Headlines – Page 17 – The Speaker News Journal

First Website Ever Made in US Brought to Light in Digital Archaeology Find

December 13, 2014November 11, 2014 by Andrew Stern

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Digital archaeology that has revealed the earliest signs of web-life in America. Stanford Libraries has brought to light the first websites ever uploaded in the US–genealogically part Euro-descendant, part US original. The pages are now available for browsing, and Stanford Wayback, a customized platform for accessing archived web assets, provides a third dimension for viewing the internet, allowing users to see and navigate the web as it has changed over time and to look back in time at code written by the earliest “WWW Wizards.”

“A handful of staff at SLAC who worked on the early web fortuitously saved the files, along with their timestamps,” said Nicholas Taylor, web archiving service manager for Stanford Libraries.

The earliest site dates back to Dec. 6, 1991–a month in which no-fly zones were being set up in Iraq after the Gulf War, the Ukrainian people voted for independence from the Soviet Union and the Cold War ended, Hezbollite (Shiite Muslim) militants released their last US hostages, and Michael Jackson and Whitney Houston won at the 2nd annual Billboard Music Awards.

The sites were installed on the first server outside of Europe, which was installed by physicist Paul Kunz between Dec. 6 and Dec. 12.

Taylor told The Speaker how in launching the Stanford Web Archive Portal, once they learned of the existence of the earliest US websites, this seemed the most intriguing choice.

“A major focus for Stanford University Libraries’ web archiving effort is preserving Stanford University’s institutional legacy. We thought that the SLAC earliest websites would be the most broadly interesting historical web content related to the University with which to launch the Stanford Web Archive Portal. That is to say, we didn’t explicitly set out to track down the oldest US website, per se, but became quickly interested once we learned about it.”

The lineage of the earliest US sites is a part European descendant-part original strain, Taylor told us.

“They’re necessarily derivative, in some sense; what made the Web was adherence to a common set of conventions (e.g., the syntax for a hyperlink). The SLAC ‘WWW Wizards’ built the first US website based upon the conventions formulated by Tim Berners-Lee, the creator of the world’s first website at CERN. In another sense, the first U.S. website was entirely home-grown, built foremost to serve the research needs of the SLAC research community.”

Taylor elaborated on this piece of digital archaeology was undertaken.

“You might say that there were two major digital archaeology efforts. One, SLAC’s previous recovery and preservation of the original website files, and two, Stanford University Libraries’ much subsequent restoration of access to the websites in their original temporal context, via the the Stanford Web Archive Portal.

We have the early sites back online today because of SLAC staff foresight.

“Essentially, SLAC staff that were involved with the early websites and, later, staff in the SLAC Archives and History Office had the wherewithal to retrieve, set aside, and document the files constituting the earliest websites,” said Taylor.

The sites were saved with their timesstamps, which are associated with the first version of a website, as well as subsequent versions.

“The original timestamps were preserved as part of the SLAC backup system for those servers and are a critical piece of context in understanding the restored content.

“We’re accustomed to thinking about the Web in two dimensions–i.e., as a flat plane that we navigate spatially. Web archives and the Memento protocol, in particular, offer the prospect of adding a third dimension to the Web–allowing users to see how it has changed over time and seamlessly navigate to archived versions of resources that have since disappeared.”

Taylor commented on the nature of investigating the origins of the digital realm, and noted that we are close enough in time to still touch its ancestry.

“A last note about ‘digital archaeology,'” said Taylor, “unlike much archaeology, our digital archaeology effort had the benefit of being able to confer directly with the individuals who created these artifacts.”

Taylor encouraged everyone to support and celebrate the efforts of this “memory institution,” and take a look at our digital past in the artifacts they have recently preserved.

Stanford Wayback is part of the Libraries’ web archiving initiative, which aims to collect, preserve and provide access to web content that is at risk of being updated, replaced or lost.

