WHERE EXACTLY?

RT

British banking giants have come under fire line from the US financial authorities. HSBC will pay a record $1.9bn to settle a money-laundering probe, with Standard Chartered getting a $327mn charge for violating US sanctions against Iran.

The fine against HSBC will include $1.25bn in forfeiture, as well as $655mn in civil penalties. In an attempt to cut costs and improve profitability, HSBC CEO Stuart Gulliver made the bank the matter for US probes and claims from UK clients. The lack of money-laundering controls at HSBC allowed terrorists and drug cartels access to the US financial system, according to Bloomberg.

The bank accepts responsibility for “past mistakes” and is “profoundly sorry for them,” Gulliver said.

Where exactly will the money ($2bn) go? To help America's health and education infrastructure? To helping feed, clothe and house the poor? To creating more and better jobs, etc...?

If he'd made an offensive film about Islam he'd be a hero of free speech

BBC NEWS

A teenager has been found guilty of posting an offensive Facebook message following the deaths of six British soldiers in Afghanistan.

Azhar Ahmed, 19, of Ravensthorpe, West Yorkshire, was charged with sending a grossly offensive communication.

He told Huddersfield Magistrates Court he accepted the message had been "unacceptable" but had denied it was "grossly offensive".

The judge said his comments were "derogatory" and "inflammatory". [...]

The offensive message, which said "all soldiers should die and go to hell", was posted by Ahmed just two days later on 8 March.

Ahmed told the court he was only trying to make his point that many other deaths in Afghanistan were being ignored and added he had no idea it would cause so much upset.

He said he replied with apologies to many people who commented on his Facebook page and when some told him they had lost relatives in Afghanistan he realised how serious it was.

"That's when I realised it was unacceptable for them to see something so upsetting and distressing, to write something like that," he added.

UPDATED: Stephen Lawrence murder verdict

UPDATED 4 January: The murderers Dobson and Norris have been sentenced today: story in the Guardian.

The racist murder of Stephen Lawrence happened 18 years ago. I remember the news reports - this was before internet - I had followed it via my subscription to the mailed edition of the Guardian Weekly. The Guardian today reports that finally there is a conviction and two men have been found guilty.

The case was one of the most famous unsolved murders in Britain. An 18-year fight for justice by Lawrence's parents led to a public inquiry which uncovered blunders by the Metropolitan police, blamed on institutional racism, which allowed his killers to escape justice.

Lawrence, 18, was murdered on 22 April 1993, as he and a friend waited for a bus in Eltham, south-east London.

They were attacked by a group of five to six white youths who shouted: "What, what, nigger?" and then rushed towards them.

From the fabric of shared experience...

Combat Papermakers posted this on their FB page: Israeli and Palestinian women come together to make paper and engage in a dialogue of understanding and healing...it's in London, check it out!

Immortalised by Google

When Grandmère Mimi made her state visit to England last year we met up in Yorkshire and visited the quaint village of Lastingham for lunch.

After our meal, Mimi and me went to have a look in the church. On the way back to the car, we were Googled and have been immortalised on their street view function.

Firsts in the British Parliament

At least something positive from yesterday's British elections:

Caroline Lucas won the Green Party's first seat.

Two Labour candidates, Shabana Mahmood and Yasmin Qureshi became the first women Muslim MPs.

Otherwise, Richard Seymour/Lenin's Tomb says "Oh, what the fuck?" Oh, and George Galloway was trounced by the Labour candidate.

Lance Corporal Joe Glenton jailed for nine months

From Friday's Guardian,

A British soldier who became a hero to anti-war activists after refusing to return to Afghanistan was jailed for nine months today, despite claims that he is suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder.

"There are many soldiers in the army who have extremely unpleasant experiences, who watch friends die or suffer appalling injuries, but they have to return and do their duty," Judge Advocate Emma Peters told Lance Corporal Joe Glenton.

Glenton, 27, fled to Asia in mid-2007, before he was due to start a second tour in Afghanistan, staying abroad for two years before returning to speak at Stop the War rallies. He wrote to Gordon Brown to denounce the conflict and urge the return of all British troops.

