Democrats Going Down in Flames
Martha Coakley’s Corporate Connections
By Russel Mokhiber | January 15, 2010
Martha Coakley is going down in flames.
So is the Democratic Party.
Why?
We found the answer earlier this week at – of all places – The Cato Institute in Washington, D.C.
Timothy Carney was giving a powerpoint presentation about his new book: Obamanomics: How Barack Obama Is Bankrupting You and Enriching His Wall Street Friends, Corporate Lobbyists, and Union Bosses.
Here’s the book in a nutshell:
“Both parties are the parties of big business,” Carney said. “They both promote corporate socialism.”
I sat there in the front row at Cato, in wonder.
Listening to the talk – as Carney outlined how Obama had cut deals with Billy Tauzin and the pharmaceutical industry.
Thinking to myself – is this why Martha Coakley is having such a hard time in Massachusetts?
She’s just another corporate Dem — just like Obama?
Then, lo and behold, as if I was channeling Carney, he calls up a slide on his powerpoint.
On the big screen at Cato is an invitation to a corporate fundraiser – that night at the Sonoma Restaurant on Capitol Hill – for Coakley.
And I say to myself – wait a second.
Coakley is in the middle of a tight race and she’s flying to DC one week before the election to be with a group of corporate lobbyists?
Yes.
She is.
And then Carney went down the list of 22 members of the host committees – meaning they each raised $10,000 or more for Coakley.
“Seventeen are federally registered lobbyists, 15 of whom have health-care clients,” Carney said.
“You see the names – Gerald Cassidy, David Castagnetti,, Tommy Boggs – those are all lobbyists I’ve highlighted there who have clients who are drug companies, health insurers, hospitals or all three,” Carney said. “AHIP, Phrma, Pfizer, Blue Cross – everybody is covered there. Aetna somehow isn’t. I don’t know how they got left out.”
“These are the special interests,” Carney said. “These are the people trying to elect Martha Coakley to be vote number 60 for health insurance.”
Carney then puts up a slide showing how the Phrma cash went from supporting Republican candidates for President in the past – to supporting Barack Obama in 2008.
“Barack Obama raised $2.1 million from drug companies in 2008,” Carney said. “That’s about equal to what John McCain raised plus what George Bush raised in both of his elections. It’s the most by far any candidate has raised from the drug industry.”
The people of Massachusetts already have tried a corporate reform that forces them to buy junk insurance.
They don’t like it.
They’re waiting for a candidate that will deliver a message they’ve been waiting to hear.
Single payer.
Everybody in.
Nobody out.
Put the private insurance companies out of business.
Drive down the cost of drugs to the levels of say Canada or the UK.
But Obama, Coakley and the Democrats are awash in corporate cash.
They have made their choice.
And they deserve to lose.
Onward to single payer.
Russell Mokhiber is editor of Single Payer Action.
Obama’s screwing of American workers and his and Hillary’s links to India
By Wayne Madsen | Online Journal | January 15, 2010
There is a reason why the corporate media focused on White House state dinner crashers Tareq and Michaele Salahi at last year’s gala honoring Indian Prime Minister Monmohan Singh. The media, which acts in lockstep with major corporate owners like Microsoft and General Electric in pushing for the import of low-wage Indian information technology and other high-technology workers into the United States on H1-B visas, did not want anyone focused on the deal worked out between President Obama and Singh.
Obama was cementing a deal on further Indian workers coming to the United States, a “deal” Obama announced during the height of the primary battle in early 2008 as he was raking in campaign contributions from wealthy Indians — citizens and non-citizens alike.
Obama stated, “I will support a temporary increase in the H-1B visa program as a stopgap measure until we can reform our immigration system comprehensively. I support comprehensive immigration reform that includes improvement in our visa programs, including our legal permanent resident visa programs and temporary programs, including the H-1B program, to attract some of the world’s most talented people to America. We should allow immigrants who earn their degrees in the U.S. to stay, work, and become Americans over time. As part of our comprehensive reform, we should examine our ability to replace a stopgap increase in the number of H1B visas with an increase in the number of permanent visas we issue to foreign skilled workers.”
