Ship 'attacked' as China mulls navy use

Thirty Chinese sailors were missing after pirates attacked their China-owned ship in waters near Somalia on Wednesday, the official Xinhua news agency reported.

Pirates attacked the vessel, owned by China Communications Construction Co., in the Gulf of Aden at 12:43 pm Beijing time (0443 GMT), Xinhua said.

"Thirty Chinese sailors were aboard the ship, 'Zhenhua 4'," the news agency reported."

"The company has lost contact with the sailors and their conditions are unknown."

The report came as China considered sending warships to fight piracy off Somalia, state media said, announcing what would be an unprecedented display of naval power far from its shores.

"China is seriously considering sending naval ships to the Gulf of Aden and waters off the Somali coast for escorting operations in the near future," Vice-Foreign Minister He Yafei was quoted as saying in New York by the Chinese state-run Xinhua news agency on Wednesday.

This would be the first time in modern history that the nation's navy carried out a mission outside Chinese waters, according to Shen Shishun, an expert with the Chinese Institute of International Studies, a government think tank.

He Yafei was speaking at a ministerial meeting of the UN Security Council - of which China is a permanent member - which on Tuesday unanimously authorised international land operations against armed pirates sheltering in Somalia.

Pirates have carried out more than 100 attacks in the key shipping lanes of the Gulf of Aden, located between the south of Yemen and the north of Somalia, and the Indian Ocean east of Somalia since the start of this year.

Last month, they captured the world's attention when they hijacked the Saudi-owned super-tanker Sirius Star, carrying two million barrels of crude oil, and demanded a $US25 million ($A35.94 million) ransom for the boat and its crew.

It is one of about 17 ships, including a Chinese vessel, in pirate hands.

Vice-Foreign Minister He also met Somalia's foreign minister, Ali Ahmed Jama, on the sidelines of the meeting to raise concerns over the 17 Chinese nationals currently in the hands of the pirates, Xinhua reported.

AFP 17 Dec 2008

Here is another job for Team America World Police, with their brand new shiny acquired toys (Multiple Kill Vehicle)

to get rid of these terrorists*, because we all know how evil terrorists are thanks to the ever so diligent unbiased western media,

and how T.A.W.P. is the purveyor of justice and goodness !!!

so that we can sleep safely knowing that ship can pass safely near Somalia*.

Somalia ??? !!!! ??? Who ??? !!! ??? Have they any Oil ( $$$,$$$,$$$,$$$ ) ??? !!! ??? !!!

*Somalia - NOT a state of the US, but WTF, let's invade it (if there's Oil)

*Terrorists - "One man's freedom fighter, is another man's terrorist" (Die Another Day - James Bond).

Pratt prosecution a 'vendetta': court

Lawyers for Richard Pratt have demanded consumer watchdog boss Graeme Samuel be called before court to explain his "personal vendetta" against the cardboard king.

Robert Richter QC on Tuesday accused Mr Samuel, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) chairman, of conducing a vendetta by pushing for Pratt to be criminally prosecuted.

Mr Richter demanded that prosecutors call Mr Samuel to a pre-trial hearing at the Federal Court to explain why he wanted the Visy Industries chairman prosecuted.

His comments drew an angry response from prosecutor Mark Dean SC who said it was not the job of the prosecution to call witnesses to satisfy Mr Richter's "lust and baseless conspiracy theories".

The fiery exchange came on day seven of the pre-trial Federal Court hearing to determine what evidence can be used in a criminal prosecution of Pratt, who is charged with misleading the ACCC.

Mr Richter asked why Mr Samuel backed down from an agreement made last year with Pratt in which they agreed a statement of facts used in a civil prosecution could not be used in any other proceeding.

"Mr Samuel is the only one who can give an explanation of what now appears to be a personal vendetta," he said.

"The application is that if my learned friends refuse to call Mr Samuel, we say your honour can call Mr Samuel.

"Could I foreshadow it will be our submission that this has been a shabby and deceitful case."

Mr Richter invited Justice Donnell Ryan to "draw inferences" against the prosecution if Mr Samuel was not called.

Justice Ryan said he would not be calling Mr Samuel to give evidence.

Prosecutor Mark Dean SC said the decision to prosecute Pratt came from members of the commission.

