Obituary: Van Tuong Nguyen

NGUYEN. - Tuong Van. You are at peace. We tried our best to save you. Condolencesto Kim and Khoa. -From The Australian Coalition Against Death Penalty, Singaporean Human Rights Lawyer M. Ravi.Justice Action, NSW Community News Network.

Australian Government couldn't possibly save Nguyen Van

Australian Government did not anticipate the reaction against Singapore hanging - a problem for Howard he had to impugne the rise of a moral movement.

Howard government had no intention to save the life of hapless Australian held in Singapore Nguyen Van for stupidly acting as drug mule. It appears the situation caused a public relations problem for Howard and his cabinet and behind the scene string pullers, it shifted out of control with increasing public interest in commendable moral basis to save this man. It is very clear the Australian government does not value life. Anyone that was taken in by public relations attempts by Howard and Foreign Affairs Minister Alexander Downer was duped.

The legislation past few years of Howard and so called main opposition party both push anti liberty pathway - shows their real character is abuse of Australians, evidence the in your face detention camps, ignoring voice of protests for military in Iraq, affairs of refugee vessels the Tampa affair show us the value for life is minimal. The present course is to remove your rights with Hitler like power of anti-terrorism laws that trample civil rights should be sufficient to show you Howard's and complicit Beazley's hand in the dangerous direction Australia is going. The Howard government attacks ordinary Australian in the workplace with IR laws aimed to destroy your wages and conditions.

The disclosure of Singapore lawyer M. Ravi, a brave lawyer leads a campaign in ordered Singapore against the death penalty. A country that it seems almost leads the world in the per capita executions - heard on ABC radio Late Night Live. Ravi voiced amazement at the Australian government seeking legal opinion of Cambridge lawyer that any appeal by Australia with the International Criminal Court of Justice is pointless to attempt to help to save the life of Nguyen Van. Ravi's disclosure confirms Australian government deliberately had worked with the Singapore government to frame a lost position so interpretion such path would be fruitless effort to save Nguyen Van's life.

The sorry evidence is Howard government and the similar Labor party shares an agenda of wrongdoing. If death sentence seen weakened by public opinion to overturn or prevent the death mandated by government would set back the radical plan of both compromised political parties to change this country. Howard wants to be seen as caring leader whilst compromising life of his own people. Make no mistake the Australian government seeks to ignore the voice of the electorate whilst appearing to do its best for you.

This action equates to the worst of crime where representative government misleads what harm it actually lies about to wound and risk the life of its own citizens. David Hicks languishing under US control for unproven crimes is another fearful example of the real offensive face of Australian politics. The deliberate compromise to reveal the Bali drug nine to the brunt of unjust Indonesian justice system shows you malice and contempt the Australian government has toward the population. Being aware of campaign and insanity in Canberra allows you to interpret assertions by Howard et al for what lies and danger they are to this nation.

By John Stoker posted 3 December 05

Related:

Nguyen murdered in Singapore
Khoa Nguyen his twin waited outside Changi prison as his brother is murdered. The execution murder in Singapore of Australian drug trafficker Van Nguyen has been confirmed. In a break from convention, Singapore's Government has issued a statement formally confirming the 25-year-old was hanged this morning.

Human rights activists are leaving candles at the front gate of Singapore's Changi Prison, as the execution of Australian man Van Nguyen draws nearer. They say they hope his death will not be in vain.

The Australian Editorial: Against executions
There is no explanation, no justification, that can excuse any nation from killing an individual who has broken the law. There never has been and there never will be.

US passes 1000 executions in 30 years
December 3, 2005: Double murderer Kenneth Lee Boyd has became the 1,000th prisoner executed in the United States since 1976. Another man was put to death on Friday for the 1994 murder of a store clerk, becoming the 1,001st person executed in the United States since capital punishment was reinstated 28 years ago. The somber moment drew a sizeable crowd to Central Prison in Raleigh, N.C., to protest capital punishment...

Send a letter to Nguyen Tuong Van
I am writing to you in this eleventh hour in the hope that you will intervene to save the life of Australian citizen Nguyen Tuong Van. As Prime Minister of Australia you are in a position of power to influence the Singapore Government to stay his execution.

Please show clemency
As you read this email 25-year old Melbourne man Van Tuong Nguyen is sitting in a jail cell in Singapore awaiting execution for drug trafficking.

SINGAPORE TO EXECUTE AUSTRALIAN MAN SOON
Singapore: Nguyen Tuong Van, 25, an Australian citizen of Vietnamese origin will be hanged within two weeks in Singapore after various pleas for clemency failed.

Exporting the death penalty - Bali 9
...and had observers present during one of the drug raids by Indonesian police claim they have - "ended co-operation with Indonesian police investigating the Bali Nine because they could face the firing squad if convicted."

THE LIFE OF WHALES OVER-RIDES HUMAN LIFE:
Mr Howard has warned Japan that it faces global condemnation if it kills whales. Mr Howard is often quoted as saying he cannot and he would not interfere in the business and laws of sovereign states. Whaling is a part of the Japanese culture. The death penalty is also a part of many countries culture.

THE DEATH PENALTY - WORLDWIDE
During 2004, at least 3,797 people were executed in 25 countries. At least 7,395 people were sentenced to death in 64 countries. These figures are only reported cases - the true figures were certainly much higher - many countries continue to execute people in secret.

WHY IS THE HOWARD GOVERNMENT PLAYING 'DEATH' WITH AUSTRALIANS: There has been much controversy recently on whether the Australian Federal Police should have tipped-off the Indonesians over the arrest of the Bali Nine. Due to the fact that Indonesia executes convicted drug-traffickers, ACADP believes that any evidence collected by AFP should have been withheld from Indonesian authorities until they have a written guarantee not to pursue the death penalty for the Bali Nine.

Death penalty-free zone in Europe and Central Asia
A coalition of non-governmental organizations is calling for a death penalty-free zone in Europe and Central Asia.

THE HIDDEN TRUTH ABOUT EXECUTIONS:
For death row inmates in Indonesia, execution usually comes on a deserted beach or remote jungle at the hands of a paramilitary firing squad. And, it rarely comes fast.

DESTROY CHEMICALS OF MASS DESTRUCTION:
The Australian Coalition Against Death Penalty (ACADP) is (again) calling on U.S. President George W. Bush, to join the civilised world and destroy all chemicals of mass destruction, for the dignity and respect of every human life.

LIFE ON A THREAD:
The difference between life and death can rest on the whim of a president or the ability of a lawyer. Whether or not the death penalty can be justified is very much up for grabs.

THE POT CALLING THE KETTLE BLACK:
US: The American media reports that thousands of Iranians cheered, whistled and clapped as a serial killer was publicly executed in Iran last week.

USA - FEELING THE HEAT FROM INTERNATIONAL FIRE:
The United States of America has withdrawn from an international agreement that gives detained foreign nationals the right to seek assistance and talk to their consular officers.

Corby lawyer pleads for Australian help
Schapelle Corby, 27, is accused of carrying over four kilograms of marijuana into Bali and could be sentenced to death if she is found guilty.

