In a letter to the Open Government Partnership, the inventor of the web, Sir Tim Berners-Lee, who collaborated with more than 100 free speech groups and leading activists condemns the hypocrisy of member nations of Open Government Partnership in signing up to an organisation which aims to preserve freedom while at the same time running one of the largest surveillance networks the world has ever seen. The organisations that have signed up include Oxfam, Privacy International and the Open Rights Group, and the individuals include Satbir Singh of the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative and Indian social activist Aruna Roy. The letter calls on member governments to overhaul their privacy laws, protect whistleblowers and increase the transparency around their surveillance mechanisms.
"We join other civil society organisations, human rights groups, academics and ordinary citizens in expressing our grave concern over allegations that governments around the world, including many OGP members, have been routinely intercepting and retaining the private communications of entire populations, in secret, without particularised warrants and with little or no meaningful oversight," the letter states.
"These practices erode the checks and balances on which accountability depends, and have a deeply chilling effect on freedom of expression, information and association, without which the ideals of open government have no meaning."
The letter underscores the difficulty the UK and USA have had in maintaining that countries like China and Iran should ease restrictions on the internet in the face of revelations from the NSA files that they themselves are intercepting private communications.
"Laws to limit the state’s power to spy on its citizens are fundamental to democracy’s checks and balances. But these laws are outdated," said Anne Jellema, the chief executive of the World Wide Web Foundation, which was founded by Berners-Lee to promote a free internet.
"With digital technologies making it trivially easy to collect and store billions of pieces of data on entire populations, and with public interest whistleblowers receiving little protection, the whole system of checks and balances on state power is being pushed dangerously close to breaking point," Jellema continued. "We are calling for an urgent public debate to review and strengthen the safeguards that will keep our societies open".
The Open Government Partnership was formed in 2011 to aid reformers committed to making their governments more accountable, open and responsive to citizens. The UK and USA were two of the first countries to join, and the partnership has since grown to include 62 nations from Australia to Mongolia.
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Anonim spunea...
Banca Centrală Europeană (BCE) nu consideră necesară reducerea de urgenţă a dobânzii de politică monetară a zonei euro, aflată deja la minimul record de 0,25%, a declarat preşedintele BCE, Mario Draghi, adăugând că nu vede semne de deflaţie în uniunea monetară.
Criza din zona euro nu a fost încă depăşită, dar există multe semne încurajatoare, precum recuperarea economică din unele ţări, atenuarea dezechilibrelor comerciale şi a deficitelor bugetare, a afirmat Draghi într-un interviu pentru publicaţia germană Der Spiegel, citat de Reuters, potrivit Mediafax.
"E mai mult decât ne aşteptam anul trecut", a precizat Draghi.
Întrebat depre noi reduceri ale ratei cheie după ce BCE a scăzut dobânda de la 0,5% la 0,25% în noiembrie, Draghi a afirmat că "în acest moment, nu vedem nevoia unor acţiuni urgente".
De asemenea, şeful băncii europene a declarat că nu este "normal sau sănătos" ca dobânzile reale, excluzând impactul inflaţiei, să fie negative pentru deponenţi.
"În unele ţări sunt negative, în altele pozitive - chiar şi prea ridicate. Suntem foarte conştienţi de riscurile acestei fragmentări", a spus el.
În noiembrie, ratele anuale de inflaţie au variat de la o scădere a preţurilor de 2,9% în Grecia la un avans de 1,6% în Germania, arată date ale Uniunii Europene.
Riscurile unor bule speculative, de exemplu pe unele pieţe imobiliare din Europa, sau cele ale scăderii preţurilor sunt limitate, a adăugat preşedintele BCE.
"Nu vedem deflaţie în prezent (...) dar trebuie să avem grijă ca inflaţia să nu fie blocată sub 1% şi să alunece într-o zonă periculoasă", a afirmat Draghi.
În Europa, pieţele se aşteaptă ca inflaţia să se accelereze de ţinta BCE, de aproape de 2%.
Greek lawmakers began debating the 2014 budget on Tuesday, even though the country’s coalition government was still enmeshed in a dispute with international lenders over a €1bn fiscal gap and unfinished structural reforms.
A parliamentary vote on the bill is due to take place at midnight on Saturday, regardless of whether Greece has reached a deal with the “troika” of EU, International Monetary Fund and European Central Bank officials monitoring its €172bn international bailout.
By pushing ahead with the legislation, Greece is also defying a new eurozone rule requiring member states to submit budget drafts to Brussels for approval before they are adopted. However, an official in Athens tried to downplay the move, saying: “We don’t see any problem with revising the budget next year, if necessary.”
This is pretty funny too:
Greece gets new EU aid, declares 'Grexit' era dead
The eurozone agreed on Thursday to provide nearly 50 billion euros ($64 billion) in long-delayed aid to Athens, prompting its Prime Minister Antonis Samaras to declare an end to talk of a Greek exit from the single currency. The deal averts a catastrophic default and secures Greece's survival in the euro zone after months of doubt and political turmoil. Athens had repeatedly missed fiscal targets agreed with the EU and the International Monetary Fund, and stalled structural economic reforms.
"We are convinced that the programme is back on a sound track," Jean-Claude Juncker, chairman of the 17-nation euro area's finance ministers told a news conference after they met in Brussels ahead of an EU summit later in the day. "Money will be flowing to Greece as early next week."
Keeeeep it comin' !!
"Grexit is dead. Greece is back on its feet. The sacrifices of the Greek people have not been in vain," Samaras said on arrival for talks with other centre-right leaders in Brussels. Agreement to release the funds hinged on the success of a debt buyback launched by Greece last week, which will enable Athens to retire nearly 20 billion euros in bonds repurchased at a third of their face value from private investors. Juncker said he was not sure additional measures would be needed to reach an agreed goal to bring Greece's debt down to 124 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) by 2020, but the bloc stood ready to take new steps if necessary.
[...]
While the government voiced relief at the long-awaited Brussels decision, anti-bailout radicals and ordinary Greeks belittled or dismissed it. Hard left opposition leader Alexis Tsipras said on visiting a memorial to the biggest Nazi German massacre during the World War Two occupation of Greece, at Kalavryta, that other countries had a moral liability for the country's debts. "Past governments have left us with an onerous debt that's bedevilling us and we're looking for a way out of it. Our people are not to blame. Other governments and other people too must repay that debt," Tsipras told reporters.
Taking more money is keeping the doomed EU's pet project the EURO on life-support. When will the Greeks stop taking money and say enough is enough:
"We're out, now."
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