An emotional journey home
Dave Hill
January 20, 2007 11:01 AM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/dave_hill/2007/01/post_958.html
Even now only one thing seems clear. It is that the outcome of the
anguished and very public legal dispute between Louise Campbell of
Stornoway and her Muslim former husband, Sajad Rana of Lahore, over
which of them their youngest child should live with is the best, or the
least bad, for all concerned. On Thursday, Pakistan's supreme court
ruled that 12-year-old Misbah Rana did not have to return to Scotland,
having absconded from her mother's care with her father and older
sister in August last year. This followed Ms Campbell's decision last
week to give up seeking to force Misbah's return.
Look at it any way you like, there was no way the latter outcome
should, or even could, have occurred whatever the reasons for wishing
otherwise. One of these derives from justified sympathy for Misbah's
mother: rejected, cash-strapped and distraught and now undergoing
therapy. Yet given her daughter's consistent public insistence that she
was desperate to stay with her "Papa" it seems doubtful she'd have got
her back for long if at all, and the reliably ruinous emotional effects
of court "custody" battles would have further poisoned relations,
regardless of the result. One of the terms of the settlement is that Ms
Campbell will be free to visit Misbah when she wishes and at Mr Rana's
expense, a pledge he's repeated to the media. This offer represents
Misbah's mum's best chance of rebuilding a bond with Misbah and the
three older children produced by her former marriage to their father. I
hope she is able to take it.
Is Channel 4 in real trouble?
Steve Hewlett
January 20, 2007 02:52 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/steve_hewlett/2007/01/how_much_trouble_=
is_channel_4.html
On the face of it - or at least until the channel finally broke cover -
not much. The scenes of bullying, some of it with distinct racist
undertones, were hardly edifying but equally, hardly sufficient to
necessitate anything by way of drastic action from Channel 4. Indeed
even the sheeer number of complaints to Ofcom might be taken as a
positive sign of wider public engagement with the admittedly delicate
issues raised. Paradoxically and maybe for the first time since it
started Big Brother might, by raising these questions, finally be
performing some kind of public service.
Andrea heeded America's call, and paid with her life
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/article2169224.ece
By Patrick Cockburn
Published: 20 January 2007
All foreigners are targets in Iraq, Americans especially. Even those
who come to the country to do good share the fate of those who come to
kill.
Moments after Andrea Parhamovich, a 28-year-old from Ohio, left the
offices of a Sunni Arab political party in Baghdad this week, her car
was caught in withering crossfire and burst into flames, killing her
and her two bodyguards. Unlike the 20,000 troops who have started
arriving in the country as part of President George Bush's "surge", she
was not a soldier who had come to Iraq to fight: her mission was to
teach the people how to vote.
Big business joins greens to pressure Bush on climate
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/article2169176.ece
By Andrew Gumbel in Los Angeles
Published: 20 January 2007
An unprecedented coalition of blue-chip US companies and environmental
lobby groups will urge President Bush next week to get serious about
global warming, calling for caps on carbon dioxide emissions that would
cut greenhouse gases by 10-30 per cent over 15 years.
The group, called the US Climate Action Partnership, will unveil the
details of its plan on the eve of President Bush's State of the Union
speech on Tuesday. The companies involved include some of the
old-fashioned pollution-generating industries normally associated with
anti-environmental policies and politicians - the chemical giant
DuPont, the bulldozer company Caterpillar, the aluminium producer Alcoa
and the US subsidiary of BP.
Robert Fisk: Fear climate change, not our enemies
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/fisk/article2169192.ece
From this wreckage was bound to come the insurgencies and the hatred
Published: 20 January 2007
It was a warning. Scratched, of course after more than 50 years, but a
home movie, shot by my mother in colour. But most of the colour is
white. Bill Fisk, the 57-year-old borough treasurer of Maidstone, is
standing in the garden of our home in his long black office coat,
wearing - as always - his First World War regimental tie, throwing snow
balls at his son. I am 10 years old, in short trousers but up to my
waist in snow. There must have been two feet of it in the garden. You
can even see the condensation from my mouth. My mother doesn't appear
on the film of course. She is standing in the snow behind my father, 36
years old, the daughter of caf=E9 proprietors who every Boxing Day would
host my own and my aunt's family with a huge lunch and a roaring log
fire. It really was cold then.
