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• Bangkok braces for shutdown rallies
• Cyclone Ian batters Tonga
• Tragedy in Uganda: Joseph Kony massacre survivors tell their stories
• Global warming and energy – interwined problems in Africa | John Abraham
• Tragedy in Uganda: Joseph Kony massacre survivors - in pictures
• Black rhino hunt permit brings $350,000 at controversial auction
• Victoria to quash gay sex convictions
• Plane crashes twice in a day – video
• Libyan government minister shot dead
• Hypnotist Scott Lewis dies in Sydney balcony fall
• Brussels rejects UK threats to rewrite immigration rules
• British politicians and generals targeted in Iraq abuse case
• Australian police name Briton who died after rescuing his children at beach
• Australian environment minister is totally, shamefully negligent with "direct action" policy | Alexander White
• British version of 12 Years A Slave to shed light on our role in Atlantic slave trade
• Ariel Sharon: a life that shaped Israel's story and mirrored its turbulent times | Observer editorial
• Coalition's lobbying bill threatens to leave a stain on British democracy | Maina Kiai
• Lobbying bill will tarnish Britain, says UN official
• Romanian sex workers in turf wars over London pitches
• 24,000 murders last year confirm Venezuela as one of the world's most dangerous countries
• Francois Hollande, Julie Gayet … and a very British scandal about a very French affair
• Forty years on, why the Boss was born to run and run
• Guantánamo's 'architect of 9/11' has care worker pen pal in Nottingham
• Amy Chua: the tiger mom returns to the fray | Observer profile
• How Bristol's gracious mansions mask the shameful past of Britain's links to slavery

Bangkok braces for shutdown rallies Posted: 12 Jan 2014 12:03 AM PST Protesters trying to force out Thailand's government will attempt to block main roads and paralyse the capital

Cyclone Ian batters Tonga Posted: 11 Jan 2014 11:02 PM PST Authorities trying to assess casualties and damage across chain of south Pacific islands after biggest storm in decades

