Indo-UK: News & Discussion

uddu · Post by **uddu** » 07 Sep 2009 09:16

sunnyP wrote: But lets not make any mistake here - these hooligans may be protesting against muslims today but tomorrow these will be the same racists beating up other south asians in the UK. Likewise the 'united against fascism' thugs are simply left wing loonies who have jumped into bed with several nefarious muslim groups.

We should stick all parties involved into a stadium, arm them and let them go at each other

Let's not generalize things. First they have a right to protest. Their protest is against Islam and the restrictions and brutality imposed on a free society with the support of the government. At the moment there is nothing racist about their protest. If these people become victorious, then there is hope for all the good people of U.K.

http://casualsunited.webs.com/whoarewe.htm
Who are we?
We are an alliance of NORMAL BRITISH PEOPLE of various different colours/races who have come together in order to create a massive, but peaceful protest group to force our Government to get their act in gear.

We are made up of various different groups, all with the same aims, and each group has its own leadership structure. Casuals United now has over 50 active branches, each doing their own thing, but ready to unite when needed.

Violent extremists are on our streets, preaching hatred of the west, trying to incite young people to blow themselves up and commit acts of terror against us, and our Government and police are either turning a blind eye, and/or actively helping them in their aims.

They wish to impose Sharia law upon us by stealth, and are already operating 85 of these courts in Britain behind closed doors.

We are not against Muslim people per se, we are against those Jihadists in their community who wish to promote or raise money for terror, abuse our troops and attempt to impose medieval and barbaric laws upon our country.

Several of our members have already been arrested in a disgusting display by the British police, led by the corrupt and unnaccountable Crown Prosecution Service, who

are happy to persecute those who protest, rather than deal with the extremists and their Human Rights brigade of lawyers.

We will exercise our right to peaceful protest however we see fit, and are growing all the time. Soon we will be big enough to influence our MP's and they will be unable to ignore us.

UNITED WE STAND

http://www.englishdefenceleague.org/

uddu · Post by **uddu** » 07 Sep 2009 09:19

Hari Seldon wrote:Very clever - displaying the Israeli flag so as to pre-emptively ward off smear attacks by the mainstream press of them being some 'neo-nazi' group.

Moi also noticed the desi tricolor on that bus.

Interesting to see how UQstan's labor gubmint handles a labor pained populace, esp yob fury. No doubt the tories will snipe from the sidelines counting chickens yet to hatch. BNP might again pulloff a shocka dutifully buried by the media.

The game goes on. AoA AoA.

The group claim to represent all the NORMAL BRITISH PEOPLE of various different colours/races who have come together in order to create a massive, but peaceful protest group to force our Government to get their act in gear.
That's a good thing.

chetak · Post by **chetak** » 07 Sep 2009 13:02

God save the queen!

' Perfidious Albion ’

The fact is, after the Iraq War crippled Mr Tony Blair and pushed him into premature retirement, the line of least resistance has become the British politician’s abiding principle. With honourable exceptions, few see the conflict in Afghanistan as essential to safeguard British citizens at home. The capitulation to Col Muammar Gaddafi, Libya’s long-time dictator, is particularly puzzling. It was after the determined Anglo-American assault on Saddam Hussein and the Iraqi strongman’s capture that Col Gaddafi saw reason, abandoned his nuclear weapons programme and turned over its facilities to the International Atomic Energy Agency. Today, the same Col Gaddafi is being sent an entirely different and ultimately self-defeating message.

The weakening of British resolve is not a new story. It has been as much a social as a political phenomenon since 1945. However, it has now reached a critical point; Britain is at the cusp of becoming a liability in the war against Al Qaeda/Taliban and their rampaging allies. Britain’s assumption of neutrality is not going to be as innocuous as, say, a Liechtenstein’s. Its geographical location, its centrality to air traffic between Asia and the Americas and, most of all, its massive and largely non-integrated South Asian Muslim population are all danger signs. If Britain opts out of the war against Islamism, it is in effect joining the dark side. It is also writing itself out of the history of the 21st century. Poor Neville Chamberlain could only exclaim “peace with honour”. Latter-day Chamberlains will perhaps boast of “peace with honour and an oil deal”.

