Bangladesh goes for 1971 war criminals, and restores democratic aims

RAHMAN NIZAMI, charged as Bangladeshis don't forget

IT may be justice long delayed, but the authorities in Bangladesh are finally going after some of the men who committed major crimes against their fellow-citizens during the war for liberation from Pakistan.

The War Crimes Tribunal has issued arrest warrants for four senior leaders of the Jamaat-e-Islam party, already in custody on other charges. During the 1971 war for independence, when what had been called East Pakistan since India's partition fought to become a Bengali state, Jamaat e Islami sided with Pakistan. Some three million Bangladeshis were killed during the war, either by Pakistani troops or their allied militias, and whether for being patriotically against the occupation, or part of the Hindu minority

The move to bring Ja'amati leaders to justice goes with steps to restore the ideals for which the Bangladeshi people strove in the liberation war. Bangladesh's Supreme Court has restored ’secularism’ as one of the basic tenets in the country’s 1972 constitution. In an 186-page ruling announced yesterday, the appellate division of the apex court said: “Preamble and the relevant provisions of the Constitution in respect of secularism, nationalism and socialism, as existed on August 15, 1975, will revive.”

It was on August 15, 1975 that the country's leader, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, of the Awami party, was assassinated. This ushered in a series of military-led governments, ready to collude with Western imperialism and religious reaction, ignoring the progressive parts of the constitution. It also put an end to preparations for trying war criminals. In recent years Jama'at e Islam even served in coalition governments.

More at : Dhaka court restores ’secularism’ in constitution http://www.thaindian.com/newsportal/politics/dhaka-court-restores-secularism-in-constitution_100403633.html#ixzz0v9zUAsgl

Since regaining government in 2008 elections the Awami League had promised to pursue justice against the 1971 criminals. Those charged with committing genocide and crimes against humanity and peace during the 1971 War are Motiur Rahman Nizami, the Jamaat-e-Islam chief and his Secretary General, Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mujahid and two lower ranking assistant secretaries general.

During the 1971 war Nizami advocated total expulsion of Hindus as the solution to Bangladesh's problems. The militia linked with Nizami and Mujahid were also implicated in the December 14, 1971 massacre of academics, writers, musicians and artists. This date became known as Bhuddijibi Dibos, the Killing of Intellectuals day.

During the first years of independence the authorities under Mujib Rahman seemed readier to move against left-wing dissidents than against the pro-Pakistan leaders, who benefitted by an amnesty. The International Crimes Tribunal Act of 1973 brought about a legal procedure to prosecute war criminals, but with the assassination of Sheikh Mujib two years later, followed by decades of maneuvre and indemnity, it seemed to remain a dead letter, until now.

Mr. Golam Arif Tipu, lead prosecutor in the tria of Jamaat e Islam leadersl, said it a was red-letter day, reports the Indian daily, the Statesman: “It appeared that the four are crucially needed to be kept in confinement as the special investigation agency has already gathered evidence against the four. They were found to be involved in gruesome crimes like genocide, killing, torture, arson and forcing exodus during the Liberation War.”

Here in London, Jamaat e Islam representatives appear to have been warned that the long-awaited arm of the law was reaching for their leaders. They held a meeting with lawyers on June 30 to discuss the International Crimes Tribunal Act and its implications.
http://www.internationallawbureau.com/blog/?p=1524

Left-wing Bangladeshis have long complained of the way Jama'a e Islami has been allowed to establish itself in the community here, around the East London mosque, with even alleged war criminals obtaining positions where they can miseducate young people. Jama'at is not on the British or US government's "terror" lists, and it has allegedly enjoyed official recognition through the Muslim Council of Britain, as well as co-operation from supposedly left-wing elements such as George Galloway's Respect.

Should the Bangladeshi government decide to seek anyone's extradition, it could prove embarrassing for some people, or would if embarrassment was an emotion they ever displayed.

From Asia, it's good news for a change

THERE was applause at the meeting on Wednesday evening when the speaker announced he could give us "one piece of good news - garment workers in Bangladesh have won an 80 per cent pay rise".

Besides our sympathy with these exploited workers, it made a welcome change from the cuts and attacks on living standards we were hearing about. And it is not the only piece of good news to reach us about struggles in south Asia.

The 80 per cent rise in the minimum wage of millions of workers was announced by Bangladesh labour minister Khandaker Mosharaff Hossain yesterday. It came after months of workers' strikes and protests.

The official minimum wage has been set at 3,000 takas (£28) a month, up from 1662 takas in the first raise since 2006. The new pay structure starts in November and has seven grades – the highest pay fixed at 9,300 takas.

"We have tried our best to meet the demands of the workers," Hossain told reporters in announcing the new wages after months of negotiations with garment factory owners.

Workers and labour rights groups had called for a monthly wage of 5,000 takas.

Garment workers in Bangladesh are the lowest paid in the world, and do not earn enough to pay for food and accommodation, according to the International Trade Union Confederation. There are some 4,000 factories employing more than two million workers, mostly women. The industry earns more than £7.7 billion a year, nearly 80 per cent of the country's export income.

International clothing companies Wal-Mart, Tesco, H&M, Zara, Carrefour, Gap, Metro, JCPenney, Marks & Spencer, Kohl's, Levi Strauss and Tommy Hilfiger all import in bulk from Bangladesh. The Bangladeshi manufacturers say they are squeezed between a slump in prices on the international market due to the global crisis, and higher costs due to energy crisis and poor infrastructure. But after months of strikes and workers' protests the government says the employers should pay higher wages.

The second piece of news comes from across the sub-continent in Pakistan, in the form of a despatch from Farouk Tariq, of the Pakistan Labour Party, to the Scottish Socialist Party website.

This is to inform you that Faisalabad power looms workers strike is over. It ended with a complete victory. The Commissioner of Faisalabad Mr. Tahir Hussain announced at the rally that all demands of the workers will be met. He said that we have received the notification of 17 percent rates increase for all the workers late last night and that will be implemented in its full spirit. The arrested four leaders case will be withdrawn after an initial inquiry in consultation with Labour Qaumi Movement leadership.

This was after over 25,000 workers marched to the city center and picketed the office of the Commissioner. Today, workers marched over 20 kilometers by foot and it was a total peaceful manifestation. We had made it clear earlier to all the workers as well that any one involved in any violent incident will be kicked out of the organisation. The bosses were too depressed to do any provocation. Workers marched despite a heavy rain. At one point, the police tried to block the workers marching towards the commissioner office. Workers broke the blockade and went on marching towards the office. All roads leading to Commissioner officer were blocked by police and every where there were countless heads of power looms workers.

It was one of the largest gathering that labour Qaumi Movement had mobilized in support of the strike.

Here in Lahore, National Trade Union Federation had organised a protest camp in front of Punjab Assembly building where scores of trade union activists turned up to show solidarity with the striking workers. Here, I was asked by LQM leadership to speak to the workers in Faisalabad by telephone. I could hear the thunder storm slogans of the workers in favour of Labour Party Pakistan and National Trade Union Federation. Yousaf Baluch, chairperson NTUF have thanked all the national and international support for the strike that paved the way for a complete victory of the working class in Faisalabad. over 250,000 workers rates will be increased by 17 percent as a result of this 9 days strike. Four workers leaders are in jail on false charges of violence.


Thank you all, here is at one good news from Pakistan.

Copyright Scottish Socialist Party 2010

http://www.scottishsocialistparty.org/new_stories/international/total-victory-for-pakistani-workers.html

In his gaffe-prone sales tour to India with Chancellor George Osborne, Tory prime minister David Cameron must be feeling grateful that the only problem he has faced so far in imposing his cuts, from the leaders of British trade unions, was how politely he should decline their invitation to address the trades union congress. (He has offered to send one of his Lib Dem lackeys instead).

It's eighteen months since a gathering of London trades unionists heard from a delegation of garment workers from Bangladesh. Afterwards I gave them a copy of the Grunwick film DVD to take back, a present from Brent TUC. It looks like they can give us some lessons on how to fight for workers' rights.

Netanyahu Speaks, and a Village is Destroyed

Ethnic Cleansing in the Negev

It took 1,500 police, armed with guns and stun grenades, followed up by the bulldozers. They came at 4.30 in the morning, and by the end of the day they had arrested one woman and detained several others. About 35 homes were destroyed, as well as sheepfolds, crops and trees were ripped up, and some 300 people, including 200 kids were made homeless.

The police laughed, and gave each other victory signs, happy with the job they had done.

The argument over the law, land ownership and residence is still going on in the courts. But the village of Al Arakib is no more, destroyed in no more than three hours.

It happened yesterday, Tuesday, July 27. Al Arakib is in the northern Negev, not far from the Israeli city of Beersheba, once the Bedouin market town of Be'ersheba. Al Arakib was a Bedouin village, one of many whose existence is not officially "recognised" by the Israeli state authorities.

