An Italian monsignor has been suspended from a senior position at the Holy See, the Vatican said on Saturday, identifying him as a priest who was anonymously interviewed about his gay sex life on a TV program.
Vatican teaching holds that homosexual activity is a sin. Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, told journalists that while the case was under investigation the monsignor was suspended from his job as a top official in the Vatican's Congregation for Clergy, an office that aims to ensure proper conduct by priests. The Vatican did not give out the name of the monsignor, who is Italian.
"The case is being handled with utmost reserve," Lombardi said. "Higher-ups are evaluating the situation with the necessary reserve and with the obligatory respect for the person involved, even if this person has erred," Lombardi said.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/14/2007 00:00 ||
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Another uniformed hierarchical institution with the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" rule. I bet it's a uniform thingy.
Greenpeace activists on Saturday blockaded a cargo ship they claimed was carrying newsprint made from trees felled in Canadian old growth forests. The environmentalists said they were preventing the 560-foot ship Finnwood from unloading its paper cargo at Terneuzen port, 130 miles south of Amsterdam, and were daubing on its side a slogan calling for newspapers not to use paper made from old growth forests.
Hilde Stroot, campaign leader for Greenpeace Netherlands, said more than 1.7 million acres of Canadian forest home to threatened species such as the lynx, wolf and caribou are cleared each year. "Huge areas of forest are being destroyed for newspapers, books and toilet tissue," Stroot said.
Greenpeace said the paper on board the ship was from Canadian forest products company Abitibi-Consolidated LLC and is used by all of the Netherlands' major newspaper publishers. Abitibi did not immediately return an after hours call to its office in Montreal. The company's Web site said that its newsprint is made of up to 100 percent recycled paper, but Greenpeace claimed samples they have had tested contained up to 90 percent new wood fibers.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
10/14/2007 14:15 Comments ||
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It is my understanding that most junky paper products like newprint and bags are made from fast-growing trees planted and grown specifically for paper pulp. Big chunks of old-growth wood are more valuable as lumber. Of course, there are branches and trimmings from any logging operation that could be pulped, but I would expect the extra handling required would make that expensive compared to pulp from a tree plantation. Color me sceptical.
#6
I'm with you WTF, old growth is NOT used for paper, Pine is used for paper, not hardwoods.
Again, sink their ship (Again and again, and again until they get the message, or are broke)
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
10/14/2007 14:24 Comments ||
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Jim there are old growth pine forests. I'm looking at one out my window.
For years we have flown over old pine forests north of Sioux Lookout. You can not believe what the loggers have done. Hundreds of miles clear cut with zero re-plantings. One of the stupidest moves I've seen regarding land use.
Makes me sick.
Also isn't the fast growing Poplar typically used for pulp?
#10
You're right TW. Pines here serve for multiple purposes. But, it's typically grown on farms nowadays.
Ah well, if the NY Slimes and other "printed" newspapers continue on their downward slide, Greenpeace should be happy. Maybe ol' Pinch is doin' it for Mother Gaia.
Posted by: BA ||
10/14/2007 22:36 Comments ||
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Detained BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia yesterday denied charges against her of corruption in awarding container handling contracts to local company Gatco and said she gave the nod only after the cabinet purchase committee had approved the deal. During interrogation by an Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) team in a graft case against her, she said, "Neither me nor my son had any involvement in the deal."
"Earlier, I did not approve the contract as the committee had decided to send back the dossier to the concerned ministry," her tax lawyer Ahmed Aazam Khan quoted her as saying.
Khaleda argued that there is barely any instance of a prime minister rejecting a proposal that has received approval from the purchase committee. The ACC filed the case on September 2 against the former premier, her younger son Arafat Rahman Koko and 11 others for graft in giving Global Agro Trade (Pvt) Co Ltd (Gatco) the contract for container management at the Dhaka Inland Container Depot (ICD) and the Chittagong Port ICD yards.
The following day the joint forces arrested the BNP chief and her son at their cantonment residence. "I was not swayed by anyone and neither did I exert any influence on the purchase committee to award the contract to Gatco," Khaleda said in reply to a query.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/14/2007 00:00 ||
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Latin America: Now Suriname wants a U.S. military base, just like its neighbors, Colombia and Peru. Over in Brazil, the military is reasserting itself. With Venezuela on the prowl, these are signs of an anxious region.
