| Egypt's influential Muslim Brotherhood says it will join other opposition groups in talks with officials following weeks of protest against President Mubarak's rule. |
| The global prevalence of obesity has almost doubled since 1980, while some inroads have been made in dropping global cholesterol and high blood pressure rates. Those are the findings of three papers published in the Lancet, looking at global heart disease risk factors between 1980 and 2008. |
| Egyptian Prime Minister Ahmed Shafiq appeared to feign surprise Sunday when he was told that journalists and human rights activists had been arrested at anti-government protests in his country. "Why are you detaining them?" CNN's Candy Crowley asked. "Oh, frankly speaking, it's not intended at all my dear," Shafiq replied. "I insist to assure all [...] |
| Fresh off a recent controversy about his potential conflicts of interest in the Citizens United decision, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas faced new questions this week about his judicial impartiality. This time, legal ethicists raised questions about the lobby group launched recently by Thomas' wife, Virginia. Critics say Virginia Thomas' activities at Liberty Consulting could [...] |
| CAIRO - Rights watchdog Amnesty International said Sunday that an Egyptian executive of the Google software giant who was snatched from the street during anti-government riots faces a serious risk of torture. Wael Ghoneim was arrested by Egyptian security forces during protests on Friday and his whereabouts are unknown, Amnesty said, adding he "is facing [...] |
| SINGAPORE - Asia must prepare for millions of people to flee their homes to safer havens within countries and across borders as weather patterns become more extreme, the Asian Development Bank warns. A draft of an ADB report obtained by AFP over the weekend and confirmed by bank officials cautioned that failure to make preparations [...] |
| WASHINGTON - Egyptian opposition figure Mohamed ElBaradei slammed fledgling negotiations on Egypt's future on Sunday and said he was not invited to the talks. The Nobel Peace laureate said weekend talks with Egyptian Vice President Omar Suleiman were managed by the same people who had ruled the country for 30 years and lack credibility. He [...] |
| WASHINGTON - US President Barack Obama reiterated his call Sunday for an "orderly" and "meaningful" transition in Egypt and said he wanted to see a "representative government" emerge. "The Egyptian people want freedom, free and fair elections, they want a representative government, they want a responsive government. We've said, you have to start a transition [...] |
| With Republicans in the House claiming they want to cut down on spending for the next fiscal year, marijuana advocates are suggesting they should start with the Drug Enforcement Administration's budget. |
| Image: Facops Read it and weep: "Germany leads the European nations in recycling, with around 70 percent of the waste the country generates successfully recovered and reused each year. To put that figure into perspective, consider this: In 2007, the U.S. was able to recover only about 33 percent of the waste generated that year." Germany's policies force companies to be much more waste-conscious than the US does (surprise, surprise). Read more about how they do it in Trash Planet: Germany, on Earth911.... Read the full story on TreeHugger |
| As the United States authorities continue with their domain name seizure policy, file-sharing, streaming and link site operators around the world are looking for ways to mitigate this aggressive action. To this end, an Internet engineer and website operator has put together a guide that might just help site owners avoid a whole heap of inconvenience in the future. |
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GENEVA (Reuters) - Former President George W. Bush has canceled a visit to Switzerland, where he was to address a Jewish charity gala, due to the risk of legal action against him for alleged torture, rights Egyptian protester in Alexandria walks up to riot police raising his hand in surrender, takes of his jacket, and opens his chest in defiance....Police shoot him down in cold blood! [link]
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I asked an old friend here in Cairo, a woman with Western tastes that include an occasional glass of whiskey, whether the Muslim Brotherhood might be bad for peace. She thought for a moment and said: "Yes, possibly. But, from my POV, in America the Republican Party is bad for peace as well." [link]
| Zum elften Mal treffen sich ab heute Zehntausende als Gegenöffentlichkeit zum Weltsozialforum. 2003 noch als "Zweite Supermacht" gehandelt, machen sich heute Ermüdungserscheinungen bemerkbar. Aus Porto Alegre Gerhard Dilger |
| Studie zeigt auf, wie ein nachhaltiges Ressourcenmanagement für Neodym, Terbium, Lanthan und Co. aussehen kann |
| A former Israeli soldier admits leaking secret military information to a newspaper, but more serious spying charges are dropped. |
| Two US spacecraft move either side of the Sun to establish observing positions that should return remarkable new information about our star. |
| Tunisia's former governing party, the RCD, is to be suspended and its offices closed, the interior ministry announces. |
| Spanish police remove more than 100 Belgian students from a Ryanair plane due to fly from Lanzarote, after a row over a hand luggage fee. |
| Egypt's opposition - including the banned Muslim Brotherhood - says government offers on ending the political crisis do not go far enough. |
Will The West Endorse Human Rights Violator Omar Suleiman To Be Egypt's Transitional President? On
January 29, five days into massive pro-democracy protests that shook the nation of Egypt, Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak appointed his "close personal friend and confidante" Omar Suleiman as his vice president, the first in the nation's modern history. While Suleiman's appointment likely was an attempt to appease the protest movement, demonstrations did not cease, as many saw the move as little more than a reshuffling of the old government.