The day before the police operation, Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu had addressed a cabinet meeting, warning of `a situation in which a demand for national rights will be made from some quarters inside Israel, for example in the Negev, should the area be left without a Jewish majority. Such things happened in the Balkans, and it is a real threat.`

The villagers of al-Arakib may not have realised they constituted a "threat". Having lived as a community since well before the State of Israel was established in 1948, they were evicted in 1951, at a time when Arab areas were under military government, and many Bedouin were even deported over the border by the military.

But they quietly returned, erected their homes, raised children and sheep, and planted orchards and olive groves. Some have gone off to work in the town, even started businesses. Bedouin can be Israeli citizens, even serve in the armed forces. The soldier charged with shooting photographer Tom Hurndall was a Bedouin. But the Israeli authorities insist on telling Bedouin where they can live, refuse to recognise traditional claims on ownership and grazing rights, and by refusing to recognise villages can ignore their needs, and deny them access to the national electricity grid or piped water supplies.

A report in Ha'aretz says:
"Inspectors from the Israel Lands Administration arrived yesterday morning in al-Arakib along with large numbers of police. The ILA said the evacuation was conducted after many years of legal - and physical - battles against the Aturi tribe. The ILA said it demolished 46 illegal buildings, 11 made of cinderblock and 11 shacks. It also said it uprooted 850 trees that were transferred for replanting elsewhere.

The ILA said the Bedouin invaded the area, which is state land, in 1998 and in 2000 a court order was handed down banning them from entering the area. But the tribe moved in and planted trees. The ILA offered to rent them the land at a price of NIS 2 per dunam, but they refused to pay. The ILA received a court order to evacuate the residents in 2003 and the case went all the way to the Supreme Court".

The destruction of the village was carried out despite dispute over ownership of the land still pending in the courts. Residents of al-Arakib say this was their grandparents' land, and they are neither squatters nor invaders. They were there before the State of Israel existed. Ownership of the land is now the subject of proceedings in the Be`er Sheva District Court, where academic researchers have already testified in confirmation of the residents` ownership right in the land.

http://www.haaretz.co.il/hasite/spages/1178648.html

As the police began their clearances yesterday, villagers called up friends and supporters from civil rights groups, and some Israelis came to join them in passive resistance, but it was not enough to stop the massive police operation.

The village lay in a zone which the Israeli authorities have designated for Jewish settlement. But they have not even got any settlers waiting to occupy it. The plan is for the Jewish National Fund (JNF) - which collects donations in Britain, the United States and other countries as a registered "charity" - to plant trees in the area so that the Bedouin cannot come back to farm there.

In a joint press statement the al Arakib Popular Committee and the Negev Co-existence Forum for Civil Equality said:
"The destruction's declared aim is to facilitate plans by the Jewish National Fund to plant a wood on the site. We regard this demolition as a criminal act. Bedouin citizens of Israel are not enemies, and forestation of the Negev is not a reasonable pretext for destroying a community which is more than 60 years old, dispossessing its residents, and violating the basic rights of hundreds of Israeli civilians, men, women and children.

This act by the state authorities is no ‘law enforcement’ – it is an act of war, such as is undertaken against an enemy."

They added that it could not be separated from what Netanyahu had said about Bedouin as a "threat".

This http://pulsemedia.org/2010/07/27/israel-wants-to-erase-bedouin-village/

For Juma al-Turi, who saw his village destroyed, the sense of war, and feeling of degradation, was deeply etched, as is described in Ha'aretz.

'"I saw the smiles of the policemen and the inspectors who did it, they simply enjoyed it while the children were left without a home. They made victory signs with their hands after the destruction. It seems they were confused and were certain they were in Lebanon in the war against Hezbollah," he said.

'Al-Turi, who made his living importing food for sale in the south, Egypt and Jordan, is among the village's more well-off denizens. To village residents he is a man of the world and a symbol of success. A large number of his friends are Jews who come every once in a while to his house in the village to eat and close deals.

'Shai Shalom, a friend of al-Turi's, came yesterday to console him.

"I simply can not believe my eyes, they destroyed all his houses. It is sad, I don't know why they did it," he said.

'In the wake of the destruction al-Turi lauded the quick help by the Islamic Movement to donate new tents.

"The Jews destroyed, the Muslims help. See what you've done. You are pushing us directly into the welcoming arms of the Islamic Movement," he said. "These were my grandfather's lands, why does someone want to take them from me? I live here peacefully and quietly and don't bother anyone. It is simply embarrassing. I am a man of peace, I always got along with everyone, but you are pushing us to dangerous directions."'

Yesterday, while his police were destroying an Arab village, Binyamin Netanyahu was visiting Jordanian leaders in Amman.

http://theonlydemocracy.org/2010/07/alert-thousands-of-police-evacuating-and-demolishing-the-village-of-el-araqib-in-the-israeli-negev/

http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/police-destroy-dozens-of-buildings-in-unrecognized-bedouin-village-in-negev-1.304443

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/jul/28/ethnic-cleansing-israeli-negev

Death, lies and profits for some

THE Afghan government has accused NATO forces of carrying out a rocket attack killing Afghan villagers who were trying hide from the firing line between NATO and Taliban. The report of the incident in Helmand province comes as a collection of 92,000 classified documents obtained by the Wikileaks internet site has embarrassed politicians, military top-brass and intelligence services by revealing aspects of the Afghan war that they have tried to hide.

These include:
* Attacks by NATO forces on civilians
* Much higher civilian casualties from both Taliban and NATO attacks than were officially admitted.
* The operation of a US-led special unit charged with tracking down and killing individuals on a hit list.
* Alleged continuing support to Taliban from Pakistan intelligence services.
* Taliban has successfully used surface to air missiles to bring down military aircraft.

Much of the material on killing of civilians will come as little surprise to those who have been opposing the war in Afghanistan. But what it shows up sharply is the difference between the realities of this war and the picture given by official sources, of "our boys and girls", along with our gallant allies, protecting the Afghan people and helping them achieve a new life.

One of the incidents described took place on March 4, 2007 involving a convoy of US marines, who had arrived in Afghanistan three weeks earlier. Hit by an explosives-rigged minivan outside the city of Jalalabad, the marines made off in a panic, down a six mile stretch of highway, firing with automatic weapons at almost anyone they saw – teenage girls in fields, motorists in their cars, old men as they walked along the road. Nineteen unarmed civilians were killed and 50 wounded.

The marines' own account claims that, simultaneous to the suicide explosion, "the patrol received small arms fire from three directions". The rampage as they drove away is captured in five words: "The patrol returned to JAF [Jalalabad air field]." Forty-nine minutes after the initial bombing, they requested a "routine medevac" for a private with "shrapnel wounds to the arm". Their only casualty. He was evacuated to safety.

Journalists who tried to report what actually happened had their cameras snatched by angry marines. Rahmat Gul, a freelance photographer working for the Associated Press, said two soldiers and a translator came up to him and asked: "Why are you taking pictures? You don't have permission." Then they deleted his photographs. Later, Gul said, one of the soldiers came up to him and raised his arm, as if to hit him. Taqiullah Taqi, a reporter for the private Tolo TV channel, said the Americans told him through a translator: "Delete them, or we will delete you."

Nine hours after the shooting, the governor of Nangarhar province appealed to the marines to stay at home. "He did not want more CF [coalition forces] in the area due to public hostility." At about the same time the Americans stopped issuing internal reports. "Event closed at 1349Z" it read. But that was not the end of the affair.

Demonstrations ran through the streets of Jalalabad over the following days, the logs report, in which protesters broke windows and blocked roads. A month later, in April 2007, the Afghan Human Rights Commission published a report into the shooting which said the victims included a 16-year-old newlywed girl carrying a bundle of grass and a 75-year-old man walking back from the shops. The report said the marines may have come under fire from one source straight after the suicide bomb but challenged the assertion they suffered a "complex ambush from several directions".

By then a US army colonel had admitted to the Afghans that the shootings were a "terrible, terrible mistake" and "a stain on our honour". He paid $2,000 to the families of each victim. The special forces commander in Afghanistan, Major General Francis Kearney, ordered the marines to pull the 120-man company out of the country. But there would be no punishment. The marines, angered by the criticism of their unit by an army commander, held their own inquiry into the shootings and issued their findings a year later. It exonerated the marines. The troops "acted appropriately and in accordance with the rules of engagement … in response to a complex attack," said Major General Samuel Helland, the commander of marine forces in the Middle East and Afghanistan.

In other incidents described, Polish troops took "revenge" for a Taliban attack by mortaring an Afghan wedding party. German planes attacked two fuel tankers, in what was supposed to be an attack on guerrillas, but actually killed over 100 civilians who were queuing for for fuel.

