Saturday, September 8, 2007

Leaders attending the APEC summit in Sydney, Australia have worn Driza-Bone coats for their traditional group photo in front of the Sydney Opera House. In APEC tradition, leaders wear attire which draws inspiration from the host nation’s national costume.

Australia’s choice was made by Prime Minister John Howard and his wife Janette. Australia does not have a national costume. In an APEC statement it was revealed that Driza-Bone had been consulted to produce an outfit that “captures the essence of Australia’s culture and environment.”

“Driza-Bone coats were born over 100 years ago when a sailor fashioned waterproof coats out of windjammer sails for protection against the harsh Australian trade winds,” the statement said.

“These coats were also perfect for people working on the vast Australian continent and have since been adapted into the perfect riding and outback attire.”

The custom-made knee-length coats worn by the leaders were the traditional dark brown of all Driza-Bones and had differing colours for the lapels and linings – slate blue for Australia’s vast coastline, mustard yellow for the sun and sand; red ochre for the outback and eucalyptus green for the bush. Leaders were given the choice over which highlight colour they wanted.

The choice of costume was a closely guarded secret by Australia officials, with speculation rife throughout the media. It has been suggested that the costume could include “budgie smugglers” (male swimwear)- and thongs (flip flops) to represent the beach;blue singlets and shorts favoured by labourers or khaki gear in memory of Steve Irwin.

The group photo is said to be one of the most anticipated parts of the APEC summit, with people wanting to see which leader looks the “silliest”. In the past leaders have been dressed in silk tunics, leather bomber jackets and Batik-print shirts.

Thursday, September 30, 2010

Tyler Clementi, eighteen, a freshman at Rutgers University in the United States, jumped off the George Washington Bridge last Wednesday after roommates broadcast his same-sex encounters online.

Clementi shared a room with Dhraun Ravi, in Davidson Hall on Rutgers’ Piscataway campus.

On September 19, Dhraun Ravi is alleged to have secretly activated a webcam in their room, then retreated down the hall to the room of his childhood friend, Molly Wei, where they used Skype to connect to the live video feed of Clementi having sex. Ravi tweeted, “Roommate asked for the room till midnight. I went into molly’s room and turned on my Web cam. I saw him making out with a dude. Yay”.

Clementi reported the incident to the university, and that information has been passed to the authorities, according to Gregory Blimling, university vice president for student affairs.

Ravi attempted to repeat his actions on the following Wednesday, after seeing his roommate kissing a teenaged boy. Writing on Facebook he said, “Anyone with iChat, I dare you to video chat me between the hours of 9:30 and 12. Yes, it’s happening again.”

The following Wednesday, at around 4 p.m., fellow freshman Lauren Garcia saw Clementi leaving the dormitory. “He had his iPod in his ear, and just had this blank stare on his face,”, she said. Clementi drove one hour along the New Jersey Turnpike, abandoning his car on the Jersey side. Writing a final message on his own Facebook page saying, “Jumping off the gw bridge sorry”, he left a wallet containing his driver’s licence and Rutgers ID card, and his mobile phone on the roadside. According to witnesses, he scaled the railings, crouched down, and jumped at approximately 8:50 p.m— about eight minutes after his Facebook posting. Those details were relayed to press anonymously by a law enforcement official.

One of the anonymous witnesses, a 45-year-old from West New York, said “It was so quick, as soon as he saw us, he went. He didn’t give us an opportunity to do anything.”

New York Police Department’s Harbour Unit recovered a body of a young man yesterday, in the Hudson River to the North of the bridge, but it has not yet been positively identified.

Ravi and Wei, both eighteen, were charged with invasion of privacy. Wei voluntarily surrendered to police Monday, and was released on her own recognizance; Ravi surrendered the following day, and has been released on $25,000 bail. All three students started their courses in August.

The crime of “transmitting sexual images” is a 3^rd degree felony, carrying a maximum prison sentence of five years.

Clementi, from Ridgewood, New Jersey, played the violin, and was a member of the Ridgewood High School chamber orchestra. A student from the same hall described him as quiet and shy. His parents were apparently unaware of his sexuality; Robert Righthand, a friend of Clementi since grade school, said “he had it in reserve for a very long time […] You never thought he was depressed. You just thought he was quiet. He wasn’t the person to open up to a lot of people.”

A gathering of around 100 people held a vigil on Wednesday, chanting slogans such as “We’re here, we’re queer, we’re not going home.”

The Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays organization announced a “call to action” today. Stephen Goldstein, of LGBT advocacy organization Garden State Equality, said, “[Clementi,] by all accounts, was brilliant, talented and kind […] we are sickened that anyone in our society, such as the students allegedly responsible […] might consider destroying others’ lives as a sport.”

On Wednesday prior to the incident, the university launched “Project Civility”, a two-year campaign encouraging students to be thougtful of others. The University president, Richard McCormick, issued a letter stating that “If the charges are true, these actions gravely violate the university’s standards of decency and humanity.”