By Andy Stern

“Inside I See” – Photography of the Blind

November 25, 2014November 11, 2014 by Sergei Stroitelev

Inside I See - Photography by Blind People

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The senses of the blind are beautifully and intriguingly captured in this series of photos taken by sightless Nepalese youths. Photo documentarian Sergey Stroitelev has created a photo project in Kathmandu unlike any other. The project was undertaken to give a new experience both to blind people, who seldom are asked to portray the visual world to sighted people, and to all the rest of us, here given a rare opportunity to appreciate the perspective of the blind–and to appreciate the gifts we have.

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The project was completed in late summer in Kathmandu, the capital of Nepal, in co-operation with the Association for Blind People. It involved 12 blind/partially sighted young people residing in the city.

The idea of the project was to give single-use cameras to the city’s youth and ask them to take pictures of the things and people they wanted to see but could not because of their blindness. I always believed that the blind people have increased sensitivity to the environment around them and a rich inner world. By the means of photography I wanted to prove it.

I wanted participants to start feeling more confident in the things they were doing after taking part in this project. I was also sure that it was not necessary to have perfect vision to make good photographs, and to display this fact was the other aim of the initiative.

During the first meeting with the participants I distributed the cameras and conducted a small orientation class in order to explain to them how to use the cameras. I gave the young people a week to finish their rolls. After that, we met again and had a discussion about the experience they had. I collected the cameras for to develop the film. We all waited for the results with great impatience.

After four days of I finally got the images and I was astonished by them. The pictures of the participants displayed very simple things in quite an artistic manner–sky, trees, water, cityscapes, friends and family members–the things sighted people see every single day. However, we do not even think about the fact that some people are deprived of this opportunity. The images I had were full of sense and feeling.

Sometimes blind people are not understood by the sighted part of society, and are even discriminated against by it. The result of the project–brilliant images by the participants–should stand as testament that despite a disability to see, blind people are very sensitive and smart. They need support and assistance from the community to develop the talents they have. I also hope that after seeing the images sighted people will understand that they have a gift–to see–and they must cherish it.

Sergei Stroitelev was born in 1985 in Leningrad, Russia. He a documentary photographer working on long-term photography projects with a particular interest in human rights issues in Russia and Asia.

He is a graduate of Saint Petersburg School of Photojournalism, and is the winner of the a “Golden Mark” award for best diploma project for his work on the Maidan revolution in Ukraine, where he spent two months documenting the events.

He has also been awarded prizes including winner of Young Photographers of Russia Photofestival 2014 for the series of pictures from Maidan “Flashes,” winner of Saint-Petersburg Photofestival 2014 for a series of pictures from Maidan “Flashes,” winner of Fotoevolution Festival 2013 (Kostroma, Russia) in the “Reportage” category, finalist of Miami Street Photography Festival 2013, second place at RusArtPhoto Festial 2013 (Suzdal’, Russia) in the “Portrait” category, and third place at Visible Features of the Era Photofestival 2013 in the “Life as an overcoming” category.

He has collaborated with numerous magazines including Life Force, VICE, Wall Street International magazine, Around the World, Russian Reporter, Neva Times, Lenta.ru, Colta.ru.

“I believe that photography can change the world for the best. By making documentary projects a photographer can raise awareness about social problems all around the world, accordingly giving knowledge to the individuals who are willing to help but do not know anything about particular issues. In this way we can together fight diseases, poverty and violence.”

– Sergey Stroitelev

By Sergey Stroitelev

Life From Death: Ecologists Demonstrate Species Manipulation With “Less is More” Approach

November 11, 2014November 11, 2014 by The Speaker Editors

Life From Death: Ecologist Demonstrate Species Manipulation With "Less is More" Approach

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New understanding has been gained into how densities within populations can affect outcomes for the species as a whole. Answers to how species populations can be manipulated to increase and properly manage fish yields, better eliminate unwanted pests, and other species-wide effects have been demonstrated by Princeton University researcher Anieke van Leeuwen and two European colleagues who asked, “Can less really be more?”

“When we think about dynamics in ecological systems, either in one population or through interactions between populations (for example predator-prey dynamics or competition) or in entire ecosystems (food webs), we have to consider the fact that individual organisms differ within a population (or stock or species),” Dr Anieke van Leeuwen, postdoctoral research associate at Princeton University’s Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and one of the three authors of the report, told The Speaker.