The court martial in Colchester, Essex, sentenced him to nine months in a military jail for going absent without leave, after he pleaded guilty. He was also demoted to private. His family and supporters said Glenton, who served in Afghanistan for seven months with the Royal Logistics Corps in 2006, had been singled out because of his activism and would appeal.

From New Left Project,

A spokesperson for Stop the War said: "This extremely harsh sentence ignored many of the facts of the case; that Joe had post-traumatic stress disorder, that he had raised concerns about the war with his superiors and been bullied as a result, and that he had voluntarily returned to barracks after going absent without leave.

"The judge herself made it clear the sentence was not based on the facts of the case but on a desire to deter other members of the military from taking a stand of conscience."

She added: "Joe is a brave and defiant man. He left the court under guard with a clenched fist held high. His outspoken defiance and the national campaign to defend him had already forced the authorities to drop the much more serious charge of desertion."

Send messages of support to:

Lance Corporal Joe Glenton
Military Corrective Training Centre, Berechurch Hall Camp
Colchester CO2 9NU, UK

Chilcott Iraqi Inquiry • Blair denies doing secret deal with Bush at Crawford

I've been listening to Blair give testimony at the Chilcott Iraqi inquiry hearing and became nauseous. Had to turn it off (it's now finished for the day, thankfully). (Colin Murray was following it, too; maybe he has more stomach?) The only time I want to "hear" Blair again is when he'll be in the dock at The Hague! Same goes for Bush... and Obama, too, if he continues his warmongering.

Snowy Britain

The caption on the BBC website says: The winter whiteout conditions affecting the UK are clearly visible in this striking image received by the University of Dundee Satellite Receiving Station. It shows almost all of the country covered in a white blanket of snow and ice. Photo by NEODAAS/University of Dundee.

Yesterday's Hits

Wow, yesterday was a record indeed. BI had 596 hits


with visitors coming mostly from a gay UK celebrity messageboard thread.

Man on run after committing criminal damage to a donkey. With his penis.

onthehushhush 22:24, arf, barf, reply
[...]
maybe he'd had a glass too many?

blazingindiscretions.blogspot.com/2010/01/chardongay.html
sgtpeppersstoneyhardcoreband 10:20

HiccUP!

Trafalgar Square's reinvigorated fountain

Now, if they could only get rid of the dirty pigeons! When I lived in London, I'd pass through the square en route to Embankment tube station to catch a Circle Line train for the ride home, stopping occasionally to watch one of the many demonstrations taking place.

Guardian

... As Joel Schobs, the engineer in a chlorine-scented lair deep beneath the square's flagstones, cranked up the pressure and eased open valves that had been closed for a lifetime, the plume in the western fountain gradually and almost imperceptibly rose.

Within a minute it was visibly taller than its twin. Within two it was high enough to splash the bronze cloak of General Charles Napier. Within five it was a spurting glory, 35 feet high – higher than anyone has seen it in at least 30 years and probably twice as long as that. The ducks that arrive every summer from nearby St James's Park quacked ecstatically.

"Not bad, is it?" said Richard Genn, who is in charge of the square for the Greater London Authority and has supervised a year-long £190,000 project to restore the fountains to their intended glory. ...

The original Victorian fountains had nothing to do with beauty and everything to do with reducing the amount of open space and the risk of riotous assembly. The police post concealed inside a granite column in the corner, often wrongly called the smallest police station in London, was added in the great depression of the 1930s: it was linked directly to Scotland Yard and has slots through which the solitary occupant could fire on any rioters.

[Photograph: Zak Hussein/PA]

De Menezes Murder: More insult to injury

Via Martin Wisse:

Police officer who altered evidence in the murder of Jean Charles de Menezes has been cleared of "deliberate deception":

The Special Branch officer deleted text from his computer note before speaking to the inquest in October last year.

The Independent Police Complaints Commission said he was not guilty of "deliberate deception".

Mr de Menezes, 27, was shot dead by police at Stockwell Tube station in south London in July 2005.