Tragedy in Uganda: Joseph Kony massacre survivors tell their stories Posted: 11 Jan 2014 11:00 PM PST Few warlords are more unpitying than Joseph Kony of the Lord's Resistance Army, as the wider world discovered through the film Kony 2012. Now some of the survivors are taking the opportunity to record their horrifying experiences. Will Storr travels to Uganda to listen About two hours east of Kitgum, in the distant north of Uganda, there's a village filled with ghosts. The people of Amoko are mostly subsistence farmers and their days are usually the same. They work, they talk, they sleep. Recently, they've been talking about Patrick Okello. Demons have been visiting him in the night; he wakes to see a strange glow in his hut as they surround him, whispering Okello, Okello, Okello. Flies, rats and bats crawl over him. The other day, he stripped off all his clothes and ran up the hill. "That's what makes him run," says elder Martin Olanya. "Because they're calling his name." The villagers have a theory as to what's behind the haunting of Patrick Okello. "Ever since the burials took place," says Martin, "the people in this community have not been settled. We assume it's the work of vengeful spirits." Martin took part in those burials. Like many other survivors here, he dug a mass grave for his family after the Lord's Resistance Army came through Amoko on 7 December 1991. You won't read about the Amoko massacre in any newspaper or book. In fact, today's arrival of a young social scientist named Deo Komakech, with his notebook and video-recorder, marks the first time that the people who lived through the attack by Joseph Kony's dreaded men have been asked about it. "There's no one to listen to our story," Nekolina Lakot tells him. "It's good you have come." Gathering these stories, quietening these ghosts, is the unusual work of the organisation which employs Deo, the National Memory and Peace Documentation Centre (NMPDC). Based in Kitgum, and supported by the UK charity Christian Aid, their mission is to harvest information concerning the 19 years in which the LRA preyed upon the people of this region, which is known as Acholiland. It was the Acholi who suffered the worst of the war's atrocities. Because they wouldn't join the LRA's anti-government forces, its leader Kony – an Acholi himself – accused them of treachery. As a result of the vengeance the LRA inflicted upon them, Acholiland is as haunted a place as any in the world. Along the district's main road are burnt-out, AK-47-strafed churches and abandoned homes scrawled with child's drawings of bullet-spraying men. In the area around Kitgum alone, it's believed there are more than 100 unmarked mass graves. Among the people here, it's not unusual to see survivors bearing the LRA's characteristic butcher marks: missing noses, lips, ears, buttocks and hands. Today, Deo has brought his story-gathering equipment to Amoko, an ordinary village that lies in the lush valley of the Langoro mountain, towards the border with South Sudan. It has a muddy main drag lined with brick buildings with doors of corrugated iron – a small shop, a charcoal store, a dark room full of drunks. On either side of the road are clean-swept living spaces, known as compounds, linked by narrow tracks. Deo sits in a clearing, explaining his work to a group of cautiously interested elders. One of them is Nekolina Lakot, a beautiful 72-year-old woman in a shimmering green dress. She listens with a particular numbed intensity. When he mentions the LRA, and 7 December, her eyes fall and she touches her heart. Once Deo has been granted permission to do his work, she sits down, smiling gently, and begins. On 6 December 1991, word reached the Langoro valley that the LRA had been sighted in the area. Gunshots had been heard. Scared, the villagers picked their way into the hills. They slept that night in hiding. As dawn breathed through the sky, the tracks and compounds of Amoko were silent. It was cloudy at daybreak, the wind was still. "It was a weird day," remembers community leader Anyongo Sisto. "Everything seemed not really normal." At around 11am, the five children with Nekolina Lakot began complaining of hunger. Everything seemed calm. So along with her father-in-law the family crept back down the hill. As they walked along the road they saw them. She doesn't remember how many. Most wore military fatigues. Some had boots, the younger ones were barefoot. They held AK-47s and wooden clubs that had been cut fresh from the trees. The eldest soldier was in his early 20s, the youngest about six. It was the elder boy who did the killing. With a log, he began beating Nekolina's father-in-law across the chest and back and continued until he was dead. Then he started on the children. As he worked methodically, smashing the life out of her family one by one, the soldiers laughed at their screaming and crying. He reached Nekolina last, cracking his crude weapon over her head. "Then one of them stood up and said, 'That's enough. Leave her alive,'" she says. "But he kept on beating me. The other person dragged me away. That's how I survived.'" Badly injured, Nekolina lost consciousness. When she woke up, swollen and bloody, three hours later, the first thing she saw were the remains of her children. An hour after these killings, at around noon, Dorina Adjero and her family also came out of hiding in need of food. Unaware of the LRA's arrival, her husband and son began preparing a meal in their hut. Dorina, approaching from a distance, froze at the sight of soldiers ordering them out. "Immediately, they lay on the ground," she says. "I saw them being hit on the neck with sticks. I could hear them moaning." Dorina hid in a nearby hut. "I couldn't call for help because they'd kill me. I couldn't even cry. Afterwards, I had to flee. I would say that they were not interested in looting. They had come with the intention of only killing." It's a peculiar aspect of the Amoko massacre that the soldiers didn't appear to have been after food: returned LRA abductees often talk of the extreme hunger they'd typically experience. But there were some opportunist abductions. By 1991, kidnap had become the only way that Kony could sustain numbers in his army. With the Acholi largely refusing to co-operate with him, his soldiers would take children by force, often making them kill their parents so they had no home to escape back to. Estimates suggest that, between 1987 and 2006, the LRA abducted between 25,000 and 38,000 children. The family of Magdelena Lamunu had a plan for attacks such as this. "Every time we heard about the rebels, we made sure we slept in different hideouts, so in case of anything happening, not all of us were taken." That day, the LRA had come from the east. "Unfortunately, my child had hidden in that direction. As they were killing people, and moving towards the west, my son jumped out." From her hiding place at the top of the hill, and with her two other children by her side, Magdelena watched it all happen. The boy tried to escape along the road to the place where he knew he'd find his mother. "They chased him. Before he could start climbing the hill, they intercepted." It was by now 2pm and the LRA had split into groups. It was a sub-team of six that pursued the boy. As they beat him, they mocked him. "You think you can hide from us! But haven't we caught you now?" When they'd finished, they tied him with sisal rope and walked him to the main group. "I was completely broken down emotionally, but I couldn't make any noise because I was afraid they might take my other children," says Magdelena. "My son never came back." Just as the LRA were finally leaving, the weather broke. It rained all night. Sometime that afternoon, Martin Olanya and his wife returned to Amoko from a visit to a nearby hospital. The scene he discovered at his compound was shattering. The bodies of two of his brothers lay on its boundary. "I think they'd been trying to escape." The rest of them, 15 members of his extended family, had been hauled into a pile. "Three were women and the rest were children. Four were young babies who were still breastfeeding." The adults had been shot in the head and stomach; the children beaten to death. "I found one baby still alive. He was fighting for his life. He died shortly afterwards. It didn't take long." As well as the 17 dead, four of his family's children had disappeared – abducted, never to return. When she saw what had happened, Martin's wife collapsed into crying. He told her: "Your tears will only hurt me more." He knew he was risking his life by doing so, but he decided to stay and bury his people. "I just told myself, if they want to come back and kill me, they'd better come. That gave me courage." Martin's mind focused resolutely on the task. "There was no one around to help me, so I dug the grave alone." It took him six hours. By the time he'd finished digging in the rain the pit was as deep as his waist. It would only fit the females. He had to return with help, the next day, to bury the men and the boys. The village stayed quiet for a long time. Nekolina, desperately injured, remained in hiding for two days. Eventually, she picked her way back down the hill to cover her dead in grass then dig them shallow graves. Others did the same. "People were sneaking back from their hideouts and just pouring earth over the bodies," says Dorina. "The burials were so fast and sketchy." Some people were so scared that they didn't even do this. "They left bodies all around their homes." Anyongo was, at the time, the community's secretary for security. When he'd finished making graves for his family, he gathered the people together and told them, "We can't protect you. We need to move away from the village." For three years, Amoko lay abandoned. Today, the survivors who speak to Deo worry about those rushed burials. For the Acholis, if a body isn't interred correctly, bad things can happen. "The spirit might think the family has forgotten them or is neglecting them," explains the NMPDC's research co-ordinator Theo Hollander. "And then it might return to haunt them in various ways. There might be illnesses in the family or a bad harvest or all kinds of distress because the spirit is not at peace." In such instances, the affected people can carry out a ritual. "You need a few goats to slaughter, you need people to attend the ritual, you need to provide food and drinks for them," says Theo. "These people live on a day-to-day basis. Buying two or three goats is a huge investment. They just cannot do it." One of the people scared by the ramifications of all this is Patrick Okello, the man who wakes to see ghosts. His misery came later, in 1996, when he discovered the remains of his father about eight miles from Amoko, where he'd run into the LRA. "My brother and I found his body cut up into small pieces," he says. "There was a lot of blood. We buried him quickly in a shallow grave with sand near our home. Then we ran away in case the LRA were still in the area. I think my father is still vengeful about the fact that his last funeral rite has not been carried out. He always tells me he needs a proper burial. He is angry." If Patrick were to see a doctor in Kitgum, he might be diagnosed with a trauma-related psychological condition, such as PTSD. But in the absence of formal medical assistance, this rural community have traditional stories to make sense of what they've been through and what still takes place. Today even bad behaviour by disrespectful children is blamed, by some, on the massacre's restless spirits. An understanding of the power of story and ritual is central to the NMPDC's project. The reparations payments that some Acholi seek from the government can be seen as a symbolic gesture: a ritual in which they publicly declare their place on the side of the wrongdoers. An apology, too, is a ritual. But perhaps the most elemental ritual of all is the simple telling of our story. As the words are spoken we become characters in an orderly narrative of cause and effect; good and evil. As the account is heard and recorded, testimony becomes history. It is no cure, but it helps. In Amoko, witness after witness tells us that the simple act of having their stories listened to and then