Amanda Knox has been freed and while the case may continue to be hotly debated in the Italian press, commentators in the US and Britain are overwhelmingly of the opinion that justice has been done. The Knox case, “was a textbook example of our never-ending fascination with the supposed femme…
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Furious archbishop warns ruling ANC to ‘watch out’ after Tibetan spiritual leader is denied visa to attend birthday party Archbishop Desmond Tutu, visibly shaking with anger, compared the South African government unfavourably with the apartheid regime and threatened to pray for the downfall of the African National Congress (ANC) yesterday after the Dalai Lama said he was forced to pull out of Tutu’s 80th birthday celebrations because he had not been granted an entry visa. “Our government is worse than the apartheid government because at least you would expect it with the apartheid government,” Tutu told a press conference in Cape Town. “Our government we expect to be sensitive to the sentiments of our constitution.” In a tirade that stunned South African journalists, he went on: “Let the ANC know they have a large majority. Well, Mubarak had a large majority, Gaddafi had a large majority. I am warning you: watch out. Watch out. “Our government – representing me! – says it will not support Tibetans being viciously oppressed by China. You, president Zuma and your government, do not represent me. I am warning you, as I warned the [pro-apartheid] nationalists, one day we will pray for the defeat of the ANC government.” Tutu had invited his fellow Nobel peace laureate to deliver a lecture to mark his milestone birthday in Cape Town on Friday. Officials from the archbishop emeritus’s office started the visa application processin June but met a series of bureaucratic delays . On Tuesday the Dalai Lama’s office finally gave up on the application for the 76-year-old. “His holiness was to depart for South Africa on 6 October, but visas have not been granted yet,” a spokesperson for the office said. “We are, therefore, now convinced that, for whatever reason or reasons, the South African government finds it inconvenient to issue a visa to … the Dalai Lama.” Tutu said he was still struggling to make sense of what had happened. “I have to say I can’t believe it, I really can’t believe it,” he exclaimed. “Wake me up and tell me this is actually happening here. It’s quite unbelievable. The discourtesy they have shown to the Dalai Lama. The Dalai Lama! “The Dalai Lama, anywhere in the world, they have problems finding a venue that can contain the people who want him. He goes to New York and Central Park is overflowing. The discourtesy is mindblowing.” Asked if he felt the Tibetan spiritual leader had in effect been banned from the country, Tutu replied: “To all intents and purposes, yes. This is the Dalai Lama. Incredible. “Many, many people are appalled in many parts of the world, especially people who supported us during the struggle. They are weeping and saying, ‘South Africa? It can’t be.’” Tutu’s daughter, Mpho, said the government’s actions had not matched “what we dreamed we would be, who we hoped we would become as a country and as a people”. Clearly overcome with emotion, she added: “It is with great sadness that we sit here.” A candlelit vigil outside the South African parliament in Cape Town on Monday drew about 250 people demanding the Tibetan spiritual leader be allowed into the country. There was bitter disappointment on Tuesday morning when it was announced that the eight-day trip had been called off. Civil rights activists blamed the government. Ela Gandhi , who planned to present the Dalai Lama with a peace prize in the name of her grandfather, Mahatma Gandhi, said: “I’m very disappointed. We were looking forward to him coming and to presenting the award. I really feel the whole situation has been handled so badly. It’s discourteous for a person of his stature to be told to wait for so long. For a person of peace to be treated like this is wrong.” She added: “Everybody thinks this is because of pressure from China. It’s very sad another country is allowed to dictate terms to our government. It’s going back to apartheid times. I am ashamed of my own country.” South African foreign ministry officials have consistently denied accusations they have been bowing to pressure from Beijing. Asked for his reaction to the Dalai Lama’s decision, a spokesman, Clayson Monyela, said: “We don’t have a reaction. He’s cancelled his trip and that’s it. We have not said no. We’ve not refused him a visa; the visa was still being processed. It’s only on 20 September that he submitted his full paperwork. In some countries a visa can take two months. I don’t know why people are criticising the government.” The Dalai Lama visited South Africa in 1996, meeting Nelson Mandela, but was prevented from attending a Nobel laureates’ conference in the country two years ago , when the government said his visit would distract from World Cup preparations. At the time, Tutu called the decision disgraceful, and accused the authorities of bowing to