New Internationalist articles from September 2005

New Internationalist archives from September 2005

From this month's editor.(anti-nuclear movement)(Brief Article)(Editorial)
September 1, 2005... Not long ago, you could have been forgiven for thinking that nuclear technology was on its way out. After major disasters such as Three Mile Island and Chernobyl, officials were sizing up the nails for the industry's coffin. But it would seem...

Nuclear is the new black: talk of a supposed nuclear 'solution' to climate change is polluting the debate. Adam Ma'anit clears the air.(nuclear reactors' gas emissions effect climate)
September 1, 2005... Just when we thought it was no longer de rigueur to talk of nuclear utopias where electricity would be 'too cheap to metre', the atom-smashing business is all the rage again. After the PR disasters of Three Mile Island and Chernobyl, lobby...

Liquid sunshine.(Brief Article)
September 1, 2005... Nuclear power has long been sold as a utopian technology that would usher in an era when no-one would need to work, energy would be free and limitless, and people would live longer and healthier lives. The cultural impacts of the 'atom age'...

Minority report: do vested interests influence the science on the health effects of low-level radiation, a natural by-product of all nuclear power generation? Alice Cutler speaks to British scientific advisor Dr Ian Fairlie about the difficulties scientists face when dealing with the industry.(Interview)
September 1, 2005... When did you first become concerned about nuclear power and health? The Chernobyl disaster in 1986 was the main impetus for me to study radiation biology. How have your political views affected your career? My political beliefs...

Toxic time bomb: millions of cubic metres of poorly contained radioactive waste threatens to become an ecological disaster for Central Asia. Gulnura Toralieva visited Mailuu-Suu in Kyrgyzstan where authorities and local villagers are on edge after massive landslides hit local dump sites.(KYRGYZSTAN)
September 1, 2005... On 21 March of this year, the first day of Spring and Muslim New Year, a landslide in the town of Mailuu-Suu left 13 families homeless and killed 2 girls--7-year-old Asel and 14-year-old Nazira. According to one neighbour: 'The parents of the...

Nuclear facts.
September 1, 2005... PEAK URANIUM * The global nuclear industry requires approximately 68,000 tonnes of uranium ore a year to operate. (3) * Approximately 36,000 tonnes of uranium a year is manufactured from 'primary sources' (mining). (3) * Nearly...

Fusion illusion: as work begins to build the world's most ambitious fusion reactor in France, and as proponents try to sell us the promise of a new, clean, fusion age, Peter Montague wonders whether we haven't heard it all before.(France working on a fusion reactor to generate electricty, through investments from various countries)
September 1, 2005... The looming calamity of global warming has begun to dawn on the men and women (really, mostly men) who fancy that they own and operate Western civilization--the petrochemical cartels and their attendant law firms and lobbyists, the insurance...

A fever of forgetting: in 1997, photographer Paul Fusco documented the lingering effects of the world's worst nuclear accident--Chernobyl. What follows are photos and excerpts from his diary.(Chernobyl, Ukraine, Nuclear Accident, 1986)(Brief Article)
September 1, 2005... Nineteen years ago, Chernobyl exploded, vomiting 8 tons of radioactive ash into the air which swept across the lands poisoning 25 per cent of the population and 25 per cent of the lands of Belarus. And now the new generation of children bears...

Green & Black: Alex Kelly and Carla Deane find Aboriginal Australians 'talking up strong' against the nuclear industry.(AUSTRALIA)
September 1, 2005... 'We, Aboriginal people, hold the key to survival on this land. We are the authority of this country. We call on all peoples to take notice of what we are saying. The Old Country is angry. It is talking, "Be aware!" It has seen the people...

Renew yourself: despite over half a century of nuking the planet, it's not too late to detox. Here are a few tonics that inspire.(energy conservation in different parts of world)
September 1, 2005... Britain: Micro is beautiful Microrenewables--renewable energy technology suitable for home use--are demonstrating enormous potential for individuals literally to take power into their own hands. The New Economics Foundation reports that if...

Action.(environmental organizations)(Directory)
September 1, 2005... INTERNATIONAL World Information Service on Energy (WISE) and Nuclear Information Resource and Service (NIRS) is the information and networking centre for citizens and environmental organizations concerned about nuclear power, radioactive...

Land: birdsong regained; Paraguay Government bends to farmers' demands.(Currents)
September 1, 2005... FEDERICO DUARTE and his eight young children used to wake up to the chirp of birds in the forested farmland of Alto Parana in eastern Paraguay. While living in an inner-city park in the capital Asuncion, at the beginning of this year, the sound...

Colombia's abortive laws.(Brief Article)
September 1, 2005... In Colombia, women can be imprisoned for up to four-and-a-half years for having abortions, even in cases of rape or when their lives are at risk, says Human Rights Watch. In a brief to Colombia's Constitutional Court in June this year, the...

