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"The people have re-elected me to continue the job I was doing. |
"Initially I was not going to stand for council, but people asked me to stay and that's what I'll do. |
"I guess Steve [Chadwick] is looking forward to it as much as I am and I'll be very interested in seeing how she hands out portfolios and who will chair the committees." |
Mr Kent said he would be concentrating on financial issues, the library and health hub project and would "give it everything I have". |
While every other socialist organisation in Britain is focusing on pressurizing Mr Blair to own up to the lies upon which we went to war, the Worker-communist Party of Iran (WPI), whose mouthpiece is Maryam Namazie, remains obsessed with the proposal to ban hejab in French schools, championing it as the best thing for ... |
Sanctimonious though she may sound, it's worth paying attention to the organisation she represents so that after any US-led invasion of Iran, we know outside whose office to demand our pay cheques. |
The language of WPI's communications mirrors the worst of White House-friendly punditry. |
On the question of banning headscarves in schools, if you're not with Namazie, you're against her and one of “them”: the Taliban, Khamenei and Ziba Mirhosseini. |
Namazie might care to ask the Sikh men who were mistaken for Muslims by deranged Americans in September 2001 what Islamophobia means; or the mini-cab driver who was attacked by racists in London that month. |
Next time you see a veil-clad pushing pram down street, remember she is in fact declaring jihad. |
Barely able to conceal its hatred for all things Islamic, the WPI is even rumoured to have considered promoting Zionism as the cure to Iran's political ills. |
It should be noted, however, that the WPI has shown admirable dedication to defending the rights of refugees internationally as well as campaigning against cases of stoning and other death sentences dished out by the Islamic gangsters in Iran, while consistently highlighting the plight of the country's prisoners o... |
This good work, however, risks being undermined by the failure of the WPI to see Khamenei as no less cute than Sharon and Bush. |
Were Namazie & Co to direct as much venom at the US and Israel as they do towards what they rightly describe as “brutal” Iran, they might win support among second-generation Iranians in the West and lead the way to a progressive socialist party rather than a reactionary one, happy in bed with capitalist states. |
See how Guatemala compares to another country using any of the measures in the Index. |
Read more about Guatemala Economy. See more from the 2019 Index. |
Guatemala’s economic freedom score is 62.6, making its economy the 77th freest in the 2019 Index. Its overall score has decreased by 0.8 point, with declines in trade freedom and business freedom outweighing slight improvements in fiscal health and government spending. Guatemala is ranked 16th among 32 countries in the... |
Although the government has pursued orthodox economic policies to support growth while preserving macroeconomic stability, economic development is hindered by a low-skilled workforce, widespread corruption, a weak institutional framework, poor energy infrastructure, and fiscal constraints. These major challenges contin... |
Read more about Guatemala Economy. |
After a multidecade guerrilla war that killed more than 200,000 ended in 1996, macroeconomic and political reforms attracted foreign investment in Guatemala. Instability spiked anew in 2015, however, when rightist President Otto Pérez Molina became embroiled in a corruption scandal. He was removed from office and later... |
Property rights are defined in statutes, but protecting them is difficult. When rightful ownership is in dispute, it can be almost impossible to obtain and subsequently enforce eviction notices. The judiciary is hobbled by corruption, inefficiency, capacity shortages, and the intimidation of judges and prosecutors. Wid... |
The top individual income and corporate tax rates are 31 percent. Other taxes include value-added and real estate taxes. The overall tax burden equals 12.6 percent of total domestic income. Over the past three years, government spending has amounted to 12.1 percent of the country’s output (GDP), and budget deficits hav... |
Bureaucratic hurdles, including lengthy processes for launching a business and obtaining necessary permits, continue to undermine overall business freedom. High-level corruption remains a problem. Outmoded labor regulations are rigid. A large portion of the workforce is employed in the informal sector. The state mainta... |
The combined value of exports and imports is equal to 45.7 percent of GDP. The average applied tariff rate is 1.4 percent. As of June 30, 2018, according to the WTO, Guatemala had 30 nontariff measures in force. The inefficient judicial and regulatory systems discourage investment. The foreign bank presence is small. A... |
However, Beckford-Johnson also informed that the school's academic performance is very good. |
“Academically, we are doing well. We strive for excellence and are moving to perfection, although that is difficult to do. Therefore, we would really appreciate some assistance in the area of sports development at our school,”she stressed. |
The school is one of 14 institutions which are part of the Pledge2Build campaign, which was developed to raise funds for capital improvement of early childhood and primary institutions across Jamaica. The campaign seeks to ensure that the schools are safe and provide children with a conducive learning environment. |
