Blog News

The time has come, I am moving on. Consequently this blog will close permanently at midnight Sunday.

I thank you all for past support and contributions.

Justice one day?

New Comments and Link Dump

A little satire, and like all good satire, not so very far from the truth. h/t Bampots

Previous Comments

Comments and Link Dump

Previous Comments

~

Avoid Distractions

Blogger Etiquette: Don't Rob The Blogger Re-Up

By way of a reply, and a reminder, a re-up from 2010.




Blogger Etiquette. Don't Rob The Blogger Of His Pay (Expanded from the original)

For the vast majority of bloggers, that pay, the only pay, is knowing that they are being read.

If you take for example, any respectable blog, usually the American ones, for it is they that led the blogger revolution, you will find that the following code of practice is adopted by the majority.

Blogger Etiquette:

If a person/blogger spends a great deal of time and goes to extraordinary lengths researching, and then penning an article; it is neither mannerly nor morally correct for you to copy paste the COMPLETE article on your blog.

Post just enough to attract the interest of your reader and then link back to the authors blog.

The author deserves recognition for his work, and this is only achieved by traffic to the article/site.

It's only fair and it's only polite.

Which of course it is, and more importantly, the blogger who has produced the work gets recognised in his own right and his blog worthy of a visit. (or not)

If the complete article is posted, all the attribution in the world won't compensate for direct traffic. How many times do any of us click through to the original source having once read the complete article? Try putting yourself in the Blogger's shoes for a week; having spent X number of hours/days researching and constructing your article, you post it on your blog and then you sit back for a while with a cuppa and a ciggy, or your drug of choice, and wait. But more often or not you would working on your next little creation, but that's by the by. What isn't by the by however, is when that Blogger (you) takes a look at his site metre after a day or two and sees numbers that might be worthy of being described as abysmal.

How is he/her/you going to feel? pissed I shouldn't wonder, pissed and robbed. And then, in a worse case scenario, might think to themselves, why bother?

There is of course a practical side to doing this, if you are posting a dozen items or more a day, you don't end up with a blog a mile long, as you would do otherwise.

And I do practice what I preach by the way, it would only be under special circumstances or out of necessity that I do otherwise. And believe me please, it's not for my benefit that I write this, it's for the numerous authors who's work I see constantly plastered around the net like cheap wallpaper.

Stop please, I beg of you.

New Comments and Link Dump

Comments full, please go here.

Comments and Link Dump

Kate McCann Curtains. Blah blah.

Comments full, new dump.

Wavy Scrolling Can You Help?

Update: After all that, my troubles were down to Firefox. I installed Comodo browser as a test, that was OK, so uninstalled Firefox 13 and installed Firefox 11. No more probs.

~

I run two PCs, one new, one not so new, both sharing a common wide screen BenQ monitor.

Prior to two weeks ago, everything was fine, but then I started to see a 'wave' on screen when I scrolled a web page, twitter etc on BOTH machines.

I have changed the line filter, bypassed the KMV, de-powered and re-set the router, tried a different monitor, a different mouse and installed the latest drivers on the new PC, but all to no avail.

The only thing the PCs have in common apart from those things mentioned, is the service itself and the router.

I do not have the same problem with a word document however.

Does my problem lie with the router? People I talk to seem to think it's unlikely.

Can you help please?

Blog News

It has been quite an upheaval these last few days, switching to a new email, a new PC, and I could say new operating system, but that system, Windows7, has been installed, uninstalled, and now replaced with good old XP.

There are one or two bits to sort out, I notice as I type this, that I have no spell-check operating. But for the main, I'm up and running again. I just need to go into town for a new keyboard, as delightful as my Mac keyboard is to use, scroll lock doesn't function within Windows, and scroll lock is something fundamental to operating two PCs in tandem.

But I must say, now with a four core processor and 8GB of ROM, this thing is rocket powered.

Blog News

Today is switchover day from ISP, BT, to Talktalk, hopefully without disruption to service.

Hopefully, but experience has taught me that's all it is, hope.

I did in fact move my mobile phone network to Talktalk, at the same time that I moved my ISP. I can't say I was overly impressed, when not only did the wrong contract fall through my door, but it wasn't even my existing telephone number on the new SIM.

WE shall see.

