Jonathon Brown | Feb 4

The Independent - Sarcastic letter to 19th-century plantation owner becomes an internet sensation

An extraordinary letter written by an emancipated slave to his former owner ridiculing his request for him to return to work on a Tennessee plantation after the Civil War has become an internet sensation.

More than two million people have already read the missive by Jourdon Anderson to "my old master" Colonel Patrick Hennessy Anderson since it appeared on the cult website LettersOfNote.com five days ago and became endlessly repeated on Twitter and Facebook.

It was written in 1865 with the help of a lawyer in Dayton, Ohio. In it, the illiterate former slave suggests he might consider returning south from his new home where he was being paid $25 a month should the Colonel – who twice tried to shoot him – consider reimbursing him and his wife for the three decades they toiled in the fields unpaid.

He points out: "In Tennessee there was never any pay-day for the negroes any more than for the horses and cows" and suggests suitable recompense of $11,680 plus interest.

Shaun Usher, who has published historical correspondence on his website since 2009, said the letter had generated record traffic after being picked up by Yahoo to coincide with US Black History Month. He was satisfied the letter was genuine despite its sarcastic tone – it was published in newspapers and books and evidence of both men appears in American census documents.

But what really shines through is the searing intelligence of the former slave – just one of the descendants of 12 million Africans shipped to the Americas between the 16th and 19th centuries.

"He was certainly intelligent. I don't know how much was put in by the lawyer, but he seems like a refined and courageous man although he had an awful life," said Mr Usher. letter at link

Homs, Syria | February 4

Al Jazeera - At least 100 people have reportedly been killed in a major army offensive in the central Syrian city of Homs.

Activists talking to Al Jazeera in the early hours of Saturday said the army had used mortars and nail bombs in the assault on the Khaldiyeh neighbourhood.

The military was reportedly responding to attacks by army defectors in the area.

February 3

BBC - Alleged Wikileaks suspect Bradley Manning is to face a court martial, the US Army has confirmed.

Private Manning, 24, an intelligence analyst who served in Iraq, is alleged to have leaked US government cables to the whistle-blowing website.

David Brown | Washington | February 2

WaPo - The number of people who die annually of malaria is roughly double the current estimate, with a huge overlooked death toll in adults who, according to conventional teaching, rarely die of the tropical disease. That’s the conclusion of a new study that, if widely accepted, could affect billions of dollars of charitable spending and foreign aid in the developing world. The new estimate is likely to spur increased competition for global health spending, which has stalled in the economic downturn.

The report, published in the Lancet, describes malaria as a problem not only far bigger than thought `but also declining rapidly because of better prevention and treatment.

Declan Walsh | Islamabad | Feb 2

NYT - The simmering crisis between Pakistan’s government and judiciary flared dramatically on Thursday when the Supreme Court announced it would pursue contempt charges against the prime minister, Yousaf Raza Gilani, for failing to reopen a corruption investigation into the finances of his boss, President Asif Ali Zardari.

The Supreme Court said it would start proceedings for contempt of court against Mr. Gilani on Feb. 13. If convicted, he faces up to six months in jail and possible disqualification from public office.

The court order was a significant escalation of long-simmering tensions between the judiciary and the government and threatened to plunge the country into fresh political turmoil as its leaders debated the contours of a new strategic relationship with the United States.

Since 2009, the Supreme Court, led by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, has insisted that the government write a letter to the authorities in Switzerland, asking them to reopen a corruption investigation against Mr. Zardari that stretches back to the 1990s and involves his finances in that country.

The government has responded with stalling tactics, using various ruses to dodge the order in court, while in public it has contended that Mr. Zardari enjoys immunity from prosecution while in office.

But the court’s forbearance ended last month when it ordered Mr. Gilani to appear before it under threat of contempt charges. Amid dramatic scenes, Mr. Gilani turned up on Jan. 19, flanked by supporters, and he was represented by Aitzaz Ahsan, one of the country’s most famous lawyers.
...

“It seems like the court has run out of patience,” said Cyril Almeida, a political columnist with Dawn, a leading English-language newspaper. “It’s in a mood to wrap this up quickly — either to ensure the government writes the letter, or let the gallows come crashing down on Gilani’s premiership.”

