I just know that Aldi stands for ('Al for Albrecht, 'di' for discount)

Btw, when I was in Australia, I often shopped at Aldi stores because as a student I had to be frugal :) RIP Berthold Albrecht (Aldi's main heir) The rest is retailing legend - from 13 stores just after the war the Aldi ('Al for Albrecht, 'di' for discount) empire marched on to dominate the German retail landscape and much of the world. Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2244577/Aldi-heir-Berthold-Albrecht-dies-leaving-11-billion-fortune-family-wait-month-announce-death.html#ixzz2EOHpJ9kO Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

A letter to a pervert

Syria: last chance for diplomacy | Paul Rogers

http://m.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/dec/06/syria-last-chance-diplomacy
Paul Rogers for Open Democracy, part of the Guardian Comment NetworkThe situation in Syria is dire. After 20 months of conflict, the war has created a human and economic disaster. Around 40,000 people have been killed, many more injured and hundreds of thousands displaced. At the same time, media sources in late 2012 have reported major rebel advances and the withdrawal of staff from Syria by the United Nations and several diplomatic missions. All this, now reinforced by concern over Syria's chemical weapons, is creating an upsurge in support (especially in western Europe) for western military intervention, on the grounds that the moment could become the "tipping-point" for Bashar al-Assad's regime.There is a clear need to assess the risks and probable consequences of such a course, and to examine the prospects for any sort of diplomatic solution. The context for both is the way the Syrian conflict has evolved since spring 2011, when Damascus reacted with great violence to the localised outbreaks of non-violent protest. Syria's power-elite drew from Tunisia and Egypt the lesson that it had to be ruthless in its repression and offer little in the way of concession. But ever more force against the eruptions of dissent only hardened the emerging opposition, and by mid-2012 a rebellion was developing. As this intensified in the autumn, many analysts doubted that the regime could survive the year.It did survive, fortified by support from sections of the population, and despite a number of defections from its core. The conflict was evolving rapidly into a form of "double-proxy" war that, by involving regional and global actors, hugely complicated the search for a peaceful resolution. In the Middle East, the rebels were increasingly encouraged by Saudi Arabia and Qatar, with the Saudis in particular determined to see the regime fall. The Assad regime was strongly backed by Iran; weapons and training resources flowed in, greatly aided by an "air bridge" that transited Iraq (thanks to Nouri al-Maliki's government in Baghdad, in an act dismaying to the United States – see "Iraq, Iran, Syria: triangle of war ", 9 August 2012).In the global arena, Washington and its allies were on the side of the rebels, while the Russians and to an extent the Chinese stood by Damascus. A further complication was the growing presence of Islamist paramilitaries, many of them travelling from elsewhere in the region. They proved particularly effective thanks to their intense commitment and motivation, but also because some had gained combat experience in urban warfare in Iraq. They also benefited from persistent disunity among the rebels, something only marginally less visible after the meeting in Doha in November 2012 which resulted in the formation of an inclusive coalition.A new momentumThis double-proxy war has now reached a point where active western involvement is looking ever more likely. So far, western powers have confined themselves to channelling aid to "acceptable" rebels while trying to prevent Islamist groups from acquiring weaponry. An extension of this stance might initially take the form of supplying the rebels with more effective arms and erecting a "no-fly zone". Both are feasible short-term actions, although the latter could be made more difficult by the presence of 2,000 Russian advisers in Syria (see Gideon Rachman's The perilous drift to intervention in Syria, Financial Times, 4 December 2012). In this context Nato's decision to ship long-range Patriot missiles to Turkey is significant, not least because these could be used to help enforce a no-fly-zone over much of northern Syria.The supporters of intervention have two cogent arguments: that an even worse humanitarian disaster must be prevented, and that a quick end to Assad's regime will diminish the risk of Islamist influence in a post-Assad Syria. They point to the evident increase in the number of Islamist-linked paramilitaries active in the conflict, with the Jabhat al-Nusra group alone claiming (a probably overblown) 10,000 fighters (see Samer Araabi, Despite growing violence, Syrian political equation unchanged, IPS/TerraViva, 5 December 2012). In parallel, the tactics of many rebels have become far harsher now that they have deprived the regime of the near-monopoly of terror it enjoyed in the conflict's early months; this has lost them support among some Syrians with no love for the regime.These two propositions are reasonable, but leave three other issues out of consideration. First, any western military action will provoke Tehran into increasing its support of Damascus (which Baghdad may facilitate). Second, the fall of Assad's regime may turn out to be a prolonged process involving even greater loss of innocent life. The power-base in Syria still has domestic support, and far more military capability than Gaddafi's Libya (which survived six months of extensive Nato action).Third, the wider impact of yet another western intervention in the Middle East may be disastrous. Assad's regime may be hated across much of the region, but it is still the government of a major Arab country. After all, Saddam Hussein was despised when the coalition's war to overthrow him began in March 2003; just a few months later, those who expected to be garlanded as liberators were widely seen as occupiers and even oppressors. This historical experience is usually ignored or its relevance dismissed – but it is vital, and it has to be faced.A different endgameThe predicament over Syria remains appalling. The consequences of intervention could (as so often in the past) be unexpected and counterproductive, but to do nothing may allow even more blood to be spilled. There is, though, one possibility that could avert the worst outcomes: a decision by President Obama's administration – hitherto very cautious about intervention – to make a very strong effort to achieve negotiated regime change (see Syria: war and diplomacy, 23 August 2012).Such a course would require the full co-operation of Moscow, which is not unimaginable: there are signs in recent days that Russia is seriously concerned about the regime's viability and what might follow its collapse (a sentiment that may even be shared in some quarters in Tehran). Amid all the violence and bloodshed, this provides a small window of opportunity; but it can be opened only if the US takes the lead in an intense diplomatic process that accepts the need for substantial – and uncomfortable – compromise over the shape of a post-Assad Syria.The west, to put it bluntly, is not in a position to dictate what form Syria's evolving governance might take. It has to recognise that this must principally be decided within Syria – but that the acquiescence of other states in the process will be essential: Russia and Iran, but also Turkey and Egypt (independently of concerns over President Mohamed Morsi's domestic actions).The lone hopeful element in this scenario is that Obama's re-election gives him room for action. Over Syria – as over Iran and Israel-Palestine – he could in principle follow a more considered approach, avoid the risks of escalating conflict, and seek the best possible solution available in difficult circumstances. Where Damascus is concerned, there is still a chance of some kind of arranged regime change – very tough though it would be to reach. Will that chance be taken? The answer lies mainly in Washington, but not a little too in Moscow and Tehran, and in Ankara and Cairo. The fate of Syria, and more than Syria, is in the balance. Back to top
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Mubarak with a Beard?