The Obama administration would like to argue that the Wikileaks documents only go up to the end of last year, and the issues can be laid at the door of the Bush administration. There are supposed to be new rules of engagement to reduce civilian casualties. But the latest incident reported by the Afghan government only happened on Friday, at Regey village. £The investigation shows that the rocket was fired by Nato and 45 civilians, many of them women and children, have been killed," Siyamak Herawi told Reuters. Some reports said the toll was as high as 52, including 17 women and seven children.

He did not say what nationality the troops were. But the incident happened in Sangin, the district where British forces have come under attack and are soon to withdraw. The British forces are coming under US command.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jul/26/nato-afghanistan-rocket-attack

What is most sickening is that the response of those in authority both sides of the Atlantic is to express outrage - not at the crimes committed against the Afghan people but at the "crime" of revealing the truth. White House national security adviser General Jim Jones claimed the documents "put the lives of Americans and our partners at risk." He attempted to absolve the Obama administration of any guilt, pointing out that the documents described a period from January 2004 to December 2009, mostly during President George W Bush's administration.

On BBC news this morning David Cameron's Security minister, Baroness Pauline Neville -Jones said the documents could have come from leaks or been obtained by hacking, but either way revealing secret information like this could endanger "your sons and mine".

This is a woman who has done well out of wars. A former chair of the joint intelligence committee she served Tory Douglas (now Lord) Hurd when he was Foreign Secretary, and met Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic at the Dayton talks ending the war in Bosnia. Later she went to Belgrade together with Hurd, on behalf of Nat West Markets, to help Milosevic in the sale of Serbian telecomms. The deal they brokered was later undone, by which time Milosevic was to die in his cell at the Hague, but NatWest had made £10 million, and Hurd and Neville-Jones were well remunerated for their part in this.

Neville-Jones next became a governor of the BBC, and director Greg Dyke blamed her for bringing about his resignation over the David Kelly affair, concerned with what the Blair government really knew when it went to war with Iraq. Evidently she saw no conflict of interest between her duties at the BBC and being paid £133,000 a year as chair of the defence research and equipment contractor Qinetiq. Taking advantage of share options she made a further £400,000 as Qinetiq was taken over by the US-based Carlyle Group.

So what kind of secrets are people like Baroness Pauline Neville-Jones or the generals concerned with guarding? Do they really fear the leaks will endanger British troops, or is it something else they fear?

As today's Morning Star asked:

'Do they think that Afghans have been unaware of misdirected "precision bombs," of wedding parties being wiped out as Taliban gatherings, of civilian buses, lorries and cars being riddled with bullets by jittery troops or of Nato assassination units causing a high level of "collateral damage?"

Is it plausible that Afghan opponents of the US occupation know nothing of the sophisticated, shoulder-mounted surface-to-air rockets deployed by Taliban forces against coalition helicopters?

The Afghan people are well aware of the ongoing slaughter and, even though civilian deaths have been caused by both Nato and Taliban actions, they blame the invaders for the conflict and for their losses.

While up-to-date casualty figures for each national contingent of Washington's coalition of the complicit are readily available, we shall probably never know the true extent of Afghan civilian deaths. Afghans are as expendable as Iraqis, for, as US General Tommy Franks noted when asked about the civilian death toll as a result of the 2002 invasion "We don't do body counts."

The point about inadequate news and deliberate disinformation fed to the media by Nato military spokespeople is that their role is not to mislead Afghans - whether civilians or military resistance - but to bamboozle domestic audiences.'

http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/index.php/news/content/view/full/93270

Whereas the BP explosion and oil spill killed workers, destroyed innocent wildlife and ruined the livelihoods of hard-working fisher folk and others, the Wikileak explosion threatens the guilty politicians and others who have lied to us, and could ruin the careers of some warmongers.

http://www.channel4.com/news/articles/politics/international_politics/secret+files+wikileaks+exposes+aposunseen+afghan+warapos/3723387

Profiting from Proxy War in Africa

From a war in which British forces are all too involved, to a proxy war, in which other people do the fighting and get killed, while governments like ours pretend to disapprove and have no interest. A charity says the British government has been covering up.

Global Witness is taking HM government to court, alleging that a number of British companies known to have been trading in minerals sourced from the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) should have been put forward to the UN Sanctions Committee.

UN security council resolution 1857, passed in 2008, calls for a travel ban and asset freeze to be imposed on all individuals and entities supporting illegal armed groups in the eastern DRC through the illicit trade of natural resources. It was backed up and strengthened by resolution 1896, passed in 2009.

Global Witness campaigns director Gavin Hayman said: "It is a sad day when we have to sue the UK government, but we hope that this case will mark a turning point. The issues at stake have global significance for how wars are financed.

"These companies have profited from a brutal conflict, and should face UN sanctions - but sanctions are useless without a fair and clear government procedure for considering whether individuals or entities should be listed."

Global Witness and the UN group of experts have obtained evidence to show that British companies have supported armed groups by purchasing minerals from areas under their control in the DRC.

http://www.globalwitness.org/media_library_detail.php/1032/en/global_witness_takes_uk_government_to_court_for_fa

Hands off Iraqi trade unions!

IRAQ's free and independent government, doing as it is told, appears set to implement all the "free market" conditions set by the occupation authority (CPA) soon after the US-led invasion seven years ago, says well-informed freelance journalist Ewa Jasiewicz. This means opening up the country for exploitation, with wholesale privatisation of state assets and industries.

"This accompanies the entry of foreign oil companies under privatisation contracts, not as radical as the proposed original PSAs (Production Sharing Agreements) but modified forms of PSAs", adds Ewa, who has worked with the Iraqi oil trade union to make its struggle and views better known internationally.

"Iraqi oil workers reject these and are working hard to prevent their realisation as they constitute an attack on sovereignty and resource and economic democracy. "

Forwarding the appeal below from US Labor Against the War(USLAW), Ewa adds that "The US Iraqi puppet regime is carrying out the orders of its' architects and the brutal occupation, albeit in different guises, continues. We need to act."


USLAW just learned that Iraqi troops and police have raided the offices of the Electricity Union all across Iraq as they execute a new decree issued by the Minister of Electricity (who is also the Minister of Oil). That anti-union decree is the latest in an escalating series of measures designed to incapacitate and destroy the Iraqi labor movement.

The unions of Iraq have called upon the labor movement of the world to respond to this outrageous assault on worker rights.

USLAW has designed a very easy process by which you can generate a protest message to Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki, the Minister of Oil/Electricity al-Shahristani, Iraqi ambassadors in the US, other Iraqi officials and have copies sent to Secretary of State Clinton.

It will take just a few minutes of your time. Please demonstrate your personal solidarity with our courageous sisters and brothers in Iraq. Send the message we have drafted or modify it to send your personal message. When you have finished, you'll have an opportunity to forward this appeal to others.

SEND YOUR LETTER HERE

HTTP://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/2488/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=4439

Thanks in advance for standing up for international labor solidarity.

An injury to one, is an injury to all!

Invite others to send a message HERE

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Contact USLAW

Have you visited the USLAW website recently? www.uslaboragainstwar.org Check it out for news, information and resources for labor's antiwar movement. See the latest news about Iraq's labor movement, the U.S. military occupation and the movement that seeks to end it. Learn more about USLAW and what you can do to bring all U.S. troops and contractors rapidly home.


Brendan Barber writes to Foreign Secretary

Rt Hon William Hague MP
Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs

Dear William

Iraqi Ministry bans unions in electricity sector

Yesterday at midday police officers stormed the offices of the electricity workers' unions across Iraq carrying out an order from the Ministry of Electricity to shut them down. I ask you to urge the Iraqi Government to stop these draconian actions.

The Ministerial order, issued on 20 July 2010, 'prohibits all trade union activities at the Ministry and its departments and sites'. It orders the police, 'to close all trade union offices and bases and to take control of the union's assets, properties and documents, furniture and computers'. Finally, it instructs the Ministry to taking legal action against trade union officials under the Terrorism Act (2005). I am attaching an English translation of the order to this letter (copied below).

The order is in clear violation of international core labour standards. It is also a violation of the Iraqi constitution, and one of the most draconian acts by the Iraqi Government since the fall of Saddam. It comes from Hussain al-Shahristani, the Minister for Oil, who has recently taken over the electricity portfolio and has a worrying track record of using Saddam-era labour laws against trade unions.

This is just the latest in a series of recent attempts to undermine the Iraqi trade union movement: a key civil society player in building a democratic, peaceful and prosperous Iraq. The movement unites working people across religious, ethnic and geographical divides in their call for safe, productive and decent work. Unions across the globe, including the TUC, are working with their Iraqi colleagues to press the new Iraqi government to replace these repressive laws with fair and just ones that comply with the standards of the International Labour Organisation.

