Climate Disruption

Posted on 2014/05/062014/05/06 by admin

The United States of America released a report on global warming and has named the problem climate disruption.

The report +confirms that climate change is not a distant threat — it’s affecting us now.” Climate disruption is “expected to become increasingly disruptive across the nation throughout this century and beyond,” the National Climate Assessment concluded.

“President Obama has announced a series of executive actions to reduce carbon pollution, prepare the U.S. for the impacts of climate change, and lead international efforts to address global climate change.”

Due to climate change, the weather is getting more extreme Temperatures are rising across the U.S. Temperatures from 2001 to 2012 were warmer than any previous decade in every region of the United States. Explore this interactive map from the National Climate Assessment to learn more.

EXTREME WEATHER EVENTS
Droughts, Wildfires, and Floods are all more frequent and intense. Precipitation was 2.57 inches below the 20th Century Average. Wildfires burned more than 9.3 million U.S. acres.

Extreme weather comes at a cost

Climate and weather disasters in 2012 alone cost the American economy more than $100 billion

$30 Billion U.S. drought/heatwave

$65 Billion Superstorm Sandy

$11.1 Billion Combined severe weather

$1 Billion Western wildfires

$2.3 Billion Hurricane Isaac

There are also public health threats associated with extreme weather

Children, the elderly, and the poor are most vulnerable to a range of climate-related health effects, including those related to heat stress, air pollution, extreme weather events, and diseases carried by food, water, and insects.

We can choose to believe that Superstorm Sandy, and the most severe drought in decades, and the worst wildfires some states have ever seen were all just a freak coincidence. Or we can choose to believe in the overwhelming judgement of science — and act before it’s too late.
– President Obama

Russia, Ukraine, Crimea and the USA

Posted on 2014/03/01 by admin

A couple of interesting facts:

1) On March 29, 1867, Stoeckl informed Secretary of State William Henry Seward that the Czar had agreed to sell Russian interests in Alaska to the United States.

2) In 1954, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev gave Ukraine a gift: Crimea.

California Zero Water Allocation

Posted on 2014/02/032014/02/14 by admin

Though much of the United States has been experiencing a cold, high precipitation winter, California has had extreme drought and fire conditions. The State Water Project announced the state reservoir will “effectively be closed for business.”

“This is the most serious drought we’ve faced in modern times,” Felicia Marcus, chairwoman of the State Water Resources Control Board said. “We need to conserve what little we have to use later in the year, or even in future years.”

“Today’s action is a stark reminder that California’s drought is real,” said Gov. Jerry Brown. “We’re taking every possible step to prepare the state for the continuing dry conditions we face.”

“The exceptional drought extends from north to south across parts of 11 counties including, southeast Santa Cruz, far southern Santa Clara, San Benito, Merced, western Fresno, eastern Monterey, eastern San Luis Obispo, western Kern, western Madera, Kings and southwest Tulare,” notes weather.com meteorologist Chris Dolce.

“Truly staggering was the fact that some locations picked up less than half the precipitation in 2013 of their previous record dry year, including Santa Cruz, Calif. (4.78″ vs. old record of 11.85″ in 1929) and the north San Francisco Bay suburb of Kentfield (7.80″ vs. old record of 20.30″ in 1939),” writes weather.com meteorologist Jon Erdman.

The White Army Militia Marches

Posted on 2013/12/292013/12/29 by admin

SOUTH SUDAN, AFRICA — A group of armed militants is marching to fight in the growing crisis in South Sudan. The White Army is named from the white ash used to cover their bodies. They are a group of disgruntled young and under-employed men.

The Washington Post reports, “Twenty-five thousand young men who make up a tribal militia known as the “White Army” are marching toward a contested state capital in South Sudan, an official said Saturday, dimming hopes for a cease-fire.”

However, the BBC reports that the group is not made up of a tribe or ethnic group.

Wikipedia defines the White Army as follows: The Nuer White Army, sometimes decapitalised as the “white army”, is a semi-official name for a militant organisation formed by the Nuer people of central and eastern Greater Upper Nile in modern-day South Sudan as early as 1991. According to the Small Arms Survey, it arose from the 1991 schism within the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) for the dual purpose of defending Nuer cattle herds from neighbouring groups and fighting in the Second Sudanese Civil War between the SPLM/A and the Sudanese government.

