It happened again, in Prime Minister’s Questions, today. It was bound to, really. Rebuked by the excellent Speaker of the House, John Bercow, for using insulting, unparliamentary language toward Shadow Chancellor Ed Balls, David Cameron fell back, like an involuntary reflex, on a mantra I can guarantee you will hear in at least 99% of Tory (and most LibDem) interviews on TV or radio, in the press or online.

Withdrawing his comment as instructed, Cameron said:

“I will replace it with ‘the man who left us this enormous deficit and this financial crisis’.”

And, of course, cue much Tory guffawing and catcalling of the type that only a £25k a year private education can teach.

This (mostly) Tory tactic has been in place since before they were elected, and has continued, unbroken and to the point of nausea, to the present. Listen to any interview, any ‘debate’ on Newsnight or Question Time (though the Tories like to avoid debate if they can!), and you’ll hear some variation of:

‘the mess we inherited’

‘we’re having to clean up Labour’s mess’

and so on. Clearly, in order to try to get off the hook of the never-ending run of screw-ups, the Tory PR gurus have drummed this into their politicians until they eat, sleep and breathe ‘inherited mess, inherited mess, inherited mess…’

The only tiny problem with all this is this: it’s absolutely untrue.

I’m going to try to show you why. It’s not really that difficult to see, but a lot of people don’t look beyond the mantras and the headlines. Anyone who knows me very well will know that I talk a lot about the ‘Big Lie’ concept. In a nutshell, this says that the bigger a lie is, and the more emphatically it’s spouted, the more people are likely to think, ‘Well, they wouldn’t dare say it, and especially not like that, if it weren’t true!’ But of course, it isn’t true – that’s the whole point. As someone said to me the other day, a plausible lie, shouted loud enough and often enough, usually gets to be taken for the truth.’

Since a picture paints a thousand words and all that, I’m going to use a couple of graphs to illustrate just how untrue this Tory Big Lie is, along with a little commentary. There may be ‘lies, damn lies and statistics’, but when it comes to nailing a Big Lie, a few objective numbers work wonders.

The ‘inherited mess’ lie has 2 main parts. The first says that the economic crisis was caused by Labour’s overspending. The second says that the resulting ’mountain’ of government debt led to such an economic disaster that Dave, George and co had to come galloping in on their big chargers to rescue us with their Magic Sword of Austerity and Competence to clean up the mess and fix our economy.

Let’s nail each part of the lie in turn. First, was Labour overspending, and was government debt drastically increasing under Labour? Well, the IMF (see www.scoop.it/t/deficit-myth) say not, and even George Osborne himself, under pressure from Treasury Select Committee members, has to admit it ain’t so (see www.youtube.com/watch?v=BK-h4aiuGIs). Now, on to those pictures:

Graph 1

This handy graph shows the changes in UK national debt since 1999 (2 years after Labour came to power). It shows something very interesting. In the years from 1999-2002, the UK’s national debt SHRANK to the lowest point it has been since well before Labour took over, right through to the present day. In fact, although not shown on this graph, the debt when Labour took power – the ‘inherited mess’ from the previous Tory government! – was higher than at any time during Labour’s tenure until the 2008 global crash.

From 2002, the graph shows a gradual, managed increase, over a period of 6 years, from about 25% to about 35%. This is the period when Labour – as they had promised to do – started to increase investment in great, beloved British institutions like the NHS, as well as in other public services. This gradual increase was no problem – it was controlled, deliberate, affordable. And it was still lower than it had been under the preceding Tory government.

Of course, in 2008, something drastic happened. There was a global financial crisis that hit virtually every country in the world – hard. National debt increased – but, as the IMF report linked above confirms, this increase was NOT due to excessive public spending! National income fell, and this inevitably pushed up the amount of borrowing. But here’s another thing – without being in the same kind of sudden meltdown, the misguided austerity policies of the coalition government have kept the debt growth-line steep! That’s because those policies are shrinking the national income far further and faster than spending could or should ever be cut. The way out of the current problems is to stimulate growth – and that’s not compatible with austerity budget-slashing.

Here’s another graph that shows very clearly how Labour did not leave a mess behind for the coalition to clear up:

Graph 2:

Now this one’s ever so slightly trickier to read, but bear with me. I want you to focus on the thickness of the very light blue block of the graph at the top. Don’t look at how high up it goes, as that’s caused by the thickness of the blocks underneath it.

This light-blue block represents UK government debt from 1987-mid 2011, as a percentage of GDP (basically, the amount the whole country earns). The striking thing about this light-blue block is that it hardly changes in thickness at all from 1987 all the way through to the big global financial crash in 2008 (in fact it gets a little thinner during most of Labour’s last period in government). The first 10 years of that period were under a Tory government. The next 11 were under Labour. If Labour were being profligate in their spending, so were the preceding Tory governments of Thatcher (Queen of Austerity!) and Major, and somewhat more so.

Of course, as already mentioned debt went up during and just after the 2008 crash, because national income went down. You can see the light-blue block thicken at this point. But Tory spending cuts, even without a global ‘meltdown’, are pushing debt up and making the debt-block fatter. Countries like the USA, who under Barack Obama took a positive approach to stimulate their economy, have experienced growth during the same period that we’ve increased debt and suffered recession. Unlike Labour, the Tories have no excuse for the increasing national debt under their (mis)management – so they invent one: ‘the mess we inherited‘, and repeat it for all they’re worth in the hope of fooling people into believing their Big Lie.

There are other things I could draw out of the 2nd graph, such as the fact that household debt and non-financial companies’ debt during the same period grew, but that far and away the big debt-increase problem, as the graph clearly shows, was irresponsible borrowing by financial companies (in other words, NOT the Labour government!), and that in spite of such companies clearly being the cause of our crisis, this Tory government is not curtailing the obscene bonuses the banks etc continue to pay themselves (I guess they need bonuses to console themselves for the destruction they caused!).

And there are other graphs worth looking at. But I think I’ve made my point and given you enough to chew on for now. So I’ll round off, for clarity’s sake, by reiterating the key point that all the graphs and words above are there to prove. Which is:

WHEN THIS GOVERNMENT AND ITS REPRESENTATIVES SAY ‘THE MESS WE INHERITED’ – AS THEY OH SO SURELY WILL – THEY ARE LYING: IT IS A ‘BIG (FAT!) LIE’!

They want to fool you, so they can continue wrecking our great country and siphoning our money into the pockets of the so-called elite who pay into Tory party coffers (and Tory ministers’ bank accounts, it appears).

Don’t let them.

Figures obtained under the Freedom of Information Act provide a unique insight into changing patterns of drug use at British music festivals

On the Isle of Wight it's been largely about cocaine and ecstasy, at Glastonbury the hauls of Ketamine have been creeping up, while the drug of choice for heavy metal fans would seem to be Jack Daniels and other booze.

As a tens of thousands of young (and not so young) music fans await another festival season, new figures based on police activities at 10 major festivals over the past four years provide an insight into the range and scale of drugs seized.

They show that seizures of popular drugs such as cannabis and ecastasy have been in decline, possibly due factors such as changing behaviour, demographics and policing priorities.

Cocaine seizures have been in sharp decline since the onset of the economic hard times, and there is some evidence to back up suggestions that recreational drug users have been turning to relatively cheaper drugs like Ketamine, the horse tranquilliser dubbed the 'new ecstasy'.

Individual events also meanwhile display particular characteristics when it comes to the type of drugs seized.

The lion's share of cocaine seizures last year took place at the Isle of Wight festival and the island's other big musical event, Bestival, where 50,000 people enjoyed an eclectic mix of rock, folk and dance.

The two festivals also stood out from the others in terms of ecstasy seizures, accounting for nearly half of the value of all drugs seized at Bestival last year.

By contrast, drug seizures were almost non-existant at the Womad (World of Music, Arts and Dance), often regarded as the festival of choice for a stereotypically Guardian-reading, older music fan. Last year, the only drugs confiscated in swoops by Wiltshire Police was cannabis with a street value of £151.

Expectations that rock fans meanwhile might be prone to emulating some of their harder living idols are also somewhat confounded. Seizures were comparatively low at the two festivals catering for them - the Download festival in Leicestershire and Sonisphere at Knebworth House, Hertfordshire.

At Sonisphere, where 190,000 fans last year moshed along to bands including Motorhead and Slipknot, just over £400 of drugs was seized across the weekend. It was mostly cannabis, with cocaine making up the balance. Ecstasy and amphetamines were absent.

At the country's best known gathering of music lovers, where Glastonbury organisor Michael Eavis last year said that the drug culture "had changed beyond belief" and that it was "a cheek to even suggest there's a problem", more than £200,000 worth of drugs has been seized by police over the past four years.