The Pledge2Build campaign is located on the ISupportJamaica website, a crowdfunding platform which is an initiative of The Jamaica National Group. The website provides a simple, creative and secure avenue for Jamaicans residing locally and overseas, along with friends of Jamaica, to provide financial support to micro-e... |
Phillip Lindsey, ISupportJamaica operations officer at JNGroup Marketing, advised that the online platform is secure, convenient and easy to use. |
“Persons can donate to the campaign by visiting the ISupport Jamaica platform at www.isupportjamaica.com and click on the Bethel Primary & Junior School High School project, and then click the 'Fund Project' button,” he explained. |
“We would be grateful to receive assistance to ensure that our students can learn different sporting skills, because we are about holistic learning at this institution,” said Beckford-Johnson. |
It might help shorten lines at some polling places on Election Day — Government Accountability Board Director Kevin Kennedy says statewide, approximately 250,000 absentee ballots had been cast as of Thursday afternoon. "Ideally, the absentee ballot increase will shorten the lines," Kennedy says. "The estimate for turno... |
Kennedy says between eleven and twelve percent of eligible voters cast absentee ballots in 2004. If you can't do that this year, he has some advice on the best times to vote on Tuesday. "Try to vote after 8:30 and before 4:30. That would be your ideal time to get into the polling place." |
Kennedy says there are now 3.5 million voters in the statewide registration system, and he expects about seventy percent of Wisconsin's voting age population will head to the polls on Election Day. Despite the best efforts of state and local officials, Kennedy says wait times of up to an hour are likely at many lo... |
World leaders have started arriving in Argentina for the G20 summit. Trade is set to dominate the agenda with expectations that the US and Chinese presidents will strike a truce in the trade battle. Meanwhile, the summit's host Argentina is facing a deepening economic crisis. With inflation expected to hit 50 percent t... |
Crude oil marketing firm Republic Gathering & Marketing has signed a long-term deal with Palletized Trucking to move up to 600,000 barrels a month of crude oil from Eagle Ford wells in South Texas to pipelines. |
The companies, both based in Houston, aim to bridge the gap between the rapid pace of new drilling and production in the shale play and the build-out of pipeline infrastructure to get the oil to market. |
“The majority of the 600,000 barrels we expect to recover from the site by the end of this year are already spoken for and we needed to secure a way of getting this crude to market that we felt would be consistently reliable,” said Daniel Layton, CEO of Layton Corp., which owns Republic. |
Hundreds of new wells are being drilled in the Eagle Ford shale this year as the high oil and natural gas liquids levels in much of the play make it attractive to E&P firms in light of high oil prices. While it’s in an area that has had oil and gas production in decades past, the new pace of drilling and production is ... |
A number of new pipelines are being built or expanded in the area by companies including Plains, Kinder Morgan, Enterprise Products Partners and Harvest. But that work can’t keep up with the new exploration, thus the need for tankers. |
Even once the pipelines are in place to carry product to refineries and other end users, there will still be some need for Palletized tankers, said Layton. |
“In many cases you will still have to get the oil to injection stations,” he said, since the volume of crude and NGLs from many wells over time won’t be enough to justify building out gathering pipelines. |
The deal between Republic and Palletized uses existing tanker trucks as well as the expansion of the tanker fleet, with roughly one new truck arriving per week, Layton said. Each truck can carry about 175 barrels. Depending on the distances traveled, the trucks make three to four deliveries per day, working around the ... |
Palletized is finishing a new trucking yard to serve the Eagle Ford region, Layton said, while his firm is considering investing in storage or other midstream assets to support growth in the area. |
In addition to Republic, Layton has invested in Platinum Energy, an oil field services firm involved in pressure pumping services like those use in hydraulic fracturing. |
Israeli court cites Omar Shakir's alleged support for boycotts of Israel, orders him to leave the country by May 1. |
Human Rights Watch (HRW) says it will appeal to the Israeli Supreme Court after judges in Jerusalem upheld a government order to deport one of its staff members, citing his alleged ongoing support of boycotts of Israel. |
The Jerusalem District Court on Tuesday rejected a petition by Omar Shakir, HRW's local director, to remain in Israel and ordered him to leave the country by May 1. |
In 2017, the Israeli government enacted a law barring entry to any foreigner who "knowingly issues a public call for boycotting Israel". Tuesday's ruling was the first time the law was applied to someone already residing in the country. |
Shakir, a US citizen, has worked as HRW's Israel and Palestine director since October 2016. |
Israel's Interior Minister Arye Dery ordered Shakir's deportation in May 2018, calling him a "boycott activist". |