OHIO: Appeals court tosses death sentence for U.S.-British citizen
In Cincinnati, a federal appeals court on Tuesday threw out the conviction and death sentence of a man with dual U.S.-British citizenship who was convicted of killing a 2-year-old girl by starting a fire in his ex-girlfriend's apartment.

THE INNOCENT SCOT ON DEATH ROW IS ALMOST FREE
If you haven't heard about it yet, you will. There's a celebration in the air: Kenny is an innocent man living on death row in an Ohio prison and the authorities may finally acknowledge what we've known all along.

EXPENSES FOR STATE-ASSISTED SUICIDE EXCEEDS $33,000.00
To prepare for Connecticut's first state-sanctioned killing in 45 years, the state Department of Corrections has spent more than US$33,000 on such items as training personnel, drugs (poison), intravenous catheters and tubing, portable restrooms, mobile offices, lighting and curtains for the witness observation room.

Child Offenders on Death Row
Recent Australian studies of alcohol and cannabis use show that girls are increasingly inclined to behave boldly. But boys out number the girls, two to one; and three to one in the juvenile justice system, mortality figures, speeding infringements and car crash statistics.

US death row numbers don't change policy?
The number of prisoners on death row in the United States appears to be falling, mostly credited to a single Governor who commuted the sentences of all the death row prisoners in his state.

Despite Drop in Crime, an Increase in Inmates
US: The number of inmates in state and federal prisons rose 2.1 percent last year, even as violent crime and property crime fell, according to a study by the Justice Department released yesterday.

How Denying the Vote to Ex-Offenders Undermines Democracy
For starters, hundreds of thousands of people who are still eligible to vote will not do so this year because they will be locked up in local jails, awaiting processing or trials for minor offenses.

DNA Evidence of Bipartisanship
Last week the U.S. Congress passed the Justice for All Act, which includes provisions of the Innocence Protection Act. As of this posting, the legislation has not yet been signed by President Bush. Attached is an analysis of the legislation prepared by the Justice Project.

Our Two Priority Bills sent to White House
US: The 8th National CURE Convention last June lobbied on Capitol Hill the Innocence Protection Act in the Senate and the Mentally Ill Offender Treatment and Crime Reduction Act of 2004 in the House. On Sunday, October 10th, Congress passed both bills and sent them to the President to be signed.

THE LAW IS AN ASS:
US: A Californian man who beheaded a german shepherd dog he had named after his girlfriend, has been sentenced to 25 years to life under California's three-strikes law.

SAVE THE LIFE OF NGUYEN TUONG VAN:A PLEA TO SINGAPORE PRESIDENT On behalf of the Australian Coalition Against Death Penalty (ACADP) and in the spirit of respect for human life, I make a heartfelt plea for clemency, compassion and mercy, to spare and save the young life of Nguyen Tuong Van, currently under sentence of death at Changi Prison in Singapore. Nguyen Tuong Van, is a 23-year-old Australian man of Vietnamese origin. Nguyen was arrested at Changi Airport in December 2002, whilst in transit from Cambodia to Australia. He was later charged and convicted of drug-trafficking. In March 2004 he was sentenced to death for his crime.

EXTRADITION ACT FLUSHED DOWN THE TOILET
A long-standing convention not to extradite people out of Australia if they face the death penalty has been abandoned.

BIRTHDAY PROTEST BACKS INNOCENT MAN ON DEATH ROW:
Kids from 3 to 83 years old beat candy labeled "Justice" out of a big Texas-shaped piqata on Aug. 1 as dozens gathered in the Houston City Hall Park to celebrate the 30th birthday of Nanon Williams, an innocent person on Texas death row.

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Appealing a Death Sentence Based on Future Danger USA-HOUSTON, June 9 - Texas juries in capital cases must make a prediction. They may impose a death sentence only if they find that the defendant will probably commit more violent acts.

Forensics? In proposing a new death penalty for Massachusetts last month, Governor Mitt Romney offered firm assurance that no innocent people would be executed: Convictions, he said, will be based on science.

Clive Stafford-Smith: The Death Penalty
"In 1993, a federal judge ruled that, as the U.S. constitution has no ruling against killing the innocent, then it doesn't matter whether you are innocent or not, when you are executed. It's profoundly stupid - the constitution doesn't say the sun must set in the west, but it does.

Silencing the Cells: Mass Incarceration and Legal Repression in U.S. Prisons People without a voice are not people in any meaningful sense of the word. Silenced people cannot express their ideas; they can neither consent nor protest. They are reduced to being pawns in the schemes of the powerful, mendicants who must accept whatever is imposed upon them. In order to keep people in a state of subjugation, silencing their voices is essential. Nowhere is this clearer than in U.S. prisons.

U.N. Group Seeks End To Executions The United States, Japan, China, India and Muslim nations including Saudi Arabia opposed the resolution. Burkina Faso, Cuba, Guatemala, South Korea and Sri Lanka abstained.

US: Execution Dear Friends, this is so sad especially for our dear friend, San Nguyen. San who lives in Oklahoma worked very hard with the rest of the Vietnamese community to stop Mr. Le's execution. You may remember San from being at CURE's First International Conference in New York City in 2001. San also plans to be at the 8th National Convention this June in Washington. Charlie

Please contact the Governor The Vietnamese-American Community, the ACLU, and many others want the March 30 execution of Huang Thanh Le commuted.

Cherie Blair attacks US over death penalty in Catholic paper Cherie Blair has renewed her attack on America's use of the death penalty. In a book review in the Catholic journal The Tablet, under her maiden name Cherie Booth, she says: "Capital cases are uniquely prone to error and thus call into question whether we can ever be really sure of obtaining the just result.

Death penalty: a lawyer sees the light The observation "Americans are from Mars and Europeans are from Venus" is illustrated by the two nations' differing reactions to the use of the death penalty as a legitimate punishment for murder.

OHIO: Judges join dissent on execution delay In Columbus, 5 federal appeals court judges say a convicted killer's request to delay his execution was illegally denied because 2 senior judges participated in the vote.

Stephen Romei: Death knell sounds for US capital law GEORGE Ryan gets my vote as Australian of the Year, even though he's the outgoing governor of the US state of Illinois. There's just no one I admire more right now, not even Greg's Kables Community News Newtwork..

Mexico Awaits Hague Ruling on Citizens on U.S. Death Row Sbaldo Torres, a convicted murderer on death row in Oklahoma, should have been dead by now, his appeals exhausted, his time up.

Jury Passes On Business Of Killing US: This drives the death penalty crowd in the legislature nuts. Yet another jury - another 12 men and women, tried and true, who had all attested to their belief in the death penalty - has refused to join in the killing business.

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A Question of Innocence Rubin Carter: Day after day, week after week, I would sit in that filthy cell, seething. I was furious at everyone. At the two state witnesses who lied, at the police who put them up to it, at the prosecutor who sanctioned it, at the judge who allowed it, at the jury who accepted it, and at my own lawyer, for not being able to defeat it.

Are you sane enough to be executed?
New York: The US Supreme Court has let stand a ruling by a federal appeals court in February that officials in the state of Arkansas had the right to force a convicted murderer to take drug treatment to make him sane enough to be executed.