Haresh · Post by **Haresh** » 08 Sep 2009 21:25

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/w ... 823406.ece

I think it is wrong to do this, much better to concentrate on infrastructure.
Economic development is the best monument.

shyamd · Post by **shyamd** » 08 Sep 2009 22:00

Lockerbie: British intelligence officers often forced to make deals

Lalmohan · Post by **Lalmohan** » 09 Sep 2009 02:36

uddu - those pictures are not of normal british people. they are typical of the far right thugs that lurk beneath the surface. they are being very smart in disguising themselves with israeli and indian and jamaican flags. the far right BNP is seeking electoral power - they are very close to signficant gains, they don't need any associations with overt racism and other unpleasant things. focusing on islamists is going to be a popular move, so they are milking it...

shyamd · Post by **shyamd** » 09 Sep 2009 02:48

Thats right. Just thugs and from what I hear from people there, they were shouting racial abuse at asians. In the end, asian thugs along with blacks and whites(the types that were involved in the violence were of all colours against the EDL) chased and rioted against those extremists.

Lalmohan · Post by **Lalmohan** » 09 Sep 2009 02:58

not only that, the police have severely criticised a muslim cleric for urging the islamists out on the streets to counter protest. they wanted the fascists to have their 30 minutes of marching and shouting and then going home. the last thing they wanted was a riot.

shyam · Post by **shyam** » 09 Sep 2009 11:02

Gerard wrote:Scotland mulls over separation from UK

SNP outlines plans for referendum

Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond has announced an independence referendum bill as the centrepiece of the SNP's plans for the coming year.

The Scottish Government wants to stage the independence referendum in 2010.

Hari Seldon · Post by **Hari Seldon** » 09 Sep 2009 12:03

shyam wrote: SNP outlines plans for referendum
Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond has announced an independence referendum bill as the centrepiece of the SNP's plans for the coming year.

The Scottish Government wants to stage the independence referendum in 2010.

Fat chance the Scots will secede. Sri Brown and Sri Darling are themselves Scots I hear even though moi got no shots of them in skirts to prove it.

Anyway, if the secession goes through, would be nice if the UNSC membership passed onto Scotland after the UK dissolves/resolves itself.

sunnyP · Post by **sunnyP** » 10 Sep 2009 01:14

Lalmohan wrote:uddu - those pictures are not of normal british people. they are typical of the far right thugs that lurk beneath the surface. they are being very smart in disguising themselves with israeli and indian and jamaican flags. the far right BNP is seeking electoral power - they are very close to signficant gains, they don't need any associations with overt racism and other unpleasant things. focusing on islamists is going to be a popular move, so they are milking it...

I agree - it's a mistake to think that just because the EDL are anti-Islam we should think of them as a positive thing.

They are just a bunch of racist thugs and football 'casuals' who today are using Moslems to vent their anger at but do you think they will stop there? Make no mistake they probably hate British Hindus and Sikhs as much as they do Moslems. Yes the UK has a gigantic problem with home grown Moslem extremists but groups like the EDL are not the solution.

Johann · Post by **Johann** » 10 Sep 2009 01:48

- They're a handful of football hooligans, and over-the-hill football hooligans at that.

- What got it started were the reports of Muslims in Luton booing during the homecoming parades of British troops from Iraq and Afghanistan

- The BNP is guiding them while avoiding direct involvement.

- EDL/Casuals United are a sad looking lot and their greatest effect is to produce a real shot in the arm for the far left, who outnumber the EDL types at least 2 to 1 at EDL 'protests'. The BNP's hope is that far-left and Muslim youth violence will radicalise public opinion, but the EDL's desire to provoke violence discredits them with the general public.

The left will also attempt to use EDL/BNP to discredit the those in the centre who are shifting consensus against the extremes of the multicultural policies that have been embedded in local councils since the early 1980s.

sunnyP · Post by **sunnyP** » 10 Sep 2009 02:25

Hari Seldon wrote:
Fat chance the Scots will secede. Sri Brown and Sri Darling are themselves Scots I hear even though moi got no shots of them in skirts to prove it.

Anyway, if the secession goes through, would be nice if the UNSC membership passed onto Scotland after the UK dissolves/resolves itself.

You know I wouldn't be too sure.