However, Obama never intended to reform the H-1B system that robs educated and talented Americans of their jobs in the American economy and wage earning potential.
WMR has learned from a reliable Indian source that a majority of the Indian workers arriving in the United States graduated from 40,000 engineering colleges that opened in India between 1990 and 2000. Many of these Indian engineering colleges were never properly licensed or received their dubious accreditation courtesy of Indian politicians anxious to export Indian workers to the United States and, in return, see wage remittances pour into their constituencies from America, thus boosting India’s foreign reserve strength. Many of the engineering colleges that grant degrees to Indian engineers lack sufficient infrastructures and employ faculty with questionable credentials, according to WMR’s source.
In Chennai, for example, almost every street has an engineering college. There is also a direct pipeline between the dubious engineering schools’ job placement offices and the U.S. Embassy visa office in New Delhi.
The exodus of Indian graduates to the United States also involves an Indian Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) program to glean sensitive and classified technology from U.S. companies that employ the engineers and technicians. The mass migration of Indian labor has been linked directly to U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and other top officials in the Democratic Party. Mrs. Clinton and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, have substantial financial interests in India.
Part of the funding for Bill Clinton’s 1992 presidential campaign, WMR has learned, came from money scammed by Indian stockbroker Harshad Mehta who gamed the Bombay Stock Exchange into seeing a sharp rise in stock. Mehta raked off the profits from his “Ponzi scheme” but when banks called in their investments, the Bombay Stock Exchange collapsed. The Clintons continue to maintain a close financial arrangement with the multi-billionaire Tata family of India through the clan’s sizable donations to the Clinton Foundation.
In 2008, the Indian stock market saw a 50 percent decrease in value. WMR has learned that the earlier “bubble” in the market saw large amounts of money from Indian financial interests pour into the presidential campaign coffers of Barack Obama.
The program to introduce low-paid Indian engineers into the United States began in 1960 with a test population of graduates from the Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT). After the first engineers were placed in U.S. high-technology positions, the RAW and the Indian government built up the program. The Indians had noticed that Israel’s Mossad had successfully penetrated a number of American research and development centers using Jewish engineering graduates from Israel who were obtaining the technical know-how for Israel to build its nuclear arsenal.
Previously published in the Wayne Madsen Report.
Copyright © 2010 WayneMadenReport.com
More than half the experts fighting the ‘pandemic’ have ties to drug firms
By Fiona Macrae and Sophie Borland | The Daily Mail 14th January 2010
More than half the scientists on the swine flu taskforce advising the Government have ties to drug companies.
Eleven of the 20 members of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE) have done work for the pharmaceutical industry or are linked to it through their universities.
Many have declared interests in GlaxoSmithKline, the vaccine maker expected to be the biggest beneficiary of the pandemic.
The disclosure of the register of interests comes just days after a health expert branded the swine flu outbreak a ‘false pandemic’ driven by the drug companies which stood to profit.
The Government is now trying to offload up to £1billion worth of unwanted swine flu vaccine.
Last July, the Department of Health warned of up 65,000 deaths, with 350 a day at the pandemic’s peak. But the death toll now stands at just 251.
SAGE was created to give Ministers recommendations on how to control and treat the virus.
Official documents show some members are linked to vaccine manufacturer Baxter and to Roche, which makes Tamiflu.
GSK, Baxter and Roche stand to make up to £1.5billion between them from Government contracts related to swine flu.
The scientists declared the interests to the Department of Health.
They were not obliged to declare the amounts they earned but they are thought to range from around £500 for a lecture or presentation to more than £100,000 for a directorship of GSK.
