British honeymoon couple Ben and Catherine Mullany were murdered on the holiday island of Antigua Two men were convicted today of murdering British honeymoon couple Ben and Catherine Mullany on the holiday island of Antigua. Kaniel Martin, 23, and Avie Howell, 20, shot the Mullanys in their chalet in 2008. The pair, who refused to face questioning in court, had protested their innocence throughout their two month long trial, which saw more than 90 witnesses give evidence. But the men were found guilty by a jury in Antigua’s High Court in St John’s today. Mr and Mrs Mullany were both shot in the back of the head during a dawn raid at their luxury hotel chalet on the holiday island in 2008. Mr Mullany, a student physiotherapist, and Mrs Mullany, a doctor, who were staying in the five-star Cocos Hotel, had only been married just over two weeks. Mrs Mullany died instantly. Mr Mullany was flown back home to south Wales in a desperate attempt to save his life. But despite the efforts of his wife’s medical colleagues in Swansea his life-support was turned off a week after he had been shot. The couple were buried in the grounds of the same church where they had married a little over a month previously. It has taken almost three years for their killers to be brought to justice. Two weeks after killing the newlyweds, Howell and Martin then went on to murder 43-year-old shopkeeper Woneta Anderson. Mr and Mrs Mullany’s parents broke down in tears as the jury of eight men and four delivered its verdicts – following an anxious 10 hour and 20 minute wait. The family said it would never be able to comprehend the nature of the couple’s deaths. A statement said: “There is no joy at today’s verdict, just a sense of relief that after three years of waiting there is justice for our children, and for Woneta Anderson and her family. “These two individuals can never again inflict the same anguish and devastation to any other family as they have to ours.” Antigua & Barbuda guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Sally Quinn reads Bill O’Reilly some of Anders Breivik’s Christian writings… and he still denies Norway shooter is ‘Christian’
July 27, 2011 No CommentBill O’Reilly has been blaming media bias for portraying the mass murderer from Norway, Anders Breivik a Christian. David wrote a great piece yesterday on it with ample justification for the man actually being a Christian. And let’s face it: It’s not the first time an extreme right wing Christian zealot took matters into their own hands. Anyway, truth is fiction and facts are inconveniences for O’Reilly on this story, which is awfully strange. He continued his denials of said facts and even brought on Queen of the Village, Sally Quinn, to defend his assertions. She pretty much trounced him. If the tragedy wasn’t so terrible I would say that BIllO’s claims are absurdly hysterical for their blatant disregard for the facts. After Quinn reads quotes from Anders Breivik’s own writings in which he proclaims he’s a Christian, Bill O’s only real defense was to constantly yell that “Mussolini” was not a Christian too. Huh? A C&L reader sent over an archived picture of Breivik’s Facebook page in which he clearly labels himself as a Christian and a Conservative. Some on the right will never admit the truth on this subject and it looks like Bill O’Reilly is championing their cause. enlarge Salon’s Alex Parene has even more details : Breivik chose to be baptized at age 15. He self-identified as “Christian” on his Facebook page. He thought “Christianity should recombine under the banner of a reconstituted and traditionalist Catholic Church” or, later, under a new (traditionalist) European Church. Breivik is not an American-style evangelical Christian. He is not a “fundamentalist” in that sense. Though he does identify with American cultural Christian conservatives. And he considers himself to be fighting in the name of “our Christian cultural heritage.” He supports a reconstituted Knights Templar devoted to winning a war against Islam in the name of Christianity. All of this says “Christian terrorist.” His goals — the restoration of a pure Christian world in its “traditional” home — were analogous to the stated of goals of al-Qaida. Does he go to church? Does he believe in the divinity of Jesus Christ? Is he a biblical literalist? I have no idea. There’s plenty about him that would lead a devout Christian to consider Breivik “not a ‘real’ Christian.” Here’s the thing about that: The same is true of all self-proclaimed Muslims who commit acts of terrorism. Terry Krepel at Media Matters has more.