The Tories will be in power in Westminister soon and what better way to kill off the Labour party even further by letting Scotland go it's own way. The Tories win very few of the 70 odd Parliamentary seats in Scotland wheras Labour and the SNP tend to share the Scottish seats equally. Thus if we lost these Scottish parliamentary seats it becomes even harder for Labour to ever come back into power in London.

Moreover, economically the Scots get a great deal from Westminister. Their public spending is far more than the revenue (even including north sea gas) they bring in.

sunnyP · Post by **sunnyP** » 10 Sep 2009 02:31

And in other news from Londonistan -

London’s “Hamas Mosque” Received £20,000 from Government -

In February 2007, the North London Central Mosque – better known as Finsbury Park Mosque – received a grant of £20,000 for a report “on combating extremism and terrorist propaganda in communities and institutions”. Two years later, one of the then trustees of the mosque, Mohammed Sawalha, would later go on to sign the Istanbul Declaration – as clear an example of “terrorist propaganda” as you are likely to find. It is not sustainable to build a counter-terrorist strategy on partnerships with people whose opposition to terrorism is entirely contingent on time and place: they will always let you down.

http://thecst.org.uk/blog/?p=500

arun · Post by **arun** » 10 Sep 2009 07:16

X Posted.

This is a problem the British would be very wise to immediately address else given the very high demonstrated propensity of Pakistani origin individuals to indulge in acts of terrorism, Britain will suffer from more and more acts of terrorism:

Failure to vet immigrants from Pakistan 'a threat to security'

Officials interviewed only 29 applicants in nine months

By Robert Verkaik, Home Affairs Editor
Thursday, 10 September 2009

Ministers were last night accused of a major security lapse after it emerged that British immigration officers based in Pakistan had interviewed just 29 of the 66,000 people applying for British visas in nine months. ......................

The Independent

arun · Post by **arun** » 10 Sep 2009 07:31

X Posted.

The recognition of Pakistan and Pakistani origin individuals as the breeding ground of terrorism in Britain, spreads.

From the Australian newspaper, The Age:

The diligent work to thwart Britain's home-grown terrorists must continue.

Philip Johnston
September 10, 2009

………………. the fact remains that the greatest threat to security both here and in America is based in Britain. Operation Overt, the bombings in London in July 2005, the Operation Crevice conspiracy to target shopping centres, the failed car bombs in London in 2007, the so-called Operation Rhyme conspiracy four years ago to detonate a dirty radiation device in London - all were either masterminded by British citizens or long-term UK residents, usually with Pakistani backgrounds, or their support networks were based here. …………….

Three-quarters of those convicted of involvement in terrorist activity are British with a Pakistani heritage. …………..

arun · Post by **arun** » 11 Sep 2009 07:52

The mother of democracy forces its own citizens to payout considerable sums of money to protect a military dictator

:

Pervez Musharraf: £25,000 to protect him at London dinners

Pervez Musharraf, the former President of Pakistan who is living in London, is being protected by Scotland Yard at a cost to taxpayers of approximately £25,000 a day.

The Metropolitan Police Specialist Protection Unit, known as SO1, has assigned a round-the-clock team of at least ten men and women to protect Mr Musharraf, who lives in a three-bedroom flat in West London. .........................

Times Online

Hari Seldon · Post by **Hari Seldon** » 11 Sep 2009 08:16

Arun saar,

arun wrote:The mother of democracy forces its own citizens to payout considerable sums of money to protect a military dictator :

Pervez Musharraf: £25,000 to protect him at London dinners

....

Kindly don't forget to mention that UQstan is not just the mother of democracy but also the mother of Pakistan. So how do you propose this venerated queen mother choose between her own different children, eh? Yindia was never a child or even step-child of UQdom, being of much older vintage than UQdom itself.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 11 Sep 2009 09:48

TOI:

Mohammed (various spellings) is now the 2nd most common name in westpakukstan

they were trying to hide this by listing it under many spellings but ET has
caught them:

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/ET- ... 990451.cms

Johann · Post by **Johann** » 11 Sep 2009 11:20

Singha,

- The Economic Times picked up the story from the Daily Mail, where it was columnist Max Hastings accused ONS of political correctness

- Hastings is wrong to assume this is a PC issue. ONS has never lumped together John and Jon because they sound the same - they're listed as separate names. When it comes to birth certificates letters have always mattered.