Last year's haul of more than £44,000 was a rise of 12% on the previous year although, like other festivals where larger quanties of drugs have been confiscated, seizures are considerably down on 2009's relative high.

Across all ten festivals - Glastonbury, V, the Isle of Wight, Bestival, Download, Sonisphere, Leeds, Reading, Womad and Wireless- there has been a sharp decline since that year in the value both of cocaine and cannabis seized, according to the figures obtained through a series of Freedom of Information requests by Request Initiative, a nonprofit that makes requests for charities and NGOs.

The graphics below show total street values of drugs seized in 2011, with figures broken down by substance and festival.

This graphic, which also appears in today's newspaper, shows street values of different drugs seized at each festival last year. Click for a larger version. Illustration: Finbarr Sheehy for the Guardian

Just over £21,000 worth of cocaine was seized last year, compared to £88,000 in 2009, while the street value of confiscated cannabis last year was also down more than 75%.

The biggest proportional increase saw confiscations of piperazine, or BZP, increase in value tenfold over the same period, though last year's total still amounted to less than half of those for each of cannabis, cocaine and ecstasy.

Other potential trends include the emergence of Ketamine, identified in the past as the fastest growing "party drug" among 16-24 year olds. The festival where the largest amount's worth of the drug (£8,277) was confiscated last year was Glastonbury, where the amounts have been creeping up.

The figures are low for the Wireless festival, where drug confiscations were conducted by private security and police present did not collect data relating to confiscations.

Drug charities cautioned against using the figures as an indicator about general drug use, suggesting that seizures depend on many other variables, ranging from police priorities to the weather.

However, Rupert George of the drugs charity Release, said the figures seemed to reflect the changing demographics of festival goers and the shift to an older crowd less likely to be taking drugs.

"Festivals have tended to become more expensive, corporate and mainstream with older more middle class crowds that probably attract far less intensive policing. The policing of drug possession tends to be disproportionately targeted at the young, the poor and people from ethnic minorities. Festival crowds probably no longer fit this profile."

David Raynes of National Drug Prevention Alliance said cultural changes had brought about a situation where people are prepared to put almost anything into their bodies.

Adding that the drugs supply at festivals was not predictable, he said: "I am not sure that Policing generally makes the effort it once did, say 40 years ago, to detect drug dealers at festivals. I have never heard it spoken of as a priority. They will of course expect to come across drugs and as I recall there have been some high profile deaths."

Raynes also referred to the ageing profile of festival goers, adding that may not have entirely given up on past habits and may well be much more more likely to use drugs than the wider population.

Brendan Montague, executive director of Request Initiative said: "This is the first major research project providing empirical evidence showing the extent and nature of drug taking at national music festivals in the UK and shows that Class A drugs including cocaine and MDMA are still very popular among music fans."

"There has also been a significant shift from cocaine which is expensive to the cheaper drug Ketamine as the country has been in and out of recession."

For more information on how the information obtained and to explore the data in full, see our explanatory Datablog post.

Bahrain, along with Syria, has become a symbol of the failure of the Arab Spring to deliver real democracy and freedom across the Arab world. The media in Britain portray a rigid, oppressive almost feudal elite who are stubbornly holding out against the inevitable wave of modern freedoms and political justice.

But what is hardly ever mentioned in the press and TV reports is that this very system of oppression, the rock against which the dreams of democracy are being dashed, was largely created by the British. That, throughout most of the twentieth century, British advisers to the Bahraini royal family, backed up by British military might, were central figures in the creation of a ruthless system that imprisoned and sometimes tortured any Bahraini citizen who even dared to suggest the idea of democracy.

The same British advisers also worked with the rulers of Bahrain to exercise a cynical technique of divide and rule - setting Shia against Sunni in a very successful attempt to keep Bahrain locked in an old, decaying and corrupt system of tribal and religious rivalries. The deliberate aim was to stop democracy ever emerging.

The Bahrainis know this, practically everyone else in the Arab world knows this - the only people who seem to have forgotten are the British themselves.

So I thought I would tell the story of Britain's involvement in the government and the security of Bahrain over the past 90 years. Especially as the present King of Bahrain is coming to have lunch with the Queen on May 18th.

 

It began in the summer of 1925 when a young administrative officer in the British Colonial Service called Charles Belgrave read an advertisement in the middle of the "Personal Column" in the Times. It said:

 

Belgrave answered the mysterious advertisement and was then summoned to an interview in a West End hotel. His interviewer turned out to be one of the heads of the India Office - the government department which ran that part of the British Empire.

What Belgrave was offered was the job of being the British "adviser" to the new ruler of Bahrain, Sheikh Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa. The precise nature of the job was a bit murky (a murkiness that was going to run through this whole story). On the surface Belgrave would be completely independent of the British government - but what was also clear was that he was being sent there to deal with growing demands for reform and modernization that might threaten Britain's interests.

Ever since 1820 the British had dominated Bahrain. The Al Khalifa family ruled, but in reality it was protectorate whose affairs were "guided" by the British. In 1923 the previous ruler had gone berserk and started terrorising his people - so the British had removed him and installed his son. It was clear to Belgrave what his job was - to create a more centralised form of control in Bahrain and to manage the instability created by the previous ruler's reign of terror.

Belgrave took the job. And here is a picture of him sitting happily in "the Adviserate drawing room"

 

Belgrave soon became very powerful - and by the 1930s he was in effect running the government of Bahrain. The thing that gave him a supreme ability to manage any dissent was the fact that he ran the courts. Bahrain had no legal code - which allowed Belgrave as judge enormous power. Belgrave described it in his autobiography:

"I found that there was no written code in Bahrain so judgements had to depend on common sense alone. It was rough and ready justice, but it had the advantage of being speedy.

I sat three days a week with a minor Shaikh who was deaf, dull and averse to making decisions. When I asked his opinion he invariably replied, 'I think the same as you Excellency; I agree with whatever you say."

Many Bahrainis soon became convinced that Belgrave was using his power to make sure that the status quo was maintained and to prevent a modern, democratic political system developing. And in the 1950s this anger with Belgrave burst out in a dramatic and violent way - a popular revolt and demands for democracy uncannily like the events unfolding in Bahrain today.

It started in 1953 when a Shia religious parade was stoned and then a Shia neighbourhood attacked by groups of Sunni fanatics. Many believed that it was a deliberate provocation - to create sectarian divisions. People noticed that among the attackers were members of the ruling family including the brother of the Sheikh.

If it was a provocation - then it succeeded. For two years Bahrain was torn by Sunni vs Shia violence. In private Belgrave sympathised with the Shias, but as the public face of the Law in Bahrain he was ruthless. He handed down sentences that were far tougher on Shia rioters than on their Sunni counterparts. And this in turn led to even more rioting.

A group of leading middle-class Bahrainis set up the Higher Executive Committee. It was composed equally of Shias and Sunnis - and it called for Belgrave to go. He was helping foment religious hatred and imprisoning innocent people, they said, in order to keep Bahrain as a tribally controlled regime. They demanded instead democracy and a code of law.

Here is a picture of the Committee.

 

Things came to a head when in 1956 the British foreign secretary, Selwyn Lloyd, flew to Bahrain for a visit. There was a large, violent demonstration with hundreds of Bahrainis trying to tell Lloyd to remove Belgrave - because he was standing in the way of making Bahrain a modern democracy.

The riots and the demonstration made the news in Britain - and Panorama came out to investigate. The report - by Woodrow Wyatt (later to become one of Rupert Murdoch's closest advisers) - is really good.

Wyatt interviews Belgrave who has a great quote about the demonstration - "it's anti-British, anti-Sheikh, and anti-me." But Wyatt also goes and talks to people on the street, almost all of who want Belgrave to go. One of them standing on the back of a truck sums it up neatly: "Belgrave is not just an adviser - he is the judge, and when he goes to the court he is also the police commandant. He is everything in Bahrain, he is not an adviser."

Faced with this instability the British government moved troops in at the end of 1956 and crushed the revolt. Three of the leading members of the committee were put on a Royal Navy ship and taken and imprisoned on the island of St Helena in the middle of the South Atlantic. The same place that Napoleon had been dumped in 1815. One of them was Abdul Aziz Al Shamlan who is the committee member interviewed in the Panorama film.

This is a picture of their prison, plus a map - the purple blob shows where St Helena is.

 

But Belgrave had also outlived his usefulness - and the same year he too was dumped by the British (and by Sheikh Khalifa). He came back to Britain and wrote a self-serving autobiography which ends up suggesting that the Arabs aren't "ready" for democracy yet.