Defense Secretary Robert Gates has returned from a rare five-day visit to five democracies south of our border, and what he quietly heard from El Salvador to Suriname and from Colombia to Peru and Chile is that the U.S. must get more involved in South America.
This is unprecedented for Latin countries, which historically have seen the U.S. as an invader and have kept its military at arm's length. But with a bully in the neighborhood, Hugo Chavez, who isn't going away soon, the old equation no longer adds up.
Prime Minister John Howard on Sunday called general elections for Nov. 24 that will decide who will shepherd Australia's economic boom and whether the country will start pulling out of Iraq.
Howard, who has been prime minister for the last 11 years, faces a tough battle to win a fifth term against Labor Party opposition leader Kevin Rudd, a Chinese-speaking former diplomat who for months has held a commanding lead over the conservative Howard in opinion polls. Howard's announcement marks the start of the official run-up to the elections, though both sides have been campaigning unofficially for weeks.
In a news conference announcing the elections, Howard sought to place the guardianship of an economic boom spanning more than 15 years as the key issue. The country's coal and mineral-driven economy continues to boom thanks to voracious demand from China, India and elsewhere. "People must decide in the weeks ahead who is better able to not only to preserve the prosperity that we now have, but also to build it further and to make sure that it is fairly shared throughout the Australian community," Howard said. "Love me or loathe me, the Australian people know where I stand on all the major issues of importance to their future."
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Steve White ||
10/14/2007 00:42 ||
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"Rudd has promised not to make any policy changes that could harm economic growth, and is trying to paint Howard as out of touch on new-age issues such as global warming and Internet broadband."
Let's play "Spot the Contradiction!," boys and girls!
Posted by: E Brown ||
10/14/2007 9:57 Comments ||
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but hey, that shouldn't stop him from questioning the regular Aussies' morals and norms
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/14/2007 10:50 Comments ||
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#3
Tim Blair:
" January 24: Labor leader Kevin Rudd challenges Prime Minister John Howard to a debate on education.
February 14: Rudd challenges Howard to a debate on Iraq.
August 31: Rudd challenges Howard to a debate on industrial relations.
September 10: Rudd declares himself happy to debate Mr Howard whenever he wants to debate me.
Well, OK. As South Park political philosopher Chef once observed: If you get served and you serve them back, then its on! And on it definitely is:
Prime Minister John Howard wants to debate Labor leader Kevin Rudd just one week into the election campaign.
He is proposing the live audience debate take place in the Great Hall of Parliament House next Sunday, moderated by Sky News political editor David Speers.
This campaign might be more fun than we thought. "
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/14/2007 14:12 Comments ||
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What, Frank, you jealous over the Engineer's personality serving as great birth control over in the "It pays to be an engineer" posting?(/sarcasm)
Being an engineer too, I "feel your pain."
Posted by: BA ||
10/14/2007 22:32 Comments ||
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by Tim Blair.
The Great Warmening is killing Europe:
Poor air and water quality, and environmental changes blamed on global warming, have cut Europeans life expectancy by nearly a year, Europes environmental agency warned Wednesday.
Hundreds of thousands of people across Europe are dying prematurely because of air pollution, it said. The estimated annual loss of life is significantly greater than that due to car accidents, the report said.
At this rate, life expectancy in western and central Europe will be shorter by nearly a year, it said. The current average age expectancy in western and central Europe is 70 for men and 74 for women.
Throw in alcohol, AIDS, TB and despair and they'll end up like Russia.
So Kyotos been a big help. Strangest thing, though: while were always told Australia has the highest per capita level of greenhouse gas emissions in the developed world and the US is by far the worlds greatest polluter, both nations kick the hell out of poor old help-help-wheres-my-medicine Europe when it comes to life expectancy. In the US: The average life expectancy for Americans is 77.6 years, a record high ...
And Australia: Based on the latest mortality rates, a boy born in 2005 was expected to live to 78.5 years, on average, while a girl would be expected to live to 83.3 years.