Hashmeya Muhsin, the leader of the Electricity Workers' Union is well know and admired globally as an inspiring campaigner for the rights of the vulnerable, and one of few women union leaders in the Arab world. For her efforts she faces great personal risk in Iraq. For the Government to effectively label her and the EWU as terrorists is an insulting and dangerous abuse of power.

I ask that you call on the Iraqi Government, as a matter of urgency, to withdraw the order, and allow unions to operate freely, underpinned by a fair, just and ILO-compliant labour law.

Yours sincerely

If they had listened to workers, maybe there'd have been no disaster, and BP would not need to be "buying" scientists

US OWNERS NEGLECTED MAINTENANCE. Workers knew it. So did BP.

THE widow of a worker killed in BP's oil rig explosion in the Gulf of Mexico has testified that her husband expressed grave concerns about dangerous work conditions before his death. A survey indicates he was not alone. But the workers, employed by Texas-based Transocean, feared risking their jobs by raising their concerns.

The testimony comes as US news reports allege that while trying to cap the well, BP has also been making efforts to cap criticism of its operations, by buying influence on scientists and academic institutions.

Natalie Roshto, said her husband, Shane Roshto, a 22-year-old roustabout for Transocean, and other workers felt pressure to continue drilling despite frequent equipment malfunctions and setbacks. “From Day 1, he deemed this the ‘well from hell,’ ” Ms. Roshto told US federal investigators at a hearing into the causes of the disaster. “He said Mother Nature just didn’t want to be drilled here.”

Her testimony backs the view that workers on the Deepwater Horizon rig were concerned about safety standards. The rig, which caught fire on April 20, killing 11 men and triggering the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Ms. Roshto testified that her husband had not expressed similar concerns about other wells.

A confidential survey of rig workers conducted a month before the disaster showed that many were distressed about safety conditions and feared reprisals if they reported mistakes or other problems. The survey, commissioned by Transocean and reported yesterday in the New York Times, says workers “often saw unsafe behaviors on the rig.”

When it began its efforts to cope with the Gulf disaster BP did not want to let outside observers and scientists near the scene. But it is being alleged that "taking a page out of the Exxon handbook, BP has now begun buying up scientists from universities along the Gulf Coast in an attempt to prevent them from testifying in court about the dangers of their oil spill".

According to a new report by the Mobile Press-Register, BP is offering large sums of cash to any scientist willing to join their camp. The company has reportedly been meeting with scientists from universities in the South for several weeks, offering to pay $250 an hour in exchange for their silence on the oil spill.

The University of South Alabama declined an offer from BP to “purchase” their entire marine sciences department after BP wanted them to sign a confidentiality agreement that would have prevented them from making their research findings public, even if asked by a court.

Since the Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded and sank in April, the US government (as well as local state governments) has relied on these independent scientists to conduct research on the dangers of the oil spill. Those who choose to sign up with BP – enticed by offers of as much as $104,000 a year – will no longer be able to provide information to the government due to the contracts BP forces them to sign. This mean that when the case goes to court, they will no longer be able to testify about the dangers of the oil spill. Without these experts, it will be difficult for plaintiff’s attorneys to make a case.

The scientists aren’t the only group being influenced by money from the oil industry – A new report by the Alliance for Justice alleges that almost the entire 5th Circuit Court of Appeals has been tainted by the industry. This is the Circuit that recently upheld the lower court’s ruling that President Obama’s oil drilling moratorium wasn’t legal.

The lower court’s decision was also delivered by judge Martin Feldman who held stock in numerous oil companies, including Deepwater Horizon owner Transocean. The 5th Circuit will end up playing a large role in the developing lawsuits against BP, Halliburton, and Transocean (NYSE:RIG), as they hold jurisdiction over the areas being affected by the oil spill.

By keeping the case in an oil-friendly court district, and paying off the scientists who know the true dangers of their oil spill, BP might be able to avoid paying out claims to victims along the Gulf Coast.

http://www.energyboom.com/policy/bp-pays-top-dollar-scientists-join-their-camp http://videocafe.crooksandliars.com/heather/democracy-now-scientist-working-government
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/23/us/23hearing.html?ref=us

Meanwhile, what of the US owners of the rig?

A confidential survey of workers on the Deepwater Horizon in the weeks before the explosion showed that many were concerned about safety practices, but feared reprisals if they reported mistakes or other problems. In the survey, commissioned by the rig’s owner, Transocean, workers said that company plans were not carried out properly and that they “often saw unsafe behaviors on the rig.”

Some workers also voiced concerns about poor equipment reliability, “which they believed was as a result of drilling priorities taking precedence over planned maintenance,” according to the survey, one of two Transocean reports obtained by The New York Times.

“At nine years old, Deepwater Horizon has never been in dry dock,” one worker told investigators. “We can only work around so much.”

“Run it, break it, fix it,” another worker said. “That’s how they work.”

According to a separate 112-page equipment assessment also commissioned by Transocean, many key components — including the blowout preventer rams and failsafe valves — had not been fully inspected since 2000, even though guidelines require inspection of the preventer every three to five years. The report cited at least 26 components and systems on the rig that were in “bad” or “poor” condition.

A spokesman for Transocean, who confirmed the existence of the reports, wrote in an e-mail message that most of the 26 components on the rig found to be in poor condition were minor and that all elements of the blowout preventer had been inspected within the required time frame by its original manufacturer, Cameron. The spokesman, Lou Colasuonno, commenting on the 33-page report about workers’ safety concerns, noted that the Deepwater Horizon had seven consecutive years without a single lost-time incident or major environmental event.

Transocean has sought in federal court to limit its liability to $27 million under the limitation of liability act of 1851. Under the law, the limitation of liability is removed if the vessel owner acted negligently. The US Justice Department has said its criminal investigation of the disaster will look at the role of the many companies involved. BP was leasing the rig from Transocean, and 79 of the 126 people on the rig the day it exploded were Transocean employees.

The first report focused on the its “safety culture” and was conducted by a division of Lloyd’s Register Group, a maritime and risk-management organization that dispatched two investigators to inspect the rig from March 12 to 16. They conducted focus groups and one-on-one interviews with at least 40 Transocean workers. The second report, on the status of the rig’s equipment, was produced by four investigators from a separate division of Lloyd’s Register Group, also on behalf of Transocean.

These investigators were scheduled to inspect the rig in April. While the report described workers’ concerns about safety and fears of reprisals, it did say that the rig was “relatively strong in many of the core aspects of safety management.” Workers believed teamwork on the rig was effective, and they were mostly worried about the reaction of managers off the rig, back at Transocean's headquarters in Houston.

“Almost everyone felt they could raise safety concerns and these issues would be acted upon if this was within the immediate control of the rig,” said the report, which also found that more than 97 percent of workers felt encouraged to raise ideas for safety improvements and more than 90 percent felt encouraged to participate in safety-improvement initiatives.

But investigators also said, “It must be stated at this point, however, that the workforce felt that this level of influence was restricted to issues that could be resolved directly on the rig, and that they had little influence at Divisional or Corporate levels.”

Only about half of the workers interviewed said they felt they could report actions leading to a potentially “risky” situation without reprisal. “This fear was seen to be driven by decisions made in Houston, rather than those made by rig based leaders,” the report said. “The company is always using fear tactics,” another worker said. “All these games and your mind gets tired.”

The rig's blow-out prevention equipment had not been inspected since 2000. A worker says the blow-out preventer was leaking days before the explosion. Some 26 parts and systems on the rig were found to be in "bad or poor" condition just a month before the incident. A safety audit by BP last year found 390 maintenance jobs yet to be done.

Transocean claims its surveys showed there was a strong "safety culture" on board. But the survey shows it was management on shore that workers were worried about. BP, it seems, was concerned about the amount of maintenance work being postponed. But not enough to halt production.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/energy/oilandgas/7905457/BP-oil-spill-Transocean-rig-not-fully-inspected-since-2000.html

http://www.democracynow.org/2010/7/21/headlines/probe_reveals_bp_knew_of_problems_ahead_deepwater_horizon_rig_explosion

Keep paying for what you will never own. A story of 'New Labour' and Auld Reekie

AS we face up to the Con-Dem government's plans to "shake up" the National Health Service, reminders are still coming of what 'New Labour' saddled us with.

The Private Finance Initiative (PFI) idea originated in Australia, where it was used for roads and railways, then spread to Britain under John Major's Tory government. It was attacked by Labour, as a form of privatisation, and future Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling warned that "apparent savings now could be countered by the formidable commitment on revenue expenditure in years to come". Nonetheless, the Treasury pushed Labour to adopt it when it took office in 1997, and soon afterwards Health Secretary Alan Milburn, announced that "when there is a limited amount of public-sector capital available, as there is, it's PFI or bust".