pressure from China. South Africa’s official opposition has added its voice to the criticism of the stalled visa. Stevens Mokgalapa, shadow deputy foreign minister for the Democratic Alliance, said: “The inescapable conclusion is that the South African government has predictably strung the Dalai Lama along to make it impossible for him to plan his trip. That way it could avoid making a decision that would either upset the Chinese or upset millions of peace-loving South Africans and citizens around the globe. “But by delaying [the visa decision] the government made its choice: it allowed China to dictate foreign policy. This is a sad day for those of us who believe in a sovereign foreign policy based on ubuntu [a humanist philosophy] and human rights. It is not acceptable that the government has allowed a breach of this sovereignty by bowing to pressure from a foreign power.” While the Dalai Lama is excluded, other leading international activists will join three days of birthday events. The U2 singer Bono is expected to speak at the launch of a biography, Tutu: The Authorised Portrait, in Cape Town on Thursday. Bono has also reportedly been invited to join former the US president Jimmy Carter, the former UN secretary general Kofi Annan, and the British businessman Richard Branson at a picnic at a vineyard on Friday. A public church commemoration will be held earlier that day. South Africa Africa Tibet Dalai Lama David Smith guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Furious archbishop warns ruling ANC to ‘watch out’ after Tibetan spiritual leader is denied visa to attend birthday party Archbishop Desmond Tutu, visibly shaking with anger, compared the South African government unfavourably with the apartheid regime and threatened to pray for the downfall of the African National Congress (ANC) yesterday after the Dalai Lama said he was forced to pull out of Tutu’s 80th birthday celebrations because he had not been granted an entry visa. “Our government is worse than the apartheid government because at least you would expect it with the apartheid government,” Tutu told a press conference in Cape Town. “Our government we expect to be sensitive to the sentiments of our constitution.” In a tirade that stunned South African journalists, he went on: “Let the ANC know they have a large majority. Well, Mubarak had a large majority, Gaddafi had a large majority. I am warning you: watch out. Watch out. “Our government – representing me! – says it will not support Tibetans being viciously oppressed by China. You, president Zuma and your government, do not represent me. I am warning you, as I warned the [pro-apartheid] nationalists, one day we will pray for the defeat of the ANC government.” Tutu had invited his fellow Nobel peace laureate to deliver a lecture to mark his milestone birthday in Cape Town on Friday. Officials from the archbishop emeritus’s office started the visa application processin June but met a series of bureaucratic delays . On Tuesday the Dalai Lama’s office finally gave up on the application for the 76-year-old. “His holiness was to depart for South Africa on 6 October, but visas have not been granted yet,” a spokesperson for the office said. “We are, therefore, now convinced that, for whatever reason or reasons, the South African government finds it inconvenient to issue a visa to … the Dalai Lama.” Tutu said he was still struggling to make sense of what had happened. “I have to say I can’t believe it, I really can’t believe it,” he exclaimed. “Wake me up and tell me this is actually happening here. It’s quite unbelievable. The discourtesy they have shown to the Dalai Lama. The Dalai Lama! “The Dalai Lama, anywhere in the world, they have problems finding a venue that can contain the people who want him. He goes to New York and Central Park is overflowing. The discourtesy is mindblowing.” Asked if he felt the Tibetan spiritual leader had in effect been banned from the country, Tutu replied: “To all intents and purposes, yes. This is the Dalai Lama. Incredible. “Many, many people are appalled in many parts of the world, especially people who supported us during the struggle. They are weeping and saying, ‘South Africa? It can’t be.’” Tutu’s daughter, Mpho, said the government’s actions had not matched “what we dreamed we would be, who we hoped we would become as a country and as a people”. Clearly overcome with emotion, she added: “It is with great sadness that we sit here.” A candlelit vigil outside the South African parliament in Cape Town on Monday drew about 250 people demanding the Tibetan spiritual leader be allowed into the country. There was bitter disappointment on Tuesday morning when it was announced that the eight-day trip had been called off. Civil rights activists blamed the government. Ela Gandhi , who planned to present the Dalai Lama with a peace prize in the name of her grandfather, Mahatma Gandhi, said: “I’m very disappointed. We were looking forward to him coming and to presenting the award. I really feel the whole situation has been handled so badly. It’s discourteous for a person of his stature to be told to wait for so