Category: Resources

Quicklinks: 2007.11.18

18 Nov 2007 @ 21:08 GMT | Permalink | Comments

• Up To 10,000 Dead in Cyclone-Hit Bangladesh (Agence France-Presse)
• Congress Silent on Party-Sanctioned Violence, Land Dispute at Nandigram (Press Trust of India via The Hindu)
• MoD Halts West Bank Construction Permits Under U.S. Pressure (Jerusalem Post)
• Rpt.: Dying Ocean, Changing Climate, Looming Disaster (The Independent)
• Carpe Diem: Ahmadinejad Wants Dollar Replaced for OPEC (IRNA)
• France Expanding Real Champagne to Meet Global Demands (The Canadian Press)
• Cure for Mitochondrial Disease vs. Cloned Embryo From Three Parents (The Independent)
• 16,000 Bolivian Children Emigrated and Trafficked (La Nacion (Costa Rica))
• 'Katrina Cars' Showing Up in Bolivia En Masse (AP)
• Criminals Infiltrate South African Security Agencies (Cape Argus via IOL)
• Let Mugabe Stay 'Till Death; He's Not a T-Shirt! (Zimbabwe Sunday Mail [official])
• Britain to Tax Farmers to Recover Animal Disease Expenses (The Observer)
• Guerilla Thaci Wins Kosovo Vote, Vows Independence (Financial Times)
• GreenPeace, Pacific Council of Churches to Fight Climate Change (Fiji Times)
• Koreas Agree to Open North-South Railway (Chosun Ilbo)
• Chávez Certain Íngrid Betancourt Is Alive (El Tiempo [Colombia])
• UK Labor Kills Off 'Husbands' and 'Wives' From Gov't Forms (Mail on Sunday)
• Lords Face Bill Granting Equal Rights to Gay Couples (The Sunday Times [London])
• Pact With One Moro Upsets the Other (The Philippine Inquirer)

Posted by Dayhawk Kim at 21:08 | Permalink | Comments (0)
TAGGED: Bangladesh | Climate Change | Disaster | Equal Rights | Trafficking

Westerners Challenge 'Yummy' Dolphin Meat

10 Nov 2007 @ 00:30 GMT | Permalink | Comments

The gruesome slaughter of dolphins takes place every year. But only recently the Western media began taking notice. And those who want to protect dolphins and whales are just now exploring a new strategy--informing the Japanese people.

The Sydney Morning Herald today tells a story about how dolphins are scared into a tiny cove in Taiji, Japan, and then killed by drowning them. Nigel Barker, who documented the slaughter, describes a horrific death scene as the dolphins drown.

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Posted by Dayhawk Kim at 00:30 | Permalink | Comments (0)
TAGGED: Dolphins | Japan | Mammals | Maritime | Whaling

By the Numbers: Democratic Republic of Congo

09 Oct 2007 @ 12:12 GMT | Permalink | Comments (2)

The Democratic Republic of Congo (former Belgian Congo, Congo-Kinshasa) could go up in flames for the third time unless rebel militia groups and gangs roaming the eastern provinces are stopped. The Enough Project has concrete policy recommendations to end the violence.

75 was the age of the oldest gang-rape patient at Dr. Denis Mukwege's hospital in Bukavu, Congo.

3 was the age of the youngest rape patient at Panzi Hospital.

8,000 sexual assault victims will seek treatment at Malteser International clinics in eastern Congo this year.

70 percent of women in Shabunda, a Congolese village, were raped or otherwise sexually assaulted.

27,000 sexual assault cases were reported just in South Kivu Province in 2006.

18,275 U.N. troops in the Congo have been unable to stop the wholesale brutality.

15 is the age when boys face the highest risk of being forcibly recruited into a ragtag militia.

3.9 million people died from the conflict between 1998 and 2004.

1,250 'excess deaths' per day was recorded during the same period.

1.2 million people will have been displaced by the end of this year.

Sources

• UN tries to feed Congo civilians cut off by combat (Reuters)

• Congo, the Democratic Republic of the (UNHCR)
• Mortality in the Democratic Republic of Congo: a nationwide survey (The Lancet)
• Congo: Nearly 4 Million Dead in 6 Year Conflict (IRC)
• DRC: Thousands of youth risk forced recruitment into militia (IRIN)
• Rape Epidemic Raises Trauma of Congo War (New York Times)

Posted by Dayhawk Kim at 12:12 | Permalink | Comments (2)
TAGGED: Abuse | Congo | D.R.C. | Peace | Rape | Sexual Assault | Shortage | War

YouTube.com a Law Enforcement Tool

21 Dec 2006 @ 15:53 GMT | Permalink | Comments

Police in Hamilton, Ontario, used YouTube to help catch a murderer.

Police in Hamilton, Ontario, a Toronto suburb, are touting YouTube.com as an 'effective crime fighting tool,' after it helped catch a murder suspect.

YouTube, acquired recently by Google, has become a symbol of the distributed power online and viral marketing. The online video site, along with MySpace, was named as a driving force behind the transformation of the Internet to a user-driven world capable of affecting change. (Hence, 'You' are the TIME Person of the Year.)

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Posted by Dayhawk Kim at 15:53 | Permalink | Comments (0)
TAGGED: Canada | Crime | Internet | Technology | Web 2.0

Early Warning: Locust Could Decimate African Crops

12 Oct 2006 @ 13:11 GMT | Permalink | Comments

Caged desert locusts at the National Locust Center in Agadir, Morocco. (Photo courtesy FAO) Watch a Swarm of Locusts From the 2004 Plague in Mauritania (mpeg)

The Food and Agriculture Organization [FAO] is sounding an alarm bell over the possibility of another devastating desert locust infestations across the Sahel, as it experiments with new biological weapons to deal with the pest. Eggs will hatch next week.

Swarms of desert locusts pose a threat to food security in Africa, where last year's infestations devastated crops and triggered food shortage for millions. Three million people went hungry in Niger as a result of the locusts.

This year, the F.A.O. has been experimenting with a promising eco-friendly biological weapon against the locusts, which can cross the Atlantic in 10 days.

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Posted by Dayhawk Kim at 13:11 | Permalink | Comments (0)
TAGGED: Food | Locust | Mauritania | Plague | Shortage

Failed States Index 2006 Shows Countries At Risk

06 Jul 2006 @ 13:21 GMT | Permalink | Comments

Failed States Index 2006 shows which countries are at risk of going belly-up.

Sudan topped the second annual Failed States Index [FSI], published by The Fund for Peace and the Foreign Policy journal. Zimbabwe, however, saw the steepest slide in the index.

We've established that we like development statistics that are easy to read and understand. F.S.I. 2006 is not as visually appealing, but its 12 indicators provide another standardized way at interpreting how states evolve or devolve.

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Posted by Dayhawk Kim at 13:21 | Permalink | Comments (0)

U.S. Amb. Recalled Amid Prostitution Ring Probe

25 Apr 2006 @ 10:00 GMT | Permalink | Comments

There are few coincidences at Foggy Bottom. The sudden departure of Reno L. Harnish III, U.S. ambassador to Azerbaijan, from Baku today is no different. Local and regional media are rife with speculations over the human smuggling ring that trafficked young Azeri women to be sex slaves in Florida. The F.B.I. suspects an inside job. Replacing the tarnished Mr. Harnish is Anne Elizabeth Derse, a career foreign service officer who has held the rank of minister-counselor. And neither President Bush nor the State Department mentioned the dirty business, for which there is a high demand in the Sunshine State.

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Posted by Dayhawk Kim at 10:00 | Permalink | Comments (0)