I think was it Andrew Marr, when editor of The Independent, who first
made me think about what was happening. It was a stiflingly hot summer
and I had just arrived in London from Beirut and commented that there
wasn't much difference in temperature. And Andrew turned round and
pointed across the city. "Something's gone wrong with the bloody
weather!" he roared. And of course, he was right.
US alarmed by Chinese 'missile strike' on satellite
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/asia/article2169179.ece
By Anne Penketh, Diplomatic Editor
Published: 20 January 2007
China faced a barrage of international criticism after Washington
accused it of destroying an old weather satellite with a medium-range
missile, amid concerns about the militarisation of space.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry neither confirmed nor denied yesterday
that the anti-satellite test had been conducted on 11 January. It was
the first such reported strike since 1985 when Washington knocked out a
satellite before halting testing over fears that space debris could hit
other orbiting devices.
Sri Lanka's military captures strategic rebel-held enclave
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/asia/article2169181.ece
By Bharatha Mallawarachi, Associated Press Writer
Published: 20 January 2007
Sri Lankan soldiers captured a strategic Tamil Tiger rebel-held enclave
in the volatile east, the military said yesterday, as intensified
fighting forced thousands of Tamil civilians to flee the area.
Military spokesman Brig. Prasad Samarasinghe said the army "gained
complete control over Vaharai," a strategic town in eastern Batticaloa
district - the scene of heavy fighting between government troops and
Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam over the last few weeks.
Robert Fisk: Award-winning writer shot by assassin in Istanbul street
http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/article2169190.ece
Published: 20 January 2007
Hrant Dink became the 1,500,001st victim of the Armenian genocide
yesterday. An educated and generous journalist and academic - editor of
the weekly Turkish-Armenian newspaper Agos - he tried to create a
dialogue between the two nations to reach a common narrative of the
20th century's first holocaust. And he paid the price: two bullets shot
into his head and two into his body by an assassin in the streets of
Istanbul yesterday afternoon.
It was not only a frightful blow to Turkey's surviving Armenian
community but a shattering reversal to Turkey's hope of joining the
European Union, a visionary proposal already endangered by the
country's broken relations with Cyprus and its refusal to acknowledge
the genocide for what it was: the deliberate mass killing of an entire
race of Christian people - 1,500,000 in all - by the country's Ottoman
Turkish government in 1915. Winston Churchill was among the first to
call it a holocaust but to this day, the Turkish authorities deny such
a definition, ignoring documents which Turkey's own historians have
unearthed to prove the government's genocidal intent.
High society: Swiss face a very British invasion
http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/article2169189.ece
Verbier is popular with celebrities, City boys and tax exiles. But
locals, alarmed at the influx of foreigners, have banned outsiders from
buying property
By Guy Adams
Published: 20 January 2007
In the apr=E8s-ski bars of Verbier, there were two big talking points
last night: a series of unseasonable rain showers that have ruined
local pistes, and news that James Blunt is setting up home in town.
Officials in the exclusive Swiss resort confirmed on Wednesday that the
pop singer has joined the likes of Diana Ross and Phil Collins as a tax
exile in the picture-postcard Alpine playground.
Blunt, an effortlessly posh former Cavalry officer, became the most
high-profile member of a tidal-wave of Anglo Saxon home-owners who,
since 2001, have snapped-up almost 50 per cent of property to hit the
market in Verbier. In a double-whammy for Britain, his arrival hit the
news less than a week after it emerged that Les Rosbifs have also taken
over one of the town's best-known institutions: an iconic mountain
restaurant and celebrity hangout called Chez Dany.
The shadow of Shilpa looms large over Jade as she returns to face the
real world
http://news.independent.co.uk/media/article2169221.ece
By Thomas Sutcliffe
Published: 20 January 2007
"Well ... Wow ... What an extraordinary week it's been," said Davina
McCall, introducing an episode of Big Brother that had been transformed
from mere reality show into an impromptu referendum on public attitudes
to racism.
The crowd had been banished from the Big Brother courtyard, for fear of
a self-righteous lynching, and the proceeds of the phone voting lines
had been pledged to charity, as Channel 4 struggled to distance itself
from accusations that it was profiting from bullying.