The United States needs to tell Egypt's new president that there's no going back to the old, bad ways. BY MICHAEL WAHID HANNA (via http://www.foreignpolicy.com) Reflecting on the lessons of the Arab uprisings in November 2011, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was adamant that traditional U.S. policies in the region were no longer tenable. "[A]s the fall of Hosni Mubarak in Egypt made clear," she said "the enduring cooperation we seek will be difficult to sustain without democratic legitimacy and public consent." But such revelations necessitate drastic changes, and in the face of unanticipated events and crises, it's all too easy for the familiar policies of the past to re-emerge. As Egypt descends again into turmoil over the country's fraught constitution-writing process, it appears that the United States is once again embracing the past and eschewing the lessons it learned the hard way during the uprising. In a move that bears the hallmark of U.S. policy in the Mubarak era, the United States has largely reduced its relationship with Egypt to the maintenance of the peace treaty with Israel and withheld serious judgment of the Muslim Brotherhood-led government, even as it actively undermines the country's already troubled democratic transition. The most severe political crisis to strike Egypt since the fall of Mubarak was sparked by President Mohamed Morsy's Nov. 22 constitutional decree, which granted the executive absolute authority and immunized his decisions from judicial review for the remainder of the transitional period. Morsy defended the move as an attempt to protect the constituent assembly -- tasked with drafting Egypt's new constitution -- from potential judicial dissolution, but his unilateral steps provoked outrage among opposition forces who again took to the streets. The crisis deepened when the president directed the assembly to ram through a governing document in a chaotic, all-night session that made a mockery of deliberative constitutional process and design. If approved in a hastily called referendum, that slipshod document will bound Egypt's political future and institutionalize its crisis. With a significant portion of the country's judges declaring a strike in response to Morsy's declaration and dueling protesters mobilizing on opposing sides, Egypt's flawed transition now risks tipping into outright civil strife and prolonged instability. Morsy's actions presented the United States with a difficult choice: Should it challenge an elected Egyptian president just as the two countries have begun to reconstruct bilateral ties? This choice was complicated further by the close cooperation and pragmatism displayed by Morsy and his government in securing a ceasefire between Hamas and Israel in the Gaza Strip last month. These efforts won the Egyptian president newfound confidence in Washington, and administration officials were quick to shower him with praise. But rather than using his burnished reputation as a regional leader to forge a more consensual and stable transition back home, Morsy capitalized on the favorable international political climate by making an untenable and unjustifiable power grab that has plunged Egypt into crisis and exacerbated existing divisions. Morsy's moves were particularly damaging to the United States since he made his initial announcement the day after meeting with Clinton to finalize details of the Gaza ceasefire. The timing raised the unfounded specter among already suspicious Egyptians that the Brotherhood had cleared their undemocratic power play with the now-grateful Americans. The Obama administration's response has only reinforced those fears -- though it does not justify the more baroque conspiracy theories about a secret U.S.-Muslim Brotherhood pact. Following Morsy's decree, the State Department released a tepid statement referencing "concerns" in the international community. The statement urged calm and encouraged "all parties to work together," calling for "all Egyptians to resolve their differences over these important issues peacefully and through democratic dialogue." The decision not to deliver a White House statement further indicated that the Obama administration wished to downplay the significance of Morsy's moves. But the administration's conservative response was woefully short-sighted and reflected old modes of thinking that were ostensibly discarded in the wake of the Arab uprisings. First, by downplaying U.S. concerns about Morsy's maneuvering, the United States seems to have forgotten the most important lesson of the Arab uprisings: Usurping authority or trampling rights are not recipes for political stability. The scenes of outraged opposition in Tahrir Square and elsewhere in Egypt indicate that the Brotherhood cannot claim to represent Egypt by itself. Its efforts to do so bode ill for the country's future and have precipitated a climate where political contestation is now accompanied with overt threats and incendiary rhetoric.  An unstable Egypt led by repressive rulers is a bad bet for the United States -- from the perspective of values and interests. A chaotic transition has tested America's diplomatic patience, but that challenge pales in comparison to the prospect of chronic instability and civil strife. With Egypt's economic woes high on the list of worries faced by U.S. officials, it bears mentioning that economic reform and growth will never take root so long as the political process remains deadlocked. Second, the American response was rooted in a fundamental misunderstanding of the Egypt-Israel peace treaty and a limited view of Egypt as a client state. While it is true that the treaty underpins U.S. security policy in the region, avoiding criticisms of Egypt's authoritarian tendencies does little to secure American interests. For too long, the United States has seen the Egypt-Israel peace as perpetually vulnerable and sustainable only through American largesse. The peace between Egypt and Israel is a cold one, and it will undoubtedly become colder still. It is hampered by the unyielding occupation of Palestinian lands and the ever-expanding settlement project. With an Islamist-led government now in place in Egypt, the deep-seated anti-Israel sentiments of the Muslim Brotherhood and its ideological affinity for Islamist fellow-travelers such as Hamas will reshape regional dynamics. Egypt will undoubtedly play a greater role in championing the Palestinian cause, and future Egyptian governments will abandon the anti-Hamas policies long pursued by the Mubarak regime. But despite the tangible shifts in atmospherics, symbolism, and policies, regime change in Egypt will not alter the underlying strategic interests that pushed Anwar Sadat to seek a separate peace with Egypt's bitter enemy. Partly, this is a function of the national security establishment's continued stewardship of the Israel portfolio. While the parameters of the pact struck between the president and his military are not formally enshrined or even fully defined, the military and intelligence services still bound the policy discussions on issues such as Gaza. Most importantly, Morsy's pragmatism should not come as a surprise. It is a clear reflection of enduring national interests and the infeasibility of aggression towards Israel. The prohibitive costs of such conflict -- both materially and for Egypt's position in the international community -- mean that the fundamental bargain underlying this cold peace is far more durable than is commonly presumed. Rewarding Morsy for his pragmatic approach to the recent Gaza conflict is a case of offering inducements for a policy already decided. In her November 2011 speech, Clinton declared that we "cannot have one set of policies to advance security in the here-and-now and another to promote democracy in a long run that never quite arrives." That long run is here. The United States retains influence, particularly in light of Egypt's dire need for multilateral financial assistance and diplomatic support. Conditioning aid and support is complicated and often over-hyped, but it is a much-needed shift that would represent a break from the blank checks so often given to Egypt's leaders. With much of the judiciary on strike and the prospect of prolonged street protests high, Egypt's democratic future is in peril. While not foreordained, a slow drift toward illiberal majoritarianism is now distinctly possible, as is the attendant instability that is likely to ensue. Injecting the United States more prominently in the current crisis also comes with risks, especially in light of America's checkered history in Egypt. But given the United States' deep ties, the Obama administration should understand that the choice between values and interests is a false one in this instance. If America acquiesces anew to authoritarian behavior in Cairo, it won't win a new stable ally; it will only further alienate the many Egyptians who find the transactional nature of U.S.-Egyptian ties repugnant. Even worse, it will encourage a destructive political culture that provides an unstable foundation for future relations.

