat by North Korea to retaliate by shelling inhabited islands in the Yellow Sea. Officials in Seoul say the morning exercise was routine and included the firing of self-propelled howitzers and mortars. Attack helicopters also joined the exercise on the western frontier islands.A spokesman for South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff says no shots were fired towards the Northern Limit Line, which is the disputed maritime border. Pyongyang Warns SeoulNorth Korea, the previous day, warned inhabitants of the five islands to evacuate to avoid its possible retaliatory shelling.And ...
Pakistanis Shout ‘Death To America’ In Islamabad
Post Date: 2012-02-20 12:08:16 by Brian S
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Several thousand Pakistanis poured onto the streets of Islamabad Monday, chanting “death to America” and demanding holy war at a rally whipped up by right-wing, religious and banned organisations. It was the latest show of support for Defence of Pakistan, a coalition of around 40 parties chaired by a cleric dubbed the father of the Taliban that include organisations blacklisted at home and abroad as terror groups. “Today, we have gathered here to raise a voice of protest against US intervention in Pakistan,” chairman Maulana Sami ul-Haq, who runs an extremist madrassa that educated several Taliban leaders, told AFP. Also present was member Hamid Gul, who headed ...
Icelandic Anger Brings Debt Forgiveness
Post Date: 2012-02-20 10:51:21 by lucysmom
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Icelanders who pelted parliament with rocks in 2009 demanding their leaders and bankers answer for the country’s economic and financial collapse are reaping the benefits of their anger. Since the end of 2008, the island’s banks have forgiven loans equivalent to 13 percent of gross domestic product, easing the debt burdens of more than a quarter of the population, according to a report published this month by the Icelandic Financial Services Association. “You could safely say that Iceland holds the world record in household debt relief,” said Lars Christensen, chief emerging markets economist at Danske Bank A/S in Copenhagen. “Iceland followed the textbook example ...
Enemies, A Hate Story
Post Date: 2012-02-19 17:28:57 by Brian S
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The all-clear was sounded as soon as the news came that the school bus was Palestinian. Only the most perceptive viewers of Thursday's accident - in which nine children and one adult were killed when their bus collided with a truck north of Jerusalem - could make the distinction. But something in the manner of the coverage intimated at it immediately. Then the reports and images started flowing in. The coverage was workmanlike overall, if faceless and depersonalized. It is not difficult to imagine how such a horrific accident would have been treated had the children been Jewish: with a lot more blood and tears. There is no disputing that, as the Talmud says, "Every person is ...
GREEK D-DAY: SLOG US SOURCE CONFIRMS WALL ST PLANS AS SECRET BERLIN TIMETABLE EMERGES [3/23/12]
Post Date: 2012-02-19 16:52:38 by Capitalist Eric
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GREEK D-DAY: SLOG US SOURCE CONFIRMS WALL ST PLANS AS SECRET BERLIN TIMETABLE EMERGES Wall St – Schauble – Draghi – Monti connection alleged London Daily Telegraph piece cited as ‘on the money’ Draghi bond-swap seen as ‘ECB protection’ Further doubts about Merkel public position on default Just before midnight GMT Saturday, within hours of Bruno Waterfield’s piece about German finance ministry Greek default preparations appearing at the London Daily Telegraph site, The Slog received confirmation from a New York based banking source that – whatever German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s public stance may be – plans have been firmed ...
Turkey Will Not Allow NATO To Share Intelligence With Israel
Post Date: 2012-02-19 14:08:27 by Brian S
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Turkey will never allow any third country, particularly Israel, to use intelligence obtained by a NATO radar system, its foreign minister said on Friday. "We will never allow any third country to use any NATO facility. Our position will be even more clear if it is particularly Israel," Davutoglu told a joint news conference with visiting NATO chief Anders Fogh Rasmussen in Ankara. His remarks came after some media outlets reported that the United States and Israel have carried out a joint missile test by using intelligence gathered by a NATO radar system based in eastern Turkey. Last year Ankara decided to host in a military facility base near Malatya in the southeast an early ...
Iran Halts Oil Sales To France, Britain
Post Date: 2012-02-19 13:52:44 by Brian S
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Iran has halted its limited oil sales to France and Britain in retaliation for a phased EU ban on Iranian oil that is yet to take full effect, the oil ministry said on Sunday. “Oil sales to British and French companies have ceased,” spokesman Ali Reza Nikzad Rahbar said in a statement on the ministry’s official website. “We have taken steps to deliver our oil to other countries in the place of British and French companies,” he said. The decision was not expected to have a big impact. France last year bought only three percent of its oil — 58,000 barrels a day — from the Islamic republic, and Britain was believed to be no longer importing Iranian oil. ...