There are now signs, including statements by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, that point to Washington and other Western capitals endorsing Suleiman as a possible transitional president to replace Mubarak and broker a compromise with protesters that could possibly lead to democratic reforms.
While there may be a number of benefits to having Suleiman lead the transition - such as his stature as a high-level military official and history of negotiation with foreign powers - there are also a number of troubling facts about his history as Egypt's intelligence chief, particularly related to his complicity in human rights abuses.
As Egyptian Intelligence Director, Suleiman headed up the feared Egyptian intelligence agencies. In this capacity, he also served as the country's chief liaison to the American CIA's rendition program, which shuttled terror suspects to countries, such as Egypt, where they could be tortured. Australian journalist Richard Neville recounts the story of how, in the case of detainee Mamdouh Habib, an Australian citizen, Suleiman ordered brutal torture:
Habib was interrogated by the country's Intelligence Director, General Omar Suleiman. … Suleiman took a personal interest in anyone suspected of links with Al Qaeda. As Habib had visited Afghanistan shortly before 9/11, he was under suspicion. Habib was repeatedly zapped with high-voltage electricity, immersed in water up to his nostrils, beaten, his fingers were broken and he was hung from metal hooks. [...]
To loosen Habib's tongue, Suleiman ordered a guard to murder a gruesomely shackled Turkistan prisoner in front of Habib - and he did, with a vicious karate kick.
While the reaction in Washington to Suleiman's ascension has been somewhat positive - Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) called him a "charming man" - the reaction amongst Egyptian civil society has been much less positive. Former IAEA chief and Nobel Laureate Mohamed ElBaradei said it would be a "major setback" if Suleiman or Mubarak were tasked with leading a transitional government, and said that it would "come down like lead on the people who have been demonstrating" if the United States and the rest of the international community were to endorse Suleiman to lead the transition. "Mubarak and Suleiman are the same person," said Emile Nakhleh, a CIA analyst. "They are not two different people in terms of ideology and reform."
The position of opposition groups in the country on Suleiman being a transitional leader is mixed. Some groups, like the Muslim Brotherhood, have opened themselves up to talks with the Egyptian vice president. Others are calling for a new constitution to be written by parliament before any such talks begin.
Whatever one's opinion of Suleiman is, it is important to view him in light of his entire record, which includes complicity in a whole host of human rights abuses. If he is to serve as a transitional leader, the millions of Egyptians who have marched in the streets will likely not rest until the transition is complete and those, like Suleiman, who were a key part of Mubarak's regime, would only remain in power if a free and fair election put them there.
Bill Kristol Slams Conservative 'Hysteria' On Egypt, Calls Out Beck's Delusional 'Caliphate' Theory
But in a surprising move, Weekly Standard Editor Bill Kristol used his column this week to scold his conservative brethren for refusing to support democracy. Kristol takes special note to call out Beck as a John Bircher who is "marginalizing himself, just as his predecessors did back in the early 1960s":
[H]ysteria is not a sign of health. When Glenn Beck rants about the caliphate taking over the Middle East from Morocco to the Philippines, and lists (invents?) the connections between caliphate-promoters and the American left, he brings to mind no one so much as Robert Welch and the John Birch Society. He's marginalizing himself, just as his predecessors did back in the early 1960s.
