US proposes cut in water fluoride level

 Europe, Health care, United States  11 Responses »
Jan 082011
 

The US Department of Health and Human Services and the US Environmental Protection Agency have proposed that the fluoride level in drinking water be reduced to prevent dental fluorosis, a form of tooth decay. But there has been no mention of the other “more serious (non-dental) health concerns” about fluoride ingestion, noted the international campaign group Fluoride Action Network. The Network added that “the chemicals used to fluoridate drinking water in the US are hazardous waste byproducts of the phosphate fertiliser industry”. The proposed cut bucks a trend of promoting fluoride that began in the 1940s. The Health and Human Services Dept has now proposed cutting the level to 0.7 milligrams per litre of water, from the current standard of 0.7 – 1.2 mg/litre, according to an AP report. The American Dental Association has welcomed the move, reports the AOL Health website. Last year, a research paper published in the [Read more]

Sweden to close embassy in KL

 Asean, Europe  22 Responses »
Jan 072011
 

Sweden is closing five embassies worldwide in 2011: Buenos Aires, Brussels, Hanoi, Kuala Lumpur and Luanda. The official reason is budget cuts. “This painful decision is a consequence of the recent decision of the Riksdag to cut funding to the Government Offices by SEK 300 million,” said Sweden’s Minister for Foreign Affairs Carl Bildt. Elsewhere within Asean, Sweden has embassies in Singapore, Bangkok, Jakarta, Phnom Penh and Hanoi. Unlike certain Asean countries, Malaysia actually has an embassy in Sweden.

GM crops: Wikileaks exposes US push

 Agrobusiness/GM food, Corporate agenda, Europe, Health care, United States  8 Responses »
Dec 262010
 

Cables released by Wikileaks have exposed United State diplomatic efforts to strongly back the corporate push for GM crops to be accepted in Europe and elsewhere. Not only that, the US diplomats under the Bush administration recommended retaliatory action against a list of ‘targets’ in Europe for failing to embrace GMOs. In a leaked cable, US Ambassador to France Craig Stapleton wrote: Country team Paris recommends that we calibrate a target retaliation list that causes some pain across the EU since this is a collective responsibility, but that also focuses in part on the worst culprits. The list should be measured rather than vicious and must be sustainable over the long term, since we should not expect an early victory.

Wikileaks and ‘The War You Don’t See’

 Accountability, Europe, Iraq, Media, Militarism, United States  31 Responses »
Dec 222010
 

It’s time for people to come out and defend the work of Wikileaks. Many governments are often afraid that people might find out the ugly truth about what they are actually doing. Award-winning journalist John Pilger interviews Wikileaks founder Julian Assange and discusses the hidden, almost permanent state of war that most people do not see. Among the Wikileaks disclosures in the video-clip (part six): watch the Apache gunship cockpit video footage showing how Reuters news reporters/cameramen in Iraq are gunned down on the streets. And the reaction? “Nice.” And look at how those who try to remove the bodies and save the critically wounded are treated. These are war crimes. Below are parts six and seven of a seven-part series of the ‘War You Don’t See’. Some 700,000 have signed a global petition by Avaaz.org to defend Wikileaks. The organisers are targeting one million signatures.

EU-Malaysia FTA: ‘Trade invaders’

 Economy, Europe, FTAs, Other Asian countries  13 Responses »
Dec 032010
 

Negotiations between the Malaysia and the European Union for a free trade agreement (FTA) are expected to begin in Brussels next week. But most Malaysians are being left in the dark about what this means for Malaysia while Parliament is not even looking at this seriously. The way I see it, the EU-Malaysia FTA aims to prise open the Malaysian market for large European firms – in the same way that these firms are eyeing the vast Indian market under the EU-India FTA and the Asean market under the EU-Asean FTA. That’s the main agenda of Corporate Europe. These large European firms or BusinessEurope are working very closely with EU Commission negotiators to secure the best possible outcome for themselves. What are they looking for? We can get a pretty good idea of what they want by looking at the negotiations for the EU-India FTA.

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