via: http://ideas.time.com MIDDLE EAST Analysis: Who's Afraid of the Egyptian Constitution? By Ayman MohyeldinDec. 05, 2012 On Dec. 15, 2012, Egyptian voters will be asked to cast ballots in one of the country's most important votes ever, a referendum on a new constitution. Egyptians–and people all over the world–are asking, "Will this document chart a way forward that lives up to the sacrifices of the people and the promise of the revolution? Will it uphold universal values and norms?" The prospective constitution has polarized the country, dividing it between well-organized and disciplined Islamist political forces and their supporters who are for it, on one side, and disjointed and divided secular and liberal forces who are against it, on the other. The debate has generated massive demonstrations—with many bouts of violence. (MORE: Egypt's Constitutional Endgame: Where Confusion is the Rule) Many here agree that the draft of the constitution that will come to a vote is far from perfect—though it has a number of groundbreaking articles. For example, Article 6 states that "No political party shall be formed that discriminates on the basis of gender, religion or origin." Others promote the general guidelines for a free market including article 29 that limits when the government can nationalize companies and industries. Other articles make torture and the detention of civilians illegal. One calls for the eradication of illiteracy. A new article stipulates that members of parliament must provide financial disclosures annually in an effort to combat the country's tradition of corruption. But the language of it can often read ambiguously, reflecting the political realities that created it—though those origins are the very reasons the document is important and historic. First, a look at what liberal critics call its glaring shortcomings. The assembly chosen to writeEgypt's constitution was selected by a parliament dominated by Islamist parties. Though that parliament was dissolved by the courts due to a technicality, the Constituent Assembly it created continued its work and reflected the Islamist bent of the body that appointed its members. By the time the Constituent Assembly voted, at least 15 out of the 100 members had boycotted the final reading and vote on the draft. Not a single Christian participated in the vote and out of the 85 total who did vote only four were women. All four could be described as Islamists. Liberal and secularist opinions were barely reflected. That, say the critics, is a decided dearth of diversity. Already the draft constitution has drawn criticism from human rights organizations because of the limited protections against abuse of powers by the state and the failure to protect religious freedoms and other individual liberties. Many people are alarmed that some articles even pave the way for government intrusion into personal freedom. They point, for example, to Article 11 which stipulates that the "State shall safeguard ethics, public morality and public order, and foster a high level of education and of religious and patriotic values…"  Another article says the President is the Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces while another article then says the Minister of Defense is the Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces. (MORE: TIME's Interview With Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi) The constitution also misses the opportunity to organize the country's myriad court systems that span nearly half a dozen of different judicial bodies including the Supreme Constitutional Court, the State Council, the Court of Cassation, State Affairs and the Administrative Prosecution. Human rights advocates, meanwhile, fear that some articles may be interpreted in such a way as to enforce the domesticity of women rather than promote their presence in the workforce and the world beyond hearth-and-home. Finally, many of those opposed to it say there really isn't much time for Egyptians to hold public readings, debate and educate themselves about how they want to vote. They will have just about two weeks to study and decide before voting on Dec. 15. (You can read a full English translation of it here.) However, while Egyptian secularists – and Western observers – may despair at the situation, others here believe the legitimacy of the document should not be viewed in a vacuum and the final document, flawed as it may be, should not detract from the process that produced it. There have been edifying elements and lessons in transparency for ordinary Egyptians. Most if not all of the sessions of the Constituent Assembly were broadcast on TV; the inner debates of the body were widely publicized and published in local press and media. The constitution was a purely organic Egyptian exercise of sovereignty. There was little outside interference or pressure. Despite calls for international technical expertise, this was an Egyptian Constitution written by Egyptians for Egyptians. For a country that is new to politicking and consensus-building, Egypt's constitution writing process reflected that reality – one where proponents of the democratically prevailing ideology, in this case Islamist, drafted a charter that they felt they were given a mandate to do. Like other draft charters at the time of their writing, including that of the United States, Egypt's serves as a snap shot of where the country is, not where it can and should go. That will be the task of future interpretations of the constitution. It took close to a hundred years for the U.S. to abolish slavery and give women the right to vote. Many Egyptians may not like what they see today—a country that is impoverished, chaotic and dominated by Islamist political currents. But this is the reality that exists—and the one that produced the document. And, looking at the way Egyptian democracy is developing, the document itself is not impervious to change. (MORE: Why Egypt's Constitution Matters) Indeed, many Egyptians believe their country's constitution doesn't have to be perfect. Not right away. Getting the constitution passed may be part of a political end game by PresidentMohamed Morsi, but it is not the end of the process. It is the beginning of a political and social evolution. Amendments to the Constitution can be initiated by Egypt's parliament or the President. They require two-thirds vote in parliaments houses and must be approved by national referendum. Furthermore, almost every article in the proposed charter ends with the words "as regulated by law"—an indication that, going forward, laws must be formed to frame and embody the idea of the article. Some observers believe that this simply gives Islamists more legislative clout. However, it can work the other way around. If Egypt's liberal forces get their act together and start winning seats in parliament, they too can shape those laws. Egypt's so-far steadfastly secular judiciary also has the ability to shoot down legal interpretations of the constitution that the judges disagree with. It's also worth noting that many functioning democracies, including the United Kingdom, that have no explicit constitution. A constitution does not ensure the state will abide by it nor will it prevent a dictatorship from emerging. Egypt had a constitution in place for decades and yet despite that, Mubarak and his predecessors managed to co-opt it to build their authoritarian regimes. A constitution does not guarantee a democracy. And while Egypt may end up with a flawed constitution, that does not mean its future will be bereft of a vibrant democracy.