And things quietened down in Bahrain.

Until 1965 when another popular uprising began. It began in the oilfields but quickly spread to general strikes. Again the British sent in troops to crush the revolt - and many of the leaders were yet again deported.

But it didn't do much good for the British government - because both press and television in Britain began to ask what exactly was this weird feudal state that we were supporting? And why?

Across the Arab world people had been inspired by the new ideas of Gamal Abdel Nasser, the President of Egypt, and they wanted freedom from the corrupt old Shaikhs and Kings who were propped up by the west. And in 1966 the BBC went out to Bahrain again and made a Panorama programme that tore into the hypocrisy of what Britain was doing in that country.

It didn't pull its punches - the reporter, called John Morgan, says to the camera at the end:

"If one of the tests of a society's health is a citizen's willingness to speak his mind freely in public then Bahrain belongs in the class of a Communist or a Fascist country - and we are deeply implicated in order to preserve our oil and foreign policy."

In the face of this the British government decided the only solution was to find another "adviser". The idea was that on the surface he would appear to be a freelance mercenary who was employed by the ruling Khalifa family. But in reality he would be chosen and placed there by the British Foreign Office to manage the internal security of Bahrain. His job was to prevent the instability that political change would inevitably bring - and the consequent threat to British interests.

The man the British chose was called Colonel Ian Henderson. He had been a colonial police officer in Kenya in the 1950s and had played a major role in suppressing the Mau Mau rebellion. The Kenyans were convinced that Henderson had been involved in ordering both torture and assassination during the rebellion - and the moment the country achieved independence in 1964 its new leaders threw Henderson out.

Here is Henderson being interviewed at Heathrow the day he flew back. I think you can get a very good sense of what he is like - especially in his slightly frightening matter-of-factness. Speculating on the reasons for his expulsion he says, with a faraway look in his eyes:

"What I did many years ago as a police officer during the emergency is today not seen as something very desirable."

Well - yes.

A little while ago a Scottish journalist called Neil Mackay uncovered secret Foreign Office documents that show that the senior British diplomat in Bahrain in 1966 - Antony Parsons - worked on the ruling Sheikh Khalifa to persuade him to appoint Henderson as head of what was called the Special Branch - and to give Henderson a free hand to reorganise it into an efficient, modern covert surveillance "anti terrorist" organisation.

To begin with Henderson presented himself a a new breed of security chief. He freed all the prisoners from the 1965 uprising and announced that the country would now be ruled by proper law, not arbitrary detention. He also persuaded the Khalifas to welcome back militants from protest movements like the Bahrain National Liberation Front and the Popular Revolutionary Movement.

It was all very nice, but many Bahrainis now believe that what Henderson was also doing was building up an intricate system of infiltrators and double agents inside the protest movement - in preparation for the day when Britain pulled out of Bahrain and gave it independence.

That came in 1971 and for a moment ordinary Bahrainis had a modern political system of democracy. In 1973 the ruling Amir - Isa bin Salman al-Khalifa - approved a constitution for the country, and the first parliamentary elections took place.

But then something very sinister happened. Within a year Colonel Ian Henderson proposed a new law he called the State Security Law. It said that any Bahraini could be held for three years without charge or trial on just the suspicion that they might be a threat to the state. It was known as 'the precautionary law'.

It caused an outrage - because it meant that anyone could be imprisoned just on the imaginative suspicions of Colonel Henderson and his State Security acolytes. Parliament rejected the bill in June 1975 and there was a standoff with the regime, and with Henderson.

The Amir solved it in the simplest way - he suspended those articles of the Constitution that guaranteed freedom to the people, and he suspended parliament.

And in August 1975 Henderson went to work. His men began to fill up Bahrain's jails with activists - and among them were members of the now deceased parliament. And for the next twenty five years Henderson ran a ruthless system of repression that kept the al Khalifa family in power and stopped any movement towards democracy.

Opposition activists and human rights groups have repeatedly alleged that this repression has involved widespread torture, the rolling imprisonment without trial of thousands of people, deaths and assassinations. Henderson denies this. In the face of the charges Ian Henderson has repeatedly said that he has never been involved in torture nor has he ever ordered his officers to torture those who have been arrested.

One of the key questions is whether this repression was still in Britain's interest? On the one hand you can argue that it protected the flow of oil, that it kept Bahrain as a bulwark first against communism and then from the 80s onwards against Shia Islamist revolution - plus that Bahrain also became the home to the American Fifth Fleet.

But you can also argue that by inserting Ian Henderson into the Bahraini system of power and security in 1966, the British created an infernal machine that just kept on running after they left in 1971. That machine had been told to prevent any political protests that might destablise the country - and that's what it proceeded to do. The Al Khalifas loved the machine because it kept them in power - and as a result hundreds and thousands of Bahrainis were left stuck with a vicious ghost from the failure of the British empire.

And true to form the British in the 1970s ignored the repression and the torture going on around them. Here are a selection of films the BBC made about Bahrain in the 1970s

First is an extract from a film made about the town of Awali - where all the British oil workers lived. It is an extraordinary place because in the middle of the desert the British have created a copy of a Surrey suburb where they live in blissful separateness from the rest of the country.

Except at the end - when a British couple being interviewed suddenly start describing how strange it is - they say it's like "living in a cotton wool world. I think it is really bad to live here in a world without responsibility. This place steals your life away"

And here are some extracts from one of the oddest arts programmes the BBC has ever shown. It follows a musical composer called David Fanshawe (and collector of Arabian folk music) as he creates his new work called "Arabian Fantasy" in various locations around Bahrain.

He does this by banging oil pipes and machinery in the oilfields, by assembling lots of oil tankers and signalling them with flags to blow their hooters, all interspersed with helicopter shots of him playing his synthesizer in a prog-rock kind of way in all kinds of locations around the island state.

It's made even odder by the appearance of Fanshawe's sidekick who had built his own very complex synthesizer that treats and distorts all the noises. He's called Adrian Wagner - and is a descendant of the famous composer.

Fanshawe is doing all this because he grew up in Bahrain as a boy when his uncle was the naval commander of the British fleet there in the 1950s - and there are bits of him wandering nostalgically round empty expat swimming pools. He's quite annoying - and he seems to like funk music as well.

Then in 1979 the Queen of England came to visit Bahrain - and I've stumbled on the unedited rushes of her visit. Here are some of them. I've listened through to all of her and Prince Philip's overheard conversations with the ruling Amir - and she doesn't seem to mention any of the repression, imprisonment without trial, or killings.

But she does have to suffer a rather strange dance which is apparently expressing how the rights have women have been progressing in Bahrain. At least that's the only thing she had to suffer - unlike many Bahrainis.

And Bahrain had other uses for Britain in the 1970s. In 1979 the BBC made a very creepy documentary film about how Bahrain had become a central hub for the new supersonic jet - Concorde. The truth was that at that time practically no other country wanted Concorde because of the very loud sonic booms it made - and the Al Khalifa family stepped in to save British Airways.

 

This is a section from the documentary where the British Airways manager Tim Phillips goes to see the Amir at the regular Majlis - where people come to petition and lobby their ruler. Phillips seems to be convinced that the Majlis is almost a better form of democracy than we have in Britain. It is followed by the very creepy scene when he gets to talk one-to-one with to the Amir, and the scene sums up in a nutshell Britain's relationship with this weird state.

Ian Henderson soon became the Dr Evil of Bahrain. He was hated because he was seen as the man whose security law had helped destroy the Constitution and democracy in the country.

In response a new protest movement began to grow which united the secular left and Islamists around the simple, dramatic demand that the constitution and parliament should be restored. It grew slowly at first - but in 1994 it emerged as The Constitutional Movement - and it set out to confront Henderson.

It was the biggest revolt yet seen in Bahrain and it had widespread popular support that crossed across the Shia - Sunni divide. Henderson and his security forces responded viciously. The opposition accused them of using the same tactics of divide and rule that had been seen in the 1950s, deliberately fomenting sectarian hatreds. Henderson's forces were also accused of imprisonment and torture on a scale not seen before.

And - just as in 1956 - at the very heart of the Constitutional Movement's demands was the removal of the British "adviser" who they said was the mastermind behind the terror that was engulfing the country. In the words of the opposition:

"Security and special branch chief General Henderson, along with a bunch of British mercenaries who are in control of the security apparatus bear full responsibility for the deterioration of relations between people and regime and for the festering political crisis - by their policy of sectarian discrimination, by waging large scale arrests and killing campaigns, and by fabricating plots designed to alienate the masses from the movement."