- The Times of London reported the same statistic (Mohammed/Muhammad/M****** as no.2) back in June 2007, so it's not exactly news.

- When it comes to boys names Muslims show a much less variety and a lot less fadishness than most other groups.
As a percentage of the total births Muslim names are not that impressive.

arun · Post by **arun** » 11 Sep 2009 11:43

Excerpt from the Max Hasting article in the UK’s Daily Mail you cited.

My own take was that Max Hastings was principally accusing the ONS of concealing the rapid Islamic / Muslim population growth rate with the PC issue relegated to a secondary role.

The article seems to have struck a chord going by the number of comments it has generated from the readers of the Daily Mail:

Mohammed is now the third most popular boy's name in England. So why this shabby effort to conceal it?

By Max Hastings

Last updated at 4:02 AM on 11th September 2009

This week, the Office of National Statistics published a list of the most popular boys' names in Britain: Jack, Oliver, Thomas, Harry, Joshua, Alfie, Charlie, Daniel. ………………..

There is just one small problem: the list is deceitful. In reality, the third most popular choice for boy children born last year in England and Wales was not Thomas, but Mohammed. …………..

The ONS explains blithely that it had no intent to deceive. Its normal practice is to catalogue different spellings separately, as in Mohammed, Muhammed and so on. ......................

Unfortunately, in recent times we have been given plentiful cause for paranoia about attempts by official bodies to conceal from us information about the changing face of Britain which our rulers know that many people will not like.....................

The ONS's hit parade of children's names, as released for publication, seemed designed to mask a simple truth which dismays millions of people, and which politicians and bureaucracies go to great lengths to bury: the Muslim population of Britain is growing extraordinarily fast. .......................

A bleak body of pundits, many of them American neoconservatives rather than spokesmen of the British National Party, believe that Europe, and Britain in particular, is threatened by a Muslim tide which will not merely transform its traditional culture but, frankly, bury it.

In a series of recent books, they argue that Islam is colonising this continent in a fashion that will render it unrecognisable a generation or two hence. .......................

Daily Mail

Johann · Post by **Johann** » 11 Sep 2009 12:24

Philip,

Dannatt is lucky - if it wasnt for the public disgust with the Labour govt over the MPs expenses outrages he would never have been able to contradict the official pablum (i.e. the govt is listening to professional military advice and meeting its needs) without being immediately sacked. It is a tragedy this didnt happen three years earlier when Brown first took over and troops were being sent to Helmand by a govt that refused to accept the Taliban's resurgence, and that also abdicated its responsibility to improve the situation in southern Iraq even though British troops were still stuck there.

I expect the Tories will only represent an improvement of degree when it comes to treatment of the armed forces.

While they lack the same ideological problem with the armed forces that Brown suffer from, at the end of the day, politically the NHS, schools, etc matters far more than the armed forces. There will be no real competition for allocation of extra funds because Cameron is in the business of winning elections, not enhancing national power.

Building up the armed forces does *not* win votes since there is no public perception of territorial threat since the end of the Cold War, nor is there public desire for expensive far-away wars.

Counter-terrorism is a different matter - the public is happy to spend on the intelligence and security services, emergency services, etc, and military operations that they see as necessary to prevent terrorist attacks on British soil as well as on Britons abroad. Iraq was never seen by the public in that light, and people aren't convinced that the campaign in Helmand has helped prevent attacks either.

Philip · Post by **Philip** » 11 Sep 2009 16:57

Johann ,would you say that there was a definite "tilt" by Blair towards the US's global agenda under Bush to maintain Britain's special relationship with the US and underline its importance at the "high table" of the P-5? Will David Cameron,as commonly expected to be the next PM,restore a balance with a more independent foreign policy and be more Euro-centric?

Secondly,would it make more sense for Britain to partially reduce its SSBN Trident deterrent ,as US-Russian reductions are being discussed ,and with the money saved beef up the conventional forces which are being starved of essential eqpt?

Hari Seldon · Post by **Hari Seldon** » 11 Sep 2009 19:59

UK ‘could face blackouts by 2016 (BBC)

How terrible.