Hopefully oneday I will be able to have a vacation in Madagascar

Anti-Mursi Protest

4 died and hundreds injured in the current anti-Mursi protest (bbc)

http://bit.ly/SGnsPZ

http://bit.ly/SGnsPZ

Arab Spring creates more corruptions?

BERLIN (Reuters) - Egypt has slid in a global league table of perceived official corruption in the past year, and the "Arab Spring" revolutions have yet to produce serious anti-graft action across the region, Transparency International said on Wednesday. In its annual Corruption Perceptions Index, the anti-graft organization said Egypt had fallen six places to 118th out of 176 countries as levels of bribery, abuse of power and secret dealings remain high in the Arab world's most populous nation. "We know that frustration about corruption brought people out onto the streets in the Arab world,"Christoph Wilcke, Transparency International director for the Middle East and North Africa, told Reuters. "We've observed that in countries where substantial change occurred they're still struggling to put in place new systems of governance. That's reflected in these scores. The hope hasn't materialized yet in more serious anti-corruption programmes." The public sector league table from the Berlin-based group - on which the higher the ranking, the cleaner a country is - produced a mixed picture for nations swept up in last year's unrest. Tunisia slipped two places to 75th while Morocco, which experienced less turmoil, fell eight spots to 88th. Syria, which is engulfed in a civil war, tumbled 15 places to 144th but Libya managed an improvement from a very low base, rising to 160th from 168th. Overall, Denmark, Finland and New Zealand were in a first-place tie with scores of 90 on a new scale where 100 stands for most clean and 0 for most corrupt. Somalia, North Korea and Afghanistan shared last place. Egypt was in a five-way tie with the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Indonesia and Madagascar with a score of 32. Islamist Mohamed Mursi became Egypt's first freely-elected president in June this year after a period of direct military rule following the overthrow of Hosni Mubarak last February. Corruption ranging from the petty to the grand scale was one of the main grievances that toppled Mubarak. However, hopes that the problem would ease remain far away as people waiting for paperwork complain that low-level graft has become even worse since the uprising because of lax law enforcement. Mursi has talked of sweeping out corrupt elements in the state and among those doing business with the government. However, many businesses have been rattled by his remarks, fearing it will mean replacing one elite with another or challenging deals that were agreed in good faith by investors with Mubarak's government. However, some executives say there are at least a few signs that corruption has become a little less blatant in some areas of business, partly because of a new sense of accountability that has come with Egypt's still incomplete democratic transformation. Wilcke said that Mursi has made a number of speeches in which he said fighting corruption was a top priority. "But as far as we can tell, very little has happened on the ground in making this a reality, as far as putting in place systems that we know work to prevent corruption," he said. "Strengthening the independence of the judiciary is just one of them." Wilcke said good work in countries that fight corruption can lead to an initial drop in their ranking because the public is made more aware of graft. "I would say Egypt has made big promises and taken some small tentative steps," he said. "Anyone who witnessed the transition would agree they are extraordinarily difficult. It's not possible to change things over night." Mursi is waging a high-stakes battle with Egypt's judges, many of them foes of his supporters in the Muslim Brotherhood, which is bent on purging a judiciary seen as tainted by Mubarak appointees. Judges called strikes and top courts halted work in protest at Mursi's decree last month that extended his powers and put his actions temporarily above legal challenge. (Additional reporting by Edmund Blair in Cairo; editing by David Stamp)