held on record for future generations of Acholi has a healing effect. "When I share my experiences, it will at least make me feel some ease at heart," Nekolina tells us. "It will make me feel better, knowing that my memories are kept somewhere." And yet the memories that are still to be gathered are innumerable. The NMPDC's "scoping" activities, which are captained by locally raised Deo, began in September 2010. He compiled data from archived newspaper reports on to an Excel spreadsheet, which totalled around 4,500 events, before heading into the field for more detail. "As I went from village to village," he says, "I began finding a lot of incidents that were not on my database." So far, he has recorded more than 230 hitherto unknown events. Even on the day the LRA attacked Amoko, the soldiers went on to commit five further massacres in neighbouring villages. The sheer weight of all this sorrow means that many stories are left unshared. "In this region, everyone has their problems," says Theo. "You don't necessarily want to hear about your neighbours' issues, because you have enough of your own." In 2012, millions of westerners first heard the story of Joseph Kony as a result of the American internet film, Kony 2012, that gained nearly 100 million views on YouTube. But this is of little interest to people here. "Maybe 2% of the entire Acholi population even knew about that film," says Theo, "and of that 2%, very few cared. The international arena is not so important." But the national one is. There's a fear that, if left unacknowledged, these hurts can fester. If they're allowed to turn toxic, painful stories from people's lives have the potential to become dangerous, by threatening to tip Uganda's decades-long cycle of violence into a new revolution. To illustrate this point, Theo describes efforts that were made in 1991 to raise a local anti-LRA force that became known as the Arrow Boys. "It took something like two months to get 10,000 people to take up arms," he says. "How do you do that? You use the grievances they have – I have a family member missing; I had a son and never saw him again." Theo observes that many people remain outraged that the Ugandan authorities not only failed to protect them, but also unjustly blamed the Acholi for supporting the LRA and committed atrocities of their own. "Right now, it's peaceful," he says. "But there's a lot of anger and a lot of former child soldiers who've had military training. What if you wanted to mobilise these people against the government?" Today, the LRA is diminished but still active. They are thought to be in the chaotic borderlands of South Sudan, Congo and the Central African Republic where killings, abductions and sexual violence by Kony's troops have been reported. In December, US-backed African Union solders attacked a group of 30 as they tried to cross the River Vovodo in south-east Central African Republic; 14 were apparently killed, including the senior strategist, Colonel Samuel Kangul. But the whereabouts of Kony, who remains wanted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes and crimes against humanity, are unknown. The people of Amoko fear his return. He always claimed to be possessed by spirits and, to them, this makes simple, logical sense. "That's why he does all the killings and all these weird things," says Dorina. "A normal person who is acting in normal conscience wouldn't kill people in this way." As worried as they are, they're doing their best to calm the disturbances that were raised during the war. Not long ago, they arranged for some pastors from a local evangelist church to pray over Patrick Okello. They thought perhaps the ritual of exorcism would ease his situation; drive away the demons that have been taunting him in the night. It's been three days, now, since the pastors came. So far, the spirits have been quiet. Will Storr travelled with the assistance of Christian Aid. For more information and films, go to christianaid.org.uk/in-konys-shadow and theguardian.com/video Joseph Kony Uganda Africa War crimes Will Storr theguardian.com © 2014 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Global warming and energy – interwined problems in Africa | John Abraham Posted: 11 Jan 2014 11:00 PM PST Kenya is training for tomorrow's technology leaders to deal with today's climate and energy problems Much of my work involves the design and installation of clean and robust energy sources in remote parts of the world. On a recent trip to Kenya, my family had the opportunity to tour the Lake Naivasha region in Kenya. This region contains a treasure of wildlife and was a filming location for the movie "Out of Africa." During a boat ride, we witnessed the impacts on climate change – not through academic journal articles or conference presentations – but through people who see climate change with their own eyes. In past years, Lake Naivasha had seen dramatic reductions in water level. The coastline had changed and plants and animals had adapted to a new normal. Recently, however, extreme rains have raised the waters approximately 4 meters according to our guide. The new waterline had submerged and killed beautiful Acacia trees. After conversations with many other Kenyans, it was apparent that the reliable wet-dry weather patterns had become more erratic; you didn't have to witness dying Acacia trees when farmers throughout the country told similar tales. Extreme weather swings were evident here before our eyes. Kenyan culture (and much of Africa) is deeply rooted in the patterns of weather and climate; much of their economy depends on agricultural production. That dependency has given them much clearer foresight than others about how to plan for the changed future. The entirety of Kenya has awakened to the threats of climate change, including the government, agricultural sectors, energy industries and the educational system. My journey to learn more about Kenya's plans brought me to the beautiful and large Kenyatta University campus, just northeast of Nairobi. There, very new and quickly growing programs in mechanical engineering, energy and sustainability, and agricultural engineering are just a few of the programs training tomorrow's technology leaders to make an impact solving today's problems. Among the many initiatives are goals to provide clean, renewable, and robust energy for the campus and the country. Some applications they are focusing on are wind-powered water-pumping systems. The plan is to design, manufacture, install, and service small-scale wind power systems that slowly pump water into elevated storage tanks throughout the day and night. Students, faculty, and staff draw the water is drawn down, typically during morning and evening hours. The prototype wind turbine will be adapted to manufacturing techniques used locally, near the university. It is hoped that wide-scale testing of the wind turbine system will occur over the next three years and thereafter, fast market penetration throughout Africa will be inevitable. Another emerging technology coming from Kenyatta is the use of novel technologies for heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning (HVAC). By using thermochemical sorption technologies, sometimes with solar heating, Dr. Jeremiah Kiplagat (recent recipient of the African Education Leadership Outstanding Professor Award) and his colleagues are setting the framework for improving the performance of refrigeration systems using these methodologies. As a third example, a series of faculty-led student projects have been completed to develop solar concentrating and tracking systems for heat generation and photovoltaic power generation. The research teams have developed effective and simple means of moving reflecting mirrors and parabolic concentrators with the sun throughout the day to increase the amount of absorbed solar energy and increase the efficiency of the overall system. While the faculty and staff are at the forefront in technology development projects such as these, much credit must be given to the administration. With implementation of new degrees such as doctoral programs in sustainability and masters programs in mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, engineering hydrology, and biomedical engineering, with a focus on solving the energy and health problems that are prevalent in the East African region, this university, and the country as a whole are destined to remain leaders in their geographical region. It is clear from formal academic studies and from anecdotal evidence that developing countries that rely upon agriculture will suffer greatly from climate change in the coming decades. It is hence apparent that the solutions to climate change, such as accelerated implementation of clean and renewable power, must be implemented with great wisdom so that people in these regions are able to access the same low-cost electricity that other nations have enjoyed. In this regard, the climate-energy problem is often thought of as a double-edged sword – solutions to the climate problem make access to low-cost electricity more difficult. Currently, the major source of energy in Kenya is hydropower. This is why the School of Engineering at Kenyatta University has also partnered with regional and international organizations to promote climate mitigation in water and energy sectors. An example is the research being carried out by Dr. Luke Olang in collaboration with IGAD climate center on developing a drought-monitoring tool for the greater horn of Africa in general. The same research team is also actively involved in water management strategies in the vulnerable Mara River Basin, considered a World Heritage site due to the Great Annual Wildebeest Migration. What Kenyatta University is showing the world is that it is possible to solve both the energy and the climate problems together. Novel energy solutions using locally available technology and manufacturing techniques can build economies, provide low-cost energy, and preserve the future climate for our children. This type of systematic planning and dedication gives me hope that our future climate and energy problems can be solved. Perhaps the vision is best expressed by Prof. Chris Shisanya, Dean School of Humanities and Social Sciences who told me, "We at Kenyatta University have decided to prepare our students early enough during their study programmes to confront the challenges posed by climate change. We are now offering such courses as MSc. (Integrated Watershed Management) and MSc. (Climate Change and Sustainable Development), whose main focus is on adaptation to climate change. We believe that by exposing our students to such knowledge, they will be better equipped to help communities in Kenya's rural landscapes enhance their resilience to climate change impacts." Climate change Energy Climate change scepticism Climate change Kenya John Abraham theguardian.com © 2014 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Tragedy in Uganda: Joseph Kony massacre survivors - in pictures Posted: 11 Jan 2014 11:00 PM PST The Lord's Resistance Army and Joseph Kony, its barbarous leader, left psychological as well as physical scars on the people of Uganda. Will Storr meets some of the survivors Will Storr

Black rhino hunt permit brings $350,000 at controversial auction Posted: 11 Jan 2014 09:53 PM PST Protests greet sale by Dallas hunting club of papers allowing holder to kill rare specimen in Namibia

Victoria to quash gay sex convictions Posted: 11 Jan 2014 09:14 PM PST Premier announces erasure of criminal records for men found guilty under laws that were abolished more than 30 years ago

Plane crashes twice in a day – video Posted: 11 Jan 2014 08:50 PM PST New Zealand pilots of light aircraft manage to make an emergency landing when engine fails, then crash it into the sea as they attempt to take off again

Libyan government minister shot dead Posted: 11 Jan 2014 08:39 PM PST Shooting of Hassan al-Droui, deputy industry minister, is first assassination of a member of transitional government since Gaddafi ouster

Hypnotist Scott Lewis dies in Sydney balcony fall Posted: 11 Jan 2014 08:11 PM PST Police investigating death of star US hypnotist, who was part of Sydney Opera House show The Illusionists 2:0

