Feature on Bob Brown in The Age

An interestingly timed feature on Bob Brown by Michael Gordon in The Age: Coming in from the wilderness. Worth a read. Quite a positive piece. It concludes with a focus on current events…

Brown agrees, and insists the Greens will work constructively with whoever wins the election to achieve good results and advance an agenda that includes introducing a carbon tax, better funding for mental health, a national dental scheme and a permanent solution for forest protection. Brown says he has worked with Julia Gillard on industrial relations and youth issues and found her ”matter-of-fact, plain-speaking and does what she says she will do”, but he isn’t expecting too much to change.

”Everybody with a progressive bone in their body raised a glass at the news of our first female prime minister, but that’s where that ends,” he says. ”Politically it doesn’t change the dynamic at all. There’s no way that we’re going to get a green Gillard government any more than a green Rudd government or a green Howard government. That’s why we’re here.”

Coverup of Gitmo Deaths

Andrew Sullivan highlights reporting that seems otherwise ignored in the US media at the moment: The Deaths At “Camp No”

As usual, the foreign press cover the new and powerful evidence that the Bush administration was using torture methods so severe they killed prisoners in Gitmo as late as 2006 – and then covered it up with claims of a triple-simultaneous-suicide. Here’s the Guardian. And the Telegraph. And theIndependent. Here’s the Irish Times. And the Canadian Press. But the US papers?

The ongoing decline of refugee rights

A brief but interesting piece online at Human Rights Watch (originally published in The International Herald Tribune) by Bill Frelick: Refugees Are Not Bargaining Chips

A virus is sweeping Asia. The symptoms are heightened xenophobia and amnesia about fundamental refugee rights. Australia and Indonesia succumbed first, in October, when they stopped boats carrying Sri Lankans. Neither country would allow the Sri Lankans to disembark even though they came from a country experiencing massive violence and displacement.

The willingness to flout international refugee law and to ignore the entreaties of refugees not to be sent back to their home countries has become the mark of chummy bilateral relations between Asian states. Thailand sends back Hmong refugees – a group with a history of persecution at the hands of the Lao government dating back to the 1960s – citing a secret bilateral agreement and the Lao government’s assurances of their safe treatment. Cambodia forcibly repatriates Uighurs just as the Chinese vice president, Xi Jinping, arrives on a visit to Phnom Penh to announce a $1.2 billion aid package to Cambodia.

Google to reconsider role in China

Google to reconsider their role in China, starting with a move to remove censorship from search results on google.cn, whilst contemplating the possibility of complete cessation of Google operations in China. Per the Official Google Blog: A new approach to China

Second, we have evidence to suggest that a primary goal of the attackers was accessing the Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activists.

Third, as part of this investigation but independent of the attack on Google, we have discovered that the accounts of dozens of U.S.-, China- and Europe-based Gmail users who are advocates of human rights in China appear to have been routinely accessed by third parties.

We have taken the unusual step of sharing information about these attacks with a broad audience not just because of the security and human rights implications of what we have unearthed, but also because this information goes to the heart of a much bigger global debate about freedom of speech. In the last two decades, China’s economic reform programs and its citizens’ entrepreneurial flair have lifted hundreds of millions of Chinese people out of poverty. Indeed, this great nation is at the heart of much economic progress and development in the world today.

We have decided we are no longer willing to continue censoring our results on Google.cn, and so over the next few weeks we will be discussing with the Chinese government the basis on which we could operate an unfiltered search engine within the law, if at all.

Handing over Police files to corporations!

An interesting (and disturbing) article from Paul Austin at The Age: Secret files on protesters given to desal consortium.

Particularly of note…

Secret police files on people protesting against Victoria’s $3.5 billion desalination project are being made available to the private consortium building the plant.

The Age understands similar agreements have been struck on other Government-backed projects such as the Grand Prix at Albert Park and the pipeline to bring water from northern Victoria to Melbourne.

Liberty Victoria president Michael Pearce, SC, accused the Government of being paranoid about protests. ”This seems to be a part of the Government’s heavy-handed response to relatively low-level protest activity which is a part of the democratic process in relation to a project of enormous public significance,” he said.

Update: The story continues to unfold. More at The Age.

Ticket Inspectors (Authorised Officers)

An interesting article in today’s Crikey by Luke Williams (subscriber only) providing some details on Melbourne’s lovable public transport ticket inspectors.

Choice excerpts include

The latest report by the Public Transport Ombudsman shows 38% of its complaints are about fines and the conduct of authorised officers

Of the complaints, 31% were about intimidation, 22% about the use of force, the rest were largely about officers not listening or acting aggressively.

Also, he notes a project undertaken by YouthLaw, called Campaign Respect, looking at young people’s experiences at the hands of ticket inspectors.

Habeas Corpus and State Secrets Privilege

Neither looking good on the ‘change’ front

More on Habeas Corpus a la Obama…

An intro from Rafe at rc3

Lots of detail from Glenn Greenwald at Salon

And some more here

A brief post at Crooks and Liars also

More here too

More on State Secrets Privilege

Rafe also raises this one

Roth at TPM catches contradictions

An article from Washington Post

More at whorunsgov

Sigh…