"It is not our job to serve up Mr Samuel to satisfy Mr Richter's lust and baseless conspiracy theories," Mr Dean said.

"There is no suggestion that supports the argument that after that point Mr Samuel actively drove the matter himself."

It is alleged Pratt misled the ACCC at a hearing in 2005 when he denied a conversation he allegedly had about price fixing with Amcor chief executive Russell Jones in 2001.

The hearing continues on Wednesday.

17 Dec 2008

In true spirit of Dr. Seuss : The Pratt that shat in the hat !

Quite simple: Corporate Fraud, BUSTED !!

Why: Not so quite simple.

"personal vendetta" - In the words of Pauline Hanson "Please Explain".

Maybe he did not listen to his colleagues from the "Buffalo Club" (the Flintstones)

* Buffalo Club - no women, were they Gay Satanists ?? !! ?? Surely they did not just go bowling.

Victoria Multicultural Awards : Discriminatory

On Tuesday, 16th of December, 2008 at Government House in Melbourne, an Awards ceremony was held in recognition of members of the community who work tirelessly within the vast multicultural society.

Such a great event, naturally requires a prospectus/booklet to be published promoting such an event. In this booklet there is no mention of the names of any of the key politicians who attended. a disgrace considering the profile of the event.

What is really more concerning is the policies the individual multicultural groups have to adhere to in order to gain "government grants". A directive has been given by the various Melbourne's City Councils, that a multicultural group will receive government funds IF it organises events that include the Muslim Community.

Clearly discriminatory / racist towards other sections of the community. Nothing new really here. A standard tactic employed by bureaucrats, kosher on the outside....

Only not so long ago the government officially employed a "White Australia" policy (maybe Baz Luhrmann should make a film ( mockumentary) about this too ?? !! ?? See earlier post ), maybe something the government would say "it never happened". These people are still in politics today.

We all know how racial intolerance is politically incorrect.

Luhrmann's Australia a 'disaster': Greer

Feminist Germaine Greer has savaged Baz Luhrmann's outback epic Australia, branding it a "disaster".

Joining a chorus of critics who have panned the movie, starring Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman, Greer picks apart its storyline and accuses Luhrmann of glossing over the exploitation of Aboriginal workers.

She describes the film as a "fraudulent and misleading fantasy" designed to promote the federal government's policy of reconciliation.

Writing in Britain's Guardian newspaper, Greer picks apart the film's plot and points out what she claims are several historical inaccuracies about how Aborigines were treated in 1939, when the film was set.

"The scale of the disaster that is Baz Luhrmann's Australia is gradually becoming apparent," Greer wrote in The Guardian newspaper.

Greer likens the love story between Jackman and Kidman's characters to one out of a Mills & Boon romance novel and describe's the film's plot as "fatuous".

On the film's Aboriginal characters, Greer says the film's "greatest asset" is Brandon Walters, a 12-year-old Aboriginal boy who plays Nullah.

However, she describes as "unforgivable" Luhrmann's decision to have Nullah speak "in a cutesified stage version of pidgin".

Greer accuses Luhrmann of using acclaimed Aboriginal actor David Gulpilil's character King George as "a cigar-store Indian, standing on one leg, the other foot propped up against his knee, silhouetted against the skyline, spar and spear-thrower in hand".

"To the few viewers who will know that this motif has been used repeatedly as a trademark, it does seem that Luhrmann is making a tasteless joke," she said.

Greer also criticises Luhrmann for not choosing to depict how Aboriginal workers on the vast outback cattle property where the film is set would have lived in a collection of "filthy" humpies without being paid any money for their work.

17 Dec 2008.

Only not so long ago, the Anglo Colonists would go out in the mornings to "shoot their quota" of aboriginals. That is part of the REAL history of Australia, just like the Stolen Generations is as well.

One of the greatest problems, is that rubbish like this may be taught in schools in later years as an accurate description of events.

Students to be taught there isn't a God

Victorian state primary school students will soon be able to take religious education classes which teach there is no evidence God exists.

The Humanist Society of Victoria has developed a curriculum for primary pupils that the state government accreditation body says it intends to approve, The Sunday Age newspaper reported.

Accredited volunteers will be able to teach their philosophy in the class time allotted for religious instruction, the newspaper said.

As with lessons delivered by faith groups, parents will be able to request that their children do not participate.

