Nuclear power “too cheap to meter”!
Gentle reader, please do not take offence at the forcefulness of our language. We are not often called to vulgarity but in extreme duress. This is precisely the attitude the greedy nuclear industry and their money-hungry political cronies in many countries, including Thailand, have for all the rest of us: “Fuck you!”
There is no escape from the critical chain reaction for our planet which began at Fukushima on March 11, 2011 − 311. Fukushima will be written in our histories as the Hiroshima of our generation long after there is anyone left to read them.
On April 12, Japan’s nuclear safety agency raised the Fukushima meltdown to level 7, the highest category on the International Nuclear Event Scale. Level 7 was created expressly for the Chernobyl disaster, consisting of “a major release of radiation with widespread health and environmental impact”.
A recent study was prepared for Greenpeace Germany by international nuclear safety expert Dr. Helmut Hirsch. Dr. Hirsch’s assessment, based on data published by the French government’s radiation protection agency (IRSN) and the Austrian government’s Central Institute for Meteorology and Geodynamics (ZAMG) found that the total amount of unstable radionuclides Iodine-131 and Caesium-137 released between March 11 and March 23 has been so high that the Fukushima crisis already equates to three INES 7 incidents.
Release of radiation from the stricken reactors has reached 10,000 teraBequerels (10,000 trillionBequerels) per hour, measured for radioactive Iodine-131. Radioctive caesium is being carried by the jetstream around the planet at precipitation levels. See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QvMOvMK_jQA as of April 13.
Act like nothing’s wrong http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lpAqiGSp29c
Radiation in milk in Hawaii is now at least 2,033% above Federal drinking water safety limits. The US safety limit is 3 pCi/l (picoCuries per litre). Note this is the minimum percentage found over EPA requirements. This figure is reached by adding together the Caesium-134 (800%); −137 (633%); and Iodine-131 (600%) levels found in milk. http://theintelhub.com/2011/04/11/japan-nuclear-radiation-in-hawaii-milk-2033-above-federal-drinking-water-limits/. It should be noted the testing was performed on samples of organic milk.
Increased radiation has been reported in the municipal drinking water of at least 14 US cities. These are not restricted to the west coast of North America but have occurred in the US midwest and east coast. Where measured, rainwater in every US state and Canadian province have elevated radioactivity. In California, Geiger counter activity has trebled, from 7.5 to 22.5 clicks per minute.
Rainwater samples taken in San Francisco April 6 measured an increase of 18,100% above Federal safety standards and included measures of radioactive caesium and Tellurium-132. The west coast Canadian city of Vancouver ordered suspended all mobile radiation testing until further notice after levels of 10,000% safe levels of Iodine-131 were detected. The Canadian Food Inspection Agency refused to test British Columbia milk for radioactivity.
Many countries have already banned the import of fresh vegetables from Japan. But what about the radioactive rain falling on your produce? Goodbye leafy greens.
This April 13 map shows the locations of North American radiation monitors. Readers report many previously active monitors are missing from west coast locations and no longer reporting.
On April 4, Japanese government also has requested the Japan Meteorological Society and Japanese universities not to release data from radiation measurement to avoid “public panic”. Rainwater samples have all demonstrated elevated concentrations of radioactive Tellurium-02, Ruthenium-04 and Technetium-04.
280 sensors to measure radiation release from atomic bomb testing were established worldwide under the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty of 1996. These sensors are detecting levels equivalent to Chernobyl releases. One scientist, Gerhard Wotawa, noted, “I’ve never seen data like this in my career.”
So how do we deal with disaster? Austria, Germany, Canada and Australia have banned 11 episodes of Matt Groening’s US anime series, The Simpsons, which deal with nuclear crisis. The Simpsons, now in its 24th season with 480 episodes, has been one of the few commercial outlets to show the greed of nuclear operators, grovelling toadies in the industry and a complacent public to a mainstream television audience. Meltdowns caused by jelly doughnuts! See http://simpsons.wikia.com/wiki/Springfield_Nuclear_Power_Plant
Kopp Online, Xander News and other non-English news agencies are reporting that the EU implemented a secret “emergency” order without informing the public which increases the amount of radiation permitted in food by up to 20 times previous food safety standards.
According to EU bylaws radiation limits may be raised during a nuclear emergency to prevent food shortages. http://blog.alexanderhiggins.com/2011/04/03/eu-secretly-implements-large-increases-food-radiation-limits-informing-public-13636/
Japan itself has now restricted rice planting in soil with more than 5,000 Becquerels per kilogram of radioactive caesium, the first time maximum radiation levels have been set for soil anywhere. The Fukushima prefectural government announced on April 6 that rice paddies 20-30 kilometers from the nuclear plant have shown as much as 15,031 Becquerels per kilogram of radioactive caesium. Goodbye ricebowl, staple protein for half the world’s population.
It would appear TEPCO dumped 11,500 tons of radioactive runoff into the ocean, 100 times the permissible amount. Although the diplomatic corps was informed beforehand and the Japanese foreign minister stated the release does not violate international law, Iodine-131 was found in seawater at 7.5 million times and radioactive Caesium at 1.1 million times the legal limit. TEPCO has announced 60,000 tons of radioactive water remain, nearly 57 million litres.
In fact, such dumping clearly violates 1972 international law, the ”Convention on the Prevention of Marine Pollution by Dumping of Wastes and Other Matter”. As Natural News puts it, “Fukushima has become the dirty bomb of the Pacific.”
Fish in nearby waters are now being measured at 4,000% above the Codex Alimentarius limits for Iodine-131 and 447% of Caesium-137. Radioactive caesium has a half-life of 30 years. Radiation levels for the isotope are not considered “safe” for 10 to 20 times longer. The caesium released today will remain dangerous six centuries from now.
When one takes into account the conveyor currents of the north Pacific, all seafood will become contaminated. Radioactive seaweed has been found in Puget Sound. Goodbye, sushi!
We’re poisoning the mother of all life on Earth.
The nuclear operator has offered $12 each in compensation to nearby residents. This paltry offer was refused. Economists at Tyler Durden have reported an inevitable economic collapse for Japan following a plunge from 52.9 to 46.4 in private mortgage insurance. What will bankruptcy of a financial linch-pin to the world economy mean to all the rest of us?
However, what we’re seeing, according to the American NGO Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility is the application of new standards which will drastically raise the levels of radiation allowed in food, water, air and the general environment. Access to internal US Environmental Protection Agency communications has revealed a 1,000% increase for exposure to Strontium-90; a 3,000-100,000% rise for Iodine-131; a 25,000% rise for Nickel-63 in drinking water.
Any radiation has no safety threshold for human exposure and the EPA’s own numbers state that 25% of people exposed to these “new acceptable levels” would develop cancers. The EPA is not required to make its deliberations public or debated by Congress; all that is required to make this Federal regulation is simple publication of the changes in the US government gazette, the Federal Register. http://www.collapsenet.com/free-resources/collapsenet-public-access/item/723-fallout
This is being accomplished, of course, to protect the nuclear lobby and its stakeholders from threats to its financial health.
Emails of protest may be sent to Lisa P. Jackson, EPA Administrator, jackson.lisap@epa.gov before this becomes reality. Sara DeCair, a health physicist with the EPA’s Office of Radiation and Indoor Air closed her memo of recommendation for updated standards with a smiley and the note, “No rest for the wicked.” Indeed. She should be sacked, decair.sara@epa.gov.
In addition to cancers, any radiation exposure correlates to an increase in immune system disorders. Thyroid diseases, diabetes, asthma, AIDS, hepatitis, multiple sclerosis, myalgic encephalomyelitis and a huge spectrum of non-specific neurological conditions are expected in the human population. Radioactive iodine attacks thyroid function while radioactive caesium mimics potassium uptake.
The ‘Petkau effect’ for ingestion of radioactive beta and alpha particles, discovered by Atomic Energy of Canada scientist Dr. Abram Petkau in 1972, draws ominous conclusions for human exposure. Dr. Petkau found that low doses of ionising radiation are actually more efficient at disrupting human cell activity. Pet cows with radioactive udders. Goodbye, dairy.