The White Army was so named due to the Nuer practice of smearing one’s skin with a light-coloured ash as a protection against biting insects, according to a Small Arms Survey report published in June 2007, though other sources contend the name was merely intended to draw a distinction between the Nuer militia and the Sudan Armed Forces.

The BBC reports they don’t know exactly why the White Army is on the move at this time. They report, “Thousands of youths loyal to South Sudanese rebel leader Riek Machar are marching on the strategic town of Bor, according to government sources.

Government troops are currently in control of Bor, the capital of Jonglei state they had taken from the rebels.

The government has offered to cease hostilities, but an army spokesman told the BBC that its forces were still battling over oilfields in the north.

At least 1,000 people have died since fighting broke out earlier this month.

More than 121,600 are believed to have fled their homes.

What began as a power struggle between Mr Machar and President Salva Kiir has taken on overtones of a tribal conflict. The Dinka, to which Mr Kiir belongs, are pitted against the Nuer, from which Mr Machar hails.

The White Army is a name that inspires fear in South Sudan.

This loose grouping of armed youth from the Nuer ethnic group was at least partly responsible for the 1991 Bor massacre, in which at least 2,000 people were killed. Then, the White Army fought alongside Riek Machar, who had split away from the main southern Sudanese rebel group fighting Khartoum.

In 2011 and 2012 a new incarnation of the White Army went on the rampage, killing hundreds of civilians from the Murle ethnic group. At the time, Mr Machar was vice president – and although he travelled to meet them, he was unable to stop their advance.

Now the South Sudanese government says thousands of White Army members are marching on Bor – under Mr Machar’s command. This is an explosive claim – particularly as Mr Machar is under international pressure to stop fighting and begin negotiations by the end of the year.

Tens of thousands of civilians have sought refuge in UN camps and reinforcements have been arriving to give them extra protection.

Joe Contreras, a spokesman for the UN Mission in South Sudan, told the BBC World Service Newshour programme that the reported advance of the armed youths was a dangerous development.”

3rd World Countries from the Third Planet

Posted on 2013/12/14 by admin

EARTH — The space race continues. Iran claims to have successfully sent its second monkey into space. “In total, this is the 2nd monkey sent into space and returned in perfect health to Iran. I congratulate the Leader, scientists and the nation,” said Iranian President Hassan Rouhani.

At the same time, China became the third country to land a rocket on the moon. “It’s still a significant technological challenge to land on another world,” said Peter Bond, consultant. “Especially somewhere like the moon, which doesn’t have an atmosphere so you can’t use parachutes or anything like that. You have to use rocket motors for the descent and you have to make sure you go down at the right angle and the right rate of descent and you don’t end up in a crater on top of a large rock.”

Bitcoins

Posted on 2013/11/252013/12/18 by admin

Bitcoin is a virtual currency that is open source P2P money. According to the Bitcom website: “Bitcoin uses peer-to-peer technology to operate with no central authority or banks; managing transactions and the issuing of bitcoins is carried out collectively by the network. Bitcoin is open-source; its design is public, nobody owns or controls Bitcoin and everyone can take part. Through many of its unique properties, Bitcoin allows exciting uses that could not be covered by any previous payment system.”

Wikipedia says, “In November 2008, a paper was posted on the internet under the name Satoshi Nakamoto titled Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System. This paper detailed methods of using a peer-to-peer network to generate what was described as “a system for electronic transactions without relying on trust”. In January 2009, the Bitcoin network came into existence with the release of the first open source Bitcoin client and the issuance of the first bitcoins, with Satoshi Nakamoto mining the first block of bitcoins ever (known as the “genesis block”), which had a reward of 50 bitcoins. The value of the first bitcoin transactions were negotiated by individuals on the bitcointalk forums with one notable transaction involving a 10,000 BTC pizza.”

Since then they inventor has gone underground. In theory, Bitcoins circulation will roll out over time without a centralized creator.