There was a significant benefit to understanding how differences among individuals within a species population affect outcomes for the whole, van Leeuwen told us.

“There are differences in sizes, and individuals need to grow and develop, which costs energy. In other words, we cannot think in terms of numbers of individuals (and therewith average all biological characteristics, such as size, over all individuals). We will have to count the biomass per individual organism and account for the energy that it takes to grow to that size and maintain that biomass.”

Van Leeuwen explained how this could be done.

“Consider a herring population that has grown to the maximum ‘capacity’ of its resource environment. In such a setting we would predict that all individuals in the population experience harsh competition for resources, resulting in slow growth and a population size-distribution that is hump-shaped. Or in other words, the population is stunted.

“When we are interested in harvesting in particular the large individuals, the presence of such large, mature individuals could be boosted by some source of mortality on this herring population. Through increased mortality the intra-specific (i.e. intra-population) competition can be released, which would allow individuals in the population to attain higher growth rates and reach larger individual sizes. In the scenario accounting for some source of mortality (which may be imposed by fisheries or caused by predatory marine species, such as cod) the population size-distribution would become bimodal (at least to a much stronger extent than in the previous scenario) and large individuals are present (at all, or in higher densities than before).”

Van Leeuwen pointed to an earlier research paper, “How cod shapes its world,” which provided illustrations of the overcompensation phenomenon as well as the collapsing pattern that can result from overfishing in a more complex species system. In this research, the scientists reviewed existing studies that showed positive population level impacts of mortality, and explained how this has been looked at in theoretical models: classically (i.e. mostly non-size-structured populations) vs when accounting for population size structure, and compared the essential assumptions and processes of such models with what is reported in empirical studies.

Logically extending their understanding, the researchers concluded that species could be decimated if imposed mortality surpassed a certain point.

“If fishing pressure in such a setting steadily increases, observations show and models predict that there is a maximum, above which the herring population collapses,” van Leeuwen explained. She offered an illustration from the world of art: Pieter Bruegel the Elder’s “Big Fish Eat Little Fish” (1557).

“It shows the importance of size-structure and differentiation so beautifully, while at the same time pointing out that humans are overexploiting natural systems,” commented van Leeuwen.

In seeking to understand species dynamics, many ecological models have ignored differences in body size in development while predicting that modest gains in total species numbers could be achieved by imposing mortality. Considering these theories, in addition to research that has shown that mortality of individuals from certain life stages or size classes can have a positive effect, the researchers concluded that the overlap of these data showed that it was a division along lines of developmental stages that was key to understanding mortality benefits.

“Only theory predicting the life stage specific positive mortality effects accounts for fundamental aspects of individuals,” the researchers found. “Mortality-induced density increases that are specific to life-history stage are common in nature.”

We asked van Leeuwen about whether their findings could be applied to human populations to understand the world’s various demographics. The comparison of humans to other animal species was complicated, she said, because human existence involves much more complicated social relationships than the animal settings in the study systems the researchers looked at allow for (for example, laboratory settings or the simplifying assumptions made in mathematical models).

“This question is extremely hard to answer from our context,” said van Leeuwen. “I think it is reasonable to say that in general human populations are limited in a different fashion or by different kinds of resources than the simplified ‘one-resource’ by which consumers are limited in the studies we refer to.

“Moreover, the structure in human populations is very much determined by certain social constructs and social configurations. These would influence populations to a large extent, while the research we review discounts any such social structure.”

Van Leeuwen offered an alternative starting point.

“I think with respect to potential applications for human interest, we should rather think about how the concept of culling has been known and used for ages in forestry and agriculture; and also in recreative or sports fisheries this is a familiar phenomenon.”

The report, “When less is more: positive population-level effects of mortality,” was completed by first author Arne Schröder, a postdoctoral research fellow at the Leibniz-Institute of Freshwater Ecology and Inland Fisheries in Berlin and first author, and Tom Cameron, a lecturer in aquatic community ecology at the University of Essex in the United Kingdom, in addition to van Leeuwen, and was supported by the Journal of Experimental Biology, the Swedish Research Council and the Leibniz-Institute of Freshwater Ecology and Inland Fisheries, the University of Leeds, the National Environment Research Council and the European Commission Intra-European Fellowship, and the National Science Foundation.