Uranium-234, previously unreported, has been detected in Hawaii, southern California and Seattle. This is likely to be a product of the alpha decay of the Plutonium-238 found in the Fukushima reactors’ MOX fuel but Plutonium-238, −239 and −240 have already been released into the atmosphere at Fukushima. Uranium-234 has a half-life 245,500 years, which means that radioactivity will be detectable for half a million years. There will certainly be no people to measure it! South Korea closed 130 schools starting April 7 due to radioactive rain at levels only 1/10 of California’s.
A further Richter 7.1 aftershock on April 8 in Japan, the largest since the March 11 9.0 earthquake, negatively affected at least a further five Japanese nuclear power facilities to varying degrees but some with loss of power. The epicentre of an April 12 6.0 aftershock was just beneath the Fukushima nuclear plant. Will Japan become a new Atlantis?
International shipping has also already been affected with many shipping lines avoiding Japan to prevent radioactive contamination. However, further reports indicate that some irradiated ships have been found in European ports. Japanese cars imported into Russia have been found to have high levels of radiation.
Some scientists have already declared northern Japan, including Tokyo, uninhabitable and recommended its evacuation. Radiation in Tokyo has been doubling every day since March 11. Video report: http://vimeo.com/22003275 and http://vimeo.com/22003021. Evacuated to where, exactly?
Fire at Fukushima No. 1 April 12. Note the smoke, note the proximity of the ocean. Move along: Nothing to see here, folks. It’s all under control…
On March 15, Germany bowed to enormous public protest and announced it will continue to phase out nuclear power and shut down, temporarily, seven of its oldest reactors. However, the final shutdown is not planned until 2020.
On April 12, China announced it was suspending all nuclear construction for 20 months, until December 2012. China had been expected to become the world’s largest user of nuclear power, supporting 40% of new development.
Thank you, but this is both too little and, obviously, too late. Nuclear power must be legislated out of existence now or the robber barons and their politician friends will just be waiting until we get lazy and forget, again.
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Noah comments: The 311 event is an altogether new category, level 8. When the reactor contents in molten state melt through to ground water, the explosive hydrogen gas produced will cause a continuous series of mini-explosions, forcing radioactive plumes to rise miles into the atmosphere. The explosions will continue until all the fuel is spent. This process will take decades to complete based upon the sheer volume of fuel present at the site.
Given the circumstance, considering all known facts as revealed just on this website alone, what is underway today is unstoppable. The full spectrum of isotopes recently found in pine needles in Vietnam gives insight into what is to come for the entire Northern Hemisphere for decades to come.
All remedial actions now underway (mainly pumping water in with hoses) have only slowed the ultimate outcome. Thanks to the brave souls who have given their lives and health to buy their nation and the world some time to prepare for a new way of life.
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67Mopar comments: Chernobyl had 180 tons of fuel on-site. Fukushima has over 1,724 tons on-site. They can call this a “Level 7″ all day long… Simple multiplication dictates that this is 10 times worse than Chernobyl.
And here we were all worried about a nuclear war!
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Cee comments: All these people complaining. We were all going to die anyway. Why? Because people are dumb as hell, that’s why. Humans can create, something that the lower animals cannot, but we cannot seem to stop shitting where we eat.
A dog or cat can do that, but a person can’t. Every human being is guilty of this, just at different scales. Yeah, I’m talking about you and me.
Fake “gods”. Fake “leaders”. Fake “science”. Fake “education”. People deep down inside know this shit is fake but they keep going along with it. The destiny of man is self destruction, because we are fucking stupid.
I hear people talking about the “elite”. This is human nature. You get rid of one group of “elites”, the next one will do this same stupid shit and people will still be stupid and go along with it.
Stupid, stupid stupid. Stupid.
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Don’t you feel stupid? We’ve bought the corporate military lie hook, line and sinker. It took a nuclear bomb to wake us up.
Meltdown physics: Rock melts at 315°−649° Celsius (600°−1,200° Fahrenheit) depending on the rock; that’s how our volcanic planet was created. Concrete melts at somewhat lower temperatures but is only safety-rated to around 200° C (392° F) before breakdown.
However, the Fukushima reactor cores and likely the fuel storage pools have now reached the melt temperature of the uranium dioxide fuel—2,865° C (5,189° F). This means there is no possibility of containing the reactors using cement for entombment—cement would simply flow like lava. http://modernsurvivalblog.com/nuclear/nuclear-fuel-rod-meltdown-demonstration/ When molten fuel and concrete combine, it becomes ‘corium’ beginning the ‘China syndrome’ effect.
Fukushima will require a containment method not invented yet. How long might this take to implement?
We’re seeing a conspiracy of silence and spin from conventional corporate news media. The lords of greed are doing a way better job of nuclear terrorism than we ever might have expected of fundamentalist insurgents. People are starting to call Fukushima 311, a la 9-11. The latest generation of robber barons has stolen our future.
Coming attractions
Nuclear power is nothing less than a weapon of mass destruction. We are witnessing the beginning of a nuclear war against humanity, one which we may not survive.
No nukes for Thailand—no way!
CJ Hinke
Freedom Against Censorship Thailand (FACT)
ThaiVisa thread: http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/450765-meltdown-likely-under-way-at-japan-nuclear-reactor/
2012forum thread: http://2012forum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=22739&f=41
[FACT comments: There can be no better example of the persistent lèse majesté Thai govt and military shows for our King. Even when the King gives direct advice, govt and military don’t listen. Especially when there’s money to be made. Hypocrites!]
Thailand in Market for German Subs
Down to the Lawn in Ships – Das Baht
Gavin M Greenwood
Asia Sentinel: April 4, 2011
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http://www.asiasentinel.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3108&Itemid=392
At the front of the Thai navy museum at Samut Prakan, some 20 miles downriver from central Bangkok, the conning tower and fore deck of a submarine appears to break through the manicured lawns and move purposefully towards the busy Sukhumvit Road.
The blue-grey steel structure is all that remains of His Thai Majesty’s Ship Matchanu and Thailand’s submarine service, a four-boat flotilla purchased from Japan in 1938 and decommissioned in 1951. The submarines were never in action against an enemy. Their finest hour instead came when their engines provided intermittent power to Bangkok’s tram system after the city’s electricity supply was disrupted by allied bombing raids towards the end of World War II.
In late March 2011, 60 years on from the decommissioning of the Matchanu and the other three boats – a full cycle in the Buddhist calendar – the Thai government announced plans to acquire six 30-year old surplus German navy submarines at an initial cost of around US$257 million. The small diesel-electric U-206A class boats were built for service in the confined seas of the Baltic, making them seemingly ideal for operations in the shallow waters of the Gulf of Thailand.
The purchase price of boats is merely the start of what would prove a costly and protracted development program to rebuild the Royal Thai Navy’s submarine force. If the U-206s are purchased the navy will then have to build at least two bases for the boats – one on the Gulf of Thailand and the other on the Andaman Sea. Each boat carries a crew of around 25 personnel, with a minimum of two plus crews per submarine. An entire support and maintenance infrastructure will have to be developed, trained and deployed at both bases. If all six boats are made operational – allowing one at each base to be always ready for sea, a second on stand-by and a third undergoing maintenance – this implies the creation of submarine arms of at least 2,000 personnel, with the recurring costs this implies.
The utility of submarines to Thailand is disputed, not least by the country’s King Bhumibol Adulyadej. In December 2007, in response to the navy’s annual demand for submarines, the king noted in his birthday address that the boats were unsuitable for the country as the Gulf of Thailand was to shallow for them operate and that they may become stranded in the mud. The navy politely responded by saying the monarch’s advice would be considered in any future plans to acquire submarines.
The strategic purpose of the boats is also contested. Thailand has extensive maritime interests, including offshore natural gas fields and a huge fishery, as well as unresolved boundary disputes with neighbouring countries. These roles are already being met by surface warships and land-based aircraft, which offer effective and proportionate means to patrol Thailand’s territorial waters and offshore extended economic zones. In addition, surface vessels have enabled Thailand to participate in such international operations as the present anti-piracy mission in the Indian Ocean and off Somalia.
Further, Thailand’s most credible external threats to national sovereignty relate to disputed land boundaries with Burma, Laos and Cambodia. Unresolved maritime boundary disputes with Cambodia and Burma occasionally flare up, but are unlikely to result in anything more than a display of overt naval power by Thailand – a function submarines are singularly ill-equipped to achieve.