Nepalese woman accused of witchcraft and burned alive
Post Date: 2012-02-18 16:48:30 by A K A Stone
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Kathmandu, Nepal (CNN) -- A 40-year-old mother of two was burned alive in central Nepal after she was accused of being a witch, police said Saturday. Dhegani Mahato was attacked and set on fire by family members and others after a shaman allegedly accused her of casting a spell to make one of her relatives sick, Police Officer Hira Mani Baral said. The attack occurred Friday in Bagauda in Chitwan district, about 80 kilometers (50 miles) southwest of the Nepalese capital, Kathmandu, Baral said by telephone. Police arrested 10 people, including two shamans, five women and an 8-year-old boy, in connection with the burning. "Those arrested have confessed to their crime and will be ...
Paedophile uses 'pagan' belief system to justify his acts
Post Date: 2012-02-18 08:17:00 by A K A Stone
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The text: CLEVELAND -- It was probably not a defense the court had heard before. A suburban Cleveland man accused of sexually assaulting nine disabled boys told a judge Wednesday that his apartment was a religious sanctuary where smoking marijuana and having sex with children are sacred rituals protected by civil rights laws. The admitted pedophile offered a surprising defense Wednesday to 74 charges of rape, drugs and pandering obscenity to minors. Appearing in an Ohio court for a pretrial hearing, Phillip Distasio, 34, of Rocky River, Ohio, said he was a pedophile. He told the judge, "I'm a pedophile. I've been a pedophile for 20 years. The only reason I'm charged ...
Atheism and bestiality
Post Date: 2012-02-18 08:12:08 by A K A Stone
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Bestiality is the act of engaging in sexual relations with an animal. The atheist philosopher Peter Singer defends the practice of bestiality (as well as abortion, infanticide and euthanasia). Despite holding these immoral views the liberal and pro-evolution academic establishment rewarded his views with a bioethics chair at Princeton University.[2] Peter Singer was installed as the Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics at the University Center for Human Values at Princeton University in 1999 and in 2006 it was reported that he still worked part-time in that capacity.[3] In 2006, it was also reported that Singer worked part-time as Laureate Professor at the University of Melbourne in the ...
Atheist rapes woman for being religious
Post Date: 2012-02-18 08:00:57 by A K A Stone
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A man has been convicted of trying to rape a woman as she walked home from a train station late at night because she was religious. The 21-year-old told the High Court in Glasgow she thought that 22-year-old David Bell was going to kill her. The woman said she asked Bell: "Why me?” and he replied: “Religion is poison” The court heard that Bell who claims to be an atheist grabbed her by the neck, pushed her to the ground before repeatedly attempting to rape her on December 10 or 11 in Irvine, Ayrshire. Bell claimed that any sexual contact with the woman was consensual and that she had approached him. Judge Lord Turnbull told Bell: "You have been convicted of a most ...
US officials believe Iran sanctions will fail, making military action likely
Post Date: 2012-02-17 19:36:22 by A K A Stone
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Officials in key parts of the Obama administration are increasingly convinced that sanctions will not deter Tehran from pursuing its nuclear programme, and believe that the US will be left with no option but to launch an attack on Iran or watch Israel do so. The president has made clear in public, and in private to Israel, that he is determined to give sufficient time for recent measures, such as the financial blockade and the looming European oil embargo, to bite deeper into Iran's already battered economy before retreating from its principal strategy to pressure Tehran. But there is a strong current of opinion within the administration – including in the Pentagon and the state ...
Muslim Brotherhood to US: to Review 1979 Peace Deal with the Zionist Entity
Post Date: 2012-02-17 19:28:24 by Brian S
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(Ahlul Bayt News Agency) - "We [Egypt] are a party [to the treaty] and we will be harmed so it is our right to review the matter," Essam el-Erian, a senior Brotherhood leader, told Reuters. The aid was one of the commitments of the parties that signed the peace agreement. So, if there is a breach from one side it gives the right of review to the parties," added Erian, the deputy leader of the organization's Freedom and Justice Party (FJP), the biggest group in the newly elected parliament. Washington has said the aid is at risk due to an Egyptian probe into civil society groups that has resulted in charges against at least 43 activists, including 19 Americans who have ...