A Small Post About Nothing

Because having caught up with the email alerts for the last two weeks, (100s of stories) there is nothing you haven't heard before and nothing I want to report on.

The end.

Blog News

Posting may be a little thin on the ground and somewhat spasmodic for a few days.

This will be as a result of changing ISPs, all email addresses et al and preparing for a new PC.

Thank you.

Blog NewsUpdate

I am back online, although must be said, in a very limited capacity. I shall endevour to reply to all comments as soon as possible, I pray though, a little patience on your behalf, I have much to catch up on and very little bandwidth with which to do so.

The reason I have no internet service, apart from refusing to pay my bill, and the reason that I am having to avail myself of a temporary mobile service, which allows me to post this, is explained here. http://mybtaccount.blogspot.com/

As you can well imagine, BT isn't flavour of the month with me.

Blog News

I am presently in dispute with my ISP, BT. I am accessing this via a third party.

I may have minimal access by the weekend, but I will not have the bandwidth to upload posts until I resolve my differences with BT, or change my ISP.

The Perils Facing Julian Assange

I have put this here in its entirety; not because I particularly wanted to, but because both you and I can read it in some kind of comfort.

Now I may not be the greatest blogger in the world, but at least I try and present what I do in the tidiest manner possible. All photo's are bordered, I use one font, one size, and keep italics to the minimum. And the text is always in readable bite sized chunks.

I don't know if you as a reader feel the same, but if the font is too small it's a struggle, equally, if it's too large it's not comfortable, it's like watching a tennis match and trying to make sense of what's written there at the same time. See footnote below.

US Extradition

Extradition to the United States

Contents

Extradition Risks
Temporary Surrender
Legal Safeguards under Temporary Surrender and Extradition
Will Sweden extradite Julian Assange to the US?
Wouldn’t the UK be more likely to extradite Assange than Sweden?
United States: Secret Grand Jury

Extradition risks

''The US investigation against WikiLeaks is unprecedented both in its scale and nature - Australian Embassy in Washington

Sweden is bound by different extradition agreements. It is not meant to grant onwards extradition to a third country without agreement from the extraditing country. But at the same level of the legal hierarchy there is a bilateral treaty between the US and Sweden that allows for extradition without consent from the UK or minimum tests. This is the temporary surrender/conditional release regime - automatic extradition on a loan basis. It is highly likely that the United States will soon request Julian Assange’s extradition from Sweden and this mechanism will be used while Julian Assange is in Swedish custody.

''The US government is certainly looking at the technical aspects of the two extradition agreements between the UK and Sweden and then considering the political and legal atmosphere in both places. - John B. Bellinger III, former legal adviser to US State Department and National Security Council

Of the reasons for Julian Assange’s challenge to Sweden’s extradition order, relevant to this topic are:

1) Julian Assange has not been charged with any offense.

2) Sweden has a bilateral agreement with the United States which would allow it to surrender Julian Assange without going through the traditional tests and standards of regular, lengthy ’extradition’ procedures.



3) There are standard EU mechanisms (such as Mutual Legal Assistance) for Julian Assange to answer any questions the Swedish government may have. It is disproportionate, and an abuse, to use extradition proceedings in this manner.

4) Extradition law requires a "judicial authority" (e.g a judge or other independent body) to issue an extradition warrant, in order to keep the separation between the executive and the judiciary. It is an abuse to permit prosecutors, intelligence agents or other officials who are not independent to issue proceedings.

''The concern is that the Swedish case is a holding case while the Virginian grand jury come forward with an indictment to take him to America. - Christine Assange

Temporary surrender - under the US-Sweden Extradition Treaty

''It is not clear how Sweden might respond to any US request for his temporary surrender to the US, if American charges were laid against him on arrival in Sweden. The present conservative Swedish Government has a history of acceding to all US rendition requests during the War on Terror. - Tony Kevin, retired Australian diplomat

Most of the attention regarding Julian Assange’s possible extradition to the US has focused on the EU agreements that are meant to prevent onward extradition - namely that the UK Home Office would have to consent to his onward extradition. Little or no attention has been given in Europe to the temporary surrender (sometimes called ’conditional release’, see the Panama example below) mechanism that Sweden established bilaterally with the United States in their 1984 treaty (TIAS 10812):

VI. If the extradition request is granted in the case of a person who is being prosecuted or is serving a sentence in the territory of the requested State for a different offense, the requested State may:

b) temporarily surrender the person sought to the requesting State for the purpose of prosecution. The person so surrendered shall be kept in custody while in the requesting State and shall be returned to the requested State after the conclusion of the proceedings against that person in accordance with conditions to be determined by mutual agreement of the Contracting States.