Yogi_G · Post by **Yogi_G** » 11 Sep 2009 20:47

Now that the SDREs have gone to the moon, it is time for the "Education System Donor" to come up with a space agency...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8249694.stm

And all written by a SDRE, er Brit!

"When you look at the latest space-faring nations such as China and India, they have very ambitious and exciting programmes," he says.
"It is not just science and manned space flight, but it is developing many applications in communications, telemedicine, looking at climate change, environment, pollution and so forth.
"This is stimulating their industry, creating a lot of internal wealth. Indeed, even some of the lesser known countries in space, such as Algeria and Nigeria, have formed their own space agencies.
"If the UK, which has an awful lot to offer and has a great capability in space, does not have the environment to encourage it, we will lose people overseas and business opportunities."

Johann · Post by **Johann** » 12 Sep 2009 00:50

Philip wrote:Johann ,would you say that there was a definite "tilt" by Blair towards the US's global agenda under Bush to maintain Britain's special relationship with the US and underline its importance at the "high table" of the P-5? Will David Cameron,as commonly expected to be the next PM,restore a balance with a more independent foreign policy and be more Euro-centric?

Secondly,would it make more sense for Britain to partially reduce its SSBN Trident deterrent ,as US-Russian reductions are being discussed ,and with the money saved beef up the conventional forces which are being starved of essential eqpt?

Philip,

- Blair held from the late 1990s a genuine conviction in the need to fight the jihadis, unlike Brown. However he also believed that Britain and the US as in WWII and the Cold War had to stick together, *especially* through disagreements and errors of judgment, if they were to win.

Cameron is nowhere as ideological as Blair. He will be driven by domestic political calculations, like Brown, rather than the idea that we are fighting the successor to the wars on fascism and communism. Like Brown he will put the minimum required to maintain the 'special relationship', but nothing more than that.

That does not make him a Europhile either. Ultimately, its the questions of trade and investment needed to keep the economy going in the right direction that will shape foreign policy, within the constraints of NATO and EU commitments.

The British state needs America as its hard security force multiplier, and the EU as its economic force multiplier. Its interest is in keeping those two tracks aligned.

No British (or German) leader will rely on the EU over America for hard security unless very fundamental changes take place all across the EU and Russia. Even the French have never depended on the EU for security, and are instead reintegrating themselves in to NATO.

However Russia's massive conventional military reorientation and downsizing, and the potential for universal nuclear disarmament may lead to *some* of those fundamental changes.

- As for nuclear vs. conventional, it all depends on Obama. If he is serious about pushing for global nuclear disarmament, Trident's replacement will be pushed back and slowed down. Certainly the armed forces would be in favour of it, even though only a percentage of savings from nuclear weapons are likely to end up with the armed forces. Much of it would just go back to the Treasury.

If Obama does not push forward, nuclear is cheaper than conventional forces. It would be easier and cheaper to cut conventional capabilities, and gradually reduce conventional overseas operations while renewing the nuclear deterrent.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 12 Sep 2009 01:08

Also arent we seeing a new Britain emerging? Its not the old hoity-toity Lords running the show even in the Conservative Party.

Johann · Post by **Johann** » 12 Sep 2009 02:38

Ramana,

British society and government has been in the process of radical transformation since the 1960s. Anyone over the age of 50 has a hard time recognising it as the same country. It is not unlike the same massive changes that Americans have seen in the same period.

Tory leaders from the 1970s starting with Ted Heath including John Major and Margaret Thatcher have largely been from a mix of middle class and working class backgrounds who were not public school chaps (that's private school for the Americans here).

If anything David Cameron and Boris Johnson represent the return of the Etonians, people born in to rather influential families, although their social views and cultural tastes would be unrecognisable to their grandparents generation.

One of the stranger things is that as Britain grows older than ever before(i.e. an aging population), its political class gets younger and greener than ever before. This may have something to do with the demands of the 24 hour news cycle, and in particular the result of television news.