Leading article: A public glimpse of private attitudes that should jolt
us out of complacency
http://comment.independent.co.uk/leading_articles/article2169174.ece
The housemates exposed the continued existence of a bigoted mindset
that many had hoped was dying out
Published: 20 January 2007
Who would have thought a reality television show would do anyone any
favours - beyond those who benefit financially? But this is what has
happened with Channel 4's Celebrity Big Brother. The exchanges between
Jade Goody and Shilpa Shetty became the talk of the week. They
dominated radio phone-ins and television talk shows. They lost the
programme, and Ms Goody, major commercial sponsors. And they threatened
a diplomatic row between Britain and India, just as the Chancellor was
over there trying to burnish his foreign policy credentials.
But they also did something else more interesting and, in the national
context, no less significant. They triggered a spontaneous national
discussion about race and racism that was in many ways long overdue.
Howard Jacobson: 'Big Brother' encourages us to embrace a condition far
more worrying than racism
http://comment.independent.co.uk/columnists_a_l/howard_jacobson/article2169=
216.ece
The debate as to whether Jade and her super-dumb cohorts are racist is
not worth having
Published: 20 January 2007
After the Revolution, the Terror. This - the invariable consequence of
filling the heads of the uneducated with grandiosity - is what we are
seeing on Celebrity Big Brother. In the days when she sweetly knew
herself to be pig ignorant, Jade Goody had neither the reason nor the
confidence to launch the sort of terrifying tirades to which poor
little rich girl Shilpa Shetty has been subjected - never mind with
what provocation - this last week.
But then television made Jade a star. Television rewarded her with
renown for all the things she didn't know. Television set her up as a
sort of Ugly Betty of the reason and the intellect, an example and a
promise to everyone who had hitherto felt damned in their own fatuity.
You, too, said television, can be rich and famous for being an airhead.
Indeed, if we have our way, you won't be rich and famous for being
anything else. And now the airhead is a swollen head, and won't be
spoken down to by a mistress of Indian subcontinent hauteur. Jade has
rights now, whether or not she can spell them, and will shake the
planet to its foundations before she forgoes a single one.
The Light and the Heat
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16711248/site/newsweek/
Clinton and Obama are generating an enthusiasm among Democrats not seen
since Kennedy was in the White House. Just ask JFK's TV adviser.
Web-exclusive commentary
By Eleanor Clift
Newsweek
Updated: 3:39 p.m. ET Jan 19, 2007
Jan. 19, 2007 - Barack Obama's likely entrance into the presidential
race has a lot of people smiling, among them Democratic National
Committee Chairman Howard Dean. No, it's not because of tensions with
the Clintons, whose apparatchik, James Carville, tried to edge Dean out
of his job. The chairman is happy because Obama is that rare politician
who can draw out the youth vote, which Democrats have been winning
lately. Dean hopes Obama can help drive up the numbers in '08.
Here Comes the Judge
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16689462/site/newsweek/
Bush finally wins approval for his controversial surveillance program.
But Democrats still want answers.
WEB EXCLUSIVE
By Michael Isikoff and Mark Hosenball
Newsweek
Updated: 11:46 a.m. ET Jan 18, 2007
Jan. 18, 2007 - The Bush administration announced Wednesday that a
secret court has authorized intelligence agencies to monitor suspected
Al Qaeda phone calls into and out of the United States. As a result,
administration officials said that President Bush will now put his
controversial warrantless surveillance program, which he authorized
without court approval after 9/11, under judicial supervision. The
officials say he will abide by secret rules set down by the Foreign
Intelligence Surveillance Court.
An Unlikely Alliance
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16671785/site/newsweek/
Elite scientists and evangelicals put aside their differences to save
the Earth.
Web Exclusive
By Samantha Henig
Newsweek
Updated: 12:13 p.m. ET Jan 17, 2007
Jan. 17, 2007 - A group of 28 scientists and evangelical Christians
today announced their commitment to working together to address global
and environmental climate change--an issue that they say is pressing
enough to trump any theological differences between the groups. Eric
Chivian, director of the Center for Health and the Global Environment
at Harvard Medical School, is one of the scientists leading the
collaboration. In an interview with NEWSWEEK's Samantha Henig,
Chivian discussed the origins of this peculiar union, what the two
groups have in common, how the evangelical Christian community can help
scientists and the spiritual significance of his fruit garden.
