The U.K.’s Security and Counter Terrorism Minister has quit. Pauline Neville-Jones is stepping down, according to the Prime minister David Cameroon.
No reason has been made public, but Neville-Jones will now serve as special representative to business on cyber security.
In a move to save government money, some British officials want to put the power of the courts in the hands of the police.
British Home Secretary Theresa May, says the plan could save the U.K. 2.5 million hours of bobby time, equating to huge savings of money for the government. The way she wants to do that is to allow bobbies to skip the patrolling, detaining and arresting phase of police work, and allow the cops to simply charge the suspects, like a hybrid police/prosecutor.
It would apply to minor offenses, but the radical changes go beyond allowing police to act as street prosecutor. Anybody wanting to file a complaint about the legal system would have to deal directly with a bobby. The intent of forcing people to deal directly with police, with legal issues, is to reduce court costs for the government. May admits this would put a lot more power with the police, and is a definite move towards a police state: “We will take a different approach, we will trust the police.”
Officials with the British Shadow government (yes, such a thing, aka Shadow Cabinet or Shadow Front Bench) say this will not only put a lot more power in police hands, but with a lot less police officers. Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper (May’s counterpart) says that May plans to fire thousands of bobbies under the police/prosecutor plan. The result of giving police the power to act as prosecutor, and then cutting police staff, will greatly increase the work load of the bobby. Cooper says this will act as a double whamming for security; people will feel even more threatened by the power of police, and and the cops will be stretched thin.
Russian officials are meeting with Iraqi officials, to discuss deals that include oil and military.
Russian oil companies are already involved with oil production in Iraq. Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, says Iraq is now interested in military help from Russia.
Lavrov is meeting with various Iraqi leaders this week.
Standard & Poor’s cut Greece’s credit rating, downward 2 points, after Greek officials announced they needed more bailout money.
The S & P’s rating now puts Greece below investment grade. S & P’s also says that Greece will need a waiver on repaying most of its current loans (that means they don’t think Greece can pay).
Sony says it got hit again. Sony officials admitted on May 9, that their Sony Online Entertainment was also hacked, resulting in 24 million accounts being compromised. The total number of compromised accounts are now at 100 million. Sony officials say the hacks took place from April 16 to 19.
Argentina is demanding help from the United Nations, in helping to fight slave trades, run mainly by organizations from the United States.
Argentina claims that U.S. organized crime is using Argentina as a recruiting grounds, and transit point, for human trafficking. Poor people are promised well paying jobs in the U.S., but end up working for little pay, if any, and long hours.
The workers, men, women and children, not only work in industries like textiles, but, according to the U.S. Bureau of Statistics 80% end up as sex workers in the United States.
Other countries that are destination points for human trafficking are Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Belgium, Israel, Japan and Thailand.
The Bosnian Serb government is refusing to recognize the Bosnian national government. This over the country’s national court, which has been hearing cases of war crimes.
Austrian Valentin Inzko, is the supreme decision maker in Bosnia, and has ordered the Serbs to back off their plans to officially refuse to recognize the Bosnian national government. In retaliation, Bosnian Serb leader Milorad Dodik, sent a letter to the United Nations accusing Inzko of abusing his power.
Since the end of the Bosnian Civil War, the Idaho Air & Army National Guard has supported several peacekeeping missions to Bosnia.
Greek officials announced that the 110 billion Euro (U.S. $160 billion) bailout money they got from the European Union is not enough.
Officials say they need another two to four years of bailout funding. They are willing to cut even more from social programs to satisfy lenders.
China is the number one exporter, which country is number two? Germany.
Germany continues to do well when it comes to exporting its products to other countries. So well, that it’s hit a record of 98.3 billion Euros (U.S. $140.9 billion) in exports for the month of March: “That was the highest monthly figure recorded for both exports and imports since the collection of foreign trade statistics had started in the Federal Republic of Germany in 1950.”-Destatis, German National Statistics Office
In another sign of who’s got the money, for the second year Chinese tourists have topped the list of biggest spenders in France.
The study was done by the UN World Tourism Organization. Recently the Japanese, in their own study, found that Chinese tourist were the biggest spenders there.
The study showed a 60% increase in Chinese visiting France, from 2009 to 2010. Spending also went up by 35%.
Russian tourists are the second biggest with number of visitors, and spending, in France.