Temporary surrender has been incorporated into the EU-US Extradition and Mutual Legal Assistance agreements entered into in February 2010. The Council of the EU’s handbook explains temporary surrender in the following manner:

''[Temporary surrender] facilitates the orderly and efficient prosecution of a person sought in two jurisdictions by allowing the temporary transfer of the person to the Requesting State for prosecution, when that person is subject to proceedings (either prosecution or service of a sentence) in the Requested State. The transfer is subject to conditions agreed to in advance of the transfer. - Council of the European Union - Handbook on the practical application of the EU-U.S. Mutual Legal Assistance and Extradition Agreements (p. 15)

The US has put what appears to be an expedient de facto extradition in place that effectively sidesteps traditional extradition safeguards. The background for this mechanism is to combat serious crimes - typically drug trafficking, terrorism, and so on - and it has implemented such innovative mechanisms with several strong allies.

One of the strategic allies that has implemented these types of mechanisms in the context of drug trafficking, is Panama: a recently released US embassy cable described the "conditional release" regime:

''use of Conditional Release, under which the GOP [Government of Panama] releases to the US a suspect already under arrest in Panama on other charges. Under this procedure, the suspect is "lent" to the US for prosecution on the condition that they will be returned for prosecution in Panama at the end of their sentence. This procedure is much faster than a formal extradition, and has proven so successful, that DEA sometimes designs operations to bring suspects to Panama so they can be arrested in Panama and turned over to US authorities quickly. - US Embassy Panama Cable, 2008

The Conditional Release mechanism appears indistinguishable from the temporary surrender mechanism, apart from the fact that in conditional release the suspect will serve his/her sentence in the US before returning to the requested state (in the case above, Panama), while in temporary surrender the US would have to negotiate with Sweden at what point Julian Assange would be returned to the requested state for prosecution/serving a sentence.

A research paper prepared for US Congress in March 2010 by the Congressional Research Service (’Extradition To and From the United States: Overview of the Law and Recent Treaties’) does not mention the Conditional Release mechanism in the report and it appears that little is known about this preferred method of extradition.

US Embassy contacted regarding temporary surrender/conditional release of Julian Assange

The US Embassy in London was [contacted by The Guardian newspaper] after readers sought clarification about the temporary surrender/conditional release mechanism, and whether the US will employ it in its request to Sweden. The US embassy declined to give a statement.

Surprisingly perhaps, the Guardian did not attempt to contact the Swedish Embassy - it is after all Sweden that is bound by the two potentially conflicting extradition regimes (under the Framework Directive and the US Extradition Treaty, respectively) and would be best equipped to address whether it would treat a ’temporary surrender’ as regular extradition (with its safeguards). The EU Handbook on the US-EU Extradition Treaty seems to suggest differently:

''The transfer is subject to conditions agreed to in advance of the transfer.

Despite the failure of The Guardian to get to the bottom of this potentially game-changing issue, the readers’ discussion raised some important hypotheticals: For example, the reader GregCallus suggested "this extradition takes place under a European Arrest Warrant [which] means that (as a matter of EU law) Sweden would be bound by the Article 28.4 rules on seeking permission from the UK (which would be judicially reviewable). If they tried to ignore those obligations, then a preliminary reference to the ECJ (on the super-fast track urgent) route would likely compel them to get the UK’s permission."

However, the question remains: if the US uses not traditional extradition but temporary surrender do the presumed safeguards under EU law apply? Is it extradition if the suspect is merely ’on loan’ to the US and not ’extradited’ proper - as the US embassy cable suggests?

Legal Safeguards under Temporary Surrender

The retired Swedish judge Brita Sundberg-Weitman (who testified at the first extradition hearing in February) wrote to SwedenVersusAssange.com and explained that Sweden’s Act regarding Criminal Extradition (Lag 1957:668 om Utlämning för Brott) requires the Swedish government to apply to the Supreme Court for permission to exercise the "conditional release" mechanism.