This has also gone hand in hand with the gradual disappearance of the old fashioned civil servant of the Yes Minister/Yes Prime Minister variety. PR types, lawyers and in some cases activists have moved from the periphery of government to its heart - they are now the only form of expertise that matters politically.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 12 Sep 2009 02:54

I met a UK software engineer who headed a ten person contract software firm working in US in mid 90s. He didnt have any Raj connections. The talk turned to service in the Military and he expressed his dis-enchantment with the pecking order there and preffered being a civilian and the software business which was great leveller as it depends on merit only and not connections.

surinder · Post by **surinder** » 12 Sep 2009 03:08

It is remarkable that the "old" British have given way to the "new" so gracefully & without any public fight. Such changes in most nations are forced, and are accompanied by bitter rancour.

Lalmohan · Post by **Lalmohan** » 12 Sep 2009 03:21

^^^ Ramana
the military isnt the career option it used to be. also, for most branches a lot more education is required these days to succeed. therefore the intake has a different social profile than the old days. connected families dont want their sons in the army... the days of eton, cambridge and the guards before a nice cushy banking job have long gone. senior officers tend to be very well educated and intellectually fine tuned. junior officers, particularly in the army are there because they didn't have the brains to make it in "The City" if they are from posh families, or middle class boys who love adventure. working class men join the ranks to learn a trade or for some because they like the excitement. over the years the social profile - like all walks of british life has changed from the upper classes to the middle to some of the lower classes. it is much more of a meritocracy than it used to be. which also explains why so many 2nd gen indians are finally doing well in the UK and in all walks of life. incidentally, modern day british army officers who know anything of history recognise the british indian army as being a fine institution, and in many ways a superior fighting service to the regular british army - mainly because the regular army saw less combat.

on blair - i agree with johann - the irony of blair is that he genuinely believed with a lot of conviction that the islamists had to be fought. it is unfortunate that he threw in his lot with the neocons on iraq, when the french atleast saw through it. the germans have dithered, but finally, the kunduz oil tanker airstrike is going to shake them out of their stupor

Indians need to understand that the old britain of empire is now a thing of history and deal with the new one on different terms. pax brittanica is over, pax americana may be waning, we need to prepare for the next yug

[added later] surinder: the old to new transition was initiated by WW2, that was a collosal social upheaval right across europe. in some ways it was the 3rd revolution of marx, but by different means

Philip · Post by **Philip** » 12 Sep 2009 12:39

Johann,your analysis explains why wars to day are being "outsourced" more and more.It is cheaper politically to let the "contractors" do the job for you.Deaths if any are in the line of "hazardous work" and not from a nation's armed forces.In the future,I predict that even UCAVs will be used by contractors.

More on the British Consul's murder.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldne ... maica.html

Note left by body may point to killer of British diplomat in Jamaica
Jamaican police investigating the murder of a British diplomat in his home believe that a note about his homosexuality left by the body may hold the answer to the killer's identity.

By Tom Leonard in Montego Bay
Published: 5:22PM BST 11 Sep 2009

John Terry, a British honorary consul in northern Jamaica, was found dead on Wednesday afternoon in the bedroom of his Montego Bay home Photo: AP
John Terry, the honorary consul for Montego Bay, was found lying naked on his bed on Wednesday, strangled and with severe head injuries.

His throat had been tied with a cord and a post-mortem concluded he had died as a result of asphyxia due to ligature strangulation.

Mr Terry, 65, a local magistrate and an MBE, had also been hit repeatedly with a heavy object, believed to be a bedside lamp, said Det Supt Michael Garrick.

A detective said that a handwritten message lying beside the body described Mr Terry as a "batty man" – derogatory Jamaican slang for a homosexual. In addition, the letter was signed "A batty man".

There were no signs of forced entry at the modest home in Mount Carey, outside Montego Bay, and Mr Garrick said he believed Mr Terry was close to the killer.

While Mr Terry may have been a victim of Jamaica's aggressively homophobic culture, police sources said they were also looking at the possibility he was killed by his boyfriend.

Mr Terry, the son of a retired RAF officer and RAF nurse, was born in New Zealand and educated in Pakistan and England.

He separated several years ago from his wife, Elizabeth, who lives in the capital, Kingston, with their two children.

However, friends said he was part of a group of well-heeled older white men on the island who liked to have young black boyfriends.

Mr Terry was last seen on Tuesday night, leaving the Half Moon luxury hotel and resort where he worked as the maintenance supervisor. His cleaner found the body the following afternoon.