If the deal goes ahead it will mark the culmination of the Thai navy’s persistent efforts to re-establish its lost submarine arm. In recent years the navy’s senior brass have routinely made an annual funding bid for submarines, mainly basing their arguments on the steady increase in undersea capabilities by Malaysia, Singapore and more recently Vietnam.
This desire to join Southeast Asia’s sub club has drawn widespread condemnation in the Thai media, where it has been characterised as extravagant, strategically irrelevant and linked to the forthcoming elections. The latter criticism rests on the theory that buying ageing German U-boats would appeal to the nationalist vote, concerned that the country was falling behind regional neighbours in terms of naval prowess.
Other less charitable views are concerned that the proposed submarine purchase offered handsome ‘commissions’ to those involved in the deal, with the timing linked to officials hedging their bets against an unfavourable outcome in this year’s proposed elections and the destabilising consequences that are likely to follow – whatever the outcome.
This explanation is plausible given the record of past defence procurement decisions that offered little additional capability to the armed forces – and in some case placed military personnel in danger – while raising widespread suspicions that individuals had benefitted greatly at the expense of public funds.
Some of the Thai armed forces’ previous eccentric purchasing decisions have invited ridicule and rage in equal measure. These include buying a US$11.5 million US-manufactured airship intended to serve as an intelligence-gathering platform in the country’s deep south, where a bitter insurgency involving Muslim separatists, criminal groups, the security forces and hapless civilians has taken more than 4,400 lives in past seven years. The idea of monitoring the southern provinces from a quiet and economical blimp is sound enough, but the airship’s failure to ascend beyond rifle shot range and the steady escape of its helium gas rendered it unserviceable.
The airship, however, represented a model of procurement practice compared to the acquisition of more than 500 British-made ‘explosive detectors,’ reportedly at the cost of around $40,000 per unit. Investigations by foreign and local scientists and media organisations quickly concluded that the devices were not merely useless but extremely dangerous to troops or police using them as they offered a false sense of security.
Accusations of fraud were made against the manufacturer and corruption against those in Thailand who had ordered the device, but a few years on no obvious progress has made in ascertaining either charge.
The navy’s past judgment is also in question. In 1997 the navy took delivery of the Spanish-built aircraft carrier Chakri Naruebet. The ship cost some $336 million, with its six-strong AV8 aircraft (the US version of the British Harrier vertical take-off fighter) adding a further US$75 million or so. The aircraft are now unserviceable and the carrier is occasionally used in humanitarian missions – most recently to rescue tourists stranded by heavy rains on islands in the Gulf of Thailand in late March 2011. Paying for and manning the Chakri Naruebet remains a considerable drain on the navy’s resources, which will be further strained when HTMS Angthong, an amphibious support ship now under construction a Singapore yard, joins the fleet in 2012-13.
There is every likelihood that the U-boat deal will go ahead, with the equally probable result that within a decade or so the submarines will be perpetually tied alongside at the Sattahip base, perhaps next to the by then immobile Chakri Naruebet carrier. One of them may even have joined the Matchanu on the lawns of the RTN museum at Samut Prakan, a source of excitement for small boys and a symbol of hubris for the navy.
Gavin M. Greenwood is a security consultant with the Hong Kong-based Allan & Associates firm. |
[FACT comments: For all govt’s and military’s wailing about “national security”, they don’t seem to respect the sovereignty of our neighbours. Thailand can’t get at the crown jewel, Angkor Wat, so it uses subterfuge to claim Khao Phra Viharn. By military incursion, Thai military firing actually damaged one wing of this ancient, irreplaceable temple. And now we find they planted antipersonnel cluster bombs which only function is to maim and kill civilians. Dastardly and cowardly! Time to reign in the arrogance and impunity of Thailand’s ‘royal’ military.]
CMC condemns Thai use of cluster munitions in Cambodia
Thailand and Cambodia should join global treaty banning cluster munitions
Cluster Munition Coalition: April 5, 2011
Based on two separate on-site investigations, the Cluster Munition Coalition (CMC) has concluded that Thailand used cluster munitions on Cambodian territory during the February 2011 border conflict. Thai officials confirmed the use of cluster munitions in a meeting with the CMC on 5 April.
This is the first use of cluster munitions anywhere in the world since the 2008 Convention on Cluster Munitions entered into force and became binding international law. The CMC condemns any use of cluster munitions, and urges Thailand and Cambodia to immediately commit to no future use and to accede to the global treaty banning the weapons.
“It’s appalling that any country would resort to using cluster munitions after the international community banned them,” said Laura Cheeseman, director of the CMC. “Thailand has been a leader in the global ban on antipersonnel mines, and it is unconscionable that it used banned weapons that indiscriminately kill and injure civilians in a similar manner.”
In a meeting on 5 April, the Thai Ambassador to the UN in Geneva confirmed Thai use of 155mm Dual Purpose Improved Conventional Munition (DPICM) cluster munitions. The Ambassador said Thailand used cluster munitions “in self-defence”, using the principles of “necessity, proportionality and in compliance with the military code of conduct”. He alleged heavy use of rocket fire by Cambodian forces against civilian targets in Satisuk, in the Khun Khan district of Thailand.
In February and April of this year, CMC members conducted two separate missions to cluster munition contaminated areas in Cambodia including in Svay Chrum Village, Sen Chey Village and around the Preah Vihear temple hill, and witnessed unexploded submunitions and fragmentation damage caused by cluster munitions. Norwegian People’s Aid confirmed that unexploded M42/M46 and M85 type DPICM submunitions have been found.
Atle Karlsen of Norwegian People’s Aid said, “There are around 5,000 people living in Sen Chey village that are at risk from these unexploded weapons. Thailand must supply information to help clear affected areas and make them safe for civilians to return home.”
Sister Denise Coghlan, a CMC leader who took part in the first research mission said, “These cluster munitions have already robbed two men of their lives, two more have lost their arms and a further five were injured. The area must be cleared immediately to prevent more suffering. Cambodia must make every effort to ensure the safety of civilians.”
The CMC has urged Thailand to provide detailed information on the results of its inquiry, including the location of all cluster munition strikes, so that civilians can be adequately warned of the dangers and to assist the effective and efficient clearance of submunition remnants, which pose dangers like landmines. The CMC is also calling on Cambodia to accede 2
to the Convention on Cluster Munitions and as interim steps commit to no use, make known the types and quantity of cluster munitions in its stockpile and start destruction.
Cambodia and Thailand are not among the 108 countries that have signed the Convention on Cluster Munitions but each has joined the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty. Both countries participated in the “Oslo Process” to negotiate the Convention on Cluster Munitions and attended its First Meeting of States Parties in neighbouring Lao PDR in November 2010.
“This conflict should spur both countries to take urgent action to denounce the weapons and join the ban treaty,” said Cheeseman.
The Convention on Cluster Munitions entered into force as binding international law on 1 August 2010, banning the use, production, stockpiling and transfer of cluster munitions, while requiring states to destroy stockpiles, clear contaminated land and assist victims and affected communities. Of the 108 countries that have signed the Convention since it opened for signature in December 2008, 55 countries have already ratified.
Contacts:
Sister Denise Coghlan
Cambodian Campaign to Ban Landmines and Cluster Munitions, Cambodia, +855-124-88950
Laura Cheeseman
Cluster Munition Coalition, UK, +44-7515-575-175
Photos of contamination in Cambodia
© Stéphane de Greef, Landmine and Cluster Munition Monitor
http://www.flickr.com/photos/clustermunitioncoalition/sets/72157626310392061/with/5592080603/
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Detailed background
From 4-7 February 2011, Thai and Cambodian troops exchanged fire over disputed territory along the border near Preah Vihear temple, a UNESCO World Heritage site. On 10 February, the state-sponsored Cambodia Mine Action Centre (CMAC) reported (http://www.cmac.gov.kh/tblnews.php?id=68) it had evidence that Thai forces had fired cluster munitions into parts of Preah Vihear province.
CMC members undertook a research mission to the Cambodian side of the border on 12 February, where they witnessed and photographed submunitions that had failed to explode in two areas – the military and police base in Svay Chrum village and the Preah Vihear temple hill. In Svay Chrum, CMC members photographed unexploded cluster submunitions lying out in the open and numerous cluster munition remnants, as well as structures and a vehicle with physical damage consistent with that caused by cluster submunition explosions.
