Newswire

Blue Nile, a Nasdaq listed company and one of the world's leading online diamond retailers has resorted to censorship in an effort to avoid answering queries about the provenance of its so-called conflict free diamonds.

Blue Nile promotes itself as a supplier of “ethically sourced” diamonds and claims to have a zero-tolerance policy towards conflict diamonds. According to the company “All Blue Nile diamonds are warranted to be conflict free”. The company promotes itself on Facebook where it has over 90,000 very active subscribers www.facebook.com/bluenile.

Yvonne Margarula continues the fight of the Mirrar people against Uranium mining on their land and within the boundaries of Kakadu National Park by calling on the Federal Government to block the expansion of the Ranger Uranium Mine. According to the ABC Online Yvonne is quoted as saying "We are worrying about what might happen, poison water". Referrig to the tailings dam she said "The water getting bigger, it's going downstream," adding ""The mining company - they wouldn't listen to us,".

In a story that is yet to be covered by the Australian mainstream press, al Jazeera has published an excerpt from Mamdouh Habib's memoirs which details in horrific details how when Habib had been "rendered" to Egypt for torture, "At one point, his interrogator slapped him so hard that his blindfold was dislodged, revealing the identity of his tormentor: Suleiman.". Habib then went on to describe how "Frustrated that Habib was not providing useful information or confessing to involvement in terrorism, Suleiman ordered a guard to murder a shackled prisoner in front of Habib, which he did with a vicious karate kick.". Mamdoub Habib was in Egupt after being sent to the U.S. through its "extraaordinary rendition" program which involved people being kidnapped and sent to to countries to be tortured for intelligence purposes. What does the Australian government have to say about U.S. attempts to have Suleiman installed as Mubarak's replacement and why is the Australian press virtually silent on this shocking Australian connection? The answers reveal the levels of both U.S. and Australian duplicity, hypocrisy and violence in its relations to the Arab world whilst they dare to talk of democracy and human rights.
Suleiman: The CIA's man in Cairo -- Imperialism and Egypt's democratic transition -- Supporters of freedom, right?

concerned Australians organised an evening on February 7th to hear from a number of highly respected Aboriginal Elders and leaders. They raised issues of grave concern to them in relation to the impact of current policy directions in the Northern Territory. They wish to express to other Australians their desire to maintain and strengthen their cultures — these are their words:

TO THE PEOPLE OF AUSTRALIA

7th February, 2011

We are the people of the land. The land is our mother. For more than 40,000 years we have been caring for this land. We are its natural farmers.

http://traffic.libsyn.com/kaputtradio/kr__186_the_weather_men.mp3

A trying world news commentary

music: Doors, "Stormy" [ unknown artist ], "World Citizen" by Akasha, "Here comes the war" by The Art

http://www.followheart.com

27:44 min 128 kbps stereo 25.4 MB

Protest against violence mounted by the Sinar Mas corporation

Rarely have politicians and corporations responded as fast: Three days after we called for protests against shots and arrests in Karang Mendapo on Indonesian Sumatra, district government, police and the management of the palm oil transnational Sinar Mas found themselves forced to take action.

The International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC CSI IGB) has passed a statement in support of the pro-democracy protests in Egypt, and called for trade unions around the world to join a Day of Action for Democracy in Egypt on 8 February.

On Thursday evening Professor Ross Garnaut launched his latest climate update report - Weighing the costs and benefits of climate change action - for the Federal parliament Multi-Party Climate Change Committee, warning we are already seeing the results of global warming in the intensification of extreme weather events in Australia.

KEFAYA! WALK LIKE AN EGYTIAN!

“Cleopatra's Egypt was modern in ancient times and Mubarak's was ancient in modern time” - Maureen Dowd.

"...the regime that Western leaders have lauded for decades as a beacon of moderation has unleashed its salaried, plain-clothes security personnel to loot its own

cities, set fire to its streets, and attack unarmed protesters with Molotov cocktails, knives, U.S.-supplied tear gas canisters, and live ammunition." - Asli Bali and

Aziz Rana [ http://www.fpif.org/articles/the_fake_moderation_of_americas_moderate_mi... ]