Excerpts:
Dirge for a 'Surge'
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16720627/site/newsweek/
In the latest NEWSWEEK poll Bush's approval rating remains at its
all-time low as his plan to increase the number of U.S. troops in Iraq
is met with widespread disapproval. Looking to '08, declared
candidate Hillary Clinton is in a statistical dead heat with other
potential nominees.
WEB EXCLUSIVE
By Brian Braiker
Newsweek
Updated: 10:25 a.m. ET Jan 20, 2007
Jan. 20, 2007 - When President George W. Bush declared earlier this
month that the only way to quell sectarian violence in Iraq was to send
more than 20,000 additional American troops, he probably knew the move
would be unpopular. Indeed, the latest NEWSWEEK poll finds that
Bush's call for a "surge" in troops is opposed by two-thirds (68
percent) of Americans and supported by only a quarter (26 percent).
Almost half of all respondents (46 percent) want to see American troops
pulled out "as soon as possible."
The Usual Suspects?
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16709700/site/newsweek/
China's dramatic raid in a remote Central Asian outpost underscores
the threat of Muslim extremism-and Beijing's credibility problem,
too.
Web Exclusive
By Melinda Liu
Newsweek
Updated: 1:26 p.m. ET Jan 19, 2007
Jan. 19, 2007 - Sometimes in China you read about the funeral before
you much know about the violence that led up to it. Last week's
media reports of the emotional memorial ceremony for 21-year-old
Chinese policeman Huang Qiang was, for some of us, the first clue that
something unusual had erupted in Xinjiang, China's "Wild West,"
where 8.5 million Muslims-most of them Turkic-speaking
Uighurs-comprise three-fifths of the population. Newspaper photos
showed dozens of Chinese police-some bowing deeply, some apparently
weeping-gathered before Huang's bier, which was draped with the
Chinese national flag.
Have women fared well or badly in the world's religions down through
the ages? Why?
http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/
Potomac High
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16692613/site/newsweek/
The earnest straight-A student. The mysterious newcomer. The guys who
love to hear themselves talk. No, it's not the pep rally. It's the
Democratic primary.
WEB-EXCLUSIVE COMMENTARY
By Howard Fineman
Newsweek
Updated: 3:34 p.m. ET Jan 18, 2007
Jan. 18, 2007 - You knew Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama in high
school. At least I did. They were candidates in the student senate
election. She was the worthy but puffed-up Miss Perfect, all poodle
skirts and multicolored binders clutched to her chest. He was the
lanky, mysterious transfer student-from Hawaii by way of Indonesia no
less-who Knew Things and was way too cool to carry more than one book
at a time. Who would be leader of the pack?
Presidential elections are high school writ large, of course, and that
is especially true when, as now, much of the early nomination race is
based in the U.S. Capitol. It is even more the case when the party in
question, and here we are talking about the Democrats, is not sharply
divided ideologically.They have a good chance in '08 to oust the
fading prep/jock/ROTC/Up With People alliance.
'Dying Isn't Hard, Parking Is'
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16693886/site/newsweek/
A loving remembrance of Art Buchwald, the venerable humorist who took
death into overtime.
Web exclusive
By Eleanor Clift
Newsweek
Updated: 4:59 p.m. ET Jan 18, 2007
Jan. 18, 2007 - I was among the legion that visited Art Buchwald at the
Washington hospice he called home for several months last year, and
where he expected to die. He had chosen at age 80 to forego dialysis
and accept his fate. Except death didn't come. His weakened kidneys
rallied and so did his spirits.
Are You Experienced?
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16659632/site/newsweek/
Obama isn't the only junior senator to eye the White House early in
his tenure. How 'BHO' stacks up against JFK.
Web-Exclusive Commentary
By Jonathan Alter
Newsweek
Updated: 7:32 p.m. ET Jan 16, 2007
Jan. 16, 2007 - Judging by the middle name alone, you gotta give
Kennedy the edge. John Fitzgerald Kennedy. Barack Hussein Obama.
"Fitzgerald" was gold among Catholic voters, about a quarter of the
1960 electorate, who voted more than 80 percent for JFK. "Hussein"?
Well, it might be an asset with a few Muslim voters in Michigan who
mistakenly think he's one of the faithful. For everyone else,
Barack's got, as Ricky Ricardo used to say, some 'splaining to do.