Trafficked maids to order: The darker side of richer India

By Nita Bhalla  a good article from Reuters NEW DELHI, Dec 4 (TrustLaw) - Inside the crumbling housing estates of Shivaji Enclave, amid the boys playing cricket and housewives chatting from their balconies, winding staircases lead to places where lies a darker side to India's economic boom. Three months ago, police rescued Theresa Kerketa from one of these tiny two-roomed flats. For four years, she was kept here by a placement agency for domestic maids, in between stints as a virtual slave to Delhi's middle-class homes. "They sent me many places - I don't even know the names of the areas," said Kerketa, 45, from a village in Chhattisgarh state in central India. "Fifteen days here, one month there. The placement agent kept making excuses and kept me working. She took all my salary." Often beaten and locked in the homes she was sent to, Kerketa was forced to work long hours and denied contact with her family. She was not informed when her father and husband died. The police eventually found her when a concerned relative went to a local charity, which traced the agency and rescued her together with the police. Abuse of migrant maids from Africa and Asia in the Middle East and parts of Southeast Asia is commonly reported. But the story of Kerketa is the story of many maids and nannies in India, where a surging demand for domestic help is fuelling a business that, in large part, thrives on human trafficking by unregulated placement agencies. As long as there are no laws to regulate the placement agencies or even define the rights of India's unofficially estimated 90 million domestic workers, both traffickers and employers may act with impunity, say child and women's rights activists and government officials. Activists say the offences are on the rise and link it directly to the country's economic boom over the last two decades. "Demand for maids is increasing because of the rising incomes of families who now have money to pay for people to cook, clean and look after their children," says Bhuwan Ribhu from Bachpan Bachao Andolan (Save the Childhood Movement), the charity that helped rescue Kerketa. Economic reforms that began in the early 1990s have transformed the lifestyles of many Indian families. Now almost 30 percent of India's 1.2 billion people are middle class and this is expected to surge to 45 percent by 2020. Yet as people get wealthier, more women go out to work and more and more families live on their own without relatives to help them, the voracious demand for maids has outstripped supply. BEHIND CLOSED DOORS There are no reliable figures for how many people are trafficked for domestic servitude. The Indian government says 126,321 trafficked children were rescued from domestic work in 2011/12, a rise of almost 27 percent from the previous year. Activists say if you include women over 18 years, the figure could run into the hundreds of thousands. The abuse is difficult to detect as it is hidden within average houses and apartments, and under-reported, because victims are often too fearful to go to the police. There were 3,517 incidents relating to human trafficking in India in 2011, says the National Crime Records Bureau, compared to 3,422 the previous year. Conviction rates for typical offences related to trafficking - bonded labor, sexual exploitation, child labor and illegal confinement - are also low at around 20 percent. Cases can take up to two years to come to trial, by which time victims have returned home and cannot afford to return to come to court. Police investigations can be shoddy due to a lack of training and awareness about the seriousness of the crime. Under pressure from civil society groups as well as media reports of cases of women and children trafficked not just to be maids, but also for prostitution and industrial labor, authorities have paid more attention in recent years. In 2011, the government began setting up specialized anti-human trafficking units in police stations throughout the country. There are now 225 units and another 110 due next year whose job it is to collect intelligence, maintain a database of offenders, investigate reports of missing persons and partner with charities in raids to rescue victims. Parveen Kumari, director in charge of anti-trafficking at the ministry of home affairs, says so far, around 1,500 victims have been rescued from brick kilns, carpet weaving and embroidery factories, brothels, placement agencies and houses. "We realize trafficking is a bigger issue now with greater demand for labor in the cities and these teams will help," said Kumari. "The placement agencies are certainly under the radar." NATIONAL HEADLINES The media is full of reports of minors and women lured from their villages by promises of a good life as maids in the cities. They are often sent by agencies to work in homes in Delhi, and its satellite towns such as Noida and Gurgaon, where they face a myriad of abuses. In April, a 13-year-old maid heard crying for help from the balcony of a second floor flat in a residential complex in Delhi's Dwarka area became a national cause célèbre. The girl, from Jharkhand state, had been locked in for six days while her employers went holidaying in Thailand. She was starving and had bruises all over her body. The child, who had been sold by a placement agency, is now in a government boarding school as her parents are too poor to look after her. The employers deny maltreatment, and the case is under investigation, said Shakti Vahini, the Delhi-based child rights charity which helped rescue her. In October, the media reported the plight of a 16-year-old girl from Assam, who was also rescued by police and Shakti Vahini from a house in Delhi's affluent Punjabi Bagh area. She had been kept inside the home for four years by her employer, a doctor. She said he would rape her and then give her emergency contraceptive pills. The doctor has disappeared. ONE ON EVERY BLOCK Groups like Save the Children and ActionAid estimate there are 2,300 placement agencies in Delhi alone, and less than one-sixth are legitimate. "There are so many agencies and we hear so many stories, but we are not like that. We don't keep the maids' salaries and all are over 18," said Purno Chander Das, owner of Das Nurse Bureau, which provides nurses and maids in Delhi's Tughlakabad village. The Das Nurse Bureau is registered with authorities - unlike many agencies operating from rented rooms or flats in slums or poorer neighbourhoods like Shivaji Enclave in west Delhi. It is often to these places that maids are brought until a job is found. There are no signboards, but neighbors point out the apartments that house the agencies and talk of the comings and goings of girls who stay for one or two days before being taken away. "There is at least one agency in every block," says Rohit, a man in his twenties, who lives in one of scores of dilapidated government-built apartment blocks in Shivaji Enclave. With a commission fee of up to 30,000 rupees ($550) and a maids' monthly salary of up to 5,000 rupees ($90), an agency can make more than $1,500 annually for each girl, say anti-trafficking groups. A ledger recovered after one police raid, shown by the charity Bachpan Bachao Andolan to Thomson Reuters Foundation, had the names, passport pictures and addresses of 111 girls from villages in far-away states like West Bengal, Jharkhand, Assam and Chhattisgarh, most of them minors. The Delhi state government has written a draft bill to help regulate and monitor placement agencies and has invited civil society groups to provide feedback. But anti-trafficking groups say what is really needed a country-wide law for these agencies, which are not just mushrooming in cities like Delhi but also Mumbai and other towns and cities. The legislation would specify minimum wages, proper living and working conditions and a mechanism for financial redress for unpaid salaries. It would also specify that placement agencies keep updated record of all domestic workers which would subject to routine inspection by the labor department. In the meantime, victims like Theresa Kerketa just want to warn others. "The agencies and their brokers tell you lies. They trap you in the city where you have no money and know no one," said Kerketa, now staying with a relative in a slum on the outskirts of south Delhi as she awaits compensation. "I will go back and tell others. It is better to stay in your village, be beaten by your husband and live as a poor person, than come to the city and suffer at the hands of the rich." (TrustLaw is a global news service covering human rights and governance issues and run by the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters) (Editing by Sonya Hepinstall)