A cluster submunition allegedly exploded when a Cambodian policeman picked it up after the initial strike at the base, killing two policemen and injuring seven others. The research team interviewed two of the victims at Preah Vihear referral hospital in Tbeng Meanchey, who sustained fragmentation wounds to the arms, torso and head as well as interviewing two 3
other victims in Siem Reap Provincial hospital who had each lost an arm in the explosion. When asked if they could identify the device that caused their injuries, each independently pointed to a picture of an M46 cluster submunition.
On a separate assessment mission carried out from 1-2 April 2011 by CMC member Norwegian People’s Aid (NPA), 5 cluster munition contaminated areas were visited: Sen Chey village, Preah Vihear temple hill, a new village development area in Northwest Sraaem, an open agricultural field behind a military camp, and a police camp in Svay Chrum village. NPA identified M42/M46 and/or M85 type submunitions in all of these areas. An additional 7 areas have been identified by the Cambodia Mine Action Centre (CMAC) as being contaminated by cluster munitions as a result of strikes but it has not been possible for NPA to access these areas. The 12 cluster munition strike areas are within a 300km2 area according to CMAC.
CMC members photographed unexploded submunitions in the contaminated areas. http://www.flickr.com/photos/clustermunitioncoalition/sets/72157626310392061/with/5592080603/
CMC analysis of the photographs indicates that the submunitions are M46-types, contained in NR-269 155mm artillery projectiles. Each projectile contains 56 submunitions, which are a copy of the United States M46 submunition. Upon subsequent inquiries by CMC members, Thailand acknowledged possessing the NR-269 projectiles with M46-type submunitions. Unexploded M85 type submunitions with a self-destruct mechanism have also been found in an agricultural field next to the military camp.
Both countries possess stockpiles of cluster munitions, but little is known about their status or composition. The Cambodian government has in the past cited an ongoing review of its defence and security situation as the reason for a delay in joining the treaty. Thailand has cited concerns over its ability to destroy its stockpile as a roadblock to joining the Convention, as well as security concerns. Thailand announced in 2008 that it had no intention of using the weapons in the future.
Cambodia and Thailand are States Parties to the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty and Cambodia will host that treaty’s 11th Meeting of States Parties in November 2011.
South-East Asia is more heavily contaminated by cluster munitions than any other region after the United States dropped large numbers of cluster bombs on Cambodia, Lao PDR and Vietnam in the 1960s and 1970s.
For more information on cluster munition policy and practice, please see the following Cluster Munition Monitor 2010 country reports: • Cambodia • Thailand
Thai peace talks come to light
Anthony Davis
Asia Times: April 6, 2011
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Southeast_Asia/MD06Ae01.html
After six years of secret contacts disrupted by political turmoil and mutual distrust, high-level peace talks aimed at addressing the roots of Thailand’s bitter Malay-Muslim insurgency are moving into a more open and substantive phase.
Senior negotiators from both the Thai government and separatist sides of the conflict expressed optimism in recent interviews that key issues should now be tabled, while conceding that the secrecy and denial that have shrouded the talks to date have outlived their usefulness.
“Keeping things secret was killing the process,” said a senior Thai official closely involved in ongoing talks between a government delegation and an alliance of two insurgent factions recognized by Bangkok as playing a central role in the conflict: the Patani-Malay National Revolutionary Front or Barisan Revolusi Nasional Patani-Melayu (BRN), the shadowy faction that has been the main organizational driver behind the violence that escalated sharply in 2004, and the more moderate Patani United Liberation Organization (PULO), which has re-emerged as the internationally active political wing of the movement.
“It was concluded there was a need to gradually acknowledge to outsiders at least in broad terms that there is a peace process,” said the official in the Thai government’s first detailed briefing to the media on the initiative. “The Pattani movement wanted a signal that the government was really serious about peace talks.”
A member of the government’s delegation added: “There comes a point when you can’t do substantive things if the process is not public. And this is something I have passed on to the top level of government.”
Notwithstanding the new openness, independent analysts concur that the coming months will likely tax the skills and resolve of both negotiation teams. Against a backdrop of sustained violence, they will need to maneuver between negotiating measures aimed at giving real administrative, linguistic and symbolic shape to the conflict-ridden southern provinces’ distinctive Pattani-Malay identity on the one hand, while on the other allaying the ingrained skepticism of both sides’ hardliners.
Bangkok’s interest in establishing communication with the armed opposition in the predominantly Muslim provinces of Pattani, Narathiwat and Yala and parts of neighboring Songkhla was first triggered by the disastrous Tak Bai incident, according to one official involved in the process.
On October 25, 2004, security forces shot dead seven Muslim protesters in Narathiwat and were responsible for the deaths in custody of a further 78 who suffocated while being transported in trucks for interrogation in Pattani. A propaganda windfall for the rebels, the incident added fuel to an already escalating conflict but prompted then-prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra to explore the possibility of opening contacts with a still ill-understood insurgency.
Brokered by an international non-governmental organization acceptable to both sides, the process of contact and dialogue gathered slow momentum between 2005 and 2007 with a series of secret meetings in various countries outside of Thailand.
Deep-seated mistrust in the Pattani movement over the government’s motives in agreeing to secret contact – a mindset honed by experience of perceived military intelligence-gathering ploys in the 1980s and 1990s – all but precluded early progress.
“The first three years of this process were about confidence-building, but initially it was difficult as they didn’t trust us,” noted the senior Thai official who has played a key role throughout.
A framework for the process was established in 2007 and appeared to promise real movement when in December that year then-prime minister General Surayud Chulanont met in Bahrain with senior representatives of both BRN and PULO – the first time a Thai head of government had sat with Pattani separatist leaders.
Political turmoil in Bangkok and disinterest by Samak Sundaravej, General Surayud’s successor as prime minister, resulted in a loss of momentum throughout 2008. In 2009, the process was revived and reformatted by the administration of Abhisit Vejjajiva in the context of a National Security Council (NSC) policy on the south that was first endorsed by the coup government’s cabinet in October 2006.
The NSC policy allows for “promot[ing] dialogue with individuals or groups of people who hold different opinions or ideological views from the State regarding how to resolve the conflict” in the border provinces.
Currently, a six-man government dialogue committee is headed by a senior academic with longstanding experience in the region, ranking officials from the NSC, and significantly, since earlier this year, a general from the Royal Thai Army nominated by army commander General Prayuth Chan-ocha.
Official sources noted that this team answered to a steering committee headed by the prime minister, in his capacity as NSC chairman, and also includes Prayuth and permanent secretaries from the ministries of Justice and Foreign Affairs.
On the insurgent side, a seven-man team under an umbrella organization called the Patani Malay Liberation Movement (PMLM) is headed by Kastori Mahkota, PULO’s Sweden-based vice president and foreign affairs chief, and flanked by other senior leaders from both PULO and BRN.
Importantly, it also includes representatives from armed elements operating inside the three main violence-prone provinces. While the actual identities and residential details of these Thailand-based cadres remain unknown to the government, their credentials as real actors on the ground have been validated by the Thai security services, noted one source.
Sporadic trust
To date, the talks have been sporadic and arguably lacking in real substance. But as one directly involved source noted, the series of meetings has been crucial in building a level of trust and channel of communication between key figures in Bangkok’s governmental and military establishment and senior figures in the insurgency.
The process has also been productive conceptually, sources say. “The talks have helped the Thais to have a debate about the future that has moved the goal posts in terms of what might be acceptable for an eventual settlement,” said the source involved in the talks. “They have also encouraged the Pattani movement to consider options beyond all-or-nothing demands for independence and helped them shape their ideas.”
More recently, two factors converged to lend the process new impetus. The first was an initial stab at a substantive confidence-building measure (CBM) in the form of a controversial month-long suspension of hostilities by insurgent forces in three districts of Narathiwat province in June-July of last year.
Agreed to by both sides with the government selecting the specific districts – Cho Airong, Ra-ngae and Yi-ngor – the move was aimed at demonstrating both insurgent good faith and, importantly, a convincing degree of command and control by those talking to the government over fighting forces on the ground.