The value of a Bitcoin in dollars:


Date	price for 1 BTC	Notes
Jan 2009 – Jan 2010	basically none	no exchanges or market, users were mainly cryptography fans, who were sending bitcoins for low or no value
Feb 2010 – May 2010	less than $0.01	user “laszlo” did first transaction – bought 2 pizzas for 10,000 BTC. User “SmokeTooMuch” auctioned 10,000 BTC for $50 (cumulatively), but no buyer was found.
June 2010	$0.08	in five days, the price grew 1000%, rising from $0.008 to $0.08 for 1 bitcoin
Feb 2011 – April 2011	$1	Bitcoin takes parity with US dollar
July 8th 2011	$31	top of first “bubble”, followed by the first price drop
Dec 2011	$2	minimum after few months
Dec 2012	$13	slowly rising for a year
April 11th 2013	$266	top of a price rally, during which the value was growing by 5-10% daily.
May 2013	$130	basically stable, again slowly rising.
June 2013	$100	in June slowly dropping to $70, but rising in July to $110
Nov 2013	$350 – $900	from October $150-$200 in November exponentially rising to $400, then $600, eventually reaching $900 on 11/19/2013.

In October of 2013, the FBI seized approximately 173,991 Bitcoins worth over $33.6 million:

Preet Bharara, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York; George Venizelos, the Assistant Director in Charge of the New York Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (“FBI”); Brian R. Crowell, the Special Agent in Charge of the New York Field Division of the Drug Enforcement Administration (“DEA”); and Toni Weirauch, the Special Agent in Charge of the New York Field Office of the Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigation (“IRS-CI”), today announced the unsealing of a protective order authorizing the seizure of approximately 144,336 Bitcoins found on computer hardware belonging to ROSS WILLIAM ULBRICHT, a/k/a “Dread Pirate Roberts,” a/k/a “DPR,” a/k/a “Silk Road,” the alleged owner and operator of “Silk Road,” a hidden website designed to enable its users to buy and sell illegal drugs and other unlawful goods and services anonymously and beyond the reach of law enforcement. Along with a prior seizure of approximately 29,655 Bitcoins, federal law enforcement agents have now seized a total of approximately 173,991 Bitcoins in connection with the Silk Road case, which, at today’s Bitcoin exchange rate, are worth over $33.6 million.

The Bitcoins have been seized in connection with a civil action previously filed in Manhattan federal court on September 30, 2013, seeking the forfeiture of all assets of Silk Road, including its website and all of its Bitcoins because those assets allegedly were used to facilitate money laundering and constitute property involved in money laundering. Also in connection with that civil action, federal law enforcement agents previously seized the Silk Road website itself. In addition to the civil action, a criminal complaint against ULBRICHT was filed in Manhattan federal court charging him with one count of narcotics conspiracy, one of count of conspiracy to commit computer hacking, and one count of money laundering conspiracy. ULBRICHT was arrested in San Francisco, California, on October 1, 2013, he was subsequently ordered detained, and he is expected to appear in Manhattan federal court within the next few weeks. ULBRICHT has also been charged in a separate indictment pending in federal court in Baltimore, Maryland.

Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said: “As alleged, Ross William Ulbricht operated Silk Road—a global illegal cyber business designed to broker criminal transactions—protected by a presumed anonymity and motivated by profit. With his arrest and our subsequent seizures of millions of dollars worth of Silk Road’s Bitcoins, we have sent a clear message to him and everyone else running criminal enterprises on the dark web: we are determined and equipped to hold you to account.”

FBI Assistant Director in Charge Venizelos said: “As alleged in court documents, the creator of Silk Road, Ross William Ulbricht, created a black market bazaar for drugs and illegal services where customer service and anonymity were added value to shoppers and sellers. This market generated millions in illegal profits for Ulbricht in the form of Bitcoins. However, what Ulbricht didn’t count on was that Silk Road’s coffers would not be out of reach of the FBI and our partners to seize. We want to thank our law enforcement partners here and abroad for their support and work on this case.”

DEA Special Agent in Charge Brian R. Crowell said: “The Silk Road underground website was the global venue for drug trafficking and money laundering, producing millions in dirty profits. DEA and others followed the money throughout this investigation, leading to this seizure. The website was used by drug dealers to put illicit drugs into our communities and literally at our doorsteps nationwide. 200,000 people die annually from drug abuse throughout the world, and our investigators worked tirelessly to bring to justice a facilitator who made every effort to hide behind highly encrypted technology while providing 24/7 anonymous services to global drug traffickers and money launderers. Ulbricht’s goals were to make millions from drug use and money laundering while protecting the world’s criminals from law enforcement. Our goal is to shut these people down and protect our children and DEA will continue to be relentless in this effort.”