Continue reading …
The attacks in Oslo and Utøya have changed Norway for ever and it will never again be the innocent, trusting place it once was, says novelist Jo Nesbø A few days ago, before Utøya and the government building, a friend and I were talking about how two things always go hand in hand: the joy of being alive and the sorrow that things change. That even the brightest future can never entirely make up for the fact that no roads lead back to what went before. To the innocence of childhood. To the first time you fell in love. To the scents of July, the blades of grass tickling your sweaty back as you leap from a boulder and in the next second are enveloped by the ice-cold meltwater of a Norwegian fjord, with your nose and throat filled with the taste of salt and glaciers. No road back to when you were 17 and, with 10 francs in your pocket, stood by the harbour in Cannes and watched two grown men wearing idiotic white uniforms row a woman ashore from a yacht with her poodle and credit cards, and you realised that the egalitarian society you came from was the exception and not the rule. Or you stood, wide-eyed, in front of another country’s national assembly, which was surrounded by guards carrying automatic weapons – a sight that made you shake your head with a mixture of resignation and self-satisfaction, thinking: “We don’t need that sort of thing where I come from.” Because I came from a country where fear of others had not found a foothold. A country you could leave for three months, travelling through two coups d’état , a catastrophic famine, a school massacre, two assassinations, a tsunami, and come home to read the newspapers and discover that the only thing new was the crossword puzzle. A country where everyone’s material needs were provided for when oil was discovered in the 70s, and where the political path was established right after the second world war. The consensus was overwhelming, the debates focused primarily on the best means for achieving the goals that had been agreed upon by everyone from the rightwing to the left. It was a country that thought it was best served by keeping to itself and chose to remain outside the EU, which most small countries would give their right arm to be admitted to. Ideological debates arose only when the reality of the rest of the world began to encroach, when a nation, which up until the 70s had consisted largely of people of the same ethnic and cultural background, had to decide whether their new citizens should be allowed to wear the hijab and build mosques, and when Norwegian soldiers were sent to Afghanistan and Libya. But the Norwegian self-image before 22 July 2011 was that of a virgin – nature untouched by human hands, a nation unsullied by the ills of society. An exaggeration, of course. A glance at police records is all it takes. And yet. In June I was cycling with the Norwegian prime minister, Jens Stoltenberg, and a mutual friend through the streets of Oslo, setting out for a hike on a forested mountain slope within the city limits of this big yet little city. Two bodyguards followed a few metres behind us, also on bicycles. As we stopped at an intersection for a red light, a car drove up beside the prime minister with the window rolled down. The driver called out his name. “Jens!” The fact that the Norwegian people usually speak of the nation’s top leader and even address him directly by his first name is in the tradition of the egalitarian spirit, and it has long since ceased to surprise me. “There’s a little boy here who thinks it would be cool to say hello to you,” said the man. Stoltenberg smiled and shook hands with the little boy sitting in the passenger seat. “Hi, I’m Jens.” The prime minister wearing his bike helmet. The boy wearing his seatbelt. Both of them stopped for a red light. The bodyguards waited a discreet distance behind us. Smiling. It’s an image of safety and mutual trust. Of the ordinary, idyllic Norwegian society that we all took for granted. Of what we considered normal. How could anything go wrong? We had bike helmets and seatbelts, and we were obeying the traffic rules. Of course something could go wrong. Something can always go wrong. In February the Nordic World Ski Championships were held in Oslo. The Norwegian participants performed well, and every evening more than 100,000 enthusiastic Norwegians gathered for the medal ceremonies in downtown Oslo, jubilantly celebrating. On 25 July, 150,000 of Oslo’s 600,000 citizens gathered in grief. The contrasts were striking. As were the similarities. Both events revealed the unexpected force of emotion in a nation where restraint is a national virtue and “keeping a cool head” is a standard expression, but “keeping a warm heart” is not. Even for those of us who have an automatic aversion to national self-glorification, flags, grandiose words, and expressions of joy or sorrow in large crowds of people, it makes an indelible impression when people demonstrate that they do in fact mean something – these ideas and values of the society we have inherited and more or less take for granted. It’s true that they are symbolic actions, which don’t cost the individual much, but the actions do say something. They say that we refuse to let anyone take away our sense of