Nor is it a sign of health when other American conservatives are so fearful of a popular awakening that they side with the dictator against the democrats. Rather, it's a sign of fearfulness unworthy of Americans, of short-sightedness uncharacteristic of conservatives, of excuse-making for thuggery unworthy of the American conservative tradition. [...]
Let's hope that as talk radio hosts find time for reflection, and commentators step back to take a deep breath, they will recall that one of the most hopeful aspects of the current conservative revival is its reclamation of the American constitutionalist tradition. That tradition is anchored even beyond the Constitution, of course, in the Declaration of Independence. And that document, let's not forget, proclaims that, "Whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends [life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness], it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it."
Over at the conservative National Review, editor Rich Lowry approvingly quotes Kristol, noting, "[h]e takes a well-deserved shot at Glenn Beck's latest wild theorizing."
Kristol would probably be less than thrilled with Sarah Palin's contribution today to the public discourse on Egypt. Employing her renowned wit, Palin slammed Obama for apparently missing a phone call at 3 AM, and said she doesn't trust the protesters because they could be involved with the Muslim Brotherhood. Palin said while she "want[s] to be able to trust those who are screaming for democracy there in Egypt," she has no way to "verify" what they actually want.
"He's avoiding the handcuffs," Reed Brody, counsel for Human Rights Watch, told Reuters.
Recall, Bush has acknowledged giving authorization to waterboard 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (waterboarding is a torture tactic that violates both U.S. statute and international treaties to which the U.S. is a signatory):
Bush Said He Was Personally Involved. Bush: "I'm in the Oval Office and I am told that we have captured Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and the professionals believe he has information necessary to secure the country. So I ask what tools are available for us to find information from him and they gave me a list of tools, and I said are these tools deemed to be legal? And so we got legal opinions before any decision was made." [Link]
Bush Said He Approved Torture. Bush: "Yes, I'm aware our national security team met on this issue. And I approved." [Link]
Bush Has No Regrets. "Yeah, we waterboarded Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. … I'd do it again to save lives." [Link]
| Analysis: Egypt's crisis is downplayed in Kabul, where popular uprisings make many nervous. read more |
| Das ist eine der brillianten Facetten der begeisternden Volkserhebung in Ägypten: diese hat nicht nur die Unrechtmäßigkeit des Mubarak-Regimes ans Licht gebracht, sondern auch die Verlogenheit hinter den Kampagnen des Westens, in den Mittleren Osten "die Demokratie zu bringen." Genau die Politiker und Presseleute, die über die "Demokratisierung" des Irak geredet haben, starren jetzt schreckerfüllt mit offenem Mund auf die ägyptischen Massen, die ihre demokratischen Rechte fordern. Das liegt daran, dass diese angstgebeutelten Beobachter nicht verstehen, was wirkliche Demokratie ist |
| An der Euro-Front ist im Moment alles ruhig, vom üblichen Gegacker der Euro-Politik-Hühner einmal abgesehen. Das wird aber sicher nicht so bleiben. Denn es braut sich in der Welt etwas Gewaltiges zusammen. Eine Welle von Revolutionen und Umstürzen baut sich auf. Vorerst einmal in Nordafrika |
| Neu entdeckte Ölreserven, ein Handlanger des IWF und ein guter alter Wahlbetrug sind die Zutaten beim jüngsten Staatsstreich durch die Wahlurne; dieses Mal traf es das westafrikanische Land Elfenbeinküste. Der Versuch des Westens, seine eigene Marionette einzusetzen, bildet einen wesentlichen Bestandteil der westlichen Politik des "Krisenmanagements", das dazu benutzt wird, Afrika zu kontrollieren und seine Ressourcen auszubeuten |
| Seine geplante Reise in die Schweiz hatte sich George Bush - der selbst geoutete Foltermeister - wohl anders vorgestellt. Die Schweizer Bundesanwaltschaft sah zwar keinen Grund, Bush zu verhaften - doch nun hat Amnesty International offiziell Anzeige gegen Bush eingereicht und wird dies in allen Ländern tun, welche die Anti-Folter Konvention unterschrieben haben. Bush steht damit faktisch unter US Hausarrest |