Brussels rejects UK threats to rewrite immigration rules Posted: 11 Jan 2014 07:26 PM PST President of European parliament says UK has 'no chance of curbing basic principle of free movement' Brussels has stepped up its fightback against UK attempts to curb EU immigration as leaders of the European parliament declared that rules on freedom of movement were completely non-negotiable, and made clear that attempts to change them would be blocked. In the latest response to calls from UK politicians to unpick the EU treaties and rewrite one of its founding principles, European parliament president Martin Schulz said that while he took UK demands for reform of the EU "very seriously" there was no question of the parliament agreeing to reopen the rule-book on free movement. Schulz, a German Social Democrat, said he would like to see David Cameron's plans for EU reform, and wanted the UK to remain inside the EU to shape policy on everything from climate change to the single market and development policy. But he added: "Where we differ is that I would rather see the UK making its case for reform from within the EU rather than with one hand on the escape hatch. "As to the debate on free movement, this is happening not only in the UK but across many member states. The principle of free movement of people has been one of the greatest successes the EU has, it is a fundamental principle and it's not up for negotiation any more than renegotiating the principle of the free movement of goods, services or capital." He stressed that such treaty change "needs unanimous support and ratification of all member states". It would also need to pass through the European parliament, where it would almost certainly be blocked. One of the parliament's vice-presidents, the Liberal Democrat MEP Edward McMillan-Scott, told the Observer changing the principles of freedom of movement would never pass through the Council of Ministers nor the parliament. "In a globalising world, for the EU to revisit its own fundamental principles of open markets and open frontiers would amount to self-harm. I do not think that the European parliament now or in the future would accept such a major upheaval." The remarks reflect an increasing determination within the EU to respond robustly to the UK's demands for a new deal on immigration, and a growing sense that British politicians must not be allowed to hold the rest of the union to ransom over the issue by bringing up the possibility of a UK exit. While other EU leaders, including German chancellor Angela Merkel, are keen to help Cameron devise a new deal that he can sell back home, Berlin insists she will not want to tamper with EU founding principles. With Cameron wanting to reopen the debate on free movement, and home secretary Theresa May floating the idea of capping the annual number of entrants to the UK at 75,000, Schulz's comments make it clear that a renegotiation on that scale may be all but impossible. Alarmingly for Cameron, several of those now jockeying to be the next president of the European commission later this year are among the strongest believers in holding the line against a special deal for the UK. Last week one of those in the frame to take over from José Manuel Barroso, Viviane Reding, who is a current vice-president, tore into Cameron for failing to counter a "myth" that immigration from the EU was harming the UK economy. She urged politicians in the UK to explain calmly what the EU is about, rather than give in to populists on the right. Others in the running for the presidency include former Luxembourg prime minister Jean-Claude Juncker and former Belgian PM Guy Verhofstadt. Cameron, under pressure from Ukip and Tory Eurosceptics, has promised that if the Tories win the next election he will hold a referendum by the end of 2017 after having renegotiated the terms of UK membership, including rules on freedom of movement. Already the government has announced tougher rules for EU citizens claiming benefits in this country. In a further sign of how Cameron is being pressured by the right of his party, the Sunday Telegraph said 95 Tory MPs have written to the prime minister demanding parliament must be given the power to veto every aspect of EU law. Backbenchers led by Bernard Jenkin want the government to reverse the spread of human rights law, relieve businesses of red tape from Brussels and regain control over immigration. In an interview with the Sunday Times, the work and pensions secretary, Iain Duncan Smith, said EU immigrants should wait for up to two years before being able to claim benefits rather than the current period of three months. He said he had been speaking to other member states such as Germany, Italy and the Netherlands who were supportive of the idea. Britain should ask migrants to "demonstrate that you are committed to the country, that you are a resident and that you are here for a period of time and you are generally taking work and that you are contributing", he said. "At that particular point … it could be a year, it could be two years, after that then we will consider you a resident of the UK and be happy to pay you benefits." Michael Ashcroft, former deputy chairman of the Conservatives, said a Ukip victory in the Wythenshawe and Sale East byelection, for the vacant seat following the death of Labour MP Paul Goggins, would be "a game changer". Bookies have slashed Ukip's odds from 12/1 to 4/1 as Labour remains odds-on to retain the seat having won with a majority of 7,575 in 2010. A poll by the thinktank British Future finds strong public support for a change in the UK's relationship with the EU. More than one in four (28%) of UK voters want to leave, while 38% wish to stay in and try to reduce EU powers. Even senior Labour figures are now talking of the need to change freedom of movement rules in terms that will cause further alarm in Brussels. Last week shadow business secretary Chuka Umunna said he had been discussing with European counterparts how to limit immigration from EU countries to people with good skills and firm job offers. "The founders of the EU had in mind free movement of workers, not free movement of jobs," he said. Labour sources later said he had "made a mistake" but party strategists are aware that in the current anti-EU climate they have to be responsive to prevailing scepticism. European Union Immigration and asylum Europe David Cameron Angela Merkel Theresa May Toby Helm theguardian.com © 2014 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

British politicians and generals targeted in Iraq abuse case Posted: 11 Jan 2014 07:01 PM PST Army chief General Sir Peter Wall and Geoff Hoon, ex-defence secretary, among those named at international criminal court

Australian police name Briton who died after rescuing his children at beach Posted: 11 Jan 2014 05:56 PM PST Andrew Priestley, 44, from Leicestershire thought to have suffered heart attack at Burrill beach, New South Wales A man who died after rescuing his two children from drowning in strong currents at an Australian beauty spot has been named. Andrew Priestley from Leicestershire died in hospital after getting into difficulty at Burrill beach, New South Wales – about 155 miles south of Sydney on Australia's east coast. The 44-year-old, who was on holiday with his family, had gone into the water to help his two sons on Friday. After rescuing the children, it is believed Priestley may have suffered a heart attack. Australian police said the children were uninjured. A report is being prepared for the coroner. A statement from police said: "Emergency services were called to Burrill beach just after midday, where they found a man unconscious. "The 44-year-old was taken to Milton hospital where he was pronounced dead. "Officers from Shoalhaven local area command attended and were told the man, a British tourist, got into difficulty after attempting to rescue his two sons who were caught in a rip. His sons were not injured." A Foreign Office spokesman confirmed hat Priestley had died. He said the family, who have been offered consulate support, had been on holiday when then incident occurred. Australia Asia Pacific theguardian.com © 2014 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Australian environment minister is totally, shamefully negligent with "direct action" policy | Alexander White Posted: 11 Jan 2014 04:17 PM PST The Australian government's "direct action" policy is like giving money to an illegal drug dealer to stop dealing drugs, then having no penalty if he keeps selling them. Moderate conservative that he is, Australian environment minister Greg Hunt ran on a platform of "lean" government, where private businesses "are the true creators of wealth", individuals need to take personal responsibility for their actions, and the former Labor government's carbon price was a "non-delivery of an invisible substance". It was a surprise then, to learn last week, that Greg Hunt wants to give $3 billion to big polluting companies to reduce their emissions, but have no sanctions for those businesses if they fail to meet the reduction targets. This is like giving money to an illegal drug dealer to develop innovative ways for him to stop dealing drugs, then having no penalty if he keeps selling them. Worse, the drug dealer could claim government funding for drugs that he supposedly didn't sell over his "baseline" of sales, but carry on pushing drugs regardless. You'd expect that a believer in lean government wouldn't use billions in tax-payer's money to create an expensive, totally ineffectual regulatory bureaucracy to auction permits to not emit carbon pollution. The Australian government's "direct action" policy will allow companies to bid for grants to implement the most efficient carbon reduction programs. Companies will have a "business as usual" baseline from which they agree to reduce their pollution. Several options are canvassed by Greg Hunt, including having multi-year compliance periods, or the ability for companies to "make good" by buying reduction credits from elsewhere. In reality, the Emissions Reduction Fund is little more than a slush-fund for the big polluters. What is surprising is that Greg Hunt seems unaffected by the cognitive dissonance of paying someone to not do something — to not emit a tonne of carbon dioxide — when his principle criticism of the carbon price was that it was a "non-delivery of an invisible substance". This policy is shamefully negligent. Not just because it won't actually reduce Australia's carbon emissions and will fall vastly short of the inadequate 5% reduction target. But because you can't measure what you don't emit. Instead, you just assume how much you would have emitted and compare it to what you did emit. This is, needless to say, utterly subjective, and open to manipulation. Private companies will be given public funds to magically reduce their carbon pollution emissions, with no consequences if they fail to deliver. As is so often the case with this government, Greg Hunt and prime minister Tony Abbott have a very flimsy moral case to implement their direct action policy, and the federal election does not qualify as a mandate to abolish the carbon price. Abbott may claim that the 2013 election was a "referendum" on the carbon price, but if so, only around 45.5% of voters supported the abolition by voting for the LNP. This falls to a miserable 37.7% in the Senate. Implicit in their "direct action" policy is that it is a more effective way to reduce carbon emissions than the carbon price. This is a view that could only be held by someone if they didn't accept the scientific basis for climate change. Considering Tony Abbott's past statements that climate change is "crap" and that the carbon price was "socialism masquerading as environmentalism", a common sense reading of the policy is that exists solely because of the climate change denialists in the ranks of the Liberal-National party. In fact, according to an August 2013 report by Reputex, the cost per tonne of emissions reduced under Hunt and Abbott's "direct action" policy, if it were to achieve the 5% reduction, would be $58 per tonne. Labor's carbon price by contrast was just $23 per tonne (and would have gone to a floating market-set price next year). Simply put, the "direct action" policy of Greg Hunt and Tony Abbott betrays either a shameful ignorance of the national perils inherent in climate change, or malicious intent to line the pockets of big polluters at the expense of everyone else. What's more, the "direct action" policy is utterly at odds with the pro-market, "lean" government, responsibility ideology of the Liberal-National party. It abolishes the carbon permit market in favour of a heavily regulated grants/auction system. It creates more bureaucracy to replace the public servants who were administering the carbon price. It creates a consequence-free money tree for big polluters who won't need to take responsibility for their pollution. This Liberal-National government is shamefully attempting to fleece everyday Australians out of $3 billion, handed out in grants to big polluters for magical, unmeasurable carbon emission reductions. Carbon tax Climate change Greg Hunt Tony Abbott Australian politics Alexander White theguardian.com © 2014 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