IRS Special Agent in Charge Toni Weirauch said: “This seizure sends a clear notice to those who think they can commit crimes and conceal the fruits of their criminal activities in digital anonymity. The resolve of the government to uncover criminality and identify criminal proceeds is strong and its investigative capabilities are magnified when different federal agencies, each with its own areas of expertise, unite to achieve a common objective.”

According to the allegations in the complaint, the civil forfeiture action, and the application and protective order unsealed today in Manhattan federal court:

Background on Silk Road and ROSS WILLIAM ULBRICHT

Since approximately January 2011, ROSS WILLIAM ULBRICHT owned and operated the underground website known as Silk Road, which emerged as the most sophisticated and extensive criminal marketplace on the Internet. Throughout the time that ULBRICHT controlled Silk Road, it served as a sprawling black-market bazaar where unlawful goods and services, including illegal drugs of virtually every variety, were bought and sold regularly by the site’s users.

During its approximately two-and-a-half years in operation, Silk Road was used by several thousand drug dealers and other unlawful vendors to distribute hundreds of kilograms of illegal drugs and other unlawful goods and services to well over a hundred thousand buyers, and to launder hundreds of millions of dollars derived from these unlawful transactions. All told, the site generated sales revenue of more than 9.5 million Bitcoins and collected commissions from these sales totaling more than 600,000 Bitcoins. Although the value of Bitcoins has varied over time, these figures are roughly equivalent to approximately $1.2 billion in sales and approximately $80 million in commissions, using the Bitcoin exchange rate in effect when the Silk Road website was seized.

ULBRICHT deliberately operated Silk Road as an online criminal marketplace designed to enable its users to buy and sell drugs and other illegal goods and services anonymously and outside the reach of law enforcement. He sought to anonymize transactions on Silk Road in two principal ways. First, ULBRICHT operated Silk Road on what is known as “The Onion Router,” or “Tor” network, a special network of computers on the Internet, distributed around the world, designed to conceal the true IP addresses and therefore the identities of the networks’ users. The Tor network is designed to make it practically impossible to physically locate the computers hosting or accessing websites on the network. Second, ULBRICHT required that all transactions on Silk Road be paid with Bitcoins, an electronic currency that is as anonymous as cash. Although Tor and Bitcoins have known legitimate uses, they were intentionally used by Silk Road to further the site’s unlawful goals.

The Silk Road website provided a sales platform that allowed vendors and buyers using the site to conduct transactions online. Silk Road is believed to have been visited by hundreds of thousands of unique users from countries across the globe, nearly 30 percent of whom indicated upon registering on the site that they were from the United States. The illegal nature of the items sold on the website was readily apparent to any user browsing through its offerings. Indeed, the vast majority of the items for sale on Silk Road were illegal drugs, which were openly advertised as such on the site. As of September 23, 2013, Silk Road had nearly 13,000 listings for controlled substances, listed under such categories as “Cannabis,” “Dissociatives,” “Ecstasy,” “Intoxicants,” “Opioids,” “Precursors,” “Prescription,” “Psychedelics,” and “Stimulants.” From November 2011 to September 2013, law enforcement agents made more than 100 individual undercover purchases of controlled substances from Silk Road vendors. These purchases included heroin, cocaine, ecstasy, and LSD, among other illegal drugs, and were filled by vendors believed to be located in more than ten different countries, including the United States, Germany, the Netherlands, Canada, the United Kingdom, Spain, Ireland, Italy, Austria, and France.

In addition to illegal narcotics, other illicit goods and services were also openly bought and sold on Silk Road. For example, as of September 23, 2013, there were: 159 listings under the category “Services,” most of which offered computer-hacking services, such as a listing by a vendor offering to hack into social networking accounts of the customer’s choosing; 801 listings under the category “Digital goods,” including malicious software, hacked accounts at various online services, and pirated media content; and 169 listings under the category “Forgeries,” including offers to produce fake driver’s licenses, passports, Social Security cards, utility bills, credit card statements, car insurance records, and other forms of false identification documents.