China's Muscle Flex in Space
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/20/opinion/20sat1.html
The way to counter China or any other potentially belligerent space
power is through an arms control treaty, not a new arms race in space.
Reform, Finally, in the Senate
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/20/opinion/20sat2.html
An overwhelming majority approved the first serious anticorruption
strictures since the Watergate era.
A Product of the U.N. System
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/20/opinion/20sat3.html
The indictment of Benon Sevan on federal corruption charges stemming
from the Iraqi oil-for-food program points to a continuing problem in
the U.N. appointments system.
An Enigmatic Wild Card in Lebanon's High-Stakes Politics
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/20/world/middleeast/20aoun.html?ref=3Dworld&=
pagewanted=3Dall
By HASSAN M. FATTAH
In this land of divisive politics and sectarian tension, few have
embraced controversy quite like Gen. Michel Aoun.
China Shows Assertiveness in Weapons Test
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/20/world/asia/20china.html?ref=3Dworld&pagew=
anted=3Dall
By JOSEPH KAHN
China's success in destroying one of its own orbiting satellites
signals its intention to contest U.S. supremacy in space.
Leading Senator Assails President Over Iran Stance
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/20/washington/20intel.html?ref=3Dworld
By MARK MAZZETTI
Senator John D. Rockefeller IV said that the White House portrayal of
Iran was reminiscent of rhetoric about Iraq.
Vatican and China Open Talks on Improving Ties
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/20/world/europe/20pope.html?ref=3Dworld
By IAN FISHER
A dispute over the right to appoint bishops has soured relations
between the church and China.
U=2EN. to Audit Its Activities After Reports on North Korea Program
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/20/world/asia/20nations.html?ref=3Dworld
By WARREN HOGE
Ban Ki-moon, the new secretary general, appeared to be making efforts
to head off the kind of problems his predecessor faced.
Israel Releases $100 Million Withheld From Palestinians
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/20/world/middleeast/20mideast.html?ref=3Dwor=
ld
By GREG MYRE
Israel transferred $100 million in Palestinian tax revenues to the
office of the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas.
Insurgents Attack Palace in Somalia
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/20/world/africa/20somalia.html?ref=3Dworld
By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN
Insurgents blasted Somalia's presidential palace with heavy
explosives on Friday, but it appeared that no one was hurt.
Class Divide in Chinese-Americans' Charity
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/20/nyregion/20philanthropy.html?ref=3Dasia&p=
agewanted=3Dall
By NINA BERNSTEIN
Rich Chinese-Americans are more likely to donate to mainstream
institutions than to the poor, nonprofits say.
Iraqi Factories, Aging and Shut, Now Give Hope
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/18/world/middleeast/18factory.html?ref=3Dmid=
dleeast&pagewanted=3Dall
By JAMES GLANZ
Surviving factories could present a last chance of sorts for dealing
with Iraq's reconstruction and its insurgency.
Clinton Says 'I'm In to Win' 2008 Race
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/20/us/politics/20cnd-clinton.html?ref=3Dus&p=
agewanted=3Dall
By PATRICK HEALY
Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton announced on her Web site this morning
that she was taking the first formal step to seek the Democratic
presidential nomination in 2008.
Clinton's Announcement Makes Waves in '08 Field
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/20/us/politics/20cnd-clinton.html?ref=3Dpoli=
tics&pagewanted=3Dall
By PATRICK HEALY
Six years after making history by winning a United States Senate seat
as first lady, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton announced this morning
that she was taking the first formal step to seek the Democratic
presidential nomination in 2008, a journey that would break yet more
political barriers in her extraordinary and controversial career.
Shushing the Baby Boomers
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/21/weekinreview/21broder.html?ref=3Dpolitics=
&pagewanted=3Dall
By JOHN M. BRODER
We could pass the torch to a new generation, as Kennedy put it. Or are
passion's fires best left burning?
Bush Urges Tax to Help Cover the Uninsured
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/21/washington/21health.html?ref=3Dpolitics&p=
agewanted=3Dall
By SHERYL GAY STOLBERG and ROBERT PEAR
President Bush intends to use Tuesday's State of the Union address to
tackle the rising cost of health care with a one-two punch.
.
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