By Day Blakely Donaldson
Photos: the research team, Jørgen Schyberg, and The Speaker

Egypt’s Largest Terrorist Group Pledges Allegiance to Islamic State

November 18, 2014November 10, 2014 by The Speaker Editors

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Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis, Egypt’s most dangerous terrorist organisation, has pledged allegiance to the Islamic State via a Twitter account associated with the group, on Monday morning.

In an audio clip tweeted by @4Ansar_B_Almqds, the Islamist group based in Egypt’s Sinai peninsula expressed their support of IS leader Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi and the IS campaign to establish a hardline Sunni caliphate. The statement also encouraged Egyptians to take up arms against the country’s “unjust” government.

The clip continued: “Your unity is strength and your division is weakness… Determine your fate, unite among yourself, and support your [Islamic] State.”

Last week a statement surfaced online claiming that Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis (ABM) pledged their allegiance to IS but the group later rejected the veracity of the information, telling news agencies to “check the accuracy of their sources and to stick to ABM’s official statements”.

However, Monday’s statement is believed to be a genuine expression of affiliation to the IS, and was initially reported by Reuters.

Whilst Egyptian authorities believe communication and advice has exchanged between the two Islamist groups previously, this is the first formal declaration that the Egypt-based group subscribes to the same goals as IS and recognizes leader Al-Baghdadi as Caliph.

Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis has achieved notoriety in the country through terrorist tactics similar to those of the Islamic State. In August, the group released a video in which they beheaded four Bedouins from Sinai who they claimed were collaborating with the Israeli intelligence agency, Mossad.

For over a decade the mountainous region of Sinai has been the main hotbed for the country’s terrorist activities, an area where such groups are able to evade the Egyptian security forces.

However, since the ouster of Muslim Brotherhood President Mohammed Morsi in 2013, terrorist attacks throughout the country have dramatically spiked and President Sisi has said Egypt faces an “existential threat” from Islamist militants.

On Oct. 24 a suicide car bomb killed 31 soldiers and left scores wounded at a checkpoint near El-Arish, Sinai. On the same day gunmen shot an officer dead and wounded two soldiers at another checkpoint near the town.

Following the attacks, Sinai has been placed under a three-month state of emergency. President Sisi has also ordered the creation of a 500 meter buffer-zone along the Egyptian border with Gaza in an attempt to quash the illegal tunnel trading between Sinai and the Gaza Strip.

According to the Defense Ministry, the tunnels are an important method for “armed Takfiri groups to infiltrate Sinai to supply militants with arms, logistical assistance and shelter after staging their heinous attacks on the Egyptian army.”

Controversially, the Egyptian army gave over 1,100 families who lived within the buffer zone only 48 hours in order to evacuate their houses. North Sinai’s Governor Abdel Fattah Harhour has stated that every family will receive EGP300 (US$40) in housing allowance for three months, and further compensation will be given for demolished buildings. However, tribal leaders from the region have expressed their dissatisfaction with the sums offered.

Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis has condemned the evacuations and stated the group will “take revenge for the people.”

Following ABM’s pledge to IS, Interior ministry spokesman Hany Abdel Latif commented to AFP news agency that the news will not change the nature of the Egyptian state’s response to terrorist groups.

“They are just different names for the same terrorists,” Latif said.

By Emir Nader

Sources:

Ebola Survivors, Immune to the Disease, Sign Up to Fight Outbreak

November 23, 2014November 10, 2014 by Heidi Woolf

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One of the most powerful weapons in the ongoing fight against Ebola is considered to be Ebola survivors themselves, who carry antibodies in their blood. Survivors in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone are signing up to work in Ebola treatment units, care for children orphaned by Ebola, and provide counselling to Ebola victims. Their fight is not just against Ebola, however. It is also a fight against the powerful social stigma faced by survivors of the disease.