And finally the British noticed. Here is a really good report made for the BBC in 1996 by the brilliant reporter Sue Lloyd Roberts. She uses secret filming and blurred interviews to show what was really going on and evoke the fear that the rolling repression was creating for hundreds of thousands of Bahraini people.

And just like in the 1950s the publicity became too much. In 1999 a new member of the Al Khalifa family took over the leadership of Bahrain - and he decided to finish with Ian Henderson's services.

Henderson returned to Britain where various human rights groups and MPs persuaded the Home Secretary to get the police to investigate whether Henderson could be prosecuted for ordering torture. But the police found that the Bahrain government refused to give them any evidence. So they gave up.

The new Amir also abolished Henderson's hated State Security Law - and announced there would be elections to parliament. At first it all seemed to be a genuine return to the democratic dreams of 1973. But it wasn't. By 2010 it had become clear that the new parliament had practically no real power.

Then came the events in Tunisia at the beginning of 2011 - and it reactivated the opposition in Bahrain. They occupied Pearl Roundabout in Manama - but on the night of the 17th of February the protestors met the full force of the Bahraini security forces.

Ian Henderson might have gone away - but the ferocious system that he helped build hasn't and it haunts the Gulf still today.

Impact assessment shows loft insulations and cavity wall insulations are set to fall dramatically under current plans

Deep concerns over the government's flagship policy to make 14m homes warmer and cheaper to heat have reached the top of government, with prime minister David Cameron and deputy prime minister Nick Clegg receiving a personal briefing on its troubles.

The green deal aims to provide "pay as you save" loans to homeowners to improve their energy efficiency and cut bills. It is due to launch in October but has faced widespread criticism from energy companies, the building industry, consumer groups and charities. The government's own impact assessment shows loft insulations and cavity wall insulations – the most cost-effective measures by far – are set to fall by 93% and 67% respectively under current plans. "The impact assessment says it is going to be a train crash," said Andrew Warren, director of the Association for the Conservation of Energy.

The escalation of the issue to Downing Street came on the same day as official data revealed that average home energy bills have shot up by up 12% – £140 – in 12 months, following a doubling in the past six years due largely to rising gas prices. Furthermore, national statistics on fuel poverty due to be published on Thursday are certain to show a rise from the current 5 million homes, a quarter of the total.

The green deal is intended to address fuel poverty, as well as being a crucial policy in cutting the carbon emissions driving climate change, but the Cabinet Office has been told it will flop unless fundamental changes are made. Warren and a series of other senior stakeholders were interviewed by Cabinet Office officials, who reported to Cameron, Clegg and energy secretary Ed Davey on Wednesday.

A Downing Street spokesman said: "As we implement all policy, we maintain constant dialogue with stakeholders and businesses who have an interest. The deputy prime minister and prime minister are fully committed to the green deal." While the commitment to the green deal is not under review, government sources said the implementation of the policy is being discussed.

Existing policies lead energy companies to lag lofts free of charge, or even pay homeowners, but the funding available for basic energy efficiency and fuel poverty measures is set to fall dramatically under the green deal. Furthermore, loft and cavity wall insulation will not be eligible for green deal loans.

The treasury has already committed £200m to sweeten the green deal for early adopters. "That is a very helpful start, but we are going to have to more than that," said Warren. Suggestions made to the prime minister include council tax and stamp duty discounts for energy efficient homes and a national awareness campaign such as that for the recent digital TV switchover.

In December, the government's own climate advisers launched an unprecedented attack, stating that the green deal would fail and reach only reach 2-3m of the 14m households targeted. "There is a significant risk in leaving it to the market, as that has never worked anywhere in the world and is unlikely to in the UK," said David Kennedy, chief executive of the Committee on Climate Change. "We are talking about the transformation of the entire building stock of this country."

Luciana Berger, shadow climate change minister, said: "That No 10 has had to call in the Cabinet Office to fix up the government's flagship green deal is a clear admission that the current proposals are a complete mess, which won't deliver the new jobs, lower bills or reduced carbon emissions we all want to see."

Other criticisms of the green deal include consumer group Which stating it is unfair to use money taken as a levy on all energy bills to subsidise the installation of expensive solid wall insulation in richer households. The Green Alliance said high commercial interest rates will mean too few green deal loans will meet the golden rule – that energy bill savings more than cover the loan repayments – and suggesting the new green investment bank should be allowed to provide discounted loans.

Chris Plumley Channel 4 Dispatches new film How Power Corrupts.

The film exposes institutional Police Corruption at City of London Police at senior level.

The film questions why officers from the Counter Terrorism Directorate made misleading statements in court under oath and the questionable relationship between City of London Police and elite global security giant Kroll.

The same Kroll whom effectively took control and lead COLP Counter Terrorism Directorate ‘Operation BOHAN’, an operation costing over £1,000,000 to censor Ian Puddicks website – www.policeexpenses.co.uk

The film will show documents used in court which name senior officers at City of London Police whom were only to happy to comply with Kroll’s requests to silence Ian Puddick.

Michael Wolkind QC interviewed for the film confirmed that Police Corruption is an issue that is rarely reported and that the public are not aware of how the Police behave in court.

Asked by Chris Plumley if in this case it was just a few bad apples spoiling the barrel, Michael Wolkind QC replied ‘it was a matter of looking in the barrel for a good apple’.

Detective Constable Colin Dawson Counter Terrorism Directorate told Ian, Operation BOHAN was instigated and managed at the very top of City of London Police

Police Corruption

Detective Sergeant John Christopher Ellis City of London Police Counter Terrorism Directorate told the court under oath that he found Class A Crack Cocaine/Paraphernalia throughout the property during a search of Ian’s property there were approx 14 other officers involved in the search.

However Sergeant Ellis when questioned on the matter, said that he forgot to confiscate the Cocaine/ Paraphernalia.

He (Detective Sergeant John Christopher Ellis) didn’t mention it to the other officers whom were with him, he didn’t make a note of it in his note book, nor did he tell his boss. He just remembered the finding the drugs cache whilst in court.

Tokyo Hotaru Festival 2012 took place recently, releasing 100,000 blue LED lights to float in the Sumida River. The bulbs rolled along the waves of the river bank, mimicking hotaru (the Japanese word for "fireflies"), for the festival that celebrates the Japanese tradition of watching fireflies float along a watercourse. The spectacular event lit up the waterway with a sparkling sapphire radiance against the night sky.

The solar-powered LED balls, known as prayer stars, were designed to illuminate when they came in contact with water and were provided by Panasonic, one of the event's sponsors. At the close of the festival, the bulbs were gathered by giants nets and removed from the stream.

Photo credits: saihouan, Jeremy V, makure, ajpscs, Mai Suzuki, Hideya Hamano, maikegotchi
Tokyo Hotaru website
via [Spoon & Tamago]

Official Olympic clothing sold by Next is claimed to have been produced in sweatshop conditions in Sri Lanka. The allegation comes days after the high street chain unveiled the formal outfits that Team GB will wear at the opening ceremony.

Workers at the company's factory in Sri Lanka allegedly receive poverty wages and are forced to work excessive overtime and to meet unrealistic, ever-increasing targets. Next denies the claims – which undermine pledges that the 2012 Games will be the most ethical yet – but has launched an investigation into conditions at the factory.

The claims emerged in a wider investigation into Olympic brands that found "widespread abuse of the human rights of workers" in eight factories around the world. Research by the Playfair 2012 campaign also cited allegations of mistreatment of staff working for the sportswear manufacturer Adidas in the Philippines and China.

Next's Sri Lanka factory employs 2,500 people making, among other items, London 2012-branded jackets, blazers, shorts and T-shirts. Employees claim they are routinely forced to work 60 hours of overtime a month.

Staff also claim they have no contracts and frequently face being laid off with no notice, with management threatening to sack them if they join a union. Workers who have protested were victimised, researchers found.

Typical wages for working 12-hour days were found to be about 12,000 Sri Lankan rupees a month (£58). Other abuses cited included agency staff made to work for 18 hours at a stretch – day shifts at the Next factory, followed by overnight shifts in a different factory next door. Such workers also say that their wages are often paid irregularly. Playfair says there is evidence that staff are deliberately recruited from poor areas to ensure an illiterate and compliant workforce.

Playfair's research into Olympic supply chains examined eight factories in Sri Lanka, the Philippines and China, with 175 workers interviewed.

In China, workers for Adidas in Guangdong province complained of regularly having to work overtime above the legal maximum, with 8am to 10pm shifts not uncommon. They reported not wearing the necessary safety masks to protect them from dust because they were so fearful of missing production targets.