security and trust. That we refuse to lose this battle against fear. We have the will. And yet there is no road back to the way it was before. Yesterday I heard a man shouting in fury on a train. Before 22 July, my natural response would have been to turn around, maybe even move a little closer. This could be an interesting disagreement that might entice me to take one side or the other, after an objective assessment of the arguments. But now my automatic reaction was to look at my daughter to see whether she was safe and to look for a possible escape route for her. I hope there is reason to believe that this new response will be tempered over time. But I already know that it will never – never – disappear entirely. That date will occur every year, 22 July, and for Norwegians who are alive today, it will be a reminder for the rest of our lives that nothing can be taken for granted, in spite of the bike helmets and seatbelts. After the bomb went off – an explosion that was felt where I live in Oslo – and reports of the shootings on the island of Utøya began to come in, I asked my daughter whether she was scared. She replied by quoting something I had once said to her: “Yes, but if you’re not scared, you can’t be brave.” So if there is no road back to how things used to be, to the total, unconscious and naive fearlessness of what was untouched, there is a road forward. To be brave. To keep on as before. To turn the other cheek as we ask: “Was that all you’ve got?” To refuse to allow fear to set limits to the way we continue to build our society. • Jo Nesbø is the author of the novel The Snowman. This article was translated from the Norwegian by Tiina Nunnally. © 2011 The
Continue reading …
Click here to view this media Yes, I’m once again watching the most soul-sucking channel on earth. Fox News. Take note of this brief segment with Megyn Kelly clone Martha McCallum where they breathlessly report a Tea Party revolt to strip John Boehner of his speakership. See that “rally”? The one with the spiffy signs and stuff? Here’s a photo taken in real time: enlarge Credit: Dave Weigel Yeah. And Fox has it as some major revolt. MoveOn.org, on the other hand, had turnouts at congressional offices all over the country yesterday, and is planning a rally on the Capitol steps Thursday at noon. Will it be covered by any media at all?
Continue reading …
• Education Committee report states that the Ebacc does not improve the prospects of low-income pupils • Schools minister Nick Gibb stands by coalition plan despite calls to rethink One of the coalition’s flagship education reforms, the English Baccalaureate, has major flaws and there is no evidence that it improves the prospects of disadvantaged pupils, a powerful cross-party committee of MPs has warned. The English Baccalaureate, or Ebacc, which was introduced into league tables in January, measures the percentage of pupils who have obtained GCSE passes in traditional academic subjects. To achieve the Ebacc, a pupil must score an A* to C grade in English, maths, at least two sciences, history or geography and a modern or classical language. Ministers decided on the measurement partly out of concern that schools in low-income neighbourhoods were not encouraging their pupils to take traditional subjects, thus preventing them from obtaining places at top universities. In May, schools minister Nick Gibb told MPs that the Ebacc was a “key component” in the “overall objective of closing the attainment gap between wealthier and poorer children”. But an Education Committee inquiry into the Ebacc found no evidence that the flagship reform will improve the life chances of low-income pupils. The inquiry – which gathered evidence from more than 360 teachers, academics and educationalists – calls on ministers to rethink the Ebacc programme. “The committee fully supports the government’s stated intention to improve the attainment of the poorest young people,” the MPs argue. “However, the evidence is unclear as to whether entering more disadvantaged students for Ebacc subjects would necessarily make a significant contribution to this aim.” Japan and Singapore, whose education systems are lauded, have models that are similar to the Ebacc. But so does Germany, and its education system performs below the OECD average on some indicators, the MPs stated. The report adds: “The evidence which we received does not suggest a link … between the prescribed study of certain academic subjects and improved attainment and prospects for poorer students.” The commitee calls for ministers to state how they will monitor the performance of children who receive free school meals in relation to the Ebacc. The MPs warn that the reform could lead to teachers devoting more time to pupils who are most likely to achieve the Ebacc, which will “have a negative impact on the most vulnerable or disadvantaged young people”.The MPs said the importance of school league tables is such that headteachers are likely to direct teachers to focus their attention on so-called borderline pupils, who may narrowly miss out on the Ebacc, rather than on brighter pupils or those struggling at the bottom. The government should focus on each pupil’s progress rather than whether they pass the Ebacc, the report argues. Conservative