Amnesty steps up campaign to abolish death penalty Human rights watchdog Amnesty International is urging people around the world to pressure countries to abolish the death penalty.

'LAND OF THE FREE' SET TO EXECUTE TWO PRISONERS BY FIRING SQUAD: Wanted: Willing executioners for two convicted murderers. Must be psychologically sound and familiar with .30-calibre rifles. No victims' relatives need apply.

TEXAS EXECUTES 300th PRISONER Keith Clay was executed tonight, becoming the 300th prisoner in Texas to die by lethal injection since the rogue state resumed the death penalty 20 years ago.

AUSTRALIAN COALITION AGAINST DEATH PENALTY " ... Our nation was built on a promise of life and liberty for all citizens. Guided by a deep respect for human dignity, our Founding Fathers worked to secure these rights for future generations, and today we continue to seek to fulfil their promise in our laws and our society.

Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty Please note the following article carefully.....it shows clearly the hateful, uncaring and anti-human rights attitude as reflected by the Governor of Texas (and most other elected Texas officials).

Bush rules out death sentence review US President George W Bush says has dismissed any chance of a review of America's system of capital punishment.

Amnesty urges Bush to shut death row Human rights watchdog Amnesty International has urged US President George W. Bush to take a "moral stand" and abolish the death penalty after the Illinois Governor dramatically emptied that state's death row.

USA - A NATION IN TURMOIL: As the year 2002 draws to a close, little if anything, has changed in the United States in regards to state-sanctioned killing. Various campaigns, calls for clemency, petitions, and international condemnation, have failed to humanize U.S. politicians.

Here come de Judge - Time to Leave [266]
There have always been examples of rulings and interpretations that have supported the saying "The law is an ass". This is increasingly the case, because even the best intentioned judges are now facing an avalanche of new technologies and social change. But, it is no good making excuses for the judiciary and continuing to accept their strange interpretations. We must recognise that not only judges but the whole legal system will struggle more and more. In the end the whole system will become a farce. This is the way empires end.

Prisons: Have a heart at Christmas

As the season of goodwill approaches I'm reminded of how at this time of year one of the main things on the minds of people in prison is food.

Already prisoners all over the country will be stocking up on biscuits and other goodies saved for from prison wages and purchased from the prison "canteen".

From the daily provisions allowance, prison cooks will be skimming a little here and there so that they can put a little extra on the cons' plates over the forthcoming holiday in order to make Yuletide inside a little more palatable.

Yet it won't be long before popular newspapers are carrying mock-ups of prison Christmas menus, designed to outrage the man in the street and infuriate pensioners.

But regardless of their circumstances, prisoners are still people and in spite of their incarceration most will experience festive treats in one form or another. As my second Christmas in the world of the free beckons I recall a couple of my favourite repasts behind bars.

The first was the oddest meal I'd ever had. Queuing up at the hotplate on Christmas eve lunchtime in my first high security prison I was suddenly distracted from my conversation with the man in front of me by the sight of a tray of unfamiliar animal organs.

The curious items were brown and pear shaped and had what looked like bits of rubbery tubes attached. Of all the sights I'd been greeted with at mealtimes since my sentence had begun, this creepy-looking pile was the most intriguing.

"Sheep hearts," said the prisoner in the grey, originally white, serving jacket standing behind the serving counter when I asked him what they were. "A Christmas present from a local farmer," he added.

"Christ," I whispered. They looked like they had just been torn from the animals' chests by a gnarled, warty hand.

Many were coated with layers of yellow fat. The rubbery bits, I realised, were the remnants of major arteries, some of which had what appeared to be snippets of lung still attached. I noticed nobody appeared to be taking their portion.

"Yes please," I said, to the obvious surprise of Greyjacket. He uttered a wide-eyed snigger as he untangled a heart with his aluminium tongs and placed it gingerly on my stainless steel meal tray.

Then I had an idea. "Is there any spare?" I asked, prompting a look of disbelief. Before he could say anything a voice from behind me chirped up, "You can have mine," followed by another, and then another and another. By the time I got back to my cell my tray was laden with more than a dozen of the little delicacies.

I'd never cooked a meal in prison before but I knew that people did. On the ground floor of the wing a cell had been converted to provide "cooking facilities" (a Baby Belling cooker had been installed alongside a table and a metal bench.)

Every night a tense queue of hungry cons formed, pans and little bags of ingredients that had been filched or bought illicitly from the prison kitchen, in hand. Some saved their hotplate food and enriched it with spices and food bought from the prison shop (tinned fish or baked beans.)

I was amazed that nobody had seen the potential in the sheep hearts, especially that day of all days.

After quickly trimming the fat and other debris from the hearts with my plastic knife I sawed them into bite-sized pieces. In the afternoon I managed to borrow a pan and trade a quarter of an ounce of tobacco for a couple of onions, some potatoes and carrots and an oxo cube from a kitchen worker.

As soon as the doors were opened at 6pm for "association" I rushed down to the makeshift kitchen and then queued for an hour before getting my pan on one of the little cooker's big rings.

The hour left before bang up was just enough to boil and simmer my stew to perfection before it was time to scuttle back to my cell, where behind a locked door I stared through the bars of the window at the starry sky and enjoyed my, er, hearty feast, alone. This first experience of cooking for myself eventually added a whole new dimension to my prison time. I became a regular in the queue for the Baby Belling, where, despite the disagreements, arguments, and fights, I managed to pick up a variety of recipes and tips which at least once week helped me to create a meal that was tasty, filling, and nutritious.

And then I met Mr Patel. Mr Patel was a man with few associates, as far as I was aware. Whenever I saw him he always seemed to be carrying a small pan around. It was under his chair in the television room, or on his bench in the fabrication workshop where we worked.

He even took it out on the exercise yard. He couldn't have stood more than five feet high, yet unusually for such a small and obviously defenceless man nobody ever bothered him.

That was until the night he was shoved out of the Baby Belling queue. Without thinking I stepped in and stuck up for him. To my relief Mr Patel's challenger backed down and let him back in. Later Mr Patel and I became acquainted and as a reward for my earlier modest assistance he shared with me the secrets of his pan.

"Pilchard curry," he said, as I tasted a spoonful, which left my taste buds singing with joy. "I teach you how to make."

It was one of the most wonderful tasting meals imaginable and in time became my very own signature dish.

Every year I produced a special Christmas panful for my neighbours, yet despite my seasonal largesse, following Mr Patel's untimely passing I always resisted attempts by fellow cons to get me to share what I had idiosyncratically come to think of as my own "secret recipe."

Now I feel the time has come. In my next column I will reveal all.

By Erwin James posted 24 November 05

Related:

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Prison officers responsible for smuggling into jails
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Plea to release Biggs rejected by ruling-class
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Prisons chief hits at 'gross' overcrowding
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Clarke faces a fight over probation overhaul
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The devilish advocate
UK: The devilish advocate John Hirst taught himself law in jail, and has never lost a case against the prison service. Erwin James meets up again with the former 'lifer' who won inmates the right to vote.