Private Finance Initiative means government turns to private capital for finance, letting business run services or rent back properties until they can revert. As Chancellor, Gordon Brown became especially associated with PFI, telling Labour Party conference that this was the only way to pay for new hospitals and schools. This was more expensive than public borrowing, and cynics say it was Brown's way of hiding mounting debt, leaving it to future generations. Labour's conference rejected the PFI policy, but the government persevered.

With the credit crunch, the government actually turned to lending money to private companies so they could undertake public projects. Brown apparently insisted that private companies were inherently better at managing than public bodies. Meanwhile the PFI idea had been spread internationally, pushed by financial institutions in their drive against public ownership

The Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh is one of the biggest PFI projects in Europe. This hospital's history goes back to the 18th century. In August 1998 a contract was signed to build a new Royal Infirmary on a mostly green field site at Little France, outside Edinburgh, to serve the Scottish capital and surrounding hinterland. In May 2001, Lothian Health Trust sold the old 20 acre Lauriston Place site for £30 million to Southside Capital Ltd, a consortium comprising Taylor Woodrow, Kilmartin Property Group, and the Bank of Scotland. They wanted it for a housing, shopping, leisure and hotel development. People were not happy about losing listed buildings, nor that Edinburgh's main accident and emergency facilities would be some distance from the city centre, and need much improvement in public transport links.

They also questioned the financial side. And now the questions could be raised officially. In what is claimed to be an exclusive in tonight's Edinburgh Evening News, health reporter Adam Morris says:

HEALTH chiefs were today facing demands for an inquiry after it emerged the NHS will have to pay a total of £1.26 billion for the privately built Edinburgh Royal Infirmary - and still not own it.
It means that by 2028, NHS Lothian will have effectively paid for the hospital seven times over but it will remain the property of private operator Consort.

The revelation has prompted fury from unions and politicians, who said it made a mockery of an agreement that was already a bad deal for the taxpayer.

Tom Waterson, Unison's Lothian branch chairman, said: "Can you imagine taking a mortgage out, making huge monthly payments, and then finding at the end you don't own the place?

"We had concerns about this contract from the start. Consort could even evict NHS Lothian at the end of it if they wanted."

NHS Lothian is tied to a £50 million-a-year contract allowing Consort to run and maintain the hospital which expires in 2028. Health authorities will have to negotiate a price with Consort to buy the hospital, extend the lease by another 25 years, or walk away, leaving the hospital and its contents to the firm. Adam Morris says the hospital has dropped nearly £20m in value since it opened 2002, down to £170m. Experts have also pointed out that it may halve in value by 2028, given it was only ever estimated to have a 45-year lifespan.

NHS Lothian's 2010 accounts revealed the deal with Consort allows health chiefs to extend the contract until 2053. Morris says "Privately, senior NHS Lothian bosses - none of whom were involved in the securing of the original deal - are despairing of the contract. They are furious that they have a £70m black hole, a sum which could be almost plugged with just one of the annual payments to the company who built the hospital. Any potential deal to buy the hospital is years off but it is understood there would be no way Consort, which also profits from running the canteen, hospital shops and car park, would sell prior to 2028".
http://edinburghnews.scotsman.com/news/Exclusive-We39ll-pay-12bn-for.6431088.jp

There was a row last year when the Scottish government sought to do away with car parking charges at hospitals. Consort wanted £14.5million to comply. "Politicians including Labour's George Foulkes reacted angrily when details of Consort's massive bill emerged yesterday. Current charges of up to £7 a day now seem likely to stay at Edinburgh Royal Infirmary. Parking at all hospitals built without using private finance initiatives were scrapped at the start of the year."

http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/2009/01/28/fury-at-firm-s-14-5m-payoff-demand-to-scrap-edinburgh-royal-infirmary-car-park-charges-86908-21076940/

Wherever big public contracts have been under way, certain names keep recurring. Consort Healthcare is part of the Balfour Beatty group. Balfour Beatty was one of the three lead construction firms involved in the building of the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh (along with Haden Young and Morrison Construction).

The Infirmary deal has been criticised in British Medical Journal report. Allyson Pollock, a professor of international public health policy at Edinburgh University, and Dr Matthew Dunnigan, of the Glasgow Royal Infirmary, said it came at huge cost to the public purse long-term and it affected patient care. They cited "reduced service delivery across Lothian and its associated Private Finance Initiatives development compared with other Scottish hospitals" and found that targets could also be missed. Their study also found that PFI did not meet targets to cut in-patient and day case admissions and length of hospital stays. This concern was pooh-poohed by some health officials, and dismissed by then Scottish Labour leader Jack McConnell, but received widespread support elsewhere.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article868594.ece
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allyson_Pollock

The Edinburgh Evening News has brought a mixed bag of responses from readers, some defending the PFI scheme, others saying they have criticised it all along and wondering why the paper has just caught on. The critics seem best informed, among them both workers who were employed in the construction of the new Infirmary and some employed in it talking about shoddy construction. Some of the old infirmary buildings had lasted 200 years and could remain. The new infirmary is given 45 years.

"The building is apparently designed so that lots of internal walls can be removed and the place turned into a factory or superstore or whatever. The whole building is shoddily constructed and I well remember the day that a consultant and I were trapped in his office when the door handle fell off! Oh and the leaking roofs of the cardiac surgery operating theatres and many more faults serious and trivial."

Another person writes:
"PFI has been an unmitigated disaster for the NHS, speaking as an employee of NHS Lothian i am happy to see the full scandalous facts about the RIE being brought into the open, Consort need to be removed from the equation and a compulsory order to purchase outright the building put in place for the princely sum of what it is now worth. After all if the SNP think its worthwhile to buy a bloody bridge out of its PFI contract (Skye Bridge) and to compulsory purchase homes to make way for Donald Pumps rich mans folly then why not do the same for the RIE?.

"Everyone who works in NHS Lothian knew about this sorry mess, but to talk or even mention it was frowned upon, there should a full frank investigation into the mess. It would have been much more cost effective to give the NHS a budget rise of £6 billion a year just to implement a new hospital and facilities building program back in 1999, cost effective and we own the facilities".

In case any of my Scottish friends were feeling that the Royal Infirmary story reflected badly on their reputation for sound sense and shrewdness, I have pointed out that it is here in smart London that plans were made to save money by closing down hospitals that have still to be built. And I cannot help recalling that the New Labour enthusiasts for PFI were the same people who kept admonishing us to "live in the real world".

NHS in safe hands?

AND NOT BECAUSE THE LADY LOVES MILK TRAY
Jane Bruton abseiling 500ft. face of Guys Hospital, London, in health fundraiser.
Takes nerve, but is it as dangerous as trusting this government with the NHS?
(photo by her partner, Paul Mason)


TORY Health Secretary Andrew Lansley has announced plans for the the "biggest shake up" of the NHS, supposedly transferring powers from primary care trusts to local GPs, and getting rid of bureaucracy. As usual we're getting the Tory buzzword "choice", along with promises to "shape the services around the patient rather than make the patient fit the service".

Lansley had "just spoken to more NHS managers than he will ever do again", commented the Health Service Journal, reporting that the Health Secretary had told the NHS confederation conference to expect a minimum of £220 million "shaved" from management costs this year, and of course, redundancies.

Lansley says fewer managers will be needed, because targets will be abolished, and GPs will be in charge of the money. The government has promised £80 million will be found for the change.

I hate bureaucracy, and despise "targets", which make for top-heavy organisations, with three people needed to change a lightbulb - one putting the bulb into the holder, one writing up the report, and the third checking the paperwork. (The bloke footing the ladder - that's me - was made redundant. Get rid of that big fellow standing about, what's all this health and safety nonsense?). Plus forgetting the object, or in this case the person involved, the patient's health, in favour of getting the figures right.

All the same, as an ordinary punter, I'm sceptical about proposals to put the GP in charge. How is it that someone who can barely find five minutes to see each patient at the surgery, and prescribe medicines, is supposedly going to take charge of everyone's health needs, keep abreast of what's happening in the hospitals, and see the public's money is well spent?

The government's White Paper includes provisions to give GPs the power to commission mental health services. But mental health charity Rethink discovered that only 31% of GPs feel equipped to take on the role for mental health. While three quarters of GPs say they can take responsibility for diabetes and asthma services, less than a third felt the same for mental health services.

Rethink is concerned that unless there’s a national plan to up-skill GPs in mental health many of the 1.5 million people with severe mental illnesses may fail to get the treatment they need.
http://www.rethink.org/how_we_can_help/news_and_media/press_releases/white_paper_to_hand.html
As a former hospital worker I am also remembering the part played by catering staff,porters,cleaners, maintenance, laundry, storekeepers and purchasing, and yes, accounts. Not to mention radiologists, pharmacists,ambulance crews,social workers and all the other trades and professions whom our politicians seem never to have heard of, or regard as unimportant. We know they are all essential to the running of the hospital, even if they don't all figure in the hospital soaps and childhood games of doctors and nurses which seem the height of ministerial and media imaginations.

