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Chess

Eurozone crisis: Late night summit talks to save euro


BBC News
Thu, 08 Dec 2011 18:22 UTC
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© The Associated PressFrance and Germany are the main driving force behind the plan to change EU treaties
European Union leaders are locked in late night talks at a summit called to tackle the eurozone debt crisis and save the single currency.

The key item on the agenda in Brussels is a Franco-German plan on budgetary discipline, with automatic penalties for eurozone nations that overspend.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has said the euro has "lost credibility".

Meanwhile, world shares fell after the European Central Bank ruled out any substantial aid for indebted nations.

The US Dow Jones index closed down 1.6%. French and Italian shares ended down 2.5% and 4.3% respectively. Shares on Asian markets opened lower on Friday.
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Whistle

Council of Europe issues free speech alert over cyber attacks and political pressure

Dean Wilson
The Inquirer
Thu, 08 Dec 2011 14:05 UTC
cyber attack
© Alamy
Raises concerns over access to online content

The council of Europe has issued an alert to European countries about the risk to free speech by cyber attacks and political pressure on internet platforms, internet service providers (ISPs), independent media, whistleblowers, human rights defenders and political dissidents.

The Council's Committee of Ministers issued a Declaration expressing concern over pressure being exerted on internet companies and ISPs to tighten controls on internet content, which supports a recent EU Court of Justice ruling that ISP filters are prohibited under European law.

The Council is also worried about the impact of cyber attacks, particularly Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks, on advocates of free speech, which it sees as a relatively new way that this right is being violated.

The Declaration asserted the usefulness of social networks, blogs, and other online communities for their role as social watchdogs that have the power to cause positive real-life change. This is likely a reference to the recent uprisings in several countries against oppressive regimes, including Egypt and Libya.
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Attention

NATO fuel tankers attacked in Pakistan


The Associated Press
Thu, 08 Dec 2011 00:00 UTC
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© The Associated PressFirefighters extinguish burning NATO supply oil tankers and goods trucks at a terminal following an attack by gunmen in Quetta on December 8, 2011.
Assailants torched more than 20 tankers in Pakistan carrying fuel for U.S. and NATO troops in neighboring Afghanistan on Thursday, the first reported attack since Islamabad closed the border to protest coalition airstrikes that killed 24 Pakistani troops last month.

The attack highlighted the vulnerability of the supply trucks that are waiting for the country's two border crossings into Afghanistan to reopen. Around 40 percent of the non-lethal supplies for U.S.-led troops in landlocked Afghanistan travel across Pakistani soil.

Islamabad temporarily closed one of its Afghan crossings to NATO supplies last year after U.S. helicopters accidentally killed two Pakistani soldiers. Suspected militants or criminals took advantage of the impasse to launch many attacks against stranded or rerouted trucks carrying NATO supplies.
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Target

Putin accuses Clinton of encouraging protesters


The Associated Press
Thu, 08 Dec 2011 00:00 UTC

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© The Associated Press/Dmitry LovetskyRiot police detain a protester during a rally in downtown St.Petersburg, Russia, Wednesday, Dec. 7, 2011. More than a thousand people have protested in St.Petersburg against Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and his party, which won the largest share of a parliamentary election that observers said was rigged.
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin blasted U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Thursday for encouraging and supporting the election protesters and warned of a wider Russian crackdown on unrest.

By describing Russia's parliamentary election as rigged, Putin said Clinton "gave a signal" to his opponents.

"They heard this signal and with the support of the U.S. State Department began their active work," Putin said in televised remarks.

Russian protesters have taken to the streets in Moscow and St. Petersburg for three straight nights despite heavy police presence, outraged over observers' reports of widespread ballot box stuffing and manipulations of the vote count in Sunday's parliamentary election. The demonstrations have been some of the biggest and most sustained protests Russia has seen in years, and police have detained hundreds of protesters.
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Handcuffs

US- Federal judge: Montana blogger is not journalist

Jeff Barnard
Associated Press
Wed, 07 Dec 2011 19:55 UTC
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© Kamorek
A federal judge in Oregon has ruled that a Montana woman sued for defamation was not a journalist when she posted online that an Oregon lawyer acted criminally during a bankruptcy case, a decision with implications for bloggers around the country.

Crystal L. Cox, a blogger from Eureka, Mont., was sued for defamation by attorney Kevin Padrick when she posted online that he was a thug and a thief during the handling of bankruptcy proceedings by him and Obsidian Finance Group LLC.

U.S. District Judge Marco Hernandez found last week that as a blogger, Cox was not a journalist and cannot claim the protections afforded to mainstream reporters and news outlets.

Although media experts said Wednesday that the ruling would have little effect on the definition of journalism, it casts a shadow on those who work in nontraditional media since it highlights the lack of case law that could protect them and the fact that current state shield laws for journalists are not covering recent developments in online media.

"My advice to bloggers operating in the state of Oregon is lobby to get your shield law improved so bloggers are covered," said Lucy Dalglish, executive director of The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press. "But do not expect the shield law to provide you a defense in a libel case where you want to rely on an anonymous source for that information."
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Attention

Patented Gene Sequences Make up Over 20 Percent of the Human Genome

Mike Barrett
Natural Society
Thu, 08 Dec 2011 13:10 UTC
Gene Patents
© Natural Society

Gene patenting has been going on for over 100 years while science and technology has been continually allowing for greater advancements. Over the past 30 years alone, there has been over 40,000 patents created and accepted on genes alone. As genes continue to be acquired and patented, it is only a matter of time before large corporations own patents on a large number of human genes and tissues. What may seem staggering, though, is that the more than 20 percent of the human genome is already patented.