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UK prisoners should get vote, European court rules
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Prison plan 'will cut reoffending'
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Clarke to scrap plan to peg prison numbers
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Crowded jails 'boosting suicides'
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Prisoner total rises 15% in six years
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CPS drops prosecution over death in custody
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Prisoner's cell death
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Prison has lost its way - report
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Number of prisoners sent back to jail trebles
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No doubt many of my readers, even those who are well-educated or widely read, think that the prison -- the place where dark deeds are darkly answered[2] -- is an ancient institution, a barbaric hold-over from barbaric times. In fact, the prison is of relatively recent origin, and this tells us a great deal about the pretentions and realities of modern times, and the wisdom and high degree of development of the ancients.

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Youth 'murdered for officers' pleasure'
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Inquest blames jail for overdose death
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Put in the way of self-harm in a place intended to protect others
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Britain 'sliding into police state'
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UK solitary confinement
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Prison suicides soar as jails hire 'babysitters'
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Plan to sell off juvenile jails as job lot
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Failure to sack 'racist' prison staff condemned
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UK: The first of the Muslim detainees released from Belmarsh high security prison after being held on suspicion of terrorism has told the Guardian his fellow prisoners are suffering such severe mental problems that they constantly consider suicide.

Suicides and unrest have soared, admits Home Office
UK:The already overcrowded prison population is set to go on rising and will top 80,000 within the next three years, a senior Home Office civil servant warned yesterday.

England tops the EU in imprisonment
England and Wales jail more offenders per capita than any other European, Union country, according to new figures.

The big thaw

Global disaster will follow if the ice cap on Greenland melts. Now scientists say it is vanishing far faster than even they expected

Greenland's glaciers have begun to race towards the ocean, leading scientists to predict that the vast island's ice cap is approaching irreversible meltdown, The Independent on Sunday can reveal.

Research to be published in a few days' time shows how glaciers that have been stable for centuries have started to shrink dramatically as temperatures in the Arctic have soared with global warming. On top of this, record amounts of the ice cap's surface turned to water this summer.

The two developments - the most alarming manifestations of climate change to date - suggest that the ice cap is melting far more rapidly than scientists had thought, with immense consequences for civilisation and the planet. Its complete disappearance would raise the levels of the world's seas by 20 feet, spelling inundation for London and other coastal cities around the globe, along with much of low-lying countries such as Bangladesh.

More immediately, the vast amount of fresh water discharged into the ocean as the ice melts threatens to shut down the Gulf Stream, which protects Britain and the rest of northern Europe from a freezing climate like that of Labrador.

The revelations, which follow the announcement that the melting of sea ice in the Arctic also reached record levels this summer, come as the world's governments are about to embark on new negotiations about how to combat global warming.

This week they will meet in Montreal for the first formal talks on whether there should be a new international treaty on cutting the pollution that causes climate change after the Kyoto protocol expires in seven years' time. Writing in The Independent yesterday, Tony Blair called the meeting "crucial", adding that it "must start to shape an inclusive global solution". But little progress is expected, largely because of continued obstruction from President George Bush.

The new evidence from Greenland, to be published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters, shows a sudden decline in the giant Helheim glacier, a river of ice that grinds down from the inland ice cap to the sea through a narrow rift in the mountain range on the island's east coast.

Professor Slawek Tulaczyk, of the Department of Earth Sciences at the University of California, Santa Cruz, told the IoS that the glacier had dropped 100 feet this summer.

Over the past four years, the research adds, the front of the glacier - which has remained in the same place since records began - has retreated four and a half miles. As it has retreated and thinned, the effects have spread inland "very fast indeed", says Professor Tulaczyk. As the centre of the Greenland ice cap is only 150 miles away, the researchers fear that it, too, will soon be affected.

By Geoffrey Leans posted 21 November 05

Related:

Changing New Orleans
US: Its bittersweet being back in New Orleans. Although the architecture is the same, and its a relief to walk the streets and reunite with old friends, already this is a very different city from the one I love. Its a city where some areas are quickly rebuilding and other parts are being left far behind. A city where people who have lived here for generations are now unwelcome in a hundred different ways.

Nuclear Power PR campaign debunked by report
Anti-nuclear activists replied to advocates of nuclear power with a comprehensive damning report 'Nuclear Power - No Solution to Climate Change'. Fifty people attended the launch held at Northcote Town Hall organised by Friends of the Earth. Speakers included report author, Dr Jim Green, physicist Dr Alan Roberts, and President of the Medical Association for the Prevention of War, Dr Tilmin Ruff.

Pressure remains on Australia as Kyoto takes effect
Australia and the United States have both refused to ratify the deal, arguing it is not in their best interest. They will be denied access to a new international trading market where developing countries will get credits for cutting back emissions.

A long stretch

UK: As head of prisons for England and Wales, Martin Narey tried to improve life for people on the inside. One of those inmates was Erwin James, then serving a life sentence. Now, as Narey leaves his job after a career spanning three decades, the two men meet and discuss the many problems still facing Britain's jails.

'Can I get you something to drink? Tea? Coffee?" I'm sitting at a small conference table at the back of Martin Narey's bright and spacious office in the heart of the new Home Office in London. Narey, wearing a smart striped shirt and matching tie, is friendly and courteous, almost disconcertingly so.

"Er, coffee please," I say.

Though this is the first time we have met, Martin Narey and I go back a long way. He joined the prison service as a fast-track prison governor in 1982. Two years later, I was sentenced to life. It would have been impossible to believe then that one day I would make this visit as a journalist or that the man with overall responsibility for all the prisons in England and Wales, second only to the home secretary, would be making me a cup of coffee.

As he makes my drink, I glance around at the pictures on his walls. Most are photographs, taken during his career, but pride of place goes to a huge painting on canvas. "That won first prize at the Koestlers," he explains as he hands me my mug of coffee. The Koestler Awards is a national arts competition held annually for prisoners and patients of special hospitals. The picture is of a group of prisoners and visitors facing each other across a row of tables. I would guess it acts as a reminder of the essential meaning of prison to all who enter the room. "Judge Stephen Tumin bought it and presented it to me as a gift," says Narey. "It will be going with me when I leave."

After a career in the prison service that has spanned three decades, Narey will soon be hanging his painting in a different office. Appointed as chief executive of the children's charity Barnardo's, his new post will be added to a heady list of career achievements - director general of the prison service, honorary doctorate from Sheffield Hallam University, gold medal from the Chartered Management Institute, permanent secretary and first ever chief executive of the merged probation and prison service (the National Offender Management Service , or Noms). Narey has been responsible for a budget of several billion pounds, a staff of around 50,000 and the lives of more than 77,500 prisoners. Not bad for a boy who was one of nine children born to working-class parents and who describes himself as having been a "waster" at the Middlesbrough comprehensive where he got "absolutely crap" A-levels.

That Narey should come across as a decent bloke is appropriate, given he is the man who introduced the "decency agenda" into prisons. I remember well his speech to a prison service conference in 2001 when he threatened to resign as director general because he was "not prepared to continue to apologise for failing prison after failing prison". It was the first time during my 20 years inside that I had heard someone at the top acknowledge that the prison experience could be deeply harmful to prisoners. From the distance of a prison landing it was hard to tell how sincere he was, but it sounded good and generated new hope for a lot of people inside.