Fucoidan

http://fucoidanfacts.com/
Got cold again! It was just 3 months ago I got this disease. What a weak body :(
Anyway, I went to a GP this afternoon and she gave me some drugs including this medicine called Fucoidan. It seems this one is not harmful for my body. Its price for 10 capsules are IDR 120.000 (US$ 13). It is quite expensive.
However the other medicines she gave, I believe, will have negative effects.
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Rogue dentist’s 30-year crusade against wisdom teeth removal extracts results

via Yahoo News The Lookout Dr. Jay Friedman relishes his role as dental outcast. Like a pesky younger brother who enjoys watching his siblings squirm, the 86-year-old dentist and public health advocate has for decades been poking and prodding at the oral health community over his personal obsession: wisdom teeth. Friedman has argued for more than 30 years that removing a young person's healthy wisdom teeth -- called "third molars" by professionals -- is an unnecessary and irresponsible practice. While many dentists and oral surgeons have dismissed him as a traitor and a zealot, in 2007, people in the public health arena began to listen. That's when Friedman published an article in the American Journal of Public Health claiming at least two-thirds of the millions of wisdom teeth extracted each year at a cost of billions of dollars were removed for no good reason. In pointed terms, Friedman accused his colleagues of ignoring the lack of evidence supporting the need for such surgery in order to line their own pockets. Friedman has compared the practice to prophylactic tonsillectomies, which were routinely performed on healthy children to prevent future throat problems in the first part of the 20th century, before the medical community denounced them as unnecessary. "There can be no excuse for tolerating so many unnecessary extractions on millions of unsuspecting and misled people and putting them at risk of so much ... nerve injury. This is a public health hazard," Friedman wrote. The next year, the American Public Health Association adopted a recommendation opposing the prophylactic removal of wisdom teeth and a few insurance plans decided they would no longer cover such extractions. It's hard to overstate how much these developments have angered oral surgeons. Dr. Lou Rafetto, a practitioner in Delaware, paused during a phone interview to apologize as he wound down a tirade. "Sometimes I get emotional when it comes to Jay Friedman," Rafetto said. Many surgeons have been similarly angered by Friedman over the years and have questioned his qualifications since he is not a trained oral surgeon. Practitioners insist wisdom teeth cause many people problems later in life, and say it's prudent to remove them early rather than wait for trouble. One surgeon said he recently had to remove an infected wisdom tooth in a 93-year-old man, who should have had it out when he was a teenager, when the surgery would have entailed a quick recovery. "It's sort of a thorn in the side of people who actually treat patients with third molars that this guy gets so much traction," Rafetto said of Friedman. Yet despite the maverick dentist's unpopularity, Friedman has sparked some soul searching within the profession and even prompted a change in policy. Earlier this year, the official oral surgeons' group, the American Association of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeons (AAOMS), adopted a new recommendation on wisdom teeth removal. For the first time, the group said surgeons should consider retaining young patients' wisdom teeth if they do not show signs of disease. For decades, the accepted wisdom was that all wisdom teeth should be removed. "The retention part is new," said Dr. Thomas Dodson, a member of AAOMS's task force on wisdom teeth. Dodson, an oral surgeon at Massachusetts General Hospital, sees himself as one of the few people in the middle of the acrimonious wisdom tooth debate. He argues that Friedman is ignoring the problems associated with keeping wisdom teeth while some oral surgeons are minimizing the risks of subjecting so many people to the surgery. And there are risks. About 1 percent of people whose wisdom teeth are removed experience nerve damage -- usually temporary numbness of the lips, mouth, or tongue. Sometimes, that damage is permanent, leading to "frequent drooling, biting of the lip or the inside of the cheek or the side of the tongue, and paralytic disfigurement or drooping of the lip," Friedman wrote. Complications from anesthesia can lead to death in very rare instances. There's no long-term research, however, on the risks of retaining healthy wisdom teeth. Some studies suggest that about 30 percent of wisdom teeth removed each year created some kind of problem for the patient, ranging from gum disease to cysts to painful infections. And oral surgeons point to research that shows gums are more likely to be infected around wisdom teeth than other teeth, which can lead to other health problems. Friedman argues that dental professionals should wait until they actually see signs of disease before removing a patient's wisdom teeth, saying it's not worth subjecting people to potential complications on a hunch that their wisdom teeth might cause problems later. (That's the official policy of Britain's National Health Service, which won't pay for prophylactic procedures.) The cost is also something to consider, since without insurance, wisdom teeth extractions can cost a patient several thousand dollars. So when Dodson is treating a young patient whose wisdom teeth seem normal, he says he's not really sure what to tell them. "The reality is the science is insufficient at this point to demonstrate that taking them out or leaving them is the right thing to do," Dodson said. Jay FriedmanFriedman says in these situations, oral surgeons should tell their patients to come back if they or their dentist ever notice a problem. Dodson, however, leaves the decision up to the patient after warning them of the risks of both courses of action. He says about 60 percent of these patients opt for surgery. Friedman calls the new AAOMS policy "a big sea change" from the days when retaining healthy wisdom teeth was not even an option, and happily takes credit for it. But he's not satisfied. Though he agrees that any wisdom teeth that are causing problems should be removed, he thinks oral surgeons are overhyping the risks of retaining teeth that don't show any symptoms. Friedman has some reason to be skeptical of AAOMS policies. A pamphlet on the group's website once stated that 80 percent of people who retained their third molars would experience problems with them within 10 years. After Friedman pointed out that the number did not seem to be based on any scientific research, AAOMS removed the figure. Friedman, who once reviewed medical claims for self-insured companies, introduced his theory that most wisdom teeth extractions were unnecessary in a fiery speech to a California dental association in 1976. The editor of a local dentistry journal published the speech, prompting a wave of outraged letters from California dentists. To this day, oral surgeons say Friedman is biased against wisdom teeth extractions because his aim is to save the insurance industry money. Friedman has taken out hundreds of wisdom teeth in his own right, including those belonging to his only child. When his daughter was 18 she began to complain of pain and discomfort from her wisdom teeth and Friedman was unable to dissuade her from taking a wait-and-see approach. He says he took her to his office, removed all four teeth in 15 minutes, and then flew the next day to a dental association meting Las Vegas to lecture oral surgeons on their overzealous extraction policies. "I didn't tell them that the day before I had taken out my daughter's wisdom teeth," Friedman said mischievously. Dodson, for one, said Friedman's crusade has made him consider his own practices more carefully, despite their difference in opinion. "He made me think about why we were doing what we're doing," Dodson said.