Africa: the sleeping lion rises.(Owen Dean on behalf of Solomon Linda's estate sues Walt Disney Co. of copyright infringement)(Brief Article)
September 1, 2005... Theft comes in many forms. The Minority World's efforts to frustrate the Majority World's control of its natural resources are well known. But cultural resources have been plundered as well. Take the case of Solomon Linda, a Zulu herder who...

Upheaval in the French Pacific.(Jacques Chirac's party analysis of recent elections)(Brief Article)
September 1, 2005... As the media focus on crises in the Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea and Nauru, a political earthquake elsewhere in the Pacific islands has passed largely unnoticed. Major changes are under way in the French dependencies in the Pacific. Key...

UNESCO stands up.(protecting cultural diversity)(Brief Article)
September 1, 2005... UNESCO member states have decided to recommend an international convention to protect cultural diversity and the right of member states to craft their own cultural policies. At a meeting in Paris in June, the 191 UNESCO members produced a...

Women: spellbound; Ghana's 'witches' find sanctuary.(regugee camp in the town of Gambaga)
September 1, 2005... 'I quarrelled with my brother and his family. My brother hit me and made me leave the house. That very night he collapsed and died. His family blamed me: his children beat me up and wanted to kill me. Luckily, my eldest son saved my life. When...

The language of world leaders.(word power)(Brief Article)
September 1, 2005... Word power 10 Bush n. small shrub with the unusual tendency of increasing the level of C[O.sub.2] in the atmosphere. Gandhi adj. small and skinny, but incredibly hard to move. Mussolini adj. small and stocky, yet capable of...

Unity in a movement situation is overrated.(Currents)(Brief Article)
September 1, 2005... Unity in a movement situation is overrated. If you were the Establishment, which would you rather see coming in the door --five hundred mice or one lion? Florynce R Kennedy (1916-2001), African-American lawyer and civil-rights activist

Refugees: a despot's disgrace; international battle to save Uzbek protestors.(Currents)
September 1, 2005... 'I'VE never seen anything so terrible. Everyone was shot, even small children and women holding babies.' Farhod, a 30-year old handicraft worker, recollects the bloody crackdown on protestors in Uzbekistan's eastern city of Andijon on 13 and 14...

Monsanto's hogwash.(Monsanto Co. seeking patents from World Intellectual Property Organization )
September 1, 2005... It was only a matter of time... and money... and a complete lack of a moral code... but those nice folks at Monsanto Corporation have miraculously invented a whole new animal--a pig. Well, OK, it's actually an animal that has existed for,...

Than Shwe.(Worldbeaters)(Biography)
September 1, 2005... Job: Prime Minister, Chair of the State Peace and Development Council, Commander-in-Chief of the Tatmadaw--armed forces--of Burma Reputation: Sullen 'Number One' in Burmese military junta Until 8 August 1988 the military oddballs who...

The Night of Truth.(Movie Review)
September 1, 2005... The Night of Truth directed by Fanta Regina Nacro In an unnamed African country, after years of civil war and vicious killing, the two sides come together. The rebel colonel and the President, sincere about peace, organize a...

Arakimentari.(Movie Review)
September 1, 2005... Arakimentari directed by Travis Klose Araki's early photographs of his wife going about her day--naked after sleep, brushing her teeth, playing with their cat--established him as an art photographer. He later lovingly photographed her...

Zaboum!!(Sound Recording Review)
September 1, 2005... Zaboum!! by Mina Agossi (Candid CCD 79800 CD) France, which is seriously selective about only elevating the best of its jazz singers, has been in a stew ever since young Beninoise-French singer Mina Agossi emerged from nightclubs to...

You've Stolen My Heart.(Sound Recording Review)
September 1, 2005... You've Stolen My Heart by The Kronos Quartet and Asha Bhosle (Nonesuch 79856 CD) Let it never be said that The Kronos Quartet lack the gift of surprise--even after 32 years, most of them spent at the cutting edge of modern classical...

Mao: The Unknown Story.(Book Review)
September 1, 2005... Mao The Unknown Story by Jung Chang and Jon Halliday (Jonathan Cape/Random House ISBN 0 224 07126 2) This book is not just another biography. Its 650-odd pages present nothing short of character assassination. According to Jung...

Wild Grass: China's Revolution from Below.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
September 1, 2005... Wild Grass China's Revolution from Below by Ian Johnson (Penguin Books ISBN 0 141 02155 1) Ian Johnson's intriguing book is an examination, on a very human scale, of the burgeoning of grassroots revolt in China's rapidly evolving...