The only form of payment accepted on Silk Road was Bitcoins, an anonymous, decentralized form of electronic currency, existing entirely on the Internet and not in any physical form. Silk Road’s payment system essentially consisted of an internal Bitcoin “bank,” where every Silk Road user had to hold an account in order to conduct transactions on the site. Every Silk Road user had at least one Silk Road Bitcoin address associated with the user’s Silk Road account. These addresses were stored on wallets maintained on servers controlled by Silk Road. In order to make a purchase on Silk Road, a user had to obtain Bitcoins (typically through a Bitcoin exchanger) and then send those Bitcoins to a Bitcoin address associated with his or her Silk Road account. Once a user’s account was funded in this way, the user was free to make purchases on Silk Road. When a purchase was made, the user’s Bitcoins were first transferred to an escrow account maintained by Silk Road, pending completion of the transaction. When the transaction was completed, the buyer’s Bitcoins were transferred from the escrow account to the Silk Road Bitcoin address of the vendor involved in the sale. Silk Road also used a so-called “tumbler” which, as the site explained, “sen[t] all payments through a complex, semi-random series of dummy transactions…making it nearly impossible to link your payment with any coins leaving the site.” Silk Road charged a commission for every transaction conducted by its users. The commission rate varied depending on the size of the transaction, but generally ranged from 8 to 15 percent of the total sales price.

Using the online moniker “Dread Pirate Roberts,” or “DPR,” ULBRICHT controlled and oversaw every aspect of Silk Road. ULBRICHT, for example, maintained the computer infrastructure and programming code underlying the Silk Road website; determined vendor and customer policies, including deciding what can be sold on the site; managed a small staff of online administrators who assisted with the day-to-day operation of the site; and controlled the enormous profits generated from the operation of the site. ULBRICHT did so while fully aware of the illegal nature of the enterprise; indeed, he deliberately sought to ensure the anonymity of the drug dealers and other illegal vendors operating on the site, as well as to conceal his own identity as the site’s owner and operator.

ULBRICHT was also willing to use violent means to protect the Silk Road enterprise and the anonymity of its users. For example, in March and April 2013, ULBRICHT solicited a murder-for-hire of a Silk Road vendor, known as “FriendlyChemist,” who was threatening to reveal the real names and addresses of a long list of Silk Road users unless ULBRICHT paid him $500,000. Upon receiving the threat from “FriendlyChemist” to expose the names of Silk Road users, ULBRICHT wrote to another Silk Road user, telling that user that “FriendlyChemist” is “causing me problems,” and adding: “I would like to put a bounty on his head if it’s not too much trouble for you. What would be an adequate amount to motivate you to find him? Necessities like this do happen from time to time for a person in my position.” ULBRICHT later explained that the threat by “FriendlyChemist” to expose the names of Silk Road users “is unforgivable to me. Especially here on Silk Road, anonymity is sacrosanct.” However, there is no record of a homicide at or about that time in the area where “FriendlyChemist” supposedly lived.

The Seizure of Computer Hardware Belonging to ROSS WILLIAM ULBRICHT

ROSS WILLIAM ULBRICHT was arrested in San Francisco, California, on October 1, 2013. At the time of his arrest, ULBRICHT was using a laptop computer, which was seized in connection with his arrest and subsequently searched pursuant to a search warrant. ULBRICHT’s residence was also searched on October 1, 2013, pursuant to a search warrant, and federal law enforcement agents conducting that search found several pieces of computer hardware belonging to ULBRICHT (collectively, along with ULBRICHT’s laptop, the “computer hardware”). Through forensic analysis of the computer hardware, federal law enforcement agents recovered a Bitcoin wallet containing approximately 144,336 Bitcoins.

CHINA
In December 2013, China banned the use of the Bitcoin. Although the value of Bitcoin’s did depreciate by 10% on the news, it still remained over $1,000.00 USD.

On December 18, 2013, China shutdown trading of a Chinese Bitcoin exchange and the value dropped by 50%.

“The Bitcoin bubble has burst and China was the pin that popped it,” writes Mark Williams of Boston University. “The latest move by China puts into question the viability of Bitcoin as a currency alternative and as a liquid and safe commodity.”

USA Drone Strike War Crimes

Posted on 2013/10/22 by admin

Amnesty International has released a statement:

New evidence indicates that the USA has carried out unlawful killings in Pakistan through drone attacks, some of which could even amount to war crimes, Amnesty International said in a major new report released today.

The report, “’Will I be next?’ US drone strikes in Pakistan”, is one of the most comprehensive studies to date of the US drone program from a human rights perspective.