The court said that Shakir "continues his actions publicly to advance a boycott against Israel, but it's not on the stages at conferences or in university panels, rather through disseminating his calls to advance boycott primarily through his Twitter account and by other means". |
It cited as an example Shakir's support on Twitter for Airbnb's decision to remove postings from Israel's settlements in the occupied West Bank, which are considered illegal under international law. The online home-sharing platform later backtracked on that decision. |
In a video message posted online, Shakir called the court's decision "shocking" and said its implications go "to the heart of the spaces for human rights today." |
HRW said the Israeli government's decision in May last year to deport Shakir was based on a dossier it compiled on his activism dating to 2006, a decade before he began covering Israel and Palestine for the organisation. |
In a statement after the court's decision on Tuesday, HRW said neither it nor Shakir promote Israel boycotts, but call for companies to cease operations in illegal West Bank settlements because they "inherently benefit from and contribute to serious violations of international humanitarian law". |
The ruling was "new and dangerous interpretation" of the 2017 law, and it "threatens the ability of all Human Rights Watch staff members to access both Israel and the West Bank", the US-based rights group said, adding that it would seek an injunction allowing Shakir to remain in the country until the appeal was heard. |
"The decision sends the chilling message that those who criticise the involvement of businesses in serious abuses in Israeli settlements risk being barred from Israel and the Israeli-occupied West Bank," said Tom Porteous, HRW's deputy programme director. |
Michael Sfard, Shakir's lawyer, was quoted as saying by Israeli daily Haaretz that the court's ruling "endangers the activities of all the international human rights organisations in Israel and in the occupied territories. |
"In the decision to allow the deportation of a defender of human rights because of his activity in defence of the victims of human rights violations, the court has toed the line with a regime that seeks to silence criticism even at the cost of infringing on society’s most important liberties." |
In Afrikaans the phrase “tyd om te trek” means “time to head out,” recalling the Great Trek of the mid-nineteenth century that ended with Afrikaner farmers wresting from indigenous peoples the same mineral-rich tracts of the Transvaal that would by the end of the century be so hotly coveted by British empire-builders. ... |
Paulus Kruger, president of the South African Republic during the 1899-1902 war. |
Alfred Milner, wartime Governor of the Cape Colony and British High Commissioner for Southern Africa; Kruger’s greatest foe. |
You see, we are currently in the midst of finals week at William and Mary, and as I write this seniors across campus are preparing for their thesis defenses. Some have already gone through the ordeal and have taken to social networking to announce their successes, emphasizing in equal measure both the exhilaration of a... |
As I’ve explained in various funding applications this semester, my interest in southern Africa and its history has been growing since at least 2010, when I inadvertently stumbled upon an internet video of a white German-speaking Namibian rapping about his hometown. I had no idea there were German-speakers left in Nami... |
Even now this project has been long in incubation. I remember vividly last year around this time trying to think of an honors topic that would incorporate southern Africa without necessitating the expensive outlay of a trip there. It was then that I first struck upon the South African War and its relation to American i... |
“It may come as a surprise to you that South Africa was not always the raceless, classless utopia you see in beer adverts. Once upon a time this was a dark and dangerous place, beset by racism and violence. Like America, but with elephants.” These are the sarcastic words of the South African comedic duo of Nik Rabinowi... |
Though largely ignored by most Americans through most of the nineteenth century, the wars and crises which wracked southern Africa in the last quarter of the century (culminating in the 1899-1902 Anglo-Boer or South African War, both imperfect names) inspired many Americans to take notice, for just as southern Africa s... |
Robin this is exciting stuff! I’m going to have to read the rest of your posts when I have time and I’m looking forward to the conclusion of your research! What you’re looking at seems very much akin to the types of things I studied as a Women’s Studies / Hispanic Studies major at the college—the ways the United States... |
Old-fashioned dude ranches are attracting a new breed of city slickers looking to unplug. |
Old-fashioned dude ranches are attracting a new breed of city slickers looking to unplug from modern life, says Gavin Ehringer, author of 100 Best Guest Ranch Vacations in North America (GPP Travel, $17.95). But now they've expanded their offerings. "Common activities include yoga and fitness classes, mountain biking, ... |
HARARE – Zanu PF says it has received the Zimbabwe National Liberation War Veterans Association (ZNLWVA) petition to strip the naming of Harare’s airport after former president Robert Mugabe. |
Party national chairperson, Oppah Muchinguri Kashiri said she is in support of the removal of the name as Mugabe’s behaviour speaks of a man who has turned against the ethos and values embodied in the Zanu PF party. |