Adidas employees in the Philippines said that pay rates were so low that at least half the workforce were forced to go to loan sharks in order to survive. They also said they were told that overtime was compulsory. In one Philippines factory, poor ventilation caused respiratory problems among garment workers.

None of the factories surveyed permitted union membership. At factories producing items for Adidas in China, workers were apparently told that agitating to improve conditions would result in immediate dismissal.

The report will add pressure on London 2012 organisers. Last month The Independent revealed claims that Adidas Olympic kit was manufactured in Indonesian sweatshops. Next is supplying outfits for the Games' opening and closing ceremonies as well as formal suits for Team GB and Paralympic GB. It will also supply 4,500 uniforms for officials, as well as soft furnishings and bed linen for the athletes' village.

Anna McMullen, of campaign group Labour Behind the Label, said: "When respected British brands like Next are supplying uniforms, you'd hope to see this respect mirrored in the production of the kit. Yet, paid £50 a month and exploited by labour contractors, these workers live in poverty. Next must take action to ensure workers have rights and wages that allow a life of dignity."

Anton Marcus, joint general secretary of the Free Trade Zones and General Services Union in Sri Lanka, said: "They don't pay a living wage and they set these terrible targets, which, when reached, are automatically increased. Similarly, overtime, which should be voluntary, is compulsory for 60 hours a month. This is forced labour."

A spokesman for Next rebutted the Playfair allegations. Next insisted they were "categorically not true" in the case of staff workers at the factory and "almost certainly not true in respect of any temporary worker, either". Next said those employed directly by the company were paid 50 per cent more than the Sri Lankan minimum wage, which stands at 6,750 rupees (£33) a month.

A spokeswoman for Adidas said: "The Adidas Group is fully committed to protecting worker rights and to ensuring fair and safe working conditions in factories throughout our global supply chain. As part of that commitment, Adidas Group has been engaging in an open and constructive dialogue with Playfair for the past 10 years."

Brendan Barber, the TUC general secretary, said: "It cannot be right that with the huge amounts of money to be made by the International Olympic Committee and the brands that secure the lucrative Olympic sponsorship deals, the people producing the goods to be worn by sports fans, athletes and Olympic officials are earning a pittance, working excessively long hours and can't even join a union to push for better conditions.

"We're presenting the IOC with clear evidence as to what is going wrong. Now it's over to them to act to prevent similar abuses happening in the run-up to Rio 2016."

A spokesman for LOCOG, the organising committee for the Games, said: "We have gone further than any other major event organiser in ethical sourcing and supply management, which has been recognised in this report."

He added: "We take these allegations extremely seriously and have asked our independent monitor to carry out a comprehensive investigation and review. The outcome of this will be made public as soon as it is concluded. We have also spoken to Adidas and Next, who have assured us that they have launched an immediate investigation into these claims."

So it’s war. We knew it would be. 

Obviously, you don’t ask the Tories how they can do this. They, streetfighters of long-standing, the current vogue for simpering head-boy bonhomie notwithstanding, are clear about their aims, interests and concomitant attacks.

Nor is this message addressed to Vince Cable or the wolf-eyed replicant Clegg. Whatever theatrics of choicelessness and discomfort the former occasionally insinuates, he, good Orange Booker, knows just what he’s up to. And the latter dispenses even with the mummery.

But you - you’re one of those Liberal Democrats who takes seriously a commitment to some kind of progressive agenda. You’re another thing. One doesn’t have to share all your politics to believe you sincere. So it has to be asked of you: WTF?

We know that the cuts are massively regressive. We know this is a hecatomb of welfare. We know the arts are being savaged in a philistine rampage. We know that all the gorge-raising horseshit about being All In It Together™ is a meaningless tic. So you, like other left-wing LibDems (LWLDs), know - know - that you’re propping up an economic onslaught by those who think it their birthright to rule in wealth against the mass of working people.

When it’s obvious that there are other ways of saving money that don’t punish the poor, are you happy with what you’re doing?

When the entire agenda about the necessity of the cuts is not only an invention, but a not-very-convincing one, is it mere economic illiteracy that keeps you quiescent? 

When it’s not just radical, but eminently mainstream, even neoliberal economists who are stressing that if your aim is to reestablish the British economy this is economic gibberish, are you comfortable? 

Sure, some Tories are fucking idiots - but a lot aren’t. They know that these measures, far from salvaging it, might very well break the economy. And that is, for them, a risk worth taking, because either way, something is gained: a transfer of power, the finishing of the Thatcherite revolution, a recomposition of class strength. And if the cost of that is mass immiseration, and even the stagnation of the national economy, so be it. 

So the question for you is, just how comfortable are you being complicit with baying class thuggery? 

What are you getting out of this? How many pieces of silver? It profiteth a person nothing if they exchange their immortal soul for the world, but for - what? Minister of State for Children and Families? The same ones you’re taking money from? 

And even if you follow the Auton Lothario of Sheffield Hallam in thinking that morals are for mortals, that concern at the antidemocratic imposition of an agenda the vast majority of those who voted for you would be appalled at is quaint, there’s also the question of strategy. If kneecapping the welfare state does not, in fact, prod the sclerotic economy into anything approaching life (and why should it?), then the LibDems - you - are finished. You face annihilation. 

Even cynically, is it worth it? To be treated, for two terms, minimum, as the scum of British politics? The most craven power-licking integrity-less liars of Parliament? Not even Tories but Tory-enablers? Do you honestly think that the majority of the electorate who supported you (in deeply misguided protest) would be willing to give you their vote again? Unless it was to shit on it, put it in a paper bag, set fire to it and post it through your door? 

Really? 

Would you not feel better being able to sleep at night? Where’s your line in the sand? 

Walk. 

Italy's recession is likely to be longer and deeper than expected after its services sector shrank for the 11th month running in April and at its sharpest rate for almost three years.

A collapse in consumer spending following cuts in wages, benefits and pensions was behind the fall in output shown in Friday's data and follows the worst manufacturing numbers for three years earlier in the week.

The dire figures from Rome added to a picture of weakening demand across the eurozone's vast services sector, which shrivelled at a much faster rate in April than initially thought.

Economists suggested that the currency bloc's recession could extend beyond the summer after output contracted in core countries such as France and the Netherlands along with Italy and Spain.

Madrid will come under further pressure from unions and anti-poverty campaigners to relent on public spending cuts scheduled for this year after the services sector fell to 42.1 from 46.3 in March.

The final reading of April's Markit purchasing managers index (PMI) for the entire eurozone services sector came in at 46.9, a full point lower than the preliminary reading of 47.9 reported two weeks ago, which itself was far weaker than City analysts had expected.

It was the steepest downward revision to the PMI since October 2008 and the immediate aftermath of the Lehman Brothers collapse.

Anything below 50 signifies contraction.

Survey compiler Markit attributed the revision to business conditions worsening at a faster rate towards the end of the month, and said the figure was consistent with a 0.5% quarterly rate of economic contraction.

A dearth of new orders suggested the figures for May could be even worse.

"Little can be said to remain of any 'core' of strength in the region," said Chris Williamson, chief economist at Markit.

"Growth has practically ground to a halt even in Germany, and France has joined Italy and Spain in seeing a strong rate of economic decline."

On Thursday, European Central Bank president Mario Draghi said the eurozone economy would recover gradually over the year. But the latest PMIs, which have a good record of tracking economic growth, suggest he will have to wait a while yet.

"Stimulus measures implemented by the ECB have not had a lasting impact on the real economy. Confidence also fell back further in April," said Williamson.

Eurozone unemployment hit 10.9% in March, equalling a record high set 15 years ago, and the latest PMIs suggest that is unlikely to improve.

New business, backlogs of work and input and output prices all showed significant downward revisions compared with the initial flash readings.

Annalisa Piazza of analysts Newedge Strategy said Spain and Italy's figures present a worrying picture for activity in the sector.

"Both Italy and Spain are suffering from a marked cyclical slowdown and tight fiscal conditions add further pressure on domestic demand. Today's PMI figures clearly point to further deterioration in the second quarter, with risks of another sharp contraction in activity," she said.

A Pirate Bay spokesperson has said that the site has seen over 12 million more visitors than ever before after the High Court ruled that UK ISPs must block it.

Virgin Media was quick to bring the block in, but the national news coverage has funnelled millions more people than usual to the site.

"Thanks to the High Court and the fact that the news was on the BBC, we had 12 million more visitors yesterday than we had ever had before.

"We should write a thank you note to the BPI [British Phonographic Industry]," a spokesperson told TorrentFreak.

