Six In The Morning

The Law Takes The Otherside      

Police join protests in Tunisia

Thousands of demonstrators including police officers, lawyers and students, have taken to the streets of Tunisia’s capital, Tunis, in another day of unrest in the North African country.

At least 2,000 police officers participated in Saturday’s demonstrations, according to the Associated Press news agency. They were joined by members of the national guard and fire departments.

Crowds gathered in front of the office of Mohamed Ghannouchi, the interim prime minister, and on Avenue Habib Bourguiba, the main street of Tunis.

The rally was the latest in a month of turmoil that toppled Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, Tunisia’s longstanding ruler, sending him into exile in Saudi Arabia on January 14.

If You Think Political Discourse In America Is Bad?

‘These death threats won’t make me flee’, says Rehman, who supports reform of Pakistan’s blasphemy laws

Sherry Rehman, Pakistan’s defiant prisoner of intolerance, vows to stay put

All Sherry Rehman wants is to go out – for a coffee, a stroll, lunch, anything. But that’s not possible. Death threats flood her email inbox and mobile phone; armed police are squatted at the gate of her Karachi mansion; government ministers advise her to flee.

“I get two types of advice about leaving,” says the steely politician. “One from concerned friends, the other from those who want me out so I’ll stop making trouble. But I’m going nowhere.” She pauses, then adds quietly: “At least for now.”

The Home Fires Are Indeed Dangerous  

Smoke from family stoves kill two million people a year

Home fires: the world’s most lethal pollution

The world’s deadliest pollution does not come from factories billowing smoke, industries tainting water supplies or chemicals seeping into farm land. It comes from within people’s own homes. Smoke from domestic fires kills nearly two million people each year and sickens millions more, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO).

A new UN project has now been set up to try to reduce this appalling toll. It aims, over the next nine years, to put 100 million clean cooking stoves into homes in the developing world.

In Egypt Democracy Is What The President Thinks It Is    

 

Egypt’s frustrated young dream of revolution

An unemployed man had set himself alight in the middle of a busy street — the 12th such incident last week. According to a TV newsreader, the man, 35, had moved to the capital in the hope of finding work and saving enough to buy a home and get married, but lack of job opportunities had driven him to despair. “That could be a description of any of us,” said Waleed, pulling his scarf tighter against the cold. “These human blazes are coming so fast, it’s hard to keep track.”

Cairo is a city built for sunny days and balmy nights; come winter the wind can lash with a ferocious bite. But that has not stopped Shamad and his friends gathering for their late-evening tea on the pavement to talk through the day’s gossip: the Friday sermons devoted to Islam’s disapproval of suicide, new government restrictions on buying bottled petrol, and, of course, all the latest from Tunis — where developments have kept the group glued to al-Jazeera TV for days.

We’ll Make Sure We Stay In Power

Changes in the supervision of the electoral commission prompt the opposition to proclaim ‘a coup against democracy.’ The prime minister’s supporters say he is merely trying to fix a broken system.

Electoral ruling riles Maliki’s rivals

Reporting from Baghdad – A ruling by the Iraqi high court calling for the country’s electoral commission to come under the supervision of Prime Minister Nouri Maliki’s Cabinet prompted rival parties Saturday to proclaim the move “a coup against democracy.”

The decision by the Supreme Court was posted Friday on its website.

The ruling called for the Independent High Electoral Commission and the anti-corruption board to be supervised by the council of ministers headed by Maliki, who secured a second term two months ago amid accusations that he was becoming an authoritarian leader.

No More Land Yachts In America?  

Isn’t That Unconstitutional?  

Can U.S. automakers build a small car in this country? GM thinks so.

This summer, a General Motors plant in Orion, Mich., will begin cranking out some very small cars.

The Chevrolet Sonics, as they will be known, are by themselves hardly a breakthrough. There are tens of thousands of cars this tiny on the road – among them the Honda Fit, the Toyota Yaris and the Ford Fiesta.

What will set the Sonic apart from its rivals and make it one of the most closely watched experiments in the industry, however, is that it will be the smallest car currently mass-produced in the United States.