Some will simply be heads of university research departments which received funding from companies… Full article
Swine flu: “They Organized the Panic”
Inquiry into the Role of Big Pharma and WHO by Council of Europe
By Bruno Odent | Global Research | January 12, 2010
New Development: The German President of the Health Committee of the Council of Europe, Wolfgang Wodarg, is issuing accusations against the pharmaceutical lobbies and the governments. He has intitiated the start of an investigation by that body concerning the role played by the pharmaceutical industry in the campaign of panic about the virus.
Ex-member of the SPD, Wolfgang Wodarg is a doctor and epidemiologist. His request for a commission of inquiry into the role of pharmaceutical companies in the management of swine flu outbreak by WHO and the nation states was granted unanimously by the members of the Health Committee of the Council of Europe…
What made you suspicious about the influence of pharmaceutical companies had on the decisions being taken in respect of swine flu?
Wolfgang Wodarg. We are facing a major failure of national institutions responsible for warning about risks and responding in case a pandemic occurs. In April when the first alarm came from Mexico I was very surprised at the figures furnished by the World Health Organization (WHO) to justify the declaration of a pandemic. I was immediately suspicious: the numbers were very low and the alarm level very high. They were not even into a thousand patients when there was already talk of the pandemic of the century. And the alert was decreed extreme based on the fact that the virus was new. But the characteristic of influenza disease is to develop very quickly with viruses which take on new forms each time, by dwelling in new hosts, animal, human etc.
There was nothing new in itself to that. Each year a new virus of this “flu” type appears. In reality there was no reason to sound the alarm at this level. This was only possible because in early May the WHO changed its definition of a pandemic. Before that date there had to be not only a disease which had broke out in several countries at once but also one that had very serious consequences with the number of deaths above the usual average. This aspect was removed from the new definition, to retain the rate of spread of disease as the only criteria. And they claimed that the virus was dangerous because people had not been able to develop immunity against it. Which was false for this virus. Because it was observed that people aged over 60 years already had antibodies. That is to say they had already been in contact with similar viruses. That is why also there are virtually no people aged over 60 who have developed the disease. Yet those were the people who were recommended to be vaccinated quickly.
Among the things that aroused my suspicions there was therefore on one side this determination to sound the alarm. And on the other side, some curious facts. Such as, for example, the recommendation by WHO to carry out two injections for vaccines. That had never been done before. There was no scientific justification for this. There was also the recommendation to use only special patented vaccines. There was however no reason for not adding, as it is done every year, specific antiviral particles of this new H1N1 virus, “completing” the vaccine used for seasonal influenza. This was not done because they preferred to use patented vaccine materials that major laboratories had designed and manufactured to be ready in case of a pandemic developing. And by proceeding in this way they did not hesitate to endanger the persons vaccinated.
What danger?
Wolfgang Wodarg. To provide products rapidly, adjuvants were used in some vaccines, whose effects have not been adequately tested. In other words, they wanted absolutely to use these new patented products instead of developing vaccines according to traditional methods of production which are much simpler, more reliable and less costly. There was no medical reason for this. It was only for marketing purposes.
How could anyone justify that?
Wolfgang Wodarg. To understand we must return to the episode of avian influenza from 2005 to 2006. It was then that new international plans were defined for dealing with a pandemic alarm. These plans were officially developed to ensure rapid manufacturing of vaccines in case of an alert. This led to negotiations between pharmaceutical companies and governments. On the one hand the labs committed themselves to keep ready to develop the preparations, on the other hand, states assured them they would buy them all. After this strange deal the pharmaceutical industry took no economic risk by engaging in new fabrications. And it was sure to touch the jack pot in the case of a pandemic outbreak.
Do you disagree with the diagnoses and even the potential severity of influenza A?
Wolfgang Wodarg. Yes, it’s just a normal kind of flu. It does not cause a tenth of deaths caused by the classic seasonal flu. All that mattered and that led to the great campaign of panic which we have seen was that it was a golden opportunity for representatives from labs who knew they would hit the jackpot in the case of a pandemic being declared.