Pirates: 1 West India Trading Company: 0

Aside from the free publicity, circumventing The Pirate Bay block is relatively easy to do – and The Pirate Bay is actively encouraging users to do it by posting instructions (if you're on a blocked connection, The Pirate Party is mirroring the info here).

Aside from Virgin, Sky, Everything Everywhere, TalkTalk and O2 are all required to stop their customers from being able to access the Pirate Bay because of its use for spreading pirated music.

From TorrentFreak

By Frank Gardner BBC Security Correspondent, Bahrain

The BBC's Frank Gardner had five minutes to meet with Bahraini hunger striker Abdulhadi al-Khawaja

Abdulhadi al-Khawaja looked as surprised as we filed into his air-conditioned hospital room on Tuesday.

Dressed in olive green overalls and white hospital slippers, his black hair neatly trimmed, his eyes bright and alert, he was sitting up on the edge of his bed after performing his noon prayers.

Bahrain's most renowned jailed dissident was not told until minutes earlier that he was about to receive his first ever visitors from the international media.

We were only told that morning that our request had been granted, on strict conditions. Five minutes only, no TV cameras, no recording equipment, just a few still photographs to record the event.

Policemen and hospital staff milled around in the corridor outside his upstairs room in the well guarded and ultra modern military hospital run by the BDF, the Bahrain Defence Forces. Several officials filed in behind us.

With so little time allowed, we needed to concentrate on the essentials. After more than 80 days reportedly on hunger strike, was he at death's door and was he going to continue his fast?

International attention

Mr Khawaja began a much-publicised hunger strike on 8 February in protest at the life sentence passed down on him and others by a military court last June during Bahrain's three-month "state of national security".

He and his co-defendants were charged with attempting to depose the monarchy by force and liaising with terrorists last year.

Anti-government demonstrators in Bahrain have been holding protests in support of Mr Khawaja

Mr Khawaja, a Shia, has never made any secret of his opposition to the 200-year old rule of Bahrain's Al-Khalifa family, who are Sunnis.

But international human rights groups and many diplomats have questioned the evidence on which he was convicted.

The day before our visit we attended a hearing at Bahrain's highest court, the Court of Cassation, where a panel of judges ruled that his and the cases of 19 other jailed dissidents should now be reviewed by a civil court.

The international community is pressing for these cases to be resolved as soon as possible while Denmark, where Mr Khawaja holds dual nationality, is pressing for him to be transferred there for medical treatment.

A nation divided

In Bahrain, the case of Mr Khawaja is like a microcosm of the divisions that split this tiny but strategically important Gulf kingdom.

To his supporters, who are many in the seething Shia villages where protest marches morph all too often into violent clashes with police, Mr Khawaja is a hero, a human rights defender who has worked tirelessly all his life for democracy and human rights across the region.

But many in the mainstream Shia political opposition do not share his radical views. They want to reform the way Bahrain is ruled but not get rid of the monarchy altogether, a move they know risks leading the country into civil war.

Mr Khawaja comes from the Shirazi sect of Shia Islam and is viewed with a degree of suspicion by mainstream opposition figures, but they can see his enormous popularity on the streets of Shia neighbourhoods and few would criticise him publicly.

Most Sunni Bahrainis, who are estimated to make up somewhere between 35-45% of nationals, do not like Mr Khawaja or what he stands for.

They see him as a threat to their whole way of life, and to Bahrain's prosperity, believing that he and his associates would usher in an Iranian-style Islamic republic. His wife Khadija has categorically denied any links with Iran.

But five minutes in a hospital room with a man on hunger strike was not the time or place to get into the finer points of an opposition political agenda.

'Managed hunger strike'

The first thing my producer and I did was to check that he was happy to meet us - which he said he was - that this was not some forced interview under duress.

Mr Khawaja, who was beaten and tortured in custody so badly last year he needed titanium plates inserted into the side of his head, said his medical treatment in the military hospital had been good, "apart from the force feeding", something the hospital and the government firmly denies.

Mr Khawaja is being held at the Bahrain Defence Forces' military hospital

After reading reports on social media that "he could die at any minute", I was expecting to see a skeletal figure chained to the bed with intravenous drips.

But Abdulhadi al-Khawaja, although closely guarded, was not restrained in his room when we saw him, and we did not see any drips.

He told us he was taking fluids and hospital staff, who check on him every two hours, said he regularly consumes cans of nutritional supplements.

It was also clear that this is a managed hunger strike, pulling Mr Khawaja back from danger when his medical indicators reached worrying levels.

He is walking and exercising but is still visibly thin, having lost around 25% of his body weight.

We had the strong impression that this is a man who wants to make a stand but does not want to actually die (suicide is haram, forbidden, in Islam).

He told us he will continue his hunger strike until free, and at the time of the interview there was no date yet announced for his case to be judged by the civil court.

IN DECEMBER, The Economist warned that without dramatic intervention the euro zone could face a new depression. Soon after, the European Central Bank sprang into action, averting an immediate financial meltdown through heavy lending to banks. The resulting calm looked like an opportunity for euro-area leaders to seize the moment and escape, once and for all, from crisis. Instead, complacency set in. The ECB's financial anaesthetic has not prevented a steady economic deterioration that now threatens to engulf—and perhaps end—the euro zone.

Across the euro area, unemployment is worsening. The unemployment rate touched a new record high in March: 10.9%, up a full percentage point from the prior year.

Of course, the pain is not evenly distributed. It is low and reasonably steady in the north but high and climbing in the south. Youth unemployment rates are staggering—over 50% in Greece and Spain, 36% in Portugal and Italy, rising sharply in all four.

There is worse to come. Manufacturing activity is slowing sharply across the euro area, and the core is no longer immune:

The details of these reports are most worrying. April's decline was stunning, but new order inflows tumbled at the fastest pace since December. The job decline in manufacturing is now impacting Germany and France.

The picture is distressing. It is not surprising. The euro-zone economy is large and overwhelmingly driven by domestic demand. That demand has been steadily squeezed by a broad, sustained fiscal tightening. Monetary policy is providing almost no relief. The ECB raised rates last year, and while it has since unwound the 50-basis-point increase from 2011, it shows no interest in cutting rates further below the present 1% level. Quantitative easing looks out of the question. The ECB's extraordinary lending to banks seems to have stabilised bank-financing conditions; it does not appear to have prevented a sharp slowdown in lending to the private sector. There was no way to avoid a return to recession amid such circumstances.

Ordinarily, of course, policymakers would react to this deterioration by taking steps to stabilise the economy. What is most frightening about the euro-area picture is that this is not happening. For now, austerity remains the rule. Despite the nastiness of the economic picture, the ECB is widely expected to take no action at its meeting tomorrow. The euro area is walking, eyes wide open, into depression. Led by its periphery, which is already there.

Most everyone seems to have convinced themselves that this sort of thing isn't so bad, so long as a Lehman-like financial collapse is avoided. It isn't. Nothing good will come of a euro-zone depression.

If, when all of this is said and done, the euro zone descends into a chaotic, costly break-up, many people will write that such a thing was inevitable, unavoidable. They'll be wrong. We are watching causation this very moment: institutions that know how and why to prevent things from falling apart and which nonetheless sit back and do nothing.

Military says no action will be taken against soldiers responsible for shelling that killed 21 members of the Samouni family in 2009

The Israeli military has closed its file on the killing of 21 members of a Palestinian family during the Gaza war in 2009, saying there were no grounds for criminal or disciplinary action against those responsible for the shelling of the house in which civilians were sheltering.

"None of the persons involved ... acted negligently in a manner giving rise to criminal responsibility," concluded the Military Advocate General following an internal investigation. The decisions of the brigade commander "did not deviate from the boundaries of discretion that a 'reasonable military commander' operating in similar circumstances possesses."

Its investigation, which had been thorough and rigorous, "comprehensively refuted" claims that the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) had intentionally targeted civilians or had acted in a reckless manner, it said.

The 21 members of the extended Samouni family were killed on 5 January 2009, nine days after Israel's onslaught on Gaza began. About 100 members of the family, including women, children, babies and the elderly, has been ordered by the IDF to crowd into a house amid fierce fighting.

Survivors said they felt relatively secure because they were following IDF instructions. However the following day, three or four missiles struck the house. Nine children were among the dead; medical access to the dozens of injured was denied for two days.

The commander of the Givati Brigade, Colonel Ilan Malka, who gave the order for the strike, reportedly told investigators that he believed militants were in the building and was unaware of the civilian presence.

The Military Advocate General said the military operation took place mostly in a heavily populated urban environment, and rockets had been fired from the vicinity before the IDF launched an airstrike. It added that lessons should be drawn "in order to prevent the reoccurrence of similar incidents in the future".