British version of 12 Years A Slave to shed light on our role in Atlantic slave trade Posted: 11 Jan 2014 04:06 PM PST New film being billed as a British echo of US epic tells the tale of one woman's role in abolition struggle As Steve McQueen's film 12 Years a Slave captivates audiences on both sides of the Atlantic, Britain's own slaving past is to be given the Hollywood treatment. A series of new books and projects have already been linked to a surge of interest in a subject that has often been overlooked. This spring, in what is already being spoken of as Britain's answer to McQueen's epic, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Tom Wilkinson and Miranda Richardson will star in Belle, which will open in British cinemas having successfully premiered at last year's Toronto film festival. Directed by Amma Asante who, like McQueen, was born in Britain but lives in the Netherlands, the film tells the story of Dido Elizabeth Belle, the daughter of an enslaved mother in the Caribbean, who went on to live at Kenwood House in north London under the protection of Lord Mansfield, the lord chief justice. While she was living there, in 1772, Mansfield ruled that a master could not carry a slave out of Britain by force, a judgment seen as a crucial step towards the abolition of slavery. Misan Sagay, who wrote the screenplay, has said that understanding Belle is crucial to understanding Mansfield's motivation. "The abolition story is often told without a black person being there," she said recently. "But Belle, living with such a power whose judgments affected slavery, must have had some impact." Belle's story is in some ways the reverse of that of Solomon Northup, the central character in McQueen's film, who was born in the US a free man but later kidnapped into slavery. By contrast, Belle achieved an unprecedented level of social status and was painted by the noted artist, Johann Zoffany. "The story is interesting in lots of ways," said historian Dr Miranda Kaufmann. "Hopefully her film will have as big a splash in Britain as 12 Years a Slave." Briefly, in 2007, Belle was the subject of a temporary exhibition at Kenwood House in 2007. Now she has been awarded a prominent and permanent presence. As with McQueen's movie, Asante's film will shine a light on the slave trade by telling its story through the eyes of individuals caught up in it. Many of the tensions that permeated late 18th century Britain can be understood through the character of Mansfield, says historian Dr Madge Dresser. "One of the interesting contradictions is that in the name of freedom, merchants in the slave trade were campaigning for the right to trade in slaves," said Dresser. "On the one hand, Mansfield was probably against slavery personally, but he also had to grapple with the idea that an Englishman's property had to be protected from the absolutism of the state." In the past year there has been a renewed examination of Britain's role in slavery. A book co-edited by Dresser and published by English Heritage, Slavery and the British Country House, has examined how much of Georgian society was funded by the slave industry, while Legacies of British Slave-ownership, an online project launched by UCL, has revealed how many wealthy families benefited from plantations in the Americas. Making Freedom, an exhibition at the Royal Geographical Society, has sought to counter the conventional slavery narrative. "The point powerfully presented in the Making Freedom exhibition is that Africans were not passive victims, but constantly resisted their enslavement and fought for their freedom," Kaufmann said. "They actively resisted, through uprisings on land and sea, by running away and establishing Maroon settlements, or even by committing suicide." Kaufmann said she hoped that, inspired by McQueen, other directors would now turn their attention to Britain's role in the slave economy. "Telling the stories of individuals is a better way into this subject," Kaufmann said. "If you just use lots of numbers and statistics, people put up the shutters." Separately, law firm Leigh Day is bringing a legal action against Britain over its role in the slave economy on behalf of 14 Caribbean countries grouped under the umbrella of the Caricom trade organisation. Senior partner Martyn Day said there had been a cultural shift in the slavery debate. "We see the momentum building," said Day, who led a successful claim against the British government on behalf of the Mau Mau people of Kenya last year. "The power of the Caricom nations, both within the UN and in the wider political world, combined with developments like 12 Years a Slave, is striking just at the right moment." Day added that the claim, which is being brought against France, the Netherlands and Britain, was different from that made on behalf of the Mau Mau people. "The idea is to engage with the western powers in a more discursive manner, rather than saying, 'Here is a claim for a zillion pounds.' Instead, the point is to say, 'Look, here are the ongoing impacts of slavery. You western powers have committed to ensuring that the impact of race discrimination is not ongoing, but the Caribbean still suffers from the impact of slavery and this is what our clients feel can be done to resolve it'. I am optimistic that the western powers would engage in this discussion in a very positive way." One possible solution, Day suggested, would be for the three countries to share expertise in matters such as health and education and to pay for a museum of slavery in the Caribbean. "In the UK there are three or four museums on slavery, but there are none in the Caribbean," he said. Slavery Steve McQueen Jamie Doward theguardian.com © 2014 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Ariel Sharon: a life that shaped Israel's story and mirrored its turbulent times | Observer editorial Posted: 11 Jan 2014 04:06 PM PST The late Ariel Sharon was present at many of the most symbolic and controversial moments in his country's history The death of Ariel Sharon, Israel's former prime minister who had been in a deep coma since suffering a stroke in January 2006, represents an extraordinary moment of rupture in his country's history. Of the generation of Israeli soldiers and politicians who fought in Israel's founding conflicts, only Shimon Peres now remains in a prominent role. Sharon's life, who died yesterday aged 85, represented a metaphor for Israel's trajectory. The son of Russian immigrants and born in a farming community near Tel Aviv in 1928, he was a teenage volunteer in the fight against British rule in the Palestine Mandate. He was present at many of the key symbolic moments in Israel's development. He fought – and was wounded – in the 1948 war of independence that Palestinians know as the Nakba – the "catastrophe". A bloody ruthlessness was also evident from early on when he led the infamous 1953 retaliation raid on Qibiya in Jordan that saw 69 Jordanians, many of them civilians, killed. All would be overshadowed, however, by his role as a key architect of the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon and the personal responsibility a commission of inquiry ruled that he had for one of the worst human rights violations of that conflict – the Sabra and Shatila massacre in which many hundreds of Palestinian refugees were murdered by Lebanese Christian militiamen. And it was Sharon who presided over another landmark moment – the dismantling, in the face of angry opposition, of Jewish settlements in Gaza. In reality, the rupture with the past took place a long time ago in January 2006 when Sharon slipped into the coma from which he would never awake. Within a handful of weeks, Palestinian politics would also be transformed with the landslide victory in Gaza of Hamas over the Fatah movement of his old adversary Yasser Arafat. Israel – and its place in the world – has also changed in those intervening years. Since the Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon in 2000, Sharon's country has prosecuted two conflicts – against Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza – that largely failed in their military objectives. The Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign – while controversial – has continued to gain traction, while the election of Palestine to the UN General Assembly as a non-member observer in 2012, against Israeli and US objections, has been another key moment. Both in domestic politics and on the wider social front, Israel has been forced to confront uncomfortable truths about tensions both within Israeli society and with the wider diaspora long overshadowed by the averred contingencies of national security. As the Israeli journalist and author Ari Shavit argues in his new book My Promised Land: The Triumph and Tragedy of Israel, his country has become a less certain place in the last decade, returning to questions Sharon's generation believed had been answered long ago: "Why Israel? What is Israel? Will Israel?" In some respects, those such as Shavit, who began in the left Zionist movement Peace Now, have moved closer to Sharon's late political vision when he ordered the evacuation of the Gaza settlements, believing that, without a peace deal imminent at any time in the near future, Israel must act unilaterally to end the occupation of the West Bank as a moral necessity. In other ways, however, evidence of Sharon and his policies is still sharply in evidence, not least in the separation barrier that he gave approval to. Perhaps the most significant change is the one that is least visible, a subtle alteration in the balance of power within both Israeli and Palestinian society that has seen the emergence of a newly confident economic class that is demanding a more normalised political state. On the Israeli side, that has been driven not only by its technology sector but by the discovery of its new offshore gas fields whose most likely customers are Palestinians and its other Arab neighbours. In the final analysis, how will history judge Ariel Sharon's importance? That task is probably best left to an Israeli commentator, Amir Oren, writing in Haaretz immediately after his death. "He is a person who experienced pleasure and pain, who lost a son and was widowed twice, who used people and organisations (the IDF, Likud, the Shlomtzion and Kadima parties, the settlement enterprise in the West Bank and Gaza) as a private launching pad for himself; who achieved maximum power but wasted it on petty matters." • This article will be opened for comments on Sunday morning Ariel Sharon Israel Observer editorial theguardian.com © 2014 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Coalition's lobbying bill threatens to leave a stain on British democracy | Maina Kiai Posted: 11 Jan 2014 04:06 PM PST Proposals supposedly designed to keep corporate lobbies out of politics will damage charities, trade unions and civil society In October last year, I presented my first report as special rapporteur on the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and of association to the UN general assembly. The report concerned the importance of these rights in the context of elections – an issue that is sometimes overlooked when judging the fairness of the democratic process. The report was motivated by numerous complaints I have received about human rights violations before, during and after elections, and I sought to highlight the respect for human rights as a crucial pillar in public participation and for fair, genuine and credible elections. I argued that we should not limit ourselves to what happens on polling day. We must also examine what happens before and after elections, and survey the long-term rights landscape, particularly the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and association that I have responsibility for. During elections, it is critical that people are given more space – not less – to exercise their assembly and association rights. If they are not, it fundamentally undermines the legitimacy of the process – and the government itself. This is why the United Kingdom's proposed "Transparency in Lobbying, Non-Party Campaigning, and Trade Union Administration Bill" is so worrying. The legislation is currently in the report stage in the House of Lords and despite various concessions from the government will face stiff opposition at the vote this week.  Although sold as a way to level the electoral playing field, the bill actually does little more than shrink the space for citizens – particularly those engaged in civil society groups – to express their collective will. And in doing so, it threatens to tarnish the United Kingdom's democracy. The most disturbing portion of the bill, part 2, restricts civil society organisations, such as campaign groups, trade unions, and charities from engaging in campaigning in the year before an election. Under prevailing international norms, "reasonable limitations" on campaign expenditures can be justified in some circumstances – namely to ensure that the process is not distorted on behalf of any one candidate or party. But the UK bill simply goes too far, and it does so in a haphazard manner. The most obvious problem is that the language regulating civil society groups is unacceptably vague and broad. What is the difference between legitimate campaigning and "electioneering"? Backers of the bill don't seem able to answer this question with sufficient clarity, but have introduced draconian restrictions on spending nevertheless. Is a charity barred from its advocacy work simply because a particular political party or candidate is campaigning on the same platform? How about groups that promote education or crime prevention? These are common issues in most election campaigns. Is civil society simply supposed to shut down and shut up for a year every time there is a general, European or devolved election?  Second, despite being touted as a way to keep big money and corporate lobbying out of politics, the bill actually has a disproportionate impact on civil society. Provisions ostensibly designed to target corporate lobbyists have a loophole so big it swallows the rule. In-house lobbyists – who enjoy the most influence in the UK government by far – are exempt. That leaves unions and civil society as the taking the brunt of the bill's impact. It is understandable that the UK might wish to establish restrictions on the influence of money in politics. But this is the wrong way to do it. The lobbying bill seriously threatens to deter civil society from speaking freely about a range of issues relevant to its legitimate work. And let's be honest: As I pointed out in my country report on the republic of Georgia, which proposed similar legislation, the work of some of these organisations is political by definition, which is protected by the international covenant on civil and political rights. This is, in fact, part of the reason they constitute such a crucial component of a free and democratic society, for engaging in political activity should not and must never be left to politicians and political parties alone. Civil society's engagement in political activities promotes and influences focus on issues, principles and ideology, rather than seeking political power. Independent civil society is one of the best vehicles we have for dialogue, pluralism, tolerance and broadmindedness. It is a prerequisite for a legitimate democracy. In the UK, civil society groups perform a vital function by promoting political participation, undertaking voter education, campaigning for good governance reforms and providing vehicles for the expression of different interests. They also act as platforms that cut across ethnic, linguistic and other barriers, and catalyse public debate on issues that affect them. Shutting down this debate wholesale does nothing to advance democracy. It only threatens to indelibly mar future elections with the stain of silenced voices. Lobbying Freedom of speech Charities Voluntary sector theguardian.com © 2014 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Lobbying bill will tarnish Britain, says UN official Posted: 11 Jan 2014 04:06 PM PST UN rapporteur on freedom of assembly launches fierce attack on bill, while charities demand further concessions A top UN official has made an outspoken attack on the government's controversial lobbying bill, describing it as a "stain" on democracy that will undermine elections in the UK, as leading charities demand fresh concessions on the proposals from coalition ministers. Before key votes on the bill in the House of Lords this week, Maina Kiai, the UN rapporteur on rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and association, says the legislation, if not amended further, will reduce the ability of people in civil society to express their views before elections, while doing little or nothing to tighten controls on corporate lobbyists. In an article published on Sundayon this newspaper's website, Kiai, a Kenyan lawyer appointed by the UN's human rights council, said: "Although sold as a way to level the electoral playing field, the bill actually does little more than shrink the space for citizens – particularly those engaged in civil society groups – to express their collective will. In doing so, it threatens to tarnish the United Kingdom's democracy." He wrote: "Provisions ostensibly designed to target corporate lobbyists have a loophole so big it swallows the rule. In-house lobbyists – which enjoy the most influence in the UK government by far – are exempt. That leaves unions and civil society as taking the brunt of the bill's impact." His intervention will embarrass the government, which has been criticised for shoddy drafting of the bill and seeking to silence organisations critical of its policies, from charities to trade unions, while leaving the lobbying industry largely unaffected. Last week ministers, under intense pressure from charities, announced a series of amendments to the bill, which aims to regulate election campaign spending by those not standing for election. It would also introduce a statutory register of "consultant lobbyists", and place new requirements on trade unions to keep lists of members. In a series of climbdowns, ministers dropped a plan to cut the amount charities in England could spend on campaigning before they had to register with the Electoral Commission from £10,000 to £5,000. This will now be raised to £20,000. The proposed overall spending limit for charities across the UK during the regulated period is also being raised from £390,000 to £450,000. But while the concessions were welcomed, more than 75 charities including Oxfam, the Countryside Alliance, Amnesty International, the Salvation Army and the National Federation of Women's Institutes, have since launched a new petition demanding more changes to prevent the bill having a "chilling effect" on their ability to campaign. The charities remain fiercely opposed to limits the bill would impose on what they could spend in any single parliamentary constituency. They also want staff costs exempted from the limits. Some argue that charities are already covered by rules banning them from political activity and therefore should be excluded from the bill altogether. In a letter to the Observer, the former bishop of Oxford, Lord Harries of Pentregarth, a crossbench peer who chairs a special commission set up to advise ministers on regulation of civil society in the runup to elections, said last week's changes to the bill were "important" but did not go far enough to address "the strength of concern that remains". He said the bill would still "limit the right of charities and campaigning organisations to speak out on some of the most important issues facing the country and planet ahead of elections". Peers are warning of a cross-party revolt unless the government backs down further. The section of the bill covering lobbying has infuriated many peers because the proposed register of lobbyists would only include lobbying companies, while exempting individual lobbyists or those working "in house" for a company. Only meetings with ministers and the very highest civil servants would be published, not those with other mandarins or special advisers. A Cabinet Office spokesperson said the bill would bring transparency and accountability to the political system and that organisations with no electoral agenda would be unaffected. "The government has listened to the concerns which campaigners have expressed. We have tabled important amendments to the bill," the spokesperson said. "These amendments directly address the concerns raised while preserving the core purpose of the bill." Lobbying United Nations Charities Voluntary sector Toby Helm theguardian.com © 2014 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Romanian sex workers in turf wars over London pitches Posted: 11 Jan 2014 04:06 PM PST Police suspect criminal gang behind 'taxing' of young women, many of them Roma, in east London and cities such as Birmingham and Manchester Turf wars have broken out among Romanian street sex workers, many of Roma origin, in east London amid claims that women are being "taxed" £200 a week to stand on particular street corners. Some of the women are thought to be under 18 and are likely to have been trafficked. They are working in red light areas in east London, in Newham and Redbridge, as well as in other major cities such as Birmingham and Manchester. One young woman, who told the Observer she was 18, said she had been threatened by older Romanians in Newham when she was out working. "They told me that if I wanted to continue to stand on the street corner where I was working I would have to pay them £200 every week because they 'owned' that corner and I was on their territory. I refused and moved somewhere else to work. I'm not earning very much money from sex work, only about £70 per night, and I can't afford to pay that sort of money." On another occasion a group of older Romanian women surrounded two young women engaged in street sex work and demanded a £200 "tax" from them for standing there. Romanian street sex workers in Manchester have come to the attention of both the police and the Home Office. Greater Manchester Police confirmed that last weekend for the first time they carried out a joint operation with the Home Office targeted at this group. A GMP spokesman said six street sex workers – five Romanian and one Czech – were interviewed about their immigration status and soliciting for sex. None were arrested or charged but two were interviewed under caution, were told they had no right to be in the UK and agreed to leave voluntarily. "In some cases it seems to be a well-oiled operation, with people from their country arranging for the women to come and work here," said the police spokesman. "It may be that they're working for a particular criminal gang." In October, Romanian street sex worker Mariana Popa, 24, was murdered in Ilford. Farooq Shah, 20, has been charged with her murder. The Metropolitan Police has been conducting Operation Clearlight in Redbridge to tackle prostitution in the area. Georgina Perry, manager of Open Doors, an NHS project working with sex workers in east London, said the presence of Romanian street sex workers is a relatively new phenomenon and they were providing support services for them. Prostitution London Roma, Gypsies and Travellers Diane Taylor theguardian.com © 2014 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

