Puppet Masters
Attorney-general Johannes Tomana said he has formed an unnamed five-member expert panel to assess some 3,000 Zimbabwe-related U.S. cables for breaches of security laws.
But Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights chief Irene Petras said Thursday the constitution and terms of Tomana's official powers don't allow him to call in outside advisers. She called the investigation "an abuse of power."
Tomana says the panel cannot be identified for ethical reasons. He said he asked panel members to submit their legal opinions by March on contacts between U.S. diplomats and Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai's party that allegedly conspired to oust longtime ruler President Robert Mugabe.
Petras said Tomana's actions contradicted basic principles of openness and transparency in the judicial system.
Hetco, which is part-owned by US oil and gas group Hess Corp, was said to have taken control of eight North Sea Forties oil shipments and two Brent cargoes - and it is believed to be in the market for more. The move would give Hetco more influence over the price of oil for immediate delivery. The cargoes are for February delivery.
The reports suggested that Hetco's purchases were the basis of a trading play and the trading house now has 30pc of the Forties oil being loaded next month and 25pc of Brent cargoes. Brent crude's premium over West Texas Intermediate oil has been increasing to abnormal levels since August last year, as US inventories of both oil and gas remain at high levels.

The global credit stock has already doubled in recent years, from $57 trillion to $109 trillion between 2000 and 2009.
This doubling of existing credit levels could be achieved without increasing the risk of a major crisis, said the report from the WEF ahead of its high-profile annual meeting in Davos.
But researchers warned that leaders must be wary of new credit "hotspots", where too much lending takes place, as the world emerges from a financial catastrophe blamed in large part "to the failure of the financial system to detect and constrain" these areas of unsustainable debt.
The cables make clear, were any further disclosure needed, exactly where the United States stands with respect to Israel's unprovoked attacks on Palestinians and its other Arab neighbors. Although Operation Cast Lead took place in the last days of the Bush administration, ending two days before Barack Obama was inaugurated, every Obama policy in the succeeding two years - including the administration's repudiation of the Goldstone Report detailing Israeli atrocities and war crimes during Cast Lead - has demonstrated a striking continuity of support for Israeli actions.
The cables give a notably one-sided account of the assault. Because they take their daily reporting primarily from the Israeli media, the cables keep a tally of rockets fired into Israel from Gaza and dramatically describe "burned dolls and destroyed children's toys" at an unoccupied kindergarten in Beer Sheba hit by a rocket, but make virtually no mention of Israel's intensive air and artillery bombardment of Gaza, including its civilian population. There are no reports of burned Palestinian babies or very few of destroyed property in Gaza. Even the western media provided more accurate coverage of Palestinian casualties than this.
It was the latest in a wave of attacks in recent days, as insurgents test Iraqi security forces ahead of the planned U.S. withdrawal at the end of the year.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but the bombings bore the hallmark of al-Qaida and other Sunni-dominated extremist groups that frequently target Shiite pilgrimages in hopes of re-igniting sectarian violence that brought Iraq to the brink of civil war just a few years ago.
Authorities estimated as many as 183 people were wounded in the near-simultaneous blasts set off by suicide bombers driving cars packed with explosives.
The panel was hosted by Mark Ruffalo, an acclaimed actor/activist known among Huffington Post readers for his insightful pieces, famous among film watchers for his recent award-nominated performance in The Kids Are All Right, and now infamous among government officials as a man who won't stop talking about fracking.
Fracking, or hydraulic fracturing, is a process that can be used to retrieve natural gas. It involves injecting chemicals, sand, and millions of gallons of water into shale rock. The shale is then shattered, releasing trapped gas. The problem is that when the gas comes to the surface, some water returns as well, and this water is often tainted with poisonous, carcinogenic chemicals.
The harmful effects of fracking are all too tangible, and Mark Ruffalo will be the first to tell you this. His friend's one-lane country road became a 30-foot highway for sonar pounding, and the quiet region of New York where Mark lives with his family may soon be destroyed by natural gas drilling.
Shame, vanity, laziness and the desire to fit in are all to be used as tools of Government policy by ministers acting on the advice of a new psychology unit in Whitehall.
The first glimpse into the confidential work of the Cabinet Office's Behavioural Insight Team came on Tuesday when ministers suggested members of the public should be able to make small charitable donations when using cashpoints and their credit cards.
On Friday, the Cabinet Office again followed the unit's advice in proposing that learner drivers be opted in to an organ donation scheme when they apply for a licence, and also floated the idea of creating a lottery to encourage people to take tests to prove they have quit smoking.
These initiatives are examples of the application of mental techniques which, while seemingly paradoxical to the Coalition's goal of a smaller state, are likely to become a common feature of Government policy.

Cash guzzling: The Energy Select Committee was told how the major firms were making a £65-a-year profit per customer
Research shows their profit margins have increased by nearly 50 per cent in the last four months alone, to the highest level for more than five years, MPs heard yesterday.
The firms say customers' rising bills are simply a result of a 25 per cent rise in wholesale prices last year. But recent studies suggest the margin between what they pay for gas and the price they charge customers, has risen by more than 200 per cent since 2008.
Yesterday, the Energy Select Committee heard from energy regulator Ofgem how last September the major firms were making a £65-a-year profit per customer. Based on a typical annual bill of £1,200, that has already risen to £97 - and is likely to climb further.
Five of Britain's 'big six' energy firms increased their prices this winter - despite the long cold spell.

William Odom, former director of the National Security Agency, was known as an outspoken advocate for intelligence reform.
The CIA is "out of control" and often refuses to cooperate with other parts of the national security community, even undermining their efforts, said former National Security Agency head William Odom, according to a recently released record of a 9/11 Commission interview.
"The CIA currently doesn't work for anyone. It thinks it works for the president, but it doesn't and it's out of control," says a report summarizing remarks made by Odom, a retired three-star general who served as director of the NSA from 1985 to 1988.
Odom, who also served on the National Security Council staff during the Carter administration, was known as an outspoken advocate for intelligence reform. He died in 2008.
The 2003 interview, among others conducted by the 9/11 Commission, was posted on the website Cryptome, which is often compared to the secret-spilling WikiLeaks website. The report was not a leak, however, but one of many records relating to the 9/11 Commission that have been released and made available on the National Archives website.
"We believe it will be a deterrent to crime when it is out and about and will help us solve crimes more quickly when they do occur," Ogden City Mayor Matthew Godfrey told Reuters.