Jadwal IPO PT Waskita Karya

Penawaran perdana saham PT Waskita Karya dinilai menggiurkan. Betapa tidak, saat tertera pertama kali di papan bursa, diprediksi langsung meroket. Alokasi 20% portofolio pun sangat disarankan. Pengamat pasar modal Sem Susilo menyambut positif Penawaran Umum Saham Perdana (Initial Public Offering/IPO) PT Waskita Karya Desember 2012. Alasan dia, karena Waskita Karya jelas milik BUMN. Jadwal IPO sementara sebagai berikut: masa penawaran awal pada 22 November-3 Desember 2012, tanggal efektif pada 10 Desember 2012, masa penawaran pada 12-14 Desember 2012, penjatahan pada 17 Desember 2012, distribusi saham secara elektronik pada 18 Desember 2012. source: http://pasarmodal.inilah.com/read/detail/1931784/ayo-borong-saham-ipo-waskita-karya

I think the battery cover of huawei ideo slim 7 is dangerous....

I got this tab yesterday and while trying to remove the back cover, my hands injured. Why is on the earth the back cover of ideos slim 7 tab. so difficult to be removed??? This is for the first time, I got injured from a gadget. Not only that, my nails are also broken and have to be cut. Hey, huawei, you should make the back cover easy to be removed. It is very tight. Even I use a small knife to open the cover and I almost wrecked the tab. Huh... annoying.
Btw, after I googled, I found that there are so many complaints about the back cover of ideo slim 7.
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Happy 20th B-Day, Text Message

It was 20 years ago today that the first text message was sent. It was Dec. 3, 1992, and Neil Papworth, an engineer working in the UK, sent the world's first short message service or SMS. It read "Merry Christmas." But while most are entering their prime at age 20, the text message might just be past its glory years. The History -- In More Than 160 Characters  Papworth, however, was in his prime when he hit the send button on that first text. At the age of 22, Papworth was working for a company called Semea Group Telecoms, which had been working on a mobile messaging project for Vodafone, a European cellular carrier. "It happened that day that Vodafone wanted to try sending a message to Richard Jarvis, one of the directors there, who was at a Christmas party. So we sat at the computer and typed him a message and then sent him the message 'Merry Christmas,'" Papworth told ABC News. "For me it was just another day's testing, it didn't seem to be anything big at the time." But, of course, it turned into something very big -- at least once some of the consumer technology caught up. On that day in 1992, Papworth didn't send the first message with his thumbs on a mobile phone. He sent it from a big computer in one of Vodafone's offices to a Orbatel 901 mobile phone, which was the size of of today's office phones, Papworth explains. (Papworth isn't the inventor of the text message; the origins of the idea date back to 1984 when Matti Makkonen, a Finnish engineer, was working with Nokia on mobile messaging.) At that time, you could only receive messages on phones; you couldn't actually send messages from phones until a year or so later when phones from Nokia and others had the proper capabilities. "Years went on and people were able to start to send text messages. It took quite a few years of it to take off," Papworth said. "But by the 10th anniversary it was fairly big by then." The Rise and Start of the Fall  And it became even bigger than that. In 2010, the International Telecommunications Union reported that 200,000 text messages were sent every minute and 6.1 trillion texts were sent worldwide. In June 2012, the CTIA mobile trade group reported that 184.3 billion text messages were sent a month in the United States -- up from 28.9 billion a month in 2007. But in 2012, there is building evidence that text messaging is past its peak as more and more people have smartphones and use e-mail, instant messaging, iMessage, and other mobile messaging services to communicate. In November, the New York Times reported that in the third quarter of 2012 text messaging was down. According to a report by Chetan Sharma, a mobile analyst, cell owners sent 678 text messages a month, down from 696 a month the previous quarter. It's not a huge hit, but it falls in line with other reports that text message usage is dropping. "Texting isn't evolving, therefore it's declining," Patrick Moorhead, principal analyst at Moor Insights & Strategy, told ABC News. "There are way too many alternatives like iMessage, BBM, Facebook chat and Google Chat that are cross-platform that texting is a backup now for sophisticated users. Texting is more reliable but is declining as a primary tool." Other experts also point out that users still need to pay for text messaging, while some of the other services are free, with no cap on the number of messages. "It comes down to cost -- carriers still charge extra for text messaging after all these years, even though it costs essentially nothing to operate. It's pure margin," Chris Ziegler, a mobile phone expert and senior editor at The Verge, told ABC News. "Alternatives like BBM, iMessage, WhatsApp, and traditional instant messaging services, like Google Talk and Microsoft Messenger, only require a data package, which any smartphone user already has anyway. A savvy subscriber can dispense of their text messaging plan altogether and rely on data alone." Additionally, with more of those services and social networks like Twitter and Facebook, users are finding texting to lack the features of the others. Ironically, Twitter, which says 60 percent of its users access the service on mobile, was based on text messaging. Like SMS' 160-character limit, Twitter has a 140-character limit and was designed that way because of text message capabilities. "Twitter was inspired by SMS and we continue to embrace this simple but ubiquitous technology. In fact, Twitter's 140-character limit was designed specifically to allow for any tweet to be read in its entirety whether you're using a rudimentary mobile phone, or a more sophisticated Internet enabled device," Twitter wrote on its blog back in 2010. But while Papworth admits that texting is past its prime, he believes it will still be very relevant for years to come. While a growing part of the population owns smartphones, which allow you to instant message, email, or connect to social networks, cellphone use without those features is growing at a very fast rate in emerging markets like India or Africa. "Those handsets can do text messaging, but not everything can use data," he said. "Yes, the data is showing that it is starting to decline, but it's not going to go away. There is a lot of use for it alongside all the data services." Also Read