Those are very serious accusations you’re making. How was such a process made possible within the WHO?
Wolfgang Wodarg. A group of people in the WHO is associated very closely with the pharmaceutical industry.
Will the investigation by the Council of Europe also work in this direction?
Wolfgang Wodarg. We want to clarify everything that brought about this massive operation of disinformation. We want to know who made decisions, on the basis of what evidence and precisely how the influence of the pharmaceutical industry came to bear on the decision-making. And the time has come at last for us to make demands on governments. The purpose of the inquiry is so that there are no more false alarms of this type in the future. So that the people may rely on the analysis and the expertise of national and international public institutions. The latter are now discredited, because millions of people have been vaccinated with products with inherent possible health risks. This was not necessary. It has also led to a considerable mismanagement of public money.
Do you have any concrete figures on the extent of this mismanagement?
Wolfgang Wodarg. In Germany it comes to 700 million euros. But it is very difficult to know the exact figures because we are talking on one side about vaccines resold to foreign countries and most firms do not communicate due to the principle of respect for “business secret” regarding the amounts in contracts concluded with States and any indemnification clauses contained therein.
Will the work of “lobbying” by pharma companies on the National Institutes of Health also be dealt with by the investigation of the Council of Europe?
Wolfgang Wodarg. Yes we will examine the attitude of institutions like the Robert Koch Institute in Germany or Pasteur in France who should in fact have advised their governments from a critical standpoint. In some countries certain institutions have done so. In Finland and Poland, for example, critical voices were raised to say: “we do not need that.
Has the tremendous global operation of disinformation also been possible because the pharmaceutical industry had “representatives” even within the governments of the most powerful countries?
Wolfgang Wodarg. As regards the ministries, that seems to me to be obvious. I can not explain how specialists, very smart people who know the problems of the influenza disease by heart, did not notice what was happening.
So what happened?
Wolfgang Wodarg. Without going as far as saying direct corruption, which I am certain does exist, there were many ways for labs to exercise their influence over decisions. A very concrete example, is how Klaus Stöhr, who was the head of the epidemiological department of the WHO at the time of bird flu, and who therefore prepared the plans to cope with a pandemic that I mentioned above, in the meantime had become a top executive of the company Novartis. And similar links between Glaxo and Baxter, etc. and influential members of the WHO. These large firms have “their people” in the cogs and then they pull strings so that the right policy decisions are taken. That is to say, the ones that will allow them to pump as much money from taxpayers.
But if your survey succeeds, will it not be a support for citizens to insist their governments demand accountability from these large groups?
Wolfgang Wodarg. Yes, you’re right, this is one of the major issues related to this investigation. States could indeed take advantage of this to contest contracts drawn up in, let us say, improper conditions. If it can be shown that it was under the influence of firms that the process was initiated then they will have to be push to ask for reimbursement. But that’s just the financial side, there is also the human side, persons who were vaccinated with products that were inadequately tested.
So what kind of risk have these healthy people unknowingly taken by getting vaccinated?
Wolfgang Wodarg. Again, the vaccines were developed too quickly, some adjuvants were insufficiently tested. But there is worse to come. The vaccine developed by Novartis was produced in a bioreactor from cancerous cells. A technique that had never been used until now.
Why, I’m obviously not an expert, but how can one claim to make a vaccine from diseased cells?
Wolfgang Wodarg. Normally one uses chicken eggs on which viruses are grown. We need in fact to work on living cells. Because viruses can only multiply in this way and so do, by definition, the virus preparations that go with it. But this process has a big flaw, it is slow and it takes a lot of eggs. And it is long and complex technically. Another potentially excellent technique is to grow the virus in living cells in bioreactors. This requires cells which grow and divide very quickly. It’s a bit like the method used to culture yogurt, which is also produced in a bio-reactor. but in this context the cell was so upset in its environment and its growth that it grows like a cancer cell. And it is on these rapidly multiplying cells that they grow the virus. But to manufacture the vaccine the virus must be re-extracted from these cells on which they were implanted. And it can therefore happen that during the manufacturing process of the vaccine, residue of cancerous cells remain in the preparation. In the same way as it happens in conventional manufacturing with eggs. Thus we know that in the case of a classic influenza vaccination, side effects can occur in people who are allergic to egg albumin found in egg white. It can not be excluded that proteins, remains of a cancer cell present in a vaccine produced by bio-reactor, may generate a tumour on the person vaccinated. According to a true principle of precaution, before such a product is allowed on the market, there should therefore be 100% certainty that such effects are actually excluded.