long. For a person of peace to be treated like this is wrong.” She added: “Everybody thinks this is because of pressure from China. It’s very sad another country is allowed to dictate terms to our government. It’s going back to apartheid times. I am ashamed of my own country.” South African foreign ministry officials have consistently denied accusations they have been bowing to pressure from Beijing. Asked for his reaction to the Dalai Lama’s decision, a spokesman, Clayson Monyela, said: “We don’t have a reaction. He’s cancelled his trip and that’s it. We have not said no. We’ve not refused him a visa; the visa was still being processed. It’s only on 20 September that he submitted his full paperwork. In some countries a visa can take two months. I don’t know why people are criticising the government.” The Dalai Lama visited South Africa in 1996, meeting Nelson Mandela, but was prevented from attending a Nobel laureates’ conference in the country two years ago , when the government said his visit would distract from World Cup preparations. At the time, Tutu called the decision disgraceful, and accused the authorities of bowing to pressure from China. South Africa’s official opposition has added its voice to the criticism of the stalled visa. Stevens Mokgalapa, shadow deputy foreign minister for the Democratic Alliance, said: “The inescapable conclusion is that the South African government has predictably strung the Dalai Lama along to make it impossible for him to plan his trip. That way it could avoid making a decision that would either upset the Chinese or upset millions of peace-loving South Africans and citizens around the globe. “But by delaying [the visa decision] the government made its choice: it allowed China to dictate foreign policy. This is a sad day for those of us who believe in a sovereign foreign policy based on ubuntu [a humanist philosophy] and human rights. It is not acceptable that the government has allowed a breach of this sovereignty by bowing to pressure from a foreign power.” While the Dalai Lama is excluded, other leading international activists will join three days of birthday events. The U2 singer Bono is expected to speak at the launch of a biography, Tutu: The Authorised Portrait, in Cape Town on Thursday. Bono has also reportedly been invited to join former the US president Jimmy Carter, the former UN secretary general Kofi Annan, and the British businessman Richard Branson at a picnic at a vineyard on Friday. A public church commemoration will be held earlier that day. South Africa Africa Tibet Dalai Lama David Smith guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …The Transportation Security Administration has apologized for an incident in which a breast cancer patient was subjected to a TSA pat-down that she says she found “insulting” and “humiliating.” Lori Dorn wrote about the experience on her blog. She described how, after walking through an image scanner at New York’s John F. Kennedy Airport, she
Continue reading …The Transportation Security Administration has apologized for an incident in which a breast cancer patient was subjected to a TSA pat-down that she says she found “insulting” and “humiliating.” Lori Dorn wrote about the experience on her blog. She described how, after walking through an image scanner at New York’s John F. Kennedy Airport, she
Continue reading …The Transportation Security Administration has apologized for an incident in which a breast cancer patient was subjected to a TSA pat-down that she says she found “insulting” and “humiliating.” Lori Dorn wrote about the experience on her blog. She described how, after walking through an image scanner at New York’s John F. Kennedy Airport, she
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‘It can’t be a good thing for London to be sleepwalking towards Johannesburg’, conference warned London’s schools are “sleepwalking” into segregation, with classrooms in some parts of the capital teaching almost exclusively black or Asian pupils, a leading headteacher has warned. David Levin, vice-chair of the Headmasters’ and Headmistresses’ Conference (HMC) – an association of 250 public schools and leading private schools – said he was alarmed at the way the capital was dividing into ghettoes and “becoming a silo society”. Levin, who grew up in South Africa under apartheid, said his school, City of London school for boys, collaborated with one school, Stepney Green in east London, where 97% of pupils were of Bangladeshi heritage. Other schools, in south London, took an “overwhelmingly” high proportion of pupils of west African descent, he said. Speaking at the beginning of the HMC annual conference in St Andrews, Scotland, Levin said it “can’t be a good thing for London to be sleepwalking towards Johannesburg”. He added: “They aren’t mixing with people from different faiths and backgrounds. I have lived pre- and post-apartheid and one of the things I have learnt is that your imagination is stronger than the reality. If you know people who are different to you, you don’t fear them.” He said education could bring children together. His school, where fees