It documents recent killings in Pakistan’s northwestern tribal areas and the almost complete absence of transparency around the US drone program.

“Secrecy surrounding the drones program gives the US administration a license to kill beyond the reach of the courts or basic standards of international law. It’s time for the USA to come clean about the drones program and hold those responsible for these violations to account,” said Mustafa Qadri, Amnesty International’s Pakistan Researcher.

“What hope for redress can there be for victims of drone attacks and their families when the USA won’t even acknowledge its responsibility for particular strikes?”

The report was released in a joint news conference with Human Rights Watch, which issued its own report on drone and other air strikes in Yemen.

Amnesty International reviewed all 45 known drone strikes that took place in North Waziristan in northwestern Pakistan between January 2012 and August 2013. The region that has seen more strikes than any other part of the country.

The organization conducted detailed field research into nine of these strikes, with the report documenting killings, which raise serious questions about violations of international law that could amount to war crimes or extrajudicial executions.

In October 2012, 68-year-old grandmother Mamana Bibi was killed in a double strike, apparently by a Hellfire missile, as she picked vegetables in the family’s fields while surrounded by a handful of her grandchildren.

In July 2012, 18 laborers, including a 14-year-old boy, were killed in multiple strikes on a impoverished village close to the border with Afghanistan as they were about to enjoy an evening meal at the end of a long day of work.

Contrary to official claims that those killed were “terrorists”, Amnesty International’s research indicates that the victims of these attacks were not involved in fighting and posed no threat to life.

“We cannot find any justification for these killings. There are genuine threats to the USA and its allies in the region, and drone strikes may be lawful in some circumstances. But it is hard to believe that a group of labourers, or an elderly woman surrounded by her grandchildren, were endangering anyone at all, let alone posing an imminent threat to the United States,” said Qadri.

International law prohibits arbitrary killing and limits the lawful use of intentional lethal force to exceptional situations. In armed conflict, only combatants and people directly participating in hostilities may be directly targeted. Outside armed conflict, intentional lethal force is lawful only when strictly unavoidable to protect against an imminent threat to life . In some circumstances arbitrary killing can amount to a war crime or extrajudicial execution, which are crimes under international law.

Amnesty International also documented cases of so-called “rescuer attacks” in which those who ran to the aid of the victims of an initial drone strike were themselves targeted in a rapid follow-on attack. While there may have been a presumption that the rescuers were members of the group being targeted, it is difficult to see how such distinctions could be made in the immediate and chaotic aftermath of a missile strike.

The USA continues to rely on a “global war” doctrine to attempt to justify a borderless war with al-Qa’ida, the Taliban and those perceived to be their allies.

The USA’s promise to increase transparency around drone strikes, underscored by a major policy speech by President Barack Obama in May 2013, has yet to become a reality, and the USA still refuses to divulge even basic factual and legal information.

This secrecy has enabled the USA to act with impunity and block victims from receiving justice or compensation. As far as Amnesty International is aware, no US official has ever been held to account for unlawful killings by drones in Pakistan.

In addition to the threat of US drone strikes, people in North Waziristan are frequently caught between attacks by armed groups and Pakistan’s armed forces. The local population lives under constant fear of inescapable violence by all sides.

The US drone program has added to local suffering, with people in the region now also living in terror of death from US drones hovering in the skies day and night.

“The tragedy is that drone aircraft deployed by the USA over Pakistan now instill the same kind of fear in the people of the tribal areas that was once associated only with al-Qa’ida and the Taliban,” said Qadri.

As the report documents, local men and women have little control over the presence of groups like the Taliban and al-Qa’ida in their villages and districts.

Al-Qa’ida-linked groups have killed dozens of local villagers they accused of being spies for US drone strikes. Residents of Mir Ali told Amnesty International that bodies are routinely seen dumped by the side of streets with written messages warning that anyone accused of spying for the USA will meet the same fate.

Residents also told Amnesty International they could not report abuses by armed groups to local authorities for fear of retaliation. Many residents were also fearful of talking about drones strikes to Amnesty International. Some of those who did speak openly received threats afterwards.

While the Pakistan government maintains it opposes the US drone program, Amnesty International is concerned that some officials and institutions in Pakistan and in other countries including Australia, Germany and the UK may be assisting the USA to carry out drone strikes that constitute human rights violations.