Hell, we were matching Europes current numbers way back in the early 80s, before unleaded petrol and when everyone smoked. Could be theres more to this European graveyard rush than might be blamed on the environment.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
10/14/2007 14:18 Comments ||
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I'd expect our health to be less affected by pollution here in the U.S. We started cleaning up our air, water and soil at least two decades before the Europeans even thought about it. Last I heard the river water was still undrinkable (that's why they're so fond of the bottled mineral waters, and why their children have so many cavities in their teeth), the forests of Germany and the buildings of Rome were succumbing to acid rain, and Eastern Europeans peel off the outer inch of potatoes, just to be on the safe side.
As for Australia, much of it never stopped being pristine, as far as I'm aware.
Western Europes highest mountain Mont Blanc is taller than ever due to snow piled atop its summit, in what experts meeting in France described as a climate-change related phenomenon ...
The volume of ice on Mont Blancs slopes over 4,800 metres high was first calculated at 14,600 cubic metres in 2003 ... but then almost doubled to 24,100 cubic metres in 2007.
Perhaps AlGore was near?
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/14/2007 14:47 Comments ||
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Poor air and water quality, and environmental changes blamed on global warming, have cut Europeans life expectancy by nearly a year, Europes environmental agency warned Wednesday.
At this rate, life expectancy in western and central Europe will be shorter by nearly a year, it said.
Ummmm...One of these things is not like the other. How can this magical "one year cutoff" be both past and future tense (unless they've already lost a year, and they're predicting to lose another).
Posted by: BA ||
10/14/2007 22:42 Comments ||
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ABUJA (NIGERIA): This is the final confirmation, if any were needed, that the UPA government has put the nuclear deal on hold in favour of keeping the government alive. Top government sources said India will soon formally tell the US that it will not be able to take the next step on the nuclear deal.
The sources said that the UPA government, in the aftermath of the October 9 meeting with the Left parties, will convey to the US that it will not be approaching the IAEA for a safeguards agreement.
This also makes it plain that on October 22, when the UPA-Left panel is supposed to hold its last round of discussions on the deal, the government will not even try to persuade the Left to allow the negotiations with IAEA.
According to the timeline for completing the rest of the nuclear deal, India has to conclude a safeguards agreement with the IAEA working up to an exemption from the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) and a final approval of the US Congress. That process now stands scuttled.
After trying to persuade the Left, without success, the PM and Sonia Gandhi publicly gave in on Friday, saving the government by jettisoning the nuclear deal.
IAEA director Mohammed ElBaradei was also informed by the UPA leadership during his visit here that India will not formally approach the UN nuclear watchdog for a safeguards agreement.
The government switched gears abruptly. Till early last week, the government was clearly preparing to take the next steps on the deal the term of Indias ambassador to the IAEA, Sheelkant Sharma, had been extended by a few months and the DAE chief, Anil Kakodkar, had been given an extra two years.
PM Manmohan Singh, who had reasons to be upset over the setback to the deal on which he had staked so much, did not interact with the media during the nine-and-a-half hour long flight to the Nigerian capital.
Posted by: john frum ||
10/14/2007 15:23 ||
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So, the Communists, obeying the dictates of their Chinese masters, have won this battle.
India will not get the nuclear energy it desperately needs for its economic growth
Posted by: john frum ||
10/14/2007 15:31 Comments ||
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Next to go will be the Japanese financed Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor.
Can't have Chinese manufacturing jobs moving to India... the Indian Communists will kill that straight away...
Posted by: john frum ||
10/14/2007 15:33 Comments ||
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This is bad for us but the Delhi Mumbai decision would be bad for India. India needs to loose its reds and we need to help even if it means keeping our mouth shut. Which leads me to believe the Senate will be sticking its foot in this tomorrow.
NEW DELHI India is drawing closer to a sea-based nuclear strike capacity.
The hull of its homegrown nuclear-powered submarine, the Advanced Technology Vessel (ATV), is under construction by the Larsen & Toubro (L&T) shipyard and is slated for sea trials in 2009, Indian Navy sources said. Land-based tests of some systems are already completed. The classified program is being run by the state-owned Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) with help from Russia. India also is buying two Russian nuclear-powered subs. The DRDO is developing nuclear-capable cruise missiles with assistance from Israel, defense sources here said.
