30
May, 2004
Saudi
Attack Sparks Fears Of Oil Crisis
By Nick Mathiason and Mark Townsend
Oil prices are set to surge after al-Qaeda gunmen
killed at least 16 people, including a Briton, and seized 50 hostages
during an indiscriminate rampage through the Saudi Arabian city of Khobar
Tens Of Thousands
Hit By Floods In Caribbean
By Peter Prengaman, David Randall and Annabel Fallon
A disaster of grotesque proportions is unfolding
in the Caribbean where floods on the island of Hispaniola have delivered
death and destruction to one of the world's poorest regions on a scale
far greater than first thought
Energy
Crisis Looms Over China
By Eva Cheng
With the price of oil hitting almost US$42 per
barrel on May 18, China's energy import bill is set to blow a major
hole in the country's fiscal account. China's oil imports have soared
35.7% during the first quarter of 2004, to 30.14 million tonnes. Oil
imports grew 31.2% in 2003
We Germans
Can Never Escape
By Thomas Kielinger
The stream of images from wartime events such as
D-Day means that Germans can never put their past behind them
Verdict 2004:Triumph
non-Brahmins
By Chandrabhan Prasad
This is a historic moment for the Dalits in India's
contemporary history. The Congress party too has the unique opportunity
of making up for its past indifference towards the Dalit cause
Invoking Regressing
Symbols
By Kalpana Sharma
Sushma Swaraj's threat to put on the garb of the
Hindu widow if Sonia Gandhi became the Prime Minister smacks of sinister,
backward politics which also reinforces the plight of the women in the
Indian society
Ameena's Dilemma
By Beena Sarwar
This is the story of a mother and her two daughters
who educated themselves against the wishes of the community in Pakistan
Jawaharlal Nehru
-- 40 Years After
By Niranjan Ramakrishnan
Nehru's achievements were many, as were his failures.
For good or bad, however, his foundations shaped the India we see today
29 May, 2004
How
To Silence An Awkward Newspaper
By John Pilger
The editor of the Daily Mirror, Britain's most
famous mass-circulation newspaper, was sacked because he ran the only
English-language popular paper to expose the "war on terror"
as a fraud and the invasion of Iraq as a crime
Catch-22 Revisited
By David Leigh
The world has focused on US soldiers' abuse of
Iraqi prisoners. But the leaked inquiry reveals incompetence worthy
of Joseph Heller's novel
Daily Life In
Iraq
By Dahr Jamail
It's been interesting watching the new influx of
retail goods: Pepsi, 7-up, and Coke are all here in force. Snickers,
Toblerone, and other western products as well....What other "progress"
can I report?
BR Ambedkar:
A Personal Tribute
By Chandrabhan Prasad
Dalit history may always seek the most uncomfortable
question: "Why it is that post-Ambedkar, Dalits have not added
even one chapter to the saga of the great trailblazer? Why it is so
that when more than half the Dalit population is illiterate?"
A Critique Of
Hindutva
By Praful Bidwai
A study of the rise of Hindutwa or militant political
Hinduism in India
28 May, 2004
A
Modest Proposal To Save The Planet
By Mayer Hillman
An extract from 'How We Can Save the Planet' by
Mayer Hillman advocating radical changes to the way we conduct our daily
lives that would ensure a future for our children
A Film That Could
Warm Up The
Debate On Global Warming
By Robert B. Semple, Jr.
With all its faulty science and melodrama the latest
Hollywood disaster movie "The Day After Tomorrow" might wake
up the public to the dangers of climate change
Bush And Sharon
- The Oil Connection
By Conn Hallinan
The Americans can ill afford another war in the
Middle East, but the Israelis might be persuaded to take the field.
Is giving Sharon a free hand in the West Bank a quid pro quo for an
eventual American-supported Israeli attack on the last two countries
in the region with any semblance of independence?
Slaughter In
The Streets
By Dahr Jamail
Driving anywhere in Baghdad on any given day, the
black funeral announcements of untimely deaths are hanging from buildings,
homes, and fences everywhere
27 May, 2004
Suicide
For Survival
By Binu Mathew
According to official figures, 50 farmers have
died since the Y S Rajashekhar Reddy government took over on May 14.