MP Graham Stuart, the committee’s chair, said the Ebacc had generated a “mainly negative response” from teachers and academics. The report warns that the suggested subjects for study in order to obtain the Ebacc are “fairly narrow” and likely to deter pupils from taking art, music and other excluded subjects.”Academic subjects are not the only path to a successful future, and all young people, regardless of background, must continue to have opportunities to study the subjects in which they are likely to be most successful, and which pupils, parents and schools think will serve them best,” Stuart said. He went on to state that: “Our inquiry has uncovered significant issues with the Ebacc’s current composition, and there are certain subjects and qualifications where we are not clear on the rationale behind their exclusion. A focus on a fairly narrow range of subjects, demanding considerable curriculum time, is likely to have negative consequences on the uptake of other subjects.”The MPs argue that ministers were too hasty to introduce the Ebacc, and teachers were outraged when ministers told schools that January league tables for last summer’s exam results would include the measurement. Their pupils had taken their exams before the Ebacc introduction had been announced. Gibb said all children had the right to a broad and balanced education that included English, maths, science, a language and a humanity. “These academic subjects reflect the knowledge and skills young people need to progress to further study or rewarding employment,” he said. “It cannot be right that children from the poorest backgrounds are significantly less likely to have the opportunity to take GCSEs in these subjects than children from more advantaged areas. Closing the attainment gap between children from wealthier and poorer backgrounds is a key objective of the government and the Ebacc measure plays an important part in helping to deliver that objective.”According to the latest league tables, just over 4% of pupils on free school meals – a key indicator of poverty – achieved the Ebacc, compared with 17% of pupils who were not. Schools Secondary schools Vocational education Education policy Jessica Shepherd guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …
“I remember everyone asking, ‘What did you do to get so thin? You looked great.’ I looked emaciated.” — ROSARIO DAWSON, who lost weight to portray a drug addict in Rent, and is now speaking out on body image in American culture (via CNN)
Continue reading …
Click here to view this media Former Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin told the Fox Business Network Tuesday that President Barack Obama doesn’t understand the American way of doing business because of his “background.” “The President is not capable of giving the right message to deal with the problem we are facing with the bankruptcy that’s facing America if we don’t start living within our means,” she said. “The right message is that growing more debt won’t get us out of debt, and raising taxes in a time of economic woes in a bad economy is a bad idea.” “A lot of this has to do with his background, him having not been a part of the private sector and running a business or having to rely on making profit. That seems to be foreign to our President. His background and those he’s appointing don’t understand what America was built upon. His ideas are the antithesis of those things that created the prosperity in America.”
Continue reading …
Amid the chaos of the final weeks of her life, Amy Winehouse could still be entrancing, writes Alexandra Topping Sitting on the bar after closing time in her local in Camden, the lights dimmed and the doors locked, Amy Winehouse knew how to hold an audience, even before she became famous. After a night of drinks and laughter, she would perch her tiny frame on the bar, take up a guitar and sing. “Everybody would just stop and be entranced,” said Dougie Charles-Ridler, co-owner of the pub and long-time friend of the singer. In those days, Winehouse was a good-time girl with a big mouth and an attitude to match. “I remember when I first met her I asked what she did and she just said, ‘I’m a jazz singer,’ he said. “No one had ever given that response before.” But the picture friends paint of the woman she became is suffused with a different type of light. No longer able to chat to old friends undisturbed, or throw herself behind the bar to serve a few lucky punters, she would go into the pub on her own on a Monday or Tuesday, often in the quiet of an afternoon, stand in front of the jukebox and turn it up loud. “Recently she’d always be with two bouncers rather than two friends,” said veteran lads’ mag journalist Piers Hernu, who had known Winehouse through friends and the Camden scene for years. “People wouldn’t go up to her any more, she wouldn’t talk to people. She just became increasingly alienated from her own world.” She was alone, it seems, for the last night of her life. During his 40-minute eulogy at her funeral on Tuesday her father, Mitch, said the singer had stayed in her Camden Square townhouse. After seeing a doctor for a routine appointment at around 8.30pm, she played drums and sang into the early hours, until her bouncer told her to keep it down. He