As a result, the PMLM undertook to suspend “organized attacks”, meaning broadly bomb and small-arms fire attacks on security forces by groups of insurgents. The agreement specifically did not cover targeted killings of individuals, which were acknowledged as difficult to control in any decentralized insurgency, and which in any case in Thailand’s violence-prone southernmost provinces are not all the work of insurgents.
At the time, Abhisit and other informed officials were reluctant to publicly confirm or deny that the exercise had taken place, let alone lend it full endorsement. Local officials were entirely unaware of the ceasefire and, in the aftermath, mostly dismissive of reports it had taken place.
Their skepticism was understandable enough given that “organized attacks” in any district in the border provinces are relatively few in the space of a single month and the difference between none and one can easily be viewed as “business as usual”, particularly against a backdrop of continued sporadic assassinations.
Nevertheless, in retrospect both dialogue teams saw the exercise as useful, notwithstanding frustration on the insurgent side by the absence of any real endorsement from Bangkok of their temporary suspension of hostilities.
The ceasefire was marred by only one “organized attack”, a failed roadside bombing in Cho Airong on June 18 that targeted a policeman driving a private vehicle from Narathiwat city back to his station in Sungai Padi district after delivering an insurgent detainee to the provincial court. The attack, which clearly involved knowledge of the officer’s movements, was arguably more likely to have been carried out by insurgents from Sungai Padi than by local fighters in Cho Airong.
Another goad towards greater openness has been awareness in Bangkok that continued secrecy runs the risk of foreign governmental bodies, notably the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), being drawn into what the Thai government has throughout insisted is a domestic conflict. Such official fears were given edge in September last year when OIC secretariat officials met Pattani separatist figures in both Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.
Moreover, going public with an already well-established peace process serves to fire a shot across the bows of concerned foreign parties while preempting any need for elements in the PMLM or the Pattani diaspora more broadly to appeal for outside mediation. For a kingdom with a proud history of resisting 19th century colonial designs, involvement in its internal affairs by foreign states or government bodies is viewed by officials as the thin end of a humiliating wedge that risks broadening into territorial dismemberment.
High hurdles
Several issues now confront the dialogue teams. First and arguably most important is a gesture from Bangkok that sustains the confidence built to date and reciprocates last year’s insurgent-organized ceasefire. As one member of the government committee summed it up: “The challenge right now is that the government has to show that forward movement has a momentum that will continue, and that this [process] is not just tactical stalling.”
One undoubtedly substantive gesture that has been mooted by the PMLM during talks would be the release of one or more of four PULO chiefs detained in Malaysia in early 1998. The four were later convicted in a Thai court for treason and murder and handed down life sentences.
“A release [of a PULO prisoner] is only one sign but it’s a really important one,” said PMLM committee chairman Kasturi Mahkota in a recent interview in which he conceded the government side was “more serious than ever before over finding a solution”. “I can’t say I’m 100 percent optimistic [over a release] but I’m still hoping.”
In the context of an ongoing debate between moderates and hardliners in the insurgent camp, a significant public gesture from the government side would also serve to strengthen the hand of those prepared to compromise rather than fight on indefinitely, independent analysts familiar with the peace process contend.
According to other informed sources, any conciliatory move by the Thai side could lead to a further limited suspension of hostilities by the insurgents – although this is again unlikely to be made public in advance given the danger of the move being sabotaged by spoilers from one or both sides.
Beyond CBMs lies the fundamental issue of the PMLM’s putting forward substantive political proposals. The need to agree on and negotiate specifics will not be easy for a movement that has hitherto enjoyed the luxury of making grandiose demands for independence untroubled by the exigencies of practical politics. A move towards real give-and-take poses the danger of exacerbating differences within a notoriously fractious movement.
However, sources note that such work is already underway and that study groups set up by the insurgent negotiation team are looking to lessons learned from a range of separatist conflicts, including in Northern Ireland, Spain’s Basque region, the southern Philippines and Indonesia’s Aceh.
The PMLM team is also examining ideas and proposals drawn up by increasingly active civil society groups in the border provinces, something that Kasturi has repeatedly stressed as important. As one government committee member noted: “Our last meeting with the [Pattani] movement was particularly productive in that for the first time they conceded that for any durable solution the role of civil society is important and necessary.”
For its part, the NSC is currently formulating a new policy on security in the border provinces to replace the one it drafted in 2006. From the outset, civil society organizations have been invited to participate in this exercise, according to the senior Thai official, who added that ideas brought up at the dialogue table by the PMLM were also being incorporated.
Nevertheless, in the coming months dialogue will inevitably transition into more detailed negotiations over decentralization of power, the role of the Malay language and a range of other issues – a process that will be contentious and carry no guarantee of success.
Despite the fact that its mandate and framework extend beyond any single administration in Bangkok, the peace process will inevitably remain hostage to events both at the national and regional levels. Thailand’s national political divide poses the threat of further upheavals in Bangkok and the danger of a lack of policy coherence on the southern crisis.
Equally, major insurgent attacks or other outrages also risk impacting the tentative talks. As one experienced observer put it: “Even though the military has joined the process, there’s always going to be a link between the level of violence and their commitment to genuine dialogue and reconciliation.”
Assuming unforeseen events do not conspire against the process, there are still several overarching obstacles to a peace deal. One is mainstream Thai Buddhist society and media that, even after seven years of unrelenting violence, have minimal understanding of the roots of Malay-Muslim disaffection and are generally prepared to back hardline responses that have only exacerbated the problem.
Another is the Thai constitution. The sanctity of the national charter and indivisibility of the Thai state it enshrines remain sacrosanct to the government. However, hardliners in the insurgent camp have pointed out with some justification that the Thai military has regularly abrogated and rewritten constitutions since the end of the absolute monarchy in 1932. To their minds, there is no reason the current charter could not be revised to accommodate their vision of Pattani’s unique place in the national body politic.
For a still tentative peace process only now emerging into public view, the challenges promise a far rougher ride than the secluded road already traveled.
Anthony Davis is a Bangkok-based security analyst for IHS-Jane’s.
The Economist banned again-Prachatai
14-04-11
The Economist banned again
Prachatai: February 10, 2011
http://www.prachatai3.info/english/node/2302
The latest edition of The Economist has been refused distribution in Thailand by its distributor due to improper content.
According to a survey of book stores by the Siam Intelligence Unit website, the 5 Feb 2011 edition of the magazine has not been put on sale in Thailand. The website’s inquiries revealed that the magazine’s distributor had refused to distribute it because its content was not proper for Thailand.
5 Feb 2011
In its online version, this edition includes an article entitled ‘When more is less. The increasing use of lèse-majesté laws serves no one’ which mentions the court case of Prachatai Director Chiranuch Premchaiporn and quotes a few academics on lèse majesté prosecutions in Thailand.
Since Dec 2008 at least 6 editions of the magazine, including the latest one, have been either officially banned by the Thai police or subject to self-censorship by the distributor.
6 Dec 2008, banned by police
24 Jan 2009, banned by distributor for article ‘The trouble with Harry [Nicolaides]’
31 Jan 2009, banned by distributor for article ‘A sad slide backwards’
4 July 2009, banned by police and distributor for article ‘Treason in cyberspace’
March 2010, banned by distributor for article ‘The battle for Thailand’
Source:
http://www.prachatai.com/journal/2011/02/32987
ASIA: Three women rights defenders receive prestigious international award for documentary
Asian Human Rights Commission: April 11, 2011
Three Asian women rights defenders have received a prestigious international award for a documentary made about their respective struggles, which was shown as part of a major film festival in the Netherlands during March.
The jury at the Movies that Matter Festival, which was held in The Hague from March 24 to 31, awarded Suciwati Munir, Angkhana Neelaphaijit and Padma Perera, a Special Jury Award for Josefina Bergsten’s film “UNJUST”.
The film documents the struggles of the three wives, mothers and activists to challenge impunity and get justice for their husbands, all of who lost their lives in 2004 due to the murderous intentions of state agents.
Basil Fernando, director of policy and programme development at the Asian Human Rights Commission, said that UNJUST was rightly deserving of international recognition.
“UNJUST is a documentary film that highlights the human rights problems in countries that do not have an adequately developed rule of law system to protect human rights,” Fernando said.