Neighbours said they had recently seen Mr Terry in the company of another man, and there were unconfirmed reports that a young black man was seen leaving his house on Tuesday night and heard asking how to get back to Montego Bay.

Mr Terry had been honorary consul for the western end of the island for the past 13 years, representing the High Commission at official functions and assisting British people.

A former coffee grower, he had been general manager of Round Hill, arguably Jamaica's smartest enclave, where Ralph Lauren has a home and David Bowie and Harrison Ford regularly take holidays.

But friends say he fell into financial difficulties after being ousted by the owners in the early 1990s and, while many white people on the island live in gated communities, Mr Terry lived in a modest house in a poorer neighbourhood.

He remained, however, a hard-working honorary consul who was clearly widely admired on the island.

Braxton Moncure, an American accountant with a house on the island who had known Mr Terry since the 1980s, said he was "extraordinarily kind, gracious and generous".

"He did a great job of representing British interests, particularly for British people coming to Montego Bay who got into difficulties," he said.

Honorary consuls – whose work was famously celebrated in Graham Greene's novel about a kidnapped diplomat in Argentina – receive no salary although some are paid a small honorarium, around £2,000, in recognition of their services.

Jeremy Cresswell, the British High Commissioner to Jamaica, said he and his staff were profoundly shocked by Mr Terry's death.

"John was not only a great servant to the United Kingdom, but also to Jamaica – a country he loved deeply," he said

JE Menon · Post by **JE Menon** » 12 Sep 2009 19:14

Ahem.... just in case no one noticed

Mr Terry, the son of a retired RAF officer and RAF nurse, was born in New Zealand and educated in Pakistan and England.

The question is, is Mullah Sandwich responsible for Terry, or is Terry responsible for Mullah Sandwich?

Lalmohan · Post by **Lalmohan** » 12 Sep 2009 21:45

analysis on the EDL Chaotic Alliance

whatever genuine resistance there was has been hijacked by the far right, and more interestingly, the far right across europe are networking and coordinating more actively. although they are supposedly fighting the islamists, their agenda is more generally racist. what is most likely to happen though is that the public will start to sympathise because they are fed up of appeasing islamists, and then like mrs thatcher did back in the 70's against minorities, the mainstream parties will get more hardline against islamists. sadly, there will be casualties amongst the ordinary minority folks too...

i wonder if that is the price that europe will have to pay to fight islamism?

sanjeevpunj · Post by **sanjeevpunj** » 12 Sep 2009 23:45

I found an interesting article on how Taleban gets its money,explosives,arms and ammunition. Most of the stuff (explosives,arms,ammunition,military supplies) is stolen as it passes through Pakistan's restive regions on its way to the NATO bases. Here's the link :-
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/colu ... liban.html

AnimeshP · Post by **AnimeshP** » 13 Sep 2009 06:58

SAS 'training Libyan military'

It has been alleged that the SAS has been training Libyan special forces, despite Colonel Muammar Gaddafi's regime having supplied arms to the IRA

SAS sources told the newspaper they are unhappy with the arrangement, which they believe could be connected to the release of Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al Megrahi last month.

They are also angry at being ordered to train soldiers from a country that provided the IRA with weapons used against British troops during the Troubles in Northern Ireland.

Lalmohan · Post by **Lalmohan** » 13 Sep 2009 16:13

^^^^ don't forget, the reason that gadafi is being courted is that he has signed up solidly against al qaeda... just about the only arab leader to have done it and meant it, saddam could have been the other one, but the neocons messed that up

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 13 Sep 2009 19:53

This is a great example of how "leaders" think, and, how a single person could make decisions that impact us all in various ways:

Why Britain and France feared fall of Berlin Wall

By James Blitz in London

Published: September 10 2009 03:00 | Last updated: September 10 2009 03:00

The fall of the Berlin Wall in November 1989 is today regarded as the most triumphant event in the history of postwar Europe, the moment when the division of the continent and of Germany finally ended.

But within days of the wall coming down, there was alarm in London and Paris as the leaders of Britain and France contemplated the imminent emergence of a united Germany.

The initial opposition of Margaret Thatcher and of François Mitterrand to reunification has long been known. The then British prime minister, in particular, made her worries known publicly. But documents to be published by the UK foreign office tomorrow provide fresh evidence of the depth of both leaders' anxieties.