heard her footsteps overhead for a while, then it went quiet. When he went to check on her in the morning she appeared to be sleeping, and it was only after checking again at 4pm on Saturday afternoon that he realised she was dead. How she died remains unclear. A postmortem examination carried out on Monday proved inconclusive and, from the information released so far, the days leading up to her death seem relatively uneventful. On Friday she saw her boyfriend, the film director Reg Traviss, and they talked about the wedding they were going to. Winehouse was trying to decide what to wear. Her mother has said that at lunch on the same day the singer had seemed “out of it”, but they had spent an enjoyable day together and among the last things her daughter had said was: “I love you, Mum.” On Wednesday, the last time Charles-Ridler saw her, she seemed in good spirits. “She jumped into my arms – she hardly weighed anything – and wrapped her legs around my waist,” he said. Asking the singer if she was all right, he received a response that was typically Winehouse. “‘Course I am, darlin’,” she said, and walked off like Eric Morecambe. The same night she made a surprise public appearance with her godchild, the 15-year-old soul singer Dionne Bromfield, at the Roundhouse. The video if not painful, is uncomfortable viewing. Winehouse comes on stage and lifts Bromfield up with the force of her embrace. Then, dressed in skinny jeans and a black polo T-shirt she dances sporadically, turning to the drummer, laughing and turning away. When Bromfield briefly holds the microphone to Winehouse’s mouth, she does not sing. Some of Winehouse’s appearances this year held promise for those desperate to see the singer back to her Grammy-winning best. During a five-date tour of Brazil in January , some performances, such as a rendition of the Moulin Rouge song Boulevard of Broken Dreams , gave a tantalising glimpse of the talent that had been obscured for many years. Then, after another stint in rehab in early June, Winehouse played a seven-song set to a small group of family and friends at London’s 100 Club on 12 June. She was “coherent” and “back on form” according to according to one observer, while Mitch Winehouse, during his eulogy, called it a great night. “Her voice was good, her wit and timing were perfect,” he said. But then, just six days later, painfully, dramatically and very publicly Winehouse came tumbling off the wagon. On the first night of a “comeback” tour of Europe in Belgrade she appeared on stage an hour late. Visibly drunk, she seemed barely able to remember the lyrics she had written and was finally booed off stage by fans who had just wanted to hear her sing. Days later her management cancelled the 12-date tour, saying the singer would be given “as long as it takes” to sort herself out. “Everyone was absolutely gobsmacked,” a source close to the management told the Guardian. “The hotel had been told to remove all traces of alcohol, but what can you do? She is a 27-year-old woman and if an addict wants to get hold of alcohol, they will do.” Questions were asked about why Winehouse was touring, and why she had gone on stage, but those close to her had every reason to think she was “back on track” professionally, the source added. “There was no reason to expect a disaster, things had seemed on the up.” In recent days Raye Cosbert, Winehouse’s manager from the Metropolis management company, and the co-president of Island Records, Darcus Beese, have taken pains to swat down reports that the shambolic performance had created a rift between them, issuing a statement saying they had always stood “shoulder to shoulder” to give Winehouse “our total support and all the love her huge talent and wonderful human spirit deserved”. But while few doubt that everyone in Winehouse’s entourage – label, management, family – were doing their best to help her recovery, a source close to Universal, Island’s mother label, said that after seeing the Serbia performance: “Everybody was shocked she was doing anything. It was very odd to us. Obviously it didn’t help, it couldn’t have.” Mitch Winehouse said this week that his daughter had been off hard drugs for three years, and was trying to tackle the alcohol problems that were so painfully apparent in Serbia. “People focus on the drugs, but the biggest problem was Amy’s alcoholism,” said Hernu. “It had the worst effect on her little frame. It basically gave in.” Winehouse’s addictions – whether to drink, or the harder drugs that seemed to control her life for years – have been played out in the public arena. The photographic documentation of her demons appear even more ghoulish now: Winehouse with her trademark black eyeliner swoops smeared across her face , her pink ballerinas caked in blood and dirt and her then husband Blake Fielder-Civil’s face covered in scratches in 2007; barefaced, distressed and wearing only a bra and jeans the same year. And her death, like her life, has been lit by the glare of dozens of camera flashes. At the messy and makeshift shrine outside Winehouse’s home, with its vodka bottles and cigarette packets, flowers and portraits, some fans cried. Others took oddly awkward photographs of themselves outside the place where she spent her last