“Pakistan must provide access to justice and other remedies for victims of drone strikes. The authorities of Pakistan, Australia, Germany and the UK must also investigate all officials and institutions suspected of involvement in US drone strikes or other abuses in the tribal areas that may constitute human rights violations,” said Qadri.

“The Pakistani authorities must disclose information on all US drone strikes they have documented and what measures they have taken or will take to assist victims of these strikes.”

The report also documents the failure of the Pakistan state to protect the human rights of people in North Waziristan. This ranges from deaths, injuries and displacement of residents due to bombardment by the military, to the absence of justice mechanisms and lack of adequate medical assistance.

The Pakistani authorities have a very poor record in bringing al-Qa’ida, Taliban and other perpetrators of human rights abuses from the region to justice in fair trials without recourse to the death penalty.

Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch are jointly calling on the US Congress to fully investigate the cases the two organizations have documented and other potentially unlawful deaths, and to disclose any evidence of human rights violations to the public.

Amnesty International is calling on:

The US authorities to:

Publicly disclose the facts and legal basis for drone strikes carried out in Pakistan and information about any investigation into killings by US drones.
Ensure prompt, thorough, independent and impartial investigations into all cases where there are reasonable grounds to believe that drone strikes resulted in unlawful killings.
Bring those responsible for unlawful drone strikes to justice in public and fair trials without recourse to the death penalty.
Ensure that victims of unlawful drone strikes, including family members of victims of unlawful killings, have effective access to justice, compensation and other remedies.

The Pakistani authorities to:

Provide adequate access to justice and reparations for victims of US drone strikes and attacks by Pakistan forces, and seek reparations and other remedies for drone strikes from the US authorities.
Bring to justice, in fair trials without recourse to the death penalty, individuals responsible for unlawful killings and other human rights abuses in North Waziristan. This should include US drone strikes, attacks by the Pakistan armed forces, or groups like the Taliban and al-Qa’ida.
Publicly disclose information on all US drone strikes that the Pakistani authorities are aware of, including casualties and all assistance provided to victims.

The international community to:

Oppose US drone strikes and other killings that violate international law and urge the USA and Pakistan to take the measures outlined above. States should officially protest and pursue remedies under international law when lethal force is unlawfully used by the USA or other states.
Refrain from participating in any way in US drone strikes that violate international law, including by sharing intelligence or facilities.

Tax Pollution

Posted on 2013/10/082013/10/08 by admin

One of the only taxes that makes sense is a pollution tax. A progressive income tax is perhaps the worst type of taxation. Why would you want to tax people for being productive… then, tax them higher the more productive they are?

These countries currently have taxes on carbon emissions: Australia, India, South Korea, Japan, Europe (28 countries), Finland, The Netherlands, Norway, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Switzerland, UK, Ireland, Costa Rica, South Africa, New Zealand.

Why doesn’t the United States have a pollution tax?

More about emissions trading.

Help stop global warming.

U.N.: Humans Induce Climate Change

Posted on 2013/09/23 by admin

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon warned that “we cannot accept a rising tide that floats only some boats and leaves many to drown.”

Ban Ki-moon has been taking a strong stance on global warming. His latest efforts include getting world leaders to admit humans are impacting climate change. Most people would think this is a given. No. In fact, quite a few government and business leaders refuse to admit to what science shows.

“Nobody can benefit from catastrophic climate change or rampant unemployment and the social unrest that comes with it,” Mr. Ban said.

UK newspaper The Independent says. “The UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) will say next week that certainty has increased from “very likely” to “extremely likely” that human activity has caused more than half of the observed temperature rise from 1951 to 2010, in a large part due to fossil fuels and deforestation.”

War: Syria, Russia, Al-Qaeda and Afghanistan

Posted on 2013/09/06 by admin

Does the impending war with Syria leave you with a feeling of deja vu? Perhaps it is because we are about to repeat our mistake.

In the 1980’s, Russia was fighting Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan. The CIA aided Al-Qaeda:

“During the anti-Soviet jihad Bin Laden and his fighters received American and Saudi funding. Some analysts believe Bin Laden himself had security training from the CIA.” — Wikipedia

Now, the U.S. wants to assist Al-Qaeda rebels in Syria despite opposition from Russia.