The IPCC said the officer, known as "Owen", had acted naively, but found no evidence of deliberate deception.

Last October, the officer told the inquest he deleted a line from computer notes which quoted Deputy Assistant Commissioner Cressida Dick.

The note had originally claimed Dick had initially said the electrician could "run onto Tube as not carrying anything".

But at the inquest he said: "On reflection, I looked at that and thought 'I cannot actually say that.'"

The officer, a supervisor in the operations room at Scotland Yard, told the court he had removed the line because he believed it was "wrong and gave a totally false impression."

The IPCC found Owen "acted alone" in failing to disclose the note and then deleting it.

Its report concluded the officer had shown a "lack of understanding" of how he should behave, but had not committed an offence.

Unbelievable, but not surprising. The socalled "Independent" Police Complaints Commission has shown time and again in the de Menezes case to be toothless or unwilling to actually prosecute the police. The IPCC is too much a part of the police establishment to do its job, either unwilling or unable to handle these sort of cases. As with parliament we once again see that self regulation does not work.

From the 'Where are They Now?' Dept.

Actually, it's from the Guardian

"Boy George has been released from prison four months into a 15-month sentence. The singer, whose real name is George O'Dowd, had been jailed after falsely imprisoning a male escort in his east London flat. He left Edmunds Hill prison in Suffolk yesterday, having been detained there since January.

"The former Culture Club singer was accused of assault and false imprisonment in 2007 by male escort Audun Carlsen. According to Carlsen, O'Dowd handcuffed him to a bed after accusing him of taking photographs from the singer's laptop. In his court testimony, Carlsen said he was then punched and beaten by O'Dowd and another man, before being manacled to a wall. He managed to escape wearing only his underwear, before taking refuge in a local newsagent. The singer was found guilty in December 2008 and sentenced earlier this year."

Design Inspiration

David Mellor, a thoroughly British designer known chiefly for his cutlery, has died a few days ago.

I like this from his obituary in the Guardian:

Mellor was no mere knife and fork stylist; he understood the behaviour of metals and the physics of tools.

He was in every sense a modern industrial designer, and technologically adept, but his spiritual roots were in the arts and crafts movement and its belief, not so much in work-life balance as in work-life integration. To him, the profession of design "is concerned not just with making objects ... but just as importantly with making choices, with choosing what we use, choosing how to live". There is a special significance in the environments Mellor made for himself, his colleagues and his family (although boundaries were fluid, since life and art and work were inseparable).


When I lived in London and and would hang out in Chelsea, on exiting the Sloane Square tube station: First thing - make a bee-line to David Mellor's shop (take a right, then another right, cross the street) before I did anything else. I have a few sets of the Paris design (shown on the right). Recommended: the company website, a celebration of exquisite craftmanship, is a fine presentation indeed.

Craig Murray speaks about torture

Craig Murray, former British Ambassador to Uzbekistan, gave evidence yesterday on torture before the UK Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights. It's not been covered in the US and has received scant reporting in the UK press. So, I'm attempting to spread the word. From Mr Murray's blog:

Nobody Can Hear You Scream

Just before I gave my evidence to Parliament yesterday, my sister Celia telephoned me to say that I would be speaking not for myself but for all those thousands who had suffered unspeakable torture around the World in the War on Terror, whose screams and sometimes death rattles were heard only by their torturers. She told me I was speaking for those who could not speak.

She put me into a calm place, and I tried to give my evidence very coolly and professionally, but I believe I did manage once or twice to break through the twisted legalese in which the committee have mummified themselves, to bring home the human cost of torture to them.

You can see my evidence here:
http://www.parliamentlive.tv/Main/VideoPlayer.aspx?meetingId=3978

If that disappears, Tony has kindly put it onto YouTube which you can find here:
http://tenpercent.wordpress.com/2009/04/28/craig-murrays-evidence-on-youtube/

But I am completely astonished, and horribly depressed, that there has been almost no mainstream media of this quite sensational information. There has been not one word in any newspaper or on TV. The Today programme on Radio 4 ran a story on it at 6.45am, but did not repeat it.