But I was forgetting of course. Everything can be privatised. We have all seen what a marvellous improvement contract cleaners have made to our hospitals' hygiene standards, enabling more people to catch more complaints than previous generations had even heard of. There I go, with my old fashioned ideas, standing in the way of progress. If it's all a bit complicated for our GPs on top of their own jobs, I'm sure there will be plenty of bumf coming through the door from suppliers and service providers, as there has been from the drug companies, with promotions and conferences to help them keep up.

Then again, as part of David Cameron's 'Great Society' idea we could consider the role of volunteers (or kids doing community service?). Though funnily enough the volunteer ladies who used to run sweet shops, or provide outpatients and visitors with a cup of tea and slice of home made cake, to raise funds for patients' extras, have been elbowed out by costly commercial chain outlets.

But over the years, volunteers have been finding bolder and more adventurous ways to raise funds for the NHS, and not just for extras. When St.George's hospital in Tooting, South London, was raising money to install an ultra-sonic scanner unit back in the 1990s, fundraising ranged from students dressing up in funny outfits to shake collecting tins around the Broadway, pretty old-hat, to firefighters abseiling down the outside of Lanesbrough wing on a Saturday afternoon.

I was reminded of this when, with justified pride, Paul Mason posted pictures on Facebook of his partner, Jane Bruton, and her friends, abseiling down the 500 foot face of Guys Hospital at the weekend, to raise money for research on treatment of Myasthenia Gravis. Jane explained "Myasthenia Gravis is a neurological condition where the nerves don't fire properly so the muscles are weak. I nursed people with this when I first was a qualified nurse". Nowadays she is a successful journalist and editor.

There are some great people around, but we have not got Cameron's 'Great Society'. In the 1990s we'd had Cameron's predecessor Margaret Thatcher declaring contemptuously that "there's no such thing as society". We also had people going around the hospital explaining that patients were henceforth "customers", and contrary to our idea that everyone, consultant or cleaner, was part of a team, colleagues in other departments were also our "customers". As for other hospitals, which had supposedly become our competitors, if they should happen also to be customers - like when their incinerator broke down - well, that would be work for the accountants.

GP fundholding had been introduced by the Tories first time round in 1991. A couple of years later, when St.George's scanner unit was up and running, the community in south London which had opened its hearts and wallets for the appeal learned that it would not be for them. GPs in the St.George's catchment area had insufficient funds to refer patients to the unit. NHS patients would have to wait behind the more affluent customers.

So we can't say we've not had a foretaste of what the Tories plans entail. Maybe that is why they did not think it necessary to tell us about it before the election, and it was not even mentioned in the coalition agreement with the Lib Dems. But never mind, people say it is a gamble, and like every shake up you roll the dice, and see who wins. Then maybe wonder if it has been fixed?

"A private health firm is set to rake in millions from a shake-up of the NHS – eight months after the boss’s wife donated £21,000 to Tory health secretary Andrew Lansley.

"Care UK expects to earn a fortune in the biggest reform of the NHS for 60 years as private companies win a lucrative role in providing services to local GPs. As one of the UK’s biggest healthcare providers, it already runs GP surgeries, NHS walk-in centres and cares for half a million people a year.

"And Mr Lansley faces accusations of a conflict of interest for accepting a donation from the wife of John Nash, chairman of Care UK at the time of the donation. The row comes amid warnings that Mr Lansley’s shake-up will cost thousands of jobs and represents a giant gamble with the nation’s health.

"The Health Secretary accepted Caroline Nash’s money in November to help pay for the running of his private office. The hand-out came just weeks after her husband predicted future Government policy would help make his company – which earns 96 per cent of its money from the NHS – even richer.

"Mr Nash stood down as chairman in March, when Care UK sold out to a private equity firm, but he is still a consultant. Unite’s nursing spokesman Barrie Brown said: 'These dangerous and untested ConDem plans will see private companies given an even greater stake in the NHS.

'And it is particularly alarming how one of the biggest private healthcare firms out there could be so closely aligned to Mr Lansley.'

"Dr. John Lister, of campaign group Health Emergency, added: 'The fact that the man in charge of dismantling the NHS has taken cash from one of the companies looking to profit from his plans stinks.' Under Mr Lansley’s plans announced last week, primary care trusts will be scrapped and family doctors given £80 billion to spend.

"Now private companies are gearing up to help GPs manage their new roles in a market worth up to £500million. A spokesman for Care UK said yesterday: 'The donation was from our former chairman’s wife, who we understand regularly makes donations to the Conservative Party.'”

This post was first published on The Mirror

London Health Emergency, which was campaigning to warn people about planned NHS cuts even before the Tories got in says this new plan could mean the end of the NHS. In a statement on July 13, Dr. John Lister said:
"This new set of policies builds on all the worst elements of the previous government's so-called reforms.

"It will establish even more private providers making profit from the public purse, while NHS staff could become a virtually extinct species in England.

"Any GPs who really believe that they can deliver improved care for their patients in this type of health competitive market are kidding themselves.
"Some campaigners have wrongly cried 'wolf' at earlier reform packages, but this White Paper leaves every previous attempt at privatisation and marketisation standing. This time we really are facing the end of the NHS as we know it - by 2015.

"Now is the time for every health union, professional body, pensioners' group, campaigner and member of the public to get together to force the Con-Dems to back off."

http://www.healthemergency.org.uk/breakingnews.php

Indeed, we may ask what mandate the government has to introduce such measures without warning, and stay in office.

Rebellion in unions against Cameron invitation

SHREWSBURY, JULY 3. There was big applause for Bob Crow when he threatened to walk out if Cameron came to TUC.
Now invitation may be rescinded.

LIKE someone slowly waking to realise there are robbers in the house, and this Con-Dem government is not just a bad dream, trade unionists are reacting with disbelief, then astonishment, and finally, indignation, to the news that the TUC General Council has invited Tory prime minister David Cameron to address this year's TUC conference in Manchester.

Rail, Maritime and Transport workers union (RMT) general secretary Bob Crow received stormy applause in Shrewsbury on July 3 when he pledged to lead a walk out if Cameron appeared. PCS president Janice Goodrich who was appearing alongside Bob Crow in support of the Justice for the Shrewsbury Pickets campaign, did not disagree. PCS assistant general secretary Hugh Lanning has reportedly agreed with the invitation, even as his members were protesting against the government's onslaught on services and jobs.
http://www.wrp.org.uk/news/5404

Other union leaders appear divided over the invitation, which was announced to the general council by TUC general secretary Brendan Barber, without prior notice. Matt Wrack of the Fire Brigades Union and Tony Burke of Unite objected, but the invitation went through. Dave Prentis of Unison is reportedly opposed, his union saying it was not responsible because the general council meeting clashed with Unison conference.

No fewer than four resolutions from affiliated bodies were submitted to the Southern and Eastern Region of the TUC (SERTUC) which met in London on Saturday. All four were ruled out of order for not having been submitted earlier, and not being emergencies. But at the suggestion from SERTUC president Martin Gould, who had condemned the invitation to Cameron in his opening address, delegates voted almost unanimously that secretary Megan Dobney should write to the TUC conveying the sentiments of the resolutions.

One of these, submitted from Brent trades union council in North West London, read:

"South East Region TUC deplores the recent decision of the TUC General
Council to invite David Cameron to address TUC Congress 2010, and asks
the General Council, in the urgent interests of trade unity unity
against this government's austerity measures, to reverse this
invitation. We call on the General Council to agree with us that neither
David Cameron nor Nick Clegg nor any other government representative be
allowed to address Congress 2010."

Brent TUC adopted its resolution after hearing that the North West and South West regions of the TUC were opposed to the Cameron invite. The South West region TUC motion, moved by the RMT and seconded by Bridgwater TUC said:

"The South West Region TUC deplores the recent decision of the TUC general Council to invite David Cameron to address TUC Congress 2010, and asks the General Council, in the urgent interests of trade union unity against this government's austerity measures, to reverse this invitation."

This was followed up by the central committee of Bristol and District Amalgamated branch of the Communication Workers Union (CWU) with this motion:

"This Central Committee supports the motion overwhelmingly passed at the meeting of the South West Region TUC on 3rd July, which calls upon the TUC General Council to rescind its recent decision to invite David Cameron to this year's TUC Congress.

We resolve to write to the CWU President and General Secretary, calling upon the CWU National Executive Council to rescind any endorsement of the decision of the CWU TUC General Council representative(s) to support the decision to invite David Cameron.

If the NEC hasn't yet discussed this subject, then we ask that the decision of the TUC General Council representative(s) be NOT endorsed.Further, that the CWU writes to the TUC General Secretary, asking that the General Council decision be re-considered as a matter of urgency."