Sundberg-Weitman notes, however, that the government could ignore that requirement with little risk to itself; the legal and/or political repercussions, if any, would most likely be negligible. They would in any event be too late to be of any use to Julian Assange, who would have already been turned over to the U.S.

Bearing in mind that the the Swedish Courts (Stockholm District Court, Svea Court of Appeal) granted the prosecutor’s application to have Julian Assange arrested without seriously considering the principle of proportionality and that the Supreme Court refused to reconsider that decision - it is rather likely that the Supreme Court would approve a request by the government to have Assange extradited to the US.

Will Sweden extradite Julian Assange to the US?

''Certainly Assange’s lawyers would mount a very vigorous opposition [to extradition] in either case [Sweden/UK], in London in particular. Past U.S. extradition requests for criminals from the UK have faced vigorous opposition, and a number of people have successfully resisted that through appeals through the House of Lords and ultimately all the way up to the European Court of Human Rights. We can anticipate lengthy litigation. - John B. Bellinger III

Both the UK and Sweden refuse to guarantee that they will not extradite Julian Assange to the United States. Political and military extraditions are expressly prohibited under the extradition treaty between Sweden and the United States, so this refusal is unusual. Moreover, it is likely that the US will request extradition on charges that are not overtly political (see below).

Shortly after issuing the EAW and Interpol Red Notice to 188 countries, the prosecutor Marianne Ny originally stated that extradition to the United States was ’out of the question’ (05 December 2010) - but her statements were later redacted (see Prosecution).

The Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt has adopted several strategies in order to lessen the pressure on him to provide assurances that Julian Assange will not be extradited to the United States:

1. Reinfeldt claims that the decision to extradite Julian Assange is up to the courts, not the executive.

- This is false. Sweden’s extradition treaty with the United States explicitly prohibits political and military extraditions. The final decision lies in the hands of the executive, who can block an extradition if it believes that political/military motivations underlie the extradition order. However, it it difficult to prove the underlying motivations of an extradition order. The US is likely to issue an order under charges that are not overtly political (see below).

- It is likely that the United States will decide to charge Julian Assange with a number of offences (whether or not in conjunction with espionage) that are seemingly not political offences. The US Department of Justice has broadened its attack to include a possible indictment under the federal computer crimes statute, which it would argue was a non-political offence. Sweden is likely to consent to such an extradition given its close relationship with the US and the argument that the offences he is being sought for are not political in nature.

- It is difficult for an individual to prove that the underlying motivations for an extradition are political, especially where the requesting state is a close political ally, which is the case of the United States both for Sweden and for the UK. Swedish troops are under NATO-US command in Afghanistan. Sweden was one of the first countries to send fighter jets to Libya at the request of the US and, in June, the Swedish parliament voted to send marines to Libya together with more fighter jets (See Political Interference).

2. Reinfeldt claims that it is not up to Sweden, but up to the UK, whether or not Julian Assange is extradited to the United States.

- Sweden is shifting attention away from the fact that the final decision of whether to extradite Julian Assange to the United States or to block it is an executive decision.

- Under EU law, Sweden should only initiate Julian Assange’s onward extradition if and when the UK gives its agreement, but the UK has little incentive to block an extradition order if Sweden does not take the step to do so first. Moreover, legal commentators in the UK have stated that it is likely that the UK would consent to Julian Assange’s extradition from Sweden (this is likely to raise less criticism and mobilisation if Julian Assange is not physically under UK custody).

- Sweden has in the recent past violated international treaties in relation to surrendering foreign nationals into US custody to be interrogated and tortured (case of extraordinary rendition, Agiza v. Sweden at the European Court of Human Rights). Furthermore, Amnesty International and the UN Committee against Torture criticised Sweden because it rendered two refugees to the CIA who were then tortured under the Egyptian regime of Hosni Mubarak. (A documentary with the testimony of tortured refugees who had been granted asylum and then rendered to the CIA by Sweden was aired on Swedish television on 5 October 2011.

- Diplomatic assurances that the person extradited will not be subjected to torture or other inhumane and degrading treatment are not a sufficient guarantee to prevent Julian Assange from suffering such treatment while in US custody, or to realize a fair trial in the United States, given the politicization of the allegations against him.