Emanuel Stoakes | Jan 29

Truthout - The extrajudicial killing of civilians, surrendering soldiers and dissident journalists under the direction of the Sri Lankan government has been alleged by a former general in the Army who was extremely well-placed to comment on military activity during the island nation's bloody civil war.

The source, whose name is withheld for reasons of safety, had high-level security clearance and access to the flow of orders during the final days of the conflict. He made the assertions in legally binding testimony to a US lawyer in New York in 2010, recorded in an affidavit seen by Truthout.

His statements hold particular significance because they appear to corroborate claims made in reports by prominent human rights organizations, international media and a report for the United Nations by a panel of experts published in 2011. The allegations also closely corroborate the accounts of other members of the Sri Lankan Army during the civil war.

It is believed that representatives of the United States State Department have spoken to the source and hold a rich collection of testimonies and other evidence regarding alleged crimes committed during the civil war.

The most explosive claims have meaningful implications in terms of international law, given that they contribute to a body of evidence that places the command responsibility for alleged war crimes at the feet of key figures in Sri Lanka's civilian leadership.

Yaakov Katz | Jerusalem, Israel | February 2

Jerusalem Post - US secretary of defense is concerned Israel will launch an attack before Iran enters so-called "immunity zone" when military strike won't bust Iran's nuclear facilities, 'Washington Post' reports.

United States Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta believes that Israel will attack Iran in April, May or June, the Washington Post reported Thursday.

According to the report, written by the paper’s senior opinion writer David Ignatius, Panetta is concerned that Israel will launch an attack before Iran enters the so-called “immunity zone” when its nuclear facilities will be heavily fortified and a military strike will no longer succeed.

C.J Chivers | Feb 1

NYT -

Today, At War journeys into crowd-sourcing to ask for readers’ help identifying a weapon found on the battlefields of Libya last year. Followers of this blog know that we have spent considerable time identifying and sometimes tracing the tools of war in several recent conflicts back to their sources. But this time, we are stumped.

The items in question are what ordnance professionals call submunitions, but are more widely known among lay readers as cluster bombs. The photograph above shows one found in November at the ruins of an arms depot a few miles outside of Mizdah, in the desert south of Tripoli. read more

JPD please pick up the courtesy phone...

Julian Borger | Washington | January 31

The Guardian - Washington openly blames Iranian supreme leader Ali Khamenei for first time over Saudi ambassador plot.

The head of US intelligence has warned that there is an increasing likelihood that Iran could carry out attacks in America or against US and allied targets around the world.

The warning from the director of national intelligence, James Clapper, reflects rapidly rising tensions over Iran's nuclear programme after the US and EU announced embargoes on the Iranian oil trade in the past few weeks, Israel leaked details of its preparation for a possible conflict and both the west and Iran boosted their military readiness in the Gulf.

David Bacon | Sacramento, CA | January 27

In These Times - Early Tuesday morning, buses of domestic workers and their children began arriving at the huge grassy mall in front of California's state capitol building. Dozens of Mexican, Filipina and African-American moms, kids in tow, poured out onto the steps leading into the legislature's chamber. When the crowd grew to several hundred, they took up their placards, pushed their strollers out in front and began marching around the building.

Some of the kids had clearly done things like this before. One five-year-old raised her fist in the air as the crowd chanted, calling on members of the state Assembly and Senate to pass the Domestic Workers Bill of Rights. Another girl, who looked about three, knew the chant by heart: "We are the children, mighty mighty children, fighting for justice and our future." She didn't miss a beat, and as one of the organizers held the bullhorn up to her mouth she did a little militant dance to accompany it.

United Nations | Febbruary 1

CNN - Arab and Western diplomats spoke in support Tuesday of a U.N. Security Council draft resolution that calls for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to step down, while representatives from Russia and China slammed it as meddlesome.

More effective than the resolution, Russia and China said, would be the fostering of dialogue within the country.

Washington | Feb 1

AFP - US Vice President Joe Biden spelled out a blunt re-election message for his boss President Barack Obama on Tuesday -- "Osama bin Laden is dead and General Motors is alive."

Biden's comment at a Texas fundraiser came as Obama stepped up his drive to claim credit for rescuing the iconic US car industry, as he took a spin around the Washington auto show and declared "the US auto industry is back."

