UK Newswire Archive
False Charges Ricochet in the War on WikiLeaks
24-08-2010 19:10
"Assange, however, quickly laid the blame on the Pentagon. He stated that he had been warned by Australian intelligence to be on guard against “honey traps”—the time-honored ploys that intelligence services use to lure a target into a sexual encounter with someone who then uses the encounter to damage the target’s reputation. Earlier today, however, Assange reversed course on these charges, telling the Sydney Morning Herald, “We don’t have direct evidence that this is coming from a U.S. or other intelligence service, but we can have some suspicions about who will benefit, but without direct evidence I won’t be making direct allegations.”The Pentagon quickly denounced the charges as “absurd.” But there is no doubt that the Pentagon is seeking to gain from them in its information war with WikiLeaks: when the case first emerged, the accusations were aggressively spread by the Pentagon via Twitter.
As I wrote in “WikiLeaks: The National-Security State Strikes Back,” a highly classified Army Counterintelligence Center 32-page memorandum noted that to eliminate the threat presented by WikiLeaks, the United States would have to strike not simply servers and databases, but against the individuals who were critical to the operation of WikiLeaks. It repeatedly identifies Assange as a target, describes the leaks as criminal acts and advocates “successful prosecutions” to “destroy the center of gravity” of WikiLeaks. The suspicions raised by Assange are thus hardly unwarranted—they match the Pentagon’s own plan to take WikiLeaks out of action. However, there is as yet no direct evidence for the claim that the accusations leveled at Assange were the work of some intelligence service, and even if there were, Assange has plenty of governments anxious to shut him down aside from the United States. But as this incident makes clear, the war on WikiLeaks will be fought with unconventional tools and those following the story are advised to accept nothing at face value."
Film: The Power of Community: 23 Sept 2010
24-08-2010 18:54
In the current global credit crisis Cuba is an inspiration ...
(Another artwork) Boycott Heineken Music Conference in Tel Aviv (by Latuff)
24-08-2010 18:44
B&K Universal fails to get planning permission.
24-08-2010 17:56
Hull-based B&K Universal, has now been bought out by New York based Marshall Farms (also trade as Marshall Bioresources)SAVE SHIVA - HUMAN RIGHTS ACTIVIST IN IRAN
24-08-2010 17:42
Shiva Nazar Ahari, an Iranian human rights activist and a political prisoner in Evin prison (Tehran) since December 20, 2009, is now facing the charge of Moharebeh (enmity against God), and she can be sentenced to death for it. Shiva’s trial date is set for September 4, 2010. We must act now to help and support her.Stop the deportation of 26 year old Raba Hamad to Iraq
24-08-2010 17:24
Novartis finally flip, demos in Hampshire
24-08-2010 17:06
Novartis demonstrations in Hampshire despite their new head of securities confusion and poor judgement.100 cities protest against ecxecution of Sakine
24-08-2010 16:51
Protests are taking place this coming saturday against the execution of Sakineh Ashtiani. Feel free to join the actions organised. Here are the ones listed so far... Protests are organised by mission free Iran and International Committee against StoningURGENT: JB Spray eviction Wed 10am
24-08-2010 15:24
The occupiers of the JB Spray have sent out a message saying they expect bailiffs to turn up around 10am tomorrow (Wednesday 25th) to evict the squat. They are calling out for supporters to come and help them resist eviction from their home.
The Spray has been occupied since May 2009. The former lace factory, which was empty and unused for many years, has been occupied and used for social and community purposes a number of times in the past. On previous occasions squatters were evicted quickly. This is the first time that people have been able to settle and make a proper home in the building.
The government admits to a total number of 62,528 vacant dwellings in the East Midlands, with almost half of these being vacant for more than 6 months. The JB Spray Factory has, in between periods of squatting, been vacant for years. The owners have left the listed building to rot.
Come and support people who are making good use of an empty building rather than greedy landlords who just want to make a profit!
Call-out for international solidarity with anarchist prisoner Marco Camenisch
24-08-2010 14:43
Marco Camenisch, known for his active role in the anti-nuclear movement of the 70s, has been a political prisoner for almost 20 years. As a militant green anarchist he has been taking part in struggles, campaigns and protests in and outside prison during all these years. He is currently detained in Regensdorf, near Zurich.Story of a West Yorkshire Hunt Sab
24-08-2010 14:24
An ace article on the also supremely brilliant Last Hours website.
Louise, a sabber from West yorkshire talks about The Hunt, class and gender via a personal tale of sabbing in the north.
If you needed something to kick you up the arse to get out onto your path of sabotage, this is it.
Conservative Party Conference Direct Action Bloc - Organise, Disrupt, Resist!
24-08-2010 14:05
As usual our our interests are being decided by corporations such as RBS, BAES, A|D|S, G4S, ASDA / Wallmart, Tesco and the Tobacco Manufacturers Association to name but a few.