Reports indicate that a 1,000 kilometer-range cruise missile is being developed, said Gurpreet Khurana, a defense analyst with the Institute of Defence Studies and Analysis (IDSA) here. Some reports have named it Sagarika, but in my view, Sagarika is most likely a ballistic missile being developed for the ATV.
The Navy is building submarine facilities at its new base at Karwar, adding to the current sub base at Vishakapatnam and looking to add another base on the eastern coast. Zachariah Mathews, a retired Navy commodore and consultant with Dua Consulting here, said the Navys nuclear needs include nuclear-capable ICBMs, nuclear-powered subs, a strategic command, safe storage and maintenance of payloads, radiation monitoring and control capability, isolation and treatment of crew when exposed to radiation, disposal and recycling of nuclear wastes, nuclear-power training for sailors and more.
A Strategic Command has already been set up to take control of the nuclear assets. Indias 2004 nuclear doctrine, published by the outgoing National Democratic Alliance government, pledges no first use of atomic weapons, but calls for the acquisition of sea-based missiles along with land- and air-launched ones for deterrence.
The sea leg of the nuclear triad is best provided by ballistic missiles positioned on a nuclear submarine, because this leg is clearly the least vulnerable, and therefore, the most survivable, Khurana said. India has very rightly opted for this course for its sea-based leg of the nuclear triad, as is evident from the ATV project.
Posted by: john frum ||
10/14/2007 15:05 ||
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On June 6, Mr. Sarmad, a journalist of Sindh TV was seriously injured after he had issued reports on the illegal Jirga judicial system being instituted in Thul, Jacobabad; the office of Sindh TV was also ransacked with all equipment broken. The attack was done by people associated with Mr. Sohrab Sarki, provincial minister of Sindh and Mr. Hazar Khan Bijarani, a member of the National Assembly, Pakistan Peoples Party.
Mr. Samard, had released to the media the outcome of a twelve year old murder case that had been decided by the Jirga system. The verdict given by the feudal lords and district Nazim (Mayor) of Jackobabad had seen the murderers hand over five minor girls not exceeding the age of ten years to the members of the deceased family as compensation. In addition, they were to pay seven hundred thousand rupees in cash. Through Mr. Samads report this was carried through newspapers and electronic media which infuriated the landlords and political personnel of the Sindh Province.
Dr. Arbab Rahim, the Chief Minister of Sindh resultantly initiated an inquiry into the matter; however this was also through the Jirga system. No action was taken as the Chief Ministers own party Provincial Minister and Local Mayor had been involved in the illegal court. However, a campaign against the Mr. Hazar Khan Bijarani, the member of the National Assembly opposition party has since started.
All this has taken place despite that in 2002, the Jirga system had been declared by the Sindh High Court as illegal and against the constitution.
#1
The verdict given by the feudal lords and district Nazim (Mayor) of Jackobabad had seen the murderers hand over five minor girls not exceeding the age of ten years to the members of the deceased family as compensation.
Exsqueeze me but isn't this SLAVERY? Not that Islam isn't duely famous for treating women worse than animals but bartering human lives as payment for crimes is slavery by any other name. This "Land of the Pure" sure seems to engage in some awfully impure practices. Then again, I suppose one shouldn't judge other cultures by Western standards. Otherwise a huge portion of this world would be seen as residing in the frickin' DARK AGES.
Thailands army-appointed government will take no action against Myanmars junta for its bloody crackdown on democracy protests as it lacks the moral authority, Prime Minister Surayud Chulanont said on Saturday. Surayud, a former army chief who was installed after last years military coup, said any action by an interim government in Bangkok could also create headaches for any successor that emerged after a Dec. 23 general election. As a Buddhist country, we disagreed with the violence dealt out by the Myanmar government, especially against the monks, Surayud said in a weekly television address. But if we do anything that will cause bad feelings with our neighbour, that will be problematic for the new elected government, he said. My government, therefore, is very careful on this issue.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/14/2007 00:00 ||
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Myanmars junta staged a massive pro-government rally in its main city on Saturday and arrested a top dissident as its relentless and ruthless response to last months pro-democracy uprising showed no signs of easing.