"Atheistical parents will be pleased to hear that humanistic courses of ethics will soon be available in some state schools," Victorian Humanist Society president Stephen Stuart said.

The society does not consider itself to be a religious organisation and believes ethics have "no necessary connection with religion".

Humanists believe people are responsible for their own destiny and reject the notion of a supernatural force or God.

Story : ninemsn 14 Dec 2008

Illustration (corpau) : http://www.pixelwiz.net/illustration/beelzebub.jpeg

Since there is no positive then there is no need for the negative.

Looks like good ol' Beelzebub may have to join the unemployment queue.

Pity for all the participants of BOHEMIAN GROVE*. Where will they go ?? !! ??

Maybe out of politics and into the schools for the masses of Victoria.

*Bohemian Grove : Google Video, Infowars

Top investors 'duped in pyramid scheme'

New York broker Bernard Madoff's alleged giant pyramid scheme duped some of the world's smartest investors, reports have suggested, adding to questions about why the scam wasn't uncovered earlier.

Evidence emerged that Madoff's alleged multi-billion-dollar fraud stretched from Tokyo to Europe to top US investors, all of them apparently unaware until the broker's arrest last Thursday that they were being conned.

Prosecutors allege that Madoff, a decades-long veteran of Wall Street and pillar of the US financial community, confessed to losing at least $75 billion in the so-called Ponzi scheme, or pyramid fraud.

US newspapers detailed how Madoff, 70, traded on his impeccable reputation and access to exclusive country clubs to cultivate A-list investment clients including big banks, hedge funds and individuals.

The Securities and Exchange Commission alleges he delivered consistently strong returns by secretly using the principal from new investors to pay out to other investors.

As long as he could attract new investors the alleged scheme worked.

The plot appears to have unraveled when clients asked to withdraw their principal — as they have been doing from hedge funds worldwide — only to discover that Madoff's seemingly brimming coffers were empty.

According to The Wall Street Journal, investors facing losses include French bank BNP Paribas, Tokyo-based Nomura Holdings and Zurich's Neue Privat Bank.

Spanish newspapers reported that a fund run by leading bank Santander was heavily exposed and that investors in Spain risk losing some $4.5 billion.

Swiss bankers face losses of up to $7.5 billion, Geneva's Le Temps newspaper said.

The report said that Union Bancaire Privee, a major asset management institution specializing in hedge funds, could be exposed to the tune of $1.5 billion.

UBP refused to comment on the report, which said that 90 percent of fund management companies operating in Geneva invested in Madoff products.

Top-drawer US investors who were taken in included the former owner of the Philadelphia Eagles American football team Norman Braman, according to news reports.

Hedge funds are likely to take an especially big hit because Madoff was handling money for several companies raising money for such funds, the Journal said.

"I'm wiped out," the Journal quoted Sandra Manzke, chairman of one such company, Maxam Capital Management, as saying after reporting $425 million in losses.

The New York Times reported that a hedge fund advisory firm, Fairfield Greenwich Group, had invested $11 billion with Madoff.

As federal investigators poured over the books at Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities LLC, the Times highlighted the apparent lack of oversight through the years of what appears set to be Wall Street's record-sized fraud.

Despite Madoff's amazingly high and consistent returns and the fact that a relatively unknown accounting firm was doing his audits, the Securities and Exchange Commission "appears to have been completely surprised,"(RUBBISH!!!) the Times wrote.

"Despite these and other red flags, hedge fund companies kept promoting Mr Madoff's funds to other funds and individuals," the Times wrote.

Among those recruiting investors on Madoff's behalf, the Times reported, were Japan's Nomura.

The debacle has "swept up some of the most prominent and wealthy Americans, along with many people who thought they were embarking on a comfortable retirement and have now been left destitute," the Journal quoted a lawyer for another victim, Milberg LLP, as saying.

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14 Dec 2008

No ONE person can pull of a heist of this proportion. The General Media makes out like he was acting alone. He is the one that takes the WRAP. The truth of the matter is that others can be implicated, but it is NOT of ANY BENEFIT for them to be named.

Australia's Greatest Rip-offs (SKASE, BOND, HENRY KAYE, RENE RIVKIN) did NOT ACT ALONE (BANKERS, LAWYERS, REALTORS, ETC were also involved).
The Law ULTIMATELY supported them in their actions.