Southern exposure: highlighting the work of photographers from the Majority World.(social conditions of Kukuyu)(Brief Article)
September 1, 2005... Eight-year-old John Karanja carries firewood the traditional way--on his back. Kikuyu women and girls used to carry firewood, water and even children for long distances without getting tired. Karanja had walked for more than 10 kilometres in...

A feeling of helplessness.(personal narrative of a Kashmir poet on Kashmir and London Terrorist Bombings, 2005)
September 1, 2005... I am no stranger to killing and chaos in my surroundings, for I have lived most of my life witnessing, dodging and reporting such events. As a journalist in Kashmir, I have filled columns of newspapers counting the dead in dozens, collecting...

Blenheim & Bangalore: Indian farmers driven to suicide; British aristocrats subsidized by the EU: Rahul Rao traces the connections between the two.
September 1, 2005... Every time I visit Blenheim Palace, an aristocratic estate in Oxfordshire, I am reminded of the connections between its most famous inhabitant and my hometown--Bangalore, in south India. In October 1896, Lieutenant Winston Churchill of the 4th...

Big bad world.(Cartoon)
September 1, 2005... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

Interview with Hassan Juma'a Awad from Iraq's general union of oil workers.(Making Waves)(Interview)
September 1, 2005... When Saddam Hussein's regime started crumbling on 9 April 2003, those whom it had driven underground began to breathe again. From Syria, Britain, Scandinavia and elsewhere, exiled trade union radicals began to make the long journey home. Soon...

Too soft?(Letter to the Editor)
September 1, 2005... I am surprised at Worldbeaters going so easy on Pope Benedict XVI (NI 380). The phrase 'brief fling in the Hitler Youth, because it was compulsory' is untrue. My father was a member of the postwar Control Commission in Germany, and he assures...

God's representative.(Letter to the Editor)
September 1, 2005... I was raised a Catholic by my devout parents, and have since--following the lead of my siblings--rejected almost every unbendingly conservative requirement of the faith. The ideals of the woefully outdated establishment seem wholly incongruous...

Stray thee not.(Letter to the Editor)
September 1, 2005... There are several elements of the Pope's teaching, including his stance on contraception, with which Bible-believing Christians would disagree. However, he is absolutely correct to identify permissiveness as the root problem underlying the...

Fighting talk.(Letter to the Editor)
September 1, 2005... Bill McNicholas (Letters, NI 380) seems to assume that the word 'fight' (the use of which he objects to) implies a fight against people. The 'fight' NI refers to on its front cover is surely a fight against injustice and the ideas, attitudes...

A question of choices.(Letter to the Editor)
September 1, 2005... Kim Armstrong's letter (NI 380) was self-righteous and simplistic. None of us choose where we are born and the situations our communities live in. Most of us in wealthier countries have never had to experience the effects of war or recession...

Understanding migration.(Letter to the Editor)
September 1, 2005... The perspective of Nancy Wambui Itotia (Out of Africa: A migrant's story, NI 379) as an international migrant worker spelt out in very plain terms the significant flow of human labour around the world and the fact that the Minority World is...

One-way traffic.(Letter to the Editor)
September 1, 2005... All the benefits, in the way of minerals such as gold, diamonds, cobalt, copper, oil, coltan and the raw materials such as coffee and cocoa, leave the poor countries, especially Africa, to enrich the already rich world. In doing so, the labour...

Skimming the cream.(Letter to the Editor)
September 1, 2005... Out of Africa (NI 379) has particular relevance to Australia where the Government is increasing its 'skilled immigration' to over 60,000 per year. There are significant advantages for the host nation--by reducing expenditure on our education...

Never enough.(Letter to the Editor)
September 1, 2005... Jeremy Seabrook's 'The Bushfires of Affluence' (Essay, NI 379) couldn't have come at a more apt time with Geldof's Live8 concerts and the G8 summit. We have finally realized that being healthy comes hand in hand with not being in poverty....

Conscience as guide.(Letter to the Editor)
September 1, 2005... Congratulations on a well-researched and topical issue on the scourge of casteism (Combating Caste, NI 380). While I am well aware of the situation in India, the insidious spread through 'Indian Diasporas' in other countries was eye-opening....

Breaking silence: a reality television show has shattered an age-old taboo for Arab women. Reem Haddad finds opinions divided.(Letter from Lebanon)
September 1, 2005... I've never been interested in reality television shows but I was intrigued by the latest programme to hit the Arab world: women--with problems--living together as they underwent psychiatric treatment. Even I was a little shocked that an...

Ukraine.(Country Profile)
September 1, 2005... When Ukrainians celebrated New Year 2005 in Klev in a delirious sea of orange and anthems of the revolution, the future looked bright. A peaceful popular uprising had finally forced the corrupt old guard out of the presidency. In their place, a...