Fighting in the New Terrain
24-08-2010 12:47
Overture: The More Things Change…Once, the basic building block of patriarchy was the nuclear family, and calling for its abolition was a radical demand. Now families are increasingly fragmented—yet has this fundamentally expanded women’s power or children’s autonomy?
Once, the mainstream media consisted of only a few television and radio channels. These have not only multiplied into infinity but are being supplanted by forms of media such as Facebook, Youtube, and Twitter. But has this done away with passive consumption? And how much more control over these formats do users really have, structurally speaking?
Once, movies represented the epitome of a society based on spectatorship; today, video games let us star in our own shoot-'em-up epics, and the video game industry does as much business as Hollywood. In an audience watching a movie, everyone is alone; the most you can do is boo if the storyline outrages you. In the new video games, on the other hand, you can interact with virtual versions of other players in real time. But is this greater freedom? Is it more togetherness?
Once, one could speak of a social and cultural mainstream, and subculture itself seemed subversive. Now “diversity” is at a premium for our rulers, and subculture is an essential motor of consumer society: the more identities, the more markets.
Once, people grew up in the same community as their parents and grandparents, and travel could be considered a destabilizing force interrupting static social and cultural configurations. Today life is characterized by constant movement as people struggle to keep up with the demands of the market; in place of repressive configurations, we have permanent transience, universal atomization.
Once, laborers stayed at one workplace for years or decades, developing the social ties and common reference points that made old-fashioned unions possible. Today, employment is increasingly temporary and precarious, as more and more workers shift from factories and unions to service industry and compulsory flexibility.
Once, wage labor was a distinct sphere of life, and it was easy to recognize and rebel against the ways our productive potential was exploited. Now every aspect of existence is becoming “work,” in the sense of activity that produces value in the capitalist economy: glancing at one’s email account, one increases the capital of those who sell advertisements. In place of distinct specialized roles in the capitalist economy, we increasingly see flexible, collective production of capital, much of which goes unpaid.
Once, the world was full of dictatorships in which power was clearly wielded from above and could be contested as such. Now these are giving way to democracies that seem to include more people in the political process, thus legitimizing the repressive powers of the state.
Once, the essential unit of state power was the nation, and nations competed among themselves to assert their individual interests. In the era of capitalist globalization, the interests of state power transcend national boundaries, and the dominant mode of conflict is not war but policing. This is occasionally employed against rogue nations, but continuously implemented against people.
Once, one could draw lines, however arbitrary, between the so-called First World and Third World. Today the First World and the Third World coexist in every metropolis, and white supremacy is administered in the United States by an African-American president.
CCTV in Forest Fields: Lessons from Brum
24-08-2010 12:24
One of the things that most disturbs friends from other countries when they first arrive in Britain is the omnipresence of CCTV. Whilst in Europe people are used to seeing cameras at major stations and airports and on government buildings and banks, they are nothing like as prevalent as the cameras we have. And they are certainly never stationed in residential neighbourhoods (or the toilets of junior schools![1]). The outrage caused by such a development would see them removed immediately, by legal means or sabotage by angry locals. Many visitors are shocked at how widespread the use of this invasive and authoritarian technology is in the UK.
To be fair, we haven't allowed the cameras in without a whimper or two of dissent. In Nottingham, the introduction of CCTV in Forest Fields was vigorously opposed through the proper channels... to complete indifference by the authorities[2]. The cameras have now been spying on the neighbourhood for some time without anything being done about them. There is even one located a few yards down the road from the gate of the Sumac Centre social centre, well placed to keep tabs on who's going to what meetings and gatherings. The attitude of local anti-authoritarians seems to be that "there's nothing we can do about it."
But CCTV doesn't just cause problems for a few anarchists who want to plot in peace. The recent outrage about 'anti-terrorism' cameras in Birmingham might shed light on an altogether more sinister attempt at social control. West Midlands Police, via the Safer Birmingham Partnership, used £3m of anti-terror funding to install 150 Automatic Numberplate Recognition (ANPR) cameras to form "rings of steel" around the Washwood Heath and Sparkbrook neighbourhoods. These were designed to prevent any vehicles entering or leaving the areas without their registration numbers being registered. 72 of the cameras were covert. Why did they pick those particular areas for this intense surveillance? Because they are predominantly Muslim.
Fortunately the residents of Washwood Heath and Sparkbrook were a bit more militant than the residents of Forest Fields and the outrage that they expressed forced local politicians and police into a humiliating climbdown. Bags were soon put over the visible cameras and there were (unverifiable) assurances that the covert cameras would be inactivated too.
The Birmingham case has shed a new light on the state's motivations for and tactics in deploying its CCTV empire of millions of cameras. Whilst "preventing terrorism" has long been cited as a reason for CCTV deployment near the seats of power and on public transport, it has never previously been admitted to as a reason for spying on residential neighbourhoods. Could the cameras in Forest Fields, one of Nottingham's biggest Muslim neighbourhoods, be being used for these purposes too? Some commentators have pointed out that some of the masts are conveniently placed near some of Forest Fields' mosques.