24,000 murders last year confirm Venezuela as one of the world's most dangerous countries Posted: 11 Jan 2014 04:06 PM PST Despite his record of social reforms, Hugo Chávez failed to curb the violence of gun-toting gangs that rob and kidnap. Some believe this is partly because crime was seen as a 'middle-class' problem 'First time for everything," my British husband said, grimacing, while he was patted down for a concealed weapon as we stepped into a neighbourhood pizza restaurant. We were in Caracas, just before Christmas. Above the restaurant door was a now ubiquitous sign: "No Guns. No Smoking." Venezuela, my home country, made headlines in Britain last week, for wretched reasons. Late last Monday a former beauty queen, Monica Spear, 29, and her British ex-husband, Thomas Henry Berry, 39, were murdered on a lonely stretch of highway in front of their five-year-old daughter. The couple were assaulted in an altogether too common way: an obstacle left in the road punctured the tyres of their car, forcing it onto the hard shoulder. A tow truck came to their rescue, but as their vehicle was being lifted to safety a gang of up to 11 people attacked Their deaths have shocked and infuriated the already violence-numbed Venezuelans. Murders such as these usually go unreported on account of their tragic frequency, but Spear's fame made this different."We are all Monica," said a protester's poster in Caracas, as people gathered to mourn and voice their anger. Last year Venezuela was branded the most dangerous country in Latin America. A 2010 UN report places it among the top four most murderous countries in the world. While the government has refused to release its own statistics for years, a recent report by an NGO, the Venezuelan Observatory on Violence, estimates that 24,000 people were murdered in 2013 alone, a 14% rise on 2012, with nine out of 10 homicides going unsolved. And, despite recent government efforts to curb firearms, Venezuela is the most weaponised place in the world. In a country of 29 million people, there is roughly one gun for every two people. As a child I camped in the southern grasslands with my family, we hiked in the Andes, through cocoa plantations and dense cloud forests, took dugout canoes through the Orinoco delta and slept in hammocks in the Amazon rainforest. The country is beautiful, but I am now too frightened to take my own children to see their spectacular heritage. Now when I take my own family back home, I rarely leave the confines of Caracas. If I do, I avoid driving at night and always travel in a nondescript car like the one Spear and Berry were sensibly driving. (Though even this precaution did not help them.) The roads have always been badly kept and rarely lit, and drivers in Venezuela have scant regard for anything approaching rules. But as a teenager it was great fun to get stuck in traffic at night on a highway returning from some far-flung, palm-lined beach. Car doors would open, someone would crank up the merengue music on their stereo, and people would walk around, chatting, sharing food and beer. Venezuela today is far from paradise lost but, regardless of the many important social and political changes brought about by 10 years of Bolivarian socialism under the late President Chávez, the level of violence is a bloody stain on his legacy. Supporters of Chávez would argue that his regime's efforts were focused on eradicating poverty and the causes of crime. Perhaps, but the reality is more guns and badly paid and corrupt law enforcement. Also possibly in play – in terms of the violence directed against the likes of Spear and Berry – is an institutional view that it is a "middle-class problem", a problem of the anti-Chavista social classes. Last August I spent three weeks embedded with the anti-kidnap squad of the Caracas police making a documentary for the Channel 4 series Unreported World. I witnessed daily the unrelenting violence of Venezuela. On our first day in the dingy Caracas police HQ, Héctor Ramírez, head of the squad's technical unit, talked me through their investigation into a kidnap gang leader known as El Viejo. He showed me an image of one of El Viejo's alleged victims. "This is how we found Celeste. Arms bound behind her back, T-shirt ripped off, one bullet to the back of the head. She was a 24-year-old university student caught in the wrong place at the wrong time," Ramírez said. "The kidnappers made one phone call to her family and realised she had no money. Her body was left on a dumpster just off a national highway." Three weeks later our Unreported World team joined the police on a raid into the Caracas slum of El Valle to arrest El Viejo. Starting at dawn, we crept down steep mud paths between shacks as the sun rose over the valley. We hunkered down by a wall of concrete blocks in dirty grass as the police raced ahead of us, automatic gunfire whipping over our heads, the gangsters exchanging shots with the police. In the midst of the gunfire crackle, I heard whistling. On the other side of the concrete wall, I glanced up to see an old man – the whistler – sweeping his front stoop, talking quietly to his dog. Just another morning in a Caracas slum. In Caracas before Christmas, that night my husband got frisked for weapons before dinner, I was heartened to see people out in the streets; a bar with tables overflowing onto the pavement, teenagers hanging out in a square, people walking on usually deserted streets. However, driving home I stopped at a red light. The cars behind me all honked their horns in fury. "What are you thinking?" they seemed to blare at me. Stopping at a red light on a dark Caracas night, what was I thinking indeed? Venezuela Americas Hugo Chávez theguardian.com © 2014 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Francois Hollande, Julie Gayet … and a very British scandal about a very French affair Posted: 11 Jan 2014 04:06 PM PST Once, news of a scandal at the Elysée palace might never have made the papers. Now, France's tradition of privacy and discretion is under pressure from the global celebrity media On Friday morning, I woke up as my usual French self. Then, from under the duvet, I reached for my smartphone and learned from Twitter that the French edition of Closer magazine had published pictures purportedly revealing an affair between President François Hollande and the actress Julie Gayet. There had been rumours for months, as there inevitably are in the higher echelons of power. Gossip is like the background noise of a Parisian cafe: the little music of our lives, familiar and inconsequential. At 7.18am, an angry Hollande made a statement to the news agency AFP deploring the attack on his privacy and declaring he might seek legal action. Good for him, I thought. His office stressed that this was the citizen, not the president, speaking. End of story. I shrugged my shoulders and thought little more about it, much more concerned by the legal wrangles of the French interior minister, Manuel Valls, who is trying to ban the comedian Dieudonné from performing his antisemitic routine in theatres and clubs around France. For the past three weeks, France has been facing one relentless question: does freedom of speech stop where incitement to hatred begins? Gallivanting was definitely not on our minds that Friday morning. An hour later, at the newsstand, I bought my usual hefty pile of French and international newspapers, and didn't even glance at Closer. Isn't it always the same: salacious and badly written stories with ugly pictures? Gossip is not news. This was to prove a difficult stance to maintain. I was barely into my third espresso when I started receiving calls and emails asking me to comment. No, surely nobody was interested – or, to be really French about it, nobody should be interested. I couldn't help noticing the painful truth that the world media seems interested in France only when it complies with the stereotypes and does what is expected of it: promiscuity, grandstanding in foreign policy, sex on the big screen, economic dirigisme, secular authoritarianism and xenophobia. I didn't have much time to lament the power of cliches. An article on Closer's revelations and Hollande's dalliance quickly appeared on the BBC website and immediately shot to most-read item on the site. Things were getting serious: calls poured in from Washington, New York, London, Doha, Brussels. I was being too French about it, it seems; it was high time I started looking at this through British eyes. I went out to buy Closer. It was a revelation – and I am not talking about Hollande's alleged affair. I belong to the generation that grew up under Mitterrand: a time when nobody would have dared to publish images showing the president going to a rendezvous and leaving the morning after. Well, let me rephrase: nobody would have dreamed of spending a whole night hiding outside a building to take such pictures. I grew up in a country where the president embodied not just the state but also the nation. He may be a man, but he is also an institution. He is France – in other words, he is me and I am him. We may dislike the human being; we inevitably revere the symbol. Hence the deference – or at the very least, the inherent respect – accorded any French president by his compatriots. That was then. Times have changed. Gossip magazines of the Closer kind, which did not exist in the Mitterrand era, are now a thriving force, with millions of readers. Trivia is of the essence. Every week, those publications put aside the money for the fines they will probably have to pay for breaching France's strict privacy laws. Tellingly, over the past 20 years, French judges have become less severe and the fines have got smaller. Revealing celebrities' intimacies has become "affordable", almost a fact of life. And politicians have had to learn that the hard way. The best ally of France's gossip press in recent years has been a former president. In a clear break with tradition, the taboo-busting Nicolas Sarkozy ventured to stage his private life for political gain. He shamelessly used his ex-wife Cecilia and his new flame, Carla Bruni – whom he subsequently married after a few months of intense and overexposed courtship – as publicity props. Talk about a culture shock. We had to close our eyes whenever we saw them on television: Nicolas with Carla in tow and her coyness à la Bambi. Images of their now-famous amorous escape to the pyramids of Egypt were simply too embarrassing to watch. Hollande obviously belongs to the old order of discretion, and would feel extremely uncomfortable in this new environment – as, probably, would a big chunk of the French electorate. While we may have gone a long way towards the 24-hour voyeuristic society that Britain and the US enjoy (or suffer from), the overall culture in France is still one that values privacy highly. As the rightwing politician Marine Le Pen declared, a couple of hours after Closer's revelations: "Everybody is entitled to their privacy and so is the president, providing this doesn't cost a penny to the taxpayer." Reading Closer's report on Hollande's alleged affair is an education. Instead of being salacious, the tone of the article is more reminiscent of Barbara Cartland. There is talk of "passion", "stolen nights", "cooing" and "being in love". A picture of Hollande in a crash helmet that looks slightly awry carries a caption that reads: "François is so in love, he has forgotten to secure his helmet properly." This is less journalism than lowbrow romantic fiction. Seven pages of pictures show the sequence of events that is supposed to prove the affair: Gayet arrives at a flat belonging to friends, near the Elysée palace, with a smile on her face. Half an hour later, the president's bodyguard comes in, allegedly to check the premises, and, a few minutes later, here comes a stout-looking man in a dark suit and a helmet, driven by a chauffeur on a three-wheeled scooter. The morning after, the same bodyguard comes in at 8am with a bag full of croissants. I am now looking at this entirely through British eyes, and I suddenly understand why the world media has flocked to Paris. Imagine the head of state of the world's fifth biggest economy scooting through the streets of Paris at night to a rendezvous, and being delivered breakfast at 8am by his bodyguard. So simple, so organic, so carefree, so natural. And so terribly Parisian. Surely, the highest form of civilisation, and the envy of the world. What other head of state could actually do the same? None. And no other head of state could survive the revelation totally unscathed. I think it is safe to say that this will not prove to be Hollande's political swansong. If a majority of the French people think it is a distraction the country doesn't need at a time of rising unemployment and social discontent, the affair won't affect his ratings – which are currently so low they could hardly sink further. It could even boost his image abroad. I simply hope for the country that the lovers quickly find another love nest, so that the president can get on with the work of reforming France. François Hollande Privacy & the media Privacy France Celebrity Consumer magazines Magazines Agnès Poirier theguardian.com © 2014 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Forty years on, why the Boss was born to run and run Posted: 11 Jan 2014 04:06 PM PST As Bruce Springsteen releases his 18th album and hits the road yet again, what is it that drives this tireless troubadour? No lesser ambition than putting the world to rights… During his keynote speech at the South by Southwest music festival in Austin, Texas two years ago, Bruce Springsteen reminded his audience of a famous remark made by rock critic Lester Bangs at the time of Elvis Presley's death in 1977: "Lester said that Elvis was probably the last thing we [the worldwide audience for pop music] were going to agree on." Springsteen was making a point about the diversity of the music being played today, and the consequent splintering of the audience into factions. "There is no key note," he said. "There is no unified theory of everything." He was too modest to point out that the figure closest to undermining Bangs's prophecy is himself, a New Jersey singer, guitarist, songwriter, bandleader and campaigner who turned 64 in September, the week after concluding his latest world tour. No one else, not even Bob Dylan, combines the role of entertainer with that of social conscience as diligently and effectively as Springsteen, or with such generosity of spirit. During the six months of the Wrecking Ball tour – named after his 2012 album, in which he raged against bankers and their political accomplices – he had played to 3.5 million people at 133 concerts across 26 countries. Fans in Helsinki were regaled with the longest of the many marathon shows he has given over the past 40 years, lasting four hours and six minutes – not including the 30-minute acoustic set he had performed two hours before the scheduled start, for the benefit of early arrivals. His energy was not spent when the tour finished in Rio de Janeiro. Two weeks later, presumably having got his laundry done, he was turning up with an acoustic guitar at Madison Square Garden in New York to perform at a benefit for Stand Up for Heroes, a charity set up to help injured veterans of the Iraq war. A frequent performer at events held to promote or raise funds for causes he supports, he retains an air of unaffected naturalness and seldom attracts the snide disapproval aimed at some of his contemporaries who are seen as seeking personal publicity for their good works. His public activism began in 1979 with the No Nukes concert in New York. In 1985 he and Willie Nelson campaigned against the closure of 3M's audio/video tape factory in Freehold, New Jersey. Twenty concerts for Amnesty International in 1988, in cities from Buenos Aires to New Delhi, were followed by a benefit for Sting's Rainforest charity in 1995. He campaigned for John Kerry on the Vote for Change tour during the 2004 US presidential election, appeared at Barack Obama's rallies four years later, and performed at an Autism Speaks fundraiser at Carnegie Hall in 2009. The following year he could be seen on telethons raising money for victims of the Haitian disaster – more than $60m – and Hurricane Sandy. In 2012 he joined the Obama re-election bandwagon. After last year's bomb explosion during the Boston marathon he helped a local punk band, the Dropkick Murphys, to raise funds for the victims. Two weeks from today, he and the E Street Band will be in Cape Town for the first of 17 dates taking them from South Africa to Australia and New Zealand. This is called the High Hopes tour, named after his new album, to be released tomorrow. As usual, great anticipation surrounds its appearance. His 18th studio album since his debut in 1973 comes at a time when he is expected to produce something that politicians are reluctant or too embarrassed to provide: an honest assessment of the state of things. "I don't have some big idea," he said in 1996. "I don't feel like I have some enormous political message I'm trying to deliver. I think my work has to come from the inside. I don't start from the outside – 'I have a statement to make, ladies and gentlemen!' – I don't like the soapbox thing, so I begin internally with things that matter to me personally and maybe were a part of me in some fashion." Nevertheless Wrecking Ball faced that challenge head on, dripping with anger and irony in songs such as We Take Care of Our Own ("From Chicago to New Orleans/ From the muscle to the bone/ From the shotgun shack to the Superdome/ There ain't no help, the cavalry stayed home"); Jack of All Trades ("The banker man grows fat/ The working man grows thin/ It's all happened before/ And it'll happen again"); and American Land ("They tried to get here 100 years ago/ They're still dyin' now/ The hands that built the country/ We're always tryin' to keep out"). His moral compass first came into view on Darkness on the Edge of Town, the 1978 album in which he transformed himself from a celebrant of