“Through this film, three women who have seen the worst aspects of their countries’ justice systems have helped the world to understand what it means to be living in these sorts of conditions,” he said.
“It is unique documentary and Josefina Bergsten has demonstrated her capacity to understand and to show through film the difficult experience of struggling for justice in countries with highly defective or collapsed justice systems,” the AHRC policy director added.
The Hong Kong-based regional rights group in July 2010 gave its Asian Human Rights Award for Creative Media to Bergsten for the film.
“It was a great privilege to work with Suciwati, Angkhana and Padma while making this film,” Bergsten said on receipt of the latest award in The Hague.
“They are the most courageous people I know and their ongoing struggle has inspired and benefited many people in Asia and beyond,” she added.
Suciwati’s husband, human rights lawyer Munir, was poisoned on a Garuda Airlines flight in 2004 while travelling from Indonesia to study abroad. A former pilot and former head of the airline were implicated in the murder, and the pilot given a 20-year jail sentence.
However, the trail of connections to his killing has led back to the Indonesian secret services, and the masterminds have never been identified.
Suciwati was among the activists who were guests at the film festival in the Netherlands, along with the film’s maker. A five-minute video profile of her is available on the festival website: http://www.moviesthatmatterfestival.nl/english_index/nieuws_en/news/169
Thai police abducted Angkhana’s husband, Somchai, from his car on a street in Bangkok. Although five police went on trial, only one was convicted of a minor offence. He has himself disappeared, and an appeal court recently overturned his conviction. All the police are still serving.
Somchai’s body has never been recovered, even though the former prime minister, Thaksin Shinawatra, and other senior officials, admitted to having inside knowledge of the case.
Angkhana has since set up an organization to work for the victims of enforced disappearances in Thailand, and is now among the country’s best known human rights defenders. In 2006 she was a joint recipient of the Gwangju Prize for Human Rights.
Padma’s husband Gerard was a victim of police torture in Sri Lanka who became an outspoken and fearless advocate of human rights. Gunmen connected to the police shot him as he travelled on a public bus, shortly before he was going to depose in court against the officers who were accused of torturing him.
The Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka has honoured Padma with an award for the struggle that she has undertaken since to get justice for her husband and to promote human rights in her country.
The Movies that Matter Festival, which is held annually in the Netherlands, this year screened ten documentaries in its main programme. The international jury consisted of activist Bianca Jagger (jury chairwoman), filmmaker Mohamed Al-Daradji, Frans Huijnen (managing director of the Equal Treatment Commission), filmmaker Pamela Yates and film journalist Belinda van de Graaf.
The first prize, the Golden Butterfly award, went to Palestinian activist Ayed Morrar, for uniting Fatah members, Hamas members and Israelis in their peaceful efforts to oppose the destruction of his village by the Israeli separation wall.
UNJUST has also been nominated for the 15th Human Rights Press Award.
The winner of this award and awards ceremony will be held on April 16 at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Hong Kong.
Persons wishing to obtain copies of “UNJUST” may contact the filmmaker, Josefina Bergsten, at josefina.bergsten@gmail.com.
COMMENTARY
Legends, yes; insects, no
Kong Rithdee
Bangkok Post: April 2, 2011
http://www.bangkokpost.com/opinion/opinion/229924/legends-yes-insects-no
The fates of two Thai movies couldn’t have been more dissimilar this past week. On Monday, Thanwarin Sukkhapisit filed a lawsuit against the Culture Ministry’s film rating board. Last December, the board banned Thanwarin’s transgender drama, Insects in the Backyard, on grounds of moral indecency. Thanwarin appealed, but the verdict was upheld. The Film Act 2007 states that filmmakers can file charges with the Administrative Court in case they disagree with the film board’s decisions, and Thanwarin has pursued that constitutional right. It is the first time in history that a film director has taken legal action against a film-related authority. Then on Thursday, the action shifted to a galaxy not so far away _ namely, 16th century Ayutthaya. The suffocating grandiosity of Legend of King Naresuan 3: Naval Battle has finally been unveiled. The film, which reportedly cost 500 million baht to make, has received the shining “P” rating: the P as in “promote”, since the government endorses it as an exemplary cultural artefact that we Thais of all ages should see, despite some tomato blood, wartime casualties and international back-stabbing.
On the first day, King Naresuan 3 made 18 million baht. It was estimated the film would rack up nearly 40 million baht by last night. Whopping! Whether Part 3 will overtake the 230 million baht generated by Part 2 is as exciting as whether we’ll get to see Part 4 before Part 1 returns on free TV and Part 5 is announced and Parts 6, 7 and 8 are imagined. I’m seeing a sea of “P” floating like confetti at a circus, or like paper money at cheng meng.
That the ministry staunchly champions King Naresuan and ruthlessly crushes Insects in the Backyard surely opens our eyes about Thailand’s vision of cultural policy. It’s an exhibition of what that tricky word “culture” means to the authority which claims to have the indisputable right to define what constitutes as culture and what doesn’t, what merits the baptism of morality and value, and what doesn’t. What can be part of our society and what cannot.
The “P” rating is like, well, high up in heaven, while the ban rating (is that even a rating?) is like, sure, hell. It’s an execution order tossed at cinematic criminals. In principle, it’s good that the state has thrown its support behind epic films that recount the key chapters in our history. I fully agree with that, though the state shot itself in the foot when that support turned out to be scarily extravagant at 460 million baht. Meantime, to support that film and then spray insecticide on an artwork whose conceit aims to disturb the complacency of “normal culture” _ Insects in the Backyard is about a cross-dressing father and his troubled teenaged children _ smacks of poor, illiberal judgement.
There have been reports about the ministerial disdain for Insects. Culture Minister Niphit Intharasombat said that as the person charged with “preserving the standards of culture”, he could never allow Thais to see that film for moral reasons. What the state is implying is that the divine right to define what is culture belongs solely to them. Culture, it seems, is not a social organism born of collective experience and contemporary streams of thought, expression, sensibility and phenomenon. Culture is not something that evolves, is tested, challenged, survives, becomes dead, and is reborn as something fresher, darker, brighter, more confusing _ something new. Culture is narrow not wide, closed not open, static not moving. In the case of Insects and its ban, the message seems to be that the third-gender culture is not worthy of being acknowledged as part of our sanctified “Culture”.
As every unworthy insect knows, pornography exists in this country. Breaking news, huh? Insects in the Backyard is, at heart, a social commentary, and it showed its sincerity by having gone through the proper ratings channel _ instead of just going underground. And now, the filmmaker has made the right decision to keep going along that proper channel by bringing the case to the Administrative Court _ instead of easily winning this war by putting the film up for free download and dismantling the entire system of moral filtering.
By the way, Insects cost 400,000 baht to make, not even half a million; a tiny insect compared to the elephantine Naresuan. But by law, they both should have the same right to be screened.
Liz vs the censors-Reuters
14-04-11
Liz vs The Censors
How Elizabeth Taylor’s Who’s Afraid Of Virginia Woolf? took on a national censorship system – and won
M G Lord
Reuters: April 1, 2011
http://www.todayonline.com/Entertainment/Movies/EDC110401-0000015/Liz-vs-The-Censors
ON JUNE 10, 1966, Life magazine did one of its many cover stories on Elizabeth Taylor.
Far from her usual smouldering beauty, she looked puffy, haggard, decades older than her 34 years. “Liz in a Shocker”, the headline proclaimed. “Her movie shatters the rules of censorship”.
The movie, of course, was Who’s Afraid Of Virginia Woolf? – a scorching drama adapted from Edward Albee’s Broadway play. Its frank, gritty language brazenly violated the Production Code, rigid guidelines that had dictated the content of American movies since 1934. Albee’s words, however, served art, not smut, and Ernest Lehman, the movie’s screenwriter-producer, saw no way to modify them without gutting the play. So he decided to challenge the Code – a bold act considering his previous stage-to-screen project: The Sound Of Music.
With Taylor and her husband Richard Burton aboard, Virginia Woolf could not be dismissed as an art house trifle. It was big box office – a perfect test case to go up against the Code.