| Ungefähr 5000 Menschen zogen aus Protest gegen die "NATO-Sicherheitskonferenz", einem Treffen hochrangiger Militärs, Politiker und VertreterInnen der Rüstungsindustrie, durch die Münchner Innenstadt. Begleitet von einem massiven Polizeiaufgebot samt USK-SchlägerInnen zog der Protestumzug von Marienplatz in die Nähe des "Hotels Bayrischer Hof" in dem das Spitzentreffen der Kriegstreiber stattfindet |
| Was in dem Neuen Strategischen Konzept der NATO vor allem fehlt, ist eine Strategie. Hier kann man allerdings anmerken, daß das keineswegs etwas Neues ist. Die NATO hatte noch nie ihre eigene, sondern bekam stets eine US-amerikanische Strategie übergestülpt |
| Nach den Demonstrationen in Tunesien und Ägypten regt sich auch im autoritären Saudiarabien Widerstand - wenn auch in einem überschaubaren Rahmen |
| Statt die Zügel aus der Hand zu geben, organisiert sich das "System Mubarak" neu und konsolidiert, dabei vom Westen unterstützt, seine Macht. Zwar feierte eine Viertelmillion Menschen am Tahrir-Platz, beschützt vom Militär, ein Volksfest. Aber die "Revolution" wird langsam müde |
| Amy Goodman im Interview mit Noam Chomsky - Analyse zu den Ereignissen in Ägypten und zu deren Bedeutung für die Region Naher/Mittlerer Osten: was hier passiert, ist absolut spektakulär. Der Mut, die Entschlossenheit und das Engagement der Demonstranten ist bemerkenswert. Was immer geschehen wird - diese Momente werden nicht in Vergessenheit geraten. Und sie werden mit Sicherheit langfristige Folgen haben |
| Ägypten, Alexandria. Es ist Freitag, 28.Januar, Tag 4 im Volksaufstand in Ägypten. Schüssen hallen durch die Gassen der alten Stadt. Schüsse der Polizei. Menschen brechen auf der Straße zusammen. Ein junger Mann geht auf die Polizisten zu. Er hebt die Arme, öffnet seine Jacke, zum Zeichen dass er unbewaffnet ist. Er steht direkt vor den Polizisten und spricht mit ihnen. Als er sich umdreht und entfernt, wird er von den "Sicherheitskräften" des Diktators Husni Mubarak gezielt erschossen. |
| Philosophische Grundlagen: Verfassung: Ein Vertrag, der sich effektiv selbst beschützt vor denjenigen, die ihn ausführen und vor denen, die er beschützt. Diktatur: Die Herrschenden machen was sie wollen. Real existierende Demokratie: Die Beherrschten machen, was die Herrschenden wollen. Reale Verfassungs-Demokratie: Es gibt keine Herrschenden, sondern nur zu hoch bezahlte Fuzzies, die die Schnauze zu halten und zu tun haben, was das Volk will. |
| Bei Protesten gegen die Polizei sind in der tunesischen Stadt Kef mindestens vier Demonstranten getötet worden. Gerade erst hatte sich die Übergangsregierung bemüht, wieder mehr Touristen ins Land zu locken. |
| Zehntausende gehen in Belgrad gegen Arbeitslosigkeit und Armut auf die Straße. Notfalls soll das Parlament belagert werden. Doch die EU ist nicht länger der Bösewicht. |
| Wie Augenzeugen berichteten, waren vor allem verschleierte Frauen unter den Demonstranten, aber auch Kinder und Männer waren zu sehen. In Saudi-Arabien sind öffentliche Demonstrationen eigentlich verboten. |
| George W. Bush droht eine Klagewelle. Eine erste Anzeige hat Amnesty International in der Schweiz bereits gemacht. Es sollen viele andere Länder folgen. |
here are a couple pics of egyptian epic gear www.spiegel.de/fotostrecke/fotostrecke-64316.html
| Der Protest geht weiter.................. Die Regierung geht den Forderungen des Volkes aus dem Weg................. |
| In the midst of battle, the protesters realised they needed someone to act as a leader. The nominees included those who had showed the most calm during tough situations and those who displayed the best tactical sense... One man, curiously, nominated himself. Most of the others nominated Mohammed. After it was clear that Mohammed would win, the man grabbed a metal pipe and tried to attack, declaring that he was actually a member of the state security forces. The protesters quickly subdued him and dragged him off to a makeshift prison that had been established at a metro station in the centre of the square. |
| Youth unemployment affects the UK as well as north Africa |
| The government should consider cutting its ties with the European Court of Human Rights, says a report by the right-leaning think-tank Policy Exchange. |
The Internet is for revolution This will become more obvious over time. It's why we must develop systems that are equal to Twitter and Facebook, but that aren't so easy to block.