However, according to the Andhra Pradesh Rythu Sangam, a farmers outfit
of CPI(M), 92 farmers have killed themselves in the last two weeks.
According to another estimate, 220 farmers have committed suicide from
Jan 1 to May 13
Mehdi Army Grows
By Dahr Jamail
The fighter is married and has six children, but
said he will be honored to become a martyr. "God will save my children
if I die because the Mehdi is the army of the people," he stated.
"This is an intifada of the people"
Flood Toll
Soars To 2,000
By Sibylla Brodzinsky
The death toll from mudslides and flooding in the
Dominican Republic and Haiti soared to around 2,000 last night as rescuers
discovered more than 1,000 bodies in a ruined Haitian town
The
View From Hubbert's Peak
By Mike Davis
The oilmen in the White House, of course, have
the best view of the lush terrain on the far side of Hubbert's peak.
No wonder, then, that a map of the 'war against terrorism' corresponds
with such uncanny accuracy to the geography of oil fields and proposed
pipelines. From Kazakhstan to Ecuador, American combat boots are sticky
with oil
In Solidarity
With The Iraqi People
By Ghali Hassan
The invasion and occupation of Iraq is a form of
globalisation by armed conquest. This armed conquest is the relic of
colonialism and we should not allow it to succeed
26 May, 2004
Fast
Arctic Thaw Portends Global Warming
By Alister Doyle
Global warming is hitting the Arctic more than
twice as fast as the rest of the planet in what may be a portent of
wider, catastrophic changes, the chairman of an eight-nation study has
said
America's
Brutal Culture Of Unseen Oppression
By Robert Chesshyre
The maltreatment of Iraqi detainees and Muslim
"terrorists" dehumanises not just those who man the cages
and take the callous photos, but also the society in whose name the
cages were built and the guards recruited
They Must Pay The
Price
By Gideon Levy
On a day when bodies of children were being stuffed
into a big refrigerator used to store potatoes, and when thousands of
homeless people were fleeing for their lives (some of them refugees
rendered homeless for the second or third time), life in Israel went
on as usual, as though what was happening in Rafah was not being done
in the name of the country's citizens
Action Alert - Farmers
Sucide in Andhra Pradesh
Write To The Chief Minister
Sixty two farmers have committed suicide since
the newly elected chief minister of Andhra Pradesh announced financial
relief to the families of the deceased. It is believed that the farmers
are taking their life with the hope that their families will benefit
from the benefit package, free electricity for agriculture , waiver
of electricity dues and a Rs.150,000 financial assistance
Influencing
Economic Policy Using
The Stock Market
By C.P. Chandrasekhar
Recent upheaval in the Indian stock market was
due to the manouerings of the financial profiteers seeking to influence
economic policy in their favour
Stock Market And
The Real Economy
By Jayati Ghosh
The current downslide in the stock markets is really
not a matter of serious concern for most Indians, and it should certainly
not be much of an issue for the new government either
25 May, 2004
Face
To Face With Injustice
By Dahr Jamail
I think of how beneath the fury of the fighting
of Fallujah in April, lies a bottomless ocean of sadness. Under the
bloodshed and fighting that rages in the South even now, there is unfathomable
grief
Sharon's Method
By Uri Avnery
The directive for the onslaught on Rafah came from
the political leadership, in order to gratify the primitive emotions
of a part of the public. Simply put: they hurt us, so we hurt them tenfold.