The vice president boiled down Obama's State of the Union message into some pithy sound bites at a fundraiser in Fort Worth expected to raise more than $150,000 for the re-election campaign.

Biden hailed Obama as a champion of America's hard-pressed middle classes as they emerge from the deepest recession since the 1930s and said the president had kept his promise to pull US troops out of Iraq.

"But the best way to sum up the job the president has done --- if you need a real shorthand -- Osama bin Laden is dead and General Motors is alive," Biden said, adding that he was passing on a line suggested to him by a supporter.

Biden also suggested that the bitter race for the Republican nomination was helping his and Obama's chances in November's presidential election.

"For the first time, the Republicans are not hiding the ball. ... They are saying what they believe, God love them. They are not even pretending."

"This is going to be one heck of a race. I think we are doing better and better every day, ... in no small part because they are making it clear what they are for."

GM regains crown as world's top-selling automaker

Lisa M. Krieger | San Jose | Jan 31

McClatchy - Scientists at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory have created the world's first atomic X-ray laser.

The researchers aimed SLAC's Linac Coherent Light Source at a capsule of neon gas, setting off an avalanche of X-ray emissions to create the shortest, purest X-ray laser pulses ever achieved.

"X-rays give us a penetrating view into the world of atoms and molecules," said physicist Nina Rohringer ofGermany's Max Planck Society in a news release last week.

She led the research in collaboration with scientists from SLAC, the Department of Energy's Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory andColoradoState University.

"We envision researchers using this new type of laser for all sorts of interesting things, such as teasing out the details of chemical reactions or watching biological molecules at work," she said.

With short pulses, scientists can capture fast changes in matter. And the purer the light, the sharper the details they can see.

The news was reported in the Jan. 25 issue of the journal Nature.

Pam Belluck | Jan 31

NYT - In a decision that is inflaming passions on both sides of the abortion debate, the world’s largest breast cancer organization, Susan G. Komen for the Cure, is cutting off its financing of breast cancer screening and education programs run by Planned Parenthood affiliates.

A spokeswoman for the Komen foundation, Leslie Aun, told The Associated Press that the main factor in the decision was a new rule adopted by Komen that prohibits grants to organizations being investigated by local, state or federal authorities. Ms. Aun told The A.P. that Planned Parenthood was therefore disqualified from financing because of an inquiry being conducted by Representative Cliff Stearns, Republican of Florida, who is looking at how Planned Parenthood spends and reports its money.

This is beyond outrageous, in my opinion...

Hu Yuanyuan | Beijing | January 31

China Daily - China's major cities saw a drop in property sales during the Lunar New Year holiday, indicating a further correction in the real estate market.

SouFun Holdings Ltd, China's largest property website, said on Monday that among the 29 cities it monitors, 27 experienced a drop in property transactions.

Property sales in Guangzhou plunged by 81.5 percent year-on-year. Those in Shanghai and Shenzhen also fell by more than 30 percent on a yearly basis, according to SouFun. Statistics for Beijing are not available because the capital's website on property transactions was closed during the festival.

Four second-tier cities - Jinan, Wuxi, Harbin and Ningbo - saw no transactions at all, SouFun statistics showed.

Port-au-Prince | Jan 30

Reuters - Former Haitian dictator Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier will face trial for corruption but not for human rights abuses, the judge handling the case said on Monday.

A 20-page ruling on the charges was delivered to the government prosecutor's office on Monday, Carves Jean, the judge responsible for investigating the case, told Reuters.

It does not include charges for the murders, disappearances, torture and other rights abuses allegedly committed during Duvalier's 15-year rule.

"I did not find enough legal grounds to keep human rights charges and crimes against humanity against him," he said. "Now my job is over. The case is no longer in my hands."

disgusting

Andrew Cohen | Jan 30

The Atlantic - Why is the Justice Department trying to make it more difficult for service members and their families to sue the government for medical malpractice?

Politicians and bureaucrats of all persuasions typically trip over themselves when it comes to praising the values and virtues, the courage and the sacrifice, of America's military families. East Coast. West Coast. Red State. Blue State. Democrats. Republicans. It doesn't matter. Everyone wants to stand up in public and say that brave and stoic military families should get the best that America can offer (cue the applause). Take the First Lady herself, Michelle Obama, who has worked consistently with and for these families since 2009.