GREEK DEFAULT EXCLUSIVE: SENIOR US BANKERS GIVEN EXPLICIT TIMETABLE FOR ATHENS DEFAULT
Post Date: 2012-02-17 17:00:46 by Capitalist Eric
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DOCUMENTS RAISE AWKWARD QUESTIONS FOR WASHINGTON, IMF & BERLIN A written document giving firm dates and detailed actions for a planned Greek default has been in the possession of two top Wall Street bank currency trading bosses since the second week in January. The Slog has separate but corroborative sources affirming the existence of the document, and a conviction among senior bank staff that – at least at the time – the plan represented “a timetable, not a contingency”. The plan gives a firm date of March 23rd for default to be announced after the close of business. Senior bankers on Wall Street have been given detailed documentation setting out a timetable to ...
Italy Plans to Tax the Church on Commercial Property
Post Date: 2012-02-17 14:50:03 by Ferret Mike
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ROME — Over the years, the Italian government has quietly passed scores of laws that benefit the Roman Catholic Church, but it is rare for it to issue a public statement announcing that it intends to strip the church of privileges. The government of Prime Minister Mario Monti took that step on Wednesday, telling the European Commission that it would change Italian law to ensure that the church pays property tax on the parts of its buildings used for commercial ends. The church owns vast amounts of property in Italy, and the move is aimed at making sure that convents that offer bed-and-breakfast services or church buildings that rent space to shops pay their share of taxes. The ...
Central Banks Financial Terrorism
Post Date: 2012-02-17 02:00:28 by Capitalist Eric
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By decree, by the privately owned Federal Reserve, zero interest rates are here to stay. You do not get to borrow at those rates, only the member banks do. In the latest currency swap (loan) from the Fed to the ECB, European Central Bank, as we noted in previous issues over the last two months, that Europe has been forced to join the Anglo-American system. The system of zero interest rates and the continual creation of money and credit. Due to the Fed’s ability to create endless supplies of money and credit it eventually took over the control of ECB and European monetary policy. These policies starkly point out the zero interest rates and monetary policy of endless money creation is ...
Food Project Proposes Matrix-Style Vertical Chicken Farms
Post Date: 2012-02-15 21:17:25 by A K A Stone
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Architecture student André Ford has proposed a new system for the mass production of chickens that removes the birds’ cerebral cortex so that they don’t experience the horrors of being packed together tightly in vertical farms. Wired U.K. Each year, the United Kingdom raises and kills around 800 million broiler chickens for their meat. These creatures are grown in vast sheds with no natural light over the course of six to seven weeks. They are bred to grow particularly quickly and often die because their hearts and lungs cannot keep up with their body’s rapid growth. Philosopher Paul Thompson from Purdue University has suggested “The Blind Chicken ...
Israeli Minister: Iran Near 'Point Of No Return’
Post Date: 2012-02-15 20:33:27 by Murron
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Israeli Minister: Iran Near 'Point Of No Return’ Israel's deputy prime minister says it's time for tougher sanctions against Iran before its nuclear program advances to what he calls "the point of no return." Silvan Shalom spoke to reporters in Columbus, Ohio, on Wednesday after addressing the state's Legislature. His comments came as Iran claimed it has achieved two major advances in its program to master production of nuclear fuel. Shalom says Iran will continue to proceed with its nuclear program until the world acts because Iranians believe it will give them "an insurance policy to their regime." He says Iran's latest claims show no ...
NYPD Ups Security Around Israeli Locations
Post Date: 2012-02-15 20:29:35 by Murron
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NYPD Ups Security Around Israeli Locations A spokesman for the New York City police says it has heightened security around Israeli government offices and synagogues. Paul Browne said Wednesday there were no specific threats. He said the security measures were put in place as a precaution amid mounting tension with Iran over its nuclear advances. Browne said the NYPD regularly adjusts its counterterrorism strategies based on events overseas. U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer also called on the State Department to increase scrutiny of Iran's U.N. mission in New York to uncover possible plots.
Investigators Suspect ‘Serious Criminality’ At News Corp
Post Date: 2012-02-15 18:34:40 by Brian S
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Investigators looking into alleged corrupt practices at News Corp’s UK newspapers suspect that cash payments worth more than £100,000 were made to police officers and other public officials, one person familiar with the investigation said. News Corp’s management and standards committee, set up after the News of the World phone hacking scandal convulsed the News International newspaper division last July, has been under fire from reporters for passing information to police that has led to the arrests of nine journalists at The Sun. On Wednesday, a person with knowledge of the investigation dismissed claims that journalists were being penalised for innocuous lunches with ...
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