hours. One fan, waiting to watch her coffin go past outside Golders Green crematorium on Tuesday, said the incessant coverage had pulled fans closer to her. “We saw her deterioration every day, in every picture,” said 18-year-old Amy Swan. “It was like we were on a journey with her. So many people just wanted her to get better.” But there were others who wanted her to play up to her hellraising image. Musician Liam Bailey, who became friends with Winehouse after she signed him to her own label Lioness Records, described going to a Pete Doherty gig with her last year. “I was gobsmacked by the attention,” he said. “There were people offering her drinks, saying they loved her, other people throwing stuff, saying things I don’t want to repeat. And all the time the bullying from the paparazzi was horrendous.” Propping up the bar at the Hawley Arms, not a seething den of iniquity but rather a tastefully decorated, candle-lit pub with a rock’n’roll edge, Charles-Ridler said Winehouse could find no respite from it. “She couldn’t go anywhere, it was always in her face,” he said. “And she was the most anti-fame person. She could play in front of 60,000 people and then be in here, and much happier, pulling pints the next night.” The fact that she could no longer do that added to her isolation, said Hernu. “Coming back to England, London and more specifically to Camden didn’t seem to work for her,” he said. “She couldn’t do what she loved which was bouncing around Camden talking to everyone. She was bored and she was lonely.” The analysis of what caused her eventual demise, on Saturday 23 July, aged 27, will be dissected minutely over the coming weeks. But, said Charles-Ridler, those who peered into her life should also take a moment to look at their own. “Yes she did this to herself, yes she was self-destructive, but she was a victim too,” he said. “We all have to take a bit of responsibilty, us the public, the paparazzi. She was a star, but I want people to remember that she was also just a girl.” Amy Winehouse Drugs Alcohol London Alexandra Topping guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …
Push to unfreeze cash assets as William Hague recognises Libyan rebels as government Britain is to open negotiations at the UN to unfreeze assets running into hundreds of millions of pounds to be funnelled to the Libyan rebel council that was recognised by the UK on Wednesday as the “sole governmental authority” in the country. As the foreign secretary, William Hague, announced the expulsion of the Libyan chargé d’affaires and the eight remaining Libyan embassy staff in London, British diplomats in New York were drawing up plans to unfreeze assets covered by UN sanctions. Britain has frozen £12bn of Libyan assets since the conflict began in February this year, the vast bulk of which will remain frozen until the regime of Muammar Gaddafi loses power. But a proportion of the assets can be released if Britain can prove that they will only be used by the Benghazi-based National Transitional Council (NTC). The push by the UK, which has temporarily closed its embassy in Tripoli, will raise questions about whether the funds will be used to buy arms. Foreign Office sources said assets would remain frozen if there is any evidence or suspicion that they were being used to pay for arms, even for the Libyan rebels. Arms sales of any description to any quarter in Libya are banned by UN sanctions. But a source close to the NTC said funds may be used to buy weapons. “We can’t,” a source close to the NTC told the Guardian when asked how it would make sure funds are not used to buy weapons. The source added: “We are militarily engaged in removing Gaddafi. Therefore it would be a bit strange to say that we are happy for you to have the no-fly zone, but rather that you didn’t buy arms. “They [the NTC] haven’t been able to meet their payroll, which is their biggest problem to keep going. They also desperately need money to buy arms, particularly in the western mountains where there is often one weapon between two fighters, who go into battle hoping to get one from the enemy or a fallen comrade.” Hague paved the way for the unfreezing of assets after expelling the last remaining diplomats loyal to Gaddafi and announcing the embassy would be taken over by the NTC, which is now formally recognised by Britain as the government of Libya. The chargé, Khaled Benshaban, was summoned to a meeting at the Foreign Office, where he was given three days to leave Britain. Other diplomats at the Libyan People’s Bureau in London – which has been under heavy police guard since the launch of the military campaign in March – have been told to leave over the course of the summer. Shortly after the meeting with the chargé, Hague invited the NTC to nominate an ambassador and other diplomats to take over the Libyan mission. In a statement crafted with the advice of Foreign Office lawyers and the attorney general, Dominic Grieve, Hague said: “The prime minister and I have decided that the United Kingdom recognises and will deal with the National Transitional Council as the sole governmental authority in Libya.” The remarks by Hague allowed the government to unfreeze £91m in UK assets belonging to the Arabian Gulf Oil Company, a Libyan oil firm under the