The Israeli human rights organisation, B'Tselem, which filed a complaint with the IDF over the incident, said it was unacceptable that no one had been found responsible for an action that led to the death of 21 civilians. "The way the army has exempted itself of responsibility for this event ... is intolerable," said Yael Stein. An investigation process independent of the army was needed, Stein added.

Salah Samouni, who survived the shelling, told the Ynet website he was outraged about the conclusion of the investigation. "The senior officer who authorised the bombing became a heralded officer at the expense of our children's blood and the people he killed," he said.

A report by South African judge Richard Goldstone on behalf of the United Nations examined in detail the Samouni family incident. It concluded that the deaths were the result of "Israeli fire intentionally directed at them" in breach of the Geneva conventions.

The Goldstone report said Israel had repeatedly violated international law and possibly committed war crimes during the conflict, which Israel named Operation Cast Lead. It also accused Hamas of war crimes.

About 1,400 Palestinians and 13 Israelis were killed in the three-week conflict.

Loudon admitted falling asleep at the wheel and striking the warning sign

A lorry driver has been fined after dozing off at the wheel and colliding with a motorway sign advising "Tiredness can kill - take a break".

David Loudon, 34, of Hamilton, admitted driving carelessly on the A74(M) in Dumfries and Galloway in March last year.

Prior to the accident he had driven for more than two hours over the statutory limit without taking a break.

He was fined a total of £1,375 and had nine points endorsed on his licence.

Dumfries Sheriff Court heard how the lorry crashed off the roadway and damaged 70 metres of fencing as well as the illuminated sign on the A74(M) just south of Johnstonebridge.

Loudon admitted driving carelessly and falling asleep in the northbound carriageway.

He also admitted seven charges of failing to take legally-required driving breaks.

UK GDP shrank 0.2% in the first three months of 2012, sending Britain into its first double-dip since the 1970s

Britain has sunk back into recession, its first double-dip downturn since the 1970s, piling pressure on the government to soften its austerity drive.

GDP unexpectedly shrank by 0.2% between January and March, following a 0.3% contraction in the fourth quarter of last year, according to the Office for National Statistics. A technical recession is defined as two or more consecutive quarters of economic decline. The figures wrongfooted City economists, who had expected a return to growth, albeit of a meagre 0.1%.

The shock downturn piles further pressure on the government to step up its efforts to boost the economy, and highlights the challenges it faces in reducing Britain's debt from record levels. The fall back into recession will also heighten calls for the chancellor to ease up on his deficit-cutting plans. However, George Osborne stuck to his guns on Wednesday morning.

"It's a very tough economic situation. It's taking longer than anyone hoped to recover from the biggest debt crisis of our lifetime. The one thing that would make the situation even worse would be to abandon our credible plan and deliberately add more borrowing and even more debt," said the chancellor.

David Cameron admitted at Prime Minister's Questions that the return to recession was "very, very disappointing". "There is no complacency at all in this government in dealing with what is a very tough situation, which frankly has just got tougher," he said. "It is very difficult recovering from the deepest recession in living memory, accompanied as it was by a debt crisis."

Hitting back, Ed Balls, the Labour shadow chancellor, said: "We consistently warned that their austerity plan was self-defeating and that cutting spending and raising taxes too far and too fast would badly backfire. David Cameron and George Osborne arrogantly and complacently dismissed people who warned of the risk of a double-dip recession and the country is now paying a very heavy price. Their economic credibility is now in tatters."

The UK economy contracted by 7.1% during the 2008-2009 recession, which lasted five quarters in a row. Since then recovery has been slow – the weakest in 100 years, weaker than after the Great Depression, the 1970s oil shock or the recessions of the 1980s and 1990s.

The latest decline was caused by falls in industrial and construction output while Britain's dominant service sector barely grew.

"The UK has sunk back into a recession, if the official first estimate of economic growth in the first quarter is to be believed," said Chris Williamson, chief economist at Markit. "However, the underlying strength of the economy is probably much more robust than this data suggests. The danger is that this gloomy data delivers a fatal blow to the fragile revival of consumer and business confidence seen so far this year, harming the recovery and even sending the country back into a real recession."

Britain's service industries, which make up more than three-quarters of the economy, grew by just 0.1% in the first quarter, after declining by 0.1% in the fourth quarter of last year. Growth was held back by a drop in output in the business services and finance sector.

Industrial output was 0.4% lower, while construction shrank by 3% – the biggest drop since the start of 2009.

The question is whether the Bank of England will respond by pumping more money into the economy under its quantitative easing (QE) programme, but it is hamstrung by high inflation.

"The biggest surprise – and perhaps the most worrying element of this report was the disappointment in services output," said Alan Clarke at Scotia bank. "Ironically construction, which had the most potential to determine whether or not the UK is in recession, proved much less negative than feared. The Bank [of England] recently highlighted that it cares most about underlying growth. Our gauge of underlying GDP showed zero growth – still very disappointing. The door is back open to more QE, but the elevated inflation outlook is the biggest obstruction."

The GDP figures conflict with other recent data from business surveys, which have painted a steadily improving economic picture.

Economists also question the reliability of the official construction numbers.

The statistics office's chief economist Joe Grice said the bigger picture in Wednesday's GDP data is that the UK economy, in volume terms, was flat between January and March compared with the same period last year. Looking at the UK since last summer, he added that the picture is of "a flattish economy".

Britain is the first major economy to report GDP data for the first quarter of 2012.

The US Sunni strategy in the Gulf enables Bahrain’s ruling al-Khalifa dynasty’s continued repression of its citizens; pits the US against pro-democracy forces in the region; and aligns Washington with Riyadh’s counter-revolution sectarian policies. The strategy is shortsighted, undermines US standing in the region and is destined to fail.

The strategy is based on the false assumption that the Sunni world is monolithic and that Shia Arab communities all turn to Iran for theological guidance and political support. In reality, Sunni Muslims have diverse cultural, political and social goals and are not preoccupied, as some Gulf rulers are, with anti-Shia or anti-Iran rhetoric and policies. Meanwhile, Bahraini and Saudi Shia do not consider Iran their point of reference.

Invented in Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, the Sunni strategy was presented to the west as a defence plan against Iran. Unfortunately, Washington bought this bogus claim lock, stock and barrel for misconceived regional security considerations.

A few years back, some Sunni Arab leaders, including those of Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, warned of a rising “Shia crescent” across the Arab world, including the Gulf. My analysts and I, however, briefed senior US policy makers that Sunni regimes used the Shia scare to muzzle their domestic opposition and paper over genuine grievances. In a report on the “Shaykhly” rulers of the Gulf, we judged those regimes must address their peoples’ grievances if they hoped to survive in the long run. The “Shia crescent” claim was a tactic to hide discrimination and repression against Shia communities. Bahrain is the most glaring example.

Since the 1970s, the Bahraini government has accused the Shia majority of being a front for Iran and urged America to expand its naval presence in the Gulf as a protective shield against the perceived Iranian threat. Washington accepted the Bahraini position despite the fact that the pro-democracy movement in Bahrain in that period was primarily Sunni.

The pro-reform demands, then and now, called for a constitution, free elections, an independent judiciary and a curtailment on the powers of the executive. The prime minister, Sheikh Khalifa bin Salman, and his traditionalist allies in the ruling family objected to reforms and viewed all opposition as a threat to the dynasty. The ruler then – father of the present king – prevailed with his reform-minded allies within the family over the conservative faction.

To end the current violence and the regime’s human rights violations, three steps must be taken. First, western powers must strengthen the pro-reform faction in the ruling family. Second, Washington should urge the king to remove the prime minister, his uncle, from office; many Bahrainis think he symbolises corruption, repression and unyielding opposition to political reform. He has worked closely with Saudi Crown Prince Nayef to undermine the pro-democracy movement in the Arab world, especially in Bahrain.

Third, America should send a clear message to Bahrain’s regime to halt violence against the Shia and act on all the recommendations of the Independent Commission of Inquiry. Washington should also begin to pull its Fifth Fleet out of Bahrain.

The huge US naval presence in Bahrain has not improved western security in the Gulf; has not altered Iran’s behaviour; and, more important, has not silenced the anti-regime opposition in the Gulf and in other Arab countries. Nor has it given the al-Khalifa and other Sunni regimes more legitimacy. Instead, its presence has arguably increased Iran’s belligerence and given Sunni regimes, including Bahrain and Saudi Arabia, the false impression that Washington has given them a licence to kill their own people.