a semi-mythical neon-lit America of stripped-down hot rods and high-school sweethearts into a kind of pathologist of the American dream, investigating its corroded hulk and examining the lives of the dead and injured. In 1982 a harsh, bare-bones solo album called Nebraska took its tone from Terrence Malick's film Badlands, the story of teenage killers inspired by the Charlie Starkweather murder spree of the 1950s. Two years later he was outraged when the title track of Born in the USA, written in the voice of an embittered Vietnam veteran, was appropriated by the Republican party, who mistook its deceptively exultant chorus and tried to use it as a flag-waving campaign anthem for Ronald Reagan. That sort of misunderstanding, he vowed, would never happen again. In 1995 he won a Grammy for Streets of Philadelphia, a subdued song written for Jonathan Demme's Philadelphia, the first mainstream Hollywood film to confront the Aids epidemic. In 1996 he gave an interview to the Advocate, an LGBT magazine, in which he endorsed gay marriage, comparing it to his own second wedding, to the singer Patti Scialfa: "It's very different than just living together. First of all, stepping up publicly – which is what you do; you get your licence, you do all the social rituals – is part of your place in society, and in some way part of society's acceptance of you. Those are the threads of society; that's how we all live together in some fashion. There is no reason I can see why gays and lesbians shouldn't get married." The shooting of the unarmed Amadou Diallo, an immigrant from Guinea, by four NYPD officers inspired his 1999 song American Skin (41 Shots), costing him support among those who had misconstrued his music and taken him for a symbol of beer-drinking, gun-owning all-American manhood. In The Rising, which came a year after 9/11, he made the significant gesture of adding a group of qawwali singers from Pakistan to one song, Worlds Apart. In 2006 he renewed his creative spark and paid homage to the folk hero Pete Seeger by assembling a new band to play traditional folk and protest songs on an album called We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions, a move so successful that the raucous spontaneity and home-made texture of the music was allowed to influence all his subsequent efforts. High Hopes, assembled from cover versions, songs left off recent albums and new versions of old favourites, appears on the surface to have no central message to impart. But its individual songs, although drawn from a variety of sources, nevertheless convey an impression of a confused America licking its wounds and looking for salvation. Several songs, including a storming remake of The Ghost of Tom Joad, feature Tom Morello, the 49-year-old singer and guitarist formerly with Rage Against the Machine, a political activist whose presence seems to have provided his temporary employer with a burst of fresh energy. Springsteen loves his job, which is one of the reasons his concerts are such delirious fun, but he is well aware that his chosen milieu, the entertainment business, is "a world of illusions, a world of symbols". Nevertheless his new album finishes with a stirring cover of a great song, Dream Baby Dream, written and recorded 35 years ago by the New York electro-punk band Suicide. Your finest dreams, he is saying, don't have to be illusions. They really can change the world. Bruce Springsteen Pop and rock Richard Williams theguardian.com © 2014 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Guantánamo's 'architect of 9/11' has care worker pen pal in Nottingham Posted: 11 Jan 2014 04:06 PM PST Khalid Sheikh Mohammed debates theology in exchange of letters with British Christian –and laments slow postal service Details from an extraordinary exchange of letters between a Nottingham care worker and the alleged architect of the 9/11 attacks can be revealed in the Observer today, offering an unprecedented insight into the mind of one the world's most notorious Islamists. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, 49, who is held at Guantánamo Bay, has endured the harshest of the CIA's interrogation methods and allegedly confessed to a career of atrocities. Pre-trial hearings before a military commission are due to be held at Guantánamo next month. In his letter to Rory Green, 25, Mohammed wrote: "I appreciate your deep concern regarding my worldly and hereafter life … You asked me to repent from my sins. For your own information, I never stop." Green began the correspondence when he was studying for a degree in athletics at Wingate University in North Carolina in 2011 after reading a newspaper article about Mohammed. A devout Christian, Green wrote: "I am not here to trick you, [or] make you feel worse than anybody in the world. There is hope in forgiveness through Jesus Christ." Two years later, Green has now received a 27-page reply, debating the virtues of Islam over Christianity. At one point Mohammed compares the Bible's view on murder to that of the Qur'an, quoting the latter as saying: "We decreed upon the children of Israel that whoever kills a soul unless for a soul or for corruption (done) in the land – it is as if he had slain mankind entirely." He later adds: "We live in two different worlds; the world of Christianity and the world of Islam. That means we are not on the same page; we have … many different perceptions and convictions regarding the seen and the unseen world." Mohammed's letter was written by hand and then transcribed and typed by his lawyers. Green, who is a care worker at a home for autistic adults, received the letter last week, delayed in part due to his move back to the UK. Explaining the delay, Mohammed wrote: "From my best knowledge of the 18th century, when your forefathers used to send letters from London to New York by sea, the mail would not take more than 25 days. We here in GTMO receive mail through the ICRC (Red Cross), family letters arrive very late. Sometimes it takes more than one and a half years. However, on a normal basis, it usually takes between two to eight months." Mohammed said that he, too, had been a student in North Carolina, at a Southern Baptist college and then at the state's Agricultural and Technical University. Most of the letter is given over to theological and philosophical discussion. "If there are six billion people who believe in Darwinism and believe that there is no God; they also believe that Moses' and Jesus' (Peace Be Upon Them) stories are old wives' tales. But there are only two billion people who believe that the beliefs of six billion people are wrong. This doesn't mean the convictions and perceptions of six billion people are true, because truth is not measured by majority. It could be that the convictions of the whole world are false and the conviction of one man is true." He added: "I think you are a smart student who has read the history of Europe in the Dark Ages and the story of Galileo, when the whole of Europe used to believe that the Earth is the centre of the Universe and all the stars including the Sun circled the Earth; but only poor Galileo was saying something else, that it was the Earth which circled the Sun." He also offers a critique of the sex scandals which have plagued the Catholic Church. The Bible contains some "immoral vulgar sex stories", he writes. "How can any normal unmarried young man read these stories and stay in a closed area with nuns and pretty, nice children – and in the bad sexualised environment in the west – without excitement or stirring up their normal sexual instincts?" Green said: "I am not surprised by [the letter]. But I am in the sense that it is a very pleasant, very polite letter. He is obviously an educated individual, an intellectual. It must be so lonely in that prison. I just had this compassion for him. I thought this man needs Jesus as much as the average Joe – who else is going to reach out to this man with love and prayers?" Green said he would write back, adding: "I think terrorism is disgusting and senseless. If he is guilty, I pray for justice to be done, whatever that looks like to the courts. But this man is in a serious life-threatening situation. I just want to build a relationship, be his friend, talk to him more about his faith." Captured in hiding in Pakistan in 2003, Mohammed is accused of murder, hijacking and terrorism and faces the death sentence if convicted. Yesterday one of his military lawyers, Major Derek Poteet, said: "I believe Mr Mohammed was touched by Mr Green's letter and wanted to respond to share his own faith. It will surprise some to see this respectful dialogue between two humans who are concerned about each other's souls." Guantánamo Bay Nottingham United States Terri Judd theguardian.com © 2014 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Amy Chua: the tiger mom returns to the fray | Observer profile Posted: 11 Jan 2014 04:05 PM PST Her tough prescription for 'Chinese' child rearing made for a controversial bestseller. She looks set to repeat the trick in a new book that seeks to explain why some 'cultural groups' are far more powerful than others Almost exactly three years ago, the Wall Street Journal published an excerpt from a book that remains its most commented article of all time. Under the fiery title, "Why Chinese Mothers Are Superior", Yale law professor Amy Chua set out a manifesto for motherhood in proudly recounting her iron-fisted reign over her two young daughters, which included the prohibition of sleepovers and the insistence that they attain no grade lower than an A. The 8,821 comments that followed are a snapshot of the kind of vilification levelled at Chua. Readers were outraged by her dogmatism and superiority, furious about what they saw as cultural stereotyping and appalled by the kind of parenting that many commentators deemed "child abuse". The noise got even louder when she published Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother later that year. In it, Chua depicts herself as so cartoonishly cruel that she seems more evil Disney queen than real 21st-century mother. Of all the many indelible details that had readers shrieking, the birthday card incident is the most infamous. This is the time that her four-year-old daughter offered her a handmade card with a smiley face on it and promptly had it thrown back in her face. Chua's words: "I deserve better than this. So I reject this." Later, in an open letter to her mother published in the New York Post, Chua's eldest daughter, Sophia, dismissed the incident. "Let's face it: the card was feeble and I was busted. It took me 30 seconds; I didn't even sharpen the pencil. That's why, when you rejected it, I didn't feel you were rejecting me. If I actually tried my best at something, you'd never throw it back in my face." To the dismay of Chua's critics, her daughter's eminently sane letter ended: "I'm glad you and Daddy raised me the way you did." Now Chua is about to publish a new book, co-authored with her husband, fellow Yale law professor Jed Rubenfeld, which, a month away from publication, is already provoking reaction on the internet. In Triple Package: How Three Unlikely Traits Explain the Rise and Fall of Cultural Groups in America, they argue that certain "cultural" (they avoid the words "racial" or "ethnic") groups succeed in the US. The list includes Jews, Cubans, Nigerians, Mormons, Indians, Iranians and Lebanese-Americans and the three traits they share, (the "triple package") are, apparently, "superiority complex, insecurity and impulse control". Whatever the controversy and success of the triple package (and Chua is sobering proof of just how the former can generate the latter), it seems unlikely that it will ever eclipse Chua's reputation as the "tiger mom", a stereotype that has generated, in turn, "manatee dad" – the kind of "weak-willed" and "indulgent" parent Chua scorns. Amy Chua was born in 1962, in the Chinese year of the tiger, which makes her, as she wrote, "powerful, authoritative and magnetic". Her parents were Chinese Filipino emigrants to the US and she and her three younger sisters were raised in a very strict Roman Catholic household. She studied economics at Harvard and remained there to study at its law school, where she was appointed executive editor of the Harvard Law Review. It's also where she met Rubenfeld, yet in remembering her time there she's confessed: "The truth is, I'm not good at enjoying life. It's not one of my strengths." Her first book was the scholarly and respected World on Fire: How Exporting Free Market Democracy Breeds Ethnic Hatred and Global Instability, which the Economist named as one of its books of the year. She followed this with Day of Empire: How Hyperpowers Rise to Global Dominance – and Why They Fall. The book that made her famous, though, came not out of academic research, but personal desperation. Louisa, or Lulu, her youngest daughter, was in the throes of teenage rebellion and their confrontation reached its peak in a Moscow restaurant where, Chua recounts, her 13-year-old smashed a glass and screamed: "I HATE my life, I HATE you!" at her mother. Chua began writing Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother as you would a diary. It poured out, she has said, and was finished in just two months. The fallout, in fact, took up more time than the writing. In the months that followed publication, Chua went on the defence, tirelessly insisting that "it's supposed to be funny, it's a self-parody" and "a satirical memoir". Most people, however, failed to see the joke. There were death threats, Chua said, as well as "hundred and hundreds" of emails. Virality begat virality and one of the most talked about responses was from Betty Ming Liu, a former newspaper columnist who now teaches journalism at New York University. In a blog post titled "Parents like Amy Chua are the reason why Asian-Americans like me are in therapy", she called Chua "a narrow-minded, joyless bigot". The writer Ayelet Waldman had a more eye-rolling response. Her essay, also published in the Wall Street Journal, was titled, "In Defence of the Guilty, Ambivalent, Preoccupied Western Mom". Despite professing a grudging admiration for Chua's perseverance, Waldman pointed out that Asian-American girls aged 15 to 24 have above average rates of suicide. "I might," she added, "question the hubris of taking credit for success that is as likely to have resulted from the genetic blessings of musicality and intellect as from the 'Chinese' child-rearing techniques of shrieking and name calling." The loudest shrieking and name calling, though, came from her critics. Despite the back cover of the book reading "How to be a tiger mother", Chua has insisted it's not a manual or a how-to guide, but a memoir. In defending the book she frequently drew attention to its subtitle, which ends "How I was humbled by a 13-year-old". Nonetheless, she became a focus not just for a global debate about parenting, but for the west's economic anxieties about China. Stephen Colbert, an American satirical writer, told her: "There is a political component here – we're terrified of the Chinese, ever since the Olympic opening games. We think they've got more discipline than we do!" The facetiousness couldn't obscure the truism: five months after Chua's piece, Time magazine published an article titled "Why do we fear a rising China?" and essentially answered that question with this statement: "The political ideology behind China's economic ascent completely counters western ideals about democracy and human rights. […] China is succeeding based on ideas that Americans despise." And so the semantic link between "tiger mother" and "tiger economy" growled on, helping many to conflate Chua's strident principles of parenting with a broader, even more frightening set of principles. Clearly, the reading public likes to be terrified: the book was a bestseller and has sold millions internationally. The expectation is that Triple Package, however lambasted, will do the same. (A few days ago the essayist Ayelet Waldman tweeted: "Amy Chua out w/ volume 2 of 'I'll Write Something Insane So You'll Buy My Book and Make Me Rich…'" In a widely circulated review in the New York Post last week, Maureen Callahan excoriated what she saw as "a series of shock-arguments wrapped in self-help tropes, meant to do what racist arguments do: scare people". The US economy is now one of the most unequal in the developed world, with more than one in five children below the poverty line. It's also the number one jailer in the world and last year the Urban Institute, a US thinktank, reported that the racial wealth divide had worsened. The average white family had about $632,000 in wealth whereas that figure was $98,000 for black families and $110,000 for Hispanics. Referencing these dismal truths on the website Race Files, Soya Jung criticised Chua and Rubenfeld for "buying into exceptionalist arguments to explain disparities means endorsing a dehumanising system of racialised norms". Jennifer Lee, professor of sociology at the University of California, had this to say by email. "While social scientists never took Chua seriously, her arguments resonate with some people who believe in the cultural values argument, and especially for those who may not understand that correlation is not causation." She added: "Perhaps the biggest misfortune is that Chua's incendiary arguments receive more media attention than the research by social scientists who are genuinely interested in understanding how culture operates as a resource to produce positive outcomes for some groups." Chua's eldest daughter, Sophia, is now a student at Harvard and there's a modicum of filial rebellion in the name of her blog, new tiger in town. A recent post began: "It's been said before, and it will be said again, but I'm going to say it now: Harvard students – students everywhere, really – need to do less." Not, it seems, advice that her mother will be taking to heart. Parents and parenting Family China Hermione Hoby theguardian.com © 2014 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