And wasn’t this done?
Wolfgang Wodarg. It was not. The EMEA (European Medicines Agency), an institution under the responsibility of the European Commissioner for Economic Affairs, based in London, which gives permission to release vaccines on the market in Europe, gave the green light for commercializing this product arguing, namely, that this mode of manufacture was not a “significant” risk. This was very differently appreciated by many experts here in Germany and by an independent drug institution, which instead sounded the alert and voiced their objections. I took these warnings seriously. I studied the case and intervened in the context of the Bundestag health committee of which I was a member so that the vaccine would not be used in Germany. I made it known that I was certainly not opposed to the development of vaccines with this technique. But first it had to have a total guarantee of innocuousness. The product has therefore not been used in Germany where the government terminated the contract with Novartis.
What is the name of this vaccine?
Wolfgang Wodarg. Obta flu.
But that means that in other European countries like France the product can be marketed without any problem?
Wolfgang Wodarg. Yes, it obtained permission from EMEA and can be used anywhere in the EU.
What alternative do you intend to propose so that further scandals of this type are avoided?
Wolfgang Wodarg. The WHO should be more transparent, so we know clearly who decides and what type of relationship exists between participants in the organization. It should also be flanked by at least one elected chamber, which should be able to react very critically and where everyone can express themselves. This enhanced public scrutiny is essential.
Isn’t the question of another system capable of handling a matter which is in fact a common good for citizens across the planet coming to the surface?
Wolfgang Wodarg. Can we go on allowing the production of vaccines and the conduct of these productions to organizations whose goal is to win as much money as possible? Or is the production of vaccines not something that States must absolutely monitor and implement themselves? That’s why I think we should abandon the system of patents on vaccines. That is to say, the possibility of monopolization of vaccine production by a large group. For this option requires that we sacrifice thousands of lives, simply in the name of respect for these monopoly rights. You’re right, that particular claim has become evident for me.
Interview by Bruno Odent translated into English by Carolyn Dunning.
To read the original article in French click here
Council of Europe’s motion for a recommendation: Faked Pandemics — a threat for health
Referendum pitched on Icesave row
Press TV – January 5, 2010 15:52:12 GMT
Tension is growing between Iceland, Britain and the Netherlands over Reykjavik’s refusal to pay compensation to foreign account holders in the country’s Icesave bank which collapsed in 2008.
Icelandic President Olafur Grimsson once again cast doubt on the repayment of more than €3.8bn (£3.4bn) to British and Dutch nationals, refraining from signing a controversial bill narrowly passed by parliament late last year which ratifies the reimbursement.
Grimsson maintains as the legislation has sparked a deepening public anger, the question must be put to the nation through a referendum, citing the country’s constitution.
“The cornerstone of Iceland’s constitution is that the nation is the highest judge for the validity of law. Now the nation has the power and the responsibility in its hands,” Grimsson said.
The announcement drew reproof from London and Amsterdam, which paid compensations to Icesave account holders after the online bank, part of Landsbanki, collapsed.
Finance ministries in both countries suggested Iceland would have no choice but to pay back the money.
“The UK government expects Iceland to live up to its obligations.” AFP quoted a British Treasury spokesperson as saying. “The Treasury will consult with colleagues in Iceland to understand why this bill has not been passed and will work with them, the Netherlands and within the EU to resolve this issue as soon as possible.”