Htay Kywe, a prominent student activist from an uprising in 1988, was detained overnight with three other people in one of the many raids still being conducted by police more than two weeks after soldiers were sent in to crush demonstrations. The 39-year-old, a leading light in the so-called 88 Generation Students Group, had managed to remain at large since 13 of his comrades were arrested in a series of midnight swoops on Aug. 21. They had felt the net closing in for several days, a close friend, now in exile, told Reuters in Bangkok.
Despite some concessions to the international outrage at the crackdown, in which at least 10 people died, the former Burmas ruling generals are cranking up the pressure on the domestic front.
After three weeks of provincial pro-government rallies - turgid, stage-managed affairs at which attendance is compulsory - the junta brought its roadshow to a sports ground in Yangon, the main city and former capital.
Tens of thousands of people from government organisations, private factories and nearby suburbs sat through drizzle to voice choreographed support for the juntas roadmap to democracy and a constitution-drafting National Convention.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/14/2007 00:00 ||
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Put Al Gore on it, he should be the "go to guy" for petty little shit like this.
COLOMBO - Sri Lanka on Saturday rejected demands for international monitoring of human rights by a top UN envoy who warned of a disturbing lack of investigation into reports of killings and abductions.
Human Rights Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe told the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Louise Arbour, that Sri Lanka would not agree to her call for UN monitoring of human rights in the country. We are not willing to discuss a UN presence in Sri Lanka for monitoring purposes nor are we willing to allow an office of the High Commissioner (here), Samarasinghe told reporters at the end of Arbours four-day visit.
Apparently the Lankans have figured out that UN 'human rights' aren't for all humans, just the favored ones. And the Lankans aren't too favored since the Tamil Tigers are trés chic.
Arbour and Samarasinghe addressed a news conference together, but both made it clear they disagreed on how to tackle the human rights situation in the embattled country, where more than 60,000 people have been killed since 1972.
Arbour said authorities had dismissed allegations of human rights violations as propaganda by separatist Tamil Tiger rebels, but she believed there were credible allegations that deserved to be investigated. There is a disturbing lack of investigation that undermines the confidence in the institutions set up to protect human rights, Arbour said, adding Sri Lankas culture of impunity was a serious concern and calling for thorough investigations and monitoring. In the context of the armed conflict and of the emergency measures taken against terrorism, the weakness of the rule of law and prevalence of impunity is alarming, she said.
I think the major mistake the Lankans made here was allowing Louise into their country. Bet they don't make that mistake again.
There is a large number of reported killings, abductions and disappearances which remain unresolved... While the government pointed to several initiatives it has taken to address these issues, there has yet to be an adequate and credible public accounting for the vast majority of these incidents.
It's a civil war, Louise. Nasty things are done by both sides in civil wars. They aren't pretty at all, and the quickest way to stop the human rights violations is for one side to war the war completely and utterly.
Arbour was not allowed by the government to travel to the rebel-held town of Kilinochchi for talks with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). I regret I did not have the opportunity to visit Kilinochchi, she said. I would have liked to convey directly to the LTTE my deep concern about their violations of human rights and humanitarian law including the recruitment of children, forced recruitment and abduction of adults and political killings.
Oh sure you would have, just as well as the mealy-mouthed Carla del Ponte no doubt.
Human rights activists accused the government of stage-managing Arbours visit, but Samarasinghe said they did not want her to travel to the Tigers political capital out of concern for her own safety.
However, she travelled to the former rebel stronghold of Jaffna in the north of the island and met families of people who had been killed or disappeared allegedly at the hands of government forces.
Posted by: Steve White ||
10/14/2007 00:00 ||
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That's prolly a good move, cause I don't think the UN is gonna try to hold the Tigers accountable, just the govt.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
An Italian monsignor has been suspended from a senior position at the Holy See, the Vatican said on Saturday, identifying him as a priest who was anonymously interviewed about his gay sex life on a TV program. 
Detained BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia yesterday denied charges against her of corruption in awarding container handling contracts to local company Gatco and said she gave the nod only after the cabinet purchase committee had approved the deal. During interrogation by an Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) team in a graft case against her, she said, "Neither me nor my son had any involvement in the deal." 
Prime Minister John Howard on Sunday called general elections for Nov. 24 that will decide who will shepherd Australia's economic boom and whether the country will start pulling out of Iraq. 