This CWU revolt is significant because it was reported that the CWU's Billy Hayes was one of those union leaders who voted for inviting Cameron along. Post workers renewing the fight against Royal Mail privatisation plainly don't think providing a platform Cameron is part of that. And as in the Brent resolution, which was partly drafted by a CWU delegate, they are adding that the same applies to Cameron's Liberal Democrat deputy dawg, Nick Clegg.

Bringing Christ the warmonger to Kurdistan, courtesy of US taxpayer

AS though people in Iraq did not have enough trouble getting over the effects of war, and coping with sectarian and ethnic strife, a bunch of aggressive Evangelicals from Tennessee have landed in Kurdistan, with a view to establishing the superiority of their version of Christianity, and waging "Spiritual Warfare" against Islam.

Wealthy as some American Christian outfits are, with their own TV stations and publishing houses, these new crusaders from Servant Group International and related bodies are not depending on the dimes and dollars of their flocks back home, nor on individual wealthy donors. Notwithstanding America's famous separation of Church and State, they are being subsidised by the generous taxpayer, Uncle Sam.

Describing the Classical School of the Medes, built on a hillside outside Sulaymaniyah, reporter Michael Reynolds says it is one of three new private schools in the region that teach a "Christian worldview," established by the evangelicals from Tennessee.

"Since the US occupation took hold, American evangelicals have established not only schools, but printing presses, radio stations, women's centers, bookstores, medical and dental clinics, and churches in northern Iraq, all with the blessings and assistance of the Kurdistan government. Many of these efforts were funded in part by US taxpayer dollars, channeled through Department of Defense construction contracts and State Department grants".

How American Right-Wing Christians Are Waging 'Spiritual Warfare' in Northern Iraq

By Michael Reynolds, AlterNet
http://www.alternet.org/story/147513/

Reynolds says that in September 2003, just four months after the US led invasion and occupation of Iraq, 350 evangelical pastors and church leaders assembled in Kirkuk, where they were welcomed by Massoud Barzani, president of the Kurdistan Regional Government. At that gathering, George Grant, a leader of Servant Group International, the evangelical organization in Nashville that set up the new Christian schools, declared: "Jesus Christ is Lord over all things; He is Lord over every Mullah, every Ayatollah, every Imam, and every Mahdi pretender; He is Lord over the whole of the earth, even Iraq!"

Documents from CENTCOM, the US Central Command for the Middle East, show that between 2005 and 2007,the US Defence Department's contracting organisation paid a Kurdish company at least $465,639 for the construction of Grant's School of the Medes. Two years earlier, tens of thousands of dollars from a State Department-funded program called Healthcare Partnerships in Northern Iraq went into various Servant Group evangelical and humanitarian projects.

In return for the Kurdish Regional Government's support, Doug Layton, a Servant Group founder, served as its liaison in Washington during the Bush years. He ran Kurdish public relations efforts and recruited evangelical businessmen to invest in the region.

For helping the Barzani Kurds gain favour with the Bush administration and its right-wing Christian base, the Evangelicals were rewarded, by being permitted and even assisted to set up their schools and churches in Barzani's Kurdish fiefdom. This is in striking contrast with the intolerance shown political dissenters in the region, and with the attacks on traditional Christian communities in 'liberated' Iraq. Some American observers, like Mike Amitey, a Middle East senior policy analyst at the Open Society Policy Center, are worried the invasion of the evangelicals could cause trouble. "Given the rise of the Islamic parties in Kurdistan and Assyrian Christian resentment of American evangelical exceptionalism and proselytizing, they're playing with fire."

The US military, then still adhering to a policy that favoured Saddam Hussein against Iran, were reluctant to admit the Iraqi leader's responsibility for the chemical weapon attack on Halabja in 1988. But the war on the Kurds led to thousands fleeing as refugees, and many reached Nashville, Tennessee. In 1992, a cadre of Nashville evangelicals from Servant Group International, including large numbers of Kurdish believers, made their way back to Kurdistan, carrying Kurdish-language bibles, money, medical equipment and a plan to establish their "Father's Kingdom" between the Turkish border and Iran. Since arriving in northern Iraq some twenty years ago, Servant Group has widened its global presence, establishing offices, ministries and schools in Turkey, Central Asia, Indonesia, Germany, and Norway.

According to Reynolds, since the US-led invasion, "they have burrowed deep inside the Kurdistan Regional Government, the ruling coalition of Barzani's Kurdish Democratic Party (KDP) and Jalal Talabani's Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK). With help from Layton at the Kurdistan Development Corporation and aided by connections with Republican lobbyists and Congressmen in Washington, they have brokered international business concessions and oil drilling contracts and funneled USAID and DOD money into their missions, setting up their chain of Christian schools. In turn, the KRG has backed Servant Group's ministries and schools with grants of land, buildings and other favors.

Servant Group and its partners are distinguished by their military model of evangelism (what they call "spiritual warfare"); their covert action tactics such as "tent making" or "Kingdom Business" (they enter a country to establish seemingly secular businesses as a cover for evangelism); their intelligence gathering, which they call "spiritual mapping" (where teams of evangelicals conduct full-spectrum "field research'" that includes demographic, historical and geographic data from the neighborhood level to entire countries); an ingrained animosity to Islam; and their dominionist "Kingdom Now" worldview (a fusion of neo-Calvinist authoritarianism and "New Apostolic" Pentecostalism, a millenarian sect of the Assemblies of God whose best known adherent is Sarah Palin)".

Douglas Layton coauthored a book, Our Father's Kingdom: The Church and the Nation, in 2000, in which he explicitly lays out his mission: "If communists and Muslims can take nations -- so can our God!"

That book's co-author, George Otis, Jr., heads a global evangelical intelligence agency, The Sentinel Group, that deploys "field cells" with laptops to gather demographic data in countries the movement has targeted for conversion -- currently, Uganda, as well as several countries in Central America and the Middle East, including Iraq. The data is forwarded to Sentinel's computer banks as part of its "spiritual mapping" project.

In June 2002, as the Bush administration began prepping for the US invasion of Iraq, Congress green-lighted $3.1 million for a State Department-funded program called Healthcare Partnerships in Northern Iraq, ostensibly an effort to improve healthcare in the Kurdish region, but primarily viewed by Middle East policy experts in the United States and local NGO observers as a way to bring the KDP and PUK together under a unified governing body. Douglas Layton was hired as field operations director for this project.

Two-thirds of the Partnership money was swallowed up by Meridian International, a "Non-Governmental Organisation" whose board, at the time, included the wife of then-Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, and its subcontractors, according to an analysis by one of the program's participants. That left about $1 million for Layton to direct into Kurdish health programs. According to published reports by Servant Group and sources in northern Iraq who were involved with the program, Layton funneled much of it into Servant Group operations such as its mobile dental service, health clinics, and into the pockets of Kurdish officials with whom he was currying favor. Layton also rented an office in the Kurdish Regional Government's Ministry of Health for $1,000 a month-another kickback to KRG officialdom-where he wrote speeches for Health Minister Dr. Jamal Abdul Hamid Abbas. According to two NGO sources who were then in Kurdistan, Layton also handed out cash and equipment from Healthcare Partners to Abbas' cronies.

Under Layton's guidance, the Partnership set up Internet connections at local clinics and medical schools, then required the organizations to pay $1,000 a month to continue the service -- money they did not have.

A field director for an international NGO involved in health programs in Kurdistan from 2002 to 2004 was not much impressed with Layton or with the Partnership. "HCP was full of shit," said the field director, who, due to his ongoing work in the politically volatile region, asked not to be named. "Our NGO conducted a series of nursing trainings in all three major hospitals, and we heard of no activity in this area by the HCP.

"You look at the HCP final report and one thing that jumps out is the fuzzy math. They say they gave twenty-six grants averaging about $13,000. That comes out to about $338,000, not nearly the $1 million they say went into the grants programs. As far as reports on grant activities go, this is one of the shoddiest pieces of garbage I have ever seen."

George Grant is the author of The Blood of the Moon, a book first published in 1991 and reprinted in 2001. In his book, Grant calls for conquering the Islamic world by military might in order to bring about Muslim conversion, an obvious prerequisite for achieving his uncompromising theocratic worldview. In his 1987 Dominionist polemic, The Changing of the Guard, Grant wrote:
"Christian politics has as its primary intent the conquest of the land -- of men, families, institutions, bureaucracies, courts, and governments for the Kingdom of Christ. It is to reinstitute the authority of God's Word as supreme over all judgments, over all legislation, over all declarations, constitutions, and confederations."