Even in her first big film, National Velvet, Taylor had nettled the censors, who sought to hide her blossoming sexuality. “Please omit the action of Velvet tapping her chest and the line ‘I am flat as a boy,” the Code Office ordered, and the movie did.
The Code might seem like an antiquated joke today, but in its heyday, the censors wielded great power, largely through financial blackmail. They had seized control during the Great Depression by threatening an organised Roman Catholic boycott of all movies – which no studio then could survive.
The Code wasn’t just about sex. It had a racist component, forbidding the depiction of inter-racial couples. And it demanded reverence for religion and government; improper display of the US flag was as severe an infraction as sodomy.
Taylor’s best films before Virginia Woolf were not sweet, quaint movies – they were daring projects with themes forbidden by the Code: A Place In The Sun (1951) deals with pregnancy out of wedlock and includes references to abortion; Giant (1956) addresses miscegenation; Suddenly, Last Summer (1959) hinges on homosexuality and cannibalism.
Her ability to convey intensity, especially sexual intensity, helped courageous directors get around the letter of the law. The censors held sway over scripts, but some films communicated much more on-screen than in writing because of all the non-verbal things Taylor expressed. In A Place In The Sun, a working-class man (Montgomery Clift) impregnates a co-worker (Shelley Winters) before falling in love with the boss’ daughter (Taylor). Clift and Taylor embrace, filling the screen. She whispers a line that director George Stevens ad-libbed: “Tell Mama. Tell Mama all.”
The line would have seemed inane on paper, but as spoken by Taylor, it touches us. Taylor’s voice overrides our prefrontal cortex. She speaks directly to our ancient aft-brain, our amygdala: The repository of love, hate, fear and lust.
In Butterfield 8, Taylor’s defiant Gloria Wandrous was sexually liberated before society permitted this for women. She was a misogynist’s nightmare: So sexy that men could not resist her, yet picky about her partners.
Geoffrey Shurlock, chief enforcer at the Code Office, was tempted to nix the entire project, until he came up with two ways to make Gloria comply with the Code: Attribute her independence to a mental illness and punish her for it hideously – with death.
The script adhered to Shurlock’s notes, but Taylor’s performance subverted what the censors had intended, searing bad-girl Gloria into our collective memory. In one memorable scene, Taylor impales her married lover’s instep with her stiletto heel, showing that she, not he, holds the power in their relationship.
Virginia Woolf, however, was making Warner Bros nervous. Shurlock had sent a five-page list of words and phrases that needed to be cut from the script. They included “goddamn”, “screw you”, “bugger”, “plowing pertinent wives” and “hump the hostess”. Nor did Shurlock bend when he saw the movie. “I could not give it the seal with that language. I’m throwing it to Jack Valenti,” he said.
Valenti was the president of the Motion Picture Association Of America. He himself couldn’t overrule Shurlock, but the Production Code Review Board – an 11-member committee on which he sat – could. And it did, killing the Code in the process.
As an alternative, Valenti in 1968 introduced a new way of handling “mature” subject matter: A rating system that put the onus on exhibitors to bar people younger than 18 from watching certain movies. The rating system remains in place.
When the film opened in July, Taylor’s bravery was at last rewarded. Stout, potty-mouthed and shamelessly adulterous, Taylor’s Martha riveted audiences.
In her portrayal of Martha, Taylor exacts revenge for 32 years of censorship. The Code ordered women to revere marriage and authority. Martha spits at the men around her, curling her lip in contempt. The Code expected women to appear demure. Famished after having to eat daintily in public, Martha shoves an entire chicken leg into her mouth.
Immersed in this dangerous role, Taylor showed Hollywood that audiences could survive an encounter with the truth. In fact, they hungered for it. They didn’t need a Code to shield them from a mirror of themselves.
“I’m loud, and I’m vulgar, and I wear the pants in this house because somebody has to,” Martha shrieks. “But I’m not a monster.”
Coverup at Fukushima-Counterpunch
14-04-11
What They’re Covering Up at Fukushima
Hirose Takashi
Introduced by Douglas Lummis
Counterpunch: March 22, 2011
http://www.counterpunch.org/takashi03222011.html
Video: http://vimeo.com/22062314
Hirose Takashi has written a whole shelf full of books, mostly on the nuclear power industry and the military-industrial complex. Probably his best known book is Nuclear Power Plants for Tokyo in which he took the logic of the nuke promoters to its logical conclusion: if you are so sure that they’re safe, why not build them in the center of the city, instead of hundreds of miles away where you lose half the electricity in the wires?
He did the TV interview that is partly translated below somewhat against his present impulses. I talked to him on the telephone today (March 22 , 2011) and he told me that while it made sense to oppose nuclear power back then, now that the disaster has begun he would just as soon remain silent, but the lies they are telling on the radio and TV are so gross that he cannot remain silent.
I have translated only about the first third of the interview (you can see the whole thing in Japanese on you-tube), the part that pertains particularly to what is happening at the Fukushima plants. In the latter part he talked about how dangerous radiation is in general, and also about the continuing danger of earthquakes.
After reading his account, you will wonder, why do they keep on sprinkling water on the reactors, rather than accept the sarcophagus solution [ie., entombing the reactors in concrete. Editors.] I think there are a couple of answers. One, those reactors were expensive, and they just can’t bear the idea of that huge a financial loss. But more importantly, accepting the sarcophagus solution means admitting that they were wrong, and that they couldn’t fix the things. On the one hand that’s too much guilt for a human being to bear. On the other, it means the defeat of the nuclear energy idea, an idea they hold to with almost religious devotion. And it means not just the loss of those six (or ten) reactors, it means shutting down all the others as well, a financial catastrophe. If they can only get them cooled down and running again they can say, See, nuclear power isn’t so dangerous after all. Fukushima is a drama with the whole world watching, that can end in the defeat or (in their frail, I think groundless, hope) victory for the nuclear industry. Hirose’s account can help us to understand what the drama is about.
Under control!
Douglas Lummis
Hirose Takashi: The Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant Accident and the State of the Media
Broadcast by Asahi NewStar, 17 March, 20:00
Interviewers: Yoh Sen’ei and Maeda Mari
Yoh: Today many people saw water being sprayed on the reactors from the air and from the ground, but is this effective?
Hirose: . . . If you want to cool a reactor down with water, you have to circulate the water inside and carry the heat away, otherwise it has no meaning. So the only solution is to reconnect the electricity. Otherwise it’s like pouring water on lava.
Yoh: Reconnect the electricity – that’s to restart the cooling system?
Hirose: Yes. The accident was caused by the fact that the tsunami flooded the emergency generators and carried away their fuel tanks. If that isn’t fixed, there’s no way to recover from this accident.
Yoh: Tepco [Tokyo Electric Power Company, owner/operator of the nuclear plants] says they expect to bring in a high voltage line this evening.
Hirose: Yes, there’s a little bit of hope there. But what’s worrisome is that a nuclear reactor is not like what the schematic pictures show (shows a graphic picture of a reactor, like those used on TV). This is just a cartoon. Here’s what it looks like underneath a reactor container (shows a photograph). This is the butt end of the reactor. Take a look. It’s a forest of switch levers and wires and pipes. On television these pseudo-scholars come on and give us simple explanations, but they know nothing, those college professors. Only the engineers know. This is where water has been poured in. This maze of pipes is enough to make you dizzy. Its structure is too wildly complex for us to understand. For a week now they have been pouring water through there. And it’s salt water, right? You pour salt water on a hot kiln and what do you think happens? You get salt. The salt will get into all these valves and cause them to freeze. They won’t move. This will be happening everywhere. So I can’t believe that it’s just a simple matter of you reconnecting the electricity and the water will begin to circulate. I think any engineer with a little imagination can understand this. You take a system as unbelievably complex as this and then actually dump water on it from a helicopter – maybe they have some idea of how this could work, but I can’t understand it.
Yoh: It will take 1300 tons of water to fill the pools that contain the spent fuel rods in reactors 3 and 4. This morning 30 tons. Then the Self Defense Forces are to hose in another 30 tons from five trucks. That’s nowhere near enough, they have to keep it up. Is this squirting of water from hoses going to change the situation?