Ever since the Conservative government largely ignored the recommendations of the Woolf report into the Strangeways riot in 1990, it seemed to those inside that prisons had been neglected by those in power. Over the years, I saw how overuse and limited investment kept the prison system from ever achieving any significant positive impact on the lives of most of those in its custody. Here, it appeared, was someone who wanted to change things. He was motivated by what he saw when he first joined the prison service and had to work on the landings of Lincoln prison as a uniformed officer.

"Lincoln stank," he says. "It was filthy, overcrowded, three to a cell slopping out. I saw prisoners in the segregation unit routinely slapped, it was constant low-level abuse. It was a horrible, horrible place. If you wanted to do any good you had to do it by stealth. The POA [Prison Officers' Association] ran the place. Assistant governors were derided. I can remember getting a real load of abuse for being seen carrying a Guardian."

Beyond having the wrong type of newspaper under his arm, Narey has rarely been seen to make mistakes. But the latest figures again show prisons holding record numbers and the system stretching to bursting. How does he feel about that? "If I've got one regret as I leave this job after seven years, it's that this morning 16,000 men woke up in prison conditions which are simply gross. Overcrowding just saps away any good we might be able to do. My personal view is that we do not need to lock up 77,000 people." He looks at the tape recorder and says emphatically: "Although I possibly did everything I could to make prisons better places, the fundamental problem is that we lock up too many. We have to reduce the prison population."

This is not what Charles Clarke is saying. While, as home secretary, David Blunkett had planned to cap prison numbers at 80,000, his successor has said there is no need. Narey announced his resignation as Noms chief last July - is a lack of warmth between him and Clarke the reason he is leaving? "Not at all," he says, "Charles and I had a glass of wine just the other night."

With so much going against it, then, is he of the view that prison doesn't work? "Well, it's unfashionable to say it, but I still think that in the right circumstances, it can work. It can be a refuge from drug abuse. It can give people a chance to get their lives in order. If someone has to go to prison, if we can take them in, give them some education, demonstrate to them that they are not stupid, make them employable. And then if we can perhaps find them a job and a home, I think that could change some lives for the better."

What about children in prison? "I think we lock up ludicrous numbers of children in this country, nearly 3,000. If we could conceive of children's prisons, not as prisons but as secure colleges, and see them as a residential experience where we could concentrate on the individual and try to sort their lives out, then they might go out with a chance."

Narey's tenure as head of prisons has not been without controversy. In 2002 he was accused of treating Jeffrey Archer unfairly when he ordered him back to a closed prison after the former peer had attended a dinner party while on a community visit. "Archer behaved appallingly," he says when I remind him. "I defended the fact that we let him go to his mother's funeral un-cuffed and again later when we let him work at the Theatre Royal from his open prison."

His attitude changed when Archer was photographed in an Italian restaurant having lunch with a prison officer and a police officer. The next day the prison officer resigned, after 30 years of service. "I believe Jeffrey Archer invited that photographer to get a story to help publicise his book," he says, "and in doing so wasted the career of a good officer."

I ask about the special powers invoked to prevent Maxine Carr, the former girlfriend of the Soham killer, Ian Huntley, from being released on an electronic tag. Was that fair? "Carr was treated appallingly in relation to anyone else who might have committed the same crime," he says. "But if we had let her out using home- detention curfew, there was a danger that it would gravely have undermined public confidence in it. We let out over 100,000 people on HDC and we've got to have the public's backing. I spent a lot of time worrying about the press reaction to her release. Her own release plan was breathtakingly naive. She was planning to go and live with a relative. By the time she was released we had managed to find her a safer place."

Preventing prison suicides has been one of Martin Narey's preoccupations over the last few years. He thought in-cell television would reduce the number of self-inflicted deaths in prison but sadly that has not been the case. The rate of such deaths remains at an average of around two per week. Last year's total equalled the previous record of 95.

I ask him how he felt about David Blunkett's comment that he was going to "crack open a bottle of champagne" when Harold Shipman was found hanged in his cell in 2004. "I was distressed and terribly disappointed. I don't think he honestly meant it, but it was a shocking, dreadful thing to say."

Will he feel liberated when he leaves this office for the last time? "At the moment I'm feeling a little sad. Every day brings messages from people wishing me well, including from ex-prisoners," he says, nodding at the cards littering his desk. "Look," he says, "I've been doing this for 23 years. It's seven years since I became DG; no one has done the job for that long. I start at 6am and I'm rarely home before 8.30pm to 9pm. Despite my haggard appearance, I'm only 50. I can't do this for another 10 years so I'm going to do something very different."

So that's a yes, then? "Yes, it will free me up a little. You can't be in this job and not support the home secretary. You work for politicians. That's the deal. We have a civil service that has to serve the government of the day. And yes, that means that I have to argue and justify things with which I haven't always agreed, and I don't have to do that anymore.

By Erwin James posted 31 October 05

Related:

Prison officers responsible for smuggling into jails
Fresh Home Office research also confirmed the extent of abuse in prisons yesterday, and suggested that prison staff were one route for drugs to get in. The study found that smuggling by uniformed or civilian staff was thought to be "substantially increasing" the availability of heroin and cannabis behind bars.

Plea to release Biggs rejected by ruling-class
UK: Home Secretary Charles Clarke has rejected a plea by Great Train Robber Ronnie Biggs to be released from prison on compassionate grounds.

Prisons chief hits at 'gross' overcrowding
Martin Narey, a civil servant who has served every Home Secretary since 1989, highlights statistics showing that thousands of mentally ill inmates and a record number of children now constitute a significant part of the prison population.

Clarke faces a fight over probation overhaul
UK: The home secretary, Charles Clarke, yesterday confirmed his plans to abolish 42 local probation boards and instead create "a vibrant mixed economy" in the management of 200,000 offenders in the community.

The devilish advocate
UK: The devilish advocate John Hirst taught himself law in jail, and has never lost a case against the prison service. Erwin James meets up again with the former 'lifer' who won inmates the right to vote.

Racism still rife in jails, five years after the murder of Zahid Mubarek UK: The prison service will be strongly criticised for continued racial discrimination against ethnic minority inmates by the official report from the Zahid Mubarek inquiry.

UK prisoners should get vote, European court rules
UK: Laws setting out who can and cannot take part in elections are to be rewritten after the European court of human rights today ruled in favour of giving British prisoners the right to vote.

Prison plan 'will cut reoffending'
UK: A network of community prisons to help cut the number of criminals who re-offend has been outlined by Home Secretary Charles Clarke.

Clarke to scrap plan to peg prison numbers
UK: The home secretary, Charles Clarke, has said he is to abandon his predecessor's aspiration of pegging the prison population in England and Wales at 80,000. He will also drop plans to put a legal obligation on the judges' sentencing guidelines council to take the size of the prison population - currently 77,000 and rising - into account when laying down the "going rate" for major crimes.