We might not even know the extent to which CCTV has been installed in the area. The revelation that scores of covert cameras can be installed in an area once the justification of anti-terrorism is invoked is extremely worrying and suggests they are not trying to "prevent crime" at all but are trying to entrap. The state has really let the genie out of the bottle with the Birmingham botch because now people know they are being spied on without their consent. The "paranoia" that anti-CCTV campaigners have been accused of in the past when claiming that cameras can be used to spy on communities has turned out to be reality.
The Home Office and police have always struggled to make the case that CCTV helps to prevent crime (even their own studies suggest otherwise[3]). Recent attempts to convince locals to accept surveillance of their homes and streets have focussed on dealing with "anti-social behaviour" instead. What this really means is relying on the state to mediate your relationships with your neighbours for you. Many in Forest Fields bought that line and supported the scheme as a result. It seems that our communities have become so fragmented that some people actually want cops, and the army of fake cops that strut up and down behind them, to sort out their lives for them.
And once enough people have accepted that the cameras are going to solve everything for us, there's no easy way of going back. Now that the masts are up the authorities can use them for anything they want, whether it is checking who is going to the mosque or who's attending which direct action gathering at the Sumac, and we won't know they're doing it.
The newspaper reports of how the Birmingham cameras were stopped focus on community leaders and public meetings, but a report from a friend in Brum reveals a different story. According to him, the public campaign went side by side with a campaign of vandalism against the cameras and threats to "turn them off or we will". The local authorities, scenting a widespread rebellion against them, turned the cameras off to limit the damage. Perhaps the residents of Forest Fields could learn a lesson or two from this rather less polite approach.
[1] http://www.independent.co.uk/news/education/education-news/antivandal-cctv-in-school-toilets-defended-1756067.html | http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/08/19/school_cctv/
[2] http://www.forestfields.org.uk/ | http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2009/04/428746.html | http://www.nottinghamcity.gov.uk/index.aspx?articleid=6025
[3] http://p10.hostingprod.com/@spyblog.org.uk/blog/2007/10/national_cctv_strategy_worryingly_incomplete.html | http://www.no-cctv.org.uk/caseagainst/docs/Assessing_the_impact_of_CCTV-HO_study292.pdf | http://www.nacro.org.uk/data/resources/nacro-2004120299.pdf
DALE FARM IMMINENT EVICTION
24-08-2010 11:52
Please help protect the human rights of the Dale Farm travellers.Keep EDL out of Covent Garden! Boycott Ahava demo 28th August 2010.
24-08-2010 11:35
Councillor challenged over violence against women
24-08-2010 10:24
Councillor Richard Leese, who is also the leader of the council in Manchester, was arrested and cautioned after assaulting a female family member.
Councillor Mary Di Mauro challenged him after he made comments on his release from police custody stating "I don't think I've ever used the expression ‘zero tolerance'" in relation to the Council's approach to 'domestic' violence.
Councillor Di Mauro has been criticised for apparently using the situation to gain political points. The Mule interviewed her on the subject.
Unchosen Bristol Film Festival - second night
24-08-2010 10:22
Raising awareness of human traffickingTuesday 26th October 7.30pm Hall 2, Colston Hall Tickets £2
Three Shorts
1. BRISTOL BIKE PROJECT Directed by Alistair Oldham
2. ECHOES Directed by Rob Brown
3. BRAZIL’S CHILD PROSTITUTES
Directed by Chris Rogers - for BBC Our World
1st short: Bristol Bike Project - A short film about cycling, recycling and asylum.
Q&A’s by: Bristol Director Alistair Oldham
2nd short: Echoes - A female sex trafficker faces an unexpected moral dilemna.
Q&A’s by: Director Rob Brown
3rd short: Brazil’s Child Prostitutes - This recently shot documentary shows the scandalous reality of children used and exploited in the sex trade in Brazil.
Q&A’s by: BBC Investigative journalist Chris Rogers.
Introduced by Dr. William Brown Co Author of ‘Moving People, Moving Images: Cinema and Trafficking in The New Europe’
Pre-film performance: WorldRoots - a ‘Gathering Voices’ choir.
Unchosen Bristol Film Festival - third night
24-08-2010 10:22
Raising awareness of human traffickingTuesday 2nd November 7.30pm Hall 2, Colston Hall. Tickets £2
UNDERSTANDING TRAFFICKING
Directed by Ananya Chatterjee Chakraborti
SOUTH WEST PREMIERE
A documentary following young girls lured across borders into the sex trade in India, and exploited by their own communities in return for a steady income. The film stresses the need to allow migration and migrants whilst, at the same time, pulling out all the stops to prevent Human Trafficking.
Introduced by: Denise Marshall OBE, The Poppy Project
Pre-film performance:
Indian Classical Singer Jatanil Banerjee
Post-film talk & Q&A’s by:
Indian Director Ananya Chatterjee Chakraborti