- The UK and Swedish governments can choose to allege that Julian Assange is not wanted for political offences, and will not interfere with a judicial decision (despite the fact that this ’judicial decision’ would be taken by the secret grand jury in Virginia where there is no judge or defence counsel).

Given that Julian Assange is neither a citizen nor permanent resident in Sweden or the UK, these countries have little incentive to afford him the type of protection they would afford one of their own citizens or permanent residents. Moreover, it is safe to assume that both the UK and Swedish government have come under pressure to comply with the United States’ upcoming request for Julian Assange’s extradition (these pressures by the US government proved effective in the extra-judicial and arbitrary denial of service by Mastercard, Visa, Paypal, Western Union & Bank of America of WikiLeaks donations).

Wouldn’t the UK be more likely to extradite Assange than Sweden?

''If the Justice Department were actually to issue charges against Mr. Assange while he was still in Britain there could be potentially a decision for the UK government whether to extradite him to Sweden or to the United States, and that could get to be a complicated clash between the two different requests which would put the UK government in a difficult position. - John B. Bellinger III on Fox News

Some critical voices claim that the UK-US extradition treaty is more permissive than the Sweden-US extradition treaty. Extradition to the US, they claim, would be simpler from the UK than from Sweden.

This argument fails on several points:

- The UK’s extradition treaty does not have the temporary surrender (’conditional release’) clause. The UK’s judicial review process, while far from perfect, has a number of practical review mechanisms. The nearest equivalent case, of Gary McKinnon - a UK citizen who has been charged for hacking US military systems - has been opposed in the courts for 8 years.

- Public opinion and the media (to a greater extent) are more sympathetic to Julian Assange in the UK than in Sweden. Public pressure could draw out the process of extradition to the United States in the UK. In Sweden the media climate is hostile (see Media climate in Sweden) due to the sex allegations. Public outcry would be significantly weaker and therefore less likely to stand in the way of a strategically convenient extradition.

- In the UK, Julian Assange is better able to defend himself, muster support and understand the legal procedures against him. In Sweden on the other hand, the language barrier prevents him from effectively challenging the actions against.

- The UK is politically better positioned to withstand pressure from the United States than Sweden. Sweden is a small country of nine million people close to Russia. It has grown increasingly dependent on the United States. In recent years Sweden has complied with directives from the United States in a manner that has not been scrutinised by Parliament, as has been revealed by the disclosed diplomatic cables (see Political Interference).

United States: Secret Grand Jury

The United States is looking to charge Julian Assange under the Espionage Act among other charges:

A secret grand jury located in Alexandria, Virginia, only six kilometres from central Washington D.C., has been meeting since December 2010. The grand jury decides whether to bring charges against Julian Assange and other people associated with WikiLeaks.

- The grand jury is held in secret, with no judge and no defence counsel. Four prosecutors are imposing subpoenas on individuals who are affiliated with WikiLeaks and on social networking sites including Twitter to disclose information about WikiLeaks’ work.

- A respected former chief judge of New York’s highest court, Sol Wachtler, famously coined the expression a grand jury would "indict a ham sandwich", given that prosecutors have complete control over the process.

- The grand jury consists of 16-23 people. Given the high incidence of government employees and public and military contractors living in this geographical area, it is likely that a majority of the components of the grand jury are ideologically opposed to WikiLeaks’ work.

- The grand jury will most likely decide to prosecute, even on weak grounds that would not withstand the minimum threshold under normal criminal processes.

- It is plausible that the grand jury has already decided to prosecute, and that a sealed indictment has been issued for extradition and will be unsealed when US extradition is convenient.

United States: What would happen if Julian Assange was extradited?

The suspected whistleblower Bradley Manning has been subjected to inhumane and degrading treatment. Julian Assange is likely to face similar treatment or worse: he will not be afforded the same constitutional rights as Bradley Manning because he is a foreign national. Over the past ten years the United States has developed a doctrine that denies basic rights to foreign political prisoners.

The 2012 US presidential elections are an opportunity to seize upon for the campaign trail: Julian Assange’s prosecution will probably be used by presidential candidates to show they are strong on "national security". Senators and presidential candidates have already called on the Obama administration to take an aggressive approach.

Republican candidates have urged the US treasury and Department of State to label WikiLeaks as a terrorist organisation, and to ’illegally assassinate’ or kidnap him, and treat him and his associates as ’enemy combatants’.

In other words, internal political pressure is calling for the United States to illegally apply torture in order to extract information, subject him to inhumane and degrading treatment as they have with Bradley Manning, or sentence Julian Assange to the death penalty. Public pronouncements by US senators and television personalities amount to hate speech and persecution (see Timing: EAW & INTERPOL Red Notice ). Source and other news justice4assange.com

Footnote: Now it goes without saying, there are some pretty sharp brains at blogger, but if someone could explain the sense of what I am about to demonstrate, then I would surely listen. (First)

As you are well aware, I upload lots of pics, and invariably I want them in the order that I upload them. Now I'm going to upload five test pics (the max) in the same order as they are numbered. Watch what happens.







The pics were upped in order 54321. Now can someone explain the fucking logic in that? Brains are grand things, but they are no good without a bit of common sense. It wasn't always thus by the way, this is a relatively new 'improvement.'

Blog News

I am in dispute with British Telecom over billing. If I should suddenly disappear offline, that will be the reason why.

Fix For: Why does outlook keep asking for a network password

It's a crock, forget I posted it.

In the end, what I still do is to delete all the sub accounts, turn off the machine, go for a walk to calm down, and then re-install the sub accounts. It works fine then, until it doesn't. Which sometimes can be as long as a month, or as short as a few minutes.

I wish I had never started this post.



It is a vast improvement, so much so that I made this post, but it ain't the perfect fix.

Thought For Today Reddit Power

As you might imagine when you have a look at the graphic, I had a bit of an eye opener when I checked my site stats for yesterday.

And the reason for such a spike, a Reddit link to this John Pilger article.

Fukushima Residents Demand Action

I attempted to explain in the post below, though I fear I didn't do it terribly well, that I may have produced a blog post that actually had some effect or influence regarding the situation at Fukushima.

Rightly or wrongly I felt that my blog post of June 10, 2011, and possibly others previous, where, through a simple cartoon, I brought to the attention, in Japan, of a Democracy Now broadcast that exposed the criminal, there being other word to describe the behaviour of, Dr. Shunichi Yamashita.

I say rightly or wrongly, because in all honesty I have no way of knowing, but I felt, and felt being the operative word here, I felt I might have played a part in providing information that helped effect the likes of this below.

Although I mention the post of June 10, that wasn't my first post that attracted mega hits; a previous post featuring Arnie Gunderson of Fairewinds Associates had in actual fact received far more attention than June 10.

But what has been a constant while blogging about Fukushima, is the criminal negligence displayed by the Japanese government, Fukushima Prefecture Council and Tokyo Electric Power Company in not evacuating the citizens, particularly the children, of Fukushima Prefecture. That behaviour typified in this previous post, which by anybody's standards, is a bit of a jaw dropper to say the least.

Fukushima Ten Chernobyls Into the Sea?

What really pisses me off about the criminally, I was about to say negligent, but a much more sinister word is required to describe the actions of both TEPCO and the Japanese government, but whatever. The real pisser here is the way both parties are playing fast and loose with the welfare of the next generation, confirmed when you read things like this.

Nonetheless children have been observed attending schools while bulldozers were removing the radioactive soil from their playgrounds outside. Amidst global protests, the Japanese government has weakened (increased) the limits of allowable radiation exposures to children. source --- more --- more

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) isn't by the way, exactly blameless in playing down the threat to Fukushima Prefecture residents.

Japan parents launch nuclear 'emergency petition'
By Yuka Ito (AFP)

TOKYO — Japanese parents living near the tsunami-hit Fukushima nuclear plant issued an "emergency petition" on Tuesday, demanding the government do more to protect their children from radiation exposure.

A coalition of six citizens' and environmental groups called for the evacuation of children and pregnant women from radiation hotspots, stricter monitoring and the early closure of schools for summer holidays.

They voiced concern that authorities had focused on testing for radiation in the environment and not on people's internal exposure through inhaling or ingesting radioactive isotopes through dust, food and drinks.

"Since atmospheric radiation levels show no sign of abating, the inhabitants of heavily contaminated areas will continue to endure high radiation doses, both externally and internally," they said in the petition.