“We are extremely disappointed…The Netherlands maintains that Iceland is compelled to pay back the money,” Finance Ministry spokesman Ruud Slotboom told the agency.
Iceland’s economy took a hard blow from the global financial crisis and opponents of the bill are arguing it cannot afford the repayments.
However, if the country fails to pay the money, its access to $4.6bn (£2.9bn) in promised bailout funds from the International Monetary Fund and Nordic countries may be jeopardized, aside from the influence of the issue on the country’s bids to join the European Union.
European Parliament to Investigate WHO and “Pandemic” Scandal
By F. William Engdahl | December 31, 2009
The Council of Europe member states will launch an inquiry in January 2010 on the influence of the pharmaceutical companies on the global swine flu campaign, focusing especially on extent of the pharma‘s industry’s influence on WHO. The Health Committee of the EU Parliament has unanimously passed a resolution calling for the inquiry. The step is a long-overdue move to public transparency of a “Golden Triangle” of drug corruption between WHO, the pharma industry and academic scientists that has permanently damaged the lives of millions and even caused death.
The parliament motion was introduced by Dr. Wolfgang Wodarg, former SPD Member of the German Bundestag and now Chairman of the European Parliament Health Committee. Wodarg is a medical doctor and epidemiologist, a specialist in lung disease and environmental medicine, who considers the current “pandemic” Swine Flu campaign of the WHO to be “one of the greatest medicine scandals of the Century.”[1]
The text of the resolution just passed by a sufficient number in the Council of Europe Parliament says among other things, “In order to promote their patented drugs and vaccines against flu, pharmaceutical companies influenced scientists and official agencies, responsible for public health standards to alarm governments worldwide and make them squander tight health resources for inefficient vaccine strategies and needlessly expose millions of healthy people to the risk of an unknown amount of side-effects of insufficiently tested vaccines. The “bird-flu”-campaign (2005/06) combined with the “swine-flu”-campaign seem to have caused a great deal of damage not only to some vaccinated patients and to public health-budgets, but to the credibility and accountability of important international health-agencies.”[2]
The Parliamentary inquiry will look into the issue of „falsified pandemic“ that was declared by WHO in June 2009 on the advice of its group of academic experts, SAGE, many of whose members have been documented to have intense financial ties to the same pharmaceutical giants such as GlaxoSmithKline, Roche, Novartis, who benefit from the production of drugs and untested H1N1 vaccines. They will investigate the influence of the pharma industry in creation of a worldwide campaign against the so-called H5N1 “Avian Flu” and H1N1 Swine Flu. The inquiry will be given “urgent” priority in the general assembly of the parliament.
In his official statement to the Committee, Wodarg criticized the influence of the pharma industry on scientists and officials of WHO, stating that it has led to the situation where “unnecessarily millions of healthy people are exposed to the risk of poorly tested vaccines,” and that, for a flu strain that is “vastly less harmful” than all previous flu epidemics.
Wodarg says the role of the WHO and its the pandemic emergency declaration in June needs to be the special focus of the European Parliamentary inquiry. For the first time, the WHO criteria for a pandemic was changed in April 2009 as the first Mexico cases were reported, to make not the actual risk of a disease but the number of cases of the disease basis to declare “Pandemic.” By classifying the swine flu as pandemic, nations were compelled to implement pandemic plans and also the purchase swine flu vaccines. Because WHO is not subject to any parliamentary control, Wodarg argues it is necessary for governments to insist on accountability. The inquiry will also to look at the role of the two critical agencies in Germany issuing guidelines on the pandemic, the Paul-Ehrlich and the Robert-Koch Institute.
Bravo!
Nigeria resumes massacres
By Rafiu Oriyomi | IslamOnline.net | September 10, 2009
LAGOS — Nigerian police have been accused of indiscriminate arrest and harassment against Muslims across the country since clashes with the militant Boko Haram group killed at least 600 people…
In July, Boko Haram, a militant group opposed to anything modeled after the West, went on rampage in three north-western states attacking police stations and other facilities.