Moving the US military presence from Bahrain to “over the horizon” would be a clear signal that Arab dictatorship will no longer be tolerated, whether in Bahrain, Syria, Saudi Arabia, or elsewhere.

The Formula One cars did eventually race in Bahrain, but calls for reform are rapidly becoming chants for regime change. Regime obfuscation will not be able to silence demands for justice and the right to live freely forever.

The writer is former director of the CIA Political Islam strategic analysis programme and author of ‘Bahrain: Political Development in a Modernizing Society’

Nesjavellir Geothermal Power Station: Iceland's second largest geothermal power station Photograph by ThinkGeoEnergy

A proposed high voltage electrical cable running across the floor of the North Atlantic Ocean to tap Iceland's surplus volcanic geothermal energy would become the world's longest underwater electrical cable, if it goes ahead. The cable would be a significant step towards a pan-European super grid, which may one day tap renewable sources as far afield as Scandinavia, North Africa and the Middle East. It's argued that such a grid would be able to widely transmit energy surpluses from active renewable sources, thereby alleviating the need for countries to use (or build) back-up fossil fuel power stations to cater for peaks in demand when more local renewable sources aren't particularly productive.

If a European super grid comes to fruition, energy surpluses will be big business. So it's hardly surprising that both Germany and the United Kingdom are jostling for position at the other end of the Icelandic cable, with Norway and the Netherlands also having been mooted as potential connectees. That would necessitate a cable at least 745 miles (1198 km) in length, making it easily the longest electrical cable in the world.

The scheme, first proposed in March of last year by Iceland's largest energy producer Landsvirkjun, would aim to export five billion kilowatt-hours of energy per year for an estimated $350 to $448 million return. A feasibility study subsequently carried out has failed to find any terminal difficulties with the idea, and UK energy minister Charles Hendry is set to fly to Iceland in May to woo the relevant authorities.

An electrical link to Iceland is one of several international interconnectors either proposed or in progress in Europe, in addition to the fifteen or so routes that exist already (existing and planned connections can be seen on this map). Norway is a focal point for many of the confirmed forthcoming interconnectors which, unlike the proposed Iceland link, would see a two-way exchange of energy designed to further boost its energy security and that of its neighbors. The country is already linked via four North Sea interconnectors to Denmark, Germany, the UK, and the Netherlands—the latter being the current world record holder for longest submarine power link at 360 miles (580 km).

More ambitious are the proposed DESERTEC and Medgrid schemes to to interconnect countries and renewable energy sources on both the European and African sides of the Mediterranean Sea. German in origin, DESERTEC would involve the investment of more than $500 billion dollars by 2050, into 6500 square miles (nearly 17,000 sq km) of solar thermal collectors (plus a bit of wind) around the edge the Sahara Desert. The scheme could, it's suggested, supply 15 percent of mainland Europe's energy needs. Facts and figures for the French Medgrid scheme (conceptually very similar to DESERTEC) are rather more elusive, and interpretation varies as to whether the two schemes are complementary or in competition.

Conceptual sketch of the proposed DESERTEC energy system.

the Trans-Mediterranean Renewable Energy Cooperation (TREC)

A problem inherent to all long-distance electrical transmission: energy loss due to the resistance of the cables. Thanks to Joule's first law, the problem is minimized by stepping up voltage, with a ten-fold increase resulting in a 100-fold loss reduction. The Norway-Netherlands link transmits AC at 300,000 and 400,000 volts.

Even the proposed Iceland interconnector, accounting for the worst case scenario of a 930-mile (1500-km) cable, falls well within the bounds of profitability according to the findings of a 1980s study which calculated the longest cost-effective distances for electrical transmission to be 2500 miles (4000 km) for AC and 4300 miles (7000 km) for DC. Official costs are yet to be tabled for the project.

The exportation of renewable energy is a logical next step for Iceland, which has done a grand job of getting its own house in order. The country currently meets 81 percent of its energy needs with domestic renewable sources—thanks in no small part to the country's tremendous geothermal assets, sitting as it does on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge (which can have occasional less welcome consequences). The country plans to be free of fossil fuels in the near future.

via arstechnica.com

• 'I prefer strong leaders,' says Formula One supremo
• Max Mosley could be a good Prime Minister, he adds

Bernie Ecclestone says Max Mosley would make a good British Prime Minister. Photograph: Vladimir Rys/Getty Images

The Formula One commercial rights holder, Bernie Ecclestone, has stoked up controversy by claiming that Adolf Hitler was a man who "was able to get things done", that democracy has not worked out for Britain and that his colleague Max Mosley would make a good Prime Minister.

Ecclestone had previously stirred outrage when he suggested in 2008 that racist comments on a website about the British driver Lewis Hamilton had "started as just a joke".

Yesterday a spokesman for the board of Deputies of British Jews said: "Mr Ecclestone's comments regarding Hitler, female, black and Jewish racing drivers are quite bizarre. He says 'Politics are not for me' and we are inclined to agree."

Ecclestone, who has been fighting recently to prevent a damaging breakaway by formula one's leading teams, said: "In a lot of ways, terrible to say this I suppose, but apart from the fact that Hitler got taken away and persuaded to do things that I have no idea whether he wanted to do or not, he was in the way that he could command a lot of people, able to get things done," he said.

He added: "I prefer strong leaders. Margaret Thatcher made decisions on the run and got the job done. She was the one who built this country up slowly. We've let it go down again. All these guys, Gordon and Tony are trying to please everybody all the time ... Max would do a super job, he's a good leader." Apparently referring to the fact that the president of the FIA, the sport's ruling body, was the son of Sir Oswald Mosley, leader of the British Union of Fascists, he added: "I don't think his background would be a problem."

He continued: "Politicians are too worried about elections. We did a terrible thing when we supported the idea of getting rid of Saddam Hussein, he was the only one who could control the country. It was the same with [the Taliban.]"

However, he did appear to row back on his earlier comments about the Hamilton jibes when he said: "If they do it again, I will go and find them and make them come and meet Lewis Hamilton." And he backed up Hamilton's controversial decision to move to Switzerland for tax reasons. "I would like to see the people earning most in this country paying less tax as it is an incentive."

When the Foreign Office urges British motor racing fans to stay away from Bahrain, this ain't no sporting event, folks, it's a political one. The Bahraini authorities prove it by welcoming sports reporters but refusing visas to other correspondents who want to tell the world what's going on in this minority-run, Saudi-dominated kingdom.

But what do our lads tell us from the circuit, 25 miles from the Bahraini capital, Manama? Jenson Button and Lewis Hamilton are only in it for sport. Bahraini repression of its democratic majority? Nothing to do with us, governor. And Sebastian Vettel? "I think it's a lot of hype." Hype? HYPE? The Arab Awakening came to Bahrain a year ago, a majority Shia people demanding a democratically elected government – with a minority Sunni monarch still at its head, for heaven's sake, as generous an Arab Spring as you could find – and it's met with police gunfire, torture and death. And Master Vettel – is there anything left of the old cliché "moral compass"? – claims "it's a lot of hype". What a disgraceful man.

Supposing it was the Assad regime shelling out $40m to host the Formula One weekend (as well as shelling Homs). Would Bernie Ecclestone have been dining out in Damascus, happy to give the regime a soft sporting cover for its oppression? At least he seems to have some idea what is going on there. Sure, I know, the Bahrainis are not slaughtering their people like the Assad government. And there's no armed rebellion in Bahrain, as there is in Syria (although all year the Bahrainis have been doing their best to persuade us that there is). Or Iran. Now here's a Muslim nation that pretty much crushed all opposition in 2009. It's not doing any more killing. So would Bernie slip over to Tehran to do a bit of Formula One if he got the invitation?

Or – a much easier one, this – what if Bahrain was oppressing a Jewish rather than a Muslim Shia community demanding democracy? Messrs Button and Hamilton and Ecclestone – not to mention the clueless Vettel – would be shouting their refusal to participate from the rooftops. And rightly so. So why do they want to go ahead now? Why is it "a lot of hype" when Vettel knows – unless he's a complete git – that the Bahraini government's own report on last year's suppression describes deaths in custody, police torture and shooting deaths on the streets? Note that I haven't mentioned apartheid-era South Africa, nor the Berlin Olympics, which gave cover to Hitler. Bahrain is not South Africa, nor is it Nazi Germany (and those who use such parallels are gits themselves).

The days have gone when sportsmen and sportswomen can dissociate themselves from the moral values in which we claim to believe in the 21st century. If they want to behave like the sporting clods of 50 years ago, they should be forced to drive round the Bahrain circuit in Alfa Romeo 6Cs, Triumph Roadsters and Crosley Hotshots. Cars of the past for men of the past.