How Bristol's gracious mansions mask the shameful past of Britain's links to slavery Posted: 11 Jan 2014 04:05 PM PST As '12 Years a Slave' reminds cinema-goers of the terrible trade, a walk through Bristol reveals how the splendid Georgian townhouses were financed by the suffering of west Africans Ani DiFranco, an American folksinger, feminist and social justice campaigner, last year found herself forced to withdraw from a songwriting festival in Louisiana. DiFranco's "righteous retreat", she discovered only after signing up for the event, was to be held in a luxury resort whose owners have been criticised for airbrushing out of history the fact that it was once the largest slave plantation in the American south. In an apologetic posting on her website, DiFranco wrote: "One cannot draw a line around the Nottoway Plantation and say 'racism reached its depths of wrongness here' and then point to the other side of that line and say 'but not here'," DiFranco said. "I know that any building built before 1860 in the south, and many after, were built on the backs of slaves." Indeed, as the acclaimed film, 12 Years a Slave, is brutally reminding cinema audiences, the US economy was built on the back of forced labour. The fact that it was a British-born director, Steve McQueen, who made the film, which tells the story of Solomon Northup, a free man kidnapped into slavery, is a cause for celebration but also surprise for some British historians. "I would be fascinated to know why as a black British director he didn't pick a black British experience," said Dr Kate Donington, research associate at UCL's Legacies of British Slave-Ownership Project, an online archive that allows users to identify those who benefited from slavery. Donington believes a film examining Britain's role would be a healthy corrective to the "tendency to see slavery as something that happened in America". One reason for this myopia is Britain's leading role in outlawing the slave trade. The 2007 bicentenary of its abolition largely became a celebration of Britain's achievements, rather than a chance to face up to unpalatable home truths. "You can't tell the story of Britain's role in abolishing slavery without first engaging with its long history of participation in the slavery business," Donington said. Indeed, as the UCL project makes uncomfortably clear, the creation of modern Britain owes much to slavery. A walk through a cold, grey Bristol on Friday made this argument in physical terms. Guinea Street, a stern terrace of five-storey houses on the dockside, was home to the slave traders and owners Edmund Saunders and Joseph Holbrook. Guinea was the name give n to western Africa by those who sought their fortunes in slavery. The Guinea coin was produced by Bristol's Royal African Company (RAC), whose members became arch-practitioners of the trade. Nearby is Queen Square, a collection of attractive Georgian houses that were home to many of the wealthiest slave traders. The Sugar House, now a hotel, in Lewin's Mead, was one of many refineries that processed sugar harvested by slaves in the Caribbean. Then there is Colston Hall, a major music venue named after Edward Colston, a philanthropist and merchant who paid for several schools, churches and hospitals, many of which survive to this day. Much of Colston's wealth came from the trade – and his investments in the RAC. The Bristol band Massive Attack have pledged never to play at the venue until its name is changed. On Corn Street is an impressive, honey-coloured building with a worn stone pl aque proclaiming "the Old Bank". The bank was formed by slave traders and, after being merged with others, went on to become the NatWest. Such buildings are testimony to a trade that was conducted with extraordinary vigour. It is estimated that Britain transported more than three million African people across the Atlantic (500,000 on Bristol ships alone), an epic trade that involved some 10,000 voyages and swelled the coffers of the owners. By the Victorian era, as many as one in six of the wealthiest Britons derived at least some of their fortunes from slavery. Few seemed to have any qualms. The Quakers, for example, were enthusiastic investors. "They were up to their eyeballs in it," said Madge Dresser, associate professor in history at the University of the West of England. And after abolition finally came, those who had participated – including, as the UCL project reveals, the ancestors of Graham Greene, George Orwell and Elizabeth Barrett Browning – were handsomely compensated for their lost income. In 1833 parliament approved the payment of £20m to the former slave owners – 40% of the government's expenditure that year, equivalent to £16bn in today's money. Much of the wealth generated was concentrated in the West Country. "When I looked at the merchants in Bristol behind the Georgian flowering of architecture, the so-called urban renaissance, they virtually all had either slave-trading connections or connections with slave-produced foods or government connections with plantation interests," said Dresser, co-editor of a new book, Slavery and the British Country House. Other cities, notably London, Liverpool and Glasgow, benefited significantly too, and even the most rural parts were not untouched. Many of the country's finest stately homes were built partly out of the proceeds of slavery. Dresser's book refers to more than 150 British properties, many run by the National Trust and English Heritage, that have links to slavery. And yet, unlike in the US, few in Britain appreciate how their country's history has been shaped by the slave trade. "The issue of geographical distance is fundamental to understanding why the experience of slavery is not as well known in Britain," Donington said. "Most of the people were on the plantations in the Caribbean so there are not what Toni Morrison describes as 'sites of memory' that you can hang [British] history on. It becomes a process of palimpsest – you have to uncover layer after layer of history in country houses and, in places like Bristol, its big Georgian townhouses." One such Bristol townhouse, number 7 Great George Street, now a museum, was once the handsome home of John Pinney, a plantation owner in the Caribbean, whence he brought back a slave, Pero Jones, after whom a dockside bridge is named. Jones's story is not unique. There were 15,000 black people in Georgian Britain, most living in London. Some had earned their freedom, having served in the Royal Navy. Most were classed as servants. But their status was a legal grey area that left the position of Africans in Britain unclear. One of the best documented accounts by a black person of the time, which has uncanny parallels with that of 12 Years a Slave, was provided by Olaudah Equiano who, according to his autobiography, was born in what is now southern Nigeria (this is disputed) before being captured and taken to Barbados and then Virginia before being sold on. Equiano ended up the property of a British naval officer. Having risen to the rank of able seaman, he was freed, only to be re-enslaved in London in 1762 and shipped to the West Indies, where he accumulated enough money to buy his freedom and return to England, where he married and became a prominent abolitionist. The historian Miranda Kaufmann hopes that film directors will turn their attention to telling Britain's slavery stories such as Equiano's which would help a new generation understand their nation's role in a trade referred to as "the great circuit" and remind them that "Africans have been living in Britain for centuries before the Windrush". "They are the sort of stories that make great films," Kaufmann said. "There are lots of pirates and bad guys. I could give Steve McQueen a list of British stories he could make after he has won his Oscar." Film-makers may already be hearing this plea. Belle, which premiered last year at the Toronto film festival, is due for release in Britain this spring. It tells the story of Dido Elizabeth Belle, the mixed-race daughter of a British naval officer and an African woman who is taken to England by her father to be raised by his uncle, Lord Mansfield, the lord chief justice, who lived at Kenwood House in north London. Born to a mother who had been a slave, Belle rose up the ranks of society to achieve a sort of freedom and social status. Her story offers an alternative to the conventional narrative that portrays slaves, in Kaufmann's words, simply as "herded cattle". "Often the only time Afro-Caribbean students encounter their history is through the prism of slavery, one that looks at enslaved people as victims," Donington said. "You can also tell the positive stories of the enslaved, of people of colour, who fought to emancipate themselves." Such an act could be seen as a form of reparation, a reminder of debts due by modern Britain to its unexamined past; debts that transcend the financial and the physical. Down on the Bristol dockside on Friday, near Pero's Bridge, in front of old warehouses transformed into attractive galleries and restaurants, two white buskers were strumming guitars. They were both playing the blues. British identity and society Slavery Social history Bristol Jamie Doward theguardian.com © 2014 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

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