The outbreak has killed over 10,000 people in West Africa to date, and continues to expand, doubling every three weeks. One of the largest current challenges is that, although hundreds of millions of dollars have been pledged in aid from foreign sources, West African governments are losing the battle because of a shortage of front line health care workers.

Treatment units are being set up by various organizations to combat the disease. Among those volunteering to work at the units are Ebola survivors.

Survivors are believed to possess immunity to Ebola because of antibodies that exist in their blood.

Ordinary health care workers must protect themselves from contamination using heavy personal protective equipment, and cannot offer victims the same type of human contact survivors are capable of offering.

Survivors can also offer counsel.

“We share our own experience with those people, explaining that we were sick but now we have been cured,” said a Guinean high school teacher, Fanta Oulen Camara, who recovered from Ebola after a two week fight. “We give them hope.”

But the fight does not end for survivors when they recover from the disease. After Camara recovered from Ebola, she lost her job, friends stopped visiting, and her brother was told not to return to his office.

“Everyone has been facing stigma and rejection,” said a Guinean doctor, Oulare Bakar, who set up the survivors association three months after he beat Ebola. “We needed to send a message to the people about the epidemic and also the possibility to be cured.” The role of Ebola survivors in the Ebola fight also involves demystifying the disease, Bakar said.

Surviviors may also offer a cure. The World Health Organization is currently undertaking a project to store the blood of survivors to be used as a serum to treat new infections. The project could be realized as early as December.

By Heidi Woolf

Photos: Anna Zieminski

“The War in South Sudan is Over” – Warring Parties Sign Peace Deal

November 21, 2014November 9, 2014 by The Speaker Editors

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The warring parties in South Sudan signed a Cessation of Hostilities Agreement Sunday. The agreement was called “the real beginning” by the South Sudanese government and was welcomed by regional trade bloc IGAD, which has been mediating the negotiations since civil war broke out in South Sudan last year.

Chief negotiator for the government of South Sudan, Nhial Deng Nhial, and chief negotiator for the rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM), General Taban Deng, signed the implementation matrix and its addendum, and agreed on a timetable for implementation of the peace.

“Let me say this is really a great day not only for the people of South Sudan but also for the entire region because this is again the commitment in the implementation of what the two Principals in front of the Summit, in front of their people and the international community declared that the war in South Sudan is over,” said the Chair of IGAD Special Envoys for South Sudan, Seyoum Mesfin.

The government of South Sudan asserted that this document would lead toward real peace.

South Sudan’s Minister of Information and government spokesperson Michael Makuei said the deal “marks the real beginning of the Cessation of Hostilities Agreement.”

“Because with this document now, both the forces will be required to provide their deployment, their armaments and with this now, we will be in a position to open up humanitarian corridors and so forth,” said Makuei.

Read more: East African Nations Warn of Upcoming Intervention in Warring South Sudan

The agreement follows days after IGAD announced that neighboring countries would seriously interfere in the conflict if the warring parties did not immediately and unconditionally cease all hostilities.

By Day Blakely Donaldson

“Pointless Waiting” Conducted by Czech Activists Against Russia

November 10, 2014November 9, 2014 by The Speaker Editors

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An international group of protesters has been pointlessly waiting for the arrival of people oppressed by Russia–at Prague airport holding placards. The protesters are reacting to legal actions recently taken by Russia against a well-established Russian human rights society.

Activists stood patiently in the arrivals area of the Prague Vaclav Havel International Airport and waited for hours holding placards displaying the names of “victims of Putin’s Russia.” The activists were completely professional, Otakar van Gemund, one of the main organizers, told The Speaker.

“It is meant ironically,” Gemund told us. “It is probably what the airport staff are going to say to us if some next time they have enough of it and they find out that we are waiting for people who cannot possibly arrive.”

The names displayed on the airport placards were those of Russian, Ukrainian and international victims: Anna Politkovskaya, Flight MH17, Pussy Riot, Natalya Khusainovna Estemirova, Ekaterina Khomenko, Nadezhda Savchenko, Oleg Sentsov, Volodymyr Rybak, Reshat Ametov, Eston Kohver, and Oleksiy a Iryna Tyshchuk.