Tweet from @blakehounshell

@blakehounshell: RT @ChemiShalev: Aluf Benn: Israel's policy of stagnation - Israel News | Haaretz Daily Newspaper http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/israel-s-policy-of-stagnation.premium-1.481983#.ULyvjT7vef0.twitter


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Wal-Mart, Sears Must Put Out Factory Fires in Bangladesh

Should we stop buying zara, hang ten and other intl brand produced in Bangladesh factories?
Dec. 3 (Bloomberg) -- The fire at Bangladesh's Tazreen garment factory might not have killed more than 100 people if the facility had had half as many fire escapes as there have been evasions of responsibility for the disaster.

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and Sears Holdings Corp. said they didn't know their clothes were being made in the firetrap. Sean Combs' clothing brand blamed a middleman for choosing the factory. Tazreen Fashion Ltd.'s owner, Tuba Group, pointed to a certificate of safety compliance from a nonprofit group, but the group said that document is bogus. Government officials laid blame for the deaths on arsonists supposedly out to undermine Bangladesh's position as the second largest exporter of clothing after China.

Each of these parties bears a share of responsibility for the tragedy. Among them, however, retailers from wealthy countries have the greatest wherewithal to ensure that the factories they hire don't sacrifice safety to the bottom line. They should force change -- for their own sake as well as for the workers on whom their profits depend.

It would be nice to think that the government of Bangladesh might start enforcing safety standards in factories. More than 500 workers have died in fires there in the past six years. Yet Bangladesh, one of the least developed countries on earth, can't afford the inspectors. Its government also fears that if safety improvements increase costs, retailers will abandon Bangladesh for Pakistan.

It would also be convenient to think that Bangladeshi factory owners would take on the costs of such things as training staff for emergencies, building fire exits and monitoring shop floors to ensure that paths to those doors are kept clear. The reality is that given the competition for orders, these businesses generally operate on small profit margins that leave little room for such expenses.

Making fire-safety improvements in a shop like Tazreen might cost $1.7 million over two years, according to an estimate by Worker Rights Consortium, an independent labor rights monitoring group. That would probably have eaten up the Tuba Group's profit on its $35 million annual revenue from the Tazreen factory.

A retailer, however, could pay a factory 2.5 percent more to cover those costs and pass on the increase to consumers, who would end up spending $20.50 for a sweatshirt instead of $20. Clothes would still be one of the great bargains of our time.

Cheap manufacturing costs in Bangladesh and other outsourcing centers have allowed consumers in importing countries to save money on what they wear. In the U.S., women's clothing costs have fallen 7 percent since 1998; men's have dropped 8 percent. Considering that this change has come at the expense of human lives, clothing has arguably become too cheap.

For years, retailers have said they were making conditions safer through programs that rely on inspections by internal auditors or auditors for hire. Yet factories keep burning. In September, 289 people died in a Pakistani factory inferno just a month after an auditor gave the shop a clean bill of health.

The Fire and Building Safety Agreement proposed for Bangladesh offers a way forward. An industry-labor collaboration, it would create an independent chief inspector to execute a mandatory safety program. Audits that revealed hazards would be made public, and the inspector's recommended corrective actions would be mandatory. Retailers would be required to pay factories enough so that they could afford renovations and training programs; retailers would also be barred from doing business with noncompliant sites. These obligations would be enforceable through the courts.

To have sufficient leverage over the factories, the program is designed to go into effect only after four retailers have signed on. So far, two have: German retailer Tchibo GmbH and PVH Corp., the parent of brands including Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger. Change would come fastest if the biggest players in Bangladesh joined in, including Wal-Mart, Hennes & Mauritz AB, the Gap Inc. and Inditex SA, owner of Zara.

Companies are reluctant to commit to higher costs, which is short-sighted. PVH initialed the deal in March after learning ABC News would report that Tommy Hilfiger had returned to doing business with a factory in Bangladesh where 29 people died in a 2010 fire. Perhaps as much as the cost of ensuring worker safety, that kind of publicity can hurt profits. More brands will be similarly harmed if they don't help re-engineer the tinderbox that is the Bangladesh garment industry.

To contact the Bloomberg View editorial board: view@bloomberg.net .

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