Monday, December 26, 2005

A new medal has been created for New Zealanders who helped in recovery efforts after the Boxing Day Tsunami.

Called the New Zealand Special Service Medal (Asian Tsunami) it recognises the work of New Zealanders who went to the region after the tsunami; locating the missing, identifying the dead, and assisting those left behind. Defence Minister Phil Goff says New Zealanders who served in the devastated areas in the first two months after the tsunami, are to receive the medal.

In a provisional list; which was released today; 163 New Zealanders are honoured in which 37 are non-military or police personnel (including aid workers).

Also, forty-seven police officers will receive the honour for their work identifying bodies in Thailand.

Prime Minister Helen Clark said the medal recognised “the special service of those New Zealanders who undertook often harrowing tasks in dangerous conditions”.

Thursday, March 13, 2008

Members of Australia’s Health Services Union (HSU) will go on strike in Victoria next week in a dispute over stalled wage and career structure negotiations. Over 5000 physiotherapists, speech pathologists and radiation therapists will walk off the job next week, effectively closing the state’s 68 largest health services.

The strike will force the closure of intensive care units and emergency departments across the state.

It is feared the strike could continue into Easter.

National secretary of the HSU, Kathy Jackson said admissions would be crippled, while intensive care patients would have to be evacuated to New South Wales, Tasmania and South Australia as hospitals will not be able to perform tests or administer treatment.

“When an ambulance shows up you can’t admit a patient without an X-ray being available, you can’t intubate them and you can’t operate on them,” she said.

“If something goes wrong in an ICU you need to be able to X-ray, use nuclear medicine or any diagnostic procedure,” said Ms Jackson.

Ms Jackson said the HSU offered arbitration last year, but the state government refused. “They’re not interested in settling disputes, they hope that we are just going to go away.”

“We’re not going away, we’ve gone back and balloted the whole public health workforce in Victoria, those ballots were successful, 97 percent approval rating,” she said.

The HSU is urging the government to commence serious negotiations to resolve the dispute before industrial action commenced.

The government has offered the union a 3.25 per cent pay increase, in line with other public sector workers but the union has demanded more, but stopped short of specifying a figure.

Victorian Premier John Brumby said the claim would be settled according to the government’s wages policy. “The Government is always willing and wanting to sit down and negotiate with the relevant organisations . . . we have a wages policy based around an increase of 3.25 per cent and, above that, productivity offset,” he told parliament.

The union claims it is also arguing against a lack of career structure, which has caused many professionals to leave the health service. Ms Jackson said wages and career structures in Victoria were behind other states.

Victorian Opposition Leader Ted Baillieu said he was not in support of the proposed strike and called on the government to meet with unions. “There could not be a more serious threat to our health system than has been announced today.”

“We now have to do whatever is possible to stop this strike from proceeding,” he said.

The opposition leader will meet with the union at 11:30 AM today.

Victorian Hospitals Industry Association industrial relations services manager Simon Chant said hospitals were looking at the possible impact and warned that patients may have to be evacuated interstate if the strike goes ahead.

Sunday, August 6, 2006

The government of Iran has banned the human rights group Defenders of Human Rights Center led by Nobel Peace laureate Shirin Ebadi.

On Saturday, the Iranian newspaper Shargh reported an Interior Ministry statement announcing the ban, “As the group calling itself ‘Defenders of Human Rights Center’ has not obtained a permit from the interior ministry, its activities are illegal and the violators of this decision will be prosecuted,”.

Ebadi told reporters that such a permit was not required, “Non-governmental organizations that observe the law and do not disrupt public safety do not need a permit. So the… Center does not need authorization”.

She said that the group had applied for the permit but the Interior Ministry denied the request without any explanation.

Saying that the “move is not in Iran’s national interest”, Ebadi said that the group will protest against the decision and explore legal options to “obtain our rights”.

The group was started by six prominent lawyers and has campaigned on human and minority rights issues for the past four years. It has criticized Iran’s judiciary for violations of human rights.

Abdolfattah Soltani, a member of the group was sentenced last month to five years in jail on charges of disclosing confidential information and opposing the regime. He had represented the imprisoned journalist Akbar Ganji as well as the family of the Iranian-Canadian photographer Zahra Kazemi, who was killed in custody in 2003.

The group demanded an independent probe into the death of dissident student activist Akbar Mohammadi, who died in prison on Sunday following a hunger strike.

The ban comes on the 100th anniversary of Iran’s “constitutional revolution” of August 5, 1906, when the monarch of what was then Persia decreed the creation of a constitution and an elected parliament – the Majlis.

“The ban has a bad meaning for the country” on such a day, said Mohammad Dadkhah, a founder of the rights group.

Ebadi was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2003 by the Norwegian Nobel Committee, for “her efforts for democracy and human rights…especially on the struggle for the rights of women and children,”. She was the first Iranian and first Muslim woman to receive the honour.