The demonstration was conducted by a group of Czech, Ukrainian, Russian and Dutch activists known as Kaputin–a group associated with oMEN. The group has been organizing the Prague Maidan for the past several months.

Kaputin waited for every Russian flight throughout the day Thursday. The demonstration was a direct action against the Russian government’s attempts to close the Russian historical and civil rights society Memorial.

“Memorial is a legendary organisation borne out of the Russian dissident movement in the middle of the 1980s immediately after Gorbachev started to experiment with Glasnost,” Gemund said. “These very brave dissidents started trying to get access to the secret Soviet archives to document Stalin´s crimes (still in communists times).

“But faced with the mindboggling violence, atrocities and disappearances connected to the first Chechen war, they also felt the need to delve in current abuses of human rights in the former Soviet Union.”

The Russian Justice Ministry has moved to dissolve the established human rights group, citing technical issues related to Memorial’s legal registration. The action was filed Sept. 24 but not publicized until October.

“It is even an international organisation which is active throughout the entire former Soviet Union and beyond,” said Gemund.”But they are extremely brave. One of its founder members, Natalya Khusainovna Estemirova, was even murdered in Chechnia in 2009. She was a friend of Anna Anna Politkovskaya.

“It is the last remnant of civic society in Russia and that is what is basically at stake if they are banned. It may be a remnant but it is a formidable remnant and has always been so. It is one of these rare instances in Russia of real European values and thought.”

In last weeks protest, there were too few participants for all placards to be shown, Gemund told us, but the next pointless wait will involve a larger group. The activists will return to the Prague airport in the near future, although date cannot yet be published.

“It has already roused quite some interest among local Ukrainians–because of the Radio Svoboda item–and Czech intellectuals–because of Adam Drda´s seal of approval–so many more people will be turning up then.

“So far, the Czech media are desperately trying to ignore us, but they have already felt obliged to refer to us several times–not with regard to this protest, though,” said Gemund.

“This will continue up until the moment the airport–though majority state-owned, officially a private entity and, therefore, not public space–will deem it unbearable and throws us out.”

Many more people will “do the same quiet senseless thing,” Gemund said.

The Supreme Court will rule on the Russian Justice Ministry’s motion to liquidate the leading Russian human rights organization on November 13.

By James Haleavy

Photos: Otakar van Gemund

Pointless Waiting Conducted by Czech Activists Against Russia (7)

East African Nations Warn of Upcoming Intervention in Warring South Sudan

November 9, 2014 by Daniel Jackson

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Member countries of the East African regional body IGAD have stated that if the warring parties in South Sudan do not maintain the peace, the nations will collectively interfere in South Sudan. IGAD is demanding a complete, immediate and unconditional end to all hostilities.

“Any violation of the cessation of the hostilities by any party will invite the following collective action by the IGAD region against those responsible for such violations, which will include, but are not limited to: the enactment of asset freezes, the enactment of travel bans within the region, denial of the supply of arms and ammunition, and any other material that could be used in war,” read the statement presented at the IGAD summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, Friday.

The leaders of the South Sudanese government, President Salva Kiir and Former Vice President Riek Machar, have maintained their willingness to achieve peace since the conflict broke out in late December, but repeatedly the two leaders have been unable to find common ground, and repeatedly the ceasefire agreements between the two warring parties have been broken.

While EGAD members were meeting, a protest letter was send to the organization’s chief negotiator by South Sudanese Rebel Chief Negotiator, General Taban Deng Gai, accusing the government of launching another set of attacks in Unity State.

IGAD also called on the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) and African Union Peace and Security Council to assist it in any measures it found necessary.

The IGAD statement also endorsed a request by the two warring parties that they be granted additional time for consultations. IGAD agreed to permit 15 days to complete the consultations, and demanded immediate and total cessation of all war in South Sudan.

Read more: Uganda War Plans Leaked

IGAD also stated that the two groups should commit to bringing the war in South Sudan to an end and immediately cease recruiting civilians into the fight.

