December 16, 2004

I’m about to do that stereotype blogger thing of doing an unfocused round-up post for want of inspiration, so please bear with me. In the Ukraine, for example, more details are out from AP (via Neeka) about the poisoning of Viktor Yushchenko. Apparently, he has the second highest concentration of dioxin ever recorded in a…

Caller to BBC Radio 5 discussion on today’s court ruling against the indefinite incarceration of terrorist suspects in Belmarsh: “I believe in the majority, not the individual!” It was almost enough to make me sympathetic towards Patrick Mercer, the Tory who is luckless enough to be “shadow secretary of state for homeland security” – that…

Yesterday’s Times carried this article concerning binge drinking. Bizarrely, the print version of this contained a large pull-quote about half-way down the story which read “Teenage drinking is out of control – ministers have been all talk” Now, your keen and agile mind will recognise the “all talk” bit as a major Conservative talking point.…

The US Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, one of the various US agencies involved in policing sanctions, terrorist finance and dirty money, is being sued by the US committee of PEN and a variety of academic organisations over regulations that (they claim) prevent books originating in countries the US maintains sanctions on being published…