Mois : novembre 2014

Published on Al-Ahram weekly online, by Doaa El-Bey, Nov 13, 2014: On Egypt’s defence of its record at the UN Periodic Review meeting in Geneva.

While the head of the Egyptian delegation to Geneva insisted Egypt had witnessed a qualitative “leap” in the status of human rights, human rights groups have widely condemned Egypt’s record on basic freedoms over the last four years.

More than 300 recommendations, questions and comments from member states were included in the UN outcome report that followed Egypt’s Universal Periodic Review (UPR) last week. Reservations were expressed over laws regulating NGOs, human rights, judicial procedures and the right to protest. Egypt’s Foreign Ministry, however, was keen to point out that amid the criticisms there were positive remarks. “From at least 100 countries,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Badr Abdel-Atti told Al-Ahram Weekly. Continuer la lecture de « Egypt: Human rights under scrutiny »

Published on farmlandgrab.org, by Chris Arsenault, Nov 12, 2014.

ROME, Nov 12 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – Development funds from European governments have helped to rescue a Canadian company that pays workers as little as $1 per day to toil on some of Africa’s largest palm oil plantations in the impoverished Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

Government-backed investment funds from Britain, France and Spain, designed to help poor countries develop, stepped in to buy 60 percent of Toronto-listed Feronia Inc for about $35 million in two separate investments in 2012 and 2013.   Continuer la lecture de « Taxpayer funds save Congo plantation paying workers $1/day »

latest Related Links:

• Pax Pacificana? US, China agree to avoid military conflict, on Russia Today RT, Nov 12, 2014;
• (remember on Global Research.ca, by Dr. Paul Craig Roberts:
• Will Russia and China Hold Their Fire Until War Is the Only Alternative? Sept 26, 2014; … and: Washington’s War Against Russia – Undermining Russia’s Historic Relationship with Western Europe, Sept 15, 2014);     Continuer la lecture de « USA – CHINA – RUSSIA – (and our politician's arse licker eu) … quo vadis? »

LIVE UPDATES – Go-go-go! Rosetta’s Philae lander descent to comet surface, on Russia Today RT, Nov 12, 2014!
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Published on The National Security Archive, by Thomas Blanton and Svetlana Savranskaya, Nov 9, 2014.

• Documents show accident and contingency, anxiety in world capitals;
• East German crowds led the way, with help from Communist fumbles, self-fulfilling TV coverage, Hungarian reformers, Czechoslovak pressure, and Gorbachev’s non-violence.

Washington, DC, November 9, 2014 – The iconic fall of the Berlin Wall 25 years ago today shocked international leaders from Washington to Moscow, London to Warsaw, as East German crowds took advantage of Communist Party fumbles to break down the Cold War’s most symbolic barrier, according to formerly secret documents from Soviet, German, U.S., Czechoslovak and Hungarian files posted today by the National Security Archive at George Washington University (The National Security Archive.org).   Continuer la lecture de « The Fall of the Berlin Wall, 25th Anniversary »

Published on Russia Today RT, Nov 10, 2014;

New rules are being proposed that will force creditors, not taxpayers, to carry the losses of banks deemed “too big to fail.” The plans come after Western taxpayers were asked to pay trillions of dollars to bail out banks in the 2008 financial crisis. The new global rules will force creditors to bear banks’ losses, ensuring that taxpayers’ money should never be used again to bail out banks.  The proposal was unveiled by Mark Carney, chairman of the Switzerland-based Financial Stability Board (FSB) and governor of the Bank of England. The new rules would require big banks to hold much more money against losses, which Carney called a “watershed” moment, adding that the bailout by the taxpayers in 2008 and 2009 was “totally unfair” … // Continuer la lecture de « No more bailouts: BoE chief says banks won't be save by taxpayers »