On November 28 1989, just two weeks after the Berlin Wall came down, the then West German chancellor Helmut Kohl announced a 10-point plan for reunific-ation without consulting either his European allies or the ruling Bonn coalition. In the weeks after that, Mrs (now Lady) Thatcher and Mr Mitterrand, then president, held several private meetings to discuss the German question. Memos of the meetings were written by Charles (now Lord) Powell, the then foreign affairs adviser to Mrs Thatcher and are among the most striking of the documents to be released tomorrow.

One meeting of the two leaders was at the European Community heads of government meeting in Strasbourg on December 8. Here, Mr Powell relates how Mr Mitterrand spoke critically of Mr Kohl, saying he had no understanding of other nations' sensitivities and was exploiting German "national" feeling. Another notable meeting was a lunch on January 20, 1990 at the Elysée palace. Here, Mr Powell reports Mr Mitterrand talking about how reunification would see the re-emergence of the "bad" Germans that once dominated Europe. According to the memo, Mr Mitterrand says at one point that if Mr Kohl were to get his way, Germany could win more ground than Hitler ever did and that Europe would have to bear the consequences.

Mr Mitterrand goes on to warn Mrs Thatcher that if Germany were to expand territorially, Europe would be back to where it was one year before the first world war. But unlike Mrs Thatcher, he acknowledged that no force in Europe would be able to stop it happening

The documents are not just revealing of Mr Mitterrand's position. They also reveal the scale of the confrontation between Mrs Thatcher and the UK foreign office, which feared throughout 1990 that her position on reunification was too hostile.

The documents show that foreign office diplomats realised as early as January 1989 that German reunification was a prospect. But after the wall had fallen, they feared Mrs Thatcher was adopting a stance that was so shrill that no one - least of all the White House - was paying any attention to it.

Mrs Thatcher clearly despaired of the advice she was getting from Sir Christopher Mallaby, the UK ambassador to Bonn. She believed he was too soft on reunification and had an "alarming" view of the issue.

Sir Christopher's fear, however, was that Britain was ending up on the wrong side of the argument and that the UK was being castigated in Germany as "the least important" of the western allies.

Mrs Thatcher's opposition to unification has long been seen as a historic misjudgment. By January 1990, there were already signs that she was becoming less obsessed about unification, as some of the documents reveal. There are signs that Mr Mitterrand may have been playing a wily game, baiting Mrs Thatcher into making increasingly hostile public statements on reunification that merely marginalised Britain.

Gerard · Post by **Gerard** » 15 Sep 2009 02:20

British officer wins two gallantry awards for fending off Taliban attack with bayonet

JwalaMukhi · Post by **JwalaMukhi** » 19 Sep 2009 09:41

'Prosperous' British India: a revelation from official records
By William Digby
http://tinyurl.com/LootOfDesh

The connection between the beginning of the drain of Indian wealth to England and the swift uprising of British industries was not casual: it was causal.

Thus England's unbounded prosperity owes its origin to her connection with India, whilst it has, largely, been maintained—disguisedly—from the same source, from the middle of the eighteenth century to the present time. ' Possibly, since the world began, no investment has ever yielded the profit reaped from the Indian plunder.'2

What was the extent of the wealth thus wrung from the East Indies? No one has been able to reckon adequately, as no one has been in a position to make a correct ' tally' of the treasure exported from India. Estimates have been made which vary from £500,000,000 to nearly £1,000,000,000. Probably between Plassey and Waterloo the last-mentioned sum was1 transferred from Indian hoards to English banks.

With some of the money thus obtained England struck down the ancient industries of India, and, during a whole century, has done naught that is worthy to constitute India a land of varied industries.

These be hard and cruel words for an Englishman to write. Written, however, they must be so as to help to an understanding of the wrong which has thus been done to India—and, in a deeper sense, to England. With understanding may come a redeeming of the wrong;— may, more likely, may not.

The last sentence in the above quote needs to be kept in mind. Especially for the Jingoes who believe that the Queendom wallahs have change of heart and turned a new leaf. Not by a long shot, unless all the loot is spent, then it will be al-taqiyya for sometime, before re-education camps are conducted across generations, there may be some hope or as succintly put; perhaps more likely not of turning a new leaf.