Ten eyes for an eye, ten teeth for a tooth. That's how votes are won
Why I Burned
My Israeli Military Papers
By Josh Ruebner
By burning my military papers, I stand in solidarity
with more than 1,300 Israelis who have stated openly, at the risk of
jail time, that they refuse to serve Israel's occupation of Palestinians
in the West Bank, Gaza Strip, and East Jerusalem and commit war crimes
and flagrant breaches of international law
Anti-Brahman
Upsurge Of Elections 2004
By Chandrabhan Prasad
Frightened by the anti-dalit, anti-poor policies
of the NDA government, most non-Brahman, non-Baniya castes reached the
polling booths with the resolve to vote the NDA out of power. A caste-wise
study would conclusively prove that the XIVth Lok Sabha has the least
number of Brahman-Baniya MPs since 1952
Three Cheers
For Indian Democracy
By Ram Puniyani
Rot is setting in different aspects of India's
polity and administrative machinery. Social welfare schemes related
to education and health are collapsing. The sufferers of all this are
of course the poor and deprived. And they have voted against the policies,
which are ruining their lives
India Rejects Neoliberalism
And Communal Politics
Report By Insaf
Although the BJP led coalition was comprehensively
beaten in the recent elections one should not look away from certain
important factors. The progress made by the Congress appears to be the
result of circumstantial and accidental factors while the BJP appears
to be well entrenched and spread all over India despite apparent set
backs
24 May, 2004
Bringing
Electricity To Their Asses
By Dahr Jamail
In the dark humor that has become so popular in
Baghdad these days, one recently released detainee said, The Americans
brought electricity to my ass before they brought it to my house!
The Marine's
Tale: 'We Killed
30 Civilians In Six Weeks'
By Natasha Saulnier
"In a month and a half my platoon and I killed
more than 30 civilians," Mr Massey said. He saw bodies being desecrated
and robbed, and wounded civilians being dumped by the roadside without
medical treatment. After he told his commanding officer that he felt
"we were committing genocide", he was called a "wimp"
Death Of A
Professor
By Luke Harding
Mohammed Munim al-Izmerly, a distinguished chemistry
professor, mysteriously die in Iraq prison. An independent Iraqi autopsy
reveal that Dr Izmerly had died because of a "sudden hit to the
back of his head"
Palestinians
Still Unable To Bury Rafah Dead
By Cynthia Johnston
On a blood-stained floor in a makeshift morgue
in Rafah, the bodies of 16 Palestinians killed in Israel's bloodiest
Gaza Strip raid in years lie in white shrouds, waiting to be buried
Death Of Rawan
Abu Zaed
By Mohammad
Rawan Abu Zaed went to buy some sweets from the
grocer's. She didnt know that going to the grocer's would cost
her her life. Two bullets:one in her neck and the other right through
her head
A Call Of Desperation:Go
For Nuclear Power
To Combat Global Warming
By Michael McCarthy
The scientist and celebrated Green guru, James
Lovelock warns that there is simply not enough time for renewable energy,
such as wind, wave and solar power before global warming overwhelms
our civilisation, and the only solution is the massive expansion of
nuclear power as the world's main energy source
In
Praise Of Higher Fuel Prices
By William E. Rees
Everybody complain about fuel costs. But to avoid
a possibly unprecedented human crisis in coming decades, they should
be urging their governments to allow the price of oil and natural gas
to rise even more
The Fight Must Go
On
By Ganesh S. Iyer
The elections have seen the rout of the BJP from
the political arena.The monster of communalism still stalks Indian society
and has the potential to catapult its practitioners to power. The fight
against communalism must go on
23 May, 2004
Russia
All Set To Back Kyoto
By Geoffrey Lean
Russia's President Vladimir Putin - who will effectively
decide whether the Kyoto Protocol stands or falls - announced on Friday
that his country would "rapidly move towards ratification"
in the wake of a complex deal with the European Union
Berg beheading:
Some Questions Raised
By Ritt Goldstein
A leading surgical authority and a noted forensic
death expert raises serious questions about the authenticity of the
Berg beheading video. They suggest the video might have been staged
Iraq's Seething
With Rage
By Dahr Jamail
As if the unremitting stream of horrendous photographs
documenting the widespread torturing of Iraqis within Abu Ghraib prison
(among other detention facilities throughout Iraq) are not enough, the
recent wedding party massacre has brought the fury to an entirely new
level
India Drowning?
