CJE Saturday News Briefs

Many killed in Bangladesh factory fire

WS – Another Fire Sale at Walmart.

At least six garment workers have been killed and 10 others injured in a factory fire in Bangladeshi capital Dhaka, according to fire fighters and witnesses.

The blaze on Saturday comes just two months after the country’s worst factory fire that killed 112 workers.

Witnesses said the fire at Smart Fashions, located on the upper floor of a two-storey building of Mohammadpur, was sparked in a tyre repair and welding shop downstairs.

Fire fighters and police have deployed teams to the building to control the situation and pulled out six bodies, and the exact cause of the fire has yet to be determined.

A source at the Reuters news agency confirmed: “Everything inside the factory has been gutted”.

A fire at Tazreen Fashions Limited in a Dhaka suburb in November killed 112 workers and injured at least 150, a blaze
that focused world attention on poor safety standards in the country’s garment sector. More…

Hippie Squats Legally in $2.5 Million Florida Estate

WS – I knew I’d seen this dude before…

BOCA RATON (CBSMiami) – Imagine moving into a palatial $2.5 million mansion in a great neighborhood and doing it all without paying a dime and it’s legal.

A 23-year-old Brazilian national is doing just that, call it squatting in style, according to the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. The newspaper reported the police can’t move Andre Barbosa and that it’s a civil matter that the owner of the home, Bank of America must deal with.

According to the Sun-Sentinel, Barbosa is using what’s known as the “adverse possession” law to live in the house essentially rent free. Under the adverse possession law, a person can move into an empty home and claim the title.

A person claiming adverse possession would have to stay in the home for seven years, pay the property taxes, and then hope the owner forgets about it. More…

Today is “Behave Yourself Day” Try something new!

UN to investigate legality of U.S drone strikes

WS – Point? -  use·less

  [yoos-lis]  adjective

A newly-announced UN inquiry into the rise of drone strikes and targeted killings around the world has drawn measured optimism and concerns from national security experts and the international human rights community.

Ben Emmerson QC, UN Special Rapporteur on Counter-Terrorism and Human Rights, announced on Thursday that he will head an inquiry examining the impact of drone strikes on civilian populations in five countries; Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen, the Palestinian territories and Somalia.

“The aim of the inquiry is to shine the light of truth on the competing allegations that there are disproportionate civilian casualties on the one hand and that there are few or no civilian casualties on the other,” Emmerson told The Guardian. “The critical lacuna in the debate that is currently taking place within the United Nations concerning the legality of drone strikes is the absence of independent, objective verification of the facts.” More…

Indian supreme court’s anger over unregulated clinical trials

WS – Take two valium and accept the bribes. Works here!

The fledgling clinical trials industry in India has been hit by recent revelations of a lack of regulation. Now, the country’s supreme court has criticised the body that oversees clinical trials for its inaction in the face of these unethical practices.
‘Uncontrolled clinical trials are causing havoc to human life,’ the supreme court stated in response to a petition filed by the human rights group Swasthya Adhikar Manch (SAM). ‘There are so many legal and ethical issues involved with clinical trials and the government has not done anything so far.’ SAM’s petition alleged that multinational companies are exploiting loopholes and gaps in the law to run their trials. Poorly run and unethical trials have resulted in health problems and even the death of some trial participants, who are often signed up without their knowledge.

The supreme court directed the government to manage the ‘menace’ of poorly regulated trials on a war-footing. The court asked the health secretary to take over supervising clinical trials across the country, revoking the power of the Central Drug Standard Control Organisation (CDSCO) under the Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI), the sole agency that monitors and regulates clinical trials. More…

Solomon Islands’ Dolphin Kill Spurred by Corrupt Dolphin Traders, Says Animal Rights Group

WS - Spurred by Corrupt Dolphin Traders? - Spurred by Corrupt Assholes that eat Flipper Meat, is more accurate. “Just sayin”

Island villagers captured and killed over 1,000 dolphins this week.
A group of villagers in the Solomon Islands in Oceana captured and killed over 1,000 dolphins this week in the worst dolphin massacre in the region in recent years.
The killings occurred in two spates — the first on Monday, when 700 dolphins including about 240 calves were killed, and the second yesterday that led to the death of 300 more dolphins.

The initial slaughter triggered off a spate of news reports in Australian and New Zealand media that said that the slaughter was in protest against International Marine Mammal Project’s (IMMP) failure to pay up funds promised to the villagers to help support sustainable development without dolphin kills. More…

DC Police Mishandle Sexual Assault Cases
(Washington, DC) – Victims of sexual assault in Washington, DC, are not getting the effective response they deserve and should expect from the district’s Metropolitan Police Department (MPD), Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. Sexual assault cases are too often not properly documented or investigated and victims may face callous, traumatizing treatment, despite official departmental policy to the contrary.
The 196-page report, “Capitol Offense: Police Mishandling of Sexual Assault Cases in the District of Columbia,” concludes that in many sexual assault cases, the police did not file incident reports, which are required to proceed with an investigation, or misclassified serious sexual assaults as lesser or other crimes. Human Rights Watch also found that the police presented cases to prosecutors for warrants that were so inadequately investigated that prosecutors had little choice but to refuse them and that procedural formalities were used to close cases with only minimal investigation. The mayor and City Council should create an independent mechanism to monitor police department response to sexual assault complaints. More…

Explainer: What Defines A Political Prisoner?
The current debate in the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly on political prisoners in Azerbaijan has revived interest in what, specifically, constitutes a political prisoner. The special designation is seen as putting extra pressure on national governments to release prisoners whose sentences are seen as politically motivated, biased, or retaliatory in nature.

There is no single standard for what makes a political prisoner, however, and international bodies and state governments are not always in agreement. RFE/RL correspondent Daisy Sindelar looks at efforts to build a standard definition.

What is a political prisoner?

There is no universally accepted definition for political prisoners. However, a political prisoner is generally defined as a person who is imprisoned for his or her political activities, particularly those who oppose or criticize the government of their countries. More…

G4S joins world’s worst company ‘hall of shame’

WS – Stock is up!

War on Want has called for an end to G4S’s complicity in the Occupation of Palestine after the company was voted one of the world’s worst companies in this year’s Public Eye award. G4S came third in the people’s choice category behind Shell and Goldman Sachs.

War on Want campaigner Rafeef Ziadah said:

“Thanks to the thousands of people who voted for G4S in the Public Eye awards the shocking actions of this multinational corporation have been exposed for all the world to see. G4S was not a household name but today they have joined the corporate hall of shame. Across the world people have shown their disgust at this company’s ongoing complicity in the occupation of Palestine and its record profiting from conflict and political instability.”

Why people voted for G4S

G4S is complicit in Israel’s occupation of Palestine through the supply of security equipment and services for use at checkpoints, illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank. In 2007, G4S signed a contract with the Israeli Prison Authority to provide security systems and other services for major Israeli prisons. G4S provides systems for the Ketziot and Megiddo prisons, which hold Palestinian political prisoners from occupied Palestinian territory inside Israel. Article 76 of the Fourth Geneva Convention prohibits the transfer of prisoners from occupied territory into the territory of the occupier.
More…