Muchinguri Kashiri said the war veterans are justified to feel betrayed by Mugabe and their petition is valid. |
She also castigated the actions taken by Mugabe when he directed the harassment of war veterans in 2016. |
“It is so disturbing to hear that Mugabe, whom we worked with for over 30 years, is the one who is now going the opposite way. If i knew that Mugabe is of such character, I was not going to join the war. He made the innocent souls to die for nothing,” said Muchinguri Kashiri. |
Workers put finishing touches on the new sign at Zimbabwe’s main international airport in Harare renamed after Zimbabwean President Robert Gabriel Mugabe on November 9, 2017 in Harare, Zimbabwe. |
Speaking at the same occasion, ZNLWVA Secretary General, Victor Matemadanda said apart from going ahead calling for the effecting of a name change of the Robert Gabriel Mugabe International Airport to another hero with sound war credentials, the war veterans want some farms taken from Mugabe since the law of the land c... |
“Mugabe is a sellout and he should not continue to benefit from the fruits of the land. We are going to take some farms he has. How can one person have more than 21 farms,” he said. |
Muchinguri Kashiri also thanked the liberation war veterans for supporting President Emmerson Mnangagwa before, during and after the just ended harmonised elections. |
Photo by Daniel Jack Lyons. |
At Smith College, the prestigious all-women’s college in Massachusetts, Desiree Akhavan was a bit of a loner. She thought that after spending her early school years either on a bus traveling from her Rockland County home to school in the Bronx or in drama club, she’d have grown out of her awkward self—and out of her no... |
This month, the Brooklyn-based filmmaker saw her first feature, Appropriate Behavior, hit the theaters and V.O.D. after a Sundance premiere last year. Akhavan wrote, directed, and stars in the film, a breakup rom-com about a bisexual, Iranian-American Brooklynite who grapples with a kind of otherness Akhavan is acutely... |
Unlike the woman in the film—who lives with her girlfriend but tells her parents they’re just roommates and best friends—Akhavan never hid sexuality. She did have to come out in phases, a series of conversations, but Akhavan fell in love with a woman and she knew then that she needed to come out fully as a bisexual. |
Akhavan believes that people who have gone through a revolution, people that have lost family, friends, everything material they had and started another life from scratch, understand what it means to let go of expectations and re-learn how to be and who to be. |
It turns out, Akhavan was entitled to be a filmmaker as well as gay, and the story of a woman struggling to be a good Persian daughter, a politically correct bisexual, and hip Brooklynite is a surprisingly relatable one for a wide variety of audiences. That’s no easy feat to accomplish, especially in a first feature fi... |
Besides having a guest spot on this season of HBO's Girls, Akhavan is developing a television series—a bisexual dating comedy that she workshopped at Sundance’s inaugural Episodic Story Lab this past fall. |
Jessica and Ashlee Simpson could pass for twins! |
The sisters stepped out together at Macy's South Coast Plaza while support their joint venture, Jessica Simpson Girls collection, in Costa Mesa, Calif. Saturday. |
Six months after welcoming daughter Maxwell with fiance Eric Johnson, Jessica, 32, flaunted her slim figure in a blue blouse and black pants for photographers. Ashlee, 28, also a mother to son Bronx, almost 4, proudly posed next to her big sis and showed off their matching blonde 'dos. See more photos of the Simps... |
In late October, Jessica told Us Weekly she's already lost 60 of the 70 pounds she gained during pregnancy with the help of Weight Watchers PointsPlus program and four-times-a-week workout sessions with celebrity trailer Harley Pasternak. |
"I feel positive about how I've done so far and really good about the goals I have set," she told Us. |
"Most people can tell a difference every time they see me," Jessica said, "which lets me know I'm making progress." |
Jessica and Ashlee's appearance Saturday was the first time the sisters have reunited in public since their parents decided to end their marriage. Joe and Tina Simpson confirmed to Us on Oct. 24 that they filed for divorce late September after 34 years of marriage. |
"It is an amicable split and there is no third party involved. Any other related allegations are completely false," a family rep told Us. "The family appreciates your respect for their privacy at this time." |
Computex Taipei 2009: While we met with GIGABYTE at their suite at Taipei 101, I couldn't help but take a peek at their booth down in hall 1 which had quite a bit on display, a lot of which we did see at their suite as well. |
However, what wasn't on display there was their range of netbooks that are now starting to pop up on the market; all of which are based around the Atom Processor. |
The biggest one there was the Touchnote T1028. This baby not only features an Atom N270 CPU with 1GB RAM, but it also has the ability to resemble a 10" Tablet PC with a touch screen. |
The screen can rotate completely around allowing for an even more compact Netbook. Personally this would be great for the project I currently have in mind. |
GIGABYTE were also showing off the Atom based mini-ITX motherboard supporting the N270 CPU, SO-DIMM memory slot, CF card reader on the IDE bus while staying completely silent with no fans. |
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