NTC’s control, which had been on an EU sanctions list. Foreign Office sources said the assets were unfrozen after the NTC gave assurances that the funds would be used to purchase fuel, not arms. Britain will now open negotiations at the UN in New York on unfreezing assets, covered by UN sanctions, which will be sent to the NTC in Benghazi. Assets would be unfrozen in three ways: • Exemptions for basic services, such as paying for food and fuel. This can be agreed at the UN security council without a vote as long as there is a consensus. • Provision for exceptional services such as medical supplies. This would need a formal vote. • Releasing large assets. This would also need a formal vote. Britain would not apply for the release of these assets, which are inextricably linked to the Gaddafi regime, until the Libyan leader leaves power. Britain decided to recognise the council after the international Libya contact group – which includes European powers, the US and allies from the Middle East – decided at a recent meeting in Istanbul “to deal with the National Transitional Council … as the legitimate governing authority in Libya”. Hague said: “This decision reflects the National Transitional Council’s increasing legitimacy, competence and success in reaching out to Libyans across the country. Through its actions, the National Transitional Council has shown its commitment to a more open and democratic Libya, something that it is working to achieve in an inclusive political process. This is in stark contrast to Gaddafi, whose brutality against the Libyan people has stripped him of all legitimacy.” The foreign secretary said that Britainnow runs its largest diplomatic mission in north Africa after Cairo in the Libyan rebel stronghold of Benghazi. This will be designated as an embassy if the NTC requests an upgrade. The decision to recognise an opposition group is a rare step for Britain, which declined to follow the example of the French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, who recognised the NTC at the start of the conflict. Britain said at the time it could not recognise the NTC because it recognises states rather than governments. A Foreign Office source said Britain would continue to abide by the convention by which it recognises states rather than governments, saying: “These are exceptional circumstances. It was an anomaly that we had these people here still representing Gaddafi … we dragged in the chargé d’affaires. He and his colleagues are now packing their bags.” The Treasury has frozen the assets in the UK of 39 individuals in Gaddafi’s government, family and army. A further 53 entities have also had their assets frozen including oil companies, airlines, property companies, banks and investment authorities based in London, the Isle of Man, the British Virgin Islands and in Libya. In February, £900m of recently printed hard Libyan currency was impounded in the north-east of England. The assets of six Libyan ports were also frozen, including the port in the oil town of Ras Lanuf in the east of the country which was claimed by rebel forces in March. Hague said Britain only decided to recognise the NTC after it was certain that Libyan students in Britain, who are funded by their embassy, would continue to be supported. He added that the appearance this week on Libyan television of the Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset al-Megrahi showed it had been a mistake by the Scottish justice minister to release him on compassionate grounds in 2009.Hague said no deadline has been set for the military campaign against the Gaddafi regime. British military chiefs have advised ministers they can continue with the bombing indefinitely. Hague, who appeared to indicate earlier this week that Britain was more relaxed about Gaddafi’s personal future , made it clear that it would be better if he left Libya. But Britain could not dictate the outcome of a political settlement to the Libyan people. “Let’s point out though, at the same time, that the view of the chairman of the NTC is that any successful political settlement does involve Gaddafi leaving Libya and that is what we continue to say is the best solution,” he said. “So don’t make any mistake about that, but we’re saying we can’t impose that or guarantee that.” Hague also said Britain was committed to ensuring Gaddafi faced justice before the international criminal court. The foreign secretary denied that discussions about Gaddafi were part of a back-channel communication with the regime, but did not deny that such a channel existed. The renewed diplomatic offensive comes as British aircraft stepped up the bombing against Gaddafi’s security and intelligence apparatus before the start of Ramadan on 1 August. Foreign policy Libya William Hague Muammar Gaddafi Arab and Middle East unrest Middle East Africa Nicholas Watt Robert Booth Simon Goodley guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …
Joshua Davies, 16, battered Aylward to death in Aberkenfig woods with no apparent motive other than breakfast bet A teenager is expected to be detained indefinitely after he was found guilty of luring his former girlfriend into a wood and battering her to death with a rock. Joshua Davies, 16, murdered 15-year-old Rebecca Aylward and left her body lying face down on the sodden forest floor in south Wales. He attempted to cover his tracks by sending Rebecca a text saying he was worried about her and after he was arrested he tried to frame a friend. Before the murder Davies had often spoken about killing Rebecca and talked about using toxins from plants to brew a poison. Not believing he was serious, his friends had promised to buy him a breakfast at their favourite cafe if he did murder her. When the verdict was announced Rebecca’s family let out a brief cheer. Davies’s family, who sat in another part of the court, looked shocked. Outside Swansea crown court, Rebecca’s family said she had “loved and trusted” Davies. In a statement they said: “The pain and horror of losing Rebecca in such horrendous circumstances cannot be put into words. “Since that Saturday in October 2010 our lives have stopped. Rebecca was killed in a senseless and barbaric act. She died at the hands of someone she loved and trusted. We will never forget what he did to her or forgive him for destroying our family.” Davies, wearing a pale open-necked shirt and dark trousers, showed no emotion as the jury returned its majority verdict after almost 20 hours of deliberation. But he began to cry as the judge, Mr Justice Lloyd Jones, lifted an anonymity order and ruled it was in the “public interest” that he should be identified. He said: “This is a crime in a small and closely knit community and it’s right that the public should know there has been a conviction and who has been convicted.” The judge adjourned the case so that psychiatric reports could be prepared. But he told Davies he expected to set an indefinite sentence. Rebecca’s killing was a huge shock in Maesteg, her home town, and the village of Aberkenfig, where the killing took place and where Davies lived. Becca, as she was known to most friends, was a bright girl with a wide circle of friends in the Bridgend area. Davies and Rebecca had known each other for some years and dated for three months a year before she was killed. They gave different reasons for the breakup but whatever the truth of it, Davies began to talk about killing Rebecca. He told friends he would find a way of murdering her and get away with it. He spoke of making a poison out of plants such as deadly nightshade. Davies once asked his friends what they would give him if he carried out the killing. They say they did not take him seriously and promised to buy him breakfast if he did it. But on Saturday 23 October last year Davies and Rebecca arranged to meet in woods at Aberkenfig, a popular hangout for teenagers. Rebecca wore an outfit she had bought the day before, possibly believing they were going to get back together. Before he left for the woods Davies smiled at one of his friends and told him: “The time has come.” After the attack, when a friend phoned him in the woods to ask him if he was with Rebecca, Davies coolly asked him to “define” what he meant by “with”. He later boasted to his friends that he had attacked Rebecca, who was slightly built, from behind. She was screaming and the worst thing, he said, was seeing her skull give way. The rock was so heavy that in court during the trial an official struggled to pick it up with one hand. Following the murder, Davies summoned a friend to the woods. The boy described in court how he “glimpsed” Rebecca’s body lying face down, her arms splayed out. Davies was a “bit shaky” but “didn’t seem upset at what he’d done”. The alarm was raised and a search was launched after Rebecca failed to return home. Meanwhile, Davies updated his Facebook page to say he was “chilling” with friends. He had a cup of tea and watched Strictly Come Dancing and the film No Country for Old Men. During the search for Rebecca he sent a text asking her to get in touch: “We’re all worried,” he wrote. Rebecca’s body was found in the woods the next day. Davies was arrested but claimed his friend was guilty. In the aftermath of the killing some people in Bridgend expressed concern that, following a spate of suicides among teenagers, Rebecca’s death was another sign of deep problems in the area. The feeling now seems to be that this brutal killing was a shocking one-off. The motive still remains a puzzle, however. The prosecution suggested that Davies had spoken about killing Rebecca so often that he “talked himself into” carrying out what started off as an empty childish threat. After the verdict, Detective Chief Inspector John Penhale, of South Wales police, said: “This was a tragic incident which brought shock and sadness to a close-knit community. “I would personally like to thank the community for their support during the investigation and the prosecution witnesses who gave evidence at the trial.” Richard Killick, senior crown prosecutor for CPS Wales, added: “This was a planned and calculated attack on a defenceless 15-year-old girl. Only the defendant truly knows what motivated him to commit such an act – but what we do know is that Rebecca’s family and friends continue to live with the awful consequences. “We can only hope that today’s verdict will, in some way, help them as they try to move forward with their lives.” Wales Crime Steven Morris guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …