I was reading the news this morning and came across an article about Antigua having won their case against the US for unfair gambling laws. Basically their case read, The US bans cross state online gambling, and this is against WTO agreements on free trade in services. The US defense basically read, The US is protecting it's moral fibre by banning cross state gambling and is attempting to stop illegal gambling and money laundering. Unsurprisingly the WTO ruled that if the US lets it...

This week the UN will debate proposals to place a worldwide ban on aspects of embryonic cloning. There are two major proposals on the table and world opinion seems to be split in two between them. The first proposal by Costa Rica is strongly advocated by the Bush led US government. This would make it illegal for any country to clone embryos for any reason. The US wants this worldwide ban, matching the ethical position of it's president that any cloning and destruction of the embryo is a de...

I was reading my local news site this morning when I came across an article about the recent activity on the St Helens Volcano in Washington state. I was slightly surprised to see no articles on Joeuser on this topic. The current situation seems to be that The volcano has now been sealed off, due to the highest level of activity since 1986. Earthquakes related to the volcano are now occurring at a rate of 3-4 a minute suggesting an erruption is imminent. Admittedly any eruption is expected to...

Today the russian cabinet has sent the Kyoto accords to the russian parliament to be ratified. With that ratification the majority of the planet and polluters on the planet will have finally signed up and the treaty will come into effect. This brings the total number of countries who have ratified, approved or accepted the accords to 126 out of 137, with Australia, indonesia and the US being the noticeable exceptions. The accords commit many of those countries who have signed (primarily th...

With the recent allegations of rape against sports stars being dragged through the papers and news shows this summer I wonder if it's time for countries to revisit privacy versus interest of the public laws. The US, Britian and Australia have all seen media circus' occur where the sports stars have later been exonerated. Is it really in the interest of the public to be told that Y has been accussed rape? Surely that information should never be released unless a trial has occurred and Y is f...

Two weeks ago the UK was shocked by suppossed photos of UK troops torturing and abusing Iraqi prisoners. The photos were spread all over the front page of one of the major tabloid newspapers along with articles from 2 soldiers alleging abuse. A scandal had broken. The UK government instigated an immediate investigation into these specific claims while stating that all previous claims had been investigated. There was widespread concern however that maybe there was some hidden problema dn th...

I read an interesting article today on torture and felt I should share it with those who may not see it. Link In the article, the physologists argue that two things are required for torture to occur. - Firstly an individual. Not necessarily any individual but many individuals, including well-adjusted individuals would do. - Secondly either bad or lacking leadership. Very interesting article. Paul.

When I initially commented on the Iraqi pow treatment I blamed much of the problem on the US government. While I accepted that there were only a tiny number of soldiers mistreating prisoners I felt that it was a failure of the US system. I highlighted the fact that the government failed to provide soldiers with the Geneva convention requirements on treatment of soldiers, failed to give any training, failed to provide support, failed to provide leadership, and failed to provide supervision. ...

Like many other I am totally shocked and horrified by the recent 60 minutes program on the abuses by the US military in the Abu Ghraib prison. Links to CBS are http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/04/27/60II/main614063.shtml and to a BBC report http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/3672901.stm The US government is responsible for it's military and their actions. Saying this is just a tiny minority of the 150,000 troops present is not enough. The damage these pictures do...

I woke up yesterday, read my newspaper and noticed tht March had arrived and another US-EU trade war was upon us. After over 2 years of waiting for the US to recind it's illegal trade subsidies the Eu had finally acted. 5% extra tariffs were added to a diverse range of US products including paper, toys and jewelry. And for every month that the US fails to recind it's illegal subsidies the traiff rises by 1%. So where has this problem come from. Well long before the steel trade war the Eu to...