[...]

I really cannot understand why no newspaper or TV channel has covered what is quite a startling development in a prominent continuing story on the use of torture in the War on Terror.

I had hoped that my evidence yesterday would be a significant step in ending the policy of obtaining intelligence from torture, and of bringing to account the ministers who approved it. But without any sign of public or media interest, the politicians will feel they can safely ignore the truth I told.

I was trying to speak up for those who have no voice. I feel very strongly that I have let them down.

Only their torturers heard their screams, and hardly anybody else heard my voice either.

MURDER AT THE G20

I'm spreading the word about the murder of Ian Tomlinson - his tragic death was not accidental and not by natural causes - last week during the G20 summit in London. The police lied to cover this up.

Via Ten Percent,

Dramatic footage obtained by the Guardian shows that the man who died at last week’s G20 protests in London was attacked from behind and thrown to the ground by a baton–wielding police officer in riot gear.

Moments after the assault on Ian Tomlinson was captured on video, he suffered a heart attack and died.

Video & more @ The Guardian:

The film reveals that as he walks, with his hands in his pockets, he does not speak to the police or offer any resistance.

A phalanx of officers, some with dogs and some in riot gear, are close behind him and try to urge him forward.

A Metropolitan police officer appears to strike him with a baton, hitting him from behind on his upper thigh.

Moments later, the same policeman rushes forward and, using both hands, pushes Tomlinson in the back and sends him flying to the ground, where he remonstrates with police who stand back, leaving bystanders to help him to his feet.

The man who shot the footage, a fund manager from New York who was in London on business, said: "The primary reason for me coming forward is that it was clear the family were not getting any answers."

PUT PEOPLE FIRST PROTEST IN LONDON

More than 35,000 marched through London.

BE OF ONE MIND

Daily Reading for March 20 • Feast of St Cuthbert, Bishop of Lindisfarne, 687

Always keep God’s peace and love among you, and when you have to seek guidance about your affairs, take great care to be of one mind. Live in mutual good-will also with Christ’s other servants, and do not despise Christians who come to you for hospitality, but see that you welcome them, give them accommodation, and send them on their way with friendship and kindness.

Cuthbert’s last words, quoted in A Holy Island Prayer Book: Morning, Midday, and Evening Prayer by Ray Simpson. Copyright © 2002 Morehouse Publishing, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

(From Speaking to the Soul.)

I would change St Cuthbert's words slightly to read, "and do not despise any persons who come to you for hospitality..."

Photo: St Cuthbert on Holy Island, by Powell of Whitefriars, St Cuthbert's Church, Great Salkeld, Cumbria.

'HICH' YEZZA JAILED FOR 9 MONTHS

I've been following the arrest and trial of writer and Nottingham University grad student Hicham Yezza. From Lenin's Tomb we have learned that he has been 'sent down for nine months.'

TRIBUTE: WENDY RICHARD 20 JULY 1943 - 26 FEBRUARY 2009

Wendy Richard, who has died aged 65 of cancer, was one of the busiest television actors of recent decades. She became a household name as Pauline Fowler, the matriarch who battled on undaunted through the many upheavals of EastEnders.

Before EastEnders, she was best known as Miss Brahms, a foil to Mollie Sudgen's Mrs Slocombe on the groundbraking series, Are You Being Served?



The cast of Are You Being Served? (from left to right): Mollie Sugden as Mrs Slocombe, Wendy Richard as Miss Brahms, Trevor Bannister as Mr Lucas, Nicholas Smith as Mr Rumbold, Larry Martyn, Arthur Brough as Mr Grainger, John Inman as Mr Humphreys and Frank Thornton as Captain Peacock. (Photograph: BBC)

There are several clips featured on the Guardian.

The pilot episode of Are You Being Served. The opening scene has Miss Brahms stuck in a lift in a miniskirt. The tone had been set:



The pilot continues:



"Are you free?" The final segment:



And of course the first part of the infamous "Dear Sexy Knickers..."!