"To minimise such exposure, residents should be evacuated promptly to areas where radiation is less severe. Top priority must be given to infants, children and expectant mothers -- all highly susceptible to radiation effects."

Japan has struggled to bring the Fukushima plant under control since it was hit by a tsunami that knocked out cooling systems, leading to three reactor meltdowns, explosions and radiation leaks into the air, soil and sea.

Following the March 11 disaster, Japan has raised the exposure limit for adults and children from one to 20 millisieverts per year, matching the maximum exposure level for nuclear industry workers in many countries.

The move has stoked anger and fear among many in Fukushima prefecture towns outside the 20-kilometre (12-mile) evacuation zone around the plant that have been exposed to lower levels of radiation for more than three months.

The education ministry has since pledged to keep radiation in schools below one millisievert per year for the current school year from April 1 to March 31.

Medical experts agree that high doses of radiation raise the risk of cancers such as leukaemia and genetic defects, especially for foetuses and children, but they disagree on the risk of lower doses over longer periods of time.

On Tuesday the six protest groups -- including local citizens, anti-nuclear activists, Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth -- launched their "Emergency Petition to Protect the Children of Fukushima" at the Japanese parliament.

In a separate petition, one of the groups demanded the sacking of a radiation health risk management adviser to Fukushima prefecture, Nagasaki University Professor Shunichi Yamashita, alleging he had downplayed the threat.

One of the organisers, Seiichi Nakate, told a news conference: "As a father of two children, I cannot forgive him for having told us that there is no problem and that we should let our children play outside as usual."

"Parents who believed what he said are now feeling guilt towards their children," said Nakate, head of the Fukushima Network for Saving Children from Radiation, adding: "Are we guinea pigs or livestock?"

Professor Yamashita's office declined comment on the claims to AFP.

Meanwhile, Fukushima prefecture said Tuesday it would test washing walls, garden shrubs and roads in and around three elementary schools with high-pressure hoses to reduce radiation levels, Jiji Press news agency said. Google News

This Week's McCann Statistics

Old adages don't always ring true, and it is of ''There is no such thing as bad publicity'' that I have in mind. It would appear that a certain publication has certainly piqued the public interest, but not I fear as was intended by the responsible party. For three blogs that have not been updated for months, these are remarkable figures.


A Verdade Da Mentira: The Truth About The Lie
Average Per Day 124. Average Visit Length 6:59. Last Hour 5. Today 33. This Week 865.

The McCann Gallery
Average Per Day 154. Average Visit Length 2:06. Last Hour 6. Today 28. This Week 1,075.

Good Quality Wristbands
Average Per Day104. Average Visit Length. 1:39. Last Hour 2. Today.24. This Week 730.

Only in America
Average Per Day 225. Average Visit Length 1:14. Last Hour 11. Today 186. This Week 1,578.


Feed: http://hubpages.com/hub/Madeleine-McCann---Lies-True---Book-review

Blog News and A Verdade Da Mentira-The Truth About The Lie

Blogger has been having problems for the best part of a couple of days, being read only, hence no posts.

Regarding one of my other blogs, A Verdade Da Mentira-The Truth About The Lie, it normally enjoys about a hundred hits a week, but this week! well, have a look for yourself at the figures.

I would have almost said such an anomaly must be an error, until that is, one considers what other publications have been in the press of late, thus causing such a meteoric rise in visits.


A Verdade Da Mentira: The Truth About The Lie


-- Site Summary ---
Visits

Total ........................ 9,113
Average per Day ................. 93
Average Visit Length .......... 7:12
This Week ...................... 651

Page Views

Total ....................... 18,995
Average per Day ................ 227
Average per Visit .............. 2.4
This Week .................... 1,590

I'm going to pass on this opportunity to comment on Kate McCann's vulgar little book of lies, but I do want to say just a few brief words about the proposed review by the Metropolitan Police.

There can be only two possible outcomes to any such course of action, there can be nothing in between. The Met are going to do a ''Leicestershire Constabulary'' and destroy their own credibility by offering us another snow-job, or, we are finally going to see justice done, the McCanns, and the tapas lot, are all going down.

I feel inclined to add one or two things here, but I think another small post under its own header might have more effect. That up next.