blessed britons

at the peak of the emergency, the British held more than 70,000 Kikuyu supporters of Mau Mau in detention camps. The vast majority of these detainees were held without trial, simply on the order of the administration, on the basis of accusation or mere suspicion... In the midst of the war, draconian anti-terrorist laws were introduced suspending the human rights of suspects, imposing collective punishments, facilitating detention without trial, permitting the seizure of property of convicts, and vastly extending the death penalty...

— David Anderson

mad world

* One quarter of the aid [provided by rich countries] – $20bn a year – funds expensive and often ineffective western consultants, research and training.
* In the UK, for example, almost half of TA spending goes on consultants and other experts, the vast majority of them British.
* A typical cost of an expatriate consultant will be in the region of $200,000 a year. According to the OECD, in typical cases more than one third of this is spent on school fees and child allowances – spending which would not be needed if local consultants were used.

— Action Aid

Real Aid II

chevron and the military junta

Submitted by antarchi on October 5, 2007 - 00:21.

Fueling the military junta that has ruled for decades are Burma’s natural gas reserves, controlled by the Burmese regime in partnership with the U.S. multinational oil giant Chevron, the French oil company Total and a Thai oil firm. Offshore natural gas facilities deliver their extracted gas to Thailand through Burma’s Yadana pipeline. The pipeline was built with slave labor, forced into servitude by the Burmese military...
Chevron’s role in propping up the brutal regime in Burma is clear. According to Marco Simons, U.S. legal director at EarthRights International: “Sanctions haven’t worked because gas is the lifeline of the regime. Before Yadana went online, Burma’s regime was facing severe shortages of currency. It’s really Yadana and gas projects that kept the military regime afloat to buy arms and ammunition and pay its soldiers.”

mostly nuggets

blessed britons

mad world

chevron and the military junta