By Dan Jackson
Photo: M Minassie/EyeRadio

Chinese and Japanese Leaders Publicly Admit Each Other’s Claims to East China Sea

November 9, 2014 by The Speaker Editors

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In what is considered to be a significant step towards resuming political and economic relations between the two contentious Asian superpowers, the leaders of Japan and China have publicly admitted that each nation has a claim to Japan’s Senkaku Islands and other territory in the East China Sea which China began to claim last year.

Both sides had some shared recognition to face history squarely and to move toward the future,” said Ken Okaniwa, Japanese Foreign Ministry spokesman. “In that spirit, both countries will overcome the political difficulties that affect the relations between the two countries.”

Japan and China both announced that they would gradually resume diplomatic and security discussions and begin to engage in a dialogue about their competing positions in the East China Sea.

“Both sides recognize that there are differences in views regarding the tension–the situation of tension–which has occurred in recent years in the East China Sea, such as the Senkaku Islands,” said Okaniwa.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Chinese President Xi Jinping publicly stated that they would try to settle the political standoff that has existed in the region since China declared that it was redrawing its territorial borders to include territory possessed by Japan and South Korea.

Both Abe and Xi made statements that included references to mutual acknowledgement of “different positions” regarding their territorial claims.

The concessions represent a large step towards conciliation. For over a year, Japan has refused to even entertain that a Chinese claim existed after China’s sudden declaration last year.

The Senkaku Islands have been clearly administered by Japan since the turn of the 20th century, but China has made claims that the islands, referred to as Daioyu by the Chinese, are traditionally Chinese. China has not been able to support these claims with any historical evidence, however, and has been questioned as to why it had never mentioned owning the islands throughout the previous century of Japanese administration.

Analysts believe that the two sides, neither wanting to concede title to the territory, strongly desire economic relations. The leaders of Japan and China will meet next week at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit meeting, already underway in Beijing.

By Day Blakely Donaldson

Top IS Leaders Killed in Targeted US Airstrike, Al Baghdadi Wounded

November 9, 2014November 9, 2014 by The Speaker Editors

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Several top Islamic State leaders are thought to be dead, and the leader of IS has been reported wounded, after a targeted US-coalition airstrike attack on a house on the Iraq-Syria border.

The leader of IS in Anbar province, as well as that leader’s deputy, are though to be killed. IS top commander Abu Bakr al Baghdadi was among the militants targeted, and Iraqi officials have reported that the leader was wounded during the attack, but the extent of al Baghdadi’s injuries are not known.

The senior IS leaders were meeting in a house in al-Qaim, on the Iraq-Syria border.

Coalition planes fired two missiles into the central area of al-Qaim.

After the bombing, militants reportedly evacuated a hospital nearby and called out for blood donors over loudspeakers. All roads in the area were blocked. TV channel Al-Hadath reported that dozens of people were killed and wounded in the strike.

The Pentagon has not admitted having any information about the strike, or of the wounding of al Baghdadi.

By James Haleavy

“Elephant Poaching Crisis” in Tanzania: Most of the Country’s Elephants Have Been Poached in Past Five Years

November 8, 2014 by Daniel Jackson

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A report recently published by the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) has found that over half of Tanzania’s elephants have been poached in the past five years. The report also investigated the causes of the “elephant poaching crisis” affecting the relatively stable, peaceful country of Tanzania, and identified the countries that were funding the trade.

“The current situation for Tanzania’s elephant population is dire in the extreme,” EIA found. “The country has lost half of its elephants in the past five years and two-thirds since 2006.”

The cause for the crisis affected Tanzania and other African nations is criminal organizations which service Chinese ivory appetites through corrupt Tanzanian channels, EIA found.

“The poaching crisis in Tanzania is due to a toxic mix of criminal syndicates, often led by Chinese nationals, and corruption among some Tanzanian Government officials.

“Both the escalation of elephant poaching and the increase of large-scale ivory shipments indicate the involvement of organised criminal syndicates in the burgeoning illicit ivory trade, abetted by corruption at key stages in the smuggling chain.

The ivory is mainly leaving Africa from three countries–Tanzania, Kenya and Uganda–and is bound mainly for one Asian nation.

“Seizure data also confirms China’s position as by far the largest single destination for illicit ivory, with Hong Kong, Vietnam, the Philippines and Malaysia as the main transit countries for shipments from Africa,” EIA reported.

