The 'Swazi' Pimp

King Mswati III arrives for celebrations marking his 40th birthday. He arrived in the stadium in a new BMW - one of 20 bought for the occassion.

> Reuters Pictures

The New Arms-Race

There are two distinct versions of the operation mounted by the US Navy to shoot down a crippled military satellite over the Pacific. The official version, expounded in mind-numbing detail by Pentagon officials yesterday, is that the US had no choice but to launch a missile to bring down the satellite.

It had been out of control since its launch 13 months ago.

A supplementary argument, not broached by the Pentagon, was that the military technology loaded on to the satellite was not anything that America wanted another country to find on its territory.

The other interpretation of the mission is not incompatible with the first but far more worrying. While acknowledging that the satellite was in trouble and a missile strike was one way of dealing with it, this version has it that the operation was in fact a covert test of a space weapon.

Such tests were outlawed by the US-Soviet Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty of 1972. By abrogating the treaty in one of his first acts as President, George Bush opened the way for tests of the "son" of Reagan's "Star Wars".

Since then, the US has conducted a series of experiments in which missiles have been launched to intercept other missiles, with varying degrees of success.

A year ago, China surprised America when it shot down a satellite at a very high altitude. It was the most glaring demonstration yet of China's steady rise as a military power. It is hard not to regard this week's show of missile prowess by the US as directed towards China. Beijing, for one, was in no doubt.

Via The-Independent

Bangladesh bans talk-show

Bangladesh's government has banned two popular live political talk shows, the private satellite television channel ETV has said.

"The information ministry handed us a written order saying that we cannot telecast out our live talk shows," a senior ETV official told AFP.

ETV, the country's first terrestrial television station, was banned by a court order during the previous Bangladesh Nationalist Party-led government in 2002.

It resumed operation last year after foregoing its terrestrial rights.

Via Bangladesh-Blogger

Despotism & Democracy

Seen on: YouTube

Do you take the word democracy for granted? Is it time to re-think again?