Commemorating the 10th anniversary of the terror attacks on America, Mrs. Obama wrote in USA Today:

As we reaffirm our commitment to hold dear the heroism, strength and compassion we saw on Sept. 11, let's also pledge to keep our military families in our hearts long after this anniversary has passed. These men, women and children have served valiantly in the decade since that fateful day. Now it's up to us to serve them as well.

Amen. But while public officials are out waving the flag toward these families, federal lawyers in court are now quietly trying to expand the U.S. government's legal immunity from exposure to medical malpractice claims brought by those very same military folks. Now, the feds want the courts to recognize a bold application of an old doctrine -- an already heavily criticized old doctrine -- that would bar many plaintiffs, whose loved ones serve their country, from exercising the right merely to be able to present the substance of their claims at trial.

Worse, Congress has consistently refused over the past 60 years to ensure that courthouse doors remain open to military personnel and their families. In one recent iteration of this battle, in 2009, it was reported that Congressional Republicans refused to go along because doing so it would allow more malpractice cases to get to trial, a goal many of those very same Republicans find contrary to their so-called "tort reform" agenda. It's a legal issue, it's a political issue, and its a moral one: How much do we really care about these families?

Larry Margasak | Washington | Jan 30

Boston.com - Congress is rushing to make it absolutely clear to everyone that its members are banned from insider stock trading, hoping to improve their sagging image that has approval ratings at historic lows.

Senators made the first move Monday. Their 93-2 procedural vote cleared the way for Senate passage -- possibly later this week -- of a bill that would require disclosure of stock transactions within 30 days and explicitly prohibit members of Congress from initiating trades based on non-public information they acquired in their official capacity. The legislation, at least partly symbolic in nature, is aimed at answering critics who say lawmakers profit from businesses where they have special knowledge.

U.S. lawmakers already are subject to the same penalties as other investors who use non-public information to enrich themselves, though no member of Congress in recent memory has been charged with insider trading. In 2005, the Securities and Exchange Commission and Justice Department investigated then-Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist's sale of stock in his family's hospital company, but no charges were ever brought against the Tennessee Republican.

Voters may believe lawmakers paid an annual salary of $174,000 are enriching themselves by making investments based on what they learn in Congress. A recent segment of CBS' "60 Minutes" in November questioned trades by a House committee chairman, the current speaker and his predecessor's husband. Speaker John Boehner, former Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Rep. Spencer Bachus, R-Ala., all denied wrongdoing. Bachus chairs the Financial Services Committee.

"Members of Congress are not above the law," Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said before Monday's test vote. "We must play by the same rules every other American plays by." He said the bill "will clear up any perception that it's acceptable for members of Congress to profit from insider trading."

Sutanu Guru | New Delhi | February

TSI - A C Neilson in India, alleged

1. Abuse of Monopoly
2. Conflict of Interest....
3. Unethical Behaviour
4. Misleading Research

(Upcoming India Times weekend magazine cover story.)

| January 29

BBC - French President Nicolas Sarkozy has announced plans to introduce a tax on financial transactions. The 0.1% levy will be introduced in August regardless of whether other European countries follow suit.

...In an interview with French television, Mr Sarkozy said he hoped the tax would push other countries to take action. "W
hat we want to do is create a shockwave and set an example that there is absolutely no reason why those who helped bring about the crisis shouldn't pay to restore the finances," he said.

Way to go!

Doha, Qatar | January 29

VOA - Taliban negotiators are meeting with U.S. officials in Qatar for a series of discussions aimed at building trust and preparing both sides for upcoming peace talks.

Former Taliban official Maulavi Qalamuddin, who once led the group's religious police, says about five Taliban negotiators are there for the preliminary talks. He says the talks include the possible release of Taliban prisoners from the U.S. military detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Qalamuddin says the Taliban delegation currently in Doha includes several former Taliban officials and a former secretary to the Taliban's leader Mullah Omar.

Addis Ababa | January 29

VOA - African Union leaders opened a two-day summit in Addis Ababa Sunday with the election of a new chairman for the pan-African organization.