Crowded jails 'boosting suicides'
UK: The chief inspector of prisons warned that an overcrowding crisis in Britain's jails was leading to an increase in prisoner suicides.

Chief justice calls for new approach to law and order
UK: The retiring [ruling class] lord chief justice, Lord Woolf, made a passionate plea for a new approach to law and order which would see a major shift away from punishment towards the solution of problems which generate crime.

Britain's only prison ship ends up on the beach
UK: The last inmates have departed and a skeleton staff is left guarding Britain's only prison ship - in case anyone is minded to break in rather than out.

Throw away the key
The one profession to get results on recidivism has been sacrificed to Labour's desire to lock up criminals in private prisons.

Judges' misdeeds will remain secret
UK: Judges who are disciplined for bad behaviour will not have the findings against them made public under a complaints regime to be launched next year.

Prisoner total rises 15% in six years
England and Wales are continuing to jail offenders at a higher rate than any other major country in western Europe, it emerged today. New research indicates that the government's use of prison as its main tool of penal policy has increased by 15% since 1999.

CPS drops prosecution over death in custody
UK: The family of Roger Sylvester, who died after being restrained by police officers, yesterday expressed their disappointment at a decision by the Crown Prosecution Service not to prosecute any of the officers involved.

Prisoner's cell death
UK: A prisoner was found hanged in his cell last week, the Home Office said, fuelling criticism over the soaring number of suicides in custody.

Plans for five new 'superprisons'
Recent figures show a total of 75,550 prisoners were held in 139 jails in England and Wales, nudging up the previous record of April 2004 by just six inmates.

Prison has lost its way - report
UK: Bristol prison is suffering wide-ranging problems because of inconsistent management, the Chief Inspector of Prisons has said.

Row over acupuncture for prisoners
UK: The Home Office has responded to criticism over prison inmates who are being offered acupuncture on the NHS in order to relieve stress.

Number of prisoners sent back to jail trebles
UK: The number of prisoners being sent back to jail after release has nearly trebled in the past five years, according to a report published today.

Top judge says crowded prisons cannot break cycle of crime
UK: Reoffending rates after a prison sentence are at an "unacceptably high level" and the failure of the criminal justice system to stop prisoners reoffending should shock the public, England's top judge, [Ruling Class] Lord Woolf, said last week.

All the World's a Prison: History
No doubt many of my readers, even those who are well-educated or widely read, think that the prison -- the place where dark deeds are darkly answered[2] -- is an ancient institution, a barbaric hold-over from barbaric times. In fact, the prison is of relatively recent origin, and this tells us a great deal about the pretentions and realities of modern times, and the wisdom and high degree of development of the ancients.

Decade after inspector left in disgust, report tells of filth
UK: Dirty, mice-infested cells, high levels of self-harm, and widespread bullying over drugs and medications were just some of the damning findings of a report into conditions at Holloway, Britain's largest women's prison.

Most women 'should not be jailed'
Women make up 6% of the prison population in England and Wales. Imprisonment of women should be "virtually abolished", a prison reform group has said.

Youth 'murdered for officers' pleasure'
UK: An Asian teenager was murdered by a white racist after they were placed in the same cell as part of a game to fulfil the "perverted pleasure" of prison officers, a public inquiry heard on Friday.

Deaths in isolation as prison segregation increases
The use of segregation [solitary confinement] of prisoners as punishment has been increasing recently in Australia, the US, and the UK. Segregation can be used for protection or punishment, but in both cases it results in extreme psychological stress. An indication that segregation is being over-used is the appearance of deaths in custody from suicide of those placed in segregation.

Inquest blames jail for overdose death
UK: An inquest jury returned a verdict itemising a catalogue of faults at Styal prison in Cheshire, concluding that the prison's "failure of duty of care" contributed to the death of Sarah Campbell, 18, who took an overdose of tablets on the first day of her three-year sentence.

Put in the way of self-harm in a place intended to protect others
UK: Sarah Campbell, 18, spent the last hours of her life in the segregation unit of Styal prison, Cheshire. "The seg", as those places are referred to, used to be known as "the block", short for punishment block. [ Seg is a bullshit word for Punishment, Solitary Confinement, Torture, Mental Illness, Self-Harm, Human Rights Abuse and that is State Terror.]

Britain 'sliding into police state'
The home secretary, Charles Clarke, is transforming Britain into a police state, one of the country's former leading anti-terrorist police chiefs [false flag police chiefs] said yesterday.

UK solitary confinement
UK: Segregation units are prisons within prisons - the places where the most unchecked brutality is meted out to prisoners. In recent years conditions in high security segregation units have deteriorated, and the use of long-term segregation as a control mechanism has increased.

Inquiry must root out prison racists
UK: It is difficult to imagine a more brutal murder than that of Zahid Mubarek. The 19-year-old was clubbed to death by his cellmate at Feltham Young Offender Institution in the early hours of 21 March 2000. He was due to be released just a few hours later.

Prison suicides soar as jails hire 'babysitters'
UK: Prison officers are being taken off suicide watch and replaced by unqualified 'babysitters' because the system is overwhelmed by an epidemic of self-harm.

Plan to sell off juvenile jails as job lot
UK: The government is to put out to tender all its dedicated juvenile jails that hold children under 18 in a departure in Whitehall's privatisation programme.

Failure to sack 'racist' prison staff condemned
UK: Two prison officers suspended for racism are still on full pay three years after a stash of Nazi memorabilia, neo-fascist literature and Ku Klux Klan-inspired 'nigger-hunting licences' was found in a police raid on their home.

Report slams 'unjust' jailing of women on remand
UK: Six out of 10 women sent to jail while they await trial are acquitted or given a non-custodial sentence, a report published today reveals. Introducing the report, Lady Kennedy QC calls for a complete review of the use of remand and bail for women saying it is "inhumane and unjust".

Concern as UK prison suicides hit record level
UK: More prisoners took their own lives in English jails in August than in any other month since records began, prison reformers said today.

End of years of despair as Holloway closes its doors
But now Holloway prison in north London - where Ruth Ellis, the last woman to be executed in Britain, was hanged in 1955 - has been earmarked for closure, along with several other women's prisons, which have been hit by a spate of suicides.

How detox and self-help brought suicide jail back from the brink
UK: Six suicides in 12 months made Styal jail notorious and the Prisons Ombudsman criticised the prison and its staff for serious failures. But things are changing.

Belmarsh detainees consider suicide, says freed man
UK: The first of the Muslim detainees released from Belmarsh high security prison after being held on suspicion of terrorism has told the Guardian his fellow prisoners are suffering such severe mental problems that they constantly consider suicide.

Suicides and unrest have soared, admits Home Office
UK:The already overcrowded prison population is set to go on rising and will top 80,000 within the next three years, a senior Home Office civil servant warned yesterday.

England tops the EU in imprisonment
England and Wales jail more offenders per capita than any other European, Union country, according to new figures.

Kiss your Democracy Goodbye (But Did You Ever Have One?)