A massive security operation resulted in the killing of hundreds of militants including their leader Mohammed Yusuf and alleged financiers.
There have since been reports of constant police harassment of Muslims on the streets across the country.
“What qualified me for this wicked charge is my beard and attire,” fumed Saleh, 29, who met a number of other Muslims at the police station, arrested on the same charge.
“What this means is that all Muslims are members of the Boko Haram,” he stressed.
“And if that is the case, then there is a danger lurking around because we won’t take this from the government.”
[…]
The harassment is not limited to Borno or Yobe. Earlier this week, at least 11 bearded Muslims were rounded up by policemen at Ijaiye, a suburb of Lagos, on charges that they are members of Boko Haram.
Sulaiman Idris, one of the detainees who police said will be charged on illegal association and terrorism related charges, told IOL he was going to work when arrested.
“I can’t remember doing anything contrary to the law,” a tearful Idris sobbed, alleging torture.
He said others are going through the same ordeal.
“I have known Idris as a peace-loving Muslim who keeps beard and wears short trousers. His arrest is a slap on fundamental human rights,” said Shakirat Adedo, a work colleague.
“I’m told 11 of them were arrested. I think this is getting out of hand.”
When contacted, Lagos Police spokesman Frank Mba denied knowledge of the arrests and pledged to investigate the matter.
Two Muslim journalists working for the Lagos-based Islamic publication Al-Minbar were arrested last week and are still being detained in Yaba.
The arrest is linked to publishing an article entitled “Every Muslim Is A Boko Haram,” in response to police action.
Money for Justice
What adds insult to injury is that Muslims have to buy their freedom from police custody.
Asked how he regained his freedom, Saleh said his relatives “had to pay through their noses to get me released.”
“This means the Nigerian police want to hide under the Boko Haram incidence to feed fat on us,” he charged.
Mallam Zakari Adamu, Chairman of the Movement of Justice in Nigeria (MOJIN) Yobe chapter, confirmed the ugly trend.
“Our great problem is that if your innocent relation is detained for alleged involvement in Boko Haram, if you don’t have money to give him, you then sacrifice him or her to remain in cell,” he told IOL.
“Even when they have finished their interrogation and find him not guilty, you still have to bribe for him to regain his freedom,” contended the rights activist.
“I know of a boy who was shot; he is an innocent businessman. His father told us that he has spent N240,000 yet he could not even see the face of his son, this is unjust.”
Muslim Rights Concern (MURIC), a countrywide network of Islamic activists, is raising the issue with the government, warning that the clampdown could trigger another bout of violence…
Update – Press TV – December 29, 2009
Thirty-eight members of the Boko Haram extremist group, including their leader, have been killed in clashes with a joint military-police force in the city of Bauchi in northern Nigeria.
Bauchi Police Chief Atikur Kafur told reporters on Monday that one soldier and two innocent people were among the dead in the Zango district of the city. He added that 14 people were also injured.
Twenty suspected militants were arrested, including nine adults and 11 juveniles.
The police chief identified the Boko Haram leader as Malam Badamasi.
Germans lose faith in political system
A poll shows that the German public now has less faith in their political system than at any other time since World War II, mainly due to the financial crisis.
The survey conducted by Bertelsmann Foundation found on Sunday that about 70 percent of those questioned did not feel that they could count on their political and business leaders, or the education system and the social welfare network.
Nearly fifty percent of respondents said they have reservations about representative democracy as a political system.
“Even the social market economy is far from being seen as positively as it once was,” opinion researcher Peter Kruse said of Germany’s system of free markets with a strong social safety net.
The loss of faith is believed to be mainly due to what Germans see as their government’s inadequate attempt to revive the slumping economy.
The poll also shows that the EUR 8.5 billion (USD12.2 billion) tax relief package passed by parliament this month has unsettled Germans at a time of record public debt.
Aletho News 