are £4,350 a term, holds private tutoring sessions for boys from Stepney Green in physics, chemistry, maths and English once a week. He said the state school would “enjoy having pupils from different backgrounds and races”. Meanwhile, Kenneth Durham, chair of the HMC and head of University College school in north London, urged the public to “take the independent sector seriously” and not to dismiss the schools as a “special interest group”. He said: “It is time that, as a nation, we stopped regarding the independent education sector as some peculiar historical aberration, as a repository of outdated social privilege, a sort of irrelevant and slightly embarrassing annex to our national education system and recognised it is something very different to that.” Durham said a quarter of pupils at private schools were from ethnic minorities and 40% of parents had not themselves been privately educated. Race in education Schools Secondary schools Race issues London Jessica Shepherd guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Some island groups in the South Pacific, already in danger of being swamped by rising seas, have run out of fresh water. Tuvalu and Tokelau have declared states of emergency because of the water crisis, caused by six months of low or no rainfall and by groundwater becoming contaminated with…
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Fed chairman blames euro crisis, uncertainty over jobs market and political battles in Washington for gloomy economic outlook Federal reserve chairman Ben Bernanke has warned that US economic recovery is “close to faltering”, and that a “disorderly” default in the Greek debt would have a serious impact. In testimony to Congress, Bernanke was repeatedly quizzed about the impact of the European crisis on America. He said the US was an “innocent bystander” in the eurozone debt standoff and that US banks were not heavily exposed to Europe’s most troubled economies. But he warned that Europe’s economic woes were already having a negative impact on US stock markets. “Unless the European situation is brought under control, it could be a much more serious situation for the US economy,” he said. Bernanke also warned that political warfare in Washington was a threat to the US economy. He told the Joint Economic committee that the recent row over raising the debt ceiling had been very unhelpful at a time of increasing economic uncertainty. “It’s no way to run a railroad,” he said. In written testimony and during a question-and-answer session, Bernanke told Congress that the Federal reserve has acted forcefully to support growth and was prepared to take further action if necessary. But he warned that political infighting was a risk to the fragile US economic recovery. “Monetary policy can be a powerful tool, but it is not a panacea for the problems currently faced by the US economy,” Bernanke said. “Fostering healthy growth and job creation is a shared responsibility of all economic policymakers.” Bernanke was asked about the Occupy Wall Street protests, now in their third week in New York and spreading across the US. “I would just say that very generally people are quite unhappy about the state of the economy,” said Bernanke, and with “some justification”. “At some level I can’t blame them. Nine percent unemployment and slow growth is not a good situation,” he said. Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont asked Bernanke: “In light of the protests, did Wall Street’s greed and recklessness lead to the crisis?” Bernanke said: “Excessive risk-taking had a lot to do with it.” So did the failures of regulators, he said. Bernanke said the US economy had grown more slowly than expected, in part because of unexpected setbacks like the Japanese earthquake and Europe’s debt crisis – but also because of the US’s own problems, especially in the jobs market. “The recovery from the crisis has been much less robust than we hoped.” “Probably the most significant factor depressing consumer confidence, however, has been the poor performance of the job market,” Bernanke said. “Private payrolls rose by only about 100,000 jobs per month on average over the summer — half of the rate posted earlier in the year – and state and local governments have continued to shed jobs,” he said. Moreover, recent indicators, including new claims for unemployment insurance and surveys of hiring plans, point to the likelihood of more sluggish job growth in the period ahead, he said. “We need to make sure that the recovery continues and doesn’t drop back,” Bernanke added. US economy Ben Bernanke US economic growth and recession US unemployment and employment data European debt crisis United States Dominic Rushe guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …People who teach their children at home helped Mike Huckabee beat Mitt Romney in 2008′s Iowa caucuses, and there’s plenty of competition for the help of homeschoolers this time around, Reuters finds. In Iowa, homeschoolers are mainly Christian conservatives, and the group can provide the right candidate with a small…
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