By Neeta Deshpande
As the Sardar Sarovar dam rises slowly, Neeta Deshpande
remembers the villages now submerged and wonders about the future
22 May, 2004
Yet
More Horror Pictures, Stories
From Abu Ghraib
By Andrew Buncombe in Washington, Justin Huggler
and Leonard Doyle
The abuse scandal at Abu Ghraib prison continued
yesterday with the publication of fresh pictures and sworn statements
that detailed a teenage boy being raped, prisoners being ridden like
animals and other Iraqis being forced to eat pork and drink alcohol
in contravention of their religion
A Uterus Is
No Substitute For A Conscience
By Barbara Ehrenreich
The Abu Ghraib did something else to me, as a feminist:
They broke my heart. I had no illusions about the U.S. mission in Iraq
-- whatever exactly it is -- but it turns out that I did have some illusions
about women
21 May, 2004
Horrific
Details Of The Wedding Party Massacre
By Rory McCarthy
"I fell into the mud and an American soldier
came and kicked me. I pretended to be dead so he wouldn't kill me. My
youngest child was alive next to me."
What About
The Women Prisoners?
By Luke Harding
A note slipped out from inside the jail written
by a woman prisoner claimed that US guards had been raping women detainees
and several of the women were pregnant, the women were forced to strip
naked in front of men. The secret inquiry launched by the US military
in January has confirmed that the letter was entirely and devastatingly
accurate
One Step Ahead Of
The Bulldozer
By Amira Hass
How Wa'il Mansur's home was demolished by the IDF
on Thursday morning in Rafah
Who Really Smuggled
Weapons To Rafah?
By Arjan El Fassed
Israel's ongoing assault on human lives and property,
killing civilians and demolishing homes is, according to Israeli spokespersons,
"aimed at preventing a huge shipment of arms from being smuggled".
What no one asks, however, is the question who supplies Israel's military
occupation of Gaza
BJP's Allergy
To Democracy
By Praful Bidwai
Sonia Gandhi's renunciation of the primeministership
exposes the BJP as an egregiously intolerant party, which is deeply
uncomfortable with democracy, and has contempt for political decency
and Constitutional law
Violence
against Dalit Women In Nepal
By Padmalal Bishwakarma
Any violence on the Dalit community is ultimately
born by Dalit
women. Specifically during the eight-year of Maoist war, many of Dalit
youths have lost their lives by being the victim of both
Maoists and state. It is the Dalit women who have to bear all such unbearable
sufferings socially, economically, culturally and
politically at great risk of her own and her children's life
20 May, 2004
Wedding
Party Massacre
By Rory McCarthy
Iraqi officials last night said an American helicopter
fired on a wedding party in western Iraq killing more than 40 people,
including many children
Thumbs Up America-
More Photos Surface
By ABC News
More Photos Surface of soldiers giving thumbs up
sign by body of dead Iraqi prisoner
Children And Youth
Massacred In Rafah
By Amira Hass and Arnon Regular
Eight Palestinians were killed and dozens were
wounded yesterday afternoon when IDF tanks fired shells at a crowd of
protesters in Rafah refugee camp in the Gaza Strip. Four of those killed
were children under 14
'140,000 People,
40 Beds And A War'
By Chris McGreal
A visit to Rafah's only one makeshift hospital
Genocide By Public
Policy
By Sam Bahour and Michael Dahan
What is happening in the West Bank, East Jerusalem
and the Gaza Strip today is dangerously close to genocide, close enough
that photographs of terrified Palestinians in Rafah loading their meager
belongings onto carts and fleeing their homes are all too reminiscent
of another time, another place another people
The Nowhere
People
By Nick Pretzlik
Israelis are proud to announce that their country
is the only democracy in the Middle East. But the 150,000 strong Bedouin
community of Israel has no democratic rights
Arundhati
Roy Interviewed
By Amy Goodman of Democracy Now!
Arundhati Roy On the Indian Elections, Her Support
for the Iraqi Resistance & the Privatization of War
Dalit Warrior
By P L Mimroth
Society and authorities in Rajasthan collude to
torture a man simply because he refuses to be ill-treated as a Dalit
19 May, 2004
Homes
Wrecked Lives Destroyed
By Donald Macintyre
Israel was accused by Amnesty International of
committing a war crime by its destruction of more than 3,000 Palestinian
homes in Israel and the occupied territories since the intifada began
three and a half years ago
Gazans Pile Up Their
Belongings And Flee
By Amira Hass
The streets of Rafah were filled yesterday evening
with horse-drawn carts, trucks and pick-ups, all laden to the brim with
any and every item that the town's residents could remove from their
homes
Ramadi- A Delicate
Lid
By Dahr Jamail
The city of Ramadi, about 120km west of Baghdad,
appears to be much more stable than nearby Falluja, where the U.S. military
currently wont enter the city after the failed siege of April.But
one must not forget that calm is a relative term in occupied Iraq
Sonia Gandhi's
Dilemma
By Niranjan Ramakrishnan
A combination of religious and political interests
in India is trying to subvert election results by forcing the congress
president Sonia Gandhi keep out of the prime ministership applying a
distinction based purely on race -- bypassing the constitution!