Hirose: In principle, it can’t. Because even when a reactor is in good shape, it requires constant control to keep the temperature down to where it is barely safe. Now it’s a complete mess inside, and when I think of the 50 remaining operators, it brings tears to my eyes. I assume they have been exposed to very large amounts of radiation, and that they have accepted that they face death by staying there. And how long can they last? I mean, physically. That’s what the situation has come to now. When I see these accounts on television, I want to tell them, “If that’s what you say, then go there and do it yourself!” Really, they talk this nonsense, trying to reassure everyone, trying to avoid panic. What we need now is a proper panic. Because the situation has come to the point where the danger is real.
If I were Prime Minister Kan, I would order them to do what the Soviet Union did when the Chernobyl reactor blew up, the sarcophagus solution, bury the whole thing under cement, put every cement company in Japan to work, and dump cement over it from the sky. Because you have to assume the worst case. Why? Because in Fukushima there is the Daiichi Plant with six reactors and the Daini Plant with four for a total of ten reactors. If even one of them develops the worst case, then the workers there must either evacuate the site or stay on and collapse. So if, for example, one of the reactors at Daiichi goes down, the other five are only a matter of time. We can’t know in what order they will go, but certainly all of them will go. And if that happens, Daini isn’t so far away, so probably the reactors there will also go down. Because I assume that workers will not be able to stay there.
I’m speaking of the worst case, but the probability is not low. This is the danger that the world is watching. Only in Japan is it being hidden. As you know, of the six reactors at Daiichi, four are in a crisis state. So even if at one everything goes well and water circulation is restored, the other three could still go down. Four are in crisis, and for all four to be 100 per cent repaired, I hate to say it, but I am pessimistic. If so, then to save the people, we have to think about some way to reduce the radiation leakage to the lowest level possible. Not by spraying water from hoses, like sprinkling water on a desert. We have to think of all six going down, and the possibility of that happening is not low. Everyone knows how long it takes a typhoon to pass over Japan; it generally takes about a week. That is, with a wind speed of two meters per second, it could take about five days for all of Japan to be covered with radiation. We’re not talking about distances of 20 kilometers or 30 kilometers or 100 kilometers. It means of course Tokyo, Osaka. That’s how fast a radioactive cloud could spread. Of course it would depend on the weather; we can’t know in advance how the radiation would be distributed. It would be nice if the wind would blow toward the sea, but it doesn’t always do that. Two days ago, on the 15th, it was blowing toward Tokyo. That’s how it is. . . .
Yoh: Every day the local government is measuring the radioactivity. All the television stations are saying that while radiation is rising, it is still not high enough to be a danger to health. They compare it to a stomach x-ray, or if it goes up, to a CT scan. What is the truth of the matter?
Hirose: For example, yesterday. Around Fukushima Daiichi Station they measured 400 millisieverts – that’s per hour. With this measurement (Chief Cabinet Secretary) Edano admitted for the first time that there was a danger to health, but he didn’t explain what this means. All of the information media are at fault here I think. They are saying stupid things like, why, we are exposed to radiation all the time in our daily life, we get radiation from outer space. But that’s one millisievert per year. A year has 365 days, a day has 24 hours; multiply 365 by 24, you get 8760. Multiply the 400 millisieverts by that, you get 3,500,000 the normal dose. You call that safe? And what media have reported this? None. They compare it to a CT scan, which is over in an instant; that has nothing to do with it. The reason radioactivity can be measured is that radioactive material is escaping. What is dangerous is when that material enters your body and irradiates it from inside. These industry-mouthpiece scholars come on TV and what to they say? They say as you move away the radiation is reduced in inverse ratio to the square of the distance. I want to say the reverse. Internal irradiation happens when radioactive material is ingested into the body. What happens? Say there is a nuclear particle one meter away from you. You breathe it in, it sticks inside your body; the distance between you and it is now at the micron level. One meter is 1000 millimeters, one micron is one thousandth of a millimeter. That’s a thousand times a thousand: a thousand squared. That’s the real meaning of “inverse ratio of the square of the distance.” Radiation exposure is increased by a factor of a trillion. Inhaling even the tiniest particle, that’s the danger.
Yoh: So making comparisons with X-rays and CT scans has no meaning. Because you can breathe in radioactive material.
Hirose: That’s right. When it enters your body, there’s no telling where it will go. The biggest danger is women, especially pregnant women, and little children. Now they’re talking about iodine and cesium, but that’s only part of it, they’re not using the proper detection instruments. What they call monitoring means only measuring the amount of radiation in the air. Their instruments don’t eat. What they measure has no connection with the amount of radioactive material. . . .
Yoh: So damage from radioactive rays and damage from radioactive material are not the same.
Hirose: If you ask, are any radioactive rays from the Fukushima Nuclear Station here in this studio, the answer will be no. But radioactive particles are carried here by the air. When the core begins to melt down, elements inside like iodine turn to gas. It rises to the top, so if there is any crevice it escapes outside.
Yoh: Is there any way to detect this?
Hirose: I was told by a newspaper reporter that now Tepco is not in shape even to do regular monitoring. They just take an occasional measurement, and that becomes the basis of Edano’s statements. You have to take constant measurements, but they are not able to do that. And you need to investigate just what is escaping, and how much. That requires very sophisticated measuring instruments. You can’t do it just by keeping a monitoring post. It’s no good just to measure the level of radiation in the air. Whiz in by car, take a measurement, it’s high, it’s low – that’s not the point. We need to know what kind of radioactive materials are escaping, and where they are going – they don’t have a system in place for doing that now.
Hiroshima – After the bomv
Douglas Lummis is a political scientist living in Okinawa and the author of Radical Democracy. Lummis can be reached at ideaspeddler@gmail.com
Radioactive Fish and Birds: Dangers from Japan?
Mother Jones: April 4, 2011
http://motherjones.com/blue-marble/2011/04/radioactive-fish-and-birds-dangers-japan
Over the weekend the Japanese Science Ministry released data from midweek showing large amounts of radioactive iodine had been discovered in seawater off the coast. According to NHK, “the detected level of iodine-131 was 79.4 becquerels per liter, twice the legal standard for water discharged from nuclear plants.”
This information follows news that has been coming out in dribs and drabs about a supposed crack in the plant and radioactive water leaking into the ground beneath the plant. While the danger of radioactivity in Japan and elsewhere has generally been played down, these discoveries raise several potentially significant questions for Japan, the central and northern Pacific, and in the United States, primarily for Alaska, Washington, and Oregon.
The first involves fish. The Pacific currents running along the Japanese coast go north up the Asian coast before turning towards the Bering Sea, and on down through the Gulf of Alaska to the U.S. northwest coast. These currents mainly move from west to east. Fish are influenced by these currents, and in particular the great stocks of tuna along the warmer waters on, above, and below the equator and in the central Pacific.
In describing the migratory patterns in its Fish Watch report, NOAA writes:
Pacific albacore (sometimes referred to as ‘white tuna’)… typically begin an expansive migration in the spring and early summer in waters off Japan that continues through the late summer into inshore waters off the U.S. Pacific coast, and ends in late fall and winter in the western Pacific Ocean…
Almost all of the albacore harvested in U.S. commercial fisheries comes from the Pacific, mainly from waters off Washington and Oregon. Much of this catch is exported to foreign markets including Spain, Japan, and Canada. The rest is sold in U.S. markets, along with imported albacore, primarily from Thailand and Indonesia.
This raises the possibility that fish that have possibly been exposed to radiation may turn up in canned and frozen fish products imported into the US from Asian markets, as well as from from Alaska and the Pacific Northwest.
Birds are another issue. Consider this, from the International Waterfowl and Wetlands Research Bureau—Japan Committee (IWRBJ):
At least 404 species of waterbird are recorded in the Asia-Pacific region. Of these, 243 species, by virtue of their nature, undertake annual migrations between their breeding areas and nonbreeding grounds, along several different flyways. They visit at least 57 countries and territories in the Asia-Pacific region. A few of these species undertake some of the greatest non-stop flights in the world, covering at least 6,000 km in one step.
Experts and scientists in the United States, appearing on television and in the general press, have assured everyone the radiation hazards are insignificant or minimal at best. But fish and birds can be harbingers of possible problems ahead, and not a lot is known is about what kind and how much they be carrying.
James Ridgeway is a senior correspondent at Mother Jones. For more of his stories, click here. Get James Ridgeway’s RSS feed.