"There are ... potentially desirable limits to the indefinite extension of political democracy ... A government which lacks authority ... will have little ability, short of cataclysmic crisis, to impose on its people the sacrifices which may be necessary" (1975 Trilateral Commission Report on the Governability of Democracies)

Just how pervasive is the myth of our 'inalienable rights' is illustrated by the following quote from an article in the Independent that even as it warns of the "drift...toward a police state" tells us

... the Government is undermining freedoms citizens have taken for granted for centuries and that Britain risks drifting towards a police state. - 'Judges liken terror laws to Nazi Germany' By Marie Woolf, Raymond Whitaker and Severin Carrell, The Independent, 16 October 2005 [my emph. WB]

Contrary to popular myth, the democratic process, the universal franchise, habeas corpus, the 'inalienable rights' and so on and so forth that the pundits spout on about, far from being an 'inalienable right' extending back to the Magna Carta some eight hundred years ago, our extremely limited democracy is barely one hundred years old and is something that is by no means 'taken for granted' as events in Northern Ireland revealed nor the raft of laws such as the infamous 'D' notice which is no more than an 'agreement' between the owners and managers of the media not to print or broadcast stories that might be embarrassing to the state, under the guise of 'state security'.

With literally hundreds of laws that collectively the state paradoxically likes to call our 'unwritten constitution' and without recourse to a clearly defined set of rules that sets limits on what powers the state possesses over its citizens, until the UK - reluctantly and with all kinds of provisos - signed the European Union's Human Rights Act, the state could pretty well do whatever it pleases. And now, under the guise of fighting the 'war on terror', it wants to opt out of key sections of the Act.

In fact, the UK is probably the most regulated, controlled and surveilled of any of the so-called democracies. With an estimated 6 million video cameras installed across the country over which there is no oversight, indeed, no controls whatsoever as to what happens to the footage, who sees it or who ends up possessing it, the state's control over its citizens is almost complete.

And if anyone has any doubts about the perilous state of our 'democracy', the vote on ID cards on 18/10/05 had only 20 Labour MPs voting against it, and most of those on the grounds of cost of the project. Public debate on the issue is virtually non-existent.

The government has consistently misled the public on the real nature of the ID card, hiding entirely the real reason, namely the creation of a national database on its citizens, an allegation it of course, strenuously denies. The vast cost of creating a national database on 60 million people, a database that will contain information of all kinds, not merely the kind that will allegedly stop 'identity theft' or allegedly identify 'terrorists', 'benefit cheats' and those participating in 'organised crime' but to add insult to injury, one that we will be forced to pay for.

So what is going here? Nobody could deny that indeed the state is undertaking fundamental attacks on the limited civil rights we have won over the past century or so of struggle but firstly, why are elements of the legal profession and the media only now waking up to the fact?

Could it be that as long as it was only 'extremists' and other 'fellow travellers' who were the alleged subject of the attacks, our 'liberal intelligentsia' were not that troubled, but now they see their own positions of privilege threatened, they have at long last spoken out?

What is revealed here is something a lot more fundamental and a lot more insidious, for these self-same people who now talk of a "drift toward a police state" have seen the writing on the wall for at least past eight years, yet said nothing and indeed were quite content to accept the 'drift' so long as it didn't affect them.

Moreover, it reveals the incestuous relationship between our so-called intelligentsia and the state, why else do they continue to peddle the line that what is happening is some kind of encroachment on these mythical 'rights' that we are supposed to have had for centuries?

The uncomfortable truth is that democracy, even the limited form we currently have, exists for only as long as it's convenient to keep it. And it's a 'democracy' that is extremely narrowly defined, namely a two-party system that exists within a structure defined by an inherited and entrenched state bureaucracy that is, we are told, neutral and independent of the political process.

Yet the 'Establishment' as it is referred to, is a recognised institution composed of people who control the organs of the state; the judicial system, the civil service, the police and security services, education, the armed forces, and through their connections, the media and big business. These are people who are connected via the schools and universities they attended; the clubs they belong to and via family and business relationships.

However, the 'Establishment' is rarely, if ever referred to as being central to the maintenance of the State's power. Instead, it is presented to us as an amorphous and inherited set of relationships that are intrinsically 'English'. The illusion is complete and reinforced by the assumptions made about its 'inevitable' nature, hence the statement "freedoms citizens have taken for granted for centuries" flows logically from such assumptions.

The role therefore of the intelligentisa is to 'maintain the illusion of a society ruled by people who have some kind of 'natural right' to rule', benignly you understand, to suggest otherwise is to be 'un-English' and it goes by the name of a 'meritocracy', those who rule through ability alone, at least that's what we are told.

The Establishment is so powerful that it easily absorbs even those who 'rise through the ranks' and end up belonging to it, such as those who head up the current 'Labour' government, regardless that they come from working class backgrounds.

Why this is important to the current onslaught on our 'inalienable rights' becomes apparent when we trace the trajectory of our governments, especially since the end of WWII and that of the Labour Party, whose historic role has been to manage capitalism when the traditional party of capital and of the Establishment, the Tory Party, eventually became a redundant force.

There could be no clearer example of the obsolete nature of the Tory Party than the current 'contest' to find a Tory Blair. Hence, aside from the ineffectual Liberal Democrats, we now have a de facto one-party system. Thus it is imperative to establish a 'legal' framework to enshrine the one-party system, in other words, the corporatist, security state, so beloved of Mussolini, a state that if it is rule, needs an absolutist framework of laws with which to protect itself and with which to control and repress any opposition.

The role of the 'war on terror' therefore, is to justify a state that has lost all legitimacy and must perforce rule by force, admittedly without recourse to an English equivalent of the SS and given the fact that the majority of the citizens have opted out of a political process over which they have no say, won't be needed - yet; except of course to repress those who fulfill the role of 'enemies of the state', Muslims, 'extremists' and other malcontents, who can be safely handled by existing organs of the state, MI5, MI6 and the various and sundry 'security' services (in authoritarian regimes, they get called the secret police) all administered with the 'anti-terror' laws. Throw in a complicit corporate and state media, which is only too happy to maintain the illusion of a democracy and we have a 'very English' police state.

Goodbye Social Contract

What is referred to as the 'social contract' between capital and labour, formulated by the post-war Labour government as the response by the state to the demand by working people for a greater share of the wealth and for a genuine participation in the political process, has finally been abandoned. The reasons are complex but not inexplicable.

In the first place, the crisis of capital that came after the first 'oil crisis' of the early seventies, precipitated the attack on working people represented by the Thatcher/Reagan so-called neo-liberal agenda that sought to address the issue of the falling rate of profit by taking back the gains that working people had won during the 'golden years' 1945-75, the longest period of consistent growth the Western world had ever experienced.

In addition, the defeat of the US in Vietnam signalled to the developing world that in spite of the US's overwhelming military and economic power, imperialism could be defeated, admittedly at great human and material cost, and perhaps at a cost that in long run it could not bear. This was a defeat that the US simply could not tolerate and one that had to be answered and in my opinion anyway, led directly to the US intervention in Afghanistan and the subsequent and final 'proxy' war between the US and the Soviet Union, a war the Soviets lost.