Benin's President Thomas Yayi Boni was selected chairman for the next year, taking over from Equatorial Guinea's President Teodoro Obiang Nguema.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon was among the first speakers in the new AU headquarters financed and built by China, an African trade partner.

Parisa Hafezi & Ramin Mostafavi | Tehran | January 29

Reuters - The three-day visit could shape the direction of Western efforts to curb Iran's nuclear program, which Tehran says is only for peaceful purposes.

Iran Sunday declared itself optimistic about a UN experts' visit aimed at probing suspected military aspects of its nuclear work and lawmakers postponed debate on a proposed halt to oil flows to the European Union watched closely in energy markets.

A team of International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors began a three-day visit to try to advance efforts to resolve a row about nuclear work which Iran says is for making electricity but the West suspects is aimed at seeking a nuclear weapon.

Ron Nixon | Jan 29

NYT - Lobbyists for the Egyptian government in Washington have ended their contracts with the country because of growing tensions after a raid by Egyptian authorities on several American nonprofit organizations.

The Egyptian government has refused to let employees of the organizations leave the country. The detained workers include Sam LaHood, son of Ray LaHood, who is the Obama administration’s secretary of transportation.

The lobbying firms include the Livingston Group, run by former Representative Robert L. Livingston, Republican of Louisiana; the Moffett Group, run by former Representative Toby Moffett, Democrat of Connecticut; and the Podesta Group, owned by Tony Podesta, one of the most powerful lobbyists in Washington. Mr. Podesta has close ties to the Obama administration.

The firms were widely criticized for distributing talking points defending the Egyptian government’s raid. They shared a lobbying contract worth more $1.1 million a year to represent Egypt’s interests in Washington, according to documents filed with the Department of Justice.

Mr. Livingston confirmed in an e-mail to Politico that the three firms had dropped Egypt as a client; Politico reported the ending of the contracts late Friday.

The firms had formed a joint effort called the PLM Group to advocate on behalf of the government of President Hosni Mubarak. He stepped down early last year after more than two weeks of street protests led by youth activists. According to the filings with the Justice Department, Egypt has paid PLM more than $4 million since 2007.

The severing of the contracts by the three firms comes weeks after the Egyptian government raided the offices of three American nonprofit groups that work with local organizations on election monitoring and government transparency. The groups are the International Republican Institute, the National Democratic Institute and Freedom House.

The Republican and Democratic institutes are loosely affiliated with the Republican and Democratic Parties. They were created by Congress and are financed through the National Endowment for Democracy, which was set up in 1983 to channel grants for promoting democracy in developing nations. Freedom House is a Washington-based group that promotes democracy and open elections.

The National Endowment receives about $100 million annually from Congress. Freedom House also gets the bulk of its money from the American government, mainly from the State Department, according to tax records and budget documents.

Yara Bayoumy | Addis Ababa | Jan 28

Reuters - Standing on what was once Ethiopia's oldest maximum security prison, the new African Union headquarters funded by China is a symbol of the Asian giant's push to stay ahead in Africa and gain greater access to the continent's resources.

Critics point to an imbalance in what they see as the new "Scramble for Africa." But the prospect of growing Chinese economic influence is welcomed by African leaders, who see Beijing as a partner to help build their economies at a time when Europe and the United States are mired in economic turmoil.

And Africans are hoping for more Chinese largesse.

"The future prospects of our partnership are even brighter," Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi said Saturday at the new headquarters' multi-storey amphitheatre, where an African heads of states' summit will take place Sunday and Monday.

"China - its amazing re-emergence and its commitments for a win-win partnership with Africa - is one of the reasons for the beginning of the African renaissance," he said.

The brown marble and glass monolith was fully paid for by China, right down to the office furniture, and cost $200 million. The office complex and almost 100 metre (330 foot) tower is Addis Ababa's tallest building by far.

For the past decade, Africa has recorded economic growth of an average of 5 percent but its under-developed infrastructure has in part hindered its capacity to develop further.

Chinese companies are changing that. They are building roads and investing in the energy sector, and are active in areas such as telecoms technology.

China's most senior political adviser, Jia Qinglin, said trade between the two partners had grown to $150 billion, and the unveiling of the headquarters was a "milestone" in the ties between China and Africa.