The EIA report implicated high-level Chinese government officials and even the Chinese presidency in the trade.

The EIA cited a 2013 visit by a Chinese naval task force to the capital of Tanzania, which resulted in a boon for ivory traders in the country. One dealer boasted of making $50,000 from sales to Chinese navy personnel, and another Chinese national was detained by police after trying to enter the port with 81 elephant tusks–weighing 303 kilograms and worth half a million dollars–hidden in his truck.

In another case cited by the report, a Chinese delegation accompanying Chinese President Xi Jinping was used to ship tonnes of ivory to China.

“The large Chinese Government and business delegation on the visit used the opportunity to procure such a large amount of ivory that local prices increased,” IEA reported. “Two traders claimed that a fortnight before the state visit, Chinese buyers began purchasing thousands of kilograms of ivory, later sent to China in diplomatic bags on the presidential plane.”

The EIA also noted that while much high level poaching takes place in conflict zones, Tanzania is relatively stable and free of conflict. Armed groups and terrorist organizations are mostly absent in Tanzania. Instead, Tanzania’s ivory gangs are business people, and are aided by corrupt national politicians

“This business involves rich people and politicians who have formed a very sophisticated network,” EIA found.

The level of poaching currently taking place in the region has not been seen since the 1980s, according to EIA. The wave of poaching across Africa in the 80s led in 1989 to the UN Convention on International Trade in Endangers Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES). The poaching trade recovered, however, beginning in 1997 when elephants were downlisted in the CITES Appendix, and has remained strong. Tanzania currently loses around 10,000 elephants per year–around 30 per day–although at this point the market itself is in danger. For example, in Tanzania’s Selous Reserve, elephant populations have plummeted from 50,000 to 13,000 in four years.

EIA concluded that a solution lied with national authorities both within Tanzania and in China.

“Overall, East Africa is losing the highest number of elephants as criminal gangs ruthlessly target the remaining herds to feed the seemingly insatiable markets of Asia and, especially, China. If this is allowed to continue at the current rate, only a few significant elephant populations will remain in Africa in the next decade.”

The report, “Vanishing Point–Criminality, Corruption and the Devastation of Tanzania’s Elephants,” was published this month on the EIA website.

The Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) is an independent campaigning organisation committed to bringing about change that protects the natural world from environmental crime and abuse.

By Daniel Jackson

Photos: Peter Steward, Philip Morton, and EIA

Radical Cleric in Britain Requests UK Guarantee of Safe Passage to Islamic State

November 9, 2014November 7, 2014 by The Speaker Editors

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Radical British cleric Anjem Choudary is asking the UK government to guarantee safe passage for him to travel to the Islamic State, saying that he was willing to consider renouncing his British nationality, but only “as a last resort.”

“I believe the world belongs to God and that one day, hopefully, the UK will be part of an Islamic State. Why shouldn’t I be free to travel to the [caliphate] and see what life is like under [Islamic law]?” said Choudary.

Choudary’s passport was confiscated by British officials in September after he was arrested on charges of belonging to a terrorist organization. He was released on bail with strict conditions.

Choudary cited human rights grounds in his request that his passport be returned. “The passport… is a basic human right and I don’t see why I should have to give it up or have my movement restricted,” said Choudary.

Choudary has stated that he is in favor of the implementation of Sharia law. He supports Sharia punishments such as public executions and the cutting off of hands.

“I want to know from the Home Office and the crown prosecution service if it is illegal for me to travel to live in the Islamic State if I have no intention of carrying out acts of terrorism,” said Choudary.

Chairman of the UK government’s home affairs committee, Keith Vaz, responded to Choudary’s request Thursday, saying, “If he wants to go, he should be allowed to go. I think that would be a much better scenario than having him stay.”

Vaz also commented on Choudary’s request for the UK to guarantee his safe passage.

“Why should the Home Office or anyone else give him safe passage?” said Vaz. “He must take the consequences if he is propagating the views of ISIS, then he is putting himself at risk of prosecution. I think people would like to see the back of him.”

By James Haleavy