The Fears Alongside with Gene Pattenting

To create a patentable gene sequences an individual must find something in nature, isolate it, and alter it in order to create something deemed 'useful'. Much of the debate in favor of creating gene sequences revolves around society and corporate driven company ownership issues. As a creator of a gene sequence, individuals or companies expect ownership of the creation as well as protection from anyone else stealing the idea. If companies were not able to patent gene sequences, then other companies could exploit the original creators' ideas and ultimately profit themselves. Of course the patents in question revolve around the human genome, which no corporation rightfully owns. In addition, corporations use the argument that many of these gene sequences correlate with diseases like breast cancer and Alzheimer's disease. The creation of such gene sequences give merit to the idea of gene manipulation as the created gene sequence could lead to increased protection against bodily invaders.
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Vader

Why Obama Wants to Veto S.1867

Dr. Eowyn
Fellowship of the Minds
Wed, 07 Dec 2011 10:14 UTC
Obama
© unknown
Some among us are puzzled as to why Obama has made known he plans to veto the recently passed Senate bill 1867, that will give him (and future Presidents) immense power.

The now infamous Section 1031 of S. 1867 does not exclude U.S. citizens from those "covered persons" whom the President can have the military arrest and detain without charge or trial. In effect, S. 1867 suspends and removes the protection of the U.S. Constitution from American citizens if they/we are deemed to be "at war" with the United States, whatever "at war" means.

Obama's opposition to S. 1867 is not due to his passion to preserve our civil liberties.
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Dollar

Bilderberg's Roman Circus: Italian junta effectively outlaws cash

Richard Cottrell
End the Lie
Thu, 08 Dec 2011 09:58 UTC
monti
© unknown
When Bilderberg Man Mario Monti promoted himself to regent of Italy almost three weeks ago, the air was thick with Valkyries warning that should the great witch doctor fail to square the books pretty damn quick, then not only would Italy go down the chute but she would take with her the euro and the entire apparatus of the European Union.

It was nonsense then and remains so today. There is no Euro crisis, the end of the world as we know it is not imminent - unless Angela Merkel and Nicholas Sarkozy pull off their sinister scheme for full European fiscal union on the back of what is nothing more than an entirely contrived and artificial crisis.

If Monti expected to walk on to the world stage and win the Oscar for fiscal probity, then he has been rudely disappointed. The great austerity package to save Rome from the fate she inflicted on Carthage two thousand years ago received a very loud raspberry.
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Bad Guys

US: Clinton Warns of Bio-Weapons Threat, Terrorism - Be afraid, be very afraid

Suzanne Presto
GlobalSecurity.org
Thu, 08 Dec 2011 07:48 UTC
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© Unknown
The ability of terrorists and others to develop and use biological and toxin weapons is growing, according to U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. She underscored the nature of the bio-weapons threat is evolving.

"The advances in science and technology make it possible both to prevent and cure more diseases but also easier for both states and non-state actors to develop biological weapons," she said. "A crude but effective terrorist weapon can be made by using a small sample of any number of widely available pathogens, inexpensive equipment and college-level chemistry and biology."

Speaking at the United Nations in Geneva, she pointed out bio-weapons have been used in attacks on civilian populations before. There were anthrax spore and sarin gas attacks on the subway system in Tokyo in the 1990s. Anthrax attacks in the United States killed five people and sickened 17 others in 2001. That same year, Clinton said, coalition forces in Afghanistan found evidence al-Qaida was trying to foster its ability to conduct bio-weapons attacks.

"And less than a year ago, al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula made a call to arms for, and I quote, 'brothers with degrees in microbiology or chemistry to develop a weapon of mass destruction'," she said.
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MIB

Hidden in plain sight: Inside a secret CIA prison


MSNBC / Associated Press
Thu, 08 Dec 2011 07:42 UTC
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© Unknown
In northern Bucharest, in a busy residential neighborhood minutes from the heart of the capital city, is a secret the Romanian government has long tried to protect.

For years, the CIA used a government building - codenamed "Bright Light" - as a makeshift prison for its most valuable detainees. There it held al-Qaida operatives Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the mastermind of 9/11, and others in a basement prison before they were ultimately transferred to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, in 2006, according to former U.S. intelligence officials familiar with the location and inner workings of the prison.

The existence of a CIA prison in Romania has been widely reported, but its location has never been made public. The Associated Press and German public television ARD located the former prison and learned details of the facility where harsh interrogation tactics were used. ARD's program on the CIA prison is set to air Thursday.

The Romanian prison was part of a network of so-called black sites that the CIA operated and controlled overseas in Thailand, Lithuania and Poland. All the prisons were closed by May 2006, and the CIA's detention and interrogation program ended in 2009.

Unlike the CIA's facility in Lithuania's countryside or the one hidden in a Polish military installation, the CIA's prison in Romania was not in a remote location. It was hidden in plain sight, a couple blocks off a major boulevard on a street lined with trees and homes, along busy train tracks.
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