In an April 2004 lecture at fellow Dominionist R.C. Sproul's Highlands Study Center in Virginia, Grant said, "We're to make disciples who will obey everything that He commanded, not just in the hazy zone of piety, but in the totality of life.... It is the spiritual, emotional, and cultural mandate to win all things in the name of Jesus."

Mark Potok, director of the Intelligence Project at the Southern Poverty Law Center, which keeps a watch on racist and far-Right movements, says Grant and his schools "are deeply influenced by white supremacist ideas." He points, in particular, to Grant's close association with Douglas Wilson, who founded both the Association of Classical and Christian Schools (of which Grant is a longstanding member) and New Saint Andrews College in Moscow, Idaho, which provides teachers to the Classical Schools in Kurdistan.

Wilson also co-authored a book, Southern Slavery: As It Was, a neo-Confederate fantasy disguised as history. The book argues that Southern slavery was sanctioned by the Bible and that slaves enjoyed a wonderful life due to the patriarchal benevolence of their evangelical masters. "Slavery produced in the South a genuine affection between the races that we believe we can say has never existed in any nation before the [Civil] War or since," it reads. "There has never been a multi-racial society which has existed with such mutual intimacy and harmony in the history of the world." According to Potok, Grant and Wilson are in the leadership of a movement within Christian Reconstructionism called "Celtic Sunrise" that is deeply influenced by white supremacist ideas.


Amitay says the Kurdish leaders are not concerned about the evangelicals' long-term agenda. "Everyone knows it's a game. The Kurds just want to cash in. The KRG isn't concerned about what evangelicals say over here. English reports in the US aren't going to be read over there." He beleives the KRG "will draw the line" if the evangelicals pursue aggressive conversion efforts. "A priority for the KRG is a decent relationship with Tehran," he says. "And there is a rising pro-Islamic movement responding to the economic disparities between wealthy Kurds and the majority of working poor. There is resentment out there that the Islamists can tap into."

American experts admit Iraq is fragmented along religious and ethnic lines, and there is contention over cities like Kirkuk and the oil-rich region around. They fear that the evangelicals helped by their own government and the Kurdish authorities could make things a good deal worse. It seems the Kurdish leaders have in a small way acted like the Israeli government, which has welcomed evangelicals like Pastor Jack Hagee bringing gifts of money, knowing that he said Hitler was sent by God, and that he preaches war in the Middle East, and Armageddon. Playing with fire is an all too common temptation.

Rebaz Mahmoud contributed reporting from Kurdistan. Michael Reynolds is a former correspondent for the Reuters Miami/Caribbean bureau and a senior analyst with the Southern Poverty Law Center Intelligence Project.
View their story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/147513/

Thanks to Tahrir Swift for drawing my attention to this story,
http://solidarityiraq.blogspot.com/

Barnet Unfair: "Easy Council" leaders don't intend to ride Economy class

BARNET council in north London has been seen as leading the way in Tory plans for local government and public services. Having lost millions through the Icelandic bank fiasco, the council came up last year with the idea of remodelling itself on budget airlines like Ryan Air and Easy Jet.

It would provide basic "no frills" services - actually the council wants to farm almost all of these out to contractors - and as for anything else, well you would get what you paid for. An old person needing care say, would have a "choice" - that favourite Tory buzz word. He or she could have a carer, or a cleaner, or take a holiday in Eastbourne.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/aug/27/tory-borough-barnet-budget-airline

Of course this freedom means that the more money you have, the less you are forced to choose between wants and needs, but that's what a free society is about, isn't it? There are some very rich people in parts of Barnet, and they might consider jumping the queue to get planning applications approved, or having more frequent refuse collection, worth paying for, rather than having to cough up higher taxes for services to the common folk.

Brian Coleman, who has doubled as Barnet mayor and member of the Greater London Assembly, was elected as a Tory councillor for Totteridge, where a lot of these rich people live, in 1998. Soon after the May 2006 elections he managed to get Tory leader Brian Salinger replaced by councillor Mike Freer. It was Freer who said after £27.4 million of Barnet's money went down the drain in Iceland that he had never kept track of the council's investments. But then, he is only a banker by profession.

It was Freer too, who introduced the "Future Shape" plan for Barnet, getting rid of such "frills" as wardens in sheltered housing, and citing the Easy-jet model. Not everybody was happy, and and it was not only union members in services, or people needing care, who objected. The council's Liberal Democrat Leader Cllr Jack Cohen said: "Barnet Council is in chaos over Easy Jet Plans. It is now becoming clear that the Tory Council is running scared. They have been caught out and are trying desperately to cover their tracks. But we are not fooled. They are marching ahead with plans that will hit jobs, services, and mean Tax Payers forking out on even bigger bills but for far worse services. It is now becoming clear that no service is safe under this Tory Administration. The latest revelation that refuse collection may not be a core service under an Easy Jet Council is in my view final proof they have taken leave of their senses"
http://barnetlibdems.org.uk/news/000035/refuse_collection_under_threat_in_easy_council_plans.html

In January, the courts ruled that Barnet would be infringing the law if it went ahead with its scheme.
Not giving in, Councillor Lynne Hillan said: "We are now pressing the Tory leadership to introduce new laws if they win power to allow councils to implement their initiatives".
http://www.leftfootforward.org/2010/01/fresh-headache-for-cameron-after-easy-council-plans-ruled-illegal/

Hillan had replaced Mike Freer as Barnet leader so that he could focus on his parliamentary ambitions. He is now the Tory MP for Finchley and Golders Green, the seat formerly held by the late Rudy Vis for Labour, and before that Margaret Thatcher's constituency.

Said to have enjoyed more free dinners than any other member of the Greater London Authority, Brian Coleman is still the big man in Barnet, as well as a GLA member, and Boris Johnson also appointed him chair of the London Fire and Emergency Planning Authority. He has managed to upset firefighters and tube workers. He described proposals for a new light-rail link between the branches of the Northern Line and going on via Wembley to Ealing as "bonkers". He has come up with his own proposal to run London tube trains without drivers.

A contretemps with a speed camera led to Assembleyman Coleman being banned from driving himself in 2006, with a total of 12 endorsements on his licence. Being a busy man he spent £10,000 on taxi fares from 1 April 2006 to 30 March 2007, compared to the average figure for a London Assembly member of around £845. A GLA audit panel report in October 2007 showed that Coleman had run up taxi expenses of £1740 in the period 1 April 2007 to 31 August 2007.^[48] This accounted for one third of all cab expenses for the Mayor and 25 GLA members. A further GLA audit panel report in March 2008 revealed that Coleman had run up taxi expenses of £4157 in the period 1 April 2007 to 31 December 2007.^[50] This accounted for half of all cab expenses for the Mayor and 25 GLA members. Then mayor Ken Livingstone said "Brian Coleman must explain to Londoners how he can possibly justify spending more on taxis in four weeks than the average Assembly member does in nine months."

In July last year Coleman was the only London Assembly member to refuse to voluntarily publish details of their expense claims . He stated "I won't do it voluntarily. It's none of the public's business", and that "Politicians with lower expenses tend to be the politicians who do least work. Those with higher expenses are the ones who do most work. Coleman complied following pressure from Mayor Boris Johnson.

Now Barnet Tories have shown how much they value their own work by increasing the leader's income from £41,893 to £47,027 and that of executive members by 38%. Earlier reports said council leader Lynne Hillan can claim up to £54,000 per year, a jump of nearly £20,000, on top of a £10,000 basic members allowance available to all councillors. Cabinet members are the other big winners doubling their £17,000 entitlement to £34,000, although they have agreed not to claim £7,200 this year to ease the transition and keep it within budget.

Many opposition councillors have lost out in the new scheme, set out by London Councils, gaining a minor allowance increase but losing the £500 travel expenses.

http://www.times-series.co.uk/news/8270134.Top_councillors_get_bumper_pay_rise_after_heated_meeting/

It comes as public sector workers endure a two-year pay freeze while national cabinet members took a 5% cut.

Local Government Minister Grant Shapps urged the council to think again. "This country has an enormous deficit. "I find it quite disturbing they should be taking pay rises - I urge them to think again.

"Which planet are they living on? For goodness sake show some leadership."

Ccouncillor Kate Salinger (Conservative) voted against the rises. "It was a policy I disagreed with and could not in conscience vote for," she said. "Councils should be leading by example. I don't think our example is very good." Councillor Salinger has been removed from every council committee by the Tories for opposing them on the rise.
Public sector trade union Unison called the rises "disgusting".

But Councillor Brian Coleman, one of those in line for a rise, called the move "sensible". Coleman added that 20 other councils in London have done the same.

Chancellor George Osborne said last year that "Conservative Whitehall will have much to learn from Conservative town halls."

We'd guess he does not want civil servants in Whitehall citing Coleman's example of a "sensible" rise! And Unison must be worrying now that its members might expect it to follow Barnet Tories' lead on pay rather than accept a freeze.