There can be no doubt that the rise of the 'social contract' was in no small part due to the success of socialism's attraction to working people and, following the disasters of the 1920s and 30s, the failure of capitalism to solve the recurring crises that beset it. For proof of this we need look no further than the roles of successive Labour governments throughout this period to 'manage' capitalism. But each successive Labour government moved further and further to the right and at each turn, it abandoned chunks of its historical mandate as the 'party of labour' as the allure of socialism faded, due not only to the failures of Soviet Union but also to the propaganda of the Cold War.

Ultimately, the Thatcherite 'counter-revolution' which hinged on the deregulation or the abandonment of the state regulation of the 'market' that enabled capital to move unhindered across the planet and which in turn enabled the state to mount a frontal assault on the organised working class as industrial production moved to un-organised, cheap labour markets, most often in repressive regimes of one kind or another, where the lack of labour and environmental laws didn't get in the way of doing business.

However, the frontal assault on working people did nothing to alter the fundamental crisis of capital, if anything it exacerbated the problem as it led not only to an increasing flood of products, but products that fewer and fewer people could afford to purchase. Capital's response to this crisis was to invest the surplus of capital into the financial markets, also now deregulated. Thus increasingly, profit was generated through speculation, especially in the currency markets that further destabilised the weak and vulnerable economies of the world - the developing countries.

In turn, failing a genuinely progressive alternative, created the conditions for a variety of 'fundamentalist' movements to fill the political vacuum, some no doubt created by imperialism using classic divide and rule tactics, others out of sheer desperation.

It can be seen therefore, that there is a direct and organic relationship between repression abroad and repression at home; they are two sides of the same coin and result from the same process, the crisis of capital. Without once more entering into and engaging with the political process, I think it's safe to assume that failing an organised and coherent opposition to the current Labour government-led regime, and one that's not led by a posse of self-serving 'liberals', whose position of privilege is only now recognised as being threatened, the omens are seriously bad. And, if you'll forgive me for repeating myself, it's up to you to break free from the illusion, so cleverly constructed, that the attacks on our rights only apply to 'extremists', as they'll come knocking on your door in the morning, of that you can be sure, history has taught us that, over and over again.

By William Bowles repost 22 October 05

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The continued disintegration of human rights in Australia will leave no one immune. The international image of Australia is, by now, surely under question, if not from the governments of the international community, then from the organisations such as Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, the United Nations. And not least from the citizens of the world who watch the news, seeing Australia but thinking South Africa, or Communist Russia.

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The Howard Government wants to give police executing preventative detention orders the power to shoot to kill. This is shoot to kill madness.

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Iraqis to vote on neo-colonial constitution
The referendum today in Iraq on the draft constitution is a cynical and, for the Iraqi people, humiliating event. Far from an exercise in self--determination, it is the next stage in a US--crafted, but increasingly crisis--ridden process aimed at turning Iraq into an American client state in the Middle East.

Bush, God and Transnationals
The tragedy (for the entire world) is not that Bush is delusional, mentally unstable and intellectually challenged - that is well known. Rather, it is that he remains as commander in chief of the USA - placed in that position by commercial and other financial interests.

Bush responds to political crisis with lies and new war threats
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Iran helps kill our soldiers: Britain... yeh right!
With Bush talking up the threat of Iran in the same way he did before illegally invading Iraq we now have the British linking Iran with deaths of British soldiers in Iraq.

Iraq's constitutional referendum makes a mockery of democracy
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How STUPID are the Americans? DON'T GET CAUGHT BETWEEN AN ADDICT AND HIS DRUG! Saddam Hussien was a dealer. We knew he was unstable and couldn't be trusted, but he was OUR dealer. We depended on him. Things you normally wouldn't even think about doing aren't an obstacle when you're addicted.

It's not the terrorists' it's us
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Cindy Sheehan Arrested Outside the WhiteHouse
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Eye's on the prize
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Bush, Howard, Blair, Axis of Evil
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A Confused Morality
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US-inflicted carnage on Iraqi people
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CCTV for illegal and degrading war
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Resistance in Iraq legitimate: Sadr
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Don't Blame Bush
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Suicide bombers may target PM: UK
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Galloway breaks consensus over London bombings
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London terror bombings: a political crime!
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Galloway: Cry for social change
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UK false flag: where the bombers struck
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Zarqawi: Everywhere and nowhere
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US confirms civilian deaths in Afghan air strike!
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Labor, 'Showroom Dummies'
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Australia: Lib/Lab Cult Squad
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Back to kill the innocent
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Crush, Kill, Destroy, Labor Wants War on Afghanistan
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Searching for resistance in Afghanistan
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Battlelines drawn on Security Council
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Bush's demon-aid tactic strikes again
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Zarqawi tape 'magic': ABRACADABRA
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USA - FEELING THE HEAT FROM INTERNATIONAL FIRE:
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Returning veterans of Iraq/Afghanistan
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IRAQ: Shiite and Sunnis to unite against occupation?
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Democracy, Iraqi style
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Violence continues ahead of Iraq Shoe Sale
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US transport company pulls out of Iraq
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Rumsfeld's war, torture and occupation ideology!
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Annan admits to a tough year
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Iraq sale to be contested by 100 buyers
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Fallujah refugees in desperate need of aid: UN
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Indonesians rally against Fallujah assault
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'This One's Faking He's Dead' 'He's Dead Now'
Fallujah: Video shows US soldier killing wounded insurgent in cold blood
by Andrew Buncombe in Washington.

US: Very superstitious? Writing's on the wall!
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World Vision Aust pulls out of Iraq
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US Senator slams !!! 'dysfunctional, rogue' CIA
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Civilian death toll to rise in Fallujah
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Illusionary demons blamed for US led Attack Iraq, Fallujah
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Full-scale attack on Fallujah begins
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US/Iraqi militants storm Fallujah hospital
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US warplanes and artillery attack Fallujah!
Journalists [in-bed] with the US military say warplanes fired at suspected resistance targets around Fallujah as night fell on Sunday, while artillery shells pounded a nearby town.

State of emergency: Allawi 'killer of saints'
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US Empire Votes For Pre-Emptive War!!!
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Saddam's family dismiss lawyer
The family of deposed Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein has dismissed the head of his defence team. Other team members had accused the lawyer, Mohammad Rashdan, of acting without consulting them.

Who's counting the dead in Fallujah? CARE?
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Iraqi civilian deaths put at 100,000
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Unknown News Update - 2009
More than 103 times as many people have been killed in these wars and occupations than in all terrorist attacks in the world from 1993-2004. About 241 times as many people have been killed in Afghanistan and Iraq than in the ghastly attacks of September 11, 2001.

Bushite group threatens civil liberties in Iraq
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US secretly moved prisoners out of Iraq for questioning: report
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Weapons inspectors missed WMD in Iraq
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US accused of breaching international law
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Allies 'planned' Iraq war despite denials
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UN warns of Iraqi malnutrition
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Annan tells world leaders to respect law
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CO-OFFENDERS DO NOT REBUFF UN ON 'ILLEGAL WAR'
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Bush team 'knew of abuse' at Guantanamo
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Enemy Mortars attack opening of Iraqi summit
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