Exit Chandrababu
Naidu
By George Monbiot
The poster boy of neoliberalism, Chandrababu Naidu
is voted out in Andhra Pradesh
18 May, 2004
12
Palestinians Killed In Rafah Incursion
Twelve Palestinians were killed today as the Israeli
army made one of its most sweeping incursions yet into the Rafah refugee
camp in Gaza
Death
And Destruction In Gaza
By Tamer Ziara
Frantic Rafah residents are running away from their
homes as Israel is reigning on them death and destruction, with hundreds
of home demolished and the threat of more demolition
Israeli Troops Bury
Family Alive
Under Demolished House
By Palestine Media Center
Israeli Occupation Forces buried a husband, his
wife and her sister alive in a refugee camp on Friday when they refused
to evacuate their home before the occupation troops demolished it together
with at least 39 houses in the southern Gaza Strip
Israel's Revenge
In Zaytoun, Gaza
By Eoin Murray
The past few nights have been sleepless. The Israeli
forces have attacked from land, sea and air. The centre of Gaza the
people of Zaytoun (which means 'olive') have been imprisoned in the
scene of some of the most intense fighting since the Intifada began
17 May, 2004
Gaza:
Horror Beyond Belief
By Ghada Ageel
Since Tuesday, May 11, thousands of people have
been denied the simple right to return to their homes; this includes
infants, children, students, employees, women, and men of all ages.
Ghada Ageel recounts the humiliating experience she and her family experienced
at a Gaza check point
How A Secret
Pentagon Program
Came To Abu Ghraib
By Seymour M. Hersh
The roots of the Abu Ghraib prison scandal was
not the criminal inclinations of a few Army reservists but a decision,
approved last year by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld
'They Tied Me Up
Like A Beast
And Began Kicking Me'
By David Rose
As America struggles to come to terms with military
abuse in Iraq, similar stories are emerging from Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
Tarek Dergoul, a Briton released from the camp in March, talks here
for the first time about his two-year ordeal
Why
Dont They Count The Dead?
By Kim Sengupta and Marie Woolf
Since the start of the invasion, 566 members of
the American military and 211 US civilians have died. The British figures
are 59 and 8. But the Americans and the British do not bother to keep
count of the people they have "liberated" and then killed
Press Freedom
In Iraq
By Dahr Jamail
With a wave of adrenaline I yelled, I am
press! I just want to get a comment from someone! Two soldiers
gestured their heads no with their heads while another waved
me away, all the while the soldier kept his gun trained on me
Examinations,
Fainting Children
Girl Blog From Iraq
The end-of-the-year examinations have started in
most of the schools. It's already unbearably hot and dusty and the heat
gets worse as summer progresses. Last year children were fainting in
the summer heat in schools with no electricity. We're hoping to avoid
that this year
Who Commands
The Private Soldiers?
By David Leigh
Allegations of abuse have raised wider questions
about the role - and accountability - of civilian contractors in Iraq
Is Sonia Gandhi
Eligible To Become
The Prime Minister?
By Ram Puniyani
Is being a citizen not good enough for holding
any post of the people find you fit enough for that? Sonia Gandhi or
no Sonia Gandhi the guidelines should be derived from the constitution
Feeling
Good
By Beena Sarwar
Indian elections, a view from Pakistan
Bye, Bye, Mr.
American Pie Vajpayee
By Niranjan Ramakrishnan
Atal Behari Vajpayee's tenure as prime minister
of India will be remembered, as a squandered opportunity, mistaking
galloping consumption for real upliftment