We must make it so that a country, if it wants to turn off Internet-enabled revolution, must turn off the Internet itself.
| An anonymous reader writes "'[T]he brain is enveloped in countless overlapping electric fields, generated by the neural circuits of scores of communicating neurons. ... New work ... suggests that the fields do much more-and that they may, in fact, represent an additional form of neural communication. "In other words," says Anastassiou, the lead author of a paper about the work appearing in the journal Nature Neuroscience (abstract), "while active neurons give rise to extracellular fields, the same fields feed back to the neurons and alter their behavior," even though the neurons are not physically connected-a phenomenon known as ephaptic (or field) coupling. "So far, neural communication has been thought to occur almost entirely via traffic involving synapses, the junctions where one neuron connects to the next one. Our work suggests an additional means of neural communication through the extracellular space independent of synapses."' If this work is replicated, it could reveal that the brain is even more complicated and sophisticated than we thought - and raise new concerns about whether our cellphones and other electronic gizmos are affecting brain activity and memory. This is truly paradigm-busting work."Read more of this story |
| An anonymous reader writes "Apparently some small security firm has been able to determine the real identities of several key Anonymous hackers which is resulting in a ton of arrests. From the article: 'An international investigation into cyber-activists who attacked businesses hostile to WikiLeaks is likely to yield arrests of senior members of the group after they left clues to their real identities on Facebook and in other electronic communications, it is claimed.'"Read more of this story |
| An anonymous reader writes "From the Wired article: 'If educators in New Mexico want to teach evolution or climate change as a "controversial scientific topic," a new bill seeks to protect them from punishment. House Bill 302, as it's called, states that public school teachers who want to teach "scientific weaknesses" about "controversial scientific topics" including evolution, climate change, human cloning and - ambiguously - "other scientific topics" may do so without fear of reprimand. The legislation was introduced to the New Mexico House of Representatives on Feb. 1 by Republican Rep. Thomas A. Anderson. Supporters of science education say this and other bills are designed to spook teachers who want to teach legitimate science and protect other teachers who may already be customizing their curricula with anti-science lesson plans.'"Read more of this story |
| A Washington Post columnist recently attacked a Nobel Prize winner by claiming that the scientific consensus that backs climate change is essentially a religious institution. "Look, if Godzilla appeared on the Mall this afternoon, Al Gore would say it's global warming," Charles Krauthammer said on PBS's Inside Washington Saturday. He continued, "Look, everything is - [...] |
| WASHINGTON - Pharmaceuticals, pesticides, chemical run-off from highways and many other pollutants infiltrate the giant aquifer under Mexico's "Riviera Maya," a new study shows. The report published in the journal Environmental Pollution argues that the waste contaminates a vast labyrinth of water-filled caves under the popular tourist destination on the Yucatan Peninsula. The polluted water [...] |
| Bei ersten Gesprächen haben sich Vizepräsident Omar Suleiman und Vertreter der Opposition laut ägyptischen Staatsmedien darauf geeinigt, Mubaraks jüngste Versprechen umzusetzen: - Die Verfassung soll geändert werden. - Die Presse soll mehr Freiheit bekommen. - Der Ausnahmezustand soll beendet werden. - Eine größere Beteiligung der Jugend an der Politik. - Kampf der Korruption. POLIZEI SOLL DIENSTLEISTER DER BÜRGER WERDEN Sie gelten als korrupt und gewalttätig. Die Lage in Ägypten bleibt brisant: Auf dem Tahrir-Platz in Kairo fielen am Sonntagabend nach mehrtägiger Ruhe erstmals wieder Schüsse. |
